Here is a really good talk from Peter Rollins on the emergent church. I find that I really connect with what he is saying here.

And for those of you who scan my ramblings here, or hang out with us at the open house, Jem and I are going to be reading and discussing Rollins book How (Not) to Speak of God – Marks of the Emerging Church starting in September. It will be open to everyone.

More to come on that. Enjoy.

Explaining Emergent Churches – Inner Compass from Calvin College on Vimeo.

I’ve been doing some thinking lately about church planting in Canada and thought I would share some of my thoughts (ideas) with you.

It is my premise that the way we church plant in Canada has not really changed over the past 5-10 years even with all the emergent hope/ activity. Very little has been changed in the church model itself. It appears that we have encompassed the same model with a hopeful/ new message… yet for many of us it didn’t seem to work, and so in the end we have reverted back to the “good old days,” keeping with the same old model. (This is not all bad, in fact I appreciate those that did this for many reasons).

So I have thought this through and think I might have an idea that could encourage more innovation. It’s centered around trials and experiments. Encourage many church plant experiments and trials, as many as 100 different ideas, no cost, and many may fail, but the best work out.

You see, in the past a church planter needed: 1) to be part of a denomination, 2) a large amount of funding, 3) to pass a strict application process in order to be sent as a church planter. I have a feeling this is no longer necessary. What if we just sent out 100 random experiments? This freedom could lead to more people trying things out. In the past only a small percentage of church planters would be funded after getting through the denominational filters. That means that the denominational gurus decided who can attempt to church plant, so if they had 5 applicants, maybe only two were sent out due to available money and skill set. But in this new wave of information, resources, etc. 100 church planters can go out into the world and do this. There still may end up only being 2 left at the end of it all, but I have a feeling they may not be the same 2 that had to go through the vigorous application process as in my previous example and might be perhaps even more successful… (without going further as I wish to write more about this in my next post, this success may not look anything like Sunday morning, FYI).

I think money is a hindrance for innovation. Money will be necessary and needed to be able to continue to fund existing church plants in the more traditional bent as they will still be needed, but unless planters/ innovators/ leaders are passionate before they get paid there will always be the tendency to do whatever works for the sake of getting paid.

If we are able to really give enough freedom to thee planters, the 100 ideas may not necessarily be church look-a-likes. Instead they could be new expressions of the church in our world that many of us have not thought of yet. And it might be this wording that changes our expectations. Active church rather than big “C” church.

I also have a feeling that innovation will be stifled by those with a more traditional theology that is not open to changing. (This might alarm those of you with a certain bent towards orthodoxy). It is this more traditional theology that ends up producing a church that in most cases looks like a large public gathering, fueled by smaller groups that grow the larger one, which in turn determines success.

I also have the feeling that it might be the case that in order to truly be experimenters, church planters will have to come into their context with more of a blank slate… we can’t have our name, look, etc. of our church already determined before we land in the city that we wish to plant. We have to welcome more people (experimenters) with an entrepreneurial heart and allow them to run wild without having it all together.

How would we determine who can come? I guess if money wasn’t involved it would be easier? Maybe it would be harder at first. Remarkable needs to be emphasized and encouraged, even if they fail immediately.

I have also been thinking a lot lately about transaction costs; the cost for us to attend, or contribute to a church. Use of twitter, meetup, facebook have made it easy for people to come to a gathering. In the past being involved with a church type event was a form of commitment because it was harder to come. Getting people to come is actually easier these days. Having them stick (consistently) is the problem. The type of people that come in many cases are not committal. I was reading that in the past 1 hand written complaint letter to the government used to mean that 200+ people were represented (or had they same concern) due to effort it took to hand write a letter and mail it off… this is no longer the case. Writing an email or having a pettiton signed takes minutes, just have a look at how many groups people join on facebook. It is easier and people do not make the same commitment.

I think for me it might be nice to visit a few new church plants just to get a feel for the type of people that are showing up.

Lastly, (and thanks for bearing with my random thoughts) i’ve been thinking about user generated church content versus leader generated content. The leader of the church in most cases is paid to create content for the church (sermons, bible study material, etc.) But I am starting to see more clearly that leaders should create environments, not just content. I am imagining what it would be like for laity (in groups) to create the programs, activity of the church versus the majority of the decisions being made by a few people such as the paid staff. This will involve more patience and waiting for the users to create and generally “patience” isn’t successful. It’s hard to wait on people, but I think if we could be more patient we might see some serious life giving examples of church in the world… at least in Canada.

Please comment and help me develop these further, these are random ideas and i’m excited about working them out.

The most helpful thought (concept) that I received from the book was no matter how cool new technologies are, unless there is a conversation to be had the tools render themselves useless. I see this over and over as people come up with the next best video sharing application, or social network, but the truth is, unless there is a reason to use it or people are excited to use it, it won’t be used and will die in a month. I am guilty for doing this in our own church, where I introduce another cool way to connect to one another, when people are just getting used to connecting via the last 5 ideas I had .

The second cool thing I learned from this book (or maybe realized) was that the ultimate goal needs to be collaborative action. We can create discussions using all the information out in the world, but unless the tools on the web and the people collaborate to some sort of action it too will be rendered useless.

The most applicable thing I gleaned from this book as it relates to church planting (rated CP 4/5 if you are wondering) is the movement of user generated content versus corporate generated content. The filters are gone and now anyone can create content in basically any industry.

How this relates to church planting is this: Anyone can now plant a church. And anyone can do it any way they want. And they can have access to all the same tools as anyone else for starting it. And (whether we like it or not) nobody can stop them.

I think this is good and here is why:

In the past a church planter needed: 1) to be part of a denomination, 2) a large amount of funding, 3) to pass a strict application process in order to be sent as a church planter. This is no longer necessary. And not only that but this freedom will lead to more people trying things out. In the past only a small percentage of church planters would be funded after getting through the denominational filters. That means that the denominational gurus decided who can attempt to church plant, so if they had 5 applicants, maybe only two were sent out due to available money and skill set. But in this new wave of information, resources, etc. 100 church planters can go out into the world and do this. There still may end up only being 2 left at the end of it all, but I have a feeling they may not be the same 2 that had to go through the vigorous application process as in my previous example and perhaps even more successful… (without going further as I wish to write more about this in my next post, this success may not look anything like Sunday morning, FYI).

This book gave me hope. There are holes, as Clay explains, all this freedom also leads to messiness much like his example of the way a group of pro-anorexia girls formed their own meetups, and how there could be some cultish groups that are formed ahead of us, but the more we release control of others I think the more chance we have to see some truly innovative expressions of the church in North America.