The Forgotten Ways: Apostles in the Emerging Missional Church

Alan Hirsch

At last I have found people within the emerging church who have apostles today just as our group of churches do. Recently I have been reading a couple of books: Alan Hirsh’s The Forgotten Ways and the Forgotten Ways Handbook by Hirsch and Altclass. It is so exciting having followed the emerging church movement for many years now and learnt so much from them to see them going in a similar direction to our churches.

Missional DNA
Alan Hirsch begins by asking the question, 'How did the early church grow so quickly?' He then looks for similar patterns in the rise of other Christian movements in history such as in Wesley's time and more recently in China.

Hirsch concludes that we as Christians have within us the ability to replicate these movements today. It’s in our DNA, so to speak, to be missional but we need to dig deep into our collective memories to recall and re-activate it.

Apostolic Genius
What is interesting is that Hirsch sees a return to the early apostolic principles is needed to re-awaken this missional DNA. As I read these books it slowly dawned on me that what he is describing are churches that would refer to themselves as emerging churches that have been pioneered by apostles.

Hirsch describes the following six elements that together formed the life force that pulsated through the early church which he calls Apostolic Genius. He argues a case for developing all these elements in balance as the way forward to be effective at doing church.

Element One: Jesus is Lord
If Jesus is the Lord over every aspect of our lives then any sacred secular divide is abolished. Jesus lordship impacts our work and home life not just our meetings and devotionals.

Hirsch points out that Christ is not just working through the church but is at work in the world around us. We can worship all the time in everything we do and not just in church services.

We should imitate the Jesus of the gospels today not just by showing attitudes of love and forgiveness but also of acceptance of others and a willingness to socialise outside of our Christian friends.

Element Two: Disciple Making
Discipleship is nothing less than every member seeking to be transformed into a little Jesus. It is not just academic learning that is applied but learning that seeks to initially address our behaviour through leading by example, accountability groups and one to one coaching.

We are to learn to embody the message of Christ. Hirsch & Altclass give us some interesting examples such as in our busy consumerist society making time for families and church by working part time, or standing up for social justice or care for the environment by buying fair trade and environmentally friendly products. But the main thrust of discipleship that they outline is encouraging people in spiritual disciplines, empowering them to serve, use their gifts and reach out to others.

Element Three: Missional Incarnational Impulse
God is on a mission and he sends us to be part of his mission. Jesus came to us, to be with us, serve us and to proclaim salvation. We call this the incarnation – God becoming flesh. In the same way we are sent to be incarnational to others to be them, mix frequently with them, serve them and proclaim salvation. This is so much more than just inviting people to meetings.

What we do as a church needs to be built around mission. We need to be relevant to the host community in order to embed the gospel into the surrounding culture through meaningful interaction. Hirsch outlines a number of ideas that have been done ranging from being involved in community groups to turning a church into a recording studio and nightclub. But the challenge is to find strategies that are relevant to your community not copy others.

Element Four: Apostolic Environment
Apostles pioneer new missional initiatives implanting in them the missional DNA as they go. They guard each church ensuring it remains true to the gospel and its missional ethos. Apostles also provide an environment for the other ministries outlined in Ephesians 4:11 to emerge (i.e. prophets, evangelists, shepherds and teachers) bringing the church to maturity.

Although he mentions people with these specific ministries such as Neil Cole of CMA, Hirsch’s emphasis is that all Christians have within them some aspects of these in varying degrees. For example someone may be mainly prophetic but also have elements of a shepherd and a teacher. On his website Hirsch provides a questionnaire to help you discover your leanings.

Element Five: Organic Systems
Hirsch sees the church as a living organism. Hence he prefers more fluid structures that involve networks of relationship rather than hierarchies. In these networks everyone can freely communicate with anyone else rather than having limited communication via your immediate leader.

Centralised institutions are potential blocks to growth but organic systems are characteristic of movements that have grown exponentially. They have the potential to spread like viruses continually reproducing themselves. If we keep church simple then churches can be easily reproduced.

Element Six: Communitas, Not Community
Rather than developing a sense of community for its own sake Hirsch sees this as a vital by-product of being stretched to your limit. In persecution Christians experience 'the fellowship of suffering'. But also groups that exist for purposes beyond themselves such as influencing the community or reaching people with the gospel develop a much more vigorous cohesion than groups set up with the aim of providing fellowship. If we are taking risks as we journey together on a missional venture then bonding will happen on the way. This is what Hirsch means by communitas.

There is much to learn from these books. Let's go for it. Don’t be afraid of the changes that come. As Hirsch comments, change may be chaotic at times but living on the edge of chaos is the best place to be.

Related Posts:
An Evening With A Real Live Apostle
72 Christian Leaders Meet at Antioch

WorkShop - our new initiative

My wife Nettes & I have recently launched an initiative that we are calling WorkShop.

What is WorkShop?

WorkShop is a Work Club serving our local community. Ladywood has significant levels of unemployment. There is clearly a need here for activities to engage people as well as enable them to look into paths into training and to take steps towards getting work. Our aim is to get people from Ladywood and the surrounding areas moving towards occupation in paid or voluntary work.

What happens at WorkShop?

WorkShop provides an environment in which to complete activities that get you to think about all your existing skills - even those you never knew you had. Some people may want to find out about training courses or volunteering opportunities. Others may want help writing a CV, or may just want somewhere to start job hunting from. When you come along we will spend some time getting to know you, assessing your needs and suggesting the best activities for you. We aim to be inclusive so wherever you are at please feel free to drop by to see if we can be of help.

We are currently looking at the possibility of a number of different activities including confidence building, keeping motivated, and coping with rejection, as well as interview and presentation skills. We will be having guest speakers from voluntary organisations, local employers and from our local money advice and credit union. We hope eventually that the people who come along will be able do presentations themselves on areas where they have skills or knowledge that may be of interest to others.

As well as helping people into training, volunteering or getting jobs, we hope to eventually help some people set up their own businesses. We’d also like to see an arm of WorkShop develop into a social enterprise, benenfitting the community, becoming self-funding and even providing employment for some of the members. We are continually exploring possibilities but developing such an enterprise would depend a lot on the skills of the group that develops.

What is the history of WorkShop?
We only launched WorkShop in November but already we have spoken to a number of people. We have helped people fill in job application forms and given others advice on how to improve their CVs. We have signposted some people to organisations who provide training and work experience opportunities. There are other people with whom we continue to work and we hope they will form the core of the group.

WorkShop grew out of our vision to see the local church serving the community and we are thrilled to see it taking its first steps. We feel that the time is right for such a venture. This was confirmed when we approached the Jobcentre with a leaflet and learnt that the government are now encouraging Work Clubs as part of the Big Society.

WorkShop has now been launched as a project of Karis Neighbour Scheme working alongside All Being Well. WorkShop is not only partnering with our own church – Church Alive – but also with Church of the Redeemer who have generously donated a room with a number of computers and are helping with our administration.

It’s early days yet but hope something will come of it.

Related posts:
looking into social enterprise
more thoughts on social enterprise
this is my church

The Tangible Kingdom

Here is a little video advertising a book that I have been reading recently.



A review of this book is available here on my new blog CharisMissional.

Christmas 2.0

It’s that time again! All newsletters and charity gifts posted and our Jesse Tree now complete with items representing the ancestors of Jesus we are relaxing and enjoying our twelve days of Christmas – sharing small gifts around the dinner table for twelve days of the holidays.

Just thought that if you enjoy Nativity plays and singing carols like ‘We Three Kings’ as well as social networking on the internet then you might like this video - Christmas 2.0:



Enjoy!

Re-Enchanting Christianity

Click here for my review of Dave Tomlinson's book Re-Enchanting Christianity.

Dave Tomlinson

Should We All Speak At The Same Time in Tongues?

In a new article Holy Gobbledygook on his site David Matthew argues for the use of speaking in tongues today but at the same time he is critical of the practice of everyone speaking at the same time in tongues.

He particularly looks at 1 Corinthians 14 and comes to the conclusion that primarily tongues are for private devotions. There is also a place for them in public worship but Paul puts tight guidelines on this such as tongues should not be heard in public without an interpretation. The message in tongues is to be given clear enough for everyone to know it is meant to be a public contribution and is to be followed by an interpretation.

David goes on to show that the quote from Isaiah in 1 Corinthians 14 serves to show that tongue speaking without interpretation tends to put visitors off. Careful analysis shows that it is a reference to foreign languages being a sign of God’s judgement when the Assyrians invaded Israel and carried the Israelites off into captivity. Today people hearing un-interpreted tongues my think, “These Christians are nuts. I’m not coming here again.”

So what do we make of it when someone speaks in tongues in a gathering in a way that is quiet enough for others to know that it is not a public contribution but loudly enough to hear? David refers to such use as ‘unhelpfully intrusive”. He evidently understands that speaking to yourself and to God in 1 Corinthians 14:28 will mean being inaudible to others around you. In a subsequent email discussion David confirmed this.

Interestingly in a recent post by Scott Lencke, as part of a series on speaking in tongues, Scott looks also looks at this verse. Generally he comes to similar conclusions to Dave about tongues and interpretation. But rather than an injunction to remain completely silent Scott sees this as simply not raising your voice but continuing to speak “at a much lower decibel”. I have great respect for Scott’s opinions but I just can’t see any basis for this one. Surely silent means silent!

What does this mean to the common charismatic practice of corporate singing in tongues? Though David sees singing in tongues as following much the same principles as when spoken he does admit that perhaps everyone singing in tongues may be more acceptable in worship than everyone speaking in tongues. Though the Bible is silent on this issue David suggests that it could be seen as similar to everyone worshipping on instruments. But then I must ask: why do un-interpreted tongues cease to be a negative sign to unbelievers just because they are sung rather than spoken?

These ideas have some real practical applications to those of us who use or are seeking to use tongues in our worship gatherings. If you have any further thoughts on this please leave them in the comments below.

5 Links for Advent

i-church.org

At this time of year there are usually a few good advent resources and advent calendars around. Here are five that I’ve found this year.

1. i-church

I have found i-church’s calendar here that I am opening each day. Behind each door there is a reflection and a song. At the foot of it there are also a few links that are worth exploring.

2. Paperless Christmas

paperlesschristmas

Paperless Christmas’s advent calendar that I did last year is still there and with my little daughter Callie we are watching the Christmas story being retold in a very contemporary setting here.

3. Ready Steady Slow

There are also some devotions at Ready Steady Slow. They were a bit too wordy for Callie but I am enjoying listening to them.


4. Beach Huts

The link for the beech hut advent calendars on i-church is out of date but I still found them. There are now actually now two sets of beach huts. So this link is two for the price of one! You can find the blog of the Bridlington Beach Huts here and the link for the Brighton Beach huts here. I think the beach hut advent calendars are a brilliant idea as each day a hut is opened with a full art installation themed related to advent or Christmas. Look at the photos and read the descriptions as part of your advent devotions.


5. Proost

If you want some resources to purchase for example for church services then I would recommend looking at proost. There is an outline on Jonny Baker’s blog of what is available here. There are some interesting animations and liturgies that you might find interesting.

God Waits Patiently

I thought it apt for the first day of Advent - a season traditionally about waiting - when at church this morning Helen spoke about how God waits patiently. It was part of a series on the characteristics of God and the series just brought us to God’s patience today but this really struck me both because of the season and because of how it spoke personally to me.

Among many verses Helen quoted 2 Peter 3:9:

“The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance”

God is patient with his people. When we sin he could respond with anger but actually ‘he is slow to anger’ and bears with us patiently. Yes God’s timing is impeccable. He came to this earth at the right time, he will come again at the right time and he comes to us to meet our needs just at the right time - whatever we may say.

Patience is rare. We get so wound up when things don’t go fast enough or when we are driving and another driver cuts in front of us forcing us to slow down. We now live at such a pace that we cannot wait for the sort of “slow food” that was common a century or more ago. Helen gave the illustration that someone might even say “hurry up” to the microwave. By the way you might be interested Helen that there is a trend to recapture that idea of slow food. You can find out about slow food movement here and here.

God isn’t like us. His patience is unlimited. It is his nature to calmly endure delay without complaining; to wait with calmness and endurance. But amazingly as Christians we can actually be carriers of God’s patience to others – just as we can carry many of his other characteristics such as his mercy and grace to others. One memorable point was that the fact we are told in Colossians 3:12 to clothe ourselves with, amongst other things, patience indicates that it must be in our wardrobe. I also liked the little insight that we get impatient when we see a lack, a lack of time, a lack of ability, a lack of power but God doesn’t lack anything - yes of course - and with God neither do we.

So when people try our patience – as our children often do – it is to see if our patience is any good. At first it might not be but don’t be afraid they will keep giving you opportunities to develop it!

This really spoke to me not just because I am reading about advent in my own devotions but also because I becoming aware just how impatient I have sometimes been and sense that God is beginning to build this character strength in me.

Thanks for that word Helen.

A Christian Perspective on Positive Psychology

Recently I have been reading through some books on Positive Psychology and trying to get my head round these from a Christian viewpoint. In doing so I found this series of talks by John Van Sloten from New Hope Church Calgary. You can find Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4 on YouTube. I found these talks really helpful as he looks at one of these books that I have been reading in the light of the Bible. Van Sloten appears to talk regularly on cultural issues relating them to the Bible. I am finding these talks very inspiring and relevant.

Van Sloten’s starting point is that an optimistic outlook gives you more confidence for life – life feels more do-able when we feel positive. He argues that positive emotions and thoughts are a gift from God who made us with positive psychological capacities to give us a full life – to be fully human and to know God fully. For instance, in Martin Seligman’s book Authentic Happiness we find this capacity inside of us whereas in the Bible we find this capacity outside of us – from God – whose Spirit has come to live within us.

John Van Sloten looks at what this worldwide phenomena of positive psychology and he looks at what one particular this key book Authentic Happiness has to say to the Bible and visa versa. I can identify with the way that Van Sloten felt he had to overcome a prejudice that ‘positive thinking’ was denial of truth. But I would tend to agree that there is a deeper understanding in Seligman’s book than I have found with positive thinking or positive confession teaching.

Van Sloten goes on to draw some interesting parallels between the signature strengths outlined and spiritual gifts and fruit of the spirit as defining characteristics that God has given us to enable us to live out of God’s love including loving ourselves – not in a selfish way – but in order to love others.

He relates the psychology phenomena of flow – when you are totally lost in a moment and time stops for you – to the Biblical idea of joy. He sees both of these as being times when we are doing what we are here to do when we are working to overcome a challenge by making things right. Perhaps worship when we are in this flow with God in mind?

He quoted Seligman “Flow occurs when the challenges you face perfectly mesh with your abilities to meet them” He then compares this to something he had often heard Christian preachers say, “Your calling is where your greatest gifts and talents meet the worlds greatest needs.”

As I have been listening to these talks I am getting more and more convinced that there is a lot to be gained from looking at books like Authentic Happiness and other books on positive psychology and examining them from a Christian perspective. Of course it is important to do this with discernment and I am particularly wary of a superficial positive perspective.

How To Make Money Blogging

Darren Rowse’s blog ProBlogger is an excellent blog that tells you how to make money by blogging and I have just noticed a recent post that tells me he has also started running on online course. Such bloggers the latest types infopreneurs – entrepreneurs who trade in information. Infopreneurs are not new. They used to sell there own books and recordings of their talks and conferences. Now they blog.

So how can writing a blog make you money? According to blogs and books like Problogger the basic idea is that you write some good stuff – “killer content” and attract readers to your blog and get them to keep coming back for more. You need to understand who you are writing for and develop one or more niche markets but basically you write about what you know or are interested in and find others that are also interested in those things. It sounds like an ideal job!

The money comes from adding adverts with links. AdSense being one of the most common but there are also partnerships with, for example, Amazon and even Ebay that you can develop so that you make referrals to them. This is called “monetizing” your blog. When people click through the ads it earns you money.

You can also sell things over the internet that will interest your niche market. This will probably be books or ebooks based on the content of your blog. Darren says that you shouldn’t worry too much about the fact that you give so much information away for free on your blog – as surprising people do still pay for a repackaged version of your blog with that 10% that you held back. He calls this the bikini effect. The more you reveal just increases the desire for small parts that are hidden!

Looking at Amazon the book ProBlogger by Darren Rowse and Chris Garret (updated to it’s second edition this year) is the best selling book on this subject. But I still think you should take the subtitle of Darren & Chris’s book with a pinch of salt – ‘Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income’! It sounds like a lot of work to even attempt to make it that successful and they don’t recommend giving up you day job until you are getting a reasonable income to live on.

Neverless I might have a go!

Reservoir Mural

reservoir mural
Originally uploaded by dave & nettes.

As part of Ladywood Arts Trail along with local residents we painted a mural on the wall of the Tower Ballroom on Edgbaston Reservoir. It was really good to get involved with this initiative. Thanks to Phillipa Allenby from Springs To Life and the All Being Well team at Karis Neighbour Scheme.

Recommended reading for Sunday School teachers

At a recent training day for children’s workers in our church Sam Donoghue mentioned some books. I have just got around to reading some reviews and previews of them and they look really good. I have used previews in Amazon some for some time to read samples of books to see if I want to buy them. But I am discovering that google books can have much longer previews.

The Growth of Love by Keith White doesn't have a preview but has some reviews here and here.

The Spirit of the Child by David Hay has a preview available here through google books.

Children’s Spirituality by Rebecca Nye also has a preview available here through google books. And this one looks like the best of the bunch. Enjoy.

Prayer and Awareness Day

In September I went to a day hearing about and praying for those working with the homeless and drug addicts in our city.



Reach Out Network

The day was run by Reach Out Network a small organisation of several volunteers who venture out into the city centre with food that they distribute to rough sleepers in Birmingham. They chat about Jesus and offer referrals to others who work with the homeless.

This was their third Prayer and Awareness Day – a chance to hear from related organisations and to pray for their work. This time it was hosted in the premises of Betel of Britain. We discussed and prayed for a number of projects. Here are just some of the highlights of the day.



life for the world

Patrick Prosser from Life For The World told us how - after setting up rehabilitation centres themselves - they responded to the call to “stop reaching the few and to equip the church to reach the many”. They set up training courses on the best way for churches to rise to the challenge of reaching out to those with addiction without suffering burn out or being taken to the cleaners. They now have a certificate course validated by the University of Gloucester that they are running nationwide and want to start a class here in Birmingham.



redeeming our communities

Patricia Hoskins – project co-ordinator for the Birmingham branch of Redeeming Our Communities, explained how they were linking together organisations such as the police, council groups, residence groups and churches and other faith groups to bring people together in unity to make a positive change in our city. Redeeming Our Communities is planning a launch event at the NIA on the evening of Tuesday 16th November with the aim to map the good things that are happening across Birmingham and inspire people to do more. 

Betel of Britain, Birmingham 

We also heard from Betel of Britain in whose premises the day was based. This is a Christian rehabilitation community that has bases in a number of UK cities and has links in Spain and the States. We heard the story of one of the members of the community including how community life had changed helped him to get free from his previous addictions. Kent Martin the director of Betel of Britain then spoke about some the difficulties that Betel had been through over the past few years and how he had learnt to develop a deeper tolerance of God's mysteries and learnt to trust God in trials rather than to put God on trial.

This was a really profitable time and Reach Out Network hope to run another Awareness Day in a few months time.

Greenbelt Music Reviews

If you look closely you might be able to find three of my reviews in the Cross Rhythms’ Greenbelt music reviews this year. I reviewed Grace’s performance of Landskapes, the King\Cave Project and Transcendence. Just search the pages for Dancin' Dave Derbyshire.  

Greenbelt's Worship Co-operative



photo by mr ush

The venue that I frequented the most at this year's Greenbelt was the Worship Co-operative. For many years now Greenbelt has been the home of new creative forms of worship that were pioneered in the 90s as alternative worship. This year instead of having individual sessions run by different alternative worship communities there were four all day worship sessions each one run by a few groups working together with a common theme.

One Friday the theme was peripheral visions and I dropped in and explored prayer stations looking at writing at unusual angles through mirrors, finding a sculpture of a cross that only made sense from one angle and listening to CD with a short talk on the paralysed man while lying on my back. An interesting thought from this was that often disabled people may not be given a choice about what they do or where they go so Jesus may have been the first person to give this man a choice when Jesus asked him to take up his bed and walk.

On Saturday the theme was ‘Here Comes Everybody’ based on Clay Shirky’s book that looks at the power of groups and communication and the Ubantu Theology of Desmond Tutu looking at the African ideas of relationship, community and hospitality. I weaved out names into a tapestry, wrote on a prayer wall and had my photo taken to go on another wall all while images played on screens around the room picking up on the this theme.

Sunday was ‘Life As Jazz’ and it was good to pop in with my little daughter Callie. There were four stations outlining four moods of Jazz: a strident/angry station where we hammered in a nail, a celebration station where we could have a drink of juice at the jazz party, a jazz/blues station where we could be sad or poignantly reflective or a cool jazz station where we could relax as if on a beach and Callie could draw on postcards. I came back in the evening the King/Cave Project was playing.

On Monday morning I found a very different musical style as Blackthorn Crescent were playing some rock songs as I explored the stations looking at the theme of ‘on the edge’. I found this deeply moving as I explored stations that looking out the idea of being an insider and an outsider based on the story of Legion and the story of Hagar. One activity involved writing two labels one with a name you had been called that labelled you an outsider and the other with a name you owned such as a profession or interest. You ripped up the first label and sprinkled it into a mush from which new paper could be made and you new label embedded.

I dropped in for about 45 minutes each time but this venue had me coming back each day to see what was happening each day. And I wasn’t disappointed.

Our Messy Church is called Family Church

Over August our church has doing other things such as barbecues rather than our usual Sunday gatherings. One Saturday two or three weeks ago and we did our own version of Messy Church called Family Church. "Centred around creativity, hospitality and celebration" our aim was, like Messy Church, "...to help other families that might not have any church connection to discover the fun of following Jesus together."

We had a number of activities including craft, cake decoration, street dance, sports and a spot of bike maintenance. We told the story of Zacchaeus and a number of the children – including our little daughter Callie - sung ‘I am a friend of God’. Finally we all had a meal together. There lots of new people joined us and it was a really good time.

More photos on facebook here.

Birmingham Alive Mission

Our church recently had a mission. This meant that several of us were busy for a few days experimenting with different ways of having conversations about God and serving people.

Here are a just few examples of the sorts of things that we were up to:

• We delivered some free Christian literature around the houses close to where we often meet and were presently surprised by the positive responses we received. It was good to be a listening ear to people and people remembered us doing community clear-ups, carol singing and free barbeques.

• We chatted with in coffee shops.

• One evening we went out with Paul & Jackie distributing sandwiches and teas and coffees to people sleeping rough in Birmingham city centre – chatting and praying with people as we went.

• A few of the team were out late the following night having a conversation in one of the bars in Bindley Place. The original plan was to head for clubs on Broad Street and I thought it might not be my scene. But they had a good conversation in a quiet bar so I think I’ll join them next time.

• We joined in with a nearby Vineyard Church in their Healing in the Streets. We were impressed how gently this was done and we found many people spontaneously coming to us for prayer.

Throughout the whole mission I really enjoyed the conversations we had both with others and among ourselves. Being an introvert it was encouraging to me to rediscover that you don’t have to be a extravert to do this sort of thing.

This was all very exciting!

Community Fun Day

Massage
Originally uploaded by dave & nettes.

I have just loaded a few photo's from this year's Community Fun Day onto our photostream on flickr. I have added these to last year's photos in the Community Fun Day set. As a church we were involved in setting up and stewarding just like last year. And we ran the Prayer Tent again.

Related post: Reflections on the Community Fun Day

72 Christian leaders meet at Antioch to seek God about mission, the kingdom and apostles

antioch 2009

An Evening With A Real Live Apostle

Last week our church met with Alan Scotland. He had just returned from Thailand and mentioned how micro-industries were being set up to save children from prostitution. Alan works as an apostle and heads up Lifelink International our little network of churches.

Alan discussed with us the role of the apostle and the apostolic ministry. He looked at Ephesians 4 which talks about the ministries of apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers which he saw all working together in relationship to produce growth - each ministry being like a different finger of a hand. He talked about how apostles worked together in what he called ‘apostolic companies’. These weren’t just teams working on job but companions who were also friends.

He showed that an apostle wasn’t necessarily a church planter but someone who was sent by God. This might involve pioneering but it might also involve building up the church. Alan himself spends a lot of his time in the background supporting church leaders. Having discussed this tension he went on to explain how the church itself should be apostolic. The true church is a church sent by God on a mission. ‘This mission is glocal’, he said, ‘both local and global at the same time’, as in the HSBC slogan ‘The World's Local Bank’

Alan talked about the diversity of the early apostles and discussed how today each church, he works alongside as an apostle, is unique. He mentioned Jonathon Sax’s book on diversity The Dignity of Difference and discussed how he saw this diversity in the church as being like a family – messy at times. And though it might involve fights and fall outs – it certainly did in the book of Acts – there is a great sense of purpose as we all work together for God.

UPDATE: It is worth checking out the account of Alan's recent visit to Syria with the Awareness Foundation whose work involve dialogue between Christians and Muslims. In the video Alan makes is an impassioned plea for peace in the Middle East.