Category Archives: Local Mission

Evangelism & Empowering Peacemakers

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Jarrod McKenna Empowering PeacemakersEmpowering Peacemakers

 

Guest in the backyard: Jarrod McKenna

Can we separate living the gospel from sharing it? Evangelism from the invitation to follow Jesus?

Last night I arrived back from a country tour with ‘Empowering Peacemakers’ (or EPYC) inviting High School students to forsake lives wasteful consumption and dare lose their themselves in lives of compassion on behalf of Jesus’ message for the poor and the earth.

I’m always amazed (!) at the responses.

Yesterday I was ambushed by students wanting to give me hugs (a bit awkward), ask for Bible’s (not something we offer just something they wanted after exploring Scripture in the workshop!!), committed themselves to the FACE UP TO POVERTY campaign and gave up their lunch time to talk about Jesus, their lives, their concerns about the world and the gospel.

-What’s EPYC’s secret that has kids that aren’t Christians queuing up to talk about Jesus after workshops?

-Why is it that young people run up wanting to give hugs and share their stories?

-Why is it that students (who aren’t Christians) ask for copies of the Bible and want to start social justice groups in their schools when many youth pastors have talked to me about difficulties in getting their church youth groups into the Scriptures and moving their focus off themselves!?

-And how is it that EPYC gets asked back into public state schools?

worshopping God's revolution

Some thoughts:

1. The Means is the Message

EPYC believes only way to share ‘Jesus is the Way’ is to do it in ‘the Way of Jesus’. The Early Christians where known as ‘people of the Way’ because they were filled with the Spirit to obey everything Jesus commanded (Matt. 28:19-20). Their is no point teaching the texture of the kingdom (nonviolence) if you are going to go about it in forceful ways (the ways of the fallen world).

2. The Medium is the Message

EPYC is committed to embodiment. Young people can feel when people really are living an alternative or if they are just talking a good game. ‘Bait and switch’ has nothing on ’embody and let them ask’ (read 1 Peter 4:15 in the context of verse 8-14 teaching on nonviolence). In sharing personal stories of the empowerment of God’s grace to live as signs of what God has done in Jesus and giving power over to young people to ask questions in the setting of their and our worlds biggest problems

3. The Message is the Message

EPYC believes the gospel is just that… good news! 🙂 EPYC actively resists watering down the gospel, tickling ears, shying away from the demands of discipleship, bending the knee to Principalities and Powers who avoid preaching Christ crucified. In EPYC workshops we trust Scripture has a power beyond our cheap four step summations of the Bible. EPYC don’t hide students from the Bible but openly explores solid exegesis of Biblical texts with students that aren’t Christian trusting that God’s Spirit is at work drawing us to all truth and that Jesus really is good news for all that our world is going through.

4. “History belongs to the Intercessors” (sorry it didn’t start with ‘M’)

EPYC believes, as Walter Wink puts it, “History Belongs to the Intercessors”. We can do solid exegesis and prepare a good workshop but if it hasn’t been covered in solid prayer it isn’t going to have the effects it could have and I’m not going to be in a space where I’m sensitive to what the Spirit is doing.

As Scott McKnight put about EPYC on his blog he resonates deeply with “evangelism programs that invite people to experiment with the way of Christ as a way of coming to Christ.”

After all can we separate living the gospel from sharing it? Evangelism from the invitation to follow Jesus?

Thanks to all those who continue to hold EPYC in prayer.

The ‘Pioneering’ Plant

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Sherry and Geoff discussed this idea of ‘pioneering plants’ with us while they were in Perth and today Sherry described it on their blog. She writes about permaculture and a book she has been reading on the subject, then goes on:

“i came across a particular recommendation in the book that interested me greatly. i think it serves as a useful, earthy anology to the apostolic work of the people of god. in a section on succession planting, the manual defines a type of plant called “pioneer species.” these plants are “selected shrubs, which can live in degraded soil, improve soil nutrients, and protect seedling trees, and are planted initially”

apparently, as other species are planted after these first inhabitants the stability of the ecosystem is strengthened. so the ability of an ecosystem to survive is based to a significant degree on the first type of species planted, a pioneering species. these initial species must be able to weather the compromised conditions of “degraded soil” in order to make the surrounding area more inhabitable for future plants.

I wonder if some of us in missionary ventures can learn from this analogy. Maybe a key quality of the pioneer is the ability to survive in difficult soil and to enable it to be more fertile for those who come after…

Thanks Sherry!

Relating to Strangers Keeps Society Strong

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So reads the title of Hugh Mackay’s Saturday column in the West Australian (Click on the image below to read the full story)

In this short piece about the nature of community Mackay describes the fragmentation of western society and the loss we suffer because of our individualism, transience and busyness.

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He goes on to say that ‘community’ is more than just developing friendships and looking out for others who are like us. He calls this ‘tribalism’. He suggests that caring for the stranger is more of a mark of real community and it raises the ‘moral’ quotient of society as we actually build bonds that are beyond simple friendship as good as that may be.

Its quite a counter-cultural message in a self centred world where most people find it hard enough to care for their friends!

If you don’t believe me then listen to an expert…

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I’ve offered some of my thoughts on kids in mission but I must say that it is my beautiful wife who really is the expert here.

On Monday she presented a session at our Forge intensive entitled ‘Risk & Reward – Families Together in Mission’ where she spoke about what she has learnt about nurturing healthy family life while being engaged in missionary work.

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Our good mate Darryl Gardiner gave her a shove in this direction last time he was here and I’ve been nudging her ever since. Danelle would not see herself as a ‘speaker/teacher’, but she has some great stuff to say and is a fantastic communicator. Some people aren’t cut out for the weekly bump and grind of teaching, but cut them loose 3 or 4 times a year and watch out.

If you want to be inspired in this whole area then listen in!

The Time Has Come… surely…

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At a recent Forge National directors meeting one of our crew shared this insight from American church leader Erwin McManus. During his time in Australia, McManus urged Aussies to be more diligent about responding to their own context and doing their own missiology. He insisted that we have to stop following what is happening in the US.

To do this he showed where we are in relation to Christendom.

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The Australian culture is much more secular and further removed from a Christendom mindset than the American one (by and large). No surprises there hey? But the problem comes in that while the American church is responding to its own culture (de-churched / nominally Christian) the Australian church by and large has chosen to follow the American church.

For some reason we have chosen to imitate US models and practices rather than seeking to develop our own home grown approaches to church. In a highly secular context where church just isn’t on the radar for most people we must radically re-think what we are doing as our context is vastly different to the USA!

Back in 1981 when John Smith wrote Advance Australia Where he argued strongly that we have never had a truly Australian church. We have imported British forms and Americans models, but we just haven’t done the work of thinking thru what an indigenous expression of church would look like.

(And yes – I realise its ironic & amusing that I am quoting an American telling us not to follow Americans!)