Picking up where we left off - a few months back Living Stones hosted a Question & Answers night and received over a hundred questions. Many of them were addressed during our gatherings and can be found on our podcast here. For the next few weeks I will be posting up answers to some of the remaining questions that were not answered. Answers for the questions have been provided by various Living Stones Elders.
Does being in the military go against living a life fully for God's purpose?
No... as long as it is done for the glory of God (1 Cor. 10:31). In fact, a deacon from our church just recently returned after serving in the military in Afghanistan. We received updates from him stating that God is using him in significant ways over there.
Would you consider the "plan b" pill as an abortion and against the bible?
The Bible is clear that sex outside of marriage is a sin. For the sake of the question we will assume the person asking the question is married. This is an interesting question from a married couple. My understanding is the "plan b" pill was made for rape victims or those who weren't planning on having sex, to prevent the life of an unborn child. The Bible is pro-children.
Isn’t prayer, simply prayer? Are the prays of a Mormon or a JW heard by God? What about prayers from a Christian with confessed sin?
God is sovereign and therefore hears all prayers. The question is what does God think about prayers prayed to another God? Mormon's and JW's don't believe in the Triune God of the Bible. The prayers of a Christian confessing brings God joy.
Is anal sex a sin?
Again, for the sake of the question we will assume we are talking about sex within marriage between and man and a woman. The Bible does not speak specifically about anal sex. In general the Bible states that the purpose of sex is for procreation, intimacy, and enjoyment. While anal sex directly is not a sin, it would be beneficial within the marriage to discuss where the desire is coming from. Pornography or past sexual sin could be the root of the desire and therefore those desires could be sinful.
Is it okay to drink if you are under the age of 21? And if not why?
No. The Bible says to be under the authority of the land. (Romans 13:1-7) God helps institute government and law and therefore we should not only respect the secular law, but abide by it as well.
What is a good scripture that would help in the healing process to not feel shame of ones past while in church?
2 Corinthians 5:21
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Living Stones Story
A friend of mine recently asked me to write up a quick story as to how Living Stones became what it is today - the following is what I shared:
I didn’t start out planning to plant a church, but I’m pretty sure that the reason we planted one is the reason churches are supposed to be planted. We wanted lost people to meet Jesus. Isn’t that the reason for churches?
I had just become a Christian after living in rebellion to God through selling drugs, sex, substance abuse and generally hopeless living. Before being saved by Jesus, I was a fairly talented rapper, but was always too stoned to do anything about it. After I was saved, I began devouring the Word and studying theology. And I started telling my drug-dealing, drug-consuming, and drunken friends about Jesus. A group of these friends were interested in talking about God, but not interested in going to church; my friend Matt had the idea that we should bring the church to them.
It started as a men’s Bible study. There were two Christians (Matt and I) and a handful of non-Christians. We taught the Bible, and some of them started following Christ and repenting of sin. (Two of those men are now pastors/elders on staff at Living Stones!) More people came, and for a couple years, this group existed as a Bible study that non-churched and non-Christian people floated in and out of, but our overall pattern was one of growth as week after week more people joined us.
Then, we moved the Bible study to a bigger house, and women came as well as men. By this time, one of the guys had learned the guitar and another had learned the bass. They knew about five songs. We did those songs over and over, week after week, until they learned more. I taught the Bible in a discussion format. I was consumed with God exalting, Jesus centered, reformed theology; I would teach non-Christians the 5 points of Calvinism, the sovereignty of God, providence, total depravity, and whatever Calvin and Luther said about the passage. And people just kept getting saved.
So, I decided to teach through the book of John. Each week, I opened up John, and I told the people there what Jesus said, what Jesus did, and who Jesus was. I remember people getting saved on the spot, following Christ, and starting to bring other friends who didn’t know Jesus. Soon we were starting to get too large; we were packing around 60 people into the house, and what had started out as a Bible study unintentionally became kind of like a house church.
During this period of time, I had also been a member of, and at some point a deacon of, my local church in Reno; when we had no more room to meet, I went to my pastor to ask what we should do. He said that we could meet in the church building on Friday night and so that’s what we did. Within two months, the group had doubled in size, and was still filled with non-churched, non-Christian people who were coming to know Jesus. I no longer led a simple discussion of the Bible, but had begun preaching. (Although really, it was more like a running commentary/rant on whatever section of John we happened to be in.) This is the way we—Living Stones—started.
Living Stones now averages about 1,500 people total per weekend, spread out into five worship gatherings at two campuses, but the mission to reach lost, broken, and non-churched people while preaching good old reformed theology remains the ethos of Living Stones. And people continue to meet Jesus. Over the years, literally hundreds of people have been baptized at Living Stones and begun following Christ. Our elder board is comprised of ex-drug dealers, ex-strip club managers, lawyers, and life-long church boys (including ex-Catholic altar boys.) I think Jesus likes this.
I guess it was a pretty good way to plant a church.
I didn’t start out planning to plant a church, but I’m pretty sure that the reason we planted one is the reason churches are supposed to be planted. We wanted lost people to meet Jesus. Isn’t that the reason for churches?
I had just become a Christian after living in rebellion to God through selling drugs, sex, substance abuse and generally hopeless living. Before being saved by Jesus, I was a fairly talented rapper, but was always too stoned to do anything about it. After I was saved, I began devouring the Word and studying theology. And I started telling my drug-dealing, drug-consuming, and drunken friends about Jesus. A group of these friends were interested in talking about God, but not interested in going to church; my friend Matt had the idea that we should bring the church to them.
It started as a men’s Bible study. There were two Christians (Matt and I) and a handful of non-Christians. We taught the Bible, and some of them started following Christ and repenting of sin. (Two of those men are now pastors/elders on staff at Living Stones!) More people came, and for a couple years, this group existed as a Bible study that non-churched and non-Christian people floated in and out of, but our overall pattern was one of growth as week after week more people joined us.
Then, we moved the Bible study to a bigger house, and women came as well as men. By this time, one of the guys had learned the guitar and another had learned the bass. They knew about five songs. We did those songs over and over, week after week, until they learned more. I taught the Bible in a discussion format. I was consumed with God exalting, Jesus centered, reformed theology; I would teach non-Christians the 5 points of Calvinism, the sovereignty of God, providence, total depravity, and whatever Calvin and Luther said about the passage. And people just kept getting saved.
So, I decided to teach through the book of John. Each week, I opened up John, and I told the people there what Jesus said, what Jesus did, and who Jesus was. I remember people getting saved on the spot, following Christ, and starting to bring other friends who didn’t know Jesus. Soon we were starting to get too large; we were packing around 60 people into the house, and what had started out as a Bible study unintentionally became kind of like a house church.
During this period of time, I had also been a member of, and at some point a deacon of, my local church in Reno; when we had no more room to meet, I went to my pastor to ask what we should do. He said that we could meet in the church building on Friday night and so that’s what we did. Within two months, the group had doubled in size, and was still filled with non-churched, non-Christian people who were coming to know Jesus. I no longer led a simple discussion of the Bible, but had begun preaching. (Although really, it was more like a running commentary/rant on whatever section of John we happened to be in.) This is the way we—Living Stones—started.
Living Stones now averages about 1,500 people total per weekend, spread out into five worship gatherings at two campuses, but the mission to reach lost, broken, and non-churched people while preaching good old reformed theology remains the ethos of Living Stones. And people continue to meet Jesus. Over the years, literally hundreds of people have been baptized at Living Stones and begun following Christ. Our elder board is comprised of ex-drug dealers, ex-strip club managers, lawyers, and life-long church boys (including ex-Catholic altar boys.) I think Jesus likes this.
I guess it was a pretty good way to plant a church.
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
Future Campus Plans
This quick message is to help answer some questions that have recently come up regarding the future campus plans of Living Stones. The following response is to help to paint a picture in understanding how Living Stones structures our Worship gatherings theologically, philosophically, and practically.
There are three reasons why we are not doing three morning gatherings at the Downtown campus. First, theologically we have a conviction that in public worship there ought to be plenty of time for all of God’s people to engage in extended times of singing. We believe that sermons should be long enough and deep enough to allow the people attending to grow spiritually and we believe in encouraging community…which leads to the next more philosophical reason for only having two morning gatherings. If we were to run three gatherings back-to-back-to-back, we would need to shorten our gathering times. This would not allow for extended for worship, preaching, or community because we'd have to funnel people in and out of the gathering. Philosophically this goes against our convictions. Finally, we also believe that threes gatherings would create practical difficulties. Although we have considered having 8a.m., 10 a.m. and 12 p.m. gatherings, we believe that this would be a pragmatic mistake since almost no one would go to the 8 a.m. gathering; history and demographic studies have proven that there is very little draw for attending 8 a.m. gatherings, and people in general don't generally want to go to church at noon on Sundays. Therefore, having three gatherings would leave Living Stones with only one optimum gathering time – the 10 a.m. which would inevitably become packed while the others remained empty. This would go against the very purpose of adding an extra gathering. Hope these explanations help.
There are three reasons why we are not doing three morning gatherings at the Downtown campus. First, theologically we have a conviction that in public worship there ought to be plenty of time for all of God’s people to engage in extended times of singing. We believe that sermons should be long enough and deep enough to allow the people attending to grow spiritually and we believe in encouraging community…which leads to the next more philosophical reason for only having two morning gatherings. If we were to run three gatherings back-to-back-to-back, we would need to shorten our gathering times. This would not allow for extended for worship, preaching, or community because we'd have to funnel people in and out of the gathering. Philosophically this goes against our convictions. Finally, we also believe that threes gatherings would create practical difficulties. Although we have considered having 8a.m., 10 a.m. and 12 p.m. gatherings, we believe that this would be a pragmatic mistake since almost no one would go to the 8 a.m. gathering; history and demographic studies have proven that there is very little draw for attending 8 a.m. gatherings, and people in general don't generally want to go to church at noon on Sundays. Therefore, having three gatherings would leave Living Stones with only one optimum gathering time – the 10 a.m. which would inevitably become packed while the others remained empty. This would go against the very purpose of adding an extra gathering. Hope these explanations help.
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