The Catalyst Conference

Last Thursday and Friday I was able to attend the Catalyst Conference where I got to hear Andy Stanley, Louie Giglio, Donald Miller, Malcolm Gladwell and Erwin McManus speak. I've just been going through my notes and I'm overwhelmed at the knowledge God imparted to me through these speakers in just a short amount of time. I want to make sure I unwrap it all and do so slowly so that I don't miss anything but for today I wanted to share with you the notes I took from Erwin McManus' session. By far, he was the one who spoke to me the most and I believe he is speaking to the church. He is a prophetic voice for this time. So, I thought I would share.

John 9. This is the Scripture verse where Jesus heals a blind man by putting spitting in the dirt, making mud and putting it on his eyes. Then he tells the blind man who now has mud all over his face to go to the pool of Siloam and wash it off. Right! How does the blind man get there? Why doesn't Jesus just touch him and heal him? Erwin explained that the word Siloam means sent. And here's where it starts to get really good.

We're all chasing daylight - like the blind man. Sometimes we're just like the blind man, walking around with mud caked on our face but we all must go to the place we're sent. Jesus won't do everything for us - he wants us to go. He's sending us. There are some things Jesus leaves for us to do. Many times it doesn't make sense to anyone else except us.

Then Erwin said there are five paradigm shifts the church has to make in order to stop being relevant and to start leading the way! We let culture dictate our order, our programs, our ministry. We need to be leading the way, not trying to catch up. He said that the following five things will enable us to lead the way.

1. We need to shift from standardization to uniqueness. We're known for standardization. We tell people they have to become like everyone else. We lose our instinct for what's real. If you want to find out God's unique fingerprint on your life go where Jesus is.

2. We need to move from utility to creativity. We plug people in rather than try to light them up. (I think this one was my favorite one) Move from visionary to visional. Move from a dream God has given us to a people who God has given dreams! We need to become a people who believe in the passionate gifting of every human being. Become the place where people discover that people were created to create. The sin that is consuming us is average. The defining moment of this movement is that it would be full of dreamers and visionaries.

3. We need to shift from homogeny to diversity. We need to be a place where we actually start liking people (yikes) - people different than us. You want people to go to church with you but you don't want people to live their lives with you. You want the church to be a lie. People don't leave their tribes without their leaders. Make space for leaders who are different than us. Homogeny communicates that we are everything. People should be your highest value. Go out and love them into a relationship with God.

4. Reject pragmatism and move toward mysticism. People are becoming increasingly spiritual and people are walking away from the church because they don't consider the church spiritual enough. We are intrinsically spirits and we know stuff we don't know how we know (he gave the example here of Peter knowing Christ was the Son of God and Jesus told him there was no other way he could have known that than by the spirit). Step into the invisible reality of the kingdom of God. You know when you love someone? You can't test that. We need to become a movement of mystical warriors. People are looking for evidence that you have been with God.

5. Shift from conviction to compassion! (My heart sang and was convicted all at the same time over this one.) The Holy Spirit convicts. He tells us to go and be compassion and wrap them in this insane love. People without God are asking if love really exists.

All this that is happening is to bring him glory - even if we have to go there with mud on our face.

Woohoo! Go Erwin! That's all I wanted to say for the rest of the day!