Missio Dei

Tonight a full house arrived in a brand new church to celebrate four streams of renewal showing up in the church. The four streams are mosaic, monastic, emerging and missional. Each is a different expression bubbling up organically and without any real help from the organized church. Each has more of a grassroots feel to it.

There was definitely an interesting feel this evening. To a certain extent the crowd was rather quiet in the beginning. Tom asked some questions which everyone felt reluctant to answer. He had an art board on the side of the room and at first only Mark Scandrette drew something on it. Tom Sine then opened with a clip from Strictly Ballroom. And if you haven’t seen the movie, it is the closest thing to Christendom (in a comical way) I have ever seen. “No new moves.” It really helped break the ice every seemed to be feeling. It almost felt like we were kids in a candy store who had been told we could eat what we want, only no one wanted to make the first move.  Once someone did, everyone got involved.

Tom provided a brief overview, which I recorded but haven’t gone over yet. (I’m sure there will be many who post their notes.) Tom’s intro was to an extent an overview of the conference and his thoughts on the streams. We also opened up to questions from the audience and there were many thought provoking questions from people looking to connect, explore, and just understand what was going on.  We also got to hear what each speaker was going to share over the two days.

I really like the vibe of this conference. It’s much more “unconference” than most. Tom and Christine are engaging, personable, and deeply caring and are not afraid to make fun of themselves. They are simply enjoying helping people explore how God is showing up in new ways.  They are hoping for and I think will get a lot of interaction and communication.  If you aren’t here, you are missing it.

Afterwards, It got to connect with Mark VanSteenwyk, from Jesus Manifesto. What a great guy. We shared our many thoughts on monasticism, of which we have both explore, him more than me.

The crowd dispersed for sort of an after party. It seemed like everyone showed up afterwards. One half the room was packed.

I’ve uploaded a bunch of photos here. And a few below.

We were in a brand new building that was two weeks old. It was really a great location.

Tom and Christine Sine led most of Thursday night.

Mark Scandrette started the art board.

Near the end, each speaker was able to share what they were there to communicate.  What a great group of people.

The after social.  The room was almost full.