PARK KEEPERS
Our values determine the how and why we do what we do as a church. Once you understand our values, then the form and function of our activities should make sense. If they don't, then we're not living up to our values.
HOLY SPIRIT LED
We deeply desire that the Holy Spirit is the leader of our church. For this reason we are committed to being devoted to the word of God and prayer and include in our Sunday service the practice of waiting on the Holy Spirit. This means morning prayer 6:30 - 8 am every morning and praying til we're done during our Sunday worship service. It also means that in our planning meetings we spend more time praying than deliberating and this means that no one person or group of people own the church. God does.
SEEN AND HEARD
We desire that everyone in our church is seen and heard. You should feel like you're known here. That means discussion time during Sunday service, that means open invitation to the entire congregation to speak into how we do church. That mean check-in and small groups and doing life together throughout the week. That means a plurality of decision makers who are good listeners- to one another, to the congregation, to the community and most importantly to the Holy Spirit.
KNOW JESUS LOVES YOU
Jesus said "If you love me you will obey my commandments". We can only love Him if we believe He loves us. This is our prayer for our congregation. That each person would know that they are "the disciple that Jesus loved." We're always praying that God will teach and empower us how to do this well.
EQUIP THE SAINTS
Two characters stand out immediately in the book of Acts- Phillip and Stephen, neither of which were apostles, both were deacons. Phillip was spirit filled and spirit led. Because of this, he broke open new ground in Africa and he went down to Samaria and began a ministry there. We believe in the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry. We want to see a congregation full of Phillips. People who hear God, do what He says and liberate new territory.
DEVELOPMENT OVER PERFORMANCE
We desire to develop leaders, especially leaders indigenous to our community. That means they need to have the opportunity to play and to keep playing even if they don't do it perfectly the first time. This doesn't mean we don't require effort or preparation. We believe in coaching and a culture that expects excellence but it does mean that the most accomplished preacher isn't in the pulpit every Sunday and the most accomplished leader is not always put in charge. We are willing to sacrifice a perfect show, and a perfect performance to create place where leadership can grow. That means being a church that is full of cheerleaders and coaches, not consumers and critics. The result is a leader full church where everybody gets to participate. If God wants to do something new He will have leaders equipped to do it.
BORN AGAIN PROJECT
God did not so hate the world that He killed His only son, He so loved the world (the cosmos) that He gave his only son. Jesus died for the people, the economy, the ecology, the culture all of it. Jesus did not come to destroy, if God wanted to get rid of bad people He could have done that easily. No, he came to get rid of the old by making the old new. This was the born again project of John's gospel. The is was the Jubilee declaring Christ of Luke's gospel- the year of the Lord's favor, forgiveness of debts, redistribution of opportunity. Jesus did this by birthing new people on every tier of the socio economic strata. Nicodemus- the intellectual and local elite, Galilean fisherman, tax collectors and zealots, the Samaritan woman, the royal official. It was strategic. You can't rebirth an unjust system without born again people to run it. You need new wineskins to pour the new wine into. We are committed as a church to do the same. To reach every strata of our society, to make broken system work for everyone and to partner with God to make all things new.
ONENESS
Oneness is one of the prevailing themes of the scripture. Christ has made a way for us to enter into the trinity's way of being. We are one body and one church. Whenever possible we do things together with other congregations. This means we do outreach with others, response to murder with others, youth group with others, worship and prayer with others. We believe in a trinitarian idea of ownership- mine, yours, ours. Mine is what I am responsible for, or what our congregation is responsible for. Yours is what you are responsible for, what your church is responsible to get done, ours is where we make decisions together, share the burden together and share the fruit together.
THE NEIGHBORHOOD
Chicago is full of micro-neighborhoods, and many of them are low-income. We see no reason that they should stay that way if the church is doing what it's supposed to. We are here for our community and very specifically we are here to serve the low-income people of our community. This is our responsibility. We contextualize the ministry to them and welcome everyone else.
