Glorious Mud

I was talking with one my leaders at church the other day about why we want to move away from traditional accountability groups specifically for our men (though we are doing the same for our women).    We are moving to a gospel-centered Fight Club model instead. Why? Because in a street fight, the gospel-centered Fight Club will beat the traditional Accountability Group into submission every time. It is just better and more effective. Why? First – accountability groups tend to be single-issue focused. Guys join accountability groups to help them because they look at porn or they spend too much money or they have problems controling their temper. The result is a group of guys who are all struggling (and failing) with the same thing in the same ways. This causes the guys involved to start looking at their struggle as an isolated unhealthy behavior instead of as a manefestation of a deeper heart issue. Gospel-centered Fight Clubs, on the other hand, pool guys togethe...

This last week, Trailhead Church in Edwardville had our first Fight Club big group meeting.  We talked about why it is vital that we fight with each other for the right things.  So, I am going to post the notes from that meeting here in case you were not able to join us.  Read this and fight with us.  (Special thanks to Darrin Patrick for writing his great book Church Planter and to John Bryson for posting his fight club material online!) The Crisis of Manhood Welcome – and good morning Be watchful, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong. (1 Corinthians 16:13) Trailhead’s vision is to create a culture that encourages manhood, not to start another men’s program.  We don't need  – one more thing to do. We need a men’s culture – where men are expected to be men – where we have high standards for ourselves and for each other. This is going to be a huge challenge because we are facing a crisis of manhood in our culture. ...