Living in the Red Zone

I spent yesterday at a Church Planting consultation with George Lings and Claire Dalpra of the Sheffield Centre. It was good to catch up with some old friends and give some thought to how our Cafe Church might be transformed from an Alternative Service into a genuine "Fresh Expression of Church".

The thing that struck me most powerfully during the day was a diagram from a book called The Missional Leader: Equipping Your Church to Reach a Changing World by Alan Roxburgh and Fred Romanuk. The diagram describes 6 different stages in the life of the church and the style of leadership that is operating in each phase. The cycle begins in the middle of the green zone when there is the emergence of new ideas and fresh possibilities, some of which thrive. As growth happens organisation and structure are needed and the church enters the blue stable zone where performance and organisational leadership are appropriate.



The red zone is the danger zone. As the organisation starts to decline the leadership reacts to one crisis after another, often by trying to control and reorganise to recapture the calm happy days of the blue zone. The impact for clergy is that we have to work harder to even stand still! We have no quick solution and everyone blames us for the crisis, when actually we are living in a very different culture and missional climate.

The message for me is that I might need to learn how to do Bridging Leadership (whatever that is) inorder to help the church understand what is happening.

Looking at the diagram again today, I think I tried to jump straight from the Red Zone to the Green Zone and tried to build Cell Church without the rest of the church really understanding why we needed to be there. I also got frustrated by the lack of organisation in the inherited church life which is still needed as the base for our mission. We were and still are suffering due to falling numbers, elderly congregation, only a short history of basing life on what the bible says etc so at times I was and am operating in the red zone reacting to crisis.

In the last two years I have not given up my dream of seeing organic missional churches planted in this area, but I have been leading some of the people through the lower part of the blue zone. I think this is the "transitional leadership" mentioned on the diagram. We are growing a team of people who are disciples who know how to make disciples. We have been using leadership Huddles to do this.

We also have some activity in the green zone as we transition our Cafe Church from being an alternative service to growing an identity as a missionary community which will become a fresh expression of church. In preparation for this we have four people attending the Diocesan Mission Shaped Ministry training course.

Anyway, I have just ordered a copy of Roxburgh's book to see what he has to say about how you do Bridging Leadership. If there are any other sources that people have found helpful please let me know.

Revival?

I have been busy with life and got out of the habit of blogging.

It is now nearly two years since I started Huddles and these have been a real blessing. We now have a core group of leaders in the church with shared vision and values.

Last year we started holding monthly prayer days and we have just finished a 24/7 prayer week with the church open for prayer day and night with someone praying the whole time. There is a growing sense of God on the move in our midst.

Several of us went to the New Wine leaders conference last year and we have been impacted by Bill Johnson's teaching (from Bethel church in Redding California). We are looking to take the healing ministry out beyond the walls of the church and hope to do some healing on the streets.

We also have a group of four ladies attending the Diocesan Mission Shaped Ministry training course with a view to helping our Cafe Church to have a missionary focus. We are going to try holding the service at 4pm on Sunday 15th June and on 13th July to see how it works at that time of day. It was always a source of irritation to some folk in the church when it was held at the same time as the service in the "Victorian" building.

The Kingdom of Heaven is Forcefully Advancing

Matthew 11:12

From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been forcefully advancing, and forceful men lay hold of it. NIV

I am about to preach on this passage of scripture. I tend to use the NIV so I was about to preach "come on folks lets be forceful men who take hold of the kingdom and forcefully advance it."

But I have just read Carson's commentary on the verse in "The Expistor's Bible Commentary (1984)" which points us to an interpretation that says

"since the days of John the Baptist the Kingdom of heaven is being forcefully advanced, and violent men are pillaging it."

So that shoots my planned sermon in the foot. However, I sense that Carson's interpretation is right. I don't feel like a mighty warrior about to take hell by storm and the people who I preach to are by and large in the scared rabbit league.

So my revised interpretation is that Jesus in the power of the Holy Spirit is forcefully advancing the Kingdom of heaven every time he heals the sick, cleanses a leper or brings sight to the blind (Matt 11:5). Jesus clearly sees these as actions of spiritual warfare against the principality of darkness (cf 1 John 5:19).

This violence against the forces of evil is carried out by a child of God - a little one whose eyes and ears are open to the things revealed by the Father (verses 15 and 25).

The violent men are the people who oppose the Kingdom of heaven by persecuting the likes of John the Baptist, Jesus, James and countless other Martyrs.

The implications for me and my hearers is that although we are little children and not forceful men we can nevertheless join Jesus in his work of forcefully advancing the Kingdom of heaven as we operate in the power of the Spirit: doing good deeds that bless people and healing the sick.

What has been happening

If you have been a reader of my blog in the past you may remember that I posted a blog in August last year about the popping of my "super-ego" bubble:

Click here to read my post from August 2006

Sadly, the fact that this had happened didn't immediately filter through to everyone and I found the spiritual temperature of the church very cool in the Autumn:

Click here to read my post from September 2006

This made the grass look greener on the other side of the fence, and I gave serious thought to moving on. I even went to a couple of interviews, but it became very clear in mid December that the Lord had other plans for me.

Coming to terms with my disappointment with how things had turned out took a couple of weeks - hence the blogging silence. During this time I organised the sabbatical to give myself space to reevaluate etc. Then by New Year my weariness lifted and the church began to respond quite positively to my ministry. I was so busy throwing myself back into ministry that I didn't have time to blog. Then I just got out of the habit!

I have now returned from sabbatical to a warm welcome and there are many signs of life in the church and many good things happening.

I'm Back

I don't know if I will be blogging much in the future. I might, but I have not felt like doing so recently.

For those who might like to know, I have just been on sabbatical from Feb - April. During this time I put a new fireplace in the living room and decorated it. I also made a pond in the back garden. I went on holiday to Angelsey with Jane and spent a week in the Cambrian mountains with my mum.

The blog was helpful last year as I wrestled with my dissatisfaction with the dear of Church of England. I am now at peace with where I fit in. Maybe I will blog about this and how I believe God wants me to minister in the future.

In a nutshell, I still see myself a missionary to the unchurched folk of Britain, but I personally am going to concentrate on those in Bredbury and Woodley. As a base for this outreach I am working to strengthen the missionary community which calls itself St. Mark's Church.

To whom are we sent?

To whom are we sent? In Acts 1 Jesus tells his disciples that they will be witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and to the ends of the earth.

In his own ministry Jesus concentrated on Galilee, Judea, and Jerusalem preaching mainly to the "lost sheep of Israel" - his own people. He did not actively seek to preach to Gentiles. However, during this time he became aware that his Kingdom would bless the Samaritans (who were contaminated by syncretizing canaanite worship into Judaism) and the Gentiles (see Matt 15:21-28).

As I reflect on Jesus' ministry it seems that our context is drastically different. There are no crowds of basically religious people eagerly hoping for a Messiah. There are some who might be called "back to church" and we should try to win these back. The majority of the population in Britain, however, are more like the Samaritans: they are comfortable in their consumerism (Baal worship) and do not feel the need to worship the Living God.

I have been preaching recently on Luke's gospel. Nearly every week we see Jesus challenging the Pharisees. These super-religious people were the stalwarts of organised religion in their time, but they "rejected God's purpose for themselves, because they had not been baptised by John" (Luke 7:30). The ordinary Jewish people responded to John's preaching and were baptised. The Pharisees, who thought they were good enough already would not submit to John's baptism because of their arrogance and pride. They missed out on the joy of being in the Kingdom of God with Jesus.

In winning back those who are the lost sheep, we need to embrace Jesus' understanding of the Kingdom of God. Grace and mercy, healing and forgiveness are more important than rules and status. I am concerned that many inside the churches at present are like the Pharisees - full of themselves and what they want, rather than getting excited about joining with Jesus in his mission to bring home the lost sheep. We need to be with Jesus praying for more workers to become active in the harvest (Luke 10:2).

Jesus' mission to the Samaritans was unsuccessful in Luke 9:51-56, but in John 4 when he exercised his prophetic gifting with the woman at the well there was a positive response. In Acts we see the Samaritans accepting the gospel when it was accompanied with miraculous signs and healing miracles (Acts 8:6-8).

We need to be out and about amongst the Samaritans of Britain with the power and gifts of the Holy Spirit. We cannot expect them to come to us. Maybe as we get a few more lost sheep back in the fold some of them will become the missionaries amongst the Samaritans of our land?

Who are these Samaritans? I think they are the ordinary people of Britain who are in employment, who own their own home, drive everywhere, drink more wine than they used to, sort of believe in God, used to be in the brownies or the cubs, but have never been active church members as adults. These are people I meet when I baptise their children, or officiate at their weddings. These are the people who want Dad to have a christian funeral and who might describe themselves as "spiritual but not religious."

The Gentiles are an even tougher nut to crack. The initial cross-cultural missionaries were Jews. Paul and Barnabas were living in a gentile city, worshipping with Jewish christians and those who had converted to Judaism. As Gentiles came to faith the church grew in its understand that the good news of Jesus was the gospel for the whole world.

When Paul and his friends went out on their missionary journeys to gentile cities it is interesting to note that they always started with the Synagogue. They looked for religious people who would respond to the message of Jesus and form the basis of a missional community in the city they were trying to reach.

What or who are the equivalent people today in Britain who will be at the heart of mission to the Gentiles?

I don't know the answer to this question. And at the moment I find myself drawn more to mission amongst the "Samaritans". This is where I am seeing fruitfulness. These "samaritans" are the "people of peace" that I am finding at the MCFC supporters club. These are the the bulk of the people living in my parish. As we do our Alpha courses and establish our "new wineskins" (Cafe Church, cell groups, praise services etc) these are the people who we are able to integrate into church life. Most of them don't want traditional Anglicanism just as the Samaritans in Jesus' time did not want to worship at the Temple. But they know when they are worshipping "in Spirit and in Truth."

Maybe I should change the title of my blog to be "to-the-Samaritans" ??

Teamwork

Andrew has taken up rowing. His team, Teddy Hall C, is the third novice crew (not expected to be participating in the next Olympic games). Nevertheless, they put in a superb performance yesterday at the Christchurch regatta, winning their first race by a huge margin against Balliol B team and then holding off Trinity's A Team in the second round until the finish line. Watch it here in larger size or in the box below. I think Andrew is the first oarsman (bow) in the nearest boat.

Cowboy Evangelism

I have done plenty of cowboy evangelism in my time. Lots of “yee-haa” but not much harvesting. We learned how to present the gospel with a little booklet. We went out on the streets of Westminster with tracts written by Arthur Blessit who led a training day in London in 1981. We tried to fill coaches with people from Hackney to go and hear Eric Delve preach in Walthamstow. We trained with Douglas McBain’s Mustard Seed to preach in the open air. We did sketchboard presentations at the local community fun day. Much energy expended. Few disciples.

When I led the “News Team” in Hackney we went out every week knocking on doors chatting to people about Jesus, inviting them to church etc. We would nearly always find someone welcoming who wanted to talk. I found myself offering lots of pastoral care and comfort to these lost sheep who never came near the church. We discovered after a while that about 1 in 7 households were receptive to visitors from the local church, but we did not spend enough time with these people. We kept trying to get them to come to us and got discouraged when they did not.

It is a shame that we did not hear the message of Luke 10:7 at this time. Stay in the house of the person of peace. ie spend enough time with this household that they catch the message of the Kingdom of God. Our vicar at the time had the best approach: he would go back week after week to his contacts with a beginners course in Christianity (similar to Good News Down Your Street). I remember thinking that we might learn from his example and do the same, but it never seemed to happen. I personally grew weary of seeing little fruit from the door to door ministry, and at about the same time I joined the FGBMFI which held evangelistic dinners. We saw lots of people get saved and healed at these events so I moved my energies into these instead.

Looking back I would say that the opportunities were there. Maybe we should have persevered in spending more time with those who were open. Maybe we needed to be less busy doing other church things in order to have the time and energy to go out and spend time with these people. After all Jesus did say "do not greet anyone along the road". A curious phrase that I interpret to mean we should be single minded and dedicated to the task.

What Happens in a Huddle?

I have been asked "What happens in a huddle?" Here is my reply:

I am not yet an expert on Huddles, but my former colleague Nick Haigh (who is now Vicar of the Net in Huddersfield has attended one in Sheffield since summer 2005. We model our meetings on his description of what happens, together with what I gleaned from the training day in June this year and the guiding of the Holy Spirit before and during the meetings.

My understanding and present practice is as follows :
· Ideal size group 5-8 people ie On an average of 10 minutes per person + 10 minutes for leadership input = 60-90 minute meeting
· Absolute confidentiality is agreed. If someone wants permission to share anything (eg a positive testimony) beyond the group permission should be expressly sought.
· The meeting will begin with a short prayer
· If someone arrives at the huddle obviously in need of support or full of what the Lord is doing in their particular ministry area we often gather round and pray for them at this point.
· A few moments are spent on feedback and accountability, following up the issues, plans and resolutions made at the previous meeting
· The leader sets the direction of the meeting (having sought guidance from the Holy Spirit) eg Today we are going to use the Square. A bible reading might be used here.
· The leader may give a brief resume of the Lifeshape that is to be used
· A few moments in silent prayer for the Holy Spirit to show us where we are on this issue
· Each person shares in turn for a couple of minutes about how they are doing, and where they think God is wanting to develop them, and what they find difficult etc It is important to note that the “victim” only shares what s/he feels comfortable sharing. Everyone else listens and refrains from jumping in with "that happened to me" type comments.
· The other members of the group have an opportunity to ask questions to clarify exactly what the issues are, and to help the person on the spot to see past their blind spots. No advice is given at this point, it is better for the person to identify with the Lord what responses might be appropriate. We use questions like “What do you think the Father might want to prune away so you have more time for prayer and bible reading?”
· One or two brief prayers are said for the person asking for God’s help in following through resolutions or responses identified.
· The next person shares as per the previous three points. Until everyone including the Huddle leader has shared and been quizzed.
· We end with a short prayer, asking for the Lord’s protection upon us.

I attended a Huddle training day in Sheffield this June. Part of the session was a "goldfish bowl" huddle in front of everyone present where a huddle meeting was modelled. They used the Huddle Character card which has a number of questions under the headings UP IN OUT. Everyone was encouraged to sit in silence for a couple of minutes prayerfully reading through the questions whilst asking the Holy Spirit to point out which of the questions was most pertinent at present. Each person shared for about a minute and were then asked questions by the huddle leader and by other members of the huddle.

In the huddles at St. Mark’s so far we have used some of the Lifeshapes. In our first meeting we used the Semi-Circle. I reminded people of the teaching about seasons of abiding and fruitfulness, daily, weekly, and monthly rhythms. We also reminded ourselves that pruning is necessary for greater fruitfulness, and that we need the Father to guide us to the best out of a massive choice of “good” things that we could be doing. We then asked the question “What does abiding look like for you? How do you recharge? What restores your soul?” After waiting on the Lord for a couple of minutes we each shared and were quizzed. In our second meeting we used the Triangle to identify whether we were weak in any of the three areas. We shared what we felt the Lord wanted us to do about this. Some of the issues raised were worth exploring more deeply, so we used the Circle together the following week.

My hope over the next few months is to ensure that every leader is able to be reflective about their own spirituality, and can use the Lifeshapes to help them in this. Also that they will grow in their ability to hold one another accountable. I am also looking for opportunities to develop leadership skills through the huddles. I sometimes draw attention to how something shared might alter the way we lead in our cell groups. I expect this area to be more important once we all feel more comfortable using the Lifeshapes intuitively in daily life.

Huddle for Mission

Since I started blogging in March I have been reflecting on the nature of Church. To reach the "gentiles" with the good news of Jesus and his Kingdom we are going to have to embrace radical church structures which are flexible and easy to reproduce. One church that had made great strides in this area is St. Thomas in Sheffield.

St. Toms has a Parish Church presence in Crookes - a suburb of Sheffield and a City-wide presence through St.Thomas, Philadelphia which has a base/resource centre in an old industrial unit near the city centre.

The history of St. Toms has been an inspiration to me over the years - I read Robert Warren's book "In the Crucible" around the time of my selection conference. I embraced his teaching about Missionary congregations. I have followed with interest the growth of clusters and cells under Mike Breen's leadership.

Out of this has now come TOM - The Order of Mission. The pattern of life is based on the Lifeshapes (originally known as Lifeskills). New disciples are taught these shapes as a way they can live in obedience to the teachings of Christ. They are simple, practical and memorable which means they can easily be transferred to a new disciple. Simple is important for movement and sustainable growth.

Leaders are mentored and trained in the use of the Lifeshapes through Huddles. The principle used is one of High Acountability - Low Control. It is very Apostolic in nature and it realeases people to lead missionary communities.

The following is a descrition of Huddles from a card that is used by Huddle members in The Order of Mission.

‘Huddle’ is the structure by which every member of The Order of Mission engages with on-going support and training. Reflecting our understanding that each one of us is both a follower and a leader, members are both called into a huddle, where they are led, and—over time—call others into a huddle that they lead. Christ-like character is the most fundamental issue for leaders. We also need to learn effective leadership skills. The questions on this card are a tool to help us identify where God is wanting to address our character.

There is a companion card with questions to help us identify where God is wanting to address our skills. In each case, we read through the questions, asking the Holy Spirit to highlight the issue He wants to address. It might be an area where we need to allow Him to change us, or an area where we need to recognise the extent to which He already has—in other words, we expect both the challenge to repent and the encouragement of seeing the kingdom break in.

The huddle leader is called to help the members of their huddle in this process. Lifeskills—the Pattern of Life of the Order—provides the tools to do so, and a summary of the shapes is found on this card. The relationship between the leader and their huddle should be one of ‘low control, high accountability’, whereby the leader is only directive where appropriate, with the aim of releasing the follower as a leader themselves; and the follower gives their leader permission to hold them accountable in both character and skills.

A bit more about huddles can be read on the St. Thomas website.

The weakness of “Lone Ranger” evangelism

I am increasingly convinced that Jesus knew what he was doing when he sent his disciples out “two by two” into the towns and villages of Israel (Luke 10). A team of two is far more effective than a solitary Christian.

One of my hopes in joining the local branch of the Manchester City Supporters Club was that I would have some opportunities to share my faith with the people I meet week by week. Up to now it has not been as easy as I had hoped, and I want to note a few observations.

I have been welcomed and accepted by the people at the club and I am there as a presence. My faith is the occasional subject of some light hearted banter, but I have not found many natural opportunities to talk about Jesus and the important aspects of faith in him. I am sure though that it would be easier for such conversations to arise if there was another Christian with me. Two Christians can model community in a way that one alone cannot.

I am sure that a lot of prayer happened while the disciples of Jesus walked to the village they visited. It is easier to be faithful in prayer as part of a team. Another believer mixing with the same group of people would be an encouragement to me and vice versa. We could pray together for kingdom opportunities and help one another to stay close to the Lord in this very godless environment. We could pray for discernment of where the Holy Spirit has gone before us and give one another courage in following up such opportunities. We could pray for the people we meet that their spiritual hunger would grow.

Please pray with me that the Lord will send another worker into the harvest field of the Bredbury Blues.