Isn’t She Beautiful? Recap
**my blog hibernation is over. nate said it was more of a nap. i think he’s right**
Earlier this week we found ourselves in Grandville Michigan attending the “Isn’t She Beautiful?” conference at Mars Hill Bible Church, stomping grounds of the now famous Rob Bell.
The crew?
Dom from the Embassy in Waterloo
Phil & Marty from New Hope in London
Jared, denominational stooge from FMC headquarters
Nate and Darryl
Steve also from The Embassy
& James, our new friend, and new church planter of The Presence in London
…a motley crew for sure.
The Long and Short of It: I wouldn’t say that there was any ‘new’ information collected, but it was affirming in many ways of the things I’ve been thinking/doing over the last 5 years. I’m not trying to be cocky, but if you listen to the Mars Hill podcast, read Velvet Elvis you could have saved your entry fee. Regardless, I’m glad I went. I left encouraged.
Noticeably Missing: The extravaganza of a Willow Creek type conference. Mars Hill and this conference can be summed up in one word: Stark. Interestingly, this ’starkness’ was very intentional I gathered…the space, the arts, the lack of anything exceptional (other than Bell’s teaching). Oh yeah, and 99.5% of participants were white.
Why I Liked It: I am fascinated by the life (and death) of churches…how they begin, end and what happens in the middle. While most of this info was great for interest sake, as far as practicality goes it, I wouldn’t say much was transferable. Maybe that was the point.
An interesting note for church planters: Mars Hill started with a core group of 700 people from the mother church, counted 1000 participants at their first gathering and haven’t looked back since.
Want notes from the conference? Nate has some on his blog.
Want to get a peek at Rob Bell’s actual message notes? Check out my post at Thinkerlabs.
Want to see pictures from the event?: I found these on Flickr.
Want to see some video from the conference?: Click below. (WARNING: there is much stupidity and ultra cheezy iMovie effects)
Filed by Joe at January 25th, 2007 under Creativity, Cool Links
for once we agree, really stupid video…
my only regret is that I watched it!!
so the conference wasn’t amazing - but encouraging.
good thing I didn’t spend 250$ to meet up with you guys by train - though it would have been fun hanging out - i would have spent 199$ for that!
Comment by david — January 25, 2007 @ 6:06 pm