When we established Jacob's Well, we used the values statement from Emergent Village as our values statement: http://www.emergentvillage.com/about-information/values-and-practices .
Emergent has people from many denominations who follow their teachings. Because of this, Emergent has not established any formal type of Ordination for people in positions of leadership within the movement. There is a belief that all Christians are qualified to perform the sacraments and therefore there is no need for formal Ordination recognition because all are 'ordained' in the body of Christ.
While I agree with the idea that everyone in the body of Christ is qualified for ministry, there still needs to be some sort of recognition for the leadership. This isn't to say that non-leaders can't minister but there needs to be a go-to person for organizational types of issues.
I have been in non-profit groups where we had complete team leadership with no one in charge. The problem that I ran into was that there was conflict because there was no clear-cut person in charge. I am now involved with another non-profit group that runs as a team. However there are specific people designated in leadership positions and the group runs more smoothly and we designate leadership for specific tasks as well.
I am wondering if there are other people out there who are not denominationally active, who are starting other Emergent Churches who would like to come together in some sort of formal recognition of being a leader in the Emergent church? Perhaps a licensing of sorts recognizing that you are a leader? Email me at jacobswellprayer@aol.com if you would like to join me in establishing a leadership recognition group.
Peace,
Lisa
