"Fish Nets or Safety Nets" with Dave Male

This year I've broken my Workshop/Conference embargo for a couple of worthwhile days of listening/engagement... Restless and tired of 'talking' about mission, change and the future I decided not to attend any more talkfests.

This was a day with one of the heads of the new Training Institute for 'Pioneer Ministers' in the Fresh Expressions project which is now firmly a partnership between C of E and Methodist Churches in the UK.

Dave Male was engaging, had a sharp presentation with the right balance between stories and principles and his input wasn't new if you've done some reading but was focused on exactly the key points that stimulate thinking and bring focus.

I was able to think where I am with 'Salt [Factory]' and with places we work in encouraging change/mission and reinvention.

Some of the quotes evoking clear thinking included:

"... do not try to call them back to where they were, and do not try to call them to where you are, beautiful as that may seem to you. You must have the courage to go with them to a place that neither of you has been before.' Vincent Donovan

"...what is taking place is not merely the the continued decline of orgnised Christianity but the death of the culture which formerly conferred Christian identity upon the British people as a whole..." Callum Browne 'Death of Christian Britain'

"...create a linguistic community which speaks to itself but gives up responsibility to put the gospel in a language which is understood by the whole of society..." Tim Keller

I suppose I'm highlighting these because they say what we do in all settings but because yuo can quote and author and book, people listen...