You don’t have to be a long-time reader to know I’m frustrated with Christianity in this country.

I’m tired of expensive buildings and the capital campaigns to pay for them. I’m tired of huge staffs and routine services and “the church has left the building” (for one day) and maybe-effective programs like VBS (can I say that on a Standard blog?). I’m tired of people who claim to be Christians but have no idea what they believe or why.

Sometimes I wonder if it’s just me. Long-time readers also know I can overthink things and be critical. (It’s amazing any of you still read this blog, actually.)

Are my expectations too high? Is the church we have now what God intended? Does anyone else feel this way?

Apparently at least two others do, and I got to chat with them last week.



Ashley Wooldridge, executive pastor at Christ’s Church of the Valley, shared how CCV completely overhauled its structure by dividing up their entire area into neighborhoods and asking people to build relationships with other CCV attenders right on their street and in their subdivision instead of driving across town for a small group.

But the goal wasn’t more convenient Bible studies; group members are expected to get to know the neighbors around them and own the responsibility for service and outreach in that neighborhood. Groups work together to meet that specific neighborhood’s needs: they provide meals for new mothers and grieving families, help with home renovation projects, organize neighborhood picnics, give groceries to the unemployed, and even collect money for a neighbor’s medical bills or a rehab stay.

(Interesting side note: despite huge growth and a merge with another megachurch earlier this year, CCV’s benevolence budget has not increased.)


On the other side of the country, RiverTree Christian Church is revamping its strategy around “GoCos”–Go Communities ranging from 20 to 70 people, each one committed to reaching a different group. The church will launch 30 of these this fall, but already a few are gathering at the local country club and among the area’s itinerant Mexican farmers. Each group has a leader who’s trained and coached by RiverTree pastors, but each one is also encouraged to function as its own small part of the body and reproduce itself.

Senior pastor Greg Nettle sees this as the way to truly grow; the church recently passed up the opportunity to buy the huge plot of land and build the huge building to focus on this—a strategy that doesn’t require much meeting space and could potentially affect many more people. These folks may or may not ever attend worship at RiverTree, but worship attendance is (finally!) no longer the ultimate measure of success in reaching a community.


I’m not blogging about this to pick on church again; instead, I want to celebrate some churches willing to try different models. Both are more difficult, time-consuming and risky than church as usual. The results of both are harder to measure. And both challenge people to move from consumers of a weekly show to participants in the mission of the church.


Are these approaches a “better” way to do church? I don’t know. But they sure look more like the first church than what the rest of us are doing.

Filed under: people, RM, the church Tagged: Ashley Wooldridge, christ's church of the valley, Greg Nettle, missional, missional Christianity, RiverTree Christian

Earlier this year I wrote a post urging “older” ladies to consider proactively building relationships with younger women and helping us navigate marriage and work and parenthood. I received several good comments and then forgot about it until a few weeks ago, when a reader emailed me this message:

I was reading your blog, my mind going in all sorts of directions from N.T. Wright’s books to finding a young woman to mentor. And it HIT me–I AM mentoring a young woman, just not the way I thought it would be.

Once a week, I stay with a young woman, 29 years old, who was diagnosed in January with ALS, Lou Gehrig’s disease. She had just completed her doctorate in physical therapy, her husband was in Afghanistan, they were planning their next chapter of having children. The military brought her husband home and has allowed him to remain in the active military in the States. Since she has already progressed to the point of being on a walker/wheelchair, she needs people to stay with her while her husband works.

I signed up for one day and she talked the whole time—very softly, but talked. At the end of the day I said to her, “You know that I’m 70, have arthritis, and can’t do a lot of your heavy work. I can do light chores, but if you fall, we’ll just have to keep each other company on the floor because I won’t be able to get you up. I need your honesty. What can I do to help? Run errands? Write letters? What?”


She gave me a life-changing response. She said, “I have lots of people to do my work. I have no one to just sit calmly and talk with me.”

So I go once a week and sit calmly and talk with her. She’s telling me about her whole life. So far we are up to age 19. She tells me about her struggles with accepting this disease. She talks about her disappointment at not being able to raise children.

Even at my age and condition, God is using me at what I do best—talking and listening. I know some might dispute my ability to sit quietly and listen, but I can when God calls me to it!

I’m writing to tell you I’m mentoring. And I’m writing to ask for prayer. My daughter said, “Mom, I know this is a God-thing, because otherwise you wouldn’t be doing it.” What she means is, I usually run from anything dealing with sick people. I didn’t even like going with my husband to do home communion! I’m determined to stay with this young woman till…..

Please pray for me.

This friend is choosing to do what she can with where she is. What a great example of obedience as well as a reminder that “mentoring” does not need to be complex or programmed, just an intentional connection between two people. It can also work both ways—I told my friend I suspect she will receive even more from this friendship than she gives.

I’m so proud of her and honored to pray for this adventure. I’d love to do the same for you this summer—leave a comment about your own recent steps of faith and how we can support you in prayer.

Filed under: giving & giving back, people, the church Tagged: ALS Lou Gehrig, mentoring

Years ago a friend asked me why I believed Christianity was true. I said it was because the story hangs together.

Genesis begins with the creation of the heavens and the earth and Revelation leaves us with the promise of a new heaven and new earth. The 14 generations noted in each phase of Matthew’s genealogy are sets of seven, indicating perfection (if not an exhaustive listing). The first-born sons of the Israelites are spared from the final plague before the exodus, but this mercy sets in motion a new sacrificial system and paves the way for The Son to redeem us all.

Perhaps it’s my hard-wired love of story or maybe it’s just my compulsive need for symmetry and closure, but the rich symbolism and connections running through the biblical account are one reason I believe God’s behind it all.


So I was captivated by N.T. Wright’s lectures on the Gospels this past Saturday. The good bishop spoke at a church here in Nashville and more than 500 of us crammed into the stuffy gym to sit on plastic chairs, take notes until our hands ached, and thoroughly love the experience.

Wright’s theme was we have missed the big picture of the Gospels: that they are the story of how Israel’s God became king of the world and the challenging, paradigm-shifting ramifications of that idea.

He urged us to consider four aspects of the four accounts: Jesus as the culmination of the story of Israel, Jesus as God’s return to his people after leaving the temple, Jesus as the beginning and renewal of the church, and Jesus introducing the empire of God vs. the empire of the world.


It was a full day and I’d need to write at least three more blog posts to summarize all the great material. But I was especially happy when—in addition to amazing discourses on Old Testament prophecy or the theology of suffering or a million other things—he also tossed in fascinating insights about the story.

For instance, those three generational accounts in Matthew not only symbolize perfection in each set of 14, but the overall structure—two 7s, two 7s, two 7s—point to Jesus as the seventh 7—the complete fulfillment, the year of jubilee.

Samuel foreshadows John the Baptist. Isaiah 55 replaces the thorns of Genesis 3 with juniper. Jesus defeats temptation where the Israelites could not—the wilderness.

On the sixth day of creation God creates man before resting on the seventh day. On the sixth day of a dark week 2000 years ago Pilate announced, “Here is the man!” before Jesus spent the seventh day “resting” in the tomb. (Implication? The 8th day of the new creation is going to be awesome.) And baptism is a symbol not only of our death to self and our emergence into new life, but of the Israelites’ rescue in the parted Red Sea, the creation of life from the waters, and the rescues of Noah and Jonah.

Maybe this is is stuff every first-year seminary student already knows, but we’ve already established I have some stuff to learn. One of Bishop Wright’s books has to be next on the list for Jen University. I’m starting Simply Christian today. Who wants to join me?

Filed under: people, resources, the church Tagged: Bible, Gospels, NT Wright, Simply Christian

One of the many hats I wear is content manager/editor for Christian Church Today. This site includes news and blog posts from Christian church leaders, a short info article about these churches adapted from Christian Standard, a jobs board, and other features.

But the most popular page on the site is the Locator. Type in a church and find its address and phone number—maybe even a staff listing if someone from the church has emailed me recently with the latest news. Or type in a city and find all the Christian churches in that area. It’s a handy tool that’s used a lot.

Last week I received an email via the site from a guy (we’ll call him Chris) who wanted to add his church. The church’s website indicated it was affiliated with, or was perhaps even a campus of, North Point in Atlanta. I wrote him back.

“Thanks for your email. Wanted to clarify that on CCT we list churches affiliating with the Restoration Movement. That’s not to be exclusive or denominational—although I realize it may sound that way—it’s just that the specific mission of the site is to serve this group of churches and be a directory for them.”

He wrote me back.

“I went to Restoration schools and worked for a Christian church and that church helped plant the new church. What defines a Christian church enough to make the listing? I am a Christian church guy, and I planted a church.”

Filed under: people, RM, the church, work Tagged: Christian Church Today, Christian churches, denominations, independent Christian churches, Restoration Movement

The kerfluffle over the weekend (other than what on earth Melissa Leo was thinking) was Rob Bell’s new book, “Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived.”

Although the book doesn’t come out until the end of March, reviewers who read some early-advance chapters had a lot to say.

Some were dismayed: “It is unspeakably sad when those called to be ministers of the Word distort the gospel and deceive the people of God with false doctrine,” wrote Justin Taylor (no relation ).

Some were intrigued: “If we’re honest with ourselves, we can acknowledge that we don’t know everything; that we have questions and even doubts about certain things,” said Eugene Cho. “While we might be attracted to absolute clarity, we  must yield to the possibility that there are some things that are mysterious; they are not fully attainable – as of yet.”

And some were smug: “Farewell Rob Bell,” tweeted John Piper, seeming to imply a) Bell is no longer a Christian and b) Piper gets to decide.


But here’s the statement I find most significant:

“What we believe about heaven and hell is incredibly important because it exposes what we believe about who God is and what God is like,” Bell says.


I’ve not read Bell’s book and when I do his conclusions may bother me. But I’m glad he wrote it, because the doctrine of heaven and hell and its implications for evangelism, pluralism and other isms is huge—and a major reason many people can’t accept Christianity.

It’s an issue we must deal with. Unlike Piper, I don’t know what Bell believes or if he is, himself, damned for writing it. (Because I’m going to READ IT FIRST.) But the reaction to the book and the blogs is proof of the need to talk about it.


Here’s the video that sparked the controversy, and here’s Glen Elliott’s recent article on the subject. What do you think?

Filed under: people, resources, the church Tagged: Eugene Cho, heaven, hell, John Piper, Justin Taylor, Love Wins, Rob Bell