What is a church anyway?

Writing and reading all we’ve posted here so far, has got me thinking… why do we persevere with this?  What is it for… what are we acheiving, and who is God?

So much of what we do in churches just seems to reflect very average human behaviour and intentions…   so what’s the  point… what are we doing it for?

After spending most of yesterday loading what could only be described as car offal:  oily grimy spare parts for my brother’s drift cars, and spares for his wifes car into trucks and then a storage container in epping, I had a delicious sleep in, and missed church.  Regretted being absent only because it means I haven’t checked in lately to continue this conversation… this dialogue between us and the institution that is asking one simple question:  Why do we still bother with this relationship?  Why do I still come here, when my heart is so weary of it all?

And then, as I was kicking mulch back over the hole in the garden bed where the builder next-door’s truck had once again missed the drive and crushed my little, defenseless plants, (argh!!!) my neighbour wandered past on his way back from church (the same church).

We chatted for a good half hour about his friends and how they are going with drug rehab, and how various individuals at the church have funny reactions to discovering that some of them had ‘got back on’ ie were using drugs again…  and I felt excited and empassioned about change, and love, and the idea that there is a God who cares for the weak, the broken, the downtrodden, people with addictions, people with pain.  Still, I dispair of the middle class institution that is ‘church’ ever understanding how it could help better, if only it would give up its perceptions of safety, security, structure, and righteousness…

But I have hope…   faith…  and love…   not in the institution or its capacity to create change, but in those sentiments alone…  and their power to create change, not in crowds, but in individuals…  in this, I see God.

I can’t understand why we get so hung up on whether someone is a lover, or a fudge-packer, or a rug-muncher, or a cross dresser, or a porn addict, as though goshing and gasping at these things makes us righteous.  It’s like we have a social obligation to say “Oh my, how could one ever be that” in order to distance ourselves from being assosciated with “those people”. 

I’m prejudiced against money-lovers, status-chasers, power-brokers, people with ‘leadership aspirations’ and ‘charismatics’. To me these are the real sins.  And all the middle-class christians go “ah he hates Hillsong”. No.  But I do hate when people think Hillsong is the national model of what church should be, and I have reason to believe the leadership at Hillsong hate this too…  which is an interesting thought.

Why is it so conveninent for churches to discuss current affairs as:
- gay marriage
- atomic (sorry nuclear) family
- political postions that take power from the right-wing

and so difficult for churches to discuss:
- environmental sustainability
- HIV Aids management including contraceptives
- fair-trade, and not just through little church-club mission groups
- environmental sustainability
- sexual abuse and human rights issues in Australia (ie its convenient to pretend it all happens in ‘mission’ places)
- environmental sustainability

It’s as though we are happy to be edgy as long as its safe…   and we’re happy to tolerate our young people being edgy and watching nooma videos, as long as they do it in an appropriate context, go about it the right way, and don’t really rock the boat.  Lip-service to serious change, but never enough to stem the tide of boring, mainstream mediocrity.

One thing I keep learning whether its improving my rock-climbing skills (currently at an all-time low) or getting a new job, is that its not sufficient just to want change…   you have to want it bad enough to do what it takes.  I think this is the basic premise that life-coaches use to help people attain things…  work on the want!

I want my faith back…  I want to believe in a God who doesn’t care about gender or sexuality, but cares desperately about abuse, misuse and addiction, about soulfulness, kindness, and generosity, about beauty and peace and harmony,  about decay, germination, and growth. Can this God be found in the bible?

Entertaining and Enlightening links, relating to the conversation thus far…

To all who have commented and added to the conversation so far, thanks heaps, and drop back soon.  In the meantime I have some links for your enjoyment and thinking…

Satirical stories about revival:

“The Revival” on Rowland Croucher’s Blog
“Mississipi Squirrel Revival” Song Lyrics also at JMM – worth a read if you’ve ever watched people convulsing with “the spirit” and wondered if perhaps it wasn’t quite authentic… was it in fact a squirrel?

Gay and Lesbian acceptance/intollerance in pentecostal churches:

Why Aussie Pentecostals Will Embrace GLBT People.   An Article by Anthony Venn-Brown on Freedom 2b[e]- Well worth a read, regardless of your POV on the topic… its encouraging if you are pro-change… and if you’re anti-gay, this article might make you very uncomfortable… but you should certainly read it!

Also, Anthony Venn-Brown’s blog…   his book is very revealing, and well worth a read, again, regardless of your POV.

A Different Way of thinking about Church:

Steve sent me this link on facebook. There’s a lot of Christian “language” involved… but behind that, there’s a very different philosophy visible. Plus, aesthetically speaking its very future-friendly.

If anyone else has valuable links, feel free to comment them below!

Why I hate the word ”Revival”:

Recently an intelligent sounding gent from the US visited the church I’ve been attending.  He talked to us about “The Cycle of Revival”. There wasn’t anything particularly wrong with what he had to say, it all seemed fair enough, and well sourced etc.

I just don’t care! 

Years of talk about revival have left me with an entirely different perspective on the meaning of the word….   revival of what… for whom?

Everything I’ve experienced under the banner of Revival, has been about getting an ‘expert’ in from overseas to sell some new program that the church is about to embark upon.  Not that all new programs are bad…  often they are a great opportunity to start doing what we’ve been avoiding for years.  But the ones I’ve seen under the banner of revival, have been about submitting more… serving more…  not the community, but the leadership of the church.

If revival is just about sitting around talking about how much more spiritual we can be…    I’m not interested.  I’m going to go back to loving the disadvantaged and vulnerable people in my life, and when everyone else is done having a revival, they are welcome to join me.

Sloganisation of faith…

Recently I was browsing through facebook on my phone, and noticed something called i58 that lots of my friends in christian communities seem to be mentioning.  What is this, I asked myself.

Is it a new christian rap effort, like Tree 63?
Or perhaps some kind of electronic gizmo that I haven’t seen yet?

So I went looking…   and all I could google was:
this:                       http://www.i58.com.au/
and this:              http://activatechurch.wordpress.com/2010/04/28/i58/

Now I actually really like what this appears to be about…  but it still  irked me a fair bit… 

Why does everything have to have a name, a slogan, and an image…   and if it does… why do we get so tangled up in our names, slogans and images?

I know the world runs on branding and brand power…  but I guess I was secretly hoping that faith, and the church might run on relationships and people power, and on the merits of a good set of values.   Maybe I’m a total fool?

So anyway from what I gather, its about social justice and community intervention work…  which I see as important stuff.  Crucial Stuff, even fundamental stuff…   if  the church is…  Christian…   in that sort-of obvious sense of following christ.  I just don’t know why it has to be a huge paradigm shift, with branding and slogans.

I wish we could just get on with caring about our community, and loving people, and being compasionate and engaged in life, without the need for some bulk identity.  

Maybe I missed something, but I feel as though get my identity from who I am in relationships with friends and family and my community, and I don’t need a brand or a slogan on my shirt to know my place or my value.

Pentecostalism – Alive, or Abusive?

             I’ve recently been reflecting on the kind of Pentecostal Christianity that I grew up around, and so much of it seems very drab and murky.  So many of the things that my pastors, friends, and family thought were “amazing” and “dynamic” when I was a kid, suddenly seem quite dark and innapropriate.

              Maybe you disagree?  Maybe you’ve experienced something similar?

              I remember at my Parent’s church one time, the senior pastor was praying for me – I was going through some normal teen angst, and because my family are all university educated, and I was interested in furthering my study, I reckon he got a bit nervous about it all, anyway he decided to have a little bit of a stab in the dark, to see if I was possessed by a ‘spirit of intellectualism’, so he proceeds to start using the lingo (language) that pastors use when they are drifting into deliverance ministry, naming the spirit “I speak against any spirit of intellectualism…  by the blood of Jesus…. ” etc. etc.   

               If you’ve experienced or seen anything like this you’re probably going “mmmmhmm…”   and if you haven’t you’re probabaly going “what-the…”  by now. 

                So, having seen all this play out before, I “knew” if I was possesed then I was supposed start convulsing on the floor…. but honestly, I just didn’t really feel like it.  Once I got over the initial temptation to pretend to “manifest” as a joke, because it all seemed so absurd…  I started to realise, the senior pastor of my church was intimidated by my choice to further my studies…   everything began to come unravelled for me from that point forth…  and it wasn’t long before I politely made an exit, and found a new place to hang out.  This is a snippet, and there’s sure more to my story than this…   but a lot of my experience of  pentecostal churches has been like this.

In the Beginning…

God created the world.  Apparently.  Everything after that is hotly debated.  For our present purpose, I have just created this Blog, and as yet it contains very little thought or information.  Deep down, somewhere close to my heart…  like a clot in an artery waiting to lodge somewhere, is the urge to create this blog…  not so much as a way to force my views on the world, as it is, I hope an opportunity to provoke, and then permit discussion and dialogue, in ways, and in a context that has not previously been possible.

My hope is that it will become an open, moderated blog, rather than a closed monologue.  Of course, I intend to shape it… guide it, and I hope nurture it, into being a safe place for all, or at least certain kinds of expression.  I want guests, and I want my guests to post things, and to feel able to debate content…  but I will also be the benevolent dictator of this, as yet unknow empire of one.

Hopefully, in time it will either do its task, and vanish, or continue in its task and become self moderating. Time will tell.

 Tim