Archive for June, 2007

The times they are a changin’ (part three)

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Todd
on Monday, June 11, 2007
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A couple more thoughts:

Recognize that our destination isn’t Heaven, it’s Jesus – I think that for too long, I viewed my Christian life as one big mine field. That is, I needed to cross through the field (life) and avoid the mines (sins) so I could reach my destination (Heaven). After reading through the scriptures and with the help of Rob Bell and Brian McLaren, I’ve quickly realized that the Christian life isn’t one of safety and avoidance, it’s one of courage and engagement.

My purpose isn’t to go to Heaven. I wasn’t created so that I could one day worship God for eternity. I was created to carry out my part of God’s mission here on earth. I was created to become like Jesus. If I truly believe that Jesus is my destination, that my life pursuit is to become like Him, I will change what I value, how I live and how I view other people. It will also change my evangelism. No longer am I trying to sell Heaven (a somewhat difficult task, frankly), I’m trying to communicate the life of Jesus and the benefits of living as He commanded.

If our churches started focusing on today rather than tomorrow, I believe we would have a much more profound effect on the world around us.

Recognize that the local congregation isn’t the sole embodiment of God’s kingdom – There are other entities than the local congregation that are carrying out God’s mission. Non-profit organizations, para-church ministries and even some for-profit business are doing their part to advance the kingdom of God.

Paul Hill, pastor of Wheatland Mission, had a blog post a couple of weeks ago titled, “God’s mission has a church.” He doesn’t remember where he heard that, so I’m going to attribute it to him until further notice. Anyway, that title (and the accompanying article) resonated with me. The church isn’t the be-all, end-all of God’s mission, it’s merely a part.

Perhaps, rather than plant more churches, we should plant a homeless shelter. Perhaps rather than start another congregation, we should open a coffee shop. It’s time to look past the traditional and start getting creative with how we can carry out God’s mission.

Reexamine how we define community – I fear that we have a fairly low view of community. Meeting with the same group of people for two to three hours a week doesn’t constitute community. Neither does lumping a group of people together based on age, sex or life-status (though, admittedly, community can spring forth from such settings). Community comes from time, shared experience, shared interests and purpose.

We should be spending time together with the local body, sharing experiences (both through service and fellowship), finding common interests and uniting through a common purpose.

I’m not sure what this would look like at a mega or even a 500+ church, so if you attend one of those, let me know.

Recognize that our calling as Christians is higher than worship – I might get into trouble for this one, but I fear that have mistaken our purpose. Ken Silva (who is by no means an expert on the way of church, but does provide an alternate view) said in a comment on another blog, “the mission of the Church is worship of God in Christ through the Spirit…Then from that His love flows through us and outward into missions.” I think that’s backwards. God doesn’t need our worship. He has legions of angels surrounding Him in worship. He has us to live out His kingdom here on earth. That’s what we should be doing.

Should we worship? Of course! It helps keep us grounded and focused on why we’re here and whom we’re here for. But focusing on worship before mission seems to contradict our commission as Jesus’ followers.

What do you think?

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A Heavenly Worldview

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Todd
on Friday, June 8, 2007
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I was reading a blog somewhere (I can’t remember where now) about developing a “Heavenly worldview.” The point was that we should rid ourselves of our earthly thoughts and instead focus on Heaven. It was a pretty forgettable (obviously) post. But it got me thinking. What does it mean to “focus on Heaven?”Have you ever asked yourself questions about Heaven? These are the ones that came to mind for me: What is Heaven? Where is it? What is it going to be like? How long is eternity really? Are we really going to be singing forever?

Sadly, I’m not sure I arrived at any solid answers. Reading Revelation didn’t help much either, with its dragons, bowls of wrath and jasper walls.

As you may know by now, I like to keep things simple. To understand Heaven, I decided to look at its opposite: Hell.

Ok, admittedly, the concept of Hell isn’t significantly easier to understand than Heaven, but no worries, this isn’t going to be a deep, theological post on the nature and/or meaning of “Hell.” I have neither the knowledge nor the desire to explore the geography, location and description of the literal, physical Hell. Rather, I chose to frame my thoughts with the practical concept of Hell that I’ve been taught my entire life: Hell as separation from God.

It may be difficult for us, as children of God to grasp what exactly that means. At times we may feel distant from our Father, or perhaps we’ve even lost sight of Him through hardship, doubt or bad decisions. Those times can be incredibly depressing and discouraging at best. However, our God is never far away. With one decision and step, we are back in God’s embrace, experiencing the depth, length, height and width of God’s love, just as - or probably deeper than - before.

We live in a world full of people who are not seeing God, living separated from Him on a daily basis. Our calling, our commission, is to point God out to those who don’t see Him and help them connect with Him. In other words, we are to create the opposite of Hell (separation) - we are to create Heaven (connection).

That’s what evangelism is all about. The idea of evangelism is a scary one for many people. The idea of walking up to a friend, family member or complete stranger and attempting to share your beliefs with them is, frankly, terrifying. I believe that fear stems from a faulty, half-true definition of what evangelism is. The current, English definition for evangelism is “Zealous preaching and dissemination of the gospel, as through missionary work. OR Militant zeal for a cause.” Uh oh. Who wants to do that?

Today, evangelism has become little more than a one-sided monologue where we talk to an unbeliever about how we became a Christian, what steps they need to take to do the same and then we provide an invitation for them to take the aforementioned steps. If the person doesn’t agree to take those steps then we have failed as evangelists.

We need to do away with that faulty view. True evangelism is about more than conversion. It’s about more than convincing somebody that we’re right, they’re wrong and they need to fix their wrongness.

The Latin and Greek origin of the word evangelism is roughly translated to “bring good news.” That’s what we should be doing when we evangelize - we should be bringing good news to every single person we meet.

Have we, as followers of Christ’s teachings done that? Have we brought good news to people? Have we done everything we can to show God’s love to everybody?

In reality, the answer is yes. You’re probably already doing that everyday. Through a simple smile, a kind word or a selfless action, you are showing the love of God to those around you.

However, I fear that we haven’t been as intentional as we should when it comes to our sharing of the good news. In our effort to show God’s love, we’ve neglected to show our love. In our haste to immerse, convert and “save,” we’ve missed our opportunity to serve, love and weep with God’s children.

I have an evangelical spirit. I want nothing more than to tell people about this Jesus character I’ve found (or that’s found me) - how His life gives purpose, meaning and direction to my otherwise purposeless, meaningless and misdirected life. However, I pray that my fervor for souls doesn’t overcome my fervor for people; that my fervor for salvation doesn’t overcome my fervor for love.

We should desire with all of our being that individuals commit their lives to Christ - that they know the life changing love that we have received from our heavenly Father. But that won’t happen unless we show unconditional, agendaless love from earthly us.

That’s really what developing a heavenly worldview is all about. It’s not living preparing to die, it’s living to create connections with those around us.

Let’s be people who are creating Heaven on earth. Let’s show true love, grace and acceptance. Let’s foster the connection with God that everybody is looking for, not solely for the sake of their soul, but for their being; not only for Heaven upon death, but for Heaven while they’re still alive.

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What’s your journey?

Published
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Todd
on Wednesday, June 6, 2007
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This summer I’m teaching the Wednesday night class for my youth group. We’re discussing “The Secret Message of Jesus” by Brian McLaren - one of my favorite books. (Sidenote: I’m also teaching the adults on Sunday Morning. In that class, I’m teaching on Mark Batterson’s “In a Pit with a Lion” - a good book, but not nearly as challenging as SMOJ.)Tonight we’re talking about our respective journeys - where we’ve been, where we are and where we think we’re going. The point of this discussion is to help them understand that the way we think of and communicate Jesus is based upon where we are on our journey. If we can recognize and appreciate this, it will dramatically change (for the better) the way we share our faith with those around us.

Many Christians have this idea that there is one way – their way – into a life-changing faith. That simply isn’t so, and to try to pull people off of their journey and onto a similar or identical journey is harmful and, I believe, wrong. Rather, we should come along side people, encouraging them on their journey while sharing our personal experience and insights.

So let me ask you. What’s your journey look like? Where have you been? Where are you? Where are you going? How does your journey color the way you think about Jesus?

(Just in case: I’m not preaching relativism; I’m preaching a big God who keeps His promises. Jesus promises that all who seek for truth will find it (Matt. 6:33) and in Heb. 11:6, the writer assures that God rewards those who earnestly seek Him.)

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The times they are a changin’ (Part two)

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Todd
on Monday, June 4, 2007
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The church’s purpose is clear: recognize that Jesus is Lord and thusly, live like He commanded.Unfortunately, I fear that many churches have lost sight of this purpose, and have adopted new purposes that often detract from what Jesus desired for His people.

What are written below are simply thoughts that I’ve developed through conversation and study and are nothing radical. I apologize for that. Also, I was going to write a full post with detailed descriptions for each thought, but it felt cheesy. So I’ve merely listed my thoughts with a brief description. If you need any clarity on any of them, let me know.

So let’s begin.

End nickel and noses ministry – The goal of the church is to get larger. True. However, when we spend a majority of our time counting nickels and noses, obsessing over the drops or gains, we miss the point. If we’re doing the work God desires, He will provide the people and resources necessary without our worrying about it.

Spend less time and energy on maintenance and more on movement – Similar to number 1, we need to focus less on making sure that everybody is satisfied and comfortable and more on living out the purpose to which we are called. I have seen (and been a part of) too many churches who are afraid to move for fear of upsetting the status quo, older members and major donors.

I kind of struggle with this point, because I recognize that the institution of the church is a massive beast that takes time to get moving. It seems unfair and maybe even wrong to demand that people go or get out, particularly when they’ve been a part of the church for longer than I’ve been alive. What is a good balance here?

Recognize that church is boring and that needs to stop – I’m not advocating that church be entertaining with lasers and smoke and dinosaurs. I’m advocating that we stop being boring. Church doesn’t have to be entertaining, but it does need to be relevant and worthwhile.

End our obsession with moral legislation – We need to start living like Jesus ourselves rather than demand that other people do so through legislation.

Recognize that our message is “offensive” so our tactics need not be – Fred Phelps, Ken Silva and others take an offensive (to say the least) stance against those with whom they disagree. Whenever they receive negative feedback, they take that as confirmation of what they’re doing because Jesus promised persecution. I don’t think that this is what Jesus had in mind.

The message that we preach (and hopefully live) is offensive enough. If we truly live and love like Jesus the things and people we value will be so counter to the prevailing culture, that we will be hated. Using hateful speech, stirring up needless conflict and outright condemnation is counter-productive. Yes, Jesus used mean speech. Yes, Jesus condemned. However, I don’t believe that we have been given the same authority, particularly when it comes to condemnation. So stop.

Embrace unity and recognize that unity doesn’t equal uniformity – We have been far too focused on the minor things that divide us. Instrumental music, women’s roles and countless other minor arguments have allowed our movement to become fractured and ineffectual. Churches can and should be united with out being uniform.

So, now it’s your turn. What thoughts do you have?

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The times they are a changin’ (Part one)

Published
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Todd
on Friday, June 1, 2007
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Primetime television is in flux. Evening TV was once considered “appointment television,” but many people, particularly young adults, are missing their appointments – or rather, they’re rescheduling them.Tivo has changed the way many people interact with their entertainment, which for advertisers is a pretty frightening thing. No longer do viewers appreciate the way “free” programming works – that is, they watch commercials because commercials are paying for their favorite sitcom.

What’s interesting is that people are watching as much as or more TV than ever – just not in traditional ways. They’re getting their “TV fix” on their Tivos, iPods and the internet.

Advertisers are being forced to get creative – something at which they’re quite adept – to win the hearts and minds of potential product-purchasers.

Do you know where I’m going with this?

The church is in flux. Sunday morning gatherings were once considered “appointment worship,” but many people, particularly young adults, are missing their appointments – and they’re not rescheduling them.

Our culture and, frankly the way the church has interacted with the culture, has changed the way many people interpret and understand the local embodiment of the church. No longer do parishioners appreciate the work of a local congregation – that is, the local embodiment of what God is doing here on earth.

What’s interesting is that more people are spiritually open and aware than ever – just not in traditional ways. They’re getting their “spiritual fix” through Bono, Oprah, Al Gore and yoga.

Local churches are being forced to get creative – something at which they’re not often adept – to win the hearts and minds of potential and current church-goers.

This post isn’t written to promote a certain method (i.e. Emergent, PD, seeker-sensitive), rather, I want to promote a renewed understanding of the church’s purpose. I’ll share some thoughts on how I think we can do that in the next post.

In the meantime, let me ask you this: What is your perception of the reputation of the local church?

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