A Return to Tent-Making?

Does the Church need full-time ordained leadership in the local context?

I have been wondering about the viability of the full-time ordained clergy in the near future. It used to be that the clergy were more often than not, the only educated person in the context of the local congregation. The knowledge held by the clergy, as well as the skills of reading, teaching, and public discourse often set the clergy apart from the parishioner. But that day has long been only found in the past.

What then is the purpose of a full-time clergy person? Is it a quaint holdover from “how we have always done it” or are we afraid of what might happen to the ‘orthodoxy’ of the Faith if the clergy were displaced from their ivory towers?

Now as a full-time ordained clergyperson, I do have a financial benefit in holding a call in a local congregation. I also have security in a future pension, healthcare, paid vacations, time and money for further education, and still some status in the surrounding community because of my position. Why do I question a good thing? Because I believe that we have stifled the Gospel by making it safe and comfortable. We have also diminished the ‘edginess’ of the message when it is wrapped in a corporate structure and institutional understanding.

I believe the ministry has suffered because of the time spent in administrative necessity in reporting a ‘successful’ ministry to the higher structural authority. The transformational power of the Gospel has been made palatable so that the financial supports may be protected while people continue to be suffocated with the status quo.

The Church needs to reawaken to the transformational power of the Resurrection if it is to continue to survive in a way that is true to its Commission. Change (conversion) is what this world needs, and if it cannot begin in the midst of those called together by the Author of Creation, we are truly a pitiful lot.

What if? – There was still more to understand

Where are we in our faith journey at this moment in history? Have we come to an understanding of faith and the Church that will serve us for the rest of time? Have we fulfilled what Jesus came to show us?
I just started reading “Integral Christianity: The Spirit’s Call to Evolve” and have already found it quite telling in opening a new understanding about where the Church is and where it may have yet to reach. Paul Smith, a pastor for almost 50 years, uses an understanding of Ken Wilber’s integral psychology to delve into understanding the Church through its history, as well as where some churches have already embraced the possibility of going beyond the “traditional” understanding of the faith.
In conversation with a number of people from diverse backgrounds in Christianity, the Church, faith, and even other religions I have noticed a great number of differences in how one approaches “faith” and “belief”. Understanding these differences through the lenses of integral psychology and developmental psychology has given me a chance to reflect upon the strengths and weaknesses of each stage of faith influenced worldviews. This book presents in an approachable way how we can better understand one another as we work and live out the life to which we have been called to in Christ.

Post-Convention Life (Seeing the Bible as a walking stick)

What really has changed?

Some people would say that everything has changed.

Questions of Biblical authority are now being discussed in many different settings and some of those conversations are convincing people that the ELCIC has departed from Section 3 of the ELCIC Constitution – “This church confesses the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments as the inspired Word of God, through which God still speaks, and as the only source of the church’s doctrine and the authoritative standard for the faith and life of the church.” In passing motions that opened ordination to those of all sexual orientations and allowing rostered ministers to preside at same gender marriages, some would say that the ELCIC is in a state of apostasy. If the ELCIC has strayed from its “only source” and “authoritative standard” is it still viable or just in a confessional conundrum?

For me it is not a question of Scriptural authority – it is a question of Scriptural idolatry. Can God only speak through the words of the Old and New Testaments? Are our hands tied in reaching out because we are told what is clean and what is unclean? Maybe what Scripture says has more to do with how we approach it and what we want it to say? Maybe our understanding is too small, too incomplete?

How would your life today be different if when you were in your early years, maybe 8 or 9, you collected the letters you had written, the pictures you had drawn, the stories you had written about your life on summer vacation and put them together in a scrapbook and for the rest of your life used it to condition the way you thought about the world you live in?

Maybe we should, just for a moment, look at Scripture that way. How has our life and faith been diminished because early in the life of the Church a scrapbook was compiled from the letters and stories that were shared in the community and then “scripturalized” so that nothing could be removed and nothing could be added? It was then used to silence new faith stories, to destroy new letters of life and faith, to control those who tried to walk further. How much greater could the church be if throughout history the canon was opened to include the Confessions of St Augustine, the Life of St Francis of Assisi, The Gospel according to Luther or Calvin, The new Psalms of the Wesleys, Letters from prison by Bonhoeffer, etc. We read and are moved by many of these stories of faith, and perhaps even give them authority in our lives. Are they perhaps also “Scripture”?

Maybe it is time to move beyond seeing the Bible as a hammer and chisel, pounding and shaping us, and to begin seeing it as a walking stick that supports and assists us along this journey of faith. It doesn’t tell us which mountain to climb or what river to cross, but it is there as we see a new horizon and as we feel the water surrounding us.

Looking forward in hope…

It is just a few days until the ELCIC gathers in its National Convention in Saskatoon, SK. Many have said that this will be a turning point in the life of the church and it will not look the same post-convention. I do believe those statements are true, but what will the “other side” hold for us. I have heard statements of despair, fear, powerlessness, wilderness wandering, pointlessness and others that have created a sense of gloom and doom in relation to the convention. It has undertones of “post-apocalyptic” living in which the life we have known will be no more.

This outburst of change is for me a sign of hope in the life of the ELCIC. Even as we are still a young church, we have fallen into a lifestyle (faithstyle?) that is killing us. We gather in small groups to do again and again what historically has been produced for us to do. We constantly look to the past and “what has been” for the “true” way to be Lutheran. We lounge in a sense of entitlement and comfort in knowing who we are historically as Lutherans, but have no idea what it is to live a “Lutheran” life in today’s world. And I believe that we fear the identity crisis that the future still holds for us.

Is it time that we renew our commitment to the Truth of Christ, instead of defending the differences that make us “Lutheran”? How would our lives change if we truly embraced the transformation that comes in the Love shown to us through the man Jesus? How could we transform this world by remembering that as we are found in Christ we are in an interdependent relationship with each other and all creation?

What might we be as the ELCIC if we look forward in hope toward a life of abundance given to us through Jesus the Christ? I am excited to see what God has in mind for the future of the ELCIC. I believe the decisions made will indeed break us from the past “institutional” identity of church (which scares some people) into a transformed life that lives in relationship with God and the Creation in love and joy and hope.

Evolutionary Christianity – A number of voices asking questions

Evolutionary Christianity.

… we looked to the future with trust?

What if we looked at the future and trusted that what needs to happen will happen? We always get so caught up in what the future might look like and what changes it will require that we forget that the future is something that we have a part in making. We gathered this last weekend in Camrose for the Biennial Convention of the Synod of Alberta and the Territories and had opportunities to look back to the past, discuss where we thought we are at the present, and look forward to what might be. Can we truly embrace the future with trust? We have a God who in the midst of difficult situations reminds us, “All things work together for good.” We can trust the future because God is good and calls us forward each and every day to share the love of Christ with those around us that transformation might occur. But still we wonder what “might” be. We are anxious that the ELCIC we know may be different in the future. I believe that if the ELCIC doesn’t change to embrace what the future brings it is not truly the Church, but rather some dusty museum piece that only has life as it is remembered. The Church will change as the Holy Spirit blows. As we gathered for the Friday evening worship service, the Holy Spirit was blowing. We gathered around one another to join in laying down our burdens at the Cross while being healed and strengthened through the laying on of hands. Tears were shed. Pain was shared. Love transformed. The assembly who left following the time of worship were not the same as those who entered. Eyes were lifted. Shoulders were straighter. Eyes were filled with life and determination. And God’s love in Jesus Christ was set free through God’s people as new life was evident in those who walked again into the world.

Should we fear what the future brings? Never! For we are wrapped in God’s love and sent into the world to transform and bless. Thanks be to God!

Emergent Village

Emergent Village is a growing, generative friendship among missional Christians seeking to love our world in the Spirit of Jesus Christ.

Another website that has some interesting ideas for living and reaching out missionally to the world.

via Emergent Village.

Exploring the Inside of the Christian Tradition Esoteric Christianity. Part 1: Two Kinds of Religion

Exploring the Inside of the Christian Tradition Esoteric Christianity. Part 1: Two Kinds of Religion.

… we really believed change was possible

Why is it that we so often fear the change that may make things not only different, but better?  I think that we really do not believe that change is possible.  We know the power of habit and the comfort of the usual, but change could bring a whole new level of understanding, of cooperation, of happiness.  All of our powers of thought, science, theology, passion, and grit have brought us to where we now find ourselves; might they not also be used to bring about a whole new world.  We must believe in the possibility of change if we want change to be a possibility in our lives.  If we feel we are powerless and hopeless and we cannot see a way out, we are most to be pitied.  But if we cannot put up with the way things are now (decreasing membership, biblical illiteracy, conflict) what is to stop us from doing a major makeover of what we are as church.  Only believing that change is really possible…

… we thought of spirituality of one part of an integral (whole) life

Maybe the problem with church is that we do not take the whole person seriously.  When was the last time your pastor asked you about your physical exercise or nutritional habits?  How about if you were studying anything at the moment?  We often as church goers only think about the church as helping learn more about our spiritual selves, but what if the church looked beyond the worship and prayer focus and also gathered for exercise classes and studies on quantum mechanics?  What if we thought that spirituality was only one part of us and we worked as hard in the church to also provide opportunity to foster greater health in other parts of our lives.

… we rested in the presence of God

We still much too often spend our time wondering what we can do next to change what is wrong with the church, with the world, with ourselves.  We feel useless unless we are doing something that makes a difference.  We are caught in a never ending cycle of doing-doing-doing.

What if we came into the presence of God and just rested there for a while?  Many times we think of prayer as that time in the presence of God, but it often gets filled with our mind/heart chatter that drowns out God from the conversation.  Maybe we can just be quiet for a while and let God fill us.  Maybe we can realize that God is in control and we can rest in that truth.

Spend just five minutes being still.  No idle mind chatter – no requests of God – no wondering what is next on the schedule – just be still.  Breathe.  Rest.  Know that God is with you.

“Be still, and know that I am God.” Psalm 46:10

A great, yet challenging DVD

Father Thomas Keating and Ken Wilber reveal:The Future of Christianity

Do you want to bring your Christian faith into alignment with the modern world? You are among friends. We also left the traditional church and looked for a different kind of relationship with God in many places, before we re-discovered this new vision of Christianity taught by Father Thomas Keating and Ken Wilber. We are so excited by what they shared with us that we created The Future of Christianity DVD set to introduce these inspiring concepts to individuals like you who are seeking a new kind of modern relationship with Jesus Christ.

Integral Life offers a new 2-disc DVD entitled The Future of Christianity: A Startling New Vision of Hope for the 21st Century.  Join Ken Wilber and renowned Christian contemplative Father Thomas Keating as they present their newest—and some say most interesting work! Discover a vision of the Christian journey that has radical implications for our spiritual lives and for the world as a whole.