Top 8 for 2008: Everything

Who was I kidding? There’s no way I’m going to find the time to write a series of ‘top 8 for 2008′ posts between now and the end of the year so instead I’ll simply cram them all into one post. So here you have it, my top 8 for 2008 of everything!

Top 8 things I did or experienced in 2008:

1. Got married! (October)
2. Got engaged! (March)
3. Started planning and implementing a church plant (All year – but especially last three months)
4. Heard Piper, Driscoll, Chandler and Mahaney at the Resurgence Conference at Mars Hill in Seattle, spent time at the Journey Church in St Louis and met a whole lot of great peeps from Acts 29, and others, in the States (February)
5. Was taught Deuteronomy by Gary Millar – the best Old Testament teacher I’ve been taught by to date (September)
6. Road up Sani Pass – my first real 4×4 experience behind the wheel (October)
7. Decided to stay in Cape Town long term – gotta love this city (March)
8. Had my thinking about the gospel deepened and enriched ten times over by Tim Keller through numerous mp3s, articles and the odd blog comment (throughout the year)

Top 8 Blogs I followed in 2008 (See my 2007 list here):

1. Church Planting Novice – Jonathan Dodson. A newcomer to the list, this blog has been perfect for where I’m at in my thinking at the moment. So much wisdom and insight from a guy on the ground.
2. Between Two Worlds – Justin Taylor. Last year’s number 1 drops down one place – but still a great blog.
3. Tim Chester. Up from last year’s number 7 spot. Tim’s writing never stops enlightening, challenging and encouraging all at the same time.
4. John Scheepers. Give it up for the Saffa bloggers! John is a friend of mine who writes a great blog and brings a welcome voice to the South African Christian blogsphere.
5. Drew Goodmanson. Down from #2 – sorry Drew. Drew doesn’t post very often, but when he does its almost always worthwhile.
6. Justin Moffat. Another newcomer to the list. Justin writes an informative and challenging blog with an Anglican slant – I’ve enjoyed it a lot this year.
7. Michael Jensen. Michael drops down from last years 3rd but still turns out great post after great post. Plus he sent me a copy of his new book which I’ll be reviewing here shortly.
8. Jason Allen. Jason was one of the first people I became ‘blog friends’ with when I started blogging. I’ve always enjoyed his blog and the sanity he brings to some current trends that rage through the church blogging world.

Top 8 Books for 2008 (books I read this year – most of them are older than 2008 – please note that the books are a little one-sided topically because most of my reading this year revolved around my dissertation):

1. Total Church – Steve Timmis and Tim Chester. Ok so I first read it in 2007 but I’ve read it several times this year because of my dissertation and I still think its the most important book I’ve ever read on ecclesiology.
2. The Reason for God – Tim Keller. The first apologetics book that I feel comfortable giving to my friends.
3. Planting Missional Churches – Ed Stetzer. Great book with practical insight. Really helpful for where I’m at.
4. The Forgotten Ways – Alan Hirsch. Really good yet at times frustrating. I’m on the same page as Hirsch with a number of things – I guess I’m just a bit more conservative on one or two others.
5. Breaking the Missional Code – Ed Stetzer and David Putman. Another great help on all things missional.
6. On the Incarnation – Athanasius. I delved into a bit of church history this year and thoroughly enjoyed this one.
7. The King of God’s Kingdom – David Seccombe. Dr Seccombe (Doc) was my New Testament lecturer this year and so I got a chance to have a crack at his book. It’s a great overview of Christ in the gospels.
8. Jesus and the Victory of God – NT Wright. Vintage Wright – I don’t agree with him at every point but this is an important book.

Top 8 places I visited in 2008

1. Seattle, Washington, USA
2. St Louis, Missouri, USA
3. Castleburn, Drakensburg, KZN
4. Sani Pass, Lesotho
5. Lost City, Sun City, North West Province
6. Franschoek, Western Cape
7. Betty’s Bay, Western Cape
8. Durban, KZN (my old stomping ground)

That’s my year in a nutshell. It’s been the year with the biggest changes in my life to date. Not only did I get married but we decided to stay in Cape Town and plant churches here rather than in Durban. Things have come a long way in the last 12 months – here’s to an equally exciting 2009.

Merry Christmas all – have a great one!

Church Planting Foundations Conference

Here’s a line up of the speakers for the Cape Town leg of Acts 29‘s Church Planting Foundations Conference (2-4 Feb 2009):

Mike Gunn:
Mike Gunn is the pastor of Harambee Church in Renton, Washington. Mike helped plant Mars Hill Church in Seattle and now currently serves as the director of Church Planting Internationally for the Acts 29 Network.

Dave Fandey:
Dave Fandey is the pastor of a growing new church called, The Fields, which he planted in 2003. Dave wears many hats as he sits on the international board for Acts 29 as well serves as an adjunct lecturer at Biola University teaching New Testament and Leadership.

Al Barth:
Al Barth oversees and encourages church planting and church planting movements in Europe and Africa on behalf of Redeemer Presbyterian’s Church Planting Center. Al is a seasoned church planter with a particular passion for church planting movements in the major cities of the world.

JD Senkbile:
JD Senkbile has recently moved to Cape Town to oversee the Acts 29 Network in Africa. Before moving to Cape Town JD was involved with justice and mercy ministry at an Acts 29 affiliated church in Omaha, Nebraska.

Sam Groves:
Sam Groves is the pastor of Church on the Ridge in Pietermaritzburg, a young growing church which he planted with two other couples just over three years ago. He has a passion for church planting and cultivating communities of gospel-centered disciples.

Siegfired Ngubane:
Siegfried Ngubane serves both as a lecturer at George Whitefield College and as pastor of Mandela Park Community Church. In the past few years Siegfried has overseen a number of church planting initiatives in township areas in and around Cape Town.

Dave West:
Dave West is the senior pastor of Melville Union Church in Johannesburg which he and his wife planted. The church is heavily involved both in ministries to students as well as ministries to street children and HIV/Aids orphans.

Send me an email (stephenjmurray@yahoo.com) if you’re interested in attending.

Acts29 Church Planting Conference: Cape Town

If you have a Facebook account then you can sign up to attend the Acts29 Church Planting Conference happening in Cape Town from the 2nd to the 4th of February 2009.I’m sure there will be a more official sign up shortly but start by signing up on Facebook.

What Mark Driscoll Could Learn from Sydney

Since the spirit of spreading ‘friendly-fire’ is upon us I thought I’d chip in with a thought or two of my own. Driscoll’s ‘skewering’ of Sydney got me thinking about his ministry and similar ministries from other missional-minded reformed peeps coming out of the States.

But first some disclaimers: First off, although I never heard Driscoll’s talk itself Gordon’s notes gave me a fair idea of where he went and what his criticisms were. As I’ve already stated I resonated with many of them as one who understands something of the Sydney paradigm of ministry. I also thought one or two of his points were probably wide of the mark or perhaps failed to understand the Sydney Anglican context well enough. All and all I greatly value his critique and hope that people will give it some serious thought.

What I was left wondering however, was what has Driscoll learned from ministry in Sydney? I hope he posts some reflections on his time there and what he has learned – but I thought that, until he does, I’ll mention something that I think he (and others like him) could benefit from in the Sydney paradigm of ministry.

I’ve been listening to his podcasts and podcasts from other Acts29 church planters for two or three years now. I’ve listened to some of their Sunday preaching and I’ve listened to their conference talks. I’ve been greatly encouraged and built up in the gospel through these talks and I’m going to keep on downloading them and enjoying them. What I have found a little concerning is the quality of bible handling on occasion. I’ve often struggled with the way narrative passages tend to get a bit spiritualized and moralized where it looks like hard work hasn’t been done on the text. Its clear that hard work has been done on the whole sermon but I sometimes wonder about the work on the text.

In this light I think Sydney ought to be applauded. Their commitment to hard work on the text, to text driven and directed preaching, is of the first order. Preachers like Phillip Jensen, John Woodhouse, John Chapman, Simon Manchester and others have provided me with great models of exposition in the past. Yes, I think Driscoll is right when he says that their (Sydney peeps in general) preaching is sometimes weak on application – I feel that too – but I don’t want to have to be in a situation where I pick one or the other, I want both. I think God calls us to both. So to Mark and the reformed missional crew I think you could learn something from Sydney here that would only make your ministries even stronger and more faithful.

Three Blogs Worth Reading

In the past few months I’ve added some blogs to my sidebar without mentioning them in a post. Maybe you’re getting tired of the same set of blogs in you feed reader, well here are three more that I’ve begun following over the last few months:

Church Planting Novice: This is the blog of Jonathan Dodoson, a church planter in Austin, Texas and part of the Acts29 Network.

For What it’s Worth: The blog of Mike Kendall a pastor in the UK

Arieljvan.com: The blog of AJ Vanderhorst an urban church planter in Kansas City (I can never tell if Kansas City is in Kansas or Missouri or both?)

Go have a read…

Acts29 Boot Camps in South Africa 2009

To all the budding church planters, and others interested, this is just an early warning call to let you know that Acts29 will be holding two Boot Camps in South Africa in January and February 2009. The first Boot Camp will be in Johannesburg 29th to 31st January before moving to Cape Town from the 2nd to the 4th February. I’ll keep you posted and provide more information regarding the venues as I get it. Please pass this news on to anyone who you think might benefit from finding out more about Acts29 and what they do.

20 Questions for Church Planters

Adrian Warnock has the low down on Scott Thomas’ recent talk at the DWELL Conference in London. Scott’s a cool guy heavily involved with Acts29 – I got to meet him briefly in February when I was at Mars Hill. In this particular talk Scott lists 20 Questions prospective church plant leaders should ask of themselves – they’re well worth a read.

Planting a Movement

I spent the day yesterday with Al Barth from the Redeemer Church Planting Center, based in New York. It was amazingly encouraging to hear how God is using Redeemer to motivate, envision and resource a global church planting movement – churches that plant churches are starting to pop up everywhere and there seems to be significant growth in post-christian Europe which is really exciting. We spent a lot of time talking through planting in South Africa and the effect it can have on Africa in general – we’ve got a lot of work to do but with the backing of groups like Redeemer and Acts29 we might just begin to start pulling some of it off.

10 Benefits from Blogging

Some of my friends ask me where I get the time to blog and why I even bother in the first place. Well blogging is not without its benefits and so I thought I’d list 10 benefits I’ve experienced over the past two years of blogging as a Christian blogger (they’re in no particular order):

1. I’ve made great Christian friends – and some of them I’ve actually got to meet in the flesh even though they live thousands of miles away from me – that’s quite something.

2. I’ve been able to clarify my thinking on a number of subjects. For example I’ve come to understand the emerging church with far more depth through blogging than if I’d simply just picked up a book.

3. I’ve discovered like minded organisations and groups to network with. My time with some of the guys from Acts29 two months ago was great and I’m hoping that together we can see a whole lot of fruit here in South Africa – this link up would never have happened if I didn’t blog.

4. I’ve been encouraged to keep on going. Reading about people doing gospel ministry on the other side of the planet is always one of my biggest encouragements in ministry.

5. I’ve enjoyed times of laughing. Ok this one is a bit of nerdy in-house thing but bloggers seem to have a peculiar sense of humour that isn’t often present in face to face conversation but is rather more unique to the blogsphere.

6. I’ve seen friends and colleagues become more internet savy. This has been one of my aims from day one in blogging, and that is to point people to the right places on the web to maximize their time online from a Christian ministry point of view.

7. I’ve been used of God to encourage people at crucial times. On more than one occasion someone has let me know that a post that I wrote really encouraged them at an important time. Praise God for that.

8. I’ve been able to negotiate the academic arena better. Interacting with the blogging world gives you access to large amounts of information but in an extremely quick amount of time. This is crucial when trying to navigate the who’s who of the Christian academic arena.

9. I’ve been able to express my feelings. What can I say I’m a Web2.0 child I have this inbuilt need for expression that I control – blogging gives me that.

10. I’ve been motivated for mission. I think this might just be the biggest way in which blogging has motivated me. Its caused me to think long and hard about mission and what I’m doing with my life.

Why not start you’re own blog and begin to enjoy some of the benefits?

States Reflection #1 – Church Planting

So I suppose its time for me to share a few reflections from my time in the USA. I thought I’d do it by looking at a few topics that came to the fore as I travelled through St Louis and Seattle. The first and most obvious thing that struck me, and was part of the reason I was over there, was the enthusiasm for church planting that seemed to be abounding in certain places.

Being at place like the Journey and then finding out that its only half a decade old really made me marvel at the desire of many young gospel workers in the States to see new churches planted and developed. There was an infectious enthusiasm portrayed by every single person that I met with who was involved in Acts 29 every time the subject of church planting was on the table. They were also always super keen to hear about potential planting opportunities in South Africa. If I can in anyway be used by God to bring some of that infectious enthusiasm to the young gospel workers here in South Africa then this trip will have been entirely worth it.

I was especially delighted to find out how rigorous the assessment process is at Acts 29 for prospective church planters. These guys are determined to see church plants succeed and that means that they want to see real evidence of godliness, gospel-centeredness, theological depth and leadership in any individual that is applying to plant churches with them. In many ways I came away worshipping God for the way he is spurring young men into action for the glory of his name as displayed in his church.

I would really like to see Acts 29 have a presence here in South Africa bringing like minded people together, across denominational lines, to plant gospel-centered and culturally engaging churches and I’m hoping that the meetings I had with various people will have gone a long way to making that a possibility. We still have a way to go but the ball is rolling now.

On a Journey – Part VIII

I’ve missed two days and so much has happened. The Resurgence Conference has kicked off and is full steam ahead already. But let me start with Sunday. On Sunday morning I went down for breakfast in the hotel and hooked up with a couple of guys from Bethlehem Baptist (John’s Piper’s church) who were also attending the conference. We were all really keen to attend a Mars Hill service that morning so we went along to the 11am service at the Ballard campus. And so after listening to all the podcasts, watching all the vodcasts, reading the books and reading the blogs I finally arrived in the flesh at Mars Hill Church. It was kind of a surreal experience in many ways to be thousands of kilometers across the ocean at the place you’ve read and heard so much about. And it definitely wasn’t a let down. The church is fairly massive but its nothing like any other mega church you’ll come across. Its got a very industrial look, being a converted warehouse. The lighting inside is all done up to create kind of grunge rock concert feel. Technology and multimedia is all over the place. And then the band got up to play – and it was nothing like any contemporary worship music. Instead the music had kind of an indie-rock feel to it with a lot of the songs being old hymns rearranged. It was a pretty awesome worship experience. And then Mark Driscoll took to the stage to preach. He was in the middle of a series of answering questions that the congregation had asked him. On this occasion he tackled the issue of the emerging church – but you can’t really just preach a sermon on the emerging church so before long he turned to Acts 17 and gave us a run down of how Paul engages culture with the gospel of Christ. At one stage he passionately declared what the foundational beliefs of Mars Hill Church are which he centered completely on the cross. At the end of that passionate little proclamation the congregation just broke into applause and cheering. It was unlike any kind of cheering or applause I’ve ever heard in a church – these guys were applauding the gospel! The entire experience was amazing.

After lunch the pre-conference tracks began and so I sat in a session of Q & A with the various campus pastors who explained how they’re figuring out the workings of multi-campus church. Mars Hill currently has 6 campuses. Mark Driscoll only preaches at Ballard (6 times on a Sunday) but the live video feed is sent to the other 5 campuses. Each campus has its own pastor (who only preaches when Mark is away), music team, community groups and is basically a church plant. It was interesting to hear how an operation the size of Mars Hill operates.

That evening I went out of supper with the guys from Bethlehem Baptist and then got to bed early for the next day of full sessions.

We started the morning with a session with Tim Smith, the worship pastor at Mars Hill, entitled ‘Building Missional Bands’. I was I quite surprised to see the Tim and Mars Hill were big into David Peterson’s ‘Engaging God’ – in fact Tim spoke quite passionately about avoiding the use of music as a spiritual mediator between you and God. It was so refreshing to hear guys that have a great theology of worship but still perform really high quality music in their church.

After that we had the main opening session of the conference with Mark Driscoll speaking on ‘Putting Pastors in their Place’. Mark came out all guns firing highlighting the centrality of preaching in church today – he was extremely passionate and extremely hard hitting – as only Driscoll can be. After his session we had a session with CJ Mahaney who preached on ‘Pastoral Character and Loving People’. CJ Mahaney is one of those guys who just oozes godliness and humility. He gave a challenging talk reminding pastors to have a heavenly perspective on the Christians that they serve. The final evening session was by John Piper entitled, ‘Why I trust the Scriptures’. It was an amazing privilege to finally hear Dr. Piper in the flesh. In fact Mark Driscoll was visibly moved as he introduced the great man of God. Unfortunately my brain was beginning to shut down by that time of the evening and so I’m glad all these talks will be available online shortly.

In between the last two sessions I got to have supper with Mike Gunn who is the international director of Acts29. He was super keen to hear about the potential for church planting in South Africa and so today I’m having lunch with a few other guys who are interested in planting internationally.

Its going to be another long day.

BTW check out Justin Buzzard’s blog – he’s live blogging the conference as the talks happen. Remember that you can also stream the talks live from the Resurgence site.

On a Journey – Part V

The roads are covered in ice – I’m thinking I’m going to be a bit stuck in the hotel today. The local TV news is suggesting that people should stay home if possible – we’ll have to see. Yesterday was a fairly busy day. It started with an early breakfast with John Ryan who is the pastor of Summit Community Church an Acts29 church just outside of St Louis. Besides pastoring his own church John also coaches other church planters and so we chatted a bit about the type of person Acts29 is looking for when they assess prospective church planters. It was a very fruitful time and, as with most of the guys I’ve met with already, John was really excited to hear about the prospect of church planting in South Africa.

Then I had the chance to go down to Tower Grove and the offices of the Journey’s social action and mercy ministry arm – Mission St Louis.  Josh Wilson, a really great guy, heads up the mission and he took us around a low-income area right next to Tower Grove and showed us some of the work the mission is involved in. From what I could see they’ve really entered the community and are actively working to be a blessing to and love that community – no strings attached. It was really an impressive setup and gave me plenty to think about in terms of mercy ministry back in South Africa.

After that I headed back to Covenant Seminary and after lunch got to meet up with Dr Phil Douglass who is the professor of practical theology with a special interest in church planting and church growth. Dr Douglass has over three decades of experience in assessing and researching church planting and so it was great to spend some time talking about the type of people he looks for when it comes to church planting. He also gave me free copy of his book in PDF format (P & R are about to publish it) in which he brings together years of research to talk about different personality types and the types of church planting they should be involved in. The little bit we got to talk about was so insightful and you could always sense his experience oozing through – so I can’t wait to get into his book.

Then last night I headed down to the Schlafly Bottleworks which is both a local brewery and pub. On Wednesday nights the Journey hosts public discussions at the Schlafly discussing cultural issues relevant to the broader St Louis community. This is all part of what they call Midrash (Hebrew – “commentary”) which is part of the church’s interaction with culture. Last night they had an open discussion on the issue of violence in America. Probably more than 50 people attended and not all of them were members of the Journey, many were just coming in for the discussion. It looks like a great way for the church to build relationships in the community as well as showing that they have a real interest in the issues that their city faces everyday – quality cultural engagement.

Finally I got back to my hotel and watched Arsenal play Milan in the champion’s league which a friend recorded for me. We should have beaten Milan!

Anyway, I’m not sure what’s going to happen with the weather today. I’ll just have to play it by ear.

On a Journey – Part IV

Meetings, meetings, meetings – that’s what I’ve been up to yesterday and am about to leave for today. Yesterday I met up with Jonathan McIntosh and Dan Herron who are both involved with both Acts29 and the Journey – two really great gospel guys. We had an amazing afternoon chatting about church planting and South Africa. They were really keen and excited to hear about the SA church scene and the potential for planting. They’ve helped to set up a meeting for me with Mike Gunn who is the international director of Acts29 when I get to Seattle.

Earlier in the day I went to a lecture by Hans Baier at Covenant Seminary. It was a really interesting lecture on the sermon of Acts 2 and the Old Testament background. Had a look around the library last night and my bibliophile tendencies started to run on overdrive!

Today I’m off to hang out with another Acts 29 planter and to see some of the social work that the Journey are doing in St Louis. As usual its freezing outside and its supposed to snow again tomorrow.

On a Journey – Part III

Its 10 degrees below this morning – not quite the African summer I left. This post will be short because I’ve got to head out it a second. Yesterday I had a great time drinking beer and talking church with my host and Chris Gensheer – as you can see I’m clearly hanging out with the Presbyterians in Missouri and not the Southern Baptists – in fact the pub I went to even had a happy hour for Covenant students! Then last night I attended a lecture by Daniel Doriani (who most of my ex-fellow BI students will remember). Dan’s a really gifted lecturer and was really engaging as he took us through the issue of miracles in the gospels.

After breakfast I’m off to a chapel service at Covenant and maybe one or two more lectures. Then this afternoon I’m meeting one of the church planter assessors from the Acts29 Network which should be really interesting.

Almost on My Way…to the Journey

On Friday I’m off to the States for two weeks. This coming Sunday I’m going to fellowshipping at the Journey church in St Louis. The Journey is part of the Acts 29 Network and is pastored by the extremely fresh and dynamic Darrin Patrick, who also happens to be the vice-president of Acts 29. On the following Tuesday I’m going to get the chance to meet up with some of the staff from the Journey as they talk me through how their multi-campus church operates. Go over to their church website and check them out.

Church Planting Audio

The talks from the recent Acts29 Boot Camp are available at their website. They include talks by Mark Dever, Ed Stetzer, Darrin Patrick and Mark Driscoll. Definitely worth checking out!

(HT – Justin Taylor)

This is so exciting…

Patrick on the Emerging Church

Check out Darrin Patrick’s talk, The History and Streams of the Emerging Church, given at Covenant Seminary on the 22nd October 2007. Darrin Patrick is the pastor of the Journey in St. Louis and an important member of the Acts 29 church planting network.

(HT – Steve McCoy)

Convergent Audio

Denny Burke has all the audio from the recent Convergent Conference at South Eastern Baptist Seminary. It includes a very thought-provoking talk by Mark Driscoll about his relationship to and views on certain key figures in the emerging church conversation.

Resurgence Conference

Gary Shavey has details on the 2008 Resurgence Conference entitled ‘Text and Context‘. This is such a great topic and something I’ve been thinking about a lot. Now I know us readers in South Africa probably won’t be going over to Seattle anytime soon (unless of course someone out there wants to buy me a plane ticket?) but the talks of the conference usually get posted online and so will be something to look forward. The speakers include Mark Driscoll, John Piper, Jill Gilmore and Matt Chandler. Go over and check it out – there’s a cool little video too.