Tyler Prieb

Genuine innovation in mission will require spiritual awakening (charismatics), missiological reflection (theologians), cultural translation (missionaries and planters), technological breakthrough (tool-builders), and structural innovation (entrepreneurs and org builders). We need an integrated, interdisciplinary approach to all of them.

Something I told 13 yo: Cities inhale and exhale each generation. People move to cities in their 20s in search of colleagues and mates, move back out to raise their kids, and then when their kids are in their 20s, they return.

A balanced New Testament eschatology integrates radical urgency and radical long-termism at the same time. Whether planting churches or caring for the environment, Christians should uniquely balance short-term intensity and very long-term horizons.

Institutions don't earn trust by making the right predictions, by saying the right things, by aligning themselves with the right powers, by reacting. The trustworthiness of an institution is founded on the quality of the relationships and the trust between people within the institution. A bad tree cannot produce good fruit. All of the instinctual and reactionary tactics that institutions are using to 'win back trust' will not work unless there is a re-founding.

For my British and European friends who are "shocked" and "surprised", here are 10 reasons you didn't see this coming. Read this short post and then read the replies from our American friends who will confirm what I'm saying. 1. Americans love their country and want it to be the best in the world. America is a nation of people who conquered a continent. They love strength. They love winning. Any leader who appeals to that has an automatic advantage. 2. Unlike Europeans, Americans have not accepted managed decline. They don't have Net Zero here, they believe in producing their own energy and making it as cheap as possible because they know that their prosperity depends on it. 3. Prices for most basic goods in the US have increased rapidly and are sky high. What the official statistics say about inflation and the reality of people's lives are not the same. 4. Unlike you, Americans do not believe in socialism. They believe in meritocracy. They don't care about the super rich being super rich because they know that they live in a country where being super rich is available to anyone with the talent and drive to make it. They don't resent success, they celebrate it. 5. Americans are the most pro-immigration people in the world. Read that again. Seriously, read it again. Americans love an immigrant success story. They want more talented immigrants to come to America. But they refuse to accept people coming illegally. They believe in having a border. 6. Americans are sensitive about racial issues and their country's imperfect history. They believe that those who are disadvantaged by the circumstances of their birth should be given the opportunity to succeed. What they reject, however, is the idea that in order to address the errors of the past new errors must be made. DEI is racist. They know it and they reject it precisely because they are not racist. 7. Americans are the most philosemitic nation on earth. October 7 and the pro-Hamas left's reaction shocked them to their very core because, among other things, they remember what 9/11 was like and they know jihad when they see it. 8. Americans are extremely practical people. They care about what works, not what sounds good. In Europe, we produce great writers and intellectuals. In America they produce (and attract) great engineers, businessmen and investors. Because of this, they care less about Trump's rhetoric than you do and more about his policies than you do. 9. Americans are deeply optimistic people. They hate negativity. The woke view of American history as a series of evils for which they must eternally apologise is utterly abhorrent to them. They believe in moving forward together, not endlessly obsessing about the past. 10. America is a country whose founding story is one of resistance to government overreach. They loathe unnecessary restrictions, regulations and control. They understand that freedom comes with the price of self-reliance and they pay it gladly.

There has been a LOT of reaction to the 4th Lausanne Congress that took place in Seoul six weeks ago. I've collated 25 of the best posts about what happened and why it all matters. Have a scan and check out the topics and authors that catch your eye... fromeverynation.net/post/mission-h…

@ChrisHowles @edstetzer @DerwinLGray @DrMarkPickett @theFIEC @TimTennent @MungaiChristian @allenlyeh @DarrenMCarlson @NathanaelZedek @tedstur @JonHirstTalks @allanvarghesem @TrevinWax @ProfeChaoRomero @DSweeting @davedv Thanks @ChrisHowles

Many thanks to authors, including @edstetzer @DerwinLGray @DrMarkPickett @theFIEC @TimTennent @MungaiChristian @allenlyeh @DarrenMCarlson @NathanaelZedek @tedstur @JonHirstTalks @allanvarghesem @TrevinWax @ProfeChaoRomero @DSweeting @davedv @_prieb . You all rock.

I think so much of our social impact work is (theologically) the pursuit of the new creation, but our approach defaults to strategic planning or power games, divorced from the life of prayer, imagination, community, and context, where change actually happens.

If the Gospel is to challenge the public life of our society, it will not be by forming a Christian political party, or by aggressive propaganda campaigns. It will only be by movements that begin with the local congregation in which the reality of the new creation is present, known, and experienced. (Newbigin)

(As an addendum, I think much of the revitalization will come from grassroots efforts from the global south, and western institutions should invest in emerging Christian leaders and voices from emerging nations).

I think vitality in the Church will essentially be a function of spiritual renewal and structural renewal in the next decade.

As a Christian who works with a lot of Church leaders and ministry leaders around the world, I think we need to get more focused around building a "great commission" innovation sector.

Imagine what might be possible if the talented writers and artists (including entrepreneurs, who I consider artists) with a beautiful aesthetic and moral sensibility banded together to work for the common good rather than each trying to build their own empire. What made America great in the first place was not rugged independence or limp socialism but a healthy tension between the individual and group, the one and the ninety-nine—a recognition that we each need to be free to build and reap the rewards of our efforts, but that it's also good if we cooperate along the way. In the tension between those things lies the secret to prosperity, and it's simply a lot more fun to enter into the war of art with a band of brothers.

Hey ambitious leader, you can "do big things for God," I made 8 figures last year, you can too, buy my 100x kingdom entrepreneur course. 🤨🤢☹️

@lukeburgis Very excited about this

I first heard about Cluny in 2013 while taking a history class in Rome. It captured my imagination as soon as I understood its full significance. In the early tenth century, at a time when political and social conditions were extremely unstable in Europe, and Western monasticism was in severe decline, the abbey of Cluny was founded at the site of the Duke of Aquitaine’s favorite hunting grounds. Within two centuries, this institution—which acted like connective tissue between various spheres of society—rose to become the nexus of intellectual life, spiritual renewal, and innovation. The monks took in the sick, cared for the poor, and illuminated manuscripts in its renowned scriptorium that spread through the world. Trust in institutions at the time of Cluny’s founding could not have been lower—it would make today look like a fairy tale. The abbey was set up at the peak of the lay investiture controversy in which politics and church hierarchy had fused. Powerful feudal lords could appoint abbots and bishops. But the Cluny abbot was established with a property grant and rights unlike any the world had ever seen at that time: the new monastery would be established as politically independent, and no local power players would be able to exert control over it. They threw down the gauntlet. They were not willing to compromise with the worldly. But rather than isolate the abbey, the bet paid off: over the following decades after its establishment in 910 A.D., Cluny built the largest church in all of Christendom and awed visitors with the beauty and reverence of its liturgy and the dedication of its monks. While other abbeys had become lax and lazy, Cluny maintained a higher standard undergirded by faith, hope, and love and a sense of mission that was articulated in centuries, not years. The Cluniac Reforms led to well over 1,000 sister abbeys and institutions spread throughout Europe united by a common bond of kinship. Its independence allowed for it to develop real spiritual and moral authority as well as intellectual independence, and Cluny became a home for anyone who wanted to refresh their souls amidst the warring world outside—some so that they could produce art, others so that they could prepare for marriage, others because they were starving and needed to eat. The hospitality was unreasonable, but real hospitality should be. When I returned from Rome in 2016, the world was a different place than when I left. Over the next 8 years, I would watch—sometimes in despair—as the fake overtook the real; as sophistry became louder than virtue; as good people were left behind and fell through the cracks at the hands of people who lost sight of the goodness and dignity of the human person; and the human condition ceased to be lived or understood because everyone seemed to forget the existential stakes. Personalism turned into machineism. Even Christian aesthetics, art, and communication became increasingly saccharine and superficial, often cringe, and the manner in which some of the most important issues of our age were discussed and “debated” lacked heart. And we lacked hope. You could almost see it, if you looked long enough, draining from our collective eyes. But nobody was looking long enough. Hardly anyone has the ability to be that attentive anymore in our age of distraction. Adhering to reality for even 5 minutes can be a challenge. But when we do, we begin to see the depths of the problem. We begin to see that it’s not going to be solved in November. Things that were more than merely subjectively satisfying were increasingly hard to come by in the public square, if you believe that a public square even exists. Everything had become siloed, fragmented. Athens is strong, but it cannot stand on its own. There are plenty of smart people, but how many faithful ones? (I don’t mean religious faith alone—there is faithfulness to one’s friends, one’s family, to one’s responsibilities, literally the ‘ability to respond’ to the wonder and the values that we encounter in the world). Having lost that ability myself at various points, and even recently seeing it diminished, I was alarmed. I witnessed corruption and naivety among the religious, and more and more incidents of religion being ‘used’ (in a deeply Girardian sense) like a bludgeon to control or purge or seek power. And the “builders”, the entrepreneurs, the hustlers, the ambitious: we didn’t just lose our moral compass, we lost our spiritual bearings. It's harsh out there. The sand and the dust washes into your mouth as soon as you step outside of the sietch. I realized that I needed to build things inside of myself much more than I needed to build things outside of myself, and that in fact those two efforts are not unrelated. But I also became acutely aware that I needed support. I need faithful friends. I want to be around people who are intellectually curious, spiritually hungry, and competent builders who are willing to roll up their sleeves and work, who want to build something that endures. Nihilism is not enough. Technology is not enough. Mediocrity is not enough. Lukewarmness is not enough. It will be spat out. As Dante entered hell, he saw a sign that told all those who entered to abandon all hope. I was looking for the opposite: a sign above a door, be it a basement lounge in New York City or an institution or a classroom or a church, that said: “All you who enter here, prepare to become more hopeful.” I would normally say that this past summer in West Michigan was “busy”, but I would be lying. There was forced silence, there was plenty of time spent with my daughter on the floor of our Rome, me staring into her face and seeing the future. Out of the silence and the cries came fire. The wildness of the lake reminded me that the spirit still hovers over those waters. And I often thought about those last lines of Auden, The meek inherit the earth, and is neither Charming, successful, nor a crowd; Alone among the noise and policies of summer, His weeping climbs towards your life like a vocation. Out of the shadows and into the deep—it’s time to build The Real. Follow @ClunyInstitute and we'll let you know when the rooms are ready.

The people that hang out on twitter and the people that went to the Lausanne congress is a very small overlap. But I went and here are my thoughts: missional.substack.com/p/reflections-…