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The tall skinny kiwi, Andrew Jones, recently blogged about a new book that is coming out March 1 that he believes “is the most significant book on international mission” that he has come across in a long time. Big words…

The book is entitled The Meeting of the Waters: 7 Global Currents that will propel the future church and is written by Fritz Kling. According to Jones, Fritz has traveled to 40 countries to interview key leaders on these changes and the book is a result of those findings.

In his book, Fritz identifies seven trends that he believes will have a major impact on the church around the world. They are:

1. Mercy: Younger people of faith around the world increasingly demonstrate their piety and their love for others by serving–by feeding the hungry, addressing AIDS, rescuing girls sold into slavery, saving the earth, etc.

2. Mutuality: While Americans and the West had long been the leaders of worldwide “Christendom,” now Christians from countries all around the world have the education, access, resources, and confidence to share leadership with powerful countries like the US.

3. Migration: People everywhere are on the move, to meet economic needs, flee repression or combat, seek freedom or asylum, enjoy tourism, etc. While in the past Christian missionaries reached diverse people groups by ships or planes or trains, now everywhere in the world is more diverse.

4. Monoculture: Focusing on helping individual people in the unique cultures and countries in which they live, the Christian church has trained and sent missionaries around the world for a long time.

5. Machines: The importance of technology is not news to anyone, but its impact on Christian communities around the world has its surprises. Studies on technology and evangelism abound, so I highlight examples of how technology is radically changing disaster relief efforts.

6. Mediation: Many people say that the world is “flattening,” and that we’re all coming closer together. But the internet and available media are actually providing more opportunities, tools, and points for polarization and division. Who will mediate, and how?

7. Memory: In the shadow of so many game-changing trends, every country, region and village has its own “backstory” — those historical features, clues and codes that may be unseen but affect everything in those societies.

You can download the first chapter here.

Here is a promotional video about the new book:


Ed Stetzer continues to introduce the individuals who will be serving as framers for The Missional Manifesto, as well as speakers for missionSHIFT (the conference that I have the privilege to be working with him on) which takes place July 12-15 in Ridgecrest, NC.

Are you registered for the missionSHIFT conference? You don’t want to miss it. Register here.

Here are Ed’s recent introductions and the best soundbites from his interviews with each of them:

Dan Kimball

Dan Kimball is on staff at Vintage Faith Church, planted in 2004 in Santa Cruz, CA. He is the author of several books including They Like Jesus But Not The Church. He is a columnist for Leadership Journal and Outreach Magazine. He is adjunct faculty at several universities including Wheaton College, George Fox University and Western Seminary where he teaches on church and mission. Dan is part of the leadership core for Origins, a new network focused on evangelism and the mission of Jesus to new generations. He blogs at dankimball.com.

(Dan will serve as a “framer” for “The Missional Manifesto,” as well as speak on what evangelism looks like in the postmodern mileu)

Kimball:

“I have so much excitement and joy for the church at large right now. Just the fact that we are now becoming so much more engaged in dialogue about what being on mission means is a source of encouragement for me. I really sense that there is a wonderful stirring happening amongst so many people and leaders about this. So the one thing I think we are doing better at engaging in God’s mission is that we are really talking about it now, both theologically and in praxis and living it out. It feels like a tide is changing right now about all this in a very hopeful way. What incredible impact could be made as we unite and rally around God’s mission all the more.”

Hugh Halter

Hugh Halter is the national director of Missio, a ministry team committed to training, developing, and apprenticing Incarnational leaders for the church. Within Missio, Hugh co-directs the MCAP, an online collaborative training environment for Incarnational leaders, pastors, and church planters. Hugh is also lead architect of Adullum, a local movement of incarnational communities in Denver, CO. As co-author of The Tangible Kingdom, and the accompanying Tangible Kingdom Primer, Hugh is an advocate for disoriented God seekers and loves to inspire and re-orient leaders around the mission of God. I was happy to write the foreword for his next book, AND…the Gathered & Scattered Church coming out through Zondervan/Leadership Network/Exponential in April.

Halter:

“The biggest hope is in the conversations that are going on. It used to be a fight to ask people to consider moving away from purely attractional forms of church, but a much greater percentage want to move forward. What’s most exciting is how the existing church is not only in the conversation, but is asking for help and now innovating some really cool movements of incarnational community.”

Bob Roberts

Bob Roberts has earned degrees from Baylor Univeristy, Southwestern Seminary, and Fuller Seminary. He planted Northwood Church in 1985 that has since planted 140 churches in the United States. He has written for various periodicals and journals both faith based and secular international relations journals. He works with the United Nations and various State Departments of various governments around the world doing humanitarian engagement projects. He frequently travels to seriously challenged nations to help with development, engagement, and reconciliation. Their focus is to engage the society with the Gospel through the use of ordinary disciples vocations. Bob has written 4 books: Transformation, Glocalization, The Multiplying Church, and recently Realtime Connections: Linking Your Job with God’s Global Work. Bob speaks around the world on globalization, faith, church planting, engagement, and a variety of global affairs issues. He is married to his wife of 30 years Nikki, they have 2 children, Ben and Jill, a daughter-in-law Ashley, and an exchange student they consider their own – Ti.

Roberts:

“The motivation to be missional is good. The context of narrowing it just to the US, or traditional “missions” is dying. A new conversation is emerging that’s global, but I don’t think we get that in the US. My hope is that we learn to speak and live globally in the global era and missional is global incarnation…”


“We must be global Christians with a global vision because our God is a global God.”
– John Stott

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Last week, I posted on the importance of understanding that God’s mission is a global mission. I promised you some brand new and soon-to-be-released books that will help you put the “mission” back in “missional.”

Recently released:

Paul Hiebert: The Gospel in Human Contexts: Anthropological Explorations for Contemporary Missions

Product Description:

While the gospel is timeless truth, it enters into ever-changing and widely varied human contexts. In order to meaningfully communicate the gospel to particular humans, those involved in cross-cultural ministry need to understand people and the particular influences–social, cultural, psychological, and ecological–that shape them. Further, we must understand ourselves and the influences that have shaped us, since our own contexts influence how we understand and transmit the gospel message. Therefore, we must master not only the skill of biblical interpretation but also the skill of human interpretation. That task is the topic of this book, the summation of a lifetime of experience and thinking by a world-renowned missiologist and anthropologist, the late Paul Hiebert.

Timothy Tennent: Invitation to World Missions: A Trinitarian Missiology for the Twenty-first Century (Invitation to Theological Studies Series)

Product Description:

This unique text is arranged in three parts according to the Trinity’s roles, relationships, and activity. Tennent questions whether missions as currently conceptualized is adequate and he challenges the reader by building the book around key theological foundations such as “missio Dei” and the “new creation” vision for the global church. This volume will call and enable the reader to understand how missions is biblically and theologically basic to Christianity, and how missions is essential to living out an abundant and impassioned life.

Coming soon:

David Hesselgrave + Ed Stetzer: MissionShift: Global Mission Issues in the Third Millennium (July 2010)

Product Description:

Veteran missionary David Hesselgrave and rising missional expert Ed Stetzer edit this engaging set of conversational essays addressing global mission issues in the third millennium. Key contributors are Charles E. Van Engen (“Mission Described and Defined”), the late Paul Hiebert (“The Gospel in Human Contexts: Changing Perspectives on Contextualization”), and the late Ralph Winter (“The Future of Evangelicals in Mission”). Those offering written responses to these essays include: Van Engen, Keith Eitel, Enoch Wan, Darrell Guder, Andreas J. Köstenberger, Hiebert, Michael Pocock, Darrell Whiteman, Norman L. Geisler, Avery Willis, Winter, Scott Moreau, Christopher Little, Michael Barnett, and Mark Terry.

Craig Ott + Stephen Strauss with Timothy Tennent: Encountering Theology of Mission: Biblical Foundations, Historical Developments, and Contemporary Issues (Encountering Mission) (May 2010)

Product Description:

This fresh, comprehensive text fills a need for an up-to-date theology of mission. It offers creative approaches to answering some of the most pressing questions in theology of mission and missionary practice today. The authors, who are leading mission experts, discuss biblical theology of mission, provide historical overviews of the development of various viewpoints, and address theologically current issues in global mission from an evangelical perspective. This readable yet thorough text integrates current views of the kingdom of God and holistic mission with traditional views of evangelism and church planting. It also brings theology of mission into conversation with ecclesiology and eschatology. Topics covered include contextualization, the missionary vocation, church and mission, and theology of religions. Sidebars and case studies enable readers to see how theology of mission touches real-life mission practice.



I’ve decided to re-post the first installment of a series I began back in April of 2009 (wow, that is a long time ago) and am going to continue it now.

I am hopeful this will spur all of us to do inventory on why we aren’t missional and move towards living sent and joining God in his mission to proclaim and enact the Gospel…

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Wednesday night, I had the privilege to attend “Theology at the Bottleworks,” a Midrash ministry of The Journey [my family's home church + where I am doing my church planting internship] at a pub, Schlafly’s Bottleworks, in beautiful Maplewood.

In older, simpler times, a pub or “public house” was often the focal point of the community, playing a similar role to the local church, where people gathered to openly discuss significant issues of the day. The Journey is re-entering the “public house” to reach into culture by tackling spiritual, political, and philosophical themes in an open environment.

And yes, this has been the setting for the infamous “Beer and the Bible” controversy that brewed, pun intended, back in 2007. There is great comment from my good friend and Journey pastor, Jonathan McIntosh, on the web home for Mike Corley of The Mike Corley Program here about TATB [unfortunately, the audio seems to be nonexistent]. You can read a couple of somewhat objective articles about TATB from the Baptist Press here and the Christian Post here…

I am shadowing the moderators for the next couple of months to eventually become a part of the moderation team over the next year. And let me say, after observing my new friend Matt moderate last night, this is going to be one of the most difficult yet shaping things I have ever done. I’m excited about what God is going to do in me through this…

This particular evening was unique in that it was the 4th anniversary of this outreach event. To be specific, this was the 48th TATB event. Pretty astounding.

There were probably about 50 people there and I was told that there are usually 70+. And my best guess was that it was split down the middle: 50% religious, 50% non-religious.

The topic was “The Impact of Technology on the American Way of Life.” And a lively topic it was. Here were some of the great points made/questions raised across a wide spectrum:

>technology makes us lose touch with reality into isolation
>human interaction is overrated
>technology pits art + creativity vs. efficiency + mass production + instant gratification
>technology makes you more human, not less
>does technological innovation undercut traditional fundamentals?
>technology makes us skip the fundamentals of knowledge, i.e., spelling
>new technology wouldn’t be realized with the fundamentals changing
>are we headed to a Wall-E or Matrix world?
>technology can enhance relationships but cannot substitute for human touch, empathy, etc.
>do we like where technology is taking us?
>technology moves us away from real sources, i.e., analog musical recording vs. digital
>to curb abuse of technology, we have to discipline ourselves and self-moderate
>technology is neutral; we use technology, it doesn’t use us
>technology is good for scientific + medical purposes but not relationships
>we are trading quantity of connectedness over quality of connectedness, i.e. Facebook friends vs. real friends
>there is no counterbalance with technology from the spritual + ethical side of the equation
>should we limit/restrain technology?
>Bible gives principles not specifics on how we should handle “stuff”, i.e., Genesis 1 “subdue” principle

So what does this have to do with why we aren’t missional? I sat at a table with a non-religious, 50+ year-old Greek curmudgeon, a non-religious 30+ year-old American-Asian (originally from Hong Kong) molecular biologist and resident at Children’s Hospital, and a non-practicing 30+ year-old Orthodox Jew. Uh, yeah. And it wasn’t the large group discussion that impacted me. It was the discussion with my three new friends after the discussion that did. Big time…

My experience Wednesday night unearthed some things inside of me that I need to preach to myself to help me understand where my heart and head don’t line up with regards to my missional posture to culture. So I thought I’d invite you to join me on the journey.

As a part of a series, I am going to unpack what I believe are the 5 main things that keep us from being salt and light in culture. I hope you join me in the conversation…


Bob Roberts, lead pastor at Northwood and author of such books as Transformation: How Glocal Churches Transform Lives and the World and Glocalization: How Followers of Jesus Engage a Flat World, has written a brand new book called, Realtime Connections: Linking Your Job With God’s Global Work.

If you read Transformation or Glocalization, you know that Robert’s loves to talk about how to enact the tagline of his new book: engaging your occupation with God’s global (or as he likes to say, glocal) mission. Here is what he says about his new book: “The book basically looks at the 21st century and projects forward from practical action that’s being done right now in a local church and what it will look like to see the Great Commission fulfilled.”

He goes on to say:

It’s written for everyday ordinary disciples – not preachers or just church leaders. It’s a “missional” book for everyone and what a missional disciple looks like.

I can’t think of a more helpful book when many are preaching, writing, talking about what a theology of work looks like. Connecting our work to God’s glocal agenda is a must and this book will no doubt help us to that end.


In his blog entry entitled “Church of the Now,” Bob Roberts outlines the three “words” that defined the church of the last two decades and waxes on the “now” words of the 2000s. Here it is in a nutshell:

1980s: excellence, relevance, anonymity
1990s: belonging, real, community
2000s: spiritual, global, activism

Bob believes, “…if Jesus were to identify more with the church of the 80’s, 90’s, or 2000’s – I think it would be the 2000’s – they seemed to define his ministry more than the other 3 categories…”

I think Bob is on to something, although I’d carry over community into the 2000s – as in small, intimate, life-on-life bands of missional “communities” sustaining local churches as the catalyst through which a spiritual, global, activist Gospel mission is instigated.

And instead of the word global, I would use Bob’s almagamation, glocal, to describe the importance of the missional church keeping both local and global mission in creative tension (note: Bob uses this word much more expansively in his books).

Bob wisely warns us of our overemphasis, though, on spirituality, global mission, and activism:

The downsides to this, in time we will see …spirituality becomes too associated with emotion…global if not seen in the light of the local can be too overwhelming and lead to the massiveness of the worlds problems causing people to do nothing. We could become activist driven more by people’s pain than God’s love – and that would be a tragedy.

The historical trajectory of missio Dei theology in the late 1900s is an example of Bob’s last comment on activism. Some believed if Christians expressed “solidarity” with the oppressed, salvation for the oppressed was a given. Soteriology no longer included justification. And proclamation of the Gospel was no longer necessary. Everything was mission. Everything was salvation. That is a problem.

My prayer is that we can see that the Gospel is the impetus first, for individual and then, societal conversion. We should be both/and activists; engaging in both proclamation and presence activism.

Read the entire entry here: Church of the Now


Wow…


Father God,

This week, as the world looks on, help the leaders in this room create a civil dialogue about our future.

We need you, God, as individuals and also as a nation.

We need you to protect us from our enemies, but also from ourselves, because we are easily tempted toward apathy.

Give us a passion to advance opportunities for the least of these, for widows and orphans, for single moms and children whose fathers have left.

Give us the eyes to see them, and the ears to hear them, and hands willing to serve them.

Help us serve people, not just causes. And stand up to specific injustices rather than vague notions.

Give those in this room who have power, along with those who will meet next week, the courage to work together to finally provide health care to those who don’t have any, and a living wage so families can thrive rather than struggle.

Hep us figure out how to pay teachers what they deserve and give children an equal opportunity to get a college education.

Help us figure out the balance between economic opportunity and corporate gluttony.

We have tried to solve these problems ourselves but they are still there. We need your help.

Father, will you restore our moral standing in the world.

A lot of people don’t like us but that’s because they don’t know the heart of the average American.

Will you give us favor and forgiveness, along with our allies around the world.

Help us be an example of humility and strength once again.

Lastly, father, unify us.

Even in our diversity help us see how much we have in common.

And unify us not just in our ideas and in our sentiments—but in our actions, as we look around and figure out something we can do to help create an America even greater than the one we have come to cherish.

God we know that you are good.

Thank you for blessing us in so many ways as Americans.

I make these requests in the name of your son, Jesus, who gave his own life against the forces of injustice.

Let Him be our example.

Amen.


This morning, I had a very special moment with my family. One of those watershed experiences that I pray will have an impact on the rest of our lives…

As we try to move towards a more externally-focused life, we have become more and more convicted of our relationships – or lack thereof – with our neighbors and our complete disregard for the less fortunate in places thousands of miles away from our backyards.

So this morning, with my entire family cramped around my computer, we visited the Compassion International website. We have long been burdened to partner with Compassion through the work of Shaun, Randy, and the Compassion bloggers, but frankly, we’ve let things get in the way. And as Holly and I have reflected on our lives over the last six months, we felt this was the time to sacrifice some of what God has given us for the betterment of those less fortunate than us.

First, we began looking for a girl who was around our daughter Margo’s age [4] who had a birthday in August. Marg’s is August 8. We also were looking for a child who was in an AIDS-affected area and who had been waiting six months or longer for a sponsor. We found a sweet five-year girl named Salome Masalu Ngisa from Tanzania who loves to sing. Our daughter is a little songbird so she quickly identified with Salome. Salome lives with her aunt. Her aunt is sometimes employed as a farmer. Salome works at home carrying water, caring for children and helping in the kitchen. There are 6 children in the family. Along with singing, playing with dolls and jumping rope are her favorite activities. Here she is…

[Funny story: Every time we would say "Salome," our 2-year old daughter Sloan thought we were talking about her. A little confusing for a 2-year old mind...]

Next, we looked for a boy around our son Cooper’s age [7] who had a birthday in October. Coop’s is October 29. Again, we were looking for a child who was in an AIDS-affected area and who had been waiting six months or longer for a sponsor. We came across a handsome five-year old named Elvis Mitsanze – yes Elvis – who lives with his father and his mother in Kenya and loves to play soccer, a favorite of Cooper’s too. He is responsible for carrying water and running errands. His father is sometimes employed as a laborer and his mother is sometimes employed as a seller in the market. There are 2 children in the family. Here he is…

What happened next was nothing short of priceless. Cooper and Margo sat down at our kitchen table – unprompted – and began to draw pictures and write little notes for the next hour or so for Salome and Elvis. I think they would have done it all day if we would have let them. So we already have our first batch of ‘pen pal’ material for our new friends. We can’t wait to get our packets with more detailed info on them.

So why did we sponsor kids whose birthdays were in the same month as our two oldest children? When we celebrate their birthdays, we hope remembering Salome and Elvis will get them “outside of themselves,” especially when American birthdays are primarily built around getting. We want to reverse that trend and move towards being ‘givers’ in our own little world as much as we can.

Our ultimate dream? To one day travel as a family to East Africa and visit Salome in Tanzania and Elvis in Kenya [Tanzania literally borders Kenya to the southwest]. We have hopes to sponsor orphan[s] from Rwanda, a country that borders Tanzania to the northwest.

This morning, sitting on our living room couch, the Andrews’ grew a little in missional compassion through Compassion. And I’m sure, we’ve only just begun…

For more information about sponsoring children through Compassion International, visit: www.compassion.com.

If you have a second, watch this presentation on Compassion’s ministry.

And take this quiz…


the 7

1. Very cool to see young pastors putting their ministry philosophy on paper – literally – for other young pastors to see. See the different incarnations of The Pulpit, The Table, and The Square: Joe Thorn, Steve McCoy, and Kevin Larson.

2. I found this very interesting. It comes via Alan Hirsch. It is a map from the World Values Survey that shows the levels of traditional and secular values in the major countries of the world. America isn’t as traditional as you might think. We better get ‘missional’ real quick…

3. Andy Farmer, pastor of discipleship and counseling at Covenant Fellowship Church, has put together a great document expressing important values to be affirmed by Christian artists. This would be a great framework for a covenant for a church’s worship ministry…

4. I’m a closet geek when it comes to the Internet, especially Web 2.0 stuff. I found this article intriguing regarding IP addresses – particularly the IPv4′s – and their “exhaustion.”

5. My love for the Christian year was peaked by this from T-Wax. I think you know what my answer would be…

6. Can a Christian sing the blues? I-Monk unpacks a very biblical concept that is resurfacing in the language of Christians.

7. This is almost three years old, but the Tall Skinny one linked to it recently and I thought it was an insightful blog entry on the debate about attractional/incarnational ministry.


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Husband and father of four, university instructor, seminarian, church planter, and conference architect.

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