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emerging church, emergent, simple church, house church, home church.Friday, September 30
a must read  An Army of ordinary People, Felicity Dale This is teaching-by-story at its best. Felicity uses a series of stories of ordinary men and women who have been starting small, simple, reproducible, home churches where they live and work. She uses each of the stories to highlight a different key principle which underlies this emerging movement in North America. This is good stuff; a must-read for those both wanting to understand what's going on and those already up to their necks in it. posted by alexander @ 7:02 PM 0 comments 
0 Comments:Announcing!  Mission 21 is the name of the church planting congress to be held in Sheffield next year, 8-10th March. The research I have been doing over the past months has been in preparation for this event. What’s Happening? All over the UK a fresh wind of God’s Spirit is producing many and varied new forms of Church. Even where church planting has not featured highly on the agenda of many streams and denominations there is a growing grass-roots level emergence of church planting activity. Even plants which appear to be traditional are finding new ways of being Church in terms of how they build community and reach out to the communities around them. This activity is happening right across the diverse cultures that make up the UK Church today – including Black majority, British Asian and other minority groupings. Our Response Mission21 is intended as an event that brings together leaders – both activists and strategists – to consider what God is doing at this time. Our venue, the new Philadelphia Campus of St Thomas’ Church, Sheffield, is able to hold around 800 people and we expect to fill the venue. Together we will assess the new landscape, honestly face past failures, and look at our faith and expectations for the future. Our desire is to learn from what is already happening, add momentum to it and to see what new connections can be made. To find out more and to book a place click on the logo above. posted by alexander @ 3:47 PM 0 comments
0 Comments:Thursday, September 29
top 10 church planting books? Check out Steve Addison's list of the best books on church planting after carrying out a poll of his readers. The List (for now) posted by alexander @ 10:43 AM 0 comments
0 Comments:Wednesday, September 28
30 hallmarks - 8  Back in action after a major hard drive failure! Mouse Church or House Church? "The fast-track discipleship of the new churches is not for invertebrates. posted by alexander @ 4:42 PM 0 comments
0 Comments:Wednesday, September 21
30 hallmarks - 7 The Foundation: Scripture or Mens Traditions? The doctrines of most traditional churches come from the Bible, but their practices are of pagan origins.The consequence of conflict between Tradition A and Tradition B is almost 34,000 different denominations. posted by alexander @ 2:58 PM 0 comments
0 Comments:Tuesday, September 20
30 hallmarks of emerging scripture-based fellowships - 6 The clergy-Laity Schism.(Mt 23:8) "The next time a guy walks up to me and says, 'Hi I'm Pastor Tim,' I'm going to smile and say, 'Hi, I'm Layman Jim." posted by alexander @ 12:47 PM 2 comments
2 Comments:We had a Pastors wife here one day and she said that her husband had a hard time convincing the people there that they were to reach out... its been a frustration for him for years. I've heard that same complaint dozens of times. When she left I began thinking about that and a quote from Eugene Peterson came to mind...... "Churches are perfectly suited for the results that they are getting now".. and I think the clergy-laity system is one of the systems that keeps people as spiritual babies..... and produces apathetic people. I don't think some house churches do much better.. in my experience after they have the honeymoon period..... which includes a lot of criticizing the I.C. .... they settle into a cozy informal church service revolving around, eating, bible discussion and singing... and prayer requests.... and little reaching out......... Frank, like the comment. Agree with you that some HC's are struggling with this too. Couple of thoughts: Thankfully there are some who have managed to break out of this merry-go-round and are seeing their churches reproducing among the unchurched down to 4th & 5th generation plants (in the UK!!). This issue is critical though - can many more of these new organic churches break out of their tight circles of comfort any better than the legacy churches from which they came? The other thing is my long held suspicion that the new paradigm of church which this involves is essentially NOT for the already-churched but for the unchurched. Often these newly formed groups from ex legacy churches simply default back into 'house group' mentality. and that aint gonna do no one no good! church planting in post communist eurasia Returned on Sunday from Budapest where I had joined a gathering of Church planters and CP facilitators from across post communist eurasia. They were all part of The Alliance for saturation church planting a network of mostly US mission agencies and churches working in partnership to see church planting movements throughout this part of Europe. I had hoped to blog each day here but discovered that I am unable to post via email to this site for some reason; so if you'd like to read a daily account of my brief trip with the highs and lows you'll have to move over to my own blog here. posted by alexander @ 12:05 PM 0 comments
0 Comments:Wednesday, September 14
30 hallmarks - no. 5 THE HUB: PASTOR OR SAVIOUR? In the US Barrett & Johnson calculate that it costs the US institutional church $1.5m to baptise each new member. In Northern Europe it is more than $2m. In home church movements in poor countries the cost is around $25-40. Sent from my XDA2. posted by alexander @ 11:37 AM 0 comments
0 Comments:Tuesday, September 13
30 Hallmarks - no. 4 FORMAT: BORED FOR THE LORD? "Lord please make something happen today that ain't in the bulletin." "I didn't realize how boring church was until I sat at the back." Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones. Enogh said! Sent from my XDA2. posted by alexander @ 7:05 PM 1 comments
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Thanks for your article 'playing in the bath', it was a real help for me as 'pastor' of a small evolving community in Scotland - I linked to your article, hope thats okay, keep on searchin - Dave Monday, September 12
30 hallmarks - no. 3 Meeting place: it's the menu, not the venue. Location, location, location are the keys to property buying, but participation which creates inspiration, affirmation, information, celebration and transformation are what makes the Family of God tick. It doesn't matter where you gather, it's everyone's willingness to jump in with both feet that counts in small, open forms of church. There can be 'poor' places to meet however. Probably the worst would be most church buildings because they have rows of pews or fixed seats all facing forward meaning that all the action is done by the person at the front. The result is a passive, disempowered people. Bad. posted by alexander @ 9:18 AM 1 comments
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Just when I thought I had an original idea. I was lying in bed last night playing with two words in my head--"simple" and "church." Well, what do you know?! You're already out there. The "menu not the venue" is exactly what I've been trying to verbalize to a few of my esteemed colleagues in our growing church that's becoming more complicated by the minute. Thanks for confirming some of my own thoughts that are a bit out of the mainstream for the church culture I am in presently.
By Friday, September 9
heresy, what heresy? Great response from Andrew Jones to that commonly heard concern about heresy creeping into small groups and home churches. Check it out by clicking on the pic. Here's a quote or two: - Research has shown that heresy usually comes through higher education [seminaries] and foreign elements. It normally does not come up from the grassroots but down from the top. Good book to read here is "Church Planting Movements" by David Garrison. posted by alexander @ 12:16 PM 0 comments
0 Comments:30 Hallmarks - no. 2 Meetings: open or programmed? KEY QUESTION: If God wants to speak strongly to your church next week through Joe or Jane Nobody, will He be able to do it? ... If not, then you've slapped handcuffs onto the Holy Spirit. You've blocked Him from using 95% of His resources. Your church has usurped His authority and "put a covering" over the head of Christ.Generally with programs God is only able to work through 2-5% of the people with their limited gifts. We need gatherings where He can use 100% of the people. We've got to set His people free. He wants His church back! posted by alexander @ 6:16 AM 0 comments
0 Comments:Thursday, September 8
30 hallmarks of emerging scripture-based fellowships - 1 Participation: "Let's say you just had your best week or maybe your worst week ever - you've gone broke, your spouse has left you, and you've been diagnosed with mad chipmunk disease. You come crawling into church, desperate for prayer, helping hands, or just a sympathetic ear. But no, you're not part of the program. (If you think you are, take a look at the bulletin. See your name in there anywhere?)...While the Pastor is forced to produce 45 minutes of fresh material every Sunday, you are prohibited from sharing 45 seconds of anything."OK, thankfully some congregational churches are not quite that bad but participation is the name of the game in small, open churches; all are encouraged even trained to take part, led by the Holy Spirit. Remember, lions don't grow in small cages. posted by alexander @ 11:00 AM 0 comments
0 Comments:Tuesday, September 6
more on megashift Ok here we go; I've done a couple of posts on Jim Rutz's book Megashift (see below) but after TSK's challenge I am going to attempt to blog through the some of the "Thirty hallmarks of Emerging Scripture-based Fellowships". First one or two of my own general thoughts about the book: I too had to swallow hard to get through the 'In your face car salesman' type style of the book, but after a while as the solid facts thrown up by Rutz's research begin to float to the top forming an ever growing picture of what God is doing in the world I could set the style to one side. What's the bottom line of the book? - Jesus wants His Church back. He wants to be Head. He wants to build it His way. - Where people are allowing Him to do this God is doing truly extraordinary things, both in terms of the miraculous and the spread of the Gospel. - God is wanting to do the same in the West. - Key to this whole process is the releasing and empowering of Gods people; if the 'professional' clergy retain control then this will never happen. posted by alexander @ 9:12 AM 1 comments
1 Comments:I am almost finished the book.... I enjoyed Jim's humor. It will be good for those who are and have been Charismatic. I like the fact that he was very honest about institutional church. I could agree with him on many different aspects of the traditional church. On the other hand the book skated on the edge of prosperity gospel... not quite there but close. Focused way too much on what's happening in other parts of the world where people are experiencing growth and perhaps miracles. I believe that North America has it's own unique problems that make house church tough to start and sustain. I would like to see someone write a book that focus' only on the North American house churches. Finally the book did little to whet my appetite for mission.... it seemed to focus a lot on what we do when we meet... I would give the book four stars (out of 5) "The Shaping of things to come still being my favorite. I would feel quite comfortable in giving this book to someone who is is considering the shift... Friday, September 2
emergingchurch.info This months emergingchurch.info is focused on Simple Church. Apart from a crazy article written by one Alexander Campbell (did I really write that?!) from Bath, there's a great article from down-under Darren of Living Room in Melbourne. From their experience of planting an organic, home, simple Church he captures "16 Church planting lessons". Read the full article here. Lessons include: - Make mission central - Multiplication not addition - Simplicity - Have fun - Go slow And - Dont let church dominate your life " I'm learning that if we allow people (and ourselves) time to live a little that they actually become much more effective in mission and that they find God and grow in their understanding and relationship with him in some amazingly surprising places!" I like that. posted by alexander @ 11:44 AM 1 comments
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" I'm learning that if we allow people (and ourselves) time to live a little that they actually become much more effective in mission ..."
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