J.R. Briggs

Incredibly exciting (and ridiculously scary) changes for the Briggs family

September 12, 2011

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I have some significant news to share with you: news that makes my heart race, because its incredibly exciting and ridiculously scary at the same time.

We announced these changes yesterday morning at the gathering of The Renew Community.

No, we are not leaving Renew.

But my role within Renew will be changing significantly.

Over the past few months Megan and I have been staying attentive to what is going on both externally and internally. We’ve stepped back and taken a look at the landscape and we’ve noticed a few things:

[1] Renew:

Last year Renew participated in a church plant health assessment, facilitated through The Ecclesia Network, the network that we are proudly affiliated with. One of the significant insights the assessor communicated to our elders was that during the first 3-4 years of a church plant, a strong presence is needed from someone who is apostolically-wired. People who know we well know that I am wired as an Apostle (i.e. I am a spiritual entrepreneur who likes to start things, take risks, cast vision and ask ‘what if?’)

The assessor communicated to us that after those first 3-4 years of a church plant being established, what is needed is for the apostolically-wired leader to step back a bit and to allow others who are more pastorally-wired to assume more levels of leadership. We’ve noticed a lot of needs surface within Renew the past several months of which I can seek to serve and help, but it is not my primary wiring, per se. The role for teaching is still needed, for sure, but the pastoral presence must be greater.

One of the things we’ve stressed within Renew since our inception is the importance of teams. Our elders interact as a trusting and unified team. We are decentralized in our approach relying on our house church shepherds to lead and serve those in each house church. Our Leadership Community is relied upon heavily to help shape and form Renew and to provide direct and honest feedback, as they are the backbone of Renew. Based on spiritual wiring, current opportunity and experience and evident potential, we need Renew to develop an even deeper team approach.

[2] Myself

For the past few years, several people who know me well (Megan, extended family members, other Ecclesia pastors and friends) have said that I am ‘capital A Apostle, lowercase p pastor’ in my wiring. In various ways and numerous times, they have communicated to me that I would find the greatest amount of fulfillment, fruit and sustainability in ministry if I could have my hands in two places: serving in a local church setting at Renew as well as in helping start and cultivate new kingdom initiatives regionally and nationally. Over time, I’ve come to realize they were exactly right.

[3] The Renew Apprenticeship Program (RAP):

While all this processing was happening, the Renew Apprenticeship Program, by all accounts, has been a great success. Our first apprentice, Jason Sheffield, completed his year-long residency program in June. We sent he, his wife Becca and newborn son to Lincoln, NE to be a part of a new kingdom initiative. As our first ‘guinea pig’ with an apprentice in RAP, it was an exciting success for our faith community – and for the Sheffields. Jason told me several weeks ago that there is no way he could be involved in the ministry he is involved in today with as much courage, wisdom and confidence in Lincoln if it were not for the year of equipping, discipling and training he experienced through the RAP.

In January, our second apprentice, Doug Moister, began his year-long apprenticeship program. Doug and his wife Mear (and many others) believed we would be training Doug and eventually send him out to plant a church within the greater Philadelphia region. Over time, however, through this process of discernment, he began to wonder if God might be calling him to pastor a more established missional church plant, instead of taking on the traditional church planter role. We discerned his own wiring, passions and giftings and began to realize that he is a ‘capital P Pastor,’ wired to shepherd and walk alongside of those who are seeking to be attentive to God or might be in deep need. He’s added so much to Renew over the past nine months and, in many instances, shepherded far better than I. It has been a joy to see our gifts compliment one another within Renew.

At this point – realizing where Renew is currently at and discerning together how Doug is wired – I stepped back again and looked around and asked myself three questions:

• what is best for Renew?
• what is best for Doug?
• what is best way to steward my apostolic wiring?

As a result of these questions a few months ago, I approached the elders with an idea: Since Doug is ‘capital P, lowercase A’ and I am ‘capital A, lowercase P’ what if Doug came on staff – which would make Renew even healthier as we head into the future? And (and here is the significant twist to this whole thing) what if I stepped back from full-time to half-time at Renew while the other half of my time was spent investing in the lives of other pastors, leaders, ministries, organizations and kingdom initiatives?

The elders discussed this. We are in unanimous agreement that this is the right fit for Renew and that this move would help us be more effective in aligning ourselves with God’s mission and seeing our primary focus of discipleship happen. Since Renew’s inception, we have said we want to be known more for our sending capacity than our seating capacity. In a sense we are doing some ‘inverted sending’ — by sending Doug to Renew and Renew sending me out (with half of my time) to be involved in other kingdom initiatives, partnerships and activity. In short, this is an attempt to move from ministry by addition to ministry by multiplication.

With full agreement and affirmation from the elders, I approached Doug a few months ago and asked he and Mear to prayerfully and carefully consider if this was God’s call on their lives – to move to Lansdale, love our community well and become a full-time pastor of Renew. A few weeks ago, Doug informed the elders that, indeed, he believed that this was God’s call on the Moister family to fulfill the role of pastor at Renew – and that they are very excited about it. We are, too! What the elders have found to be so refreshing and healthy is that this is a ‘get-to’ situation and not a ‘have-to’ situation. This is not a situation where we are acting out of desperation or defensiveness; no, it resulted from listening, looking around and asking ‘what if?’

Now let me pause here and make something very clear: the Briggs family has no intent of leaving Renew. Renew is our home – and we love it. We truly want to operate in a team formation that is best suited to our divine wirings. We’re staying right here in Lansdale. We aren’t going anywhere; I’m just shifting roles and responsibilities.

Our roles

More specifically, Doug will assume the responsibilities of being the full-time pastor of Renew. He will provide shepherding (many of the ways he has already been doing for months), which include overseeing our house churches and HC shepherds, providing oversight and leadership to Renew Kids, teaching in half of our gatherings on average, counseling, being available and present in people’s stories, visiting people within Renew, handling logistics and systems, etc. He will run the day to day operations, if you will, but mostly importantly, help all of us within Renew to pay attention to God and learn to respond more faithfully and appropriately.

As I move to half-time with Renew, I will still be leading our elders, teaching about once a month in our gatherings, building into our leadership community and continuing to develop the Renew Apprenticeship Program.  I’ll also be readily available to Doug to guide him in this new role as he takes the lion share of responsibility of our faith community.

This transition will officially take effect January 1, 2012.

As we’ve shared this idea confidentially with a few trusted friends and family members the past few months, everyone has said the same thing: this makes sense. Doug has also told me that of the conversations he has had, there has not been one person who has raised any red flag with this situation. They are all saying the same thing, too.

While it makes sense, this transition also requires a lot of faith and more risk and change for the Briggs family. Financially, this means that while I am going to half-time with my responsibilities, I am also going to a half-time salary with Renew. This is a leap of faith for us because that means we need to generate the other half on our own.

For the past few years, God has laid many kingdom opportunities in my lap to help serve beyond Renew. I’ve had opportunities to work with other pastors, churches, church plants, organizations, academic institutions and leaders in areas such as training, teaching, discipleship, preaching, pioneering, shepherding, collaborating, life coaching and equipping. Many of these I have had to say no to, because it would mean that I would be neglecting my primary responsibility of pastoring Renew. However, in this new season, I am freed up to pursue opportunities to accept these invitations for serving, training, partnership, coaching, discipleship and collaboration.

But this would mean that for a portion of my salary, we will need to raise our own support. This, no doubt, is scary and un-American because it means that we are forced to be dependent upon the Lord by being dependent upon others for our needs. Fortunately, I – and others – are absolutely convinced that this work is essential for advancement of the kingdom and believe it is quite worth the risk involved. We will be spending a significant amount of time this fall working out some of these potential partnerships with other ministries, institutions, networks and organizations, as well as spending time focusing on support raising.

All this makes our hearts race – both with excitement and with nervousness – as we move from certainty to uncertainty. It’s a calculated risk – one that makes sense – but it is a risk nonetheless. However, we know that the magic happens outside of our comfort zone - and with that, we say bring it on.

We also move into this new phase with confidence because of the affirmation of friends, family members, leaders and most importantly, from the Lord.

We will continue to be sharing our journey with you in various forms and ways (including here on the blog) as we make this transition in the next few months. We can’t wait to see what happens in the months to come and anticipate the plot thickening in this adventure of following Jesus. This morning, Megan grabbed my hand, squeezed it and said, “I’m excited about what is ahead!” Me, too.

Right now, we’re buckled in and trying to accelerate through the turn.

Yes, we’re nervous, but the opportunity for further kingdom impact and advancement is what keeps me awake at night out of sheer excitement!

Stay tuned as the journey unfolds…

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