Today we鈥檙e excited to feature the fourth episode of the Listening in Place Project with Cassie Carroll (, 鈥�16), which we share monthly here on the Intersections blog. uthorfter graduating from 天美视频, Cassie launched , collecting stories from pastors and practitioners聽throughout the United States who are practicing new, innovative, and compelling visions of what it means to be the church. In this episode, Cassie talks with聽Mike Baughman, Community Curator and founding pastor of in Dallas, TX, and Chelsea, who joined the team in the last year.
Mike: 鈥淲e wanted a church that was so embedded in its neighborhood that if the doors were closed, it would actually matter to people other than the ones who show up for worship.鈥�
Chelsea and Mike share about the unique, community-driven mission of Union Coffee, which grew out of a mission to 鈥渃ultivate the divine spark in our neighbor, for the good of Dallas and the world that it expires.鈥� Union focuses on what Mike calls 鈥渁 ministry for rising generations,鈥� and he shares how it was born after years of working in traditional church systems and repeatedly hitting walls or feeling like the rug was pulled out from under him.
When you look for God in others, they tend to see God in you.
Mike: 鈥淚f we have crafted churches where pastors can鈥檛 be themselves, then can the people who attend those churches really be themselves?鈥�
Mike, who is also the co-author and editor of , tells stories about the young people who are drawn to Union, who have often been hurt or burned out by churches in the past. Chelsea shares how, in her own experience, she was not necessarily drawn to Union because of the worship service, but because she how it was rooted in and attuned to its particular neighborhood in north Dallas. That, plus the familiar, communal atmosphere of a coffee shop, means that, for many, Union is less daunting than a church with pews and a steeple.
Chelsea: 鈥淪omething that鈥檚 awesome about Union is that we鈥檙e able to adapt to whatever needs are current in the community. We鈥檙e not planning to say, 鈥楾his is a need that might happen a year from now,鈥� we鈥檙e seeing what needs are currently here and what we can do as a community to help face those challenges.鈥�
Mike: 鈥淥ur foundational theology for Union is rooted in the omnipresence of God. We root everything we do in the fundamental assumption that God is at work in the neighborhood, God is at work in the lives of the people that walk in our doors. We didn鈥檛 set up this new church to bring God into the neighborhood or bring Jesus into the lives of the people who are here. Our assumption is that God is already at work. So our job is to see what God is up to and then cultivate that.鈥�
You can learn more about the vision behind the Listening in Place Project , and read more from Cassie鈥檚 time with Marvin over on the . And for more from Cassie, check out the presentation of her Integrative Project,
https://soundcloud.com/user-958825369/listening-in-place-project-mike-and-chelsea-from-union-coffee
Music courtesy of .