Today I pushing on into a new book by Cornel West. Most everything I read of his is full and rich and evocative. In "Hope on a Tightrope," he offers bits of wisdom in many areas of life. We first will be wandering through he reflections on "Faith."
I stand fundamentally on the profoundly Christian notion that we are each made equal in the eyes of God. a single mom on welfare has the same status as a corporate CEO and they both have the same right to human flourishing regardless of race, regardless of religion, nation, or gender. It is a deep, spiritually based notion of equality.
This deep, spiritually based notion of equality is not merely something floating in the air. As Christians we find it based in the story or Jesus which we call the story of God in the flesh. Our status rests on the fact that God is with us and will never be outside of the room. And as long as our God is among us demonstrating what it is to live together in a love that will not let any of us go, then no one in the room is pushed to the back or pushed out. In fact, the depth of this love enables us to leave the room and be that love incarnate in the world. That sense of love cannot get any more deep than that...and it makes all people into recipients of the life that comes in the middle of such a rock-solid base to our lives. When we are beloved of God and as we see beyond ourselves to others and see others as beloved, we each exist in a realm of possibility that will bring about a fundamental shift in our communities and our world. As was noted when we were reading Stanley Hauerwas - we teach the world how to be the world. Among us, the world is not to be broken - it is to be a part of the healing of all things for we honor the other who is also beloved - even though they are nothing like us in other areas of our lives. When we honor...we protect...we support...we act and live on behalf of those who are our brothers and sisters in the eyes of God.
Connection: Quite a day is laid out before us...and to think we are invited to be walk around as ones beloved as we meet and greet the world around us.
Within your eyes, O God, each of us shine with your image. When we turn to see others, help us to see that shining image in all who join us in the adventure for life that will be in this day. Amen.
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Wednesday 19 November 2008
This is a good way to leave Stanley Hauerwas' work for awhile - enjoy.
The church therefore is a polity like any other, but it is also unlike any other insofar as it is formed by a people who have no reason to fear the truth. They are able to exist in the world without resorting to coercion to maintain their presence. That they are such depends to a large extent on their willingness to move - they must be "a moveable feast." For it is certain that much of the world is bound to hate them for calling attention to what the world is. They cannot and should not wish to provoke the world's violence, but if it comes they must resist even if that resistance means the necessity of leaving one place for another. For as Christians we are at home in no nation. Our true home is the church itself, where we find those who, like us, have been formed by a savior who was necessarily always on the move.
When we, as the church, have no reason to fear the truth, we become an image given in the Quaker hymn "simple gifts." It goes like this: "When true simplicity is found - to bow and to bend we shall not be afraid - to turn, turn, will be our delight - til by turning, turning - we come down right." This hymn calls for quite a bit of movement. But it is the movement of clarification and communication and discernment so that the way of God's Reign will be the way in which we walk. It is a constant task and a constant gift. Some of that bowing and bending is done in order to create a new order. Some of it is done to listen more closely to the voices of others. Some of that bowing and bending is to give us space and time to welcome what is not a part of our own way. At that point, we are not people who are in allegiance to any power. Rather, we listen to find a place in which we can put life to the life of the one we follow within a world that has a history of not wanting to give a place to such a contrary life and voice.
Connection: Bow and bend and turn and let's see where we come down today.
Gentle and Persistent Lord, you bring us together under the blessed Reign of your grace. It is here that we are free to lift up our voices and begin to engage our world and one another. Within that grace, we become open to differences and expect to be surprised by the joy that comes when people once separated are finding that we are really quite bound to one another. We give you thanks. Amen.
The church therefore is a polity like any other, but it is also unlike any other insofar as it is formed by a people who have no reason to fear the truth. They are able to exist in the world without resorting to coercion to maintain their presence. That they are such depends to a large extent on their willingness to move - they must be "a moveable feast." For it is certain that much of the world is bound to hate them for calling attention to what the world is. They cannot and should not wish to provoke the world's violence, but if it comes they must resist even if that resistance means the necessity of leaving one place for another. For as Christians we are at home in no nation. Our true home is the church itself, where we find those who, like us, have been formed by a savior who was necessarily always on the move.
When we, as the church, have no reason to fear the truth, we become an image given in the Quaker hymn "simple gifts." It goes like this: "When true simplicity is found - to bow and to bend we shall not be afraid - to turn, turn, will be our delight - til by turning, turning - we come down right." This hymn calls for quite a bit of movement. But it is the movement of clarification and communication and discernment so that the way of God's Reign will be the way in which we walk. It is a constant task and a constant gift. Some of that bowing and bending is done in order to create a new order. Some of it is done to listen more closely to the voices of others. Some of that bowing and bending is to give us space and time to welcome what is not a part of our own way. At that point, we are not people who are in allegiance to any power. Rather, we listen to find a place in which we can put life to the life of the one we follow within a world that has a history of not wanting to give a place to such a contrary life and voice.
Connection: Bow and bend and turn and let's see where we come down today.
Gentle and Persistent Lord, you bring us together under the blessed Reign of your grace. It is here that we are free to lift up our voices and begin to engage our world and one another. Within that grace, we become open to differences and expect to be surprised by the joy that comes when people once separated are finding that we are really quite bound to one another. We give you thanks. Amen.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Tuesday 18 November 2008
Let me start with the concluding part of yesterday's piece from Hauerwas and then....push on.
Christians are engaged in politics, but it is politics of the kingdom that reveals the insufficiency of all politics based on coercion and falsehood and finds the true source of power in servanthood rather than dominion.
This is not to imply that the church is any less a human community than other forms of association. Just as in other institutions, the church draws on and requires patterns of authority that derive from human needs for status, belonging, and direction. The question is not whether the church is a natural institution, as it surely is, but how it shapes that "nature" in accordance with its fundamental convictions. "Nature" provides the context for community but does not determine its character.
So like other communities, we will see that the church muddles around in that which is a part of the nature of every community. It is within that universal context that we bring the story that shapes us - the story that provides us with a character that begins to work with what we have by nature. That can be a revolutionary journey. Whenever the vision of the peaceable Reign is brought into the ways of any institution, it carries with it the danger of being utterly rejected in favor of those elements of human community that can so easily become that which feeds our egos and has the potential to tear apart the fabric of our institutions. This vision also carries with it the possibility of something new coming into being. That newness will be something distinguished from everyday business and goals that do not consider and act upon the life of God's Reign of which we are entrusted.
Connection: I had a friend who would always say that when two people get together politics is involved. That conversation was after I said I hate the politics in the church. Well, when we come together, there are always differences and that can be a blessing or a curse. It really depends on our character. It doesn't eliminate the politics - even in the church.
Lord of All Life, we long to carry into this day the imprint of your loving character on our lives. Too often we let it go for other things that grab us and influence us and give us what we think we want. We need the reminding presence of your Spirit to keep us within the vision of your Reign. Amen.
Christians are engaged in politics, but it is politics of the kingdom that reveals the insufficiency of all politics based on coercion and falsehood and finds the true source of power in servanthood rather than dominion.
This is not to imply that the church is any less a human community than other forms of association. Just as in other institutions, the church draws on and requires patterns of authority that derive from human needs for status, belonging, and direction. The question is not whether the church is a natural institution, as it surely is, but how it shapes that "nature" in accordance with its fundamental convictions. "Nature" provides the context for community but does not determine its character.
So like other communities, we will see that the church muddles around in that which is a part of the nature of every community. It is within that universal context that we bring the story that shapes us - the story that provides us with a character that begins to work with what we have by nature. That can be a revolutionary journey. Whenever the vision of the peaceable Reign is brought into the ways of any institution, it carries with it the danger of being utterly rejected in favor of those elements of human community that can so easily become that which feeds our egos and has the potential to tear apart the fabric of our institutions. This vision also carries with it the possibility of something new coming into being. That newness will be something distinguished from everyday business and goals that do not consider and act upon the life of God's Reign of which we are entrusted.
Connection: I had a friend who would always say that when two people get together politics is involved. That conversation was after I said I hate the politics in the church. Well, when we come together, there are always differences and that can be a blessing or a curse. It really depends on our character. It doesn't eliminate the politics - even in the church.
Lord of All Life, we long to carry into this day the imprint of your loving character on our lives. Too often we let it go for other things that grab us and influence us and give us what we think we want. We need the reminding presence of your Spirit to keep us within the vision of your Reign. Amen.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Monday 17 November 2008
A few more days from Stanley Hauerwas on "The Church is a Social Ethic."
...calling for the church to be the church is not a formula for a withdrawal ethic; nor is it a self-righteous attempt to flee from the world's problems; rather it is a call for the church to be a community which tries to develop the resources to stand within the world witnessing to the peaceable kingdom and thus rightly understanding the world. the gospel is a political gospel. Christians are engaged in politics, but it is politics of the kingdom that reveals the insufficiency of all politics based on coercion and falsehood and finds the true source of power in servanthood rather than dominion.
We really are not to be something other - that is a people who try to be separate from the world. The church being the church is to be right in the mix of things. By being there - as the church - we bring to light what the world is within the Reign of God. In that sense, we will always be turning heads simply by being who we are. The strangeness in our living will not be some strangeness that comes with being stuck in certain place in time and never changing our "look" or our worldview. Rather the strangeness is that we take on a path in the world that is a living witness to how the Christ is alive within the everyday movement of the world. That is a political movement because we will not be a people who go along with how the politics of the day and the mechanism of states and governments attempt to rule when they do so in ways that are contrary to the Reign of God. We are political because we continue to live within this world community with a strangeness that will ruffle feathers and witness to other ways to be the world.
Connection: This day awaits the presence of the church and how we will bring light and life to the world.
Within your Reign, O God, you are inviting the world to re-view itself and come to see the life you have set up within the power of our humanity. Within that life comes the possibility to re-shape how the world goes about living toward a vision of peace. Guide on on that life journey. Amen.
...calling for the church to be the church is not a formula for a withdrawal ethic; nor is it a self-righteous attempt to flee from the world's problems; rather it is a call for the church to be a community which tries to develop the resources to stand within the world witnessing to the peaceable kingdom and thus rightly understanding the world. the gospel is a political gospel. Christians are engaged in politics, but it is politics of the kingdom that reveals the insufficiency of all politics based on coercion and falsehood and finds the true source of power in servanthood rather than dominion.
We really are not to be something other - that is a people who try to be separate from the world. The church being the church is to be right in the mix of things. By being there - as the church - we bring to light what the world is within the Reign of God. In that sense, we will always be turning heads simply by being who we are. The strangeness in our living will not be some strangeness that comes with being stuck in certain place in time and never changing our "look" or our worldview. Rather the strangeness is that we take on a path in the world that is a living witness to how the Christ is alive within the everyday movement of the world. That is a political movement because we will not be a people who go along with how the politics of the day and the mechanism of states and governments attempt to rule when they do so in ways that are contrary to the Reign of God. We are political because we continue to live within this world community with a strangeness that will ruffle feathers and witness to other ways to be the world.
Connection: This day awaits the presence of the church and how we will bring light and life to the world.
Within your Reign, O God, you are inviting the world to re-view itself and come to see the life you have set up within the power of our humanity. Within that life comes the possibility to re-shape how the world goes about living toward a vision of peace. Guide on on that life journey. Amen.
Friday, November 14, 2008
Friday 14 November 2008
Again we must wrestle with the church being church in the world - Stanley Hauerwas.
...the church serves the world by giving the world the means to see itself truthfully. The social ethic of the church is, first of all, an affair of understanding rather than doing. The first question we must ask is not "what should we do," but "what is going on?" Our interpretation will determine what we are to do. Our task as church is the demanding one of trying to understand rightly the world as world, to face realistically what the world is with its madness and irrationality.
Remember, we are called to be a light. We are not better than the world. We are the church. We are invited by the water of baptism to participate in the truth-telling that calls into question everything about the world in us that creates the great divides that make the blessedness of creation less than that blessedness. So, as we pause and look around we look around with an eye that looks through the lens of God's Reign. It gives us a perspective on "what is going on" and in that, we may find ourselves as witnesses to what is called the "madness and irrationality" of the world. It is then that we become a part of the world that lives in a contrary manner as it appears alongside the world as it is. When the world is content to discriminate and live within that madness and brutality, we -the church- live as though there is no partiality. That....has a biblical sound to it...but a sound that is also the life blood of a world living within the realm of shalom.
Connection: Don't forget to hold up that lens and be aware of the ordinary that may often times be a brew-pot of madness!!
Within you Reign, O God, we see the wonder and beauty of your creation. This is where we live and this is where we are invited to live within your image. We know we are not a people waiting to escape all this...but we need the reminder that we are able to be the image of your Reign now so that the world may know the ongoing wonder and beauty of your creation.
...the church serves the world by giving the world the means to see itself truthfully. The social ethic of the church is, first of all, an affair of understanding rather than doing. The first question we must ask is not "what should we do," but "what is going on?" Our interpretation will determine what we are to do. Our task as church is the demanding one of trying to understand rightly the world as world, to face realistically what the world is with its madness and irrationality.
Remember, we are called to be a light. We are not better than the world. We are the church. We are invited by the water of baptism to participate in the truth-telling that calls into question everything about the world in us that creates the great divides that make the blessedness of creation less than that blessedness. So, as we pause and look around we look around with an eye that looks through the lens of God's Reign. It gives us a perspective on "what is going on" and in that, we may find ourselves as witnesses to what is called the "madness and irrationality" of the world. It is then that we become a part of the world that lives in a contrary manner as it appears alongside the world as it is. When the world is content to discriminate and live within that madness and brutality, we -the church- live as though there is no partiality. That....has a biblical sound to it...but a sound that is also the life blood of a world living within the realm of shalom.
Connection: Don't forget to hold up that lens and be aware of the ordinary that may often times be a brew-pot of madness!!
Within you Reign, O God, we see the wonder and beauty of your creation. This is where we live and this is where we are invited to live within your image. We know we are not a people waiting to escape all this...but we need the reminder that we are able to be the image of your Reign now so that the world may know the ongoing wonder and beauty of your creation.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Thursday 13 November 2008
Stanley Hauerwas makes me spin around and see things with new eyes.
...as Christians we may not only find that people who are not Christians manifest God's peace better than we ourselves, but we must demand that they exist. It is to be hoped that such people may provide the conditions for our ability to cooperate with others for securing justice in the world. Such cooperation, however, is not based on "natural law" legitimation of a generally shared "natural morality." Rather it is a testimony to the fact that God's kingdom is wide indeed. As the church we have no right to determine the boundaries of God's kingdom, for it is our happy task to acknowledge God's power to make his kingdom present in the most surprising places and ways.
"As the church we have not right to determine the boundaries of God's kingdom." Wow. And yet, that is how we are so often see by the people outside the church. We are too often a boundary-focused people. I think of proposition 8 in California. On many fronts I'm hearing that church folk played a big part in the banning of the right to marry among gay and lesbians - even though the right was already in place and practiced. Are we so afraid of being surprised by the presence of God among us that we will not and cannot rejoice in the unexpected ways in which God brings about new life. We need to give thanks for the many people outside the church who are inspired to act in ways that are meant to be the ways of God's Reign. In some fashion, we -the church- are given a glimpse of who we are to be when our life really does reflect the image of our God. The wideness of God's Reign must surprise us...otherwise we will think that we are the ones who are able to declare its borders and also guard them against all who are not one of us. Right when we attempt to do that...surprise...the grace of God's Reign show through and the vehicle of its embodiment is someone on the outside...surprise.
Connection: Take a look around, there are many ways God is making sure that we will be surprised by grace even when we demand to control the day.
Open our eyes, O God, to the many ways you show your glory among us. Amen.
...as Christians we may not only find that people who are not Christians manifest God's peace better than we ourselves, but we must demand that they exist. It is to be hoped that such people may provide the conditions for our ability to cooperate with others for securing justice in the world. Such cooperation, however, is not based on "natural law" legitimation of a generally shared "natural morality." Rather it is a testimony to the fact that God's kingdom is wide indeed. As the church we have no right to determine the boundaries of God's kingdom, for it is our happy task to acknowledge God's power to make his kingdom present in the most surprising places and ways.
"As the church we have not right to determine the boundaries of God's kingdom." Wow. And yet, that is how we are so often see by the people outside the church. We are too often a boundary-focused people. I think of proposition 8 in California. On many fronts I'm hearing that church folk played a big part in the banning of the right to marry among gay and lesbians - even though the right was already in place and practiced. Are we so afraid of being surprised by the presence of God among us that we will not and cannot rejoice in the unexpected ways in which God brings about new life. We need to give thanks for the many people outside the church who are inspired to act in ways that are meant to be the ways of God's Reign. In some fashion, we -the church- are given a glimpse of who we are to be when our life really does reflect the image of our God. The wideness of God's Reign must surprise us...otherwise we will think that we are the ones who are able to declare its borders and also guard them against all who are not one of us. Right when we attempt to do that...surprise...the grace of God's Reign show through and the vehicle of its embodiment is someone on the outside...surprise.
Connection: Take a look around, there are many ways God is making sure that we will be surprised by grace even when we demand to control the day.
Open our eyes, O God, to the many ways you show your glory among us. Amen.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Wednesday 12 November 2008
I find this ongoing note about church and world by Stanley Hauerwas to be insightful for all of us who follow Jesus.
Church and world are thus relational concepts - neither is intelligible without the other. They are companions on a journey that makes it impossible for one to survive without the other, though each constantly seeks to do so. They are thus more often enemies than friends, an enmity tragically arising from the church's attempt to deny its calling and service to the world - dismissing the world as irredeemable, or transforming its own servant status into a triumphalist subordination of the world. But God has in fact n redeemed the world, even if the world refuses to acknowledge its redemption. The church can never abandon the world to the hopelessness deriving from its rejection of God, but must be a people with a hope sufficiently fervid to sustain the world as well as itself.
Wow! The church must be "a people with a hope sufficiently fervid to sustain the world as well as itself." What an honor. To be such a people of hope...a people whose hope is so bold and concrete and open to all that comes our way, that the world may...may...turn and see something new...something that was previously out of sight. Hope is like that. It is not fully in sight and yet it attracts us and pulls us and opens up the day to a future we did not know was unfolding on the horizon. There is nothing pushy about such a hope. It simply comes to life. There is nothing threatening about such hope. It simply is revealed as we walk through the day. Therefore, we, the church, have a daily agenda. Walk in hope. Dance in hope. Be the hope that turns heads in a world that doesn't know it is going in the wrong direction until it sees the hope of a new day - the Reign of God - graciously coming to life...already.
Connection: Be for the world today...the church...the Reign of God at hand...the character of the new age...hope in the flesh.
Lord of all Hopefulness, sustain us and move us and encourage us to step forward into your promises in a world that may not see or hear you word but longs for the reality of your Reign. Amen.
Church and world are thus relational concepts - neither is intelligible without the other. They are companions on a journey that makes it impossible for one to survive without the other, though each constantly seeks to do so. They are thus more often enemies than friends, an enmity tragically arising from the church's attempt to deny its calling and service to the world - dismissing the world as irredeemable, or transforming its own servant status into a triumphalist subordination of the world. But God has in fact n redeemed the world, even if the world refuses to acknowledge its redemption. The church can never abandon the world to the hopelessness deriving from its rejection of God, but must be a people with a hope sufficiently fervid to sustain the world as well as itself.
Wow! The church must be "a people with a hope sufficiently fervid to sustain the world as well as itself." What an honor. To be such a people of hope...a people whose hope is so bold and concrete and open to all that comes our way, that the world may...may...turn and see something new...something that was previously out of sight. Hope is like that. It is not fully in sight and yet it attracts us and pulls us and opens up the day to a future we did not know was unfolding on the horizon. There is nothing pushy about such a hope. It simply comes to life. There is nothing threatening about such hope. It simply is revealed as we walk through the day. Therefore, we, the church, have a daily agenda. Walk in hope. Dance in hope. Be the hope that turns heads in a world that doesn't know it is going in the wrong direction until it sees the hope of a new day - the Reign of God - graciously coming to life...already.
Connection: Be for the world today...the church...the Reign of God at hand...the character of the new age...hope in the flesh.
Lord of all Hopefulness, sustain us and move us and encourage us to step forward into your promises in a world that may not see or hear you word but longs for the reality of your Reign. Amen.
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