As part of celebrating our 5th anniversary, someone who is part of Everyday Joe’s will write something about it each month. Anything from essays to sonnets to interpretive dance. How interpretive dance would translate to this blog, I’m not sure…but it’d be interesting.
Whatever is written, it will come from the life that is in this building. 144 S. Mason seems to be alive and breathing…and it is something you can’t ignore when you walk in. Number six is penned by Darren Fred, the pastor of TImberline Oldtown – the church that meets at 144 S. Mason and started Everyday Joe’s 5 years ago this month. Wow.
“It’s not about the building.” This is what they always told me. You know. Them. The thems were professors in Bible College and pastors speaking at conferences. “It’s not about the building,” they would say. “The church isn’t a building.” True. That. So, I went along for eight, nine years believing that statement and repeating it. It’s not about the building. Then I came to 144 S. Mason in April, 2006. It’s not about the building, except sometimes it is kind of about the building. What is it about this place? How did all these people that aren’t normally in a room together end up in the room together? There’s a homeless guy on the couch reading a book. There’s a lawyer sitting eating a breakfast burrito (they’re good by the way), while he waits for a jury to finish deliberating. There are three moms on the floor with their babies climbing on them and around them while they talk about life. There’s a group of mentally disabled people eating lunch. There’s a transvestite (oh yeah, we can tell) enjoying a cup of something delicious while he/she visits and laughs and catches up with a friend. And, there’s a pastor (me) who holds credentials with a traditional, conservative denomination sitting in a room which has become his office looking around trying to figure it out.
When Jesus showed up, people who weren’t normally together—people who were suspicious of each other—showed up. Go ahead; read the stories. Prostitutes, church leaders, beggars, rich people, kids, old fogeys. They had one thing in common. They liked Jesus. They showed up to see him and they bumped into each other. That’s what happened when this building opened its doors and started calling itself Everyday Joe’s five years ago. And that’s what I began to understand as I sat in the room…day after day. People who weren’t normally together showed up because they had this in common—they liked the building. Or was it the coffee? Or the music? Or the people? Or some elusive and delicate vibe which exists where the love of God is. We’re Jesus. It’s about the building. This building is alive.
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