2008 Xenos Summer Institute: July 23-25

By Jay Reilly

Spend three days with us, exploring this year's topic,

True to the Word, True to Our Mission.

You'll learn practical ways to stay relevant to our culture

and its problems, without compromising God's word.

Do we withdraw from culture and throw stones over the wall

we build between them and us? Or do we accommodate with

culture and compromise the power of God's word? The Bible

says no to both options.

The emergent church movement has raised many questions,

including: How should the church engage the world around it?

How should it view and interpret the Bible? And how should

Christians share the gospel? This year's Institute will engage

these questions in a thoughtful, biblically faithful way.

Speaker Lineup

Our conference features an excellent lineup of plenary and

workshop speakers: Dr. D.A. Carson, world-renowned scholar;

Mark Mittelberg, expert on evangelism training; and Mark

Driscoll, leader of a vital, groundbreaking Seattle church. In addition,

nine breakouts will be led by experts from outside Xenos.

Breakouts

So far, 22 breakout topics are scheduled-the widest variety

ever! Subjects ranging from serving the poor, to building

community, to understanding the Bible will be offered.

Fouad Masri will return to offer his "Sharing the Hope"

seminar during the three workshop periods on Thursday.

Response

Response to this year's Institute has been phenomenal, with

our highest number of early registrations, including people from

16 states and four foreign countries. Home-stay requests also are

up, with more than 20 participants so far. In addition, the Internet

has played a large role in pre-conference promotion with more

than 330 people requesting information. This compares to a few

dozen in a typical year. Google, Facebook and Smallgroups.com are

playing major roles, along with www.xenos.org, and many mentions

on individual blogs and websites.

Volunteer

More workshops and attendees mean that more volunteers are

needed to show the hospitality the Institute is known for. Please consider

serving as a conference volunteer. Help make this a memorable and

impactful experience for our guests.

For volunteer info, e-mail mitchellsk@ameritech.net.

One Guest's Experience

Rev. Mark Gardner, of Minneapolis, shares:

"This will be my third Institute. In my opinion, yours is the

best conference of its kind in the country-beating out

places like Willow Creek and Saddleback for relevance of

subjects and workshops.

"The quality of the information received is excellent and

immediately applicable to our churches. The hospitality

of your people is superb. And the fee makes it

affordable for lay folk who really need to learn to be

the church in our culture."

To register, call 800-698-7884 or e-mail xsi@xenos.org .