“Who am I and what on earth am I doing here?” “What is my identity and what is my purpose or calling?” “What is God’s will for my life?” These are just some of the many questions most of us have at some point in our lives. Most of us, and particularly those of us who have been in church …
With rising gentrification, wealth disparity, and the decline of organized religion, often along racial lines, planting churches requires power analysis. This webinar will use a basic framework of decolonialism to reconstruct a vision of church planting that shifts the center of power from being in the possession of the ruling class (clergy, institutions, men, white folks, professionals, etc) to being …
(Note: This article was originally written before COVID-19. The ideas contained are now applicable to a time, whenever that may be, when we all can gather again.) In my previous post, I introduced my church plant Cypher Church, and discussed how we’ve intentionally shifted our community away from a worship event. Not only have we removed weekly services, we’ve also …
Rev Morgan Schmidt, a Presbyterian pastor in Bend, OR, has created an innovative online group called Pandemic Partners so that people in her community can help one another in these tough times. Morgan essentially found a creative way to crowdsource kindness online. “By posting how-to-guides on its Facebook page, Pandemic Partners, located in the Presbytery of the Cascades, has taken …
There is a haunting scene at the end of the apocalyptic disaster film Deep Impact (1998). After the water recedes from mega-tsunamis caused by a comet crashing into earth, civilians wander back into the streets with trepidation, grogginess, uncertainty and yet some hopefulness for rebuilding the world. I resonate with this image. How do we reengage our world after being …
COVID-19 is helping write endless questions right now. But I’m guessing yours sound something like this: How are we supposed to curate a community that can’t commune? What are the best ways to maintain ecclesial rhythms online? How do I best keep my community connected as we journey a forced disconnection? What do we do when we’re able to have …
In the life of church planting, communication is so key. Especially in a time like we’re in – in the midst of COVID-19. I’m sure we’re all in the same boat, making decisions for our local spaces and gatherings, changing events and plans, but in the middle of all of this, we have a unique opportunity to invite those we …
God has wired all of us for ministry. When we uncover and awaken the five-fold typology (apostles, prophets, evangelist, shepherds, and teachers mentioned in Eph. 4) in our faith communities and our neighborhoods, we will not only be able to live out our calling, but also help others discover theirs. If you want to plant churches that are resilient and …
As we race into the 2020s, we have suddenly been awakened to an accelerating global COVID-19 Pandemic that few saw coming. Those of us in North America rapidly joined countries in Asia, Europe and the Middle East in dealing with this new Coronavirus Pandemic. While most churches is the US have canceled services or re-routed their services online, they have …
Pruning branches on a living plant helps it to be more productive, grow better fruit, and sustain the plant for the long haul. As churches have become dispersed because of COVID-19 it has revealed the fruit of our labor when times felt much less complicated. The lessons we are learning in order to be church today can help us to …