Gideon Tsang is Pastor of Vision & Teaching at Vox Veniae. John Chandler is Pastor and Local Theologian of Austin Mustard Seed. These two church, both in Austin, TX, represent examples of a growing phenomenon – embracing mission as the fundamental beginning place for seeing new churches birthed.
Check out this workshop in which they share from their experience and offer perspective on both the theological ins and outs as well as the practical highs and lows of taking a missional posture toward church planting, rhythms, and life.
Are you a current (or aspiring) church planter? We’d love to have you share your stories and reflections – even post questions you are wrestling with here. Let’s have some conversation about “starting churches through mission.”
Workshop Description:
Gideon and John live in Austin, TX, one of the most progressive, out-of-the-box cities in the United States, where “church as usual” leaves behind a large percentage of the population. Their lives, and the lives of those they lead, juxtapose creativity and crisis, power and poverty on an almost daily basis. Their church planting ministries are necessarily missional. They will discuss what they have learned in their church planting settings in a conversation that intersects strategy and Spirit, intentional church design and passionate community engagement.
The audio download of this workshop is available HERE and is available for free all day today, 10/14/13 (discount automatically applied when you add the workshop to your cart).
**If you find resources like this helpful, there are many more available here. You might even want to grab a bundle all at the same time.**
Missio Alliance Comment Policy
The Missio Alliance Writing Collectives exist as a ministry of writing to resource theological practitioners for mission. From our Leading Voices to our regular Writing Team and those invited to publish with us as Community Voices, we are creating a space for thoughtful engagement of critical issues and questions facing the North American Church in God’s mission. This sort of thoughtful engagement is something that we seek to engender not only in our publishing, but in conversations that unfold as a result in the comment section of our articles.
Unfortunately, because of the relational distance introduced by online communication, “thoughtful engagement” and “comment sections” seldom go hand in hand. At the same time, censorship of comments by those who disagree with points made by authors, whose anger or limited perspective taints their words, or who simply feel the need to express their own opinion on a topic without any meaningful engagement with the article or comment in question can mask an important window into the true state of Christian discourse. As such, Missio Alliance sets forth the following suggestions for those who wish to engage in conversation around our writing:
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If you disagree with something the an author said, consider framing your response as, “I hear you as saying _________. Am I understanding you correctly? If so, here’s why I disagree. _____________.
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One of our favorite tenants is that “an enemy is someone whose story we haven’t heard.” Very often disagreements and rants are the result of people talking past rather than to one another. Everyone’s perspective is intimately bound up with their own stories – their contexts and experiences. We encourage you to couch your comments in whatever aspect of your own story might help others understand where you are coming from.
In view of those suggestions for shaping conversation on our site and in an effort to curate a hospitable space of open conversation, Missio Alliance may delete comments and/or ban users who show no regard for constructive engagement, especially those whose comments are easily construed as trolling, threatening, or abusive.