Churches planting churches, Day 1

The first full day of this conference was full of confirmation and questions when it comes to the callings on my family's life right now.

Confirmation for my ministry at Gethsemane: In plenary, we heard about 6 phases in a life of faith, pointing out that many churches stagnate in the first three, and never progress further.
1 - Belief and Experience of God
2 - Learning about God
3 - Equipping for Service - Doing service in the community
4 - Inward Reflection - Asking tough questions about faith that don't have answers (or at least easy answers)
"The Wall" -- Where one seeks healing, struggles with faith...
5 - Outward Reflection - Receiving deep callings for our lives that send us out into the world
6 - Living a life of Love

Reflecting on my own and with Lazara and Doug, it was a joy to realize that at Gethsemane we have at least some of our flock moving through most, if not all, of the stages. Our journey through worship of healing last year was definitely our time at "The Wall". I (perhaps too often?) dwell in Sunday School and worship on Inward Reflection. Those who are feeling a call to plant new churches/missions are certainly on outward reflection, and we certainly have others who are simply coming to their first experiences of God.

Healthy churches help folks through all of the different phases and partner with folks as they journey... I guess we aren't doing so badly there.

Confirmation of the call to plant a new church / worshiping community in Fort Worth: In our classes on churches planting churches, we heard two powerful messages...
1 - The only reason to plant a new church is that you are desperately concerned about those who are lost and lonely (not on the preservation of your church/denomination/self).
2 - The first step in planting a new church is identifying a pastor/leader who is truly assessed to do new church planting. This Andy did last year. As they described how to assess a proper leader, I was truly amazed at how God had already equipped my husband to do the work to which he is truly called.

We talked about how healthy churches should plant churches, because otherwise they will just plant more unhealthy churches... but the morning session gave me peace about that.

We talked about the need to sacrifice and the reality of suffering as one plants a church, spiritual warfare if you will. I smiled and I considered how much I have grown in my own understanding of tithing of myself and my tithe to serve the Lord. I found peace in the thought of Gethsemane being willing to step up to invest in a new endeavor to reach others as even a couple weeks ago, as I sorted through old office papers, I read through the dreams of Gethsemane from 2000 when they began to seek a new pastor... the constant dream was to reach new people with the good news of the Gospel. And I felt reassurance knowing that we have done a lot of healing to prepare ourselves for any journey of suffering together.

Confirmation of Gethsemane's connection to evangelism work: Parent churches blossom through the experience of having child churches... Parent churches find new life too. (Kind of like parents regain the ability to play when they have kids).

But there were questions too...

If Gethsemane is called to plant a Spanish-speaking mission, who is going to be our lead person?

Reading through the assessment questions, I know clearly that I am not there. And yet, there are so many signs that we are called to do just that. And so... perhaps I return to my own greatest weakness, the thing the pastor from the Upper Room New Church Development in Pittsburgh emphasized: prayer.

We closed that session with the simple Jesus prayer. Maybe I need to learn it better:
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, Have mercy on me, a sinner.

Missional Discernment Day 1

The energy and vibe of the Evangelism and Church Growth 2012 #ecg2012 conference and its attendees is exceptional. Lindsay, Lazara, and I are meeting wonderful people from across the congregation (and a few non-Presbyterians) who are united in the missions of this conference to find new ways to evangelize, strengthen existing churches, develop new worship communities, and effectively minister to youth.

Although Lindsay and I are both taking the New Church Development (NCD) track of the conference, we are following individual topic "threads" within that track. She is following "Churches Planting Churches" and I am taking "Missional Discernment In Your Context." From the conference brochure,

"NCD work involves being able to discern, read, and interpret signs of our culture and the winds of the Spirit in order to faithfully translate the gospel into particular cultural contexts."

Our study leaders for Missional Discernment are Doug McMahon (co-pastor of Missio Dei in St. Petersburg, http://www.themissiodei.com/) and B.J. Woodworth, founding pastor of the Open Door in Pittsburgh, PA (http://www.pghopendoor.org/). Here are some "snippets" of the thoughts we considered in todays sessions (all of which will be explored further upon our return to GPC):

• The Holy Spirit plants churches
• Success stories from previous NCD "plants" are not meant to be duplicated, but examined for their applicability to your own situation
• 3-Self Movement: Self-sustaining, self-governing, self-reproducing
• Missional "sophistication" involves a deep understanding of the people, cultural dynamics, available skills of people, and real community needs
• The book of Acts has many examples of discernment at work in the early church
• St. Ignatius of Loyola is considered the "Father of Discernment"
• Finding God in all things in order that we might love and serve all things
• Prayer walks through the community
• St. Patrick ministered to the Celtic "barbarians" and applied many of these principles

Tomorrow (Wednesday) we will spend most of the day in an activity called "Exploring Your Neighborhood: An Exegetical Walk". We will be conducting a "critical analysis" (exegisis) of several neighborhoods in areas of St. Petersburg to determine how one might begin planning for a new church development. We will be analyzing features such as housing types and conditions, whether there is building or renovation going on, how well the residences appear cared for, proximity to major freeways, who might have lived here before "civilization" arrived, community or civic centers, the number and appearance of public spaces such as parks, playgrounds, or walkways.

This promises to be the most exciting day of this topic, and I look forward to reporting on it!

Yours in Christ,

Douglas

You already have everything that you need...

Well, I knew that it was going to be a powerful conference when I felt the tingle of the Holy Spirit at the first words of Eric Hoey's welcome at the Evangelism and Church Growth Conference here in St. Pete beach (#ecg2012). There were truly signs from the Holy Spirit that I am exactly where God needs me to be. Lazara, Doug and I sat down at a random table and soon some other pastors joined us. A bit into dinner, I started chatting with a gentleman named Ebenezer from Houston... turns out his wife was born and raised and he was married in the small village in Ghana where I served as a YAV. He must have been named after the local congregation there... wow. 


Worship was focused on God's intimate presence in our lives now. The baptismal font was filled as the call to worship, reminding us of God's power to fill us... in the prayer of confession, with each confession a cup of water was removed... reminding us how our sins come between us and our baptisms... the assurance of pardon showed us how God's love overflows and refills the baptismal font, removing any evidence of our sins from this world. Powerful stuff. God is present here and now, in my life, taking away my sins... not in some distant future, but today. 


As we stood for worship, I was caught up in the fact that as folks stood, a shadow of heads obscured my view of the words, but instead of this being a hindrance or annoyance, it was joy. Here, right now, God is present in each of these persons, gathered from all over, gathered together in the midst of a denomination that often is known for its divisions, and we are brought beautifully together here to see God in action, to celebrate, and to entrust the gospel into one another's hands so that each of us can go home and plant more seeds. God is here and now. 


Our preacher was Mark Yaconelli, a man I last heard preach with my husband when we attended the Presbyterian Youth Triennium a few years ago. His words touched home so much... He talked about the disciples feeling so incapable of acting out the ministry of God. He talked about how we often feel even worse by going to these conferences, wishing we had cool churches (the chillax church) or cool ministries that grew in great numbers. We feel inept and unloved and that God will only love us when we get our ministry to "that" point in the future. 


And then he reminded us that the ministry that Jesus was most incarnate in had 12 members who totally did not understand the message, one of whom was trying to kill him. "If you are leading THAT ministry, THAT is where God is." 12 clueless people, one of whom is trying to kill you. I smiled. Maybe God can be with me here and now. 


In a time when I feel so scared and overwhelmed to imagine that my husband and a small group of believers are wanting to start a church from nothing in Fort Worth (RevAndrewWong.blogspot.com) and where my evangelism team's response is to then feel called to start ANOTHER church, spanish-speaking, in Fort Worth, (neither with any money) I heard tonight that perhaps, just maybe, that is precisely where God is. And that we already have what we need. 


God is enough. 
Jesus is enough. 
We are enough. 


That is awesome. That makes sense in my life when nothing else seems to. 


And so with joy, I sang the refrain of the closing song... 
Your love never fails, never runs out, never gives up on me. 

Introducing our new blog!

Look for updates from the Evangelism Church Growth Conference 2012 from me (Rev. Lindsay), Lazara and Doug later this week. Or follow the hashtag on twitter #ecg2012.