Hugh Halter

Yesterday we had a few couples show up who were obviously looking for a church. We had about 40 people out on the sunny porch of the old church enjoying coffee, conversation, and a casual start to our day. Another 100 folks were downstairs grabbing their coffee and mingling in fine Adullam fashion. I saw these couples move quickly through our “church,” head inside to look for our church.  They missed it, and even though I was kind enough to follow them to help relieve their stress, it was obvious they were looking for a typical church service to begin. On this day, they found an empty sanctuary as we had all our folks meet for coffee and communion and then head to a local park four blocks away. Essentially it was a modified “big table” that we do every 8-10 weeks. Our purpose is simply to take the focus off of the church service and recognize that growing together is just as important to God as sitting next to each other.

I read out of Acts where the church in Antioch was forming and shared how this church was the first group to be called Christians. I asked the group, “what set these people apart?  Why did people feel the need to call them anything at all?”

The answer is not in their doctrine, or their ecclesial structures of church. They were set apart with this title, simply because they were that wildly strange group of people that had people of completely different walks of life, together in Christ-centered community.   That’s what set them apart!

If the new world church is going to reclaim the title of “Christian” we must again become unique in how we connect people who are not alike. Yes, I do feel pain to see people come into our church and not find friends immediately. I wish everyone felt the ease that some of our people do. Yet, there’s no way to short cut community. If people don’t initiate relationship, they won’t find it. We don’t have greeters, we don’t ask people to unnaturally connect to others. We give them the theological call from scripture to see their relationships as central to the Gospel.  In this small, but significant way, we are “A-Typical.”   I believe anything less than this, will simply continue to pandor to the individualistic consumer culture around us.

So I’m just now sitting behind a table in Orlando at the national church plant conference.  I got stuck at our book table as my own salesman.  Bad feeling!  Anyway, it’s interesting that the most common question I have, as people look at our book is, “So what is incarnational?”  Now, I realize that what has been my hobbyhorse for the last 10 years may not be on the radar of many leaders, but when you’re at a church plant conference, you’d think that leaders who are about to go out to establish new congregations would understand the most central key of both Christ’s ministry and our ministry.  Namely, the leaving of our places of spiritual comfort to come and “incarnate” the presence of Christ to the world.  Incarnation is not just about evangelism.  The concept is most accurately linked to the way in which Jesus lived among people.  Incarnation is about Jesus living 30 years without “launching” his church.  It’s about how he developed “street cred” before both His heavenly father and the peasants, priests, and kings, he hung around.  The lack of incarnational presence by the church and it’s leaders is what causes the world to thing that we’re trying to sell them something instead of simply inviting them into the life we live.

This next week, I’ll be in Orlando for a national church plant conference.  One of the key themes this year will be “attractional vs incarnational” church planting.  I’ll have a chance to share the Adullam story with about 500 would-be planters who are trying to figure out how to proceed in their respective contexts.  Just free thinking about what we’ll be sharing, here’s a few thoughts.

1) There is no purely attractional or incarnational church or church plant.   Although there are certainly some basic differences in how a leader plans to grow a church, the issue is really more about degrees of missionality instead of “you are or you aren’t.”  We find that whenever you see a conversion story, someone in that church has “incarnated” the gospel.  As well, even a church that started from purely incarnational means will eventually have enough people, a website, and some draw-ability that will cause there to be some attractional elements.  Attractional elements would be those aspects of our corporate gatherings or weekly programs that provide a service to people with whom we have very little relationship.  In adullam, we now have people that find us through the website and no matter how hard we try, they just show up.  That is an attractional fruit, and although a church doesn’t want to focus on that, if something is meaningful it will draw “onlookers.”   For a planter, however, we would suggest a few systemic differences in how you start a church.

2) Staying more incarnational will require that you do or don’t do a few things that attractional churches do.  First, to avoid the consumer/attractional pressure, a church simply can’t provide what people are used to getting in other places or past church experiences.  The only way to fight half-ass, consumer oriented, put in my hour a week Christianity is to not provide this.  Second, you’ll have to have a pretty intimidating front door.  In attractional churches, you tend to want your front door to be easy, palatable, and seeker friendly.  You want professionalism, great speaking, perfect timing, and the service to end when you say it does.

In an incarnational church you actually want someone’s first glimpse into your community and corporate time to be a little raw.  One person who came to Adullam for the first time last week shared that she loved how lose our church was and how refreshing it was to notice that our time was so relational and unprofessional.  She loved that I built up this great video to show, and then forgot my mac power chord and had to tell the story instead of showing the video. She said, “it was nice to see that no one cared.”

Third,  as a leader you’ve got to be willing to lead relationally as much or more than you lead from up front.  The momentum and growth of Adullam is usually related to how often I plan the social connections for our people.  Tonight I’m spending time thinking of all the relational connecting we can do through the summer.  (church in the park, village trainings, neighborhood desserts, after gathering all church barb-Q, corporate service experiences, and planned “spontaneous” times with smaller groups of people to help them connect.  I’ve learned that if I can connect people over a glass of wine or coffee, it becomes natural for them to someday be sharing time together in scripture.

I’m sure there’s much more, but that gets me started.

This week, I got an email that essentially summarizes both the strategy and joy of incarnational church, as well as showing a few reasons why the average Christian will struggle in a “non-attractional, program driven” environment.

“Hugh, I’ve been to Adullam for about a year now. Yesterday, during and after Lou’s talk, I felt like I understood things a little better. And then going to the park afterwards to play volleyball with Laura, Sean and some others, it hit me some more. Adullam is best defined by what it’s people are actively doing in their community. By just showing up on Sunday and trying to find your fit, the meaning of our community becomes more and more vague. And I think that’s where some people get hung-up and frustrated because they can’t find such internal structure to lead them to their purpose. Adullam’s people need to be active with the nonbelievers in their lives in order to discover what we are about. I like that things remain loose and sort of intangible within our “church”. It forces people to make fruit outside our own walls, where Christ is trying to lead us. I’m glad I haven’t gotten involved, per se in the usual ways Christians find fulfillment in their churches. I’ve taken time to learn what Adullam is about and I finally find myself in agreement with it. Thanks, sue.”

Over the few years Adullam has been in existence, I’ve find myself frustrated that people just don’t hear our vision once and then get to work. Why they can enjoy a coffee with me and nod in agreement as I share our mission, and then revert so quickly back to churchianity. Sue’s email reminded me that the only way for people to “get it” is to experience it. You can have the coolest, most articulate website, slick brochures that state your values, even logo t-shirts. We’ve been encouraging leaders to avoid trying to move people through mission statements, but let me now say it more plainly. They don’t do JACK! The only way people experience the “light-bulb” going on, is to find themselves in an actual environment where the preferred values are being lived out in front of their eyes. Sue is the wife of our worship leader. She’s heard me preach at least 30 times. She’s read our website. But in her own words, she showed that isolated events or words don’t coagulate into learning. She experienced a sermon, but she also integrated the words, with a lunch after our gathering, followed by a spontaneous recreation activity.

In short, just as we reference in The Tangible Kingdom, God’s ways become real or tangible when several factors are integrated together.

She has reminded me, that my job as a leader isn’t to cast vision and then expect behavior. My job is to sanction and help move people into these integrated environments and experiences, and to keep it as spontaneous and natural as it can be.

She also, put a finger on why so many don’t make it with us. In short, it’s good hearted people who won’t allow themselves the space or focus to fill their spiritual cup out in the world instead of inside the church. People who continue to come to a church service then go home, only to return for another service, won’t experience the tangible kingdom. There’s not a nice way to say it. Life must be re-oriented around mission to the world and relationships. There, they find God.

Just a few thoughts. Thanks Sue!

Posted to dear friend Wes Roberts today.

Yo old man, thanks for being our biggest fan!!  Someone asked me the other day how I felt about finally releasing our lives to the world.  I think he thought I’d be excited, but I had to respond by saying,  “Actually a tad melancholy..partly because I know it’s like putting your head on the chopping block of public opinion, partly because anything good in our story is only because of God’s redemption of our selfish, fleshly pursuits.”  I’ve been keenly aware of both the vice of pride and greed during the weeks leading to this release and feel deeply grieved by both at any miniscule level.  The words of God break through so cleanly, “you are but a mist, vapor..I must become less, he must become more, all things gained are rubbish compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Jesus..my Lord. Words like “rubbish, filthy rags, abide in me, life in the Spirit, waiting for the coming of our Lord” keep me in both spiritual sobriety and joy!