Knowtown…

The Anapapist let me borrow Miroslav Volf’s book, After Our Likeness: The Church As the Image of the Trinity and it is great. As the title indicates, Volf is exploring how the Church is an image of the trinity. Throughout the book he is interacting with a Catholic theologian (Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger) and an Orthodox Theologian (John D Zizioulas) as he explores the relationships of the church to our triune God and persons to the community of faith. EXCELLLENT!! So far the book has been surprisingly readable even with the deep theological themes. Here is a quote from the introduction to the American edition that hit me as I read it because it speak to issues that have been on my mind a lot lately:

“Put most broadly, my topic is the relation between persons and community in Christian theology. The focus is the community of grace, the Christian church. The point of departure is the thought of the first Baptist, John Smyth, and the notion of church as ‘gathered community’ that he shared with Radical Reformers. The purpose of this book is to counter the tendencies toward individualism in Protestant ecclesiology and to suggest a viable understanding of the church in which both person and community are given their proper due. The ultimate goal is to spell out a vision of the church as an image of the triune God. The road that I have taken is that of a sustained critical ecumenical dialogue with Catholic and Orthodox ecclesiology in the persons of their more or less official representatives.

A major strand of my argument stands in close affinity with this egalitarian agenda of feminist ecclesiology. I argue that the presence of Christ, which constitutes the church, is mediated not simply through the ordained ministers but through the whole congregation, that the whole congregation functions as matter ecclesia to the children engendered by the Holy Spirit, and the whole congregation is called to engage in ministry and make decisions about leadership roles. I do not specifically address the ordination of women; I simply assume it. Everything in my ecclesiology speaks in its favor, and I find none of the biblical, anthropological, Christological, and theological arguments against it persuasive–neither those propounded by fundamentalist Protestant groups nor those offered by the teaching office of the Roman Catholic Church.”

Obviously I agree with his take on ordination of women and his articulation on the participation of the whole community is intriguing (gets much better as the book goes on, by the way) but that is not what really hit me. The big idea for me was the way he frames “gathered community” as being in opposition to “a community of grace”. I think there are a lot of ecclesial dreamers who think that their gathered communities are communities of grace but Volf is setting these ideas up in opposition to one another. This makes a lot of sense. The concept of gathering seems to assume that those who gather believe the same way, where as a community of grace allows for real, genuine and intimate relationships to form even between people who may not agree with one another. There is no grace needed to share a table with someone who thinks, believes and acts like you do. Grace is only required when you did in the cup with someone who is not like you. This is a BIG idea and one I think we need to wrestle with. Perhaps the reason the “emerging” church is getting identified as primarily white and male is that we have not realized the opposition between “gathered communities” and “communities of grace”.

I vote that we become more intentional about becoming “communities of grace” knowing full well that to say that means that my voice cannot be the voice of the community of faith I am part of. This means things may not turn out like I want them to. When everyone around the table has a voice I may have to eat new foods with flavors I am not used to. Do I have the courage to go there? I hope so.

And you may ask yourself
What is that beautiful house?
And you may ask yourself
Where does that highway go?
And you may ask yourself
Am I right?…Am I wrong?
And you may tell yourself
MY GOD!…WHAT HAVE I DONE?(courtesy, Talking Heads, Once in a lifetime)

This year marks the 200th anniversary of the beginning of The Corps of Discovery’s great adventure. Ever since reading Stephen Ambrose’s great book Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis Thomas Jefferson and the Opening of the American West I have believed strongly that the Lewis and Clark expedition is a beautiful analogy for the emerging church. The story of a group of men and one woman (who may have been the most important person in the Corps but is severely marginalized because of her gender) joining together in a quest to find the new has many touch points with emerging ecclesial dreamers. Like them we are standing with our backs to the known world and facing a horizon of unknown, unpredictable situations. Like them we are given a charge that will require undaunted courage. And like them, many of us are looking for something that doesn’t really exist.

Lewis and Clark were looking for an all water route across the North American continent that hypothetically was there. It looked good on paper. Unfortunately, the headwaters of the Missouri River ended with the Bitterroot Mountain range. Along the way, they ran into Indian tribes and political systems that they did not expect and had no idea were coming. In almost every case, the information they had about what they would find on the journey was wrong. And even though the trip never accomplished what it initially set out to do, those of us in America still celebrate this expedition as one of America’s greatest exploration success stories (rivaling the other successful failure of Apollo 13). Why? The Corps never let the geography of theory trump the geography of reality. They faithfully followed the road (in this case, the river) that was before them. They did not find what they were looking for but they learned to appreciate and value the actual things they discovered around them every day. What can we learn form this?

I have this tendency to look for things that don’t really exist. I dream and scheme about what “church” can look like as we move forward in history. I stand with my back to the known and engage in the conversation with other dreamers who are imagining new ways of practicing the faith. And a lot of the theories floating around are very, very good. But I tend to start putting to much faith in the geography of theory and it alters my course away from the river. Fortunately, Janell is every bit as competent a guide as Sacagawea was and exposes this flaw in me before it’s too late. She is bringing me back to the ability to “see” and appreciate the things that are in my reality. Over the past year I could tell you many theories about how to minister to younger people and get them into “church” but I have failed over and over again to engage with my own children. I could tell you all the reasons why I believe it is important that women be allowed freely to serve as pastoral leaders but have failed to listen to my own wife. I could articulate my dream of being involved in a community of faith that was made up people from all walks and stages of life not realizing that I already have that in the context of neighbors, workmates and friends.

I was reading through Ephesians last night for the millionth time and am amazed at how well Paul speaks to the geography of ecclesial reality and how little he mentions the things I look for as “church”. In this epistle the only building mentioned is the one Christ is building out of us. No “worship leader” but we are all instructed to speak to each other in songs, psalms and spiritual songs. No “senior pastor” but we are all called to do works of service that are prepared for us. No word on how to create children/youth ministries, but called to parent our children well. He touches on spouse relationships, labor relationships and even instructs us to lovingly include our neighbors. In the end, Paul discovered a beautiful church in the faithful of Ephesus because he was not looking for something that didn’t exist. Instead, as a radical ambassador of reconciliation he was redeeming everything that crossed his path.

I am beginning to realize that because I am a follower of Christ who happens to have a spouse, children, neighbors, friends and workmates I have everything I need in the geography of reality to be part of a community of people from all walks and stages of life. I do not need to keep “looking” for something that may or may not exist. I just need to stay on course and continue following Christ with undaunted courage.

Thanks, Janell. You are a great traveling companion.

My friend Jason has been talking a lot about leadership development lately and he has my wheels spinning. In the center I find myself agreeing with him that the church does not do a good job of preparing leaders and opening up leadership positions to both genders and a diverse demographic of people. But there is something in this whole conversation that does not sit well with me that I am not quite able to articulate. I thought if I tried to write about it here that perhaps some of my random thoughts might get tied together or corrected by others.

I guess my initial question is, “are there any truly ecclesial models of leadership?” It seems to me that even when those of us in the church say “leadership” we are thinking in the framework of corporate, capitalistic business models. And those in the business world who write in a way that attempts to bring ecclesial principles into the vocational sphere (such as Peter Block in his great book,Stewardship: Choosing Service over Self-Interest) do not get the same voice as the Maxwells and Coveys. I wonder if we would be as excited to participate in “leadership development” if we really understood what that meant from an ecclesial standpoint?

The gospels record occasions when the disciples would be arguing about “who would be the greatest in the kingdom” or “who could sit at the right and left hands of Christ” and he had to remind them that the ecclesial kingdom does not work that way. The first will be last, the weak will be strong, blah, blah, blah… Later, Peter (arguably the “leader” of the disciples) would write that we are not to rule over people the way the rest of the world does. But still we talk about preparing successful leaders in the church.

I am beginning to think that the problem is not that the church is doing a bad job of leadership development. In fact, it is doing too good of a job but using the wrong criteria. So we have an overabundance of powerful, visionary ecclesial dreamers who do not have a framework of leadership that allows them to think of others as more important than themselves, pray for their enemies or love those who persecute them. They do not create structures that allow the oppressed to be heard over those with the power. There are no systems in place for the younger (or wrong gendered) “leaders” to be seen and heard. These characteristics are seen as weaknesses and our leadership models do not allow for weaknesses even though we all can quote the verses about God’s strength being made perfect in our weakness. Puzzling.

I am beginning to see the church as a redemptive process of re-creation. God is moving through the church to redeem all things, including our warped views of leadership which are based on power, control, conformity and coercion. In the original creation story man is given dominion to steward over everything in God’s creation except other human beings. And while some take the biblical language of mutual submission in a marriage relationship to argue that ALL men have dominion over ALL women, the Genesis narrative is pretty clear that men and women, working together as followers in right relationship to God would rule over the rest of creation. But only God is to rule over human beings. And when the political nation of Israel longs for a human to rule over them God reminds Samuel it is not a rejection of Samuel’s prophetic voice (he was most likely too “weak” to be a leader) but a rejection of God’s rule.

I think Jesus’ correction of the disciples’ quest for power and Peter’s instruction to those who serve as under-shepherds are both pointing us back to the created order and design of God. So how do we implement this in our ecclesiological contexts? Can we begin to re-imagine and re-define “leadership” without appealing to the political or corporate business models that quest for power and influence? Can we begin to lead as “servants to ALL” instead of exercising control over others until they conform to the patterns we have adopted? Or will leaders who take this path of stewardship development continue to be persecuted, marginalized and even assassinated like Dr. Martin Luther King? I vote that we start renarrating leadership after the pattern of Christ who willingly laid down his life to illustrate a greater power. Why pay thousands of dollars to be mentored by a powerful leader like (insert name of your favorite leader here) when we can follow Christ for free? “Free” is starting to sound pretty costly. Of course, that’s just my opinion. I could be wrong.