Viral Faith

"Jesus' message about the kingdom of God lived out in this life has powerful implications for how we prioritize, peace, reconciliation, and enemy love in relationship with God and with others.  Ignore this aspect of gospel, and we are left with a religion that proclaims love and forgiveness while it advances through violent attitudes and actions." -- Bruxy Cavey in Reunion The book of Ruth begins with this innocent phrase "During the days when the judges ruled".  While it gives us chronological context (roughly 1400 to 1000 BCE) its purpose in the narrative is to give us cultural and political context.  The book of Judges documents the often violent, warring, and scavenging existence that coexisted with the spiritual bankruptcy of the people at the time.  The story of Ruth begins in famine in a time where the people of ancient Palestine were often vying for scarce resources.  This scarcity, led to violence.  In fact, one can look at contemporary society and...

  The Church and Societal Forces of Injustice   “Slavery was upheld by three sectors of society: religious, economic, and political.” —Tom Skinner in How black is the Gospel (1971)   One of the ongoing discussions among church leaders is the role of the church in regards to the formation, influence, and regulation of the societies in which they serve.  Many believe that churches are to promote the highest ethical standards and leverage its many privileges to encourage its surrounding society to embrace those same standards.  Others believe the church is a vendor of religious products that seeks to enhance the lives of its adherents, without any responsibility to those outside of its body.  I believe that the answer is clearly spelled out in Scripture, embodied by Jesus Christ, and promoted by the early Church.   Historically, it is important to understand the duplicitous role of the church in both bringing about justice and promoting inj...

  But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things! (Galatians 5:22-23 NLT) The Greek Scriptures that we commonly call the "New Testament" reveal God's story to restore Shalom through the work of Jesus, extended though the church.  While there are lots of moving parts of the narrative, and lots of literary devices employed in which to convey the primacy of THE STORY, it comes down to evil being discarded through love made visible.  Relationships healed, community restored, and the powers that separate, distort and destroy are banished. "Shalom is an ancient Israeli construct concretizing practical loved to be expressed through structures and systems" --Randy S. Woodley in Decolonizing Evangelicalism Shalom is a state of healthy community where relationships and processes are redeemed in love.  This is the essence of the Go...

Jesus is repetitive, and his Judean hearers do not get the message because of the power of the dominant myth to exclude other possible truths.  -- Wes Howard-Brook in Becoming Children of God Today, I read an article where an author was making an attempt to define conservative and progressive Christians.  In his eagerness to define the two groups, he used theological terms to try and describe political realities. The purpose of the article was to analyze how different Christian identities impact political and faith practices.  I would disagree with the author in understanding that both self-identified conservative and self-progressive Christians can agree on the Inerrancy of Scripture and the centrality and exclusivity of Jesus in salvation (those are the two criteria he used).  I share this only to emphasize the politicization of Christian identity formation.  In fact, there is often such a fierce affinity towards political realities, that it is often fused in...

  "So Jews othered non-Jews, Greeks othered non-Greeks, and Romans othered non-Romans.  Each divided the world into us and them, where them is always wild, violent, unmanly, dirty, stupid, lazy, horny and yet scary.  That was, of course, because they were not actually wild, violent, unmanly, and so forth, but they were actually scary... All this ethnic othering had to do finally with trying to put a finger on that fear factor.  Why are we so afraid?"  -- Stephen Patterson in The Forgotten Creed Throughout history, cultures develop narratives to understand their identity and root that identity in community values, informed by the experiences of a people.  The narrative or myth may be based entirely on a true rendering of historical facts or can be a carefully crafted multigenerational account of fictionalized stories that support a culture/nation/people's preferred understanding of themselves.  It should not be surprising to most to acknowledge that is ...

"The important study underscored the growing tolerance in many directions--gender, sexual identity, race, and ethnicity--as perhaps the most constructive and attractive element of change in American religious communities, along with growing ethnic diversity and compassion for those in need.  But the same study also noted political use of religion and divisions along political, class, and racial and ethnic lines as what continues to drive people from membership and activity in congregations."   --Michael Plekon in "Church As Community, Community as Church" In my current role as Superintendent, I have the privilege of visiting quite a few churches.  Within the conference of churches to whom I am responsible, there is an incredible diversity of contexts and communities: house churches, African immigrant churches, Hispanic family churches, traditional rural churches, suburban churches, urban churches, small, medium and large churches, all centered around the denominatio...

" Now is the time!  Here come God's kingdom!  Change your hearts and lives, and trust this good news" Mark 1:15 CEB "Culture works like a movie sound track.  It makes or breaks the story we're telling.  Every organization is telling a story, not unlike a movie: there is a script (our words) and acting (our behavior).  But every great movie has a great sound track to match, which provides the tone and energy for the story.  This is our culture--and it must match our words." --Tim Elmore at www.growingleaders.com Culture is a popular word.  It has multiple meanings.  One of the most commonly used definition is: a set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution, organization or social group.  Culture is always present even if its not clearly articulated. Culture dictates a group's rules, roles, and responsibilities.  At the church where I grew up, you were not allowed to enter the sanctuary durin...

 "We cannot let narrow religious forces highjack our moral vocabulary, forces who speak loudly about things God says little about while saying so little about issue that are at the heart of all our religious traditions: truth, justice, love and mercy." -- Rev Dr William Barber II & Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove It is always difficult to discern whether you are a trailblazer or simply a token.  Many people of color take positions where they are the "first Black/Brown/Asian/Indigenous" who has ever been in that position.  Or maybe, you are the first woman to reach a particularly coveted position of authority.  Most do so not as personal gain, but to fundamentally change the corporate culture and mission so others who have been ignored, excluded, and passed over would have an opportunity to participate and lead.   Trailblazers are those who lead into unfamiliar environments in order to change the culture and to lead others who have been excluded into leadershi...

  "Rage builds over time as a result of cumulative suppressed emotions precipitated by voicelessness"--Kenneth V Hardy in Healing the Hidden Wounds of Racial Trauma Ezekiel was a priest of Israel who was forcefully exiled when he was only 25 years old.  While in exile in ancient Babylon, he had an encounter with God that changed everything.  Its so tempting to focus on the message of Ezekiel while ignoring the person of Ezekiel.  Those who are familiar with the book of Ezekiel know that he not only is commissioned to speak the word of God but often was asked to act them out through becoming a literal human metaphor (you have to read the book to understand this).  He was largely misunderstood and frequently maligned during his ministry. The age of 30 is the age in which those who are in the priestly line become eligible to serve in the Temple.  One can imagine that during his years growing up, filled with studying and careful observation of the sacred priest...