Confessions of a Shiftless Mind

I finally got my ethics review approved, so I have the official go-ahead to begin field research on my final project.

So, I started poring over the list of churches in my target communities, when I was hit with insight #1 - how few churches have websites.

I mean, really! These people are trying to grow churches in highly technological, young demographic communities and hardly any of them have websites!

I don’t want to be derogatory, but if I was living in one of these places and I was thinking about going to church, I would check the web first. It would largely inform my decision. If the church had a website but it was antiquated, that would tell me a lot about the church’s approach to people like me. If it was nonexistent, that tells me the church has no interest AT ALL in reaching out to anyone in touch with technology. It’s like they are trying to be insular.

I know being a pastor is a hectic gig even if you only have a few congregants and you can’t be a jack of ALL trades. But it takes so little effort to make even a basic website. Surely there will be one or two congregants (or maybe their kid) who can help with it. Heck, if nothing else, sign up for a free wordpress account! At least it gives you something.

Insight #2 - how similar church planting is to real estate sales skills. It takes a gregarious person with a wide social network to be successful. It requires the professional to have marketing skills, and lots of them, while not having any formal training in marketing (although I’ll bet someone who was in a marketing career before choosing full time ministry as a vocation would do amazing). It requires databases and administration skills of a people person.

Now, they are very different careers in the final analysis. It could be said that evangelism is like selling - in fact, I see sales nomenclature shifting in that direction as companies hire “evangelists” to promote their products. It may have even gone overboard in this way in the past as evangelists seek the “close” (the salvation prayer) but like traditional sales models, abandon the customer once they have their money (most Christians aren’t after money, but souls, but the problem is we have been ignoring the “make disciples and teach” part of Matthew 28). But, there are some similarities.

The mists of time are still thick and grey.  They resist penetration.  But every once in a while the wind swirls and creates gaps and glimpses of what is to come.

Faintly shapes of men, women and families can be made out.  There is a future ahead.  There is promise of a goal.  Squinting does not good to the task at the feet though.  Peering into mystery merely allows what is now to dampen with dew, slicking the grasp and giving pause to cold hands.

Ok, done with the flowery prose.  What am I saying?  Well, true to my typical self-doubt, I have been wondering if the timeline we are looking at for possibly planting a church is too short.  I have wondered if God really means for us to do this, or if this is just something that we desire.  Lately though, I am noticing that I am making connections with people who may be able to link up with us and help.  Maybe they will actually participate in the plant.  Maybe they will wind up being just prayer partners.  I don’t know where it will land, but the fact that these connections are happening is immensely encouraging to me.

I try not to think too much on these things because I can waste too much time dreaming and not focusing on the here and now.  Right now, I need to get the ethics review updated and resubmitted.  I also need to plan with Cheryl what next month is going to look like as I work intensively to complete the first part of my grad essay.  This month has been relaxing but I also need to use it to stage.

Your prayers are appreciated.  Thanks!

I ran across this blog of a couple who are church planting for the Southern Baptists in Medicine Hat.  It is a really neat read - seeing how God is working in and through them.  It makes me want to read more of these types of blogs.  Plus, it gives me a visual to see how the lives of other church planters works themselves out.

I’ve been trying to figure out whether, or how, or how much to write about where God is leading me in my life.  Because I have this blog linked up to my facebook account, I know that family and friends that I have made over the years could read this at any time.  I still have lingering fears about acceptance that stem from my high school years.  They carry over into all kinds of aspects of my life, much as I hate to admit it.  This is an attempt to trace the origins of what I believe is a calling on my life, by God, to plant a church.

I am not ashamed of Jesus and what he has done in my life.  I can’t be.  Even though those scars in my past seem to keep me feeling like I am.  And now, this Easter 2008, I am looking forward to the next 10 years as being the most challenging, most rewarding, most bizarre, most scary, most peaceful, most amazing chapter of my life.  Why?  Because God is directing my life, and preparing me to work for him.  He really is.

Somehow, some way, waaay back when I was in Grade 11 and 12, I remember sitting in Jiro’s basement bedroom with him, playing Crib until who knows when, and talking then with him about how we both felt that we were born for something cool.  That something amazing was going to happen in our lifetimes and we were going to be a part of it.

I didn’t know how that was going to happen, but I did follow where my heart was leading - back to BC, where I was born.  That call led me down to the coast where I met my wife and for the first time took upon myself the task of learning more about this Jesus who I gave my life to back at Fort Saskatchewan Fellowship Baptist when I was 16.  I was being fed before, but in stepping into paying for myself to go to Bible College, I was taking ownership, for the first time.

In doing so, though, I was opening myself up to something bigger than I had ever thought.  I visited my grandparents on my Dad’s side the following year, and told them about the school, and how I had transferred to the Seminary.  My grandmother said, “Oh, you’re going to be a pastor?”  I said, “NO!”  Of course I wasn’t!  I am a history buff, I like the outdoors, I don’t feel like I make friends easily, how could I be a pastor?  I didn’t believe in myself enough to be one.  I thought, maybe a teacher, but not a pastor.

Flash forward 5 or so years.  No longer in Seminary, couldn’t afford to finish with a baby on the way.  God had some plans for me to start overcoming my own stupidity, and grow me up.  My next transformation was in terms of responsibility, and priority.  I put it all on my wife and kids - they were number one (actually number two, just behind God).  I started seeking more wholeness with respect to my relationship with my wife.  I just began to hate the selfish crap I had wrapped myself in for so long.  The progressive realization that seeking after Jesus and following in his footsteps over my own selfish ideas just makes me happier and everyone around me happier.  Every step I take away from that hurts me or others around me.

Then there was the trip to Mexico.  God had blessed us financially, and enabled us to take a trip to Manzanillo for a week.  It was a lovely time of rest and exploration (I love visiting new places), but we both came back feeling like something was amiss, vacationing at a resort surrounded and staffed by very very poor people.  This led us to considering, the next year, when we were thinking of another break, how we could enjoy a trip like that while giving back to the community we visited.  This led us to look at short term missionary opportunities, and ultimately, to Rwanda where we helped construct a school and visited with a number of people who were full-time missionaries.  We came back with opened eyes, for how we could participate in God’s plans.

I don’t want to downplay this mind-change.  It is a different as night and day.  Before, we looked for what we would like to do, what pleased us.  We both thought a sign of God’s will for our lives was a certain amount of satisfaction in what we were doing.  When we came back, we began to look for ways to please God with our service.  This is a major shift.  We began to look for where God could use us next.

That fall, we met a church planting couple.  They were missionaries - to our town!  Canadians don’t think of their own towns as mission fields, but that is what they are.    This is something that has bugged me, nagged me at the back of my mind, ever since my early days at Fort Sask Fellowship Baptist.  I remember looking at the “missionaries” corkboard, with pictures of nice people deployed all over the world, I was thinking, why are we paying people to travel all around the world when there are people right here who need to know Jesus?  The statistics that say 60% of Canadians believe in “God” - they are meaningless.   God wants people who love him and follow his teachings.  There are many many people who are living a lie, believing that because their parents had them baptized as infants, or perhaps in their youth they prayed a prayer, that they are “in”.  But they don’t know God.  They don’t know how much Jesus loves them, and they fool themselves into thinking that their own choices will earn them a place in heaven.  Most Canadians are like that.  Even in churches.  They need to understand the truth.

We stepped into involvement with this church plant, and it has been amazing!  Never before have we seen God work so up close.  I love watching the people who have joined us, those that came broken, needy and having those needs met by God in our presence.  It is great.  At the same time, about a year ago too, Cheryl and I both recognized in our hearts that there is something coming, that we will be going somewhere, in the service of God, soon.  We began to feel like we need to prepare ourselves for it.  It is becoming more and more clear that we will be involved in planting another church.  For the first time in my life, I have people around me who see this too.  Their vision feeds mine.  I am getting to the place where I am really starting to believe that even though I fear judgment and inadequacy, it’s God’s project, not mine.  If he wants me to preach, then he will see me prepared to do it.  If he wants me to lead, all I have to do is worry about following him, he will provide the followers.  If he wants me to build a church, he will give me the skills, or provide me with the help I need.  I just have to wait on him.

It kind of takes the pressure off.  But most of all, and I think this is what everyone is looking for, he’s given me something to live for, work for.  I am not dropping everything.  God’s got me in a great job that pays well.   I am thinking this job is here right now to help get us prepared financially.  Plus, I have a lot to learn before I am ready to do anything on my own or as part of a team.  Probably a couple of years out still.  But it’s going to be a ride!

It has now been accepted.  In point of fact, it was accepted last week, the day after I last posted.  However, the rest of the week was lost in a quagmire of competing demands, lack of sleep, and pecorino romano.

This week, my goal is to get the interview questions knocked off, as they need to be submitted for ethics review before I can use them.  Deadlines are beginning to loom, so this needs to be in ASAP.

There are two things I am hoping to gather from pastors and church planters in the target communities.  The first is  what they see as the greatest challenges in their particular context.  The second is solutions they have used to address these problems.  Perhaps a third area of questioning will be what resources have been made available to them that they felt were helpful.

Now to phrase them.

I suppose I am not the first person to try holding down a 40 hour a week job, finish a master’s at seminary part time, take an active role in the leadership of a church plant, and raise 3 (almost 4) kids, a dog and 2 cats.

But sometimes it feels like it.

For the moment though, I am feeling slightly euphoric. I knocked off a draft of my sermon last night, to be preached this Sunday. If you read this on my blog or on facebook, you are invited to attend if you live close enough to get to my church (Strawberry Hill Odeon in Surrey). I’d love to have some good friends heckling my first attempt to pass on a message to the people publicly.

It is hard to get too high though, as I have to get my second draft done for my grad essay proposal at seminary ASAP. It is probably 90% done, but as you might guess, there’s a lot of other things demanding my attention right now. On the bright side of that task, I have been contacting more people in the field of study I am working on and have received some valuable replies. I am still very hopeful that the subject is doable.

Oh, in case you were wondering, my subject area of exploration is “Issues in Church Planting in the Resort Community Context”. I want to find out what the major issues are in this type of community and how it differs from urban or suburban planting, or even rural or small town planting. I also want to survey current academic thought to come up with some fresh approaches to addressing these problems.

What an eventful week.

Not really. Actually I am very glad it is over. Emotions are very tiring, and I think I’ve used up about 6 month’s worth in the last week. No, I don’t think I’ll elaborate further.

However, the countdown has begun. I am being cast into the fires of public speaking over the next while.

First up, a turn in a Christmas Eve service skit - Come on out to Cedar Grove Baptist on December 24th and enjoy my turn as a thespian. Or my thespian turn as a character to be disclosed later. I read the script and the role sounds fun. I get to use my “big boy” voice.

Then, coming in the new year, I’ll be… wait for it… preaching.

Scary beans. I’ve been given a date, and I’ve been given a text. Now I need to come up with something to say. This will be my first opportunity to do this, and I am very much looking forward to it. The text is quite cool - lots there to talk about. I plan to do a dress rehearsal in early to mid-January to make sure I at least have some idea what the heck I am doing before I stand up in front of people.

Between last night and this morning, I can definitively say that God has already used this class in my life.

Last weekend I began to realize that I was in a bit of a funk. I used the word “discouraged” to describe my status to my pastor and to my wife on different occasions. I thought I knew what was discouraging me, and that may be true, but what I have received last night and this morning was encouragement.

I think I struggle with doubt. Last night we were challenged to look into another student’s eyes and try to understand something about them, simply from looking them in the eye for 30 seconds or so. We were then to tell them what we saw and ask if it were accurate. It was an exercise in empathy and in understanding.

One woman said that she saw in me a man who loved people, who understood the outsider, the excluded, because I had once been excluded. I was shocked that she could see this in me - if you knew my life, you would know that this is very accurate and has been accurate since I was even in elementary school.

I have been aware of this, but I really appreciated that someone recognized this in myself. Then this morning, I walked into class late, with the professor discussing the failings of many pastors in terms of sin that has “taken them out”. Not just sexual sin, but sins of pride, arrogance, and more. As we began to pray together, God brought to me an awareness that he has protected me from many sins. He has gifted me with a humility related to my vulnerability to temptation, but he has kept me from sin in so many ways. He has given me a stubbornness in the face of hardship. I think he has gifted me for service. I don’t know when I will be asked to step into it, or how much I still need to learn, but I think he has prepared me with the character needed to be in leadership. Now… to work on the skills.

I am looking at my screen and I have 4 different posts that are 1/2 to 2/3 written. I wonder if they will ever get finished. Most of them represent something topical and timely that I began to write, then had to set aside because of time invasions. Now they aren’t as relevant to the time or to my life currently.

So they sit.

Anyway, Good old Jamie, he recently dragged up all his posts on missional topics. I read over his “What is Missional… to me?” post, and so was hence inspired to push this subject around for myself.

What does that word mean to me? It brings to my mind the whole “Emerging/Emergent Church” (take your pick) question initially. That gives it a connotation of newness, which immediately is contradicted by good old Solomon, “What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.” (Ecclesiastes 1:9). However, whether or not this is really new is irrelevant to my mind - it becomes subservient to questions like, “Is it useful/edifying/catalyzing?”; “Will this affect my walk with God positively?”; “Will it affect others that way?”

I still haven’t answered the question. I’ve only framed what I think about when the word comes up. To me, “missional” describes the primary function of the church. I really am convinced that the Great Commission (Matt. 28:18-20) is what the church is all about. Some have suggested that the two greatest commandments (Matthew 22:37-39) may be a more accurate view - I think that they are the means we must use to fulfill the Great Commission.

The thing about the Great Commission is we aren’t called to tell people about Jesus, convince them they are sinners, and get them to “pray a prayer”. We are called to make disciples. What is a disciple? It is a follower of Jesus. This is a completely different thing than what the goal of most evangelistic methods are. For years I have beat myself up about not “sharing my faith”. But my faith should flow out of who I am. I haven’t been living in such a way that people ask me about my faith - because I haven’t been loving my neighbour like I should be. If we want to know why the church isn’t growing in North America, it is because it isn’t loving.

So, the church’s mission is to make disciples by loving God and loving their neighbour. It is important to recognize that it is impossible to love God without loving your neighbour. If you think you’re good at loving God but not so good at loving your neighbour, you aren’t loving God. Loving your neighbour means being Jesus for them - serving them, helping them, showing them mercy, forgiveness, and modelling peace. If you are doing all these things, they will notice. As long as you are open about why it is you are doing these things (because you are a Christian, a Christ follower), they will make the connection and see God through you. That is the Holy Spirit at work.

How does the body of Christ fit into this? The church body, or organization should exist to facilitate corporate worship, yes, but I think second to equipping believers in their faith, learning more about their saviour, and encouraging them to accomplishing their mission - to love God and love their neighbour. It seems to me the church should almost be a disciple training school, although I don’t think this needs to look as formal as the image suggests. It is the ends that are of interest, not the means. The ends are to produce mature disciples of Jesus.

It is funny, as I write this, I am beginning to notice the formulation of values, vision and mission. I wonder if this will figure into my future?

The National Post did an interesting piece on Aimee Semple MacPherson. I’ve taken a few courses on Church History, so I was aware already of her significant influence on the growth of the Charismatic movement in the early part of the 20th Century. What I didn’t know was her substantial influence over the development of Evangelicalism as a political force, or the fact that she was a Canadian!
I join the author of the article in amazement that in a sense, Canada is responsible for the social conservatism of american evangelicals and the intensive involvement of Christians in politics in the USA. The very thing that Canadians often mock and frown upon in American politics was farmed and grown by one of ours from rural Ontario.