Here are a few things from the week thus far...

Tomorrow, I am at North Central University in Minneapolis all day so I probably won't be blogging. You can read about the conference here. I will also be dialoguing with the school faculty in the afternoon. Should be a good day.

Here some updates from the week thus far.

David Landrith

On Monday, I met with David Landrith. He blogs about our meeting here.

David is a fascinating guy. He is really a country preacher, with the accent and all. His college nickname was "Country.�? I must confess to enjoying calling him that. (And his nickname for me is "Jet Plane.")

David is an East Tennessee boy to the core. And, he pastors a church that runs over 4000 people every week. David is passionate about doing whatever it takes to reach this region for the gospel.

I have written more about David here.

David is currently on sabbatical and you can follow his journeys here. I predict that David will increasingly become a voice for church transition among declining churches in this region. The Longhollow story is pretty remarkable. You can read their history here.

The Guys of Every Nation Ministries

I also had a meeting with my friends from Every Nation Ministries, Kevin York, David Houston, and Steve Murrell. I have consulted with them a few times about organizational structures that produce multiplication.

Every Nation is a ministry with a church planting / collegiate focus. They describe themselves as:

...a worldwide family of churches and ministries that exists to honor God and advance His Kingdom through Church Planting, Campus Ministry and World Missions.

I would say that they are "charismatic," but Steve writes that he does not like that here. So, I am not sure what to call them. To me, everyone who sings loud and claps looks like a charismatic. Sigh. So, I guess I will just call them "brothers."

It is a fascinating historical and missiological oddity that Steve pastors a church that with 30,000 attendees in the Philippines.

Steve explains:

my wife & i came to the philippines in 1984 for a "one month summer mission trip" - that never ended. longest month in the history of time.

We had a great time talking about their movement and its next steps. However, I left with one concern. Steve "outed�? my appreciation of Nacho Libre.

In the future, I would request that all such movie references go unmentioned. And, for those of you are fans, "the priests say I don't know nuthin' about the gospel... but I do!�?

Besides, Kevin and David like Nacho Libre more than I do. They actually own stretchy pants.

John Revell

It is always good to catch up with John Revell. John is the editor of SBCLife, kind of a denominational glossy newspaper. He has been crazy enough to publish a few of my articles. I might pull some of them out over the next few days.

What I like most about John is his passion for disciplemaking. You can't take a bite of your biscuit (we had breakfast) without him reminding you that the command of the Great Commission is not to "go�? but to "make disciples.�? John has written some about his passion for disiplemaking here on his blog.

John recently wrote:

Could it be that 21st century evangelicals have been so influenced by a Western, industrialized perspective that we have fixed our attention on the results listed in the Book of Acts and have largely overlooked the far more critical matter of the disciples' process of obedience?...

When I was a teenager (a long time ago) I attended a Campus Crusade "Lay Institute For Evangelism.�? Part of the training was memorizing their definition of evangelism: "Evangelism is simply sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit and leaving the results to God.�? There was such freedom in knowing that we were not expected to pursue results--that the results were up to God.

What if we applied that mindset to our current approach to evangelism, church life, church growth, and missions? What if we set aside our deductive approach to studying Scripture (bringing our own preconceived notions to the text and looking for support for those notions), and applied an inductive approach (examining Scripture in its original context and looking for what actually was commanded and what took place)? And then, what if we simply obeyed the Lord's command to proclaim the Gospel (as the Bible defines it, not a watered-down version designed to bring results) and make disciples (according to the Lord's definition and following His example)?

I suspect our churches would start looking drastically different--and we would let the Lord worry about the results.

Most impressive to me is that he has raised two sons whom he discipled--and his sons brought their friends to be a part of the meetings. In a day when too many pastors' kids walk away from the faith, John has walked with his kids to be robust disciples. That's a lesson worth living.

Trustees

I just left Nashville and the trustee meeting at LifeWay. I have written before about how I think it is essential that trustees from churches oversee the work of agencies. It was good to see that done in a healthy way today.

We have a good committee that relates to us in Research. It was good to get to spend some time with several of them today.

Also, I am glad that the trustees voted to give a contribution to Union University. (I will let our communications people report the details.) The trustees also voted to move my boss into a new role, moving me into a new organizational structure. Sigh. Again, the press should have details... but now I report to Thom Rainer. This is a tragedy for him... so pray for his strength and health. Grin.

Off to Minneapolis

Right after the meeting, I jumped on a plane to Minneapolis. The last time I was here to speak at John Piper's church for the Global Church Advancement conference. (I was in town a couple of weeks before the bridge collapse--and we drove over that bridge several times.)

Right now, I am getting ready to speak at the North Central University Missional Ministry Conference. On Monday, they heard from my friend Mark Batterson. The school is affiliated with the Assemblies of God, so it was only appropriate that they heard from Mark who is one of the up-an-coming leaders in the Assemblies of God movement..

I was supposed to speak today (Tuesday), but I changed my meetings to be with the trustees. My friend Todd Hunter graciously switched days with me. Todd and I talked on the phone tonight so we will avoid overlap. And, Todd gave me the heads up on a new book he is writing which sounds very good. (I plan to write more about Todd soon.)

When I look out my hotel window I see where the Minneapolis I-35 bridge once stood. Makes you think...

But, for now, it is time to turn in.