Questions

I have been thinking about what it means if we are to Pray with out ceasing and to live our life as a life of worship, and what implications this has for our construction or paradigm of church? Does it mean our paradigm is way too small?

Do we need to re-frame to “live your life as life of church or church without ceasing?

I have been doing some thinking how/what this could look like but before I discuss this I wanted to do some more thinking hence the above questions so any thoughts appreciated.The Last Days of Disco movie

Greenbelt, cyclists, and seminars

Rob and Maz arrived about 10pm on Friday Night and were surprisingly relaxed and healthy. Seeing them around site over the last few days they looks refreshed and revived.

The festival was as good as ever. I went to two brilliant seminars Pete Rollins on The Third Mile arguing that Christ was opposed to ethics, 14 pages of notes in a hour, when I get the tape I will be re-listening for about a month; and Jonathan Bartlet on post Christendom politics and the church as a movement for anarchy, great stuff and is the follow up of Stuart Murry’s post Christendom books.

The Frontier Lecture with Bob and Annette Holman went well with over 150 people attending. One excellent point raised was the use of the word integration in the Green paper and that this was about structures rather than relationships and process. A challenge for use is to re read the paper replacing the word integration with the notion of shalom and see how this impacts our practice.

Progress Report

Resting in the Evening sun

Rob and Maz are doing well and having some great encounters including a cyclist who led them across Derby and the owner of the B and B they stayed in donating £5 to FYT. They are about 60 miles into the trip where the picture was taken and heading to Walsall today.

It is not too late for you to support this event check this link to see a crazy way to get involved

THEY’RE OFF

They're Off

The FYT Virtual Cycle ride has started and Rob and Maz have made it from Macclesfield to Waterhouse and are travelling down the Derby side of Birmingham as of last night they had about 110 miles to go.

It is not too late for you to support this event check this link to see a crazy way to get involved

Outside in part 2

I guess the feeling that theological reflection has the ability to change what was an outwardly negative event to a positive inner event is that as we bring God into the situation we can start a redemptive process. One example could be the writings of Rita Nakashima Brock in Journeys by Heart – A Christology of Erotic power where some of the oppression suffered by women that stems from a male patriarchal view of the trinity is examined and challenged. She goes onto use feminist theology to “liberate” Christ from “the unholy trinity” calling for the heart of Christianity to be reinterpreted in non oppressive ways. Taking Jesus as the model of self giving, obedience, love and liberation, she describes two parts to the questions that this raises as we encounter situations. (I would call these theological reflection questions) Firstly there is the question what would Jesus do or have me do in this situation and secondly How do I and others feel right now – What can I do to lessen the suffering? The first is an external question and the second is a question of the heart that moves us towards self possession, a greater connection and an inner redemptive process.

Whilst Brock is addressing some pretty deep theological issues the identification of the two focuses of the questions demonstrates what can happen when we risk entering into theological reflection about any issue (positive or negative) and move beyond the questions of what could I have done differently to the internal questions that challenge our christlikeness and responsibilities for inner growth and change.

Make any sense Ben and Phil?

The Robe video