The first day of the Summit was intense. We went from 9:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. NGA members from around the country gathered at our home church – Calvary Chapel of Southeastern Connecticut. Those represented traveled from across our state and other parts of the country including California, Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Indiana. We had some great worship from Justin Kendrick’s team, Out of Hiding and some great talks from Dr. Tim Robnett, Jeff Pieper, Chris White and even our own, Joe Paskewich (Pastor of Calvary Chapel and Chairman of our Board of Directors).

I think the most exciting thing about our time with NGA is not just the great talks and worship, but the relationships that form at these functions. These relationships are formed through extended intentional breaks as well as conversation over great food. The Palau team has done a great job mentoring and encouraging those who express the call of evangelism and it’s exciting that they are willing to invest in the next generation to further the work.

We saw old friends as well as new ones. Representing hip-hop evangelism was Scott Free and Mike Foster. We had some pro-bmx guys here too (Mike Mancuso and Schwinny). Jerimae Yoder also joined us to lead worship on day 2. It was great seeing a few of our regional guys there too like Paul Fuller, our network Coordinator and Don Doré from Rock the Sound. Thank you NGA for putting Connecticut on the map!

Jeff Pieper is the Director of Strategic Relationships for Luis Palau’s Next Generation Alliance (of which, f2fmi is a proud member). Jeff’s role is to promote collaboration, team work and to build the network of ministries that work together.

A wise teacher said, “…it is really awesome when God’s people hang together in unity (my interpretation of Psalm 133.1). How excellent is it when we all serve together in order to accomplish something that is way bigger than anyone could do alone. “There is more that unites us than divides us.” One of my professors said that in a class about church leadership. It really stuck with me.

When I joined the Next Generation Alliance staff of the Luis Palau team, this became even more evident when collaborative missions and conferences were being conducted. At the core, the alliance ministries of the Palau organization exists to identify, affirm and equip those who believe that they are to declare the amazing transformational power of God and invite others to experience a relationship with Jesus Christ.

I was in Petionville, Haiti in December of 2009 for a collaborative mission between over a dozen separate organizations who chose to come together. The local association of churches represented a diverse denominational cohort and hundreds of local pastors and church members collaborating. The week of ministry that included conferences, humanitarian work, radio and television programs, music and proclamation reached all over the city of Petionville awe well as the national capital of Port Au Prince. Something like this can only happen when people come together and work in unity. Together, we can go so much further and accomplish so much more than we ever could alone.

It takes all types of ministries to be able to connect with the diverseness of people in this world. To suggest one method or approach would be to suggest that the entire world speaks a common language with a common understanding of all of life. Sometimes we get skeptical about working with others and can yield to what a majority of times is fear. At times we may imagine that if we collaborate with others, we’ll lose our place or our “voice” in the midst of others. Unity doesn’t mean we all have to look the same, talk the same or eat the same pizza. Can you imagine only one type of pizza? No way! Ministry, for that matter the Christian life as well, does not have to be that way either. God says it’s rad when we all hang together in unity. He gives us props when we dismiss the things that most people use to separate and divide.

That’s why collaborating with others is such a great thing. We realize that there is so much more uniting us than dividing us. People all over the world are similar in so many ways even though we all have our own unique attributes about us. Having experiences with other people who are passionate about declaring the goodness of Christ is a blessing. Traveling together, supporting one another while each other are speaking and teaching is empowering. Sharing meals or some cookies and milk is something anyone in the world – and right here at home – would totally dig. I mean, come on, who doesn’t like cookies? Cookies can unite the world under a peaceful banner of love! (Okay, I digress.)

Whether in Kigali, Rwanda, my home of Portland, Oregon or around the world, collaborating with others has been an amazing experience for me. So many people from all walks of life all over the world coming together to serve. Everyone with different background and life experience; people from various economic situations, and so many different cultural and ethnic environments have been represented. Everyone unified to serve something bigger than their own self! All God’s created people can come together in unity and harmony to share the hope and restoration that God provides. At the end of all the collaborative mission trips, it was clear that living out the love of Jesus Christ through word and actions is the most important thing we can do for the world. And anyone can do that… anywhere in the world! Everyone has the power to do the work of an evangelist in the manner God has called you.

Together we can go farther than we could alone. It’s ok to hang alone and chill, turning inward for reflection and solace. When it comes to connecting with a city, a region or a nation, we all have to put down the nonsense that divides and as the Beatles sang, “come together.”

UPDATES: 2/28: March 1 is the last day to register if you are planning to eat with us. It’s absolutely free so if you want in, register ASAP!
2/12: Venue change… see below.

What’s Up:
NGA Evangelists, Pastors, para-church leaders and those excited about reaching New England for Christ are invited to come find rest and encouragement with other Alliance members as we worship the Lord together through fellowship, praise, food and instruction. In essence, New England’s first NGA mini-conference!

When:
March 3rd and 4th, 2010

Where:
Calvary Chapel of Southeastern Connecticut – 130 Sharp Hill Road, Uncasville, CT 06382

Cost:
We have a certain amount of lodging accommodation available at no cost (first come will be the first served) and all meals will be covered. There is no cost for these conferences.

Schedule:
Download the conference schedule here.

Registration:
Because we are providing food, it is essential that you RSVP so that we can prepare enough.

REGISTRATION FOR THIS EVENT IS CLOSED.

In my last book review, I was checking out Kevin Roose’s breakout book, The Unlikely Disciple (read it here) after meeting with him on his turf at Brown University. Kevin then turned around and sent me a book that comes out later this month from his friend, Austin Carty who was a contestant on CBS reality t.v. – Survivor: Panama — Exile Island in 2006.

Although Austin is a Christian author/speaker, I had never heard of him and I have never seen Survivor. I decided to check Google for some videos on Survivor and found a few with small clips with him in them. I would have preferred to rent the season and see what all the hype is all about but since Netflix isn’t carrying it, I figured it’s more trouble than it’s worth to get my hands on it. I settled for an under five minute recap of the entire season that I found on Youtube. It wasn’t particularly enlightening to my research for this post, but you can watch it too if you want a little bit of context.

Austin is from High Point, North Carolina – pretty clever for working that in to his title. His book is a collection of essays that are in no particular chronological order and highlight different times of his life where he was wrestling with life and faith issues. Plume published it, which interestingly enough is a subdivision of Penguin, where my friend Rhiannon was working in London. Penguin’s offices overlook the river Thames, Big Ben and the Eye of London and I got some great photos from a balcony at the top of the building last January.

I have to admit, Austin’s opening chapters really irritated me. In the first chapter, Austin opens by revealing that his journey has been a combination of partying hard and then having seasons of pursuing the Christian lifestyle fairly intensely. That in itself doesn’t really bother me. Many people who have grown up in the church go through those times. I went through my seasons too. He then makes his point that nowadays when he is in a place that serves alcohol, instead of ordering water so that people can see that he’s not drinking, he orders Coca-Cola. He doesn’t want people to know what’s in his glass because it’s between God and him. He also doesn’t want to make a show of the fact that he’s not drinking. Fair enough. However, the question that continues to force it’s way in to my mind is, “Why is he telling me this?” Is it so that I won’t be religious about what I drink? Where I drink? Who I drink with? Or has Austin found a way to be a Christian party boy and be around the same crowd he has always hung out with without having his conscience disturbed by what’s in his glass. I don’t know the answer to these questions because I don’t know Austin. Not having developed himself as a character for his own book, I just think it was a rough way to start a book. Maybe if this chapter were somewhere else in the book, I would feel differently.

All that aside, chapter 2 really irritated me. He talks about evangelistic outreach in a very general way that in my opinion is reckless. For me, this did not improve my impression of his book. Yes, there are some of us out there that have done a bad job representing Christ. However, poking fun at individual evangelists was not his aim. Austin talks about his experience sitting in an evangelistic meeting and feeling the need to respond after the message. He basically says it did nothing for him. He thinks it was not a valid response. I would say — don’t throw the baby out with the bath water! Just because he was confused about his response does not mean that others aren’t reached through traditional evangelistic methods.

Austin criticizes the fact that someone was counting responses. Maybe he doesn’t have a knowledge about how event evangelism is put together, but let me share how we make it happen:

1. Numbers are important to keep track of because it’s diligence in our field. As a member of Luis Palau’s Next Generation Alliance, it is f2fmi’s responsibility to keep our ministry’s statistics. At the end of each year, these numbers get reported back to head office and then we have a snapshot of what evangelists all over the country are doing to reach people for Christ. Since it’s impossible to measure the heart, responses are what we track.
2. It is how our organization gathers resources. Without numbers, there is nothing to show donors as far as results. f2fmi’s donors are excited and engaged by our diligence in keeping track of what we are doing.
3. Finally, numbers are key in retelling the story of salvation as we encourage the church. Nehemiah did it (read the book). The Lord moved him for a cause. Nehemiah asked the king for support and then carried on with his mission. Along the way, he was diligent to record exactly what happened and and reported numbers of people, livestock and even financials. Many times in the Bible you see this model recorded. It’s very Biblical to do our homework

Moving on to the rest of the book, Austin does some great things in some of his other chapters. I enjoyed reading about his awkward years, his relationships with girls and even his ministry experiences. Austin makes some valid points about what it means to live the Christian faith like — pray as if God is a real person without using special religious language, and growing in faith through adversity and loss. These points make the book a decent read.

The book comes out nationally on Jan 26th. You can buy it from Penguin here.

The Young Billy Graham

UPDATE: Listen to the Conference talk at the NGA website here.

This past November, I was invited to teach a workshop on the Evangelist and the Community at NGA’s Innovative Evangelism Conference. NGA functions are usually the highlight of my year, so naturally I was saddened when I stayed behind to care for Amy. However, the workshop went on in my absence. My friend, Ramin Salehi stepped in to teach in my stead. I skyped in at the beginning and the end to bring it all together. Our regional coordinator from Southeastern Connecticut, Paul Fuller also got to share about what God is doing in our region through the partnership of f2fmi and churches in our community. I thought my notes from this talk would be a great way to start eNews in a New Year.

Many people go to NGA Conferences trying to network for their ministries. There’s nothing wrong with this. With over 200 ministries registered in our partner directory, there’s a lot of great people in NGA to meet! f2fmi’s philosophy of conference attending is different because we came in to Luis Palau’s Next Generation Alliance in a special way. My friend, Brad mentored me in and introduced me to the NGA community. Because of this, we learned many benefits of our membership. We have been taught by leaders in our field, coached, connected and challenged by our partnership. We have also received all kinds of support from the Palau team via endorsements, opportunities to serve, and even a little financial support. As a result, the team fund-raises together so we can go together. And when we arrive, it is a reward for working together as a team. We see old friends and make a few new ones. We get some training. And when we roll in to the conference, we have the privilege to give back whatever we have learned from NGA to new members who are starting the journey of something new in their communities. Since we ourselves are relatively still new, the materials we have pieced together to make it work for us is fresh in our brains. We are eager to pass on that information to others because NGA eagerly shared it with us. So we go to the conference to teach and to learn (one of f2fmi’s core values).

The Evangelist and the Community is f2fmi’s special blend of these teachings. It is the DNA of how we started and who we are becoming. In a way, it’s what we will be because we are being shown the way by amazing teachers who know what they are doing from experience. More importantly, the Evangelist and the Community is the life lessons that I have learned from my community that have put the office of evangelist in its properly valued and relevant context. An evangelist in community is a powerful aid to the local church and without it, the evangelist is a soapbox Bible-thumper that is disillusioned by other believers who don’t share their passion for reaching the lost. Enjoy my notes!

View: The_Evangelist_the_Community

Although I had to sit this one out, both Nathanael and John Fogg Jr. along with our regional Network Coordinator for NNYM, Paul Fuller set out to Portland, Oregon for the conference this past November:

John writes about the journey there…
On the plane from Bradley International in Hartford, Nathanael sat in the window seat next  to me while I sat next to a guy who was watching a mock-u-mentary called The God Who Wasn’t There.  Although I couldn’t hear it, I could see that it was very disparaging of Christianity. I prayed for an opportunity to talk to him. Then wham! An old lady fainted right in front of us, with a loud thump. It was scary at first, a nurse who attended her said she had a really weak pulse. I prayed that she would be alright. The pilots were considering whether to attempt an emergency landing. She finally came to and seemed to be ok. So I asked the guy next to me if he was a student. He said he was actually a sociology professor at Willamette University in Portland. He asked me why I was on my way to Portland. I told him I was going to attend an evangelism conference with Luis Palau. He said he never heard of him. I said he once worked with Billy Graham. He said “Oh yeah, I’ve heard of him before”. With that he immediately went back to reading a sociology  textbook. So pray for the sociology department at Willamette University. They need to know the real Jesus!

John got to live his dream when he got to Portland…
The day before NGA CONFERENCE started I stopped at Cal Skate in downtown Portland to buy a board and some pads. I picked up a new Powell mini double kick street board set up with really hard and fast wheels,  and a set of pads with wrist guards. After that we registered for the conference. During break we went to the Dept of skateboarding with Jud Heald, Tom Geilfuss and Shawn Hoffarth and I got to skate with them!

Nathanael reflects on his conference experience…
Innovative Evangelism Conference was a great experience this year because we were able to reconnect with a lot of the people we met with last year.  We formed sort of a band of brothers without even realizing it.  We had such a good time communing together at the workshops, main sessions, meals, and even afterward, when everything was done for the day, by spending quality time debriefing and bouncing ideas off of each other.  A core group of Ramin, Paul, John, and I even split up which workshops to attend amongst us, based on our respective interests.  I was able to attend an enlightening session lead by renowned worship leader Matt Redman, and another one focusing specifically on creative arts in ministry.  By the end of the week, with hearts and brains busting full of encouragement and information, we were sad to go, but glad to take the next step.

Paul shares about how the conference impacted him…
Several months ago Tom invited me to join his team on a trip to Portland for the Innovative Evangelism Conference.  It sounded like a cool experience, but I wasn’t totally sure what to expect. While there were plenty of speakers and ideas that I was blessed by, the biggest thing I got out of the trip was a better understanding of where Tom is coming from as an evangelist. In hearing Luis Palau speak, and observing everything else over the 3 days of the conference, I saw why Tom is so passionate about evangelism above and beyond any other area of ministry. Evangelism - which I was able to see comes in so many forms – is the heartbeat of the Palau Association.  Seeing this play out at the conference helped me to understand where Tom is coming from in a new way. It also helped me to realize that there is a great community behind Tom that he can bounce ideas off of, learn from (through both successes & mistakes), and gain resources from. While I’ve really appreciated Tom’s ministry over the past few years, it hadn’t always clicked on all cylinders with me because of my lack of familiarity with evangelistic movements. But now, having a better grasp on where he’s coming from and what is influencing him, it is all much clearer to me. Not only did I learn a lot, but I feel even more confident in supporting Tom’s ministry and partnering with him because of my time at the conference.

What is a musicianary, you ask? Good question! Why we haven’t taken time to explain this in all these years is beyond us. A MUSICIANARY is a MUSIC-MISSIONARY. The term is not original… we tried to buy the domain name when we first thought of it. Apparently, others have thought of this term and all the good ones are gone.

How did f2fmi get involved with Musicianaries?
Good question! It all started when Amy and I were living in the UK. in 2004. I was a radio d.j. at the University I attended and was invited to m.c. an event with thebandwithnoname at the end of a schools week in Canterbury. I became great friends with the lead singer, chipK and was impressed with the powerful way the band presented the Christian message. They spoke a language young people could understand using MTV-style performances with singing and dancing in school assemblies, lunch time concerts, character education classes and at Friday night concerts.

On Tour with the Band
After returning to the USA, I received a book deal from Tate Publishing. As a way of cross marketing the book, I named my book after the band’s 2nd album – Schizophrenix. Then, I went on tour with the band for 2 months in 2005 running their sound, doing some preaching and sitting through dozens of auditions. At the end of the tour, there were several recruits and I opened f2fmi in Belpre, Ohio to help musicianaries get to England once they had been accepted in to a band produced by Innervation Trust.

Carissa & Kylie
The first two musicianaries that f2fmi sent to England were Carissa Jardio and Kylie Evans in 2006. Carissa was from Tampa and went to the renown hip-hop church, Crossover. Kylie was part of a dance studio in Missouri, hailing from Lee’s Summit. The two girls raised support in months and the next thing they knew, they had both landed parts in thebandwithnoname as backup dancers.

The Lodz Mission with Passion 4 People International
Another big happening in 2006 was a collaborative NGA mission to Lodz, Poland. I was recruited to direct the mission for Evangelist Brad Butcher of Passion 4 People International. I took thebandwithnoname in to the schools of Lodz leading to a concert at the end of the week for more than 800 students.

Lucy & Jennifer
The next two to go to England were Lucy Wells and Jennifer Elrod. Lucy’s parents are missionaries from England that moved to Atlanta, GA with Operation Mobilization. We sent Lucy back as a reverse-missionary to the country of her birth! Jennifer, also from Georgia raised support to be in an Innervation band. Lucy is our longest standing musicianary, performing in the all-girl pop band, tbc.

Genetik
Musicianaries were coming home before their contracts were up. We were troubled by this because of the amount of work it took to get them over there. The question was raised, “How do we prepare them better so they will stay?” Trainings were introduced. Meetings and phone conferences followed. Paperwork. The answer turned out to be using The Message Trust, another schools work organization, to train our aspiring music missionaries. The Message founded an academy for music and evangelism called Genetik. We began to send our missionaries through their program in order to see if they could cut it in the UK before offering them permanent positions in schools bands.

Ryan & Morgan
Enter Ryan Griggs and Morgan Dinerstein. When I re-opened the f2fmi office in 2007 in Connecticut, I met both Ryan and Morgan at my new home church, Calvary Chapel. Both of them were presented with the opportunity. Both of them went to Genetik. Ryan was offered an internship with The Message and toured for a semester in a new project called Genetik Revolution. When his internship was over, Ryan and the team were offered permanent roles with The Message. The band was renamed Twelve24 and thrust in to schools all over Manchester in the fall 2008.

tbc in the USA
f2fmi changed roles in 2009 from tour coordinator to regional partner. We hosted tbc in Southeastern Connecticut for one of their famous schools weeks! tbc did many shows throughout the week leading up to a main event at Connecticut College’s Palmer Auditorium for 400+. You can read the official Mission Report here.

How will f2fmi Support the work of Musicianaries in 2010?
2010 is already proving to be an exciting year. Both Ryan and Lucy will remain in the UK touring the schools in their respective bands. f2fmi remains committed to keeping them on the field and rallying support for their cause in 2 major ways:

1. f2fmi and The Lifefaqs Foundation will bring Twelve24 to Connecticut in March to tour our schools and reach students in our community!

2. f2fmi is also committed to finding another musicianary for Innervation’s tbc. Are you between 18-24? Do you rap, dance, or sing and have a passion to share your faith? Would you like to become a MUSICIANARY? For more information, click here.

On April 2, 2009, F2fmi, Holyfire and Luis Palau’s Next Generation Alliance will be co-hosting a day of prayer for New England at F2fmi’s office in Uncasville, Connecticut (located at Calvary Chapel of SE CT). Also joining them will be Paul Ramey, the worship leader from Gallery church in New York City.

Representing the Palau team are Dr. Tim Robnett and Jeff Peiper. Dr. Tim is the Director of NGA. He and Jeff mentor and encourage hundreds of ministries and evangelists from around the world. They will be leading us in prayer for New England for the least reached. Justin Kendrick and his Holyfire team are brand new members of the NGA team. They will be leading worship along side of Paul Ramey to help direct our time of prayer.

Are you a ministry leader hungry to see your community reached for Christ? Would you join us in prayer and for lunch?

Please RSVP by emailing us: info@f2fmi.org
Download the Day of Prayer brochure.