Posts Tagged ‘incarnational’
Posted on August 6, 2008 - by ray
Multiple Choice
Question: You live in suburbia. Your neighbor is similar to you in age and family structure. You don’t know much about your neighbor but feel that God is wanting you to invest in him. Do you…
A) invite him and his family to come to church with you and yours.
B) invite him to a special men’s event your church is hosting.
C) invite him and his family over for dinner, fully expecting to talk about spiritual things. You prepare yourself by reviewing the 2 spiritual diagnostic questions, the Romans Road, and the 4 Spiritual Laws.
D) get to know him over the course of several weeks through numerous conversations. After finding out his likes/dislikes/interests you ask if you can come along to his next _______ (you fill in the blank).
E) None of the above (had to add this as no good multiple choice question leaves this answer out).
Be honest with yourself as you think through how you would “witness” to your neighbor. Don’t be too quick to dismiss how entrenched we all our in our consumeristic christian sub-culture and how that influences how you become Jesus to those around you.
Posted on July 18, 2008 - by ray
The Gap
I’m preparing to teach a class on Spiritual Formation in September. I’ll be using the Frost & Hirsch book The Shaping of Things to Come as the primary text. In review of the book I came across something I had forgotten about that I think is worth posting. The authors refer to Robert Bank’s book Redeeming the Routines and his pointing out the gap between belief and everyday life. According to Bank this gap shows up in ten worrying ways:
- Few of us apply or know how to apply our belief to our work, or lack of work.
- We only make minimal connections between our faith and our spare time activities.
- We have little sense of a Christian approach to regular activities like domestic chores.
- Our everyday attitudes are partly shaped by the dominant values of our society.
- Many of our spiritual difficulties stem from the daily pressure we experience.
- Our everyday concerns receive little attention in the church.
- Only occasionally do professional theologians address routine activities.
- When addressed, everyday issues tend to be approached too theoretically.
- Only a minority of Christians read religious books or attend theological courses.
- Most churchgoers reject the idea of a gap between their beliefs and their ways of life.
Of course, the last is the most telling. Many of us fail to see the disconnect between what we read in scripture and believe about our life in Christ and what we actually do. I have to admit, I’m guilty of this as well, even living cross-culturally, where it’s my job to avoid this type of gap in my daily life.
I’m convinced now more than ever that we do a horrible disservice to both new and old Christians in our discipleship of them if we don’t teach and example what it means to live the incarnational life…what it means to love your neighbor, what it means to bless those who persecute you, and what it means to turn the other cheek. We do a fine job of teaching truth and sound theological concepts but we fall short in giving them the full council of the Word.
So, this is where the rubber meets the road - I need to come up with a way to teach and example this to 18 year olds this September in a way that will hopefully impact them to live out their faith, not just believe in it.
Posted on July 8, 2008 - by ray
Hirsch and Missional
Back on June 23 Alan Hirsch, author of The Forgotten Ways, wrote a post about the term missional facing the same fate as the term emergent. In that he meant that missional is being over used, misused, and less understood. It seems to be one of the big buzz word in Christian circles. Unfortunately, many have used the word thinking it to be the next rallying cry to reaching the younger, post-modern generation. I won’t repeat what Alan states in his post, he does a much better job than I ever could…I would encourage you to take a few minutes and read it for yourself.
I noticed this trend (of the mis-use of ‘missional’) a few months ago. I got to the point where I didn’t like using the word, because everyone had assumptions about what it meant, and in many cases those assumptions were and are wrong. I found myself using the word ‘incarnational’ to describe my life and how I chose to live it out daily. I’ve told others that I’m simply trying to be Jesus in my culture…i.e. living a incarnational life. Hirsch points out that he prefers the term ‘missional-incarnational’. It’s a bit of a mouthful, but it does a good job of explaining both the sentness (missional) and the practice (incarnational) our lives should be shaped by.
