Practicing the Way of Jesus

We have a new discipleship group that has started at Girdwood Chapel, I've run around in circles trying to find the coolest name for it.  I first thought about calling it a "Life Group" since it was for a lived-out faith in the real world.  Then I thought about a "Journey Group" -- it trains us in the faith that we take on the journey life.  But now that we're actually meeting, it's beginning to be called "Discipleship Group" -- because, well, that's what it's about.

I have not done a very good job making sure we have a discipleship model in place at Girdwood Chapel.  It's not easy and, frankly, with all of the time and energy that we've needed to direct to the building it's seemed like there hasn't been any time to take on a pretty labor-intensive class on top of everything.  Whether or not there were excuses before, there are no excuses now.  Construction has slowed.  It's time.  Finally.

So, we have a group that's beginning to take shape.  Right now we're meeting after our 10 AM worship, during Sunday School time.  It's just a small group...but, then again, that's where real growth seems to occur.  All along as I've been "selling" the idea to the congregation I've been telling them that my vision was NOT of a Bible Study and NOT of a book study and NOT of a prayer group but that it would incorporate some aspect of each of these.  My vision was to have a group where we could help each other live into the life that Jesus would have us live, right now.  My vision was about trying to get our religion out of our heads and our hearts and our mouths but to get the faith of Jesus Christ into the way we live in the world.  My vision has been for a holistic faith.  And, I've been honest, my vision has been for there to be two of these groups next year and maybe more after that.   It's time to have our faith make a difference in our lives.  It's time to have some of that Wesleyan "practical divinity."

And, while, we're NOT a book study, we're starting off with a book study.  We're looking at Mark Scandrette's Practicing the Way of Jesus: Life Together in the Kingdom of Love.  I was sold merely by reading the back of the book.  There Shane Claiborne says this book:

is an invitation to love creatively and recklessly, so that we might do something to interrupt the status quo, surprise the world with God's goodness and fascinate the world with grace.

Another quote from the back:

This book provides something we urgently need today: a practice-based approach to spiritual formation...not merely engaging in pious practices, but 'learning to dance to God's song.'

And one more:

Mark Scandrette is a voice for all who are 'sensing a pull toward a spirituality that is more holistic, integrative and socially engaged.'

Practical, wise, thoughtful, grace-filled.

How bad could it be to start here?

I'm eager to practice the faith that I believe...or at least practice it better than I do now.

Follow Jesus...Literally

Via With a HT/Lisa Talbott

The Pastor as Artist

Eugene Peterson has this to say:

Being a pastor is an incredibly good, wonderful work. It is one of the few places in our society where you can live a creative life. You live at the intersection of grace and mercy and sin and salvation. We have front line seats and sometimes we even get to be part of the action. How could anyone abandon the glory of that kind of life to become a management expert? We are artists not CEOs. The true pastorate is a work of art – the art of life and spirit.

Now I need to ask myself if I'm a "good" artist or one of those artists someone might look at and say, "my three year old can do better work."

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True Evangelical Faith

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Below are words of Menno Simons (1496-1561), yes, the founder of the Mennonites. These words exemplify the notion that evangelical faith is one that is lived out in community and service. It is "incarnational."

Too often evangelical faith has been concerned about what one had on the inside (Jesus) and not how one loved because of the acceptance of Christ's first love of us. What's going on inside of us in faith will be shown with what we do with our bodies and our lives.

True evangelical faith is of such a nature it cannot lie dormant, but spreads itself out in all kinds of righteousness and fruits of love;

it dies to flesh and blood (1);
it destroys all lusts and forbidden desires (2);
it seeks, serves and fears God in its inmost soul (3);
it clothes the naked (4);
it feeds the hungry (5);
it comforts the sorrowful (6);
it shelters the destitute (7);
it aids and consoles the sad (8);
it does good to those who do it harm (9);
it serves those that harm it (10);
it prays for those who persecute it (11);
it teaches, admonishes and judges us with the Word of the Lord (12);
it seeks those who are lost (13);
it binds up what is wounded (14);
it heals the sick (15);
it saves what is strong (sound) (16);
it becomes all things to all people (17).

The persecution, suffering and anguish that come to it for the sake of the Lord’s truth have become a glorious joy and comfort to it.

What's cool about these words is how all-encompassing Menno's views faith are. There are aspects of sanctification in the individual life. There are aspects of peacemaking, justice, evangelism, and healing.

Too often Christianity has been concerned only about belief and not about life. The two are connected. Wesley, of course, got this as well. But here it is from another source.

VIA

Rethinking "The Front Lines" of Ministry

Jason Byassee, of Duke Divinity School has put a lot of thought into the notion of ministry being "The Front Lines" of religious work. It's a pretty common metaphor, that I know I've used myself once or twice. The image is that of pastors going off to seminary or Bible College or some education where they are given some knowledge and some training -- sort of "The West Point" of the religious system. And then the pastors become the infantry, heading out to do battle with the devil and the social ills of the world while some of the shots are called by the bigwigs, conference leaders, denominational administrators, the "generals" of the General Conference who never set foot out there in "the trenches of ministry." After all, what do they know about life on the front lines with the MRE rations of church pot-lucks, armor that can't protect against the weapons staff parish committees throw at their pastors, and ineffective "field manuals"?

A couple of problems here:

1) It's a little over-dramatic and violent considering parish ministry.
2) It claims that the work of seminary, and indeed, denominational leadership is not real ministry.

So Byassee offers a medicinal image to take the place of the more militaristic one:

The academy is like a laboratory where we try new things. Some blow up, some disappoint, others contain promise to offer cures. Then the pastor is the physician that Origen discusses in the “Philokalia.” The physician must know all the herbs in the garden, and she must know the precise malady of the patient. Then she can mix up the proper cure for whatever illness she faces. The herb garden is the Scriptures, the concoctions are their mixture in the tradition (a little Esther, some Revelation, and voila!), and their proof is in the health of the church. Both lab researcher and general practitioner are trained as physicians and aim to be healers.

This image still ranks the parish and the academy appropriately. It also judges the academy by how innovative it is in bringing forth new (and old) things for the sake of the church. And its telos is in the health of the body for which we all care.

It’s far from perfect, I grant. What do you think would be better?

Do you have something better to offer?

Following Jesus Without Converting to Christianity

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The quote below is from Gavriel Gefen's "Jesus Movements," in Mission Frontiers, May-June 2011 (p. 7).  I found it over at NextReformation.  What I find particularly interesting here is the notion of following Jesus -- and not following him lightly -- without feeling a need to convert to Christianity.  Such a notion flies in the face of much of my own education and formation, where belief in Jesus and being part of "Christianity" (and, by default, a church) was a no-brainer.

I have, over the years grown in my understanding of what it looks like to be a Christian and not be part of a church.  I'm pretty comfortable with that at this point.  However, I'm not sure I've ever thought that one could be a follower of Jesus and actually not consider themselves to be part of Christianity.

Interesting quote.

“There is a growing phenomenon taking place concurrently within at least every sizeable region of the world today. People within numerous different tribal cultures and also people within the cultures of each of the major world religions are increasingly accepting Jesus without converting to Christianity and without joining churches. ” They are encountering Jesus in ways that change their lives forever, without them leaving one group for another.

“They are learning to discover for themselves what it means to be faithful to Jesus within their own cultures and within their own birth communities. Conversion for them is believed to be a matter of the heart and not one of joining a different, competing cultural community.

“It is usually the case that after a number of these individuals within the same community are following Jesus, they begin meeting regularly as a small group. Over time this expands into multiple small groups among the same people group or within the same country. Eventually, it becomes established as a full-fledged movement of believers in Jesus that is outside of Christendom. It becomes a Jesus movement within another tradition. Does this mean they are living their lives outside the boundaries of biblical faith? Or, are they merely living beyond the boundaries of Christendom as a competing community?

“How did Jesus live as a son of Israel? Did he create a separate and competing community from the one that was already there? Did he tell people to leave their synagogues? Did he start his own synagogues?”

Christianity: There's Something More

                          Image via WikipediaBuying diet books won’t make you lose weight. Reading an auto-repair manual doesn’t make you a mechanic. Getting an online degree doesn’t make you an expert. Owning a Bible doesn’t make you a Christian, nor does joining a church. There is something more to it. 

It is easy to be spiritualistic without being spiritual; it is easy to believe in Jesus Christ without being Christlike. But it is impossible to be a disciple without discipline, and the longer we deny this simple fact, the longer our church will lack relevancy and power. 

--Rev. Dan Dick

Wrong Worship (What If We Sang What We Really Meant)

This is a video from a church in Orlando, Florida last month.  It gets at our individualistic and self-centered approaches to worship while spoofing some popular worship songs.



While this is extremely funny....  it calls the state of worship in some our churches into question. 

How to we make it less about us and more about God?

How do we move persons to make worship less about Sunday and more about life?

The Importance of Scripture

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This is an excerpt from Eugene Peterson's book, Eat This Book.  It's a beautiful account of what Scripture is useful for (entering into the Story of God) and not useful for (moral code).  Enjoy.

“Spiritual theology, using Scripture as a text, does not present us with a moral code and tell us, ‘live up to this’; nor does it set out a system of doctrine and say, ‘Think like this and you will live well.’ The biblical way is to tell a story and in the telling invite: 'Live INTO this — this is what it looks like to be human in this God-made and God-ruled world; this is what is involved in becoming and maturing as a human being.'

“When we submit ourselves to what we read in Scripture, we find that we are not being led to see God in our stories, but our stories in God’s. God is the larger context and plot in which our stories find themselves.” (43-44)

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There is Church Because There is Mission

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Mission (may be understood) as being derived from the very nature of God. It is thus put into the context of the doctrine of the Trinity, not of ecclesiology or soteriology. The classical doctrine on the missio Dei as God the Father sending the Son, and God the Father and the Son sending the Spirit is expanded to include yet another “movement”: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit sending the church into the world. . . . Mission is not primarily an activity of the church, but an attribute of God, God is a missionary God. . . . Mission is thereby seen as a movement from God to the world: the church is viewed as an instrument for that mission. . . . There is church because there is mission, not vice versa.

– David Jacobus Bosch, Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission