Is Your Carbon Footprint a Spiritual Issue?

That question hit me this morning … well, actually it blasted across every uncovered part of my body where my skin was exposed to the wind as I zipped across town on my moped. I kept thinking over and over how inconvenient it is trying to save money, cut down on emissions, and live more simply. There’s nothing like jumping in my SUV, flipping on ESPN radio, making it cozy warm inside and leisurely driving over to my mobile office (Starbucks). As I began building up speed while descending the first big hill going 45 mph I felt like a frozen piece of meat strapped to a moped. “This is ridiculous,” I thought and it was only 40 degrees outside. I’ve been indoors now for an hour and my hands are still cold.

I think there’s something kind of hip and trendy when we talk of reducing our carbon footprint and living more simply. If you were to drop some of the things you’re doing into a conversation at a party people begin nodding their heads approvingly and feeling a little guilty about their 10 mpg SUV they’re cruising town in. Have you ever wondered out loud or to yourself, “Hmmm, I wonder what God thinks of all of this?”  When it comes down to it the nuances of your theology and “end times” will influence how you answer that. If God is going to simply destroy this giant planet we call home then why bother? If God isn’t going to destroy it but instead simply renovate that that has different implications for the way we’re to live now.

We’ve just come through (and still are) many years of the negative affect of being an industrialized nation. No wonder people (Christians and others alike) looked at cities with such negativity and even hostility and why not?  The living conditions were deplorable, the skyline was littered with belching smoke stacks that emitted a stinky haze over cities, and factory life was no walk in the park. Bad cities led to bad living conditions which led to bad health and while in the West we have a spiritual/physical dichotomy all of this ends up in reality being a spiritual issue. Polluted cities and rivers is a spiritual issue.

So then, does God care that we individually and collectively reduce our carbon footprint?  Why YES! When we do so our cities are better places to live which means living conditions are better, people are more healthy, and it is difficult to be overtly spiritual when you’re dead or dying from atrocious living conditions. I remember a number of years ago hearing Mark Driscoll talk about living a balanced and sustainable life.  His first point was that you need to be in good health.  It’s kind of hard to to pursue spiritual disciplines if you’re not taking care of yourself.

Our carbon footprint is a spiritual issue.  What affects us physically affects us spiritually and vice versa. It is like how some groups talk about the evils of alcohol when they’re grossly overweight or nursing their own caffeine addictions. Urban life is an amplifier of all of these kinds of issues. Your carbon footprint is not simply an individual preference because in a city it affects all who’re around you. If you were to have 10,20,100 people all doing the same in a neighborhood you have the beginnings of a movement. This one decision can influence another one to do the same and so the trend goes. It’s not about being trendy but a modern way to still be a good neighbor.

Planting a Non-Auto Dependent Church

What would it look like to plant a church where the primary mode of transportation was NOT an automobile?  How would that drastically change the way you go about things.  I remember reading about the sociological phenom behind mega-churches with two of those factors being (1) needing 100 feeder churches and (2) a dependence upon the automobile. Before it sounds like I’m anti-mega church that’s not true. Church is church and as the body of Christ does it really matter whether we gather in a house or large auditorium? What I’m trying to say is that what would it look like if we went about planting churches in urban centers where the primary mode of transportation was either by foot, bicycle or moped, or public transportation?

I know we can point to a few examples of churches that are large in these contexts but they’re exception and not the norm. So what does this mean? Maybe this will bring forth the rise of more walkable niche churches? A question you may want to ask as you begin exegeting your community is, “How walkable is the neighborhood?” A GREAT resource to figure that out is Walk Score. In that website you can look at a color-coded google map of your city to see how walkable your neighborhood is.  If it is a highly walkable area then how do you use that to gain traction for when you plant your church?

More than likely there are cultural factors that play into walkable neighborhoods. People often times move into those places because they like the compactness, the easy accessibility of close-by amenities, and even the relational advantage by seeing more people out and about on foot. If you’re planting in one of these neighborhoods then what could you do to tap in? How do you make your new church plant a good cultural fit for the neighborhood? How could you position yourself to be viewed as building a stronger community in your neighborhood? Another feature of these areas often times is expressions of “new urbanism.” In a nutshell, as the link to the website reveals, “new urbanism is an urban design movement, which promotes walkable neighborhoods that contain a range of housing and job types.” How does your new church plant fit into what is already taking place in the city?

Since God is at work in your city shaping and reshaping it then how will your new church fit into it? I realize that when we talk of “God moving” we do so in the context of what happens on Sunday mornings, but if we believe that God is sovereign then we must believe He’s shaping the nations and even our cities. The mass urbanization taking place globally then must be looked at as an act of a sovereign God bringing the nations to our cities. As people flock to the cities and movements like new urbanism crop up then as new church plants we then can use the momentum and traction already in place to plant new churches and see city-dwellers come to faith in Christ.

You see, if you take away the auto as a key role in growing churches it forces is to look at church planting and church growth in a whole new light.

Planting Churches in Compact Urban Cores

It would seem that most church planting material produced today is geared toward reaching suburbanites who live in single family homes in the suburbs. While there are exceptions here and there by and large most of what we hear is on reaching a homogeneous group of people (mostly White) with an attractional model of church where the key is fast-paced growth through the Sunday worship gatherings. But what if you live in a city where most people live in densely packed multi-story condos/apartments/townhomes/lofts?

While many look at this as a problem or obstacle I instead see it as an opportunity. Sure with every place there are ways to gain traction as well as obstacles to overcome and this is true whether rural or urban or suburban. But what about high rises residential buildings? Many small towns across the country have hundreds and into the thousands of people who live there, but what if one building alone houses 1,000 people?  What would you do as a church planter?  How would you meet them while living in a compact urban core? For the most part the mega church phenom has been based upon a highly mobile demographic that’s auto-dependent. What if most people walk, ride bikes or mopeds, or use public transportation?  Again, like I’ve been saying the the key to church planting can be found in exegeting your context.  So what does a densely compact urban core tell you about how to go about planting a church?

Well, first of all you need to live there.  What better way to access the hundreds or thousands who reside in one building than if you lived there yourself?  This is church planting from the inside-out. Ok, so you’re there. You’ve moved from a nice ranch-style 2,050 sf house in the suburbs to a tight 1,100 sf apartment in the downtown core with your family.  Now what? How do you connect with people you may or may not ever see?  First of all, what does your building have to offer?  Are there public and natural gathering areas for people?  A grassy area for kids or pets? Are there commercial businesses on the bottom floor like a gym or coffee shop? What about hanging out in any of those places to meet and connect with people? What if you met with the management of the building and talked to them about being a program director for the building. You could help put on “connection nights” for the residents whether it is movie nights, game nights, and so much more. The possibilities and opportunities are endless.

Planting in compact urban cores is a unique experience. As you exegete your area you’re looking for ways to gain traction.  Recognize the obstacles because they’ll be there regardless of where you go. One of the key differences between living in a single family home vs. a multi-housing unit is where you take pride or find your identity. For the person living in a single family home it’s about what the house looks like, the yard, and so on.  This is all private space. But in the compact city core you find pride and identity in public places … the parks, the sidewalks and streetscape, and so on. How does that affect the way you do church planting?

You can plant in compact urban cores.  While the principles stay mostly the same the way you go about applying them is a totally different game.

Vancouver Bound!

The news is out … we’re heading to Vancouver, British Columbia to jump back into the swirling vortex of church planting.  We excited, sobered, scared, and walking with God each step of the way because this is the biggest faith adventure we’ve ever taken! We came last fall to Illinois where I assumed the role of Director of Next Gen Ministries (campus ministry and church planting) for the Southern Baptist Convention of Illinois.  It has been a great time, the state staff is amazing, and the Next Gen/church planting team is uber cool but in the end almost immediately upon arrival I knew we weren’t going to be here long term.  I spent A LOT of countless hours wrestling with God, seeking Him, trying to submit to Him to ascertain what was going on … was I supposed to have come in the first place?  Did I miss something?  Or did He need us here before he got us there?

All I can say is that it has been a rich and refining time for us which has brought us closer to God than ever before.  So why Vancouver?  This story has several parts to it that all flow together.  Right out of college me and Katie spent the summer in SE Alaska working at a camp.  We so loved the experience and the area that we desperately wanted to come back some day.  It’s funny, I’ve heard from several people that it was their first missions trip/experience that God used to bring them back to the same area for long term.  Since we went there in 1997 I have not been able to stop thinking of the Pacific NW. We knew somehow, someway, and somewhere we’d come back.

It’s funny because that experience even influenced where I was to work on my doctorate because 3 years ago I started my program at Bakke Graduate University in Seattle.  The school itself is awesome and because it was in the Pacific NW sold me on it … it was like a homing device found in birds. I knew I had to go. A few years ago while at one of my first courses there in Seattle I drove up and spent a couple of days in Vancouver.  I had heard a lot about it, how it’s a world-class city, and a model for cities around the world.  I had to check it out.  So I did and fell helplessly and hopelessly in love with it but more importantly with the people in it.  I was hooked!

Since that day it has been lots of prayer and an ongoing discussion between me and Katie about going there.  There were times where we were both afraid or that the timing wasn’t right and so on.  Off and on I’ve kept contact with Ray Woodard who’s the church planting coach there for the Vancouver Church Planting (WestCoast Baptist Assoc.).  In march while on a trip to Seattle I drove up there again to meet with Ray and from that time on we had decided to start moving our life’s trajectory in that direction.  We did have the opportunity to do some church planting strategist work in Seattle while in transition but it wasn’t a good fit in that they needed someone long term and our heart was still in Vancouver.

So here we are … inching out onto this limb feeling a sense of bewildered excitement as well as trying to battle fear as we now have the daunting task of raising funds to live and plant churches in Vancouver which is a very expensive city.  But God is bigger than all of this.  Like the story of the 12 spies, who checked out the land of Canaan that God has gave them, I pray daily that I’d be like the 2 spies (Joshua and Caleb) who saw God’s hand in it all and not the obstacles like the other 10 did.

So what will we do?  Plant churches … and Lord willing a city-wide network called the Ion Community.  This way of doing and being church has been brewing within me for quite some time.  I’m now ready to see it become a reality.  For the past 4 years I’ve been a church planting strategist and Next Gen Director and while they’ve been great experiences I can’t escape the desire to “get back into the game” and do it.  I don’t have any illusions about this as I know it’ll be insanely difficult work and I know full well that if God doesn’t show up I will fail.  Nevertheless we will trust God and step out in faith.

I’d like to invite you to pray for us. I’m building a team of 100 people who will pray for us each and every week.  Would you be willing?  Click on Ion to join our Facebook group, click on Twitter to follow Ion, or visit our website at http://www.ioncommunity.org.

Blessings,

Sean & Katie Benesh

Demographic Profiling

Sometimes I wonder about the way we plant churches and how we “target” people.  Before we get any further into this I’m the first to admit that I do this as well. I’ve heard all sorts of arguments for and against any notion of demographic profiling.  We call this target groups, focus groups, target audience, and all the other terms we’ve picked up from the marketing world.  Is this wrong?  Maybe the question is … can we even not do this?

The reality is that if you use a website for your church you’re already narrowing your demographic profile and excluding those who don’t have computers.  When you start speaking a certain language you automatically include as well as exclude.  If you use English then you’re “discriminating” against all non-English speakers in your city. Your music styles are exclusive whether it’s Sinatra-esque or a style like the Black-Eyed Peas. Your dress is exclusive.  The way you communicate truth is exclusive.  Regardless of what you do by the very things you do or avoid doing you’re going to include some and exclude others.  I’m not too sure if there’s any way around this.

But does there have to be any way around it?  Is it really that wrong?  You wouldn’t expect a church meeting in a Burmese rural village to look, feel, and be the same as a church in Manhattan … would you?  Probably not.  Maybe we need to realize that while yes the church universal IS incredibly ethnically and culturally diverse it doesn’t mean that every local body needs to be that way.  Right or wrong?  Is it possible?  Should it be normative?  What should we do with this?

Church Planting in the Global City

It’s easy for us to lose perspective because our reference point is our own life and the duration we’ve been alive. Sometimes I know I fall into the trap of thinking that the way things are reflect the way they’ve always been.  Not so, especially in the growth and development of our cities.  Take Chicago for example, just a mere 160 years ago there were only about 4,000 people living there.  160 years is not that long ago … and poof!  World class city! Or take Tucson, Arizona.  Between 1940 and 1950 the population jumped from 44,000 to 212,000.  Poof!  My first reaction is … what’s next?  In the next 10-20-30 years what city is going to sky rocket in growth?

How does this influence and affect church planting?  Cities are complex indeed.  The New Urban Frontier is found in the sprawling edges where the population explodes while the core of the city struggles and loses revenue. It does make sense that the majority of our church planting efforts are indeed along the edges since that’s where the growth is.  How does the church continue to morph and adapt to rapidly-growing globally-linked cities?  It’s now more common to find churches with branch campus or satellite worship gatherings in other cities and even other countries.  Multi-site venues are not strictly for the seeker churches.  Mars Hill in Seattle has a video venue in Albuquerque now.

The front edge of missions is truly the global city and no longer in the jungles. The complexity and diversity of the city will give church planting initiatives a run for their money.  So far from what I’ve seen (as an outside observer) is that these multi-sites and video venues are still primarily among Anglos.  Again, I said primarily. What about immigrant enclaves in each of our cities? What about whole swaths of our nation who’s cultural roots are non-Western?  Will such things as video venues work among a high-rise full of Iraqis in downtown Vancouver? Will it work in Chinatown in NYC?  What about Hispanic South Tucson?

None of this isn’t to say that we’re to stop doing what we’re doing at all.  Keep going because as we continue to adapt we’ll better figure out how to intigrate internationals / immigrants in our church planting efforts.  This is the most exciting epoch in our world’s history to be alive.  God is up to something amazing!

The Ionic Infusion

Ionic Infusion? I think I just made that up … have no idea what that means. I was a horrible student in all things science in high school and I vaguely remember taking generic science classes in college.  The labs were always fun because we all felt like we were the precursors of the Mythbusters except any explosion was merely accidental.

Tonight as I was sitting in Barnes and Noble I started thinking of the Ion Community which I had blogged about a few months ago. I began wondering what it’d be like to plant a church simultaneously in 2 different cities in 2 different countries.  I started going through a logistics check-list in my mind and that brought up a series of questions … who would lead? How would leadership be done? Would this be led by one dude or by an “apostolic band of merry men” straight from Sherwood Forest (minus the green tights)?  What would the gathering(s) look like?  Simple?  In a home? In some neutral venue? To what degree or not would it be attractional? How would we ensure diversity?  How would we pull this off with little to no resources?

I really believe (and firmly!) that it cane be done.  As a matter of fact I don’t think it’d be as complicated as it sounds. The common denominator would be they’d be city centric churches located somewhere downtown (or within 5 minutes of the central business district). It’d be very international and the bottom line is that the Gospel would be communicated clearly whether that be through unabashed teaching or in its application as we invest in the different levels of the city whether we’re seeking to offer hope to women cuaght in sex trafficking, immigrants who’re struggling to gain a foothold in their new host country (and city), or little kiddos who’re wrestling with their identity since they have one cultural foot in their homeland and one in their new country.

I think we’d start non-profits as we set out to launch the church (if we can use launching as a good descriptor anymore).  Maybe an outdoor adventure company that offers battered women’s groups or low income school children the chance and opportunity to experience the surrounding mountain in a safe and educational way.  Maybe we’d start a coffee house to offer recent immigrants employment. Maybe we’d start a bike co-op teaching teens how to work on and build bikes which we’d give to homeless people. Maybe we’d start support groups for women with depression and network with healthcare professionals.

The more I think about this the more I get amped up about the possibilities.  I think the only thing that’d limit us would be our imaginations.

The Ubiquitous City

I’m constantly impressed with the trajectory of our cities. As more people flock to them and as technology multiplies exponentially it has the potential to create new urban environments that a mere 10-20 years ago seemed like a far off concept like found in a sci-fi movie. Some of these advancements are found and seen here in the U.S. but sometimes it takes leaping over the pond to see how cities are progressively and aggressively advancing.

Like I’ve said in past blogs, to me the built environment of each city is just as important to know and understand as much as who lives where, breakdown of ethnicity, and so on. We can learn so much about a city simply by the way it was laid out, why certain things are in certain places, etc. Take for example, yesterday I drove through downtown St. Louis. A few weeks ago I spent considerable time reading and discussing city rivalries from ancient Athens and Sparta to recent examples like St. Louis vs. Chicago. Obviously STL lost and Chicago won the day as well as the future as the “great Midwest city.” But during the height of the Industrial period STL was a tragic example of deplorable conditions that wouldn’t be good even for animals.  You see, built environments are important for health and sustainability.

Korea is pioneering the concept of a U-City … “ubiquitous city.” Another term you could insert for ubiquitous that is more common in our Christian verbage would be “ominpresent” and it’s in reference to information technology.  These new cities are all wired (or wireless) and held together via information technology.  Everything is virtually linked. I know, you’re probably starting to have flash backs to movies like Terminator or iRobot.

What’s cool is that cities like these are being BUILT FROM SCRATCH.  Imagine that, whole cities … built from nothing.  Everything is new … buildings, parks (and lots of them), infrastructure, everything.  One such city is Songdo (or New Songdo City) outside of Seoul. If you want your mind blown click on Songdo to check out the website.

Again, like in everything I discuss in regards to the city … how does this affect church planting?  What will the future of church planting looks like in urban environments like this?  I’d really love to hear your feedback …

New Urbanism in Small City, USA

It’s funny, I post on New Urbanism last night and as I sit here this morning at the Coffee Hound in Normal, IL I’m looking out the window at the reality of this concept unfolding before me. Home to Illinois State University downtown (or actually called Uptown) Normal is going through a revitalization process of its own as they apply principles of New Urbanism.  Wider sidewalks, beautified streetscape, new incoming trendy apartment lofts, right next to the university, shops and restaurants galore … and my first question always is, “Where’s the church?”

I know the inherent dangers of chasing after such things as New Urbanism because these types of areas attract young urban singles and DINKS (double-income no kids) who tend to be white collar, have discretionary income, and so on.  Often times areas being revitalized are older, thus have great character, and have fallen on hard times.  Usually lower income working class people live in the area. But when a place becomes a hotbed and building and retrofitting sets in the cost of living sky rockets which forces working class families out (maybe not so much in Normal, IL). A church could be planted in these areas and be just as homogeneous as the suburbs and the poor/lower class will only continued to be marginalized and forgotten.

My dream would be to plant churches in these hotbeds with a church having a distinct missional ecclesiology.  The trajectory is outward and all people are loved and cared for whether that be mainstream or marginalized.  It could be akin to some of the apostle Paul’s writings where he talks about how when we’re in Christ there’s neither Jew nor Gentile, male nor female … poor nor wealthy, white collar nor blue collar nor no-collar, Black nor White nor Yellow, etc.  In Christ we’re all family loving and serving one another as well as our cities.

I’m humbled to live in such a time as this where cities are truly the new frontier in mission whether that be Normal, New Songdo City in South Korea, Dubai (UAE), or wherever.

Suburbanization

It’s always interesting for me to peel back the layers of history to find the source of things. I spent a couple hours last night reading and writing on the influence of ancient Greek urban planners/philosophers and the effect on the modern city today. It’s interesting that you have dudes 2,500 years ago who in essence said things like, “Listen, here’s what you need for good cities … on the street level they need to be appealing to the eye, we should make them aesthetically beautiful for the mental health of city dwellers, the layout of cities should encourage community, and so on.”  Great thoughts for a bunch of toga-wearing guys.

They are right on though, aren’t they?  We saw the opposite effect during the Industrial Revolution where cities turned into ugly over-crowded disease-infested traps with skylines full of belching smoke stacks (this picture of the city still influences our thinking as to why people hate cities today).  It was during this time in the 1800’s where the whole suburbanization concept in some ways took off.  People wanted to get away from these deplorable conditions.  They longed for more open space, safety, clean air, a yard, and thus cities sprawled.  Certain cities like LA grew to prominence because the whole metro area was like a series of suburbs one after another.

However, the tide is shifting again.  Yes, the suburbs did (and continue to do so) grow and expand the city immensely, but now with long commute times and a renewed interest in city living people have begun the slow movement back into the city.  In just about every city in the U.S. they’re in different stages of this inner revitalization which has seen lots of old factories and warehouse torn down or converted into residential dwellings. So my question is, how does this affect church planting?  What are the implications for planting in suburbs as well as the city?  Also, who lives in each? From history we note the trend that from the beginning suburbs attracted conservatives and family-types which means we need to go about church planting vastly differently than the city.

I’ve heard a phrase several times that’s worth repeating, “the heart of city is becoming the new suburbs,” in that more and more people are flocking there, church planting is picking up speed there whereas just a short while ago it was almost always synonomous with the burbs, and again trends shift as we keep pace with our cities.