Mission Shaped Values

Sermon on Holistic Mission
Over the past few months we have been talking a lot about Mission
It’s a loaded word that has many different meaning depending on the context.
Business,
Cultural abuse,
Colonization,
War against terrorism,
Undercover military operations
Sound systems,
Ice Hockey
And a host of different associations within the church too.
It’s the street preacher who rebukes the lamppost
The person who goes overseas in Jesus’ name
The activity of people who go overseas and build schools in the Solomon’s
Here is an image I grew up with….OVALTINA
Mission is also a term that has been seen by some as co word for bigotry, oppression and imposing of alien values on tribal cultures…

The problem has been that many things we have called mission have been more about us
– expanding the empire
- making people like us
- ensuring that the resources of a country fall into the hands of good Christian folk rather than pagan Muslims
Mission has been so often associated with abuse because as the Church historically we have often abused those around us in our name and in the name of profit rather than going in the name of Jesus
- At the heart of the problem is a failure of the church to recognize mission is at the very heart and nature of God – Our God is a missionary God
1. The Father sends his Son to be the savior of the world (1 John 4:14).
2. The Father and the Son send the Holy Spirit into the World (John 14:26).
3. In the same way the God who is Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, sends us into the world. So Jesus can say ‘In the same way as the Father has sent me, so I am sending you.’ (John 20:21)

The point is that mission isn’t some kind of ‘bolt-on’ activity that gets added to God. Mission defines God’s character. (Cistene chapel)
The mission of the Church is not our mission but God’s mission – we are merely his hand and his feet.
Mission is joining in with what God is already doing…So that clarifies something – mission is about God’s activity. It’s about God being active and being active in God’s name.
The question is what does that activity look like?
Depending on whom you ask you’re liable to get some very different answers
I have a friend in CHCH who says mission is about telling people about Jesus – telling people a set of truths and then getting them to tick the boxes
We have a problem – Sin
Sin is separation from God
We need someone who can bridge the gap
Only God is able to bridge the gap
Therefore God must do something to bridge the gap
Jesus is the answer – the God man
Tick the box and score 1000 points
I have a friend in Auckland too
And for him mission is about restoring creation
God created a beautiful world for us to inhabit in communion with him
We spoiled it; God kicked us out the garden
Jesus died to reconcile the relationship – and through that we could work towards restoring creation
So who is right?
Who has the right view of mission?
CHCH or Auckland?
They are both right
The good news is about more than saving us from sin, but it’s also about more than restoring creation too.

In fact in the Anglican Church we talk about mission in five ways – not one way – it’s not an attempt to make everything mission but it is an attempt to express the fullness of God’s mission as described in Scripture.

(1) Proclaim the Good News
In 1 Peter 3:15 Peter says. “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give a reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect.” That about telling people about Jesus – what Jesus has done – as God’s people we need to find meaningful ways to express the truth.
Proclaiming the good news may involve a formula and boxes to tick but for most of us it’s more likely to be about What Jesus has done for me – starting from your own experience often helps people connect with their experience.
(2) Making Disciples
That sounds easy but I guess the question is what is a Disciple?
Often in the Church we have talked about discipleship as learning scripture and understanding it – so churches have set up Bible classes studies on the Pauline letters, the synoptic gospels that sort of thing. But is that what discipleship really is head knowledge or is there more to it.
I think there is more – lots more. Discipleship is about equipping people to be part of the Kingdom of God.
The Kingdom of God is a nation within a nation –it’s a different set of values, beliefs – a different way of living.
– it’s culture is based on sharing – as a church we regularly share a meal around the communion table – in doing that we are receiving foretaste – an appetizer of reality when God’s Kingdom has come and we will all be invited to the wedding feast of the Lamb - Jesus
mutual support, love, forgiveness, giving people second and third chances, a culture where leadership is primarily demonstrated in service
– It’s about a different way of living not just in the Church but in the world too.
It’s being salt and light
Salt being an antiseptic, a preservative, adding flavor
Light being about lighting up the dark places.

Being a disciple is about nailing our colours to the flag of God’s Kingdom, Taking up a new citizenship.

(3) Responding to Human Need
What did Jesus say the greatest commandment is?
One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?" "The most important one” answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these." (NIV, Mark 12:28-31).
Standing next to the poor, offering a cup of cold water to someone in need (Matthew 10: 40 – 42) is an essential aspect of mission.
Now some people say we do that so we can preach to them because they are so grateful – no we do it because that is what God says we should do – the world has a word for this it’s called charity.
Charity is actually a biblical word – it comes from the root Charis – which sometimes we translate as love, but more often as Grace – and in both cases its God’s love and Grace.
To offer charity is about giving someone God’s grace – it’s a blessing.
Yes it’s open to abuse but God has poured out his Charis up on so who are we to say he shouldn’t do that to others just because they may sell the gift and but a lotto ticket or a 12 pack of beer.
We are simply called to love – to offer loving service.

(4) Challenge Injustice
If we are called to pray that God’s Kingdom should come on earth as in heaven – and if God’s kingdom is about how we treat one another about modeling forgiveness about sharing round the communion table as an appetizer for the reality when his Kingdom has come then as a church we should challenge everything that gets in the way of that shouldn’t we?
In Isaiah 58 God says that the kind of worship he wants to receive from his people is “to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke”. That’s powerful stuff – coming against anything that would prevent God’s kingdom coming and allowing people to receive that Kingdom
This is the sort of stuff that challenged William Wilberforce to make the abolishment of slavery his life’s work.
But it could equally be about:
Saying no to gluttony when so much of the world is starving
Saying no to the moral decline of society
Saying no to Easter eggs because the manufacturers them but their coco beans from source that use child slave to harvest them.

(5) Caring for Creation
While it seems like an optional extra too many caring for our environment is also an aspect of mission
Now I know what some of you are thinking
“Why bother to care for the environment when heaven is really our home and the earth is going to be destroyed anyway?”
Well firstly we should care because it was the first commandment of God in Genesis 1
He said to be fruitful and multiply and have dominion – that’s not about exploitation or using up all the earth resources in one generation it’s about caring - looking after it – nurturing the planet.
But God doesn’t just leave it there..
John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave His only Son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life – that’s not just about God loving humans – the Greek word that we translate as world is cosmos – and it refers to the whole created order.
If you like John 3:16 is about reversing the issues of Genesis 3 – we are redeemed but so is the whole world
Secondly we need to look after the planet because when we exploit it –someone else – usually someone who is a lot more poor than us suffer people who have less than us go without and all so we can have the latest toys – it’s sick…

We are talking about Mission but we are talking about holistic mission – that’s not some mumbo jumbo new agey thing it’s mission as God intended.
We are all called to get involved in this
Mission is at the very heart of who God is –
Our God is a Missionary God –
A God who reaches out to us…
And calls us to do the same

The Convent

A web site was set up by the Poor Claire Community about their experiences with The Convent Documentary

http://www.poorclaresarundel.org/Pages/CONVENTDefault.aspx

Passion

You don't have to go far in the blogging world to find people blogging about what is wrong with the church. Some say it is bad theology, others a lack of prayer, I tend to bang on about the need to be missional, while others comment that we need to take a marketing approach, some point to hypocrisy, the failure to deal with issues of justice, a lack of love for the poor, failure of community - too much community etc.

I think they are all right, they all point to failures, and as we might expect dealing with these issues may well help reverse the trends, while at the same time highlighting others. One thing is for certain in organisational dynamics whenever something begins to fall over - the knives often turn inward, we look at someone or something to blame.

Another institution which I have a great deal of interest in is my home Football Club, Middlesbrough FC, now when I was a kid living in the north east I was a Liverpool supporter, however when I came to NZ, MFC became a way of me connecting with the bigger picture of who I am, the team gave me sense of connectedness, roots. The Tees is my river, the riverside stadium is my mountain – this is how I know what home is. Middlesbrough like the Church in general has issues they are struggling, the fan base is faltering, they lose when they should win and make stupid mistakes constantly – I said they were like the average Church. They have some real issues, and the knives have turned inwards – it's the manager, it's the goal keeper, it's the lack of strikers, it's the weak midfield, and the heave handed defence, it's the lack of money at the club. While all these reasons for failure are right and dealing with them (like the Church) may reverses the trend I think they also highlight other inadequacies.

The solution the club has come up with I think is brilliant – rather then turning the knives inward they are calling for people to renew their passion for the club, to scream, yell and roar their support so that when teams come they are playing 11 men plus 30000 on the bench. They are encouraging people to be passionate – to do this they have put out a video with a young guy who embodies the club, he's a local lad made good and in that represents 1000 and 1000 of teenagers in and around Middlesbrough. He isn't the most eloquent speaker, nor is he a 'pretty picture' but he embodies passion. I watched it and got shivers down my spine, while it won't make me go out and buy a season ticket, it does make me proud to be part of something bigger.

Passion for the gospel – as good news for all seems to be one thing I see missing in the Church, I myself often find myself feeling ho-hum after attending Church, and I know that many feel that way – things aren't going that well and the passion seems to have gone. I still love Jesus more than ever but sometimes hanging around with his bride can be a little dull. I wonder whether we could reinstall some passion in each other through a similar approach to MFC and put the knives away…

Video link is here: David Wheater - Passion

Breaking rocks for Jesus...

If I think we were to take an honest look at the Church in general many of us would say - "this isn't working, something is not right". But what do we do about it???
I have a theory about what we can do about it - I call it breaking rocks for Jesus.
Many years ago in the penal system to reform criminals they would give them a hammer and some big rocks and tell them to break them into small rocks. To an outside this looks like pointless and cruel punishment, so it was stopped - and now criminals get to do pretty much what they want in our penal systems - but when you think about it they were actualy doing soemthing constructive - they were keeping themselves physicaly fit, they were given time in the monotony of what they were doing to reflect on their crime and probably sweraing to themsleves that they would not get themseleves in this situation ever again.
I think breaking rocks for Jesus is a good image of what we should be doing, trying stuff no matter how meaningless, reflecting on what we have been doing and generaly keeping active - not rearanging the church seats but doing stuff in the community, anything that will keep us active, fit and focused on the task. When i look back at some of the ministry that God has blessed that i have been involved in it hasn't been dreamt up it has come from breaking rocks and keeping busy.
I am a rock breaker for Jesus - and proud of that fact

Transgender kids, the church and sexual theology

Last night there was a really interesting doco on Transgender children, It told the story of three kids who all suffer from gender identity disorder. These are kids who believe they were 'born in the wrong body', and who have all gone through a process of dare I use the term being born again, into what they believe is there psychological gender. I have heard of adults who have done this and read the articles in the women's mags (purely for research...and gossip), and scene some of the scary photo's too, but never encountered it with Children. My first instinct then was to dismiss it as parents making the boy into the girl they always wanted, but to see the anguish on the faces of the parents of one six year old boy/girl and the mourning of their lost little boy, who finds themselves wanting and feeling that they are a girl certainly changed my opinion.
Though cases like this are rare they do exist and in Samoan culture they seem to be recognised in people referred to as fafafine. But what about the Church?
If ever there were families that need the love of God, a large dose of his grace and the transforming/accepting power of redemption in Christ it is these families but I suspect that if there peers reject them, then the Church would probably reject them more - I hope not. Why? because we seem to have an obsession with sex, and it's a reflection I think of our society's obsession with sex too. I would suggest that a major reason that this disorder made the doc because of society's sexual obsession, the same obsession labels people like this as outcasts and freaks.

It brings me back to Genesis, and the words of Moses, that when they had eaten of the tree of knowledge of they realised they were naked and were ashamed. I wonder if we could strip back and overcome this shame whether it would alter our understanding of sex and sexual identity, I suspect it won't happen this side of eternity, but in the mean time we need to be praying for kids like this, not that they come right, but rather that they become whole, and that people can whole heartedly accept them for who they are.

As a youth worker who works with kids who are forming and understanding who they are, I cannot be too quick to judge, but need to be able to demonstrate compassion, and stickability, that what ever strange, unsual or even normal behaviour a young person goes through they may or may not decide that is who they are, but in eternity we will be whole, we will be transformed, we will loose our obsession.

Late Late Mothers Day, and justice....

On Sunday we ran another of our services for boarders at Nelson College, with about 250 in attendance it is quite a lot of fun, especialy because most of them don't wnat to be there. The idea of a captive audience is very appealing. However we are aware to that the worst thing we can do is bang them across the head with a bible - they may be captive but we do not have to torture them...
So this Sunday we picked up on the theme of 'Mothers' a week late for mothers day but then I am always a week late for mothers day - sorry mum if you read this- I love you though.
So we played some music by typical boys college mums favourite bands - U2 and Boys 2 men, ran a quiz on famous mums and talked about the power of a 'nagging' mum...
Apparently Abraham Lincoln said on his mother that her prayers have been with him all his life .- While my mother prayers may not have always followed me certainly her advice has. Though it often seems like she is 'nagging me' and chewing my ear, the fact of the matter is more often than not she is right. In fact the origins of Mother Day can be found in Mother’s 'nagging'.
The first Mother’s Day was established in 1914 by US President Woodrow Wilson. Now it wasn’t due to pressure from the Florists' Association; nor by the telephone company or Hallmark cards or any of the other companies that make half their annual takings on Mothers Day. The idea of Mothers' Day was invented by a mother protesting the killing of World War I – a nagging mother in an anti war protest worried about the fate of her son in what seemed like a senseless war.
This caring, 'nagging' mum got other mothers to protest, too, and pretty soon Congress gave into the pressure – amazing what a ‘nagging’ mother can do.
So in 1914 President Woodrow Wilson dedicated the second Sunday in May as Mothers' Day, It wasn’t just a day to honour Mothers – which is a cool thing to, but a day to honoring their wishes -- that the killing be stopped.
Mums can change the world, and they are worth honouring, not just on Mothers day but every day.
We followed this by looking at some contemporary 'nagging' mums the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, mums whose plight and struggle were captured in the U2 song Mothers of the Disapeared, a group of mums who 'nag' the government about human rites issues in an attempt to reunite families with their stolen children who were kidnapped for speaking out against a the government. A 'nagging' mum is a very powerful force for making the world right.

Tagged for Jesus

I got Tagged the other day from a local youth group person. Not having a clue what that meant I had a look on the site was kind of confused by the whole thing. I guess like My Space, beebo and some of the MSN groups before them it is a way of socialising, semi anonymously with people from around the world. It struck me as being kind of weird, not that i don't think socialising is a good idea but there does seem to be an element of collecting people and their links, just like I collect Psychedelic Firs Cd's or my wife use to collect stamps - i think there is a real danger in this type of phenomenon that people become numbers and not a lot else. We call it making friend but is it really, or is it making transactions?
It reminds me a lot of how I have seen many Christians approach evangelism. In my BC days I had quite a few Christian contacts who only i think wanted to know me because they saw me as a potential convert, and a good one at that having been a new age Church of Scientology type with a leaning towards being a goth. It all came to a head one day when I accused one of the people of only being interested in me because they saw me as another notch on their crucifix. Needless to say after this spread many of these people wanted nothing to do with me, to them I was just a link a transaction.
I guess this experience has really shaped my approach to evangelism in the fact that I don't believe in it - and yet people often tell me I am an evangelist. I do however believe in relationships, sharing bread in whatever form that may be and I am also not ashamed about what I believe. I believe the gospel is good news, but I don't want to deliver it like postman carrying a bill, but I do want to demonstrate it and i believe that relates to the whole of what I do, whether it be smiling at a stranger who has had a bad day, and being patient with the check out assistant, it also means that i am not as quick as i used to be to judge others but would rather encourage them and dare i say it try to relate to them. I do not want to tag people for Jesus, people are not a commodity or a link to be collected.

The Soil of Community

The last few years have been rather difficult for me – in terms of my faith. It’s not that I have lost it in fact I think it may be stronger, but I have struggled with the place of community.
When I lived and pastored in Christchurch I would constantly talk about community, and spent lot of time telling the people I worked with if they could be a Christ centred community and do community everything else would take care of itself. However the house of cards I believed in fell down and I know realise that thought we talk community, we have little experience of true community.

A year or so ago I was introduced to the thinking of Anthropologist Victor Turner through listening to Michael Frost. Turner suggests that we should think about this somewhat differently. He offers the concept of communitas instead of community. According to Turner, communitas grows out of liminality (that is a state of ambiguity, openness, and uncertainty). This transition state opens the possibility for new ways of thinking, feeling and acting. Subsequently differences between participants also become less important and hence a truer sense of what we believe community should be grows.

Out of this liminal environment grows what Turner calls communitas, a new social structure that is based on equality and common experience. The focus then is not on building community, but due to a common experience a ‘type’ of community grows.

Turner was talking specifically about tribal initiation cultures and there importance in bringing life to the WHOLE tribe. But I think many of us see the same type of phenomenon in natural disasters, mission experiences, camps, dare I say even fundraising events etc. things that take us out of the ordinary and literally through us together. In Exiles: Living Missionally in a Post-Christian Culture. Frost notices this is what happened with the first followers of Jesus, they were: “Men who otherwise would have nothing to do with each other are thrown together by their shared devotion to Jesus, and as they journey together, they develop a depth of relationship that literally turned the world upside down.”I think the key is that when the church focuses on mission, communitas naturally develops. But when the church tries to create “community,” it often goes bad.
“The hunger for community is a legitimate one, but to pursue it for its own sake is the mistake. When we seek to build community without the experience of liminality, all we end up with is pseudo-community that pervades many churches." Exiles, page 121

A commitment to mission then is the soil out of which community grows.

Life Sucks....

Several years back I posted as I occasionaly do a sermon on the web site Sermon Central at the time I became almost famous with somewhere in the region of 300 people viewing it in a matter of 2 - 3 weeks. I was however forced to take it of and resubmit it with a different title and some editing. Why because it was called "Life Sucks", and apparently as one of the many complaining emails I got pointed out Sucks has Sexual connotations. Imagine that an every day word here in NZ has sexual connotations, in all honesty I did not know that (call me naive), so I thought with the web masters and the dozen or so people who objected via email for creative and artistic and cultural recognition of the word sucks as meaning really bad. My argument was simple, and I gave examples of words that went the other way, namely - fanny, where i grew up it ain't what people from America think it is, I pointed out how offensive I found the theme tune to the TV series the Nanny with Fran Drescher glorified a word that much of the world was disgusted by. I also pointed out that Tramp in our culture has nothing to do with prostitutes and that i objected to the censorship of Corrie Ten Boon's book Tramp for the Lord. But alas I was defeated and forced to resubmit (but if you look at the sermon on line you'll notice the checker at their site missed one offending sucked).
SO why am I writing this - well it's not to plead for tolerance, but just to point out that even some Americans don't think the word has sexual connotations. Had to laugh at this article. Would love to start a protest group to recognise and save the word SUCKS from dirty minded people.r

"its not the Christianity has being tried and failed. Its that it has never really being tried"

Been pondering on this quote for a few weeks but could not remeber who said it - apparently it was G.K. Chesterton.... Not the most handsome person to grace the planet but certainly one of the greatest minds, and someone whose thoughts seem to speak volumes in today's climate.
particuarly like this other quote from him too...
"Impartiality is a pompous name for indifference, which is an elegant name for ignorance." - The Speaker, 12/15/00
I think he might be a prize fighter when it comes to philosophy sucks you in and then deals a killer punch...

New (or should it be Now) Age fair in Nelson

This weekend the annual new age fair - opportunities, is happening in Nelson. While I won't be going (it costs $20 to get in) after visiting a few new age fairs and wondering where the Christians are I am pleased to see that one of our local churches has a group going in to offer healing prayer. Best thing is that a few of them are young people - please pray for them if you have space in your day.

Way back when I was in my early 20's I was quite heavily involved in the Church of Scientology, after being introduced through a girl firend who was into all things new age, so when ever Christians are willing to spend time with NA types I am well pleased, becuase it was only through a couple of kind, grace filled christians that I came to know the Lord.

God Bless the St Peter's crew - you are salt and light, and i hope the weekend is fulfilling

On death...

I was at interning (I think that is what it's called) for the ashes of a young guy who died of cancer way backin February. It was a very strange experience putting the ashes of someone contined in what looked like a recyled milk container in the ground.
The mother of the guy said the reason she choose the site is becuase he has a view of the sea and can see the planes taking off (two of his loves). While I appreciated the sentimentality I found it odd, given he has been ten months and was well and truly cremated. At the same time the same mother has talked about her son looking down from heaven. With us, yet not with us... it's a weird way to view things but then I guess when I look at the Bible it's equaly as weird. on the one hand we have a big emphasis on the ressurection of the body, but on the other their is another voice that talks in almost gnostics terms of casting of the body. It is by no means clear which is correct, or even if one contradicts the other, which they appear to.

Football, and Pastoral Leadership

In this months New Zealand Soccer Talk there is a really interesting article about Football managers. In England at the moment there are some very new top flight managers who have not gone through the apprentice system, which seems to be an aspect of any career path. Subsequently one of them at least is probably not going to last the season (Gareth Southgate)- because when a club is not playing well the first person to blame is the manager/coach. (I have a friend who used to coach rugby - he said the only thing you can guarantee is that eventually you will be sacked.)
The argument goes that if they went through the apprenticeship system and started by coaching maybe a 4th division team then after 15 years they may be ready for the premiership. so subsequently the belief is that:
(a) You have to earn the right
(b) Better to learn how to fail at the bottom
(c) Experience is more useful than skill, passion or enthusiasm.
There are some problems with this model though and maybe the throw people who show ability in at the deep end is a better model.
(1) Failure does not always cause us to grow, I view failures as opportunities to get it right next time, rather than falling I use the term falling forward - and the momentum can carry you on to succeed.
- "this isn't flying it's falling with style." Quote Buzz Lightyear
While that works for me I realise it does not work for everyone - failure does cripples some people. I suspect then it doesn't matter where on the ladder (so to speak) you are - for many people failure stops them progressing. You can see this time and time again in soccer - BUT also in churches with pastoral leaders - i have come across many who are repeating the same mistakes they have done for years - they haven't learned from them and some never will.. I suspect putting some leaders in at the bottom may well have limited their potential.
(2)Your first position sets the course for every subsequent position. In that the first place you work will often be the biggest teacher, if you start of in a soccer team of has beans and misfits you may never grow beyond that. Same applies to church life - there are not many pastors who have grown their churches through the stages of church growth barriers. Why because the first church they were involved in set the precedent for how they do ministry.
(3) coaching/pastoral ministry is hard and you will be hurt, this is very true. It would seem that in the football fraternity there are many who would seek to protect our Gareth. But does age teach you to better handle criticism??? or does youthful enthusiasm help you overcome criticism?? I think there may be truth in both corners, but criticism is still criticism it hurts whether you are 34 or 64.
(4) The apprentice model isn't biblical, while this has nothing to do with soccer it does have a lot to do with pastoral ministry, and since i reckon Jesus is the model leader I suspect that every one could learn from him.
Now many would say that the model Jesus used was an apprenticeship model where he took followers under his wing and coached them. Well in a way that is true but he also broker the conventions of what the standard religious apprenticeship model of the day was.
Firstly he called them, the model of the day was you beg a teacher to let you follow them.
Secondly he treated them as equals - it was companions not apprentices.
Thirdly he encouraged them to join him in declaring the kingdom, showing people signs of the kingdom - they blew it on the first attempt, but they got it eventually.
Fourthly he told them they would do greater things than he had... Certainly not your standard apprenticeship practice

So is the apprenticeship model of pastoral leadership which is prevalent always the best, lets just say i think it works for some if they can find someone to work under, I spent 4 years under a man who I would consider to be one of the best PL's around, he isn't dynamic, but he listens, he serves and he is a life long learner. I'm grateful for that, but I suspect if i had gone straight into PL I would still have learnt some of these things. Not because i wouldn't make mistakes but because I am teachable, and i also think i demonstrate the qualities that Paul pointed out. As For Gareth well i wish him well, and i think he will be a great coach, probably one of the best - but i don't think he will last the season with Middlesbrough - but hi next club will inherit a diamond in the making. I guess that is what i hope to be in pastoral ministry.

1 Timothy 3:1–7 Here is a trustworthy saying: If anyone sets his heart on being an overseer, he desires a noble task. Now the overseer must be above reproach, the husband of but one wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not given to drunkenness, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage his own family well and see that his children obey him with proper respect. (If anyone does not know how to manage his own family, how can he take care of God's church?) He must not be a recent convert, or he may become conceited and fall under the same judgment as the devil. He must also have a good reputation with outsiders, so that he will not fall into disgrace and into the devil's trap.

Church Growth, Church Health, Missional Church

Just been reading a book that suggests a contium between the church growth movement (Fuller etc..), church health (40 days of purpose etc..) and the emerging missional movement. WHile there is some validity in that I suspect the major difference is that form where I sit the missional movement is more about indivduals than how we do Church. It is about dare i say the Kingdom of God rather than the Church. For that reason i would not expect to see many missional churches come out of the changing paradigm, but missional communities, collections or networks of people who come together for a purpose other than worship - while this may emerge into a 'structural' church of sorts, I suspect in many cases it won't.
Which leads me to another point to ponder - what of the palce of Consultancy? at the moment that is a large part of my role and it works out of a pardigm of Church health, the model that we use suggest that "if we build it (properly) they will come." This has been an issue for me and has caused me to look again and again at what i suggest to Churches in the way of youth ministry. I want to equip, direct and allow the local church to discover there AHA moment of realising that how they do Youth ministry in their mission context is always going to be different and if the Kingdom of God is to have a broad expression of Ethne then it must be different.
I guess then missional consultancy will be about listening and guiding, offering a tool box full of expereinces but most of all allowing the local church to find her own way...

Church and enviromental issues...

Had an interesting chat about enviromental issues yesterday. In an area like Nelson the church taking a position on enviromental issues is throught with danger, and so largely we remain silent - or even promote a position that may be counter to popular 'green' thinking. Take a recent issue of coal minning in Westport, with the desire to open up a new coal face meant the removal of an endangered colony of giant snails. I was asked to sign a petition to prevent this happening but refused on grounds to do so would put people's livelyhoods at risk (many of whom are part of the parish in Westport) and I believed and still do that the local mines willingness to remove and relocate the habitat was a win/win.
In our region we rely heavily on the enviroment for business and people's livelyhood, what is under the ground - eg coal, gold and what is above the ground, forestry, vineyards and what is in the sea... Being an enviromentalist then is not just about protest, but respect for other people's right to work also. While I would love to see the Church take a stand on many enviromental issues - and i think we have a responsibility - the issues are never so simple in a region like ours.

In saying that there is still much we could and should be doing, in the case of the westport snails (which i know sounds like a joke) I believe we should be encouraging the mine for there willingness to relocate. I believe we should also be doing some of the following..

• Undertake an environmental/energy audit
• Install heat conservation measures and change lighting to low-energy sources
• Promote sustainable transport, e.g. through provision of secure cycle-storage facilities and car sharing
• Make/purchase and install bird feeding stations in church grounds
• Establish a recycling programme for church consumables such as paper
• Initiate a policy at church of using washable crockery and cutlery and environmentally friendly cleaning products
• Switch to green electricity
• Establish a wildlife garden
• Establish and maintain an Environmental Notice Board
• Install a compost pit for waste flowers and other organic material
• Advertise or provide clear signage of church policy and why it has been initiated

Next year during the Easter Holidays we are planning a Youth Camp with a bit of a twist, as part of it we will be doing service projects, but a focus of them will be on how we can be better stewards in our congregational and community life.

Mission Shaped Church Seminar DVD available

In June, we hosted George Lings here in Nelson for a morning seminar on the Mission Shaped Church report - 2 years on.

I thought the seminar was great and gave me a lot to think about..

We recorded it and the Video's are available - they are in WMV format and if you would like a DVD with the three sessions on then just post a reply or email me at youth(at)nelsonanglican(dot)org(dot)nz.

We are asking for a small Koha (donation) to cover costs (P&P and the cost of the disk) for those who would like a copy.

Please feel free to pass the disks on - we want as many people as possible to get hold of this resource..