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.

In light of this new year and the constant re-evaluation I find my self doing over and over, I thought I would consider some of my bad habits (because it seems that most resolutions come out of wanting to change bad habits), and how they have been developed by church planting. The truth is church planting can be one of the most rewarding and painful experiences you can have, and which end of the spectrum you end up on can depend on your wiring and how you make use of the time.

I am currently in the middle of year four, and have spent the last year working 4 days a week, while church planting officially for 2 days, with one day to make up the difference (I call that a Sabbath). This has allowed me to re-evaluate how i spent my time in the first 2 years as a full time church planter and the last year as a part time planter. These are by no means to be negatives, but observations and if you are a planter I would love to hear (or challenge you to write on your own blog) your top 5 bad habits as well.

So without further adieu here are the top 5 bad habits I have gained (or realized about myself) due to my life as a church planter.

5. a mis-understanding of time.

As a full-time planter I had all the time in the world. But I don’t think I embraced that time as a gift and instead I made time irrelevant. I ended up having too much free time and essentially I acted as if time didn’t exist. I now look back and realize how blessed I was when some sort of organized scheduled activity was instituted to me by my denomination, and how much freedom I had in the structure. A lot of people would say that I am a disciplined person who is great at time management, and to some degree that is true, but without a good structure in place as a church planter you can ignore its significance and become extremely lazy without even knowing it. And it is my sentiment that there are a lot of lazy church planters out there, who complain about being tired, having too much to do and have no idea of the concept of time.

4. i’m not as good at multi-tasking as i may have thought.

This of course could relate to #5 as my now tight schedule has made me realize that i can’t do all that i did when i was full time. But the truth is i either have to be working, or be pastoring and if i try to do both at the same time i do neither very well. Switching from pastoring to working is not a simple switch. It’s like moving from one side of the brain to the other (in the case of my work as a risk management consultant). The bi-vocational life (in its purest form) is dependent on a true multi-tasking brain. I now realize how important it is to help those in my community make the transition. It is my hope that all of life could be more holistic and less about changing over, but the truth is that there is a transition from working life to the spiritual life in terms of activity.

3. Accountability (mentorship) is necessary.

I was given incredible freedom as a full-time planter and believe that it was the freedom that led to some really exciting personal discoveries and church planting discoveries, but now as a bi-vocational pastor i realize that with a little more guidance and accountability I could have accomplished so much more. I am starting to think that #5 spurs on all the rest of these habits, but the truth is I don’t think being officially accountable only to yourself (even if you are relatively healthy in your activity) will allow you to grow or be all that you can. A good mentor (weekly) with a goal tracking or action taking system in place would have been amazing. I had mentors that checked in regularly, but it was more loose and because we were trying some new things I am not sure if they knew exactly how to lead me. I don’t blame them, but i think i am in a much better position now to know what i need. To go further (as per #1) I wish that I had a mentor that was a teammate.

2. I am lacking spiritual disciplines.

When you have all day to pray, read your bible, write and visit, counsel, prepare messages, dream about mission and a vision for the future you don’t realize how hard it is to turn that on when your time is not open/ free. I realize more and more that it takes me an hour just to get into the frame of mind to practice any discipline and that is 1 hour I just don’t have any more. I realize more and more that what I hope for my own community (who work just as much, if not more than me) is not as easy as it may seem. I now struggle to practice the disciplines that before was a way of life, most likely because I wasn’t living a realistic way of life. I wish I was more structured in my spiritual disciplines.

1. I was lonely and became a loner in the process.

This is something that I am being very transparent about, but now that I work more and pastor less (time wise), I have never really learned how to rest in friendship. Most of my time was either spent alone, or with people that i was getting to know, or working through church stuff with and I wondered why I would end up retreating by myself and more and more as the time went on. I didn’t think I was an introverted person, but by spending enough time alone or in work/ hanging out circumstances I became introverted and now find myself struggling to find true friendship, and making less and less an effort to do so (especially when you live in a city where the average person leaves after 2 years). I used to find rest in my buds back in Ontario, but since moving to BC I haven’t found that (moments for sure, and even some recent prospects), and I am recommending to all present and future church planters that if you move to a new city to start a church, try and find some good friends or bring some with you. Friends that aren’t necessarily part of your church, and friends that will be a good listening board and will keep you from becoming a loner, which seems to be the path of the church planter from my experience. No wonder we (church planters) tend to start churches over and over and never stay in the same place.

Well there they are. If you do decide to write your own list of bad habits, please let me know and I would love to hear your stories in the comments as well.

My wife asked me while I was reading this book if I have read many female voices in the whole emergent discussion, and I had to say that I had not. It’s not because I have avoided reading women, it is just that there are not many voices out there that are being heard. It’s not that they have been suppressed; instead they simply are not any.

Reading Phyllis Tickle was a treat. Not only is she brilliant, to the point and able to bring in some fresh understanding to the emerging church conversation, but she brings a compassion to the conversation that is not always present, or encouraged. I sensed as I read this book that she cared deeply for the direction of the christian church in western society and wanted this book to her voice toward that end.

The book starts out as a history lesson on 3 (or more considering events prior to Jesus arrival) “Great’s” in Christian life. Described as rummage sales, Phyllis speaks of The Great Reformation (1500), The Great Schism (1000), and Gregory the Great. She then begins to describe how our time’s “great” had emerged and this is where I truly began to be impacted. Her understanding of technology, the war, and the role of women as a result of the WWI and II, and technology was really helpful in realizing how we have come to the cultural point we are at now.

She then describes (with the help of a good diagram) how Christianity is presently moving within denominationalism from a bounded set (rules/ beliefs describing each denomination) to a centred set (a few or more core beliefs and practices that describe the church that we can all agree on and follow together no matter which denominational background a person comes from). And this is where I find myself and the people that make up the open house. We are all attempting to move in a direction toward Jesus, shaking off the fences and moving toward a well of practices and beliefs that we are “for” rather than those that we are “against.”

As a church planter, this book will come in really helpful as you swim through waters of centred sets, with people that want to be “for” something and not “against.” I give it a CP of 4.5/5 and believe it should be read in light of a few other books such as the “New kind of Christian” trilogy, Exiles, Forgotten ways and my personal favourite Search to belong.

Thanks to readernaut, I am going to put it on my list of books to read again in 2009.

My friend James posted a link to an old post of mine that as I sit here in Victoria had me thinking.

I wonder how much further I have truly thought about these thoughts on creating community.

One of the things that i struggle with is reviewing the past. Whether it’s reading a book I have read once before or opening some old journals to see where I have come from. This is something that I have been poor at for most of my life. Everything seems to be centred around “new” or forward for me. Even as I look at my resolution from last year (to read 4 books a month, of which I believe I am only at 22/48) I can see my desire to keep moving forward to achieve, versus reflecting and learning from my experiences.

Our church has been through 3 months of transition. One of my goals for this holiday is to think through these past 3 months and learn from it. I am having a trouble reflecting, and I am wanting to try something new and forward.

I believe my desire to always move forward if harnessed well can be effective in visioning the future, but without an understanding of the past we will continue to make the same mistakes and never truly move forward. Our forward progress will always be met with resistance and probably 3 steps back for every 2 steps forward… and yes as a former engineer that is movement backwards, not forward.

I was thinking about Jeremy Williams on the Maple Leafs today and how he has scored 5 goals in 7 games since being called up from the minors and how in the past he has been called up 2 other times and has scored in the first game of each of the those call ups, and yet the Leafs continue to send him back to the farm team despite this fact.

I wonder how important the past is to him…

3 times up to the Leafs, 3 goals in 3 first games after each call up, and possibly 3 times sent back to the minors.

Or perhaps he lives in the moment. His understanding of the past is not that he keeps getting bad breaks, but instead he remembers how awesome it was to score a NHL goal of which thousands upon thousands of players never experience.

I wonder if I was to review the past I would feel a sense of bad breaks and failure. I wonder if I looked over an old journal post I would realize all I said I would do and haven’t.

I wonder if I read that book again I would remember some greats thoughts that would have come in handy a month ago and feel like a bad leader.

I wonder…

Perhaps that’s the problem.

My assumptions are killing me.

I had a great conversation with Anna the other night about church planting. I’m starting to see two waves (understandings) of church planting rise to the surface in my life, and maybe I am being to reductionist in my thinking, but bare with me (and my constant use of parenthesis) as I am sure there a lot of spin offs on this idea.

What we talked about has some to do with my previous post. But these thoughts are more about how we can affirm those who don’t necessarily connect with a formal church body, but in fact are active as a church community with their friends around them than some churches. My last post stemmed out of the consistent profile of Vancouverites that avoid commitment, specifically Christians (in churches), due to a lack of wanting to invest in people, a community, and are effectually selfish in their activities. I would be lying if I didn’t have some of my own tendencies in this area, but I digress.

What I am seeing is that there are those who due to deep friendships and connections, gather at various times to live life, share a meal, pray for each other and teach each other toward good works that are actually done together. I think of the road to Emmaus, where Jesus encounters these two men grieving Jesus death, but upon realizing that Jesus was alive they became alive (in their own sense) and created a community around this truth/ person of Jesus.

I thought of how I might plant a church different if I was to do it again (and of course because I am such a random guy, how could I ever do it the same way twice) and I thought about connecting with a number of good missional type friends of mine (with history) and all moving to a specific area of Canada, living life and shaping church around our friendship that is not only active in growing together, but becomes such a powerful alternative community that our attractiveness in the way we live life draws people into this Jesus way of life.

This understanding of church “happening” is actually quite exciting, but my pessimism suggests that this type of planted community is actually quite rare (at least in Canada). And if it occurs, it happens in the small groups, not in the church as a whole (and I think this has problems within itself). I think of my own friends I first experienced God with and how we are all so close in friendship, and in our relationship with God, but actually live in remote places from each other (Toronto, Calgary, Australia, Vancouver) and so we end up quite spread out. We still desire community and a true connection with God, but we have to start from scratch, and establish history all over again (if that is really possible). We have to form new friendships, start or join an existing community (church or otherwise) and with that comes much more messiness and uncertainty. And this is where I find myself.

I long for church planting experience #1, but I am placed in #2. In #2 we are now spread out, in a new city, with new people, and no history (yet). I have been sent out to start a church for exiles.

I’m not sure how to define exiles, especially when you feel like one and defining yourself is one of the hardest things to do (it’s like someone asking me what it’s like to be Canadian; not sure, I just am!), but I guess I think of it like being removed from all that was comfortable to a place that is different in all possible ways.

So then, my role as a church planter is about gathering exiles. Exiled Christians that are similar to me, looking to connect and exiled non-Christians that are drawn to the hope that Jesus brings to transforming their life and the community around them. It is my hope that the Christian exiles want to connect as I have noticed many of them are quite happy with being out of the “church” community for a while. And for the exile non-church people, there are a lot more obstacles to getting connected.

So in essence, I have been asked to start a church community amongst an exiled people. Gathering people that don’t know me or the person they are sitting beside takes a lot of effort. It takes humility and effort to take the time to create a history and story together. Sometimes we won’t can’t go through the growing pains to get there.

Sometimes I think it would be easier to quit, start over and aim for church planting type #1. But that entails a whole lot of assumptions. The truth is, we are not in that place and are amongst an exiled community and I believe that type #2 church planting is going to be the true test of perseverance for those of us that call ourselves church planters (in Vancouver, Toronto, Calgary or Australia), and wherever you find yourself.

I picked up Alan Hirsch’s book in January and really enjoyed it. And then something happened (well I got a job) and it took a back seat. I guess my reading overall has taken a backseat (but hey I am still at 17 this year). But I really enjoyed this book. Hirsch does a great job of being very brainy and breaking down the thought process behind becoming a more incarnational church planting movement. This guy has a lot of very great thoughts and I have been making some mad notes that I hope to explore again later. Much of what he wrote in the organic systems chapter I found very helpful for our churches current transition.

I will give this a CP rating of 4.5/5 for any church planter who is going to engage an urban setting and would like a great handbook to help through the intial stages of the church planting process. I have been at it just under 3 years and I think this book could have really helped me in the initial stages.

My only critiques are two things. 1) Hirsch has to be the worst illustrator in the world. No he didn’t draw cartoons, but he might as well have because I found his illustrations quite hilarious as he attempted to make points through graphs and diagrams (no offense Alan, but I laughed out loud). 2) Sometimes (and I mean very rarely) Alan got a little too smart. I have been reading this stuff for many years and loved all his thoughts but I think the new church planter might find it a little over the top.

At the end of the day Alan is real, honest and brilliant. Read this book and while your at it, read this review by my bud Nick at symbiosis who has many other very insightful things to say.