Acts 29: The Church Planting Version of Napster
Undoubtedly some of you reading this were part of the Napster craze a few years ago. Whereas music stores sold music according to their rules - a whole CD at a time, for a premium price, inside their walls - Napster allowed you to download whatever songs you wanted, from any computer in the network, for free. Instead of top-down (retailer-purchaser), it was peer-to-peer. And it changed the face of the music industry.Next week I travel to California to connect with the Acts 29 church planting network. A29 is a peer-to-peer network of churches planting churches. If denominations are sort of like the music stores of the church planting world, A29 is like Napster (except that it's legal). Instead of relying on a top-down system of hierarchy and governance, A29 creates relationally-driven partnerships among churches who are 1) theologically like-minded, and 2) committed to church planting. As we pray together about spurring a church planting movement in Omaha and beyond, A29 may be a key piece of the puzzle.To find out more, you can check out the Acts 29 website here. And by the way, if you still have illegal music on your hard drive, Jesus says to delete it.