Thursday, March 5, 2009

What the church may look like?

It seems that I have created a series of blogs. It was asked of my last post basically what would this look like according to worship, community, architecture, administration, staffing, volunteer, service; and then there is the values that would need to be addressed. I will attempt my best at addressing these yet it should remain in the fore-front that this is a very large range of topics for discussion; therefore I will not be exhaustive.


The first issue is that this new imagination of church begins within the two aspects of worship and community. It is a community that worships, primarily speaking. What this is not then is a community that can gather and never have a real effect on each other. In American life today, a person can have such a fragmented life and generally the common church does nothing nor has realized the resource of overcoming this fragmentation. The fragmentation can be seen in how we can classify our friends; these are my bowling friends; these are my softball friends; these are my fishing buddies; and my church friends. This means that the church needs to become a more primary aspect of the Christian lives. There is also this aspect of volunteerism that needs to be countered. I am not going to unpack that term but what I am trying to say is that there needs to be some real honest, committed people to each other to go through the thick and the thin.


As for the architecture, I am torn and am not done trying to figure this aspect out. I went and listened to an Armenian Apostolic church father speak about his church’s liturgy. We were in the sanctuary of his church and it was one of the most theologically beautiful things that I have seen. Everything had its place and symbolic meaning; meaning that the space was holy. Likewise, I seen churches function the space out of a functionality mode where most everything was changeable and movable, to allow multiple uses for the space.


The staffing structure would have to become different as well, I think. The CEO-type of leadership just does not fit and makes us Christians unconsciously think that we are a non-profit organization which means hence a business. The church is not a business. Likewise the idea of volunteers has to change. When I clean my own house or do something to further my family along the path of life, I am not volunteering my time. This goes for the church as well. If we are a business then, yes, volunteers are necessary for the non-profit to function. If we are going to think of ourselves differently then we need to describe what we do differently. It’s sort of like being at home with my children when my wife leaves. I am not babysitting though a babysitter would do essentially the same thing. It is just different. What we do as Christians in church is different than volunteering my time with a secular community program.


Service becomes a way of life. We tend to think of our lives in compartments and service/good deeds become another compartment. We should be gathered in such a way that provides us to live a life of service. We should have a way of life in the church that provides safety to a person who may lose a job because he or she went above and beyond the traditional modes of service and hospitality. I have seen only glimpses of this in my life, yet the church has the resources to achieve this way of life.


Finally, there may not be one way that this church will look like, because all people are different and all places are different, therefore the churches will be gathering under different circumstances. It is like saying that if we were in Russia right now talking about this, my whole article would be different because there are different ideals and ways of life that we would be different from.


Though I do not have tangible community for this, I would say that I hear that congregations in places are trying to become something like this. I would say that some sort of contemporary monastic-type of look will take place, and that I intend to bring my future congregation or life to witness to this.

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

the church's response to the thread

In my previous post, I spoke briefly about the thread of culture that runs through the tapestry of America. This thread was summarized by democratic and capitalistic values that create a rabid individualism. I want to address that there may be a response to this from the Church which is the Body of Christ.

Generally speaking, regardless of what cultures we are talking about, when they are found in America and the clashes are happening on this land, the basic presuppositions that they need to have is that basic democratic, capitalistic, individualism. Therefore, the clashes are really not clashes at all but a different way of articulating the same thing. Its six to one, half a dozen to another.

What I am saying is that the Church actually has the resources and story to overcome and become a real alternative to the democratic, capitalistic, individualism of America. Now, in my experience of overhearing conversations about such, there seems to be this lack of imagination among the participants of the conversation, namely the parties that may like being a democratic, capitalistic, individual. It seems that there are only two other options to being a democratic, capitalistic, individual; a socialist or a communist.

I am not saying that the Church needs to become either of these options and in fact, saying that these are the only two other options to a democratic, capitalistic, individualistic lifestyle exemplifies a lack of imagination. A lack of imagination that hinders people from seeing the Church as it really is, a political enterprise unto itself. I suppose the American Republicanism ideal has some of the blame for this, for the effects of this cause has blinded us. We no longer see the Church but as an aggregate of like-minded individuals, whereas the Bible story tells us something completely different. The Church is the Body of Christ (found in Romans 12 and 1 Corinthians 12) where we come together as a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, (the Church, not America for America did not exist during New Testament times) a people belonging to God. (1 Peter 2.9)

This means that we can come together and be a people together, a people that does not need to have "rights" to get along. For rights act as a trump in order to protect individuals who no longer can trust one another, in order to live in some sort of proximity of each other (this can be seen with the stories I have read about children divorcing from their parents through a system of rights). Likewise, being the Church gives us the resources that no longer have to force us to chase after the profits and gains of money. Money is still needed for life but it no longer needs to be my money and your money and his money but our money. It is not that we pool ALL of our money together but that we see our money as one avenue for the service of God. This does not mean some of our money but All of it. That means we give to the poor, and we give to those in the Body that need it. Likewise we can have other means for support and security, like depending upon the Body for support of the family and children (widows and orphans: James 1.27) as opposed to life insurances.

Yet, this can only begin to take shape when we gather not as democratic, capitalistic, individuals but as members of the Body of Christ and members of each other, carrying each others burdens (galations 6). Only then will we realize and remember our polity as the Church.

It will be only then that we will begin to find real communion in the midst of freedom.