In this weeks Leadership Weekly email put out by Christianity Today an interesting tactic is being employed by many churches in their communities that will certainly do nothing to create a sense of goodwill or bring about any sort of partnership between the church and the communities they’re trying to reach and be a part of. Here’s the story:

It’s become known as “The Bush Doctrine.” In order to prevent another devastating terrorist attack like 9/11, President Bush announced that the United States would launch a preemptive strike against any credible threat. It doesn’t exactly jive with Jesus’ command in the Sermon on the Mount to “turn the other cheek,” but then again the United States Government isn’t pretending to be a church.

So what happens when a church decides to employ the Bush Doctrine by preemptively suing their local government for a zoning code the city hadn’t yet violated? This week Collin Hansen reports about the escalating tensions between churches and cities over land use. Municipalities are less welcoming to churches buying and building in their communities, because it takes land off their tax rolls. As a result, many are changing their zoning codes to severely restrict where churches may locate.

Some churches are responding with aggressive legal maneuvers of their own—including filing lawsuits before the cities even reject their land use applications. Do these strongarm tactics work? Are they right? And what is the impact on the church’s mission in the community afterward?

Here’s a full-length article in Leadership Journal about the same issue.

I must say that this is a rather destructive tactic, and one that will certainly engender more and more animosity against the church in the community. This certainly can’t be the sort of message Jesus was asking the church to convey…

Last Sunday was my final Sunday at the Shorewood Campus and Community Christian Church. I must say that it was bittersweet, however I can’t imagine a better place to have served.

When I started at Community 14 months ago I was in a completely different place than I am now, fresh off a gut wrenching and soul draining experience—in short a hellish year of ministry (somehow even those words can’t quite sum it up). Tracy and I came to Community extremely wounded, limping in on our last legs and expecting the impossible from the people and staff of Community. We came in expecting them to restore our hope in the church, to restore our wounded psyche, our broken hearts, and help us on the road back to wholeness. What was unfair on our part—we didn’t tell them of these expectations.

What’s amazing about the staff at Community and in particular the people of the Shorewood Campus: they didn’t bat an eye, were completely unfazed and immediately surrounded us with an amazing presence of love, support and encouragement like we have never experienced before. It’s the same sort of love, support and encouragement that they give to everyone—yet for us it hit the spot and did more than we could have ever hoped or imagined.

Fourteen months later I am leaving with a renewed sense of hope and faith in the church, a firm belief that the church can actually be a healthy, vibrant, world changing force. This post doesn’t come close to giving Community its due for how it has shaped and impacted me over the past year, but I am far different and a far better person because of how this church pushed towards the mission every day. Thank you Community… I wouldn’t be heading to San Francisco if it hadn’t been for you.

The Tangible Kingdom: Creating Incarnational Community
Hugh Halter & Matt Smay

Jossey-Bass—Church Ministry | Leadership
179 pages

[part 4]

At the end of Pagan Christianity, the authors called for and gave practical steps on how someone could leave the church community they were attending because of the vast amounts of pagan practices being employed by the traditional church body… Smay and Halter do something quite the opposite, something rather noble, and in fact something that looks out for the health and well-being of the church instead of someone’s personal preference. This is the kind of talk we need to hear, and the action we need to see in the church today to bring us together in unity and walk through the changing cultural landscape that is before us:

If you recognize that you are a part of a traditional-attractional church structure, don’t punt! The best response is to create the missional pyramid from scratch with a few missional people of your choice and start right where you are. If you leave, nothing beneficial will happen in your church. But if you—with a humble desire to influence or model a new way—launch out with a few friends while staying connected to your church, you’ll not only enjoy the freedom of being on mission, you’ll be able to influence and inspire more people within the existing structure to change…

We ask for a small handful of would-be missionaries to pilot incarnational community. If it works, then we believe the grassroots success will spread to more people in the existing structure. Most pastors have no reason not to want this experiment to succeed. They want you to live out this calling, but part of their calling is to also hold the saints together. Structures don’t change easily through challenge or critique. They change best as people within the organization change and model new approaches. So, instead of pointing your finger at your pastor or elder board, go live out this ancient way and pray for the larger community to eventually move forward with you… If it works, you’ll have helped move your church into new territory. If it doesn’t, you’ll have a great time with a few friends. How bad can that be?

I greatly appreciate this approach, and I could imagine a better way for the church to begin working together amidst different philosophical approaches. This is the antithesis of “I’m taking my ball and going home” which has become way to prevalent in the church today.

The Tangible Kingdom: Creating Incarnational Community
Hugh Halter & Matt Smay

Jossey-Bass—Church Ministry | Leadership
179 pages

[part 3]

…the traditional “Come to us” attraction model of church was successful in the past. People outside the church still appreciated our values… But when our values are opposite, or even different, it is much more difficult to find a way to be together… Cultural distance (a concept shared by Alan Hirsch in The Forgotten Ways) explains why there is room for some churches to stay the same, but also why most churches will need to make radical adjustments. It all depends on who you are called to reach. If your calling is to influence those with the most similarly held values, then you can keep providing the same thing. But if you want to influence the massively growing percentage of people who are much further from the gospel, you’ll have to provide, model, and invite people into an inclusive community that welcomes people with alternative values. (Page 72)

The problem today is not that the church is broken, rather the problem is that the culture is changing at such a rapid pace around us that we have yet to catch up. We need new expressions of church and of communicating the gospel to reach out to these new expressions of the culture. It’s hard to realize sometimes while dabbling on the progressive fringe, how important the establishment (traditional church) is and how seemingly irrelevant some expressions of traditionalism are becoming. Yet, they still reach out to and speak to the modernistic paradigm and fruit is being harvested regardless of what we may think.

By looking at things from this sort of lens I think it allows for us to approach differing expressions of the church with grace and generosity, in some instances even with a sense of appreciation. This is the lens we need to begin seeing each other through, and by doing so will allow for us all to come together with a strong sense of unity amidst our diversity, and realize that we are all called to reach different segments of this growingly diverse population called America.

The Tangible Kingdom: Creating Incarnational Community
Hugh Halter & Matt Smay

Jossey-Bass—Church Ministry | Leadership
179 pages

[part 2]

The issue of contextualization has seemingly reared its head again as John MacArthur and others have continued their rampage against the idea of contextualizing the gospel. Which, honestly, makes absolutely no sense to me—I can’t imagine what vacuum the gospel would have to be in in order to be considered pure, but that’s a separate issue. What Halter and Smay discuss in chapter 6 is the idea that it’s in our contextualization, it’s not solely about the context you are entering but rather the posture in which the telling/embodying is done.

Often times we are stuck in the idea that it’s okay to teach/train missionaries how to contextualize because we’re are sending them to “go over there” into the foreign land. But when it comes to our own culture and context, we often times do a very poor job of teaching people how to create entry points for the gospel in their own worlds. This is the beginning idea of missional living. Halter & Smay make a great distinction here between missional and incarnational (often times they’re seen synonymously).

Missional sentness is focused on leaving and everything related to going, but incarnational represents how we go and what we do as we go… God could have sent his son by asking him to set up a website and download spiritual information to every billboard in the world. But apparently he knew that information about him doesn’t help people understand or love him So the only option for the Father and for us is to embody the concept.

Unfortunately, in modern day evangelicalism, we’ve mastered the idea of going… but we’ve fallen way short of embodying the gospel and being the gospel to people. Instead, “we’ve prioritized the verbals over the nonverbals, the message over the method… the proclamation over the posture.” This is why the church is in such trouble in our society—we’re not living out the values of the gospel. We’re all talk and no substance. We’ve mastered the idea of belief-ism, but have yet to actually live out in tangible ways as a united community what that belief-ism is really all about. Our operating principle, our little cities seem to revolve completely around the idea of believing the right way. Those are the lines we’ve drawn (denominations) and the walls we’ve erected.

In the reconstruction of the church, it is essential that we re-discover and embody the ideals of incarnational ministry… otherwise we’re in for a long ride potentially seeping into a new “dark age” of the church.

The Tangible Kingdom: Creating Incarnational Community
Hugh Halter & Matt Smay

Jossey-Bass—Church Ministry | Leadership
179 pages

[part 1]

Deconstruction towards reconstruction… this seems to be one of the greatest sources of dissent in the church today. There are those that are actively seeking a deconstruction of the norm in order to explore and experience a new reconstructed norm that is positioned to speak prophetically into the culture and then there are those who grip tightly to maintain the systems and functions that are currently being deconstructed. It seems that this is what the emerging church truly introduced into the mainstream of ecclesiology… however the attitudes behind the movement were often times less than gracious (and even though it has tempered as of late, the undercurrent still remains.) I myself still struggle with a gracious attitude to those that have gone before me, preparing the way for the future. Halter reminds us:

As I speak for many in the budding missional church world, I have to share that I no longer judge the faithful, fervent work of so many pastors who have pastored well but who struggle to find their place in this new world. They deserve to be honored instead of belittled. Without their legacy, we would have nothing to build upon.

Therefore, it would behoove us to begin treading graciously with those who have paved the way—honoring them, yes, but also providing them the grace and mercy as they too struggle to find their way in the new world.

Reconstruction can only begin by starting with Jesus… and it’s through Jesus that we can begin coming together as a unified church. “By starting with Christology (the life of Jesus), which informs our missiology (how we live), we’ll have a better chance of finding common ground with our ecclesiology (how we do church).” (pg. 20)

These chapters took a great turn in tone. There has always been a very gracious tone, however the tone shifted from a deconstructionist viewpoint to a re-constructionist viewpoint and a presentation of hope that can be had throughout the emerging church as we move forward for change. The final question for reflection that was asked: “If Jesus were to trim down your Christian experience to his essentials, what would he remove? What would be left?” I’m not sure the wording of this question was truly indicative of the re-constructionist tone and so I’d rather answer a new question… a better question: “If Jesus were to trim down your Christian experience to his essentials, what would you keep? What would you start with?” This is probably an easier question, not to mention a shift in thinking away from deconstruction and onward towards reconstruction.

As I thought through this question of what would I keep… I’m not sure it would be a very long list. In fact, the only thing that immediately came to mind was Jesus. I think as a church we have lost focus and sight on Jesus as the bridegroom, as the head of the church, and instead have supplanted ourselves in his place. In this reconstruction it is my hope and prayer that we rediscover the supremacy of Jesus in the church, getting away from paying him lip service and move towards a new understanding and reliance upon Him. “By starting with Christology (the life of Jesus), which informs our missiology (how we live), we’ll have a better chance of finding common ground with our ecclesiology (how we do church).”

By starting with Jesus we’ll soon enough be able to reconstruct a new “norm” that can speak prophetically into our culture because of the influence that will be gained in our missional ways… but we shouldn’t expect this new “norm” to last forever… a new wave of deconstruction will come about in the decades to come as once again we will have to figure out how to present the gospel to the culture that we interact with.

The Tangible Kingdom: Creating Incarnational Community
Hugh Halter & Matt Smay

Jossey-Bass—Church Ministry | Leadership
179 pages

The Kingdom of God is not the property nor the sole possession of the church (institutional or organic), rather the church is the property of the Kingdom, and it is the church’s responsibility not to exploit but to extol the Kingdom in all of its glory. Could it be that this is where the church (institutional and organic) lose the focus? That somehow we see the Kingdom as a means to our end, the purveyor of our own self-fulfillment residing completely within the church as opposed to our residence within the Kingdom that is revealed throughout the world? These are the initial questions that I am wrestling with…

At the end of chapter 1, Smay posses the question: Describe some times in your life when you’ve wanted to tap out on God and the activities of the church. Talk about a loaded question! As I thought through my time as a “professional” Christian, there are three distinct times that I have felt a strong, strong desire to simply throw my hands in the air, say “f*ck it all!” and walk away. I have not had the easiest time in ministry, however at each and every stage, through every single turn, I have found God sitting with outstretched arms simply beckoning me to “come” and rest. And I am extremely glad that I have listened, fallen into his arms and allowed him to challenge me once again to continue on in his grace (”my grace is sufficient!”). This isn’t the end of the journey, and it certainly won’t get any easier… however He will continually be there at every step, waiting.

It’s not hard to understand why so many are walking away from the church, the statistics are startling, and as Clegg & Bird state (as quoted on page 12)

The inescapable conclusion is that we must throw out any notion that God is truly at the center of the church’s heart in North America. The shift in society’s view of the church has resulted in the marginalization of the church and the secularization of society. Christianity has lost its place at the center of American life. Christians must learn how to live the gospel as a distinct people who no longer occupy the center of society. We must learn to build relational bridges.”

I love that line: “Christians must learn how to live the gospel as a distinct people who no longer occupy the center of society.” (emphasis mine) I find that absolutely fascinating, brilliant and eerily similar to St. Francis, “Preach the gospel always and if necessary use words,” the mantra of the incarnational church. Talk about the need to understand the issues of contextualization! Halter continues: “…something must change to reverse the trends. We need to start by doing some of the things we haven’t been doing, and we must stop doing some things that we have been doing. The world around us is growing increasingly disinterested in our Christian story.”

Smay asks the question for reflection: “What are some of the ways you believe we’re losing our saltiness?” Now, honestly this could be an entire blog post, but for the sake of brevity I’ll narrow it down to the issue of evangelism. I believe the way we “communicate” the gospel (skywriters scrawling “Jesus loves you” in the sky; tracks that look like money left as tips to waiters and waitresses; bullhorns on the corner shouting “You’re going to hell!”; etc.) although they are the extreme cases, they are the picture our culture has of Christians. When we boil the gospel down to a “Get-out-of-Hell Free” card it begins to lose its effectiveness as a beautiful way to live amidst the destruction, pain and horror the world has to offer. The gospel is more than eternal destination—it’s about living beautifully… it’s about shalom.

Smay then concludes his reflecting questions with this dandy: “What do you think of the increasing disinterest of the culture towards church means for the future of the church?” My instant response was “GOOD!” I think it’s a good thing that culture has become disinterested in the church for one simple reason. It should (and I believe has to an extent) force the church to eventually begin understanding and dealing with contextualization issues! I believe that this could be the beginning of a re-awakening of the church, a great revival of sorts, right here in our midst—if and only if we are attentive to and receptive of the Spirit who is working among us. I truly wonder what this re-awakening and re-emergence of the (American) church will look like, and the amazing things that God has in store! We’re in store of a re-awakening or we’ll simply go the way of the Dodo… I’m hoping for a re-awakening!

The Tangible Kingdom: Creating Incarnational Community
Hugh Halter & Matt Smay

Jossey-Bass—Church Ministry | Leadership
179 pages

While at the Exponential Conference I stumbled across this book and was immediately captivated by the title: The Tangible Kingdom—Creating Incarnational Community: The Posture and Practice of Ancient Church Now. I had never heard of the authors, Hugh Halter and Matt Smay, but with the endorsement of Reggie McNeal (who wrote the forward) and The Leadership Network, I figured it’d be worth a shot. So, I picked it up and began reading… I haven’t been able to put it down yet! It’s an absolutely fascinating book full of exciting and thought provoking lines that have made me realize that instead of flying through the book and moving on, I need to savor it and truly spend some time reflecting on the content and questions at the end of each chapter. I truly want to learn and explore this idea of incarnational community.

So, in order to truly savor this book I’m going to blog through the book. (I’m not sure I’ve ever done this before—and if I have it’s been quite some time!) So, in order to take it slow I’ll only read 2 chapters a day (there are 21 chapters total) and spend the next two weeks posting a segment a day of my reflections of the chapters and questions at the end. I’ll post quotes and thoughts and hope that you’ll interact with me throughout. If you feel so inclined to run out and buy the book and join me that would be fantastic! I’ll be posting the first reflection on Wednesday, so join me in this journey of learning and attempting to understand a bit more about this thing called incarnational community.

do you want to heal quickly from previous ministry situations that were difficult, painful, or what you can only describe as downright evil? then come to CCC and live life with the people, experience their joy, excitement, exuberance and passion for ministry—and i’m not just talking about the staff, i’m talking about the entire church! i’ve never seen so many people excited about being the church in my entire life. in just a little over 2 months the wounds of the past have quickly scabbed over and are healing in tremendous ways, and i am quickly being rejuvinated with a strong passion for ministry once again… in fact, it’s rather difficult to explain!

this morning was another amazing reason why CCC is making waves. as we gathered at the shorewood campus for worship this morning we had 9 (yes, nine) baptisms this morning bringing the total for the year to 67! (yes, you’re reading those numbers right!) it was an astounding and exciting display of people relinquishing control and turning to faith in beautiful ways.

shorewood is only a campus of roughly 500+ people and to have 67 baptisms in one year is more than remarkable—it’s a sign that God is certainly at work! i’ve worked in and attended a lot of different churches in a lot of different shapes and sizes and i’ve never seen anything quite like this. in fact, in the 2 months we’ve been here we’ve seen at least 25 baptisms—i don’t think i’ve seen that many baptisms in all of my previous church experiences combined! (that’s probably an exaggeration.) there is such a wonderfully missional culture here at shorewood and throughout all of CCC and i have been extremely priviledged to be a part of it!

our volunteer baptism coordinator, mary kay painted a beautiful picture of baptism this morning and it was so powerful that i wanted to share it. she said, “you’re only under the water for a couple of second, but you have this beautifully personal moment with God. and when you come up from the water you see the world in different colors.”

just another reason why i love CCC.

as i continue to explore the idea of what good news looks like to different people i was able to see first hand what it meant to francisco, the principal of an under-resourced elementary school in east aurora. today, tracy and i headed over to brady elementary school to lead a team of volunteers to clean-up, fix-up, and improve the outside of the building located in the center of a rather run-down neighborhood. there were probably about 80 different volunteers around the school re-painting the playground, cutting down dead limbs from trees, mulching around bushes and trees, planting flowers, picking up broken glass and other debris from the yard, laying railroad ties around the playground, building park benches, fixing fences, etc, etc, etc. in about 4 hours the entire outside of the building was transformed from looking gloomy and grim to looking beautiful.

francisco, the pricnipal, was in awe of all the people that had come out to make a difference. his face was beaming the entire time. i had the opportunity to talk to him on several occaisions to ask him about the front of the school (the area that my team was working to improve) and what it was that he would like to see, and each and every time his response was “you’ve already made it look amazing!” so, we pressed on, planting flowers, cleaning glass, planting grass seed and creating a couple of flowerbeds where there used to be trees.

this was good news to francisco. this was an explosion of beauty, the gospel in action.

a young girl named janessa came from 2-blocks away carrying all of the tools she could muster from her garage to pitch in and help. several children and even a couple of aduls from the surrounding houses even came out to lend a hand… and many sat out on their porches watching this crew of white people in a mainly hispanic neighborhood come out and work.

this was good news to the community. this was the church expressing love to a community in real and tangible ways. this was an explosion of beauty, the good news in action.

the amazing thing about this is that brady wasn’t the only place that this explosion of beauty took place. two other schools at the exact same time (waldo and bardwell) were descended upon! over 300 people from CCC came out this morning as well as teams from Starbucks and Home Depot to help change the look of a school and give hope to a community.

unfortunately i don’t have any “before” pictures, but the first 3 pictures are of the front of the building that my team worked on. we planted a ton of flowers around the flagpole and school sign, built 2 “flowerbeds, mulched everything possible, laid new grass seed, and picked up a ton of beer bottles, broken glass and garbage from everywhere!

the last picture is of the newly painted playground—which looks absolutely amazing! there were about 40 different volunteers working on the playground. (if you click on the pics you’ll get a full sized view.)

an explosion of beauty, the gospel in action.

this weekend i ventured out with the ccc small groups team for a retreat to connect with one another and discuss our key objectives for the coming year from a campus level and a church-wide level.

one of the big philosophical discussions we had was sparked by joseph myers latest book organic community in which he tries to expand the notion of what it means and looks like to connect. it seems as if in the church we have somehow reduced the idea of connectedness to small groups alone and myers argues that there are other ways to connect than through small groups programs. although i both agree and disagree with myers, i am fascinated and challenged at what else can lay beyond our current understanding of what it means to connect within “traditional” small groups.

a good portion of this next year will be devoted to exploring this question of connectedness… and i welcome your thoughts and ideas. in the philosophical realm i am curious of what connectedness truly means, what it looks like and how it happens, yet i am stumped. i have ideas and thoughts but that’s all and connectedness still remains a mystery.

so, when you can’t solve the philosophical at a retreat with 18 other brilliant minds there’s nothing better to do then have some fun on rides that spin you round and round and round until you’re about to hurl…

[me & metcalf]