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November Blog Index
"When a community is born, its founders have to struggle to survive and announce their ideal. So they find themsleves confronted with contradictions and sometimes even persecution. These conditions oblige the members of the community to emphasize their commitment; they strengthen motivation and encourage people to go beyond themselves, to rely totally on Providence. Sometimes, only the direct intervention of God can save them. When they are stripped of all their wealth, of all security and human support, they must depend on God and the people around them who are sensitive to the witness of their life. They are obliged to remain faithful to prayer and the glow of their love; it is a question of life or death. Their total dependence guarantees their authenticity; their weakness is their strength.
"But when a community has enough members to do all the work, when it has enough material goods, it can relax. It has strong structures. It is secure. It's then that there is danger.... It can be tiring and even agonizing to live in insecurity.. but insecurity is one of the only guarantees that a community will go on deepening and progressing and remain faithful.
Jean Vanier, "Community and Growth"
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:40 AM
"When the safe assumptions of society reach the "monument" stage, you might think that you need TNT or marjor surgery to break through. But you never win with any frontal attack on the mystery of evil. You only become a mirror image of it, but better disguised.
"So instead, Francis of Assisi went out to the edge and did it better. If you attack something directly, you let it determine the energy, the style, the opposition. You soon become the same thing... that's how evil expands so successfully. So Francis respects the monuments, even loves them, but also goes back to the original dynamism and nonviolent style of Jesus the man for his inspiration.
"If you have been to Assisi, there are the walls and inside them there are the cathedral and the established churches, all of which are fine. That's where Francis first heart the gospel and fell in love with Jesus. But then he quietly goes outside the alls and rebuilds some old ruins called San Damiano and the Portiuncula. He's not with his mouth telling the others they're wrong, he just gently, lovingly tries to do it better. I think that's true reconstruction. Remember, the best criticism of the bad is the practice of the better. San Damiano was still a church building, but it was small, poor and on the edge...
Richard Rohr, "Hope Against Darkness"
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:20 AM
Bob Girard, whose book "Brethren, Hang Loose" was so foundational to our thinking when we started in ministry 20 years ago, rode an interesting 14-year-long rollercoaster of trying to renew his church, eventually moving from their church building into "house church only" mode, and then seeing the whole thing evaporate, and now he pastors a "traditional" congregation again. A later book is titled "When The Vision Has Vanished" (Zondervan chose the title). Bob doesn't like the title, because in his words written inside the front cover for me, "It HAIN'T!!"
The book is somewhat of a post-mortem on their church's history and what they learned through it, and in the chapter titled "If I Had To Do It Over", Bob writes,
"The decision to give our church building to our denomination and to move our congregation out into house churches seemed to erupt from the flames of rekindled aspiration and deepened trust in each other... Almost immediately the ten of us (the eldership team) knew: Now is the time! This is the will of God for us and our congregafion. We were certain we were hearing the voice of the Holy Spirit.
"Looking back, I can see what I was incapable of seeing then -- that we were not ready to make the move we made... But by all the tests, this was the will of God for us -- it was biblical, it was not sinful, it was affirmed by a trusted cadre of godly men and women, and the door seemed wide open. The inner conviction that we must do it was both compelling and exhilarating.
"When we announced the plan to the congregation, a few expressed caution, but all seemed willing and ready to follow their shepherds into the new form.
"And house churches were not a novelty. They have existed throughout ecclesiastical history. Special buildings for Christian meetings were not commonplace until the fourth century. The New Testament records the existence of many house churches, known only by the names of the people in whose homes they met. Contemporary house churches in many parts of the world were known to us. We were convinced that the Holy Spirit was calling us to provide a model.
"Today, even though hard experience has made me wiser, more cautious, and more aware of potential problems, if I felt with a group of trusted Christian friends the same compelling unanimity of conviction that the elders at (our church) experienced together in the fall of 1978, I would join them in that conviction, no matter how risky or radical the action seemed.
"Yes... I'd do it again!
"To some, such an admission may seem foolish in light of all the tragedy that followed. Why expose myself to all that risk? The answer lies in the value of the treasure sought..." (emphasis added)
I don't know if Bob Girard likes U2 or not, but for some reason, I read these words and find the tune of "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" playing in my mind.
I have climbed the highest mountain
I have run, I have crawled
But I still haven't found what I'm looking for
Let the Quest continue..
posted by Rob McAlpine |
9:50 AM
Here's the thing.. the hope of the world lies with ordinary people. It doesn't lie with the great and mighty.. they are too busy defending their turf, building their own kingdoms, and saying things that sound important so that others will perceive them as important.
Jesus knew this was the case.. and hung out with the nobodies. He knew that only the nobodies were listening to him. Somewhere he tells the crowd, talking about John the Baptist, "What did you go out to see? A reed shaken by the wind?"
"What did you go out to see? A man clothed in fine garments? Indeed those who are beautifully clothed and live in luxury are in king's courts..."
Most of those we listen to are comfortable, finely clothed, respected... but maybe those ones are the ones least likely to bring the changes we desperately need to see..
I have a friend who spends most of his time at the Gospel Mission. He's a native. He has never been asked to speak in any established church. His theology is a bit simple. But he lives to share the good news, and he lives closer to the life of Jesus than anyone else I know.
I wonder.. is it really possible to understand the gospel from a position of power and privilege?
O my people, your leaders mislead you, and confuse the course of your paths. The Lord has taken his place to conted, he stands to judge his people. The Lord enters into judgement with the elders and princes of his people; "It is you who have devoured the vineyard, the spoil of the poor is in your houses. What do you mean by crushing my people, by grinding the face of the poor?" says the Lord, the God of Hosts. Isa. 3:12b-15
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
3:30 PM
AdBusters is working hard to get out the word on BuyNothing Day..
"When it comes time to preach we want people to listen. We want people to learn. Better yet. We want people to learn from US. We like to be necessary. We want to be missed when we are gone and we want to be essential to ongoing ministry in God's plan. We are arrogant but pretend to be humble. We are weak but pretend to be strong. We are frazzled but pretend to have it all together. We preach the truth... but we live a lie."
The Life of Mark Riddle
At the end of Mark's rant I noticed this BIO..
"Mark Riddle is co-founder of Liquidthinking. He’s on the road for the next 3 weeks serving as a road pastor. You can email him at LiquidThinking.
"If I could just continue my rant briefly here. Have you noticed that bio’s tend to be geared at making the reader think the writer is really important? I wish there were more normal bios in this world. Bio’s like. Mark Riddle is a 30 year old guy who doesn’t have a regular job where he receives a paycheck. He just does stuff that comes his way so he can pay his bills and feed his family. He wants to be more ordinary and irrelevant. Ok. I’m done now."
Funny.. and true. Maybe it's time to change my own BIO page... Here's a try..
"Len and his family live in the very ordinary Okanagan region of BC. Len is a semi-employed writer, recovering selfaholic, and wishes he had been born a pomme couteur or vintner. Occasionally he writes on important and relevant issues, but mostly he spends his time designing add-ons for combat flight simulations or thinking of ways to improve a fruit cake recipe.."
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:30 AM
Islam As A Philosophy by Bryan Hupperts
"Nazism was as much a spiritual movement as it was a political philosophy, yet no one has a problem labeling these goose-stepping, brown shirted goons as ‘bad guys.’ And what did the Nazis believe? They believed in world domination, in the eradication of a specific group of people, specifically the Jews, that it was either "Submission to their way of thinking," .. or death!
"Submission. Oh yeah, that’s what the word Islam means. Anyway, we quote the horrible historical statistic that the Nazis murdered 6 million Jews, while forgetting that they also murdered 4 million Gentiles (mostly Christians). While cloaked under a false spiritual guise misusing the name "Christian," they were in fact a spiritual and political philosophy devoted to world domination.
"Quit thinking in terms of tolerance for a moment. Thank God our national leaders during World War II weren’t concerned with being tolerant or we would all be speaking German, Russian, or Japanese! Forget Islam as one of the world’s ‘great religions’, and think of it as a political and spiritual philosophy. Now, if Islam really means ‘peace,’ explain this:
"Muslims are bent on destroying Israel and her allies (meaning they want to exterminate the Jews). So were the Nazis. Muslims also believe that their beliefs need to be exported to the whole world and all people brought under their domination. The Nazis didn’t invade Poland and France for the water! Muslims also believe it is perfectly acceptable to kill non-believers, or to lie to further the cause of ‘jihad’ (holy war). Further, they applaud when their own children are sacrificed ‘in the flames’ of suicide bombings. Come to think of it, so did the Nazis."
There is much about Bryan's argument that is convincing, and of course I haven't included the entire letter here, but there is also much about his position that bothers me.
First, much of his argument applies equally well to fundamentalist Christians. Let's face it, there are hundreds of thousands of American Christians who are quite ready to go to war in the name of Jesus. How are these so different from the Islamic fundamentalists?
Second, his argument paints all Muslims as equally guilty by association with their religion. This simply isn't accurate. It may be politically useful to paint all Muslims as Nazis or as warmongers filled with hate, but it simply is not the reality. When we divide the world into black and white we inevitably leave out a lot of data that doesn't fit our paradigm.
Let's take it from the other side. Currently Bin Laden paints all those in the west as hateful, irreligious, immoral warmongers. Is this accurate? Of course not. There are many who pray for peace, and who do not see imperialism as a good thing. Bin Laden sees America as a Christian nation. Is this accurate? Of course not. Canada and America are secular states, Canada more so.
In the end, freedom of religion, freedom of speech and the separation of church and state are worth preserving. Muslim's have a right to their beliefs.
I read Bin Laden's letter at the Observer. There is much distortion in it. But what surprised me were the points where I sympathized.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
12:30 AM
Nick sent this link this morning... Theo Blogical
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
12:30 AM
The riots in Nigeria sparked more than one Miss World contestant to resign from the contest. Miss Canada Lynsey Bennett said she made the decision to withdraw from the event because she didn't want to take part in an event that might ignite even more violence.
World Events Meet Hollywood
Have you noticed? Not much news from Iraq or Afghanistan these days. In fact, it seems to me like a news blackout. Worse, instead of hard news we have "virtual" politics and "virtual" war. Instead of public debate with reliable information sources we have Wolf Blitzer, one of CNN's top anchors, interviewing celebrities like Ed Asner and Ron Silver about the war, instead of interviewing journalists. Since when are actors experts on politics? Oh right, these days news is entertainment, I guess. The only other public sources of information are government officials and .. oh yeah, a group of Canadian journalists at Iraq Journal.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:30 AM
Friday evening my wife and I attended the Steve Bell "Living Room Tours" concert here in Kelowna. If you have never heard any of Steve's music, you are missing a treat. Is it possible to be a thoughtful Christian, a real disciple, and actually live and sing about a real life in a real world.. where Jesus really is Lord? More.. to live authentically and honestly. Steve's life and music has been an encouragement to me for years.
The medium is the message.. and the concert style fit well with the music of Steve, Bennett and Arends. Conversational.. casual.. informal.. acoustic.. no hype. We had great seats about three yards off the corner of the stage :)
You can visit the Signposts website at Signpost Music.
It turns out that Arends is also becoming a writer. She wrote "Living the Questions." In it she writes that her "life so far has consisted of a series of seemingly routine moments, completely unremarkable except for the fact that the God of the universe chooses to encode himself in even the most mundane aspects of our lives."
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:30 AM
What Does It Mean to Follow Jesus?
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
1:00 PM
We think we know so much...
"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons." - Popular
Mechanics, forecasting the relentless march of science, 1949.
"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." --Thomas
Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
"I have traveled the length and breadth of this country and talked
with the best people, and I can assure you that data processing is a fad
that won't last out the year." - The editor in charge of business books
for Prentice Hall, 1957.
"But what is it good for?" -- Engineer at the Advanced Computing
Systems Division of IBM, 1968, commenting on the microchip.
"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." --
Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment
Corp.,1977.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
1:00 PM
"Postmodernism is a huge threat. Advocating the impossibility of knowing truth, it throws off all limits and casts us adrift in a sea of doubt."
"Postmodernism is a tremendous opportunity. It offers the potential for the rediscovery of spiritual reality and the integration of faith in everyday life."
Two positions. Two opinions. Is one position true, or both?
As I began researching the postmodern movement, I came across a host of opinions and observations, many contradictory. Furthermore, even postmodern advocates disagree as to definition. What is postmodernism anyway? Is it a cultural shift, or a worldview? What are its main tenets? And does postmodernism represent a crisis for the church, or an opportunity?
What are some of the facets of postmodern culture that offer a unique opportunity for the Gospel?
Read more.. Postmodern Possibilities.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
11:50 AM
"I want to begin this session by reflecting on two significant features of the context within which we engage in evangelism and plant churches. These are realities that Christians across Europe have been facing for some time, and they are increasingly apparent also in North America. The first is the demise of Christendom. The second is the disintegration of modernity."
Church Planting in a Postmodern Context by Stuart Murray.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:00 AM
Acts 2:46-47 reads,
Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favour of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
It has always struck me as interesting that in the earliest expression of the "church," there were small groups in homes who enjoyed far more than just a once-a-week meeting, and had fellowship far deeper than a cup of coffee and comments about the weather.
It has also been intriguing to notice that, until the persecution broke out a few chapters later, they also continued to meet in the temple courts as well. It appears that they saw both as being not only viable options, but apparently it never occurred to them to abandon going to the temple in favour of their home meetings. The two weren¹t seen as being in opposition to each other.
The home meetings were an overflow of the temple gatherings. The temple gatherings were an overflow of what was happening in the houses. It was all one big, glorious God-thing, wherever and whenever they met together, which was constantly!
And the more my wife and I, along with valued and trusted friends, continue to wrestle through the implications for ministry in a postmodern society, the more we are realizing that neither the "institutional" church nor the house church is the answer to all of our longings for God and the Body, nor is either the enemy of intimacy with God and a community of faith.
Can the institutional church be changed from within? (and should we be more cautious in our knee-jerk dismissal of large churches?) I believe that yes, a church can be changed, but it probably depends on:
(a) the size (the bigger and more entrenched, the more difficult it will be),
To those who are committed to being reformers, may grace and peace be yours in abundance. You choose a hard road, but part of "taking up your cross daily" would fit into this paradigm.
To have a healthy, growing house church, you would need (at a minimum):
(a) a core group with strongly shared values,
To those who choose to step into a house church (or "grouping" or whatever you prefer to call it), there is an equal need for much grace and peace -- that we would not become prideful of our "enlightenment" for leaving what we perceive to be a hopelessly messed up system call the "institutional church" (note: it's only called that by people who don't like it and have left).
I want to do more pondering on possible models of being "in the temple courts" while simultaneously "breaking bread in their homes" -- I think there's some middle ground between the two that warrants some careful thought and exploration.
posted by Rob McAlpine |
9:55 AM
"We now know that human transformation does not happen through didacticism or through excessive certitude, but through the playful entertainment of another scripting of reality that may subvert the old given text and its interpretation and lead to the embrace of an alternative text and its redescription of reality." Walter Brueggemann, Cadences of Home
"What is the connection between ants, cities, brains and software?
"The connection is really that they are all self-organizing decentralized systems that involve a whole host of distributed elements that somehow collectively manage to solve higher-level problems."
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:15 AM
"As a Christian how do I contribute to the loss of Gospel identity? How do I stand against the forces that want to un-form what Christ is forming in us? The difficulty I face is that I am an evangelical. As an evangelical I am part of a Christian sub-culture that is aggressive about using any and all method to make more evangelicals. There is in me, however, a serious discomfort with what this identity has come to mean in the popular imagination of those who are not Evangelicals. Evangelical is one of our great words and spirits: it means good news giving. But the word Evangelical has become so tainted, almost ruined with what evangelicalism (ism's almost always go bad) has come to represent; so much so that I no longer feel like I can be associated with the word and understand myself.
"I am fiercely uncomfortable with the sub-culture that has become evangelicalism. This dissonance is not because I am unfamiliar with the culture; on the contrary I was born and raised in its energy and fervor. I read our books, subscribed to our magazines, went to conferences, attended one of our liberal-art colleges. But in the end I wanted more - more of God. It was than I began to discover hints and guesses of a wild Kingdom. A Kingdom bursting my evangelical bubble.
"Many evangelicals, like myself, feel the need to be separated from what evangelicalism has come to represent. For me, and many of my friends - both believers and non-believers - evangelicalism does not invite us into the wild Kingdom of good-news, but instead lures us into a marketing sub-culture mimicking the larger culture."
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
12:50 AM
Buy Nothing Christmas
"This Christmas we'll be swamped with offers, ads and invitations to buy more stuff. But now there's a way to say enough and join a movement dedicated to reviving the original meaning of Christmas giving.
"Buy Nothing Christmas is a national initiative started by Canadian Mennonites but open to everyone with a thirst for change and a desire for action."
View the posters available for download HERE.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
8:50 AM
Christian organizations in Canada are spearheading an international day of prayer Sunday for persecuted Christians in Pakistan, Turkmenistan, Sudan and Laos/Vietnam. Click here for more information and resources.
You thought a pastor was the highest calling, but instead you are.. just a teacher, just a lawyer, just a housewife... check out David Hopkins writing for November 11th.. Just a teacher..
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:50 AM
This is a short description of Robert Webber's earlier work "Ancient-Future Faith." His more recent work is titled "The Younger Evangelicals."
In a world marked by relativism, individualism, pluralism, and the transition from a modern to a postmodern worldview, evangelical Christians must find ways to re-present the historic faith.
In his provocative work, Ancient-Future Faith, Robert E. Webber contends that present-day evangelicalism is a product of modernity. Allegiance to modernity, he argues, must be relinquished to free evangelicals to become more consistently historic. Empowerment to function in our changing culture will be found by adapting the classical tradition to our postmodern time. Webber demonstrates the implications in the key areas of church, worship, spirituality, evangelism, nurture, and mission.
Webber writes, The fundamental concern of Ancient-Future Faith is to find points of contact between classical Christianity and postmodern thought. Classical Christianity was shaped in a pagan and relativistic society much like our own.
Classical Christianity was not an accommodation to paganism but an alternative practice of life. Christians in a postmodern world will succeed, not by watering down the faith, but by being a counter cultural community that invites people to be shaped by the story of Israel and Jesus.
A substantial appendix explores the development of authority in the early church, an important issue for evangelicals in a society that shares many features with the Roman world of early Christians. Students, professors, pastors, and laypeople concerned with the churchs effective response to a postmodern world will benefit from this paradigmatic volume. Informative tables and extensive bibliographies enhance the books educational value.
Robert E. Webber (Th.D., Concordia Seminary) is professor of theology at Wheaton College, author or editor of over twenty books (including the eight-volume The Complete Library of Christian Worship), and director of the Institute for Worship Studies.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:40 AM
I've been thinking off and on about worldviews. I began with the assumption that there was a Christian worldview. Lately I've begun to realize that there are Christian worldviews (plural).
At first I found this confusing. Sure, we can all identify Christians across the spectrum from fundamentalist to liberal. We know that Catholics operate differently than evangelicals, and that charismatics are something of a subculture within evangelicalism. But how does all this relate to worldview?
The problem.. or confusion.. became more noticeable for me when I discovered that a friend of mine who is also a charismatic evangelical sees the world differently than I do. Specifically, he subscribes to a modern perspective, while my own perspective is postmodern.
The lights began to go on. There is more than a single unified Christian worldview.
What really appears to be happening is that we hitch our worldview to the dominant culture, and baptize it with our theology, then label it "Christian."
Which begs the question.. what are the characteristics of a worldview anyway?
And a more complex question: in order to be biblical, do we need to adhere to the worldview of the New Testament? How much of that worldview is cultural? And is it possible for us to find out?
Charles Kraft is one of the experts in this area, so I dug out his book "Christianity in Culture." Here are some of his thoughts.
"Cultures pattern perceptions of reality into conceptualizations of what reality can or should be, what is to be regarded as actual, probable, possible and impossible. These conceptions form what is termed the "worldview..." the central systematization of conceptions of reality to which the members of the culture (largely unconsciously) assent.
"A worldview is imposed upon the young of a society by means of familiar processes of teaching and learning. In this way each youngster reared in a given culture is conditioned to interpret reality in terms of the conceptual system of that culture.
"The [worldview] is the central control box of the culture. With respect to the organization of a culture, the worldview.. is the organizaer of the conceptual system. With respect to the behavior of participants.. the wordlview is that which governs the application of the culture's conceptualizations of their relationships to reality."
* * *
Let them eat cake..
In praise of fruit cake, filled with nuts and cherries, bathed in brandy...
The last time my wife and I built and baked fruit cake was around eight years ago. This week I went out and gathered the ingredients, meditating on the almost supernatural quality of fruit cake.
Sometimes memory is better than reality.. like Paul Simon said, "They'll never match my sweet imagination.." but then, sometimes reality justifies imagination.
But fruit cake has to ripen. The best effects of brandy are not reaped overnight. Like a fine wine, true fruit cake must be aged in order for the flavors to blend, and the mystical effects of brandy to interact on the quantum level with nuts and fruit.
In other words.. I can't tell you yet how it turned out. It smells wonderful. We'll unpack them in a few weeks.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:55 AM
According to Jordon Cooper Robert Webber's new book, "The
Younger Evangelicals," does an excellent job of showing some
of the differences between the moderns (traditional and pragmatic
evangelicals) and the postmodern (the younger evangelicals). You can view a chart from the book that compares the two groups here:
Chart. Here is a short sample:
Traditional Evangelicals
Pragmatic Evangelicals
Younger Evangelicals
Christianity as a
rational worldview
Christianity as
therapy Answers needs
Christianity as a
community of faith.
Apologetics Style
Evidential Foundational
Christianity as meaning-giver
Embrace the metanarrative
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
8:25 AM
"The usefulness of a metaphor for rereading our own context is that it is not claimed to be a one-on-one match to "reality," as though the metaphor of "exile" actually describes our situation. Rather a metaphor proceeds by having only an odd, playful, and ill-fitting match to its reality, the purpose of which is to illuminate and evoke dimensions of reality which will otherwise go unnoticed and therefore unexperienced." Walter Brueggemann, "Cadences of Home"
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
8:05 AM
Saboteurs: David vs. Goliath in the oil patch
At Trickle Creek in northern Alberta, Wiebo Ludwig hoped to insulate his religious community from “the madness” of modern life, but in 1990 civilization came calling. An oil company proposed to drill directly in view of the farm’s communal dining room. When the company accidentally vented raw sour gas, Ludwig’s livestock died. Four women miscarried at the farm. Over time, nearby parcels of land were clearcut. A pipeline company ripped up Ludwig’s northern boundary. Seismic crews raced up and down his road. More sour gas wells popped up. A man defending his property rights – ignored by a government working hand-in-hand with the oil and gas industry – turned to sabotage. Wiebo Ludwig’s war began with nails on the roads, vandalized well sites, and road blockades. It ended with bombings and the death of a joyriding teenager. Throughout a two-year campaign that cost the industry more than $10 million in damages, Ludwig defended the mayhem but never claimed to be its author.
This taut, careful work of nonfiction reads like a thriller and raises unsettling questions about individual rights, corporate power, police methods, and government accountability. The reader comes to question whether Ludwig can be dismissed as a religious wacko. And to ask: What would I have done in his shoes? Ludwig got 18 months in prison. The locals want justice for the unsolved murder of the young woman. Many say Ludwig must leave northern Alberta or die. He’ll be released from prison this fall, about the time Saboteurs is published.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:50 AM
Perhaps the Irish really did save civilization. But whether they did or not, Celtic Christianity and its revival seems to hold some promise. This article in Christianity Today is written by one of my mentors:
Saving Celtic Christianity.
The Art of Telling (and Listening To) Stories That Matter
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:30 AM
Remembering Remembrance Day
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:20 AM
"The power of today's evangelism is tested by the question, "WHat do we have to explain to the world about the way we live?" But that question is no longer asked of Christians. No one is asking why we live the way we do. Why? Because most people already know the answer. Christians live the way they do for the same reasons that everybody else lives the way they do. The lilfe of North American churches has become utterly predictable on sociological grounds. Facors of race, class, sex and national identity shape and define the lives of Christians just like everyone else. The loss of a distinctively Christian lifestyle has severely damaged our proclamation of the Gospel.
"The phrase "Jesus is Lord" has been used so often in the absence of any visible historical applicatino that most people do not know what the words mean anymore.
"That which commands our time, energy, and thoughts is what we really worship...
"[The subject] of wealth and poverty is one of the most pervasive biblical themes.. In the New Testament there are more than five hundred verses of direct teaching on the subject, one out of every sixteen verses (not including implicit teaching in the actions of Jesus and the disciples). Jesus talked about wealth and poverty more than any other subject including heaven and hell and sexual morality.
"Wealth is seen, at best, as a great spiritual danger and, most often, as an absolute hindrance to God. The rich are continually held responsible for the sufferings of the poor, while God is portrayed as the deliverer of the oppressed.
"Yahweh demanded justice and righteousness and declared that nations would be judged by how they treated the poor..
"Jesus is God made poor. .His coming was prophesied to bring social revolution, and his kingdom would turn things upside down.. Jesus Himself identified with the weak, the downtrodden, the outcast...
"The Bible often refers to the oppressed, the alien, the stranger, the orphan, and the widow. These are the defenseless ones, the powerless, the disenfranchised, the voiceless ones at the bottom of the social structure. But by his relationship with the poor, Jesus establishes their value. So must the church. The Christian point of view must be that of those at the bottom. Their rights and needs should always be the most determinative elements of the church's social stance." Jim Wallis, The Call to Conversion
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
11:50 AM
With the release today of the extended version of Fellowship of the Ring, I'm sure the media will again take notice of this amazing mythical world. If you have followed the development at all, you know that the extended release has 30 minutes of additional footage, some of which director Peter Jackson fought hard to keep in the film. I'm looking forward to it.
In case you missed it the first time around, I wrote an article examining the film and some aspects of Tolkien's alternate world. It is a terrifying work: both dark and glorious. CS Lewis himself thought it a masterpiece. Uncovering Meaning: The Lord of the Rings
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:40 AM
I woke this morning with a scene from "A Knight's Tale" on my mind. It was the scene where the Prince of Wales comes to the stocks to knight William, because he sees in him a true knight, while he sees around him many false knights.
The true knight is raised up; the false knight finds himself thrown down. I love it; and I love the scene where this prince with the heart of a knight recognizes and affirms William, and confers on him what is his by dint of courage. Courage, in case you don't know, is from the French root "coeur," meaning "heart."
Note: being a hero has nothing to do with birth or power or privilege, and everything to do with heart.
In fact, being born with power and privilege is often a hindrance. We all know those who have both power and privilege who continually abuse it; we all know those who have neither who continually exhibit the best characteristics of humanity, those we commonly associate with Jesus.
It struck me how this is the very heart of the gospels: that He who has all power and privilege becomes nothing to show us the way.
He has brought down rulers from their thrones,
Paul captures the heart of this message in 1 Cor.1 and 2.
For it is written,
Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?
..the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
Now, if you don't mind, I'll paraphrase..
"For consider your calling, brethren. Not many of you are church leaders. Not many of you are wealthy businessmen.
Not many of you have been given places of honor. Instead, the marks of the Cross are on you.
Many of you have been despised. You are accounted as nothing, and worthless, by those who think they are something.
Not many of you have theological education. You aren't called "Dr" or "Teacher" by others.
But you have heart! You have learned to serve! You have learned to care less whether you are noticed or not. You are content to bring pleasure to the heart of the king.
You love to see those raised up who are in love with Jesus. You love to see justice; and you rejoice when the proud fall, because now they too may experience the way of the Cross."
For God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise. God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised, God has chosen, the things that are not, that He might nullify the things that are...
that no man may boast before God.
Of course we know that apostles are not subject to this rule..
For I think God has exhibited us apostles last of all, as men condemned to death, because we have become a spectacle to the world... we are fools for Christ's sake, but you are prudent in Christ; we are weak, but you are strong; you are distinguished, but we are without honor.
You are in full time ministry, but we work with our hands. You have a thriving tape ministry, and invitations to conferences all over the world, and a new home on the hill .... "but we are hungry and thirsty and poorly clothed, .. and are homeless.." (1 Cor. 4:11)
Let's learn discernment, friends. The way of the Cross is for all who follow the Master.
The Father sees your true heart.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:30 AM
It was the week of the IHOP conference in Nov. 99, and Mike Bickle
arrived in town to do the anchoring sessions, toward launching a local
IHOP (International House of Prayer) ministry.
On the first morning I planned to attend (Friday) I was about to get
out
of bed when the Lord showed me a picture of a clock with the hands at 12.
He
said "I am watching over my word to perform it," and then, "the hour is
coming, and now is, when those who worship the father must worship him in
spirit and in truth."
A week or so later the Leadership Centre magazine arrived, and on
the cover was the same clock with the hands at midnight. The cover was
"the church in the new millennium." The magazine was filled with quotes on
what the new church would look like, but the heart of it for me was in these
ones:
The church in the New Millennium will be a major force in society only
in
as much as its leaders empower all of God's people to do the works of the
church, inside and outside its walls. When that is allowed to occur and
the
people take hold, they will be the evangelistic light that brings people
to
Christ in record numbers and Christianity will once again be the dominant
force in society.
The church in the new Millennium will be successful to the extent that
its
focus is on ministry that is biblically transforming, relationally shaping
and spiritually empowering.
The church in the new millennium will be defined through experience
and relationship. Postmodern culture is looking for an experience of God,
not an explanation. The future church, like the ancient, will live in the
mystery of the presence of the risen Christ and demonstrate authentic
community in a culture of isolation.
A few weeks later, on Jan. 28 2000 the image on the cover of a small
local newspaper showed a wrecking machine in the foreground and an old
church, half demolished, in the background. The caption, "Out with the
Old."
"In spirit and in truth" was spoken by Jesus to a Samaritan woman .
Jesus was telling her that it didn't matter where she worshipped or who
she
was (culturally) but that worship was an inner response to the Lord.
This was in contrast to what the Jews believed at the time.. one
had
to go to Jerusalem to the temple or worship didn't have validity. Worship
had very strict requirements.
But God doesn't dwell in buildings made with hands , and he doesn't
require specially qualified people to lead worship. He only requires
lovers. Stephen tried to give that message and they stoned him.
Part of our reconstruction is this recognition of cultural
relativism
in the light of who God is and what he is doing in the world. Our
evangelical and western church has been mired in a limited cultural
perspective, and built on idolatry (materialism) and false religion (a
limited priesthood and temple worship).
The hands of the clock at midnight are a call to the church to AWAKE
and to deconstruct so that he can reconstruct.
"You see the distress we are in, how Jerusalem lies waste and its
gates
are burned with fire. Come and let us build the wall, that we may no
longer
be a reproach." Nehemiah 2
Nehemiah is a great parable for our time. This time let's use living stones.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
4:10 PM
"Bloggery, bloggerah...."
For the bloggers among you, and the would-be bloggers, here are some good pages to check out.
I've had a lot more mail lately, from all over the world but the preponderance continues to come from Europe, Australia and New Zealand. Interesting. Thanks for your all your encouragement and kind words.. and thoughtful questions!
Yesterday morning the Lord took me to Nehemiah 4. I don't generally sit and ask the Lord for a passage to read, but I do like to escape the methodical on occasion ;)
I was led to Nehemiah 4. What an incredible chapter, relevant to a time of rebuilding foundations, and to warfare. Let's work with a weapon in one hand (aware of the schemes of the enemy), and a tool for building in the other. Let's build in community and with confidence in God. Listen for the sound of the trumpet..
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
12:30 AM
Overheard on CBC radio this morning, a discussion with the authors of a new book. Subject.. 150 years of Canadian history in letters.
Two memorable quotes: John A MacDonald: "Harry, my son, don't write letters if you can avoid it, and never destroy them."
"Opening a letter is somewhere between Christmas and sex."
Doubtless you haven't had the same experience when reading an email. Why not? Or if you have, probably not very often.
I wonder what we've lost along the road from stamps, paper, and long delivery times to instant messaging?
No connection, another quote: "The traditional church continues to meet the needs of many; likewise the post office continues to run even though we've got e-mail. What the emerging church is doing is e-mail, and the established church has the postal routes."
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
12:20 AM
Leadership has more to do with finding meaning than in setting direction. "Strange attractors," in the world of physics cause order to emerge from apparent chaos. "Strange attractors" are like guiding principles or values and have more impact on individual behavior than good management.
Postmodern leaders resist taking control because they know that focus is more important than individual behaviors. Furthermore, postmodern leaders don't mind fluid structures and are comfortable with chaos because they are more interested in finding meaning than in building structures or establishing order. Wheatley comments that "We instinctively reach out to leaders who work with us in creating meaning" (Leadership and the New Science, p.135).
Wilfred Drath and Charles Paulus pursued this direction in a book titled "Making Common Sense: Leadership As Meaning-Making in a Community of Practice."
Drath and Paulus argue that the old understanding of leadership rested on a set of assumptions about human nature and motivation. The dominance-cum-social-influence view assumes that humans are naturally at rest and that they need a motivation force to get them going. The meaning-making view assumes that people are naturally in motion, always doing something, and that they need, rather than motivation to act, frameworks within which their actions make sense.
From this theory comes an important difference and a powerful advantage. When we no longer see dominance and social influence as the basic activities of leadership, we no longer think of people in terms of leaders and followers. Instead, we can think of leadership as a process in which an entire community is engaged. This enables us to disentangle power and authority from leadership. Authority is a tool for making sense of things, but so are other human tools such as values and work systems.
Drath and Paulus have helped me make sense of my own world; I have never been a dominant style leader, yet I find that people listen to me and come to me with questions. As a result I have become a mentor for many, and rather than offering answers I have found that my role is to engage in honest dialogue and reflection with them and help them see their lives from a new perspective. This ability to name and interpret life is an essential quality of discovery and growth, which in turn is at the heart of making meaning.
Too often our leadership models, so heavily tied up with views of authority toward efficiency and productivity, result in our missing the context and essence of leadership. We focus on what we can quantify and become like the captain of an ocean liner who carefully steers around the iceberg.. forgetting that what we don't know and can't control makes up the greater part of the unseen reality. Working with the unseen elements of growth requires intimate connection (community) and comfort with process and paradox.
When cultures collide, as modernity and postmodernity are currently doing, those who find themselves caught in the explosion can feel that their world no longer makes sense. Old paradigms collapse, and the frame of meaning is lost. Those who are meaning makers tend to be listeners and observers, and they join the process of communal searching and learn to ride the shock waves.. they contextualize meaning and discover a new way of making sense of the new world. They arrive at a liminal place.. a place between the two cultures where new possibilities arise.
New leaders that are rising in the postmodern milieu are those unafraid to walk forward into the unknown. Like Abraham, they are rootless in this world and so willing to let go of the old security, seeking a city that is to come.
For more discussion: Don Zimmer on Drath and Palus
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:30 AM
Connecting the dots between Christianity and consumerism. Fellow bloggers Tim Bednar and Wade Hodges both share some thoughts about the corporate world's influence on Christianity -- or, should I say, consumer products and services purchased by Christians.
Bednar posts about the latest corporate schemes behind the Bible trade in Christian bookstores. He points out the crass corporate interests behind a new promotional effort to sell Bibles that is spearheaded by Zondervan Books (publisher of five of the top 10 Bibles purchased in the USA), which is no longer a true Christian publishing house, but merely a division of HarperCollins, which in turn is just a slender sliver of the huge media pie owned by A. Rupert Murdoch, an empire which in recent years has given us such wonders of wholesome entertainment as "Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire?" (TV) and "Freddy Got Fingered" (movies). Bednar lists a few others, with links. "We need to never forget to connect the dots while browsing the 'The Total Bible Solution' section at the Christian bookstore," Bednar writes. "I just think that people need to understand that even our Bibles are big, profitable business. I also want people to understand that the Zondervan web site buried its tie to HarperCollins and does not even mention that HarperCollins is owed by News Corporation. There is a reason for this. If most Christians connected these dots, it would impact the bottom line."
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
8:10 AM
"The church in the new millennium will be defined through experience and relationship. Postmodern culture is looking for an experience of God, not an explanation. The future church, like the ancient, will live in the mystery of the presence of the risen Christ and demonstrate authentic community in a culture of isolation." Michael Slaughter.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
8:10 AM
O my people, your leaders mislead you, and confuse the course of your paths. The Lord has taken his place to contend, he stands to judge his people. The Lord enters into judgement with the elders and princes of his people; "It is you who have devoured the vineyard, the spoil of the poor is in your houses. What do you mean by crushing my people, by grinding the face of the poor?" says the Lord, the God of Hosts. Isa. 3:12b-15
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
1:40 PM
I need help. I think I am seriously going insane.
I am seriously contemplating running the following ad in our local paper. If you think you can help me, drop me a line.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
11:35 AM
Early this morning I found myself pondering on churches and their foundations. In particular I was wondering if there was some correlation between the way a church building is constructed and how a church made up of "living stones" is built . . . wondering if the natural was speaking of the invisible.
In my musings between brushing my teeth and shaving I started thinking about Lichfield Cathedral, in the UK. I spent 5 years there at St. Chad's Cathedral School. In time I had become very well acquainted with the cathedral built in the 13th century. I was remembering how there were so many little rooms and chapels of the sides of the building and even in the basement.
These were crypt-like rooms, dark and mysterious with huge, thick doors that seemed more like a drawbridge to a young lad. One of them, as I was recounting to my wife, was used particularly to keep all the valuable gold, silver, and brass, items, such as chalices, offering plates, candle holders etc. Most of these items were used for communion. This room was full of these items, many dating back hundreds of years and no doubt worth a fortune.
I was thinking that I am now fellowshipping .. with a small number of living stones… and we are starting to find that we all fit together. It's fascinating to me that at the same time many of our circumstances and those things that we have in common make us all of a similar shape so that we can indeed fit together.
Most of us are struggling financially, have come out of institutional churches looking for a less sophisticated and more relevant expression of our faith.
Back to the hole analogy. If one wants a hole, one has to dig and make a mess to make a hole. Whether we fell in or dug the hole ourselves, we don't know. But what we do know is that we are all in this hole together, so to speak. . We didn't get actively enter this hole together; we just sort of ended up here and found each other here. It's a kind of a common grave because in many ways we are all dying a death . . . we have exited existing church structures and are now in this place wondering what is to become of us.
So it seems to me that Christ is actually building a church out of us. Not church as we have known it to be but it may well be church, as He wants it to be. It seems as though He has prepared a grave for us to be buried in. No one can see us from the outside unless they care to peer in and look down. We don't have a building or a structure. But we are all in this hole and we are finding that we are starting to fellowship in the hole and care for one another.
So when one builds a building, one digs a hole for the foundation to go in. Christ has prepared a common hole for us all…the grave…where having been crucified with him outside the city walls we are entombed. However, as He did himself, it was from the darkness of the grave that he was resurrected and brought this resurrected Life of God to empower us to know him and be with him forever.
So we are building a foundation in this hole we found ourselves in.. We are jars of clay in this basement of the church with precious sacramental histories carried in our own individual experiences and histories upon which this expression of the church can be built. It seems that upon these small beginnings a large cathedral can eventually be built, founded upon a few living stones that fit well together and a few jars of clay carrying the treasure of Christ within.
All of the above is a summary of what I was pondering on this morning before I discovered the archeological account of the underground church.
This is where is gets exciting in a mysterious, God kind of way.
Next thing I'm visiting with my friend Jon and we are talking about similar things.. but not the same.. and I have already totally forgotten about this mornings encounter with holes, foundations, basements with hidden jars of treasure, etc.
Late in the afternoon I am struck with the thought that Jesus came to set us all free from a kind of superstition. It seems that the law, instead of bring life, brought death as people started to trust the customs of man pertaining to the keeping of the law, rather than the law giver himself. Jesus rebuked that Pharisees for their tithing to the last leaf of mint, essentially rebuking them for being so superstitious in their practices, as though the customs and superstitious trust of customary ways of doing things would win them favour with God and grant them salvation. Even the phylacteries on their heads is an example of the length to which a Jew would go to carrying out the letter of the law, missing the whole meaning of keeping the scriptures bound to the frontlets of their eyes and their minds.
So it is today in many churches…we have become a superstitious charismatic church, following closely on the heels of the Catholics in our practices to venerate and honor certain professional ministers. Instead of carving statues of them and placing their images on the front of church buildings, we now use road signs, TV programming, and so many conferences with so many names and faces adorning the pages…rather like going down a super market aisle, one wonders what brand is going to offer the best deal! Then we carry our superstition further by purchasing tapes, CD's books, etc in order to get the next conferring of power through the next conference…
Then there is the question of tithing….ever wondered why so many churches have some great speaker come and teach on tithing in September and October…the beginning of the church year, after the summer break when the funds are running low. We must get back to our superstitious giving! If we miss one tithe, we're going to lose out on the blessing of God….this is real superstition…we missed out on God's lottery ticket!
Then later in the day I recalled my meeting with Jon Skinner and decided to do a web search on "dismantling the church."
The very first item I turned up was: "SOS Dismantle the church!" I then proceeded to read about an archeological dig in Egypt currently going on over an old monastery. I was intrigued with the rhetoric given to the discussions we had had coming out of the church with regard to foundations and examining foundations…and here was a real dig going on to examine real foundations and the real problems they were encountering.
What is God saying?
I believe that he's looking to us who admit that we're in the hole to do a personal dig on our own lives…not to add more structure and knowledge to ourselves but to dig away until we get to the foundations and discover the jar of clay that we all have…with 8 gold coins, Messiah.
Yes…tear down the structures on top in favour of getting to the riches beneath….
Something's under the church...
posted by Nick Fenn |
10:35 AM
"Love" by George Herbert
Love bade me welcome; yet my soul drew back,
A guest, I answer'd, worthy to be here.
Truth, Lord; but I have marr'd them; let my shame
This was Simone Weil's favorite poem.
Simone Weil is the patron philosopher of the If Monks had Macs... new media library. She wrote with the clarity of a brilliant mind educated in the best French schools, the social conscience of a grass-roots labor organizer, and the certainty and humility of a Christian mystic. Andre Gide called her the saint of all outsiders. Despite her rapturous love of Jesus Christ, she never ceased to study the truths of the religions of the East. She stayed outside of any church, but her passionate need to share the sufferings of others led her to fight with the anarchists in the Spanish Civil War, to work as a field hand and an unskilled laborer, and ultimately to die in England at the age of 34 from tuberculosis complicated by her refusing to eat more than Hitler's rations allotted to her countrymen in occupied France. After her death writers as diverse as T.S Eliot and Albert Camus declared her one of our century's foremost thinkers.
It was difficult to find a short biography of Simone in English. Here is a page of quotations: Quotes. More recently, the famous Harvard psychiatrist and humanitarian Robert Coles has written a book about her.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:35 AM
"I am tired; I am so tired of the entire nothing; I’m tired of all the garbage and all the talk. I am hearing great words from the modern church, but I am seeing no action – so, I am tired.
"I’m tired of hearing about sin and redemption without hearing about how to live life. Ok, I’m a sinner, now what? Ok, I’m saved, now what?"
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
1:55 PM
This weekend I got thinking about rhythm in my life..
Maybe it was the bicycle ride in the cold weather that did it; pumping those pedals up and down.. up and down.. round and round we go..
I realized that in that rhythm there was also movement. I was making progress toward Blockbuster, looking for an obscure video that they apparently had hidden somewhere.
It seems like we all forge our own rhythms; and those rhythms give us a sense that all is well in the world.
For example, in my family Saturday morning is pancakes and a family brunch. We rarely have a breakfast on this morning, and we almost always sit down together for a meal. It's more reliable than almost any other meal in the week.
It could be that I make great pancakes. Ok.. I KNOW I make great pancakes. But it's more than great pancakes that brings us together.
It's a commitment to being a family; to knowing one another; to sharing a relaxed meal and catching up on events of the past week that we may not have had time to share.
It strikes me that we have some rhythms that are individual, and some that are communal.
Over time rhythms can shift. I have a hard time changing beats, but there is real value in making those shifts.
Changing the usual rhythms also shifts perspective. When we step outside the normal routine, we see things in a new light.
Initially we may only notice our discomfort and pine for the old ways. I'm loathe to think about leaving our Saturday brunch behind, for example. But there may come a time when we have to make that shift.
Two years ago we abandoned a rhythm that had given shape to our lives for all our married years.. 16 of them. We quit attending a Sunday service.
Whew.. that was a confusing time. We didn't know if we were coming or going, up or down, black or white, wrong or right. We just knew we needed a change.
Eventually our questions birthed some answers, and those answers birthed new questions. We looked at our faith in a new way, and we looked at the church from a new place. We even began to read the bible in new ways.
At the same time, we became aware that we were upheld by older and more foundation rhythms.. internal rhythms of prayer and reflection, community and dialogue. We became aware of rhythms so deep they were like unheard music.. music older than time itself. We became aware of being upheld in the hands of Love.
Eventually we find a center that anchors our soul, and we can relax and let new cadences emerge. It becomes an exciting process of discovery and of wonder.
Meantime, we enjoy the pancakes and the sharing around our Saturday brunch.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
1:00 PM
"When I was a university student, I was unsuccessfully evangelized by almost every Christian group on campus. My basic response to their preaching was, "How can I believe when I look at the way the church lives?" They answered, "Don't look at the church, look at Jesus."
"I now believe that statement is one of the saddest in the history of Christianity. It puts Jesus on a pedestal apart from the people who share his name. Belief in him becomes an abstraction removed from any demonstration of its meaning in the world. Such thinking is a denial of what is most basic to the gospel: incarnation. People should be able to look at the way we live and begin to understand what the gospel is about. Our life must tell them who Jesus is and what he cares about."
...
"The greatest need of our time is not simply the preaching of the gospel, not diakonia, or service on behalf of justice, not charisma, the experience of the Spirit's presence, not even propheteia, the challenging of the king. The greatest need of our time is for koinonia, the call simply to be the church, to love one another, and to offer our lives for the sake of the world."
The creation of living, breathing, loving communities of faith at the local level is the foundation of all the other answers. The community of faith incarnates a new order, offers a visible and concrete alternative, and issues a challenge to the world and its systems..."
"The church will never discover what it means to lay down its life for the world until its members begin to lay down their lives for one another.. an authentic publilc witness requires an authentic community existence..."
"Conversion means a radical reorientation in terms of personal needs and ideas of personal fulfilment."
"Community is a place to grow in truth, wholeness and holiness. The only way to propagate a message is to live it. That is why there is no conversion without community. Community makes conversion historically visible."
Jim Wallis, The Call to Conversion, 1982. pp. 108-118.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:20 AM
The New Christianity is an interview with Phil Jenkins in Atlantic Monthly, based on his recent book. Part of his thesis is that the center of Christianity is shifting from the wealthy and powerful western world to the nations in the south, and that a fundamentalist resurgence there will determine the future of Christianity worldwide.
All this is rather interesting, since it is in the south and in the developing nations that modernity is alive and well. Will nations like Africa become postmodern in the next couple of decades? Maybe not. What does this all this mean for the west? Interesting..
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:20 AM
For he will deliver the needy when he cries for help,
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:20 AM
Yesterday was the anniversary of Martin Luther's pinning 95 theses on the door of the church at Wittenburg. What was intended as a scholarly disputation eventually shook the western world. Not too long before that Gutenberg invented movable type. An idea and a new medium resulted in the reformation much as is happening today.
There are a number of "95 theses" sites on the Internet; here's one you may not have seen before.
95 Theses for Apostolic Reformation
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:20 AM
Tom Sine is a "futurist." But he's also a solid disciple of Jesus, committed not only to living the gospel but to living it in community.
I had a chance to chat with Tom some years back at a retreat center. I was impressed with his understanding of culture, and with his creativity in searching for more effective ways to live the gospel.
I found an interview with Tom at http://www.ginkworld.net. This short section is from that interview.
Question: "What is the difference between doing discipleship on a two-legged and a three-legged stool?"
"This question shifts our attention ...to raise the bar for all generations concerning what it means to be a follower of Jesus Christ. We are not only losing our young from our churches at an alarming rate but we are also seeing a serious hemorrhaging in levels of spiritual practice... including time for prayer, scripture reading, church and witness and service. Declining per capita giving also concerns us. While per capita incomes increased 90% from 1968 to 1998 for American Christian per capita giving declined almost 20% during the same period according to the Empty Tomb. I am convinced that a major reason for these serious declines in levels of spiritual practice and Christian giving is that many of us operate from a seriously flawed notion of what constitutes a biblical view of Christian discipleship. Let me explain the problem.
"Anyone who has milked cows by hand knows that you can use a three-legged stool or even a one legged stool but a two-legged isn’t very stable. Most of the discipleship offered by the church is, I believe, based on a two-legged stool. One leg on the stool is getting our spiritual lives transformed which is essential. The second leg is getting our moral act together... also essential. But the missing leg on the stool is my belief that the scripture teaches God not only wants to transform us spiritually and morally but culturally too. I don’t believe it is possible to do biblical discipleship over the top of the individualism, materialism and consumerism of American culture and wind up with anything that looks like biblical faith. It is time we put a third leg on the discipleship stool and call all believers to whole life discipleship and stewardship that challenges modern culture instead of conforming to it.
"In other words, I believe, the established church has largely settled for a very compartmentalized faith in which we allow modern culture to define our sense of what is important and of value. For too many of us the real focus of our life has little to do with our faith and much more to do with getting ahead economically... getting ahead in our careers and in the suburbs. Too many of our churches tend to sanction this kind of compartmentalized accommodated faith and are content with discipleship on a two-legged stool. What kind of discipleship is taught in your church?"
Discipleship? It seems mostly unintentional in many churches, and cultural considerations are rare. But if it's more "caught" than "taught" it would be nice if we were catching the cure instead of the illness. We run after the same things the world runs after.
No wonder the poor remain mostly outside the walls.
Dallas Willard has done some great thinking about discipleship, in both "The Divine Conspiracy" and "The Spirit of the Disciplines." Important in all this is that effective discipleship requires real connections to others. The failure of small groups alone to make any real difference is documented in "The Connecting Church," among other places.
Tweaking the megachurch model doesn't work. Frazee makes a strong case that the mobility and privacy of "American Dream" suburbia fosters a spirit of fragmentation and isolation that is unworkable as a basis for authentic community. Frazee recommends opting out of multiple activities and superficial social circles in favor of "a circle of relationships that produces a sense of genuine belonging." Small groups emerge are a necessary but insufficient ingredient for reaching biblical community.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:10 AM
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"As soon as I found out that 105 people had already died due to the triggers of the Miss World, I said, 'You know what? This is not why I'm here. This isn't right. I'm going home,'" she told reporters at the Macdonald-Cartier International Airport in Ottawa. Good move Lynsey!
Betty enjoyed Carolyn Arends as much as Steve, while I leaned to Bob Bennett. His ability with the guitar was really amazing. Steve helped out with backup on his mandolyn for a few of the Arends and Bennett pieces. While sharing the stage meant we heard less from Steve, the diversity and gifting of the other musicians complemented his own music nicely.
It was a story about a major renovation project at an old church and hall
downtown.
Strangely enough they discovered that the real treasure was right at the very early foundation .. but that they would have to dismantle the existing structures built on top of the old foundations to get to the heart of the matter…and the question was posed, is it worth it to dismantle the existing structure in order to get to the old foundations? They also found in the foundations a small room with jars of clay containing 8 gold coins in them (the number of Messiah). Too funny, given my thoughts earlier on in the day!
