Week 17 Christocentric.

Week 17 (yep, somewhere along the lines I've miscounted and lost 3 weeks!)

Working just now on a presentation about the missio dei. Trying to highlight that Christ is the centre of the mission of God and hence what we do and how we do it needs to have a core christocentric DNA.

Here's some of my initial thoughts - would value some input and expansion:

 Christocentric worship. We lift Christ up in our worship and as that happens non-believers are drawn mystically to Christ. This includes not only sung worship (the urgent need to examine our song lyrics and ensure they have Christ as the object and not our emotions); but is essentially seen in the sacrament of communion.

 Christocentric teaching. Our task is to preach to people’s greatest needs – knowledge of Christ. Care needs to be taken that we do not preach felt needs; that we do not elevate the Bible to a place of worship. We preach Christ ….that in the handling of the Word, Christ is present. Christ is bigger than a sermon, than an illustration, than a drama, than a media clip. Everything needs to be brought under his redemptive use.

 Christocentric leading. Our church governance surrenders to the headship of Christ. Vision and values are fully connected to Him. We do not attach Him to our vision and values. The question here is ‘who leads the church?’

 Christocentric atmosphere. It is the presence of Christ that makes the church a safe place. Our welcoming environment draws on the belonging Christ invites people to have. [Belong, Believe, Become] A Christocentric welcome is a grace filled welcome. Can the people Christ came to save, belong in our churches.

 Christocentric scope. It is Christ who defines our audience. That audience is everyone. Christocentric scope expands our Un-churched Harry & Sally. In particular for most communities this expands us to a definitive multicultural scope.

 Christocentric spirituality. The church is a community of character more than belief. Christ is our spirituality. Beyond a program, a group, a study, a discipline, we are inviting people to define themselves by being ‘in Christ.’

 Christocentric eschatology. Christ is the climax of all things. Whatever our ending theology, it must glorify Christ and share in his ending of time. It is therefore glorious not mediocre or minimal; it is salvic not escapist; it is the climax of everything – the church, the planet, the world. This is Christus Victor. This is Christ’s Gospel that we live now.

 Christocentric ecclesiology. The Church is One – diversity is our cultural reality, unity is our historic reality; the Church is Holy – like Christ we are fully divine yet fully human; The Church is Catholic – wherever Jesus Christ is there is the Church; the Church is Apostolic – local, present leadership shares in what has been handed down in the life of the Church through the centuries.


How different would our churches be if this DNA saturated everything going on.

Anyone able to add or dialogue with me on this - helpful.

Week 14 and I'm in reflective mood.

OK, I don't do this often but Week 14 of my leadership blog is Day 102 of my dfaily blog from
http://scottishpastormusings.blogspot.com/ so enjoy reading what I blogged:

Day 102 finds me in a reflective mood.
Been thinking about the difference between compassion and justice. We have several global partnerships (Kenya, Tijuana, Guatemala and perhaps something new in Haiti emerging), in each partnership we act with compassion but been reflecting on where our justice is. We treat the wound but not the cause of the wound.

Been thinking about what we do every Sunday on our campus. Is it incredibly easy to invite people to church on Sundays? Who am I inviting in? Are we filled with Christians who invite?
The new Reveal publication "Focus" reminds us again that to be missiological is to understand the culture and the culture wants to be wowed on Sundays. For right or for wrong we need to live in our culture, while being counter cultural. There is a difficult line to hold to where you are cultural enough to be attracting, but counter cultural enough to not be selling out.

But my biggest reflection these past few days comes from a thought in the book by David Olson The American Church in Crisis. Here's what he writes "On any given Sunday, the vast majority of Americans are absent from church and if trends continue, by 2050, the percentage of Americans attending church will be half of what it is today."

He then goes on to suggest to avoid this dismal future the American church needs to engage with three critical transitions:

1. The transition from a Christian to a post-Christian society.
2. The transition from a modern to a post-modern society.
3. The transition from a mono-ethnic to a multi-ethnic society.

The first transition was the reason the INS accepted me to work in the US. I come from a post-Christian society (the UK). In my lifetime it has shrunk from 25% church attending to 4% attending. For years the church did not waken up to this reality. Not waking up costs it dearly.
Sadly, I see mirrored in most US churches and denominations a stubborn but ignorant refusal to accept reality. We are moving fast to a post-Christian society with secular overtones. Been heading this way for the past 20 years .....we are only a few years away from full arrival.

The second transition from modern to post-modern freaks the life out of most Christian leaders. For years I've been reading and studying in this arena and while I cannot claim full knowledge I can agree that a seismic shift is happening at the philosphical level and we actually have already moved somewhere. To too many church leaders this shift is a threat to truth and orthodoxy. Not so. But this fear is causing us to react too slowly and too abstractly. In many ways we are in danger of remaining holding onto the flannel graph in the digital age.

As for the third transition - this is huge. Possibly only 8-9% of Evangelical churches are multi-ethnic or multi-cultural. WOW!! We have been amazed that Redeemer's Church is 50% white, 45% brown and 5% other! Amazing. But my reflection is to realise that we are not too sure how this has happened (not great leadership) and, we are guilty of putting on the cruise control and not digging deeper and being passionate about truly outworking what God has been doing. This one needs more fuel added to it and needs my leadership placed fully on it. Watch out Redeemer's!!!!!

Intentional follow of Jesus ...reflective consideration of where we are, where we are going, and what needs to be done.
A`Sabbath' activity.

Week 13, so what did happen at Easter?

So what do the regular round of Easter weekend services actually produce?

Been hearing a little of the big crowds at various GHC churches across the region, including our own (just on the 1,000 people).

But what does it all produce, or mean?

Leadership has to define reality. Void of reality, leadership can be morass or deluded.

Easter weekend. Hours of preparation. Big services. Extra services. More people than usual, many more people than usual.

What's happening?

Be a good blog discussion - join in.

Is it a tradition thing, pseudo-Christians in a pseudo-Christian land. Time to go to church on 1 of the 3 times people think about going each year.

Is it the 1 or 2 Sundays of the year that all the church come at the one time. Average church in the US sees only 60-70% of church any given weekend. But on Easter they all come?

Where is spiritual seeking on Easter Sunday?

Is it happening?

Or is it more conscience seeking than spiritual seeking?

Is it 'our turn now' celebrating; the Christian celebration of the year and Easter special services are filled with Christians together celebrating the resurrection.

Perhaps this coming Sunday tells us more what happened on Easter weekend than Easter weekend itself tells us.

Maybe counting this weekend is more important than last weekend.

What happened at our Easter services?

Righteously, we could say 'only eternity will tell us'.

Diligently, we need to try to find the answer now.

Any ideas out there?

One of the staff discussions about Easter services I got involved in revolved around regarding many people who might come to Redeemer's Church would be self-righteous Christians coming one of the three times a year.

Questions is - do you engage as Jesus did with the self righteous and give your severest warning, or do you see them as lost souls needing to find Christ.

Do you treat them as Jesus did, or as spiritually needy?

I don't think any pastor out there does not for one minute think that some of the Easter surge is the self-righteous, three-times-a-year thinking they are Christians. But none of us preached judgement on their self-righteous heads!

So why don't we do what Jesus did?

The Gospels are pretty clear on this.

Why do we treat them differently?

Of course they weren't the full crowd - but in most of our churches they were many of the crowd.

So, who's bold enough or obedient enough to start planning Easter 2011 and a sermon Jesus style?

Just a thought.

Any other out there?

Beyond our staff discussion, here's my leadership thought:

I'm thinking the next three weeks will tell us what happened at Easter ....watch carefully. Define reality well.

Week 12 and self-leadership quiz.

Week 12 and it sees myself and at least one other GHC pastor applying the self-leadership principle.

How's that going for you?

Self-leadership.

I spent the past 3 days at the coast with my family - despite this being the biggest weekend of the Christian calender.

Self-leadership.

Bill Hybels first spoke about it. Leading up, leading down, leading across .....leading inwards! We more often than not forget the leading inwards direction - self leadership.

I've got one staff member who will congratulate me on taking this one serious. (Didn't always think I did - so thanks for the compliment Deborah!)

But this week I did.
Three days at Carmel by the Sea; golf with my boys; good food; limited emails; some books to read; running the coastline; beautiful scenery.
And all the time thinking about death!
Yep .....with a major preach coming in 4 days time ...still had to let it percolate.
But this percolating was done carefully and still I was able to be gone and enjoy family time.

I'm not saying you demonstrate self-leadership only when you break from work on the busiest week of the year. What I am saying is - self leadership can be done.... no excuses.

Self-leadership is not applying the sabbath principle. That's a given.
Self-leadership is more than the normal. It is an investment beyond to go beyond.

So how do you know if you are not giving self-leadership enough attention?

Here's a helpful grid I've been using, courtesy of Nancy Beach I heard her give several years ago; its a series of questions about the state of our hearts. Worth doing it .....I know it's worth me asking these questions again:

1- A heart in trouble has flat-lined…it can’t feel deep emotion any more.
Healthy hearts can feel the spectrum of emotion such as love, sadness, joy, excitement, anger and empathy. Hearts in trouble can’t celebrate even when life is wonderful.

2- A heart in trouble no longer engages in the moment or celebrates the good things of life. Healthy hearts have the ability to seize the day and be with people in the moment.

3- A heart in trouble no longer has room for fun, laughter or spontaneity.
Healthy hearts don’t take life so seriously that they miss the fun of life.

4- A heart in trouble has lost compassion for those hurting. Healthy hearts don’t look at people in need as intrusions but are able to extend love and concern.

5- A heart in trouble has lost the capacity to hear God’s voice and respond. Healthy hearts are soft, attentive and open to the gentle prompting of God.

(To get a copy of Nancy’s message HEART CHECK FOR THE CHRISTIAN ARTIST, go to
www.willowcreek.org. It can be found under the ARTS Conference 2000.)

Self-leadership. Miss it too often and guess what - too late and its not just self-leadership you'll have been missing it will be all forms of leading.