BGCA News

Come to Imaginate 2011

2011-10-05T15:20:00.011-06:00

Imaginate is a gathering of several other BGCA churches in your region for an evening of ideas and imagination… to share and to explore what God is doing and could do in your church.

Come for a time of dessert and dialogue, then prayer and commissioning into where God has you placed. Come to Imaginate…

“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine,
according to his power that is at work within us” (Eph. 3:20)

Cost: $5/person
Register online now

Please go to the Imaginate Events page for the list of churches attending each event, or contact Miriam Co at the BGCA office with any questions.

Imaginate (Sherwood Park) at Centre Park Church
October 22 (Saturday) from 6:30-8:30PM

Imaginate (Entwistle) at Entwistle Community Church
October 23 (Sunday) from 6:30-8:30PM

Imaginate (Langdon)at Langdon Community Church
October 29 (Saturday) from 6:30-8:30PM.

Imaginate (Northwest Calgary) at Northwest Community Church
October 30 (Sunday) from 6:30-8:30PM

You're invited to Gathering 2011

2011-04-07T16:54:00.000-06:00

You are invited to the Gathering 2011, BGCA's annual meeting held this year July 8 in Canmore, AB.
This year we join the BGC Canada Celebration in Canmore (July 5-8) with the BGC Alberta Gathering integrated into the Friday July 8 schedule. We encourage you to come for the entire event, it’ll be great!

We’re pleased to have Dr. Reggie McNeal, a Baptist pastor and noted author of many books on leadership and the missional church including “Missional Renaissance” for a special one-day seminar on Friday July 8. The seminar will be on missional leadership and discipleship in the church of the 21st century, starting at 9am. From 12 noon to 2 pm there will be a special BGCA lunch and also a short Annual General Meeting. Then we return to the seminar with Reggie McNeal at 2:00pm, and finish at 5:30pm.

Cost: $95 (including lunch)
Date: July 8, 2011
Place: Radisson Hotel, Canmore AB

See the attached PDF for more details about participating in the full BGC Canada conference.

Register online by June 1 at www.bgc.ca/register

Further details are available on the BGCA website at www.bgcalberta.ca/gathering

(Overnight accommodations are available for a conference special rate of $129/night. You will need to book this directly with the hotel, either by calling 1-800-395-3625 as part of the "Baptist General Conference of Canada" group, or online at www.radisson.com/reservation using promotional code BAPGEN).

Please don't hesitate to contact our office with any questions that may come up.

Looking forward to seeing you there!

Roger Helland, District Coach
Murray Jarman, Associate District Coach
Ron Fehr, Board Chair

PS Feel free to pass this along to others in your church who may be interested

re:Call church planting congress

2011-04-02T16:54:00.000-06:00

From consumers to missionaries, we are remembering the Story, returning to our calling and reclaiming our mission. re:CALL Church Planting Congress November 15-17, 2011 in Winnipeg, MB. Go to www.thecongress.ca for more details.

Join us for three days of remembering and embracing our call to live as God's people of mission in a world of consumption.

Speakers: Skye Jethani, Christine Pohl, Gary Nelson, David Fitch
Presented by Church Planting Canada

Women in church leadership discussion

2011-03-09T16:52:00.000-07:00

There's been lots of interesting discussions lately on the topic of women in leadership positions within the church. The Out of Ur blog run by Leadership Journal has had a few different series of posts, and John Stackhouse at Regent College has also weighed in on the topic.

Here are a few links to get you going:
http://blog.christianitytoday.com/mt/mt-tb.cgi/5087
http://stackblog.wordpress.com/2011/02/16/i-tim-215ff-gender-and-just-obeying-what-scripture-clearly-says/

Many of the authors describe their viewpoints as a journey to a different place than they started as they studied Scripture. What do you think of their positions?

Exciting happenings at Riverbend

2011-02-18T16:50:00.000-07:00

Here's what's happening in one of our BGCA churches. From Pastor Robert Sandford at Riverbend Baptist in Edmonton:

Just wanted to share a few photos from Sunday night (February 13) when we baptized 7 people! Baptism is a significant step of obedience to the call of Jesus in a person's life, where they commit themselves publicly as a follower and disciple of Jesus. This coming Sunday (February 20th) is our annual general meeting. Prior to the rest of our reports and business, we’ll be welcoming 19 people into membership!!! Imagine, such growth in our spiritual community. God has surprised us all with great joy. And there are still 4 others who’ve expressed they need more time to think and pray about baptism and membership. God is good!

What's happening in your church community? Send the updates so we can pray, give thanks and celebrate what God is doing among us.

Six Megathemes from 2010 research - Barna Group

2011-01-07T16:48:00.000-07:00

Barna Research Group released a study just before Christmas outlining six significant themes arising out of their research during 2010. A lot of it references the discussion on missional church and "effectiveness" that has been going on in BGCA circles of late. Here's a summary of the six points plus a link to the larger article.

1. The christian church is becoming less theologically literate.
2. Christians are becoming more ingrown and less outreach-oriented.
3. Growing numbers of people are less interested in spiritual principles and more desirous of learning pragmatic solutions for life.
4. Among Christians, interest in participating in community action is escalating.
5. The postmodern insistence on tolerance is winning over the Christian Church.
6. The influence of Christianity on culture and individual lives is largely invisible.

Full article here.

Thoughts, comments??

Christmas greetings from BGCA

2010-12-16T10:30:00.000-07:00

Hey, everyone, Roger and I would like to wish all our BGCA leaders, churches and people a blessed and Christ-centred time this Christmas. Here's a brief video overview of this past year and a look ahead to 2011.

TODAY video - the importance of children to the church

2010-11-04T10:55:00.000-06:00

TODAY videoThis is a great resource that was presented at the recent Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization in Cape Town, South Africa. It's a four minute story of how the gospel is spreading in our world today, and because our world is so young, many of these stories revolve around children and youth. Check it out! There's also a downloadable HD-quality video available.

http://www.max7.org/resource.aspx?id=3460bd87-b9aa-46dd-8d1d-0a0073a50888&creatinguser=1

Free police background checks for charities

2010-08-21T09:17:00.000-06:00

Here's some good news to save a few dollars in your kids ministry department: there's a new program that will cover the cost of police background checks for volunteers in churches and other charities. Up to this point the cost has typically been $25. For full information and to apply, go to Volunteer Alberta's site.

Roundtable discussion from Gathering 2010

2010-06-13T10:22:00.000-06:00

Our recent Gathering 2010 was a great day of fun, worship, learning and being together as a community of believers in Jesus. One of the best parts was the stimulating interaction around tables after lunch about how to be a missionary in your own neighbourhood, the "gospel according to you". Here's the link to the pdf document, or see below for the full text of the responses shared in the discussions. Feel free to comment or expand on things!

Roundtable Discussion responses

BGCA Gathering 2010
June 5, 2010 at Ebenezer Baptist Church, Wetaskiwin AB

1. What are three top challenges you face in being a missionary in our 21st century culture?
- inconsistent living of Christians
- too busy “doing church” (inward-focused)
- lack of willingness/availability to share; busyness
- fear of rejection
- indifferent / apathetic
- too results-oriented, not focussed on relationships
- lack of faith; will God really do anything?
- isolationism; no deep relationships
- don’t understand other cultures/ages
- hostile culture; pluralistic and inclusive

2. What are the three top practices you can adopt to address the challenge?
- be willing to follow Jesus and “go do it”; obedience, integrity, humility
- take people with you and go follow Jesus
- simplify schedules, give permission not to participate for mission reasons
- choose to connect/relate to people, make space in your life for them; practice hospitality, invite people into your home
- deep relationships give a voice to speak into culture
- don’t give up loving people in practical ways
- talk about the uniqueness of Jesus
- PRAY!!!

3. What are three top ways you can lessen the gap between challenges and opportunities for you to be a missionary in our 21st century culture
- consistent, daily Christ-like example
- spiritual disciplines form the foundation of our spiritual lives
- seek out opportunities to make connections
- love others, love love love people
- celebrate the “wins”
- take the opportunities that you encounter

Reaching Gen Y - insights from a culture watcher

2010-05-26T10:55:00.000-06:00

The Globe and Mail is running a three-part series on advertising to Gen Y, based on a new book by Seth Godin. Although coming from a marketing standpoint, there are lots of great lessons we can pick up about how churches can shape their ministries to best connect with Canadians in their teens, twenties and thirties. If Gen Y prefers small businesses, then understanding their mindset should also help churches, particularly smaller "neighborhood" churches, to present their size and status as a selling point/benefit rather than a shortcoming.

Read the articles as they appear and then join the discussion about how to apply this to your local church context.

Connecting with Facebook, Twitter and more...

2010-05-05T15:05:00.000-06:00

Here's a great resource on using social media like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to connect with people in your church and community. This is a blog posting from the Leadership Network and provides some context for the big excitement over social media, and also what benefits and costs (primarily time) you can expect. They also have a good podcast to go along with it - check it out.

Free training seminars for charities

2010-02-05T11:27:00.000-07:00

Canadahelps.org has a series of free webinars (web-based seminars) providing training for increasing donations, using email to stay in touch with donors, and other topics. Check out the online newsletter for more details.

Ed Stetzer on Missional Leadership (video)

2009-12-16T11:27:00.000-07:00

Here's a great 40-minute video on "Missional Leadership" presented by Ed Stetzer, church planter/professor/guru of the Southern Baptist movement in the US. Ed's got a lot of good things to say about how we lead and function as missionaries in our culture. He's also got an interesting blog going, check it out for lots of current discussions on church and culture.

Missional Leadership from Ed Stetzer on Vimeo.

Leadership Summit

2009-12-03T17:00:00.000-07:00

On November 25, a special gathering of key BGCA leaders took place in Red Deer. Twenty- eight BGCA leaders representing eighteen of our twenty-seven churches, along with BGC Canada, Canadian Baptist Seminary, and Lone Prairie Camp, attended the summit. Several more wanted to come but could not make it. The goal was not to impose pre-conceived plans top-down and ask churches to change what they’re doing. Rather, the goal was to provide a forum for us as leaders to express the challenges we face and how we can collaborate to move ahead together. We collectively comprise the BGCA. Our main question was “Where to next?”.

To start, we noted the lack of any substantial net growth in baptisms, attendance, and church planting since 2002 in both the BGCA and BGCC. We face a widespread lack of passionate spirituality, mission, and disciple-making with a corresponding widespread resistance to change, which are both challenges and opportunities as a district. From one perspective the need for “repentance” was suggested. We spent time in prayer and discussion. We noted that each church faces unique contexts and challenges, that God is at work, that the pastor is the leader of the local church, and that overall we share some common challenges.

Responses from our discussions seemed to cluster around four areas: Missional Leadership, Spiritual Passion, Disciplemaking, and Youth Leadership. Through our interactions and the ideas that were suggested, BGCA plans to focus on these key ministry areas as we resource and serve our churches to see life-giving growth and health spread across our province. Read the full report for all the details.

Can a denomination be missional?

2009-12-03T11:26:00.000-07:00

That's a good question - any thoughts? Take a look at this video montage of ministry events in our BGCA churches over the last year or so and let us know what you think.