By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.
In Part One we were all about work. In Part Two we're talking about a Sabbath and a rest. Without wishing to warble the theology of the Old Testament, I'm wondering whether the two are very different things. Perhaps it's possible to enjoy them both on the same day, but it's worth figuring out the distinction as we go along.
Pretty much any biblical reference to the Sabbath that I mention here will be well known. And that's a pretty good place to start. We all know the premise that God was laying down within the story of His creation. So often though, the premise and praxis find trouble connecting. God hasn't had a break since so His rest was more likely a not-so-subtle nod and a wink in our direction rather the result of him being all tuckered out.
So, let's kick off with the Sabbath. It's always a good way to start or end a week (depending on how you've decided it makes the most sense or what church you've grown up in).The Israelites are to observe the Sabbath, celebrating it for the generations to come as a lasting covenant. It will be a sign between me and the Israelites forever, for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day he abstained from work and rested.
Informed by a healthy Protestant work ethic (or unhealthy - depends on your worldview), I'd always figured that observing a Sabbath infered that you're working the other six days. That's not an unreasonable assumption, nor an unreasonable practice. Yet I read verses like Exodus 35:31 (It is a sabbath of rest, and you must deny yourselves; it is a lasting ordinance), and my opinion starts to waver.Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.
Our Sabbath is for God. It's not for our indulgence. It may be a day for serving Him in different ways (worship, hospitality, administration, justice, mercy...the list is long) or it may be a time for resting from those things (if they're what's work for us) so that we can keep a day holy. And what does keeping a day holy mean? It means a day dedicated and consecrated to Him. A day of rest probably isn't frenetic or ridden with anxiety—a day centred on God is unlikely to yield those outcomes.
While we're at it, is it good enough to say that we can rest and Sabbath on the same day, or are we indulging ourselves on God's clock? Without getting legalistic yet staying biblically faithful, what does a great sabbath look like? Even as I tap away I'm reminded of the Essenes, a bunch of hard core blokes before Jesus time, who believed that if Israel could just muster one perfect Sabbath, it would trigger the coming of the Messiah. Must have been a bummer when someone stuffed up...
The perfect Sabbath doesn't come from our legalism, the perfect Sabbath rest comes when we submit our all to the Lord, accepting joyfully his promised guidance through a “narrow way” to the Kingdom. It's when we rest from our own works, from all effort to justify ourselves. We confess ourselves to be imperfect and unworthy of Divine grace, and unable to make ourselves worthy. And we gratefully accept Divine mercy extended toward us in our redemption through Jesus.
So, if our Sabbath is a time for denying ourselves and seeking God, when does the rest come? Sure, we find our rest in God but, in the context of work, rest and play, where does the rest fit in.
Fortunately, we're not left with a Torah alone to navigate through our weeks. Jesus came to fulfill the law. And what does he say about the Sabbath? Far a start He declares himself Lord of the Sabbath. Then he puts the Sabbath in perspective by saying: "The Sabbath was made to serve us; we weren't made to serve the Sabbath. The Son of Man is no lackey to the Sabbath. He's in charge!" (I'm not completely sure he said 'lackey'—I think that's Eugene's work.) You can tell me what you make of Jesus' words, but what I get out of it is that the practice of a Sabbath was designed to bring us back to God; a trigger for re-consecrating ourselves. The Sabbath is the period in the paragraph. It resets the meter of things.
So often, we deviate by degrees. We don't so much go awol and take out the guy who won't give us breakfast, more often we just veer a little, then a little more, to the left or right of true north. I think the Sabbath is intended to recalibrate our souls so that again we respond to our God. Maybe we haven't drifted at all. Maybe we're ready to raise the rafters with our God-songs and God-deeds, but maybe we need to raise our heads and bow our heads to discover His greatness and glory covering our brokenness. I think this is what Jesus meant when he said 'the sabbath was made for man'. I think this is what the Sabbath's all about.
And where does rest fit in?
Some of the activities and practices that become part of a well-intentioned Sabbath can make us blimmin' tired. They tire me sometimes. So, where does the rest fit in? If our Sabbaths are intended to be days of self-denial, when do we recover? While we work? On the job? Or is there room for rest somewhere or somehow else?
And what is rest to you? Because my guess it's different for each of us. My first thought when I hear the word 'rest' is a good sleep, but in the context of recalibration and rejuvenation it's quite different. A restful weekend for me (the best place to get me some rest) would probably contain a decent run, some writing, breakfast at a café, a bit of reading, some cricket or AFL viewing while lying on the floor, and some cooking. If I put my head on the pillow on a Sunday having worked some or all of these around some Sabbath action, I'd be well-rested.
That needn't be you. I think my brother-in-law would stick pretty rigidly to 'a good sleep' as a definition for rest. And his not wrong. Some people would find a few hours of shopping restful. Yeah, that's not me. The big deal about resting well is figuring out what you classify as 'activities of rest' and practicing them.
I know some excellent 'resters' (see the above paragraph for an example). I don't mean that they're lazy. They work hard in their jobs, they offer themselves freely outside of their working lives, but they know how to rest and when to rest. Either they've figured out or wrestled with the biblical principle of the Sabbath and grown in the discipline of rest, or they're naturally predisposed.
Both a Sabbath and a scheduled time of rest require discipline. It often requires discipline to do things that ultimately or immediately restore us. I don't think that's contradictory, it's just life. Sometimes we're so lazy we don't even do the things that give us rest. Weird, but true.
Work requires rest. And rest assumes that we go back to work. And somewhere in there we've got to play a bit as well. So as not to get all dull and stuff.
Until we play, rest up!
Sunday, August 19, 2007
Work. Rest. Play.
Part Two: Rest
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Spacious Miracles
Think quick: which of Jesus' miracles do you remember first? There's no winning answer, just something to get us off and running.
In an internal monologue (probably a dialogue given there was Q&A involved) during my Sunday morning run, I settled on one...
Riverview had a Miracle Offering Day on Sunday for all our Riverview Trust initiatives and while I was considering what I might talk about with the team I lead as a foray into leading our church in worship, I got thinking miracles.
My answer took me back to Year 9 at Wesley. Before I get there though, the miracle:Some time after this, Jesus crossed to the far shore of the Sea of Galilee (that is, the Sea of Tiberias), and a great crowd of people followed him because they saw the miraculous signs he had performed on the sick. Then Jesus went up on a mountainside and sat down with his disciples. The Jewish Passover Feast was near.
When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward him, he said to Philip, "Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?" He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was going to do.
Philip answered him, "Eight months' wages would not buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!"
Another of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, spoke up, "Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?"
Jesus said, "Have the people sit down." There was plenty of grass in that place, and the men sat down, about five thousand of them. Jesus then took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed to those who were seated as much as they wanted. He did the same with the fish.
When they had all had enough to eat, he said to his disciples, "Gather the pieces that are left over. Let nothing be wasted." So they gathered them and filled twelve baskets with the pieces of the five barley loaves left over by those who had eaten.
After the people saw the miraculous sign that Jesus did, they began to say, "Surely this is the Prophet who is to come into the world." Jesus, knowing that they intended to come and make him king by force, withdrew again to a mountain by himself.
I want to write a few words about Jesus feeding the 5000 but first, let me just say this: my theological understanding of what went on is fairly simple. Jesus took the lunch of a boy who was willing to give sacrificially and blessed it. Something miraculous and supernatural took place that was inaugurated by Jesus and activated by the obedience and faithfulness of the disciples. The food didn't multiply upon being blessed, it multiplied upon distribution. While there's plenty of significance to be gleaned from the miracle, I just want to leave my understanding of it there for the moment.
I guess it was a neat and salutary message to selfish school boys. Heretical in my humble opinion, but neat and salutary nonetheless.
As I reflected on this on Sunday morning, I realised that whether or not it was accurate to the events that might have taken place 2000 years ago, the notion of behaving spaciously was demonstrated in the telling.
Our words and our action inspire and grow, or deflate and diminish those around us. Our attitudes are contagious. And, from that perspective, we're all leaders. We're all capable of building up or tearing down. Unintentionally or intentionally.
The Apostle Paul recalled a principle regularly considered in Proverbs when talking to the church at Corinth:Remember: A stingy planter gets a stingy crop; a lavish planter gets a lavish crop.
I vote yes to miracles that can only be explained through the supernatural. I also vote yes to the authority of Jesus to be the steward of those unexplainable signs and wonders. Yet I also vote yes to the (often miraculous) notion that you and I, through going about our sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life with eyes on eternity, can change the flavour of the world around us. We can be positively contagious. There's truth in it.
Live creatively friends.
(PS. On reflection, 'water into wine' was probably my 'top of mind' miracle...but I don't have a Year 9 story about water into wine. And that's appropriate.)
Monday, May 28, 2007
Don't you know who I am?!
My friend Justine told me a story yesterday about the most irate customer she'd ever had to deal with. She was working with a large national furniture company (known for their liberation) while the customer was the figurehead of a prominent wine company (two names, '&' in the middle). In the course of an animated discussion that followed some goods being damaged through the rough handling of the customers' courier company, the customer, demanding a replacement, began to explode down the phone: 'Don't you know who I am?'.
On and on, louder and louder...'Don't you know who I am?'...'Don't you know who I am?'. Aside from being rude and obnoxious, I was tickled that someone actually used the phrase seriously. I've heard people use it in jest, never legit.
It got me thinking: How often do we, by our words and actions (or maybe our thoughts), exclaim at some level: 'Don't you know who I am?'.
How often does someone wrong us, or treat us differently to how we feel we deserve, or ignore our needs and we respond somewhere inside, 'Don't you know who I am?'
We all crave justice—particularly for ourselves. Perhaps we all crave a level of recognition too. We want to be treated consistent with 'our station'...whatever that is. And when we're not, we feel wronged in some way.
And then there's Jesus...Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross!
Jesus, who had every right to demand authority, every right to assert dominion and every right to reign and rule, asserted none of these things. Paul tells us here in Philippians that he actually does the complete opposite...he becomes a servant. Interestingly, given that he was 'in very nature God', he was all these things all the same. Yet he had no need to assert authority—it was recognised in Him.
Isaiah tells us that: He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth. And yet the lamb to the slaughter is also the Lion of Judah. Only Jesus makes sense of this kind of tautology by modeling it. Mark writes Him saying: 'If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all'.
But...Don't you know who I am?
We discover that, for Jesus, the answer was absolute: Yes.
Jesus revealed to us what the Kingdom of God looks like in contrast to what often prevails on earth. His ministry was chiefly about this revelation and become the means by which we are restored to God. That restoration is, in large part, a growing understanding of the economy of the Kingdom of God as opposed to what we've commonly experienced. And the two are a whole lot different.
I guess the bigger question is: 'Don't you know who He is?'
As we discover who Jesus is, we discover all we are because of Him. We also discover who we're not. As Luke wrote in Acts: 'It's in Him we live and move and have our being'. Paul wrote to the Ephesians: 'It's in Christ that we find out who we are and what we're living for'. I don't think we get this once and are done with it. Discovering who He is a continual process. A journey, a wrestle, and in a completely tautological fashion, as we lay down our lives we discover what it means to be human. Better still, part of a new humanity.
Conversations like this could (and often do) go on forever. This one is going to stop in blog form real soon. But not without action. The laying down of our agendas to follow him is active after all. Paul's all about action in Philippians:Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus...
Do you know who you are?
Friday, May 25, 2007
Who do you belong to?
Football fans will need scant introduction to Kaka, a Brazillian playing for AC Milan who played a big part in getting his side across the line in the UEFA Champions League final last night against Liverpool. His real name is Ricardo Izecson Santos but Ricardo's little brother couldn't bash out that complicated name and went with Kaka. It stuck.
I opened my Australian this morning to Kaka celebrating AC Milan's win. It's easy to pay out on bumper stickers and anything that makes you squirm...but my hat's off to this guy.
For starters, he's a tidy football player.
And he features a tidy version of Leonard Cohen's 'Hallelujah' that I don't think I've heard before on his website (well, one of his plethora of websites).
Then there's the way he celebrates a goal. From another website: Kaka is a nice guy, very religious, very family man. You can see that he points his fingers to the sky when he scores a goal. He does that to thank Jesus for healing him from a very serious injury that could have ended his football career.
Here's Kaka (I keep wanting to type Kafka, but I'm hanging in there) celebrating last night's win:
And the gear:
Now, I don't know Kaka beyond some websites, a newspaper, the occasional football match and AAP Reuters, but I'd love to hear what a t-shirt like this triggers in you. Spacious?
Friday, May 18, 2007
New Norcia Reflections: Servanthood
I've retreated to New Norcia this weekend - a monastic town a couple of hours north of Perth by car. I come here often for quite reflection, recalibration and refueling. Basically the equivalent of a car service...but for the soul. Sometimes it's that stuff I come away with. Other times it's more serendipitous.
Eating with the monks is always a treat. Aside from the silent nature of the meals, there's always something on the reading list to pique the curiousity. It's monastic practice not talk during meals, but to have one of the monks read. The meal is considered an extension of the prayers that precede the meal. Tonight it was Colossians 4 then 1 Thessalonians 1 and then into a book on Western Australia's legal system from 1829-2005 - a natural segue I thought.
At the meal's end, the reading monk runs over the 'necrology'. For those who don't delve into a necrology after each meal, it's a recounting (in this context) of the various monks of this order who died on this day (May 18) over the years. They are cited for remembrance and prayer (some interesting theology there but we'll keep moving). The necrology tonight remembered, among others, a monk from Subiaco in Italy who was a 'retired abbot'. This got me thinking: abbots retire. In an order where a vow takes 3-5 years to genuinely 'begin' - and then lasts a lifetime - the abbot (the father of the community) can retire.
Outside of the dining room where it's fine to resume normal conversation, I approached the Abbott. "According to the necrology, Abbot's retire", I said.
He replied: "Yes, at the age of 75, the Abbot offers his retirement to his superiors in Rome who then consider if they will reject it or, if they consider there may be grounds for change, they will put it to the vote within the local monastic community".
He continued: "This is interesting for me...I'm 75 next year".
Failing to betray my transient evangelical piece of turf, I enquired: "Do you have any sense of what you'll do?" To which he gave a great reply: "I am a monk. It is not for me to think about these things. If they have thoughts on it, they will let me know".
"You serve at His pleasure", I added. He nodded knowingly.
As I walked away, the first verse that came to mind was Paul telling the Corinthians that he was a 'slave to Christ'. In an age when we deliberate over the ways we can be most effective for the Kingdom or seek out opportunities where we can shine our light the brightest, the Abbot in four words reminded me of my purpose. I am a slave...to Christ.
Beyond all else, followers of Christ exist for His good pleasure and His glory. Wherever we find ourselves or see ourselves, it is our honour to serve the Master. Sure that service will take on many hues, textures and flavours, but they are all informed by humility and servanthood.
Friday, April 6, 2007
Good. Friday.
Today isn't like any other day we reflect on or remember. It's different.
History's course changed on Good Friday. After thousands of years of bringing sacrifices from our own efforts; from our own farms, by our effort, purchased for the purpose of sacrifice and atonement for a finite duration, the perfect and spotless lamb came. To take away the sin of the world. The spotless lamb shed his blood in obedience to his Father, so that the world might be saved not condemned. An old covenant for a new covenant. One perfect sacrifice carrying the imperfections and vileness of all humanity. Made once in obedience; resonating through eternity. Setting captives free, loosing chains that bound us and ensuring that the power of sin passes over the citadels of our lives because of the terrific sacrifice of God's own Son.
And me? I go free too. He hung and bled and died for me.
How can it be that you were the one on the cross, lifted for all our shame?
How can it be the scars in your hands are for me? You are the King of all.
Lord, your sacrifice, your blood and your cross overwhelm me. But what amazes me most is that you were obedient to the Father in the face of the painful knowledge of the cup set before you. I can tell myself that you were fulfilling your mission, that you were doing what you knew you came to do...but that sanitises the humanity of it all. You despised the shame for the joy of your Father. That's fully God and fully man. Fully good. Way more good than I can comprehend.
Amazing love how can it be that you my God would die for me?
Sunday, March 18, 2007
Count the cost
More often than not, I write because I have something to say. Sometimes though, I just want to write. In those times, my muddling prose doesn't see the light of day (other than on the pages of a journal). Today, it's being dragged into the annals of cacophony.
Last Thursday, I was talking to a mate of mine, Mal, about speaking and preaching... We talked about an exercise that's fairly typical in a presentation skills course or a Toastmasters meeting. In the exercise, you stand up, introduce yourself and tell the audience that 'you will be speaking on the subject of...'. At this point, you pause momentarily while some pre-ordained member of the audience yells out the topic and away you go. A little like theatre sports, yet most likely of no comedic value.
I just asked my wife, Fi, what it might be good to write on and she filled the blank space with... the spiritual lessons to be learned in building a house.
This is relevant to us right now. Given the small size of our home and the family expansion program we have undertaken (a little girl while be showing up in around eighteen-and-a-half weeks!) we're planning to build. We've had sporadic conversations about it over the last twelve months, but they've started to ramp up in colour and intensity over the last couple of months. The plan is to begin to build (or pitch a larger tent) by the end of the year. And that's where the fun begins. Having built once before I can testify: there's not much fun involved.
The process of building can reveal a lot about us. It can say a few things about our vision for the future as well. Not to mention the future of our bank accounts.
The first hurdle for me has been: do we really need to build? Fiona tells me the answer to that question is very definitely 'yes' so perhaps I should simply move on to the next hurdle. But let's camp here for a few lines. Our natural, societal-informed inclination is that my answer must be 'yes'. In fact, I not only need a bigger house, I need a bigger car, a bigger investment portfolio, a bigger boat and a bigger business. Somewhere along the way, any glimmer of simplicity is extinguished. I'm not advocating martyrdom or pauperdom, but I am keen for simplicity to burn brightly. My thought is that we should think. We should think about the necessity of stuff and things and the trade-off for that stuff and those things. This clearly has implications beyond me.
Simplicity isn't poverty, it's economics: making decisions about the allocation of scarce resources. And that definitely goes beyond me. If we all decide to leave our lights on, we'll either have a power shortage or a need for bigger power stations. Yet, if we decide to only use electricity when we really need it and not be wasteful, we'll find there's enough. This obviously comes back to stewardship. I think it was John Wesley who said: 'Gain all you can, save all you can, give all you can'. What I can give is determined by what I have left after I've done what I'm going to do with what I've gained. My consuming/spending decisions have a profound effect on my ability to give.
Yes, this is all coming back to building a house.
Jesus said, in Luke 14:28, "Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Will he not first sit down and estimate the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it? For if he lays the foundation and is not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule him, saying, 'This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.'
In many ways, Jesus was throwing out a no-brainer. But he knows us better than we can know ourselves. Depending on our wiring, we can be more about chasing a one-dimensional dream than counting the cost.
The second hurdle for me has been a spiritual one as much as a financial one. If a decision I make in one area of life could remove the ability for me to say 'yes' to God in another, then I need to ponder that decision prayerfully and intentionally. If I feel called to serve God in a particular way (that perhaps requires a more frugal existence) and yet I plough ahead and build something that determines that I need to earn even more over the next 25 years, then I'm intentionally or unintentionally telling God the parts of my life that are available and those that can't be touched. I'm not for a moment discounting the ability for God to supernaturally provide. He does: I've seen it and experienced it. And yet, I think he blesses our obedience and our desire to give ourselves to him. Sometimes He blesses us despite ourselves (just to remind us who's in control) but, most times, it's about partnership; us putting our hands in His and going for a long walk. On that walk we learn the unforced rhythms of grace that issue from a life that operates on his economy not ours.
Proverbs 11:24 tells us that while 'The world of the generous gets larger and larger; the world of the stingy gets smaller and smaller'. My thought is this: we can be generous with little and we can be generous with much. And our decisions regarding the stewardship of 'all we have gained' financially determines the resources available for generosity. I'm not saying this to compare one person's generosity with another; the widow gave a coin and gave all she had. What I'm saying is that our world becomes larger through the stewardship of what we have - this is intrinsically linked to the decisions we've made. And the extent to which we've 'counted the cost'.
Each of us has particular needs. While people in Vietnam often have families of five on a small scooter, that would incur a fine where I live. And so a family of five is probably getting around in a larger car...or an SUV...or a station-wagon. That's practical for our context. I'm not arguing for us to sell up and move to a commune in the hills. What I am proposing is a reflection of what informs that stuff. What itch do our acquisitions scratch? And should they being scratch by someone other than stuff? Jesus said to seek his Kingdom before anything else. When our perspective is re-oriented we find that everything we need is added to us. We may also find along the way that the things that we thought needed to be added no longer need to be.
In some ways, the entire point of this post lies here: the stuff that we decide we need ends up making decisions for us. The houses we build, the credit we burn, the cars we drive, the energy we expend...all of these have a butterfly effect over the rest of our lives. Not always immediately apparent, but it's there. Sometimes filling in cracks where air could once be inhaled and exhaled, sometimes opening cracks where there was once relationship and the freedom to enjoy moments.
If you're waiting for the moment that I'll dismount from the soapbox, please forgive me. I've made my share of decisions that removed choices. Perhaps they make me more cautious now. Or it could be that the things I value have changed over time too. And so, the value I now place on some areas becomes more sacred than others. More worthy of protection. The preeminence of mission is gradually shaping what, why, when and how I build the things I try and build.
A legendary Australian, Daryl Kerrigan, once said that 'a man's home is his castle'. But he also said 'it's not a house, it's a home' and 'you can't build what I've got'. If there's a place to finish up, it's right there. Don't forgo the stuff of life that can't be built with money for the things that can. Legacies and relationships cannot be 'compulsorily acquired'...but our stuff can get eaten by moths and rust.
I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life. Deuteronomy 30:19
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Only in the Poetic...
Last week I heard someone speaking on the subject, 'Why Sing?' . One of their memorable points was this: some things can only be expressed in the poetic. We can write through reams of paper (or countless pages in a Moleskine), or get our theology on, or preach our heads off, and yet still only skim the surface of the succinct, captivating truth of 'Amazing Grace how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me' or 'Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so'.
I was thumbing through a book yesterday and re-discovered this superlative poem by a dominator in the metaphysical realm: George Herbert. And I remembered all over again, that there are some sentiments that can only be expressed through the richness of the poetic. From around 400 years ago...take it away, George:Love bade me welcome, yet my soul drew back,
Guilty of dust and sin.
But quick-ey'd Love, observing me grow slack
From my first entrance in,
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning
If I lack'd anything.
"A guest," I answer'd, "worthy to be here";
Love said, "You shall be he."
"I, the unkind, the ungrateful? ah my dear,
I cannot look on thee."
Love took my hand and smiling did reply,
"Who made the eyes but I?"
"Truth, Lord, but I have marr'd them; let my shame
Go where it doth deserve."
"And know you not," says Love, "who bore the blame?"
"My dear, then I will serve."
"You must sit down," says Love, "and taste my meat."
So I did sit and eat.
-- George Herbert
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Jesus and James Cameron
I read today that James Cameron recently announced that his next big film project is a documentary that seeks to debunk the story of the resurrection of Christ. He also suggests that Jesus had a son with Mary Magdalene. Their attempt at a real-life The Da Vinci Code documentary will feature DNA researchers, historical "experts" and, of course, a truck load of controversy.
While this web page gives some details as to the plot that Cameron will be following, it got me thinking for a minute. I have faith that Jesus lived a breathtakingly revolutionary life while 'incarnated' here with us. In 'three and thirty years' he pretty much changed everything: the way many of us see the world, and the way many of us see ourselves. The accounts of his life, his teaching, his example, his signs and wonders, his leadership and his relationships demonstrated a way of living that was radical then as it is now.
Having lived this radical life, he was put on trial, crucified, killed and, after three days, was resurrected and after appearing to different groups of people on a number of occasions, he ascended to be at the right hand of his father, our Creator God.
Without steering in any direction, my faith informs that last paragraph.
My question is this: if a movie and scientific evidence (probably in reverse order) were to reveal that the DNA-verfiable remains of Jesus were found in a crypt in Jerusalem and it was indisputable...what effect would that have on you?
Would you ignore or integrate? And how would that integration look for you?
I'm not postulating anything here, just throwing out a question.
***Please bear this in mind: I'm striving to do this in the context of Titus 3:9, 2 Timothy 2:23, Colossians 2:4. That is to say, I'm not trying to start an argument or controversy here. I'm a follower of Jesus - that's my starting point. And it's my context for the question.
Sunday, February 25, 2007
W.I.P.
It's a spot of poetry to kick off the new week, innit?
I’m a work in progress
I’m not finished yet
I will continually fail in areas I’d love to succeed
I will continually over-promise and under-deliver.
You know that
You love me all the same
You know what lies within and what fuels my heart
And, somehow, you love every part of me.
One day, we’ll be fully united—
Body, soul, mind and spirit
We will dance. We will cry.
We will sing. We will laugh.
And we will be overjoyed that your work in me is complete.
Monday, February 19, 2007
Just like me
What's rolling around my head - probably because of the Donald Miller book I've just finished reading - is how we become imitators of Christ.
And yet, even as I write, I'm aware I could be barking up the wrong tree. The moment I start talking or writing or thinking about becoming more like Jesus, I turn what should be a pursuit of relationship into ritual or endeavour. Or worse, legalistic competition.
While there are things that I seek to be quite intentional about with Fi (my wife), I don't live in a calculating, mathematically-driven, 'see-what-I-can-get-on-the-board' fashion. We hang out. We talk. Sometimes we talk nonsense (and sing nonsense), sometimes we're chunky, sometimes we argue and sometimes we say nothing. And then I look at the sometimes cerebral approach I have with Jesus. As if he is an inanimate genie-like creature in the corner. Or worse - a Tamagochi that only responds when stimulated but is otherwise stationary. Jesus is alive and active. Regardless of my moves and stimulation. He pursues relationship with me and with those around me. He exists, at least in part, to intercede on my/our behalf. So, we don't talk ourselves into a lather to wake Him. We open our eyes to see him and our ears to hear what He's already doing.
Perhaps there's two things at work here. We pursue intimacy with Jesus because He's absolutely worth hanging out with. He loves, guides, instructs, leads, hears, comforts and pours out grace as he invite him into our lives and re-align our journey and enter in to what He's doing and His plans for us. And yet, as we do, we quickly come face to face (and read of and hear about) someone who is completely otherly. Not like us...and in a good, sublime way. Pure of heart, altogether lovely, altogether worthy, graceful, merciful, righteously angry when it's called for yet never descending into the dysfunctional places we go.
About the same time we discover this, we might discover Paul's instruction to imitate Christ just like he does. Before too long, if we're not careful, we're moved off the main highway into a self-righteous side street. Suddenly we're doing stuff, ticking boxes and generally striving to be more like Jesus rather than more with Jesus. Our efforts become like forced rhythms than an 'easy yolk' and the idea of us being in relationship with him becomes a little more muddy. Yet our lists make more sense. My lists make more sense. It's easy to calculate how you're doing when you can scan down the list for validation and self-approval. And yet, Jesus stands at the door of our hearts (and our heads, and our souls) and knocks. He waits to come in, hang out and have a meal with us.
Abide. Abide. Abide. Wrestle and rest.
We're back to the top. Back to a place where we need to remain. In communion with Him and inspired to become like him as a product of being with Him. Fresh intimacy. Fresh revelation. Fresh transformation. Not from memory, not by rote, but because of what He's doing and has done. And yeah, I become like Him. Slowly. Sometimes backwards, sometimes forwards. Yet it's a result of the main game, spending time with him.
We end up where we first began: remembering that the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.
Thursday, February 8, 2007
'I didn't get much out of the worship today...'
I discovered this great article today by a friend of a friend. Full of great stuff on one perspective of worship.
Read away. It's good gear.
Wednesday, February 7, 2007
Wrestlemania
We have a tendency to unintentionally/intentionally, through messy thinking, create a 'tin god' that fits into our little self-made box.
Most of us pitch our tents into one of two camps.
The first is the 'Buddy Jesus' camp. Here, Jesus is my Homeboy (you can have the t-shirt to prove it), my boyfriend and the guy I shoot hoops with (okay, I don't know basketball, but all the other euphemisms seemed rooted in the 'mother country'). Buddy Jesus is all-forgiving, graceful to the point of naivety, never angry and abounding in love. My 'Buddy Jesus' often speaks out love without any regard for the truth at all. He lets me do whatever I want, whenever I want...and just loves me all the same. He doesn't want me to change a bit. In fact, just like Buddy Billy, he loves me just the way I am. Every thing's sweet as a nut in Buddy Jesus camp - he's just alright with me. And I'm okay with him too.
Somewhere else (on far higher ground no doubt) and only a pendulum swing away, is the 'Angry God' camp. Here, God is as mad as hell and ready to smite with a mighty smite the first inkling of moral wavering. We're always in a bit of a bind in this camp. We know it's culturally uncool to sacrifice a goat, but we should really do it anyway. It's just the right thing. In 'Angry God' camp, people don't talk too much; just enough to let their 'yes' be 'yes' and their 'no' be 'no'. There's a cozy culture in the 'Angry God' settlement- a compassionless moralism that finds joy in staying away from the edge and in creating new legislation that 'helps' people stay on the good side of a wrathful God who, quite frankly, is quite p'd of with you. Beware the stray thunderbolts in 'Angry God' camp - they keep us on our toes and remind us who's in charge and, more enjoyably, who ballsed up.
Both of these camps are built on a lie. A half-truth is ultimately a kernel of truth wrapped in a lie. A shrink-wrapped lie of our own convenience.
There's a tension that lies in the gulf between these two camps and therein lies the problem: we don't like tension much so we tend to lob in to one camp or the other. Sometimes we're gypsies, skipping from one camp to the other as our pendulum swings from one side to the other. Generally though, we lay our foundations pretty deep in one camp or the other.
The bedrock of another camp looks like this: humble grace. God hates sin but he's a merciful lover. It's fair to say the folks in this camp have the story of God and the life of Jesus on their side. When sin abounded, grace abounded even more. Not because sin was okay, but because grace was bigger.
There's plenty of wrestling in these parts though. Not a tormented, pugilistic, anger-driven punch-up, but a strenuous search for what makes sense and is true of Jesus...and what is us just making stuff up because we decided it sounded pretty good (or someone told us to think it). We continually work out our salvation with fear and trembling. Not because we doubt our salvation, or because we're petrified of God, but because we know that if we're not continually pursuing what's true in Him, where we make camp becomes our lie.
God is slow to anger, true, but He does get angry. God gets angry, true, but he's abounding in love. God's compassion abundantly exceeds His retribution but it isn't oblivious to choices and consequences. He is a rewarder of those who go all out to find Him because He wants to be found. And He wants to be found with a childlike faith that says: 'What's next, Papa?', not a faith in intellectual overdrive that has well-constructed box for God that, although disconnected from relationship, can be readily articulated.
I think Paul wrote for us all when He told us to continually wrestle over these things because as we explore, we get a glimpse of things that are not easy to throw in either the 'Buddy Jesus' camp or the 'Angry God' camp. We come with a childlike faith and we're cheered on to grow up, reach maturity, eat some meat and stop slurping all the milk. But in the wrestle, we realise we need a balanced diet so we become neither spiritually fat nor spiritually emaciated.
Strenuous wholeness doesn't come from living a life with the top down, the radio on and the car in cruise control...and yet there's time for simply enjoying God, being still and just 'cruising' in Him. It's not all about wrestling. Wrestling informs the journey but it isn't the journey. Sure it's part of it, but we don't just wrestle, we live too. Wrestling clarifies and deepens our relationship with Jesus, but it doesn't define it. In him we find out who we are and what we are living for. And we find out what He's giving us to do. And we get moving. But not without continuing to wrestle...because the connection between His heart and our stuff is so easy to sever. And the connection of relationship is the deal that informs that stuff. It's the relationship that leads us to repentance, to obedience, to faithfulness, to participation, to servanthood and to truth. Not disconnected from the author, perfecter and finisher. That's why wrestling has to remain one of our regular pursuits.
One last thought: whenever I think of WWF or any of those phony wrestling deals, I just see something totally bogus and dodgy. (Only Ultimate Fighting has a genuine authenticity about it - but that's another post waiting to happen.) Our wrestle isn't meant to play itself out under the glare of the spotlight to the tune of "We will rock you" or "Eye of the Tiger". It's in community and in the silence, but never as a spectacle. I hope I haven't been guilty of that right here. The big deal is the strenuous wholeness that comes from the wrestle...as much as it comes from the basking, the walking and the enjoyment of the light of God.
Where do you live? And how deep are your foundations in the camp? Have you ever shifted camp?
Friday, February 2, 2007
Label me Elmo
So... a portion of the creative genius that comprises The Cacophony Ensemble have colluded to define some broad creative parameters for the labels/categories/genres that combine to form the writings you'll find from the ensemble. Believe us, they're plenty broad.
Above all, the intention is to shed some light (however filtered, misguided or well-informed) on the noises that surround us. Sometimes as amused onlookers and reporters, sometimes as curious participants, sometimes as participants, sometimes as frustrated folk and sometimes as people with a thought for a way out of the noise.
So, the labels/categories are thus:
JESUS_is more than alright with us
RUNNING_the simplest and most efficient form of physical exercise
LEADERSHIP_without followers is merely taking a walk
REVIEWS_movies, music and literature
THE CHURCH_gentle observations and thoughts about Christ's bride.
TRIVIAL PURSUITS_random gear and curious fun
SPIRITUALITY + THEOLOGY_God in the cacophony
CULTURE_the cacophony that surrounds us
YOU'RE TOPS_there's been some fine people who've walked this earth. We pay homage.
STUFF'N'THINGS_have you seen the iPhone yet?
CULTURAL ICONS_Chuck Norris et. al.
STRENUOUS WHOLENESS_getting tidy at being a well-formed human
VENT YOUR SPLEEN_step on to the soapbox and let rip
TOP5+_FOr lovers of lists, order and clarity
PHILOSOPHY_a bunch of words to confuse, bewilder or illuminate
All of us have our different inclinations and passions. That'll be pretty obvious as we get going.
It's what we're thinking. Thoughts?