Tonight I listened to two kids who are becoming adults. Both of them have been failed by the Church. The one has a father who is a clergyman that has not been allowed to spend time with his son because of the ridiculous demands of what we have allowed to eat the Church alive. Demands that are not a part of the kingdom. The other is a kid who has been involved in the Church for years and know one has had the balls to enter into his pain and help him sort out his life.
The Church is meant to be a place of healing and has turned into a place that feeds peoples' psychosis and delusions. When do we stand up and demand that we forget about the properties and the mortgage payments, and the thousand and one paper pushing meetings and we sit with hurting people and cry.
When will the people of God wake up and withhold their tithes and gifts until the machine of the Church starts cranking out people who understand human pain and suffering and enter into it. I fast from the machine of Church. I grieve the monstrous beast we have become, so concerned with moral and ethical issues and so afraid of going into places of suffering and pain.
Sure cast out the gays, the people who have had abortions and affairs,the lepers and everyone who has something in them we don't like - yeah thats the Church. I am sorry - THAT IS NOT THE CHURCH!!! The Church is people recognizing they are broken and hurting and that others are as well. We all long for wholeness. When will we demand true action, true belief, and true intention and stop hiding behind divisive platitudes that tear people apart.
The Church is masquerading and it is a shame. People are all broken and just want someone to hold their hand. That doesn't seem so hard.
tjm+
Showing posts with label community. Show all posts
Showing posts with label community. Show all posts
Appalling Nature of Church
It has become common knowledge that many of the mainline denominations are flailing and in disrepair. Many seem on the verge of collapse. When you dig into the chaos that exists, it appears that the greatest contributor to possible ruin is finances.
It makes me wonder how we have gotten ourselves into this place. It does not matter whether it is Orthodox or Free Church denominations. They are all closing doors because of finances. How have we allowed CHURCH to become synonymous with corporate structure and ownership?
The nature of CHURCH is the "called out ones" of God. Called out of the world, CHURCH is allegedly the community of people who have opened themselves to the indwelling of God's Spirit - we are TABERNACLES of God.
It is up to the creative ones to figure out how to disentangle the two concepts so that true CHURCH is challenged to go on and meet the conditions of a new way of gathering and so that whatever the shape of that gathering becomes, it does not commit the same crime of seeing buildings as CHURCH and programs as CHURCH.
The shrinking and withdraw of support from institutions in this country has been going on for a long time. Big business and consumerism is the new culture we live in. As this shift occurs, many grass roots movements are being challenged to go back to their origins and reclaim the vital link they have with living the vision and mission they espouse without the "luxury" of bricks and mortar.
I hope people are starting to think about what the core values of faith are all about. What constitutes spiritual life and growth. And, how to become community without the abundance of property and wealth.
The option will be for these collapsing denominations to scrap what they have and all run out and find another "thing" that is similar in shape and size to what they knew; or, to re-envision what we may have been missing in the call of God. Listening to the call requires the abandon of a Prophets heart and a ruthless audacity to shout out when we have fallen away from our connection to the Father of lights.
Times ahead will be prophetic to say the least. It may be too simple a response to look at the churches that survive and say what are they doing right? The Churches that survive just have more money. Now is the time to find out how CHURCH and "luxury" are distinct. Let's not rebuild something that falls apart on our grandchildren because we mistook abundance as a sign from God that we had found the WAY.
It is time people start asking themselves how house churches, small groups, and communities find their ways into the changing shape of CHURCH.
TJM+
It makes me wonder how we have gotten ourselves into this place. It does not matter whether it is Orthodox or Free Church denominations. They are all closing doors because of finances. How have we allowed CHURCH to become synonymous with corporate structure and ownership?
The nature of CHURCH is the "called out ones" of God. Called out of the world, CHURCH is allegedly the community of people who have opened themselves to the indwelling of God's Spirit - we are TABERNACLES of God.
It is up to the creative ones to figure out how to disentangle the two concepts so that true CHURCH is challenged to go on and meet the conditions of a new way of gathering and so that whatever the shape of that gathering becomes, it does not commit the same crime of seeing buildings as CHURCH and programs as CHURCH.
The shrinking and withdraw of support from institutions in this country has been going on for a long time. Big business and consumerism is the new culture we live in. As this shift occurs, many grass roots movements are being challenged to go back to their origins and reclaim the vital link they have with living the vision and mission they espouse without the "luxury" of bricks and mortar.
I hope people are starting to think about what the core values of faith are all about. What constitutes spiritual life and growth. And, how to become community without the abundance of property and wealth.
The option will be for these collapsing denominations to scrap what they have and all run out and find another "thing" that is similar in shape and size to what they knew; or, to re-envision what we may have been missing in the call of God. Listening to the call requires the abandon of a Prophets heart and a ruthless audacity to shout out when we have fallen away from our connection to the Father of lights.
Times ahead will be prophetic to say the least. It may be too simple a response to look at the churches that survive and say what are they doing right? The Churches that survive just have more money. Now is the time to find out how CHURCH and "luxury" are distinct. Let's not rebuild something that falls apart on our grandchildren because we mistook abundance as a sign from God that we had found the WAY.
It is time people start asking themselves how house churches, small groups, and communities find their ways into the changing shape of CHURCH.
TJM+
The New Monasticism
When the dregs of depression over the state of the denominational churches takes hold of your hungry heart, have faith. There is hope. There is a whole new wave of spiritual life dawning for the Church Universal. All over the nation, and the world, pockets of intentional communities are emerging and calling themselves a New Monasticism.
Combined with the crest of the Emergent Church, this New Monasticism is build on some simple basic rules of community. They are:
1) Relocation to the abandoned places of Empire.
2) Sharing economic resources with fellow community members and the needy among us.
3) Hospitality to the stranger
4) Lament for racial divisions within the church and our communities
combined with the active pursuit of a just reconciliation.
5) Humble submission to Christ’s body, the church.
6) Intentional formation in the way of Christ and the rule of the
community along the lines of the old novitiate.
7) Nurturing common life among members of intentional community.
8) Support for celibate singles alongside monogamous married couples and their children.
9) Geographical proximity to community members who share a common rule of life.
10) Care for the plot of God’s earth given to us along with support of our local economies.
11) Peacemaking in the midst of violence and conflict resolution within communities along the lines of Matthew 18.
12) Commitment to a disciplined contemplative life.
WOW is this something, or what.
A community based on the sharing of things in common, prayer, poverty, intentional formation and contemplation - this sounds like the SECOND CHAPTER OF ACTS. It is worth looking into. Just google the words NEW MONASTICISM.
I am including a link to a publisher that is carrying some of the best mongraphs the movement has produced. Check them out: Wipf and Stock Publishers
Ciao!
+Tom
Combined with the crest of the Emergent Church, this New Monasticism is build on some simple basic rules of community. They are:
1) Relocation to the abandoned places of Empire.
2) Sharing economic resources with fellow community members and the needy among us.
3) Hospitality to the stranger
4) Lament for racial divisions within the church and our communities
combined with the active pursuit of a just reconciliation.
5) Humble submission to Christ’s body, the church.
6) Intentional formation in the way of Christ and the rule of the
community along the lines of the old novitiate.
7) Nurturing common life among members of intentional community.
8) Support for celibate singles alongside monogamous married couples and their children.
9) Geographical proximity to community members who share a common rule of life.
10) Care for the plot of God’s earth given to us along with support of our local economies.
11) Peacemaking in the midst of violence and conflict resolution within communities along the lines of Matthew 18.
12) Commitment to a disciplined contemplative life.
WOW is this something, or what.
A community based on the sharing of things in common, prayer, poverty, intentional formation and contemplation - this sounds like the SECOND CHAPTER OF ACTS. It is worth looking into. Just google the words NEW MONASTICISM.
I am including a link to a publisher that is carrying some of the best mongraphs the movement has produced. Check them out: Wipf and Stock Publishers
Ciao!
+Tom
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