Religion

Canada Day Rawdon St. Block Party 2008, originally uploaded by senor diecast.

I love my church.

Every year we block off a section of the street in front of the church (legally) and throw a block party on the Canada Day weekend. This year there were easily over a couple hundred people from the church and neighborhood filling the street where we had a barbecue, great conversation, a wee bit of frisbee, a multitude of sparklers for the kids, and a great fireworks display. We never advertise ahead of time – just block off the street, fire up the grill and welcome anyone who might happen by.

Rawdon Street Baptist Church has been a light in this corner of the city for a long, long time. Sometime soon I’m going to write out a bit of our history here for you. It’s never been that large of a family and it may never be, but it is far from anemic. I hope this little missional family continues to infect its neighborhood with the Kingdom of God for a long time to come.

We’ve all heard politicians saying that America is the world’s greatest hope. While that is certainly not anything close to truth I have also heard some Christians saying the same thing about the Church. But is it?

Tags: America, hope, church, obama

I had a quick follow-up thought after putting up my Missional post last night. The thing that I find invigorating about a missional Christianity is that there is only one mission.

God’s mission is our mission.

Let me explain:

In the modern paradigm there seem to be two things going on.

One: There is God’s mission, which was to send Jesus into the world to die for our sins and then to prepare a heavenly home for us post-resurrection.

Two: There is our mission, which is to tell people about what God accomplished and will accomplish (note the past and future emphasis with nothing to say about today)

In a missional Christianity God’s mission is very much different. Yes it includes the sending of Jesus, the death of Jesus and the resurrection of Jesus. But those events are embedded in the thing that God has been doing all along. The past, present, and future work of the reintegration of all of creation with the purposes of God. In a missional Christianity we are called to be full participants in the work of this God on a mission. A God who most often has shown himself to us as He who is active and involved in His creation.

One mission. Yesterday, today and tomorrow.

Tags: missional, mission, creation, god, jesus, missioning

This post is a contribution to the Missional Synchroblog organized by Rick Meigs.

It held promise. Honestly, I had held out hope. As much as I had had issues with the direction of the place in the past, I had never heard a blatant rejection of the type of Christianity that I hold dear. In all actuality this is a place that for me holds a high place of honor when it comes to mission. A church with a proud missionary tradition of going to the farthest reaches of every continent, and even to our own indigenous people groups. They had sent people into the “darkest” places on earth. Those who were sent were known in every context to be people of great love and compassion. I know many of them personally and can attest to these claims.

Like I said, regardless of any other frustrations I have had with leadership, committees, programs, structures, and style, I had always said, “These people get mission.” I’m not sure if I still believe that… Let me explain.

What I heard today was a point by point upholding of the old ways. The “take Jesus to the dark places where they didn’t have him, and tell them the message that will save their soul from flames” way of doing mission. It wasn’t all bad, but much of it was downright horrible.

Things started off well enough. We sang songs (you can’t go wrong with a good old hymn sing). We sang and prayed about the importance of getting into God’s streams – of following Him where ever He may go. After all, it is true that “people need the Lord”. (He’s the open door)

The first lines of the sermon were pretty much great. “Your mission cannot fail because it is God who has ordained it.” Oh, but wait… what was that? As we walked a hop-skip-jump Roman Road for the next 30 minutes I found myself frantically searching for the context surrounding the cherry-picked verses that outlined a lot of stuff that did seem to be in that context…

• how knowledge about Jesus was what people need to be saved
• how if there is anything we need to include in a gospel message it is the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus – anything else we may do or say can just get in the way
• how people first need to know that they are doom to eternal hell (I had a hard time finding the word eternal in the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man — but no doubt it was somewhere in Romans)
• we heard how the biggest prayer meeting in all the cosmos was going on in Hell right now
• we heard how when Jesus said to GO he added on the “make disciples” line as a secondary command. Sort of a “while you are going and saving souls you might should probably make a few disciples along the way as well.”

All of these statements trouble me to various degrees, but their were two things that troubled me more than anything. I heard today that God has given us a mission. We as people have a mission to reach people. Our mission is crucial because it is the way God has chosen to work in this world. God has chosen to limit himself to using people to accomplish the gospel. Over and over it was Our Mission. God didn’t seem to have much to do with it at all, outside of giving us the power to accomplish it. So, the question that arises is, “What is God really up to then?”

How did we miss it? Being a church that has stood on its head for mission for the last 50 years, where have we been looking that we have missed the most crucial aspect. How did we not hear anything about the fact that GOD has a Mission in this world? Did I miss something? Has God completed what he is doing and now he has chosen to sit back and watch us do our thing? Not a chance! Our God is active. He is present. He is at work. He is reaching out to the broken and hurting. He is sitting patiently and moving actively with the stubborn and stressed, the hungry and suffering, weak and afflicted.

Yes, we are part of this. God wants us to be a part of this. God wants us to find our place in His mission. Our God is a Missioning God who has called us to partner with Him for His cause. That cause being the restoration and completion of ALL THINGS. The redemption of all sin (disintegration from God). The patching up of broken dreams and relationships. The patching up of wounded knees and hearts.

We are also called to proclaim the message of God. We are called to proclaim the message of Jesus, our hope of a life lived in the glorious reign of God. His Kingdom here on earth. Our Saviour who would could not be beaten by the powers of this world. But who was resurrected as fully aligned with the Kingdom of God as ever before. Our Saviour the fully integrated person of God, moving and active in our world then just as He is today.

Today, in that church service, the question repeated over and over was “do you know where you are going after this life?” The question I believe God would have us ask is much more Missional, much more Incarnational. God’s question to us is, “do you know where you are living Today? Are you living in My Kingdom, or are you living in the Kingdoms of this world?”

The second thing that bothered me is very much tied into the first. Since we are called to participate with God’s Mission in the world we have to ask ourselves, what is God’s Mission? I believe He is doing the same thing Jesus was doing. Proclaiming peace in the midst of war, healing in the midst of sickness, hope in the midst of despair, subversion in the midst of Empire, and life in the midst of death. As missional Christians we are called to live a life that is marked by our Master. A life drenched in Kingdom values. We are not called to lead people toward an intellectual understanding of how they are sinners, need Jesus, and can have Jesus come and save them so they can have be given life after this life. Jesus’ intellectual conversations on the metaphysics of salvation were few in comparison to his many interactions with “the least of these”. Interactions where he provide immediate healing and hope, not just a hope for tomorrow or the next life, but a glorious hope for today. Coupled with this hope was the call to “go, and sin no more”. Jesus called those he had healed into a life in the Kingdom.

And you know what. Missionaries get this. In spite of the bad focus that I heard from the pulpit today, those who are really going out into the world have the heart of Christ guiding them into acts of compassion that far exceed their drive to provide personal conversions by intellectual understanding. Missionaries are far more easily found in hospitals tending to the sick or in service garages fixing some chap’s car or on the streets of some megacity playing with the street-kids, than in pulpits and seminaries and libraries.

So today at the commissioning service of two people who I adore and who I know have a desire to join in with God and His work in the world I found myself torn in two directions. Every thing preached from the pulpit spoke of the modern assumptions of a world that is run by a distant, removed God who touched humans and sent them on their way to reconnect with Him, eventually, in another life. Everything in the faces of those two people spoke of a God who resides with his people. A God who would not be traveling across the ocean with them in a few weeks, because he would already be there when they arrived. A God who is doing mighty things in this world and who has called us all into FULL participation with Him. Not as an afterthought to salvation, but as a way to be involved in God’s work toward the redemption of ALL THINGS.

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I definitely urge you to explore the rest of the participants in this missional synchroblog. All 50 are linked below.

Alan Hirsch Alan Knox Andrew Jones Barb Peters Bill Kinnon Brad Brisco Brad Grinnen Brad Sargent Brother Maynard Bryan Riley Chad Brooks Chris Wignall Cobus Van Wyngaard Dave DeVries David Best David Fitch David Wierzbicki DoSi Doug Jones Duncan McFadzean Erika Haub Grace Jamie Arpin-Ricci Jeff McQuilkin John Smulo Jonathan Brink JR Rozko Kathy Escobar Len Hjalmarson Makeesha Fisher Malcolm Lanham Mark Berry Mark Petersen Mark Priddy Michael Crane Michael Stewart Nick Loyd Patrick Oden Peggy Brown Phil Wyman Richard Pool Rick Meigs Rob Robinson Ron Cole Scott Marshall Sonja Andrews Stephen Shields Steve Hayes Tim Thompson Thom Turner

A great short by The Work of the People

All things…

All things…

All things…

it echoes throughout scripture.

Tags: liturgy

Part Four of Doug Pagitt’s promo videos for his new book, which I am reading right now.

…. and .. the video that we showed at the beginning of Chris and Em’s wedding ceremony. The couple are known for their love of all things tardy, so they each filmed their adventures in trying to get to the church on time which we debuted to those in attendance. It was good. And, yes, they did both actually get there on time.. we made sure of that.

“The God we affirm is then, at its best, inspired by the incoming of God and born there, but it is never to be confused with God.” – Peter Rollins

You know those times when your thoughts are building and changing so quickly that you barely have time to reflect on each of them and give them the brain time they deserve? Those times when all you can do is pound your hand on the table or attempt to suppress a squeal of excitement? Yes. Those times.

You know those times when thoughts start to crawl beneath your skin and into your eyeballs amidst the most queasy of itchiness? When you find yourself only able to think about how you need to stop thinking about these concepts because they are burning worse images in your head than those Faces of Death videos from grade seven? Yea…

Admittedly, three years ago the ratio of the first to the second would have been entirely reversed, but still, Pete’s latest book had me in both regions of anxiety. When reading The Fidelity of Betrayal the table pounding squeals far outweighed the eyeball squirms, but they were still there.

Pete takes us through three (four) aspects of our experience of God that we possibly need to be ready to betray in order to avoid mistaking these objectified realities for the creator God we worship. These being the Word, the Name, and the Act of God – the fourth being Truth itself (himself).

My biggest pauses came when I heard myself saying things like, “Aw that snake wasn’t such a bad guy,” Even though my beliefs about the story of the fall have changed drastically in the last while, I was still believing that the person-hood of God was contained in the words written about the encounter between God, Eve, Adam, and the Serpent (poor snake). Pete’s intent is not to pull us into a sympathy for the devil but to pull us from a loyalty to our words about God as contained in the Bible. We need to search out a deeper devotion to our creator born out of that betrayal. So while I’m not ready to run off to join some serpent cult, I am more ready to embrace the ambiguity of God’s nature within the Biblical narrative and try to see past my simplified ideas about a knowable personality of God.

Skipping ahead to the end of the book, Pete prompts us to consider a betrayal of our secured church boundaries in favor of a communal encounter with a God that we find in a religion without religion. A religion founded on the movement of God in miracles of love and reflected on through sacraments and then third and least made knowable through a set beliefs and creeds. I’m still to find a church institution that doesn’t try to downplay 1 John 4 in some way – to attempt to house the “of Gods” first within a church structure, system, or belief net.

So, I finished this book angrily and over-joyed. I’m angry because I feel alone. I feel alone among a sea of churches and Christians. I feel an insecurity in my beliefs that somehow fills me with a wonderful desire to fill the absence with love. I’m angry that I believed for so long that doubt and insecurity would be my enemy in life – that I needed to make sure I built my house on a church-rock. The problem being that the church-rock lately has felt much more like quicksand. Quicksand that pulls down anyone that doesn’t fit in order to make room to stabilize those who would do well in that system. And the thing is, I have a vision of Jesus jumping right off that church-rock too. Not to pull people back up on top, but to be present with those who have been sucked down.

It seems scary, and right now I feel alone, but I am going to try to stop squirming and go down too. I’m thinking that’s where I’ll find God. It seems that’s where heaven is.

Reading The Fidelity of Betrayal on a dripping Saturday afternoon. I’m now into Part Two and his exploration of the Name of G–D through ancient mythologies such as Lilith, Isis, and then the Moses narrative. Reading Part One where Rollins explores how a faithful reading of the text of the Bible may involve our betrayal of the words we find has already lead to some fascinating and rich discussions with friends. I’ll leave you with a passage from Part One while I continue on myself.

“The words of the Bible, wonderful as they often are, must not be allowed to stand in for God’s majestic Word, as if the words and phrases have been conferred with some sacred status and the phonetic patterns given divine power. Rather, the Word of God can be described as that dark core around which the words of the text find their orbit, the unspeakable Source within the text that cannot be reduced to the words themselves but that breathes life into them.” (Rollins, p. 57)

We often interpret child-like faith to mean simple and unspoiled – pure and singular of focus. But maybe a more truly child-like faith is the openness to being held in an infinitely uncertain place. A place absent of our knowing and a place of being deeply known, as a mother whose voice is an unknowable comfort to her infant.

***Disclaimer*** I am neither a viticulturalist nor a climatologist by any stretch. I’m not deluded enough to believe I have enough information to fully buy into the facts I state, but they are helpful in proving my point – such as it is.

Disclaimer out of the way, lets look at some trends and stats. I will leave most of the numbers out to avoid boring myself.

Viticulture is a very fragile thing. Prime grape growing conditions exist within a thin temperate sliver. Average temperatures can not deviate too drastically during the growing season. Too many cold nights or scorching days and the crop fails. Too short of a season and harvests are thin. These strict requirements have meant that areas like Napa Valley in California, much of France and Italy, and many other temperate climates around the world have been wonderful places to plant vineyards. But this is swiftly changing.

In the 21st Century two words scare viticulturists witless. Migration and Elimination. Climate change and global warming especially have resulted in prime grape growing zones moving further toward the poles and higher into the mountains. France, which has strict laws in place governing the types of grapes that are allowed to be produced in specific areas, is being forced to readdress these laws to allow their vineyards to succeed in growing quality grapes. Places like Germany, and Ontario and British Columbia in Canada have been some of the very few winners in the midst of these climactic shifts. California is poised to be a big loser.

Gregory Jones, along with other notable viticulturalists, predicts that potential premium winegrape production area in the United States could decline by up to 81% by the late 21st century.¹ In response to these trends many vineyards are turning to geneticists to protect their crops. Hardier grapes that are able to withstand greater temperature fluctuation are being explored. Imported wine varieties from as far away as Australia are more and more common here in North America. Massive amounts of energy is being expended in attempts at preservation, forced adaptation and modification.

So how does this have anything to do with practicing the Eucharist?

This seemingly bizarre connection was sparked by a conversation between a mainline pastor and a congregationalist in which I got to be the fly on the wall.

The first said, “I’m as open to doctrinal and structural reform as the next guy, but I draw the line at the eucharist. Milk and cookies is not sacramental.” Various attempts at reconciliation were bartered and a non-unanimous conclusion was reached. Anything semi-fluid containing “fruit of the vine” was acceptable for the Lord’s Table. Milk is out, but grape jelly is in. We didn’t get to debate percentages, but I believe there are allowances for fruit cocktail as well.

Anyone who will hold to such an absolutist position on a topic is just begging for hypotheticals to be lobbed at them – “holy hand grenade” style.

So now, let’s get hypothetical!

What if warming trends continue and temperate grape growing zones disappear  from much of Europe and all of America? Let’s say that 200 years from now the bulk of winegrapes are grown in Canada, Russia and China, but less stable temperatures at these extreme locales result in much lower yields. Demand outgrows supply and wine prices begin to become prohibitive. Just to get a little crazy let’s assume that much of China and Russia has been wiped out by nuclear war and rendered unharvestable by radiation levels. Lay off me… this is my hypothetical situation!

How does a church in the 22rd Century deserts of Georgia support spending a large chunk of their resources on supporting their Eucharistic habit duties? Will we one day find the predominant feature of church buildings to be a greenhouse housing the holy vines of the communion cup? Will pastors be taught viticulture in seminary? Will the Vineyard Church become more than a biblical metaphor?

My point is not to prophecy doom, but to question our affection for a particular “wineskin” (oh dear) in the face of changing realities. I for one do not want to be the guy decreeing that churches in poor and non-vined areas of the world need to work on their importing or face divine judgment. I just can’t help but think that such an assertion really misses what it is to come together around a common cup.

Drink ye all of it, in remembrance of Him!

Tags: eucharist, wine, viticulture

Mudhouse Sabbath – Lauren Winner

In the last few days I have devoured this tiny book during lunch hour reading sessions. Mudhouse Sabbath is an honest and concise exploration of how ancient and more modern Jewish practices can enrich the lives of Christians if only we would look outside our own houses once in a while. Lauren takes us on a journey through a selection of Jewish spiritual practices including shabbat (sabbath), avelut (mourning), hachnassat orchim (hospitality), tzum (fasting), kiddushin (weddings), and mezuzot (doorpost inscriptions). In her distinctively vulnerable way, Winner takes us through her own attempts at incorporating these practices into her adopted Christian life. Lauren’s deep love and respect for both spiritual traditions and her knowledge of the quirks and intricacies of them each surfaces in every personal reflection.

One large theme echoed in my head in each chapter. The first and most important reason for a Jew to engage in all of the mentioned practices is because they were told to. Their first thought was never to personal benefits that arise from the practices, but to God’s command to be faithful; although the personal benefits are indeed numerous. “They don’t light Sabbath candles simply because candles make them feel close to God, but because God commanded the lighting of candles. Closeness might be a nice by-product, but it is not the point.” (Winner, xii)

Christians are more likely to practice spiritual discipline for personal benefit and it is a great freedom and privilege to do so. However, we would do well to consider the selfless attitude of obedience that marked the consistency with which the Jewish community has committed themselves to remembering these time-honored rhythms.

I also really love the devotion to community and hospitality as a spiritual discipline above all others. If your adherence to dietary laws does a disservice to your interactions with others then it ceases to be a blessing. The rhythms in the Jewish wedding and mourning traditions give preeminence to the role of the community in those celebrations. Often we think of spiritual discipline as something we act out in our bedroom when we are supremely alone with God. But a faith that is only personal gives us a very partial view of the real blessing awaiting a community that practices together.

My own attempts at spiritual discipline are always disjointed and more valiant in my head than they end up being in practice. The simplicity in Lauren’s book has strengthened me to try again. Practice is never all that fun, but the results are always thrilling and most surprising.

Tags: reading, lauren winner, judaism, christianity, spiritual discipline

Right now I am engaged in conversation with friends. Tuesday night church it has come to be called. We are collected from a variety of backgrounds (city and country, pastor and student, business world and outdoors enthusiasts) with a shared thirst for true community and mission.

We are dreaming about and beginning to participate in a community that we have decided to describe as missional. Missional was the FIRST word that we chose as a point of connection. It came before church, baptist, relevant, emergent, postmodern, purpose-driven, subversive, or biblical. All buzzwords begin to lose immediacy through our careless useage as characterized by the grandfather of buzzwords: Christian. Before the followers of “The Way” were labeled with the first-century buzzword of “Christian”, they were engaged in mission.

Every successful buzzword has action at its core. Christians were those in communities that were following the mission of God as perfected by Jesus, and living it within a cultural mission flavoured by the Jewish and Greek customs of the day. But somehow the perfect example of Jesus didn’t finish the mission. He sent his followers onward to continue to live this mission. To be missional is to be in transit. In the past there was a bestowing of mission. That comission is then acknowledged and acted on. We are now Missioning.

To be missioning is to live intentionally restorative reflections of God’s creative purpose into every part of our lives. Every relationship, every endeavor. Our missioning community is aiming to create connections and space to empower each other to live these lives of deep restoration. We are determined to not build walls, but instead to plant gardens. We are determined to go kayaking and laugh together in the woods. We are determined to cry with each other. We are determined to never wear our “Sunday Best”.

Since friendship and strategy just don’t seem to fit together, we are determined to avoid every 4 step evangelism strategy. In the words of Brian McLaren, we are counting conversations, not conversions. Instead, we commit ourselves to knowing each other’s strengths. We commit ourselves to listen to the purposes of God in the people we don’t yet know. We commit ourselves to our commission beyond our allegiance to any buzzword. Christian, Postmodern, Emergent, or Missional.

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This post is part of a Missional Synchroblog organized by Jonathan Brink

Synchroblog Participants
Jonathan Brink - Meeting God Where He’s Already Working
Ben Wheatley - Are Things You Are Living For Worth It
Blake Huggins - What Does Missional Living Look Like
Alan Knox - Living in the love of God
Dave DeVries - The Missional Challenge
Bryan Riley - What Does Missional Living Look Like To Me
Jeromy Johnson - What is missional living to me
Tim Jones - Living Like the Word Says
Nathan Gann - Inevitability?

Tags: Missional, Emerging, Emergent, Church, Christianity, Jesus

Listening in on a conversation among professors at Dallas Theological Seminary as they discuss the points of the various expressions of the emerging church movement. I am so fantastically excited by this dialogue! It is so fair and non-confrontational on all fronts. Honestly, there is a level of respect I honestly did not expect from a conservative, evangelical institution. During the conversation they bring up many diverse aspects of the movement and deal with them all fairly. Often they first applaud the work of various folks in the movement and then offer a word of caution against the dangers that, may or may not be real right now, but could be if certain paths are followed without enough foresight.

The profs affirm the health and balance that the emerging movement is bringing to the many parts of Christianity. Perhaps a conversation of this level coming from this corner of evangelicalism will spur on some more responsible debate from others in that tradition.

HT: TSK

Tags: emerging, emergent, christianity, theology

I found a couple books on Darryl Dash’s blog that it looks like I will want to place in the front of my reading queue.First is a novel called The Shack that I don’t know much about, but sounds quite intriguing based on Darryl’s description.

The second is a book on church history and practice that makes me absolutely salivate. I am a massive believer in constantly looking to the first century church to see where we could in improve in our “Body of Christ-ness” and this book, Pagan Christianity does this like few books dare.

This time of year we get so up in arms about people saying Happy Holidays instead of Merry Christmas, but the majority of Christians don’t even know why we celebrate Christmas anyway. Well, we know a good reason to celebrate it (Jesus is the Reason for the Season), but we don’t know when or how or why we began this tradition in the first place. Ditto to almost every church practice. These pagan incorporations along with classroom / seminary incorporations have tag teamed, to create a church environment that is faily unsuitable to the mission of community and neighbourly love that we were commissioned with in the first place.

I hear critics of postmodernism saying that deconstruction is bad and eventually we have to start reconstructing. This really comes from a poor understanding of what deconstruction is. It does sound like a negative or destructive venture. Until you disengage yourself from the rewards of your actions. Oh dear. Now this is really straying from my original topic of conversation. I will leave my connections between Jesus and Hinduism for another inflamatory post…

Here is an excerpt from a questionaire I filled out for my friend Tim. The questions dealt with differences and points of conflict between traditional, evangelical Christian beliefs and emerging Christian beliefs. I spoke as someone who had some emerging views and another fellow represented a more traditional stance.

What follows is part of my answer to this question:
How would you classify the predominant Christian thought that stands in contrast to the Emerging Church, as you understand it?

The idea that the Christian’s mission is to get as many people as possible to convert to Christianity by praying a prayer and/or verbally affirming (in the witness of other ’safe’ people) that they subscribe to a set of dogmatic statements so that one day when they die they will go to heaven and be with Jesus is terribly unbiblical and is the single most unhelpful cause we could possibly be a part of. The Christianity that on one hand says that Jesus only saves those who turn to him, but then will try to defend some fluffy belief that babies that die will be in heaven is absurd. It really misses the point of Jesus’ ministry. Jesus never commended anyone for having his or her doctrine right… that was the role the Pharisees wanted to play. He commended those who had an awareness and love for those around them – their enemies and friends alike. He commended those who gave away their belongings to live in balance with the rest of their community. He commended those who practiced love and the Christian ethic of intentional community before they knew anything about the fact that they were supposed to believe Jesus was the one the prophets were pointing toward.

Here is a portion of my summary statements:

Proverbs 3 sums it up. We do not worship our understanding of God… we worship God. We leave it to Him to reveal what he will reveal. We are not called ultimately to understand God and find our eternal security in our knowledge. We are certainly not called to judge the eternal souls of those who do not find the answers we have found. We are called to do justly, to give away the first of our harvests so that no one will go hungry. We are to trust above judging. We are to converse above arguing. And above all we are called to LOVE.

Feedback? Do you connect with these statements? Are there big questions that you are left with? How could I have stated things better?

Tags: emerging, emergent, christianity, god, gospel, religion, church

This series was started over a month ago over at http://www.jesustheradicalpastor.com, but i just discovered it and thought it was worth sharing. Some very important points in here.

JESUS: THE FIRST EMERGENT LEADER

Blogged with Flock

Tags: emerging, emergent, jesus, deconstruction

Wow. Can this story be anymore immense? How about reading from the perspective of a group of people surrounded by communities that worshipped the sun, the moon, the birds, the animals, and the earth itself as their gods. What were the Genesis storytellers thinking!?!? Their god created all these things? They all move at the wishes of their god?!?!

Immense!

There is one of the many themes of Genesis 1 that I believe are so much more astounding and worthy of our attention than a modernly simple reading of it as a literal history of creation. Why do we continue to rob ourselves of the astounding truths found in these passages when we fail to consider them from the point of view of the original hearers? Talk about the original GOSPEL story! God created and loves all creation! He called you good! This is a story that could be preached to all their neighbours and provide hope for a relationship with God! And this is thousands of years before Jesus.

This book is incredible.

Blogged with Flock

Tags: bible, deconstruction, theology, interpretation, creation, evolution, narrative, gospel, jesus, god

Question:
Is the main concern of the church its own expansion? Is the main concern of the church the discipleship of its members? Is the main concern of the church the protection of truth? Is the main of concern of the church to be a beacon in its community? A little bit of all? Maybe.

Where am i going? Well, that’s my question. What is our direction? Where do the currents go? Are we sucking people into the doors of the church building? Or are we pushing people out the doors to help the neibourhood surrounding us? How exactly do we benefit the needy in our community by simply getting them to come to Sunday services? Are those living in God’s blessing not there to be a blessing in turn?

“Jesus never says to the poor, ‘Come find the church,’ but he says to those of us in the church, ‘Go into the world and find the poor, hungry, homeless, imprisoned,’ Jesus in his disguises.” – Tony Campolo

Here is another possibly (not) off topic quote…

“We are trying to shout the Gospel with our lives.” – Sister Margaret

As my computer uploads about 10,000 book covers to amazon and indigo I will otherwise entertain myself here.

I ordered quite a few books from previously mentioned amazon the other day… One that I am especially interested in reading is Myth of a Christian Nation…

“The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power Is Destroying the Church” (Gregory A. Boyd)

I heard a sermon that Gregory Boyd preached at Mars Hill - April 29th on Christus Victor (Christ is Victorious). The theme of atonement… what Christ DID on the Cross and WHY.

Why did Jesus have to die on the Cross?
Today we say… To save me from my sins and take away the separation that sin creates… the me and my personal Jesus Christianity

In the first century they said… To destroy the Devil and his works.

The BAD difference, Greg suggests, is the increasing individualism of Christian religion.

Greg suggests that the GOOD NEWS of Jesus death includes our own personal salvation, but goes FAR beyond that.

I’m finding a lot of encouragement and hope in this whole Kingdom Movement that is going on…

The more serious I get about passionately following the teachings of Jesus, the more I find myself at odds with the majority of Christians in my local church. I’m becoming somewhat convinced that protestant evangelical tradition has done just as much to hinder the actual “Gospel” as it has to help sustain it.

I was passed a copy of a conservative evangelical propaganda piece trying to dismantle the Emergent conversation as a cult. And strangely I found the quotes proffered as evidence for the sinfulness of Brian McLaren and Tony Jones to be wonderful, uplifting and REAL voices of leaders to whom we should be paying more attention to.

I think the article was based on an essay or radio program by Dr. John MacArthur, who seems to have a BIG problem with the emerging church. MacArthur’s main concern is over the supposedly Postmodern influenced “wishy-washy” spiritualism that he sees in Emergent. To be honest I don’t see it at all. What I see and hear from Emergent is a call for us to reach an even deeper REALITY of the GOOD NEWS OF THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN ON EARTH that needs to be rediscovered and reinvented (or just simply discovered) otherwise known as the Gospel.

I love this quote which, incidently, was offered as a proof text of the Un-Christian-ness of Brian McLaren. It makes me giggle and clap! This is the opening argument against McLaren and Emergent

I present a short excerpt from the article Interview with Brian McLaren about the previous ‘A Letter to Friends of Emergent’, from McLaren’s own website as an illustration and example of his denial of the Lord he says he serves and the Jesus he says he follows. The anonymous interviewer asks Pastor McLaren:

Interviewer: You wrote, “Which reminds us that none of us has a complete grasp of the gospel… It’s very dangerous to assume you’ve perfectly contained the gospel in your little formula.” I think with all the other change going on, one thing we’ve got to hold firm on is the gospel.

McLaren: What do you mean when you say “the gospel?”

Interviewer: You know, justification by grace through faith in the finished atoning work of Christ on the cross.

McLaren: Are you sure that’s the gospel?

Interviewer: Of course. Aren’t you?

McLaren: I’m sure that’s a facet of the gospel, and it’s the facet that modern evangelical protestants have assumed is the whole gospel, the heart of the gospel. But what’s the point of that gospel?

And so I am completely satisfied with Brian McLaren’s answer to this critic and that seems to make me wishy-washy. I really think I am very much more stern about the gospel than what is assumed by such an answer.

continued…

Amy and I had a wonderful, long talk about spiritual things tonight. This may sound scary to some, and hopeful to others… and I’m not going to elaborate right now… Mostly our conversation revolved around my recent frustrations with Christians thinking they have truth all wrapped up. We talked about how in many places around the world, including right here that Christians are what is actually hindering people from finding a relationship with God. They see us living with such pride and hypocritical attitudes and anger and fear and judgementalism and they say… “if this is jesus then see ya later”.

know what i mean.?

maybe not, but, like I said, I’m not going into it further right now.

g’night.