Matthew's Party

We had a cool experience of seeing God at work at the end of the Matthew’s Party last Saturday…

We called it a Matthew’s Party because when Matthew became a follower of Jesus, he threw a party for his friends and invited Jesus along. The idea first came to us from the awesome people at the Cincinnati Vineyard, who have turned outreaches like this into an art form. We (maybe a dozen of us or so from the church) tried to imitate him by throwing a party on the grounds of some apartments in town – hot dogs, drinks, potato salad, cookies, etc., along with volleyball games and other fun activities for kids – and prayed that Jesus would show up while we tried to bring his life and love in a practical way to the people who lived there.

We had a great time of course, with lots of conversations and friendly interactions, but I kept feeling like God might want to be at work in a less expected way as well. As we were cleaning up afterwards, we decided to gather in a circle (with the volunteers from the church) and pray for all the people we’d had the privilege of serving during the party. A couple of lingerers (who lived in the apartment complex) overheard what we were talking about, and piped up by saying how thankful they were for us showing up and throwing the party for them.

“We’ve had a lot of things happen here over the years – different groups coming in and stuff,” said a woman, “but this was the best one, by a long shot.”

The thought popped into my mind that maybe God was at work here, and that it might be worth exploring it a little more. We asked if there was anything we could pray for them about as we closed up.

They said yes, there was, and the woman shared about her battle with multiple sclerosis and the man shared about an addiction that he wanted God’s help with. A couple of guys from the church piped up right away that they had struggled with the same things, and that there was hope in God for him. Deep stuff. They seemed really positive towards us, and not cautious at all, so we asked if they would like us to pray with them right them. They said they wouldn’t mind at all.

The rest was really sweet. We gathered around them and prayed for them. We asked for Jesus to touch them and release his power for healing and freedom and hope. We also prayed for the other people that lived there that we’d gotten to hang out with. When we were done praying, nothing dramatic happened that would make the newspapers or anything, but they had tears in their eyes and were obviously really impacted by God’s love and presence there.

I don’t know if anything more will come of this particular chance to be part of what God was doing, but it sure felt great to be part of it, and join in however we could. It just felt right, you know?

and fyi for those of you who are part of our local church community, this post should be up shortly at www.summerofdiscovery.com (under the servant outreach tab) - so please visit it and comment on it, especially if you were there and have other stories from the outreach to add.