{"id":6609,"date":"2021-06-15T09:05:17","date_gmt":"2021-06-15T17:05:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/?p=6609"},"modified":"2021-06-15T09:05:17","modified_gmt":"2021-06-15T17:05:17","slug":"kicking-off-the-2021-summer-reading-project-b-l-e-s-s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/archives\/2021\/06\/15\/kicking-off-the-2021-summer-reading-project-b-l-e-s-s","title":{"rendered":"Kicking Off the 2021 Summer Reading Project: B.L.E.S.S."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Blog read\u00aders: Chi Alpha @ Stan\u00adford is engag\u00ading in our annu\u00adal sum\u00admer read\u00ading project. As we read through B.L.E.S.S. by Dave and Jon Fer\u00adgu\u00adson, I\u2019ll post my thoughts here. They are all tagged sum\u00admer-read\u00ading-project-2021<\/a>. The sched\u00adule is online<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Dave Fer\u00adgu\u00adson and Jon Fer\u00adgu\u00adson are broth\u00aders who plant\u00aded Com\u00admu\u00adni\u00adty Chris\u00adt\u00adian Church in Chica\u00adgo. It\u2019s grown large (the church was draw\u00ading 6,500 atten\u00addees before COVID) and they\u2019ve writ\u00adten sev\u00ader\u00adal books to help their con\u00adgre\u00adgants serve Christ more effec\u00adtive\u00adly. This sum\u00admer we\u2019re going to take a look at their book about evan\u00adge\u00adlism: B.L.E.S.S. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

B.L.E.S.S. is an acros\u00adtic built out of the five prac\u00adtices the book advo\u00adcates: B<\/strong>egin with prayer, L<\/strong>isten, E<\/strong>at, S<\/strong>erve, and S<\/strong>tory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This week, we\u2019re look\u00ading at chap\u00adters 1 and 2. Dave describes his strug\u00adgles try\u00ading to share his faith (although the book is co-authored, they wrote it in Dav\u00ade\u2019s voice to make it less con\u00adfus\u00ading), shares encour\u00adag\u00ading data about how open peo\u00adple are to talk\u00ading about God, and at the begin\u00adning of chap\u00adter two drops this gem about an email he received:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2026Two teams of missionaries\u2026went to Thai\u00adland. While both teams went with sim\u00adi\u00adlar goals, they car\u00adried two dis\u00adtinct\u00adly dif\u00adfer\u00adent strate\u00adgies.<\/p>

The \u201cCon\u00advert\u00aders\u201d group went with the sole inten\u00adtion of con\u00advert\u00ading peo\u00adple and evan\u00adge\u00adliz\u00ading. Their goal was to \u201csave souls.\u201d<\/p>

The \u201cBlessers\u201d group explained their inten\u00adtion like this: \u201cWe are here to bless who\u00adev\u00ader God sends our way.\u201d<\/p>

The study fol\u00adlowed both the \u201cCon\u00advert\u00aders\u201d and the \u201cBlessers\u201d for two years. At the end of that time, the researchers dis\u00adcov\u00adered two key find\u00adings:<\/p>

First, the pres\u00adence of the \u201cBlessers\u201d in the com\u00admu\u00adni\u00adty result\u00aded in tremen\u00addous amounts of \u201csocial good.\u201d It appeared, accord\u00ading to the study, that this group con\u00adtributed to the bet\u00adter\u00adment of soci\u00adety, com\u00admu\u00adni\u00adty life, and the cre\u00adation of social cap\u00adi\u00adtal. The pres\u00adence of the \u201cCon\u00advert\u00aders,\u201d how\u00adev\u00ader, seemed to make no dif\u00adfer\u00adence.<\/p>

The sec\u00adond discovery\u2013and this was very surprising\u2013was that the \u201cBlessers\u201d saw forty-eight con\u00adver\u00adsions while the \u201cCon\u00advert\u00aders\u201d saw only one! The \u201cBlessers\u201d group saw almost fifty times as many con\u00adver\u00adsions through being a bless\u00ading than the group that was only try\u00ading to con\u00advert the peo\u00adple around it.<\/p>B.L.E.S.S pages 17\u201318<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve nev\u00ader seen that study and can\u2019t com\u00adment on its rig\u00ador, but it intu\u00aditive\u00adly makes sense to me. A sim\u00adi\u00adlar line of think\u00ading led to the way I close our on-cam\u00adpus ser\u00advices each week. If you\u2019re part of Chi Alpha, you\u2019ve heard me say the fol\u00adlow\u00ading dozens of times:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs you leave, remem\u00adber you\u2019re not just leav\u00ading a meet\u00ading. You\u2019re leav\u00ading as part of a com\u00admu\u00adni\u00adty, if you want to be. We\u2019re Chi Alpha, a com\u00admu\u00adni\u00adty of stu\u00addents earnest\u00adly fol\u00adlow\u00ading Jesus in the pow\u00ader of the Spir\u00adit. Our name reminds us of our mis\u00adsion: Chi Alpha stands for Christ\u2019s Ambas\u00adsadors because we rep\u00adre\u00adsent a King and we do what ambas\u00adsadors do. We make friends on our sov\u00ader\u00adeign\u2019s behalf and we advance His inter\u00adests wher\u00adev\u00ader we find our\u00adselves. And since<\/strong> our King is in the bless\u00ading busi\u00adness, that makes it our busi\u00adness too. Go forth tonight with an eager expec\u00adta\u00adtion to see how God will use you to bless oth\u00aders.<\/strong> Go forth with faith in your heart, hope upon your coun\u00adte\u00adnance, and love upon your lips.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those aren\u2019t just idle words I say, they express some of my deep\u00adest con\u00advic\u00adtions about min\u00adistry. And so my hope is that read\u00ading this book togeth\u00ader will help us become even more effec\u00adtive at being agents of bless\u00ading. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bless\u00ading peo\u00adple is always good. When we bless peo\u00adple at a min\u00adi\u00admum they receive our love, and at max\u00adi\u00admum they receive both our love and God\u2019s. In oth\u00ader words, the worst case sce\u00adnario is that they are blessed, and the best case sce\u00adnario is that they are both blessed and also trans\u00adformed by God\u2019s grace. There\u2019s no bad out\u00adcome \u2014 it\u2019s either good or it\u2019s great!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Blog read\u00aders: Chi Alpha @ Stan\u00adford is engag\u00ading in our annu\u00adal sum\u00admer read\u00ading project. As we read through B.L.E.S.S. by Dave and Jon Fer\u00adgu\u00adson, I\u2019ll post my thoughts here. They are all tagged sum\u00admer-read\u00ad\u00ading-project-2021. The sched\u00adule is online. Dave Fer\u00adgu\u00adson and Jon Fer\u00adgu\u00adson are broth\u00aders who plant\u00aded Com\u00admu\u00adni\u00adty Chris\u00adt\u00adian Church in Chica\u00adgo. It\u2019s grown large \u2026 Con\u00adtin\u00adue read\u00ading \u201cKick\u00ading Off the 2021 Sum\u00admer Read\u00ading Project: B.L.E.S.S.\u201d<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Some initial thoughts from our ministry's summer reading project. This summer we're reading a book about blessing those around us.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[8],"tags":[235,115,293,294],"class_list":["post-6609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-resources-reviews","tag-evangelism","tag-missions","tag-summer-reading-project","tag-summer-reading-project-2021"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Ded-1IB","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6609"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6609\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6614,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6609\/revisions\/6614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glenandpaula.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}