I had a conversation with a student just yesterday which has had me thinking. We started out by talking about church and modernity and Paul and Corinth and how Paul subverted the political and social structures of Corinth (heavy I know). He was asking how do we as the church subvert the structures of modernity... I had a bit of a chuckle to myself as I explained to him that in actual fact the church was one of the pillars of modernity... we are looked upon as one of the structures that has set up and maintained the modern approach to life for a very long time, funny really when you think about what modernity stands for and where it comes from etc, you would think we would all be rushing to leave it behind, but no we aren't, well some of us are. And that was really his question. As we talked what we realised we needed to be asking was "So how do we subvert church?" How do we make church something that is not a pillar of modernity, rather something that (dare I say it) is truly post-modern in its approach to community, being, and spirituality. (A scary thought I know).
We always talk about what church should be like and I think that many of us have a good handle on some of the ideals of how postmodern, Christian church should operate, or, rather, what postmodern, Christian relationships should look like. BUT (and it is a big BUT) I don't think many of us have any idea how to BE someone who makes this happen. How to even BE what we are hoping the church will become. Hence the question, "How do we BE what we are meant to BE?"
You will notice I haven't defined what we are meant to be, that's because we always define it, and I don't think we are meant to be the definers! Therefore in the very act of defining it we are undermining what we are actually meant to BE... here-in lies the difficulty of postmodernity and spirituality and many other things. So the question for me has moved from "What are we meant to BE", I would lke to leave that open, to "How do we BE what we are meant to BE". And perhaps, what we are meant to BE is very different for me and my student and for you also.
Is this just nonsense?
Let me put some real life in there. This particular student gets frustrated at the lack of commitment of many of his classmates to the Scriptures and to their own personal search for truth (I can relate to that, both sides). He loves to seek and explore and study the Word (very comendable). He also tells me that church should be a place where people come into real relationship across boundaries etc etc... all the stuff we all know it should be. However, I then asked him "so what did you and your little group of friends (there are three or four of them who are quite tight) do to create that kind of place in the college community here at BCNZ all of last year? What is one thing you did that made a difference, any or all af you? He had to admit that they had not done a heck of a lot... in fact none of them had done anything at all! Typical hypocritical Christian attitude (we both agreed and confessed to that, maybe not in those words).
You see the thing about our community is that it is multicultural (European, P.I., Maori, and Asins from a variety of countries) BUT the students don't integrate as well as him and I would both like to see. Also our community is interdenominational (baptist, anglican, presbyterian, pentecostals, charasmatics, independant churches, bretheren, AOG etc), our community has people from city and country and representatives from many different theological backgrounds and perspectives, we have x cons, and recovering alcoholics (generally well into a clean period), we have young and old, married and single, conservatives and not so conservatives and all of these live together eveery day (and some stay at night as well), and all of these come together to study, and most of these know (or have a fair idea) what church is supposed to be BUT few of these are actually being it! When you scratch below the surface of "keeping up Christian appearances" division is often more real than connection or relationship.
So here again is my question...
HOW DO WE BE?
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5 comments:
As well as all the other dicussions that go own about how we "do church", I can't help but wonder what church would be like if it was mainly about hearing and responding to scripture.
Hi Dave. Great blog, I love where you're coming from. I'm doing youth ministry in Stratford (yeah Naki... you know me I used to cruise up to BBB a bit, had an affro to match yours!!)...
But yeah we trying to suss out a plan of attack for this year and to me it's all about getting the actual gospel across to them because it amazed me last year when we did "Quest" and so many of them had no comprehension of what the cross actually means...
And I so know what you're talking about - it's so much about what's right and wrong - don't have sex, don't do drugs, etc. etc. but it needs to be more about how do we understand what it is do be human - why don't we do these things, and how else does having a Christian worldview affect how we live our life - how we identify and pursue our calling in God, and yes how we subvert society - and how we do church in a way that is authentic...
My desire is that our youth are able to engage with what Christ has taught us about how to live, how he's empowered us to do that through trhe incernation, atonement and resurrection, and how we do that along with every other Christian with whom we are called...
Re: modernity I think there are certainly strengths of modernity that can be attributed to the church, such as the modern work ethic, submission to authority, commitment to peace and order, and conviction of truth. We have to be careful not to postmodernise church so far that church loses the ability to speak critically to postmodern culture - to relativism, hedonism, and to the worship of youthfulness and casualness and the predominance of apathy...
Keep up the writing and asking these questions that so need to asked.
Garreth, personally I thikn church could be a lot more fun if we just told the stories of Scripture, and I love good times!
A.J. this is what pisses me off, that so many young people, raised in Christian families, have no concept of what the cross is about and little understandingof the story at all. Thewn they come to our youth group or bible study or whatever and the church expects youth workers (in one hour a week) to teach them everything and make sure they have a good time and stay out or trouble, and tidy their rooms and change their undies as well! Not gonna happen.
I like your comments about modernity and postmodernity etc.
Just a thought... all those people in the church and the churches themselves that are the objects of critique are probably 'being' as they know how to 'be'.
Hence, I think such discussions should be taken with grace for those people who are 'being'. Their 'being' may not align with view of the way they should be 'being' but that is the way they read it...
hence my challenge is, 'how can we have this very important, good and necessary discussion without 'being' critical graceless people who in their pursuit of authentic 'being' fall into the trap of wandering around with logs in their eyes?'
Also... can we all stop clumping 'the church' into huge boxes of modernity etc? I mean, there is a heaven of a lot of authenticity in the churches I have been in... however, there is a lot of what I perceive to be inauthenticity and failure as well... I am appealing I suppose for balance? Am I misguided, I know I am ranting!
Hmmm, clumping the church into huge boxes of modernity... I don't know if I can stop, I guess it is one of the issues. While I don't want to accept everything about post-modernity and I certainly don't endorse all it's ideals as being the answer for church, I still think that the church has mostly clumped itself in with modernity! The ideals of modernity are often what drive church life and practice... and perhaps some theology. Take for example management structures, and even biblical interpretation (you may have some thoughts here Mark) where the science of literary analysis seems to be what drives churches understanding of scriptre. I know this is changing at the academic level but I still think we often approach Scripture with the idea that we can figure out it's code or it's secret message and find the answer... that is a modern mindset. And, I am not willing to throw out all of that either, I just think that at the moment the church reflects modernity far too much.
But yes Mark, you are right, there are some brilliant people in the church, some amazing Christians with genuine hearts but, do they typify church goers? I don't know? For years we have talked about 'pew warmers' and the like and I think we must acknowledge that there is still an issue there, do you really think they 'are probably 'being' as they know how to 'be'.'
I certainly don't want to be ungracious and don't want to have a log in my own eye, which is why the original post was made in the context of a conversation with a student and me. We are both trying to work this out for ourselves... we are both trying to drag the log out of our own eye, so to speak.
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