Blah Guy

Great article from Ryan Bolger at Fuller…Does the Church Have a Color?

I love people that spur on creativity.

Nicholas Berdyaev was a poet/philosopher/critic/Christian from the Russian late 20th century who wrestled, as we all do, with the complexity of creative living amongst a world of oppression, sadness, and fatalism. His ideas, although widely swept under the rug because of his over-arching Universalistic message, have been very profound and affected many.

I was struck by two quotes in some recent reading:

1) ‘Food for me is a material issue. Food for another is a spiritual issue.’

Berdyaev, raised in communist Russia, no doubt saw the fruits of hunger. He spun the issue on its head by making the case that it is a spiritual matter to care for the needs of another (although I think it is rather important to feed ourselves as well.) But for Berdyaev, another’s hunger is a deeply spiritual issue to me.

2) ‘Free creativeness is the creatures is the great answer to the call of the Creator.’

This is a quote from his ‘The Destiny of Man’ which I found very interesting and compelling. His chapter on the creative response of humanity to the Creator was quite timely for me. In a church-culture of McDoctrine (to borrow a phrase of Marva Dawn) passed from the top down, a dose of creative criticism may be much needed.

At one point in his text, he makes the case that Jesus’s parable of the Talents (Matt. 25 and Luke 19) is referring primarily to the spiritual duty to use one’s creative-ness to preach the gospel of Christ in a world lacking the creativeness of God. While I see creativity everywhere (everyone is created by something, right?), I think Berdyaev’s words are right on.

The world seems to be quite aware of the gospel, at least the gospel the church has been sharing for 2,000 years. What makes the gospel compelling, I argue, is two things. First, its message. Resurrection, grace, judgement…etc. All the good stuff. But second, the compelling-ness of the way it is preached. When it is preach analytically (deductive, in a way), linear, top-down, A-B-C…we hear the same old message over and over again. Not that that is bad. We all need reminded of the same old message. But when we approach it as CREATIVE individuals of a CREATOR God, we preach it with zeal, and power, and with every Talent we have.

‘The best messages deserve the best packages’

I heard someone say last week, ‘deliberate mediocrity’ is a sin. I think to ‘preach the gospel with deliberate mediocrity’ is a sin. The message of Christ and the Kingdom of God cannot, ever, under any circumstances, bore.

How bout a good old fashion return to the joy of creativity. It seems to be God’s nature. Right?

I knew it would spark dialogue.

Of course most of the response I received regarding my last post about vegetarianism came ‘behind the closed doors’ of direct email or Facebook message, which I appreciate. Carol Adams was right, ‘Vegetarianism sparks dialogue.’ It sparks anger for many Christians.

The best question I received was from a friend at George Fox who asked, ‘Why meat?’ So I told him I would explain.

Three reasons:

1) Meat, especially red meat, has proven to be one of civilization’s most complex industrious systems. It requires more energy per pound of meat to get from the fields to the table than any other form of food in the history of the world. TOO COMPLEX. I think a simpler chain of food would be good for everyone. As one person said, the goal is to get ‘the shortest distance between the field, the table, and the mouth.’

2) I am pausing from eating meat not for the ‘meat’ factor, but mostly for the ‘torture factor.’ Any human, who has seen, as I have, the horrors of modern ‘Agri-business’ (Wendell Berry’s words), especially that of the ‘torture’ of the animals we eat, has a deep conscious awareness of the suffering that went into play for the eating of that meat. I struggle with that. Slavery of humans was bad, and equally is that of the animals we eat. If there was an equitable, affordable way to put turkey in my sandwiches, I would do it. But I neither make sufficient funds nor friends that could do it for me, which leaves me in what we call a pickle.

3) Solidarity. I think Jesus exemplified solidarity with those who suffered. He touched with his bare hands the lepers. He hung on the cross with two first-class felons. The story goes on and on. I guess in essence, if I ever saw someone who didn’t have food period, and I knew what I ate, there would be a sense of guilt on my conscience. There is something, in my mind, special about suffering with those who don’t have the higher foods of meat. Read Carol Adams ‘The Sexual Politics of Meat’. She makes that case that meat for centuries has been a sign of the rich. This is the first time in history meat has been something anyone can eat, in America that is. While this is not the case in the South, it has become so here.

Okay, now that I have put my thoughts down, I am sure by breakfast tomorrow I will be calling myself a heretic. Or at least a loser.

They say the third time’s the charm.

I say the thirty…thousandth works too.

I got asked this evening, again, why, of all things, I am a vegetarian. Why not, everything is fair game around the table, isn’t it? I would ask myself the same question if I sat next to myself awkwardly not eating the scrumptious piece of blood red-meat loaf before me while I nibble at a under-cooked pile of mushy-green asparagus complimented by a Gardenburger covered in cheese and rice flakes. I would take issue with me. I do. That’s why a Vegetarian was born.

I was raised on meat. Some kids ate sweet potato soup. Not me. Tri-tip at two. Or at least that’s what I remember. I can’t recall anytime in my life being deprived of the blessings of ‘the meat’.

Then there was a porch in England.

Everything came to head last summer while on a trip to England working on my PhD. After a day of studying, sitting in a beautiful British backyard, under two hundred year old trees eating the most amazing pile of fried oysters shipped from another part of the world, all for me. I sat that, butter on my lips, oysters in my heart, and I nearly raptured. It was unbelievable.

Then I had what those in AA called ‘a higher moment.’

Now, a little story from earlier in the day. I had been reading endless material on the realities of children in Africa having so little food that barley was barely an option on good days. If memory serves correctly, some of my best writing took place that day. Taking notes, writing my deep thoughts on this sadness, pontificating on the West and how it has led the world down the street of starvation.

Then, later at dinner, when I had the option, I loaded my plate with the most blissful fried oysters (ironically from the US) you could imagine.

And sitting there…something happened.

I’m eating fried oysters…most kids in Africa barely have barley on a good day.

My heart broke in two.

Why am I a vegetarian?

I think Jesus said one thing but lived another. Jesus said, ‘Man does not live on bread alone’, but he lived the truth that he knew they couldn’t live that long without it. He simply fed people Spirit and Bread.

Sitting in the backyard of a British eatery, I realized my eating was not a representative of Jesus’ simple desire to feed people, which he did ALL THE TIME. I was eating something that did not represent Jesus’ desire of solidarity with with broken.

So keep asking…cause simplicity begins with the fork. Today, I’m a vegetarian.

I’ll start eating fried oysters again when all the kids in Africa get at least a little Barley.

An interesting trend has emerged with the coming of our new president, Barack Obama. Having a president with a skin color all different from my own is one thing, but from our own as a traditionally white-run country, many are wondering whether this is a time to move away from making our children read such books as Huck Finn, a classic by Mark Twain, because of it’s obvious racist language and undertones. There seem to be many who think we should wave the magic wand of historical amnesia through our history books. Howard Zinn would vomit.

The line of thinking goes something like this. A new time bodes a new chance to escape our past. Why subject our children any longer to the evil of our past, teaching them afresh the age-old language of the black-suppressed American culture? Why not let that language die?

I was struck by this.

And a bit miffed.

The Bible portrays one of the most disliked people groups of all time, especially by the Jewish nation. They’re the Amelekites. From Exodus on, there is a sort of racist-esque perspective permeated in the Biblical language. Enemy is an understatement, and understandably so. They had been an ongoing boil on the life of Israel. They are to be forgotten for all time, and be destroyed from the face of the Earth. Do a quick glance of all the references of the Amelelikes and you will see the point. They were hated.

Well, we should stop reading the Bible shouldn’t we?

Should we stop reading the Bible? Is that how we encounter history?

To learn the way into the future is to grasp the pain of the past. We can’t move on and grow until we know the mistakes of yesterday. I think it wise for our children to read Huck Finn, maybe Mein Kampf, and even beyond. Not because it is agreeable. It isn’t. But because the evil of humanity can never be destroyed by ignoring it, but only by encountering it, not being afraid of it, and stepping over it.

We get to live a new life tomorrow. What a day of first. But it isn’t the end of the past, it is as well the beginning of the future.

Keep reading Huck Finn. Never forget.

You can’t believe what they are doing now. Read this article in the New York times. This is the sort of thinking we desperately need.

Just read Rob Bell and Don Golden new book, ‘Jesus wants to Save Christians’. While very similar in style, it is a bit more willing to tackle the institution, which I appreciate. During my visit to Mars Hill (the church he pastors) I was immensely blown away by the simplicity of their message…Jesus. I have never been to a service that began with 5 minutes to breath. Brilliant…and I like to breath.

He (they) are both getting a tremendous of flack for this book, and I would think that is a good thing. I appreciate among many things Bell’s ability to at least speak his heart and mind. While I no doubt take issue with many of his methods, his message is very important and must be considered…in light of the size of his audience.

I found a great interaction with Bell on this new text.

http://www.relevantmagazine.com/god_article.php?id=7569