Vintage Faith

Emerging Church memories and good and nice things

I got a copy of the book "Evangelicals Engaging Emergent" in the mail. It is a book which calls itself on the back "A comprehensive Evangelical assessment of the Emergent/Emerging Church". I flipped through it and saw in the index that my name and our church was mentioned quite a bit in it. So I have been reading and scanning through it. There's some people I really respect who are some of the authors of this book such as the amazing church-observing Ed Stetzer and Darrell Bock from Dallas Seminary who I try to read everything he writes. So I was very intrigued to read it.

The book recalls the history of "the emerging church" and goes back and tells the origins and history. It was interesting reading it as for me the term "the emerging church" seems increasingly distant for me at this point. Due to all the confusion about what the term means (I blogged about it here) I am not really using the term anymore.

However, I did write a book called "The Emerging Church" back in 2002 (it came out in 2003) and it is quoted and discussed in this new book so I was remembering back on that time period. But today, I am not thinking too much in "emerging" categories and terminology like I was back then. However, (and this is an important however) it doesn't mean that I am not still very, very, very passionate about what got me into the whole emerging world (a passion and urgency felt for evangelism and mission).

Recently, due to this same passion I have shifted my personal focus and time into the Origins Project which is a network/community much with the same zeal that I felt back in the early days of what became the USA emerging church in the late 90's. When we were discussing how does what we do change as we are more and more experiencing shifts in our culture to be communicating and proclaiming the gospel and good news of Jesus? These shifts are still very much happening, so it isn't as though the need for mission has changed.

But as I was reading the book, I was reminded of some of the things that were so refreshing and good about the early days of the emerging church. Friendships comes to mind first. Such great times with people who helped me process faith and struggles and "what is church?". In the early years there wasn't all the theological controversy or terminology confusion that developed later. So it was so fun being on Youth Specialties/Zondervan editorial publishing team and going on several retreats with everyone on that team. Discussing new approaches to worship, leadership, and evangelism.

Thoughts On Planning Ahead Sermon-Teaching Series

A couple weeks ago I Twittered that we had an all-day sermon planning series and mapped out a year in advance of what the teaching is. I got several emails and questions about when we plan in advance - does it limit the Holy Spirit or are we simply programming something without allowing the Spirit to change things.

 

                                                                So... a couple of thoughts about what we do and responses to some of the specific questions from emails. Here's how we currently are planning things out. So for those interested, here is what we just did a few weeks ago and what I Twittered about.

1) For anything you do in ministry or everything we do at all, of course there is a presupposition that prayer is flowing throughout everything.

2) Planning out what we teach is not a solo thing. It isn't just me determining what is taught and then I bring it to a group for approval of what I came up with. I have a specific temperament and personality and I don't trust myself to make that decision by myself since it is so important. It's not that I don't think I have insight to lay out a teaching schedule. But I am fully aware that I have my own biases and my own way I view things, and there are things I may want to teach about what I may feel is best but may not be for everyone etc. So we determine the teaching for our church with a teaching team who together decides what the teaching will be. The teaching team currently is 4 people with very distinct and different personalities (currently it is myself, Josh Fox, Joe Bishop and Kristin Culman). Over the years this team shifts, at times we have had non-staff volunteers on this team who are teachers themselves and would teach in our gatherings or they were on the creative team. This year it is was 3 of our staff and one volunteer who we consder staff.

Origins Project update

                                                                      We had a conference call today about the Origins Project which was great looking ahead a bit. For those that don't know what the Origins Project is - it is a community being birthed for those who have a passion for Jesus, Humanity and Innovation - revolving around mission really. The focus of connection which birthed this was a passion for evangelism (but I say that word in the good sense of the word). Evangelism means so many things to different people. But it is about Jesus being the way of life and salvation and the cross and you can read the basic theological direction and statements we are using on the Origins Project website. What one's theology is strongly impacts one's urgency for participating in evangelism and mission. How you view the cross, the atonement, salvation - ties into how urgent or not you see evangelism. I have been increasingly aware of when I am reading the New Testament, how incredibly passionate they were about evangelism and mission - and did not just passively sit around hoping people would come to know Jesus.

Scot McKnight, Erwin McManus, Margaret Feinberg, Dave Gibbons, Eric Bryant, Jeanne Stevens, Mark Batterson and others are part of the leadership of this community (see the full list here of leadership). So this is really a fun thing to be part of.

Apart from prayer, I can't think of anything more important than outreach right now

I am posting today being part of the National Outreach Convention blog tour. They are going to different blogs of the various speakers to have some blog-dialog and today is the day at this one. The focus of their convention naturally by what they call it is "outreach" (evangelism/mission/compassion). They have a strong social justice and global compassion theme in their convention as well and motivating local churches this way.

I have spoken at the Outreach Convention every year since it started - so I have not missed a single one. I also have been reading Outreach Magazine since it started and served on the editorial advisory board for several years. So for me to blog for a day for the Outreach Convention is something I am honored to be able to do. Lindy Lowry who is the editor of Outreach Magazine is also a very dear friend and she has just joined us to be on the Connecting Team for the Origins network as well. Lindy and Kim from Outreach will be interacting here on the blog today as part of this.

Could Green Day be the next U2?

I don't agree with some of Green Day's political pokes as well as some of their themes. But I just listened to their new album from beginning to end. It was catchy and I want to listen to it again. I first didn't like Green Day in their early years as I was so into The Clash that it felt they were trying to be like them. But then as the years went on they seemed very authentic and it wasn't just wanting to be "punk". I still think The Clash was perhaps the greatest band ever. But I am thinking about Green Day in this post and also U2.

I got an email from Josh Fox this morning who shared how the new U2 album slipped fast in the charts and is at #58. I have seeen U2 about 8 times over the years, so I have floowed them a long time since college years. I got their new No Line On The Horizing right when it came out, listened to it twice... but then have pretty much forgotten about it. The new Green Day makes me want to listen to it again and already a song or two is in my head after one listening. U2's messages were more thematic to a Christian narrative I believe than Green Day.

But... could Green Day be the new U2? (That almost sounds sacrilegious asking it, but I am just wondering).

Weird and Wonderful New Jersey

We have been taking a few vacation days here in New Jersey visiting my mom.

I am speaking in Columbia, Maryland on Tuesday, May 12th - you can read info. and where it is here. 

It is an event with the Baptist Convention of Maryland and I look forward to spending the day with them. So we are spending some vacation days before and after this event.

Becky, Katie and Claire all came with me here and we will be driving through Pennsylvania and then to Maryland and then heading to Washington DC for a few days to see the tourist things. Katie and Claire are very excited about Washington DC because they have been reading about and studying the first ladies dresses which they will now get to see at the Smithsonian.I am not particularly excited about the dresses but I am excited to see Fonzie from Happy Days leather jacket which is also on display there at the Smithsonian.

Never got a haircut during a worship gathering before

This past Sunday was the wrap-up of our twelve week "Vintage Christianity" teaching series. It was a series where we developed a holistic look at what it means to be a follower of Jesus in community and on mission. The teaching each week started with Jesus, as He is the head of the church (Colossians 1:18) and the one who sends us on mission. So we have "Jesus" in the center of the diagram we used and walked through each of the ways we broke it down during the series.

 

Each week, we had several artists painting four different art pieces during the gatherings that represented "Worshiping" and "Community" and "Missional" and "Theologians". (You can click on each of the smaller photos posted below here to see the art and prayer stations larger).

Since it was the last week of the series, we set up the room like the diagram we have been using to show the flow of all this.  In the center of the room, like in the diagram where it says "Jesus", we put up a large cross and the communion bread and cups were placed all around the base of the cross. We then set up the art pieces in the 4 corners of the room and created interactive prayer stations which focused on  asking God to shape us into each of the four aspects we taught about being a disciple of Jesus. There were Bible verses from the teaching we gave each week displayed at each art station as well. We will be hanging up the art pieces on the walls of the sanctuary as a reminder of this.

After the teaching when it came time for communion, people got up and walked to each station to read the Scriptures and pray that God would shape us in the various ways we have been teaching about. And then they would walk to the middle where the cross was to take communion. We set up pillows so people could kneel if they wanted to as well. It was a bit chaotic as it was pretty crammed as people made their way around the room and lines were long - but it was a beautiful ending to the series showing we cannot do this on our own strength.

Youth Ministry 3.0 = Church 3.0

I just reread  Youth Ministry 3.0 today for the second time. It is a book that is short, but it is not a book that is shallow. It's written by my friend Mark Oestreicher from Youth Specialties. I met Marko in Colorado around 10 years ago at a retreat think-tank sort of thing we both were at. He was not yet on staff with Youth Specialties but was soon to be going there. I found an instant admiration of his unique hair style that he had at the time. I will say that his hair changes seasonally in ways that I am in awe of. It feels like every year at the Apple Convention the excitement builds for the unveiling of the new Mac products - and I feel that way about his hair. It feels like an annual event. You can sense it coming... the anticipation builds -  and then there is the revealing of a new style.

I have had many fun days through the years with Marko and we went to Singapore together a couple of years ago  (where he saw me with my hair drenched and flattened after a downpour).

Haircut and anthropology professor Sunday

This Sunday we are wrapping up our 3 month series on what the Scriptures teach about what it means to be a disciple of Jesus and be on mission as a church community. We have used the phrase "We are asking God to transform us into a: Worshiping-Community-Of-Missional-Theologians" and been breaking that down each week to show what the Bible teaches about each of those things. We have been creating art pieces during the gatherings with each one representing one of the words "Worshiping" or "Community" etc. This week those art pieces will be part of the prayer stations when we pray for God to truly transform us as a church in these areas.

 As part of the wrap-up I will be interviewing Susan Harding who is a professor of anthropology at the University of California Santa Cruz. She has written a couple of books about religion, one was studying Jerry Falwell called The Book Of Jerry Falwell.Susan is someone who admittedly is not a "Christian" as we would generally define that in the church.  Yet she is someone who values Jesus and His teachings. She came to Vintage Faith Church to do an anthropological study as part of research for her next book. She started coming almost 2 years ago and she is still here. She has become part of our community and I have grown to really respect her and I thoroughly enjoy talking to her. She is someone who really is a thinker and I learn from her every time I get to chat with her. She knows I blog and I asked her if it is OK to blog about her and she said it was. So hello Susan, as you read this!

As part of the series conclusion this Sunday, Susan will be sharing some of her observations of our church community on mission from her study as an anthropologist. So that will be quite interesting.

And in the evening 7 PM gathering, Angie who cuts my hair will be there. Cutting my hair. I have been going to Angie for about 3 years. We have developed a friendship and she has never been to our church community gatherings and isn't part of a church. We have had some talks about Christianity and faith - and she also was part of the They Like Jesus But Not The Church DVD. So, as a way for her to finally experience our church community, she said she would come if I would get my hair cut. So if that is what it takes - then I shall have my hair cut this Sunday night in our church building as the worship gathering begins. She'll be bringing her barber stuff over and setting it up in our church building. I have really wanted Angie to experience the people of our church, what the whole vibe of the community is, our coffeehouse and art gallery. So now she shall as I sit and have my haircut as the gathering begins.

So, the life of mission is an adventure and this teaching series that ends tried to paint a holistic portrait of what that looks like. We used these diagrams below in the series.

We start with Jesus as He is the head of the church and the reason we are in existence and on mission.

Then we are Worshipers of God foremost. Worship will continue for all eternity. But we worship in Community - we are not meant to be in isolation. However, if we are only remain worshipers in community, we can slowly become inward focused singing-happy-shiny people who exist in our own Christian world. We may escape the happy-shiny-world to go do a service project every so often, but we run back into our happy-shiny worshiping community world.

That is why a worshiping community needs to be in the world on Mission as a lifestyle. But if we are on worshipers on mission who don't have Community nor are growing Theologically - then we can be missionally passionate, but burn out since we have no community to support us or we can be shallow if we aren't growing in Scripture. Another off-balance approach would be if we are in Community and Theologians - but we aren't in the world on mission and in the lives of people. So then we stay inward focused and over time we can become mean Bible-heads. Now being a Bible-head is a really good thing as we need to saturate our minds with Scripture - so our hearts melt in worship to God and in love for people as Jesus said were the two greatest commands. I absolutely love apologetics too and my largest section of my bookshelf is books on apologetics by great and insightful apologetics writers. But if we only hang with each other that isn't the point of apologetics. And if we only hang out with each other, we slowly can become Christians with a lot of head knowledge but we don't have much love for people. Some of the meanest Christians I have ever met ironically were ones who knew the Bible really well. So knowing the Bible is not about simply gaining knowledge but for transforming our hearts to be worshipers of God whom loves the people He loves.

It needs to be holistic is what we have been trying to teach. Worshiping.. Community... Missional... Theologians... with Jesus as our head of the church and why we are doing what we do.

So, this Sunday should be a fun one. Wrapping up the teaching series. The artwork that was created during the series will be finished to be hanging up on the sanctuary walls. Getting a haircut during the beginning of the worship gathering and Angie seeing our church community. And interviewing an anthropology professor..... Fun fun.

Late night with Rick Muchow from Saddleback and my Joey Ramone bobble-head

Had a fun Sunday yesterday - I taught in the 3 Vintage Faith Worship gatherings on why we should strive to be theologians (in the non-academic sense of the word). I was even able to use my Joey Ramone bobble-head as a prop when teaching, which I will explain later.

Theology means the 'study of God' and we all should be using our minds as Christians and the importance of Scripture in our lives. Jesus said to love God with our minds (Matthew 22:37). We are transformed by the renewing of our minds (Romans 12:1-2). So I focused on how theology comes alive when we are on mission and challenged with different ways of thinking. We should enjoy that and thrive in that if we are truly "missionaries". I shared if we aren't getting challenged in various theological questions, we probably aren't on mission as we then aren't interacting with people outside the faith to be getting the questions. There is a big difference in discussing theology with other Christians (and often that is discussing a lot of the same theological debates that others have had in the past too that we rehash in various forms) rather than theology for the sake of mission with people.

In the gatherings I opened it up to everyone there to give their thoughts on what are the doctrines we need to be secure in and know. And which are the ones which may have many opinions and we may hold one but don't need to fight about them. I drew them out on a white board as people in the gathering gave what they felt were the doctrines we need to hold as essentials and which are the ones which there may be a variety of opinions on. Such as "Jesus is coming back" was an essential doctrine, but how He is coming back (amillennial, premillennial etc.) wasn't as important to have a distinct opinion on. No matter what doctrine we hold to, which may in the more non-essential catagory we still need to think about the ramifications of our theology. So we if do hold a premillennial view of the the end times, it doesn't mean we abandon trying to make things better in this world - or simply bunker down and wait for the end to come (as some who hold this viewpoint can unfortunately do). So it was a great Sunday having this discussion as part of the actual sermon.

Back home from Origins and Catalyst event

  Heading home as I write this from being at Origins-Catalyst West Coast down in Orange County, CA. I think there were 3,000 people at Catalyst. I have never been to a Catalyst event before, but it was one of the most organized and well-run large conferences I have ever been to. Brad, Ben and the team do such a great job with this. It was also extremely refreshing being there because it didn't feel at all like you had to win over people to the cause of mission for the church. I had so many great conversations in between, during and after sessions with people. 

At the event I got to hang with my friend Jonny Ray Bartel, who is the bass player for the fantastic band The Knitters. Jonny has played bass with Mick Jagger, Johnny Cash and lots of others. Got to go out to lunch with Marko from Youth Specialties. I will be posting a review about his latest excellent book Youth Ministry 3.0 tomorrow. But it always great being with Marko and catching up.

Got to finally meet Andy Stanley and talk with him a little while. I have been to NorthPoint Church two times speaking there, but we never have met. My mom became a Christian through the ministry of his dad, Charles Stanley. It was one of those things where I shared about Jesus with her for 15 years and then she turned on the television and it was Charles Stanley and she prayed to put faith in Jesus. She told me "he made sense of what you have been telling me for 15 years". So never give up on someone and you never know if it will be 15 years of praying and hoping.

Origins.... beginning the network/communty

I am down in Orange County and was in an all day meeting about the new network/community. We had a meeting with those from the teams helping lead and shape the network who are here for the Origins/Catalyst conference. There's so much to share about what is being birthed and we'll be defining some of the terminology and purposes more clearly and in depth in the months ahead. This network is for those who are passionate about about Jesus and the inspired Scriptures, Humanity (evangelism and mission) and Innovation and wanting to be joining in with others as we are on this adventure.

But, from today's meeting there are a couple of updates:  

1) After all the wonderful ideas, input and suggestions about name ideas we decided to use "Origins" as the name of the network. More on the name later and why, but that is the scoop on the name and for those that contributed ideas, thank you!!

2) Although this will be a community, any community does need leadership. The Creative Team is now formed and they are the leaders who will be voices to be shaping and help lead the network.

Erwin McManus and Eric Bryant from Mosaic - Dave Gibbons and John Park from Newsong Church - and myself and Josh Fox from Vintage Faith Church have been the core developers and the Creative Team for this network will be:

Rick McKinley  - Scot McKnight  - Jeanne Stevens  - Margaret Feinberg - Mark Batterson - Amena Brown

- Skye Jethani - Adam Edgerly - Bryan Lorritz - Naeem Fazal

You can go here and see the leadership page which has the Creative Team and links to each person's blog or church so you can read more about them.

A night with the Queen of Rockabilly who loves Jesus

Last night Becky and I had a very fun experience as we got to spend the evening with Wanda Jackson. Wanda is known as the "Queen of Rockabilly" and sometimes as the "First Lady of Rock and Roll" as she was the first female singer to cross over from country to rockabilly which became rock and roll. She was encouraged by Elvis Presley to record music like he was doing. She actually dated Elvis for a while in his very early days and she toured with Elvis, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins. She was friends with all of them and has quite a history and stories to tell. In the movie "Walk The Line" an actress played her as she was one of the touring regulars with Johnny Cash.

She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame two weeks ago. You can read more about her on her web site.

I have been in touch with Wendell, her husband and done an interview once with Wanda a couple of years ago. She was playing in San Francisco last night, so Becky and I drove up there and met Wanda and Wendell for dinner before the show. Over dinner we got to hear more details of their stories and music and most of all the thrill it was to hear about their faith in Jesus. They are actively involved in their local church back in Oklahoma.

The story of the resurrection in downtown Santa Cruz

We planted Vintage Faith Church in 2004 and each year we have put our Good Friday focus and time not in a Good Friday worship gathering but instead we bring the story to the downtown Santa Cruz streets. We have Easter Sunday gatherings at our church building on Sunday which is where we have the more usual teaching, songs etc. about the resurrection. But for Good Friday we try and tell the story in a public place as the crucifixion itself was in a very public place.

 

On Good Friday (and we also have it set up on Saturday) we have what is normally 12 "stations" of art or interactive art of some sort that is set up on the sidewalks of downtown Santa Cruz. We get permission from the city and also work with the stores who we set it all up are in front of. But along the sidewalk for a block we tell the story of the crucifixion and resurrection through art and Scripture. Some are very large art pieces, some are extremely interactive which people are there creating things to tell the story right there on the sidewalks. We even we had a walk-in empty tomb 2 years ago that you would enter into as part of that station. That year it was built by someone in our church who had recently became a Christian the year before and was so cool to see what she came up with for that station. You can see some photos from a blog entry I posted 2 years ago about that year's Stations of The Cross here. I'll post photos on this blog next week of what this year's experience was like. The local newspaper just called us again about it and will be doing some write-up and they had it as a front cover story once. So it is favorably received in our community with this approach.

Liturgy: some escaping and some discovering

I am a columnist for Leadership Journal and they just posted an article I wrote for the print version magazine at their Out of Ur blog about the discovery of liturgy by some while others leave it who may have been raised in it. It is posted here.