It’s been amazing to see how truly simple life is as a follower of Jesus when our life isn’t about running an organization but rather washing one another in God’s Word as a family of Jesus followers. We more and more are convinced this is not necessarily “the best or better” way of walking out our faith. Instead we are making our focus Jesus, and watching His life spring up in and through our lives. We are intentionally making a point to not seek to compare or compete in any way with how traditional church Jesus followers are walking out their faith. Instead we would hope to mutually grow up into Christ with any other Jesus followers we naturally cross paths with and do life with. We are not separatists but rather simpletons wanting to know Jesus more intimately than ever before and make Him known.

This passage has been really impacting me and I’m prayerfully asking my Jesus community to commit it to memory:

“Abstain from every form of evil. Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.

Brothers, pray for us.”

– 1 Thessalonians 5:22-25

My prayerful hope is that we would more and more press into knowing Christ and making Him known, and seeking to see the life of this God of peace spilling out into our homes, neighborhoods, work places, and strategic displays together of the love of God.

Today I will be asking our family to pray together for the victims of sexual abuse and to seek in our own lives to be accountable and above reproach as we begin to go after the local concern of slavery, the enslaving of girls, women, and boys for the sale of their bodies for sexual acts.

It may seem like too weighty a topic for a little Jesus community, but then again God has done wonderful redemptive work through very small groupings of believers and unbelievers throughout world history.

There is a beautiful coupling of visions the Lord has been giving me confidence in as Jesus Missionary Communities takes shape:

– House church and unpaid pastors / church planters

– Missionary Communities

When you combine these two thrusts of the Spirit in the last decade or so here in the US, there is an exciting productivity that the local bodies of Jesus followed to be a part of, small bands of Jesus followers engaging with Christ together and worshiping Him and getting our direction from Him, and then together going out into our community and making a difference!

It would be so special to see another community birthed and then another two from that one and two from the other, with each community prayerfully choosing a focus for their six months to a year together! At times two to three of these communities could have the same focus or members from various communities could cross-pollinate and over-lap.

Our constant focus should be encountering and knowing Jesus and making His love and truth known to those we encounter individually and together. However, we should also be intentional and strategic. There are huge needs than we can be a part of meeting when we create small “task forces” out of our little missionary communities. The more we are obsessed with our Jesus the more we become highly focused in on the needs of those God leads us to. A focus such as the victims of sex slavery is not in isolation. We must be faithful to do life well among those immediately close to us, each other, our co-workers, and our neighbors. Yet, we will impact these even more if we are also going after those who are in some of the darkest and hardest situations in this world. Jesus didn’t “stay busy” with those around Him to such a point that He walked by dark situations and particularly the PEOPLE caught in those situations. He instead addressed their concern head-on and made a difference!

We never want to quench the Spirit, so we will never try to tell God what’s up! We will simply continue to ride the wave of His awesome work in and beyond our land for His eternal purposes! Our ultimate hope is not just the addressing of physical concerns on people’s lives but their finding of the same hope we have in Jesus, eternal hope and eternal relationship with God Himself, the God of peace!

In the love of Christ,

– Torrey