Categories
Church Growth Church Planting Evangelism Missiology Missional Practical Theology

What should local missional outreach look like?

A key question churches struggle with is what missional outreach looks like in their local area. Many Christians feel their church is not doing "evangelism" OR "social justice" well. I think that there needs to be local analysis. Is violence, water, food, housing, medical, employment, education a major need in the local community because government is failing? Or is the locale wealthy and therefore struggling with meaninglessness, depression, loneliness, and broken relationships? These local realities and needs will shape the nature of local church outreach. In other words, biblical and theological convictions will not be the sole factor in what a local church's local outreach looks like. The context will also factor in. Paul's Gentile churches reached out to wealthy Roman citizens differently than James's Jerusalem church's care for the poor. Paul also collected offerings from the Gentle churches for the Jerusalem church. This is an example of churches reaching beyond their locale.

This is a Twitter thread by Andy Rowell

produced by https://tinysubversions.com/spooler/

Categories
Bethel Seminary Discipleship Evangelism Leadership Missiology Missional Models of the church Practical Theology Spiritual formation

My 2015-2016 Ministry Leadership syllabi at Bethel Seminary

Here are some of my syllabi from the 2015-2016 school year at Bethel Seminary. 

 

Introduction to Transformational Leadership (hybrid of online with synchronous sessions and intensive)

Download 00 Syllabus ML523 Rowell 2015-09-30

 

Organizational Leadership and Church Governance (traditional)

Download 00 Syllabus ML615 Rowell 2015-09-30

 

The Global Mission of the Church (fully online with synchronous sessions)

Download 00 Syllabus ML632 Rowell 2015-09-30

 

Contemporary Models of the Church (fully online with synchronous sessions)

Download 00 Syllabus ML714 Rowell 2015-09-30

 

Discipleship in Community (traditional)

Download 00 Syllabus ML506 Trad Spring Rowell 2016-02-04

 

Missional Outreach and Evangelism (traditional)

Download 00 Syllabus ML507 Trad Spring Rowell 2016-02-03

 

You can see required textbooks at Bethel Seminary at: 

http://bookstore.mbsdirect.net/bethelseminary.htm

Categories
Evangelism Missiology Worship

Worship should be potent and invitational

An Episcopal friend of mine is worried about how many churches accommodate Christians to such an extent that the fierceness of the gospel is diluted. I talked about the importance of being accessible but agreed with him about being wary of overcontextualizing. 

 

  1. Wanting church to be comfortable for new people usually just means wanting it to be comfortable for moderately traumatized post-evangelicals

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    @adalehunt Yes, "comfortable" is wrong. Correct is missionary mindset: trying to communicate in such a way that new people understand.

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    @adalehunt Missionary approach navigates between: overcontextualization (syncretism, comfortable) and failure to communicate (withdrawal).

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    @adalehunt Professor Lindbeck suggests that those who give primacy to the question of how the Gospel is preached in a post-Christian …

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    @adalehunt environment ‘regularly become liberal foundationalists’, preoccupied with translating the Gospel into alien terms, …

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@adalehunt or at least redefining it in response to secular questions. I am not so sure." Rowan Williams, On Christian Theology, 38.

 
 
4:56 PM – 17 Nov 2015
 

 

 

 

 

 

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@AndyRowell @adalehunt Lindbeck is right.

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    @AndyRowell You know how I love me some Rowan Williams, & in his larger critique of Lindbeck I think he's right. I don't think, however…

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    @AndyRowell that what the gathered Church does in the liturgy is proclaim the Gospel to newcomers, at least not by purposeful orientation…

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@AndyRowell that what the gathered Church does in the liturgy is proclaim the Gospel to newcomers, at least not by purposeful orientation…

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    @AndyRowell What we're doing is, *as a called people*, responding to what the Gospel has done for us. We're addressing God, not newcomers

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Andy Rowell ‏@AndyRowell  Nov 18Minneapolis, MN

@adalehunt All good comments. 1 rejoiner: Paul wants intelligibility in worship because of "outsiders or unbelievers" in 1 Cor 14:16, 23-25.

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@AndyRowell I really don't think it is a workable analogy. Massive diff btwn wild charismata like tongues & ordered worship in the venacular

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    @AndyRowell Was raised old skool AoG; been to those 'revivals.' Even *I* didn't get what was going on half the time 🙂

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@sheddenm @adalehunt My like means that I'm glad you chimed in but does not connote agreement. 🙂

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