How Should We Gather?

How have church gatherings changed as a result of the global pandemic? I am making an assumption here, of course, that your community has changed in some manner in an effort to connect to the needs of marginalized people, particularly the disabled/immunocompromised community (a post for another time). But most of us have not recovered the “old normal” entirely. Many …

Build a Better Mousetrap?

The well-known idiom, “if you build a better mousetrap, the world will beat a path to your door” is often attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson. What he actually said was, “If a man has good corn or wood, or boards, or pigs to sell, or can make better chairs or knives, crucibles or church organs, than anybody else, you will …

Come and Follow Me

As Jesus walked beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. “Come, follow me,” Jesus said, “and I will send you out to fish for people.” At once they left their nets and followed him. When he had gone a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother …

Competing for Community

Purpose of Community When we consider community, what are some things that come to mind in terms of the purpose of community? While many of us can think of the benefits of community in both providing a sense of belonging and a sense of purpose within a neighborhood and actual place, the unspoken hardship is that, most of us, if …

COURAGE IN A TIME OF COVID

Our anxiety muscles have grown. We were told to be anxious. We were told that this anxiety should drive our behaviour, and that our lives depended on it. This behaviour created physical space and safety, which in itself was necessary. But was there another spirit by which we could have achieved that? Could we not have been driven by courage? …

An Ethic of Listening

In times where the “cancel culture” goes both directions (a cultural reaction of taking offense and rejecting someone due to their biases and assertions), it takes maturity to listen with hope, love, and faith. We listen with hope knowing the Redeemer. We listen with love for our neighbor. We listen with faith that God will give us wise, gentle, humble, …

Online Church

Most of us have developed a level of proficiency for “Zoom church” and its many lacking facets. To what degree has moving online been helpful to your church? In what ways has it been a hindrance? These pandemic times have made many leaders re-think prior assumptions surrounding the online church. I would certainly count myself as one. Incarnation Church planters …

Looking Back, Moving Forward

A good friend asked me recently “If you were pastoring a church today what would you preach on?” My quick response was “How do we love God and neighbor in a post pandemic future?” As I pondered his question a little more deeply however I found myself looking back over the last year and the important questions it has taught …