Grace

What do you think?

Will Be Back Soon

Having a techno break - in a Guthrie paraphrase, ‘[for now], so long its been good to know ya’.

Prayer

The following is taken from the excellent book by Kenneth Bailey ‘Jesus through middle eastern eyes’,

Before teaching the prayer, Jesus offers his disciples some advice about how to pray:

When you are praying, do not heap up empty praises as the Gentiles do; for they think that they will be heard because of their many words. (Mt 6.7 NRSV)

This is puzzling. On the one hand the prayers of Jesus, recorded in the Gospels, are quite short. On the other hand those same Gospels relate that occasionally Jesus prayed all night. This raises the question of the nature of prayer. Did prayer for Jesus include long periods of Spirit-filled silent communion with God that was beyond the need for words?

The Fathers of the Eastern Churches certainly thought so. In the seventh century, Isaac the Syrian wrote about ’stillness,’ which in his writings has been summarized as ‘a deliberate denial of the gift of words for the sake of achieving inner silence, in the midst of which a person can hear the presence of God. It is standing unceasingly, silent, and prayerfully before God’ (Helarion Alfeyev, The Spiritual World of Isaac the Syrian (Kalamazoo, Mich.: Cisercian Publications, 2000, p77).

It is easy to assume that a long prayer equals a good prayer and a short prayer is an immature prayer. The Gospel accounts contradicts this. In Matthew 6:7-8 Jesus criticizes the Gentiles for long prayers. When they addressed their gods (which usually included the reigning emperor), the Gentiles used long salutations. They wanted to be sure to use all the correct titles lest the god (Ceasar?) take offense. p92

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(Some excerpts from)

Summary: The Lord’s Prayer: God our Father

1. Jesus inaugurated a new age by praying in Aramaic. He thereby set aside the precious heritage of a sacred language and a sacred culture, and made every language into an adequate manger into which the Word of God could be placed

3. The accumulating of titles and phrases is discouraged. Words offered to God are precious, must be sincere and can be few.

4. Jesus taught his disciples to pray to God who is near and yet far away. He is ‘our Father’ and at the same time is ‘in the heavens.’

5. Set times for prayer are neither affirmed nor rejected. Jesus apparently wanted his followers to go beyond the pattern of three daily prayers, which was the practice of his day.

9. God is ‘our Father.’ The personal finds its deepest meaning in the communal. God is ‘my father’ because he is ‘our Father.’   p102-103

Tangible Kingdom

Hey, I got this video link from http://www.theforgottenways.org/blog/2008/04/18/the-tangible-kingdom/ check it out!

 

Dr John Smith

 

Pilgrim or Patron

To Journey without being Changed is to be a nomad,                    

To Change without Journeying is to be a chameleon,

To Journey and be Transformed is to be a Pilgrim.

(Mark Nepo, philosopher, poet, author).

I grabbed this quote off a friend who runs a centre for the homeless and marginalized and it made me reflect on the journey I am on. Am I just settled for progressing through the Western rites of passage on my way to a residential home, stopping off at the appropriate places and moments. Following this path as one who allows life to change me in a passive way, rather than initiating, creating, being proactive in my search for change and all that encompasses. Or am I so focussed on being changed of becoming something I want to be or re-ordering what I already am that I have forgotten the bigger picture of the journey that I am travelling? As soon as the word pilgrim is spoken, all sorts of images fill the mind. Perhaps, more than anything, thoughts about monks or people on journeys of faith to sacred places. Such things can be nothing more than religious symbols and de-personalized experiences. Yet, my calling is to not remain static but to keep moving. To be transformed and allow myself to be formed rather than remaining the way I am. I am to be aware of the journey with others that I am on, as well as my own journey. A pilgrim is fluid, open, explorative, intuitive, always arriving but never there, willing, struggling but keeping on, hopeful and yet realistic, dreaming and yet earthy, needing nothing, loving and learning to love and the list goes on… to be continued…

T And T

Raging waters caught essence in

the palm of hands

                                outspoken

                                                outreached

hoping you too will understand.

Heart laid out before a storm

                waiting watching

                                for all to be revealed

past glorious

                present gift

                                future.

Foundations as illusion

                creative confusions

                                limited sight

                                                yet immeasurable light.

And now the time returns home

placed in its proper place

explored no more

for rest is primary

and love is the throne

on which I place you.

 

Everything is Spiritual

Yes Rob Bell is fantastic and yes the content provides exciting and stimulating thoughts and strands weaving their merry way to an impressive conclusion. Yes he borrows a lot from heschel and you are maybe waiting for the but… but there is to be no real but. Is a person who constantly critiques teaching, preaching etc, a human being or is it human doing? I believe in some aspects of inner-child-work such as Bradshaw et al and also elements of yoga, reiki and some esoteric practices only in the sense and regard that they implement and teach practices found, already, in the scriptures; ‘Be still, and know’. Yet they do highlight the stillness and awe of experiencing salvation in our human-spiritual relation with the fibre of creation and life itself. Jesus is that life. One of my old poems has the line ‘the next breath i breathe is a gift from heaven, and when it’s gone you grant me another one’. Such profoundity is within a drop of water. This, as i am sure you are aware, is nothing new but many human communities have such strands within their cultural histories and frameworks. The rich tapestry and depth of langauage in the book of Hebrews describes the spiritual dress that clothes the people of God - we are ultimately fed with a bread not of this earth (physical?) but of heaven (spiritual?). When i watch my daughter grow, i can only know everything is spiritual!

An Artistic Recommendation

A friend of mine has a cracking blog and, i think, powerful digital art things happening. A couple of examples here but follow the link - http://craftycurate.blogs.com/pilgrims_progress/digital_art/index.html

Missional Preaching

Taking the website http://www.postmodernpreaching.net/missional.htm as the foundation for this. In the article on missional preaching it remarks on 5 characteristics: prayer-dependent, God centered, transformative, engaged with the community, compassionate and suggests ‘Missional preaching is preaching under a vigorous sense of the power and reign of God.’ Do you agree with this? I am not sure why the tag missional has been attached to preaching which bares these hall marks - preaching, although flexible and broad in style, content and application, should always have to some degree a sense of the power and reign of God. This got be thinking about other tags which would today be appropriately added to preaching. What are your thoughts on 5 marks of ‘Ecological Preaching’, ‘Sexuality Preaching’, or ‘Anti-consumerism Preaching’?

Preferential Option for the rich or comfortable

Was at a ‘Global Connections’ conference yesterday discussing mission-structures-traditionalism-emerging-church?-contextualized approaches etc. I was challenged, not necessarily by what the speakers shared, but more within my own understanding and experience of a kingdom theology which embraces the poor and marginalized and brings freedom within unjust and fragmented structures - encompassing an holisitic framework. I was challenged yesterday by the educated-middle class-male feel to initiatives which were being shared. I must reiterate this was my own experience. The ‘poor’ in this country is not always easily observed and the label has broader consequences perhaps than other cultures. Yet ‘church growth’ is predominately occuring within middle-class, professional, educated environments. This is fantastic and i am pleased about this but am questioning why is their a lack of impact with those to the lower social strata. We all know that the following words and phrases are for the few - mission-shaped, post-modern, post-church, cross-cultural-contextual - now am i saying that the uneducated are of a lesser intellectual ability - absolutely not! What i am trying to convey is my struggle with is that fresh expressions etc do not (as far as i am aware - please tell me if i am wrong and mention them) have indigenous leadership (and with a charismatic democracy approach) which is led by the poor for the poor. I say that phrase because i think it phrases better what i am attempting to say. I am also concerned about what has been the role of women in fresh expressions. I class myself as someone who is comfortable and perhaps see my own personal tensions and uncomfortability about my work with those in the past of a debased human experience and seeing a minimal releasing of such leadership when appropriate. I have seen glimpses in pentecostal churches and in some established churches but to a much lesser degree. So, basically what preferential option has God got within what is emerging in the new fresh-emergent expressions? (if you believe God has a preferential option! 196

Jesus the Backpacker

So in 2009, or there abouts, the film ‘The Aquarian Gospel’ will be making its way out of Hollywood to invigorate conversation about the Jesus that Christians do not know and the Jesus that spiritual-seekers can relate to comes to screen. The missing years when Jesus took extended gap-years to travel and thumb it on a spiritual quest to and through India and time spent in Buddhist monasteries etc. The film is based on the 1908 book by Levi Dowling and there is a movement which has emerged from it. The Aquarian age is a term I heard a lot and read a lot about when i was engaged in my pursuit of New Age practice and Idealogy. It is not my place here to go into great detail - read the book or watch the film - but yes, I would love to have more scripture around this period of Jesus’ life as I think it would perhaps reveal more of an understanding of the God who embraces and enjoys the human life and that life’s relationship with creation (encompassing everything from washing up plates to dreaming in our sleep). I am glad the film may provide opportunity to speak about what Jesus may have been doing during that period, like school, work, discovering his identity, making friends, getting sad - you know all the stuff we humans get up to! The film also reveals the popularity within Hollywood for ’spiritual-quest-themes’ in their films. Although this time it is not The Beach and its hedonistic journey into oblivion and then self-realisation but rather the founder of a major faith who finds true identity and meaning thousands of miles from his own community, at 13 years of age! Apparently, the special effects will be similar to that of the recent 300, well that should try and pull people into a film with some digitalized fight scenes if people are not that interested in Jesus.

Cycles of Mountains

Once again the hands reach out
Side views of something distant
Created intensity and reflective
  something meant to be
My feet are barely on the floor
I want to fall
Yet my consciousness keeps on its critique
The Spirit waits and moves
Yet I stay clearly on my feet
something meant to be
For a moment I let go
Gifts and dreams, clarity and meaning
Invested in me
Take their place and increase my faith
something meant to be
I see a mountain and it is no longer in the way
Its routes are clear, size absent of fear
And then I see
something meant to be.

Secular Songs Sacred Sounds

There is no doubt in my experience of the Christian faith that music has been central to my understanding of and relation to God. Yes, I believe in a God whose image permeates all of creation and when I listen to a Radiohead song I connect with that imago dei. However, I also wonder if it is possible that I am hearing the cry of humanity for a God they do not know. Sometimes I am brought to tears, sometimes God speaks to me (like through Mike Scott’s This Is The Sea et al), sometimes I question the limited style of ‘church-music’. That is not to say I dislike such music, in fact I like some Christian worship and some choir-singing but the range of genres present in the music, including bigger congregations, seems to lack reggae, ska, punk, pop, thrash, techno, deep house, funk, disco, folk, R ‘n’ B and on and on. Now I know some places such music is being played but if we are God’s image bearers to a world who may not have discovered who God is… well… I think Willy Mason with a track like Oxygen is a voice of a generation - it is prophetic - God speaking through the youth today for the youth tomorrow. He is one amongst many musicians. Now we have so many fragmented sub-groups in today’s culture that it is not possible (i think) for one artist to speak for a generation. In fact, it may never have been - although Dylan certainly connected with the American youth culture. Redman and Hughes and this kinda of folks have an opportunity to be even more missional and experimental with their music to both cross-over and to influence culture. They may be doing this already, to which I say great but they are young and with a passion of a M Joseph and others could represent God in music and the music offered for God to those seeking God?