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.