Christianity is the Context

“Christianity is not offered up as one truth among many, or as one version of a single truth common to all.  Real Christianity…is both the truth that makes sense of all other truths, and the truth that offers itself as the framework within which those other truths will find their meaning.”

(N. T. Wright)

The truth of Christianity is the context – it is the single category – for thinking about and understanding everything that happens in the world, not the other way around.

We don’t measure Christianity by the things that happen around us: we don’t understand God through the lens of 9-11, or earthquakes and tsunamis, or wars or the deaths of the people that we love. We measure those things - and think about and understand those things - through the lens of Christianity, through the lens of resurrection, through the lens of a God who loves us, and who came to us and entered into and endured our human condition with all of its limitations and temptations; a God who set himself up to die in order that we might live eternally.

The Whole World Loves Soccer!

     The whole world loves soccer and the whole world (almost) lives in Guymon!

     May 28 - June 4 we will welcome our friends from Igreja Presbiteriana Missional do Buritis from Belo Horizonte, Brazil!  Ten visitors will stay in our homes, eat and socialize, lead worship and Sunday School and help us with a Free Brazilian Soccer Skills Clinic for the community!

     For two years we have been cultivating a relationship with our brothers and sisters at IPMB - I've traveled to Belo twice and my earlier posts about last summer's American baseball clinic are posted here.  Now FPC Guymon will have the opportunity to host our friends and work alongside them in mission.

     Our hope is that the various nationalities represented in Guymon (Mexican, Guatemalan, Vietnamese, Burmese (Karen), Sudanese, Nigerian, Zimbabwean, Somalian and Samoan to name a few) will have an opportunity to come together and mix while playing soccer and watching their children play soccer.  We are blessed to have the Guymon Public Schools as a co-sponsor as well as the use of their fields, fieldhouse and equipment. 

     Our children will begin praying for their un-churched friends in the weeks to come and we have already begun making plans for host homes, common meals, and Guymon-friendly activities.

    The soccer clinic will be free to ages 5-18.  The clinic will be offered in the mornings, followed by group lunches and activities, working at Loaves and Fishes and family dinners, a picnic and a trip to Hunny's. 

     Plan to help - or come to play - and have an extraordinary experience in the Panhandle!

    

The Gospel According to the Adjustment Bureau

Yes, it's true...I haven't done anything at all since August...haven't read a book or seen a movie...just the suspended animation that is pastoral ministry LOL! Not sure if I have the temperament for regular blogging - but yet, here I am...the suspense probably keeps you up nights, right?

Chris and I saw Adjustment Bureau last night...the reviews have been mixed (and it's PG-13 rating might be too low...I wouldn't take the youth group and that's too bad; maybe there will be a PG rental version). Whatever its other shortcomings might be, it's good theological practice to measure its plot line against Christian orthodoxy.

But if I wanted to make a movie based on Romans 8:28, (We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose...) this would be a good start. The tension between the sovereign will of God and the free will of humans - and the ongoing redemption of creation - is like a string that is plucked in every scene.

The "Chairman" ("you know him by many names...you have seen him many times") has a "plan for your life" (Jeremiah 29:11) written in a "book" (Psalm 139:16) - the trouble is, humans deviate from the Plan and need "adjusting": what amounts to being "transformed by the renewing of [their] mind[s]...that [they] may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will" (Romans 12:12) of the (apparently benevolent) "Chairman."

Especially entertaining is the writer's explanation of how much free will humans really have (Matt Damon asks this question directly, so you won't miss it.) The "Gospel According to the Adjustment Bureau" is that the "Chairman" is active in the affairs of humans. It's a good way to stretch your theological muscles...

The Electric Christian

My thinking about ethics, good works and social responsibility has led me to read The Presence of the Kingdom by Jacques Ellul (1912-1994). Ellul was a committed Christian (a theologian, pastor and author) who was deeply influenced by Marx; but who found both contemporary Christianity as expressed by the church and Marxism to be insufficient guides for living as a Christian in a "suicidal world." He writes from the perspective of one who lived through the Nazi scourge as part of the French resistance, and from his observations of post-war reconstruction (he'd thought that the devastation of war would allow for the construction of a new civilization and was stunned by how quickly the pre-war status quo was resumed).

I may be late to this party (it was first published in 1948), but it is a breathtaking study of the tension of the Christian's position in the world, which is to be "salt, light and sheep" (especially since everyone in the world is more interested in being a "wolf").

He wrote that what Jesus Christ calls "hypocrisy" is to give up an attempt to live out one's religion in the world. To be "salt, light and sheep" are not mere metaphors (the kind of abstraction that he felt rendered the church impotent in the world), but rather a stark reality: Christians are to meet the concrete, discrete situations of daily life in the world as "light" ~ giving meaning and direction to history (all history is God's history); "salt" ~ to be visible signs of the new covenant in that our life and words should manifest the covenant so the world can see what that means; and to be "sheep in the midst of wolves" ~ another kind of sign of the reality of God's action ~ we cannot be a purifying sacrifice, but we have a share in the same kind of sacrificial living witness.

The church fails to do this when (1) we attempt to "moralize" the actions of the world by trying to create institutions that are not "too shocking for the Christian conscience," and thus live continuously "on the bridge" between the world and the Kingdom of God; and (2) when we try to decrease our sin by increasing our virtues (the idea that we can "improve" the world).

We become caught between two necessities: it is impossible for us to make the world less sinful; and it is impossible for us to accept it as it is. An oversimplification of Ellul's thoughts about how to live in this tension, is that through the Holy Spirit God uses material means by using human beings as instruments:

"...it is this human instrument that our churches lack; that is why, when the gospel is preached its message no longer reaches the world. The channel through which the gospel should reach the world - and does not - ought to be the 'layman' living the tension...as the point of contact between the ideologies of the world in which he lives and theology - between economic realities and the forgiveness of Jesus Christ for those realities..."

Just as the Cross placed Jesus at the "point of contact" between the economic realities of the world and the forgiveness of Christ for that reality, every Christian is called to be a "point of contact" by taking up positions that place him- or herself between two forces, two"currents": the will of the world and the will of God.

Inception

I've been home for exactly a week now ~ with everything that's happened these last few days, I'm only now getting an opportunity to reflect on the mission in Brazil...

Tonight I went to see Inception, the new Leonardo DiCaprio movie about a thief who extracts secrets from within minds by entering into their defenseless subconscious minds in their dream state. As the plot develops, DiCaprio takes a job where he tries to implant an idea (called "inception") in order to get a person to act in a particular way as though the action was his own idea.

Thinking about the baseball clinic, as well as this movie, led me to compare the work of the Holy Spirit ~ through us, God's people ~ in the lives of others. We have this persistent sense that profession of faith, our salvation and our standing before God is something we do ourselves and something that we have to take care of. The truth, though, is that God "plants the seed" (inception) of faith, yet we act on it as though it was our own idea.

In Inception the "seeds" of the ideas implanted into the dreams of other people grow and influence the dreamer until that person's perception of reality is actually changed in his or her awakened state. Again, this is our evangelistic hope: that the seeds of faith planted by the Holy Spirit grow and influence the new believer until that person's reality is transformed in ways that affect his or her life and the lives of others.

That's how something as mundane as a baseball clinic can be spiritual and evangelistic - our prayer is that through a week's worth of daily contact with Believers, the seeds of faith have been implanted in children and adults who had been living their lives in dreams of their own construction ~ and that in time those dreamers will awaken to a new reality, "transformed by the renewing of their minds." Romans 12:2

Almost home!

If you go, you have to come back...

Spent Wednesday morning re-writing my column for the church newsletter while others shopped for souvenirs (it's okay, I already had all of mine...) and then Ana and Marco arranged for 3 cabs to haul us and our luggage to the Rio airport for the first leg of our flight home.

The Deadly Card Game With the Painful Penalty for losing started on the floor of the Rio airport and continued at Sao Paolo...I'm not much of a card player, so I could only cringe as others stepped up to bare their forearms and take their punishments...this may take some demonstration when I get home ;)

We lucked out on the overnight Sao Paolo-DFW flight - it wasn't full, so several of us had more than one seat to ourselves - a little more wiggle room, and much better for snoozing attempts. Still, I managed to fall asleep in an unusual position, so I'm working out the kinks...

After clearing customs (Monotone: "You forgot to write your passport number on this form, ma'am. Welcome to America, ma'am. Have a good day. STAMP. Next." So much for a warm and welcoming WELCOME HOME TO AMERICA!!) we said our goodbyes with promises to do this again together. After a little while I got a call from Pastor Kye (who was waiting for his flight to Montreat where he is scheduled to lead the music in worship for the youth weeks coming up), with an invitation to the Admiral's Club! It really IS nice to be able to sit with free WiFi, refreshments and nice surroundings while you wait for your flight. Let's hear it for friends in high places~

Only one more hour and I finish up on American Eagle to Amarillo for a reunion with Chris (next time, he's going!) and our drive home (that is, after I make a claim for the new suitcase American Airlines owes me...) and my first PB&J in two weeks!

This has truly been one of the best mission trips I've ever been on: best country, best food, best project, best hosts, best team - still sad for those of you who didn't come this time - ever hopeful that we'll be able to share it together in July, 2012...start putting a little money away between now and then, write it in your schedule and instead of saying you can't make it because of "this and that" make "this and that" move over for Belo! I promise you won't regret it!

Christ the Redeemer

This morning we headed up to see the Christ the Redeemer statue that can be seen from anywhere in Rio.

The statue was constructed between 1922 and 1931 and is 130 feet tall. It has been named as one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World. Most recently you have probably seen it toppling over in the sci-fi movie "2012."

We took a cab about 3/4 of the way up, followed by a short walk, and then several flights of stairs (232 steps). There are enough landings to catch your breath and take some spectacular photos of Rio.

There are lots of visitors and it's pretty crowded at the top. Lots of people lie down on the tile patio at the base of the statue and take photos straight up. A little weirder are the people who pose with their arms outstretched like the statue...or you can hold your hand out flat and get a photo that looks like the statue is sitting on your palm...(hey, I'm just sayin')!

We heard some American accents at the top ("Wish I had a Dr. Pepper...") so we said hello and discovered that the people were a group of about 100 Baptists from Texarkana who were on respite on the way home from doing missionary work with one of the Baptist churches in Belo!!

After lunch at Subway (we're running out of money...Rio is costing a little more than we expected, mostly for food and transportation) we went to the beach to sit in the sun and wade or swim. It's winter in Brazil, so the Atlantic is cool - but not cold - and the sun is still hot when you're out in it (the air temperature is around 75 degrees, though). We rented a couple of umbrellas (in case my dermatologist is reading this...) and sat in the shade, did a little wading, talked to a fisherman and looked at the things vendors were selling...the sand is very clean - no seaweed or litter anywhere - we "crashed" the Copacabana Beach (in front of the exclusive hotels), and we're sure we saw "somebody who looked like Madonna" and maybe even "somebody who looked like Beyonce." Lots of bikinis on beautiful and ordinary women...not as many Speedos as we expected (thankfully!) ~ this is school vacation time in Brazil and there were lots of families doing the typical beach holiday.

Our current favorite beach food is churros - a fried tube of dough (like a crispy donut) that is filled either with either caramel or chocolate creme. You buy them from street vendors for about $1.25. Somehow I don't think this is what the girls in the bikinis are eating!

I'm still a Belo fan, but it's nice to have an opportunity to actually see a place I've only heard about.

Heading home tomorrow afternoon - Rio to Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo to DFW (where we go through customs), and then about a 5 hour layover for me in Dallas before heading to Amarillo (I messed up my return flight - used the wrong Brazil itinerary before it was changed - so it will cost to switch to an earlier flight...oh well!)

See you soon! Can't wait!