How does this new economic reality change the way churches are planted? Are church planters moving to more organic & decentralized models? Will there be more bi-vocational church planters? Will more church doors close, consolidating Christians into larger churches?

Cobblestone is more than a social networking site; Cobblestone is designed to engage users in behaviors that help them be the church.

Keep your eyes out for Goheen’s book on Missional Ecclesiology. Also, don’t forget his Living at the Crossroads: An Introduction to Christian Worldview which will be a must buy!

Main Sessions

A Community-centered Gospel – Steve Timmis
The gospel is about a King who died to rescue a people who would reveal his character by their shared lives. In keeping with who I am ‘in Adam’, I individualize and privatize the gospel so that church is reduced to a necessary but often intrusive addendum. The gospel calls us to live ‘in Christ’ corporately and so show the power of the cross to reconcile and create community. (A Community-Centered Gospel Q&A)

A Gospel-centered Community – Steve Timmis
The gospel is that which creates, sustains, nurtures and perfects the church. To achieve this, the gospel needs to be at the center of all we are and do as the people of God. The gospel needs to be taken out of our pulpits and meetings and applied into the mundane and routine of our corporate and personal lives. (A Gospel-Centered Community Q&A)

Rethinking Attractional Church – Tim Chester
Attractional church (‘come to us’) and missional church (‘go to them’) are often set up as alternatives, yet throughout the Scriptures God calls his people to a life that attracts the nations. We can bring attractional and missional approaches together by re-conceiving church as a community rather than an event. (Rethinking Q&A Session)

Remodeling Attractional Church – Steve Timmis
As we focus more on the quality of our lives together rather than the slick performance of our Sunday meetings we will see how a gospel community is an integral and indispensable piece of the evangelism jigsaw. In fact, people won’t be able to fully understand the magnitude of what God has done in Christ without it. (Remodeling Q&A Session)

Making Disciples for Missional Church – Tim Chester
‘I’m free and belong to no man’ could be the slogan of our age. But Paul continues: ‘I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible.’ What kind of people are going to sustain a church planting movement? This session explores how the cross and resurrection should shape our lives. (Making Disciples Q&A)

Making Disciples in Missional Church – Tim Chester
This session looks at how we train and pastor one another in the context of ordinary life and the context of Christian community.

Breakout Sessions

Being Neighbors: a Gospel Strategy (Steve Timmis)
When so much emphasis is placed on being missional and incarnational, contextual and radical it’s easy to forget the simplicity and significance of the truth that gospel makes us into lovers, of both God and others. Instead of trying to send out edgy, hardcore dudes with body piercing and tattoos, we should be satisfied with sending people who will be the neighbors everyone wants to have as a neighbor.

Forming a Gospel Community (Jeff Vanderstelt)
Now that many are aware of the need to form gospel communities, how do we move from theology and theory to actual forming and leading them? This session will explore the process and the specifics of moving an individualistic group of people toward a gospel-centered community on mission.

One-Anothering: A Communal Gospel (David Fairchild)
Why are so many Christians detached and isolated from one another? How can we experience a radically reshaped community? What kind of social ethic does the Gospel produce? What would it look like if we lived lives together as if the Gospel were true? Join us as we unpack the various “one another” passages in a quest to answer these questions together.

Evangelising the Urban Poor (Tim Chester)
We have endless resources on reaching postmoderns, most of which in fact address student and professional culture. In comparison there’s very little on understanding and reaching the urban poor. Drawing on insights from biblical counselling, this session suggests some ways forward for evangelizing and discipling the urban poor. Join the work-in-progress!

Story & Rhythm of Soma Community (Caesar Kalinowski)

Reading Cultural Texts (Mike Gunn)
This is a missional gaze at pop culture. We will be taking a look at the “Other” gospels in our culture (Media, film, books, etc.), and how to read them in a way that can help propel you to a better understanding of them for the sake of the gospel. We will look at the reason why this is important to our mission, as well as, some help for understanding and engaging pop culture in authentic ways.

Out of the Frying Pan… (David Fairchild & Mark Moore)
Is God calling your church out of Ur? How do you get your church to move from traditional to missional? Both Mark Moore and David Fairchild are practicing church planters that initially planted relatively traditional churches built around the Sunday gathering. As they labored to develop deep community as a gospel display people for their cities, they realized things needed to change. Come and hear their stories and insights as they share what pitfalls to avoid and what challenges to accept as missional leaders. This breakout is intended for anyone looking to turn the corner missionwards!

Beyond Total Church – Sowing the Seeds of a Movement (Tim Chester)
How can we plant churches that plant churches? What can we learn from church planting movements? How can we build in reproducibility?

Communication in a Post-Christian World (Drew Goodmanson & Caesar Kalinowski)
The culture is changing and it requires new thought in 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.

The Everyday Rhythms of a Gospel Display People (Jeff Vanderstelt)
The gospel community is called to be a display of the gospel in everyday ways of life so that others might see what their life would look like in the gospel. In order to do this, the church needs to lead their people to identify everyday practices and then lead them to live out their identity in Christ within them. This session will identify some of those everyday rhythms and and then explore how we can display the gospel through them.

True Gospel Community in a Truly Big Metroplex (Mark Moore)
Being a gospel community that does life and mission together is sometimes easier said than done. This is especially the case in large cities that are characterized by sprawl as well as population. This session will concentrate on leading your people to make missionary decisions in their everyday lives in response to the gospel. Specific challenges to this way of life in a metroplex setting will be examined.

Reaching the Domains of Society (Drew Goodmanson & Caesar Kalinowski)
How do we bring gospel renewal to our cities in the 7 pillars of society… Business, Education, Healthcare, Government, Media, Social Services [including other churches] & Marginalized? We believe the gospel informs all of life and this good news helps shape how we view the world and our involvement in it. How do we equip Christians to engage in redemptive work in science, politics, art, culture, business, economics, education, local concerns, mercy ministries, social justice, environmentalism, law, media, social concerns and spirituality.

Panel Q/A Session

Wrapping up Total Church (Tim Chester)
This session will be built around the questions of those attending, especially concerning the application and implications for the issues Tim raised during his main sessions.

Developing Missional Leaders (Jeff Vanderstelt)
There is plenty of opportunity to hear and learn about being a gospel-centered church on mission. And, after a few days at a conference, the tendency of teachers and preachers is to go home and tell our people to get going. If we are going to lead a gospel-centered church on mission we must do more than that. During this session we will explore some ways to identify, equip and support a group of gospel-centered leaders to share in leading the mission with us.

Urban Discipleship (Mike Gunn)
The city holds more than 50% of of the world’s population, and is growing rapidly toward a world-wide megalopolis, while the church continues to migrate to the suburbs. The city also holds both the keys to the culture, and abyss of brokenness. In America our cities are becoming multi-ethnic/racial posing unique challenges and opportunities for our churches. In this session we will take a look at the role of the church (Make disciples), what it looks like to make disciples, and why we should be doing it in the cities of West and the world!

Location: Orlando, FL
Dates: January 27 - 30, 2009 (Tues-Fri)

Thousands of leaders from over 100 denominations and 25 nations have profited from this practical, hands-on training. Give your church plant - and the community you seek to transform by the power of the gospel - the benefit of this excellent church planter training!

This is one of the best conferences for church planters. Learn more about this GCA Conference.

There are a few invites left at Mashable if you want to try it out.

“Tell him the one who puts on his battle gear should not boast like one who is taking it off” (1 Kings 20:11).

Now, as this transition (and much of what I wrote in theory) has begun to take shape (in ways we imagined and ways we did not imagine). In fact, the beginning of this year has been very difficult where we lost about 1/3 of our people due to varying circumstances. In contrast, the last 3 months have been more of a blessing to me than any period of Kaleo’s existence as much fruit has been seen in the live’s of people around me.

I am currently working on a shared document to re-communicate the ideas from these posts from what we learned through our own experience as well as from our interaction with communities we share values with. It should deal with the way we do church, eldership, community and develop people within these structures. I hope by posting it we are able to continue to learn from one-another and share the vision of how we plan to do what we believe it means to be a local church.

There are a couple things that are still in theory. For example, at the end of this year we will endeavor to begin the planting process as discussed in Organic Movement - Reverse Church Planting. So this will still be an area where we will need to learn as we go through this process next year. Secondly, we are actively re-thinking our discipleship process which we see as core to the future of the Kaleo Community. So this will be very much a work-in-progress.

If you missed much of the last year, here is a abbreviated listing of the transition at Kaleo:

• The Decline of the Western Church and the Call to renew your Church’s Ecclesiology
• Missional Eldership - Leading a Transformational Community
• Triperspectival Ecclesiology - Being the Church as Corporate, Intimate & Group
• Leading a Movement Not an Institution
• The Church as Movement – Organizing Decentralization
• Leadership Development in Community - Prophets
• Leadership Development in Community - Priests
• Leadership Development in Community - Kings
• Multiplying Missional Communities
• Organic Movement - Reverse Church Planting
• Shared Values of Missional Church Communities

#42 Drama Teams
#40 Frosted Tips
#39 Side Hugs

QUOTES:

Planting new churches isn’t enough, we need to create church planting movements.

The model of mission is supernatural. Prayer is the primary missionary activity.

The model of living is martyrdom. From incremental discipleship to martyrdom. We are called to take up our cross daily. We can often feed people’s idolatry with religion.

The model of the church should be reproducible. Every Christian should say, “I can do this.” There should be rapid incorporation of new converts into the church. People should be put into leading sooner than we are used to.

Notes from Simply Missional.

Audio/video sessions coming soon…