Words Not War

As violence continues to rage in Iraq, and now in Lebanon and Gaza, a new confrontation is looming with neighboring Iran. Talk has increased of possible military attack against Iran to halt its nuclear program and support for Hezbollah. While we agree Iran should not support terrorism or obtain nuclear weapons, we come together as religious leaders to urge that the U.S. engage in direct negotiations with Iran as an alternative to military action in resolving the crisis.

Take Action: Words, Not War, With Iran

The idea that war in Iran is a possibility is completely insane to me, and not for the usual reasons. Granted, I am not the biggest advocate of settling international issues through violence. However, considering the terrible situation in Iraq and Afghanistan, the idea of the U.S. entering a conflict in any other part of the world is sheer lunacy. I cannot imagine that even they, the world’s lone superpower, has the resources available to start a third simultaneous war. Then again, I suppose the draft could be a remedy for their lack of manpower.

Regardless of the plausability of this conflict, the potential loss of life is an even better reason to stand in opposition to it. The link below the quote above will take you to a page that will allow you to read the full text of the statement against the war, and if you so choose, to sign it. I know it seems like a small step and one has to wonder what their small voice could do. Still, that still small voice is all we have, we might as well use it.

technorati tags:Words+Not+War, Iraq, USA, Sojourners

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Blogspiration

As you have probably noticed things have changed around here a bit. The changes aren’t only cosmetic and technical, I feel like they go deeper than that.

Andrew Jones, blogger extraordinaire, has been on sabbatical for the month of September. His last blog post was August 31 in which he outlined why he was taking a break from blogging. Some of which I identified with.

- Because my blog is old and tired and not nearly as much fun as it used to be. I want to be re-inspired and invigorated.
- Because I have an idea of how blogging should be and I want my blog to catch up to my vision.
- Because I have been SELFISH in my blogging recently, concerned with building my own blog and tracking my own progress rather than being a resource on other people’s blogs.
- Because the quality of my blog posts has decayed and I am posting fewer poetic posts [a sign of good spiritual health] and fewer thoughtful theological/missiological posts [a sign of rigorous thinking in my head] and I need to raise the bar.
- Because I have become infatuated [again] with my stats and my blog authority and google-ranking – a form of idolatry and narcissism that can only be harmful.

Don’t get me wrong, I hardly put myself in the same class as Mr. Jones. He is a very influential person, not only in the blogosphere, but also in the emerging church. Some of the things he said though really resonated with me. I felt like the time had come for me to reexamine my own blogging and whether it was fulfilling a useful purpose or stroking my ego.

Writing my first book was a great experience for me, despite all it’s warts and foibles. I want to write more and I want my blog to be part of that. I am going to explore and examine thoughts and ideas on here that I plan to later include in a book of some sort. By writing them here, it will help me figure out what is worth exploring more and what I have taken as far as it can go. Most of all, I want to get back to writing like I did when I first started blogging. I want to be as honest and transparent as possible without giving my stats or Technorati ranking a thought.

Heartless

A buddy of mine emigrated to Canada from the Congo a few years back. His last few years in Africa were spent hiding in the jungle from the militia that murdered his parents and living in a refugee camp in Kenya. To say that his life has been difficult would be an understatement.

For the last year or so, my friend has been working as a cleaner at a restaurant that is part of a very large fast food chain. This job is not the most high paying job in the world, but when you have no Canadian work experience it isn’t easy to get a job here.

He estimates that the number of paychecks that weren’t short hours he had worked could be counted on one hand. They would always be apologetic for the "oversight" but the promised pay that he was owed would never materialize.

Despite being treated so badly, he continued to go to work and do the best job possible. He did so well in fact, that he was enlisted to train the new cleaning staff that were hired on a regular basis. The bad working conditions meant that turnover was very high. The only constant there was my friend.

Recently, however, he had decided that the time to find a new job had come. He was tired of being shorted on his pay. Who could blame him for that? Despite what he had experienced at this job, he gave them a full two weeks notice because he felt that was his obligation. Once again, he was asked to train the new staff. In this case, his replacement.

His boss promised him that he would be paid time and a half for the training that he would do. This meant he would be paid his hourly wage plus a bonus of half his hourly wage for every hour that he worked. For him this was great news, he has a grandmother, two brothers, and three sisters that he is helping to support. He trained his replacement, put in his two weeks, and worked his new job during the day.

When the time came for him to be paid, his boss told him that he would no longer be able to pay him the time and a half he had been promised. He also told him that he wanted to pay my friend in cash instead of the usual direct deposit into his bank account. The manager asked my friend to go in so that they could calculate the hours he worked and pay him out.

There is no need for his hours to be calculated. He clocked in and out via a punch card system. The hours he had worked were in black and white. My advice to him was to not attend this meeting and to ask to be paid by direct deposit as he had normally been. I also thought that it might be a good idea to let his former employer know that if they wouldn’t pay him the agreed amount he would take his grievance to the labor board.

How can people be so heartless? How is this person able to sleep at night knowing that he is taking advantage of my friend and who knows how many other people? I am so pissed off about this. Frankly, if I was bigger and tougher the temptation would be there for me to go and take a piece out of this guy. I know though, that is the wrong way for me to handle this. God may not have made me a big guy but He made me smart and eloquent. If this clown doesn’t cough up the money he owes my friend I will be helping him file a grievance with the labor board and doing anything else I can to bring the actions of this business to light.

Considering what my friend has been through, it is the least I can do.

Trust

The other day I wrote a post called Being Better. I have to be honest, I have been pretty down on myself and my relationship with God lately. I feel like that I generally do a lousy job of living up to my Christian ideals. It seems that I mess up much more often than I get things right.

The night I wrote that post I was praying as a I usually do. I was naively asking God why He hasn’t made me a better person. I had forgotten the reality that the Christian faith is not a magic wand that is supposed to improve who you are instantly. Remembering that though doesn’t help me, I still want to be a better person, one who lives out his faith. Then I heard the still small voice of God.

This is one of those seriously weird moments where either you get it because you’ve been there, or you think that I have flipped my lid because you haven’t been there. For that reason I hesitated to write this, however, I am convinced that authenticity is more important than respect.

God spoke into my heart. I was told that my trust in God is more important than my good behavior. In fact, I learned, that if God granted my prayer I would probably become smug in my perfection and forget my total reliance on God.

I have since stopped feeling so down on myself. This reality doesn’t excuse me from trying to live in a Christ-like way, it just frees me from self-condemnation.

And we’re back…

My apologies for the interruption. As you can see, theospeak.net is back on line.

The trend

Once again it happened. I was approached by a friend of mine who wanted to talk. He told me how frustrated he is with the church he has been going to. He told me stories of how despite his best efforts he has been made to feel unwelcome there. He also shared with me how he had gone to his pastor in confidence and that what he had told his pastor had gotten around to other people in the church.

This has been a trend with me over the last few months. Maybe it is because I have been so vocal in my disgust with the things I have experienced in the church. I think there is more to it than that though. Part of the trend is that it has been people in my peer group, contemporaries of mine who have decided to give up on church as they have been practicing it and move on to the next step in their faith journey. Another part of the trend is that part of the journey has been a move back towards more orthodox forms of church.

My friend who confided in me today has been contemplating returning to the Catholic church that he came to faith in. Another close friend has attended services at an orthodox church, and enjoyed them immensely. I have been attracted to both the liturgy and accepting nature of the Anglican Church.

This is an interesting phenomenon. I am not sure if it is a backlash against the mega-church or non-liturgical church styles that have become so popular over the last decade or more. I guess it could be a backlash against what that type of church movement has become and how many of those churches seem to be speaking to the world.

The final part of the trend is really interesting. As we have discussed returning to more orthodox forms of church, we have also discussed the demise of church altogether. This isn’t discussed with any kind of excitement or joy, it’s more of an inevitability than anything. It seems that the churches my friends and I have gone to have a decidedly older demographic. Over time the people who make up this demographic will pass away and unless things change, there will be no one left. Last Sunday Tiffany looked around the congregation at church and remarked that "this place will be a Starbuck’s in five years."

Maybe that is a good thing. If church as we know it dies, maybe all the bad things that church and Christianity have become will die with it. A fresh start could be just what we need to get things back on track. Regardless of the positive or negative effect it could have, it seems that unless churches stop being a social club, bucking the trend, their fate is sealed.

Being Better

For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do.

O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord (Romans 7:13 & 24-25 NKJV)

It is funny really that the words of Paul have been elevated to being on the same level with the words of God. It is obvious from this passage, and others like it, that he struggled with his own sinful nature just like the rest of us do. Sure, much of what he wrote was inspired by God. However, it is not much of a stretch to think that it is possible for him to have written some things that were outside the inspiration of God. Still, this is fodder best left for another post.

Today is not the day for me to critique the Apostle Paul. Today is a day for me to agree with Paul and understand what he is saying in this passage. Like Paul, I struggle with my sinful nature and wish that I could do better. No matter how much I wish though, I still mess up everyday.

I’m impatient with other drivers. I get pissed off when they drive to slow or cut in front of me. I get annoyed for stupid reasons and sometimes act like an asshole. I swear to myself I won’t do these things again, but when the chips are down I do.

Why can’t I be better? Why can’t I act the way I want to act? My old boss used to define non performance of employees as being a matter of will or skill. Am I missing the will to be better or the skill? I think the answer to both questions is yes. Sure I want to be better but I haven’t developed my will to the point that I can always choose to do the right thing.

    "You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin" (Hebrews 12:4).

No matter how much I work on my will and develop my spiritual muscle I will still sin because it is in my nature. I will never be able to fully eliminate it from my life. What is sad is that I become afraid of God like Adam and Eve did in the Garden of Eden after they had eaten the forbidden fruit. I try to cover myself with a proverbial fig leaf and hide in a bush so God can’t see me. This isn’t the answer. I need to understand that God is bigger than I am (see Isaiah 55:9). God is big enough to love me through my sin and to help me to do better.

I know this with my head, now if I could just feel it in my heart.

Jim Wallis on CBS News

Subversive

Yesterday at church we heard an excellent message. The guy who was speaking talked about how scripture has been used, and is still being used, to justify horrible acts. Everything from slavery to the subjugation of women and so called holy wars were touched on.

He also discussed how Christians marginalize members of society. How we spew hate instead of sharing the message of Jesus with love. These are all topics that are near and dear to my heart. I have written many a blog post regarding these matters. Sadly, things seem to be getting worse all the time.

Near the end of the message, he spoke about how Christianity has become the state religion (ironic in an Anglican church I know) in many countries. Christianity, he said has lost it’s subversiveness. I totally agree.

We’ve polished the passion of Christ to a shimmering gleam. There is nothing ugly about it anymore. We have all these books, music, and other kitsch that have desensitized us to just how world changing the message of Jesus was meant to be.

When Christians piss people off it isn’t for the right reasons. People get pissed off when Christian leaders stupidly blame environmental disasters on it’s victims and when we act in ways that even non-Christians know are not representative of Jesus Christ. People should get mad at Christians when we throw open our church doors to those who some think shouldn’t be allowed in.

Church attendance declines every year. We devise useless methods of bringing people in that don’t work. What would work is living in a way that is so counter-culture that people become curious about what we are doing. Hate though, is not counter-culture, love is.

Yes, Christianity needs to become more subversive, but for that to happen Christendom must die.

technorati tags:Christianity, Anglican+Church

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