Monday is for Missiology

Monday August 6, 2007 ~ 6 Comments

One more post before we turn to tomorrow's research.

Last week in class at Indiana Wesleyan University, Rick Champ, one of my students, presented a good summary of The Forgotten Ways: Reactivating the Missional Church by Alan Hirsch. You can find the PowerPoint here.

I believe Alan is a good thinker and has been challenging us all about the purpose and structure of the church, God's mission, and the gospel. We've developed a friendship-- and have even argued about a few things. But, we share similar passions-- and I know few Christian leaders as gracious and thoughtful as Alan.

I think his analysis of cultural distance and the western church is very helpful:

cultural%20distance%20and%20western%20church%20new%20version.jpg

Alan's official site is http://www.theforgottenways.org.

I use Alan's book whenever I teach on missional church issues. However, I was surprised to receive an email this week from my friend Jimmy Draper indicating that he was reading the book and saw my endorsement inside. Jimmy is going to share his thoughts here at the blog in the coming days.

I love the fact that Dr. Draper is continuing to engage in such conversations. For those of you who are not SBC, Jimmy is one of the great leaders of my denomination and was saluted recently here. He is often called Mr. Southern Baptist.

Finally, Brother Maynard has some thoughts on the word "missional" as used by Gordon MacDonald in the recent Leadership Journal. Maynard, who does have a real name that he does not use, is the one who got me started writing about how people use the word missional in different ways.

Regarding the same issue, Earl Creps has some observations on the word "missional" as well.

For next week's "Monday is for Missiology," and after our discussion of the church dropout research, I will begin my series on how people use the word "missional" and why it matters.

Posted on August 6, 2007 at 7:36 PM ~ 6 Comments

Tagged with: draper, hirsch, missiology, weslyean

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6 Comments

By "Bob" on August 6, 2007 10:46 PM

I am glad you will be discussing the "missional" term. Since I am out of the American church loop, I have been trying to play catch up on the term "missional" which seemingly came out of no where. Wikepedia (not the source of all truth, I realize) describes "missional" as:

"more narrow in scope than traditional terms such as "mission" and "outreach" which infer the inclusion of propositional evangelism and instruction. Jason Zahariades identifies the difference between a traditional "disciple making," evangelical church and a missional church as fundamentally theological[1] . Missional churches are non-traditional in more than methodology. Their non-traditional methodology and tolerance results from an embrace of postmodern epistemology that changes their theological self-understanding."

This seems quite different from how you define it. It will be good to see how the word has been developed and used by others.

By Jaman Iseminger on August 7, 2007 6:33 AM

Ed, actually Rick and I (Jaman) did the powerpoint together. I just wanted to say also that I very much enjoyed the fellowship and learning opportunities this past week. It was insightful and fun.

By Ken Sorrell on August 7, 2007 8:01 AM

Ed,

I too look forward to your posts on using the word "missional", if for no other reason than to understand better it's etymology. I am methodically working through your work, "Breaking The Missional Code". I am intrigued as an IMB missionary the numerous references to how we are doing our work overseas and it's possible impact in the U.S. My only disagreement at this point is the position that every Christian is a missionary. I'll wait for another time to engage you in this.

For me, ppt slide 6 expresses the real issue for growth in churches worldwide and not just in the U.S. The importance and impact of living a incarantional lifestyle cannot be fully measured, but only observed. One of the ideas that we are constantly sharing wit new believers is that their ability to share a verbal witness is based upon the testimony of a transformed life.

I hope a slightly different viewpoint of many of the issues this blog will address is welcomed.

By Ed Stetzer on August 7, 2007 10:52 AM

Jaman,

Sorry about that! It was good stuff and I appreciate it.

By Devin on August 7, 2007 2:22 PM

Ed,
Just a small thing, but, Alan's website is http://www.theforgottenways.org/ not .com

I appreciate your extra work with the blog, I will look forward to what the guest bloggers will add to your site.

Maybe you and Justin Taylor can put your heads together for a guest blogger list.

By Dennis Mixer on August 8, 2007 5:52 AM

Thanks for sharing the summary and the PowerPoint. It seems one of the disconnects between missionary and the mission field is the language each uses. I appreciate the value of clear definitions and etymology, but wonder if we might be more effective if we can translate our linguisticly ecclesiastic vernacular into people speak.

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