Craig lets the pendulum swing the other way and challenges women who cheers from the sidelines when Mark Driscoll tells of Christian men.

That's right: our morning service isn't Cornerstone, it's Crossroads House ;-)

"Family church" often means something like: suburban, middle-class and dominated by a certain type of family-friendly ethos. We're not that kind of family church. There's a place for that kind of family church, but it's also alienating to many people who don't fit the suburban family mode... including many families!

But it's not true to say that Crossroads is 'not a family church'.  We have about two dozen kids in the church. We have a morning service - 'Crossroads House' - that has all the normal stuff: kids talks, creche, even a soon-to-be-unveiled Sunday School. It's not very nice to all these young families to suggest that they somehow don't belong at Crossroads.

Crossroads concentrates too much on evangelism.

Can you focus too much on evangelism? I don't know if that's a very wise thing to say. It is possible to focus on evangelism to the detriment of other things, of course. That's a better way to express this myth, perhaps.

In the past we have given the wrong impression that every Christian must be an evangelist and that only certain types of activities are valuable to the church and the church's mission. We have in the past neglected the importance of loving care and nurture of our relationship with God and our fellow believers.

Of course, neglecting your relationship with God and your love for the church actually undermines your commitment to evangelism in the end. And that is what we found out.

But is this still a fair criticism of Crossroads? No, I don't think so. We do two 'missions' each year. We see a few non-Christians come along to our meetings. We see one or two conversions every year. We are deeply committed to evangelism. But we are neither exclusively focused on it, nor astonishingly fruitful in it.

Crossroads has grown and changed a lot since it began in 2000. I fear that some of our critics haven't. I fear some of them are still stuck in the year 2000 or something.

In 2005-2006 Crossroads spent about 6 months on a careful consultation process to evaluate our strengths and weaknesses. If anything, we could be accused of focusing too much on pastoral care! You can read the report of that process here .

Oh that's David Jones' church, right?

Well yes and no.

Yes

Yes it is the church that David Jones planted. Yes David Jones is the 'moderator' of Crossroads as far as the Presbyterian Church of Tasmania is concerned. No, he is not the pastor of the church. 

No

David stopped being the pastor of Crossroads in 2003. But he planted a church called 'Cornerstone'. It's the 'C' that trips you up. Two churches beginning with 'C', it's very difficult to get a grip on, I know.

It's exciting to think about planting new churches. A lot of young man warrior for Jesus types in Sydney are pretty keen for it after Mark Driscoll glassed them last month.

But church planting has many ugly realities. One reality is that it's hard and it hurts and you make mistakes and sometimes you fail.

Another hard reality is that it requires planning and funding and organisation and assessment and forms and stuff. An ugly reality indeed. Yet if we want to be wise in our service of the Lord, we ought to pay attention to this stuff too. Ed Stetzer has a bunch of links to reports on church planting best practices which are probably worth a read for those considering church planting.

Sigh. Happy reading.

I did some walk-up evangelism at the markets with Kerri today. She has apologetics powers.

What basis do you have for your belief in heaven and hell? a sceptical agnostic asks.

Thoughtful pause.

 

What basis do you have for your belief that after we die we just turn to dust? she responds.

I just nod my head and feel wise. 

Did you know that Edward De Bono had Six Action Shoes too?

1. Navy shoes: Formal, routine, procedure.
   
2. Grey sneakers: Exploration, investigation.
   
3. Brown brogues: Practicality.
   
4. Orange gumboots: Emergency and danger.
   
5. Pink slippers: Care and sensitivity.
   
6. Purple riding boots: Authority and command.
   

It is good to keep these in mind during team and committee meetings. Firstly, it reminds us that our goal is to decide what actions we should do next. We are not just here to talk and worry. We are here to plan what that next thing we will actually do is. Then to write that down and go home.

Secondly, it forces us to clarify what type of actions we are capable of or willing to do. No use discussing the pastoral concerns (pink slippers) of someone at length if we are not in able to or willing to to care for them one on one. No use arguing about what rules should be made (navy)  if we are not in charge of procedure.

Thirdly, it allows us to focus discussion around the relevant issues. If the main issue is one of getting the job done (brown brogues), then we shouldn't be too worry about exactly how it is done (navy shoes). If our job is to deal swiftly with a report of sexual abuse (orange gumboots) we could cause a great deal of further problems by dwelling too long on everybody's feelings (pink slippers).

Phillip Jensen's initial thoughts on Mark Driscoll's critique of Australian Christianity is a pleasure to read and a blessing to read. Check it out.

Here's what I had to say at Crossroads last Sunday. Three more weeks of our Spirituality and Suffering series to go.

Jimbo walks around Warrane , loving the city, learning from the city, watching with spiritual eyes.

Some missiologists are so keen to help people in the West to see that they are in a mission field that anything and everything becomes a tribe. This is a very loose and annoying use of the word 'tribe'.

Missionary does all the work just fine. Missional is a stupid make-believe word.

1. Be serious.

2. Be curious.

3. Answer questions with questions. 

4. Be willing to lose, be willing to say less, expect more.

5. Give people information to use.

6. Go for sound bytes not downloads.

7. Speak subjectively.

Gordo has a pet peeve:

A current pet peeve of mine is people who want to insist that we be culturally savvy in our understanding of our own culture and the culture of the Bible, and that this needs to happen before we can really get the message from the text. It seems to me a subtle attempt to deaden and dull the immediacy of God's living word. 

But I sense a false either/or thing going on here... or else he's being flat out naive about how meaning works.

I was chatting to my friend Matt the other day. Matt is as cool as a Christian can be without falling away. We were chatting about podcasting sermons and that conversation has prompted me to make this point. It's obvious to me, but maybe it's not obvious to others:

You'd have to be on rosters at Mars Hill and Bethlehem Baptist too. You'd probably be in a small group where you didn't get on with the leader at those churches too. Some days you wouldn't feel like going to church even if your preacher was awesome.

You don't have to put your status as 'busy' or 'away'. You can simply ignore. 

There is no requirement for you to respond if someone says 'hi' to you on chat. Just ignore. For all they know you are fighting off a pack of wild dogs who have broken into your home. Just ignore.

Some people avoid chat at all costs for fear of being interrupted. Some people waste masses of time because they feel that they have to respond to someone who strikes up a chat. You don't need to. Just ignore.

All my friends who work in IT seem to have their chat on 'available' almost all the time. But they are simply happy to ignore.

As far as I'm concerned, the only netiquette issue here is, if someone does ignore you, then you shouldn't get offended and you shouldn't say 'you there?'. After all, for all you know they are fighting off a pack of wild dogs who have broken into their home.

Please share some links. I try to take the time to listen Dominic Steele and Greg Lee. 

1. Atheism: Deny that God exists.
2. Idealism: Deny that evil truly exists.
3. Pantheism: Deny that God is only good.
4. Polytheism: Deny that God(s) is all powerful.

From P. Kreeft and R. K. Tacelli, Handbook of Christian Apologetics

Craig has a great idea to plan out the first 25 songs of a new church plant 's public meetings. I agree that this would be a great benefit to a new music team.

I do wonder though, if the church plant is being all man-warrior like Driscoll says, shouldn't we have some Eye of the Tiger or Seven Nation Army?