Three Is Enough

Churches are beginning to use TiE Groups as their approach to discipleship and evangelism.

Below is a letter I gave to one such church to use in their brochure.

Dear TiE Group Member,

Thank you so much for participating in a TiE Group!

There are two really crucial underpinnings for TiE Groups. One is theological and one is practical.

The big idea about God (theology) and his relationship with us is this: heaven is real, but it is the destination, not the goal. The goal of Christianity is spiritual transformation into Christlikeness for the sake of serving others as ambassadors of Christ’s kingdom. The practices associated with TiE Groups give us a way to enter into and live out that reality.

The practical contribution of TiE Groups is that they locate both our discipleship and missional engagement with the world in the routines and rhythms of our actual exiting life. Many sincere attempts at discipleship have been frustrated by trying to make discipleship work in what we might call pseudo, temporary community—that limiting them to church and traditional small groups. Hold on now—I am not condemning churches and small groups! For all the good they do—and they do a lot—they are limited by space and time. In terms of time, the average Christian only spends 1 – 3 hours per week at church and home group. In terms of space, church is not where we have our most organic community.

For most of us, and this is the practical contribution of TiE Groups, our most organic, natural community is at work, school, hobby, places of residence, etc. Community, by definition, implies unplanned for, routine contact. The kind of connections you have over cubicles, or passing colleagues in hallways, elevates, parking garages, etc.

Neither our own discipleship, nor serving others can be something we add to an already over-busy, over-indebted and over-scheduled life. We must find God, discipleship and mission within the available routines of our present life. TiE Groups point us down that path and give us some tips to get us started.

My prayer is that through participation in a TiE Group you will go on what the Church of Savior in Washington, DC calls the journey inward and the journey outward; that you will grow inwardly as your life increasingly aligns with God’s purpose for you; and that others around you will experience your growth as for their good—the journey outward.

I’d love for you to share your stories on the TiE blog at www.3isenough.org. Also, please feel free to contact me on our contact page www.3isenough.org/contact-us.

The peace and power of the kingdom to you as you go on the journey.

Todd Hunter

Okay, let’s just admit it, so far I am a total failure at living up my several blog-posts per week pledge. I am just like the person saying they are going on a diet—only to raid the fridge that very night!

I do have some excuses: I’ve been traveling a great deal; I am finishing one book with IVP and starting a second. I’ve also been occupied getting all the legal non-profit issues finished for SFKL.

On the fun side, my TiE Group is having an enlightening time reading Dallas Willard’s Hearing God.

Hear is our favorite quote from last week:

…we demean God immeasurably by casting him in the role of the cosmic boss, foreman or autocrat, whose chief joy in relation to humans is ordering them around, taking pleasure in seeing them jump at his command and painstakingly noting down any failures. Instead we are to be God’s friends (2 Chron. 20.7; John 15.13 – 15) and fellow workers (1 Cor. 3.9).

We’ve noted that we are doing pretty well with the pray part, really good on the grow part, but we are needing to pay more careful attention to, and be more creative about the serving parts.

How about you—what is happening with your TiE Group?

I was traveling the 19^th – 26^th, slammed from early morning to late at night, so I got a little behind posting news.

My trip started in Portland, Oregon with a reunion of sorts: I spoke at the Vineyard Regional Pastors Conference. It was great to see old friends and get to discuss with them the things I care most about: evangelism, mission and spiritual formation in contemporary culture. It is heartening to see a group like Vineyard churches wrestle with these real issues. When a group has recently been on top—Vineyard churches got more press in the 80s and 90s than just about any other group and Vineyard Music was on a roll—it can be hard to change what was a successful recipe. I give these guys big props for not resting on their reputation and going for it again.

I caught an early morning flight from Portland to Chicago to do some Alpha business. I am in an interim period wherein I work for myself. In addition to writing, speaking and adjunct teaching (George Fox Grad School, Wheaton Grad School and Fuller this year), I do some consulting. Alpha is my biggest client. I spend 25% of my time on Alpha-related work. In Chicago we had our semi-annual board meeting, a conference with 1,200 people on the Wheaton Campus, and a strategy meeting with the key Alpha pastors from around America. I still say that if a church is looking for a simple to apply and easy to customize approach to evangelism, I do not know of anything better than The Alpha Course.

While away I got three bits of great news regarding my book—Christianity Beyond Belief: Following Jesus for the Sake of Others:

• It is slated to be out in January 2009
• Eugene Peterson has given me the high honor of agreeing to write a forward
• IVP is going to do an audio book of CBB which should be out roughly the same time as the paper version.

I am looking forward to the book hitting Amazon and book stores. These months between now and January feel like a long dress rehearsal for Three is Enough. I am speaking virtually every weekend this fall, and about half this summer. My trip around the world in early December is coming together, but still needs some work. I have some mid-week openings the rest of this year if your group would like to hear about the concepts in my book which give rise to TiE.

Peace~

Yesterday, at our almost-weekly lunch hour meeting, my TiE Group discussed chapter two of Willard’s Hearing God. Each time we meet, as we practice the “grow” aspect of TiE, we ask ourselves “what ideas in the chapter helped us to better imagine and practice being a follower of Jesus for the sake of others?”

Hear are a couple highlights we noticed:

• It is common, at least in jest, to suggest that speaking with God “is a little nuts”. What’s worse is saying you “hear” from God.  But Willard says “what else can a personal relationship” mean if it doesn’t include individualized communication? We go down an unhelpful path if we assume that “personal” merely means that “some of Jesus’ merit has been assigned to my personal sin/debt account”. While that statement contains truth, it is not the main point. Forgiveness of sin is a means, not an end. We don’t come to forgiveness of sins; we come through forgiveness of sins to a relationship with God. The relationship—for the sake of others—is the destination; forgiveness is something like the gas money—which we could never pay on our own—to get there.
• Willard says “…nothing is more central to the practical life of the Christian than confidence in God’s individual dealings with each person.” This is important because in TiE practices we aim to be alert to and obedient to the movements of the Spirit in our actual “practical” lives. We need confidence that we are seeing and hearing God within that matter-of-fact life.

In our group we talked a lot about the importance of confidence; confidence on two levels. On the first level we easily recognized that none of us like to do stuff that we are not good at—such activities make us feel really uncomfortable. For instance I hate math. I’d say I’m a total loser when it comes to math. Thus I have no confidence in the face of complicated numbers.

But there is also confidence on a second, deeper level. This deeper level of confidence empowers the first level. This is the confidence that God loves us and is patient with our growth processes. This confidence is similar to that which a young child might feel out in the front of their house, kicking a soccer ball around, trying to make their feet obey the vision in their brain with the hope that the ball where go where they see it in their mind. They do this with real joy—it is a fun learning experience—so fun that it can seem impossible to get hem to stop, come in the house, wash their hands and have dinner.

Why the fun? Why the joy? Why the confidence? Because inside the house sits a parent or some authority figure taking great delight in seeing their child at play, learning to steer the ball and growing in confidence. Add this overarching confidence to the internal confidence of the child (they wouldn’t be playing for hours if they did not have confidence in their potential ability) and you’ve got a powerful, life-shaping force at work.

This is just the vibe I hope to create through TiE Groups. I want followers of Jesus to practice praying, growing and serving a joy-filled, guilt-free, and grace-inspired way—like the kid learning to curve a cocker ball left and right. God is always happy that we are even trying to follow Jesus and serve others. He would never condemn or scold us for mishearing or misunderstanding him. As the book of James says:

If you don’t know what you’re doing, pray to the Father. He loves to help. You’ll get his help, and won’t be condescended to when you ask for it. Ask boldly, believingly, without a second thought.

Don’t give it another self-consciousness thought: just enter into conversational prayer with God; read good spiritual books and talk about it; serve others. In so doing you will enter life as God designed it.

Peace…