Though decisions are made by group concensus among our church worship team, I am still the "bottom line" regarding song choice every Sunday morning, and I have really made a science out of it! I have learned to navigate the pressures of personal preference and discern the occasions on which an obscure song or even a non-traditional one might be amazingly appropriate, as well as the times that the latest thing from "Jesus Culture" which would be totally expected from us is equally appropriate! I love the rhythm of church life and how the Holy Spirit tends to weave in the unexpected amidst the familiar and I really do believe that "song choice" can be summed up with a phrase from the book of Acts: "It seemed good to us and to the Holy Spirit..." God works with humans in a very intimate way and his purposes STILL wrap themselves in flesh 2000 years since the manger scene.
And that last thought brings me to the topic of Christmas. I'm sure every worship leader on planet earth noticed that yesterday was the last Sunday service before Christmas--you know the one where we contemporary churches with youthful bands who are more familiar with Weezer than the Wesleys attempt to pull off a few carols! Joy to the World is always a favorite due to its upbeat nature (thank you G.F. Handel for your foresight) and Away in a Manger works in Texas because enough "country" covers have been done that it now abides in the collective consciousness with a gentle acoustic strum. However, at least for our worship team, the carol experience is often a painful nod to the holiday--which everyone now knows is not even celebrated in the right month!
Yesterday, I decided to refuse the pressure of expectation. I went to church with a list of songs that had no direct reference to the Christmas story, in full confidence that every bit of worship we do has to do with the fact that Jesus was (and still wants to be) incarnated into the real world. What could be more celebratory of the incarnation of Christ than people gathering to sing, shout and dance around, fueled by the inner confidence of his absolutely transcendent reality? Though I love the carols, I felt suddenly liberated from the need to adapt them to a rock band format! You go girl, right?
If the story ended there, it would have some merit, but God had an infusion of the unexpected. Someone on our team said, "Let's do some Delirious," and I accommdated that request by reaching back a few years to the standard and ever-popular I Could Sing of Your Love Forever which did seem fresh because it had been a long while since we had done it. It was the last song in the set and flowed well with the other songs, general celebrations of God's grace and goodness. As you do, when we reached the end of the song, we went to that "flow-y" place of improvisation that dances in and out of the prophetic--you know how it goes: one minute you are lyrically exhorting the congregation to "go ahead and sing of his love in your own way..." and then suddenly a phrase shows up that is from somewhere beyond the lyrics. You sing it out and you sense the worship has just stepped up to another plateau...suddenly things are spontaneous--vocally and instrumentally you are venturing out into the great unknown of God!
And that's when it began: I heard myself start to sing about...wait for it...Christmas! Out of my mouth came the most amazing streams of words completely unpremeditated. The last line in the Delerious? song says, "I will always sing of when your love came down..." and I suddenly remembered a line from a song my mother used to sing, "Love came down at Christmas...love all lovely, love divine..." and there I departed. For about ten minutes, I sang this spontaneous Christmas medley of sorts that for a while centered on "O Come O Come Emmanuel, and ransom captive Israel..." and then focused on the line from O Holy Night that says, "...till he appeared and the soul felt its worth..." It was amazing and rambling and rhythmically flowing with what the musicians were laying down and it just kept coming. Words, like a river popping into my head from all that has been sung through the years about Christmas, but now being incarnated into an utterly contemporary setting. It was like my brain stood in awe of what was coming out of my spirit, and, clearly, (and I don't mean this as disparagingly as it may sound), we all got our "Christmas fix"!
Later, as I pondered, I marvelled at the lesson that I gleaned--the same lesson that all of life seems to be wrapping around me these days--a Kingdom lesson that I wish I could shout from the rooftops! We so often waste time and energy trying to fulfill expectations--especially our own--when in fact there is a fully equipped expectation-exceeding "machine" inside us! The Kingdom of God is swirling inside us Christians, fully resourced with Christmas words and music--or anything else desirable--accessible precisely at the time needed! The Kingdom wants to emerge with more power and force than we could ever muster in our own initiative--we just need to participate in its incarnation! The Scripture in Hebrews that urges us to come boldly to the throne to find grace to help in time of need need not only mean a desperate approach in a desperate situation. That comfort is only a slice of a much broader pattern of living to which God is calling us: there is always empowerment for life and action to be experienced in our contact with God--He is always wanting to demonstrate Himself by showing up in the moments of our lives with surprising displays of Presence. The throne of grace is a throne of participation and partnering between heaven and earth. This God truly wants to live Himself out among us still and gladly does so--much to our enjoyment--when we refuse to nervously overplan his arrival!
And that really is, now that I think of it, the message of Christmas. The obvious answer to the popular Christmas song of a few years ago, Mary, Did You Know? is a resounding NO! Mary did not know that the pivotal Person of all time, eternity and spiritual substance was residing inside her young womb. How could anyone "know" that and bear up under it? She did not know, but she was willing to "let it emerge". She carried the Kingdom of God the way we all should--with the sense that she was participating in a mystery that her mental capacities could never fully master, yet remaining open to all the possibilities. The good news of Christmas is vast, but one very real aspect of it is this: This spiritual Kingdom to which we Christians now belong requires none of the effort, strain and fevered pursuit that we bring to it. This Kingdom, like the Savior that instituted it, wants--more than we know--to emerge. It wants to leap into being and fill every time and space around us, making things whole and right, hopeful and holy.
When we actually resist the pressures of do-it-yourself professional Christianity, we give the Kingdom a chance to show its overwhelming orchestrational ability and take our very breath away. Whether it is one Sunday morning's worship experience, or deliverance in the midst of an impossible situation, or the transformation of the nations--it's really all the same. God help us, as we hurl headlong into 2010, to learn the rhythm of Kingdom participation. Give us the incredible grace to, like Jesus, refuse to run to the dying Lazaurs, because we have already observed the power of resurrection and its ability to EMERGE! I'm looking for--and hoping to be a part of--an army of strangely sane Christians with eyes fixed on another realm. I'm looking to fully lose the religious performance frenzy and march forward with bold confidence minus the need to push or prove. Sign up now and leave the pressure behind...I think the call is clear.
Monday, December 21, 2009
Monday, November 23, 2009
Twelve Hours Later and Still Speechless....
There are amazing times in life when we do actually get blindsided by blessing. Last night was one of them. I oversee the entertainment at our church Thanksgiving dinner, but at this year's gathering, a presentation was made that was a complete surprise to me. Jack Warren and his daughter Adria Weaver dressed in nun's habits and sang the following song which they had composed, set to the tune of The Sound of Music's "How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?" I share it here both to allow anyone who knows me to have a real laugh (though I was really honored--believe me, I take this as a massive complement, a fact which in itself testifies to my noted nonconformity), but also to celebrate the incredible creativity that it demonstrated! I am continually amazed at the vast field of hidden treasure in the hearts of God's people--like gems in every imaginable color, shape and size waiting to be mined and displayed. Would to God that the church would celebrate that journey of discovery and show the world the resulting kaliedescope of beauty! Thanks again, Jack and Adria....I'm still speechless (and I pray sincerely that I do live up to your noble assessment by God's grace!)
Here is the "spoof":
HOW DO YOU SOLVE A QUANDRY LIKE PERRIANNE
She shows us YouTube videos and mingles with the youth.
She waltzes of to England with her Eastern-mindset views.
And even through her humor, she's anointed to her shoes.
I love to hear her singing in the Abbey.
She's really note Bette Middler and Grace Slick she cannot be.
Instead a modern miracle of post-modernity.
I really have to say though it is very plain to see:
Perrianne is such an asset to the Abbey!
(I'd like to say a word on her behalf: Perrianne makes me laugh!)
How do you solve a quandry like Perrianne?
How do you catch a cloud and pin it down?
How do you find a word that means Perrianne?
A flibbety-gibbet, a will-o-the-wisp, a clown?
Many a thing you know she'd like to tell you.
Many a thing she hopes you'll understand.
Like engaging culture and art, with all your "burning heart".
It's quite a quantum leap for man.
How do you solve a quandry like Perrianne?
How does a non-conformist fit the plan?
Inspiring others with her Kingdom passion,
Using the proper side of her brain.
A football mom with rock-star sense of fashion.
A prophetess, a storm of latter rain.
Many a thing you know she'd like to tell you.
Many a thing she hopes you'll understand.
But how do you watch her play and in religion stay?
How do you keep a wave upon the sand?
How do you solve a quandry like Perriane?
How does a non-conformist fit the plan?
(Amen.)
Here is the "spoof":
HOW DO YOU SOLVE A QUANDRY LIKE PERRIANNE
She shows us YouTube videos and mingles with the youth.
She waltzes of to England with her Eastern-mindset views.
And even through her humor, she's anointed to her shoes.
I love to hear her singing in the Abbey.
She's really note Bette Middler and Grace Slick she cannot be.
Instead a modern miracle of post-modernity.
I really have to say though it is very plain to see:
Perrianne is such an asset to the Abbey!
(I'd like to say a word on her behalf: Perrianne makes me laugh!)
How do you solve a quandry like Perrianne?
How do you catch a cloud and pin it down?
How do you find a word that means Perrianne?
A flibbety-gibbet, a will-o-the-wisp, a clown?
Many a thing you know she'd like to tell you.
Many a thing she hopes you'll understand.
Like engaging culture and art, with all your "burning heart".
It's quite a quantum leap for man.
How do you solve a quandry like Perrianne?
How does a non-conformist fit the plan?
Inspiring others with her Kingdom passion,
Using the proper side of her brain.
A football mom with rock-star sense of fashion.
A prophetess, a storm of latter rain.
Many a thing you know she'd like to tell you.
Many a thing she hopes you'll understand.
But how do you watch her play and in religion stay?
How do you keep a wave upon the sand?
How do you solve a quandry like Perriane?
How does a non-conformist fit the plan?
(Amen.)
Friday, August 14, 2009
Having the Dialogue
Note: A treasured friend of mine recently e-mailed this back to me--a "blog entry" I had written months ago and shared with her, but never published. "Synchronistically," (I started to say "ironically," but realized I could coin a better word) I had just had a great "dialogue" that morning with a man in a restaurant that made this all the more poignant. He belongs to the Church of Christ and was discussing with us the maxim of their denomination, "Speak where the Bible speaks and be silent where the Bible is silent." The conversation had set me off in a world of thought. Do we believe that the Bible draws lines or opens doors? Do we believe the Bible is "final" or transformational? Do we honor the divine nature of the spirit-words more by treating them like ancient writings or by accepting them as living radiative generators of high-energy light? IS THERE A TIME IN WHICH--on any level or in any realm--THE BIBLE IS EVER SILENT???? It all depends on how you view it all... There is much more to be said about this, but for now, here's the previously unpublished blog entry as a beginning towards that dialogue:
In Britain, more than in Texas, they use the word “dialogue” as a verb, and I have come to greatly respect that practice. If a leader is pondering a change in style, schedule or format in the “new churches” in the U.K., he doesn’t go off into a room alone and produce a document (as we Americans might tend to do), but rather he gathers people and—wait for it—begins to “dialogue.” Yes, they “have a curry” (or something else) and they go round the room tossing about the implications of the change or concept they are considering. No one even really takes notes—there seems to be little being done but engaging hearts, mouths and brains in various combinations. It seems that the overall agenda of “results” is subordinated to the process of interaction and there is a bedrock conviction under it all that if we don’t get there together, we haven’t really “gotten there!”
I am aware that this may be a cultural difference. The broad tendency in the British culture leans toward such extreme respect that our friend Clive Price says that his people have a national obsession with the word, “sorry”. (You accidentally bump into them at the airport, but THEY say, “oh, sorry,” as if they were guilty of choosing to stand on a piece of earth which was destined to be part of your path to the ticket counter.) It would make sense that British leaders would genuinely value their comrades’ opinions, given this deferential climate. (In America, especially in Texas, so often this contrast is stark: We are often clearly and solidly NOT sorry, even when the collision of whatever kind might be our actual fault! We often would indeed think, “You really shouldn’t have been standing in my way.” Ouch…)
Perhaps the British educational system has fostered this fondness for dialogue. The British psyche with its frequent reminders of Roman occupation as a part of its own history may have an inextricable tie to the classical methods that built the Western world. Greek philosophers reasoning together as they applied the Socratic method of discussion may have looked a bit like church leaders discussing whether or not to rent the local school hall for a youth meeting (except for the togas, probably). Again, the value placed on the collective wisdom would be the common theme. (I’ll speak up here for my British friends as well: At this point a few of them would bring in the other side and say, “Yes, but at least you Americans arrive at a decision and act!” And in fact, there might, dare I say it, be an advantage at times to being a cowboy! There might be a point at which dialogue ends and action is called for, but that’s another blog entry.)
The bottom line is that church leaders will dialogue rather than dictate when they “do church” from a relational grid. We here in Texas have been trying to do that for years—often misunderstood, sometimes even gently corrected by well meaning people who mistake the group-speak for weakness, but nevertheless we press on. We don’t always know how to bridge the gap between the vision we have in our hearts (that exists on a plane which is beyond what we can express) and the common understanding of a group of people trying to make the journey from traditional church and non-spiritual communication. After more than twenty years of perhaps getting in wrong as often as getting it right (the jury’s out on that proportion)—I still say it’s all about the willingness to have the dialogue. In fact, I’ll go as far as to say that as a leader, what you really have is NOT the stuff you put on paper as law and hand out—all you really have is the dialogue in which you are willing to engage. We wrongly strain to view the policy documents as comprehensive, when in fact--like the Bible which hopefully inspired them--they are instead meant to be living, breathing starting places for life—opening doors to a thousand applications—coming alive in the hands of living hearts and moving pictures—uncontainable urgings of life wanting to leap into being off the page. It is not the words arrived at that are important, but rather the ongoing dialogue with people that keeps on generating a “chat”! (The best policity documents will leave room for the dialogue.)
How silly to think we can line it all out, figure it all out and prepare for every contingency, when life ongoing will present a thousand different challenges a day that are not foreseeable by our small minds. We need to view all our “documents” (including the Bible) as doors rather than ends. We need to dare to walk through them into the world of experience. This does not lesson their value, but rather enhances it. The Bible is of course the word of God, but how in the world--if it is the Word of the living Creator who Himself is full of fire and light so intense it can blind an Apostle travelling down an opposing road—how in the world can that Word fail to challenge my current understanding of life and relationships at every turn? This thing is so big we must engage—our hearts, our passions, our minds, our time—we must be living the dialogue ongoing! We are dialoguing with heaven when we dialogue with each other!
Of course I have a quantum physics truth to refer to here, because the fact is that you can be absolutely assured that this is the way the universe works. Now that we understand that the universe is far different than classical physics had predicted, we are slowly realizing that systems are indeed much more than the sum of their parts. We used to believe that to understand anything at all, we only need to isolate, define and describe each component. Understand the proton, neutron and electron and you understand the atom…understand the atom and you understand the molecule…understand the molecule and you understand the substance…on up to a complete and unshakeable understanding of the world…right? NO!!! Not at all! It turns out that it is not enough to define and describe the particles. It is not just the particles that make things what they are, but rather it is the INTERACTIONS between all the particles! The universe is defined as we interact—life is ongoing, not preset! The fabric of the universe is woven through RELATIONSHIP and empty space between particles is never really empty. Empty space is filled with INTERACTION of particles upon one another. We all really affect each other. (So much so, that it is a RELATIONSHIP that affects eternal destiny and the very substance--be it life or death--that issues forth from a human heart! The whole Kingdom—and the whole universe run on relationship.)
So…..the dialogue is all important and it makes sense that this would be the case. As a church leader, I am redefining success. My success is not about what I have delivered, defined or documented. My success—and the question of my heart today—is, simply, “Am I still having the dialogue?” Am I still willing to try to bridge the gap between the Kingdom of God as I see it in my heart and the psyches of those with whom I am travelling? Am I still engaging in the interaction or have I, through hurt or pain, decided to live out of my own stockpile, dumping on people what I have rather than discovering with them together?
Recently in our church, we hit a patch of rough waters in a very treasured relationship. (I’m reminded of the lyrics of the Dave Mason song from the 70’s: “There ain’t no good guys. There ain’t no bad guys. There’s only you and me and we just disagree.” How it would help if church people could say this rather than invoking heaven’s endorsement solely on one side or the other.) If you’re still tender at all, you hate these things and in your pain, you are tempted to either look outward or look inward. I look inward. I have been wondering what I could have done or said along the way that could have prevented the problem. I talk and dream and cast vision constantly, but did I err in failing to deal with the current state of things while peering down the road into reformation? Was I, as I am so often accused of, being an impractical dreamer leading people on with my idealism, but unable to translate the conversation into any action?
As I was sharing with my 20 year old son this morning in my introspective funk, he said to me, “Mom, you did the best you could. You’ve just been having the dialogue and the dialogue is your prayer.” Suddenly the cloud cover broke and I recommitted. The dialogue doesn’t always promise a perfect resolution—the dialogue may hit impasses and even break down, but it is still worth having and yes—he’s right—it is my prayer. Stay away—far away—from Perrianne Brownback if you don’t want to talk, dream and create a world where church is set free from the trappings of religion and allowed to flesh itself out authentically in a postmodern culture which is ripe and ready to hear the truth. This IS my prayer…though I bungle it, blunder it and botch it up at times. My heart is pressing for something because in terms of church lived out on earth, “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for….” Love me, hate me, receive me, reject me…I might feel the cuddle or the sting, but ultimately I won’t care. It will always come back to this. I can’t help it. I’m a carrier of the dialogue and it must continue. In every form and at every turn, I must (perhaps less aggressively than I’m raging on about here, but still ‘must’) explore the possibilities of the reality of God showing up where we’ve been told he can’t do!!!
I’m finally free to “not have all the answers”, but bless God, I dare you to try to stop me from having the conversation! If you can’t handle it, get out of the way because, though I’m British enough to say, “I’m sorry” when our paths collide, I’m American enough to plough on through towards the thing I see ahead. (Obviously, a balance of the two would approach “Kingdom”.) I may not get there by a predictable path or even a very pretty one, but I will not stop. There is only the cause of Kingdom Come to live for and press for and to shift the local church more and more fully into so that the days of wasted efforts of the flesh and inefficiency fully come to an end. I’m gone, hopeless…but I suspect I’m not gone alone. Who else is up for the dialogue….???
In Britain, more than in Texas, they use the word “dialogue” as a verb, and I have come to greatly respect that practice. If a leader is pondering a change in style, schedule or format in the “new churches” in the U.K., he doesn’t go off into a room alone and produce a document (as we Americans might tend to do), but rather he gathers people and—wait for it—begins to “dialogue.” Yes, they “have a curry” (or something else) and they go round the room tossing about the implications of the change or concept they are considering. No one even really takes notes—there seems to be little being done but engaging hearts, mouths and brains in various combinations. It seems that the overall agenda of “results” is subordinated to the process of interaction and there is a bedrock conviction under it all that if we don’t get there together, we haven’t really “gotten there!”
I am aware that this may be a cultural difference. The broad tendency in the British culture leans toward such extreme respect that our friend Clive Price says that his people have a national obsession with the word, “sorry”. (You accidentally bump into them at the airport, but THEY say, “oh, sorry,” as if they were guilty of choosing to stand on a piece of earth which was destined to be part of your path to the ticket counter.) It would make sense that British leaders would genuinely value their comrades’ opinions, given this deferential climate. (In America, especially in Texas, so often this contrast is stark: We are often clearly and solidly NOT sorry, even when the collision of whatever kind might be our actual fault! We often would indeed think, “You really shouldn’t have been standing in my way.” Ouch…)
Perhaps the British educational system has fostered this fondness for dialogue. The British psyche with its frequent reminders of Roman occupation as a part of its own history may have an inextricable tie to the classical methods that built the Western world. Greek philosophers reasoning together as they applied the Socratic method of discussion may have looked a bit like church leaders discussing whether or not to rent the local school hall for a youth meeting (except for the togas, probably). Again, the value placed on the collective wisdom would be the common theme. (I’ll speak up here for my British friends as well: At this point a few of them would bring in the other side and say, “Yes, but at least you Americans arrive at a decision and act!” And in fact, there might, dare I say it, be an advantage at times to being a cowboy! There might be a point at which dialogue ends and action is called for, but that’s another blog entry.)
The bottom line is that church leaders will dialogue rather than dictate when they “do church” from a relational grid. We here in Texas have been trying to do that for years—often misunderstood, sometimes even gently corrected by well meaning people who mistake the group-speak for weakness, but nevertheless we press on. We don’t always know how to bridge the gap between the vision we have in our hearts (that exists on a plane which is beyond what we can express) and the common understanding of a group of people trying to make the journey from traditional church and non-spiritual communication. After more than twenty years of perhaps getting in wrong as often as getting it right (the jury’s out on that proportion)—I still say it’s all about the willingness to have the dialogue. In fact, I’ll go as far as to say that as a leader, what you really have is NOT the stuff you put on paper as law and hand out—all you really have is the dialogue in which you are willing to engage. We wrongly strain to view the policy documents as comprehensive, when in fact--like the Bible which hopefully inspired them--they are instead meant to be living, breathing starting places for life—opening doors to a thousand applications—coming alive in the hands of living hearts and moving pictures—uncontainable urgings of life wanting to leap into being off the page. It is not the words arrived at that are important, but rather the ongoing dialogue with people that keeps on generating a “chat”! (The best policity documents will leave room for the dialogue.)
How silly to think we can line it all out, figure it all out and prepare for every contingency, when life ongoing will present a thousand different challenges a day that are not foreseeable by our small minds. We need to view all our “documents” (including the Bible) as doors rather than ends. We need to dare to walk through them into the world of experience. This does not lesson their value, but rather enhances it. The Bible is of course the word of God, but how in the world--if it is the Word of the living Creator who Himself is full of fire and light so intense it can blind an Apostle travelling down an opposing road—how in the world can that Word fail to challenge my current understanding of life and relationships at every turn? This thing is so big we must engage—our hearts, our passions, our minds, our time—we must be living the dialogue ongoing! We are dialoguing with heaven when we dialogue with each other!
Of course I have a quantum physics truth to refer to here, because the fact is that you can be absolutely assured that this is the way the universe works. Now that we understand that the universe is far different than classical physics had predicted, we are slowly realizing that systems are indeed much more than the sum of their parts. We used to believe that to understand anything at all, we only need to isolate, define and describe each component. Understand the proton, neutron and electron and you understand the atom…understand the atom and you understand the molecule…understand the molecule and you understand the substance…on up to a complete and unshakeable understanding of the world…right? NO!!! Not at all! It turns out that it is not enough to define and describe the particles. It is not just the particles that make things what they are, but rather it is the INTERACTIONS between all the particles! The universe is defined as we interact—life is ongoing, not preset! The fabric of the universe is woven through RELATIONSHIP and empty space between particles is never really empty. Empty space is filled with INTERACTION of particles upon one another. We all really affect each other. (So much so, that it is a RELATIONSHIP that affects eternal destiny and the very substance--be it life or death--that issues forth from a human heart! The whole Kingdom—and the whole universe run on relationship.)
So…..the dialogue is all important and it makes sense that this would be the case. As a church leader, I am redefining success. My success is not about what I have delivered, defined or documented. My success—and the question of my heart today—is, simply, “Am I still having the dialogue?” Am I still willing to try to bridge the gap between the Kingdom of God as I see it in my heart and the psyches of those with whom I am travelling? Am I still engaging in the interaction or have I, through hurt or pain, decided to live out of my own stockpile, dumping on people what I have rather than discovering with them together?
Recently in our church, we hit a patch of rough waters in a very treasured relationship. (I’m reminded of the lyrics of the Dave Mason song from the 70’s: “There ain’t no good guys. There ain’t no bad guys. There’s only you and me and we just disagree.” How it would help if church people could say this rather than invoking heaven’s endorsement solely on one side or the other.) If you’re still tender at all, you hate these things and in your pain, you are tempted to either look outward or look inward. I look inward. I have been wondering what I could have done or said along the way that could have prevented the problem. I talk and dream and cast vision constantly, but did I err in failing to deal with the current state of things while peering down the road into reformation? Was I, as I am so often accused of, being an impractical dreamer leading people on with my idealism, but unable to translate the conversation into any action?
As I was sharing with my 20 year old son this morning in my introspective funk, he said to me, “Mom, you did the best you could. You’ve just been having the dialogue and the dialogue is your prayer.” Suddenly the cloud cover broke and I recommitted. The dialogue doesn’t always promise a perfect resolution—the dialogue may hit impasses and even break down, but it is still worth having and yes—he’s right—it is my prayer. Stay away—far away—from Perrianne Brownback if you don’t want to talk, dream and create a world where church is set free from the trappings of religion and allowed to flesh itself out authentically in a postmodern culture which is ripe and ready to hear the truth. This IS my prayer…though I bungle it, blunder it and botch it up at times. My heart is pressing for something because in terms of church lived out on earth, “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for….” Love me, hate me, receive me, reject me…I might feel the cuddle or the sting, but ultimately I won’t care. It will always come back to this. I can’t help it. I’m a carrier of the dialogue and it must continue. In every form and at every turn, I must (perhaps less aggressively than I’m raging on about here, but still ‘must’) explore the possibilities of the reality of God showing up where we’ve been told he can’t do!!!
I’m finally free to “not have all the answers”, but bless God, I dare you to try to stop me from having the conversation! If you can’t handle it, get out of the way because, though I’m British enough to say, “I’m sorry” when our paths collide, I’m American enough to plough on through towards the thing I see ahead. (Obviously, a balance of the two would approach “Kingdom”.) I may not get there by a predictable path or even a very pretty one, but I will not stop. There is only the cause of Kingdom Come to live for and press for and to shift the local church more and more fully into so that the days of wasted efforts of the flesh and inefficiency fully come to an end. I’m gone, hopeless…but I suspect I’m not gone alone. Who else is up for the dialogue….???
Friday, April 10, 2009
Quantum Grace
Ezekiel 2:1-2 Then He said to me, “Son of man, stand on your feet that I may speak with you!” As He spoke to me the Spirit entered me and set me on my feet; and I heard Him speaking to me.
I'll make a confession here and risk the judgment that could be incurred! Like millions of Christians, I workout daily, iPod on hip, but in my case, the music that flows to my ears in an effort to distract my brain from the muscular challenge is not often Christian. It's not that singing the high praises of God are not conducive to maximum exertion--it's more that there is so much creativity that has been explored beyond the confines of the Christian industry and it is creativity that motivates me--and it is clearly motivation I need when I am trying to get this late 40-something body to embrace the gym moment! However, on my large iPod I do have many Christian albums that I love (many by friends whom I love), and the other day I was exploring one by a British friend named Dave Middleton. Somehow it was working and fueling my inner fire. On his CD entitled "Songs of Men and Angels," Dave reads out a long portion of the vision of God that Ezekiel had by the river Chebar (described--as best as Ezekiel could describe wheels with eyes and four-faced beings--in Ezekiel 1). When he got to the statement above at the beginning of chapter 2, I had an epiphany. It didn't necessarily translate to an immediate increase in the number of leg curls I could do, but it is the kind that will translate to a greatly empowered inner life!
I think often about the "quantum" world and if that doesn't turn you off, you can be my new friend (as many of my current friends are quite tired of hearing about it). This world of new science is such a model, or better said, a reflection of the nature of a reality that is, in essence, spirit. What we have learned about how infinitesimally small, speed-of-light approaching particles behave has given us great insight about navigating our spiritual lives. It's not the "new age" territory--it's the territory of the Eternal One and therefore should be the home of the Christian. But I'll save that large work of persuasion for another blog (and other books) and share with you this specific quantum observation related to Ezekiel and something very important but never mentioned by Ezekiel: grace.
In a quantum world, the notions of time and distance are erased, superceded by the notion of relationship. If things are related, cause and effect is not really an issue--change in status can occur essentially and simultaneously even through distance of space--and time! It turns out that things can be so related that the experience of one particle is "known" by the other instantly, skipping the stage of education--it's more like impartation! This is a shock because, in the classical physics lab that we experienced in high school, the "cause" was issued and then we turned our eyes towards the observation of the "effect" and it slowly yeilded data for us--measurable and comforting. In the quantum world, it is hard to tell which is cause and which is effect--they are so related that they get actually rolled into one--at least to our slowed-down observational powers.
Ezekiel here was told to "stand on his feet"--which might have been a difficult task for him after seeing the vision of blinding God-demonstration that sent him to the ground! But Ezekiel indicates that even as the command to stand was leaving the mouth of the Lord, the responding standing was being accomplished in Ezekiel by the Spirit of God. In these two verses, we see a microcosm of grace: God commands Ezekiel to stand up and hear while the Spirit of God is simultaneously performing that action in and through Ezekiel. Both the command and the ability to carry it out are married as if quantum particles--God says it and Ezekiel finds it happening to him as he hears God say it! Surely this is grace and it reminds us of every statement Jesus made to people in healing: "Rise up and walk...and immediately the man's ankle bones received strength..." We don't hear Jesus use the word grace often--that really comes later in Paul's writings. And yet, Jesus IS grace, demonstrating it everywhere he goes by empowering people to do what he simultaneously calls for! (I have often thought of the woman caught in adultery to whom Jesus said, "Go and sin no more..." I imagine that those very words spoken by Him into the depths of her being did not set up a law or performance standard, but rather released in her an inner empowering that she had never before known, awakening the strength to turn away from her former lifestyle and live out a newly imparted grace.) For it is God who is producing in you both the desire and the ability to do what pleases him. (Phil. 2:13, ISV).
Through Ezekiel's description of his enoucnter, I appreciated more fully the "quantum" nature of grace. So often, we hear an injuction of Scripture and go off endeavoring to "do" it. More often than we admit, however, we hear a command and sigh a sigh of hopelessness inside, feeling we will never be able to "do it". Especially when it comes to those though relational commands, like "Love those who hurt you...," "Forgive...yet again," we often find ourselves so wounded that we just quit trying. Our hearts want to obey, but we find a Romans 7 "wish I may, wish I might" situation cast across our souls and we inwardly lie down. This is not the way God intended it, however, and it is not the way he left it, thanks to the cross!
What we need to do is realize again that the system that we've fallen into: not one of law, but one of grace. (Ezekiel had to reach ahead to that system which was not yet inaugurated, but it is actually the system by which we entered the Kingdom and is intended to be the one by which we function there!) In the system of grace, the ability accompanies the command and is released by the words spoken to our hearts. What Ezekiel "got right" was being so lost in the moment that his judgment of performance was suspended. He was in flow state--one with the encounter and one with the Spirit of God. Though Galatians 2:20 had not yet been written, he was temporarily experiencing "it is no longer I that live" as the Spirit moved and motivated him. Grace is more amazing than we ever realized and it is not just a general change of heart. It begins there, but it goes on to become a specific empowering for the tasks necessary to fulfill the good works God is calling for. Yes, there are "good works" to be done, but the doing of them is the act of the Holy Spirit in and through us in an involvment so intimate it can only be described by the Apostel Paul as "union". He says "go" and the command finds no resistance in the heart of one given over to the union!
I remember in my word-of-faith cassette tape-listening days, often feeling a hint of apprehension when the concept of James 2:26 was referenced. Someone had found a translation that read, "Faith without corresponding actions is dead..." and I remember the pressure I felt to create enough properly corresponding actions to get any "results" from my faith(oh how very linear, when I think back on it, but it was where we all were living...and it did yield fruit at the time to the degree it was based in a learning relationship with God). Now James 2:26 reveals itself gloriously in the light of quantum grace, however. Faith has contained within it the corrpesponding action, for that is the nature of grace-imparted faith. The life of God deposited inside us is not a ball of potential, but rather a tumult of kinetic energy, bursting forth into action. Check the faith you have: if it is not bursting to get out of you into action, then you need to go back for another relational dose! YOU don't go frantically looking for corrpesponding action--you simply step across the line into the spirit dimension and let those actions form themselves in you. You don't create--you yield. You observe the system implanted inside you and silence the opposition telling you it is illogical.
There really is an unseen reality seeking to manifest and I can feel myself only scratching the surface here as I seek to "explain" it (and now I fall on my face like Ezekiel at the impossibility of that challenge--explaining the infinite, ha!). Grace is far stronger and more basic than we ever realized. Though it can be quiet and still-small-voice like in its influence, we should never think that grace is a sweet little force. Grace runs the universe. God thinks a thought and the universe simultaneously resources His intention. We are a part of that, should we choose to loose our religious rigor and let Him play his symphony through us. Grace will accomplish in us all that we need to "do". He will say "stand up" and we, with no barrier in our flesh needing to perform and get a pat on the back, will find ourselves amazingly on our feet. "Results" will be His doing and "response" will be simply our agreeing to be part of the plan. Human effort will be superceded by the inestimable value of divine coordination.
I have had some encounters with God by the rivers of my life--maybe not as apocoplyptic and multi-dimensional as Ezekiel's, but still very real. There have been times that I knew he met and brought a measure of his glory which was much larger than the limited one in which I had been living. And yet, many times, I have pressured myself almost immediately afterward to sort of "live up to" what just happened. I think it is an overflow of too many Easter altar calls in my past: This is the extreme suffering Jesus underwent for you: now, what are you going to do for him? Out of sincere gratefulness for what God has poured out on me, I found myself leaning back into my own strength to carry on--ridiculous! I needed this QUANTUM GRACE that I am describing: the sense that the "encounter" carries with it the ability to live out the command! God, let us more fully, as Stuart Bell says, "live in the good of" what we have inside us. Deliver us from trying to "pay God back" with our actions and lift us into a realm where we aware of the great power available within us through Him! Heal the sick? Raise the dead? We are conscious that it will take God's grace to do those things through us. But what about our own daily living? Deliver us from the notion that we need to supply our own power for those "smaller" actions! It's all grace, from start to finish--quantum grace!
I'll make a confession here and risk the judgment that could be incurred! Like millions of Christians, I workout daily, iPod on hip, but in my case, the music that flows to my ears in an effort to distract my brain from the muscular challenge is not often Christian. It's not that singing the high praises of God are not conducive to maximum exertion--it's more that there is so much creativity that has been explored beyond the confines of the Christian industry and it is creativity that motivates me--and it is clearly motivation I need when I am trying to get this late 40-something body to embrace the gym moment! However, on my large iPod I do have many Christian albums that I love (many by friends whom I love), and the other day I was exploring one by a British friend named Dave Middleton. Somehow it was working and fueling my inner fire. On his CD entitled "Songs of Men and Angels," Dave reads out a long portion of the vision of God that Ezekiel had by the river Chebar (described--as best as Ezekiel could describe wheels with eyes and four-faced beings--in Ezekiel 1). When he got to the statement above at the beginning of chapter 2, I had an epiphany. It didn't necessarily translate to an immediate increase in the number of leg curls I could do, but it is the kind that will translate to a greatly empowered inner life!
I think often about the "quantum" world and if that doesn't turn you off, you can be my new friend (as many of my current friends are quite tired of hearing about it). This world of new science is such a model, or better said, a reflection of the nature of a reality that is, in essence, spirit. What we have learned about how infinitesimally small, speed-of-light approaching particles behave has given us great insight about navigating our spiritual lives. It's not the "new age" territory--it's the territory of the Eternal One and therefore should be the home of the Christian. But I'll save that large work of persuasion for another blog (and other books) and share with you this specific quantum observation related to Ezekiel and something very important but never mentioned by Ezekiel: grace.
In a quantum world, the notions of time and distance are erased, superceded by the notion of relationship. If things are related, cause and effect is not really an issue--change in status can occur essentially and simultaneously even through distance of space--and time! It turns out that things can be so related that the experience of one particle is "known" by the other instantly, skipping the stage of education--it's more like impartation! This is a shock because, in the classical physics lab that we experienced in high school, the "cause" was issued and then we turned our eyes towards the observation of the "effect" and it slowly yeilded data for us--measurable and comforting. In the quantum world, it is hard to tell which is cause and which is effect--they are so related that they get actually rolled into one--at least to our slowed-down observational powers.
Ezekiel here was told to "stand on his feet"--which might have been a difficult task for him after seeing the vision of blinding God-demonstration that sent him to the ground! But Ezekiel indicates that even as the command to stand was leaving the mouth of the Lord, the responding standing was being accomplished in Ezekiel by the Spirit of God. In these two verses, we see a microcosm of grace: God commands Ezekiel to stand up and hear while the Spirit of God is simultaneously performing that action in and through Ezekiel. Both the command and the ability to carry it out are married as if quantum particles--God says it and Ezekiel finds it happening to him as he hears God say it! Surely this is grace and it reminds us of every statement Jesus made to people in healing: "Rise up and walk...and immediately the man's ankle bones received strength..." We don't hear Jesus use the word grace often--that really comes later in Paul's writings. And yet, Jesus IS grace, demonstrating it everywhere he goes by empowering people to do what he simultaneously calls for! (I have often thought of the woman caught in adultery to whom Jesus said, "Go and sin no more..." I imagine that those very words spoken by Him into the depths of her being did not set up a law or performance standard, but rather released in her an inner empowering that she had never before known, awakening the strength to turn away from her former lifestyle and live out a newly imparted grace.) For it is God who is producing in you both the desire and the ability to do what pleases him. (Phil. 2:13, ISV).
Through Ezekiel's description of his enoucnter, I appreciated more fully the "quantum" nature of grace. So often, we hear an injuction of Scripture and go off endeavoring to "do" it. More often than we admit, however, we hear a command and sigh a sigh of hopelessness inside, feeling we will never be able to "do it". Especially when it comes to those though relational commands, like "Love those who hurt you...," "Forgive...yet again," we often find ourselves so wounded that we just quit trying. Our hearts want to obey, but we find a Romans 7 "wish I may, wish I might" situation cast across our souls and we inwardly lie down. This is not the way God intended it, however, and it is not the way he left it, thanks to the cross!
What we need to do is realize again that the system that we've fallen into: not one of law, but one of grace. (Ezekiel had to reach ahead to that system which was not yet inaugurated, but it is actually the system by which we entered the Kingdom and is intended to be the one by which we function there!) In the system of grace, the ability accompanies the command and is released by the words spoken to our hearts. What Ezekiel "got right" was being so lost in the moment that his judgment of performance was suspended. He was in flow state--one with the encounter and one with the Spirit of God. Though Galatians 2:20 had not yet been written, he was temporarily experiencing "it is no longer I that live" as the Spirit moved and motivated him. Grace is more amazing than we ever realized and it is not just a general change of heart. It begins there, but it goes on to become a specific empowering for the tasks necessary to fulfill the good works God is calling for. Yes, there are "good works" to be done, but the doing of them is the act of the Holy Spirit in and through us in an involvment so intimate it can only be described by the Apostel Paul as "union". He says "go" and the command finds no resistance in the heart of one given over to the union!
I remember in my word-of-faith cassette tape-listening days, often feeling a hint of apprehension when the concept of James 2:26 was referenced. Someone had found a translation that read, "Faith without corresponding actions is dead..." and I remember the pressure I felt to create enough properly corresponding actions to get any "results" from my faith(oh how very linear, when I think back on it, but it was where we all were living...and it did yield fruit at the time to the degree it was based in a learning relationship with God). Now James 2:26 reveals itself gloriously in the light of quantum grace, however. Faith has contained within it the corrpesponding action, for that is the nature of grace-imparted faith. The life of God deposited inside us is not a ball of potential, but rather a tumult of kinetic energy, bursting forth into action. Check the faith you have: if it is not bursting to get out of you into action, then you need to go back for another relational dose! YOU don't go frantically looking for corrpesponding action--you simply step across the line into the spirit dimension and let those actions form themselves in you. You don't create--you yield. You observe the system implanted inside you and silence the opposition telling you it is illogical.
There really is an unseen reality seeking to manifest and I can feel myself only scratching the surface here as I seek to "explain" it (and now I fall on my face like Ezekiel at the impossibility of that challenge--explaining the infinite, ha!). Grace is far stronger and more basic than we ever realized. Though it can be quiet and still-small-voice like in its influence, we should never think that grace is a sweet little force. Grace runs the universe. God thinks a thought and the universe simultaneously resources His intention. We are a part of that, should we choose to loose our religious rigor and let Him play his symphony through us. Grace will accomplish in us all that we need to "do". He will say "stand up" and we, with no barrier in our flesh needing to perform and get a pat on the back, will find ourselves amazingly on our feet. "Results" will be His doing and "response" will be simply our agreeing to be part of the plan. Human effort will be superceded by the inestimable value of divine coordination.
I have had some encounters with God by the rivers of my life--maybe not as apocoplyptic and multi-dimensional as Ezekiel's, but still very real. There have been times that I knew he met and brought a measure of his glory which was much larger than the limited one in which I had been living. And yet, many times, I have pressured myself almost immediately afterward to sort of "live up to" what just happened. I think it is an overflow of too many Easter altar calls in my past: This is the extreme suffering Jesus underwent for you: now, what are you going to do for him? Out of sincere gratefulness for what God has poured out on me, I found myself leaning back into my own strength to carry on--ridiculous! I needed this QUANTUM GRACE that I am describing: the sense that the "encounter" carries with it the ability to live out the command! God, let us more fully, as Stuart Bell says, "live in the good of" what we have inside us. Deliver us from trying to "pay God back" with our actions and lift us into a realm where we aware of the great power available within us through Him! Heal the sick? Raise the dead? We are conscious that it will take God's grace to do those things through us. But what about our own daily living? Deliver us from the notion that we need to supply our own power for those "smaller" actions! It's all grace, from start to finish--quantum grace!
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