church growth

#6) I have never been a fan of the church growth movement. While I went to a large church in high school - and served a large church in Nashville - I just never bought into the whole church growth schtick. As one of my seminary professors put it - the only thing that grows that fast is cancer.

I never realized how much I would love being in a small town church until I got here. It's amazing folks. People are there to lend a hand instantly, you really get immersed into the community because you are living among your parishoners - instead of everyone traveling in to the church from far off places. They have a great work ethic, they are hungering to learn more and want to get their hands dirty.

My focus has never been to get the church to grow. at least not numerically. Growing in our faithfulness - yes. Growing in our commitment - yes. Growing in our ability to respond to God's Spirit - yes. Growing in numbers... eh.

But we are! My first year here, we about evened out with our deaths and members joining. But this year, with our confirmation class and so far 4 new members, we have grown our church by 11 in six months.

At an Ad Board meeting sometime last fall, someone commented that if we are doing what God wants us to do - the people will come... or maybe they said that the money would come... either way - if we are faithful, people will see that and they will want to be a part of what we are doing. And I think that is true.

We don't need to market our church so much as witness to what cool things God is doing in our midst right now. And right now we witnessed seven young people professing their faith in front of friends and family and their church. We have watched God connect us with a ministry in Cedar Rapids and have been called to respond with donations and building of relationships. We had a family join our church who was so excited about doing so that they brought all of their siblings and parents with them.

Stuff like that is pretty cool. And we are going to keep trying to follow God. And if more people want to join us on that journey - amen!

the incredibleness of sms

I think I never realized how SMS really is impacting the world and has transformed how we communicate until I listened to this story a while back on NPR: Mobile Phones Do Much More Than Make Calls

In the phone calls that ensued on the show, people called in about living in a mud hut in Africa, but using a solar charger to keep her connected through cell phone with her daughter 100 miles away in the city. Or fishing off the coast of India and texting to the buyers on shore what the catch of the day was so that nothing went to waste.

I don't think I realized how different SMS was than regular phone calls until last week when we literally had no coverage because the network was jammed with people stuck on the interstate due to flash flooding, but I could update my facebook status from SMS and people were sending back comments instantly.

There is something about the instantaneous nature of communication that is both really exciting and really troubling. Some of the comments had to do with how health workers were able to finally sync their data and know when outbreaks were occuring and then respond. But then others spoke about how dangerous it was to have locating technologies built into these same devices that made them increasingly vulnerable.

It is an amazing tool that connects us to one another, and yet 140 characters is also especially limiting. It has literally changed the way that we write and speak and SPELL! I am constantly amazed at how "what" is now spelled "wut" in my youth group's correspondance to each other on facebook or even on papers they turn in to me. I wonder what kinds of hair-pulling frustration their English teachers are having.

There is also an expectation of always being connected - of having instantaneous response. If you send an email or a text message - you often hope the person is right there, ready to respond to get you the information you need. But at least mediums like twitter and facebook (and their SMS applications) have the benefit of responses from multiple directions. As an example - a pastor friend I know who was working on writing a funeral sermon for a tragic death of a young couple in a car accident connected quickly with colleagues to get some really helpful advice. Not everyone needed to respond instantly, but enough did.

But language changes, people adapt, and at the age of 27, I feel almost as if I'm on the brink of being an old-fogie. While I love my cell phone, I'm only just now figuring out how to take it with me everywhere. I'm quickly trying to figure out twitter, I'm staying connected with facebook, I'm building relationships through new medias, so I'm hoping that I have the skills I need to be an adapter and not someone who just grumbles at the changes happening. The key is to figure out what really is valuable about these new technologies (or in the case of SMS - new uses of technology) and still be able to critique the faults of the medium.

facebook ministry

7) outreach and ministry through facebook (prayers in the aftermath of the shooting tragedy in our county).

Nearly two weeks ago, we had a tragic shooting near our community. I don't need to go into details, but a young woman's life was taken. There were very little official details at first, but everyone in the community had their own version of what might or might not have happened. I didn't know anyone who was involved, and so while it was very close to me, it also seemed very remote.

Until I watched the news the next morning and saw a congregation member being interviewed. And it was as if I suddenly realized that even though I was not personally affected by this - people in my church were. People in my church knew those who were involved and were grieving the death of a friend. People in my church were shaken up by the fact that something like this had even happened.

I was still in my pj's at the time, but I knew that as a church, the best response we can have is prayer. so I got dressed and headed over to the church.

Here is where I realized that we have no great means of getting the word out fast to people. We don't have a calling tree. Most of our congregation doesn't regularly use email or check our website. But I knew that some of the people affected were on facebook.

I recently created a page for our church on facebook. I thought it might be a good way of publicizing events for our youth who are on there. And so far it has worked very successfully. But some of these kid's parents are also on facebook. So I created an event - a day long prayer vigil at the church for anyone and everyone who wanted to stop in.

And I called a few of the people that in 18 short hours I knew had been personally affected. I let them know that I was at the church and was available.

I don't think we had anyone stop in and use the prayer space at all that day. BUT... simply because it was there, other conversations happened across facebook.

One of my members who saw the listing also posted it as her facebook status. And friends of hers in the community who have never been to our church were touched by the fact that we were doing this. One person even messaged me directly and said that she wanted to come and visit our church after that. Another person requested to add me as her facebook friend afterwards.

People go back and forth all the time about what kind of persona pastors should have on facebook and other social network media. I have always taken the stand that I need to a) be myself wherever I am, and b) that used in the right way - it can be a powerful tool. I do block some of my information/pictues/etc to my church group - mostly because there are kids included in that group that don't necessarily need to see what my friends and I were up to in college. But for the most part - who I am is out there. And I have found it to be an incredible resource for ministry. I get to chat with parents about their kid's baseball games. I can give students encouragement before a concert. I am making connections with people that sneak out of worship before I really have a chance to talk with them on Sunday mornings... or who come to worship only occasionally. In many ways - I'm meeting those congregation members where they are... but I'm also connecting with their friends and colleagues in a way that would not have been available to me before. And that is pretty amazing.

I have a pretty idealistic view of the world. I look for the best in things before I look for their faults - but I also know that everything has its pros and its cons. The best we can do is navigate the waters as best we can, and (I think this this is my new motto) take one step beyond caution when the Spirit nudges.

secrets

Link to a United Methodeviations post

Dan Dick makes a distinction between what he sees as mainline emergent and the roots of the emergent conversation and people out there who are living it