YWAM Alaska, Greenland,and Western Canada District Office

2012-02-03T11:21:00.000-08:00

Leadership Letter #8 Leadership and Vision

I am asked quite regularly, What isYWAM Canada’s vision, or more broadly What is YWAM’s vision? Frankly, this is a question I cringe tohear. I usually answer the questionfairly broadly with the hope there is enough substance in the answer that itsatisfies the inquirer’s question. Icringe because the question seems to me to come loaded with Christianpresuppositions. After all, peoplewithout a vision tend to perish. (Proverbs 28:19a) And after all God tendsto speak to leaders. So, iff he has notspoken to me convincingly about broad geographic vision, or national vision, orinternational vision then perhaps I am not really a leader. Or, if Ianswer with what I believe God has shown us about Canadian national leadership,perhaps it lacks the pizzazz of prophetic fervor, or enough current buzz words of the unending flux of current theological fads. How coulda “Meat and Potatoes” vision be authentic? This seems to be the unasked question.

I guess I am at a point in lifewhere I have heard so much visionary talk over the years that I am reticent togo down the road of grand pronouncements that massage my ego. My conclusion is that kingdom vision, what Jesus alluded to in His parables, isnot a linear command to do one specific thing all together at the same time. Rather kingdom vision is the wildly colorfulresult of believers “working out their salvation with fear and trembling” inthe context of their obedience to God’s word to them individually withoccasional collaborative interfaces. Outof this rich tapestry of interwoven vision there may very well arise a largervision, but this is really a case where the process itself is visionary, notthe end results. The Kingdom by the very nature as being from God is profoundly radical and extraordinarily visionary. Church or missions expression of kingdom may get stuck in the debris of institutional rigidity, praying for revival, and when it comes resisting the inevitable change it ushers in its wake.

Which means that, if I takeseriously that we (and the “we” could be any YWAM grouping) are a kingdom ofpriests and a royal nation, then implication-ally all of us doing what the Lordhas called us to do is a kingdom vision. A kingdom vision could occupy our thinking, our praying, our planning,our strategizing, our daily conversation. What we talk about together, what we dream about, what we envision is, whengrounded in a revelation of the kingdom, opportunity to co-create with theSpirit a field where kingdom things happen. A kingdom field has an odorless but delightful aroma, a tasteless but savory flavor, invisibility to most but polychromatic reality in thedomain of the Holy Spirit. Such a fieldis richly infused with Grace, the powerful light, energy, and life thatemanates from the Trinity to us. Whilethere is always need for us to read more about this other worldly kingdom, tohear messages about this upside down kingdom, to pray this kingdom would come,ultimately we must do it. All of ushave a contribution to this becoming reality. Thankfully, Kingdom is not wholly dependent on some grouping of leadersgetting it right. Kingdom could happenif enough believers from the grassroots reach a tipping point where there wasthe will to live in this world differently. This is a vision worth stirring-up.

Of course there are times when leadershipneeds to act decisively, especially in a crisis. However, it seems that looking at leadershipthrough a kingdom lens means that the overall creation of an environment ofkingdom possibilities is great long-term stewardship of one’s leadership influence. A place where all can thrive in the Spirit,doing what is on their heart to do as a calling from God, would ultimately bethe kind of ecosystem where all are empowered in a rich interconnection ofrelationships. So when we reflect thatYWAM leadership has to do with Elders learning to elder, all of us havingfreedom to do what God has said in the Spirit to do, and the context of positiverelational connections, we could say we are experimenting with kingdom living. Then when we gather together we are notwaiting for pronouncements from the mountain top, rather there are the steady murmursof what the Spirit is saying to all of us in the valley.

So, is that the Canadian YWAM vision? Yes, I think it is!

Are there more specifics to thatvision? Yes, but I can only answer formyself, yet when I do so, it is my contribution to the Canadian leadershipconversation.

So, Paul, what is your contributionof a visionary thought to the Canadian leadership conversation?

The following is a brief foray intoa huge topic. I want to only sketch theparameters of this thought, because it is not about arriving with a Word forall, rather it is my contribution to the whole. If we truly enter into a dialogue together the conclusions may be beyondwhat we think, perhaps in the realm of the Spirit.

Last year I read John Ralston Saul’s book, AFair Country. His basic observationcould be summarized as Canada’s identity, historically, was a Metis nationfounded on the interdependence of First Nations, British, French and Hudson Bayrelationships and alliances. While this generousview of early settlement was not without its problems, it did create a placegeographically where the stranger was welcome and could succeed. Much of this original mutuality of peoplesshifted during Confederation to a more colonizing mindset, most dramatically inthe alienation of First Peoples and attempts to assimilate them into mainstreamCanadian (White) culture. Saul’sthoughts suggested that for Canada to achieve the dreams of truly being amulticultural nation there was a necessity to recapture the essence of whatCanada once was as a Metis culture. Ifyou want a thoughtful and stimulating historical and relevant socialcommentary, I recommend the book. Interestingly, this was also Grand Chief Shawn Atleo’s premise as headdressed Prime Minister Harper at the recent meetings attempting to redressthe divide between First Nations and the Canadian Government.

How do we redefine ourselves as aMetis nation? How could we redefineourselves as YWAM, a Metis culture in Canada? The only way these questions would have any relevance for me in ourCanadian context is for us as be open to and listening to the voice of thepeople of the land and letting that affect our identity as a mission. Wow, this is tall order and not something tobe entered into lightly. The recentNative Ministry Roundtable, part of our CLT meeting in Vancouver, was one wayfor us to hear more from native ministry grassroots. There is still a long way to go as we do needto have more First Nations input into YWAM. Several years ago, when Rod Wilson was still alive, the WCLT gatheringin Winnipeg had some great teaching and counsel from a native perspective. Added to this there are about 10 YWAMministries across the country that engage with First Nation peoples on aregular basis. If we could harness theenergy of these cross cultural encounters, may it enrich us as a kingdompeople?

Like a good cup of coffeepercolating on the campfire, these thoughts are fusing together as the neuronsin the brain fire and the heart warms to what the Spirit is whispering. I welcome your thoughts, as well as, yourvision for who we might be in Christ, in YWAM as a sodality community, and inCanada.

2011-09-21T17:19:00.001-07:00

Seminars suitable forDTS/SOE/SOFM modular learning:

The Cross of Christ-Aholistic overview of Jesus’ Ministry and the implications of Salvation for Believers.

The Kingdom of God-Thefoundation of a Kingdom theology opens us to be always growing, learning and changingin the context of God’s love for us and the world.

The Book of Acts-Thestory of Acts as both history of the early church and the basis formodern/postmodern missions strategy.

Hearing the Voice ofGod-Exploration of spiritual disciplines to tune heart and ears to hearwhat the Lord is always communicating.

Emergent Leadership-Leadingin a postmodern world through influence, decentralization, creativity and diversity.

System Thinking forFaith Communities-Exploring the patterns of behavior in communities usingsystems archetypes and crafting creative alternatives of response to betterreflect the creativity of the Spirit.

The Nature andCharacter of God- a theological quest to reflect on Trinitarian theologyand be moved to worship with body, soul and spirit.

Seminars that can beadapted to weekend or one day events:

Coaching in ChristianMeditation-Exploring the world of Meditation, Contemplative terminology andSpiritual Discipline practice.

Christ-in-Creation-Movingthe classroom outdoors and discover the interactive nature of the Holy Spiritwith us in creation. This is adaptableto wilderness, gardens, or urban green spaces.

Oral Learning-thepower of story in simple words and uncomplicated presentations.

Co-Creating with God-Engaginga project as a team, listening to God and working together to create somethingof lasting beauty.
World Cafe: Innovative Approaches to Dialogue and Conversation-Coaching in the World Cafe methodology to mine the rich vein of conversations that matter.

Open Letter to YWAMers in Canada

2011-06-24T16:23:00.000-07:00

Dear Canadian YWAMers,

During the last GLT in Kona, Hawaii, there were several monumental decisions made as YWAM evolves in structure and governance for the next 50 years of our history. Pete Iliyn, sensing this shift in organizational energy entitled the last NALC, “Year One”, signifying a movement into the next fifty years with a new energy based on the values of the past.

So, some of this shift entails the Global Leadership Team reformatting to become the Global Leadership Forum (GLF); and the previous “Team 3 Plus” model of governance relinquishing their corporate titles to serve as an international eldering body. This further “flattening of the YWAM structure” and an embracing of more Biblical language to describe leadership in such a large international mission is unprecedented in scope and implications. If any of you are interested in studying organizations, YWAMs’ growth and continual restructuring is an example of an organization seeking to be Spirit-led and honouring to Jesus. I am sure there will be continual refinement to some of these governing decisions over the next several years.

The history of last December’s decisions actually evolved from a message that Loren gave in Nanning, China, called the “Tripod Message” which envisioned YWAM structure to be grounded on three legs of a tripod. The 3 legs are “Spiritual Eldership Oversight, Freedom in the Spirit for all YWAMers, and Relationship-based Leadership being the Glue that holds YWAM together”. We were very fortunate as the Canadian Leadership Team to have Frank Naea, as the then outgoing YWAM President, to meet with us in Ottawa immediately after the Nanning GLT . Frank helped us as the CLT to reformate our national leadership along the lines of the Tripod message. Frank is one of our leaders that is great on implicational thinking and strategizing in the Spirit. So in many respects we are grateful as YWAM Canada that we have had the past years to work through the implications of what is now becoming the norm in YWAM. Here are a few more implications presented in a bulleted format:

· The Global Eldership includes Loren and Darlene Cunningham, John Dawson, Lynn Green, Iain Muir, Jim Stier, and Tom Hallas. They will assemble for priestly intercession and relational, spiritual oversight to YWAM Internationally.

· Our YWAM Values are largely statements reflecting the “Word of the Lord” to us as a Mission Sodality and may be expanded upon by the International elders or the Global Leadership Forum.

· There may be other councils of elders recognized internationally, but none are at this point in time.

· The Global Leadership Forum will largely meet to continue the eldering ministry of priestly intercession and the inter-relatedness of the YWAM as a global ministry. There will be very few policy initiatives from this level, rather policies will need to be contextualized more locally and at grassroots levels.

· Every 2 years there will be a Global Leadership Gathering (GLG) much like the predecessor Global Leadership Congress, but at this point in time I do not know who in Canada or North America will be part of that structure, nor does Pete Iliyn.

· The CLT has functioned in Canada as a council of elders, and in the Western Canada District we have recognized “District Elders”.

· All YWAM directors are requested to drop the title of “director” and begin to use leader in its place. (In Canada “Director” is a legitimate title for a charitable society board member, so there are areas of legal and financial/fiduciary matters where the director title is appropriate, but in the context of YWAM ministries the use of leader is the new norm).

The Priesthood of All Believers

The doctrinal backdrop for the leadership changes in YWAM is the Reformation doctrine of the “Priesthood of all Believers”. Essentially, this doctrine is that all believers have direct access to God without the need of any earthly intermediary. Several New Testament texts teach this doctrine either explicitly or implicitly (Rom. 5:1-5; 1 Tim. 2:5; Heb. 4:14-16). Believers’ direct access to God was also implied during the 400 years of the time of the Judges when the government of Israel was a theocracy.

In addition, the idea that each person as a believer is important to the whole body, being both gifted by the Spirit and all equally serving both one another and the Lord. ( 1Cor. 12 and Rom 12). The multiplicity of gifts suggests the broad-based inclusion of many in decision-making. Acts stresses group consensus for major decisions (Acts 4:32; 15:22). In addition the term fellowship in its original meaning has more to do with mutual accountability to one another in a relationally close context (brothers and sisters), than it does to Christian socializing as in our contemporary context.

At the same time that individual “freedom in the Spirit” was present in the early church, there is equally a need at times for leaders to provide some order in a representative way. Here is where the concept of servant leadership that Jesus emphasized shaped the conscience of the early church. Servant Leadership was not easily caught by the disciples. Jesus teaching over three and a half years did little to root out the human tendency to introduce monarchial/hierarchical leadership into organizational living. Note the background of Jesus last teaching in the upper room, the disciples vying to sit closest to the soon-to-be-king of Israel. Yet after Pentecost, there was little political posturing of the leaders, rather servanthood prevailed, not only in the apostles, but among the elders and other ministries as well. Apostolic servanthood was not the imposition of leadership over the whole body of believer’s in a hierarchical authoritative manner. Rather than emphasizing being-under-apostolic-authority, there was a definite empowerment of local assemblies to exercise their choice to be “submitted to authority”, the highest expression of this is to be submitted directly to Jesus. A curious example of this is the sectarian nature of the early Corinthian churches (1 Cor. 2), each separate house church recognizing “submission’ or identification to their favorite apostle/teacher/elder. Paul chides all of these groups to not look to an earthly apostle for identity and loyalty, rather to maintain a primary submission to Jesus. Jesus taught the very same “way” as a countercultural model of “His-Kingdom-Come” (Matt 23:8-12).

The central task then of leaders is to be in a relationship with Jesus and to model out an attempt to walk in the Spirit with integrity. At a recent gathering of the YWAM Americas’ Field in the Dominican Republic, Jim Stier said, “The principle job of a leader is to be so in love with Jesus, that his/her love for Jesus is what qualifies the leader for leadership!” Further, “Our worship of Jesus (as leaders) is our first love!”

Church polity (the doctrinal term to describe church government) has ranged in models from non-governmental forms (the Quakers or Plymouth Brethren) to hierarchical models (Roman Catholics, Orthodox, Salvation Army). YWAM as a mission sodality is attempting to both reduce a Western business model of corporate leadership and reinvigorate eldership as the form of servant leadership in our mission. Hence the flattening of structure, while maintaining an identity that involves a second-choice commitment to both a global mission vision, and an international mission identity.

As a priest, we can take responsibility for our own spiritual growth, and we can mutually gather together to serve one another. Jesus showed us the way to do this (Phil. 2) by emptying himself and laying down his life. What will it take for us to take on the same posture and serve both Jesus and YWAM here in Canada?

Pentecost 2011

Reflections on an Unusual Way to Live

2011-06-23T15:03:00.000-07:00

I often chuckle when occasionally the old-fashioned hymn is sung that has the following phrase, “Here I raise my Ebenezer, Hitherto I’ve come by faith”. I wonder if anyone is asking, “What’s an Ebenezer?” The term is a Hebrew name, meaning a “stone of help’, a memorial stone signifying an event of God helping Israel. I hope all who carefully read the following blog would see it as a memorial stone to the Lord signifying a snapshot at a-point-in-time in terms of reflecting on ministry and the future. Hopefully, the heart of this paper is written under the advice of St. James when he encouraged future planning to be linked with humility of heart when he advises, “If the Lord wishes, and we are alive, we will do such and such.”

Life-long learning has been one of my reoccurring themes in leadership development. Not only is this good for mental agility, but since there is so much change currently in our culture, survival itself needs a high degree of adaptability. I recently took a Strengths-Finders self-test and scored quite high in adaptability, “the ability to see the future not as a fixed destination, rather a place you create out of the choices made right now”. Maybe this gives a whole new meaning to finding joy in the journey. In YWAM we have dubbed this a new beatitude, “Blessed are the flexible, they shall not be broken.”

So, in response to the adaptability strength, I would venture to say that I have entered some new territory, off the map in respects to the past, and maybe in the realm of “There-be-dragons!” A clear indication ascribed on ancient maps warning of dangerous, unknown territory. This has been abundantly made clear as my faith-support income has steadily been shrinking, the effects of aging are catching up to me, and the general culture shifts which are now the new norms challenge us on multiple fronts. Let me unpack these three factors briefly.

Faith-support is a form of financial support for Christian workers that recognize to live in the world one needs some income from some source to offer Christian services, often without a cost. After all salvation is a free gift, so there should be no cost to any who receives it. Therefore, Christian “work” involves a high degree of benevolence within the system to sustain ministry of any type, be it church, ministry, or missions. Youth With A Mission takes an unusual stance in this field by not paying a salary to any of it workers, even long-term ones like myself. So, YWAM works because all of the staff from the newest recruit to International leaders are self-supporting volunteers. Faith-support has worked for many years, but there are many challenges as the system changes-it is harder to raise donations in all sectors of charity work. For example we had support from 2 “home churches’ in Minnesota for over 25 years, but due to the economic downturn both churches re-prioritized their missionary giving. On the positive side we have been extremely grateful for the longevity of backing from these 2 church bodies; but once the support is gone there seems to be little chance of reinvestment in us, no matter how the economy behaves. Meanwhile, to shop around for similar churches to support ministry to the same degree is a daunting task. So, rather than looking at this in a negative way and adopting a fix-it mindset, perhaps this is a new opportunity!? Should we look to the broad group of friends and family, as well as seek some new church backing?

Along with the obvious financial challenges that come with a shift in faith support are the new challenges of aging. I remember clearly a shift in our parents’ conversation with us when all of a sudden health issues started to dominate. We are not quite in that space yet, however I am noticing some early warning indicators. Linked with this “recognition of mortality” is a narrowing of focus with a desire to create and invest my energy with wisdom. Many of the leadership councils I have attended in the past year have been times when huge challenges have needed the wisdom of the Spirit to unravel complex situations. It has been a joy to be included in these times and to reflect on the good effects of decisions made and implemented. As I move into more of an eldering role in YWAM, it is not about taking on more tasks and responsibilities, but becoming a coach and mentor to a new generation of missionaries and postmodern cultural workers. Theoretically, most leadership experts agree this time of my life is one of congruence, when wisdom and experience meets another generation as a new season of ministry. It has the greatest degree of ministry satisfaction as long as one can maintain to the end.

Bob Dylan sang back in the 1960s that “The times, they are a changing!” What was then a protest and minor cultural disruption has become a full scale cultural transformation where change has been seen as a river of (dis)continuous white water rapids. As thrilling as running rapids can be, doing it full-time with all of the adrenaline involved is not healthy for anyone involved. Culture shift is hard on everybody, even if adaptability is a high strength.

Despite the challenges I need to raise more faith support. To do so I need to convince potential donors that not only am I a supportable ministry, but that donors actually are partners with me in ministry. Essentially, my ministry is now an eldering ministry in YWAM that includes leadership development and organization integrity. Rising to a new level of support is absolutely essential for the ability to continue in ministry. Donations made in both Canada and USA are tax deductible and the prayer back-up that comes with these donations is essential. It is easier to have large donations from single sources, but wisdom seems to dictate that many smaller donations from a broad body of committed friends and family are actually more sustainable.

I will continue to teach in YWAM, but I hope to restrict that teaching to 1 week per month. There is often an honorarium linked to these opportunities, but equally many places I go I do so at my own expense. Last year when I taught in "closed country" XYZ, the whole trip was self-supported. I am hoping to introduce teaching University of the Nations certificate courses out of my own home (works great for 12-15 students). Over the course of the next 8 months I will be introducing 3 YWAM Modules, “The Nature and Character of God”, “Ministry to the Pain of the Heart”, and “Transformational Mind Renewal.” I have also branched out with a On-Line Course for developing an itinerate teaching ministry in YWAM. Currently, I have 6 students taking this course.

Another new venture is hosting retreats. This is mostly my project as Sandy is fairly preoccupied with her counseling and play therapy. So far in the past year I have hosted 4 retreats. I plan to add a hermitage in the back yard and will offer a place for people who are looking for quiet place for meditation, prayer, and spiritual direction. A mini-retreat is the monthly “Theology Café” which is a World Café style of dialogue focusing on “conversations that matter”. This has become an absolute joy since as a group we are learning to communicate at a heart level.

Retirement is out of the question for me, since the investment necessary to do so was beyond our means when we first started down this “faith-path”. Now with some hind-sight wisdom I am telling my kids to invest for this future reality. So I am happy to continue in ministry, but to do so I need to monthly raise $2000 in additional Faith support and $1000 income from teaching. I have the vision and the energy for the next 5 years, and with an increased support level less anxiety about paying all the bills.

I will close by paraphrasing the Apostle James’ advice presented earlier in this article: If the Lord has anything to do with my plans, and we are alive, we will do what I have broadly laid out before you.

Thanks for reading this article! If any of you have any questions I would be delighted to answer the questions to the best of my ability.

Blessings,

Paul Martinson

To Donate Directly (no tax receipt) make your check out to Paul Martinson and mail to:

Paul Martinson

2718 Robinson Rd.

Winfield, BC

Canada V4V1G6

To Donate for a Canadian Tax Receipt: Make your cheque out to “YWAM” and on a separate paper write “For the ministry of Paul Martinson” and send to:

YWAM Project Funding

PO Box 57100

Vancouver, BC

Canada V5K1Z5

To Donate for a USA Tax Receipt: Make your check out to “YWAM” and on a separate paper write “For the ministry of Paul Martinson” and send to:

YWAM Tyler

PO Box 3000

Garden Valley, TX

75771-3000

Leadership Letter #7 Re-thinking a Trinitarian Vision

2010-09-09T21:19:00.001-07:00

In August we had our biennial YWAM Canadian staff gathering In Pinawa, Manitoba. Considering that this location is roughly mid-Canada points to the challenges we face as a nation as we drive the 30+ hours from either East or West to Rendezvous in the tradition of Canada's early fur traders. This was our sixth such gathering and in many respects we are starting to see the fruit of networking and connecting both as friends and YWAM Co-workers from coast to coast to coast.

A treat for us this year was to have Baxter Kruger (http://www.perichoresis.org/) both give glory to God as he beautified the triune relationship of Father, Son and Spirit, and how God in Love meets us in our "I –am-nots…" The revelation that Jesus presented of God as His Father was such a radical departure from traditional Jewish thinking. The very nature of Christian discipleship was rooted in the profound understanding that God is Abba, Father, and that the incarnate Son is both Lord and Christ (Messiah), and the Son is also the Creator. By implication through the incarnation the Son and Creator completely identified with humanity and after dying a shameful death on trumped-up charges was resurrected. So rather than ending the Jesus story at the Cross and Jesus dying for our sins, the end of the story is God through Christ gathering all of humanity into His resurrected and at-the-right-hand-of-the-Father Life. All of Humanity is being influenced by that Triune Life right now. Salvation is becoming aware (seeing/hearing) that we are loved right now in that Eternal Life. Hence the doctrine of Adoption captures the Life we have together in Christ through union with Him in the Holy Spirit.

The closing evening our tradition is to have a "World Café" type session to both capture the essence of the week together, but to also prepare us for our departure (http://www.theworldcafe.com/). For several hours the dining room was a-buzz with animated discussion as we talked and processed. Several of the tables expressed themselves by saying, "Doesn't this teaching seem to skate dangerously close to 'universalism'"? Universalism is the doctrine that postulates since Christ died for all, then all will eventually be save.

The next day as I drove Baxter to the airport I asked him whether his Trinitarian viewpoint was universalism. His answer to the question was telling: "I wish I was, but I can't hold to that position (universalism). The sad truth is that even God in His great Love for humanity does not by pass the necessity of human will responding to God's Grace." The ancient doctrine of God was soundly Trinitarian and rooted in the initiative of God to come to us Incarnationally as part of the salvation of mankind. If you would like to read an ancient document that represents the understanding of the Early Church see Athanasius' "On the Incarnation" as a prime source (http://www.spurgeon.org/~phil/history/ath-inc.htm).

On my long drive home I had plenty of time to reflect and hopefully, work through some of implications of emphasizing the Triune nature of God. One of the ideas I had was to re-work the 4 Spiritual Laws popularized by Campus Crusade. See http://www.4laws.com/laws/english/flash/ for an on-line version of this tract. The following reworked Four Spiritual Laws is for discussion only, I am not planning to introduce this as a tract, but would sincerely welcome some critical thinking on how we present the Good News of Jesus.

Law One-God does Love you and have a wonderful plan for your Life. In fact God (Father, Son and Spirit) is already at work in your life to help you become all he desires you to be. Jesus as the Son of God has taken on humanity to teach us about God and open the way for a relationship without condemnation. John 3:16 & 17. John Wesley called this God's prevenient Grace.

Law Two-We are separated in our relationship with God, because we are blind and unhearing. Hence we end up doing what is right in our own eyes, which often only increases our blindness. We need to have our eyes and ears opened. Prayer for illumination may precede prayer for forgiveness.

Law Three- Jesus' death on the cross, His resurrection from the dead, and his ascension to be now alive together with the Father and the Spirit is the current reality. Jesus meets us in our lostness when we reach out in faith through prayer for His help. Lostness may involve guilt that needs to be forgive, but it might reflect a broader gamut of human needs as well.

Law Four-Belief in Jesus as Lord, Son of God, Alive with the Father, and then a receiving of His life by the power of the Holy Spirit is our adoption into God's family. We become aware of His Spirit at work and then through discipleship grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus.

I deliberately did not put all sorts of proof texts in the above proposal, because I am in process too in my perspective being shifted. I am mostly interested, if the above shift in perspective is more Trinitarian in it's over all approach, and if indeed it might be a more inclusive approach with respects to evangelism and discipleship.

Please join me in continuing to reap the benefits of us gathering together in the Canadian Conversation.

St Barnabas Learning Community

2010-09-09T11:48:00.001-07:00

St. Barnabas Learning Community is the ministry name for multiple initiatives that bridge the Mission and Missional Worlds, the Emergent and Ancient Movements, Leadership Conversations linked with Servant-hood Expressions of Action and Trinitarian Theology in a Creational Context.

As a YWAM Location it is at once the Western Canada District Office, the Teaching Ministry of Paul Martinson, A Location to Gather for Counselling, Spiritual Direction and Retreats, as well as a covering for "The Heart Connections Counselling Model Institute". For further information and blog articles see www.paulmartinson.blogspot.com.

Leadership Letter #6 Mentoring Along in Missions

2008-01-07T18:15:00.001-08:00

With the most rudimentary of strategies and by dint of much effort by an eclectic mix of people my wife and I were part of a missionary church plant among urban First Nations people in Thunder Bay, Ontario in the late 1970s on into the 1980s. In hindsight we really planted 3 successive churches-one on top of the other-since the migrant population ebbed and flowed between the challenges of living in the urban world, and family relationships back at people's home reserve communities. One of the classic dilemmas for a white missionary in such a setting is knowing how to work-your-way-out-of-a-job, since the ideal of having a native leader seemed to be an important component to what constituted a successful cross-cultural church plant. I think now I would be much more pragmatic about whether the ethnicity of leaders mattered that much, but at the time this seemed to be relevant. So, in that context my wife and I along with our family of 2 kids took a sabbatical and went to a Youth With A Mission (YWAM) Discipleship Training School.

Our goal was personal refreshment after 7 years of ministry and also to test the viability of the native elders governing the church without missionaries being present. Our YWAM experience was both intense and wonderfully restorative. We felt like we finally received both mentorship and discipleship in a concentrated package that fostered a new love for the Lord and a renewed desire to serve Him in missions. Whatever motivation we had at the beginning of our missionary ministry had over time leaked out of our lives by the "cares of ministry". The upshot of this time was personal renewal for us as a couple in missions, and the growth of the native church in our absence. It seemed like a perfect opportunity to leave church planting and move to missions training with the idea of multiplying missionaries. To that end over the past 25 years I have been involved in mentoring a wide variety of Christian workers in cross-cultural missionary settings in North America, but also Europe and Asia. The following chapter is really a reflection on what I have learned to be important hard-won life lessons, and what I would see to be critical areas to seek out mentoring by others.

One of the major reasons that it was relatively easy to leave our church planting role was the positive impact the YWAM Discipleship Training School (DTS) had on us, both individually and as a couple. We felt like we had finally witnessed what discipleship might have meant for the early church instead of the haphazard discipleship that we had received. Consequently, our church-planting/missionary model of discipleship was equally haphazard and seemed to centered around attending meetings.

The DTS model is really based on an intensive boot camp type experience. I think it could be successfully argued that the boot camp/retreat/camp experience is modeled on the older monastic order type of spiritual development often called a sodality. The YWAM staff that "pastored" the students were highly relational, not only teaching content, but using many hands-on experiential learning methods with coaching and mentoring as part of the growth paradigm. In addition the proximity of living so close to others worked subtly on reducing our autonomy, yet not so far as to seduce us into group-think. For me this really pointed out that for the 15 years that I had been a Christian my discipleship model was based on what I knew rationally, doctrinally, theologically, and intellectually, but not so much on the "softer" side of change such as spiritual/emotional/ psychological health. Therefore, my basic model for discipleship was to get the right knowledge and everything would be OK. As important as much of the head side of discipleship is, it is not a sufficient model for transformational change. To engraft transformational change, discipleship seems to work well when it is walked out in community. Gunter Krallman writing in a mission classic, Mentoring for Mission, cited that Jesus basic mentoring model was the obvious fact that primarily he was "with His disciples". Therefore, as much as we learn from Jesus through the stories about Him and His teaching, the bulk of the Gospels covers a very brief accounts of the actual time Jesus taught His disciples in a 24/7 relationship based discipleship. In respects to mentoring a foundational need is to adopt some model of discipleship and to find the relationships that foster personal growth. Essentially, discipleship is a relational paradigm for character growth, and not something that can be packaged and duplicated strictly as a program. Over the years either through self-teaching, but more dynamically through mentored relationships the following topics have proven invaluable for my own growth as a disciple (learner):

Seeking out wisdom, versus learning from the school of hard knocks
Discovering a more holistic view of Repentance
Seeking out "Soul Friends"
Learning to soften self
Learning from a variety of Christian traditions
Finding a way to work with social and organizational complexity
Leading from the grassroots as a tempered radical

Part of the challenge of any list is to determine the "logic" of the list. The above list would satisfy my own mind better as a picture, thus a pie diagram, rather than a bulleted list. If it were a pie diagram, you could read it in any order and each topic would be seen as a piece of the whole. Viewed more holistically the pie diagram could be seen as a picture of what I have learned over the past 30+ years in ministry. Seeing-from-the-Whole (the Bigger Picture) is a major aspect of seeking after wisdom as a learning style, versus learning through the school-of-hard-knocks which tends to have a more fragmented pattern.

My parents raised me to be independent. I am sure that during the age of Dr. Spock this was deemed to be the wise way to raise children, a way to promote both self-reliance and autonomy. However, for me this resulted in too much self experimentation, too many wrong turns, and too many disastrous consequences. I suppose the inevitable "bottoming out" contributed substantially to my salvation, but my pride-filled autonomy took a long time to be even acknowledged as a limiting factor in my life. Given this background it is wonderful to see how God can meet us in our brokenness and offer his love and forgiveness. While the Bible points the prodigal to salvation and a restored relationship with God, much of the Bible is also wisdom literature; which is designed to prevent us from becoming "prodigal sons," and learn proactively to modify our inner and outer worlds, living in such a way as to please God. Following the Wisdom of God's ways comes through personal study of the Bible as a primary source in partnership with the grace of God's energy present through the Holy Spirit. In addition, however, this wisdom seems to me to be the most attractive when it is seen in real people who have learned to lay aside their own autonomy, submit to God's word, but to do so in a winsome, humorous, genuine way, not as ones' baptized in pickle juice. I have had dozens of mentors in this discipline, but the ones' who stand out have not shirked the hard work of study and reading, they live principled lives, but do so with a relational warmth that includes the Trinity and others. There is a point in the Orthodox liturgy where the priest intones, "Wisdom, let us attend!" This attention to wisdom, a reminder prior to the Gospel reading, is equally relevant in recognizing both the Bible's wisdom, and those that model the way-of-wisdom in their lives as our mentors.

Out of the wisdom tradition there is a very rich understanding of the Biblical concept of repentance. All too often when repentance is cited today, it means to be sorrowful for our sins, to feel guilty, and ashamed to such a degree that one changes his/her ways. While this is an aspect of what the Bible teaches on the subject of repentance, the term "to repent" has a much broader range of meanings and hence a much more in depth understanding of the dynamics of human growth and change. The Greek word translated "to repent" is "metanoia", literally meaning "to change one's thinking". Therefore, Metanoia, means to change one's thinking (mind), to change one's intention (will) and to change one's behavior. In this context when Jesus started His public ministry he said, "Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!" Actually these were the exact same words John the Baptist used in preparing the way for the Messiah to come. And while this does imply quitting sinning and getting right with God, it also is perhaps much more neutral in its' convicting emphasis. Therefore, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is a hand" likely means something closer to "change your thinking about the future coming of the Messiah, the time is now, not future. The kingdom of God is being ushered in your presence, recognize it! Get ready! It is now!" So, by implication God's kingdom intrudes into His world, but it means I need to respond by changing the way I think. So, how does one do this? More to the point what does it take, or what is the process where I recognize I am not thinking accurately and how do I change my thinking. Does guilt motivate me to do this? Does shame? Does wisdom? Does experience? This seems to be especially applicable in learning to adapt my thinking to God's ways while living and working with others. The broader my intercultural, interpersonal experience, likely the more I will need to change my rational mind and thinking dynamics. Therefore learning to make one's thinking explicit and to open self up to other's perspectives is a first step in broadening out repentance as a life style.

The implication of metanoia for theology and Christian practice is staggering. Could theology be more emergent, evolving, innovative and organic? If so, what will it take for me to have these type of learning mindset so that I might to enter into the perichoretic dance of the Trinity and learn and grow in relationship to God as Three-in-One. Can I in my daily relationships, in cross cultural relationships, in interaction with fellow pilgrims on this journey of faith actually learn over a whole lifetime? To begin to answers some of these questions I have needed the mentoring influence of soul friends, relationships that soften my self (my flesh, my natural humanity), creative metaphors and images that inspire me, and discovery of some of the rich history of others that have gone before me from a variety of traditions, backgrounds, and cultures.

I once had a visit with an Orthodox missionary priest in Alaska, who leapt into our initial conversation with the enthusiastic rhetorical question, "Do you know what the greatest thing about the Orthodox Church is?" Of course I had not clue, so Father Paul answered his own question. "It is confession-the ability to unburden your heart about anything, ANYTHING that is weighing you down!" I am not a stranger to confession, but for me it is basically a private affair and only very rarely does it involve a neutral witness. For the Orthodox and others in the more liturgical types of Churches, confession involves publically confessing sins to a "confessor." This heart unburdening involves absolution as well, but what the confessor role shows me as an evangelical is how rare it is to have a relationship with someone where I can unburden my heart about anything.

In the Celtic tradition the anamchara, the soul friend, was a spiritual director, a pastor, a friend, a judge-one who loved deeply so as to inform a person being mentored of his blind spots so that spiritual growth did not stagnate at a certain level. Over the years I have realized how vital it is to have this type of relationship in one's life. For me it has involved a variety of people for different seasons fulfilling aspects of this role. It is often implied that leaders have this in their covering structures, but rarely have I found this to be true or satisfactory. At the serendipitous end of a continuum soul friends involve those conversations that are deeply satisfying and matter to one's soul. On the other end it requires finding and making appointments with spiritual directors for a monthly check-up. All of this is important soul care to forestall some of the mind-numbing loneliness that can exist in the midst of Christian service (quite a source of tension and ambiguity given the relationship we have with God). The image that most speaks to me is the need for myself to soften and yield before the Lord, so that somehow God by His Spirit works above and beyond my own ability to grow and change. For this I need people who love me enough to speak the truth into my life so that I might become more than I am.

In my own journey I have been surprised by the wide variety of inspiration I have had from sources not part of my own spiritual tradition. Brian McLaren captured this sort of breadth-of-influence in his book, A Generous Orthodoxy. This book is McLaren's tribute to the broad impact that the whole Church in all it's divergency has had on his own spiritual development. I too recognize that I am a product of not just a relationship with Jesus, but also the mentorship-from-a-distance of Christians from the Orthodox, Catholic, Lutheran, Anabaptist, Charismatic, Anglican, Evangelical, Faith Missions, Postmodern Missions, and the emerging church movement. Perhaps at one time I would have feared acknowledging such a mongrel pedigree of influences, but now I urge Christian workers to broaden their horizons by embracing the whole body of Christ, especially finding inspiration from those the most unlike one's own natural spiritual inclinations. Definitely, having a more ecumenical viewpoint has boundary-blurring risks associated with it. However, sectarian inclusivism seems to be more dangerous both to personal spiritual development and advancing the kingdom in ministry.

To see the kingdom requires thinking and promoting metaphors and methods that speak to our current reality. When Jesus talked about putting new wine in new wine skins this was an ancient metaphor that is being worked out today. Many of the new wineskin experiments do not look like what has worked in the past, but it is these new innovations in ministry- anchored by the core orthodox beliefs of the past-that keep us linked to Jesus and promote creative responses to the influence of the Holy Spirit at-work-in-our-world. Generally, linking ancient church with innovation creates a strong field of ambiguity. The tendency in stress between opposites is to resolve the tension by moving to one pole or the other. However, another viewpoint is that creativity is birthed out of the matrix of opposites (perhaps even multiple opposites) clashing with each other. Therefore there is a need personally to find models of living with such ambiguity and being creatively adaptive in ministry. While most mentors are as unsure of the future as everyone else, a companion in the journey is invaluable aid to foresight.

As important as living with ambiguity is to personal growth, it is also critical to understand how organizations and ministries are coping with increasing complexity and diversity. One of the numerous tools for understanding complexity is the whole interconnected field of what is termed "learning organizations". These are not only educational facilities, but businesses, ministries, churches, and missions that embrace learning as a key means of adapting to the complexes of change that are awash in our world. One of the disciplines in this field of learning is systems thinking, which is a means of seeing the interconnections of multiple actions within a unifying whole. At one point I was very close to leaving the ministry I am now involved in, but it was "chancing" upon some of the resources of systems thinking that gave me the hope to continue. This is a field of study that is hard work, but there is so much internally and externally in most organizations that can paralyze progress, that overcoming some of the inertia is essential in leadership.

Linked with organizational understanding is the need to continually re-invent the model of Jesus' leadership often dubbed "servant leadership". It seems to me that servant leadership is most applicable to grassroots activities that are more networked than hierarchically structured; more organic than centrally planned; more pneumatically influenced than command and control driven. Again from a mentoring perspective this is a whole new field of expertise that might be called "chaordic" mentoring (from blending chaos and order). This is one area where finding mentors "outside-the-box" to create adaptations of missions and ministry that are new wineskins seems absolutely necessary for having hope for an unfolding future.

Just as I had a paradigm shift in discipleship from programs and meetings to relationships and mentors, it seems it is crucial for those moving into ministry to seek out mentors that can help them navigate. The navigation metaphor is adept, since some leadership experts are seeing out current world as a perpetual white water rafting type experience. Therefore managing the rapids is not an occasional activity; rather it is now the current norm. To manage rapids might be too strong a controlling metaphor. Perhaps a fitting exhortation would be "Run the rapids with courage! Stay in the boat! Help each other! Rest when you can! See you at the Ocean!"

A Book Review of “Signs of Emergence by Kester Brewin

2007-11-24T19:10:00.001-08:00

The sub-title for Signs of Emergence by Kester Brewin hints at a unique approach to understanding church in our current rapidly changing culture. Brewin sub-titles his central thesis as "A Vision for Church That Is Organic/ Networked/ Decentralized/ Bottom-up/ Communal/ Flexible {Always Evolving}." This is a fresh perspective and contributes positively to some of the world-wide discussion of what is dubbed the "emergent church movement/discussion/debate." The inherent problem with labeling is to prejudice a work before it has been thoughtfully engaged. There is a tendency in using "emergent" and "church" in the same sentence for those who are convince this is an important discussion of Christian relevance to jump on the band wagon and declare this work to be an important step forward. It is equally problematic for those who line up opposing the notion of church as emerging to be naysayers and dismiss the work prematurely. It is precisely in the tension between these 2 extreme perspectives that Brewin positions his book in a place he identifies with Jesus as conjunctive, incarnational, and emergent.

Conjunctivity is a term adopted by Jung to describe a stage of spiritual development whereby an individual is able "to hold opposites together in a single frame." Relying on James Fowlers' work on spiritual growth, conjunctivity is also a term used to describe "Stage 5" spiritual development in a 6 stage model. Stage 3 is a place where faith is simplistic/ black and white and largely controlled by external authority. Stage 4 is a lonely, individualistic questioning of the naiveté found in Stage 3. Stage 5 follows "dark night of the soul" experiences that dominate the Stage 4 process. Stage 5 fosters spiritual transform into a second naiveté marked by the complexities of life being held together in tension and hierarchies of external authority abandoned to being replace by networks and relationships. Using this model Brewin extrapolates from individual spirituality to conclude that Church in a very broad universal sense has been in Stage 3 for a very long time. But now the boundaries of holding on to Stage 3 spirituality are collapsing. The vision in Brewin's book attempts to project ahead in hope to what might arise from the ashes of this crumbling hold on the imagination of what faith might look like lived out in the context of contemporary Christian experience.

What has been called loosely "the post modern era" has had both a positive and negative impact on the stability of the Church. The resultant shifts in thinking that are thus arising by the questioning of Stage 3 spirituality has fueled much of the heat that surrounds "enlightenment" (modern) and postmodern church-in-society issues. Oliver Wendell Holmes is quoted as saying, "For the simplicity on this side of complexity, I wouldn't give you a fig. But for the simplicity on the other side of complexity, for that I would give you anything I have." Conjunctivity describes aspects of simplicity on the other side of complexity and Brewin identifies much of the creativity in the emergent discussion to be coming out of many people engaging the discourse from a Stage 5 spirituality perspective. Taking the insights from this stage in spiritual development and engaging our culture in a missional strategy will thusly often put us on a collision course with church life stuck in the paradigms of Stage 3 spirituality.

The incarnation of Jesus is not only a doctrinal belief, but an essential apologetic for those who are seeking a relevant church engaged in the world of current reality. Drawing on reflections based on Jesus' life and ministry Brewin paints a verbal picture of the incarnation where waiting over time is a key to spiritual growth. In addition he presents a challenging reminder that we too need to wait, to give ourselves permission for our understanding of God to evolve and change, to engage in the dirt of life, especially, in the context of the urban world. The incarnation then is a central theme of this engaging book. Rather than presenting a doctrinal treatise however, the incarnation of Jesus moves us to model our lives after His creative example. Brewin uses words in a meditative and reflective manner to paint a written picture of incarnation and its' implications for ministry in our world. Therefore, incarnation grounds Brewin solidly in the theological place to speak authentically into both the church and the world. His crafted poetic thoughts become a window into the author's soul for what is moving him and motivating him to engage in this timely topic. As in all written works, once ideas are committed to print, they become fixed statements-no longer part of the dialogue that created the original impressions. Many of Brewin's "conclusions" remain open-ended; a manner of writing that invites interaction rather than the opinions of an expert. Brewin writes in a manner in which he advocates living out the empowerment of people to engage life in Christ from the grassroots, in the complexity of their locality, and see transformation as the only way forward. If the community of such activists is identified as church, then the way of Jesus seems to support a community that is creative, faithful to truth, but disinterested in hierarchical/institutional power. This is transformation by empowerment and essentially is worked out at the grassroots of life.

Drawing on the science of "emergence" Brewin identifies the transformation church in Stage 5 conjunctivity as "the Emergent Church". The adjective "emergent" is not used in the sense of "emerging church", meaning some of the new ways of doing church. Rather emergence attempts to position the church somewhere in the conjunctive space that exists between total anarchy and dictatorial control. The science of emergence attempts to understand living systems as self-organizing, as potentially greater than the sum of their parts, as evolving and adapting, as existing in a place between chaos and order (a "chaordic" place). Applying emergence ideas to the church, the church becomes a community where the life of God should most dynamically interface with humans as a living system, Brewin points the Church in a direction of engagement rather than retreat. Taken seriously Signs of Emergence is an impassioned call to "metanoia", literally the changing of our thinking, about living out our kingdom faith.

A quote from Kester Brewin captures the heart of his plea for us to revision church in our world:

"Christ's birth, life, death, and resurrection provide us with an archetype for change and grounds for belief that God is not done yet. It will take time and courage, but we must stop, wait, and grieve. We must let go of our simplistic, mechanistic, legalistic, top-down ideas about God. We must allow God God's holy freedom, and mine the past for hope that the present is not all there is. We must become wombs of the divine and give birth to newness. Slowly, quietly, under the radar of the authorities, we must bring the church down from its local peak to rebirth and nurture it, allowing it to learn from and be dependent on its particular host culture. We must free it to evolve into cunjunctivity, rich and complex, networked and decentralized, not allowing it to be co-opted, and always keeping it open to its environment, sensing it, learning from it, responding to it." (pg. 200)

This is a hopeful book, but not hopeful in any sort of revolutionary way. Rather hopeful in the sense that Christ is still growing His Church, and our understanding of the times is a critical contribution to His kingdom coming.

Leadership Letter #5

2007-10-18T16:52:00.001-07:00

This past summer I have been reading a book called Theory U-Leading from the Future as it Emerges by Otto Scharmer. On the one hand this has been a fascinating probe into the realities of spiritual perceptions. I have taken some of his insights and used them to good advantage in teaching. I will use one of his diagrams in a Christianized version later in this blog to highlight the process of changing one's thinking. However, the other part of this book has been extremely frustrating. The source of this frustration is that I believe Scharmer has "insight extraordinaire" for what we would call "walking in the spirit wisdom". The reason this is frustrating is that there is no claim on Scharmer's part to having received much input from Christian sources, rather his spirituality is decidedly post-modern, a blend of reflective and meditative practices from a wide variety of sources, none overtly Christian (and none explicitly anti-Christian). So, the end result of this is I feel caught in a "place of ambiguity" somewhere between a position of generously orthodox Christianity and contemporary, post-modern spirituality. Intellectually, I can identify I am in this twilight zone, but my feelings elicit all sorts of questions that have no ready answers. Perhaps this unease mirrors the kingdom message Jesus taught. It seems Jesus produced a general feeling of frustration and ambiguity in preparing the disciples for the new work of God in their lives. I have come to the conclusion that the dissonance of this ambiguity is a good place to be, because it fits well into the metanoia model of Jesus. The cognitive dissonance of "metanoia" is what Jesus relentlessly guided His disciples into for the sake of their spiritual growth. Let me apply this insight to two current leadership issues we are facing in YWAM Canada.

National Vision Percolating from the Grassroots

Back in 1992 when Uli Kortch resigned as the Canadian Director of YWAM we meet as a council to determine who would replace him. At the time the more we prayed and processed as the Canadian Leadership Team (CLT), the more we became aware that the position of a national director in the sense of leading the whole nation forward on some common vision had never really been achieved during Uli's tenure. So, were we to put someone else in a similar national role, or could we come up with another way that seemed to offer more regionally sensitive leadership possibilities? We believe the Lord led us to the latter decision, even though we faced some opposition from both the YWAM International leadership structure and from some of our own Canadian operating locations. (In 1992 we only had handful of ministries across the country). At the time we did not have the words to describe what we were attempting to create, nor did we understand the shifts that were taking place both within YWAM and in the broader body of Christ and missions. In a sense we were creating a YWAM hybrid that both was international in YWAM identity and Canadian in a more post-modern, flat and grassroots expression.

One of the new mindshifts in this leadership experiment was to acknowledge that there would be from time to time national vision that would arise either from our Canadian leadership team or from the grassroots of YWAM ministry across the country. Recognition of national vision required a governance style that recognized vision as a gift (charis- a gracelet), and that the Holy Spirit could and does work through all believers, not exclusively through a hierarchy of leadership. This endorsement of the Spirit as a roving initiator and anointer of vision seems to be critically important in launching some of what God seems to have on his mind for us as a mission sodality. Therefore, vision (especially in the national sense of a trans-Canadian vision) could come from anyone moved of the Spirit and able to share this effectively with YWAM Canada. Since 1992 two major events stand out as "national vision": Initiation of our biannual staff conference in Manitoba; and the "Wake Tour" culminating in the Ottawa conference. Currently, the Winter Olympics in 2010 seems to be on track to become a national vision as well. The role of the CLT is to foster a governance model of inclusion and championing of those who are articulating vision through spiritual nurture and strategic inquiry. This type of governance requires of all participants a certain skill set of discernment, emotional intelligence, and collective will for vision to become reality.

Global Vision Trickling Down to Grassroots

In a similar manner there are times that Global Vision from the Global leadership Team filters through the international organizational side of who we are to challenge us as multiple grassroots expressions of YWAM to unite together for a common purpose. This does not happen often, but occasionally there are globally agreed upon words from the Lord that affect the whole mission. Currently, the Call2All Congress is one such expression. In a similar manner as the 2010 Olympics becoming a national vision, the Call2All movement is vying for our attention to be included on our personal agendas as YWAM leaders in our region (North America), our Nation, and our District. To contemplate how this affects us, the same model of discernment, emotional intelligence, and collective will may offer some guidance to the emotional dissonance that precedes "doing new things in new ways."

Metanoia and Recognizing the Challenges of Embracing New Vision

The above diagram is my adaptation of Otto Scharmers's Presensing Diagram. This is my synthesis of the discomfort experienced this summer and how his teachings might be adapted in a Christian environment. The Left hand side of the diagram represents Metanoia, literally the shifting of one's thinking (usually translated as the verb repent). The right hand side is another Greek word, "Maieusis" meaning" to birth the new". The decent down the Left hand side of repentance has a mind, emotion, and will component culminating in an experience with God followed by dynamic action on the Right side. The more I reflect on this process the more I believe this is a rough map describing the human side of hearing from God and moving out in faith. I would like to apply this diagram now to the grassroots vision of the 2010 Olympics as a possible national vision and the Call2All Congress as a global vision for YWAM ministries. In both cases we hear the vision and begin to process with our rational minds. Therefore, our past experiences of either Olympic outreaches and/or evangelism activities immediately colour our perceptions. This could be called download thinking because the past more or less dominates the thinking process. Given the power of download thinking in our lives this might immediately stall the process of shifting our thinking at the rational/mind level. One characteristic of downloading is that the thinking is defined by the past not by what is coming in the future.

One of the ways Jesus addressed this type of thinking in His disciples was to use stories to work around the religious rigidity of thinking in the First Century. One of Jesus exhortations was to challenge the perceptions of his followers by asking simple, but profound questions, such as, "Do you have ears hear? Do you have eyes to see?" Therefore it seems the first hurdle in processing something new is to get by our natural download thinking to a place of at least having ears and eyes open to perceive something new. In a group this is not an easy task.

An excellent Biblical example of this is the Jerusalem Council convened to address the issue of Gentiles becoming Jews as part of the process of becoming Christian. Initially, the discussion ("to verbally beat upon") proceeded in the rabbinical style of bashing each other with word and law-think a parody of "fightin' fundies" Bible bashing, with the winner being the last one standing. Both sides of the Jerusalem Council, the Jewish law keepers, and Paul and Barnabas, argued from their perceptions and experience. It seems that Peter's recounting of Cornelius' households' conversion shifted the council off of download thinking to a new place of being more civil and open to each other's perspective. If I use a spiritual gift analysis of the shift in thinking, it seems that discernment to listen and not trust the immediate rational reaction is crucial for metanoia to lead into God's perspective. Perhaps the rational mind needs to yield to faith, which is future orientated because "faith is the substance of things hoped for…" a desired future reality.

Having an open, seeing/hearing mind does not happen without strong emotions being elicited. Having the emotional intelligence to both profit from emotions and not necessarily be led by emotions is a key part of the metanoia pathway. One of my emotions that is often just-under-the-surface along with new ideas is that of cynicism. I have come to identify this "corrosive sense of hopelessness" as a harbinger of me moving into a reactive stance. By "reactive" I mean a self-protecting, non-creative holding-the-fort emotional distancing from an idea; decidedly, not in the hearing/seeing mode. Emotions are often discounted in our Christian worldview, however, I am not advocating ignoring emotions, rather listening to their message. Feelings are giving us valuable information that needs to be recognized. So, I have come to realize that cynicism is saying to me "protect yourself, this is the same old/same old, this will not work, it will probably end like other past efforts". While there are elements of strategy that might be birthed out of cynicism, likely the strong emotion will simply shut down participation. Cynicism is non-creative; therefore somehow I need to have my emotions shift in the direction of hope, not hopelessness. A listening stance with the heart open is the fruit of many spiritual disciplines. Strong emotions need not be ignored, but converted through grace to invigorate the metanoia journey. In fact most of us will not change without emotions tagging the experience. Cynicism tags experience with strong caution, Hope tags the same process with a sense of wonder and possibilities.

So far, if I apply metanoia to the vision of the 2010 Olympics or the Call2All, there is no possibility of "hearing from the Lord," if I enter into these events in a close minded, cynical state. My natural response is initially closed and cynical. How can I open up my mind and move beyond a reactive cynicism. Essentially, I think being open to listen and participate is a good first step. I can not hear without being willing to participate with discernment. Secondly, an emotional holding pattern somewhere between natural cynicism and Biblical hope, while uncomfortable, is a much more useful than reactive cynicism or naïve biblical literalism. Perhaps God can truly intervene and change, not only me, but the vision too by my non-judgemental participation. It takes emotional intelligence to learn the process of walking in the Spirit, so that natural flesh responses are converted to a proactive place of leadership grace.

As one slides down the metanoia side of the diagram the next level of the process is that of engaging the will. In the leadership context collective will is where hearts are joined together in the sense of discerning together the will of God. One of the issues that arise in moving towards collective will is a fear of losing one's autonomy or a fear of collective failure. Both fears paralyse further action and stop the process short of experiencing God in a new way. The counteractive to fear is love, brotherly love between leaders and agape love from God to all. Thus experiencing God in respect to embracing either grassroots vision or global vision requires Faith, Hope, and Love in an environment of collaborative processing. Once a group experiences God in a dynamic way, moving into Maieusis is often decisive, swift and energizes future potential. In the Jerusalem Council James summarized this dynamic by reflectively saying "It seemed good to us, and the Holy Spirit…". Not every one of our leadership decisions requires us to engage this process to the same degree, but I offer this as a reflective way to sort out vision, whether grassroots or global.

Practically, I think for myself this means I need to be in a place of openness and listening, not reactive or closed off. This further implies that endorsing vision implies some form of participation. Finally, I sense that there should be a greater awareness in our various councils that when we engage in vision decision making that we hover on the brink of new experiences with God. This is a holy threshold and it is not always clear how to arrive at the divine in our actions, but since it a place of wonder, it would be good on our parts to adopt a more child-like posture of holy expectation.

With this background let us hear/see again the breadth of what Scripture might mean when metanoia (repentance) is used:

Acts 3:19 Repent (Change your thinking) therefore and return, that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord;

Rev. 2: 4b,5a You have left your first love. Remember therefore from where you have fallen, and repent (shift your thinking) and do the deeds you did at first;

Leadership Letter #4

2007-03-15T16:37:00.000-07:00

March 2007

Last week I spent a very stimulating week at the YWAM North American Council Meetings at the Leadership Learning Center in Richmond, Virginia. These meetings had an unexpected spin to them, since Jim Stier, the YWAM Americas Field Director, was present to facilitate some major dialoging regarding the values we aspire to as a sodality in North America. The bulk of this letter will focus on the process we went through and a very insightful early morning trip to the Airport.

What Does a YWAM Base Leader Need to Do?

Early Sunday morning Dmitri from the Richmond base picked us up to shuttle the “early-birds” to the airport. During the course of our ride Dmitri (originally from Belarus) asked me for the 3 most important things a YWAM base leader needs to know to survive some of the rigors of YWAM community leading. I surprised myself with three clearly articulated insights and I have since added a fourth.

The first thing I said is that a leader needs to take care of self. This is not permission to be selfish, rather it is a clear-headed exhortation to love self enough to take care of self (meaning one’s own person and family). Such a love willingly serves, but does not lose self in the process. I realize that might sound contrary to “Deny yourself, and take up your cross to follow Christ”, but I can assure you that I do not advise self-care in any sort of self-negating or self-promoting way. Years ago in the zeal of youth we would often chide one another with the motto, ”It is so much better to burn-out for Jesus, than it is to rust out”. Now having witnessed first-hand the devastation of burn-out among friends and peers, I can no longer glibly endorse burning-out for any cause particularly Jesus. There is too much preventable human devastation that masquerades as sacrificial living through ill conceived reactionary living strategies. Laying one’s life down for Jesus, does not mean to reject life, rather embrace it to the full in Christ. Jesus is the master Life-giver, not the life-extractor. There is no point in sacrificing health or family relationships in a mistaken belief that this pleases the Lord. Contemplate the theology of our choices and follow through with how our ideas have consequences both to the Lord we serve as our primary loyalty, but also to the community in which we witness to God’s innate goodness.

What I mean about taking care of self is all the daily common sense activities that rounds us out as human being. The physical areas include getting enough sleep, exercising as needed, taking in fresh air, proper nutrition, and meaningful work. Intellectually, it means life-long learning, conversations that matter, and multi-discipline studies. Spiritually, it involves practicing the disciplines of personal growth and change, as well as growing in healthy relationships with others. The major point of this is that to take care of self, one can than yield a whole self to Jesus and whole-heartedly serve. This is a primary pre-condition for others to also know they are loved and cared for sacramentally by your attention, hence self-care, soul-care, member-care, and obedience to the Great Commands and Commission are all linked and inter-connected.

The second recommendation is that leaders need to understand finances both personal and corporate. This is an area that took me a long time to understand. I suppose part of this is that our lifestyle has always been simple and we have not had much in the way of finances, especially early on in our journey. The best recommendations I can make for this is to understand the spirituality of money, practice budgeting, and understand the wisdom of tithing and savings, and practicing stewardship of God’s creation. Earl Pitt’s book co-authored with Craig Hill offers many hard-won insights that are a good foundation for both personal and corporate financial wisdom. Wealth, Riches & Money- God’s Biblical Principles of Finance.

Thirdly are the disciplines of spirituality that move a team of people together in the same direction. This recommendation for leaders is much more of an art than it is a science. Therefore, it has to be more experimental and perhaps mysterious, since it is not always clear what combination of spiritual activities will work in any given circumstance. It is always easier to do this at the founding stage of ministry development than it is at the maintenance stage. Prayer, worship, common projects, retreats, conferences, and outreaches can all contribute to serendipities of Grace leading a team of people into their destiny.

Fourthly, define ministry by outcomes, not projects or events. This is an important afterthought and a corollary to the last point. Defining by outcomes are broad statements that can be answered in many creative ways. For example the Great Commission statements by Jesus before his ascension are all outcome based commands. Jesus does not give detailed instructions, rather he says things like “make disciples”. He does not say how to do this, instead the multi-form creativity of His followers linked to an infinitely creative God suggest a multiplicity of ways to make disciples. For YWAMers defining ministry by projects like “start a base”, “staff a DTS”, or “plant a church” immediately puts us into a duplicate-our- own-experience mode, which limits our creativity to our experience. Broader outcomes are helpful in that they open up the creativity circuitry in our hearts to the work of the Holy Spirit. So here is some more outcome-based suggestions for the above 3 examples: “create a way to live, work, worship to influence the community in which we are called”; “learn how to help people grow and change”; and “create a means for new disciples to continue to grow in their new found faith”. This more outside-the-box thinking allows for innovation to happen when and where it is most needed at the grassroots of our lives committed to Jesus. It also means that a “base” could look differently from place to place. Maybe discipleship is not just confined to the DTS model. Perhaps there are many more possibilities in helping new disciples grow than to start up a meeting on Sunday morning.

A “Briefing” on a Six-Day Process

I used the word “briefing” in the title to highlight the challenge of reporting adequately on a six day dialogue and interactive time interspersed with the North American Council meeting. How could such a report be called a briefing? It will only take you a few minutes to read what we did over 6 days. Definitely, the time was full and like most YWAM events phenomenological-a fancy word for saying that the full meaning and significance was in the participation of all that were involved in dialogue. Ontario had a fitness program called “particip-action” which would be a good word to describe this event. Those who participate with action found it quite meaningful. Jim Stier in his role as the Americas Field Director and Eduardo Angelo, a Brazilian YWAMer with a side business working with businesses to create mission statements, were the facilitators.

The conversation began with a candid recognition by Jim that YWAM was no longer predominately youth and the youth that are coming into the mission are entering with a postmodern mindset, values, and post-Christian experience. Eduardo picked up on this point by using a powerpoint presentation to illustrate how advertisers gear their ads to the anxieties of current culture. The message may be subtle or overt, but what advertisers say is the “we understand you, therefore buy our product, because we are contemporary and relate to you.” These advertisers spend a lot of money to find out the current anxieties (which change every 4.9 years) and then position their business with 4 core values to identify with their potential customers. So we embarked on a process to see what our core values are as YWAM Canada and USA. (We were not talking about the YWAM values in this setting-rather the values we project as an organization in Canada). At the Canada Table there was Anderson and Jay from Toronto, Scott from Alaska, and Randy and myself from BC. To find out values Eduardo gave us 2 sheets with icons and words to describe the current buzz words that resonated with people in general (not necessarily geared to a Christian audience).

Our first assignment was to find 4 words that best describes our current reality as YWAM Canada. Here is our initial sort:

Practical Cross-Cultural Innovation Team Spirit

You can imagine that there was much discussion over these words and many others that could have been chosen, but by the end of the session we felt these words describe us today across the nation as YWAM Canada.

Our next assignment was to look to the future and craft a mission statement that reflects who we are as YWAM Canada. Here it is with much wordsmithing already finished-and likely more to come in the future:

YWAM Canada-Incarnating Christ in our place of call, multiplying transformation in our communities.

The next assignment was to select 3 strategies that best captures how we are presently living out the mission as a sodality in Canada. For this exercise we departed from the general buzz in the room by asking the question of ourselves. “What stories do we find ourselves as Canadian in?” I suppose this might be construed as more of a postmodern response, but we thought that there were many stories involving

Social Justice (Multiple types)

Our Purpose and Identity as a Mission/Sodality

Coloring outside the lines (Innovation in ministry)

The above is a report on 3 days of processing interspersed with feed back, questions, short lectures, prayer, etc.

The last 2 days were focused on producing 2 lists of values that actually correspond to the first values list above. However these values were distinguished by what values we would internally use to identify ourselves (an in-house set) and what we would use to communicate our values via media to others.

First the Internal set- the words in italics are ones that are similar, but we do not necessarily think we finished these values as a final sense that we had really captured the sense of all of us across the country. (We need more voices at the table).

Truthfull Engaged Diversity Pioneering Cohesive
(Incarnational) (Holistic/Collaberative)

Truthfully Engaged Diversity Pioneering Cohesive (Incarnational) (Holistic, Collaborative)

The last set of values are the ones we would use in the media:

Innovative Creative Authentic Dynamic

I end this report with an awareness that words on the paper are not going to do justice to the interaction we had at the Richmond meetings. . What we need now is for us to continue this process of dialogue and as a nation begin to face the future with faith, hope, and love trusting the Lord will lead us. Please think, pray, and plan for more interaction with this initial step as we meet together at the NALC in Albuquerque, the WCLT in Winnipeg, and the CLT in June.

As a Lenten devotion this year I have been using Frederica Matthews-Green’s book “First Fruits of Prayer”. After battering my soul with petitions of prayer I did have a first-fruits experience with the gift of tears yesterday. The ancients thought all change was well-watered with tears. O, Lord continue to have mercy upon me.

Seminars for 2008

2005-12-31T13:34:00.000-08:00

Following is a record of the recent teachings we have conducted in 2005 and are willing to serve the Kingdom in either seminar or retreat formats in the coming year, 2006:

1. “The Cross- God's Infinite Centre of Grace and Mercy” (I am pleased that this is now a required part of the new DTS Curriculum. I see this as a core foundation of evangelical/charismatic theology and personal Christian growth in an experiential context).

2. “Lessons from the Fractal Edge of the Kingdom” ( An overview of Church History including the origin of the Bible, Creeds, Fathers, Saints, Characters and Missionaries).

3. “Seeing the Invisible- Mystical Theology and the History of Art"- a catalytic overview of mystical theology and modern praxis to shape creative expressions as art and witness.

4. “Starting Now to Finish Well” (The quest for Christian character, models of change and adaptation, seeking wisdom and character transformation, life-long learning and leadership development).

5. “Evangelism, Church Planting, Apostolic Teams, and Missional Communities“. This is really a Frontier Mission course, but can be adapted to many different settings.

6. “The Book of Acts and Missions” (Kind of a Missions 101).

7. My wife and I do a whole series of staff training seminars under St.
Barnabas Learning Community that focuses on equipping for counselling, discipleship, mentoring, spiritual disciplines, and spiritual direction. These can be developed or modified to fit specific learning situations.

8. Geoff Clarke, a former Canadian Parks Warden, and I have developed “Christ-in-Creation Retreats“- contemplation mixed with modest creation adventure- a balance of Creation, Christ, the Church, and the Word taught outdoors with a multi-sensory participation and awareness.

9. “Systems Thinking for Fractal Communities of Faith“- A study of the disciplines surrounding systems thinking and an application for use in personal counselling, group dynamics, church organization, missional communities, and team growth.

10. “Personal Learning Styles and Christian Growth“- a study in integrating a persons individual learning style with the need to grapple with Biblical truth for both growth and spiritual transformation.

11. "The Nature and Character of God"-Taking a Hebraic/Messianic mindset to focus in on God's Character as revealed by Jesus in a Trinitarian understanding. This can be applied to personal growth as Fatherheart teaching, or as Spiritual Warfare equipping, or as a missional applications for community trnasformation.

12. "Marriage Encounters Missions"- Either a Marriage Retreat or a Pre-marriage retreat that seeks to honestly face the diverse challenges of marriage and missions in a healthy, life-focusing retreat format.

13. "The Kingdom of God Meets the Sons of Issachar" Reflections on the Kingdom of God from both the Old and New Testaments with an ineteractive strategic focus that can be used in a variety of teaching or strategic planning contexts.

Thoughts on the Grace of God, Re-mixed

2005-12-30T13:56:00.000-08:00

A number of years ago someone mentioned to me that I had a grace-based approach to ministry. I took that as a sincere compliment only to find out later that the intent was more a criticism than praise. My critic's perception was that I was “too soft on sin” and consequently, the sinner had no fear of the Lord and lived out their own-way-ness (pride) in an unchecked manner. I understand the problem.

Recently, I had someone very close to me apologize for some very ungodly actions and attitudes. What would I do? Would I forgive unreservedly as Christ has done for me, or would I let the person squirm a bit as I “contemplated” my response. I ended up forgiving and pronouncing blessing, but I did walk away with the sense that justice had not been done. (At least from my perspective). Especially, since the sin-in-question was willful and repeated over a long period of time. How would my forgiveness affect any real change? Or is it my forgiveness? Is it my kindness, or is it God’s kindness that is powerful and leads to repentance? (Rom. 2:4) And, do I have the faith to trust that my graciousness might in some way be a door opener to God’s grace working dynamically in another person.

Yielding to the grace imperative somehow lacks the feeling of power that accompanies self-righteousness, or revenge, or bitterness. Do I see in myself shades of the elder brother from the Prodigal Son story?

All of this catalyzed my thinking again about grace. Grace is such an oft-used Christian concept, yet it is one of those words that very few people define while they are using it. Therefore, grace runs the risk of other well-worn words (i.e. “love”, “God”) that we assume everybody knows what we mean when we are using it. Because grace is a theological concept it is often subjected to sloganized definitions. Grace is “God's unmerited good favor to undeserving sinners”, or acrostically, “God's Redemption At Christ's Expense”. Both of these definitions are of some value in defining grace, but the word "grace"has much more in-depth nuances of meaning. For a readable and comprehensive inductive examination of grace I would recommend reading “The Grace of God” by James A. Fowler. <http://www.christinyou.net>

The good news of the New Testament is a radical message of God's (The Holy Trinity's)
grace revealed to mankind in Jesus of Nazareth, the incarnated Son of God. Jesus is the embodiment of the invisible God's message that God is for the complete and total salvation of the human species and the redemption of all of creation. This message is called by the Apostle Paul, “the gospel of the grace of God” (Acts 20:24) and the “word of His grace” (Acts 14:3; 20:32). Following are three definitions of grace from a “big picture” perspective. James A. Fowler concludes his essay mentioned above with,

“God's grace is as broad as God Himself, His every expression. Grace must not be limited to redemptive grace or regenerative grace or conversion grace or justifying grace. When grace is defined predominately by the benefits bestowed by God in Christ rather than by the dynamic Being of God in Christ, it degenerates into a “fix-it” commodity, rather than the ever-present and continuous dynamic of God's activity expressing His character.”[i]

Scot McKnight in his current book, Embracing Grace, unites the gospel of Christ with grace by saying,
“The gospel is the work of God to restore humans to union with God and communion with others and the world. This is what I call the gospel of 'embracing grace'”[ii]

Vladimir Lossky, essentially, articulates the same premise in language unique to an Eastern Orthodox perspective,
“...the Trinity dwells in us by means of that in itself which is communicable-that is to say, by the energies which are common to the three hypostases, or in other words, by grace-for it is by this name that we know the deifying energies which the Holy Spirit communicates to us.”(Emphasis added)[iii]

The last quote by Lossky differentiates the essence of God in Father, Son and Holy Spirit from the energies of God. God in essence is unknowable, (dwelling in unapproachable, uncreated Light), but in His energies knowable. Therefore, when we experience God at work in us through forgiveness, mind renewal, worship, etc. we are experiencing His energies-another word for this is grace.

A nature metaphor might be appropriate for understanding. After a long winter the reviving warmth of Spring's waxing sunshine is a welcome event. If we go outside and “bathe in the Sun” we are not directly experiencing the Sun (it's essence), to literally do so, we would be instantly incinerated. However, we are experiencing the energy of the Sun, tempered by distance (93,000,000 miles) and the filter of the earth's atmosphere. Yet the Sun-source (the essence) and the radiation (the energy) are inexorably linked in a relationship one to another.
The promise of God-at-work-in-us is that one day we will be like Jesus, forever the creature, but in union with Him as the Bride of Christ. Both mystical language and concrete metaphor fails us when attempting to describe this future reality, our inheritance in union with Christ.

There is a word used in theology to describe the interpenetrating Love of the Trinity for each other-a word that touches on our inheritance. The term is perichoresis, meaning literally “dancing together in a circle”. This term, introduced into the understanding of the Trinity by St. John of Damascus, is used to describe the relationship of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit-Three Persons united in the oneness of Essence and Energy. The Love of God revealed in energy of Grace infuses the relationship of the Trinity with an energy meant to overflow unto and into redeemed human beings. Our union with Christ is awash with the love of God in the divine energy of the cosmic circle dance.

One of the most recognized and beloved of Orthodox icons is that of the “Holy Trinity, by 15 Century iconographer, Rublev. Reading this icon entices us into the possibility of joining a relationship with God, that Baxter Kruger calls the “Great Dance”.[iv]

We enter the table fellowship of the 3 angels that visited Abraham at the Oaks of Mamre (Gen. 18) by humbling ourselves to enter the narrow door in the altar through the open way created by the position of the angels (Trinity-open to us the ones created in their image). The meal on the table has only one element, a chalice of wine which in the eucharistic meal of the Church represents one of the means of grace being dispensed to mankind.

This concept of “the means of grace” raises the question of how do we as humans receive grace? Are there things that we can do, or not do, that help us to orient our lives towards the energy that streams from the dance of the Godhead.

Darrell Johnson writes about a revelation he received about the Trinity while reading one of Thomas Torrence's books. “But here is what startled me and brought it all into focus, 'God draws near to us in such a way as to draw us near to Himself in the circle of his knowing of himself.'”[v] This drawing in of human beings into the perichoretic dance of the Trinity seems to be an apt description of the dynamics of grace.

So, how does this work? Is it a revelation that comes unexpectedly? Does it happen in the Eucharist? Does it happen while worshiping? Is there a special place to pilgrimage to get it? Can gifted people download it in an impartational “word”? I suppose there are two short answers to these questions. Yes, God can do it this way; and No, these are not the only ways God ministers grace. There seems to be infinite possibilities for God's grace to intersect with human receptivity. The focus is not so much on the power of grace, but rather on the feebleness of human faith having “eyes opened to see” and “ears opened to hear”. Thomas Torrence writes in another book,

“Grace is to be understood as the impartation not just of something from God but of God himself. In Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit God freely gives to us in such a way that the Gift and the Giver are one and the same in the wholeness and indivisibility of His Grace.”[vi]

Grace and faith are often linked in scripture. For example in Paul's Letter to the Ephesians he writes, “For by grace are you saved through faith; not of yourselves , it is a gift of God” (Eph. 2:8). It seems that, if we are in this great trinitarian dance, that as God takes the initiative through His grace the human response is that of faith. God leads, we respond-adapt-repent-
glide-shuffle-pirouette!

Jacques Ellul has an interesting perspective on faith and belief. While in scripture the terms are often used interchangeably, as in “to believe” is very much the same as “to have faith.” Ellul suggests belief is a more concretely rigid concept than faith.

“Belief provides answers to people's questions while faith never does. People believe so as to find assurance, a solution, an answer to their questions to fashion for themselves a system of beliefs. Faith (biblical faith) is completely different. The purpose of revelation is not to supply us with explanations, but to get us to listen to questions. . . . Faith presupposes doubt while belief excludes it. The opposite of doubt is not faith, but belief.”[vii]

The human response to grace is more faith than belief. A faith like Ellul suggests that is able to dance with the doubts and become open to the questioning that arises. To abandon the safety of rigid belief for a creed that is expansive and dynamic in its’ love for God and neighbours. After all, what we bring to the search for God's grace is a faith that finds hope in the sacraments of the church (including hearing His Word); Love (Agape’ energy) from our heavenly Father; a place of learning at the feet of Jesus, the Son; and manifold gracelets (“spirituals”-energies) sown into our lives through the Holy Spirit.

Advent 2005

[i] Fowler, James A. “The Grace of God”, http://www.christinyou.net, 1999, self-published.

[ii] McKnight, Scot. Embracing Grace. Brewster, Mass.: Paraclete Press. pg.xiii.

[iii] Lossky, Vladimir. The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church. Crestwood, NY:St. Vladimir's Seminary Press. pg. 86.

[iv] Kruger, C. Baxter. The Great Dance. Jackson, MS. Perichoresis Press. Title.

[v] Johnson, Darrell W. Experiencing the Trinity. Vancouver: Regent College Publishing. pg. 60.

[vi] Torrance, Thomas F. Reality and Evangelical Theology. Westminster Press, 1981. pgs 14,15.

[vii] Ellul, Jacques. Living Faith:Belief and Doubt in a Perilous World. San Francisco: Harper and Row, Publishers.

2004-12-02T16:29:00.000-08:00

North of 70 in Norway

Faith-Support

2004-09-29T14:49:00.000-07:00

What Do You Mean When You Say You Live By “Faith-Support”?

Over the years one of the issues that keeps on reoccurring with most of our family, friends, and even our supporting churches is the question of what it means to live by “faith support”. My father-in-law has never been able to figure this out. Recently, he asked me again when I would get a “real job”? Of course he means a job that pays a set hourly wage and is much more predictable in terms of income. It doesn’t communicate at all for me to say I do work on the average 50 hours a week on Youth With A Mission related issues. And when I explain that YWAM doesn’t pay me to do this, but in effect I pay myself to do it, my very real job with very real challenges seems all the more incomprehensible.

So, how did this system come about? And is it working for us? The faith-support mission system is a product from the era of missions called the modern missions movement (less than 200 years old). “Faith-support” means depending on God alone to supply all our needs by trusting in Him. Of course all Christians in effect do this whether they are in missions or are making a living in a variety of manners. Missions of this ilk rest on several foundational values that make it distinct from the normal manner of making a living.

The first distinguishing feature is that dependency on God is generally channeled by people through obedience to the Holy Spirit to other people. While the amazing manna-type provision is often used to capture the drama of God providing, the actual provision literally “from heaven” is rare. We have a couple of stories about manna, but only a couple in 30 years of ministry. Therefore being dependant on God has both a vertical relational quality directly to God, and a horizontal relationship quality with others (His family-the Church). Practically speaking, this means that both God and others need to value what a person is doing for God. The Bible is clear that anyone ministering the gospel is worthy of their hire and that making a living by the gospel is a permissible pattern for living (see 1Tim. 5:17-18 and 1 Cor. 9:14). Paul and Barnabas circumvented the typical pattern of the New Testament by working in the marketplace in conjunction with their ministry. This type of “tent-making” is a modern adaptation in self-supporting missionary endeavors.

A secondary assumption of faith-support is that the recipient prays to God as the principle means of soliciting funds. George Mueller and Hudson Taylor are two of the famous ministry pioneers that advocated this type of methodology. I know of very few who still actually adhere to this method exclusively. Most people in ministry write newsletters with the dual intention of establishing their credibility in ministry and as a way to let people know their financial challenges with the hope that people are moved by the Spirit to give.

In Youth With A Mission we have as one of our founding values a statement that guides the financial needs of both our ministry centers and our staffs’ personal support:

“Value # 16 YWAM is called to a relationship-based support system, depending upon God and His people for financial provision, both corporately and individually. We believe that relationship-based support promotes responsibility, accountability, communication, and mutual prayer. It involves the donor as a partner in ministry. As God and others have been generous toward us, so we desire to be generous. YWAMers give themselves, their time and talents to God through the mission with no expectation of remuneration.”

In effect this value has been instrumental in YWAM growing to both the size and scope of its’ worldwide ministry. In many ways the genius of this system places the faith back on the individuals involved and their relationships, not on some corporate entity. Hence the support base for YWAM is very broad and worldwide. An old adage often equates ones strengths with counterbalancing weaknesses. And this is definitely a challenge in the YWAM systems as well. Many of our staff not only have the challenge of learning how to minister the gospel, but also learning how to make such a support- system work for them. Recently, someone with a large sum of money that they wanted to invest in the kingdom was speaking with me. I assured this person that I knew of over 50 missionaries in my district that had inadequate support and that were worthy of support. Without a relationship with the staff in question the donor preferred to invest in a project. And while the project is worthy of kingdom investment this underscores the challenges YWAM staff face. Without long-term support we will not have “ministers of the gospel” available over the long-haul for ministry into the peoples of this world and the desperate needs many of them face daily.

So, is this system working for us? While I am not trying to be deliberately vague, the system does work, and it also does not. Let me explain. When I take a long-term perspective and look back over 30 years of living like this, it has worked well. We have raised a family in this milieu, sacrificed much, grown in grace and knowledge of the kingdom, and overcome many financial challenges. On the downside however, it has never gotten easier, in fact it is in many ways it harder today than it has been in the past. Giving patterns have steadily eroded over the past decade as one generation merges into the next. In addition there is simply less disposable income from both individuals and churches to under-gird the mission and ministry enterprises. This is because in many places the church is actually in decline, a new generation does not have the same financial concerns as the past, and there is simply more out there to invest in.

Sandy has been working full-time in the community for the past ten years. This is one way we have been able to manage. Her income has been off-set by educational costs for all four of us. I (Paul) have depended on faith-support, honorariums for speaking, growing raspberries, and small district office budget to make ends meet on the ministry front. So, we have survived. This past summer we launched-out with Sandy working with an agency doing part-time counselling and also part-time in YWAM facilitating Member-Care (a resource ministry to provide professional counselling for staff without paying remuneration). One thing we did not anticipate was that most of her counselees checked out for the summer, no counselees- no paycheck. While we were able to see her do more Member Care at our staff conference, a week of staff training, and a recent marriage retreat, we have not seen an increase on the faith-support side to off-set the increase in ministry. So in the long-run for both of us operating in this realm we need to raise our support level. We also need to see an increase from a broader base to warrant our joint involvement as we project into the future.

Meanwhile we do have the longevity of churches and individuals being consistent in our support. We are extremely grateful for this provision. Now it seems we need to garner the faith to launch a new initiative to raise our support income for both of us to be involved. Our goal in the next year will be to increase our support so that Sandy can be involved half-time. Future goals will be to increase her involvement to full-time. At this stage we are soliciting prayer support from all to move forward in this endeavor.

“For a wide door for effective service has opened for us…” 1Cor. 16:9a