Pride & Love

I’m disappointed in a lot of people.

From reading lame, crude, & otherwise offensive Facebook status updates, my spirit is dampened. Come on, morons. It’s 2008. Obama is not the anti-Christ. He’s not a man of low moral character, save for the opinions some will take based on a few political stances of choice. The man has spent far more time fighting for the poor and downtrodden in urban areas than he has in formal government. That’s low character? give me a break. If you don’t like his politics, suck it up. Get over the paranoia. Stop listening to FoxNews and backwoods preachers and look at facts. He’s not “the liberal of liberals.” He’s a Democrat. He’s for more government control, government spending & support, and of course higher taxes in some areas to support that government spending. And do you know what else? He’s not the first! Bill Clinton was similar and he was a far better President in virtually every realm than any Republican leader of the past 25 years, maybe longer. 

Last night I got to have a good conversation with a friend about Pride and America. On the cusp of the election, I had talked some to a group of young adults about how American values and the Kingdom of God values were antithetical in a lot of ways. Here’s a picture:

My friend was particularly curious about the subject of pride. This country is what we have, and whatever President is chosen is the President we have to follow. Shouldn’t we at least take pride in that? From the context of our conversation, the bigger question is “shouldn’t we support the country & the president?”

Absolutely. I think the problem is that “Pride in Country” and “Love for Country” get mixed up. Our pride is related to our identity and our integrity, so our pride and allegiance should reside with the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom only. But our love? Oh my, it should be overflowing. We should have abundant love for America, Americans, and the American president. 

Maybe as Christians in this brave new world we’ll have the courage to leave pride behind when it comes to our politics and instead champion Love. After all, pride is a great and beautiful thing, close to the heart of God. But Love… Love IS the heart of God.

(*the chart of values is loosely adapted from the thoughts of Shane Claiborne & Chris Haw in “Jesus for President”)

more on Community

When we use the word ‘community’ in church, which definition do we mean?

When we say we want ‘deep community,’ which definition do we mean?

When we say we want a “Sunday morning Community” or that we’re interested in a “Tuesday evening Community,” which definition do we mean?

I’ve heard so many young adults express the need for community. They say they connect better in community, grow better in community, and even learn better in community. All of which I agree with. 
The connection point is a no brainer.
Your holistic growth is definitely hinged on dependency and humility, something you can’t fully grasp solo or loosely affiliated.
Learning is the quality I find major disagreements with, but only if we’re talking about learning in the Western, modernistic sense. If we’re talking about a shared life, setting an example type learning and education–then community fits the bill.  

Will you scroll back up and glance over the 9 definitions again?

 I want to quickly make these 2 points:

-the first 4 definitions are probably not in line with the Biblical, eastern idea of community. They’re more of sociological definitions dealing with research methodology and structure. Here, the language of community is used to group people for the very purpose of defining, segmenting, and differentiating. In short, they sum up the Western cultural idea of ‘community.’

-The last 5 definitions are better. They’re much simpler, much more graspable. In some ways, they stand in stark contrast to the first 4, though they share some phraseology in places. Now, we can use these definitions. We can co-opt these definitions for Kingdom use. Listen to the phrases….

“leading a common life according to a rule…”
“community of property”
“community of interests”
“the needs of the community”
“joint possession”
“similar character”

 
 
I don’t want to be quick to point out the similarities to the church in Acts… but here we are. Let me be the first to say that I think there are far too many Christians, especially young Christians, who over-romanticize the Apostolic period and the early church. What people need to be upfront and honest about is that there were a lot of problems in the church. Everything wasn’t peachy and super spiritual, like sitting in front of a TBN broadcast all day, or being out with Ray Comfort and successful 9.5 out of 10 times using a banana to evangelize.
But what I think we can learn regarding their church(es) and community is that they brilliantly co-opted the prevailing culture’s concept of community and fused it with something bigger, more dangerous, and deeper than Rome had ever seen. Their communities were bringing the Kingdom of God to collide with the lives of everyone who saw them.
What I’m suggesting is that we must find a way, through authentic struggle, to take in the cultural norms concerning “community” and co-opt them. Not 50 years ago, or 400 years ago, or 1800 years ago. Today. in 2008.

First step? Maybe dream of ways to see the Kingdom bumping into those first 4 definitions, blurring the lines of where research ends and the transformation of God is only beginning…

Can you finish this sentence?

Recently I was on an airplane….

Those words have to lead to a story right? A good story, a bad story, maybe even a life-changing one. After all, I am a follower of Jesus and “we” seem to be notorious for taking unwanted and unwelcome “action” in the moments that take place between buckling the worthless seatbelt (come on… if the plane has problems, what’s that going to help?) and that awe-inducing moment after touchdown when every person on the plane whips out a cell phone at the same time and has a million people to call or text. 

No, not me. I’ve never once sought a meaningful interaction on a plane. It’s rarely even crossed my mind. In college I did more preaching and speaking than I tend to do these days, but I can remember the question of a friend as if he just asked it, “Do preachers really have all those amazing stories or do they make them up?” Hmmmm…. if I were to ever tell you a good airplane story, I’d be making it up. 

So it doesn’t pass for a good story, but I do remember something particularly striking about my last flight. I didn’t know the lady that sat beside me…but she sure thought she knew me. Here’s why: she had a TON of questions for me. A lot of questions. But I never really got to answer them. She answered her own question before she even let me attempt it. The few times I did manage to get a few words out, she finished my sentence before I could. And she was impressively wrong on most “answers.” Thankfully, she struck up a conversation with the guy on the other side of her for a long enough period that I slipped on my headphones and pretended to sleep for the next 3 hours. 

It somehow, in some way, works into the thought that’s been plaguing me for weeks now. I spent 3 years away from cultures that claimed a Biblical heritage. Most of the Christians we interacted with had very little experience in church and little-to-no discipleship history. They had no guises about knowing a lot about Jesus or the Bible, and in some cases they didn’t seem too interested in learning about it anyways. Now I find myself back in the Bible-belt, with churches on every corner. It’s not a bad thing, it’s just different and I’m learning to cope. Do you know what I’ve realized?

I’m not a humble person when it comes to Jesus (or other things). We (most Christians) don’t have a childlike faith. I don’t have a childlike faith. I know EVERYTHING. I have an answer for every question. I don’t need to experience it or have a conversation about it. I already know it. Right? Most of the conversations that are had in churches are just helping us reinforce the same things we’ve “believed” since we were younger. The “priesthood of all believers” has become “everyone’s an expert.”

The “priesthood of all believers” has become “Everyone’s an expert.”

Please let the gravity of that kick you in the face.

 Some conversations I’ve had about church and Christianity slightly remind me of that horrifying feeling that came over me as I watched Jesus Camp, where these elementary school kids are taught to recite creeds and statements that champion Creationism and “defeat” Evolution….using words and concepts that they can barely pronounce, much less grasp. Because, for those Christian parents and leaders, we don’t need those kids to be intercessors who come before God for the people (priesthood of all believers)—we need them to be experts on Creationism who kick some Evolutionary butt. Wow. 

Have we created Christians who, much like this lady on the airplane, are much more likely to try to finish people’s sentences and insert their expertise and knowledge rather than listening, loving, and experiencing?

We Can Solve It?

I just saw a commercial with Al Sharpton and Pat Robertson sitting on a couch talking about the “one thing [they] agree on–the need to take care of the planet.”

Is this just good publicity that these guys need with the general public? Probably. But is it worth looking into? Check it out here. [wecansolveit.com]

In the words of a famous rapper: “Danger!”