A promise of the Bible is that none of us are “everything enough” — because no human but Jesus was ever intended to be enough. No church is “everything enough” to accomplish the beautiful, weighty, spiritual task of sending — because no church without God’s Spirit can accomplish what only God can accomplish. Another promise of the Bible is that “God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.” (1 Corinthians 1:27-29)

As the height of the 2020 presidential election season approaches, many Christians are asking important questions about our political responsibility: What policies should I support? Do I vote on party lines or on the issues most important to me? In the midst of a global pandemic and racial tension splintering our society, the stakes feel different this year. But important questions about parties and candidates can easily obscure another question at the heart of our political and spiritual lives: What story am I buying into?

What keeps churches from planting churches and sending missionaries? For nearly a decade in various roles, I’ve been honored to create and oversee training for discerning one’s ministry fit and for equipping potential church planters to plant across North America and in multiple nations. I've also been honored to serve, coach, and train church planters in various cultures all around the globe. (I often learn more from them as they learn from me!)

While it’s probably true that 18-25 year olds of every generation are sort of anti-institution, we have not seen any other generation born into the age of the internet, extremely heightened by social media, raised in an economic recession, plagued by mental health diagnoses, navigating college during the most politically and racially divided moment in our lifetime, and then thrust into the workforce in a global pandemic.

Gen-Z is not a snowflake generation. They’re just accurately reflecting back to us the cultural chaos that started off this decade.

Bivocational ministry -- like so many other aspects of life -- often leads to an outcome unexpected by those who pursue it.