Be the change by Jason Valendy is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
I disagree with the Church, which is why I stay.
If you have not picked up anything in the "New-Monastic" movement, then I want to encourage you to do so.
I have been given the gift of the Prayer Book called "Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals". It has quickly become my favorite devotional each day.
Each month takes one of the 12 marks of New Monasticism and explains it just a bit. The "mark" for April is "Submission to Christ's Body": the Church".
I will not post the entire entry, but I think this is one of the more profound essays related to the '12 marks' in the book. This is the first paragraph of this wonderful essay, and I share it for all those who have left the Church, those who disagree with the Church, and those who do not understand why some of us stay in the Church to ponder. I would love any responses to this opening paragraph:
"Discontentment is a gift to the church. If you are one of those people who has the ability to see the things that are wrong in the church and in the world, you should thank God for that perception. Not everyone has the eyes to see, or to notice, or to care. Bur we must also see that our discontentment is not a reason to disengage from the church bur a reason to engage with it. As Gandhi said, "Be the change you wish to see in the world." Our invitation is to "be the change" we want to see in the church. There are things, worth protesting, but we also have to be people, who "pro-testify," proclaiming the kingdom that we're for, not just the evils we're against."
I have been given the gift of the Prayer Book called "Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals". It has quickly become my favorite devotional each day.
Each month takes one of the 12 marks of New Monasticism and explains it just a bit. The "mark" for April is "Submission to Christ's Body": the Church".
I will not post the entire entry, but I think this is one of the more profound essays related to the '12 marks' in the book. This is the first paragraph of this wonderful essay, and I share it for all those who have left the Church, those who disagree with the Church, and those who do not understand why some of us stay in the Church to ponder. I would love any responses to this opening paragraph:
"Discontentment is a gift to the church. If you are one of those people who has the ability to see the things that are wrong in the church and in the world, you should thank God for that perception. Not everyone has the eyes to see, or to notice, or to care. Bur we must also see that our discontentment is not a reason to disengage from the church bur a reason to engage with it. As Gandhi said, "Be the change you wish to see in the world." Our invitation is to "be the change" we want to see in the church. There are things, worth protesting, but we also have to be people, who "pro-testify," proclaiming the kingdom that we're for, not just the evils we're against."
"I will pray for you."
Of the many phrases that ministers use, one that might be the most common might be "I will pray for you."
It has become aware to me that that phrase may be misunderstood by people.
When I say "I will pray for you", I do not mean I will not just add you to a laundry list of people or situations. I will not just pray "for you" as one might ask God to provide you something as just one of many voices that will also ask, and thus operate like nagging children to a parent. I will not just pray for you as a way of thinking of you for a moment.
I will not pray for you so that you do not have to pray.
Rather, when I say I will pray for you I mean that in light of your situation, you may not be able to pray for yourself. You may be in a situation that is difficult or troubling that results in your inability to pray. Perhaps you are so overjoyed in life that you are unable to focus on praying for the least, last and lost of the world. Perhaps you are so down that you cannot pray for new life, new creation and resurrection.
It is in these situations that I will pray for you.
I will pray for you when you cannot pray for yourself.
This ought to be part of the reason why we go to worship on Sunday regardless of your state of mind.
Perhaps you cannot pray that day - the community of the Body of Christ will pray for you.
Perhaps you cannot sing that day - the community of the Body of Christ will sing for you.
Perhaps you cannot listen that day - the community of the Body of Christ will listen for you.
Perhaps you cannot lament that day - the community of the Body of Christ will lament for you.
I will pray for you when you cannot pray yourself, because we are the Body of Christ. We are the Church.
I know that there are days for which I cannot pray, sing, listen or lament...
and I know the Body of Christ will do that for me.
Are you a TED talk person???
I was at the Fort Worth Museume of Science and History recently with my wife and son. While walking though one of the rooms where there are these very cool light drawing pads (I hope these are a precursor to the light saber), there is a four page print out of an article entitled "Are you a TED talk person?"
I always wondered as soon as I watched my first TED talk, "If the Church is supposed to be a culture making entity, then why can the Church not host or 'be' like TED?"
What if the Church gathered together occasionally and invited people in the congregation to give their own 18 minute talk? Heck there are even "The TED 10 Commandments"!
People pack into TED, people talk about the ideas of TED, TED is open, TED is counter cultural, TED is not afraid of new and and what is being "called" out. It seems to me the the vacuum for culture making the Church created when we began to focus on ourselves has been filled by a number of other culture creators.
Maybe the Church cannot reclaim that culture making position on a large scale ever again (maybe it should not have been that powerful to begin with?), but local individual churches can create culture in the communities in which they are embedded.
What culture do you see being made in your local church?
I always wondered as soon as I watched my first TED talk, "If the Church is supposed to be a culture making entity, then why can the Church not host or 'be' like TED?"
What if the Church gathered together occasionally and invited people in the congregation to give their own 18 minute talk? Heck there are even "The TED 10 Commandments"!
People pack into TED, people talk about the ideas of TED, TED is open, TED is counter cultural, TED is not afraid of new and and what is being "called" out. It seems to me the the vacuum for culture making the Church created when we began to focus on ourselves has been filled by a number of other culture creators.
Maybe the Church cannot reclaim that culture making position on a large scale ever again (maybe it should not have been that powerful to begin with?), but local individual churches can create culture in the communities in which they are embedded.
What culture do you see being made in your local church?