imagining how the church can reorient around mission

Sept 14th- 9 am-1:30 pm – Free lunch included – hit the barcode below to register

This event, hosted by the Pacific Northwest Movement (PNWM), is free and open to all Pastors and Christian leaders interested in what church planting would look like in a rapidly changing culture.

“Church planting is not an end in itself, but one aspect of the mission of God which churches are privileged to participate”

Stuart Murray

Church planting is a dynamic and purposeful endeavor that involves establishing new Christian communities within specific cultural and social contexts. There are three ideas that will prove to be very important as guiding principles for success. read more

Immanuel Church, the church I help lead, is an apostolic, church planting community (its leadership has planted 10 churches incubated in the Pacific Northwest, along with years of international urban church planting experience). In collaboration with our denomination, the Evangelical Covenant Church, Pacific Northwest Church Planting, and Whitworth University’s OCE, we have developed a hands-on leadership residency to equip and resource people in real-time on how to plant justice-oriented, missional, incarnationally formed churches. We are a laboratory for learning and after completing the Leadership Residency, we have multiple funding streams available. If you are interested in planting, in particular a woman or a person of color, we have a couple of positions currently available in our Residency program.

If you are interested let us know at the bottom of this page – www.immanuelspokane.org/mission

It was a sunny, breezy, end-of-summer day eight years ago when I stepped foot on Whitworth’s campus for the first time as a student. I remember like it was yesterday the confidence I had as I waltzed around campus with my nerdy lanyard–student ID card in full view for all to see. I don’t want to be unnecessarily hard on myself, but I do remember feeling like I was pretty cool already, like I was going to take this university by storm. Just like high school, I was going to get all the jobs and leadership positions, make a ton of friends, do all the right things, and you can bet I was going to stuff my calendar full of all the right activities. (Yikes!)

I would run into friends around campus, and at times I’d find myself sort of bragging about how busy I was. A full plate and a growing resume of success, however small, were badges of honor. I think I was a little blind to the love around me, and of course, I was also blind to the suffering around me. I was living in to a twisted theology that said I was loved only when I really proved myself. Busyness and a good reputation were my idols, and the unsustainable approval from my community replaced the unconditional love of God. 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

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

This is part 3 of Immanuel’s Theological Vision. You can find part 1 by clicking here and part 2 by clicking here.

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If you’re not aware of it, you may as well be brought into the circle. I have an apostolic calling. OK, relax. Some of you are thinking what does he think he is, one of the 12. The only “12” I’m a part of is a huge fan of the Seattle Seahawks. No, not a big “A” apostle, but I have an orientation that finds its greatest fulfillment in multiplying these reconciled communities that are populated with restored people.

A brief history of my pastoral experience is after pastoring a small rural church, I planted a church in Wenatchee WA, which, by the way, was a miserable failure. A humbling experience is almost always an efficient but austere teacher. From there, in 1991, I planted a church in Spokane called New Community, which in turn launched six other churches. After 17 years in the role, I took a job as the president of an international church planting organization called Christian Associates International. Its sole mission is to plant churches in Western culture. And now, at 59, I have planted another church called Immanuel. I think it is fair to say that it is far from a phase in my life. At 59, I am way past the normal age of church planter. By and large, church planting belongs to the young. Nevertheless, it is really a part of my orientation, to extend the work of Christ into the nations.

I am persuaded that this ministry of reconciliation takes place best through the multiplication of communities of faith.

Here’s a question: how did the gospel get to Spokane? When you consider the distance and challenges that stood in its way it is amazing. Jerusalem is 6707 miles from Spokane. How did the Gospel get all the way to us? Well, it got here as courageous believers who experienced the life of Christ and believed that they were supposed to go beyond their local context, left friends and family to take the Gospel to the nations. In our case it crossed language and cultural barriers and geography, even an ocean, to finally get to a place where we are today. That is precisely why Jesus says in Acts1:8, “For when the Holy Spirit comes upon you in power, you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, and to the very ends of the earth.” There is a concentric progression to extending the gospel into the nations. We cannot have a mature missiology without a firm conviction and vision of taking the gospel to the nations. That starts here in Spokane and goes as far out as God allows us.

Additionally, I believe this reproduction must be a part of every aspect of our ministry. It has to include what we do with kids, with our Life Together Groups, and ultimately with churches. Each leader should be giving his or her life away to someone else. It is the idea of working yourself out of a job. It is epitomized by Paul’s words to his mentee, Timothy.

“And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others.” 2 Timothy 2:2

It is really a perpetual succession plan. You receive from God and in turn you willingly and joyfully give it to someone with the expectation that they will pass the baton of faith and leadership on to someone else.

I have always felt strongly that my main calling in life is to give my life away to young men and women, to help them live into what God is calling them to do. I read a poem years ago that had a line in it that went like this, “I don’t want to be a king but I want to be a kingmaker.” That is what it means to be reproductive.
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“Being missional means moving intentionally beyond our church preferences, making missional decisions rather than preferential decisions.” ― Ed Stetzer, Comeback Churches

I got the privilege of meeting with a young church planter from a mainline denomination yesterday. She is charming and passionate, though somewhat doe-eyed, seemingly not completely sure what she was getting in to (though, she is quickly arriving there).

I met her last week while teaching a track on the Missional Church at the Whitworth Institute of Ministry. While during the introductions, I came to find out about her dream and calling to church planting (got me excited) and how she was an embedded planter in a mainline church here in Spokane (got me even more excited, because I believe an embedded approach is the healthiest model to embark on the challenging journey of planting).

Anyway, that all led to us connecting yesterday. After some small talk, I began to ask into the “why?” and the “how?” of this new project. While I was thrilled to hear the church plant was being initiated, I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my gut that those who were helping her hadn’t fully calculated the cost, nor were they clear on how to pull it off.

Part of the dilemma is that the local church she is embedded in and will supposedly send her out is in somewhat of self-protected posture. In other words, they like they idea of birthing a new church, but they don’t want it to cost them anything. There is already an apparent pulling back of support because they fear they will lose members.

Ok, listen carefully to this next part: You cannot do any form of mission, particularly church planting, without risk. Because the denomination she is a part of is dying, and the church that wants to send her is an aging congregation and apparently not robust, there is a contraction of resources…which is the very worst thing a denomination or a local church can afford to do.

If you want your church to flourish, you must have the courage to release resources – both money and people. It is not the churches job to try to keep people. If a church goes into protective mode, the very people the church wants to participate will not stay. The people who correctly see “life as mission” will go somewhere, where the church is not trying just to stay alive, but to a place where the church will give itself away for the sake of the Kingdom.

What happens is, to keep from dying, all resources flow toward vital systems, which seem logical and even natural. Yet, in the Kingdom, there is a counter logic. We hear Jesus say all of these crazy, counter-intuitive things like, “If you want to live, you have to die. If you wanna be great, you have to submit and become a servant.”

If a church, or a denomination for that matter, cannot transition its identity from a “container” for Christian people (Christendom orientation) to a missionary community, it will eventually come to an end. I know, those are hard words…sorry. Why? It will come to an end because the church is living counter to what God intended it to be…a community on mission.

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I say to people all the time, “The church is born with a Womb.” That is maybe a strange way to put it, but in my experience, churches rarely conceptualize themselves as church planting movements. Church plants and planters are courageous types, forging new territory for mission, reaching people that more historical churches cannot. That said, church planting usually is seen as a single act, planting a single church, rather than preparing from the very beginning to be a missionary movement. I have always believed that we don’t see movement because we fail to see ourselves rightly. When we planted Immanuel 3 ½ years ago, we framed into the very DNA of our being not only the need but also the priority to multiply. And, not just disciples, but discipling communities (btw – IMHO, this is a critically significant aspect of discipleship). Discipling is a communal venture. Our hope and intention, at Immanuel (the plant that I help lead) is to not only be a presence of shalom in the West Central neighborhood of Spokane but that that shalom would be extended to other neighborhoods in our city, regions and even countries. We are purposely shaping our priorities to live into God’s dream of multiplication.