INTERN NEWS - February Update

INTERN NEWS - February Update from Jacob Gonzales on Vimeo.

FEATURED ARTICLE - With new building, Karis Church deepens roots in Columbia

By: VICTORIA TRAMPLER

COLUMBIA — In 2005, the members of Karis Church fit around the kitchen table of lead pastor Kevin Larson. The cars were all parked neatly in his driveway.

"I told Kevin, 'You know, there's going to be a day when I'm going to have to put on a little traffic orange vest and I'm going to have to go onto your street and help navigate parking. This is such a beautiful thing we have here that it's going to grow," Executive Pastor Rob Gaskin said.

Now, the parking lot behind Karis: Westside, formerly Bethany Baptist Church, fills up on Sunday mornings. More cars park up and down Spencer Avenue in northwest Columbia.

"I just remember joking with him about parking, and here we are at Westside. It was the parking that was just a little bit sentimental for me," said Gaskin, who was a graduate student at MU when Karis got started.

Inside the church, the floors are still unfinished and some walls have yet to be painted. The basement renovations haven't started. But this doesn't stop the congregation of Karis from gathering there every Sunday morning at 10.

After nine years, the church has gone from an idea to a congregation of 220. The recent addition of a building is a brick-and-mortar testament to the church's deepening roots in Columbia and will provide a launching point for continued growth.

"There are three elements that sort of make up our DNA: gospel, community and mission," Gaskin said.

The church is independent, but has received guidance and is affiliated with Acts 29, a network dedicated to helping "plant" gospel-based churches, which will in turn plant more churches.

Karis received its new building at 1703 W. Worley St. as a gift from the Bethany Baptist congregation, which decided to disband a few months ago. This is the first time Karis has had a permanent home, though it also rents out The Bridge on Walnut Street for Karis: Downtown, the Sunday evening worship at six.

"With a space comes the potential to get in a rut where you think the building is the church and not the people," Larson said. "But at the same time, as we looked at it, we were a people that gathers together regularly for worship, and these people were gracious enough to pass it on to us."

A new opportunity

Although the building was a gift, Karis also raised $50,000 for renovations. The renovations included updating the flooring, installing carpeting, installing a new stage for the worship band and painting the church.

Volunteers, including congregants, friends and people from other churches across Missouri who wanted to help, have done almost all the renovations.

The goals of the changes were to make Westside both welcoming and well-functioning, Gaskin said. He estimated the volunteers put in more than 3,000 hours working on the building, which would have cost the church about $250,000 to do through a company.

"My first thought was, 'Wow, this place has potential, but it’s going to take a lot of work. It doesn’t look like us,'" Gaskin said. "We’ve always been a mobile church. We’d meet in nontraditional places, whether it's another church building, The Tiger Hotel, Missouri Theatre, the basement of our pastor's house."

The Westside building includes much more room for Karis Kids, the children's ministry, as well as for storage. In addition to working better for the congregation, Karis also hopes Westside will help serve the neighborhood around it.

"Because we own this building, there are things down the road that we can do during the rest of the week. We would obviously love to be a place where we can open up to the community," Larson said. "It is right next to public housing in a neighborhood that we’ve been at for a while, so I think it provides some opportunities throughout the week to do some really cool things."

Karis has a partnership with Love INC, an organization that works to help churches provide needed services to the community. It also provides classes to help develop career skills, which Westside may offer in the future, Larson said.

"I just want Westside to be an active, flourishing gathering for the people, living among and caring for the people in that area of town," Larson said.

A dedication to serve

For the people of Karis Church, their motto of "In the city, for the city" means more than just the building's location.

Jacob Gonzales and his wife, Ali Gonzales, moved to their Worley Street home specifically to serve their neighbors. 

"It’s not something we have to do — it’s something we get to do," he said.

The couple recently started the Douglass Park Missional Community, which meets Wednesdays at their home. It is one of 14 missional communities Karis has. They are meant to be small gatherings of the congregation throughout Columbia and Jefferson City to serve different neighborhoods.

The second meeting of the group drew six people, including two other Karis members and two neighborhood children. Laughter rang out as Ali Gonzales served pasta and steamed vegetables. After dinner, Jacob Gonzales gave a lesson to the group about how to best serve the area.

"The only way we know what needs to be done is if you know the people," he said. Trying to meet needs without knowing them lacks humility, he said. At the end of the lesson, Ali Gonzales let the children pick out school supplies that had been purchased for the neighborhood residents.

Jacob Gonzales cautioned against what he called "drive-by evangelism," where Christians serve a community for a bit and then leave. He believes Christians are called to invest their whole lives into serving others.

"I think that investment is rare — because it's hard," he said.

Before the missional communities were created, congregants met in small groups. But in some cases, the groups drifted away from their purpose: investing in people outside the church. This led to the change in name to missional communities three years ago and reaffirmation of their key reason to exist.

"We just felt like the further we went, those groups were about just coming together with your friends," Larson said. "That group is not meant to be an end unto itself. It’s meant to point out to the city, to the world."

Earlier this year, Karis started an additional gathering in Jefferson City and, more recently, sent a member to plant a church in Fayetteville, Ark. The hope is to plant another church in North Carolina soon.

At the older Southside Missional Community, the gathering looks quite different than the Douglass Park one. Aimed at serving the people of southern Columbia, especially families, the members of this community are all parents. On a recent Saturday, 10 children ran around the house until their parents called them to the living room for the sermon.

Scott Schilb, the leader of both Southside and Karis Kids, calmly spoke to the group as his three daughters crawled over him. The children tried to remain attentive, taking turns to pray for the church's health and growth.

"This group is hard," Schilb acknowledged. "It is really challenging to have all the toddlers and all the activity distracting us."

Nevertheless, he thinks it's important to have this family-centered gathering because faith should be a family affair.

"I think that church has become so program-oriented that we've forgotten how to worship as a family unit," he said.

At Southside, members have helped each other financially, he said.  At one point, the larger church even helped a family with the costs of adopting a child.

"One of the things that's so evident is that the people truly love each other: genuine, sacrificial love," Schilb said. "I feel like it's rare and it's hard."

A look into the future

The new building means more stability for Karis. Since the church's founding, the congregation has moved six times. In key ways, though, that created internal stability for members.

"If I had to leave my family every time I had to move out of a house, it would destroy me," Gaskin said. "But moving is not that big of a deal because we’re doing it together. And when I go in new house it’s still me, it’s still my wife, it’s still our family."

Gaskin said the metaphor fits the church because "the house doesn’t make the family, the family makes the house. The church is not a building."

In the future, the members of Karis hope to continue reaching out into Columbia by creating more missional communities.

"We’re a people that is fully convinced of our brokenness and our need for grace," Larson said. "We’re called Karis — we mean grace — and we’re a people that are constantly aware of our sin and our need for a savior. We want to extend that grace to other people in our community."

To see the article online -- Karis and Douglass Park MC Article

Douglass Park MC

BIG NEWS!

Ali and I have exciting news...

On July 30, 2014 we will be launching a brand new Missional Community at Karis Church called Douglass Park MC. 

The MC will be focused on the Douglass Park neighborhood, and we are super excited to see God bring people to faith in our midst, with His help, grace, and power!

Please be praying for us!

If you are at all interested in more information about the MC and maybe interested in attending our first MC Gathering, let me know by commenting below or emailing me -- jacob@karischurch.org

God is good and gracious.

Jacob Luis Gonzales

"Does Karis have small groups?"

A question that I have gotten a lot in the past is the question of how Karis Church does small groups? The odd answer is yes and no. We have Missional Communities, but we don't have what traditional small groups. The reason is perfectly explained in this video on the founder of Missional Communities and the organization that Karis has connections with:



God is good and gracious.

Jacob Luis Gonzales

Center City MC Hang Out - Photos

Last night the Center City Missional Community from Karis got together and had a bonfire in the southern part of Columbia. It was a good time: food, friend, and fire.

Here are some photos from last night.

Jesus Is The Better Jonah

On Wednesday July 10, I taught Jonah 1:4-6 to the Center City MC, the Missional Community I am a part of at Karis Church. This post will be a brie look into what I talked about on Wednesday.

This will not be exhaustive, but I hope it reflects the points I tried to make on Wednesday.

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Jonah 1:4-6 :

But the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship threatened to break up. Then the mariners were afraid, and each cried out to his god. And they hurled the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten it for them. But Jonah had gone down into the inner part of the ship and had lain down and was fast asleep. So the captain came and said to him, “What do you mean, you sleeper? Arise, call out to your god! Perhaps the god will give a thought to us, that we may not perish.”

We are Jonah.

That is the thing that we need to see over and over again while we read the book of Jonah. Jonah is a sinful man who is running away from what God has called for him to do. As we see in these three verses, Jonah not only is taking a step away from the mission, but Jonah is also taking a step away from community.

When we sin we are like Jonah, we take a step away from community and we take a step away from the mission that God has called for us. But Jesus reveals authentic community and a total willingness and submission to God's mission.

The first thing that we see is that God causes the storm to occur. Why in the world would He do that? Why would God create a storm to potentially tear this ship apart?

We will ultimately see that as we read the book of Jonah that God creates the storm to ultimate bring people to repentance and faith in His steadfast and unfailing love. The entire city of Nineveh repents and places their faith in the One God of the world!

We we move into verse 5, we see mariners - not believers in the God of the Bible - frantically freaking out and pleading with their gods to save them from this huge storm. After they cry out, they begin to throw things overboard to save themselves from their inevitable death.

We act like this all of the time. We cry out and frantically do anything we can to save ourselves from the storm that is coming our way and rocking us back and forth. We sometimes think that our family, friends, our significant other, our sexual desires, lying, power, wealth, or our public image will satisfy us. We think that if we are liked by everyone, if we drink another beer, if we hook up with one more person, or if we get all of the money and power we can, we will be completely satisfied in this life.

It does not work. Trust me. Only God can truly satisfy our desires, needs, and longings.

Take a look at Matthew 8:23-27

And when he got into the boat, his disciples followed him. And behold, there arose a great storm on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by the waves; but he was asleep. And they went and woke him, saying, “Save us, Lord; we are perishing.” And he said to them, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. And the men marveled, saying, “What sort of man is this, that even winds and sea obey him?”

Do you see all the resemblances? There was a storm, people were freaking out, the main character is asleep during the storm, and they seek for something or Someone to save them!

In both stories the entire point of these stories is that they come to the main character looking for something or Someone to save them.

The men on the boat in Jonah ask him to go to his God to save them from the storm. The disciples of Jesus come to Jesus to save them.

This is a huge difference:

Jonah can not save the men on that boat. Only God can do that.
Jesus can save the men on the boat. He DOES do that.

Some people might be quick to point out that Jesus solely saved them physically on the boat, but if you look deeply into the entire point of Jesus' life it was centered on saving people for eternity. He talks about this over and over again. Read the four gospels and you will see Jesus say that He is the only way to go before the Father (John 14:1-11).

Jesus not only saves the disciples from the destruction of a storm, but He also saved them from their sin and the judgement that comes from the act of rebellion.

Jonah was in rebellion against God's plan. Jesus found joy in God's plan. Jonah could not calm the storm or save anyone on the boat. Jesus calmed the storm to show His saving power and He saved everyone on that boat. Jonah was hard-hearted. Jesus showed compassion. Jonah lacked faith. Jesus is the One we need to place our faith in!

Jesus is the better Jonah. The perfect Jonah. The fufillment of what Jonah should have been.

Jesus saves those who cry out to Him to save them. He did it in that boat and He still does it to this day. He saves people in addiction, in their pride, in their bitterness, in their darkness, and in their rebellion towards God's will and plan. He saves us from ourselves and brings us to see His way is what we were made for. His will and plan are ultimately our joy because we were created to enjoy His goodness, His faithfulness, His love, and His Son, Jesus Christ.

Jacob Luis Gonzales

Teaching Jonah

This Wednesday I am teaching a lesson from Jonah 1:4-6, and I am already feeling convicted by this text:

But the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship threatened to break up. Then the mariners were afraid, and each cried out to his god. And they hurled the cargo that was in the ship into the sea to lighten it for them. But Jonah had gone down into the inner part of the ship and had lain down and was fast asleep. So the captain came and said to him, “What do you mean, you sleeper? Arise, call out to your god! Perhaps the god will give a thought to us, that we may not perish."  (Jonah 1:4-6, ESV)

 There are so many things that you can say about this specific piece of Scripture, but I will quickly boil it down to what I think is the clearest point for our Missional Community (MC). The Center City MC is focused very heavily on the center of Columbia, which tends to be a highly impoverished with broken families all over the place.

I will be posting my lesson here by the end of the week. I hope it is an encouragement, and I hope that God is glorified in my teaching.

Jacob Luis Gonzales