Costumes from Halloweens Past

The Metamorphosis of a Blog

Folks,

Not that any of you exist, but just in case you were subscribed...


I've moved and renamed my blog. As my life has changed (as all of ours continually do) I've made the switch to wordpress.

You can follow my new blog Coffee Shop Prophet over there.

Please take a minute to change your subscriptions and comment on the new blog.

I'm really going to try to blog more these days.

Thanks for your comments and support.

Signing off,
Snod Bloggins

The Killing of Me

I don't understand it.

I can't comprehend how millions of Christ-followers before me have done it.

How they have stayed motivated to fight for what matters.

I understand how most "Christians" have done it, because they avoid, or numb themselves to the pain. They seek the things of earth that will not last (when Christ comes to take the world back through his redemption of the church)

But how do the true followers do it. Christ himself, in his infinite patience, didn't have time for some things. But he always loved people, especially those who got love the least, and needed it the most.

I'm having trouble loving. but its not the traditional "least of these" that I struggle so mightily to love. Much of the struggle I have is with the own leadership at my faith community.

I've had a problem for a long time of placing leaders that I look up to on a pedastel, only to be crushed when they fall. Well I have gotten better.

I thought I had found the happy medium between the hopeful dream and realistic expectations. I guess I was wrong. People will always fail you.

This isn't about an isolated event, its been building. I just don't understand how people can treat other people, whom they act like they love, like dirt sometimes. Or how relationships can be built around convenience. It's very convenient for some people to be my friend, because I don't often say no, because I am passionate, because I want to follow Christ, and have seen glimpses of what the church can be.

Now I'm not claiming to be innocent of treating people poorly as well, but I don't use people... and I try my best to treat them with dignity always.

So why are we so broken?

We could discuss original sin in circles until we all hate ourselves (and are angry with god)

We could pretend like everything is peachy keen when its obvious that it is not.

I want to face my brokenness straight on. I want to be open and honest about it, I am not perfect (or anywhere near it). I want others to point out my brokenness, and rejoice in the redemption that is happening in my life.

But for some reason, I don't get excited too easily about others' brokenness. I get hurt.

I'm frustrated with inaction and injustice, I'm injured when I'm treated (intentionally or not) like I have less value than others, like my time isn't as important. I am let down when people who say they care don't show it.

Today a gifted speaker from stl came to speak to our congregation. He talked about exclusion.

He focused on Jesus cleansing the temple grounds. He told us about a short wall that separated the jewish section close to the main temple from the gentile section, and he talked about how the Jews mistreated the gentiles through the misuse of religious power. Then he asked us who our gentiles are. Who in our own lives are we drawing lines against. Who do we automatically drop into a lower class because of some characteristic.

A few specific people came to mind first, but then I started to realize that I easily give up on people who speak one way, act another, and don't seem to be trying to reconcile the two. I give up on people who don't visibly grow.

I'm not sure I've gotten this entirely wrong though. We must fight the pharisees, but we must do it because we love them, we mustn't separate them out in judgement, but bring them in in love.

The Frown on God's Face

I was almost home yesterday, just having entered my beautiful and myopic suburb when I passed my favorite church.

Now my real favorite "church" is the one I am a part of, my brothers and sisters, but I love this church for its street sign. See, the sign is on one of the two main streets in a suburb of 60k, so it gets lots of exposure.

I have had so many laughs on my way home from work, I've also gotten pretty angry (at this specific church, and the church on the whole).

Well unfortunately this was an angry one.

America Bless God

We've all seen it/heard it before.

What the hell does it mean?

Because when I look at scripture and it talks about God blessing Israel, it meant bestowing certain gifts upon them. Now maybe blessing god makes sense to some of you (Just like saying, "God we pray that blah blah blah..." while you are praying), but to me I am lost. I certainly have nothing to give to god, other than that which he already owns (everything). Unfortunately I think that the word bless has come to mean, wish well.

And really, don't get me wrong, I want god to have the best week, so yeah, bless him up! but seriously, this phrase has no meaning. God has blessed us, blesses us now, and will continue to bless us, he has given us life, and everything in it.

I came across a post on Tony Jones' blog six months or so ago about meaningless statements. the discussion was about whether or not statements can be/are meaningless that reference the limits of god (I'm not explaining it well, but its not important).

It got me thinking about meaningless statements. America Bless God certainly holds some meaning these days, but that doesn't mean it isn't meaningless meaning...?

I think the author means America Praise God, which is nice, except we have no clue how to do that...

but how do we bless god?

Its just another example of christianity trying to be cute, thinking it somehow can be relevant to the society that already hates it.

Not sure what I'm trying to even say here, other than I'm frustrated.

Frustrated with every attempt to be relevant, without really being relevant. To me, relevance is an infinite term, limited only by the number of people you are trying to be relevant to, which, by definition, makes relevance a relational thing. Too bad the church can't learn to be relational. Even then, the times that it seems to get it, it is a shallow and meaningless relationship.

When will we learn to truly know people?

The Emerging Church

Dr. Eddie Gibbs on the Emergent church (for those of you looking for a three paragraph description [not definition])

He's pretty spot on with most of it. (seems to come from an "unbiased" but pro-emergent view)



They(Emergents) believe that the church – especially the Protestant and Evangelical streams – are the product of modernity, and our assumptions need to be re-examined now that we are in a post-Christendom, pluralistic and increasingly post-secular social context. These profound cultural shifts have increasingly marginalized the church. Consequently, the church can no longer operate on a come-to-us basis. It must become a truly missional church, recapturing the simplicity, mobility and engagement with culture that characterized the disciples of Jesus and the churches of the New Testament.

For Emerging Church leaders the church is not a noun but a verb; it is not a place but a people; it is not primarily a weekly gathering but a community of the faithful.
Salvation is not a visa for heaven stamped in your passport, but a life to be lived here a now that presents a radical challenge to the materialistic values of our culture. It is as much concerned with life before death as with life after death. On account of their emphasis on relationships, community and active participation, they are not interested in megachurches. They regard the bible as central to their faith, but not as God’s answer book to all and every question. Rather it is a book that inspires them in their journey of faith, linking their personal stories to God’s unfolding drama from Genesis to Revelation. Also they insist that spirituality, that is so significant within our culture, must bea holistic spirituality that embraces every area of life. They don’t buy into the separation of spheres – public from private – that prevailed within a modernistic, secular mindset. They find most in common with the early church that operated from the margins, owned no real-estate, and engaged the pluralistic world of their day with humility, grace and sacrifical service in the face of hostility and persecution as a counter-culture movement.

But they do not adopt an isolated, judgmental stand. Rather they believe that God’s
presence is evident in the wider culture, with which they seek to identify, in order to become “good news” to the tens of millions of younger people that have either walked away from the church, or never walked through its doors. In theological terminology this is a mission characterized by incarnation, which represents authentic identification and reconciliation with a view to transformation.

The Emergent Churches represent a ground level movement rather than top-down
leadership initiatives. It is present both within traditional denominations as well as new networks. It is both de-centered and interconnected, via websites, chatrooms and blogs.

The Practice of Resurrection

"we will continue to practice resurrection, in the face of a world that continues to create destruction"

-Shane Claiborne on the fire in kensington



More to come soon...

The Lightning Storm

I was driving home after a particularly frustrating day yesterday when I was blessed with a treat.

Lightning.

My drive home from work is around 35 minutes without traffic and the sun had just gone down so the roads were clear of other commuters.

The storm had been gathering on the horizon for most of the day, it seemed.

Finally as I was driving on the highway the show began.

There was an amazing electrical show directly in front of me in the distance. This allowed me to watch and keep my eyes safely on the road (sort of).

There were two lines of clouds in the distance, both large and billowing, but I only stole glimpses as the lightning struck. It was nearly all cloud to cloud lightning, stretching out and splitting into the fingers on God's immortal hand. I can't even find the words now to describe the beauty.

As the lightning struck the top edge of the closer line of clouds was illuminated and the entire back line was lit. In fact, much of the lightning was blocked by the closer storm. It was quite frustrating to not be able to soak in the entire beauty of the storm, but for it to be just out of grasp.

As I kept driving I wondered if this is the very reason for discontent. I see such a beautiful picture of Christian love, but not fully.

I experience some of it daily, and can dream about what the rest looks like, but it never comes to fruition.

Obviously this is just the way life is, always moving forward (hopefully) but never quite reaching the goal...

But I know it is beautiful, even if I can't see it all, and we're melting away clouds as we get closer to our dreams.