Steve Lavey | 20 Million Minutes

Burma Disaster Relief: Park To Send a 10,000 gallon/day Water Purifier May 9, 2008

Posted by Steve in : Volunteers, Church, Urban Church, The Cultural Conversation, DifferenceMakers, Entrepreneuring, Faith at Work , add a comment

As many of you are already aware, last weekend Tropical cyclone Nargis claimed thousands of lives in Myanmar early Saturday morning 2:30am. By daylight, the full effect of the storm was obvious. Homes were destroyed, giant trees crashed through buildings, and were lying uprooted, blocking roads. Blackouts, water shortages and rapidly rising prices were reported in Rangoon, a city of 5 million people. The cost of gasoline has tripled since Saturday.

International news organizations are not allowed to report from Myanmar, but the news that is trickling out is horrifying. The death toll is estimated to be at least 100,000 and another 41,000 are missing.

Jackson and the elders would like to invite you to pray right now for the people of Myanmar, especially those who have lost husbands, wives and children - and those whose loved ones are still missing. And as you sit down for your lunches and dinners this week, continue to pray for this country which is in terrific need.

We will be taking a special offering during our services the next two weeks which will go directly to relief efforts in this devastated country. Hundreds of thousands of people in Myanmar are suffering in the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis. They need your help, and quickly.We will provide envelopes for you to put your donations in, so please come prepared to give.

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Here is a quick update to all our readers about where Park will be redirecting its special offerings this week for relief efforts in Myanmar. There have been many questions about how relief is going to get there with the military junta not allowing aid relief workers in and seizing aid shipments. We have been working to find a relief agency that is onsite and able to get our donations and use them in a way that will get aid to the people in Myanmar as quickly as possible.

We will be collecting donations for Water Missions International based in South Carolina. They are working with World Vision, which has had a national office in Myanmar for 40 years,and Samaritan’s Purse to provide water purification units.

Our goal is to raise $15,000 to buy a water purification unit which will provide at minimum 10,000 gallons of fresh water daily to help meet immediate needs in this devastated area. Also, this unit will be part of an ongoing community development program which will continue to help provide clean water for years to come.

Water Mission International has already deployed 12 units to Myanmar as of this morning (details here) that they knew would get through. They want to be good stewards of the donated resources and ensure that needs are being met, so units will not be sent until it is confirmed that the resources will reach the people in need. World Vision is aware of the situation and will let Water Missions know when shipments can begin.

Volunteer help will be needed upon assurance that the resources will be received, so Park will be sending a team to South Carolina to help assemble the unit we provide before it is shipped to Myanmar. Details will follow.

Continue to pray for this horrific situation, for those affected, and those working to provide aid. And please come prepared to give this weekend.

If you have additional questions about Park’s response, please email Scott Clifton.

Which Choice Do You Make? Food or Fuel? April 25, 2008

Posted by Steve in : Breaking News, Methods & Strategies, The Cultural Conversation, Entrepreneuring, Sustainability , 1 comment so far

Look at this article and then reflect on which choice you would make — it is obvious what choice Al Gore would make but what would you do if you were the country’s policymaker?

NEW YORK SUN – The campaign against climate change could be set back by the global food crisis, as foreign populations turn against measures to use foodstuffs as substitutes for fossil fuels. With prices for rice, wheat, and corn soaring, food-related unrest has broken out in places such as Haiti, Indonesia, and Afghanistan. Several countries have blocked the export of grain. There is even talk that governments could fall if they cannot bring food costs down.

One factor being blamed for the price hikes is the use of government subsidies to promote the use of corn for ethanol production. An estimated 30% of America’s corn crop now goes to fuel, not food. “I don’t think anybody knows precisely how much ethanol contributes to the run-up in food prices, but the contribution is clearly substantial,” a professor of applied economics and law at the University of Minnesota, C. Ford Runge, said. A study by a Washington think tank, the International Food Policy Research Institute, indicated that between a quarter and a third of the recent hike in commodities prices is attributable to biofuels. Last year, Mr. Runge and a colleague, Benjamin Senauer, wrote an article in Foreign Affairs, “How Biofuels Could Starve the Poor.” “We were criticized for being alarmist at the time,” Mr. Runge said. “I think our views, looking back a year, were probably too conservative.” Ethanol was initially promoted as a vehicle for America to cut back on foreign oil. In recent years, biofuels have also been touted as a way to fight climate change, but the food crisis does not augur well for ethanol’s prospects.

“It takes around 400 pounds of corn to make 25 gallons of ethanol,” Mr. Senauer, also an applied economics professor at Minnesota, said. “It’s not going to be a very good diet but that’s roughly enough to keep an adult person alive for a year.” Mr. Senauer said climate change advocates, such as Vice President Gore, need to distance themselves from ethanol to avoid tarnishing the effort against global warming. “Crop-based biofuels are not part of the solution. They, in fact, add to the problem. Whether Al Gore has caught up with that, somebody ought to ask him,” the professor said. “There are lots of solutions, real solutions to climate change. We need to get to those.” Mr. Gore was not available for an interview yesterday on the food crisis, according to his spokeswoman. A spokesman for Mr. Gore’s public campaign to address climate change, the Alliance for Climate Protection, declined to comment for this article. (more…)

Are you part of an Expeditionary Force? April 20, 2008

Posted by Steve in : The City, Breaking News, Church, Urban Church, Methods & Strategies, Missional, The Cultural Conversation, DifferenceMakers, Culture and Faith, Faith at Work , add a comment

The Missional Challenge has an excellent article about the local church becoming a Expeditionary Force in the city — take a read…..

Dr. Ray Bakke describes the church as an expeditionary force in The Urban Christian (1987). He views Christians as ministers to their worlds of relationships. For example, a banker who is a Christian doesn’t simply serve at his church by teaching Sunday School or being on the Finance Committee. Instead, he would “identify a mission within the bank, perhaps running a Bible Study with his colleagues or even planning resources to help build up neglected neighborhoods.” (p 132)

Bakke sees several advantages to an urban church which sees itself as an Expeditionary Force, emphasizing its role to “go” on mission into the city:

It legitimizes the call to lay mission

It reaches more widely and follows the urban twenty-four-hour clock

It fulfills the need of specialized urban people to affirm their personal vocations as their ministry

“In this model the pastoral task is to help these members identify, plan for and equip themselves for their diverse ministry opportunities.” (p 132)

Where are you in your vocation as a missionary force?

Can you imagine the missionary force that could be released in every town and neighborhood in America if local churches would begin to see themselves as an expeditionary force? <MORE>

Willow To Eliminate Mid-Week Service April 17, 2008

Posted by Steve in : Chicago, Breaking News, Sunday Services, Church, Urban Church, Methods & Strategies, The Cultural Conversation, Culture and Faith , add a comment

(Christianity Today.com) For three decades Willow has been focused on making the church appealing to seekers. But its detailed and thorough research (summarized in their new book REVEAL) shows that it’s the mature believers that drive everything in the church—including evangelism. Greg Hawkins, the Executive Pastor says, “We used to think you can’t upset a seeker. But while focusing on that we’ve really upset the Christ-centered people.” He spoke about the high levels of dissatisfaction mature believer have with churches. Drawing from the 200 churches and the 57,000 people that have taken the survey, he said that most people are leaving the church because they’re not being challenged enough. Because it’s the mature Christians who drive evangelism in the church Hawkins says, “Our strategy to reach seekers is now about focusing on the mature believers. This is a huge shift for Willow.”

One major implementation of this shift will occur in June when Willow ends their mid-week worship services that had been geared toward believers. Instead the church will morph these mid-week events into classes for people at different stages of growth. There will be theological and bible classes full of “hard-hitting stuff.” Hawkins said most people are very enthusiastic about the change.

On the seeker end of the spectrum, Willow is also changing how they produce their weekend services. For years the value people appreciated most about the seeker-oriented weekend services was anonymity. This is what all their research showed. People didn’t want to be identified, approached, confronted, or asked to do anything. But those days are over. “Anonymity is not the driving value for seeker services anymore,” says Hawkins. “We’ve taken anonymity and shot it in the head. It’s dead. Gone.” In the past Willow believed that seekers didn’t want large doses of the Bible or deep worship music. They didn’t want to be challenged. Now their seeker-sensitive services are loaded with worship music, prayer, Scripture readings, and more challenging teaching from the Bible.

Willow has been wrestling with the research from REVEAL since 2004. Hawkins said, “We’ve tried incremental changes for four years, but now we know we have to overhaul our whole strategy.” Small steps are no longer the method; Willow is revamping everything. “It would be malpractice for us to not do something with what we’re learning.”

In the larger REVEAL survey taken by 200 churches, people were asked what they want most from their church. Three of the top four responses were:

1. Help me understand the Bible in greater depth
2. Help me develop a closer personal relationship with Christ
3. Challenge me to grow and take the next step in my faith

Hawkins said that sometimes Willow gets accused of managing the church based on market research; of simply giving people what they want. “Look at what they want!” he said while pointing to the screen. “They want the Bible, they want to be close to Christ, they want to be challenged. Yes, we will give them what they want!”

Provision Theater Presents: SMOKE ON THE MOUNTAIN April 17, 2008

Posted by Steve in : The City, Chicago, The Cultural Conversation, The Arts in the City, Provision Theater, Culture and Faith , add a comment

It is that time again!

Provision Theater, who is dedicated to performing works of hope, reconciliation and redemption and has received accolades for its last six shows, is getting set to mount its last production of the year, SMOKE ON THE MOUNTAIN, a foot-stompin’ musical, featuring Susan Moniz, !

In this musical, Provision’s artistic director, Tim Gregory, takes you back to a simpler time, where you become the congregation of Mount Pleasant Church. You have been invited to their “first ever Saturday Night Sing”. Pastor Oglethorpe is determined to move his flock into the “modern world”, by inviting the Singing Sanders Family to join him. They will delight you with some of the best old gospel tunes ever written, like “Church in the Wildwood”, “Wonderful Time Up There”, and “I’ll Fly Away”. A mixture of song, stories, hilarity and honest emotion, this audience favorite will have you tapping your toes and lifting your spirit.

WHAT: SMOKE ON THE MOUNTAIN

WHERE: VIADUCT THEATER 3111 N Western Avenues (MAP)

WHEN: May 8 - June 8 — Thur, Fri and Sat at 8 pm, Sun at 3pm

To purchase tickets: Call 773.506.4429

15,000+ visitors April 16, 2008

Posted by Steve in : Breaking News, Methods & Strategies, The Cultural Conversation, Culture and Faith , add a comment

Today , I surpassed 15,000 visitors to my blog (since I installed my NEO counter more than a year ago). What are all these people doing coming to my blog? What do they find interesting? The most amazing thing to me is that those visitors come from more than 129 countries. The largest visitor groups hail from:

USA 11,648

Canada 514

United Kingdom 502

Germany 234

France 220

Australia 185

Brazile 102

Cote D’Ivoire 66

The most interesting visitors hail from:

Burkina Faso 20

Kenya 16

Iran 13

Iraq 6

Guinea 4

Rwanda 4

Only in America - The Mobile Phone Scourge April 14, 2008

Posted by Steve in : Technology, The Cultural Conversation, Photos, Culture and Faith , 1 comment so far

I saw this photo online and couldn’t believe it. What sort of person would order their wedding topped with a bride and groom that are talking to OTHER people on their mobile phones? Say it ain’t so. What are your thoughts?

Worship Top 25 April 14, 2008

Posted by Steve in : The City, Inside Park, Urban Church, Powerful Passages, Methods & Strategies, The Cultural Conversation, Music That Moves, Culture and Faith , add a comment

As we sit each week at Park, and have worship times with Joseph Tenney and his team, I began to wonder what are the main worship songs that are played? So I did some research on the CCLI site and thought I would list out the top 25 played worship songs in churches around the U.S.

This list came from the latest results from CCLI which is the main Christian music copyright/licensing company for non-profit organizations around the world. They conduct two surveys per year, one in February and one in August. (Please note that this compilation does not contain many of the excellent old hymns which are sung a lot but are actaully public domain and not subject to royalties). However, it does contain “Shout to the Lord” which was recently sung on American Idol. This list is the latest data and is ranked from the most played to the least:

1	How Great Is Our God	Tomlin, Chris \ Reeves, Jesse \ Cash, Ed	4348399
2	Blessed Be Your Name	Redman, Beth \ Redman, Matt	3798438
3	Here I Am To Worship	Hughes, Tim	3266032
4	Open The Eyes Of My Heart	Baloche, Paul	2298355
5	Shout To The Lord	Zschech, Darlene	1406918
6	Holy Is The Lord	Tomlin, Chris \ Giglio, Louie	4158039
7	You Are My King	Foote, Billy	2456623
8	Forever	Tomlin, Chris	3148428
9	Lord I Lift Your Name On High	Founds, Rick	117947
10	Come Now Is The Time To Worship	Doerksen, Brian	2430948
11	God Of Wonders	Byrd, Marc \ Hindalong, Steve	3118757
12	Everlasting God	Brown, Brenton \ Riley, Ken	4556538
13	You Are My All In All	Jernigan, Dennis	825356
14	We Fall Down	Tomlin, Chris	2437367
15	The Heart Of Worship	Redman, Matt	2296522
16	You’re Worthy Of My Praise	Ruis, David	487976
17	Breathe	Barnett, Marie	1874117
18	Trading My Sorrows	Evans, Darrell	2574653
19	Beautiful One	Hughes, Tim	3915912
20	In Christ Alone	Townend, Stuart \ Getty, Keith	3350395
21	I Give You My Heart	Morgan, Reuben	1866132
22	Days Of Elijah	Mark, Robin	1537904
23	Friend Of God	Gungor, Michael \ Houghton, Israel	3991651
24	Better Is One Day	Redman, Matt	1097451
25	Above All	LeBlanc, Lenny \ Baloche, Paul	2672885

So what do you think of the list?

Idol: Shout to the Lord? Wow! April 12, 2008

Posted by Steve in : Breaking News, Powerful Passages, The Cultural Conversation, The Arts in the City, Music That Moves, Culture and Faith , 3comments

For the millions that watched this week, the American Idol Gives Back show ended surprisingly with the globally popular worship song “Shout to the Lord” by Darlene Zschech.

I’m sure you’ve seen all the blog uproar over this issue. Evangelicals on a blog raised the roof with the producer’s decision to downplay its “Jesus” message by replacing the word “Jesus” with the word “Shepherd” in the first line, contending that the deletion of Jesus eliminated it from being a Christian song in its entirety. (The next night, they sang the song again — this time with the original wording.)I didn’t think too much of it when I first heard it, assuming that, as usual, the entertainment powers had cut it out — I was more surprised that Hillsong would allow it (they didn’t).

But I came across this excellent post by Josh Harris, that has several comments from entertainment insiders who are Christians and the impact this small song has on all the Hollywood types — -check it out. It changed my perspective on the matter, prompted me to pray for all those hard-working brothers and sisters in Hollywood and really challenged me about integrating my faith into the culture I am in.

Hey all you “culture and faith” folks out there, what do you think? Is this a step for Hollywood or a debacle for Christian songs? Please comment and let’s engage on this topic.

Crosby Update and Work Days March 31, 2008

Posted by Steve in : The City, Breaking News, Inside Park, Adaptive Reuse, Church Construction, Missional, The Cultural Conversation , add a comment

Finally — after many delays, we are GOING TO PULL AUDIO-VIDEO wire this Saturday (woo Hoo!) as we gear up each weekend in April to get all of our audio/video stuf installed. It is starting to get real exciting!

Crosby Work Days

Crosby Work Days are back in full swing as we are counting down the days to opening our new ministry center at 1001 N. Crosby. Volunteers have already done a great job helping us paint the garage, and this Saturday, April 5, we need 20-25 volunteers to help with wire pulling throughout the day from 8 AM-6 PM. Come on out all you home renovators and construction-types and be part of this historic time! Please register to volunteer so we can plan accordingly.

Additional work days will be held on April 12 & 13, April 19 & 20 and April 26 & 27. Work times will be from 8 AM-6 PM on Saturdays and 1-5 PM on Sundays.

Check out the photos below:

Third Floor Worship Center Lobby With

HUGE windows looking on onto Crosby

Stage and Catwalk are coming along nicely

Can You see the boxes for the sub-woofer on the open stage area?

The Chicago brick is being put up and the greystone tile is coming next — It

is so cool to live in Chicago!

All the platforms are almost done for the permanent 517 seats on the tiers.

Easter Creativity - God is at Work! March 31, 2008

Posted by Steve in : The City, Sunday Services, Church, Powerful Passages, Methods & Strategies, Missional, The Cultural Conversation, The Arts in the City, DifferenceMakers, Culture and Faith, Entrepreneuring , 1 comment so far

It’s now a week after Easter and I am checking out the blogs and news to see how God used people this Easter weekend and what drew people in to hear the Word of God on Easter. Wow! There is lots of creativity out there and that affirms that God is working His plan with the churches here in the United States and new creative thinkers are bringing the Gospel to the folks. I love God’s verse on creativity in the church — in Luke 14:23 (NASB) it says:

23“And the master said to the slave, ‘Go out into the highways and along the hedges, and compel them to come in, so that my house may be filled.

“COMPEL THEM TO COME IN” –

Here are my “Sweet Sixteen” creative teams who I found that did a lot of brainstorming, planning, hard work and execution with excellent creative ideas to COMPEL PEOPLE TO COME IN this Easter — To God be the Glory!:

1. The Elevation Church in Charlotte, North Carolina that is just over two years old celebrated as 4,800 people showed up for services for an excellent start to a series called “Breakout” and over 500 people gave their lives to Christ! Check it out here.

2. Oak Leaf Church, less than 19 months old, did a message on TATTOO and left their mark by giving tattoos live on stage for all three services. The point of the message was that external marks are meant to point to internal life change. The point isn’t the mark, it’s the story and the meaning. In the same way, external behavior modification is never enough…what makes us Christians are our changed hearts. They were praying for 1,000 people but had 1,350 with 60 people accepting Christ (read about it here)

3. Craig Groeschel and the folks at multi-site Lifechurch.tv Started a new series on Easter and handed out fortune cookies with a note inside of them inviting people to the series entitled “The Warrior.” They placed huge barrels of fortune cookies outside and asked people to give them to their friends. More than a grand total of 31,000 people attended all 13 LifeChurch.tv campuses this Easter weekend with 479 hands raised during altar calls.

4. Scott Hodge and his team from Orchard Church in Aurora, Illinois dropped Easter eggs from a helicopter. 20,000 eggs and thousands of people (see pictures here)

5. National Community Church in DC also celebrated with 20,000 eggs and a baptism service on Saturday (read about it here)

6. Gary Lamb and the folks at Revolution Church in Canton Georgia also dropped Easter eggs from a helicopter. I love this idea from all three of these churches! Check out the story and pictures.

7. Eric Bramlett and his team in Naperville IL at Community Christian in Naperville have a really funny video as they debuted their series called “Losing My Religion” which started Easter Weekend. Check it out HERE.

8. High Desert Church in CA continued their series called “The Most Spectacular Show on Earth” and had more than 6,000 attend and over 100 people come to Christ after battling spiritual warfare with everything going wrong on their sound systems at their various locations.

9. Travis Johnson and the crew at Life Point Church in Homestead FL held a Moonlight Easter Egg Hunt (7-9pm) and had 7,000+ people show up. How creative is that idea? A moonlight Easter Egg Hunt!? They had a great turnout on Sunday with many coming from the community who attended that Easter Egg hunt.

10. Cross Point Church in Nashville had an amazing Easter at their two campuses locally (read a great letter from someone who was greatly impacted here) and at their new church start-up in the Dominican Republic. A team of 20 from Cross Point spent their week working on the church building and while the building was far from being completed, the pastor led their first service in the new church on Easter Sunday. How cool is that?

11. Check out the things Granger Community Church had people hold in their hands during the service. HERE are the pics. Read about it here and here.

12. NewSpring Church saw 12,000 people attend their services and over 120 people receive Christ (read here) and held a great service in their Man Series called “Ultimate Fighter”

13. The team at Seacoast Church launched a new campus on Easter in one of the most crime-ridden areas of the country. HERE is the story.

14. Connexus had more than 1,300 at their two compuses with some moving stories.

15. Jordan Creek Church played the Upside Down Video.

16. A worship leader in Atlanta experienced what true worship is really all about (read this moving story here)

PS…BONUS COVERAGE I just found out that Saddleback Church opened two new sites on Easter and their San Clemente site celebrated its one year anniversary! The first service of Saddleback Corona gathered 490 attenders and 43 accepted Christ. That’s almost 10 % of those who attended! The first service at Saddleback Irvine gathered 1,826 attenders and 34 accepted Christ! The service at Saddleback San Clemente (open one year) gathered 1,550 attenders and 39 accepted Christ!

Chicago Voted Best Destination for Food and Dining March 16, 2008

Posted by Steve in : The City, Chicago, Chicago Fact, The Cultural Conversation, Culture and Faith , add a comment

Travel + Leisure, Headline News and CNN.com are launching their annual search for the best cities in America. Since Chicago was voted the best destination for food and dining in 2007, let’s make it happen again in 2008!

Here’s how to vote on the Travel & Leisure website below.

Let the debates begin

When Travel + Leisure announced the results of last year’s America’s Favorite Cities Survey, debates raged on television, in print and on the Internet: Was Chicago really the best destination for food and dining (as well as pizza)? As a foodie, I knew that, and all of you knew that, but finally the rest of the country knew that.

But did you think that Philadelphians deserve last place in the attractive citizens category? Are Seattle residents really the most intelligent in the country? How could sunny Los Angeles edge out surly New York as the least friendly city?

Cast your vote now

Here’s your chance to tell us what YOU think. Visit TravelandLeisure.com/afc/survey from March 7 to June 15, take the 2008 America’s Favorite Cities Survey and enter to win a dream trip for two. We want to know: Which of these 25 urban contenders has the best shoe shopping or ethnic eats? Where would you go for a romantic escape? Which cities have the best (and worst) museums, theater and live music? If you want a wild weekend or a relaxing retreat, which urban destination would you visit? You know best, so tell us!

(HT: Bestofthebestdiningchicago.com)

Chciago Voted Best Radio Market in the Country March 16, 2008

Posted by Steve in : The City, Chicago, Chicago Fact, The Cultural Conversation , add a comment

We know what a great music town this is, but it’s been confirmed by The Infinite Dial Radio Blog, which rated Chicago the best radio market in the country. Here is what they said in summary:

When we put together the list of the Ten Best Markets For Radio Listeners–those that offered the best combination of quantity and quality on AM/FM radio–there was some discussion about whether our choice for the No. 1 market would surprise people. After all, it wasn’t New York or Los Angeles, two places that get a lot more attention. But nobody who has ever been connected with Chicago radio will be surprised. This is a market where radio has always been taken very seriously and held to a certain standard.
Chicago is a great market for listeners because of the choice it offers.
There are more head-to-head battles than you’ll find in most markets (Top 40, Urban, Talk, Mainstream AC, Regional Mexican, Classic Rock, Urban AC, Sports, and even the Variety Hits battle between Jack-FM and Nine-FM).
There’s also, seemingly, the most student-run radio per capita of any market,
There are more viable suburban radio than in most places.
Chicago is also still the morning show capital of the world.
Chicago has what many consider to be the best male/female morning show in the country in WTMX (the Mix)’s Eric & Kathy, who still manage to animate what has become a cliché in other markets, and get more out of their callers than most.
It’s also a market with a lot of recent activity. WKQX (Q101) has segued from its more eclectic version of Alternative to the cusp of Active Rock, meaning that Heritage Rock sister WLUP has gone more Classic Rock. FM Talker WCKG has become CBS’ second “Fresh FM,” launching while longtime AC WLIT plays Christmas music. WILV (Love 100.3) has segued from Jammin’ Oldies to a broader-based ’70s/’80s party format. Progressive talker WCPT has moved frequencies.

Barna — A New Perspective on Unchurched March 6, 2008

Posted by Steve in : Breaking News, Church, Urban Church, Methods & Strategies, Missional, The Cultural Conversation, Internet Resources , add a comment

According to a new study released by The Barna Group, popular measures such as the percentage of people who are “unchurched” - based on attendance at a conventional church service - are out of date. Various new forms of faith community and experience, such as house churches, marketplace ministries and cyberchurches, must be figured into the mix - and make calculating the percentage of Americans who can be counted as “unchurched” more complicated. The fact that millions of people are now involved in multiple faith communities - for instance, attending a conventional church one week, a house church the next, and interacting with an online faith community in-between - has rendered the standard measures of “churched” and “unchurched” much less precise. According to Barna, one way of examining people’s participation in faith communities is by exploring how they practice their corporate faith engagement. Unveiling a new measurement model, Barna identified the following five segments:

Unattached - people who had attended neither a conventional church nor an organic faith community (e.g., house church, simple church, intentional community) during the past year. Some of these people use religious media, but they have had no personal interaction with a regularly-convened faith community. This segment represents one out of every (more…)

Christians in the Culture March 6, 2008

Posted by Steve in : Weblog, The City, Church, Methods & Strategies, Missional, The Cultural Conversation, The Arts in the City, Provision Theater, DifferenceMakers, Culture and Faith , add a comment

For as long as I can remember, I have been interested in how the culture ebbs and flows and who drives the culture. I’ve also seen a more determined generation who wants to drive faith and values into the culture. hidden chicago A good friend of mine, Dave Carlson of Bucktown Pictures, has continually told me that the movie theaters are the churches of the next century and movie directors are the priests so we better wade into the culture and not shrink from it as Christians.

Recently, I have been introduced to the Wedgewood Circle folks, sort of a national angel investment network of successful entrepreneurs, investment institutions and high net worth investors who provide investment capital, strategic guidance and relationships to contribute to the renewal of the culture by investing in cultural “artifact” creation in the key influential sectors of film, music television, publishing, theatre/performing, fashion, fine arts and computer/console gaming. I like what they are doing.

I also like what Gabe Lyons and the Fermi Project is doing. Fermi Project is a broad collective of innovators, artists, social entrepreneurs, church and societal leaders experimenting with ways to advance the common good in culture.

Well over the last ten years, many have begun to make an impact in Hollywood and recently, Beliefnet has chronicled their top dozen most influential and powerful Christians in Hollywood? Well, Beliefnet has come up with their list, and it includes names like Mel Gibson, Denzel Washington, Patricia Heaton, Angela Bassett, and Martin Sheen. Sounds like a pretty diverse list with a pretty broad theological definition, but none the less, interesting. You can read more here…