Paper Pt XVIII: Emphasizing IS Prioritizing

Prioritizing: Majoring on the Minors

Educators talk about something they call Hidden Curriculum.45 A perfect example would be a History class that accomplishes the goal of teaching students facts about History, but does so with a method that has the unintended consequence of causing students to dislike the study of History. The hidden curriculum is, ‘history is boring.’ This can be said another way; what is taught, and what is learned, are not the same things, and so we must think through our curriculum from the learner’s point of view, not the educator’s.

This applies practically to the Church in our previous point on ‘counting.’ A large attendance isn’t bad, nor is counting it bad; rather, it is simply not comparatively all that important! After all, Jesus seemed more interested in hiding from the crowds, and sending people away (directly or indirectly), than in counting the number of His followers.46

The same goes for most of what passes for ‘Church Growth’ wisdom. Strategically thinking through the various church systems we employ, designing creative logos or corporate names, crafting precise mission statements, or implementing programs that meet congregational needs, are all varyingly good things. However, they are not best; something can be good, yet be 52nd on the list of importance.

We must stop prioritizing issues of secondary importance! There are appropriate times to deal with minor issues, but we cannot ever allow them to usurp the place of major issues.

We must start prioritizing what is primary! We must make our focus a theology and practice of the Kingdom of God; in terms of power, justice, and the Cross.

The amount of time spent on something, and the priority that it has in the discussion, communicate something. Our current practices often have the effect of communicating that something is 1st or 2nd when it is actually 52nd. My pastor would call that “majoring on the minors.”47 We will stand before our King and be held to account for the way we pray and teach people to pray, the way we serve and teach people to serve, the way we sacrifice, and teach people to sacrifice; not for the flashy mailers we do or don’t send to encourage church hoppers our way.

"My Rights" and Circumcision in Acts 16

This song is from my old life before Jesus, and I think it typifies the American cultural values of individualism and self-determination. Here are the lyrics:


My right to say what I want
And think the way I wanna think
My right I wanna speak my mind
My right to yell my right to scream
My right no one's ever gonna
Tell me what I have to do
I'll live my life the way I want
I don't care about your little world
And I can't believe you're telling me
What's good for me how do you know what's good?
And I can't believe you're telling me
What to believe, get away from me - my right
No matter what I do, to you
Is one big mistake
Well I'm sick of you I know I'm right
You sleazy money grubbing fake
My right my life my soul my mind
My body my existence means
That I don't have to listen to you
It's my right cause I'm a human being


The message? Stand up for your rights!


=======================


Here is a passage from the book of Acts, it comes right after the great Church Council in Jerusalem to determine the question of the Gentiles and the Law:


¹He came to Derbe and then to Lystra, where a disciple named Timothy lived, whose mother was a Jewess and a believer, but whose father was a Greek. ²The brothers at Lystra and Iconium spoke well of him. ³Paul wanted to take him along on the journey, so he circumcised him because of the Jews who lived in that area, for they all knew that his father was a Greek. ⁴As they traveled from town to town, they delivered the decisions reached by the apostles and elders in Jerusalem for the people to obey. ⁵So the churches were strengthened in the faith and grew daily in numbers.


"...so he circumcised him..."


Four very important words for any man to read!


Why did Paul circumcise Timothy?


Because he was taking him on a journey through a region with many Jews.


What was the purpose of the journey?


To let everyone know that circumcision was no longer required!


=======================


A very different message than the one our culture gives us!  Paul is clearly compelled to fight for the rights of others (he goes to Jerusalem to battle against those who would compel Gentiles to obey a Jewish Law), and yet wants to teach his young disciple not to stand up for his own rights.  The message is, make sure people know you didn't have to do this, but rather that you chose to do this for their sake.

The Parable of the Hungry Girl

Paper Pt XVII: We Count What Matters

Counting: Poor Labeling Effects

A major effort of Environmental and Health advocates is changing the labels on our products. They are doing this because the label affects the consumption decisions people make. When we count something, or label something in a particular way, we create a sense of importance about that aspect of what we are labeling or counting. If this food product is indistinguishable from that one in all areas except for price, the obvious choice is the cheaper product. If however, there is new information added to the decision making process (it was produced in ways that don’t exploit labor, it is from a local producer, it uses a higher quality standard, etc.), we may choose the more expensive product.

Labeling is a key issue for the Church as well. Dallas Willard has said, “We need to stop counting people and start weighing them.”44 This is a critical task! It will require a lot more effort and ingenuity to take qualitative measurements instead of quantitative ones. However, it is not impossible, and to fail to do so is to fail at our calling.

We must stop counting the wrong things! If we count attendance, offering, and square footage, we are reinforcing the false value of these things, and we will continue to see the Church leveraging our resources to produce more of these things.

We must start counting the right things! A potential list of ‘hidden ingredients’ that we could start placing on the Church label could be thoughtfully created out of the fourteen implication listed in this paper. If we start counting these things we may actually begin to see the Church leveraging our resources (perhaps even intentionally decreasing in attendance, budget, or facility) to pursue these things.

In short, we need to think deeply and critically about the effect our labeling has on Christian holiness, community, and mission.

Paper Pt XVI: Where do we Shine the Spotlight?

Spotlighting: Imitating Popularity

Much is often made of the primacy of place given to athletes, actors, and musicians in our culture, simply because they are able to score points, look cool, and, well… Conversely educators, carpenters, retirees, or even simply ‘moral’ people, are never placed into the spotlight for these characteristics. Cultural exegetes are right to say that this communicates our cultural values; we place more importance on ‘being cool’ than being wise, skilled, or having good character. In short, what we give attention to, what we spotlight, communicates what we value.

In the Church we continually spotlight communities, ministries, and leaders who have a large attendance and polished administration.  These individuals are the speakers at conferences, they are the regional overseers within denominations. They are the authors we read, and the blogs we link to. We need to rethink this practice, and begin to choose what we highlight, in light of what is actually valuable, and what true indicators of the Kingdom’s presence are.

We must stop spotlighting people and ministries because of their size or polish! This merely reinforces the stereotype that Church is about large crowds, charismatic speakers, and anointed musical performances.

We must start spotlighting people and ministries because they faithfully articulate and practice the theology and praxis we see manifested in the Cross of the Messiah. We must highlight those ministries that successfully model the equipping role of leadership, that send out with no regard for ‘personal ministry success;’ that identify with the broken, and effect justice; that embrace the Cross.

To clarify, we don’t need to stop highlighting large ministries as a rule, we simply need to think critically about what we are trying to accomplish when we choose who and what we highlight, after all Jesus wouldn’t qualify for our spotlight! In beginning to spotlight (for example) churches that successfully send out Church planters instead of large Churches, we will communicate a value for Church planting that will result in a greater leveraging of the movements resources towards this value; moving it from a stated value to a lived value. The same is true for Churches that successfully reach multi-cultural populations, establish centers for artistic and cultural influence, etc.

Paper Pt XV: Show and Tell

COMMUNICATING BY DOING: A MORE REFLECTIVE PRAXIS

As we said at the outset, what we do communicates our theology. Even the ‘roommate wanted’ ads attached to the Church bulletin board, intentionally or unintentionally, speak to what we think about God. In four specific areas we will attempt to diagnose the underlying problematic theology, and recommend practices that communicate a theology of the Kingdom, centered on the power and purposes of God as revealed in the Cross.

Most of what has been presented above is not new material, nor is it peripheral to the discussions going on in Christian circles. The main contention and concern behind this paper is the failure of a thoughtful and cohesive implementation of Kingdom theology to the everyday practices of the Church. We are talking the talk, but not walking the walk. We are guilty of bad praxis more often than we are guilty of bad theology, but whatever the root cause, the agenda must change. The agenda going forward must be to find ways to make each of these areas an avenue for fostering a Kingdom Vision of the Church, in terms of God’s purpose and power revealed in the Cross! It is in the following areas (Spotlighting, Counting, Prioritizing, and Defining) that a more thoughtful praxis will enable us to fix our focus on the whole story, instead of our lines, or our costume.

Paper Pt XIV: A Successful Church

The Cross and Ecclesiastical Success

It should be clear to any individual reading the canonical gospels that our formulation of a ‘successful ministry’ was foreign to Jesus. Perhaps we had better restate that; it was not foreign to Jesus in that He was unaware of the concept, but rather in that He explicitly and repeatedly rejected such a concept of success. Jesus deliberately rejected fame and the approval of the crowds,38 He hid from people who wanted to be with Him,39 said and did things that made people leave,40 and used a metaphor of torture and death for discipleship.41

12) Carrying the Cross – Our Master has made it clear, by personal example, and plain teaching, we must embrace suffering, and die to self. This stands in direct contradiction to the stated aim of most Church programming. A friend attributed the following anecdote to pastor Rob Bell (Mars Hill Bible Church, Grandville, MI): He was asked by a visitor, “what programs do you have here to meet the needs of me and my family?” If only more pastors would give this response, “we only have one program here, ‘Come and Die!’ “

13) Identification with the Broken – If the Cross is the center of the Church then we should share the same passions as the man who hung from that Cross. We should find, welling up within us, an attraction to those places where we might encounter hunger, danger, injustice, addiction, oppression, or poverty. This is the shame of the Western Church, we have retreated from the brokenness of the world, and then congratulated ourselves on how well our programs work without those broken people. We must reverse the trend of Christians emigrating to homogenized suburban communities pursuing idols of safety and security.

14) Necessary Failure – If the Cross is our Victory, then we must reexamine our language of ‘success.’ For Jesus, success, was abandonment and failure. We must think through our use of language; we say, “healthy things grow,” but Jesus said, “unless a seed dies, it will produce nothing.”42 Our yearning for success has more in common with the gospel of prosperity, than the gospel of the Kingdom. We must create contexts where failure is a part of our culture, where our failure and that of others is a normal occurrence, and where polished presentation is not the sign of God’s presence.43

Of course none of this is a repudiation of God’s good creation. Embracing the Cross is not an end in itself; but rather the only road to Resurrection and New Creation. Rebellious humanity needs to be crucified with Christ, not because we are human, but because we are rebels.

God has glorified Jesus and has promised to glorify us in Him. His very promises of justice are an affirmation of creation. We must prevent, however, an attempt at justice that does not involve the Cross, for that would not be justice. Resurrection is on the other side of the Cross. We must embrace the lessons taught by suffering, we must submit our egos to death, indeed, the motive behind our lust for success is simple pride.

Paper Pt XIII: The Purpose of the Church

In claiming justice as the mission of the Church, we are rethinking commonly held beliefs and practices. This does not negate the need for evangelism, and compassion ministry, but rather places these essential pieces in their proper, more comprehensive, context of ‘salting and lighting’ the earth. The purpose of the Church is to proclaim the Victory of the Cross to the powers,37 but also to participate in and implement that victory as both a manifestation of the presence of the Kingdom, and a sign of its future consummation.

For Bernard

John takes 8 stickers, 4 black and 4 white, shows them to his three friends Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and then sticks two to the forehead of each friend so that each of them can see all the other stickers except for the two in John's pocket and the two on his own head.


John then asks each of them if they know what color stickers are on their head:


Matthew says, "No."
Then Mark says, "No."
Finally Luke says, "No."

So John starts to go around again:


Matthew says, "No."
Mark says, "Yes."


What color are Mark's stickers?

Paper Pt XII: Implications for Purpose

This also raises another important question; are we building the Kingdom or waiting for it to show up? Here, I will borrow language from my betters; Kingdom justice is both ‘now and not yet.’ We are not so much building the Kingdom as building for the Kingdom. Just as a musical instrument can be a work of craftsmanship or artistry in its own right, so too is the Church to be working for justice outright in the ‘now.’ Yet, as that same musical instrument, for all of its inherent beauty, cries out for a master musician to come and play; so too the justice the Church has brought about cries out for a time in the ‘not yet’ when the Master will come and bring justice of a deeper, fuller, and better sort.35 The justice that is effected within this age is a sign pointing to the Justice of the Coming Kingdom.

10) Christian Storytellers – If, then, we are to be signposts pointing towards hope, we will need to write new parables to tell the world. The Church desperately needs adepts in the arts. Not just any art will do; we need art that avoids the twin extremes of superficial sentimentality and pointless self-expression, and opts for the radical middle. We need art that is a prophetic voice weaving tales of God’s reality in the language of the world. The voices in our collective cultural framework are telling other stories, we must tell The Story.

11) Eucharist – We must reengage the ritual practices of the historic Church. The meal Jesus commanded us to share is the Cross in our midst. By it we are bound to the death and resurrection of Jesus, bound to each other in a union that bridges all other differences, and bound to the Kingdom purposes of the Crucified One who “gathers all to Himself.”36 It is Jesus’ lasting parable for the Church; the story we are invited to find ourselves in.

Paper Pt XI: Implications for Purpose

Kingdom Justice and Ecclesiastical Purpose

The good news of the Kingdom is the proclamation of the Kingship (Messiah or Christ) of Jesus.31 The Kingdom of God is the powerful advancement of God’s agenda, His ‘making all things good again,’ through the victory of Jesus over all other powers on the Cross. The resultant state of this victory is justice; God’s manifest ‘good.’ This victory has power over sin in all of its manifestations, within individuals, between individuals, between ethnos, and even where it is found ensconced within the power structures of our societies. If the Kingdom purpose is justice, then the Church’s purpose is to further that justice, through proclamation and participation in God’s ‘good.’

6) Personal Transformation – If Jesus has conquered sin through the Cross, then by being joined to Him, individual humans are being transformed. We must acknowledge that when the gospel is preached women and men will be “taught to obey everything (Jesus) has commanded”32 as a result. Therefore notional and nominal assent to certain doctrinal statements will be replaced by confidence in, and reliance upon, Jesus’ victory over all powers. Justice (God’s ‘good’) will be manifested within us individually.

7) Deep Community – If Jesus has renewed the covenant people, and reconciled people to each other through the Cross33 then there will be a resulting experience of community within the Church. Mere coexistence will not suffice; attendance at the same events will be replaced by intimacy; participation in the same programs will be replaced by sharing common resources; receiving services from paid church workers will be replaced by laboring together for common goals; we will move to a place of vulnerability and submission before each other. Justice (God’s ‘good’) will be manifested in us communally.

8) Multi-Cultural Expression – If the Cross has “destroyed the dividing wall of hostility”34 between Jew and Gentile, then the Christian community will be marked by extreme diversity. A diversity that goes beyond ethnic diversity, and brings together people who share little except their common commitment to Jesus. The gospel demands true multi-cultural expression, where diverse backgrounds, value-systems, and even languages, must be brought together in common submission to the King.

9) Social Justice – The Church must go beyond individual conversion, and even personal and communal transformation, and work to see justice effected in any and every arena where systemic evil is present. The victory over the powers at work in individuals is also accomplished within the various economic, social, and political systems of the earth. This rebuts our conservative rejection of the social ramifications of the gospel, and the political alliances we have allowed ourselves to be co-opted into in some contexts. Global income inequalities, environmental degradation, human trafficking, urban segregation, minority disenfranchisement, etc. are all issues that speak to the veracity and effectiveness of the gospel. Justice (God’s ‘good’) will be manifested on the earth.

Mine

“There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: ‘Mine!’”

Abraham Kuyper (Dutch Prime Minister 1901-1905)

Paper Pt X: Implications for Ministry

It has been said “the Church is like manure, if you spread it around beautiful things can grow, but if you pile it all up in one spot, it just stinks.”24 Jesus models this for us in many ways, sending away those who desire to follow Him,25 sending out the Twelve26 and the seventy-two,27 and ultimately commanding His followers to scatter abroad.28 We must hold our own ministry up to the same mirror. Are we producing harvesters or consumers?29 Are we gathering crowds or sending out missionaries? The difference between fertilizer and sewage is whether the excrement is dispersed over the field or sealed to prevent contact; which one are we trying to accomplish?

4) Outward Ministry – Ministry is primarily conceived of in terms of leading church events and programs; preaching, worship, teaching, childcare, or even technology or maintenance. The ministry of the ‘royal priesthood,’ however, is not to other priests; the Church’s ministry is not to itself. Ministry must be re-conceptualized in terms of mission; and we must cement this in the theology of all Christians. Our ministry is to the world; this is the reason God has covenanted with us, and it is the guiding principle that should govern the purpose of both individual Christians and the covenant community as a whole.

5) Redeeming the Trades – When ministry is taken outside of the context of the Church community it is primarily conceived of in terms of evangelism, or compassion ministries; providing material resources for those in need, offering prayer and healing for those suffering, or engaging in discourse with the hope of conversion. A theology of the Kingdom necessitates that we begin commissioning (and perhaps even ordaining) lawyers and artists, carpenters and philosophers, educators and urban planners, even homemakers and retirees; in effect, we must redeem the entire scope of work available for use in the Kingdom project.  Most importantly, we must go beyond talk in doing this, we must actually equip and hold accountable for such callings, as we do for preaching.

Kingdom theology is about God’s mission to the world. Therefore, the Church must minister to the world. This ministry is to bring God’s powerful rule and reign into every corner of the world by means of our presence and influence there. The Vineyard movement has a history of reexamining the significance of the priesthood of all believers; “everybody gets to play.”30 It is time to take this to its full conclusion; a theology of the Kingdom demands that we think through what we mean by ‘everybody’ and what we mean by ‘play.’ Church can no longer be a place where paid clergy minister to Christians, rather Church must be a community equipped by leaders to minister to the world.

Vineyard Friends I met in Texas

Paper Pt IX: Implications for Authority

Kingdom Power and Ecclesiastical Authority

Trying to dig a posthole is problematic enough, having small children try to ‘help’ only makes it worse; usually they end up standing in the hole you are trying to dig. God exercises power by giving it to others to act in collaboration with Him in spite of the potential problems with this approach, Jesus models the same thing in His ministry; the disciples are often standing in the way of Jesus’ intended purpose. In handing a child a shovel, you are not actually asking them to help you dig a hole, you are offering to teach them how to use a tool; Jesus’ larger purpose had to do with what was happening in the disciples themselves. The Cross itself crystallizes this into a poignant focus, it is the exact point at which God empowers His people at His own expense; dealing with human opposition in a way that actually benefits us instead of eradicates us.

1) Power is for Others – Those who have power, influence, and control in the Christian community have been given this for the sake of others. Leadership is for the Church, not the other way around; strength is for service, not status. This makes discipleship (not mere education or direction, but rather building up others into Christ) the primary purpose and goal of leadership.

2) Leadership is for Equipping – An obvious corollary is the equipping function of leadership. Leaders should be creating space for others to learn to engage in the purposes of the Church. Our hiring practices greatly inhibit this; every time we hire outside our sphere of discipleship we communicate bad theology. Many will ask, “what do I do when I have a leadership shortage?” The response is, “you don’t have a leadership problem, you have a discipleship problem;”21 hiring people who can ‘get the job done’ reveals a failure to understand that the job is the creation of people who can get the job done. This, of course, signifies a willingness to allow ‘amateurs’ to lead the charge, which will frustrate some, just as it frustrated the Chief Priests in first century Palestine.22

3) Leadership is for Sending – The role of leadership in the Church is to commission the Church for pioneering work. This is a major problem point for the Church; we have difficulty breaking out of our ‘gathering’ paradigm and into a ‘sending’ one. We must be diligent at establishing new works by sending every capable soul to the mission field. This ties in directly to our definition of success; a large crowd with open wallets and smiling faces. If we actually understood that our “success is determined by our successors”23 we would be perfectly happy to dismantle our own ministry, send out dozens of new ministries, and start over from scratch.

Paper Pt VIII: Missional Implications

THE CHURCH AS THE KINGDOM AGENT: IMPLICATIONS FOR PRAXIS

The covenant community exists as the means to accomplish God’s purposes; this has considerable implication for what the Church attempts to accomplish, how we work toward those goals, and the rubric used to measure our success. Our task is to take our ‘theology and practice of the Kingdom,’ as revealed in the Cross, and apply it to the Church. We will draw fourteen specific implications by looking at how power and authority function in the Church, how justice is the mission of the Church, and what the Cross reveals about the success of the Church’s mission.

Labels

Paper Pt VII: The Church

THE CHURCH: A WORKING DEFINITION

The Church is a shorthand term for an aspect of the Kingdom of God upon the earth. The common metaphor for the Church (the Body) reveals three essential realities about how the Kingdom is revealed in the Church: 1) people connect to the King just as the body connects to the head; 2) people connect to each other just as the knee connects to the leg; and 3) the Church performs the will of God just as the human body performs the will of the individual.

1) The Church is not a program, a structure, an institution, an event, a particular resource, a set of practices, or any combination of these. The Church may use these, create these, attend these, or even onfuse itself as one or more of these, but it is not. The Church is the people who are connected to God. All of those people, joined to God by the reconciling work of Jesus on the Cross, are the Church.

2) The Church is more than just individuals who are connected to God. Our connection to God becomes a connection to each other. Discipleship in the Kingdom is not something that can or should be done alone. God intends for us to know and be known, to confess and hear confession, to work together and become vulnerable before each other. Again, this is not about sharing a pew or even a cup of coffee, but about intimacy and a shared life with a common purpose.

3) The Church is more than people simply enjoying fellowship with God and each other. We were birthed out of God’s mission, and in fact exist as the means for God’s mission. If we are in intimate connection to the Messiah, then we will be engaged in His work; “as the Father has sent me, I am sending you.”18 To state this in strong and clear language; the Church does not have a mission, rather the mission has a Church. The Church is the method of the mission. The mission is central, and it is for this that the Church has been called forth as a Kingdom agent.
Therefore, our reconciliation to God is accomplished through the Cross, the “dividing wall of hostility”19 between peoples is destroyed by the Cross, and we are recreated to “do good works”20 as we are joined to the Cross; in this way we are a Cross shaped community. The Cross is the paradigm for the Kingdom, and also for the Church. We are a community created and defined by God’s Kingdom action in the Cross. We must learn how to live fully in this story, and not some other narrative.

An Interesting Atheist

Paper Pt VI: Victory

Kingdom Collision: The Cruciform Lens

‘Tis at the cross of Christ where earth and heaven meet

Where sin is overcome, to God the victory13

These popular lyrics, which we sing during corporate worship, capture in poetry a reality that must be our paradigm; our lenses through which we view the rest of theological discourse. In Kingdom language the realm of God comes marauding into our realm precisely in the Crucifixion; it is the point at which heaven collides into earth. In eschatological language, the Cross is also the proleptic invasion of God’s Future into our present;14 the point at which the end of the story crashes into the beginning. The Cross is the precise way in which God’s power and justice are brought to bear upon a world that has been subjected to other powers and other notions of ‘justice.’

In the Cross God’s power is revealed; so too a godly vision of justice. The Cross is how heaven imposes itself upon a rebellious earth, and is the manner and method of heavenly conquest and victory. In the Cross God brings His power to bear on the earth by allowing a rebellious earth to impose itself upon heaven, and to suffer the world’s ‘justice’ in order to defeat the powers at work on the earth. The powers of evil come fully to bear on Jesus, but they are exhausted in His body, and those powers are broken in His death.

15And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

Colossians 2:15

The Cross breaks the power of sin. We often isolate this to individuals, however, it is also at work in other spheres. The justice (the making things good) that is effected within individuals is also effected in the power structures of communities, societies, and nations, through the death of the Messiah. In fact “God was pleased to reconcile all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven;”15 nothing escapes God’s desire for redemption. Even power and justice themselves are redeemed; the Cross is powerful without being coercive, and ushers in justice without collusion with worldly concepts of justice. We should not ignore the fact that the cross was the symbol of Roman power and justice long before it was used by Jesus to symbolize God’s power and justice.16

So the Cross, then, becomes the paradigm for Kingdom thought. If we seek to understand God’s rule and reign, if we seek to come under it, to propagate it, or to implement it; we must think deeply and honestly about the death of Jesus.17 It is for this stated reason that we are left with the twin symbolic ordinances that recall His death, our participation in it, and the results of that on our behalf. Through it, we see God’s power displayed and His justice manifested, His character revealed and His plans culminated.

The phrase Kingdom of God, then, is a shorthand way of referencing the unfolding narrative of God's power coming to bear on the world through a covenant people, with the climax seen in the Crucifixion of Jesus, the promise in terms of His Resurrection, and the future consummation in terms of His judgment and a resulting state that we can call justice...

Paper Pt V: Power and Collaboration

Kingdom Power: God’s Collaborative Action

We read in Genesis that God decides, “let Us make man in Our image, and let them rule;” after He does so we read, “and God saw that it was very good.”8 God’s rule, even from the beginning, is exercised through a people. Humanity, made in God’s image, is given dominion over the earth; reflecting God’s goodness and justice into creation.

This same pattern of authority is seen throughout the ongoing story of scripture. God covenants with Israel, and begins to teach them how to be human; they are to exercise an influence over the earth, to be a light to the nations. So too the Church, the covenant people in the Messiah, is the very dwelling place for God, and the central conduit for His authority upon the earth in this present age.

While the metaphor of ‘King and Subjects,’ or even, ‘Shepherd and Sheep’ may (out of context) invoke an authoritarian approach, God also uses other metaphors for His relationship to His creation. Like a Father, or even a Mother,9 with children, God is intimately concerned with us. This is no mere autocrat, governing by fiat, but rather a doting parent, deeply concerned with the wellbeing and the maturity of His children; hoping to involve them intimately in the family affairs. Even beyond this, provocatively, God is a Husband,10 wooing a Bride.

To talk of power in terms of God’s Kingdom, is to talk of power ‘in and through’ a people. As Paul writes, the church is “the fullness” of Christ as He “fills everything in every way.”11 It is for this reason that “the creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed.”12 God’s intended vessel for His power is a Spirit-indwelt people, empowered for His Kingdom purposes; the hope for our world is the covenant community in Christ; a restoration of God’s “very good.” Therefore, power in God’s Kingdom is tied to what God is doing and how God is doing it; to talk about justice and power we must look to the Cross.

Paper Pt IV: Justice and Purpose

Kingdom Purpose: Justice and God’s Good Desire

We see in the opening verses of scripture the repeated refrain, “God said” and, “God saw that it was good.”3 This is the opening salvo in God’s Kingdom story; the Kingdom project begins with creation. God creates a world of marvelous diversity; creative explosions of sound, smell, and color; a wonderful harmony and plentiful provision abound. God’s creative activity realizes His goodness, and His desire for goodness.

This same creative goodness is revealed under different circumstances in the second great Kingdom initiative; God calls Abram from the ranks of sinful humanity and makes a deal with him. God promises to bless him, but also to bless the whole world through him; “I will bless you, and you will be a blessing.”4 The Kingdom project goes forward in Jesus. He fulfils Israel’s calling on her behalf, redeems Adam’s humanity; and initiates a new covenant community on the earth.

The Church lives in the tension of proclaiming the Kingdom promise in the midst of a broken creation. We embrace the vision and mission of the God “who is over all and through all and in all,”5 to “place all things under (Jesus) feet.”6 This is the prophetic future of the New Jerusalem in John’s vision where every wound is healed. This consummates the Kingdom story; it is the ultimate goal of God’s Kingdom project.

31For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead."

Acts 17:31

It is in this context that we can begin to talk about justice. Something is just when it can be truly said, “and God saw that it was good.” We tend to think of justice in terms of the great problems and evils in the world (in a world broken by Adam’s rebellion this is proper), however, justice has more to do with the way things ought to be, than with the way things are. It is the brokenness of man that required Jesus’ death to undo, and it is the resurrection of Jesus that gives us the foretaste of the New Creation, where judgment will be past tense, and justice will be reality.

Justice is rooted in God’s desire to manifest goodness, and so in the context of a “creation subjected and in bondage to decay”7 we see justice spoken of in the scriptural promises of Creation and New Creation, and in the language of future Resurrection and Judgment; where all wrongs are made right, and we will share in the new heaven and the new earth.

Justice, then, is simply the state of ‘goodness’ that is a reality when God’s rule is implemented. In the now, and in the not yet, justice is simply a description of the state of individuals, situations, societies, and systems that have come under the good authority of Jesus the King. We turn now to a discussion of that authority at work.

Paper Pt III: The Kingdom

THE KINGDOM OF GOD: A WORKING DEFINITION

Most are quite familiar with the basic phrases used to explain the Kingdom, “God’s rule and reign,” “wherever God is king,” “wherever what God wants to happen is what actually happens,” and so on. This rudimentary definition is actually surprisingly versatile; God’s Kingdom is where His purposes are accomplished by His power, and by His methods; wherever this is not the case, we find ourselves outside His Kingdom, and under the authority of another. We will briefly answer: What are His purposes? …powers? …and methods?

The Dangers of De-Construction

Or as my friend Phil Harold puts it, "What happens when the spiritual journey ends in little more than a prolonged rant against existing forms of religion.  Its all about dissociation.  There seems to be a stunning capacity to persist in that mode indefinitely today, and an equally stunning incapacity to find a spiritual home."

Just Be Quiet!

¹¹ The more the words,
       the less the meaning,
       and how does that profit anyone?


Ecclesiastes 6:11

Paper Pt II: Why Write?

This paper is born out of the twin impulses of 1) grappling with the implications of allegiance to a Crucified Messiah and 2) watching Church leaders and practitioners encourage and implement a praxis that seems to have other allegiances.  There are simply too many examples of practice and language that communicate a foreign theology. A praxis that effectively equates success with a pastor’s ability to raise a salary, or a praxis that attempts to grow a church by way of racial profiling (i.e. the homogenous principle), clearly communicate a theology very different than the one we claim to hold. People who implement such a praxis are often comfortable with much of the theology outlined in this paper, and even some of the implications for praxis, yet fail to comprehensively work that theology out into their vocabulary and practice.

I am sure that others will be able to find yet more practical implications, and specific recommendations, than those that we will here outline. The goals of this paper are not an exhaustive study, but rather something more like planting a flag. It is imperative that we do not lose sight of the very center of God’s purpose and powerful activity as we begin to pour our time and energy into maintaining the structures that were intended to be a vessel for that very purpose and power. Lest we become like a gardener who dutifully props up the tomato cages, keeping them perfectly aligned, long after the tomato plants have died.

We will break our project into four sections, the first and second are only necessary to lay down the underlying theological framework, the third will address the significance of that framework, and the fourth (and most important section) will address the practical application of that framework. Section one is a rudimentary discussion of the Kingdom of God, attempting to understand Kingdom theology in terms of ‘power,’ ‘justice,’ and ‘the Cross. ’ Section two will move briefly to examine the Church’s relationship to the Kingdom. Section three will extrapolate fourteen specific implications of our Kingdom theology for the Church. Section four is the crucial aspect of our work, here we will finally be able to critique current Church praxis and determine just how our practices fail to adhere to our theology.

From a Good Friend

(This was taken from the blog linked to in the title)


1. Expect substantial and relentless spiritual obstruction, confusion and attack from an adversary hell-bent on derailing God's Kingdom initiatives, especially in places of long-established demonic strongholds. Planting is a fight on spiritual, emotional, relational and physical/practical fronts; sometimes all at once. Chaos will show up in surprising ways and create setbacks threatening to wear down your resolve. The pain of the fight is real.

2.  Expect to have your faith tested beyond what you have experienced in the past. Church planting requires a strength of faith and trust equal to the Kingdom weight it must carry. You need to believe when the money is not there; when the people are not there, where the way is frequently blocked, problems cascade and you are spiritually, mentally and physically drained. It could all fall apart, but you must hold fast to God no matter. He will make a way where there appears no way. In the meantime, it feels like muscles being stressed and strained to be ready. Sometimes they tear.

3. Expect God to expose and work on your weaknesses through trial. Character flaws, relationship tensions, unhealed wounds and areas of spiritual immaturity will be brought to the fore so God can create a pure heart ready to produce Kingdom fruit. It will take time and is a critical part of the planting process: God plants his Kingdom more deeply in you so you're more fit to do the same in others.No one likes having to look into a mirror of sin and weakness. It hurts, but is necessary.

4. Expect the re-tooling of your expectations about what your mission is going to look like. The vision may or may not reflect where you end up. What sparkled off the page on the drawing-board may evaporate when real life takes over your days on the mission ground.  Again, he's focusing your effort around his will for what he's called you to do. We see in part; he sees exactly as he desires it to be. You might experience frustration as God goes to work. No one likes having to re-do what seems a winner.

5. Expect periods of second guessing and questioning. As you run into delaying obstructions which persist, you very likely will ask questions about whether God called you to do this in the first place. You might wonder if you are the right man or woman for the task. You may question your gifts or spiritual fitness. You might feel you are disappointing God because you're not making more headway. Questioning is good if it brings you to your knees and opens you to God's wisdom. This kind of suffering can be excruciating because it calls your sense of value and competence into question. Confidence in God gets built there.

6. Expect periods of discouragement even disillusionment. There are countless stories of missionaries and planters suffering great long, dark nights of the soul where it feels all has failed, God has disappeared (or worse yet is really ticked), and its might be time to abandon ship. Sometimes it will be accompanied by excruciating stresses and strains physically, financially, relationally, emotionally and spiritually. Being overwhelmed for an extended period of time can produce disillusionment also. These periods will come. You are being tested and made durable like a marathon runner. It hurts because you feel let down or you are letting down others who put their confidence in your mission.

7.  Expect training in humility where much of what you stood on in the past is removed so you have nothing to toot your spiritual horn about. If anything happens of any real import in the mission you've been summoned to it will be God's doing and his alone . . . period. Humility is prized by God. Suffering creates humility because it puts us in God's hands with only him to hold on to. Pride puffs us to blindness and missional impotence. Our initial, grand designs for God need some cutting down to size. Suffering gets the job done if we keep our eyes on him in the ordeal he fashioned for us.

Thanks PM

Reggie McNeal Main Session Unleashed Conference 2010 from Unleashed Network on Vimeo.

Paper Pt I

Power and Purpose in a Cross-Shaped Community:

Examining the Contradictions between Theology and Praxis

For the Society of Vineyard Scholars

The Theology and Practice of the Kingdom of God:

Justice, Power, and the Cross

The Church has a purpose. That purpose is shaped by its theology. In turn, however, Church practice also communicates a theology. A friend of mine once remarked, “the fact that ‘they were fishermen,’1 is a significant theological revelation;” in the same way, the current praxis of the Church reveals a theological vision of God, His action, and purposes. This raises the question: do we violate our theology by our praxis? Yes, we do.

We read in Philippians 2 “Jesus being in very nature God, became obedient to death on a cross.” This was not something that Jesus submitted to as a sort of unfortunate and ill-fitting garment, soon to be discarded, but rather as a central expression of His character and purpose.2 We contradict this character and purpose with our praxis. This must be said more clearly; Jesus’ death on the cross is not him setting aside His power and justice agenda, but rather the cross must be seen as the very manner in which Jesus would display power and implement justice. This forces the Church to seek power that originates in God’s action and to practice it in a manner patterned after God’s use of it; i.e. the Cross. Additionally, this requires the Church to view its purpose as flowing out of God’s creative work and restorative justice; again centered on the Cross. The Church then, must craft its praxis in light of what God has done through the crucifixion of Jesus.

Where have all the Martyrs gone?

"In Acts, chapter 17, Paul is assailed on a charge of saying that there is another king, namely, Jesus. Wouldn’t it be great to have Christians in the Western world hauled up on that same charge today?"

N.T. Wright

Thanks Bro!

"I can imagine a world without evil. A world without war. A world where people live together in harmony... and I can see us attacking that world because they'd NEVER see it coming!"

Jack Handey

Gospel Contextualization for Science Geeks

"I was praying last night and God said..."

translation: "I have established communication with extra-terrestrial intelligence from dimension X."

"I asked Jesus into my heart..."

translation: "I have become a symbiotic host for an extra-terrestrial being."

A Common Mind

"...the covenant community is not a mere human institution following an agenda but a fellowship of disciples together seeking to know, listen to, worship, love, and serve their Lord. In particular, the community we see in Acts, the Epistles, and the writings of the second century was constantly concerned to invoke, celebrate and be deeply sensitive to the leading and guiding of the Holy Spirit. Repeatedly, this involved fresh searchings of Scripture (for the earliest Christians, the Old Testament; for the next generation, the apostolic traditions as well) and serious prayer and fasting, waiting for a common mind to emerge."

NT Wright

A Taste pt III

The photo comes from an interesting link. A fancy meal, at a fancy restaurant, served to blind-folded diners...

...what a provocative parable!

==================

...with that image in mind we turn to 'Postmodern' thought.

Many leaders in the Church have spoken with skepticism about the postmodern elements within our culture. They call it relativism, or 'liberalism,' and claim that it is incompatible with Christian faith. Postmodern thought looks with skepticism upon universal truth claims, and it is this attribute that leads many Church leaders to push against it. The postmodern assertion is that all truth claims are ultimately attempts to gain control over others. But the reason for the skepticism of universal truth claims is fundamentally about mistrusting the people making the claims, not so much the claims themselves. To put this in 'Christianese;' postmodern thought is saying 'human beings are fallen, and so their claims about the universe are untrustworthy.'

Postmodernism ultimately becomes a way of speaking about 'the Fall' to the arrogant way in which Modernism has approached the universe.

Postmodern thought has many strengths, primarily the emphasis on the value of individual humans, and the validity of personal experience. A friend of mine always wants to validate the stories, beliefs, and values that I hold as a Christian, while simultaneously validating those of her friend the Spiritualist. This is the great strength of postmodern thought. Personal stories are immensely valued, experiences of beauty, emotion, connection, or even leaps of intuition, are given premium. There is the sense that life is happening, and we must enjoy it; we need to experience all of the subtle flavors, delightful harmonies, powerful rhythms, and riotous hues of life in our universe. We must be sure to safeguard the sanctity of experience, and with that aim in mind, we must not threaten it with questions about the accuracy or universality of that experience.

...the emphasis on personal experience is so heavy that the ability to talk about shared experience (universal knowledge) becomes lost. The weakness of postmodern thought is the apparent lack of language to describe how personal experience might point to something beyond personal experience; postmodern thought often fails to make the connection that my experience of the world might actually give insight about the world irrespective of my experience of it...

==================

This approach is brought directly to spiritual truth: my friend has told me that 'spiritual truth is like the taste of the apple, for you it is sweet, for me it is bitter. The same apple can taste different to different people. It is sweet, and it is bitter; they are both true. And so, for you Christianity is true, for them Spiritualism is true, and for me neither is true.'

This is a common postmodern approach to truth.

We take the journey, eat the fruit, and heed the voice, but we do not know where we are going, what we are eating, or who we are following! ...nor do we care to!

God's Plan

"There is a made-up story that describes Jesus returning to heaven after His sojourn here on earth. The angels gathered around the Lord to find out about all the things that happened on earth. Jesus explained to the angels how He lived among people, shared His teachings, expressed His love, died on the cross to atone for humanity’s sins, and was resurrected to declare that the new kingdom is at hand.

When he finished telling his story, Michael the archangel asked the Lord, “What happens now?”

Jesus answered, “I left behind a handful of faithful men and women. They will tell the story! They will express the love! They will spread the Kingdom!”

“But what if they fail?” asked Michael. “What will then be the plan?”

Jesus answered Michael by saying, “There is no other plan!”

Ours is the responsibility to be the instruments for the propagation of God’s truth. That is the task of the church."

Tony Campolo

More Training Wheels

"...the law had a temporary purpose, and when that purpose is accomplished those bits of the law can be wisely set aside, not as archaic or ill-informed restrictive practices that we’ve now outgrown, but as necessary earlier elements in a plan which has now reached a new stage at which those elements, no longer required, are rightly to be shelved. The amphibious craft switches off the propeller when it comes on shore, not because the propeller was a bad thing we shouldn’t have used in the first place but because it was a good thing which has completed its water-related job."

NT Wright

The DR

Assumptions

"Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in awhile, or the light won’t come in."
Alan Alda

A Prostitute's Birthday

"It was the middle of the night, but sometimes sleep just won't come. Especially if there are long plane flights and several time zone changes involved. So it must have been 2am or so when Tony finally gave up, got dressed and left the hotel for a little look around the neighborhood. His body said it was morning and was not accepting any different opinions. The hotel coffeeshop was long since closed, but he found a greasy spoon diner a block or two away that looked like it had been open forever, where he could get some of that life fluid, and a donut. The counterman poured a cup, wiped his hands on an old stained towel around his waist, lifted the lid, grabbed up a donut and dropped it on Tony's plate. Tony decided to eat it anyway..
As Tony sat there at the counter the door opened and in walked three young women, ladies of the evening they used to be called. They took the other stools at the counter and ordered coffee, too. And as they compared notes one of them said, "Did you know that tomorrow is my birthday?" What do you want from me, Agnes?," one of her friends answered. "Shall I maybe bake you a cake or throw you a party?" "I've never had a birthday party in my life, and I've never had a cake, and I don't want you to do anything. I was just making conversation." They soon finished both the coffee and conversation and went back out into the night.
The next time the counterman came by, Tony had a question. "Do those women come in here every night?" "The prostitutes? Sure, regular as clockwork, three am." "Could we have a birthday party for Agnes tomorrow night? She said it will be her birthday." The old counterman just looked at him for a moment, then called his wife from her place at the grill. "Come out here. This guy wants to throw a birthday party for Agnes here tomorrow night. What do you think?" "Let's do it," she replied, and the plot, as they say, began to thicken.
The next night, right at three am, the door opened and Agnes and her friends walked into the diner. Only it wasn't the same diner. Oh it was the same building, but there were streamers of crepe paper hanging from the ceiling. They were the same dirty walls, except one of them was covered by a pretty big sign that said 'Happy Birthday, Agnes'. It was the same counter, stools and booths, but tonight, in addition to Tony and the counterman and his wife, there were dozens of other people, too. Word had gone out and all the prostitutes in town were there, waiting to see the look on Agnes's face.

Agnes just stood there in the doorway, stunned. Finally her friends had to push her on into the room and up to the counter. There among the ketchup bottles and napkin dispensers was a birthday cake. Agnes's birthday cake. She just looked at it in silence. "Cut the cake. Let's eat," came the cry. Agnes didn't move. The counterman handed her a knife. "Cut the cake, Agnes. Let's see how it tastes." Do I have to?" "Come on Agnes, cut the cake." Raising her eyes, Agnes looked at the counterman. "It's so pretty. Do I have to cut it?" "Well, I guess not, if you don't want to."
"I've never had a birthday day cake before," Agnes said, more to herself than anyone else. "I don't want to cut it." Then to the counterman she said, to everyone's surprise, "I don't live very far from here, just a block or so. Could I take this cake home? I'll come right back." "Sure Agnes, go ahead." And Agnes picked up her birthday cake, and holding it like it was the holy grail, she waked carefully out the door, into the night.
Everyone was silent, stunned by what they had just witnessed. Finally Tony said, "Let's all say a prayer for Agnes." Everybody bowed their heads and Tony prayed aloud that God would bless Agnes and watch over her, and touch her life. "Amen."
"I didn't know you were a preacher," said the counterman, as conversation gradually began to grow. "I'm not. I'm a sociologist." "Well, what church do you belong to?" he asked. "I guess you could say I belong to a church that throws birthday parties for prostitutes at 3 o'clock in the morning.”"

Tony Campolo