I ended the service at Drumchapel Essenside URC with these brilliant words from Roddy Hamilton:

let us go out
with quiet boldness,
tender daring,
simmering anger,
impatient justice.

let us go out with provocative peacemaking
into advent,
enough to crack open the moribund and dry faith of the world
in it’s spent and necrotic cravings.

let us go out with a message
that disturbs the world with restless whispers
about god and incarnation,
goosebumps and justice.

let us go out
and muffle our laughter
behind an unnerving truth
heaven-shaped
sharp-edged
waiting to crack it all open
and let the glory through
with a living word:
jesus

Restless whispers.  Goosebumps and justice.  That’s what Advent is for me.

Let the waiting begin.

Christmas is coming

The waiting begins

It should be a time of joy and anticipation and yet the lectionary gives us Isaiah 64:1-9.

7 No-one calls on your name or strives to lay hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us and made us waste away because of our sins.

God is gone

The people wait

Impatient

Fearful

Trusting

that God will return… soon

God is missing… but the rumours persist.

God is missing… but hope remains.

God is missing… but the people keep watch.

The waiting begins

what do you wait for?

Peter Johnston and Scott Rennie have the first part of a fascinating conversation about the book ‘Why Liberal Churches Are Growing’.  Listen HERE to their discussion about the challenges facing the ‘progressive’ church, creating community, the church and young people and much more.

Today was at an event organised by the Church of Scotland called ‘Emerging Church - Centre Meets the Fringe’ in a new church development in Gilmerton, Edinburgh (domain of the inimitable Paul Beautyman).  We’re hearing about ‘emerging church’ from people who are ‘on the edges’.

In some ways the day so far has been inspiring and in others ways frustrating.

Firstly, it’s a Church of Scotland event and despite the large minority of people here from out with the CofS it’s a bit Church of Scotland centric.  That said, the issues that they face are the same as every other denomination.  

The tension between denominational church and the expressions of faith out there in the wild was very evident as is the thought that ‘emerging church’ is just for children and young people, that 11am is a rubbish time for a service and that power is both a problem and an opportunity.

But what is also evident is that there are people around who are thinking deeply about what the church is, how we express faith and how the ‘church’ of the future might look and be.

I’ll try and get some proper thoughts together later but for now I’m inspired by Paul Thomson’s vision of Christians in the wild, being followers of Christ where they are.  Groups of people who share a dream coming together to make that dream a reality.  Grasping that thought that the Good News is for the poor, that people outside the institution still have faith and are managing to resource their spiritual journey just fine thank you very much.

What’s my role in all of that?  I work for a denomination.  I try my best to support, challenge and encourage it.  To help it’s congregations to develop and wrestle with how to be church here and now.

But part of me has disengaged.  Part of me wonders what the Sunday morning thing is all about (you might have detected some of this in yesterday’s sermon).  My questions are similar to the ones voiced here by Paul and by Doug Gay.  What is the church?  How can we reclaim some of that rich heritage of the word church?  Where does liturgy fit and how can it resource a richer experience?  How do we understand heracy and orthodoxy?

Questions, questions.  I like the questions.

Today’s sermon, preached at Barrhead URC.

Why are you here?  Today?  Why did you choose to come here this morning?  When you come here, what do you find?  Why do you come back every week?  To meet your friends?  To sing songs, to listen to people me, to hear the Bible read?

Your role in this whole Sunday thing is really very passive.  I decided the hymns, the prayers, the readings and the content of the sermon.  Your job seems to be to sit there and listen and to sing what I tell you to.

I suppose I hope that something you will hear or sing might cause you to think about your faith, your God, your place in the world, and if it does then that’s a good thing.  But if that is all that happens, if we have a nice time and are maybe stirred a little in our souls then we have completely missed the point.

Our Gospel reading today (Matthew 25: 31-46) is most definitely the point.  It is the reason for our being here, although it’s sometimes hard to see the connection.  Jesus tells the people listening to feed the hungry, give a drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, and visit the sick and the imprisoned.

Join the Advent Conspiracy!  Give your presence this Christmas!

After discussion with Chris today we decided to create a Scottish Youth Ministry Network online at http://scottishyouthministry.ning.com.

This network is for anyone involved in or interested in work with young people in Scotland.  We hope it will be a place where we can support, encourage and resource each other.  So join up and tell your friends.

I’ve just finished reading Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell.  I know it’s taken me a while to get round to this but I’m kind of glad I waited because I think I’m probably in a place now where it makes more sense to me that it might have when it came out a couple of years ago.

The book is full of gems.  For me, Bell’s engagement with the Jewish Jesus is illuminating and helpful but the line that struck me most was:

If it’s not good news for everybody then it’s not good news for anybody.

His explanation is that if person X starts to follow Christ that should be good news for the Muslim next door or the Hindu across the road because person x will be a better neighbour.

I’ve asked the question ‘What difference does it make to the world that we follow Christ?’ in a few sermons over the past months.  I think Rob Bell’s observation gives at least a place to start looking for an answer.  The Good News isn’t just Good News for us.  It should be Good News for the people we live with, the people we work with, the people we share our street with, the people we meet and all the people we come into contact with.

The lectionary for this week is Matthew 25: 31-46 (the sheep and the goats/i was naked, hungy, sick, in prison) and in his Chocolate teapot for 28 Nov Roddy Hamilton has posted some thoughts:

There is no way Jesus intended to start a church. Nothing he did was designed to grow a great institution that has fought over how many angels you can get on a pin head, the colour of cups in the cupboards and who should be allowed to use them, should the minister raise three fingers representing the Trinity during the benediction, should we stand for the bible, what should be the balance of hymns between traditional and contemporary etc, etc, etc. You can add to the list as you feel the need.

All Jesus did was tell folk there are forgotten folk in the world and there ought not to be, there are people who starve and there shouldn’t be, there are folk imprisoned in memories and pain and guilt and marriages and illness who should rather be free to life fully, there are people who can’t afford clothes for their own backs let alone their children’s backs and that is a shocking thing to let happen. Sort it.

The principle is dead straight forward. This is quite simply all there is to do as a church, a nation, a company of people, an individual. Here, and rarely anywhere else will you find Jesus. He never said he’d be found among those who wanted pews or those who didn’t, those who wanted everything sung with the organ or the piano, those who wanted Moody and Sankey or those who wanted John Bell.

But he did say, if you want to find me, look among the poor.

Which bit did the church fail to understand?

My answer? All of it.

We, the church, the supposed people of God, the followers of Christ, have forgotten that the Good News should be Good News for everyone.  If it’s not Good News for everyone then it’s not the Good News Jesus was talking about.

Any thoughts?

Last night I had the privilege of filling in for Thomas, the regular co-host of the Something Beautiful Podcast. Thomas is ill and so asked me if I could step in and chat with Jonathan about his interview with Dave Schmelzer, author of Not The Religious Type.

Jonathan and Dave talk about stages of faith, signs and maths, then Jonathan and I have a chat about some of the issues raised in the interview.

This episode of the Something Beautiful Podcast is now avaialable HERE!  Have a listen and let us know what you think!

ASBO Jesus does it again!