Missional Canadian

So I got a handful of people asking if I’m going to say anything about my time at Catalyst West and Origins last week. So with such enthusiastic encouragement I’ll begin to post a few thoughts over the course of the next week or so. The problem with being away, is you gotta catch up, so attending to the blog world is sometimes a challenge for me!!

Let me quickly jot down a few initial thoughts about both the pre-Catalyst Origins Conference as well as the Catalyst West Conference itself.  Origins was more challenging and much less safe than Catalyst as a whole, but the whole experience was very much worthwhile for a dude over 50 hanging out with folk mostly under 35!

• While both Origins and Catalyst were excellent experiences, for me personally the Origins Conference was overall a better and more helpful experience. McManus’ thinking on living the kingdom out in three spaces was helpful for me (I’ll blog later on that!), getting into the mind of Dave Gibbons of Newsong Church and being introduced to his concept of third cultures churches that are passionate about addressing the local and global concerns of justice, advocacy and the poor was hugely inspiring.  I gotta look more at what he and his church are doing locally and globally.

• I really enjoyed Mark Batterson at Origins. His enthusiasm to grow a Spirit directed ministry would resonate strongly with anyone raised in the Christian & Missionary Alliance. He speaks with the  passion of an AB Simpson, just in 21^st century terms. David Acros of Mosaic stretched me with his call to embrace the chaos that  storms bring in order to see Spirit empowered creativity emerge. He even suggested that there’s a role to play in creating storms for the advance of the kingdom.  He made chaos and storms look pretty exciting! He’s almost got me saying, “Chaos, storms … bring it on!!”

• I didn’t hear Alan Hirsch speak with his wife on their new book. Very few attended their session. And on our team, a Hirsch fan who did was hugely disappointed, as apparently they really had nothing to say. Overall Origins/Catalyst was not a conference for Alan Hirsch devotees. He’s just a bit too cynical and harsh about mainstream evangelicalism to fit here.  Perhaps that’s why he was so cautious at Origins??

• I didn’t check Dan Kimball out as much as I could have, I can’t handle his hair. J What little I saw of him suggested that he tends to speak with a bit of a chip on his shoulder.  It seemed a bit louder than in his books, but to be fair I only caught him in a panel discussion. I do like his books!

• I was disappointed that not one mention was made of Earth Day during the Origins conference. The Canadians and Australians both noticed that, but our U.S. hosts seemed oblivious to it all – in my mind a somewhat indicting  reality about elements of American evangelicalism.  I give a big thumbs down on that one!!

• I usually like Rick Warren, but not as much here. He came with his own agenda and wouldn’t let Andy Stanly actually interview him. He had some great things to say, like really good things to say, but it all got lost in how much he promoted himself and the success of Saddleback and by the fact that he took over and didn’t allow Andy Stanley to lead the interview. Despite the standing ovation some gave him, I think he did huge damage to his reputation among most who were there. A lot of folk wanted to give Andy Stanley a standing ovation for how graceful he was in that situation.

• As I’ve suggested Catalyst was a bit safer than Origins. Yes it’s geared for the under 35 crowd, but in many ways this conference was geared to mainstream evangelicalism that is not necessarily emergent, but under 35. Those in attendance were by far under 35. In many ways this conference served to underscore mainstream evangelical values that sometimes the emergent movement is questioning.  The speakers were not all on the same page, which was helpful, but there was nothing extremely left or extremely emergent, or extremely right or extremely reformed.

• Catalyst West reminded me that even among the under 35 crowd, they are very much divided among the broad evangelical spectrum.  Among the diversity you have  the emergents, who I sense are really still a minority, just a loud minority. On the other side your got the passionately loud young Reformed crowd, the Mark Discollites among them. And Catalyst is kind of in the middle of all that.

• The comedy duo of Tripp Crosby and Tyler Stauton who assisted Jud Whilte in emceeing were mint! Sometimes Jud tried a little too hard to keep up with that duo!

• Hillsongs United led worship on the first day of Catalyst and that was simply mint, even double mint!

Now I feel a bit awkward being this upfront and honest about my reactions, because all of the speakers are great men of God. I respect all of them and have learned from all of them.  I don’t believe in really dissing people I don’t see eye to eye with, but rather prefer to promote what I believe without putting others down.  But I also know that some of you are looking for my gut level honest reactions that you might get from a private conversations with me.

Overall it was a great experience from start to finish that introduced me to some new thoughts, to some new leaders while affirming many of the perspectives that I hold passionately too. It’s worth getting the MP3’s and listening to quite a few of the talks!!

I wrote the article that follows for the Easter edition of the Chronicle Journal … thought I’d post it here for those of you who don’t read Thunder Bay’s fine daily paper …

 You don’t see him as much anymore, the guy with the rainbow-coloured afro-style wig turning up at every major television sports event with his John 3:16 sign, although I have noticed a few churched types sporting John 3:16 T-shirts. Most folk don’t know what to make of the John 3:16 sign or T-shirt, except with good Canadian politeness, quietly write it off as just a bit weird.

 John 3:16 – it’s the spot in the Bible where the these words of Jesus are recorded, “God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son so that whoever believes in him may not be lost, but have eternal life.” (NCV)

Easter is the ultimate demonstration of love, where we see how the Creator of the Universe in his passionate irrational love for the people he made, entered this world to live among us, as one of us through Jesus. And then he allowed his own creation to brutally nail him to a cross, only to bust through death itself three days later!

 Christians, through the teaching of the Scriptures, understand that this death and resurrection of Jesus has made a way for us to access life as it was meant to be – full of love, freedom and peace, and to access this life for eternity. And because of this love we personally experience from God’s hand, authentic Christ followers seek to live and love like Jesus, pouring out our lives sacrificially on behalf of those who need and yearn to experience God’s love in personal and tangible ways.  

 Further, Christians understand that the death and resurrection of Jesus is God’s expression of love towards his entire creation, towards the entire world, making it possible for not only for you and I to experience healing and wholeness, but ultimately for this planet to experience healing and wholeness. Christians look forward to the promised new creation, the new earth and new heaven made possible by the cross and resurrection. As a result they do all that they can to see pockets of restoration and healing pop up all over the world, in anticipation of what is promised to come.

 It really is all about our God who so loved the world, including you and me, even in the midst of the human mess we get so entangled in; as well as our planet, even in the midst the decay and degradation it continues to experience.  He so loved us and our planet that he made way through Jesus to see all that is wrong made right.

 Jesus said the Christian faith and all of the Scriptures can be best summed by these words: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and all your soul, and all your mind and all your strength.  And love your neighbor as yourself.  There are no commands more important than these.”  (NCV)

 We respond to the God who so loved as at Easter, by loving him with everything we’ve got. And to love God the way he wants us to love means loving our neighbour, even as we love ourselves. It means giving our lives for the sake of our neighbours here and around the world, it means helping our neighbour experience the love of God for themselves, including touching the very neighbourhoods they live in with a bit of this promised new creation.  We love because He first loved us. And like Jesus, we love not just with words but with sacrificial action.

 This  Easter season, why don’t you check out a local gathering of Christ followers for yourself, and see if you don’t just personally experience God’s life transforming love, that in turn will empower you to love and live sacrificially in a city and world of deep need. 

A few years a ago a small group of us within the Christian & Missionary Alliance family of Churches began to describe ourselves as being in the “radical middle,” of the theological and philosophical spectrum of church life. But after reading Adam Hamilton’s “Seeing Gray in World of Black and White: Thoughts on Religion, Morality, and Politics,” I realized that my definition of “middle,”  was bound by a much narrower spectrum of “the church,” than that held by Adam Hamilton, pastor of the 14,000 strong United Methodist Church of the Resurrection, in Leawood, Kansas.  Cleary our “radical middle” is a bit to the right of what Hamilton calls the “radical center.”

Hamilton is promoting what he calls a middle path between the fundamentalism of Jerry Falwell and the liberalism of John Shelby Spong. Truth is, typical of so many from evangelical backgrounds, I’ve never included John Shelby Spong along with those of the Jesus Seminar ilk, within the spectrum of what I understand to be the broader church family. I figure you need to at least be able to affirm the historic creeds such as the Apostles and Nicene creeds to make any claim to be authentically Christian. Some would call that an “evangelical bias,” but many of my Catholic and Orthodox friends also hold to that bias.

And on the other-side, while Jerry Falwell lies clearly to the right of where I land, his life and ministry was far more moderate than that of many fundamentalists. Making it even more interesting, while that small group of Alliance friends see ourselves as being in the “radical middle,” others within our own church family might describe us being a bit to the left. It does all depend on where you draw your lines.  

And while my “middle” lands to the right of Hamilton’s “middle,” I found his overarching theme of the need to bring the social gospel and the personal evangelical gospel together, understanding that neither is complete apart from the other, as a much needed corrective for the church today. On the issue of holiness, his call to find the “sweet spot” between legalism and libertinism is critical for any church desirous of having lasting impact in our culture.

My sense is that he aligns with Brian McLaren and McLaren’s views of “Generous Orthodoxy,” and in the process arrives at a few conclusions related to an understanding of the bible and salvation that are quite left of where I’m comfortable. However unlike some of my friends who land to the right of myself, I don’t see these guys so much as dangerous heretics, as much as I see them as sincere Christ followers who have allowed themselves to drift further than what I believe is biblically warranted. I see them as brothers in Christ with whom I do not see eye to eye. That doesn’t prevent me from appreciating them and learning from them.

 Back in the late 70’s when I attended what is now Tyndale Seminary in Toronto, the ethos my professors impressed on me was the well known quotation of unknown origins, “In essentials, unity, in doubtful matters, liberty, in all things, charity.” Even if my middle lands to the right of a guy like Adam Hamilton, I’m reminded of the need to remain charitable and to be willing to listen and dialogue and learn from those like Hamilton to the left of me, or those to the right of me who align with the theology and philosophy of a Jerry Falwell. 

So I do like the idea of “generous orthodoxy,” even if I don’t appear to be as generous in my orthodoxy as some. I like the idea of seeing gray in a world of black and white, even if I don’t see gray in quite the same places.  In my passion to uphold the Jesus ethic of love of God and love of neighbour, I will choose remain charitable towards those who draw their lines differently than myself, especially those who hold tenaciously to a personally relationship with Jesus as their forgiver and leader.  

I’ve been listening to the new U2 Album (they still call it an album on iTunes!), “No Line on the Horizon,”  and I found myself linking some of the introspective lyrics with NT Wright’s “Surprised By Hope.”

Those of us raised with well honed theological formulations will tend to struggle trying to figure out exactly where Bono and U2 are trying to go. The words are not neat. They don’t fit comfortably with how we’ve been trained to think. They are the words of an artist and poet more than those of a theologian. Hence before we dismiss them too quickly, maybe we should wrestle with the underlying message that touches the heart of seekers, committed Christ followers and even unbelievers.

“No Line On the Horizon,”  tends to reflect the dissonance most people feel about the state of our current world and what we deeply  know should be. As I listened, I got the sense that U2 would remind us, as NT Wright does in “Surprised By Hope,” that while this is earth and not yet heaven, there is hope – hope, that we can bring a bit more of heaven to earth, hope that starts with the here and now  but goes beyond.

I couldn’t help but think that there just might be some good eschatology, even missiology in this album, such as in ‘Get On Your Boots’:  The future needs a big kiss / Winds blows with a twist / Never seen a moon like this / Can you see it too? / Night is falling everywhere / Rockets at the fun fair / Satan loves a bomb scare / But he won’t scare you.

Mess and hope all mingled together.  Reminding us of the promise found in the book of Revelation  of a yet future recreated new earth and heaven together, where our God “will wipe every tear from our eyes. Where there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain.” Reminding us as well that until then we’ve been given a mission to pray for and accomplish, where we will “see God’s kingdom come, God’s will be done in increasing measure on earth as it is in heaven,” a mission that impacts lives individually and impacts the city and world we live in.  So yeah, maybe it’s time to “get on your boots.”

Oh … U2 won’t let me directly embed the video below, so if you want to see it, DOUBLE CLICK A SECOND  TIME after the “embedding disabled by request” message comes up and it will take you directly to the youtube vidoe, or go directly to youtube yourself: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOwH6IqwRqM

It was reading the blog of Franklin Pyles, President of the Christian & Missionary Alliance in Canada, that prompted not only a response to his blog but the motivation to finish setting up this blog,

 So now, as one of the first posts to my blog, let me jump from some thoughts in Franklin’s post, “A Tipping Point for Christianity,”  (http://rebirthingsimpsonsvision.blogspot.com/) where he stated: “The program church has many advantages, but one of its disadvantages is that it totally absorbs the life of its key workers leaving little time or energy for them to coach or play kids sports, to sit on school councils, or to join in meaningful community activities. Thus, those who could be connectors are unplugged from the wider populace.”

Now I don’t dispute that balanced statement or the many other statements Franklin made in his blog. However the reality is for a lot of folk in most of our evangelical churches, that even if our churches were structured so that the average person in our congregations had time to be more involved in the lives of our sparsely churched neighbours and join with the people of our city in meaningful community activities, we have unfortunately discipled many in such a way, so as to strip them of the ability to truly enter into the lives of those apart from Christ. Our interpretations of holiness and separation even in these less legalistic days, still makes it hard for most of us to give ourselves permission to party, dance and just enjoy average everyday people. The old adage, “we don’t drink, dance, smoke or chew or go around with girls that do,” still holds a grip on us, more than we care to admit.

Living incarnational lives, being Jesus to the people of our city and world is met head on by a code of personal holiness that somehow has come to exclude normal interactions with our neighbours. (Hugh Halter & Matt Smay make this point well in their book, “The Tangible Kingdom.”)

And it’s so opposite to the way of Jesus. Think of how many folk we know who would be so uncomfortable to attend the kind of event where Jesus conducted his inaugural miracle, where Jesus turned water into wine. Why the miracle? Because they had already, imagine this, finished all the wine far earlier than the hosts had anticipated. Why did Jesus chose to turn water into wine at a party where in all likelihood, if you’re at all honest with the context, some had already had a bit too much? Why is this his inaugural miracle? I suspect it’s very intentional.

So while it’s easy to point the finger at how structure and programs rob us of time needed to interact with average non-church attending Canadians, we really have a much deeper systemic problem that needs to be addressed long before making church “simpler,” will have any kingdom impact.

The family of churches Redwood is a part of, the Christian & Missionary Alliance, are a part of what historically has been called the holiness movement.  My  hunch is,  we really need to wrestle far more deeply with what true holiness is all about. Perhaps we would do well to learn and teach more intentionally that holiness is more about who we become and what we can do instead of defining holiness as those things we don’t do. It’s not that holiness doesn’t bring limitations, it’s that holiness is so much more than that, and so often the limitations we list may not be consistent with the way of Jesus.

Further I would think after looking more closely at Jesus in the Gospels, that what holiness looks like more than anything else is love and that true holiness expresses itself by loving God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength and loving our neighbour as ourselves.

I suspect if we could learn to be holy even as Jesus was holy, if we would look and act and hang out in culture a lot more like Jesus, then program church versus non-program church, versus sticky church, versus creating a plausibility context and so on would really become non-issues.

Maybe I’m too simplistic, but I suspect that if those of us who follow Christ would just start to look and love a little more like Christ, and if our churches began to act a bit more like how we see Jesus in the Gospels, we would see spiritual transformation sweep across our cities, regions and nation and beyond.