Chapel Street….One to watch

Russ Rook, who had formerly headed up UK Salvation Army Youth initiave ALOVE has now moved on to pastures new with his new project, Chapel Street.

Check out the vid for some background info:



Russ has been an innovative and prophetic voice in The Salvation Army for a number of years now, and was a significant player from day one in the Roots movement, which has been hugely influential over the last decade as the SA in the UK re-visited it’s early “roots”, and grappled once again with what it means to be missional today. Here’s a few thoughts about the 2008 Roots event that I wrote down at the time.

I guess there are some parallels with the move that Russ’ good friend and early Roots pioneer, Phil Wall made when he left the full time employ of The Salvation Army to start the wonderful HIV and Aids charity HOPEHIV some years ago.

Both Phil and Russ are still deeply involved in their local community in a Salvation Army context at Raynes Park Community Church, who’s modest website belies a vibrant, active Christian community with a heart for mission in that part of London.

It will be interesting & exciting to see how this pans out, as Russ steps out in faith. I’m sure Chapel Street will be one to watch.

The Salvation Army Croydon Citadel presents Christmas Praise

I'm happy to give a shout out to our Church's annual Christmas Carol Concert at Fairfield Halls in Croydon.

If you're in the area, it'd be great to see you!

This year's special guest is 11 year old singing sensation Charlie Green, from ITV's "Britain's Got Talent"

...not to be missed!

Noah’s 3

My boy Noah was three years old yesterday.

Noah is a diamond.

A beautiful, happy, kind, cheery little fellah who lights up my life, as well as that of his Mum and his wonderful big sister, Mia.

• He has a capacity to make me smile at the mere mention of his name, and can make me roll around on the floor laughing at his antics.
• He adores his Mum and Sister, and I think he loves me, although when I kiss him – which is often – he says “Yuk! Disgusting!”
• He loves his football (soccer) lesson, and as far as I’m concerned he’s the fastest, brightest, most enthusiastic one there, so I harbour dreams of him one day representing Scotland!
• More often than not these days he’s dressed as Spiderman or Sportacus, as he bounces around the house with limitless energy
• He loves the drums – and will usually be found behind the full sized kit at Church when I’m desperately trying to prize him away to leave for lunch
• He loves dragons, dinosaurs and robots

I thank God for the day each of my kids were entrusted to us. We don’t deserve them.

Time for some Blunnies?

As winter creeps in, and the cold wet and damp become more prevalent as I endure my daily cross-London commute from home to office I’m feeling the need for some decent boots that can keep out the elements. I’m thinking about going for some Blundstones…simple, beautiful bit of kit that inspires a whole lot of enthusiastic customer loyalty and has created a little bit of a subculture. If you blogsearch “Blunnies”, ”Blundstone” or “Blundstones” you’ll uncover a whole little world of folks who think the world of these Australian classics.

Hat Tip to Oz newspaper The Age for the pic of these old Blunnies…if I buy some I’m sure they will look a little less worn!

Following the Missio Dei into strange places…with Mike Frost

Since I spent a couple of days last week immersed in the teaching of Mike Frost at two different events run by the Evangelical Alliance, I’ve made a few scribbles, as much for my own benefit as anyone else’s, to try and unpack the thoughts & ideas that grabbbed my attention.There was so much to take in that these notes should not be regarded as comprehensive or definitive in any way….it’s just a note of some of the things that impacted me.

It was good too to hook up with top fellah, Krish Kandiah.

First off, I guess it’s important to understand that I came to hear Mike having read a two of his books at least a couple of times each, and also having heard his friend and missional compadre Alan Hirsch earlier in the year. Essentially, I’ve already bought into the notion that MISSION needs to be the first organizing principal of Church……

Mike posed three big questions:

1. To whom shall I go?
2. Who will go with me?
3. Where will we meet them?

It was clear from the get go that Mike was not pushing a model (“I don’t have a model!”) or template for missional Churches to plug into, but rather was exploring the bigger picture of the reasons for Mission (Theologica, Cultural/historical and I guess what I would call the ethos of the Church) drawing on his conviction that God is a “sent” and “sending” God. Although Mike has an amazing head-knowledge about being missional, and is quick to acknowledge the influence of folks like Lesslie Newbigin and David Bosch, for me it’s his experience as a practictioner in his own smallboatbigsea community there in Manly, Sydney that is the most telling. (note to self: If I ever get to Oz, must visit smallboatbigsea!) If you want to get more of a feel of the Manly vibe, you might want to check out this post from my bloggin’ buddy Hamo at Backyard Missionary.

Frosty is completely sold out on Jesus and a master story teller who’s passionate and emotive retelling of Scripture would be well worth listening to alone, even without all the great stuff he outlined about mission over the two days. I don’t think I can effectively summarize everything he said – I’m just not that good a writer, but I can recommend, once again, the books I’ve written about on this blog. (Search "FROST" in the blog search window, top left). Neither can I do justice to capture in a few clicks of my keyboard how moved I was when Mike was recounting tales of people’s responses when he’d asked them “so….you’ve never had a religious experience?”. To hear of the supposedly non-believing mother ponder the meaning of life, and where it comes from when – for the very first time – she draws her new born daughter to her chest, or the surfer who – feeling the huge undulating swell of the mighty Pacific before he caught that amazing wave – bristles with a knowledge that somehow, somewhere there is a force so much bigger than he can really grasp...is that not a religious experience?

I liked a powerful phrase Mike used about Jesus followers marinating ourselves in the Gospels, and the notion that we should be trying to be ever more like Jesus. Good advice.

Although Mike kept most of the stuff about smallboatbigsea on the back burner, it was good to hear little snippets about some of the stuff they did there in their own context and community. He talked about being more of an “infiltrating” Church than an “inviting” Church, so clearly they are more about seeping into the cracks and crevices of that particular stomping ground than simply setting up their Church stall and expecting people to come to them….inspirational. It was fascinating to hear that during the early days of smallboatbigsea they identified two hangouts - The Artichoke and the Ivanhoe Hotel – as somewhere where they could live out their “sentness”, not with an agenda somehow targetting unsuspecting non-Churched folks, but rather simply as part of this calling to a missional lifestyle…following the Missio Dei into strange places.

In fact, the third place - as identified in Ray Oldenburg’s The Great Good Place – features often in Mike’s stories of the missional Church, with references to Pittsburg Hot Dog Restaurant Hot Dogma (which I understand eventually changed its name to the equally imaginative and witty “Franktuary”), the Four Olives Deli, again in Manly where Mike regularly breakfasts with two other guys who together form their Discipleship, Nurture and Accountability group, or DNA, to the kids life saver club, where parents sit on the decks drinking coffee chatting about their kids, life and the universe.

It’s this whole , expansive, and very rich life that makes the incarnational Church so…….attractive. Hope you catch the playful, subtle irony of that sentence! If the Missional is about “going”, then the Incarnational is about “going deep”.

I was also interested in the challenge to the notion that busyness in Church somehow equates with effectiveness. I loved Mike’s little illustration of the Pastors who’s dialog is often preceded with the greeting “How are you? Busy?”
Mike’s reply has become “Busy…I’m not busy, I’ve got all the time in the world…what do you want to do?”

This just goes to illustrate the power of the maxim “No time for relationships – no time for mission”…something important for me to bear in mind. In my local context we’ve been wrestling with this, so it was good to be reminded that if you release people from Church commitments – as we have done to some small extent - you must also model and provide missional opportunities….. stirring up latent missional potential.

“God is already at work in the places where you have been sent”

For much clearer and more eloquent unpacking of Mike’s talks, try here and here.

Diary collision

October is a chronically busy month for us, and I find myself in a position where I have to make choices about where I want to be.

Tomorrow, I’ll take a day off tentmaking to go and hear Michael Frost, and again on Saturday. This was an easy choice….a no-brainer, if you will. I’m really looking forward to these couple of days.

On Saturday 25th it’s much tougher.

• For a while now I’d been anticipating an interesting Prayer Development Day (although I hadn’t taken any action to hook myself up wth it) with mayBe’s Ian Adams and the guys from MOOT. Since my visit to MOOT for the Tom Sine event this has been even more appealing, but I don’t think I’ll be able to make it, which is a huge shame. I’ve been meaning to post about this excellent Tom Sine event, but somehow haven’t gotten round to it…maybe the time has passed. I was hoping to go the Prayer Development Day with Janet , so I’m gutted we’re unlikely to be able to be there.

BTW, so glad to have hooked up with Ian Mobsby and Eliacin as a result of my trip to MOOT – 2 excellent blogs well worth checking out, and top fellahs to boot.

• On the same day we’ll be attending the Retirement celebrations of some good family friends, and that is just one of those can’t miss occasions. We really want to be there to share in this special event, so this gets the call.

• Again, on that same evening, our Church is hosting a concert by The Salvation Army’s premier Brass Band (Holy Cow, Headphonaught!! ;-)), The International Staff Band, and under normal circumstances I would find myself there out of a sense of duty (Check this post for some background), but this time the Retirement really has to squeeze that out. It wasn’t a tough call to make that decision.

At the moment I sway between a thankfulness that we (Janet and the kids and I) have such a busy fulfilling life, and a deep anxiousness that perhaps we try to do too much, and sometimes end up shelving things which we would like to do or would be helpful for others to be available for other things where our attendance is more out of a sense of obligation.

This time, at least we didn’t succumb to the obligation.

Richie

Having given a little Birthday shout out to my elder nephew, and niece I’ve been feeling like I wanted to say “hey” to my younger nephew, Richie.

He’s a cool kid, who’s such fun to be around when we have the chance to visit the US.

As I’ve said many times before, I’m blessed by my family. I just wish we could be with them more regularly….but there’s the little question of huge air fares.

We miss you guys!

Church Under the Bridge

I heard a great quote from Church Under the Bridge’s Jimmy Dorrell.

This isn’t word for word, but Jimmy was having a gracious & affectionate pop at Post-Modern Churches by saying something along the lines of some people thought all you needed for a post-modern Church was

“a couch, a candle and a copy of the Matrix”.

There was no malice, or agenda….it was just a very funny line that had me laughing out loud as I listened to a podcast on my iPod on the train to the office.

More significantly, what Jimmy had to say about Church & Mission & the marginalized was on the nail. Jimmy wasn’t a name I was familiar with so I Googled him, bounced through the Wiki and found the site for his Church Under the Bridge. As I write this, I haven’t had the time to check much of it out, but the things he had to say certainly inspired me. I’m looking forward to finding out more…

Time for a little clear up

It’s been a while since I updated the blogroll, so here we go again:

Outies

My good friend MrsParker has given up the ghost as far as blogging goes, having put all her online energy into Facebook, so I have to bid a fond farewell to her space on the blogroll. As soon as you’re blogging again ‘Nit, you’re right back in there!

Innies

• Probably my favourite recent discovery is This Fragile Tent which is consistently imaginative and so easy on the eye, and it has a bit of a Celtic vibe which is always appealling for me

• I’ve been meaning to add Nigel Coles’ The Old Forge for some time. I met Nigel at an Alan Hirsch event earlier in the year, and have enjoyed catching up with his missional musings.

• Lon at Solar Crash also goes in

A few adjustments

• Tony Morgan has shifted to a new home
• Dan Rous is now at House of Rous
• Chris Hinton can now most often be found at Geek-Speak
• Ubertech- man of a thousand blogs ;-) - moves to Faith Life
• Duncan has closed What’s Your Point Caller, and now concentrates all his efforts towards Seven Men
• Jason Clark is now blogging at Deep Church

As always, I’d encourage you to have a a wander towards the various blogs & sites listed…bounce in and join the conversation. If you’ve received a name check here, you might wanna check out the other people who’ve also been mentioned. Chances are there will be some common ground.

This little reshuffle gives me another chance to ramp up my campaign to get Darrin Reeves blogging again. Join the fight, Tweeple.

Tom Sine at Moot

A little later in September I’m hoping to head over to Moot – if my diary doesn’t get too rammed – to hear Mustard Seed Associates’ Tom Sine speak..

Tom has just released a new book called The New Conspirators

This should be an interesting evening for all kinds of reasons:

• It’s always good to hear up close what writers have to say about their own work
• An opportunity to see the work of the guys at Moot, a community who seem to be doing some really interesting and creative things
• Another chance to break outside of my tribal box, and hook up with other Jesus followers. I’ve been really encouraged lately when stepping out a little like this. In fact, I’m starting to feel the stirrings of something very special about the opportunities that are coming my way, and the relationships that are quietly building in the background. There’s a feeling of inter-connectedness and authenticity that seems like a God-thing. We shall see…

This London event is free…..but you do have to book your place.

For booking details you can go here

James

Just a few posts ago I was wishing my niece Victoria "Happy Birthday", and now it's time to celebrate the 18th birthday of the elder of my two nephews, James and Richard.

This week, James hit the important milestone of 18.

James is a man.

A man of honor, and faith, and like all my family, I'm proud to be a small part of their lives.

Walk the way of Jesus, James.

We love you

Stuart Pendred

Check out a really good buddy of mine, Stuart Pendred is a guest on Premier Christian Radio's Breakfast show on Saturday AM (UK time.

We grew up at the same school & Church when we were kids, as part of a tight little group of guys who had such a great time together doing kid stuff.

The interview is scheduled for about 8.20 AM onwards through until the end of the show. Stuart will be having a general chat about hislife and career and then talking about his debut solo album 'Benedizioni'.

Stu is a really top guy, and a good friend. He's been around in my life for a long time, and always has interesting things to say.

Because I've known Stu for such a long time, I feel completly justified in using a completely undignified pic to illustrate this post!

Premier Radio can be found through the channels listed below:

1305, 1332, 1413 MW
Sky Digital 0123
Virgin Media 968
Freeview 725
DAB

Happy Birthday Victoria!

Just wanted to say a big Happy Birthday to my niece, Victoria who turns sixteen today.

We love you Vic.

Have a great day!

When I met & married Janet, I was blessed to be embraced by her wonderful family, who are now such a large and important part of my life, and are so completely integrated into the world view of my own kids. They are now – without reservation – my family too.

Mike Frost in London

I’m looking forward to a couple of events next month featuring Michael Frost.

First off, on October 10th is next.generation.church: rethinking church, mission and evangelism for the 21st century at the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. Although it’s apparently designed for “younger” leaders, I’m going to go along anyway!

Secondly, on the following day I’ll head over to the London School of Theology for New church, fad or future?

Should be great to have a couple of days to spend some time listening to one of today’s most respected thinkers - and more importantly, practitioners - in the area of mission.

If the days are even close to as valuable as the day I spent listening to Mike’s writing partner, Alan Hirsch, it will be well worth it.


HT to Frosty for the wonderful pic to illustrate this post…..hope no offence is taken by me cribbing it. I’ve been in two minds whether it was ethically correct to use it without prior permission, but it was so good, I just couldn’t resist m’lud!

Peace

Solar Crash

I’m glad to have found Lon’s blog, Solar Crash – where heaven and earth collide - which I stumbled across blogsearching “Erwin McManus”, in light of my current iPod marathon of Erwin’s Mosaic podcasts which I got into during my recent holiday.

There’s lots of thought provoking and creative stuff on there.

Lon also blogs at One Life

Pop over and say “hello”, and tell Lon Johnny sent ya!

Pax

J

Thanks for the pic, Lon

New books from "Mission" Al and Frosty

…really glad to get a heads up that Alan Hirsch has a couple of new books coming out later in the year – a guide book for communities to take some practical steps in the direction outlined in Alan’s excellent Forgotten Ways book, and another collaborative effort with Michael Frost call reJESUS; A Wild Messiah for a Missional Church

…and I quote

This is a radicalizing book that aims at helping the church recalibrate itself around Jesus as the protoypal Christian. It is what I would call a missional Christology. And it is wild!

No doubt, both books will be hugely useful, and create a bit of a stir in the blogosphere.

I’ll be trying to grab a copy of each as soon as I can.

Welsh Retreat

Well, we're back from a couple of weeks of holiday.

Week one, we chilled at home, and I wrestled with an IKEA wardrobe, which seemed to take the whole week to assemble! All the same, it was so good to get up when my body was telling me to do so, instead of when my Blackberry's alarm told me to. It was even better to hang out with Janet, Mia and Noah. I love to spend time with them, and this was the best opportunity to do this for quite some time.

Week two we travelled to West Wales to stay at the beautiful Cerrig Llwyddion in Camarthenshire. This was our chance to really chill and relax in the most wonderful peaceful environment. Check out the site if you are looking for a quiet friendly place for a family break, or a venue for a retreat. The Barn can take up to eight adults. Highly recommended!

The kids loved the easy going nature of the place, and being around the chickens, pigs, cats and Murphy the dog.

Even though it rained pretty much every day, we still mananged to hit the beaches along the Ceridigion coast every day. Mwnt became a favourite.

I didn’t manage to do as much reading as I had planned, but did manage to whizz through one of the Oxford University Press’ cute little Very Short Introductions series on “The Celts”, which was OK, if a little bit heavily skewed towards the Breton part of the equation, with only cursory mentions of the Scots. (hence my interest). As a series of books, though, I think they are worth exploring.

..caught up too with some excellent podcasts from Eric Bryant & Erwin McManus at Mosaic, and various bits from Mars Hill, particularly preaches from Steve Chalke & Phyllis Tickle …just quality stuff.

Thanks to Linda & Julie for making our stay so special. (and thanks for the pic to illustrate this post)

Silicon Roundabout - Riding the zeitgeist

Every once is a while a new buzz word hits the streets…looks like the latest one describes the little cluster of web companies in and around London’s Old Street, which has been dubbed “silicon roundabout”.

Yesterday’s FT and today’s Evening Standard each had a feature on Dopplr’s Matt Biddulph, who coined the pithy little phrase.

Let’s see how big it (the phrase) becomes.

Karl at Q

Glad to share this little vid from this year’s Q conference, which Duncan McFadzean posted at What’s your point caller?



The speaker is Karl Martin of Edinburgh’s MBC.

…really good stuff….and inspirational if you are involved in Church transition.

For a little more background, check Duncan’s post here

Thanks, Duncan!

Something Beautiful Podcast

It’s taken me aeons to get round to downloading these onto my iPod, but I heartily recommend my buddies’ JB and Thomas’ Something Beautiful podcast.

I’m very happy to give them a shout out.

….and while I’m chatting about iPods, podcasts and all that webby stuff, I’m finally on Twitter….or at least I think I am!

Follow me…