Date: 10/19/2008 – Disclaimer

I’ve read lots of books by lots of different authors with lots of different worldviews, but this is not an easy topic. I want to approach it with humility. Besides, 30 minutes should be enough time to discuss a topic like this, right?

I know we have a lot of people at all of our locations that come from different perspectives, and I may open up a can of worms, but this is the stuff we need to be talking and thinking about.

Genesis 1:1

I’d like to share a bit of my spiritual and intellectual journey. I grew up in church, and my mom read me Bible stories, some about creation. I had Sunday school teachers who used flannel graphs to explain creation. A Creator has always seemed intuitive to me, but I also realize that I grew up in an environment that would cause that and others didn’t.

Oliver Wendell Holmes said that there is simplicity on the near side of complexity and simplicity on the far side of complexity. I think many Christians settle for simplicity on the near side of complexity, but I think God has called us to a far side faith, and we try to do that here at NCC. Our Alpha course is an example of that. We also try to create a culture where the most important decisions ought to be the most informed decisions.

I grew up going to church, but I had a near-side faith, if you will. When I went to college, I knew what I believed, but I didn’t know why I believed what I believed. The University of Chicago was a highly intellectual environment. One of my core science courses was taught by a professor who very clearly did not believe in God. I remember sitting in the class and experiencing cognitive dissonance between what I believed and what I was being taught as fact. My professor was basically teaching us about the Big Bang and evolution. I’m not sure how to reconcile my faith and science. By the way, I decided to do my term paper on intelligent design. I don’t think I’ve ever worked harder on a project. I got an A.

I look back on that. I’m a few years older and wiser, and if I knew then what I know now, I don’t think I would have been as frightened by what I was hearing. I’ve learned a few things about science and theology since then. This is a conversation about it, but we all need to discover why believe what we do.

I was made to feel somewhat foolish believing in a self-existent, infinite God. People would ask me where God came from. It’s the first cause question. It’s beyond the ability of the human mind to fathom that, but those who believe in creation by random chance have to answer that as well. My question is, “Where did the soup and single-cell amoeba come from?” It seems to me that on the causological issue, it’s a mystery no matter how you look at it. It seems that those who believe in God are put on the spot and those who do not don’t have to meet the same standard of proof.

You can’t prove or disprove the existence of God. It’s a tenet of faith, but it goes both ways. Michael Guillen says: there are two types of people in the world, those who believe in God and those who believe in something else (a god of randomness). It takes faith to believe the universe is the magnum opus of a creator, but I think it takes more faith to believe it all just came from randomness.

This weekend I was reading about the Jens-Olsen clock. It is the most complicated clock in the world. It is also the most accurate. It has parts that won’t move for 2500 years. It has 15,000 parts. Imagine if someone in Copenhagen (where the clock is located) told you that the clock wasn’t designed by anyone, that it just appeared after a large explosion.

[Lots of facts about how complicated, intricate, and precisely balanced our world is.] It seems to me that our planet is perfectly synchronized to sustain human life. Is that the result of random chance or is that the result of intelligent design. All I’m saying is, let’s not make the mistake of thinking that religion takes faith and science doesn’t. I think there is tremendous evidence that points to intelligent design, but in the end it comes down to Hebrews 11:6. By faith we believe that what is made comes from not from what is seen but is unseen.

This is just scratching the surface of one small issue, but I would be remiss if I didn’t talk about some theological issues. The Bible does not explicitly put a timeline on human history or the age of the Earth, but I think the unspoken assumption by a lot of people is that the Earth is young. I think that causes some cognitive dissonance for Christians.

I think a lot of the dissonance comes from the translation of the word “day” in Genesis 1. What I think you have to remember is that this was written thousands of years ago by an author inspired by God by an author who I don’t think was trying to write a scientific treatise for your biology class. I’m not saying there are scientific mistakes. I’m just saying you have to appreciate the context in which it was written.

The Hebrew word for day in Genesis 1 can be translated in a variety of ways. It can me a 24 hour day, sun-up to sun-down, or an age, eon, etc. It was used in each of these ways in the Old Testament. I know that there are some literalists who would suggest that anything other than a 24 hour day is a slippery slope.

Let’s talk about hermeneutics for a minute. It’s a fancy word for interpreting the Bible. On a very simple level, it’s important to remember that there are different literary genres in the Bible. I think you have to interpret the Psalms artistically. I think you have to interpret the historical part literally. Some people want to explain that away. I believe that God created Adam and Eve from the dust of the earth. When you translate prophecy, you’d better not do that literally because it’s going to be weird. If you translate Revelation literally, you’re going to be wrong because it wasn’t written that way. Jesus was using hyperbole when he said “pluck out your eye if it causes you to sin.” I’m pretty sure at all of our locations we’re allowing women to come in without headcoverings even though Paul said that women needed to wear them. Why? Because in Paul’s culture that would have been weird. It would have drawn a ton of attention for a woman not to be wearing a headcovering. It would have been a distraction.

So, going back to the evolution/creation debate, back to the tension. I know this may not be what you want me to say in this message. Some of you want me to get into macro and micro evolution, punctuated equilibrium, but no. I think what happens for many of us is that we just take one side or the other and discard the other side. I want to propose a middle way. Let me say up front that all truth is God’s truth. I believe that the Bible is a special revelation from God, but also that creation reveals God. Paul said that God is seen in nature. If that’s true, then every “-ology” is branch of theology. I think we ought to send our kids into science with the same degree of encouragement that we send our kids to the mission field. We ought to be discovering the cure for cancer, discovering new species and new planets, unlocking the genetic code.

I think what I want to suggest is that science is not something we need to be afraid of; it is a spiritual endeavor. Solomon taught not only about spiritual matters but about science as well. I think the more discoveries we make, the more we learn about God.

Emerson: The religion that’s afraid of science dishonors God and commits suicide.

It’s not always easy to reconcile those two things. This is a bizarre place for us to end. I think we’re so afraid of the “E” word that we’ve made a mistake. When I say that I believe in evolution, not referring to macroevolution, not saying that we come from apes, but do I believe in microevolution? Of course, it’s something we ought to celebrate. God created us with an evolutionary capacity, the ability to adapt to environments. Here is the great irony. Evolution is a testament to God’s creativity. I think microevolution may be one of the greatest testaments to God’s creation. I think it’s kind of like sex. Let’s give credit where credit is due, sex was God’s idea. Sex is a gift from God. Are there parameters? Absolutely, it was a gift from God to be enjoyed by husband and wife in the context of marriage, but God never gets any credit for that because the enemy has co-opted that because the abuses in our culture are ruining people’s lives. I think the exact same thing has happened with the concept of evolution. What I’m trying to say is, let’s not be afraid of this. Let’s celebrate it.

Einstein: Science without religion is lame, and religion without science is blind.

What I want to do is talk about those four words, “Let there be light.” We use words to communicate, but God uses words to heal and create. Prior to the 20th century, some of the leading scientific minds didn’t believe in a beginning. It was called the steady state theory. Now we know that the universe is expanding.

Stephen Hawking: Most people do not like the idea of a beginning, probably because it smacks of divine intervention.

I think that most people oppose the idea of God not because of scientific reasons but because if He exists, you’re accountable to Him.

The Doppler Effect: Galaxies are still being created at the edge of the universe.

Thus, “Let there be light.” Is still creating. Everything you look at is an echo of a creator that said “Let there be.”

Forget the science, science is gone now. We teach in our classrooms the assumption that everything is random chance. We think that the idea that we are a cosmic accident has no implication. You think that the depression rampant in our culture isn’t an effect of that. You take out God, you suck the meaning out of our lives.

You are not an accident. Someone needs to hear that this weekend. You were created by an omnipotent God big enough to know the hairs on your head, and he has a plan and a purpose for your life. You were created by and for God, and some day you will stand before God.

Here’s some good news, an amazing thought. Let’s not get embroiled in all of the debate and controversy, let’s study it and wrestle with it, but let’s zoom way back out. Isn’t the universe that we live in an amazing place. I was on a flight this week, and it was the first time in a long time I’ve been in a window seat, and for almost the entire time I stared at the moon. It was brilliant as it glared off the cloud cover beneath the plane. It was amazing. You think about everything God has created. 1 Cor 2:9 – No one can conceive what God has prepared for those who love him. Creation is a glimpse of eternity, a glimpse of heaven. We will experience things that in our current condition we cannot process.

Main Session 2

Description: The high-achieving, highly mobile, de-churched neighborhoods of Washington, DC, aren’t ideal environments for small group ministry. Yet, National Community Church is making it work. Learn about their “organic approach” to community and how you can see group life flourish despite harsh surroundings.

Speakers’ Bios:

Mark Batterson serves as lead pastor of National Community Church in Washington, DC. In 2007 Outreach Magazine recognized NCC as one of the 25 Most Innovative Churches in America. One church with eight services in four locations, NCC is focused on reaching emerging generations. 73% of NCCers are single twenty-somethings and 70% come from an unchurched or dechurched background. The vision of NCC is to meet in movie theaters at metro stops throughout the metro DC area. NCC also owns and operates the largest coffeehouse on Capitol Hill. In 2007, Ebenezers was recognized as the #2 coffeehouse in the metro DC area by AOL CityGuide.

Mark is the author of In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day and Wild Goose Chase: Reclaiming the Adventure of Pursuing God.

A native Alabamian, Heather Zempel invested her parent’s money and six years of her life at Louisiana State University earning bachelors and masters degrees in biological engineering. She finally left Cajun country to apply her newly acquired skills as a consultant at an environmental engineering firm and later as a policy advisor in the United States Senate. She now engineers environments that foster community and spiritual growth as the discipleship pastor at National Community Church in Washington, DC. Heather and her amazing husband Ryan can be found on Capitol Hill enjoying theater (from the audience or the stage) and settling arguments with Webster’s Dictionary. Check out her daily ramblings at www.discipleshipgroups.blogspot.com.

Notes:

Okay, starting off, I’m excited for this session. Mark and Heather are my bosses at NCC.

MB: We needs lots of different kinds of churches because there are lots of different kinds of people.

It was the first weekend of January 1996. It was our first Sunday as pastors of National Community Church. It was also the weekend of the blizzard of ’96: two feet of snow. We had three people, my wife, myself, and our baby Parker. The good news is that with 19 people the next Sunday, we had 633% growth in the first week.

I had never pastored a church, and it was baptism by immersion. It was tough. I used to lead worship and would close my eyes because it was too depressing. We’d start with 6-8 people.

The school we were meeting in got closed down for fire code violations, and if the church had died, only two dozen people would have known or cared. But sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do is hang in there.

But somewhere in the back of my head I remembered that Willow Creek had started in a movie theater, so I went in to meet the manager at the Union Station theaters. They had just started a campaign to rent out their facilities during off hours. It was like God was in the middle of this thing!

I started with the traditional idea of renting a building until you can buy one, but in our neck of the woods, Capitol Hill, land goes for about $10 million an acre. I began to realize that our location was perfect. We were in the most visited destination in Washington DC with our own subway system, food court, etc.

We also own and operate the largest coffeehouse on Capitol Hill. Coffeehouses aren’t just a place to get coffee, they are postmodern wells. They’re the places that people just hang out.

Every day we have hundreds of people come through our coffeehouse. On Saturdays we have two services there. On Monday we have Alpha groups that meet there.

We are in a unique place. We are 73% single twentysomethings. We have 40-50% turnover every year(?).

Without the favor of God I don’t want to be in ministry, do you?

As our staff has grown through the years, I realized how much you enjoy doing ministry has a lot to do with who you are doing ministry with. The quality of your ministry will also begin to depend less on your competence and more on that of the people you work with.

God will not grow our churches beyond our capacity to disciple people. In other words, all of the pressure is on Heather.

HZ: Before coming on staff I was a biological engineer, so that happens to be the lens through which I view ministry.

I know some of you are groaning because you were the kids who hated science in school.

One of the most profound stories I heard in the science world is from a cereal company that wanted to replace it’s old equipment because it took equipment from a 5 story building to produce irregularly shaped cereal. The engineers figured out how to reduce the process to a machine that produced perfect cereal and was the size of a tabletop. However, no one wanted to buy the cereal.

I have a bad habit of going to conferences like this, finding the perfect model or system, and trying to implement it without regard to the specific culture where I am. You can have a perfect small group model that will produce perfect disciples, but if the people in your congregation won’t get involved with it, then it ceases to be the perfect system.

We’re going to talk about some of the catalysts that push forward the growth of community in the context in which we do ministry.

Don’t confuse the outcome with the methods. The outcome for us is people who are living and growing in community. There might be a number of processes that will get you to the outcome.

MB: 1. Everything is an experiment

Neurologists sub-divide the brain into regions responsible for a variety of functions.

THe visual cortex responsible for the optical nerve

The pre-frontal lobe (?) is responsible for spacial operations.

The medial ventral pre-frontal cortex is the east of humor.

Your left brain is the locus of logic, and your right brain is the locus of creativity or imagination.

Those hemispheres are connected for about 300 million nerve fibers called the corpus collosum. Female brains have about 40% more connections between the hemispheres. Men have 20% more bone density.

Over the course of time there is a cognitive shift from right brain to left brain. At some point we stop doing ministry out of right brain imagination and start doing it out of left brain memory. We stop dreaming and start remembering. I think God has called us to creativity. It’s not optional. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind.”

We believe that there are ways of doing church that no one has thought of yet.

What we try to do at National Community Church is approach everything we do in an experimental fashion.

Here’s what’s beautiful about this. How many of you as leaders have found that no matter how God-ordained your vision is, there are some people who will oppose it. So, if someone says, “I don’t think we should be doing that.” You know what our comeback is? “It’s just an experiment.” If it doesn’t work we’ll stop doing it. If it does, we’ll try to do it better.

This gives you the freedom to fail, the freedom to try new things, and to create what you want the future to look like.

HZ: One of the experiments we started about 4 years ago was running our small groups on the semester system. And this is one of those times when your context is important. We have a ton of college students and Hill staffers.

We’ve found that people are a lot more willing to try out a group if they’re only going to make an 8 to 12 week committment. How many of you really want to sign up for a 5 AM prayer group that meets in perpetuity? The fear is that people won’t stick with it, but we’re finding that isn’t true. People will join as long as they can see the exit sign.

We’ve had situations where people have been in the middle of year-long inductive Bible studies of Romans. That’s great, except that in the middle of it people may realize they’re struggling with relational and sexual purity and need out to address the issues they’re dealing with.

MB: We had quite a bit of resistance when we started.

So first, we said, let’s just try this. It’s an experiment.

Second, we allowed long-standing groups to keep meeting.

We take a break in August. And there was some concern that we’re taking a break from God, but we are supposed to be teaching people to feed themselves. Also, it allows our leaders, who invest so much time and energy in their groups.

HZ: We’ve tried some digital discipling as well. We’ve started zonegathering.com, a blog for our leaders, and a lot of our groups have started their own blogs, places where they can have discussion throughout the week.

MB: I love technology, but I am inept. I have our kids help me through the DVD. I walk through our media department and ask them if they need any non-tech support.

I started blogging because I felt like I lost connection with people as our church got larger, and it allowed me a way to connect with them.

There was some thing where people felt like technology would stifle community, but exactly the opposite has happened.

I follow our church staff on Twitter. It allows me to know when someone had a rough night because their kid was sick.

We need to redeem technology for Christ.

HZ: You promised a bad experience, and I don’t have any, so you want to share one?

MB: We decided to do a Rock Band tournament as a fundraiser for a missions trip. It worked well. We raised about $1000. Note to self: you might want to check the lyrics before you do that. But here’s the thing. It’s that dimension of leadership where you take God very seriously, but you don’t take yourself very seriously. You know how you laugh at yourself. You try stuff, you experiment with stuff.

HZ: 2. Maturity does not equal conformity

Modulus of Elasticity: How much force can you apply to an object to deform it without which it will not be changed.

Each object has a yield point at which it can no longer go back to its original self.

The modulus of elasticity is important when thinking about spiritual growth. We’ll take people to a retreat or get them in a small group but not push them beyond their yield point, so they come back and return to their old self. We need to push them beyond their yield point.

We decided to allow small groups to emerge from the creativity of our leaders. We told people that we want to build community and make disciples; how you do that is up to you. We’ve got groups doing inductive Bible studies, reading books, serving the homeless. A few years ago one of my leaders wanted to start a group around fantasy baseball. I trust Nathan. I told him we wanted to make disciples of Christ, not disciples of the Phillies. The guys got together to pick their teams. Then they adopted a little league field. Every so often they go out and take care of the field. People began to ask questions. There’s now an NCC banner hanging in the outfield. Our staff had nothing to do that.

MB: We call this our free-market system of small groups. We’re speaking descriptively, not prescriptively, but this has worked well for us.

We take our leaders though a 3 hour leadership course and have them sign a leadership covenant. We want people to be part of a small group before they lead a small group. We expect our leaders to get a vision from God and go with it. Are there groups we’ve said no to? Yes. Are there groups that ended up being very marginal? Yes. How many of you have a committee in your church that should have died 20 years ago? That’s the great thing about the free-market system. If no one shows up to your group, you don’t have a group.

Oswald Chambers: Let God be as original with others as he was with you.

HZ: 3. Expect the Unexpected

MB: Spiritual growth is a conundrum. The key to spiritual growth is establishing routines. We call them spiritual disciplines, but when a routine becomes a routine, we have to change our routine. When I’m in a spiritual slump, it’s because I need to get out of our routine. Change of pace plus change of place equals change of perspective.

In physical exercises routine eventually becomes counterproductive. Your muscles adapt and stop growing.

The disciples didn’t know what Jesus would do next. He overthrew money-changers in the temple, walked on water, and then healed someone on the Sabbath. Jesus could have healed someone on any other day, but it wouldn’t have been as much fun with the Pharisees. A good leader’s got to have a good curveball.

You cannot overappreciate your small group leaders.

HZ: We wanted to bless our leaders beyond anything they could imagine, so we went to Five Guys burgers and went into the Senate and House office buildings and took burgers not only to our leaders but also to their offices.

MB: 4. Love People When They Least Expect it and Least Deserve It

We want a culture of experimenting, originality, etc., but when you get right down to it, where does community grow best? In an environment that is graceful and respectful. John 1:14 – Jesus was full of grace and truth.

We need both of those things. Let me speak bluntly. We live in a culture where it’s wrong to say that something is wrong, and that’s wrong. I live in a city where it’s all about being politically correct. I’m going to be biblically correct. This generation wants the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, the hard truth. Let’s stop answering questions that no one is asking.

If you want to impact someone’s life, love them when they least expect it and least deserve it. When a woman is caught in adultery and brought to Jesus, she expects to be stoned. Jesus stepped in and loved her when she least expected it and least deserved it.

If you can try to love people when they least expect it and least deserve it, you can create a culture where amazing things happen.