I have been looking forward to this day for ages and, although I could not agree with everything I heard in its totality, I was not disappointed in the day.

Some on blogs (Steve, Maggi)have expressed concern at the Australian macho view of church, but I must admit that was not the view I came away with. I have checked with Sarah – it’s so novel us two going to a conference together, it’s a bit like a date! – and she did not detect the macho bit either. Maybe today’s presentation was different to last nights?

The day was provocative in many ways. The one downside of the day was that loads of information was forthcoming and I am not sure if I have had time to process it all yet. There are some points that did hit me, however, that will no doubt stay with me.

Alan Hirsch did the middle, more theoretical, part of the day. His whole presentation came form one question; that being, how did the early church, which was illegal and oppressed by the Roman Empire grow from 25 000 in 100AD, to 27 million in 300AD? Its a good question worth consideration, one which I would guess if we could crack would give us clues for how to be church in the 21st Century.

Others have spoken of liminality and communitas, but they are not points thatb hit me so much. I was excited by comments such as discipleship needing to be a core activity of the church and our Christology should determine our Missiology which in turn affects our Ecclesiology. In other words, our relationship with Christ should affect our mission and that in turn determines what church is like. Too often we reverse our missiology and ecclesiology in that statement.

These two statements got a big agreement from me. For a while I have noticed shallowness in so many in churches. I think the only way to challenge this is through discipleship. Our people do not know some f the stuff that we take for granted!

Although Alan was good I did find Mike far easier to listen to. He shared far more stories and gave practical applications to the theory we were hearing. At the start of the day Mike shared 4 foundations for a missional church:

1. Proximity – between Christians and non-Christians

2. Prescence – and asking what would Jesus do here in this situation?

3. Powerlessness – an abandonment of instituonal authority

4. Proclamation – someone, somewhere, somehow, has to proclaim Jesus.

Mke ended the day by challenging us, as individuals to life with 5 principles:

1. Holiness – a provocative holiness which is noticed

2. Prayer – for more evangelists, their blessing and by name for those not yet Christians

3. Socialise – with those who don’t know Christ

4. Pool our resources to fund the evangelists

5. Be prepared to answer questions which will come if we follow 1 – 4!

As a whole the day was very provocative and not too different from the principles of Provocative Church.

Clearly Hirsch and Frost have a difficulty with organised or institutional church. There can be a tendancy to try and replace what is already there with the ‘new’ idea. I firmly believe it needs to be a ‘both and’, and not an ‘either or’ approach. The institution, for all its faults, is hitting it in places and meeting a very big need. To lose it would be a travesty.

There does, though, need to be an understanding and trust between both. Both can co-exist as long as both realise that they are both part of the solution and neither have unrealsitic expectations of the other. I’ll elaborate on tht thought at a later date as its getting late!

And … all my aims of the day … they were met – got together with good friends and met Gordon from blog fame for the first time (thanks for coming to say hello), which was cool!

Thanks Jonny for the day – well worth the trek to the big city!