why did it bother me so?

Sitting in church this past weekend I felt my frustration rising. It wasn't just the length of the sermon which was over an hour long. It was the content.

The purpose of the sermon was to get church members fired up to support an evangelistic campaign in the fall. This is Adventist jargon for a public series of lectures which run 5 nights a week for over a month systematically teaching people the beliefs of our church and trying to recruit them to membership.

The preacher tried to reinforce an Adventist belief that is strong in some and waning in others. It's the belief that the Adventist church is THE remnant people of God mentioned in Revelation. Furthermore, it's the remnant to the exclusion of ALL other denominations, religions, and faiths. To some Adventists this belief is their understanding of being unique and following the Great Commission to preach the Gospel. To an increasing number it's seen simply as arrogance and needs adjustment.

It was no surprise to hear this line of reasoning as I have grown up hearing it. But it was annoying.

Why did it bother me so?

1. Maybe because I simply don't believe that anymore. I think Adventism CAN be A PART of God's faithful remnant, but I don't believe the denomination is the definition of God's remnant in totality. (This doesn't mean that Adventism has nothing valuable and unique to offer.)

2. Maybe it makes me feel despairing. I long to see the church move more progressively towards unity with other churches (not uniformity) and I feel messages like this take us ten steps backwards because a certain element of Adventists lap this thinking up. I wonder, "What's the use of trying to fight it? Furthermore, do I have any purpose as a pastor if I can't make a difference?" (Here comes another pessimisism swell)

3. Maybe just pride. It proves I can't make the church become what I want it to be.

4. I think I feel a bit embarrassed of my church. I am trying to build networks of connection in the community and here my church is going to engage in an activity that I feel builds walls, not bridges.

5. I find it hard to sit through these type of arguments, and this fall I'll have to be a "good" pastor and support this with at least my attendance. Approximately 25 nights of stuff like this--ahhh.

The interesting thing is that aside from these beliefs, this preacher is actually a nice guy. I hope I can find a way to not be so bothered by this event and simply go along with it to be with the people that I'm called to minister to. Maybe I can even find points within the series that I can use has injection points to drop seeds of a different focus and purpose for Adventism. The above picture I found online was in an article entitled, "Frustration as an Opportunity".

May my frustrations with this upcoming series not be a discouragement to what I feel God calling me to do, but a challenge to look for creative ways to still live and preach what I believe, remembering that it's not my job to change the church. That's God's work. I'm just a seed planter.

golden contacts

I heard a story recently by a retired colleague of mine in pastoring. He was sharing how one particular time a couple of young Mormon Missionaries knocked on his door. He invited them in and carried on a conversation with them. For some reason (not sure if the weather was bad and he felt sorry for them or not) he and his wife invited them to stay for a meal.

Somewhere in the conversation it came out that these young men had discovered a "Golden Contact" that very day. My friend inquired as to what this meant. The young men responded that this was a person who had been so interested in what they'd had to share that the person committed to becoming a member of the Mormon church that very day.

My curious friend then asked these fellows, "What kind of contact am I"? Their reply was, "A dud"! As you can imagine this didn't give my friend's wife the warmest of feelings after making these guys a meal.

I talk about this not to harp on Mormons, but to illustrate the typical approach of many church efforts across the board to evangelize. Although usually done less blatantly, the success of most church evangelism is considered reached when it leads to more people becoming members of that church.

Maybe the idea of "Golden Contacts" needs to be broadened. Any opportunity to serve and bless others in the name of Jesus is truly a "Golden Contact" irregardless of whether it builds the Church institution or not.

identity of spiritual community

Yesterday I was listening to a podcast over at the Spectrum website that was a panel discussion of sorts on George Knight's new book, "The Apocalyptic Vision and the Neutering of Adventism". Having only read a few introductory pages this morning I'm in no position to authoritativly describe the book's content or purpose. But, from what I hear, it's arguing that in order to have a reason to exist, the Adventist church must be faithful to the sense of urgency about Christ's second coming that was present in it's infancy. This, and other related doctrines, were the impetus for the formation of this now global spiritual community. Evidently, Mr. Knight feels that we must be true to our distinctive message (albeit in a Christ focused graceful way) in order to not whither into uselessness. It sounds like he feels that trends to downplay a focus on the Adventist interpretation of the profecies of Daniel and Revelation relating to "end time" events will ultimately result in the demise of our reason for existence.

Some of the discussion in the podcast seemed to go in the direction of recognizing that this is about understanding our identity as a spiritual community. Furthermore, what does it mean to be true to the historic and original versions of Adventist identity?

Do we need to believe exactly the same things as our forefathers or can we progress in our beliefs in ways that honor their beliefs, but adapts to our experience and culture just as they were responding to their own? Does our reason for existence in our current world cease to exist if the basis for our sense of identity grows/changes from the original definition?

In other words, is preaching that Jesus is coming soon (based on the above mentioned Biblical profecies) and other related Adventist doctrines really what it takes to be an Adventist?

I find this to be a fascinating discussion. I love the hope that Jesus will come to set things right eventually, but I've grown weary and disinterested in the idea that I have to maintain a sense of urgency about it. I have a hard time believeing that each momentous world event may just be the thing that causes "the end" to transpire. When generation after generation continue to promote these claims without the "great event" taking place, it begins to take it's toll. In fact, I almost have to hand it to those folks who can maintain that sense of urgency long term.

But what if that sense of urgency can be redirected? What if we can honor our theological history as Adventists in a different way?

What if our urgency was to work towards being the presense of Christ in this world now in more practical and relevant ways? Maybe embedded within Adventist doctrines are seeds of hope for the world that honor it's history, but look different now.

Okay, enough thinking out loud for now. I'll talk more about the book after I finish it.

incarnating the church

Continuing the theme from the last post, I wonder how incarnation concepts apply to change and progress in the church?

When we think about influencing "the world" for God, we talk about this idea of incarnation-where you become a part of a culture not entirely your own and basically be an influence that is acceptable most of the time to the culture. There are times to make counter cultural stands for sure, but much of the time it's about engaging the culture and serving the culture.

What about change in church life? I feel institutional church life is largely about how to build the institution with others from the world who can be made to think and believe like the church. I long more and more for church to simply be a body of people who are on a mission to bless the world (even those who won't become members of the institution) and partner (not compete) with other religions and faiths in announcing God's kingdom work in the world (all what I believe to be in line with Jesus' mission when He was on earth).

Typically pastors are taught to act like CEO's and to guide a church to where he/she envisions the church should be. I have a problem with this though. I am not the CEO type. Furthermore, the vision and dream I have growing in my heart for the church goes against so much of traditional church thinking and practice. In fact, it may counter some church theology since practices are often the result of theology.

I know increasing numbers of pastors whose visions for the church and their seeming ability to accomplish it are incompatible. So they simply leave the pastorate to serve God's kingdom another way. I do not judge these folks and affirm how God leads them.

But, what if there's a calling to incarnate church culture? To work with a people whose beliefs and practices at times go counter to where you see the church should be going for the purpose both of serving these people and dropping seeds and hints of a different direction and purpose for the church. When do you work counter to church culture and when do you go along with it? What do you do if things that are a big deal to the church go directly against what you believe to be God's purpose for the church? Do you stand up and fight and likely destroy any possibility of change or just go along with the flow quietly spreading salt and feeling like no change is happening either?

In the end, I think there's value to the church incarnation perspective. But it's not easy, at least the way we as pastors are taught to think and practice. The biggest battle is likely with self, not the church.

IN but not OF the world

This classic line from the lips of Jesus still challenges people today. Recently I posted the following question on Facebook, "What does it mean to be IN but not OF the world? What do we actually mean by this? Is what we mean by this the same thing that Jesus meant by it?"

I was surfing another blog at the Spectrum site where my friend Ryan Bell responded to a similar question in this way, "the tension might be described as being an oxygen-breathing creature in the water, but not of the water. Being in the water, he said, requires getting wet. But it does not require drowning."

I really like this analogy. The creatures pictured above go up for glorious moments of freedom above the water's surface, but that's not where they live. The environment and culture in which they spend the majority of their time is in the water with many other creatures. In fact, they couldn't survive above the water any more than they can survive below without air. They live in a tension between two worlds-that of air and that of water.

I think the final application to the above statement by Jesus is really about tension. There probably isn't a formula that can be applied across the board. Each must wrestle with what it means to get wet in this world and yet still breathe heavenly air.

finding meaning

This past Saturday my church family participated in the age old sacrament of sharing in what's called the Lord's Supper. I've often mused and wondered what makes this so significant. How am I supposed to feel from this activity? What difference does this make to me or God? Am I supposed to feel really bad about my sins? Am I supposed to try to scan my life for stuff I can improve on (don't have to scan too deep for this)? I often end up feeling like I should be generating some sort of feelings (cause I don't have them) that are spiritual and sacred.

This week I sensed a possible breakthrough. I've been thinking a lot lately about the purpose of the people of God being to bless the world around us and to watch for opportunities to cast the vision of God's world made perfect (evangelizing about the coming Kingdom restored).

I've felt for a while that the Lord's Supper and Footwashing (a practice my church observes prior to sharing the Lord's Supper based on Jesus washing His disciple's feet) are nothing more than rituals and ceremonies.

I think that ritual and ceremony are for both remembering and imagining? We remember our heritage for the purpose of living in the present. This requires imagination. We have to wrestle with current realities in our world while we remember our historical stories and imagine better futures.

This weekend I asked myself, "What does the communion service have to do with blessing our world"? So, I challenged church members to use the foot washing ritual as a time to imagine specific ways that we can serve and bless our community this week.

During the Lord's supper, I again challenged people to imagine that this bread is not the body of Christ. We are! The bread is only part of the body of Christ as it becomes part of us. Maybe then, the Lord's supper can simply be another imagination catalyst for what it means to truly BE the body of Christ in our world. Or, simply a time to share ways we've been practicing serving our world. Or maybe even just shareing ways that we see Christ's life becoming evident in our local society, not just our church family.

The interesting thing about human nature is that when we do things together (especially acts of service) our capacity to be closer and more intimate is heightened. My wife and I often attribute certain elements of our friendship to the fact that we enjoying doing lots of different things together. It's after doing things together, that our friendship is strengthened and we have lots to share and talk about.

Could it be that the Church can truly commune together around Christ's life only as we practice being the Body of Christ in our communities and cultures?

In short, maybe the rituals of Footwasing and Communion have deeper meaning if they're focused not so much on our own personal spirituality, but on being a blessing to others.

holy huddling

Tomorrow is holy huddling time for me and my tribe (church family). While this may sound sarcastic, I think this is a healthy way to view our church gatherings. As long as we remember that huddles are not the point of a game. Playing the game is the point and huddles simply assist the better playing of a game.

My challenge as a pastor right now is, how can I encourage people to view their holy huddling for what it is and what it is not?

Or how can I encourage people that the majority of their spiritual/ministry energy is best spent outside of the huddle? Churches so often (I think) begin to view the holy huddling as God's great purpose and hope for the world. We think God's work is being successful when the huddle is growing and bustling.

But what if God isn't calling the huddles to grow so much as he's calling us to engage our world for him as He grows His kingdom in the world?

As more people are being blessed. As we use our unique gifts and religious perspectives to bless the real world around us, not compete for market share trying to increase the image of our huddle.

Let's go get em....