Friends and Family

"We can see this in Jesus’ ministry; he is recruiting disciples who bring their friends or their family, their workmates. Whenever you see the gospel expanding exponentially it’s expanding along networks of pre-existing relationships." An excerpt from an interview with Steve Addison posted on his blog. This quote is taken from part 4

Whose turf? Whose terms?

A few years ago a book with the title How the Irish Saved Civilization appeared on the market. The BBC have now given their take on the great Hibernian rescue. How the Celts Saved Britain was broadcast on Monday evening on BBC 4. Presented by Dan Snow, it began to tell the story of Patrick and the conversion of Ireland. According to the evidence Snow had gathered, not only did Patrick bring Christianity to the Emerald Isle, but civilization as well.

For church leaders and preachers - in fact for anyone interested in mission - there was a wealth of interesting material. One of the things that stood out for me was that Patrick brought the gospel to Ireland by meeting the Celtic people on their turf in their terms. He gatecrashed their holy rituals and ceremonies and invaded their sacred spaces. Consequentially, he found himself preaching to some of the real power brokers of the day.

"Their turf, their terms" is a good mission value to practice. If for no other reason than that the people we want to reach are unlikely to visit our turf on our terms, at least initially. A good value to practise, but not one that the church always finds easy to practise.

Part 2 is next Monday at 9 p.m. on BBC4

You can see part one on iPlayer

Tim Keller at Urban Plant Life

Dr. Keller did not disappoint. He delivered helpful talks on preaching, the city and integrative ministry. I have never received such full handouts at any conference I have attended. He clearly has spent a lot of time thinking about ministry in a city context.

One example of his creatively orthodox approach to preaching, can be found in how he handles the kinds of topics that our culture finds offensive.

He talks about "A" doctrines and "B" doctrines. "A" represents those doctrines that a culture finds attractive and "B" those that it finds offensive. These differ from culture to culture. For example, in the West people find the Christian emphasis on forgiveness an attractive doctrine, whereas God's justice and judgment offends. In other cultures it is the other way round.

He says that we can communicate the "B" doctrines on the back of "A" doctrines. He compares these two categories of doctrine to a pile of stones and a pile of logs that you want to get across a river. If you try to float the logs on the stones, it doesn't work. However, if you tie the logs together and put the stones on top, you can float the whole lot across the river.

The logs are the "A" doctrines and the stones are the "B" doctrines.

He used an example from a sermon he delivered recently on abortion. He based his appeal on the Western idea of human rights founded on the image of God in man - which Westerners find attractive and presented his pro life position (which is a divisive issue in our culture) on that basis.

I thought that approach was really good. The whole day was worth it for that one insight!

Thanks to London City Mission for hosting the event.

I hope that the talks will be made available to download. Some previous Keller talks at LCM can be found here

Tim Keller in London

Off to London today to hear Tim Keller speak at a church planting conference.

This really is a big treat. Keller has been a hero for a while and is becoming a very influential figure in the Western evangelical world. I'll let you know how I get on.

That video

Driscoll at his controversial best. The video was supposedly dropped at a church planting conference because it was considered too controversial.

What's out there

A couple of interesting posts on Worldchangers blog.

Making the case for medium sized churches:

http://www.steveaddison.net/2008/08/01/planting-mid-sized-churches-in-europe.html


Tim Keller on the gospel:

http://www.steveaddison.net/2008/08/04/a-new-kind-of-gospel.html - there's a link to the full article.


J. Lee Grady's blog has some sobering coverage of what is really happening in China:

http://fireinmybones.com/index.php?col=073108~In%20China,%20They%20Beat%20Christians%20With%20Crowbars


Hoping to listen to Frank Damazio's latest sermons on faith as I drive to Holyhead and then from Dublin to Northern Ireland. You can find them here:

http://www.citybiblechurch.org/p/8834/Default.aspx