I’ve taken some time out for reflection and study this week and have been very encouraged in the process. It is always true that the greatest learning happens in interaction, and I have been grateful this week for a series of thought-provoking interactions with a number of people.
The holiness/mission question won’t go away in my mind, and looking around at the general tone of the “theological conversation” at the moment I find myself increasingly dissatisfied.
There are a number of voices arguing for The Salvation Army to rediscover its Wesleyan holiness roots. They have a lot to contribute to the discussion of what it means to live for Jesus today, and much of what they say is challenging and helpful. However, what I find in some of these conversations is a concept of mission that is confined to narrow personal evangelism. Mission is so much more than evangelism, and I believe we need to rediscover a corporate dimension in mission as well as personal responsibility. It might also be argued that there is too much emphasis on how some people in our movement’s history interpreted Wesley rather than on what he actually taught, but that’s a whole different discussion.
Somewhere else in the conversation are the voices of “new expressions” – in lots of forms – but in all the years this conversation has been running it seems some people can never get off the “inherited church bad; fresh expression good” band wagon and it seems to me that there’s a lot more critical discussion than constructive activity going on. The result seems to be a broad definition of mission, coupled with a poor quality of discipleship that nowhere near matches the rhetoric.
We don’t need an understanding of holiness that induces guilt and legalism, but neither do we need an understanding of holiness that is so liberal that we can all hide behind the missio Dei because God will make a happy ending regardless of what we do.
All these are old conversations, but can we begin to take them in a new direction? Can we rediscover, through Scripture, what holiness means for living a Jesus lifestyle in our age? Can we rediscover corporate dimensions of holiness and mission as well as individual ones? Can we really begin to understand that to live “in Christ” means participation in the divine life, that holiness and mission can never be divided? Can we frame the conversation in a way that respects where we came from?
At this point lots of people, many of whom I respect, will tell me why I am wrong – but I still think something is missing.
One of my interests is the crossover between spiritual formation (holiness) and mission, and it is an area in which I am planning to do some more work on as I progress through my MA studies at Nazarene Theological College.
My friend and colleague officer in Australia, Captain Adam Couchman, is writing some good stuff over at his blog, “Set Apart in Christ,” which deserves a wider readership, particularly this post on the subject of holiness.
I found the following paragraph in my drafts folder. It was written some months ago and I decided not to post it because of a number of sensitivities at the time. As I reached for the delete option I realised that the lesson I learned then is worth re-examining, especially now that we have all calmed down a little:
We are in a period of great pastoral need with a number of people very seriously ill. Like everyone else we prioritise. Like everyone else we sometimes fail to communicate those priorities clearly. Against this backdrop I visited someone who is not very happy with me and God gave me Jonah 4 to share – a scripture in which God takes Jonah to task for sulking. For a moment I adopted the moral high ground and then I realised that God was talking to me rather than the other person. What right do I have to be angry? Plenty, if I am angry about the same things that make God angry, but how often is that really the case?
Anger is a destructive emotion if it isn’t channelled into constructive change. Maybe I can learn to be less angry with the people who misunderstand me and more angry about the injustice, exploitation and enslavement that we see all around us? Not “angry enough to die” like poor, petulant Jonah, but angry enough to do something.
Yesterday saw the launch of our new Employment Plus initiative, which received some good publicity in our local press, as well as benefiting from some great publicity by local Councillors Martin and Barker. The day didn’t get off to a good start as one of the three new laptops we are using in the cafe area failed on start up – well it was fine so long as you didn’t want to use the keyboard or trackpad! The employment resource centre is open on a Wednesday, the same day that Lynley runs “Mainly Music” for pre-school children, parents and grandparents. It was good to see new people coming to that, and taking note of the employment resource centre as they went through to the main hall. Even better, we hadn’t been open long before we had our first user.
It’s also been a week where Debt Matters has been very active, with Lynley and other members of the team working on a complex case (involving interest rates in excess of 50%!!) on and off throughout the week.
People were anxious about so many things, even before swine flu turned up. But it is very much our privilege to be able to do something practical for people – and, thereby, demonstrate something of Jesus and the values of His Kingdom.
As I write I have just received in the post a copy of the Poverty and Justice Bible which the Bible Society kindly sent me as a free gift in return for me completing a survey about their Lyfe resource. Flicking through it, I read:
“I looked again and saw people being ill-treated everywhere on earth. They were crying, but no one was there to offer comfort, and those who ill treated them were powerful.” (Ecclesiastes 4:1, CEV)
Lynley is in London today taking part in discussions about The Salvation Army’s response to debt issues. We’re a long way from fixing Failsworth, but I’ve watched her offering comfort to the ill treated and heard her speaking up for the powerless, and I think it is OK to say that I am very proud of her today, as well as being truly thankful for the privilege of serving alongside her.
I have been reading Dewi Hughes’ book, “Power and Poverty: Divine and Human Rule in a World of Need”. Hughes is the theological advisor for Tearfund.
Hughes spends a lot of the book unpacking stuff that lots of other writers already cover well, with a whole section on what the Old Testament says about God’s view of social justice and another section on what Jesus meant by the Kingdom. He does justice to both those topics in a fairly accessible style. However, the most challenging parts come towards the end when he gives us a much broader treatment of what evangelism could mean in a world where we should care about Jesus’ intentions to fix the world as much as we should about people booking their place in heaven.
“Fundamental for those who believe that evangelism and social action are inseparable is the conviction that the purpose of evangelism is to gather people into the community of those who desire to live together under the lordship of Jeus the Messiah. If this is the case, evangelism is a profoundly political activity because politics has to do with government, and here we are thinking about a people who voluntarily come under the government of Jesus Christ. Standard evangelical phrases like ‘coming to know Jesus as personal Saviour’ or ‘believing in Jesus for the forgiveness of sin’ must be placed in a wider context if they are to describe adequately what happens when someone becomes a Christian. . . . The biblical imagery points incontrovertibly to the fact that at the heart of the good news of the gospel is an ordered society under the government of Jesus.” (Hughes, 2008: 200)
If Hughes is right, and I think he might be, doesn’t that have huge implications for how we do church, for how we demonstrate an alternative Kingdom where justice and inclusion are at the forefront?
God has drawn very near in the midst of a very busy Holy Week and Easter weekend.
In yesterday morning’s family service, Lynley used the following “cardboard testimonies” video clip with the soundtrack of Graham Kendrick’s “Led like a lamb.” We sit on the front row rather than facing the congregation, but during the film Caitlin needed me and as I walked to the back of the hall with her I realised that there was hardly a dry eye in the place. The reason? Simple. We can all put names to these cardboard testimonies, and each name is accompanied with the prayer that God will do a work of transformation in that person’s life as well as our own.
Today, Easter Monday, is a public holiday in England. We had our first proper family day for what seems like ages. We went over to Manchester Airport to catch up with our friend Nikki and her new fiance Jonathan who were en route to Belfast. Afterwards, we stopped off at Didsbury where I am a part-time postgraduate student at Nazarene Theological College. Didsbury is a leafy suburb between Manchester and Stockport, the home of the famous Ivy Cottage Church, and a very different place to Failsworth. It was good to stroll in the park, let our children enjoy their scooters in the wide open space, and wander up to the Pizza Express for tea. It was only a twenty minute drive home but, for the sake of a couple of hours relaxation, we could have been anywhere. Once again, we learn the value of having bolt holes close to home but away from our immediate ministry “patch”. Wesley is supposed to have said, “The world is my parish.” That being the case, I wonder where he escaped to for some downtime?
We have been blessed with a really helpful Holy Week this week, with evening meditations Monday to Thursday and our Good Friday service yesterday. Although the day before Easter Day is still a reflective day in the Christian calendar, we had a change of mood today with our first Easter Family Fun Day.
Lynley had the vision for this day some months ago, but after some challenging times with our new kids’ club in the run up to Easter we were a little anxious about how it would go.
As it turned out we had nothing to worry about and God had His hand on the whole day. The sun was shining so we were able to get the barbeque going and a willing team turned out to serve burgers, sausages, tea, coffee and hot cross buns throughout the day. With face painting (modelled by Caitlin), games, puppet workshops, all-age egg and spoon races and some creative teaching by Lynley we were able to tell the Easter story in a non-threatening and enjoyable way.
It was good to just throw the church open to the community (not that it isn’t always) to welcome people in and to chat over simple food (without charge). The agenda was simple – just to let people have fun in church and maybe find out that Christians are OK.
A good day, at the end of a busy but fulfilling week which has seen some amazing ministry opportunities, and in which we were able to have some meaningful conversations.
Tomorrow, we celebrate Resurrection Sunday with a church breakfast and our usual morning and evening worship services.
(Christian is pictured with Boris the Bunny, which he made out of modelling clay whilst I was preaching on Good Friday. The intricacy of his creation probably says as much about the length of my sermon as it does about the skill of the artist – of whom we are very proud.)
It’s been a while since my last post, for a variety of reasons: time, priorities and not having very much to say. I have also been rethinking some of my attitudes to blogging and the whole social networking phenomenom. However, as we come up to the second Sunday in Lent something written by Gordon over on UrbanArmy set me thinking about the concept of fasting from self. This added to something else I saw that Andrew Clark (read his stuff over at ArmyRenewal) wrote on his Facebook page about what makes us think that giving up chocolate will really help us get to grips with the reality and mystery of Christ’s sacrifice for us. Their contributions, among many others, keep me coming back and challenge me to try and give as well as receive.
During Lent, I’m working my way through Henri Nouwen’s Show Me The Way. In a world where those of us who have the privilege of exercising leadership in the church are constantly asked to indulge in “reflective practice” the question too easily becomes, “How am I doing?” rather than, “What do You want to do next, Lord?”
Nouwen reminds us about the importance of first things:
“Perhaps we must continually remind ourselves that the first commandment requiring us to love God with all our heart, all our soul, and all our mind is indeed the first. I wonder if we really believe this. It seems that in fact we live as if we should give as much of our heart, soul and mind as possible to our fellow human beings, while trying hard not to forget God. At least we feel that our attention should be divided evenly between God and our neighbour. But Jesus’ claim is more radical. He asks for a single-minded commitment to God and God alone… It is in God that we find our neighbours and discover our responsibility to them. We might even say that only in God does our neighbour become a neighbour rather than an infringement upon our autonomy…” (Nouwen, 1992:10)
So whether I give up chocolate or even self (Mark 8:34) it really has nothing to do with anything that I do, and everything that One who demands our complete attention does. Everything else is secondary.
Last Sunday, Lynley was preaching on the call of Samuel and asked me to deliver a monologue. The opening line, “I’m Eli,” raised a laugh but Lynley still made her point effectively.
During this week’s mission studies seminars the same passage of Scripture was referred to (1 Samuel chapters 2 and 3) and the tutor’s comment has stayed with me:
Eli was concerned for the spiritual health of the nation, “but he failed to make spiritual provision for his own children.”
(Thanks to Dr. David McCulloch for the quote)
In all the demands of a busy appointment, busy family life and, now, a busy academic programme, it has been helpful to be reminded again of what I always knew: that ministry begins at home.
In the next few weeks we are having a careful look at our children’s outreach work, and will be calling our church to be intentional about praying into this part of our mission. As we seek God’s leading in the “spiritual provision” for the children in Failsworth I am reminded of my responsibility for the spiritual provision of the two very special children living in my house.
As it turned out we had nothing to worry about and God had His hand on the whole day. The sun was shining so we were able to get the barbeque going and a willing team turned out to serve burgers, sausages, tea, coffee and hot cross buns throughout the day. With face painting (modelled by Caitlin), games, puppet workshops, all-age egg and spoon races and some creative teaching by Lynley we were able to tell the Easter story in a non-threatening and enjoyable way.
A good day, at the end of a busy but fulfilling week which has seen some amazing ministry opportunities, and in which we were able to have some meaningful conversations.