Things have been going swimmingly over at Emergent What?. We’re having some excellent cross-cultural discussions (or conversations if you prefer) and finding a lot of common ground.
Also, Scot McKnight’s excellent Jesus Creed feed for his Emerging Movement series has been added, even though it’s not anti-EC. He offers a significant and wise voice for the emerging church to listen to. Check it out.
James the brother of Jesus said:
Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. James 1:17
E.W. Kenyon, grandfather of prosperity theology, said:
What I confess, I possess.
I agree with James (taken slightly out of context), that we should thank and glorify God for the good things we experience in life. Every time I get a webhosting customer, I can’t help but feel, well, blessed.
But I don’t like the words blessed and blessing, because they’ve been so TBNified that we have ceased to allow them to refer to their biblical meaning. In fact, we’ve started to invoke God’s blessing as a way of implying that we’re special, that we’ve won God’s favor, and that He likes us more than everyone else.
God said to Abraham:
The LORD had said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.“I will make you into a great nation
and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you.” Genesis 12:1-3
If being blessed doesn’t mean God likes us better, what does it mean? I’d like to suggest that it means God has chosen to do something through us, and that has benefits for us. In Luke 1:26-38, an angel appears and tells Mary that she is “highly favored”:
26In the sixth month, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, 27to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”
29Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. 30But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God. 31You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. 32He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, 33and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end.”
34″How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”
35The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called[a] the Son of God. 36Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be barren is in her sixth month. 37For nothing is impossible with God.”
38″I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May it be to me as you have said.” Then the angel left her. link
It certainly appears that Mary has done something to gain her status as “favored” in God’s sight. The text doesn’t mention how good a person she was (just that she was a virgin), though, so we’re still not clued in to much.
The real answers can come from considering the plight of those who are indeed good, but do not seem very blessed, and in fact seem cursed financially, tragically, or otherwise. I cannot accept the “word of faith” idea that people in this category must have some hidden sin in their lives. Nor can I believe that the hard times they face are a result of failing to ask earnestly enough for something better. The entire book of Job seems specifically designed to get this point across to us. Blessing is not automatic, and lack of apparent blessing is not a sign of God’s displeasure.
So where does that leave us? I still feel like telling Pat Robertson to shut up whenever he predicts that a natural disaster will befall his ideological opponents. I still thank God when I get a new hosting customer. I don’t think God causes disasters to punish people or sends prosperity as a reward for righteousness (though of course he could do so if he wanted to).
Here are some things I do think, that help me deal with the joy and pain of life:
You?
I know I’m about five years late in offering this feature, but you can now subscribe to this blog via email, using FeedBlitz.
You can also use FeedBlitz to get an email digest of any blog that has an RSS or Atom feed (which basically includes all blogs - WordPress, TypePad, MT, Blogger, LiveJournal, etc). Check it.
Brian McLaren is asking people to donate to support Emergent. They would like to be able to support Tony Jones in a full-time role as national facilitator or whatever.
This request illustrates the shift that is occurring for Emergent. As Emergent becomes more organized, e.g. with the naming of Tony Jones as National Director (er, coordinator), it is positioning itself to be of greater assistance to established churches.
It seems to me that Emergent’s role for the emerging church is in two primary areas:
a) Providing guidance through speaking and writing
b) Encouraging practitioners through events such as the Emergent Gathering
Emergent is increasingly under pressure to offer an official perspective on everything anyone wonders about the terribly diverse movement known as the emerging church. They are always very quick to point out that they can’t do this, but that doesn’t seem to have diminished the expectation much.
I will state in no uncertain terms that Emergent does not speak for me, though I resonate with many of their books and ideas. It seems to me that most of the leaders in Emergent have come through the seeker-sensitive route, whereas I arrived in this conversation via the simple-church paradigm. It’s great to have a public face on such a diffuse movement, but that pardox has its difficulties, too.
So, I probably won’t be giving Emergent any money directly unless I attend an event or buy a book. I’m not very clear on what Tony Jones would actually be doing for the EC, though I agree that there is plenty to be done in the way of liaising between the EC and traditional churches. Hopefully the established churches, with their tithe theology to back them up :), will foot the bill for Tony’s position. Best wishes, guys.
Scott at Theopraxis says:
I largely avoid political discussions here. But this is a deeply disturbing issue, no matter one’s political affiliations - or at least it should be for those of us who claim to follow the Prince of Peace.
If you haven’t heard, Senator McCain has sponsored a bill (more correctly, an amendment to a Defense Appropriations bill) that would establish uniform treatment standards for enemy combatants held by US troops. The bill passed the Senate with an overwhelming majority. The Bush administration has threatened to veto the bill if passed by the House. Personally, I’m horrified that this is even a matter of debate.
Sojourners has made it easy to respond. Click here to contact your representative to voice your support for the McCain amendment.
I agree, and I think the “enemy combatants” thing threatens to become the loophole that swallowed our civil and human rights.
It’s also the biggest threat to our country’s international credibility. We need to uphold the rule of law and human rights, even as we seek to secure our lives from terrorist attacks.
Stan Granberg, currently teaching at Harding Graduate School of Religion, recently wrote a brief piece on emerging churches in the HUGSR newsletter (pdf; page 4):
the twentysomething, emerging generations are responsive to the gospel presented through these new churches for the simple reason that these churches are theirs. These new churches ask their questions and answer them in their ways. These emerging churches speak the language of emerging generations. In short, the emerging generations perceive these new churches — generated out of their concerns, their issues, their lives — to be real.
He points out, using some of Barna’s statistics, that most people in their 20s and 30s do not go to church, even if they grew up going to church. The implication, to me, is that there is a huge number of de-churched people in America. They have not all left for the same reasons, and making church cooler is not going to bring them back.
It’s interesting to hear about emerging churches from church of Christ people. They generally don’t say negative things about the EC publicly, though I’m sure they have their reservations. It’s good to know we’re on the radar for them.
EDIT (later that same evening…):
I guess what I’m saying here is that I would like to be in more contact with more people from my tribe. Stan was very encouraging to us when we started out in church planting, and I think we could all benefit from talking more (especially if it involves mexican food, like it did the first time we met :)).
What do you want for Christmas? The item at the top of my list costs $16,000. And I really want it.
Allow me to explain:
In many parts of Africa, clean water lies hundreds of feet below layers of hard rock. Children have no choice but to drink disease-infested water from surface lakes and ponds. When our drilling teams strike water, entire villages erupt in celebration because a clean water source cuts a community’s child mortality rate in half.
$16K can dig and install a hand pump on a well that can supply 300 people with life-sustaining clean water. It’s just one of many things you can “order” from the WorldVision Christmas Catalog.
It’s disgusting how far our money goes in other countries that need it more than we do. A one-ounce bottle Chanel No. 5 costs $275. Imagine other ways that money could be spent:
Dairy Cow - $545
Send a child to school for one year - $75
Brood of chickens for fresh eggs - $125
They have hundreds of items that you can buy in honor of someone else, and you get a card to give to that person, explaining how the money that otherwise would have been spent on them was used to help those in need. Here’s the catalog.
For more information on the clean water crisis in Africa, please visit Blood:Water Mission.
Detention Figher II Turbo, uploaded by justinbaeder.
I found these four tiny images of two guys in a classroom staging scenes from Street Fighter II Turbo (SNES) with the chalkboard a long time ago.
Today I found this larger image (above), but am still searching for the other three. Geniuses.
Because theirs was destroyed in an accident and they need one
Browse by category:
Explore by tag:
We aren't very into all that copyright stuff. Creative Commons licenses are better, so RC is licensed under this one.
Quote Radical Congruency at will. Inbound links are appreciated, and required for direct quotations.
