December 30, 05 by ed
Young people and technology are redefining church and how we belong.
<%image(20051230-youngpeople.jpg|184|260|youth)%> First of all the New York Times reports that young people attend multiple churches based on what they feel each has to offer.
“In a survey of 13- to 17-year-olds conducted from 2002 through 2003, the National Study of Youth and Religion found that 16 percent of respondents participated in more than one religious congregation. Four percent attend youth groups outside their congregations.”
They are not interested in being limited to one church’s programs. In some respects this seems to be a very positive trend. Teens recognize that they need guidance and a relevant message and they are not afraid to go beyond traditional boundary lines to acheive that end. The article reports:
“We see it all the time, everywhere,” said Jose Zayas, director of teenage evangelism for Focus on the Family, a conservative Christian group based in Colorado Springs. “They gravitate to where they feel a connection. They’re more pragmatic than their parents’ generation. They look at what works for them. I think it’s healthy.”
Yet there are some really disturbing parts of the article. First all, I know that the anti-consumeristic blood hounds are waiting to pounce. Yes, this may very well be a case of teens looking out for their needs and gobbling up whatever they can lay their greedy paws on. This may be the case. But we all consume. It’s a necessity. I wonder if they give back in addition to consuming. Giving back keeps consumers from being chubs.
Actually, what disturbs me the most about this article are some of the quotes from the teens themselves. And the quotes reveal some of the incomplete doctrine they are being taught. The pastors and teachers who shovel this stuff to them should know better. They should also read Tony Jone’s excellent article on youth ministy in the book Stories of Emergence about being a pastor and not a promoter.
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December 29, 05 by ed
Time away from VT in Philly was good for us. We needed a little bit of time in the car to talk, we needed to catch up with family (who reminded me that I hadn’t sent them our new address, sorry!), and I really needed time to think. So today will be a little inventory of some ideas I hope to fill in over the next week or so.
1. Theology books are boring. I’m sorry, I love them like a brother, but they’re boring. The Younger Evangelicals changed my life, but boring. Beyond Foundationalism is an incredible book by two of my favorite theologians, but (sorry fellahs) boring. The Next Reformation, The Cambridge Companion to Postmodern Theology, Transforming Mission, boring , Boring, BORING!!! I even told the elders of a church that Missional Church is an incredible book, but none of them should attempt a reading. Find someone at a seminary who can provide the Reader’s Digest Condensed Version.
Of course I pull through, persevere, and benefit immensely from their content. And don’t get me wrong, I’m glad we have these books. We are better off with them. Nevertheless, my initial plunge into Emerging Churches by Gibbs and Bolger is teaching me that theology books do not have to be boring. How so? By telling stories. Stories are not usually boring, and theology needs to be rooted in some kind of example, context, etc.
And that brings me to idea number two. . .
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December 24, 05 by ed
The NY Times reports the story of the Little Shell Tribe of Indians who were forcibly removed from the land in 1892 and who are still fighting for a piece of real estate in the state of Montana to call their own. The article reports:
Today, with most of its members living in public housing around Great Falls, Mr. Shield and Mr. Boham are leading a protracted fight for government recognition of the tribe. Recognition would allow their people to gain control of federal money to buy land here for a tribal headquarters and housing, and to win back a measure of dignity.
Read the whole article.
December 24, 05 by ed
<%image(20051224-way of heart.jpg|65|97|wayofheart)%> In continuing my meditations on the works of Henri Nouwen and his thoughts on prayer and solitude, the following have been pointing me to the place where we can meet and share Jesus:
“Compassion is hard because it requires the inner disposition to go with others to the place where they are weak, vulnerable, lonely, and broken” (34).
“We have to give up measuring our meaning and value with the yardstick of others. To die to our neighbors means to stop judging them . . . Compassion can never coexist with judgment” (35).
“Solitude molds selfrighteous people into gentle, caring, fogiving persons who are so deeply convinced of their own great sinfulness and so fully waware of God’s even greater mercy that their life itself becomes ministry. In such a ministry there is hardly any difference left between doing and being” (37).
“About the desert fathers and mothers: “Anthony and his followers, who escaped the compulsions of the world, did so not out of disdain for people but in order to be able to save them” (39).
We would do well to heed the words of Nouwen. He points us to the place where we can meet Jesus and act with compassion to one another. I don’t see a lot of compassion in myself and in the church. Perhaps we need to be alone more often.
December 24, 05 by ed
<%image(20051224-damon_i.jpg|275|200|damon)%> Ah, nothing warms my Philadelphia heart like mediocrity and poor management of a sports team. Yes, the Boston Red Sox’s blunder in the case of Johnny Damon is wonderful to watch. The fans are outraged, calling him a traitor, Judas, Brutus, you name it. And I just shrug my shoulders. This is nothing new to a guy from the inept sports city of Philly.
And let Philly be the first to comfort Boston with the prophecy that Damon will have the biggest year of his career and lead the Yankees to a World Series title. That’s how it’s going to be. Just expect it.
Before we cast stones at Damon, it is advisable to consult the article by Bill Simmons at espn.com. He writes:
The question remains: If you were Johnny Damon, would you have passed up $12 million to return to a team that didn’t really seem to want you back? Didn’t think so. He’s not Anakin, he’s not Judas, he’s not the Reverse Earl Hickey. He’s just another businessman who followed the money and never looked back.
In other words, he’s a professional athlete.
His points:
- fans are fickle and turn on athletes
- they would have eventually booed Damon out of Boston anyway
- athletes follow money like a hound on the scent of a fox
Read the rest of the article.
December 23, 05 by ed
<%image(20051223-outofsolitude.JPG|122|150|outof)%> Part of my meditations this advent include reading some of Henri Nouwen’s books. He has a simple way of cutting to the chase, much like C. S. Lewis in fact. His book titled Out of Solitude calls Christians to stillness before God. Through a series of three meditations on the silence and solitude of Christ he asserts that Jesus met God in that solitude and ministered out of the strength he drew from that time.
In a culture that defines us by what we “do”, Nouwen encourages the reader to be defined by that time of silence and what God says in it. Easy to read, but hard to do.
His other book on prayer is titled With Open Hands. I’m not too far into it, but have found the imagery of closed fists and open hands to be helpful in my conception of prayer. His simple question is something like the following: Are we tightly clenching our fists, not letting God in to the hurting and debilitating places of our lives? Or are we letting him in to work his healing.
What struck me more than anything is the need for faith that things can better. Change and renewal can happen. God can bring a new reality to our lives. It is far to easy to bear with the devil we know rather than imagining that God can give us a new life. Fear of failure or of being let down by God often freezes me, stalling any movement toward God and his freedom.
December 22, 05 by ed
<%image(20051222-bishop_pearson.jpg|236|192|pearson)%> This American Life reported the story of Bishop Carlton Pearson who dropped the doctrine of hell, preached a Gospel of inclusion, and then was promptly dropped by just about everyone he knew. To hear it, look under the 2005 archives for the story labeled “Heretic.”
It’s extremely thought-provoking to hear his journey and the ways that he believes God led him to the Gospel of inclusion. While dropping hell altogether does not strike me as being particularly faithful to historic Christian Orthodoxy, the story of Reverend Pearson reveals some major problems in how the chruch handles theology and our subsequent relationships.
- First of all, everyone is deeply concerned about their image. No one wants to be seen with a heretic. No one wants to look bad. Friendships are disposable if it means we can save face. The way people fled from Rev. Pearson like rats from a sinking ship is inexcusable. Sure there is room for discipline, correcting errors, and so forth, but wholesale abandonment over theological scruples is extreme overkill.
-Secondly, let’s face it, we don’t know as much about hell and salvation as we think we do. There are some things that are mysteries. While scripture seems pretty clear about there being some kind of judgment, some kind of punishment, some separation of sheep from goats, and some designation of the saved from the unsaved, we don’t have a clear handle on it.
While I think that Pearson is wrong, I wonder how precise we have to be in our doctrine of hell. Where do we draw the line between orthodoxy and heresy? Can we perhaps be more charitable in the doctrine of hell than in essentials such as the humanity and divinity of Christ?
And with that in mind, here’s my own bit of heresy:
What if God told Pearson to preach the Gospel of inclusion?
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December 21, 05 by ed
<%image(20051221-mtsinai.jpg|238|174|fuzzy sinai)%> After a relaxing evening I have to concede that my spy mission to discover the real Mt. Sinai was inconclusive (read more about the search). Sigh. The picture of Google Earth is great until you get really close. It then becomes a solid mass of fuzz. So major sites like New York City, the Pyramids, the Grand Canyon, and so forth are very clear and quite fun to check out.
Another part of our quiet evening at home was the film “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.” We found it to be quite an interesting flick. I essentially deals with the relationship of two characters portrayed by Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet. Their relationship hits hard times, Kate has Jim erased from her memory, he attempts to respond in kind, but finds that he truly loves her in the midst of memory deletion. It’s a quirky love story that shows all of the complexities and pain that true love calls for.
Even better than that, I think it asks the question, “If we could erase our mistakes, would we be any better off?” I think the answer is no to a certain degree. Of course you can always find exceptions, but this movie suggests that removing parts of our past and those mistakes are like deleting parts of ourselves. Even if we benefited from memory erasure, we would still be drawn to make the same mistakes again since we have no previous experiences to guide us. Carey and Winslet portray characters who are on bound on a course for each other, no matter how hard they try to stop it. Very thought-provoking.
December 20, 05 by ed
My finest idea came last night and of course the New York Times wrote a story about it today. Man, the information age is way too much for me. Maybe George W. has tapped our brains as well as our phone lines . . . but I digress.
I was thinking of how neat it will be to use Google Earth as a way to study Biblical geography (by the way, download Google Earth if your internet is fast enough and your computer is new enough, it’s way too much fun). Think about it, you could get all kinds of shots of the wilderness for the Exodus, check out the Sea of Galilee, and observe mountain and valley formations. Whereas maps are dull, drap, and horribly static, Google Earth is far more interactive and open for zooming and roaming.
That led to another thought . . . Since going to Israel in 2005, I have always been curious about several archeological sites. Before boarding the plane, my friend Adam said, “Don’t bother going to Mount Sinai, it’s probably the wrong site.”
That unleashed tons of speculation and curiousity about the real location of Mt. Sinai. It’s supposedly covered up by the Saudi Arabian government. It’s probably in their interest to keep one of the holiest Jewish and Christian sites under wraps. But now Google Earth will enable me to leap past their security fences and have a look at the desert by the Red Sea. I’ll have a look tonight and post my findings tommorrow. I’m curious if anyone else can find something.
December 20, 05 by ed
We left off this article with the challenge of reversing conventional church wisdom: “The equation is as follows in either case: new generation = new program.”
That may have worked in the past, but I strongly doubt a facelift of current church offerings will connect with those outside of church. Their concerns and connection points are well beyond the walls of the church, and that is where we must go. To those on the outside, church is for church people who hate gays, vote republican, judge, evangelize, force their views on other people, and are generally stuck up and mean. Would any person willingly go to a place with even one of those negative associations tacked on to it? Whether or not these stereotypes are true, they cover the church like a tacky paint job.
Whereas the pragmatic church moved from programs to relationships in a previously “churched” context, the emerging church requires a reversal. Relationships must precede programs, if programs enter the picture at all. Even if you start a program, effectiveness is proportional to the priority given to relationships. And with relationships as our goal, here is what you can do about the emerging church today.
Mentor
I have never met a member of the emerging church who would refuse a mentor relationship, even if the mentor is into pragmatic church. If the mentor is willing to hear them out and extend a little grace and patience, any church leader can easily connect with a small part of the emerging church.
Start with one person. Get to know him/her, challenge blind spots, pray together, encourage one another, and help him/her figure out God’s calling. This person may never help with your current programs and may even leave your church to find a placed that’s more in line with God’s calling. But I would guess that investing in just one person in the emerging church will open your eyes to new ministry opportunities. Those in the emerging church know what ministries to the unreached will not work and they may even have some innvations of their own. Just be ready for this: it will most likely NOT take place in your church facility.
Relationships are the starting point. Before you sit down and strategize, go out to a diner or hang out at a coffee shop with someone in the emerging church.
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December 19, 05 by ed
<%image(20051219-endofspear.jpg|400|285|end of spear)%>
I honestly think King Kong will have nothing on “The End of the Spear”. It’s a movie based on the mission of Jim Elliot and four Christian missionaries to the Auca tribe of Ecuador. While their wives and children waited to hear word from them, the five men were killed by the tribe because some young people falsely accused the men of threatening them. The young teens were just trying to keep themselves out of trouble and it was easy to blame the foreigners.
<%image(20051219-sandbar.jpg|218|134|sandbar)%> What’s more amazing is that Elizabeth Elliot and Rachel Saint went eventually shared the Gospel with this tribe about 2 years later. Since the tribe lived by violence, they found that having lost family and friends to the spears of the warriors gave them something in common with the tribe. They found a true bond with the people and the love of Jesus has infiltrated the tribe to the point that violence has significantly eroded away. In fact, they only agreed to help with a documentary and the subsequent movie after hearing how violent the USA is. They wanted to help the people who had helped them so much.
I watched the documentary, Beyond the Gates of Splendor this past weekend. It was riveting, emotional, powerful, inspiring, and incredibly well done.
The movie titled, End of the Spear will come out on January 20th. It’s based on the book with the same title by Steve Saint, a son of one of the missionaries who lived with the tribe and befriended the man who had killed his father. It’s an absolutely astounding story. If the movie is anything like the documentary, it should be a great film. Yes it will probably have some strong Christian overtones, but the documentary was far from preachy. It just told the story, and the story itself is enough.
I have only heard bits and pieces of the story of Jim Elliot. The truth is that all of these missionaries were/are incredible disciples of Christ who gave up what they could not keep to gain what they could never lose (HT Jim). The five missionaries who were martyred had guns, but refused to use them. They declared, “We’re ready for heaven, and the Aucas are not.” That is faith if I’ve ever seen it.
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December 19, 05 by ed
<%image(20051219-missionary.1841.jpg|184|210|missionary)%>The New York Times has an interesting story about the work of South Koreans in bringing the Gospel to China and to North Korea. Apparently many North Koreans escape to the South and some convert to Christianity with the help of missionaries. What I find most amazing is the fact that North Korea was the starting point of the Gospel in the Korean peninsula.
With a nearly 30 percent Christian population, the South has the world’s second largest missionary movement, after the United States, with 14,000 people abroad. An estimated 1,500 are deployed in China, evangelizing secretly and illegally among Chinese and among North Koreans living in China - a population that various estimates say ranges from 10,000 to as many as 300,000. South Korean missionaries shelter North Koreans and have brought thousands here to the South; others train them to return home to proselytize, as well as smuggle Bibles into the North.
For the South’s missionaries, converting people from the North, where Christianity first spread before the peninsula’s division, dovetails with their dream of a reunified peninsula. “Oh Lord, please send us, for our brethren up North,” reads a verse in the most popular hymn among missionaries working with defectors, “Evangelical Song of Unification.” It is also part of a larger dream of spreading the Gospel along the Silk Road back to its source.
Read the whole article.
Other news that’s worth a look.
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December 16, 05 by ed
Psalm 62
For the director of music. For Jeduthun. A psalm of David.
1 My soul finds rest in God alone;
my salvation comes from him.
2 He alone is my rock and my salvation;
he is my fortress, I will never be shaken.
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December 16, 05 by ed
<%image(20051216-roundtable.jpg|150|75|axis roundtable)%> Silence. More silence. Evasion. These were my replies to a pastor and friend who asked, “What should we do about the people who aren’t connecting with our church?” My mind was blank. I saw the problems well enough, but the solutions seemed to be out of my grasp. Emerging jargon such as relational, missional, contemplative, and experiential generously poured from my lips, but they were only concepts leaked onto the floor. They ran amuck, never coalescing into a comprehensible form and leaving my pastor-friend high and dry.
A few years and experiences later and I may be on to something. The problem with many of us who want to connect with emerging generations is our preference for the quick programmatic fix. I have no issue with programs in their proper place and in the correct order. And that is the matter we must discuss.
Before you can make any decision concerning your programs, you have to understand your context. The seeker-sensitive or pragmatic church understood its context and adapted. While critics can find flaws and mistakes in the pragmatic approach, it essentially caught on to the spirit of the times. In a culture with Christian roots and a desire for a laid back way to approach God, tweaking the service, attracting seekers, and building relationships (once they were in the fold) worked. And yes it still works in some contexts, but let’s not get too settled.
The emerging generations who have grown up in a very different, often God-less, world from their parents will need a new approach to church. The temptation of any church that is not connecting with this generation is to tweak programs. That was the problem before. If people wouldn’t come to one kind program, then surely they will come if the music is better, the sermon addresses their choice of issues, and you serve them coffee afterwards. And for those who really want to reach this generation, emergency elder meetings be damned, they may even have contemplative prayer, lectio divina readings, and go to a bar for Guinness. The equation is as follows in either case: new generation = new program.
To Be Continued.
December 15, 05 by ed
<%image(20051215-jibjab2.jpg|125|143|jibjab2)%> CNET reports that jibjab.com, the creators of the insanely popular “This Land” ditty of 2004 have added a new video to their collection. Their previous political stuff is hilarious, a bit over the line at times, but wonderfully hysterical satire.
<%image(20051215-jibjab.jpg|103|103|jibjab)%> You have to watch a short ad before the videos, and it’s usually well worth the wait. Heck, I’d toss in a commercial or two if I was in their shoes. If you have not seen “This Land” or “Second Term,” give them a look at jibjab.com.
