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  Mark 9:33 am on May 12, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

  Table Questions 

  One of my favorite habits we have in our house church is “Table Questions.”

  It isn’t anything super formal.  We gather in the evening time each week, and begin by sharing a meal.  We share, laugh, pass the potatoes, and catch up on each other’s lives and missions.  It feels like a family reunion of sorts.

  And then, before finishing up our meal and moving on to a time of prayer and worship, someone shares a specific question at the table that helps guide the conversation into a time of discovery, worship and common reflection.

  Table Questions are something you can do in your missional communities, house churches, small groups, or simply your family’s dinner each evening.  It is reminiscent of Jewish practices, where a question is asked at table and there is dialogue and learning – both for the children and adults.  This is where family learning happens!

  The table is a place of safety, a place of unity, a place for partaking in food and each other.

  To be honest, Table Questions, not carefully thought through before asking them, can lead to disaster.  Allow the potentially divisive question to wait for another time - Table Questions draws people out, it doesn’t recoil them into hiding.  It offers a simple starting place for each person to contribute no matter their faith maturity or intelligence, which will help them find their voice later in the evening as you all share in a “worship potluck” (1 Cor 14:26).

  Pass around the responsibility of Table Questions to new leaders in your community.  Give lots of people the chance of fascilitating meaningful conversation.  Even non-believers in your gatherings can lead this!  It gives all a sense of ownership, and helps the group cultivate new leaders for new churches not-yet-planted around other kitchen tables!

  How to ask a Table Question that leads to life:

  • Understandable. Think about the specific words to use.  Say the question once, and say it succinctly.  Make it easy to understand, and folks will be happy to answer.
  • Perspectives. Ask questions that point not to hard truths, but to one’s experience.  For example, don’t ask a question starting with, “Is it right to…” but instead, try, “When have you ever experienced…”
  • Value-Driven. Draw on questions that might lead to values your community holds.  For instance, ask, “What does love look like in your life?”
  • Collaborative Questions. Avoid trial matters.  Avoid doctrinal matters.  Avoid political positions.  Again, these things can wait for another time, perhaps later in the evening, or at another gathering all-together.  The aim here is to cultivate collaboration, not competition.
  • Have Fun. Give people opportunities to tell their own story.  Ask them to share favorite memories, challenging circumstances, and more from their own life.  Keep a playful spirit about you.  And always give people the chance to ‘pass.’

  Great ways to start a Table Question:

  • “When have you ever…”
  • “How might we…”
  • “In your experience, what does ______ look like?”
  • “If you could say one thing to someone else in the room that would build them up, what would you say?”

  The table is a sacred space for humans.  It is where our LORD waits for us – a great banquet table.  I am sure there will be many questions asked at that table (mostly, us asking God all those BIG questions we have for him…), imagine your Table Questions as an echo to that banquet feast coming soon in Heaven!

  

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    Sean Durbin 4:05 pm on May 12, 2011 Permalink

    I LOVE table questions!

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  Mark 9:26 am on May 5, 2011 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Exponential Conference ( 2 )   

  #Exponential // Handy churches 

  What could you learn from an illiterate Indian woman half a world away?

  At the recent Exponential Conference, (the world’s America’s largest gathering of church planters) we heard David Garrison author of Church Planting Movements and global research maven talk about something he picked up from Indian church planters.  He did by simply showing us his hand, and I don’t mean deck of cards.

  Holding up his hand, he gave us a simple acronym used to help Indian leaders reproduce leaders among the hundreds of thousands of churches being planted right now across that nation.  He learned it from others, and now I’ll pass it along to you.  (Who will you pass this on to?)

  Hold up your hand, and starting with your thumb, spell out the word P-O-U-C-H.  Imagine a little pouch in the palm of your hand.  This is the descriptive (not necessarily prescriptive) list of elements seen in viral house churches spreading like wildfire among the persecuted peoples of India:

  P- Participative Gatherings.

  We let the Holy Spirit lead, and we all contribute.  No one person sucks up all the oxygen when we gather.  Everyone has a moment to offer what they’re learning from God.  1 Cor 14:26 says, “Well, my brothers and sisters, let’s summarize. When you meet together, one will sing, another will teach, another will tell some special revelation God has given, one will speak in tongues, and another will interpret what is said. But everything that is done must strengthen all of you.”

  O - Obedience to Christ, radically

  There must be a serious, all-in commitment from each person in the group to commit their full lives to Jesus, and to each other.  Nothing short of that will be sustainable, or reproducible for long.  Francis Chan told a story of how he went to China, and spoke with some of the persecuted church there, and when he described what we call church in America (1 hour a week event, many creature comforts, apathy, etc) at first they LAUGHED OUT LOUD – then they asked, “How did you get that picture of church, from this?” (as they held up their Bible) For them, it would be impossible to conceive of apathy in the Chinese church – why give up everything including your safety for nominal beliefs?

  U – Unpaid Multiple Leaders

  Tithes do go to pay for one leader (1 Cor 9:11), or maybe two, but the goal is to ask the leader not to feel responsible for all the teaching, all the evangelism, all the leadership of the larger church.  This leads to burnout.  Instead, segment the tasks and pass them out to multiple, unpaid leaders – this also gives more people a chance a leadership development.  These are not a bunch of volunteers passing out bulletins, these are tomorrow’s church leaders, today!

  C – Cells of 20 Members or less

  Groups made up of 20 adults or less allow the group size to live in that space where everyone knows they’re a part of something bigger, but that it is small enough to ask each person to contribute, thus developing an active, rather than passive church.  This is not your typical “small group” (read Neil Cole’s recent post for more on this).  This is a place where growing disciples come to celebrate and encourage, not to be transformed by a flashy worship service.

  H – Home-centered

  This is more than just a strategy to save your church money on rent.  It drives your church to be the family it already is!  When you meet in homes, it will ruin the segmentation you have created between your church life and your family life – and transformation will happen!  Another way to say this is that the home is the family.  These Cells (MESOs as we call them) can meet anywhere – but its never about the event; its about the family.  There is the hospitality of the home wherever they go.  It is the family metaphors that the Biblical writers used throughout Scripture that make the most sense – a King and a Kingdom, a Father and his children… this is what God is giving birth to here on earth!

  Watching churches in India multiply like rabbits is a joy and it leads me to worship God, who is declaring his glory through these simple and ephemeral families of faith.

  
   
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  Mark 11:45 am on February 22, 2011 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Saint Benedict ( 2 )   

  Dwelling in the Word Together 

  How often does the word “dwell” show up on your personal calendar?  If you are like me, it is exactly never.  But consider the word for a moment.  Dwell. It can mean to “think deeply” about something, it can mean “originating in” a certain space, it can mean “to inhabit or find your home” somewhere, and it can mean “a place to come back to often.”  It is a rich and potent word to “dwell” on.

  So how does someone dwell in a text?  How does an entire community dwell in the Word? Here’s an idea:

  Whenever you meet, as an family of faith, house church, leadership team, training group, work team; spend the first 20-30 minutes dwelling within a particular scripture.  I recommend starting with the text Luke 10:1-12; it is a text of mission, of being sent out with the most basic of instructions, dependent upon our receivers’ hospitality, proclaiming that the Kingdom of God is near!

  As you listen to the text being read, consider how the text impacts you personally, at a family level, at a congregational level, and how it impacts our world.  Let God speak in the silence, as well as in the written words.

  As we consider our decisions and actions in congregations and church bodies, in creating partnerships, in venturing out in mission… this text speaks to us, sometimes moving us forward, sometimes making us think differently about what is happening to us and how we should respond.

  You can have this habit, too.

  1. Choose a passage - perhaps a lectionary text for this coming week, perhaps a passage already meaningful to your group, and read it aloud.
  2. Read the passage 2-3 times, preferably read by different readers each time, and optionally changing translations.
  3. Between each reading, sit silently for 3 minutes, letting certain words, phrases and images to surface in the minds of the participants.
  4. Sit together with the passage, in silence, or in conversation, sharing with one another where your imagination was caught or where a memory was triggered. Let the passage draw you together as a group.
  5. Bring the passage up throughout the day, or when you’re trying to make a decision. See what it says to you then.
  6. Close with a prayer of thankfulness to God for what was revealed.

  Bring up the passage again during the next meeting, in the same manner.

  Live in the passage for several months. It will bring more and more to you as you revisit it!

  Some other Scriptures to get you started in Dwelling in the Word (also known as “Lectio Divina“)

  God “dwells in light” (Ti1 6:16; Jo1 1:7), in heaven (Psa 123:1), in his church (Psa 9:11; Jo1 4:12)