Wired Magazine on 'Manga News'

Putting the two together, they are appealing to young potential readers by setting the news into manga – real news in cartoon form. Talk about adjusting your approach to meet the culture!

Evidently I like the books that are part of the Leadership Network Innovation Series. Dave & Jon Ferguson’s The Big Idea ¹ which I reviewed here and Larry Osborne’s Sticky Church ² reviewed here were both significant reads for me, and now Geoff Surratt, Greg Ligon & Warren Bird’s A Multi-Site Church Roadtrip: Exploring the New Normal (Leadership Network Innovation Series) ³ dropped in wanting to be read and I’ve dog-eared many of the pages, just as I did their previous book, The Multi-Site Church Revolution ⁴.

The authors seem to enjoy drifting around the country visiting other multi-site churches – and they must have done it a lot in preparing this book. It’s a great scam! I only wish I’d thought of it first – but it’s always such a big deal for me to get organized for travel. However, I think they should take me with them for the next book.

‘Roadtrip’ is not an obvious book. Obvious would have been to write a chapter on each church visited, list the goods and bads of their implementation, then perhaps the history of the transition and a bunch of facts. And they do that, to a certain extent. But they also use each chapter to open up a sort of discussion on other areas of the multi-site challenges: technology, for instance (chapters 6 & 7) or international campuses in chapter 9. The end result is that they cover different approaches to multi-site – Do we want to open a new campus locally, in another state, in another country, on another continent, even on another world (the internet (not Mars (yet)))? Does the preaching happen live because the other campus has its own teacher? Or does the preacher drive from one campus to the next to preach? Or is a message transmitted by satellite or the internet or mailed or driven around? All these have their discussions. Then again, what triggers the church to open the new site? Is it a deliberate spin-off, or did the second site start as a church in its own right and merge in (and why)? How do you go about doing this? What are the hard-and-fast rules, and what are the guidelines? (See IPOD for instance, chapter 1.)

(As an aside: Not so sure about the (somewhat difficult to read) infographic on p. 17 that has 6 milestones of multi-site history; number 1 is the birth of the Church and number 5 is the publication of their previous book. Seems like the relative importance of things went adrift somewhere there – not sure I’d put my book on quite the same level as the birth of the Church!)

Their definition of ‘Multi-site’ is “one church meeting in multiple locations, sharing a common vision, budget, leadership and board” (p. 10).

• You don’t have to be a mega-church to go multi-site.
• 10% of all Protestant Christians in the US and Canada worship in a multi-site church. (This seems high to me, but I’m convinced that multi-site is a trend that God is using – read ‘Is God Dismantling Denominations?’ for more on that.)

I appreciated the summary facts about each church at the front of the chapter. As it happens, many of the churches they visited are the same ones that get me excited about church innovation, and so I get this extra low-down on them. Cool.

Other points of interest:

• What kind of madman launches multiple new campuses at the same time? I mean, why would it even cross your mind? (See chapter 12 for how well it worked.)
• What’s the difference between being a church with multiple sites and a church of multi-sites (See chapter 3.)
• Think a long-established liturgical church made up of parents and grandparents can’t go multi-site? Wrong. (See chapter 3.)
• Do not overlook the appendices. They’ve got some great summary information – resources, job descriptions and pitfalls to avoid.

There is one page in the book that I think is very wrong (sorry guys!), and I realize that the authors may have been more carried away with the idea than considering the ramifications: Chapter 6 has the story of the woman who lives in Texas but every Sunday turns to her old church (in Florida) on the internet for her time of worship. True, some weeks she invites friends and family over to watch with her. But we’re specifically told that she is not connecting to a local church. Usually when you move to a new town you put down new roots; you find a new church; you make new friends and enjoy and grow from their fellowship. It’s not all perfect, but it’s important. Sad to say, at this point the book lionizes the fact that this woman ‘and a growing community of people’ have used the internet to remove themselves from fellowship. This self-isolation – or clinging to the past – is emphatically NOT what we are called to do as Christians.

OK, flame off – I’ve just written about the only bit I disagree with. Not bad for 3 paragraphs of an entire book.

In summary and in the main, I found it a tremendously helpful book. Questions that have been surfacing as my church plays with the ideas involved in expansion – such as planting, moving to a second service or going multi-site – are finding answers here. And between it and its predecessor, The Multi-site Church Revolution, a good ‘roadmap’ of options and their costs has been laid out.

Give it a read – it’s a tremendous resource and documents the early days of what I am convinced is one of God’s next steps for His Church.

• Andrew Murray. With Christ in the School of Prayer: A 31-Day Course in Christian Prayer, with Note on George Muller. Spire Books. Paperback, 1972 – with my small group.
• Various commentaries on the book of Revelation for adult Bible fellowship at church
• Mark L. Waltz. Lasting Impressions: From Visiting to Belonging. Paperback. Group, Dec. 8, 2008
• Dan B. Allender. To Be Told: God Invites You to Coauthor Your Future. Paperback. WalterBrook Press, Nov. 7, 2006
• Bob Kauflin. Worship Matters: Leading Others to Encounter the Greatness of God. Paperback. Crossway, Mar. 31, 2008
• Dan Kimball. They Like Jesus but Not the Church: Insights from Emerging Generations. Paperback. Zondervan, Mar. 1, 2007
• Jack Stack. A Stake in the Outcome: Building a Culture of Ownership for the Long-Term Success of Your Business. Hardcover. Currency/Doubleday, Mar. 19, 2002
• Francis Chan. Crazy Love: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God. Paperback. David C Cook, May 1, 2008
• Ronald Rolheiser. The Shattered Lantern: Rediscovering a Felt Presence of God. Paperback. Crossroad, Feb. 1, 2005
• Terry Nance. God’s Armor Bearer Volumes 1 & 2: Serving God’s Leaders. Paperback. Focus on the Harvest, Dec. 2003
• Tony Morgan. Killing Cockroaches: And Other Scattered Musings on Leadership. Paperback. B&H Books, Mar. 1, 2009
• Geoff Surratt. A Multi-Site Church Roadtrip: Exploring the New Normal (Leadership Network Innovation Series). Paperback. Zondervan, Oct. 1, 2009

I’m just finishing off the last one, Multi-site Roadtrip, and will be writing a review in a couple of days.

• 10am – Troy Gramling, Mark Beeson, Anne Jackson, Dave Ferguson, Scott Hodge
• 11am – Perry Noble, Stacy Spencer
• noon – Dino Rizzo, Nancy Beach, Steven Furtick, Reggie McNeal
• 1pm – Craig Groeschel, Leonard Sweet, Greg Surratt, Jon Tyson
• 2pm – Margaret Feinberg, Larry Osborne, Matt Carter, Pete Wilson
• 3pm – Neil Cole, Reggie Joiner, JD Greear
• 4pm – Mark Batterson, Dan Kimball, Mark DeYmaz
• 5pm – Jud Wilhite, Brian McLaren, Bob Roberts, Rick McKinley, John Ortberg
• 6pm – Alan Hirsch, John Bishop, Toby Slough, Ed Stetzer
• 7pm – Mark Driscoll, Darrin Patrick, Brad Powell
• 8pm – Darrin Whitehead, Brian Bloye
• 9pm – Eric Bryant, Nancy Ortberg, Rick Warren

Some big names there, and some of my favorite speakers. I’m at least as excited that there are folks I’ve never heard of. If only a few of them are as good as the ones I know, I’m in clover.

Not sure why they didn’t list them all – they said ‘We don’t have room to list every one of the speakers here’, but as it’s an email I’m not sure what that means.

Also – vindication! – I’d like to note that this will run for 11+ hours as I predicted here last week. (I’m so proud…)

There’s almost 9,000 people signed up at this point, and lots more who are watching at central locations. Hope you can join us for the day tomorrow.

• The schedule assumes 9 hours of transmission – there’s 8.62 hours of raw footage already. I must say I’m a little surprised, since there are some 75 speakers, and who ever heard of anybody that ever got up into a pulpit to speak for less than the allotted time! My guess would have been for 75*9/60 = 11.25 hours – but they’ve got the files.
• Some 7,000 people have signed up to watch. And if I’m any indication, that only includes the signer-uppers, not all the additional people who are going to show up by invitation to watch.
• There will be some live cut-ins at the top and bottom of each hour – sounds like the Catalyst conference is going to do some advertising then.
• There is no schedule for the day yet – they may push one out during the day. This is a bit disappointing – while I want to find new people to listen to, I’d also like to know when people I’ve heard of (but never actually heard) will be on.
• It will be pushed at streaming quality (500 Kbps), not at satellite quality for most people.
• Recordings will be posted after the conference.

I’ll probably be blogging the conference here at Praise Christian Fellowship in CT – let me know in the comments if you’d like to join us.

Now imagine sitting down with some of the best leaders in today’s church and hear what their “9 minutes” were. That’s the idea behind THE NINES. THE NINES is a free one-day conference that will take place totally on-line. It is designed for all current and potential pastors, church staff members and ministry leaders who want to be motivated and stretched in their leadership.

Over 6 dozen of the country’s best evangelical Christian leaders and communicators have each been given the opportunity to speak for a maximum of 9 minutes. At 9 minutes, you know each talk will be both intense and very specific.

THE NINES is an internet broadcast to be held on 9/9/09 at 9:09 Central (that’s 10:09am Eastern). These messages will help you and your church navigate into the future; each one will last a maximum of 9 minutes. Find out more at their web site here, and see their list of over 70 speakers – there’s the names of some impressive people whose books, blogs and tweets I read:

• Alan Hirsch (Forge Mission Training Network)
• Anne Jackson (FlowerDust.net)
• Dan Kimball (Vintage Faith Church)
• Dave Ferguson (Community Christian Church)
• Dino Rizzo (Healing Place Church)
• Ed Stetzer (Lifeway Research)
• Eric Bryant (Mosaic)
• Geoff Surratt (Seacoast Church)
• Greg Surratt (Seacoast Church)
• John Ortberg (Menlo Park Presbyterian)
• Larry Osborne (North Coast Church)
• Mark Batterson (National Community Church)
• Mark Driscoll (Mars Hill Church)
• Neil Cole (Church Multiplication Associates)
• Perry Noble (NewSpring Church)
• Pete Wilson (Cross Point Church)
• Scott Hodge (Orchard Valley Church)
• Scott Williams (LifeChurch.tv)
• Steven Furtick (Elevation Church)
• Troy Gramling (Flamingo Road Church)
  … along with 54 others that I’m looking forward to finding out about for the first time.

Praise Christian Fellowship is hosting THE NINES at 52 New Hartford Road, Barkhamsted, via internet feed. We’ll bring in lunch (bring a $5 donation to help cover costs) since the conference goes straight though the day. We’ve only just heard about this a few days ago, so unfortunately it’s pretty short notice. If you’d like to attend, please let us know in the comments .

Thanks – hope you can join us!

It might be a simple thing, but it’s also profound yet counter-intuitive in today’s church – just say one thing at a time. Say it to everyone. Say it clearly and loudly. Strip away all the competition to it. Get everybody on board. Drop the busy-ness of multiple programs whose schedules and resource requirements conflict and simplify everything into a more-easily-led approach.

The Big Idea reminds me of a business book I read some 10 years ago – Jack Stack’s brilliant The Great Game of Business – a brief set of profound truths backed up by the mechanics of how to build them into the daily business structure. That was one of the most exciting business books I’ve ever read (and I’ve read a bunch) – head and shoulders above trivial feel-goods like ‘The Apple/HP/IBM/Microsoft/Starbucks Way’.

What Stack did, and what Ferguson has also done, is to flesh out the mechanics of the process in subsequent sections. This is a good approach – techies (like me) connect to a structure through the blueprint; those who need help understanding (also like me) appreciate the explanation of the details that make an example of it work.

Unfortunately, churches with a more traditional and committee-driven structure will not be fully free to indulge in this approach. But I’ve talked about this concept to several pastors, and those who were positioned to take advantage of the concept got very excited. The idea of replicating a single idea throughout the entire congregation has a dynamism that can be both exhilarating and freeing – a permission to follow the vision of their heart.

An excellent book – worth a re-read once in a while.

As I continued reading, however, I have to say that the points he made resonated:

• Page 91 – the need for the church to take real life into account – people are busy; today’s world demands it; the new (& reversed) Christian pop analysis along the lines of ‘Busy hands are the devil’s playthings’ is not universally true;
• Page 94 – the need to control how much ‘stuff’ the church makes available for people to do. When the opportunities for events are moved onto the calendar, is the church leadership protecting its highest priority – or is it the church’s highest priority to be the busiest place in town?;
• Page 110 – small groups don’t run continually – they last for 10 weeks – and they have an easy exit strategy. However, once you have the relationships built, you may be with those people for many years (he calls this Mayberry, USA);
• Page 111 – small group leaders act as pastors to the group – when life throws a crisis, they’re in there for their small group members who need them.

Somewhere between chapters 5 and 12 I came to realize that he was talking about a rather different type of small group to the ones most churches have – these are mini-churches, people deeply committed to looking after one another, to the point that they do their own baptisms, even the hospital visitations. I also came to recognise the rationale behind the approach. Would it work across the board? Of course not, any more than the Chu method would (and indeed, Osborne is quick to point this out himself – every church is made up of a unique blend of people, cultures, economies, ages, and so on). But it has clearly worked for his church, and I’d love the opportunity to spend a few weeks there.

One thing I would have a real problem with, if I were at this church – the idea of  deliberately ‘hamstringing’ personal growth opportunities in the event that they get in the way of the small groups. The North Coast U. is crippled down to courses that consist of a maximum of 4 evenings.  The author makes the point that the average person can’t afford more than two meetings for church per week, therefore the church intentionally puts North Coast U on as a third meeting in the week! That’s just wrong. Now based on what I’ve read in the book, there are three alternatives they could use to support those people who wanted to know more – (1) they could run the school during the summer; (2) they could divert a group that was interested into the school for a 10-week session – this would also give the leader and the host an apparently much-needed break – or (3) the small groups are running for 10 weeks at a time – there would certainly be room to fit the course in between them. (Clearly this hit a chord in me!) This deeper education is something I think should be available in a church, and I think is denied to its members’ detriment. Too many of us do not know the Bible on anything but a superficial level. We therefore remain ill-equiped for either personal understanding or apologetics – and we’re missing a vital pillar of support during times of crisis, where we’re questioning rather than moving forward. However, the school is not the point of the book; I expect they redeemed it somewhere along the line.

I have to say I’m glad the author spent some time debunking some myths, including ‘divide to multiply’ – tried it and seen it fail – and challenged the standard views in a few other areas.

All in all, a great book with a great message. Interestingly enough I moved straight on to Mark Waltz’s book Lasting Impressions: From Visiting to Belonging, which notes that Granger Community Church takes almost the exact opposite view of small groups. The mindset is the same however, and as noted above, Osborne makes the point that no one way is correct for every church.