Headed to California

I'm headed to Saddleback this week with Mark, Sheila, and Michelle.  Ron Vandergriend and his wife Lou are already out there enjoying themselves.  Ron's a smart man. 

Rick Warren is hosting the 2008 PD Network Summit and invited 25 influential pastors to join him in present.  Our very own Senior Pastor got the invite!  Here's the rest of the list:

Mark Batterson, National Community	AR Bernard, Christian Cultural Center
Bil Cornelius, Bay Area Fellowship	Bryan Crute, Destiny Metro Worship
Jimmie Davidson, Highlands Fellowship	Mark Driscoll, Marks Hill
Jonathan Falwell, Thomas Road Baptist	Dave Ferguson, Community Christian
Floyd Flake, Greater Allen AME	Ken Foreman, Cathedral of Faith
Jentezen Franklin, Free Chapel	Dave Gibbons, NewSong Church
Troy Gramling, Flamingo Road	Dave Holden, Lake Gregory Community
Joel Hunter, A Church Distributed	Ray Johnston, Bayside Church
Tim Keller, Redeemer Presbyterian	Daniel Kim, Sa-Rang Community
Tommy Kyllonen, Crossover Community	Lee McFarland, Radiant Church
Miles McPherson, The Rock	James Meeks, Salem Baptist Church
Perry Noble, NewSpring Church	Bob Roberts, Northwood Church
Nelson Searcy, The Journey Church	Jud Wilhite, Central Christian Church

Rick's taking a very collaborative approach this time around, which I'm pretty excited about.  He'll present at two sessions and the other six sessions are panel discussions built around around the following topics:

• Worship
• Discipleship
• Fellowship
• Evangelism
• Ministry
• PEACE (The Missional Church at Work in the World)

Mark is going to present what GCC has been doing outside of the four walls of the church in the last session.   We're looking forward to sharing the model we've been working on for the last seven years. I can't wait to hear what these other progressive churches are doing.

This month has been been unbelievable. First the door to lead the One Prayer International Initiative opened and we found ourselves with the unbelievable privilege of facilitating the planting of 500 churches in four nations.  The website is live. Check it out here.

Then, my buddy from Saddleback, Mike Constantz, Pastor of PEACE, called about a HUGE PD initiative in India.  Mike is one of the most experienced and wise missional leaders I know.  Anytime he calls and asks for anything, it's an automatic, "I'm in."

So, we're headed out a day early to gather with a few dozen churches that will be training hundreds of thousands of pastors and church leaders in India.  Mike  is heading up the project and has asked GCC to provide leadership in Southern India.   We'll provide a coaching track to complement the conference track that Saddleback has developed.  Combine the those two and you have a left/right combination that will be a knockout.  We're looking for PD churches that want in on this, so if you're church leader who is interested in getting involved, let me know.

Pray for Mark this week as he opens up the hood on the what and the why of our work in India.  Rick sent us a heads up on what he is looking for.  He wants a bullet list of "what we've learned" and one example of something we did that "failed."

Mark, Jack and I have been working on that list.  So, I'll be sharing that here over the next couple posts.

Comments

[Sarah Koutz]

I want to go to California! What do you say we switch places for the next week? I think you could handle teaching music to middle school students. There is nothing do it. So what do you think?