Church and Fundamentalism: Dialogue II (Mushy Liberalism or Better Story?)

Fundamentalism: My principles can show you just how far your morality is sinking. Don't you even remember the head coverings (I Corinthians 11:15) and the greeting of one another with a kiss (Romans 16:16; 1 Corinthians 16:20; 2 Corinthians 13:12; 1 Thessalonians 5:26; 1 Peter 5:14)? Oh, if the people would just truly take the Bible seriously how the world would be better off and will return to normal!
Church: Don't you know Fundamentalism how young you really are? You are not as old as you suppose yourself to be. Perhaps you are the one who needs to do some revisiting of history. Read again of the Enlightenment fathers and see how your roots lie there. In fact, you might even have the eyes to see what a strong trust, perhaps even a dangerously wrong - idolatrous even, foundation you have in your own reason!
Fundamentalism: Oh what gushy liberalism! Your people have this stubborn tendency to keep speaking about a story or narrative.  God of the Story or God of the Truth! Which will bring greater security? Truth is what you need. Come home I say, come home again and we will reason together (Isaiah 1:18). You need me so much more than you realize. You are forsaking the Truth!
Church: Reason, reason, reason. Who's reason? Can't reason be swayed, twisted, and selfish? Why once again we see where your true faith lies, reason! Stories are no weak vessel. Whose actions haven't been shaped by the lessons learned from stories such as The Boy who Cried Wolf? Jesus did not come as reason in flesh, but a person. So when we speak of Truth, we speak of Truth revealed in the form of a person. To understand a person you must understand their story! My people have an incredible story of being loved by God. God did not set down to give them mere rules to apply across all generations and all cultures. Rather it is a story that helps shape beliefs, actions, groups, cultures. Fundamentalism, I think I'll keep searching for a better story. 

Church and Experience: Dialogue II (Defining Love)

Experience: If you would just have more Love how your people (and the world!) could be cured of its insensitivity and self-centeredness. Too often your people look like a Social Club rather than a hospital for the sick. Your people so easily forget the Lord's Greatest Commandment: Love God, Neighbor, Self, (Matthew 22:36-39). Love embraces instead of excluding. Love that will be for all no matter what they look like, what they believe, what they do. Doesn't God love all? Why can't your people be more tolerant?
Church: Love is certainly important. Love is a part of God’s essence and should be of mine. You have named some very important Scripture passages that are at the heart of what I am. But, Experience, for all your lofty talk about love can you define it for me?
Experience: Unconditional, tolerant. Love, love, love.
Church: Those are characteristics of love I've heard a lot lately. I recall the story of how the prophet Hosea was called by God to merry Gomer, the whore. This shows God is faithful in spite of the people's unfaithfulness. God is committed to them even when their own commitment is shaky and tentative and even non-existent. But also in this story God doesn't change who He is for them. God is, in fact, free from them. God can be free because God is so stable in His ability to give love without changing.
Experience: I'm not sure I follow you Church. Aren't you proving my point? God is love therefore the experience of love and giving of love is enduring and eternal. See, Church, you need me. Enter into a contractual agreement with me. 
Church: Experience, you too have made me think. Though, love is more than a concept. Love is tangible. More than simply a feeling or tolerance of ideas and behaviors, God's love was tangibly expressed in giving of His Son and how the Son lived and died for the world. God's love is compassionate. God's love is sacrificial. Certainly you are right that experience of God's love should lead toward (and even be measured by our) love for our neighbors. But love is also free from having to bow at the altar of tolerance, because it is rooted and has as its foundation in the Holy God of Scripture. That's why, my dear friend Experience, I must pass.   

Church and Experience: Dialogue I (Shouting Methodist!)

Experience: Church don't you realize how much you need me? Can't you hear the truth proclaimed by your own Pentecostals, Charismatics, and even the early Methodists? Experience is at the heart of it all. What good is mere belief? Even the devil believes! (James 2:19) I'm not advocating we do away with the Creeds, Doctrines, or anything, but isn't what really matter the religion of the heart! You need me to help teach your people that they need to get out of their pews, out of their fortress style churches and display the exuberance of the Lord! Don’t you remember your own hymns? “I do believe, without a doubt/The Christian has a right to shout…They pray, they sing, they preach the best,/And do the Devil most molest./ I'm bound to march in endless bliss,/And die a shouting Methodist.” (By Winthrop Hudson) Together we could use Technology to help people really experience love through high impact worship services and other virtual means as well.
Church: Experience, haven't you heard, It's not how high you jump, but how far you love?
Experience: Love! Why that's exactly what I'm saying. Now you are finally starting to listen, Church. Your people need more love! Your people can get all caught up in Truth and Doctrines and even Theology. Again, those aren't unimportant, but too often they get in the way of Love. Don't you remember, "And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love." 1 Corinthians 13:13. Too often throughout your history your people exclude, even murder in the name of Truth.

Church and Entertainment: Dialogue II

Entertainment: It is one thing to introduce TV's and DVD's to Sunday School curriculum or projectors and screens in a worship service with drums and guitars that's a nice start, but that's merely a beginning. Why not add slides and bouncies to your children's ministry? What child (and really adult!) doesn't love a good bouncy? You want more kids, just hang around more with me and I'll make it happen. Oh how you are missing this generation. Especially your more established people. Just look at the statistics. Numbers don't lie!
Church: I can’t deny the decline. But too serious you say? Too serious about the Greatest News in the world? Can that be possible? Perhaps you have a point though, Entertainment. This Greatest News should be characterized by celebration, liberation, and joy!
Entertainment: Joy, yes joy and celebration. Now you're really starting to hear me. That's what I'm talking about uninhibited, unencumbered joy! That's what your people need, a little heaven on earth, here and now. You place too much emphasis on the sweet-bye-and-bye and forget the joy of heaven now. Let them eat cake! Let them slide! Let them bounce! Then they will want to listen to your message! Then they will have ears to truly hear!
Church: Umm.
Entertainment: Let us enter into a long term contractual agreement and together we can use Efficiency and Technology for our advantage. Together many more will come; many more will experience joy and fun like never before. That Good News you're selling, I've heard it said, it is should be anything but boring. I am just what you need.
Church: Entertainment, you too raise some important points about joy. But I am not an organization that values customer loyalty and pleasure at any costs. Rather I value deeper values like commitment and sacrifice. You too make me question though, "Why do we take ourselves so seriously and forget the joy we can experience?" "Yet, how might fun and entertainment lead people away from the Gospel such that all they experience is a surface level understanding of commitment and sacrifice that is called for in the Gospel? After all, so many left Jesus when He called for a discipleship that was solely committed to His way of life and love?" I think I'll skip along for something more everlasting!

Church and Entertainment: Dialgoue I

Entertainment: Church you are so archaic! Efficiency and Technology weren't forceful enough. You are in serious danger. In particular, you have been too slow to ask from me what you need. I have what you have been desperately seeking. Some churches still don't even allow piano's in their sanctuaries! Can you believe it? What is this the Dark Ages? Of course, for a long time you didn't even allow women to sing in the church because your archaic ways (1 Corinthians 14:34). That's how the boys’ choirs started. Most of your people have updated to the 19th or perhaps 20th century, but you are still so far behind what your people are seeking. You need me so much more than you realize. Why can't you just see your need for me and embrace me? There are some churches getting it much more than others. They have lights and sound as good as almost any secular concert you can pay money to attend. Don't look now Church, but these churches are on the increase and are growing. I know it makes you nervous and scared, but your dichotomy between sacred and secular is a foolish myth. I say, let your people eat cake! Give the people what they want and they will come!
Church: Entertainment, we are more different that you realize. Your audience is in the seats, in your consumers. I have multiple audiences, one of which is God! I cannot simply be about pleasing people's desires and wishes. For one, they always change. Desire is a funny thing that way.
Entertainment: Your people are too solemn. They take themselves too seriously. What they need is fun, fun, fun. You've heard a thousand time, "Build it and they will come!

Church and Technology: Dialogue II

Technology: During the Dark Ages and even the Middle Ages you might have been a learning organization that taught many, but not today. If people have religious questions they don't have to come to you. I can provide all their answers. Haven't you heard how reliable Wikipedia is? There are websites and blogs run by your own people who have embraced my abilities that provide answers at any moment accessible from almost any location in the world. No longer do they have to wait for a sermon series, much less the lectionary that give answers so slowly. And the answers they give are so, “out there” they’re just not very relevant either. But with me, no longer do the people have to wait for one of your groups to mass produce the answers in a way that relates to them. Today I allow them to ask questions on blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Message Boards and get answers not just from lay people but from the experts themselves who help ensure their accuracy. Can you hear my tone? It is similar to Efficiency's. I too fear for your future. I can help.
Church: Technology, you too, like Efficiency, seemed to have bowed at the altar of relevancy. What you call irrelevant, I call creating a larger perspective with which to see the world. While I might not always address the immediate, felt need of some, my aim is often to the larger perspective of deeper, real needs people have in helping them to see the world differently. Simply giving quick and packaged answers to felt desires isn’t always the best answers.
Technology: Call it what you will, Church. In sticking to your guns, you are being left behind. Meet the people’s needs! I can help you.  
Church: Just as Inefficiency raised some important points and questions so have you Technology. Can real community happen in a "virtual" world? Certainly the way people can get answers and create virtual community might be a means to real community or a means to service, but they are not the same are they?
Technology: Just as Efficiency stated, I fear you are not catching the depth of the issues. Please, stay longer, let us enter into a long-term, contractual agreement and I will show you the way. I have much more to teach you.
Church: Technology, I really appreciate the dialogue, but I must be going. Perhaps to look into how Facebook or Twitter might increase my public image.

Church and Technology: Dialogue Part I

Technology: Efficiency sure had some good points. I overhead the latter part of your conversation. Though, I will admit you had some great points too. But I'll leave that for y'all to figure out. My point is that simply to make a small step toward the culture you need me. Oh man do you need me Church! I know much of your people have dappled with me a little, but I have so much more to offer! Twitter, Facebook, Websites, Projectors, Screens, Microphones, Sound Systems are all but a start of what I can offer. Your people have personal computers and internet capabilities right in the palm of their hand. You need to catch up and catch up quickly.
Church: Yes, we have certainly met before, Technology. Like with Efficiency, I approach you with hesitancy. Technology is a gift, but so much can go so wrong and be such a distraction. It can be so disturbing. Honestly, for some I’ve seen you become an idol.
Technology: Idolatry, please. Don't believe all you hear, Church. Honestly, you’re not that naïve. Video Conferencing, Virtual Worship Services, and Virtual Online Bible Studies are the waves of the future. Let me just say, Church, I really don't think you're getting just how much I affect your people. In fact, I would argue that with my current level of influence (my influence will only continue to grow) people have little need for you. I don't mean that to be arrogant, just truthful. People don't need you any more, Church.

Church and Efficiency Dialogue Part II

Church: In your emphasis on the urgency of “now,” you overlook ancient truths. It takes only a committed few to change the world. It only took twelve empowered but far from perfect disciples who spread Christianity across a hostile world! And as for changing times, well I've been through that plenty of times before. Many have signaled for the flag declaring my death before. The Church has been through persecutions, crusades, inquisitions, scandals, political revolutions, scientific revolutions, ups, downs, and many other tribulations. I might move slowly for you but sometimes slow and reflective is exactly what is needed among the hustle and the bustle. There are far too many voices proclaiming the next, the newest, the greatest, the best, and the biggest without listening for the still small voice of God (1Kings 19:11-12). I'm afraid I’m just not as concerned as you are.
Efficiency: Oh, your focus on the past proves my point! Oh, how I wish you would listen! Times are different today. Without adapting to make yourself efficient, up-to-date, relevant, for heaven's sake, you'll continue to die out. Check your own statistics! Get your head out of the sand and be realistic. You are being too naïve!
Church: Naïve! Adapting to the culture? Like when some of the Lutherans and others adapted to the Nazi regime? Like with theology adapts so much to cultural truths there is very little Good News left to proclaim? Like the inquisition? Like indulgences?
Silence captures them both.
Church: You do raise several questions though, Efficiency. The sorts of questions I am seeking answers for. How should I relate to the surrounding culture today? Where is the boundary between adjusting to cultural context and cultural values dictating beliefs? Or the line between maintaining a holy distinction as God's called out people and irrelevance to the needs of the time? Between incarnational ministry and pandering?
Efficiency: Those questions are not going far enough, Church. You need me to help you adapt to regain your once dominant influence over the culture. Let us enter a contractual agreement and I can help you make the adaptions you desperately and quickly need to make.
Church: Thank you Efficiency for a helpful dialogue. I really must be going. Perhaps I can work on my efficiency by leaving this conversation!?   
Efficiency: Nor do I have time for such a worthless conversation. What a waste of my time!

The Church takes stroll...(Beginning of conversation 1)

The Church, like much of the world, is struggling with the anxieties and stresses of a rapidly changing world. Imagine if the Church went shopping for some remedies. Taking an introspective stroll at the Mall of Current Ideas, venders attempt to lure the Church into a long-term, contractual agreement. What should the Church decide in order to ensure its survival and perhaps even a brighter future?  
The Church first encounters, none other than Efficiency.
Efficiency: (Of course he speaks first) Church you are a slow organization. You move so slowly. You adapt too slow. Today's successful companies and organizations run as models of efficiency. Due to the pace of the market place they have to make quick decisions in order to compete. Church you are a slow organization using the committee structure and Robert's Rules of order. You need to adapt to the fast-paced times. You are falling so far behind you are becoming irrelevant. You are like a large ship that turns slowly in the water and so cautiously that you couldn't catch the weakest Jet Ski. I'm like a speed boat that can turn on a dime and yet large enough to maneuver in the roughest seas. I can do a world of good to help you adapt to today’s realities. You need my expertise! 
Church: Making quick decisions sure are essential for competing in the rapid pace of today’s marketplace. You are right about that. I desire a voice in the marketplace of ideas. But speed, I believe, can also be detriment. Novelty can mislead. Remember New Coke? Sometimes older is better. When something has been around for thousands of years it has been thoroughly tested. Remember though, the turtle, not the rabbit, wins the race. You forget the average lifespan of a Fortune 500 company is around 40 years. I have been around for at least 2,000 (and some would argue for longer than that). I'm not so sure I need you, Efficiency. In fact, you could learn a thing or two from me.  
Efficiency: True you have been around, and perhaps we might learn a little something from you, but don't you keep up with the news? Times are changing and changing faster than ever before. That companies only last a few decades is exactly my point. Don't you see your fate there as well? Just look at your attendance numbers and aging congregations. Look to Europe to see your fate! Massive and beautiful cathedrals with barely a person inside worshiping the god of the middle ages! Come, let us speak about organic groups and dynamic groups, downsizing and bottom up empowerment, downscaling, doing away with middle management, putting more cost and responsibility on your customers, and all the latest trends. If you don't listen now and begin changing, I fear your irrelevance in our society will only continue to increase. Can you hear the peril in my tone of voice? I am really afraid for you. Adapt now or there will be only a small remnant left who will not have any influence or impact in the world. Trust me, heed the dire warning signs - change or be left behind yourself!
The conversation will continue next time.

"In and For" Part I

With Annual Conference for the North Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church coming next week, I remember the first Annual Conference I attended in 2001. It was held in an arena in Augusta, Ga. In this large arena that was evidently used for sporting events and the like, were back light message boards for beer bottling companies and sports bars that did not convey the most "holy" of images especially during times of worship. Yet the Bishop reminded us that it is in such a world the Church exists. In fact the Book of Discipline for the United Methodist Church reminds us, "The church of Jesus Christ exists in and for the world."

The Church of Christ is in the world as the light of the world (Matthew 5:14). As the called out people of God and bride of Christ, the Church's values and virtues are shaped and empowered by the Triune God. God the Father sent the Son in to the world. Jesus was God in flesh. The incarnation of Jesus Christ shows that God is not "this world" denying, but exist within it. In other words, God isn't aloof from the pain,  alienation, disappointment and hurt that exist in the world. In fact, God through Jesus knows (has experienced) them intimately. So too the church is to exists not aloof from the pain and hurt of this world but right in the middle of it giving witness to God's reality in the world and active power for healing and holiness. Thus, the Church exists in the world in such a way that it serves the least, lowest, and the lost and those addicted to stuff and power. Paradoxically, it is in those acts of serving in the world the church finds it has been serving Christ (Matthew 25:35-40). 

Scripture: John 3:16-17
Questions:
Why did God send His "one and only" or unique Son into the world? What is unique about Christ?
How does v. 17 expand v. 16?
What does this passage say about God's relationship with the world? Against it? For it? Transform it? How will this world's salvation come about?
What comfort can you take from knowing that God is not aloof from our pain and hurts, but the God we worship and serve knows the feelings of pain and alienation?
How have you seen the Church serve in the world such that it gives witness to God's healing presence that is active in this world?
How does being part of a church and serving Christ in the world free us from our tendency toward self-serving attitudes and narcissism?
How do you maintain the tension between being "in" the world but not "of" it? Why is that so hard? How is this also true for the church?