The Acts 29 Network application process has taken some time and the actual boot camp itself and assessment have always seemed to be far off. Well, they are no longer in the distant future, they’re next week! We got an updated schedule yesterday and the names of our assessors. If I had to assemble a list of godly men that I would like to hear in person at a boot camp, I would have a hard time coming up with a better list than this

• Session #1: “The Gospel & Ambition” – Dave Harvey (responsible for church care, church planting, and international expansion for Sovereign Grace Ministries)
• Session #2: “Church Planting & Ambition” – Ed Stetzer (author, President of LifeWay Research and LifeWay’s Missiologist in Residence, Re:Train professor)
• Session #3: “The Church & Ambition” – Steve Timmis (author of Total Church, director of Acts 29 Network in Western Europe)
• Session #4: “Leadership & Ambition” – Darrin Patrick (lead pastor of The Journey in St. Louis)
• Session #5: ”Decoding your City & Ambition” – Kevin Cawley (Preaching Pastor & Directional Leader at Redeemer Fellowship in Kansas City and fellow Wheaton alumnus)
• Session #6: “Discipleship & Ambition” – Bob Thune (Lead Pastor/Elder at Coram Deo in Omaha, NE)
• Session #7: Preaching & Ambition. “Speaking Past Demons: Christian Preaching as Expository Exorcism”– Russell Moore (Dean of the School of Theology and Senior Vice-President for Academic Administration at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, a preaching pastor at Highview Baptist Church, author of Adopted for Life: The Priority of Adoption for Christian Families & Churches. Get it and read it now!)
• Session #8: “Ministry for the Long Haul & Ambition” – Matt Chandler (Lead Pastor at The Village Church in Dallas, TX)

After the Boot Camp is over, Julie and I will be assessed by Acts 29 Pastors and their wives for 2 hours before I fly to Seattle for our next Re:Train class, Missional Missiology taught by Ed Stetzer. Our assessors are

• Kevin & Stephanie Jamison from The Oaks Community Church in Middletown, OH
• Nick Nye from Veritas Community Church in Columbus, OH
• Jerry Funston from The Journey Fellowship in Sunbury, OH (Cedarvile grad Yeah! Buckeye fan Boo)

I’m excited to meet them and for Julie and I to be examined by people who know what the life of a church planter is like. While I believe that God is specifically and clearly calling me and us to plant a church in Ann Arbor, MI, I welcome the input, direction, and guidance that comes through the assessment process and will take the outcome very seriously. Should our assessment uncover problematic areas that may make us ill-suited for church planting, we will prayerfully and earnestly seek God about the path to which He is calling us and endeavor to trust Him in all things.

The practice of multi-site church is, in a nutshell, one church meeting in multiple locations with central leadership of the church. Some churches like Mars Hill in Seattle do multi-site across multiple states. Others, like Highview Baptist in Louisville, KY are committed to their particular city. This is a topic that warrants discussion because it goes to the very heart of what the church is called by God to be. I believe there is a particularlity to the use of church in the New Testament that defines the church as being a particular local, gathered assembly. Here’s the definition of church that I write for our Missional Ecclesiology class

A local gathered community of regenerated believers indwelt by the Holy Spirit, saved and reconciled through the substitutionary death of Jesus Christ, sent on mission all to the glory of God. The church is governed through congregational polity led by qualified male elders responsible for the right preaching of the Word. The church covenants together for holiness and discipleship; demonstrates and proclaims the true Gospel so as to evangelize the lost, bring back the wayward and serve the community; participates in the ordinances of believer’s baptism by immersion and the Lord’s Supper; and practices meaningful church membership and church discipline.

I’m still working on it, but it hits the main points

• Location – Church is local and gathered
• Composition-  Regenerated believers
• Polity – congregational with male elders
• Activities – discipleship, proclaim gospel, evangelism, ordinances of Lord’s Supper and Baptism, service

Southern Seminary presented a panel this week entitled “Perspectices on Multi-Site Churches” featuring R. Albert Mohler, Jr. (president of Southern), Gregg Allison (professor at Southern and in Re:Train), Kevin Ezell (Senior Pastor of Highview Baptist Church), Greg Gilbert (Senior Pastoral Assistant for Church Planting at Capital Hill Baptist Church), and Daniel Montgomery (Founding and Teaching Pastor at Sojourn Community Church) which featured both practitioners (everyone but Gilbert) and non-practitioners. It’s a great conversation and it is a testament to disagreeing in love.

Today, Thabiti Anyabwile of First Baptist Church Grand Cayman posted on the 9Marks blog about multi-site. I would say that I’m in agreement with 9Marks and their concerns about multi-site. Many of the proponents of multi-site champion its pragmatism and effectiveness. What if, though

the limits of single-site, single-serivce congregational life are limits divinely appointed to ensure careful pastoral oversight.  To ensure none of us actually have more sheep than we can handle by God’s grace.  Perhaps.

That’s a powerful reminder to me of the weight of the responsibility of shepherding the flock that God entrusts to me, even if that flock is only ever my wife and children.