The mission of Citylight Global is to empower Citylight Omaha to faithfully join Jesus’ kingdom movement of multiplying disciples and churches among all peoples by: discovering the Mission of God, developing members of all ages to step into the various roles of this mission, and sending those called to GO to the unreached. This summer, two groups of adults will GO to two separate regions in the world to serve and support.
Cambodia Team
Outside the major city, Siem Reap, is a small village that is built around the city garbage dump marked by poverty and hopelessness. In the past 5 years, they have experienced the “gospel of the kingdom” of Jesus as missionaries have started a sewing business and welding business centered on discipleship groups. These businesses have begun transforming the community, providing a livelihood, and restoring dignity within the community - and most importantly the Church is growing. The Cambodia team, leaving at the end of June, will help launch a ESL/Sports ministry by putting on a VBS/Sports summer camp for the local youth.
Germany Team
Leaving at the end of May, the Germany team will be serving alongside our global partners, Jon and Rachael. The team will be empowered to be genuine blessings in word and deed to those around them, building relationships marked by openness to the Gospel. Finally, the team will be sent back on mission to our local community. This trip is a powerful, immersive, discipling trip in what it means to be the Church, to live a life on mission - especially in a post-Christian context.
Jacquelyn’s Story
One of the members of the Germany team is Jacquelyn Baudhuin. Jacquelyn has been attending Citylight for over eight years. She was raised going to church, but it was in college where she quietly accepted Jesus as her savior. She kept her faith mainly to herself. As her faith in Jesus grew stronger, she began to notice He was the first thing that came to her mind each morning. A few years later, Jacquelyn was baptized while in graduate school. It was at that time that she decided to turn away from previous identities she had so tightly clung to that never satisfied. After living in her dream city of Portland, Oregon for a year with limited Christian community, she apprehensively accepted a job in Omaha. Even though she came “kicking and screaming,” she trusted God had a plan. It was in Omaha that her Christian community grew, and she witnessed the overwhelming peace and personal growth that came with good Christian accountability, prayer, love, and support. She experienced this both within and outside of Citylight.
Even at the beginning of her journey with Jesus, Jacquelyn had a heart for those who are outside of the big ‘c’ Church. Even now outside of her close-knit Christian community, most of her friends do not have a personal relationship with the Lord. She heard and witnessed the stories of many of these friends who have been hurt by the church. She empathized with them and sees their perspective. These situations have led to an internal struggle in her heart.
“This struggle is not with God,” Jacquelyn shared. “I don't struggle with God's promises or his truths. I’m speaking more about the Christian culture in America and the general dispositions of large groups of Christians seen and experienced by my friends who do not have a relationship with Jesus. As I have grown in my faith, I have no problem being associated with Jesus. I love Jesus. However, I struggle with how He is represented to non-Christians by the Church and including myself. I want to understand how I can best engage. How I can open my eyes to the perspectives of non-Christians without clouding my own heart with judgment and contempt toward God’s people. I want to know what it looks like to be an authentic, loving, forgiving, and a God-glorifying Christian in these current times.”
She has longed for her friends to experience the love of Jesus and not the judgement of the church. She has tried to make it clear to her friends that she is a Christian who loves them first and foremost, but she struggles to know how to maintain the balance of continuing to share the love of Christ while still allowing a safe space. She wants to maintain open hearts so that others feel like they are free to listen and wrestle with the gospel.
The past few years, Jacquelyn has been confronted with what she would call “having a very high bar and limited grace for God's people within the church.” She found herself constantly trying to disassociate herself from the sinful things seen in the church such as hypocrisy, self-righteousness, exclusivity, but God in His mercy has also been revealing to her that those things are found in everyone and it points to everyone’s need for His Son, Jesus. When Jacquelyn heard about the mission trip to Germany earlier this year, she had a strong conviction that brought her to tears. God revealed that going with this global team to a country that has more non-Christians and skeptics would be an opportunity to grow and to face her personal struggles of living out her faith in the current culture.
“God has shown me that as I try to disassociate from the church, people only see my critical spirit and not His Son, Jesus,” Jacquelyn exclaimed. “What kind of witness is that? If I am honest, I must admit and repent of feeling sinfully superior to the church and exclusive from the church. Isn't that the same self-righteousness I am disgusted by IN the church? The reality is that sin is within me too. John 17 is a piece of scripture I have now run across a few different times as I’ve prepared to go to Germany and serve on this team. The first time I read it I was focused on verses 20-24 where Jesus prays for those who WILL eventually believe in him through the words of the believers. He says, “That they may all be one just as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me." I used to read it with a desire for the church to break down the walls they have built up. Asking myself why these walls around the church get so high and so burdensome to those who don't know Jesus. Asking, haven't "ALL sinned and fallen short?" But then God convicted me of my self-righteousness.”
Jacquelyn continued,
“And then...the next two times I came across this scripture, I saw the need for the CHURCH to be united. The prayer starts with, "9 I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours. 10 All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them. 11 And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me that they may be one, even as we are one." Am I glorifying God as a solo self-righteous church critic? Nope. As you have heard from my story, I know I desperately need and thrive within good Christian community. I need the church and my heart still needs to be for the church not trying to disassociate from the church. I am thankful that despite my critical heart toward God's people, He has allowed me to join with His people to pray, learn, and serve in Berlin.”
Jacquelyn is thankful to go to Germany and for the community God has given her through Citylight and now through the Germany global team. God has revealed the nature of Jacquelyn’s heart and has created in her a new heart that longs to love God's people. Her prayer is this:
“That I would figure out how to stop fearing association with the church, stop choosing to criticize the church, and instead take on the same posture of love for God's people in our sin, as I have for those who do not have a relationship with Jesus. Even as I share this, it feels like a huge mountain to move. Still, I know that a loving posture towards all would be a much more effective witness and representation of Jesus’ love. I long to be lovingly fearless and not to be so concerned about what others think.”
God is saving Jacquelyn from herself and now invites her, and all the global team members who are going this summer, to share the good news of Jesus to those outside of God’s Church. Through the Holy Spirit, God is reshaping Jacquelyn’s critical heart and giving her a new heart to serve others with love and humility and a courageous faith.
As a church, we have developed a culture that we genuinely SEND to the nations, not projects but people. First, would you pray for our teams going to Berlin and Siem Reap? Pray for the members like Jacquelyn, that Jesus would use this time to move powerfully in and through them, that His name would be known amongst the families of Berlin and Siem Reap? Would you also make this opportunity possible for our teams by sending them financially. Donations can be made at:
Siem Reap: https://app.managedmissions.com/Donations/Donate/76851
Berlin: https://app.managedmissions.com/Donations/Donate/72632
Finally, as Jacquelyn’s story reveals, short-term trips are amazing opportunities to get out of our “water,” and experience joining the mission of Jesus to every nation… and then be sent back to live the same way here. If you would like to learn more about future opportunities, please reach out to our global missions director, luke@citylightomaha.org.