Mark Driscol on ABC's Nightline

Driscoll appeared on ABC's Nightline last night. It was actually a pretty good interview.

Check it out - http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline

Plant & Thrive A-29 Boot Camp

Amy and I will head up to Raleigh next week to participate in an upcoming Church Planters Boot Camp. This is the same church where we attended Boot Camp as potential planters. This round, Amy and I will help assess potential new A-29 planters. Here's the write up:

The Acts 29 Boot Camp is considered by many to be one of the best available. It is required for Acts 29 applicants, but is open to anyone. Are you considering planting a church? Are you ready? The Acts 29 Boot Camp can help make the difference between success and casualty. The Raleigh Boot Camp will be hosted by Vintage 21 Church in in Raleigh, NC.

If you are interested in undergoing assessment as an Acts 29 Network Church Planter, please complete the online application. **Note: the wife of the planter is required to be at assesment. Assessments will take place on Friday, February 6 for those who have completed the application process. Cost for assessment is $99. If you would like to be assessed please contact tyler@acts29network.org.

Raleigh ‘09 Boot Camp Schedule
Some Session content to be announced
Schedule subject to change

Wednesday, Feb 4:
Track 1 Main Track for ALL Potential A29 Planters - Vintage 21 Main Auditorium
8:00am Registration
9:00am Worship
9:30am Session #1 Mark Driscoll
10:30am Session #2 "Gospel Centered Reformed Theology" - Wayne Grudem
11:30 am Session #3 "Preaching the Gospel" - Danny Akin
12:20pm Presentation Advance09
12:30pm Lunch (provided)
1:30pm Session #4 "The Biblical Mandate on the Man" - Scott Thomas
2:20pm Break
3:30 pm Session #5 "The Affects of Planting on Family & Self" - Andreas Kostenberger
4:30pm Q & A Mark Driscoll & Wayne Grudem

Thursday, Feb 5:Track 1 Main Track for ALL Potential A29 Planters - Vintage 21 Main Auditorium
9:00am Worship
9:30am Session #6 "Mission Rises Out of Community" - Tyler Jones
9:30am Wives Track:
9:30 Session #1: “Role of a Church Planter’s Wife” – TBD
10:20 Break
10:30 Session #2: “Resisting Your Enemy” – Kacey Grudem
11:20 Break
11:30 Session #3: “Speaking the Truth in Love” – Christin Stevens
12:20 Prayer for new church planter’s wives
12:30 Lunch in session room
10:30am Session # 7 "Mission Rises Out of Discipleship" - Ed Marcelle
11:30am Session # 8 "Our Mission" - Daniel Montgomery
12:20pm Presentation Great Commission Ministries
12:30pm Lunch (provided)
1:30pm Breakout #1
"About the Benjamins: A Practical Guide to Financial Support" - David Dorr
"Parachuting" - Kurt Hannah & Winfield Bevins
"Developing People for Mission Part 1" - John Fooshee, Matt Adair & Jim Fickley 2:45pm Breakout #2
"System & Structures" - Jamie Munson
"Leading the Mission" - Justin Anderson
"Developing Leaders for Mission Part 2" - Elliot Grudem
3:45pm Break
4:00pm Closing Mark Driscoll

Wednesday, Feb 4:Track 2 For Planters in years 1-4 - All Saints Chapel 110 S. East St.
8:00am Registration in main sanctuary
9:00am Worship in main sanctuary
9:30am Session #1 "Coaching Introduction" - Jason Roberts & Chris Atwell
10:00 am Coaching TRIAD
10:45am Session #2 "Leading the Mission" - Justin Anderson
11:30am Coaching TRIAD12:20pm Presentation Advance09 - located in Main Sanctuary12:30pm WORKING LUNCH & Q & A with Mark Driscoll
1:30pm Session #3 "Systems & Structures - Jamie Munson & Nate Williams
2:30pm Coaching TRIAD
3:30 pm Session #4 "Leadership Development: Elders, Deacons, Volunteers" Elliot Grudem
4:15pm Coaching TRIAD
5:00pm Q & A Jamie Munson
5:30pm Closing remarks Jason Roberts & Chris Atwell

Thursday, Feb 5:Track 2 For Planters in years 1-4 - All Saints Chapel 110 S. East St.
9:00am Worship in main sanctuary
9:30am Session #5 "Small Groups - Taylor Roberts
9:30am Wives Track:
9:30 Session #1: “Role of a Church Planter’s Wife” – TBD
10:20 Break
10:30 Session #2: “Resisting Your Enemy” – Kacey Grudem
11:20 Break
11:30 Session #3: “Speaking the Truth in Love” – Christin Stevens
12:20 Prayer for new church planter’s wives
12:30 Lunch in session room
10:15am Coaching TRIAD
11:00am Session #6 "Assimilation to Membership" - Chris Atwell
11:50am Coaching TRIAD
12:30pm WORKING LUNCH - Q & A with Wayne Grudem
1:45pm Session #7 "Strategic Planning" - Tyler Jones & Kevin Marshall
3:00pm Session #8 "Debriefing: Long Term Implementation" - Jason Roberts
4:00pm Closing Mark Driscoll in main sanctuary

Friday, Feb 6:8:00am-6:00pm Assessments for A29 applicants

Unknown Hurt II - A Father's Pain

Sarah Kate Hinton is fighting for her little life. Her dad, a New City dad and MC Leader recently blogged - I wanted to share it with you...

I have never in my life been made to endure such trying circumstances and I can't help but feel as though there is nothing I can do. So when there is nothing you do, faith becomes something you rely on heavily. What I'm learning is that I've had a hard time relying on faith for my whole life and so now, when I need it the most, I am lost. My mind says curse God, shake your fist and renounce all the things you said you believed..how could this happen? An innocent childs life hangs in limbo and multitudes are put through the pain and agony of a silly waiting game. Part of me says to God "Show me why I believe in you!" I write this as I am stuck...at home with a virus of my own, unable to be at my daughters side, my cellphone is dead and my charger is at the hospital. I can't go get my son because he would become sick and has already been exposed to the RSV and we can't risk anything infecting him. I am angry because of my impatience and my own sense of self importance. Impatience because this is taking so long and I am growing increasingly scared with every waking minute. My self importance because I thought something like this could ever happer to me. So many people say that and yet so many can't grasp the concept that we are all succeptible to anything. I go back to faith because my anger and frustration does me no good it adds to the pain. So i cry out to God instead to please heal this little one that cannot fight for herself. How can I grasp that she is indeed God's to take if he chooses? How as a parent do you find a peace in that? I don't understand that but I do know that this did not take God by surprise. Maybe it's time to actually put my faith to action. To stop talking about it and start doing it. My peace (when I have it) comes in the gospel. In knowing that this is not my fault. There is nothing I did to cause this. My wife did nothing wrong to bring this on. We are a product of a broken, imperfect body, and indeed susceptible to disease, injury and death. But Jesus has redeemed us, and I am thankful and encouraged, as hard as it may be, that one day we will have a perfect body. I pray that my faith will increase as I wait and pray and cry.

Think about Brooks and Melissa and Sarah Kate. Pray for them. I am thankful that in the midst of the storm - first Brooks' mom, and now Brooks have said - my peace comes in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Unknown Hurt

Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging dart of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six- year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is asking: "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes "nigger," your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness" then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.

Letter from a Birmingham Jail

Jesus Dreaming and the Upcoming Holiday

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed. We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal.

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; that one day right down in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and every mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plains and the crooked places will be made straight and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.

This is our hope.

Martin Luther King, Jr.
Ephesians 2:11-3:12

edited 1/16/09 for a very concerned friend:

It should be noted that this post is not in celebration of a man, but of a dream that coincides with my heart to see what Jesus died, in part, to accomplish - an end to racism.
The only man to be lifted up here is Jesus.
MLK, Jr was a man - imperfect and flawed... as I am, as you are, as was Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and Daniel, and David, and Isaiah, and Matthew, and Mark, and Luke, and John, and Paul, and Peter, and James, and every person other than Jesus.
The upcoming Holiday gives us a wonderful opportunity to address the reality of racism within the church and ourselves and to be challenged to BE the church.

Sylvia Abney. Opening this Friday @ the 567

2nd Friday Gallery @ the 567

Stop Going to Church - A New Web Site

Thanks to the creative genius of a few of our folks there is a new site for the new series.

Check it out!

Stop Going To Church

Stop Going to Church

It is time to re-think church. Whether you never miss a Sunday or haven't been in years - this teaching series is for you. It is time for us all to Stop Going to Church and start being the church.