coffees with john of ellis

so as part of a pretty incredible weekend up in the kwazulu of natal i managed to get some coffee time with john ellis (formerly of tree63 and ‘john ellis has hung up his cross and become a giant piece of plasticine’ fame) to hear his version of where he is at and whether he still loves Jesus (he does, whoops i hope that wasn’t one of the ‘between you and me’ moments we shared, john?) and what the flippery flop is going on in these parts…

i left having had coffee with a new friend (well i think i did, or having spent time with a reeeeally good actor – aw man he’s probly going to post something on his blog saying i just used time with him to get better blog hits…oh wait, which in turn will give me better blog hits… hee hee win-win, go for it you thespian!) and someone who is a lot on a lot of the pages i find myself on in terms of God, good christian books and Monty Python/Blackadder humour (altho someone do him a favour and buy him a copy of Black Books so can at least update a little, sheesh – oh wait he Mighty Booshed… never mind, as you were) which let’s face it, are among the most important things in life… ‘she turned me into a newt… i got better!’ and all

in fact twice when i mentioned the two books that had changed my life asking him if he’d heard of them his response was ‘that book changed my life’

is john ellis still a christian? you know what? ask him yourself. i’m pretty sure i know the answer to that question and i look forward to many more conversations and hangings (of the caffeine type not the christian lynch mob) with him when we happen to be in the same place and maybe he’ll even one day include a song about No_bob on one of his albums (okay, maybe not THAT close!) but the point is i did not meet jon to interview him for a magazine or a blog and i don’t think it’s particularly fair on him for me to talk about all the stuff we talked about (and hope i haven’t already said too much, john?) and i don’t really want to – i was just glad for the opportunity to spend some time speaking to someone with a brain, who thinks, and loves it that the place where he is in right now is getting other people to think, and has a sly mischievous sense of humour which creeps in and out of his regular conversation

i do think that sometimes the judging of a person, for whatever reason and in whatever way, says more about the person judging than the person being judged and that Jesus had a bit to say on people with planks sticking out of their face muttering comments about the person in front of them cleaning the dust speck off of their contact lens…

tx john for a treemendous time (no no no PLEASE TELL ME I DIDN’T JUST WRITE THAT!)

an enGAGeingful nite

so last week at enGAGE (sun eve congregation gathering at stellenbosch vineyard church) we had over 40 people there including a bunch of first-timers and roymond preached up an elijah storm in his first ever preach on the firetruck in the desert and your buckets capacity… at the start of the service i challenged the congregation to be more committed in terms of choosing to hang with us more regularly (attendance can be a bit sporadic at times) not wanting to make it a heavy ‘you-must-come-to-church’ vibe but also when i preach this term a series that build on each other it really helps to have people coming more regularly to get the whole journey as opposed to one or two of the pit stops

so last nite, once the worship team took their places – and we don’t have a worship team of 25 people – there were close to ten people left – from 40 plus to under 20 – great upping of commitment there – and so i was completely bummed

before then i was only partially bummed – we have a prayer time with the leaders and whoever wants to join us before the service and everyone felt so dead and withdrawn and no one was really praying or anything so i felt like God wanted me to pray for peoples amping and filling with the Holy Spirit and so i shared a bit of that and then said whoever wants God to fill them or up their amping please stand and i will pray for you – by then i was super amped to see God just pour Himself into people and really bring His joy and life and ampdness…

til no one stood – a room of 6 or 7 people and no-one seemed ampd to be ampd – and then one of the guys tried to cover over the awkwardness perhaps by making it into something else but i really felt strongly that this is what God was wanting to do and if no one is ampd then that’s fine but i really want to pray for anyone who does – my beautiful wife Val stood and i got to pray for her which was amazing – but again, no one else – and i’m sure people have their reasons and so on and that’s fine – i’m not judging them, but i’m just saying that i was super bummed…

and so during worship singing time i really didn’t know what to do because the preach i had prepared on engaging with those outside of the church seemed a bit random when there were only about 20 people inside the church and so i decided to lus my preach and instead share the anne rice/john ellis stuff that i’ve been blogging and thinking about – i started by saying how i know the pastory type guy has to have it all together and can’t be bummed and so on, but i am and mentioned the previous week’s commitment thing…

and so i read Anne Rice’s three comments/posts and we had the raddest discussion and within about two minutes i had left super bummed behind and just embraced the potential and opportunity to discuss something that is quite real in the church and the world right now – the importance of understanding where a lot of christians are coming from at the moment – loving Christ completely but not so ampd for some of the horrible hurtful things church can get up to

this week i also read the headline of a story of a church in the US (think i know which one if their reputation is anything to go on) who are planning a koran burning on the 9th anniversary of the destruction of the twin towers – i can not begin to imagine the damage that might cause – i can imagine the ‘message of love’ it is sending out with the label ‘church’ attached and i can fully understand a lot of people wanting to have nothing to do with being associated with that particular label

another friend of mine commented on the anne rice note i had on facebook something about those clowns who love Jesus but leave the church – again words of love which are really going to help ‘those clowns’ realise how misguided they are and draw them back towards the church?

at the end of it all, and the really delightful participationary service it had become, the conclusion was this – it is our responsibility and opportunity to draw alongside the anne rice’s and the john ellis’s and so many more people out there in similiar waters, and demonstrate to them a church that IS known by the love they have for each other, that is loving the sinner (while hating the sin but making well sure the sinner realises the difference between the two), that is involved in society actively building, reaching out, loving, reconciling and being the body of Christ in a world that is desperately hungry to see a church that lives out what it says it believes

hanging up john ellis of tree63

so i managed to track down the john ellis article that started all the ‘fun’ and am very much looking forward to having caffeine with the man when i hit durban this week to hear more of where his heart is (and cos, hey, caffeine!!) but i’m not too sure he is going to be poster boy for pagans anonymous just yet – also take some time to read some of the comments by christians and meditate on the whole ‘you will be known by the love you have for one another’ piece of that book we follow…

the article that was published [disclaimer – it was an article, written by a journalist, wanting people to read it]

john ellis blog response

the real deal [may contain traces of john ellis and anne rice]

cool, i really enjoyed my teaspoons/socks post earlier today cos it feels like the most for me thing i’ve written on here lately – almost like i’ve slipped into writing for an audience again which is not what i wanted my blog to be – aware of the audience yes (and my responsibility there) but writing what i want to write and what is more real than just giving a lesson…

anyways i have a feeling it’s about to head more that way and that excites me.

have heard a lot about john ellis (formerly Tree63) giving up Christianity or saying things that good christians aren’t allowed to say or something like that and i don’t want to comment on that cos i haven’t had a chance to connect with him and ask him what it’s all about – but i went on to his page and saw a comment which linked me to anne rice (the author)’s facebook page with these two comments:

Anne Rice: “For those who care, and I understand if you don’t: Today I quit being a Christian. I’m out. I remain committed to Christ as always but not to being “Christian” or to being part of Christianity. It’s simply impossible for me to “belong” to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group. For ten …years, I’ve tried. I’ve failed. I’m an outsider. My conscience will allow nothing else.”

followed by this one: Anne Rice: “As I said below, I quit being a Christian. I’m out. In the name of Christ, I refuse to be anti-gay. I refuse to be anti-feminist. I refuse to be anti-artificial birth control. I refuse to be anti-Democrat. I refuse to be anti-secular humanism. I refuse to be anti-science. I refuse to be anti-life. In the name of …Christ, I quit Christianity and being Christian. Amen.”

and i think i ‘get’ it – and it may be the same kind of thing John is saying, again i don’t know at all where he stands – in terms of my own stance which has been for a while now to refer to myself as a Jesus-follower rather than a christian because there seem to be Christians who follow Jesus and christians who don’t and i don’t so much want to be associated with those who don’t as if i am part of them, because clearly i am not…

again, i am not sure exactly what she is saying or what she means by it but there does seem to be an embracing Jesus, running away from religion kind of feel to it, and yeah, that i get

altho, and this is my twist, and it’s a question, do we get to do that? is it that easy? when i look at Jesus, He persevered with His bunch of people who lived and acted and spoke time and time again completely against who He was, what He was teaching them and who He wanted them to be, and yet He stuck with them… and ultimately – one Holy Spirit filling later – He transformed them and they were the ones (not a bunch of Jesus followers getting it right the whole time, the disciples!) who went on to change the world

so i get it. but i am not convinced, yet, that it is the way to go. altho it does appear to taste very nice.