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Utilizing The Largest Global Network - The Church

I've been carrying this issue of Forbes Magazine around with me since sometime this summer and I'm just now reading it.  It is special issue that came out last May on The Power of Networks.  It is has some great stuff in it.  It also includes a tremendously compelling article by Rick Warren titled The Power of Parishioners:  Utilizing The Largest Global Network - The Church.  If you are thinking, "Rick Warren...I know his bit...'purpose-driven, blah, blah, blah'...".  You should read this!  It is a thought provoking case for how the local church can restore the dream of God for this planet.  I would love to hear your reaction.

The Big Idea Road Show

Here are my two co-authors (Eric and Jon) of The Big Idea on our ride back after doing an interview at Willow for the Defining Moments audio journal. We found out that they do three of these at a time and we were the second interview.  The first interview was with Dick DeVos (President of the Amway Corporation and former Michigan gubernatorial candidate) on asking people for resources.  The interview after us was with Greg Hawkins on the Reveal book that is creating a buzz around Willow and across the country.  So, it was cool to be in such good company.  It was cool that Willow Creek is right in the middle of doing their own Big Idea that they call Fuel.  Good stuff! I think the highlight of the interview was at the end when Bill talked about how he read The Big Idea, gave it a passionate endorsement and then asked every church leader listening to get a copy and put it into action.  I think I was surprised that he actually read the book.  I was really honored by what he had to say.  If you want to get a copy of the Defining Moments it will come out sometime after the first of the year.  Escorted by Pat on the way home we had our usual good time and stopped for ice cream!

The Big Idea on Defining Moments

This afternoon Jon, Eric and I are headed up to Willow to tape an interview for the Willow Creek Associations audio journal Defining Moments.  I did this once before a couple years back on the topic of multi-site churches; this time the topic is The Big Idea.  It is a pretty cool deal because you are being interviewed by Bill Hybels and Nancy Beach; and of course you are thinking, "shouldn't I be asking you guys the questions?"  I think it will be more interesting this time than last time because I'm going with Jon and Eric.  And since there are three of us and two of them who knows what might happen!?! If anything funny or interesting happens I'll let you know.

Initiative #4: Defining Spiritual Maturity

Our fourth and final initiative for the '07-'08  ministry year (October-September) is to clearly define spiritual maturity for the people of Community Christian Church. 

This story will help illustrate what we want to get across with this initiative.  Imagine that you meet a 50 year old man and then you discover that this 50 year old man still lives at home with his mom and dad. What is your reaction? Your not gonna say are you? Ok, while I may not say anything out loud; the truth is I’m thinking, “Why is this guy still at home?” And then you find out that this 50 year old man who still lives with his mom and dad doesn’t have a job and that he spends most of his day sitting on the couch watching the cartoon network. Now what are you thinking? Ok, you are with me - you are thinking, “Why isn’t this guy providing for himself and why is he still mooching off his parents?”

And let’s say you observe this guy at dinner at his parents and when it comes time to eat you watch his 75 year old mother reach over and spoon feed her 50 year old son. At this point you know there is something very wrong. Something is very wrong in his maturing, his development. I mean, if he was five months old, this would be appropriate. But even at five years…he should be feeding himself. And at 50 he should not only be feeding himself, but providing for himself and really providing for others! Right!?!

In the same way, spiritual maturity is not all about you getting fed. Just like with a baby you don’t want to be feeding him/her when she is an adult. By then, you want them feeding themselves and once they have kids, they begin to feed others, right? And I know sometimes churches have created a spiritual dependency relationship and teach people that the be-all and end-all in spiritual maturity is getting fed by coming to hear the Pastor teach. This feels great for the pastor’s ego, but that leaves everyone as a spiritual infant crying, “feed me”. We need to grow to the place where we know how to feed ourselves and then feed others.

We started the process this weekend as we began the Arrested Development series.  In a simple Big Idea we are explaining spiritual maturation like this:

• Spiritual Infancy = Getting Fed
• Spiritual Adolescence = Feeding Yourself
• Spiritual Maturity = Feeding Others

There is a lot more we will say on this topic; like spiritual maturation is not about the length of time you have been a Christ Follower, it is about the speed in which you obey.  It is possible for someone to show signs of both infancy and maturity at the same time.  Like I said, there is more to come...but that gives you an idea of where we are headed.

Community 4:12 & Kirsten Strand Win Redbook Award!

This past weekend Kirsten Strand and her husband Scott flew to New York City at the invitation of Redbook Magazine.  Redbook was honoring seven women that are changing the world including Ashley Judd, Leann Rimes and others.  There were three women that they named as national recipients of Avon's Hello Tomorrow Award and Kirsten was one of them.  Kirsten is being her usual modest self on her blog, but check it out for more of the details.  I am extremely proud of Kirsten, our Community 4:12 ministry and the difference we are making.  Congrats Kirsten!!

The Big Idea 3rd Printing!

We just got a note from Zondervan that The Big Idea is now into it's 3rd printing!  Kinda cool!   Actually, they sent a card to Eric and myself and left off Jon's name.  So he's feeling kind of left out.  :(  Could you send a little love his way and leave Jon a note of congratulations on his blog for being a "better-selling author" (not quite "best-selling").  By the way - we also found out that not only is The Big Idea being published in Korean, but it  is also going to print in a Chinese dialect.

Selling Golf Clubs, Getting Baptized and Auctioning a Motorcyle!

Community Christian Church staffer Julie Bullock was at the Simply Sold on eBay Store to sell some of her stuff when she ran into CCC'er Ron Coluzzi. This is a pic of Ron and two of his kids selling their golf clubs, gas generator and a baseball bat. And what is really cool is that Ron recently made a commitment to be a Christ Follower and his whole family of seven are planning on getting baptized!  And while we are still talking about people selling their valuable possession - if you are interested in bidding on this CCC-Montgomery attenders motorcycle, click HERE.  I love this church!!

"CCC people are standing in line to sell their stuff"

One of our leaders who attends CCC-Montgomery just stopped into the offices at CCC-Yellow Box and said, "I was just at the Simply Sold on eBay Store to sell some sound equipment and the lines are really long...and the lines are Community Christian Church people." I thinks this is awesome!  Isn't cool that people are responding to Jesus call to be generous people and declaring in a very tangible way,  "I will not be a greedy person"  I love it!  I love this church!

Everyone At CCC to Sell a Possession of Value!

As a part of our Retro series today the Big Idea was all about the materialism of the 80's.  Since we can't stand simply "talking" about this kind of stuff we asked people to really DO something about it!  We asked every person that is part of Community Christian Church to sell a possession of value!  We set up an account on eBay and mission fish asked that over the next two weeks that everyone at CCC make a clear and radical declaration that they will not give into materialism and sell a valuable possession.  I love this!  Here is how we defined greed:  "when it comes to the choice between my comfort and someone else's need, I pick my comfort".  That's greed. Where will the money go from all the stuff that we sell on eBay?  Good question.  It will go to some real needs that are far more important than our comfort.  Here are three needs:

• Benevolence - every week we have people show up at one of our eight locations who have real needs.  Often times it is a single mom who needs a "hand-up" to get them through the next month or so. 
• Community 4:12 - we have a phenomenal ministry that partners with schools in under-resourced east Aurora.  We an array of services (tutoring, mentoring and more) that we offer.  More recently we have started a sports ministry since many of the extra-curricular activities in this school district have been cut.
• New CCC-Plainfield Campus - on March 2, 2008 we are starting our ninth campus in Plainfield.  65-75% of all people who live in Plainfield are unchurched.  We want to start a new site there to help people find their way back to God.

As I was leaving CCC-Yellow Box, Campus Pastor Tim Bakker showed me an high end Movado watch that a guy who was baptized two weeks ago  gave him.  He told Tim, "I don't really need this".  I also got a phone call from CCC-Shorewood Campus Pastor John Ciesniewski telling me that a lady told him that she had just bought some expensive diamond jewelry and she told him, "I really like this, but I don't need this." 

Why not join us?  Here is how you can do it:

1. Sign up for an eBay account at www.eBay.com
2. Sign up for an account at www.missionfish.org
3. Return to eBay and list your item:  take a picture, write a description,
   set a price, and get ready to wheel and deal.
4. Once your item sells on eBay, click on the mission fish.

For those of you who are not eBay savvy, we have an arrangement with the Simply Sold Stores in Romeoville and Naperville.  Just drop off your stuff and they will take care of it from there.

If any of this is confusing or you have any questions call our hotline:  630.328.8945
or e-mail: giveitaway@communitychristian.org

CCC videos on Nightline tonight!

I just got a voice mail from Eric Bramlett telling me that Tom Greever (CCC's video guy) got a phone call from ABC Television saying that they are doing a special on GodTube.com tonight on Nightline.  They said it will include the Christian vs. Christ-Follower videos. This series of videos has had more than a million total hits so far! They already have a preview on their site which includes our Mac/PC parody and also Dan Smiths parody Baby Got Book.  Funny stuff!  So if you get a chance to check it out on Nightline let me know what you think.

10.19.07 edit:  I watched Nightline last night and did not see our videos...??  But if you check out the ABC News website it is showing the Christian vs. Christ-Follower video.  Still cool.

Initiative #3: Alternative 3C Communities (Poly-site)

In 1998 Community Christian Church went multi-site and at that point in time there were only a handful of churches in the entire country that had more than one location. We not only started a second site, but a third site and continued to reproduce. We will reproduce our ninth site this year. And we are the only church that is currently offering training for how to reproduce locations. Today, most of the largest churches and most innovative churches are multi-site churches.  

In 2007-08 we are going to become the first church that I know of in the country to be not just multi-site, but poly-site! Not just a church with multiple sites, but a church with multiple kinds of sites. I’m convinced that we need all kinds of churches to reach all kinds of people. And I want to give you permission to start your own church!!

While 80% of Chicago was not in church this last weekend, I’m pretty sure that about 1/3 of the people who live in Chicago will not come to the kind of church that we have created. For a variety of reasons they will not. It might be style. It might be fears. It might be something from their past. It could be a host of other reasons and issues.

But what if we went to them?!? Jesus said “go into the world”…not “bring the world to us”…right?  What if we started churches…small little communities that practice the simple 3C’s (celebrate, connect and contribute) where we work; in our neighborhood; at coffee shop / local hangout; where you workout or play in some league.

 Alan Hirsch told me a story that gave me the vision for how we can do it at Community Christian Church. A guy by the name of Shawn Tunstall had been a Christian all his life, grew up in church but had a not-so-positive experience, not because of church, but because he was ADD and dyslexic, which makes sitting through church rough which is why I’m on stage, at least the ADD part, people tell me. Ya think?  So Shawn gave up on church, and started using his Sundays pursuing his love of water skiing.

The first Sunday he went out with two of his non-Christian buddies and just before he was about to put in, he got an attack of the guilties.  So he says, “Guys, I’m Baptist and I’m feeling guilty for not being in church today, so do you mind if I read a bit of Scripture first?” The guys seemed a little uncomfortable, so he read the shortest Psalm he could find (he knew the short ones well because he was dyslexic).  Then he said “We Baptists pray for needs, so anybody got any prayer requests?” One guy said he was unemployed and the other guy said his grandma was in ICU.  So Shawn prayed for the guy’s job, and the other guy’s grandmother, and then asked God to bless the day and the boat and then they went skiing.

The following Sunday the two guys brought a bunch of friends, and Shawn did the same thing with Bible and prayer.  But this time he said, “We Baptists like to see if there are any answered prayers.” The one guy said he’d gotten a great job, and the other guy’s grandma had been released from ICU.  At that point he asked if there were any other prayer requests.  All these hands went up.  They prayed, asked God to bless the day, and went skiing. 

 They now do this weekly and there are more than 60 people who come out, have breakfast, read a bit of Scripture, pray for each other, take up an offering to give to the poor, and water ski.  And they bring spare parts so if another boat breaks down, they can help out. Shawn says of this experience “I think I accidentally planted a church.”

I’m not sure it is fair to call this an initiative because I only want to see about a 5-6 of these started in the next year so that we can all learn from them. These alternative communities of CCC that will not come to our weekend service; instead they will do all 3C’s out there. They will report in monthly at Leadership Community with their progress and we will learn together. Why? We need all kinds of churches for all kinds of people…to help people find their way back to God!

Paseo is Resurrected!!

A few weeks ago I announced the death of my 94 Paseo.  Well, it turns out that my Toyota Paseo is back! It has been resurrected.  Thank you to a couple of brilliant mechanics (Cary & Guy) who saved me lots of money on repairs I am going to keep on driving this little scooter.

The good news:  I'm still in the junky car club!

The bad news:  I'm still in the junky car club!

Our 1st Big Idea Practicum

I'm sitting here at the Yellow Box in the middle of our first Big Idea Practicum.  It seems to be really working!  I started it off with my talk on Idea Overload and now Eric Bramlett and Tim Sutherland are walking people through a simulated Big Idea creative meeting.  The group seems to be really into it.  We have done about a dozen Multi-Site Practicums and all of them have sold out (including the one we are doing in November) but I wasn't sure if this would feel the same - it does!  Great vibe and great feel...so far!  If you are interested in a future Big Idea Practicum, click HERE.

Lunch with Rick Warren

Ok, I know this is the second pic of me and Rick Warren in the last couple weeks.  We are not really best friends, we just dress alike!?! This is a pic from the last day of Catalyst where Rick got together about a dozen people for lunch. He said that he was spending this year listening to young leaders.  He asked us where we saw the church headed in the future and took notes as we talked.  He then went on to tell us that he was in a season where he wanted to invest in us.  How could you not like that?  I was impressed and honored.

During the 2 hour lunch Rick inserted a lot of his own wisdom and I took notes as fast as I could.  Here are some of the things that he said that stood out:

• When he commented on his work globally Rick said, "If we want to change the world there are three major sectors that must work together to bring about change:  government, business and the church."
• His thoughts on people who are very wealthy, "Even when you reach the top, you still have a need...a need to give back."
• His comment on culture:  "I don't want to change culture, I want to create culture."
• His comment on the local church: "The more I honor the local church, the more God blesses me."
• His thoughts on church growth:
  • "You must learn to manage transition.  We are on Saddleback 5.0 right now.  You must be willing to sacrifice anything except your purposes."
  • "Nobody goes to church because of it's size...only pastors like big churches."
  • "Pygmalion effect:  if you expect people to be receptive, they will be.  People are not hard to reach."

Initiative #2: Operation Generosity

Our second stop on this road trip that we all need to take together is Operation Generosity. If reproducing campuses is who we are; generous is who we are becoming! This last year we saw a 38% increase (counting general fund and NEXT) in giving at Community Christian Church! I think this last year is indicative of what is to come - us becoming a more and more generous church in the future.

 A couple months ago we had someone stand up at one of our campuses and say, “what have this church ever done for this community?”   While I don’t want to encourage heckling at CCC, I want the answer to that question to be blatantly obvious! So here is how we will answer this question in the next year.

First, we are asking every CCC campus to identify a project in their surrounding community; set a goal and ask their people to give “above and beyond” a one time gift to that under-resourced need. I think this is the kind of church Jesus wants us to be and I think this is the kind of church the world is waiting to see. I see us in the next year through a single offering we are calling Operation Generosity (Above & Beyond) – investing over $250k in the under-resourced within CCC communities.

Secondly, Operation Generosity is also going to be an ongoing challenge through out the year to see us increase our generosity factor. I believe that God wants us to have 200 locations in the Chicago area that are “helping people find their way back to God.” One of the big barriers to big dreams is resources. So we are going to give more and more people an opportunity to be a part of a dream that will change the eternities of thousands and thousands of people. Our goal is to double the number of people that are tithing (10%) off their income to Community Christian Church so we can see that dream come true!

Initiative #1: Reproduce A Campus in Plainfield

One of our four all-church initiatives this year is to  reproduce a brand new campus in Plainfield!  This is what we do! This is who we are! We reproduce Biblical community so that we can “help people find their way back to God!” Plainfield is in Will county which is the fastest growing county in the midwest.  And in 144 days we will reproduce what I believe will be the largest new campus in the life of Community Christian Church!  I love that.

So, as the launch of this new campus approaches, Campus Pastor Brad Prunty and his team are looking for the following:

• 200 people who will pray everyday for the launch of this new campus.
• 250 people who will make up the launch team. These are not people who are just taking up a seat at a new campus but people who are going to serve and/or lead at this new Community Christian Church site. 
• 20 small groups that will allow people to get connected within the first couple weeks of coming to CCC.
  
• The end result is that we will have more than 650 people on the opening weekend of March 2^nd.

Christianity's Image Problem

Time Magazine has an interesting article titled, Christianity's Image Problem. If you were at the Catalyst Conference you got the inside scoop on all this.  It is based on the Barna research and published in the book UnChristian by Kinnaman and Lyons.

Here is a clip from the article:  "Kinnaman says non-Christians' biggest complaints about the faith are not immediately theological: Jesus and the Bible get relatively good marks. Rather, he sees resentment as focused on perceived Christian attitudes. Nine out of ten outsiders found Christians too 'anti-homosexual,' and nearly as many perceived it as 'hypocritical' and 'judgmental.' Seventy-five percent found it 'too involved in politics.'"

Love to hear what you think?  Leave a comment.

#1 Band To See Before You Die

Amazing!  It is the third time in the last year that I have seen Mute Math in concert...and I have not been disappointed.  They were at the House of Blues and they were incredible! If you need some incentive to check them out, they were recently named "The #1 Band To See  Before You Die" by Alternative Magazine.  That might be a stretch...but they are in my top two! 

Thanks to Don and Alice I got a chance to have dinner with Darren King the drummer from Mute Math.  Cool guy.  I thought it was fascinating that all the guys from this band came from a little church in Marshfield, Missouri.  It was also interesting to hear him talk about that little church - lots of great stuff and also some big disappointments.  He said his favorite artists are Howard Finster, a pastor turned painter and David Axelrod who played with the Electric Prunes in the 60's.  I don't know much about them, but I'm going to check it out. 

Why I'm Not Returning Calls...

If you are wondering why I haven't called you back over the last few days it is because I dropped my blackberry. 

Yep!  That is where I dropped it.  It was gross.

Don't ask.

I tried everything to revive it.  I was even told that if I put it in the freezer that it would dry out quicker.  Nothing worked.

07-08 Initiatives for Community Christian Church

"I have never been as excited about the future of Community Christian Church as I am today!"  That is how I started my vision time on Saturday at Leadership Community.  One reason I'm feeling so pumped about CCC is the current momentum we have after the last few weekends.  We have seen about a 30% jump in attendance.  A second reason is just a growing sense that God is going to do something extraordinary in the coming months.  I can't wait! 

The key verse for us in the coming year is from Ephesians 4:4 - "You were called to travel the same road and in the same direction, so stay together both outwardly and inwardly".  The Apostle Paul is talking to the church in Ephesus about unity.  And unity in mission is going to be critical to our success in the coming year.  Ever heard of “drafting”? It’s a term that is used in auto racing. It’s also used in competitive biking, running and Olympic swimming. “Drafting” is when you get behind someone else or a group and the momentum of the group allows you to move with greater velocity while exerting less energy. It’s called “drafting”. It was race car driver Junior Johnson that “drafted” most of the way to the finish line of an Indy 500 that he won. He won the race despite being 10 mph slower than his competitor. In a marathon a runner can take 5-10 seconds off every mile by “drafting” off the pack. For us to be successful in the coming year it will mean that every one of us is 3C! (celebrating, connecting, contributing) It will also mean that every one of the people in our groups and teams is 3C (celebrating, connecting, contributing). Because if just one of us is not headed in the same direction it slows down the whole group. As a church we are going on a road trip this year…important that “we all travel the same road in the same direction; stay together outwardly and inwardly.”

During the next week I will post about each of our four all-church initiatives.