Archive for the 'General' Category

OK, I live here. What now?

Published
by
Michael Clary
on July 18, 2008
in General
. 5 Comments

Things have been crazy for us! We are trying to get settled in to our new home and get everything unpacked and put in the right place. Our basement couch wouldn’t fit in the basement, our desk wouldn’t fit up the stairs, and so we’ve had to perform a total furniture reorientation.

Next week I have a team of young people from Georgia coming to Cincinnati to help me do pretty much whatever I tell them to do to help me get a church going. They will spend the week doing survey work and “decoding,” which pretty much means learning everything they can to help me become more of a Cincinnati insider.

Priority one is to locate and develop a core group. I’m not a lone ranger. But since God didn’t send me here with a team, I have to trust him to provide the team for me here.

So my first step is to try to meet with as many people as possible over the next couple of months and share with them the vision for this new church and challenge them to be a part of a core group. At the same time, I want to be sharing my faith with neighbors and other people I meet along the way as well, and trying to make friends in the city.

The second step will be to gather the people together that seem interested into some type of a core group. We can dream together about the needs of the city and how to best bring the gospel to bear on those needs. Hopefully, the core group will continue to grow as the core group networks with their friends and so forth. We will meet monthly to discuss what a church is and probably work through a book together on understanding racial issues.

Before we can start hosting people in our home, however, we need to finish getting the house ready. I think I’ll get back to work on that right now.

Hello, Cincinnati

Published
by
Michael Clary
on July 4, 2008
in Cincinnati and General
. 5 Comments

The view from our living room

As of today, we have been residents of Cincinnati for one week. We live about a block from a hospital, which is great if we have an emergency, but not so great when ambulances decide to scream into the ER at 2 am every night.

This pic is the view from our living room. The house on the left is an inner city ministry called “City Cure.” Their president has agreed to help me learn about inner city ministry. The group of buildings looming just above the City Cure roofline is Christ Hospital. They like to wake us up at night.

God has been graciously connecting us with other awesome believers in town, whom I hope will show me around and help me to understand Cincinnati better. I met John a few days ago, who found me by reading this blog. We had coffee and spent a few hours together, talking about ministry, the church, and how to be an effective witness in Cincinnati. John is one of those shave-your-head-and-grow-a-beard types, kind of like Andy Mckee, which goes a long way if you want to intimidate someone. But this guy loves Jesus and doesn’t want to waste his life (thanks, Piper). Fun dude.

I definitely have a great deal to learn and can’t wait to get started.

The move here was quite an adventure. Our front lawn in Louisville was filled with our furniture and other things, getting loaded into our moving truck, when it started raining. The fine fellows who helped us move everything out there was kind enough to move everything back into our living room, only to move them back out again once the rain stopped.

We prayed for the rain to stop. Evidently, we experienced only a light drizzle compared to the other parts of the city, which had bucket sized drops of rain dumped on them. This was an answer to prayer for sure.

Fortunately, a friendly team of local Cincinnatians helped us move in from the soon to be renamed Seven Hills Church (changing their name to Grassroots Community Church; I dig it!), Centerpoint Community Church, and others.

I haven’t had much time to tour the town yet, but I have met many of my new neighbors and some other locals. My next step is to try to immerse myself in the local culture, meet a million new people, try to make some new friends, and wear a sandwich board and tell people they’re going to hell or something.

Goodbye, Louisville

Published
by
Michael Clary
on June 24, 2008
in General
. 7 Comments

Our New Front Door

Everything I own has been packed into boxes and will soon be crammed into a U-haul truck. Crazy!

After spending the last 5 years of our lives in Louisville, we are leaving this wonderful city and headed for Cincinnati this Friday. These are bittersweet feelings, because we love it here, but we are totally certain that we are going where God wants us to be.

Pictured here is our new house in Cincinnati, which is a townhouse. There are 7 other doors just like this one that we will share under one roof.

Public parkin front of our house

Yesterday, Laura and I drove there with our kids to let them see where they will be living, and we got to meet

a couple of new neighbors, which made the whole thing seem so much more real. City living will be a big adjustment, because we no longer have our own fenced in yard, and I had to pay extra money on our new house just to have a parking space for Laura.

But there is a city park in our new front yard, with a view of it out our front window. We are located in the downtown area with quick access to just about everything. There is a hospital a stone’s throw away.

Front view of our new home (we will live in 1/8th of it)

With the majority of the world’s population living in cities, we will be living a little more like the rest of planet earth: people everywhere, shared public space, and less driving. We’ll definitely miss some of the perks of our Louisville life, such as a large backyard and off-street parking, not to mention our friends, but we’re excited to be starting this new adventure together and seeing what God has in store for us.

“Jesus is under my blanket.”

Published
by
Michael Clary
on June 16, 2008
in General
. 1 Comment

My daughter, who is 3 years old, starting crying during her nap. I went in her bedroom to check on her and to see what was wrong.

“I need Jesus,” she told me. I was intrigued by this newfound theological insight from a 3 year old. We have been telling her over the last few weeks that she has sin in her heart and she needs Jesus, but I wasn’t expecting the moment to come this soon.

“Where is he?” I asked her. “Jesus is under my blanket.” Perhaps she experienced a holy ghost baptism or something and saw a vision. I probed further.

“What does he look like?”

“I dunno. He’s under my blanket.” This time I pulled her blankets and, sure enough, out dropped a tiny Veggie Tale character from the Christmas nativity set. This was the Veggie version of baby Jesus that was so tiny she lost it in the wrinkle of her sheets.

I’ll keep praying for the real thing to happen soon enough.

Personal Updates

Published
by
Michael Clary
on May 17, 2008
in General
. 3 Comments

I don’t like using this blog for personal updates, but I have a couple of updates worth publishing.

First: Our house is now under contract. We’re praying that there aren’t any problems with this and everything will go smoothly through the process.

We’re set to close on June the 27th, which means that we will be moving to Cincinnati at that time.

Second: We’re having another baby boy! Laura was convinced it was a girl all along, but I thought it was a boy. Reese is very disappointed.

You can track with our family and kids stuff at Laura’s blog.