Sleeping Beauty part 6 OR "The Way You Do the Things You Do"

We now come to the “where the rubber meets the road” part of our journey. If all this is true, if this is a priority, if this is our example, how should it play out in our weekly gatherings—our place of corporate worship—our place where we publicly meet with God?

Many times people will visit Westwinds and their jaws will drop. Because we have embraced the concepts of scripture as we have discussed in the previous 5 posts and because we put a high priority on the arts—both visual and performing—it is sometimes shocking. Usually in a good way.

“I didn’t expect that!”
“Finally!”
“This is how it should be done!”
“My old church would have never . . .!”

It would be easy for us to get a big head. And . . . we have at times.

We are proud of our “traditions” here.

But we would rather focus on what we are trying to design and for what purpose we are designing than focus on the design itself. Sure, Westwinds is a cool place to be. We don’t feel bad about saying that. But, more important for us is that Westwinds is a place of life change where people are falling in love with Jesus.

That is why we do what we do.

Just like our catholic ancestors (yes, we were all catholic at one time) who used stained glass—the motion picture of their day—to tell a story, just as the apostle Paul quoted the poets of his day (Acts 17:28), and just as our friends Bezalel and Oholiab shaped and molded and carved and painted, we are committed to using the mediums of our day to tell the story of hope and redemption and respond to everything that God is with all that we are.

Why do you do the things you do? Do you have a philosophy of ministry statement? Do you have regular conversations with your church leaders and people you serve with about beauty, art, culture, design, etc.?


To save space on the blog and pull you away to check out a cool site that is beginning to take shape, I have posted our Philosophy of Ministry statement for Fusion design (our weekend gathering) on Cultural Watercooler on the Philosophy of Ministry page. You all should check out this wiki site anyway and add your two-cents. Share the love.