Here are two interviews with some Western workers serving the church in Taiwan and other nearby settings.

Phil Nicolson, with OMF, describes "Shopkeeper Churches" and their ministry among the underclass. Few of us have to worry about doing ministry among people who are not available at normal respectable church times. Listen to how they work through these issues:

"Garth," who works with my "company," explains his work and why he is there. The video is intentionally dark and "Garth" is filmed from behind because he goes to some other areas in the region.

"Garth" and I have known each other for a long time. He has planted in more than one place and his story is worth hearing.

If you or your church wanted to partner in planing churches in the area, "Garth" is the person who can help make the connections.

I was humbled and burdened to talk to these men-- and it made me wonder, am I doing enough?

I will have one more post on Taiwan... so stay tuned.

I am writing this post from Taiwan. As I have been working with both local leaders and American pastors, I have been struck by a few things and thought I would share them with you.

First, I have traveled to Taiwan as a part of the Upstream Collective. The reason is to accompany American pastors with a desire to be missional on a cross-cultural, international encounter. (You can scroll down the last few posts to learn what we are doing in Taiwan.)

Each person on the trip has the missional impulse as part of their DNA, and they are here to consider how they might join God on his mission globally. While I admire the faithfulness of these men, I must admit my surprise to see that there is not a bigger interest in such global concerns among American pastors in general. My fellow travelers seem to be rare of a breed in ministry.

Second, when I blogged about this on Sunday, two readers contacted my hosts-- one working with the Presbyterian Church in America and one from the Oversee Missionary Fellowship (OMF). Why? Well, according to one email, the author explained, "I'm particularly interested in attracting young missional church planters here."

Third, I was recently told by a pastor who called himself "missional" that his church needed to pull back on their global mission support to help their people "be missionaries right here."

All this provokes me to ask, "Why are so many missional Christians uninvolved in God's global mission?" As the missional conversation continues and deepens, what has occurred that has led to our blindness to the lost world around us?

There are five reasons I think this has happened:

1) In rediscovering God's mission, many have only discovered its personal dimensions.

I don't mean they have somehow localized mission into their interior, "private" life-- that would make little sense. Rather, the encouragement for each person to be on mission (to be "missional") has trended toward a personal obligation to personal settings, rather than toward a global obligation to advance God's kingdom among all the nations.

"Missional" has merged with privatized Christianity to serve as the reason for personal projects carried out in personal spheres. This is not bad, necessarily. But when the missional impulse is not expanded to include God's global mission, it results in believers moved only to minister in their own Jerusalems with no mind toward their Judeas, Samarias, and uttermost parts of the earth (Acts 1:8).

2) In responding to God's mission, many have wanted to be more mission-shaped and have therefore made everything "mission."

Missions historian Stephen Neil, responding to a similar surge in mission interest (the missio dei movement of the 1950s and following), explained it this way: "If everything is mission then nothing is mission." Neil's fear was that the focus would shift from global evangelization (often called "missions") to societal transformation (often called "mission"). He was right.

Recently John Piper echoed these same concerns, differentiating between evangelism and missions. He reminded us that when "Every Christian is a missionary" equals "missional," then we have diluted the need for and specialness of missionaries to foreign lands. (Although I would want to nuance John's language a bit, I agree with his point.)

One American church's website recently identified their ministry as missional, which they proceeded to define as "reaching out to the community to invite them to come" see what is happening in the church. Another's young adult community service project consisted of landscaping the church grounds. Inviting people to church and cleaning up the church are noble endeavors, but passing them for "missional" and "service" is ministerial naïveté at best. It demonstrates the fuzziness that creeps in when labels become catch-alls. And as the outer edges of the missional label gets fuzzy so does mission to the outer edges of the world.

3) In relating God's mission, the message increasingly includes the hurting but less frequently includes the global lost.

One only needs to watch the videos to see the emphases: global orphan projects, eradicating AIDS, Christmas shoeboxes, etc. All of these causes now have advocacy groups, and rightly so, as they are important. However, their vocabulary and frames of reference do not frequently make room for evangelizing the very people they touch. The message of world evangelism, actually, seems more common in legacy/traditional churches than in missional churches. Missional churches seem to speak more of unserved peoples rather than unreached peoples. As we engage to deliver justice, we must also deliver the gospel regardless of anyone's status in a culture.

4) In refocusing on God's mission, many are focusing on being good news rather than telling good news.

St. Francis allegedly said,"Preach the gospel at all times; when necessary, use words." Interestingly enough, Francis never actually said this, nor would he have done so due to his membership in a preaching order. But it is a pithy quote tossed into mission statements and vision sermons in missional churches all around my country. Why? It seems that many in the missional conversation place a higher value on serving the global hurting rather than evangelizing the global lost. Or perhaps it is just easier.

I am not urging a dichotomy here, only noting that one already exists. It is ironic, though, that as many missional Christians have sought to "embody" the gospel, they have chosen to forsake one member of Christ's body; the mouth.

5) In reiterating God's mission, many lose the context of the church's global mission and needed global presence.

For whatever reason-- the admirable one of commitment to the local church or the ignoble one of commitment to personalized consumeristic Christianity-- we have lost the grand scope of the entire family of God. While Christ calls people from all tongues, tribes, and nations, we have become content with our own tongue, tribe, and nation. Many churches are wonderfully embracing the missional imperative, but as they seek to "own" the mission by adapting their church into a missional movement in their local community, some inadvertently localize God's mission itself and lose the vital connection all believers share together. A hyper-focus on our own community results in a, have lost vision for the communion of the saints.

So how do we fully embrace missional without losing the mission? The Mission Exchange (formerly the Evangelical Foreign Mission Society) asked me to talk to their global leaders on the topic "How to Put 'Missions' Back into Missional." In my talk, I proposed four principles we needed to consider:

First, recognize it is God's mission, and we need to be passionate about the mission as He describes it. We don't own mission and it is not ours to define. A church vision statement is fine, but God's mission is better and bigger. Our first task is to submit to God's mission.

Secondly, evangelicals have understated the call to serve the poor and the hurting and need a stronger engagement in social justice. This sounds counterintuitive if we are seeking to remedy the loss of concern for articulated evangelism. But social engagement entails relational engagement, and relational engagement entails opportunities to share the gospel. The successes and experiences in our communities should awaken hearts and minds to global needs. We just need to maintain the reason for social justice: the glory of God in the worship of Jesus.

Third, share God's deep concern about His mission to the nations-- that His name be praised from the lips of men and women from every corner of the globe. Feel the Great Commission in your bones. Ask God to turn your heart to those you cannot see. As Paul did, develop ways to "struggle personally" (Colossians 2:1) for those far away.

Fourthly, churches that are serious about joining God on his mission will obey his commands to disciple the nations. The end product of missional endeavors should be a thriving Christian ready to produce more thriving Christians.

It appears to me that many missional churches are missing the Great Commission in the name of being missional. That makes zero sense. It is a huge (but historically common) mistake.

If we are truly interested in being missional-- in joining God on His mission-- our efforts should actually reflect His stated mission. We are bound to the Great Commandment as the fullest human expression of God's love. But the Commandment is not hermetically sealed off from the Great Commission. Rather, the Great Commission provides the what of mission, while the Great Commandment provides part of the how. Answering the age-old question of "Who is my neighbor?" should result in the desire to "make disciples of all nations."

Video number 4 from the Jet Set Vision Trip in Taiwan all goes down during a cab ride through Taipei as Ray Chang and I talk about how second generation immigrant churches in America can be involved in God's global mission. Ray is the pastor of Ambassador Church (an Evangelical Free congregation) in Brea, CA.

Watch and listen as a second generation Asian American leader talks about his vision for the nations. It's worth your time!

If you missed the earlier videos, they are listed below.

Taiwan Video 1: Meeting and Learning from Pastor Chen
Taiwan Video 2: Ancestor Worship and Taiwanese Christians
Taiwan Video 3: Knowing Taiwan

We have been here in Taiwan for about half the week and we have seen some remarkable settings, fruitful ministry, and spiritually hungry people.

Be sure to check out the posts thus far:

Taiwan Video 1: Meeting and Learning from Pastor Chen

Taiwan Video 2: Ancestor Worship and Taiwanese Christians

As we talk to pastors, local leaders, and just everyday people, we regularly hear two things:

1. Taiwan is a difficult field. Operation World explains:

Taiwan remains the only major Han Chinese population in the world where the spiritual breakthrough has yet to come. During the 1990s the influence of Buddhism grew markedly with a large increase in adherents (800,000 in 1983 to 4.9m in 1995). Many of their outreach techniques have been adapted from Christians. Ancestor worship is one of the major barriers to faith in Christ. Added to this is the materialism stimulated by the rapid rise of living standards. Pray that every obstacle to the reception of the gospel may be broken down.

2. The heart religion is primarily animism and ancestor worship.

Take a look at this video to better understand the situation in Taiwan.

Please pray for the people of Taiwan so that the name and fame of Jesus might be more widely known here.

One of the fundamental challenges with evangelistic cultural engagement is how far to go to engage culture. It is always easy for unengaged people to sit on the sidelines and throw rocks at people who seek to engage cultures. I see it every day. But, people who care about God's mission also care about engaging culture.

The fact of the matter is this: in every missional cultural engagement, some go too far and some don't go far enough. It is the nature of contextualization. It is hard. It takes a commitment to biblical principles. It takes wisdom. It takes listening to each other. And, those outside the culture need to listen to those inside. And, those inside the culture need to learn from those that have gone before them.

In this video, Robert Young, a local Taiwanese believer who trains visiting personnel, explains to us how he has worked through issues of contextualization in regards to the veneration of ancestors. As you will see in tomorrow's post, animism and ancestor worship is much more significant in this culture than Buddhism and Taoism.

Listen as Robert Young (his anglicized name) explains in this video shot by our team member, Ray Chang. Listen as he explains the issues and how his family has addressed them:

Why does this matter? Well, at the Madras missionary conference, way back in 1938, they explained that churches had to be "indigenous," or be rooted and related to their own cultural context:

An indigenous church, young or old, in the East or in the West, is a church which, rooted in obedience to Christ, spontaneously uses forms of thought and modes of action natural and familiar in its own environment. Such a church arises in response to Christ's own call. The younger churches will not be unmindful of the experiences and teachings which the older churches have recorded in their confessions and liturgy. But every younger church will seek further to bear witness to the same Gospel with new tongues" (International Missionary Council, "The Growing Church: The Madras Series," Papers Based upon the Meeting of the International Missionary Council, at Tambaram, Madras, India, December 12-29, 1938. Vol. 2, (New York, International Missionary Council), 276.)

Such a value is not easy to uphold and there are dangers on both sides.

Dean Gilliland explains:

Contextualization [is] a delicate enterprise if ever there was one... the evangelist and mission strategist stand on a razor's edge, aware that to fall off on either side has terrible consequences... Fall to the right and you end in obscurantism, so attached to your conventional ways of practicing and teaching the faith that you veil its truth and power from those who are trying to see it through very different eyes. Slip to the left and you tumble into syncretism, so vulnerable to the impact of paganism in its multiplicity of forms that you compromise the uniqueness of Christ and concoct "another gospel which is not a gospel." (Dean S. Gilliland, ed., The Word Among Us (Dallas: Word Publishing, 1989), vii.)

An organization I serve recently put out some helpful guidelines on contextualization that are worth your time and consideration:

PRINCIPLES OF CONTEXTUALIZATION

1. We affirm that the Bible is the only infallible text that exists. It is appropriate to evaluate all other books by the Bible. We encourage our personnel to search the Scriptures daily to see whether the principles presented by any text or teacher are true (Acts 17:11). Content that is in accord with biblical truth should be embraced. What is contrary to sound doctrine should be rejected.

2. We affirm that there is a biblical precedent for using "bridges" to reach out to others with the Gospel (Acts 17:22-23). The fact that Paul mentioned an aspect of the Athenians' idolatrous worship was not a tacit approval of their entire religious system. He was merely utilizing a religious element of their setting (an altar to an unknown god) to connect with his hearers and bridge to the truth. Similarly, our personnel may use elements of their host culture's worldview to bridge to the Gospel. This need not be construed as an embracing of that worldview. It should be noted that Paul not only used their system to connect, he also contrasted elements of it with the truth. Our evangelism must go beyond bridges to present the whole unvarnished truth of the Gospel (1 Corinthians 15:1-4).

3. We affirm an incarnational approach to missions that is bound by biblical parameters. Following the example of Him who became flesh (John 1:14), it is appropriate that our personnel continue to tailor their ministry to their setting. The apostle Paul likewise embraced this approach, "I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some" (1 Corinthians 9:22b). We advocate the learning and appropriate utilization of language and culture. Constant vigilance is required lest contextualization degenerate into syncretism. Where linguistic categories and cultural mores are deficient, these must be challenged and corrected with biblical truth.

4. We affirm both the sufficiency and unique nature of biblical revelation (2 Timothy 3:14-17). We deny that any other purported sacred writing is on a par with the Bible. While reference to a target people group's religious writings can be made as a part of bridge building, care should be exercised not to imply a wholesale acceptance of such.

5. We affirm the need to be ethically sound in our evangelistic methodology (2 Corinthians 4:2). Becoming all things to all men in an incarnational approach does not necessitate an ethical breach. Jesus instructed His disciples to be as "wise as serpents, and harmless as doves" (Matthew 10:16). We are to be wise in our bridge building. We are to be harmless in our integrity as we hold forth the truth.
(Footnotes specific to another religious tradition were dropped from the guidelines as I posted them here.)

More on this over the next couple of days... but please weigh in below, specifically on Robert's comments and missions in this culture-- where not worshiping one's ancestors to be both dishonoring and spiritually dangerous.

One of the funny elements in my video interview with Pastor Chen included a reference to a Bluegrass concert (he calls it Greengrass in the video).

Phil Johnson (of Grace to You and John MacArthur fame) made a comment about it. Phil and I have traded tweets twice, both in regards to contextualization, so he is enthusiastic about the subject. ;-) Anyway, Phil tweeted:

OK, Ed Stetzer seems excited by this, but but I don't get how bluegrass helps contextualize the gospel for Taiwan: http://bit.ly/25TivB

I don't remember being excited or saying it "helps contextualize the gospel," but Phil and I like to tweet about contextualization, so I responded:

@Phil_Johnson_ LOL. I was a bit surprised, but he said it was a great outreach. Bluegrass in Taiwan-- who knew? ;-)

Well, here is the rest of the story.

People in Taiwan have no context for bluegrass music (there's not a term in Mandarin for bluegrass), but they love music and American culture. So, it led to an interesting outreach event.

A team of "young missional Calvinists" (thought Phil would like that) from Southern Seminary has been sent to Taiwan for five months to proclaim the Gospel alongside career missionaries. In America, they are known as "The Long Run Players" here their Chinese name translates as "Mighty River Music Group."

Sarah Morrison, Matt Shirley, Cameron Beckerdite, Paul Martin, and Jeff Gayhart are learning Mandarin, engaging the Taiwanese culture, meeting people, building relationships, and sharing the Gospel--all through the use of guitar, banjo, fiddle, mandolin, and upright bass. Jeff says, "People always asked us before we came, 'Do they like bluegrass in Taiwan?' I would say, 'Not yet.'"

The ultimate goal is to make something much greater than bluegrass music fans; they want to lead people to Christ and make disciples. So, not really contextualization, but a neat opportunity for connection. (Though a bit surprising to me!)

Now, in regards to contextualization, you won't want to miss my next post. It will deal with contextualization and ancestor worship-- and it will be fascinating.

I am in Taiwan right now and will be blogging the trip all week. Other bloggers will also be weighing in over the next few days. See my last post for a list. (The guys at the Upstream Collective made a nifty little graphic that our "official commentators" will use a bit later, but you can see it at the top of this post.)

During the week, we will talk to local leaders, workers living here permanently helping local churches, and also some of those who came with me. You will meet leaders from different cultures, denomination, and ages.

For our first video, I talk with Pastor Chen. He pastors a traditional Baptist church and tells a bit about the context and ministry here.

Take a moment to listen and begin to hear about ancestor worship, the growth of the church on the mainland compared to the slower growth in Taiwan, and a bluegrass concert.

I will be posting more in the days to come, but enjoy:

Please feel free to comment below, but if you have friends working over here, be sure they would want their name mentioned before you do so.

I am blogging from Taiwan. You can't get much farther away from Nashville.

While here I will be working with the Upstream Collective and another organization. For some contextual reasons, I won't be saying the name of that organization in my blog posts.

And, as you can tell we will be avoiding some other terms as well. Many of our M friends move between different regions in the area and they have asked us to be careful.

I am bringing several pastors with me on the trip and we will be post video content here are on several other blogs. Our hope is that we might give some global focus on the missional conservation.

Here are some of my friends who will be posting content in the next week.

Andrew Jones (Tall Skinny Kiwi)
J.D. Greear
Matt Chandler
Ed Stetzer
David Phillips (Integrating Missionally)
Almost an M
Michael Carpenter (Dining with Sinners)
Derek Webster (re:frame)
Grady Bauer (Missional Space)
C. Holland (Missionary Confidential)
Kevin Mullins (Life.Outpoured)
Guy Muse (The M Blog)
Ray Short (Cultural Dichotomy)
Todd Littleton (The Edge of the Inside)
Paul Chambers Cox (OMS International)
Tim Patterson (Travel Light)
Justin Powell (Urban Idealist)
David Jackson (Moving at the Speed of God)
Ernest Goodman (Missions Misunderstood)
David Putman (DavidPutmanLive)

Lots of good info and discussion in yesterday's post (you can still join in the discussion there).

From a missionary serving in Taiwan:

I have been asked to speak a little about Taiwan and Taipei. Taiwan is a Tobacco Leaf shaped island 60 kilometers off the coast of China. 22 million people call the island home. There are over 6 million people who make the city of Taipei home. The city of Taipei is a safe and comfortable city where people of all ages can move about and be involved in all sorts of activities to share the gospel. Though there have been missionaries and churches here for many years many people have never heard the gospel in a way that is easy for them to accept.

Continue reading Taiwan Recap.

As many of you know, I have a "shared" role at the International Mission Board. I am particularly focused on helping pastors and churches in my sphere of influence to become involved in global missions and church planting. Regrettably, many new and innovative churches are less involved in global work than more traditional churches. We have a team at the International Mission Board that is working to change that.

I want to tell you about a mission / vision trip that I am putting together with the Upstream Collective and the International Mission Board to Taiwan this Fall. We will depart from the states on September 19, arrive the next day on the 20th, and will complete the trip on September 26th.

Each day we will be taking a look at various ministry venues for church planting in that part of the world. I will be leading a session each morning with the group. We will also hear from some of the leaders of the Upstream Collective network each day as we talk about missional living in an urban and cross cultural context. We have some slots left for this trip. If you have an interest in going you need to fill out an application on theupstreamcollective.org and they will be in touch with you.

Hope to see you in Taiwan.

I recently was in Rome, Italy and Marseille, France connecting pastors in the states with church plant opportunities in Europe. I was there with The Upstream Collective and the International Mission Board.

Daniel Ott was part of our team. Daniel is on staff of Southland Community Church, an independent Christan church in Lexington, KY.

Here is my interview with Daniel:

Here is my interview with a French pastor, Julien, who tells a fascinating story of his journey to be a bi-vocational church planter in France:

A neat journey...

Here are two interviews worth your time.

First, I interview Luigi who talks about the church he is a part of in Venice. It is a fascinating story of an indigenous believer now serving as an elder at his church. Second, is Scott. Scott is the real deal-- a church planter with a heart for the people to whom God has called him. I was told that less that 10% of missionaries return to France after 1 five year term. Scott is coming up on his third term. He has my respect and you should give him a moment of your time.

Luigi in Rome, Italy
Luigi, like many in Italy, grew up Catholic, but was later led to Christ through the ministry of an American missionary. After a year of hearing the gospel, and then attending worship he says he could see the difference between the religion he grew up with and the gospel and was converted. He is now an elder, leading worship and preaching at Christian Bible Church (it sounds much cooler in Italian). He stays connected to the community through his fulll time work in the electronics business.

Luigi talks about the religious culture in Rome (people are Catholic, but typically do not attend church but 2-3 times a year) and explains why the church of Jesus Christ in Italy needs partnership from their brothers and sisters in the States.

Scott in Marseille, France
Here I talk with Scott at the Notre-Dame de la Garde about gospel ministry in the post-Catholic city of Marseille. Here there is a very small Evangelical presence and a growing Muslim population in the midst of a very secular culture. Scott shares some of the difficulties of missionaries coming into this area, and explains that the key is relationships and time. He also talks about how North American Christians and churches can get involved.

I continue to be challenged (and increasingly burdened) by the work here in Europe. You can follow along with the Upstream Collective at http://thejetset.wordpress.com/.

Hello from Rome! They Jet Set Tour keeps us moving, so I am pretty tired and heading to bed, but I wanted to get a video up of part of my interview of Steve Miller, campus pastor at The Journey (Tower Grove campus) in Saint Louis, MO. Steve talks to us about how a church in the States can be involved in church planting and advancing the gospel internationally.

It's been a great trip -- exciting to see all that God is doing here in a place most Americans really do not understand. Stay tuned for more updates from The Jet Set Tour!

Here I talk with Michael Carpenter (blog - twitter) about the church he has planted (Matthew's House) and how they might be involved in global church planting. It is a good reminder that "missional" involves joining God on His global mission.

Take a look:

As I mentioned on Twitter last week, I received an email from Barb Winter that the great American missiologist Ralph D. Winter passed away Wednesday night May 20th. Ralph had been battling the resurgence of the multiple myeloma that has plagued his body since 2002 and the lymphoma diagnosed in early February of this year. Several mini strokes plus drop foot in both feet following his surgery in March complicated his recovery. Ralph was 84.

His influence in the church and the world for missions is unrivaled. Time Magazine tagged Winters as one of America's 25 most influential evangelicals. His book, Perspectives on the World Christian Movement, is an essential read, proving formative and motivational for thousands of believers who begin to see God's heart for world evangelization.

I had the chance to know Ralph when he contributed an essay to a forthcoming book I am editing with David Hesselgrave. His keen insights are, as always, challenging.

He will be missed.

As I mentioned yesterday, I am in Kentucky today, Virginia tomorrow, and then I will be heading to Germany tomorrow afternoon to spend some time in Europe with the The Upstream Collective. I am speaking to a non-denominational group in Frankfort, Germany and then am off to Rome and Marseilles.

I do two of these trips a year with Upstream as part of my role with the International Mission Board. We think it is important to take pastors and mission leaders globally to give them a taste of missions overseas and to help them find ways to connect with missions internationally.

Please pray for us as our group prepares to go. We will be blogging and twittering about these as we go on the trip.

We shot some video while I was in Rome last year. They are raw, but authentic. Take a look at this one featuring Jason who is doing church planting in Rome. He talks briefly about the religious culture, spiritual climate and how a focus on Jesus helps to overcome some anti-Christian bias.

Obviously you hear a lot about Rome but you may not know as much about Marseilles. Marseilles has a large immigrant population from people in North Africa. The city also has a large Jewish population. Meet Scott who works in Marseilles as a church planter. Scott talks about how they are utilizing Third Places in Marseilles to connect with the French and tell them about Jesus Christ.

We are planning a trip this Fall to Asia. For more information about this trip go to the Upstream website to fill out the initial application. The dates are September 19 - 27th and we will be in Taiwan.

I have a lot to share with you about upcoming seminars and conferences. Dates, places topics - and even a way to save you some money!

March 15, 2009
After services tomorrow, I'm speaking to the Georgia Tech (Atlanta, GA) campus ministry students who are coming up to Nashville for church in the morning. Should be good.
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March 17, 2009
Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary Spring 2009 LifeWay Conference (Wake Forest, NC)

Thom Rainer and I have switched chapel days so you might be surprised to see me there on Tuesday and Thom will be there on Wednesday.
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March 19, 2009
Protestant Church Owned Publishing Association Spring Conference I will be speaking on "Protestant Pastor's Today" at the annual meeting in Nashville, TN.
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March 23-27, 2009
Starting next Monday I will be teaching for a D.Min. class on "Entering the Missional Conversation" at Biblical Seminary (Hatfield, PA)
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I have mentioned the Exponential Conference before. While I am there we are planning a special dinner on Monday night. Here are the details:

Dinner and Dialog with Hirsch and Stetzer (April 20)
Let me give you a "heads up" about a couple events in the Orlando area in April around the Exponential Conference.

What if Alan Hirsch and I were starting a church together?
What would it look like?
What strategic considerations would we talk about?

Here's the blurb:

On Monday, April 20, at 6:30 pm in Orlando The Upstream Collective along with Christian Associates International will host Alan and Ed, who are among today's leading missional thinkers and church planters. Join them in a conversation about what church planting could look like in North America, what values a church planting team might espouse, what attractional and/or missional elements it might employ and more.

We have a limited amount of seats available. Tickets are 10.00 at the door and that helps cover the cost of the dinner that will be hosted by Houseblend Café in Orlando.

If you want to reserve your spot go to www.theupstreamcollective.org to sign up.

Also on Wednesday, April 22, at 6:30 pm The Upstream Collective will hosting a dinner with Derek Webster, a church planting strategist for Scandinavia. He will talk about some unique opportunities for North American churches to get involved in what God is doing in Scandinavia. You might be surprised to hear about the ways your church could be a perfect fit for this region of the world!

You can sign up for either or both of these upcoming dinner events online at www.theupstreamcollective.org until April 12.

May 12-13, 2009
And, if you are pastoring in a small town, you might want to check out "The Sticks," a conference for pastors and leaders in small towns. Their early bird registration is about to end. I will be at the SE regional conference along with Perry Noble, Tony Morgan, Gary Lamb, etc.

Last week I spoke at the Innovation3 Gathering in DFW. I have already posted my main session notes here.

I also co-led a breakout session with Matt Wilson who is the Executive Director at The Message Trust, a youth and community ministry based in Manchester, England. We talked about European church planting, a subject on which he is far more of an expert that I would ever claim to be.

In preparation for my session, Larry McCrary, Caleb Crider, and I prepared this paper (handed out at the conference). It tells some of the European story. I have posted it in its entirety below.