Barking

A tiny Yorkshire Terrier just walked by the house and taking an aggressive posture, began to bark at our 120 lb. Chocolate Lab. It was as if the dog was yelling, "Why don't you get off of your lazy butt and get out on a walk with me?" It was kind of humorous. Kona (our Lab) just barked back, "I'd love to, but I'm tied to this fence."

Sometimes I feel like this little dog. I'd love to see the church free from restrictions and out enjoying the neighborhood, but the church seems to just call back, "We'd like to, but we have so much keeping us tied here to do our thing, the same thing we have done as long as we can remember."

At this point, I have at least two options. My first option would be to run off, ignoring the church's stuck state (being tied to programs and traditions, not making inroads with the Gospel into the culture) and perhaps ridicule her in the neighborhood. I could simply dismiss her as irrelevant and out of touch and go do my own thing. But my reading of Scripture keeps this from happening. Paul reminds us that "as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, ESPECIALLY to those who are of the household of faith" (Gal. 6:10). It would be short-sighted and selfish of me not to engage the established ministries and invite them to join us on mission.

Another option would be to stop everything, sit down and just bark at the church. I could make much noise about how stuck she is and how tied to programs and traditions the institution actually is. This is unprofitable because it limits our calling and mission. God has placed us here to join the Spirit in calling out a community of people who challenge one another to love Jesus and other people with the goal of transforming the values of the city so that they look more like God's values.

So we live in this tension of joining with other congregations and keeping our distance because we are on mission. Here's what it looks like in real life:

We had really cool neighbors over for dessert the other night. We talked about family, housing, neighborliness, past shame and regret and religion. These folks have a wealth of life experience for us to learn from and are, to put it simply, great, honest people.

One thing that stung was their experience with the Institutional model of the church. They had both been shunned, belittled, and clearly unwelcomed by a group of people in the name of Jesus. We have to live in the tension of writing these Christians off as being unloving and really not representing God well to keep that sort of image of Jesus at a distance and relating to these Christians because they do name the name of Christ.

If love "is patient and kind...does not envy or boast...is not arrogant or rude...does not insist on its own way...is not irritable or resentful...does not rejoice at wrongdoing...bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things," (I Cor. 13:4-6) then I keep my mouth shut to my neighbors and proactively, with much prayer and patience ask God to use me to show them a better way. We love and accept them and do it all, boldly in the name of Jesus. We learn from them and listen (really listen) to their struggles and heartaches. We offer hope and the forgiveness of sins and we pray that they would see Jesus and fall in love with Him, because it's really all about Him anyway. It's not about our way of doing mission.

The Church Fortress

Some of our close friends have a daughter with freckles and red hair. I affectionately call her, "Little Red." Little Red as long as she could talk has referred to her father as "papa." This has changed recently. Because she spends more time conversing with other children her age who refer to their fathers as "daddy," Little Red has made the switch. Nothing about the relationship has changed, only the name. While at first it was heartbreaking to her parents who loved the originality and the sweetness in her little voice as she called out "papa," they have come to accept that "papa" will now be "daddy."

A similar thing has happened in the church. New congregations (made up of people from other congregations) are popping up all over claiming to "missional" and "emergent." What is strange, is that many of these "missional, emergent" churches are new in style, but not in substance. These churhes are "daddy" and no longer "papa." The relationship to the culture is essentially the same. The message to people is come to us, we have cooler music, we have more fragrant candles, we have a place for you to pray to our God and while you're here, you can become more like us. While this might be far more hip, it is really no different than the Pharisaic mindset that Jesus so often attacked. That mindset was, "come to US, speak OUR language, keep OUR observances, don't fraternize with those outside unless they are willing to come in, and then you can be close to God."

The Gospel of the Christ calls the church to be different in substance. The church gathered is fuel for the church scattered. Real worship (that spirit and truth worship the Father seeks) is found in everyday life. It is found in the eating and the drinking and the standing and the sitting and the walking by the way, and in our work, and in our friendships. We are to be a community within a community offering up our hearts and hands to people praying and working so that joyfully, much is made about Jesus. We are to become friends to our fellow sinners, listening to their stories, laughing with them, crying with them, and praying that God would give us wisdom on how to relate that to the grand story that Christ came to save us because we are broken.

Missio Dei Church is striving to become that kind of expression of Christ's body. We believe that God is calling out people to represent him in the world (don't take us out of the world, keep us from the evil one). We believe that the fortress mentality so prevelant in the church (even the hip "missional, emergent" ones) is dentrimental to the Gospel of Jesus. It is messy work, and it may get us killed, but the Spirit keeps us from doing anything less. It is not enough to just change the name, we must get back on mission.

Blessings <><

Celebrations of Life

Yesterday morning I woke up with my usual anticipation of Thursday morning mountain biking at Bent Creek with my buddy Mike. The forecast called for rain and biking through Bent Creek is miserable in the rain, so after a quick (and I mean quick) ride through a connector trail, we hit the forest road and began climbing one of Bent Creek's many mountains. Around the top, at an area called Ledford Gap, the trees thinned and the view was unreal. Clouds and mist were rising up in the valley and I was overwhelmed with the imagination of God. The attention He pays to detail and beauty is beyond words. This was grace, because even in a fallen state, where the creation itself groans and works in rebellion to God, her beauty is unsurpassed.

Yesterday was also my oldest son's 3rd birthday. In the afternoon, my wife and I took him to the toy store so that he could pick out a modest birthday gift. He played with several things in the aisle before we laid some of the appropriate toys out and asked him to pick one. He chose a simple race track and carried it with delight to the checkout lane. After we paid for his toy, I remember looking down at my son and I was taken with his expression of contentment and expectation. I love giving gifts to my kids and it was a reminder of how God delights to lavish upon His beloved good things from above.

My kid is playing with his new toy today and it is already a source of frustrtation. It is loud and obnoxious. What was supposed to be a token celebrating the life that God has graciously given to my wife and me has become a token of strife. Probably, I need to chill about the noise it makes and my son needs to chill about having it run 24/7. This scenario illustrates how often good gifts that God gives become our pursuits that actually drive us away from God. He grants us things to point out to us how good He truly is and in our sin and rebellion we become obsessed with the gifts and give God the finger. For this I am thankful for Christ and His redemptive work on the cross so that when I meet God there, I witness the Divine spanking, receive the Spirit and am restored to a right relationship. I am undone, Spirit change me.