Sentness: Six Postures of Missional Christians

Ever wonder why people fall asleep in church?It happens. We?ve all seen it. We shuffle into rows of seats that grow more comfortable with every new fundraising campaign. We slouch down and settle in for an hour or so, as singers and storytellers and preachers and teachers take their turns filling our ears. And almost without fail, at least one of us nods off while listening to the greatest story ever told.The church was not meant to be like this. The church was meant to be on its feet, in the world, making all things new. The church was meant to be sent.Kim Hammond and Darren Cronshaw want to help us--all of us--rediscover our sentness.Dive into Sentness, and explore the six postures of a church that's keeping pace with God's work in the world. Rediscover the gospel that first quickened your pulse and got you up on your feet, ready to go wherever Jesus called you. Get Sentness, and prepare to get sent.

Kim Hammond serves as the international director for Forge Missions Training Network. After being the Victorian director of Forge Australia for several years and the national recruiter and networker for Youth for Christ Australia, he moved to the United States in 2009 to launch and lead the work of Forge in America. An engaging international speaker with a background in theater and comedy, Kim also serves as director of missional imagination for the multiple sites that make up Community Christian Church in Chicago. Kim lives with his wife and three sons in Aurora, Illinois.

Darren Cronshaw is passionate about training, coaching and resourcing leaders and missionaries through his work with the Baptist Union of Victoria, a network of churches and congregations in Victoria, Australia. Along with serving as pastor of AuburnLife Baptist Church, he is an honorary research associate at Whitley College (Melbourne College of Divinity) and Associate Professor in missiology and pastoral theology and practice with Australian Colleges of Ministries.

Michael Frost is an internationally recognized Australian missiologist and one of the leading voices in the missional church movement. He is the vice principal of Morling College in Sydney, Australia, and the founding director of the Tinsley Institute, a mission study centre located at Morling College. A popular speaker around the world, he has written more than a dozen books including The Shaping of Things to Come, Exiles, The Road to Missional, and Incarnate.An expert in church planting, Frost cofounded the Forge Mission Training Network with Alan Hirsch. He remains an international director of that movement which is now based in the United States.

Alan Hirsch is the founding Director of Forge Mission Training Network. He is the co-founder of shapevine.com, an international forum for engaging with world transforming ideas. He leads Future Travelers, a learning journey applying missional-incarnational approaches to established churches and is an active participant in The Tribe of LA, a Jesus community among artists and creatives in Los Angeles.Known for his innovative approach to mission, Hirsch is a teacher and key mission strategist for churches across the western world. His popular book The Shaping of Things to Come (with Michael Frost) is widely considered to be a seminal text on mission. Alan's recent book The Forgotten Ways, has quickly become a key reference for missional thinking, particularly as it relates to movements. His book ReJesus is a radical restatement about the role that Jesus plays in defining missional movements. Untamed, his latest book (with his wife Debra) is about missional discipleship for a missional church.His experience in leadership includes leading a local church movement among the marginalized as well as heading up the Mission and Revitalization work of his denomination. Hirsch is an adjunct professor at Fuller Seminary and lectures frequently throughout Australia, Europe, and the U.S.