Matt Smay

As I look ahead to 2008 there are several key developments under way…

The first is the release of The Tangible Kingdom due out April 18 that Hugh and I wrote in 2007. This book highlights much of our ministry story and philosophy as it was developed through our ZerOrientation training and lived out in the start of Adullam.

The second is the continued expansion of the MCAP (Missional Church Apprenticeship Practicum) – an 8 month, online apprenticeship practicum that was launched one year ago with the first pilot group of 24 leaders. This training environment has proven to be significantly more beneficial to participants that desire to learn and apply missional community principles than traditional seminar trainings. With the kickoff of the second cohort this past October with 23 participants, we anticipate training/apprenticing 60-75 leaders in 2008 through the MCAP.

In conjunction with each MCAP kickoff, we are planning to host Missio Intensives to provide an opportunity to continue the missional community dialogue. We hosted the first Missio Intensive in October 2006 at Fuller with 90 in attendance, and in October 2007 at Denver Seminary there were 225. As we look to 2008, we anticipate the continued expansion of the missional conversation and look forward to additional opportunities to ‘be in the room’ with other like minded practitioners.

With these opportunities and as Missio continues to expand as an entity within CRM, we’ve had to spend significant time clarifying and articulating our core purpose. Through a series of meetings with Andrew Taylor, our CRM Communications guru, we’ve narrowed our focus to a phrase that is informing our future goals and plans -

Missio both apprentices and shares experiential learning with incarnational people and communities in a Western context

This statement has several clarifying points:

• Apprenticeship is our primary purpose
• We share learning from the posture of a practitioner
• We prioritize working with incarnational people and their communities
• We do this in Western contexts that share much of our philosophy and ministry challenges

As we continue to develop the Missio team, the MCAP online apprenticeship, and host Missio Intensives – we hope to improve our communication strategy so that we can better connect with people that share our ministry values. Where we find common ministry philosophy, we hope to establish partnerships, serve leaders, and apprentice those that could benefit from shared learning.

Here are some quotable phrases taken from “The Kingdom of Heaven.” It’s a movie from 2005 that I hadn’t seen since it was released, but I thought I’d share some great words to live by that are romanticized from a simpler but harder time in history…

Live without fear in the face of your enemies. Be brave and upright that god may love thee. Speak the truth always even if it leads to your death. Safeguard the helpless and do no wrong. That is your oath.

I put no stock in religion. By the word religion I have seen the lunacy of fanatics of every denomination behold the will of God. Holiness is in right action and courage on behalf of those that cannot defend themselves. And goodness, what god desires is here (head) and here (heart). And what you decide to do every day will (determine if you) be a good man…

You see, none of us choose our end, really. A king may rule a man. A father may claim a son. But remember that even when those who move you be kings, or men of power. Your soul is in your keeping alone. When you stand before God you cannot say that I was told by others to do thus, or that virtue was not convenient at the time. This will not suffice.

Have you ever had someone ask you one of those awkward and ill-timed questions? At our neighborhood Christmas party, which has become a tradition with our five nearest neighbors, I was put me in one of those situations. The host couple this year is a solid Christian couple, about my parents age, and they’ve known about Adullam since shortly after we moved into the neighborhood – a little over five years now.

So, shortly after coming in the door, my neighbor tossed out a question to me from across the room, “How’s the Church going?” A fair and innocent question, but one that is difficult to find words for in a room full of people that are dear friends and who have varying degrees of connection with church (in a general sense). I think most of my neighbors rarely even think of me as a pastor, but rather the handy man, dad, fellow mountain biker, a Broncos and Rockies fan, consistently around and available for a conversation, and the guy who keeps his lawn green and shovels his driveway when it snows. Early in ministry, I might have jumped at this opportunity to “unload the truck” and share all the things we’ve had going on at Adullam. But I’m finding that very few people outside of the church have any interest in how church is going. In fact the term is an insiders term and has very little meaning for people. It’s sort of like being asked about a book club, sports club, gym, or other private membership group from someone that doesn’t belong.

I bring this up because I spent some time wondering about my initial reaction, and came to the conclusion that I think it’s OK to feel a little awkward when someone asks without consideration about our most intimate friends. If we reach one of our goals and church really becomes a people we belong with, then it makes sense that we describe our church like we would our family…we’ve come a long ways and there’s a lot of great people in Adullam – it’d be fun to introduce you to them sometime!

Since we’ve been talking about simplicity and stewardship over the last few weeks at Adullam, I found another article by  Liz Pulliam Weston that provoked some thoughts on simplicity and provides some very practical stories from people that have made simplicity a priority of life. The article is called -

Huge debts, paid off fast

Here’s just a few of the best suggestions I found from the article -