Things We Can Learn From Terrorists

There are some things that we can earn from terrorists! Like how to organise into small, multiplying cells (there have been a few papers on this since 9/11 including some work by Alan Hirsch). How to operate under the radar of giants like the US military. The importance of training. Small is beautiful. How to funnel anger into a cause. etc.

But there apprears to me to me a bigger one for Christians to observe and reflect on for ourselves. The shadow side of the glory that these people are striving for. These guys who have been caught this week in Australia were allegedly half way towards blowing up something important- maybe we wil never know what. But they got so wrapped up in their mission and their obscure and dangerous understanding of Islam that some interesting things stayed in their lifestyles.

I don't know if you noticed it but those young men who attacked the camerman were wearing Nike and Addidas clothes with their logos clearly on display as a fashion statement! So here we have angry young men who 'hate' the West but adore its' high priests! They probably ate at McDonalds for breakfast! And their leader was welfare dependant! That's right the guy who is allegedly leading these people into a right against the West is being funded by John Howard's Centrelink... I guess even a suicide bomber has to eat!

So we should reflect as Christians about the things that get in the way as we conduct our lives, that seem hypocritical to our message. There are plenty of examples... The current image in the world that Jesus is best represented by Republican voting morals crusaders. Our own over-concern with image (the external, rather than the presence of the Holy Spirit dwelling in us - the internal). Anyone who preaches a message that Christianity can make your life easy and that there will be no more problems - 'Jesus will fix it'. People who get so wrapped up in the mission of their church that they forget about the mission of God (thinking that both missions are necesarily the same thing). etc.

There are plenty! Let's learn something from these dangerous fanatics!

Great Funeral!

‘Life wasn’t meant to be easy’, said Malcolm Fraser. I often think that those who present a glitzy Christian message filled with beautiful, successful people and lots of financial prosperity have missed the best that God has for us. This week I had one of those reminders of the nature of what joys that the Gospel can bring.

I led a funeral service. It was a great time. I hope mine is like that! There were lots of family and friends who had come to farewell a loved 85 year old lady whose body had finally given out. But as I presented to the assembled congregation a summary of her life you couldn’t miss the tough times that had been there: Growing up in the Mallee as a child of a WW1 soldier-settler, a husband who died 43 years ago (that’s half her life without him), constant battles with depression and mental illness, The Great Depression, WW2 and regular financial jeopardy, were just some things on the list!

But here we were at the end of this lady’s life and there was nothing but celebration in the church. Memories, love, stories, laughter, warmth and gratefulness for having known her were the feelings that day. As the Mastercard advertisement says: “PRICELESS!”

So if things are tough at the moment, don't discount God's presence in that. He might not have wanted it to be like is it but that doesn't mean that he isn't there in it. Look for the nature of the Gospel... find it... it's about.

Church Planting Books

Steve Addison has posted a list of the top 10 books for church planting. It is a good list and Steve is one of the best in the business worldwide (and lives here in Melbourne) so if that is your cuppa tea.. drink it in and then read it too!

http://www.steveaddison.net/

5 Years Old?

I was at the Australian Missiology Conference last night. Dr David Tacey was speaking. It was an immence session. It was amazing to just take in what he has to offer. He is a Professor at LaTrobe Uni and teaches English, English Lit and Spirituality. He is the author of more then a few books and publications including 'The Spirituality Revolution'... which I made students read in my Church in Australian Culture subject at Burleigh College.

Two things stand out from last night (well actually several but two for now!). First, Tacey draws much of his conclusions from his students. He really listens to them. He truely understands what teaching is about. No wonder that his spirituality courses are packed out at LaTrobe. People of all perspectives come and engage and he guides them from his more then substantial perspective of literature, philosophy, psychology and theology.

Second. He made a comment that really spoke to me... He commented that the faith that many churches taught was one that was suitable for a '5 year old's faith' but not for an adult. He commented about the use of the Bible, the simplistic aswers given that don't stand up to the 'test of real life', and the lack of spiritual direction/adult faith development. And I thought... 'Yep, he's got a point there... a big one'.

Paul spoke of this. He said that as believers we are meant to move on from 'milk' to 'meat'.

A Radical Thought!

I've been popping in and out at the Australian Missiology Conference at Whitley College this week. That's the disadvantage of being at a conference in your own city! You aren't away anywhere so the things that are close to home stil have to be done. But it is a great conference filled with some really interesting people. Great people. And it gives me heart that it filled up within a few months and has been booked out since June.

So here I am in a room filled with 140 wonderful, smart people all dedicated to mission in Australia and New Zealand. Many of them also doing it. And as I am listening to all of the great speakers a radical thought pops into my head. What if at a conference like this, rather then the usual suspects presenting their well thought through theologies and arguements instead we invited people who don't go to church and see no reason to go to church. But people who are maybe in faith comunities of other religions and philosophies or else in nothing. And we just listened to them and in that to God's heart for what they represent and the best ways to missionally 'incarnate' in order to share the love of Christ.

Food Mission

I went out last night with 'K' to spend the evening with some old friends. 'K' used to work with the wife of this couple and like old friends who hadn't seen each other for years (the price of living interstate) we caught up as though we'd been apart for just a week. But that's not the story that I want to tell in this post.

We went to this small but groovey cafe in the outer north eastern suburbs of Melbourne. I could never of found the place if these friends hadn't guided us there. In fact, even with their clear directions we still had to call them on the cell phone twice to find it and in the end 'H' had to stand out on the road and wave us down!

So this cafe is in a small lane that is too small to even get named in the Melways but we go in and the owner shakes us by the hand and welcomes us in. We sat down out the back in an area that could take 15 people at a squeeze. The deck next to that could comfirtably take 8 (no more). Oh and there is the area round the bar that could take another 10 (maybe). So it is imtimate enough for the owner to greet everyone and call them by name for the rest of the night. I suspect that if I went back in a week he'd still remember me.

And the food and drinks menu was enticing. No 'main means' just groovey ante-pastas, cheeses, dips, samosas, etc. And a simple but alternative wine list. We got there at 6.45 (finally) and it was quite empty. I wondered if it was going to close. But the 4 of us settled into a great time of catching up and freaking out because while 'K' and I are facing the joys of parenthood these friends (who are not much older then us) are becoming grandparents!!!

We must have been deeply engaged in conversation for an hour or so because when I looked up I noticed that there were now about 20 people in the cafe and another 10 outside where they could smoke. There were 3 x 35 years olds catching up. There was a 50 year old bloke drinking a red wine and reading the paper, clearly enjoying being in a 'community space'. Other groups chatting away... and this happens every night there.

So here we were in a hard to find place that was found by plenty of people whop just like to 'hang out' together in a community space and relate. It was wonderful and reminded me about the time a couple of years ago that I was outside of Christchurch in NZ. Fraser the Scottish Youth Pastor took me to a pub where I experienced the same thing on a freezing Winter's afternoon. A whole bunch of locals watching the rugby together.

And then we went to a cafe down the road that provided coffee and dancing. Saturday afternoon and people were practicing the tango! I found out later on, that this place was a church and on Sunday afternoons they worship together. Exciting possibilities for a missional church.

A Bit of Fun!

Thanks to Steve Taylor at Emergent Kiwi for posting this one... Make sure you don't do this if the boss is paying you to work!

http://www.eoiweb.com/EFL/snakes_and_ladders/snakes_and_ladders.htm

Something to Think About

Read and decide whether to laugh or cry... This raises profound ecclesiological (theology of church) and missional issues for me.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16654819%5E28737,00.html

Andrew

One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism

Yesterday was a special day for me as a pastor of our church. We are currently going through a series on being The People of God. It is basically a series on what a missional church is. The series is downloadable at the resources section of the church website... camberwellbaptist.org

Anyway we are looking at the nature of the church as a body. This is one of Paul's dominant metaphors for the church and is often used today when we say 'The Body of Christ'. That, as I explained, is drawing on ancient understandings and values for the body (think ancient Greece think Olympics, think Plato); on the incarnate and eventually crucified body of our Lord; and highlited in the eating of the bread in communion.

This is the context for the passage that we looked at (1 Cor 12: 12-14) which refers back to 1 Cor 10:17 where the word loaf is used. A part of the message about a body is unity in diversity... you know... hands need feet, feet need eyes, etc. And they all make up a whole, unified body. And then in 12:13 there is this literary parallell that uses an interplay on the words drink and baptism. It is referring to our imersion into Christ by our baptism which is marked by the Spirit (who is the only one who really knows our inclusion or otherwise in Christ). So that is all standard, orthodox Christian biblical stuff.

But what do you say when you are a Baptist church that draws it's very name from this subject? Therefore baptism is an important subject to us that refers to what is sometimes called a sacrament. It is also referring to our identity. Our forebears' sometimes died for this conviction... an adult believer's baptism by full imersion in water. But what if there are many members of your congregation who were christened as children or infants or sprinkled as believing adults? Should/can they be members of the local Baptist church?

Well this was opened up for us yesterday by me! I didn't want to go there but this passage clearly calls us to be united in our baptism so we have to look at it. There are people in our church from Presbyterian, Methodist, Anglican and Catholic traditions. Can they become members of our church? Do they have to be baptised 'our way'? Sounds a bit arrogant to deny many of their previous baptisms, especially if their conscience is asking them not to be what would be for the a 're-baptism'. Second baptisms are not kosher in Christian doctrine. Is it right for them to be involved, giving and loved parts of our church but not allowed to vote at member's meetings just because of the tradition from which they came?

Anyway the day was special because some of the older members of our church who have been life members of the Baptist tradition came up to me one by one and independantly encouraged me for sticking to the scriptures above even Baptist tradition! Good on em! Their passion for God's Word and for the mission of the Gospel in today's changing world was a great encouragement to me. I hope I'm like that if I get to their age and stage.

But what do you think about this passage and baptismal traditions? My message fleshes this out a lot more if you wanted some background on this.

shalom,

Andrew

Back Down the Mountain

Had a great time up the mountain. For those of you who live in Melbourne and have never spent time at Pallotti College in Millgrove in the Warburton Valley I thoroughly recommend it as a great place for silence and refreshment. It is run by a Catholic order called the Pallentine Order (named after their founder, Italian, Vincent Pallotti). It is just a beautiful, peaceful place with sweeping views over the valley. Why do the Catholic's always choose the high ground with the best views?

I didn't know the others on this retreat but we soon became collegues and friends. Geoff Pound the principal at Whitley College led us through some reflective questions and exercises about our previous theological training, mentors, formation, hopes, dreams and relationships. There was good opportunity for sharing and personal reflection. A great time and one I appreciated greatly...

Which brings me to a question that I have been comtemplating for quite a while. How can this be created for people who live busy lives in the city and can't necessarily take 24 hours out of their schedule like I did? Mum's, dads, students, workers, housebound, citybound?

Here are some ideas I have that we can all do...

1. Take the lunch break to sit in a park and pray, journal or meditate on similar themes.
2. Get a few friends together for a night of reflection and sharing on similar themes.
3. Practice praying through a daily office like David Adam's Celtic Daily Prayer.
4. Walk early in the morning (get a dog if necessary!).
5. Use meditative CD's.
6 Journal.
7. Go to an old church that is open through the day for private contemplation.
8. Purposely sit in a busy shopping mall and read the Bible. Feel the juxtaposition between the modern, consumer forces upon you and the ancient truth of God's Word.

Any others out there?

Andrew

Up the Mountain

Well I am off on a retreat for 24 hours with the other 6 people who are getting ordained in November and the Whitley College Princpal, who is running the time. I'm looking forward to getting to know them and the chance to have 24 hours of reflection and P & Q!.

It make me think again about what ordination is for a Baptist? I mean, we do believe in the idea of the Priesthood of All Believers. This means that we don't need a priest to get through to God but we each have access through the work of Christ. That's why we don't have confessionals in our churches... you can go direct to God or by confessing to another believer and it doesn't have to be me. So why do we have ordination?

I guess it is a recognition that God calls some people to servant leadership in a full-time vocational sense and that there should be some quality controls about who and why as well as some levels of Biblical, theological, pastoral, leadership knowledge in the candidate. Afterall, we expect plumbers, doctors, nurses, lawyers, hairdressers, accountants, carpenters, etc. to be trained and accredited by their professional organisations. How much more important is it for those given a pastoral leadership amongst people's lives? I am committed to the notion that there should be a formal process for accreditation of pastors by denominations and wider systems or the whole thing is just up for abuse. I've seen too many example of these personalities who dodge the system and are loose cannons.

My path to ordination has not been a 'typical one' but I expect as I listen to the stories of the others there that none of the will be 'typical' either. My path has taken me through 2.5 theological degrees (a BMin, a MMin and now a DMin) and I was mentored by several key people who each have made a major effect on my life and ministry, each in quite different ways. And of course my ministry at Crossway, Marshmead and in Adelaide (at Burleigh and with the SABU) were major experiences. I am grateful for each of them.

What elements do you think should be in an ordination process?

Trinitarian Worship

Continuing on the discussion about the Trinity here is a great post that will help you think a little deeper about what worship is about:

http://maggidawn.typepad.com/maggidawn/2004/07/ten_minutes_on_.html

cheers and happy reading

Andrew

114 Reasons

Three motivations for living missionally! A vision of God. A vision of Christ and a vision for the world. But 114 resons on our 114th church anniversary! I was personally challenged to the bottom of my socks with the message that we heard on Sunday from my own pulpit! But it wasn't me preaching. It was someone with 55 years more experience (and a couple of doctorates to boot!).

Sunday's message had it all! (For those who didn't hear it you can do so on www.camberwellbaptist.org - Just go to the messages section and you can stream it or download it).

I guess the power of the message is in the messenger and when it is in a person who has been a pastor for 70 years of continuous ministry, you ignore it at your peril! Rev Dr Geoff Blackburn is just such a person. He took his first church in 1935! and has been faithfully serving God in local, state, national and international forums ever since. He is a statesman but also a faithful servant and member of our own church.

So how do we respond? Where do we start? I've got my ideas but what do some other think?

Shalom in the City

I have been doing a lot of thinking about the message on Sunday. We had a visiting guest speaker, Mark Lau Branson (a professor from Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, CA) give a message out of Luke 10:1-16. It is the passage where Jesus sends out the 70 (actually 72 is the better translation). Now I have had a 'head's up' on extended time in this passage because we spent an hour each morning as a class when I was at my cohort classes in January at Fuller in it. But it still challenges me and takes me to new levels of reflection!

Mark told an amazing story on Sunday... of an artist from his church who had been robbed at gun point and who used that as a 'door' into the brokenness of her community. She was fishing for the ones to who Jesus shalom could be made known. The same people who Jesus says that the Kingdom is inbreaking for through (in him) in Isa 61. And I have been reflecting on the powers of this world and how they subtly grab hold of us and take us captives to the thoughts and mindsets of this world, rather the the liberty and freedom that we can have through following Jesus.

Jesus sent these people out into a dangerous world and taught them how to incarnate naturally into local communities (ie. don't take a suitcase full of stuff which gives away the fact that you are a newcomer to that village). And he taught them how to offer shalom to those that took them in and how to avoid others. In short, Jesus was teaching them about the powers that were in operation of that day (ie, culture, the Roman Empire, Jewish selling out through Herod, etc). So I started thinking about the powers today that capture us/me and inhibit us from shalom and the offering of it to our city? Because, surely our presence here should announce that shalom (Acts 2:47).

Two things about Love

As I look deeply into Paul's famous 'love' passage in 1 Corinthians 13 I see that there are two actions that love compels. Paul says that 'love is patient, love is kind'. Gordan Fee says of this that Paul is doing two things here:

1. He is referring to the two responses that love compels. First, patience is translated in the King James Version of the Bible as 'suffereth long'. Sometimes in the name of love we are powerless to do anything but 'suffereth long'. Second, The other thing that Paul says about love is that it is kind. Kindness speaks of 'taking action', often in a compassionate fashion. So, love compels us to either: wait or take action as ambassadors of Christ. We can trust the Holy Spirit to guide us in both contexts.

2. But on a deeper level these two 'love responses' are symbolic of God's actions for us. They are actually what he has done for us. He waited and withheld what we deserved and then he acted through the sending of his son, Jesus Christ. Read John 3:16! Wow!

Which Theologian are you most like?

This survey described me as this?

Who are you like?


You scored as Karl Barth.


The daddy of 20th Century theology. You perceive liberal theology to be a disaster and so you insist that the revelation of Christ, not human experience, should be the starting point for all theology.

60%
Karl Barth

60%
Jurgen Moltmann

53%
Friedrich Schleiermacher

53%
John Calvin

53%
Charles Finney

53%
Martin Luther

47%
Augustine

40%
Paul Tillich

27%
Jonathan Edwards

Check it out at: www.quizfarm.com

What I Learned at Kinder Today!

Every Wednesday I spend the mid-morning with the four year-olds at our kindergarten. It is a cool time where we sing songs, I tell stories and we pray together. Today I gave them a paraphrased version of Luke 10:25-37, 'The Parable of the Good Samaritan' and then asked them to tell me what it meant.

We all know that Jesus said that it was kids who most 'got' the Kingdom of God. Us adults are the ones to justify, modify and rationalise things beyind the point of recognition of their origional meaning. Not these four year olds. They got it.

One replied, "Andrew, that's easy... We are meant to care for people who need help." I asked the rest of the group if they agreed. They did (although a couple of them thought Spiderman and Batman also helped the police when they needed help!). And I thought to myself as I walked out, "It is that simple! Jesus 'helped and helps us' and we are to do the same to others. That is what will tansform our community from its anxiety driven consumerism and fear of 'the other'. That is what the community will never despise the church for... "Out of the mouths of babes..."

Perfect Community: Our Example

On Sunday we explored the nature of the Trinity (Father, Son and Holy Spirit). As we looked into the interconnectedness of the three members we saw that material examples of the Trinity like an egg (shell, yoke & white) or a triangle or water (in the forms of ice, liquid and steam) while helpful were insufficient because they didn;t help us with the aspect of fellowship.

For the relational aspect of the Trinity we dug into Eastern Christian thought. I held up my Russian wedding ring and we saw how the three rings were interconnected, unseperably. That is our example of what we need to become if we are going to follow Christ and be his example to the watching and waiting world. Six things stood out to me about the Trinity that we should 'live by or die by' in our church:

1. Fellowship/Relationship
2. Generosity of heart
3. Joy in Service
4. Mission orientation
5. Trust and Confidence in each member
6. Unity in Diversity

Indeed an exciting and great vision for us as we live into the Biblical narrative as God's People in Camberwell.

Andrew