In theory, all denominations want to engage in forming new kinds of churches. Many will state publicly that their future depends on it. But saying something is different than doing something. The future we all face
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Here at New Leaf, we find stories essential. We want to connect you to stories that you will find encouraging, and we want to know your story. Have you ever been in a conversation, telling a story and your conversation partner interrupts your story with a story of their own?
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Some of my favourite moments in the Bible are when God calls someone to something big. I find a strange sort of comfort in how these stories play out. Jeremiah 1:4-10 shares an intimate moment between the prophet Jeremiah and God Himself, when God calls Jeremiah to do his difficult work of preaching bad news
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Planters and starters are people who are fueled by what is their hearts: a gnawing sense of holy unrest, a vision of a new way of being the body of Christ, a courageous decision to try something new, and the willingness
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I finally broke down and attended my first women's retreat when I was about 27. I had been married for 2 years and figured, this is what older, married women do right? (Back then I used to think 27 was old). I was a woman, I really loved camping & being at the lake
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Clarity is a valuable commodity in any start-up project. Clarity can be hard to come by especially when things are going full steam. Planters and starters can find themselves so busy mopping up the floor that they don’t have time to turn off the tap.
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I think everyone has their awkward years growing up — that particular phase of angst, searching for personal identity, not feeling you like fit in or belong, making questionable fashion choices
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People are often surprised that I was born and raised in Sudbury, Ontario. In Saskatoon they imagine that a black girl, with Jamaican parents, who is originally from Ontario is obviously from Toronto… but we are not. Growing up we were
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Planning for your future becomes more important the closer you are to retirement. If you’re 20 and come into a windfall of cash, it’s unlikely all of that money is going into the TFSA. We tend to struggle with picturing ourselves in the distant future. Churches tend to lack vision that extends beyond 3-5 years. Lead pastors are kind of like politicians, they have direction enough for their term, and little beyond. What we rarely see is vision casting that extends into generations. We struggle as a whole to plan for the future.
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You ask me how I can still be a Christian when all over the news in this country and that other one to the south, we hear stories, we see pictures, we drown in evidence that to be Christian is a blank cheque to power, infidelity, abuse and deceit.
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In the last couple of years I have been deeply inspired by a group of people who have chosen to see themselves as part of the same story. Through MCC’s Indigenous Neighbours work I came to know of a reconciliation effort now known as Reserve 107.
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The ability to interact online is a marvelous gift and one that, as someone who has been blogging for nearly a decade, I am immensely appreciative of. But to the surprise of precisely no one who has spent more than five minutes online, the shared spaces of our online discourse can also be profoundly uninspiring
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Stories have a great power to inspire and help us see outside ourselves. History is filled with stories, many of which come from a context different enough from our own, that we can see the aspects of another life in a
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Like many church kids I grew-up listening to Bible stories. From the story of Joseph being sold into slavery by his brothers, to Samson ripping off the city gates with his bare hands, from David
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When was the last time a church coach or lead pastor was fired for not hitting a discipleship quota? Never. What we measure describes what we deem the most important in the community. By this metric
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