Lifeshapes
Well, this week I'm in another intensive class and it's all about discipleship and "postmodern/emerging" churches. The first two days have been a conference and although the stuff is outstanding, it's not very "postmodern". It's based on different shapes that are symbols reflecting different aspects and patterns of discipleship. Visit their site at www.lifeshapes.com NOW! ;)
Normally I'm VERY suspicious of any sort of methodological approach that is packaged so neatly (purpose driven life, anyone?), but this stuff is fantastic. (P.S. I'm not really slamming the purpose driven life because my friend Asako became a Christian, the only one in her family, after reading it.)
Due to possible copyright infringement ;) I'll just share one thing about this that have really got me thinking:
Mike, the author of the books and former pastor of St. Thomas Moore Church in Sheffield, talked a lot about their evangelism strategy. They focus on what he calls finding the "person of peace". This is from Jesus sending out of the 12 and the 72, telling them to find a person who will welcome them and stay with that person.
Many of our evangelism teachings tend toward the other direction, however. We tend to say, "I need to find a person who doesn't like Christianity, Christians, the Church, etc., and prove them wrong by showing them what a great person I am."
Jesus seems to offer an easier path (a lighter yoke, if you will), and says, "Find people who like you and share with them. When people don't like you (for whatever reason), dust off your shoes and keep walking."
It seems very simple, but it's how this church became the largest in North England and continues to grow today. They just kept their eyes open and people would come up to them and ask them how they could know God. God's doing the work and we harvest where we did not plant, but that's the beauty of it. It's never supposed to be about us, so we've got to stop planning our heroic conversion of that atheist and start spending time with people who seem to like us for no obvious reason.
Another thing he said that I really liked is that anything worth doing is worth doing badly. We have to get over ourselves and let people grow and make mistakes and even do things wrongly (or at least do them not how we think they should be done).
So, as I was challenged, I challenge you. Who is the person of peace God has placed in your life? There is a couple I met about a year ago, and the guy (whose name I cannot even remember) was extremely keen to hear as much as I wanted to tell him about Christianity. I'm praying now for him and his girlfriend that I will either cross paths again with them, or that God will send someone in their lives to share. It was so strange that I think I didn't share as much as I could have because it was disconcerting how interested he actually was. I don't know if any of you have ever felt like this, but it was almost too good to be true and I was thinking he was just being polite. I see now I was as dense as I usually am and am praying for God to open my eyes to the people who are hungering for the good news around me.
In & Out
Well, I've been in Mississippi and Louisiana and then made it back home just to start a one-week intensive. This class is all about discipleship, though, so I'll share SOON, stay tuned. Also, It's been brought to my attention by SEVERAL people that this blog gets a little "heavy" at times. I'll try to slip a fart joke or two in the mix ;)
Mission to England
Missionary takes on tough test in darkest Telford Shropshire town is among most secular in Britain David Ward and Tom Edwards
Monday July 11, 2005
The Guardian
Telford, the Shropshire town named after the great engineer of the industrial revolution, is one of the most secular places in Britain, according to the Church of England: fewer than one in a hundred residents attends an Anglican church and adult churchgoing has declined by 20% in 10 years. Now the Church Mission Society (CMS), in collaboration with the Lichfield diocese, has decided to send in a missionary who will start work among the 150,000 residents next month and stay for seven years.
Read the rest of the article HERE. This is the type of thing we're working on developing in the US, too, but they're a little further along in the UK.
Above Reproach Part Deux
From Megan: Here's my question:how does the attitude of my heart (teachability, humility, willingness to change) play into the process of learning what being above reproach means. Do we really have the ability to hold up the process? And how does that harm a ministry like the Ring? I'm not concerned with my being right as I am with the possibility of my leading others astray.
Well, I'll post my response, but what do we think?
Zeal Justifies the Means?
I wanted to add a bit to our ongoing discussion, THANK YOU everyone who's putting their two cents in!!!!! This is what I want this blog to be.
This is a quote from a book called The Ministry of the Spirit: Selected Writings of Roland Allen. He was alive from 1869 to 1947, so think about that as you read below:
Zeal Does Not Ensure the Propriety of the Means Which it Employs
We need to recognize that zeal for God is not a guarantee that the means used to express the zeal is divinely inspired. There was an age when Christians thought the sword a proper weapon for expressing their zeal and faith; but it did not follow that the sword was a proper weapon. Their zeal and faith had its reward; but growth in the knowledge of Christ taught us that the sword was not a fit weapon for the Spirit. So men today are earnestly desirous of following the guidance of the Spirit, and of revealing His power to men; and they employ these activities. Their faith and zeal is not lost: Christ's kingdom is advancing, men are being converted to Christ, Christ's Spirit is being shed abroad; but it does not follow that the activities are the proper weapon of the Spirit. Another age may learn to look upon our use of activities much as we look upon the use of the sword by an earlier age. Because in them money takes so prominent a place, ours may one day be known as the age of financial Christianity, just as we look upon that earlier age as the age of military Christianity. As we regard the sword so a later age may regard money. It may learn the wisdom of the Apostle and decline to use such an ambiguous weapon. If the sword was an ambiguous weapon which might easily confuse the issue, money and activities which depend upon money, are not less ambiguous and may as easily confuse the issue. The time is not yet full. We have yet to learn the consequences of our use of money.
