This is from Tim Keller on how the gospel makes us both bold in presentation and winsome in spirit when sharing the gospel. The combination of both is a rare, but valuable and attainable, spiritual grace!

“When the gospel ‘comes home’-humbling and affirming you, it turns every believer into a natural evangelist…Evangelism happens because of a) the humility of the gospel. The gospel (unlike religious moralism) produces people who are not disdainful and contemptuous towards those who disagree with them. Also, it happens through b) the affirmation of the gospel. Because of the reality and joy of Christ’s love, we are not as concerned what others think. The gospel brings a gentle boldness.”

“The gospel makes us neither self-confident nor self-disdaining, but both bold and humble at once. To the degree I am still functionally earning my worth through performance (i.e. to the degree I am still functioning in works-righteousness), to that degree I will be either operating out of superiority or inferiority. Why! Because if I am saved by my works, then I can either be confident but not humble (if I am living up) or humble but not confident (if I am not living up). In other words, apart from the gospel, I will be forced to be superior or inferior or to swing back and forth or to be one way with some people and another way with others. I am continually caught between these two ways, because of the nature of my self image.

So the gospel humbles me before anyone, telling me I am a sinner saved only by grace. But it also emboldens me before anyone, telling me I am loved and honored by the only eyes in the universe that really count. So the gospel gives a boldness and a humility that do not “eat each other up” but can increase together.” 

For more on this, see my recently released Gospel: Recovering the Power that Made Christianity Revolutionary.

We at BtT would like to make you aware of An Evening with Tim Keller, an event being sponsored by DurhamCares and held on May 4th at the Durham Performing Arts Center. Keller will be speaking about the impact local churches can have on their cities for the Kingdom of God. In particular, he will be addressing questions such as: Is it important for the church to be involved in serving the community? If I want to be more involved in serving the community, what might the next step might be? Does community service commit me to ‘the social gospel’? After speaking, Keller will address questions from the audience.

For more information on An Evening with Tim Keller, click here.

You heard it here first. Advance the Church 2011 is coming to the Raleigh Convention Center May 4-5 with the theme, “Gospel: Recovering the Power that Made Christianity Revolutionary,” and you do not want to miss out. Tim Keller, Danny Akin, J. D. Greear, Tyler Jones, Eric Mason, Alan Hirsch, and Darrin Patrick are the plenary speakers.

The conference website poses and answers a provocative question: Is it possible that the reason the Church has lost its credibility and prophetic voice is that its Christians no longer believe the Gospel? The Gospel turned the ancient world of the Apostles on its head. It transformed the most unlikely of people into fervent ambassadors for God, while making enemies of both the secular and religious establishments. In contrast, the Church in many places today has become a part of a dying tradition that neither challenges the culture nor attracts the skeptic. Even in movements founded on Biblical truth, a pervasive legalism and moralism has eclipsed the explosive power of what God did for the world in Christ. There is only one thing that can restore the revolutionary power of God to the Church: the Gospel. The Church is in a moment of crisis. The Gospel is our only hope!

The plenary and breakout sessions will address many other questions at the intersection of gospel and ministry, such as: How does a gospel-centered worldview inform the way we preach, treat social issues, plant churches, think about current events, give pastoral counsel, treat our spouses, raise our children, and approach the task of world mission? In what ways do American Christians misunderstand the gospel? In what ways have Christ and the gospel been replaced in church life today?

I’ve attended Advance the Church in previous years, and I was not disappointed. I expect that this year’s conference will be equally profitable. If you would like to join me at Advance the Church Raleigh, you can click here for a link to the website or click here for a link to the Advance11 video.

Revelation 2:4: “Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Remember therefore from where you have fallen.”

Romans 10:15: “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, who bring glad tidings of good things!”

____________________

In the summer of 2000, I returned home from having spent two years in a predominantly Muslim context in Central Asia, where I found opportunities to share the gospel nearly every day. It was my experience in Central Asia, just as it had been during my college years, that contact with lost people was good for my soul. My love for God poured out naturally into a love for the lost around me. But the reverse was also true: my encounters and relationships with the lost spurred on my love for God. There is something beautiful and indeed powerful about seeing a lost man cry out to God, be saved by God’s grace, and walk in newness of life. Our love for God and his gospel results in a love for man (one does not commend that which he does not cherish), but also our love for God’s image-bearers results in a yet deeper love for God and his gospel (the more we proclaim and embody God’s love, the more we love Him and recognize his unsurpassed worth).

Upon returning home from Central Asia, I threw myself into Ph. D. studies. I preached the gospel, especially during the summer breaks, but for the most part I studied. As the months and years passed, I found that I rarely had conversations with unbelievers. I lived on campus, taught on campus, and worshiped with believers on Sundays. Rare was the day that I had a meaningful conversation with someone who was not a believer. Even worse, I felt like I was slowly losing the impulse to share the gospel. As a result, not only was I was withholding life from men and women who are dead in their trespasses, without hope and without God in this world, but also I was losing one of the very things that fired my passion for God.

Ironically, I was attending a seminary that confessed absolute confidence in God and his gospel and encouraged evangelistic zeal at every turn. For over a decade now, under two different presidents, this has remained the same. And yet retaining my affection for God and a love for the lost remains a struggle for me. I suspect that I am not alone, and I offer some advice for those those who may find themselves in this situation-seminary students and employees, pastors, employees of SBC entities, etc.: Do whatever it takes to break out of the Christian bubble within which you live, and take the gospel of life to those who are dead. In an attempt to do this myself, I have designated a few days each month during which I do my work (research, writing, email, whatever) at a coffee shop or student center at UNC, Duke, or one of the other college campuses in our area. Here is another idea: Try coming home from work or from the library before 10:00 p.m., and in so doing you might actually meet some of your neighbors who are lost. A final idea: Instead of listening to that next Tim Keller sermon, put down the iPod and actually do what it is that Keller is talking about-share the gospel.

In conclusion, don’t resent your time “in the bubble.” Don’t reject the great opportunity God has given you to lay the foundation for a lifetime of ministry. Don’t feel guilty that you are here. Seminary is your calling at this time in your life. Take advantage of your classes, your professors, your fellow students. Make the most of your studies in church history, theology, or missions. But while you are at it, don’t allow yourself to lose your first love for God and your love for the lost.

In the fourth session of the Greenhouse Church Planter’s CoOp, we talked about building missional churches in the 21^st century post-Christendom contexts. Again, we used some passages from Keller’s Manual as starting points for our discussion.

At the beginning of the session, we talked about how we minister in the context of a dying Christendom. Christendom was marked by “cultural Christianity” in which American social institutions often stigmatized non-Christian belief and behavior. Christendom provided some advantages (such as a common language for social and moral discourse) and some disadvantages (Christian moral principles without gospel-changed hearts). Nonetheless, we increasingly recognize that we must change our Christendom-style assumptions. We cannot assume that people have heard the gospel, understand our vocabulary, will show up at our church services, etc. As we discard certain past assumptions, we must remind ourselves that:

A missional church draws people into the biblical narrative. In Christendom, the church could exhort “Christianized” people to do what they already know they should do. In a post-Christendom context, however, people do not understand or subscribe to the biblical narrative of the world. They must be taught and persuaded that the biblical narrative is the True Story of the world. Therefore, A missional church pays close attention to the surrounding culture (people and their conversations, music, movies, literature, etc.), seeking to understand its questions, felt needs, hopes, dreams, heroes, and fears. In so doing, the missional church will better be able to position that culture’s story within the True Story of the world, the narrative of God’s redemption. Augustine’s City of God is a fine example of how to do this.

A missional church speaks the language of the people. In Christendom, American culture was more monolithic and there was not as much difference between language inside and outside of the church. The current American context, however, is marked by multiple cultures and a dizzying variety of sub-cultures. The majority of these cultures and subcultures have not been exposed to the biblical narrative or to church language. Therefore, the missional church seeks to (as Keller puts it) avoid tribal language, “we-them” language, and sentimental or pompous inspirational talk in the pulpit. In particular, a missional preacher avoids talking as if non-believing people are not present. Until he does so, non-believing people are less likely to come and less likely to understand or be persuaded if they do come. In a nutshell, missional churches are adept at cross-cultural communication: they learn to communicate the gospel in a way that is faithful to the Scriptures and meaningful to the cultural context.

A missional church is counter-cultural and counter-intuitive. In Christendom, Christian fellowship focused on support and accountability. In a post-Christendom context, however, Christians realize that they must embody a Christian “counter-culture.” The missional church redefines absolutely everything in life, including the three biggies: sex, money, and power. The church redefines sex: Keller writes, “We avoid both the secular society’s idolization of sex and traditional society’s fear of sex. We also exhibit love rather than hostility or fear toward those whose sexual life-patterns are different.” The church redefines money: Keller writes, “We promote a radically generous commitment of time, money, relationships, and living space to social justice and the needs of the poor, the immigrant, and the economically and physically weak.” The church redefines power: Keller writes, “We are committed to power-sharing and relationship-building between races and classes that are alienated outside of the Body of Christ.” The missional church defies categories such as “conservative” or “liberal” because it is more committed to evangelism and conversion than liberal churches and more committed to culture work (mercy ministries, vocation, culture work) than conservatives. This counter-cultural and counter-intuitive church is the only type of church that will succeed in making much of Jesus.

A missional church trains people to glorify God in all of their callings. In Christendom, the church simply trained people in prayer, Bible study, and witnessing techniques (such as wearing t-shirts that say “I’m cross-eyed,” or giving out Test-a-mints, or consoling people with clichés such as “Any time God shuts a door, he opens a window”). In a post-Christendom context, however, the church realizes that she must train her people to live “Christianly” in all of life. The missional church is full of lay people who renew their city and community by fulfilling their callings in a uniquely Christian manner. Martin Luther is a good guide here; his sermons are replete with references to a Christian’s callings to family, church, workplace, and community. Gene Veith’s God at Work is a very helpful and slim little book that teaches us how to unleash the church and the gospel through a Christian’s callings. This is the church scattered.

A missional church trains people to glorify God in all dimensions of society and culture. In Christendom, the various spheres of culture reflected (however imperfectly) a Christianized culture. In a post-Christendom context, the church realizes that she must train her people to work out the implications of the gospel in all dimensions of society and culture. Her people must consciously hold to a Christian world-and-life-view. A missional church (as Keller puts it) encourages her laypeople to venture forth humbly and boldly as Christians into the arts, the sciences, government, media, business, and education. A missional church demonstrates biblical love and true “tolerance” in the public square.

A missional church is characterized by love for those with whom they disagree. In Christendom, everybody was a “Christian.” For this reason, churches focused on defining themselves in contrast to other churches. In a post-Christendom context, however, churches find it more illuminating and helpful to define itself in contrast to “the world.” While we hold to our doctrinal convictions and limit our cooperation in various ways, we seek to love and reach out to other congregations in our local area so as to bear witness of our love for one another to a watching world.

In the second and third sessions of the Greenhouse Church Planter’s CoOp, we (1) set forth the gospel by tracing the four major plot movements in Christian Scripture: Creation, Fall, Redemption, and New Creation; and (2) talked about the gospel’s implications for humanity, the church, and the city. The CoOp had assigned those attending to read portions of Tim Keller’s Church Planting Manual, so we used some of Keller’s material, modifying it a bit and adapting it to the focus of this particular session. Here are the six talking points:

The Gospel: The gospel is the good news that through Jesus Christ, God’s kingdom has entered history. Through Christ we may be saved from our sin, have union with God and his church, and be set free to live a gospel-powered life. When we believe upon and rely on Jesus’ person and work (rather than ours) for our relationship to God, that kingdom power comes upon us and begins to work through us. May we never cease to revel in the power, beauty, and profundity of Christ and his gospel. This was Peter’s point when he said that the gospel sent from heaven is something into which angels long to look (1 Pet 1:12). Even the angels, whose lifespan is far longer than ours, are endlessly interested in Christ’s gospel. This gospel is simple enough to be understood by a child, and deep enough to be everlastingly contemplated by the wisest of men or angels.

Humanity: The gospel is the power of God to salvation. It changes us from the inside out, giving us a radically new identity, freeing us from both self-righteousness and self-condemnation. He liberates us, breaking the bondage of idols we once worshipped. One result of this inner change is that we now overflow with grace and love toward our fellow image-bearers, including those who do not share our beliefs.

The Church: The gospel creates a new community which is a sign of God’s kingdom. This community proclaims and embodies the gospel. In the church, we see diverse types of people loving one another who could not have done so without the healing power of the gospel: the gospel overcomes racial, social, and economic barriers. In the church, we also see sex, money, and power used in God-honoring, life-giving, and non-destructive ways: the gospel breaks the power of idols.

Service: We joyfully invite every person to faith in Jesus, but at the same time we are committed to serving our neighbors sacrificially whether they believe as we do or not. We do this by using our gifts and resources for the needs of others, especially the poor and powerless.

The City: Nothing promotes the health, peace, and joy of a city like the spread of the gospel. It renews not only individual lives but also whole neighborhoods and even cities. Only the gospel can motivate us to humbly love and live with all of the diverse people of the city.

The Culture: The gospel has a deep, profound, and healthy impact on all dimensions of human culture: the arts, the sciences, government, media, business, and the academy. Therefore, we are committed to engaging all dimensions of our socio-cultural context, especially by supporting believers as they fulfill their vocations/professions with faithfulness, excellence, and distinctiveness.

What is the Missional Gospel? Part 5: The Evangelical Missional Church

By Keith Whitfield

At a recent conference, Tim Keller addressed the challenges of evangelism in a post-modern context and gave six principles on how to pursue evangelism in this context. The first principle was “Gospel Theologizing,” and what he meant by this is phrase that all theology should articulate the gospel message. He says our theology should be an exposition of the gospel, and our presentation of the gospel should be situated within the biblical story. In order to engage the post-modern society, he argues, the gospel must fit into a coherent story that interrupts all of life. Ed Stetzer echoes this point as he emphasizes the need to be aware of the changes in our culture and the need to realize that proclaiming the gospel in the West is like cross cultural missions.

The Gospel in the Evangelical Missional Church

In the evangelical missional church, there is an effort to recast the message of the gospel. The recasting does not involve a change in the nature of the gospel, but it rather involves situating the historic orthodox gospel message within the Christian worldview so as to make the gospel clear, coherent, and holistic. Mark Driscoll models this when he writes that to “understand the doctrine of Jesus’ death on the cross, also known as the atonement, we must connect it to the doctrines of God’s character, God’s creation, human sin, and the responses of God to sin and sinners” (Listening to the Beliefs of the Emerging Churches, 29).

What you find in Driscoll’s words is that the gospel message entails the doctrines of God, sin, and God’s response to sin. He affirms that a historic fall affected all humanity, leading everyone to committing sinful actions. He affirms God’s holiness and just punishment towards sin. He affirms that God deals with the problem of forgiving sin by satisfying His holiness and justice through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus. He argues that this view of the atonement matters because “Salvation is defined as deliverance by God from God and his wrath” (Listening to the Beliefs of the Emerging Churches , 34).

This approach to the gospel is related to older approaches to gospel proclamation, like The Four Spiritual Laws booklet: (1) “God loves you and offers a wonderful plan for your life,” (2) “Man is sinful and separated from God,” (3) “Jesus Christ is God’s provision for man’s sin,” (4) “We must individually receive Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord.” However, the new trajectory among missional evangelicals is to situate gospel truth within the story of redemption. The evangelistic impact of this approach is that it offers a story that can confront and challenge the alternative stories people are trying to live.

In a short article, “How Can I Know God?,” Keller argues that the gospel requires that people understand three things: “who we are,” “who God is,” and “what you must do.” The story of redemption tells us that we are created by God and for Him, but we have sinned against him. It also tells us that God is just and loving, and these two characteristics of God come together in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Finally, the story of redemption tells us what we must do, which Keller captures in the words “repent,” “believe,” “pray,” and “follow through.”

Regarding ministry to our changing culture, Driscoll asks, “In our fast-paced and ever-changing culture of insanity, many Christians are prone either to cling to yesterday or to run headlong into tomorrow searching for a home. What’s our goal?” He answers himself,

The gospel requires us to proclaim and embody the full work of Jesus’ death and resurrection. Jesus has accomplished four things which people long for. First, Jesus takes away the sins that separate us from God so that we can be connected to God, which fills our spiritual longings. Second, Jesus takes away the sins that separate us from each other so that we can be reconciled to each other as the church, which fills our social longings. Third, Jesus forgives the sins we have committed, thereby cleansing us of our filth, which fills our emotional longing for forgiveness. Fourth, Jesus cleanses us of the defilement that has come upon us through the sins of others, which fulfills our psychological longing for healing, cleansing, and new life (The Radical Reformission, 82).

Evangelism in the Evangelical Missional Church

One of the key features of the missional approach to evangelism is a shift from program-driven and attractional evangelism to relational and missional evangelism. This shift is stimulated by the realization that people are not able to convert from one worldview to another by a mere decision. Rather, they need established relationships where the credibility of the gospel can be demonstrated. Stetzer and Putman write,

What we are discovering is that those who are effective in breaking the code understand that there has been a radical shift in how we do evangelism. We can no longer just appeal to people to come ‘back’ to an institution of which they do not remember being a part. With this fading memory, proclamation evangelism has decreased in its effectiveness. Asking people to literally change their worldview after simply hearing the gospel, with no previous exposure to a Christian worldview, is usually unrealistic. While churches that effectively evangelize the unchurched/unreached do not abandon proclamation evangelism, they set it in the context of community, experience, and service (Breaking the Missional Code, 84).

With this cultural change, the evangelical missionals realize that they cannot simply ask people to say yes to a presentation of religious truths. The task of evangelism is pursuing the process where people’s thinking and worldviews change. Evangelism then must become more process-oriented and relationally based, where the gospel truths are lived out before their eyes in the lives of others and the gospel reality is worked out in their own lives. The process approach assumes theological convictions. First, it maintains a belief that God is at work in the lives of lost people. Next, Christians should build relationships with people and value them. Third, it is important to listen and learn where God is at work in people’s lives. Fourth, we depend on God to lead us in how to share with people about the gospel and help them connect the gospel story with their own story.

“Missional,” for the evangelicals, is a strategic disposition towards its culture that directs how the church seeks to fulfill its calling. Stetzer says, “missional means being a missionary without ever leaving your zip code” (Planting Missional Churches, 19). Driscoll captures this vision in these words, “a radical call for Christians and Christian churches to recommit to living and speaking the gospel . . . to continually unleash the gospel to do its work of reforming dominant cultures and church subcultures” (Radical Reformission, 20). For Keller, missional means attempting to communicate so that non-Christians will understand the gospel. Its vision involves retelling the culture’s stories with the gospel, training lay people to “think Christianly” in public life and vocation, and creating counter cultural Christian communities. Keller sets forth this vision to demonstrate that what God is doing in the church through the gospel is radically different than what is happening in the culture around the church (“The Missional Church“). The gospel that he is referring to has at its center a substitutionary atonement and a call to repentance, and thus, for the evangelicals, being missional demands pursuing the spiritual conversion of individuals.

Keith Whitfield is pastor of Waverly Baptist Church in Waverly, Virginia, and a doctoral student in theological studies at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. This post is fifth in a series of six articles.

Though I have never been the “permanent” pastor of a local church, I have been a youth minister and done interim pastor work. Three of the churches I’ve served were rural congregations of less than 100 active members. I wouldn’t trade my experiences with those small-church saints for anything in the world. Perhaps because of my own experiences, I think Tim Keller’s advice to seminarians–consider becoming a country parson–is good advice for many would-be pastors. This is especially true in a denomination like the SBC that is filled with rural churches, many of which are in need of sound pastors (and sometimes other staff leadership). I am all for urban church planting and church revitalization (my current church, FBC Durham, meets in the inner city). But we mustn’t neglect the thousands of rural churches across our Southern Baptist landscape. They are in many ways the heart and soul of the SBC. I hope God will raise up many, many godly and gifted pastors for these churches, even as he raises up church planters to go to the great urban centers of our nation.

(By: Danny Akin & Bruce Ashford)

Our convention must confront the brutal facts:

In Matthew 28:18-20, Jesus commands us to make disciples of all nations. This includes our own nation-the United States of America-and yet the truth is that we are failing to meet the challenge. While the population of our nation increases, the population of our churches has not kept pace. While the United States becomes increasingly diverse, the Southern Baptist Convention remains a mostly middle-class, mostly white, network of mostly-declining churches.[1] This is a painful truth, and to ignore this fact is the worst form of denial.

It is not as if the churches of the SBC have not tried to reach their own towns and cities. Many of them have worked hard to reach their cities and many of them have more or less succeeded. But the truth of the matter is that we are losing the battle. Our nation is becoming increasingly post-Christian and we are not stemming the tide. Perhaps one of the reasons that we are losing the battle is that we are “aiming at” a culture that no longer exists. The SBC built its programs and its personality, if you will, in the 1950s. But we find ourselves in a socio-cultural context that varies significantly from that of 50 years ago. Many of our churches no longer have the luxury of communicating the gospel within a city that has basically one culture. Instead, they find themselves communicating across numerous cultural and sub-cultural divides. [2]

In years past, many of us found ourselves ministering in regions heavily influenced by Christianity, but now often we do not. Many, if not most, of our neighbors had sufficient knowledge of the biblical narrative to understand “sermonese,” but now they do not. In a previous era there were common categories for moral discourse, but now these categories are less and less common. There was a day when we were able to build our churches by inviting people to church events but now we find it hard to do so. So, how do we conceive of the task of communicating the gospel effectively to the various cultures and sub-cultures of our own country? How can we create and implement a missiology that will enable us to win the lost, make disciples, and plant churches in an increasingly larger array of American socio-cultural contexts? In a nutshell, how can we build missional churches and a missional convention?

Our mission must be cross-cultural:

The United States is increasingly multicultural, multiethnic, and multilinguistic, as immigrants from around the world now live in our own cities and suburbs. Many of the tribes, tongues, and peoples of Revelation 5 are right here on our doorstep. Further, there is a dizzying variety of sub-cultures within the broader American culture, each with their own distinctive beliefs and ways of life. Many of them do not have even a basic understanding of Christian worldview or vocabulary. Southern Baptists missionaries and pastors in North America must take their own cultural contexts as seriously as Southern Baptist missionaries take their international contexts.

We must seek to understand the cultures and sub-cultures around us so that we can preach the gospel faithfully and meaningfully within the framework of our neighbors’ cultural and social contexts, and plant churches that are at home in the culture. We must preach the gospel faithfully, allowing it to be defined and delimited by the Scriptures. We must also preach the gospel meaningfully, so that the hearer understands the gospel in the same way that the preacher intends it. The concept of the gospel might be foreign to them, but we may communicate it in language and constructs that are not. By doing so, we are able to preach the gospel clearly within the framework of the audience’s cultural, sub-cultural, and situational contexts.

The way we preach the gospel affects the way the audience receives it. Many church planters, pastors, teachers, and authors have pointed out that if evangelical churches are to be missional, they must make changes in their preaching. Southern Baptists are no exception. When Southern Baptist churches were ministering in the Bible Belt in the mid-to-late twentieth century, they ministered to a population who had some (or much) knowledge of the biblical narrative, and there was a common language for moral discourse. But in the 21^st century, we find ourselves in a context where many people have little or no knowledge of the Scriptures or Christian language. How do we communicate the gospel effectively in this situation? Tim Keller is one church planter who has written extensively on this challenge.[3] He argues that:

The missional church avoids ‘tribal’ language, stylized prayer language, unnecessary evangelical pious ‘jargon’, and archaic language that seeks to set a ‘spiritual tone.’

• The missional church avoids ‘we-them’ language, disdainful jokes that mock people of different politics and beliefs, and dismissive, disrespectful comments about those who differ with us.
• The missional church avoids sentimental, pompous, ‘inspirational’ talk. Instead, we engage the culture with the gentle, self-deprecating, but joyful irony the gospel creates. Humility + joy = gospel irony and realism.
• The missional church avoids ever talking as if non-believing people are not present. If you speak and discourse as if your whole neighborhood is present (not just scattered Christians), eventually more and more of your neighborhood will find their way in or be invited.
• Unless all of the above is the outflow of a truly humble-bold gospel-changed heart, it is all just ‘marketing’ and ‘spin.’[4]

To Keller’s admonition, I would add this clarification. We are not proposing to give up biblical-theological language, the very grammar and vocabulary of our faith. Instead, we are proposing to speak to those who are gathered in such a way that they can understand the gospel. And we do so precisely so that we can draw them into the biblical world, where they will find a better set of categories for understanding God and his world as well as a deeper and more profound vocabulary for speaking of those things.

[2] One particularly helpful treatment of ideological diversity in the United States is Gertrude Himmelfarb, One Nation, Two Cultures (New York: Vintage, 2001). Himmelfarb argues that the United States is a divided nation. On the one hand, there is a religious culture that has common categories for discourse and common convictions on ethical issuess. On the other hand, there is an elite culture that is very permissive on moral issues and does not share the religious culture’s moral language and categories.

[3] Tim Keller is the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City, New York. Keller founded the church in the late 1980s, and since then has seen the church grow to more than 5,000 in attendance (in addition to 5,000 sermon downloads per week), most of whom were unchurched before finding Redeemer. More significantly, perhaps, is the fact that Redeemer’s church planting center has facilitated over 100 church plants. In January 2007, Outreach Magazine named Redeemer the top “Multiplying Church” in America. http://outreachmagazine.com/docs/25innov_JA07.pdf.

[4] Tim Keller, “The Missional Church,” (June 2001) http://www.redeemer2.com/resources/papers/missional.pdf. Also, this material is explained in Tim Keller and J. Allen Thompson, Church Planter Manual (New York: Redeemer Church Planting Center, 2002), 224-5.

North American church planting and renewal is not for wimps, dummies, or dorks. In order to plant and revitalize churches in 21^st century America, we need men who are strong in their walk with the Lord, strong as husbands and fathers, and strong in perseverance. Further, the church needs men whose mind is buttressed by sound theology and missiology. Third, we need men who are culturally savvy, having a ready gasp of their socio-cultural context and an ability to communicate the gospel and plant the church appropriately in that context.

Finally, North American missiology is for those who are seeking to minister in diverse and multicultural country. Why? Because we no longer need to cross the ocean in order to cross cultural and linguistic boundaries. In our own country, and even in the South, we find a dizzying array of cultures and sub-cultures, each with their own distinctive beliefs and ways of life. Many of these cultures and sub-cultures are non-Christian or post-Christian, in that they do not have even a basic understanding of a Christian worldview or Christian vocabulary. And because the SBC is a mostly middle class, mostly white network of mostly declining churches that are not yet reaching those cultures and subcultures.

For this reason, evangelicals in general (and Southern Baptists in particular) must begin to take their own cultural contexts as seriously as IMB missionaries take theirs. We must labor consciously and carefully to learn the cultures and sub-cultures around us so that we can communicate the gospel faithfully and meaningfully in those contexts.

Along the way, it is helpful to read widely on issues related to church planting. Toward that end, here is a list of books for prospective North American church planters and renewers. (Note: Also beneficial is Ed Stetzer’s annotated N. A. Church Planting Bibliography from April 2009.)

Ecclesiology

After having immersed ourselves in biblical and theological studies, which provide the matrix within which we think about church planting, the first order of business is to deepen our understanding of the church. Pick a couple of ecclesiologies and study them with a pen in hand, reflecting, critiquing, making application. I recommend John Hammett, Biblical Foundations for Baptist Churches and Mark Dever, Nine Marks of a Healthy Church. The former is probably the best one-stop doctrine of the church available, while the latter focuses on nine crucial aspects for building a healthy church. If you would like to go retro, J. L. Dagg‘s Manual of Church Order is an older ecclesiology text written by a pastorally-minded theologian.

Classic Church Planting Texts

The next order of business is to read at least one of the classic texts on church planting. I will mention several. First, John L. Nevius, The Planting and Development of Missionary Churches is a slim little volume written by a 19^th century Presbyterian missionary to China. In juxtaposition to most missionaries of his day, Nevius encouraged workers to plant churches that were contextual and self-supporting. Second, Roland Allen, The Spontaneous Expansion of The Church is another slender little book written by a turn-of-the-20^th-century Anglican missionary to China. He urges church planters to start churches that will spontaneously grow, multiply, and overcome various difficulties that hinder the church from growing in this manner. Finally, David Hesselgrave, Planting Churches Cross-Culturally: North America and Beyond, 2d ed., is written by the doyen of 20^th century evangelical missiology. In this contemporary classic, the author provides a biblically and theologically driven model for church planting that is also informed by historical, sociological, anthropological insights.

Warning: The first two volumes were written in another era and are a little more difficult to read than books being published in the 21^st century. (In bygone eras, theologians were audacious enough to assume literacy in the Western world.) But they are worth the read. In fact, I think I can say without too much exaggeration that all contemporary church planting theory is “footnotes to Roland Allen.” Even today, his work is salient and timely.

Five Streams of North American Missiology

After having beefed up on ecclesiology and church planting classics, you are ready to begin making theological and missiological assessment of contemporary trends in North American church planting and renewal. I have divided current literature into five categories.

1. Reformed & Contextual:

By far the most well-thought-out and influential book in this category is Tim Keller & Allen Thompson, Church Planting Manual, published and distributed by Redeemer Presbyterian’s Church Planting Center (New York). Keller and Allen’s book manages to be at once deeply theological and eminently practical. Also in this vein are Mark Driscoll‘s The Radical Reformission: Reaching Out Without Selling Out and Confessions of a Reformission Rev: Hard Lessons from an Emerging Missional Church. In the first book, Driscoll argues that the American church must center itself on a proper understanding of gospel, church, and culture. In the second, he tells the story of Mars Hill Church, from the time he planted it until the present. Both books are full of funny stories, so much so that I almost fractured my diaphragm on several occasions reading them.

2. Purpose Driven:

Rick Warren‘s influence on the contemporary scene is mammoth. Ron Sylvia, Starting New Churches on Purpose, is a church planting text in the vein of Warren’s Purpose Driven Church. This text is, for the most part, a-theological.

3. Missional/Incarnational:

The missiologists in this third category overlap at points with those in the first category, but are by no means synonymous. One foundational text to read is Michael Frost & Alan Hirsch, The Shaping of Things to Come: Innovation and Mission for the 21^st Century Church. A second significant book is Ed Stetzer, Planting Missional Churches, which is one of the most handy and helpful church planting texts on the market. Finally, Alan Hirsch, The Forgotten Ways and Michael Frost, Exile are helpful treatments of a missional-incarnational model for church planting.

4. Organic/House Church:

Proponents of organic/house church overlap at points with the missional-incarnationals. The books to read here are Neil Cole, Organic Church: Growing Faith where Life Happens and Jonathan Campbell, The Way of Jesus. Another helpful but relatively obscure little book is Rad Zdero, The Global House Church Movement.

5. Miscellaneous Contemporary:

The fifth category is a catch-all. A few of the more significant texts are Steve Sjogren, Community of Kindness: A Refreshing New Approach to Planting and Growing a Church, Ralph Moore, Starting a New Church: The Church Planter’s Guide to Success, and Bob Roberts‘ trilogy of books, Glocalization, Transformation, and The Multiplying Church.

A Few More

In addition to the books listed above, here are a handful of other books beneficial for the aspiring church planter. Thom Rainer‘s books are well-worth the time spent reading them. I will limit myself to two. The Book of Church Growth: History, Theology, and Principles is the single best introduction to the church growth movement, including an almost-100 page section on theologically-driven missiology. Simple Church: Returning to God’s Process for Making Disciples, co-authored by Rainer and Eric Geiger, is a lucid and persuasive argument that churches need to return to the simple disciple-making process exemplified by Jesus.

In Comeback Churches, Ed Stetzer and Mike Dodson report on more than 300 formerly declining congregations across multiple denominations, reporting on what it took to revitalize and renew those churches. Planting Churches in the Real World is the story of Joel Rainey’s first church plant and the numerous challenges and times of discouragement he faced. As Stetzer puts it in the blurb on the back of the book, “If you are a planter drunk with vision, this will sober you up.” Finally, Tim Chester and Steve Timmis‘ Total Church: A Radical Reshaping around Gospel and Community is a helpful little book arguing that we must center all of the church’s life around gospel and community.

A Final Comment

In this installment, I have only mentioned a few of the books that will be helpful for aspiring church planters. Further, I have provided little or no critique of them. For that reason, I would like to invite our readership to comment on books that I have not included that you think are particularly helpful, or even to comment on or critique the books that I have included.