What have I been up to?

Hey guys since I last Blogged it has been CRAZY!!

Last Saturday I met with my team and we discussed the things we need to do before the launch on March 1st. We feel like things are going well with Bible studies starting up next week. I also saw a friend of mine who is a great drummer play at a bar in the afternoon. He was a Christian once, pray that he will realize music is not enough but Jesus is what he really needs.

Sunday I preached three times on Hell at my now old Church Christ Church Mortdale. At the night service a bunch of people just walked in off the streets that don’t usually go to Church. Pray that they will come back and they will learn to love Jesus. I love preaching at Mortdale and will miss these guys greatly. Pray for them as they are looking for a new minister and also pray for the Assistant Brendan McLaughlin. He is a great brother who I love and he would value your prayers as he is effectively running a Church with no senior minister.

Monday was spent doing a heap of reading on Luke because I am preaching through it at church till Easter 2010. It was the first day that I really dug into reading since last year and so it was a very tiring day. At night I met up with a guy named Matt Freeman. We ate together and had a great time being accountable to each other and talking about Mark Devers nine marks. Matt is hoping to go to Capitol Hill Baptist Church (Mark Dever’s Church) as an intern. It would be great for him and I am just a little bit jealous that I never thought of going and doing that. Matt is a great preacher and a loving brother pray for him that he would go over there and that it would make him into the loving pastor that he wants to be.

Tuesday was the day I was dealing the Government so it was off to Centrelink then job futures and then the RTA. It was a depressing day because I was thinking about my mates from college starting their jobs, living in their new homes and getting a paycheck and here I was not sure if anyone will turn up to my Church, in a crappy smelly house and almost broke. Then I went to lunch with Paul Liao, a guy in my Church plant. We had a great Thai meal and were enjoying each others company when I got an encouraging call from the Department of Fair trading saying our latest constitution was rejected and that we couldn’t call the church Foundation. So I sent out a text to almost everyone in my phone that if they come up with the best name for a Church I will shout them dinner in Newtown.

Here were some of them (you can use any of them because we aren’t)
• Foundasian (but we would have to start an Asian Church)
• Themelios (Foundation in Greek)
• Zacchaeus’s house
• Track one
• Revolution

Anyway, we as a Church plant team couldn’t decide on one so we went with the name I came up with when I first started out and so now the Church is called Resolved.
I chose Resolved because iis a strong word which says you have a made a decision and it will remind me to keep preaching the work despite all the hindrances and all that comes my way.
Tuesday night I met with two people, both about starting bands, one a rock band and the other an RnB band. The first one was a girl who I have done some work with before, we talked about the band, what songs we would do and then we switched and chatted about her marriage and how that was going and then my relationship status, whether I drink, have sex, masturbate etc. It was a weird conversation but I talked to her about Jesus and the difference between religion and the Gospel. She didn’t get it because she was always asking so can you do this? What about this? I think it will take a lot of these conversations before the penny drops. It reminded me of Paul’s charge to Timothy to preach the Gospel with great patience and careful instruction. The people I want to reach out to have so many walls up that they will have to hear the Gospel again and again and again before they get it even intellectually. The second conversation was with an ex Australian idol guy who is a great singer. We chatted about songs, who to get in the band etc. I hope these bands get up and get gigs because it would be a great opportunity to play fun music, get paid well and most importantly build relationships and share the Gospel. I then chatted online to three different non Christians who I am meeting up with next week. They are all people who I have reconnected with through Facebook and they all are interested in hearing more about the church. Pray that God spirit will move and these people will come to church and they will turn to love Jesus.

Wednesday my girlfriend came back from Thailand and so I took a day off and spent the day with her and her family.

Thursday I went to Centrelink again and had another meeting that lasted a whole 3 minutes but the waiting in line is really where it is at. I think when you walk into Centrelink someone should punch you in the face and you would be like “Oh, someone punched me in the face. I guess waiting in line is not so bad after all!” I listened to two whole John Macarthur sermons while waiting in line so that is how long I was in line!!!
The rest of the day was spent doing some study for an exam I have got next week and fixing up our constitution and sending it off again. I also started an event on Facebook to invite people our Bible studies, I pray that many people will come. At night two mates fixed my car which was hit last year. It looks like a bomb but it should get me from A to B. I shouted them a nice steak and a few drinks for thanks which was fun.

Today I was looking for a new place to stay, answering emails and chatting on Facebook to some guys who were interested in the Church. I also applied for Job with CMS which is a 4 day a week job which will pay the bills and give me a few days in which to work for the Church. I am going, with my girlfriend, to see Laura Nolan sing at the Excelsior hotel in Glebe which should be fun. Laura is a friend who is coming to the Church after she goes to America in a few days.

As I read over my blog and my diary I am thinking of the amount of non Christian contacts I have. In the last two weeks I have met with 14 non Christians who I am actively praying for. As a church planter it is so easy to get caught up with constitutions, structures and internal issues. These things need to be done but we as church planters need to be the ones who are setting the evangelistic temperature of the church. If we are not out there talking with non Christians and seeking to share the gospel with them why would the people in our church evangelize? Here are some things to think about:

• Take your diary out and notice in the last month how many meetings/dinners/drinks you have had with non Christians.
• How many friends that are non Christians do you have who would happily sit done and eat with you?
• How many non Christians have you invited to church or an evangelistic event in the last year?
• Have you got specific time each day set aside to pray for more non Christian friends, for more opportunities to share the gospel and for your friends to became Christian?
• What aspects of the gospel would your friends most want to hear? For example to my friends who with catholic backgrounds I emphasize Grace, to my friends who have had a bad relationship with their parents I may emphasize the love of the father etc. I always try to talk about the cross but I try to do this in a way which confronts either a need or unbelief in their life.
• Do you support your non Christian friend’s interests? When they invite you to their kids party or a gig they like or a movie screening do you go? If not why would they come to your church? And do you REALLY love them?
• How honest are you with them? Have you shared your life with them? Have you shared what is wrong in your heart with them? Be real and honest with them and they will be real and honest with you.
• Do they know you love them? Do you serve them with your time and money? Because in the end people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. Do your non Christians friends know you love them? But more importantly do you love them or are they just another potential evangelistic scalp and no more?

My sin, my life and disciplines I am trying to cultivate

I always thought that ministry would make me a better person. I would love to say that it has. But what is has done is show me how sinful I really am and in certain times it has brought to the fore new sins. Not only has it brought my sin out into the light, ministry has brought my weaknesses out into the light. So much so I sometimes doubt whether church planting and ministry are for me!

I feel I am called to ministry and church planting so I guess I gotta deal with my sin and inadequacy. I am aiming to do this in a few ways.

1. I read my Bible and pray. Sounds stupidly simple but without communion with God I am depriving myself of the relationship that strengthens me and helps me kill my sin and fight my weaknesses.
2. I read Good theology. I need to fill my head with great thoughts about God and his world. This will help me to see the world and it’s pursuits for what they are; meaningless a chasing after the wind. I think it was Piper who said about struggling with sexual sin “Don’t tell me you are fighting sexual sin unless you are filling your mind with God exalting Theology!” To this end I am trying to read an hour of theology a day. I have started with the compendium of John Owen’s stuff on sin called Overcoming Sin and Temptation which is a hard read but brilliantly refreshing.
3. I am accountable to a good friend who has permission to ask me about anything in my life. We meet once a week over dinner to talk about each others lives and offer encouragement and correction. Piper has got a pastoral accountability report which you can get at Desiring God that we work through.
4. I take time each week to write down my besetting sins and how they have manifested in my life over the past week and then I try to see patterns in behavior and sin which I need to eradicate from my life. For example, I noticed that I am far more likely to be filled with lust when I am lonely or bored at night so I try to have either something to do at night i.e. band practice/ read a book/ Work on something or I try to hang with a mate. After I have tried to discern certain patterns in my life which may or may not lead to sin I then spend time meditating on the cross and God’s grace, remembering that despite my many sins and weaknesses I have a great and glorious savior who has taken all my sin away and dealt with the consequences of that sin.
5. I search everyday for evidences of God’s grace in my life and I thank God for them. I see us make a few steps towards our goal of planting a church I thank God. I have great meal with friends. I give thanks to God! I have a productive day. I give thanks to God! Because in the end it is his gracious activity that allows me to do the things I do and experience the things I experienced.
6. I am pharisaic about my diary. I write EVERYTHING down in my diary so that means I can make appointments and keep stock of where my week is. I think for some of us who are on more of the creative bent (like myself), this kind of discipline is hard but I am finding already that I have been able to be more effective in planning out my time.
7. I try to cultivate a joy and have fun. If I am doing something I hate or is boring me I will not do it and so I have to find ways to make things I hate fun. So I try to be competitive with myself and give myself time goals in which to get things done in. I find this keeps work fun I also love to laugh and so I am always looking out for the funny side of everything I do. I find this keeps the mundane lively and fun.
8. I am intense. I am trying to attack everything with an intensity that forces me to focus and be motivated. I write out a to do list at the start of the day and go through the list of things to do working as fast and well as I can. Once again this seems like common sense but what I have learnt is that lack of discipline starts with an undisciplined mind. If I think I will do it later or lets have a look at this site or whatever I will not get anything done. So my thought pattern when I am working is intense!
9. I take time off. I take Saturdays off every week as well as other times during the week. This means I have time to hang with my Girlfriend or see a movie or sleep in. I have been raised in a society that has elevated relaxation to an art form and so I don’t struggle with taking a day off or relaxing but I know others do. I am not sure what I would say to them other than that I find if I have a day of relaxation and fun I am more likely to get a lot of things done in my days of work.
10. I don’t take myself too seriously. I worked in a factory before college with people who had a far less privileged background than I and they were able to show me what really matters in life. So I try not to take myself seriously (maybe I go too far in this!). So people rip me off and it is cool, I laugh. A person says they cannot make it to my meeting, it is cool, and I reschedule another one. I live in a crappy, stinky house with a terrible landlord (which I do), it is cool, at least I have house to live. If a person doesn’t get something done on time, it isn’t the end of the world and so I ask them if they need help or what is happening in their life at the moment instead of getting angry because usually when I get angry at people it because I am inconvenienced. So I try to see myself in proper light..

I am wrote this blog to get us to think about our personal lives. How are you doing in your personal life?

How is your Bible reading and Prayer life going?

What sins are constantly plaguing you? How are you fighting them?

Do you have a friend or mentor that you can share your life with and who will hold you accountable?

Are their any patterns in your life that need to be either done away with or corrected? How will you deal with these patterns?

What evidences of God’s grace have you seen in your life? When did you last thank God for these?

In what ways can you laugh at yourself because you shouldn’t take yourself too seriously!

Church planters need to be strong on their holiness, spiritual upkeep and discipline. If you are like me and not naturally disciplined work out ways in which you can keep your spiritual life fervent, kill sin and be disciplined.

The story so far part 2

Once I got a team together we started meeting up and making plans and strategies. What I did was to to come up with an agenda of things to talk about and then I or someone else in the group would prepare little papers that would say where we thought we should be on the topic/theology/strategy/etc. in question. Vigorous discussion normally ensued and we would usually work out some kind of way ahead.
The hardest thing in starting up a new independent church was the constitution. I only learned halfway through the year that unless we had a constitution that was ratified by the Government we couldn't have a bank account or get insurance/pay taxes etc. So I learned how to write a constitution and wrote one which our team lawyer would then critique and we would make it clearer and better. The first time we sent the constitution off it was rejected outright because we wanted to be called Foundation incorporated and for an incorporation to have foundation in the title it must be a not for profit organization, the government has stipulated that Churches aren't strictly not for profit. I am yet to hear back from the Government about the major redraft of the constitution but I will be letting you guys know when it comes through. If you need help with a constitution let me know and I will do whatever I can to help. And please pray that this constitution is fine and we can go ahead!

The team, minus two people, is meeting tomorrow which should be fun and we are just getting everything on track for bible studies that should be starting soon and our first month of meetings that are taking place in February before we officially launch in March.

On a personal note I have just moved into a new place and have to find a job that will support me. I am hanging with a friend and her fiancee and hoping to get them checking us out when we start. Also pray for my drummer friend who used to be a christian and who I am going to see his gigs to build relationship with a view to talking about Jesus. I have got about 38 non Christians who I am actively seeking to love and tell about Jesus. Pray that they will come to know and love Jesus and see him as the great king.

One of the things a church planter must be is an evangelist. I know a few guys that want to plant churches but they don't like hanging with non Christians, seems dumb but that is what they say. I think if you are a person who cant hang with non Christians for whatever reason then church planting probably isn't for you. So if you are a potential planter ask yourselves these questions:

Do I have non christian friends?
Am I able to talk with non Christians?
Am I able to understand them?
Do I have tears for the lost?
Am I able to share my faith with them in a way which they will hear?

If the answer is no to these questions and you don't want to change then you are not a church planter. If the answer is no to these questions and you want to change then get out amongst non Christians and love them, cherish the time with them and seek to gain their trust and when the opportunity comes up to share about your faith take it! Train yourself to be an evangelist. I pray that you will see many people come to know Jesus through your ministry!

The story so far Part 1

I got the crazy idea of Church Planting way back when I was a teenager, basically I thought I knew everything and thought I could change the world and so I would plant a church and everyone would bow the knee at Hans Kristensen's preaching.
This planting thing never really took wings until I was going to a midnight Jam Session in the middle of Kings cross on a Thursday night. There I met a lot of friends who really loved the ideas of spirituality, God and Jesus but were mainly turned off by a lot of the religious goings on they had seen. A weird thing happened one night when I was going home from this Jam, I was driving a long when I had this question ringing in my head 'Who is going to share the love of Jesus with my friends?' I began to weep for my friends and so because I had the heart for these people and I was thier friends I thought Ishould plant a church that would hopefully reach these people. So after checking with a few men whom I trusted and would tell me straight whether or not this was good Idea I started putting down on paper what I wanted to do with this church.

I then brainstormed a list of over 100 quality people who I knew from different churches in sydney. I then pruned this list down to about 30 people and started to ask them to join the church plant. Luckily for me about 9 said yes. One decided a few meetings in that he didn't agree with my ecclesiology and left. We are still mates and I can still kick his butt at Basketball so everything is cool between us. Another guy I asked to leave because of theological differences. He said he was thinking about leaving anyway because of these differences and we are still great friends who love to argue about Rob Bell, Obama, Postmodernity and theology. He is a dear friend and I still wish we could have worked it out but God is using him in powerful ways to help poor people in other countries which is his hearts cry! Another member of the team was going to Spain and was a great help in sorting out constitutional stuff out and chatting through church discipline issues.

The people I have on team are a Lawyer who grew up on the north coast to musician parents, who has been great at helping with the legal side of things, a singer song writer who has always got the cool bad hygiene look happening, he has been great in challenging me to think more humbly and careful about how my theology and how I present my theology impacts peoples lives. We have a Girl who works at the Australian bureau of statistics. She has been a band manager and a door wench for a few goth nightclubs round town. Her sister is also one of the up and coming DJs in Sydney. She has been great in helping me think trough women's ministry and some of the pastoral care issues, she has been great to in making sure we keep focusing on what church we want to be and not just reacting against other church models which I deem (in all my lack of experience and wisdom) to be ineffective at reaching our culture. Next we have a dude who is teacher and a great guitarist/singer songwriter, he kinda looks like a dude who could go bear hunting with a twig and come back with seven carcases. He is getting married soon to a gem of a chick and he has been a great support as a friend, which all church planters sorely need. Next we have a girl who just finished a music business degree, she is currently in Africa serving on a Short term missing which is awesome!! She is great in caring for people and she knows a lot of musicians through working at an industry newspaper and managing a heap of bands!

If this church plant succeeds it is first and foremost because of the sovereign grace of God but on a human level it is because these guys have been so great in getting this thing together. I love them and I have a blast whenever we meet!!

The thing that I have learnt as a leader of a church plant team is that you must always pick the best people you can to be on team. It sounds obvious but it seems like the planters I have talked to have been desperate for anyone to be on team. My church plant team is very small compared to some but we are all on the same path, we work great together, we have blast when we get together and we love doing this church plant thing. There were about 20 others who wanted to be on team but for different reasons I told them they couldn't be on the team. There were also people that liked the sound of the plant and the vision but were either wishy washy in their commitment or they couldn't be stuffed coming to a meeting or a vision afternoon. And so even though I wanted more people to be on the team these were the very kind of people that could derail the vision and therefore even though it was sometimes embarrassing to talk to other planters who had core teams of of 20-30+ I am glad that I got the right people on board and that I didn't take on anyone else who might have been a weed in the midst of my plant.

So if you are thinking of church planting make sure you get the right people around you. You will make mistakes and the right people will help you figure out what you did wrong and how to make amends. You will lose heart and the right people will encourage you. You will make stupid decisions and the right people will correct you on these. But the wrong people will be argumentative, lazy, ungracious, distrustful, power hungry etc.

As Jack Welch the CEO of General Electric said 'The team with the best players wins.'

Don't blame me I have been asked to blog!!!

I think blogs generally suck, but, I have been asked by a number of dudes to write a blog about my experiences of church planting in Sydney, Australia. I hope to fill you in on the everyday workings of whats happening with the church and my life to give you a glimpse into a church planters life and so you can learn from my mistakes and failures and rejoice with me when God does something awesome through me! So I hope you enjoy this blog.