Carey Nieuwhof

I Survived a Boring Church Service to Watch a Japanese Game Show

It occurred to me a few years ago that although I had grown up in church, church and fun generally didn't go together.   So we tried to make our experiences as a community of Jesus followers more fun. Then we met some friends a few years ago who made us look boring. North Point, Connexus' big-daddy church affiliate, and our good friends at Orange, know how to have fun.  They notched it up a level or two.

Last night my kids and I sat down to watch I Survived a Japanese Game Show, a really kitch show about ten Americans who end up on a zany Japanese Game show.  It was just funny at every level, and it made me think again about how church people rarely think outside the box.  Not that we're going for crazy stunts, but our God is way more creative and imaginative than most of his followers are.

As I was writing this post, I just got off the phone with a woman I haven't met who attends our Orillia Campus.  She brought her boyfriend for the first time two weeks ago.  He hadn't been to church for years, and his comment was "this isn't like any church I've ever been at before, period."  For him that was a good thing.  One of the things he had was "fun".  The service engaged him and didn't have any boring religious mumbo jumbo. It bothers me that so many unchurched people write off church because, among other things, we're just boring.

As you think about making fun, shock, surprise and delight as words that might one day describe some of your church experiences, here's why I'm committed to becoming more creative as time goes on:

• Humour disarms people.  If people laugh, their defenses go down and they are far more ready to hear a hard truth.
• Fun helps makes environments irresistible.  It makes people want to come back.  Truthfully, most non-church attenders never want to go back to a church they've just visited.
• Fun should be appropriate, and ideally it should make a point.  Best yet is when it accentuates the key point in your message.
• Fun, humour, shock and surprise makes things memorable.  A couple weeks ago during our God and Sex series, we handed out gourmet chocolate bars with a cryptic message on them, encouraging people to wait and not open them.  Naturally, by the time we explained what we were doing, many had opened it and chowed down all or part of their bars.  The message was on waiting with sex for marriage, and then we revealed that everyone who didn't open their chocolate bars would be given another one on the way out - similar to the way sex is more of a blessing if people wait for marriage. I poked gentle fun at people who had opened their chocolate bar and been "caught."  It was a cool and funny moment, and I think it helped people remember the "wait" message well!  Then, as an act of grace, we gave everyone an extra chocolate bar as they left.

The last thing I want church to be is boring.  Because God, actually, is not boring.  Not in the least.

How comfortable are you with 'fun' in church?  What are other things things has humour and fun helped you accomplish in church?

I Wish I Played Team Sports

So my parents tell me I quit just about every sport they enrolled me in.  I guess I was a six year old in serious need of character development. Shoulda stuck with it.

Despite my secret desire as a young dad to keep my kids out of sports, my ever-sensible and sporty bride prevailed. So tonight a whole bunch of us head off to watch Sam (#34, click the photo to enlarge it) and his friends play football.  I like the winning part - they are 2-0.  Last week, we named the team "Orange Crush" in honour of their style of play.  I like that too.

But what I love most about my guys playing sports is the life-lessons they've learned.  Here are some things I wished I learned from sports when I was a kid:

• Helping matters as much as leading.  In hockey, another Nieuwhof house-hold fave sport, assists are worth as much as goals.
• Play your Position: everyone doing their part makes a far better effort than a couple of all-stars trying to do it all themselves.
• Follow the Play-book.  Strategy matters, and pre-thinking plays helps everyone win.
• Everything is Interrelated.  What you eat and how you rest affects game time.
• Listen to the Coach. You grow wiser by following an experienced lead.
• Discipline is your friend.  Disciplined players are always better players.  Self-discipline is one of the hardest arts adults have to master.
  

What did you learn from playing sports as a kid.  Or, like me, what did you wish you'd learned?

Praying Like I'm Grown Up

As I get further along in this journey with Jesus, more and more I want to learn how to pray like a grown up.  What do I mean by this?  I mean I want to learn to pray about things matter to God, not just to me. 

It's like what happens when a child grows up.  Our toddler years are spent demanding our way and and wanting what we want - even hitting, grabbing and biting to get it.  Even polite toddlers have a hard time thinking beyond themselves daily to care for the needs of others.  There's a lot of toddler in the church today if you monitor the prayers and behaviour of Christians.  Why do we always want God to do what we want?

Hopefully as child matures, he or she begins to care about others - family, friends, neighbours, the world.  Life stops being about "me" and "mine."  Do Christians really get that?  Not sure.

I think Jesus was powerful in prayer because he used prayer and scripture to access the mind and heart of God, and to pray for the wisdom to align His life with that mind and heart.  We are at our best when we do the same, and at our worst when we use prayer and scripture to get God to do and say what we want.  We talk about becoming spiritually mature, but maybe part of growing up means that we choose to change to a new way of praying.

I love your prayers on the blog this week.  As we head into the weekend, what if we shifted our prayer to align our prayer more and more with the heart and mind of God as we understand it through the Bible?  What if we prayed that our lives would spill over with love?  What if we prayed for God to use us to extend His love to others?  What if we prayed for our actions to be Christ-focused and others-centered?  What if?

What would need to change for you to begin to pray differently?

Alongside Grace

Been off the blog for a couple of days. Thanks for your prayers for our big weekend.  The launch of I Doubt It went better than I expected.  I wrestled for days with the message and in the end felt underwhelmed by it, until the feedback started flooding in.  God really seemed to use it.  Grateful for that!

Irresistible was a pretty awesome venue.  Well over 100 adults who call Muskoka home joined many of our people to worship together and talk about planting a Connexus Muskoka.  To call the evening energizing and exciting would be an understatement, and it was incredible to preach Acts 10 last night. It was great to see a vision begin to turn into reality.  It will be exciting to see where God takes this.

On the weekend it felt like we were really feeling God's pleasure in what we were doing.  Even though the hours were long last week, the reward is sweet when you have a sense that God is more than in the middle of it.  I woke up to read this from Psalm 127 this morning:

It is useless for you to work so hard
      from early morning until late at night,
   anxiously working for food to eat;
      for God gives rest to his loved ones.

It was a long week last week, but I got this incredible sense that we are doing what God wants us to be doing - and that gave a real sense of peace and even rest.  I think that's the way it works - when we are doing what's close to God's heart, the rest can be sweet.

Made me think once again that there's nothing I'd rather be doing with the days God has given me.

How about you - what hard work gives you "rest"?

Sorting Through Priorities...

I'm having a hard time with priorities lately.  Overall, my life is more in balance than it's been in years.  (Which sounds weird, because why on earth would I have trouble with priorities then?)

Several years ago, I wrestled down the work-a-holic demon. Some good friends gave me good counsel, and my idol of performance as a measure of success has been slowly hacked away at over the last few years.  I love that Connexus is committed to a simple model of ministry.  My calendar is no longer married to a crazy church schedule. When I have evening meetings, I actually want to go to them because they are important and rare. Usually, I go home at night and hang with my family.  Imagine that! Unreal, I know.

I'm just thinking through the time I actually spend in ministry during a typical week.  A priority is simply a pre-decision about my time (thanks to my friend Reggie Joiner for that definition). What are my priorities?

Here's how I'm thinking through these:

• The most important thing I do is communicate, yet I might only spend 10 hours a week on that.  Too little.  I'd love to get two days a week to pray, plan and write.
• The next most important thing I do is invest in staff.  I spend 10 hours a week with staff in meetings/one on ones.
• I love to meet with Connexus people (volunteers, just plain people).  That's on average 4-6 hours per week. It's low this week, high seven days from now (elder's meeting and baptism stuff...cool!)
• Growing over the last three years is my time with leaders from other churches.  This week it's a huge investment: 14 hours (one full day retreat in a mentoring circle with Willow Canada friends) plus a day with miscellaneous ministry friends.  Other leaders sharpen me. I hope I sharpen them.  Typically it's 4-6 hours a week.  Too much?
• Correspondence/email/blogging has got to take 10-12 hours per week. 
• Miscellaneous drivel consumes the rest, I'm sure.

What are helpful priority management techniques you've found in ministry/life/work?  Comments on my priorities?  What would you change? 

Oh yeah, personal time with God is my time...Christian first, pastor second.  So that's how every day begins (that's why it's not in my 'work' schedule).

Live Love Loud

I wrote this post before I went home yesterday.  I'm reminding myself and you...we are being defined this weekend.  Life is moving on.

I want this question to rock my world Saturday morning.

How am I loving people today God?  Jesus, how is my heart...my love...my sacrifice...growing today?

I think if I ask that line of questioning enough, people might see more of Jesus in me. 

All of this came out of our discussion this week on the blog.  Thanks folks.  I hope you are surfing off each other's challenges and encouragements this weekend.  You make me rethink so much!

You WILL be Defined

Something is going to define your life and mine.  It will.  That's what I've been driving at this week on the blog.  I know that when I die, my kids are going to stand around and say many things, but inevitably it will get reduced to a sentence or two that begins this way: "Dad was...."

The reason I love to think about the now is because we still are able to change and influence what our lives will be about.  The sad part is that too many people don't think about what their life will be about.  We just kind of live it, and in the end, we hope it will be good enough.  And I know my drift (when I'm not intentional) is to make my life about things that matter less, not more.

So what's it going to be about for you?  Who do you want to be?

We were asking that question collectively as the church this week on the blog (I hope at a minimum you read this)- what do we want to be about?  I've been to too many churches where in the end, the church is dying because it was about the whims, wants and preferences of the members and not enough about Jesus and the world He died for. 

Your life will be about something.  So will mine.  And our collective life will be about something too.  We all end up being about something.

i have completely dug the great comments on the blog this week.  But before we leave this...any parting thoughts on what you want all of this to be about?  Any last thoughts on what you want your next decade, four decades, six decades, to be about?  Or what you want the church you are a part of to be about?

This Made My Day...Maybe My Week

So I'm at a garden center in Orillia yesterday to buy dirt (a sure sign of my stubborn urbanism - I buy dirt).  As I get out of the car, this kid working there sees me has a huge smile on his face. He's about 17 and I don't recognize him. As I walk over he comes over to shake my hand and says "You're my pastor."

I smiled back and said "I"m not sure we've met." 

"No, we haven't" he says. "I go to Connexus Orillia (pointing to the Galaxy).  Man, I love what's going on there.  It's so awesome!"

As I talked with him, I tried to figure out who "brings him".  No dice.  Parents don't go.  His grandparents go to our Barrie campus.  He comes all by himself.  Except then he lays this on me:  "I usually bring 4 or 5 friends with me.  Some of them don't go to church, and they love it."

"You're kidding", I said.

"No, it's just so relevant. We think it's so great.  They're excited about going. Thank you for what you are doing."

I had heard that groups of my-parents-don't-go-to-church-but-now-I-do teens were showing up in Orillia (and have met some in Barrie too).  But to meet this guy and get to hear his story first hand...that was so cool.

It made me SO grateful for what God is doing in our midst.  SO grateful for our volunteers who set up environments so teenagers whose parents don't come with them can discover and grow in Christ.  Environments that make teenagers wake up on Sunday and say "I can't wait to explore God today." Environments that help teens realize God is not nearly as lame as they think He is.

I am so thankful to be a small part of this amazing team.  Connexus people - you rock the stadium!

Culture Club (2)

So I see my Culture Club (1) did not generate a basketful of responses.  Lots of traffic on the site, but people are surfin off the last week's posts.  Cool. 

Anyway, thanks to Bill and Allen for your comments.  Trust in Jesus and life-change seems to emerge in both posts as a major celebration/win.  Totally agree.

Here are some things I would love to see us celebrate in our culture at Connexus, in our generation:

• The number of conversations we have with people who don't know Jesus, not just the depth of conversations with people who do.
• People with no church background feeling safe in our midst to ask their questions without fear of judgment.
• Baptism.  It just rocks the house in every category.
• Community groups that integrate issues of life and faith.
• Community groups that serve the poor, locally and far beyond.
• Families that are beginning to discuss and live out (at home) what it means to follow Jesus.
• Authenticity.  None of us has arrived yet. Admit it.
• Acceptance.  We get on each other's nerves some times.  We screw up.  Celebrate each other anyway.  If you find the perfect church, don't join it.  You'll wreck it.
• Selflessness.  I want to care more about the next generation than I do about my own.

Those are just a few random thoughts.

If you had to bullet point what you want your generation to be known for, what would it be?

Culture Club (1)

Make sure you check out the line of the week, posted today. I think it strikes at the heart of something I think about a lot in ministry.

So much of the transition churches are going through these days has to do with sorting out the difference between the Gospel of Jesus (what this is all about) and culture.  A lot of church culture bothers me. We so often elevate our traditions above Jesus. And it's not just about overcoming old music and stale rituals. It's easy to make fun of traditions we're not part of.

Last month at Orange, Louis Giglio (founder of Passion and writer of a ton of modern worship songs) banged the nail on the head when he said relevance, worship music and cool lobbies serving lattes may be the golden calves of this generation's churches. We all tend to elevate preferences and trends above Jesus.  I'm sure we can all rant and rave about something that bugs us. 

But all of this just gets us to here:  what are the things we are going to celebrate together in this emerging generation?  What are the real "wins" for the church in this generation? What are the things worth fighting for, living for, dying for? When it's over for our generation, what do you want this to have been about?

I spoke a bit on this a few weeks ago, and the Line of the Week feature earlier today gets pretty close to my heart on this one, but I'd love to hear what you think is worth all of this.  What should be the marks that characterize the followers of Jesus in this generation?