whatever you do.

Ever been in a busy airport, rushing to make a connection? It’s almost never a relaxed and leisurely stroll; especially when you have to dash from one terminal to another. Or have you had to navigate a crowded subway system, navigating multiple levels, searching for letters and numbers and colours, stressed about the possibility of jumping on the wrong train? Even if you have been in these situations a thousand times you may still need to fight a stressed-induced panic.

That’s where I am – at the nexus. I’m navigating between past and future life and I could really use some prayer. There are some really incredible things to come, lots of plans, dreams, hopes and realities. But right now it is mixed with what I believe to be more than a fair dose of uncertainty and scarcity. I’m searching for my connecting flight.

We are strangers in a strange land. Admitting that means, however, that we are acknowledging that there is a land that is our home. For the Israelites, the first journey home was a lifelong march from Egypt across barren wasteland. The second was a hasty retreat from Babylon around the Arabian Desert. Our alien identity does not refer to this planet, but to our place in it.

We are tied to this place, and it is God’s place. God’s crib. We live lives that are designed to be connected to this planet. We often work hard to disassociate ourselves from this place. This kills us.

When we yearn to desert this world to go to another place we tell God that this creation is not acceptable to us. In a sense it isn’t and shouldn’t be. Its present form is cracked. Those cracks are sin. Lost harmony, broken relationships and prideful rebellion are the sinful cracks that cause us to long for our real land. But it is not somewhere else. It is here.

God’s plan is clear… Full restoration… of this, his good creation. Not just people.

We often come to see heaven as a place for people (instead of what I believe is its rightful designation as the place where God is). This view of heaven reflects our understanding of the earth as an object. We refer to our environment as a resource to be mined instead of being the life-giving, cycling, renewing, gifting environment of life that it is. We can’t exist as God’s people without God’s grasses and God’s cattle and God’s oxygen. He designed it that way and called it good. Why do we long to leave it all behind?

These hilarious, fake church signs are a marvelous commentary on the disconnect between heaven as complete and restored earthly creation fully embodying the purpose and mission of God vs. heaven as escape hatch for born-again Christians. I, for one, am a firm believer that my pet rock is included in the redemption of all things. Heaven is most definitely a place, but it is – and is to become – this place.

Tags: heaven, earth, kingdom, creation, environment, green

Dennis Kucinich wakes up America at the DNC. Wow.

“Up with health care for all!”

“Wake up America!”

Tags: election, obama, kucinich, america, dnc

“From a biblical perspective . . . it is critical that the church be not just a vehicle for people to associate with others who are socially the same. The church is called to be God’s divine presence on earth, and as such, it lives by an eschatological set of values that brings people with different social characteristics together through the common bond of mission under Jesus Christ.

“A missional ecclesiology challenges the church to be intentional about its unique social potential. Congregations should reflect the full social mix of the communities they serve, if they are truly contextual. In like manner, denominations as larger communions of congregations should seek to reflect the broad social reality of the North American population. Taking this approach will require substantial changes on the part of many congregations and most denominations. But it is in taking such an approach that congregations and denominations with rediscover what it means that the church is ’sent’ into a particular context. If the North American church is to regain a public voice for the gospel, it must address this issue.”

Tags: missional, church, context, multicultural, ecclesiology, emerging

source: indymedia uk

Tags: georgia, iraq, war, putin, bush

In my dreams about our future local church community I continually return to the vision of a multi-cultural church. When in Grand Rapids a few weeks ago I was conversing with a local pastor, boasting about the wonders of living on the doorstep of a place like Toronto, where the world is present in a very real sense. While I expressed to him the incredible beauty inherent in such a rich tapestry I also had to confess the deep sadness I have for the place. I passionately love the diversity of Toronto and its surrounding communities, but my heart aches for the deep divisions between cultural communities. It isn’t so much a division of animosity or dislike – although I’m sure there does exist a certain mistrust and fear – but they are more-so divisions of convenience. Folks tend to stick to their own and remain disconnected and unconcerned with what goes on in the communities surrounding them. This apathy and tolerance breaks my heart.

Cultural tolerance is a huge step up from racial cleansing and war, but I am so tired of being content to trade an evil for a lesser one. I believe Jesus when he says that the Kingdom is here. Every day I long for a larger bit of the “not yet” to appear before us. In Toronto that bit of the “not yet” includes a truly Mosaic community.

So, to my friends that are engaged in this church-planting with me and to all that find themselves in these diverse yet self-segregating places, I pray we can grab hold of this dream together. It needs to be intentional. DJ Chuang said it well: “It doesn’t happen by accident. If it just “naturally” happens (i.e. without intentionality), we’d see a lot more diversified church, wouldn’t we.”

Finding Connections

Reading Tom Sine’s fantastic book, The New Conspirators, I was greatly encouraged by the pictures of Mosaic church communities around the US and elsewhere. I’m wondering if anyone knows of an example of such places in the Greater Toronto Area? I would love to connect, learn and dream with folks that are moving in a similar direction.

Tags: mosaic, multicultural, toronto, church, kingdom,

Has anyone exploited this resource yet? Although I’m skeptical of Alltop’s seeming un-flattening of the internet by selecting what are supposedly the most influential or worthwhile blogs and news feeds and weeding out everything else, I do have to admit that it is very well designed. It provides a very quick and somewhat comprehensive snapshot of the headlines of whatever realm of study you are browsing. Thoughts?

Tags: alltop, news, browsing, search, rss

“[Q]uestions related to ministry tend primarily to be social, political, and ecclesial rather than arising out of the modern penchant to reduce all knowledge to the scientific and the historical and all research method to the individual and the private.”

– Hauerwas & Willimon, Resident Aliens, p. 161

I never mentioned on here how our weekend in Grand Rapids went. We had a fantastic time. Mike and I didn’t make it to the crazy hotdog place, but we did manage to get to Hopcat. I had an really great Belgian Beer – quite sweet-tasting with a tremendous flavour. Alas, I don’t remember its name.

We camped a couple nights at a local campground and spent most of Sunday touring the revitalizing downtown core. Revitalized though it may be, it was the most eerily quiet downtown I have ever been in. On many of its red cobblestone streets we were the only car – or people for that matter – about. We also ducked into the Grand Rapids Zoo for a couple hours. Zoos in the middle of a city are fairly odd. I’m not sure what else to say on that at the moment so I’ll leave it.

In the evening we trotted on over to Fellowship Covenant Church for the Roadshow. Blazing (see below). The three fellas really brought it, and the crowd fully caught the revival spirit. There have been reports of people who have misinterpreted the 1908 Revivalist schtick as mockery, but I’m not sure anyone who came out that night left with that impression. I’m fairly convinced that if you expected to find mockery and are determined that that is what it was then you will hold to that conviction. Otherwise, you will see it for what it really is. A wonderfully whimsical and poetic homage to an era that was being as faithful to the gospel in its day as we are trying to be in ours. (again, see below)

John Frye, pastor at Fellowship and his partner in crime, Jeremy Bouma were fantastic hosts to everyone that came that night. Also, we are incredibly thankful for the generosity and hospitality of Randy and Kathy Buist who are part of the Water’s Edge community. Randy invited us over for breakfast on the Monday morning and we had only met them the previous night. We ended up talking with Randy, Kathy and Wendy Eason around the breakfast table until around noon. As we drove back to Canada that day both Mike and I were quite high on the beautiful emerging picture of a church community that really cares for each other. All the theologizing in the world can’t compare to the Church being the Church, caring for and conversing with each other. So amazing!

So, back to Brother Duke, Professor A. B. Hawthorne and Preacher Withee. These three grandest of gentlemen and their “great grandsons” are here to tell you about a man they called Truth. His other name is Jesus. And they are calling all y’all to join in a healing and restoring, sanctifying and rectifying, purifying and death-defying good news message we call the Gospel of Jesus Christ. But don’t take my word for it. Emergent Village has posted a recording of the Church Basement Roadshow in its entirety as filmed in Birmingham, Alabama. So stand up, get your healing balm of Gilead in hand, give it a Whoop and Pushhhh, and get ready for a Rollin’ Gospel Revival!

Church Basement Roadshow from Steve Knight on Vimeo.

Tags: emergent, grand rapids, church basement roadshow

Now this was John’s testimony when the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him who he was. He did not fail to confess, but confessed freely, “I am not the Messiah.”

They asked him, “Then who are you? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.”
“Are you the Prophet?”
He answered, “No.”

Finally they said, “Who are you? Give us an answer to take back to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?”

John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, “I am the voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’ ” Now the Pharisees who had been sent questioned him, “Why then do you baptize if you are not the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?” “I baptize with water,” John replied, “but among you stands one you do not know. He is the one who comes after me, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.”

This all happened at Bethany on the other side of the Jordan, where John was baptizing. The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is the one I meant when I said, ‘A man who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’

“I myself did not know him, but the reason I came baptizing withwater was that he might be revealed to Israel.” Then John gave this testimony: “I saw the Spirit come down from heaven as a dove and remain on him. And I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water told me, ‘The man on whom you see the Spirit come down and remain is the one who will baptize with the Holy Spirit.’ I have seen and I testify that this is God’s Chosen One.”

The next day John was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!”

– John 1:19-36

Tags: john, jesus, liturgy, work of the people, wilderness, lamb