"Let there be 'context'..."

Having just watched Bono give an amazing interview about Live 8 on the Sunday morning news show, "Meet the Press," I'm off thinking again about the issue of "context". It was a few years ago that Pete Atkins first introduced me to the term as related to people with dreams of ministry. After listening to me express in desperate tones the passion and possibilities for new expressions of local church that were bursting forth from inside me only to swirl around in the atmosphere, he patiently offered his diagnosis: "The only thing you need is the right context." I knew what he meant. A dictionary does not finish its serivce when it has supplied simply the definition and origin of a certain word. It must go on to demonstrate that word in context--use it in a sentence--bring it to life by putting it to work in relationship to strings of other words working at the same thought! I, a single word, needed to find sentences in which I belonged!

On the most basic level, "context" is provided for individual Christian by the local church and it is here that the Bono thought pattern kicks back in. It is generally agreed by progressive thinkers that the "word" in Bono--the vision he had to change the world, make a statement, get outside the cloister--found no context at the time in the local church, so Bono creted his own. He and U2 crafted a "sentence" of their own when the church refused to surround them with their meaning. By inhabiting the priveleges that the West awards rock stars, U2 has made room for their messages, whether they be related to the AIDS or the poor, Martin Luther King, Sept. 11 or the Kingdom itself and the search for God. They went outside the church to find context, and now, ironically, they are speaking back into the church their "word", influencing many.

Throughout the past decade, as I have explored the relationship of the church to postmodern culture, my local church has indeed patiently provided me with context. They discussed, questioned, tempered, adjusted and added their words to every new spiritual discovery I made. Like a base camp for a mountain climber, they patiently waited for me to come in from the extreme and report on my most recent excursion to the summits. They have been a wonderful family to me and I thought that was as good it it could get. Though I still didn't feel I understood my position fully, I tried to be satisfied. But, I now realize, that there is another Kingdom level--beyond the local church--through which "context" must and can be provided.

Through a visit to our church by a man named Stuart Bell, my understanding of context took a quantum leap into a Kingdom dimension. One morning of having him speak into our local setting explained so much to me. And through the conversation that followed, I felt, for what seemed like the first time in my Christian life, someone really understood what to do with my "energy" (and the turbulent storm that comes as part of the package)! Stuart Bell's world of meaning was the sentence my single word needed. His view of the Kingdom calmed me down as I realized there was plenty of room for me within it! Soon, I began to notice this same phenomenon in other places. I heard Terry Virgo speak and there it was again--a sense of context--knowing how to assemble dreams and visions into a cohesive Kingdom whole. Again, the view through his eyes settled my restlessness and eased my striving. I looked back to my past and remembered hearing John Noble and Normans Barnes make statements that had the same effect. I thought of David Thatcher and Arun Community Church--a place able to cope with the incredibly huge buzz surrounding their own rock band Delirious? without losing sight of either sanity or the local church. All of these were context-providers for Kingdom dreamers who were wise enough and/or blessed enough to receive them.

And then I realized what you theologians may have already realized. What I'm really talking about is the "apostolic". CONTEXT for the artists, preachers, dreamers, and all those desperate to help break the church out of its staid ghetto rhythms will come as the voice of the apostles (whether or not they own the title) is heard. If you are a "word" without a sentence--even a strange word, an action word, a hard-to-say word--don't lose heart. God is setting up context in the earth for the things that need to be expressed. There are leaders who carry within them enough meaning to house the big picture. They are a new breed who would rather do the work than wear the title, though they will wear the title if it helps do the work. They have lived a few years and seen a few things and they are tougher than they look and wiser than you had realized. And one day they just might point to you and say, "I know where you fit."

So, here's to the context providers...long may they live and well may they see... Read Luke 5:37-39...

"Almost cut my hair..."

(And yes, that title is a quote from the David Crosby song on the C,S &N Deja Vu album.)

I pity the hair stylists who land me in their chair. I place upon them so much responsibility as I describe my vision for a "look" that communicates both, "I refuse to fulfill your expectations of an American Charismatic pastor's wife," and "I refuse simply to follow the latest trend." Usually, I have compiled from three or more glimpses of haircuts gained while riding the London underground a vision that I attempt to communicate to Texas hairstylists with wild hand-gestures and words like "messy," "a bit uneven," "unique but not weird," and the ever-popular "edgy". Even the best stylists have resorted to presenting me with large books of pictures and saying, "Just point to what you mean," attempting to hide their frustration that I am trying to channel my huge inner need to make a statement through their tiny scissors!

Recently I left a local Azle stylist with a decent haircut. We had communicated as well as could be expected and I looked fairly "uncategorizable," which made me happy. I should have been fine for at least a month. I wasn't. Whether it was the intense Texas summer heat or the fast pace life had taken recently, I just wanted even less hair on my head than the geometric edges left to me. Ridiculous thoughts I had never had before came and would not leave: "I could probably cut hair--I do calligraphy." So, on Memorial Day when it was really hot and all the shops were closed, I picked up the scissors and proceeded to do my own version of Annie Lennox.

I'll spare the details, but a few days later, I sat in another stylist's chair again using words like edgy, messy and unique, but now asking her to "fix" what I had butchered. To fix it, she had to make it really short, since I had already taken it to short. When she finished, I felt a great degree of resolution. I assumed that that the satisfaction was simply a hair crisis averted, but for the last few days, I've been thinking it was more. Indulge me while I make sense of it. (And though this blog entry may have seemed gender-specific until now, here's where it goes universal...)

I have spent years studying God, the world, the culture, and the Scriptures because I could not help but do it. It was my worship, suggested to me by no one but the forces of my own heart. If I found a moment's down time between all the activities of suburban church and family life, I ran to a pile of waiting books, journals and a computer and continued to build my stock of revelatory observations about this amazing Kingdom journey that God inspires. Everywhere there was treasure and I was the explorer. In the arts, the sciences and even the business world (where I had formerly counted myself a real outsider), I found both evidences of, and potential for, God's touch! And I looked at it, thought about it, and attempted to record it much like Monet recorded the light that flashed upon a landscape in a single impression.

Recently, it became apparent to me through the wise counsel of others, that my little aresenal of collected thought could indeed find a welcome outside my own brain. It was time to take my inner world on the road, so to speak, and let it inspire and affect others! What followed is well known to any artist who attempts to connect natural passion to necessary promotion: a lot of work, planning and packaging that some days feels right and other days feels like embarassingly disorienting self-agrandizement and finds us saying, "What am I doing?" I am used to unearthing revelation that makes people stop and wonder, not trying to compete with all the trendy Christian things "out there"! My friends were right in nudging me outward, but there were things to process.

I honestly believe the haircutting fit was somehow related. I was hating the sense that I needed to add extra "grooming" to myself to "look good" in a world where appearances were everything. Wasn't the spiritual information I had enough? The haircuts I found myself longing for reminded me of the way medieval nuns are portrayed in movies--shorn messily close to their heads, with no regard to appearance. In some way, I think I was longing for just the simple life of devotion I had before I thought anyone might be watching. I wanted the extra weight of not just "being myself" but now "packaging myself" to be whacked off, no matter how it left me looking. I wanted to be free from the temptation to preen and posture. I didn't want to succumb to the performance-orientation and competitiveness that smacks of religion rather than Christianity and ultimately chokes true worship.

Of course, it's only hair. It doesn't really matter either way. But just as I begin to aplogize for choosing this topic for a blog entry, I think of prophets like Jeremiah and Hosea and I think perhaps I don't owe an apology. Jeremiah's physical appearance was often metaphorical and Hosea's metaphor even extended even to his marriage. It seemed God used all aspects of the prophets' lives to "make a statement"! Who could have thought that the torture I put the stylists through could be related to a Bible story? (I don't think I'll tell them that.)

Funny, I have made a statement this time with my hair--not to society, but rather to God. To Him, I am crying out, "Help me believe NOW--as I emerge slowly from the sanctum of obscurity-- what I have always believed: that you are the Master Artist not just of my inner world, but also of my destiny and the path I am to take. Help me look past all the politics and competition that dances around the fringe of the Kingdom--stop me somehow from being intimidated by it and refocus me on You! I don't want to play the game or sing the song that marketing demands. I only want to continue to share my inner world of worship with those who need to be warmed by it. I am willing to work hard, but I am not willing to lose my life of worship. Deliver me from the 'strife of men' and teach me to live in a secret place with you, even in the midst of a crowd--or Christian feeding frenzy."

I really did cut my hair... I may never need to physically "shake it off" in the same way again, but I am sure I will continue to apply the lesson learned. If I am not enough, just as I am, to be thrown like seed to the wind in the hands of the Harvest-Lord, I will never become enough by adding the polish, scheming and technique that I pick up from scanning the market horizon.

To read what I'm really saying in fewer words and without any cosmetology mentioned, go to Micah 6:8 and Psalm 131

Rivers of reformers...

The other day at "worship practice" (I'll speak about the oxymoron in that phrase another time), the sound in the monitors was "messed up" (a highly technical term used only in amateur musician circles). After an extensive search for the electronic or human culprits, it was discovered that someone had removed the small stack of hymnbooks that were used to prop up the floor monitor that feeds sound to the platform. Once the hymnbook stack was replaced, the monitor again gave to us (rather than to the ceiling) our sense of "how we were sounding" and all was again well (on an amateur level!). Evidently, someone new had come along and cleaned the platform and thought a stack of old hymnbooks did not belong under a monitor, but oh, how they did!

The obvious admission from the above report is that the hymnbooks, which were a gift to us when we started the church years ago, don't get used for their originally intended purpose. Every now and again when a Vineyard-type acoustic recording of a hymn comes out, we glady grab it and give it a whirl, but even then, we type the words into the power-point and electrically project them large for all to see! We don't say, "Now turn to page 313..." As I glanced down at the hymnbooks supporting the monitor, it occured to me, however, that nothing was actually wrong with that picture!

New expressions really always rest upon what has preceeded them. Nothing arises from a vacuum. We are all a part of the river through time that is the church of Jesus Christ. We actually are singing the new hymns of the day (I'm sure Charles Wesley would enjoy Tim Hughes and maybe even Bono???) and every true hymn-writer that I have encountered seems to feel a true respect for those who have gone before, serving their generation.

Recently in an interview on "Inside the Actor's Studio," Russell Crowe referred to his acting as a manifestation of the gypsy blood within him. He said that gypsies are storytellers and if he had been born in medieval times, he would have been a storyteller still. He would have done from the back of a travelling wagon what he gets to do now on film. In those comments, he revealed a great respect and understanding for the craft in which he participates--AND for its heritage. The form may change, but even Led Zepellin knew, "the song remains the same."

If you want to take the metaphor too far (and I always do), if there was a lack of respect in my little hymnbook incident, it was not in the propping of the monitor with the books, but the removal of them! Someone thought they didn't belong in the current scene. But I say, they belonged just where they were. We could have propped that monitor with a block of wood, but now every time I look at it, I am conscious of the reformers that have gone before, writing hymns of challenge and change, like,

"Rise up O men of God...have done with lesser things...give heart and soul and mind and strength to serve the King of Kings..."

Now, Martin Smith, resting on that heritage can write, "I want be a history-maker in this land...I want to be a speaker of truth to all mankind...I want to stand...I want to run into your arms..."

I don't de-value the hymnal because I stick it under a monitor. I honor it by singing words worthy of the warriors who have gone before.

Again I direct you to Matthew 13:52