The Church in Eugene | John 17:11, 20-23

Patti Buss reminds us that those who are one in Christ communicate the good news of Jesus into the world through their complete unity. Within the landscape of Eugene, pastors, churches, and Christians have joined together in prayer, service, and creative response as they partner together as one body. 

Patti has lived in Eugene with a missional mindset for over 20 years. She and her husband Steve lead a local non-profit called One Hope, which connects our community to demonstrate God's love in the greater Eugene / Springfield area. 

/// Fourth Sunday after Pentecost ///

The Global Church: Part 5

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One of the things that I love about being here with you guys is this. Um this part of town, from the time that we lived, moved here 32 years ago, we counted four churches that are no longer in this part of town. And so when Jarelle and Lauren began praying about this space and planting, and I were thrilled. We're just thrilled that this would be a space, and and I'm sure that some of you actually live in this part of the town of town too, which is even better, right? Like it's our neighborhood. So we're just so excited for what you guys are standing in and believing for, and we are cheering you on. We just think what's happening here is awesome. So it's an honor to be with you guys today. I'm gonna just um back us up for just a second. So, Steve and I've been married 36 years, 32 of those years we have lived here. Shocking, shocking. Uh, because that was not really, it probably would have been on our radar to move here. We met at Colorado State. We were part of a move of God. Honestly, I can say that looking back now, of many, many college students coming into the kingdom and just getting thrust into the world by Jesus. It was an amazing season of time for us. We went through um some, we went through a perspectives course, and Steve and I felt very called to missions. And we felt called particularly to Southern Russia. And so we began researching, we found out that there was a ministry out here in Salem, Oregon, called Slavic Ministries and Youth with a Mission, and we got sent out from our church and moved to Salem. So from 91 to 94, we we trained and then we led discipleship training schools, and we went in and out of the dissolving Soviet Union three or four times, and it was a Book of Acts time. Everyone was coming into the kingdom, preaching at schools, preaching at hospitals, preaching to Red Army pilots, and everyone was coming into the kingdom. Bibles getting distributed for the first time. It was wild. And we thought pretty pretty much that was the trajectory that we would be moving to because there was such a need for discipleship and church planting, and that's really what we thought was on our path. And then we got a call from our pastor, who was our pastor in Salem when we were in the country. And he said, Hey, I have the Lord is moving me to Eugene to a church and would love to have you come join me. And we were like, wow, such an honor. This man is an amazing man. Um, but that's not really what God's doing, and we don't think so. We prayed, but it was like, yeah, I don't think so. But then we had so we told him no, and we had no peace. So then we said, Hey, can we pray again? You know what? God doesn't care. He's like, it's okay, you know, he guides us by peace a lot. So we he said yes. So we prayed, and boy, did the Lord speak. We're coming to this place, sight unseen, church unseen, but we're coming to Eugene. And I tell you that story because, in many ways, how we came to this city has shaped how we've lived here. Because even though we had an assignment at Willamette Christian Center with Steve Savilich and that that team at that time, we were always asking the question, God, what are you doing in this place? What are you doing in this city? What do you want to do in this city? We just kind of came with that in our back, just in the back and forefront of our mind. And so that is how we have sort of lived while we've been in Eugene. Now I want to return for just a moment before I talk of context. What is God doing here? I want to return to John 17 for a minute. Because John 17, where Jesus says, My prayer is not for them alone. I'm praying also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one Father. Just as you are in me and I am in you, may they be brought to complete unity to let the world know you sent me. This priority, this desire, this prayer that we just got to listen in on should arrest our attention. It should grab us. This is what the king of the universe is praying for. I think his prayers get answered. But I do think we can read this and feel like that is a really lofty heavenly goal, or it will be fulfilled when Jesus returns and brings all things together under the headship of Christ, right under him, which we read about in Ephesians. And that will be also. But we can't put it out there as something that will just come about because it's tied to the world believing. It's tied to those who do not know him yet, finding out who he is. Now, this oneness that he had in mind was a unity that doesn't come from our trying harder. Man-made unity is called Tower Babel. This unity that Jesus is praying for is the oneness for all who are in Christ. In Christ. It's a mystery. But if Christ is in me and my life is hid in Christ, and you also are, we belong to one another, we are now that mysterious one body, a people across every language and nation and tribe and ethnic group and socioeconomic strata. We are one body. It's crazy stuff. This is wild to me. It's the greatest thing going, and we're in it. This oneness is simultaneously made possible because of Jesus' death and resurrection, and all who belong to him are now in one body. It is simultaneously made possible, but it is also something like sanctification that needs perfecting, it needs yielding to, it needs walking out by the saints, and we haven't done too great over the history of the church. But, but this is some of what Jesus is doing with the church in Eugene, and not only in Eugene, but all across the globe. There are there is unity coming about in cities. Steve and I connect with many of them in England, in Southeast Asia, in the Middle East, where God is uniting the body of Christ in an unprecedented way, really, and the Church of Jesus in local areas is being restored and functioning in unity. So how is God at work in our context? What is happening with the Church in Eugene? Since early 2000s, there's been a growing expression of unity. Some of you know this. It's not that everyone is having a uniformity, and what we, you know, we're all looking the same. There are expressions of church, there are expressions of the body of Christ, but there is this oneness of working together, of knowing and honoring one another. What began here locally as a pastor's prayer summit at the in about early 2000s with a small group of pastors going away and praying for three days has continued up to 2026 every year with a growing number of leaders coming together just to seek the Lord together. And they they come together across denominational lines, praying for one another and praying for what God would want to do in this place where He has called us to live. These Jesus followers in Eugene, Springfield, and surrounding areas are endeavoring to walk in love and unity. And here's some of what that looks like. It looks like every month there's a gathering. It isn't crazy, cool, it's just steady of leaders coming together of God's church, Jesus' church, to pray for each other and pray for the community every month. It's simple, but it's a long obedience in that same direction that builds trust and cements the living stones together. It's a core of all that begins to spring off of that connectedness. The monthly pastors prayer gathering, they seek the Lord together. There's Baptists, there's Pentecostals, there's men, there's women, there's young and old, there's church planters and established church leaders. And this has been happening every month since 2001. Churches and ministries have been linking arms, serving vulnerable populations, school partnerships, populations of children that are in foster care or have incarcerated parents, helping with the poor and the unhoused. Of course, every church has an assignment that God gives us, our neighborhood. But there are those things in the city that matter for the body of Christ to link arms together, that we can actually move the dial of flourishing when we do it together. You have been involved in that. You're partnering here with Camas. You also have been involved with every child. Some of you have done Camp Agape. There's also those who are helping with Project Hope last summer and this summer. That's a collaboration of over 50 churches that have been working together and it has made a difference. This is what else it looks like. It looks like 45 churches praying for our city with your prayer guides. You've seen them, the See the City prayer guides that you've been given. That is developed by believers working all over the community in the sector they're called to: education, business, government. And these are believers in that sector saying, How does God want to increase his kingdom activity in this sector? And that creates the prayer guide, see the city prayer guide, which goes out, and 45 churches are utilizing that and praying in agreement, in agreement, relevant intel. This is your kingdom come prayers. Lord, come more into our community. Bring societal change, systemic change. What else does it look like? It looks like 25 youth groups coming together to pray for their peers, pray for their school campuses a couple of times a year. It looks like five youth groups coming together, Baptist and very charismatic, and doing a spring break outreach together, taking their spring break, 100 kids, and doing outreach into Eugene. And they come across pockets of poverty and areas and neighborhoods that their normal travel would never come across when they're driving from home to school in their neighborhood. This is what is happening in our city. Over the course of the year, there's about 8,200 congregations that engage with the whole body of Christ in some way. And you know what I think we're seeing? I think we're seeing the commanded blessing of Psalm 133. Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity. Because when that happens, it says, for their God commands a blessing. And I believe we have a lot of work to do in our city, but I believe we are experiencing a bit of God's commanded blessing on our city. There's been shapes and changes in many ways. There's so many stories. I'm going to tell you a couple. We have a friend who does similar work, like with One Hope, that's called a city gospel movement. We just get to steward, just steward and try to come along, see what God's doing, and help us come together to join him in what he's doing in the city. We have a friend who does city gospel movement in Charlotte, North Carolina, and he has this quote, and he says this the fragility of the city requires the muscularity of the church. And the muscularity of the church is in our demonstrated unity. See, that unity has to look like something. It's not just a nice thought, it's functional. It's when the body starts to work together. So I want to tell you a muscularity story. You know, if you were gonna see something beautiful like a diamond, what do diamonds get set on so that you can really see how beautiful they are and bright, shiny? Yep, black cloth, velvet cloth, right? Let's think about COVID as the black cloth for the brilliance of the unity of the body to come forward. So March 2020, schools end a little bit early, they decide during spring break we're not coming back. Problem number one, we have families who have food insecurity and they actually rely on breakfast and lunch for their child at school. Problem number two, because of what's happening with COVID, there's restrictions for teachers or staff to go. There's so much fear around what's going to happen. They had, they were prohibited from going to these households to check in on families or to give food. Problem number three, there's no system or structure set up for what we just walked into. God's solution. For many years, 16 years, we'd already been doing Project Hope, and there were probably about 25 churches that were engaged in school partnerships like you guys are with Camus. So the school district called One Hope. And when I say One Hope, it's not like they're just calling me and Steve. Yes, we have relationship, but they know they're calling on the broad body of Christ. And they said, here's our issue. We know there's families the next five weeks that are not going to be having food. And some are afraid to go out. Do you think some of the people in your churches could take food to these families? Within two days, I had probably something completely illegal, a spreadsheet. I know it was illegal. A spreadsheet with family names and addresses and how many people are in their household. And I'm distributing them to the body of Christ who said, I can go to that family every Monday with food for five weeks. Who could set that up? Only God. One church couldn't do it. But it was it was believers from Northwood and believers from Ecclesia and believers from First Birthday. And guess what happened? 85 households had someone from Jesus' body show up with groceries for five weeks at their front door. And they're in their life now. The stories are unbelievable. One person was like, yep, someone in their family had died of COVID. I'm there and I'm praying with them now. Another couple went to this, they got this name and they're like, this is so familiar. They go to the woman's house, and it's a woman they had taken off the streets a few years before and had lived with them. Here they were reconnected. Only God sets these things up. Now there was a lot going on during COVID, and it looked like a very divisive time for the body of Christ. But there was another story that God was writing. And I want you to know that because you are in it and you were in it if you lived here at that time, whether you engaged in going to a household or not. Four months later, if the if if if that wasn't enough, four months later we have the holiday farm fire. And ground zero ends up at Springfield High School. Now, problem number one. This is the first time Red Cross is having to do something like this during COVID. So all of their protocol isn't working. They can't set up a gym, they can't lay out cots because people needed to be separate. So they had this table for Red Cross, but they were immobilized from helping. Here comes the body of Christ. We're not organized, but we know each other. And so there was about seven of us. Then there were ten of us. Then there were all kinds of believers down there, and we set up another housing table right next to them. They had a cardboard sign, housing options, better housing options. I mean, it was a joke. It was fun. We were laughing. They they knew their hands were tied. Because what happened is the body of Christ started to open up their church. They started to open up homes. Oh, I can take a lady in my room. I have an extra room. Oh, they can park on their cars on our property. I had a couple of churches' credit cards in my back pocket. Get them some hotel rooms. See, the kingdom moves at the speed of trust. And if we did not know each other, if we did not pray together, just steady month after month, if we did not take time to know each other and love each other, things would not have moved the way they did. But the body of Christ, the muscularity of the body of Christ is in our unity. And we never get to say we don't need the really big church or we need the really small church. I have seen it over and over and over how we need every part and we belong to each other. I've seen the small church have a key to something we were doing and fill a need that we never could have. All right, I'm watching my time. Because I get really excited. Because I think it blesses the heart of God. He gets the glory and we get the joy. Oh, the body of Christ is beautiful. What if missionaries came to Eugene? What would they say? And I will tell you, we've had a lot of missionaries come to Eugene, and they often get in touch with us because they're like, hey, you know a lot of things that are going on in the city, so what can we do when we get here? And so we'll kind of connect here and there, we'll know some needs, and you know what? I here's what missionaries have said. Wow, I wish we had this kind of unity where we live. I wish something like this could happen where we are. Now we're not perfect. I'm not saying that. There is a lot of work to be done, but there is something we also get to export because we've been walking in this. So that I feel like in some ways missionaries has, they have come, have received perhaps vision, perhaps faith that it's possible. This isn't an out there thing. God made the unity, it takes humility, we yield to it. So I think a missionary would give us that commendation, just like in the book of Revelation, right? There's a commendation and there's a well, you could work on this. And when I think about that critique or that a couple of things, I have to say I might re-emphasize what Agum said amongst you a couple of weeks ago. And I think potentially if they were friends coming from third world countries or other countries, you've made, these are Agam's words, but I'm I I think they bear repeating. You've made God safe. You have a faith that admires God but does not expect. And it's okay for us to have that check us once in a while. It's okay, because we're really meant to live much more dynamically than what our hands can do and what our hands can create. We don't want to. We just want to deal with him and then see him do all the things we can't. So I I just want to say I am so excited for the way you all are actually beginning in this season of a church plant, a a new foundation, the ways you're looking at the community, the ways you're looking at how God is moving and working with him. Um what you're measuring. I was listening to what Jarrell shared. You know, what should we be looking for? What should we be measuring? I just feel like there's spot on the way you guys are thinking. And I'm so encouraged. And I want you to know that we need you. And when I say we, the body of Christ needs citizens church. We need what you carry, we need who you are, we need your faith, we need your your grace gifting. You know, it's kind of like every church has a has a measure of grace, and we need you. So I just would love to pray for you all as as I close. So, Father, thank you for this amazing. It really is mysterious, this living organic body the body of Christ on the globe, that you fill with the fullness of who you are. And that you're somehow revealing yourself through us, your people. So we yield to you. And I bless this place, I bless this family. God, I thank you for what you're growing, what you're developing, what you're what you're doing here, and I pray grace and strength and anointing, just like that this body would just be like leaven all throughout the neighborhood around here. Connecting, bringing life, bringing hope, bringing joy, bringing relationship and community. Lord, I bless Citizen Church. We bless them. We thank you for them. We thank you for what you're doing. Come and dwell richly in them and with them. I thank you that you're building your church. I bless Jarelle and Lauren and the whole team. In Jesus' name. Amen.