Workshop - Tim Conder - Emergent Ministry for Existing Churches

WORKSHOP - TIM CONDER - EMERGENT MINISTRY FOR EXISTING CHURCHES

This last workshop on Friday morning - I saw several that looked appealing, and kept changing my minds on which one to attend. Finally as I looked at this topic, I felt like it might have the most applicability to our own context at BUMC.

Tim Conder is founding pastor of Emmaus Way, a small, “emergent,” missional church in Durham, North Carolina. Before that, he worked for years in established, existing churches. He has also been very involved in a group called Emergent Village.

Very helpful book - The Great Emergence: How Christianity is Changing and Why, by Phyllis Tickle. Every 500 years there is a movement and a counter-movement, that leaves us with two streams that are more effective than the previous stream.

ACT ONE: ASSESSING A CHANGING ECCLESIAL LANDSCAPE
I believe we are in the last gasps of the foundation war (between evangelicals and “liberals.”) I notice “liberals” talk a lot about Jesus and the Kingdom, and that evangelicals talk a lot about justice and creation. The old categories mean less and less to your new audiences. You need to be wary about that. But also be careful not to build upon a foundation that is no longer there. There may be a “third way.” We live in a culture with a lot of crazy juxtapositions - you will have modern and post-modern side by side. You will have “strange bedfellows” side by side. In addition, this emerging ministry has already moved into multiple streams, with some conflict along with that.

ACT TWO: DEFINING YOUR GOALS
What is your goal? Survival? My experience is that “emergence” is not a good tool to help a congregation survive. If a congregation is dealing with survival, it is probably something else. Demographic change? This probably is not going to work either. Appeasement? Trying to deal with a group that is buzzing about the possibilities of change? I don’t know that appeasement is good pasturing.

Missional change? The conversation about being a missional church is happening simultaneously. They too challenged how church has been done, that it had become more of a producer of goods and services. Emerging culture ministry can help you identify your mission, and it can help you to change your mission. Authenticity is also an important piece. Sometimes the idiom in church is so radically different from the world. Our church is not at all what you would describe as “contemporary” - it is much more eclectic, and seeking to be authentic.

Postmodern people tend to think the church is immoral, and the church tends to think that postmodern people are immoral.

Frankly, some churches shouldn’t spend a lot of time and energy on emergent issues.

A good question….Are you doing ministry “for postmoderns,” “with postmoderns,” or “as postmoderns.” Different strategies apply. Be very clear.

ACT THREE: DANCE WITH YOUR DATE
With ministry, you need to dance with the one who brought you to the party - do it within your tradition! Do it in a way that makes sense for you.

ACT FOUR: ETHOS, TONE, ECCLESIOLOGY
If you don’t get these pieces right, your efforts will suffer! When you practice methodologies without a corresponding change of ethos, it looks like a “bad comb over.“
Self-righteous superiority, cultural defensiveness and triumphalism really do not work. Christians in the post-Christian era really get miserable and obnoxious. Some are offended at aspects of post-modern culture. You may need a “tone police!”

What if we could define our ecclesiology around missionality and hospitality? I’m convinced that hospitality is the spiritual discipline that will touch our culture. (Henri Nouwen, Reaching Out). Hospitality as “radical receptivity” (to those who decipher truth differently) and as honesty - meeting them with a real presence. Too many churches do only one or the other. This will shape the whole tone. (Beware of hospitality that becomes pretentious.) Hospitality is divine, relational (kindness), ideological, cultural. In many existing churches, there is no safe space to raise questions, and become a sort of “don’t ask/don’t tell” environment - “I know I’m not supposed to ask this…” If we only voice the things we agree on, you will not be engaged. How many things would change in your community if this were a core value?

Missionality. Begin to deconstruct a “benefit Christianity” (if you follow God, your life will get better). Expanding a “reductionist Christianity.” Transforming a “homogenous Christianity.”

ACT FIVE: INITIATIVES

• Structural/Institutional Changes - changing worship, leadership, meetings - the “hardware” of the church environment.
• Tribal Offerings - changing a subset (church within a church, new worship service, new age-group ministry) - these all tend to have a “shelf life” - either bring it back in or send it out.
• Entrepreneurial Plans - developing businesses/structures that connect your church with the culture around you - like recording studios, day care, intervention, political groups, vegan cafes - whatever fits. In the postmodern world, you are scary to them - this helps break that down. Business places may feel more “safe” than churches.
• Missional and Monastic Approaches - forming partnership with existing missions, or forming communities that change the way your church operates.
• Church Planting as a Strategy for Existing Church Change - a decision to plant a church that is not like you.

Conder also shared a handout listing five streams of “Emergence”:

• Counter-Reformation - keeping existing theological models while being committed to creative methods
• Transitional - no obvious theological mark
• Post-Reformation - sacramental theology and practices, connecting to ancient traditions
• New Monastic - communal living and shared values
• Post-Church - informal communities that free themselves of the restrictions of institutional church

The last thing on our agenda is this morning's closing worship and Communion service. It has been fun to stay in touch with you electronically. I will follow up on Sunday and Monday with further posts from Atlanta.