So thinks one of the foremost authorities on it, Andrew Jones (TSK)
Here
"In my opinion, 2009 marks the year when the emerging church suddenly and decisively ceased to be a radical and controversial movement in global Christianity."

One of the factors Andrew did not talk about was the demise of Forge here in Australia. Which occured in 2009.
Forge Demise

Andrew has this view on EC.
"In many places around the world, the movement has already been either adopted, adapted, or made redundant through the traditional church catching up or duplicating EC efforts" (Andrew)

Forges own webpage expressed a similar sentiment, but it appears the page is now down.

From my own perspective and own church life, Forge and the Emerging Church have had no impact in a positive sense on my mission. Being a natural evangelist, and a passionate advocate of an 'outward' focused church, we consider ourselves to be a missional church, in the sense that we are seeking to grow through people coming to faith. We are not a 'cosy' little bible study group.
This has not come without cost, as our church has had to transition to this. But this had not been through Forge or EC influences, rather people like Borden, who advocated painful church transition, rather than rejection of the establised church, which at its worst, the EC did seemingly promote. The Churches in WA which had seen and implemented radical transformation, and an outward focus, are missional, growing churches...Churches actually doing mission in their community.

However I am not here to judge their efforts, as someone a lot wiser than myself said, "But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop these men; you will only find yourselves fighting against God."
Besides...what was the Emerging Church anyway? I don't think anyone really knew...as Murry states, "Emerging churches are so disparate there are exceptions to any generalisations. Most are too new and too fluid to clarify, let alone assess their significance. There is no consensus yet about what language to use: 'new ways of being church'; 'emerging church'; 'fresh expressions of church'; 'future church'; 'church next'; or 'the coming church'. The terminology used here contrasts 'inherited' and 'emerging' churches"

At Inglewood Church we had a seriously good Christmas

Christmas Eve saw a huge crowd crammed into the Community Centre for our Childrens service.
Well over half the crowd was non-churched, which is awesome.

Christmas Day was packed as well, with more of a trad feel, more of our own folk, but a lot of visitors as well...

It left me drained...emotionally, physically etc.

Christmas day we had a big lunch, with my wife kicking up a massive food extravanganza. The highlight was the warm fat plump olives drenched in her own olive oil based herb dressing, and lightly pan fried Chorizo sausage, also in olive oil and herb dressing...
Afterwards we headed over to the brother in laws pool and had a massive water pistol fight. We slept in a tent in the backyard...and I was officially wasted....no energy left at all!

Good times...roll on 2010

I don't think I have ever laughed so hard at something I have written myself...
Christmas Eve message should be a beauty....with some real challenges from the story as well.....

Have to say...it was inspired by someone else...but I have made it my own, and added some details particular to Inglewood Church.
If you know and love some of the folk at Inglewood, and don't mind a but of poking fun...you wont want to miss Christmas Eve!

You can listen to my Sunday message here...its about John The Baptist, burning some bridges with Pharisees and Sadducees...

Listen

Who else but a fiery prophetic type like John the Baptist to illustrate the need to sometimes 'set the bridge on fire'.
"You brood of vipers…who warned you to flee from the coming wrath.
I mean John the Baptist is sarcastic, confrontational, mean!
Pastors have been sacked for a lot less than that!
So have Mc Donalds employees…
What gave John the right to talk so awfully to these religious leaders…he was not nice.
We confuse niceness with godliness.
God is God, He is nice sometimes…but a lot of the time He is not…nice
And John portrays something of Gods character here when he declares that those religious leaders were vipers…
I believe John portrays something of Gods character when he is sarcastic and downright mean to them…not only did they need to hear the words and the tone of Johns message towards them, but so did those around them......"
If you want to hear the rest, see you on Sunday...

Here is a presentation I have made up, probably use on Christmas Day....interspersed with some scriptures from Isaiah 60



You can download a wmv version by right click here
If you do use it, please let me know...

If this does not get you in the mood for Christmas....nothing will! :)

Is there anyone who has lost more money because of his adultery than Tiger Woods?
Seriously, how much has he lost financially since the news broke, and kept growing?

But that is not the worst part.
Now he has lost his wife, and presumably a lot of contact with his kids.

Respect, integrity, relationships....all gone.

I wonder why he did it, not just once, but again and again....

Husbands, love your wives, wives, love your husbands.
It is not always easy, nor does it always feel 'natural'

But at the end of the day, I have seen and heard enough about adultery to know most things turn to mud when married people give in to temptation....the fantasy does not match up with the reality.
Love your wife, love your husband.....

Post script Mark Connor has some good thoughts on this here

Yawn.

How many people/bloggers are there out there that are wasting their time posting blogs and comments on what pastors, and what churches should be doing....
'churches should be focusing on....., Pastors should be focusing on.....'

Seriously...get a life!

If you are a Christian...you are the church!
If you are a Christian...you are a minister!

Stop focusing on what someone else should be doing, and start focusing on what Jesus wants you to do!

What Jesus wants you to do may very well be an exciting, life transforming, redemptive ministry!

In fact, I am sure it is what He wants you to do.

Posting a blog post on the ills of this minister or that church, chances are that the person you are posting about will never read it, and if they do...they wont change! And why should they? Because you said so?

Huh! Most of my good friends who are pastors are too busy doing ministry to be worried about your blog post.... so get on with it...Christ has a plan for your life, and it does not involve telling others what they should be doing, it involves you serving Christ!

Blessings and peace to all...and honestly this is not directed at any one individual, it is for us all, the Body of Christ, myself included...to apply.

Really busy and my mind is full of issues and opportunities, so I have not given much thought space to Christmas.
But I am looking forward to it.

Here is what we are doing at Inglewood Church.

Christmas Eve Children's Service 6.30 to 7.30pm

This service is particularly tailored for children and will include Christmas items from our various children's groups, including Toddler Jam, carols, and a short devotion.

If your child has asked you about the true meaning behind Christmas, you might enjoy bringing them along to this fun night. We guarantee that if you need to leave, the service will be over by 7.30pm at the latest. This will give you time to go home, make the bikes, put out some carrots for the reindeer, and prepare for the early morning onslaught!


Family Christmas Day Service 9am to 10am

This service is for everyone to enjoy, including families. It will include carols, songs, items and a short devotion on Christmas.

If you feel that Christmas is a time to enjoy with your family, to the full, this short service will be a great way to start the day. Once again, we honour your time and guarantee the service will run from 9am to 10am sharp. This will give you time to check the roast, put the ice in the sink, and prepare for the onslaught of relatives and freeloaders.

Speaking from Acts 28 this week, when Paul gets attacked by a snake.
'Here is Paul the missionary, who has devoted his life to Jesus, he hears the Lord voice on the road to Damascus, he turns himself around, he preaches against those who he had once served, he sees thousands of people come to know Jesus, he travels the known world to spread the gospel. Now he finds himself on a stormy island in the middle of nowehere, cold, wet, tired and with a snake hanging off his arm"
See you Sunday for the rest.....

My son and I sat down to watch some of the Australian Golf Tournament recently. Not because he is interested in golf, but because I wanted him to see the greatest golfer of all time in action.
A man who has smashed the racial divisions in golf, and brought excitment to a game some feared had lost its edge.
He certainly brought them in through the gates at an Australian golf tournament threatened with irrelevance.

I said to my son, 'there is the greatest golfer ever!"

Now we find out that his feet are well and truly made of clay, with multiple affairs becoming apparent.

What interests me though is what the failure in a moral sense means for a leader.
We find out today that sponsors are dropping off the Tiger... News

While on one hand we seem to be a society that endorses a hedonistic lifestyle, when someone public crosses that indistinguishable line, we drop off them!

People actually do have in innate sense of decency about them, a conscience. We might all be hypocrites and hold others to a higher standard than ourselves, none the less, none of us really think we are just animals, nor do we think we behave like them.

"At another point in Wednesday’s discussion, Sheler talked about Warren’s time of depression and how he literally went to the desert to take refuge. When Warren was in seminary, he had the vision of building a church for people who don’t go to church. He felt God told him that the church would one day have 20,000 people and be on a 100-acre property.

During his first year at Saddleback Church, the congregation already grew to 200 regular attenders and the number was increasing. But Warren, after giving a Christmas service that year, fled to the Arizona desert and described himself as falling into a depression. His depression, Warren said, stems from feeling that the success that he was already experiencing as a pastor was undeserved and from feeling that he was not equipped to pastor a 200-member church let alone a 20,000-member church as God had promised.

“He felt even that he wasn’t all that great a Christian and ‘maybe I shouldn’t even be a pastor',” Sheler said.

But during his time in the desert, Warren said he had a “dialogue” with God when God agreed that Warren didn’t deserve to be successful or to be saved. However, he was saved by grace and by the same token his ministry is successful because of grace."

Fascinating! Rick is the real deal, a humble Pastor, aware of his own failings, yet hearing from God keeps him going.
More

Perhaps more interesting is the fact that scientists are confirming what we have believed all along, we all come from one man..the so called 'Y Chromosome Adam.

"'The Y chromosome is the piece of DNA that makes men men, only men pass it on to their sons,'' Dr Wells said. ''We can trace every man alive today, every Y chromosome, back to a single Y chromosome, therefore a single man, who lived in Africa 60,000 years ago."

More

In contrast to Kims dire 'whiteant' prognastications of the past few months, the twice All Australian Dockers ruckman, Aaron Sandilands, has signed on for life at Fremantle, extending his contract until he reaches veteran status.
(Kim gets it wrong again)

Like the former All Australian Ruckman before him, Dean Cox, Aaron has rewritten the standards for a mobile ruckman. Other teams are being force to go defensive against him, because trying to counter him is a little difficult.

I have watched Aaron chase down what would appear to be much more mobile players. Obviously it takes him a little longer to get going, but once he does, he is a sight to behold. He is also incredible 'below the knees', if you know what I mean. When he leans down and picks up the ball, on the run, you know you have someone special.

I hate confronting people....
I prefer things to be nice and good and calm.

But there are times...like when someone asks you a question, where you have to say what you think and feel...even if it comes out wrong and jumbled...and are left with that debilitating feeling in the pit of your stomach.

But saying something, even when nauseating, is probably...probably....better than not saying anything at all...at least I think it is..but it may not be.

I hope that when you confront, you do it with grace and love...but that the other is better because of it, not worse.

When I started off in this pastoral caper I was in a peer group of 6.

4 of those blokes are no longer serving in the ministry.

1 of them that left is now suffering with as serious sickness, but it does appear he is out of the worst of it.

He is 44.

Today I am off to Northam to pray for him with two of the other guys from my peer group.
Its an interesting and emotional day.