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From Paul Martin's blog (TK = Tim Keller; JT = Justin Taylor):

TK: If you define evangelicalism in a John Stott kind of way, the seeker movement is inside evangelicalism. The emergent church is moving away from orthodoxy. In places like Yale, there is a post-liberal emphasis on the text that shows a distinction from old liberalism. This emergent group is really much like this group. Emergent will never really grow as they will not plant churches or build colleges. They may produce some writers… but that is probably about all.

JT: Is emergent growing?

TK: It is producing pundits, but not community and institutions.

This is for another day, but I think the legacy of the emerging church will not be to build more institutions but to do something that's been ignored by the existing church, and eventually to influence existing institutions for better (and for worse). But more on that another time.

Wish I was at this conference - almost went with my friend Ken Davis from up the road.

Just finished reading Resident Aliens for the first time after Jordon mentioned it a couple of months back. What really bugs me is that Hauerwas and Willimon wrote this back in 1989 and I'm only reading it now. Reading this book earlier could have saved me from making many mistakes over the past 17 years.

It's now on my must-read list of pastoral theology books, and it's one I'll return to often. It ties together some of the themes that have occupied me in the past few years (such as theocentric preaching and dying to ourselves as churches). If you haven't read it yet, it's worth picking up.

Pastors with half a notion of the gospel who get caught up in this web of buying and selling in a self-fulfillment economy one day wake up and hate themselves for it. We will lose some of our (potentially) best pastors to an early grave of cynicism and self-hate. What a pastor needs is a means of keeping at it, a perspective that enables the pastor to understand his or her ministry as nothing less than participation in the story of God.

To the extent that the church and its leaders are willing to be held accountable to the story which is the gospel, ministry is the great adventure of helping to create a people worthy to tell the story and to live it. The faithful pastor keeps calling us back to God. In so doing, the pastor opens our imagination as a church, exposes us to a wider array of possibilities than we could have thought possible on our own.

Contemporary pastors are expected to have "the entrepreneurial skills of Bill Gates, the counseling skills of Dr. Phil, the organizational abilities of Stephen Covey, the authenticity of Oprah, the compassion of Mother Teresa, the courage of William Wallace, and the humor of Jon Stewart. (Kara Powell, quoted in The Church in Transition)

Bob Hyatt has a post today on Pastor's Monday Syndrome. Love his image of the blue screen of death. I'm sure many pastors can relate.

Monday is post-adrenaline letdown day, especially tough for introverts in an extroverted role. That's one reason I work on Mondays. It's much better to do low-level brainless work and save your day off for when you feel better.

The good thing about Mondays for pastors is that you usually feel a little bit better by Tuesday. Be nice to your pastors on Monday. You can treat them normally the other six days.

I realize this will seem like old news to many ("Weren't you done last month?") but I just completed the final chapter of my thesis, summarizing the feedback from last week's Theocentric Preaching Seminar.

I was encouraged by the feedback. This is an issue that seemed to connect, and despite running out of time, people seemed to engage with the issue and each other.

I mail the final chapter to my thesis advisor tomorrow, and to an editor friend who's going to help me tidy things up. If all goes well, I defend in March and graduate in May. Another step closer.

In The Church in Transition, Tim Conder argues that transition is essential. Nevertheless, "the church's journey into the emerging culture will follow no single path, nor will each congregation arrive at the same destination. The existing church's journey of transition will take many forms and embrace a variety of goals."

Conder is right on when he says, "While the church as a whole must transition, not every congregation will or should pursue these new directions." He describes two types of churches in which it would be foolish to try to change:

Some churches need to continue in their current paradigm of ministry, either because it has proven successful in their particular context or because the costs of transition are too high at the moment....We must recognize that emerging culture transition cannot occur through a midnight takeover of a local congregation that leaves faithful followers lost in a new environment without working language, compass bearings, or meaningful symbols. The pace of transition should vary widely between churches. Transition to emerging culture ministries will be much easier, more natural, and far more necessary in some communities than others. And some methods and practices will not translate into every community. But along with the opportunities, there will be unexpected costs and casualties in every situation.

I've recently stopped thinking of pastors as leaders of an organizational system, and more like in-laws who have married into an established family system. It is arrogant to think that as an in-law who just entered the family, you will change the way an established family functions - especially if the family is dysfunctional. Yet many pastors come into churches and expect to transform a family system that has been entrenched for decades.

Even if this image of an in-law in an entrenched family system is accurate, change is possible. The in-law can be an influence toward health, but it will take a huge investment in relationship, a lot of time and patience, and it will likely involve some pain. That's the type of ministry God has called some pastors to - but it's not easy, it's not fast, and it's not for every pastor or for every church.

Just started Tim Conder's book The Church in Transition. So far, it's the best treatment I've read on existing churches in an emerging culture.

Many have written off existing (some call these inherited or traditional) churches. Conder disagrees:

I believe the existing church is still a viable, needed, and fruitful expression of Christian community in our culture. In other words, I don't think the existing church is a candidate for reformation by extermination. I don't hope for the demise of the existing church. Like many of Christ's followers, I have many frustrations with the existing church...

But inevitably, the moment I lapse into a state of religious self-righteousness and arrogant confidence that proclaims I know something that you don't but should, I'm surprised and appropriately shamed by the depth and quality of the existing church...I am constantly surprised and humbled by the creativity, passion, and effectiveness I witness in churches that are not on the cutting edge of the emerging culture conversation.

Went out last night with Steve Knight, blogger from Charlotte, North Carolina. As I drove to meet him, I thought of when it used to be strange to go to a meeting with someone you met over the Internet. Now it's just fun, although it still sounds slightly creepy. Blogs are great for making connections but nothing beats the face to face.

I like meeting guys like Steve. They stimulate my thinking and stir something within me that otherwise goes latent. I walked away with at least one book I'm moving to the top of the pile, as well as a new friend. Not a bad way to spend an evening.

I listened to a podcast this week that said when you do version 1.0 of something, your goal should be just to survive. "Just get through it the first time. You can try that stuff you read about in magazines later."

Yesterday I rolled out version 1.0 of a seminar on theocentric preaching, and I think it's safe to say we all survived. We had fun and I think we might have thought through some important issues. I couldn't have picked better people to attend and to interact with the topic.

The best part of the seminar was the interaction. Most of the interaction seemed to be about two issues. First, what does it mean to be theocentric when God and Scripture seem to focus on humanity? Second, what does theocentric preaching look like in practice? All kinds of other issues surfaced too, such as how to interpret and apply Scripture accurately (hermeneutics, especially relating to modern methods which may be too neat and reductionistic), and the hot button issue of exemplary preaching (preaching biblical characters as models to emulate).

People felt free to push back, which I appreciated. I found some areas where my thinking is still fuzzy, and I realized that I need a lot more concrete examples. Still, I was pleased that some of my findings seemed to strike a chord, and it was clear that we were talking about issues that everyone felt a need to discuss.

Although I tried not to do this, I still make a rookie mistake: I had way too much content for the amount of time. I think if I did it over I would send out a brief paper with introductory material, and then teach the session inductively. Learning is much more effective when you learn yourself rather than when someone else tells you what they've learned. We ran out of time for the hands-on part; I really had more there than we could accomplish in four or five hours.

I was glad when it ended, because I was exhausted. Today, though, I wish we could go at it again, because I loved thinking things through with a group of people. There's a lot to be said for learning in community.

Now I have to summarize the feedback, add it to my thesis, and send it in. Good to be coming to the end, but I hope that the type of learning experience I had yesterday will continue in some form.

Just got out from the Theocentric Preaching Seminar. Eighteen people attended, which was the perfect size to engage and discuss the issues. I'll post some reflections tomorrow.

If you're interested in reading the seminar notebook, you can get it here.

Modernism is breaking down, and many Christians are now churchless. But there is hope for the Church as it responds to these trends, according to David Fitch, pastor of Life on the Vine Community near Chicago, and author of The Great Giveaway.

Fitch recently spoke in Hamilton, Ontario at an event hosted by Resonate.ca, a "network of Canadians striving to love God and our neighbors in a changing culture." Fitch calls himself a Canadian at heart, having grown up in Hamilton.

According to Fitch, we can no longer depend on approaches that once worked, such as evidentiary apologetics, seeker services, CEO style leadership, huge hall pep-rally worship, lecture-hall type sermons, and paying someone else to do justice for us. Canada is well ahead of the States in these trends. The answer is not to redouble our efforts, but to revisit the practices of the church in an effort to be more faithful. Fitch spoke on four areas of practice: evangelism, justice, worship, and preaching.

Too cheap to buy Seth Godin's new book? Free samples available here. I found this as part of a bzz campaign.

Seth says (among other things), "A small church has a minister with the time to visit you in the hospital when you're sick...Don't wait. Get small. Think big."

I've been playing around with content management systems for the past couple of months: Joomla, Typo3, Drupal, and more homegrown solutions. It seems that they're all pretty good, but I think there's a huge market opportunity for someone to develop the Typepad or Backpack of content management systems. By that I mean a CMS system that is:

• Free or cheap
• Ready to go in five minutes after signup
• Looks great
• Easy to use
• Powerful
• Scaleable
• Customizable
• Web 2.0 look and feel

So far I haven't found anything like this. Some try but they don't quite get there. Maybe somebody needs to read Getting Real and start filling this hole.

Worth reading: (and signing):

The Call to an Ancient Evangelical Future challenges Evangelical Christians to restore the priority of the divinely inspired biblical story of God's acts in history. The narrative of God's Kingdom holds eternal implications for the mission of the Church, its theological reflection, its public ministries of worship and spirituality and its life in the world. By engaging these themes, we believe the Church will be strengthened to address the issues of our day.

More on the Call at Christianity Today

I've bookmarked this and I plan to use it someday:

Founded in 1997, Pastors Retreat Network offers five-day retreats to pastors and pastor couples. Our programs balance solitude and community time. Scripture reading and meditation are at the heart of the experience.

Pastor Retreat Network’s strategy flows out of a profound vision:

To glorify God and build His kingdom by strengthening Christian pastors for better ministry to the people they lead.

We do this by providing a self-directed and Christ-centered retreat experience, where God prompts Christian pastors to feel His presence, discern His will and follow His leading. These spiritually strengthened pastors will be empowered by God to transform their ministries and build His kingdom.

The program is free and I've heard good things.

Richview needs a website makeover, and like many churches, we don't have a lot of money budgeted. I've been looking at various content management systems. Some are free but a little frustrating and others look great but are more expensive. I don't want to sink a lot of my time into this.

I guess I'm asking for a lot: an inexpensive and powerful system that doesn't require a lot of initial set-up time.

I think I may have found what I'm looking for at Web Empowered Church. You could invest a lot of time here, but they also have a turnkey host and a 30-minute set-up. They have a book coming out later this year and it looks like it's powerful enough. Take a look if you're interested.

I have a new review up at my book blog:

Chase Falcon, megachurch pastor, has lost his faith. When a young girl falls off her bike and never wakes up, Chase's answers suddenly seem hollow. His faith comes crashing to the ground at the worst possible time: in the middle of a sermon.

I used to have all the answers, just opened the Bible and there they were. The truth is, they aren't all there - or if they are, I can't find them. I've tried to convince you that Christianity is logical and straightforward, as if God can be codified and stuffed into files he can't jump out of. Each time uncertainty knocked on the door, I hid behind the couch until it went away. Now I'm the one who's thirsty. And the Jesus I've known for twenty years isn't making it go away.

And what about our church? I mean, is this all there is?...

more

Thanks for those who've commented, called, and e-mailed since my post the other day. Now I know what to do to get attention.

What's up? Can't get into it all here but - really just normal pastoral stuff. Normal except sometimes it gets to you more. I'm okay. Sometimes church is just tough and relationships are messy, and things (especially relational things) can't be fixed as easily as we would like. It seems that the things we're supposed to be really good at, like relationships, present the biggest challenge.

I think I've had one of my best weeks in a while overall even among the mess, and Sunday was a good service. Funny how some of the best times go along with some of the harder times.

Thanks again for being there and praying.

Andrew Hamilton, long-time blogger pal from down under, sits on a panel with D.A. Carson on the emerging church. Hamo recounts what was said here and here.

I have had the strangest week and a half.

Last week, I got some news that rocked my world. I can't get into it here, but it was enough to make me question a lot of things, and to experience sadness I hadn't felt in years.

This week, I had the saddest meeting I have had as a pastor in over 15 years. By far.

I should be a mess, and I am sad. But somehow I have also (mostly) felt a peace as well. It's almost scary but I'm thankful.

All this to say: I would appreciate your prayers for me still if you think of me.

Yesterday I stopped by the local Apple store with a question: does my Gordon-Conwell student card do any good in Canada? After all, I'm not going to have it much longer.

The answer: Yes! A couple of hundred dollars off, plus a free iPod, plus discounts on AppleCare, blah blah blah. I did a little math and figured out that if I sold what I have on eBay, plus the free iPod, I would come pretty close to breaking even and have a better machine.

So I came home with this:

I was smart enough not to open it until I talked to Charlene, who didn't freak out. We left it unopened while we decided whether or not to keep it. (I have a patient wife.)

Today I realized that an 80 GB hard drive wasn't going to do the trick, so I took it back for a full refund. Sigh. And to get a bigger drive in the store, I have to buy the next model up, which is way more. I could order online but they don't seem to like my student card there, unlike in the store.

It was kind of cool to own a MacBook Pro, if only for about 24 hours.

I am essentially done the draft stage of my thesis. It weighs in at 231 pages. Feels amazing.

Still to come: edits, and the outcomes chapter, which will have to come after the seminar on September 19th, which you are still invited to attend by the way (but you have to RSVP).

But for now I'm done!