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A Generative Fellowship, or, Broadening the ConversationToday I led a breakout session at the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship General Assembly in muggy Atlanta. The title of my chat was "Beer, Candles and Kierkegaard: CBF and the Emergent Conversation." You can see my Keynote slides here. In my presentation I briefly introduced the salient features of the Emergent Conversation, focusing primarily on the praxis, ecclesiological and theological strands of the discussion. My talk was an explication under a thesis. I wanted to help CBFers to wade through the turbid waters of hearsay about Emergent Village in order to understand the primary facets of this generative friendship. My thesis was that Emergent Village, as a multi-tiered generative friendship of Christ-followers, is a kindred spirit with the CBF. For those of you who don't know, CBF is not a denomination. Rather, we are a fellowship of autonomous Baptist churches and Christians that share a passion for the Great Commission of Jesus Christ and a commitment to Baptist principles of faith and practice (esp. soul, religious, Bible and church freedoms).I printed out 40 handouts to go along with my presentation. (You can see my resource list here). I thought I would have some left over. To my pleasant surprise, we had over 150 people in attendance! During the Q & A, someone asked if we currently had any venue to discuss issues of emergence within CBF. I told them that I knew of no such venue, so I have decided to get the conversation rolling. If you are reading this post and are interested in broadening the Emergent Conversation within CBF life, then here are some action steps I would suggest: I am envisioning three definite streams of intersection between CBF and Emergent Village: 1) Emergence and Theological Education (for college and seminary students, professors and administrators); 2) Emergence within Pastoral and Parachurch Ministry (for all pastors, lay leaders and parachurch professionals); and 3) Emergence for Church Planters (for church planters and national/state missions coordinators). If this sounds like your kind of conversation, let's begin to dialogue about how this will take shape within the Fellowship. When and where would be a good place to meet? Ought this be played out on the state or national level (or both)? Are the proposed streams listed above adequate or would you suggest others? Feel free to post your comments, suggestions, concerns or queries in the comment section listed below. FYI: I'll be out of pocket for a few weeks on a mission trip to Sri Lanka to do Tsunami relief. I'll be interested when I return to the US to see where this organic conversation might have spread. Peace. posted by Jake at 6/23/2006 08:53:00 PM  
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hey jake
thanks for including my site as a resource.
say hi to Dan Vestal for me. its been 7 years since i stopped in to see him in atlanta but we did have a good conversation regarding emerigng church issues.
peace
jake,
i am a church starter, long time participant in CBF and conversant in the emergent dialogue. I don't know how we have missed each other, but my transition into church planting and attempting to start a bi-professional career to fund it have kept me away from recent CBF meetings. Please consider me apart of future dialogue about the intersection of CBF community and emergent conversation
Jake, thanks for taking the lead on this. These conversations would enrich the CBF movement. I attended your breakout, but just before I attended another on "Postmodernity and Missions." The content was good and on-target, but when the conversation shifted to the "emergent church," the leader showed he had no idea what the "emergent conversation" was all about. Let the conversation begin!
great slides!
Jake..just read through the handout. That is a really impressive and concise launching pad for this discussion. Props for the hard work in putting that all together.
Great suggestions for reading that blur the practical/academic lines and many thanks for including my blog as a resource..
Im with you in thinking that for many in CBF, emergent would be a natural fit. Both have similar concerns about organizational structure and the principle of freedom. CBF'ers have a lot invested in maintaining a bottom up approach..
Count me in on the conversation. I look forward to it!
Mark Shivers
Jake,
nice meeting you and your wife after the workshop. I am very interested in the conversation and CBF. I think it's a natural fit, especially if CBF wants to adopt Dan Vestel's language of being a 'renewal movement' in the landscape of church life.
I like your three layered conversation paradigm and look forward to exchanging ideas with other pastors, students, and theologians who are also pulled this direction.
looking forward to more conversation in the near future.
peace
Hey jake,
i met you at the HIV/AIDS summit. I heard good things about the breakout. I'm sorry i was unable to attend due to another meeting. my responsibilities include missional initiatives and church planting. I have thought for some time that this conversation should happen. I will help in anyway I can. Thanks for including your handouts. I'm looking forward to your reflections on sri lanka.
Peace and blessings,
Mike
Hi Jake
Many thanks for taking initiative for all of us.
I'm specifically interested in how the Emergent Village movement & missional church movement can/does/will inform existing churches. While specific, my interest isn't quite so narrow--like you and lots of other wise folks, I'm interested in ministering to & being ministered to by folks who like God and don't like the institutional church.
You pose a question about where and how to meet--whether at the state level or national level. I'd like to see a forum for CBFers everywhere, but it is probably most convenient to follow something like the cohort deal already in place in the Emergent Village community based on geography. We'll have to see how your responses work out. I'm in the Raleigh/Fayetteville NC area.
In addition I'm also in contact with a number of women in ministry. I am most grateful of your comments regarding white male privilege and your efforts to broaden the friendship to the fullest possible inclusivity of race and gender.
Thank you very much for all.
Grace & blessings to you
It is great to see other baptists talking how much of the "emergent" conversation is very much in-line with traditional baptist values. I am the pastor of a small church in rual Kentucky. In this 164 year old concervitive congrigation (with most of its memebership over 60) we have begun to recite the Apostle's Creed every week. The idea is not that we are forcing members to submit to a creed, but that it is worshipful to speak true things about God and to identify with His universal church, across time, space and denomination. I hope to get to know all of you much better.
Grace and Peace
hey jake,
i attended your session at the CBF convention and thank you for your insights. i also see an important link between CBF's missional emphasis and the emergent conversation. i have done a fair amount of reading on the emerging church and an extremely intrigued (i feel like i personally connect with many aspects of this conversation) but have never been to any formal emergent meeting or even a true emerging(ish) church. i am a recent grad of duke div and am currently looking for a church to serve. i live in the triangle area of nc and see a great need for a possible cbf effort to plant an emergingish type church in that area. with many universities so close together and many college students with postmodern tendencies in their thinking, this seems like a great need that no one is meeting. i would like to do something about it but have no idea where to start. so count me in on the conversation also!
thanks,
kris
I didn't attend your recent session in Atlanta, but a friend who did pointed me in this direction. Being in campus ministry and teaching at a small Baptist college in NC, I have been a participant in Emergent by attending a few conferences, reading whatever I get my hands on, and having a couple from the Emergent leadership, including Tony Jones, come to speak here. (I've even paid my emergent village dues and posted the logo on my blog!) I like what I'm seeing, reading, and hearing so, all this is to say, I'd like to continue the conversation in light on CBF and Emergent.
Keep me informed.
TMN