Creating Margin

Charles Kiser —  March 24, 2008 — 6 Comments

One of the rhythms we’ve been developing in our early weeks in Uptown concerns space for reflection and evaluation. Andy Stanley and company, in 7 Effective Practices of Ministry, call this rhythm creating margin—space carved out of the calendar for the purpose of evaluation, planning and celebration.

My suspicion is that, if you’re like me, there’s not usually a whole lot of margin in your life. The activities take up all the space on the page. We keep pretty busy; things are hectic; we don’t have time for much more than crashing in front of the TV for a little while at the end of a long day.

Porche and I are trying to make deliberate calendar decisions in our church starting work that will provide moments of margin along the way. We’re convinced it will make us more fruitful and less crazy in the long haul.

Margin moments occur when we evaluate what’s happened in the past: how did the Prayer Walk go? What were the strengths and limitations of that worship gathering? What went well in that hospitality event? What progress are we making toward achieving our goals?

Margin can also be used for future planning and generating new ideas. Maybe it’s reading a book on a subject of interest and sharing its best concepts. Maybe it’s a retreat experience for the sake of planning sermons for a year.

Probably one of the most neglected uses of margin is celebration: rejoicing in our successes, saying thank you, encouraging each other to keep up the good work. How weird would it be if a baseball team forgot to celebrate after winning the World Series? It would never happen. Yet sometimes we get so caught up in the busyness of life and ministry that we forget to celebrate our victories with each other.

This margin idea is not really new at all. The Israelites’ word for margin was Sabbath. God started the Sabbath rhythm after creating the cosmos. What did God do for Sabbath? God evaluated/celebrated (“God saw all that he had made and it was very good”) and he rested.

One concrete way Porche and I have put the margin principle to work is through the development of our own annual personal growth plans. In short, we’ve created a document that puts together all the ways we’ll seek to create margin in the following year—from vacation dates and conferences, to monthly mentoring and coaching appointments, to monthly personal mini-retreats, to daily times of solitude and spiritual habit. I’m invigorated just thinking about how I’ll be invigorated in these times of margin.

Where do you find margin in your life?

In Books, Leadership, Spiritual Formation
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A Time to Invite and a Time to Be Invited

Charles Kiser —  March 17, 2008 — 1 Comment

I’ve asked Ryan Porche, my co-worker in our church starting efforts, to contribute to the blog this week. Enjoy. CK

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We are grateful, as always, for your prayers on our behalf. Next time, Charles will write about creating margin in ministry. For this week, I (Ryan) want to write about what I’m learning about outreach.

Lately, my paradigms for outreach have been attacked (and this is a good thing). I used to see outreach as sending people out to invite more people back in. Granted, even in college, I began to see how the invitation “back in” was much better received when it occurred in the context of genuine relationship. But I was still approaching these relationships with the idea that I had everything to give. I know, I know…such humility! Actually, it’s embarrassing.

You see, as Claudia and I have begun making invitations to our Uptown neighbors, we’ve been surprised at how many—in the same instance of introducing themselves—have invited us into their homes for drinks and conversation. But I’m even more surprised at my own resistance to these invitations! After all, this is not what I had in mind! You’re supposed to come to our apartment so we can get to know you. And the words of a friend begin to echo in my head: what if we need to belong to them before we ever ask them to belong to us?

Ah. Now that’s a question. A one-sided relationship is not much of a relationship. I have realized how important it is for me to see the new people I meet as those who have something to offer me, rather than the other way around. So I embark with a new perspective this week: I’m looking for opportunities to learn and to belong. Rather than starting a new group of guys to play hoops at the park, I will join those already gathered. Rather than schedule as many people over for dinner as possible, we will leave margin to accept the invitations from others.

And as I write, my mind floods with stories of Jesus accepting the hospitality of others. May those who show hospitality to the Kisers and the Porches encounter Christ in us.

RPorche

In Hospitality, Mission
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What are we all about?

Charles Kiser —  March 10, 2008 — 4 Comments

We’re in the process of drafting our initial purpose and values for the new church. When we’ve finished the process in a couple weeks, we’ll be ready to choose a name for the church that reflects the language of our values and purpose. The Kisers and Porches have had some fun times brainstorming with a dry-erase board and listening to the Scriptures. I’ve been learning several things along the way, a few worthy of mention:

1) Adaptation is a key value. We’ve been reminded from several different mentors that we are decidedly NOT going to “get it right” in the first two months. Some of our language won’t resonate with Dallas people; some of our values we’ll want to delete later; we’ll forget others that will become important to us later.

All of this is reminding us to be committed to a culture of change and adaptability. Who says we can’t add a value in three months? Who says we can’t tweak our purpose statement six months from now? We want to be responsive to our environment as we start this new church.

2) Listening to Scripture. It seems obvious, but it’s been so tempting just to rip off somebody else’s values or purpose, rather than go through the more laborious process of reading lots of Scripture and listening for what comes alive in our Dallas context.

3) Listening to Insiders. To be truthful, we’re actually the outsiders. Dallas residents are the insiders. We are wanna-be insiders. If we’re going to start a church for Dallas people, it makes sense that we would listen to Dallas people, particularly those who aren’t a part of a church. Their input will help us determine the way this church will take shape.

I’ve been inspired by the good listening Rick Warren did nearly 30 years ago as he was starting a church in Southern California. For twelve weeks he went door to door taking an opinion poll. He would say, “Hi, my name is Rick. I’m taking an opinion poll of the community. I’m not trying to sell anything or sign you up for anything. It should only take about 2 minutes. Will you participate?” Then he asked 5 questions:

  • What is the greatest need in this area?
  • Are you actively attending any church? [If yes, he’d say “Thank you, have a great day” and end his survey there; if no, he’d continue to the next question]
  • Why do you think most people don’t attend church?
  • If you were to look for a church, what kind of things would you look for?
  • What advice can you give to a minister who really wants to be helpful to people?

What powerful questions! We intend to adapt Warren’s survey and use it for our own context as a way of listening to insiders. Their answers will inform the way we craft our purpose and values language.

Please pray that God will give us discernment and clarity as we draft the initial values and purpose of this new church.

In Values
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Lessons in Hospitality

Charles Kiser —  March 3, 2008 — 4 Comments

There are so many things to blog about. Rather than cram them all into one entry, I’ll spread them out over the course of the next several posts. Here are a few topics floating around in my head: 1) translating established patterns of ministry to more ‘organic’ ones; 2) creating ‘margin’ in ministry; and 3) letting outsiders participate in the development of values and purpose. I’m writing them down in this post mainly so I won’t forget to post on them later. Stay tuned for reflections about these things.

First of all, all of you should know that our dessert party last week was a tremendous success. Thanks for your prayers. We were nervous that no one would show. But without fail, when put your neck out there God comes through. Nine people showed up from our apartment community: several were from our hallway, and a few more worked at the leasing office where we live. Interesting observation: no one at the party had lived in the community longer than 6 months.

Another family of four RSVP’d but had to decline because they caught the stomach bug. We’re excited about this particular family because they have two children Ryan’s age and have expressed a lot of interest in having play dates. We really didn’t expect for Ryan to have any playmates in our apartment community, but again, God provides.

Now I’ve really feel like we’ve started. Relationships with outsiders have begun.

I’d say the most critical learning lesson for us in this experiment of hospitality concerned the issue of agenda or motivation. In short, we tried to make it our agenda solely to extend ourselves as friends and good neighbors, nothing more. Not as church planters. Not as Christians. No gospel strings attached.

This is hard, particularly for someone whose livelihood is wrapped up in the gospel. It’s my job to connect with people, right? We’re starting a church in Dallas, right?

I think, however, that there’s a healthy sense of reservation required of Christ-followers who show hospitality to outsiders, for two reasons: 1) God calls us to love people and be good neighbors regardless of whether they show interest in God or being part of a church; and 2) outsiders can sense when they’re disingenuously being set up for a sales pitch or recruitment to something.

We’ve got to be able to form relationships with unbelievers without pretense or ulterior motives, other than loving them as those who are created and loved by God.

I was careful, therefore, not to divulge too much about myself when asked. I was certainly honest in telling them we were starting a church in the area, but I was slow to add any more detail. What I discovered was that those who were interested were quick to come back around to ask more questions about it later.

It’s so much easier to let people explore the gospel on their own terms, in their own time. Our work is simply to respond to those who God is moving to respond to us.

It reminds me of the parable of the sower—some soil responds to the seed and other soil doesn’t. One of the dominant metaphors for mission in the gospels–the agricultural image–does not include instructions for tilling the rocky soil, getting rid of the thorns, or shooting the birds that come and try to carry the seed away. We leave that to God’s Spirit. Our role in mission is sowing seed and gathering up the harvest—that is, collecting what’s grown up from soil that’s responded to the seed of the gospel and the work of the Spirit.

Keep praying that God will be preparing people to respond to the gospel as good soil, and that he’ll give us eyes to see the harvest that’s ripe for gathering into the kingdom.

In Community Connection, Hospitality
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Good Foundations

Charles Kiser —  February 25, 2008 — 6 Comments

Time flies when you have too much to do.

What in the world have we been doing in the last three weeks? In short, we’ve been laying good foundations.

I read a story recently about a young guy who was helping his dad build a log cabin. He spent days leveling the ground and setting the foundation. When he had finished with the foundation, he confessed to his father that it didn’t seem like he had accomplished very much. There was no house there. Not even a frame. Just level ground. His father replied: “Don’t worry; you’ve already done most of the hard work.”

I’ve been feeling like the son this month. I find it hard sometimes to push ahead in mission when I’m not seeing the house going up before my eyes. I’ve been eager to get right to hanging out with lost people. I want to start a house church. I want to throw some parties in the community. I want to initiate some justice projects.

But we’ve been trying to build good foundations: whether it be working agreements, staff covenants, office policies, financial systems, cultural research, vision and values, task lists or time lines. I suspect that foundation-laying will be a common theme not just in the next month, but in the next year. Pray for us as we seek to be fully present in the important work of starting well and laying good foundations—especially when we might be distracted from it by other good things.

I am excited because our people time will start to pick up significantly in the next month. On Wednesday, we’re hosting a dessert party to get to know our neighbors. Pray that someone comes; we’re trusting that God’s Spirit is already at work in the people who’ll be there. This night is the continuation of a weekly hospitality rhythm that the Porches and Kisers have started as a way of connecting with new people.

Another night of the week we plan on hanging out in local social hubs—restaurants, coffee shops and pubs (that’s right, I said it—did I mention that Jesus hung out with tax collectors and ‘sinners’?). McKinney Avenue, from Pearl to Blackburn, is in many ways the social epicenter of Uptown.

God has also connected us with some well-connected people—which is huge. One such person has invited us as guests to some significant organization meetings in the community. Pray that God will raise up other ‘people of peace’ who will open doors for the good news.

One last thing: I was eating lunch in West Village one day and wandered over to the Magnolia Theater, a place that shows independent films. I picked up an informational pamphlet inside and was ecstatic to read the following:

Love Gaming?

Play your XBOX, PS2 or GameCube on the big screen.

Call for rates, times and locations.

Can you say connective event #1? (And if it weren’t for our wives, #2, #3, #4. . .) One local told us that if we hosted a Guitar Hero party we’d have tons of people show up. Guess I’ll be getting the guitar accessory.

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On another note, I went with a good friend to the Deep Shift conference this weekend to hear Brian McLaren. It was hosted by the Cliff Temple Baptist Church in North Oak Cliff. He presented ideas from his new book Everything Must Change. It’s a must read for anyone interested in how the gospel addresses the global crises of our time. I’m sure I’ll post more later about it.

In Books, Community Connection, Gaming, Prayer, Uptown
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