Chapter 7: a book review +…

This post is quite personal and a bit self-indulgent, but it is genuine and heartfelt. I’m 66 years old and have been a Christian for 56 years, so you’d think I’d have got this sorted out by now! I hope it will encourage you to look at your own life and aspirations, and if nothing else, to read a great book. I hope no-one is offended by my candour-please do try to read all the way to the end…

Sometimes hearing from God can be painfully healing.

I wallow far too frequently in a sort of “if only” state, where I think about how things might have been, what I might have been, if it wasn’t for decisions good and bad that I’ve made, or, worse because of the ways people who should know better have treated me. So many of the people I grew up with have gone on to be ‘somebody’, making a difference to peoples’ lives, writing books, founding organisations…the list could go on.

Don’t get me wrong…I truly rejoice and thank God for the way these people are prospering, and the influence for good and for Jesus they are having on others…just this morning I listened to the first song release by “Social Beingz’ and remembered what a pain Josh Green was in his growing up years and marvelled at the way God has turned his life around and was genuinely thankful. And that repeats for so many others.

It makes me wonder…have I been such an awful Christian, such a fake and sham that it sometimes feels as if all I’m good for is to be buried in an ageing, shrinking church at the forgotten end of England.

And then, God spoke…

He spoke through two books…hardly surprising when he knows how much I enjoy reading and how much the things I read make me think and change.

At present I’m using “The Message//Remix:Solo” during the time each day I set aside to intentionally spend time with God. Today I practiced Lectio Divina (some call it ‘Resting in the word’) with Matthew 15:1-14. The bit that stood out to me was:

“These people make a big show of saying the right thing,

but their heart isn’t in it.

They act like they’re worshiping me,

but they don’t mean it.

They just use me as a cover

for teaching whatever suits their fancy.”

Was this me? I had to ask myself this difficult question. It’s true that I get easily discouraged, that my heart isn’t always in it, but I found I could say I do love Jesus, I do want to live for him and to reflect: “goodness and greatness, growth and success through the lens of the life and teachings of Jesus”.

That quote is from Chapter 7 (hence the post title) of the second book that God is using to speak some sense into me!

Back in the days when I was helping to pioneer the work of The Message in Manchester alongside Andy and Simon Hawthorne one of the churches I had a bit to do with was Mount Chapel, in Salford. I also enjoyed the worship music of a band from there called “Heat”.

Chris Lane was part of both of those. I became aware of him more recently through some Facebook posts from my friend Paul Keeble, so I checked him out and found he’d written a book.

The book is about the history and life of a church in Salford called Langworthy Community Church, a church in which eating together has become a key part of everything that goes on. I’ve been thinking about the centrality of meals in Jesus life and ministry, and what that ought to mean to us, so I was drawn in.

The book is called, “Ordinary Miracles-mess, meals and meeting Jesus in unexpected places”.

I’ve been enjoying the practical, down-to-earth (should that be ‘incarnational’?) nature of the book…this morning I read chapter 7, from which the above quote is taken.

In Chapter 7, Chris takes a penetratingly personal look at the allure of the cult of celebrity in Christian ministry; so easy to be drawn into, and so destructive in our view of our own worth and significance if we’re not careful.

He talks about small in a world of ‘mega’, hiddenness in a world of celebrity and slow and steady in a world of fast and instant. He reminds us that Jesus died alone and obscure after just three years in the public eye in an occupied backwater…and yet…

He talks about how Christian leadership “needs a huge overhaul”.

I have been taken in too. I have wasted time, talent and tears on trying to emulate others, to get recognition for what I’ve done, to be a ‘somebody’. I’ve failed time and time again, and have shrunk in confidence and as a person as a result.

I need to accept that the person I am becoming with God’s help is good enough. Thanks Chris, you’ve really helped and encouraged me to see things differently!

And by the way, that “ageing, shrinking church” is full of people I love, and has a part to play in what God is doing in Berwick and I want to be part of that. My recent wider involvement with the Northern Baptist Association leads me to believe that in God’s eyes the North East is far from the “forgotten end of England” too…all around the Missio Dei is going on and we are slowly but steadily waking up to it and joining in.

I’ll leave you with one among many quotable quotes from chapter 7:

“I’m part of a generation who were taught to look for the Big Bang, to pray for revival, to change the world, to make a bucket list and do it all on our gap years, to live life to the max – to be outstanding and exceptional and be the best – but by definition only a tiny number of people will be outstanding. The rest of us need to get on with being ourselves, loving the people who we come into contact with, serving others, not waiting for our big break but getting on with living as ordinary people in ordinary time, believing in an extraordinary God.”

“The Message//Remix: Solo” by Eugene Peterson, Published by Nav Press                 ISBN-10: 1600061052 ISBN-13: 978-1600061059

“Ordinary Miracles: Mess, Meals and Meeting Jesus in Unexpected Places” by Chris Lane, Published by Instant Apostle ISBN-10: 1909728764 ISBN-13: 978-1909728769

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Up for a Journey?

You may remember that some time ago I wrote a series around the theme of “Life as Pilgrimage”,which continues here.
Hence my interest in the title and theme of this book: “Journey – he way of the disciple”, by Richard Littlejohn. Richard is a Baptist minister in Newbury, Berks. and has tried to compare discipleship to the stages on a pilgrimage.
The book gets off to a bit of a slow start, but quickly gathers speed as the print pilgrimage takes us through the stages of leaving, finding provisions for the journey, our relationships with companions on the way, distractions, arriving at our goal and the return to ‘normality’.
I think the highlight of the book for me was chapter 7, “Journey’s End”, which is a sensitive and powerful piece about death and bereavement.
All in all, a very thoughtful book, peppered with quotes from other ‘pilgrim’ literature and a range of ‘walking’ literature which firmly embed it in the real world.
Definitely worth a read!

All I Really Need to Know…

…I Learned from Noah’s Ark

1. Plan ahead. It wasn’t raining when Noah built the ark.
2. Stay fit. When you’re 600 years old, someone might ask you to do something really big.
3. Don’t listen to critics—do what has to be done.
4. Build on high ground.
5. For safety’s sake, travel in pairs.
6. Two heads are better than one.
7. Speed isn’t always an advantage. The cheetahs were on board, but so were the snails.
8. If you can’t fight or flee—float.
9. Take care of your animals as if they were the last ones on earth.
10. Don’t forget that we’re all in the same boat.
11. When the doo-doo gets really deep, don’t sit there and complain—shovel.
12. Stay below deck during the storm.
13. Remember that the ark was built by amateurs and the Titanic was built by professionals.
14. If you have to start over, have a friend by your side.
15. Remember that the woodpeckers inside are often a bigger threat than the storm outside.
16. Don’t miss the boat.
17. No matter how bleak it looks, there’s always a rainbow on the other side.

With thanks to the weekly email from Grove Books, where I first saw this…

The not-so-pretty truth…

The Psalms are often brutally honest prayers, uttered by people who are at the end of their rope. They are sometimes violent (although whatever some people may say, God is not). Sometimes they are just plain self-centred and selfish.

But they are real…real people being unafraid to display their deepest feelings to a God with whom they have a real relationship. No sanitised religiosity for them.

I’m reading Ted Loder’s collection of prayers called “Guerillas of Grace”, and came across this prayer today. In the beginning, it may be a bit too honest for some people, but it gets better…

It pretty accurately describes how I feel most of the time when I’m honest enough to admit it.

There Are Things I Do Care About

Holy One,
most of the time
you don’t seem very close or real to me—
only a word, an ought,
a longing, maybe, a hope—
and, for the most part,
I don’t care much about you,
and that is the not-so-pretty truth of it.

But there are things I do care about:
myself mostly,
and some people I feel close to—
families, friends, children,
most of all children.
I do care what happens to them

So, I do care about love,
about being loved,
and about loving
(or trying to);
and I wonder about it,
how to do it,
and what makes me want to do it.

With those close to me,
I care about laughing,
and crying,
and learning,
and talking honestly (a little);
and fighting openly and fairly,
and forgiving (a bit more),
and admitting I want to be forgiven
and need to be (once in awhile.)

I care about things,
about getting them
and being gotten by them;
And I do care about money
and all the things I do for it,
and with it,
and what it does to me;
And I care about being a little freer
of all that, somehow,
because I care about being secure
core deep.

I care about my neighbors,
at least some of them,
sometimes;
and about all the things that would make it better,
and perhaps easier
for us to live together;
and the hard decisions and sacrifices
it would take for that to happen.

Which means I do care about justice,
though mostly from a distance,
because I care about what it might require of me;
and then I get testy or silent
but am haunted but it
because something in me
won’t let me stop caring about it,
even though I often wish I could.

So, I care about my enemies,
and am tired of being angry
and suspicious so much,
which is such a waste;
and I care about the least—
the hungry
and the sick
and the terrorized
and the exploited of the earth—
because I care about peace
and long for it inside and out,
and am weary of being afraid
for myself and my children.

I care about this tiny fragile blue planet,
this home, this mother earth and all her offsprings,
all the creatures who share the mystery of life.
And I really do care about beauty,
about the songs in me,
the poems, the stories;
I care deeply about
the wondrous, puzzling,
aching struggle
that I am;
I care about this joy I feel
flickering sometimes, flaring sometimes,
when I touch hands or eyes
or minds or sexes or souls,
and ache, then, for more.

I care about living—
living more fully,
abundantly—
and about my urgent longing for that;
I care about what makes me restless,
makes me reach
and stretch
and grope for words,
for dreams,
for other people
and…
for you.

Holy One, you,
I do care about you,
sometimes fiercely,
or I wouldn’t be stumbling along like this,
trying to pray,
trying to put myself in your way;
I care about you,
and such is my faith,
however faltering it is;
and I trust that, past words
you crea about all these things
that I care about,
care about them more,
infinitely more,
than I care about them;
and that you care for me,
even when I am careless
of the things I care about.

 

Whole week worship…

How do we connect the Sunday experience of whole-church worship with the Monday reality of each individuals working week? How can “our Sunday worship of the God and King of the universe not only express our wonder, praise and love for him but help us live our whole Monday-to Saturday lives differently?

Sara and Sam Hargreaves, of “engage worship” set out to show us ways we might begin to do this in their book “Whole Life Worship: Empowering disciples for the frontline”, published by IVP Books.

The London Institute for Contemporary Christianity has long been trying to encourage us to engage in whole life missional discipleship, encouraging Christians to prepare for life and mission out there, on our many and varied “frontlines”, rather than basing all our focus on church-based activity…after all, most of us spend only about 10 hours of our week in church, leaving us with around 110 hours when we are awake and living life at home, at work or in our wider communities.

“Whole Life Worship” suggests ways that our Sunday worship, part of the “10”, can help us live out the “110” as missional disciples. It also makes suggestions about the way that the experiences of life on our “frontlines” can inform our prayers and worship.

The book begins by setting out foundations and frameworks for a theology of Whole Life Worship, before moving on to a number of helpful practical examples of how it might be done. Coupled with the ‘engage worship’ website this provides a really useful resource. Sam and Sara also run helpful workshops to aid churches wanting to become proactive in equipping their members to live missional lifestyles in their everyday lives.

This is not just a book to read…it is an encouragement and help to a worshipping life.

Useful resources, including free small group films and discussion materials, can be found on the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity’s website.

Musical messages…

Because it’s a musical
A musical
And nothing’s as amazing as a musical
With song and dance
And sweet romance
And happy endings happening by happenstance
Bright lights, stage fights, and a dazzling chorus
You wanna be great?
Then you gotta create a musical

From: ‘Something Rotten’

My youngest daughter is into musicals in a big way. She watches them, preferably live, but failing that, DVDs or YouTube are just fine. The soundtracks are constantly playing in her room or in our car. She knows the words and sings along. I suspect that, in the privacy of her room, she probably performs one-girl shows with word-perfect dialogue. She’s currently rehearsing for a part in both ‘Bugsy Malone’ and ‘Oliver’. She has converted many of her friends into musical-lovers too.

As a consequence of her musical adoration, I too have become very familiar with the songs (but I’m never allowed to sing along…she is the equivalent of the Musical Secret Police). Some of them truly move me, and I’ve been mocked more than once for having eyes glistening with tears.

I have come to realise, however, that you can learn a lot from a good musical.

Family life, relationships, social history, politics, propaganda, intrigue and faith all have their place. Musicals have filled my head with ideas and experiences as I’ve watched the actors and absorbed the lyrics.

Take, for example, ‘Shrek’, for a long time one of her absolute favourites. We learned that even the most hideous ogre can be loved and lovable, which gives us all hope, and loyalty and friendship can be found in the most unlikely places and the most unlikely people.

“Hamilton”, which has proved to be a very popular musical gives us some glimpses of the founding of the USA through the story of a hitherto largely overlooked Founding Father, Alexander Hamilton. It shows us a country birthed in violence whose leaders cannot agree right from the outset. It also draws our attention to the vital role played by immigrants like Hamilton and Lafayette in the war to oust the British and the subsequent government of the nation (“Immigrants – we get the job done”).

‘Wicked’ turns the well-loved story of “The Wizard of Oz” into an example of how fake news and propaganda can make the good seem bad and the truly wicked appear to be the heroes…it is frighteningly contemporary.

“Les Miserables” shows us the underclass of French society in the 1700s. It is a classic tale of the struggle between ‘law’, personified in Javert and ‘grace’, first offered to Valjean by the Bishop but becoming the underlying theme of much of the story.

Billy Elliott shows us gender roles and the Miners’ Strike in the 1980s, while more recent musicals, like “Rent” and “Newsies” are about poverty, sexuality, exploitation friendship and hope. One of my personal favourites is “Dear Evan Hansen”, featuring two dysfunctional families brought together by the death of Connor Murphy. Themes of dreaming of a better life, lies that get out of control, grief and regret are woven together into a powerful story about what makes us significant and loveable. It has one of my favourite songs in “I will sing no requiem”, a true lament of Biblical proportions.

What is it about musicals (or the books, plays and movies that birth them) that makes them so powerful.

David Putnam, the Producer of “Chariots of Fire” (not yet a musical) remembered:

“Far more than any other influence, more than school, more even than home – my attitudes, dreams, preconceptions and pre-conditions for life had been irreversibly shaped five and a half thousand miles away in a place called Hollywood.”

Ken Gire, in “Windows of the Soul” (see blog post on 30.12.2016), describes movies as “a window through which God speaks”, which by extension, applies to musical theatre too. Some-how they show up our own experiences and help us to, perhaps, make more sense of them. They also enable us to lose ourselves in someone else’s story, and by losing ourselves, we find ourselves again (sounds like something Jesus said about losing our lives to find them!).

Like a movie, a musical is able to:

“…reflect at a very fundamental level, the longings of the soul: the longing that good triumphs over evil, that truth wins out, that the drama of life brings out the hero in us, that a good character in the course of the drama grows better, wiser, more understanding, and that a bad character, if not redeemed is at least brought to justice, and that in the end there is a happy ending, which is none other than a dim reflection, I think, of our longing for heaven.” Ken Gire

Like so many expressions of truth through art, musicals are deeply subversive They have the power to really get under your skin in a way that mere words and pictures ever can, with lyrics that are so memorable and sing-able that they take a lot of forgetting or ignoring, and break down our barriers of prejudice and pre-conception. And as we change our ideas, and see ourselves more clearly, we have the opportunity to become different people, and more important we may begin to behave differently.

And, perhaps, we may even become more capable of hearing the quiet whisper of the Spirit of God drawing us into an ever-deepening relationship with Jesus.

Because after all, if all truth is God’s truth, sometimes God uses unexpected people and unexpected ways to make sure we get it…

Success…or faithfulness?

When was at primary school, my best friend was called Dave. As there were at least six Dave’s in our class (including him and me), the odds were forever in his favour.

Dave was always that bit better than me…he was brighter academically, better at sport and, unlike me, came from a family where both parents were Christians. When we both learned guitar, his long fingers proved more suited to the quick riffs of lead guitar while I strummed out the rhythm (I was, however, the better singer, so later on it was me, not him, that got to ‘front’ the band). When we went off to grammar school, he ended up in the top stream whilst I remained an ‘other’. Our differences seemed irrelevant to our relationship, and I spent quite a bit of time at his home, where I got to know his parents, who were also leaders in our church, fairly well.

A few months before I was due to take my GCE ‘O’ levels (yes it was a long time ago) I had a fairly serious sporting accident which resulted in at least four month’s absence from school. Despite the best efforts of my teachers, and some hard work on my part, I failed, or got disastrously low grades in all my exams. I was pretty devastated, especially as Dave passed with a string of ‘A’ grades.

Shortly after the results came through, I received a card from Dave’s parents with a simple message. The cover bore the words:

In any year…

“God asks not for success, but faithfulness.

Not for great skill, but that we do his will. “

They will never know how much their encouragement meant to me. By this time I had been a Christian for about six years, and had some inkling of what God’s plans for my future might involve. It mattered to me that despite failing at this early stage, God was still pleased with my effort and intent.

So, I stuck out the stigma of joining the general sixth form (for a year of doing it all again) before studying for my ‘A’ levels.

Any cursory read of my CV will amply demonstrate how apt were the words given me all those years ago. Choice and circumstance have given me many changes of job or career over the years (alongside a sense of constant vocation), but my sense of God’s approval for my efforts to live true to his calling remain undiminished. A while ago a friend from Manchester commented that I seemed to have a real ability to re-invent myself…I truly believe that the encouragement given me all those years ago was a vital part of this.

I was recently reading a pre-publication copy of a book written by a friend so that I could review it. It’s a book that reflects on a different way of being an ‘all of life missional disciple’. People always seem to need to know how it’s possible to measure the effectiveness and success of such an endeavour. It reads,

“As Christians, are we called to be obedient or successful (however that is to be defined”

Paul Keeble, “Mission With” page 121

It took me back to the message on the card I was given all those years ago, and I started to wonder where the original quote came from.

A bit of research turned up two similar quotations, although neither were quite the same. One was from Oswald Chambers, the other from Mother Theresa.

Mother Theresa says:

“God has not called me to be successful.

He called me to be faithful.”

The Oswald Chambers quote is from “My Utmost for His Highest”, and reads,

“The test of the life of a saint is not success, but faithfulness in human life as it actually is. We will set up success in Christian work as the aim; the aim is to manifest the glory of God in human life, to live the life hid with Christ in God in human conditions.”

I also came across the identical quotation, with two extra lines, on the website of an Irish Presbyterian church, but still without attribution.

God asks not for success, but faithfulness,

Not for great skill, but that we do his will.

Live so as to be missed,

Live with eternities values in view.

So, the fact is that I am still no closer to finding the source of my life-changing quotation.

Any offers?