jonnybaker

photo competition

i just noticed the emeringchurch.info january update. one of the things on there is a photo competition. this was on the site for december but has been extended (i think with christmas and all that very few people got round to submitting entries) so make adrian happy and send a set of 5 photos on emerging@christmas or emerging new year. the prize is a fractals CD ROM

column 1: mission holds clues for shaping the church of the future

i am currently writing a series of six columns for the christian herald sharing some stories on emerging church. i think they just keep the current column online. the current one is actually no 2 - tea for the soul. i'll paste the first one below...

I have been involved in youth ministry for about twenty years. On a pretty regular basis some new fad or trend comes around that is packaged and sold as the latest solution to reaching young people. This month youth cells, next month 24-7, then purpose driven youth ministry and so on. There is nothing inherently wrong with this - many of these things are good - but after a while you can get tired of hearing about the next quick fix…

The thing that opened up a whole new world for me was discovering insights and stories of people who traveled to other cultures to share Christ and had to go  through a process of re-imagining what the gospel might look, feel, sound, smell and taste like in those cultures. This process invariably involved a crisis of realising that what they thought was the 'gospel' was actually a mix of their own cultural stuff along with the story of Christ. They had a whole lot of rethinking to do! One book in particular that grabbed me was the story of a missionary to the Massai, a nomadic tribe in Africa. Rather than following the usual pattern of expecting the tribe to come to the mission compound Vincent Donavon decided to go and meet with the tribe on their turf and share the gospel with them. In the book Donavon reflects on his journey with a wonderful quote about how his insights might relate to working with young people…

Do not call them back to where they were and do not try to call them to where you are, beautiful as that place may seem to you. You must have the courage to go with them to a place that neither you nor they been before.

My hunch is that mission holds the clues to shaping the church of the future. Insights from cross-cultural mission will help us do ministry in our own cities, communities and networks. This is particularly so at the present moment because of the cultural changes taking place all around us, and because the church has unwittingly found herself caught in some sort of time warp. Joining the Church Mission Society for me has felt like a sort of homecoming - I am excited at the prospect of mining a wealth of expertise that can fuel mission amongst youth and in the emerging church. In these columns I will particularly focus on emerging church and share stories from mission around the world to try and tease out some of what God might be up to and beckoning us to join in with.

simple church

simple church is a site tracking stories of what is happening under the radar in the uk - small groups committed to a new kind of way of being church that is about going where people are rather than running along the usual attractional model of church. this kind of activity is not measureable in the usual ways of thinking about church which is why i call it under the radar. it's the kind of missional community model advocated by alan and mike at forge. this is the blurb on the site:

Something is happening across Britain today: a new kind of church is beginning to appear; increasing numbers of christians are starting to gather in homes, colleges and work places. Living out a 24-7 faith, they are missionally focused with a 'go to them' dynamic instead of a 'come to us' invitation. These churches are small, fluid, organic, reproducible and most of all simple; so simple that any believer would respond by saying "I could do that!" The aim of this site is to begin reporting what is actually happening amongst these new groups. We want to serve this emerging missional movement by telling its stories, connecting its members and offering resources...

alexander campbell explains his thinking in this article . it is a very comprehensive article but well worth a read. one of the things i have disliked about some of things i have previously read written by house churches/small chruches like this is their judgemental/critical stance towards other forms of church, particularly denominations. but alexander has a much more appreciative stance that god is at work there too. this simple church stuff may be or may become a significant mission movement. and it is simple!

akutronica EP

akutronica (who i blogged about in july) have released a 4 track CD. it contains the track journey that i enthused about before. akutronica are a danish ambient duo blending soundscapes, beats and trumpet/sax. you can order the EP a complexity from their site.

eden blog

derek a youth worker in sussex, pioneer of youth congregation eden, my brother in law and the man responsible for getting me to play golf has started a blog which i have added to my blog list...

cms response to tsunami

a few people have asked me how the tsunami affected cms and what cms are doing. info is on the cms web site and will be regularly updated.

emerging church conversation elsewhere

the conversation about emerging church and all that is happening in lots of places. i've mentioned this before but canadians are networking and blogging at resonate . in the usa the emergentvillage web site has been revamped by will. it seems a lot clearer. i was interested to read the rule of life which i hadn't seen before.

i have had a few conversations with people from emergent recently about emergent and how it interfaces with the rest of the world. at heart the guys in emergent want to build a friendship but here's the problem - emergent is a global american brand publishing and marketing resources as well as the friendship. this makes it highly problematic because whatever anyone says it isn't just about a friendship - that is naive. my suggestion to the guys at emergent has been that they should forbid anyone round the world from calling their local network emergent - save the name for the usa conversation (in fact maybe if would be clearer if the usa conversation was called emergentvillage and emergent was the publisher?!). and encourage people in their regions to network but to develop their own names and local take on the conversation. that is why i am delighted to see that the canadians have done that. then there can be a genuine relationship/friendship with the americans and anyone else in the world without any complications of brand tie ins and all that s**t. part of the old world that is passing (and we brits sure led the way big style) was about empire. but that world is gone. even though emergent may be a great thing its international strategy should be about encouragement and gift - encouraging local/regional conversations that are genuinely contextual and giving away ideas and whatever else. i love what kester says in the complex christ - that the economy of gift should characterise the emerging church. before anyone gets upset at this post please don't mishear me - i love what emergentvillage are doing. i have lots of friends in the network. i also think its great that there are resources being produced. just resist the temptation to push your brand on the rest of the world and make friends instead.

grace ignatian examen

join us at grace tonight for the first grace of 05. we have a guest from the london meditation centre who will be leading us in the ignatian examen.

i watched jump britain last night which was fantastic and inspirational... sebastien foucan and other exponents of parkour/free running negotiating various sites around britain. urbanfreeflow seems to be about the best site if you want to find out more about parkour. as with jump london there are probably a few good sequences in the programme that you could loop for alt worship. if you missed it i think they are going to produce a dvd of that and jump london in a couple of months.

notes from IASYM 05: resisting moralistic therapeutic deism

the last paper was presented by kenda creasy dean. a huge survey has taken place amongst teenagers in the US - the National Study of Youth and Religion by Christian Smith - the largest study of religion and youth ever undertaken in the U.S., extensively profiling 3,370 American teenagers between the ages of 13-17. her paper is 40 pages long - but a quick summary:

most US teens are religious, but the kind of religious belief doesn't correlate too well with the chrisian faith we know - the survey describes it as moralistic therapeutic deism which might be summarised as having this creed:

1. A God exists who created and orders the world and watches over human life on earth.
2. God wants people to be good, nice, and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible and by most world religions.
3. The central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about oneself.
4. God does not need to be particularly involved in one’s life except when God is needed to resolve a problem.
5. Good people go to heaven when they die.

the three groups who fared better than others were mormons, conservative protestants, and black protestants. kenda's response is that part of the reason for this is that they have learned and embodied a consequential faith. this has been in four resources that those communities offer to provide anchors for religious identities - a creed to believe, a place to belong, a call to live out and a hope to hold onto. the obvious question is that if she is right youth ministry (and churches across the board) need to ask whether they might be able to offer or deliver these things? however (and it's a pretty big however) it's only up to about 8% in those three groups that are doing better - so everyone has a big challenge on.

clearly the US context is very very different to here but this is fascinating and probably has lots for us to learn from... the report is published in a month or two i think.

notes from IASYM 04: youth ministry in india

it's the last morning of the conference... as ever it has been wonderful meeting people. i had good intentions of blogging as i went but have only managed to do so on two sessions so far! one of the sessions i went to that has provoked me in similar ways to the intergenerational challenge was one on the multicultural challenge. simon bell argued that culturally specific mission is fine to reach different groups but that church has to be integrated and diverse. mission shaped church/emerging church is in danger of producing lots of homogeneous groups. he thinks it is in danger of shooting itself in the foot for this reason. this has given me lots to chew over...

this morning jakob isaac from bangalore spoke - this was particularly exciting for me as he is from bangalore where i am headed in june. he spoke about the changing urban indian context   (a country with 540 million young people!) and the problem that church ministries are wedded to styles and practices of ministry that relate to a bygone era:

Most ministries still cling onto traditional forms of outreach and ministry that have very little to do in terms of impacting a nation that is fast becoming a center of knowledge and business. There is an urgent need for churches to address these issues and lead the way. There is a need to revisit the Word of God and to make the gospel relevant to the youth masses which comprises of 54% of the Indian populace.

he outlined a context in bangalore with the influx of software and call centres that is rapidly leaping into postmodern culture shaped by a new consumerism among the young. he suggested several strategies for reshaping ministry under the heading of a holistic evangelism model. he is involved in a new creative youth ministry project that he has pioneered has pioneered called  kerygma coffee house that is a drop in coffee shop in bangalore with a roof terrace and counselling and recreational facilities for youth. they produce a magazine coffee beanz across the city and run a series of small groups called coffee talk. he suggests that:

There is a need to be creative and effective. A fresh breed of leaders who are innovative and creative in their approach and interests have to be trained and equipped for the work of the Lord in India. The harvest is plenteous and the laborers are few, pray that the Lord of the harvest will send forth laborers to reap the harvest through various creative strategies like the Kerygma ministry has used and developed.

hopefully I can visit the coffee house and see it in action in June...

every paper that is presented has a response. this one had a response that really got everyone wound up - an american sounding pretty colonial albeit they no doubt didn't intend to. it just highlighted the complexities of mission and global relationships in the post-colonial world we are now living in.

notes from IASYM 03: intergenerational congregations

avril baigent is a catholic youth officer in the diocese of northampton. she presented a paper on 'intergenerational congregations: are they truly possible?' this opened up a really interesting debate that i think is pertinent to youth ministry and emerging church. she described two problems - in the catholic church congregations are not appealing to/catering for young people. whilst she expressed excitment about the anglican report mission shaped church and the permission it gives for fresh expressions of church, the solution of developing youth congregations (homogeneous units) seems far from ideal. avril said that she fears that the experience of a diverse community is missing from that tack and that the value of youth in the wider church is massively important for the rest of the church - if we separate them off we are in danger of cutting off an arm or a leg. young people also actually need adults to be wise mentors and friends. adults need young people to challenge them in their faith. but is it possible to relate between the generations, to develop intergenerational communities? the other issue for avril is that politically and ecclesially to develop a youth congregation isn't an option. if one was developed that would be the end of the funding.

having outlined some thoughts on what community is, avril said that sadly there are two main strategies to relate to young people in most churches - they are welcome as long as they become like and behave like adults (socialisation) and to keep the young people separate to explore their own spirituality (separation). socialisation has its pluses where it works - it's the way the church passes on its traditions and practices when it works well. separation can easily lead to extreme practices without good leadership. but neither of these strategies develop intergenerational community.

she suggested intergenerational community projects may have something to teach the church. they develop strategies for sharing across generations, recognising that the two most marginalised and entrenched groups are probably young people and old people. any project needs to have something of mutual benefit. usually a project works separately with older and younger groups and establishes ground rules before getting under way. is it possible to find practices or events in churches that could be treated in this way as intergenerational projects? stations of the cross is one example that she has seen that has been used in this way in catholic churches.

i liked the session. it is a massively important question. there was some good discussion as a result. i think the idea of developing projects to build relationships between generations is a great one. however i'm far from convinced that developing intergenerational congregations is going to work unless you can shift the power in the relationships so that young people are on an equal footing. but i do think it's possible to develop intergenerational church if we are happy to rethink church as the network of relationships between everyone in the community - but they may not need to gather together under one roof all at the same time very often! i couldn't help thinking of steve's picture of a church building that prevented everyone from meeting together at the same time - if this was where a church community was given the task of being intergenerational it clearly wouldn't have to focus around congregating together at the same time, but would focus on developing relationships...

sri lanka visit

i received an e-mail from a friend of mine from my YFC days andy harrington who is now working with YFC in vancouver. at short notice he is going out to help YFC in sri lanka. he has set up a blog to say what he is up to...

notes from IASYM 02: the hat

doug has a thing about hats when visiting england... so much so that here is tony sporting his at IASYM

notes from IASYM 01: redemptionitis

at the IASYM conference. frustratingly the conference centre does have wireless but none of us seem to be able to access the internet so these notes may only get posted after i get back...

this morning bob mayo presented a paper called 'redemptionitis'. his goal for 2005 is to be more selectively idle. the heart of what he was saying was that youth workers have picked up the bad habit of over busyness:

My suggestion is that youth workers are adopting some of the worst work habits of church leaders – chief among which is a tendency to overwork. The idea that working long hours is the unavoidable and only way of expressing a Christian commitment leaves youth workers and church leaders feeling tired, stressful and sometimes even resentful. Youth workers are in the dreams business, helping young people to become the person they have inside them to be. This will not happen if what youth workers end up doing and what young people end up hearing is nothing more than a thinly disguised form of duty and obligation. It is bad practice but it also emerges out of muddled doctrine – doctrine shapes behaviour in the same way that ideas affect actions. This spiritualization of busyness comes out of what I am choosing to call, ‘redemptionitis’.

what bob calls ‘redemptionitis’ he suggests is what happens when the incarnation of Jesus is focused on to the exclusion of the doctrines of creation and eschatology. activism is somehow attractive to us. but it gets worse, and ultimately becomes destructive (bad practice and bad theology).

Christians are subdivided and then reclassified according to their levels of commitment – there are cultural Christians, believing Christians, born again Christians and then finally committed, believing, born again Christians. The closer I get to the centre the busier I become. The more I am drawn in, the greater the compulsion to live up to a theological ideal. It is a crazy disparity in that the longer I am a Christian youth worker the harder I seem to have to work.

the activist message ends up making the gospel not sound like good news.

this was a great paper - busyness is a virus in the church. i am guilty of it myself. not enough time to be creative, too many things to do. maybe i'll join bob in a quest to be more idle as well!

new design of church

following recent discussions on open source conferencing etc.. steve has designed a new church to prevent the problem of everyone meeting together in the same place all at once! brilliant as ever...

jump britain

off to the IASYM conference today which i am looking forward to...

following the success/inspiration of jump london, the programme on parkour/free running round famous sites in london. the runners are now doing the same thing round sites in britain, it's on channel 4 thurs evening 10pm. one to watch...

worship trick 10 [second series] - signs of the times

signs of the times was a worship installation put together by enigma for a city-wide meeting in christ the cornerstone church in central milton keynes in november 2004. the gathering was to discuss the implications for the church of the huge expansion of the city, already one of europe's fastest-growing cities, that is coming in the next decade. they have uploaded an explanation, an animation ( a screensaver for windows that you can download or you can directly link to the flash animation) and a set of roadsigns(pdf) you can download. i am making this worship trick 10 [second series]

prayer and liturgy responses to tsunami

prayer and liturgy in response to the tsunami (thanks bob )