Tag: Theology and Spiritual Reflections

A friend of mine spent a few years away from church. She was burnt out. Eventually she decided it was time to return to a worshipping congregation, but wondered which one. She decided to go visiting congregations on a Sunday morning in the hope she might be welcomed beyond a handshake at the door and a copy of the news-sheet.

She worked out a ‘cup of tea’ test. The plan was to hold her cup of tea after the service, very slowly sip it, and smile at everyone who walked past, hoping that someone might be interested enough to pause and talk with her.

Sadly, several churches failed the cup of tea test. Thankfully, at least one church passed the test when someone noticed her, engaged her in conversation and seemed genuinely interested in her wellbeing.

Too easily we conclude we are a friendly congregation, when it may be the case that we do not notice or go out of our way to look after the newcomer or the stranger. We may have created a place of welcome for the regulars, but not so much for the hesitant visitor.

In congregational ministry I regularly encouraged our leaders to follow the ‘two-minute’ rule. I would suggest that straight after the benediction every leader resist the temptation to gravitate towards their friends. Rather, in those two minutes they should cast a careful eye around the congregation for the visitor or stranger and go straight to them with welcoming words and see where it might lead.

In Micah 6:8, the prophet challenges us, “What does the Lord require of you? Surely it is to act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”

Six years ago, my daughter – who is a professional midwife – was advised that her unborn child had a high risk of Down Syndrome and was advised to consider abortion. She struggled with this advice and in her prayers turned to this text. She and her husband decided to go ahead with the pregnancy and to face whatever consequences may lie ahead; acting justly, loving mercy and walking with God. As it turned out their son, who has been named Micah, was born without Down Syndrome.

I write this because we so often make our choices for our own personal benefit, rather than for justice, with mercy and in humility. It is a difficult balance and we often get it wrong.

Jesus set us an example of how to walk this balance. It did not mean that his view of equity for all made him a soft touch. Indeed not! He was angry at injustice, he rejected favouritism, and he overturned the tables of the crooked moneylenders. And yet he called a tax collector, loves sinners and forgave those who killed him.

Sometimes we stand and we know what we stand for. Sometimes we fall and we are tripped over by our lack of attention and focus.

Sometimes we just wobble.

We wobble when we celebrate God’s awesome creation and then add to the pollution of God’s world. We wobble when we claim to follow a Jesus who was poor while we chase a dream of luxury  and affluence. We wobble when we speak about being inclusive while we ignore people who are different to us. We wobble when we talk of justice for others while we can so easily become   self-absorbed and self-interested. We wobble when we preach the timeless gospel and do it in outdated and irrelevant ways.

Maybe this side of the full kingdom of God, we will struggle to run the race of faith and walk the way of Jesus without some wobbles.

This edition of Revive reminds us that Jesus did not wobble when it came to loving, serving, advocating and acting for others. Scot McKnight reminds us that Jesus as a Galilean prophet had a job  description a bit like this.

I recently watched the film ‘Suffragettes’, the early twentieth century story of the struggle of women to win the right to vote in the UK. It powerfully reminded me of the cost, courage and persistence that is needed to make a stand for something you believe in.

History is full of examples of people who stand up and speak out for what they believe to be true. Often it is in the name of justice, truth and God. They may be whistleblowers at the workplace, activists in a street protest, artists who defy totalitarian regimes, or just people of compassion and conviction that are not afraid to voice their beliefs in a hostile environment.

I was very privileged recently to visit Robben Island, off the coast of Cape Town where Nelson Mandela and other prisoners were brutally held for their stand against the evils of apartheid. Solitary confinement, hard labour, daily humiliation, cramp and the loneliness of separation from family and friends was part of the heavy price Mandela and his followers paid for their defiance. For more on my trip to South Africa, where I attended the International Fresh Expressions Conference, click here.

Although the word ‘harmony’ does not appear in the Scriptures even though it existed in Greek diction at the time when the New Testament was written, a cognate or synonym is used frequently in the Scriptures. That word is ‘reconciliation’. Though the word itself is not used, the idea of harmony is central to the history of salvation.

“God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself…” (2 Corintians 5:19) could be rendered “God was in Christ harmonising the world with himself.”

I do not propose to talk about the mystery of reconciliation. Despite our best theological explanations it still remains a mystery. It is a truism that all our talk about God (theology) tells us more about ourselves than about God. So, let me reflect on the idea of harmony in relation to ourselves.

The term itself is a musical one. It denotes the agreeable effect of the apt arrangement of parts to form a harmonious whole. To harmonise, everyone vocalising, or playing an instrument, has to be playing or singing from the same music score. To use a contemporary idiom, they need to ‘be on the same page.’ Each may be playing a different instrument or part, but the music score has to be the same. Each part compliments the others to form a harmony. So, differentness is essential to harmony; and harmony is the result of the reconciliation of diversity.

How easy are you to live with? How often do you disagree with someone? Have you ever felt frustrated that some people’s views, opinions, lifestyles or values are very different to your own?

German philosopher, Schopenhauer, once said that human beings are like porcupines on a winter’s night. They draw close together only to find that in the process of unity they end up moving apart and hurting or needling each other.

Living together harmoniously is one of life’s great challenges. Ask a parent of a teenager or a teenager with a parent. Ask a mother with a two-year-old or the chairperson of a church council.

We humans are a complex and paradoxical bunch. We are made in the image of God, how glorious is that, and yet we are fragile and broken beings, with a tendency towards self-interest, the enemy of harmony. We may hold strong convictions about what is right and wrong; yet in doing so we can see our own view of the world with 20/20 vision while suffering from blind spots when trying to see another’s viewpoint.