imagining how the church can reorient around mission

A while back, I was privileged to listen to Scott Arbeiter, the President of World Relief, speak at a community leaders’ breakfast. He was quite inspiring and captivating. Nevertheless, something he said opened a door in my mind that led into one of those tangential moments. He shouldn’t feel bad about my daydreaming, because as someone with ADD, it happens in almost every situation of my life. I think it even happens when I give talks. 🙂

He made mention to the idea that he had hoped that what they were doing at World Relief, helping refugees and immigrants, would become viral (this was several months ago, so the current example of how a virus can travel was not on the radar yet) read more

A few years back now, I was approached by a prospective church planter seeking to get an endorsement for the project. This person told me his plan of planting a church to attract and teach young people the Scriptures like what was happening at the church I was pastoring (the church I was leading at the time was made up of about 60-70% college-aged folk). To say that how I responded caught him off guard would be an understatement. Because of a core theological belief I hold that God is a missionary and that the church should emulate that identity, my advice was, “Go home and take off your pastor hat. Put it in the closet. Then, put your missionary hat on. Spend your time reaching people with the Gospel of Jesus. If God allows you to reach young people with the Gospel, then you can put your pastor hat back on, but if you don’t start with your missionary hat on first, I don’t think you should plant the church.” It was obvious by this person’s crestfallen countenance that the advice wasn’t what he was hoping for.

Those who know me might find the title of this blog unnecessarily provocative, if not disingenuous. After all, I’ve spent the “lion’s share” of my 35 years in ministry catalyzing church planting, both locally and internationally. Over the years, however, as a result of my involvement in church planting in the region, I feel the need to qualify my commitment. I’ve been approached by scores of would-be church planters, looking for advice about how starting a new church might happen in Spokane. If I can be completely candid, over the last 15 years I have discouraged as many of those people as I have encouraged. The reason is, unfortunately, much of church planting is a replication of things that have gotten us into the dilemma we are currently in regarding the church. It’s been said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Statistically the trajectory of the church in the west, and in particular, the Pacific Northwest part of America is one of obsolescence. The church is shrinking faster than we can add new members or new congregations. The flood of younger people looking for the exit ramp out of churches grows at an almost exponential rate. There are many reasons for this, but in my humble opinion, one of the foremost reasons is our attempt to start churches, rather than to do mission both individually and as church communities. read more

This is a webinar from Exponential featuring Rob Wegner and Ralph Moore…and hosted by Daniel Yang as they discuss the power and beauty of the dispersed church. I just wanna say that I am all in on this and always have been. Those in the early days of New Community will hear language in this that is similar or identical to that we used then.

It is the very center of what I hope for at Immanuel Spokane. read more

Here is a talk I gave regarding the topic of generosity and how we might utilize our stimulus checks to bless vulnerable people during the Coronavirus Pandemic.

I wish this idea would become viral. #givethecheck #payitforward

“By judging others we blind ourselves to our own evil and to the grace which others are just as entitled to as we are.”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

I have been a Christian for a long time now. I became an ardent follower of Jesus at 21, 40 years ago. During those days there was fresh fire and unquenchable faith. There was also not just a little bit of arrogance and desire for certainty. Also, during those days I listened to several Bible teachers on the radio (that’s what you did then). One of those was John McArthur. He was sure and brave…and “biblical.” Everything I was looking for. But, even in the cocky, more youthful version of me, I quickly began to sense his hard, and non-humble take on things. He was the only one “right” in the world. I also quickly discovered that he had a very unyielding theological grid in which he read the Bible through. This came off as very ungenerous and very ungracious toward others. It became most evident to me in a book he published called, “The Charismatics.” A book in which his deductive approach (I’ve pre-settled the issue, now I will interpret the Bible to prove my opinion) was clearly exposed. It was incredibly stilted in its hermeneutic. After combing through it several times, I reasoned that it was nonsense. He built a fence of fear around the full-life of the Spirit for scores of good-hearted Christians who hung on his words as gospel. Even as a young pastor, I intuitively felt like there was something more going on. Almost a vendetta. I turned the radio off. I stopped listening. read more

One of the continuing commands in the Old Testament was to remember from which you came. It was a warning built around the idea that if you don’t remember, you will forget that once you were immigrants as well and treat those who are now immigrants with dishonor and show them no compassion. Hmmm…

God tells the nation of Israel, read more

I have begun to describe myself as “post-deconstructionist.” That is not to say that I am done deconstructing ideas, because they are ever-evolving and refuse to behave, but I am observing what seems to be a sort of an addiction to deconstruction.

My friend, David Swanson wrote this a couple of years ago on FB: read more

I posted a blog last week about the desperate need in the church for a reawakening to the Holy Spirit’s presence and power. Some might call that a revival. Perhaps that is the right word, but what I do know is we cannot hope for the supernatural work of God by employing human strategies and maneuvers.  Listen, we are not gonna out organize, out build, out cool the world. Even if we could, it would not bear fruit that remains.

I will say that something amazing is percolating at Immanuel (the church I am part of), and in some ways, I cannot even tell you why. It isn’t like we are doing anything really different. Maybe it is just us keeping our ears and eyes a little more sensitive. I will let you know more as things unfold. read more

I am involved with a group of church leaders in which we are dreaming of how we can multiply the Gospel in our city and beyond. It is a collaborative effort with many other churches here in Spokane. This morning was a gathering of the Immanuel Network, a smaller iteration of the larger movement (The Pacific Northwest Planting Movement).

One of the leaders shared about how his church is experiencing a Holy Spirit revival. Please know that I usually am a bit dubious of “testimonies” like this. I suppose because I have seen so much nonsense in the church connected to the sentiment, “The Holy Spirit led us.” (God save me from myself) read more

In my sermon prep today I came across this piercing paragraph from the always prophetic Stanely Hauerwas (his commentary on Matthew).

“Rightly reading the signs of the times requires a church capable of standing against the legitimating stories of the day. American Christians often think that if we had been confronted with someone like Hitler we would have been able to recognize that he was evil. Yet in many ways, the church in Germany was a church more theologically articulate than the American church has ever been; still the German church failed to know how to adequately challenge the rise of Hitler. It failed because Christians in Germany assumed that they were German Christians just as American Christians assume that they are American Christians. Churches that are nationally identified will seldom be able to faithfully read the signs of the time.”

Please, please don’t read this as some overt political statement from me or some kind of Hitler/Trump equivalency. If you do, you are missing the target.

It is actually an ecclesial statement.

How does the church remain faithful in the midst of so many counter-stories, particularly “nationalism”? How do we maintain our equilibrium in the midst of so many different and competing narratives?
How do we maintain our equilibrium in the midst of so many different and competing narratives?

BTW – this commentary was written in 2006 if anything he was referring to George W Bush. Hehe!

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