Romero's Prayer

Oscar A Romero, Archbishop of San Salvador in El Salvador, who was assassinated on March 24, 1980, prayed:

It helps now and then to step back and take the long view.
The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,
It is even beyond our vision.
We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.
Nothing we do is complete.
Which is another way of saying that the kingdom of God lies beyond us.
No statement says all that should be said.
No prayer fully expresses our faith.
No confession brings perfection.
No pastoral visit brings wholeness.
No program accomplishes the church’s mission.
No set of goals and objectives includes everything.
This is what we are about.
We plant the seeds that one day will grow.
We water seeds already planted knowing that they hold future promise.
We lay foundations that will need further development.
We provide yeast that produces effects far beyond our capability.
We cannot do everything.
And there is a sense of liberation in realising that this enables us to do something.
And to do it very well.
It may be incomplete – but it is a beginning.
A step along the way.
An opportunity for the Lord’s grace to enter and to do the rest.
We may never see the results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the apprentice.
We are apprentices not master builders.
We are ministers not messiahs.
We are prophets of a future that is not our own.
Holy Spirit come.
Amen

A Full Life in the Emptiest of Places

Today we reflected on our communities.
We lamented that neighbours are too often strangers who live near us,
And that it's sad when we have to pay people to help us.
We found it strange to think that we live in a culture that maintains such high walls between ourselves and our neighbours, wants so little of God or church, and yet longs so sincerely to be famous, to be known, to have significance.
And yet we also sensed a greater hope,
In which life streams forth from the church,
To the streets, to peoples homes
Into the lives of lonely, disconnected people.
And though we may have secretly thought that no change was possible,
God reminded us who He is,
That the very soil beneath our feet can be changed,
Transformed, restored
If we'll only dig our roots deep into Him.
A salt bush has a capacity to tolerate the most barren of environments
Environments suffering so much degradation from human irresponsibility
And there, in the midst of the lifelessness, it plays a part in rehabilitation
Restoration
And things are changed
All we thought we knew, gives way to the new.

Isaiah 58
9-12"If you get rid of unfair practices,
quit blaming victims,
quit gossiping about other people's sins,
If you are generous with the hungry
and start giving yourselves to the down-and-out,
Your lives will begin to glow in the darkness,
your shadowed lives will be bathed in sunlight.
I will always show you where to go.
I'll give you a full life in the emptiest of places—
firm muscles, strong bones.
You'll be like a well-watered garden,
a gurgling spring that never runs dry.
You'll use the old rubble of past lives to build anew,
rebuild the foundations from out of your past.
You'll be known as those who can fix anything,
restore old ruins, rebuild and renovate,
make the community livable again.

Series One Finale

Television shows guarantee a cliffhanger at the end of a series, with tantalising promises of drama, intrigue and joy. Welcome to the finale of White House Community Season One.

Series one has seen the birth of a community united by a greater purpose, sustained by respect and fun and energised by beautiful hopes and promises. What a joy it's been to see stirring and dreaming turn into reality.

We have learnt that if you dare to do the ridiculous, God will do the impossible.

We have recognised that we ought to be more afraid of our faith being irrelevant and meaningless than the fact that the risks we take might blow up in our face.

We have been stirred by the challenge to ensure that listening is accompanied by action - on God's terms, not our own, but for our own sakes, for plans of good men and women will never be good enough; they will never be big enough, wonderful enough - they will always be restricted by common sense and apparent circumstances. God-plans are not subject to such limitations.

We have discovered that you can pray for as many different things as you like but it is simple faith in the goodness of God that is the greatest thing that you can be given.

And so, as we enter the final stages of season one we welcome new faces - new permanent house mates, new young people. We farewell old house mates, temporary visitors and prepare for new life and celebrate fresh love. We seek to hold on to the amazing things we have come to learn together and ask God that we would continue to be challenged, animated and guided by the radical impulse of his Holy Spirit.

Pray that season 2 would be just as life-giving.

BLESSED ARE THE MERCIFUL, FOR THEY WILL BE SHOWN MERCY

Lord you have wired mercy into our being!
We know intuitively not to harm, whoever we are, wherever we come from.
But even this, this is only the tip of the iceberg.
You ask that we would not only be harmless,
but that we would treat others as we would like to be treated.
As those who love to be blessed we join as one to be a blessing.
As those who love mercy, help us to be merciful to others.
Remind us Lord, that we have life because of your own merciful choice.
May we live out our gratitude, loving others as we have been loved.
Help us to feel what others feel Lord to such an extent that our actions are no longer left "un-checked"
May our judgments be tempered with mercy and empathy.
May we delight in letting people off the hook,
giving people ourselves rather than our animosity.
Because when we come to you your hands are not tightly clenched and ready to strike,
they extend kindness, generosity and support.
Your arms remain open.
Make us like you, more and more.
Amen.

What's Getting Sam's Goat #2

Flies pro-creating on his desk.

BLESSED ARE THOSE WHO HUNGER AND THIRST FOR RIGHTEOUSNESS

Lord our appetites leave a lot to be desired.
Create a new hunger within us Jesus, a new thirst,
a taste for seeing the world as it ought to be.
Redeem our desires Lord, shape them with your love.
Help us to love justice,
to long for the deliverance of those exploited,
and liberation for those caught up in cycles of violence.
More than that, help us to love people in such a way that we reach out and embrace.
May just communities that include the powerless and loveless spring up.
May we gather for worthy causes,
may this be our zeal, our obsession.
Ruling over people brings no revolution.
May we come together not for our own strength or benefit,
but to lay down our lives in our commitment to those who are pushed to the margins.
May we join in the plight of others,
May we refuse to remain idle.
Hold us to our prayers Jesus, amen.

What's Getting Sam's Goat

Bread.

BLESSED ARE THE MEEK

Lord we act as those completely at the mercy of our passions, our hurts, as if our path is dictated by what happens to us and around us.
We get hurt and then we hurt others.
And we get stuck in this game of who can hurt who the most.
But there is no force, control, or coercion in your nature.
You don't conquer through violence and domination.
You come with an unconquerable love that has the capacity to withstand the greatest degrees of unlove and hostility.
You redefine our ideas of justice.
What is just? What is right?
We learn that cycles of hurt and pain do not make the world a better place.
You challenge us to be angry, but respond in a different way, a higher way, your way.
Teach us forgiveness, help us to show restraint.
Let us in on a strength we barely even understand.
Help us to treat others as we would like them to treat us - especially when they're treating us so poorly.
And may we not stand by when others are being profoundly harmed when we have the capacity to do something about that.
Shape us Lord, Amen.

COMMUNITY MEANS EVERY PERSON PARTICIPATING IN THE LIFE OF THE HOUSE

By now the house has a bit of a life of its own as we have settled into some natural rhythms and practices. We meet on a set night to discuss house matters and make decisions together. We gather each Sunday for reflection and prayer. We each have our nights where we make sure we're home to spend time with the young people in our care and share dinner with them. Having said that there's been a lot that has gone into getting the initiative off the ground and even now there are key areas to not only keep on top of but to see that we keep growing in these areas, using our God-given skills, innovation and imagination. We see these each of these areas as a shared responsibility but we're currently working towards matching people up with roles to oversee as part of the house. We see the following as important areas to maintain and develop:

Community care - ensuring that as a community we're looking out for each other, that we are making space for rest and fun and closer relationships.
Finance and property - making sure that money is coming in and out in an appropriate manner, that the house itself is being looked after properly and our relationship with the real estate agents is being nurtured.
Mission initiatives - being committed to using our gifts and passions to go and bless people and places that God calls us to.
Discipleship - ensuring that we are growing in our faith, letting go of things that don't belong, learning to hear from God more and more
Youth Support - making sure that the young people in our care are supported, safe and feeling at home as they work towards independent living.
Networking and partnerships - building important relationships with those who can strengthen and empower the vision of the house.
Hospitality - creating a genuinely inviting space for people in our homes, in our lives with food, drink, laughter, kindness and celebration.

We make decisions prayerfully and thoughtfully together. We recognise that autonomy creates a satisfied minority at odds with a dissatisfied majority whereas democracy creates a satisfied majority at odds with a dissatisfied minority. We believe that it is only through consensus and every one participating in the decisions of the house that true community can be created. No individual runs the shop. This seems to us to be the best possible environment for encouraging creativity and imagination, initiative and innovation, nurturing and unleashing gifts and passions, taking responsibility and developing leadership.

Pray that we'd continue to love and serve each other in the house in all the areas that we need to attend to, that God would give us inspiration and energy and that as we make decisions together we'd do so in the most loving and faithful ways.

BLESSED ARE THOSE WHO MOURN

It would be easy, Lord, to not think about the way things really are.
To live in our little worlds,
Worlds that are safe, protected, affluent.
Surely those who are ignorant are blessed?
Not according to you.
You sound a wake-up call to all those with ears to hear,
Eyes that see,
Hearts that feel.
And your Spirit moves in us, stirring our hearts so that ours might beat in time with yours.
And in the process Lord we feel this discontent, a restlessness.
It's so much harder to accept the present state of affairs.
We become aware of human suffering and we can no longer remain as we are.
As we identify with you we identify with the marginalized, distressed, disabled, and disadvantaged.
Jesus help us to cry out, lament and wail prophetically,
To mourn without being crushed,
And to find hope and see you at work.
Comfort those who have lost much.
Come Lord Jesus, may your Spirit bring life in abundance.
Amen.

BLESSED ARE THE POOR OR POOR IN SPIRIT

Jesus you dare us to imagine.
You invite us to imagine a world in which it is not status or riches that we place our trust in,
A world that doesn't play favourites.
And you challenge us Lord,
You plead that we'd endeavor to see the distance between ourselves and the poor become less and less.
With our hearts exposed by the company we keep and the things we pour our best energy into, you challenge us to a richer way.
You ask us to become poor 'in spirit'.
So may our comfortable existence be tampered with,
Our safe distance trampled on.
Lord grab us by the hand and take us wherever you're going,
To whomever you want us to meet,
Because following you is where we gain real treasure in this world.
And you want to show us where to find life, life to the full.
It might just be in the last place we'd expect to find it.
Teach us humility Lord. Help us to love more.
Amen.

Blessed Are They

On a hillside outside the town, this new Teacher from Nazareth has drawn quite a crowd. He doesn't look much, but he speaks authoritatively, in simple but poetic cadences that make his words easy to remember. But it's not his delivery that silences the crowd. It's his crazy, illogical, counter-intuitive, hope-filled message.

"I'll tell you who's fortunate," he says. "The really lucky ones are not the rich, the conquerors, the religious elites, the people with power and land and everything going for them. It's you - you who are poor and sad and at the bottom of the heap. You, who realy want to do what God requires, who care about others and stand up for what's right. You're the ones who make God smile."
Lyn Jackson

Come join us as we journey through the 'Be-Attitudes' each Sunday, 11am-12.30pm, over the next 8 weeks starting on the 31st of May. If you are interested in coming along, we would love to hear from you: Contact Jesse - mrjessesize@hotmail.com. The 8 weeks look like they will culminate in a contemplative-mountainous-beatitudes-picnic-bushwalk... tentative details:
Sunday 26 July, 11am @ Morialta Conservation Park
What better way to journey through the be-attitudes than in open space on a mountain trek (in the mode that Jesus delivered the original 'sermon on the mount'!)

Bless.

House Update

Dear friends and supporters of the White House,

It’s been a while! We’ve been busy. A brief update:

· Our forty days in the wilderness are up, how quickly time slips by. We’ve allowed this to be a time of finding our feet, a time of discernment, a time to be shaped. There have been some things to let go of, things to hold on to. We emerge focused on Jesus’ risky, engaged, passionate and personal way of being human.

· We have our first young person moving in this Friday which is great, almost a relief. You feel a little uncomfortable talking about what you’re doing when what you’re currently doing doesn’t involve any young people! Please pray that she’d settle in nicely and feel really at home.

· Sunday gatherings have been great. We had a commissioning service of sorts last Sunday which was really encouraging, we had lots of folk praying for us individually and corporately giving us a strong sense that we’re entering into a new chapter together as a house. We’re working through the beatitudes over the next eight weeks, can’t wait. Feel free to come along any Sunday, 11am at the house.

· We have our fundraiser this Thursday night at the Capri Theatre (141 Goodwood Rd). Come along and watch "The Boy in The Striped Pyjamas" at 6:30pm, $15 at the door. Come join us back at the house after (9pm-ish) to have a tour and hear a bit more about what we’re doing if you like (83 Quinlan Ave, Pasadena).

· We have a new house mate also moving in on Friday, keep Colleen in your prayers also, she’s a real answer to prayer and we’re really excited to have her be a part of things. It's been amazing seeing relationships develop in the house, everyone is so caring, i really love living with everyone in the house, they're great people.

In terms of practical needs, couches, fridges/freezers/frozen meals are our best friends, but prayer is even better. God has been incredibly faithful in answering all our prayers, it’s hard to get our heads around to be honest, but more importantly it shapes our hearts each and every time giving us a wonderful sense of gratitude and purpose. Please keep us in your prayers, especially as we begin the next chapter with young people in our midst!

Thanks for all your beautiful support,

God bless.

Jesse

COMMUNITY MEANS RESPECT FOR THE UNITY AND DIVERSITY OF PEOPLE IN A GROUP

Often with great curiosity people ask me what it is that holds the group together. They want to know what it is that will enable us to stick together and care for young people in the house over the long haul. Sometimes people will ask straight out if this is a ‘Christian thing' – and who knows exactly what people mean when they say something like that - but I hope on some level it’s a broader recognition that followers of Jesus are to seek meaningful connections with those who are disadvantaged in society. What holds us together is a shared hope in the dream that God has for this world, a hope that leaves us restless about the notion of sitting back and doing nothing at all. And for us to be able to do anything at all we need to come together. Partly we are bound together through the recognition that we need each other, that we are incomplete in and of ourselves and only truly reflect the image of God when we are in relationship with others.

As we share life together we recognise the importance of:

• Having a common goal/ethos – as a group we’re guided by a common purpose and identity that shapes the way we operate and ensures that we don’t drift too far from what we know to be good and true. We seek to follow Jesus at all costs and lay down our counter-agendas.
• The willingness to co-exist – commitment is crucial, when withdrawing from community remains an ever present option we adopt a real willingness to hang in there when things get rough.
• Diversity in Unity – while we place a high importance on protecting the unity of the group, within that unity must be a genuine freedom to be different.
• Equality – despite our differences - our gifts, experiences, resources and so on - we're all in the same boat, eat at the same table. This critiques our efforts to establish hierarchy or pecking order.

Pray that we'd hold tight to what we know we are called to, that we'd have the courage to hang in there with each other at all times, that we would value the unity that we have as a community without alienating individuals in the process.

Wilderness Time (Luke 4:1-13)

In a world that puts forward an array of lifeless promises,
A world that values might and power,
And seems to be satisfied with cheap thrills,
You offer another way.
A way that makes sense of who we are as human beings,
Even if everything we hear in society seems to suggest otherwise.
But you show us the way.
You are the way.
Deliver us from the temptation to build a life around things,
Things that take more than they give,
Free us from lives dedicated to futile offerings that have no lasting significance.
Deliver us from the temptation to offer concern without compassion,
Welfare without care,
Aid divorced from love, trust, relationship, sacrifice.
Jesus, deliver us from the temptation to reduce our life of faith to another form of escapism,
A mere reprieve from the ordinary.
May we part company with popularity, prestige and party tricks.
Yours is a way of sacrificial love,
A risky, engaged, passionate and personal way of being human.
Your way is life.
You are life.
Amen.

COMMUNITY MEANS HAVING A SENSE OF RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE WELFARE OF EACH PERSON IN THE GROUP

“Those who love community destroy community, those who love people build community” (Bonhoeffer)

From the beginning we recognised that for all the ways things could blow up in our collective faces, if we managed to draw nearer to God in our walk with him then it would all be worth it. It was apparent to us that the group exists to help people grow as people. For all the grand visions we have it is people that matter. If people are becoming burnt-out, over-burdened casualties of some greater mission then we have missed the point. So part of what community means to us is that individuals are cared for, looked out for, and that we have a sense of responsibility for each other. We think of the story of the lost sheep in Luke 15 where Jesus hints at God's concern for the individual even at the expense of the broader community. People matter. Some of the things we seek to make central to our life in the house are:

• Grace - Freedom to disappoint, to let down, to follow God at all costs
• Connectedness – seeking and creating genuine relationships. Only when people are actually remembered,acknowledged and recognised as people do they feel part of a group.
• Authenticity – having openness, honesty, grace, providing a place where people can be heard
• Blessing – encouraging and lifting each other up, letting our words be gift
• Rest and play - enjoying each others company and ensuring that the community does not become all-consuming, exhausting or wearisome

Pray that we'd love like our lives depended upon it, that no-one would be slipping through the gaps, that there would be a sense of vulnerability with one another and that we would help each to draw nearer to the love of God, that we would sing, laugh, dance, delight.

God's Kingdom is Here (Mark 1:14-20)

Jesus you come with a radical kingdom invitation, a radical welcome.
You don't restrict your invitation to those who have ticked all the right boxes, those who are worthy, the elite - not by the world's standards anyhow.
You redefine and rename. You transform. You add new meaning and life.
You call those with ears to hear, eyes to see, those hungry for a new way of being human.
Those restless and longing for change delight in your kingdom call, people disenfranchised with lives dictated by greed, comfort, security, fear, alienation and so on...
You search for actors willing to audition for parts in the kingdom - God's drama being staged here and now.
A way of righteousness and justice,
A way of peace,
A way of joy.
Lord may we be those who drop our nets immediately - our agendas, our fears, our excuses - and instead pick up your agenda as we follow you wherever you lead us.
May we delight and long for your kingdom.
Give us kingdom eyes and kingdom hopes.
May we in some sense be your kingdom, together offering both a challenge and invitation to all that you love deeply, to all who hear your call.
In Jesus' name, amen.

COMMUNITY MEANS CREATING A SAFE SPACE

Something we've been doing a lot together over the last four months or so is exploring what community means to us, the type of community we sense God is calling us into. And though this is something that we will no doubt have a far greater appreciation of over time, here's the start of some reflections that we feel are central to who we are and what we're about.

COMMUNITY AS A SAFE PLACE

• A place where hostility is confronted and turned into hospitality
• Creating a free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend instead of an enemy
• Hospitality is not a subtle invitation to adopt the lifestyle of the host, but the gift of a chance for the guest to find their own - offering space where change can take place
• The cost of our friendship is not people’s souls

We suspect that we'll know we're on the right track when there is a real sense of acceptance and forgiveness – freedom to be, freedom to make mistakes, recognition that we are weak at times and incomplete in and of ourselves.

The key we feel is respect, eyes that recognise the image of God in all people. Pray that we'd see ourselves and others through the eyes of God (like in the Rabbi's Gift).

THE RABBI'S GIFT

The story concerns a monastery that had fallen upon hard times. Once a great order, as a result of waves of antimonastic persecution in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and the rise of secularism in the nineteenth, all its branch houses were lost and it had become decimated to the extent that there were only five monks left in the decaying mother house: the abbot and four others, all over seventy in age. Clearly it was a dying order.

In the deep woods surrounding the monastery there was a little hut that a rabbi from a nearby town occasionally used for a hermitage. Through their many years of prayer and contemplation the old monks had become a bit psychic, so they could always sense when the rabbi was in his hermitage. "The rabbi is in the woods, the rabbi is in the woods again " they would whisper to each other. As he agonized over the imminent death of his order, it occurred to the abbot at one such time to visit the hermitage and ask the rabbi if by some possible chance he could offer any advice that might save the monastery.

The rabbi welcomed the abbot at his hut. But when the abbot explained the purpose of his visit, the rabbi could only commiserate with him. "I know how it is," he exclaimed. "The spirit has gone out of the people. It is the same in my town. Almost no one comes to the synagogue anymore." So the old abbot and the old rabbi wept together. Then they read parts of the Torah and quietly spoke of deep things. The time came when the abbot had to leave. They embraced each other. "It has been a wonderful thing that we should meet after all these years, "the abbot said, "but I have still failed in my purpose for coming here. Is there nothing you can tell me, no piece of advice you can give me that would help me save my dying order?"

"No, I am sorry," the rabbi responded. "I have no advice to give. The only thing I can tell you is that the Messiah is one of you."

When the abbot returned to the monastery his fellow monks gathered around him to ask, "Well what did the rabbi say?" "He couldn't help," the abbot answered. "We just wept and read the Torah together. The only thing he did say, just as I was leaving --it was something cryptic-- was that the Messiah is one of us. I don't know what he meant."

In the days and weeks and months that followed, the old monks pondered this and wondered whether there was any possible significance to the rabbi's words. The Messiah is one of us? Could he possibly have meant one of us monks here at the monastery? If that's the case, which one? Do you suppose he meant the abbot? Yes, if he meant anyone, he probably meant Father Abbot. He has been our leader for more than a generation. On the other hand, he might have meant Brother Thomas. Certainly Brother Thomas is a holy man. Everyone knows that Thomas is a man of light. Certainly he could not have meant Brother Elred! Elred gets crotchety at times. But come to think of it, even though he is a thorn in people's sides, when you look back on it, Elred is virtually always right. Often very right. Maybe the rabbi did mean Brother Elred. But surely not Brother Phillip. Phillip is so passive, a real nobody. But then, almost mysteriously, he has a gift for somehow always being there when you need him. He just magically appears by your side. Maybe Phillip is the Messiah. Of course the rabbi didn't mean me. He couldn't possibly have meant me. I'm just an ordinary person. Yet supposing he did? Suppose I am the Messiah? O God, not me. I couldn't be that much for You, could I?

As they contemplated in this manner, the old monks began to treat each other with extraordinary respect on the off chance that one among them might be the Messiah. And on the off off chance that each monk himself might be the Messiah, they began to treat themselves with extraordinary respect.

Because the forest in which it was situated was beautiful, it so happened that people still occasionally came to visit the monastery to picnic on its tiny lawn, to wander along some of its paths, even now and then to go into the dilapidated chapel to meditate. As they did so, without even being conscious of it, they sensed the aura of extraordinary respect that now began to surround the five old monks and seemed to radiate out from them and permeate the atmosphere of the place. There was something strangely attractive, even compelling, about it. Hardly knowing why, they began to come back to the monastery more frequently to picnic, to play, to pray. They began to bring their friends to show them this special place. And their friends brought their friends.

Then it happened that some of the younger men who came to visit the monastery started to talk more and more with the old monks. After a while one asked if he could join them. Then another. And another. So within a few years the monastery had once again become a thriving order and, thanks to the rabbi's gift, a vibrant center of light and spirituality in the realm.
You can find this story in M. Scott Peck's book The Different Drum: Community Making and Peace

SUGGESTIONS FOR SIMPLE LIVING

The following is from Scott Bessenecker's book The New Friars, it's good stuff.


Simplicity is voluntary, free, uncluttered, natural, creative, authentic, focused, margined, diligent, and healthful.

Simplicity is not easy, legalistic, proud, impoverished, ascetic, neurotic, ignorant, escapist.

RELATIONSHIP
Cultivate a closeness with God
Practice regular hospitality
Help each other, emphasise service
Always speak the truth. Develop a habit of plain, honest speech. If you consent to a task, do it. Avoid flattery and half-truths. Make honesty and integrity the distinguishing characteristics of your speech.
Don’t judge.
Reject anything that breeds the oppression of others.
Consciously seek to identify with the poor and forgotten - visit hospitals, prisons, nursing homes.
Schedule “simple” dates with your spouse.
Teach your children.

ACTIVITIES
Make your commitments simple.
Don’t overwork.
Fast periodically from media, food, people.
Elevate reading, go to the library.
Reject anything that is producing an addiction in you. Cut down on the use of addictive, non-nutritional food and drinks such as alcohol, coffee, tea, soft drink, sugar, chocolate.
Simplify Christmas and other holidays. Develop the habit of homemade celebrations.

PACE AND ATMOSPHERE
Slow down.
Do not exhaust your emotional bank account.
Give yourself permission to be uncreative, barren, inactive.
Say no.
Restrict/eliminate television watching. Turn off or mute advertisements.
Learn to enjoy solitude.

POSSESSIONS AND FINANCES
Cultivate contentment, desire less.
Resist covetousness and consumerism.
Buy things for their usefulness, not their status.
Learn to enjoy things without owning them. Benefit from places of “common ownership” (parks, museums, libraries, rivers, public beaches).
De-accumulate. Develop the habit of giving things away.
Offer others the use of your possessions.
Develop a network of exchange.
Avoid impulse buying.
Don’t buy now, pay later.
Avoid credit cards if they are a problem.
De-emphasise respectability.
Simplify your wardrobe – give away excess.
Learn how to make do with a lower income instead of needing a higher one.

APPRECIATION
Be grateful for things large and small.
Emphasise a joyful life.
Appreciate creation.
Send cards of encouragement and appreciation when others are not expecting it.

SPIRITUAL LIFE
Make the Word central.
Meditate and memorise Scripture.
Pray.
Encourage simple worship.
Shun anything that distracts you from seeking first the Kingdom of God.

Cleaning House

We are in the White House, well okay, right now I'm not at all, I'm at my old house because they have the internet and we haven't quite made it that far at the White House, but that aside after weeks of negotiating and planning we have the keys, most of our rooms have been unpacked, we've had our first house meetings and meals and junior sporting trophies have been placed in far too prominent areas. We're just finding our feet at this stage, actually people have hardly been home. Just quietly it's a little scary when you're there all by yourself. It's been fun though. I like coming home and reading the notes that have been left behind for each other on the kitchen counter.

Already there's a great sense of community, community pulled into a way of life shaped by God's life, community that's been shaped by a call to trust God and each other as we ask God to help us to love one another as if our lives depended on it. We hear the call to travel with a deep consciousness of God as he shifts things in us and guides us with his love. And while we're sure that God cares deeply about the house, there's a sense in which God is asking each one of us to clean house, our house, our lives - life that begins now, not when we're done and dusted.

And what is community if it doesn't reach beyond itself? Initially, at least, we will take some time settling before we take some young people in (though there are several waiting and ready). We feel that it is important to develop some rhythms and practices that will guide the house and to continue to form community. It seems right to do some time in the wilderness together before we embark on the next chapter.

We are going to meet on Sunday's from 11-12 to read some scripture and pray followed by lunch at the house, if you'd like to be involved you're more than welcome, drop any of us a line and we'll make sure there's some food for you too!

Also, if you feel strongly, like a flame shut up in your bones to be a part of something like this then let us know, maybe you should be in the house with us, so think, pray, act, but don't let the thinking get in your way too much.

Bless you all,
Jesse on behalf of Obama and the White House

Update

The lease is coming - that's what we're hearing every day! And while we're all itching to get into the house and some times feel a little impatient, we can rest in the pretty amazing fact that the lease will come and we have scrapped together enough for the bond! Once again it's been the generosity and support of people that keeps getting us over the line, whether it be donations, words of encouragement or prayer. We've always known that we need to go beyond our own resources to make this work - sometimes this is something to be celebrated, a real tangible experience of the kingdom in our midst. At some points, however, if we are really honest, it has felt like a burden. It's funny that we would think light that - burdened by not being able to do something in our own strength, particularly when God is so faithful - but I guess that's human nature. The bottom-line though is that whether we celebrate God's faithfulness or rue our own limitations it doesn't change the reality, only our experience. The reality is that God is faithful and Jesus is Lord. So thanks to all of you who have supported us, we're becoming less and less surprised (but ever grateful) by how caring people are. Keep us in your prayers as we enter the house by Easter, pray that we will continue to make space for each other and others who will be a part of the house at a later point.
Peace, courage from Jesse on behalf of the house xo

Love is for the blind

Sometimes, when we look out before us, we see so little
We scan the horizon searching for something, anything, some kind of sign of life
But in the mist and the fog all you can do is see one step in front of you
Sometimes you are forced to step out into the unknown
The reason you are there though is because some things, terribly important things, are known.
With each step you take, your foot sinks into God-terrain, God-country - you can't flee from his kingdom company
If we only stopped to be silent we might hear the divine breathes.
Even as we take each step we are beckoned to remember that we have been gifted with a God-given energy for a God-given task
An involuntary valve allows the courage-building presence of God into our fearful hearts, pumping his life-giving blood into every sphere, carrying all that we need ever so faithfully time and time again.
Faith tells us that we'll be okay in the fog and mist.
Hope tells us that we'll find our way through the fog and mist, eventually.
But love is really important, love is what must guide each step.
Love never eliminates mystery, love can mean a million things.
But love will pave the way.
When we're so lost that we can hardly put one foot in front of the other
When we have no idea where we are,
Or where we're going,
Love will pave the way.
It might be all we have, and all we know
But that's great, because it might just be all we need
And love never fails.
So come fog, mist, rain or snow, love will lead us home.

Participating in the Divine Glory

It's amazing the way the house already calls us to shift expectations and reservations, to confront, to trust, to communicate, to let go of control, to give in a costly way - well before we've even gotten into the house together! I like M.Scott Peck's following reflections on community. He says,

When I am with a group of human beings committed to hanging in there through both the agony and the joy of community, I have a dim sense that I am participating in a phenomenon for which there is only one word. I almost hesitate to use it. The word is "glory"

In all the chaos and shifting and trusting and communicating that goes on, perhaps this is precisely how it is actually supposed to be, that this is what it really means to reflect the image of God most powerfully - in community, with one another, for better, for worse, in the good times and the bad. And I reckon we'll come out better for it too.

April Fools

After weeks of negotiating, praying and planning we have officially been approved to move into the White House on April 1st – Fittingly, I think, April Fools. It seemed foolish right from the beginning to check the house out, foolish to offer so much less than they were asking for, foolish to think we’d find enough “fools” to fill house and foolish to place justice and community before individual security and comfort -at least that’s what we’ve often been told along the way. It’s still pretty surreal to think about how this has all come about but to be honest I prefer thinking about why it has all come about. I’m convinced that we are called to be part of Christ's answer to the real cries of a community's heart as we seek solidarity with the poor and powerless. I think God is all about helping us to see needs and well as recognising, within ourselves and beyond, abilities. That’s why we will open our homes and commit to supporting young people by feeding them, giving them our time and ensuring their safety. That’s why we will advocate for homeless young people. And that’s why we’ll probably ask for your help along the way.

Maybe you can help us out with things like:
Prayer
Meals
A Filing Cabinet
Locks for doors
Furniture and Electrical Stuff (Bunk or single beds, couches, tables and chairs, desks, computers, wardrobes and cupboards, chest freezer)
Household linen (Single bed sheets, pillows, pillow cases, quilts, quilt covers, blankets, towels, tea towels)
Our impending and imposing $10,000 bond
Or perhaps you’d like to help out in an ongoing way with financial donations that would specifically contribute towards the rent and food of the young people in our place.

If you want to get involved in the life of the house some how just let us know. We’ve never thought that we could/should do any of this alone and we want people to be involved in the house.

Thanks for everyone who has already shown such amazing support and encouragement.

Peace and courage from the house.

Remember

To the daring ones who hear the voice, who hunger for adventure and find rest in following,
It seems like so long ago, those days when we started paying attention to the stirrings God had placed on our hearts.
I think it’s because God has done so much in that time.
He has challenged us to greater depths of faith and openness to his Spirit within us.
He has brought together like hearts.
He has dared us to orient our lives around his heart, his purposes, his kingdom.
He has been shaping us and forming a living hope within us, preparing our hearts like a master chef prepares for a banquet.
The invitations have been sent out. The guests are at the door.
There is a sense of excitement, but also, if we are really honest, some nerves.
And why wouldn’t there be?
We are all-too human,
with our all-too human vulnerabilities,
with our all-too human fears.
Fear is a funny thing. Fear can make us do unusual things, or even worse, nothing at all.
It seems silly to think that we would allow fear to call the shots, particularly after everything we’ve learned.
But that’s because we forget.
We forget so easily who is running the show, who brought us all together.
We remember the part about how we can’t achieve a whole lot but forget the most important bit:
He who calls us is faithful.
He goes before us, calling us out into wide open spaces.
We are vulnerable, but he is a strength made known in weakness.

Remember, remember, remember.

Be fearless.
Laugh at impossibilities.
Pray at all times.
Be fully persuaded that he has the power & willingness to do what he has promised.

Remember, remember, remember.

House Update

Friends and Supporters of the Pasadena Whitehouse Housing Initiative,

Maybe writing to you all is as much about trying to get my head around the last few crazy weeks as it is about letting you know what's happening. Actually more than anything I wanted to say thanks to all those who have offered encouragement and prayer. As much as I'm sure following Jesus calls us to follow him in some pretty crazy ways into uncharted territories, the reality is that entering into unknowns and going beyond your own resources is quite daunting. More often than not it's been the support many of you have offered that has kept us focussing on Jesus rather than the chopping waves beneath our feet. Please, please, please continue to pray for us. If you're wondering who has committed to living in the house, Sam Polglase, Kate Sare, Amanda Hillgrove, Sarah Addington, Chelsea Schramm, Matt Breen, Allie Ranson and myself are looking at moving in early March. When I say pray for us though "us" means so much more than those eight in the house. There are plenty of others involved, people who share the dream and are involved in ways that are so important. The house is about far more than simply living in community; ultimately we want the house to serve a purpose greater than community for the sake of community.

A bit of history for those who aren't quite up to speed, for a while now, a small group of young people, trained and working as youth and social workers, occupational therapists, and community workers began to dream of how we could make a difference to some of the young homeless people we encounter on a daily basis. Without supported accommodation many young people remain trapped in a cycle of unemployment, poverty and hardship with little hope of escape. We longed for an opportunity to arise where we could provide safe, stable, and affordable short-term accommodation for some young people.

Early in January 2009, a large house in Pasadena became available for rent, and the owners were generous enough to grant us access to a lease at a greatly reduced price. Our plans for this property are as follows:
· 8-10 full-time tenants united and committed in both their Christian faith and professions to serving the poor and disadvantaged will occupy and maintain the property, and develop a functioning community home. They will also be committed to covering the full cost of the weekly rent.
· The remaining rooms in the house will then be made available to persons who are in need of short term accommodation.
· Each person who seeks accommodation support will be assisted to gain support through community agencies and services in order to obtain long-term stable accommodation.

This initiative is not seeking to become a formal youth service, offering professional care. Rather it seeks to create a welcoming, supportive and safe residential community home. It is our hope that this home will support some of the young people we know who may be struggling, and help them as they work towards being able to support themselves to break out of the cycle of unemployment and poverty.

As things currently sit, we're working out between us how we can get together enough money to pay the $10,000 bond by March the 1st. I don't know exactly where all of that will come from but God has stirred too much and provided too much for us to start thinking that this is something that will stop us! Right from the outset it's been a process of God stirring, us curiously and tentatively moving, God providing and revealing His faithfulness.

If you would like further information on this project, please don’t hesitate to contact us. We continue to pray that such a community draws together like hearts.

Blessings,
Jesse Size on behalf of our Whitehouse Community