As Christians, we are called fulfill the Great Commission (Matthew 28), which means sharing the gospel and advancing the kingdom of God throughout the whole world.  What a privilege, but what a big task!  Yet, we are so limited given our families, jobs, and responsibilities.  Where do we find the time?  Moreover, in light of life’s busyness, where do you go to learn how to fulfill this Great Commission?  Do you really have to go over seas to be a missionary?  Have you ever wondered where your gifts and talents fit in to God’s plan to change the world with the gospel?  What about your neighbor across the street, your co-worker, and the waitress at your favorite restaurant?  Who is reaching them with the gospel?

That’s what Seed is all about.

SEED is a ministry that will equip you to reach your neighbors, community and the city with the gospel.   We do this by learning to think and act as a missionaries.  We serve others together, meet others needs together, and invite others into our lives as a means of sharing the Good News in both Word and deed.

The ministry equips you on multiple levels:

• As an Individual – Join us and see a missional lifestyle modeled, which will help you to discover and use your passions to be the presence of Christ in your world.  The aim is to help you think and live like a missionary in every sphere of life.  For example, we help you learn to share the gospel to your co-workers and neighbors, we help get you resourced to complete service projects in your neighborhood, we help you mobilize and join with others in a way that unite your gifts and talents – to address needs you can’t meet by yourself.

• Sojourn Gathered – Seed hosts numerous large scale events for the city that pull together the entire body of Sojourn Community Church.  For example, we host a yearly medical clinic, Fall Festival, and others.  These large scale events open doors and reach literally thousands in the city with God’s Word and good deed.  We believe that the gospel transforms everything, including the city.

• Sojourn Scattered – You will serve your neighborhood along with your Community Group to address specific needs where you gather.  We learn most when we serve together.

• City-wide Church collaborations – You can join our partnerships with Jefferson Street Baptist Center (a men’s shelter), Louisville Orphan Care Initiative, and others.

Why do we do this?  What do we hope to accomplish?

A Transformed City

As you live out a missional lifestyle, you are participating in Sojourn’s larger vision of city transformation.  We believe that as we pray, serve, meet needs, and share the gospel with people in the city, the city will change.  We believe that, because of the gospel at work in people’s lives, marriages will be restored, crime will decrease, kids will be mentored, homes will be renovated, etc.

What are you waiting for?

It is not a requirement for any individual to participate in seed, but there are many benefits:

• A missional lifestyle is lived out and modeled together with like-minded Christians.
• Your responsibilities remain small and manageable.  A seed leader will be your guide and will coordinate each project.
• Participating with a group forms friendships, accountability and affirmation.
• Serving together is easier because everyone gets to know everyone.
• The structure is simple and it is easy to reproduce projects that result in genuine relationships.
• Participating with a small group aids courageous evangelism
• Serving the marginalized will help keep your attention on daily life issues.

See our “Next Steps” document to get involved.

I often get asked what we are trying to accomplish through the mercy ministry here at Sojourn.  Author Steve Corbett helped bring clarity to our goals for Seed:

Our goals are NOT:

• To make the materially poor into middle-to-upper-class North Americans
• To make sure that the materially poor have enough money
• To complete projects and produce products for people

Rather, our goals ARE:

• To restore people, through the power of the gospel, to a full expression of who God created us to be – a release from the bondage to sin into a right relationship with God.
• To demonstrate what a just, loving, peaceful relationship is as we point our neighbors to Christ.
• To equip or develop our neighbors to fulfill their callings of glorifying God by working and supporting themselves and their families with the fruit of that work.
• To genuinely care for those in our neighborhoods and invite them to share in our lives, even if and especially when it takes sacrifice.

Relationships and Processes, Not Projects and Products

Our goal is to see people restored to being what God created them to be:  people who understand that they are created in the image of God with the gifts, abilities, and capacity to make decisions and to effect change in the world around them; and people who steward their lives, communities, resources, and relationships in order to bring glory to God.

These things tend to happen in highly relational, process-focused ministries more than in impersonal, product-focused ministries.

In other words, biblical mercy includes relationships combined with the proclamation/application of God’s word with deeds that demonstrate God’s provision and compassion.  These relationships take time and do not happen over night.

How are you doing?  How are you extending mercy to your neighbors?  Is your community group focused on a service project or are you focused on the relationships you are forming with the people you are serving?

Seed is an equipping ministry to help you and your group serve others.  Contact mercy@sojournchurch.com to speak with someone who can help you establish redemptive relationships as you serve individuals and families in Louisville.

God’s Word + good deeds = Seed. Grow your faith by putting it into action.  Join us.

Feed and Seed Luncheon September 13th – 12:30-2:30pm
Anyone interested in Seed is invited to attend this monthly potluck.  After lunch, there are several ways to get involved and serve.  You can help clean the rail road tracks and Swan Street or distribute the Sojourn Germantown Newsletter.  Seed Leaders will learn how to visit the sick and equip their groups for action.  Register online here.  http://sojourncommunity.ccbchurch.com/app/w_form_response.php?form_id=238

Mercy Mondays – Every Monday – 6:30pm-8:00pm
Every Monday evening we serve, visit and run errands for Germantown widows and residents.  This ministry will equip you for face-to-face mercy ministry in the city.  No one goes at it alone and everyone is guided by an experienced deacon.  We visit approximately eight families every Monday.  Contact Jesse Moss at mercy@sojournchurch.com for additional information.

Feeding the Poor – September 5, 12, 19, 26 – 11:30am-1:30pm
Bring your family and be blessed as you share a meal with poor families who live in our neighborhood.  Contact David Taliaferro at david.taliaferro@summitenergy.com for more information.

Handyman Meet Up – Wednesday September 23, 6:30pm.
Leaking gutters, busted pipes, broken doors, rusty windows and rotted ramps are all problems that occur in the 100+ year old homes in Germantown.  Join us if you are good with your hands and willing to sacrifice your time to fix things up.  You must email us to attend, since we meet off campus.   Contact Andy Robinette at mercy@sojournchurch.com for more information.

Sojourn Fall Festival Leadership Team – September 13th – 9:30am-11:00am
Sojourn hosts a fall festival every year with over 1,000 people attending.  There is free food, music, games, petting zoo, cakewalk and more.  Join the leadership team as we plan for this year’s festival scheduled for October 17th.  We meet every other week for 6 more weeks.  Contact Nathan Ivey at nivey@sojournchurch.com.

Help Deepen Our City Partnerships – September 20th – 4:00pm-5:00pm
Seed has partnered with several non-profits, neighborhood associations, churches and businesses in order to serve and bless the city.  If you want to learn to be a point person to facilitate one of our partnerships, please come to this meeting.  Individuals trained are responsible for coordinating Sojourn efforts for the agency that is closest to their heart and passion.  Contact Nathan Ivey at nivey@sojournchurch.com for additional information.

Give a ride to church – Every Sunday and Wednesday.  Let us know if you can pick someone up and bring them to church for worship or classes.  Contact the Coordination Team at mercy@sojournchurch.com for information.

Remember the story about Jesus trying to get some time alone to grieve after John the Baptist was beheaded and the crowds just following him like the paparazzi?

When Jesus heard what had happened, he withdrew by boat privately to a solitary place. Hearing of this, the crowds followed him on foot from the towns. When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them and healed their sick. Matthew 14: 13-14

When I read this story, I like to think that I would be like Jesus and welcome the needy crowd with open arms. However, reality has shown that I actually would feel justified in locking my doors and pretending I’m not home because “I deserve a break.” Thankfully, two Sojourn community groups took the path of Christ this week and served a family with an unexpected and urgent need.

Andy walks into Sojourn Community Church and let’s the leaders know he just found out he is being evicted. Not next month. Not next week – but tomorrow! If you aren’t familiar with the procedure for evictions, it goes like this: Sheriff comes to your door, then all your possessions get thrown onto the sidewalk. And in a neighborhood where crime is high, it’s like a yard sale without the sale. Needless to say, Andy needed help to find people to get his belongings somewhere safe so he wouldn’t lose them to weather or thieves. And he needed it done that day. He said he had been to other churches in the area and no one was able to help. They, like Sojourn on any given day, probably just didn’t have the man power to help him. But, through God’s grace, the Rogers and Hobacks community group had the man power and made the time to help Andy.

Sojourner Lesie Hoeback says, “Andy and his wife have 3 small kids and just one small car, so he said there was no way they could move everything by themselves.  So, Matt Harner rented a U-haul truck and our group and Brandon & Bethany Rogers’ CG headed to his house around 6:30 to move Andy and his family to a very small efficiency apartment at Wayside Christian Mission.  We helped them finish packing everything up, played with their extra-loving and super-friendly kids, brought the wife and kids Subway for dinner, all while we loaded everything into the U-Haul, 2 pick-up trucks, and a few cars and took everything to their new “house.”  It was all we could do to get all of their stuff into this small apartment, so I am not sure how Andy, his wife, their 3 small kids, and their cat are going to live there! Once we piled everything inside, there wasn’t even room to lay down the mattresses, much less really walk around!  But, nonetheless Andy talked about how they were blessed to have a place to go and so blessed to have people help them move all of their stuff.  We told them we were glad we could help and glad their family would at least be together.  We asked if we could pray with them before we left, and they said that would be great.  Brandon prayed for their family and thanked God that He gave us the ultimate example of love through sending Christ to die for us, and thanked Him for giving us a chance to show His love to others.

“Nathan said yesterday that Andy told him he was going to bring his family to Sojourn now.  We hope and pray that through showing God’s love in a tangible way in Andy’s time of need, he and his whole family will come to know the overwhelming love of Christ and learn to lean on Him through the trials and challenges of life.”

Was it inconvenient? I’m sure. I bet they had dinner plans that night after a long day at work. Was it awkward? Of course. Who naturally wants to go into an inner city neighborhood and move a strangers belonging to a homeless shelter in the freezing cold? But thank God they answered the call to a small sacrifice that night. God has used this small token of love toward Andy to show His love for this man and his family. Andy stated he wants to come back to Sojourn and wants to bring his wife. Whether he really will at this point and time doesn’t really matter. Whether he comes to Sojourn or another church doesn’t matter. What matters is Andy saw the hands of God via His people when they cared enough for this stranger to stop their lives for a night and help him move. Perhaps he will step foot into a church and further learn about God’s love for him. His situation isn’t fixed, but his broken heart might have one stitch closer to healing.

Lindsay Eubanks is a longtime member of Sojourn, a wife, mother and Occupational Therapist. Lindsay ,  her husband Jesse and their daughter Evangeline  live in the Shelby Park neighborhood in inner-city Louisville where they are trying to learn to be better neighbors and love God more.

Below is a compilation of stories and snapshots of the friends (kids) I’ve spent time with in the past few years in Shelby Park (Louisville, KY). Some are funny. Some will make you wonder why you complain that your king-sized bed is a bit hard. Some will just make you think.

LUCY – 11 years old.

“It’s beautiful! So Beautiful!,” Lucy delights loudly as we walk through the clear glass doors. I have to hold onto her jacket to keep her from bumping into people as she gazes up at the ceiling and takes in all the smells and sights her 11 year old eyes have never seen before. “I smell something good.” she says with longing as dinner time grows nearer. She begs me to ‘look around’ a little longer. It’s like she is seeing the Grand Canyon for the first time. Maybe to her limited experiences, it is like the Grand Canyon. To me and the hundreds of other shoppers, it was just another trip to the Oxmoor Mall. Lucy talks about the time she went to the mall like I talk about my trip to Lake Tahoe.

CARLA- 14 years old

Carla is a freshman in high school. She lives with her mom in a rental house in our neighborhood. She told me how excited she was to move into a new house on another block. Why? Because she would finally have a room with a door.

DARLENE- 9 years old

Darlene is 9 years old. “Well, I lived with my daddy till he got in some trouble. Now I live with mam maw. This is the third time we’ve moved this year. I think I’ll be going back with my daddy after school lets out and he gets out of jail.” Darlene adds with a smile, “Oh, and his girlfriend is pregnant! I love babies.” Darlene also mentions to me that she and her 3 other sisters (6, 7, and 8 years old) are going to have their own room. There will be 2 to a bed she says. I ask if the beds are big. She says “they are huge.” I’ve come to learn that huge may mean a twin or full.

JD – 4 years old.

JD: Oh, what kind of bug is this?

Me: It’s a lady bug.

JD: Where does he come from?

Me: God made him. Do you know God made everything, even you?

JD: God made me?

Me: Yep. He made the ladybugs, the grass, the sky, everything.

JD: What kind of car does God drive?

Me: ?

Lindsay Eubanks is a longtime member of Sojourn, a wife, mother and Occupational Therapist. Lindsay and her husband live in the Shelby Park neighborhood in Louisville where they are trying to learn to be better neighbors and love God more.