“This community has changed a lot since I was a girl,” Beatrice explained as we sat on her front porch. “The library used to be just up the block. We used to have a grocery store and lots of things within walking distance.” “Where do you get your groceries now?” I asked. “Wherever I can get a ride,” she said. …
Lent is the forty-day period before Easter that commemorates Jesus’ sojourn in the wilderness in preparation for the launch of his ministry. In the early church, Lent was a time to prepare for baptism. Today, it is usually regarded as a season of soul searching, privation, and repentance. It begins with Ash Wednesday and ends at sundown on Maundy Thursday. …
I have confessed that I have been guilty of three leadership assumptions that work against the missional work of God. In case you missed it, here are those assumptions (the more I confess, the better it is for my healing): We just need to find the right program. More is better. Hub-and-spoke leadership is effective for missional leadership. The truth …
It’s one thing to verbally affirm that in our postmodern, post-Christendom world we face adaptive challenges. It is entirely another to respond to these challenges adaptively. We naturally assume (at least I do) that we can formulate the strategies, organize the resources, and outline the steps for leading our people in participating in God’s mission. But if we are in …
We fell in love with the idea of being missional before we actually started practicing it. It was just easier to articulate a missional theology than it was to start practicing everyday mission. Eventually, though, we realized we needed to start somewhere. We needed to get outside our normal rhythms of “church” if we were going to learn missional living. …
I don’t know if you’re like me, but when I hear the word evangelism, I have a visceral response. My heart sinks, and one of three images usually comes to mind: The bearded, scruffy-looking man walking down the sidewalk with the cardboard sign declaring, “The end is near!” The street preacher dressed to the nines on the corner, bullhorn in hand, …
My husband and I recently returned from vacationing in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, a highly multiethnic city of 1.67 million people in a metro area consisting of 7.9 million people. The city itself is predicted to grow to 2.2 million by 2020. Kuala Lumpur is a global city, offering international financial services, headquarters to multinational corporations, a center for new ideas and …
My wife Deb and I recently moved our family to a northeastern suburb of Indianapolis to plant a church with our friends Matt and Sharon Tebbe. There were a few reasons for landing where we did, mostly having to do with the relationships our friends (who had arrived a few months before we had) were establishing. It seemed good to …
Anyone doing the work of planting churches will meet unpredictable cultural challenges. By definition, you are going into uncharted turf. You will have to listen, encounter new issues, interpret, translate and engage in ways you never would have to in established churches. Anyone wishing to lead a traditional (attractional) church into contextual engagement will face the same challenges and tasks. …