The Hull Truth… and nothing but

I just finished reading through Getting Fired for the Glory of God a new book by Youth Specialties which is a combination of articles and talks from Mike Yaconelli.  For those who might not know who Mike was, he pioneered modern day youth ministry (along with Wayne Rice and others) and was the co-founder of Youth Specialties.

While I had read most of the articles the first time they came out, they reminded me of Mike’s passion for teens, for the church, for youth workers and most importantly for the kingdom.  Mike was truly one of a kind.  The greatest treasure of this book though it the DVD that comes with it which includes video and audio talks from Mike.  I found myself stopped in my tracks physically and spiritually as I listened to Mike speak.  He was a powerful speaker and clearly anointed by God.  Was Mike perfect?  No.  But he did so much to point so many towards Jesus and teens, one of those of course, was me.  Thanks for sharing this treasure with us YS.

And yes, Mike was fired for Jesus… more than once.

I wrote a brief summation report on emergentia… thought I’d share it here.  It’s not particularly beautiful, but it sums things up fairly well.

Over 40 leaders from Nazarene churches around the USA gathered in Portland, Oregon this November for emergentia. The gathering was specifically focused on the practical and theological groundings for doing ministry in an emerging culture. The conference focused on conversations including: “Theological Underpinings: Embracing Wesleyan Theology in an Emerging Culture”, “Called to Plant: How do I start a new work?”, “Starting Ministries to Emerging Cultures within Traditional Churches” and “Evangelism in an Emerging Culture: From Response to Evaluation”.

The event started the first night with a time of sharing stories. It struck me as incredibly beautiful as I heard laypeople and pastors say again and again in their own words as part of their own story how desperately they wanted to remain connected to the Church of the Nazarene. Most grew up in the Nazarene church and are trying to figure out how to help the church better reach an emerging culture that has mostly moved away from the established church. The stories oftentimes included broken hearts and dreams as a part of their journey, but they also included hope; hope that the Nazarene church would continue in its tradition of bringing the good news to the marginalized, to those who most desperately were seeking connection to a larger story found in God’s love and grace.

Emergentia, in partnership with Nazarene Youth International and USA/Canada Mission Evangelism NewStart, was hosted by Community of Adsideo a two year old Nazarene church in the heart of the Sellwood community in Portland. In addition to the formal conversations, the conference attendees got an opportunity to see the ministries of Community of Adsideo, all integrally connected within the neighborhood, and also to join with them as they served at the Portland Rescue Mission and worshipped together on Friday night. Friday night’s service was a beautiful expression of God’s work through Adsideo in that neighborhood. Interwoven within the music worship and the artists working, several people from Adsideo shared their stories of hope and redemption in Christ.

The response by the attendees was overwhelmingly hopeful in the Nazarene church’s support of ministry to an emerging culture and their place within the church.

Here’s my first “report” on the event.  This event was first dreamed up with a group I mentioned here.  You’ll recall seeing it develop more here and here.  I’ll be doing some more formal article type things and I’ll post them here as well, but this is my unedited responses to date:

1)  Someone asked me if this was what I was hoping for.  I answered, “when people walked through the door it was more than I was hoping for.”  This is to say, who would have thought that a small group of Nazbo’s would have been able to bring others together for encouragement, hope and conversation in this way?   I truly believe that this was a hugely important event in the life of the Nazarene church.

2)  The first night we spent getting to know one another, sharing stories, etc.  Two themes arose… the first, vitally important to our tribe: person after person recounted the Nazarene church as part of their life when they were young and their strong desire to see the Nazarene church be a place where they could continue to worship and minister in this emerging culture.  The second theme was that the writings of Brian McLaren have given hope and encouragement to almost everyone somewhere in their journey.  [I sent Brian a note thanking him for his faithfulness and how God has worked through his writings - which I was able to see in such a tangible way.]

3)  Thursday morning we opened with a few ground rules and opening comments.  I’ll try to figure out how to post my pics/powerpoint here for those interested.  The title of the opening was “With Arms Wide Open”.  Then we spent the rest of the morning in conversations.  These were great!  We asked people what they wanted to talk about and they responded.  We had conversations on things ranging from theology to evangelism to practical how to start a church plant.  Very rich conversations, very good people.

4)  Thursday afternoon we spent kicking around a “white paper” on Nazarene’s and the emerging culture that a few of us have been working on (MORE TO COME ON THIS, BUT NOT YET).  Also very good feedback.  By the end of the day all of our brain’s had melted so we went out for some dinner and fun in small groups. Very good day.

5)  Friday we spent meeting some of the people in the neighborhood and seeing some of Adsideo’s ministry… this included everything from an educational time with Father Slider the Catholic priest in the commmunity on symbolism in the church, to seeing the coffee house Adsideo is developing, to helping serve with them at the Portland Rescue Mission.

6)  Friday night we worshiped together with the folks at Adsideo.  This service was powerful in many ways.  First, the authentic expression was incredible.  Second, the stories.  Jim Wicks had folks from the church come up and share their stories.  It was so powerful.  Tears flowed freely that night to be sure.

7)  [no idea why I'm numbering these]  Saturday morning we spent some time finishing up conversations and sending folks back into their communities.

8)  Overall I loved the inclusiveness of the group towards each other and towards different thoughts, ideas.  I also loved the gracious attitude that pervaded all conversations.  There was no bashing going on here.  This was all done with incredible respect for those who may differ in opinion.   The overarching theme of people wanting DESPERATELY to stay connected to the Nazarene church was so hopeful, so encouraging.

9)  Finally (for now), I want to thank Jim Wicks and all the wonderful people from Community of Adsideo for their incredible hospitality in hosting us for this event.  Thanks for being present, for being open and for being you.  Special thanks to the Wicks family; Teddy the handsome; Chad (the dodgeball commish); Chanelle; Rachel; Jen, Jen and Jen; Kacey Ann (love the spoken word!); Brian (love the song); Rick; and a whole bunch of others I’m sure I’m leaving out.