Imaging and Enacting Heaven on Earth

I wrote this for the church I used to attend.

A single Sunday morning worship service, preferably no later than 10:00, probably would help encourage inquiring newcomers to return and also benefit those of us who like to attend adult bible study.

However, my primary concern is that we at Old Condo Shadows and in all churches offer public worship that reflects and embodies God's incarnation and Self-giving in Jesus Christ, which clearly happens whenever we celebrate a baptism or the Lord's Supper, but it also becomes possible with a carefully constructed order of worship sourced from scripture and history—including our own history here on this mesa.

As Christians, God's people in Jesus Christ, each Sunday is a day of resurrection, a time especially to remember who we are, Whose we are and Who has called us by retelling and re-enacting the meta-narratives of redemption, of deliverance from death to life in the Exodus and Passion/Easter stories within the context of public Lord's day worship; in these stories we find healing memory and discover hope for a free future. As we invite our neighbors and other people who don't have much church experience, we're hoping to meet and to reach them where they are and speak in a language they'll understand, which can be a precarious endeavor. But did God ever call the people of God to live in ways congruent with their local cultures? Or in a radically culturally incongruent, actually counter-cultural manner? Are we presenting inquiring newcomers with a choice, a real alternative to costly and deathly consumerism and related excesses? Are we telling and showing the world something very different from anything they've previously experienced? Do we dare imagine we can domesticate the wildness of Jesus? For sure it is about the ways our lives demonstrate faithfulness and obedience to the God Who covenants with us in Jesus, but it is equally about how together we worship the Crucified and Risen One, and it may require some explanation and interpretation, not only for so-called outsiders but also reminders for the insiders among us. It is strange; in many ways it is wholly "other than", this reality of a people (us!) who already have experienced their first death and their second birth, this reality of seemingly regular, ordinary, everyday people who follow a crucified outcast, trusting the God Whose ultimate word is resurrection from the dead.

Although I didn't grow up even on the periphery of the Church, the texts, colors, music and symbols of the liturgical year gradually came to shape my entire understanding of God's gracious encounter with all creation and God's redeeming work in Jesus Christ, so by the time I started preaching and teaching on a seriously regular basis, I naturally drew upon those understandings. Of course, as a life-long artist I'm very visual about everything!

And again, the church's historical liturgy is deeply rooted, not only in the practice of the early church (when to be ecclesia still was far more political and cultural than it was religious or theological), but also in the worship of God's people we first knew as Israelites and later as Jews. One of the many strengths of retaining some aspects of historical forms is the way those words and actions connect us vertically with the people of God in every place and time and also horizontally connect us here at OCS to the contemporary Church and churches around the world. Of course, the way of Jesus is comprehensive, but retaining historical liturgical practices helps move us out from our own concerns as individuals to the demands of the gospel for political and social justice and advocacy, something I don't see or feel happening nearly enough (anywhere, actually). By the way, our liturgy classes in seminary were team-taught, not only because I attended an ecumenical seminary but also because we can learn so much from other styles and traditions.

A few words about the assurance of pardon: needless to say we all sin far too frequently, but the rite of confession, pardon, absolution isn't nearly as much about announcing the fact our lives again have fallen far short of God's demands along with our need for grace and forgiveness as it is an opportunity to reflect upon God's claims on our lives in this community and in the world. Possibly it better could be expressed as a proclamation or assurance of our reconciliation to God, one another and all creation in Jesus Christ.

I'm asking questions rather than offering answers, and I'll conclude by asking if our presence in our neighbors' lives and in the world beyond this corner of Paradise can be partly in our own world, partly in our neighbors', and wholly in the sovereignty of heaven? Can our Sunday worship reflect such a way of life? There are no easy, instant answers, and we'll need to anticipate a lot more changes as the months unfold.

Worship Notes

Worship notes, etc. Saturday 26 April 2008

Since I'm playing once again at another church that once again is without an organist, I won't be at Sunday's potluck and discussion, so I'd like to say a little more today. Thanks for all the thoughts and ideas, everyone; Pastor M, thanks for this opportunity!

Like previous posters, I enjoy the lively energy of the music at the first service, and I love singing those songs. I also love playing arrangements of them on the piano—during the year plus I played keyboards for the Heritage Service, I always and inevitably played a setting of a contemporary praise song for the offering.

I particularly resonate with the comments by PB and LAW, but in the interest of posting this and possibly even getting it read, I won't specifically say anything about their remarks, but will offer a few more of my own.

Before I continue talking about this subject I'm so passionate about, I'll admit I don't know how many folks in this congregation besides LAW, PB, and the Sunday adult Bible study group know much about my background. I won't go into the long Pauline-style list of credentials, etc., or even the extensive list of Pauline-style shipwrecks and related disasters, but I'll mention that in fall 2000 I returned to SD after serving on staff at a church in North County before venturing back to the east coast to serve a term call there for an inner-city congregation, coupled with entering the candidacy process for ordination to ministry of word and sacrament and concurrently beginning an MDiv program.

In September 2000 it looked as if I might be in SD for only a year; there was about a 20/80 chance I had a PT position to return to in Boston starting the following September. Although the entire situation fell through, that possibility excited me because in addition to serving an inner-city church as worship specialist I'd have been developing new liturgical forms that still would focus on Word and Sacrament in a fully participatory manner, and in a highly multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, multi-everything setting…

Although I didn't grow up even on the periphery of the Church, the texts, colors, music, and symbols of the liturgical year gradually came to shape my entire understanding of God's gracious encounter with creation and God's redeeming work in Jesus Christ, so by the time I started preaching and teaching on a seriously regular basis, I naturally drew upon those understandings. Of course, as a life-long artist I'm very visual about everything!

And again, the church's historical liturgy is deeply rooted, not only in the practice of the early church (when to be ecclesia still was far more political and cultural than it was religious or theological), but also in the worship of God's people we first knew as Israelites and later as Jews. One of the many strengths of retaining some aspects of historical forms is the way those words and actions connect us vertically with the people of God in every place and time and also horizontally connect us here at NPC to the contemporary Church and churches around the world.

The way of Jesus is comprehensive, but retaining historical liturgical practices helps move us out from our own concerns as individuals to the demands of the gospel for political and social justice and advocacy, something I don't see or feel happening nearly enough (anywhere, actually).

A few words about the assurance of pardon: needless to say we all sin far too frequently, but the rite of confession, pardon, absolution isn't as much about announcing the fact our lives again have fallen far short of God's demands along with our need for grace and forgiveness as it is an opportunity to reflect upon God's claims on our lives in this community and in the world. Possibly it better could be expressed as a proclamation or assurance of our reconciliation to God, one another, and all creation in Jesus Christ.

Our liturgy classes in seminary were team-taught. That was because I attended an ecumenical seminary and because we can learn so much from other styles and traditions. Yes, I do understand all this is developing and evolving at NPC and everywhere else, but I'd be very happy to work together with Pastor M. and anyone else to write some orders of worship, prayers, and responses reflecting our scriptural and confessional grounding and this congregation's history and experience as a people of God in Jesus Christ here on this mesa.

LAW also has a great deal of knowledge and interest in worship and liturgy; given her involvements in church and elsewhere, I don't know to what extent she'd be interested in being part of this possible endeavor. I'm making this offer because of my concern for this congregation as my church community and because of my own need to use my gifts, education, experience, and skills to a far greater degree than I've been able to for the past dozen or more years. I have no regrets about not continuing to serve in authorized, public ministry; I trusted and still believe that choice was consonant with God's call to me and would lead to better stewardship of my life, yet very few of the opportunities I'd anticipated have happened. Besides, it could be résumé fodder for me, and might even form part of a book of worship resources I've imagined writing!

Prayers continue arising to heaven from here; be blessed!

Earth Day 2008

40 years later...

Martin Luther King, Jr., 04 April 1968 - 04 April 2008

amidst tracks of my tears, I had to post (sadly, as of 08 April 1997 now departed from this phase of eternal life) Laura Nyro's song again today; now that the biblical year "40" has arrived, how far we've journeyed yet so far we still have to go, "I can't study war no more" and I so hope you can't, either: take that dream and oh, please, please dare to ride that Dove for the life of the world...may every one of us soon discover grace in this wilderness!

Save the Country

Come on people, come on children
Come on down to the glory river
Gonna wash you up, and wash you down
Gonna lay the devil down, gonna lay that devil down.

I got fury in my soul, fury's gonna take me to the glory goal…
In my mind I can't study war no more.
Save the people! Save the children! Save the country now!

Come on, people! Come on, children!
There's a King at the glory river.
And the precious King, he loved the people to sing;
Babes in the blinkin' sun sang
We Shall Overcome.

I got fury in my soul
Fury's gonna take me to the glory goal…
In my mind I can't study war no more.
Save the people! Save the children! Save the country now!

Come on, people! Come on, children!
Come on down to the glory river
Gonna wash you up and wash you down.
Gonna lay the devil down, gonna lay that devil down.

Come on people! Sons and mothers!
Keep the dream of the two young brothers.
Gonna take that dream and ride that Dove…

We could build the dream with love, I know,
We could build the dream with love, I know,
We could build a dream with love, children,
We could build the dream with love, oh people,
We could build the dream with love, I know,
We could build the dream with love.

I got fury in my soul, fury's gonna take me to the glory goal…
In my mind I can't study war no more.

Save the people! Save the children!
Save the country, save the country,
Save this country now!

–Laura Nyro

Time of the Spirit - Season of the Church

Adult Study Proposal | Early Summer 2008

In a special emphasis on the Pentecostal reign of the Spirit, in 3 class sessions we'll investigate selected texts from Galatians; Acts, Ephesians and Colossians, particularly in terms of our identity as a people uniquely constituted by Jesus' death and resurrection. We'll explore concepts of gracism and inclusion and consider a Christus Victor atonement model of Jesus' triumph over the pretense, dehumanization and violence of Roman imperial rule.

The congregation at Galatia was the first ethnic church; we need to become more aware of our own conscious and unconscious cultural and other attachments that lead to our living and proclaiming either more than our less than the gospel. As Martin Luther insists, worship and hymn-singing in the vernacular is a mark of the true Church; we also need to contextualize, cast into local vernacular (but there's not just one!) our outreach to our neighbors. How can we fully bring others into our congregation's life of worship, witness and service and also graciously receive their gifts of hospitality when they invite us closer to the centers of their worlds?

In his books Multicultural Ministry: finding your church's unique rhythm and Gracism: The Art of Inclusion, David A. Anderson, pastor of Bridgeway Community Church in Baltimore writes about Gracism, a word comprised of "racism" preceded by the letter "g" for God. "Gracism" encourages people to extend favor to others based on their unique class, culture, ability, color or other distinctions, and to make that preference visible and apparent. How can we become gracists with each other and with newcomers?

The synoptic gospels, the undisputed epistles of Paul and deutero-Paul ring with language of Roman imperialism and domination. What deathly economic, political and cultural forces control and determine our contemporary situation? Can we live and proclaim a Christianity as explicitly anti-imperial as that of the early churches, when to be ekklesia still was primarily political rather than religious or theological? What Word of Life does the cross of Calvary and the empty tomb of Easter dawn speak and enact here in this corner of Paradise in 2008? As we live in Christ, does our theology become our biography to a sufficient degree to liberate and redeem our neighbors from their false allegiances? Can we grasp the stories of Jesus' birth, life, death, resurrection and ascension in ways that challenge our understanding of society and our fundamental loyalties?