Responding Charitably in the midst of Controversy

Books, Ecclesiology, Gay & Lesbian, Social Issues, The Marin Foundation No Responses »
Apr 032013

It’s all over the news in Manitoba. Whether it’s Bill 18 or some recent controversy in Morris , the news is saturated with the polemic between Christians and the Gay community. This is a tragedy. It is a tragedy because charitable Christian dialogue must never seek to encourage this type of divisive, hyper-sensationalized, unrelational form of engagement around ethical matters. We must always seek unity and peace in a spirit of love and yes, of course, with a commitment to truth. However, truth does not come as some static statement that we simply try to defend at all costs. It comes through humble searching within community. And so, The ConneXion community has begun a process of searching in just such a way in relation to  how The Church can build bridges with the Gay community both locally and abroad.

We are beginning our humble search by reading and reflecting together on Andrew Marin’s book Love is an Orientation.

Our prayer is that God would teach us how to be humble learners and listeners in what is often a politically charged environment. If you are interested in learning more about our humble searching, please email me for more information.

Zac

Posted by zac at 11:56 am Tagged with: , ,

Discipleship in a "Rapture" Culture

Biblical Interpretation, Ecclesiology, Mission, Prophecy, Social Issues, Thinking Critically 1 Response »
May 252012

Do you remember what was supposed to have happened on May 21st of last year?

Have you seen the movie 2012?

Have you read any of the Left Behind novels?

Have you heard of the term apocalypse?

Have you heard of the term rapture?

I bet you have heard of at least one of the above. Our culture is, in one way or another, obsessed with the end of time, with the almost total destruction of everything. So, the question is, as disciples of Jesus, what do we do with all of this? What should discipleship look like in a culture obsessed by the end of the world? Of course, who you ask this question will greatly determine what kind of answer you get. Some answers include:

  1. As followers of Jesus, we should try to understand if we are living in the final days of our existence so that we can feel the urgency to bring the gospel to the world.
  2. As bible believing people, we should take seriously its message about the end of time laid out in the prophetic books of the bible and use those details as a way of witnessing to non-believers.

Still yet, some Christians take this perspective:

  1. No matter what “time” we are in, we are called to take up our cross and follow Jesus in the world, living a life like he lived, and praying that God’s kingdom would come on earth as it is in heaven. We should be wary of certain end-times focuses as they could distract us from discipleship.

This third perspective is the perspective that I would like to promote by way of linking you to a 24 minute film produced by a student as a final for his master’s class in university. The film details the history and development of the idea of “the rapture,” especially as it became popular in America. Throughout this short film, several terms are used, some of which are defined for you in the film and one important one which is not. The one important one that is not defined I want to define for you before you jump into the film so that you are not totally out of the loop. That term is:

Millennialism – Of course, you will all know the term millennium as it relates to the number 1000 but you may not know its theological history. In the book of Revelation, a book filled with powerful and odd imagery, we read this in chapter 20:1-6:

“Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit, and locked and sealed it over him, so that he would deceive the nations no more, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be let out for a little while.

Then I saw thrones, and those seated on them were given authority to judge. I also saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for their testimony to Jesus and for the word of God. They had not worshipped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. (The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.) This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy are those who share in the first resurrection. Over these the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years.”

On the surface we can see that the basic idea of the millennium or the 1000 year reign of Christ is that sometime in human history there will be a period of peace and improvement on the earth before the final judgment and establishment of the new heavens and the new earth. But beyond that basic description of the millennium, endless interpretations are offered in Christian history as to what this thousand years really means and what it really will look like. The most common interpretations can be classified into three perspectives: Premillenialism, Postmillenialsim, and Amillenialism.

First, Pre-millenialism is the belief that Jesus will physically return to earth and reign for 1000 years before the final judgment of all.

Post-millenialism, on the other hand is the belief that Jesus will reign spiritually through the church for 1000 literal years, bringing peace and worldly improvement during that time and then return physically after (post) that time is up.

Finally, A-millenialism is the belief that the 1000 years mentioned in revelation is a symbolic number, not literal, that we are in the millennium right now and that, after an unknown amount of time, Jesus will indeed return to judge the living and the dead.

So, now that you have way too much information in your head, take some time to watch this film and discuss it in the comment thread afterwards. Here is the link:

https://vimeo.com/12166965

Posted by zac at 9:28 am

EMC Social Concerns Blog

Evangelical Mennonite Conference, Social Issues No Responses »
Mar 152011

Hello all. In September of last year, I had posted on the question of what a social concern is. The motivation for that post sprang from the recent re-forming of the EMC’s social concerns committee of which I became a member. This committee has since met over the last ten months to discuss just what it might look like for the Church to acknowledge that the Kingdom of God is pressing in on the world. We discerned, through prayer and in conversation that the spirit was stirring us into the task of dialogue and thought concerning EMC’s relationship to our Aboriginal neighbours.  This has been both a challenging and beautiful task. We are pursuing many different approaches to making this dialogue happen. One such approach is a blog which you can read on the conference website. We have titled the blog Kingdom Provocations. Head on over, read, and please do comment if you have something to contribute to this important conversation.

Posted by zac at 9:51 pm

Some further thoughts on the implications of the cosmic scope of God's reign

Canadian Politics, Mission, Reconciliation, Social Issues No Responses »
Oct 262010

In the previous post, we saw that God’s plan for redemption is not limited to a people group or a nation, but is cosmic in scope. This all sounds great and profound, but in what way should this cosmic scope affect and shape our identity as followers of Jesus the Christ? Perhaps at least one way in which it should shape our practices is in terms of how we understand our own identity. Let’s take a common form of identity for an example:

Most of, if not all, the people who attend The ConneXion are Canadians. Yet in what way might we imagine this type of identity to influence or be influenced by faith in Jesus? Is our Canadian identity constitutive of our Christianity or vice versa? Now, this is a complicated question, especially seeing as how what exactly makes for a “Canadian” (is it love of hockey? multiculturalism? the diverse landscapes? social status? economy?)  and what makes for Christianity (is it a particular denomination? is it commitment to the church? is it doctrinal positions?) is up for grabs. Furthermore, this may seem to some an odd question and one to which we would (if we gave the pat answer) reply: “Of course my identity as a Christian is more constitutive of my Canadian identity than my Canadian identity is of my Christianity!” Yet if we were to challenge ourselves, perhaps we would have to ask, as Kent Dueck did this last Sunday while exploring Psalm 146, “at the end of the day, who do we trust?” Do we trust the identity that gives us the most “security” in life, or the identity that makes the most demands? The identity that encourages us to work for a life of individual pleasures or an identity that pushes us into the complicated and frustrating work of community and mutual submission? Don’t get me wrong, I am not trying to claim that everything “Canadian” is in opposition to God but rather that as Christian disciples we will always face the temptation to find our security in the “gods” of the world (whatever form they take) rather than the one who is “true” and “faithful” forever (Psalm 146:6). Canadian identity need not be a rival God, but it certainly can become one.

This is not hard to swallow, especially when one looks at what has gone on in the Middle East for so many years now.

Much evil has been done from both sides and yet at the end of the day, so much of the struggle comes to a head precisely over the question of identity (especially national). Previously I provided a quote from Alain Epp Weaver’s States of Exile and I think it appropriate to do so again to begin to imagine what the cosmic scope of God’s reign might mean for Christian identity in a world in which Nations and other Global Systems vie for allegiance:

Epp Weaver says, quoting Gerald Schlabach, “Christians can live rightly in the ‘land’ that God gives…only if they sustain a tension with landedness itself.” Part of this tension is not being fully at home in the land so long as others are excluded from the benefits of landedness, with exile allowed to shape our understandings of home.” pg.50

I think that last line, “not being fully at home in the land so long as others are excluded from the benefits of landedness, with exile allowed to shape our understandings of home” is critical for any Christian discipleship as it always recognizes that the many competing identities of this world always seek to make a dividing line between those who can come in and those who must stay out. This is easy to see at work in the Canadian question as well.

There is no doubt that while much has been done to try to atone for sins against the Aboriginal peoples of Canada, these peoples still largely find themselves excluded from the “benefits of landedness” and, recognizing that this is an incredibly complicated issue, one could make a pretty good argument that this is in large part based on certain notions of what makes for “Canadian” identity (individualism, certain economic systems). The Christian message must push us into discomfort in this regard, as the Gospel states that God’s justice and benefits are to encompass all nations, in their uniqueness; that all are to be beneficiaries of God’s reconciling work. May we, in our communities, ponder how our “landedness” (whether that takes the form of our Canadian status or economic or social status) must be put into question in light of those who are excluded, knowing that God executes justice for the oppressed and the hungry (Psalm 146:7). And in response to that pondering, may we imagine practices that can faithfully join God’s already active work among the nations.

Posted by zac at 3:00 pm

What is a Social Concern?

Ecclesiology, Language, Social Issues 1 Response »
Sep 292010

Hello All,

As some of you will know, I am part of a Social Concerns Committee that has been organized by the Evangelical Mennonite Conference. It has been started largely because “social” concerns is an area that the EMC feels has lacked attention in its recent and not so recent history of teaching, theology, and practice. My question, however, is what is a “social” concern? Is the very need to classify a concern of the church under the category “social,” illustrative of the fact that the church has largely come to think of itself both ideologically and practically either in asocial ways or in downright anti-social, individualistic terms. Of course in this way it is also legitimate to use the term in order to draw out a certain lack of vision or scope within the church. Yet there is a danger that “concerns”, especially those social ones, become departmentalized and specialized in such a way that sidesteps the need for a more broad involvement of all community members in the work of reconciliation among and outside of our communities.

I guess a way of summing this all up is to say that ultimately the church is by its nature a social reality in that it deals with life together. Indeed, the latin socialis means “living with others” of “fellowship”. Furthermore, this word has, at least on the surface, a close connection to the greek work ekklesia which denotes a gathering of peoples. The New Testament church was always a corporate reality. Paul’s epistles were not written to individuals. Rather, they dealt with issues of life together. The Corinthian church is a great example:

“Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be answerable for the body and blood of the Lord. Examine yourselves, and only then eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For all who eat and drink without discerning the body, eat and drink judgment against themselves. For this reason many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. But if we judged ourselves, we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world. So then, my brothers and sisters, when you come together to eat, wait for one another. If you are hungry, eat at home, so that when you come together, it will not be for your condemnation.” 1 Corinthians 11:27-34

Paul’s words are pretty strong: are we discerning the body in our churches (the body here referring to more than just the “insiders”, of course – see Matt. 7:21)? What are the social concerns of our day, in our community?

Zac

P.S. If you are interested in reading the mandate of the Social Concerns Committee, click here.

Posted by zac at 9:05 pm
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