For part one of this series click here So, what is transparency? Perhaps it’s easier to start with what it is not. Transparency is not brutal honesty or the lack of a filter. It is not living like you’re in a real-time confessional. It doesn’t mean sharing every single thought that comes to mind or disclosing every emotion as you …
Re-imagining New Scaffolding In planting a missional-incarnational church you will collide with the big question “How do we do leadership in this new but old way of being the church?” Re-imagining and reconstructing leadership scaffolding are essential for being a movemental church in Post-Christianity, but it can be hard to find templates. I confess that my own history in leadership …
John 1:14 from the Message reads:“The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood.” There’s something significant, inspiring, and mysterious that the Creator of all things dwelt in a neighborhood. Accessible God That God would care to be known in a simple and tangible way to humanity is a powerful reflection of the incarnation. It makes God from “way out there” …
We’re so excited to feature a very thoughtful and creative church planter who started Gather in Tacoma, Washington – listen in!
When my church plant began it was perfect. We had a full roster of mature leaders who were experts at shared leadership and conflict transformation. There were people eager to be discipled in the way of Jesus and willing to substantially commit to that endeavor. Because of the relational depth we had cultivated, we agreed on everything, and our gatherings …
As people who live and lead within missional communities, church planters and pastors often bear the weight of keeping the vision and mission in mind on behalf of their people, but in the midst of all the busyness of leading and caring for others, we sometimes miss keeping the main thing the main thing. What is the “main thing” in …
Money. Money, finances, giving, budgeting, tithing, offering — however which way we try to spin it, it leaves most of us, especially in the church planting world, feeling uncomfortable. I wonder if the focus of our conversation is amiss when we talk about money, and instead, we, as shepherds of our missional communities, should actually be honing in on something …
As church planters, one of the key questions we need to be able to answer for our missional communities is this: “What is the Church?” The premise for being able to answer this question lies on the fact that, most people who have gone through some sort of negative experience with an institution will fall into a distaste and a …
In our fifth annual time together, we will plunge into the hands-on-work of Life Together in Community with particular emphasis on creating a missional-community, a tethered community, a multi-ethnic community, a peace-making community, and a healing community. We’ve gathered some of the best on-the-ground church planters and practitioners to furnish us with the possibilities for lighting a path ahead in our churches, …
There is a seismic shift in American culture, the church now finds itself in increasing irrelevance in its “come to us” posture. The Church is invited to break down the sacred/secular divide by creating sustainable missional faith-communities while providing services and relational connection to local neighborhoods. This is where Mission and the Market can converge in context. As early Trappists …