Ask Me Why I'm Not In Church: A Call for the Church to Get out of the Building

By An Anderson and Canty Production

Through scripture (the biblical narrative), this book challenges, equips, and deploys the body of Christ into the true mission of God. You will either be convicted and put the book down or you will be totally motivated to stop doing church as usual and assume your role in being an ambassador for Christ.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Jun 21, 2019
• ISBN: 9781973664703

An Anderson and Canty Production

Dr. Larry L. Anderson Jr. serves as the Director of Healthy Churches for the Baptist Resource Network of PA. and SJ. He also serves as the Sr. Pastor of Great Commission Church located in Philadelphia PA. Dr. D. Kyle Canty serves as the NAMB SEND City Missionary for the City of Philadelphia. He is also the Assistant Pastor of Great Commission Church located in Philadelphia, PA.

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Ask Me

Why I’m Not

In Church

A Call for the Church to Get Out of the Building

AN ANDERSON and CANTY PRODUCTION

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Copyright © 2019 An Anderson and Canty Production.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This book is a work of non-fiction. Unless otherwise noted, the author and the publisher make no explicit guarantees as to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and in some cases, names of people and places have been altered to protect their privacy.

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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Unless otherwise noted, scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The NIV and New International Version are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

Scripture quotations marked MSG are taken from THE MESSAGE, copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

Scripture quotations marked KJV taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

ISBN: 978-1-9736-6471-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-6472-7 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-6470-3 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2019906479

WestBow Press rev. date: 6/21/2019

Ask Me Why Endorsements

Anderson and Canty aren’t providing three easy steps so you can clone their urban ministry model, nor are they doing armchair theology. Instead, Ask Me Why I’m Not In Church is overflowing with nuggets of wisdom from actual pastors leading a missional church in Philadelphia. Read this book with care as you live the Gospel in your neighborhood!

Drew Hart, PhD, Assistant Professor of Theology at Messiah College, author of Trouble I’ve Seen: Changing the Way the Church Views Racism

Dr. Anderson and Dr. Canty are highly experienced pastors who understand both how important it is to preach the gospel and how imperative it is to understand one’s context. They also practice what they preach. In Ask Me Why I’m Not in Church, they take the reader on a journey that begins with a stirring of the heart and ends with a missional community of faith. At times prophetic, at times devotional, Ask Me Why I’m Not in Church tackles any number of burning cultural issues and seeks to address them through the lens of the Bible. This is an ideal book for pastors, small groups, and Sunday school classes to read and discuss in order to learn how to better understand and reach the community around them. As Anderson and Canty note, our culture is changing rapidly, and this is a book that is sensitive to the needs of our culture yet also faithful in its preaching. This is a resource packed with personal stories, biblical teachings, practical applications, missional strategies (especially T4T), discussion questions, and just the right amount of theological insight. It will be a great addition to your church’s ministry toolkit.

Derek Cooper, PhD, Associate Professor of World Christian History at Missio Seminary, author of Christianity and World Religions: An Introduction to the World’s Major Faiths

Ask Me Why I’m Not in Church is a well-written book on how a church can become missional in context. Although it is largely formed around an extended case study of Great Commission Church in Philadelphia, PA, the book brings out many solid principles that can be applicable for all churches regardless of their context. Especially helpful is chapter 3 where the authors have selected Scripture passages that are familiar to most churchgoers and have made novel applications that can bring Scripture to life in 21st century church conversions to being missional. Churches in the U.S. seem to have lost their missional response to Scripture, and this is a must read for all those wrestling with God’s Great Commission. This book is for church leaders/teachers who want to see their church move from being pew-centered to being missional within their unique community.

Susan Baker, PhD, Assistant Director of the Doctor of Ministry Program at Missio Seminary, author of Understanding Mainland Puerto Rican Poverty

The very useful and practical training in chapter 4 was excellent. And in chapter 3, you stress the various justice issues that are inherent in the community and the need for the church (or the seminary) to engage those issues. I fully support this missional approach at GCC. I was deeply encouraged to read about the incarnational ministry of your congregation. What struck me most was that I think much of what you did with GCC is applicable to MISSIO as we move to the city.

Frank James, PhD, President of Missio Seminary, co-author of, Church History: Pre-Reformation to the Present, vol. 2

This book is one of those rare gems that merges academically informed theology with practical ministry, leadership, pastoral, and real-life experience. The Anderson-Canty partnership seems to be something fashioned by the Spirit of God for achieving Kingdom goals, first in ground-level ministry, but now in merging their insights together to produce an extremely useful manual for fellow missional leaders. What brings you to this book? I’ve always wondered if missional is just a buzzword. I mean, what is the big deal, theologically speaking? You’ll find the answer here. I like how missional theology’ captures some key biblical themes of Trinitarian theology; but what practical difference does it make on the ground? You’ll find the answer here. Yes, I appreciate the ideals that ‘missional ministry’ embraces, but does anybody understand how difficult it is to actually try to lead real transition in a real church composed of real people? Again–you’ll find what you’re looking for here!

R. Todd Mangum, PhD Clemens Professor of Missional Theology, Missio Seminary, author of The Dispensational-Covenantal Rift

Ask Me Why I’m Not In Church is a love letter to communities facing challenges, an instructional manual for street-level evangelism, and a frank and honest portrayal of one church’s journey into the places where the saving message of Jesus Christ is still turning lives around. I believe this book will have a tremendous impact for Christ as other churches use it as a roadmap for evangelism.

Solomon Jones, author, Praise 107.9 radio host, and Philadelphia Daily News columnist

Dr. Larry Anderson and Dr. Kyle Canty have written a compelling account of the journey on which they led their church from the comfort of the suburbs of Philadelphia into the city to fulfill the mandate of Christ to go into all the world and preach the Gospel. When many churches leave cities to escape violence and other conditions, they faced into the storm to bring the light and hope of Christ to those walking in darkness. Their bold journey has yielded much fruit because of their determination to take part in the mission of God. We need go no further than their introduction to feel Holy Spirit conviction for our  …presuppositions and procrastination, while we …[claim] to love God all the while ignoring His mission." May God use the words in this well-written, well-documented book to ignite a fire in our souls to make God’s mission our top priority.

Anthony W. Hurst, Sr. DMin, Associate Pastor, Church of God Adjunct Professor, Cairn and Eastern Universities

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Chapter 1     Suburbs To City

Chapter 2     Resistance To Repentance

Chapter 3     Pulpit to Pew

Chapter 4     From The Church To The Community

Chapter 5     From Outreach To Outcomes

Chapter 6     Why Use Training For The Trenches As A Ministry Motif

Conclusion

Appendix A Sample Half Day Prayer Guide

Appendix B T4T Representative Survey

Appendix C Community Location Survey

Appendix D Group Dynamics Survey

Appendix E Conversation Survey

Appendix F Measuring Community Engagement

Bibliography

Tables:

Table 1: Sample Letter

Table 2: Spiritual Birthline

Table 3: GCC 2008-2019 Categorized Presence in WOL

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We want to thank the following institutions for providing world-class education and the tools that allowed us to engage in this kind of ministry. Thank you Missio Seminary for a cutting edge education in missional theology. Thank you Cairn University for a foundation in the sacred Scriptures. Thank you Baptist Resource Network for the opportunity to put into practice what we know and love. Thank you NAMB for the opportunity to reach the great city of Philadelphia and oversee the planting and flourishing of churches. We want to thank our readers Sue Baker, Derek Cooper, Solomon Jones, Al Tizon, Todd Mangum, David Lamb, Frank James, Andrew Hart, Shannon Baker, Pam Canty, and Barry Whitworth for the feedback you gave on the manuscript. You helped us shape it into becoming Ask Me Why I’m Not In Church, the book. We would like to thank our dear friend Anthony Hurst for being our first reader and editor; your contributions have been priceless. We also thank Shana Murph for being our second and final editor. We would also like to thank Manny Ortiz, who has gone home to be with the Lord, and Susan Baker for making time to mentor and guide the both of us. There have been too many others to name that have contributed to this work and for that we are eternally grateful.

Dr. Larry Anderson

First, I want to give glory to God. Hallelujah! Now, there are many people I would like to thank that helped us pen this book. I want to thank my wife Kim. You have been my sounding board and my ride or die partner from the corner to the cross. You’ve always believed in me and supported my dreams. My children, Marquis, Darius and Gabrielle, thank you for sacrificing some of your quality time so that I can not only write this book but live out the experiences which led to its penning. Thank you to Bill and Dollie Parker for embracing me, not as a son in law but as a son, and your enormous support. Thank you to Uncle David, AKA Bishop Hill for spiritually raising me up to accept my call. Thank you to my sister Lisa King and my brother Aaron Bryant for always being the close knit and supportive siblings Mom would have been so proud of. Thank you Great Commission Church, who for 15 years, has allowed me to grow and pastor you into the mission of God, which has been non-traditional, challenging and very rewarding—to God be the glory. And finally, I would like to thank our pastor, Hal J. Hopkins for challenging me from the very beginning of my ministry journey to embrace my own authenticity and enjoy