New City Notes

December 2003

Most of us are getting ready to celebrate Christmas.  When we reflect seriously on the enfleshment of God in Christ we find an overwhelming truth that lies at the foundation of our Christian faith.  If we take off the “holiday” blinders for a moment and assess our world within and without, this truth becomes all the more powerful.

At first glance, what we see can be unsettling.  Signs of fracture and symptoms of disorder confront us from every direction.   Everyday the Media bring us additional casualty figures from Iraq and Israel.   Local violence confronts us on the front-page and reveals the painful reality that international conflict is an extension of crime we experience in our own neighborhoods.  Our more popular TV shows continue the onslaught through a surfeit of police and crime-scene dramas that detail human cruelty in unspeakable terms.  Sadly, when we look to the church for healing and wholeness, all too often we find more dysfunction and division.  Turning inward, we find within ourselves an acute and unholy brokenness.  

Having lived in and through the depth of our brokenness, in a final prayer, just before his arrest and death, our Lord Jesus discloses his passion and plan for our restoration: “ I  pray now 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 that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.” 

Here then in Christ, the tangled threads of our personal lives and corporate concerns are woven together into a coherent fabric.  Our fragmented selves actually can find wholeness in intimate relationship with God.  As we live in communion with Christ and in tangible unity with one another, a confused and estranged world really can glimpse God and his passionate love for all things and all people. What a beautiful and yet burdensome vision: Immanuel in and through Christ'’s disciples!

Through the cultivation of Christian community, art, and discipleship, New City continues to explore the beauty and burden of God’s incarnation as relates to creativity, personal integrity, and unity among God’s people in Knoxville.  If you’ve been around this year at New City, you know the graciousness of the Lord as evidenced in a variety of enhanced initiatives through the Café and the Consortium in our new location, www.newcitycommunity.org.  

For the various ways you have supported New City we are extremely appreciative.  Thank you.  It is our prayer now that during this Advent season you will revel in your relationship with Christ and live your life from the inside out as a holy parable, pushing back the interior and exterior brokenness, fulfilling Jesus’ prayer: “That all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you…to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them…”.

Respectfully yours, in Christ
Kenny Woodhull

New Mailing Address: New City Community, PO Box 397, Knoxville, TN 37901