a Missional Theology: part 3

I recently posted a podcast at our new site - www.MissionalMonks.com - titled "a missional theology," which addresses my understanding of who we are called to be as God's people. I decided to post the transcript of that podcast here. Its a little long, so it'll show up as a series of three posts (this is the final of the three).

Note that its entitled "a" missional theology...not "the" missional theology. What I attempted to describe are some basic understandings of functioning as God's community of ambassadors to all creation. There is plenty of room here for the different denominational distinctions and doctrines - I didn't even try to get in to all the finer points of systematic theology here. So, if you think that something I added is wrong, please feel free to open dialog. If you think I left something out...I did. Add it and serve faithfully.

If you aren't interested in reading 3500 words over three posts, you can listen to nearly the identical thing at missionalmonks.com - the "music" player is in the left hand column - its just under 30 mins including the intro (shorter than most of my sermons...). Whether you read or listen, I'd love your feedback.

Towards a Missional Theology

part 3

Broken or not, we are created in the image of God and I think one of the great examples of human pride is the false belief that there is anything we could have done (like the concept of original sin and total depravity) that could ever completely destroy what God placed in our very essence.

We are not God. We are broken and fall very much short of our ideal, but we still carry within us the image of the Divine Creator. Because of this, our identity is formed not only by our difference from God but also by what we’ve seen God at work doing, who we’ve seen God revealed to be.

Before the beginning God existed as a complete Community of Love. Unlike the claims of some religions that hold the beliefs that the gods need human worshippers to maintain their power, we worship the God who needed nothing. The Father, Son and Holy Spirit share in a fully contained and unified community of Love. The full understanding the Trinity is certainly beyond us. But this much is clear, one cannot love without an object to receive love. Unlike us, God needs no external object because the Father loves the Son and Spirit, The Son loves the Father and Spirit and the Spirit loves the Father and Son. And yet, the nature of love is to make room for others to experience loving community and so God created. And when God created, God made room at the table for creation. However, this is not a story of a wealthy landowner simply throwing occasional parties at his mansion. Time and time again we see that God is not only willing, but apparently anxious to be out in the midst of those God loves.

Communitas

I am grateful to Alan Hirsch for introducing me to the word communitas. It is a latin word that refers to community which develops and is cultivated among people who have a shared struggle, ordeal or mission. Like sports teams that endure long difficult seasons, or soldiers who share a foxhole, communitas refers to that bond that comes from being in a place where you have no choice but to depend on those around you. We see this in the very nature of the Triune God. Be it the act of creation or the redemption of creation through the cross, we find Father, Son and Spirit with a shared mission and apparently even a shared struggle. It doesn’t take away from God’s greatness to acknowledge struggle - because the struggle doesn’t come from God’s inability to overcome, but rather from God’s willingness to neither overwhelm creation nor abandon it.

If we are the people of God, created in God’s image, then communitas is going to be a vital component of our lives. When it isn’t, we know something is missing. This is part of why both gangs and fraternities are so popular - whether they are healthy or not, they are an experience of communitas. I also think this is why buddy movies, war movies, sports movies are so captivating - they tap into our desire to go through something significant with others.

Hospitality

Because God, the Community of Love, not only created us but made space for us within the Community, we see the importance and even centrality of hospitality. When we trace the story of Scripture we see over and again that God welcomes us into his presence. We see God clothing the naked and even the poorly clothed like Adam and Eve. We see God feeding the children of Israel as they wandered in the wilderness. We see Jesus feeding the multitudes, washing the disciples’ feet and going to prepare a place for us in his father’s home. (Which by the way, is a reference to ancient marriage customs...where a betrothed male would actually build a room for he and his future wife onto his father’s house. He would continue working on the room until the father decided it was ready to be inhabited and then the father would send the son to get his bride). Throughout the old testament we find God instructing the Israelites that they were to be people of hospitality - welcoming the stranger into their homes, making sure that foreigners and the poor were taken care of, even ensuring that they’d have a place at the annual feasts. Hospitality is a central component to the revealed nature of God and is a vital piece of identity for the people of God.

Hospitality means so much more than just inviting our friends to our house for dinner. It literally means to welcome the stranger...and if we take Jesus seriously, it will also include loving and welcoming even our enemies. It means caring for the poor. It means remembering those who are overlooked and forgotten by society. It means that we are a community that practices the customs of the new Kingdom, the Kingdom of God that is here but still coming. It means that we should live in a way that seems radical and even foolish in our get ahead at all costs society.

Missional Living

But again, God doesn’t merely welcome us in, God comes to us and brings his peace with him. In addition to hospitality we see that God is the preeminent missionary. In other words, from the very beginning to the very end and everywhere in between, God is not content to sit in heaven and watch our lives from a distance. God draws near. God sets up his tent among us. In Exodus we read about the Tabernacle. It was basically a large tent that the Israelites carried around with them. The Tabernacle represented God’s presence with the Israelites.

Several years ago I realized that in the Gospel of John when it is says that Jesus made his dwelling among us, the Greek word used is the word for tabernacle. In other words, like God with the Israelites, Jesus set up his tent in our midst...as Eugene Peterson says it in the Message, Jesus moved into the neighborhood. The cool thing is that when you read Revelation 21 - the end our Scriptures. It says that when everything is finally brought to its culmination, the new Jerusalem will come DOWN out of heaven and God will dwell with his people. Again the word is tabernacle. The dwelling of God will be with his people. From the beginning, to Jesus’ life to the culmination of all things, God chooses to come down and tabernacle with us.

How can we choose anything different? If we are God’s people, formed in the image of God we must seek to cultivate communitas - which means that our life in God will not be carried out alone but in community. We must be a people of hospitality, welcoming the stranger. But we must also be a missional people - a community sent out by God to dwell among the people, among creation, in the dark places where the light needs to break in.

These six things: discipleship, spiritual formation and worship because we are not God and communitas, hospitality and missional living because we are created in the image of God, are not meant to be the final formula to fix the churches problems. However, I contend that if we, as a church, can live into these principles we will find that we are in a place where we are more likely to witness God at work, praise God for what we see and answer the call to go and do likewise.

a Missional Theology: part 2

I recently posted a podcast at our new site - www.MissionalMonks.com - titled "a missional theology," which addresses my understanding of who we are called to be as God's people. I decided to post the transcript of that podcast here. Its a little long, so it'll show up as a series of three posts (this is part 2 of 3).

Note that its entitled "a" missional theology...not "the" missional theology. What I attempted to describe are some basic understandings of functioning as God's community of ambassadors to all creation. There is plenty of room here for the different denominational distinctions and doctrines - I didn't even try to get in to all the finer points of systematic theology here. So, if you think that something I added is wrong, please feel free to open dialog. If you think I left something out...I did. Add it and serve faithfully.

If you aren't interested in reading 3500 words over three posts, you can listen to nearly the identical thing at missionalmonks.com - the "music" player is in the left hand column - its just under 30 mins including the intro (shorter than most of my sermons...). Whether you read or listen, I'd love your feedback.

Towards a Missional Theology

part 2

Discipleship

And so, because we are not God and in too many ways we are not like God, we are called to discipleship in the way of Jesus - which teaches us, conforms us, transforms us not into gods...but more fully into our humanity, which was created in the image of God. Discipleship is more than just Christian education. Learning what the Bible says is a fundamental aspect of our life...but merely knowing Scripture does not make you a disciple any more than knowing the menu at a fancy restaurant makes you a chef.

This may sound obvious, but experience suggests that it might not be. I was raised in a culture that seemed to equate bible knowledge with being a good Christian. We seemed to think that if we could just raise the level of biblical literacy then all our problems would be solved. I began to suspect this wasn’t the case as I got to know some pretty nasty individuals who could quote whole books of the Bible.

Discipleship should certainly include a familiarity and love for Scripture, but it must go beyond that. Discipleship is about committing our lives - every aspect of our lives - to learning the way of the one we follow. Like an apprentice to a master we learn the way of our teacher not just so that we’ll know what they know, but so that we can do what they do.

Becoming a disciple carries a recognition that we are not a master, but what kind of apprentice would attach themselves to a master if they never had any intention of taking on the master’s trade? That isn’t a disciple. That’s a groupie.

So being a disciple will entail regular excursions into the realm where our master is at work. We’ll be uncomfortable at first, but we keep pressing on. Periodically we withdraw to process, rest and prepare for our next adventure. But these periods of rest should follow and precede engagement, they shouldn’t exist to simulate or worse, replace, them.

I love the TV show Scrubs...no apologies, I love that show. There is an episode that guest stars Dick Van Dyke as an extremely well-loved older doctor. There is a point in the show where it becomes apparent that he simply hasn’t kept up with the advancements in medicine through the years. His practice was stagnant and because of that it actually put a patient in danger.

There is a great need for practice. I don’t mean practice in the way that the Dallas Cowboys really need to practice more during the week. But practice in the way a doctor practices medicine. As Scrubs reminds us, we need ongoing practice in our practice, continuing ed credits as my teacher friends are familiar with.

In addition to our need for discipleship, we who are not God and are thus finite and imperfect, need a set of spiritual practices that keep us grounded in a rhythm of connection to God and the world. This spiritual formation goes hand in hand with discipleship.

Spiritual Formation

Spiritual formation has been very important to me for a long time. I absolutely love opportunities to help others learn and embrace practices that can have a lifelong impact on their spiritual health. BUT I’d be a big fat liar if I pretended that my deep interest in spiritual formation didn’t come, at least somewhat, from my own need for formation. I have a theory that for many of us, the things in faith that we are most drawn to often come not from a place of abundance but a place of poverty. I love prayer and meditating on scripture, but I am so prone to stumble through my life dealing with whatever is right in front of me. With all honesty I will admit that without serious intentionality - and usually unless I have friends helping me - I will go days, even weeks without any significant time spent in prayer or reading scripture outside of preparing to help someone else.

But I can say with a tremendous degree of confidence that you can trace many of my highs and lows spiritually by tracking how intentional I was about cultivating spiritual practices at that time.

Christians throughout the ages have referred to an intentional plan or rhythm of spiritual formation as a Rule of Life. Whether you call it that or not, if you are not God, a Rule of Life is an important aspect of faith that many of us are missing out on. I’ve only recently come to realize the value of developing a communal Rule in addition to a personal one. I can’t say that we’re models of this, but some of us in Christ Journey have experienced the benefit of ordering our life in connection with others; joining one another in a rhythm of prayer, scripture reading, service to others and shared meals. Not all of our spiritual formation looks that “spiritual” on the outside. I’ve found that committing myself to a place - such as my favorite booth at Denny’s - on a regular basis has opened up unbelievable doors for my own spiritual formation - in addition to placing me in the midst of God’s work in others’ lives.

Because we are not God. Because we’ve seen the master at work as we’ve engaged in discipleship. Because we’ve reflected on God’s greatness in the midst of our spiritual formation. Because we’ve opened our eyes, just a little, to see what God is doing all around us, the other natural response is worship.

Worship

Some say worship is where we go to get recharged as Christians. Sure that is sometimes the case. But worship is not about me getting my batteries charged - in fact, if we follow Jesus’ example, our batteries will be charged as we do God’s will...as we follow our master into his workshop and join him in his craft. Worship, properly understood, is where we respond the charging we’ve received. It is where we share stories of the master at work with one another, where we debrief by telling the tales of a God who is not like us, but has invited us into community nonetheless. Worship is where we shout with joy for the great things we’ve witnessed, weep together over the brokenness that has yet to be healed and approach God on behalf that brokenness.

This doesn’t only take place in a “worship gathering” - though I’ve come to appreciate those times so much more as I’ve slowly learned that they aren’t about the worship style, location or presentation.

Worship takes place anytime we are moved to respond to God - in praise, thanksgiving or lament.

It is important that we remember we are not God. It is important that we commit ourselves to discipleship, spiritual formation and worship BECAUSE we are not God. However, if we only recall how we are not like God, we miss out on the greatness of what we are created to be.

to be continued...

a Missional Theology: part 1

I recently posted a podcast at our new site - www.MissionalMonks.com - titled "a missional theology," which addresses my understanding of who we are called to be as God's people. I decided to post the transcript of that podcast here. Its a little long, so it'll show up as a series of three posts.

Note that its entitled "a" missional theology...not "the" missional theology. What I attempted to describe are some basic understandings of functioning as God's community of ambassadors to all creation. There is plenty of room here for the different denominational distinctions and doctrines - I didn't even try to get in to all the finer points of systematic theology here. So, if you think that something I added is wrong, please feel free to open dialog. If you think I left something out...I did. Add it and serve faithfully.

If you aren't interested in reading 3500 words over three posts, you can listen to nearly the identical thing at missionalmonks.com - the "music" player is in the left hand column - its just under 30 mins including the intro (shorter than most of my sermons...). Whether you read or listen, I'd love your feedback.

Toward a Missional Theology

Over the last couple years I’ve been working on a degree in evangelism and missional leadership from SMU. It has been an awesome experience and I’ve really enjoyed the diversity of folks I’ve been blessed to study with. I’m usually the youngest in the class, usually one of the only (if not THE only) white males and so far I’ve been the only one who would be described as a “missional church planter.”

So I’ve had anything but the experience of sitting in a room with people just like me, telling each other what we want to hear to feel better about who we are and what we do.

I’ve learned a lot by listening to the struggles and questions of folks in contexts that appear so very different from my own. When they ask me to describe my context, it isn’t usually very easy to do. Partially this is because “my context” changes pretty regularly. At one point I would have basically described us as a typical non-denominational suburban store front church that was trying very hard to keep our focus outside of ourselves, but not succeeding very well. At some points I’d have described us as a small group of shell shocked survivors huddling in a living room. Sometimes we’re a vibrant community of families serving our neighbors. Sometimes, we’re a haphazard collection of individuals wanting to experience an authentic connection with others, but unsure how to escape the individualism we’ve all been raised in.

At our best, I think we are a community of disciples in process who sense that church as usual just isn’t cutting it. But rather than defining ourselves over against traditional church, we’re seeking to emulate Jesus by living more fully into our lives. We’re committed to living the gospel in the midst of the suburban disconnect. Proclaiming gospel isn’t about getting someone to join our club. Its about getting our club to join God in the ministry of reconciling the brokenness we see all around us.

In some ways our context is hard to describe because we are exploring territory that hasn’t had many visitors recently. Yet, we aren’t really trying to be novel. We’re trying to faithful to God and the mission that God has entrusted to us, the ambassadors and image-bearers of the Triune God.

So, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking, reading, praying and discussing what it means to be church. I’ve gained a lot of understanding from reading Exodus, the prophets and the Gospels - even though I was trained (implicitly if not explicitly in church growing up and in seminary as well) to look to Paul as the primary source of insight for church organization.

Authors such as Alan Hirsch and Mike Frost, who wrote The Forgotten Ways...and numerous other books - Hugh Halter and Matt Smay have also been very helpful. Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove and the new monastics have helped me think more specifically about the role of community in our development of whole life faith.

Really where these authors have been the most help is in painting a picture and providing language to describe what we see in the text when we stop reading through the lens of the empire.

In many ways and for many years, I believe that our reading of scripture has been heavily influenced by Christianity’s way to comfortable relationship and even identification with the dominant culture. I think this is problematic. It is very hard to take to heart Scriptures admonition against the powerful and God’s overwhelming consistency of siding with the oppressed when we’re associated with the powerful oppressors.

Take the Scriptural concept of “The Day of the Lord.” For those who have been oppressed, the day of the Lord is an event to be looked forward to with great anticipation because it is the day of deliverance and justice. For those who have been guilty of oppressing others, it is a day to fear greatly for the same reason. But we don’t ever like to assume that we are the ones being prophesied against...we never associate ourselves with the Pharisees. And so the Day of the Lord becomes about judgement to those outside of our group. We can oppress, neglect or ignore people all we want, so long as we show up for church, don’t cheat on our spouse and sign off on the doctrinal statements that our group feels are most important. God sides with the weak, the overlooked and forgotten. If we want to find ourselves on God’s side, sitting in a comfortable worship assembly completely oblivious to the darkness all around us may not be the best strategy.

As I’ve thought about what it means to be God’s people - the church - I find myself returning to passages like Genesis 1-2 quite often. Those of you who know me are probably used to hearing me comment on the paradoxical descriptions of God in these two chapters.

In chapter 1 of Genesis we read of a God who is anything but like one of us. In fact there are very few things in this chapter that seem to describe God in even remotely human concepts. The Spirit of God hovers over the waters, which gives us the impression that God IS somewhere and isn’t just a concept. God speaks, implying a voice and the ability to make sounds...which we can do. Beyond that, this Being, whatever he, she, they, it is...it isn’t one of us.

And yet, in Chapter 2 God is described in a very different way. Still great. Still mighty. Still in charge. But also familiar. Intimate. Like a father - the good kind of father, not the abusive absentee ones that some people have experienced.

This God walks in the Garden, kneels in the dirt, forms a body and breathes life into its nostrils. This God walks with his children, talks to them and empowers them with productive tasks to accomplish.

This may be the most simplistic and obvious statement I could make, but it strikes me that in some ways we are like this God...but we are not this God. I think, however, that it is very important for us to remember to keep both of these truths in front of us. If we forget that we are not God all kinds of things go wrong - Scripture, human history and personal experience will all attest to that!

to be continued...