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Blogs for May
The next step in immersion : Essential Reality.
My wife and I are off to the coast tomorrow for a graduation dinner and my Dad's 75th celebration. Should be a nice change from the heat of the interior. We went from a lengthy spring to sudden summer and around 35 C yesterday. When it gets that hot this normally cool house finally capitulates. We spent the last two evenings in the shade at a small lake to the north.
It was hard getting to sleep last night. Generally it cools off beautifully here in the evenings. But when the thermometer hits 35, we seem to lose that effect. Time to buy a fan!
I'm looking for a full time job. I've worked from my home for the past six years. It was nice to be flexible, though it has also had drawbacks. When you work from your home you are very accessible. This is nice if you like to visit with friends during the day, bad if you need to get work done. I've enjoyed the flexibility over all, but there are times when it has been challenging.
I'm not looking forward to 36 hours a week in an office... Then again, if I can't find something soon it will mean my wife goes back to nursing full time. We would prefer to avoid that. The reason there are so few RN's in our province is that they are overworked and overstressed. Twelve hour night shifts don't help.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:30 AM
"My internet relationships are more important to me than most other relationships."
"My connexity kids spend as much time with their friends on the net as they do with their school friends."
What is a "real" relationship? Are virtual relationships "real?"
Does a relationship have to involve physical space to be significant? Or is a relationship more about what we bring to it and what we ask of it than where and how it occurs?
What would my own relationship with my wife be like if we had never physically met? What if we had an "internet marriage?"
Is my relationship with God less real because we have never "met?" Or is that a unique category since His Spirit indwells me and is "immediate," in the original sense of having and needing no other mediator?
I could argue that since internet relationships are always mediated (occur via media and not directly) they have the potential of being misleading. We can "edit" before we write. We don't have as easy an opportunity to do that when we meet in person. Other cues are lacking: I can't see someone flush or their eyes narrow or their eyebrows arch.
But many people are good actors. If they intend to deceive they can do so in person as easily as online.
On the other hand, we do tend to present the side of ourselves that we want others to see, whether online or in person.
And how much of my true self can my internet friends get to know? Two hours of personal face-to-face conversation are worth a lot, especially if I feel truly safe and valued. People can hear and see my feelings more easily in person. Yet, it's possible to present our feelings online also.
What do you think? Are online relationships as real as face to face ones?
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
12:30 AM
Sex. Ten years ago it seemed like sex was the hot topic everywhere I went. If those times have passed, thank God.
We would be nuts to underestimate the value of the topic. We would be nuts to overestimate the value of the topic.
Back around 1989 when I was studying marriage and family therapy, I ran across some fascinating research on sex. At the time I was also working with some couples who were working through sexual issues in their relationships.
One of the astonishing facts the researchers discovered was that men who reported the highest sexual satisfaction were a. married, and b. spent time in the kitchen. On further inquiry, the researchers discovered that sexual satisfaction was directly related to the amount of housework done by men. It seems that women feel more cared for by men who help with household chores; this in turn contributes to open communication and a good relationship, which in turn translates into a satisfying sexual relationship.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
11:30 AM
My father celebrates his 75th birthday this week. Happy birthday, Dad!
With my mother sick so much of the time, Dad had to be the wage earner, parent, and all around handy-man and home coordinator. It was quite a task. With all four of us children doing well, he must have done something right.
* * *
Had some mail from a friend of ours who is heading overseas to assist among starving children in Africa. She dislikes the term "missionary." "Can't find it in the Bible."
This seems like one of those words that the church has invented to escape responsibility for impacting lives in our own neighborhood. If we can invent a special class of Christian, then we can find special people with special gifts to do all the work, while the rest of us sit in the pew and feel we have done our part when we drop a few coins in the collection plate. We've done this with pastors and teachers, and we've done it with missionaries. We still have a priesthood, in spite of the Reformation.
I don't know.. I doubt if the Lord chose Peter because he was the ideal missionary.
In reality, you too are called to missions. Who is your neighbor? You too are a priest, and seated with Christ in authority at the right hand of the Father. Who are you praying for? Whose life are you impacting for the kingdom outside your own family? Who do you hold before the Lord each day?
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:15 AM
A recent flurry of unreasonable and unnecessary discussion on the postmodern mailing list had us all praising variously the virtues of beer and wine. ("Unreasonable" in the sense that we rarely give reasons when expressing our passions.. we simply praise.)
Four years ago we relocated our family to the fruit belt of the west coast in BC, Canada. Before we made the move I was driving through town when the old, comical song "Red, red wine" sounded on the radio. Immediately I felt a lightness in my spirit, as if the Lord made an internal promise to me that this move would bring a season of favor and joy for us.
Wine, as you know, is the grape in resurrection. It defies reason. It calls us to celebration. It was the first miracle of our Lord (beer drinkers note, Jesus did not turn water into beer). It needs a better writer than I to extoll the grape, so I leave it to RObert Farrar Capon:
Let us toast:
"to a radical, perpetually unnecessary world; to the restoration of astonishment to the heart and mystery to the mind; to wine, because it is a gift we never expected; to mushroom and artichoke, for they are incredible legacies; to improbable acids and high alchohols, since we would hardly have thought of them ourselves; and to all being, because it is superfluous; to the hairs on Harry's ear, and to the seven hundred and sixty-eighth cell from the upper attachment of the right gluteous maximum in the last girl on the chorus line. CHEERS, men and brethren. We are free; nothing is needful, everything is for joy. God is eccentric. He has LOVES, not reasons. SALUTE!" (from The Supper of the Lamb).
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
8:45 AM
Rob McAlpine adds spice to his first article in Part 2. Andrew Jones comes up with a "blogger's prayer"... scroll down the page to find it. Here is a sample..
"Our Father
Give us this day a life worth blogging,
Your Kingdom come into new spaces today, posted by Len Hjalmarson |
8:30 AM
"To live faithfully in the 21st century, we must live out of the full 2000 year history of the Christian church, and not lobotomize the last nineteen centuries to get back to the first century." - Leonard Sweet
Rob and Wendy McAlpine are church planters in Winnipeg, Maniboba in Canada. Rob asks, "What does it mean to be the church in this culture? In this article Rob shares the journey, some of the questions and the learnings they have gathered along the way.... A Bit of the Flavor.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
2:40 PM
Eugene Peterson was interviewed in the most recent edition of "Cutting Edge." This is a short excerpt from the interview.
Q. How would you suggest pastors today go about thinking through their
vocational identity?
Basically, we have to get our identity from the bible, from the biblical
story. And Americans are not very good at that. We assume we are living in a CHristian country, and everybody's on our side. So we let the culture shape what we're doing because it seems so benign,
and then we think, "We can Christianize it.."
But we can't.
The church is a totally counter-cultural movement. We are a marginal people. There is NO WAY we can be a success in this culture on their terms...
American pastors don't want to hear this, though. They want to now how they can grow their church, as though if you have the right technique and enough water and fertilizer, it's going to go. But here's the thing: ALL the stories of spiritual leadership that we have in the scriptures are failures. EVERY ONE. I can't think of one that in our terms we would call a "success."
He goes on to talk about Moses, then Isaiah as examples and concludes..
"As pastors, we have to be willing to be a failure in the eyes of the culture, and if we're not, we're seduced by the culture to "being religious" in the culture's way. Of course, they reward us wonderfully when we do that...."
I love this guy.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
11:10 AM
Someone sent this to me a while back.. too funny..
Something to consider next time your computer freezes.
In Japan, they have replaced the impersonal and unhelpful Microsoft Error
message with Haiku poetry messages. Haiku poetry has strict construction
rules. Each poem has only three lines containing a total of 17 syllables:
five syllables in the first line, seven in the second, five in the third.
Haiku's are used to communicate a timeless message often achieving a
wistful, yearning and powerful insight through extreme brevity . . . the
essence of Zen.
Your file was so big.
The Web site you seek
Chaos reigns within.
Program aborting:
Windows NT crashed.
Yesterday it worked.
First snow, then silence.
With searching comes loss
A crash reduces
You step in the stream,
Serious error. posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:10 AM
Debt. He loved it.
At least, he embraced it. He made Himself the debtor of all, and then paid the highest cost possible.
Some followed his example, and sold themselves into slavery. Isaac Newton was one. Saul of Tarsus was another. They made themselves debtors to all, and prisoners of love.
As this twist on debt impressed itself on me this morning, I thought how far short I fall. I still serve myself too often. I still get edgy sometimes when my schedule is interrupted. I fail to love like He loved.
As the Lord impressed this on me, I wasn't overwhelmed with my sin.. I was overwhelmed with His grace. I was overwhelmed as I saw my selfless Savior, the only one who deserved it all -- giving it all away. He gave away every right when He was the only one who truly had a right.
I saw the beauty of humility and grace and suffering service. I've always wondered why humility and service were so becoming.. so beautiful... almost like visible robes that some wear. Now I know that that beauty is a mantle of grace directly from Him. Those who walk in these things are reflecting the glory and beauty of the Lord.. no wonder it's so attractive.
As all this flashed into my spirit this morning, my eyes overflowed with tears and a song came to mind. This song was written by Don Potter. I've had the joy of hearing him share it in person twice. Here are some of the words..
"I'm a prisoner, I can't explain this mystery,
Click HERE for a cut from the song.
Don Potter is part of the MorningStar Fellowship, as humble a servant as you could ever meet.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:10 AM
When things become less linear, the center may become more obvious. I've had some time to give this some thought, based on the experience of myself and others over the past few years. Maybe Jesus had it right all the time.. we should gather over a meal and tell stories...
Read my article exploring non linear gatherings HERE
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
11:50 AM
Debt. I hate it.
Way back in 1993 my wife and I purchased a fifty acre piece of land in the East Kootenays, a beautiful area in the eastern part of BC between two mountain ranges. A number of friends helped us make the purchase, because we couldn't get a mortgage in the area, having just moved there.
We paid out two of the friends when we borrowed locally after a couple of years. But the third remained as a partner as we began to develop the land.
Costs escalated faster and higher than anyone had predicted. The Highways Department made a change in their requirements, resulting in an extra $20,000 in road building costs. Meantime, employment for my wife and I declined. The combination meant that my partner carried the greater share of development costs, while I and my family scraped along waiting for the sale of the first property.
In the end what had begun as a hopeful project that would leave us in a home debt free became an albatross, and a strain to our relationships. Now ten years later we are still working on paying old debts.
Over the years we've seen other friends struggle with debts, primarily with charge cards. Those debts are nasty, and they can place an immense strain on family relationships, but they tend not to strain outside relationships in the community. Unfortunately, we have had to face both the internal and external strain.
By the grace of God, we are still talking to our original partner. But recently we found out there was other fallout. Not everyone is sure we did the best that we could, or that our motives were clear. In the end we are left not only with debt, but with blots on our character. This in spite of the fact that we did not declare bankruptcy when we easily could have done so. We chose to stay with the pain, mostly for the sake of our partner, who had more to lose than did we.
I feel sad about this; strangely, not bitter. I understand that few have walked in my shoes. I understand that the story is only heard in pieces and in parts, and that few have the perspective that we have -- having walked it out.
In the end, the Lord has used all this to produce perseverance and character in us. We know the value of friendship and of community. We have a clearer sense of what is really important. We've been poor, and still struggle along. We appreciate the limited options of the poor. While some of our friends think we are wealthy (because they are on welfare and we aren't), we know what it is to have nothing in the cupboard. In spite of the fact that both my wife and I are trained professionals, we live below the poverty line.
The days ahead will be more difficult than the days that lie behind. With cutbacks to government services and welfare, with job shortages increasing (particularly here in BC where lumber producers are going bankrupt and mills are closing their doors), more and more families will face the strain of living in poverty. May those of us who have been there continue to share freely. "Freely you have received, freely give."
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
11:00 AM
I'm still converting old articles to the new format. This morning I placed
"The Challenge of Embracing the New" online, as well as
"Building Church Communities for the 21st Century" by Peter Senge, the well known author on leadership.
I attended a high school graduation last Friday night with Betty. Near the close one of the teachers introduced the retiring principal with a touching testimonial. In doing so he quoted a writer on leadership who wrote that, "When the best leader is finished, the people will say: 'We did it ourselves.' Wow.
I was rereading "Cutting Edge" magazine last week, with particular interest in the articles on worship. I was surprised to recognize similarities in what is described as the post-modern worship context and our experience since meeting in our home. In contrast, the order of service is one of the things that has bothered me in the modern context. What bothers me about it?
The order that Paul describes in the New Testament (1 Cor. 14) seems spontaneous and controlled by the Spirit. But in virtually any Sunday service one can attend the order is entirely predictable: intro, call to worship, worship and praise, announcements, the sermon, blessing and dismissal. And we say we aren't liturgical!
In the post-modern setting, things are much less linear and much less predictable. The center becomes much less obvious.
We usually call the large Sunday gatherings of the church a "worship service." The idea seems to be that we are serving God in worship. The entire gathering is usually orchestrated around the word and "worship" in the sense of songs of praise and worship. Active participation is generally limited to pre-chosen persons, often the same small group of trained leaders who say and do most of what will be done in the 90 minutes or so alloted to the gathering. The only participation by the congregation is as spectators and "worshippers." The majority remain largely passive.
When things become less linear, the center is also less obvious. It's no longer clear whether we are gathering to "worship" or to "listen and learn" or to just be together. The designated leaders may also no longer be clearly identifiable (though they will still be present). I have a feeling this is a very helpful direction in terms of the real work of the church and the purpose of our gathering.
As I reflect on the last year of our meeting with the church in our home, I realize that when we lost the traditional center (the functions of word and worship) the center changed to the people themselves. We all became players, and the whole world was our stage (apologies to the Bard).
My hope is that the real center became Jesus and His people. I think that this is in fact what happened.
I have more to say on all this, but it needs treatment in a separate article.. :)
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
1:20 PM
As I've continued converting old articles to the new format, I've discovered some great ones that I had forgotten. Dan Pantoja, one of the leadership team in the Waves community, has written some excellent material. His article "Questions I'm Learning While Mentoring Postmodern Church Planters" will be a great introduction to the new world of doing church for many of you.
One of the first articles I wrote after reading Margaret Wheatley's stunning book "A Simpler Way," was "Coloring Outside the Box". Margaret writes that "There is a simpler way to organize human endeavor. It requires a new way of being in the world. It requires being in the world without fear. Being in the world with play and creativity. Seeking after what's possible. Being willing to learn and to be surprised."
"This simpler way to organize human endeavor requires a belief that the world is inherently orderly. Life seeks organization. It does not require us to organize it." I love it. If you resonate with this, great. If not, read my article or get her book.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
11:30 AM
Betty and I returned from a retreat with the North Langley Vineyard crew yesterday. The retreat was held at Manning Park in south central BC.
What a treat to be in the mountains again. It's almost frightening that I can forget how much I love these natural spaces.
The retreat was much more than mountains and open skies and fresh air, of course. The retreat was packed with people and words and conversation; great people, significant words and conversations. But I want to stay with the theme of beauty and nature for the moment.
Beauty. Incredible beauty. Trees that reach to the sky. Lakes of crystal blue. Frigid fresh water where you could see ten feet to a pristine rocky bottom. Pine and fir trees and wild flowers that are astonishing in fragrance and complexity.
If you have no experience of mountain air.. you have no experience of air as God intended it to be. Just breathing the air in these places makes one feel lighter, stronger and younger. There is a wildness about the air itself. I don't know how to describe it. Granted some of this may be bound up with my own childhood memories of camping in the mountains, waking up refreshed and building a fire in the cool morning air.
Beauty. Crunching along a pine-studded ridgeline, occasionally catching glimpses of the valley 2000 feet below. The cool breezes of the mountains alternates with the heated air from the sheltered spaces. The smell of pine, and the crunch of needles underfoot.
Beauty. Looking out across a wide open space to the sharp sculptured ridge of mountains ringing the valley. The sharp contrast of deep blue rock and winter snow.
The world is charged with the grandeur of God;
.. for all this, nature is never spent; posted by Len Hjalmarson |
11:00 AM
"My starting point is that we are already there. We cannot attain the presence of God. We're totally in the presence of God. What's absent is awareness. God is maintaining us in existence with every breath we take. As we take another it means that God is choosing us even now and no and now. We have nothing to attain or even learn. We do, however, need to unlearn some things.
"To allow that unlearning, we have to accept what is often difficult, particularly for people in what appears to be a successful culture. We have to accept that we share a mass cultural trance, a hypnotic trance. We're all sleepwalkers. We human beings do not naturally see. We have to be taught how to see."
Richard Rohr, "Everything Belongs," p.29
We have to be taught how to see...
When we come into the world, we don't recognize a thing visually. We recognize sounds.. particularly the sounds of voices. But we can't make sense of a thing that we see.
Two things gradually happen. First, our brain reconstructs reality, turning the upside down world right side up. Second, we learn words and meanings and connect them to objects that we see: glass, chair, cat.
We don't naturally see.
And how do we learn to see what is there? Even a very young child references the objects he sees to his own needs. Cat.. that means softness and fun and distraction. Water.. that means something to quench my thirst.
But water wasn't first made to quench anyone's thirst.. it somehow expressed something of God. Perhaps the metaphors tell us more.. water is freshness, movement, life, flow, coolness, clarity.
But without light.. we would see nothing. "If your eye is whole, your whole body will be full of light" (Luke 11:34)
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:00 AM
This is the International Decade of the World's Indigenous People (1995-2004). You didn't know it? Neither did I.
I've made some interesting discoveries along these lines. Did you know that an indigeneous nation claims to be "the oldest living participatory democracy on earth...". Neither did I. Here is a little more information..
"The people of the Six Nations, also known by the French term, Iroquois [1] Confederacy, call themselves the Hau de no sau nee (ho dee noe sho nee) or People of the Longhouse. Located in the northeastern region of North America, originally the Six Nations was five and included the Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas. The sixth nation, the Tuscaroras, migrated into Iroquois country in the early eighteenth century.
The Iroquois Confederacy has a policy that no major decision can be undertaken by the council without first considering how the decision will impact the next seven generations...
I'm not rehearsing all this to give to indigenous people some ideal status. I know that they are fallen and broken just like the rest of us. But I think we can learn some things from them.
This past year I've had the first friendships with native people since almost twenty years ago. I find them honest, humble, and real. They have no pretences. They know how to share, and are free with their possessions that most Christians. They have been greatly oppressed, yet most of them want to move on and learn to live with white culture.
I don't think there are simple solutions to the land claims issues, or issues of self-government. These are complex issues, with dark histories. But I believe there is hope to work them through where there is honesty and faith.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
9:00 AM
It's been a while since I visited Ship of Fools. This UK publication describes itself like this:
"Ship of Fools is a fast-growing Christian website, specializing in humor, satire and popular theology. Based in London, it was originally a printed journal in the 1980s, and is now the UK's first Christian web magazine."
Satire is a wonderful thing.. it has a parabolic way of pointing us to the truth. Sometimes we take ourselves too seriously!
A sample? You want a sample?
How about Rev. Gerald Home's "Minstry Manual.."
"You too can be an international soulsaving superchristian!"
"At last, a handbook for anointed ministers and spiritual celebrities. Learn from my years of humble service and miraculous triumph, and follow me in mighty paths of blessing.
"Find out how to:
Write worship songs as inspired as "O God you're really Lord"
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
11:30 AM
Where do you acquire your sense of worth?
Most men acquire their sense of worth from their job. For men, losing a job has the same emotional impact as losing a child has for a woman.
Most women, by implication, acquire their sense of worth from their family roles: wife, mother, daughter.
The standard response to this is that we should acquire our sense of worth only from the Lord.
But I don't know.. I'm not convinced that this is true.
The Lord placed us in families. Then He adopted us into the family of families.
We have physical bodies, and a spirit. We live between these worlds.
Even the writer of Ecclesiastes says that it is a good thing to delight in our being in this world.
The Hebrew word for "word" is "dabar." When God speaks, it is done. There is no separation in God of being and act. We separate these things conceptually in our Greek heritage, just as we separate sacred and secular.
So if God IS and DOES, is it so strange that we should have an identity that is rooted both in who we are and in what we do? Is it so strange that we are so strongly impacted by the identity we are given through the love and attention (or lack of these) by our parents?
* * *
I have two teen daughters. Todd Rutkowski in an unpublished manuscript proposes that the role of fathers is three-fold: to tell their children who they are, to give them a sense of security and belonging, and within that framework to offer a sense of destiny and purpose.
As my children grow older, their lives become more rooted outside the home. It's a challenge to pull them back in; something I believe we must do at times.
It's also a growing challenge to find ways to connect with them. The more they are rooted in activities and friendships outside the family, the more I have to be intentional about this. It's a learning area for me. I believe they still need to hear that they are loved; and they still need that "well done" when they accomplish something.
I'm looking for ways to celebrate my girls. They are quite talented, but it's easy for me to take that for granted. Talent alone isn't bringing them success; they work hard at the things they enjoy.
I believe that the security they find in the love of Betty and I will make it easier for them to find security in God. These things can't be separated. The Lord designed families to model His love, so that mature adults could eventually launch out into the world and freely offer to others the love they have received.
Sometimes the challenge is to make the effort to connect. I get too much into my own world; the world of work and of writing and kingdom things. I have to remind myself that they won't find security in God alone; that the Lord has given them parents to root them in His love. But if I fail to find MY source of security in God and try instead to find it all in my work, I will fail as a father. I'll fail to enter into my family to the depth required.
That's the mystery and the paradox of creation. I father because He fathered, and His fathering must be reflected in me.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
11:30 AM
I've uncovered a mistake. Not a problem, if it was yours or mine. But see.. it was the Lord's.
I don't know how he missed it.
It happened quite accidently. I was taking a break from a project and wandered out onto the back yard patio. The sun was hot.. the air was clear.. the sky was blue.. all around a perfect day.
So I wandered onto the grass, drinking it all in. Then I recalled that I hadn't finished spacing the fruit on the peach tree.
You have to understand about this tree. It bears very heavily. It blossoms at just the right time, and we have bee farmers in our area. Consequently, at blossom time it gives a spectacular show. A few weeks later there are probably 3000 peaches on this dwarf tree.
And there it is. A blatant error.
I know, I know. Jesus says in the Gospels that every tree that bears fruit he will prune. But we all know that pruning is done during the rest season, when the tree is almost dormant. Every year I go out and cut off the waterspouts, and trim back excessive growth. I'm careful to give attention to the overall shape of the tree, keeping bearing limbs accessible and keeping the center of the tree clear.
But now here I am presented with a very fruitful tree, and I take off about 3/4 of the fruit.
See.. Jesus never talked about taking off fruit. Surely he didn't mean that when he referred to pruning?
The problem is this: if I leave the tree as it is, even the good fruit is at risk. The growing season here is long enough, but only if the summer is hot and fairly dry. And we live at the base of a hill, so the sun rises later than if we were in the open part of the valley. It's as if our growing season was two weeks shorter than our neighbors a mile away.
So if I leave all three thousand peaches, or even 1500, we may get only a few hundred semi-ripe peaches, with the rest small and green. The tree just can't support so much fruit.
So obviously, it's a mistake. The tree is a mistake. The pruning thing is a mistake. I shouldn't have to do this.
I wonder.. is it like this with my life? Are there two seasons of pruning?
Just when I think I'm becoming very productive, am I so self conscious of it all that the fruit really isn't any good anyway? Am I sometimes so busy working to please the Lord that he has to prune even my fruitfulness?
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
8:30 AM
There are three things too wonderful for me, even four things that I love: the smell of earth and growing things after the rain; the song of birds in the morning; the softness and beauty of my wife; and friendship.
Last year I had a dream. I was visiting an old friend, and we were laughing and horsing around. He was a bit tipsy; not typical of him, but not completely astonishing either. Dan has an appreciation for good wine.
Dan and I were listening to music. Off by a tree were three indistinct figures, dressed in white (or white jersies?), and playing musical instruments and laughing. The indistinct figures seemed somehow unreal; in memory I wasn't entirely sure they were real, or if real, if they were of this world or another….
The feeling of this picture was warmth, friendship and celebration. Dan is a good friend. In the early eighties we shared some laughter and some tears, a love for the music of Bruce Cockburn, some great hikes, and a hunger for reality. We also shared a trip with a third friend on an incredible fall day down a lazy river in a canoe, with the splendor of fall colors all along the banks.
In the early nineties I moved my family a days journey inland, and Dan and I don't see one another anymore. But whenever we do, it's as though we talked only the day before. We always connect immediately, honestly, and easily.
When I awoke reflecting on this dream, the center of the message seemed to me to be friendship. I found myself thinking about this gift in my life, the gift of friends. I can count five close friends over the past twenty years, all of whom I am still in touch with. First Murray, then Dan, then Wes, Owen, and Nick. These men have enriched my life, given it color and significance. They have believed in me more deeply than I believe in myself. They have been examples of courage, compassion, honesty and devotion.
When I think of these friends, I am overcome with thankfulness and awe. They are men "of whom the world is not worthy." To have been given such a gift FIVE times is astonishing, and I wonder at the Giver and His goodness. Aware of the gift, I can believe there is something worthy in me; the love of my friends gives me hope I have a value I cannot readily measure.
As I reflected on the significance of these men and their friendship, I found myself thinking again about the men in white. I seemed to be seeing what was not there. Were they real or not? I'm not sure.
"What is essential is invisible to the eye." St. Exupery
In our material and visual world its easy to become caught up in the important and urgent things, and miss the things that really matter. In the church its easy to get caught up in healing, and prophecy, and miracles, and to seek these things.
It's wonderful that God is releasing His power into the world. We need to be a supernatural people. But in our excitement it's easy to miss the natural things, the ordinary things that can become a vehicle for the incredible grace of God.
The heart of the Gospel is love, and community. Jesus is a Body. We need to rediscover friendship. Friendship is at the heart of community, and friendship is often the greatest gift we can offer.
It's no small thing that Jesus says, "I have called you my friends."
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
8:30 PM
It's the Queen's Golden Jubilee. I'm always amazed that our American friends are as fascinated by royalty as we Canadians and British are.
I think it has something to do with authority, and how it comes down from above. But I'm not talking about authority, I'm talking about Authority, with a capital "A."
Years ago I heard a tape series by Robert Bly, at that time the head of a growing mytho-poetic movement in the USA that was bent on helping men rediscover themselves as men. In the series Bly talked about the king, the real King, and Kingly energy (he also talked about the Queen, but that's another story).
What struck me was that Bly, not a believer, recognized the need for a mythic figure who stood outside, above and beyond, any human king, in order to give real meaning to the word. In a sense, he was connecting with some of the things CS Lewis wrote about myth and meaning many years ago.
In "Original Self," Thomas More wrote,
"Myth is the narrative in which we find ourselves when we become aware that our lives are shaped by stories. The myth at work at any particular moment may derive from the family and from powerful but hidden currents of imagination strong in the culture. Our basic humanity also accounts for the deepest stratum of our lived myth. We are always in a myth, but cultural narratives do vary from one place to another, and even in a single culture they can shift over time."
While we post-moderns are reacting against authority, we are desperately looking for enduring myths. I'm not talking about stories that aren't true, but about the real Story. We are experiencing "mythic vertigo" as the narratives that anchored our culture are no longer accepted. More continues,
"In this time of deep change, we may feel dislocated ... Sensing the waning of a myth, we may take several different steps: We may try to reinstate the old myth, insisting that it is the only truth that will hold us together. We may try to invent new myths, but these, Hopper says, are ... too rational and fail to give us the deep inspiration we need. We may also turn to countermyths, stories that emphasize a vision opposite to that of the dominant but weakening myth. Our literature and movies show fragmentation, falling apart, destruction, violence, and hopelessness.
"Stanley Hopper's solution for our sense of mythic vertigo is a new appreciation for the role of imagination. He recommends that we replace theology, the rationalistic interpretation of belief, with theopoetics, finding God through poetry and fiction, which neither wither before modern science nor conflict with the complexity of what we know now to be the self. This is a theology for a period highly influenced by technology and by psychoanalysis.
"If we could make this shift, which is being forced on us by our very success in science and other areas of knowledge, we might find a more solid security, one that is not easily disturbed by the findings of science or the shifting of mores. We would realize that our conceptions about the nature of things are always provisional and therefore may best be served by a poetic sensibility that looks deep into experience. Our sense of the religious life might be less external, less factual, and less rationalistic."
This new appreciation for the role of the imagination might create fear in some. Are we talking about making up stories out of our heads and labeling these are "true?"
No.
Consider the parables of Jesus. He spoke of the kingdom of God as "leaven in a lump," and as our role in it as "lamps on a lampstand." Metaphor is an inexact approach to theology. But for Jesus, metaphor carries truth.
Consider also CS Lewis statement, "The imagination is the vehicle of understanding."
The challenge is not to leave truth behind, but to find new anchors for meaning. We won't find these anchors in the old way, and we won't find them without imagination. Tom Sine comments that,
"Many Christians operate as though all the important theological questions have been asked and we got all the answers right... decades ago. I seriously question whether many of the answers we operate from are as biblically grounded as we assume they are. I am convinced we need to spend much more time reflecting on "why we do what we do." We need particularly to assess the extent to which we have allowed the values of modern culture to define our sense of what is important and what is of value. My central passion is to enable Christians to rediscover the kingdom of God not only as doctrine we embrace but as an alternative cultural vision of what is important and of value to the one offered us by the modern global culture of consumption. Anyone interested in reawakening this kind of biblical imagination?"
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
1:42 PM
James Fowler is well known for his work on stages of spiritual growhth. Michael Clark recently sent me a link to a collection of parodies that are quite good: McDeity.
I was visiting Next-Wave on the weekend and read an article by
Mike Bishop on subversion. Mike quotes Eugene Peterson's "The Contemplative Pastor"...
"Three things are implicit in subversion. One, the status quo is wrong and must be overthrown if the world is going to be livable. It is so deeply wrong that repair work is futile. The world is, in the word insurance agents use to designate our wrecked cars, totaled.
"Two, there is another world aborning that is livable. Its reality is no chimera (illusion). It is in existence, though not visible. Its character is known. The subversive does not operate out of a utopian dream but out of a conviction of the nature of the real world.
"Three, the usual means by which one kingdom is thrown out and another put in its place - military force or democratic elections - are not available. If we have neither a preponderance of power nor a majority of votes, we begin searching for other ways to effect change. We discover the methods of subversion. We find and welcome allies."
A great summary as to how the kingdom contrasts with the world and how it breaks into our world. Peterson says that the chief aim of the Subversive Community is to train other subversives (the Great Commission). Our tools are prayer and parables. "The quiet (or noisy) closet life of prayer enters into partnership with the Spirit that strives still with every human heart, a wrestling match in holiness. And parables are the consciousness-altering words that slip past falsifying platitude and invade the human spirit with Christ-truth."
Mike's genius is to add a third element from the gospels. Prayer and parables is only half the story, pardon the pun. The third part is parties. Mike calls this the three "P's" of church planting: Prayer, Parables, and Parties. I love it!
Some of you already know all about this. You discovered at some point in your walk with the Lord that the best way to build the kingdom was to throw plenty of parties, and invite anyone who would come. As Henri Nouwen put it, hospitality is not part of the gospel, hospitality IS the Gospel.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
10:42 AM
The guys from the city are ripping up our street. What a mess. They start about 7 AM each morning, including Saturdays, when the noise from the big machines is NOT welcome.
The dust is nasty. It covers everything. It's that fine dust that is kicked up by the slightest breeze. Our patio, which overlooks our small city, and where we usually like to sit on a warm spring evening, is no longer safe. Even when the breeze isn't drafting up the hill, one can't sit on the patio without first cleaning the chairs and wiping the table. Placing a glass of pop or lemonade on the table creates that grinding sound that is almost electric, and instantly sets my teeth on edge.
When the crew is actually working our house vibrates. Sometimes the vibrations are minor, almost below the threshold of human sensitivity. Sometimes they feel like a small earthquake. At other times the vibrations feel like someone just pulled into our driveway.. but their brakes failed and they hit the house. At those moments all the pictures on the wall jump and the glass in the windows resonates.
It's hard to know what the finished project will look like. All we have now is a dirt road, equipment parked everywhere, empty pop cans and the odd crumpled lunch bag of the workers strewn about the neighborhood. Ripped up hedges with gaping holes line our street.
The purpose of all this? Installation of the sewer line. All the houses on our street will go "online" in a new way over the next few weeks.
Got me thinking about change; it's messy. First, you have to tear down the old structure. It's disorienting. When the dirt is flying you can't tell which way is up. People are gasping for air.
It's dangerous. There was a deep trench running along the roadway for a few days. I wondered what would happen if my wheels just tipped the edge of the trench. Would the whole car slide in? Was there a bottom? When would they find me?
It's chaotic. Equipment is strewn everywhere. Piles of dirt and rock appear randomly placed.
At least, that's how it looks from ground zero. Maybe it would look different from treetop level.
Though the contractors have a plan, not everything is predictable. And the process does not APPEAR planned. There is linearity, but while they start at the bottom of the hill and work their way up, some stages require them to go back to the beginning.. like the placement of the new gravel, and eventually the new pavement. So maybe it's more like a circle, or a series of connecting circles spiralling up the hill.
The crews learn to respect mystery. They never know what they are going to find when they dig into the earth. In some places they found soft soil, in other places stone. At one point they hit something primordial. Every time the bucket would disappear the bones of our house rattled and groaned.
What happens below the earth I really don't know. Does the worm population get disturbed? Do the microbes have any idea what's happening? Do they have borders they have to replant? Chaos and the unknown engender fear. Everyone reacts to fear in their own way. Some get angry, some lock themselves in. Some don't sleep well. Some hang around and ask questions. Some want answers. Some want the neighborhood back the way it was.
The reactions of people on our street have varied. Though most are understanding, some, especially those who have worked hard on maintaining the lovely green borders of their yards with cedar and juniper hedges, haven't been as welcoming. They watch as their beloved hedge literally "bites the dust," limb torn from limb, the roots of the living plant torn harshly from the earth. Where once was life, now there is bare earth and pocked moonscape. It isn't always easy to hang on to a vision of new life.
It's a shakeup. It's a cultural sea shift. The orienting points aren't the same. One wonders if the supervisor is using the right map. Who made the map anyway?
One wonders who the supervisor is? These guys all dress the same, sound the same, wear the same hard hats, the same bright orange vests with the yellow X.
Eventually we'll have a brand new sewer functioning on our hill. The hedges will grow back. The grass will be replaced, the road repaved. For a while the road will be smoother than it was before. We might even spot some new plants and trees along the way. The ditch along the road will be lined with chunky broken rock, something entirely new in this area.
Chaos can birth community. We've met a few more of our neighbors.
The neighborhood will never be the same. Chaos will give birth to order. Shiny new blacktop will appear over the scarred earth. All the messy stuff will be underground, and moving steadily downhill.
posted by Len Hjalmarson |
8:42 AM
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In fact, moving to the fruit belt means apple and cherry orchards, peach and pear trees, and vineyards galore. More to the point, our new neighbors have somewhere around three hundred bottles of wine in their cellar: Chablis, Merlots, Rieslings, Chardonnnays, Cabernets, Sherrys, and a host of other varieties. Water in excelsis, with some 20,000 varieties of grape in the world, wine seems to represent the very heart of the Lord in his love for diversity.
"Together these peoples comprise the oldest living participatory democracy on earth. Their story, and governance truly based on the consent of the governed, contains a great deal of life-promoting intelligence for those of us not familiar with this area of American history. The original United States representative democracy, fashioned by such central authors as Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson, drew much inspiration from this confederacy of nations. In our present day, we can benefit immensely, in our quest to establish anew a government truly dedicated to all life's liberty and happiness much as has been practiced by the Six Nations for over 800 hundred years."
But best of all.. I discovered that Alan Jamieson has a book out. Alan is the author of some of the intriguing articles at 
