We had a 2 day Origins planning meeting in Los Angeles that I just got back from last night. Launching what will be a global network is a fascinating experience. It may feel like it is taking a long time if you have been following this since we announced it last year - but as we discussed in our meeting this week, we want to do this right and with high a quality as possible. We want to launch something that will be sustainable and make as large an impact as possible. So we are spending a lot of time fleshing out structure, strategy, ethos, values, roles etc. - so when we really do launch we are in a good place.
So we had a great meeting with some of the Origins team. Myself, Dave Gibbons, Erwin McManus, Margaret Feinberg, Amena Brown, Josh Fox, Eric Bryant, Marlon Hall, April Diaz, Charles Lee, Lindy Lowry - had a phone call with Scot McKnight during the meeting and got a lot done.
One day Origins event - July 24, 2010 in Los Angeles
We'll be posting some of the fleshed out vision and further updates on the Origins web site at some time soon. And one big thing we talked through was the summer 2010 event. We will have a one-day event on Saturday, July 24 in Los Angeles. We scaled it down from a 3 day event so we can really do it well since summer is going to be here so quick! And we will move our festival-like big 3 day event to summer 2011. It will be in Los Angeles as well. So if you are looking at dates, July 24, 2010 is our one day event in LA that we will post info and registration and all that ver soon. We will announce our festival-conference date for summer 2011 date as soon as we lock it in.
At Catalyst West Coast in April, I am speaking there and Scot McKnight, Erwin McManus and Margaret - and there is an Origins track as part of Catalyst. The Catalyst web site is here. I have great admiration for Brad and the Catalyst team and their events are really incredible.
Wheaton College - Emerging Church focus next week
Monday, I head to to Wheaton College for something they are doing on "The Emerging Church" over 2 days in 2 parts (Tuesday, January 19 at 7 PM and then Wednesday, January 20 at 4 PM). On Tuesday night I will be giving a retrospective history on the emerging church, where it is now according to the perspective I personally see it, the future, diversity of theology etc. You can see info and links to times and all that here. Then on Wednesday, Skye Jethani, who is also on the Origins team, will be there and speak and then both of us be there for open forum and dialogue. So should be fun. I will post my basic presentation on Tuesday night and what I will say here afterwards. I don't use the term "emerging church" too often anymore apart from events like this. So I look forward to giving a perspective of it from the vantage point I have had - which I hope is helfpul for those interested. There will be a lot of interaction, so I look forward to that. I love going to Wheaton and I'll be back there in April for a private event before their big theological conference where about 20 of us get to spend a day or two with NT Wright discussing mission and Jesus and Paul. So that is something I am very happy I get to go to.
Will I look like this in 20 years?
And oh my.... my good friend Mark Oestreicher posted something on his blog. What he thinks I will look like in 20 years. You can see it here. Yowza.
