On Thursday evening (30th Sept 2010) I went to join The Wanderers MSC as they gathered, for the first time in a new way, as many people involved in The Wanderers as possible. We had Curry and Communion - a great time together. A number of things occurred to me about this. The 'extended family' (oikos) nature of this - people were part of this and yet involved at all sorts of different levels in the wider MSC activity. The way in which this gathering involved a potent combination of perspiration and inspiration - they have got on with doing things... not waited around for things to happen.... they have also been very open to getting inspiration from God through praying together as a core team etc. Finally I was really encouraged that this MSC started under two years ago as just four people. Now there was a group of 18 gathered for curry and communion, some of them, maybe even up to half of them coming to faith over the last year or so. How encouraging! How simple!

I have just contributed to a presentation for the Diocese of Ripon & Leeds Diocesan Synod on Pioneer Ministry. In my presentation I was giving a simple introduction to what we are trying to do - I went over just a few of our values - some memorable phrases that are influential

• A Community of Communities - MSCs & Services - Gathering & Scattering
• Low Control High Accountability - releasing & the taking of responsibility
• Mission as the organising principle - MISSION shaped communities
• You can belong at different levels - MSC isn't about delivering people to central gatherings where 'the proper Christians are'!
• There are many opportunities but fewer callings - revelation and response, hearers of the word and doers of the word, inspiration & perspiration

It was good to go over these things again - I find that I need to regularly revisit vision and values - its kind of a missional discipline to reconnect with such things regularly. If God has given revelation in such areas we must respond. 

Getting firmly established

Those who regularly read this blog (sorry for the lack of updating recently), or are connected with Kairos in any way will know that we are in a significant transition. 3 years on and we are moving an established Church of England church into a network of missional communities - a community of communities. At time of writing we have 6 mission shaped communities - MSCs - all functioning in different ways developing at different paces. What an adventure!
Recently I have been thinking about what it takes to become firmly established.... that is not just being in existence but living life to the full. King Solomon's life is worth looking at. In 1 Kings 2 we find him taking on the kingship from his father David. David gives Solomon some instruction and in effect the kingdom to rule. At the end of this passage it says "So Solomon sat on the throne of his father David, and his rule was firmly established" (2:12). Solomon then goes and does what David has told him and right at the end of the chapter we hear these words; "The kingdom was now firmly established in Solomon's hands" (2:46b) - it seems to me that if we are to become 'firmly established' we need to understand the dynamic of being established in 2 ways as Solomon was. First he received the crown, from his Father he gained the right to rule. We get a 'crown', a right to rule, as we come to Christ and pledge ourselves to follow him. We gain our identity as children of God, people he is pleased to give the kingdom to. This right to rule, however, has to turn into the action of reigning. Just as Solomon had to follow his father's instructions, so do we. We have to do everything Jesus commanded (Matt 28) - that is the action that will enable us to become established. 
What we are looking for in those leading MSCs, well basically in all disciples, is a clear sense of their 'right to rule' and a willingness to take the appropriate action even if it is challenging and costly. 
What it seems that Solomon learned is that a combination of wisdom from above (what do you want asks God.... wisdom please says Solomon 3:5-6) and humility from below (I am only a little child 3:7) was the way to function and not only was his rule and reign established but it was also fruitful. Two qualities I look for in followers of Jesus are humility and the ability to go to God for wisdom. Humility and wisdom are clearly interlinked throughout scripture - let's take them seriously.

MSC Leaders & Emerging Leaders Day

Yesterday we had some time gathering together MSC Leaders and emerging leaders for inspiration and encouragement. We will be doing these things termly and the idea is to get practitioners to come and stir our thinking, our creativity, our imagination.Martin Garner of Freespirit http://www.freespirituk.org/home.html was really inspirational, challenging and encouraging.
Here are some things I noted as he spoke:

Its impossible for God not to do something

Mission has been called the mother of all theology, Martin added that it is also the mother of all practice

In regard to mission he quoted Sojourners as working with 3 questions when seeking to be effective
1) What is the mission to this community?
2) What kind of community supports that mission
3) What set of disciplines supports the community to support the mission

Jesus and the Church has been subject to identity theft (Think about it!!)

Many people that we will come across are already praying - there is already something going on between them and God - articulated or not

If you are a truly missionary people you won't know where you'll end up

We must endeavour to do things WITH people not FOR people

Bounded Set & Centred Set
Christianity can be very 'bounded set' - if instead you move to an understanding that you don't define things by who is IN or who is OUT but instead are defined by what is at the centre, JESUS, then there are no boundaries just the question of where people are in relation to Jesus.

Jesus command was to go into all the world and make disciples, teaching them to obey his commands and baptise them. George Patterson listed a series of commands:
1) Repent and believe
2) Be baptised
3) Receive the Holy Spirit
4) Love God, neighbour, enemy
5) Pray
6) Give
7) Share in Communion
All these things are continous - they need to be done over and over again - so that they are emnbedded in our lives

Jesus doesn't belong to me

LOVE - with no agenda

Jesus says 'Come follow me' - it means he believes in us - that we can be like him - otherwise he wouldn't ask

The invitation is not to join the church and/or become religious but rather to become part of God's great rescue plan

Steps the Disciples took in following/believing in Jesus - the recognised him as:
Great Teacher
then
Prophet
then
Messiah
then
Son of Man
then
Son of David
then
Son of God - God himself

The best medicine for me is always repentance

MSCs - households of faith

I've been spending quite a lot of time with leaders of missional communities in the past couple of weeks. There is lots to be thankful for - two MSCs are preparing to do ALPHA courses with people who are interested in exploring faith further. The great thing is that these ALPHA's are emanating from a community of people who are willing to take the call seriously to 'go and make disciples' - in other words they aren't expecting some 'others' to do it... they are doing it themselves. This confirms that as a church a key part of our vision is to seek to transfer responsibility... the ability to respond.... to those who have been commanded by Jesus to go and make disciples. Communities of disciples are well positioned to respond positively and strongly to our society - an MSC is small enough to care and big enough to engage as a spiritual household, an extended family in a western world that is thirsty for community. The 'oikos' was the household of extended family and friendships formed around common purpose that was  the primary 'unit' of early church. MSCs as oikos are about committing our lives together to a common purpose and re-ordering our lives bringing faith, family & mission focus together. It means that we also need to have to adjust our faith expectations. Where perhaps we have expected people to come to faith through something centrally organised like ALPHA or our services instead we are expecting MSCs as 'oikos' to be life-transforming environments that multiply and this requires that we have faith for people coming to Christ as we go.I'm praying that faith will be released for multiplication of MSCs throughout the surrounding area.

Shared Values & Shared Hearts

I was talking to someone the other day who is thinking about joining one of the MSCs. Our discussion centred around shared values and a shared heart. You have to share values - for instance the Wanderers group demonstrates a high value on getting out amongst other people, Outnumbered highly value family life - it seems to me that there is an hierarchy of values - some are higher than others.... and you need to agree to walk in these values with others. The Wanderers value family life of course - but it just isn't their defining value. But shared values aren't everything.... you need to share a heart as well. This is much harder to quantify - maybe the person of peace teaching of Jesus helps... if someone is open to us, welcomes us, if we feel a similar welcome and openness in our lives - if we are able to think 'I can do and want to do business with that person' then probably we share the same heart as well as values. But eventually we have to do it to see it - the more time we spend UP & IN & OUT together the more we'll clarify whether indeed we share values and share a heart.

"Fewer Services, More Service"

I'm just finishing a book called 'New Monasticism - what it has to say to today's church' by Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove. A challenging read, though unashamedly American in context, at one point he talks about wanting to introduce a new slogan to churches "Fewer Services, More Service." He is drawing on Jesus' washing of feet and points out that we often remember that Jesus said that others will know we are Christians by our love but we forget that the context for this showing love was in the washing of feet. It is good to have ministries that are focussed on showing love, it is great to have inspiring worship services, it is good to have rituals of foot-washing but we forget that footwashing was something that had to be done, that was need based because feet in those days became filthy. Footwashing was the daily job of a servant tending to the basic needs of a household and we are told to function like this. How much do we pay attention to the care of each others needs? Do we turn up at a Central Gathering or any service of worship with the attitude of 'how am I going to serve the needs of others today?' Do we even know the basic needs of those we worship with? How far, anyway does a worship service permit the genuine serving of need?

One of the things that MSC allows us to do is to grow in this sense of each others needs, to provide opportunity for needs to be met. MSC provides us with fewer services and more opportunity for service. It takes time to form relationships that can meet needs as needs must be disclosed and will only be disclosed where there is trust and trust has to be earned. But there is something deeply attractive about Christians genuinely serving each other because from the overflow of such love others are served and cared for also. I love the quote that David Day had in his fantastic little book about Jesus called 'Pearl of Great Price' "She built a bridge of friendship to my heart and over that bridge walked Jesus." Wow!

Now of course if you are after a church that is focussed on merely on providing services of worship then our vision and practice is not for you. We are making it quite difficult to be part of this church because our times of gathered worship are not seen as the 'be all and end all' but merely part and parcel of a whole life of being a 'follower and a fisher'. We are serious about discipleship, leadership and that being a Christian is supposed to be an adventure for us all not just a select few who relish change.

Counting the cost to be fit for service

Last Sunday at our twice a month central gathering we were looking at 3 of Jesus' encounters with people:

As they were walking along the road, a man said to him, "I will follow you
wherever you go." Jesus replied, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have
nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head." He said to another
man, "Follow me." But the man replied, "Lord, first let me go and bury my father." Jesus said to him, "Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God." Still another said, "I will follow you, Lord; but first let me go back and say good-by to my family." Jesus replied, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God." Luke 9:57-62

I noted 3 challenges for us as followers:

1) Comfort - the guy who tells Jesus he will follow him and maybe expects congratulation and affirmation only to be probably surprised or even shocked by Jesus telling him that his way of life is one where he gets nowhere to lay his head. It is not a comfortable way.

2) Convenience - this guy seems to have a pretty good reason not to respond immediately to Jesus calling him to follow. Jesus' reply challenges the way in which we seem to find all sorts of plausible excuses not to put following Jesus first in our lives. We fit Jesus into our diaries and calendars forgetting that we wil live better by submitting them first to him.

3) Distraction - "I will follow you, Lord; but first let me..." - how many times do we function by the word 'but'? Too much. It isn't wrong for someone to want to say goodbye - it just isn't great to be distracted - there are always things that could distract us - I am writing this with lots of commotion of our family-life around me and am having to concentrate hard so as not to lose the thread of my thoughts. It is so easy to find an excuse for not following NOW. As Jesus points out, if we were ploughing and kept looking back the furrow we have created will be next to useless for sowing and harvesting. So often we look at other things, we look back and find ourselves moving in the wrong direction. We are therefore not fit for kingdom purposes.

As we continue to develop mission shaped communities we will find that there are times when we have to tackle these kinds of things in ourselves - are we ready to count the cost?

Messy Church

This Saturday one of our MSC's begins Messy Church - if you want to know more have a look at our website http://www.stmarysharrogate.org/ The idea is that we have a chance to gather a whole load of families together for Glue, Glitter and God once a month as well as gathering around food in someones house and a small group at other times. This MSC is known as Outnumbered - the name taken from the BBC sitcom of family life - "Outnumbered follows the daily chaos of family life and two parents and three young children locked in an unequal contest." So much of family life is chaotic and challenging - Outnumbered MSC reckons that it is a good idea to include God in it!

Things often feel chaotic, or at the very least messy, in our lives. Somebody recently wrote about change, commenting that we are okay with continous change, the kind of change that develops out of what has gone before and can be anticipated and managed, .... but it is discontinuous change that is our main challenge a kind of change that is disruptive and unanticipated, that we feel ill equipped to deal with. This kind of change seems to be what we are so often dealing with in our present circumstances but we believe that God brings order out of chaos, that he redeems and turns things around. We are a people of hope even in the face of change and uncertainty and we see this being worked out in our lives as we remain faithful to him and his promises.

Digging or doubling?

Last Sunday I spoke on the parable of the talents. Three men, two of whom had a 'doubling' attitude (they doubled what the Master gave them) and one that had a 'digging' attitude (he dug a hole and buried that which the Master gave him).

The 'digger' had an attitude towards the Master that was wrong. He somehow felt that the Master was mean and lacking in mercy whereas the response of the master to the 'doublers' showed something very different.

We need to check out what our attitude to God is. Do we really see him as a generous father who will give good gifts to his children? If we see him like this we are much more likely to

1) live a life based on making positive investments - putting our money where our mouth is. One of the biggest laughs we had on Sunday morning was when Ian Jenkins was reading the Parable of the Talents and got to that bit where the Master tells the 'Digger' that he could have earned some interest on the money in the bank! Some investments will fail - if we are to speculate to accumulate there will be an element of risk taking. But we must still seek to make investments - not to dig a hole and bury what we have.

2) be unafraid to take risks. One of the things that most winds me up is over cautiousness. The church in our country is too often characterised by a paralysing caution and a fear of failure. I want to encourage an environment that sees taking risks, making investments and making ourselves available to God as key parts of our common life.

Our direction as a church is an investment and a risk. We are investing in mission shaped communities, in releasing communities of disciples in the mission of Jesus. This is a risk because if we wanted to play safe we would have stuck with focussing our energies on more traditional forms of being and doing church - which in themselves are not bad - they are just not what we are called to do.

I am so glad that all the indications are that 'doubling' is what we are interested in rather than 'digging'. But we need to regularly check ourselves on this. Am I investing and putting my money, resources, gifts, skills where my mouth is? Am I prepared to take risks or responding out of fear and therefore becoming over cautious?

Fundamentally am I avaliable to the Lord and responsive to him?

Remember this...

Proverbs 3:5
Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;
in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.

Fishing on the right side - creating new families

At the end of John's gospel we find the account of Jesus directing the disciples who had been fishing all night without success to put their nets over the other side and they will make a catch. They haul in 153 fish.

This passage has occured a number of times recently as groups of us have prayed.

For me it brings to mind that as a church we have been called by God to cast our net over the other side of the boat - the 'right side' for us. The process of moving into missionary communities will at times be uncomfortable if only because we have been so used to a certain style and way of doing and being church. For many of us church in a certain way is ingrained - the neuroscientists talk of the brain circuits we develop - often considered to be very hard, if not impossible, to change. Penny and I went on a day conference recently on adoption and the attachment issues raised for children who have truamatic start to life. One of the speakers gave the following quote;

"What is helpful about recent neuroscientific evidence is that change is certainly possible throughout the life span. We might never erase the old experiences and their related brain circuit but we can build new experiences and their related brain circuits, new expectations, new circuits in the brain" Miriam Steele. Creating New Families.

Our journey is one of building new experiences, new expectations and new circuits - it is about creating new 'families' - communities of disciples in mission. That is our kind of fishing.

Summer 2008 Text of a letter given out Sunday 20th July

SMC: A Community of Communities
Simply loving, living and leading like Jesus

Dear friends,

Transition.
We are moving into a time of transition for the church that will be gathering pace from September onwards. In order to make the transition our focus has been very much on readying the church centre for reoccupation and doing the initial thinking regarding developing mid-sized mission shaped communities (MSC’s).
We will move from being based around a Sunday service at the Grammar school to meeting in a larger gathering twice a month (1st & 3rd Sunday). During the autumn term on the 2nd and 4th Sundays we will still be meeting together in the church centre to explore the dispersal into the MSC’s further. In January we will take the next step ‘out of the boat’.

MSC’s.
Do look at my blog via the SMC website or this link http://smchurch.blogspot.com/ and you will find some of my reflections on MSC’s amongst other things.
I expect that we could explore starting up some MSC’s with a specific mission focus such as:
1) Family MSC
Vision: Encouraging and Supporting Families
2) Footprints MSC
Vision: Connecting with the wider community
3) Life beyond loss MSC
Vision: Caring for those who have experienced loss in one way or another
4) (Younger Adults MSC?) (Cold Bath Community MSC?)
Vision: Building community of faith amongst those who are spiritual but not religious(?)
These are just thoughts at the moment but I wonder whether as you reflect on these kinds of things over the summer that you may feel you would want to be part of one of those areas. You may even have a vision for leadership in one of them. Over the summer I am most available during the last two weeks of August if you want to get together and talk this through. Simply phone me on 07841595203 or email me mark@stmarysharrogate.org.

Help.
We want to get the SMCentre redecorated over the Summer – please don’t leave it to the usual suspects – spare a morning or an evening to help out. Andrew Clarke can advise you.

Pioneer Children’s Leader.
Do pray that we are able to get the Cold Bath Road flat sorted out quickly for Rachel and Mark Turner to move into at the end of September. Some of us will be meeting Rachel at New Wine.
Until Rachel arrives we will be carrying on working together to support the children’s groups. Again, ‘transition’ is the word… Rachel will need help and support as she takes things on.

Parish Communion.
Our 9am Holy Communion service is taking shape. This service has a traditional feel with liturgy and hymns and is open to all (not just those who have been involved with All Saints). If you feel that the MSC’s may be a little hard for you to feel at home in why not see if the 9am parish communion is a better place to belong. The meeting room, to the surprise of some, makes a very worshipful chapel-like venue and I envisage services being held in there indefinitely.
Please pray for those who are making the transition from All Saints to this service and those who are making a transition to other churches after much prayer and reflection.

The Anglican Communion.
Do pray for the gathering of Bishop’s called the Lambeth Conference that is happening at the moment. The political game playing, bad press and absence of up to a third of the conservative Bishop’s will keep this in the public gaze. I’m not sure how much of it will be good news and I feel sad that things have come to this. As I write I am reminded of Hosea 6 and especially the first few verses – why don’t you look these up and use them as a basis for praying for the worldwide church and especially the Anglican Communion.

Here comes the summer! Keep an eye on the FYI and website for details of services.
A good number of us are going to New Wine and onto other holidays – have a great time wherever you are going.

Defining MSC at SMC

Medium-sized - 15-35 people but can start smaller

Mission-shaped - defined by a common vision

Community - building a shared life



"big enough to compete and small enough to care"

"small enough to have a common vision and big enough to do something about it"

SMC Changing... some FAQ's (frequently asked questions)

What is the plan?

• During the Summer of 2008 reoccupy and resettle the SMC Centre/Hall.
• During the Autumn 2008 begin to focus on two main organised worship gatherings with children's work, worship, teaching and ministry per month.
• The intervening times we will begin to explore, envision and develop MSC's (medium-sized/mission-shaped communities).
• We will seek to appoint a Pioneer Leader to work especially amongst children and tweenagers from September 2008.
  

Here are some of the things I would say in answer to questions that people may find they don’t always get time to ask/reflect on regarding what we are doing/developing at SMC...
Why don’t we just continue to do what we are already doing?

• there is a town to call back to God and generations of people (especially younger people/children) who are open to God
• what we do at present is good but not missionary - we are able to do UP and IN to some extent but we are less effective at doing OUT.
• our focus is primarily Sunday based and service orientated – designed to attract people but in a limited way
• we are finding it hard to resource a Sunday by Sunday service pattern and don't want maintaining a Sunday event to be the be-all and end-all of SMC
• we don’t want to grow on the back of transferring Christians from one church to another
• 24/7 discipleship is not being promoted and encouraged adequately
• it seems that the loss of identifiable church buildings has positioned us to do a new thing and take advantage of a new and unusual opportunity

Why MSC’s?

• because this medium-sized grouping enables us to be large enough to compete but small enough to care
• because MSC’s can be mission focused in a way that larger gatherings often can’t
• because MSC’s offer a primarily social feel thus enabling a higher degree of participation and ability for people to belong on this level that they can’t on other levels
• because MSC’s can be flexible and gather in all sorts of different types of places and ways
• because MSC’s embrace what is best described as ‘biblical congregation’ – the kind of grouping that St Paul was setting up, teaching and serving e.g. Corinth
• because the thing I have most often heard from the Lord as I have prayed regarding direction has been regarding being a tent community with a tent mentality - and MSC's have the potential to be such things