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>3 ways to think of God

>The Simple Way to talk of God

Some things are complicated. Admittedly, this is not always fun or desirable. It is so nice sometimes when things are simple: like There is one God. Some like to say “there is no name under heaven or earth by which men can be saved” .Or as our ancestors said “Hear oh Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one”. Or like our religious cousins say “There is no God but one and this is his prophet”.
And we see that even amongst the Abrahamic faiths, this one simple confession has already made things unimaginably complicated.

I have to admit, I think that it is better if things are realistically reflective of how complicated and complex things really are! I don’t think that it serves anyone when we overly simplify something that is, by necessity, complex. Like when we say ‘pray this little prayer and you will go to heaven’ or that “grace is the free gift of God” without mentioning that the free gift will cost you everything – like a free download that once downloaded unzips itself and re-formats your entire hard drive, replaces your operating system and deletes all your favorite files. ( That, by the way, is what most people refer to as a virus – but that is for another day)

But today is about the Name of God, or should I say the Names of God. This is one of those areas that you do not want to over simplify and that we do a great disservice to by boiling it down to a bare minimum. There is such richness is a study of the multiplicity of Names for God – even just those that are found in the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures.

Three quick groupings of these:

First, there a number of lists and resources that will show you a whole array of these names. Some will catalogue the Hebrew names for God is Scripture – Jehovah, Elohim, Adoni, Ancient of Days, Jehovah Jireh, etc. Some will detail names for Jesus or titles he inherited in our ‘old’ Testament. These a great photo albums of different snapshots of God’s story.
The only thing to be mindful of is that they are lifted out of a narrative and are thus missing their context that so often gives them their meaning.

Second grouping is Titles that we know well but may not know where they come from. For instance, many people know that Jesus is called both the Son of God and the Son of Man. But it is helpful to ask ‘Is Jesus the only person called the Son of God” and the answer is ‘No’. Many people in the Bible are called Son of God. It was a political term and it turns out that Israel may have borrowed it from Egypt, Babylon or Rome – all of which had it in their records before it shows up in Israel and we know that Israel had contact with these places.
The Son of Man, though is interesting because it is a prophetic title that Jesus borrows from the book of Daniel and other Hebrew writings that are not in our canon. Jesus uses it so many different ways and if you only did a study that focused on that phrase, you would probably learn so much and have such a developed picture of how Christ embraces it’s many facets.

The third grouping is phrases or ideas that are lost in translation. They are concepts that did not come over when the original Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic transitioned to English. It’s like how there are seven Greek words in the New Testament for love , but in the KJV, New American and NIV they all come out simply as ‘love’.

Well, there are all sorts of interesting words left back in the pre-translation texts like for instance ‘Wisdom’ words like Hokma in Hebrew, Sophia in Greek, or how Spirit in Hebrew is Ruach. The interesting thing in these examples, as in many other places, is that these words of feminine. The fact that in the original language used in the texts of scripture has both Spirit and Wisdom not just with feminine words but contain feminine word pictures and concepts.

It may be helpful to recognize that other things have been lost in translation too and some of them contain gender issues. The phrase ‘help mate’ is often used of the relationship of Eve to Adam or of a wife to her husband. The word is ‘paraclete’. This phrase though only occurs one other time in scripture. The other time, it is about God. Holy Spirit is promised to us as a ‘Helper’. That word is a God word and reflects God’s relationship to us: Helper.

So, no – things are not simple. But, if you embrace that complexity, you can actually emerge into a place where there is great clarity and perspective. It won’t be any simpler , but it will more accurately reflective the complicated nature of the reality that we are dealing with.


Say God three times

I got permission to pick out two clips of a conversation between Elizabeth Johnson (author of “She Who Is”) and Tripp Fuller (of Homebrewed Christianity) to help us really appreciate the classic formulation of the Triune God .

We listen to Elizabeth Johnson and take the opportunity and say God’s name 3 times in 3 different ways.

God beyond us
God with us and
God within us

John 14:16-18
And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever— the Spirit of truth … you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.

Dancing with God

One of my favorite pictures of the relationship of the Trinity ( the Triunes Godhead if you prefer) – is found in a word picture that pre-dates the formulation of our New Testament. It is called the Perichoresis (it is popular in the Eastern tradition and dates back before the 4th century but it was not the preferred picture of the Three Fold nature of God for the Roman West and thats why so many of us Protestants have never heard of it) and I have to tell you – it has revolutionized my prayer life, my Bible reading and my view of society.

The term Perechoresis comes from two words: Peri (where we get our word perimeter) and from the same word that we get Choreograph from. So Perichoresis means that dance of God or the movement of God and it is a picture of the relationship that is a little different than the Father sitting on the throne, the Son at his right side and the Holy Spirit doing all of the work. It is not static – it is dynamic and full of motion.

One of things you will run into in early church history is that there are hundreds of ways to picture the Trinity incorrectly. There were so many councils and creeds that tried to address all of the wrong ways to picture this and talk about. It you read a theological dictionary you will find names and titles for all sorts of errors and heresies regarding these formulations. You are not allowed to say that the Son proceeded from the Father or that the Holy Spirit proceeded from the Father and Son. They all have to be equal. The Son was begotten but not made and comes from the same substance as the Father but is not the same person. You can not say that they are 3 substances in one person but you have to be careful with them being one substance in 3 persons. On could go on and on about how complicated and complex this is, but suffice to say that when you are done with the whole exercise… you want to be left with more than a Organizational chart detailing the hierarchy of the Godhead.

That is why I love Perichoresis. It has movement – is sees God as a divine Community – as Relationship in it’s purest and best and that for which all other relationships are but shadows and reflections. It is the fountain from which all our expectations for community flow and the source of our relational expectations.

Here then is how it works:

It is coordinated dance (choreography) around the perimeter. It is each member taking it’s turn to move into that central place and then deferring of defaulting to the others. It is the Father saying “this is my son” then the son saying “I do only that which I receive from my father” and of the spirit “I will send you another who will teach you all things” and Spirit calling back to our memory “everything that Jesus said”.

It is the humility and patience of God to not occupy that central place and to rotate and turn around the others, moving to allow the other a place to come and be central. It is a chance to prefer and find importance in other. I love this picture. It speaks to me. It moves my soul. It inspires me to community and relationship.

It want to take it further, you can go ahead and ask the question. If they are moving around the outside (the perimeter) then what is in the middle?
And that is the question. What is in the middle? If you know me and how I construct these essays – you can probably guess.
It is Sophia. The wisdom of God for humanity is that place. But here is the thing: It is not an empty space. It is actually a pregnant place, for it is the womb. It is Mary saying “may it be unto me as you have said” in daring response to the initiation of God. It is place that the Bride is held. It is not an empty space but a place of possibility and potential. The womb is where the knowledge of God is born. Sophia.

Isn’t that an amazing picture? It is such a gorgeous metaphor for the moving of God. For humble community and dynamic relationship.

So, In closing. I just want encourage you to try something new. That might be researching the Names of God, or the background of just one of the Names.

Or, you might trying what Elizabeth Johnson suggested and try saying God three times each time you invoke the Name in prayer : God who is beyond us – God who is with us – God who is within us.

Or, you might close your eyes and let images of God dance in your head and in your heart as they move and turn and dip and recede in coordinated humility and preference. You may even want to go that extra step and incorporate the picture of the womb, the ministry of Spirit as ‘Helpmate’ , Jesus’ mother heart or God as She.

We end where we began: this is not simple and trying to make it so is dangerous. It is messy and necessarily complicated – just like life and exactly like faith

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>Is God a Man?

>God as She – Some people get upset if others refer to God as ‘she’ when they are talking.

and I kind of see why, as I think I use to be one of the one that would twinge, but in the end I just chalked it up to the person either wanting be novel and cutting edge, or irreverent and challenging.

But there are two things that that come out of the Bible that have made me reconsider this
(and a third thing out of church history that almost convinced me).

The first thing to notice is that God is bigger than gender definitions or human parameters that we have. In the beginning, it says, he made them male and female, he made them in his image: both male and female are in God’s image. If we were to draw a Venn Diagram (those overlapping circles) and put “male” in one circle (yellow) and “female” in the blue, we would notice two things right away: first, there is an overlapping section (let’s call it ‘green’) of share traits between the genders and this is shared humanity. In my opinion, this green section is very large as I think that males and females have more in common as human than they do that is distinct to their gender.
But it is the next thing that really makes you think. Not only would you have these three categories of Human, Male and Female but you would also have a fourth category called ‘other’ or ‘none of the above’ and that is the area around the two circles. This represents the things that are true about God that are not contained in humanity. Because I think that we could all agree that God is bigger than God’s creation and that saying ‘God’ is not just saying ‘human’ loudly. God is not just the collection of all our best hopes projected onto the heavens. So while God made them – male and female – in the image of God , God is not entirely defined by what they show or reveal about God. While they reveal something about what it is ultimately true, what is ultimately true is not shown in it’s totality in them.

Women are created in the image of God. Men are created in the image of God. Humans show some of what God is like, but God is not only or entirely found in or defined by what we see in humans.

The second thing to notice in the Bible is that the authors used masculine pronouns when talking about God and even where the original language might gender neutral the translators into English went ahead and used the masculine ‘He’. Now some people let it rest there and say ‘Jesus called God “father” and that is enough for me’ as there capstone. Cased closed. Period.

It is also interesting to notice what else the Bible calls God. More than 40 times the Bible says that God is a rock. It is interesting because we would not say that God is a cold inanimate object. We don’t think that God is actually a rock! We know that is metaphor, it is a word picture, a language device – some call it ‘Theo-poetics’ or the way we talk about God. The Bible also says clearly that ‘God is light’ (1 John 1:5) but we don’t think that the Sun is God. We don’t flip the light switch on and say ‘oh God is in the room’. It is a metaphor – a word picture. It’s how we talk about God. It is not revealing the totality of what is true about God. Other places in scripture talk about God having wings (5 times in the Psalms alone) but we don’t think that God is a bird. We don’t have hearing about what kind of feathers God’s wings are adorned with. There are not denominations that insist on pictures of God being in flight and others that prefer the flightless picture of the penguin version of God. Come on -that would be silly. It is a word picture – it is metaphor – it is the way that we talk about God. So we understand these as cultural expressions of different conceptions of God in their language. Yes God is Father , just like God is a rock. But God is not actually a rock! and that Rock is not God. It is Theo-poetics. Yes, God is light – but God is not actually defined in totality by light. It is a world picture. I could add tons of more examples and I’m not trying to get ridiculous, but if we hold too tightly to these, we have a picture of the Rock Father flying with his wings at the speed of light – or something.

We all know, at some level, that this is the gift of language. It allows us to use comparatives (whether metaphors or parables) to say ‘I will use this thing that you know to tell you something that you don’t know.’ That is the message.

Bottom Line : God is bigger than our conception of God and it not totally defined by our ability to conceptualize or communicate it.

Some people are going to object. They are going to say
A)the Bible reveals God as male and
B)B) when Jesus came, he came as a man. (a big ole’ hairy man)

But I would just like to point out that A) the Bible is the expression of a culture and time. It is a story and not everything in that story is good. Sometimes God’s people do things that God is not sanctioning or validating. It is simply telling us what people in that time and place thought. It was a very patriarchal society and some of the views express that. We need to be careful we don’t make women second class citizens in our churches and families BECAUSE they were when the Bible was written. If we do that, we might be missing the entire trajectory of the story: that redemption…and restoration… and reconciliation had come to earth and that after the veil was torn in two (the first symbol of what was to come) and then the Temple was destroyed in 70 C.E. and the people of God were dispersed (Diaspora) – they were not to import the old order but to initiate a new order. That would even outgrow that Apostles writings (the Epistles) as this message crossed rivers and into new lands it was to invite the Kingdom ‘on earth as it is in heaven’. Unfortunately – it got co-opted by actual Kings and brought into the kind of hierarchy and authority structures that earthly Kingdoms are defined by and built upon.

But that is a story for a different day.

B) As far as Jesus coming as a man… well – that is really something worth considering!
Stop and think about why that might be so important.
Is it because God is a man? No – we know that everything that is feminine is also found in God.

Is it simply cultural? No, I think that is too simple and misses that point entirely.

Could it be that Jesus came as a man to give us new model for masculine?
An invitation to a different way to be a man?
The possibility for a new picture of humanity?

I think that it is noteworthy that if Jesus came as a women and did the sort of things that he did in the culture to which he came, two things would have happened. A lot of people would not have even noticed. Women were expected to serve and take care of the hurting and be compassionate. Most people would not even have marked how remarkable it was that God had come as a parable – to use something we know in order to show us something that we did not know.
Some people would have confused the message and would have focused on the fact that God was female and would certainly elevated Female to god and began to worship the feminine. Missing that that too was a metaphor and would have thought that it was the message. This was a common conception the cultures all around Israel- Babylon to the East, Egypt to the South West and Greece & Rome to the North West. This was actually a real danger in that region in ancient times.


I think that it is significant to note two things about Jesus in this regard:
1) The gospels record at least 4 significant interactions with women. In all four of these cases, Jesus challenged or broke the cultural expectations, boundaries and barriers. He clearly was not that interested in reinforcing, maintaining or even abiding by the gender categories of his culture. (see John 4, Luke 10, Luke 7, John 12 – Mark 14- Matt 26)

2) Jesus’ radical non-violence, his heart for service (I came not to be served but to serve Mark 10:45, Matthew 20:28) his use of mother hen imagery “Oh Jerusalem Jerusalem how I longed to gather your children like a hen gathers her chicks under her wings” Matthew 23:37) borrowed from the prophets, and so many other examples portray Jesus as a different sort of man. It is actually a portrayal that gets some people quite riled up. I have actually heard two different pastors – both nationally famous – say recently that this portrayal of Jesus bothers them. One said that if Jesus had come as a women and did the sorts of things that he is reported to have done, most people would not have thought much of it. That is what we, generally speaking, expect from women : self sacrifice, service, etc. I don’t think that he meant it in a bad way. The other guy however… said that he hates the modern portrayal of Jesus as an effeminate and the bottom line is that he can not worship someone that he could beat up.

Here is the thing. This isn’t the 1600’s anymore. You just can’t pine for the old days and claim that you are being faithful to traditions of the faith. The core of this religion we call Christianity is this thing called the Incarnation. It is a manifestation of God in a given place in a specific time. We have to manifest that message in this place at this time… and Jesus modeled for us how to do that. He not only showed us what God is like, told us what God values but he released us to do the same in our context in our community.

Having said all of that, I close with this. Women are made in the image of God. They show something amazing about God. They are not second class citizens.
God values women just as much as a man. Sure, our physiology is different. Biologically there is uniqueness. We have different parts. We play different roles sometimes… but in the end – with generalities aside – every human contains, reflects or portrays the Image of God (choose you language). God created them , male and female, in God’s image. Yes, the Bible may use the masculine pronoun in reference to God. and we can debate if that was cultural or if that was simply limitation of language. But in that debate – to say that God is Father is no more of less true than saying that God is a rock or that God is light or that God has wings or that God is love or – if someone were so inclined – saying that the Great I Am is not the great unknown but is instead – She who Is… That the I am who I am and the Un-namable Ground of All Being is one and the same with ______ . Whatever language you choose… is no more true of false than saying that “Jesus lives in my heart” or that “God is on the throne” or whatever else you want to say.
In the end this is Theo-poetics (at some level).
This is metaphor and parable and word picture.
These are not exact formulations or legal expression of definitions in their totality.

God is a much a Mother as He is a Father. My mother is as good a picture for me of what God is like as my father is. My wife is far more like God than I am – and anyone who knows me will know that that is true.

We are missing something about God because of the way we think about God.

Our communities are missing something because of the way we talk about God.

Our world is missing something that it desperately needs because of the way that we think and talk about God.

So in summary :
God is bigger than God’s creation.

God is bigger than our conception of God.

God is not defined by or contained in our ability to talk about God.

I look forward to hearing from you on this. I welcome you posts, emails and comments.

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>The Most Important City in the World

>What will be the most important city in the world this year (and decade) ?
Jerusalem? Beijing? Moscow? Bombay? Washington DC? Baghdad because of the war? Tokyo because of the economy? Johannesburg, South Africa because of the World Cup? Maybe that old favorite Rome & it’s Vatican City.

I say “none of the above”. But for I tell you why let me tell you why cities are important in general, why they are important to God and then I’ll tell you what I think will be the most important city in the world this coming year.

To listen to the Podcast of this CLICK HERE

Why Cities Matter:

Whatever ever reason we would have given that cities are important in the past – for instance that they are place where people and ideas collect and collaborate so that (I have heard it said) “The future is created there”.

For us there is a much more practical reason. 100 years ago only 13% of the worlds population lived in cities. Statistics are saying that by 2050 over 70% of the worlds population will live in cities. IBM Has compared this (in a recent advertisement) to adding the equivalent of seven New York Cities to the planet every year.

The challenges for education, commerce, safety and health concerns are massive. I think that the ramifications and implications for spirituality and the way that we are the church. Christianity historically is based in community constructs that come from a far less urbanized and far less transient world. Christian Spirituality, by necessity, needs to look different in cities than it did for farm communities or monasteries out in the country. Christian community will need the same.

Just think about how much things have changed in these areas in the past 150 years. literally in the late 1800s (150 years ago) you could set up a big tent and – I’m not kidding about this- if it had light it would be a huge attraction. The revival meeting was born. people didn’t have electricity. So a big gathering of people in the evenings with live music and good preaching was an attraction. Just think about how to different church Community now that people have cars. think about how different the services now that people have television and get their entertainment elsewhere. think about how to different communication has become with cell phones. The Internet, e-mail, FaceBook and texting have really affected how people spend their time, their expectations for where God fits in.

Technology has radically impacted most peoples devotional life. the Industrial Revolution did – when people don’t work at home either in their trade or on their land – it will impact how they spend their day. Electricity is another example. When people can read at night, watch TV and set their alarm in the morning – they behave differently. In fact impacts their spirituality. This move towards cities will do the same.

How God relates to cities:

Laodicea – in Revelation Chapter 3 there is a message from the Lord to the church at Laodicea. One of the things in the message is that they should be “neither hot nor cold — but if they are lukewarm they will be spit out”. this has become a pretty famous passage though it is not the only thing in the message ( there are many other parts including where they have grown rich and arrogant and think they need nothing).

When I look at this passage with people after I read it I usually stop and ask “what is the most important word in this passage”. There is always a huge array of answers ( mostly ‘lukewarm’ though). then I say “its Laodicea”. To whom the letter was written is the most important thing. Not universal principles that we can draw out of it. Not modern applications. All content happens in that context. This letter was written to the church at Laodicea. If there is some principle or lesson that we can draw out of it as modern readers and communities that’s great. But we need to understand that it wasn’t primarily written to us or for us. It was written to a specific place and a specific time.

Leodicea is the most important word in the letter. It is here that we understand that the city to whom the letter is written had built an elaborate aqueduct system. They brought the famously cold clear water from their neighbor city to the east ( Collosea). They also brought water from a hot springs 6 miles awat into the city. The aqueduct system was magnificently designed and impressively constructed – hot healing water from one place, cool drinking water from another – but by the time the water got to Laodicea – guess what ?

Now however you want to interpret the message to that city ( I think it’s about usefulness) that thing I most want you to see in this is that the message was in a language they can understand. God was speaking to the Laodiceans using Laodicean imagery and metaphor. God was not using something general but something specific. Not something universal but something local. And my theory here is that this is how God relates to the people in any location.

This is my theory: that God does not speak in general principles as much as specific examples. That God is less concerned with communicating something universal than something local. And this makes sense because love happens locally. Truth is known contextually. Faith is experienced relationally.


Athens – mean Acts chpt. 17 Paul visits Athens. There’s this famous story where he gives a presentation based on one of their many monuments and statues that served as idols to gods. He found one that had an inscription below it entitled “to an unknown God”. This has generally been preached that they were so fascinated with idol worship if they wanted to make sure that they didn’t leave any gods out so they had this one token cover all. The problem is that this story happened in Athens. Paul’s message was to a specific people in a specific place in a specific time. All content happens in the context.

And if we were in that place we would know that Athens had as a part of its past a legendary battle. Hundreds of years before Paul walked into Athens there had been a miraculous event. In that event of their salvation from a plague and the war had come after they had made sacrifices to every god they could think of. Having no relief from the sickness they said ( as people in that day did) is there any other god he may need to appease – any god we have left out – any god we don’t know about? it turns out that they had to Hebrew young man among their ranks who told them of the Hebrew God. they made sacrifices and the curse was broken. In remembrance of that day they erected a monument. So ask yourself why didn’t they know that God’s name? Because Hebrews don’t say the name of God. This is the unknown God.

Paul walks into that place and says “ I can see that you are very religious people.” And then proceeds to tell them what the great God of heaven had done on the earth through the son. Most people don’t know about that story behind that encounter in Acts 17. I think it’s because we try to read everything as a universal story. But that story happened in a specific place in a specific time and if we miss that we miss the point of the story. God had a message for Athens that day, but it was not the first time God it done something for Athens or in Athens. The message that day was not universal, it was local. it was not generic it was specific.


Bethlehem – In John chapter 1 we have the Hymn of the Logos. this is John’s ‘ Christmas story’ and it says “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us”. That word dwelt would be the equivalent word to the Old Testament idea of Tabernacle. A tent that moves with the people. The idea is that for a time God camped with us – where we were. not generically but specifically. Not just universally but locally. God became one of us. This is a very powerful idea (obviously – as if that needed said) and still draws a negative reaction from some people. now the debate is probably more about how his followers behave more like the Romans who killed him then they behave like him – but that is for a different podcast. The point I want to focus on today is that the incarnation – what Christians believe to be the central event in human history and the one we attempt to orient all counting of years around – the incarnation did not happen generically it happened locally. It did not happen universally as much as contextually.

It has been pointed out that Jesus could have come to earth as a baby and appeared in Antarctica. He could have never talked to a single person — in fact he could have never even learned a language — and still accomplish the atonement. God comes and indwell flesh, then dies: the righteous for the unrighteous. And that would have been enough. But that is not how it happened! Jesus came to a specific people who lived in a specific place in a specific time. He learned their language. He learned their scriptures. He used examples from their lives. He touched their bodies. He talked through their stories with them. He called them by name.

He did not call everyone “earthling” and wave his hand over crowds and everyone was magically healed. He taught each each person in a way that was significant to their illness and understanding. to the blind man he touched his eyes. To the woman ostracized from the community for 12 years he called attention to her as a restored one. To a fisherman he pointed out where the school of fish was and made breakfast on the shore.
Jesus’ content happened in a context.

The Most Important City:

So this is my theory: that God does not speak in general principles as much as specific examples. That God is less concerned with communicating something universal than something local. And this makes sense because love happens locally. Truth is known contextually. Faith is experienced relationally.

Which brings us to the question: what is the most important city in the world to God?

And the answer is: the one you live in. Where you are… There — Now.

Some people who think the old way will stick with the answer that Jerusalem is always the most important city. I would say that Jerusalem is the most important city — for those that live there. God has something very important and unique for them. But God also has something important and unique for Rio de Janeiro and Soa Paulo, Brazil… and it might not be the same thing as Jerusalem or even as each other.
Some people will always think that Rome is the most important city because the most important person in their faith lives there. The good news is that God doesn’t only live your ( because he does live there) but he also lives in Sarajevo, Paris, and even Riga Latvia. God has something important and unique for each of those cities. The specific people in fact specific place in this specific time are of interest to God.

Maybe the gift is to ask God, not what God wants to say universally but locally. not what God wants to do generically but specifically.

When we think in generals we are in danger of missing how important our city is and either trying to important something that God did in a different city (say like a model of church that works in suburban Chicago called ‘Seeker Sensitive’) or something God did in a different time (like the stuff we see in the Book of Acts).

I think that what we see in the Book of Acts is that God works in context in each place. THIS is why I think that the books of the New Testament Bible are entitled after the cities that they were written to! Corinth, Ephesus, Rome, etc. and why they are not entitled topically “Haven & Hell” “How to run a church” & “Salvation”.

They come out of a narrative that comes out of a context.

To God, the most important city in Earth is where you live. This is true even if it’s not a city. Your town, county and neighborhood matter to God.
Not generically but specifically.
Not just universally but locally.

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>Praying to a God who isn’t There

>I wanted to follow up on last week’s podcast “the three gods we pray to” because some of the feedback that I got said that I just wasn’t specific enough.

Listen to the POD here : EveryDay Link

Not wanting to use labels: One of the things that makes being specific difficult is that I am trying to stay away from using labels. In my effort to steer clear of the Argument Culture, I have tried to speak generically where possible and avoid over-categorization and divisions. Sometimes I just try and broadcast a progressive concept or put forward an innovative idea and sort of let people chew on it and let it soak and savour without being too specific or directive. And I like to do that…but this time I’ve been asked to be very specific because of the nature of what I’m putting forward. And I think that’s a good idea.

so I’m just going to spell it out in as clear an English as possible, then share with you why I think it is and finish up with some application.

Here it is: when we talk about God, we usually talk about the God of the Big 5 ( omnipotent, omniscient, omni-present, immuntable, impassable) we say that this God “knows the future” and “never changes”. It’s a pretty conservative view of God. And that would be fine… if that’s who we prayed to & how we behaved. But I don’t think that’s who we prayed to & doesn’t seem to me that we act like that God runs things.

Let me share with you where I think the problem is coming from and then I will get to the other gods.

The lens of history: I believe that the disconnect is coming because we have a false view of history as if it were linear. When we as every day Protestant & Catholic Christians ( whether we are Eastern Orthodox, Anglican, mainline, charismatic, evangelical, Pentecostal or conservative) we try to look back to the cross – but we are not looking straight there. We look through several lenses.

Most of us are individuals. We are the results of enlightenment thinking and don’t see ourselves in the way that somebody born in 1600s — whether in North America or Western Europe or Africa or Asia — would’ve thought of themselves 400 years ago, even if they were our same race or lived on our same acre.

So if I just offer myself up here is an example, I am a male of European descent in North America trying to look back past the Industrial Revolution, Protestant Reformation and Renaissance. Trying to skip over the Middle Ages and the Crusades back to this event that I know as Christmas and read about in my Bible. I do this by skipping ( or assuming) the Greek philosophies that have impacted Christianity and its creeds and the writing of its scriptures. Then I try to wade through that Hebrew nature of this story without getting bogged down in it’s Jewishness by trying to read about this cosmic event in a universal way. Now by Universal I mean generic and that is where I fail.

Jesus didn’t do what he did in a generic way. He did not come to a generic place in a generic time and generically redeem us all. He came to a specific place in a specific time and that has been portrayed to me in a specific way and that has been handed down to me in a specific way. When I ignore all of that context, I may not be aware of what else is being reflected in my lenses if I don’t acknowledge that I look through lenses.

Last week one I was part of an online chat. It was a really good question about church leadership and it was just opened up for discussion. It was a good discussion. Then this guy comes on and says something like ‘here’s a novel idea: why don’t we look at what God said in the word’ and proceeded to be condescending and pushy and tell us all what we already knew about the Apostle Paul. It effectively brought the conversation to an end because how do you respond to that? It took so much energy for me not to reply and get into it. I wanted to say to this guy: dude I have so many problems with your opening sentence. First, I know that you mean well but when you say “word” you don’t mean it the same way that those who wrote it mean it. When Paul said “word” he wouldn’t have been talking about the same thing you’re talking about and now using as a heavy-handed precedent. Secondly when you say that “God said” you are ignoring authorial situation of the Scripture -please acknowledge that Paul or Luke or whoever you are quoting wrote in their own voice the things that they were inspired by God to write. They were not dummies being used by a ventriloquist god. Thirdly don’t act like there is one chapter in the New Testament that says ‘ here’s how to run a church’ & that is the final word on the issue. We piece this together from all whole bunch of snapshots about many different ways that churches were organized. There was not one church in the Bible. Lastly, even if that was the case (which it wasn’t) we don’t live in that world. We live in a world that has been deeply affected by what we read about in Scripture.

The very fact that we are having this conversation on the Internet in English should bring some humility to our perspective. Unfortunately it seems to do the exact opposite. It seems to make us more programed, more certain and more prescriptive unless we intentionally acknowledge it and account for it… our lenses can actually limit our view.

the Three Gods

So here is where I’m coming at this — I don’t believe in the Big 5 God. Not as it is configured in those 5. I don’t see that God in the Hebrew Scripture or the Gospels. I don’t imagine that God when I pray and I don’t see that God at work in the world.

In fact, I would say that if you pray and expect anything to change your probably not praying to the Big 5 God but more of a free will god. Even people I know who will passionately defend this classic view of God as sovereign and transcendent and unchangeable, pray in ways that, at least to me, seem inconsistent with the classic conservative view of God. Praying to the Big 5 God is in order to get your self in line with what is already written in the stars.

Praying to the God of free will is, I think, what most people are comfortable with or at least practice. No matter what they say in their doctrinal statement or theology debates, it all kind of sounds the same when we pray. I get to pray with people from different denominations and in different settings. It seems to me that in the free flow prayer that Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Anglicans, Pentecostals, Calvinists, Arminians and just about everyone else — no matter how they say that they differ — only once in a while does someone pray something that I can’t say ‘ amen’ to. I have found this when praying with Europeans, people from former Soviet countries, Africans, those from various countries in Asia and Canadians. I think that we all (mostly) pray to God #2: The God of Free Will.

Since I don’t believe in the Big 5 God, who do I pray to? I pray to the one that is intimately involved in the process. The one who is present in spirit. The one who works through us and with us and on us and for us.

Let me give you an example. If I hear about the atrocious living conditions in Haiti or the water and the mosquito problems that foster malaria in Africa and my heart is burdened for this. I pray about it. Maybe God calls me to go and be a part of the solution. Maybe God calls me to send money to someone who is on the ground working there. And that’s how God works. But the top soil doesn’t come back to Haiti because I pray in my multi-million dollar church building. The wells in Africa aren’t made clean because I pray at the mens’ breakfast at Starbucks. Children don’t suddenly develop resistance to malaria or AIDS because I pray from the comfort of my living room. That is not how God works. God is in the process of someone going. When that person goes -God is at work.

We don’t ask for topsoil to fall out of heaven onto Haiti. We don’t pray that tomorrow morning they are going to wake up and all of the trees will have magically regrown overnight. We know that’s not how it works.
And when we want to send someone money, whether for ministry or out of simple generosity, we send it to someone we know. Because God works in relationship. It’s not like a name pops in your head, and as you’re writing the check to this person you’ve never met their address comes to you. Then you fill out the envelope put a stamp on it and drop money in the mail to someone that you do not know if they exist or if the addresses right (and just say ‘I have faith’).

God lays it on our heart to give to people we know… brings their situation to mind… brings their face to our memory. We hear a story and are moved.

If someone in our congregation has an extended sickness and we pray for them, but no one calls them or visit them or writes them a note… once they recover and they come back church and we ‘oh we were praying for you- that you would be cared for and ministered to’. You see where I am going here… they are ministered to when we go over and cared for when we care for them. In that sense, we are the answer to our own prayer. That is how God works! It how it is designed and how it works best.

Look, I am not saying that we are answer to every prayer or that the answer is found ‘within’ or something like that. All I am asking for is that we be honest… that is how god really works: through us. I believe in the transcendent. I believe in the mystical. I believe that God’s Spirit is present among us and at work through us. That God is intimately involved in the process of unfolding history. I do not believe in the puppet master that manipulates by pulling the strings behind the scenes. I do not believe in the God who wrote the script ahead of time and is now just sitting back watching the play unfold on the stage of history. Who shows up on a stage once in while to move the set around but for the most part just wound up the clock and let history play out.

I do not believe that the future exists. I think that what ever we have that looks that way is really divine prophetic promise of participation. Put that together with God’s intimate knowledge of the creatures and the creation and you have a divine perspective we don’t have access to except through revelation. But this Big 5 God is a hybrid between some elements out of Scripture, some out of early Greek philosophy (mostly Platonic) and the evolution of church history (mostly Aristotelian).

That’s why I think it would be far better for us to pray to God who is present with us by spirit. Who is in fact with us here in the moment. And who is making available all of the resources that we need to bring about this will that God has an invested interested in.

If you want to stick with praying to God #2 and saying that the future is an elaborate series of possibilities and that God is the God of all of those possibilities that’s fine. I can go with that. As long as we acknowledge how things really work. Regardless of how the Hebrews pictured it, regardless of how it was portrayed in the early apostolic age, we need to talk about how the world really works for us here now.

I believe that the God of Calvin and Luther died in the second world war. Between Auschwitz and Hiroshima that concept of God died. That God is dead and even if he* did exist like that before World War II, he sure hasn’t been at work in the world since then. Even if he did exist, and I don’t think he did, he isn’t around now.

That isn’t to say that God isn’t around. God is alive and well. God is here with us now. It’s just that conception of God passed away in the gas chambers and in the nuclear fallout. The world will never be the same. And if we keep using these old pictures of God when we debate and when we pray I fear that those of us who call ourselves people of faith – the ones who still actually take time to pray- we may not be participating in the world the way it actually works. Which may be why we cling to antiquated fantasies about what a different world would look like and then hope that God ejects our soul out of here and evacuates the planet because we don’t want to go through the hard process of bringing about that preferable future and seen the kingdom, and earth as it is in heaven.

It’s a conversation I want to have. I want to talk about how the world really works. Who we actually think God to be. Make sure that our prayer both lines up with that conception of God and prepares us for the process of participating in the world as it actually is. That to me is what the brand-new day is all about. We live in a world that has “come of age”. I think it’s time to grow up and mature our faith for a world that is radically changing in our day.

and since I don’t believe in the second coming or the end times in the classic sense **
– I think that we will have plenty of time to do this.
But more than that, I think that it IS time to do this.

* I use ‘He’ for God when talking about the Big 5 God.
** I believe that the book of Revelation was directed to the events of the first 3 centuries and specifically Rome. It was probably fulfilled in the sense that it was intended by about 312 or 353 CE]

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>3 Gods we Pray to

>Since I am just getting started over here on Blogger – I thought that I would transfer over one blog a day from my site. If I do one a day, I can get them lined up.

I have had the privilege that I get to hear a lot of people talk about prayer. Whether it is at seminars, in small groups or one on one I have over the last 15 years been able to survey countless people in the area of prayer.

It is my observation, as I listen to these different perspectives and experiences, that it almost seems as if there are three different gods that you can pray to.

So I’ve looked into it. It turns out there are actually three different gods that people pray to. Well, more like three different conceptions of God that people pray to.

This doesn’t bother me at all. I get it. We each conceptualize and participate in our religious community, our unique expression and with our individual experience. This is bound to produce multiple manifestations and allusions to this transcendent being or greater reality or central axis of life.

What is somewhat concerning to me is how jumbled, muddled and incoherent the mixing and amalgamating seems to be. I’m concerned that we may be approaching this with a thoughtless or careless approach. So what I would like to do is take a look at each of the three gods — or conceptions of God — individually. Then talk about how one would pray to each one of these unique constructs and address why it is potentially not helpful to mix and match gods with approaches.

The first God is the classic god. This God is transcendent, omniscient, omnipotent and all the other things we want A divine being to be. When we talk about this God we say ‘ He know the future’, and ‘God is in control’ or (if you prefer) Everything Happens for a reason ’.

The second God let’s us have free will. This is a God who somehow let’s us be flawed human beings and somehow still maintains the ability to be God. We don’t know how – it’s a mystery.This is the god of possibilities. Somehow… this God has scripted the future. He has outlined a ‘perfect will’ and somehow planned for every subsequent contingency with a ‘less than perfect will’ or acceptable will. This is a God that has accounted for everything.

Whereas the first god has ‘seen’ the future or ‘knows’ the future, this second god has scripted a preferred future – it is not necessarily going to come about exactly in the way it was designed… but this god is still able to salvage what was desired in the midst of our human frailty, fallenness and failure. (3 F words you hear all the time in with this God).

The third God can be called Emanuel – God with us. This is a picture of God who is here… in the midst of us. This is the God of the process. Who is amongst us in the midst of the moment. This is the God of presence and incarnation.

These are three different concepts of God. They are three different constructs or conceptions. We may have gotten used to mixing them or jumping between them as needed, but they are definitely three different pictures of God that come from three different stories in three different eras.

And when it comes to prayer, the differences really come to the surface!

For instance: if you believe in God #1, since he has seen the future, you pray that he might clue you in as to what the future might be so that you can get ready. Praying to this God is trusting in what is Predestined or fated. You can’t change the stars but it is comforting to know that this God knows and is in control.

If, you believe in God #2, you are praying to the God who has scripted the future so you are hoping that that He tells you what he wants from you so that you don’t miss his perfect will. You ask this God to change things. Since this God is powerful and in charge of the future, but has somehow allowed us free will.. we ask for direction, do the best we can, we have faith and we turn over the rest.

Praying to God #3 is a little different. In the world of this God, there is no future. I don’t want to get into all the technicalities of Einstein, meta-physics and cosmology but – just trust me there is no such thing as the future with this God. It does not exist. and what we think of as Prophecy is actually the Providential promise of God’s participation and an intimate knowledge of our creaturely propensities. Praying to God #3 is not to be clued in or not to miss the way, but is to be available in the moment to what God is doing among us.

This is Emanuel – God with us. This is God who is among us and when we pray to this God we are creating the future. The future is created by us participating with God’s will – which is neither like a movie that God has seen or a script that God has written. It is a plot that is currently unfolding. It is determined by our actions and participation.

You may be listening and think ‘you are making too many delineations and categories’. And I might agree with you… if it were not for the fact that when I hear people talk about God, it sounds one way – and then when they pray & it sounds an entirely different way – when we act, we behave as if god is a third way.

People talk as if God is all-powerful and all-knowing and all..everything. Then they pray that they ask this God to heal this person, change this circumstance and bless what they are doing. Which is fine if you believe in free will – but then , let’s stop talking about God as in the way the the early Greek philosophers did and get rid of all the omni-scient omni-potent and omni-present, unmovable and unchangeable talk. (5 Biggies)

I don’t believe this Greek God Theos. I believe in the God of the Hebrew narrative. This is a god who regrets, changes minds and enters in. This is the god who is here with us now! Emanuel – god with us. Not a god who was incarnate one time on the first Christmas but a God is who incarnate in his people every Christmas – every day between Christmases.

We talk as if with God things are set. Fate is written, God is in control and everything happens for a reason.

Then we pray to a God who compensates for our our free will and fallen nature by asking for things to change and bend to the ways things are and the way that we are.

We talk about about God in one way and then pray to God in a second way.

And if those were the only two options… that would be one thing.

But I actually conceive of God in a different way (a third way). This is isn’t about whether the future has been seen or scripted but about being here in the moment. This is about being the person who is available now.

Praying to god #1, for whom the future is set, is to be clued in so that we are prepared for what is coming.

Praying to god #2, who accounts for our free will, is so that we don’t miss the script and he can adjust things that don’t bring about his greatest good.

Praying to God #3 (for whom the future is not a vision or script but a possibility) is an exercise in availability – to create them and participate in things as they are becoming.

For some people, the formulations of the Dutch in 1700s really work. The all-knowing God is in control and you can trust him. Pray that you may know his will.

For others, who believe in Free Will, prayer is a powerful influence to ask the Father for his will to come on Earth as it is in Heaven.

Others of us who struggle with the thoughts of the early Greeks and superstitions of the centuries past wonder if if isn’t time readjust the way that we talk and think about God. But most of all – we want to make sure that we pray in ways that are consistent with our formulations of God.

There is no sense in talking about God one way, praying to god another and then hoping for the outcome of another.

If this was a mystery or a paradox – that would be one thing. But there is no sense in trying to cover over ancient concepts of god with modern practices and then hoping for fantastic future results.

There are mysteries in the universe. There are paradoxes to explore. But what we are dealing with is a simple incongruence between conceptions of god from different eras and inceptions.

If we talk about God in one way – Pray to God another and then behave in yet another… the incongruence will eventually catch up with us. In fact, I think that it has for many people and this is why some have given up and gone a different way. Others have become disgruntled and bitter. Others have stuck with but are a little bit bored and disinterested.

This is obviously a huge concept and a massive conversation – I just wanted to introduce the idea that they way talk about God and the way the pray and the way that we live may be 3 totally different ways.

and I am not sure that is working so great for us.

We will obviously return to this in the New Year –

May the God of peace guard your heart and mind as we travel the road together.

If you want to listen to the Podcast instead of read this : PODCAST LINK

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>Did that Elephant say Merry Christmas?

>I thought it would be fun to share one of the Christmas messages I preached on the podcast.
[PODcast Here]

In case anyone wanted to chat about it, I have put a short set of bullet points here.

  • Trying to explain our holiday celebrations to someone from outer space or from a foreign land who had never seen them might be tricky. To get from a poor family having a baby a long time ago to our massive shopping sprees and gift exchanges might take a while.
  • Consumerism is one of the elephants of Christmas. It’s that giant presence in the room that’s just easier to ignore than to acknowledge and address.
  • The “Happy Holidays” versus “Merry Christmas” controversy exposes another elephant. The fact that this whole holiday is centered around the gift of love and humility makes it tough to sell when it gets entangled with cultural constructs and political realities.

  • The Gospel of Matthew has two things that none of the other Gospels in our Bible have. One is the slaughter of the innocents where King Herod (King of the Jews) tries to murder all boys under two years of age in the region. The second is Mary and Joseph’s flight to Egypt. It is clear that Matthew includes these because he is trying to tell us a distinct type of story: an Exodus story. He includes images and allusions to portray Herod as a Pharaoh character and then connect with this to Egypt in a way that makes it impossible to miss. ( There are many other devices that Matthew uses to construct his gospel in a way that mirrors the Pentateuch.)
  • These two elements from Matthew’s Gospel reveal biggest of the elephants of Christmas. The Christmas story is couched in, set in a context of, violence. When we ‘Hallmark’ this holiday we sometimes sanitize it and sterilize it to the point that it is unrecognizable from the Gospel accounts.
  • Let’s be honest, as these two Jewish young people flee to Egypt to become illegal aliens, foreigners in a land that holds deep cultural implications for their people, the idea of people saying ‘Merry Christmas’ or ‘ Happy Holidays’ seems pretty irrelevant.
  • In fact I think that this exposes two things. The first is that the “Merry Christmas” controversy is not about this at all but about something else entirely. The second is that we are disconnected from the violence of that first Christmas.

  • When the angels say “Peace on Earth – goodwill toward mankind” it might have seemed redundant to those that first heard it. The region already had a Peace : Pax Romana. The Peace of Rome was enforced this way — you obey the rules and there will be peace. If Jesus came as the Prince of Peace he comes into the context of the Pax Roman and provides a different kind of Peace.
  • We miss this point because we are disconnected from the context of that original Christmas. when the Magi say to Herod “we’re looking for the one born King of the Jews” they are speaking to the one appointed by Rome ‘King of the Jews’. this would have been a subversive sentence. “ Peace on the earth” would have been a subversive sentiments to the Peace of Rome – saying that it wasn’t good enough. Many Christians don’t know that the phrase “Jesus is Lord” is a mirror to a very popular saying in the centuries before and after the birth of Christ. people in every direction from the place Jesus was born would have said “ Cesar is Lord”. So when Jesus’ followers would have said that he was Lord they were in an act of subversion saying that Caesar isn’t Lord.
  • The Christmas story is couched in violence and is violence to the ways and powers of this world. It still is today. The Christmas story says to the structures and institutions of this world ‘ you don’t get to stay this way’. The peace that you provide commerce through violence and submission and victory and is not a real peace. when we sanitize, sanctify and sterilize the Christmas story we lose this part of it.

  • Revelation 12 is the Christmas story as seen from heaven. It is distilled to us through a genre of literature known as Apocalyptic. It is the Christmas story nonetheless.
  • You never see Christmas cards of the image of a pregnant woman lying on her back with a dragon perched between her legs ready to eat the baby as it comes out. I’ve never seen a Christmas card carrying the image of the slaughter of innocents or of a terrified couple fleeing into the wilderness running for their life.

  • The Christmas carol “Oh Holy Night” is probably my favorite. I especially like the big notes of the chorus: Fall on your knees! Oh hear the Angels voices! Oh night divine Oh night when Christ was born! Oh night divine… and mostly I’m just hoping that I’ll be able to hit that big note at the end. Mostly I don’t. But it’s such a climactic moment in that song that after it’s over afraid I’d miss the next chorus because I’m thinking about how I can never hit that note outside the shower!
  • It’s a shame because that next verse is amazing. And in the context of what we are talking about — the violence of the first Christmas And the subversive nature of the story– it makes a lot more sense.

Truly He taught us to love one another,
His law is love and His gospel is peace.

Chains he shall break, for the slave is our brother.
And in his name all oppression shall cease.

Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we,
With all our hearts we praise His holy name.

Christ is the Lord! Then ever, ever praise we,
His power and glory ever more proclaim!

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>Opening Thoughts

>

Analogy

Every Spring I use to take an extended backwoods Canoe trip in a remote part of the Adirondack mountains. We would start on one body of water and navigate through several connectors over the next few days. One night we would stay on this big island and the next morning we would cross our biggest lake of the trip. We had a saying ‘ the wind always blows against you on Lowes lake” which of course was really saying two things: the wind always blows on Lowes lake and secondly, it is always against you.

When you reach the far shore of Lowes lake, which takes a while, you get to rest for a minute and collect yourself before you put your canoe up on your shoulders and hike it – an old move called portaging – to the next body of water. We would camp at Big Deer pond and inevitably the conversation that night would invariably turn to how difficult that portage was and how short it was compared to the one that was waiting the next day.

The next day was quite a haul and in the middle of the portage there was this ascent called ‘Heart Break Hill’ where you plateaued and had a relatively flat walk the rest of the way. Fatigue would set in and other members of your group would help you out or rotate in to give your shoulders a break. By the end of the day you were able to set down your canoe and pack on the shores of the Oswegatchie river. This was new fresh water. You would be paddling with the current now and you were now fishing for native Brook Trout instead of Bass. These were legal to keep for dinner and there aren’t many things that taste as good as fire roasted trout after an exhausting day with a group of trusted buddies.

This helps me think of two things about our conversation. The first is that I designed year one of Everyday Theology based on the pace and geography of that canoe trip. I tried to sketch it out – where to push hard, where to camp for awhile and when to pick up our vehicle and portage it up to new water – all in keeping with the layout and topography of that backwoods adventure. This means, of course, that in our little analogy we have finished the trek to the Oswegatchie and this begins the next leg of our journey.

The second thought is that as nice as it is to be in the new water and as thankful as we might be to have the heavy work behind us… we still have our same canoes and paddles. Our vehicle has not changed. But while we will still paddle in roughly the same manner, since we are flowing with the current our pace and technique will change a bit. Our tone is a little more casual. We are still doing the same activity, we are just in a different environment. But with that change in environment comes a new stroke: the backstroke. Out on the big open water you don’t want to lose any forward energy so back strokes are generally less desirable. But over here it is pretty essential. The current will do much of the work for you as long as you navigate and negotiate well. Read the current, watch for obstacles, mind the shore… and it will go well.

This analogy fits here well for me. I see the current direction of the world – globalization, technology & media as well as the information age- heading in a pretty clear direction. This strong current pulls us along and we want to navigate and negotiate it well. Some people of faith want to fight the current in order to preserve or conserve the past. I think that is a losing battle – in fact, I’m not even sure it is the good fight that it is often portrayed to be. No, I don’t want to combat the age we find ourselves in – I am interested in where it leads and if it can deliver us to the place that we are all called to in the end. History only flows in one direction. You can not live in the past. You can live in today only as long as today. The current keeps flowing , always in that one direction : forward. The past is passed and while part of it was great… it is certainly has been a mixed bag. God has been involved in the process of history, but it moves forward.

Theology is our vehicle, conversation is our paddle and culture is our stream.

I’m looking forward to the journey.

______________

Here then are some things that came with us from the first leg

Opening thoughts:

I typed up (over on the main Podcast page) that “Navigating in a liquid culture takes some unique tools.

Narrative Theology pushes us away from bullet points and propositions only.

Developing an every day theology takes an thoughtful addressing of the intersection and integration of modern Biology , Psychology, Philosophy … and even Cosmology.

There is a way to do it, however.

When people say Theology they often mean the History of Theology.

We don’t.

We mean the expression of content in a context. All content happens in a context. Historical expressions will be considered and addressed. Some will be applauded and approved even adopted. Others might be best left in their own day.

We live in a world of massive change. If we approach this exponential situation with a debate about incremental adjustments – or worse yet : classical formulations – it probably won’t result in what we hope it will.

I love that famous Einstein quote:

“ the kind of thinking that will solve the world’s problems will be of a different order to the kind of thinking that created those problems in the first place.”

– Albert Einstein

The difference between a tree and a river

“We are not living in a world where all roads are radii of a circle and where all, if followed long enough, will therefore draw gradually nearer and finally meet at the center: rather in a world where every road, after a few miles, forks into two, and each of those into two again, and at each fork you must make a decision. Even on the biological level life is not like a river but like a tree. It does not move towards unity but away from it and the creatures grow further apart as the increase in perfection. Good, as it ripens, becomes continually more different not only from evil but from other good.” – C.S. Lewis

So while our allegory is a river our experience is more like a tree and this is why we are humble in our conversation and dialogue about the ‘other’ and their perspective and experience. This propensity toward diversity and multiplicity requires it.

_______

Big point:

I hope that people don’t think that I am just being fancy for that sake of being fancy. Or that we are being innovative as an end in itself. Or that we are obsessively updating as a fun little experiment or trivial hobby or out of fear of being shunned as unintelligent troglodytes who believe in superstitions of the past.

If someone misses what I am suggesting here then they will probably not get what we are up to or why we are doing what we are doing. So let me be really clear about this. I am suggesting three things:

– The recent centuries have seen massive innovations in the areas of Biology, Psychology, Philosophy and Meta-physics. Maybe it’s time to update our Theology too. I don’t want to cling to classic formulations of the past for the sake of tradition only or for fear of veering from orthodoxy. If something is right and true and can stand up on it’s own merit, I willing to believe it no matter when it first came into formulation as I am willing to move on from something that doesn’t stand up regardless of who has in the past believed it or for how long it’s been believed. In the Brand New Day ideas either hold water or they don’t – and if we want to take something by faith that is fine. But let’s be clear that is what is happening and not promote the facade that this is reasonable when in fact it is simply historic tradition. Intellectual honesty and humility needs to mark our way forward.

– One of the great advantages to the post-modern framework is that it can handle – more than that , it helps facilitate – the multiplicity of options, perspectives and positions. That means that it is going to be essential that we frame our conversation and label our categories with broad enough boundaries and big enough regions that family members from other ‘camps’ or ‘tribes’ can be included in the territory. There are some people who calls themselves Christians who are seeing modern day miracles (even old style signs and wonders). There are also believers who do not believe in the breaking of physical laws of nature – they do not believe in the miraculous. They think that it is scientifically inviable. There are other believers who think that the miracles did literally happen in the days of the Bible but that those ceased in the change of ages. Here is the thing : they are all Christians. The days of drawing up the boundaries in ways that one group classifies the other as ‘outside’ the faith needs to be over. If we want to have conversation and even disagreements, that is fine. What we can no longer do is ostracize and vilify those in other camps. We are all a part of the same family. The big wacky wooly family of God. There are going to be those in the family that think that the world was created in 6 days Six thousand years ago and others who are going believe that God has superintended a process that has taken Millions of years. They are both part of the family. There are going to be those who think that Homosexuality is a sin and those that think God ordains it and that those 3 passages in the Bible are not about sexual orientation but about a distinct act that we still need to vigilant against. They are both members of the family and as heated as the debate might be, we cannot disqualify or disown each other from what only God is in charge of. We are going to have to change the way that we frame this conversation if we want it to go differently that it has in the past.

– There are parts of our tradition that are rich and wonderful and we want to embrace them, fulfill them and promote them. Not all of church history is admirable but neither is it all antiquated relics and superstitions. We want to honor and adopt those things that draw us forward to living authentically in our day while acknowledging those that have come before us. We obviously want to be careful that we don’t fall into thoughtless rhetoric, mindless obedience and empty ritual. We all kind of agree that religious ceremony that is absent of the power that it is suppose to represent is pretty hollow. We want to do things – not just because they were done in the past – but because they are worth doing today.

To recap:

– We need to update our Theology to incorporate innovations in Biology, Psychology and Philosophy.

– We need to draw bigger boundaries and more inclusive circles because believers who believe very different things can both be Christians. There is not just one way to believe that qualifies as legitimate.

– We need to be wise about integrating the parts of our tradition or heritage that are worth embracing. There are parts of the past that just need to stay in the past.

So that is our initial plunge into the new water.

Feel free to post on the Blog, email me personally or chat in the Facebook discussion room.

Oh, and one last thing: we also have a saying about being on the river “bye all means necessary, stay upright – do whatever it takes – just DO NOT TIP” and I think that applies here. Sometimes the waters are turbulent and the current is scary strong… I understand why people’s faith gets a little tippy (this is an official Canoe word – I think) and they want to get out of the boat. But let’s just remind each other once in a while -especially if we see some danger up ahead or notice someone having a tough go of it – “Stay upright , do whatever it takes – just DoN’T TiP”

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