Living Wittily

"NO" is a charistian word

Thirty years ago in an article called 'The Nerve of Failure', published in Theology Today, Leonard Sweet anticipated some of the themes that have captivated his readers in a stream of his recent bestsellers. My favourite quote is the one at the start:

"The quality that should mark the Christian church is not goodness, but grace, not merit, but mercy, not moralism, but forgiveness, not the enshrinement of success, but the acceptance of failure . . . Lacking the nerve of failure, we have suffered a failure of nerve-to dare to dream dreams, venture visions, and risk getting splinters that come from cutting against the grain."

And then there's the wise reminder from John Oman, an unjustly forgotten theologian, "NO is a Christian word". By which Oman meant, not 'NO' as negativity and withdrawal, but 'NO' as positive engagement against whatever diminishes, demeans or dismisses our humanity - NO as cutting against the cultural grain....and to hang with the splinters. The book from which it comes is called Grace and Personality - now there's two interesting criteria for a church - a place demonstrating, embodying, performing, the grace and personality of Jesus.

Composing, conducting and performing a human life...

The Russian cellist, composer and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich has died age 80. One of the finest cellists of the 20th Century, his playing so accomplished and passionate that major composers were prepared to compose pieces designed for his playing. In his own view, of all that he wrote and composed, the most important was the letter he sent to Pravda in support of Alexander Solhzehnitsyn in 1970. He campaigned on behalf of Andrei Sacharov, and publicly criticised the authorities of the old Soviet regime. He was persecuted and banished for that - but this noble, humane, composer, cellist and conductor embodied the spirit of freedom and resistance to totalitarianism and the abuse of state sponsored power. In 1991 he even joined Boris Yeltsin in facing down the Communist pusch and defending the pro-democracy movement as the old regime crumbled.

For me there is an almost metaphysical connection between the gifts of composition, conducting and performing music, and the gifts of composing, conducting and performing a beautiful and humanising life. As one young Russian said, 'may his soul rest in peace and glory.'

Going to a Conference on Providence, God willing.

Andy Goodliff - thanks Andy, has drawn attention to a Systematic Theology Conference in Aberdeen, January 2008, on the theme of Providence. I emailed the organiser to say I intended to come (dv)!(Details here), and would he send me booking details in due course.

So. Does God guide our lives? Are coincidences just that, the accidental coming together of circumstances, just one of those things that happen, or does God surprise us and challenge us to look again at how blessing and unlooked for pleasure might be God knocking at the door of  lives too busy and self-centred for their own good? Or come at it another way, when someone survives a crisis, sometimes there’s a half-joking but half serious flick of the eyes upward, and the comment, “Someone up there must have been looking after me!”

Our last Austrian holiday was in Mayrhofen, in the Tyrol where it is hard not to think of God, if only because the mountains demand to be looked at, walked on, and thought about. At six thousand feet, looking at ribbons of water, six feet wide, tumbling a hundred feet down a sheer rock face, millions of water drops refracting sunlight and making rainbows against the background of grey rock and green mountain meadow, it’s hard not to ask, so does all this just happen to be here. Is this the intentional beauty of an artist, or just coincidence, nature doing it’s thing?

Then there's the contrast between hundred ton boulders and tiny symmetrically perfect flowers, in pink, yellow and blue, growing in the sheltering shadow of those same rocks, ages old. Or again, in Alpine sun, climbing towards the Alpenhut where hot soup and a cold drink will both be needed to warm and cool a body working harder than it has for some time, we stop and fill our water bottle at a mini-torrent of crystal clear water, and drink mineral water as nature intended before it got bottled and labelled.

Enjoyment, wonder and admiration for mountain permanence and floral fragility, experiences of the mind and heart which put the routine worries of life in a different more humbling perspective. So is all this extravagant attention to detail an irrelevant by-product of natural forces, or is beauty one of God’s significant nudges to get the attention of minds too preoccupied with achievement, performance, production, results, profit margins, bottom lines and all the other trivialities we have invested with such undeserved significance.

So is all this just coincidence? I learned a long time ago that the word ‘just’ is a devaluing word, best avoided. Are there times when 'coincidence' is a significant nudge. That same holiday we were on a walk all morning. On the way back along the valley we stopped to talk to John and Julie, a Yorkshire couple and great company. The steam train passed us on its way to Mayrhofen, we waved to the passengers, and walked on to Mayrhofen ourselves. As we walked past the station, there, deep in conversation about the best way to spend an hour in the town before the train left, were Stewart and Helen, two close friends from our time in Aberdeen. I didn’t even know they were on holiday. If we hadn’t met John and Julie… If Stewart didn’t still have the heart of a boy for steam trains… if we had gone up the cable car instead of to our favourite coffee stop. Coincidence? Yes, but not just coincidence. One of God’s more significant nudges, I believe.

I hope, God willing, to learn more of what all this means at the conference in January 2008!

God's recreation of the new day

Ever since my father took me across the fields in Ayrshire, pushing a wheelbarrow and filling it with the soil from molehills, I've enjoyed the garden as a therapeutic place. To be amongst things that are growing; to contribute to the process of growth and beauty; to cut and shape the hedge as a way of sticking my tongue out at those parts of life that are harder to control and make tidy!; to exercise stewardship not as dominion but as care, appreciation and willing labour.

Yes, I can see why Cat Stevens' rendering of Eleanor Farejeon's poem, Morning has broken, elbowed its way into our hymn repertoire - it celebrates the wet, lush, freshness of an early morning garden. It's so popular that I've conducted weddings, funerals, worship services and school assemblies where the simple evocative words and tune touch something deeply human (humus), almost regardless of the mood of the occasion - joy, sadness, adoration, endurance.

All of this because today I did the hedge, and last night scarified the grass. Morning has Broken doesn't have a verse about weeds, moss and flymos, but no matter, I can live with a song that is uncomplicated in its vision of what makes it worth getting out of bed for. So much of my life is focused on ideas - and yes I do live in my head a lot! So it's a relief, and a return to a lifelong enjoyment of getting my hands dirty, when I'm let loose to do the labouring in the garden. One of my happiest memories (and best paid jobs!) was when my father paid me to mix his compost - three parts soil, two parts leaf mould, one part each of peat and sand - except for the stuff for his cacti which had two parts sand, two parts soil, and one part peat. And it was riddled using my bare hands - I still remember being fascinated by the texture of riddled compost, the damp smell, the promise of fertility and anchorage for all those cuttings!

The photo was taken 50 years ago - when dad was lying beside the drystane dyke that was our garden fence - the dog was our working collie, Norah. Taken by mum, with a box camera, it's a no' bad photie, eh?

The sense of divine things....

A long time ago, when I was 40, one of my best friends bought me a print of Rublev's Icon. Before then it was an attractive piece of Russian medieaval art - since then it has been a source of spiritual and contemplative reflection that has often drawn me into the presence of the Triune God.

I never tire of looking at it, thinking about the rich interplay of familiar symbol, noting the liturgical colours, listening for unmistakable biblical resonance, joying in (enjoying) the deep mystery it portrays, of the Holy Trinity, the eternal communion of self-giving love, the God who is Father, Son, Spirit. Sixteen years on my icon has faded, it hangs in the College study and is still one of the focal points in my mind and heart when I want lifted beyond all this - whatever 'all this' happens to be at the time!

And then today, Frances brought me a new copy (for which many thanks!) - bright, colourful, unfaded, once again a glimpse into truths too dazzling to see, and into a world beyond any categories I control. The restful gaze of God's love, the eucharistic cup surrounded by eternal communion, the threefold touch of God from hands shaped in blessing, the hospitality of God laid out in the meticulous generosity of welcome - for once the overused epithet is appropriate - it is a 'stunning' achievement of human spiritual creativity.

The idea that beauty is an important category for theology has become an important recent emphasis in the way Christian theologians think of God. Beauty, along with truth and goodness appeal to that in us which retains the image of God. Jonathan Edwards called this the sense of divine things, which is the gift of grace that enables us to apprehend, appreciate and respond to the beauty of God. This icon draws me into a sense of divine things, and into a sense of the beauty of God's Holiness.

Christ has brought it to pass, that those that the Father has given him, should be brought into the household of God; that he and his Father and his people, should be as it were one society, one family; that the church should be as it were admitted into the society of the blessed Trinity.

A week or so ago I promised a blog on Jonathan Edwards and Jurgen Moltmann. Edwards the New England Calvinist would have puzzled at the icon, Moltmann loves it. I'll post a few excerpts from their writings on the Trinity soon. For now see a characteristically engaged sermon on the Trinity by Moltmann over here.

The ministry of women: a rich, indispensable Spirit endowed gift to the church

I've added a new name to the list of blogs I visit regularly. Scott McKnight is a NT scholar, an evangelical who is also a thoughtful enthusiast for the concerns about the mission of the church as expressed in emergent circles. I've read his blog almost since it started two years ago. He is passionate about a number of things I care a lot about. When he writes he thinks before he blogs! His track record as a scholar, pastor and thoroughly fair minded evangelical make him educational fun.

So, I've decided to link him here because his blog is a good resource for some of the important debates going on in the church, particularly the evangelical wing. His categories sidebar gives easy acsess to major themes in his posts. For example his comments on recent debates on atonement are rooted in deep study - he's recently published a major academic study, Jesus and His Death.

His interactive conversation about Emerging Movement is sympathetic but not uncritical - in fact it's one of the most balanced responses I know - and because it's an ongoing conversation, how emergent is that! There's a whole sidebar on Emerging Movement.

But for me one of the most important areas where McKnight is required reading is Women in Ministry (57 posts so far, some of them substantial contributions to the debate - see his sidebar). McKnight adopts an egalitarian position - which means he affirms the place of women in all forms of ministry, and sees gender rendered irrelevant by a gospel which affirms equality before God. The reason I think Mcknight is an important voice in any debate about women and ministry is because he argues from biblical evidence, and with a care to understand what the Bible means as well as what it says.

I don't know about you, but I'm kind of weary (at times to the point of being rude!) of those who think there are only two positions - those who affirm the ministry of women (egalitarians) and those who adopt the biblical position (complementarians). Excuse me - I'm biblical in my Christian discipleship too! I affirm the ministry of women as a position congruent with Scripture, consistent with the Gospel of Christ and with a life lived following after Him, and as a rich indispensable Spirit endowed gift to the church. The issue isn't one that divides into those who adopt the "biblical" position and those who don't. An argument isn't right because we label it biblical, and label others' position unbiblical because they disagree with our interpretation. The issue for me, as a Baptist Christian, is one of being obedient to the call of Christ to follow Him, as the decisive, living and personal authority in our lives, and to seek the mind of Christ through Scripture prayed, studied, heard and interpeted within the community which gathers in His name.

Quality Enhanced Discipleship?

Like some football games, (one of which I am about to watch!) this was a day of two halves. I spent the entire working day formulating learning outcomes in preparation for the revalidation of our whole suite of awards and modules. After a while the mind begins to get the hang of this. What starts as an exercise in semantic arrangements to satisfy academic administrative procedures, becomes a process of defining as precisely and fairly as possible what our teaching, and the student's learning should be able to achieve in a collaborative educational commitment.

And at that point I sense the vocational importance of doing it right - which maybe panders to the perfectionist in me. But 'Do everything in the name of the Lord' is one of Paul's no exceptions statements, and I'm always suspicious when those Christ honouring demands are softened. So yes - here's an opportunity to offer good work as an act of spiritual faithfulness. Dag Hammarskjold warned us, 'in our era the road to holiness necesssarily passes through the world of action'.

It's tiring though - and there's only so much of this you can do well before you mutter, with a different kind of semantic precision, 'ma heid's nippin'! So I came home and before dinner went for a run - that's when you realise how stiff and tight the body becomes stuck in front of a computer, staring into  electronic white spaces you are trying to populate with keyboard generated symbols that might eventually win whatever prize is offered for the most original, creative, imaginatively conceived Quality Enhancement Documents!

It's surprising how stiff your legs get after a long stint plonking a keyboard. So I toddled up the park, and took it out on the hill. The hill is the longish steep incline in Barshaw Park (pictured) which I'm trying to run up at a respectable pace as part of my 'personal development plan'. It must be suppressed anger / frustration / euphoria, or a form of middle aged denial, but I did a personal best, set a new 'benchmark', 'gave evidence of progression', 'demonstrated a capacity for  self-motivation and personal development'. See! The terminology of Quality Enhancement has multiple life applications.

I wonder what would happen if we sat down and prepared a Programme Specification for Following After Christ. What the learning outcomes would look like, what would be included in the curriculum as relevant and important, what the learning and teaching methods would be, the criteria to be used in assessing progress and performance, the regulations about attendance, participation and commitment to the work of the class.....

Come to me all who labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon me and learn of me.....

More interesting still - the admission requirements would be surprisingly open - you'd just have to want to be there, and to learn from Jesus!

Listening, a strategic act of patience

  Mostly when we talk about the church we use qualifiers, missional church for example. Rowan Williams in the lecture I noted in yesterday's blog, suggests an altogether different qualifier. In relation to the Bible and the breaking of bread he understands the church as a listening community. And perhaps listening is a spiritual discipline the evangelical church needs to rediscover, and even as C S Lewis long ago suggested, perhaps we need to repent of our talkativeness.

Listen - to the Word read and proclaimed

Listen to the invitation, this bread, my body broken for you...take and eat.

Williams brings Bible and eucharist together as means of grace, as sources of nourishment and spiritual vitality, as representing the summons and succour of God.

The Church’s public use of the Bible represents the Church as defined in some important way by listening: the community when it comes together doesn’t only break bread and reflect together and intercede, it silences itself to hear something.  It represents itself in that moment as a community existing in response to a word of summons or invitation, to an act of communication that requires to be heard and answered.

Listening to the Bible, listening to the summons of Jesus to His table, is not a passive activity, it is an active alertness to that voice which addresses us. Listening is not a low energy alternative to action it is the necessary prelude to knowing what is required of us, what to do, how to act. Listening is therefore a strategic form of patience, a way of waiting to hear the One who speaks, in their time...and having heard what is required is response. In hearing and responding life is transformed, we are in more sense than one converted, turned again to the ways of Christ.

Theologically inept or rootless accounts of Scripture

Ben Myers at Faith and Theology (see my Favourite Blog sidebar for the link to Ben's blog) has a link to a lecture by Archbishop Rowan Williams on The Bible: Reading and Hearing.

Ever since I read Rowan Williams prophetic and perceptive Lent Book, The Truce of God, around 1985 I think, I have read whatever he has written with care and a willingness to listen to this deeply spiritual and intelligent Christian thinker. Yes, I think Rowan Williams is first and foremost a thinker, of the kind the Christian church needs and should cherish, and should listen to with care and humility. That he was made Archbishop is in my view a mixed blessing - the politics and institutional tip-toeing required of his high church office may not be one of his strengths, though he's no political lightweight either. But there is a generosity of mind, an imaginative and humane intellect, a spirit richly endowed with learning and experience, that make him one of the most important theologians the Church of England has produced in a century or two. He is deeply read in the fathers of the Church, sympathetic to the diversity of Christian spirituality, global in his sense of the scope and significance of the Gospel, and a persuasive if at times undogmatic apologist for the Christian Gospel of Jesus Christ.

In this lecture he states his aim early on:

my aim is a very modest one, to examine the practice of reading the Bible so as to tease out some of what it tells us about the nature of Christian identity itself.  Because some of our present difficulties are, at the very least, compounded by the collision of theologically inept or rootless accounts of Scripture, and it seems imperative to work at a genuine theology of the Bible as the sacred literature of the Church.

A genuine theology of the Bible - absolutely. A placing of the Bible within a clear understanding of God definitively revealed in Jesus Christ, the church receiving the Bible as God's gift to be read, heard, preached, performed - as the script of the Christian community. Yes; but the script of the Gospel drama interpreted and performed as an expression of our relationship, not to theological ideas, but to a Person, Jesus.

I'm going to ponder Rowan Williams lecture some more - and then blog on it. Like the Archbishop, I think the way we approach the Bible, the way we interpret it and live it, and the way it interprets us and calls how we live into question, decisively forms our christian identity - for good or ill.

Learned Optimism

Optimism isn't the same as hoping for the best but not sure if it will happen. It isn’t a kind of philosophical crossing of the fingers behind our backs either. That kind of uncritical optimism mean we’re simply not being realistic. The relationship between optimism and realism is very interesting for people who take Jesus seriously enough to trust Him. For people of faith, is their trust in Jesus optimism or realism?

An important insight comes from an unusual book entitled Learned Optimism. It sounds complicated, but stay with me:

One of the creative techniques in John’s gospel is that the writer sets you up, to hit you with truth. His gospel is about learned optimism. Repeatedly he argues, if you believe in Jesus you can combine being realistic with feeling optimistic, because He will create ways to improve the realistic situation as we understands it.

For John the gospel writer, optimism is not only a matter of temperament. It is a worldview, a considered view of how the world is. In John’s Gospel, to believe in Jesus is to develop a radically different worldview.  Jesus, says John, is God’s radical intervention who redefines all other reality.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word became flesh…..in Him was life and the life was the light of all humanity…the Son came that you might have life….if the Son shall set you free you shall be free indeed”. Reality is reconfigured, the way the world looks changes forever, when Jesus’ presence, purpose and power are presupposed.

So, John says – Jesus is the life-giver, the light bringer, the liberator. For example in chapter 11, Jesus’ friend Lazarus is dead, buried, locked in the grave, decomposing in the darkness, confined by embalming bandages; that, says John, is the reality. And John says to us his readers, "faith is learned optimism, faith is feeling optimistic about God improving reality - your considered view of how the world is, is about to be reconfigured".

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John says, ‘Watch Jesus and learn’.

‘Take away the stone’, says the Life-giver

‘Lazarus come out’, says the Light bringer

‘unbind the grave clothes’ says the Liberator. 

And Lazarus walked out, into the light, back into life  and out into the freedom Jesus both commanded and gifted.

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“Learned optimism” - it’s the worldview of those who have seen Jesus at work, and who believe that he still works; that the light shines in the darkness of every death -confirming, life-threatening grave. But says John, the darkness can never get the better of him. And that says John, is the learned optimism of resurrection faith.

I am the Resurrection and the Life. Whoever believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.

“I have always prided myself on being realistic, and still value that quality. What I learned is that being realistic should be combined with feeling optimistic about creating ways to improve the realistic situation as I understand it.”