Greenhouse and growth of an organic church (this is a LONG ONE!).....

Well, I finally get to share the insights from the Greenhouse intensive conference that I went to last weekend. There is a lot to share and I am not sure if I can or will fit it all into one post, but I really want to try to do that so that all the info can be found in one place. And I will not be able to share all of the information because I think that would not be honorable to those who put the Greenhouse conference together. So my advice is for anyone who is considering organic churches to attend a greenhouse event and even though I did not totally agree with the theology that was mentioned...I loved the presenters Neil Cole and Paul Kaak and 90% of what was shared I believe to be spot on and I agreed with and can be found in Neil's book Organic Church, Growing Faith Where Life Happens! So, with no further adieu:

• What you need to start an Organic/Simple church: 1. Drink Coffee, 2. Play chess and Checkers, 3. Listen to and love people! (I love this understanding!)
• "The Gospel says, 'Go,' but our church buildings say, 'Stay.' The gospel says, 'Seek the lost,' but our churches say, 'let the lost seek the church.'" --Howard Snyder from Radical Renewal: The Problem of Wineskins Today.
• Luke 19:10 10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost." So if this is true then it is God that is the seeker not the lost.....I wonder how this would change the term "seeker service"?
• Their working description of what "church" is: "The presence of Jesus among His people called out as a spiritual family to pursue his mission on this planet."
• The DNA of every church should be the same: D: Divine Truth (the dynamic and living presence of Christ in His Word) N: Nurturing Relationships (love for one another is to be a constant pursuit of the family of God. This is the most basic of Christ's commands.) A: Apostolic Mission (our mission is to go into the world and disciple the nations for their good and God's glory.)
• you can not have one of these without the others, it should be found in every cell of church life, it provides a pattern for diagnosing the health of a church's life and practice
• In most US churches these parts of DNA have become compartmentalized, for example, this is a missions committee and a nurture/growth committee, etc....
• Mark 4:1-32 is a huge insight into the Kingdom and what Christ's church should be!
• You have to start with a sower in the field, you have to start with the right seed (and that seed must be the Word of God), you have to start with the right soil!
• The one ground that produces good fruit makes all the other 3 bad soils worth the effort, 30x's, 60x's, and 100x's
• How it grows (Mark 4:26-29) shows how it grows...God does the growing!
• Paul Kaak in his simple/organic church uses the following questions for the discussion time of the Scripture reading in their "services" A. What did you like best about what you read? B. What did you not like? C. What did you not understand? D. What new things did you learn about God or his kingdom? E. What Idea or phrase do you want to take with you this week? F. What are you going to do about it?
• Neil in the first few weeks of starting a simple/organic church has those attending to commit to 7 weeks and each week he reads one of the seven signs of Jesus in John's gospel (2:1-11; 4:46-54; 5:1-18; 6:1-14; 6:15-25; 9:1-41; 11:1-46) and then at each gathering he asks these questions, 1. What does this story tell us about the way people are (or about human nature)? 2. What does this story tell us about what people need? What does this story tell us about Jesus?
• A church planting movement is: 1. simple reproducible strategies that release common Christians for uncommon work, 2. Witness and multiplication that is nature and spontaneous (i.e. no need to persuade people to witness to others...they do it naturally), 3. Reproduction occurring at every level and in every unit of the church life, 4. Interdependence among the churches, not unhealthy dependence nor self-centeredness interdependence, 5. The churches must be self-perpetuating (will continue to live with out the need of outside infusion of resources)and self-propagating(she will naturally start birthing new groups that will in turn do the same and birth new simple/organic churches.
• Their highest goal is not to plant a singe plant/church, or a single fruit-bearing plant/church, or even a field full of fruit-bearing plants/churches, But their highest goal IS the health and fertility of the land so that it will produce generation after generation of fruit=bearing plants/churches! And of course the highest goal is that Jesus would reign as King in al the Earth!
• some contrasts between institutional approaches and organic approaches to church planting:

Institutional approach--------Organic approach
seating: rows only-----------circle(s)
Environment: Anonymous--------Intimate
Leader Source: from institutions of higher learning-----from the harvest
Cost: Expensive----------Inexpensive
Goal: Deeper knowledge------deeper relationships
Church Posture: "Yall come!"-----"We go!"

• Lost people are not dirt or dirty....they are soil!
• Oikos Witness (Oikos is a Greek term that includes the meanings of a house or household, and many places in the Bible it refers to the fundamental natural unit of society...one's family, friends, neighbors, and associates (Acts 10:11; Philippians 4:22)
• God has places us in particular oikos contexts to that we might find him (Acts 17:26,27)
• For every Christian, mission begins with those who god has put in their lives (oikos) it is our stewardship and responsibility to grow it)
• The keys to growing your Oikos and eventually sharing Christ in it are: 1. time and availability, 2. A life that is open and being renewed day by day, 3. Hospitality, 4. Spiritual Intuition, 5. Generosity 9this has two sides thought...while you are busy inviting them into your home...make sure that you allow them to invite you into their home! (i.e. Zacchaeus story)
• The key to spreading the gospel may not be in your "Christian" oikos, and it is more likely to experience expansion through the oikos of a new believer!
• Where can you find good soil: bad people, poverty, young people, those searching for God, uneducated, etc...."Bad people make the best soil...because they have a lot of fertilizer!" <--one of their saying, heh.
• But you can even find good soil in the bad soil, by some of these examples: go on a ride along with a police officer, and ask them where the most domestic abuse occurs, or what neighborhood or restaurants have the most calls, check the local paper for bankruptcies or foreclosures and call them to let them know you care and pray for them, look up the 12 steps recovery programs and help them anyway you can...and you can find better soil if you go to the ones that smoking is allowed, heh.
• 2 kinds of lost people: moths and cockroaches. Moths will be drawn to the light and cockroaches will run from the light! Just show up with the presence of Christ in you and you will see who is before you. Our significant is most shown in the darkness!) I love this saying...because it is very true in my life...I "feel" God's presence much more when I am living in and around non-Christians!
• The busier we become the less compassionate we become
• The church must be conceived in heaven before it is birth on earth!
• So.....the bride must woo the groom to give birth to a new church...so spend time in prayer wooing the groom!
• Jesus’ missional methodology POP: Practice Of Prayer (Matt 9:37-38) The workers came from the harvest!, Pockets Of People (Luke 10:1) Identify these pockets of people for example, places like, cheers, or the coffee house in Friends (the TV shows), Power Of Presence (Matt 10:7-8) Where you go the king goes and where the King goes people bow!...watch the end of the last Lord Of The Rings Movie and you will see the kind of bowing I think they are talking about), Person Of Peace(Luke 10:7-8), and a People Of Purpose. (Matt. 10:11-13)
• Person Of Peace explanation: Read Luke 10:-8---"When you enter a house, first say, 'Peace to this house.' 6 If a man of peace is there, your peace will rest on him; if not, it will return to you. 7 Stay in that house...Do not move around from house to house. 8 "When you enter a town and are welcomed, eat what is set before you." This is the key person in birthing new organic/simple churches! This person is: 1. Responsive to the Word of God and is very interested in it for their lives, 2. has Relational Influence and are well connected to others, 3. and have a reputation (god or bad it does not matter when God get a hold of their lives if they have a good or bad rep...both will glorify God) Biblical examples of Persons of Peace: Matthew, Zacchaeus, Lydia, Woman @ the well, Gerasene demoniac, Ethiopian Eunuch, Cornelius, Philippian Jailer, etc...
• Assume that everyone has their own Oikos and will continue the Kingdom through it!
• Don't plant churches, plant the Gospel...and God will do the rest!
• How to share Christ in a relationship in your Oikos: the example of Christ: Jesus did three things when meeting lost people: Commendation, Confrontation, and Comfort! So lets take the woman at the well, Commendation (Jesus gave her the gift of conversation when no one else would), Confrontation (Where is your husband?), and Comfort (He gives living Water and tells her worship will occur not only here or only there...but anywhere!)
• if you don't acre then don't share
• If we want to grow relationship with others for God, then the key to it all is to LISTEN!
• Lost people do not want to be preached to; they want to be listened to!
• Listen for their pain, passions, and purpose, and in the midst of these find connection and develop relationship with them!
• Don't force anything onto the organic/simple churches....Let it happen indigenously with in that culture!
• Make the Kingdom be about Jesus...not a model...allow the organic/simple churches t have their own flavor...but stay in it's roots the same nature (i.e. Water, ha ha ha)
• We need to spend more time scattering the seed and reaping the harvest, not on the growth...read Mark 4:26-29 again...the growth happens because God does that part the worker does the other two...what would Christian book stores look like if we spent more time scattering and reaping than of growth?
• Life grows in stages so do not force the reaping of the harvest...we must think in phases and a process!
• 96% of churches in America today will never birth a daughter church........most Christians hear this statement ad agree sadly and it is sad...but what if you turned on the news today and heard Katie and Matt say, "96% of all women in the US can not reproduce as of today!" We would all be freaking out! We would be asking, 1. This is not natural to not be able to give birth what is going on here? And 2. What will happen to the human race?....these are the same questions the church should be asking....and it should be just as shocking!
• Lost people are not drawn to our churches, we have lost our relevancy, and so church shopping has become the way life for most Christians! So....we start selling our churches and start the sells job, we have the best, sermons, children's program, music, etc... (there is not much different between church goers and non-church goers
• We need to lower the bar of "church" and raise the bar/standard of what it means to be a disciple!
• A strong church is made up of strong disciples(2 Tim. 2:1), a motivated church is made up of motivated disciples (2 Tim. 2:3-13), and a reproducing church is made up of reproducing disciple making disciples (2 Tim, 2:2) (italics added by me)
• the best context for growing a disciple is in community (2 Tim. 2:22, 23)
• Te challenge of 2 Tim. is that we need to influence that expands: in space (beyond the driving distance from your church) and expands in time (beyond your life span "to the end of the age".....so for us to expand these areas...WE MUST INVEST IN PEOPLE!
• As a part of all of the Organic/Simple churches everyone is highly encouraged to be a part of a LTG: Life Transformation Group. These groups are made up of 2-3 same gender groups who read the bible together, hold one another accountable, and prayer for each other and those people in their Oikos that do not have a relationship with Christ. The LTG is the embryo of a Simple/Organic Church...it is the discipleship making component.
• LTG often last around a year and should constantly be reproducing and forming new LTGs.
• Reminders for getting new Organic/simple churches started: 1. Make it your goal to embed the DNA in the community from the very beginning, 2. Don't wait to get people connected into LTGs, 3. Keep the leadership that is modeled simple and reproducible, 4. Identify the emerging leaders to begin to invest in as soon as possible, 5. Don't worry about getting it "perfect"...........maybe for a long time!

--------------------------------

Ok, how’s is that for an intensive weekend recap? heh.... I know there is a lot of stuff in there and I know that most of you will not ever read it all and see if it will soak in...So I encourage you to attend a greenhouse event near you....you can find out more about greenhouses in your area and buy resources from www.CMAResources.org and like I said almost everything from the greenhouse is in Neil's book Organic Church, and I would recommend it to anyone who is thinking about these ways of being church.

-------------

Currently I am deep into the planning of the block party planning meeting this Sunday (13th) @ 6:00 pm. We hope to get a lot of input and find out the amount of support and commitment that people are willing to give towards The Waters and a very important meeting for everyone who is interested in to attend! It should be lots of fun and hopefully, not just another meeting to go to...I am trying to make it be well worth everyone's time and energy.

-----------

The first ever The Waters' budget will be turned into the finance committee of Florence UMC and I hope and pray that it will be passed and supported and then t will be the job of the stewardship committee and ultimately the church to meet the increased needed budget for the 2006 year to support The Waters1 Tons of prayer will always be needed for this endeavor!

-----------

I am also leaving this Thursday to attend the Young Adult Summit in Nashville to find out how I can give some input into what would be effective ways to minister to and reach young adults as an entire UM church...so that should be interesting and I hope to share a little more about what we are doing here and see if we can find any others that might have the same passions and desires for what God is doing here and how we can help the United Methodists to do the same in their own communities and lives!

-----------

I hope to discuss more soon. I have lots of other meetings with lots of other people that I am forming relationships with and joining their network/Oikos...it is exciting and fun to top it all off...but I have been felt lately that I need to spend more time in the Pockets of People places around here and perhaps develop a LTG-type of group. So please pray that God shows me where that place is.

------------------

OK...well, I have spent an extremely long time developing this post and I am sure that several of you will not even get through it all, or will have to read over it over the course of a week, or even need to print it out and read it that way...what ever the case...please read this information and see if you can apply it to your ministry settings, and even in your own life? Who is in your Oikos? When is the last time you listened to them...and then commended them, challenged them, and comforted them? Are you looking for new people to be a part of your Oikos? Thank you for your prayers and please keep them all coming! And know that I am praying for you too! (Who ever reads this blog, heh)

May you experience love, grace, and peace flowing from the arms that Christ has wrapped around you!

======================

"Hub: Sometimes the things that may or may not be true are the things a man needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money, money and power mean nothing; that good always triumphs over evil; and I want you to remember this, that love... true love never dies. You remember that, boy. You remember that. Doesn't matter if it's true or not. You see, a man should believe in those things, because those are the things worth believing in."
--Secondhand Lions