categorizing

'holy'days abandoned acts advertising apologetics Apple art athiesm audio authenticity Baptism Bible Bible study blogging books CCM Christianity Christian season church church planting commentaries Communion community compassion international concert contextualization cross culture discipleship economics editorial education electronica emerging church emerging culture environment eschatoloty evangelism examining extract'd family fatherhood food futurism Gospel health hermeneutics history homosexuality humor hymns incarnational independent music kingdom of God language leadership leading liturgy media meme ministry missio Dei missiology missional church missional living missions mobap movies multi-ethnic multi-site music my favorite songs news New Testament orthopraxy parenting pastoring philosophy photography picture planning poetry politics post-Christian post-Evangelical postmodern prayer preaching Psalms q & a quotes of note radio reflections relationships relevintage religion research resurrection reverse-engineering review roaring lambs sacraments sacred space science seminar sermons social issues social justice social networking songwriting sports technology television the 7 the art of... theatre theology tithing travel twitter Uncategorized vacation video vision vodcast web web 2.0 world issues worship

promoting

Click here to subscribe to Bible Study Magazine!

licensing

Unless otherwise noted at the end of a post, all content here is covered by the following copyright:

content top round

the journey to tusla continues

hillcresttulsa

My family is in Tulsa again (our fourth visit in the last year) to continue to firm up plans for the planting of networks of missional communities and expressions in large Midwestern urban metropolises in the High and Central Plains of the United States, with Tulsa, being the “hub” for this adventure.

God continues to place us in the center of his momentum as we look to plant here in the near future. He is developing a providential network of relationships, connecting us to key spiritual and community leaders. He is giving us a deep burden for midtown Tulsa. He is bringing people around us to pray, support us financially, and to join our core team. He is giving us specific vision for a future church that loves the city of Tulsa and is in the city, for the city.

Our prayer this week echoes Phillip’s words from John 14: “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.” Amen…


This is a treat via Adrian Warnock. Two full-length talks from Tim Keller at New Frontiers in London on transforming culture and the importance of cities for ministry and culture making.

In light of the growing momentum towards church planting in urban Tulsa, these videos capture the ethos of what I believe God is calling me to there. To be honest, Keller is the impetus for much of my thought on urban core ministry. Enjoy:


Tim Keller – Cultural Transformation from Newfrontiers on Vimeo.


Tim Keller – The City from Newfrontiers on Vimeo.


on the road again

tulsa-skyline12

I’m in Tulsa again, this time with my family and my partner’s family in this endeavor, Clint Carter, to continue to firm up plans for the planting of networks of missional communities in large Midwestern urban metropolises in the High and Central Plains of the United States, with Tulsa, OK being the “base” for this adventure.

We arrived late last night and will be here through Thursday, meeting with local pastors and community leaders to continue to learn about the spiritual ‘climate’ and seek advice, encouragement, warnings that they would see fit to share; canvassing and “prayer-walking” areas that could serve a “base” for the collective and “hubs” for these first missional communities in the city of Tulsa; and visiting some church worship gatherings (this morning, we visited our friend, Art Rogers, and his church, Skelly Drive Baptist Church).

Tonight we attended a great event here in Tulsa via my new friend, Michael Bates, opinion editor for Urban Tulsa Weekly. See Michael’s comments below about it:

Tulsa Teachers Credit Union, one of the area’s largest thrift institutions, has been running radio ads lately about their humble origins — a cigar box in the desk drawer of a Central High School teacher, as teachers pooled funds to help one another meet their financial goals.

In the US, the cigar box approach to finance is long gone, and it’s hard to tell credit unions apart from banks these days, but the idea of mutual finance on a small scale is alive and well in the developing world, and it’s being used to lift people out of poverty in a way that’s sustainable over the long run. The idea is called microcredit, and it’s just one of the economic development tools being researched and taught by an organization called the Chalmers Center for Economic Development, which is affiliated with Covenant College and the Presbyterian Church in America. (The PCA is one of the Presbyterian denominations that still believes that Jesus is the Son of God and rose from the dead and that the Bible is the Word of God.)

The Chalmers Center’s director, Brian Fikkert, spoke this morning at Christ Presbyterian Church (CPC) about the work of the center. The organization is not a charity or a missions agency; rather, it researches best practices in the realm of sustainable economic development and then trains missionaries and church leaders in their application, by means of seminars, distance learning, and literature. The aim is to help the church to help the poor to help themselves, without creating dependency.

(For the OK-SAFE folks who are freaking out because I used the word “sustainable,” this has nothing to do with the environment. We’re talking about an approach to economic development that becomes self-perpetuating, unlike anti-poverty programs that require continued massive infusions of money from the outside.)

For example, about a year ago, CPC funded a Chalmers Center training course for Pentecostal pastors in Uganda, so they could start microcredit and micro-business development courses through their congregations. A Chalmers-trained woman is working for the Anglican Church in Rwanda; the archbishop wants every parish to begin one to three rotating savings and credit associations (RoSCAs) in the next year. So far they’re on track to have 80,000 families involved in a RoSCA by the end of 2009. A group of 50 HIV-positive Kenyans, rejected by their families and living in a slum in Nairobi, have been meeting weekly as a RoSCA. After a year or so, not only have they been able to build capital for their own needs, nearly every member has started one or more RoSCAs on their own.

Here in the US, the Chalmers Center is training churches to teach jobs preparedness and financial literacy and to set up Individual Development Accounts, to help the poor build wealth toward lump-sum expenses — a home, a car, education, equipment for a small business, resources to handle emergencies.

I hope to tell you more about what I learned this morning. It strikes me that these techniques may become more and more useful in the US and the west as our massive banking infrastructure falters. Going back to small groups, with mutual trust and accountability, pooling money to lend to one another, may be the way to escape the credit crunch.

This evening (Sunday, March 8, 2009) from 5 to 8:30 at Christ Presbyterian Church (51st St, between Lewis and Harvard), Fikkert will lead a Christian Economic Institute seminar on these topics. There’s no charge to attend or for dinner, which will be served during a break. If you’re interested in how to help the poor both here and abroad, please come.

Clint and I closed out the evening with a vision session at the trendy, third place: McDonalds.


extract’d

disciples

…we need to think hard about our definition of success in church planting and in the life of the existing church. Too often, pastors and leaders are hearing an unspoken communique that success is leading a church of several hundred or growing 10% in attendance every year or building a new building…Maybe success is about obeying the voice of God and making disciple making disciples. Maybe the only numbers we should be counting in our churches is the number of missionaries that leave the parking lot on Sunday morning rather than the number of people who came to see the show.

-Darren Casper, from his article, “A challenging piece on,’what is church?’” from his 1.22.09 St. Louis Metro Baptist Association newsletter



The first Midwest Acts 29 Quarterly of 2009 is tomorrow at The Journey – Tower Grove. I’m going to try to live blog it via the Cover It Live platform. I know it is difficult for some of you to travel to St. Louis, especially in these difficult economic times…

Here is a blurb from A29 about what the quarterly will focus in on:

Approaching Evangelism: Salt & Light

As Christians, our primary ministry calling is to bring the gospel to the broken culture. But, sadly, as pastors, church planters, and church leaders we can lose touch with this call while navigating the other demands of local church ministry. Throughout the history of the church we have seen movements that have reacted to this issue by becoming wholly focused either on making the gospel attractive to the culture or through incarnating the gospel within the culture. Does there have to be an either/or response to our call? How can we keep personal evangelism a priority for ourselves and our congregations while shaping a church culture that expresses an attractional facet of the gospel?

Our teachers for the first session focusing on The Shape of an Attractional Culture will be Darrin Patrick, lead pastor for The Journey, and Jonathan McIntosh, Teaching and Hanley Rd. Campus pastor for The Journey.

Our teacher for the afternoon session focusing on Jesus-Style Evangelism will be pastor, teacher, and author Jerram Barrs, Professor of Christian Studies and Contemporary Culture and Resident Scholar of the Francis A. Schaeffer Institute at Covenant Theological Seminary, St. Louis, MO.


1. Ed Stetzer – edstetzer.com

Ed Stetzer, President of Lifeway Research, Lifeway’s Missiologist in Residence, on the faculty of Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and Southern Seminary, prolific author and blogger, multiple church planter and ministry trainer, is my #1 missional blog of the year.

So I’m a little biased here, but as many of you know, I’ve had the special privilege to work under Ed through my master’s level work at Liberty Theological Seminary this fall/winter. I’ve witnessed first hand his heart to help and serve people at all levels of ministry understand the missional conversation and practically move them towards it. And this heart for mission, the church and God’s people shines through on his blog.

Check these:
The Meanings of Missional series
Speaking of Jesus and Justice
Simply Missional
When the Mission Gets Lost in the System
Missional Living

Top 8 Recap
8. J.R. Woodward | 7. Jonathan Dodson | 6. Neil Cole | 5. Drew Goodmanson | 4. Bob Hyatt | 3. Alan Hirsch | 2. David Fitch


2. David Fitch – Reclaiming the Mission

David Fitch, Betty R. Lindner Chair of Evangelical Theology at Northern Seminary; founding pastor of Life on the Vine Community, an emerging church in the Northwest Suburbs of Chicago; co-founder of Up/Rooted, an emergent cohort that gathers leaders and thinkers to engage issues of the emerging church and the post-modern context; and author of The Great Giveaway comes in at #2.

David has been one of the most influencing voices in the development of my ministry/church planting philosophy. It started with The Great Giveaway, but continuing on with the stream of consciousness on his blog, let’s just say, it’s a gold mine. I believe it will be shown that David was one of the most important shaping influences on the grounding of missional orthopraxy in the twenty-first century.

I’m looking forward to becoming a regular part of the missional leader learning community in the future. I was personally invited to the one in January but can’t make. I hope to down the road..

Check these:
Please Lord, Don’t Let Me Get Pragmatic: Spiritual Formation for Missional Leaders
“The Numbers Are Going Up But Something Doesn’t Feel Right”
Conversion a casualty of Missional Theology?
When They Will Not Come – Community: The anti-attractional process of beginning a church with community
The Middle In: The Unique Missional Opportunity

Top 8 Recap
8. J.R. Woodward | 7. Jonathan Dodson | 6. Neil Cole | 5. Drew Goodmanson | 4. Bob Hyatt | 3. Alan Hirsch


It is terrible how much has been forgotten, which is why, I suppose, remembering seems a holy thing.

Anita Diamant, from The Red Tent

It’s the last day of 2008, time to look back at the year that was:

January

I had the privilege to lead my oldest son of 6, Cooper, in a prayer of belief in God’s grace for his salvation. I thank God for the awesome opportunity.

Sally Lloyd-Jones stopped by the blog and thanked me for my kind words about The Jesus Storybook Bible, which I believed God used in a providential way to help make the gospel clear to Cooper.

My Sloan turned two.

February

I remembered three tragedies that hit close to “home”: one in my hometown, one in the town I live in now, and one that affected a sister Christian university.

March

Cooper was baptized. Praise God!

I wrapped up my series: The Emerging Church: A Postmodern Reformation.

I posted my review of Todd Agnew’s new album, Better Questions. (I review music for Ardent Records)

I had the privilege to be a part of a unique event that ended up being one of the most transformational times in my spiritual life. I was part of a recording for the Shapevine’s Active Learning Podules series with Reggie McNeal. You can watch it on the home page of their web site. I would embed it here but it doesn’t have that capability.

April

I posted my review of Derek Webb and Sandra McCracken’s new EP, Ampersand. (I review music for Speakeasy)

Cooper enjoyed his first Cardinals game with my Dad and I and played organized baseball for the first time.

I talked about how the will of God is that we would pray ceaselessly.

I “celebrated” two years blogging.

May

Our family grew in missional compassion through Compassion International…

I saw Radiohead in concert at Verizon Wireless Amphitheater in St. Louis. Wow…

I wrapped up my book review series on the Zondervan Counterpoints book, Four Views of Hell.

I posted my review of Delirious’ new album, Kingdom of Comfort. (I review music for Sparrow Records)

The Lost finale. Unbelievable…

June

I celebrated nine years with my amazing wife…

My family enjoyed a local vacation…

I recapped my series on the missional church: The “Sent” Church: A Missional People.

I talked about one my vices: morels.

For the second year in a row, I judged Joy FM’s iSing competition at Six Flags – St. Louis .

July

My family and I visited Tulsa for the first time to confirm the call to plant missional communities there in the future. God answered our prayers…

I posted the first (and only at this point), vodcast on Acts.

August

We celebrated Margo (5) and Everett’s (1) birthdays.

I posted on my weight loss. Total loss = 20 lbs. I have to say, wow…

I spoke on emerging worship at Bible Preaching Week at Windermere at the Lake of the Ozarks.

I spoke at the first annual Missouri Baptist University Ministry Group retreat at Cornerstone Farms in St. Jacob, Illinois.

Fall classes began at MBU; teaching “Worship History and Leadership” and “Worship Performance Workshop”

September

I announced the cool opportunity to do two directed studies in missiology under the tutelage of Ed Stetzer.

I posted on my first trip with Ed to a conference in Jackson, Mississippi. This pretty much sums up the trip..

I had the privilege to host Dan Kimball, Matt Maher, and The Afters for MBU’s second annual Abandoned: Worship as Life seminar. Here are some pics…

October

We celebrated Cooper, Holly, and I’s birthdays.

I posted on my second trip with Ed to Johnson City, Tennessee. Here is a pic…

I traveled with my good friend, Clint Carter, to Tulsa to continue to exegete Tulsa…

I attended the Lead Conference, put on by The Journey, a conference on the theological and practical implications of ministry in an urban context with Clint.

I posted on my missional practicum in University City.

November

Relevintage becomes transformission.

Holly and I saw Coldplay at the Sprint Center in Kansas City. Not bad, not bad…

December

We celebrated Christmas with all of our families. Blessed…


4. Bob Hyatt – bob.blog

One of my favorite blogs of the last few years also happens to be thick in the missional. Bob Hyatt, pastor of Evergreen Community in Portland, is a “heart-on-the-sleeve” blogger who gives us a unique window into his ministry. I appreciate Bob’s humility in sharing the journey with the rest of us. He is particularly savvy in relating the challenge of maintaining a missional mindset amidst a church culture that is increasingly becoming ingrown. Pithy, pithy…

Check these:
Kimball’s Missional Misgivings
Truly missional…
Missional Leadership Development…


5. Drew Goodmanson: Goodmanson.com

Drew Goodmanson, equpping/teaching elder at Kaleo Church in San Diego, is one of the sharpest missional practitioners out there. I’m particularly thankful for his [and Kaleo's] graciousness to share with us Kaleo’s journey toward pushing missional through everything they do. Drew is singlehandedly changing the fact that missional resources – particularly those moving beyond the orthodoxic to the orthopraxic – are far and few between online.

Check these:

Missional Communities and Contextualization (.pdf)
Leading a Missional Community (.pdf)
Missional Community Leader Development (pdf)


about me


Husband and father of four, university instructor, seminarian, worship consultant, and church planting intern.

posting

commenting

archiving

recommending

supporting

international justice mission

bloodwater mission

invisible children

to write love on her arms

kiva micro loans

compassion international

analyzing