The question?

Been wondering if we're asking the right questions lately, but it hasn't crystalized into a blog post, but it did while talking to LT on google talk. So here's it is with some [minor edits].

leightontebay: Are you still thinking of going to len's conference in Kelowna?
[deleted details]

Dave: is there a link?

leightontebay: http://www.nextreformation.com/forum.htm

Dave: Peregrinations: An Emerging Church Forum

leightontebay: yes

Dave: he does love big words

leightontebay: He does

Dave: you know I think it comes down to the fact that we don't love people
we get all up tight about marketing, post this or that
structure
if we were loving people the church would be growing
all the rest would follow
I think there's a real danger of using all this to avoid asking the hard questions
why aren't we loving people

leightontebay: You make a good point
I'd also say that we have redefined Christianity in such a way that it doesn't mean following Christ anymore.

Dave: I wonder if the PoMo thing is the same avoidance as the church growth movement
Yeah I'm reading Dallas Willard and he's making the same point
I wonder if the whole PoMo storm has ripped away what was rotten
but we shouldn't be looking to replace it
cause it will just rot the same way

leightontebay: You have been doing some thinking

Dave: The fact that we haven't weathered the PoMo storm well means we're not built on Jesus
It's not about adjusting to the storm
but getting back to Jesus
But that hasn't been modeled for a really long time
or it has but it's not what we've been paying attention to

leightontebay: You are right
I'm part of something that has totally stripped away most of the structure

Dave: yeah, need to blog this stream

leightontebay: In the end we are left with ourselves and we find that we are part of the problem

Dave: The problem with the world is me [I think I quoted GK Chesterton]
Mind if I blog this rant as is?

leightontebay: I'll say that I really like being part of a house church, I do find it better than regular churches (and I attend one with my wife off and on now) but if we stopped there we wouldn't be much further than we were when we started.
Feel free to blog this

Dave: thanks
need some sleep if I'm going to hit my mile stone
- Peace

leightontebay: ok
good night

I should note that I was talking to LT without reading all that Len has posted about the forum. I think there's some great stuff there, I just worry that more basic things can get lost in the larger PoMo church coversation.

Update: having had a chance to sleep on it I realized I should post the links that got me thinking along these lines. Jordon posted a link to Earl & the AG Pastors and Jason posted a link to Rick Warren's Turning attendees into a part of the family. Now there are great things in both articles , but it struck me that both make church all about me, what you need to reach me as a potential church member. Neither article makes the hard work of loving one another key.

John 13:34 & 35

Let me give you a new command: Love one another. In the same way I loved you, you love one another. This is how everyone will recognize that you are my disciples--when they see the love you have for each other

Jesus still has great appeal in the world, it's the Church people are leaving. It seems clear to me it's because we're (I'm) not living this command. We can avoid the issue by focusing on all the secondary issues of how we reach modern/post modern culture but with out knowing and living in God's love it's waste of time.

- Peace