Yes check out the stories and opportunity for dialogue on some of the developing issues at AFiM

Greece has been loaned hundreds of billions of dollars by others in the EU because they can’t get favorable terms for the loan elsewhere. If they took the high interest loans now they would default very quickly. The low interest loans buy time for Greece to reform its economy. But will it be enough? Proverbs 22:7, “The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender”. The bible reminds us that you loose control whenever you get into too much debt. This is true on a personal level as well as for nations. We should pay attention to Greece because the USA is the largest debtor nation in the world; at the moment our creditworthiness seems unlimited. But everything has a limit. People are rioting in the streets of Greece at the stringent measures which their government is forced into adopting. You can bet the Greek government does not like imposing strict financial reforms, but they have no choice. The borrower has to do what the lender says.

Meanwhile Iceland, which was a victim and a cause of much financial stress a couple of years ago, has suffered a major volcano eruption. We actually visited this part of Iceland last summer on our vacation. We spent 12 days touring Iceland and saw the remains of the destruction from the previous eruption. What is different this time is the constant outpouring of ash high into the atmosphere. This ash has disrupted air flights over Europe for months. Natural disasters happen, but because we are so dependent on our high tech lifestyle and the world is so densely populated, natural disasters today have a much larger impact. Proverbs 3:25 “Have no fear of sudden disaster or of the ruin that overtakes the wicked, for the LORD will be your confidence and will keep your foot from being snared.” This does not mean that Christians will be protected from famines, drought, plague or war. But the Lord will be with them in the middle of all of those problems. Think of Job who had multiple disasters come after him at once, yet the Lord was with him to the end.

We have all seen the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and know that this gigantic leak will take a herculean effort to fix. Great damage will be done to our environment and some places may never recover. I am not going to argue for or against oil exploration in this letter. I am not trying to enter the political fray but only wish to point out that we humans are not as clever and competent as we think. Complex systems will always fail at some point. I believe one of the most dangerous temptations we will face as a race in the future will be to harness the ability to change the human genome. We will reach a point soon where we are smart enough to alter our own DNA and redesign the very essence of what it means to be a human being. But we will not have the wisdom to make the right choices. Proverbs 16:3 “Commit to the LORD whatever you do, and your plans will succeed. The LORD works out everything for his own ends even the wicked for a day of disaster.” A Christian should have a healthy respect for the environment and human nature as God created us to be. We must learn to function within the limits the Lord sets for us.

Problems from Greece, oil and ash may come and go but as Christians our hope is in the name of the Lord who promises to take his followers through the disaster. Meanwhile it provides wonderful opportunities for witnessing to a broken world who may be more open to listen to the voice of the Lord in the midst of a personal disaster. Ten years ago Ireland was a nation fairly closed to the gospel. They were enjoying the novel prosperity of an economic boom and turning away for the first time from Roman Catholicism. But now the economy is shattered and the intuitional Church discredited, but many of the people are hungering for a lively faith in Christ. One which makes sense of fallen human nature and the complex world in which we live. New church plants are popping up across the country and many are coming to faith.

Proverbs 16: “To man belong the plans of the heart, but from the LORD comes the reply of the tongue. All a man’s ways seem innocent to him, but motives are weighed by the LORD. Commit to the LORD whatever you do, and your plans will succeed.”

If both can be right, what does it mean to be healthy? And following the same analogy, what does it mean for a church to be healthy? What signs indicate a congregation is both free of disease and spiritually fit?

Leadership set out to answer those questions. We did not find just one answer, but we did find the many responses revealing. So here, with contradictions and redundancies intact, are various ways to identify and maintain a healthy church.

Eight Qualities of Healthy Churches

Christian A. Schwarz, head of the Institute for Church Development in Germany, conducted reportedly the most comprehensive church-growth study ever, drawn from more than 1,000 churches in 32 countries. His study revealed eight qualities in healthy churches.

link to Christianity today article

Having grown up in a small Episcopal church in North Carolina, I was raised on the old Book of Common Prayer – the words, canticles and cadences settled themselves into my mind and heart, and those early years have had a great impact on my faith. Since those days, I have learned more and more about our Anglican heritage, our heroes, our highs and lows. I find my theological home in the Anglicanism of Cranmer, Whitfield, Simeon, and Stott. I am grateful for our rich and varied heritage.

There’s a great need for churches in our Anglican tradition in the world today. Why? Because we exhibit an unusual collection of characteristics. Every church is different. The Baptists have their great traditions, the Methodists have their great strengths, the Roman Catholics, the Greek Orthodox, they all have such strengths. But we’re Anglican, and we’re grateful for it, because it’s something very, very special.

Anglicanism at its best has always been known for several key qualities, some of which I list below:

-Anglicanism at its best is biblical. It finds its life and its teaching rooted in the word of God. We believe the word of God is true; not just that the Scriptures contain the word of God, but that they become the word of God spoken to us. We believe the Scriptures have authority and they’re true, and we want to be biblical Christians.

-Anglicanism is sacramental. We value the sacraments, particularly of baptism and Holy Communion. We believe in the real presence of Christ in our midst. We don’t think that we’re just playing around with bread and wine and water. We believe that Christ is present in and through these elements, and we view them as a holy part of our life together. We’re sacramental Christians.

-Anglicans, when they’re at their best, are also evangelical. That means they’re people who proclaim the good news of Christ to people who don’t know the Lord. And every good Anglican church is seeing a little steady stream of new people coming in, who are coming to new faith, and finding new life in Jesus Christ.

-Anglicanism at its best is liturgical. That means that when we come together and worship God, we just don’t do the latest fad that they’re doing down the street. The way we worship God is rooted all the way back in the earliest days of the church. The first Anglican Christians came to England in the first century and started worshipping God there and laid roots in how we worship God and it was done in a particular Anglican way. The way our services are laid out, they’re built on those early forms of worship. The liturgy, we make it important. We are committed to doing it the way it has been done through the ages. We bring new flavors to it, new emphases, but it’s rooted in history.

-Anglicanism is worldwide. We’re a catholic church. We’re committed; we want to be linked closely to our brothers and sisters in the Two Thirds World. It’s not just about us, it’s about us together. We’re a worldwide catholic church.

-Anglicanism is charismatic. That means we believe in, we’re dependent upon the power of the Holy Spirit. We believe that the community of the church is to be a healing community, it’s to be an exorcising community, and we believe in all the gifts of the Holy Spirit that are taught in the Holy Scriptures. We want them all to be manifest.

-Anglicanism is about accountability. We have bishops; we believe in bishops, we want bishops. We want them not only to teach us and pastor us; we want them to hold us accountable, to tell us when we’re gone astray and to hold us up to our best.

-Anglicanism at its best is musical. We love good music; the best of ancient music and the best of modern music.

-Anglicanism engages the society and the world around it. We’re not about being in our own little ‘holy huddle.’ We’re about being involved in politics, we’re about being involved in the issues of the community, we’re about serving on school boards, and working in clinics and working in food kitchens. We’re about society.

-Anglicanism is prayerful. Some of our major services are the services of Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer. Historically, Anglicans have met every day to pray to God. Anglicans go forward on their knees.

-Anglicanism at its best is a community of grace. There’s something about Anglicanism that is particularly gracious, and I don’t quite know what it is except that in 60 years of being part of the Anglican family, my experience has been that when we’re together, we don’t take ourselves so darn seriously. We are humble before God because we know we’re all sinners. We know that we all kneel at the foot of the cross, and the ground is level there. And we know that God is doing such bigger things than we’re doing. We’re just a little part of it, and we believe the best of one another. We’re not negative; we’re gracious when we’re at our best.

-Anglicanism loves children and Anglicanism is committed, not just to baptizing babies, but to beginning to work with them and make them disciples from the cradle to adulthood.

-Anglicanism also has a love for beauty, as Martyn, our bishop has said, we’ve always appreciated the value of aesthetics in Anglicanism. That’s why you’ll see so many beautiful Anglican houses of worship, that’s why the furnishings are usually beautiful, that’s why the way things are done are usually aesthetically pleasing. God catches our imagination through aesthetics. He speaks to us through beauty, and we learn to know God through the beauty of worship. So we’re committed to reverence and beautiful aesthetics in worship.
I want to urge upon you faithfulness to this Anglican tradition and to these wonderful qualities. Listen to these encouraging words from Thomas Cranmer, the architect of the Book of Common Prayer and martyr for the Gospel:

“If there were any word of God beside the Scripture, we could never be certain of God’s Word; and if we be uncertain of God’s Word, the devil might bring in among us a new word, a new doctrine, a new faith, a new church, a new god, yea himself to be god… If the Church and the Christian faith did not stay itself upon the Word of God certain, as upon a sure and strong foundation, no man could know whether he had a right faith, and whether he were in the true Church of Christ, or in the synagogue of Satan… Stand thou fast, and stay thy faith, whereupon thou shalt build all thy works, upon the strong rock of God’s Word, written and contained within the Old Testament and the New, which is able sufficiently to instruct thee in all things needful to thy salvation, and to attainment of the kingdom of heaven.”

In an encouraging word to the Anglican 1000 conference now taking place in Texas, renown missioner Ed Stetzer encourages Ancient-Future Anglicans to be about the business of mission through planting the right kind of Church.

This is the kind of fellowship we need to plant in Manassas. Are you interested in joining us to help make it happen?

read more of what ED said to the Anglican 1000 conference.

North America could see a thousand new Anglican churches planted on its soil if 300 church planters and leaders have anything to do with it. If they succeed, they will be the leading church planting denomination in America today, the brainchild of Anglican Archbishop Robert Duncan.

Fr. David Roseberry, rector of Christ Church, Plano and host of the church planting conference, told the church planters that the Anglican Communion is at a crossroads and this gathering could break the logjam in North America Anglicanism.

Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) Archbishop Robert Duncan noted that when he first spoke at Plano last year there were 73 congregations. “Now there are more than 800 churches or 200 a week since June. If there is fruitfulness it is because what our Father (in heaven) is doing and his work in us and his Son. We are sent by his Son and the world desperately needs to hear what his Son says. We are transformed by his Son and that is our call.”

Duncan said the conference is an opportunity “to get our [ACNA's] vision together in a way that movements like this can change the world. It is our understanding of the vision that there is no need for control like the age of Wesley. If we are accountable to the Word, tradition and the Holy Spirit and if we are accountable for the transformation of society we will have 1000 churches in five years.”

The Rev. Dr. Ed Stetzer, church planting president of Lifeway Research, missiologist and seminary professor, told listeners that church planting is like having a baby…bloody, messy painful, but great when it is all done.

Using II Tim 4:5 as his text for church planting, Stetzer said church planting is not easy, that he has planted five with one failure in Buffalo, NY. Churches must produce a sustaining movement if they are to survive and grow.

Recognizing that most of the conferees have come out of The Episcopal Church, Stetzer said, “What is going on in your windshield or filling your windshield with the troubles you came through must now be in your rear view mirror. You need a clear windshield.”

Is church panting doable? Stetzer said for a church to multiply and grow from 800 to 1200, 50% must be converts for the next generation. He predicted ACNA would become a multiplication movement in North America.

Citing history, Stetzer said that in the 15 years between 1795-1810, the Methodists and the Baptists planted 3,000 churches on the western frontier in the US. “Church planting is not simply an idea, but a passion. It must permeate your national consciousness.”

Stetzer offered these ideas:

* What you celebrate is what you become.
* When you harvest, think of what the Global South has achieved. Do the work of an evangelist. They are doing missionary work in new evangelistic ways.
* The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.
* Make sure the 1000 are church plants. Most new plants are lifeboats, not church plants.
* You cannot build a church planting movement on life boat Episcopalians.
* You must plant 1000 churches in evangelistic ways.
* 50% growth and 50% must be new generation.
* Do the work of an evangelist. Church planting is not the goal; church planting is the tool. The goal is the glory of God and the redemption of people.
* We are told to make disciples and churches are formed. The command is to do the work of an evangelist.
* The way the church is formed now will determine the way the church is formed for the future.
* On church planting. Evangelism is a bloody cross and an empty tomb. Christians are turned off to evangelism because it is done in unhelpful ways. Must not become a life boat movement but a missionary movement.
* Challenge of universalism. – Jesus is the only way to heaven. If you don’t believe in the uniqueness of Jesus Christ, then you are little more than a Rotary or Optimist Club. The answer is Jesus is THE way, THE truth. We must call people to repent and believe in the gospel.
* This universalism is not just a denominational hierarchical problem; it is an issue with people in the pews.
* We are not a recruiting movement but a reconciliation movement. We must reach the lost.
* We must not recruit people to a cause we must recruit people to Christ.
* If you always talk about the church without an evangelistic plan and an evangelical passion, it is a recipe for disaster.
* Share and show the Good News about Jesus Christ.
* Plant change agent churches
* Sharing and showing the Good News of Jesus Christ is about advancing the work of the Kingdom of God.
* Be holistic, but tell them what they must do to be saved. Tell the good news at any cost.
* Show the gospel by your actions and by your words. Both are needed.
* Invitations. Inviting people to church is not evangelism.
* Planting churches in the 80s and 90s is not the way to plant churches in 2010. You need more than invitations.
* Labor is the work of evangelism. Ask the question what occupies your time. My Anglican friends find this very hard for them. The biggest struggle of church is how to spend 12 -15 hours a week not just filling in the hours.
* Try coffee shop evangelism. It is where you will meet strangers. Make conversation with strangers. It is not easy. Find their felt needs. Begin there. It is not easy.
* Ultimately you must get to the point where the cross has to be preached; the cross is the stumbling block you cannot avoid it.
* You cannot lead what you do not live.
* You don’t have to be seeker or be cutting edge, but you do have to tell people about Jesus.
* The answer is to proclaim the gospel and not to compromise on the message.
* There is no such thing as the gift of evangelism in the Bible. We have convinced Christians only certain people have the gift and should be responsible to do evangelism. Not true. Evangelism is the duty and calling of every Christian.
* The reality is we are called to be missionaries, or as Spurgeon said, you are either a missionary or an imposter.
* Message of reconciliation to the US is to do the work of an evangelist. Inviting people and bringing a friend is missional. The wheat is still not harvesting itself.
* Be known as a place where Jesus is known and other people know him. Preach a clear unchanging gospel so His name is more widely known.
* Keep a clear head, endure the hardship and do the work of an evangelist and fulfill your ministry.
* I believe you can do it sociologically because you believe what you believe.
* Focus on the harvest field and the workers.
* Be more like the Global South. Let them be a theological and ecclesiastical covering. Have a missiological focus. Be like the Global South, a robust mission driven movement proclaiming the gospel in faithful ways.
* Be a robust confessional movement of Anglicans at a substantially higher level of enthusiasm. Recognize the passionate nature of the gospel.
* You don’t have to reinvent anything to be more like the Global South. Be passionately evangelistic. See church planting as a tool for gospel expansion.
* Take a lay catechist approach. Lay pastors might have to be bi-vocational. Learn to love the word bi-vocational. It is not a bad thing but a good thing.
* Baptists have a Low Church polity. You need to learn from the Baptists. They give someone permission on the local level to go out and evangelize.
* Methodists had circuit riders in church polity and so practice their polity.
* Anglicans need to have circuit riders following as the Methodists did.
* You really have to create a system based on historical practices and biblical theology.
* You need a robust credentialing.
* Your missionary methods should be St. Paul’s, not your own.
* Your polity should be a servant to your theology and mission.
* The Vineyard movement gave people permission to church plant.
* Fight for converts not over prayers books or jurisdictions.
* You are the third way.
* You must have confessional consensus and missional passion.
* Structures will form out of mission.
* Move from a parish mentality to a people group mentality.
* The parish system which we inherited from our predecessors was built on sameness and geography. It is not applicable here. We have ethnic diversity in the world. There are more people groups represented than ever before. The parish model was set up when we all looked alike. That is gone.
* One of the rules is that you can’t be near any of the 800 churches you now have. Go plant elsewhere.
* Pockets of church planting can begin and then expand.
* Remember there are plenty of lost people to go around, so share with others.
* Convert people to Christ and not to a cause.
* This room is still very white. Move from parish to people groups.
* You must not plant Anglo churches. The majority of church plants are non Anglos.
* 57% of Southern Baptist new churches are non Anglos.
* They are seeing remarkable revival. They have moved from parish to people group evangelism.
* Every church could start a language church and meet at different times of the day.
* Focus on confessional consensus and missional cooperation. You have to have common beliefs. You have REC, Anglo-Catholic, charismatic and evangelical.
* Allow for diversity of practice while standing on biblical doctrine. You can do both. If you cannot do both stop fellowshipping with the global south.
* Have a space for the entrepreneurs.
* Don’t lose your John Wesley’s. You can have space for those with a common theological understanding.
* There is a move to de-emphasize distinctives. You Anglicans are a fascinating movement because you are evangelical, catholic and charismatic. People need something unique and distinct. Evangelicalism is adrift in many ways. Don’t go there.
* Where you find orthodoxy in denominational structures, work with it.
* If you are going to be a movement to change the world, there are things you should do and not do. Do not be part of the evangelical mainstream. Join as friends but be faithful to what the churches teach.
* Be willing to get dirty. Know who you are. Do not abandon theological principle.
* Remember liberals don’t plant churches.
* Why not support a dying church instead of staring a new church? Answer. It is easy to birth the baby than raise the dead.
* Church planting movements sometimes create new life forms. (Laughter). You need to get comfortable with failure. I planted 5 churches; one of them didn’t make it. Fail boldly. Be willing to get dirty. Do not exist as an alternative to someone else.

Stetzer concluded by saying that orthodox Anglicans in North America have an unprecedented, kairos moment to reach people who need the unchanging biblical message of transformation through Jesus Christ presented in a way that connects them back to that great tradition of word, sacrament, and spiritual disciplines: deep calling unto deep, Christ changing us from the inside out, and that transformation spilling over into our (Anglican) networks, neighborhoods and communities.

CANA canon missioner, Julian Dobbs said, “If you are not passionate about Jesus you ought not to be in the church planting business. We want churches that reach the lost for Christ that is what this new Anglicanism is all about.”