fully completely?

You who truly and earnestly repent of your sins, who live in love and peace with your neighbours, and who intend to lead a new life, following the commandments of God and walking in his holy ways, draw near with faith, and take this holy sacrament for your comfort; and humbly bowing, make your honest confession to Almighty God.

(Invitation to the Free Methodist Communion Liturgy)

***

so my friend and i came to a surprise disagreement over the little piece of holy poetry cited above:

I ask myself how can we say we have an open communion when our liturgy narrows who’s invited? Our current liturgy is personally troublesome in that the invitation, in my opinion, excludes honest, seeking people – honest in that they confess they are truly seeking God but cannot in good conscience say they yet have “truly and earnestly” repented of their sins and/or are reconciled and at peace with their neighbours, much less intend to lead a new life, following the commandments of God and walking in his holy ways.

Sometimes I wonder if I, by this invitation, am even invited to the Lord’s Table.

concerning the invitation, i believe that the qualifying 'truly and earnestly' is valuable. gotta say that right off the top. the way we frame in faith experiences does make a difference to the one who is engaging, and attaching strong language like 'truly and earnestly' places the onus on the one who is interested in pressing into something deeply personal, to do so with an appropriate degree of intention and ownership. i've learned, after all, that people don't value things that come too easily, and so the problem poses itself: how do you invite everyone to participate at their level in a spiritually meaningful practice without cheapening, bastardizing or even desecrating the practice for others?

oh, tradition is a messy thing, but i didn't expect a kind of spanish inquisition...

(JARRING CHORD - The door flies open and Cardinal Ximinez of Spain enters, flanked by two junior cardinals. Cardinal Biggles has goggles pushed over his forehead. Cardinal Fang is just Cardinal Fang)

Ximinez: NOBODY expects the Spanish Inquisition! Our chief weapon is suprise...surprise and fear...fear and surprise.... Our two weapons are fear and surprise...and ruthless efficiency.... Our *three* weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency...and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope.... Our *four*...no... *Amongst* our weapons.... Amongst our weaponry...are such elements as fear, surprise.... I'll come in again. (Exit and exeunt)

Man: I didn't expect a kind of Spanish Inquisition.

(JARRING CHORD - The cardinals burst in)

Ximinez: NOBODY expects the Spanish Inquisition! Amongst our weaponry are such diverse elements as: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope, and nice red uniforms - Oh damn! (To Cardinal Biggles) I can't say it - you'll have to say it.

Biggles: What?

Ximinez: You'll have to say the bit about 'Our chief weapons are ...'

Biggles: (rather horrified) I couldn't do that...

(Ximinez bundles the cardinals outside again)

Man: I didn't expect a kind of Spanish Inquisition.

(JARRING CHORD - The cardinals enter)

Biggles: Er.... Nobody...um....

Ximinez: Expects...

Biggles: Expects... Nobody expects the...um...the Spanish...um...

Ximinez: Inquisition.

Biggles: I know, I know! Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition. In fact, those who do expect -

Ximinez: Our chief weapons are...

Biggles: Our chief weapons are...um...er...

Ximinez: Surprise...

Biggles: Surprise and --

Ximinez: Okay, stop. Stop. Stop there - stop there. Stop. Phew! Ah! ...our chief weapons are surprise...blah blah blah. Cardinal, read the charges.

Fang: You are hereby charged that you did on diverse dates commit heresy against the Holy Church...

(courtesy of the silly people at pythonet )

the messiness of tradition is only one possible explanation for the fact that more people aren't interested in receiving communion bread and wine- symbols of the redeeming sacrifice of the body and blood of Christ- in a local church, whether that church practices 'open communion' (as we do) or not. the fact that so many purpogators of this particular grace-based faith are exceptionally graceless themselves most of the time definitely weighs in.

the basic tenet in a grace-based faith, is that relationship with the Divine is 'free'

but the question of tradition and religiosity seems to circle back here: who decides whether something is too free or not free enough? is one's theology too open or too closed to describe the God of the universe? how about the practices used by this one to approach this God? are these practices and perameters transferrable, or are they strictly as individualistic as the relationship that this God seeks to engage in with these humble created personal beings?

see, it gets a little slippery, in my view, with the holy pendulum swinging back and forth causing this great gospel thing that is supposedly free and available to all to have all these hidden costs showing up which are impossible to calculate because everyone you talk to draws up the 'salvation bill' differently. what began as a movement of freedom and hope for the lost and emotionally, socially and spiritually disconnected becomes something decidely less free, less hopeful.

like when we discovered that, although napster was back online as a digital music service, the utopic 'what's mine is yours' P2P shine had been replaced with butt-covering licensing fees and such. (yeah, that was a tangent)

well, whether it's digital music or God that we are seeking to access, it appears as though it is up to us to sort it all out in order to attain that to which we are driven. God himself seems to be okay with open-sourcing his gospel and the life-changing truth that is at its centre. in fact, that seems to be how he's preferred to operate for a very long time. God has left a fair bit of room in the bible for maneuvering.

i mean, questions similar to those above of my friend concerning open communion could be posed regarding the claim that God has unconditional love, yet only those who 'believeth in him will not perish but have everlasting life...' (john3.16)

i must confess that this conditional grace doesn't go down easy for me most days, as i work hard to discern between the questions that i wrestle with in my own understanding of how this all comes together and the words i am to speak to a crowd.

see, i've heard people speak of 'cheap grace' and how it is incorrect to consider that God may just say on that day of days:

"you know, you were lied to by the prince of the air your whole life about who you are and who i am and i agreed to abide by your will, as ill-informed as it was... but i'm God and this is my day now- the day of the Lord- and i, the Lord say to one and all 'behold now, the kingdom. enter into my rest.' ''

i'm not so sure. it sounds like that kind of grace, although perhaps 'cheap' for the recipient of it, is pretty damn expensive for God. this would make it grace- unmerited favour- for real. yet i mustn't preach those thoughts lest i be branded a heretic or at least a bleeding-hearts liberal. in my heart of hearts, the question is perpetually posed for consideration.

we have liturgies that have been prayerfully drawn up to give us a structure for our worship, and i believe that their orthodoxy protects us all if these more liberal versions of God's grace, although they may feel right to me, are a little off. by including these thoughts in the invitation, those who have been entrusted with leadership are equipping people for meaningful decision-making with righteous intention: we say everyone is invited and we include, in the invitation, words of preparation. (1 corinthians 11.27-29).

as to the degree to which a person understands (or misunderstands) those words of invitation, it's probably between that person and God. God knows what any of us really mean and how fully completely given to him our hearts are, yet he invites us to step forward in faith and assures us that these steps are not in vain...

yep, more grace, courtesy of God.

TGWU (baggage handlers' union)

some good questions:
1)why is unencumbered good again? (hineini)

wow- well posed. i think that hineini's question above is really strongly related to societyVS' one below:

2) Outlive a painful experience, interesting. Like as in 'forget about it' or 'deal with it'? (societyVS)

both of these questions have been going round and round in my head the last couple days for reasons that have nothing to do with blogging, and the more i think about them, the more i wonder if, in fact, unencumbered is necessarily a good thing. i mean, it probably depends on what we mean by unencumbered.

here's what set me off. last night a mom showed up at our small wednesday night prayer group and shared some desperate pain with everyone there (it was a small meeting compared to some- only about 10 people) concerning her angry young daughter's journey into extreme sports self destructive decision making.

at this gathering was a guy who had been absent from our fellowship for about 8 months. having been admitted to the hospital for day surgery back in july, he had contracted an infection which had brought about excruciating pain that had to be treated eventually with morphine which triggered his cocaine addiction and caused him to basically fall off the edge of the world, spiralling downward for literally months. he was completely unreachable and, at times, even untraceable until the disease finally remitted and he came to at one of the local rescue missions where he now lives, having sold everything he owned for drugs.

so he didn't know this mom or her daughter at all, having been seriously 'out of the loop' per se. he sat quietly listening, drinking in the whole story. when he spoke, however, it wasn't to recount his own experiences or personal regrets, providing glib testimonial to the fact that hope was not completely out of reach because any one can change blah blah blah. he instead shared his duaghter's story which, for all intents and purposes, was very similar to the story just shared.

suddenly the conversation was between two people who knew what they were talking about. the rest of the group bore witness to it all, but listened in silence. the true healing that took place there (obviously in small measure, considering the tragic tales being exchanged) was in the basic sharing of common pain.

unencumbered? hmm. i'm not sure that one completely unencumbered would have been much use at that meeting. it was an enactment of God's mercy and grace that, on this particular evening and in spite of the bad weather and the multiple bus transfers that were needed to be worked through in order for my friend to come to the prayer group, he was there as the one completely empathically understanding set of ears in the room. reminds me a lot of the kind of environment that societyVS describes in some of his earlier comments. the writer of acts concurs, as does the apostle paul in what he extols the baby church to become in 2 cor 1.1-11 (which had been my chosen devotional text for the evening, having no idea what was about to happen.)

so if living unencumbered means somehow glibly denying that this or that abuse happened again and again and no one seemed to be listening, or winking at the moral failure of one in a position of authority, or otherwise just running from reality because it hurts then what's the point? but if, when we speak of living unencumbered, we mean somehow outliving (surviving) truths that would enslave or negatively redefine us- and using the freedom that follows to inform our journey as we walk alongside of others in community and support, then i'm in.

That there- thats not me
I go where I please
I walk through walls
I float down the liffey
Im not here
This isnt happening
Im not here
Im not here

In a little while Ill be gone
The moments already passed
Yeah its gone
And Im not here
This isnt happening
Im not here
Im not here

Strobe lights and blown speakers
Fireworks and hurricanes
Im not here
This isnt happening
Im not here
Im not here

(thom yorke, circa 2000)

a cruel God

(disclaimer: warning, some theological BASE jumping here...)

nope, you're right

i definately have a tough time with the 'big cruel God' thing... however, as i started typing the drivel below my brain started to do some backflips which may or may not make sense... let me try to put the ideas together.

in my understanding of it (bereft of any supplemental consultation with our friends at either biblegateway.com or dictionary.com LOL) the whole notion of cruelty turns around not only one person's propensity to act in his or her own self-interest at the expense of all others, but to draw great satisfaction from the pain inflicted upon others in the process. ability, opportunity and motive are all part of the deal.

it is for this reason that i really push back against the whole 'cruel God' idea because most of the time it is embraced by those who are seeking someone to blame for the things that they hate or cannot explain. might as well project responsibility upon someone invisible- provides a bit of counterfeit comfort.

okay, here's a question: are cruelty and responsibility the same?

(i know i'm already in trouble here because H subscribes to much of emmanuel levinas' ideas on responsibility, but i'll let him tell everyone more about that)

i mean, we leap to the conclusion that one who is capable of preventing them but permits awful happenings must do so because that one draws some sick pleasure from the pain of others. you know what? in my view, no God would be better than a God like that... if that's who God is then i'll take my chances and not give him my love or my devotion...maybe there's someone else up there i can talk to.

but then we get all this stuff about bad things happening to good people going on, and the age old questions don't really go away when we default to 'who can say?'...

we need someone to blame.

blame God- it's easy... he's invisible and doesn't contest our blasphemies with miracles, signs or wonders- he just lets us choose to believe what we want- even about his very character.

the heart of God must be a ragged mess.

i know that my own skimpy picture of right and wrong bristles when i hear people attribute stupid, humanly preventable tragedies to God's 'plan.' as i've mentioned in this blog before, we saw through the loss of two of my wife's brothers in three months to automobile accidents. one sunny morning in july of 2003, my brother in law went face to face with a semi as he drove to work... no one has ever been able to explain what happened there. then, three months later to the day, another brother in law and his wife and her young daughter collided with a drunk driver in the middle of the night, claiming not only the lives of my brother-in-law and his soul mate, but that of the driver of the other vehicle as well... there was no one we could even hate over it. both of these tragedies just happened.

as angry and confused as i was about it at the time (and still am- the three-year anniversary of losing my dear friend and brother-in-law terry was october 11) i just couldn't blame 'God's plan' for the night when this one drunken bastard left a wedding in his car and was able to drive an hour and a half in the dark with his lights off before running head-on into the front of my brother-in-law's van as he and his wife of only six-months and her daughter were travelling back home after a dance competition.

what the heck would be the point of blaming God? wouldn't bring anybody back. three people died in that crash and the young dancer had to work obsessively at her physiotherapy once all the skin and bone-grafting had healed just to walk again, much less dance (which she did, by the way... she danced at the same event a year later.)

but is God cruel because he doesn't prevent these local tragedies, much less things like the holocaust? is there something that we, in our temporal subjectivity might be missing?

well what if God IS the cruel one? if you twist it around just so, you just might be able to make a case for it and still remain mildly orthodox...

here's what i'm thinking: God can prevent all bad things. however, he doesn't- he has made a deal to permit all of humankind with freedom of will and he's not backing out now. would it be fair to say that God draws satisfaction from permitting us to make up our own minds about things that we believe or don't believe, things we do or don't do etc? well, he's either satisfied or putting up with it for some reason because this appears to be our causal cage whether we like it or not.

is satisfaction pleasure?
could be.

and if it is, then can God be seen as drawing pleasure from allowing us to make the decisions we make even though he can see they are going to bring about pain and consequence for ourselves and others, as well as himself? if so then here lies the cruelty of God...

to agree to abide by our stupid decisions because he derives more pleasure from our freedom to choose life or love or pride or pain than he derives from happiness- ours and his own.

who is really to blame here?

off the record

okay, so here we go again.
it seems if you really want to see the phone lines light up, just bring up either worship music or homosexuality among a group of evangelical pastors... this time the catalyst was a decision to by wal-mart to become corporate members of the Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce.
(http://news.yahoo.com/s/usnw/20060821/pl_usnw/national_gay___lesbian_chamber_of_commerce_announces_wal_mart_stores_inc__membership109_xml)
one person made this honest and open statement at the end of an email on a list which invited opinions from many different angles:

"The homosexual community is so suspicious of the Christian community that I am concerned that a boycott would only convince them of our lack of love toward them. But I'd love to hear what other people think about it! These questions always challenge me to rethink my interaction as a Christian with the larger world."

amidst a barrage of, in some cases insightful and in other cases unsightly, comments and opinions on whether or not to boycott wal-mart and the like over their willingness to join said organization, one voice resonnated with the grace of experience, so i wrote the guy to talk more. what i've tried to do is pull some of that ongoing dialogue together here so that it reads a bit like an interview... meet william gardner.

WG: Hi Jolly. Sorry my response took so long. I just got back from a missions trip where we work amongst our own samaritans (ie: acts 1.8) every summer. Then I did a quick family getaway to cottage land. Just got back from that.

JB: hey man. thanks for writing back. i remember hearing of your work from a mutual friend and how it was so obviously Holy Spirit-inspired. love it when God takes on the logistics that would typically hold us back... the same kind of stuff has happened with regard to our missions to sri lanka.

anyway, thank you for your words and, more importantly, i think, the tone of your words. there is so much unlove around- particularly among clergy- that the heart behind a few simple lines here was a cool breeze amidst so much hot air.

WG: Thanks for the kind words. Appreciated!

JB: i have a question, however. context: a guy that had started going to our church asked me to go for lunch about six months ago, so we hooked up at this great little thai place downtown. amidst a whole bunch of other questions and curios, he slipped in a question about my position on gay relationships. didn't think much of it at the time, as the whole lunch felt a bit like an interview- sort of a reverse membership process.

WG: Very cool that you had lunch with him! To me that is the way we are supposed to be. I am going out for a drink with a lesbian who has checked us out on the web and wants to know if she would be welcome at our church.... As she is? Supposed to be going this week. Have another good friend who is a practicing lesbian...errr, actually she is legally married to her partner. She has come a few times to our church and loves the love she feels here.

JB: yeah, well, last sunday he came up at archived me back to our conversation... in particular, the relationship part. then he told me that he is currently in a gay relationship.

WG: Funny how people do that.

JB: right. so, okay, now my rhetoric is being tested. i've blogged a couple times in this direction:

http://e-pistles.blogspot.com/2005/07/others.html
http://northvus.blogspot.com/2006/05/song-for-drella.html

what i am trying to sort out is whether my position held is something that i can maintain publicly amidst possible pressure from those in our church who are spectating... believing in God's grace for themselves without receiving it to overflowing- that others' thirst for it would be quenched through a cup of it given by them in the name of the Lord, ya know?

WG: Yeah, I find people are so low on the giving grace to others scale. Showed in the recent hurly burly online. My goodness- that one guy was attacked by some really stupid comments. I wanted to jump in and call the other guy an asshole. But I have learned... the knives of right wing fundamentalists are very sharp.

JB: i always hold that we are introducing people to Jesus, and that the real work is being done by the Holy Spirit- but what if my friend missed what i was saying when i spoke of sexual purity and how intimate friendships between people of either gender are part of how we share God's love and strength with each other, but that these are not to move to sexual relations... hearing only that "love is love and the pastor said it's okay?"

WG: I think you should not worry about that. That is how we start to want to play the role of something we are not. We are not the Holy Sprit. God is. We are what we are....stumbling, fumbling, bumbling people who ache to dance with God. Indeed we do dance with God. Or rather, God dances with us and lets us stand on His feet as it were. He carries us in this crazy dance. It looks comical, like a little kid standing on his dad's feet does. But what a picture. It makes you smile. It makes you feel warm. Not sappy crap warm. But real warmth. God warmth. That draws people.

Relationship takes time. Trust. In that time and trust, lives are changed. Gently, lovingly, grace-filled-ly.

JB: i remember hearing someone refer to the neighbourhood inwhich your church is situated as being an area with a high gay/lesbian population within its demographic.

WG: Um, we probably have the same percentage that your own neighborhood has. Just some places are a bit safer for people to be honest about who they are.

One of the safest and most honest places I have ever been was a narcotics anonymous meeting with one of my people ( a recovering heroin addict). She wanted me to see her "other church"...her words. She also wanted her other church to see her pastor. They asked me to speak that night, impromptu.

It was awkward as I got up and said: "I am not worthy to speak here because I have listened to all of you speak so stripped down honestly about all kinds of stuff and I feel as though I could slip into some kind of inauthentic bullshit. I do not want to do that in this place. I just want to thank you for letting me be present here tonight. With you. Your stories are precious. Thank you."

That NA meeting was more 'church like' than most churches I have been in over the last 20 years. I was convicted by the reality there. By the presence of God there.

I share that tid bit because, I think a lot of church folks think they are bringing God into a place or situation. That is completely wrong headed. I do not bring God anywhere, He is there ahead of me and asks me to join the wild dance He is already doing in that place.

God is already amongst the Gay people. He just is looking for a few of us to go and be His skin in the situation where He already is.

JB: great story. a nice one to have lived, not simply heard somewhere... i am reminded of one of my favourite bible bits, 1 corinthians 14.24-25, where paul speaks of strangers just showing up 'impromptu' and being so moved by the apparent presence of God at a meeting that they are convicted of the sin in their own life- like what happened for you at the NA gig.

it is important for people to not only feel but actually be loved when they enter God's house- i don't really care who they are because it doesn't seem as though God does.

no- strike that.

i think it is more that God cares deeply about who they are while the people of God often get sidetracked by the sin problems that are so much more evident to the naked eye than the soul being strangled by them is. we fail to see Jesus' blood upon others, finding ourselves ever fixating upon that which our knowledge of good and evil recognizes in others (even if our knowledge of good and evil is skewed by far too much human tradition and history to be objective anyway)... this whole world view being the one thing from which God tried to save us back in the garden anyway.

WG: Yeah. Hey, sorry for blabbering on and on. Thanks for engaging me. I hope you don't mind my being fairly open and honest with you. There are a lot of people in the church world that I would not talk as honestly and real as I just did above. After reading your Warhol blog though, I felt I could be myself with you. Thanks for that.

Blessings and joy be yours!
William.
***

blabbering on and on? no worries from my end... it's what i do best.

but now for some questions with no answers: when, if ever, do we address the whole area of sexuality and fidelity and the like with our gay friends, and how do we do so without coming off all sanctimonious and, as was said above, ready to perform surgery to their current sexual identity with a very sharp right-wing fundamentalist knife?

i keep saying 'they' and 'their' because, within my own sphere i know very few people who are 'out.' there are some natural degrees of social separation that i'm trying to somehow attend to for my part. however, i have had a few frustrating discussions (with one individual in particular) which have brought to articulation some pretty comfortable little prejudiced defaults of others towards clergy. because i am a pastor, i am sometimes relegated by others to as few distinguishable characteristics as your everyday homophobe might for a lesbian... in this view, i am autocratic and judgemental and presumptuously ethnocentric- holding to my own bigotted view of what the scriptures say rather than considering other more open-minded possibilities. i have conceded that this may be true of many in my vocation (thinking of the online skirmish that prompted the conversation with william, for instance) but that one has to be careful not to reverse discriminate...

however, in roll the personal doubts. these brow-beatings have me continually reassessing my own world view, wondering if these relational presumptions are in fact true of me and all that. i don't want them to be. i want to lead everyone who becomes part of our church family in the paths of righteousness, and am eager to discern by God's light, where these paths truly lead and through what terrain.

whatever- tangent. nevermind.

point is, our church is starting to become a place that is investigated every now and then by an openly gay person looking for God... i see this as a blessing because i think it means that God is trusting us with some really spiritually fragile people who have received a lot of heavy disaffirmation in their lives and have somehow heard that our church on the corner is safe.

i want it to continue grow into the identity of a safe place- even for 'others.'
i want the one investigating to sense that this is an environment where we are going after deepening relationships with God and each other and that the Holy Spirit is the one who is doing the convicting.

i guess that i am aware of the 'us and them' scenarios both on and off the record, and am eager to proceed on to the 'we.'

lest ye be

"It is too easy to judge people anyways, were idiot humans that know less then we think yet percieve to have all the answers because some book said so." (SocietyVs)

yes- to presume to have arrived is to make plain how great the distance yet to travel. my gosh, i hate it when i sound like a fortune cookie!

what i mean by all that drivel is simply that i agree... especially with the 'too easy' part. nobody's got it all together.

a friend of mine and i were talking recently about whether the difference between judgement and condemnation is simply semantics... you see, we are all reminded again and again from others that we mustn't be quick to judge- however, these statements usually come from people who are busy judging pastors and the like as being too judgemental. i grow frustrated with this whole reverse bigotry thing that leaps to the conclusion that, by trying to understand the behaviours of another in order to help them move ahead in their faith journey, a pastor is sitting in judgement over a parishioner. it's more a case of trying to walk alongside someone, offering some coaching.

in my view, judgement is being able to weigh facts justly and make a decision towards a resulting plan of action. our judgement should be a good thing, an endowment.

what qualifications must a judge in a court of law have? i don't know, but i imagine that, apart from very specific credentialling, things like extensive personal legal experience, a keen understanding of the laws of the land and an awareness of precident all have to be part of the deal. there is, however, one more thing: wise decisiveness. the ability to use all of the information available in order to set out a plan which, through due process, intentionally brings justice back into balance.

i'm not talking about corruption and i'm not talking about abuse of an office- we know those things happen and we know that they are wrong. i'm just acknowledging that in our culture, where the judicial process is still somewhat respected, the judges are not typically suspect- it's the lawyers that often bear the burden of our mistrust, largely because of our huge need for them, and the suspician that arises out of needing someone and having to place our faith and our cash in their integrity as they interact within a system that we find completely alienating due to its jargon and rhetoric alone, much less its power to which we are subject... (but that's a whole nother blog.)

where it breaks down for people is in confusing judgement with condemnation. i think that when we flippantly quote the bible to each other 'judge not, lest ye be judged' we need to be very clear as to what we are really saying and to ensure that we are not implying the condemnation of others. most of the time, when people remind us of how we are not to judge another, they are speaking about the importance of not condemning... sadly, they are often doing simply that to those whom they presume to admonish- defaulting in their suspician to the notion that anyone who uses their endowment of God-given judgement does so in order to condemn others and move ahead in some line.

the easy condemnation call is a dangerous default that hurts people who are just trying to live their lives, attending to the needs made evident to them. perhaps it would help if we spoke of active discernment (in the non spiritual-gift sense) and the importance of applying that discernment in those moments where we are tempted to condemn another.

have i been hurt by this default of suspicion?
maybe once or twice- does it show?

cross roads

what's the big deal with the cross?

i remember my pastor saying once that wearing a cross around your neck or displaying it in a church is as weird as having gold plated electric chairs or guillotines around to help us focus on God.

yep- that would be weird... but the thing with Jesus is that he brought new meaning to so many things, death by execution being one of them (not any death by execution, mind you- just his.)

i love that bit in romans (5.8) where paul points out that 'while we went on actively breaking fellowship with him, Christ died for us... that's how God shows his love.' he then goes on for the rest of the chapter talking about how death was brought into the world by adam, and how Jesus brought life in, instead, through his death. it wasn't just that Jesus lived a good life or that he died a tragic death, it was that he lived a good life and died a tragic death out of his love for humankind and then he overcame the tragedy, turning everything that we all thought we knew about everything right on its ear.

mourning to dancing
sackcloth to glory
silence to singing the salvation story

without Jesus' death, there could be no resurrection, no hope of a living and eternal communion with a perfect God. death was and is the penalty for wanting things our way and trading our eternal inheritance to get it. if Jesus were beheaded the way john the baptist was then we might have a different symbol of our freedom from mortality. as it is, being that crucifixion was the method of execution, the cross serves as this symbol for God's ability to take even the most fearful thing known to us- a painful, torturous death at the hands of those having no measure of grace or mercy to extend in the process- and give it new meaning in light of who he is rather than who we are.

in our church, we have this huge eight foot cross that stands in between the platform where the band plays and the floor where the people sit or stand or whatever. there are coffee tables gathered around that cross for those who respond better to more natural, coffee house seating than to institutional rows, and all of the speaking/ teaching takes place on that common plain, not up on the platform. in fact, the only reason that the platform is raised is that it was built at a time when the services we conducted were less interactive/ more 'performance oriented.'

a friend recently expressed a desire to see the layout change because the cross was obscuring the view from the floor of the musicians as they played. this was becoming a distraction for him.

distraction is a really good word. it seems to be realized in different people in different ways.

where one person is distracted by what he can't see onstage, another can be distracted by what he can see there. the clothing of a person onstage, that person's expressiveness (or lack thereof) when that person does worship music, or even just a knowledge of who that person is in life when he or she is not on display- they can all get in the way of a person's desire to press in during a meeting. in various conversations over the years, all of these have been mentioned to me... in most cases i've tried to remind the person to extend grace and endeavor to focus on God in spite of those serving on any given sunday. however, knowing that this is really hard sometimes because people all have their own triggers, i have privately thought of just shutting off the lights on the band altogether, so that the only things that anyone saw were the cross and the projected words that they were singing together.

even then, the sound of the music created with all the lights off might be distracting... arguably moreso than our actual presence onstage!

the problem, i think, is that people come to a worship service looking for different things. whereas it is nice to presume that everyone is there to meet with God and God's people, the reality is that there are not only almost as many ways of connecting as there are people trying to sort it all out, but there are many other reasons that the people come together which have less to do with God specifically than with simply becoming people whose lives make sense. (thank God he is able to bring sense to the apparent nonsense that we holds us in its grip- i know... a whole nother blog. i think that i will start another blog where i can develop my tangents ad nausium!)

God is immutable and perfect and is the only constant in the worship equation- he's the only one who does not bring baggage of the week and its relational faux pas and failings into the worship circle. he also doesn't bring health concerns or any other form of existential anxiety with him. in truth, he is the only one who doesn't have his own personal pathway, paradigm or formula for a successful meeting. he does not pay attention to trends and traditions, nor does he ignore them: he simply acknowledges them as being valuable as human connecting points... ways that different people connect with him, not necessarily ways that he requires to connect with different people.

he only required one way. to live here and to die here and to rise again, setting the captives free to be all that he intended them to be from the beginning.

although, even in our rather small but significant evangelical denomination, there are many different approaches to experiencing God at the throne of his grace and spending time trying to sort out who we all are in his eyes, one congregation in sri lanka did something i found interesting, mainly because it was different from the traditions that have become my stability: the musicians and those leading the singing all faced forward with the congregation as everyone sang together.

it's an eastern tradition... they faced the cross.

singing 'grace' before the sunday meal

teri said...
i really want people's eyes to open spiritually. Plain and simple...Check it out...

so i did... and this is what i read:
This is the one day of the week that I don't like working. Those people that have gone to church and now they want to be waited on. They're arrogant and give off this, "How dare you work on Sunday", and the, "They are not giving me much money for a tip because they gave to the church"... If they truly believe that I shouldn't be working on Sunday, they should not bring their sorry asses out to eat on this day...

this post made me sad in the same way that the situations described make God sad, i think.

(good point about our sorry asses forcing businesses to be open. if it wasn't worth it, no one would bother to open up on sunday would they? )

here's what i began to say in response to this one post that stands for the thoughts of thousands yet unposted...
***

i remember, as a churched kid, being embarrassed when all the christians would just invade a restaurant and start 'singing grace' and all that. i hear you with the bad tip bit too!

however, i need to tell you that all believers aren't like that. that wasn't what Jesus was about- still isn't. he abhorred behaviour like that when displayed by the religious leaders of his day. Jesus' strongest words were towards graceless followers of God.

grace- now there's a heavy word. it means, in today's vernacular, giving someone a break even when they haven't done anything special to somehow 'deserve' it. really, in the presence of a perfect and holy God, none of us deserves anything but a busload of hell for our own spiritual rebellions, great and small, anyway.

yet for some reason God chooses to use regular people to do his work because he is about relationships, not control. the level to which we extend grace to others is a direct indicator as to the relationship that exists between ourselves and the author of all good things including grace itself.

sadly, that is probably not particularly good news for the person who serves a bunch of graceless 'would-be-if-not-for-the-state-of-their-heart-and-their-actual-behaviour christians.'
but let me thank you on their behalf.

let me bless you for serving them and for not spitting in their food or otherwise strengthening the dividing walls that seperate them from the world that Jesus has charged them to reach for his glory with his love.

let me bless you for extending undeserved kindness and giving people a break even though they have something else coming.

and let me bless you for your grace. it certainly won't make the world colder... and maybe somewhere in there a heart will recognize the kindness that God authored being extended to them through your humble service.

further reading?http://northvus.blogspot.com/2005/06/confessional-dodgeball.html

'others'

Same-sex marriage law passes 158-133
CBC News
The Liberals' controversial same-sex marriage legislation has passed final reading in the House of Commons, sailing through in a 158-133 vote...
( http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2005/06/28/samesex050628.html )

obviously, i've been thinking about this for awhile. (bill c-33 passed back in june and here it is the end of july...) there have been so many openly expressed positions already, that posting something seemed a bit pointless until i got into a conversation within a small bible study i lead. it seemed to me that, even with all of the political rhetoric and (self-) righteous posturing by so many, once again the everyday people with whom i try to interact regularly were still feeling a bit lost as to what they were to believe, how they were supposed to express it and why. such is life with almost any political football, i think. there are efforts made to inform 'the masses,' but in most cases this informing takes on the added colour of persuasion... probably because we have a really tough time actually being objective about anything.

(nice thing about a blog is that, for the most part, we all acknowledge that the writing is just a personal point of view, taken or left by the reader- a nice kinda freedom in that to just be- and in so being, being honestly, yeah? of course this doesn't address the whole problem of not being honest with ourselves, but that's probably a whole nother blog!)

so what to say to the 'sheep' on this issue? well, i'm not sure that the role of believers has really changed that much, regardless of the legislation. it is still our job to uphold the traditional (dareisay 'biblical' without the whole notion being confused by all who are eager to point out the many rather odd eastern cultural spins on marriage and concubinery that are also found in the bible?) concept of marriage and the nuclear family in an age where it would appear as though almost anything short of polygamy goes.

recently we (staff at my church) were asked to wear a yellow ribbon to express our position on the recent debate. i found this uncomfortable, not because of what i stand for, but because so often people misinterpret this stand as some form of spiritualized bigotry. without the chance to speak openly and directly to someone who inquires about the significance of the symbol, i was fearful that others would make presumptions about my faith and my God without actually asking. however, when asked, i found that the conversation was quite natural.

(tangent: now that i think of it, wearing crosses and the like is probably the same thing... nobody asks what the cross around my neck means- yet everyone probably makes assumptions about its significance and meaning based on their own experiences with people wearing that symbol too.)

in my view, the key is to share our biblical view face to face with those who inquire, and to use every opportunity to uphold the sanctity of the institution of marriage within the law rather than without it. in order to share the biblical view, or the denomination's company line on it, we need to know what that is. below is an exerpt from an email thread that spun out of the initial conversation at the bible study. my friend was having trouble sorting out the harshly expressed homophobia of his youth with his newly acquired understanding of the grace of God- he had now swung hard the other way to an 'anything goes because God loves us all' theology of grace and morality in attempts to somehow redeem himself from his loveless youth which he recognized as fascist and wrong. when our morality pendulum is permitted to swing back and forth in response to our life experiences, the end result is that we don't really subscribe to anything constant. my friend was frustrated by this, wanting to share Jesus' love for people, but confusing that with permissiveness.
***

i agree strongly with your statement about judgement. there is usually no love in the judgemental pronouncements we make about others- most of the time it is about 'legalism'. one of the things that God has given us as a light to guide us through life's issues is his Word. if we are careful to live life according to it, to 'walk in the light as He is in the light' (1john 1.6-7) then we are free to live according to his original vision for us.

your redemption is free, man. free to you anyway- it cost Jesus everything as we read in phil2. though you still feel the burden of your past, please remember that Jesus died to take that burden off of you. to keep taking it back is to take back that which Jesus has offered to take upon himself on the cross. it's like he bought your spiritual peace with his blood and now you don't even get what he paid for. don't worry about trying to rectify the mistakes of your youth, pal. they're long gone.

we all know that individuals have to make up their own minds on social issues, but part of that mind-making has to do with being informed. it is every believer's responsibility to develop convictions based on a synthesis of scripture and everyday life and relationships. it is only in order to offer some further perspective for you on this matter that i am sending the Bishop's words.

so, as to gay people's 'right' to marry and have the relationship legitimized in the eyes of God and man through a christian ceremony that acknowledges it as in accordance with God's design and plan, i think that taking a close look at the bishop's statement and the scriptures cited will help in clearing up the 'confusion'.

here, for your consideration, is the free methodist church in canada's stand on the matter, as found in the manual. http://www.fmc-canada.org/

(and by the way, for the detectives out there, there are pictures of jollybeggar and mrs jollybeggar in a commissioning service that took place in july... as well as one old guy in the youth band that also looks strangely familiar... thanks for pointing these out, Pensive Johnny !)


¶630.2.8 Homosexual Behaviour

Homosexual behaviour is condemned by the Scriptures as immoral because it is a distortion of God’s created order, a practice contrary to nature (Romans 1:26,27; I Corinthians 6:9,10; I Timothy 1:8-10). The sanctity of marriage and the family is to be protected against all manner of conduct that moves away from the Creator’s design.

This behaviour is contrary to God’s intention for humans and therefore harmful to those who participate in and form habits toward such behaviour.

Homosexual behaviour is different from homosexual inclination; and persons with homosexual inclinations are accountable to God for their behaviour (Romans 14:12). Because Christians are part of fallen humanity we must deal with many inclinations to sin, but we trust that the grace of God is available and completely adequate to forgive and heal us (I John 1:9; Hebrews 7:25; Luke 4:18; I Corinthians 6:9-11).

While some Christians, regrettably, violate the church’s historic commitment to the deep worth of all persons, The Free Methodist Church in Canada affirms it (See ¶630.2.1). Therefore, Free Methodists have a responsibility to be God’s agents of healing, ministering in love to those involved in homosexual behaviour and giving them support as they learn to live a Christian life that is wholesome and pure.
***

personally, i feel that this statement is a balanced one in that it denotes a crucial difference between inclination and behaviour. people become slaves to their drives: nietzsche said that. however, it doesn't have to be that way, for the grace of God is free to all.

i realize, as i've participated in conversations that go this direction, that transgendered people and people with same-sex inclination can be hurt by well-meaning moralists who draw easy lines between behaviours that feel so natural and things like theft or murder. truth is, there are no easy lines. scripture does not support sexual lifestyle decisions that go in same-sex directions... however, scripture also fails to support the presumption that anyone with same-sex inclinations is somehow outside of the invitation that God made through Jesus to cast aside the earmarks of our old life in order to enjoy freedom within his grace to be all that we were intended to be when God dreamed us up in the first place. Jesus was always there in the middle of the crowd, showing love to the marginalized, the lost and the confused. he was enjoying supper with 'sinners and others' (people whose lives went in directions that were even too much for the new testament writers to describe in their gospels) much to the disgust of the religious right, and only preached against those who walked around lording their legalism over people.

i have gay friends and they know how i feel on this issue. they also know that i love them dearly. until we can be loving revolutionaries, do we subscribe to anything higher than the pharisees standing outside of matthew's party in matt9.10-13?

again and again i find myself marvelling at how Jesus dealt with people- somehow able to be openly loving and righteous at the same time.