pursuing faithfulness to the Word of God and fullness of the Spirit of God
Posts tagged newfrontiers
Together at Westpoint 2010
Aug 24th
I got back today from Together at Westpoint, a regional newfrontiers camping weekend featuring Bible teaching, worship and kids’ work. We had teaching from Guy Miller and Dave Stroud, with Chris Kilby finishing off with a gospel appeal. Probably my favourite talk from the week was Dave Stroud on Noah and the life of faith.
For me, one of the most exciting things about these weekends is hearing what is happening in the region and around the world with church planting. It is great to see that churches in their early stages last year are now becoming established and more plants are planned for the coming year.
Our church only had a small group this year, but we were very blessed to be camped right next to the incredibly warm and hospitable Family Church Christchurch, who more or less adopted us as their own for the week, and we went on a day trip to Exmouth with them the day after the conference ended (you could pay to stay two extra nights).
Worship was led by Matt Giles and the inimitable Evan Rogers, who once again had us all dancing and doing silly actions. I’ll leave you with a video to give a taste of the event…
Dave Bish has a report on the conference too.
Together at Westpoint
Aug 14th
Any of my readers going to Together at Westpoint this year (or accellerten as my kids insist on calling it)? Would be great to meet up with you if you are, especially as there is a disappointingly low turnout from my church this year. Comment on this post or send me an email.
It should be a good time, with David Stroud and Guy Miller speaking and Evan Rogers and Matt Giles leading worship.
TOAM 2010
Jul 8th
After sadly missing out last year, I was able to make it for a day visit to the newfrontiers “Together on a Mission” conference this year. As always, Adrian Warnock is doing a sterling job of live-blogging the conference. You can also get real-time updates by following the #TOAM hashtag on twitter.
I always find a visit to TOAM to be a spiritually refreshing and energising experience and this year was no different. I’ll just give a brief report on the sessions I went to.
Session 1 – Matt Hosier – Faithful & Fruitful – The “Lion”
My first session of the day was a seminar by Matt Hosier. His was the first in a series entitled “The Lion, the Bear & the Bulldog”, which was about how we can remain faithful and fruitful at different life stages. I just about still fall into the “Lion” category (up to 35). He worked his way through 10 things you should do before you are 40, based on a list from John Maxwell.
Rather than being a biblical exposition, it was more a collection of proverbial wisdom: “become reconciled to your averageness”, “don’t be dictated to by the tyranny of the urgent”, “things that are worth achieving take time”, “develop the skill of friend making”. A nice touch was that a representative of each of the three age-groups was given a brief chance to give their perspective on the needs of those in the “lions” age range. We were reminded of the importance of simply being willing to serve, and the need to actively seek input from older generations. It was great to be prayed for by a really nice bloke from Brighton at the end.
Session 2
Sadly my visit was on a day when Dr Goodwill Shana was due to speak, and he was unable to attend due to visa problems. Still the extra time meant the day wasn’t quite so rushed as usual. It was great to meet some fellow newfrontiers bloggers, including Dave Matthias, Dave Bish, Steve Froud, and Steve Dunn.
Session Three – Terry Virgo – The Armour of God
The afternoon session started with worship led by Evan Rogers in his usual exhuberant style. Then it was Terry Virgo, preaching on “the need for defence”, working through the armour of God from Eph 6:10-17. It is testimony to his gift for Bible teaching, that a passage that most of us have heard preached on dozens of times was brought to life yet again, in a challenging & insightful way. I won’t summarise his points since Adrian Warnock has already done so here. He was particularly good on the breastplate of righteousness, and on the helmet of salvation, where he emphasised our future hope – the “not yet” part of our salvation.
Session Four – Dave Devenish – God’s Purposes Fulfilled Through Scattering
The evening session’s worship was led by Kate Simmonds, and we learned an excellent new song about the grace of God. Dave Devenish had the unenviable task of preparing a message for a major conference at very short notice. After a slightly rambling introduction he got right into his stride, speaking on the way that God fulfils his missional purposes through scattering. He showed that this was not merely apostles going to new places, but hundreds of ordinary people taking initiative at a grassroots level. I think this is a principle we really need to take hold of if we are to see significant gospel advance in our nation. Again Adrian Warnock has provided detailed sermon notes.
MP3 downloads
I obsessively listen to almost every TOAM message each year so am eagerly awaiting the downloads to appear on the newfrontiers website. Sadly they haven’t appeared online yet, but look out for them here over the next few weeks.
Together at Accelerate 09
Aug 31st
I got back today from the Newfrontiers “Together at Accelerate” conference, which is a mini-Bible week running over the bank holiday weekend for the churches in the “Wessex” region. Here’s a few miscellaneous thoughts about what was a great holiday for our family.
First the bad. The less said about the football tournament the better. We crashed out in the first round, and I drew the short straw to play in goal so didn’t even get a proper game.
There was a better layout to the site this year, with tents surrounding the big top rather than all at one end, which made us a lot closer to the action than last year. And like last year, it was a very well run event – a superb effort from the organizational team.
Evan Rogers led worship for the opening meetings which those who have heard him before will know means lots of silly dancing. While his style not to everyone’s taste, you had to be impressed at the way he managed to get everyone joining in, and it gave a good kick-start to the weekend.
John Groves preached on the first night, and the remainder of the talks were shared between Guy Miller and a visiting Indian speaker Vinu Paul. I only heard one of Vinu’s talks, in which he gave a very Pentecostal style reminder of the vital need of the Holy Spirit’s power in our lives.
He warned us against low-risk Christianity which revolves around cake and coffee. I thought Guy Miller’s messages were well targeted and challenging. At the Brighton leaders conference, many of the talks revolve around how to be an inspiring visionary leader, but Guy made it very applicable to the whole church by tackling issues such as the importance of family, of sexual purity, submission to authority, and of how we behave in the workplace. If we are to be a ‘kingdom’ people, we need this kind of practical teaching on what it means to live under the rule of King Jesus.
One slightly interesting thing about this weekend is that it featured churches in the “apostolic sphere” of Guy Miller and his apostolic team. This was why we had the visiting speaker from India, and also why there were a good number from a church plant in Portugal. But the fact remained that for the British churches, we were simply carved up by region.
I still think newfrontiers need to wrestle with how they deal with the inevitable tendency for apostolic movements to tend towards a structure with regional apostles over time. If we say that “apostolic spheres” are built on relationship (particularly through an apostle being involved in the planting of the churches in his ‘sphere’), rather than on geography, do we not set ourselves up for tension in the future where churches are in the region of an apostolic leader but do not particularly consider themselves have a close relationship with him? I guess I am saying that the mechanics of a future for newfrontiers of “interconnected apostolic spheres” is a little unclear to me. This is a particular problem for established churches who may not really consider themselves to be in anyone’s “apostolic sphere”.
Although these smaller and shorter gatherings don’t quite reach the same heights that the old Stoneleigh Bible weeks did, I am glad to see they are becoming a regular fixture in the church calendar. Whilst the Brighton Leaders Conference and Mobilise serve as something of a replacement for envisioning church leaders and students, I always felt that the ‘ordinary’ church members were missing out, so it was great so see many families and grandparents on site – people who would never make it to the Brighton conference. It was also good to see many people still very new and immature in their faith, or not even Christians come along. Smoking, swearing and heated family arguments may not be the ‘nice Christian behaviour’ we try to encourage, but it does at least show that some our churches really are beginning to reach the “unchurched” and “urban poor” of their communities and experiencing the ‘messiness’ that brings with it.
Which brings me on to the subject of church planting. If in newfrontiers we are serious about spreading the gospel through church planting then we need everyone to catch the vision, from the youngest to the oldest. So I was very pleased to see that church planting was very much on the agenda, with a well attended seminar outlining some of the opportunities and practicalities of church planting, and a call to commit to church planting on the final night which many responded to.
Newfrontiers Future Directions
Feb 14th
I have been thinking for some time about what the key influences on the newfrontiers group of churches are. What are the trends that will shape the future of our churches? I had hoped to post these thoughts a few months ago while Dave and Phil were posting about strengths and weaknesses of newfrontiers (see here, here, here and here), but things were a bit to busy.
So without further ado, here are what I consider to be the key four influences affecting newfrontiers, and the wider new church movement. Most churches I have come across are heading in one of these four directions.
1. Church Growth – (Bill Hybels, Hillsong, Rick Warren)
By “church growth”, I mean deliberately shaping your church around the intentionality to grow. Great music such as at Hillsong, and teaching that is seeker-sensitive and full of practical wisdom such as modelled by Bill Hybels have proven highly effective in building large congregations. These churches are not so well known for their doctrinal distinctives as for the excellence with which they do their Sunday morning service. Rick Warren (author of the Purpose Driven Church) would be another prime example of someone who has built a very large church with a non-denominational feel.
The strengths of this approach are the desire to take seriously the need to fulfil the great commission. Weaknesses include the danger of only appealing to the middle class (or worse still, to Christians from other churches), and the watering down of doctrine to make for a safe lowest common denominator (though to be fair, these churches tend to retain an evangelical commitment to the Bible at least in principle).
2. Reformissional – (Tim Keller, Mark Driscoll)
Though Terry Virgo is reformed in doctrine, newfrontiers perhaps hasn’t always had very strong ties with the rest of the reformed world due to their suspicion of all things charismatic. However, the combination of reformed doctrine with a missional emphasis such as that of Mark Driscoll and Tim Keller, have deeply influenced many leaders within newfrontiers.
In additional to the reformed plus missional folk, there are also those such as C J Mahaney and Wayne Grudem who show a way to be reformed and charismatic. This has resulted in a stronger belief than ever that we can build churches that are biblically sound and doctrinally robust, while at the same time retaining our charismatic distinctives an taking on a more missional emphasis.
3. Neo-Pentecostal – (Rob Rufus, Todd Bentley)
I wasn’t quite sure what to call this, but what I mean by “Neo-pentecostal” is a very strong emphasis on the miraculous, including a confident expectation of healings. A good example would be Rob Rufus, who has twice spoken at the newfrontiers Brighton conference. There was also great excitement about the “Lakeland Revival” amongst many in newfrontiers circles, while others remained guarded about it.
This direction tends to be quite polarising, and in some ways is in conflict with the reformissional direction, although perhaps people like Sam Storms can show how those two emphases could be combined. It is not a tension easily held together though, as those who follow the direction set by the New Mystics will find themselves increasingly at odds with those of a more reformed persuasion.
4. Emerging Church (Rob Bell)
The final direction may seem surprising. In fact, few if any newfrontiers churches are following this path, although many of the other “restorationist” new church movements have done so. The emerging church is in many ways a critique of evangelicalism, including the charismatic movement. It emerges as “post-evangelical”, and “post-charismatic”.
While emerging leaders such as Brian McLaren and Steve Chalke do not have many sympathisers within newfrontiers, due to some controversial theology, figures such as Rob Bell are less polarizing (possibly Shane Claiborne too). Emerging churches are passionate about the environment, social justice and the poor, and downplay the importance of many things that conservative evangelicals would consider central. This can offer a refreshing change to those disillusioned with whatever branch of evangelicalism they find themselves in.
It would be nice to think that we adopt some of the positive aspects of the emerging movement without needing to compromise theologically. I have written about how I think that can be done here. Phil Whittall is the best example I can think of as a newfrontiers pastor who has taken on board some of the emerging church concerns of the environment, living simply and social justice.
Your Thoughts?
I would be interested to hear your feedback if you are part of newfrontiers (or if you are just interested). Do you agree with my analysis? Have I missed a direction? And which of these directions would you consider most fruitful? Personally I am most positive about the reformissional direction, and more cautious regarding the other three.
Newfrontiers Guest Speakers
Jul 20th
One of the things I love about the newfrontiers annual conference is Terry Virgo’s willingness to invite speakers from outside the movement to address us. While they share many of our core values, they typically bring their own distinctives that complement and even challenge those within our movement. In the last few years, we have had Mark Driscoll, Wayne Grudem, Rob Rufus, and CJ Mahaney amongst others.
So I was encouraged to hear that Terry Virgo is taking steps to get Tim Keller along next year (although sadly not for the Brighton conference). I have a lot of respect for Tim Keller after hearing and reading a lot of his material on the gospel and mission.
It got me thinking about who else I would like to see invited to a newfrontiers conference, either as a main speaker, or to do some training track seminars. Here’s a few of my ideas, along with a suggestion for a subject they could preach on…
Sam Storms – reformed doctrine and charismatic experience
Christopher Wright - Old Testament hermeneutics
Simon Ponsonby - loving God
Mike Reeves - church history
Tim Chester - church and the poor
Ravi Zaccharias – apologetics
How about the other newfrontiers bloggers? Who would you invite…
Together on a Mission 2008
Jul 11th
I had the privilege yesterday of attending the newfrontiers Together on a Mission 2008 conference as a day visitor. Sadly I couldn’t attend the whole week, but it was great to get a taste of what has been going on this week in Brighton.
First up was a talk on "The Messiah of God" by Andrew Wilson. This addressed the way in which Matthew makes use of the Old Testament, which can pose a problem for some evangelicals as his exegesis appears to be somewhat unconventional. Andrew’s approach was to highlight the theme of Jesus as the "true Israel" and demonstrate how Matthew deliberately draws our attentions to parallels between the story of Israel and that of Jesus. He seemed to be drawing in a number of places from N T Wright’s excellent "Jesus and the Victory of God" and also recommended Tim Keller’s sermons as exemplary demonstrations of how to preach Christ from the Old Testament. It was an excellent seminar, and it is encouraging to see someone so theologically astute emerging from within newfrontiers. Andrew has already published two excellent books (Incomparable, Deluded by Dawkins), and I was pleased to hear that another is imminent. You can listen to some of his sermons at the King’s Church Eastbourne website.
Second was a talk by P-J Smyth on The Army of God. I felt this was the best sermon I have heard from him. Adrian Warnock has written some detailed notes. For me the highlights were his emphasis on the importance of respecting people’s consciences and the end section where he used a cricketing analogy to show how a leader defends, steadily advances, and breaks new ground. He also made some interesting points about church structure. Just as some people didn’t quite fit into David’s "thirty" or "three" mighty men, so there may be people in our churches who don’t quite fit neatly into our leadership categories yet still need to be utilised in their gifting.
Third was Mark Driscoll, speaking about Movements. Again, Adrian Warnock has blogged his sermon notes. I had been looking forward to hearing Mark and he didn’t disappoint, although I don’t think anyone was quite expecting what we got. He addressed some pertinent issues of how newfrontiers must adapt if it is to survive beyond its first and second generation and avoid becoming an institution. He very gently put his finger on an area in which he felt we were at risk. Will we be able to survive the transition when Terry Virgo hands over to the next generation? I personally feel that Vineyard has struggled with its self-identity as a movement since John Wimber’s death, and it was interesting to hear Mark Driscoll cite them as an example of a movement that has lost its way (although his reasoning is different – no prizes for guessing where he lays the blame!) At the end of the sermon, Mark was given a standing ovation. There was a real sense that his message had come as a timely prophetic word to us. The gentle spirit in which it was brought also blew away a lot of people’s stereotyped impression that Mark is always a headstrong outspoken bull in a china shop kind of preacher.
Finally, in the evening it was prayer meeting night led by Dave Holden. Evan Rogers was there leading us in the now traditional South African singing and dancing. Apparently he is moving to Dubai, so we expect next year to be singing in Arabic and doing some middle eastern dancing. It was great to hear news of the church planting that is going on, as well as pray into Mark Driscoll’s challenge to our movement to plant faster! Terry Virgo preached a short message encouraging us to emulate the lavish generosity of Mary as she anointed Jesus’ feet in John 12. Then followed the offering, but sadly we had to head home before the celebration got fully underway.
I am delighted that newfrontiers are continuing their policy of allowing free sermon downloads this year. They have already got a good number of sermons from the conference up and ready to download. This is a great way of ensuring that those who could not make it to the conference get to benefit from some of the excellent teaching we have enjoyed.
