Easy Like Sunday Morning.

Here at CTK Durango, we have our worship service on Sunday night. We meet at 6pm. At first, this was just a logistical issue. We wanted to visit other churches, we had dinner together (when we were small enough to fit around my dining room table), and we wanted to get to know the town. I guess we always thought we would eventually transition to Sunday mornings, but I'm starting to wonder if that ever needs to happen. Durango is an active town, to say the least. By meeting on Sunday evenings, we make ourselves that much more accessible to the people who live here. I've also noticed that, by meeting in the evening, there is a very relaxed and laid back feel to our meetings and worship. People seem to be in a restful mood. They're not in a hurry to get home and watch a football game or eat lunch. My favorite thing about meeting on Sunday nights, though, is personal. I've always struggled with the idea of the Sabbath. I've never understood why it seemed that only people who were not pastors or church staff were allowed to rest on God's day. I've always thought the leadership of a church community should model the life they expect their congregation to live. Our habits of worship on Sunday night allow me to slow my pace on Sunday. I can eat breakfast with my kids, clean the house, go outside and do something. I'm not stressed and out of the house by 7am and barely getting home at 2pm only to crash out after kicking the dog and reviewing all the things I could have done differently that morning. Instead, when I get to the worship meeting, I'm relaxed and ready to go. I'm excited to see my friends. I can preach with a cup of tea in my hand and it feels more like a conversation than a sermon.

I don't know that every congregation could operate this way--I'm certainly not saying they should. But...for us, I have to say this way of doing church is downright heavenly! Bring on the Sabbath!!!

Office Space

We've hit yet another milestone in our journey at CTK Durango--we have an office. We are now located downtown in a building that is designed to accommodate small buisnesses. The owners are people who value community, so they encourage interaction between tennants and even have networking parties every month. Our particular office overlooks a big deck on the second story. We're pretty excited about having a space we can work in and the sense of community in the building fits our vision better than anything we could have imagined. My favorite feature is the CTK window sticker Steve made for the door--perhaps because that's about all the furniture we currently have for the new office!

New Location

We had a great time at our new location last night. We are now meeting at the Rec Center almost across the street from where Pickles used to be. It was ironic to drive by Pickles which has now been repainted blue and white, sporting a Kettle sign instead of the giant, spatula-toting pickle. It's almost as if Pickles never existed.

We took some time to talk a little about where we're headed in the coming months. We also talked about what it means to be a church for people who don't belong in church. I love looking around that room and seeing that the likes of us have found a home!

Right now I'm really looking forward to our visit to Salinas. I hope a lot of you can make it to the show-and-tell at Salinas Valley Community Church on Friday, May 4th. We will be sharing a little about what we've been up to for the last year. We'll also be showing a video featuring our beautiful town and the amazing people who are part of our church community. We are also hoping to be able to express our deep gratitude for your support and encouragement in this journey.

See you there!

I'm going to be a house husband!

This past Saturday, Jenn interviewed for a job at a new magnet high school in town. This morning, they called and offered her the job! She will be teaching English at a small high school designed to equip students to be more ready for the work force by the time they graduate. It is a great opportunity for her to be in on the ground level of a very creative way of doing high school.

This new development means a couple things for our family. One is that we will be taking our house off the market. By refinancing and cutting some costs, we will be able to afford our home--staying in our neighborhood will be good as well as keeping our house which has been a great place to host friends and church events. Having Jenn teaching full time will also mean that I get to facilitate the day to day life of our family. I'll be taking kids to school and keeping up with the house. While I've never worked in such a domestic capacity, the flexibility of the schedule will allow me to manage my pastoral duties during school hours.

This is great news for us and an incredible answer to prayer. Once again, God has been faithful to us as we've deepened our commitment to do whatever is necessary to follow through with our calling in Durango.

Easter

Tonight was great. We had to scramble to find a place to meet when Pickles decided to close a week earlier than planned. We ended up at Manna House. I love worshipping with these people--we have such great vocalists that we are able to have quality worship even with a small group of people. Add to that the level of authenticity we value so much at CTK and you have a fantastic worship experience.

One of the highlights of the evening (on a less spiritual plane) was sharing the 30lb chocolate Easter bunny that was donated to us through the soup kitchen. Let's just say that you'll be able to tell a CTKer by the terrible acne we're all going to have tomorrow from all the chocolate we ate tonight!