Mission and Inclusion

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I have been discussing with a student, issues around Mission and Inclusion. On further reflection the issues for inclusion when we have a Kingdom based approach are vast. Impacting practice and theology around church, language and choice(see last post), mission etc. It can be hard to remember when at the coalface of trying to get involved with God in building the kingdom, that it is already here. This dual paradigm, and living as an in-between people has all sorts of issues. For a long time I have been trying to grapple with the issues of inclusion and kingdom, and it is still so easy to forget the God given image that young people maintain in their DNA. How far this may be a key to working in this kingdom which is now and not yet. I am wondering if we might borrow from education theory which has two basic approaches; banking knowledge or drawing out learning. Much of our history of mission sees banking as the way, inputting the gospel story (or evangelical theological takes on it) and then seeing young people respond. How much can we draw out the image of God within? Some traditional evangelical language talks about people having “a God shaped hole in their life”. Maybe we can turn this on its head, and see young people as having a small God shaped light already in their life and our role is to encourage that to shine into the rest of their life. A helpful metaphor???

Choice and faith

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When we are working with people to look at issues, it seems to be increasingly important for people to maintain a sense of control over decisions made and this is the basis of all good one to one work. Yet when we talk about choosing to become a Christian we use language such as giving over you life to God. This can lead to people seeing faith as something that will have the effect of changing them reguardless of what they think or their part in the process and thus for some becomes a stumbling block.
Do we need to think more about our language in contemporary society and encourage people to see that the choice is theirs and resides with them. They have the choice to change and God will take their loaves and fishes and do with it as S/He will, but that following God and the changes that result are always dependent on our choosing to bring forward the loaves and fishes each day.

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plan

“I love it when a plan comes together” said Hannibal of the A team. I love it when suddenly things seem to come together in a way you don’t expect. I don’t about you but I often have my head down plugging away, working away on a project and seeking to make things happen and slowly unaware to you God is doing the same. You reach the end of your efforts and God starts to unleash THE plan and opens a new way forward.

Great!

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Been doing quite a bit of networking and traveling recently. Keep hearing great stories and meeting people doing creative things with concepts of church, youth work, detached stuff all sorts. Many of the people who I met have never heard of fresh expressions, emerging church etc, or read any of the books, some people may have come across bits and pieces but the great thing is that they are proactive and responding in ways that are not just following what they have heard others doing but following God into new missionary activity.

looking for some feedback

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I am preparing an article on detached work. One of the questions I have is about the values of detached work. Many of these are drawn from notions of journey, core youth work values, incarnation, relationship theology etc. When i started christian detached work in the early 1990’s (how old am I) these values were still quite fresh and my observations were that they were not the same as i observed in many other christian projects. The growth of writing about relational youth work (Ward etc) and the growth of professional christian training seems to have moved the values I saw in detached work to being more a part of mainstream christian youth work. Is this true in your experience? Any help please?

In the final

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I have supported the hammers since I met an older, cooler cousin, who had West ham written all over his trainers, I was nine at the time that I pledged my allegiance to the team. That season we won the FA cup and it has been a long time, through relegation, Harry moving on etc that I have stuck with them. My commitment hasn’t really changed, but I no longer have a scarf or write them on my trainers. West Ham or at least my notional commitment to them being my team is a strange constant in my life. We don’t have Sky so I rarely see them on the TV, I will make a point of seeing how they have done at the weekend but couldn’t tell you who they are playing next week. Yet I know they are the team I support. Perhaps its a wishy washy commitment by some standards, but it is a constant and open one to those who ask.

Knitting

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A few things caught my attention and I have knitted them together chesk out this hattip to Rev TC and the quote below Hattip Steve

“…the more I considered Christianity, the more I found that while it had established a rule and order, the chief aim of that order was to give room for good things to run wild.”
G.K.Chesterton in ‘The Paradoxes of Christianity’.

When we are spiritually free, we do not have to worry about what to say or do in unexpected, difficult circumstances. When we are not concerned about what others think of us or what we will get for what we do, the right words and actions will emerge from the center of our beings because the Spirit of God, who makes us children of God and sets us free, will speak and act through us.

Jesus says: “When you are handed over, do not worry about how to speak or what to say; what you are to say will be given to you when the time comes, because it is not you who will be speaking; the Spirit of your Father will be speaking in you” (Matthew 10:19-20).

Let’s keep trusting the Spirit of God living within us, so that we can live freely in a world that keeps handing us over to judges and evalutators.
Henri Nouwen

Holidays are great

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Holidays are great. Starting back can be hard, and after a stressful few weeks followed by a couple of weeks off, it is easy to slip back into things at a breakneck pace. However I am determined to manage more effectivly. For me this isn’t just about time but also the amount of things to be juggled. Too many things hovering and needing to be done adds more stress to me than actual amount of time I spend working. So the reflecting through this post confirms that something needs to go.

Where's the start

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Great few days with Bob and Mary Jackson and Howard Pesekett as part of the MA I studying. Looking at the issues to do with church and mission. Lots of stuff from fresh expressions and good to get such a long term view from Bob. Interesting to hear Howard’s views on the links to his mission experience and start to put it altogether.

Also with a lot of background material about church planting it helped me make sense of a lot things I had observed over the years. Good to relook at some stuff I had not seen in a while particularly, Warrens model and entry points for church planting (worship, mission, community). Also The church armys Encounter from the Edge series by George Ling, one of which reinforced the need to start with community. Together it gave me more of a context and rationale for several questions I have had in the past around church planting in UPAs and explained (at least in my head) one of the historic weaknesses that I often saw in church plants that often aimed towards the entry point of worship.

Some good implications for the Church on the edge, and need to build community, and how this can correlate. When we see mission and worship in a more wholistic sense, how more important the building and growing and exploring community stages identified so far in the church on the edge project are. Both as a startpoint and as way to move beyond some of the current models.

Inside Man video