There’s a story from American folklore that Henry Ford, after launching the Model T, declared consumers could pick any color they wanted…so long as it was black. To me this sounds like the same approach Christian worship has taken. It comes in basically one color. There are two main versions: sing songs and listen to a preacher, or follow some …
If you’re following along with the ministry of Jesus, He spoke of seeking — searching for with all your might and with urgency — only two things. He tells His followers to seek first the Kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33) which feels like a given since people are wanting to participate in the good and powerful rule and reign of …
At 57 years old, a lot has changed in my perspective of things. Life looks different, the future takes on the priority of legacy-leaving, and my idealism has taken on more grace. The other thing that has exited my priority list is the need of a title. I often have people ask me what I do and so I have …
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 …
In our fifth annual time together at The Praxis Gathering, 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 …
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 …