Today I’m beginning the last leg of three weeks on the road. It’s been an interesting journey that almost transcends history.

It began almost three weeks ago at the 2009 TYPO3 Conference in Dallas. There, we talked about and learned more about internet ministry, particularly using a Content Management System to create websites that don’t just sizzle, but facilitate real ministry. It was a look at the future.

Next came Exponential 2009 where I was one of the presenters (thanks to Bill Easum for the opportunity). Exponential is the nation’s largest church planting conference. I had the good fortune to rub shoulders with Alan Hirsch, Francis Chan, Ed Stetzer, Tom Clegg, and Neil Cole – all heroes of my faith journey. Since I’ve planted a couple of churches in my day, I found it both exciting and depressing to hear what’s going on in the church planting world (more on why it depressed me in a future post).

Next, it was off to Chicago and the NACCC Minister’s Convocation on the Mundelein Seminary campus (NACCC = National Association of Congregational Christian Churches). I was asked to lead a retreat on the “E” word. It was a beautiful setting and gratifying to know that there’s rising interest in relevant evangelism practices in the Congregational Church.

And so, now I’m on my way to New York where I’ll lead a training/overview on the house church movement to United Methodist clergy who are interested in doing something completely different. That will be gentle look into our past.
Future, Present, and Past. It’s where the church is.

As I take a few minutes to reflect on my journey, I’m heartened by the men and women whose eyes lit up as we talk about ministry practices that can speak to the present and future generations. But my joy is tempered by the reality that has so clearly presented itself by so many of the leaders I’ve rubbed shoulders with these last three weeks. There is a resignation in the eyes, defeat in their minds, and hopelessness in the spirits of far too many of our church leaders. They’ve heard the spiel of the pundants and the promise of their programs for too long and have seen so little change. They’ve tried a little bit of this and a little bit of that. They’ve gone to mega church conferences, micro retreats, and denominational convocations that roll out more hype than a used car sales commercial, but leave with little substance. And so, largely, they’ve given up and are mostly going through the motions.

Who’s to blame them? Most – though certainly not all – got into ministry to change lives through Jesus Christ. But let’s be really, really honest. Most of the members of most of our churches are pretty much the same people they’ve been for decades. They may know more about the Bible and they may know more about God, but their primary spiritual relationship is with the the church rather than with Jesus – with the bride rather than groom.

And so, I continue my journey … physically, mentally, and spiritually. I’m biblically grounded enough to know God’s in charge and the Spirit can do great and awesome things. And I’m a student of history enough to know that just because they can, they’ve seldom moved upon a culture to change the hearts of the adherents, choosing to move on to receptive fields (currently in China, India, SE Asia, Northern Africa, and Latin America). Historically the change, if there is to be one, comes from those who are willing and able to emerge from the culture and rise above it. That won’t come from programs, but from life changes – and until our eyes light up, there will be precious few of those.

Yesterday morning I was in my hotel’s breakfast nook with Trevor from Cambodia. Sitting at the next table was Glenn and Bob (not his real name). Bob was the only non-Christian among us and he and Glenn were having a typical “Geek” conversation about TYPO3 (the website content management system that was the focus of the conference we were all attending).

The conversation between Trevor and I ran it’s typical course, at least for me. We’re both of the school that the Western Church is largely ineffective, if not unfaithful, and that even the emergent movement has left its first love. The conversation was animated as we dismantled many of the church’s sacred cows and noted that little the Western Church actually does or practices has any biblical basis (weekly worship, buildings, preaching, pulpits, pews, altars, professional clergy, etc.). Then we began to speak of those instances where we saw the church being the embodied Jesus. We spoke of developing nation churches as well as those churches in the West where prayer and discipleship was actually practiced. And finally, we both shared personal stories of where we’d seen Jesus at work in our lives.

Did I say it was an animated conversation? We had a grand time together, moments that make new friends especially wonderful and it’s entirely possible that those around us couldn’t help but overhearing little snatches of the conversation. In the end we all headed for the last day of the conference together.

Later that day, I ran into Glenn in the hallway of the Irving Bible Church where the TYPO3 Conference was being held. It turns out that he had just returned from dropping Bob off at the airport. He stopped me and said he’d had an interesting conversation with Bob on the drive. It turns out that Bob, our non-Christian friend, had overheard Trevor and I talking candidly about the church, about Christianity, and about Jesus. Bob admitted that his view of the Christian faith was, shall we say, unsavory and that he’d grown up having no use for any of it, including this Jesus. But he’d heard something in a different light that morning and he asked Glenn to “Tell me more about this Jesus dude.”

The point is, what do you talk about when you’re out in public? You never really know who’s eavesdropping and you don’t know the affect your conversation may have on those around you. And so, here’s a couple of tips I’ve picked up as a “hitchhiker” along the way.

1. Keeps Acts 1:8 in mind. You’re called to be a witness wherever you go. There are lots of things you can talk about, but not everything is worth a whole conversation. If your God talk doesn’t well up from within you naturally, it’s time to invest more of your time in Bible reading, prayer, personal worship, encouraging others in the faith, and other spiritual habits.
2. If you’re going to engage in “God talk,” have the integrity to be authentic. This isn’t an invitation to slam the church or the faith, but it is an invitation to be honest about your faith. If you’re wrestling with doubts, don’t put on the air of having it all together. If you’re looking for something more, don’t be afraid to say so.
3. Don’t be so heavenly minded that you’re no earthly good. If butter won’t melt in your mouth, get thee to a nunnery or a monastery whichever suits you best. The Western Church is in dire need of disciples who are “real” and have lived a “real” life. Trevor and I laughed like hyenas and although we weren’t particularly profane, we sure as heck weren’t holier-than-anyone else. Having fun is not a sin. Either is smiling, laughing, and even carrying on some.
4. And finally, expect God to do things with you, through you, and around you. Many Christians walk through life without keeping their eyes open for what God’s doing all around them. They don’t expect God to be busy intervening in their lives, let alone the lives of “innocent” bystanders. Keep your eyes open, both the ones in your head and the ones in your spirit. You may be surprised at what’s really going on around you.

Today I’ve spent all day … well, from 10:30 AM until 4:20 … training fifty-two participants the first half of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to Evangelism seminar. I’m exhausted (that’s a lot of time up in front doing a lot of the talking) and yet I’m too wound up to sleep. There’s something about watching folks “get it” when it comes to good-newsing the world. What’s most gratifying, is the number of the under-thirties who shared how much they got out of it and that what they heard are tips and tools that they realize will work in their contexts.

One of the hot topics of conversation at this event has been the discussion of the “church’s” role in evangelism. When I use the word “church” here, I’m meaning the cultural understanding of the church as a local expression, that is, a typical North American congregation that meets in some sort of dedicated building. What happens, several were asking, when we share our faith stories and invite our friends to come with us to church and when they get there the welcome and the love and the acceptance just isn’t there. In other words, is our evangelism efforts for naught if all we have to invite them to is church-as-usual?

That’s the rub, isn’t it? I’ve been on staff at churches in the past wheren I was hesitant to invite the unchurched and the irrelgious to visit. I figure that I get ONE chance with someone who’s authentically seeking and if I, or the church, blows it, the seeker may never give the church another chance. Rather than risking the loss to the kingdom, I’d invite them to other churches in the area where I knew they had a pretty good chance to meet Jesus rather than to a church where I knew they had a better chance of meeting ho-hum church-as-usual. I’m afraid there are some things that I’m just not willing to risk.

Which is a real dilemma for some in this evangelism seminar. Just what DO you do when the church you attend is “stuck” or in the midst of its own transformation? How can we prepare the serious seeker for their encounter with “the church” when it’s more of an insider’s club than a well-functioning rescue station? When is taking the risk the “right” thing to do?

It’s a dilemma and I’d be interested to hear your answers. My response is, instead of inviting a serious seeker to the “church” (i.e., the Sunday worship service in The Building), I invite them to an effective small group that I’m a part of. Hopefully that small group would be attached to the “church,” but I’m less concerned about that than I am in creating an incubator for love, warmth, hospitality, and discipleship.

What do you do when your friend, relative, associate, neighbor, or co-worker is seriously seeking spiritual answers? We live in a time where the economic crisis may be helping people get “ripe” for asking those questions. When they do, will you “risk” taking them to church? If not, what will you do?

Back at home and trying to get back in the groove of things. As I reflect on my time at the World Convention of the Christian Church, one of the things that niggles me is that ostensibly the purpose of our meeting was to help instill unity amongst the three strands of the Campbelite movement (the Church of Christ (non-instrumentalist/a capella), the Disciples of Christ, and the independent Christian Church). There was some good talk about unity, but I didn’t notice a lot of progress in that vein as I attended a variety of seminars. For instance, Gailyn Van Rheenan of MissionAlive, a church planting support ministry, presented his church planting process. His methods are much like what I recommend when working with an individual who is going into church planting with minimal funding … start with small groups, develop committed disciples of Jesus, and then move into the public launch when you have a core of 60 or more.

It’s a good model. Not the only good model, but a good one nonetheless. But there were those there who were from a different strand and were narrow-minded enough to be dismissive of this model because it didn’t start with a large team, didn’t emphasize public worship from the beginning, and didn’t depend on marketing to create a launch. I’m okay with folks disagreeing with what’s best for a particular setting, but not only to dismiss, but to be dismissive, of a model that is working (Van Rheenan helped start 150 churches in Africa and has several church planting teams in the US now) … well, that’s not alright. Rather, it’s clearly the workings of a very teeny tiny mind.

Teeny Tiny Thinking is a real issue in North America. As a church, we don’t believe big enough. We struggle to raise $5000 for a worth ministry project and forget that it’s nearly as easy to raise $1 million. Really it is … but you have to have a BHAG, a Big Hairy Audacious Goal … and you have to believe in it enough that your heart and mind and soul sing. BHAGs are God-Sized visions, not little teeny tiny thinking visions.

Unity? That’s a nice goal, but the last time i checked, that seems to be a minimum expectation in the New Testament, as a quick read through John 17 and Ephesians quickly reveals. So, let’s get over our teeny tiny thinking and ponder on what God might have in mind. Like getting serious about multiplying disciples of Jesus regardless of which denomination gets the credit … or even gets the “member” for their rolls.

I’m curious, what kind of BHAGs do you carry around with you? What’s propelling you to the next level?

I’m at the World Convention of the Christian Churches and attended the Bader Lecture. This year, Ashley and Anji Barker of Urban Neighbors of Hope. Ashley and John Hayes wrote the book Submerge several years back, based on the commitment they have made to urban ministry. The main difference between their ministry and other urban ministry programs is that they actually walk the walk – they moved into the urban center (Springvale, an inner-urban slum in Australia) and not only lives there, they lived on the same subsistence income as their neighbors. It’s a ministry of peer-to-peer that demonstrates the commitment of the mission. Today, Ashley, Anji, and their two children have relocated to a slum in Bangkok and are working and living in a similar manner (their describe their flat as approximately the size of four double beds pushed together).

Their lecture was particularly instructive, especially in terms of the urbanization of our world and the typical Christian response. First, a word about the slums. Approximately 1 billion people currently reside in slums and that number is expected to double by 2030. Why are the number of people living in slums rising so quickly? Perhaps because we’ve reached the urbanized tipping point. According to the UN, sometime between January and July of this year the number people living in urban areas grew to the point that there are now more people living in urban centers than in rural areas. The migration to urban centers will continue to rapidly increase in the foreseeable future and the church needs to be thinking seriously about this issue.

One last thought about Ashley and Anji’s lecture. He asked us a question:

“Did Jesus spend time with the poor?”

We all affirmed that indeed he had. Significant time with the poor. Then he asked:

“Does Jesus expect the church to spend time with the poor?”

We all nodded emphatically. Yes indeedy, the church is called to come alongside the poor, and the goal remains Acts 4:34. So then he asked, “How many of you are spending significant time during your week in the presence of the poor?”

Silence. According to Ash, this is far from uncommon, especially as the downtown churches flee from the urban centers to relocate in the “safe” and more “convenient” suburbs. Indeed, only 2% of Christians spend any time with the poor.

Two Percent. 2%. Two out of one hundred.

And there are over a billion living in slums and over half of our global population has emigrated to urban centers. How will we faithfully reach these people at this rate? The answer: We won’t. What are we going to do about it? Well, that’s the real question, isn’t it? We’re not going to do it by continuing to do what we’ve been doing. Something’s going to have to change and I suspect that change will have to begin with us … and by us I mean you and me. Personal commitment. Us. Together.

Still on the road … and feeling pretty road weary. As we drive (I’m riding, Kris is driving) and I realized I hadn’t scheduled our radio show “Church Talk” for August yet. The one problem I have with BlogTalkRadio is that scheduling shows is a pain. On the other hand, I can’t complain about the cost. Anyway, Tom Bandy, my co-host, and I have scheduled our shows for the rest of the year both dates and topics. I’ve put them down below so you have an idea of what’s coming … for those who want to either tune in or call in.

• August 20:  Worship Wars
• September 10:  Follow-up
• October 22:  Holiday Hospitality
• November 26:  Holly or Holy: Keeping Holiday Sanity
• December 10:  Keeping on Message: Mission Integrity

BlogTalkRadio is one of the Internet’s best new technologies. In a nutshell, the BlogTalkRadio people allow you to host an online radio call-in show (you can phone in when we’re on the air at (347) 324-5923. IMHO, the church needs to take a good look at technology just like this. Our show has been popular enough that we’re hoping to offer the show weekly in 2009.

The sun’s going down over Illinois and we’re only three hours from home … if we don’t stop. So I’m going to turn my attention to my wife, which is always a good thing.

Over the years, it’s become clear to me that the single most difficult ministry in a local church is just that … singles. Those “College and Career” groups are literally just killer. Of course, one of my “answers” is always to focus on life-transforming small groups and then let the good times roll from that. In our experience … I checked with my bride, Kris who has as much or more experience in working with singles than I … although there are a number of reasons singles’ ministries are difficult, one of the biggest is over-programming and over-thinking. This is especially true for small groups. We want the “study” to be engaging and informing and filled with ice breakers so the group bonds. Yeah. Over-programming.

Instead of scheduling the small group time moment-by-moment, we suggest letting the small group time be a lot more free-flowing. Do something over a meal … always the ultimate ice breaker … and then get someone who’s been trained in Discipleship Small Groups (see the webinar recordings at www.easumbandy.com/store and upcoming live small group webinars or the upcoming training event in Palm Beach) and let it rip. In a nutshell, Discipleship Small Groups are focused around discipling using a curriculum that some have called a “non-curriculum.” The whole evening kicks off with a single question: “So, what have you read this week in scripture that intrigued you?” This will spark some interesting conversation, since the #1 answer will be “Huh?” followed by comments like “I tried to read through the Bible” and “I tried to read the Bible, but I just couldn’t understand what I was reading.” The facilitator helps the conversation along and typically doesn’t have a lot of answers … but the conversation tends to lively. There are other Discipleship Development questions that the facilitator can use to keep the conversation going, if needed, though in my experience this one question is lively enough for the evening (other questions include the likes of, “Who’s life did you intentionally touch in Jesus’ name?” and “Who did you encourage in their faith journey this week?”).

In week two, when the reading question is asked again, the conversation will be equally “Huh? I can’t believe you asked us again!” and the conversation will probably hinge on excuses and talk about how to fit spirituality practices into real life. By week three, though, people start sharing and the conversation become tailored to the group’s interests and whims. Other DD questions are introduced during the coming weeks, all of which are designed to raise the “Huh?” factor into consciousness and help stimulate discipleship behavior during the week.

The best thing about these kinds of small groups is that the singles (or anyone else doing them) set their own agenda overall. They can do these questions over pizza, at a club, while camping or skiing (at the lodge), and even keep in touch with the questions with those not there via SMS.

Is this the only answer for effective small groups? Hardly, but in our experience, it works out pretty well. Letting the small group set their own agenda within the context of becoming more effective in their faith walk seems to be a winner overall.