URBANarmy

It has been sometime since I have thought about 'lost themes of mission' but today's daily dose of Nouwen got me thinking about what constitutes developing 'true community'.  "There are many forms of poverty:  economic poverty, physical poverty, emotional poverty, mental poverty, and spiritual poverty.  As long as we relate primarily to each other's wealth, health, stability, intelligence, and soul strength, we cannot develop true community.  Community is not a talent show in which we dazzle the world with our combined gifts.  Community is the place where our poverty is acknowledged and accepted, not as something we have to learn to cope with as best as we can but as a true source of new life. Living community in whatever form - family, parish, twelve-step program, or intentional community - challenges us to come together at the place of our poverty,  believing that there we can reveal our richness." Nouwen's words made me think how easy it is for ...

It has taken an unrelenting NT Wright to point that this great theme, which brings a framework of meaning and purpose, is present throughout scripture both in poetry and song and rich and dense theology but more significantly embodied by Jesus himself. "There is a remarkable image in the closing pages of Scripture that has become a touchstone for the way my colleagues and I think about faith and culture..." writes Miroslav Volf in an article ( The Church's great malfunction ). Amid its descriptions of the New Jerusalem, Revelation includes "the tree of life, bearing 12 crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations" ( Rev. 22:2 ). The tree holds out hope that whole cultures will be healed and mended, becoming places where people can flourish. And it sets an agenda for faith as a way of life that contributes to that flourishing, in anticipation, here and now. Brueggemann ( Brueggemann. (2007: 161ff). ...

As we learn to 'live within the contours of God's future', eschatology rather than an excuse for disengagement becomes the 'empowerment for radical engagement'. Charles Ringma talks of a church's preoccupation that loses sight of the fact that the Christian faith is fundamentally eschatological in orientation. Something is missing when people's preoccupation for tomorrow leaves no significance or time for today. Yet a strong emphasis exists that would indicate the real danger of living for the future in such a way that the present is seen as unnecessary; a real danger of living waiting for the 'life to come' at the expense of the world now; a real danger of 'soul-saving' that has heavenly significance at the expense of the work of justice and social transformation. I sometimes wonder if eschatology could represent a lost theme of mission? "Why offer a sticking plaster when major surgery is required .... why offer a sleeping bag when an e...

This speaks of a reconciliation beyond singing 'bind us together' and takes the church to a place where it has to position itself within issues where true reconciliation makes sense. "Whereas the model of mission most common in the 19 Century was one of expansion, and the model most common in the second half of the 20th Century was one of accompaniment, the model of mission most needed at the beginning of the 21 Century is that of mission as reconciliation" Shreiter (1997) quoted in Landmead, R. (2008) Mission Studies 25:5-20 His argument being that reconciliation is the form within which the good news of Jesus Christ is most appropriate at this time of history. On one hand it seems a little too obvious an to think about reconciliation as key to mission, but as with many of these kind of terms I wonder if it all to easy to have a single dimensional grasp of the concept. Landmead in his article gets us to think deep into what being reconciled to God means; to how we ma...

"It is important to stress, as Paul would do himself were he not so muzzled by his interpreters, that when he referred to "the gospel" he was not talking about a scheme of soteriology." OK this is intriguing. We've heard the 'gospel' rhetoric, we've preached the 'gospel' in the understanding that 'gospel' = good news and that good news is that Jesus lived, died and rose again accommodating whatever theory of atonement is in vogue or catches our whim. Paul's use of the word gospel however, could be and might represent ever so much more. NT Wright explores the concept to some depth and asks that to get to grips with the concept of 'gospel' there is a need to not only understand where the word came from, but also to get an insight as to what such a term would mean to Paul and to his readers. NT would argue that the term infers an announcement of kingship, of a new reign. The euaggelion , gospel, was announced when a new emper...

God's justice is not simply a blind disposing of rewards for the virtuous and punishments for the wicked I've been spending a bit of time in NT Wright's writing recently and it has inspired some new 'lost themes of mission' The whole concept of judgement seems to be a pretty loaded word. I remember as a kid watching a guy walk up and down Oxford St in London with a sandwich board informing the tourists and shoppers that God's judgement was at hand. Hell and damnation, eternal rest the destination of such judgement - the communication of eternal sentence. NT Wright points out in Evil And the Justice of God that "God's justice is not simply a blind disposing of rewards for the virtuous and punishments for the wicked, though plenty of those are to be found on the way. God's justice is a saving, healing, restorative justice, because the God to whom justice belongs is the creator God who has yet to complete his original plan for creation, and whose jus...

Interesting that 'liturgy' is related to Leitourgia which is work or to act in a way that benefits the public at large Bosch asks "can we hope for such renewal of our celebration that it returns to this authentic liturgy?" I must have got to that sad stage in my blogging life where I do repeats, or it could do something with my age! But this modern day parable does the trick for me everytime I read it. One day after dinner, while finishing dessert, a father sent his boy out to cut the lawn. Smiling broadly, the son said, "No, Father, I just want to stay here experiencing your presence, expressing my love for you, my dear Father." The father frowned and said, more firmly this time, "Actually, Son, I would rather you go out and cut the lawn." But the boy acted as if he didn't even hear his father, and he replied, "Dad! Guess what? I just wrote a song expressing my love for you!" The son began to sing, his eyes closed in sincerity and in...

"As God has compassion on Israel and others, and as Jesus over throws the codes of society in boundless compassion on the marginalized, so we too are called to show compassion. This is a fundamental thrust of the biblical picture of mission." D. J. Bosch Bosch in a chapter entitled "Reflections on Biblical Models of Mission" draws attention to missional motifs, attributes of God outworked in his redemptive plan that is woven throughout both Old and New Testaments. One theme being that of compassion, Bosch's exegesis centres on Ezekiel 16:4-7 "on the day you were born your navel cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water to cleanse you, nor rubbed with salt, nor wrapped in cloths. No eye pitied you, to do any of these things for. you out of compassion for you; but you were thrown out in the open field, for you were abhorred on the day you were born. I passed by you, and saw you flailing about in your blood. As you lay in your blood, I said to you, ...

It is sad that we as a Church have allowed the concept of shalom to remain a carved olive wood curio bought back by Holy Land travelers to sit on our desks, hang on our walls! David Bosch ( 1993 ) points out that: "The mission of the church, then, has all the dimensions and scope of Jesus' own ministry and may never be reduced to church planting and the saving of souls. It consists in proclaiming and teaching, but also in healing and liberating, in compassion for the poor and the downtrodden. The mission of the church, as the mission of Jesus, involves being sent into the world - to love, to serve, to preach, to teach, to heal, to save, to free." Contentious or a true picture of holistic mission? I'm wondering if the depth of our understanding of shalom holds the key. Pernell quite some way back pointed out Dan Sheffield and his post describing shalom - here it was a useful and comforting reminder to me how central the concept of shalom was to Jesus and his motive a...

"Christ is the deliverer for time as truly as well as for eternity.... He is come to open the prison doors. He is come to set men free from their bonds. He is indeed the Saviour of the world!" (William Booth 1889). Ray Harris (TP in Canada) once said your 'understanding of mission will only be as wide as your understanding of salvation' . Thinking about 'Lost Themes of Mission' I remembered in the early days of URBANarmy trying to explore this and discovering the danger of watering down Salvation. I also remember taking a bit of minor yet friendly stick for it - even being labeled a heretic ;o)!!! Stumbling into bechurch shortly afterwards I read these thoughts… "a friend of mine asked me a few months ago something that I've really been wrestling with for a while. It has to do with salvation and the common evangelical understanding of it. (belief in Jesus = Salvation and Righteousness.... No belief in Jesus = Condemnation and Hell)"...

Jubilee should be something that shapes our understanding of mission - but I sometimes wonder if we are too busy singing songs or looking at cool video loops backed by Coldplay Bruggemann (2002) ( Reverberations of Faith: A Theological Handbook of Old Testament Themes ) draws attention to the biblical concept of Jubilee, a radical ethical-economic practice sanctioned for Israel to curb greed, exploitation and the whole rapaciousness of society where the rich get richer at the expense of the poor. The general idea was that every fifty years the people were to: release all debts; set slaves free; let the lands lie fallow, and lands were to be returned to their original (and rightful) owners. This certainly sounds like good news to the poor. Disappointing then that Old Testament scholars suggest that it never actually happened. I was disappointed but found myself drawn to what was however God's intention for humanity. The idea of Jubilee recognised that a major source of fragmentation...

Agape speaks of a love that exceeds passion, friendship and benevolence. Agape speaks of a love that goes beyond self yet is more than an unselfish feeling. Agape speaks of a love that acts. Agape speaks of a love that loves unlovables. Catherine Booth – writing in an era of wanton nominalism and 'run wild' philanthropy talks of 'sham compassion' and 'spurious charity'. Her use of words 120 odd years ago has had me ruminating over what 'spurious charity' might look like. Mission surely is more than just an act of charity, or perhaps something is lost in the nuance of the contemporary use of both words - mission and charity? Caritas in the vulgate is translated from Agape love (1Co 13:13). Agape speaks of unconditional love an attribute God'’s own heart, a kingdom value. Agape speaks of a love that exceeds passion, friendship and benevolence. Agape speaks of a love that goes beyond self yet is more than an unselfish feeling. Agape speaks of a love th...

"True charity looks at ...the spread of righteousness in the earth - the reign of the king.. " (Catherine Booth) Bosch points to the damage that has been done to the biblical concept of righteousness through the churches maintainance of a seperation of inward and spiritual righteousness from an outward and manifest justice in social relationships. Leslie Newbigin points out that it is easy "to see how the use of two different English words 'righteous' and 'just' for the single biblical word has seduced evangelical Christians into a mental separation between righteousness as an inward and spiritual state and justice as an outward and political programme." NT Wright writing on righteousness reminds us that "The church is to be not only an example of God’s intended new humanity, but the means by which the eventual plan, including the establishment of world-wide justice, is to be put into effect." Bruggemann continues to make sense of righteou...

"True holiness will not keep us from the world, but drive us into it in faith" Phoebe Palmer and Social Holiness... A long gone conversation on Holiness which for me dovetailed with another long gone discussion on Mission sent me looking and reading about different characters largely thanks to Andrew . Phoebe Palmer is cropping up in my reading a lot recently. Several issues intrigue and excite me particularly how Holiness was worked out through 'actions of love' particularly through the Five Points Mission in a inner city deprived area of New York City. I read this "Phoebe Palmer preached that holiness insures usefulness. These nineteenth- Century followers of Wesley believed it was their duty as Christians to be useful. Holiness doctrine, with its emphasis on love, provided the basis for social holiness which is the Wesleyan/Holiness equivalent of the social gospel. The phrase “social holiness” is borrowed from Wesley who wrote: “The Gospel of Christ knows . ...