Welcoming the Young Adult

Posted on

Having just recently entered my 30’s, I’ve experienced church mostly as a young adult.  From that limited experience though I’ve discovered that in church, as in life, young adults wish to be treated as what they are – real people.  Too often young adults are seen as separate – a demographic to be dealt with instead of embraced.  Because of their youth, clothing and musical tastes, and limited giving resources, the church often views them as a necessary but bothersome commodity.  Young adults are vital for church survival, so churches fund programs to attract and entertain them while simultaneously hoping to mold them into members that look and act just like everyone else.  But treating people as acquisitions and not as real people usually doesn’t work well in the long term.

 

The church is a gathering of believers and young adults want to truly be part of that community.  They want to be respected for who they are, not for what they represent or who they might become.  If the church believes that it is one body with many parts (all of which are necessary), then it needs to embrace young adults as young adults.  In my experience, this can involve inviting all ages to speak up in discussions – not in perfunctory condescending ways, but in ways that honestly seek their perspectives.  Churches can also include young adults on boards and committees, allowing their voice help guide the church.  Young adults can serve, not just as physical laborers, but as musicians, readers, and teachers.  Integrating young adults into church life is a far more effective sign of welcome than simply tacking on services with guitars and drums here and there.

 

Yet as young adults become part of the church they should be allowed to be young adults.  I served at a church once that opened its choir to high schoolers, but then immediately imposed a new choir dress code obviously meant to keep the students from dressing as themselves.  Other churches invite young adults in but then balk at the styles of music they like or condemn them for the hard theological questions they ask.  While mentoring young adults into the faith is vital, it shouldn’t suppress their very nature.   Instead churches where the old and young believe they can learn from each other represent a better model of a fully functioning body of Christ where all parts are appreciated.

 

I’ve participated in small traditional churches, large mega-churches, and missional house-churches.  I have grown the most though in the settings where I was more than just part of the audience, but was also invited to be a contributing and connected member of the church family.  In those settings, my age and culture, although not ignored, mattered less than the fact that I was part of an integrated whole.  I’ve heard the same from other young adults – it’s the community that attracts us to gatherings of the church.  Programs are useful, but nowhere near as meaningful as respect and love.

Read more

Merry Christmas

Posted on

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us. And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger. – Luke 2:8-16

Read more

Fourth Sunday of Advent 2008 – Joy

Posted on

As part of our Christmas decor we have some wooden alphabet blocks that spell out “Noel” and “Joy.” Emma enjoys playing with them, so they are never actually in the right order (at the moment the words “nejy” and “loo” are on display). But Emma likes the words. We asked her recently if she knew what joy meant though. She gave us one of her “they must be smoking something” looks and said, “that’s silly. Joy is just a word. It doesn’t mean anything.”

We think its cute when 3 year olds say stuff like that. But isn’t she just echoing what is pragmatic reality for a lot of people? Joy, like peace, this time of year acquires a certain status as a trendy catchphrase. Much like “boo” or “trick-or-treat” around Halloween, it is an appropriate invocation of the season. Even when we sing along to “Joy to the World,” the usage often seems hollow. We are not consumed by joy – letting it overtake us and responding outwardly to its presence.

The angels though came proclaiming good tidings of great joy. The carol calls for heaven and nature to sing a joy to the world because the Lord has come. True joy cannot be contained, it must be shared. I love the Christmas card image above because it captures a part of this mood. The “I’ve got to tell someone about this even if they think I’m nuts” feeling that comes with being filled with joy.

Joy is so much more than just a word. It is a complete way of being that one cannot help but respond to. So the candle on this fourth Sunday of Advent is a proclamation of joy. Joy as not just an abstract idea or a seasonal word, but as the response of our hearts preparing room for our king.

Read more

Hierarchy, Freedom, and Emergent

Posted on

I was out shopping recently and saw a baby boy onesie (it was blue, so in the strictly color coded baby clothes world, it was intended for boys and boys only…). On the front was the phrase “Second in Command After Daddy.” Now as a good feminist that pissed me off. Who in their right mind would stick that on their baby, even as a joke? Even tongue-in-cheek promotions of such family hierarchy encourage the myth that having a penis somehow makes you more important than women.

If you haven’t gathered it by now, I’m not a huge fan of hierarchical leadership (even when it’s not based on gender). I prefer flat networked structures that allow for input from all. And in truth, it’s less about equality or sameness and more about simply respecting people as people. Letting voices be heard and appreciating contributions for what they are.

So on one level, I appreciate that fact that Emergent Village is transitioning to a more decentralized structure. While some may be heralding Tony Jones stepping down as National Coordinator to symbolize the dismantling of Emergent, it was meant as an opportunity to allow a wider variety of people to step up into leadership positions (as the amusing series of I Am The Emergent National Coordinator videos demonstrates). And as Tony mentioned on his blog yesterday, “Any time you can dethrone an overeducated, loud, brash, white man,people just feel more openness for their own voice to be heard.” It’s all about reducing hierarchy and opening up the conversation.

But will it work? In brief discussions with other women leaders in the emerging movement, I’ve heard the question raised if the lack of a central leader will actually help women become more involved in the conversation. Many post-evangelical women still struggle to jump into the conversation, much less assert themselves as leaders. For good or bad, they still seek invitations to come alongside and be a part of the in-group. With no one to officially offer that invitation, the question remains if the women will step up or just remain on the sidelines peeking in. I honestly have no idea. It would be easy to say that women just need to get over it and assert themselves, but that would stray into dangerous psychological territory and miss the point. I don’t want to need a man’s permission to do anything, but an invitation (from someone) is still what many women are looking for.

So I’m curious to see how the decentralization of power affects the presence of women in Emergent. I’d of course like to see a vibrant representation of women in Emergent leadership. I’m encouraged to hear from some that at The Great Emergence event men at times seemed like the token voice. But to the best of my knowledge, I haven’t seen any women making national coordinator videos. That’s not a criticism, just an expression of curiosity of where this will lead. I hope the speculation of other emerging women will be wrong and we will see an increase of women’s voices in Emergent. But at the same time be proactively aware that the opposite could just as easily occur.

Read more

Looking Ahead to 2009

Posted on

Perhaps it isn’t such a great idea to be looking ahead to 2009 right after going to see the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still.  Bad acting, plot holes and the end of the world aside, I can’t get the idea of tipping points out of my head.  The film of course proposes (with an implied hat tip to Al Gore) that the earth has reached a tipping point – either our wanton environmental destruction will completely destroy the planet or it must come to an end.  The alien visitors believe that humans are incapable of change and therefore must be exterminated to save the planet, while the humans argue that when faced with a large enough crisis they can actually change (imminent destruction by aliens being that crisis).  I don’t want to spoil the ending, so I’ll leave you hanging on the whole “do humans survive or not” question.

But ignoring the sci-fi melodrama, the film’s message bothered me.  I understand why crises can prompt people to alter habits, but does it always have to be that way?  I don’t want to believe that the only reason people choose to do good is to avoid negative consequences.  Granted this is a common equation in our culture.  We exercise and eat right to avoid heart disease.  We study for a test so we won’t fail the class.  We even accept Jesus so we can avoid the flames of hell.  Sometimes it seems like life is just one big crisis aversion scheme.  We avoid expending energy and doing anything until it becomes apparent that not doing anything personally hurts us more than actually doing something.  So we act to save our own butts.

Depressing, isn’t it?  It’s what I see all the time, but I’d like to believe it isn’t true.  The idealist in me wishes that sometimes people did the right thing because it is the right thing.  You know, like taking care of the planet because we genuinely want to care for God’s creation and not because aliens are threatening us with extermination.  To reach that tipping point and base our decision on whatever is loving, right, and just instead of that which is self-serving.  To actually do that whole “each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others” thing we Christians like to quote so much.

So while I am not anticipating any alien invasions in 2009, I do believe our world is at a tipping point.  In addition to environmental destruction, injustice and oppression abound.  Too often our response is to do nothing.  We make excuses about how seeking justice and loving others takes too much time, energy, or money.  We are encouraged, for example, to only buy organic foods when not to do so presents us with a personal health risk.  So we buy organic apples to avoid the personal pesticide exposure, but don’t bother with bananas because their pesticide usage only affects the farmworkers and the environment.  Other times it benefits us more to allow injustices to continue – so we can spend less we buy the sweatshop jeans or the slave-grown chocolate.  We look to our own interests and not the interests of others.  And so the balance keeps tipping away from whatever is true, noble, and right.

But the outcome isn’t inevitable.  Selfishness doesn’t have to win.  Perhaps change can occur without impending doom.  Maybe we can all do good simply for the same of doing good.  We forget that it is within our power to make that choice.  It is my hope that 2009 will be a year when we decide to declare ourselves in that regard.  A year when the tipping point must be dealt with.  A year when we stop doing nothing and take a stand for good regardless of whether it benefits us or not.

And I really don’t care if that sounds about as melodramatic as a cheezy sci-fi flick; it’s what needs to happen.

So I look forward in hope to a year of action.  To a year of doing something.  To tipping the balance towards justice in 2009.

Read more

Hopeful Imagining

Posted on

Contrary to what my husband may think, I really am an optimist – at least in the long term perspective. I think we can bring about good in this world. As one of my favorite lines from Lord of the Rings goes, “there is some good in this world and it’s worth fighting for.” As hard and hopeless as it might sometimes seem, I think it’s worth working towards a positive vision.

That said I understand the reluctance of some to affirm efforts to present such a positive vision of the future. These efforts can come across as insincere – mocking instead of hopeful. We believe another world is possible, but don’t know how to cope when glimpses of that world invade our. We might smile at the ideas, but are wary of utopian visions of the future.

For example when the Yes Men a few years ago marked the 20th anniversary of the Bhopal Diaster by creating an elaborate hoax where posing as a representative of Dow Chemicals on the BBC a Jude Finisterra announced that Dow was finally accepting full responsibility for the incident and offering a multibillion dollar compensation to the hundreds of thousands of people still suffering from the accident. This is what the world had been waiting for for two decades as opposed to the cover-up and denial of responsibility that actually occurred. The name Jude Finisterra – the saint of impossible causes and the ends of the earth. Fitting. The response though? Dow share prices dropped 4.2% in 23 minutes (fully recovered later in the day). The BBC issued an apology to Dow and the Yes Men were chastised for bringing false hope to the Indians. So the harbingers of hope, those who dare to image a better world, are chastised while those that should be taking responsibility are apologized to.

Another great examples of hopeful imagining is the Jim Carrey movie Fun with Dick and Jane. After losing his job in an Enron like company collapse, Carrey’s character pulls a Yes Men like stunt by holding a press conference announcing that the company’s CEO will personally reimburse the retirement funds of the jobless employees who lost it all. Surprised at his house with the news, surrounded by cameras and people thanking him, the CEO has to go along with the scheme. This is the way things should have been after Enron – the fair and positive world we desired but didn’t get.

Same thing with the video to U2’s The Saints are Coming. One sees images of Katrina ravaged New Orleans, but then fake headlines of “US Troops Redeployed from Iraq to New Orleans” flash across the screen. Images of bombers dropping aid packages and rescuing children from the floods along with the mesmerizing lyrics of “the saints are coming” do inspire hope. This is how it should have been (and if you read some of the 20,000+ comments on YouTube, what some people actually think did happen). But then the lyrics remind us that “I say no matter how I try I realize there is no reply” and the video ends with the sign “not as seen on TV.” Is it a hopeful future or simply a reminder of how bad things are?

So what do you do with such hopeful imaginings? Do you laugh at their naivete? Roll your eyes and say “that will never happen”? Or appreciate the encouragement in envisioning a better world? I’ve personally come to enjoy these positive visions. I like the reminders of the way things could be. Having something concrete to grasp onto, albeit fictional, helps with the whole moving forward in the quest for justice thing.

So yes, I’m an optimist in my own quirky way.

Read more

Third Sunday of Advent 2008 – Love

Posted on

*I meant to have this up on Sunday, but I’ve been too sick to think the past few days… so better late than never.

“Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds” – Shakespeare, Sonnet 116

“But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” – Romans 5:8

This week of Advent we light the candle representing love (depending on your tradition). As with peace, I find that this too is a word that has been stripped of its meaning in our culture. Not that the many usages of the term or the various ways we evoke the concept are bad, but often they are simply comfortable. We can handle advice that encourages us to unconditionally love our husbands and kids, that our love should be patient and kind, or that our love should flow from our relationship with God. Those expressions of love may be difficult, but we can accept them in theory at least.

What’s harder is the messy love. The love that continues even though someone messes up. The love for people who just aren’t living the way we would like them to live. The love for those who serve us that we may never meet. These sorts of love are more difficult to grasp. They don’t fit into our comfort boxes. They not only take work, they are generally unpopular and often not deemed worth our effort.

So I find myself returning to the rhetorical questions – what if Jesus hadn’t chosen to love us no matter what? Can you picture Jesus saying things like – “they’re just too messed up for me to love them” or “she’s a sinner, I don’t want anything to do with her, if fact I’ll just pretend she doesn’t exist” or “why should I waste my time dying for a cog in the machine factory girl in China.”

I like the assurance that Jesus loves me, but sometimes it’s hard to believe that Jesus loves everyone. I mean really believe – not just intellectually assent to the idea, but believe enough to let it change me so that I love them too.

To love without reservation or alteration. To love the yet messy.

That’s the hard part.

Read more

Church and Mission

Posted on

Once again a commentary on the missional musings at the Out of Ur blog…
I have to say that I found Skye Jethani’s recent post on mission and recession to be an insightful look at the dangers economic hard times pose for the models of “church as we know it.” He points out that typical models of church involvement depend on people having leisure time to devote to the church. But as the economy tanks, that affluent leisure time evaporates. Skye writes, “people who could previously spend multiple hours each week in church programming are now holding down part-time jobs, job hunting, spending more time at home cooking rather than eating out, or taking classes to train for new careers.” He questions this mission based on leisure time not only for its current downfall, but because it “devalues members without expendable hours…mothers with the 24/7 job of caring for young children, single-parent households, laborers working multiple jobs to stay afloat, or those in the “sandwich generation” using their leisure hours to care for aging parents. Do we write these members off because they do not have leisure time to dedicate to the church’s programs and ministry teams? Do they get a pass on the Great Commission?”

Skye suggests that we need to shift how we think about mission and the institution of the church in light of these issues. While I like his ideas about helping people see that their everyday lives (jobs, commitments, errands) are actually mission and that the church is about people living out incarnation and not institutionalized programs, I am not fully on board with all of his suggestions. He proposes equipping the believer to be in communion with Christ in her everyday life and then come to church to celebrate not to do mission. He believes this would eliminate the focus on church programs, buildings, and staff and turn the focus to ordinary lives.

Unfortunately this alternative focus of church still requires much of the same programs and structures to survive as before, just with fewer people. To hold a celebration service that “feeds” the masses one still needs buildings, staff, and programming for the celebration. It’s church as we know it just without commitments. In addition, rubberstamping what people are already doing leaves out some rather important aspects of what it means to be the church and do mission. Letting one’s co-workers know that Jesus loves them is all good, but what about caring for the poor and being in community with other believers? I’m all for slashing programs – committees, choir, and multiple Beth Moore bible studies can, yes, just be a waste of time. And I’m all for affirming that being a 24/7 mom who can’t leave the house to do anything because she doesn’t have childcare is a way of serving Christ.

But to take a foundering institution and try to keep it afloat by redefining a few things doesn’t go far enough in my opinion. The mission of the church doesn’t just need to be switched from programs to everyday living (although that is a good step), it needs to become the driving force of church. Telling members to do mission in their day to day lives isn’t a “get out of jail free” card for a church. Abandoning programming but retaining the structure of a come and see celebration service moves us farther away from mission and truly being the church. If church was not about the event in a building, but really about who we are as followers of Christ then there wouldn’t have to be this huge distinction between real life and church. Church isn’t a place you volunteer at or go to to be fed, it is simple the life you lead and the community you indwell. The church does life together – eats together, raises kids together, serves together… We shouldn’t be individuals serving God that come together to be encouraged in that endeavour once a week, but a group of people on the same journey, sharing its joys and sorrows.

So while I like the intent of Skye’s article, I think a more radical redefining of church and mission than what he is proposing is needed. Not just to save the structure of the church in hard times, but to help us reorient ourselves in relation to each other. We are the church, we all do mission – as individuals and as a group. As a 24/7 mom I don’t just want to be told that I’m doing mission already even if I can’t make it to some church meeting. I want to be with the church while I am being a mom – relating to others, serving with others, and being one with them. This isn’t about me being fed and then living my life (even if its for God), its about being in committed messy communion with believers as the church.

at least that’s the way I’d like it to be…

Read more

Darkness and Light

Posted on

I couldn’t resist the image. As the world reaches its tipping point and the days grow ever darker, we are preparing for the return of the light. We might have shifted the day a bit and turned our focus away from the sun to the Son, but the idea remains the same. The traditions haven’t changed much even if their interpretations have – we drag evergreen branches into our homes and deck them out with candles to represent our hope in the light. This symbolic return of the light is so powerful in the collective human unconsciousness that the celebration of the incarnation of God naturally must occur during this season. It’s Christian, it’s Pagan, it’s beautiful and it is true.

There is something hardwired in our souls that pushes us towards the light. We rejoice in the light and yearn for it as darkness continues in steady progression. At the Winter Solstice we affirm that light will always overcome the darkness – returning to bring new life on this earth. At the Summer Solstice we simply give thanks for the light we have (as opposed to despairing that the darkness is returning). Our deepest desires are manifest in this longing for the light – for comfort, for illumination, for hope. It is simply part of who we are to seek out the light.

The yearnings of our souls for light find confirmation as we remember the birth of “the true light that gives light to every man” (Jn 1:9). Our circles of candles burn ever lower in our attempts to ward off the encroaching darkness by anticipating the advent of light. The soft glow of twinkling lights on boughs of evergreen give testimony to the eternal light vanquishing the darkness. We deck the halls with our intimations of the light, for there can never be too many reminders that light will always prevail.

So joie be to you as you anticipate the return of the light.

For more entries in this Synchroblog on “Darkness and Light as Motifs of Spirituality” enjoy these sites –

Phil Wyman at Phil Wyman’s Square No More
Adam Gonnerman creeps around “In Darkness”
Lainie Petersen at Headspace
Jeff Goins is “Walking in the Light with Jesus”
Ellen Haroutunian at Light is Coming
Julie Clawson walks through Darkness and Light
Kathy Escobar will Take a Sliver Anyday
Susan Barnes at a book look
Joe Miller thinks you can Discover Light in Darkness
Beth Patterson talks about Advent: Awaiting the Ancient and the Ever New
Liz Dyer says What the Heck
Sally Coleman muses about Light into Darkness
Steve Hayes with the Lord of the Dark
Erin Word writes Fire and Sacrifice
Josh Jinno with Spiritual
Motifs of Darkness and Light

Read more

Second Sunday of Advent 2008 – Peace

Posted on

So the other day at MOPS we heard a talk about Christmas traditions and putting Jesus back into Christmas. One of the points made was to make sure that your holiday decorations convey to your neighbors that you are a Christian. I was pretty sure the speaker didn’t mean using LED lights so that your neighbors know that you care for God’s creation by not wasting energy. I just smiled at the idea with a “to each her own” response, but as I looked at my house while thinking about this week’s advent theme, I had to wonder if anyone would assume I was a Christian because of my decor.

The decor is simple – some golden stars, a baskets of poinsettias, and a sign that says “Peace on Earth” (and hopefully after Mike’s finals some of those LED lights…). But, I wondered, would the term “Peace on Earth” straight out of the biblical Christmas account be associated with Christianity these days? Are we known as peacemakers – doing whatever we can to bring about peace on earth? My gut reaction to that question is no. In fact many of the Christians I know mock those that stand for peace and instead say that war, judgment, and violence are the more biblical paths. Theirs is the voice that is often heard, so much that I can put a bible verse on my house and it not be seen as a Christian thing. That’s weird to me.

One of my favorite Christmas carols is “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day.” It contains the lines –

The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along the unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And in despair I bowed my head:
“There is no peace on earth,” I said,
“For hate is strong and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

But far from it being the belfries of Christendom spreading the biblical message of peace, they are often instead the ones mocking the song and promoting hate. How can their ever be peace when those that claim to worship the Prince of Peace shun his very message?

So as the candle of Peace is lit for Advent today, I find myself hoping it holds some meaning. That it is more than just a ritual or a warm-fuzzy moment, but an awakening to a message Christians have largely forgotten. I pray that we can reclaim “Peace on Earth” not just as a phrase, but as our calling. To have the world see that seeking peace on earth is part of what it means to be a Christian. For as the carol continues –

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth he sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail,
With peace on earth, good will to men.”

Read more