Uncommon Fellowship

I spent Thursday and Friday in Atlanta attending the Catalyst Conference which is geared for Christian leaders.  This year’s theme was Uncommon Fellowship, which focused on building unity between churches and diversity in our congregations.  My friend Bea Ward attended with me, and it was great to be there with someone who loved it as much as I did. I came away full to the brim.

Here are a few of the best thoughts I collected from Catalyst.

Andy Stanley

"Jesus believed that our unity is our message to the world."

"People who were nothing like Jesus liked Jesus and Jesus liked them back."

"What if people were skeptical of what we believe but envious of how we treat one another."

"Unity preempts personal preference."

"Jesus gave his life so that we could have uncommon fellowship.  The relationship between humans and God is the most uncommon fellowship there can be."

Mike Foster

"I want to be a grace-flavored snow cone on a hot, judgmental day."

Craig Groeschel

"People are sick and tired of hearing about the love of Jesus.  They need to see the love of Jesus."

"Unity is not the same as uniformity.  There is strength in diversity."

"We need to err on the side of being for things, not against them."

"We need to give everything we can to strengthen others.  We will lead the way with irrational generosity."

Travis Boersma, owner of Dutch Brothers Coffee

"Our motto is 'Love all -- Serve all'."

"We are not in the coffee business.  We are in the relationship business.  Our product is love."

Father Edwin Leahy

Father Leahy got the biggest ovation from the crowd.  He comes across as such a genuine person.  He has spent his whole career at St. Benedict's Preparatory School in Newark, NJ, educating African-American and Latino young men.

"Our credo is 'What hurts my brother hurts me.'"

"Someone asked me what our preparatory school was preparing our young men for.  The obvious answer is college but the reality is that we are really preparing them for heaven."

His advice to the leaders in the room:  "Give up what you want for what we need."

Judah Smith

Preaching on Matthew 9 about Jesus calling Matthew the tax collector:

"Jesus has plans to take me to Matthew's house."

"Jesus intends to include those who have been excluded."

"At the end of the story, Matthew's table had changed."

My thought;  How should my table change?

Brian Houston, pastor of Hillsong in Australia

"We build up our ceilings and they become the floors for the next generation."

"We must push out of the past.  The hope of the church is our sons and daughters."

Brenda Salter-McNeil

I loved this woman!  She described her trip to Ferguson and work in racial justice.

"God is breaking up our holy huddles."

Scott Sauls led a panel discussion that I wish would have gone on a lot longer.  It was very rich and thought-provoking.

"The closer you get to 'the other' the closer you get to Jesus."-- Scott Sauls

"The race issue is really a power issue." -- Jenny Yang

"Christ gave up power, privilege and position." [implying we should too] -- Mark DeYmaz

"Charity is giving someone crumbs from the table.  Justice is giving them a seat at the table." Jenny Yang quoting Bill Moyers

Yang went on to apply this to the church... "a seat in the sanctuary vs a voice at the microphone"

"Violence is the language of the unheard."  Propaganda, hip-hop and spoken-word artist

Rachel Cruze

"Money is a tool that can help create unity."

"Debt kills generosity.  Debt enslaves and slaves don't get to make decisions."

Simon Sineck

Another one of my favorites, he gave a phenomenal presentation.

Speaking on the need to sacrifice:  "Giving money is not a sacrifice because you can always make more.  Giving time and energy is a sacrifice because you can never get it back."

He talked about understanding our work in the church (and life) in terms of playing a game.  Some games are finite and the object is to win.  Other games are infinite; the object is to outlast and stay in the game.  The church should realize that we are like the infinite game.