One Unholy Divided Church

February 1, 2014 / rtrube54 / 4 Comments

I’ve commented in a few posts about the polarities and divisions in American culture. But I was reminded today that the faith I identify with has no room to stand in judgment of the culture. I’ve been reading Mac Pier’s book, Consequential Leadership, in which he profiles fifteen influential Christian leaders. In his chapter on evangelist Luis Palau, I was struck by the observation Palau made at least twice in the chapter about his concern over the divided state of American Christianity. And so I’ve been musing today on what it would take to overcome these divisions.

1. Rather than fighting over Him or acting if He didn’t exist or was simply a vague haze around the Father and Son, unity will come when we yield ourselves to the Holy Spirit. The apostle Paul says, “be eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Eph. 4:3). That tells me that we actually already are one and if we were really full up with the Spirit, we might start acting like it.

2. When we decide that praying together is more important than posturing, self-promoting, programming, and building our publishing platforms, we might start living out our unity. Pier’s book talks about the impact Concerts of Prayer in New York City has had in the spiritual awakening and uniting of the church across denominational and ethnic lines.

3. Again and again I hear from people returning from missions in other parts of the world that Christians engaged in mission are not involved in lobbing potshots at each other. The needs are urgent, the mission of seeing people come to faith and caring for them is clear, and the resources and personnel are often scarce. Somehow, the stuff we argue about here just doesn’t matter there. I wonder when we will wake up to the truth that the case is no different here. Our culture is both increasingly plural and secular. Youth are walking away from the church. Perhaps the words of judgment I fear most for the American church is “you fought among yourselves for who was the purest of them all while people were dying for lack of the truth that only you could bring.”

4. So many of our divisions seem to reflect the reality that we have married divergent aspects of the culture rather than give ourselves to be the pure, spotless bride of Christ. We marry political liberalism or conservatism rather than recognizing that we are called to be our own culture as kingdom of God people. Our bridegroom Jesus must sometimes wonder why he engaged himself to us!

5. Some people think unity can only come by de-emphasizing dogma or doctrine. I’m not one of them. I think we should be deeply troubled and be crying out to God where we are doctrinally at odds with one another. The answer is not indifference! It appears that we (and God) are talking out of both (or many) sides of our mouths. Consequently, many in the world I work in just consider this so much gibberish. Only when we come with humility, repentance, mutual submission to the Lord and his teaching and a willingness to learn and be corrected by one another will we make progress in these things.

6. This also means a willingness to learn from people not like us. The Church in the global south is growing far more quickly than in North America and Europe. What might Latin American, African, and Asian Christians teach us? In our global diaspora, God has brought many to our country. Will we listen and discover that the One Church is bigger than we could have imagined? Likewise, we have much to learn from different ethnic churches and churches ministering to different social strata of our own country. And will we learn from women as well as men? It seems that if we ignore half or more of the church, we will be immeasurably poorer.

Unity doesn’t mean uniformity. Christians above all others, it seems to me, should be into unity in the midst of our diversity. We worship a God who is Three yet One. It seems that if we focused more on the One who unites us, the One who redeems us, the One who in common we all worship, the One who calls us into mission, the One who has created and redeemed us all and the One who has spoken and shown himself through the prophets and apostles, we could possibly do a bit better at this unity thing than we are at present. What do you think?

Review: Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture Into Ordinary Life

October 18, 2013October 18, 2013 / rtrube54 / 3 Comments

Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture Into Ordinary Life by Evan B. Howard
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Lectio divina is an ancient practice of reflective reading and praying about the scriptures that includes the elements of slow and repeated reading (lectio), reflection (meditatio), prayer in response to one’s reflections (oratio) and resting in God’s presence (contemplatio).

What Wilhoit and Howard give us is not a “how to” manual for lectio so much as a deeply theological and formational reflection of what it means to weave this discipline into one’s life. They begin with our thirst for God and the scriptures as God’s speech, his invitation to relationship.

They then focus on the fact that we do not come alone as we read the text but read with and in the Spirit’s presence who helps us understand. The authors walk us through their own reading experience in the story of Jesus and the paralytic in Luke 5:17-26.

Succeeding chapters focus on meditating (with a fascinating discussion of meditation being compared to a dog growling over/gnawing a bone), praying (“prayer as the house that lectio divina inhabits” is a particularly striking idea), and contemplation (they discuss how in relationships, we have our verbal conversation, our thoughts of the other as we speak, and then a more foundational level, our awareness of our presence in the presence of the other). Each flesh out the bare bones of the different elements of lectio. The concluding chapter speaks of the rhythm of life in which scripture leads into action and action leads into scripture.

Overall, I found this a very helpful book. Beyond the personal examples shared, I would have found some exercises in lectio helpful, particularly for those new to the practice. The book assumes that readers will translate concepts into practice. However, for those already acquainted with the practice, the book is quite helpful in taking one deeper into how lectio divina helps us encounter the living God.

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Prayers Before Reading

September 27, 2013September 27, 2013 / rtrube54 / Leave a comment

All of life is spiritual. As a person of faith, I make no divisions between sacred and secular, material and spiritual. That’s one of the reasons that I and many others give some kind of prayer of thanks before eating. Norman Wirzba, a writer on sustainable agriculture and good eating has written, “Food is God’s love made edible.” Food is literally the substance of physical life–what I eat becomes part of who I am. For Christians, one of our most profound practices, variously called the Eucharist, the Lord’s supper, or communion, is basically a meal in which we are reminded of Christ as our spiritual food, our life.

Why then do I rarely or never pray before reading? Maybe I think that because I’m “good” at this I don’t need to. Maybe I don’t think it is that important. Yet books nourish my soul, make me laugh, cause me to think, give me perspective. Why then shouldn’t I give thanks for them, ask for understanding as I read (particularly challenging texts), and for discernment and perspective as to how to respond to what I read? It seems to me that if the first sentence I wrote is true, then books and reading are spiritual and just as worthy of God’s attention as my food.

Below is a prayer attributed to one of the greatest scholars of the church, Thomas Aquinas. While I might not use exactly these words, the thought are ones that might serve as a good guide for a prayer before reading:

Thomas Aquinas Prayer Before Study

Ineffable Creator,
Who, from the treasures of Your wisdom,
has established three hierarchies of angels,
has arrayed them in marvelous order
above the fiery heavens,
and has marshaled the regions
of the universe with such artful skill,

You are proclaimed
the true font of light and wisdom,
and the primal origin
raised high beyond all things.

Pour forth a ray of Your brightness
into the darkened places of our minds;
disperse from our souls
the twofold darkness
into which we were born:
sin and ignorance.

You make eloquent the tongues of infants.
Refine our speech
and pour forth upon our lips
the goodness of Your blessing.

Grant to us
keenness of mind,
capacity to remember,
skill in learning,
subtlety to interpret,
and eloquence in speech.

May You
guide the beginning of our work,
direct its progress,
and bring it to completion.
You Who are true God and true Man,
Who live and reign, world without end.

Amen

I’d love to know what you think of this and how you connect your reading to your spirituality.

Review: Christianity With Power: Your Worldview and Your Experience of the Supernatural

September 16, 2013September 16, 2013 / rtrube54 / Leave a comment

Christianity With Power: Your Worldview and Your Experience of the Supernatural by Charles H. Kraft
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Why do we read of Jesus healings and other works of power yet see so little of this in the church that acts with his name? This is the question that increasingly nagged at Charles Kraft, first during missions work in Africa where other healers claimed spiritual power, and then later as he sat in on John Wimber’s signs and wonders course at Fuller Seminary.

Kraft argues that there is no good case for the cessation of these works following the era of scripture, any more than there is a case for the cessation of preaching that announces the kingdom. These two go hand in hand. Rather he argues that our “powerless” Christianity is a consequence of our embrace of a Western worldview that partitions God and the supernatural from involvement in the physical world, contrary to the testimony of scripture and the experience of Christians in the two-thirds world.

Kraft narrates his own change of perspective and his beginning attempts to minister to people in the power of Christ. He compelling speaks of his realization that this is not a power trip (a pitfall in these kinds of ministries) but power wrapped in love and attentive to God. He speaks of learning this ministry and encourages people to engage in prayer ministry for healing 50 times unsuccessfully before giving up! He speaks with wisdom about not promising a healing but rather going together to the Lord to see what he wants to do. He gives practical instruction for a seven step process in this ministry. He also cautions against emotionalism while paying attention to the emotions that manifest during prayer.

This seems a biblically sound and pastorally sensitive approach. Reading this challenges me to be more open to what God might do when I’m asked to pray for the sick or for those facing other emotional or spiritual challenges.

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