Keep Imagining

For those of you who are not fortunate to read Herr Blumhardt's daily offering I submit this:

I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh. Then they will follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. Ezekiel 11:19-20

As the heart is, so is the person. The heart is the soil from which divine plants grow; it is the source of all the power that is needed for their growth. That is why the seed of God’s word must first be planted in the heart. For the same reason a mere outward conformity to the law on the basis of fear is worthless. If it doesn’t stem from the heart it is hypocrisy; it is pharisaic.

The heart must be tender, kind, and good. We must be warmhearted if we are to please God. Therefore, look to your heart. Whoever understands God’s will in his heart and is sensitive to it, will carry it out. Put effort into it—stir up this feeling you have in your heart for God, so that it lights up your whole being and turns you into a fulfilled and genuine person of God!

Christoph Friedrich Blumhardt, from Family Prayers for Each Day.

If it doesn’t stem from the heart it is hypocrisy; it is pharisaic. - I love that. It's all about the heart and the heart is all about actions and choices. It is there that we learn what we really believe. Don't be like the "too many" that are content to say "We believe!" but live it in a measly way.

Go help the heartless dispassionate one's! Those who are more intent on comfort and confirmity. Busy about the business of smoothing the way and points of order - making everyone alike - removing contention the heart of a thing and calling it unity. Making everything a choking beige and extinguishing the fires of fervor.

We are the church of God! Those for whom passion won eternity! Those who despite the bleak darkness that swirls around them can drip with joy!

God help us for loving our safety and predictable cloying comforts, too afraid of our own shadows to step up to the position we own in Christ. This cancerous ease that turns us into meager and exiguous shades of what Christ Himself died for us to become.

"God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them.....Man - that great and wonderful living creature, more precious in the eyes of God than all other creatures! For him the heavens and the earth, the sea and all the rest of creation exist. God attached so much importance to his salvation that he did not spare his own Son for the sake of man..." (http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p1s2c1p6.htm)

May God grant that we all look to our hearts and stir them to live in grace, gusto and the marrow of our faith - leaving off comfort more quickly and risking more of what we only suppose we own for that which we truly do!

I've been getting back to a better pattern of self care and with that resuming my reading schedule. I've synthesized some stuff from my own thoughts and the heavy influence that "The Artist's Way @ Work" (W@W for short) has been on me.

I've been wrestling with the notion of presence - being present. We often talk about people who have presence - we admire that much self possession. Eleanor Roosevelt said "No one makes you feel inferior without your permission." A smart lady, with presence.

Anyway, for those of us on the journey inward to heaven, those who are trying by grace to know how we are, and to accept that despite it's truth - we are loved by God, saved and will be saved by God - being present is really important. Living in the liminal places demands it. I often suck at it.

The antithesis of being present is presenting. "Presentation" is that state that insists on controlling the information flow. It says to others "This is who I am - no really." While it means is: "Listen Bud - this is what you’re getting."

The presentation mentality offers us a lot of control and gives the appearance of having it together - of being acceptable and just as good (or even better) than the rest of our world. In church it allows us to say "I'm fine." when someone asks even when we are not. It's why we wear neckties in August or yell at our families through clenched teeth blinded by anger over something in the parking lot - then go into worship with others as if nothing is wrong whatsoever. It's the reason one of my teenagers in sunday school confided "My parents aren't as perfect as they want everyone around here to believe."

There's only one problem. Presenting doesn't work. It only promotes "fraud complex."

Fraud complex is that fear drenched state of worry over being exposed for who you really are.

"Presenting" means that I must vigilantly and constantly manipulate other's perceptions of me to protect the false self I choose to portray. It's like the actor that insists on being photographed from their "good side" trying to make sure everyone sees only what they want seen.

The presenter becomes exhausted by this process of fronting. Being with others becomes draining instead of revitalizing or comforting - you can't relax when you walk this road. It becomes preferable to keep just about everyone at arms length, or farther. Slowly it turns the presenter into an isolated shadow. Even finding pleasure in accomplishments becomes limited. Any joy they might derive from a success eventually becomes a fleeting respite from the possibility of being found out - of being exposed as a fake.

I want to live differently than that - in a community of people who are open to the possibility that we are all faking it at least some of the time, and that Jesus loves us anyway.

Found this in some books we were packing up. This is what some people are calling an offering envelope for  "church."
Is it any wonder people are tired of how church is sometimes? We need a new word or one that can be redefined to capture a better metaphor.  Faith Community" is awkward - Ecclesia too Ancient Greek.  Any ideas?

I wanted to post about this yesterday bet the day got away from me.  I was sitting in the unfavorable situation of dropping our kids off at the church I just "resigned" from.  It was a kind of thing one has to prepare emotionally to accomplish.

I was flat unable to walk into the building - so as my wife took our kids to check in I sat in the car and listen to the ipod.  Sting had managed to work his way to the top and sang two ballads (Fields of gold and How fragile we are) then this whining starts - a singer I can't place whining so badly I think it's one of those old Ray stevens tunes - just a gaff.

But it isn't.  This is what I heard:





So now I'm crying trying to remain motionless so as to not attract any attention and avoid a hard conversation.  It was hard.  But I thank God I'm not stuck in reverse.  Actually the hardest part of all of this right know is knowing that a needy church lost a great Youth Pastor.  However, "God's next" gained in the deal – what happens remains to be seen.

Fred at Abductive has posted some notes about the Nexchurch Conference at Kentucky Christian University.


I think I can get right behind a lot of what Len Sweet says,  the "church moderne" is so addicted to the process! May God grant that the age of the driven church is over!  I am so sick of the emptiness.  This Jabez quoting, semi-present, plastic unenthusiastic they sell as spirituality is superficial and disconnected at best, and a Jesus based theme mall at worst..

They have no notion how to get where they want to be, so like two ticks with no dog - they just suckle each other on the latest marketing scheme to make Jesus sellable.  Pastors are not ministers they are CEO's or department heads - middle managers ...

I'll stop - the rant would be too long otherwise.

Just ask yourself - when you next meet a professional cleric.  "Did I just meet person who is about being and living holy, or someone just trying to sell me on the idea?"

The Christ followers with the greatest clarity want to know how to own who they were created to be - "as is." (NOT listen to the next sermon on the "seven easy steps to never fail spirituality."  The of clowns who write that crap would do well just to meet that person God created them to be.)

But people who want to be like Jesus start with the hard work of meeting their true selves - shortly after they meet Him.  How can anyone get from one place to another without knowing their starting point?  A map is only useful if you know where you are in relation to your destination.

But relentless self knowledge has been mostly abandoned by the church moderne.  They seem to aspire to reconcile the Kingdom with their dreams of Corporate American success.  Just look at the cover notes of the books they write for each other.

But most people quietly fear our extended (or immediate) family may end up as an episode of Maury or COPS. We are collectively screwed up!  What if I'm not upwardly mobile (or trying to be) is there room enough for me in the pew without being checked off as someone's outreach trophy?

The only thing these driven churches ultimately end up with is a desire to escape the "quiet desperation" it offers as spiritual life by "planning the work and working the plan."  Doing takes over for being.  They all swim in a little row - like Dory says in Nemo "Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming"  -with only the vaguest notion of where they are headed.  "If we're swimming we must be getting there! We have all of these programs - we HAVE to be spiritual!"

Remember that the goats thought they were doing it all for God just before they got kicked to the infernal curb.

love much, pray more,
K