e~mergent kiwi

congregational innovation and missional texts: a snip from an email I wrote today

great question: how might a 'missional reader' in a local church innovate the bringing into public discourse the real, lived narratives of the people in our local churches? For me there have been key biblical texts and "questions" around which great energy has been released at Opawa. They are texts that we have lingered with and keep returning to. Four that immediately spring to mind are;

1) Luke 1:39-45 - what is God growing and birthing - how do older bless younger - how to speak words of courage and hope?

2) Peter vs Paul - what would it look like to be intentional about evangelism to Peter's ie process and the invitation to community discernment around this process.

3) Change is best sourced in organic metaphors rather than narratives of decline.

4) The different responses of Peter, Mary, Thomas, John to the Risen Jesus and what does it mean for us to create spaces that acknowledge this diversity and allow this contextual freedom of expression; as a pre-cursor to our multi-congregational model as a concrete way of bringing about change in an established church context.

But these are unique to Opawa. So how transferable are these "texts"?

DJing gospel and culture

I was with a lecture class a few weeks ago, talking about gospel and culture. We tend to polarise into two camps; withdrawal from culture or assimilation into culture. This duality blights the emerging church. We get accused of assimilation; of buying into postmodernity. I think a much more subtle process is at work, and I offered the class the following three symbols (gift from Steve Collins).

Juxtapose: placing two contrasting things alongside each other. In doing so, we allow a new mix to emerge from the contradiction.

Subvert: using one thing to alter the meaning of another thing.

Amplify: two things that together enhance and compliment.

The emerging engagement with postmodernity is complex. At times we amplify the culture (e.g. we wonder if Web 2.0 amplifies what it means to be the body of Christ); at times we subvert the culture (e.g. we become passionate about creativity and imagination because we realise that creativity is sourced in God. In this realisation, we declare that creativity is not for Holywood pleasure, but it is to respect the image of God, as seen in the poor and marginalised); at times we juxtapose the culture (e.g. while respecting the full embodiment of humanity, we choose not to follow the increasing sexualisation of women in contemporary culture.) Reducing the emerging church to "assimilation" totally bypasses these realities.

Anyhow, students found the concept helpful. And I like the visuals, so I thought I would post it.

For a QT e-video of me being interviewed about this in relation to culture, download here (11 MB); for more on DJing, including where I explore how this is happening in 1 Peter, and engage with the work of Miroslav Volf, read out of bounds church? book); also check out the outofbounds blog.

Leading through change

Effective leaders understand that change is a reality of life and ministry. Leading through change is a one day seminar led by Dr Steve Taylor. It will explore the dynamics of leading change, grounded in Biblical and theological understandings, contemporary leadership insights and Steve’s experiences of transition and change at Opawa Baptist Church.

Details: Friday April 7, 9:30-12:30; 2-5 pm, Bible College of New Zealand, 70 Condell Ave, Christchurch. To register phone 3544270 or chch at bcnz dot ac dot nz

what dreams may come 2

This week he emailed, wondering, could he explore combining theological formation and his internet skills? And yes, he had read, and resonnated, with some of my thinking on the place of cybermonks in the future church.

"Cybermonks: Internet use is a form of tourism. Cybertourists search for identity in an arena so vast it acts as a level playing field in which all have equal access to its riches. Traveling in cyberland involves a form of pilgrimage, including the ritual of leaving home (dialing up) to wander an interconnected world of conversation and spiritual resources, before returning home by logging off.

In this world, the emerging church needs cybermonks to act as spiritual guides. They blog their stories with image, narrative, and experience. They design websites to provide spiritual resources online. This is not a modern "come to us because we have a great worship service." This is a postmodern "here are our spiritual resources, feel free to try-before-you-buy." The cybermonk is a new missionary calling." (Excerpt from my out of bounds church? book, 95.)

And so we talked; about ways to integrate technical and spiritual, about "economies of grace" and ways to subvert the market and express the Kingdom.

Might this be the first "monk" in an Opawa postmodern monastic order?

For more on cybermonks and postmodern monasteries; read out of bounds church? book. For the first draft of my concept of "postmodern monasteries" (written a year before the book) go here. For additional, updated, resources (written since my book was published) ; go to (postcard 7) of my book blog.

a must read

I don't normally blog reviews of my out of bounds church book here, because I didn't want this blog/my personal blog to become some sort of pimp. Hence I maintain a separate out of bounds church book blog where I record reviews, discussion, further resources, stuff that got edited out of the original.

But this recent review was a real encouragement;

The Out of Bounds Church has revolutionized my thinking about the Church as it relates to college-aged people... If you are interested in making the church work for teens and twenty-somethings, I think this is a must read.

For the full review go here here;

For all reviews of the out of bounds church? go here;

To buy the book go here.

passionate practice of pilgrimage

We kicked off another passionate practice for the next 5 weeks of Digestion, our evening service. (The passionate practice for last month was discernment of music.)

I told the stories of two pilgrimages that inspire me; Celtic peregrini and walking the Camino de Santiago. We then offered a number of stations; communion, praying for Easter camp and plaster casting our feet (which will evolve over the next weeks). The passionate practice of pilgrimage, could be embraced in the the following concrete practices;

1.Go for a walk each day for the next 5 weeks. As you walk, pray the same pilgrim prayer. See what you learn.

God be with me in every pass,
Jesus be with me on every hill,
Spirit be with me in every stream,
Each step of the journey I goest

2. Go to Easter camp.

3. Do an internet pilgrimage. Go here twice a week for the next 6 weeks.

7 things I learnt from Bono and the real life of worship leading

Early this week I suggested that Christian worship could learn something from Bono and U2; under 7 headings;
1. Connect uniquely.
2. Engage through familiarity.
3. Use repetitition to call forth prayer.
4. Secure a 5th (visual) band member
5. Create hope by drawing the best from the past.
6. Plan participation.
7. Invoke passionate practices.
The post has drawn some interesting comments (including the suggestion I might be manipulative and a bit cult-ish:))

This morning I put together the following concrete act of worship, and this afternoon I thought I should put it through the "Bono worship" grid.

First some context. We as a church have been a key networker in planning and organizing a local community fun day. We have been part of the organizing group, hosted planning meetings and delivered advertising.

(Photo from Jason). We have also put together a display for the Fun Day, profiling what the Opawa church is doing in the community. This Sunday morning the display was placed in the back of the church.

Psalm 147 was read and I then invited our children to join me around the display at the back of the church. A digital photo was also displayed on the powerpoint at the front, so that everyone could see.

I invited the kids to tell me what they saw. After a bit of slow start, they pointed out their families, different congregations, photos of social events. I repeated their words and then invited the gathered congregation to say aloud three phrases from Psalm 147; Praise the Lord, Great is the Lord, Sing to the Lord. Thus the words of children became a framework for a contemporisation and contextualisation of Psalm 147 in the life of Opawa.

Reflecting on this act of worship, in light of my U2 post;
1.It was a way to connect uniquely; the Opawa display for a Waltham Fair,
2. It was a chance to engage through familiarity; using a Psalm that has been a source of church worship for thousands of year,
3. It was a chance to use repetition to call forth prayer; using three phrases from the Psalm to allow the community to verbalise their corporate “yes” to the words of our children,
4. It was a chance to use our visual senses, the God-given gift of our eyes, by inviting the kids to look with me at the display and tell me what they saw, and by displaying the display on the powerpoint so that all could see,
5. It was a chance to create hope by drawing from the past. Psalm 147 celebrates God re-building Jerusalem. Similarly, after some years of decline, God is re-building Opawa. I made a number of verbal connections around the phrase "re-building." This connected our Opawa story with God's story, in a hopeful way that honoured the source of our re-building,
6. It was a chance to plan participation; what each child said became the catalyst for our prayers, while naming various Opawa ministries and congregations,
7. It was a chance to invoke the passionate practice, both of thanksgiving for what God is doing at Opawa, and of mission, drawing the Waltham Community Fun Day and the work that has gone into the stand into the heart of our worshipping life,

Please note that I did not set out to design worship around the 7 U2 linkages. It was a fragment of worship that just emerged as I got up this morning and only after the event did I wonder about the connections with my U2 post.

Spirituality resources birthed

Paul met God in a dramatic encounter. Peter met God step by step, in process. Which raises the question; how do we be intentional about connecting with the Peter's we know.

To do so would value;
- Variety; creative, adaptive, flexible; issue and audience focused.
- Celebrate small; if we had lots of variety, then success would be 1, not 99.
- See people as pre-Christian, not anti-Christian; believe that God can be active in people's lives before they were Christian. And this would change our conversation. It would not be us and them. It would be, how can any person, take a next step toward Jesus.
- Keep focused. Our activities would need to invite people into relating with Jesus.

Today I met with a group to bat around two concrete ideas in relation to spiritual resources;
- spirituality courses that explored spiritual practices in a small group setting
- rituals of change – offering a spirituality and rituals around birthing, including the 9 month preparation, birthing boxes, capturing emotions, baby room's "dedication" prayers, prayers for sleepless nites, adoption rituals, grandparent rituals (memory book, symbolic actions), naming (home or church, formal or informal):

The five in the room (with four apologies) then discussed the following:

What energized us? Both ideas are very exciting. We love the birthing ideas. Writing is a felt need. Journalling is a felt need. We have people we would like to invite. We are journallers and have been blessed by journaling. When we compared our journaling we realized that we journal differently and we learn more from each other. Thus a journaling course will feed us. As we share how we journal, we are sharing our life in Christ. This is a missional sharing.

What are our fears? Inviting people. The time commitment. Will people come?

Details.
a) Spiritual courses: We will offer a course "Introduction to Journalling." And will offer it as 4 weeks and then another 4 weeks of "Advanced Journalling." We will advertise in local newspapers, especially in the Mind/Body/Soul sections. We will also advertise as a resource to Counsellors, Libraries, New Age book shops. We will offer limited places and early bird registrations. We will meet in the church foyer and offer coffee. We will charge – people will pay for a book, plus be expected to buy their own journal. We will use Spiritual Journaling by Richad Peace as a guide book. We could then offer Spiritual Autobiography, Contemplative Prayer. We will look to start in the Spring, when people's energy lifts and when the change of seasons gives us time to reflect on change in our lives.

b) Family Spirituality: We will look to do this yearly. It would fit well as an option in our annual NorWest (Pentecost) festival. We will draw on the 8 couples in the church giving birth at the moment, plus new grandparents in the church, plus advertise in the community.

what dreams may come

Last year he attended my BCNZ Emerging Church course. Today we met over coffee and I listened to his dreams, to plant something emerging in his church and his denomination. It's the sort of coffee I dream of having.

7 things I learnt from Bono about worship leading: update

Update: I have added to the post below with a second post here; 7 things I learnt from Bono and the real life of worship leading, in which I discuss the 7 points below in relation to an actual worship service.

1. Connect uniquely. Time and again on the Vertigo DVD, Bono speaks about Chicago and his memories of Chicago. It is also his birthday, another uniquely contextual layer. A wise worship leader does not start in heaven and continue to the 7th heaven. Rather they search for the unique connections that make that context, that day, that date, that time, uniquely unrepeatable.

2. Engage through familiarity. The use of familiar songs brings back layers of memory. A wise worship leader includes songs that resonnate with previous experiences and previous encounters.

3. Use repetitition to call forth prayer. Bono dedicates Running to stand still as a prayer. He concludes Running to stand still by sliding into a repetitive "Hallelujah." It's so easy to sing. The simple repetition enables the audience to sing with the band. Bono has turned a concert into a participation in prayer, through the simple use of repetition.

4. Secure a 5th (visual) band member. U2 concerts are no longer a 4 band show. They are a 5 band show, with Willie Williams providing visuals that add multiple layers to the experience. Not many worship leaders have U2's dosh. But a wise worship leader will look to add not just singers or musicians, but a "visual" person to their team, charged with enhancing visual environments.

5. Create hope by drawing the best from the past. As Bono tells the audience of the Vertigo CD, We as a band are looking to the future. We're taking the best of the past and moving forward with hope. A wise worship leader searches the past for the fragments that resonnate with a hopeful future.

6. Plan participation. Faced with 40,000 fans, Bono can draw one boy from the audience to sing to, one woman from the audience to dance with. He can use repetition to call forth prayer and he can hold the mic to encourage "congregational singing." A wise worship leader intentionally looks for ways to turn the many into one.

7. Invoke passionate practices. Bono invites the audience to haul out their cell phones. He kills the house lights and thousands of phones dance blue. He invites them to do something, to text the Make Poverty History campaign. A wise worship leader looks for ways to turn singing into action and turn entertainment into justice.

an iPOD spirituality OR passionate practices of discernment

We ended the first cycle of passionate practices - discernment of music - on Sunday. (I introduced the concept on my blog here).

Theology: We are passionate. God is passionate. Passionate practices help us connect our passion with God's passion.

How:

How: The practice for the last month has been discernment. We can connect our passion for music with God’s passion through the passionate practice of discernment. Go listen to your favourite music and discern where God is.

On the first Sunday we told the life stories of musicians we were passionate about. We played God made Rock and Roll, by Kiss, juxtaposed by various scriptures (Psalm 119:105; Romans 12:2; 1 Timothy 4:4; James 1: 5). We offered two models of discernment.

For the next three Sundays we looked at three case studies. With U2 allegedly coming to New Zealand; three people looked at where they found God in three U2 songs; I still haven't found what I'm looking for; Stuck in a Moment; Bullet the Blue Sky. This meant that each week we were offering a practical case study, seeing someone "do" discernment of their favourite musician.

Interaction: On Sunday we celebrated the end of the practice. What had we learnt about a passionate God and our passionate over the month? We opened the floor. People shared a favourite artist, played a song and where they found God. People read helpful quotes from each other’s blogs, insights from among our Digestion community discerning music. And we offered to God our CD cross.

Each CD represents a favourite song from among our youth group. On each CD is a "post-it", a hand written note, explaining where God is found on their favourite CD. That’s practicing a practice and offering it to God.

Reflections: I am sort of proud of this. For the last 4 weeks we have loitered with intent. We have mixed (DJed) Scripture, theology, stories, practice, interaction, our culture. We have been able to integrate Sunday services with our youth group cell groups on a Wednesday, church with our blogs, God with our headphones.

Growing up, I was either told to burn my music, or the church was silent about my music. Either withdrawal or assimilation. Yet for the last 4 weeks, an iPOD generation has been given practical skills to help them connect their beats with God.

Next week we turn to the passionate practice of pilgrimage. What does it mean to walk a journey, spiritually toward, and away from, Easter, physically, toward, and away from, Easter Camp?

Resources I've used:
Practicing Passion: Youth and the Quest for a Passionate Church which gave the initial theological framework and opened my eyes to passion as a way to affirm youth spirituality; God bearing life:The Art of Soul Tending for Youth Ministry, which has excellent reflection on passion and passion in youth ministry; and Soul Tending which is stacked with actual practices.

the Verti-CAN'T-go tour

A night for all depressed fans

Playing the U2 DVD Collection
on the large screen
with amplified sound

Saturday 25 March, 7:30 pm
Opawa Baptist Church
Cnr Hastings and Wilson

Google ads

Since this blog costs me to run, I'm playing with using Google ads on this site to "fund" my habit. It might take a day or so to get ads in the right zone, so in the meantime, I might not support all the ads you see.

brokeback mountain film review

Here's my latest film review: of Brokeback Mountain. I do these for a Denominational magazine, who allow me to place them on the web once the monthly magazine has been published.

Brokeback Mountain. A film review by Steve Taylor. The date is 1963. The location is Signal, Wyoming and the mountain is Brokeback. Two young unemployed cowboys (Jack Twist, played superbly by Jack Gyllenhaal, and Eniss Del Mar, played by Heath Ledger) will spend the summer on its slopes. Mustering sheep against a stunning backdrop ... For the full review click here

My other film reviews include;
Narnia here;
Serenity here;
The World's Fastest Indian here;
Sedition, a New Zealand film about the fate of conscientious objectors in World War 2, here;
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, here
And look at next month for review of a New Zealand film called River Queen.

Further film resources:
Film as a point of gospel engagement (PDF).
Film and spirituality web resources.
Why gospel and film?

copyright and blogs: updated

In the last 24 hrs I have had two of my blogs posts copied in their entirety on someone else's blog. I'm not going to name them because this is not in any way a personal discussion. Rather it just got me thinking.

In a book world, you are allowed to "copy" 10% or a chapter from a book. Should there (is there?) such (voluntary) guidelines for the blog world?

Advantages of 100% copying
1. Ideas get spread. A person's thoughts get multiplied. That is part of the new media revoluation.
2. Ideas get read more widely. Every blog audience is unique and so the readership of an idea increased.
3. Imitation is the highest form of flattery, so 100% blog post reproduction is a huge compliment.

Disadvantages of 100% copying
1. Words lose context. A blogpost gains layers of meaning because it is shaped by an author and by the surrounding posts. Reproducing a blogpost loses that context. (This is also the reason why I don't use or like RSS feeds. They might be efficient but they strip context.)
2. The original author is more likely to be removed from any ensuing discussion (ie comments occur in another context and the original author is less likely to be aware).
3. Chinese whispers. You know that game you play where you form a line and pass a whisper down and laugh at how much it has changed. Similarly, reproducing a reproduction heightens the risk of not giving due credit or mixing up words from various bloggers.
4. Internet pollution. In an information rich world, should there be an ethical commitment to streamlining information rather than reproducing the same information?

I am not upset or anything. It just got me thinking. What do you think? What advantages and/or disadvantages do you see?

Updated based on comments:

I feel I need to clarify that I am not in any way accusing people of breaking copyright. I am just pondering the fact that blogs allow us to so easily do this. I could never, as say a weekly newspaper columnist, write something that said "I like what Taylor says: ..... and then print everything Taylor says." I would struggle to have a book published that consisted of great big long quotes from others.

Yet web technology makes cut and paste so easy. So we have a whole new way of publishing. It is are easier to cut and paste others words than to write your own. And I want to ask: what is the impact of this on the nature and understanding of writing and reading? Are we seeing less originality and more re-production? Do we, or don't we, like that impact? And only having pondered these first three; to ask, what are the legal implications.

Wanting some short, sharp leadership focus?

Mark Strom is speaking for a day on Wise Leadership, Friday, March 24 at the Bible College of New Zealand (Christchurch). Mark combines a passion for Jesus, a PhD knowledge of the Bible, church ministry miles and years of leadership consultancy among business and educational spheres. It is a unique blend not be missed.

Details: Friday March 24, 9:30-12:30; 2-5 pm, Bible College of New Zealand, 70 Condell Ave, Christchurch. To register phone 3544270, chch at bcnz dot ac dot nz.

For overseas punters (included North Islanders :) ), I might see if I can do a podcast with him on "leadership challenges for the New Zealand church."

the good old days: yeah right

I am working on some notes for my Leadership class tomorrow.

Much Protestant thinking about church leadership is based on the assumption of the "good old days." All we need to do is re-find the vitality of the "good old days" and we will be right.

However, closer examination suggests that the early church might not be as "ideal" as reformers and revolutionaries tend to make out. The "early church" of Acts involved fraud (Acts 5:1-10), misuse of church finances (6:1-7) and racial segregation (Acts 10).

As John Drane helpfully notes;

[We assume] that the [early church] were always 'successful' in the sense of large numbers of people responding to their message. This was not the case, and by including stories of small response [Acts 17:34], as well as of persecution and hardship [Acts 13:50], Luke emphasized that occasions such as the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2:1-41) were few and far between, and his readers could expect that evangelism would generally be hard work with average results. Do Christians Know How to be Spiritual?, London, DLT: 2005. Note 32, p. 179.

We need to be wise in how we apply the so-called "good old days" idealism to our understandings of church and leadership today.

that moment you dread: updated

Last week I got that email I was dreading. "I was wondering if you had any copies of your PhD left that you got made into a smaller book size? If so could I purchase one of you?"

When I completed my PhD in 2004, I wondered if people would want copies, yet knew that it was cheaper to do a bulk run. So I offered a Graduation special, hoping that if their was sufficient interest, to do a bulk run and thus cut costs. I also took a bit of a punt and did a few extras, suspecting that requests might trickle in over the years.

They did. I sold my last extra a week ago. And then, you guessed it, I got that dreaded email, requesting a copy. So I am going to repeat the offer and see if I get enough requests to make it worth generating another run.

Update: Here's one happy purchaser, who comments: "Go purchase its excellent and a valuable resource!"

Here's the PhD details:

A New Way of Being Church is a world first, an indepth academic exploration of how the emerging church responds to cultural change. It asks the question; how effective is the emerging church as a postmodern expression of faith? It takes one particular church, the innovative Cityside Baptist Church in New Zealand. It surveys 48 members and discusses three months of worship innovation. It deeply engages with themes of community, creativity and culture, in dialogue with the gospel and with postmodern thinkers. It draws on interviews and visits with 13 alt.worship communities in UK.

The thesis argues that in response to contemporary cultural change, people are, in the words of French philosopher Michel de Certeau, "making do," engaging in transformative processes to creatively subvert their surrounding context.

Three processes of "making do" were evident. Firstly, the use of a communitarian hermeneutic in which individual meaning was located within the narrative of the community. Secondly, the offering of imaginative space - both individual and communal - through practices of creative play, storytelling and creative pilgrimage. Thirdly, like a DJ, "tactics" of sampling from various cultural artefacts were used in order to renegotiate their relationship with gospel and culture.

Note: $NZ25 to cover printing costs plus P&P. (P&P approximately from NZ to USA or UK = $NZ20; From NZ to Australia = $NZ10, within NZ = $3.50). Credit card options for payment are available.

Note: This offer lasts until the 1 April 2006 and the thesis will be sent at the end of April or on receipt of payment, whichever is the latest.

Note: Usual copyright applies.

Note: This offer assumes that the purchaser recognises that a PhD is a PhD, written for a select intellectual audience. A PhD is a demanding read and it bears little resemblance to my book, the out of bounds church?

Drop me your details if interested.

Feel free to use the accompanying graphic to advertise this on your blog.
img alt="thesis with title.jpg" src="http://www.emergentkiwi.org.nz/archives/images/thesis with title.jpg" width="259" height="72" border="0" /

books resourcing my mission

On Tuesday with the Christchurch Presbyterians and on Thursday with the Dunedin Baptists I mentioned two books that have greatly resourced my mission and my thinking in the last six months.

A FIRST RESOURCE:
Richard Peace, conversion in the New Testament. This book looks at conversion in the New Testament. It helped me clarify how evangelism is both process and event. The highlight is a wonderful chapter on what evangelism-as-process might look like in a local church. This chapter resourced my thinking and preaching (here and here). This chapter then helped resource and spark an "evangelism-as-process" forum we had at Opawa in October. About twenty people at Opawa gathered to ask "what would evangelism-as-process look like at Opawa?" We prayed and discussed and dreamed. As a result, the previous Sunday at Opawa we launched five "birthing units." Five people from the October forum wanted to run with their "evangelism-as-process" dream. We introduced:
: intermediate community programme
: family film night helping families find God at the movies
: spiritual resourcing through journalling and naming ceremonies
: third-age programme, offering financial, health, relational and spiritual resources
: grief work among children.
These are ideas dreamed up among our faith community, resourced by my preaching and leadership, largely due to conversion in the New Testament.

A SECOND RESOURCE:
James Kemp, gospel according to Dr Seuss. This book explores gospel themes that emerge from the stories of Dr Suess. It provides creative sparks for the Take a Kid to Faith services at Opawa. Take a Kid services involve all-ages exploring faith together. This book, gospel according to Dr Seuss, gives me ideas that both engage kids and suggestion significant gospel themes.

Presbyterians don't clap

I spent this evening with about 60 Presbyterians from around Christchurch. A very enjoyable evening. I was asked to provide some stimulus in terms of mission. So I talked about:
: the diversity of our contemporary cultures
: the diversity of response to Jesus at the resurrection (Peter ran, Mary loved, Thomas questioned and experienced, John thought)
: which raised the question; if Jesus met these people at their point of experience; what does it mean for us to be part of communities and spaces that similarly meet people at their point of experience?
: i then talked about the multi-congregational model we've developed at Opawa

and concluded with two concrete examples:
: espresso and
: take a kid to faith services.

Afterward they all clapped. I was then informed over a pleasant cup of tea that Presbyterians very rarely clap. So a good sign of an evening well spent.

Resources I used tonight, for those interested include:
: the multi-congregational model
: spoken words from the Lenten 40 visual resource.
: take a kid to faith services.
: espresso
: my out of bounds church? book.

(The above is quite similar to what I did with about 35 Baptists in Dunedin on Thursday evening.)

This is 40

I waited patiently for the band
In time they heard my cry.
I set my fingers to the net,
and made my bookings firm.

I will sing, sing a new song,
Not long to sing this song.

Vertigo to rock our land,
we'll cheer our favourite band
Many Kiwis to see and hear
Thousands to sing and cheer

I will sing, sing a new song,
Not long to sing this song.

Now we light a flame for the Edge
And pray for all that's dear

And we'll sing, sing an old song.
How long to sing this song?

Link: U2 concert postponement

comment denial

Sorry if you have been trying to leave a comment anytime in the last 4 days. I have been overzealous in my despamming settings. I trust it is fixed now.

podcast: women, the emerging church and male cultures

Here is a podcast I did with Jenny McIntosh . In a first podcast Jenny describes the ministry of Spirited Exchanges as a ministry to those outside the church. Download file: ethos of Spirited Exchanges: 2 mins : 600K

In a second podcast Jenny and I talk about women and the emerging church. We identify three ways in which the emerging church can exclude women;
- in the way the Bible is used
- in not seeking representation in speaking and in leadership
- in continuing a "culture", patterns of being and talking, that are male in nature.
Jenny and I then discuss one thing men could do and one thing women could do to increase the place of women in the emerging church. I'm biased but I think it's one of the most helpful and challenging conversations I've had in a long time and I think anyone serious about the future of the emerging church needs to listen and ponder. Download file : women and the emerging church : 9 mins : 2.5 MB

Today is Saturday 11 March

Today is Saturday 11 March. There are people from Opawa Baptist;
: meeting in the foyer training in youth leadership
: meeting at the Christchurch Polytech to learn how to make coffee in the church coffee machine
: meeting in my office talking about global mission and prayer
: sleeping in over at the church tonight because they are fasting and raising money for mission through the 40 hour famine.

Photo via Jas

It's a snapshot of our life as a church; diverse, caring, outward.

a day to be organised: UPDATE

Today is a day to be organised.

9-10 am; Pastoral leadeship and management lecture.

11-12:20 am: Working with a local community trust on leadership.

1:20 pm: Flying to Dunedin, where I spend the evening working with local churches in the area of mission (and doing 2 potential Letters from a dying church).

So today involves speaking among 3 different groups in 2 different cities. I learnt a word over last weekend "alignment"; the looking to make different parts of my life work together. Today feels a bit like "alignment;"
: what God is doing at Opawa; working into my speaking; working into a writing project
: the same content from my leadership lectures being spoken in two contexts.

UPDATE: I managed to meet all the deadlines and there seemed to be some good connection in various contexts. Peace to all the people I met!

passionate practices in Next Wave Magazine

The latest edition of Next Wave magazine includes an article based on a blog post I did back in February, on how we are applying passionate practices here at Opawa, on how we are trying to make the doing of our faith a community activity around which we shape our worship.

The Next Wave article is here.

Lenten practices: using 40 as a worship resource

Here's a Lenten DJed worship resource, that morphs into a spiritual takeway. It's from my weekend, where I used it three times; as a call to worship at the start of Brian McLaren, as an introduction to communion on Sunday morning and to focus our evening service on passionate practices during Lent.

It's based on the "40 CD" which offers 40 different hand drawn images, reflecting on Jesus spending 40 days in the wilderness preparing for ministry. (You can buy the 40 CD here, through the future church nz website.

The CD comes with background music, which I used as I clicked through the 40 slides one by one, over about 6 minutes. Here's another one of the slides;

I had written a sort of poem; 28 phrases like,
Jesus took 40 days to prepare for ministry;
by living at a different pace;
to remind himself of the scale of project God was working on;
which I spoke over the music, to give some narrative to the images. Many phrases were repeated, so it sort of became like a spoken bass beat.

Some of the phrases were based on various practices that one could embrace for Lent. I sourced the practices from the excellent book; Peter Graystone's Detox your spiritual life in 40 days. (You can also order the book here here or from the publisher here.)

In addition, I had made a simple postcard, with the 40 visual on one side and more information about these practices on the back. This was intended so people could take it away to "practise" over Lent.

So, in summary; I was
a) DJing three sources; the Scriptural narrative, the 40 CD, and practices from Detox your spiritual life;
b) in a way that could be used in layers; both as worship; and as a spiritual takeway. (for more on the theology and practice of spiritual takeaways, see Postcard 5 : Spiritual Tourism, from my out of bounds church? book.

Feel free to download the worship words I used. And again, if you want to buy the 40 CD resource; (go here to the future church nz website).

podcast: emerging church scene in New Zealand06

Here are some "voices" commenting on the emerging church scene here in New Zealand, recorded as part of the Brian McLaren weekend.

Here is Grace McLaren giving her impressions of the emerging church scene in New Zealand. Download Grace McLaren: (2 mins; 700K)

Here is Jason King, part of the team at Opawa, reflecting on the challenges of the weekend; Download Jason King: (1 min; 270K)

brian is preaching

Opawa Baptist has wifi. So these are notes, what I heard Brian say, [with a few editorial comments by me], as Brian preached. It will be interesting to see the difference between seminar mode and working with the text mode.

What is the project that God is working on? What project will we commit our lives to? How big is that?

Matthew 15:21-28.

The invitation to imagine that you are a woman. You have a daughter. You are not Jewish. You have heard of some trouble maker called Jesus. Jewish people did not like to mix with people not like them. Some Christians are like this today.

You hear word that Jesus is coming to your region.

Your daughter is sick. She writhes and calls. You are worried about your daughter.

Try to imagine you are part of this story. Feel you are inside her.

Brian reads and pauses. He asks how you are feeling? People respond with words and phrases.

Brian continues reading, verse by verse, pausing; asking "what are you thinking now?" People respond with words and phrases. Brian repeats them, unpacks some of the responses, provides more details from the original context at times.

At verse 26 he asks mothers to say how they would feel.

Now he is asking us to switch positions. Imagine that you are his disciples, lying in bed that night. What would you be feeling.

Brian continues into the next narrative (29-31). Jesus is now healing thousands of Gentiles. (32-38). People respond with words and phrases.

I don't know what you think about this and I'm not going to tell you what to think. But I wonder, did Jesus have to learn how to ride a skateboard? Did he have to learn how to walk? In Hebrews we read that Jesus learned obedience. In Luke we read that Jesus grew in stature. So when did Jesus stop learning? Is it possible that Jesus could learn something at age 32?

Some of you would say, no, it doesn't fit with my theology.

There are only 2 times Jesus changes his mind. (John 2). Both involve women.

What does the wider context say? John the Baptist has just been killed by Herod.

The Kingdom of King Herod kills people like John the Baptist. It criticises you constantly.

The Kingdom of God heals and feeds people. It listens to you.

When I read these stories, I think there is no greater project that the Kingdom and we are still learning today. It's as if Jesus is saying, no more killing in the Kingdom. I'm starting something new.

If I was a disciple, lying in bed that night, I'd think there's no better thing to be involved in.

Brian is praying
what do you think of this project and what would we like to commit ourselves to;
have we stopped learning or can we keep lets keep learning and following as disciples in the Kingdom.

workshops

All afternoon people have been cruising around various workshops. I believe in contextual theology and so I worked hard so that Brian's input could be surrounded by "coal face" New Zealander's working on the issues, not as experts but as storytellers.

Do the workshop topics indicate who my friends are?

Or could they perhaps give some idea of the unique "charism" of the emerging church in New Zealand; in worship and art as mission, transitioning existing churches through multi-congregations, workplace spirituality, ministry among church leavers?

Or could the workshops also show the new edges of a movement? 10 years ago the emerging church in New Zealand was under heavy criticism and the practioners tended to be bunkered down and concentrating on survival. Are we seeing a move toward greater dialogue among denominations and a focus on mission, justice and the margins?

Workshop topics included;

How much Spirit has the emerging church got? (Steve Graham): A look at the questions Pentecostal/Charismatic churches and the emerging church might have for each other over what it means to be people of the Spirit eg the place of congregational singing in worship, ecstatic gifts in services, divine creativity, seekers' 'initiation' into the dynamics of the Spirit

The Art of Curating Worship (Mark Pierson): seeing worship as an art form to be curated rather than a list of boxes to be filled.

A café church spirituality (Lynne Taylor): two stories of emergence, of different groups engaging with our world in different ways... with common themes.

Spirited Exchanges (Jenny McIntosh and Elizabeth Taylor): Spirited Exchanges is something for people who are struggling to find a "place" at church - who have been wounded or hurt by church or it's leaders, who are asking questions but not necessarily finding answers. We want to create a regular place where people can come and air their doubts, share their story, and find acceptance, not judgement. This is a double workshop that includes exploration and then the running of an actual Spirited Exchanges. Ideally people would attend both.

Emerging Workplace Spirituality (Alistair McKenzie): Emerging church can easily just focus on doing things differently when we gather together. If we continue to think that church is something we come to, then we will fail to realise our potential for being the church God sends out into the world to work in partnership there. What sort of spirituality will support the ministry of all God's people the other six days?

Emerging church and post-colonial mission: A discussion of how the emerging church discussion could stimulate mission in non-Western, post-colonial contexts.

brian mclaren session 3: spiritual formation in practice

Opawa Baptist has wifi. So these are notes, what I heard Brian say, [with a few editorial comments by me], as Brian spoke for a day on the topic of spiritual formation.

He is offering 16 practical ways for embrace spiritual formation. I have added in some practical examples which I think are happenning at Opawa.

1. Seeking both/and and recycling "failed" or "worn" approaches. Eg. Re-finding altar calls as a call to commitment without the abuse.

2. Emphasis on hospitality. Eg. Being together in homes for meals and informal interaction and conversation. This is disciple-making.

3. The use of queries. Eg. Spiritual friendship or spiritual direction. Any Christian can learn to ask queries - ask; listen; say "tell me more"

4. Engaging the arts. Eg. Both enjoying and creating.

5. A focus on practices. [check passionate practices on my blog]. Eg peripatetic prayer (walking around prayer, reflecting on Scripture as you walk), practicing God's presence, responding to the poor, using "Jesus prayer," fasting, feasting, silence, journalling. What spiritual practices should I do? The ones you need. How do you find out? Gain a spiritual friend (3). Practices should be liberating. What do we want our people to "do;" eg how to watch a movie as a spiritual experience?

6. Conveying the Biblical narrative. As a redemptive mega-story containing arguments, discoveries, regressions, recoveries, mistakes, insights, and more. Eg Stations of the cross. Eg Christmas Journey Eg. Godly play.

7. Re-visioning spiritual gifts. As "ours" not "mine" ie Help new believers discover what is their church's spiritual gifts. As for mission "out there" not just ministry "in here."

8. Trading heroes among traditions as part of the Tradition. Reading biographies and repeating sagely stories. It's like a stack of trading cards that we share with other traditions. Eg.

9. Increasing transparency, so leaders are known as learners and strugglers. Leaders need to be sharing the practices that are sustaining them in this season.

10. Rediscovering the Bible for more than sermons or analytical studies. There is something harmful about using the Bible only for sermons. You can only deal with an episode, yet the Bible is a narrative. Eg. Reading the narrative. lectio divina, ignatian readings, memorization, meditation, centering prayer

11. Experimenting with fixed-hour prayer and the church calendar (seasons and holidays).

12. Seeking orthodoxy but not alone; adding orthopraxy (right practices) and orthopathy (right feelings). There is an emotional dimension to discipleship.

13. Making pilgrimages, retreats and mission trips, which are short-term monastic practices.

14. Redistributing energy from church work to the work of the church. Eg Alistair McKenzie's books, like Where's God on Monday?.

15. Working for justice by demonstrating, civil obedience, working for global justice isses. What if prophetic stands were an everyday part of discipleship?

16. Simplifying to the Greatest Commandment, the Lords Prayer and love.

brian mclaren session 2: forming disciples : panel

Panel 2: Lyn Campbell, Alan Jamieson, Kathy Mayes. They are not experts. They are helping us contextualise and process what Brian is saying and what it means for us.

What is resonating:
You learn by doing. The gap is supervision, we lack "disciple makers." Kiwi's are "can do" No. 8 wire people. The danger of this is that we don't pass on what we learnt. Young people need not "can do" No. 8 wire people, but people to walk beside them.

Do indigenous cultures offer us better apprentice models than Western cultures?

The church must re-think mission so that people can learn by doing. There are some wonderful things happening in New Zealand but boy, we have a long way to go.

What does it mean for families as models of "doing" and apprenticeships?

So many families talk about spirituality in our culture. Families in New Zealand are around parenting and work/life balance. Can the church take our families with us to meet these needs; and see a gathering mission momentum?

Most Christian diet today is simplistic. Churches go for lowest common denominator. We are simple. We need to talk about complexity, let alone perplexity. Life is more grey than church is making out, because people notice that our reality is grey.

Churches are greedy of people's time and money. We suck people dry and so they are stressed.

The rule of the art of discipling: What is one way in your context people could pick up the "art.":
Pastors invest in people. Rabbi's class - every fortnight to talk about whatever with pastoral leaders.

To do is to make mistakes and to learn. We are in a "perfect" society; body, family. We need to learn to let each other make mistakes.

The art of discipling is not cloning. It is helping them be true to themselves.

There is a dearth of Christians in "public" places. How do we as churches and families open up our children and young people to think about working in difficult places?

Who are our mentors? We seldom get to see people thinking out aloud. We only hear them report the solution. [are blogs a way of hearing people think out aloud?] It's time to stop portraying perfection and to be honest and keep speaking aloud. We need leaders to model not being all together.

brian mclaren session 2: forming disciples

Opawa Baptist has wifi. So these are notes, what I heard Brian say, [with a few editorial comments by me], as Brian spoke for a day on the topic of spiritual formation. These are notes on the art of forming disciples.

Spiritual formation is for mission.

"It's easier to give birth than to raise the dead." Only a male could say that. Paul uses childbirth to "raise" the Galatian church. All leadership - planting or re-forming the established - will be hard. This is formation.

Revivalism cheers the start. It lacks attention to long distance formation.

Disciple = "student of the art." Disciples are apprentices of Jesus.

Micheal Polanyi, Personal Knowledge. [Wow first time I've ever heard an emerging church speaker talk about Polanyi. I stumbled across Polanyi back in 1994 during seminary and find him useful in terms of offering a way out of the secular dualisms of Enlightment modernity.] "It follows that an art which has fallen into disuse for the period of a generation is altogether lost. There are hundreds of examples of this to which the process of mechanization is continously adding new ones. These losses are usually irretrievable. It is pathetic to watch the endless efforts -- equipped with microscopy and chemistry, with mathematics and electronics -- to reproduce a single violin of the kind the half-literate Stradivarius turned out as a matter of routine more than 200 years ago."

Stradivarius had "elbow knowledge," he was 4th generation violin maker. The art of apprenticeship has been lost in modernity. You learn to follow your master even when you can't analyse or account for the detail. You watch and learn unconsciously, even those rules not explicitly known to the master.

This knowledge does not reside in books; "Idiot's Guide to Violin's." It can only be assimilated by surrendering uncritically to the imitaton of the master.

"Practical wisdom is more truly embodied in action than expressed in rules of action." Practical Knowledge, pp. 53-54. Could Christianity have become pre-occupied with words? Could we have lost this wisdom and the art of disciple-making?

You would have to go from church tradition to church tradition to try and put the lost fragments back together. It is an art learned by training.

What if the church risked everything to train in the art of discipleship?

We need a triangle of community; spirituality; mission.

In history spiritual formation has occurred in the following ways;
attraction; does not equal perfection
induction/initiation; becoming part of the group
transformation; you start to change
mission; you start to work this out in practice
transmission; you need to pass on the art. Mission is not the same as transmission.

One fragment; AD 200; Hippolytus.

Seeker - you could not become a Christian in AD 200 unless you knew one. This is attractional mission. You would come to a meal, experience the hospitality of the community. Then you would be dismissed. To stay you would be interviewed -- not on 4 spiritual laws, but on your behaviour. Do you want to live our way of life?

Hearer - experience the whole service, including Apostles Creed and Lords Prayer. To be part of communion, you need to be interviewed. You would be assigned to be catechised, to prepare for baptism.

Kneeler - you would memorize a theology based on the Lords Prayer and to preform exorcism. For more, see Robert Webber's Journey to Jesus. It is a helpful exploration of ancient church catechism. [Brian say's this sounds strange, but I think we need to see exorcism not as individual, but as cultural. So I want to work on pre-baptism classes that exorcise cultural "evil." This opens up environmental, economic and racial discernment.]

Transformation for mission - another fragment is the early church 3-fold way as stages of spiritual formation;

stage 1; purgative way - catharsis of sex, money and pride, not to get them out of your life, but to face sex, money and pride and to recognise how driven you are internally.

stage 2; illuminative way - having pulled back the curtains of my inner life, to be bathed in light. Practices include daily prayer - ie bathing in front of God, breath prayers (Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on me a sinner), singing, etc. We begin to absorb God.

stage 3; unitive way - the goal is to experience the filling of the Spirit, to be awakened to God, to be a Christ-bearer.

These stages are a spiral, that you keep learning and deepening, and recircling.

Religious groups can malform and deform a person. What does it mean for us to explore spiritual re-formation?

Churches are like tortoises. They can only get ahead when they come out of their shell and stick their neck out.

brian mclaren session 1: spiritual formation: panel

Panel: Murray Robertson, Dave Atkinson from Primal, Jenny McIntosh. They are not experts. They are helping us contextualise and process what Brian is saying and what it means for us.

What has resonated with you?:
We as Kiwis are so often made to feel inferior by Americans, Brian's humble approach is so refreshing.

Love the deep ecclesiology. Love the move beyond consumerism of Christianity.

What about the tension between not being formed by our consumer culture and yet the need for enculturation of faith?

Will in the emerging church be less guru focused and trust the Spirit (and each other?)?

How has the panel seen self:church:world circles being reshaped?
Is emerging church niche and alternative or deep ecclesiology? The church needs to be permission giving and should promote church:world engagement.

Young people need space to do ministry. Hierachies don't allow this and thus we lose spiritual formation.

Danger of emerging church is it being viewed as church re-packaged. It needs to be theology re-packaged. For example women leaders, for example empowering leadership not dominating leadership. The church emerging must grapple with church domination by white, males and the move to "bewildering diversity."

Panel: What are our dreams for the future ie emerging church?
Church for people by people. Relational. Creative. Incarnational. Inclusive not box ticking.

More appreciation of different ways of being church. More encouragement of new leaders and less criticism.

Seeing church as more wholistic, less niche.

Next 20 years are hugely crucial, as mainline church in New Zealand dies. Crisis will be huged. Church today is so mixed; so vital; so grim. Will enough churches grasp an outward vision. It is so hard to do this when a church is in decline.

brian mclaren session 1: spiritual formation

Opawa Baptist has wifi. So these are notes, what I heard Brian say, [with a few editorial comments by me], as Brian spoke for a day on the topic of spiritual formation. Here is the introductory session.

Spiritual formation is caught in our history of protest and desire to be the next new thing.

Spiritual formation a substitute for things like evangelism, discipleship, teaching.

Semper reformanda -- always reforming.

We have inherited a cognitive process to convey information. We place people on a conveyor belt -- unsaved; saved; serving. We formalised Sunday Schools. We filled in blank booklets.

Matthew 28:18; Go and make (spiritually form) disciples (apprentices). So few of our churches see themselves as initiating life-long learners and providing life-long formation opportunities. What does wholistic transformation look like?

Pentecostal/charismatics trade on intense experiences. But you can still beat your wife.

So we need a holistic approach and a different understanding of the gospel. Our practice problems relate to our bad theology.

[Really funny slide] Gospel = how to get to heaven (self) in large bold type; attend worship (church); with smaller and smaller type, harder and harder to read, ending with social transformation (world), can hardly read.

What if; God loves the world; and so has called a group of people to work with God in loving the world; and what if you could be converted to life participate in this and thus live outside yourself.

Mark 1:16 - Kingdom of God does not equal heaven. It is a public/social and personal/spiritual. We need an interior castle and a growing Kingdom.

The most significant idea about spiritual formation is that it is not about self but about participation in what God is doing.

What would it look like if we risked everything on making disciples of Jesus formed by the gospel of the Kingdom?

brian mclaren session 1

Opawa Baptist has wifi. So these are notes, what I heard Brian say, [with a few editorial comments by me], as Brian spoke for a day on the topic of spiritual formation. First he is talking briefly about the emerging church.

Defining emerging church using Gibbs and Bolger's emerging church.

Too much emerging church talk is talk about church, church, church. If we keep the kingdom at our centre, it reminds us of the world and saves us from talking only about ourselves.

The emergent church should not mean looking for the one new model. Rather we are in the middle, in cultural transition, and moving toward the churches of tomorrow.

The emerging church is not a slice of the existing church pie - evangelical; pentecostal etc. Rather, think of a tree. It is a new ring emerging in a new climate.

Brian is raving about tallskinnykiwi [praising New Zealander's in New Zealand -- very cunning :) ], and the term "deep ecclesiology" as a way to honour the church in all of it's forms. This is part of the true ethos of emerging church.

Apartheid Museum in South Africa; to illustrate the need to move beyond historic polarities and colonial patterns, to a new mission statement with new values. And so we are needing to rethink spiritual formation.

podcast: emerging church scene in New Zealand06

I'm hoping to interview some of the voices from the emerging church scene here in New Zealand as part of the Brian McLaren weekend. So, let's see if this works: Download file If it does, it is my first ever podcast. Let me know what you think.

letters from a dying church

The big challenge, in the next few years, will be to develop the stories of those emerging churches that work within existing churches. In the US, we have very few examples of these... Link.

Two and a half years ago it was my intuitive sense that the future would need models not only of emerging church plants, but of transitional churches in which emerging congregations could be birthed as part of existing churches. It was one of the (many) reasons I moved from planting an emerging church called Graceway, to move to an established church, Opawa Baptist, to do this very thing. The above quote suggests I might not perhaps be as mad as many at the time thought.

I did not come with an agenda and have been amazed with some of the things that have emerged; new congregations, new forms of mission and spiritual formation. (for more explanation go here.) As part of the transition, I started a new blog category; "re-imaging at Opawa." I was stunned to check my archives last month and discover that it now has 114 entries. That's over 23,000 words.

Three denominations have contacted me recently asking me to share the story. So I'm considering writing some resources, perhaps titled Letters from a dying [Western] church.

1. If you have a question about transitioning a church into postmodernity and seeing emerging churches from within existing churches, drop them in the comments and they might become gist in a "letter."

2. If you would like to read a draft of each "letter" before it goes public, and so help me shape - theologically, missiologically, practically - each letter, drop me a line and I will be in touch.

3. If you are a publisher who is happy to participate in an shared public domain project, ie you will let me publish the letters on-line and I will let you publish them as a book, email me steve at emergentkiwi dot org dot nz

4. I'm working on a half-time liver, so I am not making any promises about how often these letters will appear. But I suspect there's enough material lying around for me to start.

mclaren weekend: updated

Things are falling into place nicely for Brian McLaren, this weekend (for more details, go here and it's still not too late to register ).

- Registrations are update: finished with near 100, which means a good conversation. Update: with a real diversity of church backgrounds which will also greatly "salt" the conversation
- The coffee maker is booked.
- We are having a number of panelists who respond to Brian on the Saturday, as part of the discerning and contextualising process. The panelists have gelled into a really nice mix that includes young, women, lay, alongside the usual respected leader names.

Here is an outline of some of the workshops for the Sunday afternoon;

How much Spirit has the emerging church got? (Steve Graham): A look at the questions Pentecostal/Charismatic churches and the emerging church might have for each other over what it means to be people of the Spirit eg the place of congregational singing in worship, ecstatic gifts in services, divine creativity, seekers' 'initiation' into the dynamics of the Spirit

The Art of Curating Worship (Mark Pierson): seeing worship as an art form to be curated rather than a list of boxes to be filled.

A café church spirituality (Lynne Taylor): two stories of emergence, of different groups engaging with our world in different ways... with common themes.

Update: Spirited Exchanges (Jenny McIntosh and Elizabeth Taylor): Spirited Exchanges is something for people who are struggling to find a "place" at church - who have been wounded or hurt by church or it's leaders, who are asking questions but not necessarily finding answers. We want to create a regular place where people can come and air their doubts, share their story, and find acceptance, not judgement. This is a double workshop that includes exploration and then the running of an actual Spirited Exchanges. Ideally people would attend both.

Update: Emerging Workplace Spirituality (Alistair McKenzie): Emerging church can easily just focus on doing things differently when we gather together. If we continue to think that church is something we come to, then we will fail to realise our potential for being the church God sends out into the world to work in partnership there. What sort of spirituality will support the ministry of all God's people the other six days?

Other workshops include public artistic mission and a book club discussion of McLaren’s "a generous orthodoxy" and Taylor's "out of bounds church?" (authors not necessarily present).