Since I did my session on Post-Christian World, here are a few add'l external links from the last day in the blogosphere that relate:

What do our church buildings witness to? "Our church buildings witness to the immobility, inflexibility, lack of fellowship, pride and class divisions in today's church." According to "Radical Renewal: The Problem of Wineskins Today" (Howard A. Snyder), post at Mark Moore's blog.

The Center for Christian Leadership is pleased to announce an upcoming conference, Beyond the Church Doors: Developing a Missional Mindset within Your Congregation, on March 31 and April 1, 2008, featuring Dr. Ed Stetzer and Dr. Alan Roxburgh. If your church is developing creative and strategic ways of engaging in missional ministry, we would like to profile your activities in our conference materials.

Take the Missional Church Survey online >>

Many North American churches today are shifting away from an “attractional model” of ministry designed to draw people into the church building to a “missional model” which involves training and equipping whole congregations to act as missionaries in their local communities. We would like to know how your church is engaging in ministries of compassion and service in order to further the gospel and impact the culture. …

We are compiling a list of stories that will inspire others to creatively engage in missional practices. Please share one or two of your church’s activities that have impacted your community. (HT: djchuang)

Also check out Inc. Magazine's newest issue, Fun! It's the New Core Value to continue to see how the culture shift is changing institutions.  

Here is the session I did at GCA on Communication in Our Post-Christian World (86-page PDF).  There is a lot of stuff the pdf won't explain but it will provide a general idea of the conversation.  For example,

We are in the middle of one of the greatest worldview transitions in recent history.  Gen-X is turning 40. While much has been discussed in terms of culture/postmodernity, it is now beginning to take hold institutionally as this generation moves into positions of power.  How the values of Gen-X & Y are reshaping ecclesiology, theology and mission and causing greater diversity in the forms and expression of the church.  

The ghost of Christianity and Christendom and it's gospel inoculation impact on mission.  The reversal with new church expressions seeing 'tradtional/modern' churches as synchronizing to a dying culture.

How the increased connectivity of Gen-x & Y creates a Virtual Tribalism and the impact on evangelism, outreach and churches. A look at this hyper-affinity and the 10 Idols of these new generations. 

For those who asked for the church planting movie, it's located here: Post-Christian America & the Urgency of Church Planting (This post also has the link to all stats/sources) 

I attended Emerging 1 & 2 and Evangelism 1 & 2 today. Emerging Session 2 was led by Steve Treichler from Hope Community.  Some quotes:

"We are in the middle of the greatest worldview shift in 200 years and evangelicals have largely sheltered themselves from this transition."  (Meaning: we no longer understand our culture)

"The gospel is a chocolate covered waffle cone.  In 11 years of our church  I have never told our people, "'you should invite your friends to church.  We do  very little 'should'." (Meaning: If our people don't see the gospel as something to prize and share, our people don't get it.) 

Here are a couple quotes from Martin Ban who is currently the Senior Pastor of Christ Church Santa Fe.  These are from his session, Making Room: A Trinitarian Reflection on Evangelism and Cultural Engagement with the Gospel. This was an excellent session which impacted me particularly as it relates to how God has allowed us to be IN Christ.  I'll have to digest this for a bit, but here are two quotes that struck me (but don't really indicate the thrust of the message). 

"The gospel is not efficient."   (As it relates to loving others and being missional.

If our people learn a Systematic Theology of Grace it results in a reduction of risk (taken by people).  We need to teach our people a Kingdom view of Grace with enables them to take greater risks. 

Dan said one of his mentors was Dick Kaufmann (he also mentioned Frame, Keller, Schaeffer, Newbigin and others) so I liked him from the get-go.  Plus, he presented his session with a triperspectival understanding of evangelism.  Eg., He discussed things like the Logos, Ethos and Pathos in evangelism.  He's going to send out his presentation PowerPoint so I will refresh myself on a couple thoughts and post on these.  

Ed Stetzer promises to blog regularly.  He just launched EdStetzer.com.  Here's the goal of the blog:

This blog will be a mixture of several things. We will look at research and discuss it here. In just a couple of weeks we will release some groundbreaking research on the dropout rate for the transition years from high school to college. Several guest bloggers will both write and interact here. Whenever we release research, this will be the official forum for interacting with us. You can post questions, question our assumptions, or say we are the smartest people ever for doing the project (thanks, mom, for dropping by).

David Wayne and I had breakfast with Ed and asked him a couple questions.  Here is a quote:

Evangelicals have a weak ecclesiology.  Ecclesiology and missiology are the defining issues of our day.  We are going to see a great die-off in the American church of established churches, yet see a broader diversity of forms of church.

…more from GCA later. 

We completed day 1 of the GCA Church Planting conference.  John Piper did a session encouraging the church planters and reminding them to be weary of church planting experts/formula's it is the Holy Spirit the preaching of the gospel.  The first sessions took place as well.  Afterwards, I had a chance to meet David Wayne (JollyBlogger) in person.  Bart Johnson, Larry Kirk, James Martin and I sat around a table at an ice-cream social talking about cessationists, creedo/paedobaptism and a sundry of other denominationalism topics SBC, PCA, EV Free.  All over a nice sundae. 

Ed Stetzer came over and gave me a hard time for my Missional - Missio Dei, Missionary or Mission post that got him in trouble over at Bill Kinnon's blog.  Stetzer's talk is now leading many in the emerging church to begin the overthrow of governments according to Kinnon (all in good fun people).   I realize my post didn't portray Stetzer's full intent, I apologize for the ease of the straw man argument with no substance.  Stetzer asked us not to post further, so we're left waiting for his article to come out…..  (no pressure Stetzer).  

Stetzer, David Wayne (JollyBlogger) and I plan on getting together tomorrow morning for an interview.   So if you have questions for Stetzer that you can post prior to 5am PST (when we meet!), post them. 

I'm putting the finishing touches on my GCA presentation, Communication in Our Post-Christian World:

The culture is changing and it requires new methods of communication.  This session will help you learn how to effectively minister in a post-Christian context.   Come learn the 1) five values of this Post-Christian generation, the 2) ten idols that enslave them and 3) effective ways to communicate the eternal and unchanging gospel message.

This is the first session for my Media & Message series.  Any of you planning on being there?  (Jollblogger is coming to the conference! btw- If you haven't, add his feed to your reader.)

This week has been extremely crazy, as the Monk team is in town planning the future of Ekklesia 360 Church CMS.  We now have over 750 churches and ministries using our system and growing rapidly!  Secondly, I am wrapping up my two sessions for the GCA Conference on Message and Media: Communicating the Gospel in Our Post-Christian World.  It will be held at John Piper's church next week.  I haven't been able to finish a couple posts I'm working on, so here are a few links that have caused me to think:

Part-time pastors are making a comeback (another reason the Tentmaker Group is so necessary…) 

Top 25 Church Planting Churches in America : Reformed vs. Reformational (David Fairchild)

A new book is released, entitled: Signs of Emergence by Kester Brewin.  (HT: Jordon Cooper with a full review of the book.) In his discussion of how the cities have changed into complex, bottom up systems, Brewin says this (pg 63),

There are still those who cry for revolution, for a revival that will change things in a snap, make everything OK as thousands flock to church… But the days for revolution are over. The cry for revival is too often a cry for abdication: you do it all, God. Well God has done God's bit, it is the systems that now need to change. This is the faith we have signed up for: the Church as the body of Christ where we have real parts to play, real responsibilities. 

Lastly, if you haven't already done so, I'd encourage you to check out Tim Chester's blog : Reformed spirituality, radical ecclesiology.   Chester and Steve Timmis are releasing a new book (not yet in America) called Total Church.  I leave the summary to Mark Moore :

Total Church is one of those books that you hold in your hand and think two things after you've read it. First, Wow! This book says it all. Second, Wow! This book says it all. The first "wow" is the one you say while cheering and applauding that someone has said things that you have desperately wanted to hear. Each page drips with gospel understanding and real life love for the church. The second "wow" is the one you say while realizing that you pretty much have nothing new to offer the world at this point other than a copy of this book. The things you had been thinking about that seemed so "radical" and "refreshing" are now nothing more than restatement of what's been said.

The Tentmaker Group is launching.  On August 13th & 14th a group from the Tentmakers will travel to Las Vegas to observe and meet with one of the companies to participate.  This company has a role that fits well with the need for church planters to fund a transition into ministry as described previously.  Training for this role will take place August 27th through 29th.  We expect a class size of 5-10 for this first round of training.  This role is a sales role, but allows for flexible work-schedules and the ability to work from home.  People who are interested in moving to San Diego to participate in a church planting movement will be able to shortly.  (We are looking at office space Friday.) We also have a second opportunity for pastors or ministry leaders who seek to supplement their existing income with part time work.

After we launch this out of San Diego, cities who would like to start their own Tentmaker Group will be able to.   

The Vision of the Tentmaker Group

1. Helping fund local church planting and ministry movements.

2. Allowing church planters, ministry leaders and others to augment their existing salary or setup a transition into ministry.

3. Providing a Kingdom expression through the value of work and a desire to demonstrate the cultural mandate to cultivate this earth to reflect God's glory.

4. Involving local organizations and businesses in these expressions.

5. Providing gospel consulting to people starting companies who want to give back to the city.

The Opportunity to join the Tentmaker Group

1. Church planters or ministry leaders who would like to raise support through one of the Tentmaker Group's positions.

2. Companies who would like to provide flexible part or full-time jobs to people transitioning into ministry.

2. Business leaders who want to impact their local city with a gospel-centered view of work and the city.

3. Entrepreneurs who desire to start business to impact their local city with a Kingdom mindset.

If you would like to learn more, feel free to contact me.  At this time we also will seek to raise some seed capital to fund the development of the Tentmaker Group. 

UPDATE: The Tentmaker Group has launched to help church planters raise funding.

A while back I recall seeing the Did You Know? Shift Happens video and wanted to create one for church planting and the state of the church in America. So here it is, just in time for us to celebrate July 4th Americans! (I've compiled statistics from a variety of sources such as Planting Missional Churches, Christianity Today, Barna, stuff from Tim Keller and other books. All-in-all I hope it is a powerful call to the church to support church planting. If you are interested in the statistics, they are all located at Church Planting Resources: The State of the Church in the U.S.) Enjoy.  Watch Church Planting in a Post-Christian U.S. >

UPDATE: I've had several requests, so a Quicktime file is available for download at Church Planting Resources .

I returned last night from the annual Acts 29 pastors retreat where we spent most of the week in Sonoma. It was great to see friends and spend time with other church planters from across the country. A couple things came from the conference, which I may post on more:

1. Acts 29 re-organizing from a network to a movement.  Leadership, structures and vision are all adjusting to reflect this.  Some exciting news is that John Piper & Tim Keller will return to speak at Acts 29 bootcamps.  (Tim Keller's is the month after his new book is supposed to come out in March, 2008: In Defense of God: Doubting Your Doubts (Hardcover).  Start reserving your tickets now!

2. Ed Stetzer (pic of us @ Jonathan Herron's blog ) spoke on the history of the word missional which traces it's origins from three streams of thoughts: missio dei, mission & missionary.  He presents why we may all use the same word, yet it means radically different things for emerging churches, evangelical camps and the reformed community.  So when Tim Keller speaks about being missional it is not the same thing as when it used by John Franke or Alan Roxburgh.  He plans to publish a paper on this soon which will be extremely helpful for the missional conversation. 

3. Scott Thomas and then Driscoll did a State of the Union address on the network.  More changes will be coming soon…

A few days ago I posted an idea to help fund church planting and transitions into ministry.  Since then I've been thinking a bit more about a 'tentmaker' organization that would create sustainable church planting movements.  The concept comes from the apostle Paul who worked as a tentmaker in Thessalonica, Corinth, and Ephesus (cf. Acts 18:3, 1 Thess. 2:9) in order to plant these churches.  The goal is to create an organization to equip church planters so that they can provide for their families and transition with income into the ministry as their church develops.  The church planter could even seek to start a tentmaker organization in their city to provide ongoing support for their first and hopefully future church plants.  It is like Agathos' plan of One Church One Village, who instead of asking for continual support to fund their ministry to the orphans of aids victims in Africa, seeks to buy farms to create ongoing support.

By focusing on self-sustenance, and requiring that each village be self-sustaining, costs to each participating church are limited to a specific amount – capital costs. No further funding will be needed for each village. 

Do traditional methods of raising funds to plant a church impair the mission of the church?   Is there a connection between typical funding that requires church planters to put on a more 'event-driven' church in order to attract Christians who attend other churches and tithe?  Does the church focus more on Sunday's service than the very life of the people living on mission throughout the week?  Does it re-define what is a successful plant?  Can a church never 'break-even' and still be seen as successful?  Are there areas (inner-city, small towns) where it is impractical for a church to support itself through the congregation? 

How might church plants supported by accompanying resources from a tentmaker organization re-define success?  Could it change unspoken priorities and challenges of money to allow for intensely missional living with a longer-term view of 'success'?   There is still a lot to think through…

UPDATE: The Tentmaker Group has launched to help church planters raise funding.

How do you fund a church plant?  For many planters money is the number one challenge to being able to pursue their calling.  I've been thinking about creative ways to do this and wanted to post an idea:  (This is at the idea stage, so things may change)

In order to (1) help church planters fund their ministry or (2) bring people on and train them up within a hands-on environment we would create a 'tentmaker' company. (Picture of Paul the 'tentmaker) This company would allow church planters to be trained and work part (or full time) from home or here in San Diego. The nature of the position would offer a residual commission, which would slowly taper off after a church planter quit working. (We're looking at a couple companies now that look like they'd work.)  The objective would be to create a plan that would fit earning goals of the planter, including after they quit working.

For people who want to transition into ministry, we would offer an intensive training.  During the day, trainees would work roughly 5 hours but also take one-class a day.  This class would teach practical theology for ministry, philosophy on ministry, missiology with hands-on projects to actively do this work in a multi-site church plant.  All this training would be done with other men who are learning from one-another and living in a community.

For example, we have a recent church plant on a college campus.  A person could come, work, be trained and actively participate in the new church plant.  The goal would be to transition the person to full-time ministry or to equip them to go plant a church at another college campus with a funding base from their work.

This is just a start, I appreciate any feedback/suggestions.  Church planters, is this something you would have wanted to do if you could have?

UPDATE: The Tentmaker Group has launched to help church planters raise funding.

It's been well over a year since my first post on multiperspectivalism (or triperspectivalism), but more and more people & churches are seeing this as a framework to do effective ministry.  In the Acts 29 forum, there appears to be several churches who are re-thinking their structures based on this framework.  At Kaleo Church, Dick Kaufmann and Doug Swagerty (from Harbor Pres.) have influenced us greatly.  These two missional church planters have had years of applying a triperspectival approach to ministry. Also, they both taught on triperspectivalism with John Frame.  I've been told Redeemer is flying Dick out (who used to be 'Keller's right hand man') to do some consulting for them.  David Fairchild has also been emailing John Frame (right image, the man credited with introducing triperspectivalism) who we're trying to schedule for our regional event in San Diego. We are just at the beginning of unpacking this and seeing how it applies to the church & our lives but I thought it would be helpful to consolidate what we have so far:

John Frame's Primer on Perspectivalism (pdf)

Posts from my blogs: 

How Multi-perspectivalism and Tri-Perspectivalism should shape your Worldview

Triperspectival Ecclesiology - Being the Church as Corporate, Intimate & Group

The Decline of the Western Church and the Call to renew your Church’s Ecclesiology

Missional Eldership - Leading a Transformational Community

Creating a Church to Change Culture

Developing Leaders to lead

Triperspectival Ministry Assessment

How Mutliperspectivalism shapes Church Leadership and how you staff a church

Leadership Conflict Resolution: Prophet | Priest | King

What type of churches NOT to plant (triperpectival)

Deacon Training & Development

Other bloggers mentioning these perspectival approaches:

Ministry through the lens of Multiperspectival Epistemology 

Multi-perspectivalism

Frame Friday: Multiperspectivalism

Frame and Triperspectivalism

Ed Stetzer sent over his recent insights for Church Planters:

Church planters have a million issues to consider as they start a new church: what music style do we use, how do we let the community know about us, and when do we get started (to name just a few). Yet they may now be able to cross one more worry off their list—whether it hurts them to not meet in a "church" building.

This is something we had to think through as a church. Kaleo Church has met in a church, an office building, a theater, a warehouse and we are only a couple years old.  We've found that guests increased when we moved into the theater, but the downside it is hard to build community and do the family ministry. 

Our experience would agree with Stetzer's research, finding a church building is not important.  According to the survey of 1,200 people  asked, If you were considering visiting or joining a church, would knowing that the church does not meet in a traditional church building impact your decision?

• It would not make any difference  73%
• It would negatively impact my decision 19%
• It would positively impact my decision  6%
• Not sure      2%

Read the full article: Where Should a New Church Meet?

The North America Church Planting Seminar is an inter-denominational training event designed to equip church planters, coaches and supervisors to start, grow and multiply healthy, gospel-centered churches that result in the spiritual, social and cultural transformation of entire cities and regions. Christian leaders from more than 30 countries, representing over 100 denominations and mission agencies, have taken this church planter training.  This conference will be hosted at John Piper's church.

I will be presenting a couple sessions at the conference dealing with Message and Media: Communicating the Gospel in Our Post-Christian World

Session 1: Communication in Our Post-Christian World
The culture is changing and it requires new methods of communication.  This session will help you learn how to effectively minister in a post-Christian context.   Come learn the 1) five values of this Post-Christian generation, the 2) ten idols that enslave them and 3) effective ways to communicate the eternal and unchanging gospel message.

Session 2: The Internet & The Sovereignty of God
Pax Romana, the Gutenberg printing press and the internet.  God has used major technological and cultural shifts to bring sweeping change.  As our culture moves increasingly online, this session will help your church effectively use the internet to be missionaries to unbelievers, gather the unchurched and connect with your community.  Come learn how to use this powerful tool to change the community in which you are called to plant a church.

Session 2's title is a play of J.I. Packer's work, since a lot of reformed folks are there, I'm have to address the antinomy of internet outreach and God's sovereignty. :)  Let me know if you will be there…

View the other sessions & speakers such as Stetzer, Nabors, Childers, Ogne, etc (or view my mug shot).