The Lifelong Learning Community

I compiled the following as an introduction to the faculty community of Regents Park College - the "Senior Commons Room", or SCR - about my journey and professional interests, and as groundwork for my intended research on Learning Communities. Thought it might be good to share here - as context for my time at Oxford, and also seeing as how many of you figure prominently in the narrative :-).)

Anatomy of a journey

From an early age, I've observed and been drawn to reflect on the life trajectory of leaders – in society in general, and within the Christian community in particular.  Why do some leaders “finish well”, while others crash and burn, or simply plateau?  My upbringing in a pastor/missionary/renewal leadership family provided a front-row seat to the vicissitudes of ministry, and to the enigmas as well as the rewards of leadership.  

Why is the body count so high among those most committed and courageous in God's Kingdom – those who...

After many good years on "the hill", we sensed a major change coming.  While we understood that our next life-phase would contain much of the same grace and life-flow of previous eras - and continue to reflect the bounded open space theme in various ways - it needed to become geographically untethered, and also less dependent on our own personal presence or leadership. The Lord used my 2009 sabbatical to go deep on some of this, working in me to freshly lay things down and letting Him orchestrate the process of refocusing and re-engagement.  

He worked in both Charlene and myself, enabling us to embrace a number of shifts - including the fact that in the season to come the two of us would be less “joined at the hip”, focused more independently of one another, still supporting and resourcing each other as needed but less structurally and strategically engaged in each others’ spheres.

For me that sabbatical space also accelerated the shift, already in...

From the beginning of our marriage there’s been a particular grace on our lives in the realm of hospitality and hosting, with an eye toward healing, empowering, and unleashing people, particularly leaders. We’ve attempted to steward this by creating what we’ve come to understand as “bounded open spaces” into which we invite people and where we (and increasingly others) commit to be with them, in the expectation that God will meet us there.

Our part has been to create and help define the space, invite people into it, and enter it expectantly, alert to the script that will emerge but is not ours to write. We do what we can to encourage people to fully embrace His invitation to meet with Him there, believing that our loving Father will write that script and good will come of it. Within such spaces we humans do of course make choices that affect outcomes (including the occasional choice to opt out!), but through the years we have only become more confident...

While in Spain exploring Sevilla and following the warm genealogical trail of Charlene’s maternal grandmother, we stumbled into some cool serendipity. It’s a fun story, worth telling ... with a worthwhile takeaway.  For now I’ll call it the “Serendipity Effect."

While researching things to do in Sevilla, Charlene and I heard that "the international festival of the [Spanish] guitar" was taking place around the city during the month of October. That week, several of the world’s leading guitar masters were in town for a special event - to pay homage to Paco Lucia, a mentor to many and pioneering artist of the genre, who passed away earlier this year.

Remarkably, we were able to secure $12 tickets to the commemorative concert at an intimate little venue buried in a maze of back streets. To be clear, this is the kind localized event you wouldn’t even hear about if you weren’t already in town … and even then, you had to...