Wonderlust Theology

God Likes Our Neighborhood

2012-02-13T14:03:00.000-08:00

From the moment I found out that we were having a daughter over 4 years ago, I began to pray that she would be my little Feminist Theologian. And sometimes she says things that make me think God might just answer my prayers. Just the other night we shared one of those moments where I realized that Gracie may actually believe some of the things I say and pray a little more than I do.

Out of the blue Gracie looked at me with her deep, beautiful, inquisitive eyes and declared "God likes our neighborhood!!!"

In her mind this little profound statement was just a simple expression of reality as she understands it. This is the narrative that she experiences life through, and it it beautiful. While I say that God loves our neighbors and neighborhood there are many times I wonder how he could.

For many of us we have been told the wrong story, given a poor narrative to live by. We have been convinced that there is not enough, that we ought to judge and hate people for their mistakes/addictions/flaws, that we are right and so they must be wrong, that we belong here and they do not, that the world is out to get us, that there are a lot of bad people, that we have no responsibility to anyone but ourselves, and worst of all God loves us but not those who are different than us. We have sadly believe that God does not actually like our neighborhoods.

God does love our neighborhood, he even likes it. The people here are a delight to him, and this is the type of place I think Jesus would want to live. I think Jesus would find great joy in every single person who lives here, and I think he would always be dreaming with people of a healthier life. He would be in the work of restoration, the work that requires eyes always looking for the good and beautiful hidden in the dilapidated and broken.

Jesus was always announcing this overflowing, inclusive, generous love to people. My daughters question first made me wonder if I believed it, then caused me to wonder if the people in my neighborhood know it. To often there are people speaking judgment, intolerance, and even hatred against people in the name of Jesus. This is blasphemy, this is violence being committed against the kingdom of God. We may not like who all God has invited to the great banquet of his love, but what a horror it would be if we missed the banquet because we didn't think the guests were deserving enough. I want to announce this, to creatively encounter my neighbors and neighborhood in a way that communicates "God likes you, and he really likes our neighborhood."

Most of all I am realizing how God allows me to raise my daughter in a way that calls me into honestly living out the radical love of God. Kids have a funny way of reflecting back to you what you say in a way that catches you off guard and actually operates as a critique of your practical theology. I hope my daughter Gracie leads a revolution. I hope her love for God, for people, and for the world leads her to critique the broken systems that would make room for oppression, poverty, exclusion, and hatred. I want her to be a radical for love, not because she is trying to be a radical, but because she is so compelled by love that their is no other way for her to live. I want her to grow up in a world where people know that God likes them, and I want here to be a continual call to me to live into that vision also.

The Unknown Familiar Places

2012-02-01T19:49:00.000-08:00

The other day I found myself walking down a trail I have walked a thousand times. At one point though, about 2 miles in, I realized that I was now walking where I had never walked. I would say that I know this trail, and I do, yet here I was in an unknown familiar place. It was a space that my mind easily imagined the contours of, but my feet had never felt. My awareness of the beauty around me was heightened as I started to know it in a new way.

Neighborhoods can be this same way, a space that is entirely familiar to us and yet remains unknown. We know the streets, we know the parks, we know the house that leaves their Christmas decorations up until Easter, we know the house that always throws parties, we know the house with the beautiful community garden, we know the streets we choose to avoid, we know the streets we wish we lived on, we know where the schools are, we know our way around, but the people and the space remains in this unknown familiar place.

While walking on the trail I became aware of this, aware of the fact that most times I live in my neighborhood but don't really inhabit it. That I wave at people and say hi without really knowing them. I could tell you a lot about my neighborhood, and even the people that live there. But if you spent a week with me how many of their stories would you hear? How many houses would you walk into? Would you be impressed with my familiarity or confused by how little I really know? This takes time, it takes a continual entering of that space, and it is never ending. I had to walk that trail into the unknown, and I am realizing more and more how much I need to walk my neighborhood. I need to pay more attention to my surroundings, and I am realizing how much more I need to listen. My desire is to inhabit this place, to be a part of the fabric of the Roosevelt Neighborhood, and to have my life intertwined with the real lives of others.

A little after the two and half mile marker I stopped and turned around. I thought it might be a good idea to leave some of the trail undiscovered, it might remind me that I don't really know this trail as fully as I could. I think I also stopped there and turned around because it would have been harder to appreciate my new discoveries if I just charged on, I wanted to take this place in, to fully savor its beauty. In the same way, I am venturing out to savor the beauty of my neighbors and neighborhood as I dig in deeper to inhabit the space where I find myself, and where I imagine my life rooting down for many years to come.

What's a Peacemaker?

2012-01-18T09:57:00.000-08:00

The other day as my daughter was going to sleep I prayed over her as I do every night, but something I said caught her attention. When I was done praying she asked me what a Peacemaker is, because I prayed that she would be a peacemaker. All of the sudden I had to explain this idea to a 3 year old and tried to give a simple answer that she could understand. I’m not sure my answer made as much sense as I had hoped.

A few days later we were watching “How to train your dragon” and I quickly realized that this was a picture of what I had tried to explain, and I talked with my little Gracie about how Hiccup was a peacemaker. In the movie Hiccup goes against what everyone else is doing and creatively finds a new way to relate to dragons. He chose friendship and relationship over violence. That is what a peacemaker is, someone who seeks to know and understand the other rather than violently responding out of fear. It is someone who seeks a new way through the complex tensions of relationship.

Maybe this tree is what Peacemaking looks like. It is called the Tree of Life, and was created out of weapons that had been used as the instruments of war and violence. Around the world there are many places that have become memorials to a variety of wars and violence. I find that these memorials tend to serve the purpose of reminding people of historical horrors and acting as a warning to future generations. But this tree of life is a memorial of hope, it is a symbol of resurrection where death has turned to life. It does not call the viewer back into the suffering, it does not stand as a warning, instead it offers hope and beauty that violent men and women cannot silence. This is what peacemakers create in our world. This is what Jesus has called us to. To point the way forward into a prophetic vision of Peace.

The cross is a horrible thing, and yet it is a beautiful thing. In the midst of its violent reality springs hope and beauty. It was created to be a symbol of shame and defeat, but has become a call to hope and a symbol or life. My prayer for my daughter is not just that she would lay down all weapons and be a pacifist (although I do dream this for her), but that she would participate in the beautiful creative act of redeeming the tools of violence in our world into symbols of hope and life. That's not something I can explain to my beautiful little girl, but it is something I can attempt to model for her.

Wisdom On Display

2012-01-11T09:35:00.000-08:00

I hate those moments in life where I get the awkward feeling that I have to do or say something really great. Mostly it has happened in classes. My mind spins as it considers if there is anything up there that might make me look really smart. My heart races. Then I usually say and do nothing because it seems like even my best ideas would come off as awkward and foolish.

Insightful revelations never seem to come when I want them most, they tend to hit me out of no where. The church celebrated Epiphany last week and it made me think about what the church is displaying to the world. What does the world see, hear, and experience through us. How can our awkwardness display the wisdom of God? Can God's extravagant love and forgiveness shine through a people who are more known for being judgmental and exclusive? Is there still surprising beauty emanating from a people who continue to choose power, violence, and comfort over sacrifice and suffering?

Paul is talking about how God's mysterious plan has been revealed in Ephesians 3. This mysterious plan is so awesome because it shows that God's love is not reserved for the insiders, there is no longer an us and them. There are no longer Gentiles, no longer outsiders, there are only those God loves. There are only children of God. Maybe this is how it was always supposed to be, but history shows how difficult it is to embrace such a great gift without becoming entitled and isolated. Eph. 3:10 says that God actually shows his beautiful wisdom in all its variety through the church, and it blows away all of the universe.

His beauty is revealed in a Mega Church that brings thousands into the Kingdom, where hundreds are baptized. His wisdom is revealed through the tiny church that has learned how to love the elderly well. His beauty is reveled through a Young Life leader who is willing to do the grossest, wildest, most embarrassing things imaginable in order to earn a place to speak God's love into the real heart of teenager. His love is revealed in the church that sits together over a meal and allow joyful laughter to spill all over the table. His wisdom is revealed in the church that has a passion for the homeless or passion for prayer or passion for world missions or just the simple passion to persevere as a healing presence in their neighborhood. We'd like to imagine that the church that reveals God's wisdom looks like the one we go to (or even lead) but the truth is our churches are a part of the rich variety of God's wisdom, we can play no more than the part we were called into being to play.

Our foolish, awkward churches display the beauty and wisdom of God in all of its variety. His mysterious plan is that we should all make up something so strange, so diverse, so complicated, so dynamic that the overlaying theme of love would draw the worlds eyes away from all of our misguided attempts to bring the Kingdom in our own way. It's like those painting that look like a ton of dots. The real picture isn't seen on the surface because the dots distract. But when you relax your eyes and ignore the details, a picture pops out at you. I don't want to pastor a perfect church, just a church that is a faithful witness to the extravagant, generous love of Jesus the Messiah. We want to declare to our neighbors and neighborhood that God loves them. And we pray that they might see beyond all of our failures in order to catch a glimpse of the the beautiful wisdom of God.

Coaching, Cussing, Swearing, Loving

2012-01-04T09:36:00.000-08:00

I love watching football. I don't want to love it as much as I do, but one of the most wonderful things in the world is to cuddle up with my wife on that couch and lazily enjoy a game. Lately I have been paying more attention to the way different coaches act and respond. Some yell, some swear, some throw things, some look like they have no idea what they are doing, and some look like little kids playing with their friends in the back yard.

It makes me think of pastors. Some yell, some get angry, some laugh, some seem preoccupied with other things, some look confused or awkward, and other appear to be filled with childlike joy. Specifically, it seems that there are some who feel that the way to motivate people is make them feel like crap. Both coaches and pastors use the negative approach at times (yelling, judging, threatening, and putting the fear of God in people). While others can be overly positive, so that even when a person screws everything up its as if the coach or pastor didn't even notice.

In football, a good coach should know what their players need. Some players perform the best under coaches who cuss and swear and yell at them. But other players will never be able to flourish under that type of coaching. And then there are some players who become their best through encouraging and positive coaching, while others would never be motivated by that style. The coaches job is to help their players be the best they can, so they must learn to coach them in a way that most resonates with the player.

Pastors often have one style, and assume it is what their people need. I have heard some say that people ought to leave church aware of their sinfulness (almost leave feeling guilty and fearful), while others do everything to make sure their people leave feeling really good about themselves. Both rub the other the wrong way, both seem to reject the other as a true representation of the Gospel. But maybe, as leaders, it is more important to know our people and lead in a way that helps them the most.

All this to say that I love me some good old fashion preaching filled with fear and trembling, but I am pretty convinced that is not the mode or message that the Gospel can most effectively be communicated in my neighborhood. So I want to learn more and more how to know the People God has placed around them, to catch a vision with them of what God's dreams for them are, and then to work with them to live into that dream. I don't want to be a yeller, I don't want anyone to fear anything, I don't want people to live in or act out of guilt. I want to inspire, I want to encourage, I want to re-imagine being human in the way of Jesus. I want the Good News to be mind blowingly good. I want to guide us together to the path of peace, to the life giving way of Jesus, to love, to hope, to joy.

You Are My Storm

2011-06-24T08:59:00.001-07:00

Oh lord you are my storm; you are the one who ravishes the landscape of my desires.

Come and unleash your love in my life, leave a path of destruction as your Grace passes through my brokenness and selfishness.

I have nothing to offer, the castles I have built are empty, dark, and lonely.

People come to me and I have no protection for them, At times I barely have enough to sustain myself.

You are a magnificently gentle King who puts all the empires of this world to shame.

You are a lion who feels no need to go around roaring and scaring people into giving you their fear.

You are the mightiest of warriors and yet you stand in the face of your enemy and lay down all your weapons.

You are the only light that can love the dark places enough to offer your own light to them.

My center is found in the center-less reality of your beautiful being.

My spirit hovers over the waters and has no idea what the hell to do, no idea what to make, no vision of beauty.

Yet you hover over the waters and rip wholeness, beauty, and being out of the chaotic nothingness that continues to consume humanity.

I fall into the darkness and am overwhelmed by the powerlust, selfishness, and loneliness that envelope this world.

I fall into your hand and find myself changed forever, I find the reason you called me into being is not to be victorious but to be beautiful of soul.

We justify hate and refuse to love, and you refuse to hate and justify love.

We make otherness painful and evil, you transform otherness into self, welcoming all into your very being.

You are my God, my creator, my king, forever and ever amen.

Trading Transactions

2011-06-09T10:55:00.000-07:00

Sometimes life feels so transactional. Everything is based on exchange, everything has a specified cost, everything is an event. Every meeting has goals, a set amount of time, and specific function. We plan and organize life as though every part of our existence is transactional, an exchange of one thing for another. I have become such a consumer that every aspect of my life has been permeated with a consumeristic worldview. I move from one transaction to another, but I struggle to live out the dynamic story God is calling me into.

Even theology has been invaded by this pervasive view. Substitutionary Atonement: we owed something, God paid it (which is a true statement but it is only a piece of the full reality). There was an event where one thing was exchanged for another, and we get life instead of death. We confess a sin and it is forgiven. But is that the way forgiveness and redemption work, is reconciliation with God an event, an exchange, a static reality. Or is forgiveness a way of speaking of the dynamic relationship we have with God. Does forgiveness speak of a moment, an event, an action OR does it speak of a new form of existence, a new stance God takes in relationship with us and all of creation. On the cross was a price paid or was a new kingdom established where evil was overthrown by a good king who chose the way of suffering.

I have heard so many sermons and read so many books that laid out steps to be taken, as though at the end of those steps was a place at which you arrived. I guess what I am saying is that maybe we need to focus on how to walk, rather than the steps we take. That maybe grace and forgiveness are not events but redefining, radical statements about who we are and who God is. Jesus is the resurrection and the life, HE IS - not he did or accomplished. Redemption is not the peak at which we arrive and then remain, it is a river which eternally washes downstream further into the depths and beauty of God's love. The Kingdom of God is coming and it is a movement I want to be caught up in.

Neighorhoodliness

2011-06-06T16:11:00.000-07:00

So I have been thinking a lot about what it looks like for me to be fully rooted with others in the place God has put me. As I dug up blackberry bushes, weeds, and vine maples in my back yard I realized how these diverse and competing plants had actually worked together underground to create a complex root system that made a strong foundation. They had interweaved so well together that it was a huge pain in my butt to get rid of them, each one was surprisingly strong but was even harder to remove because of all the other roots surrounding it.

I believe that we are called to be rooted, to have a theology of place, to live with and love people as neighbors rather than passing through life like a tourist. Our story needs a clear setting, a place from which all the events and relationships in our lives find their orientation. Our story needs a unifying connection we call neighborhood, a place where relationships make sense because life is really being lived together.

For a long time the Christian heros were wandering evangelist, revivalist, and itinerant preachers. I think we need to look to the new heros all around us, to those embedded in neighborhoods on the margins where they love the people, to the new monastic movement, to people like John Perkins and Shane Claiborne, and most of all I think our faith is calling out to rediscover what it means that Christ has sent us to live out the fullness of our human existence in the lives we have been given. We are each uniquely and beautifully created, each reflecting the creator in some way, and I believe we are all in need of the messy process of becoming rooted with those around us. The Spirit of God is renewing the call to the Christian virtue of Neighborhoodliness, and it is beautiful!

Antique Roadshow, Baseball Cards, and True Self

2011-05-24T10:21:00.001-07:00

Lately I have been working through a lot of internal issues. Fear. Apathy. Self-Hatred. Anger. Selfishness. Deep Pain. Loneliness. These things have been bubbling to the top as I spend time allowing God to walk with me into the depths of my being. Through prayer, both speaking and listening, the Spirit has enlightened areas in my life that lay hidden in deep darkness for so long. As these issues emerge I can't help but feel like I am a really messed up, broken person. In the recesses of my mind I have always struggled with the reality of my own twisted nature. This past week, at a prayer conference, I was reminded that the twisted self is not the true self. We are created beings, and at the core of who we are is our true self, our created self. The journey with Christ in this life is to nurture and reconcile that true self in the midst of our world. To pray that His Kingdom would continue to establish itself in my life.

Sometimes when I am flipping channels I get sucked into the Antique Road Show. The basic premise of the show is that people bring their old crap to old crap experts, or something like that. Actually these experts are brilliant, they are able to see and find the beauty and value of pieces that I would throw out on the sidewalk for free. It might be a name, or a style, or a small mark on the piece that unlocks the mystery. Often the piece is not in a perfect state, it has been worn out through the years. Time has not valued it and left it pristine. The condition of each piece has a direct impact on its value, but the value is most deeply tied to its originality or quality of creation that the antique experts unveils. Or sometimes its just a fraud.

I once had a Frank Thomas Jr. rookie draft card. It laid in boxes with all the other baseball cards I had accumulated in a brief season of card collecting. Over time I traded cards, lost them, and gave some away. I gave this specific card to one of my little brothers. One day I was looking through the values of baseball cards and came across the value of this specific card, which at that time had risen over $1000. Which at that point in my life would have been like a million (not that I have ever had any idea to whom or how you sale such things). So I went to get it back from my brother only to find it bent up, essentially removing all of its value. Beneath my very fingers had been this little card worth unimaginable amounts of money, for me at that time, and I had just not known or cared about its value. I gave it away, it was mistreated, and the value was gone.

Is this the way I am, is this the way the value of my true self plays out in the eternal drama. Is the mark of the maker barely there but still has an impact on my desirability and value, even if life has torn and twisted me. Has my value been diminished by the way I have misused my life many times. Or maybe I am just a fraud. Am I like that baseball card, where my own bentness makes me essentially valueless. Is my value connected to my perfection. If this is the way things are then I must protect and build my image, I must work hard to look like I have never been used up by this journey of life.

Money on the other hand is very different. It's value is not connected with the state of the item itself. You can spit on a dollar bill, crumple up a dollar bill, draw on a dollar bill, and even rip a dollar bill but it still retains its value. The value is not in the state of the bill but in what lies behind it. It is just paper, just a small piece of paper. But because of who printed it and guarantees it, this paper holds a specific and (relatively) unchanging value.

I think what I am coming to realize is that we are more like that piece of paper we call a dollar bill. We are uniquely and beautifully created. Our true selves hold and reflect the beauty of the creator and king of the cosmos. I do not need to find my value, or restore myself to return to my value. I just need to accept my value, accept who God created me to be, accept my true self that Jesus loved so much He died for. Then I need to live from that place, from my true center as an image bearer.

Our call is to live out of the true self, but for me there is so much garbage in the way. Pain I've caused and received through my life. Lies I have believed about myself. Jesus has been speaking to me, calling out my true self, and helping me to peel away some of that other stuff. He is my Father and I am his son. He is my creator and I am his creation. He is my lover and I am his beloved. He is my King and I am his servant. I am lovely because God loves me. I am once again hearing the call not to become something different but to return to the core of my identity, to once again find who I was truly created to be.

Inspire Me

2011-04-25T10:40:00.000-07:00

Lord inspire me. I want to be so filled with your life that is seethes out of me. There are days when I long for that final day when the pain and suffering of life ends, but it seems that your call to follow is about embracing the full scope of being human. I find your redemptive power not in the ease of a tensionless life, but breaking through the painful reality of this beautiful life. When Martha says to Jesus "yeah I know he will rise again on that day" it reminds me of my tendency to overlook the redemptive power of a living and active God in this Life.

Jesus answer's Martha "I am the Resurrection and the Life." Jesus is not just offering a hope that at the end of this dark tunnel there will be light. He is saying that right now the light is breaking through into the darkness. The power of Jesus' Resurrection and Life are let loose in this world, to captivate us and call us to be the light. Our inspiration comes not from an apathetic view towards this life where God has placed, but that at their very core of God's creative act which called us into being is the Resurrection and Life of Jesus being freely offered to the world, and undoing the curse that has been let loose on all of creation.

Lord inspire me. Not to great words, or fame, or genius, but inspire me to be who you called me to be. Inspire me to live this life you have given me, even the dark parts I try to avoid. Inspire me to see every moment as an opportunity for your power to transform things. Inspire me to live out your light. That I might join the fellow of the burnt men and women who have been fully consumed by God.

Glistening Rain

2011-03-28T15:18:00.000-07:00

I don't remember winters being so dark and rainy in Bellingham. This has been a strange winter in that way, in many ways it has been the best season of my life, and yet it is veiled in the grey haze of oppressive drizzle. Right now the rain is falling and the sun is shining, one of my favorite things. As I look out at the rain it is shimmering in the sunshine, as if the the sun is transforming the oppressive grey drops into the very spring of life. It feels vibrant, life giving, and invigorating. But its just rain. The same rain that has fallen on all of these grey days.

In Mark 5 a woman comes through the crowd to seek healing from Jesus. She has been bleeding for 12 years, suffering for 12 years, unclean for 12 years, ostracized for 12 years. Yet she appears perpetually propelled by hope. We see her sneak through the crowd filled with fear, pain, suffering, and hope as she tries to just touch Jesus. She gets to him, is healed, and then gets called out by Jesus only to receive a blessing instead of the judgmental outburst she was recoiling in anticipation of. He commends her for her faith.

This faith reminds me of the rain. Earlier Mark told us that she had sought healing in lots of places, put her faith in lots of others, even given up her money. Each time she risked faith and finances it only added insult to injury and left her further in the pit of despair. It always rains like that, the long cold grey rain of suffering. So many people find themselves in that place. There backs up against the wall, they lash out in hope. They go to doctors, to family to friends. They give their money to T.V. evangelists, to healers, and to their drug of choice. But as they scream out in faith, the echo only returns deeper pain. The dull grey persists.

Then one day everything changes for this woman in Mark. Same movement of faith she has made a million times, same risks, same hope. Did she close her eyes when she reached out and touched him? Did she say anything? Did she keep following or did she freeze? What did her body feel like? Did she immediately begin to celebrate what this stoppage of bleeding meant for her relationships with neighbors, friends, family, husband, and even God?

One thing we know is that she tried to get out of there without being noticed, she didn't want to get called out. She was expecting the crowd to react to her audacious actions with judgment and anger because she was an unclean person. But her rain finally glistened in the light of the Son and for the first time her fearful faith was transformed into healing. She was clean. Jesus changed everything.

The violence, sickness, and oppression in our world can bear down so heavy on the shoulders of anyone whose dreams have been transformed by the cross. Some days the news feels like that rain, the never ending drizzle of pain in our world. And it seems we apathetically accept it, so long as the rain isn't washing away our lives. Jesus compels me to want to see an end to war, and end to sickness, an end to violence, an end to hatred, an end to inequality. Some days that rain just keeps falling, but other days I find myself standing in the light of Jesus and His kingdom; the rain glistens with hope, and I am inspired what God is doing in and through people around the world.

This is just a season, summer is coming. But the glistening rain reminds me that summer is breaking in now. Hope is breaking in. And Jesus is meeting people at the intersection of pain, suffering, fear, hope, and faith. Jesus is making all things new. I would like to live in that intersection, to have the kind of love that reflects the transformative hope of resurrection.

Awake To The Christ

2010-12-03T14:43:00.000-08:00

"Grant me to so follow in faith where you have led the way, that I may at length fall asleep peacefully in you and wake in your likeness." - Phyllis Tickle

My daughter has been such a crappy sleeper lately. This means that I have not been sleeping as much as I would like, and even some of the time I have been able to sleep has been on her floor next to her bed with no blanket (although I have found that cuddling with her giant horse Jakey is quit warm). This has led to a longing for that feeling in the morning of being fully rested and waking up energized, excited for a new day. There is something about falling asleep that is actually a hopeful act. An act of hope and faith that tomorrow will come, that I will be able to face it, that it might be the greatest day in my life. An act of hope that if I get enough rest, tomorrow will be filled with vibrant life and the beauty God's world has to offer.

In Galatians 2:20 Paul talks about being crucified with Christ. We have entered his death. It is as though we have gone down with Him into that final sleep of death. But because this is Jesus the Christ, death actually means resurrection. We are crucified not because we embrace the painful and brutal death of Jesus on the cross, but because we have hope that on the other side death we will be resurrected to new life, abundant life, and that it will pour out of us into a world that needs life. We are crucified with Him so that we might also be resurrected with him and begin the work of His new creation as His children in this place where has chosen to put us.

I long for a good nights sleep, not because I love sleep but because I love waking up rested and full of life. And I choose Jesus the Christ because I am convinced that as I fall into Him, he is the Resurrection and the Life. God may you take me in your arms, may I be crucified with you, and may your life permeate my whole being.

The Way and The Wilderness

2010-12-02T20:16:00.000-08:00

Like a voice calling into the wilderness, "Prepare the Way" Isaiah 40:3

To often I find myself lost in the wilderness, or I find the wilderness expanding inside me, and I get stuck in that place. God chooses John the Baptist to come and call out to those of us who struggle with wilderness, those of us who get lost in our own pain, those of us who turn to moralistic rules in order to place ourselves somewhere on the map.

John does not call out to the people to Find the Way, nor does he tell them to get out of the Wilderness. Why not? If I was talking to people who were actually wandering in the wilderness those would be my first two pieces of advice. What if salvation is not removal from the wilderness? Maybe what God wants to say is that Salvation is coming to you in the midst of your Wilderness Experience. Then the call is not to fix ourselves, or find our way out, but only to be ready for the King who is on his way to the very place you are stuck now.

This voice calls into the Wilderness still, "prepare the way" because Salvation is coming the heart of the desolate place where we so often find ourselves.

Shalom Theology

2008-06-24T06:47:00.000-07:00

Shalom, Peace, the way it was meant to be, the way it was, and the way it will be. All of the bible seems organized around this idea of shalom or wholeness, as though it is actually the core of God’s desire for us, not pre or post fall but his eternal purpose for us. And not just us but them, the whole world, the other.

I recently heard about this idea of Shalom Theology, and it rang in my heart like beautiful truth. As a hermeneutical tool Shalom is very helpful, in the past few years love has become my personal hermeneutic but this new core idea of a theology built in and through Shalom is shifting my very core. Peace and wholeness make sense of how I understand God and his story, our faith is informed by a narrative of Shalom. If this is true then we as Christians have been living far outside of God’s narrative. Loving war and hating the other (mostly for moralistic reasons) does not fit into the gospel, Christians have made the good news good for us and bad for everyone else. What if the good news was truly good news for everyone, good because of the shalom it created in our world and in all of our lives.

So I am by no means an expert in Greek, but I was studying the Greek of Hebrews 12:14 which most translations translate as something like “make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; for without holiness no one will see God”. Again I know that people who translated this are much smarter than I, but the Greek does not have a semi colon in the verse at all. And in fact where it talks about seeing God it seems to me that it is referring to both living at peace and being holy. I am not sure looking at the Greek why we only translate the holiness as what it takes to see God. The word holiness is only found once in the Greek text, but it seems to me like the translators have over emphasized the personal piety and separated it from the active peace making, or Shalom, that the verse has tied up with the idea of holiness and seeing God.

What if the author of Hebrews is making a declaration about how we should live that is outside the mainstream dichotomy of his day and ours. In His day the Greek idea of Body vs. Spirit ruled, in our day as Christians I see a deep split between trying to be holy personally (generally defined in moralistic and spiritualistic terms) and actively living out the Kingdom of God in our world. We are called to be Shalom makers, to see His Kingdom come. Anything less than living for peace, healing, and justice keeps us from seeing God. Holiness is then tied up not with doctrine, or morality, or any other religious standard we have set up, but it is bound up with living in peace with all people and all of creation. No matter their religion, their political affiliation, their ethnicity, their gender, or any other measure; they are our brothers and sisters. We are called, if we believe God’s story and have committed to live within in it and be a part of it, to live in the wholeness and reconciliation of a God who is actively setting things right. What if we actually did this? What if when people were converted they were not converted to heaven or avoiding hell but were converted to a new way of being. This new way would call and compel them to seek God’s Shalom in their world and to radically follow Jesus which is the only way to be Holy; to walk with God eternally.

At Envision I heard Shane Claiborne say something that is like a Glacier moving through my soul and undoing me altogether. He challenged us to think of the story when John the Baptist disciples came and asked Jesus if he was really the “one”. Jesus then healed and taught and loved. After all this, he turned to the disciples and told them to go and tell John what they saw. No list of doctrine, to statement of faith, no apologetic, no defense or explanation; just a life living out the Shalom of God. What if when we were asked about our faith, our God, or the story we are living out; what if we were able to say look at my life and tell me what you see. Maybe that is why Hebrews tells us that to see God we must be bringing this shalom to the world and seeking to follow Jesus; because in this we can then point and say look this is what being a “Christian” looks like.

Hebrews 10:20 talks about the new life giving way that Jesus invites us into. Maybe its time to actually work on living out that new way rather than defending it, maybe its even time to enter fully into the narrative of God, which is a story of Shalom. And maybe this life giving way is not about us but about giving life to others, and maybe this story of Shalom is not about comfortable easy lives for us but about peace, healing, and justice for all those outside ourselves.
I am being undone, I only pray that this disturbance in my soul never subsides and never gets quietly buried in the corner by justifying comfort and ease.

May the world experience Peace.

Danger of God

2008-06-13T10:30:00.000-07:00

I love getting messed up, in fact most of the time i feel like i am living in the constant flow of a spiritual current that unrelentingly brings the beautiful chaos of life to the center of my soul. I don’t want to fight that flow and yet i have to find a way to struggle with it in order to be fully wiped out by it. This envision conference has done more to cause an unvisioning than an envisioning. Not that it was pure deconstruction but that it was such a contrast to the majority of my experience that I am now forced to find a new type of vision, and to be honest it is a scary thing to own a new vision that has the possibility of not just being new but actually being something that the old vision would see as a pure and violent conflict.

A beautiful picture i was given was by this rabbi i was listening to, he spoke first of pre creation in this way. Before God there was no space, nothing but God, he was all in all and there was nothing else. Than out of his divine love he pulled back himself to make the space to create, it was like him breathing in deeply before breathing out and speaking creation into being. It took that empty space to create, a withdrawal was needed to birth something new. This is me drawing back, creating space, allowing for a void that might be filled with something more beautiful and more meaningful.

We all love to fill all of our time with stuff, or we hate it but feel compelled to do it. The empty space can be intimidating and unnerving. I am not even sure exactly how to take this deep breath in, but i must. Something new and crazy will hopefully fill this new space, that His kingdom of peace and beauty would overwhelm my life and radically change my world. I have been standing at the edge of God’s power and deep darkness for to long, Its not enough to stand here anymore. Time to engage the kingdom, pray for me.

Envision 08

2008-06-05T11:19:00.000-07:00

I have the awesome opportunity to participate in Envision 08 at Princeton an event about envisioning and re-imagining the Gospel at work in our world, especially in the areas of injustice and poverty. In preparation I have been thinking a lot about these issues, and being compelled to a different way of life and faith that I still can't quit draw out in my mind. My prayer is that I will be forever changed, that this conference will be the final ignition of the burning in my soul and that I would find myself in deep beautiful darkness of God where he takes in and loves all those we reject and oppress.

Part of my journey over these days will be to walk through "Religious Pluralism and Christian Faith" with Miraslov Volf and Samir Selmanovic. Recently Volf's book Exclusion and Embrace has been doing some violent work to my soul. I don't always know the path God is calling me to; but I am convinced that it is a path of Love and Reconciliation, where it leads probably depends on how willing I am to fall into the depths of God. Over the next few weeks I will be writing on the things I am learning and trying to process, it should be fun.

What Is Success

2008-06-05T10:53:00.000-07:00

Last sunday was our time at Grace Chapel to celebrate all of the graduates in our community, I never know exactly how to honor people in situations like that. One thing i did was try to share from my heart the words of hope that i wish someone had shared with me a long time ago (click here to listen to the sermon), the words about loving God and loving others and abandoning some of the selfish tendencies burned into my soul that have been labeled "The American Dream"

It hurts so much to feel the painful dissonance between my longing for comfort and ease and the call of the cross, the call to suffer and sacrifice, the call to something radical that leads to true peace for the poor, oppressed, and broken. The hardest for me is figuring out how to see God's reconciliation working out with the people who i have the most broken relationships with.

What would a church look like that was sold out for the community. I really like the most recent podcast from Rob Bell's church. This guy Steve Chalke, from Stop The Traffik, talked about the hubs which he is a part of that are less like churches or church ministries and more like communities serving and seeking Jesus in the whole of life. One picture i loved was him talking about how they are 360 degrees, meaning that their is a radius around them and their hubs that become the place where they are trying to see the Kingdom come in a holistic way.

So many great Christian movements, so many opportunities to do something radical, so many people in need, and I always feel like I am waiting. How do we jump in? How do we move beyond what has been ingrained into the being that Christ has transformed us to be? Sometimes i just don't know.

Grace and Peace.

Vision Of The Cross

2008-05-23T10:40:00.000-07:00

A while back when I was praying this picture came to me that continues to haunt me like a shadow behind all my thoughts and dreams.

I found myself standing before the cross; there was my Savior and friend Jesus. It was like I had always imagined it: Three crosses on top of a small hill with the sun setting in the background. It was eerily calm and quiet; I was overwhelmed with the sense that this is nothing like what really happened. My picture of it was too simple, too nice, too easy to look at and live in.

Then something fell from the heavens and ran over my vision causing everything to run together. The sky darkened, and it was like a painting that was getting wet. Everything wept, everything fell, everything was clouded and chaotic. Except the cross. There in the center was the cross untouched by this movement that was destroying all that I had ever seen. I felt like it was even running over me and that I was being changed by it.

Then I heard the voice of God; at least it seemed to me to be like the voice of God. He said, “Be still and know that I am God”. Just be still. I couldn’t.

My first reaction was that I could rush forward and save Jesus, he didn’t deserve this and I could stop it. I could run to the cross and fix things, I could somehow put this painting back together. I could bring back the straight lines that now all ran together and were blurred. But he whispered “Kurt what are you thinking, be still, just be still”.

I wanted to run, it was too much. The darkness was becoming overwhelming and I was suffocating in horror of what was dripping in front of me and all over me. Everything was being ruined and undone and I needed to get far away. And he said “Be Still”.

I cried out to him, screaming, crying, cursing. He needed to hear me, I needed to be justified, he needed to know, I had to say it. As I was freaking out, he said, “Be still”.

I looked at the cross. Broken. Afraid. Freaked Out. Anxious. Offended. Humbled. Compelled. What could I do, I had to do something. But his voice continued to speak, “Be still and know that I am God”.

This was God, dying on the cross. He held life and death in his hand and he allowed death to crush him. And all I could do was watch, all he wanted was for me to be there and be still. He wanted me to watch this picture be destroyed as God himself died on the cross and in the scandal and horror of it all to realize that he is God.

Finding A Name

2008-05-22T07:07:00.000-07:00

This morning I spent some time playing with my son Elijah as my daughter Gracie slept in her bouncy seat. My son has decided that her name is T C, and I love it. We named her Gracie because we believe that the grace of God removed a small cyst in her brain when she was still developing in the womb. On a Monday it was there, we were freaked out, people prayed, and on Friday it was gone. In many other ways she has become the grace of God to us and so we named her Grace, but my son has decided that her name is T C.

It's not that he doesn't like her real name, and I don't think that he has a reason for re naming her (although who know what goes on in the mind of a child) but it is his way of reaching out for her name and speaking it in the only language he can. Her name really is T C to him, that is who she is becoming in his life.

What about God, What about the Holy Spirit, What about Yeshua? Why have we named them as we have? Some of it is the way that these names have been revealed to us by God, or at least the way we have interpreted that revelation and been able to understand it. In one way this is God's name, it is the reality we can grasp at of this infinite God. In another way it is not God at all, it totally fails to fully grasp who he is.

Names are funny things, they seem to reveal who a person is and at the same time call a true identity out of that person that is always in the process of becoming. As parents it is a great weight to name our children well. Then their sibling and friends just rename them for silly reasons. On a mission trip in high school this girl just started calling me Bubbles, she decided that should be my nickname. No reason, it just was. Luckily it didn't stick, but others have. On that same trip I bought a whip and was trying to whip a bird at the campground where we were staying, it came back and hit me in the face and cut my cheek. At that point my friend Colin started calling me Indy, and that name stuck a little more because it had meaning.

Often we cry out to God in the names that have little meaning to us, but they are what we have learned he is called. Other times we cry out to him and we can not even speak his name because we are so moved by his overwhelming beauty and deep darkness. We must cry out, and each of us must call to Him in the most meaningful ways we can, by the name that we truly know him by. But someday we will know his true name and he will speak our true names and we will all be undone by the beauty and depths of love wrapped up in our names and in his name. Until then we continue to find our true name in this place, and we journey toward his true name as it is worked out in our current world.

Peace.

Swimming For Air

2008-05-20T12:30:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I feel like I am drowning, like all of my effort is a frantic swim towards the surface to get even one gasp of air. So much for life being like one big cruise. It has been a while since I have taken the time to write very much. In the next few weeks I am going to try to reengage this Blog and to live in the wonderlust of searching the unfathomable depths of God again.

God is calling me to something crazy, His current is dragging me away from comfort and the so called American Dream, this spiritual undertow is dragging me out into the deep beautiful darkness of the God who chose to draw the suffering of the world into himself through Christ, and who continues to bear the scars of that suffering in his very being.

As he calls me out, I need some people to get swept away with me. I need some brothers and sisters who want to see God's love and justice poured out to the broken and oppressed of our world. May God draw us as His lights to the center of this worlds darkest places.

Peace.

kurt

Unattached

2007-07-25T09:38:00.000-07:00

Floating, no ground, no ropes, no connection, no destination, no idea what God is thinking, just floating.

In the depths of my heart I have always struggled to feel fully connected, the idea of finding my identity in community is really dificult because I have never really feel like I fully belong, like this is my life forever. A voice inside is always whispering that this is just another stop along the way but that I am not fully here. In some ways this has allowed me to build a beautiful relationship with God as I am journeying into his beautiful, mysterious, darkness. In other ways it has kept me from developing a healthy theology of place. The institution of the church continually bothers me, and sometimes I just don’t like people (especially Christians), other times people are all I care about and feel that God has given me compasion for his beloved no matter how messy things are. When I left for Peru a long time ago now I gave up, without knowing it, the sense of fully belonging to one place or people. Now my once satisfied heart is ever longing to see more, to read more, to experience more, and most of all to understand new stories through relationship. Floating.

Intellectually I see the value and need to live out Christ in one place for a long time, change is slow and hard and it takes a long time. It’s not that I don’t know these things or believe in them, it’s just that I feel different. People hunger and consume without reason or reflection, what I hunger for is change. Both to be changed and be a continual part of change. Maybe it is some abstract form of ADD, or Restless Soul Syndrome. It’s not that I am searching for myself, or for anything else. I just seem to be made to float. Always floating.

Jesus floated some, or maybe a lot. I think He understands, I think we are walking in the garden of wonder together and he feels me. Maybe my call to follow Him includes some floatiness in my identity, maybe I am a deluded idiot. All I know is that I love what God has made and I want to experience it all. Maybe this is the air I breathe, maybe this movement is my journey, maybe I was made to float.

I love where God has called me, and yet I hate it. I have radical dreams of what it could become and yet I feel so depressed when I interact with the people who will protest any of those changes. I love the students who are starving for the reality of Christ to be made real in them and in our community. I am in awe of how God has already used our presence to impact this neighborhood, to bring hope and healing. I am a torn man. But I am torn and broken and floating in the center of God’s will for me right now, or maybe just off center. Some are meant to build, some are meant to soar, I was meant to float.

Peace.

P.S. As I am reading “How Not To Speak Of God” I’m finding myself pulled toward the Mystics, I think maybe that is the spiritual river I would like to float in, do any of you know any good Mystical works that would be good reading?

The Other Side

2007-04-08T10:02:00.000-07:00

Jesus died on the other side of the river. This thought has been crushing me this morning. One night a few months ago I had a profound moment in a small chapel looking out a window into the cold darkness while taking communion, in that moment God reminded me that Jesus died out there in the cold darkness, and I am called to follow him there. Recently I watched Motorcycle Diaries again, it speaks to my soul in a way that no other movie ever has, and I was hit by the picture of this leper colony being on the other side of the river. This morning I have been listening to the song Otro Lado Del Rio (click on here to listen for free), it is a beautiful lament and at one point in the dark sadness of the song it says “deep down inside of me I smile, because I see a light on the other side of the river”, in the movie it is late at night when the clean good side is celebrating that che jumps in the river and swims across, out into the cold darkness, through treacherous waters, because the light is on the other side and that is where he belongs. I love my church, but it is way to clean and pretty. The sound system alone could probably pay for an entire impoverished nation to eat for a year. How can I pretend to sit in the comfort of that place, with pristine crosses hanging everywhere, a high quality music being played and sung, and even imagine that I am in anyway drawing near to the cross? The Pope’s Easter address was focused on the suffering in our world, it is so great; both on an international level and on millions of individual levels. Today is a celebration, but of what? If we have not truly lamented the suffering in our world can we actually join in the celebration of Easter? Today, it feels much like this song, and it is only somewhere deep inside me that I am finding a smile, and it is only caused by the dim light across the river in the place of suffering. God help me if I spend my life on this side of the river and do not jump into the dangerous river in order to live on the side of the cross; which is the side of the suffering and the oppressed.

Desperate Hope

2007-02-20T10:53:00.000-08:00

Over the past two years I have experienced a complete shattering of many things in my life, not least of all my reality. As life has ebbed and flowed, my hope has not floated but drowned. Leading me to the profound conviction that if I despair it means I have placed my hope in the wrong places. This is not to say that I should not have felt pain or grieved the loss of certain things and dreams, but in grieving I should have been held together by my hope in Jesus. Like the song says “my hope is built on nothing less then Jesus blood and righteousness”, only my heart has been tossed and torn in the torrential down pours of life and my hope was (and sadly still is in some ways) built on something less. So many things have brought despair, even deep despair. I have found myself with Job crying out against God and his injustice, with Jonah crying out against to do what He is supposed to, crying out with Ecclesiastes against God and the meaninglessness of this life he gave me. In light of my life the Proverbs seem at best a cruel joke, they have taken on a sarcastic tone as if to highlight the misery of life. But there is hope, hope in Jesus, and when I wait on it I find strength. Living in a world run by money, as a Christian who knows that one day there will be no rich and no poor, why should I not desire to see no riches and no poverty in this life here and now. Of course, Jesus's point that we will always have the poor with us is because sin is the root of poverty and oppression (not necessarily the sin of the person suffering, and in fact more likely the sin of the person with money) and unless we can abolish sin we can not abolish poverty, but we fight against sin so why should we not fight equally as hard against poverty? Even if the pains of this world continue to deteriorate God’s good creation, we must hope. Recently I heard Brian Walsh give a lecture and he was asked if he was optimistic at all, he answered “no, optimism is not in my vocabulary but I am hopeful”. Optimism is built into the myth of progress who is modernity’s god, but true hope can only be built on the person of Jesus and the Kingdom of God. Easy to say, but when I have gone through hard times I continually asked how can I really find my hope in Jesus. Hope has always felt like the struggle, to hope means to fight, to do battle, to not give up. As the Holy Spirit has been convicting me about my despair and where my hope actually lies, He led me to this amazing verse that I think has become the picture of the anchor of hope in my life.

Isaiah 30:15
In repentance and rest is your salvation,
In quietness and trust is your strength

Kind of subverts the empirical or crusader mentality of salvation and hope. I find my prayers are turning more and more to the language of trust and rest, of letting go; the act of submitting to Jesus and following him into and through struggles and defeats. Hope in Him is powerful, it’s a way of connecting with the eternal so that we can fully engage in this world but live as new creations in it. There is a beautiful prayer that I have in Guerrillas Of Grace, since I first began to think about our faith and call in light of the idea of identity it has been a powerful prayer for me to turn to and so I turn to it again, may this quietness and submission give us strength.

In The Silence, Name Me

Holy One,
Untamed
By the names I give you,
In the silence
Name me,
That I may know
Who I am,
Hear the truth
You have put into me,
Trust the love
You have for me,
Which you call me to live out
With my sisters and brothers
In your human family.

Can We Be One

2007-01-13T12:09:00.000-08:00

“Social existence involves and depends on a shared consciousness, a shared system of meanings. This shared system of meanings is structured by symbols that shape or express the understanding of reality, of space and time, of human being and its authenticity, of life and its goods, of appropriate relations, roles, customs and behavior, symbols which together constitute the unique gestalt, the identity or uniqueness, of that social group. To be a member of any community is to be aware of, to participate in, and to be oneself shaped, energized, and directed by this common symbolic mythos.” - Brian J Walsh Worldviews, Modernity and The Task Of Christian College Education

As I was reading this article on worldview, it challenged me to consider the power of the gospel within a communal context. So often the focus is on how Jesus death saves the individual from eternal damnation (which may just be an excuse for pious Christians to say the word damn) but how does this story impact the very fiber of our community? Since Protestants have gone so far away from the holy sacraments, which are a type of common symbolic mythos, what is the story and common mysterious symbols that are not logical or legalistically driven but are a part of joining in a story bigger than ourselves. If this quote is an accurate picture, than the common symbolic mythos that we embody and celebrate become the core of our identity.

I am just not sure what exactly those are in our current day, specifically at a mega-church style community which I am a part of.

No really what did happen?

2006-12-14T09:13:00.000-08:00

This morning as I was reading articles at cnn.com I came across an amazing article about Christianity, sometimes I think it is crazy how many people out there are like minded about the critiques of modern Christianity; its like the Holy Spirit is moving us as a whole towards another reformation of sorts. Anyway check out Bakker, Brown: What the hell happened to Christianity?

Zeal

2006-12-11T14:41:00.000-08:00

The other day I found this sweet poem by John Newton:

Zeal is that pure and heavenly flame
The fire of love supplies;
While that which often bears the name
Is self in a disguise.

True zeal is merciful and mile,
Can pity and forbear;
The false is headstrong, fierce and wild,
And breathes revenge and war.

While zeal for truth the Christian warms,
He knows the worth of peace;
But self contends for names and forms,
Its party to increase.

Winter Nonsense

2006-11-28T14:15:00.000-08:00

Today is one of the most beautiful days ever. I sit in my front room looking out at a snow covered world under the deep majesty of a never ending blue sky. All I can think about is how much delight I find in the little things, like my sons laughter. Even one little smile or laugh and it all I can do to keep from bubbling over with giddy joy. What a beautiful world, what a beautiful God. Sometimes I wonder if He delights in me like this, if he looks down at us when we are free and happy and is just filled with joy that we are experiencing this beautiful laugh. If He cries with us, certainly he laughs with us. And maybe when our faith is like the little child, who adventures in the snowy world like a sojourner from another country with innocent bewilderment at the wonder of something so simple as snow, he is more glorified then when we pack into a heartless building for one hour with a thousand people we don’t know to do something that someone thinks is worship but all we can think is that this show is kind of boring and confusing. Maybe what we really need is to have some snowball fights on Sunday morning.

Beautiful Of Soul

2006-11-21T11:16:00.000-08:00

Sometimes it seems like our whole world is falling apart, like everything is getting worse. I don’t mean to sound so skeptical, but it is hard sometimes for me to see how the kingdom of God is defeating the kingdom of darkness in this world. Sure there are plenty of people who profess to be Christians, having raised their hands and said a sinner’s prayer, but are they new creations? As I consider the full meaning of the Gospel, as told from Genesis through the New Testament, I wonder about its full expression here and now, specifically in my own life. There is a longing inside me to be perfect, to not screw up; then when I do screw up there is a longing for people to just let me be human. How do I balance a longing for transformation and holiness with the shady and sinful self I know? How do I unconditionally love those that I hate? How will I ever see the power of God with such faltering faith?

The recent fall from glory of another “powerful” Christian leader is challenging, especially knowing that he probably sat where I sit today and thought it unimaginable that he would ever end up in such a crapy place. In my humble opinion the real problem is the power that men seek, may I never seek it, power and influence (even if wielded for so called Christian purposes) is dangerous and seems like the antithesis of the gospel. We are called to die and serve more and more as we mature, yet those we hold up as the leaders of the church often seem like they are being served and gaining power. Humility vs pride seems to be the main battlefield of Christians leaders today. Clearly when the gospel wins out, humility wins out. Being a servant leader, picking up the cross of Jesus, hardly seems to be a recipe for power and influence.

So if political power is not the answer for bringing the kingdom what is? Jesus did speak politically at times, but it was clearly a path he avoided on the road to his throne. What about preaching, is that the way for the kingdom to come? It sure seems like the protestant church has long believed that preaching is the central piece to corporate faith, but Jesus not only spoke but lived a subversive message. There are times when I get discouraged, looking around and not seeing the healing power of the Gospel manifest in the world. Instead of a church that is bringing healing to the world through love and grace, I feel like too often we have the crusader mentality of coercion and manipulation. Where is the darkness being pushed back and the gospel winning out? Some Christians seem more interested in pushing democracy and capitalism, and satisfied to have a faith that insures them a place in a far off land called heaven where they will not be held accountable for what they did on earth because of Jesus blood.

The big picture is discouraging, but I do know people who are seeking the truth, longing for healing, and living out the new creation. There are those who still long for peace, who love unconditionally (no really, they love regardless of religion, gender, race, or sexual preference), and who know that if what they believe is true than it has to make a difference in our world. The Gospel has to make the world a better place, not just for Christians, because those who have become new creations are living out a different kind of humanity. They possess a beauty of soul that does not require a defense or explanation because it stands out as true and powerful. A quiet submission to the work of the Holy Spirit, lived out in a real world, is how we see the kingdom come. In this awesome book I am reading right now, Streams Of Living Water, there is a quote from Frank Laubach that has challenged me this week “God, what is man’s best gift to mankind? To be beautiful of soul and then let people see into your soul.”

This is my journey, possibly our journey, into the beautiful darkness of God. So often we are afraid of intimacy and transparency because of what others might see in our souls, but the gospel releases a power in us to enter into the most holy place and be transformed into the likeness of Christ. To plunge into the deepness of God and to be overcome by his consuming fire, as Merton put it “to join the fellowship of burnt men”. May we truly be lost in the consuming depths of our great God.

Religious Dysfunction

2006-08-31T12:36:00.000-07:00

They will keep up the outward appearance of religion but will have rejected the inner power of it. 2 Timothy 3:5

In a list of warnings of what to watch out for in the final days, Paul list this type of person to Timothy, the person who says they are a Christian but rejects the inner power of it. This does not mean they don’t have the will power to do it, just the opposite it means they have misunderstood faith as being about will power. We live in a world where this truth has impacted everyone. Christianity has in many ways become about maintaining the appearance of religion, but where is the transformative power, where are the healings, where are the completely and radically different people who love peace, justice, and mercy. I wish I could say I am one of those people, but I have spent so much of my life living under the lie that so much of this is about will power and me doing things, under the lie that miracles and healings don’t really happen any more, worst of all I have lived under the lie that the American dream is a Christian one. The anointing that Jesus received by the Holy Spirit, the anointing his followers received on Pentecost, where is this in our modern world. We talk about call, and our walk, but what about the anointing power of the Holy Spirit. God’s kingdom does not overcome the kingdom of darkness by good doctrine, or intellectual conversion. The kingdom is come when the power of God comes upon us and we are anointed into the kingdom Jesus inaugurated, which is a kingdom that values the poor, that heals the sick, and absolutely transforms humanity into new creation. I read the following paragraph today and it really hit me, I don’t know where I stand on healings and baptism of the Holy Spirit, but I know that the church has lost its voice in our culture because people have the outward appearance of religion but deny the inner power of it.

“Much of our preaching has to do with ‘sin management,’ but how many times do we hear that we need to pray for the transformation that can only be accomplished through the power of the Holy Spirit and not just through our own efforts? Without this hidden but real power, we cannot fulfill Christ’s great commandment – loving as He loved, which is characterized by loving our enemies.” Francis MacNutt The nearly Perfect Crime: How The Church Almost Killed The Ministry of Healing

To Walk Justly And To Love Mercy

2006-08-29T09:37:00.000-07:00

As I watch the news and am angered by the injustices we ignore, and the worse ones we commit as a nation, my heart burns for the justice of God’s Kingdom. The basic truth that Jesus inaugurated the coming Kingdom of God which is overthrowing the kingdom of Evil, seems to be merely in word and not in deed. Where in the church or in the world are the tangible expressions of that kingdom and its authoritative reign. I think we are often afraid of those things, I know I am, the miraculous works that come with the kingdom are scary, and things like grace and mercy can be even harder. But if we do not have regular healings, salvations, deliverance, inner healing, and other visible signs of the kingdom than the gospel we announce does not appear to be real. What I find even more difficult is the call to live in the tension of justice and mercy, which is all dictated by a divine love of which I feel I will never grasp. I was contemplating Micah 6:8, and it was just blowing my mind. The people who first heard these words had much less theology to work with, and so when they are told that being Gods people means doing justly and loving mercy I am not sure what exactly they thought. Justice is a more human response, and possibly easier to understand, not that it is actually done very often. We expect justice, especially when we are thinking of ourselves. The question is how mercy works into the high call of justice. How can I long for oppressors to find justice, and to want mercy for them at the same time? How can I long for victims to experience real justice and yet for there to be mercy? When it comes to war, how can we long for justice but act in mercy? Maybe it is in the divine grace which we find the clash of justice and mercy. Jesus on the cross is God’s justice and it is his mercy both fully revealed and fully worked out. If we are to follow this Jesus guy, it may mean that personal sacrifice is the only way we can live a just and merciful life; longing to see justice worked out in our world, but mercifully taking on the burden of guilt even when we don’t see why we should. Maybe this would help ease the pains of racism, if we longed for justice and took on the burden of guilt that we may not feel is ours. True justice is in the long run not focused on the punishment of the guilty, but on the freedom and life of the victim. On the other hand maybe true mercy is not focused on the victim but on the perpetrator, as the ultimate grace. Humans were the guilty ones and we received the mercy, Jesus was innocent and he was the one who received the justice. All I know is that this verse in Micah does not allow us to say we are Christians and then do nothing about the great injustices in our world (or the small ones), and it does not allow us to stand in judgment of our world because it is calling us to be merciful and compassionate.

May his kingdom come.

Age of Empowerment

2006-07-24T11:08:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite things in school is when a teacher goes off on something that has nothing to do with the actual class. A few weeks ago in Greek, my teacher talked for 15 minutes about the Age of Enlightenment, and it resonated so much with my soul. He had recently visited Auschwitz and is planning to write about how those horrible things could only happen in the scientific age. The problem with the enlightenment is that rather than actually enlightening mankind it empowered them. Christianity has never been and can never be about power, especially political power. Our world is set up in such a way that we glorify men and women who crave power. Even our churches have been praised for becoming purpose driven and bringing in the numbers. The western empire has introduced the greatest heresy of all time, the gospel of empowerment.

As we watch wars destroy innocent life, we see genocide in Darfur, we see AIDS ravaging impoverished nations; how does the gospel call us to respond. Are we called to take up arms and preemptively attack a nation like Iraq? Are we called to allow Israel to violently attack innocent people because we have somehow convinced ourselves that they are sovereign and can do no wrong? Are we called to just build bigger churches for people to come to? What is the gospel calling us to in our world?

The so called enlightenment calls us to progress and power, making greed a virtue and destroying ethics in the name of science. Jesus had a different message, one that subverted all of this. A message of hope, healing, and peace. Where those who followed him were to give up all rights, to submit. Enlightenment is not about achieving great things, it is about the veil being lifted so that we might see how great and loving God is. It is not about action steps or achieving a mission statement, it is about understand that we are messengers, missionaries to our world. Power has corrupted the gospel, and we have glorified the idea of being driven by goals instead of being led by the spirit. Christians are not called to pick up arms and become soldiers of the gospel. We are called to lay down everything, to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God. We have become light so that we might bring light to the world, to bring hope and healing; we have become salt so that we might preserve the good world that God created. So how do we change from trying to empower people to allowing the gospel to enlighten them?

“It is finished” John 19:30

2006-04-15T13:48:00.000-07:00

If it is finished, why do we wander? After the first exodus, the Israelites had the opportunity to march into the promise land and to live the abundant life God had promised them so that they would be agents of true humanity for their world. Standing at the border to their promise land, they woosed out. Like so many of us they saw the giants, and were overwhelmed. It was to big a task for them, but also like us they forgot who God is and what his covenant with them truly was.

We are the new covenant faithful people. Jesus initiated the second exodus through his life and ultimately on the cross. He fulfilled the old covenant and wrote a new one with his blood so that we might live in the promise land now. Knowing that he has done this, that we are his new creation meant to bring about and live out the redemption of the world, why do we wander?

What is finished? Clearly the problem of sin is not finished, because I still screw up and sin. Clearly the eschatological hope is not finished, because we still hope for the new heavens and the new earth. What is finished is the power the world had over us to hold us as slaves. We are now set free to head towards the promise land. This is the final plan of God’s creation, the final culmination of his covenant with Abraham. All people can now live free. Easter Sunday is the first day of the new creation, and all men are given the right to follow Jesus into the promise land and experience new creation. Yet, so few lives seem transformed, so few people live in that freedom, so few people see past their own narcissistic agendas. The cross brought us to the border of the promise land and invited us in, but history shows that we have continued to wander in the desert. Why do we wander?

Rather than be a part of God’s redeeming work of new creation, we have huddled together in the desert of our own self absorption and built religious fortresses. Instead of the covenant faithful community living out and bringing new creation to a hurting and broken world, we have set up church organizations and sanctified the idea of being “Purpose Driven”. Instead of an intimate relationship with our creator we have chosen to make an idol out of the canon and allow that to be the only way God speaks, for fear of what he might say outside of those human limitations. Instead of bringing our light into the darkness, we have learned to network our lights together so that we might encourage one another. If we united and marched into the promise land with all of our resources and under the banner of the crucified God we could eradicate aids, we could demolish wars with peace, we could offer a hand up to the poor; instead we spend millions on giant building that don’t even reflect the beauty and glory of our Living God, but serve our mega-church agendas quit well. We are the salt that should preserve the world, the light that should bring healing; instead the world seems almost unchanged by our existence. Pain and suffering seem unaffected by the truth we claim to hold. The promise land still sits there waiting for God’s people to live out His reign as King. But we huddle together, point fingers at immorality, give abstract spiritual reasons for real physical need we should be meeting, and we wander in the desert, why do we wander?

When Jesus spoke these words, when he declared “it” finished, he opened up what Hebrews calls the “new and life giving way” (Heb. 10:20). Which means that as we seek to follow His way, we should be giving life to this world; not to be confused with building big churches, or having lots of good Christian friends. There is a new way, and if we can walk in it our world (all of creation) will be blessed with true life. This becomes an easy way to see if we have become part of that new creation, if we have truly joined the covenant faithful community, because we need only look around and see if our faith has made the world a better place. What would our neighbors say? What would people of other sexual orientations say? What would people of other religions say? What would people of other socio economic backgrounds say? If the rocks and trees could speak, what would they say? What would children dieing of aids say? What would citizens of war torn Iraq say? These are not just abstract question, but revealing truths about what we have allowed the church to become. It is in the promise land that we experience what Jesus meant by “it is finished”, it is there that we live in a different way. “We are able so to live not because we have answers to all the world’s troubles, but because God has given us a way to live without answers” (Hauerwas). Wandering in the desert we find ourselves trapped by the need to find answers, in the promise land of new creation we can live without answers. We are free to live without the need to convince the world that we hold the absolute truth, because we have a true relationship with the one who is absolute truth.

It is scary standing at the border, knowing that there are giants in there that we can not overcome, knowing that we will be asked to live without answers, knowing that we will be called to sacrifice everything for those who may hate and mock us. But there is a land overflowing with beer and thai food (or something like that), and on the cross Jesus finished our spiritual exodus, he put an end to our wandering. All we have to do now is put down all of our selfish desires and institutional agendas and follow the rejected and crucified Messiah into the beautiful dark mysteries of our Creator God.

So why do we wander?

“Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise” Luke 23:43

2006-03-23T13:12:00.000-08:00

What did this executed thief really say to Jesus that merited his salvation? I sure didn’t hear the sinner’s prayer. I know we don’t really believe in works, but come on this guy did nothing. The question is then if we have done the nothing that this thief did so that we might also be invited by Jesus into the feast of new creation. Maybe Stanley Hauerwas can throw some light on these three men being executed on crosses:

“Why does one thief taunt Jesus while the other seems to recognize who Jesus is? What does it mean to say these are criminals? Could it not be that they are zealots who sought to overthrow the Roman occupation of Palestine? Does the one mock Jesus because Jesus did no turn out to be the liberator Israel had long desired? Is this taunting thief like the two on the road to Emmaus, who have been told that Jesus no longer is in the grave, but they are leaving Jerusalem because, as far as they are concerned, this Jesus does not appear to be the one they had hoped would ‘redeem Israel’? After all, what kind of redeemer ends up on a cross? But if the problem is that Jesus does not seem to be the kind of redeemer Israel desired, what made it possible for one criminal to recognize that this loser hanging on the cross will come into a kingdom?”

If I had been steeped in Jewish tradition at the time of Jesus I would not have believed that he was the Messiah, or at least I don’t think I would have. Not only because he dies on a cross as a criminal, which is no way to win anything, but also because of the people he associated with. When I read this cry, the first question i had is 'why did this man believe in Jesus dying on the cross?' But the second is what kind of a kingdom is this, that with one word allows a man in who has proven himself a criminal?

Not that it mattered at this point in the story, but how much would this piss off self-righteous Jews. The whole idea of the first covenant had been (wrongly) understood as separated and glorifying one nation alone, and only the faithful among that nation. If you were on the outs with the religious leaders it meant you were on the outs with God. But here is a man hanging next to Jesus, every Jew knowing that he was being rejected by God because of his sin, and Jesus who claims to be God invites him into paradise that very day.

Something I have begun to understand from this story is that it is not as important that we have a legacy, that we are remembered, but that it is more important who remembers us. The religious leaders were working to be remembered as Holy Jews, this criminal realizes that the only person in the cosmos whose remembering of a person matters is in fact this very Jesus dying next to him. So he turns to the Messiah, and ask not to be forgiven, nor for God to come into his heart, he doesn’t confess his belief in the cross, he simply ask that the God of the universe remember him when He is back on His throne.

So before we start acting like the older brother from the Prodigal son story about Jesus remembering this guy in paradise, we need to remember who he partied with on earth while he was here. He avoided those who sought to make their mark, to be remembered, and he journeyed through life with those who sought only acceptance and to be remembered.

“After all, we ourselves are only at Jesus’ table because he made a habit of celebrating parites with all the wrong people. Isn’t it about time we started to copy him?” – N.T. Wright

“I Thirst” John 19:28

2006-03-22T11:08:00.001-08:00

As I read this today, and thought about it, I kept going back to Jesus being this “living water” John 4:10. It seems to me to be a picture of this fulfilling, and delicious substance that when we drink is both pleasure full and satisfying; must be like beer.

What if theology is like beer: intoxicating, best in community, adds joy and celebration, and is both pleasure full and satisfying. As I began to think about this a few things came to mind. The first was Lucky Lager (or whatever trashy beer comes to mind). This is a beer mostly drank by under aged kids who just need to get wasted, it’s like Max Lucado. Max Lucado is the Lucky Lager of Theologians. He is awesome when you are young in your faith and just need to get wasted by God. He’s cheap and easy, and was instrumental in my faith. When I first began to thirst for the true Creator God, he pulled back the veil and gave me a peak. But my thirst began to become deeper, it needed something fuller bodied.

(Of course we all know the best bears come from small breweries, not mass produced cheap stuff. Which is why we should avoid books and ideas mass marketed by the multi-million dollar Christian industry.)

A new thirst is born, the thirst you have on a hot summer day when you are barbequing steak on the back porch with friends. At this point, only a good porter or stout will do. This is the stuff that fills your stomach long before it has the chance to impair your mind, and that you drink for the taste and pleasure more than for the affect. You are moving from the gift to the giver. Many theologians have become my oatmeal stout (NT Wright most of all). These are the Christian Mystics, the people who lust for the wonder of God, who seek not to mass produce but to refine and deepen. So while I needed Lucado at a certain point on my pilgrimage, now I have completely different needs. I am not looking for a spiritual high, but for something that is thick with the presence and mystery of God. Something I have to drink slowly, because it fills my spiritual stomach long before it has the abstract spiritual affect I looked for in my youth. I now need a deep, dark, gritty faith that makes sense in my world and at the same time changes my world.

So what are we drinking? Are we just grabbing the cheapest thing we can find, hoping to get trashed as quickly and easily as possible, or are we searching for the sweet nectar? The word from God that is “sweeter than honey, than honey from the comb? (Psalm 19:10) Most of all what was it that Jesus was thirsting for? Much of the Old Testament speaks of Israel being a thirsty people in a dry land, they are exiled and thirsting for the fulfillment of their covenant with God, a covenant of course they did not keep. What if this cry of thirst is about the new Exodus? Maybe Jesus is thirsting for something real, more than the “I raised my hand one Sunday and play Church once in a while” Christianity? Maybe his longing should be echoed in our hearts as we search to drink from the sweetness of His Kingdom, to taste the heavenly brew.

Local Newspaper

2006-03-20T11:29:00.000-08:00

I live in a small town, and i read this in our local newspaper and it cracked me up. This is the last paragraph in an article about choosing concrete colors

Council member Charlie Hawkins suggested to Ely perhaps it was a job better suited for his wife. Liebert, however, added it will be difficult to please everybody. “Contemplate all you want. Once it goes on, someone will be bitching about it,” Liebert said.

“Father forgive them; for they know not what they are doing” Luke 23:34

2006-03-19T12:34:00.000-08:00

The first of the final words, as Jesus is dying on the cross. Did he fully understand how he was fulfilling God’s covenant with Israel and writing a new one with his own blood? I’m reading this book “Cross-Shattered Christ” by Stanley Hauerwas and it’s freakin blowing my mind. It is so easy to assume we have heard and understood something as fundamental as the cross, but then some author or friend challenges the very things we have understood as fundamental. Like what this book says about our personal buddy Jesus

“I think nothing is more destructive for our ability to confess that the crucified Jesus is Lord than the sentimentality that grips so much that passes for Christianity in our day. Sentimentality is the attempt to make the gospel conform to our needs, to make Jesus Christ our ‘personal’ savior, to make the suffering of Christ on the cross but an instant of general unavoidable suffering.”

That pretty much rips at the heart of most sermons I have heard on the cross. So as I take this Lent to ponder the cross, I am challenged to see what it meant for God. How did the crucifixion impact the Trinity? There is something much deeper going on than Jesus dying for me (as warm and fuzzy as that makes me feel). And if this death is not about me, than neither is this first statement made from the cross (although Hauerwas makes the point that this we most likely not what was first said).

“They don’t know what their doing”, yes they do their crucifying some Jew who ruffled too many feathers. In one sense, they absolutely know what they are doing, yet in some other they don’t. Maybe we still don’t really know what they were doing. What does it mean to kill God? When Jesus died, in some way God died and that death was taken up into the Trinity and in some way is the means to our redemption. Which of course only gets more confusing when Jeuus later cries out “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me”, words that seemingly reveal a God who has a horrible problem.

So why has the Christian tradition chosen these words as the first, what about them helps us as we journey towards that final moment? Maybe it has to do with our human desire to make everything about us, about our personal conversion moment, about our faith, about our sins, about our transformed life. What if that is not the main point. Here we see Jesus crying to his father to forgive people who have not asked for forgiveness. Jesus alone has the right to ask the father to forgive us. We get to look at the cross, but we can not enter into it because it was an act that was between a son and a father. We see the Trinitarian life being lived out in front of us, but we can not fully grasp it. All we can do is realize that Jesus alone has the right to ask the Father to forgive us, and that even in suffering he longs to see us forgiven.

Jesus forgive us for us for our narcissistic theology and worldview.

Broken Identity

2006-03-19T11:48:00.000-08:00

"Do you not realize or understand your own nobility?" ask The Homilies of St. Macarius. "...Each of you has been anointed with the heavenly Chrism, and has become a Christ by grace; each is king and prophet of the heavenly mysteries."

How is it that we have allowed our identity to be so broken. It is easy for me to humbly admit that I am a horrible sinner and don't deserve God's grace, but his love has made me lovable. I have received his name and therefore his identity, but guilt continually pokes its finger in my gut and lets me know that I am so unworthy of that name that I had better not live out of my God given identity. In our world there are many people who shy away from using their last names because of the connotation that comes with it, modern families unashamedly desecrate what used to be so sacred. In the same way Christians have desecrated our name, to the point where many have rejected the title even while embracing the faith, and even more feel like they must apologize for what people bearing thee name Christians have done through the ages. Our father has given us His name, we are to be little messiahs for our world, and we are so confused and broken that there is no end to the search for who we really are.

Too many people spend much of their lives trying to figure out who they are in a narcissistic manner. We were not made to create our identities from within, but to have our identities called out by others. Beginning with our parents, our sense of who we are should be grounded in the affirmational truths others have spoken into our lives; of course this rarely happens. So we struggle through life trying to define ourselves with no help from the people God created to give us that definition. As we turn inward, our identity becomes twisted because we can not see ourselves outside of the way we see others, and so we begin to compare. This leads us to find all of our faults, and to live them out as our identities. We have faults, I have horrible faults, but they are not my identity they are the infection that is eating away at my identity. Who I truly am lies outside of those faults, but because I am sinful I can not see past them. A veil has been pulled over my eyes, and I have closed my ears to those who should be speaking truth into my life. We are sloppy, messy, broken people; walking around blind and deaf. To top it off we are kings living like homeless drug addicts. The veil of sin is so deep and gritty that we can’t see the crown Jesus has given us, and we miss our call to be light and salt in this world. We are prophets of the heavenly mysteries, adopted children of the high King of the Universe. Our identity has been set in gold since before the foundations of the earth and can not be shaken. But instead of wearing our crown we try to cover it up, and we live in shame because we can’t get past the lies in the mirror.

One of my roommates once caught a rattle snake; we named him Cristos like the guy off Desperado. For over a week he tried to feed it mice, but it would just coil up and rattle at us. The snake was so used to the dry and dangerous wild he came from, that he could not trust. His defense mechanisms were so high that he could not receive food from someone else’s hand. In a sense he chose to die of hunger over trusting. Free food was offered, and he hissed out of hatred at it. When we live out of our brokenness we are like that stupid snake, and we will die. We are like a bunch of damn fools pissing on a fortune that is being offered us. But Jesus said he came to bring life and life abundantly. He has given us a new name, a chance to live out the true light because we have become that light. When we allow God to transform us, our lives will transform the world. N.T. Wright often says “we are to be for our world what Jesus was for His”; which we can never do unless we see ourselves as His brothers and sisters. When we look at the gospels do we identify with Jesus or Judas? Are we willing to dust off our crowns and be light and salt in this broken world? Can we set aside our broken narcissistic identities and embrace the Holy Adoption we have received? Can we truly be citizens of heaven?

What God

2006-03-19T11:35:00.000-08:00

What God
What God would create this world with the power of his hand
Then leave it to be destroyed by the selfish greed of man
What God would sit in heaven while men suffer in pain
What God would allow countries to starve for simple lack of rain
What God allows sin to hurt so many precious lives
When He’s looking down upon us, do you think He ever cries

What God
What God would create a diamond from dirty worthless coal
And put into the hearts of fallen men a divine imprint on the soul
What God would let us ask questions whose answers can’t be found
What God would hear our cries to Him and not utter back a sound
What God allows himself to feel so very distant
When only in His presence can we be truly content

What God
What God looked down and saw our broken and lonely state
Then sent His only Son to die in love to conquer hate
What God saw who we really were and loved us anyway
What God chose our salvation over his sons life that day
What God watched his son become the sacrificial lamb
What God is this, my Lord and King, He is the great I AM

by Kurt Allen Ingram