back from elderlink 2005

Yeah, you read that correctly... I went to ElderLink 2005 in Nashua, NH. I am in no way, shape, or form a church elder or leader, nor do I intend on being either of those things anytime soon (well, at least that's what I think, God may have something else in mind). For me, this was a great opportunity to re-balance my life a bit. Since I've been working a lot lately, I kind of felt my spiritual life suffered a bit since I didn't really have the time or energy to reflect on much.

In short, the plenary sessions with Randy Harris about doctrinal disagreements were awesome! I think a lot of what he had to say shook up some people who were there, and while this was primarily a Church of Christ event, I think a lot of what he said translates directly into inter-denominational and inter-faith/religion relations. I also thoroughly enjoyed David Wray's talks on Christian spiritual formation. He started with a brief introduction to some of the thoughts conveyed in Brian McLaren's A Generous Orthodoxy concerning modern churchs' overemphasis on spiritual information, as opposed to spiritual in formation. David Wray jumped off from there and talked about a need for balance of 3 things: spiritual information, spiritual formation, and spiritual transformation. I would translate this to the ideals of education, nurturing growth, and openness to being conformed to the image of Christ. Ok, you got me, that last bit about conforming was some more from David Wray's talks.

However, I would be horribly rude to leave out the main reason I went to ElderLink. Paul Clark was a co-presenter with Jeff Christian in a couple of sessions about being and becoming a missional church. The idea being that a missional church is not a place that you go to, but rather is a group from which you are sent out into the world (local, regional, global, or whatever your groups' calling is). I would say that while some of the tools and topics that were covered have no bearing on my current station in life (me not being a church leader of a church looking to move more missional), I did find the concepts helpful in understanding the kind of church community I want to be a part of. Paul is a great friend of mine, and he recommended that I come up for the event, for which I am grateful since I enjoyed his sessions and everything else. I did have a few people comment that I seemed a bit young to be at a conference aimed primarily at church elders, which was a bit amusing to me as it was truly curiosity and nothing more on their part. Most who continued in deeper conversation got a small taste of the ideas I have been floating around on this blog over the past year, along with the address of my blog (Welcome!).

I will have to check out what is on the books for next year's event, and maybe shake things up a bit more (I admit, I was mostly a wallflower). Anyway, I've rambled on plenty to make up for my weekend away from the blog. Coming up next, a recount of my winding outdoor journey from today (from which I am exhausted) and my current plan for expanding my prayer life and dwelling in scripture.