Mercy Ministries, Mercy Update | by Pastor Justin Keogh

The Mercy Ministry Updates are a regular snapshot of our Mercy Ministries in DCC, where we are working to serve and uphold the value and dignity of God’s most vulnerable image bearers in our city. For more regular updates in each focus area, please request to join our Mercy Focus groups in Church Center (linked below).

Gospel Framework

The Bible, as God’s inspired word, displays God’s good design and our radical need for a savior, found only in Jesus, and calls us to live out our new identity in Christ as we engage the world around us.

“Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of wickedness,
to undo the straps of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover him,
and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?
Then shall your light break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up speedily;
your righteousness shall go before you;
the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard."
– Isaiah 58:6-8

In this passage in Isaiah, God is rebuking the people of Israel for their platitudes of worship. They had been fasting and "going through the religious motions" without a heart set on God nor a life lived according to his instructions.

Israel was God's chosen people—chosen not because of their works but because of God's grace—and God gave them a clear picture of how he wanted them to live as a shining example among the nations, which was characterized by their worship of God (celebration of their vertical reconciliation with God) as well as their care for their neighbors (a demonstration of love in their horizontal relationships).

Jesus, when asked about the greatest commandment, replied similarly, saying that the first thing we must do is to love God with our whole being, and the second thing, inextricably linked, is to love our neighbor as ourselves (cf. Matt 22:34-40). We too, as God's adopted sons and daughters, freely given grace upon grace, are called to love others, even our enemies, in word and deed, as an overflow and reflection of God's love for us in Christ.

MERCY MINISTRY TRAINING: This Sunday, January 17th @ 1PM

Scripture is full of imperatives for us to serve others—not to earn God’s love, but in response to God’s lavish and gracious love for us. But how exactly are we to go about serving those around us in our city? With so much need, where do we start? How can we serve in this challenging Covid season?

In this training, we’ll look at the imperatives in Scripture to serve others as a response to God’s love for us in Christ. We'll introduce our current mercy ministries, discuss ways to serve and pray for those most vulnerable in our city.

If you’ve not had a chance to connect to our Mercy Ministries yet, or perhaps want to learn more about how we’re serving in this challenging season, this training is for you! This will be a live, virtual session, so please register below.

Register

CARENET FUNDRAISER: Through Saturday, January 23rd

This year, coinciding with our annual focus on the sanctity of human life, we are hosting a fundraiser to support our pro-life partner Care Net of Puget Sound—to help assist with the essential needs and services they provide to women facing unplanned pregnancies. Contributing to Care Net helps them operate their many services, from ultrasounds and STD screenings, to prenatal and parenting classes (and much more!)—to anyone who needs them, free of charge.

Our prayerful hope is to be a tangible blessing to Care Net through this fundraiser, helping them as they seek to help women facing unplanned pregnancy choose life for their babies.

Donate

All contributions are tax-deductible, and Care Net will receive 100% of your donation, less any processing fees (if applicable). Please select CareNet Fundraiser as the fund when you donate. A gift acknowledgment will be included in your year-end giving statement.

Stay Connected

Learn more about our Mercy Ministries HERE. Join the focus area city groups in order to hear more regular updates, events, and opportunities to serve:

• Mercy Focus: Foster Care & Adoption
• Mercy Focus: Homelessness
• Mercy Focus: Juvenile Detention
• Mercy Focus: Life Project
• Mercy Focus: Refugees

For the Kingdom,

Pastor Justin

Onward Building Campaign | by Pastor Adam Sinnett

Downtown Cornerstone,

By now you’ve heard that, by God's grace and kindness, we bought a building in Belltown! A permanent home is another step towards fulfilling our vision of becoming a faithful gospel presence in our city for, Lord willing, generations to come.

Therefore, we created this short video to share more about the building and how you can participate to see it renovated as our future gospel outpost.

As you can imagine, buying and renovating a building in downtown Seattle is quite expensive. While we are certain that God is going before us in this unique opportunity, it will require all of us to participate financially for it to become a reality.

Will you prayerfully consider giving towards the onward spread of the gospel in our city? You can learn more by visiting our Onward landing page.

Whether your contribution is an end-of-year gift or a monthly pledge, a sacrifice of your monthly coffee budget line or a donation of stock, it all goes towards achieving the end of preparing this building as a future stage for God’s unfolding story in our beloved city. Just imagine the lives that will be changed through our collective sacrifice and generosity!

If you have any questions at all, please don't hesitate to contact our team at .

Merry Christmas!

The King has come and is coming again,
Pastor Adam

News, Onward Building Campaign | by Pastor Adam Sinnett

Downtown Cornerstone,

Do you believe in miracles? I do.

Our God is “able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask, think or imagine” (Eph. 3:20). Our church is living proof of that. But, it is easy to take for granted until you step back and consider what God has done.

Together we have spent a decade laboring to plant a vibrant Jesus-centered, Bible-saturated, gospel-proclaiming, people-loving church in the heart of our beloved city. Astonishingly, God has grown an eight person planting team into one of the largest churches in Seattle.

We have seen the gospel spread, the Scripture savored, prayers answered, lives changed, souls saved, saints sanctified, the nominal awakened, sin repented of, relationships reconciled, hurt healed, shame conquered, hope restored, gifts deployed, communities multiplied, missionaries sent, churches planted, relationships forged, couples married, babies born, pandemics endured, and disciples made in one of the least churched, most post-Christian cities in the US. That’s just scratching the surface.

We’ve gathered in apartments, coffee shops, rooftops, parks, community centers, living rooms, foyers, movie theaters, and (most recently) a former dance club as we’ve sought to love our city to life, from the avenues to the alleyways. Throughout, we have searched for a permanent home but have come up short every time—until now.

I am incredibly excited, and profoundly grateful, to share that our gracious God has given us an opportunity to purchase a building in the most densely populated neighborhood of our city (Belltown)—amidst one of the hottest real estate markets in the country.

This is an opportunity for us to have a permanent outpost for proclaiming the gospel, making disciples, planting churches, training leaders, and loving our city for generations to come. It’s a miracle.

God uses people, but always people in actual places, like arks, prison cells, tents, deserts, whale bellies, shipwrecks, and stables. Places are not neutral. Our every day places are miniature stages where Jesus’ story continues to unfold in ways big and small. So, think of this building as a stage for God's unfolding story.

A permanent home in the heart of our city is another step towards fulfilling our vision of becoming a faithful gospel presence for, Lord willing, generations to come. We will have a larger sanctuary, a more versatile children’s space, more classrooms for ongoing discipleship, more space for counseling, greater ability to serve our neighbors, and even a covered parking lot, all under the shadow of the Space Needle.

Therefore, we have created the Onward campaign as a tool to share more about this unbelievable opportunity and invite you to partner with us in prayerful giving to see this building renovated for, Lord willing, generations of gospel ministry. You can learn more here.

Will you join us in establishing a permanent outpost for the gospel in the heart of our beloved city?

Christ is all,
Pastor Adam Sinnett