this is our story  |  what we've learned

The story of our community started just a few years ago when a stirring began in a group of people. They began dreaming the impossible once more, embracing that the world God created is good and that love, displayed in it's truest form, could change the way the world works.

God is moving; He is inviting people to partner with Him to show the hurting, the dirty and the dying of this world that He is the God who is near to His people. Many believe that the church is moving more and more toward irrelevance in the world; they would say that the message is dated and that religion is simply a false sense of security for people living in a world without hope or even a means of keeping a safe distance from an unsafe, unlimitedly creative, passionate God. We couldn't agree more and so we're declaring a love war.

To understand this family and to hear our story isn't to read a list of the things we believe, it's to join with us; we've been invited to love the world to heaven. ...but Jesus talked about a heaven here and now; a world being put back together with love and mercy and compassion and generosity.

A few years ago a large group of us were on a bus coming home from camp...have you ever had one of those moments where you're just sitting with others, talking, and all of a sudden you realize that you're doing more than just sitting with others, talking? David wrote that "the earth is the Lord's and everything in it". God is everywhere. Sometimes we just forget to notice. As we sat on that bus for 10 hours coming home, the Spirit began to move and walls started falling--fast. Family isn't formed overnight but we would certainly argue that there are certain moments that form lasting bonds in a community. We got off that bus that day and something hasn't been the same since.

We believe that we were brought together to live deeply with one another. We have celebrated and suffered greatly (we buried one of our own in the summer of 2008: 13 year old Addison W. Toole; we have loved and failed to love; served and forgotten how to serve; but somehow in these open honest relationships we're finding meaning, purpose, beauty, learning to live and love regardless of circumstance and status, believing that wherever we go, we go together. The way of Jesus cannot be lived alone.