Dangerous Stories - Two
The national summit of forge australia last year was called dangerous stories and next year it is happening all over again - with the name dangerous stories two. Clever hey!
Seriously though this is not to be missed if you are interested in inspiritational speakers and engaging in discussion around aspects of the emerging missional church.
I would rate the last dangerous stories as the best summit/conference/thinktank/symposium (or whatever we are currently calling these thigs) I have ever been to.
So, pop the dates in your diary now.
technorati tags:church, emerging, christian
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July 25th, 2006 at 3:03 pm
Clearly you have never been to Hillsong Phil.
July 25th, 2006 at 4:33 pm
I did actually go once.
July 25th, 2006 at 9:50 pm
I went to the same conference. It was in our pre-dating phase (which in turn was pre-marriage). I like to think that my insightful commentary as a 19 year old, together with my rad undercut (seriously) won him over so that he fell for me (2 and a half years later).
July 26th, 2006 at 10:25 am
Maybe your picture was flashed up on the big screen and he took it as a sign.
July 26th, 2006 at 11:08 am
So Phil… come clean. If this conference is better then Hillsong which had ‘future potential marriage-able babes who had rad undercuts’ then what are the babes like at this one? What is the talent like? You said that it was good but how good?
July 26th, 2006 at 1:55 pm
there will be no babes - it’s a conference for serious thinkers not girly looker atterers…more’s the shame!
July 26th, 2006 at 2:23 pm
ex-ce-USE me!!
March 14th, 2007 at 6:16 pm
Well, I attended most of Dangerous Stories Two, and at the risk of sounding like an airhead, it was awesome. Really.
To continue sounding trivial, I met the Rev! The funny thing is, I don’t think I picture Signposts posters as looking like anything in particular… but I must have imagined something… because he seemed taller, fairer and more serene looking than I’d imagined… I suppose I must have imagined anyone seriously into martial arts must look a bit dark and foreboding!
I heard a lot from Wolfgang Simpson over the couple of days… introduced as a mad German! I found his stories about how God is growing the church through the house church movement (overseas… but also in the West) really inspiring… it’s going gangbusters.
I just had a look for one of his books on the net and the comments about it… some of you might want to check it out. If the institutional church doesn’t sit right for you, and the emerging missional church seems a bit too artsy / trendy / reactionary for your tastes, he argues that a network of multiplying missional house churches is more what God always intended. So I’m reflecting on this… he made some interesting points.
See:
http://www.amazon.com/Houses-Change-World-Wolfgang-Simson/dp/customer-reviews/185078356X
March 14th, 2007 at 6:52 pm
If anyone wants to hear some of the talks (or watch on DVD) you can go to:
http://idearipple.com
Great stuff.
March 14th, 2007 at 7:58 pm
I too went to all of DS2, and it was a great weekend. I am also doing the Forge internship so I had an extra couple of days with the Rev, Hammo, and the Hirsch’s etc. Needless to say that after four and a half days, my brain is just about mush from info overload.
Janet you said,
‘If the institutional church doesn’t sit right for you, and the emerging missional church seems a bit too artsy / trendy / reactionary for your tastes, he argues that a network of multiplying missional house churches is more what God always intended.’
My experiance of the missional church is that it takes on whatever form God wants it to. Whether that is meeting in a pub, waterskiing or in homes. Yes it is true that the missional church can seem a bit ‘artsy / trendy / reactionary’, but i would argue that, if you carefully critique it, at its core it is a multiplying missional/incarnational community.
If you weren’t able to go to DS2 then I too would recomend getting a copy of the cd’s or dvd’s. All the speaker were great and, as I was told, so were the workshop sessions.
March 14th, 2007 at 9:16 pm
adsy - did we meet?
I was the Phil that kept introducing the transition stream and did the responsive prayer on tuesday morning…
March 14th, 2007 at 9:29 pm
I’m not sure if I should reveal my true identity on this site.
March 14th, 2007 at 9:31 pm
Just kidding, Adam Taylor. I’m at the Junction.
March 14th, 2007 at 9:32 pm
I missed Tuesday morning though because i couldn’t get out of work.
March 14th, 2007 at 10:16 pm
ah Adam!!! Yes, I know you. We have met - I am Phil on the staff of forge!
March 15th, 2007 at 12:23 pm
Yeah, adsy, a bit harsh… I was picking up on the feelings of some expressed here in a recent debate on the emerging church! I think Michael Frost did warn of the dangers of being a bit too trendy and losing focus on the mission, and I respect the fact Forge do try to keep the focus on the mission.
March 15th, 2007 at 12:31 pm
Was anyone as blown away as I was by Mike Frost on the Friday night? Profund and challenging stuff.
March 16th, 2007 at 8:21 am
I wanted to put some of my “heretical” reflections of late out into signposts land to get some feedback from signposters. I think this is the most relevant thread to put them in….
I have been very disillusioned of late about the whole concept of mission and striving to be “missional” and the whole missional church thing. I have been a church planter, started “missional” communities, and been very involved with Forge. So I have been immersed in the whole missional thinking.
My unrest though lies in the ambition that I know I have strived for, and how I see the church at large striving for in relation to mission. It feels like it is something we have to achieve, another performance hoop that we have to jump through. I actually feel like the ambition that we tend to create towards mission and being missional is pandering to our ego, our false self. It is an invention to keep our egos feeling like we really are making a difference and our self-esteem, security and sense of significance is bolstered. It is a futile attempt at satisfying our ego.
My reflections are leading me toward being rather than doing. The most effective way to make any difference in this world is to change our selves - our being. When we change and truly transform, it is then that we actually touch and change those around us and make a true difference. (And true transformation tends to only come through dieing to ourselves, our ego, our false self, the self that wants significance, success, security, etc…, and this dieing process is incredibly painful).
I am feeling like our ambition for mission is futile and is merely an invention of our ego. True and effective mission comes when we die to ourselves and in the process of doing so we experience true transformation and so become an expression of mission without even trying….
Any thoughts?…..
March 16th, 2007 at 9:00 am
I think some wisdom from the episode of the Simpsons called “Bart’s Inner Child” would be of service in this situation - (Brad Goodman is the self help guru - a take off of a guy who was popular a while ago named John Bradshaw:
Brad Goodman: You see, folks, we’re all trying to please someone else. And as soon as you’re not a human be-ing, you’re a human do-ing. Then what comes next?
Bart: A human go-ing! [gets up to leave]
I think there’s something in that for all of us - in closing may I just point out:
Brad: We can all learn a lot from this young man here, this, this –
Bart: Rudiger.
Brad: — Rudiger. And if we can all be more like little Rudiger –
Marge: His name is Bart.
Brad: [snaps] His name isn’t important! What’s important here is that
this lad has fully developed ego integrity with well-defined
boundaries.
Bart: [snoring noises]
[Audience laughs]
March 16th, 2007 at 11:54 am
Great question Wayne… I think Robert Clinton’s book on leadership actually outlines how throughout the course of a leader’s life they will start off with a lot of “doing”… but in the later part of their lives (when they are at their most truly effective) their ministry comes out of a very different place…. they’ve been really refined and honed and are some much more authentic, true to who they are and to who God has moulded them to be.
I guess our example (as always!) is Jesus. He spent a lot of years working with wood… not doing any “ministry” that we know of. He didn’t “need” a ministry to make him fulfilled. But at the right time, he was led by the Holy Spirit into “doing”… healing the sick, preaching and teaching casting out demons, and eating.
I find these are powerful words:
John 8: 28
I do nothing of Myself (of My own accord or on My own authority), but I say [exactly] what My Father has taught Me.
29And He Who sent Me is ever with Me; My Father has not left Me alone, for I always do what pleases Him.
Out of Jesus “being” His Father sometimes led him to “doing”… but the inner work had been done: it was done only to please the Father, and not to please Himself.
Blessed are you that you’ve seen this about yourself! You might need to “detox” from “doing” for a while… but not from loving Christ or submitting to the Holy Spirit. One day you may be called to “do” something by your Father… but it will come from a different place.
March 16th, 2007 at 12:39 pm
Thanks for your insights Janet.
How much do you think that the concept of mission and missional thinking in our churches is motivated by the doing and satisfying our egos?
March 16th, 2007 at 1:13 pm
I’d find that impossible to judge. It’s hard enough to read my own heart, let alone anyone else’s.
I seem to recall Daryl Gardinder having a stab… he reckons when we’re newish Christians we might think we’re giving our all for Jesus… in Daryl’s opinion though it’s really about 10% for Jesus and 90 % for ourselves. As we truly grow in grace and Christian maturity there’s more motivation for Jesus and less for ourselves… but let us not kid ourselves and think our egos aren’t mixed in with what we do. All the more reason for grace to abound. And I do think God is incredibly gracious and patient with us, and that God even uses our ego-driven imperfect efforts and can grace them and bless them for a season. Eventually, however, we’re asked to grow up. Ouch.
March 16th, 2007 at 3:03 pm
I guess the question I’m really asking is about the whole push for mission at all. Whenever I hear people talking about mission, changing the world, that it’s all about “them”, being missional, I get an uneasiness in my gut. Perhaps it is just where I’m at in my journey, but I also suspect there’s something more to it.
Why do we feel the need to push mission? Why do we even create an ambition for it? And before people start throwing verses at me, I am well aware of the great commission, etc… But somehow I think in our culture we are missing the point with mission. Mission isn’t something we need to strive for, it is an expression of who we are….
March 16th, 2007 at 3:34 pm
It’s a really good question… I wonder whether Al Hirsch’s blog is a better place to pose it (in a “test case” sense) because Signposts is a “mixed economy” kind of place: that’s more a focused forum of missional leaders. (although there’s quite a few here too… comments welcome!)
I suppose in ministry I come from the place of helping people to see what God has uniquely gifted them in and has made them passionate about… this may be mission, or prayer, or working with children, or helping people who’ve been through life crisis, or cross cultural work, or humanitarian work, or church leadership… whatever it is… to identify what they are called to do, equip them to do it, work on any blocks to their doing it.
Just as much… and more importantly… to help them in who they are called to be… how God is at work deep in their hearts… to draw them closer into his love.
But I’m a chick, not some macho missional leader… (God bless them). Maybe part of your disquiet is what God has shown you about yourself and what your “driver” may have been for a time. Maybe part of it is prophetic about others. I don’t know.
March 17th, 2007 at 8:23 am
It is an interesting question and one that I will post up for its own thread Wayne.