Going full time

I'm into my first week of full time church planting now. Almost all of the books are out of my old office...and piled all over the floor in my new office at home. I've got one bookcase on order and am working on plans to redo one of my closets to hold a bunch more of the my seemingly endless supply of scholarly tomes.

It's been a great week so far. Meeting with people in our core group. Meeting with people who are still checking us out. Sitting around our backyard fireplace with people and discussing all kinds of aspects of what our new church will be like (that's the way to have a church meeting--with 'smores!).

Things are beginning to coalesce, beginning to take shape. On our immediate agenda is finalizing our name and doing some legwork to get a facility secured for our first real worship service in October. Hopefully I'll have news on both of those fronts soon.

Rhythm

I’ve been thinking a lot about rhythm lately. Not musical rhythm, but life rhythm and especially church rhythm. I grew up in a church that celebrated communion on the first Sunday of the month. In college my church had communion every week. Different rhythms.

My first experience with small group Bible studies was a weekly commitment. When I came to Helena I met people whose groups met every other week. Different rhythms.

Some churches follow what is called the church year, beginning with Advent, then Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Easter, Ascension Sunday, Pentecost, and so on. Other churches only observe Christmas and Easter. Different rhythms.

In Seattle I met with church planters who are trying out different rhythms. Some are celebrating communion every week. Some aren’t even meeting for worship every week. One church in particular meets for worship monthly and then as smaller houses churches on two of the other weeks and then does community outreach and service on the final week. It’s a different rhythm.

The Bible gives us a lot of leeway here. The book of Acts describes the believers meeting daily together (Acts 2:42-47). The book of Hebrews simply encourages us to not neglect meeting together (Hebrews 10:25). Paul’s instructions about communion in 1 Corinthians 11 give me the impression that communion was something they celebrated quite frequently. Nevertheless, the Bible does not dictate specifically how or how often we are to gather for worship, when to celebrate communion, how to incorporate teaching and outreach and so on.

One of the dangers is thinking that there is only one correct rhythm to all of this. As we establish this church we’ll be thinking about this, talking about this, praying about this. We want to find a rhythm that incorporates worship and outreach, teaching and service, prayer and fun, times of engagement and times of rest.

The future is wide open right now. Pray that we’ll find a rhythm that honors God and gives us life.

Church of Starbucks

Last night I went down to Starbucks to meet with Lauren, one of the people who is on board with our new church. (Usually I'm a Fire Tower Coffee kind of guy, but I make exceptions.) We were getting together to talk about ideas and possibilities for the new church.

When I walked in I saw Russ Danaher, who is also planting a church in Helena. He was leading a groups of people in a Bible study.

(Russ and I and Steve Bostrom, a Presbyterian (PCA) church planter, have been getting together for lunch a few times a month lately. It’s good to meet with other church planters for encouragement, to learn from each other, and to keep focused on the fact that even as we’re leading different efforts, we’re also working alongside each other.)

I ordered my drink from Samara, who is part of Steve's new Presbyterian church.

While I was waiting, Dan Green, who is a youth pastor with the Salvation Army here, walked in.

It was cool to see four churches—three of them new church plants— represented at the coffee house last night. God is certainly at work in Helena. Good things are happening. I can see lives being impacted. I can see people getting fired up about being a part of God’s mission here. I’m encouraged. Let’s see what happens and see how we can be a part of it.

Almost tomorrow

Our first church planting open house is tomorrow night. I’m looking forward to getting into what this whole thing is going to be about. Here are some of what we’ll be looking at:

• Our mission: as a church, in the community, what it looks like
• What our first steps will be
• Defining our values
• Developing leaders
• Our spheres of influence
• Where all of this will take place

Are you excited about this? Is there something that you’re wanting to know about as we launch the church plant? Let me know what’s on your mind.

The end of suburbia

Last night I went to a free outdoor showing of The End of Suburbia, put on at Performance Park in the walking mall downtown (thanks to Urban Mountain Development for hosting it). It’s an engaging documentary about life in America after world oil production peaks (which the filmmakers contend will be happening any minute now. While the film is from 2004, the various talking heads point to right about now as when world oil production will be peaking and beginning an inexorable decline).

The point the film makes is that the American suburban lifestyle—with it’s endless tracts of single family homes, miles of interstates, and people driving everywhere in their personal cars for everything needed in life—is simply unsustainable in a post-cheap-energy world.

I realize that this kind of topic, along with anything vaguely political or environmental can quickly polarize people. So why bring it up when I should be making some more insightful comments about the new church?

Because the church needs to engage the realities of the world. Because our values as a church— from how we organize, to where we hold meetings, to how we will be involved in our community, to what kind of society we want to contribute to—our values are not isolated from the rest of life in our community.

I am not interested in a private spirituality that has no relationship to the rest of my life. I live and work in Helena. I shop and eat and enjoy parks and go to ball games. A healthy society is incredibly important to me.

And so our understanding of what it means to follow Jesus Christ must take into account what it means to live in society. We compartmentalize our faith, work, entertainment, finances, politics, and so on at our peril.

This film made me all the more want to walk more, downsize to one car, consume less (in every respect!) and simply simplify in general.

And interestingly enough, simplicity is one of the classical spiritual disciplines. Faith has always been tied to how we actually live our lives. We need to consider this as individuals, as the church, and as a society.