Heading home as I write this from being at Origins-Catalyst West Coast down in Orange County, CA. I think there were 3,000 people at Catalyst. I have never been to a Catalyst event before, but it was one of the most organized and well-run large conferences I have ever been to. Brad, Ben and the team do such a great job with this. It was also extremely refreshing being there because it didn't feel at all like you had to win over people to the cause of mission for the church. I had so many great conversations in between, during and after sessions with people.
At the event I got to hang with my friend Jonny Ray Bartel, who is the bass player for the fantastic band The Knitters. Jonny has played bass with Mick Jagger, Johnny Cash and lots of others. Got to go out to lunch with Marko from Youth Specialties. I will be posting a review about his latest excellent book Youth Ministry 3.0 tomorrow. But it always great being with Marko and catching up.
Got to finally meet Andy Stanley and talk with him a little while. I have been to NorthPoint Church two times speaking there, but we never have met. My mom became a Christian through the ministry of his dad, Charles Stanley. It was one of those things where I shared about Jesus with her for 15 years and then she turned on the television and it was Charles Stanley and she prayed to put faith in Jesus. She told me "he made sense of what you have been telling me for 15 years". So never give up on someone and you never know if it will be 15 years of praying and hoping.
Got to hang out a bit with Rick Muchow, who is the worship pastor at Saddleback Church. Rick is going to be near Santa Cruz this Sunday and he is coming to Vintage Faith Church Sunday night and may even join in to lead with a song. Also chatted with Luis Palau today as well. Luis is someone I originally got to meet about 15 years or so ago. He spoke at the church I was high school pastor at, and then a few years later he spoke at the young adult ministry I was leading. I love, love, love, love his evangelistic heart. So many people - it was just great... Lindy, Lynne, Jesse from Catalyst, David C., having dinner with the Leadership Network Team with DJ in his traditional orange outfit and orange encased iPhone and orange crocs....So events like this always feel like reunions of sorts and wish time could stand still and just stop and hear everyone's journey's and just chat and never be rushed.
As I posted here about the meeting we had the day before the event started, we also kicked off the Origins Project network. About 900 people were there for two main sessions and labs during the day. When Erwin led the Origins closing session he had myself, Eric Bryant and Dave Gibbons come up and we did a little back and forth discussion about why we are starting this network. Basically it is to be om mission, focusing on evangelism (but not how evangelism normally is done) - but we are doing this so we don't have to be alone. We want to be on mission together - and this will be a way to connect with others who have the same mission-oriented heart.
The leadership team for Origins consists of Erwin, myself, Margaret Feinberg, Dave Gibbons, Josh Fox, Eric Bryant, Rick McKinley, Jeanne Stevens, Amena Brown, Scot McKnight, Skye Jethani, Naeem Fazal, John Park, Mark Batterson, and Adam Edgerly. We also have a Connecting Team which will have roles in this as well. You can go to the web page and see the bios that are linked and also those on the Connecting Team. We will be announcing some basic events and a flow of this upcoming year - but we will be having an event or two this Fall, most likely two regional ones - we will be part of Outreach Convention in November for a forum discussion, we discussed for next summer a "Woodstock-like event" where we may do it on a campus of some sort, having artists, film makers, musicians, poets, church leaders and people in churches who resonate with the missional vision get together for a unique communal event. On the Origins Project web site there will be posting updates.
The web site has a place to sign up for email updates as well as a Community page. I signed up on this Community page and trying to figure it out a bit as anyone can post things, even photos or videos as we build community - so will be building the web site and getting things together as we go here. More on it soon and updates happening regularly. If you have any specific questions about the web site or network, feel free to post them here or on the Origins web site.
I am in the airport now and looking forward to being home as I have been gone 4 days. I am preaching on Sunday and haven't even started yet to prep so gotta do that tomorrow... after I spend good riding bicycle time and going out with Katie and Claire...... This is my bicycle - a Schwinn Deluxe 7 which is a modeled after the 1950's Schwinn Black Phantom. I love my bicycle.
