Video: Ed Stetzer Interviews Daniel Ott in Marseille, France

Video: Ed Stetzer Interviews Julien Bonnel in Marseille, France

Jet Set Vision Trip: Day 7, Marseille

Today was the last day of the trip. After all the walking, listening, and talking, the group was exhausted. We talked a lot about missiological concepts this morning, and considered how we had seen them being put into practice by the various teams we’ve connected with here. Here’s the short list:

• Segmentation- decide what people group/population segment you are working with.
• Contextualization- working to communicate/model the gospel in a way that is appropriate to cultural context.
• Indigenaity- the work is native to the soil in which it’s planted.
• Reproducibility- How easily can your people do what you’re doing in another place?
• Syncretism- avoid combining Christianity and other religions/beliefs.
• Laity vs. Clergy- is the distinction helpful?
• Oikos- people are already in groups. Those groups can be radically transformed by Jesus.
• Person of Peace/Goodwill- God prepares people beforehand to receive the message and help us engage people.

After saying goodbye to our French church planter friend, Jullian, we split up to get souvenirs and see what we hadn’t yet seen of Marseille. It’s a beautiful city, right on the Mediterranean. Remember the “Chateau D’if,” the island jail in the movie “The Count of Monte Cristo?” That’s in Marseille.

We spent a little while on the beach. Not too long, it was a French beach, and then walked the downtown area with the Marseille team. It was encouraging to hear their stories of successes and failures in ministry and church planting here.

We finished the day with a big dinner (crepes, of course!) and took some time to evaluate the trip. We decided the following:

In pre-trip communication, it would be helpful to have suggestions from Jet Set alumni.

Even after visiting with the teams in Rome and Marseille, it’s still difficult to imagine what a partnership with them would look like. It would be nice to have a few concrete examples to take home to the churches.

Videos of the teams sent out beforehand were extremely helpful. We might want to add some “in-flight” reading to the mix- something that would allow group members to prepare mentally and spiritually on the way.

We leave bright and early tomorrow morning. What a great group! We loved to visit with these guys, and to dream together of the day when churches truly start thinking like missionaries.

We’ll add some more thoughts about the trip as we have time to process all that we’ve seen and heard. Thanks for reading and praying for us.

Jet Set Vision Trip: Day 6, Marseille

Today we did something a little bit different. We met in the basement of a local evangelical church. This is pretty rare, because in France, evangelical churches can be hard to come by. This was the first time on the trip that we all sat down to talk in a private setting. Ed talked about the importance of “every tongue” to our mission. Here’s a great quote: “(The Book of) Acts is Acts 1:8 happening in the power of Acts 2.”

We also had a great opportunity to hear from a French church planter, Jullian. I’ve never met a Frenchman who told “French-surrendermonkey” jokes before. But then again, how many French nationals have I met that studied theology in an African-American church in inner-city Oakland, CA before returning to France to be a one-man emerging church movement? Watch for the interview soon.

We spent lots of time today with French students who are studying English. The team here set up a round table discussion for us to ask them questions about matters of faith, values, and spirituality. The essence of the conversation would be this: “I’m okay with Jesus being a way, I just can’t bring myself to believe that he is the Only Way.” It was all some of our people could do to keep from launching into a “Lord, Liar, or Lunatic” rant.

If you ever get the chance to eat authentic Indian food in a foreign country (other than, say, India), you should do it. We did that for dinner tonight, and it was great. Ordering chunks of meat in spicy reddish-brown sauce served over rice in a language you don’t speak is really living on the edge.

Video: Ed Stetzer Interviews Scott Campbell in Marseille, France

Jet Set Tour: Day 5, Marseille

It’s hard to say when, exactly, our train rolled into Marseille. We were up at 5:30 to change from our Italian overnight train to the daytime French train. In a sleepy stupor, we packed our suitcases into a car and headed (via metro) to the hotel. Thankfully, it was much cooler in Marseille than it was in Rome. We were excited to arrive in the city, eager to explore, yet completely exhausted.

The remedy for exhaustion, it turns out (besides, you know, sleep), is a visit to the Notre Dame de la Garde. The basilica overlooks Marseille, situated atop a 532ft. rocky mountain on the coast. The views were breathtaking. The church itself reminded us of Arabic architecture- its black and white stripes, bulbous arches, and square tower would be right at home in Casablanca.

After the church, we ate at a seaside restaurant and talked about what it would look like for hundreds of churches to step up and take spiritual responsibility for the people of Marseille. What would they do? Who would coordinate the work? How much would it cost?

We headed back to the hotel, excited to take advantage of the “free wifi” (”free” in French, aparently means “weak signal”). Watch here for more videos featuring Ed Stetzer interviews with group members and national leaders.

Video: Ed Stetzer Interviews Pastor Luigi Cuchin in Rome

Jet Set: Rome, Day 4

We got a late start this morning. Maybe it was because we walked around until after midnight looking for a nightclub, bar, or pub to hang out in. That’s what the church planting team here does, by the way. They meet people and spend time with friends in these “third spaces” throughout the city. We didn’t have any luck, though- the places we tried were either full, closed, or pretending to be so the loud and obnoxious group of Americans would just go away.

We went to the Vatican. For those who may not know, Vatican City is technically not a part of Rome, though it’s in the center of the city. It is the center of the Catholic universe, and home to the largest Catholic church in the world, St. Peter’s Basilica. It’s a beautiful building, if a bit intimidating.

We waded through a sea of shops selling Pope-themed trinkets; everything from John Paul II ties to Benedict snowglobes. We ate a quick lunch (pizza, what else?) and split up for the afternoon. We met up with Kyle Anderson, a friend of the Collective who leads student trips to Europe through Joshua Expeditions.It was great of her to take the time to race across town just to meet us for a few minutes. We look forward to working with her in the future.

We were booked on an overnight train to Marseille, so we met at the Termini train station at 5:00. Poor Steve Miller has been very sick, so he was sprawled out on the floor waiting for our train to arrive. He had just fallen asleep when a police officer walked by, “nudging” Steve with his foot in oder to get us to get up off the floor. “Pastor Kicked by Italian Police Officer” would have been a great title for this post.

The train ride was, well, long. Luckily, we had sleeper cars, each complete with six beds and large picture windows. We shot a video with Ed Stetzer interviewing Rick Gibson in that little room. It was tight, but the backdrop was an amazing sunset over the Italian countryside.

As we trundled away from Rome, we tried to process all that we had seen and heard about ministry there. I’m not sure we left with any solutions, but I know we all saw the tremendous spiritual need there. Please join us in praying that God would provide access into the community there and that His church would be built there.

Video: Ed Stetzer Interviews Steve Miller in Rome

Jet Set: Rome, Day 3

This morning we visited the jail where the Apostle Paul was imprisoned. It was a neat reminder that obedience and persecution go hand in hand. We sat outside and talked about European worldview. We find it helpful to outline some of the general differences between Europeans and Americans when it comes to things like certainty, morality, and matters of faith. I’m not sure the Italians around us appreciated us talking about them in vague generalities, but it’s hard to discuss missions strategy if we think Europeans are just like us. They aren’t.

Later, we visited the Pantheon, and ancient temple built in honor of various Roman gods. Maybe it was the Pantheon, maybe t was the McDonald’s across the piazza, but we were reminded of the gods worshiped by the people back home.

Over lunch, we heard from some of the missionaries working here. They shared from their hearts about the opportunities they’ve had recently to share the gospel with Italian friends. As in many parts of Western Europe, the work here is measured in terms of conversations and relationships- not conversions and churches planted. If you think about it today, please pray for the work in Rome among university students.

Afterword, we explored the differences between “missionary” thinking and “ministerial” thinking. Here are some of the marks of missionary thinking:

Missionaries:
-Keep the big picture in mind.
-Say “hello” with “goodbye” in mind.
-Join what’s already going on in the community.
-Talk about Jesus all the time.
-Avoid dependence.
-Recognize that influence flows both ways in a relationship.
-Recognize the importance of rest.
-Don’t wait until it feels “natural.”
-Invite themselves over for dinner.
-Understand that people are already in groups.

For more on how to “think like a missionary,” visit theUpstreamCollective.org. We’d love to visit your church and explore ways for you to get involved more directly in God’s global mission.

It was great to spend time with Luigi, a bi-vocational Italian pastor. He encouraged the missionaries here, and asked us to remind the churches in the U.S. that there is great need (and great opportunity) for ministry and church planting in Italy.

We ended the day with a great dinner (authentic oven-baked pizza) and a trek across the city in search of an open night club. Believe it or not, the majority of the work done by the missionaries here is done in bars, cafés, and night clubs. In the end, there wasn’t a lot going on (it was a Monday night), but it gave us an idea of how things work here.