Categotry Archives: food for thought

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Covered Wagon or Bandwagon

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Categories: changing mindsets, food for thought

So I’m pondering the current trends I’m seeing, reading about, and experiencing–both away from more traditional forms of church and toward new expressions. Emergent, missional, organic, and other terms–these are words that are used in an attempt to explain what God is showing us, to explain what we are doing, and how it is different from the traditional approach.

The way I see it, there are generally two different approaches people have when venturing into new territory like this. For our purposes, let’s call them the “covered wagon approach” and the “bandwagon approach.”

This is a preview of Covered Wagon or Bandwagon. Read the full post (1004 words, 2 images, estimated 4:01 mins reading time)

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Stuff You Can Learn from the Movies

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Categories: food for thought

As further evidence of my profound geekiness…I am a sucker for classic movies. Turner Classic Movies is my favorite television channel, and the DVR is loaded with some of the greats.

This is apparently “Rosalind Russell” month on TCM, so I recorded a movie called Sister Kenny a few days ago, and watched it last night. Sister Kenny is a biopic about, um, Sister Kenny–an Australian nurse who, while practicing in the remote Australian bush, accidentally discovered an effective treatment for polio years before the vaccine was discovered. (For those who are confused, Kenny was her last name, and she was not a nun. The term “sister” was used for nurses in the Australian military.)

This is a preview of Stuff You Can Learn from the Movies. Read the full post (533 words, 2 images, estimated 2:08 mins reading time)

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The Fruit of My Journey Thus Far

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Categories: changing mindsets, food for thought, Meanderings (look it up)

On the journey, every so often it is helpful to take a look backward–not in a bad way (“remember Lot’s wife”), but simply to take inventory of where you have come. Some people say in cliche manner that we must only live in the moment, that we only have today, that we can’t change the past and don’t know the future, so let’s just look at the road before us, no looking back.

This is a preview of The Fruit of My Journey Thus Far. Read the full post (1008 words, 1 image, estimated 4:02 mins reading time)

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What I REALLY Think About the Institutional Church

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Categories: food for thought, You need to read this

When I’m talking to someone and they start ranting and raving about something, one of my favorite things to say to them (tongue-in-cheek) is: “Oh, don’t beat around the bush; tell me what you REALLY think.”

A lot of time is spent on this blog de-constructing various aspects of institutional Christianity. Taken together, it might seem like so much ranting and raving. So today, I thought I’d tell you what I REALLY think about the institutional church.

I love it.

(Well, not the “institutional” part, so much as the “church” part.)

This is a preview of What I REALLY Think About the Institutional Church. Read the full post (579 words, 2 images, estimated 2:19 mins reading time)

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Retooling our Gifts for a New Season

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Categories: changing mindsets, church, food for thought, music

My mind has been drifting back to some previous posts (see here and here) where we were discussing individuals who function in various ministry positions (like pastors and worship leaders), who find themselves displaced when they no longer feel they belong within institutional Christianity. Their gifts don’t go away, but they no longer know what to do with them. My blogger friend Glenn has talked about it; I can certainly relate; and I know there are others.

This is a preview of Retooling our Gifts for a New Season. Read the full post (1186 words, 1 image, estimated 4:45 mins reading time)

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Fluid Church

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Categories: changing mindsets, church, food for thought

When I think about how God has been re-shaping my perspectives on the church in general, one analogy I like to use is based on science–particularly, the properties of water, and/or the properties of solids and liquids.

We most often think of water as a liquid, because that’s where we identify with it, mostly. A liquid, a fluid, easily takes the shape of anything that contains it, and can be poured from container to container. It gives way when you dip your finger in it. It is movable, flexible, easily changed. And yet, liquid water molecules tend to stick together. Droplets of water on glass tend to find each other and merge together. It is a loose structure, but there is a natural cohesion of the molecules.

This is a preview of Fluid Church. Read the full post (878 words, 2 images, estimated 3:31 mins reading time)

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Extra-Biblical Christianity (or Stuff We Do That’s Not In the Bible)

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Categories: food for thought, fun, What the heck was THAT?

Have you ever stopped to think about how much we say/do in Christianity that is not found anywhere in the Bible?

Not saying all of it is bad–I have mentioned in previous posts that I feel the Bible purposefully gives us a lot of latitude in how to “do church”. So just because something isn’t in the Bible doesn’t mean it’s wrong. But what is kind of interesting–and a bit funny, even–is when we treat our extra-Biblical stuff as sacred, as if it were in the Bible. Things we’re so attached to that we wouldn’t feel like it was “church” or “Christian” if it weren’t there.

This is a preview of Extra-Biblical Christianity (or Stuff We Do That’s Not In the Bible). Read the full post (517 words, 1 image, estimated 2:04 mins reading time)

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The Tower and the Ladder

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Categories: changing mindsets, food for thought, religion

At a worship conference I participated in last year in Joplin, Missouri, a friend of mine there named Jim gave a Biblical comparison I’ve been chewing on ever since. And some things in Sarah’s post today indirectly stirred these thoughts again. So I thought I’d share them with you.

In the Book of Genesis, we find two powerful pictures of heaven-earth connections. One of them is the Tower of Babel, found in Genesis 11; the other is Jacob’s ladder dream found in Genesis 28. One negative, one positive.

This is a preview of The Tower and the Ladder. Read the full post (700 words, 2 images, estimated 2:48 mins reading time)

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Confusing Method for Principle

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Categories: changing mindsets, church, food for thought, religion

I’ve alluded to this topic probably several times, the most recent being in my post “Questions of Heresy?”. It’s probably time to cover this one head on, because in my opinion it is at the root of many of our relgious practices. A lot of the disputes that divide the church, and a lot of the resistance to new things, boil down to a confusion between method and principle.

It is apparent through the Scriptures that God does not change. This makes sense, since Someone who is eternally perfect has no need to evolve. His character, His nature, His love, the things that He likes and dislikes…all of this remains constant, and always has. However, it is also apparent that while God does not change, His methods do. (A key example of this is in Isa. 43:19, when He says, “Behold, I am doing a new thing.”) Because man does change over time, God will alter His methods in His relentless quest to reach man.

This is a preview of Confusing Method for Principle. Read the full post (928 words, 2 images, estimated 3:43 mins reading time)

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Stuff I Learned from U2, and How It Influenced My Current Path

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Categories: changing mindsets, food for thought, My Story

As I’ve said at other times on this blog, my journey out of institutional Christianity has been a progressive one, but it wasn’t until I had a wake-up call–a public rebuke from a local pastor–that I truly realized how far I had drifted from the culture of the institutional church.

Before that point, I was still trying to belong to “the club” in many ways–still trying to garner acceptance from the mainstream church. After this point, I recognized that wasn’t working. I was clearly outside the walls, and I needed to learn how to embrace that fully.

This is a preview of Stuff I Learned from U2, and How It Influenced My Current Path. Read the full post (580 words, 2 images, estimated 2:19 mins reading time)
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