11.18.09

Wednesday morning..

Posted in culture, ekklesia, mission at 10:13 pm by len

The first session this morning was with Glenn Smith. My guess is that this academic surprised with his passion, but left some wondering how the theology works out on the ground.

Glenn opened by asking two questions: who isthis God we serve? Why does he love place – neighborhoods? Glenn then presented three horizons for a missional encounter: text, city, and neighborhood.

Glenn began talking about the church engaging Scripture by asking, “are we really listening?” In terms of our engaging the city he suggested that we need to be reflecting on worldview, culture, and the social imaginary (Taylor). Glenn further noted that we need to be thinking about place AND space- the internal world through which we filter and read our experience.

From here Glenn offered some stats on Canadian cities, in particular distinguishing them from the American experience.

Finally Glenn noted the third horizon – neighbourhood. Here he noted four agendas. I won’t summarize these, but note instead that engaging our neighbourhoods will require that we embody the good news of God’s reign. It will also mean that we not neglect the transcendent nature of God, and that we become learners, discerning the movement of God among ordinary people in ordinary places.

The afternoon plenary with Stuart Murray and Juliet Kilpin was also helpful. I’ll summarize some of the gleanings from this session tomorrow.

The evening a few of us went to visit Roger and Gail Helland. Roger is the district coach for Alberta with the BGC. A great evening and great conversation… thanks for your hospitality guys!

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