Category Archives: Verge

March 8, 2012 · 12:05 pm

My Verge Breakout Notes

I had the privilege of participating in the For The City Pre-Conference at the Verge Conference. I led a breakout session titled “How to get the people who care about you to care about your mission.” Below is an overview of my notes. I hope they are helpful, but I publish them to invite dialogue, pushback, and additions to my ideas. If you want the full version of the notes you can email me.

The idea was to assist people who are passionate about a certain mission to be able to articulate and spread their passion.

Where are we going?

  1. You need more people than yourself to accomplish the dream
  2. Community accomplishes mission
  3. Shepherd them into the mission

Biblical Basis for a Community-Driven Mission

Main principles:

Jesus Himself gathers a community to His mission and when He sends, He always sends a community on mission, not a lone ranger.

-       Matthew 10, Luke 10:1-12

-       Matthew 28:18-20 – Great Commission

-       Acts 2 – Community, Acts 4 community, Acts 13 – community

-       St. Patrick – Evangelizing Ireland through a movement of communities

The goal is to meet people where they are and guide them toward a greater mission.

To get people to care about and partner with your mission you must move them from prayer to ownership of the mission. I would encourage you follow the following path.

Prayer –> Understanding –> Educate –> Vision –> Engagement –> Ownership

Prayer – Matthew 9:35-39

Jesus had a clear goal and His first word toward His disciples was…PRAY

Matt. 9:36 – The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few, therefore…pray earnestly!

If passion for mission is lacking, prayer is lacking. Prayer is God’s means of aligning our hearts to His, of us declaring our dependence on Him, and requesting an action greater than we can create ourselves. We don’t ask of God because we aren’t typically doing anything beyond our own means.

We want to exhaust all of our options first and then go to God for help. Jesus shows us the opposite. We see someone faithful to being with God, asking Him for people.

Prayer continues throughout the process, but it must be a foundation. What do I need to be praying for? Who do I need to be praying for?

From there, we move from prayer to understanding.

Understand The Other Person or Community

If you are ever going to get people to the point where they care about your mission, you must first discover where they are at in regards to your mission. This comes from asking questions and listening with a filter.

-       Listening for what they value

  • What do they say? What do they do?
  • What are they most passionate about?

-       Ask good open-ended questions

  • Have you ever thought about…?

-       Are they receptive and interested in your idea?

Their values display their worldview and meeting people where they are means understanding and connecting the mission to their worldview.

Educating

Know the Issue.

Knowledge Communicates Competency & provides confidence worth following.

Read Multiple Approaches

Tim Keller’s thoughts on preaching

“When you listen and read one thinker, you become a clone… two thinkers, you become confused… ten thinkers, you’ll begin developing your own voice… two or three hundred thinkers, you become wise and develop your voice.”

Whatever your issue, you must become the pseudo-expert. In our age of information, we have no excuse for pursuing knowledge and gaining information on all sides of the issue.

Informing on the Issue

-       How much do they know?

-       What do they need to know? How easy can you tell it and they repeat it?

-       What stories can you tell them?

Visioning

From there, Jesus had a Clear, Repeatable Vision & Values.

Jesus’ vision: “Go & Make Disciples”

Jesus’ values: “Love God. Love one another. Love your neighbor.”

Our vision and values are based on the aims of our mission. The ultimate goals of the challenges we face. Vision is the mission statement and values summarize the direction our actions must take.

Ways to Assess: How repeatable is your vision?

Harvard Business Review Quote:

“Companies with Great Repeatable Models℠ translate their strategy into a few simple values and prescriptions that people throughout the organization can understand and use to shape actions and decisions.”

Engaging

Let the Values Guide Engagement & Ownership

Engagement is how they start to serve in your mission.

This happens by letting your practice flow out of your values. This is how values become repeatable. They connect with how people learn and retain (head, heart, hands).

Develop a Pathway for Engagement

Exposure à Investment à Commitment

Exposure – 1 time serving

Investment – Consistent Serving

Commitment – Main Service Outlet

Owning

Empower People to Own The Mission

You know you have accomplished this when the people that are a part of your mission are the ones guiding people through this same process. That’s the aim, to transfer the passion for your mission to the people who join you.

Most people stop at engagement, but we must move to ownership for this process to become transferable.

Conclusion

A Mission is Sustained by the Gospel

Lastly, I want to make a comment about sustainability for you and your community on the mission. We must be careful to not focus so much on the mission we neglect the proper motivation and ultimate purpose, which is the gospel of Jesus Christ. The gospel leads us to make cherishing Jesus the ultimate mark of success rather than mission success (Luke 10:17-20) and then to care for those who are a part of the mission as well as our own souls.

Dialogue, Pushback, And Additions

What do you think? How have you been able to get people to care about your mission? I welcome additional thoughts, disagreements or additions to help me and other continue to learn in this process.

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March 2, 2012 · 2:40 pm

Verge Day 3: Main Take-Homes

Verge Day 3 was convicting, challenging and continued the stream of inspiring everyone. I don’t have time to recap the whole day, but as I’ve thought about it there are some major game changing take-homes from Day 3.

Everyone has been inspired to embrace the gospel and it’s missional implications, but day 3 laid out the necessary components.

Overall the main take-home was a healthy community + healthy dependence on God + healthy discipleship = healthy gospel mission.

Healthy Community
Dhati Lewis did an amazing job of challenging everyone to evaluate the health of those we call and send on mission.

One of the more beautiful & balanced statements he made was this:

“A lot of us spend time trying to be unleashed without first getting healthy but others of us try to get healthy primarily without having a concern about getting unleashed.”

It’s a great picture of pursuing mission without neglecting community & cultivating community to be on mission. A great message in the midst of the methodology conversation.

Healthy Dependence on God
The two speakers who stood out from the rest were Jeremy Story & Dave Gibbons. Knowing Jeremy from NYC, I expected his message, but loved how he spoke with such conviction on the transformative power of prayer on the mission of God. Amazing content and convicting message from him.

Dave Gibbons stirred things up by sharing his own story in experiencing dependence on the Holy Spirit. Discussing his initial lack of openness to the Holy Spirit & gifts of healing but how God used his own children and ministry partners to challenge him to be open to be used by God with spiritual gifts the American church has neglected because of their abuse in the charismatic circle.

I left both of these with confirmation in the essential nature of dependence on God for His mission to flourish in a community.

Healthy Discipleship
Neil Cole laid the foundations of discipleship with 2 Timothy 2:2 “what you have been taught, entrust to faithful men who will teach others also.

Rodrick Gilbert & George Patterson brilliantly taught that to be Christian is to be a disciple maker, developing & teaching people to model the life and ministry of Jesus.

George Patterson is easily the most enjoyable speaker. He always does something out of the ordinary that slams the truth home and makes it memorable. He planted people in the audience who tried to prevent a Christian from becoming a disciple maker. It was engaging and memorable.

Kevin Peck, who has taught me more than I even realize, taught on Christ’s plan for discipling the world. In contrast to us spending most of our time on the many to reach the few, Christ spent his time with the few to reach the many. There was no plan B. This seemed like a big epiphany for the crowd.

Healthy Gospel Mission
All of this results in the mission all of us were inspired to pursue. The mission of replicating the love, message & mercy of Christ in other people.

It was a refreshing and challenging day.

Today and tomorrow are travel days for our family back to NYC. I’m looking forward to continuing to process all that happened at Verge.

I’m very thankful to the Austin Stone and the many speakers for their time and energy to make this such a great conference.

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March 1, 2012 · 11:18 am

Verge Day 2 Recap

Wow, there is so much to process through after day 2. With all of these amazing speakers, it made me thankful for going to the Verge Pre-Conference and especially the For The City Pre-Conference.

Day 2 started with Stew setting the tone and fixing our purpose on the right thing, knowing, delighting in, and loving Jesus and His gospel above the ministry strategies and methods we would be hearing.

Following worship, Stew warned us that we would be drinking from a firehose, but challenged us to think through the lens of 2 major questions. He said these questions are prevalent wherever there is a major movement of disciple-making disciples.

The 2 questions: What is God telling you? What are you going to do about it?

The Format

For those of you who have never been to Verge or did not watch it on the simulcast, the format is different from many of the conferences I have been to because the main sessions are tied to a major idea and then 3-6 presenters are given the opportunity to teach, equip, and inspire us on these main ideas over the course of an hour.

This format requires that you process this information in some way and preferably with another person so it was really great for Stew to frame the content through the lens of these questions and then call us back to these questions following each session.

The danger of conferences is never processing what God is telling you and challenging YOU to do in your context because if you do not do this, you jump at adopting ideas and practices without yourself ever being changed in the process. If you are not changed you will never lead change in other people.

Main Session 1: For The City

Rudy Carrasco, Bob Lupton, John Sowers, & Dr. John Perkins

Main session 1 was truly amazing. Rudy Carrasco led off by challenging us to affirm that business is an outstanding Christian calling that we must honor and encourage in our congregations. If we only affirm business for the money it can provide, we completely miss the opportunity for people to use their business to create jobs and opportunities for our city. The greatest way we could enable people to be for the city is to affirm that their skills, talents, and ethic in their work can create jobs and equip people to create new companies and enterprises in poor areas of your city.

Having listened to Bob Lupton & Dr. Perkins yesterday, I loved hearing Rudy cast the vision for unleashing the workforce in your church from feeling guilty for being successful in the “secular” world and affirming the absolutely necessary skills and talents they have for restoring the brokenness of neighborhood.

Lupton and Dr. Perkins are always a highlight. Knowing how much they love one another and have been so influential in each other’s lives over the last 30+ years made it all the more special to see them share the stage at different times in the morning.

It is always amazing to listen to Dr. Perkins. Justin Lopez of the For The City Network did an amazing job of interviewing Perkins by not pushing any agenda and letting Dr. Perkins expound on all that God has taught him. One of the more interesting parts was his conversation about parachurches and churches. He discussed a need to repent for creating a parachurch rather than affirming and building up a church. It was beautiful to watch an 82-year old man affirm that God continues to teach us and work on us for our whole lives.

Main Session 2: Incarnational Mission

Mike Breen, Leonce Crump, Hugh Halter, Dave Ferguson, Alan Hirsch, Jon Tyson, Todd Engstrom, Jen Hatmaker & Jeff Vanderstelt

Yes, those were all of the speakers. Drinking from a firehose doesn’t begin to describe it. I’ll try best to summarize the highlights.

Alan Hirsch led us off by defining Incarnational Mission. Again, Alan is way smarter than me and seems even smarter than that with his accent, but setting the focus on following Christ and embodying Christ (incarnational) made it impossible to seek to adopt a ministry strategy and led us to focus on following Christ.

Dave Ferguson shared his personal story of how God has been changing him, a mega-church pastor, into someone who seeks to love his neighborhood. The transformation came as a result of focusing on being a blessing to his neighborhood rather than trying to convert it.

Hugh Halter placed our focus on 1 John 2:6 “whoever says he abides in Christ ought to walk in the same way that Christ did” and then contrasted a religion focused life with how Christ confronted his culture on their abuse of the scriptures, the Sabbath, and discipleship. It is definitely interesting how we need to be challenged in our approach to all 3 in our current day in the church just like the Pharisees in Jesus’ day.

Jon Tyson was the highlight for me. He discussed how faulty our typical ways of sustaining mission are and then laid out the only way to sustain mission. “Love is the only thing that can sustain incarnational mission.” His reasons were that love leads us to identify with people rather than our brand, project, or mission and identifying with people leads us to agony for their needs. Only in agonizing in their need will we follow Christ’s love for the world and extend Christ’s love to the world. Passion for God, compassion for people.

Todd Engstrom of the Austin Stone did a great job of challenging us with a very practical training tool they use to equip their leaders. It contrasted the church’s typical approach to community with how the rest of the world approaches community. This contrast forces you to ask what is going to change about how we seek to develop community with the rest of the world. Very helpful and you could see a lot of light bulbs go off in the room.

Admittedly, I missed Mike Breen and Jeff Vanderstelt, both guys I respect and love their content, but I wanted to see my former co-workers since I was in downtown Austin again. It was great to connect with them and share with them what God is doing in our lives in New York.

Jen Hatmaker put our focus on the scripture “Follow me as I follow Christ” and then asked us “If people are following you are they becoming more like Christ? Or are they spending their week writing a sermon or participating in bible study?” The challenge was a great one. Am I using my time too much for ministry work without developing people and challenging them toward the way Christ lived.

Unconference and Main Session 3: For the Gospel

This was followed by 4 hours for what they call Unconference. This was the more organic portion of the conference where you could dictate the topic and the location and discuss with others at the conference what you were processing.

It provides a great opportunity to get even more practical with those who are processing some of the same issues. A very different idea for a conference that I continue to think is the best.

I also skipped the night sessions for a family dinner. From what I heard, Jeff Vanderstelt challenged us all through the Story of the Prodigal Son to focus on the gospel implications that drive us to worship God more. Matt Carter reminded us that activity is worthless without knowing and loving Jesus. This was followed by an amazing time of worship.

My day ended with grabbing drinks with guys who do my job way better than I do my job. Thankful to Todd Engstrom to organizing these men and getting us together. It was refreshing, I learned a lot and felt more equipped to serve Apostles Church when I return. It was a great time.

Conferences as Seminaries?

One of the more interesting thoughts was shared over twitter by Jon Tyson with an observation that conferences have become the new seminaries.

I completely agree with him and think this is a great opportunity. There’s more collaboration, there’s more practical handles and tools for people to begin to actually accomplish the ideas and it’s more refreshing.

On to day 3…

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February 29, 2012 · 12:20 am

Verge Day 1 Recap

The Verge Conference started today and it was amazing. I said it was the only conference that I feel like was worth attending for its theology and its practice.

It did not disappoint at all. I really love the way it is arranged this year with Pre-Conference Breakout Sessions for Missional Communities & Mercy/Justice all on one day. This provides a great opportunity for any church member to take a day off and attend so that it’s not just a pastor’s conference.

Today, I spent half the day at the Missional Community Pre-Conference & half the day at the For The City (Mercy & Justice) Pre-Conference. I’m so thankful to have been at both.

Missional Community Pre-Conference

I missed the first panel discussion thanks to Austin traffic and fog, but I made it to Brandon Hatmaker’s breakout session, Serving Through Missional Communities: Seven Steps to Moving Beyond the Event. It was very helpful and practical for how the gospel of Jesus Christ develops a community to be merciful and compassionate. It was also helpful in leveraging service events to be more than a social justice activity to become an opportunity for Christians and those outside of the church to be educated on the full meaning of the gospel.

One of the more impacting parts was the idea of letting go of the return on investment we get from serving. Brandon told the story of feeding the homeless and the homeless consistently asking about when the church was and how he began to understand that was their way of paying him for his service. They had nothing to offer him, but the hope that they might come to his church. This is important because churches can often use social justice to get people to come rather than to extend the love of Christ without expectation of anything in return.

It challenges us to check our motives and come to serving others and meeting needs with no expectations but to extend the love of Christ.

It was really refreshing to hear how God is using Brandon and his church to display the gospel of Jesus Christ. He wrote a book if you want to learn more: The Barefoot Church (Primer)

For The City Pre-Conference

As much as I enjoy missional communities, I could not have been more thankful to be a part of the For The City Pre-Conference.

I think it could potentially be the best part of Verge for me this year. Time will tell.

I arrived right before Bob Lupton spoke and it was absolutely amazing. I’m sure much of it is in his book Toxic Charity, but to hear someone who has empowered the poor rather than kept them dependent on handouts was challenging and so encouraging.

Some quotes that challenged me:

“The poor can pay a heavy price for our goodness.” – Talking about how our handouts create dependency which continues the cycle of poverty.

“One way giving keeps the needy in the needy role and the giver in the giving role. It diminishes relationships.” – This was incredibly challenging in regards to how the giver can often relish their position and never relinquish it to those they give to. We can participate in giving olds clothes and gifts in a way that removes the dignity of the poor and disempowers them. So challenging.

I also got to lead my first breakout session at a conference. How to get those who care about you to care about your mission. It was fun to share what I’ve learned (and continue to learn) about meeting people where they are, helping them understand the mission God has called you to, and how you invite them to participate and engage needs with you.

But nothing really compared to listen to Dr. John Perkins. I was able to meet him and just thank him for his life, his love for Jesus, and his faithfulness in ministering for the gospel of Jesus Christ. He has been a slave, fought for civil rights, created the Christian Community Development Association, and participated in discipling and creating many leaders to continue the work of restoring broken communities.

Some quotes from Dr. Perkins:

“We have deified capitalism to the point that the church is unable to speak prophetically into the system.” – He was discussed how capitalism is the best system in the world, but making it a god makes us slaves to a system that was meant to serve us. For the church, we are unable to talk about the brokenness of America’s abuse of capitalism because Christians have replaced Jesus with the system as well. A challenging thought for sure.

Listening to him talk about 50+ years of knowing and serving Jesus was such a powerful testimony to the worth of giving your life to serve Jesus and display Him through restoring brokenness in neighborhoods as well as systemic brokenness.

In the middle of Bob Lupton’s talk, I asked one of our church staff to buy the digital access for the Verge content because I know I wanted to hear it again. It’s worth it.

I ended the night with dinner and beverages with great missional community thinkers that challenged and encouraged me tremendously. It was a great day 1.

Tomorrow starts the Main Conference sessions that you can watch on simulcast if you want. It will be well worth your time.

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December 13, 2011 · 2:42 pm

Why I’m going to Verge and why you should too

Every year there are hundreds of church conferences where pastors and church leaders gather to collaborate and learn from speakers and breakout sessions. They are usually titled after a motivational word (Exponential, Vault, Catalyst, Unleash) tied to a theme for the conference.

I don’t like most church conferences.

So when I initially heard about Verge when I lived in Austin in 2010, I thought “Another Conference? Is this really necessary?” But since it was in my hometown at the time and focused on Missional Communities, a topic I am passionate about and now work to accomplish, I decided to go.

I was blown away.

It was unlike any church conference I had attended. I am used to a church conference that has all the celebrity pastors and feels more like a sales pitch for the pastor’s church/book/website/resources than about Jesus. When most conferences are promoting theology but lack practicals, or promoting practicals for church growth without good theology, Verge combined good theology with best practices. When many conferences pit the megachurch against the house church, Verge brought the two together and everyone else in between to focus on how each can learn from the other.

It started with Matt Carter & Francis Chan calling us to love Jesus more than our mission or method, what followed were speakers from house churches, global church planting movements, mega-church pastors, mid-size church pastors, and authors coming together to promote Jesus and the mission of the church over any method of church. I attended the pre-conference workshops, the main sessions, the breakouts, and I walked away challenged by truth and equipped for ministry. It’s the reason church conferences exist, but they rarely accomplish this goal.

That’s why I was disappointed to hear there was no Verge Conference in 2011, so I attended Exponential (which I will never do again and wish I would have attended RightNow instead), but it’s also why I’m excited for Verge 2012. Every pastor I meet, I recommend Verge to them because it really is, in my opinion, the best church conference and one of the few I will always attend.

Verge 2012 maintains the focus on missional communities, but has expanded it’s scope to address the impact of the gospel in mercy & justice through their For The City track and the impact of taking the gospel to the nations in their For The Nations track. The speakers continue to range from theologians to practitioners, from house church leaders to megachurch pastors, and everyone in between.

The For The City track has Dr. John Perkins who was a part of the civil rights movement and has done monumental work in establishing lasting Christian community development principles that inform the way we approach mercy & justice. It includes Dave Gibbons, Bob Lupton, and many others who have and are working to fight injustice, poverty, and seeking to extend the mercy of Jesus Christ.

The For The Nations track brings back George Patterson, who came off the stage into the audience at Verge in 2010 to make his point during his message and who has also been a part of starting and multiplying churches through Central America. He is joined by David Platt, author of Radical, and Jeremy Story, who is the president of Campus Renewal Ministries. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Jeremy here in New York City and am always encouraged by his heart to see God use the prayers of the church to fuel missions.

Verge was established as a Missional Community Conference, a conference focused on helping communities of believers join Jesus in renewing all things with the message and mercy of His gospel. It continues to bring some of the best thinkers and practitioners in missional communities with Hugh Halter, Alan Hirsch, Neil Cole, Jeff Vandersteldt and many others.

When I attended in 2010 I was a part of a college ministry in Austin while working as civil engineer. It influenced my approach to ministry, but also my approach to work and how I cared for my neighbors. I think that may be what is most unique about Verge, its ability to impact anyone who attends a church with the implications of the gospel let alone those who pastor them.

It’s only $129 (until Feb. 20) for 4 days that will encourage and refresh you as much as challenge you.

That’s why I’m attending Verge 2012 and you should too.

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April 21, 2011 · 11:00 am

What is a Missional Community?

This is the question that the Verge Network has been asking a number of leaders on their website, and this is the question that many churches around the country and world are asking, and this is the question I deal with on a daily basis as someone who oversees Community Groups, which we view as gospel communities on mission.

It’s a vital question for the church, which is typically seen as a Sunday event and maybe a small group bible study or Sunday school. Somewhere along the way, the common understanding of church became a place to go instead of a people who are going. A place to attend, instead of a people with a message to extend. The gospel was never to be kept inside of a church building, but was meant to define all of a Christian’s life and then lived out in a community that seeks to love and care for others.

The origins of the Missional Community idea are found in Acts chapter 2 in the scriptures that show a community responding to the good news of Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection by being devoted to God, devoted to one another, and devoted to including their friends and neighbors in the good news. Church history shows us St. Patrick who lived this out in a community that eventually evangelized all of Ireland this way.

So now the church is asking, what happened? How do we return to being a people that extend the message and mercy of Jesus Christ, the good news of a good Savior to the world around us? How does missions become normal and local instead of being seen as only an overseas endeavor?

In comes Missional Community. The name spells it out, a community of people that live on mission together. But as the Verge Network has proved with their question, every church & leader has their own way of living it out.

Ultimately Missional Community is about principles more than it is about exact practicals. The various definitions and forms that happen all over the country and world all carry the same principles but are practically lived out differently depending on leadership and context.

Those primary principles appear to be:
1. Gospel Identity: Everyone in the world lives defined by a certain identity. For the church & those in missional communities, that identity is found as someone saved by Jesus Christ’s work, not our efforts, and then sent as missionaries into the world. We’re not just blessed by God in Christ, we are also meant to be a blessing to others. We are missionaries because God is a missionary and we get to represent what He is like.
2. Community on Mission: Missional Communities is an acknowledgement that our salvation is not an individual, “me & my God” thing, but we are saved into a family or community that cares for one another and serves others together. When a community receives good news, it shares good news.
3. Gather around Mission: The missional community gathers around a specific evangelistic mission. Whether that’s a specific affinity group that everyone cares for or a geographic area where they live, each community has a specific group of people they want to extend the love of Christ to & serve them with the deeds of Christ. I’ve recently seen a greater emphasis on proximity rather than affinity.
4. Discipleship is the key to sustainability: In the past, churches relied on a singular dynamic leader & in some instances that is still the case, but missional communities focuses on enabling every person to be a missionary & minister (or leader) in serving other people with the gospel of Jesus Christ. Missional communities will only be as missional as their discipleship. Are they creating & enabling more people to be leaders? Are they making it simple & transferable? If not, it won’t last.
5. Multiplication: The goal of a missional community is not to grow large in numbers of people, but to create new expressions of community & compassionate mission. They see as their end, multiplying into many communities and spreading the gracious message of Jesus to as many people as possible.

As I mentioned earlier, various churches and leaders do it differently and summarize it in a variety of ways. Typically focuses on core values as they define their practice.

The Austin Stone has God, Gospel, Mission. Austin City Life, Soma Communities, Kaleo San Diego, & The Crowded House, from England, have formed the GCM Collective to share resources centered around Gospel, Community, & Mission.

3DM, originally from England, has Up, In, Out. Neil Cole says Divine Truth, Nurturing Relationships, Apostolic Mission. JR Woodward lists 5 things. Felicity Dale summarizes it as a multiplying family that shares life together on mission. Christian Community Church in Chicago, which puts on Exponential which is centered around the idea of Missional Communities this year uses the terms Grow, Connect, Expand.

If I understood what Alan Hirsch was saying half the time, I might be able to summarize it similarly, but his accent entrances me. I know he is saying profound and great things, I just have trouble summarizing it. His latest book, Right Here, Right Now, is fantastic and summarizes the movements of a Missional Community as Move Out, Move In, Move Alongside, Move From.

The practicals of all of these leaders in this idea vary, but the principles do not. Practicals range from size, house church or megachurch, content, location, discipleship methods, and on and on, but the principles are the necessary components for each individual church and leader to wrestle with and define in their context. The message and principles must be contextualized rather than merely adopting the practicals.

The non-negotiable is that to be a Christian is be a career missionary alongside a community and Missional Community or whatever you call it has become to most effective means for churches to live out this truth to our world.

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April 30, 2010 · 8:31 pm

What Francis Chan should force every lay leader to ask themselves

For those of you who do not know Francis Chan, he’s a godly man who is the lead pastor of Simi Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley, CA and the author of The Forgotten God and Crazy Love. He’s an incredibly dynamic speaker who travels North America and the world preaching the bible.

Recently, he announced to his congregation that the Lord has led him to step down from his highly successful job and pastoring a large mega-church in the suburbs of Los Angeles. It was the talk of Christian circles because why would a successful pastor leading a large church leave his position? If you have heard him speak in the last few years, it’s easy to see a man willing to do whatever God asks him to do. As he and his wife and family have prayed, they believe that God the Holy Spirit is leading them away from Cornerstone to something new and the crazy thing is, he doesn’t exactly know what it’s going to be.

As I’ve thought through this the last few weeks, I went through a range of thoughts. Mainly centered around my initial thought that “every pastor should have to wrestle with what Francis is doing and consider doing the same”.

But then I had to face the music and question whether I was willing to ask the same question of myself. I think the tendency of lay leadership is to expect a higher standard of their pastors than themselves.

That means that every lay leader, including myself, should have to ask 2 questions of ourselves in light of Francis Chan’s actions.

1)      Are we willing to follow God’s leading in our lives no matter what the cost? Are you willing to seek God and ask Him to lead you even if it means you have to change your life? And I’m not even talking about the big stuff yet, I’m talking about the little things. Are you willing to let God lead you to serve more in a church and sacrifice a night you could be watching Lost? Or are you willing to sacrifice your sports knowledge to spend time investing in your family or your neighbors for deeper relationship? These are small sacrifices that seem big because they’ve become part of our routine.

2)      Are you willing to follow God’s leading out of your job similar to the way Francis Chan did? Now this question just seems crazy to me. It seems irresponsible and foolish.

A thousand questions rush to my mind. How you will you make a living if God leads you away from your job? Are you even in a position to do so? How will you take care of your family? It involves so much fear, and reveals so much about me. You see, I say I believe God is the one who provides for my family in every way. I say I believe that God is in control of my job situation. I say that I believe God when he says that I shouldn’t worry about provisions because He says he provides for the birds and the flowers and I am much more valuable than that.

As church-going Christians, our tendency will be to assume the radical decisions like Francis’ are something pastors have to deal with, but the reality is that all Christians by declaration of faith profess to follow God no matter what the costs or where He leads. Francis’ decision forces us to deal with what we really believe.

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