“I love my Church, and I’m a Catholic who was raised by intellectuals, who were very devout. I was raised to believe that you could question the Church and still be a Catholic. What is worthy of satire is the misuse of religion for destructive or political gains. That’s totally different from the Word, the blood, the body and the Christ. His kingdom is not of this earth.”
–Stephen Colbert in TimeOut New York
My sleep habits have returned to just about 90% of normal – right on schedule – 2 weeks post-travel. Hooray.
Painful transparency: I wrestled with a lot with new emotions on Easter – 1st service Chris actually prayed something that seemed to hit it on the head for me – He said, “Jesus, let us not fall into forgetfulness about the meaning & power & impact of the cross & resurrection.” That summed it up: falling into forgetfulness – coming close to missing the power of the event by slipping into church holiday mode. It was wearying almost like walking through deep snow is wearying…
Made me wonder if its just me that feels this – kinda like this at Christmas too – fighting the ‘going on autopilot” feeling.
I ponder… . if having a different kind of service on Easter (like a party) would be more appropriate or at least an appropriate response to the resurrection… not to go counter-culture for the heck of it, maybe even doing a ‘regular’ service, but also have an alternative – a celebration of life. Just my musings on it so far…
At the encouragement of Brintus Maximus… here’s a little pic from the downstairs TPLF WC… & a little story to go with it. I was takin’ care of business after a hard days meetings – the cardboard roll at left in the pic tells the story of the drama I faced. No mas.
No worries. There was a handy little package of baby-wipes for just such an occasion – as you can see, the package is wholly in German, but the package resembles the one we use, literally, at our house. It even had a cute little puppy dog on the package.
My first swipe w/the mystery wipes was effective, yet accompanied by a vigorous tingling, & not the good kind, in just the wrong place. My second swipe did the job, yet the tingling grew more intense… into pain.
Checked w/Johannes on the contents of the mystery package. Turns out they’re BLEACH wipes.
Duly noted.
11-4. 11-5. 12-5. 10-4. My sleep schedule – isn’t working yet – a version of a cold/allergy/hay fever/sinus-y, coughing & sneezing fit is contributing. Hooray.
Pasty Gangster has his permit to drive – so we’ve been spending some time together in the car, albeit in opposite seats that we’re usually in. So far, the joy of driving has been limited to the Exp & the auto-tranny. This afternoon, we’re off to the Reed High parking lot w/the Jetta for a 5 speed lesson. Love it.
Lost In Translation Story from Deutschland – we were at TPLF for church, & a wonderful lady came up to reconnect & talk to the Bean about stuff. They talked for a while, & our friend ended the conversation, with, “I’m so glad that you’re here. Your smile is like a douche of happiness every time we see you.”
Made it to 5 today. Woohoo. More musings then. And, may I warn you now, it is deteriorating, though my mental acuity increasing with each passing moment.
-Every long plane ride, I take my Tolkien – its like travelling with an old friend that you haven’t seen for a while. Didn’t finish Lord of the Rings (book) this time. I usually make it through on the plane trip home, but this time, Casino Royale was calling my name, thereby sabotaging my reading…
-glad we missed the snow last week.
-they’re everywhere. On our flight home from SFO to RNO, 2 German ladies sat across from Joni, coming to visit a relative in the Reno area.
-2 Daylight Savings Time jumps forward in one 3 week period is lame. 4 March in the US, 18 March in the EU. Progressive.
-Pondering & repondering Luke 9:23-25… still. The whole “deny your selfish ambition” makes me have to introspect – What are my selfish ambitions? If I’m going to deny them, I better know what they are or least what they look like… How deep does this rabbit hole go?
On that note, 1John 2:15-17 comes to mind…
“Do not love the world, or the things in the world. The love of the Father is not in those who love the world; for all that is in the world- the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, the pride in riches – comes not from the Father but from the world. And the world & its desire are passing away, but those who do the will of God live forever.”
Identifying selfish ambition: the 3 things mentioned in these verses are about me & fulfilling me. Like Indulgence. Accumulation. Self-exaltation. Gaining the whole world, while losing the soul. –> Denying selfish ambition. Its got to be more than mere asceticism, which can be done in the name of God, albeit with a selfish motivation.
Maybe the “denying of selfish ambitions” can’t be separated from the “taking up the cross daily” – simple obedience. Makes me ponder some more –
Has God really called me to do “great things” for Him? The divinely-ordered task of doing “great things” seems to hide in it lots of room for selfish ambition. I can see a trap here. My introspection continues… I can’t recall a time in my life that I have ever had God call me to do something “great”. Usually, for me, God’s call is a point of obedience that no one else finds out about. And it often seems to involve pain. And being misunderstood. And suffering. Standing firm somewhere.
Something that comes to mind is God’s call to the Apostle Paul on the Damascus Road HERE– esp. verse 16 – where God says, “I myself will show him (Paul) how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.” Interesting.
Selfish ambition points to me, ultimately, no matter what flowery language or high purpose I declare that I am really pursuing – the taking up of the cross, daily, is a call to obey, but also a call to die. Jesus must have chosen the words carefully, loaded with imagery as they are, esp. in the context of the 1st Century Roman Empire. Lay aside selfishness & obey. It will hurt. We will suffer for obeying. But, we’ll be following in His footsteps.
-time for another cup of joe.
Cheers.
Ho there friends.
As usual, the return from Germany is accompanied by a funky-schedule. Up early today (4-ish) which may mean a nap later. Anyhow, I thought I’d take the opportunity to use my time, & process some of my thoughts & observations from the trip.
In many ways Germany seems very familiar re: church culture… in Deutschland, the church culture is a few hundred years older than ours – & it is more obvious there (to me) that churches often take on the expected (but perhaps unspoken) role of “what churches do” & “don’t do”) – (e.g. meaning meeting on Sunday, in a “church” building, the calendaring of events, creation-or lack thereof, of specific programs). Much of what becomes normal seems to be based on what is “successful” – not necessarily a bad thing, but only as long as the definition of success matches Jesus’. Otherwise, success is the number of people at church. It is the lack of conflict. It is reputation. It is sticking to what others are doing – esp. when the other church is experiencing “success…” There’s a thought of “why re-invent the wheel? We’ll just follow what others are doing.”
This shows up in the adoption of models – (not Zoolander silly,) rather, meaning the copying (almost exactly) a particular church/organizations structure/plan – the state church, Hillsong, Willow Creek, Saddleback, Emergent, Church on the Way, etc. These models may “work,” but is it right?
So, I’m pondering conformity & normalization in the context of church, especially the local church – seeing this organization through the lens of another culture has spurred me to comtemplation mode… esp. from asking clarifying questions about things that I’d observed in the church structure – questions like:
-What is “normal” for the local church? What has made this “the norm?” (Think: traditions, identifying something as especially important/sacred, churchy-ness/religiousness etc…)
-What does it look like for the local church to be developing its own unque identity? esp. in the context of “conformity” – where outside pressures/influences (personal aspirations & agendas, denominational forms & norms, city/community ‘standards’, &/or expectations, to name a few) intentionally or not, exert force/pressure to shape the church into something it may/may not supposed to be becoming…
-Are there non-negotiables for every church (behaviors, norms, practices, methods, etc.)? If so, what are they? (beyond a statement of faith &/or an intellectual affirmation of values.) If not, why not?
-How do you determine the methods you will use to get from point A to point B with the people of your church?
More to come… your input is welcome. Probably.
Ich bin Amerikaner… in Deutschland through the 29th – if you’re interested in following my journey, I’ll be posting HERE
See you later.
The Bean & I had some interesting interactions last week, & through some time intentionally carved out for communication have ID’d a monster – the imagination. I’m not talking about creative thinking imagination that Mr. Rogers told us was good to use; its the one-sided conversations that happen in our heads where we ‘imaginarily” interact with another person & come to a conclusion, albeit a faulty or lie-based one, from the imagined interaction.
Taking the time to articulate the imagination & to check in “for realsies” with the other person completely deflated the faulty conclusion.
When I was a kid, my dad would take me & my brother fishing – I wasn’t very good at it, didn’t catch much, & really struggled with the touching of the bait & the fish… seemed like it took forever to get the smell of salmon eggs off of my fingers. Something I could never understand is how my dad would know where to stop & fish – sometimes he’s even say, “There’s a few fish right over there.” I thought he was just trying to get me to wet my line…until the time that he took off his sunglasses & let me wear them.
They had this cool polarized effect, which eliminated the glare & allowed the wearer to see under the surface of the water. Now I knew why my dad said that there were fish over there – I could see them too. But I couldn’t see them until I had the glasses & was able to get past the powerful glare on the water.
Sometimes I feel like I’m still wearing the glasses, & that I can see things that are flowing under the surface of life as plainly as if they were exposed & in the open. I wonder why others don’t see it too. And when I try to describe what I’m seeing, all I get is a blank stare. Or worse, conflict. Sigh.
PS. cg- I changed the sunglasses pic because I couldn’t stand the starburst “white” outline around the glasses on the jpg.