Recently I retweeted an article from a Methodist leader entitled "Whatever Happened to the Missional Impulse of the Methodists?" In that post, Steve Manskar, Director of Wesleyan Leadership at GBOD (the General Board of Discipleship) of The United Methodist Church, speaks of his experience at the Exponential Conference:

Most of the people I met would identify themselves in the Calvinist/Reformed tradition. Very few would say they are Arminian or Wesleyan. While they likely disagree with Wesley theologically, they fully embrace his practices. United Methodists, on the other hand, sort of embrace the theology and neglect or outright reject Wesleyan practices. Why is that? That's a question I heard from a few of the people I met at Exponential.

Editorial comment: Steve calls them mostly Reformed, though when you are a United Methodist everyone else looks Reformed-- from my perspective, Exponential is hardly a Reformed crowd. more >>

Thou shalt love thy neighbor – all 600 million of them?

Hosting the first-ever interactive service on Facebook, St. Pixels, an online 3D church, is redefining the way most people worship.

“Love it or hate it, Facebook is where people are in 2011,” said St. Pixels pioneer Mark Howe in a statement. “If the Gospel is for today’s connected culture, it has to find a distinctive but culturally-appropriate place within social networking.” more >>

Church planting will gain much spotlight at the annual pastors' conference of the Southern Baptist Convention in June.

"This year's conference we are going to have a major emphasis on church planting. There is a renewed sense of urgency to take the gospel to the ends of the earth," said Vance Pitman, President of the 2011 Southern Baptist Pastors' Conference.

The June 12-13 conference in Phoenix, Ariz., will be held under the theme, "Aspire: Yearning to join God's kingdom activity," taken from Romans 15:20. more >>

All is not well in ministry world, shared one concerned pastor and church planter.

Distressed with the state of pastors and churches throughout America today, Shawn Lovejoy, founder of churchplanters.com, spoke truthfully to some 2,000 people at the 2011 Radicalis Conference.

“The church planting world, the church planting movement on the surface looks like a successful movement,” said Lovejoy, “but I want to tell you being up close and personal with it that there is a dark side of the force.” more >>

Author and pastor Steven Furtick tackled the "why bother" syndrome that can plague the faith of many pastors during his address Wednesday morning at the Radicalis conference.

Furtick, who leads Elevation Church in Charlotte, N.C., spoke from Mark 5 on Jairus, the synagogue leader who asks Jesus to come to his house and heal his sick daughter. But along the way, a woman who has been bleeding for 12 years "cuts in line" and gets healed by touching Jesus' cloak. Meanwhile, Jairus learns that his daughter has died at home.

He said pastors attending the event at Saddleback Church can become inspired by the conference but then can fall into depression and despair as they compare the size of their ministry and church to the magnitude of what they see at Saddleback. more >>

NEW YORK – Carl Lentz, senior pastor of Hillsong New York City, never imagined that a deal he had roughly 10 years ago with Joel Houston, son of Hillsong Church's founder Brian Houston, would actually pan out one day.

Today, the long-time friends from Bible college lead Hillsong NYC, the first U.S. location of the Australian-based Pentecostal megachurch.

The Manhattan-based church, which meets at Irving Plaza near Union Square, recently kicked-off weekly services on Feb. 13, 2011 following it's official launch on Oct. 17, 2010. more >>