I think this is a great article.  I did a lock in with our teens a couple of years back.  We usually have around 50 @ this lock in.  I planned a little over 50.  I had almost a hundred teens show up.  Not enough staff, food, our equipment.  What a good suprise and great problem to have.  God took care of it, and we had the best lock in we ever had. 
This lock in made people nervous.  Some of the church people where grumbling, but I was praising God that i got to share the message with 100 some teens.  I did not have enough food, sponsors etc. but God took care of it.  It was a risk, I could have turned the kids away and said we were not ready for this, but why would I do that?  That was a risk I was willing to take to share the gospel with these teens.
God stretched the sponsors the food what a time we had. 
In ministry we can’t plan for everything, and we need to dream big for God.  He won’t put anything in our lap that we can’t handle.
Good article!

I think this also goes for church planters and the denoms that are sending them.

Do they (denoms) allow the planter to be aggressive, take risk and sometimes fail for the sake of the kingdom?

Sometimes planters are freaked out because the “church plant” is so huge for a denom that does not want to waste it’s resources...because their are not a lot of resources to go around in the first place.

Maybe this is also why we plant so many churches in fast growing suburbs....but, for some reason few churches seem to be started in the city.

I think we need to bring back the art of risk and the grace of failure to the church.

Everyone makes mistakes, but there is a problem in doing things too fast and furious in church ministry.  It can be “of the flesh.” Rather than rushing off and doing things, asking God to bless it, we can seek God’s will and timing instead.  It’s easy for man to create his own busy work.  Google is a product of the flesh, but kingdom building should be a product from working “in the spirit.”

John 15:5
5"I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

...Bernie

I think the bigger lesson is less about taking risks and working fast and more about a spirit of reconcilliation, forgiveness and honesty.

I think that the business world and Google operate by terribly different standards that the church should be.  I should be working for God, not results. I should be doing what I do out of a love for and desire for Christ, not to see how many people I can “get saved” or even “get to church.” My job is to do exactly what the scripture says and to obey the prompting of the Spirit.  If I’ll do that, God will do His work through me.

“I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.  So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase.” I Corinthians 3:6-7.

What amazed me about this story (and what I see as so missing from today’s churches) is
1) the honesty and integrity it took for the VP to admit her mistake, to own up to it, to share the news with the appropriate authority and be willing and ready to accept whatever consequences were necessary.  That attitiude alone indicates the proper actions and intent, even if the result of those actions is less than desireable.  She was after what was best for the company (big returns to investors) and was distraught (and willing to correct it) when her well-intended actions didn’t exactly accomplish that.

2) the attitude of forgiveness and reconcilliation that Larry Page exhibited.  Most would NOT go to him with this kind of news because of the fear that he would fire them or hinder them in their career at Google or even in the entire tech industry.  But instead, Page says that the result of her work indicated the value of the work she was doing.  Further, I am confident that the exchange, as reported here, was not the end of the story.  I’m sure there were repercusions: I’m sure that her revenue goals weren’t lowered, I’m sure there was a thorough investigation to understand the problem, I’m sure that some sort of probationary period or, at least, some sort of review process on her decisions for a period.  Bottom line: there was likely not reckless forgivess ("oh, it’s ok, we can afford to lose millions of dollars"), but an attitude of reconcilliation—seeing that this was a thoughtful, useful employee that made a bad decision; worth saving.

That’s the real lesson to churches; not a prompt to be more reckless, regardless of the consequences.