Welcome to anyone who has found their way here. The links I mentioned last night are on the right hand side of the page under the emerging church category. You may also like to read the link to sunday papers which explains more about the metaphor we discussed.
If you have any questions or feedback you can type them as a comment below.
Two contrasting recent experiences. Both working with structured organisations, but one willing to use the structure for accountability that does not get in the way of building kingdom and one where the structure got in the way of kingdom and then using the structure as defense. I can live with structures and like accountability and even understand the need for some but find it hard when people cant see beyond the structure to the opportunity. Then I find myself on the precarious on the edge of being judgemental of people whose hands are probably quite tied. The freedom of the kingdom is a spacious place, but the different approaches remind me of the now and not yet.
Was chatting over lunch to a guy about the idea many churches have of a slope of activities that lead to faith and church attendance. The idea of contact work, leading to socials, to small groups, maybe alpha and then sunday worship alongside which faith and belonging develop.
I wonder where this comes from and if anyone has any research to suggest it works. Is it another case of having a shallow theology of church and looking for methods that fit this? Joe Myers questions many of these assumptions about belonging. However I wonder how much a deep ecclesiology that is more missio dei in focus and maintains that Christ came that we may have life in all fullness enables us to see the value of each activity in and of itself without needing to see that it fits into a slope and thereby placing a value judgement of one kind on another.
This links to the redefinition of churchidea. Recenty I have been looking at a community profile of the town we are moving to and have been asked to speak to a local church mission group. It would seem that from the profile and capacity within the church there is scope for a family event. A kind of dick and dom meet ant and dec in Noels house party, with quizzes, gameshow, food, live band etc but with a level of intentionality (see point 5) that is in line with a deep eccelsiology and not part of a slope idea. Yet this would be a huge culture shift for the church.
I have signed up to the Henri Nouwen daily quote email. Today I got this, I was taken by the phrase that our vocation is hidden in where we are and who we are. As a youth worker and employed in/by a faith based agency it is too easy to slip into our vocation being what we do.
Often we want to be somewhere other than where we are, or even to be someone other than who we are. We tend to compare ourselves constantly with others and wonder why we are not as rich, as intelligent, as simple, as generous, or as saintly as they are. Such comparisons make us feel guilty, ashamed, or jealous. It is very important to realize that our vocation is hidden in where we are and who we are. We are unique human beings, each with a call to realize in life what nobody else can, and to realize it in the concrete context of the here and now.
We will never find our vocations by trying to figure out whether we are better or worse than others. We are good enough to do what we are called to do. Be yourself!
Some of the stuff we will be looking at through the session is basic missio dei stuff:-
Mission is not a program of the church but rather an attribute of God. Mission comes first from the heart of God and we are caught up in it rather than initiating it.
Mission is primarily the work of God and we participate with God in what He is doing.
Missio Dei sees our mission as stemming from the Triune God: The Father sends the Son, The Father and the Son send the Spirit, The Father and Son and the Spirit send the church.
As the Father sent me, so I send you. (Jesus)
Therefore one of the things that Bosch highlights is the role of church in the process Bosch would say “Mission denotes the total task God has set before the church.. To love, to serve, to preach, to teach, to heal, to liberate the world� Continue reading
Been doing some prep for a lecture on mission. I always liked Bosch transforming mission and found it very shaping but somewhat heavy going. However in prepping for the lecture I have been using Nussbaums reader which is excellent and have found it helped having Nussbaum highlight particular quotes. I can’t help wondering where Bosch’s work on church and mission would have eventually taken him if he had been able to continue his work. If you are unfamiliar with his stuff or found it to hard work I would thoroughly recommend Nussbaums Reader.
I am not one for new years resolutions, I find them unhelpful and would rather set my mind on something at whatever point in time and stick to it. Looking ahead however is a consuming issue for me. I spend a lot of time planning, culture watching, time framing etc. Recently I have been wondering more and more how relevant this is. Practically it makes sense when I have such a busy schedule, but I am not sure how good it is for the soul. If I don’t plan holiday it can get squezzed out, but equally there may be value for the hearer or who ever you are meeting to say (with some advance warning) I need some family space, or whatever. Not overly practical I know but perhaps more honestly human, as I don’t know six months in advance when I need a holiday. Making the most of every moment, and valuing the time we are in, has always been important but wonder how much the essence of these moments get pushed out as I plan every moment ahead.
What role does looking back have on future change?
Great couple of days on retreat, led my Stuart Murray (post Christendom). We did some work on parables and values all good stuff. Over the retreat I was also reading A Scandalous Prophet The way of Mission after Newbigin. Someone I have great respect for, and whose work over the years I have valued greatly. The first chapter is on Newbigin as a public theologian but I couldn’t help questioning what was written as a very Christendom approach (I am aware he was writing at a time when this was stronger) but it also made question the whole role of debating theologically with structures and power systems, and how do we approach change and dialogue in a more powerless way. How we promote a system that is more about powerless persuasion and journey and not one that promoted as the right and only alternative?
I kind of link it to a stange idea about applying to go on Big Brother, with the idea to see if I could get the whole group to aggree on certain values and questions to promote through the whole programme. Real basic lowest common denominator (LCD) stuff like “where is the love” or “if you don’t know your nieghbour then talk to them” or even just concious raising stuff like “why is the world not like it could be”. Or even develop a symbol that summed up these kind of statements. I thought we could spray cleaning fluid into the grass so every time the camera showed the garden a message would be seen.
Anyway back to the real world, I wonder if LCD is the kind of public theology we need in the post christendom world.
Keith writes a complex issue so brilliantly I wanted to paste some here
Cotton is a Christian issue! Cotton and other agricultural subsidies in rich western countries are robbing people in poor countries like Burkina Faso of honestly earned income. What should our response be?
Burkina Faso’s exemplary efficiency
Burkina Faso is a model of efficiency and production – at least when it comes to cotton. Her cotton farmers are the most efficient in the world, producing cotton at only 21 cents/lb. Cotton, known as “white gold” in Burkina, is the main export of this, the third poorest country in the world, providing half her export earnings. So you would think that everyone would be keen to applaud such an exemplary effort of a developing country helping itself, independant of international aid. Especially in a country of which US officials recently said: “we are proud of their success in encouraging economic and personal freedoms…”American cotton subsidies take from the poor
But not so, apparently. Even at such prices, Burkina struggles to sell her cotton. This is because American cotton, produced at 72c/lb is subsidised to the tune of 3 billion/year to her 25 000 cotton farmers, thus depriving the poor of an honest income. It is estimated these subsidies cost West African cotton farmers $250 million in lost income. Burkina Faso, for instance, received $10 million in U.S. aid in 2002 but lost an estimated $13.7 million in exports because of U.S. cotton subsidies.Next to this, the U.S. pledge of $7 million (of which only $5 million is new money) to aid West African cotton farmers hurt by these subsidies seems ridiculous. As Francois Traore, president of the union of Burkinabe cotton producers, said:
“This is a question of human rights. We’re not asking for a gift, we’re asking for just rules.”
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