One for the road...

The story of stuff...

Now you've seen the teaser i heartedly recomend you check out the full 20 min presentation, here are the story of stuff...

HT to Cindy

I am not a consumer - I am a human being!

The title of course is a spin on the line from the TV serious the prisoner: "I am not a number - I am a free man!"  But in a similar vein the Killers sing: "I got soul,  but I'm not a soldier." All of this is by way of setting the scene for a quote from Eugene Peterson on the longing within us to be a soul and not reduced to a consumer, a resource, a means to an end, a self or reduce others to that level of inhumanity...

"...in our current culture, "soul" has given way to "self" as the term of choice to designate who and what we are.  Self is the soul minus God. Self is what is left of the soul with all the transcendence and intimacy squeezed out, the self with little or no reference to God (transcendence) or others (intimacy)...

When "soul" and "self" are turned into adjectives in colloquial speech, the contrast becomes even clearer: "soulish" gives a sense of something inherent and relational, entering the depths, plumbing the underlying sources of motive and meaning, as in soul food, soul music, the soulful eyes of a spaniel, and, negatively "that poor lost soul;" "selfish," on the other hand, refers to self-absorbed, uncaring, and unrelational - a life that is all surface and image."

Setting the two words side by side triggers a realisation that a fundamental aspect of our identity is under assault every day. We live in a culture that has replaced soul with self. This reduction turns people into either problems or consumers. Insofar as we acquiesce in that replacement, we gradually but surely regress in our identity, for we end up thinking of ourselves and dealing with others in market place terms: everyone we meet is either a potential recruit to join our enterprise or a potential consumer for what we are selling; or we ourselves are the potential recruits and consumers. Neither we nor our friends have any dignity just as we are, only in terms of how we or they can be used."

pp 37-38 "Christ plays in ten thousand places" by Eugene Peterson

I read that and thought how much in my life is orientated around losing my soul, getting caught up in the shallowness of my self and a constant stream of wants that never satisfy and dissatisfactions that always make me feel like I am missing out. When I do get what I think my heart desires it turns out to be a shallow achievement, a brief second of respite before i realise that it is still not enough.

I live in my self with a constant reminder as to how I am not loved enough, nor slim enough (I've lost 1.5 stone this yr and i still cannot see past my love handles!) I am not happy enough, i feel that I'm in the wrong job that neither earns nor satisfies me enough and in my leisure time I am playing at that which i wished i was better at. I am not the great parent I wished I was and I am far too self centred to appreciate my wife for who she is - i demand for her to love me and accept me as I am and therefore ironically deny her the right to be loved and accepted as who she is.

My obsession with myself is shallow, narcissistic and draining of my surrounding circumstances and people who i want to make me happy on my terms. This is in contrast to the richness and depth of the life that God calls us to pursue, that Jesus asks me to follow and that he modelled - which is all about life giving not life taking, participating not consuming, living freely rather than living in fear - the price tag (in my consumer eyes) is the death of living for my self - i struggle with that cos i want to follow Jesus but on my terms, where he fits in with me rather than me orientate my life around him.

Jason talked yesterday about the richness of this life, the challenge of Jesus who will not allow me to consume him but instead offers that I be consumed by him instead - invaded from the inside so that all of my life is infiltrated with his life, his hope, his generosity, love so that i can serve others rather than consume them. My humanity gets restored, my soul gets restored - instead of living in world where i am never good enough i get to live in a world where there is more than enough to go around. I am being changed, finding my humanity so that i can restore the humanity of others, to treat people as souls rather than selves.

It is a process of continuing to find life - how quickly I lose myself in me again - or as Just Jack describes the western consumer life so aptly in his song lost, "to lose my way in the way I live"...

Picture this 2.30 on the hottest night in June
He awakes for no reason and checks his watch by the moon
And his mouth feels as dry as his eyes as he struggles to rise
And stops to contemplate his wife’s thighs as he does up his flies
He finds his slippers where he left them under the chair behind the 2 cups and an old copy of Marie Claire
He switches on the coffee machine that of course works like a dream
catches sight of his reflection in the silver surface sheen
And It’s a face he knows well although it should look less abused
With all these moisturisers and the skin products he’s used
As he moves through the kitchen, his homage to brushed steel
Across the new pine flooring that’s plastic but looks real
Past the plasma with the wide screen and the cinema surround sound
And he stops on his favourite spot by the window and looks down
On the orange lit street at the edge of the private car park
Where his Audi TT is waiting safely in the dark

Keeping it all inside of you
Something will have to give
And if you could you’ll take it back
But you lose your way in the way you live

Now he can hear wind chimes tinkling out on the balcony
And his phone beeping out a text message in the same key
He checks it and it’s Jill who used to be his secretary
Before they started an affair and things began to get really scary
Now his wife Mary is getting weary of his lies
Like she’s read the whole sordid story in his eyes
It doesn’t help that Jill’s now saying that she’s 2 weeks late
His mental state is really starting to deteriorate

He never knew how he got so out of his depth
Or why he’s broken more than all these promises kept
And it’s been ages since he slept
Properly, his sleeps now broken by these dreams of extra-marital activity
Trying to recapture the rapture that he used to get from his material possessions
And endless retail therapy sessions
Should listened to what his dad said before he died
The best things in life are the ones you can’t buy son

Keeping it all inside of you
Something will have to give
Wish you could buy a ticket back
But you lose your way in the way you live

He used to feel so safe up here in his shrine to Ikea
Away from the shouts and the louts and the girls with the over-painted pouts
And the queers and the Dyke's and the kids in their box-fresh Nike's
Delivering rocks to the house across the street on rusty mountain bikes

Aha aha
Aha aha aha"

I wonder how you face your self and find your soul? How we as a community of people plagued by this problem of objectivity/consumerism can rediscover and practise humanity together - in the way that Jesus Christ revealed true humanity to be...

More trick than treat...

In the cold light of the morning after the monsters of the night before I'm still feeling uncomfortable with Halloween...

Yes, it was great seeing some of our neighbours and their kids come round.

Yes, it was great that my son wanted to give sweets to the 'big' girls next door, so much so that when they hadn't arrived by his bedtime we went out and found them ( he must get his kindness and generousity from his mother :).

No, it wasn't a post evangelical hangover from fears of being tainted with celebrating some cultic pagan festival.

I think what troubles me last night is what troubled me last year - the sheer consumer blow out that halloween represents.

For example:

...hearing from Debs that our giant supermaket was completely sold out of chocolate just makes me feel a little hollow - on the one hand it was great that so many people feel generous enough to buy enough candy to empty 2 whole aisles in a supermaket (heh we were trying to do the same but had to settle for 10p packets of harribo :) on the other i feel almost forced by the system to make that choice.

or

...seeing the all marketing shebang that the kids were wandering around with, kitted out completely for halloween, plastic pumpkin bucket for some reason were what stood out for me.

Here i think is the the centre of my angst - i am rich enough and fortunate enough to live somewhere nice enought be able to take part in a contrived marketing fest which is celebrated by everyone one else who is also rich enough and fortunate enough to do. It's a festival of self indulgent consumption and heck i do like to consume and self indulge - i feel a little like a cow led by the nose with my head stuck in a trough where the feed never stops pouring in - just eat and eat and eat. I never wonder why i am being fed, why the system i am part of encourages me to keep eating, i just keep filling my face...

I live in a very nice place in London where people feel free to walk down the street and knock on random doors, in fact just a few doors down one of our neighbours is a community police officer who assures us that there is no crime at all in our urban village!

I am very aware though that that just a couple of miles from where I live you would be far too scared to do either walk down the street or open the door if it was knocked on. In London this year alone there have been 22 violent murders of teenagers with either guns or knives, which as one commentator notes "more teenagers have been killed with a gun or a knife on the streets of the capital in 2007 than the number of British teenage soldiers killed while fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan."

And of course mention of places like Iraq and Afghanistan etc makes me uncomfortable thinking of the billions of dollars that halloween rakes in from people like me taking part in the consumer fest without blinking at the price tag and quibble at the cost of ending the vast inequities that millions of people in such countries experience everyday - apart from to nod my head with the media consensus that fighting over there is such a waste of young life and we should bring our troops back home.

I find the growing feeling within myself that Halloween this year was mostly all trick and no treat. Maybe its the coming down from the sugar high of yesterday a brief moment of clarity before my head goes back down into the trough for the next over indulging consumer feedfest of christmas (only 54 shopping  days to go!) but i really wonder what else as a christian, or merely as a responsible citizen of this planet that I can do differently...

So I wonder what are you thinking or doing in the light of all this?

Abstinence makes my consumer heart grow less wronger?

Whilst I have been burrowing my head in the sand of deep church I notice that the blog world has been pulsing with debate about the southern baptist decision to abstain from alcohol [John and Helen both have good posts on this].

Now I'm not southern baptist, or baptist from any other point of the compass [i was going to say I'm not even American but due to an accident of birth i hold dual citizenship] so what on earth has this got to do with me.  As I read the posts and comments on christian view on alcohol and whether to abstain or not, I'll tell you what I thought...

'How dare any institution ,or any person for that matter, tell me how I should live my life!  If I want to drink alcohol then dammit, I will!  And what's even better is I can think of bible verses to back me up'

What I wanted to do was write a long post ridiculing people who lived by such legalistic notions and celebrating my freedom to do what I want, with some of those good sounding bible verses thrown in and then go for a pint or two...

But the more I thought about the more I find myself trapped in my own prison, in which I am the jailer - I am not really free I am self obsessed, selfish and unable to accept that anyone would want to deny themselves something - such that i feel i have to assert my right to do what I want free of all restraint.

Is practicing abstinence really such a bad thing?  In a consumer dominated world, when i can have what I want when I want it at my convenience - that I have come to expect this as my right?  Maybe if i want to start detoxing from the effects of my consumer addiction praticing abstinence is in fact a good thing?  Certainly if i was a recovering alcoholic for instance the southern baptists would sound an ideal church for me to go - maybe as someone who is as touch with his consumption as an alcoholic is with their drinking I need to go along as well?

Not that I know any southern baptists, which is a shame, but if I did I wouldn't offer them alcoholic drink if they came to dinner out of respect of their convictions, i wouldn't meet them in a pub either, in fact i wouldn't try and drink alcohol in front of them out of respect for their practice.  So why should I start now on the internet telling them they are wrong - when i am reacting out of my own wrongness and self addiction?

Is the consideration that I might be wrong the new right? or why christians like me shouldn't find [on-going] humility such a surprising revelation...

Christians should find it easy to consider/acknowledge or even go as far as admit that they might be wrong - was the thought that I had this morning.  Swiftly followed by the question: 'ok so why do I find it so hard then?'

I was wrong once [upon a time]...

What do I mean - well I was thinking that the most natural entry point in entering the kingdom of God is the one where we repent, or re-think how we are doing life and come to a crisis of realisation that maybe we are not doing so well - heading the wrong way down the right road as Jason described it in his talk yesterday.

Now however that has been framed in the decision making process is not really the point - the point is at some point I made a decision to follow Jesus - or to put it crudely i said ok my kingdom is pretty crap, small, crowded squalid place where i reign and i've heard/read/felt/experienced something different Jesus which seems to be your Kingdom and therefore I abdicate my throne and my kingdom and instead want to join/be part of/live in your kingdom.

I admitted i was wrong/limited/shallow/oppressed/selfish/arrogant/greedy/cruel/unkind and consumeristic and more than that i participated in a confederation of kingdoms called 'society/culture' where we shared all these things in common - we had a simple constitution which said...

We each have the right to do whatever we want that makes us happy as long as it doesn't mess too much with our individual happiness [and even then it will limited by our historical understanding of protecting my rights to health/wealth/possession].  With that caveat I won't tell you how to live your life and you don't tell me how to live yours...

Your kingdom come - but i'll take the franchise option of my will still being done!

But here is the nub, I wonder after making that initial confession that I was wrong and deciding that I needed God whether I just changed the name on the outside but fell straight back into my old practices - instead of one form of cultural acknowledgement i now had another, instead of moving into God's kingdom I set up shop on the border and took the best of God - he will look after me, sort things out for me, keep me safe, healthy, wealthy, problem free whilst continuing to have the best of my life before - it's about me and my happiness.

Yes of course this living still required pay offs, compromises and becoming fluent in two forms of language/lifestyle and if anyone asked of course i was fully in - look i bashed the minorities who christians were supposed to bash, i had made my confession, i tried to twist a few arms of people to join me but in reality it was still my kingdom, loosely affiliated to God's, mainly in name only.

In my kingdom i drifted away from that original thought that maybe i was wrong, maybe i needed to continue the process of rethinking, repenting, reconsidering and instead I became about being right in my new affiliation - I found a nice comfortable place of doing what i wanted and any challenge to that was met by the reaction:  'who the hell are you to tell me how to live my life, what I should believe and how i should live that belief!'

Over recent years experience has shown me that I have been wrong about many things - that I my own actions are so often rooted in my own insecurity and addictions, my selfish need and more than that i participate in a faith whose systems inherently reinforce that...

I have come back to the point where I started from which is that I am often as wrong about being a christian as I was as about being a secular member of society - i have made both experiences about me and my needs, about doing things that make me happy with a veneer of respectability of doing so in the name of God...

So I wonder....

... if instead of insisting on my own rightness i became open to consider that maybe i was at best only partly right?  I wonder if i continued to rethink/repent in my life whether i would be open to letting it be about how i acted in my marriage, at work, who i voted for, what i wore, how i played, who i hang out with, how i care for the communities i am part of including this planet? 

...whether that ongoing consideration that I have a tendency to get things wrong would help me be less insistent that MY way was the right way - whether that was my way of doing church or anything else?

...if being more humble would make me more open to advice about how to live my life, would make me more open to sharing who I am rather than who I think I should be, make me transparent as to the pain/selfishness/addiction/stress/tension/hang ups that I have and need help with but also make me more loving in reaching out to people with their own issues/stresses - to care for them as people made in God's image rather than as projects to shape into that of my own and assimilate into my kingdom [so i feel better/smugger/more righteous about being me]?

...that being wrong is an opportunity to be a work in progress rather than have to feel i am a finished article?  That life is about learning, seeking, searching for God and he is about finding me in growing depth and transformation?

...that i might have not have all the answers, or even all the questions makes me wonder if rather than seeking to enforce a particular practise/way i should be more open, supportive, encouraging of people who are different to me?  To what end am I right is less important to the Q is this helping someone find/connect/express their faith in Jesus in practise rather than per my own preferences/experience/choices?  Is polarity - i'm right/you're wrong a concept that should be on the way out and instead maybe something that says where are you right, where can i learn from you?

...what the impact of reflecting on whether we are still  being wrong would mean to our gatherings/structures/systems as a faith, how could we change them and how could they help us to be more humble, open, God seeking?

...that being open to being wrong by myself and my tendency to self determine in favour of me is not an invitation to seek to participate in a community? to encourage confession?  to support accountability?  To seek to make my life not so much about just me but to encourage me to open up to others, to seek to love and care for people and in return to do the same for me - so that we can challenge each other and ask the Q how are we living life?  Are we living out what we believe? More are we living out the practise of life, the marks that Jesus suggests that we should? And encourage, love, support and spur another on to do so?

...any more that you can think of/would like to add for you?

Why I am growing to appreciate and value all kinds of christian - but especially the old kind...

One of the tensions that i feel when i participate in conversations with those who identify ourselves with the emerging church is a sense of frustration with the church that people seem to feel.  I know myself that I have experienced similar frustration and anger with what we, when being polite, may term the modern church, the established church, the traditional church, sometimes with additional adjectives such as conservative, evangelical, fundamental, liberal etc...

I say it is a tension as over the last few years I have come to feel that frustration and anger is not always helpful, not least because it leaves me:

• making generalisations [sweeping and otherwise];
• labelling and judging people;
• feeling that i am right and others are wrong;
• increases my indulgence in resentment/bitterness/moaning; and
• feeling negative about the whole idea of church and increasing my consumeristic tendencies

In short all the things that I thought were bad about the church I am equally as guilty of and no doubt even more self righteous about!

Exploring the spiritual discipline of frustration

I have come to realise that frustration is not always such a bad thing, particularly if frustration is a motivation that leads me to:

• motivating decision making,
• self evaluation/judging,
• growing aware of/addressing character weaknesses,
• practically helping people,
• seeking opportunities for conversation,
• seeking to pray for, love and understand people [where they are] more than I am loved and understood myself. 

I am not saying that this is an easy process, for example, whilst still serving in my last church,  I still wanted to be connected but I stepped down from a lot of leadership roles as I knew the temptation to use my position to undermine would be too much, far better to not give my anger and frustration that sort of platform.  Instead I sought to support people who were leading, to encourage them, to reach out to people who were dissatisfied and help them with their own anger.  I tried to channel my frustration into being the sort of Christian i thought i should be: practising generosity, honesty, love etc rather than insisting every one should do it the way that I thought it should be done 

For me it became a spiritual discipline.  I remember listening to sermons and rather than just being frustrated that the 'right words' weren't being said I instead sought to not wait for church to validate my version of christianity but to live it  instead.   When i disagreed with a talk instead of dismissing it I tried to think through the 'why' of that and to see that often the points being made were valid and that they, together with my own thoughts, often added a balance.  often it was a case of that language was different and I didn't like it - a matter of style rather than a disagreement with orthodoxy/substance.

Four thoughts on why I am learning to like and value all kinds but especially the ol' kinda christians...

I been spending the last few weeks thinking about why I value inclusivity rather than exclusivity  and the following are some thoughts about why I feel I should value all forms of christianity, whether they are old kinds of christian or a new kind...

1. Heritage

There is no getting away from it I owe a huge debt of gratitude to the conservative evangelical and charismatic traditions I have been part of.  It was these tradition that taught me so much about what it is to be a christian, e.g.:

• they gave me a love for encountering God in the bible and today;
• the foundation to think and ask questions about God, the world, purpose of life;
• the experience of being guided by the Holy Spirit, spiritual gifts, healings and other God inspired life transforming and enriching encounters;
• a fine understanding of orthodoxy; and
• a desire to love God in thought, action, experience and emotion... 

If it wasn't for the people of these traditions serving God as faithfully as they know how and with the best of intentions passing on their faith/expeeience/love to me than I doubt I would be writing about matters of faith at all.

It makes me think of that other most difficult and frustrating time of my physical life which was my teenage yrs and the struggle to find my identity as a person - seperate/independent yet still related/connected to my parents.  In the same way I see the struggle to find my 'spiritual identity' and to do so with a healthy relationship with my 'spiritual parents' is one that is equally hard a time of transition for both child and parent.  Understanding how hard it is for those 'parents' might make me more generous and kinder - it is not because they hate me and are out to frustrate me but becaause they love me and don't want to see me hurt, are uncertain about what will happen when they let go and even how fast to do so.  Questions of freedom, of maturity of respect matter immensely and one where I think i would find it healthier [and demonstrate these qualities] by following the advice of the bible on how to treat parents and seek to honour/appreciate my church family/heritage [even if they do frustrate me at times - and me them...] 

Note to self: blood is thicker than orthodoxy after all :)

2. Character

One of the recent thoughts I have had is that God is not concerned about making me happy - in the sense of how i see happiness [healthy, wealth, new 40 inch LCD tv, easy life etc] but is more interested in me developing a mature Christ-esque character.  This rthought coupled with my recent fave quote - that hanging out with people who i agree with, people who think the same as me, people who are like me makes a clique not a community - makes me appreciate the character growing process of experiencing all kinds of christians, especially the ones that I disagree with the most [at least in maters of style, expression etc].

In other words rather than belittling people for not getting me maybe instead I should invest time in trying to get them, to explain myself, to open myself up to critique rather than to seek to critique them. 

Maybe if I really believe in a generous orthodoxy I should start living that out by being generous to the conservative/modern [etc] parts of the church?

Perhaps if being a christian is about love and if Jesus said that the ultimate mark of the church would be the love that the people who followed him showed one another, then I should be more loving, more generous, kinder, softer, less angry and more hopeful?  Rather than shaking my head at their foolish/outmoded ways maybe I should consider whether my own life of faith is really better, or am I maybe better in some areas but far worse in others making me less overall?  [Why do I hear my mother saying - when you point with one finger, three fingers point back at you?]

What if God is serious about growing patience, love, kindness, mercy, grace, encouragement, passion, generosity, faith and self control [etc] in me - what better way than in/through/by encountering people who stretch me in all of these ways?  In trying to build relationships with people who I struggle with and seeking to live a life that is a blessing to them, that is about giving myself away rather than trying to get what I want from them?

And what better way then by exposing how when I try and do so I promptly fail because my reserves of love et al are remarkably low for any one else other than me?  Thus reminding me that this is not about what I can do but what God does in my weakness, not my strength - that his kingdom is a work of the Holy Spirit and therefore I need to seek God first - i need to ask God for the patience I need, for the love I need and keep asking him to grow me so I can love more because I am seeking to love more?

3. Deep church

I hinted at this above  - if I really believe in a generous orthodoxy should I not be equally generous with the modern church?  If I believe that it takes all sorts of different churches to reach all sorts of different people and that part of my call as a christian who is loved by Christ to love everyone, including those people who follow him as well - then maybe I should be asking different sort of Qs?:

What if it is not just about creating another stream of church but looking at opportunities to work together as different churches, where it is not so much my mission but our mission, where the people who are served by the church who don't care which church it is but love the fact that some one cares about them? 

A place where the huge amount that the church as a whole has in common is not overshadowed by the small differences of language, emphasis, style? 

A church where we look at the bigger picture, where we are cheered on by a great cloud of witnesses from all denominations and seek to encourage, support and look out for all christian here on earth? 

What do I need to do differently?  What aspects of negativity or polarity or kingdom building do I need to shelve in order to be more generous?  Not only should i ask myself what it costs but what price I am prepared to pay?  If being a follower of Jesus is about seeing his kingdom come and his will being done rather than my will/kingdom than maybe I need to trust Jesus more and me less with the answers?  What does it mean to seek the kingdom of God first in this context?  What does it mean to think about loving and appreciating all my christian cousins?  What does it mean to validate them as much [if not more] than I want to be validated myself?

4. Global conversation

Finally, I am conscious that a lot of what I feel is only applicable within my western cultural context, which is a post-church one - a lot of my frustration on style of church is pretty meaningless when people can't be bothered with church in the first place. 

We might live in the 'whatever' generation but for me I'd rather care enough to engage with church and participate with in it.  I have a deep love and appreciation for the church, yes it might lumber but at its best it is a body that is revolutionary.  For example its very essence is counter-cultural in its desire/expression to permeate the dominant cultural motiff of a life that is all about: 'me, who is important, my life to live how I like so don't judge,  and its myself first and others only if i can be bothered.'  Ironically such liberation needs to start at home as I am chronically addicted to such a cultural existence that if I can't consumer my out of a situation, if it requires commitment rather than a one off transaction, time rather than a flash of the credit card, serving rather than expecting service 24/7 then I struggle...

But more than my own cultural context there is a whole world in Africa and Asia where christianity is different again, where culture is different again - to assume that my issues are the normative would I think be grossly short sighted and further evidence of my own self love. 
In the context of a global conversation I need to think about how my actions impact on the world, issues like trade justice and the environment become not just causes to consume for but challenges for long term commitment that will cost me and my time and treasures...

And here comes the nub - Christ loves the church, we're that imperfect bride, we're not a super model, we're not a gold digger, we're not after a sugar daddy we're just average people trying to love him back.  All of us have are being revealed by Jesus - revealed to have beauty in ways we could not imagine, revealed to have a worth that we never thought we could possess, revealed to revel in a life that is beyond ourselves, that is not about getting what we can but giving ourselves away, giving ourselves up to him... and we get to that together, to see each other the way he sees us, to call out the God colours in each of us and to cheer each other down the aisle...

So next time...

I feel tempted to write the trad church this or the conservative church that... to rant at a grey monolith, to make a sweeping generalisation, to score an easy point, to poke fun at a person's or denominations blind spot or weakness I hope I will stop, reread and delete.  I hope I can be specific, i hope i can share experiences in a way that is both positive and real to how I feel.  I hope that instead of pointing the finger I can instead offer an embrace.  I hope that I can be honest, real, gracious and loving and extend all of that first without the expectation that it be extended back to me but with a undying hope that it will be. 

Instead of making it about them and us, maybe I'll make it just about me - or it that is too self centred - maybe just us.

Maybe... afterall the story doesn't end here and I still have a lot of growing and loving to do.  At least i don't have to do that alone...

Choosing church...

So you're fed up with your church, tired, frustrated, disallusioned... it's too light weight, too deep, too loud, too quiet, too much bible, not enough bible, too big, too small, too worldly, too sheltered, too inward looking, too outward going, too modern, too ancient, too many comfy sofas, too many pews... etc etc.

So how do you choose another church to go to?  Maybe these might help...

1) Be clear about what you are looking for...

2) Lessons from one family's journey to find a new church...

Start with what I have, start with who I know, start from where I am...and give away more than I need to those who need it...

I have been reflecting on the last few days on the question I asked on my last post - about wheree to start in taking the NOW of the Kingdom of God seriously... and have been inspired having watched this clip reminding me of God's heart for the poor, the oppressed, the lost and the least, something you also may wish to do:

HT to Jamie

More than ever I think that the following words of Jesus sound the simpliest and yet seem the hardest to put into practice but maybe that has just been an excuse.  This year I said I would like to live more graciously and generously than last yr so I will try and take these words as being for NOW and not just for some other better time and ask Jesus and fellow followers like me to  help us all to live this sort of revolutionary life giving/revealing light...

"To you who are ready for the truth, I say this: Love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer for that person. If someone slaps you in the face, stand there and take it. If someone grabs your shirt, giftwrap your best coat and make a present of it. If someone takes unfair advantage of you, use the occasion to practice the servant life. No more tit-for-tat stuff. Live generously.

Here is a simple rule of thumb for behavior: Ask yourself what you want people to do for you; then grab the initiative and do it for them! If you only love the lovable, do you expect a pat on the back? Run-of-the-mill sinners do that. If you only help those who help you, do you expect a medal? Garden-variety sinners do that. If you only give for what you hope to get out of it, do you think that's charity? The stingiest of pawnbrokers does that.

I tell you, love your enemies. Help and give without expecting a return. You'll never—I promise—regret it. Live out this God-created identity the way our Father lives toward us, generously and graciously, even when we're at our worst. Our Father is kind; you be kind."

Chrisitianity - a call to tend and serve creation (including the animals)

Jason Clark has this awesome post on: Is Christianity Irredeemably Speciesist? Basically how man exploits animals and justifies that exploitation - and whether christianity has been co-opted to that exlpoitation...

Next to the rise of the feminist movement I think the single other biggest movement to have arisen over the last few decades has been the animal rights one - both movements have valuable things to teach the church, not least in the areas of mercy, justice and humility.

I wrote here how I feel as christians we are called/comissioned to tend and serve creation not just exploit it for our own ends.  That tending and service includes how humanely we treat the animals as well as the atmosphere etc.  Whilst I still see a place for eating animals or having them help us in our labours I think we need to be concerned about factory farming conditions as christians in the 19th century were concerned about factory conditions for workers...  No treat animals as things is to exploit says much about ourselves and our own appertites, whilst to restrain ourselves, to pay a higher price for healthier, safer conditions that we raise animals is recognise that role of tending rather than just consuming.

I therefore heartedly commed the Meatrix site as a clevel culturaly relevant way of finding out more about the impact exploiting animals for our own consumption and have put the Meatrix clips below for you to view...

Meatrix

Meatrix 2

Meatrix 2  1/2

Hallow-weaned: spiritual subversive of Hollow-ween consumer celebration

I have done a guest post on Jason Clark's blog, trying to engage with Halloween the consumer fest that it has become and open up a conversation to  explore ways of subverting the fest to something more spirtually wholesome that connects me with nearly 1600 years of Christian celebration of the vigil of All Saints Eve and All Saints Day.  No idea what I am talking about, well come over and engage in the dialogue.  In the meantime here are some exerts from my post to wet your appetite...

"Halloween has become big booming business, with major stores dedicating staff to research trends and providing marketing to drive this consuming experience. When I was a child we hardly bothered with Halloween, not because we were Christians but because no one else did either, apart from a few parties and the occasional child knocking on the door. Now it is a feast that we are invited to participate in, to spend, to experience, to enjoy a night of all age celebration with a price tag to match any other the family market manufactured experience (a fun day out at a theme park for instance cost us around £50 for 2 adults and children). In and of itself I do not see it is wrong to choose to participate in this consumption but I do think it is important that I do so with my eyes open in what I am celebrating is a secular subverted market manufactured feel good experience. So as a Christian how can I engage in the process/project of subverting Holloween back to something that connects with my culture and the traditon of Halloween in its Christian traditional heritage?...

...I need to be hallow-weaned, no longer fed on the sweet, high in fat, low in content, extra rich but ultra poor milk of the consumer version. I need to connect throught that to something that will feed me and grow me spiritually, not leave me soul saturated with consumer clobber…"

From: Halloween - a festival that consumer culture has subverted from Christianity: are we subverting it back? (with apologies to pagans?)