You want to see a butterfly? A poke on tract evangelism

I used to own tracts, but I never liked them. Even as a kid, I though they were cheesy. As I grew older, and several complete strangers gave me a tract on the street, I got a very sour taste when I encountered them, because it felt so impersonal and cold. Most people that gave me a tract didn't even ask me my name- it was as if they were filling a quota over actually connecting with me. Here's a little humor on the the topic from The Core Blog...

clipped from www.thecoredowntown.com Here... I've got one smashed in this book somewhere... aha! Here it is! A pipevine swallowtail... very rare. Yes, I realize the colors are a little dull... it is dead after all. But this way you can look closely at it... study it. You can turn it over in your fingers and catalog its parts and know everything you need to know about a butterfly, with none of that silly running around in a meadow to worry about! You wanna see Jesus? Hmm... oh yes! Here's a tract.

Emerging Wednesday- motives for evangelism?

clipped from www.jesuscreed.org First motive: evangelism; secondary and apparent motive: helping out. Some see through the thin skin of that secondary motive and think they’ve been used or had. There are two possibilities here as I see them: either one does everything for a chance to evangelize or one sees all acts of kindness “a new kind of evangelism” or “the goodness of the gospel itself.” Let’s add a third: do all things with the hope that one can evangelize but waiting patiently for that chance. Let me suggest something and it comes from this Christian conviction: God redeems in Christ and our vocation is to live in that story of Jesus by performance and proclamation.

Emerging Wednesday- Christianity and social justice in a postmodern world

Vanguard Church discusses some of the issues facing the church in the field of social justice-- specifically, how should the church converse with postmodern people in regards to social justice? Here a few snippets that grabbed me.

clipped from vanguardchurch.blogspot.com Ministry that is properly situated to reach postmoderns embraces postmodern ideas about evil. We affirm the “will to power” that points out that we human beings (both individually and in our institutions) consistently abuse power in order to oppress others and to further our own agendas. We affirm that we should be careful not to trust others too far. We affirm that Auschwitz and brutal World Wars and even current empirical power grabs by the governments of the West prove that our supposed morality is questionable at best. We affirm that even those who are religious are not immune to the bent human need for power A Christian movement that displays the grace of Jesus Christ in righting injustices speaks to the postmodern heart and mind. It says that God knows that the world is not the way it should be. It says that God is indeed doing something about it. It says that the ultimate solution to these problems is God…God hanging on a cross.

Emerging Wednesday- Christ's strategy

A portion of a great series from Signs of Emergence about Christ's "strategy" in regards to how he carried out his mission and vision. I thought this would be something a little Easter-y but something different.

clipped from kester.typepad.com what Christ is doing when he stays silent at his trial is refusing to even enter the game that the strategists plotting against him have set up. It is as if he deliberately loses, because by losing he is totally subverting the very idea of the game. And this is where Paul and Judas go terribly wrong. Presented with amazing opportunities to 'do something for Jesus', they fall into strategy, they throw their chips in and enter the game. Why didn't Paul imitate Christ and keep his mouth shut? Because his strategy was always to get taken to Rome, and to take part in a 'power play' with Caesar. On the cross the religious leaders taunted Jesus - if he's so powerful, why doesn't he save himself? This was the final temptation Jesus faced, the same one the devil ended with in the desert: take part in the power play. Jesus emptied himself of all that power, emptied himself of strategies, because he had to be emptied of the Self - the Self that pretends that it is powerful and influential.

How often do we go with Jesus' strategy, and how often do we follow Paul and Judas? I shudder at the thought of what we would find if we polled it.....

Emerging Wednesday- burnout

I have never been a big fan of the "Superman Pastor." While attending college preparing for ministry, I vowed I would never let myself experience burnout and would never try to run my own show and do everything. While I think a little age and maturity have shown me that avoiding that may be harder than you think (passionate people have a hard time holding themselves back), I still think that if you as a pastor can remember a few key points, you're well on your way:

1. The pastor isn't supposed to do it all. I'm not a C. Peter Wagner follower, but one book he wrote, Pastors & Prophets, makes a really good point: pastors shouldn't and can't wear all the spiritual hats in a body. He/she is not supposed to be the pastor/teacher/apostle/prophet/elder/evangelist/caregiver. It will kill them to try to do it all.

2. Some pastors are bad at doing anything other than pastoring. Let's be clear: a pastor is someone that fosters relationships and communes with others in fellowship through life. They comfort, guide, and share with others and serve them. That doesn't make them a good preacher or speaker, though, and that's part of the problem. Some pastors need to get out of the pulpit, and some preachers need to just teach and let someone else run the church. We have titled people as "pastor" when they aren't, and we have asked pastors to be things they are not.

The paradigm problem is that the "pastor" is in charge, and only he can be the mouthpiece of what God wants to say on Sunday, and that's not healthy. Why? Because I don't think the pastor can hear EVERYTHING God is saying and I don't think one man can convey that message to the right people at the right time.

I was fortunate in 2005-2006 to work in a church where the head man was willing to share his pulpit, and all the leaders rotated and shared the pulpit. Some were better than others, and sometimes I wished someone would skip their turn, and sometimes I thought someone had something going and should go a few weeks in a row. But the overall beauty was that the congregation got to see the hearts of their entire leadership, and the church experienced the Word of God and the heart of God from different perspectives, different voices, and different styles. It was refreshing!

The problem is that if the "pastor" is relieved of the majority of preaching, then what are you paying him for? The idea would be that he is more free to pursue community development, counseling, relationship building and visitation. But how can you measure that? Will logs have to be kept? Would he have to report his minutes? The reason I bring this up is because tithers will want to know where there money is going. I don't like that, but it's going to be an issue.

I'm going to ramble more on this later....

In other news, the Cubs are 0-1. Surprised?

Emerging Wednesday- a sad definition

What is a Christian? This clip is from Ryan Wiksell's blog, asking not what we Christians would define ourselves as, but what we may have allowed the world to define us as. Read on....

clipped from www.thecoredowntown.com Christian: (n) An adherent to the western religious paradigm known as Christianity, identified by numerous cultural indicators, including: mandatory attendance at weekly religious performances, neat and tidy appearance, chipper attitude, straight-ticket Republican loyalty, big house less than 25 years old in an excellent school district, well-dressed and well-behaved children, homogenous circle of friends, SUV or minivan ownership, abstention from alcohol, tobacco and crude speech, upwardly mobile, and others of the like. Common usage: “I can’t let my family find out that my boyfriend got me pregnant; they’re Christians.” “I don’t want to work Sundays anymore; Christians are the worst tippers.” “Christians think that they can start a war, and God is always on their side.” (Source: The Non-Christian Worldview Dictionary.)

Emerging Wednesday- theology by Bono

Bono from U2 recevied an award from the NAACP for his Red campaign, and had this to say about God and the poor:

"Whatever thoughts we have about God, who He is or even if God exists, most will agree that God has a special place for the poor. The poor are where God lives. God is in the slums, in the cardboard boxes where the poor play house. God is where the opportunity is lost and lives are shattered. God is with the mother who has infected her child with a virus that will take both their lives. God is under the rubble of the cries that we hear during wartime. God, my friends, is with the poor. And God is with us, if we are with them."

The quote is even more striking because he pointed it directly at the church, specifically "those in the church who sit in judgment". Ouch. What does it say to the world when Bono is making more sense to them than the church is?

Emerging Wednesday- what it heresy? apostasy? schism?

Just about everyone throws around words without knowing what they really mean-- especially religious folks. In reading all about the emerging movement, and theology in general, it's amazing how quickly the words heretic, apostasy, and schism are so commonly invoked. But what do they mean? Well, here you go.

clipped from kenn.typepad.com

APOSTASY, the most grievous of the three, is a complete and utter rejection of the faith (“denying the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ”). That is clearly not the aim or purpose of the emergent church movement as I read them.

SCHISM means separating from the universal Church because of unwillingness to be constrained by unity. I think the emergent movement might be guilty on this count, but so is Calvary Chapel, and most of the Christian church. More on that some other time.

HERESY is an intentional or rejection of an essential element of the faith as outlined in the three creeds (Apostle’s, Nicene, Athanasian) embraced by all four streams of the universal Church (Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Protestant, and Anglican). False doctrine and heresy are synonyms.

Emerging Wednesday- inerrancy, Amazing Grace, and choice sermons

A movie called Amazing Grace is coming out on the 23rd. It stars Ioan Gruffud as William Wilberforce, the British Parliament member who helped end slavery in the British Empire decades before America abolished it. Early reviews I have read are promising, and the trailer looks good. I intend to see it in theaters and support it. Oh, there's some connection the the song Amazing Grace as well, if you hadn't already figured that out. For those out there that want a total surprise, I won't say what the connection is.

Tagged onto the movie's release is a movement to have as many churches as possible sing Amazing Grace on Sunday, Feb. 18th. While there may some PR here to promote the movie, the website for this (http://www.amazinggracesunday.com) talks quite a bit about the resurgence of the slave trade in some parts of the world. I might just add our house church to the list....

While attending Lee University, one of my favorite chapel speakers was Rev. Joe Novenson, pastor of Lookout Mountain Presbyterian Church near Chattanooga, TN. He is an amazing teacher that presented the gospel in a humble yet powerful way that still captures my spirit. I was pleased to discover that many of his recent sermons are available as mp3's on the church site for free. In a day where many pastors are charging $20-30 for sermon sets (something that REALLY bothers me when the price is exorbitant), it is refreshing to see someone of great anointing and talent willing to share it freely.

Now here's the one that'll get somebody mad- I am studying this whole topic of biblical inerrancy. Since I was raised in rather fundamentalist circles, believing in an inerrant text is kind of a given, so it was never discussed. I have been reading some excellent posts from internetmonk.com on the subject and am encouraged for one reason: you can still believe the bible is true even though it may not be inerrant. Most fundalmentalists will say that if the bible is not inerrant, then you:

1. Can't take the bible as true anymore.
2. You are claiming that God made mistakes, which he can't do.
3. You doubt the Spirit's ability to rightly inspire the authors of the text, or the authors' ability to hear it correctly.

In all areas of faith, Christians are always willing to concede that no matter how anointed a person is, or how much God uses them, they will still make mistakes and that's just part of the result of a perfect God communicating through an imperfect man. But when it comes to Scripture, that argument is completely dismissed and somehow that fraternity of bible authors managed to get everything correct down to the last punctuation mark. We always talk about how God can overcome our failing and still get his message across, but that doesn't apply to Scripture.

I'll be talking about this alot in the near future because I really want to understand both sides. I am starting with an intertmonk recommended series by Chris Tilling.

Emerging Wednesday- Jason Clark's polar views

Jason Clark is one of the links I permanently keep on the blog for his insight and wisdom in the emerging conversation. He was one of the first blogs I ran into when searching out emerging resources and read him daily.

Plug complete.

Jason posted back in January about 2 "poles" of emerging ideas that exist. I will not recap the whole thing here, but go check it out because it is worth a read. His basic presentation is that there are 2 kinds of emerging Christians; the "post/anti-church" crowd, who is ready to abandon the traditional brick-and-mortar institution, because it is so far gone it is not worth saving. That's the "a" side. The "b" side is more reconciliatory, and willing to labor within the church to foster change. Jason talks about finding a middle ground between the two, as both have their advantages and flaws. Again, I'll let Jason's blog (and the great comments on the entry) speak for itself.

I'll soon be writing about my "emerging polarity" and where I might be heading.

Your programming schedule

I'm going to try and be a little thematic around here, mainly to have some order to my OCD brain. Since I am not doing this for "fortune and glory" (Indiana Jones, anyone?), I don't want to limit what I write about, but for my faithful 3 readers out there some continuity may make things more understanding. The randomness will still appear from time to time, but I'm going to try to include at least one entry a week in these topics, although the days are not set in stone:

• Photo Monday- interesting, funny, pretty pictures I find on the internet tubes.

• Emerging Wednesday- Since Wednesday nights are usually associated with church here in the South, I'll talk, muse, or link to something about post-church issues/questions/topics.

• Nerdy Thursday- something from the Nerdery; computers, movies, games, gadgets, comics, who knows? It will be nerdy.

The other neat thing about this is that the labeling feature will allow to search for posts that only fall under these topics, so some of my blogging threads will stay continuous. I will also be going back to old posts and apply the new labels just to add some depth to the categories.