"I Brought You My Son."

The church is the presence of Jesus in the world. Let's think about that.

In a startling statement in Mark 9:17-18, "A man in the crowd answered, 'Teacher, I brought you my son... I asked your disciples to drive out the spirit, but they could not'."

Actually at the time the man brought his son to the disciples Jesus was on the Mount of Transfiguration with Peter, James and John, and Moses and Elijah. If I was Jesus, I would have pushed back at the frantic and bewildered father, "What do you mean by saying 'I brought YOU my son'? You talkin' to me? I was not even here, you numbskull!"

But, thankfully, Jesus did not say that.

In the mind of the man, to bring his son to the disciples was equivalent to bringing his son to Jesus. The disciples were an incarnate extension of Jesus. The disciples' failure was Jesus' failure. Later on the father would preface his request with "If you can..." (Mark 9:22). This "if you can" irritated Jesus and he responded accordingly. But the man had some reason to question Jesus' ability in light of his disciples' failure.

Jesus in his last hours would pray for the disciples, "My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me" (John 17:20-21). Oneness with Jesus and the Father...that the world may believe that the Father has sent Jesus. That reality is about us--the church. Most USAmerican Christians are "one" with America more than with the only radical Savior for America.

Ponder these words of the glorified Jesus to Saul of Tarsus, ""Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"

Saul answered, "I am not persecuting you, Lord. I'm only persecuting Christians here and there."

Jesus said, "Don't you get it, Saul? Everything you do to the Christians you are doing to me!"

Jesus seals the reality that his followers are his presence in the world.

This world, filled with desperate people, has every right to conclude who Jesus is and what Jesus can do based on the life, words and deeds, attitudes and priorities of the church.

God help us. "Lord, we believe; help us recover from our unbelief."

The Joy of Mini-Church: 5th and Final Part

I will conclude with some personal musings about mini-church. I use mini- in place of mega-. I am persuaded that mini- is where it's at pastorally.

A person who is interested in and skilled for (and "called" to) pastoral ministry carries an internal vision of local church life. The prevailing "business" model of church will appeal to those with the requisite leadership (read CEO) and management skills. Achievable goals, clear objectives, measurable standards and crisp job descriptions will be the vocabulary of the operation. None of this is bad nor is it necessarily biblical. It's the way things are in the good old U.S. of A. A Harvard or Yale MBA is more required than, let's say, a seminary ThM or MDiv to take charge of the megachurch. Bravado and challenge are the guts of mega-ministry. "We gotta take the hill even if we die trying!" shouts the commander- in-chief. Mega- means big. So, you need help. It's a "team" thing. Probably Philip, the disciple, was Jesus' "executive pastor" because Philip carried the calculator. "Lord, we don't have enough bank to feed this mob. Cha-ching!"

Maybe it's just me, but pastoral ministry ought to be, well, pastoral. My goal as a pastor is to help ordinary people living their ordinary lives to be attentive to God. If they take a hill or two in the process, fine. But to take several hills and then have them ask, "Well, dang, where was God in this whole enterprise?" seems futile to me. Jesus got more done in 3 short years with Twelve people than a lot of USAmerican pastors get done in 20 years with 5000 people. What's up with that?

You can't package and market "soul care." It can't be purpose-driven. There are no 7 sure steps to soul care. You can't fill in the blanks in a manual and learn soul care. Do pastors need to be attentive to God? Yes or no? Here's the reality : We're burning pastors out by the hundreds every week and they show up at our retreat/renewal centers ashamed and crying, "I lost God. I actually lost God somewhere in this mess called ministry. I kept the 'operations' afloat, but I was running on empty." Church = keeping the operations afloat (expletive deleted).

Human relationships are not digital or programmatic. Sound and sight and touch, laughter and tears and silence, story and memory and hope, pain and questions and freedom to deeply doubt and still be loved, hate, confusion and bitterness, forgiveness, peacemaking and embrace. Waiting for and helping Rodney and Betty to get from their car using their walkers to their chairs on Sunday morning. Listening to little Jessica tell why she's wearing a watch: "It tells me when I get to go potty" she beams with an absolutely gorgeous smile. High-fiving with energetic Sam and getting some coffee for aging Ray. Talking theology with Jeremy, talking drywalling with Harold, thanking Cheryl for her delicious meat loaf and helping Rich hang letters on the church sign. Grieving with a new widow and laughing with Tim and Sonja about the "thrills(?)" of raising daughters. And in the midst of life as it is, encouraging one another to stay attentive to God---to God's presence, love, promises and mystery.

Few are those who find it.


I am ending this brief series because all you need to do is google "small church" and helpful resources galore are available.

The Joy of Mini-Church: Part 4

Nickles and noses. Not!

How do you measure a "successful" church? Budgets and buildings and bodies? I read somewhere that when you measure a church by personal relationships, the small church is the best expression of the Christian faith. When we think that a Sunday event is the marker of success, then personal relationships take a much lower rank on the priority list. Many people filter in and out of "big" churches and nobody knows their name. So with the dawn of the 1980s, "small groups" became the mantra of big churches. One illustration I saw at a "church growth" conference was a picture of an elephant made up of a collection of mice. Big church made of small groups. Nice. Whoopee.

Love is never anonymous. Love has named, personal interaction all over it. The Trinity is love according to the Apostle John. Yet, this love never came from a distance, from a platform up front through a well-crafted monologue. Love had a face and a name, touching hands, dusty feet, both a tender and turbulent voice, and an engagement with the best and worst of humanity. Small churches are about named people who are deeply committed to loving God and loving others. The love is not a succinct leaflet or an iPod message or a stunning foyer with a Starbucks in the corner. The love is a smile and handshake, a listening ear, a reaching in the pocket and money given without having to go through "the proper budgetary channels." It seems that small churches are just the right size for loving God and loving your neighbor. I read somewhere, "Small congregations are the right size to be all that God calls a church to be."

I think a church is too large when its size distracts us from practical, nitty gritty love. When all the energies are directed into "growing" rather than into "loving," the church has become an idol. Jesus did not say, "The world will know that you are My disciples by the massive people- warehouses you build and call churches."

Can large churches really love God and love people? Of course! But they have to overcome so many obstacles (or, as in the movie O, Brother Where Art Thou "Ob-STACK-als") that simply don't exist in the smaller churches.

Here's an insider note, a myth-buster. Conventional, big church wisdom says that in a small church the pastor does everything. He or she has to. Pastor is the hired gun; the paid professional. It's simply not true. In my small church I am not frantic to "mobilize the laity." I'm trying to keep up with them! They are loving God, loving each other and their neighbors. My challenge now is to take all that loving and help shape it into some corporate---"let's do these things together"---strategies.

I hope you ponder this particular joy of the small church.

NOTE: Les Puryear visited and commented. You talk about some good stuff about mini-church! Click here www.lesliepuryear.blogspot.com

The Joy of Mini-Church: Part 3

Family. The greatest joys, the deepest heartaches.

One of the joys of mini- versus mega-church is that people want a sense of family. I admit that it is possible to create a "family feel" in a mega-church, but it's not easy and it's not the same as being a family. Sometimes people will gravitate away from a big church saying something like, "We just felt lost there. We could come and go and no one would even know. So, we wanted to seek out a small church where we could develop a sense of belonging...of 'family.'"

Those who know more than I do about these things tell me that the moment you choose to be a "family" church, you have immediately limited your growth potential. At a certain growth point a church will not feel family-like anymore. Some line is crossed and the church becomes "an organization" or "a team" or (gasp!) "an army." Mega-churches work like mad to break their bigness into littleness--with connecting church, house churches, small groups, or "platoons." I think that at some point the very forms of bigness work against what the "church" is supposed to be. I could be wrong.

My question is this: why do we have to outgrow the sense of "family"? Who says with any kind of binding authority that being a family church is a bad thing? I get out my New Testament and review what God's up to in calling out people for his Name and I see "family" everywhere!

I know that the first century familia was not the same as the USAmerican "nuclear family." The familia included a man, his wife, his children and his slaves (with their families). Yet, the family was a working metaphor for the called-out ones of God. We are the "household" of faith. We have a common Father and older Brother. Even Paul chose to use the family metaphor to shape his apostolic ministry, telling the Thessalonian church that he served among them like a "nursing mother" and like "a father." He didn't throw around his apostolic weight; he demonstrated family love. Moreover, and most strikingly, Jesus said, "Who are my mother, my sister and my brother? Anyone who does the will of my Father, that's who!" Jesus redefined the family--the new people of God.

When our daughters were younger I would sometimes refer to one of them as "old-what's-her-name."

"Oh, Da-aaad! You know who she is."

Of course, that's what families are for: a place where you are known. Not tagged with a sticker that reads, "Hi, my name is John." And it's not just your name that matters. You matter, and your entire story is held as a sacred trust. You are not your story, but you and your story are honored and challenged and transformed "in the family."

I know that's what bars are for, too. "Cheers"--where everybody knows your name.

Mini-church is family size. We're small enough to create a common family story and yet big enough to do more in and for our community than any one (USAmerican nuclear) family can do. A Trinitarian God-shaped relational community exists and it seeks to spread the love and the joy. The idolatry of the USAmerican (Christian) nuclear family is dismantled in the presence of a serving, missional, multi-gifted spiritual family where there are no "big shots."

Turn in your Bibles to Luke 4, and pass the green beans and potatoes...

The Joy of Mini-Church: Part 2

Uncontrived intergenerational community is another joy of the mini-church.

The bigger the church, the more the crucial realities have to be programmed. Crucial relationships have to be turned into "goals," "objectives," and "measurable standards" with someone responsible to see the program succeed. Nothing "mega-" happens naturally. "Mega-" must be "visioned" and "staffed" and "budgeted."

Thankfully it's not that complicated in a small church.

Meet Ray. He's an older Dutch man with white beard and hair. His rich, sonorous voice stirs us all as he reads the Psalm for the morning. In the Netherlands during World War II he served in the underground and led clandestine assaults against the Nazis. When Ray tells me what he did to survive those horrendous months of war I sense that I'm at the edge of a suffering and pain that I'll never really comprehend. Ray deeply loves "Gott." To hear Ray's passion as he ends the corporate praying of "the Lord's Prayer"--"...and the power and the GLO-ry forever"--sends chills down your spine.

And the following Sunday, there is 11 year old Shelby, blonde hair, blue eyes, 'cute as a bug' as they say, reading for the congregation the Psalm of the morning. Her voice brings to us the 'voice of God' just as Ray's did the Sunday before. I've met Shelby's two younger sisters and I know her mom and dad. Shelby is sharp. She's already a seasoned trial lawyer in a little girl's body. I know from inside sources and I've seen proof.

For a small church, we've got the generations covered end to end. I baptized little baby Nathan on Mother's Day and I recently did the funeral of Mark who died unexpectedly at age 53, leaving a widow and four children and four grandchildren.

Nothing is contrived. We aren't trying to be intergenerational. We just are. Young voices and old, aches and pains, giggles and diapers, walkers and hearing aids, game-boys and hair-ties. We've got bald babies and bald old men. We've got young adults (like Julie and me...don't I wish we were still 'young adults'). Children have a place and space with the adults, and yet have their own space as well. We have singles, and widows, we have marrieds and remarrieds. We have war veterans and postmoderns. Most of all we have a common love for Jesus Christ.

As the pastor, I want people to know that God's voice sounds like the voice of everyone in our community. Not just mine, or Ray's or Shelby's. Even out of the mouth of infants our God speaks.

Life, intergenerational life happens in mini-church. What a joy!

The Joy of Mini-Church: Part 1

In Leadership Journal I saw a funny cartoon some years ago. A street ran between two churches. On one side of the street was a huge mega-church and on the other side a small mini-church. The pastors of both were fleeing their respective churches and running toward the opposite church shouting, "Finally, this is what I really want!" Mega-guy wants a mini-church and Mini-guy wants a mega-church.

I am going to do a meandering series about the joys of mini-church. While I do not intend to disparage mega-churches, I do tend to view them as celebrity churches. Just as Hollywood elevates celebrities against whom many citizens unwisely measure their ordinary lives and live vicariously through "the stars," so lots of people (and pastors) in small churches get star-struck by and perhaps envious of the evangelical celebrity churches. I do confess that I've learned a lot from Willow Creek Community Church, Saddleback, Mars Hill Bible Church, Hillsong, and other big time churches. But, let's admit it, these are the celebrities among us---us, the ordinary, non-celebrity churches. The average Episcopal Church has 89 members. Most USAmerican churches are 100 or less.

Ed Dobson, long-time pastor of Calvary Church here in Grand Rapids, MI, once said at the Moody Pastors' Conference, "Big churches have big problems; little churches have little problems. So, brothers and sisters, don't envy me because I pastor a big church." I'll never forget Dobson's transparent comment.

I don't want to repeat the recurring litany (cliche) of the small church: Bigger is not necessarily better. Why? Because sometimes bigger is better. Bigness is no sin, but neither is smallness. The fatal flaw in thinking about smallness in a "super-size me" culture is that smallness means or marks failure. Or, smallness represents lack of passion, or comfort with the status quo, blah, blah, blah. Wrong!

I, like most of you, am aware that we're in a massive transitional era in church history. We're in a vast liminal space. Some enduring, cherished, yet merely human constructs of theology are being questioned, debunked and/or reconfigured. Ideas move the world. Theological ideas move the church.

These are the days of highly interactive, global, transitional theology. I, for one, like it. It does not scare me, as apparently it does a lot of my pastor-peers. Even the idea of "pastor" is being reimagined. Great. But in liminal space, the floor moves. Nothing is nailed down. Liminal space needs liminal leaders. For those who need a "nailed down" confidence--an unmoving floor-- these are frightening times. Fear provokes a plethora of panicked idiocy. My advice? Chill. As passionate followers of Jesus and the Jesus Way, we'll make it through. Not without tears and, perhaps, not without scars. Take a hard look at our Leader--the "nailed down" One.

The first joy of the mini-church: I see a gathering of people and I know all their names. I am even learning their stories--their many blessings and their heart-rending brokenness. We're here for each other and we're here for our community. We're not driven by church policies; we're driven by relational trust as we seek to love God and love people. Do we want to grow? Of course, but we will grow relationally and deeply and personally.

I do not miss the days when I looked out on a room of mostly strangers...regular attenders. As Eugene H. Peterson emphasizes: the personal name is the most important part of speech.

"The shepherd...calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me..." (John 10:2,3,14).

"Free Labor for the Sunday Event"

My friend, Susan Arnold, over at The Philosophical Pastor made some unsettling, yet-true-in-many-cases observations about "church" in our time. Susan commented, "Seriously though, (and this is, unfortunately, serious) you know what is really heart-wrenching about all the pushing and signing up and “discovery of gifts” you describe here is that those “discoveries” are just a way to get people to think they are using spiritual gifts and doing ministry when they serve coffee or set up chairs. Those “inventories” never really result in people being mentored by others and developed in the gifts of the Holy Spirit for the equipping of the saints; they result in people getting corralled into free labor for the Sunday event."

"...people getting corralled into free labor for the Sunday event."

When is this crap going to stop. Many American evangelical churches are chewing staff pastors and people up and spitting them out for the sake of the "bottom line" and "getting the numbers up." Something as biblically valuable as the Spirit gifting a community of people to live a life of love toward God and others is degraded into USAmerican pragmatic manipulation to keep the activities of a workaholic church afloat.

Get a Laugh! PFKATPFKATC

It's good to be able to laugh at ourselves.

Dan McDonald is a friend of Bill Kinnon and Dan pastors Grace Toronto Church. Dan has jumped into the People Formerly Know As conversation. Here are Dan's thoughts on People Formerly Known As The People Formerly Known As The Congregation"

"I raise a glass to the People Formerly Known as the People Formerly Known as the Congregation, who, upon hearing that their disaffection had created a tsunami-like publicity wave that was about to become a Zondervan marketing campaign and then a new para-church ministry (40 Days of Anti- Purpose?), quietly realized that it was no use. Even their defiance had become hip. Soon CNN would be calling, and Larry King would be asking them for an interview. Sigh.

"And so, with heavy hearts, they looked around for the most authentic expression of Christianity they could find. It wasn't in the Christian bookstores. It wasn't in the radio programs. It wasn't even in the TV shows; Lord, no. Oprah didn't quite make it. Benny and Jimmy and the TBN gang had too much hair spray and too many white suits and ever-white teeth. And it was no longer in the blog weave known as TPFKATWhatever, which was now hopelessly popular, cool, hip, and with it.

"So they dragged themselves down to the local church. Not the magnet Uber-church that took up 15 acres of land, but the local church with the faded sign and the musty carpet. And there, they found something bizarre.

"Second-rate music, draggy announcements, bad children's stories, dated PowerPoint templates, and something else.... real parents who were teaching children about Jesus with joy in their hearts. Ushers who loved to serve. Snacks teams that laughed as they missed the last part of the service just to feed a hundred people. Guitarists in tears over a cheesy illustration by the young pastoral intern, who was so nervous he had forgotten to button his shirt properly and was speaking for 58 minutes because by gosh, since he only got to preach twice a year, he was going to tell them everything he had learned in the past 6 months. And patient singles, couples and parents nodding dutifully to him, knowing he was nervous and helping him feel loved and prophetic and useful. and finding that in those 58 minutes were some very helpful things for them, because a Voice was using this intern in his inadequacy.

"And that Voice, the Voice of the Shepherd, touched the PFKATPFKATC. And they remembered why it took them so long to become the PFKATC. Because despite the second-rate production values, the Spirit was here. He promised to be wherever two or three are gathered in His name. Excellent it wasn't- Cheesy it was. Authentic? Go ask the snacks coordinator if her joy is authentic, and she'll think you're from another planet. You can't DREAM UP this kind of second-rate cheese combined with this much first-rate joy in our culture any more; it has to be authentic.

"So they- the PFTATC, that is, decided to be radical and do a crazy thing. They called up the People Presently Known as Pastors, and found a bunch of peope equally frustrated, tired, restless, and hopeful. And they talked. And the PFKATCongregation realized the PPKATPastors hardly read blogs, because they are so busy dealing with the complaints and needs of the People Still in Their Congregation. The pastors were stunned that these people cared so much; they had assumed the leaving was because the PFKATC cared too little.

"And lo and behold, they each found out something wondrous and true, and that is this: that the people presently known as pastors mostly got into the pastorate for people like the PFKATC, because you care so much about the kingdom. And so do we.

"And so I raise a glass, as a Person Still Willing To Call Myself a Pastor, to You, the People About to Be Known Again As The Congregation. I know church isn't what it should be. That's my fault- and yours. I stamped it with my pathologies, and so did you. Don't try to bail on your responsibility just because I got paid to do this full time. Guess who paid me? This sucker is OURS, first to last. It's wounded, and weak, and corrupted, and full of hypocrisy- I agree.

"But the funny thing is... it IS the body of Christ. A messed up, messy, ego-saturated, hypocritical institution on earth. With idiots like you and me running it, what did you expect? Oh yeah, and one more thing - it is also His Bride. The glorious, triumphant, sinful yet forgiven, cleansed, spotless Bride against whom the Gates of Hell shall not prevail.

"If you turn your back on His Bride, you turn your back on Him. And since you are His, you won't do that. You will come back and help make the Bride beautiful again. Because you care. There is enough piss and vinegar and sadness and passion and real, Spirit-groaning hope in these blog threads to start a new Reformation. It's high time we started. Who's got the nails for the Door? I'll bring the hammer.

"And drink a glass to you all.

"Welcome back.

"Cheers."

Dan

* * * * * * * * *

Bill Kinnon commented, "Dan made me laugh and skewered me with the truth."

Dan, I, too, thank you for your wading into these PFKA waters and bringing a perspective that can easily get lost in the turmoil of "doing church" in the 21st century.

TPFKA Update from Bill Kinnon

Over at "achievable ends," Bill Kinnon provides an update of THE PEOPLE FORMERLY KNOWN AS series. It is the April 20, 2007 entry.

The TPFKA virtual conversation is expanding. The church as "institution" is sick. People are willing to voice the symptoms of the sickness. They are longing for a healthy reality that participates in Jesus' vision of "church," and that vision is not only emerging, it is being lived "outside the four walls" of status quo church.

The Women Formerly Known as the Pastor's Wife

Thanks to Lyn Hallewell over at "Beyond the 4 Walls," we now have another episode of "The People Formerly Known As..."

With a spirit of gentle honesty Lyn writes her reflections.

Click: The Women Formerly Know As The Pastor's Wife.

Thanks, Lyn.

Note: eye = a Google image.

THE GIRL FORMERLY KNOWN AS A NORMAL CHRISTIAN

The following is from Heidi Daniels.
(photo on the right)

* * * * * * * * * *


I am the girl formerly known as as a "normal Christian."


You may know me as a violinist, as a teacher, as a sister, daughter, wife, and friend. You may have noticed that I don't attend a church building anymore and worried about me, maybe thinking that I have really fallen off the deep end theologically. Maybe you haven't talked to me in a long time because you are convinced of this. Maybe you've thought I'm turning away from God, or away from the Bible, or at least away from the Body of Christ. The truth is...
I'm a girl who deeply desires God. I believe I'm his image-bearer, though I'm still learning what that means. There are many like me, many who for years fit inside status quo Christianity. Many who, like me, find that the old boxes no longer contain the expansive life that Christ has filled us with. Many who have quietly and sometimes not-so-quietly found new ways to live out our lives as Christ followers.


I am the girl who, as a child, would wake up her parents late at night to confess some little act or thought that I perceived to be sinful - because I couldn't sleep, my conscience was keeping me awake. I am the girl who couldn't lie because it made me sick to my stomach. Don't get me wrong, I don't think these things reflect my "godliness from a young age", but rather my tender conscience combined with the overwhelming fear that I had, even as a child, of being "wrong."
I am the girl who read her first theology book when she was 13. I ate it up. By the time I was 18, I felt like I knew it all. I had systematic theology "down." I began to study philosophy in high school. I could use words like "pelagian" and "gnostic heresy" and "synchronistic" and "dialectic" intelligently in conversation. I read everything that existed by Piper, Packer, and Bridges. Then, being that it wasn't enough to read "about" the works of people like John Owen, I went back and read the originals, like "Mortification of Sin."


I am the girl formerly known as a normal Christian. I read my Bible daily and highlighted, underlined, and wrote notes in the margin. I led my first Bible study when I was 16. I am the girl who attended not one church during my high school years, but two. I was the faithful church attendee every Sunday, and then a faithful youth group member at a different church - always showing up early to Bible studies and Sunday evening events.


I am the girl who was promised the world by church leaders and famous authors, if only I would read my Bible and pray every day and submit myself to Christ. If I listened closely to the voices of "authority" in Christendom, I'd hear messages about how to secure God's blessing - how to avoid being hurt in romantic relationships - how to live a victorious or successful or wealthy life. When suffering was talked about, no one ever mentioned how dark it could be, how sometimes it felt as if God had left you all alone. Somehow even suffering was victorious, if you could be cheerful and stoic through it.


I am the girl whose world was shattered when a tale of unrequited love broke my heart, shattered my reputation, and for a while convinced me that God was holding out on me. Then I discovered that what I'd been taught was wrong. God wasn't a vending machine...I couldn't do the right thing and guarantee his response. God was wild, but good. He didn't always do what you'd expect, but he always did what was best.


I am the girl formerly known as a normal Christian...who came to see that much of Christendom in the modern era was about control. We couldn't control God, but we tried, by writing up our ideas about him and then freeze-drying them, shrink-wrapping them, and having them nailed down forever. "Sola Scriptura" became, instead of the liberating mantra of the Reformation, a way to climb into a box where we could close the lid and say that everyone on the outside "just didn't get it."


I am the girl who sat in a pastor's office with two pastors and a very hurting girl and watched as they "shoulded" on her, loading her down with burdens too heavy to carry. What was it that Jesus said about not breaking a bruised reed? It began to seem to me that the opposite was true of church leaders dealing with women who had been victimized by domestic violence and emotional assault.


I am the girl who slowly but surely moved away from being an attendee at a church and being to realize that the passion God had given me for his church wasn't about buildings, or programs, or budgets, or attendance. It was about his people - his body - his bride, the people he died to save.
I am the girl formerly known as a normal Christian who sacrificed her reputation as "one of the mature ones" - one of the ones you'd WANT in leadership, leading Bible studies, "ministering" - to instead become a person solely dependent on Christ....not pastors, not elders, not authors, not caregroup leaders. It's not that I think pastors, elders, authors, or caregroup leaders are bad people...many of them truly love God and are serving him as best they know how. It's just that I no longer accept that any of them are in a position to mediate my relationship with God, or are given any authority by him in my life. There are those that I respect and look to for an example, for guidance, for advice - like my parents, or Paul Morgan, or others who have walked with God longer than I and have much to offer me. But these people are not my authority, nor are they a mediator between God and me. They are friends, they are the community of Christ with me on the journey...but I do not bow to them.


Indeed, I do not bow to anyone except my Lord. I do not bow to church history, though there are many people that have come before, and I am grateful for their writiings, their example, their bravery. I do not bow to any organized expression of church, though they have done much good, I have come to see that there are other ways and sometimes better ways of being a living expression of the Body of Christ.


I am the girl formerly known as a normal Christian. I'm not normal anymore, I certainly don't stick with the status quo, I don't have much reverence for sacred cows, and I'm not afraid to disagree with the majority. But I haven't stopped loving the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and I'm passionate about loving his body - the church. I might not agree with you about how best to do that, but I haven't forsaken fellowship. I meet with the body of Christ in my home and the homes of others, in coffee shops, across fried rice at Thai restaurants, participating in redemptive conversations and living, loving, crying, and praying together. This, I believe, is Church - and it is something I will love and serve until my dying day.


You may disagree with me and you may think that what I'm saying is wrong...but all I ask is this...


Did Christ call us to be normal Christians? Or normal anything, for that matter? Or did he open up the possibility for so much more than getting along with Pharisees and not upsetting the status quo? As I recall, he wasn't afraid to cause a ruckus in the temple of his day. Wherever you are and wherever you serve - whether inside traditional church or outside - don't settle for normal. He has given us so much more than that.

* * * * * * * *

Thank you, Heidi. I hope many people hear you.

Greg Laughery: A Necessary Plea about "Church"

Greg Laughery is a blog friend who lives in Huemoz, Switzerland. He has a site called Living Spirituality: Renewing the Mind, Refreshing the Heart, Reviving the Soul.

Greg in a recent post has reflected on Bill's, Grace's, Jamie's and my posts about The People Formerly Known As The Congregation/Pastor.

Read Greg's gentle commentary:

This post is connected to those of Bill Kinnon, John Frye, Jamie Arpin-Ricci, and Grace. It should be read with their concerns in mind as they seek to define The People Formerly Known as the Congregation. Their four posts seem to form a nucleus around the themes of lament, of disappointment, of betrayal, of pain, of renewal, of hope and redemption. Exodus continues. The journey of wilderness wandering, in the company of God, will lead toward new beginnings, and one fine day we will all arrive in the Promised Land. In the meantime, this time in-between times ….

A Plea from the Battle Torn and Worn who are longing for New Beginnings

Conflicts are brewing at an alarming pace between Christians who are emerging and those who are not. Fine – let’s get at what we have in common and where we disagree. But please, for the sake of Christ Jesus, let’s do this with grace, love, humility, and a flair for holiness, as we live before the watching world. There has been too much, and it must be said with tears, spiteful innuendo, anger, disrespect and injustice in the past. Let’s not repeat that in the present. These battles get ugly and there is no winner. The numbers of wounded merely increase and the love of Christ pales into obscurity. We are torn and worn by the wars. Release us, oh Lord, and give us a new beginning.

Give voice to those who long to be free; let us speak of some important matters.

We believe it is essential to love God, each other, and all people.

We believe it is crucial to turn our hearts and minds to God, and in so doing to worship, to encounter God, not just to talk or read about God.

We believe we are actors in the great drama of God’s global mission of redemption and the renewal of all things, centered in and upon the crucified and risen One.

We believe Scripture and Spirit reveal God, refresh our memories, empower our imaginations, and direct our lives into increasing and ever deeper community with God and each other.

We believe that Jesus is Lord and that churches or Empires are not.

We believe the focus on and drastic slippage into church activities, committees, buildings and bureaucratic mumbo-jumbo being central results in deep spiritual impoverishment. Tear down the walls – let the people go – let us go – following in the footsteps of Christ will bring freedom for the oppressed and disenfranchised. People are where it’s at.

We believe the arts, and cultural participation and analysis, are vital.

We believe in church as community, as a Scripture reading and living community.

We believe in hospitality and a compassionate welcoming of strangers.

We believe that the Christian life is an expression of living spirituality. Living spirituality is both verb and adjective. It is to be lived and it is living. Living because God is a living God and lived because we are spiritual people.

Thanks, Greg.

"I'll Have A Double Galatians. Hold the Psalm."

Ken Medema once sang about our Christian culture's creation of the "corner drugstore Jesus pushing happiness pills." Well sung, Ken.

I am startled at the responses to the previous post. My friend, Bill Kinnon, is wondering why his essay and mine have struck such a sensitive nerve in the evangelical community (see previous two entries). "Grace" offered insights into the underlying issues of "church" gone awry and Jamie points us to a preferred missional future.

It's risky writing as we did because some will think we're petulant or whiney or bitter. As far as I can tell, Bill is a happy guy. And I'm enjoying the place God has called me to at this time in my life. Others may conclude differently. Such is the risk when you reveal the "family secrets."

I don't think Bill and I are seeking to place blame on anyone. We're trying to address a prevailing form of USAmerican/Canadian "church" that is spinning out a lot of negativity. Disillusioned people are fleeing congregational life as we have come to know it. Pastors are jettisoning a toxic form of ministry parading under the banners of "success" and "cultural relevance."

Remember "paint by numbers" kits? This is the USAmerican church. Just like McDonald's across the States---all the same---so is the average evangelical church. Same songs, same current trendy stuff, same effort at some kind of coffee bar. We older folks poke fun at teens wanting to express their "individuality" and end up in the same jeans, same shoes, piercings, same T-shirts, iPods, etc. as all their friends. Why do we joke about the teens when we sit in our churchy cultural sameness from sea to shining sea? For all the fuss about GenX, etc. versus Boomers, I even see an ocean of sameness in the emerging church. The 'conference-ization' of anything is the evangelical way.

We don't have honest evangelicalism. We have an American Christian economy driven by market share and media. You got a good idea? Publish it (with a workbook). You got a creative ministry? Put it on a DVD. You got a heart for the poor? Make money off of it. Anything is marketable. Bank on it.

Christians are investors in the corporation. What is their profit share?

"I pays my money and I makes my choice." Christians are consumers.

"May I see your menu, oops!, I mean your church bulletin..."

"Is this service rated G or PG? I hope to God, not R."

Q: "Are we going to do the 40 Days of Purple?" A: "Yeah, after we do Experiencing God and before we do Alpha."

"Can I bring my snack, oops!, I mean my coffee into the theater, uh, sanctuary?"

Who wants to serve in that mess? Who wants that mess in the first place? A whole lot of people and pastors are saying, "Not me!"

The USAmerican Luxury of Church Hopping

Sasha Savich is a good, truth-telling brother.

I wrote earlier about his thoughts on our USAmerican "cheap grace." With our "repeat after me" prayer followed by our rock-solid affirmations of eternal security, we produce a cadre of people convinced of heaven when they die without any shred of evidence that the seed of truth has taken root in the soil of their lives. I don't think this "gospel" is either Jesus's or Paul's.

Sasha is stunned by another USAmerican church feature. We have the luxury of church-hopping. We are so use to this feature that it is hard to understand the spiritual horror that this feature generates in our Ukrainian brothers and sisters. With our franchizing everything in the USA, including church, we cater to the consumer mentality, to the shopper spirit, to the hopper syndrome.

I report this to Sasha and he sucks in his breath like I am lying to him. I'm not. Sasha shakes his head and looks so bewildered.

"Oh, John, that does not happen here. When we unite to the church, it is a covenant decision. It is serious. We would be horrified to see Christians in Lutsk shifting around from church to church. We pastors would not allow it."

In Ukraine Christ-centered, Bible-informed, mission-minded churches are hard to find. You find a family of believers and you become part of that family.

Imagine if our own children shifted around from family to family in our neighborhood, saying, "I don't like my current family. I think I'll go join the Smith family. They have a swimming pool and a large screen HD TV." We would be shocked. That's how Sasha responds to the USAmerican church-hopping mentality.

Serious. That's the word that describes the faith of Ukrainians. Utilitarian. That's the word for our USAmerican faith. What will my faith get me? My family?

Serious, but not somber. Committed and saturated with joy. United and living in a wide-open freedom. One of the reasons I like going to Ukraine is that it gives me a reprieve from the evangelical bubble of feel-good, me-centered, "I-deserve-to-be-served-today" faith.

Some of our luxuries are killing us.