Jesus wants a new digital camera. February 21, 2006
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“Too often of course, the contemporary church simply mirrors the culture. Increasingly we are less a holy city drawn together around Christ and more a part of the suburban sprawl that celebrates individual autonomy, choice, entertainment and pragmatic efficiency…Capitulating to niche demographics and marketing, churches that once nurtured the young, the middle-aged, and the elderly together, with all of the indispensable gifts that each one brings to the body of Christ, often now contribute to the rending of this intergenerational fabric…Being ‘countercultural’ today often amounts to superficial moralism about sex and SUVs…Beyond that, many of the churches with which I am familiar are captivated by the same obsessions as our culture: religion as individual spirituality, therapy and sentimentalism. It all serves to keep us turned in on ourselves, like a kid at a carnival instead of a pilgrim en route.”
Michael Horton, “
Christianity Today is doing a series of articles this year to celebrate their 50th anniversery on the church’s role as “a counterculture for the common good.” What and how and why is the church, exactly? The question of the role of the church has been on my mind as my own church works through the book of Ephesians, as my university struggles with its identity as an “arm of the Church,” and as I consider my continuing role as a member of the Body.
I found Michael Horton’s statement of our obsession with “religion as individual spirituality, therapy and sentimentalism” - our obsession with ourselves - to be extremely appropriate. Christo commented earlier on evangelicals being “all too embracing of life.” And I think the point is well taken: if we are obsessed with the life here and now it is because we are obsessed with ourselves. We have little regard for the immediacy and reality of others in our participation with them but an unhealthy focus on the reality and immediate satisfaction of our own lives and needs. I am finding that many of my own assumptions about church see it as something here to serve me, or serve an elite clique of ”believers” rather than something that engages the world in a meaningful way. Church is something outside of me rather than something I am with others in Christ.
Even in some of the branches of evangelicalism seeking change one often finds the obsession with the same issues. If one side devotes its energies to showing how American Beauty is innappropriate for Christians to watch, then the other side devotes its energies to showing why its ok. Both seem to miss the point in some respect I think. We too easily think that watching certain movies or listening to certain music that was perviously taboo is an engagment with culture, with the world, and in some ways it may be, but it seems to me that it is a fairly superficial triumph. In some contexts it seems to be less an engagment and interaction with culture and more of an act of uncritical surrender. The fact that most of us, as the church, know more about the plotline of Brokeback Mountain and the dating status of its stars than we know about the Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda (and no, it is not a Christian missionary group), is disturbing. If we are to truly engage with the world, if we are to be the body of Christ, we must engage it in Uganda at least as much, or more than, we do in Hollywood. Is it strange that it seems like Christ wants everything we want?
Life plans February 15, 2006
Posted by thomas in : xanga , add a comment Forget my angsty ponderings on my future. I now have a plan. I will kill Jamie Oliver, perform a face transplant and steal his identity. I will then spend my days cooking delectable meals for my rockstar friends and say witty things in a cool accent while starring in my own TV show that implies I’m naked in the kitchen when really it is just a clever metaphor for my open and easy-going style.If that fails, I will die my hair blonde and style it in a classic combover while wearing lots of denim and soft pastel colors - comfortable yet stylish, serious but not aggressive - and share my skills at turning useless crap around the house into centerpieces for your latest dinner party all under the pseudonym, Martin Stewart.
Dream big. Ummm…yeeeeah?
Valentine’s Day 2006 February 14, 2006
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I have to smile at the groups of men, sheepish and awkward, as they circle displays of flowers in the supermarket and examine racks of cards trying to look manly - like junior high boys at their first dance, unsure of what to do with their hands when they talk to the girl that sits beside them in math class. They look at bunches of roses out of the corners of their eyes before sidling up next to a bouquet in an eyes downcast, shuffling sort of way. One guy in a suit makes a joke that the guy with a Harley-Davidson t-shirt and a beer belly, gripping a large bouquet with his big rough hands - complete with teddy bear perched on top - laughs at a little too loudly, a little too long. I wonder who the flowers are for. I wonder if she shares his love for motorcycles and beer. Love is such an awkward thing - such a tender thing - and we’re all so sheepish when caught holding flowers and teddy-bears. You’re always so scared of looking like a dork at your first dance that you don’t notice that no one else knows what to do with their hands either.
Considering this is my first Valentines Day ever where I actually have a real valentine and I won’t be spending my evening with a group of guys watching Die Hard 2: Die Harder, eating pizza, expressing frustration through manly competitions and pining after girls who do not recognize our existence…I’m pretty excited. I mean the cards from mom were great, but it’s nice to be all sheepish and awkward and be accepted for it all the same by someone other than your mother.
I’m in love. And it is awesome. There is something almost magical about loving and be loved by another - the magic is that there is someone there to guide and encourage me in help me up in all my dancing clumsiness. Which is all any of us really can ask for - a clumsy partner to stumble along with to “What’s My Age Again?” while the teachers chaperoning check their watches.
Motivation? Motivation. February 8, 2006
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Well, the sun is shining, that’s good.
That is good. Actually, the sun shining is freaking great.
Ok.
Let’s start with that.
The sunshine. And bare feet on the floor.