sustain:if:able kiwi

plotting healthy mission conversation

Sharpening the middle kicked off on Saturday in Auckland, and was one of the best mission events I’ve been at in a long time. It is not often I return from a full day of work with my heart singing, but I did yesterday. Here is why ….

Intersections – mission history, then mission theology was followed by 4 mission stories. The day then ended with two people, designated listeners, who sought to name some of the Biblical narratives heard during the day. In other words, practioners were listened to by Biblical missiologists, and enlarged by wider ranging contextual overviews. This mix provided a wonderfully rich set of conversations. So often Biblical missiologists talk to each other at one conference, while practioners listen to practioners at another.

Space – each bit of input was followed by time in groups, processing the implications. A highlight was seeing church teams, pastors surrounded by lay leaders, grappling with mission in their place. Input was given time to take root.

Breadth – we heard stories from ordinary churches through to established churches in transition, through to incarnational missional communities (groups of young adults living in community in poor streets). All were affirmed and sat easily alongside each other. We’ve moved well beyond one size fits all in mission.

Team – this was not a one guru-show. It involved 7 different speakers, ensuring diversity. Yet all spoke in humility and in ways that affirmed a diversity of approaches.

Denominational ownership – this was Baptist run and Baptist funded. People in the room included the Baptist national leader, the national consultant, the President and denominational lecturers. Resourcing for mission currently lies at the heart of our denomination.

Sharpening the Middle continues in Wellington on Thursday, then Christchurch on Saturday. It is being vidoed, and a DVD will be released, along with a discussion guide, for use by church groups. This could end up being a highly significant Kiwi resource – a sort of homegrown Fresh expression type mix of history, story and Biblical frameworks. I am also working on writing it up as a paper (given that I was both one of the listeners and one of the storytellers).

the missional God is an ordinary God

This place was build so that people who gathered can read their hymn books. A comment made to me recently as a person gazed around the Opawa building. It was a reminder of the history that faces us everyday.

I enjoyed my time with the Board also – it helped to make me more aware of your context and the ‘ordinary’ things that you face in the journey. Another comment, another person, a reminder that amid all the mission changes is the ordinariness of everyday.

As one who has made a journey through alternative worship to community development work to parish ministry I find it disheartening to read your seemingly gleeful evaluation that ‘now the parish system has been legally blown open’. A comment made here. It’s a heart cry that God might be considered missional among plain parish and not only sexy fresh expression.

The organisers are looking for alternative worship… but, of course, since it’s a conference, I have no control over the space at all – over the lighting, seating, where the focus of attention will be… i can’t do stations, there will be limited multimedia capacity… up until now i’ve been fighting the limits and getting nowhere. today i’ve just given into them, and stopped thinking it needs to be alternative. it just needs to work with the people and the context. A blog post naming the stress of being asked to be emergingly alternative in showcase settings.

Can God be a lifegiver among the ordinary, in the plain parish, in the places where the hymn books go, in the limitations of conference settings? Is resurrection really that powerful, that inclusive, that revolutionary?

This is the real challenge for missional church. It’s not to start a hot new thing for 20 years olds, or to import the latest flash song/video clip/alt. idea from another context. It is to truly live the claim that God is life-giver in our here and now. This is surely the heart of Incarnation – God with us – not in some idealised, abstracted other.

be:holden wedding prayer

I did an outdoor wedding a few weeks ago, to a couple mad keen on cars. On the morning of the wedding, I sort of scribbled the following prayer, and it seemed to connect well.

God of love and passion, God of commitment and promises,
We pray for xxxx and xxxx today,
That, they will treat their marriage like a well-maintained Holden car,
They will pay attention to each other’s oil and water and tire pressure,
That they will be quick to forgive, well able to listen to the best advice from their pit crew.

May God’s grace rest on their life as they drive life’s road together,

May they grow in peace as one,
Always faithful to this model of 2008,
May the love that we see today last through all their life,
through every S bend and hairpin they negotiate,
so that at the end of their days,
they may just feel as they do now.
Very happy to be in love and married. Amen.

needing sermon help

I need some sermon application help. Church ministers are NOT allowed to respond. I am working on a post-Easter sermon series titled Biblical pictures of witness. It is based on a honey of a book, Picturing Christian Witness by Stanley Skreslet: Using a wide range of Bible texts and some great art, Skreslet outlines 5 different images of witness used in the New Testament.

Announcing good news, for example the public speeches in Acts where the role of the Christian is to share publicly and in vulnerability
Sharing Christ with friends, for example, Mark 2:1-12, friends of paralytic man, where the role of the Christian is to walk with and alongside.
Interpreting the gospel, for example Philip and the Ethiopian Enuch, where the gospel crosses cultural barriers and the role of the Christian is to link and translate.
Shepherding, for example Luke 15 where the shepherds goes searching for the lost one and the role of the Christian is to carry the hurting,
Building and planting, for example 1 Corinthians 3, where Paul is building and planting and the role of the Christian is to ensure at all times that the medium is the message.

Now I am doing this series because I think the 5 images remind us that there is no one way of being a witness and thus frees us from rigid stereotypes to be ourselves.

But here’s the rub. I’m stuck with application in regard to the first one. What, practically, does announcing good news mean today? As a minister, I get to announce good news most Sundays. But what might announcing good news mean in home and workplaces outside Sunday? Love to have your comments ….