A New Model

So, while I like to use this blog to talk about life and faith and church, I don't often use it to write specifically about church planting; mostly because I assume that the actual act of church planting might be interesting only to those who are church planters or hope to be.

However, the experiences and conversations over the past few weeks connect to church and faith and life enough to put them down here.

First off, a few weeks ago, I got a coach. His name is Glenn, he's a really nice guy who will tell you when you're about to really get something wrong (or how to fix it when you already have). I like these kind of people very much. Glenn was church planting when church planting wasn't cool, so his willingness to coach me is a God blessing.

A church planting coach is just what it sounds like, someone who has done this before, is still doing it, is passionate about doing it, and can show someone else how to do it. So, a few weeks back, Glenn I sit down and he says "you know, they call where you are 'the church planters' graveyard'?"

This, of course, excited me to no end. I love to hear that those who have gone before me have died doing this. He went on to say that I probably find it fairly frustrating to read church planting books with chapter headings titled "Creating The Perfectly Authentic Worship Experience", given what I had already shared with him about what it was we were up to with our approach to being the church. I agreed that, yes, I did find this frustrating. Then he smiled and said, "that's OK. The problem is that you're a part of creating a new model. No one in church growth is really doing this. It's sort of like building an electric car."

Now, to someone a little more daring, this would sound exciting. But I don't really have the personality to "boldly go where no man has gone before." I like having a working model that's been road tested a bit. For me, this is just scary.

But where, 2 years ago, fear would have gone right past giving me pause and stopped me dead in my tracks, faith has me pushing forward in the midst of fear. Believing that the one I follow really did walk on water makes it easier to go out into the deep end a bit.

Faith is a big part of this, but a community of faith is a big part of that. Walking and working alongside folks who aren't seasoned professionals, but are willing to tread out with me has been, and continues to be, an amazing adventure. As we say at Immanuel "we don't promise an easy journey...just people to walk it with you."

So, today I thank God for this opportunity. I thank God for those over the many of thousands of years who have done far crazier things out of a desire to follow God's lead. I thank God for being present in the process, through His Spirit, His Word, and His church. I thank God for a wife who said "sounds good to me" when I first started talking about this. I thank God that my son might grow up knowing the version of me willing to take risks as a sign of faith and not the version who used to talk more than he walked.

And I thank God for making life an endless and interesting conversation. For the things I'm learning and the things I have yet to learn. For the mistakes and the challenges and the unknowns. I'm getting used to the unknowns. I'm getting to like them. And I thank God for that too.