kinnon.tv

Prologue to Missional Discussions

Ed Stetzer has rightly become concerned with how the word "missional" seems to have become a buzz word - rather than an actual theological term with legitimate meaning. To that end, with a number of colleagues, Ed set up missionSHIFT to explore how best to frame our understanding of "missional." A number of us, who were part of the What is Missional Syncroblog? that Rick Meigs (The Blind Beggar / Friend of Missional / Missional Tribe) instigated, began talking with Ed about how blogdom could aid this discussion. This first post, instigated by Rick is the beginning of that "bloggers live aid".

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David Fitch once said that most missional thought leaders "emphasize incarnational forms of church over attractional; the church as Missio Dei over mission as program; organic forms of missionary living in neighborhoods over ministry set in a building." Yet many others seem to add the term to the current program they are attempting to promote or make cool sounding. As Ed Stetzer noted, "The word missional is used to bludgeon legalism and antinomianism alike. To some it is a sign of freedom from all established forms of the church and to others it is a degeneration into syncretism with the world."

So, do we abandon the term and move on? Not yet, because the concept behind missional is really big and words help us when we can agree on their definitions— or at least we can agree what we mean when we use a word.

Over the next few weeks, we want to discuss how "missional" happens in our lives and in the life of the church. It will be discussed here as well as at other places including the blogs listed below. As the conversation moves forward, we hope you will move from blog to blog and offer insights from the scriptures and how you see missional happening in your local community.

By doing this, we can all be a part of a specific missional conversation. As many of you know, there are several working toward a "Missional Manifesto" that will be rolled out as a part of the missionSHIFT conference on July 12-15. The intent with the manifesto is to say, "This is what we mean when we talk about being missional." It is not the manifesto's intent (or within its ability) to say this is what everyone should think or say about the term, but reflects a hope that it will help us all be clearer and more mission-shaped in our own thinking and practice.

Conversation on the grassroots level is important, so be sure to join in here and at the other blogs and let's see where God take us. Here is the team that will be leading the conversation:

Rick Meigs: The Blind Beggar
Bill Kinnon: kinnon.tv
Brent Toderash (Brother Maynard): Subversive Influence
Scot McKnight: Jesus Creed
David Fitch: Reclaiming the Mission
Tiffany Smith
Jared Wilson: The Gospel-Driven Church
Jonathan Dodson: Creation Project

So for the sake of conversation today, leave a comment about with your own 1-sentence definition of "missional.” And, in the weeks to come, we will be addressing certain points or issues in the missional conversation that need consideration and perhaps clarity.

David Fitch, Ed Stetzer, Missiology, mission-shaped, missional, Missional Tribe

Missional® Level® Marketing®

'Cuz some of us little people need to make money from this missional marketing thing, too.

Leave a note in the comments if you want me to sign you up.

Many territories still available, but don't delay. Spots are filling up quickly.

Note we no longer support Emergent® Level® Marketing® - market's gotten a wee bit too small and rather over-saturated.

Missional Level Marketing

Mere Churchianity - Finding Our Way Back to Jesus-Shaped Spirituality

I count it a privilege to call the Internet Monk, Michael Spencer, my friend. His writings have been extremely helpful to my family as we've navigated the waters of the church these past five years. [Update: That's these past five years in particular. We've been involved in the church for a whole heck of lot longer than that.]

His support of this humble corner of blogdom has also been greatly appreciated.

I know how excited Michael is about his new book, Mere Churchianity - Finding Your Way Back to Jesus-Shaped Spirituality. I had been looking forward to chatting with Michael about this before Christmas - and then his health concerns turned into a rather severe cancer diagnosis - and Michael's time has been consumed with fighting that battle. (Please continue to pray for Michael and his family as he, his doctors and the prayers of the people continue to fight the cancer.)

Michael's book is now available for pre-Order on Amazon. I haven't read any of it yet, but I know from Michael's writing at Internet Monk and our email conversations that this is going to be both a very good and a very important book. I've pre-ordered my copy from the Canadian Amazon store. It would be a great encouragement to Michael if you ordered a copy now, as well. (Links in this post are to the US Amazon store.)

You can also support Michael via the PayPal Donate link @ Internet Monk. (If you click the linked "Donate link" in the previous sentence - you will go directly to PayPal.)

Michael's medical coverage and his work remuneration have both come to an end and his medical battle is very expensive. (Michael was a teacher at a private Christian school that was more a mission than a profitable venture. They do not have "gold-plated" medical coverage as I doubt they could afford it.)

InternetMonk, Michael Spencer, Jesus-shaped Spirituality

A Missional KISS

I could write another very long post that provided the history behind the present missional impulse - while debating / explaining the desire to either define it or contain it.

We could talk / debate ad nauseum about David Boesch, Lesslie Newbigin, the UK and US versions of the Gospel and Our Culture Network, Missio Dei, missional from a Reformed perspective / Arminian perspective or any number of the finer aspects of "missional". And, at one level, this might be a rather important part of the discussion as we learn how to disciple a mission-shaped people.

But at another level, it is simply more talk - when what we need to do is simplify the talk so that people might consider being formed as mission-shaped.

A suggested Missional KISS

The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. And that is what He is calling us to do.

The first sentence is from Eugene Peterson's poetic transliteration of John 1:14
And for those who don't recognize the acronym KISS.

mission-shaped, missional

DannyMac Says Mercy is Not Optional in the Missional Conversation

Dan MacDonald is a good friend and PCA Pastor in Toronto. He blogs sporadically - but he's always worth reading. Dan has entered the fray on the Missional = Liberal discussion and scored a KO in my opinion.

...when respected Christian leaders say that an emphasis upon social justice may lead to theological slippage, they are, I think, getting the cart before the horse. It is true that historically, some churches and denominations departed from biblical orthodoxy in the early 20th century, retaining only a strong biblical sense of social justice. In response, orthodox evangelical churches grew wary of both the doctrinal departure of many mainline churches, and of the social justice that they emphasized. The first wariness is healthy, wise and necessary. But the second wariness - of embracing social justice - needs to end. Now.

Mercy is not an option. Mercy is a reflection of the gospel of God who had mercy upon poor, miserable, sin-addicted self-destructive slaves - you and me. The gospel is all about mercy. Jesus showed spiritual mercy, physical mercy, social mercy, relational mercy in His ministry; he foreshadowed the new Creation He will one day bring in.

Please go read it all and comment there (as well as here, if you'd like). Thanks Dan for this very welcome addition to the conversation.

mission-shaped, missional, Dan MacDonald, Does Missional Mean Liberal?

You Might Not Be Missional...

...if your response to the term is to see it as a liberal/progressive plot to move the church into the purely social gospel column.

[Note that I've edited this post for clarity and updated it with a few more links since first published earlier today.]

I've been away from the blog for a while. Mostly tweeting and retweeting 140 characters of limited wisdom. In that Twitterverse, someone noted Brent Thomas' response to Jonathan Leeman's 9 Marks post, Is The God of Missional Gospel Too Small?

Leeman begins his cautionary tale with this;

It's been said that liberalism often creeps into the church through the doorway of evangelism and mission work. I think that's right

And shortly thereafter,

More and more evangelical and missional leaders have begun to characterize the gospel of justification by faith alone, penal substitution, and the salvation of souls as a "small gospel." [emphasis added]

One might reasonably ask who the "more and more" are - though it's probably just easier for Leeman to refer to the amorphous "they" to make his point - stats and facts being optional.

Thomas, who like Leeman writes from a Reformed perspective responds to the post,

It seems that, on one side, we have many moving towards what is becoming known as a “missional” approach, focusing on God’s mission to restore all things to Himself through the person and work of Jesus Christ. It might be said that Tim Keller is at the forefront of this movement. On the other side, we have the more traditional, church-focused camp spearheaded by 9 Marks Ministries and Mark Dever focusing on the supremacy of penal substitionary atonement in any talk of salvation (I’m not so sure these things are mutually exclusive, personally, but that’s not really the point). Again, this is just my sense and I could be wrong, but from my perspective, such as it is, I not only sense a growing separation, but that separation being pushed by the more traditional side. [emphasis added]

I've read Thomas' post a number of times and commented there on how I felt Leeman's central four points against missional sounded like boilerplate from certain Reformed blogs - attacking the particular Emergent Village brand of the much wider global emerging church conversation. (As an aside, please read Reformed Pastor Michael Newnham @ Phoenix Preacher on what he feels the wider emerging church conversation has added to 21st Century Christianity.) In rereading that post this morning, the emphasized line in the above quote stood out to me.

Thomas sees missional as "focusing on God’s mission to restore all things to Himself through the person and work of Jesus Christ" over and against Leeman and 9 Marks focus of the "supremacy of penal substitionary atonement in any talk of salvation."  The Kingdom of God position versus a soteriology that revolves around penal substitionary atonement. To which I want to respond - what difference does this argument really make to the unbelieving people in your neighbourhoods?

Sorry brothers.  Your discussion may be a great one for the academy but I don't see it helping with a necessarily simple and important understanding of missional.

My Credentials, or Lack Thereof, to Be Involved In This Discussion
I'm not a theologian. In my 55th year (how I hate to write that), I've been a Christian since 1982. I have owned a television production company with my wife since 1985 - I'm a writer, director and editor who has spent 95% of my career working in secular media. I've also been, for want of a better phrase, a lay leader in the church for more than half the time I've been a believer - predominantly in charismatically-flavoured Baptist and independent churches. Imbi and I now attend an evangelical Anglican Church in downtown Toronto.

In 2006, I began working with an organization that identified itself as a Movement of Missional Leaders. I was documenting that movement from behind the viewfinder of an HD camera. Never one to miss an opportunity to engage in interesting conversation, I was drawn into hours of discussion on missional with missional practitioners & thought leaders on three continents - while also producing hours of content that discussed all things missional.

References to those missional discussions & insights can be found in hundreds of posts here at kinnon.tv.

One of those posts was written for the Rick Meigs' inspired Missional Synchroblog, What is Missional Church? or A Little More Missional Shampoo. In it I unpack where the recent missional discussion has come from - identifying Lesslie Newbigin as the instigator of this present missional conversation.

In brief, Newbigin returned to the UK in 1974 after the better part of four decades on the mission field in India. What he discovered was a post-Christian/post-Christendom culture that no longer understood the Christian meta-narrative. Newbigin recognized that for the Gospel to have any kind of impact on English culture - Christians would need to become missionaries to their own nation.

How did that translate to North America?

Vast swaths of the U.S. still function in what remains of a Christendom culture. The plot has not been completely lost. But that is not the case for many of the northern states and is certainly not the case in a post-Christian Canada. And the reality is that the trajectory of the Christendom areas in the predominantly Southern States is towards post-Christendom. (See the data coming from Barna, the Pew Foundation and anecdotally in this article from USA Today. Ed Stetzer is the goto person to understand what's happening to the church in North America.)

And this is my simple, yet I believe, easily comprehensible understanding of What is Missional:

To quote Eugene Peterson, it's about,

The Word (who) became flesh and blood and moved into the neighborhood.

Becoming missional means we realize that Jesus has "moved into the neighborhood" and we are to follow him. It stands in stark contrast to church buildings that say, come. Missional stands counter to the attractional church model of Christendom.

I believe there are three aspects to this discussion. Missional is incarnational - in that we are to be the hands, feet and voice of Jesus in our neighborhoods - positional in that we are to move out and amongst, and relational - we are to love our neighbors, whether they ever darken the doorsteps of our church buildings or not - in fact, whether they ever even "become Christians". Luke 10 provides a framework for that journey as we move into our neighborhoods - engaging everyone we meet - entering wherever we are invited - receiving hospitality and engaging in relationship - understanding that in C.S. Lewis' words, Aslan IS on the move - and we are to follow Him.

My definition does not negate the need for Christians to be a part of a real Christian community where they are being discipled and are growing in their faith and their witness. Chicago's Life on the Vine would be one example of a church attempting to live this out. (Dave Fitch is one of the leaders there - and Imbi and I shot the Stetzer/Fitch videos in LotV's building.) There are many others. But the focus is not the building as the locus of the community.

Missional is about us getting off our butts and actually engaging with our neighbours as Christ engaged with the people he met - teaching and then sending His disciples out to do the same.

But.

Sometimes it's seems easier to simply engage in esoteric arguments about who has the completely correct theological understanding - rather than to actually meet and love our neighbours.

Missional isn't complex - but apparently, it also isn't easy.

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You might also find this post helpful on the Missional Longview - written a week after the one I link to above for publication on the actual Missional Synchroblog date. And please make a point of reading the other posts in that synchroblog. If you are at all interested in What is Missional? Brent Toderash aka Brother Maynard wrote eight posts covering all 50 of the Synchroblog posts with a final summation here.

The Missional Mobilization video with Pete Atkins in the sidebar is also worth watching in light of this post. Pete and Kath Atkins, Fresh Expressions missioners in the UK, have had a profound impact on Imbi's and my understanding of missional/mission-shaped - as they are both thought leaders and practitioners.

And might I also recommend you add these voices to your missional blog reading list if you haven't already: Jason Coker and the three JR's: JR Briggs, JR Rozko and JR Woodward.

Ed Stetzer, mission-shaped, missional, Missional Tribe, Lesslie Newbigin, Missional Synchroblog

Thoughts @ the End of the 2nd Week of the New Decade.

I'm finding it hard to post this week. I've begun a number of posts and abandoned them for good, or for a more appropriate time.

I'm still troubled by things from last week that need further discussion. I'm missing the sane voice of my good friend, Michael Spencer. (Please keep praying for Michael and his family.) And the Haiti Earthquake puts the brokenness of this world into forced focus.

You can find me commenting 140 characters at a time on Twitter: @kinnon. You will also find brighter Kinnon lights in the Twitterverse if you follow @liamkinnon and @kailikinnon - Imbi's and my oldest and youngest, respectively.

A couple of quick comments then.

First, the BHT's illustrious Matthew Johnson (Twitter: @revmhj) tweeted about this post from Oak Leaf Church, Selfish Christians. Matthew liked it. I didn't and commented there. Discipleship has got to be the biggest problem in the Western Church (and probably the Church universal.) This story, More U.S. Christians mix in 'Eastern,' New Age beliefs, in USA Today from last December (that I believe Ed Stetzer pointed to) strongly makes that point.

The second comment is about Mark Driscoll's Tweet (Twitter: @PastorMark) about his plans coming together to go to Haiti with a film crew "to help raise awareness & money for the church there." Now, I don't want to question Mark's heart in any way. But I do need to ask the question of why it's necessary for anyone, other than those who are going to work on the ground, to take a camera crew to Haiti right now?

There are probably more than 50 crews already there. Producing more tragic visual impact than one could ever possibly need. Do you really need to be there to raise awareness? (Look at this post of Jordon Cooper's alone.)

Resources are already so scarce, does Haiti need any more attention-tourists arriving at this point to tell anymore stories of the horror and trauma? (@TimmyBrewster points to the fact that the FAA is not allowing anymore planes into Haiti as there is no where to put them and no fuel available for them. UPDATE: Moments after I posted this @NPRNews says aid flights have resumed.) World Vision, World Concern, the Red Cross, Oxfam and every other credible agency is there working there tails off - with people shooting what's going on. And every network is covering this tragedy as the biggest story of this still young new decade.

I doubt another "film crew" is necessary.

UPDATE: And one final thing. If you want to give X% of sales this month to Haiti, that's very cool. But do you need to make it part of your marketing communications. I find that kinda "gross" in the words of @jaredcwilson.

InternetMonk, Mark Driscoll, Haiti Earthquake, Boar's Head Tavern

Coffeehouse Theology Study Guide (Free 'til Dec 31st)

Ed Cyzewski (@edcyzewski on Twitter) is a gifted professional writer who blogs on culture and the church @ In A Mirror Dimly - one of my favourite blogs. (Ed's blog on writing is also worth following.)

Ed is also the author of a good book, Coffeehouse Theology:

Coffeehouse Theology will help the reader understand, shape, and live out practical Christian theology in the postmodern context. Beginning with the relationship of cultural context and theology, Coffeehouse Theology roots theology in the church’s mission to be the presence of God’s Kingdom.

If you haven't had a chance to read Coffeehouse Theology, Ed and his publisher are offering a 35% discount (coupon code: K82E1D8E6).

FREE EBOOK STUDY GUIDE:
Until the end of 2009 - a scant 16 days away - you can download a free ebook version of Ed's study guide for Coffeehouse Theology.

I've already grabbed mine.

Missional Mobilization - Where Will the Leaders Come From? Seminaries?

I don't think so. (At least not most of them.)

The trigger for this post comes from blog and Twitter friend, JR Rozko, who has begun a series of posts on A Missional Vision of Theological Education; (UPDATE: His second post in the series is here.)

After having given several posts to the consideration of bi-vocational ministry, its relationship to missional ecclesiology, defending it as a spiritually formative leadership model, and then commenting on its relationship to theological education, I have been thinking more and more about how we are equipping leaders to lead truly missional communities. Though it’s in no way a brand new topic of interest to me, I want to unpack, in a more focused manner, some of the shortcomings of our current system of theological education and begin sketching what I find to be a more faithful way forward. [Note this quote is full of great links @ JR's blog.]

I'm married to a recent seminary grad and have great affection for seminaries. But. I believe their model has to change if they have any hope of surviving the next 20 years - let alone having the kind of impact they should be capable of as we engage in this missional adventure.

In an interview I shot with Eddie Gibbs a couple of years ago (no longer available online, I'm afraid), Eddie talked about the present seminary model that leads to students incurring huge debts in pursuit of their Masters Degrees. He commented that his banker, financial advisor and a real estate agent he knew were all M.Div's who couldn't afford to work full time at a church - they wouldn't be able to service their seminary education debt.

Eddie was bold enough to suggest that seminaries needed to learn how to give their education away for free - like MIT and Stanford are doing. (Not that I expect to see that any time soon.) He also suggested that churches needed to be the ones sending folk to seminaries, paying for that education and expecting the seminarians to return to their sending community to work there or to be sent out from that community to plant new churches.

Cam Roxburgh, Al Hirsch and Don Goertz talk about seminary missional-leadership engagement in the later part of this video (embedded in small size on the right) - with Al strongly suggesting that seminaries need to break out of the habit of training almost exclusively for one aspect of the five fold ministry we find in Ephesians 4 - shepherd/pastor. (Al provides more insight into APEST or five-fold ministry here.)

However, seminary output cannot begin to provide the necessary leadership to see the church missionally engage with society in hopes of having any kind of kingdom impact. And the present church reality is that most seminary grads are going to need to be bi-vocational, unless they can find a megachurch gig that feeds their debt monster whilst stealing their soul. See Dave Fitch here on Bi-Vocational - or - Go on Staff at a Big Church. (Also make a point of reading Dave's latest, Can Missional Be Multi-site?)

Insight from an English Missional Practitioner
I've talked about Pete and Kath Atkins a number of times on this blog. I've had the pleasure of being with them twice in the past three years. The second time was with Imbi where she and I shot hours of footage for her upcoming documentary release.

Pete and Kath are team members for Fresh Expressions in the UK and have been planting mission-shaped expressions of church in Lincolnshire for more than a decade. (UPDATE: Read George Lings on Threshold - the church planting movement that Pete & Kath work with in Lincolnshire.) They are the primary designers of  FXUK's Mission-shaped Leadership Course - a course "designed for laity, clergy and for all trained church leaders."

In the unedited clip below from Imbi Medri-Kinnon's documentary (to be released in early 2010), Mind the Gap - Church Leadership in the 21st Century, Pete talks about how we are going to need to mobilize the laity as the primary mission-shaped church leaders. We must do this if we expect to have any kind of kingdom impact on a region...or a nation. Seminary-trained church leadership will need to play a supporting and equipping role - more apostolic, rather than pastor or teacher, I would strongly suggest (in agreement with Pete, I think.)

Pete Atkins - Mission-shaped Mobilization from Bill Kinnon on Vimeo.

Fresh Expressions, mission-shaped, missional, Pete Atkins

Moving the Missional Conversation Forward...in Canada

(A links heavy post - you can just click on the 5 minute video below for the actual story.)

A week ago (on Oct 30th), Imbi and I popped back into the north end of Toronto, to participate in an event put on by Forge Canada - the joint network created by the originally Australian Forge and Western Canada's Missional Training Network - begun by Cam Roxburgh with roots in the multi-congregation Southside Community Church where Cam is team leader.(A longtime church network leader and Canadian Church Planting consultant, Cam is part of the missional Roxburgh clan, his father, Bob, being one of the conversation's elder statesmen.)

The ever engaging Al Hirsch was in town along with Cam. (Cam is Forge Canada's National Director as well as being the National Director for Church Planting Canada, whose bi-annual congress is in Calgary this month.)

The Toronto event was put on @ Tyndale University College and Seminary - with Don Goertz as the host.

Hirschy had arrived in Toronto after spending the better part of a week in Winnipeg with friends of ours including Jamie Arpin-Ricci, Gerry Michalski and Brent Toderash (Brother Maynard).

I brought our little Canon Vixia HF11 with me, just in case Imbi and I might get an opportunity to grab a couple of minutes with Al, Cam and Don. We did.

Moving the Missional Conversation Forward in Canada - Forge Canada from Bill Kinnon on Vimeo.

As Al rightly points out, Canada, is much further down the post-Christendom road than much of the population in Canada's Trousers (the US of A). Honourary Canadian, Dave Fitch makes this same point in the Stetzer-Fitch conversation.

Forge Canada is one part of the missional church conversation in my country.

Missional and Emerging networks like Resonate (which people like Jordon Cooper, Pernell Goodyear, Jared Seibert and Jamie Arpin-Ricci are a part of) - and the Resonate inspired Cultivate Gatherings  (the next Cultivate Learning Party is Saturday, November 14th), the Epiphaneia folk, Sarnia's The Story - which has a disproportionate impact on the Canadian Missional Conversation (see Joe Manafo's One Size Fits All), Fresh Expressions Canada and numerous others are all part of what's happening in the occasionally Great White North. (In the summer, we are the great Green and Blue North - the Arrogant Worms explain.)

Since Imbi and I are producing a number of missional-focused videos, I'm thinking of creating the Kinnon Missional Network. But nah, on 2nd thought. I really don't think that would be appropriate.

I've created a Missional Channel widget that you are welcome to stick on your blog or website, if you'd like. It's automatically updated when we add a new missional video to the channel.

Canada, mission-shaped, missional, Alan Hirsch, Cam Roxburgh