John H Armstrong

New Blog Site Soon

Over the course of the next 24-72 hours a mentor/coach is finishing the design for my new blog site. It will be on a WordPress platform hosted by a different server than the one I have used for over seven years. Please check back in a few days and let me know what you think when this site is launched. I will be doing a series of blog posts on the extremely important new book, Bad Relgion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics, Ross Douthat (Free Press: New York, 2012) over the next several weeks. I really hope that you will read these posts and interact with me as you do. I believe this is one of the most important books for missional-ecumenists I have read. 

"To Boldly Go Where No Man Has Gone Before"

"Where no man has gone before" was originally made popular through its use in the title of most episodes of the original Star Trek television series. Every Trekkie knows it well. I am no Trekkie but even I have heard it and used it. The phrase refers to the mission of the original starship Enterprise. The complete introductory sequence, narrated by well-known actor William Shatner at the beginning of most episodes of Star Trek, said it this way:

Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before. 

I was reminded of this phrase last week. It made me take notice again that truly following Jesus, especially in this new century, a century that is taking us to new civilizations and to the exploration of strange new ideas, is to "boldly go where no man (or woman) has gone before." If we continue to live dull, bland lives that make an adventure out of missing the point we will end up missing out on what God intends for his people in the new global village that we call the post-modern world. I am just curious enough, and hopefully bold enough, to want to keep exploring what all this means, especially for a faithful church that dares to truly follow Jesus!

 

When Jesus Met Mary: A Conference on Friendship with a Unique (and Controversial) Emphasis on Friendship with the Opposite Sex

Can men and women be close friends without the sex part getting in the way?

Can men and women who are married enjoy opposite sex friendships?

What would our marriages, our friendships, our churches, and our communities look like if men and women were not afraid of connecting with each other in deep ways?

What would male-female relationships look like in marriages and friendship if every man and woman could know the spiritual richness and beauty of oneness between genders?

These are the kinds of questions that grew out of my reading of a fine book I reviewed extensively on this site, December 21-24, 2010. I wrote long blogs about Sacred Unions, Sacred Passions, a ground-breaking and courageous book written by my good friend Dan Brennan. I believed then that it had something extremely important to say about real friendship to our modern over-sexualized culture, especially inside the Christian church. I believed, and believe even more now, that the absence of real friendship is destroying the life of the Spirit among us. This book is an important work that addresses the need for healing in this area of life together. 

Dan and I go back a very long way. I was his pastor in the 1980s. Quite honestly we had a tragic break in our relationship. That break lasted for more than a decade but after some years this broken friendship was beautifully healed. We were totally and completely reconciled and thus have enjoyed, for several years, a great (and very healthy) friendship. I tell you this story because it underscores an important point about my friend Dan Brennan. He practices what he preaches/writes! He is so refreshingly honest that some people do not like him for it. Plus, his understanding of a controversial subject is truly unique. But Dan is a man who makes friends and values his relationships very deeply. Like me he can be, and has been, hurt by friends who have turned against him. He has proven to be a true friend to me. I hope this friendship will continue to be the treasured by him as well. It is a powerful evidence of the kingdom to celebrate friendship with a person you once loved and then lost, only to regain that relationship with much greater depth and richness. 

This weekend I have the great privilege of sharing in a one-of-a-kind conference that Dan has planned for some months: When Jesus Met Mary: A Conference Exploring Friendship Between Men & Women. The event publicity says that it will seek to promote understanding, demystify the opposite sex (as if that were entirely possible, eh?), desexualize interactions between men and women, guide us in overcoming sexism, help us to tap into our deep longing to reflect the image of God and help us to enter into the deep unity and communion that God desires. 

I will speak on unity at the end of the event on Saturday afternoon and assist in serving the eucharist in the closing session at 3:40 p.m. The event begins with dinner at 6 p.m. this Friday evening, April 27. The speaker lineup includes some wonderful writers and thinkers, a few I know and more new people that I look forward to meeting. The meeting place for the conference is Life on the Vine, located at 5105 RFD, Arlington Heights Road, Long Grove, Illinois. 

You can register now. I urge you to do so and then attend this weekend. I'd love to see many of my Chicago friends. I do not believe that you will regret coming to this event. Even if the topic frightens you, and it does for many great people, come and learn. Listen, ask questions, think deeply. The price is reasonable and the fellowship and topic will both be truly unique. 

 

Burning Questions for Missional Christians

Christianity began as a tiny movement of Jews who believed that God had raised Jesus from the dead. They spread this message to Jews and Gentiles and planted churches across the Roman Empire in the first three centuries of the common era. There is abundant evidence that these churches were generally small and that most congregations numbered something like 30-70 people. Issues regarding how to develop and govern these churches arose over time. It seems apparent that there is no extant blueprint that has been passed on to us regarding how this should be done down through the centuries. Christianity seems incredibly adaptable to various cultures and for this reason it could spread into all cultures. 

What we do know is that in spite of many faults the church acquired it eventually provided the basis for a new era of learning, industry and civil order that arose from the impact of the church upon society. In the sixteenth century the Reformation not only divided the church in the West but it led to renewal in the Catholic Church. Eventually this resulted in a great rise in missionary activity from both Protestant and Catholic sources. By the twentieth century a worldwide exportation of products and ideas followed and this global expansion opened the door even wider for global missions. At the same time Europe's civilization began a long, slow slide toward secularism. There is an almost astonishing correlation between the decline of births with the decline of the church and its influence throughout Europe. The question remains what this will mean for North America. Will we follow this European pattern? There is growing evidence that we might follow Europe but there is considerable reason to think that America could follow a very different model. 

By 2050 Patrick Johnstone says that less than half of Europe will claim any adherence to Christianity. This leads Johnstone to conclude that there are "uncomfortable parallels between the situation in Europe today and the collapse of the Greco-Roman civilization of antiquity."

But here in America the situation does not entirely parallel that in Europe. Two centuries of Protestant immigration and numerical growth combined with periodic revivals have shaped a different kind of situation. Here church and state were never connected in the same way. The church in America was free to innovate and develop new ideas. (This is a double-edged sword I realize!) The result of these developments is a Christianity that has a huge variety in church life, teachings and worship styles. In the midst of this chaos some very good things have emerged at various times in our history. Cults have grown, for sure, but so have genuine Christian churches and movements that have given us both health and numerical growth. 

The rise of non-Christian immigration, in recent decades, and the gains of the non-religious (or "nones") in our religious demographics, makes things extremely problematic for the church going forward. (We are in a period of church decline, make no mistake about this fact.) The influence of secularism remains strong, especially in higher education and among the culturally elite. The problems these changes present will not go away anytime soon. But the separation of church and state makes for a unique opportunity for thoughtful Christians to emerge into new missional thought and practice in America. Let me explain.

Could a new kind of civilization, one not rooted in empire or in dependence upon religion linked with the state in any form, arise in the twenty-first century? Simply put, could a new kind of Christianity emerge that produces a more tolerant, less proud and more deeply caring expression of public faith? Could a vigorous, but less politically motivated, Christianity take the place of a church deeply engaged in culture wars and partisan, divisive bickering? 

I do not believe that we know the answer to these questions quite yet. There are signs that give me hope but there are signs that I find deeply troubling. This leads me to ask the question I've been asking for some years now:

"What will Christianity look like in North America when the impact the church once had upon the culture is gone and Christians must then learn how to live meaningfully in a setting where they do not get to directly determine the cultural outcomes of their society?"

How should Christians prepare for this future? 

I believe we need to train leaders who are genuine missional-ecumenists. These will be leaders who grasp the central importance of Jesus to all of life. Such missional faith is not privatized religion. It must be very public. But it is not public in the way we've known it in the past. It is not boisterous and in your face about its truth claims. What we need, especially in the face of religious pluralism, is a developed imagination produced by the Holy Spirit. This developed, Spirit-filled imagination, will guide is in knowing how to proceed in our "brave new world." Without this we will not thrive in being faithful to Christ's mission in the decades ahead of us. With it then who knows what kind of civilization might we become under God's grace? 

One thing I am sure about in asking these kinds of questions. We cannot go back. The America I knew as a child is gone. Political elections, revival campaigns, new church plants, and a myriad of other religious and social solutions, will not bring back that America. We cannot work ourselves out of this new diverse context. It is here to stay. The question is how the church will respond and what our role will be in a new American reality? 

Religious "Reverts" -- Are Americans Coming Back to Church?

The Easter Weekend edition of USA Today had a front page story on religious "reverts." It explored the current push of various religious groups, including Jews and Christians, to reach out to a large and growing demographic. That demographic consists of millions of people who have left organized religion over the last two decades. The article told the story of people, ranging from cradle Catholics to former-Southern Baptists, who have come home.

For all that the article revealed about people who are on their way back this sentence said it all: "Then (referring to the reverts), unlike most, they came back." Simply put the stories of reverts make an interesting narrative but the numbers of such reverts is still small. Very few people who leave the religion of their childhood ever return to it.

The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life noted that more than half of all Americans say they have switched religions at least once. Only 9% of them say that they've come back to the churches or religious centers that shaped them, or maybe I should say never shaped them.

The interesting thing here is how much energy and money various groups are pouring into trying to regain these former members. Catholic churches have seemingly done the most with their "Catholics Come Home" effort. While this effort is well conceived and very professionally produced it seems to have born limited results so far. Mark Gray, a Catholic political scientist, says that it is not clear if those who have come back will really stay, at least not yet. He notes that the Catholic share of the population still remains at 25%.

So what makes reverts stay, so far as we can tell at the present moment? At St. Bede's, a Catholic mega-church of 3,700 families in Williamsburg, Virginia, it is a seven-week program called "Welcome Home" that seems to bear the most fruit. This class is specifically designed to answer the questions that reverts have. The intention is to calm their concerns about what has kept them away from the church. The program seeks to intentionally draw them back into the life of the parish, not just to return to Mass on Sundays. Education and evangelization are central to this approach.

One clear trend is clearly at the center of the narrative accounts of these reverts. Family is very important, both that of their past and their present. This is not surprising. Could the growing breakup of the family prompt many to search for faith and discover the church again? It is possible. I am just not sure that the numbers strongly reflect a major movement quite yet. I pray this will be so but right now most of those who were churched, and left, are not coming back. It seems to me that the harder work for the church will be to reach those who were never churched at all, which is increasingly a very large percentage of younger Americans.

The Tragedy of Syria: Christians in the Crossfire

If you watch or follow American news, from the left or the right, you hear continual calls for our government, working with the United Nations, to engage militarily with the Syrian government in support of the rebels in that nation. I submit that the simple view held by the vast majority of Syria's Christians is very different from what we hear day-to-day. Their message is: "Please stay out!" Why? After all, some Christians have died in the present cycle of extreme violence. And this uprising is now nearly a year old. The images we generally see are of government oppression and open attacks on rebels that defy imagination. 

As with Iraq so it now is with Syria. If the secular government is removed the end result will likely be much worse for minorities, especially for Christian minorities. Syria's religions are as follows: 74% Sunni Muslims, 13% other Muslims, 10% Christian and 3% Druze. President Bashar Assad, an autocratic leader for sure, leads a secular government. If he is removed the result would likely be a Sunni Muslim government that would be extremely unfavorable to minorities. Those Syrians I have spoken with tell me that Sunni Muslims, Christians and the Alawite community, a small offshoot of Shiite Islam, are all under threat if this present government falls. (Interestingly, the Russians and the Chinese are keeping the UN out of Syria right now. Their reason seems to be entirely based on a "balance of power" position in the Middle East!)

Like Saddam Hussein was in Iraq, Bashar Assad is an oppressive ruler. But if the West supports an "Arab Spring" the results will very likely be much like those we've seen in Egypt and Tunisia. A dentist, under anonymity, said, "Of course the Arab Spring is an Islamist movement. It's full of extremists. They want to destroy our country, and they call it a 'revolution'."

Syria's Christians date their origins to Paul's conversion on the road to Damascus. Church leaders in Syria have generally aligned themselves with the government urging their followers to give Assad a chance to enact a long-promised political overhaul while also calling for an end to the present violence.

Ignatius IV, patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church, described Syria as an oasis of religious tolerance where Christians can worship freely, build sanctuaries and run schools, activities that are restricted to varying degrees in almost every other Middle Eastern country. Christian ministers are often shown on television in Syria taking part in joint prayer services for peace with Muslim clerics. And the defense minister of Syria is openly Christian! The patriarch actually displays a photograph of himself with President Assad on his wall. I find the same response among Syrian Orthodox Christians in the United States. 

Do not misunderstand my point. Christians have died in Syria. Things have been terrible over there the past twelve months. But recent reports from Syria suggest the rebels are as violent and aggressive as the government troops. Rebels are acting more and more like the Assad regime according to many Christians. The truth is that Christians in Syria have little or no confidence in a successful revolution. The ones I have spoken with tell me to urge Americans to stay out of this situation. It took me some time to realize why but now I think that I understand their reasons. When we removed Saddam we celebrated but the church in Iraq began a whole new period of history. Many Christians have died, churches have been bombed and most Christians have fled Iraq now, many into neighboring Syria. 

While we may think these Middle Eastern uprisings are a good thing the fact is that most of them lead to great suffering for our brothers and sisters. Perhaps we should make this a higher priority than America's own political agenda in the world. I, for one, think the church transcends military operations. I hope our government will listen to the Christians of Syria, and other minorities, and stay out. I also pray for the peace of Syria, especially for my suffering brothers and sisters there. Many of these people are wonderful Christians with deep faith in God and profound love for their homeland. Syria is a gorgeous country with friendly people. It may not be a just democracy but it is not an evil empire either. 

One of my frequent themes on this blog is global Christian mission. If we are to practice a truly global faith, and not simply an Americanized version of Christianity, we should pray for the church in Syria and then work for peace. This seems to be at the core of what it means to faithfully follow Jesus in the modern world. 

One of My Favorite Modern Authors

I have many favorite authors. Some are theologians. Some are pastors. Some are missiologists. Some are novelists. Not all are Christians. The ones I appreciate the most make me think the best. 

One of my favorite writers is a United Methodist Bishop by the name of Will Willimon. I am not sure when I first began to read Willimon but it has to have been at least 35 years ago. I like Willimon because he is a contrarian and a provocateur. He's been a pastor, a university chaplain (Duke University) and now is a Methodist Bishop (Alabama). If you ask Willimon what he is he will tell you that he's a preacher first. He says that he is called to be a truth-teller of Jesus Christ. A Pulpit and Pew Research Center study discovered that he was one of the most widely-read authors among mainline Protestant pastors. Willimon feels most at home behind a pulpit. If you've heard him you will never forget it. Sometimes Willimon rubs people the wrong way. He offends the Left and the Right pretty evenly. He has always challenged me. Maybe I inherited a tiny bit of his spirit. I hope so to be honest.

A new Willimon book was released last week. My copy, ordered months ago, arrived on time. It is simply titled: The Best of Will Willimon (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2012). This book includes one gem after another. I encourage you to get it and read it slowly, whether or not you have ever read Willimon before now. Here is one quote, taken at random (literally):

To read Scripture is to risk transformation, conversion, an exchange of masters. You might think of Sunday morning as a struggle over the question, Who tells the story of what is going on in the world? Scripture reading can be uncomfortable, as we are made by the Bible to see things we would have just as soon ignored, as we hear a word we have been trying to avoid. Reading is not only a formative activity, but also a potentially disruptive means of existing in our culture, of defamiliarizing and making the normal seem strange and the strange seem normal, of having delightful respite from conventional, culturally sanctioned accounts of "the ways things are." Therefore, the primary interpretive question is not, "Do I understand this passage?" but rather, "How is this text attempting to convert me to Christ?" Behind all Scripture is not simply the question, "Will you agree?" but rather the more political, "Will you join up?"

I will likely give you some more Willimon in the future but chew on that and if you are moved by it get the book.

The American Church and the Problem of Passing Fads

For some years I have enjoyed a precious friendship with a dear brother by the name of John Paul Todd. John has served the church in many capacities and now lives in Kentucky after some years on the mission field in Latin America. He blogs about unity and Christ's kingdom at a great site. I encourage you to check it out and create a tab. Now and then John and I have shared rich private fellowship. I mention John Paul in my book, Your Church Is Too Small, because he helped me frame several of my ideas for that work. He has been a great personal encouragement. Occasionally we share email correspondence. He recently wrote me a personal email that I wanted to share. With his permission I share it here.

 

 

I just returned from a road trip with my daughter & husband to the Southwest -- nine states in all. It was great to see some of the major national parks that I hadn't seen before such as the Petrified Forest & Painted Desert. Besides the chance to spend time with my adult children and to visit their son at Prescott College (AZ), I did a lot of meditating, thanking God for all that I saw of His handiwork, not only in breath-taking nature but in other obvious signs of grace in His people in every time and place. I was especially focused on the Native Americans. I rejoiced that we are living in a time when many traditions and heritages are finally getting the respect and justice that is so rightly their's.

Just one example -- in Prescott, Arizona, the Yavapai Indian tribe is dominant! The tribe had a tragic history and was almost entirely wiped out at one point. I was able to pick up a brief biography of a lady who was greatly used to stabilize this tribe and then lead it into a position of prosperity. Chieftess Viola Jimulla, who was for 26 years a tribal head of native Indians in the US, was this wonderful lady in this story. She was a strong Christian believer, a Sunday School superintendent in the Presbyterian Mission and a deacon. These are the kinds of stories that we should be learning about and celebrating, stories that demonstrate that God's people, the Church, has had remarkable victories in spite of her failures.

I have followed with interest your ACT 3 Weekly series on the "Churchless Christianity". As always you've given us a lot to think about. You wrote: "These [expressions] present a form of Westernized (American) Christianity that gives the impression that the only choice the Christian can make is between a very bad idea about the church and no church at all. To put this simply, they create a common straw man of stereotypical Western Christianity, with all its significant flaws, and then knock it down. "

From your latest article I'll make this general observation. The above comment sums it all up for me. In every age the sensitive biblical believer has wrestled with the great redemption that God has made for his people on the one hand and the reality of the mixed-multitude with all their failures to live their heritage in Christ on the other. Most Christians, in their more mature moments, realize that this is the nature of things in this present evil age. We are never to condone sin or living in the flesh but we also must recognize that this world is still a battle field and thus this will always require constant, repeated, vigilance by the Church. I think what those involved in this latest fad of attacking the "institutional" church are completely neglecting is 1) the wonderful stories of victory, such as the one I shared above, and 2) the fact that millions are living in traditional church settings all over the world, and for them, the local church is still the center of their Christian faith. These multitudes simply cannot be ignored nor do they show any sign of significant change in the future -- they are not going away. Those who have convinced themselves that we are living in a new "reformation," or a some kind of giant shift in Christianity, are simply not viewing the total reality in my view. I've lived long enough (now in my 70th year) to have seen this kind of fad at least twice. If I live long enough I'm sure I'll see it again in the 21st century. 

 

For the most part I agree with my friend. However, I do believe we are seeing new challenges that require new leadership and this leadership needs to understand missional-ecumenism to be more effective in the future. Actually, John Paul agrees with this analysis. 

Defining Ministry in These Times Is the New Question for Us All

On Saturday, February 25, I had the privilege of teaching about 35 (mostly) young adults at City Church San Francisco. The program I taught was connected with the Newbigin House of Studies, which is a wonderful new program for training lay leadership. It also includes a seminary program for urban church planters and pastors linked with Western Seminary in Holland, Michigan. Western is a seminary that is affiliated with the Reformed Church in America, my own denomination. 

I cannot tell you how thrilled I was to teach missional-ecumenism to this eager group in San Francisco. I met Christians who have been in the faith for less than two years who are already mature in their thinking and missional practice. They are living out the faith beyond what I have seen in most Christians that I’ve encountered around the country. This is why I am so excited about the future. The number of such young Christians leaders is not large but their depth and vision is strong. They are light years ahead of where I was in my 20s and 30s. They will need this depth and wisdom to navigate the future. I am committed to serving them to make a difference for that future. 

Over lunch, on this particular sunny and gorgeous Saturday in San Francisco, I ate outside the church office on a roof top at a picnic table. (What a sight in February!) I spent some time with one young married couple in particular. The couple has been engaged in vocational pastoral ministry for several years (seminary trained with a degree) but has recently stepped out of this role for several reasons. I asked this young brother to write to me. The following email (with appropriate changes) is what I received:

 

Dear John:

I write today thinking that what I say is clearly related to some of what you were talking about on Saturday, and also to some of the political vs. missional issues that you raised in your recent blog. What follows is something I wrote to my wife after we decided to leave "ministry." Of course that is just vocational ministry we left. We are excited about the fact that we might actually get to do ministry now.  She had mentioned feeling guilty, like we were turning our back on God by leaving my paid pastoral position. This is what I wrote to her:

"It feels like there is an imposter claiming to be the bride of Christ. She wears a similar veil so that it is often difficult to tell the difference until you come close and begin to lift it and rather than finding safety, compassion, and embrace you find protocol, judgment and exclusivity. I feel like our decision to move on is a desire to experience the true bride where vulnerable intimacy, unconditional embrace, and true rest exist and where protocol is not in charge except for the protocol to love. What is additionally discouraging is knowing that I have been seduced by this imposter and tried to entice others into her arms, explaining away her institutional nastiness while redirecting attention to her surface-level ‘pretty gown.’  From my time living behind this veil, I have seen many others who are much more beautiful than us on this side, who possess the characteristics of Christ and his bride much better than we (those who claim to be the church) do, even though they are not members of this visible/physical body.  I think our decision to move on is a longing to celebrate with all those who possess the characteristics of the true bride and to cleanse ourselves from much of the nastiness that is contained and left un-dealt with behind the veil."

This word to my wife came after a stretch in which we were both feeling discouraged in my vocational ministry role which eventually led us to our decision to leave.  Like I said, my wife felt especially guilty that we were turning our backs on God and the church, and I tried reassuring her that what we were turning our backs on was the institutional elements that have claimed the title "church.” What we were longing for and seeking by our decision was, in fact, God and his true church, which does partially still exist in the "institution" of the church that claims that title.  Since making the decision, we have really grown in our excitement to serve and minister to our community. We are not feeling the awkwardness of being accountable to a job description.  We love the church, but the present view of what church is, (not having read your book yet) is too small, and not only too small, but in many ways, simply wrong.  This is true in a similar way to what you explained when you walked with African-Americans and realized how racist you really were. I never felt sexist in any way but it took my wife to show me the ways that the church still stifles and even dehumanizes women. Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy. Feel free to use these words.

Blessings,

Name Withheld

 

Once again a young man and woman have shown me a great deal and encouraged me to press on in teaching this vision of missional-ecumenism everywhere I can. Pray for me and what I do to add something of faith and virtue to the lives of such young leaders who will have an incredible impact on the future of the church in America. 

 

A Question My Friend Posed to Christopher J. H. Wright

The Rev. Dr. Christopher J. H. Wright is one of the most respected Christian thinkers and leaders in the world. I have followed him for years, especially when he began to work closely with John R. W. Stott.

Chris was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, in 1947. His parents were missionaries in Brazil, though Chris as the youngest son was born after they came back at the end of the Second World War. He grew up in Belfast and was nurtured as an Irish Presbyterian. He studied classics at Cambridge in the 1960s, and then started his career as a high-school teacher in Grosvenor High School, Belfast. In the 1970s he studied for his doctorate in Cambridge, England, in the field of Old Testament economic ethics; his book from this work was published as God’s People in God’s Land (Eerdmans and Paternoster). He was ordained in the Anglican Church of England in 1977 and served as an assistant pastor in the Parish Church of St. Peter & St. Paul, Tonbridge, Kent, England.

In 1983 Wright moved to India with his wife, Liz, and four children to teach at Union Biblical Seminary (UBS) in Pune for five years. At this time he and Liz were mission partners with Crosslinks, an evangelical Anglican mission agency. While at UBS he taught a variety of Old Testament courses. In 1988 he returned to the U.K. as academic dean at All Nations Christian College, an international training center for crosscultural mission. He was appointed principal there in September 1993 and held that post for eight years. In September 2001 Chris was appointed to his present role as the international director of the Langham Partnership International. It is in this role that I was afforded the opportunity to briefly meet Chris after he led the memorial service for John R. Stott at College Church in Wheaton on November 11, 2011. Chris served as the Chair of the Lausanne Theology Working Group from 2005 – 2011, and Chair of the Statement Working Group at the Third Lausanne Congress, 2010, which produced The Cape Town Commitment. The Cape Town Commitment is, in my opinion, the most important evangelical statement of mission and theology in my lifetime. I consider it a great support for what I call missional-ecumenism, which follows closely the legacy of John R. Stott himself. 

Chris and his wife, Liz, belong to All Souls Church, Langham Place, where Chris enjoys preaching from time to time as a member of the ministry team. This is also the church where LPI’s founder, John Stott, was rector emeritus.

My good friend Jeff Gokee, the executive director of Phoenix One, is the young man that you will see with me in the video interviews on the ACT 3 site where I talk about the Missional-Ecumenical Cohort Groups. Jeff recently called me and told me that he had been invited to share in an evening group that would meet with Chris Wright in Phoenix. He asked me some questions about Chris and wanted to know what to ask him if he had the opportunity. I listened with real interest and prayed for Jeff to have a wonderful life-changing evening. I wrote him the next day and asked, "How did your time with Chris Wright go?" He answered:

It was wonderful. :-)  

There were only 15 people invited to a private home and I was clearly the least educated of all of them.  God keeps putting me in rooms with really smart people. I LOVE it.  

I prefaced my question by saying that I read John 17 with new lenses this year and it's ruined me in the best kind of way.  So, with that being said, I asked: "How important is the unification of the church?"

He said it is THE issue in the church today and went on to unpack his answer. Basically he validated all that you and I are sacrificing our lives and dreams for in our respective missions.  He said he can't understand why Western church leaders feel the need to publicly criticize each other… asking, "How does that profit the kingdom?" He then told a story about when he was in India and a local pastor came and told him that the Hindu priests can spiritually replicate all the miracles that the Christians can do, but they can't replicate our LOVE.  

I had some time to chat with him about our mutual friendship and then I told him that you and I were praying for him and deeply appreciate his work.  I'm going to send him a copy of Your Church Is Too Small to touch base with him again. Who knows what God will do.  

Cheers,

Jeff