What concerns you, concerns me

So i think i have a different understanding and idea of church than a number of people i know.

And my picture of what church is feels a lot bigger, rather than smaller, than some other peoples. i am not saying that the Sunday church local congregation vibe is not church, but i am suggesting that maybe it is more than that.

One example for me has always been so-called ‘para-church’ organisations like Scripture Union and Youth With a Mission. Kingdom-focused people doing kingdom-focused things. How is that not the church? It fits in with both the ‘bride of Christ’ and the ‘body of Christ’ metaphors that Jesus used to describe His church.

Yet, for a whole lot of people, if you are not attending a meeting at that particular place on that particular day [which must be a Sunday, by the way] then you are on some kind of a slippery slope and should be very careful.

Something like that. And while people we know would probably not quite put it in those words, there is a strong sense of ‘Not Alrightness’ when people hear you are not attending a local church.

“We must pray for the Andersons.”

The beautiful Val [tbV] and myself went to visit a church yesterday morning. And on the way home we were chatting and really interested in the idea that ‘This’ [our morning experience] ‘is the thing people are very concerned we become a part of.’

i wrote a piece recently on how we [as christians] have far too often gotten caught up in majoring on the minors, while neglecting or sometimes skipping completely the things God seems to think are majors.

WHAT CONCERNS YOU, CONCERNS ME

For example, there are literally thousands of verses in the Bible that talk about the poor and our attitude and action towards them, the fact that to Jesus, having some kind of outreach or relationship or investment with the poor seemed to be a big deal.

There are not thousands of verses talking about being part of a local congregation and giving them ten percent of your money.

Yet, which of those two get church-going-people freaked out when they are not happening?

That’s right. We are more than okay with attending a meeting once a week with a majority of people who have absolutely no engagement with the poor at all [beyond the ten percent we throw in the bag, box, tin as it goes past because then job done, conscience cleansed, someone will now be looking after the poor with that money, slash paying the church electricity bill] but panic stations when someone we know who professes to love Jesus, are not in regular attendance.

So first of all, i think it is imperative to figure out what are the things God is wanting us to major on, to prioritise, to make essential in our lives and to make sure we are doing those, and then to fill in whatever gaps may appear around those with everything else.

And secondly, before you get too concerned that tbV and i have ‘not found a church yet’, look at yourself in the mirror and then at those who sit next to you at church and through the lens of giving-to-the-poor see if you should be more concerned about that. Then continue to pray for us.

WHAT IS THIS CHURCH YOU WANT ME TO BE A PART OF?

A lot of this is stuff i have covered in my book which i am furiously working towards self-publishing. So watch this space or something.

The service we visited yesterday was not particularly our style. One of the things we spoke about as we drove home was, ‘Is THAT the thing people are so concerned we are a part of?’

And so this is my genuine question [and i’d love it if you would take a few minutes and leave an answer in the comments section cos i really am interested in how you would answer this question], what exactly is this church you want me to be a part of?

When tbV and i were part of the Simple Way community in Philly, we had morning prayer times [with a group of gathered people]five times a week where each time we read a passage from the Old Testament, one from the New Testament, a Psalm, sang a song together, read some liturgy together and had an open time of praying for whatever was on our heart. Our weekly ‘work’ was largely serving those in the community around us [so trying to love our neighbours well].

In fact, when i talk about it to other people, i usually conclude by saying, ‘the only thing we missed in terms of regular congregational church services was corporate worship’ – singing together in a group. Which i am not now even convinced is the way tbV or i would particularly primarily choose to worship God. [There is not a lot of space or patience or understanding in the church for those who don’t particularly like to sing – typically it is met with a suck-it-up-this-is-the-only-way-to-really-worship-God attitude].

So please tell me, before you let me know my views on church are wrong or how important it is that we are part of a local church, what does that mean? What exactly is the thing you are wanting me to be a part of?

DESPERATELY SEEKING CHURCHING 

tbV and i have visited a few church services since being back [as people have invited us] and i definitely have Common Ground Wynberg on my list for the next free Sunday we have cos that sounds like a great mix of people. But we haven’t been panic’d about it. We are in a period of transition where we don’t even know where we are going to be living yet and so committing to a group of people in an area far off from where we land doesn’t seem like the most sensible of things.

So on the one hand, not desperate in terms of ‘Must. Find. A. Church.’

But on the other had, we chatted about it during the same conversation and both agreed that we are not happy with our current state of non-regular-community as an ongoing thing. We both realise and acknowlege that gathering is good. That breaking bread together feels essential. That journeying with a specific group of people can be really helpful.

i do imagine however, that neither of us would be too concerned if that did not happen on a Sunday. Regular gathering with a group of Jesus-following people on a different day of the week feels like it might be okay to us. [Runs to check bible]

i also imagine that not meeting in a church building would be okay with us. And probably more than okay. I imagine if we were given the choice of church building or home or pub on the corner or coffee shop that church building would probably come in 4th. Jesus spent time in the Temple. Absolutely. But He also spent probably a lot more of His time churching outside of the official building – in boats and on hillsides and at dinner tables and at wells.

i have a deep hunger for the Word of God [the bible] – understanding it better and knowing it more and so whether by myself or with other people, i imagine that will likely always be an important part of what we do. Wrestling with the words and actions of Jesus and the early church and how they often look so different from ours. Engaging with the Scripture as opposed to merely having it spoken at us. [This feels like a definite area the local church would do well to have transformation in, although it would require a LOT of work and would more than likely be EXTREMELY messy, which is perhaps why we stick to man at the front giving the message and no or little space for questions or push-back or engagement].

i want to see people brought into relationship with God. i really don’t feel like i have a gift of evangelism and think actually that i am particularly bad at it [although every now and then God manages to use me anyways] but i believe that it is important and want to see it happen and am not convinced that a Sunday meeting in a church building is the best place for those outside of the church to be brought near [because the stuff we do when we get together is PRETTY WEIRD to those not used to it – think singing and arm-raising and dipping tiny pieces of cracker into pretend wine which we refer to as blood and so on]. But around a dinner table might be, or in a lounge where an intentional conversation has been initiated and so on.

And so on.

Do i think Sunday church gathering in that particular building is church? Absolutely [as long as it is much bigger than just that hour and a half meeting – if that is all your churching is, then you need the prayer] – if the Sunday gathering does not inform or empower the rest of your week experience and your whole life, in fact, then i seriously think you need to rethink that area of your life.

But bigger than that, i see ‘the church’ as a singular entity made up of smaller and larger church congregations and what we call para-church organisations [a horrible name, cos they are not outside of/separate from the church] who are the gathering people of God working together for His kingdom things. Or more simply the people of God doing God stuff together.

i absolutely don’t think it is healthy or even biblical to be a  ‘christian-without-church’ because God definitely calls us to do His stuff together. But i also do understand why so many people have walked away from traditional sunday church services as the expression of the only way church can be.

We are the bride of Christ, not the harem.

We are the body of Christ, not the bodies of Christ.

There really only is one church, although many smaller expressions of how that plays out.

i think, when we truly understand what church is all about, then it will become the question of Monday to Saturday, rather than Sunday, ‘Are you going to church today?’ [where church is a verb, rather than a noun of place]. Are you going to be being the body of Jesus and the bride of Christ to all of those who you encounter this day?

i would absolutely LOVE to hear your thoughts and response on this one… [be gentle]

“And then God opened a door for me.” Slap!

“And then God opened a door for me and I met “The One” and I was truly blessed and…

…everyone lives happily ever after? 

Do you ever get the urge to slap christians for speaking like this? i most definitely do!

Sometimes i just want to slap christians on the head. And sometimes i realise the well-meaning christian needing a slap might just be me.

Cos i might not use those particular words but i’m pretty sure there is other jargonese [like the word ‘christianese’ – urgh – SLAP!] that i slip into that makes other friends of mine want to slap me on the head.

And probably not just other christians either…

Hermann, who sometimes writes racist-sounding-comments on my blog, thinks i use the term ‘blown away’ too much:

You tend to use the phrase, “blown away” a lot. Every time I read it, I think of you being blown away like a feather – it implies that you are not very grounded. It sounds very cliched – used a lot by Christians. It may also have other meanings – lets not go there..

He wasn’t too fond of my use of the word ‘intentional’ either:

You use the word “intentional” a lot. Everything everyone does is intentional. By saying this, you imply that the rest of us act as zombies with no free will. If for example I spend R200 on a bottle of whiskey, it is my intention. If I give it to the poor, it is my intention. Everything we all do is always intentional so no need to mention it.

Hermann is quite direct when it comes to suggesting the way forward for me in this regard:

Please get those words out of your blog.

Well, at least he did say “please”. [Although do you think it was intentional?]

OPEN DOORS? OR CLOSED DOORS AND OPEN WINDOWS? 

i think this may be one of the ones that gets to me. listening christian types talking about God opening a door for them when it comes to being accepted into college or getting funds for a short-term missions trip or starting a relationship with someone.

i don’t think i’ve ever heard someone tell a story about going to the shops… “And then God opened a door for me as I saw a hungry person sitting outside of the store and knew that God was telling me to ask them what they wanted for lunch and I went in and bought them a meal with my own money.”

i HAVE heard quite a number of people tell me stories about buying people they meet in the street lunch, but i can’t recall any of those ever being a ‘God opened a door for me’ story.

Maybe that’s just cos all of those stories are simple obedience stories – doing what God already opened many doors for us to do when He shared His will with us [much of which i cover in this post on The Will of God]

SO WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR GOD TO OPEN A DOOR FOR US THEN?

Well, i’m not sure that He does.

i tend to find more stories in the Bible of God closing doors.

i think of Balaam and the donkey [Numbers 22]

i am reminded of David wanting to build the temple for God [2 Samuel 7]

James and John’s mom trying to strike a deal with Jesus for them to be able to sit at His left and right hand side when He is king [Matthew 20]

and i’m sure there are more and i’m sure other people could name a bunch of stories that they think are clear illustrations that God DOES in fact open doors and how could i be so stupid as to think otherwise. But i am less concerned with that right now.

The story i really DO like on this topic though [yes, Hermann who scribes racist thoughts, it blows my mind!] is this one, which can be found intentionally in Acts 16:

⁶ Paul and his companions traveled throughout the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been kept by the Holy Spirit from preaching the word in the province of Asia. ⁷ When they came to the border of Mysia, they tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus would not allow them to. ⁸ So they passed by Mysia and went down to Troas. ⁹ During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” ¹⁰ After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them. 

What is interesting is that there is no real commentary on the story and so we have to kinda fill in the blanks a little. But what it LOOKS like is that Paul and his companions tried to do a bunch of stuff.

They tried to preach the word in the province of Asia – but the Holy Spirit stopped them somehow [gut feel? word of prophecy? hint or a nudge?]

They tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus would not allow them to.

What i absolutely LOVE about this story is that the whole Trinity seems to get involved to make sure it happens right.

We don’t know why God stopped them, but they try a bunch of stuff and He does.

And then maybe the most hysterical part of the whole story is the fact that the “Yes” comes while Paul is sleeping. [so i guess this whole story could be interpreted the complete opposite way as in Paul was doing a bunch of stuff and God needed to slow him down and then stop him completely before He was able to tell Paul what He wanted him to do].

But i like the idea of Paul trying something – door closes. Paul tries something else – another door closes. Paul keeps on trying stuff [and it’s important to note the “stuff” he is trying is “kingdom stuff” – he’s not just farting into a sock here] and the doors keep on closing. Finally God speaks to Paul clearly and Paul obeys.

Does God open doors? Kind of, i think, but not so much in the way we like to talk about it:

i want a child, but we can’t fall pregnant – could an open door be the thousands of parentless babies desperate for a family who will take them in and call them their own?

i want a girlfriend, but the girl i like doesn’t like me back – could an open door be finding contentment in singleness for the moment and taking advantage of everything that goes with that?

i want to know God’s will for my life – might an open door be the homeless shelter just three blocks away from your house that is looking for volunteers, the local prison ministry looking for people who will write letters to inmates and simply be their friends, the old peoples’ home that is desperate for young [and older] people who will come and have conversations or play games or read stories to their people?

So many open doors, so little time…

And surely, the God we serve is big enough to close a door if we are earnestly heading for a wrong one?[even if He has to pull in the other members of the Trinity to do so!]

Let’s stop waiting for open doors and start living obediently.

i remember a prayer Keith Green’s wife Melody challenged her audience to pray after one particular talk:

[1] God, i will go anywhere You want me to go

[2] God, i will do anything You want me to do

If you want to see doors open quickly, that is a dangerous and liberating prayer to pray as you start each new day. Especially if you mean it.

What are your thoughts on the whole ‘Open Door’ vibe? 

on cauliflower, strawberries and raiSINs [aka UNLEARNing church]

TRUE STORY 1

When i was a young boy [yes, yes, many years ago in a galaxy] i remember a number of occasions of sitting in front of a plate of [now] cold cauliflower cheese that my mom had made for what seemed like hours with the mantra ‘You don’t move until you’ve eaten that last bit’ hanging over my young little head.

I hated cauliflower with a passion and the logic of eating it while it was warm cos it was at least a whole lot better than when it was cold, was never quite explained to me in ways that i assimilated.

Years later, i love cauliflower, and in particular, my mom’s cauliflower cheese [which is cauliflower with a white cheese sauce over it – so great!] and really can’t get enough of it when we go for lunch and she makes it.

Some things change.

TRUE STORY 2

I hated strawberries my whole life.

Until something dramatic happened one day.

I ate one, and discovered they are actually not all that bad.

For a time i would still defer to others when strawberries were around because i knew some people REALLY enjoyed them and i just thought they were okay.

But now i might knock you down if you try beat me to the last one. Especially if it is dipped in chocolate.

I have absolutely no idea why i thought i hated strawberries as a child and i was literally 18 or 21 o something when i discovered, never having tasted them before that i could remember, that they were actually okay and later became pretty amazingly good.

TRUE STORY 3

i hate raiSINs.

no, i mean really.

no, more than you.

i REALLY hate them with a passion. always have and always will.

i believe there is a reason the word SIN appears in the second half of the word…

i can trace back my vicious hatred [as opposed to just the standard hatred i had before] to a time when i was 5 and my mom made me eat something with raiSINs in, via a similiar cauliflower cheese plate-staring contest and the result was that i ended up vomiting and missing out on our annual visit to the local children’s home to watch the big screen movie [to this day i have still not watched Ben Hur] and so that is when it grew in me, but as far as i can remember, even before then i did not dig them at all.

my hatred of raiSINs and all things squishy fruit led me to write and record two anti-raiSIn/squishy fruit songs in fact, which you can track down if you are really desperate, over here.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

And then there is just the pure hypocrisy like the other day when we had dessert at my mom’s place and both my mom and my wife, tbV, looked on with unbelieving eyes as i helped myself to a large piece of Swiss Roll despite there being jam in the centre.  You know, squishy fruit. i hate jam too, but for some reason, in swiss rolls it is okay [must be some chemical transformation that takes place, or something]

WHAT DOES ALL THIS HAVE TO DO WITH CHURCH?

Well, i AM working on self-publishing a book about church that will help explain a lot of this to greater depth, at least in the way that i see it.

But in the meantime, through posts like ‘Did you go to Church today?’ and this one, i hope to challenge the way many people think about church [or maybe more accurately, don’t think at all]

Leaders of churches seem to get particularly iffy when people start questioning church or encouraging others to question any aspects of church.

But i believe it is so incredibly important for us to be questioning why we do the things we do on a regular basis [and if we discover that there is no reason for doing something we do regularly, possibly taking the big risk of stopping it]

This is my conclusion for pastors and other leaders. If your thing [in this case, church] is a good thing, then surely at the end of questioning and challenging, people should naturally arrive back at what you have. If they don’t and you realise collectively that change needs to happen, then surely that is a great and important process.

WHY IS THE CHURCH SO AFRAID OF QUESTIONS?

In Acts 17.11, we read this incredible piece:

Now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.

And then ignore it completely forever.

i am convinced that one of the biggest problems in so many local congregations of the church today is that it is filled with people who don’t read or know their bibles outside of a sunday meeting hardly at all and so, because people do not know their bibles, whatever the pastor says up front has to be correct [because they have nothing to tell them otherwise]

a comparatively huge and related problem seems to be so many people in church leadership who seem to have a fear of people in their congregations asking questions [or, heaven forbid, expressing doubts] and so we cultivate a space where people are encouraged to ‘just believe because i said so’ and not be real [to suppress questions and to hide doubts] and always give the impression that everything is great.

i wrote this piece a while ago in response to that:

love Jesus… and grow a brain

because if Jesus told us to Love God with all our heart, strength, soul and MIND, it does seem like he might be wanting us to use our minds.

 WHICH BRINGS US BACK TO THE FOOD

When we start looking at how we do church [particularly in the meetings we typically hold on Sundays but also in prayer meetings and home groups, prayer times and youth gatherings] perhaps we will have some cauliflower reactions: As a person growing up, i never saw the reason for this and didn’t particularly like it, but now that i am older i find that it is amazing and i know that is is really healthy for me.

[i have seen a lot of people, especially in Americaland heading from protestant churches back towards catholic and more high church liturgical gatherings, because they realise that in their pursuit of living out their passion for Jesus, they may have ignored or missed out on some incredible practices and rituals that make a lot more sense now]

If we start asking questions and sharing fears and taking what we see up front [and behind the scenes] and, like the Bereans, holding it up against Scripture, we might find like the strawberries that certain things we haven’t thought were worth doing, actually are. We might also have the opposite effect and realise that some of the stuff we have always liked [because it was always there and we always did it just because everyone else always did it and never took the time to ask why] needs to be thrown out, or given lesser preference to. i really believe that any church that gives itself the time and the energy to look at all its stuff and ask some why questions, can only benefit from the outcome.

We also might find, that like raiSINs, some other stuff we have always been against, is right to continue to be against. Just because others around us might be professing that raiSINs are good doesn’t mean they are.

This becomes an incredibly tricky task because there might be different things that fall into these different groups, yet seem to be similiar things which should be treated the same. So much wisdom and discernment and being led by the Holy Spirit is required to be able to move forward. To let some things go. To add some things in. To change some things around completely. To embrace some things we have always had more tightly.

But at the end of the day, it must always come down to Love.

Loving God and being known by the Love we have for those around us.

[If you feel like your church leadership might benefit from reading this message, why not forward them the link, or print it out and hand it to them. These are important things to consider.]

Did you go to church today?

i didn’t.

strangely the world has not ended yet, but we ARE on African time, so maybe give it a few hours.

in fact, we’ve been back in South Africa for three weeks now and are yet to attend a sunday gathering [gasp!]

some people are not okay with this, and we’re okay with them not being okay

i don’t imagine i will be standing in front of God one day and He will be looking down at me [cos that’s the posture you take when you ask this question] saying, “So, skipped three weeks of church in a row, eh?”

what i did do this week was read my Bible – i have been working through 1 and 2 Peter, reading them the whole way through again andagain, trying to get a feel for the whole letters in context and dig a little deeper than a single visit will do for me. i did this with Philippians once, where i read the whole book [yes, all four chapters!] every day for a month. surprisingly i didn’t get bored, but found that the more i went through it, the more i started to see. once you get to know the main bits and get familiar with them, then things that were hidden in the background start to surface and often surprise you and get you thinking and acting a little more deeply.

another thing i did this week was pray. for my sick wife [still sick]. for my best friend with cancer [really struggling this week. conversations with God about why He doesn’t seem to heal people when i pray for them. invitation for God to help me be more patient and less snappy with my beautiful wife. prayer for a number of friends who have lost loved ones this week. prayer for the right opportunity of the what-next for my life. asking God to just generally reveal Himself to me and increase my faith during what can typically be a tough time of transition. and more.

one thing i did this week was show hospitality. to friends i know and friends of my family who i didn’t know before. from simply inviting them into our current home to making them tea and coffee or hanging out with them and hopefully helping them have a good time.

i also took some time to encourage some people online. from friends i know who are sick to strangers i don’t know who commented on a blog piece i wrote and seem to be in a place of struggle. nothing revolutionary perhaps and certainly quite easy to do, but hopefully in a way that conveyed love and shared hope and helped bring some life.

we broke bread and ate together with family and had conversations dealing with God and mission and how to use money well and more. wrestled a little bit with the types of shows that we watch and how each of us probably has our own hypocricies in terms of what we think people should not be watching, but what we are okay with. great food for thought and an opportunity to share ideas and learn from other peoples’ decisions.

we worked together on training up children in the way they should grow [Val’s sister’s kids who we are currently living with] and tried to love God and love the people who crossed our paths [whether they were beggars at the traffic lights or the Jehovah’s Witnesses who interrupted this blog post by ringing the doorbell to hand me a tract to invite me to a meeting to inform me why we need a one world government] and said sorry for when we had hurt someone or got it wrong. we cared for the sick as best we could [even though these sick were our own which made it a lot easier to be motivated for].

and some other stuff.

i imagine if i asked one of the early disciples of Jesus if they had gone to church today, they would have looked at me a little bit funny or completely confused.

“Go to Church? Go to Church? How do i possibly do that?”

And sure, they had the example of the temple and then later on had the practice of home gatherings [where according to Acts 2 , ‘They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.’]

i’m not convinced they had the concept of ‘Sunday church’ because it goes on to say, ‘Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, ⁴⁷ praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.’ [Acts 2 Parts of 42-47]

i am not suggesting for a moment, that the sunday church meeting and larger context of congregation or community is bad. no, i think it is great, especially when it is.

what i am suggesting is that maybe there is more to it than that.

did i ‘go to church’ this week? i did not.

but was i church this week? absolutely.  in some many ways that count.

and it is possibly that many people who ‘went to church’ this week spent the majority of their week not being the church? i would suggest that, given the evidence, that is a strong possibility.

i can imagine someone standing in front of God one day and hearing the words, ‘You were not the church. Depart from me and continue in the life you have chosen for yourself.’

Sunday [or whenever you have them] meetings or gatherings of Jesus-following people are the pit stops to get you ready for the rest of the week – for the work of being church – salt and light and the fragrance of Christ everywhere you go. Whenever the Sunday meeting or gathering or even group becomes ‘the thing’ then i seriously believe we have missed the point.

so please, feel free to invite us to your Sunday gathering – we do hope to visit a number of church meetings and gatherings to see what God is doing in the Western Cape – but please don’t feel the need to judge me right now for not ‘going to church’ and i will do my best to not judge you because you do.

 

[For a post on Unlearning church and whether or not you should be able to ask questions in church, click here] 

 

Time to get some of my thorts together

in December of 2012 i wrote a short blog piece talking about the TFTW [Thort for the Week where ‘Thort’ is simply phonetic for ‘thought’ as in a thought i have on some aspect of following Jesus] that i used to send out regularly.

in the three years of being in Americaland, TFTW soon became TFTM [month] and then TFECOM [Thort for Every Couple of Months] before almost dying out completely, except when i would randomly decide to send one out.

i decided yesterday, now that we’re back in South Africa and are connected more regularly to the internet, to send out a TFTW and as i was writing it i decided to ask the question if anyone still wanted to receive it. While the list has about 3500 names on it, i have absolutely no idea how many people still receive them and if any at all still read them on the very intermittent occasions when they appear.

to be honest, i was expecting two or three people to respond [of which one would be my dad] and that probably would have been enough for me to continue with them [after all, that is where i started] and to be honest most of my focus in terms of writing is on my blog these days.

but i was really blown away as within three minutes i had three people saying they were in and an hour later maybe 5 to 10 more… a day later and i still have emails coming in telling me they read about one in three, or they have found them useful in sermon planning from time to time or they get to one in 5 and it was just such an encouraging thing.

so not quite 3500 emails, but a whole lot more than 2-3.

it was a huge encouragement and so i am definitely hoping to get into a more regular rhythm of sending the thorts out.

If you want to take a look at the group on Yahoo and i think get access to any of the last 10 plus years of messages, you can take a look over here: https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/Thortfortheweek/info

If you would like to sign up for these messages you can send an email to thortfortheweek-subscribe@yahoogroups.com or else you can like the Thort For The Week page on Facebook where i also post each message.

i hope these continue to challenge and encourage people who are trying to be followers of Jesus to live every aspect of their lives for – how are you using your gifts to share with the people you love the things that God has done and is doing in your life? so many exciting different creative ways to do so and sometimes it just takes one little step in the right direction.

 

Why your church map might be misleading

This is a follow-on from yesterday’s most insightful passage about map-making from M. Scott Peck’s ‘The Road Less Traveled’ that i am busy reading and so make sure you have read that one first, but this is a little bit of a deeper look at the ramifications of it, specifically for my Jesus-following friends.

There is a much larger chance that you at some point or other have been subjected to the sung or chanted version of this little mantra:

 

“God, you’re bigger than my box

You’re bigger than my theology

You’re bigger than my understanding

You’re bigger than me.”

The point being, that due to the size and vastness and complexity and enormousness of God and the smallness of us mere mortals in comparison, that no matter how big your view of God is [Who He is, how He speaks, what He looks like, how He works or reveals Himself to us, if He does at all] it is with all likelihood not going to match up with the reality of who God actually is.

A really poor analogy would be akin to a four year old child taking a look at the inner workings of a personal computer and expecting them to understand it. They will have an experience with what they see and they will understand it to the extent that their minds and vocabulary allow it to. But the reality is that their definition and understanding will fall so far short of what the truth and reality is. It is not the child’s fault. They simply don’t have the capacity to understand at that point.

So it is with God. And us. We can have some measure of understanding and some extent of experience, but if we ever decide that we have arrived at a comprehensive and complete understanding of who God is and how He works, then we are very likely going to look foolish.

“God, you’re bigger than my box

You’re bigger than my theology

You’re bigger than my understanding

You’re bigger than me.”

This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have a box or theology or an understanding. Or a map. But it does definitely mean that we can’t hold the edges of those things too preciously. As with yesterday’s Peck passage, we need to be constantly shifting or revising our map as our knowledge and experience and conversations and learning dictate to us.

What is also super helpful is realising where we are taking our picture and understanding of God from. Most Christians would claim it is from the Bible. That was given to us to help us have a better understanding of God and His story and how and where we fit into it. I would agree with that in terms of intention, but i would also suggest that for so many people in the church, that is not their reality.

For example if your picture of God tells you that the preacher of a church [a man] has to shout and get worked up and have passion oozing out of every vein and pore for it to be an effective preach, then i don’t think you have been informed by the bible. I think you have been taught by the culture of the pentecostal church.

If your picture of God tells you that to worship Him you must raise your hands in the air and emotion must be present [you must feel the songs you are singing so they become more real] then you have not been informed by the Bible. You have likely been taught by the culture of the charismatic church.

If your understanding of God dictates that liturgy is the way to truly connect with your Creator and that the only person who is able to administer the communion bread dipped in wine [or wafer dipped in grape juice, because, you know] then it is likely that you have been influenced by the culture of the anglican or catholic church.

i am not saying for a second that any of those thoughts or ideas are necessarily in themselves wrong. What i am hoping is that each of us will look at the things we believe about God and church and christianity and really try and be more sure of what is directly taken from the Bible and what is definitely a message from God [One absolute we can hang our coat on is ‘Love God with all your heart, strength, soul and mind, and love your neighbour as yourself!] and what things [some of which might be good and helpful, some less so] were merely aspects of the culture of the church we felt connected to, that we have taken on as a God thing.

“God, you’re bigger than my box

You’re bigger than my theology

You’re bigger than my understanding

You’re bigger than me.”

It is helpful to have an idea of who God is and how He works. But it can be restrictive when we hold those as set boundaries that He is never able to break out of.

For example, before Moses, God had never spoken to anyone through a burning bush.

Before Balaam, God had never sent a message to a human by way of a donkey.

Before Jesus, God had never appeared to mankind as a baby or done many of the things Jesus did in quite the same way that He did them.

Does that mean God doesn’t speak through burning bushes, donkeys or babies? Not at all. It just meant He hadn’t yet. Until He had.

ENGAGE WITH YOUR MAP, CHURCH

i believe the map-adjusting concept is for everyone. But i especially believe the church needs to embrace it.

What makes it particularly tricky is the need to embrace it with discernment. There are many long-held beliefs and practices in the church today that are being challenged [women in leadership, the LGBT conversation, stance on abortion, death penalty, euthanasia and more] and these need to be looked at. But they do not need to be changed simply because they are being challenged. They need to be looked at through the lens 0f scripture and in community God’s heart, view and stance needs to be determined.

This should be an easy one as followers of Jesus have the Holy Spirit living in them helping to inform, guide and nudge in the right direction. Although we have seen too often people on both sides of a complicated conversation [take the death penalty for example] who are clearly Spirit-filled and yet coming to different conclusions.

So this is not easy stuff. But it is so incredibly important. Too often i see people chiming in on Facebook discussions or article comment feeds and throwing out a statement like ‘The bible says so’ without giving any reasoning [beyond often an out-of-context quoted verse] or backing for their statement. And too often, if you look a little deeper you can easily see that it is ‘my church culture’ or ‘the family understanding i was brought up with’ that is actually saying so.

The easiest way to be sure if it is God or the Bible that is doing the informing in a particular situation is to take a look at the Love being demonstrated. If Love is lacking or not evident at all, then it is quite easy to know we are not dealing with a God thing here. Because with God, Love is always the key and the heart. It doesn’t mean that Love won’t sometimes be a tough one to swallow or be interpreted as unloving [God does not tolerate sin easily. He does always continue to Love sinful people though] because a spoken Truth that points out that you are not behaving in a Godly way will not necessarily feel like the way we expect Love to feel. But if Love is absent, then God is as well. And that is a lesson the church could do well to focus more strongly on.

Where we have failed to Love, we have failed to bring/show/demonstrate God.

And any space on our map that is devoid of Love, needs an instant change [and quite possibly a significant one] to get us moving in the right direction.

Can you say/sing this with me?

“God, you’re bigger than my box

You’re bigger than my theology

You’re bigger than my understanding

You’re bigger than me.”

[For the next part looking at how adjusting your map means refusing to settle, click here]

The will of God [aka When God dies, who gets His stuff]

“I’m not sure what God’s will is for my life!”

i hear this a lot, or some other version of it. And i have spoken about/written on this before, but feels like a good time to bring it up.

YES, YOU NAILED IT, GOD WANTED THAT BABY TO GET SICK AND DIE

possibly the worst scenario this plays out in is when someone gets an incurably disease or a person dies and somebody who is chatting to a friend or family member of the dying or dead person has a moment of well-meaning panic and blurts out, “It was God’s will.”

No, No, No, No, NO! It may have been God’s will that you were a moron [debatable] but i don’t believe that sickness or death was ever God’s will. Not according to His book at least – both sickness and death entered the world after mankind decided to turn its back on God and try and do things for themselves [a game we’ve been playing – badly – ever since].

and it might be good for you to take a moment and think through the ramifications of telling someone that it was God’s will that their baby died because the way you say it, if you join all the dots in all the right [or wrong] ways, it comes out sounding like you are saying, “God wanted your baby to die.” And that doesn’t sound very much like a God anyone would choose to serve.

CAUSES vs. ALLOWS

however, at the same time, i must add the piece that says that i do believe that God ALLOWS people to die [of course He does, if He can create the Universe in a breath or over a millions-of-years period, then surely He has the ability to stop every person from dying] and that i think for some people, this is seen as pretty much the same as He causes all people to die. and that, when a baby dies at birth for example, it is an idea worth much wrestling over to hold on lightly to the idea that ‘God allowed this baby to die.’ Especially when it is ‘God allowed my baby to die.’

i do believe there is a very significant distinction between CAUSES and ALLOWS though, maybe for another post, and that the latter of those is not an easy thing to work through when it becomes personal.

but IF we live in a world with a God and IF we live in a world where there is an enemy of God [in some shape or way or form – that some might refer to as the devil] who has troops or forces of his own [and some measure of power in using them] and IF we live in a world where people have free will, or some measure of it… then we cannot blame everything on God because there are at least three different forces or people or groups at work at any one time.

SO HOW DOES GOD’S WILL WORK THEN?

This is how i understand God’s will to work and it makes a lot of sense to me through my reading of the bible which i see as God’s Word to us.

I describe it as there being two kinds of will in the Bible – God’s general will and God’s specific will.

SPECIFIC WILL: Moses gets a call from God. God tells him to go and tell Pharaoh to ‘Let My people go!’ – Through a series of encounters Moses does that and eventually comes to a point where Pharaoh tells Moses that he can take the people and leave. It was a specific request or commandment or mission that went directly to Moses and no one else.

GENERAL WILL: For the rest of the hundreds of thousands of Israelites, they get a message that they are leaving tomorrow and the choice of coming or not. There is nothing to suggest that each one of them got a specific message from God calling them to follow Moses and leave Egypt. For them it was a general message that covered everyone ad that everyone got to choose to respond to in some way.

The stories that stand out for us in the Bible are those of a Specific Will nature, but if you look carefully, you will see that for the majority of the people, General Will was all that they were faced with. David and Daniel and the prophets get a Specific Will message from God which they then deliver to the people who receive it as General Will and choose how they will respond.

Crowds of people follow Jesus, but He chooses twelve of them and even within the twelve there are a few Specific Will assignments for just Peter, James and John.

BUT DOES GOD CARE ABOUT THE COLOUR OF MY SOCKS?

i have heard some people get so pedantic about God’s will for their life – i asked God this morning what clothes to wear and what breakfast cereal to eat and…STOPPIT, you’re embarrassing us!

but more importantly, i believe that you might be missing the point. and one of the biggest points in the question of ‘WHAT IS GOD’S WILL FOR MY LIFE?’ is that in so many ways, He has already answered that question for you.

a person may open their cupboard and choose one jacket [out of the 4 jackets they have] and get dressed and leave their two bedroom house [that just one couple is living in] and walk past a homeless person begging at the side of the road on their way to buy a ridiculously overpriced coffee [and a brand where the particular farmer involved in that process receives a pittance for his work] on their way to work [for a greedy multinational-corporation which is exploiting its cleaning staff] and spend the day asking God what His will is for their lives. And God sighs quietly to Himself [cos He has tried being louder and more obvious but with no great effect], ‘Why don’t you just open your eyes a little.’

THE MILLION DOLLAR QUESTION: WHAT IS GOD’S WILL FOR MY LIFE?

This may come as a shock to some of you and you will hardly believe me when i announce it, but i know absolutely, without a shadow of a doubt what God’s will is for your life. Does that surprise you? Do you not believe me? Well, open your mind and give this crackpot a chance to explain…

I know absolutely that God’s will for your life is… that you love Him with all your heart, soul, strength and mind… and that you love your neighbour as yourself [Matthew 22.37-40]

I know for a fact that God’s will for your life is… that you forgive everyone who has hurt you in any way [Matthew 6.14-15]

I know that it is God’s will for you to make disciples of all nations, baptising them and teaching them everything Jesus taught us [Matthew 28.18-20]

I know that it is God’s will to not just listen to the word’s of Jesus, but to actively live them out [James 1.22, Matthew 7.24] and to look after orphans and children [James 1.27]

I know that God’s will for your life is to reach out to those who are marginalised and considered to be the least of these, which in Jesus day were those who were hungry, thirsty, sick and in prison and who in our day may be those who are refugees and sex trafficking offenders and victims and more.

Do i need to go on? Each one of those things [and there are more] are God’s General Will for anyone who calls themselves a follower of Jesus [as well as the ‘deny yourself, take up your cross daily and follow Me Jesus gave to us in Luke 9.23 – have you taken up your cross today?]

So the answer to your ‘How do i know God’s will for my life?’ question is READ YOUR BIBLE and read it for understanding, or get someone to explain it to you [Acts 8.26-40] if you’ve been reading it for years and not realised all of this.

God has revealed so much of His general will which is for everyone who follows Him. Get that right and finished and then you are more than welcome to start asking for more will from Him. But i suspect He has given us more than enough for a lifetime [and will that is so much easier to accomplish when we do it together, in community]

SO WHERE IS THE SPECIFIC WILL?

Well this is maybe where it gets a little less obvious or a little more tricky as interpretation of scripture definitely comes into play. If you are part of the group that doesn’t believe the Holy Spirit operates any more and that the gifts of the Spirit were only for the people during Jesus’ time then you are going to have to stick with General Will [which, as pointed out, will keep you busy]. But if you believe, like i do, that the Holy Spirit comes and lives inside us and prompts us and directs us and speaks to us and sometimes through us, then that has to lave the door open for Specific Will – i don’t know how to explain that as well as a lot of it for me feels like gut feel or stepping out in faith or taking a chance and hoping it was God, but as i do those things more and more – as i create space for God to speak to me and really try to listen and as i take moments to ask, ‘God is there something you would have me say or do here?’ i see it happen and i step out and i have come to learn through my experiences some ways in which the Spirit does lead and prompt and guide and just try my best to be faithful and obedient to those [while continuing to carry out God’s General Will]

i hope this has been helpful for some of you, and i am certainly open to discussing this further – this is simply how i have come to understand it, but for the most part it feels pretty straightforward and hard to argue with. How do i operate? Well, when in doubt, or not hearing specifically from God, then let the default setting be God’s General Will. What of the things that i know god has already told me to do, do i need to be doing today? Is there someone i need to show love to? Is there someone i am needing to forgive or ask forgiveness from? Is there a marginalised person who could really use a conversation and just someone asking their name and listening to their story. Is there some more simplicity i can bring to my cluttered, expensive, busy, technology-filled life?

Do the General Will. And keep doing it. And invite others to do it with you or seek out others who are doing it well and do it with them. But be always listening for the Specific Will that might interrupt at any time [also the Specific Will is not likely to contradict the General Will – if you specifically hear God saying ‘Don’t forgive that person’, it is probably not God!]

His will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. By us. Through His strength and guidance and leading.