Josh Fox helped start Vintage Faith Church (Santa Cruz, CA) with Dan Kimball. He has also served as part of the core team for the Origins Project.
Josh’s newest worship project is called RADIANT. Paul Mabury produced the record and Jason Ingram served as co-writer and executive producer.
Listen to the interview below:
Josh Fox
[audio:NotLikeMe-Fox.mp3]
Download MP3 Here
What were your favorite insights? How do the worship and the mission of Jesus most effectively connect?
Partnerships and networking remain essential to accomplish more in our world. We have enjoyed some relationships for decades whereas some relationships may have begun more recently.
“To go fast, go alone. To go far, go together.” – African proverb. This proverb is true of individuals as well as for a local church or an organization.
Our two main networks include The Origins Project with Dave Gibbons, Dan Kimball, Margaret Feinberg, and many others along with those connecting with the Mosaic Alliance. Here are some responses to some of the most frequently asked questions:
1. What is the difference between The Origins Project and the Mosaic Alliance?
Origins shares the same passions whereas the Mosaic Alliance shares the same passions and the same values.
2. Who makes up Origins?
Anyone who shares the same passion for Jesus, Humanity, and Innovation can connect and contribute!
The core and creative teams are made up of friends who have wanted to work more together and invite others to join us in serving, loving, and influencing our world. Some of our names may be familiar and others may not. These are people of influence from business, ministry, the arts, and academia.
3. What is next for Origins?
Currently we are interacting online in forums, publishing online articles, sending out a monthly newsletter, meeting in different places for Listening Sessions, and partnering locally towards different initiatives. To register and contribute, go to www.originsproject.org.
We are looking at having a big event in July 2010 in Southern California. (More details to come…)
4. Who makes up the Mosaic Alliance?
The Mosaic Alliance is made up of church planters and church leaders from across the world with churches in Asia, the Middle East, Europe, Africa, South America, Australia, New Zealand, and North America.
There are three ways to connect with the Mosaic Alliance. Level one remains free and includes a newsletter, podcasts, and events such as The Mosaic Global Initiative, Ethos, and Yelo. Level two includes Immersion events, an online community, access to more resources, and discounts. Level three churches contribute 5% of their budget towards church planting through any organization or denomination. Levels two and three require an application and administrative fee.
For more details on how to connect with us to create the future go to www.mosaicalliance.com.
“Got back tonight from 2 fun days in Los Angeles where some of the Origins Project leadership team met together to put some ideas into planning.
Origins is a network/community being birthed for those who are passionate about Jesus, Humanity and Innovation. So this means it is for anyone who desires to join in on the hopeful mission of people experiencing and knowing the love, and saving grace of Jesus. And using our God-given creativity and innovative thinking in this mission. You can read more on the Origins website here. As well as sign up for email updates and ongoing news and join in on the discussions already happening.
You can see who is on the full Origins leadership team here.
(Dave Gibbons left before we took this photo here from one of the meeting times), but in these meetings were with Erwin,and Dave Gibbons and April Diaz and Margaret Feinberg (and Leif and their toy poodle Hershey) and Josh Fox and Amena Brown and Eric Bryant and Marc McCartney and some of the NewSong and Mosaic staff joined us for one of the dinners. I was texting during the meeting with Scot McKnight who couldn’t be there because of teaching class and Mark Batterson is over in Germany. Getting this group together is one of the craziest experiences due to everyone’s nutty schedules and travel. But we are moving ahead and got a lot done and talked about.
Some basic updates are:
– Origins festival-event – July 2010: We will be doing an event next summer (most likely in July). It will have a festival-like feel to it with lots of break out groups for connecting, music, art creating, poetry and spoken word creating and inspiration of stories and various sized meetings. Part of the event will be actual serving the community – so it will be about the gospel of Jesus being both proclamation and in deeds. We are choosing summer as we most likely will be using a college campus when school is out and there is dorm rooms, lots of open space as well as meeting areas. But as soon as we lock in our actual place we will announce dates and more details. But had such great input and ideas so this will not be just another usual type of “conference” but a festival and taking words to action. And this is not only for church “leaders” but for all those interested in this mission. Because of the nature of this “festival” vs. conference – I can envision many in the community of Vintage Faith Church going down to LA for this.
– “Listening” tour – Fall and Spring 2009-2010: We are taking the development of this seriously as we want to be listening to people who have ideas and how they envision Origins to be. It is already happening in the “community” section of the website. But this Fall we will have meetings all across the country where we will be asking questions and listening. Questions like “What would you envision this network to be like? How can it be beneficial to you? What are the issues you face on mission you would love to hear how others are facing them? We will post the schedule very soon and all we want is for you to show up, share ideas, and share together. What you share will help give further direction as this network/community develops.
– Origins at Outreach Convention in San Diego – November 3, 2009 Myself, Eric Bryant and Marlon Hall will be leading a one day workshop on evangelism as part of the Outreach Convention. But we will also be doing a “listening” meeting that same night or the next in San Diego. But if you’d like to register for this day long workshop go here. We’ll post about the listening meeting soon and time and place.
– Regional Groups: part of this will be forming regional groups around the country who can connect for inspiration, discussion and encouragement and learning from one another. On the Origins Project website there are some regional discussions happening already. But we will be formally establishing point leaders and meeting people this Fall and Spring as we are around the country on the “listening” tour.
– A kick-off book: We discussed some really great ideas for a kick-off book which will hopefully be an inspiring one and a different approach to what a book like this normally would be. So I am writing up a basic outline for this based on our meeting and discussion.
Being in meetings like this are so incredibly invigorating and because it is what I believe the church should be about. Serving others in the world. Passionate about seeing emerging generations know the grace of God through Jesus. Not being afraid of risk and change – and so many things. Better stop. My posts are always so incredibly long. But for those that want to know that’s an update!”
For Dan’s entire post, go here.
For thoughts on Origin from sociologist, Davidson professor, and author Gerardo Marti, go here.
As part of the National Outreach Convention blog tour, I thought I would share this article on the “Human Mosaic.”
For more on creating a diverse community, come to the NOC09 in San Diego and check out my workshop “Hindus, Homosexuals and the Hard to Reach: Evangelism in a Post-Christian World” or the pre-conference Origins Project event with me, Dan Kimball, and Marlon Hall.
Mosaic – a work of art created from broken, isolated pieces taken by an artist and joined together to create an extraordinary picture of beauty
Mosaic – a community of broken and fragmented people being made whole by the Master Artist and joined together to reflect the beauty of God
I love the name of our community. Mosaic is such a great way to describe who we are and who we are becoming.
A few years ago the Gallup organization decided to conduct a research experiment on our community. Known for their business consulting and polling, Gallup had been looking to study a company that was diverse from top to bottom. Rather than a company, they chose to study us since there was no dominant cultural group. The elders were a combination of Latinos and Asians, the paid staff were a mixture of various backgrounds including: Latin, Asian, African American, and Anglo. The volunteer staff was composed over 50 nationalities, and those attending represented an even wider range of backgrounds. The Gallup organization discovered that not only was Mosaic ethnically diverse, but Mosaic was socio-economically, politically, and even spiritually diverse.
How did this happen? How were we able to become so diverse in so many ways? Do we emphasize race relations or diversity each week? Do we change our message to accommodate all religious beliefs? As someone who moved from Seattle to Los Angeles in 1998 to volunteer at Mosaic, I feel I have discovered some of the “secrets” that have created this remarkably diverse community. Here are my discoveries:
Mosaic helps each person pursue their divine destiny. Each person is created with uniqueness and the capacity to make a difference in the world. We actively strive to empower, equip, and unleash the latent power, strengths, personality, and passions within those who desire to connect with Mosaic. Our backgrounds shape who we are. Some have tried to move towards seeing the world as “color blind.” This falls short since “color blindness” ignores an important part of a person’s identity. We should see beyond someone’s color to get to know the person, to love and serve the person, but to truly get to know a person we need to find out what being black, brown, or white is like rather than pretending we do not see what makes us unique.
Mosaic strives to be permeable. People can be different yet still find a place here. Living in Los Angeles County gives us the opportunity to love and serve over 10 million people from over 190 countries. We would almost have to try to remain homogenous in such a diverse place! Recent solutions for ethnic tension do not go far enough. Tolerance and racial reconciliation were a step in the right direction, but they did not get us to where we should be. We end up acknowledging another group has value, but we act as if their value is best appreciated from a distance. When we become tired of tolerating others, we should try loving them. To reach the world, we know we need everyone.
Mosaic actively seeks to create reconciled communities. We don’t talk about racial reconciliation, we try to live out reconciled lives. If we are honest, conflict doesn’t just take place among different ethnicities. Conflict takes place even among those who look the same and even among those who are related. Jesus showed us the path towards loving enemies and befriending those around us. Jesus shows us a way out of conflict and enmity – a way filled with peace, hope, and love.
At one of our Sunday gatherings, a man who was visiting noticed the diverse crowd and said, “If I believed in heaven, it would look like this.”
Diversity reveals God’s heart. Our world is more and more diverse. In fact, people are more diverse themselves. Rather than just a mixture of European cultures, Americans are a blend of Latino, African, Asian, Middle Eastern, and European – sometimes all in one person. The path to diversity begins with the mission of Jesus. When we choose to reach out and love all of those around us, we will experience a glimpse of heaven on earth.
How have you seen your community become more diverse?