Wednesday, February 25, 2004
Selfish Pig
5 a.m. by the red digital beast beside my bed. I hear the sound of soft weeping. Tone rising. I close my eyes to it. My ears try to follow their lead.
She bolts up and out. One smooth, determined motion toward the nightmare that's been had or the flu that's developed.
My ears are open again.
They hear soft, mother words. "What's wrong?"
Spoken in light sobs, "there are books on my bed."
Softness turns hard. Female voice rises to an angry pitch.
No devil brute chasing down the corridors of a dreaming mind. No stomach reaction to last night's snack food. The evil is... books, stacked neatly at the end of the bed. Put there by a dad too selfish to get out of bed and check on his son who softly weeps.
5 a.m. by the red digital beast beside my bed. I hear the sound of soft weeping. Tone rising. I close my eyes to it. My ears try to follow their lead.
She bolts up and out. One smooth, determined motion toward the nightmare that's been had or the flu that's developed.
My ears are open again.
They hear soft, mother words. "What's wrong?"
Spoken in light sobs, "there are books on my bed."
Softness turns hard. Female voice rises to an angry pitch.
No devil brute chasing down the corridors of a dreaming mind. No stomach reaction to last night's snack food. The evil is... books, stacked neatly at the end of the bed. Put there by a dad too selfish to get out of bed and check on his son who softly weeps.
Wednesday, February 18, 2004
To The Man Formerly Known As Pastor Craig
Old Friend,
I heard you say once that you think the church is going to experience revival, but it won’t happen in the church.
I told you then that you were far more missional/emergent than you know.
Try to think of the church in two different ways. I’ll call them “place” church, and “people church”. We’ve said for a long time that “every member is a minister” and “the priesthood of all believers”. What we meant by that is that every member of our church should serve in our church and our programs. What if we really meant it? What if church really is life, held every moment in the web of relationships we already have.
I think the church you are thinking about needing a revival is the “place” church where people go to experience church, showing up to consume what their local purveyor of religious services is selling. Like Ray’s voice in Field of Dreams, this church says “build it and they will come”. It is place and event central. This church defines how well it is doing according to what happens at that place or event: how many people came, how much money did they give, how many of them are serving, how many of them are involved in a small group.
But if church is “people church”, church would be happening everywhere you are. As a missionary into your world, the specific culture you are a part of. You are taking the gospel, the kingdom of heaven, with you into every corner of your life. You wouldn’t evaluate this church by how many people you know or how close you are to them. You wouldn’t even judge it by how many of them who were once “outside” the kingdom of heaven who are now “in”; how do you really know and isn’t that a judgment best left up to God anyway. You would judge by the stories they tell, describing their journeys of life which they may or may not yet know God is a part of.
How would church the “event” be different every Sunday if we really believed that every person in a missionary? Would it spend all its energy on trying to create “Christian” community for its people, or would it validate and motivate people toward the community that is already happening in their lives? Would it focus on feeding people who are already over-fed and under exercised or would it spend it’s time nurturing the calling in its people’s lives? Would it treat what it does during the event, Sunday morning, as most important or would it see what takes place there as secondary, supplemental to each of its missionary’s lives?
I don’t have good answers to any of this, but questions like these have forced me to view church differently, and for me that’s been a good thing.
All said, I agree with your statement. I believe that the church going to experience a spiritual transformation, and it won’t happen in “event” based churches. In fact, this change is already forming all around the world from the guy who own a trendy shoe-store in Frisco to the Christians who own and operate a Pub in Bradford.
Sort of sucks, huh? You thought you were getting out of ministry, and it turns out it’s still who you are, you’re just not getting paid for it now. Booya!
Your comrade,
Russ
Old Friend,
I heard you say once that you think the church is going to experience revival, but it won’t happen in the church.
I told you then that you were far more missional/emergent than you know.
Try to think of the church in two different ways. I’ll call them “place” church, and “people church”. We’ve said for a long time that “every member is a minister” and “the priesthood of all believers”. What we meant by that is that every member of our church should serve in our church and our programs. What if we really meant it? What if church really is life, held every moment in the web of relationships we already have.
I think the church you are thinking about needing a revival is the “place” church where people go to experience church, showing up to consume what their local purveyor of religious services is selling. Like Ray’s voice in Field of Dreams, this church says “build it and they will come”. It is place and event central. This church defines how well it is doing according to what happens at that place or event: how many people came, how much money did they give, how many of them are serving, how many of them are involved in a small group.
But if church is “people church”, church would be happening everywhere you are. As a missionary into your world, the specific culture you are a part of. You are taking the gospel, the kingdom of heaven, with you into every corner of your life. You wouldn’t evaluate this church by how many people you know or how close you are to them. You wouldn’t even judge it by how many of them who were once “outside” the kingdom of heaven who are now “in”; how do you really know and isn’t that a judgment best left up to God anyway. You would judge by the stories they tell, describing their journeys of life which they may or may not yet know God is a part of.
How would church the “event” be different every Sunday if we really believed that every person in a missionary? Would it spend all its energy on trying to create “Christian” community for its people, or would it validate and motivate people toward the community that is already happening in their lives? Would it focus on feeding people who are already over-fed and under exercised or would it spend it’s time nurturing the calling in its people’s lives? Would it treat what it does during the event, Sunday morning, as most important or would it see what takes place there as secondary, supplemental to each of its missionary’s lives?
I don’t have good answers to any of this, but questions like these have forced me to view church differently, and for me that’s been a good thing.
All said, I agree with your statement. I believe that the church going to experience a spiritual transformation, and it won’t happen in “event” based churches. In fact, this change is already forming all around the world from the guy who own a trendy shoe-store in Frisco to the Christians who own and operate a Pub in Bradford.
Sort of sucks, huh? You thought you were getting out of ministry, and it turns out it’s still who you are, you’re just not getting paid for it now. Booya!
Your comrade,
Russ
Wednesday, February 11, 2004
Gotta Love Those Irish Poets
The Little Vagabond
Dear Mother, dear Mother, the Church is cold,
But the Ale-house is healthy & pleasant & warm;
Besides I can tell where I am used well,
Such usage in Heaven will never do well.
But if at the Church they would give us some Ale,
And a pleasant fire our souls to regale,
We'd sing and we'd pray all the live-long day,
Nor ever once wish from the Church to stray.
Then the Parson might preach, & drink, & sing,
And we'd be as happy as birds in the spring;
And modest Dame Lurch, who is always at Church,
Would not have bandy children, nor fasting, nor birch.
And God, like a Father rejoicing to see
His children as pleasant and happy as he,
Would have no more quarrel with Sin or the Barrel,
But kiss him, & and give him both drink and apparel.
William Blake - 1794
The Little Vagabond
Dear Mother, dear Mother, the Church is cold,
But the Ale-house is healthy & pleasant & warm;
Besides I can tell where I am used well,
Such usage in Heaven will never do well.
But if at the Church they would give us some Ale,
And a pleasant fire our souls to regale,
We'd sing and we'd pray all the live-long day,
Nor ever once wish from the Church to stray.
Then the Parson might preach, & drink, & sing,
And we'd be as happy as birds in the spring;
And modest Dame Lurch, who is always at Church,
Would not have bandy children, nor fasting, nor birch.
And God, like a Father rejoicing to see
His children as pleasant and happy as he,
Would have no more quarrel with Sin or the Barrel,
But kiss him, & and give him both drink and apparel.
William Blake - 1794
Ode to Ordo
I have this friend named Matt.
He is an artist, a musician, and a true comrade; and like a piece of good art or a well written lyric, he is a little difficult to figure out. You have to keep coming back to him, rolling him over in your mind, and the more you do, the more you find in him.
He sent me some lyrics to a song he wrote about friendship and the way that God works with us.
V1
Why don't you tell me what you want?
1 Trillion Numbers...
Even if you counted both day and night, You'd never get there until it had been 33 thousand years. I'm never giving back your records.
REFRAIN
It's like a single dotted line, that you've traced around my heart
and you've applied the scissors gently so.
You made sure not to damage any arteries, but my heart's on the mending table. a cold metal table.
V2
It was the only way, You sent a trillion numbers by way of satellite.
It was a ?????? state of fear, that I was acting on down here.
Now I'm spinning all your records
REFRAIN
BRIDGE
He stays awake most every night
and he thinks about the circuits in his speakers
how can he make them grow?
He doesn't know X4
He stays awake most every night
he's spinning records on the top of every hour
but he cannot make them sing
But We'll still sing X4
Man, I love that guy.
I have this friend named Matt.
He is an artist, a musician, and a true comrade; and like a piece of good art or a well written lyric, he is a little difficult to figure out. You have to keep coming back to him, rolling him over in your mind, and the more you do, the more you find in him.
He sent me some lyrics to a song he wrote about friendship and the way that God works with us.
V1
Why don't you tell me what you want?
1 Trillion Numbers...
Even if you counted both day and night, You'd never get there until it had been 33 thousand years. I'm never giving back your records.
REFRAIN
It's like a single dotted line, that you've traced around my heart
and you've applied the scissors gently so.
You made sure not to damage any arteries, but my heart's on the mending table. a cold metal table.
V2
It was the only way, You sent a trillion numbers by way of satellite.
It was a ?????? state of fear, that I was acting on down here.
Now I'm spinning all your records
REFRAIN
BRIDGE
He stays awake most every night
and he thinks about the circuits in his speakers
how can he make them grow?
He doesn't know X4
He stays awake most every night
he's spinning records on the top of every hour
but he cannot make them sing
But We'll still sing X4
Man, I love that guy.
Heaven
"Altogether elsewhere, vast
Herds of reindeer move across
Miles and miles of golden moss,
Silently and very fast"
W. H. Auden
What I wouldn’t give to be altogether elsewhere.
"Altogether elsewhere, vast
Herds of reindeer move across
Miles and miles of golden moss,
Silently and very fast"
W. H. Auden
What I wouldn’t give to be altogether elsewhere.
