It is Friday at the covenant yearly event I am at, and I have my license interview this afternoon - A really bizarre thing that strangers are going to say that I can be a pastor. It is kind of like receiving an honorary degree.

Anyway, there is a big conversation going on among a bunch of my cronies in response to a critique by a guy named Kevin Miller, who wrote about the Passé nature of the postmodern church debate. www.emergentvillage.com has the whole story.

I have really smart friends that are "dealing with him" (as president said about the terrorists who were not arrested, but “dealt with”) and they will refute all points that need refuting - but in the truth of it, we must be on to something if people are going to take time to tell other people that we are really not on to anything.

To me it is kind of like being in elementary school and being picked on by a girl and realizing that she only picks on the people she “really” likes. My problem in elementary school was not that the girl was picking on me; the problem was that I did not want her to like me. So I would make her stop, so she wouldn’t keep liking me. Confusing as an adult but made sense in elementary school.

Next thing now, we are going to be asked to the “dance”, but in this case will be writing with them in some dialog for others to listen in on. We do live in a world where everything can be packaged and sold – even our disagreements.

But my friends will “take care” of this in a fine way.

For me all this (multiple emails) came in the context of being at this event where I spent time with Sundihn. He is from Laos. Escaped from their during war, lived in a refuge camp in Thailand, where he was led to Jesus by a "Buddhist" monk, who would teach Buddhism and the way of Jesus and then would drop the Buddhism and help people to just follow the way of Jesus.

Ephram (who is starting a hip-hip church in North Minneapolis) and I took Sundihn to see Two Towers. He had never been in a movie theatre before - only seen movies on TV. So there we sat, Sundihn having a Blue Ice and watching a fantasy.

But, I guess the idea of eastern thought and western thought coming together to understand a story of faith and life in a high tech setting, while enjoying a iced confection, was probably useless when there are important responses to have in relationship to the passé nature of emerging churches.

When I am at church leader events, like the one I am at now, I have so many opportunities to tell the story of Solomon's Porch, that I often get tired of hearing my self talk about it. But, I did have a thought of clarity the other day.

If all churches were like Solomon's Porch, that would be a over limiting and very bad thing for Christianity. But, if there was not a place like Solomon's Porch, that would be a bad thing for me.

Maybe I will put that in the book, which I need to discipline myself to work on this week while in Chicago.

Monday, February 03, 2003

I am in the Theological destinctives class. It is much better than I thought.
I received an email about how church went at Solomon’s Porch went last night. Here is what Marlene wrote – I sure love these people and this church. I hate to miss it, it makes me realize how much I need Solomon’s Porch in my own life.

Marlene’s Comments:
Hi Everyone -
I was just talking with Shana and a few others last night and wanted to pass on that I thought the evening went really well from the direction, to the different voices in reading, the Barnhill and "family" hosting and last and DEFINITELY not least the music. I hope all the songs will be on the Guatemala CD. Thanks as always Michelle for all the work in the Powerpoint as well. The images have been great and I really appreciate the larger job you had to do last night with ALL the readings and lyrics! Oh and the 1 Corinthians thing for Marcus may have been a joke but it was nice to hear a male read that rather than just "another emotional woman".
I got feedback from others that the energy was good, they loved the soloist's and enjoyed the "worship" time. ... not really sure what that was about :-)

uh ... and oh yeah, we missed ya Doug. ;-)

It is the weekend of February 1, 2003 I am going to spend the week in Chicago at an event called mid-winter that is a yearly gathering of the denomination that Solomon’s Porch is part of called the Evangelical Covenant Church.
I have to take a class called Theological Distinctives of the Covenant – I am not so looking forward to it.

I will spend time over the weekend visiting some churches in the Chicago land area.



Saturday – I attended a church that is doing many of the things that I, and a bunch of my knuckle-head friends have been talking about for the last 5 years.
It is odd to see this playing out in situations that are different than I would imagine.


Here is a snap shot of what I saw.
The use of kitchen here is really great. There are people eating together all over the place. Many kinds of people. They are eating and sharing life with one another. There is a cake on a table that says “Happy 55th” with two 5 candles. It is great to see the values of hospitality playing out.

Many of us have talked about decentralized preaching.
That is happening here. There are multiple voices of teaching – at the same time, even.

The worship was led by a multi-cultural group of people from the community.
The content in one of the teachings was put in the question format, very refreshing – “Who knows, Maybe God will be gracious today?”.

These people are very aware that they are not perfect at what they are doing – refreshing.

They took time to pray for the needs around the world.

Now, before it sounds like the perfect setting it sure wasn’t. I am certain I could not make this place a regular part of my diet, but seeing in action what many of us have talked about is pretty cool – even here. Crazy World.

So, if you are in the Chicago area and can get to South Barrington, try a church on Algonquin Road.

What agreat reminder that the issues of the emerging church are not just about form and method, but are truly about message and content that needs to go well beyond form.



Sunday, feb 2
I visited Christ’s Church Wriggleywille this morning.
Dave Gwartney and Tiffany Gwartney are the innovators of the effort and they are doing a great thing. I think Tiffany has a web site at TiffanyGwartney.com.
These folks are so kind and I think that what they are doing is such a great thing to see.

I spoke at the student ministry of Willow Creek last night. It was good to be with my friends here and to bless what they are doing as friends, even being at a place that is so the other side of the coin from my life and what I would prefer.

It is clearly a world unto itself here, and at time way over the top.
I was invited to, and did run down my newest stuff on the kingdom of God. I think I did OK. They really seemed to like it.