Rich Kirkpatrick posted this list of 10 More Statements that will Help you Fail as a Christian.

1. I cannot possibly change for real.
2. I do not need the church (or “Church”) to worship or live my life.
3. Jesus did not mean all the hard stuff he said, it was just “figurative” right?
4. Being “relevant” is the mission of the local church.
5. Drinking alcohol is a sin since the Bible teaches that.
6. If this feel so right then it can’t really be wrong–even if the Bible teaches otherwise.
7. I “go” to church.

Read the rest and discuss the list here. If possible, use scripture to refute one of the above 10 statements.

Cultivate & Story are two new and innovative Church conferences this year.

I know what you're thinking, "Really!? MORE church conferences?" - let me explain. The illustrius Ben Arment put-on a new conference this year, Story. Since everyone was coming to Chicago, Cultivate was sorta organized last minute with more of an unconference feel.

In cased you missed it, here's links to all the summaries, photos, tweets and everything. Your one stop shop!

STORY

SPEAKER SUMMARIES
Donald Miller
Ed Young
Dave Gibbons
Mike Foster
Chris Seay
Stacy Spencer
John Ortberg
Nancy Beach

Best Quotes from STORY

Pictures from STORY
Joshua White
Story Chicago Flickr Stream

Tweetstream from STORY

CULTIVATE

SPEAKER SUMMARIES
General overview
Phil Cooke
Jon Acuff
Clint Runge
Terry Storch & Bobby G

There are more speakers from Cultivate, but it's hard to find summaries.

Cultivate Pictures
TwitPics

Tweetstream from Cultivate

Sam Rainer wrote a great blog post the other day. He delineates what it means to be a poor leader that is "friendly" but also toxic and controlling.

Here are some of his bullet points:

• They avoid conflict at all costs or anything else that may affect their friendly image.
• They are liked by outsiders, but they irritate insiders. People who report to friendly dictators typically do not despise their bosses. But these followers do feel trapped and irritated. For example, a congregation may have no clue about the leadership style of their pastor, and the direct reports cannot address the issue with the leader because he’s not self-aware enough to realize his problems.
• They insist on relaying all the good news to the congregation; they also figure out ways to have others communicate bad news.
• They micro-manage irrelevant details. Amiable autocrats waste hours of staff meetings discussing irrelevant topics and details. They’re more concerned with things like service order than with things like the discipleship process. They will dictate instructions on the minutia and neglect the bigger picture.

Read the rest of his explanation and bullet points on his blog.

How can we avoid the pitfalls of becoming an Amiable Autocrat?

Dave Ferguson was recently interviewed by the Exponential RV about his upcoming book Exponential:  How You And Your Friends Can Start A Missional Church Movement.

Here are some quotes from the interview:

"Within each of us, God has put the ability to expand and advance the Kingdom"
"We've mistaken discipleship for downloading cognitive content"
"You need to be reproducing yourself and the life of Jesus in another person"

here's the interview: