Ron Cole : unplugged, unorthodox, sacrilegious

transformation...

I do dimly percieve that whilst everything around me is ever changing, ever dying, there is underlying all that change a Living Power that is changeless, that holds all together, that creates, dissolves and re-creates. That informing Power or Spirit of God. and since nothing else I see merely through the senses can or will persist, He is alone.

And is this Power benevolent or malevolent? I see it as purely benevolent, for I can see that in the midst of death life persists, in the midst of untruth truth persists, in the midst of darkness light persists. Hence I gather that God is Life, Truth, Light. He is Love. He is the supreme good.

But he is no God who merely satisfies the intellect, if he ever can. God to be God must rule the heart and transform it. This can only be done through a definite realization. more real than the five senses can ever produce. It is not proved by extraneous evidence but in the transformed living and character of those who have felt the presence of God within.

(The Essential Ghandi...pg 18)

Life...becoming prayer

A little book I read many years ago hugely impacted my prayer life. It's title is, " The Practice of the Presence of God " by Brother Lawrence. He was able to live his life in the reality of it being an unceasing prayer.

For Brother Lawrence, "common business," no matter how mundane or routine, could be a medium of God's love. The sacredness or worldly status of a task mattered less than motivation behind it. "Nor is it needful that we should have great things to do. . . We can do little things for God; I turn the cake that is frying on the pan for love of him, and that done, if there is nothing else to call me, I prostrate myself in worship before him, who has given me grace to work; afterward I rise happier than a king. It is enough for me to pick up but a straw from the ground for the love of God."

Brother Lawrence felt having a proper heart about tasks made every detail of his life possess surpassing value. "I began to live as if there were no one save God and me in the world." Brother Lawrence felt that he cooked meals, ran errands, scrubbed pots, and endured the scorn of the world alongside God.

… Brother Lawrence reminds me to chill… Here are the words I read this morning that resounded deeply in my soul space: “The holiest, most common, most necessary practice in the spiritual life is the presence of God, that is to take delight in and become accustomed to His divine company, speaking humbly and talking lovingly with Him at every moment, WITHOUT RULE OR SYSTEM and especially in times of temptation, suffering, spiritual aridity, disgust and even of unfaithfulness and sin. We must continually work hard so that each of our actions is a way of carrying on little conversations with God, NOT IN ANY CAREFULLY PREPARED WAY BUT AS IT COMES FROM THE PURITY AND SIMPLICITY OF THE HEART.”

I don't know why it is that we make prayer so difficult, to the point it becomes about place, position, constructing the right words...where it becomes a formula, a ritual. Worse, it can become a chore or work. But what would happen if it became life, almost to the point of our breathing being prayer. Would that be any less sacred.

Ok, pause for a second and breathe in the reality that you have been crucified with Christ [in Him you have shared His crucifixion]; it is no longer you who lives, but Christ (the Messiah) lives in you; and the life you now live in the body you live by faith in (by adherence to and reliance on and complete trust in) the Son of God, Who loved you and gave Himself up for you. ( paraphrase Galatians 2:20 )

I think the seed of unceasing prayer is planted in that truth. I know there was a season where I meditated on those words before sleeping and upon awakening everyday. I didn't do it out of ritual, although it might appear that way, but it excited me. It was like kindling that I through on the fire of my imagination. The reality that through some profound mystery beyond my comprehension that Jesus dwells in me...and I can live out of the mystery constantly.

It becomes living in the reality of constant communion, not just Sunday morning in the taste of a wafer and a sip of wine, and when the taste fades communion is over till next Sunday. It's as if the reality of Jesus has been spliced into you DNA, and you spliced into his. Your whole day, your whole life, your comings and goings are all done in constant communion with Jesus. How does that make you feel? Does it make you want to live differently?

But more than anything it should move us towards lives of unceasing prayer, to the point all life is a prayer. Some thoughts I've had on prayer over the years that I hope don't seem to heretical are...

You don't have to always pray with words. You can be in situations, or conversations where thoughts can be prayer. Remember the Spirit intercedes when words are not audible.

If you pray for someone, or some situation like injustice, poverty, homelessness...be prepared to be part of the answer.

Raging, venting anger at the Divine is OK. Read the Psalms or Job. Go for it at the top of your lungs. Scream, exhaust yourself. Then...listen.

Help! is a great prayer. Like igniting a flare at a road side accident it might not seem like much at the time. The answer may be  strange, and untimely...so be alert.

You can pray with your body; you can breathe prayer;a hug can be prayer; touch can be prayer; tears and laughter can be prayer; your mere presence in someones life can be prayer. Coffee with Al can be prayer.

Singing, dancing, walking can be prayer.

Aligning life with creation, the waxing and waning moon and sun, the seasons of the earth, the plants and animals is prayer. Living in the interconnectedness of " all " life can be prayer. A congruousness of " creation sorrow ", when the boundaries between you and " all that is " disappears and you feel the pain, the wounds of creation...maybe you've had the feeling recently reflecting on the Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Gratitude and kindness are always prayers.

You do not have to have a belief system to pray. You do not have to have a fixed opinion about where the divine resides or if the divine as a noun exists. All our words and images are metaphors to help us connect with the mystery, the intimately known and unknown.

Dreaming can be prayer. Cooking can be prayer. Eating can be prayer. Making love can be prayer. This list could go on and on.

When you pray for someone you become, for a moment, a co-creator, a bridge, a conduit to an eternal source of profound mystery and life. Remember Grace. It is unconditional. It is radical. It is scandalous. It's uncontainable. It has no limits. It has no boundaries. If you even have to think about it...suddenly it has become something less

I remember those moments when I have seen someone without the filter of my hopes or concerns for them, which can all too easily take on the tinge of judgment or control. Those moments are startling, illuminating, humbling...they are moments of grace.

Pray with grace. Let your life become unceasing prayer. Become prayer...in unceasing prayer you become.

radical scandalous hospitality...a Kingdom reality

If we're honest, our hospitality is safe, rationed, and usually by request only. Membership certainly has its privileges. The radical nature of the hospitality in the gospels, or even the early church has been lost in the age of marketing and consumerism. We are better at hosting, than living out the radical scandalous hospitality of Jesus. 

There is a tragic and beautiful story from the early church about the hospitality of Polycarp, written shortly after the old mans execution sometime around 155 AD. A much revered bishop of Smyrna in Asia Minor, Polycarp was in his mid-80’s when he was arrested and executed in one of the long series of persecutions that besieged the Christian church over the first 300 years of its existence.
 
As the story is told in the ancient document, under torture a servant had betrayed Polycarp’s whereabouts to the Roman authorities and in time soldiers arrived at his door to arrest him.

As soon as he heard them arrive, he went down and chatted with them; and everyone there was struck by his age and his calmness, and surprised that the arrest of such an old man could be so urgent.  In spite of the lateness of the hour he at once ordered them to be given all the food and drink they wanted; and then asked if he might be allowed an hour to pray undisturbed.  When they consented, he got to his feet and prayed; so full of the grace of God, that two whole hours went by before he could bring himself to be silent again.  All who heard him were struck with awe, and many of them began to regret this expedition against a man so old and saintly.

In his interpretation of the events, local artist James Nesbitt’s painting behind me reveals the redemptive imagination of Jesus and his Kingdom, set at the dinner table which has been offered to the arresting soldiers.  

(Painting courtesy James Nesbitt)

While the 2nd Century account has the aged bishop in prayer during the meal, Nesbitt places Polycarp at the table with his captors, extending to them the sort of table hospitality which Jesus models throughout the gospels.  Head lifted in laughter, Nesbitt’s Polycarp embodies a deeply challenging Christian truth: he is one who can not and will not confess any other Lord than Jesus, but he is also one who cannot do other than open his table to any and all, including those who would take his life.

The occasion for the hospitality offered by Polycarp to his captors is triggered by a betrayal by one of his own servants, and yet, as with the last supper, it becomes a meal which proclaims the deep liberation found only in Christ. From James Nesbitt’s palette has come a most remarkable portrait of the truth – and cost – of liberation in Christ.

On every imaginable front Jesus is restoring every victim of a broken world. Jesus stories of the Kingdom invoked a radical energy for they announced as sure and certain what had been denied by careful conspiracy. The stories of the Kingdom were almost more radical than his actions, because the stories played out the implications of the harsh challenge and radical transformation at which his actions hinted. It was one thing to eat with outcasts, but it was far more radical to announce the distinctions between insiders and outsiders were null and void. It was one thing to heal and forgive, but quite another to announce that the conditions which made one sick and guilty were now irrelevant.

The stories of the Kingdom, like Jesus’ actions are earth shattering, open and inviting, they stir the heart, mind and soul…awakening us to the eternal and abundant life of the Kingdom. The Kingdom conjures a present and a future that had been closed off. They indicate infinite possibilities that had been defined as impossibilities.

The hospitality of Jesus is without boundaries, and borders. It erases the lines between " us " and " them "; the loved and the unloved; the tax colllector and the priest; the poor and the wealthy; the sick and the healthy; the wise and illiterate; men and women; gays and straights; Christians and other faiths...friends and enemies. At Jesus table all are welcome, even those who would and did conspire to kill him. At Jesus table there is liberation, of peace, and healing...the Kingdom becomes a tangible reality.

It's not so much about the food...it's more about you, and me becoming a guest house...open to everyone , and everything.

The Guest House 

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

 ~ Rumi ~

 

a question of re-imagining life...

     

In the gospels is the profound mystery of life. In the lines, between the lines, are the infinite depths of eternal mystery, where we find the deepest questions of what it is to be fully human. We have forgotten that Jesus planted this mystery outside the boxes of all established religions of the day.

The Word became flesh and blood,
  and moved into the neighborhood.
   We saw the glory with our own eyes,
  the one-of-a-kind glory,
  like Father, like Son,
   Generous inside and out,
  true from start to finish.( Eugene Peterson's, The Message; John 1 ) 

Jesus did not deliver these profound questions of life into the hands of the religious establishment, its scribes, it's pharisees, and inner circles of power. He delivered it, into the sea of humanity...its diversity of culture, of religions, of race...it crossed all borders. Sadly, what was sown like seed by the hand of God, was quickly snatched up and boxed as religion as soon as the sower had left.

In the gospels, is an eternal mysterious truth...much of it beyond human comprehension. Much of it raised more questions than answers. We don't like that ! We had to reinterpret the gospels. To read the gospels, to read Jesus words unedited, with no reinterpretation...is too much mystery, and too much truth. So religion dilutes it, to half truths, and one quarter truths. We drink it it like kool aid, feeling better...but the power to re-imagine is gone.

But in the gospels, is the divine redemptive imagination of the God of creation...and in the gospels, if we are willing to wrestle with mystery, and questions...is a truth, so powerful,that it will help all humanity, despite religion and geographic borders imagine a new world, the Kingdom of God.

Here are the profound mysterious questions I find in the gospels. Can a man understand life, solely on Jesus unedited, un reinterpreted words? Can he understand, that is, that his life doesn't belong to him...not to his own self interests, not to his family, not to nation...but to this redemptive imagination, the God of all creation? Can we understand that there is only one law to fulfill, which is found in these profound words, " To love the lord your God, with all your heart, soul, and strength...and to love your neighbor as yourself?"

Can a man realize that the aim of life is to fulfill that law, to live it out in the context of everyday living? Can a man give that law his sole allegiance, beyond even the laws and the rituals of religion, so that everything else looses all its control and power...that in divine redemptive imagination, in the intersection of God and neighbor will be the sole focus of life and living?

Can man live by the divine law of love? Can this redemptive imagination be planted into the soul of humanity? Can we develop a human consciousness that is willing to wrestle with the deepest questions of life? Always seeking a redemptive imagination to see God, and " all " humanity living in the intersection of life?

I find it profound, Jesus law of divine love is not an either or option. God and neighbor are included in the same sentence, they are inseparable. Love does not happen at the exclusion of the other. And neighbor is not defined geographically, or by race, or by language, or by religion. One can not escape the reality that we are all each others neighbor.

A New Kind of Christianity...deep questions of faith at the intersection of main street in the global village

I first casually met Brian McLaren in 2003 at the " Shifting Realities Conference ", at Lambrick Park Church.( Yikes, was it that long ago ) I had a great vantage point, I spent most of my time behind the counter in the Cafe Suburbia brewing and serving coffee. It was the ideal space for some great conversations. What captured me then, and still does is Brian's humility, his grace and his hospitality of engaging others, drawing people in to conversation. Just when the conversation seems to be sputtering like a car running out of gas, Brian has that imagination to see something else...to ask that question that brings it back to life.

I'm not ashamed, call me a " McLarenite ", Brian has always stretched me, he has encouraged me...to stretch my limits of what it means to follow Jesus.  I wasn’t alone in finding his musings engaging. Many people occupying the virtual spaces of blogs, coffee shops, the fringe of the church were asking similar questions. The conversations that followed have stretched our understanding of orthodoxy and orthopraxy. From The Church On The Other Side , New Kind of Christian ,  A Generous Orthodoxy and Everything Must Change, Brian's journey has been one of profound re-imagination of what it means to faithfully follow Jesus across the threshold of a new decade and beyond.

Brian over the years has been caught in the cross fire by his critics, feeling he's gone to far in stretching the limits of faith conversation. But, in spite of it, he always responds with gracious humility. One wonders why he keeps going. Is it the money, being a high profile author, speaking and conference tours...I really don't think so. If you've ever talked to Brian you can't miss his passion for the " Church " and for living out faith in the wide open spaces of the world, it's contagious...that's what drives him.

Brian isn’t finished dreaming, imagitating and asking deeper questions. Whether you've never read any of his work, or whether you've read it all , his latest book may be his most important and inspiring yet: A New Kind of Christianity. Brian is sage, a pilgrim who has traveled the globe in search of faith, watching, listening and listening. Out of this lengthy season of exploration and reflection comes not answers, but profound questions. In the book, Brian asks ten questions that attempt to merge our everyday living with our faith, to live faithfully in the intersection of the global communities main street.

• The Narrative Question: What Is the Overarching Storyline of the Bible?
• The Authority Question: How Should the Bible Be Understood?
• The God Question: Is God Violent?
• The Jesus Question: Who is Jesus and Why is He Important?
• The Gospel Question: What Is the Gospel?
• The Church Question: What Do We Do About the Church?
• The Sex Question: Can We Find a Way to Address Sexuality Without Fighting About It?
• The Future Question: Can We Find a Better Way of View the Future?
• The Pluralism Question: How Should Followers of Jesus Relate to People of Other Religions?
• The What Do We Do Now Question: How Can We Translate Our Quest into Action?

The OOZE are teaming up with Brian to bring these questions into your churches, coffee shops, pubs and living rooms. In addition to the Think:FWD episode here (go here for show notes BTW), They are going to be launching an entire Brian McLaren channel devoted to exploring these questions starting in February. Stay tuned! A huge huge thanks to Spencer Burke, the busiest man around, always out there in the world measuring, and listening for the pulse of what's going on at the intersection of faith, culture and technology. He seems to be interviewing everyone. I'd love it if someone sat down to interview him. ( hint, hint...Bill Dahl, or Mike Morrell )

Over at Brian McLaren's website, he has been doing a countdown to the release of the book and give us small glimpses in the way of quotes...a clever way of baiting the hook.

I'm hoping to review the book here in a couple of weeks, so stay tuned. And I'm also looking at the possibility of exploring the book in a local coffee shop with a few folks who might be interested. It would have to be an afternoon gathering likely 2:00 til 4:00, because of my work schedule. If you think you might be interested shoot me an e-mail at ( labmanster at gmail dot com )

Emerging movement...at the interesction looking beyond

A New Year always seems to bring reorganization, restructuring, out with the old and in with the new and it's a time to look back...and to look ahead. I was going through my Google Reader this morning, catching up and doing some updating. One post caught my eye, " Emerging Church Movement ( 1989-2009 )?" written by Andrew Jones aka TSK.  I've followed Andrew's blog ever since I first started following the emerging church conversation some 14 years ago. Probably more than anyone, Andrew's experience is "global", he is a teacher, practitioner, thinker and has done it globally. So I would not doubt he has a fairly good read on the pulse of the emerging church movement. What I find disheartening is some see the emerging church movement on it's death bed, some of the close family are more than ready to pronounce death while there is still a heart beat, and brain wave activity.

Just maybe were not reading all the vital signs properly. Maybe we've fallen into the same trap as the modern church, using the the same instruments for measuring life and growth. If we are, then yes, death is immanent, and maybe there never was real life. Maybe from it's premature embryonic birth, real life was not realistic. Maybe it was just a short lived lab experiment in which it used up all the medium in it's culture dish, and now with nothing left to sustain it, it is withering away. One of the deep thinkers in the emerging conversation, who still continues to stretch it's theological boundaries, Pete Rollins said this a few years ago...

" While the term ' emerging church ' is increasingly being employed to describe a well defined and well- equipped religious movement, in actual fact it is currently little more than a fragile, embryonic and diverse conversation being held between individuals over the Internet and at various small gatherings. Not only does the elusive and tentative nature of this conversation initially make it difficult to describe what, if anything, unifies those involved; the sheer breadth of perspectives held by those within the dialog makes terms such as ' movement ', ' denomination ', and ' church ' seem somewhat inappropriate. "

"Our first attempt to understand this network will often leave us with a certain frustration, as its kinetic and dynamic nature seems to defy easy reduction to a single set of theological doctrines or ritualistic practices. what we are presented with instead is a diverse matrix of relationships that bridge a number of different communities. Even a cursory glance over this network will show that the participants are unified neither by a shared theological tradition, nor by an aspiration to one day develop one. The word ' emerging ' cannot, then, be understood as describing a type of becoming that is set to one day burst onto the religious scene as a single, unified, and distinct denominational perspective ( analogous to a caterpillar that is soon to break its cocoon, and arise as a butterfly ), or a becoming that can be carefully charted ( like the trajectory of a bullet )."

Really, I think we have to ask ourselves, " What was the expectation?" Did we expect churches were going to fly an " Emergent Banner?"

Peter Rollins musing on the emerging conversation might be a few years old, but, I think in all truth we still might find ourselves closer to there than somewhere else. And, I think that is still the reality why it is so hard to measure the pulse of the emerging church movement. We knew from the beginning it was beyond definition, but certainly looking across the emerging church movement there were common denominators. Professor Scot McKnight wrote this article three years ago for Christianity Today, " Five Streams of the Emerging Church." In the opening paragraphs he says this about the movement...

To prevent confusion, a distinction needs to be made between "emerging" and "Emergent." Emerging is the wider, informal, global, ecclesial (church-centered) focus of the movement, while Emergent is an official organization in the U.S. and the U.K. Emergent Village, the organization, is directed by Tony Jones, a Ph.D. student at Princeton Theological Seminary and a world traveler on behalf of all things both Emergent and emerging. Other names connected with Emergent Village include Doug Pagitt, Chris Seay, Tim Keel, Karen Ward, Ivy Beckwith, Brian McLaren, and Mark Oestreicher. Emergent U.K. is directed by Jason Clark. While Emergent is the intellectual and philosophical network of the emerging movement, it is a mistake to narrow all of emerging to the Emergent Village.

Emerging catches into one term the global reshaping of how to "do church" in postmodern culture. It has no central offices, and it is as varied as evangelicalism itself.

You can read the whole article ( here ).

But even with the common denominators, every church planted in it's locality and context, like ecosystems is developing differently. I think that is the beauty of the emerging movement is because it is crossing the whole geographic landscape of church denominations we are seeing incredible diversity. Maybe if from the outset we were looking for conformity the conversation it would have developed much differently, or likely would have shut down all together. And maybe the biggest mistake was this subtle shift from conversation/ movement...to church. One can't help think if that became the point of arrival, or if the goal was to be a church, apart of the BIG CHURCH. 

Even since the Christianity Today article, both Emergent UK,and Emergent Village have all restructured. Emergent Village coordinating group disbanded in April of 2009 which also fueled the myth to some extent that the emerging movement was winding down. Was it the writing on the wall, the leadership throwing in the towel? I know both Brain McLaren and Tony Jones would tell nothing could be further from the truth. It was more to flatten out the leadership, invite more people in, and to expand the conversation.

I love these words from Danielle Shroyer who has been apart of the emerging movement from it's embryonic origins...

As someone who is driven by challenges, I like to look at our current chapter in this global emerging church revolution in a different way.  Now that we’ve gained a following, our challenge to be revolutionary is more important, and more difficult, than ever.   Now we must figure out a way to push the envelope in the middle of something that’s become familiar, to try to redefine church when everyone assumes they know the answer already, to speak poignantly enough so as not to be confused with the pre-fab, boxed kit, marketed products now sitting on the 50% off  table.  We got the audience we wanted, complete with a readily listening ear.  Now what will we tell them?

Now what next?”  That’s where we are right now, and I personally believe we have plenty of work left to be done.  We have institutional structures that still desperately need reform.  (Just because the Archbishop likes us doesn’t mean we couldn’t say a few more words he needs to hear!)  We have theology that is broken and tired and unhelpful that desperately needs to be re-visioned, rethought, reinvented.  We have communities of faith (and pastors leading them) who still need examples of how to live sustainably and holistically.  And I’m certain we each know plenty of people who are just trying to find a way forward in faith, still trying to ask the simplest, most important question of all (and I’d suggest it’s the question we all must ask ourselves, over and over again):  How do I follow Jesus faithfully in this world in which I live?

When I think of all the questions facing us as we enter the second decade of the 21st century, I get both giddy and dizzy at all the new ground we’ll get to cover- and that we’ll need to cover.  And I know, as we start to ask those questions and come up with our first round of answers, there will still be people joining this conversation who have yet to hear the word “missional” and others who could really use some help in re-envisioning their church gathering to reflect a change from hierarchy to web.  Somebody’s going to need friends to discuss how great the idea of perichoresis is and how brilliantly Moltmann applies it to our ecclesial shared life (and that person should call me!). Someone is going to read one of these Emergent books for the first time while browsing through Barnes and Noble and need a cohort of people to walk with through each of the questions it raises.   Someone is going to need a friend and fellow companion to walk this road.  And the beautiful, Spirit-drenched truth is that we have friends to recommend, and churches and communities of faith where we can send them, and books we can give them, and a map of cohorts we can offer up.  And as sexy as it was fifteen years ago, we didn’t have any of that on our side.  If our goal in this movement is to help people follow Jesus better in our current world, we’ve created entire networks of friendships and artifacts that can be of great comfort and help.  We’ve become that married couple who has the weight of all those beautiful memories on its side, even if it’s added a few extra pounds.

I still continue to see us somewhere here, while the term ' emerging church ' is increasingly being employed to describe a well defined and well- equipped religious movement, in actual fact it is currently little more than a fragile, embryonic and diverse conversation...leading to experimentation and practice. If we look at it in the same way as we look at emerging natural science in ecosystems it is a slow evolutionary process. Maybe, we were thinking more in terms of revolution, that by now we would have seen something more tangible. But like new growth in an old forest, this started deep beneath the forest floor...in the dirt, and the dark. Conditions, seasons, environment all dictate the rate of growth. Sometimes the growth is not always visible, sometimes roots, sometimes shoots. But the movement continues to grow, there is something happening on the forest floor.

We live in a profound place of uncertainty. Deep, deep questions about life are floating to the surface of the sea of humanity. We are at three way intersection of religion, and science...and something beyond. Our religious theological language is tired, worn out. No one is asking the questions to which we have answers for. And, science is no longer the ace in our back pocket to save us in the game of life. We live in an emerging world, of multiculturalism, pluralism, world religions, not widely spread and segregated around the world, but in your own neighborhood.

At this cross road of religion and science and looking to something beyond we need to look a redemption in a radical new dimension. We need to immerse ourselves into the truth of the gospels, not reading from the point of an answer...but to deeper questions that move us forward. The myth of certainty is over. Brilliant questions will always move us.

We need to get past personal salvation, about it just being God and us. That salvation is about God and creation, in which we are just a strand woven into the fabric of that profound relationship. The radical idea of a universal redemption, that the cross is about restoring the righteousness of all creation.

Like I say, we are at a profound place of uncertainty. But, I look ahead with excitement, and hope, and I think the emergent movement will continue to grow, and help the church to navigate that road beyond.

Some people I continue to see helping us in the conversations are Brian Swimme, Philip Clayton, Nic Paton, NT Wright, Spencer Burke, John Franke, Miroslav Volf, Jurgen Moltmann , John Caputo , Jim Henderson and yes, still, Brian McLaren.

So emerging movement ( 2010? and beyond ) yes, I think so. Put your ear to the ground and listen, maybe scratch the surface and cultivate something.

Another person I'm waiting patiently to hear from is Bill Dahl, in his upcoming January Next Wave article, " The Decline of the Emerging Church (?).

from baby...to the Cosmic Christ

This time of year, life is like the last big down hill of a roller coaster ride as we speed recklessly towards the day. But this year, It's my prayer that we would take time to pause, to sit, and to think deeply about life. To breathe in deeply the relationship between Jesus, creation and humanity. Don't let it be a fleeting thought, like a gust of wind, here for a second and then gone. Keep breathing it in, until it rests in that place where the psalmist says, " deep calls to deep."

Jesus was around long before his embryonic human presence would form in the womb of an unwed marginalized young woman. And then birthed into humanity on that starry night in the filth and stench of a stable. We seem so easily caught up in the nostalgia of the Christmas scene...

Away in a manger,
No crib for His bed
The little Lord Jesus
Laid down His sweet head

The stars in the bright sky
Looked down where He lay
The little Lord Jesus
Asleep on the hay

It's as if the scene has lulled us to sleep. We have forgotten the awesome nature of this Jesus. Whose name should leave us breathless. Where we are left silent, mouths open in awe, lost for words. Even with the limits of our imagination we come to an edge where we are left reaching, but never touch. He is the Word, through which all creation came in to being, from atoms to galaxies.

This structure of complexity, of infinite power and wisdom, of such unity that none can exist separately...it is the origin of all existence, likely beyond the physicists imagination of a pre-Big Bang theory. It is here God, the creator; the Son, the Word; and Spirit, the Power existed as something infinitely beyond human imagination, and unseen. Yet, infinitely immense as to fill everything from beginning to end.

Into a dark murky void of nothingness the Creator thought, and the Word spoke, and like wind the power moved, there was light...creation began.

In the opening of John's Gospel the writer says. " In the beginning the Word already existed. The Word was with God, and the Word was God. He existed in the beginning with God. God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him." And, that the Word, Jesus made his dwelling among us. 

This is Christmas, the Word becoming flesh, Jesus the Christ, the Messiah...Emmanuel, God with us. And out of this comes the redemptive imagination of God, the Word comes speaking, and revealing a new creation. In Jesus, the Kingdom would be near, that the Kingdom would be among us.

This new creation comes through reconciliation of Jesus...

^15-18We look at this Son and see the God who cannot be seen. We look at this Son and see God's original purpose in everything created. For everything, absolutely everything, above and below, visible and invisible, rank after rank after rank of angels—everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him. He was there before any of it came into existence and holds it all together right up to this moment. And when it comes to the church, he organizes and holds it together, like a head does a body.

 ^18-20He was supreme in the beginning and—leading the resurrection parade—he is supreme in the end. From beginning to end he's there, towering far above everything, everyone. So spacious is he, so roomy, that everything of God finds its proper place in him without crowding. Not only that, but all the broken and dislocated pieces of the universe—people and things, animals and atoms—get properly fixed and fit together in vibrant harmonies, all because of his death, his blood that poured down from the cross. ( From Colossians 1, Eugene Peterson's, The Message )

However we see this reconciliation happening we merely scratch the surface of the radical scandalous redemptive imagination of Jesus. To make this reconciliation solely a personal event is to make creation all about us, a creation just for us, and a creation outside of us. We are woven into the very fabric of creation. It is the very fabric, every strand and fiber, seen and unseen that Christ has come to redeem, restore to reconcile to himself. To restore the original relationship with "all" creation.

Against the backdrop of all that is going on here on planet earth,  I pause this Christmas, sit, reflect and breathe in deeply not an image of a baby...but of a cosmic Christ. More than ever, we are at time when the fragility of life stares us in the face. In a sense we are no more further along in this human journey than when we decided in the garden that we would eat from the tree of knowledge and become our own gods. That we could control our own destiny, create our own eternal life. Thousands of years later our own eternity has become our delusion. Our own wisdom, knowledge and technology can not save us. Humanity stands on a road in which we see unavoidably, has a dead end. We stand in a place where we have exhausted every effort to save ourselves. With all money spent, all wisdom spent...we are only left to hope.

And there is only one hope, and that is the truth, the way and the life of a Cosmic Christ. There is a way forward, and it is the way of Jesus. He came, pitched his tent in our neighborhood. He showed us, and lived the life of what it is to be truly human. He showed us life consists of an intimate relationship with God, creation and humanity. This relationship must be cultivated, nurtured, that when it is lived to the fullest we find wisdom, life...and a true revelation of the Kingdom.

So this Christmas let the Cosmic Christ capture your imagination. Let the Cosmic Christ reign in our life. Don't just slot him into some small vacant place in your life. Center your life in everything that He and His Kingdom are about. Learn to give, learn to sacrifice...to live with less. Learn to embrace all of humanity, not the colors and languages you like. Learn to care, to rekindle the covenant that the creator gave us in the garden...that we would be good stewards of all of it. There is Hope this Christmas, in the reality and totality of a Cosmic Christ.

I close from these words of a dear friend that I've come to know over the past few months. A friendship in which we both search for the truth of the Kingdom, and these words come from seeing the Kingdom unfold on Victoria's inner city streets...

Peace on Earth isn't impossible.  It has already started with you and me.
If you have seen the light in the eyes of one of our family when they have been blessed with a cup of hot chocolate, a treat, or a piece of warm clothing, you have seen a glimpse of Peace on Earth.
If you have noticed the gentleness (usually!) that this rough and ready crew exhibit towards each other when we are around, you have seen a little bit of Peace on Earth.
If you have been able to give (and receive) a hug from one of the 'least of these', you know that you have planted some seeds of Peace on Earth.
Whatever your theology might be, you have to recognize that doing what we do helps bring about the Peace on Earth that the angels sang about.

Merry Christmas...to ALL.

exploring doubtful belief...courageous imagination

Thanks to Paul Fromont for these breath taking quotes from Rollo May's book, " The Courage to Create."

“…People who claim to be absolutely convinced that their stand is the only right one are dangerous. Such conviction is the essence not only dogmatism, but of its more destructive cousin, fanaticism. It blocks the user from learning new truth, and is a dead giveaway of unconscious doubt…”

“The person then has to double his or her protests in order to quiet not only the opposition but his or her own unconscious doubts as well.” 

“…The person with the courage to believe and at the same time to admit his doubts is flexible and open to new learning”, and I’d add, open to new depths of meaning and new vantage points from which to gain new or different perspectives.

“Commitment”, May writes, “is healthiest when it is not without doubt, but in spite of doubt. To believe fully and at the same moment to have doubts is not at all a contradiction: [rather] it presupposes a greater respect for truth, an awareness that truth always goes beyond anything that can be said or done at any given moment…” 

It's interesting after many years into this journey of faith, that this is where I find myself. I fully believe, as much, as if not more than when I first started. But, I do have doubts. But, my belief has become an anchoring pin, secure enough that I can explore doubt. I can repell it's depths without fear...it's here we find new dimensions. We are at a time when we must plumb the depths of truth if we are to find a redemptive imagination that speaks hope into a world that seems to have lost all imagination.

the Truth...plain and simple

                                  ( painting by Mattia Preti 1655 )

It's remarkable that the greatest theologian that walked in the midst of humanity was Jesus. After all, was he not God in the flesh.

⁴⁴But Jesus loudly declared, The one who believes in Me does not [only] believe in and trust in and rely on Me, but [in believing in Me he believes] in Him Who sent Me.

⁴⁵And whoever sees Me sees Him Who sent Me.

⁴⁹This is because I have never spoken on My own authority or of My own accord or as self-appointed, but the Father Who sent Me has Himself given Me orders [concerning] what to say and what to tell.

⁵⁰And I know that His commandment is (means) eternal life. So whatever I speak, I am saying [exactly] what My Father has told Me to say and in accordance with His instructions. ( The Amplified Bible ; John Chapter 12 )

So although no one has seen God except maybe Moses who saw the Glory of God tucked away in the cleft of a rock, away from the radiation that might have vaporized him. I think we can say with some confidence, as humanity, we have seen God, and heard God...and tend to ignore it.

If Jesus  thought theology had to be all figured out, that his rag tag band of ragamuffins all needed to march to the same tune, why didn't he just rent classroom space in local synagogue. I don't think Jesus came to create an institution who's biggest concern seems to be believing the right things.

To begin with, the faith that Jesus reveals to us is LIVED out in the wide open spaces of everyday life. It's to take a salt shaker and shake it every where, every last granule, into every nook and cranny of creation. It's to shine light into the path of your daily living. It is living in the reality of " CHRIST IN US ", allowing that truth to shine visibly into our daily living.

There is No Where in the gospels where the disciples make a statement of faith. Peter comes close on the road to Ceasarea Philipi, the others juggle answers between teacher, rabbi and prophet. You would think if you were a teacher and one student in the class gets the answer right you might want to look at your methodology, or maybe set the bar a little higher in terms of prerequisites for class enrollment.

But Jesus knows in the faith he has come to reveal there is far more learned in belonging and following. I find it fascinating, and breathlessly beautiful that Jesus opens the door to their faith journey, and leads them across the threshold into a wedding at the village of Cana. John in the opening of his gospel says that Jesus pitched his tent in the midst of humanity. Here Jesus reveals to his followers that they are to be his incarnational presence in the midst of humanity. The wedding is a snap shot of humanity, community and culture. There is the young and the old; family and friends. There is the messiness of dysfunctional family relations. But Jesus pours himself like kegs of wine into the midst of it all. Rather than have his students working out faith with ink and scroll in the sterile environment of the synagogue...in the midst of humanity is the scroll, the landscape on which real faith is worked out.

In the gospels you don't find propositional theological truth, you find the redemptive imagination of Jesus in radical scandalous eye opening parables about the Kingdom. It was a profound truth that captured imagination on one level. On another level it was a truth that couldn't be seen until it was lived out. I am the Truth, the Life, and the Way. Living Truth is Jesus. He lived the truth of his parables. This was the faith he came to reveal.

The evangelical preoccupation with “propositional correctness of Christian doctrine” tends to destroy the vitality of the Christian faith. The reason is that such an emphasis views faith as “little more than intellectual assent to propositions, losing the vital and dynamic connection with the person of Jesus Christ, who, for Christians, alone is the truth.”

In his survey of the rise of evangelicalism, Stanley Grenz claims that the “new evangelical theology,” which was formed in the fundamentalist battle with liberalism, “oriented itself to questions of propositional truth, in contrast to the issue of one’s relationship with God characteristic of classical evangelicalism.”

In our pursuit of propositional truth we have lost sight of the historical nature of theologizing. We treat Scripture passages as timeless and culture-free statements that can be assembled to yield a timeless and culture-free theology that stands over and above the shifting sands of our postmodern culture.

Similarly, Stanley Grenz and John Franke complain that because conservative theologians view the Bible as a “storehouse of theological facts,” the goal becomes that of compiling the “timeless body of right doctrines.”

For thousands of years we've been trying to figure God out with our theological construction, laws to keep us in line with our belief. The closest religion has come to nailing God down was on a cross, and we know how that turned out.

Jesus is the transcendent truth of God. It is a truth more like the laws of physics, an invisible force beyond human imagination that holds all creation together. Jesus, the Word that spoke creation into existence; is the same Word, made flesh that spoke radical scandalous theological truth in parables that sparked the redemptive imagination of the Kingdom. It was a truth that had to be wrestled with, a truth that unravels us, unnerves us, taking us to a space where we are no longer in control, a liminal place where we confront grace, mercy and love. It is a truth that can't really be etched out in granite. It's a truth in which it's timelessness, it's eternity is discovered when it is lived out.

I had coffee with an 84 year old friend a couple of weeks ago, a saint who has a real gift of sowing seeds of encouragement. He knows that the truth of Jesus can only be discovered by following Jesus. Faith has to be lived, not just believed. He's been phoning people in his church community to live the truth, to get out into the wide open spaces and live out the gospel.

In the Fyodor Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov is a parable of the Grand Inquisitor, where Jesus returns during the time of the Inquisition. Jesus performs a number of miracles echoing the miracles of the gospels. People recognize him and adore him, Jesus is arrested by the religious leaders of the day and sentenced to be burnt to death. The Grand Inquisitor visits Jesus in his cell and tells him that the church no longer needs him.The main portion of the story is the inquisitor explaining why Jesus return would interfere with the mission of the church.

The Inquisitor states that Jesus rejected the three temptations in favor of freedom, but thinks that Jesus has misjudged human nature. He does not believe that the vast majority of humanity can handle the freedom which Jesus has given them. The story ends when Christ, who has been silent throughout, kisses the Inquisitor on his "bloodless, aged lips" instead of answering him. On this, the Inquisitor releases Christ but tells him never to return. Christ, still silent, leaves into "the dark alleys of the city." Not only is the kiss ambiguous, but its effect on the Inquisitor is as well. Ivan concludes, "The kiss glows in his heart, but the old man adheres to his idea."

Dostoevsky's story is just that, a story, but I wonder if we haven't become more enamored with our ideas of God, our theology. I wonder if Jesus came back today, if he wouldn't mess things up for us.

The truth really is simple...the truth is Jesus. It isn't a profound theological statement...it's a person. You want to know the truth...follow the person. The truth is found in the gospels. The truth becomes tangible when we live it out. When we live the gospels out daily, the truth becomes visible.

Born Again...tradin' up

I was talking to a friend last night who is teaching up at Hope Farm on the outskirts of Duncan. She is leading a group of recovering addicts through John's Gospel. This week they're looking at chapter three, the rooftop meeting with Jesus, and Nicodemus in the dark of night.

Late one night he visited Jesus and said, "Rabbi, we all know you're a teacher straight from God. No one could do all the God-pointing, God-revealing acts you do if God weren't in on it."

 Jesus said, "You're absolutely right. Take it from me: Unless a person is born from above, it's not possible to see what I'm pointing to—to God's kingdom."

Unless, a person is born again...it's not possible to see, or enter into God's Kingdom. Sadly, I think we've made this born from above, or born again into an event thing. The altar call, the revival meeting, the roman road...a choreographed dance; saying the right words, a confession, the laying of hands, a dispensing of the Holy Spirit. Suddenly your a new person, born again.

Yes, there are instantaneous realities of being born again, such as being justified, of being declared righteous before God because of Jesus sacrifice. So called, justification by faith. The reality, " born from above ", is a process. And of course the Holy Spirit being breathed into your life.

It's not as simple as trading up, taking your old beater self and trading for a newer model. Having the deal finalized when you can mumble like an auctioneer at an auto mart, and then drive away into a new life. For me, so far it has been a forty year process.

Born again is not a guaranteed loading pass on Revelation Express to heaven when the last call is announced. Being born again is about the Kingdom of God, the now, and the future of the Kingdom. Being born again is developing eyes to see what Jesus is pointing to, today.

For me it has been a series of epiphanies. Almost like looking through a frosty window on a winters day. Rubbing the window pane I see glimpses of things that weren't readily visible before. I begin to " get it." I get revelations of God's Kingdom. I develop a redemptive imagination, to see the Kingdom in places of hopelessness. I get the idea that the more we can build the Kingdom on earth as in heaven, that it becomes a profound revelation of the redemptive imagination of Jesus...pointing to the absolute glory of the future Kingdom.

Born again is not just a personal individualized spirituality trip. It's about a profound sense of wholeness in everything and everyone.

We look at this Son and see the God who cannot be seen. We look at this Son and see God's original purpose in everything created. For everything, absolutely everything, above and below, visible and invisible, rank after rank after rank of angels—everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him. He was there before any of it came into existence and holds it all together right up to this moment. And when it comes to the church, he organizes and holds it together, like a head does a body.

 He was supreme in the beginning and—leading the resurrection parade—he is supreme in the end. From beginning to end he's there, towering far above everything, everyone. So spacious is he, so roomy, that everything of God finds its proper place in him without crowding. Not only that, but all the broken and dislocated pieces of the universe—people and things, animals and atoms—get properly fixed and fit together in vibrant harmonies, all because of his death, his blood that poured down from the cross.( Colossians 1; Eugene Peterson's The Message )

Being born again is part of the wholeness, of being partners with Jesus, co-creators in the new creation. Being born again is developing the eyes to see the Kingdom in all of that, its fixing all the broken dislocated pieces of the universe. That's me and everything around me. Jesus came to heal relationships, and in God's Kingdom I'm related to everything, and everyone.

Jesus said, "You're absolutely right. Take it from me: Unless a person is born from above, it's not possible to see what I'm pointing to—to God's kingdom."