Conferences
I'm officially on the Verge social media team and for the Verge Missional Community Conference from February 4-6. Hope to see some of my readers there! Follow Verge on Twitter and Facebook. Early bird rate for another 10 days. Go register now.
Sojourn: Ambition - Acts 29 Louisville boot camp audio
Dustin Neeley: Matt Chandler interview Part 1, Part 2
Ed Stetzer's 2008 interview of Tim Keller
Homeless man throws coffee in face of barista in the Crystal Lake Starbucks I visit somewhat regularly.
Had a great trip to Louisville for the Acts 29 Boot Camp: Ambition. Thankful for a church like Sojourn and good friends who serve there as well as many friends in Acts 29. It was a like a family reunion and I'm not even in Acts 29! It was a great couple of days. Check out Chuck Heeke's Flickr account for Ambition photos. (Photo on this post is from Chuck.)
Though I'm not going to talk about any details, the wives' track really impacted Molly. Huge. Just what she needed.
Otherwise, throughout the conference a couple of reoccurring themes stuck out to us. We are still processing and praying about what we learned, but we wanted to share a four things with you that we.
1. Believe the Gospel. -- We all struggle with unbelief with all sorts of issues, at all kinds of times. This was hit upon by many speakers, of course. But it was lasered into me by Steve Timmis (Total Church, http://twitter.com/stimmis). We need to always be encouraging each other to believe the Gospel, not just seek practical advice. We need Gospel intentionality, to bring Gospel truth to bear on our lives and the lives of others.
A part of this is the overarching emphasis at the conference of recognizing our sin and having a life marked by confession and repentance. In a time when conferences are more and more practical, Acts 29 has done well to keep it theological, doxological, and Gospel-centered.
2. Know and love your city. -- Kevin Cawley (http://twitter.com/kevincawley) talked about decoding your city and knowing it like a life-long resident, a cab driver, a geographer, and a spiritual anthropologist. We need to get on the inside of our city and then speak as one of them. We need to let our ambition for the Gospel drive us to become students of the space we are in. We need to learn the questions people are asking and speak the truth of the Gospel as the answers.
Other speakers talked about calling and how our call should affect our heart for our city. A great reminder and encouragement.
3. Be yourself. -- Matt Chandler (http://twitter.com/mattchandler74) said, "You wanting to be anyone other than you is sinful." I chatted with and sought advice from an Acts 29 church planter and friend who said much the same thing, but from the angle of freedom. Be free to be yourself as you serve and love your city. You will be bad at being anyone else.
Don't seek to be like another pastor, or preacher, or whoever has a similar calling. Darrin Patrick talked about knowing our divine design. Who are you? How has God made you? Go be you. That's who Jesus made you to be.
4. If you want to know more people, blog about your wife's health and tweet photos of your kids. -- Holy cow. Everyone knew Molly. Ok, overstatement. But so many we didn't know came up and said they've been praying for Molly's health issues. One couple said they've been praying together for her for years. How much blessing have we received from the connections made through Reformissionary and Twitter? We'll only learn on That Day. We are continually blown away by the love and prayer of brothers and sisters all over the world.
We had a similar experience with our kids, as people recognized them from the blog and Twitter. They were at Sojourn on Wednesday afternoon because there was no room for them at the inn, and we heard that one person said (when we weren't there to hear), "Hey, those are the McCoy kids." Weird, but cool.
I regularly tell other pastors of the blessings of blogging/Twittering. It can connect you to a community of coworkers and friends that you wouldn't otherwise know.
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Let me add this here at the end, as something worth spreading from the conference. Matt Chandler gave an outstanding and devastating quote during the last message of the conference. It's from Eugene Peterson's Working the Angles: The Shape of Pastoral Integrity, which I read way back in Bible college. Here it is for you...
For a long time, I have been convinced that I could take a person with a high school education, give him or her a six-month trade school training, and provide a pastor who would be satisfactory to any discriminating American congregation. The curriculum would consist of four courses.
Course I: Creative Plagiarism. I would put you in touch with a wide range of excellent and inspirational talks, show you how to alter them just enough to obscure their origins, and get you a reputation for wit and wisdom.
Course II: Voice Control for Prayer and Counseling. We would develop your own distinct style of Holy Joe intonation, acquiring the skill in resonance and modulation that conveys and unmistakable aura of sanctity.
Course III: Efficient Office Management. There is nothing that parishioners admire more in their pastors than the capacity to run a tight ship administratively. If we return all phone calls within twenty-four hours, answer all the letters within a week, distributing enough carbons to key people so that they know we are on top of things, and have just the right amount of clutter on our desk—not too much, or we appear inefficient, not too little or we appear underemployed—we quickly get the reputation for efficiency that is far more important than anything that we actually do.
Course IV: Image Projection. Here we would master the half-dozen well-known and easily implemented devices that that create the impression that we are terrifically busy and widely sought after for counsel by influential people in the community. A one-week refresher course each year would introduce new phrases that would convince our parishioners that we are bold innovators on the cutting edge of the megatrends and at the same time solidly rooted in all the traditional values of our sainted ancestors.
(I have been laughing for several years over this trade school training with which I plan to make my fortune. Recently, though, the joke has backfired on me. I keep seeing advertisements for institutes and workshops all over the country that invite pastors to sign up for this exact curriculum. The advertised course offerings are not quite as honestly labeled as mine, but the content appears to be identical—a curriculum that trains pastors to satisfy the current consumer tastes in religion. I’m not laughing anymore.)
Creation Project: Resources for Biblical Womanhood, Resources for Biblical Manhood -- also Thinking Well About Your City
Mark Driscoll: Organizing a Silence and Solitude Day, Part 1 (4 more coming)
Rethink Mission: Books Every Church Planter Needs to Read
I connected at the Acts 29 Boot Camp in Louisville with a guy I met a years ago at Capitol Hill BC in DC, Brad Byrd. I stayed at his house when visiting CHBC. He gave me a copy of The Gospel-Centred Church workbook by Steve Timmis and Tim Chester from the press he works for, The Good Book Company. Hope to review it soon. I should also be getting The Gospel-Centred Life soon for review. Find The Good Book Company on Facebook & Twitter. Glad to connect again Brad!
Jonathan Dodson: Marriage Resources
Rain City Hymnal CD is out at Re:Sound, and on Noise Trade.
Matt Chandler on the role of men
Resurgence (Bob Thune): Is preaching killing your church plant?
Art21 is on Hulu. Episode 1: Art in the 21st Century on "Place."
A couple of months ago Ben Arment of Catalyst asked me an about a dozen other folks to meet at The Orchard in Aurora for a creative meeting to discuss his plans for a conference in Chicago (Aurora's beautiful Paramount Theater) simply called Story. You need to check out the Story website. Pretty cool.
I don't want to say any more than the website says, but I'm pretty pumped about this conference. Not only are there some great speakers for a conference like this, but the plans for how the conference will be put together and experienced are something to look forward to. Plus, guys like Chris Seay and Don Miller will be there. Here are the details...
As a communicator of the gospel, I'm looking forward to Story.
I was asked a while back to speak at the Band of Bloggers event at The Gospel Coalition conference, which was this month in Chicago. I was happy to go and be one of the eight panel members discussing being "Servants and Stewards" through our blogs. Each panelist was given 7 minutes to answer a particular question on blogging. Mine was "What is the place for art and culture in Christian blogging?" Here's a general outline/recap of my talk. It always comes out differently than I write it down, but should still be helpful. You can also view the handwritten notes from my Moleskine that I used for my talk (page 1, page 2 - page 2 is really my talk outline and page 1 quotes that I referred back to).
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*As I stood to talk I took a shot at my friend and co-panelist, Justin Taylor, who has yet to spent $9 on a domain name, but still has one of the best read Christian blogs in the universe. Justin, seriously, buy a domain name. :)
Context
1. Art - Beauty -- mention I don't have the time to explain a theology of the arts; assume the audience assumes it (later quotes should be an encouragement to look further into the arts)
2. Blogs -- mention that because we have different kinds of blogs with different purposes (pastor blogs, church blogs, personal blogs, family blogs, resource blogs, etc). I will explain what I do on my personal/pastoral networking blog and let the audience determine how to best blog on art & culture on their blogs.
3. Christians in general -- mention the need to enjoy, support, and create the arts; our blogs are a good place for us to do that
Abraham Kuyper quote, found in Art for God's Sake by Philip Ryken -- "Like God himself, we have 'the possibility both to create something beautiful, and to delight in it.'" - and I add "...on your blog"
Use the quote for a two part outline, in reverse. As we delight in and create art (and blog on it), we encourage others to do the same.
1. To Delight
Someone who delights in the arts is called an arts patron (observer, supporter, advocate). Use the questions from and Tim Keller quote in "Are you a patron?"
Questions:
Have you attended an arts event or venue in the last six months?(live music concert, museum or gallery, play, dance performance, independent film, etc.)
Do you have a favorite art form that you particularly enjoy experiencing and learning about?
Do you occasionally attend different types of arts events/venues, besides your favorite?
Do you have a favorite artist or arts organization whose work you follow closely?
Do you ever spread the word about a particular arts event or artist?
Do you sometimes look through the Arts section in newspapers or magazines?
Have you financially supported an arts organization or artist (outside of purchasing tickets) in the last year?
Do you know an artist, are you involved in his/her life, and are you actively supporting his/her career?
- The more "yes" answers = the better patron. Where there is a "no" it's good to stretch ourselves.
Quote:
"Christians cannot abdicate the arts to secular society. We must consume, study, and participate in the arts if we are to have a seat at the table. Whether it has a religious theme or strikes us as irreligious, we must be patrons if we are to have an impact on how the world interprets and responds to the arts. We cannot be wary, we cannot be afraid, we cannot be self-righteous. Christians must look, listen, read, and experience the arts if we are to lead our culture to renewal." - Tim Keller (via)
*As I mentioned I was going to quote Keller I took a second to mention my Tim Keller Resources page. Then I told the attenders that they received a Tim Keller book in their bags (each received 10 books as a part of attendance). I told them Keller's new book is very short and titled Unfashionable, which includes a lengthy epilogue by Tullian Tchividjian. As you probably know, attenders did get Tullian's book which includes a 3 page forward by Keller. People laughed. [By the way, get Tullian's book. Like it a lot so far. He graciously signed my copy after.]
How I delight in the arts at Reformissionary...
Music Monday: I use my enjoyment of music to fuel a weekly post on music, CD's, music videos, concert experiences, etc. Illustration: recently at the Brandi Carlile concert my wife, Molly, for the first time heard the background singers because she could see them. It was a learning moment for her. Patronage increased her appreciation for and delight in music. Now the CD sounds different to her. As we blog on these kinds of experiences we will encourage others to become a patron and delight as well.
National Poetry Month: Each April I blog on National Poetry Month with numerous poems, poet highlights, videos of poetry readings, etc. We can take advantage of nationally recognized arts emphases to become patrons and to encourage patronage.
2. To Create
"The characteristic common to God and man is apparently that: the desire and the ability to make things up." - Dorothy Sayers in The Mind of the Maker
"The primal artistic act was God's creation of the universe out of chaos, shaping the formless into form; and every artist since, on a lesser scale, has sought to imitate him." - Perrine's Sound and Sense
How I blog on my creation of art at Reformissionary...
Phriday is for Photos: The last few years I have taken up photography. While I've been a little too infrequent in my Friday photographs lately, it's been a staple at Reformissionary for a long time. When I've slacked I've gotten notes from friends and readers mentioning they've missed it. Because I'm creating and blogging my art, my readers have been an encouragement to me to keep creating. And through blogging my photography I hope I've encouraged my readers to create themselves. Actually I can say that I have talked to several readers who have taken up photography because (at least in part) they have enjoyed my Phriday is for Photos posts. [One Band of Bloggers attender talked to me after the event and said he just upgraded from a Nikon d50 to d90, to some degree because of my blog. I'm jealous.]
Conclusion: A quote by Luci Shaw from her chapter "Imagination, Beauty, and Creativity" in The Christian Imagination (Ed. Leland Ryken)
"We were each, in the image of our Creator, created to create, to call others back to beauty, and the truth about God's nature, to stop and cry to someone preoccupied or distracted with the superficial, 'Look!' or 'Listen!' when, in something beautiful and meaningful we hear a message from beyond us, and worship in holiness our creator who in his unlimited grace, calls us to become co-creators of beauty."
Select art/culture websites:
Select art/culture podcasts:
Looking forward to The Gospel Coalition conference this week. Most excited about Tuesday afternoon and evening with Keller, Piper, Ryken, and Driscoll. I'm speaking at the Band of Bloggers event on Wednesday. My topic is "What is the place for art and culture in Christian blogging?" I get like 7-8 minutes to answer that question, which is about 50 minutes less than I'm used to speaking. Should be interesting. I'll try to put some notes up here after. I'm sure my talk will be profound and life-changing.
If you are going to The Gospel Coalition and want to meet up, send me an email.
Also of note, and I just keep forgetting to mention this, the Tim Keller Wiki.
Great sub.text forum with Ed Stetzer today. Ed's a lot of fun and full of tons of info. Good to think through our suburban mission. Hopefully in the near future we will have some audio to put up over at sub.text. I was challenged particularly today by Ed's encouragement to consider the idols of our culture.
I picked up a few books today at the Trinity bookstore, including Makoto Fujimura's Refractions. I've been a Mako fan since I learned of his work through Redeemer NYC and IAM.
Great news! New sub•text forum coming on March 12th at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School with Ed Stetzer. Ed is gonna talk, in three sessions, about the missional nature of the
church and what that looks like in the suburban context in practice. It will also include a Q&A session at the end.
Cost is only $25 and includes lunch! So if you are anywhere near the area this is a great opportunity. Hope to see you there, and if you have the chance please pass the word on to your friends in the Chicagoland area.
Brief Molly Update: She is doing really well. Scheduling a neuro/psych test for the late summer and a sleep test in the near future. Otherwise, all is relatively well.
Are you going to The Gospel Coalition 2009 Conference? C'mon! I'm one of the speakers at Band of Bloggers.My topic is "What is the place for art and culture in Christian blogging?" As you know if you've read Reformissionary for long that I'm very fond of music, photography and poetry. Should be a good time.
A summer Chicago Tea Party? Interesting CNBC video...
I'm hooked on the eyeballing game.
Marvin Olasky: Prodigal Sons: Part of the evangelical problem is knowing which brother we are
Everybody talkin' Calvinism. Scot McKnight. Alvin Reid.
Planning a Mars Hill sermon series.
Have you seen The Legend of Speedo Guy? Good stuff. Yes, Joe Thorn actually found something in sports that I hadn't heard of.
If you live in or near the Chicago suburbs, there is a great opportunity to learn about and discuss suburban life and ministry, as well as network with other suburbanites. Our first sub•text forum with Al Hsu, author of The Suburban Christian, is coming on Saturday, January 17th at Redeemer Fellowship in Saint Charles, IL from 10:30am - 2:00pm.
It's free and anyone can attend. Check out the rest of the info at sub•text.
Thanks to emailer Colin Millar of Belfast, Northern Ireland, you have three new talks by Timothy Keller. Keller spoke at a church planting conference called Urban Plant Life in late November.
1. Contextual Mission
2. Church and Culture
3. Gospel Renewal
The original links to the conference talks are at the London City Mission site. You can stream the messages there rather than downloading if you like, but that's like going to P.F. Chang's once without ever returning. It's just stupid. Enjoy!
By the way, the beginning of the first talk Keller talks about what "missional" is, what a "missional church" looks like. The whole talk is in that direction, but the start was particularly interesting.
Quick Molly & Elijah Update: Molly has had a few really great days. Better balance, more energy, more driving with less danger, etc. Very excited. Maybe finally catching up on sleep is doing something. Elijah had a 102+ fever for 6 days, which included several hours at the hospital for IV fluids, but is back to his normal self. So glad for that.
In 2 days the Catalyst One Day Conference hits Granger, Indiana. If you are nearby you should go. Should be great, and I believe registration is still open. I'm actually still considering going, but haven't decided yet.
I've been dealing with male leadership in the home with some church members recently. Here are some complementarian resources I've found helpful on this issue from The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood website...
Fifty Crucial Questions (John Piper)
Summaries of the Egalitarian and Complementarian Positions (Bruce Ware)
We Need Some Leaders! (Bob Lepine)
Download Driscoll's Porn-Again Christian in full.
Desiring God's 2009 Pastor's Conference is on evangelism.
Tim Chester has provided a narrative statement of faith. (HT)
Resurgence; Six ways to engage culture.
LEAD for the City conference is streaming video with chat. Loving it, via the Planting Channel.
Tuesday, October 21
9:15 AM - 10:00 AM: Darrin Patrick on “Gospel Centered Repentance”
10:45 AM - 11:30 AM: Eric Mason on “Hybrid Leaders”
1:45 PM - 3:00 PM: Dr. Bryan Chapell on “Christ-Centered Preaching”
Wednesday, October 22
9:15 AM - 10:00 AM: Randy Nabors on “City Leaders”
1:45 PM - 2:30 PM: Matt Carter on “Broken Leaders”
4:45 PM - 5:30 PM: Jonathan McIntosh on “Missional Leaders”
As some of you know we are headed to see Dr. Frim, Molly's neurosurgeon, at 10am tomorrow. They will have reviewed all her MRI stuff, spinal fluid flow info, etc and have a view of where to go from here. If this is news to you, catch up on Molly and Chiari. FYI, she's had mostly very bad days lately, but today was slightly better as she was able to walk and stand without constant help.
If you think of her, pray for Molly's appointment tomorrow. You may also want to pray that we get there on time, as that seems to be a problem lately. Chicago traffic is unreal sometimes (most times). We are driving out at 7am. If you want to keep up with our trip and get the scoop first, follow my Twitter updates on the right sidebar of the blog, or here.
Molly and I were at the Desiring God conference last year called Stand: A Call for the Endurance of the Saints. That was just a few months after her brain surgery and elimination of her symptoms. Now that her symptoms are back there is much good to remember from the conference. Honestly, I hadn't thought of the conference in a while. Then today a friend at Crossway pointed me to Jerry Bridges' message found as chapter 1 in the Stand book. It was good for us to revisit it. Here's an excerpt...
How do we do this? We do it by faith. We don’t just grit our teeth and say, “Lord, I don’t feel thankful, but you said to give thanks, so I’m going to give you thanks even though I don’t feel thankful.” That’s not giving thanks. We do it by faith. We do it by trusting in the promises of God. We do it by faith in the words of God through Paul in Romans 8:28–29, where he says “God causes all things to work together for good to those who love him.” And then he defines the good in verse 29 as being conformed to the likeness of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is what God is after. He wants to conform us to the likeness of Christ; so he brings or allows these various circumstances, circumstances that we ourselves would not choose. He brings them into our lives because he wants to use those circumstances in his way to conform us more and more to the likeness of Christ. And so by faith we can say, “Lord, I do not know what particular purpose you have in this difficulty or this pain, this trial. But you said that you will use it to conform me more and more to Jesus Christ, and for that I give you thanks.” So we give thanks by faith.
Stand: A Call for the Endurance of the Saints, chapter 1 "Four Essentials for Finishing Well" by Jerry Bridges, page 34.
On October 22-24 the LEAD Conference begins in St. Louis. From the website...
We are gathering some of the best leaders to equip, encourage and employ up and coming urban leaders. Our focus will be on the theological and practical implications of ministry in an urban context. There will be three breakout tracks for leaders to participate in: Church Planting, Mercy, and Arts. ...We will learn together, grow together and change the world together.
The conference coincides with an Acts 29 Boot Camp, and the list of speakers is top notch: Bryan Chapell, Darrin Patrick, Daniel Montgomery, Eric Mason, Randy Nabors, and Matt Carter. Breakout tracks include church planting, arts, and mercy. Should be great. If things are ok at the time with my wife's "illness," I hope to go.
Here's a guide to understanding what happened at the 2008 meeting of the SBC in Indianapolis. I wasn't there, but I didn't need to be to know what happened. I'm sure there were many great things that happened, including networking and building new relationships as well as renewing old ones. But here's my list, just for fun, of the 10 things that happened at the SBC because they, to some extent, always happen at the SBC.
10. Many thousands made "a decision for Christ" during the Indy Crossover evangelism push. Most of them won't join churches.
9. Someone proposed a stupid resolution that got more discussion than someone who proposed a significant resolution.
8. Some bloggers discovered that blogging influence doesn't amount to much, and shouldn't.
7. Someone blew a shofar, metaphorically at least.
6. Some guys who preached included lines merely to hear the applause of the masses.
5. Mark Dever had 14 disciples following his every move and seeking his advice on bookstore purchases.
4. No less than 7 people had beer with their meal, to the shock of onlooking SBC messengers.
3. They mostly voted on stuff that won't change minds, churches, the convention, or the world.
2. Guys in suits won elections.
1. Indianapolis is now officially out of beef and butter.
Chicago has once again been praised for being awesome, this time by Fast Company magazine. When we thought things couldn't get any better, the Chicago Bulls gets the top NBA pick. There was only a 1.7% chance of that. And to top it off, and this is an unbelievable achievement, Chicago also has the best gas prices (highest is best, right?).
Michael Foster: What do WE Mean by Missional Communities.
Jonathan Dodson: Living in the Tension of Mission & Community.
David Fitch: 10 Ways to Engage Mission in the Suburbs. Some great thoughts.
If you are like me and can't be at Whiteboard, there are options.
Alvin Reid has a love-hate relationship with the American Evangelical Church.
I have now won the second blog voting contest! That has picked me up, between the two contests, $175 in online bookstore gift certificates: $50 for Westminster Seminary bookstore, $50 for Amazon, and $75 for Eisenbrauns. Woohoo! I will order The Reason for God copies from Westminster and Amazon. Eisenbrauns was a late addition to the first place prize and doesn't carry Keller's book, so I will be picking up some books for my personal library. Thanks for all your effort! And thanks to Scot McKnight for his effort to find some votes for me.
On a side note, the total official vote count for all blogs was "666" as you can see by the screen capture. While some might find that a bit off-puttin', I think it's awesomely hilarious.
O Lord, let there be a blog contest for the cost of hotel, airfare and conference fee for the Total Church North America Conference. I WANT TO GO!!!
Carolyn Mahaney: How to Help Your Husband When He is Criticized
John Piper on C.S. Lewis on writing.
Al Hsu on "The New Suburbanists."
Scott Hodge has some advice for those who are thinking about change.
Makoto Fujimura: A Wedding and the City.
10 Questions Every Leader Should Ask
Joe Thorn is now making my voicemails on his cell a matter of public consumption. I want to be upset, but it represents such a positive side of me that I can't help but propagate it...
