Fresh expressions

The annual missiology lecture is happening this week at Fuller.  This year the Right Reverend Bishop Graham Cray from England is coming to speak about the new church planting movement happening within the Church of England.  As you probably know, the church in Europe has shrunk in the last several decades to less than 10% of the population calling themselves Christian.  In England, the statistics say that 40% of the population have never attended church in their lives, 40% have attended at one time but no longer go, 10% attend sporatically and the last 10% are regular attenders. 
The movement, called "Fresh Expressions," that Bishop Cray is part of seeks to bring church to the communities in their natural context.  It's not about creating a "cookie cutter" church like the ones before, or even exporting successful models of church from the US or other parts of the world.  The motivation is to see how God is moving in different communities and join those movements.  These include cafe churches, pub churches, even surfing gatherings and an entirely youth led church. 
If the church is dying, we have to breath life back into it.  This has to be done with creativity and innovation, working within the cultural networks to draw people in.  It's not about watering down the message. Christ is still central and the mission is to raise others and ourselves to become disciples, building one another up in community.