About Us

Christview Ministries Newsletter--September 2005

Dear friends,

As we begin our second year of this adventure, we want you to know how much we appreciate your support.

This newsletter is for your spiritual enrichment.

Read it. Enjoy it. Share it.

John and Judy Turner

God-Sightings: Teachers and Students All

One day last November John walked into the Eureka Springs gallery of artist Susan Morrison-Woodward and they started talking. John’s words, “I will be mentoring people in the Bible,” caught Susan’s attention. She wanted a way to learn more about the Bible and especially to know Jesus at a deeper level. She had been praying for a mentor to guide her. That conversation in the gallery started a mentoring relationship that involves weekly meetings. John and Susan are dialoguing through the Gospels. A mentoring setting allows for the study to flow to the questions Susan wants to explore and the insights she wants to test. Although John prepares carefully for each session, Susan’s questions and insights frequently lead them far from John’s lesson plans into other parts of the Old and New Testaments as they explore together the wonders of God’s word. Susan is gaining a Biblical framework for her Christian path.

Susan offers to Christview her skill in visionary planning that she developed through building her art business. In effect, Susan said to us, “You’re not going to accomplish your mission the way you’re going about it. You’re going to have to think outside the box.” She helped John and Judy brainstorm a strategy for a mentoring movement. After an exciting evening where Susan served as our consultant, we thought, “Tonight our student was our teacher.”

Scott Frame is preaching for a local church several times a month. This is not a time in his life when Scott can go away to school. We work with Scott as coaching mentors, helping him develop Biblical foundations, preaching skills, and leadership skills. He says, “I couldn’t go away to school, so God brought the school to me through Christview Ministries.”

But we also learn from Scott. He wants to do everything in his power to connect people with the life-transforming Jesus. Scott tells us about his method of witness in his daily life. He looks for opportunities help people in the workplace. As friendship grows, he finds out if the person has a Bible. If not, he buys a Bible and has the name engraved on it. “That makes it more special,” he says with the joy of someone who is able to give the best of all gifts. We are inspired by Scott to think of creative ways we can make God’s love real for the people we encounter every day.

Last week, John presented Scott and Judy with a rough draft of a sermon he was preparing. They helped him find ways to communicate his points more effectively. John included ideas that each of them offered in his final sermon. The Holy Spirit worked through each of us, and all three of us learned from the interaction.

Judy sometimes participates in the Bible mentoring sessions John leads; John sometimes participates in the coaching sessions Judy leads. We’ve always viewed discipleship as life-long learning, a continual growing in understanding and servant effectiveness. But we didn’t expect to learn so much from each other! At Christview it is hard to distinguish who is the teacher and who is the student. At Christview we live out one of the most beautiful truths about the body of Christ: each of us has much to learn, and each of us has something to teach.

We believe that this is what Paul has in mind when he speaks of mutual submission in the body of Christ, each one making room for fellow believers to exercise their spiritual gifts and callings in appropriate ways. When we benefit from what the Holy Spirit is doing through our fellow believers, we are seeing God at work in our fellowship. Our mutual teaching and learning is a God-sighting.

Viewfinder by Judy: Calling Home

This weekend some friends are taking their daughter to college for the first time. I can imagine what the journey will be like for them. The car is packed with all the things to be crammed into a small dorm room.  The mother, father, and daughter riding in the car are full of feelings: grief, anxiety, excitement, dread, hope.  The car pulls up to the dorm, where other parents are helping students unload the stuff. 

Mom and Dad have a hot afternoon of carrying boxes and installing the computer, while daughter is torn between helping with the moving in and meeting new people. As the sun sets, the dreaded moment comes. Mom and Dad have to leave. Mom tries to smile reassuringly while holding back the downpour of tears that comes once the car pulls out of the parking lot. Dad’s parting words are, “Call home.”

“Calling home” is an analogy for prayer. As those parents want nothing more than to hear their child’s voice, God wants to hear each of our voices. It may not always seem true to us that God cares and wants to be intimately involved in our lives. So the act of prayer requires faith on our parts. We choose to believe that we are vitally important to God. We choose to believe that although God is always with us and knows us far better than we know ourselves, God wants us to regularly “check in.”

The parents could always initiate the call with the student, but they may call repeatedly and find the daughter distracted with other people and events. It delights their hearts when she makes a space in her life for them and initiates the contact. When she makes the call, she is more likely to be fully present in the conversation. It delights the heart of God when we value being in God’s presence enough that we make space in our lives and  “call” by choosing to turn our attention as fully as we can to God.

The daughter may call just to report on what’s going on in her life, to ask for guidance, to ask for money, or simply because she misses her folks and wants to fill the empty, lonely place within by connecting with them. Whatever her condition, whatever her agenda, the empty place in the hearts of her parents is filled when she calls. The nature of love is to experience joy in  connecting and find fulfillment in providing whatever the beloved one needs.

The analogy invites us to feel free in our praying. We don’t have to get our lives together before we call on God. Maybe we see no way out of the mess we’ve gotten ourselves into. God wants us to call.  In our pain, perhaps all we can do is sob in God’s presence.  God wants us to call.

We don’t have to have something of great importance to share with God. Whatever concerns us is of concern to God.  God wants us to call. We don’t even have to have words, but just the desire to be more fully with God. Long pauses in our conversation with God are fine.  God wants to be with us in the silence.

But parents also want the student to listen to them. They want a place in the conversation to speak and share their perspective and wisdom. They want the student to know their concerns and to carry those concerns in her heart.  There are times when the parents have something specific for the student to do.

Sometimes the parents will initiate the call. When the student sees the home number on the Caller ID on her cell phone, she gives priority to taking that call. No matter what else she is doing, she listens. As our relationship with God grows deeper in love and intimacy, God will “break in” to our consciousness as we are going about our daily lives.

We may suddenly have a strong sense that we are to go somewhere or do something. The answer to a question we’ve been asking of God comes into our awareness like lightning in the night sky. The boundaries of our understanding may be pushed back with the revelation of more truth. We may be moved to tears with a deeper knowing of the extent of God’s love.  We come to recognize God’s “caller ID”. We pay attention and are quick to respond. We gratefully receive the message and enter into conversation with God about it. Whatever God asks us to do, we take the first step.

The student’s parents may be very important and busy people. But when their caller ID shows the number of their child, nothing is more important than taking the call. So it is with God. Prayer is our wonderful privilege, at any time, in any circumstances, to call home.

Getting in the Picture: These Lovely Changing Hills

In the print version, this article is a photo essay. Most of the photos we used appear in our photo gallery. To receive the print version, subscribe to the newsletter.

We have now lived in these lovely Ozark hills for four seasons. How different they look with fall’s colors, with winter’s snow falling, with spring’s fresh, new greens, with summer’s darker greens and browns. Guests remark on how the hills look different even in the course of several hours as the mists rise, and the sun and shadows paint the landscape.  

All of us deal with change. Change sometimes brings the joy of new possibilities, but often it seems to uproot and undo our lives. How do we move gracefully and faithfully through change?  Rather than focusing our minds and setting our hearts on particular people, places, situations, or outcomes, we ask God to establish our lives in God’s unchanging nature and character.  As we study,  pray and listen, we grow more secure in God’s loving commitment to our well-being. Even though we feel grief, we can let go when something or someone goes out of our lives. We can always look forward to God’s bringing good things into our lives, even though we may not know how those good things will come. Our expectation is open-ended.

Our hills teach us about change. The hills themselves do not change as frequently as our perception of them changes. But even the substance and form of the hills gradually changes. As Psalm 46 reminds us, our hope is misplaced when it is attached to anything created, “…we will not fear though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea.”  Our hope is in the Creator, “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.”  Because of God’s unchanging loving-kindness and mercy, we can hold a continual expectation of good, even as we experience change, “Be still, and know that I am God.” Our hope will not be disappointed. There may even be some delightful surprises: “There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God.”

Jesus said that  rivers of the Holy Spirit’s living water would flow out of the hearts of those who believe in him. The Spirit is the One who can guide us through change and make our hearts glad in the midst of it.

Beholdings by John: Becoming Jesus' New Temple

As Solomon dedicated the temple that he had built for the Lord (1 Kings 8), he acknowledged that no temple could contain the Lord, but he prayed that the temple could be a point of contact with:

Solomon’s temple was built nearly a thousand years before the time of Jesus’ ministry. Jesus was dealing with a later temple building and later temple officials.  Buildings and rulers come and go, but the purposes belong to God and endure.

On the basis of the purposes revealed in Solomon’s prayer, Jesus saw that the temple had been hijacked for sterile, elitist, nationalistic purposes. Rather than helping broken people find God, the temple system was driving people to despair. Jesus condemned the temple and cursed it as fruitless. It was:

Jesus told his disciples that, if they had faith, they could tell the mountain (the temple mount?) to be taken up and thrown into the sea, and it would have to get out of the way. In its context of Jesus’ dealings with the Jerusalem temple (Mark 11:11-26), the point is that the fellowship of the disciples was to replace the purposes of the fruitless temple. The disciples lives were to be marked by prayers of faith and offers of forgiveness.

The factor that enables the disciples to take on the role of being a new and living temple is that they will manifest the spiritual presence of Jesus:  “For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them” (Matthew 18:20). Where Jesus is, there the purposes of the temple can be fulfilled.

Many churches today convey that Jesus had high moral expectations of his disciples, but they fail to convey his healing, redeeming love. Many other churches convey Jesus’ radical acceptance of outcasts, but they fail to convey his challenging, transforming power.

Unlike many moral agenda churches, Jesus never failed to be loving as he reached out to people who had failed morally. Unlike many permissive churches, Jesus never watered down a single item in God’s perfect will. He was proclaiming the reign of God in the lives of believers.

The basics of our mission were present in Solomon’s prayer and were at the heart of Jesus’ ministry.  Solomon prayed that the temple would stand for  atonement and empowerment for the whole world. Alas, Solomon’s own choices did not match his prayer. But, Jesus’ life, ministry, death, and resurrection fulfilled Solomon’s prayer. 

The church of Jesus Christ is not designed to be an institution, but to be a fellowship of faith and mission manifesting the spiritual presence of its living Lord and Savior, continuing to fulfill the purposes of Solomon’s prayer. The church is to represent the character of God in ways that show God’s readiness to answer prayers, to restore penitent sinners, and to give hope to those who are outside. If the church today would have fruitful mission, we need  to pay very close attention to the mission of Jesus and the apostles. We believers need to become what the Jerusalem temple never became, a point of contact for restoring the lost to God.

We will never get it right until we understand that, as disciples of Jesus Christ, we are commissioned to represent the present healing power of the reigning God.

Not one of us is righteous, nor can we make ourselves so. Yet not one of us is excused from the ultimate goal of Christlike perfection. The only hope for ourselves and others is that God reigns in love, and that he is willing, not only to cover our lives with grace, but also to touch our lives with healing, transforming power.  That is our hope, and it is the hope we offer.

What's New at Christview

A Mentoring Movement

The Christview Ministries Board of Directors has approved a sharper focus for our work. When we incorporated Christview Ministries as a religious non-profit organization in August 2004, we listed six tax-exempt purposes. All six still apply. We are not changing our basic identity.

But, after a year of existence, we are ready for clearer  focus and strategy. Mentoring now takes central position with the other purposes orbiting around it. Further, mentoring is not just what we (John and Judy) individually do, but we aim to found a growing, spreading mentoring movement.

The purpose of Christview Ministries is to create a movement of mentoring  spiritual leaders for Christ’s mission.

We will:

Christview Ministries seeks to build a movement of reproducible mentoring. John and Judy Turner will individually mentor about a dozen disciples of Jesus Christ at a time. There will be monthly roundtable gatherings for shared learning and spiritual enrichment among those who are being mentored.

John and Judy Turner will develop print and multimedia materials that can serve as content resources for other mentors and roundtable leaders.  They will train roundtable leaders for other locations.

About the Publications

Judy works in the areas of spiritual formation and leadership development. Judy breaks complicated concepts into bite-sized pieces and enlivens her messages with real-life stories. She has a strong instinct for things that work in day-to-day existence.  Her work will help you improve your spiritual life and make your service for Christ more productive.

Judy plans to write and edit publications in the Our Everyday Lives series with titles such as:

John works in the areas of Bible interpretation and Christian history. John has spent years immersing himself in solid Bible scholarship. He offers the practical fruits of his learning, stripped of academic terminology, and supplemented by creative insights and pastoral experience. Avoiding tangents, John’s work will guide you to what counts for your Christian spiritual life and mission.

John plans to write the Getting to the Things That Count in Scripture series. These small books will focus on conclusions about the message of the Bible. The overview books would be:

There would then be more specific topics such as:

For those who want to go a little deeper, there would be:

John may also write on “Getting to the Things That Count in Christian History.”

What Should a Well-Mentored Disciple Be Able to Do?

A well-mentored disciple will be able to:

Grow in relationship with Jesus Christ and in likeness to him.

Actively participate in personally suitable spiritual disciplines.

Identify and pursue gifts and callings for ministry/mission/servanthood in the name of Jesus.

Faithfully and wisely interpret the Bible.

Mentor others and perhaps eventually lead a roundtable gathering.

Confirmation

We are beginning to see how a mentoring movement can work. As we prepare this mailing, evacuees from the hurricane devastated areas of the Gulf Coast have begun to arrive in Northwest Arkansas. This is how God has mobilized the people associated with Christview to be Christ’s compassionate, visible presence:

Tuesday, August 30: A Christview director and her husband who own a nearby dormitory-style retreat center made their facilities available for transitional lodging of evacuees.

Thursday, September 1: The director asked Christview executive officers to help organize a meeting to pray for the storm victims and to seek God’s guidance for our response.

Friday, September 2: Christview’s executive officers publicized a Saturday prayer meeting,  designed the service, and worked with another Christview director in setting up a fund to help evacuees.

Saturday, September 3: Christview students called people in their networks and invited them to the prayer service.  Some Christview students and their friends provided food and money to minister to the first group of evacuees. Other students and their friends began to envision some longer term solutions for evacuees.

Sunday, September 4: Christview executive officers were present when two churches prayerfully considered their response to the arriving evacuees. One of the churches donated its entire Sunday morning offering to the retreat center for its work with the evacuees.  At the other church, a Christview student preached and called for further prayer; more offers of aid followed.  The Christview student was reproducing what his mentors did the previous day.

Christview’s students, directors, officers, and supporters are vital to this local mission. We are learning in action how to serve Christ.  In mentoring sessions in the days ahead, we will be clarifying what God is teaching us. Students will use that learning in mentoring others. The movement will grow. 

Note: After we mailed the print newsletter, FEMA canceled the projected arrival of mass numbers of evacuees for which Eureka Springs had been preparing. This does not invalidate all that was accomplished. We will instead help those who come through on their own.

How You Can Take Part in Building This Movement

Stay informed. If you have not yet done so, subscribe to the Christview Newsletter and Email Updates.

Help publicize. Ask for publicity materials. Pass along your Email Updates. Ask your church or Christian organization to link its Webpage to Christviewmin.org.

Pray for Christview Ministries. Prayer moves mountains.

Make a financial contribution. Better yet, make a monthly pledge.

Talk with your church or Christian organization about helping sponsor the creation of materials. In return for sponsorship, you get the opportunity for input and feedback regarding test editions of the materials. 

Watch for the finished editions and buy them for use in your personal or group studies.

Good News from the IRS!

The long-awaited IRS approval of our application for 501(c) 3 status arrived August 25.This means thatthe IRS will treat Christview Ministries as a public charity and that future gifts to Christview are officially recognized as tax-exempt.

The determinationis retroactive to August 5, 2004. As we have promised, all gifts since that date are covered.

For those of you who have been waiting for this designation, we can now say that it is here!

Your gifts are important to enabling the work of Christview Ministries to grow and develop.

Contributions (copy to word processor and print, fill out and send with your check to):

Christview Ministries
992 CR 309
Eureka Springs, AR 72632

_____I wish to contribute to the work of Christview Ministries with a:

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Subscription to the Newsletter and Email Updates (4 print newsletters and 8 Email Updates for $15.00)  ________________________________.

_____I wish to discuss how my Christian organization can sponsor test editions of  some of the mentoring materials that John and Judy will produce.        

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