Category Archives: Missionary Thinking

Slapped

Posted on by
7

Last year I read The Slap while on holidays and found it both intriguing and gruelling. The makers of the series on ABC have done well to capture that same car crash sense of ‘This is terrible, but I want to keep watching’.

My friend Andrew Menzies posted this on his facebook wall – a comment he overheard:” ‘The Slap’ should be compulsory reading before refugees leave for Australia… It will certainly make them think twice as all the people are so awful!!”

There certainly isn’t much redemptive or hopeful in the story. There really is’t a single likable character and there are plenty of horribly dislikable ones. The secret of The Slap’s success, I would suggest, is that it is a very raw slice of reality and as we watch we see familiar people, feelings and responses. Tim Winton offers a slice of reality also in his novels but he writes in such a winsome way that the rawness has a beauty about it. In The Slap that rawness is ugly. Dog ugly. And I don’t think its a failure on the part of the author. I think he wants us to see how messed up some of our lives really are.

As Danelle and I watched it last week we saw the tragic story of Aisha and her screwed up life. A messy unhappy marriage held together by kids and convenience, a random affair as a result of pain, a husband (half) wanting to make amends for his infidelity and so it goes on. Maybe its just the world I observe, but it feels affrontingly real – very much like life in the suburbs of this city.

There are a few moments of hope and happiness amidst long periods of struggle and darkness, but they fade quickly and the dominant landscape is bleak, cold and conflict ridden. People have spoken of how harsh and vulgar the language is in the story, but as I observe the world we live in, its pretty much par for the course. Its just that we don’t hear that stuff regularly on TV.

To some degree The Slap evokes a deep sadness in me and on the other hand my response is to want to ‘slap’ the people for being such self centred morons. Perhaps at the core of this sad story is the inability of people to have relationships and resolve conflict in a healthy way, and maybe that is why it is so tragic. Take away relationships in this world and what do you have?

I’ve seen too much of ‘The Slap’ in the world around me to call it a caricature or an aberration. I’ve seen friends cut friends off in a heartbeat rather than resolve conflict. I’ve seen husbands play up, regret it but then do it again because they are miserable in their marriages and feel trapped. I’m sure you’ve seen it too.

The good news?…

There isn’t much in the story. But if you read this blog regularly you’d know there is good news and hope. You’d know there is someone who invites us to follow him and live in a different reality. I don’t think Jesus way is easy – not at all – but I find myself wanting to speak to the people in the story and ask ‘have you considered a different way?…’

And then again I just want to slap them back… And therein lies some of the struggle for us as missionaries in the west. To love those who don’t look very lovable is a challenge. If not for Jesus I don’t think we’d have a hope

Get Sunday Right and The Rest Will Take Care of Itself…

Posted on by
8

Just when it had gone quiet around here… I was doing some thinking today so here’s a small hand grenade to lob into the conversation…

It was 9 years ago that I wrote my first ever blog post and this was the title – a short reflection on our obsession (as the church) with the weekly Sunday gathering. It seemed we had a belief that if we could just get Sunday ‘working’ with a happening worship experience and some great teaching then that would be the catalyst for everything else in the life of a church community to fall into place.

People would love, give, serve others before themselves, stop sinning and generally morph into disciples because they had been part of such a gathering.

Naïve?… Foolish?…

Perhaps those words are too gentle and ‘absurd’ is more appropriate, but such is the weight of the Sunday meeting in the psyche of the average evangelical Christian that my words are already starting to sound heretical or dangerous to some of you. If nothing else, it sure puts a lot of pressure on one event to shape the lives of those people.

I really cannot imagine Jesus and the apostles ever sitting around during the week and asking the question ‘ok – how are we going to do sabbath this week?’ I don’t see from the NT that their lives revolved around the planning and execution of one major weekly event.

Surely they would have told us about it if it was that important?…

Hmmm…

But I do see that their lives revolved around tight relationships with each other and around questions of how they lived out their radical devotion to Christ in the world they were a part of. I see them very focused on living and demonstrating the kingdom of God in many different ways thru everyday life. And of course there was a need for structure and order (ala appointment of deacons in Acts) but it was as needed rather than prescribed.

That things have formed up as they are is no great surprise because as human beings we like systems, predictability and order, but that things have formed up in their current manner is also a great concern on a couple of fronts. Now anyone can simply attend church on Sunday and feel like they have fulfilled the obligations of discipleship – or for those who don’t get there each week, they can feel like failures because they haven’t made the all important meeting. Contributing to the Sunday event can be seen as the primary form of Christian service with everything else desirable but optional. In this mode it is more desirable to let mission suffer than the Sunday event…

In fact I’d suggest that the more we focus on Sunday the further we stray from the main point of what Jesus was saying.

Jesus called us to a life – a life in community – and that will inevitably involve meeting, but I would forgive anyone who interpreted Christianity to be a weekly commitment to a Sunday event – because so much of what is communicated (often unconsciously) is exactly that.

I was sharing with some friends today that stepping back into a mainstream church has not been a way of me renouncing the views that have shaped this blog over the last 8 years.

Hardly.

But it’s a place where I sit uneasily because I believe I am there to transform rather than conform and on many occasions I have felt myself slipping into the cogs of the machine. When you are tired from another job, when you are already weary from conflict it is tempting to just ‘shut up and go with it’ and when your existing skill set fits the situation fairly well then it is even more tempting.

But at core, gut level there is an unrelenting conviction that for the church to actually be true to its calling as a sign and foretaste of the kingdom we must have some higher priorities than really good Sunday services with as many in attendance as possible.

At times I hold great hope for reform and refreshing and other days I fear I am losing my own soul in the machine. There are days when I want to call people out and challenge them to more and days when I just want out myself.

It’s not that running a church is hard. I actually think that for anyone with basic leadership skills, ‘running a church’ is pretty straight forward if you are prepared to follow the formulas and play the game.

However shifting people’s deeply entrenched understandings of church, mission and the kingdom is something I baulk at because it inevitably involves pain and conflict. It inevitably involves being misunderstood and maybe even cast in the light of a villain who just wants to screw things up. And very few people are intentionally obstructive – its just how we have been trained to think…

So some days I sit and wonder. Is it worth it?

I know that getting Sunday right is not the answer but the primary platform to speak to this expression of church is… you guessed it… Sunday…

Is the solution part of the problem?…

Freeing the APEs

Posted on by
4

This week I am teaching from Ephesians 4 – the section on ‘apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers’ and arguing that the presence of all 5 is an essential element of a healthy DNA for any church.

Remove any one of the 5 gifts above and you create a mutant religious organisation that might look a bit like a church but in fact isn’t one.

Because we have seen the marginalisation of the APEs for so long I doubt many of us would have a real clue as to what a healthy full developed church would look like, but I for one would really like to have a go at discovering that.

During my time leading Forge I spent a heap of energy trying to help churches re-enervate their APEs and I think we made some progress, but by nature churches are conservative, status quo preserving organisations so giving a free reign to apostles and prophets especially can be scary.

My hope for QBC is that we will be able to empower all 5 of the gifts to function as they were intended and that we will have that experience of seeing the church functioning as Paul describes in Eph 4. Of course the goal of all these gifts is the maturation of the Christian community of attaining towards Christlikeness in every way, so I’m looking forward to seeing what this teaching unearths in people.

Kamikaze Mission

Posted on by
5

I think for a long time, I along with plenty of others have made mission more central than Christ.

While that wasn’t the intent – and wasn’t what was said – it often was the reality. Take a A type, task oriented personality and a world that is increasingly hard to reach with the gospel and you have just hung a red rag in front of a bull.

I’ve reflected recently on some shifts in my relationship with God and this article by Skye Jethani echoes some of what I have been feeling. It was only last week as I met with our church leaders that I was saying a few years ago I felt incredibly passionate to change for the world for God, but didn’t feel so ‘close to God’ in relational terms. These days I feel great warmth in my relationship with God, but I am less motivated to chase down every possible ‘missional opportunity’.

What’s with that hey?…

Some of it is the conditioning that Jethani writes of in his article, some of it is a maturing faith and some of it is a shift in my own personality with a different stage of life.

If you have felt similar then read the article and see what he says. I reckon he’s on the money. I still feel a deep sense of calling to be a missionary/apostle but these days I see it working out differently in how I live. From a distance I would say my life appears somewhat dispassionate and unmotivated – and to some degree I struggle with that because I ‘feel’ different and haven’t completely resolved that its ok to be here.

Yet there is stuff too that can’t be seen and that matters. Stuff being learnt and experienced that is somewhat of new territory but that isn’t so easy to articulate, nor easy for an A Type person to understand.

To be honest I worry about me some days. I worry that I have lost my drive. But I’m also conscious that somethings is happening… something good… maybe better than being Mr Superdriven and articles like this simply give me hope.

Who Am I Again?…

Posted on by
4

I have been pondering this decision for a while and then today it happened.

I went for a surf at a little wave just a short walk from home. I’ve been there twice now and had some very nice waves. Today I waited for the crowd (5 blokes) to go home and then at 4.30 I put on the wetsuit and hit the beach.

After 15 minutes of lone surfing another bloke paddled out. We got talking. He has lived in Yanchep all his life – all 45 years of it – and he knows the area pretty well so it was good to get some inside knowledge on the break and on the area in general. We talked surf, family, life in general and of course work.

‘So what do you do for a crust?’ he asked.

I’ve always answered this by telling people I’m a Baptist minister but I’ve been wondering what impact it has on a relationship to immediately be suddenly faced with a religious leader. I am wondering what images that conjures up in people’s minds. Is it more helpful to ongoing relationships to introduce myself as a retic bloke?

I have no qualms about who I am and what God has called me to do – a backyard missionary / apostle is still central – but try explaining that to a bloke out in the surf.

So I’m experimenting again.

These days I will be introducing myself as a retic bloke and along the way as people get to know me they will learn that I am a Jesus follower who leads a Christian community. Previously the order was reversed but I don’t think its any issue as to what order they get revealed in.

I imagine this is what the people in our churches do all the time – those who aren’t paid religious workers – so I’m interested to see where it goes and what I learn along the way.

Any reflections?…

 

 

Generic prescription drugs are simply the versions of viagra cialis medications.viagra store online Since the availability of cheap generic prescriptions can make such a positive difference in the lives of patients viagra online rx store The ability to buy generic prescription drugs with such ease particularly important for people cialis online cheap levitra online

Because Imagination is More Powerful Than Knowledge

Posted on by
1

It was Einstein who once said ‘imagination is more powerful than knowledge.’

I was responding to Steve’s comment on my own blog last night and wrote this:

‘When we (as the church) start to value spirit inspired innovation as much as spirit inspired preaching then we may have a more hopeful future.’

Occasionally I feel I have moments when I say something worth sharing, or I have a perspective that is worth presenting and this is one of them. I have found myself bemused over the years that certain gifts and abilities rank more highly on the ‘we need that in the church’ rating system than others.

I wonder why spirit inspired preaching is valued more than spirit inspired innovation / creativity?

I am guessing its because its the culture we have created and lived with for so long, so my question that arises is ‘how do we create a culture where fresh ideas and creativity is seen as every bit as valuable as our more traditional foci (preaching/pastoral care/worship)?”

I don’t think there are any magic answers to reaching the western world with the message of Christ, but I would dearly love to see us become a people who ask ‘what if?’

A couple of years back we closed Forge down in WA and scaled back nationally. Since then I’ve been busy leading a church and running a business in the outer suburbs of Perth, and because we are a long way out and life is what it is I no longer have much networking or connecting with others around missionary ideas.

I have lost touch with many of my more creative, and innovative friends, folks who regularly inspired me and provoked me to keep going. Perhaps part of my own struggle lately has been because I have settled back into a space in life that I had intentionally stepped out of.

To be fair I feel a sense of divine leading to this place, but amidst the various demands and necessities of my roles I have found it difficult to keep on the creative edge. I don’t think I’m seeking a new ‘network’ as I have several good friends who I talk with regularly and some folks within our community who also have some creative spark. But I do miss the sparks that fly with wider interaction.

There aren’t too many conferences I ‘must attend’ these days, but I am keen to get to Vose in August to be part of what Scot McKnight has to say as I imagine that will be a good couple of days. Since reading Scot’s blog over 5 years ago now I have found his thoughts to be really valuable and hearing him lead us in the topic of ‘Church in a Post Christian Culture’ is something I could really get my teeth into. To get there we will need to shorten our planned camping holiday up north so its a big call.

I’m constantly conscious that the tug of the familiar is strong. There is much more kudos for a ‘good sermon’ than for a ‘good idea’ and with limited hours in the day its easy to play to the crowd.

I imagine this is the case for all church leaders, but I’m hoping that we can begin to raise the value of the imagination again.

I really believe its a ‘must do’ and not an optional extra for those uniquely gifted.

Time To Change

Posted on by
9

Here’s a pretty convincing piece of research about the need for change in the Aussie church via Steve Taylor.

Steve (who titled his post ‘Landslide Victory For Fresh Expressions in Australian Churches’ writes:

Some 66% of church attenders agreed that the traditional established models of church life must change to better connect with the wider Australian community (only 11% disagree).

For an even larger majority, this was personal. 82% claimed that they would support the development of new initiatives in ministry and mission in their church (3% disagreed).

So why on earth would there be resistance?

My own reflection is that people would rather hang on to what little they have got rather than risk losing it. To try something new is to risk pissing off the faithful few who remain and that would be suicide. But to do nothing is to choose a slow and pointless death.

What a choice…

Seriously its a lame choice, but in the face of that, the vast majority still choose a slow painful death. Why?… My guess is because change is difficult, time consuming and painful. The status quo might be lame, but we know how to do it.

Its the ‘club’ mentality overriding the missionary heart. The path of least resistance wins out and the possibility of change evaporates with the desire to simply do what comes easiest. In a busy world its an easy default position. “It may not be effective, but we at least know how to do it!”

.

The research seems to say people want change, but I am actually not convinced. I think people think that they want change, but its usually change without risk, or change without any impact on the current state of play.

Low cost change.

Its a hedging of bets so that if the new initiatives don’t cut it we can always steer back to the tired (no spelling error)and tested expression that will see us thru to our graves even if our kids will find it bizarre and maybe even abhorent.

The research gives me hope, but I also know that people don’t like pain, risk and uncertainty… so it may be a much greater stretch than we would hope.

We can only hope.

Church Plants – from 1 to 17 to 47 in just a few years in WA

Posted on by
3

And its not who you think…

Get past the ‘history of WA’ intro in this video and hear the story of how the Seventh Day Adventists in WA are planting churches faster than you can say ‘Sabbath Day’.

As Phil Brown says in the video “Now there are so many church plants that its become normal.” Of course it all depends on what you mean by the word ‘church’, and the Sevvies have decided to run with the simplest definition allowing for rapid growth and multiplication.

These guys have been prepared to take risks and ask ‘what is possible?’ rather than simply asking ‘how do we maintain the status quo?’

Not surprisingly they have also managed to maintain the status quo quite effectively and many of their more traditional expressions of church still exist alongside their new ventures.

Having spoken at their WA church planting summits for the last few years (where there are always over 100 people present) I cannot speak highly enough of the energy, enthusiasm and adventurous spirit these guys show.

Enjoy a well made video and be inspired by the Sevvies. I remember the first time I had lunch with Glenn Townend, the newly appointed SDA state leader and we got into a pretty feisty argument over the need to re-think church for a changing world. Once we got past our misconceptions of one another and listened more carefully, we realised we were both on the same page and both seeking the same things. Glenn and the SDA movement became some of Forge’s best supporters and their work in WA alone is truly inspiring.

Renewing Adventist Movement in Western Australia from AMN – WEST on Vimeo.

Running on Empty

Posted on by
7

We have expended an humongous amount of energy in the last ten years trying to help our churches become more ‘missional’ and much of it has been from good theology and with the best intents. But it has been hard work.

Not just that, it seems that many who have started on this journey have found it incredibly difficult. It’s not simply that those in the community aren’t interested. Its true that we are one of the most secular countries in the world and the Christian faith does have something of an image problem, but I think the issue runs deeper than that.

Increasingly I am coming to the conclusion that the reason we find it so hard to engage in mission is because our own spiritual formation is lacking and has been lacking for a long time. We have not done discipleship well, so we have people who ‘know the rules’ and can keep the club functional but lack the passion to do much more.

When love for God is fading its hard to find enthusiasm for introducing others to him.

Its epidemic to be so busy with work (often because we have bought the consumer myth) that we lack time to build relationships with people let alone God. Simply challenging people to ‘get on with the job’ of mission is like telling a fat person to run a marathon. It just isn’t going to happen. Or if it does it will be from all the wrong motives and will then get done in bizarre and unhelpful ways.

There is so much that needs attention in the life of ‘church’, but as I have reflected recently on what I consider the most critical place to start if we are to be effective, I am coming back to the need for some more substantial and rigorous spiritual formation. I don’t mean more Bible studies, although you won’t go far wrong if you’re really engaging with the Bible.

But I do mean helping people to recalibrate their own spirituality so that they find themselves deeply connected to God and living life out of that connection.

When mission and evangelism are engaged in dutifully and as tasks they are rarely effective, but when a person who is encountering God regularly and genuinely connects with another person then its impossible for that experience of God to stay hidden. So when we ‘send people out’ who are running on ‘spiritual empty’ it ought not be a surprise if they come home disappointed, burnt out or simply disinterested and uninspired.

So the focus of my own life this year will be in kindling a deeper and stronger connection with God. Not so I can do mission more effectively, but because I need that. I have no doubt that the result will be a more credible witness, but I think the horse needs to get in line with the cart.

“I’ll Have What She’s Having”

Posted on by
Reply

I thought this was a really well written and stirring article from Susan Campbell. Susan did a great job as the Young Adults Consultant for Global Interaction, before entering motherhood.

———————-

Thursday lunchtime. North Island café, Fitzroy North, Melbourne.

8 women, 8 prams, 8 babies, 8 variations of ‘coffee’.

One of those women, Susan Campbell (mother of Lucy), explains how loving church and engaging in mission go together like poached eggs and hollandaise sauce.

The addition of one tiny person to my family has lead to the addition of 16 new friends to my contacts list. Half of them are learning how to fit their fists in their mouths while the other half are learning how to feed-shower-settle-clean-feedchange- pack and get to the North Island in time for lunch.

Non-Melbournian readers may need a profile of a Fitzroy North mothers’ group: Women in their late 30s. Brief breeding breaks from careers in academia, graphic design, environmental science and alternative medicine. Exorbitant rent or mortgages for warehouse-turned- apartments or century-old terraces. Vegetarian. De facto partnerships. Funky haircuts. Independent. Arty. Politically active. Designer clothes with op shop accessories. Discuss landscaping designs for the 2×3 metre courtyard; absorbency of modern cloth nappies; personal post-natal Yoga instructors; organic baby foods; nanny services and pram-friendly cafés to take baby Django, Jemima, Celeste, Jasper, Harriet or Poppy.

This is my ‘hood’, this is my context, and these are my wonderful friends. And as the only follower of Jesus in the group, this is my mission field. We have recently formed, so the level of sharing hasn’t progressed further than opinions about the child health nurse’s new hair do or nappy-explosion-in-the-café stories, but as the summer rolls on I’m sure we’ll be sharing our lives on a deeper level. My hope is that through our relationship, my new friends will be able to recognise the transforming work of Jesus in their lives.

… but then what? What happens if they begin a relationship with Jesus?

I live in one of the most secular postcodes in Australia. Developers and restaurant entrepreneurs are eager to get their hands on church properties. Tiny congregations are struggling to survive, and like most places in Australia, young adults and families who grew up in the church are leaving in droves. This creates challenges for maintaining church functions, but an even greater challenge for being effective in mission.

Croatian theologian Miroslav Volf wrote: “The interest of the people of God in transmitting their faith will not be much greater than their interest in the Christian congregation in which they actually live out their faith.” In other words, we’re unlikely to share our faith if we’re disengaged, embarrassed or disappointed by the friends and experiences we have with our church community. If a new believer asked about connecting with church and we awkwardly reply, “Um…ahh…well…I used to go here… I sort of go there but the people aren’t that great…” it doesn’t give a fabulous impression or encouraging start. Yet the sad reality is very few people

I know actually love their church community.

How stark is the contrast to the picture of the church in Acts? “The whole group were of one heart and soul…everything they owned was held in common…with great power they gave their testimony…there was not a needy person among them…great numbers of both men and women were added to the Lord.” Those were the days!

I am currently looking for a church to belong to and a friend asked what I was after: Solid teaching? Yep. Inspiring leadership? Definitely. Opportunities to get involved? Absolutely. But one of the most important factors for me is a place where there may be some connection, resonance and relevance for my North Island friends. ‘Place’ might mean a service or event they come to, or it could mean that during parties and picnics they experience welcome and acceptance from church people, and the friendship networks spread.

We face two big challenges: The first is to invest time and energy into our church, to make it a thriving, mission-focused, Acts-like community…yet still have time and energy to maintain quality relationships with those ‘outside’. The second is to be a people who are different from the crowd, noticeable by our characteristics of love, justice and peace…yet similar enough to make sense to those around us.

I’m excited by the vision of the Global Interaction teams working among unreached people groups. They empower communities to develop their own distinctive ways of following Jesus. The vision is for people movements, whole families and social networks to follow Jesus in personally meaningful and relevant ways.

There are places around the globe where faith communities are beginning to take shape – a handful of new believers meeting in a rural area in Thailand and small discipleship groups sprouting up in African and South Asian villages.

It’s a significant time, as the new believers are making choices about the form, style, character and function of their faith community. They are deciding who and what they want to be. The process of reading how the first church in Acts started, waiting on the Holy Spirit, and discerning their way through many situations is a fascinating process. With so much ‘buy in’ at such a formative time, the new believers are passionate about their community and keen to share their faith with others. With the focus on whole communities, the gospel will spread like butter on hot sourdough!

How much we have to learn! Imagine if we adopted a similar approach as we invest in our churches here in Oz. Imagine if our generation could wake from apathetic slumber and make some bold and radical decisions about who we are, what we do, and how we do it. Not just to make us more satisfied and comfortable. Not just to grasp a tighter hold on those joining the exodus from the church. Instead, let our motivation be for mission. Just like the new believers overseas and those in Acts, let’s love our faith communities and strive for relevance, cultural sensitivity and an unswerving commitment to those who don’t know Jesus.

May our generation see mothers’ groups, tute classes, footy teams and Facebook friends experience transformation through Jesus, and may my North Island friends slip into Christian community as smoothly as organic honey slips into a soy chai latte.