News from Iowa City

Last night Salt Company got bumped from one bar (Blue Moose) to another (Third Base/Fieldhouse). We went in on Tuesday to set up, and it was dark. Literally and Figuratively. This picture was taken with all the lights on. One of the highlights was standing in a circle on this checkered floor, begging God to bring the light of the gospel into this place. We felt like God led us to Matthew 5:13-16, and that He was in this. We ended our prayer time singing "Holy, holy, holy". I got chills when singing the line, "though the darkness hide thee, though the eye of sinful man thy glory may not see..." How many times has this hymn been sung in a sketchy bar? At least once, now.

Over 150 people packed in, and Jeff did a masterful job with 46 verses in Mark 5. There was a great vibe to the night. You can see Jeff is on a make shift stage, looking down into the checkered dance floor area, with people packed in way to the back.

After Salt last week Spaid and Laugerman decided to stand outside the bar and lead some worship.

After a late night of Salt, I joined some of our freshmen who are meeting EVERY weekday morning for prayer and fellowship at... brace yourself... 5:30 AM. Put this on the list of things to love about college ministry. They will change the world because they don't know any better. Ahhh I love the passion.
Makai got a bunny.
Here's a video we showed last night at Salt. Incredible testimony and great job by Lance, who filmed the whole thing on his iphone 4. Not bad at all. Cale, I love what God has done and continues to do in your life- this was just 6 months ago that you gave your life to Jesus then followed him to Iowa City. Stay on the Psalm 1 path, my friend.

This is my God story - Cale from Veritas Church on Vimeo.

The next few pics chronicle my morning last week (or a couple weeks ago?... it's all a blur) setting up for a typical Sunday morning at Veritas.

5:15 am- Leave my house in the cold rain.

5:33 Arrive 3 minutes late and help load the trailer. The faithful set up crew beat me there, so they had most of it loaded already.

6:00 Carry EVERYTHING (Stages, Sound, Lights, Instruments, Children's Ministry totes...) into the hotel

Empty room. We can do this!

Everyone has a specific job. Like ants, they all go to work.

1:00 pm: Fast forward to the end of the day. It's sunny and the nameless servants (they wouldn't have it any other way) are on the home stretch. All that's left is to head to the office storage unit and unload everything.

I'm humbled to work with such amazing volunteers and humble servants of Christ.

A Recap of the First Veritas Service

We're quickly aging as a church. We'll be 3 weeks old this Sunday. But here's a look back at our kickoff on September 12...

First Veritas service recap from Veritas Church on Vimeo.

El Diablo: A Homeless Man

One way to describe our church is in the words of Bono, who describes himself as "a friend of the poor, and sometimes the rich."

It's hard to read the Bible and miss the fact that God has a special affection for the poor. Rhetorically, Politicians have a heart for the poor, but in reality their heart is with the rich. We know the temptation to give special attention to the rich (they have money and power), but we are striving to be a community whose ethos is to care for the poor (James 2, for example).

Recently, I've had an amazing opportunity to share with a guy from the streets of Chicago, who is here visiting his sister. In a recent conversation, he was very close to giving his life to Jesus. Please pray for Terrell.

But this morning I was reminded of another unfolding story in our community of love toward a homeless man, "El Diablo." I read this post this morning from James (I just wrote about James and James music- click here), and it about wrecked me.

Here's the story of Keith (aka "El Diablo"). Listen to the rap song they recorded and produced with Keith. It made me cry, as I listened to the slurred rant of a confused, proud and yet broken homeless guy: http://jamesfromames.wordpress.com/2010/09/16/999-red-balloons/

Here are some pics of El Diablo...

This was the first ever encounter with El Diablo last March, when he shared about his exploits as a cage fighter and gambler:

We asked him how he did at the casino, and as if to add an exclamation on how he rules the casino, he said, "I walked in with a twenty, and out with a hundy."

Our second Diablo sighting at the bank:

This picture was taken the first time we learned his real name, and why we were seeing him all the time: Keith is a homeless man.

Oh God, can you transform the mind and heart of a person with such unique mental, emotional, and spiritual struggles?

yes, Yes, YES!

More pics from the Veritas kickoff

I'm so proud of Mark Duvick...he did a great job leading in worship (with a stellar band!)

Laugerman played a song he wrote that was intertwined with a video about how God provided for him.
Jeff Thune rocking some announcements. I can't wait for him to open our study of 1st John next week.
Preaching action shot...The crowd was captivated...

Seriously, every time I get up to speak, I have developed the habit of praying the Bartimeaus prayer, "Jesus Christ, son of the living God, have mercy on me, a sinner." I know how utterly helpless I am apart from God to speak life giving words. Not to mention living it out...

I love it that people were immediately able to engage in worship.

Here's Wally figuring out the intro to "Mighty to Save".... on the spot. We didn't realize he had never played the lead line before. But that dude is pretty ridiculous and quickly rocked it out.

Props to our children's ministry workers who missed the entire service in order to serve behind the scenes.
I loved the mingling that happened before and after. There was a definite buzz.
Here's the sign in the Ped Mall. If you've never been to downtown Iowa City, you must visit sometime. You would never guess you were in Iowa. We had a few people (that I know of) that showed up because they saw the sign.

James and James

Recently I've been listening to Xuadalupe by our very own James and James.

James Laugerman is one of our brilliant Anthem song writers (His glory never fades) here in Iowa City, and I'm still recruiting his counterpart, James Pusey, to come to Iowa City (apologies to all my homies at Cornerstone who are holding onto him with white knuckle grip...)

This album is brilliant! I'm especially addicted to tracks 1 and 3. I was listening to this with our staff (now you know what we've been busy doing) and Clint said this should be on the radio. Hear it for yourself. The five song demo is only $3.

What?

Yeah, 3 bucs.

Check it out here: http://jamesandjames.bandcamp.com/

Keep writing, James and James!

Sunday's Kickoff Sermon

Thanks to Chris, our videographer and web guru, the sermon from Sunday is up on the Veritas website: http://www.veritasiowacity.com/