"It's not about you." Those are the first four words in a book you may have heard about—The Purpose Driven Life, by Rick Warren. While that sentence alone is a much needed tonic for a culture that's become increasingly me-centered, it also has come to describe the ministry vision of Warren himself.
He readily admits he's had to change his assumptions about doing mission in the world. He no longer promotes his "church in a box" concept. He's learning from his mistakes, because mission is not about him, or even his ideas.
The future of the church, he now suggests, lies in its latent power as a global network. And he's not afraid to lift up that network, even if it means directing influence away from himself. During a recent meeting with 250 international church leaders, Warren told them, "you must increase, and we must decrease, because networks are poly centric."
"We don't want to be the Vatican," Warren insisted. "I ...
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