Hope, Peace, Joy and Love

19 Friday Dec 2014

Tags

Atlanta, Christmas, Family on Mission, hope, joy, love, Peace

The Christmas season has been a little different for us this year. Being still in a place of the transitioning of our home, (continuing to press in and ask the Lord to sell our house in Pawleys would LOVE for you to join us in that) we have found ourselves during this season celebrating the holidays with our “stuff” being back in Pawleys while being surrounded by borrowed things in the place we are staying in “Atlanta.”

Last year I spent lots of time bringing out all the Christmas items and decorating things around the house. Things that come out year to year and have a staple in our home. The tree decorations, the nativity, the kids ornament boxes that hold memories since the day they were born. These posessions currently sit in our attic and I long for the day soon that they will abide in our new place of residents. Somehow when we transitioned in November I was not even thinking about grabbing the Christmas things we would need.

But in the loss of what was and things left there is a huge blessing in the what is, and things new. When we walked back into the house we are living in, after Thanksgiving it was entirely decorated for Christmas. It was such a wonderful sweet surprise and our family has enjoyed this particular Christmas season enjoying the beauty, the blessing and the generosity of others. Not sure how many hours Carol and Don worked to put it all together but we certainly have been enjoying their traditions and their special things.

But most of all, what we as a family have come to realize most this season… is that when you strip away possessions you almost always find yourself clinging on to the things that matter most.

Because we’ve not had to spend time decorating the house, we’ve spent much more time this month gathered to family and lots of intentional time doing things that well in the past we’ve just never had time to do. We’ve baked and decorated Christmas cookies, we’ve made cards, we’ve searched for our elf Fidek each morning who get this…actually moves around each day to a new location and does not sit in one place for a good part of the week with kids wondering why. And we have spent time daily to gather around the advent candles as we’ve pressed into the journey of Hope, Peace, Joy and Love and what that means to us as a family right now.

Hope – “What could be” – We are overwhelmed by excitement and HOPE this time in our lives as each day we get glimpses of what could be. Pressing into HOPE for us has been important step in the transition process. Ever feel without HOPE? Regardless of any circumstance you might be experiencing it’s good to remind yourself of His HOPE for you and that He has a plan for you. We have much Hope.

Peace – “Shalom – A sense of well being.” For us right now there is still lots of Chaos in our lives. Ever feel that Chaos surrounds you? We are living in a new place, kids are in new schools, we have not sold our house yet, we are still using map quest to get from one place to another. But what we continue to learn is that PEACE is not the same as calm. So if things seem chaotic for you, instead of trying to find the calm, why not try to fully embrace His PEACE that only He can give. We have much Peace.

Joy – Seeing all Circumstances through the Goodness of God. Even when things happen that could seem to steal your JOY, His Goodness always comes through. Could not be more true for us. As I look at the amazing community of people that surround us and the mission that is unfolding our family is blown away by His Goodness. Often I wondered through many transitions through the years how in the circumstance of different things that limit JOY how could they ever turn to good? So is there something that is robbing your JOY? Why not try to look for the beauty in the brokenness. It’s in His Goodness that we can see our circumstance differently. We have much Joy.

Love – Relentless giving of ourselves to others. We will always attempt to live our lives We before Me. There is no better way to live. It’s only when you give everything of yourself with complete abandonment to serve others that you can fully be known and loved. And it’s often when you give of yourself… is when you receive the most in return. And it’s in the transaction of giving your life away that you realize others are giving their lives for you. Still overwhelmed at the way people have loved on us and have leveraged themselves for us. Is there someone you need to show LOVE to this time of year? Is there a place that you need to open yourself up to, to be shown LOVE? It all starts with relentless giving. We have much Love.

As we evaluate our first few months in this next season of life we have found that Hope, Peace, Joy and Love are not only things we feel we’ve been able to step into but also what we have been able to receive in abundance in the larger family on mission we find ourselves in here in Atlanta. Which going into this new year we have so much to be thankful for. We have much thanks.

Not sure how this Christmas season has fallen on your family and loved ones but praying for each of you that Hope, Peace, Love and Joy would find you. That you would be known by them as you give your life and also that they would welcome you as you engage and receive from others.

Wishing you a VERY Merry Christmas. Much HOPE, PEACE, JOY and LOVE to you. – The Rhodes Family

The Subversive Gift of the Move

25 Tuesday Nov 2014

Posted by thedaverhodes in Uncategorized

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Dave, family, Family on Mission, Transition

Post by Dave:

I don’t know anyone who likes moving themselves.

In fact, I believe movers are one of the best inventions of all time.

It’s the word all our friends hope to hear from the moment we tell them we are changing houses. “So are you getting movers?” they ask sheepishly, silently hoping by movers we don’t mean them. Unfortunately, I’ve never been able to help my friends out on this one—every time we’ve moved my friends and I have been our movers. And yes—on many occasions I have returned the favor and been one of their “movers” as well.

The past three years, living in Pawley’s Island, we have moved in and moved out lots of people. And in this season it’s been our turn to move. We haven’t gotten our furniture out yet (please pray for our house to sell), but our family has already taken our most basic essentials and joined our new missional family in Atlanta. And like all moves, we’ve found it’s required adjustment. We literally are living currently out of our suitcases.

Here’s what I’ve found about moving though—moving reveals a lot about what we call normal. It’s when we move our furniture that we find out just how treaded our carpet has been in it’s current pathway and set up. It’s in moving we find out just how much extra stuff has made it’s way between our couch cushions or under our beds. It’s in moving we find out what furniture might not have been working the way it should have been and why. Yes—these are the subtle and subversive gifts of the move we might not discover any other way.

I’m thinking about that today, because even though we haven’t moved out our furniture yet, the less physical staples of our life are in the middle of an adjustment period. As a Family on Mission, we know just how important the predictable patterns and routines of life are. But nothing tries those patterns more than trying to establish those patterns in a different place. And nothing gives us more opportunity to evaluate those patterns than a move.

So here’s where we are—caught between adjustment and normal. Many of the normal patterns we’ve established in the past we think are really healthy. A few of the patterns are not though, so we are trying to learn from our mistakes and make adjustments. We’re not there yet—but at least we know where we are.

In the patterns of health we hope to fully return to, it can be kind of frustrating in this in-between time. Because we know what it means for the family to work and work well, we sense our current brokenness on this level. But it’s the gift of our healthy normal to know just what we need to return to and why. As we all know on every level—“there is one thing worse than being broken, and that is being broken and not knowing it.” So whether it’s in our leadership, our work or our family rhythms the gift of a healthy normal is that it helps us know when we are broken and what to return to.

And yes, there are things that we are adjusting in our normal rhythms and patterns as we enter a new culture, with new people and new surroundings. Like the gift of placing our old furniture in a new house, so being around new people, new cultures and new surroundings help us determine what both our old stuff can do that we had no idea of, and what it’s limitations might be. It’s in learning from new people that we see the places we might have called what is actually unhealthy “normal” and learned to accept it. And it’s in these places that we seek to adjust. The gift of the move is that it not only gives us that opportunity, but it helps us do so.

My hope though is that moving won’t be the only time we do this. My hope is that from time to time we will at least move the furniture around our new house to do two things—first, evaluate whether our normal is healthy and if not adjust it. And second, in places where normal is healthy but we’ve been pulled out of normal—return to it.

Like all leaders and families we will not be fully functional all the time. There will be moments when we break. But the gift of evaluating normal is that at least we will know we are broken and learn from it.

So if you’re moving today, like so many of our friends are, why not take this moment to evaluate and adjust? And if you’re not moving, like many of our other friends, why not at least move the furniture around and evaluate and adjust anyway?

Managing a Ministry or Leading a Movement

18 Friday Apr 2014

Posted by kimrhodes in Uncategorized

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discipleship, Family on Mission, Ministry, Movement

As a Family we are excited about heading out to Greenville today to spend some much needed time with our family. Spending this particular Friday getting ready to rest and abide. Reflecting on the season of lent as we wind that down. Feeling the heavy burden today of what HE did for us years ago and looking forward to celebrating the good news of the resurrection and the life we now live freely.

Dave recently posted a blog on our 3DM Leadership Blog. Wanted to share that with you today. Even though this post is about Managing a Ministry or Leading a Movement, As it relates to our context of being the Rhodes family – It’s not about Managing our Family but it’s about Leading our Family on Mission. Being part of an extended family is that we choose to never do anything alone. It’s a matter of closing the gap between our intention and our practice. Which is why as a family on Mission if we hear God speak to something we make sure it’s reflected in our weekly practices and disciplines as we seek to bring the Kingdom of God to all places as weShow and Tell people Jesus.

So here is Dave’s post. Enjoy!

Love – Rhodes to Anywhere…

Managing a Ministry or Leading a Movement

Life is full of choices.

Some choices come and go and very few things are really affected.

Other choices directly affect us not just in the moments we choose them but also in every moment after. In fact, some of choices we make today are directly related to the kind of lives we live tomorrow. And never do we really know that more than when we make the wrong choice.

For me, one of these moments happened when I was around six years old. My mom had dragged me to the grocery store to run errands with her, as moms often have to do. But moms can’t go to the grocery store to just get what they need, like normal people. So I was being dragged up and down each aisle, slowly but surely making our way through the entire store. I questioned the meaning of life more than once in the frozen food section.

But then on aisle nine, I found it. My purpose for being at the grocery store turned the moment my mom looked at me and said, “David, it’s your turn!” Here’s why I was so excited: aisle nine was the cereal aisle, and that meant I got to pick out one box of cereal for the week. I remember as a kid running up and down the aisle looking at all the different choices. Cocoa Pebbles, Life, Cheerios, Trix, Cookie Crisp (my personal favorite), Fruit Loops and so many others. These are big choices in life.

On this particular grocery store run, I had made my decision. The box of Cookie Crisp was already in my hand. That’s when I saw something out of the corner of my eye. It was a box of cereal called Fiber Bran, or something like that. Now, no kid really wants to eat Fiber Bran—that’s a cereal for old people who have issues in their lives that we don’t really want to discuss here. But the reason I noticed this box of cereal was because there was an advertisement on it that read “Free Spider-Man Action Figure Inside!”

I loved Spider-Man. So my six-year-old brain started thinking… I knew that if I asked my mom for a Spider-Man action figure on this grocery trip I probably wouldn’t get it. But here in this box of cereal was the opportunity of a lifetime. My mom would think I was getting cereal but I would really be getting a Spider-Man action figure! Quickly I turned the box of cereal over to see the HUGE portrait of Spider Man on the back of the box. And again, my six-year-old mind raced into action, thinking, “If the Spider-Man figure is that big there can’t be much cereal in the box of Fiber Bran.”

Spider-Man won out. I handed the box to my mom insisting that Fiber Bran was my new favorite cereal. The next morning I raced down the stairs to open the box of Fiber Bran and claim my awaited treasure. As I dug my hands in the bottom of the box, I’d like to tell you that I was delighted, but the truth is that I have never been more disappointed in all of my life. The Spider-Man figure was two inches tall and it broke the second time I played with it. To make matters worse, I was now stuck with a whole box of Fiber Bran. You don’t want to know all the things that cereal did to my body (just kidding).

I learned a valuable lesson that day as a six-year old kid. It’s easy to get distracted by toys. It’s easy to see the back of the box and end up missing the substantive things in life. It’s easy to choose the wrong thing.

Never is this more true for the heart of the leader than when it comes to the choice of managing a ministry or leading a movement. The truth is, I know very few people who dream of managing a declining ministry. Most of the people I talk to dream of cultivating and leading a dynamic movement of faith. But it’s what we choose to do on a daily basis in discipleship that makes all the difference.

In classic Mike Breen fashion, I now have been trained to see the way of Jesus in places in Scripture I once would have overlooked. That’s why this year John 4:1-2 has caught my eye in a way it never has before. Here’s what it says, “The Pharisees noticed that Jesus was baptizing more people than John (although it was not Jesus who was doing it, but his disciples).”

It’s that last parenthetical statement that has owned me these last few weeks. Jesus didn’t just “do” his ministry and let his disciples tag along. No, Jesus invited his disciples to do his work with him–even before he commissioned them to do so, and because of this, Jesus started a movement instead of managing a ministry.

I’m not making any assumptions about John’s ministry, but what the Pharisees noticed about Jesus was that his movement was outpacing John’s ministry, and what the Apostle John fills in for us parenthetically is that it was all because of discipleship.

The lesson is clear: if you want a movement tomorrow choose discipleship today. Invite your disciples to do what you do. Do your best to never do anything alone. It’s a matter of closing the gap between our intention and our practice. We all want a movement, but desires alone accomplish nothing. If we want a movement we will have to choose it, daily… one disciple at a time.

You can read more amazing things on Family on Mission and Discipleship on the 3DM Leadership Blog.

Rhodes to Anywhere… I’m/We’re Back!

06 Thursday Mar 2014

Posted by kimrhodes in Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Family on Mission, Vision

I’ve missed you! We’ve missed you! How crazy is this? After almost 4 years in Hibernation we were having a family conversation a few weeks ago and I decided for all of us that we should start blogging again, but this time as a family.

I actually just hit send on a book of Frankie’s Blog I used to keep. Reading through the posts I was reminded how as an introvert it’s important to take the time and actually write. It’s really a spiritual discipline not only for me, but for Dave and now as our children as they grow older and begin to share their story. And I feel like along the journey we have learned so much. The process of Discipleship requires us to look at the life of Jesus and to learn what He did, learn how to imitate Him and then look at ways to innovate in our lives in a way that causes us to ask who would Jesus be if He were us.. with our life, with our family dynamics and the giftings that he has given us? When you live that way… He will take you anywhere…

So welcome to our new adventure “Rhodes to Anywhere”

We have certainly traveled many “Rhodes” over these past 4 years of blog hibernation and what an amazing adventure it continues to be. One of the fun traditions we’ve taken on is collecting snow globes of the places that our family is coming and going from. Each represents a story, a community, a people, a mission, a culture, a breakthrough, a barrier, a family, a mission. They are truly more than snow globes as they sit in our home. They represent the pictures of the Kingdom to us. They represent ways our own family is trying to live into our Family Mission: To Show and Tell People Jesus.

So what have we been doing for the past four years? Well I’m glad you have asked. It’s really simple. We have been dying. I guess that sounds a little harsh… but it’s what we have been doing. Daily coming to the cross. Dying to ourselves, our plans, our wants, our needs, our dreams in hopes of being reborn into something new. Dave just tweeted today.. “There is no issue in life that the cross does not address. And there is no struggle in life that resurrection does not teach me to conquer.”

Just last week someone dear to us said she had been praying for our family and was given the verse John 12:24 to share with us. Little did she know that I had already penned these words you are about to read. “When you lose your life you will find it… When you try to hold on to your life, you will lose it. John 12:24 – “Very Truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.” So we as a family press into knowing it’s all His, we daily lay it down to die in hopes of multiplication and daily trust to follow His Voice as we seek to lose our lives and go “ANYWHERE” the “RHODES” we walk lead.

We are pretty excited about where we have been and where we are headed. The amazing thing about dying is that is when the fun happens. It’s the most messy beautiful process to get to walk through. We have never lived in a time filled with so much joy, fruitfulness and blessing. Never as a family have we been more passionate about living and being a Family on Mission. I hope all 5 of us can share parts of our story here to encourage those of your own pursuit as you live out all you are going after in your life and your context in the Mission he’s called you to.

Excited to be back.

With Love,

Rhodes to Anywhere…