29. April 2008 by David Alexander.

I am sitting at a demographic encounter. The speaker right now is telling us of the demise and prosperity of the churches within  New Orleans because of Katrina. Many churches in N ew Orleans, as well as the MS gulfcoast, were either completely destroyed or seriously incapacitated. A He has  spent some time showing us pictures of the damaged buildings and demolished buildings. One remark that immediately stood out to me was, “the church could not function after Katrina until certain Baptist Conventions and national churches came and helped them to rebuild and function again”.

Major question: can today’s church not function without a building?  Is a church not a church unless it has a building?  Does it not seem strange that we have celebrated rebuilt buildings more than rebuilt lives? Why is our stansdard of measurement how many people we can cram into the building rather than it being how many missionaries (Christ followers) we are sending out?

It could be argued that many of these churches were incapacitated even before Katrina came. When you see the lack of community impact, the growing rate of unchurched along the gulfcoast and in

  New Orleans before Katrina, it argues that Katrina did not incapacitate the church, it did the church a favor by pushing it out of its sanctuary and into the mission field. Like a mother bird does in pushing the young ones out of the nest to get them to fly, Katrina did the church a favor.   

Finally, the speaker is getting to the heart of success as he shows the meeting place of congregations that, because of the mission opportunities provided by Katrina, were able to continue with a strong community presence. Katrina opened ministry opportunities that they used as open doors to make disciples among those in the community. The post-Katrina congregation is stronger because the church functioned. It functioned through the storm, after the storm, and now even without a building. The rebuilt walls only serve to make the gathering of the church more convenient. But, a healthy congregation will function without regard to where. As one pastor very ably replied when asked where his church was, “What time is it now?”

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10. December 2007 by David Alexander.

God has called me to “entrust to others what He has entrusted to me.”  I live to give my life away in every aspect  -  total reproduction.  God has allowed me to be directly involved with 4 church plants in recent history, and since, I have had the privilege of working with many other new churches and ministries.  The experience has been and continues to be total exhilaration as it exemplifies and embodies completely what God has formed me to be.

            My core values of synergy and innovation come from the engineering and missionary background.  “Mcgyverisms” are the heart of flexibility and making do with what you have in order to get the job done.  That is engineering.  To always improve upon and challenge the existing structure.  Nothing is ever so perfect that need not be improved.  Yesterday’s innovation is tomorrow’s artifact.  As Electronic Arts puts it, “challenge everything.”  To be satisfied with what is given and still do the task with excellence is the only option for satisfying the Biblical command of Colossians 3.17.  The ministry I have been allowed to have with Mississippi Baptists exists, not to do a job, but as a natural extension of who God has shaped me to be.   I could do, in any environment, no less than what I do as a strategist for Church Planting.  The task of equipping leadership to start new ministries, teaching others all that I know, synergizing with the other ministries in the organization, and training someone to take over this ministry is the only task that God has given me.  This is accomplished enthusiastically, with every resource and technological advance at my disposal, because that is the most excellent, and most fun way of doing things. 

            It is not so much that I fit church planting, but that church planting fits me.  As God has put the many different puzzle pieces together to form who I am, this is an intricate piece.  Even greater still, is the realization that while I am a work in progress, I am also a piece of a greater puzzle that God has put together.  I cannot function, nor can God accomplish His ministry through me, unless I team together with the other pieces around me.  In MBCB life, this means that I cannot exist void of the other ministerial pieces.  Although I could do good enough by myself, that is not satisfactory.  Each member of the winning team fulfills their part with synergistic expertise.  If my piece serves to add a little multicultural postmodern diversity to the whole so that together we can refrain from obsolescence, then I have served my function well. 

            I am far from complete.  But I am continuously seeing the picture of my puzzle come into focus.  In time, God will reveal to me the scope of the pieces yet to placed.  The mystery of what lies ahead is part of the fun of the great adventure.  I look forward to seeing the finished portrait.  Until then, I’ll enjoy the ride!

David A

2 Timothy 2.2

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28. August 2007 by David Alexander.

The “your way right away” society has done away with strategic planning; or at least fully informed strategic planning that is not based on past assumptions. Churches and church planters are skipping the time it takes to properly do demographic and community analysis of target areas. Assumption is that this can be done while we do the duty. So the best laid plans of mice and men end up contextually way off.

The International Mission Board requires missionaries to spend at least a month of days doing field research, a year of days doing language study, and contact with an intentional mentor so they will be prepared to contextually engage their target peoples with the Gospel. Not necessary for people in the United States, you say? WRONG!

It is a confirmed statistical fact that almost every people group in the world has representation within the US borders. In addition to this, the demographic salad bowl that is our society is not only comprised of a plethora of ethno-linguistic people groups, but also a myriad of socio-cultural people groups and population segments. We have discovered a general grouping of at least 16 english speaking socio-cultural groups in Mississippi that would be hard pressed to want to worship with one another on a consistent basis.

Its time to quit doing first and asking questions later. The masses of unreached peoples demand our intentional attention. It would be great if every pastor before going to a new church, would be given a 30 day orientation on the cultural aspects of the community he is about to reside in so that he can rewrite his sermon file in a more contextual fashion before he regurgitates it to the new congregation. Wouldn’t it be great if search committees understood the culture of their congregation and community before calling a pastor so they could find one that fits rather than just calling the next seminary ph.d. grad?

It’s time to take our communities seriously and get to know them rather than making blanket assumptions. The urgency of our world’s need for the Gospel requires and demands our patient pain-staking cultural investigations.

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21. March 2007 by David Alexander.

my child is egocentric. The world revolves around him. Now this is nothing new. Child psychologists have known this for centuries. I was once told this. But it doesn’t really sink in well until 2.30 am when chaos breaks loose in the split second it takes for him to leave the comatose stage and realize he hasn’t eaten since 3 hours ago - or he needs his passy - or to be held - or burped - or diaper changed - or etc.

I fully expect him to grow out of this, to have his worldview expanded. To finally arrive at global perspective bliss where he is able to not only think of others first, but also understand their point of view. This is indeed maturity.

Generally Americans are considered egotistical ethnocentric monolingual narrow minded people. Having lived in a rural corner of a southern state, I would definitely agree that there are prime examples that would be defined as such. But it will always amaze me to find long standing church leaders who continue to think that all people would be comfortable attending their church. If that is the way it will be in heaven, then it should be so now. I can already hear Belinda Carlisle singing “we’ll make heaven a place on earth.”

I long to one day be part of a multi-ethnic church. I have seen some in action - read books by leaders and pastors of such. O the bliss of that glorious thought. However, it is missiologically impossible to have a multi-cultural one. I have observed that those that say they have one ignore that all ethnicities present have compromised bits of their own cultures to adopt a common church culture in order to find some sort of unity within the body.

What is needed are more partnering churches that would unite forces to provide a third culture that would reach third culture kids trapped in the middle of parental and host nation cultures. A regional multi-cultural network of missional churches. Now that truly would be “heaven on earth.”

If someone knows of one, let me know.

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