When Tempest Tossed

When tempest tossed
The waves that lost
The broken plate
The misplaced mate

When tempest tossed
The car exhaust
Smells of rotten rinds
And forgotten lines

When tempest tossed
And listening costs…

Linked Up: theVoiz Blog: The New Big. Small’s In.

theVoiz Blog: Gritty thoughts by Aaron Flores on Life, Spirituality & Faith: The New Big. Small’s In.

“But I wondered what if churches redefined what it meant to be big. The New Big would purposefully remain smaller, need to sustain very little organizationally, and automate everything else so it could be free to live out its dreams accordingly.”

Can size be an idol?  Big or small?

Linked Up - willzhead: A Response to Bill Easum’s Thoughts on the Emerging Church

Link: willzhead: A Response to Bill Easum’s Thoughts on the Emerging Church

This industrial cycle is one that Easum stands at the end of, and one that was largely driven by a scientific epistemological approach to ecclesiology. This epistemology affected the way Christians conceptualized being a follower of Jesus and greatly influenced the kind of congregations we created. Thus, theological orthodoxy became accedence to a set of propositionally constructed truths, as opposed to adherence to belief statements. And, as proof that “form follows function,” a kind of methodological orthodoxy crept in as well, enabling an ongoing conversation about which model is right. Thus was born the need within the Church for firms whose sole purpose is to help churches connect with the right model and grow, with growth generally being measured in economic and consumer terms as more: more people, more buildings, more giving, more small groups, etc.

Good post from Will Samson.  I submit that you may agree or disagree with his assessment of Easum’s assessment, but I think it is a good engagement with the core issues at hand in the shifts taking place in the church.

Pasadena Star-News - Fuller Seminary to expand

Pasadena Star-News - Seminary to expand

Good article on Fuller.  As a former resident of Pasadena and current (sorta, 5 classes left) student of said seminary, I loved that Fuller was located in SoCal, Pasadena specifically.  Wonderfully diverse neighborhoods, easy walking to and fro campus (and theatres and coffeeshops and shopping and friends and …..).

Wondering about that Jesus character…

All this business about discipleship as apprenticeship to Jesus has caused me to wonder what it really means to follow Jesus in 21st century America (specifically Cincinnati).  I mean he lived 2000 years back, in a vastly different world/context.  So when we read the things he said and did and what he called folks to do as they followed him then I’d say we have a good bit of translation work if we are going to apply that to ourselves.  That much, I suspect, is obvious to most.

It is his talk of the Kingdom of God that fascinates me.  When I read the Gospels now it just leaps out at me, but when I was in high school starting to read the Bible for the first time (seriously, not just as “children’s stories” for Sunday School) I never noticed the Kingdom.  So, how do I translate this Kingdom stuff to 21C Cincinnati?  Well, how do WE translate Jesus’s message about the Kingdom to 21C Cincinnati?  Great question…. let’s live the answer!