NNCC Plenary Session 2 - Ed Stetzer

Note...this message alone was worth the trip...

A new church will move beyond addition by being MISSIONAL.

"You shall be my witnesses..."

Acts 16:7-10 When they came to the border of Mysia, they tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus would not allow them to. So they passed by Mysia and went down to Troas. During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, "Come over to Macedonia and help us." After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.

1) COME OVER TO MACEDONIA

- John 3:16 leads to John 20:21

- sometimes even Paul didn't know where to go

- DON'T GO AND PLANT A CHURCH IF ALL YOU HAVE IS A VISION FOR THE CHURCH. YOU'VE GOT TO HAVE A VISION FOR THE PEOPLE

- You've got to love your community, not someone elses

- too many planters are in love with someone else's community

- Planting the gospel will lead to planting a church which will lead to changing the community

- Make Christ preminent -- not your church

2) HELP

- the most important help you can give is to remind people that it's all about JESUS

- the proclamation of the gospel has to be preminent

- IT'S GOT TO BE ABOUT A BLOODY CROSS AND AN EMPTY TOMB!

- the HELP we've got to bring is the help of the gospel

- we've got a problem when relevance becomes the goal in our churches...RELEVANCE IS SIMPLY A TOOL...NEVER THE GOAL...THE GOSPEL IS THE GOAL

HOW DO WE EXPRESS A LOSS OF CONFIDENCE IN THE GOSPEL?

- when we focus on personal transformation and not gospel transformation

- when sermons become so practical, they lack any gospel

- when the approach makes you the hero and not God

- when your outreach demeans others who are sharing the gospel

- when attendance is a bigger value than conversions

- when the cross gets less focus than the church

- when not offending seekers is more important than telling the gospel...we need to shift from being seeker sensitive to seeker comprehensible

3) US

- us is the lost world around us

- we've got to get desperate about reaching the lost

- John Knox's prayer to God, "Give me Scotland or I die."

- MAKE THE HARD CHOICE...go after those without Christ

NNCC - Maximizing Your Environments (Mark Batterson)

7 Keys to Creating the Right Church Culture:

1) BE YOURSELF

- creating culture starts with knowing who you are and who you're not

- "You can't please all the people all of the time" - Abraham Lincoln

- One of the most important decisions you will make in your ministry is "who are you willing to offend?

2) STAY POSITIVE

- start every meeting by sharing WINS

- church planting ought to be fun

- who you do ministry with determines how much you enjoy ministry

- get rid of negative staff

3) ESTABLISH BOUNDARIES

- boundaries between family and ministry

- Mark allows 1 evening per week for church activities, the rest are dedicated to family time

4) LITTLE THINGS ARE BIG THINGS

- 1% of what you do makes 99% of the difference

- ex) unevenly folded bulletins, misspelled words on screen

5) THINK LIKE A GUEST

- as leaders we are prone to inattentional blindness...we get blindspots in our ministry

- do reconaissance at other churches who are doing ministry with excellence

- book recommendation..."The Science of Shopping"

6) EXCEED EXPECTATIONS...good isn't good enough!

7) CAST VISION LIKE CRAZY...most church problems are vision problems

NNCC - Day 1

Yesterday, Jason, David, Aaron, Andrew, Shane, Adam, and I caught our red eye flight out of Pittsburgh to Orlando for the first day of the National New Church Conference in Orlando. Here are some random thoughts from day 1...

• Wayne Cordeiro hit the ball out of the park in the first plenary session. He spoke about the need to be led by the Holy Spirit and the power that comes from the Spirit in Acts 1:8. His call to personal devotion in the Word and prayer brought me to tears. For more notes from his session, check out Tadd's blog here.
• Shane Suiter is the loudest sneezer I've ever known. When he went into a sneezing tirade on our flight, he disturbed the entire cabin and caused the flight attendants to bust out laughing.
• In spite of unrelenting peer abuse, I led the charge to go to Mimi's for lunch by the Mall at Millenia. Their roast beef rocks and the guys were won over by the magic of Mimi's.
• What's up with the Youth Specialties style hijinx between sessions? A boxing tournament between the sponsors? Come on.
• They say that the NNCC is several conferences within a conference. Being the trackjumper that I am, I noticed how different the dynamics were within the conference when I jumped from Mark Batterson's "Maximizing Your Environments" in the postlaunch track to "Small Town Church Planting" in the networking track. Totally different demographic makeup of the people in those breakouts and different mindsets. Interesting.

More coming later...

Delayed Thoughts From the MABA

Jason, Aaron, and Scott have already posted recaps from last weekend's Mid-Atlantic Baptist Association meeting in Littlestown (Gettysburg area) Pennsylvania. Well, I'm a slow newsman and I don't want to rehash what they said, but I thought I would share some random thoughts from the weekend.

• The MABA is the best association in the ABA. Hands down. There's liberty to do your thing and be different. Lots of diversity in methodology, yet we all seem to get along well, enjoy each other's company, and share a common desire to advance the Kingdom.
• Our meeting locations are interesting and fun. In 2005 and 2006, we rode the Metro in Washington DC to get to the meetings, even coming into DC on Amtrak from Cumberland MD in 2006. This year's meeting led us to Gettysburg. Great destinations compared to the East Texas meeting locations in my former life.
• It's just not a MABA meeting without egg salad sandwiches, fried chicken, and crowded basement level fellowship halls. This was true when I attended these meetings in the '70's and '80s and it's true now. And I wouldn't have it any other way. Good stuff.
• It would be cool to host the MABA at the Warner Theatre. A little taste of theater church. Maybe in 09.

Concerning Portable Church

Bob Franquiz just wrote a excellent piece outlining necessary fundamentals to do portable church well. You can check it out here.

Coming Sunday

Wherefore Art Thou, Spring?

It's been a weird April in West Virginia. Yesterday morning our county received 6 inches in snow in the upper elevations. We've had two weeks of gray skies, rain, sleet, snow, and other weather assortments. Thankfully, a change in our weather pattern is on the way for the weekend, just in time for our college small groups camping trip and Friend Day on Sunday. Forecasters are predicting a high of 73 with sunny skies for Sunday. Great cookout weather!

God Bless Virginia Tech

My heart aches for the families and friends of the students that were slain yesterday at Virginia Tech. This hits close to home, as this could easily happen at any campus, including WVU. My prayer is that God will bring much good out of a horrible situation.

This calamity reminds me of the desperate need to win our campuses for Jesus Christ. I believe there is a candlelight vigil planned on campus at WVU tonight and I hope there will be numerous opportunities to share the good news during such a tragic, heartbreaking week.

People Who Leave Your Church

Gary Lamb has a great post on the types of people that leave churches. Most do it the wrong way. You can check out his post here.

StoneBridge T-Shirts Coming Sunday

Jason's blog displays the front of the shirt, but I thought I would show you the back as well. If you want a T-Shirt, contact me and I'll hook you up.

Constant Contact

At StoneBridge, we've found that one of the best mediums of communication is through email. I've been looking for a more professional look for our email communications, and Jason's been telling me to check out Constant Contact, so I downloaded it yesterday. It looks really great, is user friendly, and I think its going to give us an extra measure of excellence as we communicate with our church and the community.

There is a 60-day trial and then a moderate monthly fee kicks in. If anybody knows of a comparable or better program, I would love to hear about it.

Theater Church Hits the Washington Post

Ben Arment made the Washington Post again. The Post did an article on Reston Community Church's relaunch to the cineplex in Reston Town Center. It has been exciting to follow their progress moving from Herndon Elementary to Reston Town Center and I'm praying that God will do big things through their new venue. By the way, does anybody else think Ben's picture in the Post is dead-on Phil Mickelson?

Ben's journey is very encouraging to Jason and me as we follow a similar path meeting in the Warner Theatre in downtown Morgantown. Praise the Lord and pass the popcorn!

Easter Bunny Fun