Doin' the Stuff

I've just invested a wee bit o' time in recreating some of my links on the right. It all started because of Pernell Goodyear, my friend and planting pastor of The Freeway, which is an emerging Salvation Army church plant in downtown Hamilton ON (nicknamed "The Hammer" by its inhabitants, and "that smelly place that peels the paint off your car -- while you watch" by the masses of unwashed heathen in the Centre of the Universe).

Pernell has been one of the Journeymates listed on this blog, but he's been so busy with the launching of the Freeway Cafe, that his blog has been left all alone and neglected. So, I was going to simply change his blog link to the Freeway Cafe link (and I'm really happy with the link image I created for him), when it suddenly occurred to me that I should add a few other links to emerging church plants that I'm aware of (there's certainly many more than the ones I've listed here), so that people who visit here can have a look at some emerging church plants who are, to use John Wimber's famous phrase, "doin' the stuff"

In short:

1. Basin & Towel is the missional community that Brother Maynard is a part of. I've visited this fairly new group just last August while in Winnipeg, and they're a great bunch of solid, intentionally missional people.
   
   
2. Soul Sanctuary is the church plant headed up by Gerry Michalski, whom I've known since the early 90's, and who blogs at SoulPastor. Soul Sanctuary is an emerging church plant out of the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada.
   
   
3. Jamie Arpin-Ricci, who blogs at Emergent Voyageurs, is the co-director, along with his gifted and lovely wife Kim, of YWAM Winnipeg. Wendy & I met Jamie & Kim several years ago, shortly after they first arrived in Winnipeg, and they're a very refreshing couple to spend time with -- people of the spark, definitely.
   
   I'm pretty much settled on the idea that the old "church versus parachurch" idea is a false dichotomy, so I have every confidence on including an emerging YWAM base in a list of churches who are doin' the stuff. (I'll blog more on that whole topic in a couple of days.)
   
   
4. Frank Emmanuel, the planting pastor of the Freedom Vineyard in Ottawa (our nation's capital), will be the first to loudly confirm that his church needs a new website, big time!
   
   I "met" Frank via the Resonate.ca discussion forum, and besides really liking the guy, he's leading a church plant out of Sarnia ON (where I did most of my growing up), plus along with Brother Maynard, Jamie Arpin-Ricci, and Soul Pastor Gerry Michalski, he's trying to work out what it means to be post-charismatic as his church develops its own unique DNA.
   
   
5. On a similar note, but on the other side of The Pond, Vineyard Sutton (U.K.) is on a similar journey. Jason Clark, one of the Journeymates, is involved in Emergent UK, as well as being the lead pastor of this Vineyard church plant. While I've never met Jason, his blog has always impressed me for its depth and character, so I thought including a link to where Jason leads a church would be helpful.
   
   
6. I have met Dan Kimball before, although only for one conference -- he was the speaker, I was one of the three people in the front row saying "amen" while the rest of the pastors present were forming a lynch mob (this was about five years ago). It was the first time I'd ever heard or heard of Dan, and he was basically putting into words (much better than I could) all of the stuff that Wendy & I had been wrestling with for most of the 90's. Dan leads Vintage Faith Church, as well as being a Journeymate here.
   
   
7. Mike Morrell's Sites Unseen, which is perhaps the largest weblink portal of its kind, is not exactly a church plant, but if there's any other emerging church practitioners out there, you'll find them here.