how do you start from nothing?

becky garrison has another book out - starting from zero with $0: building mission shaped ministries on a  shoestring. first up this is one of the crucial issues in the whole area of fresh expressions, emerging church etc - what you might call sustainability - how do you create sustainable projects/communities when you have nothing to start with?

the book has around a dozen stories of creative passionate people who have done precisely that - started from nothing in a host of different ways. i confess i expected a few more answers to the overarching question but maybe that was either naive or overly optimistic or too much a mindset of looking for models. but what the book does offer is a mix of stories of projects and churches who have started and kept going and struggled along the way - and if you read between the lines there are a number of ways that they became sustainable ranging from being run entirely by volunteers (as we do in grace - cheap to run!), through to getting individuals to support a leader, bi-vocational ministry (that is part time work, part time ministry) and raising monies through business and grant making bodies.

the book has some gems in it - i think my favourite story was common cathedral probably partly because i hadn't come across it before. this grew in response to debbie the founder's concern for the homeless and she simply went where they were and ended up taking worship services on boston common for people disconnected from church and a community and range of things just sort of emerged/evolved from there organically for which they fundraised along the way. both grace and proost are highlighted in the book.

i liked the reflections on the way forward at the end by karen ward, andrew jones and tom brackett. what becky does well is seek out good stories and let them speak for themselves - you can make of them what you will. those different voices in the book are good but they also make the book a challenge as a whole - it ends up feeling qute piecemeal. but it's a welcome addition to the conversation around an important question...

we'll certainly be addressing this question in the pioneer mission leaders training at cms - especially in the missional entrepreneurship module next autumn.

Comments

[Alicampbellyes]

Like this . . . trying to create something out of nothing at the moment. Thanks.

[Laura]

Great Question! Looking forward to reading what Becky has to say.
Thanks for letting us know about the book.

[Dbw18]

Love the idea of this starting from zero and especially the 'Common Cathedral'. Thanks

[Becky Garrison]

Thanks Jonny - and I agree it's very piecemeal but that's how the US Anglican emerging scene is at the moment as you know from your conversations with Tom Brackett, Karen Ward, etc. Rising from the Ashes was even more disjointed - it's a struggle as a storyteller to report on something as it's unfolding. I would love to offer a silver bullet that will cure the church but that isn't there. What we can learn from are the struggles of those who have followed the way of Common Cathedral.

[Becky Garrison]

Thanks Jonny for engaging with the book. I agree it is piecemeal but as you know from your conversations with Tom Brackett, Karen Ward, etc., this is how Anglicanism is emerging in a US context. In particular, many churches do not want to self-identify as "emerging" because of the identification of US emergent as an offshoot of a historical evangelicalism. Though as you noted, like Common Cathedral, they are truly responding to a particular culture not reached by traditional church.

Rising from the Ashes was even more piecemeal - there I was capturing the conversations that were just starting to enter into the US stream by chatting with those who either market themselves to the US mainline churches or like you engage with US Episcopalians.

The next book is interviewing community members to answer the "so what?" question - so someone starts a ministry but how do is this impacting the people in the pews (or sofas, community kitchens, etc.)? This will also sound piecemeal as people have a range of responses.

And as I write for the Washington Post, the Guardian, etc., I'm moving more and more into the secular market where one thing is crystal clear - branded Xns (albeit emergent, organic, missional, hipster etc.) are seen at best as jokes to this larger world. Very eye opening.

[Kim]

Starting from nothing is a pretty repeateable biblical model, and the mustard seed stuff that looks small and weak and ramshackle is used by God to great effect. We sometimes have to scale back our own ambitions and use the Bible's metaphors to measure 'success' when we are starting something.

It is hard because we know if we start something eyes are on us; many people from 'mainstream' church always want to know 'how many people are coming?' rather than what kinds of conversations are you having, what is the depth of the interchange etc. It seems perhaps we need to step outside of the success models of modernism and just begin to recognise the Spirit at work and go with that. (I run a community drop in/prayer room that provides space for people at the margins)

[Thomas Brackett]

In a recent conversation with Jimmy Bartz, I heard him say that Church Planters eventually discern that they look to "different metrics." When I pressed him to explain, he sounded alot like what Kim is saying, above. Thank you!

More on Jimmy: http://thads.org/

Thanks Jonny!