So, with all the commentary I've done about churches, I'm sure you're curious about what I'm doing church wise.
As I mentioned before, I recieved my pastoral lisencing over a year ago. I have a Bachelor's degree in Pastoral Studies. Yet, I am called to be helping my friend Joe with a church plant here in my town called The River while working elsewhere as a counselor. We haven't actually launched yet, and that's a very good thing. Over the past several months, God has been working in our hearts to totally rethink how we are called to reach people in this community.
To summarize, we are a church made up of small groups, that gather once a week on Saturday nights to worship. The vision of the church was to reach the diconnected. For a while, we got really caught up in an extremely 'by the book' structure practically copied from church planting books. We started putting all of our energies into making Saturday night the coolest church thing in this traditional Virginia town. Over a short time, nearly everybody that started with our church had left. It was devastating to see just about everybody leave, leaving only five of us, Joe and his wife included, meeting in the office house on Saturday nights for worship. We were completely reduced. But it has been in this time that we have been able to slow down and find out that we had been missing the boat with the vision given to this church. We almost completely neglected small groups and the disconnected, appealing only to Christians who got bored with us real quick. The cool stuff flopped big time!!
We are now finally absolutely excited about this church! Why? Because now the vision is sharpened and honed through MUCH trial and error. Before, we just did what we were trained to do in college. Now, we have really seen where to go so clearly that it's hard to contain. Already, within a week, a strange fire is quickly igniting and spreading! THIS is what we are to do. This is it! And the vision is pure and beautiful.
I'll explain it later sometime. ; )
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