by emma | Dec 27, 2006 | Faith
Just read a couple of really challenging posts.
Brant Hansen posted a great mini-essay (it’s fairly long!) on church, the American Dream, and the kingdom of God. Read it here. I love his honesty about the struggles he has with conventional church.
Shaun also posted some comments on Brant’s post here. (The title of this post is also the title of Shauns post, and comes out of Brants post.)
Here’s a brief quote (its all worth a read!):
I think I’ve taken one too many trips. I can’t listen to “Where the Streets Have No Name” anymore without crying. Here are a few of the faces I see:
In Calcutta, I met a little girl who looks just like the other uniformed girls in her Christian school in the slums…
Please tell me, again, about how we need to “attract” more Americans, using more features, to a building, when in some places, they have to fence kids from the church building, for lack of funds?
I think I am beginning to get to that ‘too many trips’ stage. I think it’s a good thing. What about anyone else? Any thoughts on this?
by emma | Dec 11, 2006 | Faith
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God”
Matt 5:9
Jamie gave a fantastic message at church on Sunday about our calling to be peacemakers. We looked at Matt 5:39-41.
Jamie shared how there are 3 responses to violence: passivity, violence, or Jesus’ way.
He talked about how in each of these instances, Jesus made both the other options look silly. In that culture, you couldn’t hit someone on both cheeks without implying equality. If someone took all your clothes, the shame was on them, the one who made you naked. If you walked more than one mile with a soldier, they could be flogged for potentially causing an uprising. Each response is calculated, not violent or passive, but creative and disrupting.
“Violence is for those who have lost their imagination… We need more of the prophetic imagination that can interrupt violence and oppression.”
[Shane Claiborne]
Walter Brueggemann coined the phrase prophetic imagination. I think that is what Jesus is doing in this passage. Finding ways to take peoples mind off the violence all around us, and remind us that there is a better way. I think our world needs more people who will dare to use their prophetic imagination to change the situations around us. It wont be easy… we look for the quick-exit plan… there is none with this method that I can see. It will take work. But isn’t it worth it? I fear we give up too easily on situations that could be pacified if only we worked harder.
by emma | Dec 9, 2006 | Books, Faith
I finished off Shane Claiborne’s book The Irresistible Revolution today. Boy does that guy challenge me.
Will post some thoughts later when I process them a bit more, but until then heres a few brief quotes to mull over:
“How can we worship a homeless man on Sunday and ignore one on Monday?”
“I saw a clearer glimpse of Jesus in this leper’s eyes than any stained-glass window could ever give me.”
“Following Jesus is simple, but not easy. Love until it hurts, and then love more.” (Mother Teresa)
“If you have two coats, one of them belongs to the poor.” (Dorothy Day)
“When we look through the eyes of Jesus, we see new things in people. In the murderers, we see our own hatred. In the addicts, we see our own addictions. In the saints, we see our own holiness.”
“We live in an age in which people, when they hear the word Christian, are much more likely to think of people who hate gays than people who love outcasts.”
“If we are crazy, then it is because we refuse to be crazy in the same way that the world has gone crazy.”
by emma | Dec 6, 2006 | Faith, Music
Foy Vance… my word.
Every single time his music does something to me. There is this thing in his music which leaves me feeling peaceful and disturbed at once. Like Gabriel and the Vagabond. There’s this beautiful story of hope in the midst of despair. Beautiful guitar music overlayed with words of challenge and hope.
It is easy to walk past people every day. To be disconnected. Thinking that their lives do not affect ours. It’s not true. There are people who are desperate for hope all around us. They’re on our doorsteps! There are so many people who are longing to be brought back to life. All it takes is a step in the right direction. This is as much a post for me as it is for you (as are all my posts, incidently). I need reminded of this regularly, because I forget it so easily.
We are called to be lovers bold in broken places, pouring ourselves out again and again until we’re called home.
We are called to gently whisper hope in the ears of vagabonds.
(Also: Supporting Foy last night was The Fortunate Sons… an amazing Glasgow band, who sound quite like the Dave Matthews Band. Check them out if you ever get the chance.)
Gabriel and the Vagabond :: Single released Dec 18th. Go buy it!
by emma | Nov 27, 2006 | Faith, Words
What have we begun?
Here we see angels,
burning like the sun.
Here we juggle destinies –
what is this thing we’ve done?
What army gets commissioned
kneeling in this way?
What passion finds expression
when wounded soldiers pray?
Are nameless heroes rising?
Tomorrow’s choosen ones,
carriers of Jesus,
what plague have we begun?
What dreamer writes upon the wall?
[Found on a prayer room wall]
What are the ‘walls’ in postmodern/postchristian/whatever-they-are-now-calling-it culture? Websites? Blogs? Music? Film?
Who are today’s dreamers, stirring up the church?
by emma | Nov 23, 2006 | Africa, Faith, Words
I remember hearing about an old comic strip back in the days of St. Ed’s. Two guys are talking to each other, and one of them says he has a question for God. He wants to ask why God allows all of this poverty and war and suffering to exist in the world. And his friend says, “Well, why don’t you ask?” The fellow shakes his head and says he is scared. When his friend asks why, he mutters, “I’m scared God will ask me the same question.” Over and over, when I ask God why all of these injustices are allowed to exist in the world, I can feel the Spirit whisper to me, “You tell me why we allow this to happen. You are my body, my hands, my feet.”
[ The Irresistible Revolution – Shane Claiborne ]
At CU yesterday we were thinking about the issue of pain and suffering, why it exists, what we do with it etc. Then I read this today. This is why we must act. We are called to not only pray against injustice and suffering, but to act to bring about its end. In a wise mans words, ‘It’s not about charity, it’s about justice.’ (Yes, that man was Bono.)
It’s about bringing heaven here.
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