Here is what you need to know about me.
Jesus is my life. Who he is and what he is doing dominates everything I do. He is my King, and all my alligience ultimately belongs to him. He is my hope and joy and the goal of everything I do. For better or worse, my life is inextricably connected to him. Whether or not I do a good job at following him, he is all I got and all I need.
I am married to Michelle. She is beautiful, wise, and she loves Jesus, the kind of woman every man should hope for. She is my partner, my friend, my lover, and my highest calling. With all my heart, for as long as we both shall live, am commited to love, serve, and lead her into a faithful and God-honoring lifestyle. We go together, and you can’t have one of us without the other. She has a blog too. Check it out.
We have a mission. When Michelle and I got married, we sat down and wrote this mission statement together, and it expresses the ideals by which we hope to live our life:
We will join in God’s mission to bring about a culture that expresses and enjoys his character by:
- Developing a lifestyle of worship
- Facilitating Christ-centered community
- Making disciples of Jesus
- Serving others generously
- Encouraging curiosity and investigation of God’s creation and activity in the world
- Engaging and challenging present culture
Beginning with each other and our children.
My specific calling is to study the Word of God for the sake of God’s people. I am obsessed with the Bible because it is all about Jesus. I feel called to devote my life to studying it so that I can serve the people of God. I am not sure what form this will take at any given time in my life. Right now, it means I am in school learning how to study the Bible well.
This blog is an outlet for my musings, curiosity, and intellectual endevors. You never know what I will write about here at Claytonius.com. Mostly, I am focused on theology, the church, culture, and the way those three things interact. I ramble and get into random stuff sometimes, but mostly that is what I like to write about.
Where I am coming from: I write from a Christian perspective. I tend to come from the direction that is broadly sympathetic to both reformed thinking and the emerging church. I am not sold out to either entirely (as both contain a diversity of perspectives and get a lot wrong), but I find my opinions and values tend to connect with both of these groups generally. My church is Wheaton Bible Church, a large (2000+ attenders) Evangelical church in the midwest. This is the church I grew up at. I was on staff for a number of years as College Ministry Director, Director of Emerging Ministries, and eventually High School Pastor. Now, I am a graduate student at Wheaton College Grad School. I am studying Biblical Exegesis and Historical and Systematic Theology. I am a part of a smaller community within the church called Ecclesia. Ecclesia is our own missional experiment in trying to reach post-Christian culture.
I say all this so you can gauge where I am coming from, and put me in context. Hopefully, it will help you read what I write with greater understanding.
