imagining how the church can reorient around mission

Incarnating the Gospel

What does it mean to incarnate the Gospel? Observing God’s love toward humanity best captures the idea of incarnation. It is actualized by God taking on human flesh and lovingly drawing near to His creation. As a matter of fact, in John 1 it is articulated by verse 14, which says, “The Word became flesh and
made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and
only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” Literally, it means God came near, even moving into the neighborhood. read more

Welcome back to my dead-ish blog. I fell off the blogging grid
awhile back and have had a tough time climbing back on. Hopefully I can
maintain some rhythm as we approach fall. 

What brought me out of the blog black-hole? Exciting Mission
activity! read more

‎"If your presence will not go with us, do not send us up from here." Ex 33:15

I was in the great city of Chicago this last week. While I got the chance to see a large swath of the city, I spenta good share of my time in a region called Bronzeville (southside of the city). When the Great Migration brought African Americans from the South to jobs in the North early in the last century, many found their way to this area of Chicago. It was the greenhouse for greats like Muddy Waters, Buddy Guy, Nat King Cole, Dizzy Gillespie, Louis Armstrong, Lou Rawls, Jesse Owens, Joe Louis and countless others.  It is crazy how many cultural greats have emerged from this area. Today, at least in part, Bronzeville can be described by terms like high unemployment and poverty, urban violence, and population density.

Into to this setting, my good friend Ronnie Harris has been called to  plant a church – a Kingdom outpost. Actually, it could really be said that he has been called back.  See, Ronnie is from Bronzeville and has returned from living away to re-embed himself into this community. read more

Last week I had the distinct honor of visiting Haiti and the Dominican Republic. The later I have been to many times and love, the former…never.  The reason was to pay a visit to Julio and Suzette
Volcy.  They are church planters with Christian Associates.  His intention is to start a church in Petionville, a part of the massive city of Port au Prince. I believe the official numbers for residents of the city are around the 5 million mark.  Most say it is about the size of Chicago – an immense city (some estimate many more).

I know Haiti has gained a substantial amount of international attention since the earthquake in 2010.  It was a gigantic quake with literally scores of aftershocks.  The Haitian government estimate at least 316,000 died in the catastrophe.  The multiplied tragedy is that Haiti was the poorest country in the western hemisphere before the mindboggling natural disaster occurred.  The city is enormous  without a central sewage system.  The road system is quite undeveloped and transportation is arduous, and that is an understatement. If you think the roads are bad in your city, quit complaining. For many of the roads in the city you need to think of driving through a wheat field, only about 10x worse. I needed a kidney belt just to drive around. The picture to the left is the highway just before the Haitian / Dominican border. Also, the poverty is pervasive (I just read over 50% unemployment, some say it is up to 60%). read more

Today's post is by Julie Jones.  Julie is a collegue of mine at Christian Associates. Her and her husband, Darrin have ministered in France and Morroco and are amazing people.  

Brennan Manning in his book, Lion and Lamb takes a look at two views of life and theology. As I read this chapter I was struck with the powerful reminder that the way we see life and interpret theology greatly influences how we plant churches, what kinds of churches we plant and ultimately what kinds of lives we lead. read more

The following is from an entry from me in Christian Associates Connections e-newsletter.  If you would like to get these monthly updates, you can type your email in at the bottom of the CA site.

This last March I delivered one of the plenary session messages at CA’s Summit in Spain.  I made a couple of statements that may have come off as a bit confusing.  One thing I said with a bit of bravado is that I don’t want to plant churches.  Now, that comes off a bit peculiar, since I lead a church planting organization.  That is what CA does – we plant churches.  What I mean when I say that I don’t want to plant churches must, however, be qualified.  What I really mean is that I don’t want to plant churches that just do “church.”  I see many churches being planted at this time, but many of them are really simply starting worship services.  The reality is, we don’t need more worship services.  Most churches in most cities have plenty of seats available – right?  Read what veteran missionary and theologian  Howard Snyder says about this dilemma:
read more

Here is a video from Justin Powell.  He is the planter I just visited in Barcelona.  Amazing.  It will take a couple of minutes, but it would be great if you took a look at it!

I get the pleasure of being a part of Christian Associates’ North American Engage this weekend in Portland, Oregon (Portlandia – You Gotta Watch This!!!).  What a pleasure it is to meet and encourage a crew of folks who have set there sights on multiplying missional communities in some of the most amazing cities of the world.  We have people interested from Germany, the UK, Norway, and Latin and North America.  If you would make a note to remember to pray for them as they get poke and prodded a bit and as they further investigate the next steps for their lives (a weighty proposition, indeed) it would be deeply appreciated!

Thanks!

I am sitting on a plane as I type this, on my way back home from Madrid. We have just had our annual Advancement Team retreat. The Advancement Team leads CA's church planting work in Europe. I lead this team together my friend and colleague Kevin Johnson. The team consists of 6 people: five of us serve as regional 'facilitators (we prefer the word 'facilitator' to 'director' as it emphasizes the serving nature of the role more). The sixth person is Al Dyck, our HR liaison.

via ourjourney.typepad.com read more