Ed and Others Attend the Exponential Conference

I imagine that most of you saw the May 9, 2008 edition of Ed Rosenberry’s CGGC eNews in which Ed described the privilege that he and Dave Green, Rick Mason, Kirk Schneemann and Bill Shoemaker and Bob Eatherton and Eric Starkey, Paul Sabelhaus, Jeff Rockey and Greg McIntosh had in attending the New Church Conference in Orlando on April 21-24.

Encouraging.

I was happy to read Ed’s supportive summary of the messages of Andy Stanley, Bob Roberts, Alan Hirsch and Tim Keller. And, I say a hail and hearty AMEN to everything our brothers heard during the Conference. But, I also point out that the remarks of the speakers at the Conference bear a striking resemblance to comments that are the norm on this blog.

I’m glad that our brothers embraced what the Big Names in Missional Christianity are saying. Here’s to praying that they will embrace the missional people in their own church half as warmly as they do Andy, Bob, Alan and Tim.

I am heartened by Ed’s last paragraph which begins,

The three days challenged my thinking and proved very inspirational. The key now will be to translate the concepts back into our ministry setting in the Churches of God.

Amen, Ed, Amen!

However, I suspect that a process as subtle, gradual and gentle as translation will not do it. I don’t think there’s time for that.

Here are some of my thoughts on translating those concepts into the CGGC:

1. Translating these concepts can only begin with an understanding that Andy and Bob and Alan and Tim were describing a way of ministry that is the exact opposite of the way most of our pastors and congregations view ministry.

We have allowed ourselves to settle into an attractional model of ministry in which we turn the word ‘go’ in the Great Commission against itself to the point that ‘go‘ now means ‘come.’ Our churches envision ‘outreach’ as the practice of inviting people to come to us. How purely oxymoronic! How unlike the idea that John Winebrenner had in mind.

To complicate the matter, we define leadership according to what the Exponential Conference gang would call a Medieval “Christendom” model in which it assumed that every parish should have its own priest--whom we call the ‘pastor.’

I can’t see any possible way that we can translate these concepts unless we understand that those concepts are challenging us to throw out our 1,500 year old model of the church, and actually re-adopt the New Testament model. You’d think it shouldn’t be so hard for us to do that. We didn’t start out with the Christendom view of the church, but in recent generations we have embraced the Medieval model our own with a passion.

Ed cited my most recent hero, Alan Hirsch saying, “The current world climate becomes more like the first century almost daily and the church must return to its New Testament construct or face the ash heap of history.” And, that’s a fair warning. It’s not hyperbole.

Hirsch said the same thing (with Michael Frost) in The Shaping of Things to Come, and he said it even more vividly on his own in The Forgotten Ways.

The question I have is, did Ed and our guys understand how radical the challenge of the Exponential Conference really is? Are they willing to as Hirsch says, “return (the church) to its New Testament construct or face the ash heap of history.”

I strongly agree with Hirsch. We are heading directly to the ash heap of history and will end up there in not much more than a generation unless we are quick to change.

But, will we understand that the days of attractionalism and the parish priest/pastor are gone before it’s too late? Will we return to the New Testament model of the church that was the core of John Winebrenner’s vision while there is still time?

2. To do so will require that real, honest, old-fashioned, biblical repentance takes place in the CGGC. This is not a matter of forming a slightly different strategy and leaving almost everything as it is. This is an issue of heart. Translating these concepts is not a matter tweaking what’s already in place. Nothing short of a radical change in the way we think and act will allow for the CGGC to become the missional group it was in its first generations.

Making the decision to call people to repent is not a decision that can be made frivolously. The history of people of faith is that nearly everyone who consistently called God’s people to repentance has met with hard times. A few names come to mind: Moses, Jeremiah, John the Baptist, Jesus, Peter, Paul, Martin Luther, John Wesley as well as John Winebrenner.

My sense of most of the CGGC is that it is made up of more people who live according to the dictates of the principle, “We never did it that way before,” than “Thus says the Lord.”

Ed and his gang in the General Conference office and the leaders in the Regional Offices are going to have to assume a prophetic role. They are going to have to be willing to say things that most CGGCers don’t want to hear. They are going to have to repeat them many times. They are going to have to push people and then push again harder and then still harder. They are going to have to be willing to be unpopular--as were Moses, Jeremiah and John.

They are going to have to eschew the kind, gentle, nurturing shepherd role that we value in our staff people. They are going to have to be willing to say with John the Baptist, “You brood of vipers.” They are going to have to remember that John described the ministry of Jesus is this way: “He has his winnowing fork in hand and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”

So, yeah, repentance, major repentance is necessary.

3. With those thoughts in mind, those of us who blog here have two responsibilities to Ed and all our leaders. First and most prominent among them is as ancient as the call to God’s people to repent. It is this:

Pray.

The Word says that the first thing believers did after the ascension was to pray. “They all joined together constantly in prayer….” (Acts 1:14)

To develop the understanding of the radical components of the Exponential Conference and to be fearless in challenging the CGGC to repent will call our General Conference staff people and most of our Regional leadership to climb outside of the comfort zones.

If it is true, as Ephesians 4 says, that Christ will continue to gift the church with apostles, prophets, evangelists and pastors and teachers “until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God,” (Eph. 4:13) we are going to have to recognize that most of our leaders are shepherd/teachers, not the sort of people who are naturally disposed to force change. They are not apostles, prophets and evangelists. It is not the natural thing for these guys to be calling for radical change. It is far less natural for them to be pushing for radical change.

I have promised Ed that I will pray for him every day for the rest of my life. I’ve been doing that for a long time. I pray daily for the General Conference Ad Council and for my own Region’s Executive Director and for its Ad Council. As I think about the challenge before us, I am convicted to pray for more of our leaders and to pray more passionately.

If our leaders have any chance for success is this monumental challenge, it will be because they are bathed in the grace and blessing of the Spirit as they are lifted up daily by many of us in passionate and unceasing prayer.

4. The second responsibility that those of us who blog here have is to offer ourselves to the cause. The positive thing in all of this is that Ed and the other leaders have resources available to them. They have us.

What Ed and the others heard at the Exponential Conference is new to them. It’s old hat to us. We have not recently been excited by this vision. It’s what has been making our hearts beat for some time. It is this shared vision that compels us and makes us friends.

For the most part, we are not shepherd/teachers. We are apostolic and prophetic. We are restless and impatient, forceful, pushy, assertive, insistent, demanding, uncompromising and dissatisfied. We have qualities that have been sneered at in the pastoral culture that has developed in the CGGC in recent generations. But, our apostolic and prophetic qualities will be required if the CGGC is going to make the changes necessary in the short time we have to make them.

5. In The Forgotten Ways, Alan Hirsch talks about the importance to the church of what he calls “holy rebels.”

It’s time for us on this blog to stop talking. I know that postmodernism is all about conversation. But, I’m getting tired of the pointless chatter. I’m way past being impatient for action. Those of us who blog here have a gift. We have the gift of understanding. What it might be hard for the people in leadership to fully grasp, we get already.

We need to demand to be brought on board.

OR…

…We need to take the matter in hand. If we need to, we need to be willing to do what Luther and the first Anabaptists and Wesley and Winebrenner did. We need to be willing to say, “We love ya bros and we want to work with you, but if you’re not going to move right now, we’ll take this thing on ourselves.”

Much as most CGGCers don’t know this, or want to admit it, holy rebellion is how the CGGC got started. Holy rebellion is in our spiritual DNA. If holy rebellion is not a part of who we are, we are not being true to our nature. We talk about building “healthy churches.” Well, for us radicalism will always be a part of us if we are healthy. It worked for us for a long time until we lost that founding radical vision.

We need to be “Holy“. “Rebels“. Both holy and rebellious.

Can we stop talking about this?

Can we start doing it?

Can we offer ourselves to this radical way? Can we be radical and have the same attitude that was in Christ Jesus? Can we do it and still let our gentleness be evident to all? Can we push relentlessly and still submit to others out of reverence for Christ? Can we do the almost humanly impossible and speak the truth in love?

Can we be restless and impatient, forceful, pushy, assertive, insistent, demanding, uncompromising and dissatisfied? Are we willing to take the risk of moving ahead if others--even important others--drag their feet?

Can we stand up for our Lord who came with His winnowing fork in hand to clear His threshing floor?

Or, am I Bluto in Animal House saying, “Let‘s get going!” only to run off into his battle while everyone else on their filth cover frat house couches and chairs, sits and watches?