tabletalk

How to Speak Missional: Present an Alternative Reality

How do we begin to train ourselves to be missional? John Addison Dally in his book "Choosing the Kingdom" talks about preaching in a way that I find helpful for organizing sermons. But more than sermons, I think it is a helpful way for us to form language and images for a witness that practices missionality. Though I will present these ideas in a linear fashion, they need not be thought of as linear in nature, just parts of how our conversation with each other and the world should go.

The first thing Dally suggests is that we proclaim and alternative reality to the present one most of us captive to. Following Jesus' lead, this means proclaiming the reality and presence of the Kingdom of God. It's a world that beats swords into plowshares, where people of different cultures sit at table, where there is no Jew nor Greek, male nor female hierarchy. What he suggests is that we give people another choice besides what is directly in front of them.

It is what the church is supposed to model - a new reality. We are to be a sign and foretaste of this alternative to the way things are. I know we fail miserably at this. But I do believe that some of it is simply attributable to the fact that we have such a limited and beaten down imagination. In many ways this is C.S. Lewis's suggestion in "The Discarded Image", that the medieval church had the right imagination. They saw the Kingdom of God present around them and had an imagination to receive it.

To present an alternative reality to people is to be genuinely creative and hopeful. It is also helpful. The world is mired in its present condition, and this includes Christians. How can one get out of the mire, if they can't imagine more than what is before them. Look again at Lewis's "Silver Chair" in Narnia. Isn't it Puddleglum who states to the Emerald Witch something like - If we're just babies making up a world, then how is it that four babies can make up a world that licks the 'real' world you suggest? The biblical view of the way things should be is sorely different from the way we act and believe. But we need to still put forth a different reality in our speech.

Next we need to begin to put forth an alternative reality in our actions. We need to live into the Kingdom's values. We need to live out - love thy neighbor, turn the other cheek, lay down your life. They are intended to be present realities not merely future promises that end up as cynical critiques of the failure of Christians to live out their faith. I honestly believe that when the bible says "turn the other cheek" it means it. I stand condemned by all the times I've failed to do this. But I also stand guilty, remorseful, grateful, graceful, forgiven, and restored. But not for my own satisfaction. This is intended to be turned out again to the world so that the Kingdom can be proclaimed in word and deed.

This is a bit of a ramble as usual, but you get the point. We don't need more clever ways to be God's people, we need to believe in and live into the Kingdom reality that Jesus began. We need to do all the hard stuff, and realize that the hardest stuff - forgiveness and restoration and love enough to be sustained in this life is accomplished by Jesus.

Next up: Implications of this Alternative Reality.

Your Church's Story: The Rituals

A year and a half ago I posted the 3rd of what would have been five articles. I got waylaid!

Rituals: Rituals symbolize the beliefs, archetypes, behavior patterns, and ideals of a church. Rituals are collective activities that do not serve a pragmatic purpose but that the church considers socially and even spiritually essential. Rituals are carried out for their own sake. - Kevin Ford "Transforming Church"

How does this work? To re-establish using Trabuco Pres as an example when I was there - let me suggest a common practice of coffee, donuts, and conversation following worship. This is a ritual repeated in many churches. This ritual is repeated weekly, year after year. It is not religious, but it is done religiously.

One of our mission partners was the Markus Church in Plauen, Eastern Germany. We had many exchanges between the congregations over the years. While we were visiting with them, we were having brunch at our pastor-friend's home. The group consisted of our friend, the assistant Pastor of the Markus Church, her husband - Pastor of the Paulus congregation, our team and some friends from the Markus Church. In the conversation our pastor-friend sighed and said, "I wish we could have our people stay around after church and enjoy a time of fellowship and coffee, like you do at Trabuco." Our response was, why don't you? The response was swift - "Because the women all have to go home and make "klossel"!

We didn't understand. The explanation was forth-coming. A traditional German wife would go home on Sundays to make the mid-day meal. It consisted of "klossel", a dumpling, served with gravy and meat and potatoes and vegetables. Apparently it took some time to get it done, and the women would leave quickly and not linger at church so they could get the meal done.

At this point our friend's husband chimed in, "I don't get klossel!" The response was quick and to the point, "I work on Sundays!" The retort was "My mother made klossel." Now we had the makings of a good debate! It went back and forth for some time, then finally our friend's husband pounded on the table declaring, "Klossel is Christian!" At which point the room erupted in laughter.

As funny as it sounded, they finally got to the point of the "klossel" ritual. It was that "family food" trumped "congregational fellowship". I can only hint at what it meant about the church's code. Perhaps it meant that centuries of Christendom had made that Sunday meal as much church as anything. You could unpack the values in that and probably get close to writing a piece of the congregation's code. Maybe strengthening the family meal time would be a better strategy for church transformation than trying to get people to "hang around"? Maybe the idea of family could be extended to others in such a way that the Sunday meal was shared regularly with other families? But you can see what a ritual is and how it shapes the church's code.

What are you rituals? Not merely describing them, but what are the stories associated in them. Those stories will add to your understanding of code. They will be consistent with themes that emerge from your recounting of the myths and heroes of your congregation.

What is your coffee hour ritual? What is your klossel?! (pronounced - kloo-zel)

Your Church's Story: Symbols of Your DNA

This is completely stolen from "Transforming Church" by Kevin Ford. It's a great book and quite helpful. What I hope to do here is give you examples of things that reflect the "dna" of a particular church. Why? Because when the chips are down and we feel stressed we will return in our behavior to the patterns of the past. Also, though these things are always operating in the background and even the foreground of our institutions, these symbols, actions, values, character, they don't need to be responded to in the same way as we might have a few years ago. For me as the son of an alcoholic, I won't change that or how it has shaped my life. But the reality is that I no longer respond to that past in the same ways I did when I was 16 or even 50. But if I don't know how the alcoholic past plays out in my life I am at its mercy and can live out the same craziness. Don't know if this makes sense. But the reality is there is no value to ignorance and knowing our "dna" as a church is critical to being able to respond to it with intelligence and not be victims to our pasts.

Ford suggests there are four symbols to explore that will show us our "dna" or as he puts it our "code" as a church. For him these are the myths, the heroes, the rituals, and the visuals. Over the next few posts I want to explore each of these and give them legs as I understand how it works. My hope? That we'll take a more serious view of the things that have shaped our life together in our congregations so we can respond to it in the light. So that it doesn't operate in the shadows but out where we can see it and make healthy choices and habits.

I believe in my version of "Transforming Church" you can find this around page 82....

A Church's Story - Your Part

It recent months I've been spending a lot of time with leadership groups from various churches. All of them want to know how to move forward. Many are anxious about where they are and question their viability over the next decade.

In these next few posts I want to muse a bit on what can be discovered in a church's story.

One of the techniques for discovering a church's story that I have been using comes to me from Linnea Nilsen-Capshaw from Deep Shift, Brian McLaren's group. She asked the leadership of our former church to write a few things on some butcher paper. The questions were: Your Name; the date you entered your church's story; the significant people you remember when you arrived; the significant ministries that were taking place; were you aware of any conflict.

These questions have become the backdrop for me to investigate with church leadership the dna of their congregations. This is a non-threatening and simple way to begin a self-reflection that doesn't need to end in navel gazing. In fact what it begins to uncover are patterns and perceptions that have been present for a very long time. It does this without passing judgment on those things.

What is always humorous to me is that each person will get their turn at the time-line. I give everyone instructions that we're not trying to get it right, we're trying to hear the perceptions that each person had as they entered their church's story. The humor is that you can't go more than a minute before somebody steps in to correct or add or comment on the story. People's memories are jogged. Sometimes old wounds are opened. Most of the time, I have found a shared fondness for many of the significant people that they share in common.

This sets the backdrop for the next steps. A church's dna is their character. In new churches we consciously and unconsciously set the dna. In older congregations we consciously and unconsciously respond to it.

A good first step is understanding your part in your church's story. Remember your part in your church's story is also your part in the the greater story that God is writing not only in you but through you.