Monthly archive: March, 2007

What Do Missional Leaders Look Like? #6

March 15, 2007, by 3 comments

The sixth characteristic in our series on what missional leaders look like from notes of Dr. Dan Morgan, Nehemiah Church Planting Professor at Southwestern seminary is:

They disciple with a view to deployment on mission, not servicing the organization.

Morgan stated that as the institutional church ages an increasing percentage of its workers and leaders are deployed to service existing members and maintain the organization. However, a missional leader is committed to raising up leaders primarily for kingdom involvement, not maintenance. Read more →

The Forgotten Ways – Chapter 1

March 12, 2007, by 5 comments

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We continue our discussion of “The Forgotten Ways” by Alan Hirsch by looking at chapter one. Remember chapter one can be downloaded from Hirsch’s website, however after that you will have to purchase a copy, but I think you will discovery that it is clearly worth the buy.

In chapter one, titled “Setting the Scene” and subtitled “Confessions of a Frustrated Missionary” Hirsch tells a bit of his own story as leader of South Melbourne Restoration Community. Hirsch shares how he and his wife were brought to the church as a kind of last ditch effort to revive a church that had experienced birth, growth and decline in its 140 year history. Through the process the Hirschs came to the conclusion that they wanted to be involved in a church that was highly participatory (much more than the 20:80 rule) and missional.

Hirsch provides a good contrast between the typical church growth principles that are used today to grow a contemporary church and the essential components that best describes the nature of the church. Hirsch states “if you wish to grow a contemporary church following good church growth principles, there are several things you must do and constantly improve upon:

1. Expand the building for growth.
2. Ensure excellent preaching that relates to the life of the hearers.
3. Develop an inspiring worship service with an excellent band.
4. Make certain you have excellent parking facilities.
5. Ensure excellent programs for children and youth.
6. Develop a program of cell groups rooted in a Christian ed model.
7. Make sure that next week is better than last week. Read more →

The Forgotten Ways – Introduction

March 6, 2007, by 10 comments

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During the next two network gathering times we will be examining Alan Hirsch’s “The Forgotten Ways.” We plan to discuss the first two chapters in March and finish the book in April. I hope everyone has secured a copy of the book, if not remember you can still download the introduction and chapter one of the book from “The Forgotten Ways” website. 

I hope other friends who are unable to join one of the network gatherings and readers of this blog from other areas will join our discussion via this blog as we work our way through the book each week. There has been a good bit of discussion of the book taking place the past month over at Jesus Creed. Additionally, there is a helpful interview with Hirsch at Rodney Olsen’s site.

To begin our discussion I want to share a bit from the introduction. Under a section entitled “A Journey of a Thousand Miles Begins with a Single Question”:

Using studies by Rodney Stark, Hirsch calculates that the early church grew from 25,000 in AD 100 to about 20,000,000 in AD 310. How did this happen? What was going on in early Christianity to experience this type of growth? To illustrate that this phenomena was not just an early church experience Hirsch shares the example of the church in China. When Mao Tse-tung took control of China there were approximately 2 million Christians. However, when the Bamboo Curtain was lifted some estimated the Christian population in China to be near 60 million. Moreover, the number of Christians in China today are around 80 million. Once again, how did this kind of growth happen? Read more →

What Do Missional Leaders Look Like? #5

March 6, 2007, by No comments yet

The fifth characteristic in our list of what missional leaders look like is:

They foster relational structures rather than institutional structures.

At this point Morgan shared some great insights on relational networks. He stated that in comparison to institutional structures there is no doubt that highly relational structures appear to be more chaotic. In fact, one of the reasons organization/structure emerges is to reduce and control the chaos of relational networks. Morgan’s point however is that while missional leaders still use organization and structures in this way, they allow the growing edge of the church to remain purely relational and learn to live with the chaos that exists.

What Do Missional Leaders Look Like? #4

March 5, 2007, by No comments yet

The fourth of the seven distinctives of missional leaders as observed by Dr. Morgan is:

Their focus is on the Kingdom, not preservation of an institution.

With this characteristic Dr. Morgan’s primary focus was on the missional leader’s caution toward the entanglements of buildings and formal organizations. They recognize that owning a building and developing a large organization is problematic in light of the contexts in which they work. Read more →

What Do Missional Leaders Look Like? #3

March 2, 2007, by No comments yet

The third of the seven characteristics or distinctives of missional leaders as observed by Dr. Morgan is:

They work opportunistically rather than routinely.

In other words, misisonal leaders focus their efforts in places where they see God working. They understand that God is already active in the world therefore the missional emphasis is on entering into His activities rather than creating activities that we hope are used or blessed by Him. As I heard Dr. Henry Blackaby say this week in a meeting in Atlanta, “God is already on mission, we just need to ask Him where He wants us to join in.”  

What Do Missional Leaders Looks Like? #2

March 1, 2007, by No comments yet

The second of the seven characteristics or distinctives of missional leaders as observed by Dr. Dan Morgan, Church Planting Professor at Southwestern Seminary in Fort Worth is:

They don’t assume a friendly environment in which to carry out church life.

The misisonal leader has come to grips with the end of Christendom. They understand clearly that Christendom is no longer the dominant seat of culture. Thereforethey do not assume or expect a friendly environment in which to carry out church life. As a result they recognize the need for a misisonal/incarnational approach to ministry whereby they enter into the lives of people as a servant and invite others into their lives by showing biblical hospitality.