Antioch 2009, All Things Starfish, and Haven In The Hood

About two years ago Christy and I by the providence of God found ourselves at the Tribal Gathering hosted by Rock International.  While Christy and I try to make a habit of going to the Tribal Gathering as often as possible, this year God seemed to have something up His sleeve.  A work schedule that should have been impossible to navigate opened up and we found ourselves in the middle of a series of meetings that blew our minds.

The Rock’s guest that year was Wolfgang Simson, a German missions expert who wrote the mind-bending book, Houses That Change the World. To make a long story short, my life was dramatically shifted during that weekend in a way that’s hard to explain.  Wolfgang unveiled his vision for multiplying house church movements being used to win masses for Jesus at the end of the age.  He likened the process to a starfish, which can be multiplied many times over but never dies throughout the process.

Without going into a ton of detail, this “Starfish Vision” called for a gathering of believers to meet in Antioch in 2009 to gather before the Lord and repent for having missionary agendas that were not the Lord’s.  This meeting, however, was only to serve as a springboard to a more significant gathering where house church leaders from around the world would gather to hear God’s plan for gathering in the last great harvest. I think it may look something like this.

Needless to say I was intrigued by the idea of the Antioch meeting and never forgot about it.  Well, two years have come and gone and this meeting finally occurred.  In the last few weeks, several of those who were there have written about what happened.  You can read Guy Muse’s very personal observations here.  You can get Tony Dale’s perspective here.  And last but not least get the thoughts of the guy who called the whole thing together (Wolf) here.

And as if that wasn’t enough at the gathering, Wolfgang and Mercy released the finalized version of the Starfish Manifesto.  The Starfish Manifesto is the culmination of a couple of years of waiting on the Lord, hearing His voice, and pairing apostolic strategy with prophetic insight.  I have not read this version, but the early version I saw was amazing and challenged me to go deeper in the things that God started in me that weekend two years ago.  You can download the final version of the Starfish Manifesto here.

And finally, turning our attention from Antioch back a little closer to home, I want recommend to my readers a new blog “Haven In The Hood.”  The blog features two new friends of ours who moved out of suburbia and into a neighborhood not too far from us.  The blog is their story about creating a little place of refuge where many think none could be had.  You can check them out here.