Ben Sternke

Field notes on life and mission with God after Christendom

Thoughts

Editing as you go

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Seth says it used to be like this:

    Create —> Edit —> Launch

But now it’s like this:

    Create —> Launch —> Edit —> Launch —> repeat

Software and websites typically come out with a "beta" version, etc.

The satellite gathering/community that we’re starting is working like this as well. We’ve been meeting for a few weeks already, and guests have come already. But we’ll "launch" sometime in the future. But that’s not to say we’ll have all our editing done. We’re going to launch and edit as we go. And in some sense we’ve already "launched" when we started meeting for worship. And we "launched" before that when we simply were getting together to dream and discuss ideas.

And I imagine we’ll "launch" again in the future, after we’ve done some editing.

Random update

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Correction: NUMBERED random update!

  1. I am in the process of putting together a team to start a new church service. We had a meeting last Sunday night (and will have another this Sunday night) to cast the vision/have a conversation with those interested. It’s a missional expression of Heartland, we’re wanting the gospel to reach new people, new areas, of Fort Wayne. We’re interested in how a community that worships together in time-honored and home-grown ways can be formed as the Body of Christ to be an embodied witness to an emerging culture. We’re wanting to discover how the regular rhythms of worship, prayer, eating, partying, confessing, forgiving, listening and speaking can shape our life together and draw others to life in Christ. We aren’t meeting publicly yet, but we will likely start worshiping together fairly regularly in December in homes, etc. Drop me an email if it’s something that interests you and we can have coffee.
  2. I found out the first essay for my Master’s is due earlier than I thought! January 1, 2008 is the deadline, and I’m trying to figure out if I can finish it by then. 5000 words. I’ve narrowed things down and need to choose between two topics to write on. The first is a quotation from John Goldingay: "Without the assumption that texts have determinate meaning, interpretation as a cognitive activity becomes logically impossible." Discuss. The other is a quote from N.T. Wright: "Knowledge… although in principle concerning realities independent of the knower, is never itself independent of the knower" Discuss. So if you have any great ideas on one of those topics, let me know! Or even some good resources for research.
  3. I just finished producing an album of songs written at Heartland. It will be released through Declaration Music in early December. That’s a big weight off my shoulders should provide some more time to focus on the other projects.
  4. Planning to attend this conference in Chicago as it relates to how preaching will be done in the new service – I’ll also be to connecting with some friends who lead a like-minded church up there.

Back to it!

In the land of Holy Faith

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I’m spending a few days in Santa Fe ("Holy Faith" in English) spending some time with a pastor down here. We’ll be talking about church, leadership, theology, spiritual formation, liturgy, etc, etc. The fun stuff. I’m also going to be spending some time preparing and writing for the new service I mentioned a few posts ago. I’ll be posting some thoughts during the course of the week. Hope you can take some time to interact with me! By the way, all of the buildings in Santa Fe look like this:

Santa_fe_architecture

I’m not kidding. There must be some kind of ordinance. It’s really pretty though – I love the rounded edges and sandy colors, the architecture matches the landscape: simple, but stunning.

Good name for a church service?

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Lightbulb
I am in the midst of facilitating a team that will be starting a new church service this fall. One of the most difficult things for us has been deciding on a good name. I am humbly requesting assistance from those of you who read this blog (all 4 of you).

Some of the distinctives of this service that may help you in your brain-storming:

  • Liturgically-focused worship
  • Incorporating both ancient and modern practices
  • Authentic, but not hyped, spirituality
  • Regularity/consistency combined with creativity/spontaneity
  • Valuing silence and quietness
  • Valuing the community-at-worship, not just isolated individuals worshiping
  • Weekly rhythm of Word and Sacrament (Scripture and Eucharist)
  • Participation in mystery rather than explanation of it
  • Comfortable with paradox and truth-in-tension

I’ve also been drawn to themes of light and illumination in thinking about this service, our whole lives (good and bad) being brought into the light of God’s presence, which is paradoxically both comforting and blindingly bright, warm but frightening.

So: send me some ideas! You can leave comments, or if you’d like to send me an email, use the link right under my picture on the left. The person who comes up with the best name will receive a brand new car! Just kidding.

Another thought on “Thinking Outside the Box”

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Boxwoman
Thinking outside the box is vital to human life. Yeah, I know I said it was over-rated yesterday. Welcome to my head. I see things from both sides, to a fault usually.

While I maintain that life does have limits, and that you really can’t just do whatever you’d like to do, we desperately need creative, lateral thinking to help us see possibilities we didn’t know were there, to break us out of the soul-killing machine of commercializing and monetizing everything. We need to play, and be inefficient, "unproductive", at least sometimes, so we remember that life isn’t just about being "functional" in society.

There are real limits in life – this keeps us humble. But there are some boxes that we need to get outside of. The one I’m thinking about today is the box of "Everything-Is-A-Product-To-Be-Consumed".

What boxes do you want to think and act outside of?