Guests Kirk Cowman and Brian Westnedge join us on the pod this week to tackle these questions about the future of our church!

Please circle your calendars and register for the upcoming Listening Gatherings on June 6 (in-person) and June 9 (via Zoom). Discernment Gatherings on June 14 (in-person) and June 22 (via Zoom). Here's the link to register!

MJAC Conversations podcast is back with a series of candid conversations with your Board and Transition team members about the proposed merger between Living Hope Alliance and our church. Our next episode is called 'Releasing MJAC to merge with Living Hope--not everything that is buried is dead.' Thank you for sending your questions into the office! The questions we'll be tackling this upcoming week are:

-For those of us who are unfamiliar with Living Hope, can you give us a nutshell description of what they’re like? How are they different from MJAC or other churches in Moose Jaw? Are there similarities to us or other churches in Moose Jaw that you see?

-What specific aspects of Living Hope are we hoping to lean into through this merger?

-Will there be space for our local church culture to have its own flavour because we’re in a different geographic location and consist of different people? Or are we imagining we’ll become a satellite/replica of Living Hope?

-Has the Board discussed what specific aspects of MJAC we need to retain? Recognizing the merger agreement is still in discussion with the transition team, what are you imagining or hoping we’ll preserve through this merger?

-Over this last season at MJAC, we have talked a lot about something being birthed. Now we seem to be talking about MJAC needing to die to be reborn again. Can you unpack what that ‘death’ language means (or doesn’t mean)?

-What do we do with all those things that were birthed during this past season?

-Do you have suggestions for how we process this together? For example, some people in our church will need to grieve this merger as a loss, and others may be relieved or celebratory. Will there be events that bring closure to our shared MJAC experience before we move into a merger? "

Our podcast, MJAC Conversations, is back this week, with the first in a series of episodes exploring the future of our church. This week on the pod we'll talk about the backstory of the proposed merger between Living Hope Alliance in Regina, and MJAC. We've been gathering your questions and a member of your Board and a member of the merger Transition Team will candidly discuss the behind the scenes. Please continue to pray for our MJAC leadership community as they discern through this unprecedented time!

It's the last episode of 2020, so settle in for a good long chat about coping with COVID Christmas, Mark's cooking secrets, entering into grief as a practice that makes us more human, and where Jesus is in our seasons of darkness.

How you're marking this COVID Advent season.

What's different this year? What are you missing? 

Cooking winter dishes to cope, and the secret of Mark's delicious food. 

Let's talk about Sunday! Grief & disappointment in the story about the death of Lazarus.

Mark & Steph's personal grief journey.

Practicing being human by allowing yourself to grieve the small things.

Links and resources:

Advent: The Jesse Tree

https://www.seriouseats.com/

Finding good things in the midst of the ordinary, dealing with shame, and trusting friends with your crap. Sometimes literally. Anthony Skepple shares his journey with Crohns disease over the past year.

Picking up the phone to get through this COVID winter, playing 'Among Us' with all the MJAC friends we miss, and healing past wounds.

Competitive jump rope, looking for stuff to say sorry for, and the risk of reconciliation. Melissa brings her expertise as a counsellor to our conversation about what steps towards reconciliation look like when trust as broken. Rachel and Melissa share personal stories of forgiveness and reconciliation from their work and family life.

Finding ourselves in Biblical characters, fear of failure, and how to move through our fears courageously.

Proud papa moments, the origin of Jeremy's love of sword fighting, and how to break free from negative habits to build new, healthier ones. Bruce shares about his journey with a generational sin pattern of anger in his family, and his hopes as a dad for his grown-up children.

A tale of stolen video games, two flawed kings and the difficulty of repentance. Jeremy and Mike share stories about getting punched in the face and doing time in their conversation about sin and saying sorry.