Tag: Conference

Posted on

Stay in the Boat by Judah Smith

This is the message by Judah Smith from the New Spring Leadership Conference I attended several weeks ago. The actual title was “Matters of the Meantime” but the overarching theme of the message was “Stay in the Boat.” I was following Judah on Twitter, but I had never heard one of his messages. I was kind of blown away by his attire, I had never seen a man wear leotard before (okay they were skinny, skinny jeans), but he preaches the Word with boldness and blew me away with his message, so he can wear leotards if he wants 🙂

Check out more videos from the New Spring Leadership Conference.

Posted on

Velocity 2010 – Alan Hirsch

alanhirsch-buttonVelocity 2010 Church Planters Conference

Speaker: Alan Hirsch

More of the same will not bring fundamental change.

Our decisions make a difference in the world.

Why do we need to be Missional?

It’s not a cute new term. Not another cool buzz word.

Concepts:

1. Cultural Distance:

m0…….m1………..m2…………m3………..m4

Each ‘M’ signifies one significant cultural barrier to the effective communication of the gospel
(M0 is easier – M4 is more difficult)

Significant Cultural Barrier to Communicate the Gospel Meaningfully:

  • Language
  • Worldviews
  • Other Religions

Culture is heading in the direction of becoming more difficult. Closer or at m4, not at m0.

Church must become cross-cultural missionaries again. (This is HUGE for Grovetown)

“Attractional” Church works well in sector m0, however it doesn’t work as well in sectors further out.

When people plug into church, they have less connection in the sectors outside of m0. This is a problem.

“Extractional” Church – It extracts people from their networks of people outside the church.

We are asking the disconnected from Christ to do the cross-cultural work and move from their sector to the m0 sector.

Christians are all missionaries, we are obligated to take the gospel message to other sectors.

*Research in Australia, what non-churched people thought of: God, Jesus, Spirituality, Church

Results: God; positive, Jesus; positive, Spirituality; positive, Church; negative*

The Church can work with the fact that the “basic message” of the church is viewed as positive.

What has to change? The Church. – It must adapt itself to deliver the message.
(My note 1 Cor 9:19-23)

The contemporary church is carrying the load.

America: 40% of Americans would be attracted to the contemporary model of the church.

Strategic Problem… 95% of churches are trying to become what will only reach 40% of the population.

2000+ Churches have over 2,000 people in attendance. There are over 400,000 churches in America!!! Big strategic problem.

Missionary Problem:

60% of Americans will not go to the contemporary style church.

Plus…the 40% is not increasing, its decreasing.

**More of the same will not get fundamentally different results**

More of the Same?

  • Organizational Insanity
  • “The problems of the world” – The problems in the church cannot be solved by things that created the original problems (What got you to 40% will not get you the 60%)
  • Digging holes

(The church of Christ was built for ADVANCE, not Defense)
(A message makes you a MESSENGER)

Solution – The church will have to look different than the contemporary model of the church.

The in Western Culture battle will be won at the level of imagination…or it will be lost at that level.

Einstein – “I value imagination more than I value knowledge.”

Missionary has to go amongst the people. “You know nothing about church”

Ask 2 basic questions:

1.    What is church to these people? – You cannot assume the answer to this.
(Churches have to be much more diverse – A thinking of the church vs. a model of the church)

2.    What is gospel to these people? – You cannot assume the answer to this.
(The church does not have a mission, the mission has a church)

If the only thing you have is a hammer, everything begins to look like a nail.

Will the reformation model work? It was formed from a culture where people felt guilty for their sin. Do people now feel guilty for their sin?

The church is supposed to be the Good News people, not the guilt bearing people. That makes us become the Pharisees, which Jesus reserved his harshest criticisms for.

You plant the gospel, not churches.

People are enslaved to idols: work, money, sex, etc…that offer everything and give nothing.

The churches decisions matter!

Church planters should be missionaries first before we are planters.

Velocity Conference: Main Session 1 Highlights – – Main Session 3 Highlights – – Breakout Session 2 with Pete Wilson Highlights – – Main Session 4 Highlights – – Breakout Session 3 with Tony Morgan Highlights – – Main Session 6 Highlights

Posted on

Velocity 2010 – Shawn Lovejoy

shawnlovejoy-buttonVelocity 2010 Church Planters Conference

Speaker Shawn Lovejoy (Twitter)

Satan knows if he can get the leader to doubt themselves, he has them on a slippery slope.

When leaders get insecure in their own skin:

1. We start comparing ourselves to other leaders –

The Challenge is, with technology, we can look all around the country and see what is happening everywhere else and start comparing our church to others and ourselves to other leaders. This brings a great deal of negativity.

2. We start copying other leaders –

We’ll use their logos, their sermon series, etc.

We become afraid of becoming or being the leader God’s called us to be.

Copying leads to envying other ministries and leaders.

3. We Condemn other Leaders –

When condemning others does not make us feel better, we start getting down on ourselves.

(Either God called you, or he didn’t…If he called you…don’t quit, don’t give up!)

2 Timothy 4:1-5, 6-7

[Francis Chan] “I can build a church bigger than Jesus with enough money and slick marketing. (Large crowds are not always attracted to the commitment Jesus calls us to)

  • Be Patient
  • Do Your Ministry
  • Use Your Gifts
  • Be Self-Disciplined

1 Samuel 17:38-40

Pastors try to wear someone else’s armor:

  • Copy their personality

(God wants to use MY personality in MY community)

  • Copy their gifts

Someone else’s armor could be someone else’s testimony

A lot of churches look good and look the way they do, because they reflect the testimonies of the leaders of that church.

(We cannot duplicate the testimonies of other churches)

**God wants to use OUR testimonies in OUR community!**

Could God be limiting our voice in our community because we are trying to duplicate everyone else in our church?

Are you willing to take off someone else’s armor?

Velocity Conference: Main Session 2 Highlights – – Main Session 3 Highlights – – Breakout Session 2 with Pete Wilson Highlights – – Main Session 4 Highlights – – Breakout Session 3 with Tony Morgan Highlights – – Main Session 6 Highlights

Posted on

The 2008 Orange Conference Final Thoughts

The 2008 Orange Conference Rocked!

I posted highlights from each of the main sessions on my blog: (Sessions 1, 2, 3, 4, 5) it was the first time I blogged anything live, it was challenging keeping up with the likes of Louie Giglio and Francis Chan, because while you type they can throw out like 3 huge thoughts that are essential to their talk.

Modeling Leadership: The over all message that I heard throughout the conference was that our children and students need adult leaders to model being the kind of church they are to be when they take on the roles of the adult leaders in the future. – The big issue I see here is the need for adult education, because if you are awake and a leader in the church, you may have heard by now that the church is in decline, that’s because our adults are modeling a church they were shown, and its disconnecting with this generation.

Being Versus Doing: I think Louie Giglio ended the conference with a great message. He opened by asking the crowd, “What if we decided to just BE the church?” He did a great talk about how the church cannot make relevancy its “golden calf,” but his fear is, that the contemporary church has already done so, and that the modern church will make social justice their “golden calf.”

I think the best point was that we should choose to be a transcendent church, being the church of Jesus Christ as our goal, versus trying to always be relevant. The problem with relevance is that you will always be a step behind, because the person who is setting the pace for “relevancy” is always going to be a step ahead, but with the church, we have Jesus and He was before us, He is with us, and He will be after us. It doesn’t matter what happens with culture ahead of us, because Jesus will be there.

Breakouts: Were good minus 1. I did not care too much for the UNEDITED: reThinking Student Ministry. Then again I have been to some of the top notch student ministry conferences in the country and I get to hang out with the absolute best youth pastors in the country and Doug Fields once a year, so I may be a little spoiled? In this breakout it felt like the session never gained traction!

Breakouts “Engaging Parents of Teens” with Chap Clark, “Mobilizing the Next Generation” with Stuart Hall, and “College Prep: Protecting our Investment in Kids” with Chuck Bomar was absolutely awesome. I am going to have to email these speakers to get their notes as I could not keep up. Every single session was top notch. Continue reading “The 2008 Orange Conference Final Thoughts”

Posted on

2008 Orange Conference Session 5

2008 Orange Conference

Session 5

Louie Giglio

New Question: Can the church influence culture or lead culture?

  • The church is not poised corporately to take the lead in culture.
  • A whole new idea – What if we decided together to be the church of Jesus Christ? What if that was our Goal?
  • The church that Jesus said He would build…the one that Jesus said that even Hell would not prevail.
  • What if  we chose to be instead of just do?
  • John 1:1-3, 14-?
  • It’s an incarnate church – The Message “Jesus put flesh on and moved into the neighborhood” – We are the presence of God in the neighborhood.
  • The church is transcendent – We, “the church,” can transcend culture.
  • Jesus was before us, He is with us, and He will be after us.
  • Relevance is to be in step with, so to strive to be relevant means that we will always be behind someone. Trying to be relevant is tiring because you can never catch up.
  • One extreme is to completely avoid being culturally relevant…the other is to be oversaturated with cultural relevance. Relevance may have become the golden calf of the contemporary church. The golden calf of the future/emerging church may be social justice.
  • Because of Christ, we transcend culture…I cannot even type the notes for what Louie just said…Wow!
  • It doesn’t matter what is going to happen…because Jesus “Will Be…” – We can relate to people even if we do not have a lot in common, because Jesus “Is” Continue reading “2008 Orange Conference Session 5”