I am excited to reintroduce Mission Alive’s Missional Church Planting blog. It has been nearly 5 years since our last post. At the time we were in the midst of a leadership transition from Dr. Gailyn Van Rheenen, Mission Alive’s founder, to me as the second-generation executive director. We have made the transition well, planted several new churches, developed a focus on marginalized communities, and are now ready to recommit ourselves to providing helpful articles on missional church and church planting.
As we relaunch this blog, we are doing so as part of Mission Alive Media. Mission Alive Media will consist of 3 media platforms
- This Missional Church Planting blog,
- Our monthly webinar called Innovative Church Conversations, and
- A podcast called Discipleship Conversations.
Each platform will have a unique audience but together they will explore the breadth of topics involved in missional church, church planting, leadership, discipleship, and the future of the church in North America.
I am even more excited to announce the leadership team that will oversee Mission Alive Media. It is my pleasure to announce that Steven Carrizal, Associate Minister for the Alta Mesa Church of Christ in Ft. Worth, Texas will chair the Mission Alive Media team. In addition to his ministry at the Alta Mesa church, Steven is a coach and an associate with Hope Network Ministries. Steven and Jeremy Hoover, Mission Alive church planter in Sarnia, Ontario, originally launched the Discipleship Conversations podcast. While Steven will lead our media team, Jeremy will oversee the Discipleship Conversations podcast. I will continue to oversee the Innovative Church Conversations webinars.
This Missional Church Planting blog will be under the direction of K. Rex Butts. Rex is a gifted preacher, pastor, theologian, and congregational leader as well as a husband and father. He is a ministry coach, guitar player, and enjoys a good brew — coffee and more. Rex holds a Doctor of Ministry degree in Contextual Theology from Northern Seminary in Lisle, IL (Chicago). What makes Rex the perfect leader of this Missional Church Planting blog is how well he brings together missional theology and missional practice. I am excited to entrust the leadership of this blog to Rex.
This blog will address missional ecclesiology in general and missional church planting specifically. It will focus on the connections between Christology, missiology, and ecclesiology all with an eye toward ministry practice.
Our hope is that this Missional Church Planting blog will become a valuable resource to you and your church, as you seek to join God in what he is doing to bring about the holistic restoration of every soul and every community. Our goal is to provide you, the well-trained ministry practitioner, with high-quality, theologically robust articles that are at the same time enormously practical and inspiring. We will seek out the leading theologians, missiologists, and practical ministry experts in the field of missional church and church planting to write for this blog. Many who are already part of the Mission Alive Network will share with us their thoughts and experiences and we may even convince Dr. Gailyn Van Rheenen to write an article from time to time to share with us his ongoing insights!
We in Mission Alive believe that the cultural tables have been turned over. While tried and true ministry methods may continue to gather the already-Christian – introducing our unbelieving neighbors to Christ and helping them grow in Christ will take more creative and innovative methods. That means no one is truly an expert. We are all experimenting. Our goal is to bring you the result of many experiments from many missional trailblazers. Please join us.
~ Tod K. Vogt