That being said, Imbi and I have just shot an interesting conversation between Dave Fitch and Ed Stetzer in Chicago last week. The one hour conversation will go up in chunks over the course of the next month or so. (I won’t get to the edit for about ten days.) It will be available for embedding via Vimeo – and will show up on my blog as well as Allelon, I believe.

Bill, I thought you probably had something to do with the video. I knew it had been around for a while but didn’t realize it was the first in the series.

I actually just gave a talk on this topic at the Acts 29 Bootcamp: Spirit-led Ecclesiology: Following the Spirit thru Church Planting. Van Gelder has been one of my influences in this. I suggest that the role of discernment is often replaced by apostolic moxie or academic models/methods, jettisoning the role of the Spirit in planting. To cut to the chase, I think we can gain more discernment by asking the Spirit what he is doing in our cities and in our churches when we encounter unplanned change. The Spirit has been at work in our cities, towns, and villages long before we arrived, yet we frequently plant as if we bring a denovo work. When we encoutner resistance or barriers or unplanned change, we force our agenda or create a new one without inquiring of the Spirit. Simply creating a habit of asking and listening to the Spirit when our culture shifts, our target people change, our city suffers, our church changes, our people push back, etc. Simply asking the question in every circumstance and following the SPirit’s leading would lead to much greater discernment in church planting and contextualization of the gospel