thinking outside the cookie cutter

tonight was the night. the cookie dough had been cooled for the three required hours and we were ready. we took out the dough, argued over who was going to roll it out, argued over who was going to sprinkle the flour, argued over who got which cookie cutter to use. it was great! LOVE IT!

ok, aside from the usual grief that comes with a 7 and 6 year old, brother and sister respectively, it was a great night. we laughed, listened to christmas music and found joy in just being with each other. after a couple cookie cutter cuts, i took out a knife and began to carve my own figure. the kids observed intently and guessed inquisitively. "it's a cross" grace said. "no, it's an airplane!" derek yelled. "yep, said dad, that's it. you got it D".

"so who wants to use your brain to cut cookies instead of cookie cutters?" i asked. "your brain or cookie cutters?" i asked emphatically again. grace shouted out, "my brain!" i gave each of them a knife (hope you're not listening kc) and watched as they began to imagine, engaging with creative thoughts bubbling up from within. what a sight to see. they had become co-creators! how fun and frustrating at the same time, but wondrously free to be.

there was a snag however and it was this: all their brainy creativity was taking FOREVER. i said "alright now, let's just go back to the cookie cutters and stop using our brains." they argued again and demanded not to go back. i agreed after the usual ping pong match of words. in that moment i thought it kind of interesting how impatient we can be...i could be.

isn't this how life is sometimes? we get excited about trying new things, using our brains for a change, getting creative, and yet for some reason it never gets along as fast as we would like or hope. but maybe that's the point. isn't it about the creative process and not merely the "getting-it-all-over-and-done-with"? isn't it about the gift of wondering, and together, what could be? what we also learned was that if it failed, we balled up the sugar cookies and started again. ahhhh, fresh starts, who doesn't like those?

and so i celebrate tonight, that for a moment, for a short break in time, we were able to stand in opposition to the constraints unassumingly and unconsciously imposed on us...and for that time, we were able to think outside the cookie cutter!

taking a leap

well, i have done it. i have discerned, for better or for worse, for what i hear God calling me to do. i have been serving as an interim/transitional pastor simultaneous to beginning the flagstaff abbey an emerging expression of church. last week i notified the bishop, council, call committee, all to their surprise, that i will not be submitting my name as an interviewing candidate for the traditional parish. that means i'll only be serving for a few more months as an interim in this setting. i am discerning what to do, but very much feel called to put old wine in new wineskins, not for the sake of an ecclesiastical beauty contest, but for being true to the kind of leader i hear God calling out in me.

i feel too schizophrenic to be living in two completely different cultural realities. the best example, although i know they all break down, is this. i feel i'm not the leader to restore a 1964 vintage mustang, but do feel called to work on hybrids and push even further into the future with the very way we build and use transportation. this is the best expression for helping to share the divergent and vexed reality i have continually found myself occupying.

i've got to say at another level but very much related, i'm also concerned about the professional aspect of church leadership, lay and clergy alike. i don't know how it will all work out, but i just know that the perception from those supposedly outside the church, don't really give a flying shit that there is a professional and many won't actually and financially support such an effort. what this doesn't mean however is that they aren't concerned about generously contributing to good causes for the sake of serving the common good. but the church is loosing its ground on how to sustain itself. which in and of itself is a telling reality. i realize this is a huge generalization toward mainlines and that they will vary, but when i think about 20-30 somethings here in my southwest context, i am not seeing an interest and enthusiasm in financially supporting and sustaining such communities with full time paid church staff. this doesn't mean that there won't continue to be churches who have people willing to pay their pastors, but i believe there is a decline happening, with attached suspicion toward this whole venture.

where do i fit in?

i love life! my wife and two children derek and grace. what a gift to be held by each of them, and warmly. i have great and real friends who share an understanding of God that can't be articulated only lived.

i'm sitting here doing my favorite activities, indulging in some belgium beer i picked up from a liquor store in san diego, Corsendonk an abbey ale. i was drawn to the picture of mary holding jesus, what better sales ploy could you have really. i've got my incense burning as i'm listening to Duke Special, suggested from my friend and mentor who doesn't even know me, peter rollins. all the while reading and sitting here wondering.

last week i attended, at the invitation of the synod office and our new assistant to the bishop for outreach, an outreach national conference in san diego. little did i realize how i've grown to be anti-evangelical, that is, those who i have determined to be driven theologically more by propositional concerns than matters incarnational. i had a stirring conversation, albeit short, with dan kimball. even though i was a bit agressive in my questioning, probably too judgmental (sorry dan i just yearn for conversational parnters). from my perspective in what i was wanting to talk about the conversation boiled down to heeding jesus call to make disciples. dan's claim was that peter rollins and others like karen are not doing that only gathering people together with no real leadership development into discipleship. i think we'd all agree that discipleship is key, the question for me becomes what does it mean to learn from jesus and what are we actually teaching people from jesus? do we teach all the biased perspectives from scripture as truth or could they be contextualized. is there a formational, character building piece, in isolation from being missional in service to God's world? what does it mean to cast your nets? i've always thought about it in relationship to his first words about his primary mission "repent and believe, the kingdom of heaven is at hand." what does it look like for us as disciples to learn that we are caught in God's kingdom net? is it merely a propositional venture? this is where i love peter rollin's ideas that propositions are the very aftermath seeking to articulate the very encounter we've had with the holy.

i'm wondering recently about the pursuits we have in life. i've been listening and learning about the emergent conversation and heard a lecture from the 2007 aar event, the second emergent forum at the event. the event had scott mcknight, diana butler bass and tony jones. tony mentioned an interesting thing about those who are pursuing this thing. he said essentially, 'you know, a lot of those who are involved in this are involved because this is their last ditch effort for being involved in church. if this didn't exist they will be joining the 125 million who are predicted to be leaving the church by 2050.'

wow! so where is my home? i want to be a part of a church that isn't afraid of critically thinking about absolutely everything. that learns to live the very grace oriented life it so eloquently articulates and celebrates.

ya know in my own wondering and discerning for going to get a phd i have had a lot of people tell me that i shouldn't do it because i'd be missing out on the very thing i was trying to create, an alternative church. the other thing i hear is that you don't want to do that because you'll become too aloof, esoteric and elitist from the very people you want to help and make a difference for. this all has me thinking because that's how i've often experienced a lot of those phd people too.

but on the flip side maybe it has something to do with what tony jones says, this is the only way they would ever be connected to church. you know, me and my judgmental ways, i wonder why is would it be that one of my professors whom i admire so much through my dmin program at luther, why does he not attend a local church, why is he himself not connected to an incarnational community of faith? even as he helps others to be church, how is he being church? maybe this is the only thing keeping him alive as in any way connected to the church and if he didn't have this outlet he wouldn't even be involved.

i admire tony for at least being connected to his place solomon's porch, even though i've had a bad experience years ago with their pastor. maybe at some level we're all just doing the best we can with where we are and what's available and for how we're trying to make a difference. maybe that's just what a lot of this comes down to. maybe its the best way to deal with the depression for the immensely systematic mess and enigma we find ourselves in as the transitioning church and how God is trying to work through us to birth a new reality. maybe. all i know and all i really hold on to are the thoughts from bonhoeffer's "i am" poem...wherever i fit in, wherever my place is in this world even as i'm still discerning what i should do and where i fit in..."whoever i am, i am thine."

Peter Rollins on Irony

Peter Rollins is, in my opinion, the foremost thinker and framer of the emerging church conversation. This introduction briefly gives you some insight into the person we can read about and learn from. Hope others can gleen from him the very gold that I have. thanks pete for your inspiration and humility.

What Would Jesus Buy? - Official Trailer!

a great film speaking to the deep challenges of our consumption driven society. we have become so ingrained in it we don't even realize. rent it, you can get it on netflix.

The Great Emergence

Check this out. a helpful contextualized notion for where the church is trying to find itself today.

pete rollins lecture

check out this link to a pete rollins lecture. WOW!

you might also want to look at his blog: peterrollins.net/blog/

also his new book: a fidelity of betrayal