L.A. Hope

Lord-willing, I’ll be involved this summer with a “Boot Camp” for church planters at the Arch Ministries National Church Planting Conference. More information is available here.  You’ll want to look carefully at the schedule, because the Boot Camp is in two parts at the beginning and end of the Conference.

The National Church Planting Conference is a very affordable conference with a very encouraging format. It’s not just for young church planters, but also for pastors who are seeking to revive struggling works, potential church planting team members, and pastors who want to see their church become a church-planting church.

But the Boot Camp is specifically designed for:

• men considering church planting (and their wives)
• men preparing for church planting (and their wives)
• team members preparing to help with a church plant
• pastors of existing church who want to see their churches mentor church planters.

The conference materials refer to me as a “seasoned” church planter. That may mean nothing more than that I’m a little salty. Seriously, the boot camp is in no way an attempt to teach you what I know about church planting, or to teach anyone a particular method of church planting. I know far less now that I ever have. But the Lord does seem to have gifted me with the ability to help men ask the right questions as they prepare for church planting, and this is the focus of the Boot Camp. I’m especially excited about the potential to help men and their wives get a much more realistic picture of the road ahead, so that they can prepare adequately.

Since the Boot Camp is a fairly new endeavor (this is the second year that we’ve done it), I would appreciate it if you could help spread the word.

Heritage Bible Church of Riverside is moving (back) up to the heart of the Inland Empire. You can pray for the Lord to smooth the way for the final approval of their Conditional Use Permit on their new facility. They are getting very close. They’ll be meeting very close to the intersection of the 215 and 10 freeways in Colton, easily accessible from many parts of the Inland Empire. Since “HBC Riverside” isn’t very accurate any more, they’ve updated their web address to www.heritage-bible.com

Audio from the 2011 Mid-America Conference on Preaching (hosted by Detroit Baptist Theological Seminary) is now available for free online. This year’s topic was “Church Planting & Renewal.” Audio is available here.

Ahhh …. finally. Can get my own study notes and sermons indexed in Logos, since I can never remember where to locate what I need. Nothing quite so frustrating as studying a passage or word that you know you studied sometime in the past, but you just can’t seem to locate the notes. Logos 4 also took all of the sermons I had imported into L3 in the past and made them a book. Yeah!

http://blog.logos.com/2011/08/free-personal-book-builder-ships-with-new-logos-4-update/

The Wall Street Journal ponders “The Divorce Generation”:

“Every generation has its life-defining moments. If you want to find out what it was for a member of the Greatest Generation, you ask: ‘Where were you on D-Day?’ For baby boomers, the questions are: ‘Where were you when Kennedy was shot?’ or ‘What were you doing when Nixon resigned?’

“For much of my generation—Generation X, born between 1965 and 1980—there is only one question: ‘When did your parents get divorced?’ Our lives have been framed by the answer. Ask us. We remember everything.”

I am aware that some (many?) pastors of my generation who were raised in a family or church with a total abstinence policy have moved away from that and embraced another position. But I will admit that I was still a bit surprised to read this sentence in Darrin Patrick’s Church Planter:

“As I coach and mentor church planters and pastors, I am shocked at the number of them who are either addicted or headed toward addiction to alcohol.” (51)

I am aware of all the “alcohol isn’t the problem, God created us to enjoy it, etc.” arguments. But in light of the first qualification in I Timothy 3, would it be wiser to just avoid that road altogether, especially if alcoholism is becoming a shockingly common problem for pastors? I have more than enough areas in which I need the Spirit’s help to resist gratifying the flesh – I don’t need to make another one.

A few days ago I posted about the new demographic in inner cities: young, educated adults. If the old inner city stereotypes may no longer be valid, how about the suburban stereotypes? The 4/2 issue of The Economist has a sterotype-busting headline: “Black flight.”

They note that lower income migrants are leaving the inner cities and moving to the suburbs, but discovering “poverty, crime, and poor social services” when they arrive.

“In the past decade, poverty has increased more than twice as fast in the suburbs as it has in the cities.”

Goodbye, suburban stereotypes. Goodbye, white flight. Hello, new church planting opportunities.

The full article is available online.

Just a reminder that registration is open for the National Church Planting Conference in Mentor, OH Jun 15-17. Dr. Bruce McAllister and Dr. Dick Fellars will be speaking. Keep in mind that we are also starting a new church planting Boot Camp that will be held during the day on Wednesday, June 15 (the conference begins that evening). You can contact me if you’d like more information. Here are the basics:

2011 Church Planting Boot Camp
by Arch Ministries

An intensive, one-day seminar overviewing the major issues that church planters will face in preparing for and launching a church plant. The focus will be upon evaluating areas of weakness, understanding available resources, and developing a plan to prepare for a healthy church plant.

The boot camp is designed for
• men considering church planting
• men preparing to church plant
• team members preparing to help with a church plant
• pastors of churches who want to get involved with church planting

Time & Place:
Grace Church of Mentor, OH
8:30a-4:30p on Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Lunch will be provided.

It has appeared that urban centers have become “cool” for young adults, and new census figures validate that observation. In most of the nation’s largest cities, the young adult population is growing much faster in the city centers (remember that old term “inner city”?) than in the rest of the metro area. This is a remarkable change, to which church planters should pay careful attention:

Urban centers draw more young, educated adults

(USA Today)

Though I’ve been tempted to thoroughly ignore the NFL labor brouhaha, an article by Rick Reilly at ESPN provided some poignant reminders of why it really does matter for pastors. He lists winners and losers if the 2011 season doesn’t happen. One of his winners:

• “preachers used to half-empty churches.”

And one of his losers:

• “Your kids. Sundays, which had been a refuge where they could do (video games) and not do (chores) whatever they wanted, will suddenly be taken back by fathers who will have time to team up with them and finish that spice rack, show them how to throw a spiral or, worst, talk.”

Imprecatory prayers, anyone?