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The Story we find ourselves in: God’s Grand Narrative
As people individually and as a body we are in a story bigger than ourselves, bigger than Redeemer 'Central', bigger than 'Redeemer in Belfast'.
Tags: Belfast, Church, Church planting, Community
Another year over
We haven't even been meeting a year! It’s amazing to think of all that God has been doing amongst us since February this year. It seems a long time since a small handful of us gathered in my modestly sized lounge to worship and pray. Then came Love:Belfast which saw 120 people gather in the Studio Theatre at the Waterfront Hall to worship, pray and support. We quickly found ourselves too big for our front room so complete with wafting smells of pizza’s we began meeting above Pizza Express in the City centre. Within weeks it became clear that we were going to quickly outgrow Pizza Express and by September, surrounded by memorabilia from Belfast's rock music history we settled into our new home, The Oh Yeah Music Centre. In the space of a few months we doubled in size gathering together as ordinary people called to be and do something extraordinary! So into 2010, meeting on Sundays and launching as a church in September. Next year is going to be very exciting.
Tags: Church, Church planting, CityGroup
We are nothing unless We are everything
It's the way it all goes down in Luke part 2. The acts the Apostles do see a dynamic community established. The new followers first response is to be an everything people. Everything for everyone, in no small amount. You need it and I’ve got it? Then you can have it. You are poor and I am less poor? Then I will choose to become poorer so you can become richer. My home is your home, your home is my home, lets share a meal of bread and wine.
Tags: Bible, Christianity, Church, Church planting, Community, Faith
Studio altercations
I recently visited an exhibition of paintings by the Irish born painter and two time Turner prize nominee Sean Scully. Speaking of his work Scully says "I hold to a very Romantic ideal of what's possible in art, and I hold to the idea of the 'personal universal.' This is a complex agenda. My project is complicated in this way, and in that sense I'm out of fashion. I'm going against the current trend towards bizarreness, oddness; as you just called it, the 'esoteric', which of course was around in the 1920's. That's what is being revisited now. In between the two great wars, there was a very strong period, particularly in Europe, of a strange, bizarre, distorted and perverse kind of figuration, with freaks in the paintings. Very disturbing twins, subjects like that. These paintings were mostly coming out of Italy and Germany. Now we have a return to that again in a strange period, after the end of Modernism".
Tags: Art, Christianity, Church, Church planting
Deep church
Been reading the book Deep Church: which you can buy here
Tags: Books, Christianity, Church, Church planting
Tags: Christianity, Church, Church planting, CityGroup, communication, Community
Everything Must Go - Jesus Christ Superstore
On Wednesday night at CityGroup we had a great time of worship, teaching and discussion. We began our new mini-series Everything Must Go - The implications of being a missional church. Around candle lit tables we sang, listened and threw out thoughts and questions, all incredibly helpful and challenging stuff. The audio of the talk will not be made available but I hope to be able to capture some of what we looked at here.
Tags: Christianity, Church, Church planting, CityGroup, Community, Faith, Made me think, Preaching, Teaching
My Grandad’s chair
My Grandad always sat in the same chair in his lounge. It was his chair, his cushion beside which was his table sat, upon which he could place his drink, TV remote, newspaper and gold half-moon glasses. The chair would be positioned in the optimum TV viewing position. Centre room, 7ft from the TV and 2ft from the door, that way tea could be taken without any TV sight-line infringement. Nobody touched the chair, not even moved it. In a way I am glad the chair was never moved, who knows what kind of museum dust gathered around the carpet indentations would be revealed underneath.
Tags: Christianity, Church, Church planting, Faith, Made me think
Adventures of living with a church planter
Again I'm in a privileged position of being able to support a family and a church plant and witness first-hand how much work is involved, although I know I don't get to see or hear everything that goes on. I may be living with David and Trish but there are still boundaries regarding the church plant – which is quite right and a good thing too – I don't want the responsibility or burden of knowing all that happens. There are pastoral issues and lots of other things I don't know about. Yes, I knew David and Trish before joining the church plant team but that doesn't give me a right (or a need) to know everything. After all I'm a church plant team member like the rest of the church plant and I fully acknowledge and understand there are issues and decisions we don't need to know about and I trust decisions made on our behalf. I feel privileged to have witnessed first-hand in Serbia what a church plant team have to deal with. That was a great training ground and made me really appreciate the eldership of churches (and the role some wives play) – from outside looking in you cannot see how much goes on unless you are able to spend time with them. I was able to do that and am able to do that here in Belfast too.
Tags: Church planting, Leadership, Life, Relationship
Interview with Pastor Scott Thomas
Pastor Scott Thomas is Director of the Acts 29 church planting network and serves with Mark Driscoll as an Elder at Mars Hill Church, Seattle. Acts 29 have seen numerous churches planted throughout America and the world. It was a tremendous privilege to be able to host Pastor Scott at Redeemer Central on Sunday 4th October. After Scott spoke David Capener grabbed a few minutes with him to ask him some questions - Watch the interview here.
Tags: Audio, Belfast, Christianity, Church, Church planting, Newfrontiers, Video
3inOne
Last night at CityGroup I gave the second talk in the series Redeemer:Values - This is who we are The talk included a lot of scripture references and quotes - So, if you are interested, you can read my sermon notes. They are unedited, unformatted, uncut, rough and ready.
Tags: Bible, Christianity, Church, Church planting, CityGroup, Community, Teaching, Trinity
Like a cricket ball in the head
Ok. Here’s a thing. It's a kind of secret thing, but not for much longer. Secrets are not best kept on a website that has had over 1500 visits in the last few weeks. Here it is, you see, one of my favorite films is the 1939 adaptation of the L Frank Baum book 'The Wizard of Oz'. Even better is the book which I recently read to my 7 year old daughter. Towards the end of the book, after meeting the big angry green fake remote control wizard (you remember, right?) Dorothy and her band of imaginary and maybe-not-really-believable friends head homeward bound to Kansas. On their way they meet a wall over which they climb to find themselves in a miniature city made entirely of china. Here’s what happens.
Tags: Christianity, Church, Church planting, Made me think