New Church theology holds many simply precious truths. One that struck me when I read it last week is the idea that salvation is “an ongoing act of creation.” Many see salvation as an act avoiding damnation. Salvation then is not about creating anything but far more about avoiding punishment.
But lets just think for a moment what that might mean to see salvation as a creative act – if that was our “jumping off place.” Creation itself is about growth, reproduction, change, even adventure. Imagine those being the antonyms for “salvation”!
The role of a pastor is far more about walking with people in the present than about predicting the future! That being said, maybe there is some value in offering a few thoughts about 2012.
Economic Dislocation Will Continue
We are in a time of sea-change. Many of these shifts I believe are permanent and will create not only anxiety but dislocation. And the fact is that humanity does very well, usually, at the rock bottom. We figure it out. (Sounds crazy right!) I think that happens because we start looking for places other than our pocketbook for meaning. As Richard Rohr notes "in desperate and dark situations where the old god doesn't work anymore, the old self and the old attitudes don't work anymore. "Our gods much each die until we find the True God." Each dying god is another darkness and another death." Finding the True God is HOPE.
Expect To See Signs Of Hope
The hope will not come in ever expanding financial resources. It will come, I believe, in a "settling." Love whispers. Fear screams. Love will whisper some powerful messages in 2012!
Live Into Solutions
And if you are reading this, you are part of the solution. Live into it. There is a lot of work ahead. NewChurch LIVE is just one part of a different sea-change, a different shift that will meet new economic realities through alternative offerings. We are in the end to be just that - an alternative - an alternative to fear, anxiety, hatred, and need.
We are ready for 2012! May God bless your journey. May God bless this congregation. May God bless this world.
I have not posted here in a long time but I thought I would throw something on we did recently - a sermon on "Wrestling for a Blessing" - something I have been thinking a lot about recently. http://vimeo.com/32862689
"Invest and Invite" is a catchy little phrase and the basis of our growth strategy at NewChurch LIVE. Restated, it means we must "invest" in relationships and then "invite" if and when appropriate. These words though carry with them greater gravity then just a prescriptive catch phrase that informs marketing.
Parker Palmer, a Christian Quaker, wrote the following words about his own spiritual development. "I had embraced a form of Christian faith devoted less to the experience of God than to abstractions about God, a fact that now baffles me; how did so many disembodied concepts emerge from a tradition whose central commitment was to the Word become flesh?" Christianity without the investment in others clearly is a disembodied concept, uncoupled from the incarnational core of our faith.
As we approach Christmas, I am struck by how much the story of Jesus' birth is designed to draw us in. The main characters - Mary, Joseph, the Shepherds, the Wisemen - were inspired by angels, faced fears, were asked to travel. The only individual who did none of these things was Herod, and, well, he does not come out so well in this story. The point is that all were asked to "invest" in different ways. When our goals are clear, when trust is present, when we see the star, we move more easily though the fears that surround us will no doubt accompany us on the trip.
Maybe that is the "risk" of investment. We need to allow the call of Christmas, of Jesus, to actually unsettle us. That "unsettling" should call us to candidly look at where we are investing our lives. Are we close to each other? Are we reaching out? Are we willing to travel? Are we willing to look up and see the star, to see the angels, that will call us home? Can we come to see God incarnate as more than a disembodied concept but as the Other?
No fear, no movement. No joy, no movement. No risk, no growth. Be mindful of this blessed promise, "The Lord is present with you the moment you start to love the neighbor." (Heavenly Secrets)
Holy Communion, called by some Holy Supper, is an ancient Christian sacrament body spoken of in the Gospels. From the Gospel of Luke ...
14 When the hour had come, He sat down, and the twelve apostles with Him. 15 Then He said to them, "With fervent desire I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer; 16 for I say to you, I will no longer eat of it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God." 17 Then He took the cup, and gave thanks, and said, "Take this and divide it among yourselves; 18 for I say to you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes."19 And He took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, "This is My body which is given for you; do this in remembrance of Me." 20 Likewise He also tookis the new covenant in My blood, which is shed for you.
In the Christian New Church, we celebrate Holy Communion several times a year. The actual service includes a brief talk, and then the wine and bread are passed and everyone partakes. (Water or juice is provided for those whom the consumption of alcohol is unwise or unhealthy.) Within what is actually a rather simple sacrament lies a true celebration of the heart of the Christian faith - or as the New Church theology phrases it, "the primary thing of external worship."
The first part to consider is that the call the celebrate the Holy Supper is an unqualified call. Regardless of our station in life - broken or blessed - we are called by Jesus to this communion. He arrived in life living with others as they were. Around the table of 12 disciples - the first group gathered for the Holy Supper - were Thomas the serial doubter, Judas the betrayer, Peter the mercurial hot-and-cold one.
The other 8 brought their imperfections as well. We will bring the same.
Secondly, consider the elements of the Holy Supper - unleavened bread and wine. We are asked to picture unleavened bread as symbolizing our desire to bring a "sincere heart" to life. A sincere heart wraps around that deep call to love unconditionally. We take it into us - "eating it" - because that is life - bringing in that piece of God.
Wine differs from the bread in that wine actually comes into being from fermentation process. This makes for a fascinating paradox within the elements - one, unleavened bread, "pure," the other, wine, "contested." Fermentation images the struggle of truth with falsity, with the end - wine - becoming the fruit of that struggle. We must welcome that struggle. It is part of life. I love the words of Yann Martel that speak so clearly to the struggle ....
Doubt is useful for a while. We must all pass through the Garden of Gethsemane. If Christ played with doubt, so must we. If Christ spent an anguished night in prayer, if He burst out from the Cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” then surely we are also permitted doubt. But we must move on. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation.
So we bring the sincere heart and truth born of struggle together, together. Sit with the words. In this Christian denomination, I will file a report at the end of year that asks me to record the number of celebrants. What a marvelous word! How many "celebrated" this wondrous sacrament! And we celebrate it in the form of a holy "communion" - an act or instance of sharing, together.
Church, religion, spirituality, faith, belief - all these terms are hard to nail down, hard to define tightly. Often different words are used by different people to mean the exact thing, i.e the individual who says "I am spiritual but not religious" might mean the same thing as someone who states that they are "deeply religious."
What is clear is that we have to remain deeply aware of the difference between church as a institution and the heart of God. A church - including NCL - is one of many possible expressions of the heart of the God. We are no more "valid" than other denominations, or than individuals who chose to find God on their own outside of formal religious/ denominational affiliation. As Swedenborg noted, "Everyone whose soul desires it is capable of seeing the truths of the Word in light." We can all see it - there is no denominational "lock" on truth (Which can, when lived into as a "truth" of the New Church make us pretty unique and tolerant!).
"If we try to make the church into the kingdom of God, we create a false idol that will disappoint us." These words by Richard Rohr were the first words I read this morning. Clearly uplifting and challenging they call us to a core truth - "Church" does not equal "The Kingdom of God." The Kingdom of God will exist, will constantly be born anew again and again into the world. We can cooperate with that birth, choose to be part of that path, "ride the current" so to speak but thankfully just we cannot create we neither can destroy it.
Church can be an incredibly powerful vehicle as an expression of the heart of God. Just don't think it is the only one!
So easy to fall into a pattern in which our primary concerns center on managing life vs. actually living life. It is easy to become deeply fearful within the lives we have created. On a recent trip to Lancaster, it was frankly with a sign of envy that I watched carriages carrying Amish on their way. Granted such a life of rigid uniformity is limited in ways of which I am unaware, yet, in watching those buggies I thought of issues such a culture does not create – global warming, war, avarice.
Maybe this is part and parcel why we need to continually ask question ourselves in terms characterized by deep thought and true candor – what is God’s will? As society runs towards limits, runs towards certain historical “stoppings”, alternative ways of holding the world I imagine will emerge. In times of fear, we focus on accruing numerous forms of “insurance” that we believe will give us back control and safety. Yet those efforts arguably will fail. They will prove to be non-viable alternatives. Forms of “preservation” rarely succeed – “He who saves his life will lose it.”
How then will Christianity step forward? How will the Christian message form a viable alternative? Jesus did not establish an economic, social or political “system” in the way we understand those words today. He appears to allow those areas to be sidebars by effectively claiming “There is a bigger picture than what we see. There is a bigger call, a bigger vision than what we know.” And, in calling us into that bigger picture, He in turn calls right back down into the very human lives we live and the decisions we make, opening up alternatives of which we may have been blissfully unaware left to our own thoughts, ideas, rationalizations.
When we are thus called into life, we can then learn to live life vs. just manage it.
We just finished our first part of a 2 part series on Angels. It was a lot of fun and well received.
Fun to go back to what we "know" at a deep level. I think of newborns. One woman in our congregation just had her first grandchild. That is big news! And all she is an angel. And she, I think, is right. We just forget sometimes.
Emergent Christianity is a fascinating movement occurring in Christendom. The name grows out of the belief that a re-focusing on the core of the Christian message “emerging.” This emergence is not marked by sectarian or doctrinal divides but a by a deep agreement on what matters most. Swedenborgian thought clearly saw this as key to Christianity as well as well as other denominations: “The Lord’s Church is not in this particular location or in that, but, it resides wherever people lead lives in keeping with the commandments.”
Listed below are several key components. This movement is well attuned to New Church theology.
Less Appeal of Biblical Literalism: This trend should be regarded as extremely favorable to the New Church. Individuals moving from a literal-factual orientation to the Bible to an orientation that is far more comfortable seeing the Bible as historical-metaphorical. [1]
a. In 1963, 65% of Americans reported believing in the literal letter of the Bible
b. By 2001, only 21% reported the same.
Focus on here-and-now of service vs. then-and-there of salvation: More Christians appear to be focused on the here-and-now of transformative Christianity that calls them to a more hands-on relationship with God and others vs. an individual approach focused solely on Sunday church attendance and personal salvation.
a. Don’t want body of belief but a way of salvation/ healing. Not about set of propositions about ultimate reality but showing a way, a life that fixes the problems that they see. Therefore about “living out” Christianity.
Christ as Model vs. Christ as Salvation:
a. Christ as teacher, example, master and we are to be disciples. Therefore imitate the example of Christ.
Increased interest in Spiritual Disciplines and Sacraments: In NCL this trend while anecdotal is very interesting.
a. Large Interest in the broader culture around spiritual disciplines Yoga, Meditation, the study of Buddhism, books like “The Secret” etc…
b. Clear interest in the sacraments of Marriage and Baptism
c. Clear interest in the spiritual disciplines of Meditation and the 12 Steps as measured by our two most successful small group programs
As these concepts gain mainstream acceptance, it should be a fun decade ahead!
The role of a pastor is far more about walking with people in the present than about predicting the future! That being said, maybe there is some value in offering a few thoughts about 2012.