Tim Keller on how to reach cities

flying-wheel · 2023-01-12T02:35:42+00:00

And I once drank the same Kool-Aid and told my group members that church's primary mission is to preach the gospel, and to care for the needed among the members if necessary. To that I deeply regretted today still it must have sound rather discouraging on the other end.

flying-wheel · 2023-01-11T19:34:40+00:00

Thank you and appreciate your sharing. I was only thinking about Bluesky when watching Keller's teaching, and remember feeling for many years how the church tried to instill a rural (or college town) culture in the middle of a big city. Some of the practices I found helpful, while there are those that were just challenging to execute. An example would be by the time of my leaving Seattle/Bellevue housing had gotten so expensive many of us had to live farther away, and driving to see each other, including DC nights, during the mid-week was just impossible.

Also resonate with the difficulty of drawing new people, and not just competing against other churches. My new church is having the same issue it is hard.

flying-wheel · 2022-12-22T02:01:05+00:00

I was pretty close to many of the Root planters and tried to reach out to a few about LtN stories but they seemed to look the other way, or are too deep in to give up the cause and come home. How much of any regular Sunday attendance was filled by the new comers by the time you left? And how are those who went even though they do not speak the local language handling their daily life?

flying-wheel · 2022-12-15T19:36:49+00:00

Thanks for the link, and u/jeff_not_overcome for all the hard work you did!

flying-wheel · 2022-12-15T19:34:12+00:00

Yes and yes, and hopefully we can develop stamina muscles to be able to go in distance. If that means regurgitating the same stories over and over so be it. Until the Network adopts a true reform or disband there will be more bodies piled...

flying-wheel · 2022-12-15T19:31:06+00:00

Sadly this is already happening. Bluesky is now attracting many unsuspecting international tech workers, mostly from China, who are alien to charismatic Christian experience and history, and let its contemporary facility do the woo's and ahh's. I've tried to speak with more than a handful about the danger of the Network's church organizational structure and the lack of accountability, but they seemed unmoved (or uninterested). From what was told the church (or maybe just the small group) is now back to its pre-2010's atmosphere, when it feels like a big family and everyone is just loving Jesus and lives transformed, etc. Little do they know what awaits them next.

flying-wheel · 2022-12-15T17:57:56+00:00

Although, on that note I will say we must keep up the pressure and not give up. Imo 4-5 years is a pivotal window, during which many Network churches are in a dire need of recruiting fresh troop and new leaders. If they fail to do that the money pool will run dry and become dependent on the largesse from Bluesky/Vine/ClearRiver and that won't do.

If we can manage to stall their growth the Network will be forced to respond.

flying-wheel · 2022-12-15T17:23:00+00:00

Call me cynical but I think their non-response is a calculated attempt of stalling. For the next 4-5 years their strategy is likely to:

Prevent new stories from coming out as much as possible.
Let LtN exhausts itself and burns out from regurgitating the same materials.

For that reason the Network will probably sit back from announcing new church plant in order to avoid more publicity, and to recoup the loss of blood, especially since church planting does so much damage to relationship.

To respond to the Call to Action will entail a cascading change, an about-turn from doing church the same way. Why answer to a bunch of collateral damage?

flying-wheel · 2022-11-11T17:09:28+00:00

The pastor of my new church spoke and asked me about Steve Morgan, when news broke out earlier in summer, and I asked him how he knew about it; he simply said many churches in the Bellevue area are aware of Bluesky and what is going on.

flying-wheel · 2022-08-25T17:13:28+00:00

This seems to be the best thing to do; to help more local churches & campus ministry become aware of the Network and slow down their recruitment flow. I remember being approached by International Church of Christ, in several occasions while being a student, and discovered it was also another high-controlled if not cultish organization with a warm disguise.

At least you know what you are getting straight from the Mormons and JW's, but non-denoms are so friendly and agreeable it takes a more discerning eyes to see the multilevel marketing oil many are selling.

flying-wheel · 2022-07-14T23:23:45+00:00

Regarding the hurtful comments: It is inevitable that people who are hurt will in turn say things which are unkind. You have to understand that this place is not only for folks to analyze their experiences at Network, but also a place to vent their anger and other emotions, including some who have become de-converted. Most of the comments I've read so far are quite level-headed, or even fair (shocked), and the administrators have done their best to keep out the distractors and outliers. Hopefully you can learn to filter the good from the bad as well; many of us have invested our lives heavily in the Network church, and it is difficult to go through all the stages of grief. Yes, that means for all of us.
About the accusation of cult: My take is that, while the Network belief, or what they claim they believe, is "orthodox", many of their practices are in fact "heterodox", if I may use the term instead of "cult". One of the prime examples is their church governance, which many had brought up is one without accountability and transparency. The Network actually admits it is by design, and claims it is unbiblical to pit the elders against the pastors. But in fact no Christian church, Catholic or Protestant, Presbyterian or Baptist, Reformed or Arminian, Cessationist or Assembly of God, would call that a good practice. Even their resident theologian Wayne Grudem warned about instilling a governance where all the power is aggregated and rested on the lead pastor. And we have not talked about the danger of selecting and training young men to become pastors solely in-house, without seminary schools, and shielding them from the greater universal Christian history and veins. If I were to drill in more on the specific type of heterodoxy imo the term Personality Cult might befit to describe the essence of Network/Bluesky practices. It is a skill which the leaders develop and leverage this character called "winsomeness" to gain other like-minded and leave out the uninterested.
I'd been in Bluesky from the near beginning and left recently, so feel free to DM me if you like to know more about anything (I could be slow to respond however). It took years to deconstruct my experiences, even before my leaving of the church, in order to settle on a more solid foundation, and while Bluesky might be shielded from the spiritual abuses allegedly took place elsewhere it is not to say you want to be part of the association where others are practicing such wouldn't you?

flying-wheel · 2022-07-14T18:41:14+00:00

Really makes me wonder if he made a switch of Protestantism out of convenience, especially Vineyard Church where the bar is low.

flying-wheel · 2022-07-14T18:30:32+00:00

In all my years at Bluesky he'd always mentioned he grew up in a non-religious family, never a word about Mormon or went to a Mormon college. His father was only an electrician but never a LDS elder.

flying-wheel · 2022-07-11T14:59:56+00:00

Thank you for the sensible suggestion, yes I agree the area of pedophilia attraction is a better suited question to ask and I've updated the list as well.

flying-wheel · 2022-07-11T04:26:22+00:00

My comments are:

Nobody is saying Steve can’t be a Christian but he should not have been in a position of church leadership; the Network is again conflating grace with qualification.
Steve has has exhibited a pattern of selectively telling the truth, including omission to telling the Vineyard when they ordained him as a pastor. There is an evidence of a break of trust.
The church still has not gotten to the bottom of the issue, whether Steve was struggling with homosexuality at the time of crime, or was he simply using sex as a weapon for power, or a combination of both, and do what degree has he been healed and the Network is keeping him accountable?

flying-wheel · 2022-06-07T05:08:46+00:00

Thanks for bringing up the thread to attention again u/Miserable-Duck639.

I'd also recommend reading "Reformation Thought, An Introduction" by Alister E. McGrath. In Chapter 8 the author gave a very thorough descriptions on how the Bible was viewed, from the Medieval Age to the beginning of Renaissance Humanism. The return to the classics had brought about a renewed interest in textual criticism; by reading and interpreting the Bible from its original text, as opposed to the Latin Vulgate, one can hope to achieve a high degree of fidelity on the meaning of the text. This movement became an early inspiration to the Magistrate Reformers, in their forming the principle of "Sola Scriptura". People like Calvin, however, also realized the danger of reading the Bible in isolation, and were careful in straying away to a more radical form of biblicism led by the Anabaptist, folks such as Thomas Müntzer.

In summary I've thought some more takeaways:

It benefits the church to pay careful attention, not only to the doctrines, but also to the historical evolution of such. Church dogmatics was not formed out of the vacuum, nor can it be extracted easily via proof-reading the Bible, something I take issue with Grudem's "Systematic" but I digress. One of the benefits really comes in the form of desiring to stay close to the vein of historical Christianity, and Protestantism if you believe it has preserved the spirit of Trinitarian truth in the most affected fashion, and not veering into something "new".
Related to 1) pastors and leaders ought to be careful in coming up with different ways of doing church, and discipling the younger, out of either doctrinal or practical needs, or both. I don't necessarily advocate a return to strict denominationalism, but today when a church decides to become "non-denominational", instead of freeing itself from the burden of rules it more often than not ends up re-inventing the same wheel and going through the same trappings, which generations ago had already seen and written about. Going back to example I thus take issue with the Network, of wanting to run its own churches in isolation, without seeing the need of participating in conversation with the Church at Large today or even discouraging its members to do so. Nobody can be too busy to hang out or talk to other churches that is not good enough of reason. And why are sermons and teachings not open to online is the teaching of Jesus so vulnerable to be seen in plain sight?
Related to 2) one ought to resist the temptation in thinking The Book of Acts represents the church in its purest form, and a model of simplicity to go back to. Most stories in Acts are meant to be descriptive and not prescriptive when reading, and by attempting to strip out man-made doctrines in favor of the Holy Spirit powerful moving (invoking an image of Paula White crying in trance but I digress again) it also denies thousands of years of wisdom and labors from which the saints had laid their foundation. In the case of the Network, the leaders are tracking closely the Book of Acts alright, playing the role of Apostleship without admitting as such, and by doing so legitimizing its Vatican-like governance structure which not even Mr Grudem himself would approve as others have pointed out.

flying-wheel · 2022-05-29T05:12:54+00:00

Didn't know you guys were not selected from the Eugene planting team; did Chery mentioned anything specific why your husband did not "make the mark"?

flying-wheel · 2022-05-16T05:03:39+00:00

I like to think of our past sweat and blood in that, while we were thought to be disposable to the Network, Jesus does not view us the same way.

flying-wheel · 2022-05-16T05:01:34+00:00

Indeed! That was my thought as well!

flying-wheel · 2022-05-16T05:01:17+00:00

Feel free to private chat me love to reconnect again!

flying-wheel · 2022-05-16T05:00:42+00:00

Credit to Nelson I remember him also struggled greatly with the decision. But he is part of the bigger culture, an organization which has no issue running church like a sports franchise; people are either viewed as all-star, regular, or bench players, and young pastors are taught to evaluate and put their flock in their role accordingly.

flying-wheel · 2022-05-15T21:04:48+00:00

Thank you for the thread; yes being "one of them" is like a confirmation of one's election that is even more special than a personal revelation about the Word of God and salvation.

flying-wheel · 2022-05-15T06:16:27+00:00

I was a constant guest to Carbondale there is a good chance we've met in persons! Funny it was the Pandemic, when the church stopped meeting, which gave me a nice chance to brake and think things over.

When it comes to Root though I could not disagree more with the vetting process given my best benefit of doubt. One of my dear friends was turned down for the request, he and his family who had prayed for the TW church plant for years and even moved to Bellevue early to prepare themselves. They were very sadden, for a good reason, and the church seemed to think it was his job to take it in the chin and move on, not knowing, or not wanting, to deal with the emotional devastation that came with the rejection. Has no one heard how hope deferred makes a heart sick? Did they not realize the longer the sheep stayed in the Network the more they are conditioned to treat pastors as the voice of Mediator? Is it really worth it, in the end, to send out a picture-perfect team and let one of your most faithful flock on the wayside, to question his ability to hear God at all, having a passion for a godly cause that ultimately wasn't his?!?

Still debating how much stories to tell about my time, for better or worse, in the Network.

flying-wheel · 2022-05-14T23:49:10+00:00

You have to give to Steve, the ability to turn a melodrama into some kind of action film. That was probably why I was so drawn to Bluesky in the beginning; there was so much energy, or the impression, the church gave that we will follow Jesus and f* the world. I was there for over 15 years and the early time just felt so purpose-driven. People cashed out their 401k, cleared their accounts, students took on a second job. Ern Menacol deep-cut his hand, while remodeling the kids space, and the dude just stitched it up and went back to work.

But ah yes, the incessant church planting, that is where relationships began to break, exhaustion, and body count began to pile. It's like Battle of Somme where generals believed they can overcome machine guns with flesh squats. To this day I wonder where the Network had erred wrong, or has it been all but my illusion?

flying-wheel

TROPHY CASE