Here’s a blog post that Bob Leopold, our keynote speaker for Play, wrote for the Episcopal Church Foundation. You can read the whole article here. Bob’s post was originally published on the Episcopal Church Foundation’s Vital Posts blog on March 5, 2014. It has been reprinted here with permission.
Recently, I had a wonderfully fun opportunity to participate in Play: Praising God in Life and Worship – A Fresh Expressions Worship Conference, hosted by the Diocese of Southern Ohio’s Fresh Expressions office and Missioner for Fresh Expressions, Jane Gerdsen. Jane, who invited me to be a presenter, had the insight to bring together some practitioners involved in missional – also called emergent – communities. Don’t get me wrong, I am a cradle (at least playpen) Episcopalian and I love and am deeply fed by “traditional” Sunday Morning worship – whatever that means – but, I am also aware that there are buckets of people who are not being reached by “traditional” means. They aren’t having that kind of fun yet.
I learned a lot from this conference, but perhaps the most important was twofold: some people are out there trying something, but there are many more people who would like to try something. It is to these folks that I say: you can do it!