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Did your soul survive the summer festival?

Our church community had a great and very productive summer this year. Firstly with our holiday bible club. This year we did not use the typical holiday club material that churns out the same 'gospel' message every year. Children you are all guilty of sin. Jesus died for your'e sin so if you give your life to him you will be free from that sin and live for ever with him in heaven when you die. This year we used material from CURBS www.curbsproject.org.uk called peacemakers. This material

Posted by: Barney Barron Created on: Fri 09 September 2011 10:04 Last modified: Sun 30 October 2011 23:03

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"Live Dangerously or not at all!"

I remember on leaving theological college many of my colleagues were looking for "settlement" in their first church. I was often annoyed by their response on feeding back from churches they had visited complaining the manse wasn't big enough or the stipend wasn't enough. There seemed to be little acknowlegment or interest in the sense of calling or radical discipleship.
That is not to justify the all to many churches who seem to want ministry as cheap as they can get it and exploit their

Posted by: Barney Barron Created on: Thu 11 August 2011 10:02 Last modified: Sun 30 October 2011 23:11

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The Problem with Mission Weeks (by Michael Shaw)

It is that time of year when University CU’s break out of their holy huddles tucked away in c50009 and attempt to convert the University in a week. Now I have no problem with their enthusiasm or motivation. I have a problem with the concept.

I have been involved in many ways with Mission Weeks, whilst at University a part of the CU, as an assistant missioner and also as a church representative, through all my experiences I can say that I never saw or met one person who became a Christian

Posted by: Barney Barron Created on: Thu 10 February 2011 11:04 Last modified: Sun 30 October 2011 23:08

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Leadership and Governance

When I consider the issues of leadership and governance in general but for the church in particular at heart I am a bit of an anarchist. I want the church to be a movement that is organic and fluid as much as possible. I don’t like notions of control and hierarchy.

However the reality is I still believe as followers of Jesus it is important for our spiritual journey to be in community and not in isolation. The trouble is as soon as you have any community of people you will have people

Posted by: Barney Barron Created on: Thu 20 January 2011 17:00 Last modified: Sun 30 October 2011 23:09

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Rethinking Evangelism and Discipleship

The world is changing in some significant ways. The way we understand evangelism is changing to. The questions about evangelism are not only about methodology, but about our understanding of the gospel.

Much of evangelism today is rooted in a misunderstanding of salvation. People have been told they are Christians because they have confessed they believe that Jesus died for their sins, but the total package is presented in such a way that it leaves the general life untouched.

Biblically

Posted by: Barney Barron Created on: Thu 21 October 2010 09:48 Last modified: Sun 30 October 2011 23:05

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New Interest in Church Planting?

Now if you’re one of those people that I bump into at every church planting event I go to, please don’t be offended by the following blog, I love you all! However it has been refreshing that recently both at the Church Planting 101 events and at a church planting workshop, that I ran, there seemed to be lots of new faces interested in church planting. The Church planting 101 day held in two venues, Bristol and Southend had over 60 delegates. Very few of these were people I knew. The

Posted by: Barney Barron Created on: Tue 05 October 2010 12:38 Last modified: Sun 30 October 2011 23:04

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Released for Ministry?

I don’t believe in an ordained/ laity divide. The ‘laity’ is a term that should be abolished, as followers of Jesus we are all ordained to be part of his mission. However I do believe that God called me to be released from having to earn a living in the normal way so that I could focus more of my time and energy on the ministry to which I am called.

Others recognised this call and saw that my primary gift was as an evangelist. Evangelist is a loaded term, but I am gifted in an ease

Posted by: Barney Barron Created on: Tue 08 June 2010 11:13 Last modified: Sun 30 October 2011 23:05

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Incarnational Mission

I used this as the basis for our discussion at the Solent Regional Group today and thought it might spark some thinking/discussion for others.

Incarnational Mission: Understanding the Context.

The way church has been organised in the West has tended to baptise a white, middle class, Christendom culture and understood it as Christian. When looking to engage in mission, there is a need to understand and engage with the culture to which we are called. The complexity in contemporary society means

Posted by: Barney Barron Created on: Mon 26 April 2010 14:46 Last modified: Sun 30 October 2011 23:04

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Bi-vocational Ministry

Some of the denominations are suggesting that church planters need to consider bi-vocational ministry. This is to address the challenges of funding church planters. On one hand I have no problem with this challenge. Let's face it those of us who are paid to church plant are an expensive resource. If it means more people could be sent out to plant more churches then it's got to be worth considering. One of my aims is to work myself out of a job, so that the church I am planting wont always

Posted by: Barney Barron Created on: Sat 27 March 2010 17:33 Last modified: Sun 30 October 2011 23:04

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Is longevity the sign of a successful church plant?

Recently we faced some challenges that for a moment threatened the feasability of our church meeting. We got through it okay but it made me question if it had all collapsed would that mean we had failed and the last seven years had been a waste of time?
The church is or at least should be seen as essentially missional. God is a missionary God. The church are a pilgrim people, we are called out and sent back but we are only temporary residents. We often see church as an institution to which

Posted by: Barney Barron Created on: Sat 06 March 2010 07:41 Last modified: Sun 30 October 2011 23:04

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Biting the hand that feeds: Do we really need denominational support?

The question as we look to creating new churches will often come down to how will we afford it. Some like Urban Expression certainly attempt not to make this prohibitive to church planting by recruiting self-supporting ministers and finding creative ways of financing their ventures.

In the two church planting experiences I have had our support and resourcing has been very different. In the first we had loose connections with a network of churches via an informal relationship with another

Posted by: Barney Barron Created on: Tue 16 February 2010 07:14 Last modified: Sun 30 October 2011 23:03

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