This summer I picked up a copy of Alan Hirsch’s book, The Forgotten Ways, at our CCSB convention meeting after Jeff Christopherson waved a few copies as give-aways.  I finished reading it a couple of weeks ago.  I will probably read it again this Fall as a companion to a certain pain I have.

At least five years ago I sat in the kitchen with my wife and uttered the words that took my breath away.  "If I can’t be a part of discipling men to a greater walk with Jesus, I should do something else!"  I didn’t know where those words came from.  But I was so shocked that the next day I went for a two-day retreat at the Westminster Abby in Mission.  I had to sort out what was going on in my heart.  The pain of yearning for the Body of Christ to be fully engaged in the mission and glory of the Gospel is sometimes too much.  The Forgotten Ways evoked that pain again, but also reminded me that the are many faithful companions in the Body of Christ who also yearn for the local church to be fully alive in Christ. 

I am appreciative of Hirsch’s parallel presentation of his own story and experience with broad study of what is occuring on the edges of mission.  The book proved to be encouraging and enlightening.

Hirsch presents a concept of leadership he calls Apostolic Genius in order to get at the life or spirit of an active, reproductive, disciplemaking community of Christians.  "In coining this phrase I want to try to identify something that is very hard to "see" but that seems to be always present in the church when it is in its most phenomenal form.  There is no current word or phrase to define this ’spirit’ that imbued the New Testament church and other expressions of apostolic forms of church…. It is the total phenomenon resulting from a a complex muliform and real experiences of God, types of expression, organizational structures, leadership ethos, spiritual power, mode of belief, etc.  And it is the active presence, or the lack of it, that makes all the difference to our experience of Jesus community, mission, and spiritual power."  Hirsch illustrates Apostolic Genius with five constructs orgainzied around the Lordship of Jesus Christ:  the missional-Incarnational impulse, disciple-making, communitas not community, organic systems, and the apostolic environment.

I was especially encouraged on this read through the book by his work on the five-fold ministry of the church and the interaction of the gifts for the mission of the church, disciple-making as a priority that never ceases, and the body of Christ as a "band of brothers," a communitas.  This last chapter was particularly fascinating as he considers the tension between the stability in life brought about by the Gospel’s transformation of lives and the enduring call of Christ to enter the missional frey.

A great read.  I recommend it to anyone seeking to plant a church or seeking to stimulate an ACTS type life for a local congregation.