Tag Archives: Church

January 18, 2013 · 1:50 pm

2013 Resolutions: The Fourth of Four

Recently I read the book Dangerous Calling by Paul Tripp. He openly discusses the culture of the church that typically views the pastor as having it all together all the time and how this pressure can be challenging on pastors. While God has called qualified people to be pastors, they are still people, flawed and in need of a Savior. Their character, convictions, and competencies are those of a leader, but no leader is perfect and expectations must change.

My last resolution is to be a faithful shepherd, pastor of my church, but also to be a fellow brother in Christ with my church. The fourth of four resolutions is simply to be a friend and to be a friend in need. 4a & 4b if you will.

To be a friend & a friend in need

The gospel of Jesus Christ is a powerful thing, powerful to save anyone from a life bent away from God’s desires, transform anyone, and empower all who embrace it by faith to meet the needs of others. Throughout the scriptures, God speaks about blessing people with Himself in order that they would be a blessing for others.

Part of this reality is that I am have been given certain gifts and a certain role in the body of Christ, for me it is to be a pastor. This involves studying the word of God, praying, counseling people in the scriptures, dialoguing about Jesus and His gospel with anyone regardless of their beliefs or background, and cultivating communities that do the same. If you were to boil it down to one idea, it’s to be a true friend to anyone I meet, to love them with the love of Christ that they might know about a relationship with God.

But the gospel of Jesus Christ is also powerful enough for me to confront my weakness. This brings freedom to acknowledge that there are times when I am a friend in need and that God has provided people in my life, from all background or beliefs and especially in the church that share my beliefs to help me when I am in need.

The perception that the pastor has it all together all the time is an impossible expectation because no one does, except for Jesus. We are all in progress, constantly learning and growing, and the gospel of Jesus Christ brings freedom to walk in this reality. This allows me to sit down with a friend and be honest. I can let people know that there are times when I’m tired, times when I’m not as happy as I wish I was or had been last week and that I need their help to change. That there are times when I’m not fired up about reading the scriptures or talking about the Lord, but I don’t want to feel this way and many times it is the help of other people in our community, using their stories and their gifts that God provides a path toward change.

Use My Gifts and Benefit from the Gifts of Others

This also provides me perspective on how I’m gifted and to celebrate how others have been gifted. It takes the pressure off to always have the solution, to be able to say I don’t know, and to honor how God has uniquely gifted other people. God’s design was to gift all of God’s people to serve all of God’s creation.

When all gifts are celebrated, honored, and embraced by the church, the church truly begins to embody Jesus Christ who possesses and exercises all of the gifts perfectly. The church would like everyone they interact with to experience Jesus through them, but it’s only possible when individuals are introduced and invited to experience the entire community of Christ followers.

I hope this year involves helping people identify how they have been uniquely designed and gifted by God to serve others, to equip them and empower them to do so and to see those gifts be used to love others well.

These are my resolutions and I hope that I can look back at the end of the year having been fully present to enjoy my marriage, love my kids, and serve the city we live in by empowering and serving my church. Here’s to 2013.

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September 5, 2012 · 11:09 am

Soccernomics & Church: Lack of Innovation

(This is post 5 in a series of blog posts on how a book on soccer, Soccernomics, can teach us much about the American church.)

From hiring practices to game strategy, soccer clubs love to do what has always been done which leads to unprofitable and unsuccessful soccer. The church is also notorious for lacking innovation in methods and this lack of innovation would be foolish in a culture that is changing the way they interact, plan their lives and engage with the wider society.

Lack of innovation in soccer

Soccernomics highlights the glacial pace at which most soccer clubs embrace new ideas and innovation. Often the ideas do not come from within a soccer club, but from an outside observer. One example was the Taylor Report in 1990, which simply evaluated the benefit that teams would receive from investing in their stadiums. The outside report led many soccer clubs to consider this for the first time resulting in growth in crowds and popularity. It’s as if soccer clubs discovered the world was filled with consumers for the first time. The authors also highlight the often foolish, yet ingrained way “things have always been done” in soccer clubs.

The hiring practices for a new manager for soccer clubs is often based on perception of his star power. This aim leads to managerial hiring that is often quick, lacking a thorough interview process, not assessing qualifications, but looking for immediate availability and making a media splash. Then when he fails, the cycle repeats because it was not the process that failed, but the specific manager.

The soccer clubs are often so concerned with the immediate fan reaction that they make foolish decisions about players, thinking a big signing will generate fan interest immediately rather building for a long haul and we’ve already addressed the suspicion of outside ideas about soccer strategy.l

Lack of innovation in the church

The way it’s always been done is not only cherished in soccer clubs, but in the local church. It is often unquestioned and off limits for being challenged in most churches.

One thing is certain for churches, theology does not change. We are a modern expression of an ancient faith articulated extremely clearly and well in the scriptures. Culture would like much of it to change, but changing God’s words are impossible since they originate from the unchanging, eternal God. We embrace the fullness of God in Jesus letting His truths shape our life, ministry practices, and the mission to meet the needs of others with the message and mercy of Christ.

Theology doesn’t change, but methodology must be evaluated and this is where the glacial pace of embracing change is so easily seen. I’m no stranger to this myself, as I once hated the idea of changing of a method of small groups to missional communities. Sunday services, Mass, and gathering mid-week at the local church only are not enough. This has become clear from declining numbers that churches aren’t the most welcoming places for people who are far from God. If the mission of the church is to help people who are far from God grow near to God, why are we waiting for those far away to stumble into a church?

Away From Programs & On toward Mission

There are too many churches that are filled with programs. There’s a pre-school ministry on Sunday morning, another one (Awanas) on Monday night and a Mother’s Day Out program during the week so your child can overdose on church meanwhile the rest of the world takes their kids to the local playground. There’s a men’s ministry, women’s ministry, singles ministry, marrieds, retirees, pre-retirees, and the list goes on. For every affinity, the church has adopted the Field of Dreams “If we create a niche ministry, they will come.”

The church is meant to be a community on mission and over-programming a church leads to death of the mission for outsiders at the embrace of a mission for insiders. In churches that are under-programmed it can be difficult for people to feel involved because this mentality of over-activity at the church has become so ingrained over the last few decades.

The Widening Gap Between Cultural & Church Norms

I am not advocating for any kind of aim toward cultural relevance, I’m asking that we as the church evaluate whether we place unnecessary burdens and barriers towards encountering our culture to provide a complex dialogue about faith and life. Are the activities of the church normal to our society or have the methods become so abnormal that they are uncomfortable to those outside the church? Think about the ways churches gather as small groups or form for mission.

These small groups often meet in a local home, gathering in a circle to discuss the bible and the challenges of life. Where does the rest of the world gather? Local restaurants, pubs, playgrounds, school yards, PTA, and sports clubs to discuss how their worldview is shaping their experience of life. They might not describe it as their worldview, but their frustrations at home, work, or in relationships are because of their aims in life (i.e. worldview).

Looking at the life of Christ, it is easy to see one who is confident in God, freed to enter into every arena of life, risking reputation, to demonstrate the goodness, strength, and love of God to those far from God. Those who claim to represent Him are called to do the same. Our methods of church are not the silver bullet to seeing people come near to God, the gospel of Jesus Christ is the power of God to see people be reconciled to relationship with God. But our methods can have a way of distracting from the gospel, of bottling the gospel, and hindering it from being demonstrated and declared.

Preaching to the Choir or those who aren’t there?

As this gets demonstrated in soccer clubs at matches where the team with foolish practices doesn’t do well on the pitch, Sundays demonstrate the culture of the church. Music, sermons, and whether a people are welcome demonstrate if we are preaching to the choir or preaching to those who aren’t there.

Are we simply gathering to comfort and enjoy our fellow Christians or are we hoping to bring a friend, neighbor, or co-worker? If we did would they hear preaching that is aimed at the long-time Christian or aimed to exalt Christ for Christian & non-Christian alike? Our Sunday gatherings should be a reflection of our community life outside Sundays. If neither reflect a desire to connect with the people of our culture to engage in a complex dialogue the way Christ did, our methods are failing our gospel.

Since the gospel of Jesus Christ never changes, we should be ready, willing, and quick to evaluate and embrace new ideas in methodology rather than write them off because they don’t fit into what we are used to. The mission of God was made to enter into any environment with grace, love, and power. Innovations in pursuing this mission without compromising the truths of the gospel are a gift from God rather than a diversion from Him.

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August 28, 2012 · 11:26 am

Soccernomics & Church: The Wisdom of Crowds

(This is post 4 in a series of blog posts on how a book on soccer, Soccernomics, can teach us much about the American church.)

Decisions can often be made in a vacuum in business, professional sports clubs, and churches. They lack information from a variety of sources that allows them to make appropriate decisions.

The authors of Soccernomics highlight the French soccer club Olympique Lyon, a club that in 1987 was unknown and unloved even by local residents, but now consistently finds itself competing in the Champions League as one of the sixteen best teams in Europe. The rise of this soccer club is largely attributed to their management over their coaching and Soccernomics highlights their use of the wisdom of crowds in decision-making when choosing their players, which is large part of the success of a soccer club.

“Lyon’s method for choosing players is so obvious and smart that it’s surprising that all clubs don’t use it. The theory of the “wisdom of crowds” says that if you aggregate many different opinions from a diverse group of people, you are more likely to arrive at the best opinion than if you just listen to one specialist…If you ask a diverse set of gamblers to bet on, say the outcome of a presidential election, the average of their bets is likely to be right. (Gambling markets have proved excellent predictors of all sorts of outcomes.) The wisdom of crowds fails when the components of the crowd are not diverse enough. This is often the case in American sports. But in European soccer, opinions tend to come from many different countries, and that helps ensure diversity…

At most clubs the manager is treated as a sort of divinely inspired monarch who gets to decide everything until he is sacked. Then the next manager clears out his predecessor’s signings at a discount.” Soccernomics p. 68-69

Lyon’s stability of leadership and method of incorporating a number of voices when selecting a player provides a consistent strategy that leads to success regardless of the manager.

The wisdom of crowds involves incorporating team leadership and cultivating a collective vision. It isn’t easy, but it’s worth the challenging process for guiding people toward a common mission.

Could the American church benefit from using the wisdom of crowds?

The church tends to lack this mentality and can often operate like an English soccer club, where one or two individuals are the divinely inspired voice to make each and every decision. The result for the church is often copying the latest trends, adopting someone else’s methods, and doing little in the way of applying biblical principles to the local community of God.

The Bible speaks to a different way that actually precedes the theory of the wisdom of crowds and speaks to the value of seeking counsel and plurality of leadership. Proverbs 15:22 says “Without counsel plans fail, but with many advisors they succeed.” Proverbs 20:18 “Plans are established by counsel; by wise guidance wage war.”

In the New Testament, the church in Acts, the instructions of the authors of the Epistles, and the method of Jesus was a plurality of leadership. It was 12 apostles that Jesus sent out, it was different gifts that Paul pointed to in Ephesus as the equippers of the saints of the church, and elders were always to be appointed to lead in the church. The wisdom of crowds appears to be God’s idea and design.

While the American church agrees with this, it has adopted the CEO model of the business world pointing to the idea of ‘first among equals’ in leadership which tends to place final authority in the hands of one. 9Marks, an organization focused on building healthy churches, has some good thoughts on this here.

While there is inevitably a first among equals that has to make the final decision, does that authority come from the teachings of scripture or from the position? While there can be a specialist on a church staff in community, preaching, mercy & justice, counseling, and even vision, that does not negate the wisdom from other members of that staff and church. The specialist actually improves their ability to lead by listening to other voices, diminishing their pride in their own ideas to let the wisdom of crowds shape a better path going forward.

Sounds like a great idea, but how would this practically function in a church, a small group, or other ministry?

Develop a Collective Vision: Come with a Plan & Open Hands

I can speak to how I’m seeking to incorporate this into my leadership and in leading a small group. I’m a internal processor who likes to think through every aspect of a plan, develop a strategy and assume it’s bulletproof, but as I’ve come to find out (shockingly) my ideas are not always comprehensive, complete or perfect.

So as we enter into a new season of Community Groups, I’ve chosen to solicit feedback and create environments to utilize the wisdom of crowds. I still have a plan, a rather thorough one, but I come with open hands to listen to how the plan may shape out in a particular area or to see what holes I may be blind to.  This is kind of a first draft of a vision if you will. Effort is put into it, but I’m not holding it so tight that it cannot evolve to the ideas and wisdom of other invested members and leaders.

On our church staff, I’ve become known as someone that develops lengthy documents on ideas because I want the document to be the beginning of a brainstorming process. From there it’s been a hard, but good process to let my ideas be shaped, critiqued, and molded by the wisdom of others.

For our community groups, I’ve set up a community group roundtable dinners with different sets of leaders to allow them to ask questions, solicit feedback on what they hear when the vision is set before them, what areas are unclear and how they see this vision being accomplished in their local community. These are often refreshing times for me to listen to what is going on in each community, hear their questions and challenges to incorporate these ideas in shaping the final direction of the vision.

In our community groups, I encourage our leaders to think through how to incorporate our core values of Gospel Enjoyment, Intentional Community, & Prayerful Mission practically in their local neighborhood. After they think through this, I encourage them to discuss these ideas with their community, invite their feedback and form a collective vision and understanding going forward. This collective vision process creates ownership and momentum towards the entire community being on board to implement their vision and not the dictated vision from above.

Do we believe God has gifted every believer or is that just rhetoric?

For the American church, and likely the global church, we have to confront whether we truly believe what the scriptures say about the gospel of Jesus Christ. The New Testament clearly states that every person who has placed their faith in Christ and seeks to live their life following His ways is empowered by God the Holy Spirit with gifts that are used to build up the body of Christ. Every church leader cognitively believes this, but not every church leader practically believes this.

The professionalization of the ministry and mission of God tends to lead to a separation between church staff and church attenders. The staff has been given by God to spend their energy listening to God and forming a plan, but incorporating and empowering the members of the local church to shape, finalize and join the mission of God to love, care for, and speak into their neighborhood with the gospel.

The wisdom of crowds is not merely a sociological idea, it’s the design and gift of God as He gives the church a community to establish their collective vision for extending the good news of Christ to their city. When the church moves beyond rhetoric and begins listening to the empowered believers in their church, it will benefit greatly. It does not negate the value of church staff, but rather enhances their leadership.

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May 15, 2012 · 10:37 am

The Life Cycle of a Missional Community

At the beginning of each new season of Community Groups at Apostles Church, we gather together as leaders to re-focus on the gospel and our core values while also highlighting important points of emphasis for the season. Back in January we gathered for 3 hours, had amazing conversation, shared a meal and communion with one another to start the year. It was a great beginning.

One of the things we discussed was the life cycle of a gospel-centered community on mission (missional community). Every living thing has a specific life cycle and it’s important to identify this for a Community Group so leaders don’t have false expectations throughout leading their community.

Every community goes through a time of formation, fun, messiness, mission, and multiplying.

Formation

This is the beginning of the community where developing relationships, vision, and a cohesive direction happen. It’s a crucial time, but it also takes longer than most people think.

Many leaders approach a new community thinking it will develop great relationships quickly and when the first few gatherings of the community turn out to be awkward, they’re confused. Communities typically take at least 3-6 months to form quality relationships and begin to care for one another well. There are some communities that form faster and some slower, but it generally takes about this much time.

This is the point where the community lays the foundation, vision, and future direction for the community. For missional communities, it is essential to begin with the understanding of and preparation for extending the gospel on mission and eventually multiplying. Each community must recognize that this will not be the last community they will be in and more than that, begin seeking to extend the community to others from day one.

The community takes this time to get to know one another, to work through the awkwardness, to begin bearing one another’s burdens, learning how to care for one another and extend the message and mercy of Christ together as a community.

Fun

After the community forms, there is usually a time period where things are pretty smooth and enjoyable. Relationships have been developed, depth of gospel conversations is happening, and the community is beginning to extend the gospel. This usually happens for a few months.

It is easy during this time for the leader to feel like the community is successful, but the community is about to face a new challenge that can feel like failure.

Messiness

As a community is established on the foundation of the gospel of Jesus Christ, it will eventually face a season of messiness. This time of messiness happens when people begin to feel comfortable sharing the junk in their lives. Sins, past hurts, brokenness, and ongoing struggles begin to be confessed. Most leaders assume failure because hard things are being revealed and it’s not “picture perfect”, but messiness is actually the best sign of gospel health. Confused yet?

Messiness reveals that the community is actually founded on the gospel of Christ and not just merely liking one another. The gospel of Jesus Christ tells us that we are sinful, but we don’t have to make up for our sinfulness, mistakes, errors, and brokenness because Jesus did that for us through His perfect life, forgiving death on the cross, and life-giving resurrection from the dead. As the community continues to encouraged people to believe this for every area of their life, the people in the community begin to realize that freedom from the burdens of sin and brokenness is actually possible.

An opportunity to be rid of guilt and shame through confession and belief in the power of the gospel gives great comfort to people and lets them begin to share where their lives don’t match up with Christ’s life.

This is messy and this is good. This is how a community becomes empowered by the gospel, by letting the truths of Christ’s redemptive work transform the individuals within the community. Healthy mission follows healthy gospel transformation. If you want to know why your small group or church aren’t on mission, it’s because the gospel of Jesus Christ hasn’t been applied to the community yet. When the gospel is applied, sin is confessed, and people become delighted in Christ over themselves, mission follows naturally.

Mission

As the gospel of Christ is applied to the ordinary life of the community, the ordinary life becomes a place of a great mission. Mission as a community is extending the regular rhythm and life activities of the community to people’s neighbors, co-workers, and family. It’s opening the community to new people to let them experience a community shaped by the gospel.

This happens through meals together, gospel conversations over late nights, nights out together, family outings and every other “normal” activity that both the community and the local neighborhood participate in.

One side of mission that can be neglected by a missional community (to its own peril) is extending the mercy of Jesus Christ through social justice. The phrase social justice makes some people cringe, but Jesus was clear that His disciples would experience His salvation in such a way that they couldn’t help but care for the poor and the marginalized. Something powerful happens to a community that takes ownership of their neighborhood to the point of creative compassion to meet the needs of the neighborhood around them.

Mission is a time where the community continues to grow in their knowledge of God, His gospel, and their love for one another. The results are usually that the community grows in number and then it faces another challenge. Will the community multiply or will it decline?

Multiplying

As a community grows, it approaches a point where it either multiplies, creating another community or it begins to decline as a community. Becoming multiple communities is challenging, but remember in formation that this was planned and discussed. It doesn’t make it any easier though. If the community chooses to delay multiplying, they will see the community decline, the conversations begin to lack the gospel depth they once had and mission becomes harder with a larger community.

Most communities delay multiplication out of fear. They fear losing friends and relationships. Multiplying is never easy, but often results in the exact opposite of these fears. I’ve seen multiple communities where friendships deepened as a result of multiplying. While they no longer spent as much time together, their time together developed a quality in encouragement and care that they had not seen before placing the gospel mission before their relationships.

Following multiplication, the life cycle begins again for both communities. It can be a confusing and challenging time after experiencing great things in the original community, but eventually each community begins to see the same results of the gospel they had seen earlier.

While this is the typical life cycle of a missional community, some communities that are starting in brand new areas where there isn’t a gospel presence from their church community face a more challenging and longer process for developing as a community. Tomorrow, I’ll look at the challenges facing missional communities that are started in new areas and later in the week, I’ll look at the key components of the formation of a new missional community.

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April 25, 2012 · 12:45 pm

The Gospel, Christian Parenting, & Schooling Options

When I first became a parent I was taken aback by how quickly I wanted to find the right method of parenting and trumpet it as the authoritative way that every parent should do it! It wasn’t just me though, everyone reads and discusses being an attachment parent, if you’re going to Ferber-ize your child and everyone has their own advice they’d like to give you.

It can be a stressful situation that new parents find themselves in because it feels like there should be ONE right way that you HAVE to figure out or you’re going to screw up your kid for life. This is true for any parents, but I especially saw the debate inside of a church setting as even more heated. This is the result of people baptizing their family preferences in the gospel of Christ and seeking to make it an absolute truth that everyone should follow.

This is made worse by the fact that disagreeing on parenting methods is seen as an inappropriate conversation in many circles. People feel judged and offended, but we were blessing to be living inside of a Christian community that didn’t allow it to be an off-limits conversation.

It helped us to distinguish between gospel-centered parenting and preference-exalting parenting. Gospel-centered parenting sees the truths of Jesus Christ’ life, death, and resurrection and the scriptures as the primary focus and principles that shapes all of parenting. This outlines the purpose of a family, how the mission of God is accomplished as a family, and how the family is to interact with one another, the church, and the world. It informs the principles, attitudes, discipline and education for children in parenting.

Preference-exalting parenting agrees with gospel-centered parenting but typically goes beyond that to define the exact methods that must be followed to accomplish all that parenting entails. This happens when homeschooling parents are ostracized as culture-fearing super-protective parents and this also happens when people interpret the scriptures admonition to educate in the Lord to only mean classical Christian education condemning those who choose public school.

As my kids have grown and the schooling conversation has entered our lives, it’s felt like we had our first baby all over again. Questions, our convictions and desires,  along with other people’s convictions and preferences were coming at us. Can you be a Christian parent and send your child to public school? Does being a Christian parent mean homeschooling or private Christian schooling?

It has been a challenging process of asking and exploring these questions theologically, practically, and discussing these ideas with a number of other people and families. It has become clear that many people want to exalt their way of schooling as the perfect way to follow Christ and be a Christian parent, but God does not spell out a perfect method of schooling.

Christian parents are tasked with the responsibility to educate their children in the scriptures, the gospel of Jesus Christ and develop them to be able to maturely encounter a world that increasingly doesn’t believe the same truths.

The education of a child plays into this task tremendously, so parents must explore and examine the best route for their child, their family, and themselves for schooling. There is not just one option for Christian families and the church must be more open and ready to equip families to enjoy the benefits and tackle the challenges of each.

As each Christian family decides how to educate their child, the gospel of Jesus Christ gives them the freedom to have confidence in their choice without condemnation of those who do not choose the same as them. When a church is filled with families who have confidence in their families approach to education, they can be a collection of families who collaborate for the holistic flourishing of the children in the church and in their city.

Not One, but Many Schooling Options for Christian Families

There are predominantly 5 major options for a Christian family when approaching education. Each of them has their challenges in seeking to follow Christ, but the church should encourage, and needs, gospel-centered families in every single option. The mission of the church is to display and declare Jesus to every sphere of life and schooling is one of those spheres.

Currently, here are the 5 options I see:

  1. Private School
  2. Private Christian School
  3. Public School
  4. Homeschooling
  5. Charter School

We spent a year exploring these different options before enrolling Eli in public school here in New York City and it’s been amazing, but it hasn’t been without its challenges.

I’m hoping to discuss the benefits and challenges for gospel-centered parenting that each of these options present another time.

Here’s the major challenge and the most necessary thing for a church community to encourage for families. Families need to be encouraged to have confidence in their schooling choice without condemning others and families need to collaborate for holistic flourishing.

Confidence without Condemnation

There have been times when I have felt condemned and even seen as foolish for sending my child to public school, as if I’m failing them in their spiritual journey by sending them to public school. I also know that others families have felt condemned by me because of our confidence in sending our children to public school.

I’ve seen too many Christian parents that seem almost embarrassed about their schooling choice, whatever it may be, and that needs to change. Families should be confident in the direction and vision they have for their families to be educated and their families to embody Jesus in every environment.

Without confidence, condemnation will be felt and conveyed, but confidence provides the freedom to communicate the motivations for the schooling options. This sets you free from the need to exalt your choice above others and the ability to acknowledge and understand others’ choices.

Collaboration For Every Holistic Flourishing

Since each schooling options provides its unique challenges, I imagine the beauty of collaboration among families. Imagine the homeschooling families sharing their wisdom in teaching their children scriptural truths being shared with families of children who only have a few hours every night and weekends to do so because of school outside the home.

Imagine public, charter, and private school families inviting their homeschooling friends to share in the social and missional benefits they lack from schooling at home.

I see great benefit, encouragement, and empowerment in families with confidence in their schooling choice seeking to collaborate for the benefit of their children. The gospel of Jesus Christ calls us to be an alternative community in our way of living, but also to be that community in the midst of people who believe differently than we do.

For families, the way we educate our children has implications for our ability to embody the gospel to one another and to the world around us. We have a responsibility to our kids, but also to our neighbor’s kids so we must take that corporate responsibility to seek the holistic flourishing of our families and the families of our city.

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April 19, 2012 · 2:28 pm

Missional Community Implications: For Church

I’m a big fan of missional communities as I believe the scriptures clearly articulate the power and intent of God for a community to demonstrate the gospel of Jesus Christ through their love for one another and their neighbors.

It’s becoming a larger conversation and many churches are considering the idea. As they consider it, they must consider and be ready for the implications. The idea sounds new and exciting, but directly affects the common understanding of church. As I’ve thought about it and considered it, there are many implications depending on the current approach of a church, but overall there are 4 immediate implications for which a church should be prepared.

Monday-Saturday as valuable as Sunday

The Sunday gathering is what most people call church, but the scriptures use church to describe a people, not a service or a building. For a church to implement Christ-centered communities on mission, they will have to give as much, if not more, effort to equipping people to let their faith affect the rest of their week as they do to putting on a Sunday service. Is the church ready to spend its effort on equipping the saints? If it is not, missional community is merely a brand name change without substance.

This does not mean that you need to abolish the Sunday gathering as some have suggested, but it does mean you no longer treat the music or the sermon as the primary point of mission for your church.  The Sunday activities become a part of the rhythm of mission that occurs amongst the community. It becomes catalyst and culmination of mission that leads to the worship of Christ. Is the church ready to define mission as the everyday extension and representation of the gospel of Christ to the world? If not, missional communities will not be missional at all.

In moving this direction, a church also begins to address the personality driven nature and the celebrity pastor culture that can be prevalent for many churches. Leadership is no longer confined to a few “professionals”, but freely spread across an entire community. This can be uncomfortable at first for pastors and congregants who are not used to having less/more ability to lead God’s people. Missional communities thrive in a church where leaders are ready to celebrate others gifts and stories of loving their community.

Mission Requires Margin Requiring Less Church Events

The church calendar can be the biggest impediment of mission. How busy is your church? How busy is the church staff or key church leaders with church or Christian-only activities? It’s not necessarily that church activities can’t also be missional, but for many churches the activities continue the “come to me to hear about Jesus” mentality rather than entering into the neighborhoods activities following Jesus’ “go and tell” charge.

A church will need to evaluate their current calendar and activities to evaluate if they are asking the impossible of the community of God. Most people are fighting for margin already and need the church to give them the freedom to join their co-workers, friends, and neighbors in their activities. This may mean they don’t come to church on a Sunday occasionally (blasphemy!?!?) but that will confront the church’s view of the overall purpose of the community of God.

Missional communities thrive when margin is provided to exist as members of their neighborhood and church events/activities/equipping needs to serve to supplement rather than compete.

Church Programs, Committees, & Ministries Will End

This is the biggest one for many churches in established denominations. Every ministry, program, or church committee will have to be re-evaluated and adapted to join the missional community mentality or missional community becomes another option on the church activity buffet line.

If a church wants to release their people (they may not) to love their neighbors and serve their neighborhood, every ministry or ministry opportunity needs to be evaluated. Does it compete with or encourage Christians to join the mission of extending Christ’s love to all?  This coincides with the mission requiring margin because many of the programs are more church activity to make people feel involved or contributing when they need to connected to a community not a church task.

A church of missional communities thrives when the entire church is flowing in the same direction. It’s not to say there won’t be care or counseling ministries or similar things that focus on the church community only, but it’s recognizing that those ministries end in missional communities.

Every Vocation is a Spiritual Calling

Most people spend more time at work than they do anything else. If this is not seen and encouraged as an opportunity to exalt Christ with and at work, then there will only be one spiritual job – full-time ministry. Throughout the scriptures we see God specifically impart abilities to people that have nothing to do with our understanding of full-time ministry, but God does this to make Himself known through work.

Every company can be a people group to extend the gospel to and an opportunity to display the love of God and the magnificence of God through the work. Until we all see ourselves as missionaries sent by God in every profession, we will only see church staff members as people paid for ministry. That is a false understanding of who ultimately provides all things for us (God) and is able to use any means possible to fund His missionaries (your salary from your company).

Missional communities thrive when people see all of their life as an opportunity to demonstrate the grace, mercy & transformative love of Jesus Christ to whomever they encounter. This means their jobs, their neighborhood, and their favorite restaurant is an opportunity to display Jesus to the world.

Is it worth it?

This is surely what many churches will begin asking. Is it worth it to affect the status quo? Is it worth it to transition to missional communities if it will take years to do so? Is it worth it if it will cause frustration amongst a people who like the building-Sunday service understanding of Church?

Make no mistake, it will be a challenge for every church that chooses to pursue missional communities, but asking is it worth it with an eye toward the implications is the wrong question.

The right question is, does Jesus deserve the worship of everyone in my neighborhood and city? That answer is yes, He is the only one worthy of worship, the only one who loves perfectly, challenges perfectly, and transforms people. Because of this, any difficulty a church has in extending the gospel of Christ to cause more worship of Jesus is worth it.

Aside from that, I can share that personally there is no greater joy than being in a community that loves the gospel of Christ most and being a part of extending that gospel to others.

So yes, all of these implications are worth it.

 

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April 10, 2012 · 10:33 am

The Disciple

At our church, we just concluded a series titled The Disciple. We asked the question, how would a disciple of Christ look different than a disciple of the culture, specifically in New York City? As we looked at the scriptures to answer this question aiming to identify the true call of the follower of God in a context that increasingly does not follow God, we discovered that a disciple of Christ instead of culture would look different and point to an alternative way of life.

We narrowed it down to 6 specific characteristics and covered them over the 6 Sundays involved in Lent. It was definitely one of the most profound sermon series I’ve been a part of as it forced anyone listening to be confronted with whether the culture was dictating their life or their beliefs.

We are all disciples, it’s not a question of will we or won’t we be a disciple. The question is who are we disciples of? Our culture produces different disciples than our churches should be producing if the churches are making disciples of Christ. The Christian must consider whether they are following Christ with their life or merely with their words.

Each sermon and the audio is below. I had the honor to preach on the Supernatural Love of Others while the great JR Vassar preached the others. I was blessed by this sermon series and I hope you will be too. You can also download these podcasts from iTunes.

The Call to Rest

A disciple must first decide to follow a certain way of living. The invitation of Jesus is initially to find rest and trust in God rather than to find identity in exhaustive work and trust in our efforts. JR preached from Matthew 11:25-30 on The Call to Rest.

Incomparable Love

Many think of being a disciple as a duty, but Christ calls those who will follow Him to love Him most. The disciple is someone who loves God so much that his/her love for others looks like hatred in comparison to his/her love for God. JR preached from Matthew 10:34-39 on this type of Incomparable Love.

Renunciation of Self

Just as Christ has chosen to lay down His life for others, to be His disciple we are called to align with God even against ourselves. Instead of pursuing our own ways and our own desires, we are called to deny ourselves for the benefit of others. JR preached on Luke 9:23-27 about the Renunciation of Self.

Abiding in Jesus

The disciple of Jesus Christ is called to agree with, spend time learning about and letting their thoughts and affections be guided towards God. However we spend our thoughts or affections, intentional or not, is ultimately what we become. We all long for success, but the disciple of Christ finds this through abiding in Jesus. JR preached from John 15 on Abiding in Jesus.

Supernatural Love of Others

In John 13:34-35 Jesus issues a new command to His disciples to love others as they have been loved. Christ goes on to show that a loving community is the method of His mission. While the culture calls us to a tolerant love, Christ calls us to a transformative love. I had the privilege to preach on a the Supernatural Love for Others.

Stewardship of Life

All of us have been given certain talents, gifts, abilities, resources, and time that enable us to create a life for ourselves and others. While our culture encourages us to use these things for ourselves and the building of our most successful selves, Christ calls us to use all that has been given to us, much that we could not create in ourselves, for God and for others. It’s a redefining of success as faithfully using these things for God’s purposes and not just our own. JR preached on Matthew 25:14-30 about the Stewardship of Life.

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April 4, 2012 · 11:27 am

Reading the Bible with People who Don’t Believe it

I didn’t grow up going to church and when I finally did, I started reading the bible on my own. I started reading from Genesis hoping I would end in Revelation and after 5 and ½ years I did. But even reading it on my own, there was much confusion and many questions. It wasn’t until I was a sophomore in college that someone invited me to read the bible with them, answer my questions, and challenge my worldview.

I started to be confronted with a theology I had built of God based on my experiences rather than what God says about who He is in the bible.

Five years later, I was challenged to be on the other end of that equation, to invite people to read the bible with me who didn’t believe it. I was challenged to extend an invitation to people that might be curious about Christianity or understanding who Jesus is, what He did, and why He is so important. I remember thinking, “Why would anyone who doesn’t believe it, want to read it with me?” all while forgetting the affect reading scripture had on my own life.

Since then, I’ve read through the gospel account with a number of people who do not believe it, have no faith or have a faith that is dramatically different than mine. I have found these interactions to be the most amazing, joy-filled and impactful times in my life. As I’ve started to do this again with some friends of mine recently and I began thinking about what I’ve learned in the process of inviting people who don’t believe it to read the bible with me.

Bad religious experiences define understanding of Jesus

Most people have a view of God that is based on poor religious experiences with flawed Christian churches rather than on seeking to understand Jesus Christ in the Bible. I’ve heard so many stories of not wanting to associate with Christ because of experiencing judgment and hypocrisy from those claiming to be Christians and from church experiences.

It’s important to recognize that all Christians and churches are flawed, which is why the gospel of Jesus Christ exists. This gives us the freedom to apologize for the sins of others who claim Christ, our own sins and build bridges of imperfection in people that lead to a perfect Christ.

Listening to them tell their story of their interactions with Christianity will be a great way to connect their current theology to their religious experience. Reading the bible together allows the scriptures to explain Jesus and Christianity better than our experiences.

Explore Jesus & Christianity, not Church

There’s no reason to discuss joining a church if people are just beginning to explore Christianity. I’ve learned to distinguish reading the bible from joining a church, not to neglect the church community, but to remove any obstacles to truly exploring Jesus.

Relationship & Gospel Receptivity is Essential

Evangelicalism can put such an emphasis on knowledge that it neglects the relational aspect of life. When it comes to sharing our faith with others, we can easily forget that our lives testify to the truth of our words. Authenticity is the expression of our faith through everyday life.

Only if people are somewhat receptive to the gospel will they be receptive to reading the bible that explains the gospel. I’ve learned to only extend this kind of invitation to people who express a desire to learn about God, God’s grace, Jesus or the gospel of Jesus Christ. This is because I know the bible is better at explaining these things than my words.

Explain the story & content of scripture

If you are familiar with scripture, you will easily forget how much you assume in regards to other people’s knowledge of the bible. Explain the story of God as laid out in the scriptures from Genesis to Revelation. Skipping straight to the gospel story misses the explanation of why a Savior is needed.

Additionally, it will be helpful to explain the Old & New Testament and the gospel accounts, since they have 4 different writers with 4 different perspectives. Similarly, you and I tell a story differently, the story has similarities, but key differences. Preparing people who are reading a book they don’t understand communicates concern for them and is essential to making the Bible more tangible for reading.

Listen, Answer Questions, & Learn

I usually recommend going through the gospel of John. This is partly because I love it, but also because it spells out clearly who Jesus is and what His purposes are. We usually read 2 chapters together and I encourage them to ask any and every question possible.

It’s amazing how much I learn when people who have fresh eyes on the reading point out things I easily skip. I don’t always know the answers, but then get to pursue the answers and follow up.

We also aim to share what we think these chapters are challenging us to do and how we are responding to the challenge.

Uncomfortable but Enjoyable

There have been times that I have done this and it’s been a complete train-wreck, and it is no doubt uncomfortable at first, but it really is incredibly enjoyable. Pushing past the initial awkwardness creates an opportunity to learn more about Jesus and more about one another.

Reading the bible with someone who doesn’t believe it lets the scriptures explain clearly who Jesus Christ is and what He has done for us in His life, death, and resurrection.

Much will be made of Easter Sunday this week, which can be one powerful day, but inviting people to read the scriptures for themselves moves beyond passive learning to active exploration.

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April 2, 2012 · 10:42 am

Filling the Missional Community Holes

On Wednesday, I wrote about how the church needs more than missional communities because the nature of these gospel-centered communities on mission are limited. While they are able to accomplish much in the area of discipleship and life transformation, they can be lacking when it comes to theological training, counseling, discipleship, and family equipping.

As I’ve looked into a number of churches who pursue missional communities, I’ve noticed that they supplement their communities in these areas to enable people to live gospel-centered lives with a group of people. These are just a few of the ways I’ve seen these addressed in a way that doesn’t run contrary to missional communities, but promotes mission in the context of a community of Christ-followers.

Theological Training

Porterbrook Network

Porterbrook Network was established in 2006 by Steve Timmis & Tim Chester. They are the authors of my favorite book to give away, Total Church. They established it to “equip individuals and churches to rediscover mission as their DNA, to become better lovers of God and lovers of others, and to proclaim the Gospel through word and action for the Glory of God.”

Our church had over 100 individuals sign up and go through the Porterbrook Learning material which is compact theological training, best processed within a community. What I love about the material is that all of it is designed to equip communities with the theological understanding of God and His mission. This propels a community toward application in mission rather than ending in knowledge as I’ve seen many a Sunday school class do.

Equipping Classes

One example of equipping classes that I’ve experienced and learned an immense amount from is the Get Trained Ministry at The Austin Stone Community Church. Equipping classes can be a great opportunity to further learning in the truth of the scriptures, Christian theology, and Christian mission.

The consistent danger to be avoided is creating another environment where passive learning can take place. Passive learning plays into the dominant consumerist nature that destroys Christian community and is a product of the culture, not the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Counseling

Counseling Centers

There seems to be a growing desire for Christian counseling to be operating in conjunction with a church and I am all for it. Professional Christian counseling without connection with a church seems contrary to the thrust of the scripture that sees God creating a loving community for His mission.

There have been a number of churches who have seen the value in professional counseling and have started Christian counseling centers. I love the idea of a church connected counseling center when it comes to Christian counselors because of the connection to the community. The downside of counseling can be its seclusion from a people who can care for, support, and provide accountability to the individual seeking change.

It embraces the idea that change of the individual is best accomplished in a community, while providing someone trained to address the issue and focused time to spend seeking healing. Counseling can too often manage your condition and circumstances, where a gospel-centered community can remind you that it’s about Jesus and only His redemptive work in the cross and resurrection can truly heal and transform you.

Redemption Groups

Redemption Groups were started by Mars Hill Church in Seattle, WA. They are an “intense small group that digs deep into difficult and seldom-discussed areas of life, such as abuse, addiction, and trials of all sorts.” Since the focus on missional communities is not a support group, redemption groups provide that environment to spend focused time addressing these issues.

They are also gospel focused in nature which aims to provide an easy transition into a missional community. The end goal must be a transformed community ready to extend the healing that they have received in the gospel.

Discipleship

Building a Discipleship Culture

Missional communities are one of the primary ways people can be discipled by Christ in a community. They must be a part of a church with a discipleship culture for them to truly serve the purpose of discipleship. Mike Breen & Steve Cockram’s book are great on cultivating a discipleship culture within the church.

While the book is great, the content doesn’t need to be simply copied and pasted into your community. Discipleship is ultimately implementing and embodying Jesus’ way of making disciples who make disciples. It was a repeatable process that focused on the few to reach the many instead of the modern church aim of focusing on the many to reach the few.

Family Equipping

Honestly, in the area of family equipping and missional communities, I’ve yet to find anything that cultivates families on mission & discipleship within families. I fully believe in integrating children into missional communities as it takes a community to disciple a child, but I also believe the church has the responsibility to equip parents in discipling their children.

Many churches provide age appropriate worship and peer contexts, but don’t confront the deferral parenting these have a tendency to create and our culture typically promotes. Other churches emphasize family discipleship and separate it from missional communities.

If anyone knows churches or ministries seeking to both, I’d love to learn. The church community is a family and a community of families. Equipping for gospel-centered parenting seeks to develop the missional community conversation for multiple generations. It’s a hole that still needs filling.

These are obviously just a few examples to assist gospel-centered communities on mission. There are many more and many that I am not aware of I’m sure. How have you seen churches supplement missional communities?

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February 26, 2012 · 10:54 am

Missional Community: Rhythms over Events

At Apostles Church, we are defined by 3 core values, Gospel Enjoyment, Intentional Community, and Prayerful Mission and our Community Groups aim to contextualize these values in their neighborhood. They are often guided by 3 convictions that we believe assist them in being a gospel community on mission. Those 3 convictions are proximity over affinity, rhythms over events, and integrating children.

A large shift in my understanding of church was moving from events to rhythms. Church has become a place to attend, an event to experience, rather than a people to partner with, a lifestyle of mission. Small groups aim to provide that expression of church, but can easily become another church event. So now church becomes Sunday & Tuesday night, but no community is actually built.

Let the Community happen all week

If a community forms a rhythm of life where interaction happens more often than once a week, then there is less pressure to accomplish so much in the formal group time. We try to cram prayer, bible discussion, mission discussion, accountability, confession into this time and it’s impossible. We then define success by whether we covered all portions of these or if the conversation was good. But the success of Christian community is so much more than great discussion, it’s the gospel applied to our everyday mundane lives and the gospel extended to our neighbors.

The challenge is to view yourself as part of a community that forms rhythms and patterns rather than a member of event that happens once a week. We all currently have rhythms of life for meals, work, rest and recreation. We must filter these through our faith and believe that the gospel informs and transforms our rhythms. We may need to transform our old rhythms and incorporate new rhythms.

Let the Community speak into your life

This type of Christian community only occurs when we reorient our lives with the community of God for the mission of God. Letting the community challenge the way we spend our time, letting them challenge our idols so we seek to build the kingdom of Christ rather than our own kingdom.

Jeff Vandersteldt describes mission as doing ordinary things with gospel intentionality. So it’s looking at current rhythms (when we eat, work, play) and asking how these can be shifted to incorporate our community and our neighbors so they become focused on the gospel. The kitchen table can be your greatest place of mission if you expand the reach of the meal you are already eating.

We may have to reorient our work schedules or be more purposeful with the little time we have. When I worked as a civil engineer, there were regular happy hours on Thursday & Friday evenings that I would typically miss to be home with my family. I discussed this with my wife and she encouraged me to go to these happy hours occasionally and I invited a guy from our community to join me. It was a great opportunity to develop relationships that led to great gospel conversations at and away from work. It only happened because I worked with my wife to reorient our schedules for the mission of God. Gospel enjoyment is so key here. We only change our lives so we can enjoy the things we love.

Practical Steps

One of the most helpful things we have done as leaders was to identify the circles of people they current exist in. The people we interact with who do not know Jesus in our neighborhood, our workplace, our friends, and our hobbies. I encourage you to do this with the other believers in your community and identify where God has provided open doors for mission to your people group.

Then we brainstormed ways we can invite these people into our community and ways we can participate in their community. In the gospels we see Jesus enter the lives and homes of non-believers, then invite people to follow and participate in His life. It’s not just about asking them to come into our world, but it’s about going to their world, their turf and believing the gospel is the power of God unto salvation.

Asking questions of your neighborhood

What are the rhythms of your neighborhood? When are they outside enjoying the neighborhood? When do they eat dinner? What type of cultural destinations do they participate in, what is the predominant religious makeup of your neighborhood? These are all essential questions to ask in order for your community group to form rhythms that naturally interact with the people group you are hoping to reach. God has sent you as a missionary to these people groups.

How does your Community Group need to change for each other and the mission of God? For some of your Community Groups, there needs to be a new rhythm for gospel confession and accountability, the creation of a time where each of them are challenged to make Jesus their greatest delight and then address their sin. Sin can be one of the greatest hindrance to the mission of God.

For others it is creating a rhythm where non-believers are regularly incorporated into the community. It could be a weekly pot luck dinner, participating in local concerts or events, or joining sports leagues with gospel intentionality.

Approaching the gospel for holistic transformation in every aspect of life, moves us from events to a comprehensive rhythm of life in the community of God for the mission of God.

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