Waiting for the Lion's Roar

I came across another old notebook from 1996. It had several poems in it, most of which were rather drivel-ish. But I still rather like this one.  I assume the lion mentioned is Aslan. 

Waiting for the lion's roar,

  we go about our business.

Occasionally we remind ourselves

  that the roar is coming.

But we must continue to live

  until it comes. 

And we get caught up in the living.

I wonder if there is a way

  to be always expectant

  and always living.

Introverted Evangelists? You've got to be kidding.

The eighth chapter of Adam McHugh's book, Introverts in the Church, is entitled "Introverted Evangelism" -- a term that many people might consider to be an oxymoron. I've always considered myself to be more of a discipler than an evangelist and this chapter pretty much bears that out, except that Adam makes the point that that discipling sort of behavior might also work well as evangelistic sort of behavior.  Let me explain from my point of view first, then I'll toss in some quotes from the book.     

When I think of discipling, I think of deep conversations about scripture, spirituality, life and our place in it. It's often a one-on-one thing and though one person in that pairing might be more "mature" or knowledgeable than the other, both end up learning and benefiting from the relationship and interactions. What Adam is saying is that when you do that exact sort of thing, only you're doing it with a non-Christian, that's evangelism.  

OK, so here's some words from the horse's mouth:

I think that our prevailing evangelistic methods are ill-suited for introverts.

For too long we have envisioned evangelism as one person, carrying a quiver of answers, assaulting another person who is armed with the questions. 

Rather, I consider us all to be explorers of the mysteries of God.  Fellow explorers are bound together by their trust and friendship, and by their shared aspirations and struggles.

We might even call our style of evangelism a "listening evangelism."

Postmodern people are not as persuaded by rational argumentation as much as they are by a lifestyle that substantiates a person's worldview.

He also made a comment that I found particularly interesting just from the introvert vs. extrovert perspective.  He said, "Introverts are more exhausted by initiating than by responding."  That is SO TRUE. There have been times when I've had "call so-and-so" on my to-do list for days.  But then for some reason they'll call me instead and I'm so relieved that I can accomplished whatever I needed to without having had to initiate the call. 

I always assumed that it was just an "I hate telephones" thing, but as I think about it, I can see that it fits for other circumstances as well. For example, it's hard for me to walk up to visitors during Sunday morning services. I don't know what to say or ask or do.  But if someone else is already talking to them, and I can just walk up and stand there until there's a point of conversation that I'm interested in and can speak to, then I feel much more comfortable and able.

A Colony of Heaven

"...the Holy Spirit formed [the church] to be a colony of heaven in the country of death." -- Eugene Peterson, quoted from BeliefNet

Sustainability and the Poor of the Earth

Pam wrote an interesting piece on the intersection of poverty and sustainability (Poor Folks Don't Care About the Earth). The question that particularly struck me was, "Can we help people struggling to survive, live sustainably?" The tension, of course, is struggling between helping those in the here and now vs. protecting the world for those to come. 

Heifer International comes to mind as an organization trying to help those in poverty through a program that is sustainable. I also thought of several organizations trying to provide sustainable cook stoves or sustainable means of making clean water available (such as Trees, Water & People).

But I suppose this is also a local question. How can I help those who are in need in my community live more sustainably? Backyard gardening pops immediately to mind.  I've been involved in the Garden Club at our local elementary school and was excited when I heard that the local middle school (which has a higher percentage of low income families than our elementary school) was going to start one as well. Unfortunately the principal replied to my inquiries by telling me that the garden is still at least a year down the road.   

Do you have thoughts regarding the intersection of poverty and sustainability? Conflicts? Solutions? General ramblings?

The Role of a Church Leader

I'm about 2/3rds of the way through Introverts in the Church and just finished the section on leadership. Here's a tidbit from my reading this morning:

The gifts he gave were that some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ. -- Ephesians 4:11-13

These three verses are packed with insight about leadership.  We see that God creates different sorts of leaders and that they, therefore, lead out of who they are and the gifts they have been given.  We also learn that the main responsibility of leaders, with their manifold gifts and functions, is to equip others for ministry and pave the way for their maturity.  In order for pastors to be faithful to their biblical calling, and survive in ministry, they must empower and release others to do the ministry of the church. 

I like the "equip others for ministry" description.  Though I do know many pastors who have this as their goal, I've also met too many who seem more set on keeping a tight thumb on what they see as their domain. 

How would you describe the difference between reformation and transformation?

Who are you? <-- in one sentence

Jason, over at Sustainable Traditions, asked if he could republish my review of the book, Redeeming Creation. Along with the post, he wanted to include a one sentence bio.

Those things are tough to write.  How do you sum up your life in one sentence?

I finally settled on this. Hopefully it doesn't just describe me, but sounds like me as well.

Meg is the member of Cornerstone Pres. in Fort Collins, Colorado who is most likely to be found barefooted during a gathering, and though her husband prefers shoes, her three children often join her in padding about with bare feet.

I was really tickled with myself that I was able to mention the "wife and mother of 3" bit without quite saying it that way. I left out the "I am what I do for a living" idea entirely. And I was able to give a nod to our congregation even though we're not one of the funky, community-focused house churches that are probably more in vogue among those on the site.

So, now I'm curious. If you were getting reposted somewhere and you had to write a one sentence bio, what would you write?

8. Take a Camping Trip

Take a Camping Trip -- this is suggestion number 8 from Chris Smith's book, Growing Deeper in our Church Communities.

I don't know about a camping trip, but in the 8 years we've been at Cornerstone we've never had a church-wide retreat. We've had a couple of weekend overnight gal events, but that's it. 

I like retreats. Granted, they're often exhausting and they're a boat load of work to plan, but usually there's enough free time scheduled in that you can get away into the woods to spend some time in nature and in silence. And it's a great opportunity to hang out with others in a different setting than usual for an extended period of time.

1. Create Spaces for Open Discussion

My initial thought when reading this first suggestion for building community by Chris Smith, in his book Growing Deeper in our Church Communities, was that our congregation does this already every time we have a fellowship meal.  But as I read more, I realized that Chris was talking about a time with a more specific purpose and topic of discussion. He gives some examples that draw this out:

Once you gather people, there are thousands of things that could be discussed: How could we be more faithful together? Are there people in our congregation who aren’t being taken care of?  Perhaps there is a book that could be read and discussed.  For us, the initial conversation went in the direction of “What is scripture and how should we read it?”

This is the kind of conversation I've longed for in our congregation for quite awhile now. We seem to march ever onward in our traditional roles, making little tweaks here or adjustments there in how we do things or when we do them or what we're doing, but we never get together as a congregation and brainstorm on any of these things as a body. I would love to hear what people appreciate in worship, group study, fellowship, etc. from the past year of our life together. I'd like to know why they liked those things or hear their ideas on how we could do better at them in the upcoming year.

I think sometimes people direct their thoughts or reactions to the pastor like he's supposed to be the repository for all of our opinions as a church, and he is to be the master coordinator and organizer regarding how those opinions will henceforth change our means and methods of interaction. It would make so much more sense for us to all share our thoughts and ideas among each other -- to hear how something that I didn't really care much for meant quite a bit to someone else or to discover that there's a need I wasn't aware of but that I can help to meet.

This would develop a greater openness among the body as we learn more about one another's needs and preferences and we also learn to honor them in these things. I may not like reading through a question and answer of the catechism each Sunday, but if that's something that's particularly meaningful to another member of the congregation, and it helps him to feel more connected to God, then I'm more likely to read that question and answer with delight, not because I find value in it, but because I know that that act is enabling my brother to draw closer to God and that has value for the entire congregation.

Growing Deeper in our Church Communities - quotes from the book

I've just started reading Growing Deeper in our Church Communities: 50 ideas for Connection in a Disconnected Age, by C. Christopher Smith. I thought I'd share some quotes:

...it might not be as readily obvious that our call to love and connect with people goes to a deeper level, namely that God is gathering a people whose life together reflects the intimate communion of the three Persons of the Trinity and embodies the love and reconciliation that God desires for all humanity and all creation.  This gathering of a people is essential to God’s mission of reconciliation in the world; it began in the Old Testament people of Israel, continued in Jesus’s gathering of a community of disciples and continues to the present in the church.  Our churches, then, are local, context-specific manifestations of the one people that God is gathering*.  Especially in the disconnectedness of the present age, our churches are the hospitable environment in which we can learn what it means to love and be loved in deeper, more holistic ways, and as we learn to do so, our love will overflow to our neighbors around us.

I like the phrase, "local, context-specific manifestions." In our gals Bible study we've been looking at Hebrews and seeing that the Old Testament is full of types of what is to come.  A type is an example or representation of something greater. (Think of it like the printed letter being a type of the letter itself.)

God gathers us in specific places, and in these places we are called to be the Body of Christ together – the physical, tangible presence of Christ in this place.  I, by myself, cannot be the Body of Christ; I can only be a part of that body, whose existence is understood only in relation to the Whole.

This is something I struggled with in high school.  Our youth group leader and the pastor often spoke in terms of the individual and it just didn't seem to jive with what I was reading in the Bible where there were a lot of plurals - you all, us, we, them.  Community was a big discussion point among our little band of college students in the InterVarsity group at the University of Michigan that I was a part of. Finally all those plural references to people started to come clear. And living in such proximity (in various dorms and apartments all within a small radius from each other on campus) helped us to start living out what we were learning. 

We embody Christ together in a place, and the shape of the life together that God has given us proclaims God’s love and reconciliation in ways that can be understood by our neighbors.   The monastics have long had a name for this connection to place: stability. We primarily need deeper connection to other people, but in our age of overwhelming transience, we need stability – connection not only to people, but to people in a specific place.

I grew up as an Air Force brat and assumed that my longing for a place to settle down was due to living in several different states growing up. But I think Smith is right, that it also related to connection as a people.  When Moses led the Israelites up out of Egypt, it wasn't just for them to be a people, freed from slavery. But it was to be a people in the promised land. The fact that the land was divvied up among the people and thanks to the concept of Jubilee was meant to remain in the hands of those specific sub-divisions is yet another sign that God doesn't just put individuals into families/tribes, but he also puts them in specific places.

These quotes are all from the introduction to the book.  The rest of the book consists of 50 practical ideas for building community.  I think I'll talk about some of those in another post.

In the meantime, if you are interested in reading through this book, you can download a pdf copy from the Englewood Review of Books website.

Christian Leadership - Adam McHugh quote

"Christian leaders give people the biblical and theological tools to see their ordinary lives in the broad horizons of the kingdom of God." - Adam McHugh, Introverts in the Church

Paul - the life of the party?

"You can measure leaders by the number and the quality of their friends. Judged by that measuring rod, Paul had a genius for friendship.  He was essentially a gregarious man." -- J. Oswald Sanders, Spiritual Leadership (Chicago, Moody Press, 1967)

Thoughts on Sanders' measurement system? Do you think of Paul as a gregarious man?

Relational vs. Sociable

Quotes from a repost of a 2007 article by Dr. Richard Beck called Introverts in the Imago Dei?

"Introverts are very, very relational. They just aren’t sociable."

"It is true that deeper relationships are needed at church, but the route isn't always best achieved by throwing strangers together into forced conversation."

I've always hated those "turn and greet the person next to you" times.  Worse yet, I've been in huge meetings where you're surrounded by strangers and we were expected to turn to our neighbor, pour our hearts out to each other and pray for each other.  I'd rather spend several hours at the dentist rather than go through that again. Talk about awkward.

Baptism -- the first five centuries

Jason of Sustainable Traditions posted a link today for a free ebook download of Growing Deeper in Our Church Communities: 50 Ideas for Connection in a Disconnected Age. by Chris Smith (which looks like it will be an interesting read).  While I was on the site, I glanced at some of the books that they've recently reviewed.  One was called Baptism in the Early Church: History, Theology, and Liturgy in the first Five Centuries, by Everett Ferguson. It looks amazing.

Ferguson has apparently done a survey of literary, artistic and architectural references to Christian baptism from before the first century (to give a little background) through to the fifth century AD. As the reviewer, Marius Nel, explains, "The primary strength of Ferguson’s excellent study is its comprehensive focus on all the available primary literature, while also surveying (chapter 1) and engaging (in numerous footnotes) the relevant secondary literature." Nel then proceeds to give a chapter by chapter description of Ferguson's findings and conclusions. 

As intriguing as the book sounds, even just the review of it brought up some interesting questions.  The following is a quote from the review that typifies the type of provocative questions that a survey such as this can raise:

Christian literary sources (backed by secular word usage and Jewish religious immersions), for instance overwhelmingly supports full immersion as the normal baptismal practice. Exceptions for a lack of water and sickbed baptism were however made (857). If this was the case the question arises when is a baptismal practice (for example sprinkling instead of full immersion) wrong and unacceptable (even heretical) instead of a practical matter to be decided by faith communities in terms of their own specific context? Put differently: what is the relationship between the sign (water) of baptism and what it signifies (redemption and regeneration for example)? To what extent can the baptismal sign be minimized (as in partial immersion, pouring or sprinkling) before it loses its theological significance? Early Christian text (like the Didache) seems to imply that the precise volume or nature of the baptismal water did not determine the validity of a baptism (204-205).

I was particularly intrigued by the bit about a sign being "minimized" to a point of losing "its theological significance." I've often felt that way about communion: It's talked about like it's a feast when really it's a minuscule piece of often tasteless bread or cracker followed by watered down reconstituted grape juice.  If anything it makes you wonder why you bother rather than being a sensual connection to the sacrifice of the Son of God.