Everything up to this stage contributes to how you are a “good tree.” The following resources help us face the typical challenges Jesus followers face when they want to make a difference in the world.

Experience communion across boundaries

We deliberately keep our congregations small and have one church spanning many neighborhoods. We do not divide up in regard to state or neighborhood boundaries, instead we try to demonstrate how to overcome them. Our anti-racism includes hope for reconciliation. We welcome people of all languages and nations. Single people are not second class. Children are not invisible. The communion table is a challenging place! It represents how we are fully accepted and fully accepting. Seriously entering into community is a major help to being a "good tree."

▧ Healthy conflict

Many churches keep things distant and avoid conflict at all costs. Meanwhile Jesus is spitting on people and causing all sorts of problems that only authentic speaking the truth in love can solve. Healthy disciples take the steps of reconciliation laid out by the Lord in Matthew 18. We have a method we employ when conflict is bigger than an individual or partnership can handle:

• Forgiveness and Containment

The United States mainly deals with conflict by perfecting self-defense. We have a better way.

• Teaching on Guns and Gun Laws

▧ Lasting marriage

Many of us are not married and some never will be. No one is less valuable for that. Over half of us already are married and some of us are divorced. The process of sticking together makes us and breaks us. Marriages generate reparative love and can also create damaging division and sorrow. We are up for all circumstances with an eye on the blessings of overcoming the obstacles to communion.

• Marriage in the New Creation. This is our summary of how we relate to all the ways loved-ones approach marriage and sexual expression in this era.
• Power Struggles and How to Get Beyond Them John Gottman’s teaching on the “four horsemen” applied to us all, with an additional horse! Also see The Art and Science of Love for a journalist’s view.

▧ Loving family

Our statement about Caring for Children Together begins with a reminder that we are all children. Jesus is our older brother and we are all brothers and sisters with God as our Father. So even if we do not have children of our own, we are aunts and uncles. And every new believer is young in Christ. Every person is carrying the child they were when they first got separated from Jesus.

• Village Parenting at Circle of Hope is our blog site for things we share about parenting. You’ll find a list of parenting books and marriage books our parents have collected, another link to the Children’s plan and a guide for becoming part of the Parents Listserv.
• The Children’s Plan guides our Children’s Teams and parents in how we care for children in relation to our meetings and how we see children participating in the body of Christ.

▧ Helpful rites of passage

Earth/Wind/Fire/Water is an ancient/future way to acknowledge that we are all moving into eternity and we are all going at our own rate through similar stages. We take our first steps into every new era of development and experience some capacity to understand all the eras as they are resident in us and repeated in our experience. Our rites of passage honor individuals and families who are taking major steps of development. We are not only acknowledging that they have arrived at a new place, we are calling on God to protect and guide them as they do as we announce our solidarity. You can see our resources here.

Again, everything up to this stage contributes to how you “bear good fruit.” Many resources have already been shared in EARTH and WIND.

▧ Learn how to be a church planter

Jesus is a planter, like a sower sowing seeds. We imitate him. Through the church God’s revelation is made known and God’s promises are made evident. We are the presence of the future. Everyone has a place in God’s redemption project.

▧ Expand the kingdom

• Why Four Congregations? – an explanation of our way to be larger and smaller, regional and local, inclusive and unique at the same time
• Church Growth Eyes – a basic chart that helps us see how we grow.
• Spiritual Gifts Discernment

▧ Share God's love in practical ways

In Acts, Jesus is described as someone who “went around doing good.” All through the Bible, God is described as a generous, caring parent determined to heal and nurture his people. We are imitators of God, an incarnation of the Lord’s love.

• Our Compassion Teams – Here is a list and a description of teams people have formed to demonstrate compassion and serve.
• Mennonite Central Committee - Here is a link to our major, worldwide partner in compassionate service.

▧ Build the new humanity

The greatest scandal corrupting the church in the United States is the general disinterest in racial justice and reconciliation and proactive peacemaking. It is so difficult to confront the national sins that many give up the faith instead. We are hanging on until the end, even though we are notably unsuccessful in relation to our imagination.

• The New Humanity - Here is a link to our statement reflecting on racial reconciliation.

▧ Own the whole enterprise: The Map

Circle of Hope is not “someone else’s church.” It belongs to all who are it and are making it by the power of the Spirit. Paul sums up the spirit of what that reality and responsibility means so well in his letter to the Galatians it is worth quoting at length:

Now before faith came, we were imprisoned and guarded under the law until faith would be revealed. Therefore the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came, so that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian, for in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith. As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to the promise.

The point is this: heirs, as long as they are minors, are no better than slaves, though they are the owners of all the property; but they remain under guardians and trustees until the date set by the father. So with us; while we were minors, we were enslaved to the elemental spirits[a] of the world. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children. And because you are children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So you are no longer a slave but a child, and if a child then also an heir, through God (Galatians 3:23-4:7).

So we have a lot of confidence that everyone can participate in the fullness of all we are an do because God is with them. Our Map is the main expression of this conviction. Our map does not describe all we do, but it gives our diverse, region-spanning, neighborhood-linking church a common way to explore and express God’s love.

Almost every year we discern our direction together. We do it for many crucial reasons:

• We want to know what to do. Listening together breeds discernment.,
• We want to share our life and mission in a truthful, practical way. Everyone matters.
• We want to teach each other how to listen to the Spirit and speak the truth in love. Our process is a laboratory for deepening faith, hope and love.
• We want to include the most recent person in our life-giving process. You don’t have to be socially in to be in with Jesus.

Here is a link to our 2020-2021 work of art. Our Map