What a full couple of weeks...

Well, I have been busy doing several things these past couple of weeks..and it is amazing how in your mind you have time lines figured out and everything is right on schedule...and then life happens and things start to back up. Well, that is what has happened.

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OK, on the Prayer ministry front...I have wonderful news!!!!! The basic prayer team has formed..and we now how agreements with several current members of FUMC to be vital active prayer team servants to form the foundation of the ministery that God desires to have with t he people in and around Union. The team plans for their first meeting to be in the first to middle of September, and they will decided how often they feel they need to meet and what ways they are going to lay the foundation of prayer of the community of Union. (I have heard they may do some prayer walking, and prayer driving, lots of time praying over the maps we have and all kinds of other things especially listening to God's direction and leading for the entire ministry.

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Speaking of maps.... It turns out the maps that we purchased did not match up side-by-side so I had to get them to redo the maps so they would fit together...and they have done that now...and I spent the afternoon in Kinkos cutting the maps for our Sr. Pastor to take to his wife to laminate them and then finally....we will be able to put the maps up on the wall and start pin-pointing the current FUMC member locations of the map...And start the one-on-one meetings with individual homes of at least a few homes at one time to let them know of our next steps and see if they could help this ministry continue to grow in the right direction.

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I have been spending the last two Sundays (and I hope to continue to do until finished) meeting with FUMC Sunday school classes to share a little built about me and what I have done since I have been here and what the near future plans are shaping up to look like. It is a great time...but I am still learning how to share everything and not use up too much of the Sunday School hour to allow for questions. I hope that everyone will feel welcome to ask me questions anytime (and any staff member for that matter). I truly feel the better the communication we have in FUMC of what God is doing in this Tribe Extension the better and greater the support will be for God!

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I have formed a very basic a preliminary time line for the next few months and it really is me just testing if any form of basic timeline will be effective....I have found that God's watch does not look at all like my watch and the same goes for my calendar! So I would ask for prayers of leading from Holy Spirit to guide us all in this process of holding each other accountable in the work that we each do for Christ while also not have expectations in the time that WE think that everything should be done.

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I wanted to touch on a few terms with yall so you will know and remotely understand what I talk about when I mention a few terms when talking about the tribe extension.... The first two terms are those that I defined for everyone in the first post Cultural Architect. This is the title that I have borrowed from Erwin McManus and I feel it does a better job of explaining what the "church" should be about...God has called us as God's people to join God in forming a new Christ centered culture that is know for its words of hope, its selfless giving of love, its transformational creativity, and its showering of grace in this world. I am and invite everyone to join me in becoming a transformational Culture Architect!

Another group of words I wanted to share I will just copy from my personal blog that talks about what a Crash and a tribe extension is (that will also explain why there is a group of Rhinos as the picture in the upper right of this blog)(those of you who have already read my personal blog can skip this and read the end of the blog post):

Why Tribe Extension? (some of you may ask) or What in the world is a Tribe Extension? (a few more may ask) or even What the? Honey....I think this guy has gone insane! (as a few of you very special people out there who actually know me might say, heh)

Well, let me explain.

"Extension" is self explanatory...Whatever "tribe" means it is an extension of an existing tribe. and I can say that most people could and probably will use the term "tribe" synonymously with the term "church"...but I have more reasons to use the term "tribe".

1. All too often the term church has lots of baggage with it when people hear the term...and to people who are not Christians I have a feeling that the term is not all that positive in their minds. The same would go for the terms "evangelical"(no offense, but this is the first picture that Google brings up), "conservative"(notice the image name), and even "Christian" (I have had a run-in with these people sadly...and man they give Christian a misunderstood understanding)" for that matter...and tribe forces people to think of what "church" is (and I believe should be) in a different and new way.
2. Tribe carries a better understanding of a group of people more so that the term "church"...which to the average non-Christian...and even average Christian can come to mean a building where a group of people who worship together meet. Tribe emphasizes the people and the community not a building, place or location.
3. The "Church" has always meant to have the meaning of "the people of God" and the community that is formed when Christ is the center of their community.
4. Tribe is just cool! heh heh....

So, what I am doing is providing a atmosphere where a gathering can form to make a tribe for Christ! This tribe will be known as a tribe, community, gathering of people who seek relationship with God and each other and can walk into a journey of unknown, growth, and kinship. This will be a place that discussion is emphasized, creativity is encouraged, and Christ is glorified by honesty and real lives truly seeking for relationship and community.

Peter put it this way:

NLT 1 Peter 2:9 But you are not like that, for you are a chosen people. You are a kingdom of priests, God's holy nation, his very own possession. This is so you can show others the goodness of God, for he called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light. 10 "Once you were not a people; now you are the people of God. Once you received none of God's mercy; now you have received his mercy."

This allows us to all be different and not walk in the same line that is "expected" but that we are all still part of the same tribe and all walking at least in the same direction.

(this stuff sounds like it is coming from a Cultural Architect? heh heh)

Oh, and "why a "Crash" you may be asking? Why a group of Rhinos in the picture up top? Well, Erwin McManus puts it this way:

"Rhinos moving together at full speed (30 mph) are known as a crash (because they can not see past thirty-one feet..but they run at full speed a lot of the time because of the big horn in front). Even when they are just hanging around enjoying the watershed, they're called a crash because of their potential. You've got to love that.....That is what happens when we become barbarians (a Tribe) and shake free of domestication and civility. The church becomes a crash. We become an unstoppable force. We don't have to pretend we know the future. Who cares that we can see only thirty feet ahead? Whatever's at thirty-one feet needs to care that we're coming and better get out of the way......there is a future to be created, a humanity to be liberated. We need to stop wasting our time and stop being afraid of what we cannot see and do not know. We need to move forward full force because of what and who we do know." (Erwin McManus, The Barbarian Way, 2005, page 138) (the Bold I added.)

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Ok well that is plenty for you to chew on for now...but please in encourage anyone to promote discussion on the comments of each blog post and talk about your thoughts and feelings on these new terms and please express your prayer support for the Tribe Extension....what would you like to see? How could you be more active in helping God make this Christ centered transforming creative culture a reality?
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Thank you all for your prayers and never forget the (I believe better) translation of Philippians 4:13:

"I can endure all things through him who strengthens me."

Chapter 1: Where are we?

I started writing a space here to be about my background...but I really see that this blog should be able the church so lets start with when I got here and what have we done so far....(if you want to know about me...just go to my blog...or believe it or not...I have a phone number that you can call me at, ha ha ha)

When I got here I had no job description, an excited church who wanted to "do"something, and a Sr. Pastor that had worked so hard to allow a congregation to see the need of the people in Union to have an amazing relationship with God.

I am part of a 1st Start Development Team made up of members of the current congregation I am appointed to...as well as, the Sr. Pastor, Associate Pastor, District Superintendent, and the team leader of the NCCD team of the KY UM Conference. (basically, some church members and some big wigs). This team is in place to meet with me on a regular basis and help hold me accountable, and keep me on track and to bounce ideas off of and provide a support structure for me and the lead in this new ministry opportunity. Our first meeting consisted of a understanding of who they were as a team and what their responsibilities were and a little it of Q & A.

The general process that the KY conference has layed out for doing this sort of thing (in somewhat order) is:

-->Prayer Strategy, Culture Scan, Ministry Audit, Values Formation, Vision development, Mission development, Strategy, Timeline, Structure, Evaluation.

out of this very basic ladder of steps we start to form a ministry action plan.

So, using this as a basic guideline we started to work.

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The prayer strategy aspect of the new ministry is and I believe has to be the foundation of anything we do for/with God. It allows what we do for God to be with God. So as of a few days ago we now have a team leader to support and develop a prayer team that will specifically focus prayer and listening to God about this new ministry opportunity. They will decide how often they meet, and what will each meeting prayer time look like...but this ministry is underway and the foundation is being formed.

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While the prayer team was forming I spent the next few weeks right after I first arrive...not only unpacking our house (my oh my am I sick of boxes, heh heh) I also started to form meetings with people who understood and could find demographic information of the community of Union, KY. These are all number demographics, but these were extremely useful. For example, we found out that the average household income in a 2 mile radius of the geographic center of Union is around $100,000/year, over 85% of the houses were two or more child families, and one of the most interesting facts we found were that around 90% of the people who live in Boone County work in Boone county! Extremely interesting being a county who borders one of the 50 largest cities in the U.S.

There is tons of other Data that was found in different areas...but this was a first and important step in finding out where we were and who God desired for us to minister too.

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I then started meeting with those that were knowledgeable about the future growth of the Union area and where they saw the grow happening next. I met with people like the Boone County Planning Commissionwho showed me and told me where they saw the next big grow areas happening in Union and gave us an idea of what the developers were interested in doing and where they wanted to develop.

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I then started to meet with area churches to get their take on what they saw were the needs of the people living in and around Union and to also let them know what we were praying about and invite them to be a part of this ministry. I am still contacting pastors and meeting with them (man ministers are so hard to actually get a hold of, heh heh). Most have been helpful and supportive...but nothing beyond that. But I continue to meet with others and to develop relationships with them.

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I have purchased a few maps from the planning commission office so we can start to pinpoint out where the current church members of FUMC live and see if we have a current good representation on the city of Union from a geographical stand point. Once we can see the places where people live....I plan on contacting all of the current church members of Florence UMC to get to know them and find out from them if they could sum up and share what they perceive are the needs of the Union community and share the vision of offering to meet those needs in some way in a new ministry for the people of Union.

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So, that is where we are at currently and I will attempt to update you on the progress of this new ministry extension so that you can be a part of this ministry in presence, prayers, gifts, and service. Look for more to come on what is happening next.

Sometime soon I hope to share the meaning of the use of new terms to express what we are doing and why we are doing things differently. Hope to hear from you then! Until that time.....KUTPs!!!! (Keep Up The Prayers)

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Cultural:
adj 1: of or relating to the arts and manners that a group favors; "cultural events"; "a person of broad cultural interests"
2: denoting or deriving from or distinctive of the ways of living built up by a group of people; "influenced by ethnic and cultural ties"- J.F.Kennedy; "ethnic food" [syn: ethnic, ethnical]
3: of or relating to the shared knowledge and values of a society; "cultural roots"
4: relating to the raising of plants or animals; "a cultural variety"

Architect:
n. 1. One who designs and supervises the construction of buildings or other large structures.
2. One that plans or devises: a country considered to be the chief architect of war in the Middle East.

The first of many....(Genesis)

Welcome to the first blog post that will hopefully walk you through the conception, birth, and maturation of a new experimental tribe extension. This will be a place that I (the Cultural Architect of this process, and I hope eventually others) will attempt to record and share how God will lead and develop this creative ministry. This blog came into view from a dicussion with my wife who suggested that it might be beneficial to have a record of the events of this undertaking, supply prayer needs, and a place to have an open place to talk about this ministry with all of the ups, downs, and spin-arounds that will come from doing something new, exciting, and possibly experimental for God and the people in and around Union! So, welcome and join us for the journey as the Fellowship of the Tribe Extension begins!

The first few blog posts will be the history up until now and then I will try to update the blog at least once a week or after special turning points occur. So let me play a little historical "tomato based condiment"(ketchup) and get us up to date. Thank you for your interest and may this blog be a blessing and a resource to bring worship into a lifestyle, relationships with God and each other closer, and a culture shifted into something beyond any dream!

"Waaaaahooooo!"
-Albert Einstein riding on a Motorcycle for the first time in the movie I.Q.