Viral Jesus Give-Away
I’m incredibly excited to be reading Viral Jesus by Ross Rohde. For those of you who don’t know Ross, he has been blogging for almost two years about initiating Jesus movements similar to what God has done in the New Testament and in China. He’s also an organic church planter who has experience starting multiple house churches in places that are resistant to the gospel. Needless to say, he’s the kind of guy we like here at Pursuing Glory.
So to help get the word out about Ross’ book and promote some more discussion about spawning Jesus movements in the West, I’ve decided to give away a free copy of Viral Jesus here on the blog. Now most blog giveaways I’ve seen require you to subscribe to an email list, follow someone on Twitter, or follow you on your Facebook group. And while you’re welcome to get involved at a deeper level with what we’re doing here, we’re going to do this a bit differently.
In order to win “Viral Jesus” I want you to answer the question that Ross asks with his book: “What will it take to see a rapidly reproducing movement of Jesus followers take root in the West?” Anyone who writes an answer and posts it online for others to see will be entered into our give away. You can post it on your blog, your Facebook Notes, your Tumblr account, or your Google+ account. Really anywhere people can see it will be great. Then email me, tweet me, message me on Facebook, or leave me a comment in comment field about how to find your response. I will read the responses and publish the best response here on the blog on March 5th, 2012, along with the links to the other responses. The winner will receive a free copy of “Viral Jesus.”
Three Things that Hinder a Movement
I’ve been listening to a phenomenal set of interviews by Steve Addison that are part of his “Movements That Change the World” podcast. Steve is interviewing “Barney,” a missionary and church planter that has helped spark a movement in an undisclosed third world nation.
In his fourth interview, “Barney” is describing the wider context in which movements happen. Near the end of the interview, Barney talks about three different things that work their way in and distort the DNA of a church multiplication movement. Most of us would expect these things to be things like heresy or sin. What’s shocking about the things that he lists is they are things that well-intentioned people want to do for successful ministries. What does Barney say hinders movements?
- Buildings- According to Barney, church planting movements happen in all sorts of unconventional places: houses, restaurants, wherever people gather. When someone comes in and builds a building for the movement, the focus shifts from starting multiple churches in many people’s homes to getting as many people to come to the building as possible.
- External Funding- When money comes in from outside of the movement, it can cause the movement to embrace activities that in can’t sustain on its own financially. This can cause the church receiving funding to not be responsible for the resourcing of it’s own activities. Financial independence is crucial in the life of movements.
- Non-Practical Training- Probably the most seductive of the three, this typically happens when someone comes in and offers to build a bible college to train workers. The reality, though, is that this training takes people away from a more hands-on, obedience based training already happening within a movement.
Pretty interesting. Now, here’s the real question: these realities cause movements to slow in the third world. Is it possible that they hinder us as well? If so, why haven’t we noticed it before? Share your thoughts in the comment section!
Photo Credit: Social Media Patterns (Energy Minimized / No Overlap) by KentBye
The Wayback Machine: January
Some things just get better with age. “The Wayback Machine” posts occur at the end of every month and reference the best posts of that month in years past. My hope is to provide a good jumping on point for readers who have never been to Pursuing Glory.
2010
Why You Come To Pursuing Glory
This post was my 199th post. It was my attempt to sum up the reasons why people come and participate in this crazy blog and also articulate a little bit what the path forward looked like. If you’re wondering why you’re here or you have an interest in revival, apostolic ministry, the global house church movement, interecession, or our personal lives, you should check out this post to find out why you’re in the right spot.
2007
I wrote this blog because I was in a season of trying to plant a house church and was finding out very quickly not everyone was going to be as excited about it as I was. You also will get a good look at me wrestling with whether I wanted to bear the stigma of what was (and still is) part of belonging to a house church. The good news is the Lord is faithful and we’re still here.
Our House Church Came Together
This post came out of the very first gathering of our house church. We’ve grown a little numerically, we’ve grown a lot in community and in each other’s lives. This post ought to give you some great insight in where we started. It’s hard to believe it’s been four years.
Cluster Map
