January 9, 2009
“The problem of bread for me is a material problem, but the problem of bread for my neighbor, for all, is a spiritual, religious question.” Russian philosopher Nicholas Berdyaev
I read this and thought of previous lines of discussion on this blog and with some of you who I know. I thought it was a quote worth pondering (or–can I help myself?–chewing on). Comment at will.
August 8, 2008
As I indicated in my previous post, I want to work through Harvie Conn’s Evangelism: Doing Justice and Preaching Grace here on the blog. This book, along with Conn’s Eternal Word and Changing Worlds: Theology, Anthropology, and Mission in Trialog, had a radical and profound impact on me. My whole approach not simply to conceptualizing theology and to studying the Bible, but also to living out Christ and the Gospel as part of a community (or at least trying to do so) was set on a new trajectory through Conn’s writings. This book very much stands at the start of this new trajectory for me.
Hopefully I can offer further reflections, or at least promptings to discussion, on how this book so radically impacted me, why it was so challenging, and why it was and remains so compelling now—as we work through it. Hopefully we can grapple with some of the basics of Conn’s refreshing and edifying challenges and what it might look like for us to continue (to start?) taking them up today. Where and why is he helpful to us? How do we see him working to challenge us (and himself) to live out Christ in quite challenging, missional, and rich ways, with the broader church for the glory of Christ?
I think looking at the Preface is a great place to start. Since it is so short, I decided to quote most of it below. In this way we hear from Conn himself what he wanted to do through this book. I left out some parts, mainly where he notes parts of the book stemming from previous publications… (more…)
August 4, 2008
For a while now I have desired to start posting more on some of Harvie Conn’s writings. Sadly most of my books and articles by Harvie are in a box five hours away from me, until September. Today, however, my copy of Harvie’s Evangelism: Doing Justice and Preaching Grace was returned to me by a deacon who had borrowed it and I thought, for now, I would post several of my favorite passages/quotes from the book.
This book had a radical and profound impact on me when I read it about five years ago. In the near future I plan to work through it in some fashion on this blog. But, for now, a few of my favorite quotes from the book. These provide some excellent snapshots of Conn’s heart and what he desired to see our Reformed churches live out.
For too long evangelical white Christian communities in the United States have had a “come” structure, a parochialism that identifies with saints. One cannot be a missionary church and continue insisting that the world must come to the church on the church’s terms. It must become a “go” structure. And it can do that only when its concerns are directed outside itself toward the poor, the abused, and the oppressed. The church must recapture its identity as the only organization in the world that exists for the sake of its nonmembers (23).
The gospel that ignores the sinned-against may work among the middle class, but it cannot possibly work among the overwhelming majority in Asia or the United States—publican peasants and workers. It conveys too much superiority, condescension, yes even pity, to be credible. What is missing is compassion. Compassion becomes possible when we perceive people as the sinned-against, as well as the sinning (47).
Let people know that by giving their allegiance to Christ they will be embarking on a great campaign to banish war and poverty and injustice, to set up a life where love and service and justice have taken the place of selfishness and power. Let people know that the church that sends out this manifesto plans to be an advance copy of the new world order it preaches (56). (more…)
May 27, 2007
Watched Children of Men last night, Alfonso Cuaron’s loose adaptation of the P.D. James novel. Not exactly a celebratory film for a new seminary grad, but one that speaks volumes on the consequences of living in Adam. For anyone who likes using the implements of the culture to get to the gospel, this is a must-see.
By the year 2027, there have been no babies born in 18 years, attributable to some unexplored problem. The setting is London reminiscent of the worst of bombed out Berlin – or perhaps Baghdad; the other major world cities have collapsed. Warring groups roam the streets. Radicals and rebels working at cross purposes with unclear affiliations have created an atmosphere of utter anarchy. Immigrants are unwelcome, and caged for deportation. The plot revolves around a young woman who has somehow become pregnant, and has come under the protection of one of the groups. The hero, a suffering, deeply depressed alcoholic, Theo, played by Clive Owen, has been identified by his ex-lover, Julian (Julianne Moore), head of the group, as the only one the girl can trust. Owen is reluctantly dragged into the scheme to protect the girl, and get her to some vague haven called The Human Project, which no one seems to be able to verify actually exists.
More significant than the plot, which sputters out within the hour, is the bleak, rubble-filled atmosphere created by Cuaron, and the despair that pervades Theo’s soul. Whether cause or effect, a world with no one under 19 is hideous. Tenderness is gone. Depravity is no longer held in check. Those things we esteem as valuable – Cuaron uses Michaelangelo’s David as an in-your-face summary statement – are worthless with no future generation to buy them. Suicide pills are advertised like allergy remedies. Schools are abandoned buildings. (But, to reassure, everyone has a flat-screen TV, and the video games and ipods are better than ever.)
Whether or not Cuaron succeeds in making his political statement is debatable, but wittingly or unwittingly, he makes a remarkable theological one. The veil of civilization is thin indeed. Remove the meaning from life by doing away with future generations, and we become what we are in Adam. The “man is basically good” crowd will find nothing here to grab. Cuaron affirms T.S. Eliot: the world ends not with a bang, but a whimper, and a grotesquely sad one at that.
There are crowds of marching Muslims in this film, and a few half-baked pagan incantations, but no overt Christianity. Except. (Spoiler warning here . . . )
We have a terrified pregnant mother who jokes that hers is a virgin birth, a foster-protector who finds a hovel in which she is able to give birth amid the warring chaos outside, and an infant who is wrapped in swaddling clothes as they quickly are forced to flee. The cry of the child (OK, she happens to be a girl) silences the guns and warring for an instant, and she is ultimately seen to safety. This baby is not the savior of the world. But, she represents and points to the hope that is properly invested in the one who is.
Theological Mom
January 30, 2007
Acts 1:8 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
In this manner our Lord left the early Church, he didn’t label them beyond saying you are my disciples, and he certainly didn’t give them a building to look after – at least not one built with bricks and mortar. The earliest description applied to Christians was the phrase ‘the way’. I personally don’t have a problem with the language Christian but I think I prefer ‘the way’ because it says my life and my faith isn’t about belonging and hanging out, but its about belonging and moving forward. What does it mean to be a journey people, why did Luke chose this description and what does it tell us about the Church?
“Acts continues that journeying theme of the Gospel. The risen Jesus, now speaking and acting through the Holy Spirit in the life of His pilgrim people, continues to journey. No longer to Jerusalem, but from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth. Now He proclaims the gospel not simply to the Jews but “to all the nations” (Luke 24:47). The gospel itself receives a new name that indicates its traveling nature – “the way” (Acts 9:2; 19:9;, 23; 22:4; 24:22). This is Luke’s unique designation for early Christianity, journey language to describe a journey gospel.”(pgs. 99-100, A World To Win,Harvie Conn)
Has the Church in Western culture lost sight of her nature as a pilgrim people? Has she dichotomized between foreign missions and domestic evangelism, losing the missiological dimension of herself in her own local context? Do we even know how to use ‘journey language’, or have we forfeited our ability to speak prophetically into the present of people’s lives because we find ourselves trapped by our own cultural language game of symbols, signifiers, and the like that the world really won’t and can’t get? Is the gospel really a ‘journey gospel’ or is it something more tame and ruly, less wild and more of a trained set of propositions that Christians walk through with ‘the other’ in five easy steps – in a manner to pass on the ‘choke collar of church-culture’? Can we be planted, with responsibility of maintenance needs while remaining missional in our identity and praxis? I think the answers to these questions for many churches could be yes, but there are those among us who haven’t lost sight of the missiological dimension of God’s people, who haven’t religated it to a 15% line item on the budget, who have a covenantal view of family and mission together. What are your reflections on these matters…
January 29, 2007
Last fall, towards the end of the semester I took to reading Ministries of Mercy by Tim Keller of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City at the urging of my cousin and her husband, who I was living with at the time. It was a paradigm shifting book for me and also proved to be a precursor to me moving from the suburbs into the city to begin working with the mercy minstries at liberti church.
