"Here's the church,
and here's the steeple.
Open the doors,
and see all the people."

Idyllic structures housing great ideals--that is what church purports to be. Then the disappointment comes--when the doors are opened and it is revealed that the church is filled with people. Uggh! Less-than-perfect people. Sinners and seekers and sundry non-saints. People with problems; people who create problems; people who are problems.

It all goes back to God's incredibly bold experiment to entrust this venture of the Kingdom of God to ordinary people on an extraordinary mission. Jesus said it was the Father's good pleasure to give the Kingdom to ordinary people. God! What are you thinking?!! The apostle describes the church as Christ's body. Ordinary people have been entrusted to embody the Lord's presence here on earth. God! What are you thinking?!!

Years ago my heart was captivated by this wild experiment called church. I had grown up not liking church so much. Then being a teenager in the late 60's and early 70's I was afflicted with the same anti-institutional affliction that gripped most all my generation. I liked Jesus; not a big fan of the church.

Then God did something crazy. He gave me the opportunity as a very young college student to lead a small-town congregation. God what were you thinking?!! But in that little Presbyterian church in Hemingway, SC something amazing happened. I fell in love with another man's wife. The apostle also refers to the church as the "bride of Christ." What I had formerly disdained began to captivate my heart. Grandmas and little kids; indifferent teens and anxious parents; laborers and salespeople; farmers and school-teachers all in one little congregation. And real community. That is what captivated my heart--a community of very different people seeking to live out life's highest ideals as they cared for one another and sought to serve God in the midst of their issues and brokenness and real problems.

I fell in love and have never gotten over it. Lord, I love your bride! Not just the idea of the church, or the building, or even the ideals of the Kingdom of God. But real live people trying to do what's right and serve their world and follow after your ways. I have been captivated by this notion that the Lord has more faith in us than we ever have in him. It is his good pleasure to entrust the Kingdom to the likes of us--sinners and seekers and sundry non-saints. God, I love the way you think!!!

And I love the particular church called Wellspring. If you open the doors, yes--you will see all the imperfect people. People with problems. But you will also see people climbing out of their problems. People who are helping others with their problems. People who have signed on to tackle some very real problems in their communities and beyond. People who are embodying the Lord's presence in their world.

Wow! What a beautiful bride!!

At 8:40 AM our time on Wednesday morning—6:40 in Guatemala—my office phone rang with a call from Bob Switzer, our assistant pastor leading a mission trip of our teens and youth leaders to work in an orphanage and senior center in a fairly remote section of the country.

When Sandy, my administrative assistant told me it was Bob on the other end of the line, I thought to myself--this is either going to be really good or there are some big problems going on with this trip.

Turned out to be really good--really good.

Bob told me that the day before the team was slated to go to a small and poor village some distance away and distribute food to the people there. That seemed good. The students could get outside the bounds of the orphanage compound, do some very useful service and get a further sense of how blessed we are in our lives stateside. But then the director said that they would also be doing some evangelizing in the process.

"How is this going to work?" Bob thought. We can't speak the language; we don't know the people or the culture; these kids aren't Billy Graham. I hope that they aren't going to make the people file into the village church and get preached at before they line up to be given the meager bags of food assembled to distribute.

Then he had another thought, "We can evangelize in the way we are learning how to cooperate with God."

So the team travelled to the village. Bob spoke for a few minutes as the local village pastor translated. He told the people that the team had come from the United States to be a blessing to their country. He told them that they had come because the love of God was motivating them. He told the people that God loved them and had provided a Savior for them; that his name is Jesus. He told them that Jesus has brought us a better way to live--a Kingdom of love and forgiveness and the power of a new life within. Then he said the students would be happy to pray for any need that the people might have--any pains, sicknesses, infirmities, whatever. Or if they just wanted to be blessed the teens from America would pray for them. Again, the pastor translated.

The people lined up--not for the food, but for the blessing of the Kingdom of heaven. The students began to minister to them. Working their way through the English-Spanish thing the team listened to the needs/requests of the people. Then they did as they have been taught--they laid hands on the people and prayed. What happened next is why Bob called me so early.

Heaven invaded earth!

Fevers were dispelled in Jesus' name. Injured, hurting knees were healed. Pain and weakness was banished--to be replaced by comfort and relief. "These kids--our students--healed people!!!!" Bob said laughing and crying over the phone. Then he described more encounters with the radical goodness of God. The people began to be filled with the peace and love of God as the team prayed and they became overjoyed. Meanwhile, the pray-ers were also filled up by God's presence and power. Heat and power and tongues of praise broke out among the student ministers as they got filled to overflowing with the Holy Spirit.

Time came to distribute the food. While that was going on the village pastor began relating the testimonies of the people who had been touched, healed, and blessed. Not all the students were needed to distribute the bags of food. So the others on the team began to ask the Spirit to direct them to those in the crowd whom the Lord was still moving upon--so they could give away more of the blessings of the Kingdom.

At the end of the day our students turned in--exhausted but exhilarated. Heaven had invaded a small village in Guatemala through their prayers and hands. In Luke 11:21 Jesus was "full of joy through the Holy Spirit" as he reflected upon his "mission team" having had similar experiences in ministering the good news and saving power of the Kingdom. I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure.

Another good day in the Kingdom!