One weekend in early March, someone stole the set up trailer containing about 75% of Kinetic Church's equipment, leaving their portable church with virtually nothing.
Just imagine, all of your hard work, fund raising, loads of hopes and dreams loaded into the back of a trailer, and that trailer being stolen. This would be a death blow for most new church plants.
How would Kinetic Church respond?
Their response is one of the most moving things I've witnessed recently. First of all, they conducted a billboard and web campaign in an intentional effort to make contact with whoever took the church's stuff.
Here's one of the billboards the church posted:
No one can accuse this church of using "Christianese."
Besides the billboards, the church also filmed a video message to the Church Trailer Thief that they've placed on You Tube and a variety of Internet outlets... At this point, the church knows they'll probably never see their stuff again, but they still dream of meeting the people who stole their stuff.
Why? To make them pay? To get justice? To get even? To make them squirm?
Not even close...
This is church planter and lead pastor, Dave Milam's message to the thief. Click here to check it out...
After watching, tell me what you think of this church's response...
Reminds me a whole lot of somebody else I know...
14 comments:
Powerful.
That was good stuff Doc! What would happen if this was the mentality of of all Christians...A great revival!
Honestly, the whole thing seems a bit self-indulgent and overly dramatic. Furthermore, using words like "Ballsy" crosses the line between being in the world but not of it. The Church is people, not stuff. I guess the question is... if all this video, billboard, look at how we are going to be so gracious stuff didn't translate into attracting any attention/publicity to the Church, would they have directed so much time, attention and resources to it? God certainly can work all things out for the good, but this seems like it borders on the exploitation of a situation God purposed/allowed for the testing of their faith, not marketing skills.
"The church is people, not stuff." True, but it is easier to have church with your stuff.
Thanks for the comments.. I was honestly moved by this young church's response... Perhaps the response of this church will be used by God to allow Kinetic Church to minister to a greater number of people, but I don't believe that was the motive behind their response... The motivation seems to be patterned after the teaching of Jesus: "Love your enemies. Pray for those who spitefully use you..." In my opinion, the response of Dave Milam and Kinetic Church was a loving response to a difficult situation.
Wow... so loving our enemies means spending significant kingdom dollars (an amount probably more than what was stolen) on putting up several derogatory, bitter-sounding, highway billboards (one of which alludes to a "lightning" striking God) in response to when people sin against the Church?
(I am assuming you know that there a several different signs)
And then after that public display, expecting them to show their faces and come to the table for a meal (surely to be videotaped and put on youtube)? Yeah right.
Maybe they forgot what Jesus teaches about handling conflict in a truly loving way... do as much as you can to contain it and handle it privately (Matthew 18) But of course, that doesn't bring near the spectacle.
Doesn't sound like love to me.
Rather difficult to do Matthew 18 until you know the identity of your offender.
eternity church: i understand your concerns. but, in all reality, it really seems that their genuine desire is #1-they want to get their stuff back, and #2-they want to invite this person into community so they may do matthew 18 kind of stuff.
also-on the "marketing" note, you wrote,
I guess the question is... if all this video, billboard, look at how we are going to be so gracious stuff didn't translate into attracting any attention/publicity to the Church, would they have directed so much time, attention and resources to it?
If you think about it, this was actually rather genius, regardless of their motive (see Phil. 1:18), since they invested some resources, let's say it's 5,000 dollars. Now they have received likely 30,000 or 40,000 dollars in publicity. Seems like a pretty savvy investment. Maybe if more churches were able to invest strategically like this, the church in America wouldn't be declining the way it is.
two more thoughts: 1. the church always grows fastest under two conditions. a. Homelessness, i.e. the believers in Acts were "scattered." and b. Persecution, i.e. after a wave of persecution, the church usually experiences miracles and powerful growth. In this church's case, they have now experienced both. And, they used it as a platform, perhaps to stir some spiritually apathetic people to consider a grace-saturated church. in spite of the "lighting strikes" billboard, which i think even the most irreligious person realizes is a joke (since their is no scriptural or otherwise documentation of God's judgment occuring in the form of a lighting strike), and they may even be interested in visiting a church that has a decent sense of humor!!!
It looks like we are all going to have to agree to disagree as we could go back and forth forever on all of this. We are obviously singing from two different song books.
All I can say is that let's all (that includes me) make sure we are speaking more from the counsel of God than from mere opinion, the latest Church fad we picked up at a conference, or from our latest sip from the well of postmodern/emerging church kool-aid.
Oh and by the way...
Psalm 18:14
He shot his arrows and scattered the enemies, great bolts of lightning and routed them.
Psalm 144:6
Send forth lightning and scatter {the enemies}; shoot your arrows and rout them.
Psalm 148:8
lightning and hail, snow and clouds, stormy winds that do his bidding
Blessings to all in your ministry.
In response to Eternity Church's comment, "so loving our enemies means spending significant kingdom dollars (an amount probably more than what was stolen)..."
For the record the billboards were generously donated... If you knew the hearts of the lead pastor or of the people of Kinetic it might be easier for you to understand these issues. Kinetic is a loving and wonderful community to be a part of. Obviously I am a member at Kinetic and can honestly say that I would not be the person I am today without the love, support and guidance on my journey without the people of Kinetic. The underlined and most important message that should be read from this entire billboard stuff is that we forgive and would like to have the chance to change someones life by introducing them to Jesus. We want others to know Him and want to show others the love Jesus has given to us.
kristin-great to know the truth!!!! thank you for sharing what God's doing in your life through this church!
ec-check your literary genre before you quote scripture. appears to be a bit symbolic, although it's obvious that God is completely capable . . . just no record of it. i hate unessential arguments, though. i'm sorry i even brought that up. it certainly isn't essential.
it is important to not chase fads. also, it's extremely important not to lead in a environment that doesn't challenge us to think of creative ways to invest wisely in building the Kingdom through the church. it does not seem like you are arguing for the church to drift into the background instead of being the backbone of America, however, it seems as if you are striving for the church to be the church. how that gets played out is radically different for each local body, though, right?
Kristin
Thanks so much for giving us some insight into Kinetic Church. When I ran across this story, I was deeply moved by the response of your church... It is my prayer that God use your church to continue sharing God's unconditional love and extravagant grace with the people in your community.
Keep the faith. We're praying for you guys.
Chris Goins
I wish I went to a church like that! What an amazing response, not a reaction. Reminds me of the response Jesus had to the adulterous woman. No pointing fingers or "pressing charges" only love and forgiveness!
check out www.mefindit.com or
www.trailertheft.com or
www.ihateathief.com
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