Copying Jesus: by Tim Kernan

Nehemiah 1: 3-8
They said to me, “Those who survived the exile and are back in the province are in great trouble and disgrace. The wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates have been burned with fire.”
When I heard these things, I sat down and wept. For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven.
Then I said: “O LORD, God of heaven, the great and awesome God, who keeps his covenant of love with those who love him and obey his commands, let your ear be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer your servant is praying before you day and night for your servants, the people of Israel. I confess the sins we Israelites, including myself and my father’s house, have committed against you. We have acted very wickedly toward you. We have not obeyed the commands, decrees and laws you gave your servant Moses.
“Remember the instruction you gave your servant Moses, saying, ‘If you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the nations, but if you return to me and obey my commands, then even if your exiled people are at the farthest horizon, I will gather them from there and bring them to the place I have chosen as a dwelling for my Name.’

First of all I would like to say how wonderful it is to be here in London. Of course I was very encouraged by the baptism of our new brother Albert! Thats a nice way to start things off, thats for sure. I would also like to thank all the disciples who have reached out to us in the past few weeks as we have been settling into our new home. Your encouragements and humility have lifted my heart. God truly does have many people in this city. England’s reputation as a land of honest and straightforward people is true; even more so the disciples. I am glad that I have been able to quell some of your concerns as well. This mission team is not planting this church because there are no other churches or disciples in England. God has been working powerfully in England before and we are not here to diminish His victories. On the contrary! A Christian is a Christian.

So what are we doing here? Well the answer to that question goes back a few years. In the aftermath of the sudden changes our fellowship endured, ushered in by sin and then followed by a more autonomous church theology, I was blown by the Spirit into Portland Oregon and there I met Kip McKean. He was a man who had built churches all over the world and had had an enormous impact. He was a man who had been deeply crushed in God’s rebuke to our fellowship. It was at that time that Kip, in his frailty and pain, gathered to him about eighteen or so brothers from around the world. I think its all he could do. I was honored to be part of that group. In the following three years in tears, in laughter, in serious times and fun times Kip and Elena poured their lives into us. At their weakest they were at their strongest. These have been some of the best years of my life. With Kip and Elena, my wife and I are satisfied children. Now about three years later, as we children mature, the Spirit is blowing us all over the world. We are being blown into Portland, Chicago, Phoenix, Kiev, Syracuse, Eugene, Hawaii, Honduras, Santiago, Stockholm, Toronto, Kinshasa, now London and soon New York.

We have been sent here by the Spirit to imitate what we have seen Kip copy in Jesus. At the end of the day that is what we are left with when all our worldly ideas come to dust, simply the imitation of Jesus. My wife Lianne and I are here to gather together a group of disciples and pour our lives into them as Jesus did with the apostles. We don’t care where they come from or what their reputation is. If they were hypocritical “leaders” who were drunkards behind closed doors, or if they haven’t paid any mind to Jesus’ commission to make disciples of all nations for years, it will not matter. Instead of being mad that the gates are burned and the walls destroyed we will take action as the cup bearer Nehemiah did in the passage above. We are here on a totally unambiguous mission to make disciples and we are totally unapologetic about our desire to go to all nations. As Kip wrote in a recent article:

Why (are we doing what we are doing)? Because we believe Jesus desires a movement to evangelize the world. Independent, isolated, autonomous congregations going in various doctrinal directions may be composed of saved disciples, but will not even be able to evangelize their cities. A church government of isolated autonomy will only lead to isolated and autonomous disciples within those congregations. Therefore motivated by all these convictions, I will invite anyone in any conservative Christian Church, mainline Church of Christ or ICOC Church to join us as the Spirit is building a new movement to evangelize the world in our day. I am not inviting them for the purpose of their personal salvation as a faithful baptized disciple is already saved. I am inviting them for the salvation of the world as only a movement of disciples who make disciples will be able to penetrate and then saturate this pagan world of sin. God sent Jesus to die for a worldwide movement of multiplying disciples that are likeminded in spirit and purpose to produce a fellowship of love that is the same in whatever city a disciple travels. City of Angels Website

We are not here to tell saved people they are not saved because our arrival is not a salvation issue for many disciples. However for those who don’t hear the message because we are too busy reacting to the past and arguing it is a salvation issue. I believe with all my heart that when those people are baptized their hearts will sing to God and He will be moved by the sound. God will be far more influenced by their prayers than the sound of our intelligent sounding debate. My aim is to move Gods heart.

On that note I encourage all the disciples who’s hearts are moved at the idea of copying Jesus to join us at “The Gathering” European Missions Conference here in London England on October 19th to 21st. It will be our congregational house warming and inaugural service. It will be located at The Franklin Wilkins building of Kings College, 150 Stamford St. You can buy your tickets online here: http://www.londonchurch.org.uk/?page_id=22. We are looking forward to seeing you there and joining together to praise God and hear His Word be preached. Let us usher in a time of refreshment brought through repentance and grow in love once more! Lets stop being upset the walls are broken and set to work to build them.

Please pray for us to meet all the people the Spirit is working in already and to be able to heal hurting disciples who need our love and boldness. Also, when your blown on the wind you can’t bring much money with you. If you would like to contribute to the mission here please click here!

Thank you!

In Jesus,

Tim Kernan
011 44 790 846 1477