The ACTS Group
March Update
The Action on My Street
It was 11:30pm on a Saturday night. It had been a long and full day and Heather and I were ready to sleep. You know the feeling? Nothing in your body wants to be awake, just to rest. Then, WHAM! The noise of a collision in the front of the house. Suddenly, I was awake and rushing outside while Heather called 911. I came out to the scene of a collision as a car didn’t make the corner and ran into a parked car and into my neighbor’s yard. Now, I was awake and so were the neighbors. We helped the driver and the police arrived. Things had been so quiet and sleepy, now there was a swirl of activity of neighbors and law enforcement and tow trucks and firemen. Everyone “rushed to the scene.”
There is an acronym most of you know “NIMBY” - “Not in My Back Yard”. In this case, we could add an acronym “NIMFY”! This NIMBY acronym is used by people wanting to keep the pain and problems and “collisions” of our culture far from them. But, the pace of problems and the proliferation of pain is growing in our culture, not dissipating. These are tense times. Honestly, I get tired and numbed spiritually by the issues and incidents and collisions in our communities and culture. Most reading this can quickly agree that the news stream is wearying! This weariness impacts many and can roll right into our corporate life as the Church. Collectively, we may find ourselves overwhelmed by, or numbed to, the urgency of the need for intervention in lives being destroyed by sin, by corrupt cultural systems and by our real spiritual foe, the devil.
But, when these collisions happen close to home, we can find ourselves quickly alerted and taking action with neighbors. It occurs to me that the action on my street and “close to home” gets me motivated and moving when the collisions happening up the hill or downtown. The action on my street gets me activated, and I see that this is true for most everyone I know. In my back yard or in my front yard or down the street or in my community, we can take immediate action and see real transformation. That is why the ACTS Group, while encouraging regional vision for transformation, is harnessing and applying our resources into applications of prayer, service, leadership and gospel engagement on a community basis. The action on your street will get you moving, and the ACTS Group is on call to help.
Jeff Kreiser - ACTS Group Director
Let's Serve Our Schools!
We are a month and a half into this year's Season of Service and we love seeing movement of churches serving the needs of their communities through local schools. Season of Service is running from Martin Luther King Jr. weekend to April 23rd and will culminate with a weekend to weekend service blitz from April 16-23rd 2016 called Serve Our Schools. Why a focused service week? There's something incredible about churches working together in a specific joint effort that demonstrates to every person and neighborhood that Christians are alive and well and wanting to see communities transformed for the better. Similar efforts in collaborative service are happening in cities all across California with the Love Our Cities initiative on April 23rd. If you are planning a service event for Serve Our Schools, please let us know about it by emailing your plans to megan@serveunited.us
Megan McCleary - Serve United Director
Prayer Leader's Fellowship
As we see discord at large in our culture, we also see the unifying work of Christ echoing from John 17 across our communities: “that they (the Church) may be one.” One of these John 17 expressions of unity in the Greater Sacramento Area is Prayer Leader's Fellowship.
Prayer Leader's Fellowship exists to create a deep unity and love for one another amidst prayer leaders in our city. On March 5th, over 40 prayer leaders gathered at the Rock of Roseville under the new leadership of Shaun Gartman and Beth Mulkin for food, fellowship, worship, a word from Pastor Mike Horn on the culture of honor, and strategic prayer. Many were blessed in this time and many new prayer leaders were connected relationally to the group!
Prayer Leaders Fellowship is a quarterly meeting and we look forward to the three remaining meetings this year! Our next one will be on June 4. Click here to send us your contact if you are the identified prayer leader of your church or would like to share the name of a prayer leader you know.
Mike Brill - SacramentoPRAYS Administrator
mike@sacprays.com
Q Commons Sacramento
Q Commons is our opportunity twice a year as gospel centered leaders to get together, get inspired and get connected to transform our communities and culture. On March 3rd we had our first Q Commons of the year and it was a great night! It was full of wonderful insight, connectivity, and encouragement as leaders from all around the Sacramento region came together to learn and to be inspired to do good. Connected with over 30 other cities (see www.Qideas.org) by global talks via video, we also featured “culture makers” locally in the Sacramento region. These talks were filmed and will soon find their way to our media platform www.Convergence.World where you can see talks from previous Q Commons Sacramento and Convergence “Live” events.
Didn’t make this one? We will meet again in the Fall! Mark your calendar for the next Q Commons Sacramento on October 13, 2016!
Janie Lynne Lovejoy - ACTS Administrative Coordinator
An Easter Offering
As you are aware of the ACTS Group as a mission organization for the Sacramento region, would you be willing to give a one time special gift this Easter week. There is a great tradition in the church to give offerings for extending the work of Christ in the season of remembrance of the sufferings and the joy of the resurrection of Jesus. As we close this first fiscal quarter of the new year, we are trying to close a $5000 gap. Maybe you could make the offering that covers that, or maybe you could give a “widow’s mite”, but for the furtherance and growth of this ministry, I encourage you to join me in making an offering now.
We have made it as simple as possible through Stripe on our Convergence leaders platform which you can use here: https://www.convergence.world/donate/
Merisa Moy - Finance and Development Officer
ACTS Group Endorsement
Debbie Bettencourt, Folsom Cordova Unified School District Superintendent DBettenc@fcusd.org
About Us
The ACTS Group is…
Unified, gospel-based leaders working for transformation in the diverse communities of the Sacramento region. These leaders provide ongoing leadership and encouragement for gospel movement in communities as well as in the spheres of cultural influence of the city.
Email: acts@jessup.edu
Website: actsonline.net
Location: 2830 G St, Sacramento, CA, United States
Phone: (916)577-2389
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheActsGroup
Twitter: @TheActsGroup