Our House Saga

Karen and I have been working on our living situation for two years. It began as an episode in househunting, became an epic after we bought a house to renovate, only to sell it. Now we're calling it a saga, and the third installment of the series will be the last one (so help us God).

We're building new in Sage Creek, a development in the south part of Winnipeg, where St. Mary Magdalene is part of a new church plant. We're blogging the construction. Check it out at Sage Creek Pioneers.

And if you're on facebook - there's a group over there too, called The Parsonage. (Karen thinks it should be called the Sunabackage, but I'm not so sure. Parsunage? Now that's just goofy). Join the group and you get a guaranteed invite to the housewarming!

Back

I'm back from Toronto, and an excellent conference.

The three best quotes from three great days:

"There was a woman who fell down a well and became a Christian. But that hardly makes a good strategy for evangelism."
- George Lings in conversation

“I think people are fed up with consumer approaches, even though they’re addicted to them. But if we cast the evangel in terms of benefits, we’re setting people up for disappointment. We’re telling them lies.”

“This is not the way our Scriptures are written. This is not the way Jesus came among us. It’s not the way Paul preached. Where do we get all this stuff? We have a textbook. We have these Scriptures and most of the time they’re saying, ‘You’re going the wrong way. Turn around. The culture is poisoning.’”

“Do we realize how almost exactly the Baal culture of Canaan is reproduced in American church culture? Baal religion is about what makes you feel good. Baal worship is a total immersion in what I can get out of it. And of course, it was incredibly successful. The Baal priests could gather crowds that outnumbered followers of Yahweh 20 to 1. There was sex, there was excitement, there was music, there was ecstasy, there was dance: ‘We got girls over here, friends. We got statues, girls, and festivals.’ This was great stuff.”

“And what did the Hebrews have to offer in response? The Word.”
- Eugene Peterson, quoted in a presentation by Joe Manafo, church planter and documentary film-maker

"May you roll a long time, your shoulders never wear out, and your arms never get tired!"
- the man with a long grey beard on Bloor Street, blessing me as I headed for coffee

Off to Toronto

I just booked flights and accommodation in Toronto for a conference on church planting. St. Mary Magdalene, along with one other Anglican and two other Lutheran parishes, are in the process of planting a daughter church in Sage Creek - a development that is just beginning to break ground in the south of Winnipeg. (Sage Creek is also where Karen and I are building a new house. I think we'll call it the Parsonage.)

I do believe at least one other blogger will be there - and as we didn't get a glass of beer together at General Synod, maybe it will happen in TO. And if the beer happens to give anyone gas, at least we know how to pray about it . . .