Sharing Christ While Experiencing "Crowded Solitude"

Bill Westfall wrote a post, Crowded Solitude in Pittsburgh, for his blog, Earth's Edge Perspective, that got me thinking today — especially the first 4 paragraphs. It got me thinking first how easy it is for me to withdraw into solitude in a crowd or even when there's not much of a crowd but when I'm around people I don't know. Last night, for instance, I was at the airport waiting for my parents to arrive from the US for a visit. There was a crowd there but I poked my nose in my (digital) book and withdrew into solitude.

Then I got to thinking how necessary it is to be intentional in engaging people when we're around them. Many of us (OK, maybe this is a case of projection, pointing and realizing that while I'm pointing at someone else, 3 fingers are pointing back at me) are more comfortable with choosing the time and place in which to engage people. We fail to take advantage of natural opportunities to talk with people, just be friendly, find out where they hurt or what their needs are, and then present Christ to them. And, I'm not talking just about "sharing a Gospel witness." I think we want and must get to that point but we may begin presenting Christ to people by simply loving them enough to care about them as individuals.

The key is that we have to be intentional...

• ... intentional in engaging people
• ... intentional in loving people
• ... intentional in caring about people
• ... intentional in talking about the deep issues of life with people
• ... intentional in sharing the truth of the Gospel with people

According to Paul, the truth of the Gospel is ... Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behaviour. But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation.... (Colossians 1:21-22 NIV but see the whole passage, Colossians 1:12-23). We have to be intentional in sharing that.

• So, what do you think — can we share Christ while experiencing crowded solitude?

For the Kingdom,

Bob A

Do You Plant Churches in Your Head or Among a People?

Ed Stetzer is the Vice President for Research at LifeWay Christian Resources in Nashville, Tenn (USA). Recently, he wrote a blog post for Pastor.com entitled, "Don't Plant or Pastor a Church in Your Head." Here are a few excerpts from the post:

When we formulate our mission and ministry strategies, it's important we do so for our own community, not someone else's. It's so easy to hear an incredible speaker at a conference and say, "I'm going to be just like that pastor!" But that is not what God is calling you to be. Too often, we get so excited by someone else's church that we get a vision for their church before we get a vision for our people.

My challenge is don't plant or pastor a church in your head. Plant or pastor a church in your community. That's where the Gospel transforms real people who are living real lives. Know and live in your culture, not someone else's. Don't just bring a model, bring the Gospel. Lead a church; don't lead a plan.

There are marks of a biblical church that should and must be present in every culture, but biblically faithful church looks different from culture-to-culture. A biblically faithful church in Singapore, Senegal, and Seattle share the same gospel, worship the same God, and teach the same scriptures, but they should (even must) look different. 

• Do you plant replications of churches in your home culture (whether that's an African culture or a non-African culture)?
• Or, do you consider the people among whom you hope to plant that church?

For the Kingdom,

Bob A

Another Resource: "Best Practices Institute Manual"

In a post a few days ago, I gave a list of mission resources. One of those was the web site, Church Planting Movements. This morning, I found a helpful resource on that site. It's available to the public without actually joining the site:

• Best Practices Institute Manual

It's a 1.8MB downloadable PDF file. The BPI manual is a detailed outline of an 8-day Strategy Coordinator training institute that has been used in South Asia for training national strategy coordinators. It would require some revision before being used in an African context, primarily to change S Asian references and examples to African ones.

I think this would be an interesting training to do with a mixed group of national and ex-pat workers.

• How are you training others to plant churches?

For the Kingdom,

Bob A