Category Archives: emerging church

Missional- how is the word bedding down?

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the-alamo

So, now that the M word seems to be supplanting the E word, how are you with it?

(See here and here for earlier posts.)

I tried a google search on ‘missional’ today. A couple of years ago, it was a rarely used word, but no longer. Now there are hundreds of ‘missional church networks’, ‘missional projects’ and ‘missional training’ opportunities.

And I confess to a rising cynicism.

Why is this, I wonder? Time for a list…

  1. What does the word mean? It’s application seems so broad, and to be adopted by such differing organisations. Perhaps it has value as a noun, but not as a verb, which it seems to be becoming.
  2. The people in my group cringe when they hear it used.
  3. Is it about money? Do those who hold purse strings like the word?
  4. Is it about fashion- the next new thing? If so, it might be that we use it to fend off our insecurities, by giving the illusion that we are forging a path of significance…
  5. Is it about a retreat from the controversy that the words ’emerging church’ seemed to attract? If so, it seems a little cowardly- even unmissional (Aghhh! The word gains another incarnation!)
  6. Perhaps I am still missing the words ’emerging church’. For a while, they represented something that was precious to me.

Then there is the root word- MISSION.

It has many other connotations;

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It may be that I will come to value this word much more, given time.

But lest it become a distraction I am going to forget about labels for a while and try to concentrate on the important stuff…

cheeses

The Underground Railway…

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In response to Brian McLaren’s event in Glasgow (mentioned in my previous post- here), here is an excerpt from part of a book called ‘Blue-dark’, available here.

I reproduce it as a kind of mission statement- a reminder of what I set myself towards.

I have a feeling I may have posted this before, but for my own sake at least, I think it is worth saying again!

The term ‘underground railroad’ was first used in relation to an organisation of people who helped slaves escape from the American south to the northern states who had declared against slavery.

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In the dark days of the Third Reich, when the whole of Europe was under the heel of dictatorship, still there was a remnant. There were men and women who were uncontaminated by circumstance, and emboldened by passions born of a different Kingdom. Sleeping now like spring in winter were memories of better times now gone. And with the sleep came dreams of justice for the oppressed, liberation for captives, and ministry to the sick and the lame and the alien in a conquered land.

Ordinary people – just like you and me, in an extraordinary situation, performing simple acts of heroism, in the face of certain prosecution and possible death. At first they were loud in their outrage, but hard lessons taught caution and subterfuge, and so they went underground.

And quietly, in the shadows, they grew bolder, and found that they were not alone. Many people opened up their lives and their homes, and began to gather the unlovely and the unloved, to give food, and warmth and shelter. They found others who still kept the light alive. And so they formed a network. No-one knew the whole of this network – the overall plan was less important than the simplicity of saving those immediately at risk. But almost by some hidden hand, Jews, gypsies, gentiles, escaped soldiers, political undesirables – all were passed down the line – closer to freedom, closer to the other Kingdom.

So was born a time of heroes.

And the Underground Railway…

I think that we are called to live what we believe.

And to believe in how we live.

It sounds simple, but so few do. Jesus said that when we are born again in him, we become new creations. The old parts of us are dead and gone, and the new person is made in His image. This means that we become more like him.

More passionate
More compassionate
More holy
More real
More loving
More merciful
More open
More hungry for justice
More whole
More like a child
More willing to go for it!

Less selfish
Less concerned about earthly security
Less proud
Less jealous of what others have
Less carnal
Less judging of others
Less earthbound
Less empty.

So what gets in the way? Why is it that the old habits drag me down? It is almost as if the old man, who is dead, rises in me like a corpse and fills me with the smell of death.

And somehow this becomes normal. It becomes culturally acceptable. We see it all around us, in both the secular and the so-called sacred. Jesus told us to enter through the narrow gate, because the alternative is broad and easy, but leads to destruction. Narrow is the way to life, and only a few find it (Matt 7: 13-14).

He was never much into going with the flow.

What would it be like to live what we believe? It would mean loving God, and loving others. Simple.

Unlearning lots of layers of stuff that get between us and Him, between us and people.

I believe it is possible. Because I have seen it. I have seen men changed. I have felt it. I am not the same.

And I am not my own – I belong to a different kingdom. This kingdom has different rules and has a different culture.

So I decided to set myself again to live what I believe. I became less tolerant of the smell of death, and instead went for life, and laughter, and freedom. Like Lazarus, I walked to the mouth of the tomb, and looked out.

And I began to see a world full of different colours. It brought me to tears, but still I wanted to sing praise songs, redemption songs, songs of freedom.

But also, I saw again the people all about me through new eyes. Some were broken almost beyond repair, at least in this world. Others were hungry, others were homeless. And here and there were people captured by addictions and close to death. Many of them had been inoculated against God by their experience of religion. It was almost as if he was giving me a window into their souls. And my heart broke open.

I decided that it was wrong, and something needed to be done. But it is hard to go against the culture, to swim against the tide.

What is needed, I thought, is an underground railway…

(From ‘Blue Dark, 2006, by Chris Goan)

Lessons on Kingdom from Brian McLaren…

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I took a trip into Glasgow last night to hear Brian McLaren speak at Strathclyde university. His writing has been hugely influential on my spiritual life and my understandings of faith, and so I felt a bit like a groupie!

I went with a couple of friends from Dunoon, Simon and Ali, and had a chance to meet up with a couple of on-line buddies too- Stewart and Thomas. In fact, the picture above is Stewart’s- who had the technology (royalty check in t’post!)

It was a great night. Finished off by a lovely drive home over the Rest and be Thankful pass under a clear starry sky. Oh and a good take-away in Balloch…

Brian McLaren was profound in what he said- and although not much of it was new to me, the words were like food to the soul. Lots of people seem to have this experience of listening to him almost telling their story- allowing them to ask questions, and permitting them to start a new journey with God. I am reluctant to build him up with labels that will later become millstones around his neck, but he has something of the Apostle about him that is not taken, but rests as a result of who he is.

Yesterday is a case in point- it was not just what he said, but the way he said it. There was a kindness to his words- a respect for all things, but always a gentle invitation for as all to aim for something better.

Highlights? For me there were many. He got into a lot of discussion about the Kingdom of God- and old theme for me, which has been the subject of much discussion in our housegroup. We had previously playfully tried to find new names for the Kingdom of God, and I was delighted to see McLaren taking this to a whole new level.

The suggestion is, that Jesus was using the term ‘Kingdom of God’ as a way to engage with the people of his time in words they would understand. If he was here today- he would do the same, but would not necessarily use the same words.

‘Kingdom’ today ( suggested McLaren) is a word that has lost it’s potency- it is embedded in an ancient understanding of power and authority. What Jesus was doing was suggesting that there was a new way of doing Kingdom.

He then went on to list a whole series of words that Jesus might use if he was here today (Stewart gives a list of these on his blog- The Dream of God, The Peace Revolution of God, The Mission of God, The Party of God, Network of God, Ecosystem of God, God’s New Planet, Beloved Community, God’s Economy, The democracy of God.)

But there were two that I really liked.

One was

The dance of God

The idea that we learn to take part in a dance, in which we are part of an interrelated, dependent cycle of life and love- moving in response to divine music…

And perhaps most of all, I liked

The non-terror cell of God, or The insurgency of God

These seemed redolent with an idea that has been buzzing about my head for a while about a subversive group of Christians modeled loosely on the underground railway- I’ll post it soon I reckon.

Starbucks, learning from church??

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Terry sent me a link to this- which raised a few painful chuckles.

Painful as it was very familiar!

Not quite sure what point they are making though. Is the issue about image and presentation? Do we just need to be hipper and more trendy? I thought this had been tried, and had not worked, at least in the UK. Perhaps we are just not trendy enough? Perhaps we aimed at Starbucks but got stuck somewhere in a 1950’s milk bar?

Perhaps too the church in America is a bit different- they can still count on large numbers of folk who go every Sunday, even though numbers are going down there also.

For my part, I think that church as an institution does need change. But perhaps the real issue is that we Christians need to change the way we live out faith, rather than the way we institutionalise it…

The clip above seems to be challenging the church to market itself better. Is this what we should be about? Sure, I can see the wisdom of being creative and relevant in how engage with the world around us, but I still feel uncomfortable with the idea of ‘church marketing’.

I think this relates to a certain extent to New Labour, and ‘spin’. In 1997, I was euphoric along with many others as the Labour government swept aside the Tories and finally came into government. They had finally found themselves a winning formula that was eminently marketable, just as the Conservatives seemed to degenerate into a sleeze jelly.

But ideology, passion, reality- all seems to have been subordinated to spin. The message was lost in the marketing.

But I also feel a bit uncomfortable with the idea of church as ‘corporation’.

Church is (or I think SHOULD be) a collective of activists, whose rules of engagement are counter cultural, as well as intra cultural. We are called out, to seek and to save. To liberate captives and bring sight where there is blindness.

Marketing techniques, whose aim is to attract more people in, to build up the corporation- nope, not for me I think…