The only hermeneutic of the gospel...

I haven't read the book. In fact, I don't think I'd even heard of the author until yesterday. But to the extent that I understand what he's saying, I agree whole heartedly. If the world cannot see the gospel embodied in the church, then how can our story speak with authority or effectiveness?

The following is directly copied from Tolle Lege where I found the quote.

“I have come to feel that the primary reality of which we have to take account in seeking for a Christian impact on public life is the Christian congregation. How is it possible that the gospel should be credible, that people should come to believe that the power which has the last word in human affairs is represented by a man hanging on a cross?

I am suggesting that the only answer, the only hermeneutic of the gospel, is a congregation of men and women who believe it and live by it. I am, of course, not denying the importance of the many activities by which we seek to challenge public life with the gospel– evangelistic campaigns, distribution of Bibles and Christian literature, conferences, and even books such as this one.

But I am saying that these are all secondary, and that they have power to accomplish their purpose only as they are rooted in and lead back to a believing community.”

–Lesslie Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1989), 227.

I feel like my gift to the church has been...

I'm writing a survey and I'd like feedback on this question. When you read the question, keep your own church congregation in mind. 

What do you think of the question itself? What do you think of the possible answers? Is there something that immediately springs to your mind in answer but that's not listed in the possible answer list? 

I feel like my gift to the church has been ____________________________________.

Please fill in the blank with whatever comes to mind (whether it's in the following list or not). Feel free to use the following list if that helps. 

a. compassion	b. hospitality	c. faithfulness
d. humor	e. kindness	f. thoughtfulness
g. prayer	h. evangelism	i. teaching
j. listening	k. forbearance	l. financial gifts
m. music	n. singing	o. experience
p. leadership	q. knowledge	r. hope
s. practical help with the facilities		t. gentleness
u. practical help to people in the congregation
u. a welcoming attitude to newcomers		v. wisdom

Radical Together: Unleashing the People of God for the Purpose of God

Rating:	★★
Category:	Books
Genre:	Religion & Spirituality
Author:	David Platt

I decided to read the book, Radical Together by David Platt, at the suggestion of our pastor. Upon finishing it, I think I can best summarize my thoughts on the book by saying that Platt had a lot of good things to say, but he not only didn't say them very well (sometimes contradicting himself, many times overstating himself, and almost always showing only one piece of a much larger picture), but I think he overemphasized very extraverted traditional forms of evangelism and what it means to be "radical". I've read other reviews on this book and most readers seem to really, really like it. So obviously Platt is hitting cords with people and is able to motivate them in a way that just doesn't seem to connect with me. Different strokes for different folks and all that. (Could it be that Sensing individuals like the very clear, very physical forms of being "radical"? Both my mom and Pastor Don are S's and both like Platt's books. If you're an iNtuitive and you read this book, I'd love to hear your thoughts.) But this review is going to be about my response and thoughts on this book. So if you liked this book, that's great. But it really rubbed me the wrong way.

I could summarize Platt's six main points, but most other reviews already do that, so I won't spend the time. Rather, I'd like to focus on his underlying foundational premises and presuppositions. For the most part I agree with his stated points. We do need to be congregations who focus resources on more than just ourselves. We should have Bible-based preaching. We should encourage and equip congregants to build relationship with people in the community, helping people physically and spiritually. We should have a great concern for the poor and the orphans and the widow. I'm right on with all that. But Platt rests these "radical" (some might call them Biblical) behaviors on a foundation that I find at times to be shaky and at other times to be very one-sided. Platt clearly has a heart for evangelism and his book is primarily a focus on evangelism. And I don't have a problem with that. But I do have a problem with Platt's understanding of the church and her purpose and I do have a problem with Platt's statements that put evangelism at the pinnacle of all that is radical. It is one thing to focus on evangelism as an important part of what it means to be within a Christian community, it's another thing to make evangelism out to be all and (literally) end all.

Premises and Presuppositions
Platt makes several statements throughout the book that put in no uncertain terms his opinion of the purpose of the church:

"The only possible vision for the church of Jesus Christ is to make known the glory of God in all nations."

"God has called us to lock arms with one another in single-minded, death-defying obedience to one objective: the declaration of his gospel for the demonstration of his glory to all nations."

"If the ultimate goal of the church is to take the gospel to all people groups, then everything we do in the church must be aimed toward that end."

Platt apparently believes that the ultimate and overarching goal of the church of Jesus Christ is evangelism. He doesn't say it's a part of the church's calling, but that it IS the church's calling. Sure, we're supposed to go forth to all nations. God definitely wants to get the word out and he wants us to do some of the footwork on that. But evangelism is only one of several things that glorify God. (Of course, evangelism can also be done in a way that very much does not glorify God and makes him out to be something he's not. But that's a different topic of discussion.) There are other things, according to the scriptures, that also glorify God: our worship (John 4:24), our love for one another (Romans 15:7), our sanctification as we become more like Christ (2 Corinthians 3:18), and our service to others with the gifts God has given us (2 Corinthians 8:19). To imply that one of those things is more important than any other distorts the picture of what the church has been called to be and to do. If Platt had written from a premise that evangelism is one of the actions of the church, I'd feel much more comfortable with that. Writing that it's the "only possible vision for the church" minimizes the importance of other gifts within the church such as discipleship, hospitality, teaching, preaching, encouraging, showing mercy, etc.

I believe Platt also sensationalizes what it means to be "radical." He never defines the term, but the impression you get from reading the book is that in order to be radical, you must do something that can be measured, and when it is measured, it will big. Quitting your job and moving to a third world country to tell people about Jesus is clearly visible to the undiscerning eye. It is big. Going through the church budget and giving more away to overseas missions, or giving substantial amounts to programs that help orphans and widows, is measurable. And big. Platt may not have meant to imply this, but from reading the book it's fairly clear that if you can't see the action from a mile away, it's not radical. The Bible makes clear, though, that sometimes it's the little things that are radical. When there's another person in the congregation who gets on your very last nerve and who almost makes you want to just leave the church altogether, and yet through Christ's love and forgiveness you learn to love and forgive that individual in turn, that is radical. It's not easy to measure. It might not even be visible to those who didn't realize the animosity that was previously in the relationship. But that doesn't mean it's not entirely radical, especially in the midst of our self-protectionist, cut bait and run kind of culture. Or sticking with a congregation through thick and thin because we recognize that God has put us in the family, not to run away from it or to despise it, but to learn, within that context, how to hope, how to forgive, how to be patient, how to be kind, how to forbear and above all how to love well. That is radical. Sure, staying put might not look radical. And to be honest, sometimes it isn't radical. But staying put and learning to faithfully follow Jesus in a day to day setting as an imperfect person surrounded by imperfect people -- that is truly radical. If we're going to talk about being radical, we should be using the Bible's standard (forgiving 70x7 times or turning the other cheek) rather than using an outdated, Americanized view of what the term means.

Maybe it's not a contradiction, but it sure isn't very clear
Platt also seems to contradict himself a few times. The first time I think might actually have been intentional. In fact, the title of the chapter, "The gospel that saves us from work saves us to work" shows the problem. Though I understand what Platt was trying to get at (I think) -- that we are not saved by our works, so we should quit trying. Rather we are saved by Christ and the overflow of that is radical obedience to Jesus (shown in our actions/works) - I don't feel like he made that very clear in the chapter. I finished the section thinking, "OK, so we're supposed to stop working our butts off to the point of exhaustion so we can work our butts off to the point of exhaustion... for Jesus. How are those two things different again?" It simply wasn't clear and the chapter seemed like one big unresolved contradiction. But I also felt like Platt contradicted himself when talking about programs. In chapter one, Platt made very clear that sometimes we're so focused on programs that we're not actually following God's word. I agree to some extent with that. Sometimes a church that is focused on its programs is a church that's lost focus of itself as a body, the body of Christ. So what I got from chapter one was that programs should be demoted or done away with altogether in an effort to better align with the word of God. But then he proceeds in chapter four, in the section entitled "People, Not Programs," to suggest an alternative to big programs that take place in the church building. The alternative? Little programs taking place in people's homes. He doesn't change the what so much as the size and the where. So programs are OK as long as they're broken into little bits? As an introvert, I certainly have nothing against smaller group sizes. But if we're going to talk radical, shouldn't the difference be more than just quantity and location? Shouldn't there be a fundamental difference in how we relate to one another, not as co-participants in a program but as co-participants in the Kingdom?

What also wasn't clear was what Platt meant by certain words. I've already pointed out that he didn't define "radical" except through big, measurable examples. But he also never explained what he meant by "the gospel." He talked about the gospel quite a bit. But if I had never heard the term before, and I only knew about it through Platt, this is what I would discern from this book: 1) The gospel has been chained. (Implied on pages 45-46.) 2) The gospel needs to be unchained so that it will unleash God's people/the church. (Pages 25, 30, 34, and 46. Although on page 41 it's leaders who do the unleashing.) 3) The gospel gets people to do stuff that they wouldn't otherwise do (I didn't get page numbers for this. It was frequently stated, though.) and 4) sometimes the gospel is "of grace" and that gets people to do even more than they would have done. (Not as frequently stated. Seemed like a special case scenario.) I also felt like evangelism was never defined. Again, if I were an outsider looking in, I would assume from this book that evangelism consisted in convincing people (preferably in far away countries) to turn around and start convincing other people to turn around and convince yet other people about... something. ... probably about this "gospel" and Jesus and about how important evangelism is. Remember back in the days before the postmodern area when people could talk about Christianey stuff and assume that everyone else knew exactly what they were talking about? This book would have fit in really well back then. Even if Platt is directing his book toward a wholly Christian audience, I still think that some background, such as what he means when he says things, would help round out his message and make his meanings far more clear. As it is, he could very well mean that we just need to make people pray a prayer. And that's it. It's over. Check that person off and move on to the next one. I find that neither "radical", nor indicative of being "together."

Radical Together
Which brings me to one last pet peeve. When I see the words "radical" and "together" placed side-by-side, my impression is that the topic being covered will have to do with being together, being a community, in a way that is only made possible through God (which would therefore mean that it's radical). So upon reading this book and finding that most of the sections were really about how to organize programs and budgets in a large church setting, I was pretty thrown. Where's the together? If we're doing something simultaneously does that make it a "together" thing?

Walk the Word
I think David Platt is overall trying to make a good point. If you're going to say that you're a follower of Jesus Christ, then you should be reading the word. If you're trying to build your spiritual life only through reading books about the Bible rather than reading the Bible itself, you're going to end up being either a weak or a nominal Christian. If you're going to call yourself a Christian, but you're going to immerse yourself in the wealthy, self-centered American mindset rather than in the self-sacrificing, giving Christian mindset, then is your faith coming through in your actions? Are you a follower of Jesus or a follower of comfort? Are you walking the walking and not just talking the talk? These are certainly things that self-satisfied American Christians should be reflecting on.

But the way that Platt challenges people to think these things through, and the specific examples he gives as answers to the problems he's addressing, can go a long way toward creating guilt and misdirection among the people of God. You don't have to be livin' it loud to be radical. If your gifts are compassion and hospitality, those are things that are sorely needed. If your gifts are discipleship or teaching, the church needs you. If your gifts are preaching or showing mercy, God has a purpose for you. Evangelism is not the only call that God has placed upon his people. If you do not have the gift of evangelism, or if you are an evangelist who perseveres quietly through trial rather than running for greener pastures, that does not make you any less radical in God's eyes. You know what makes Christians truly and completely radical? Jesus. It's only through him that we're anything at all. His gifts are many and plentiful and cover a variety of purposes within the church. And by using those gifts within the context of a congregation, we can bring glory to God through worship, love for one another, sanctification, the use of our God given gifts, and evangelism. Now that's radical together.

Thoughts on Church Planting - does the old model need a serious do-over?

David Fitch posted a suggestion today on how church planting is done. (STOP FUNDING CHURCH PLANTS and Start Funding Missionaries: A Plea to Denominations) I thought I'd repost my reply here.

Great post. I love munching on new ideas and this is one you can sink your teeth into. I agree that the church planting process is abysmal. The very fact that it ever worked is a sign that we (Americans, at least) have a ridiculously screwed up view of what church is. As Bob pointed out, “the only expectation that has been placed upon the people is to give their money to pay someone else to be a Christian for them.”

Having lived in both urban and suburban areas, I’ve yet to find an area in these United States that doesn’t already have at least one, if not zillions, of congregations already meeting in it. I think it’s interesting that we have a mindset that if our own denomination, or network, or whatever umbrella organization we feel connected to, doesn’t have a congregation in an area, then they’re probably not doing it right and a new church needs to be started there. What about using the congregations that already exist, the four churches who have touching parking lots, for example, and disciple people so that they live their commitment to christ themselves, rather than paying someone else to do it? (I know I’m echoing several folks sentiments here.)

I don’t see anything wrong with people moving to urban or poor areas. I’m all for that. But to do it with the intention of starting a new church still seems silly to me. I’ve lived in Detroit and in the Mission district of San Francisco – both of which are (or were, when I lived there) rather poor urban zones. But they had churches already. Why rebuild the wheel? Why not help those “dying” churches get their second wind? Does it please God when the energy and excitement of youth is spent “for his glory” while simultaneously ignoring the wisdom and experience of the christians already living in that area? It seems to me that the old but faithful need the excitement, abilities and energy of the young. And the young and energized need the wisdom and the encouragement of the old and perseverant.

Pressuring Congress to pass laws --> Civil Religion

I'm on chapter four of Resident Aliens, which hits upon the topic of Christian ethics and therefore also upon the relationship of the church and the government. Hauerwas and Willimon hit the nail on the head when ti comes to Christians trying to legislate morality. It shows a misunderstanding of the nature and purpose of the church as well as a gross misunderstanding of the relationship between church and state. What follows are several quotes from the fourth chapter. (*sheepish grin* OK, so not just several but lots.)

"The way most of us have been conditioned to think about an issue like abortion is to wonder what laws, governmental coercions, and resources would be necessary to support a 'Christian' position on this issue. The first ethical work, from this point of view, is for Christians to devise a position on abortion and then to ask the government to support that position."

"The habit of Constantinian thinking is difficult to break. It leads Christians to judge their ethical positions, not on the basis of what is faithful to our peculiar tradition, but rather on the basis of how much Christian ethics Caesar can be induced to swallow without choking. The tendency therefore is to water down Christian ethics, filtering them through basically secular criteria like 'right to life' or 'freedom of choice,' pushing them on the whole world as universally applicable common sense, and calling them Christian."

"Here is an invitation to a way that strikes hard against what the world already knows, what the world defines as good behavior, what makes sense to everybody. The Sermon [on the Mount], by its announcement and its demands, makes necessary the formation of a colony, not because disciples are those who have a need to be different, but because the Sermon, if believed and lived, makes us different, shows us the world to be alien, an odd place where what makes sense to everybody else is revealed to be opposed to what God is doing among us. Jesus was not crucified for saying or doing what made sense to everyone." 

"Merging one's personal aspirations within the aspirations of the nation, falling into step behind the flag, has long been a popular means of overcoming doubts about the substance of one's own life." 

"Christian community, life in the colony, is not primarily about togetherness. It is about the way of Jesus Christ with those whom he calls to himself. It is about disciplining our wants and needs in congruence with a true story, which gives us the resources to lead truthful lives. In living out the story together, togetherness happens, but only as a by-product of the main project of trying to be faithful to Jesus."

"Yet most modern ethics begin from the Enlightenment presupposition of the isolated, heroic self, the allegedly rational individual who stands alone and decides and chooses. The goal of this ethic is to detach the individual from his or her tradition, parents, stories, community, and history, and thereby allow him or her to stand alone, to decide, to choose, and to act alone.  It is an ethic of great value in our type of society because the corporation needs workers who are suitably detached from communities other than their place of work, people who are willing to move at the beck and call of the corporation."

"The question is, What sort of community would be required to support an ethic of nonviolence, marital fidelity, forgiveness, and hope such as the one sketched by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount?"

"Whenever Christians think that we can support our ethic by simply pressuring Congress to pass laws or to spend tax money, we fail to do justice to the radically communal quality of Christian ethics. In fact, much of what passes for Christian social concern today, of the left or of the right, is the social concern of a church that seems to have despaired of being the church. Unable through our preaching, baptism, and witness to form a visible community of faith, we content ourselves with ersatz Christian ethical activity--lobbying congress to support progressive strategies, asking the culture at large to be a little less racist, a little less promiscuous, a little less violent. Falwall's Moral Majority is little different from any mainline Protestant church that opposes him. Both groups imply that one can practice Christian ethics without being in the Christian community. Both begin with the Constantian assumption that there is no way for the gospel to be present in our world without asking the world to support our convictions through its own social and political institutionalization. The result is the gospel transformed into civil religion." 

"The Sermon on the Mount cares nothing for the European Enlightenment's infatuation with the individual self as the most significant ethical unit. For Christians, the church is the most significant ethical unit."

"We ask ourselves what sort of church we would need to be to enable an ordinary person like her [a pregnant teenager] to be the sort of disciple Jesus calls her to be. More important, her presence in our community offers the church the wonderful opportunity to be the church.... ...we are graciously given the eyes to see her as a gift of God sent to help ordinary people like us to discover the church as the Body of Christ."

"Our ethics do involve individual transformation, not as a subjective, inner, personal experience, but rather as the work of a transformed people who have adopted us, supported us, disciplined us, and enabled us to be transformed. The most interesting, creative, political solutions we Christians have to offer our troubled society are not new laws, advice to Congress, or increased funding for social programs--although we may find ourselves supporting such national efforts. The most creative social strategy we have to offer is the church. Here we show the world a manner of life the world can never achieve through social coercion or governmental action. We serve the world by showing it something that it is not, namely, a place where God is forming a family out of strangers.

"The Christian faith recognizes that we are violent, fearful, frightened creatures who cannot reason our will our way out of our mortality. So the gospel begins, not with the assertion that we are violent, fearful, frightened creatures, but with the pledge that, if we offer ourselves to a truthful story and the community formed by listening to and enacting that story in the church, we will be transformed into people more significant than we could ever have been on our own.

"As Barth says, '[The Church] exists... to set up in the world a new sign which is radically dissimilar to [the world's] own manner and which contradicts it in a way which is full of promise' (Church Dogmatics, 4.3.2)" [Brackets in this quote are from the authors.]

"Ethically speaking, it should interest us that, in beginning the Sermon on the Mount with the Beatitudes, Jesus does not ask disciplines [sic] to do anything. The Beatitudes are in the indicative, not the imperative, mood. First we are told what God has done before anything is suggested about what we are to do." [emphasis theirs]

The Sermon on the Mount "is morality pushed to the limits, not so much in the immediate service of morality, but rather to help us see something so new, so against what we have always heard said, that we cannot rely on our older images of what is and what is not."

"We are forever getting confused into thinking that scripture is mainly about what we are supposed to do rather than a picture of who God is." [emphasis theirs]

Turning the other cheek "is not a stratagem for getting what we want but the only manner of life available, now that, in Jesus, we have seen what God wants. We seek reconciliation with the neighbor, not because we will feel so much better afterward, but because reconciliation is what God is doing in the world in the Christ."

"Therefore, Christians begin our ethics, not with anxious, self-serving questions of what we ought to do as individuals to make history come out right, because, in Christ, God has already made history come out right. The Sermon is the inauguration manifesto of how the world looks now that God in Christ has taken matters in hand. And essential to the way that God has taken matters in hand is an invitation to all people to become citizens of a new Kingdom, a messianic community where the world God is creating takes visible, practical form."

Whew! I still have a few pages of the chapter to go, but I thought these quotes were all so meaty that I wanted to share them here. 

Part of God's Story - a series of quotes from the book, Resident Aliens

"Too often, we depict salvation as that which provides us with a meaningful existence when we achieve a new self-understanding. here, with our emphasis on the narrative nature of Christian life, we are saying that salvation is baptism into a community that has so truthful a story that we forget ourselves and our anxieties long enough to become part of that story, a story God has told in Scripture and continues to tell in Israel and the church."

"It is our baptismal responsibility to tell this story to our young, to live it before them, to take time to be parents in a world that (though intent on blowing itself to bits) is God's creation (a fact we would not know without this story. We have children as a witness that the future is not left up to us and that life, even in a threatening world, is worth living -- and not because 'Children are the hope of the future,' but because God is the hope of the future." (emphasis theirs)

"The church must be created new, in each generation, not through procreation but through baptism."

"People of God do not let the world determine how they respond to tomorrow."

"To launch out on a journey is to move toward some goal. Of course, in the journey of faith, we have no clear idea of what our end will be except that it shall be, in some form, true and complete friendship with God. For now, our daily experiences of testing and confirmation of that friendship sustain us. Perhaps this explains why Jesus' ethic was so thoroughly eschatological -- an ethic bound up with this proclamation of the end of history. Ethics is a function of the telos, the end. It makes all the difference in the world how one regards the end of the world, "end" not so much in the sense of its final breath, but "end" in the sense of the purpose, the goal, the result."

"Travelers, in the midst of the vicissitudes of the journey, learn to trust one another when the going is rough."

[The apostle] "Peter stands out as a true individual, or better, a true character, not because he had become 'free' or 'his own person,' but because he had become attached to the Messiah and messianic community, which enabled him to lay hold of his life, to make so much more of his life than if he had been left to his own devices."

-- Resident Aliens (Hauerwas and Willimon), chapter three.

Bouncing off of some stuff that David Fitch said about mega churches

David Fitch posted recently about issues he sees among the Gospel Coalition (TGC). I'm not even going to begin to try to address who that is or what they're about. So just roll with that bit, OK? Fitch made 5 points that he feels the TGC is comfortable with that he thinks they shouldn't be. One of those is mega-churches. I've never been a mega-church fan, and I wanted to put my own 2 cents in regarding the issues he brought up on mega-churches. So the bits in quotie-boxes is what Fitch has said. The rambling monologue in between is from me.

5.) The Mega Church Still Makes Sense. [ <-- he's saying that's what the TGC believes.] Because of the above mentioned Reformed tendencies (exacerbated by American pragmatic evangelicalism) to individualize the gospel, to individualize the reading of Scripture, to individualize salvation, to separate doctrine from “way of life,” the Neo-Reformed do not see the problem of mega church for the future of church engagement with post-Christendom.

Whew! That right there is fodder for a gorgeous diatribe against the American individualism that reigns supreme in many congregations. *breaks out in a round of singing, "It's all about meeeeeeeeeeeeee... Jesus."* Megachurches certainly aren't the only ones that jump feet first into following "the doctrine of ME" but they're at the top of the list, in my book. With a staff the size of a small church, the congregants in many mega-churches believe that "church" is all about paying people to do what the whole church really should be doing. The role of the congregant is primarily to be "fed." (Sounds like something only a bunch of dumb sheep would believe. bahhhh, bahhhh)

Mega churches have worked well within Christendom’s modernity.

Worked well? What does that mean? They work well within modern day American individualist culture, sure. But do they work well within Christendom? I'd say that's debatable with a capital "D". ... unless "Christendom" means "a bunch of sheep drinking cool-aid." (OK, OK. I'm being a little too hard on MC's. All my snark comes out when I talk about this topic. Feel free to take what I say with a grain of salt. ... or with a Lik-a Stick of Fun Dip.)

Here the individual reigned supreme and the remainder of Christian culture lingered long enough to provide a foundation for masses of individuals to become Christians within large servicing organizations.

I'm not even really sure what he's saying here. But that's OK. I'm not trying to argue with Fitch. I'm just bouncing off what he says. (The more Fun Dip I eat, the more I bounce.) So I'm just going to run with that last bit - "large servicing organizations". That describes MCs well. They do provide services. And they can be really helpful services. MC's are able to provide programs and assistance in a way that little bitty churches just can't. There are serious advantages to being large, just ask the folks at Walmart.

But is "a large servicing organization" the same thing as "church"? I'm talking about church as the Bible describes it, not as we think of it traditionally or conventionally. Can you operate as a body, the body of Christ, when you're mammoth? I don't think so. At least, I've never seen it happen. I've seen it in small pockets within the larger organization, but never in the organization as a whole.  MCs, in my experience, are pastor-centric shows in which the congregation is called to participate, mostly by giving money and attending programs.

Then again, MCs are doing important stuff. Like I said, they've got the money and the resources. They can do stuff. What I don't get is why little churches don't pool their resources to achieve similar purposes? I'm not saying that the little churches should combine to create their own MC. I'm saying they can remain as they are, smaller groups of individuals who can really get to know each other and serve each other, but linked in with other such bodies in a way that they can provide some of that bigger stuff too - training and assistance - both to their own congregations and to others in the community at large.

Now however, with the lingering remainder of Christian culture gone, the gospel must take root in a social communal embodiment.

Like that wasn't needed before? OK, so here I am taking issue with Fitch even though I said that wasn't the plan. The gospel is embodied in Christ, and what is the church but Christ embodied on earth? The gospel must take root in a social communal embodiment not just now, in a post-Christian world, but always. That's how it works. That's how it's always worked.

Here is where the gospel can be seen, heard, understood, experienced by those completely foreign to our faith in Christ.

Yes, yes, yes. Exactly.

And it's not just where those completely foreign to our faith experience the gospel. It's where we experience the gospel as well. We are all foreigners to the gospel at heart. We are all continually being reintroduced to it, even when we think we've finally grokked it as deep as we can ever grok anything. No deep, theological, cognitive understanding can stick it to our understanding in the way that living it can.

This kind of communal embodiment is nigh impossible in mega sized organizations (although I think I’ve seen it at least once). Still, I see the Neo-Reformed enamored that good solid preaching and culturally relative apologetics will gather post-non-Christendom into its churches. I fear TGC then becomes a force for coalescing mega size preaching churches that preach to the already initiated. We in essence become a church that preaches to ourselves and in the process retrench from being expedited for Mission into post Christendom. (P.S. I still strongly believe in preaching!! As my writings and “the college of preachers” at our church will attest to).

This gets back to what I was saying about MCs having something of value. They do. That's why people flock to them. They might not be the best place for living in the midst of the working out of the gospel, but they're a great place to hear good speakers, learn through well written programs, and/or be involved in social justice issues as part of a movement rather than as an individual. MCs are a powerhouse of knowledge dispersal and social services. They do have strengths. They just operate more like an institutional organization than an organic organization. They run more like a business than a body. They're a good thing, but calling them a "church"... aye, there's the rub.

Presbyterianism, Brainchild of the Vikings?

I'm just throwing this out there to chew on, but it strikes me that there are some notable similarities between the form of government used by the Vikings and that used by the Scotland sprung, Calvin influenced, Presbyterians.

Hurstwic, a site dedicated to educating "the general public on the history and culture of the Viking Age" describes the Icelandic government (The Norse form of government that we know the most about because there are more written descriptions from Iceland than other lands of the North men.) as follows:

Throughout the Norse world, open-air governmental assemblies called þing (things) met regularly, usually once a year in most of the Norse lands. Local þing, regional þing, and (in the case of Iceland) a national þing existed, called the Alþing. These meetings were open to virtually all free men. At these sessions, complaints were heard, decisions were rendered, and laws were passed.

Some sources describe the government in even more detail, explaining that:

The ting was the assembly of the free people of a country, province or a hundred (hundare/härad/herred). There were consequently hierarchies of tings, so that the local tings were represented at the higher-level ting, for a province or land. At the ting, disputes were solved and political decisions were made. -- Glen Erikson

Essentially the Vikings used a form of government that included local governing bodies which were in turn mediated by regional governing bodies and at the largest extent by a national governing body, or parliament, called the Althing.

The Presbyterian form of government was instituted by John Knox of Scotland (a country overrun by Vikings during the Middle Ages) and heavily influenced by John Calvin of Geneva (who was born in Noyon, which is located in northwest France close to Normandy where the Vikings (also called Normans or Northmen) settled). Within the Presbyterian church, local churches are governed by elected elders who meet regularly as a session (sometimes called the Consistory). Representatives of the session gather throughout the year in a larger, regional group called the Presbytery (sometimes called the Synod). Members of each Presbytery gather once a year in a national assembly called General Assembly.

	Vikings	Presbyterians
local	local Thing (attended by any free man who wished to attend)	Session/Consistory (attended by elders who were elected (or hired if you're talking about the teaching elder) by the congregation)
regional	regional Thing (attended by members of the local Things)	Presbytery/Synod (attended by members of the sessions/consistories)
national	Althing (attended by members of the regional Things)	General Assembly (attended by members of the Presbyteries/Synods)

I have heard it said that the American form of government is directly descended from that of the Presbyterians (such as in this article entitled, A Presbyterian Nation, Thank You). However, I agree with Steve Salyards who believes the two systems developed around the same time and within the same climate and were similar for that reason, not because one was built upon the other. But these parliamentary ideas, which rumbled throughout Europe and overthrew, or radically changed the nature of, many a monarchy, were a chief tenant of the Norse system of government, one that they brought with them as they invaded those very parts of Europe that later felt the rumblings of self-government rise up from within them.

I have often been told that the Presbyterian form of government springs directly from the Bible. Providence OPC (of Chilhowie, Virginia. How's that for a cool name for a town?) sums up this belief rather neatly when it states on its website, "The word 'presbyterian' comes from the New Testament Greek word for 'elder." First and foremost, then presbyterianism is a form of church government based upon the Bible's teaching that since the close of the Apostolic age, Christ has ordained that His church be led and ruled by duly ordained officers known as Elders." This argument, drawing a link between Presbyterian rule and Scripture is about as sound as the argument that an Episcopalian might make that the word "episcopos" comes from the New Testament Greek word for "bishop" and therefore episcopalianism is the  form of church government based upon the Bible's teaching.

Please don't read into what I'm saying. I think the Presbyterian form of government is fine as far as institutional church governments go. It's certainly not one that focuses on nurturing and exhorting fellow churches/presbyteries. From what I've heard, meetings of the Presbyteries and General Assembly tend to focus on legal issues (generally regarding the Book of Church Order, which comprises the rules or laws of the institution). But then again, the purpose of the Norse Things tended to be legal in nature as well (although they had a Lawspeaker who had memorized the law and recited it rather than a written book to refer to).

I suppose this whole train of thought leads to other questions. Does church government mean the same thing as church leadership? Or does church government only involve the legal, while church leadership is more pastoral (which would include nurturing and exhorting as opposed to only being concerned with the legality of the church). Should the government of church look different than the government of a nation  (in form? in function?)? If so, how so? And perhaps the most important question of all, if the Presbyterian form of government did indeed spring from that of the Norse, should our congregation chip in to outfit our pastor with broadsword and wooden shield before he attends Presbytery next season?

Living in Two Kingdoms - Meg's Homework Ramble

Our Sunday school class just finished a John Piper video series in which Piper explained that Jesus is a lamb-like lion and a lion-like lamb. He expounded on that, of course, but I think the phrase pretty aptly summarizes what he had to say.

We're now beginning a new series entitled "Living in Two Kingdoms." I'm not sure if this is another tape series of someone speaking or if this is something Don has put together himself. But he sent out some homework questions for us to answer before we show up tomorrow. I thought I'd "think out loud" here with my answers.

1. What is the Kingdom of God?
The obvious first part of that answer is that the kingdom is the domain of God. And God wouldn't be god unless everything was in his domain -- from atoms to the universe, if it weren't all God's to rule then he really would be more of a demi-god or a sub-god than an almighty god.

But I think there's more to this answer than just the easy bit. The Kingdom of God encompasses all of this substantial world, but it also refers to a realm that overlaps with ours but that is distinct from the earthly/human world.

The book group that I'm in recently finished a book called The City & The City (by China Miéville) in which two distinct nations overlapped each other geographically, but were entirely distinct otherwise to the point that people in one nation learned to "unsee" people in the other nation. In order to "see" the people in the other nation you actually had to go through customs  to socially and politically enter the other nation, at which point you'd have to "unsee" the people that you had seen all the time back in your old nation. In other words, you could live right next to people in another nation and never interact with them, or even acknowledge them, because they technically lived somewhere different from where you did. It was a trippy book, but an interesting concept.

I think the Kingdom of God is similar to Miéville's story in that we live in an overlapped situation. But it differs in terms of interaction. We daily walk in both nations, as opposed to only in one or the other. But I think many people who call themselves Christians live only in one nation and believe that the other nation, the heavenly nation, is a subset or part of that one nation. They spout "God and country" in a way that clearly subjects God to the designs of the country. I think they miss "the Kingdom of God" in its entirety - or else severely misunderstand it.

I still don't think I've answered the question, though. The Kingdom of God is a political entity that defies all other polities. It is an eternal kingdom ruled by God, with characteristics unlike any other nation, and yeah, I'll cop to it, it's a utopia. It is the glorified, unified,

2. What are the characteristics of God's kingdom?
The Kingdom of God is characterized by love. In fact, love is the characteristic that governs every other characteristic in this kingdom: forgiveness, unity, kindness, faithfulness, caring, gentleness, mutual submission (looking out for each other's best interests), compassion, meekness, humility, self-control, selflessness, trust, patience, contentment, peace, equality of worth, hopefulness, truthfulness, generosity, perseverance, righteousness, readiness, holiness, prayerfulness,....

3. What features of U.S. culture are explicitly biblical-Christian?
I think this is the hardest question of the bunch. Maybe that's because I'm reading into it. I expect this question to be, "What features of U.S. culture are explicitly inline with features of the Kingdom of God. But I suppose that's not necessarily what it's asking.

I suppose the first part of this question is "What are the features of U.S. culture?" Individuality, selfishness, strength, craving entertainment, ingenuity, entrepreneurial spirit, risk-taking, creativity, consumerism, untested trust, arguing, hatred (that Westboro Baptist Church comes to mind), insensitivity, callousness, overload, brilliance, diversity, acceptance, .... This is a really hard list to come up with. There is obviously kindness in America, but is kindness a feature of U.S. culture? It doesn't strike me as being integral to our culture. Then again, if I were looking just at our neighborhood, or more likely, in a rural American neighborhood, then perhaps kindness would strike me more as being a feature of the culture. Maybe the first part of the question isn't "What are the features of U.S. culture?" but "What is the U.S.?"

OK, so to take a stab at answering the original question here, I'd say that diversity and creativity are explicitly biblical-Christian. There's probably other things. But I'm still caught up in "What is the U.S.?" and "What are the features of her culture?" to see them.

I'll be really eager to hear Sonia's thoughts on this question. She probably sees American culture with different eyes than we do.

4. How do we live in God's kingdom and earth's world?
Fully.

What? Is that cheating? I can't just answer with one word? *sigh* I'd say it's very easy to live in the earthly world. And those who like to point out the most loudly that they aren't living according to the culture or values of this world are often the very ones who hold more tightly to nationalism and cultural values of anger, hatred, and individualism more tightly than most. I think it's important that we're aware of how we're embedded in this world. What values have we taken on that are distinctly worldly? (Not just American, since not all Christians are Americans (*gasp* I know. For some I'm speaking heresy here.) but of any human culture.)

We are humans and therefore we cannot not live within human culture. It's impossible. Even when we try to steep ourselves in godly culture, we build within it so much human culture of our own making that we are no longer in godly culture. (The Pharisees and Westboro church are poster children here.) We do best to be aware of that in which we reside, to use well that which is good of our own culture and to disengage from that which is bad.

And we need to steep ourselves in the culture of heaven. Church should be our proving grounds where we test forgiveness and unity and kindness and.... It should be a safe place where we learn to put on heavenly culture and where we can safely mess up and try again. It should be a place where we experience godly culture, where we are helped to grow in it, where we have partners who grow with us. And it should be a launching point for carrying God's culture with us out to the world, loving the world and all her people, enabling those not of God's kingdom to experience the culture of God's kingdom and inviting them to join in it with us.

Group personality and activity

Every group has its own personality. Philip Douglass wrote specifically about the personality of church groups in his book, "What Is Your Church's Personality: Discovering and Developing the Ministry Style of Your Church." Douglass is the first person that I know of who has assigned personality typing (He uses the MBTi.) to groups. And though it's generally not quite as clear cut as determining the personality of an individual, I think it is possible to generalize about a group of people and I think it's helpful to understand a group in this light. Just as when typing a person, there are advantages to knowing and understanding what strengths and weaknesses are natural and to be expected from a body of people.

Of course, the ideal (in my opinion) in any group is to have such a diversity of personalities represented that the group winds up right in the middle of all 4 of the Myers Briggs indicators. This would give the group access to all of the strengths that are described by personality typing. But I have yet to find such a group. What generally happens is that a leader, or a group of leaders, form the group initially. Their personalities dominate the group in the beginning phase. As the group grows, it is quite common for people with similar personalities to be drawn to the organization. The personality of the group, therefore, stays about the same.

Once in awhile, however, someone with a very different personality will join the group (either because they were hired to fulfill a position within the group - new pastor, new secretary, new principal, new admin assistant, or because they've stumbled upon the group - invited by a friend, joined along with a spouse whose personality does fit the group, etc.) and that causes tension. The group can go a few different ways at this point. When the new personality is in a position of leadership, there are often explosions within the group with the result that a chunk of people end up leaving. If the new personality is not a leader, they may eventually drift away, or they may hang on within the group but never feel like they quite fit in. It's a rare group that is faced with strongly different personalities and yet still manages to find a way to work together despite that. (One would think that in the church, this would be a common event. It is, after all, a core tenant of the gospel that Jesus brings unity where once there was enmity. Unfortunately, churches are full of humans and another core tenant of the gospel is that humans are bunch of selfish dorks.)

Lately, an aspect of group personality has been tick tocking around in my brain - activity. There's probably a better word for it, but that's what I've come up with so far. Maybe "method of activity" or "format of activity" or "mode of operation" would work better. Feel free to throw thoughts out there on what exactly I'm talking about. But the main idea is that groups do things. The PTO raises money for the school, encourages communication between staff and parents, etc. The garden club plants things, teaches gardening, and harvests. Churches worship, disciple, evangelize and fellowship. Every group, no matter how similar, probably approaches even similar tasks in different ways, reflecting the specific personality of that group.

Like I said, I'm just at the beginning of thinking about this, so I'm sure my diagram could use a lot more arrows and activity types, but this is what I've been fiddling around with so far.


I'm sure there are inactive groups, but those are essentially dead, so I didn't even go down that road. Among active groups, I figure there are some that plan out exactly what they're going to do before they do it. Any fundraising group needs to do that or they're not going to make enough money to blow a bubble at. But there are other groups that just kinda take what gets thrown at them and they deal with issues as they come. They're more reactive than proactive. (Actually, the fundraising example is very specific. What I'm really trying to focus on is the bigger picture - group goals, vision, purpose, etc. So when I give specific examples, I don't mean to. They just show how I'm still just thinking all this through.) The reactive group may have a general sense of its purpose, but it approaches activity within that purpose more from an intuitive perspective than a scripted or planned point of view.

I suppose most groups are a mixture of these methods, but I think every group falls into one of these categories more often than the other by design. Even the most well scripted PTO can suddenly be faced with something unexpected that they have to deal with. But their intention is to be a completely prescribed group. While a girl scout group leader might only plan from meeting to meeting without having any overarching organization or goal for the year.

There is value from being organized and there is value in being flexible (S vs. N) and any group that is too much of one or the other risks being so straight-jacketed that they can't bend to accommodate new situations or so loosey-goosey that things only get done haphazardly. (The "traditional church" vs. the "emerging church" come to mind, although I think even emerging churches are often more scripted than they'd like to admit. The least scripted church I've ever known was a house church in San Francisco. Though they had traditions and overarching goals for periods of time, they were ultimately flexible and ... slowly dynamic, for lack of a better term.)

Given that we're talking about groups, and groups generally have leaders, I think the top-down effects of being too far one way or the other are that either the group is shoehorned into following the style, format and goals of the leader, or they're left without any leadership at all and everyone just does what is right in their own eyes. I think ideally the leadership would provide a blend of direction/goals and leeway for people to innovate and achieve the goals in a way that works for them. I suppose what I'm saying is that leadership should help to provide a framework that will help the group achieve their goals in way that's in keeping with the personality of the group.

Random vs. Organic vs. Programmatic

A group with an unintentional framework and a random means of accomplishing tasks, still accomplishes some tasks. But it can be so hit or miss that the group is unreliable and though maybe not ineffective, at least untrustworthy.

A group that is programmatic can achieve quite a bit, especially on paper. Schools are programmatic. They have programs of coursework that need to be completed in order to progress either to another level or to graduation. Large churches tend to be programmatic. People that I know who attend large churches can often list several of the programs that the church provides. Hierarchy is important in a setting like this. A clear cut pyramid of authority helps the programmatical structure to run smoothly.

A group that is organic often doesn't look nearly as accomplished as a group that is programmatic. In order to get a sense of the achievements or growth within an organic group you often have to stick around awhile and see it in action to "get" what's happening. End results are often not as clear cut in an organic group as compared to a programmatic group where programs have very clear beginning and end points and ending is often seen as a success irregardless of what the individuals within the program got out of it. People that I know who attend more organic churches can often list several, if not all, of the group members by name. The group often operates more like a bunch of cells in a body. Everyone knows what their own roll is and when they get the word, they move into position and set to work. Leadership in this case is often a matter of communicating a need from one part of the body to another so that those who can fix the problem are alerted to move into action. A lot of the training for action happens in one-on-one relationships or in small groups. 

As a T, I think I gravitate toward programmatic formats as they're often a compact and intensified means of learning or doing something. Attending the University of Michigan suited me to a T because the size of the institution meant they could afford a plethora of programs that I could partake in. But what I've learned in the last couple of decades is that organic formats often take an idea or an action to a much deeper level. For example, a programmed week of intensive building at an orphanage in Mexico can mean a new and important building that will affect many lives. But an organic relationship with an orphan from Mexico can intimately change both their life and mine for the rest of our lives. Both are good things. They're just different in form and function.

Programmatic formats are much easier to advertise, much easier to quantify, and much easier to scale. Organic formats are often in such small groups that they aren't advertised at all, they're hard to quantify, especially if you're not in the group and don't have a handle on what exactly the group has been doing or learning or talking about, and they're much harder to scale... and once they're scaled large they often turn into programs.

I should add that just because something is programmatic doesn't mean that it's guaranteed to be compact or intensified. There are long programs and there are programs that I've been involved in that were nothing but a waste of time. Nothing got done, nothing got learned, nothing happened but lots of hot air got blown around and participants were largely idle or just going through the motions. And just because something is organic doesn't mean that it's going to be deeper or better integrated. Sometimes organic situations feel like you're just spinning your wheels or biding time.

But I do think that sometimes certainly personalities fit better with better styles. As I said before, the T in me loves programs for fast and intense learning. But the I in me has learned to appreciate the connectivity and personal interaction of organic systems. I don't know where F's fall, and I suspect that F's and P's could both add categories to my little chart above that haven't even crossed my mind.

I think it's important to remember that these styles aren't necessarily better or worse, they're just different. They have their own strengths and weaknesses. But I do think it's important to be aware of the different styles and to see that they do both have value.

Church Growth

Our church is pretty small. It's grown and shrunk numerically several times since it started in the early 80s, but at the moment we're at 27 official members and we average between 35-45 people (including kids) in attendance at a Sunday morning service. The topic of numerical church growth has come up now and again within the congregation and just recently the pastor sent out a pdf-ed copy of a publication on church growth (which I've attached at the end of this post in case you'd like to read it). I do think that our church would be healthier if it grow numerically by another 10 or 20 people (at the least). But the publication, though it had some good things to say, still struck me as a bit fishy. So this is my response to it.

Location, Location, Location
I think this section and the accompanying graph say a lot more about the American population and real estate trends than anything else. I suppose the take away here is, "if you want to grow numerically, locate your congregation where people are moving to." That said, it's this exact mindset that has traditionally left the poor and impoverished (those who can't move as easily as the rest of the population) with anemic churches. Central Alliance, the church that I was a member of back in Detroit, is a perfect example of this. The congregation carried on and had important ministries within the city, but it was a shell of what it had been. And once the white folks left town, they didn't really look back and help support the church they'd abandoned. Out of sight, out of mind. As Keith Green said, "Jesus commands us to go." But at the same time, Jesus said we'll be his witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria to the ends of the earth. (Acts 1:8) So it seems to me that we start where we are before we move out. If all the Christians were to leave Jerusalem, where does that leave Jerusalem? (CFHL) So location is important, but I don't think following the masses is always the answer.

The "fact" that "Congregations grow in locations where they find like-minded people" tells me that the gospel does more in regards to numerical growth when it's ignored. What about Galatians 3:26-28?

So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

If the gospel breaks down superficial barriers of race and class, why would we seek to rebuild them by searching out and collecting people that think and act just like us? Is the gospel so weak that we need to ignore it in order to spread it?

A Combination of Factors
The article then explains that there are several factors that lead to numerical church growth: denominational loyalty, congregational vitality, confidence in the future, and serving as a moral beacon to the community. It then does a great job of not explaining those areas very well.

Denominational Loyalty: The article doesn't mention this again. I also don't see how denominational loyalty fits anywhere into the gospel, so I'll likewise jump right past it.

Congregational Vitality: The article doesn't explain what it means by this term. However, it does say that congregations that report having high vitality also promote themselves through radio advertising, evangelistic campaigns, personal witness, revivals and big events. In other words, with the exception of personal witness, the "vitality" of a congregation depends upon how well the church markets itself - how big and grand the congregation is portrayed through advertising and events. In other words, vitality has very little to do with the spiritual maturity or growth of the congregation or individuals within her and has quite a bit to do with how the congregation is perceived by people at large, whether or not the perception in any way matches the reality of who the congregation is.

Confidence in the Future: Apparently having confidence in the future means having "a clear sense of mission and a crisp organizational style." In other words, a congregation that has confidence that the path they have set before themselves is right is the congregation that will grow. They don't have to have confidence that God holds their future as long as they have a clear sense of what they hold for their own future.

Moral Beacon to the Community: Why be a spiritual beacon to the community when you can direct their morals instead? Why call people to God when you can call them to good works? I'm all for outreach ministries and committing to social justice issues. But God didn't call us to be a church in order to affect the morals of those around us. He called us to be a church to, as a group of believers, incarnate him. (Romans 12) Sure, that will lead us to commit to social justice issues and to reach out to others, but the forming of the body (Romans 12:5) comes before the actions of the body. We should be calling people to join us in the body, to join us in following Jesus. If we're growing because we have a social agenda, then what are we calling people to after all?

Uplifting Joyful Worship and Spiritual Nurture: Worship and nurture weren't listed in the combination of factors, but they were mentioned in a small paragraph in the midst of the articles elaboration on the other points. Again, it doesn't define these phrases and, in fact, it doesn't mention spiritual nurture again in the paragraph, focusing instead upon how churches with contemporary forms of worship grow more than churches with traditional worship. (What counts as contemporary or traditional is anybody's guess, but we'll assume they're referring to praise songs over hymns and the "sing then preach" format of service over a more traditional or liturgical style.)

Everything Else
The article then briefly mentions several other factors that lead to larger congregations: more worship services, a plan for growth, a website related to growth, a young congregation, and a newer congregation are all positive inputs towards having a numerically growing church. In other words, to grow you should increase your number of services, write a plan, make a website, kick out your old people, and if you're already an older congregation, you should just give up now.

The Gospel and the Church
In Matthew 28, Jesus told his disciples to go and make disciples of all nations. That certainly implies growth. It also implies disciples. I find it striking that this article doesn't really talk much about discipleship. In fact, the closest it seems to come to that comes on page 5 where it says,

Another critical interplay to consider is that between numerical growth in membership and participation, and growth in other critical dimensions of congregational vitality such as spirituality, commitment, discipleship, service, and financial giving. All are important!

All are important, but the article isn't going to waste more than one sentence on those topics. And I think that's telling.

What is more important, that 1000 people come to Sunday services and feel more positive about themselves and the world around them when they leave? Or that one person comes and learns how to be a disciple of the Christ? Sure, 1000 disciples would be better than 1. I get that. But 1000 non-disciples? If growing means abandoning the gospel, or circumventing it with Evangel-babble, then I'm not down with that.

Cornerstone, a mature little church
Like I said at the beginning, our church is pretty small. It fails on most of these areas that the article says we should be strong in. We've been around since the 80s, which makes us an old congregation. We sing hymns and follow an order of service, so we miss out on the contemporary boat. We don't have any radio advertising, no evangelistic campaigns, no revivals, and the last big event the church had led to a church split. In other words, when it comes to following the facts laid out in this article, we suck. It's no wonder we're so small.

But if we look at that one little sentence in the article, the one that mentioned stuff that was so important that it got an exclamation point, then I think we're doing alright. In terms of spirituality, commitment, discipleship, service, and financial giving I think we have a mature and well grown congregation. We've been put through the furnace on a number of occasions and a whole lotta dross has been burned off. Just in the decade that our family has been members in this church, I've seen people grow in ways that I haven't seen in most other congregations I've been a part of. Sure, there's still more dross to be burned off. We still have a long way to grow. But I am confident that what Cornerstone is growing is disciples, not attenders.

Some Good Things to Say
When I first mentioned the article I did admit that it had some good things to say. There are some areas that we need to grow and I think that having a sense of ourselves and our purpose is one of those. When we were looking for a new pastor a few years back, the search committee spent quite a bit of time talking about who we were as a congregation. I thought it was really helpful to be part of those conversations and to get a sense not just of what I thought of us, but what others of us thought of us as well. There was a lot of agreement on our strengths and weaknesses -- our congregation definitely has its own personality. But we've never had those talks as a congregation.

There's something about getting together with other people and talking things out that helps build ownership. When I was in InterVarsity in college we spent a week at the end of each school year talking about where we'd come and where we were heading. It gave the leaders a better sense of where they should be leading and it gave the rest of us a better sense of what to expect and how we would fit in over the coming year. It built community, it gave us direction and it built cohesion of purpose and activity. In the ten years we've been at Cornerstone we have yet to have a church retreat (where discussions like this often take place). We've had many congregational meetings, but they're often a matter of covering specific issues rather than brainstorming about who we are and where we're headed. I think Cornerstone would benefit from something like this. It might not make us grow numerically. But it would help us to acknowledge where we're mature and where we're still lacking. And it would give Cornerstone another chance to do what we already do pretty well -- BE the church rather than just go to church.

Attachment: FACT_Cong_Growth.pdf

Christian Culture and Raising Kids

Richard, Michael, Jerid and I have been having an interesting discussion on the intersection of public schools and Christianity in America. (That discussion should be viewable by all, but when I tried to get to it while signed out, FB asked me to sign in. So I'd be curious to know of non-FB-contacts of mine can see/comment on that thread.) I just started rereading Resident Aliens (by Hauerwas and Willimon). I hit two passages in the short section I've read so far that seemed to hit on this topic, so I thought I'd share them here.

The second paragraph touches on raising children, but the first paragraph explains the context of the term "colony":

The image that evokes this adventure for us is, again, found in Philippians 3:20 -- "our commonwealth is in heaven." Moffatt more vividly translates this politeuma as "We are a colony of heaven." The Jews in Dispersion were well acquainted with what it meant to live as strangers in a strange land, aliens trying to stake out a living on someone else's turf. Jewish Christians had already learned, in their day-to-day life in the synagogue, how important it was for resident aliens to gather to name the name, to tell the story, to sing Zion's songs in a land that didn't know Zion's God.

A colony is a beachhead, an outpost, an island of one culture in the middle of another, a place where the values of home are reiterated and passed on to the young, a place where the distinctive language and life-style of the resident aliens are lovingly nurtured and reinforced.

The context of this second quote was the change in American culture between the days when everything was shut down on Sundays and "The church was the only show in town," to our present situation where there are many alternatives on a Sunday morning and people no longer feel obligated to attend a religious service of any sort on a Sunday. This change, by the way, is a repeating theme in our Sunday school classes and gals Bible study in our congregation and therefore one that is frequently at the forefront of my mind.

The demise of the Constantinian world view, the gradual decline of the notion that the church needs some sort of surrounding "Christian" culture to prop it up and mold its young, is not a death to lament. It is an opportunity to celebrate. The decline of the old, Constantianian synthesis between the church and the world means that we American Christians are at last free to be faithful in a way that makes being a Christian today an exciting adventure.

There has definitely been a change in American culture over the past decades. It's a change that we are probably still right in the middle of. But to the extent that it has freed people to follow through on their beliefs, whether Christian, atheist, humanist, or some other system of belief, I think that's a good thing. I'm all for integrity and I see no integrity in a culture that encourages people to go through the motions of going to church and calling oneself a Christian if that doesn't match either your beliefs or the way you live your life outside of the obligatory Sunday morning service. I also think it's an important change in how kids grow up today. Rather than being raised in the heart of a culture that often said one thing and did another, the children of Christians are hopefully being confronted with the Scriptures in a way that makes it clear what encompasses Christianity and what has been tacked on by people and worldly culture.

In a sense, what we are living in the midst of is the fruition of the Reformation. In America, we have finally come to a point where we can separate "church" from "country" or "culture" and see it for what God has said it should be and not what we have said it should be. Of course you can't separate church from culture. But you can recognize a culture that is of the church and a culture that is not of the church and see that those are two distinct things, just as the culture of the colony will be different than the culture of the host country where the colony is located.

So what does that look like as we raise our children? Jerid's original post that got me traipsing down the education discussion road was this:

‎"Over the next ten years, nearly half of all new jobs will require education that goes beyond a high school degree." -President Obama

This is little because the knowledge required has increased. It is mostly because schools, especially public schools, are spending more time teaching social agendas and less time demanding excellence in knowledge and ability.

I do think that schools teach social agendas, for good and for ill. I like the overall social agenda at our kids' school - one that encourages Independence, open-mindedness, integrity, caring, and community involvement. (Granted, how that plays out isn't always what I'd wish for. There's a curriculum, and then there's staff, and sometimes the attitudes of the latter overrides some of the positive aspects of the former.) Our kids perform well on standardized tests, so their knowledge seems to be proficient despite the social agenda. And I think that more often than not, the social attitudes and teaching of the staff mirrors our own beliefs, even though the teachers' spiritual beliefs might not align with our own. The difference doesn't lie in the what, but the why, and our children learn that through their interaction with our Christian colony.

(Completely tangential: Though we raise our kids in our colony, whether they choose to remain in our colony is a decision that we leave up to them. But that's a topic for another day.)

There's of course an implied "agree/disagree" question in this post, but I'd also be curious to hear of examples of social agendas in the school that hinder the ability of a colony (of any sort - Christian, Muslim, environmental, gay, Mexican, etc.) to raise their children according to their own colony's values. I don't think that being challenged on your beliefs is a hindrance. Harassment is. 

"What if Church Felt More Like Home?"

[I wrote this a couple of weeks ago, so references to recent events aren't so recent any more.]

This past Sunday, as I sat at the back of the sanctuary getting ready to press the "record" button when Don started his sermon, I noted to myself that I knew everyone in the room by name. This wasn't any huge revelation, of course. It was just one of those thoughts that pops into your head and you know you've known it, but your brain has just articulated it for you again. And of course, there was the corresponding thought that, there are some congregations where not even the pastor knows everyone by name.

My mom sent me a link a few days ago to a social network that is being used by a church we used to attend when I was growing up. It's the largest church, west of the Mississippi, in the denomination that we're a part of. So I'm talking about a church where probably even the pastor doesn't know everyone in the congregation by name. (When I was a member there, the youth group alone was about 100 kids. We were sort of a sub-congregation within the larger congregation.)

The social network is called The Table Project and is introduced by a pretty nifty video. I agree that church should be intimate. It should feel like family. That is, after all, how the Bible itself refers to the church. (Galatians 6:10 "Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.") But what I find ironic is that it's the churches that are so large that they really don't feel like a family that this Table Project is reaching out to. They're saying, we have the answer that will bring your congregation together. It's like taking a rather large problem and saying, "We have bandages that will cover that."

Instead, it seems like there needs to be a solution that deals with the heart of the problem, rather than just bandaging it up. I love being online and meeting with people socially via the internet. So I have no problem with social networking, even within a church. And I think that what they say is true about feeling more connected to people when you've connected with them throughout the week online. So I'm not trying to bash their product. It sounds cool. Given that the congregation uses it, it could even be helpful. But it still feels like it's glancing off a larger problem - and perhaps church size isn't the issue so much as church attitude.

There were a couple of churches in San Francisco that we were involved with in one way or another that took "church" seriously. I don't mean they had particularly fancy services or were staunchly legalistic or anything like that. What I mean is that they talked about what "church" means. They had training events and discussion times and read books together on the nature and purpose of the church. They didn't just assume that everyone was on the same page. And their conclusions were often along the lines that church is a family, a building with each of us fitted together with Jesus as the cornerstone, a colony of people whose first and foremost allegiance was to a heavenly kingdom, not an earthly one. With a view like that, walking into a gathering of believers isn't a time to expect great music (though there may be some) or hear a great message (though that may also happen) or even to end up feeling better inside once it's all said and done. The expectation was that you were meeting with family for a shared purpose, to worship and serve God.

One of the lines in the Table Project video is: "Imagine the church feeling intimate. All those faces in the hallway becoming recognizable." Yeah, imagine that. Only, it can really happen in real life, not just online. But that needs to be the expectation. When the attitude is that attending church is equivalent to punching a spiritual time card, then all the social networks in the world aren't going to make a difference.

The Table Project - Introduction from The Table Project on Vimeo.

What the World Needs is Reconciliation

More from John Alexander:

"...What the world needs more than anything else is reconciliation. At the heart of all our problems is broken relationships; symptomatic of those broken relationships are racism, war, child abuse, ecological degradation, drug addition, oppression of the weak, divorce, abandonment of the elderly, indifference to the poor, and on, and on, and on. What the world needs is a sign that reconciled relationships are possible. It needs the church to be a beacon of light for the world, a counterculture, a contrast society.

"And that is what it is all about. The church is a sign that reconciliation is possible. Jesus prays 'that they may be one even as we are one.' That is not some abstract reconciliation but concrete reconciliation: blacks, whites, and browns, men and women, ignorant and educated working together in peace. It means people working closely together in the church without ruling patterns of hatred or coldness or grudges or cliques. It means a contrast society."

Free to Love

In the movie Happy Feet, there were stern leader penguins who fit the stereotype of  sanctimonious church leaders to a T. In fact, their Scottish accents and the fact that they were referred to as "elders" makes me wonder if the screenwriter hadn't grown up in a stiff Scottish Presbyterian church. The media, even the Christian media, has painted a very clear picture of the problems of arrogant, inflexible leadership. But one of the religious opposites to that uptight, old time religion is the radical, hip young leader. With a shaved head and a soul patch, these cutting edge preachers show that it's not all just about rules. Grace is important, too. In fact, it's so important, that if you don't do grace the way they do grace, then they're going to treat you pretty much just like a sanctimonious church leader would and shun you. I've seen it happen in various denominations, in various locations and among various ages. The theme is the same: I get it and you don't.

John Alexander writes,

"I've been in many places where people were committed to radical discipleship..., and my observation is that in those places we were not lovers of God or of each other. That's what failure is--failure to love God and each other. My conclusion is that confronting people with law, even Jesus' 'law,' doesn't free them to love. Instead, it sets up a dynamic of condemnation and tension and anger and superiority. An understanding of the law (or better, a misunderstanding of law) sets people up to try to straighten others out. to fix each other, whether anyone wants to be fixed or not. When that happens (which is often) live-in churches [which is the type of church Alexander was a part of] explode in fiery holocaust. All in the name of Jesus. ... Oddly enough, none of that frees people to love."

Jesus said that others would see that we are his disciples by our love for one another. He never said people would make the connection due to our understanding of the creeds, or our cool music during services, or by how authentic we are, or how polished, or how well we create a spiritual ambiance. All of those things can be helpful to people depending on their personality types, but they're not the crux of the matter. What shines out of us and lets the world know that we are followers of the Christ is our love for one another. At least, that's what Jesus said. You don't have to be cool to love people better. But you do have to be humble, and caring, and kind. And you do have to practice. And you do have to take time to love others well.

And as we become conduits of God's love, loving those that are different from us as well as those that we "click" with or agree with or feel comfortable around, that in turn frees others to love. That is the gospel in action.

... because for some people, this is what it's all about.

North Point's iBand

A Little Church of Miracles... on Wheels

This "Little Church of Miracles on Wheels" is for sale in Stanley, Idaho. It would make a really neat little chapel. The video highlights all the detailed wood work as well as several items brought in from churches around the world that were being dismantled. What a great place for "quiet times."

Homogeneity in the Church, A Bad Thing

The following is an extensive quote from James M. Harrison's article, Church Complex: on the Value of Being Uncomfortable with Others. (From Touchstone Magazine, July/August 2007)

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But what makes the gospel unique is the way in which Jesus is not like us. I don’t need someone who is just like me. I’m sinful. I need someone holy. I’m human. I need someone divine. I cannot stand under the wrath of God. I need someone who has stood there in my place. I cannot raise myself from death to life. I need someone who can raise me up because he himself has been raised.

The Incarnation is not a reason to associate only with those who are like us. It is actually a reason to associate with all those who share the life he came to bring us, because he made no such distinctions. The Paul who became all things to all people constantly spoke of the unity of the churches he founded and fought any kind of division.

A Bad Thing

From the very beginning, the gurus of the Church Growth Movement have contended that to grow a church we need to focus upon a specific demographic, and seek to make our churches reflect it.

The idea is that people will be more receptive to the gospel when it is presented to them in their own environment, within their own comfort zone. This has affected the way in which we “do church.” Church must be made to be a comfortable place, and since people are most comfortable around their own kind, their own kind should be encouraged to come (which means that other kinds will be effectively discouraged from coming).

The result has been a church-planting strategy focused upon specific groups: Baby-boomer churches, Baby-buster churches, Gen-X churches, GenNext churches, and on and on and on. And they are successful, defining success by church-growth standards.

Some would ask, “Isn’t that a good thing?” And I would answer, “No. It is not.”

I have no doubt that individuals have come to know Christ through these ministries. But that is not evidence of a correct, and by “correct” I mean a biblical, church-planting or church-growth strategy. It is evidence of the extreme graciousness of God in accomplishing his purposes even in the face of our errors. Moses was not only in error, but positively disobedient, when he struck the rock. In spite of this, God graciously provided water for his people.

Nonetheless, it must be said that this emphasis on similarity is not a good thing for the church. It runs counter to the biblical ideal of what the church is to be, and also counter to the biblical example of what the church is to accomplish before a watching world.

In the New Testament, whenever a problem of cultural or racial division arose within the church, the solution to the problem was not separation into compatible social or racial groups. The solution was to foster ever-increasing union around the gospel and its implications.

The church of Christ is to be a witness to the power of the gospel to change lives and minds and hearts, as Peter’s was changed when he saw the sheet descend from heaven. The church is to be a witness to the power of the gospel to break down walls of division between races and ages and cultures, between generations and social classes.

The church is to be an earthly representative, imperfect though it is, of the heavenly glory, in which men from every tongue and tribe and nation are gathered together, worshipping the One who sits on the throne, and the Lamb.

Denominations and Accountability

When we attended the Church of the Sojourners in San Francisco, the church that John Alexander pastored at the time, one of Rob's largest complaints was that they had no oversight or accountability from anyone besides themselves. They were a house church that wasn't, at the time, affiliated with any other house churches, nor any denomination. They did have ties to other house churches, most notably Church of the Servant King, but there was no formal accountability structure. 

This, and several other issues that Rob was dealing with, eventually led us to join City Church instead, which was just starting up in a little chapel in the Presidio. But the questions that Rob put to John Alexander seem to have gotten John thinking about the idea of accountability between churches. He even mentions, in his Stop Going to Church and Be the Church book that I've referenced several times in recent posts, the decision making process that he and the other church leaders went through as they considered the issue and tried to determine what might work best for their congregation. 

They eventually developed a consortium of churches in which members of one congregation would (on a yearly basis, I think it was) travel to one of the other house churches and live among the members for a week. They would meet with each of the leaders one-on-one as well as in a group and they spent time (also one-on-one and in larger groups) with the rest of the members of the congregation as well, asking questions about their own spiritual growth, the perceived strengths and weaknesses of the church congregation and so on. In the end, after having spent a fair amount of time immersed in the matters of the church (both spiritual and worldly) they would give an evaluation of how the church was doing, areas where they could improve, where their strengths lie, etc. And when they gave their report, it wasn't in a business fashion in which ultimatums were handed down or numbers had been crunched. Instead it was a thoughtfully prepared evaluation written by a group of people who had built relationships with those they were evaluating. I'm sure it's not a perfect system, but what I love about it is that the people get to know each other. They talk over a period of time and everyone gets a say. And the conclusions are hopefully drawn up in love for the betterment of the congregation. 

Compare that to the system that we found at City Church, a member of the Presbyterian Church of America (PCA). There the pastor attended Presbytery meetings 3 or 4 times a year where he'd meet only with other pastors or elders from the other PCA churches in the region. They often have specific issues to discuss and make rulings on. Then they'd travel back home having never met with other members of any other congregations and therefore only hearing the news from other churches through the lens of the other leaders (if they spent any time talking about their congregations at all). Though City Church was a member of a denomination with a body of leadership that was ostensibly in charge of holding each church accountable to the directives in the Bible, that leadership generally only dealt with issues once they'd grown so large that they had to be dealt with. There was no system whereby help was brought in before an issue grew too large. And when decisions were dealt out, they were from a stand point of leaders ruling over either other leaders or other church members. They were not done in a context of relationship and the problems were rarely, if ever, dealt with when they were still small and manageable. If it wasn't explosive, it wasn't worth dealing with yet. 

The difference between the Sojourners model and the City Church model speaks volumes to me. I've been in many Bible Studies or Sunday School classes in which we've discussed the verses in Scripture that speak about holding each other accountable and almost always someone jumps in and quotes from Ephesians that you have to "speak the truth in love" and that means you have to know the person and have some sort of relationship with them before you can expect to be allowed into their life enough to also help them deal with their issues and struggles. (We only give paid counselors the right to tell us what to do without them first becoming our friends.) 

But when you talk about accountability on a congregational level, that relational stuff often seems to fly right out the window. Within our denomination, the leaders of the other congregations can step in and make judgement calls without having had built any sort of relationship with the members of the congregation before hand. In fact, in our current presbytery, getting together across congregations outside of official presbytery meetings seems to almost be taboo. At least, every attempt I've seen made to get this to happen is akin to pulling teeth and still getting minimal or no results. 

In the end I'm left wondering what the positives are after all to being in a church that's a member of a larger denomination. Sure, they'll whip us in to shape if we get out of line. But they're more than likely do it with harshness and lack of love because they don't have a clue who we are and why we've come to the place we're in. So if there's value in having a stick over our heads, then sure, there's value to being in the denomination. But if we're looking for outsiders who will come in and get to know us, and let us in to get to know them, and who will assent to holding us accountable to our goals and we to them, then we're certainly not going to find it in the PCA. From the presbyteries I've been in, this not only isn't a priority. It's not even on the radar. 

I wonder how many denominations have split into even more denominations because, rather than building relationships so as to have a context in which to discuss their differences, they have formed sides, fought battles, and eventually resorted to a denominational split rather than come to an agreement on whatever issue they're struggling with. What a shame! Jesus said that the world would know we are his disciples because we love one another and instead we lord it over one another, not only at a personal level but at a congregational level. 

Shame on us.