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What Do We become Christians for?
From David Bosch’s brilliant little book, Believing in the Future,
As we call people (back) to faith in God through Jesus Christ, we must help them to articulate an answer to the question “what do we ahve to become Christians for?” As least part of the answer to this question will have to be: “In order to be enlisted into God’s ministry of reconciliation, peace, and justice on earth.” -
Working Through the Pain
Still reading the book Failure of Nerve. He’s writing about how leadership is affected by the way people and people groups in our society want the quickest relief possible even if it isn’t the best way forward.
Friedman writes,
For there is no way out of a chronic condition unless one is willing to go through an acute, temporarily more painful, phase….we will naturally choose or revert to chronic conditions of bearable pain rather than face the temporarily more intense … -
Leader: It’s Your Fault / Responsibility
Last week I wrote a little bit about how leaders need to take reponsibiltiy when things go wrong in their communities or organizations. Far too often we are quick to blame it on those we are trying to lead.
Seth Godin says it in his book Tribes better than I did and clearer than Edwin Friedman did. He writes,
If you hear my idea but don’t believe it, that’s not your fault; its mine.If you see my new …
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Amazing People
Been loving Seth Godin’s little book called Tribes. It’s full of some amazing one liners and is the kind of book that makes you want to get up off the couch and change the world.
Here’s a good one:
“When you have amazing people and give them freedom, they do amazing stuff.”
Seth Godin, Tribes
If you are a leader, this begs the question: Do you trust the people you work with?
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What is Mission?
“Mission is more than and different from recruiting to our brand of religion; it is alerting people to the universal reign of God.”
David Bosch in Believing the Future
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The Church: Shaped by Prayer?
This month (Nov. 16th) we are meeting as a community at The Well for our quarterly discussion on issues that are important to our mission together. We call these meetings Midrash meetings. This month we’ll be addressing the issue of prayer in our community life. Our mission statement reads “…a community shaped my scripture and by prayer…” We’ve got some big time room to improve in being a community that is actually shaped by prayer.
In preparation for this gathering, I’ve …
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Books in the Works
[/caption]Some of the books on the shelf
I’ve been blessed with a number of Amazon Gift cards and a few books as gifts recently. This means I have a pile of books on my shelf that I am currently reading or getting ready to read. I am always looking for new books and really value the recommendations of my friends highly. Some of these books I’ve …
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Book Recommendation: Linking Arms, Linking Lives
Read Me.
I have received a bunch of amazon gift certificates so I’ve bought about 6 new books in the last two weeks. Soon I’ll list a bunch of them here. But I just wanted to take a quick post to recommend a book that I just started reading called “Linking Arms, Linking LIves: How …Misusing the Word Missional?
Somehow I fear that the word missional is often misunderstood merely as “social justice.” That might be the fault of how we talk about that aspect of the concept. But, if we understand the church as “a sent community” then it entails so much more than that.
Like I have said before, David Bosch’s book Transforming Mission is a really helpful text to understanding the concept.
There is a short section where he addresses the …
The Church as Sent: Five Important Thoughts from David Bosch
I’ve been reading David Bosch’s book “Transforming Mission” for almost four years now. If you are familiar with the book, you will know why its taken me so long to get through it. It is essentially a summary of paradigm shifts in how mission has been understood throughout history. It’s widely respected and largely identified as one of the most important books in missional theology ever written. My friend John Chandler and I talk …
Lesslie Newbigin on Election
Great stuff from my favorite author…
No one can say why it is that one was chosen and another not, why it is that here the word came “not only in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost” (1 Thess. 1:5), while there the same word carried no regenerating power. The answer to that question is known only to God. But if we cannot know for what reason one was chosen, we can most certain know for …
NT Wright on the Resurrection & the Church
Reading NT Wright’s book, Surprised by Hope this afternoon. A few quotes for your reading pleasure:
The mission of the church is nothing more or less than the outworking, in the power of the Spirit, of Jesus’s bodily resurrection and thus the anticipation of the time when God will fill the earth with his glory, transform the old heavens and earth into the new, and raise his children from the dead to populate and rule over the redeemed world …
What are Some Practical Examples of What it Means to be Missional?
In the comments of the last post, Jim asked this question:
“I’m just beginning to try to help my established congregation turn itself into a missional focus.I really like the notes and presentation, but where I struggle is where your presentation leaves off…what does this look like practically…what are the practices your community is a part of…in what ways is your community different in appearance, look and action than what I see going on in my established non-missional congregation?
just looking …
How does the gospel judge suburbia?
I’m working on a class at The Well for tomorrow that is basically serving as an introduction / overview to missional theology. It’s been a blast to put it together and I think we’ll spark some great conversation about our specific context and calling here in suburban Philadelphia.
Of course, I’ve been looking back through a few of my Newbigin books and came across this gem in The Open Secret:
“The day-to-day worship and word and witness of the …
The Bible and Mission
“The Bible renders to us the story of God’s mission through God’s people in their engagement with God’s world for the sake of the whole of God’s creation…”
The Mission of God
Christopher WrightBegin Reimagining Your Life…
“We can begin [to reorganize our lives around the Kingdom of God] by surrounding ourselves with other people who are asking the same questions - who are suspicious of the emptiness of consumption and who dare to risk just a little bit more and dare to love just a little bit deeper.”
- Shane Claiborne as quoted by Tom Sine in The New Conspirators
Guder and The Missional Church
“We believe that we are the church, that is, we are a community of God’s people called and set apart for witness to the good news of Jesus Christ. We are blessed to be a blessing. As the Father has sent Christ, so Christ sends us. Jesus Christ has defined us as his witnesses where we are. We believe therefore that the Holy Spirit not only calls us but also enables and gifts us for that mission. Our task is …
Top 5 Books for the Back Table?
Steve McCoy asks a great question of his Southern Baptist Friends, “What 5 books would you recommend for a church’s book table?” So, i am stealing the idea for this post from him…
Most of the answers there were in the Reformed circles. Some good titles there. But, I do wonder what top 5 books you would put on the back table of a church.
Here are mine:
A Walk Through the Bible - Lesslie Newbigin (a great, short, non-churchy …
African Friends and Money Matters: 1-5
As I stated recently, I am reading the book African Friends and Money Matters in preparation for my trip to Zambia. This book is broken up into 90 general observations about the differences between African and Western cultures. The author appropriately states that these are general observations and, like in any culture, there are exceptions to them. I am basically going to try and read about 5 of these observations every day or so until I leave. …
Poverty
“Poor people die not only because of the world’s indifference to their poverty, but also because of ineffective efforts by those who do care…”
William Easterly, in the book The White Man’s Burden
Apparently I am now friends with myself on facebook. I live in Canada too eh.