Whatever Happened to Marriage?

People want to discuss or debate the lagalities or "rights" of gay marriage but I want to ask a deeper question, why should the church being doing marraiges that are sanctioned by the empire or state?  Do our rights come from God or the state and does the state sanction the church today?  The family in the Scriptures are to be under God's rule and kingdom and resist the ways of the world.  Unless one is part of an Almish family, the family has taken its marching orders more from the world than it has from scripture or the church.  The family is not only in trouble but it has already been redefined way before people started bringing up the gay marriage issue.  If all marriage is about as a contract between two-consenting adults then why not a whole lot of alternative situations that our society has not even talked about yet (it may get there if society hasn't totally disintegrated before then).

Christian families for the most part do not disciple one another in the home.  People expect the church to disciple their children and the church expects the parents to do it so hardly anyone is doing it.  One would be hard-pressed to find families that have "alter-times" or moments of prayer, worship, and Bible study.  Parents for the most part do not have "faith-talks" with their children and in our American society or privacy and everyone owns their own home, Christian homes as places of hospitality and open to strangers is almost non-existent.  These were the defining marks of kingdom families in the early church that has been lost by modern families in our industrialized and materialistic age.

Marriage is not only entangled with the state but for many churches and ministers who perform weddings, it does not matter whether the people are believers or not or whether they havbe been married multiple times.  The church has been living with these compromises for so long that when it comes to the relationship between the church and state, it has been for better or for worse.

Christian marriage is not just a contract or covenant but it is a sacrament.  Marriage is not about individuals but its about families and their relationship to God's kingdom and church.  Marriage and eucharist were integrated historically but since they have been separated, so the direction of marriage has become secularized and has lost much of its meaning.  For marriage to be fully Christian, this divine mandate to discipleship must be regained or marriage will continue to lose itself to both the state and continue to lose its value in our modern world.

Reflections for the Journey

1.  Be generous to others, especially those who disagree with you.
2.  Be open to new possibilities God may be presenting to you.
3.  We cannot pick and choose what kind of God or Jesus we want.
4.  Really listen to what others say and not what you want them to say or what you think they should
     say.
5.  Continually be moving in the direction and destination God intends for you.  Avoid stopping and
     side trips.
6.  There will be disappointments on the journey with God.  Don't be surprised or shocked when
     things don't turn out the way you expect or go differently than what you want.
7.  Do not waiste time in life majoring on minors or focusing your energy on the tyranny of the
     urgent.  Relax and enjoy what God has put in front of you at the moment.

Creeds or Deeds or Both?

[Picture of the late Chuck Colson, Founder of Prison Ministries -  "You will be missed!"]

"We need Christians to not only do good deeds, but to know the creeds"  -  Chuck Colson

NO CREED BUT CHRIST - Early American Church Slogan

We live in an age where people are sick of the church fighting over creeds, doctrinal differences and distinctives, and where are the deeds from the church that make this a better world to live in?  Beliefs are under attack in our gray world and Christian deeds and saints modeling them are a rare commodity.  The world has quit listening to the church for many reasons but one of them is the church's own inner divisions, contradictions, and arguing over things nobody cares about!

The power of God's story redeeming and healing us still grabs people's imaginations and changes people's hearts but even this is getting lost under the rubble of theological squabbles over the atonement and academic duels over theology where it seems the biggest loser in the end is the church.  Is the Bible simply a bunch of arguments to use against others or is there this grand story within the Bible that wants to turn this world right-side up again?  Is the issue we would rather be right than loving? 

We can not throw the creeds out because they are signposts to our faith (without them, we are more likely to lose our way and might even get lost).  But creeds should not be used to separate from other followers of Jesus or think church unity means uniformity of belief.  There is a uniformity that God desires but the focus can not be on creeds but on Christ.  The focus can not be simply on beliefs but on the uniformity of the Spirit.  It is the Spirit of God that reveals both our relationship to one another and the unity of the Church. 

Maybe we need more poets in the church to help us understand the Scriptures.  Maybe we need more Christian mystics to show us what a disticntive Christian lifestyle might look like?  Maybe we need to sing the faith more with songs of praise like "We are one in the Spirit, we are one in the Lord."

Why are we not scandalized by Jesus today?

"SCANDALS ARE INCONVENIENT TRUTHS"  -  David Instone-Brewer

Jesus is this radical revolutionary that had everyone talking in his day, especially the way he scandalized most God-fearing folks.  Jesus often said the wrong things, hung around the wrong kind of people, and did things that were at least shocking in his day.  At the end of the day, Jesus said many things that people did not really want to hear.  Why is it that Jesus sounds so polite and respectful and would never harm a fly today? (he must have been vegetarian as well since we know he would certainly not hurt animals).

I am reading two books that are rocking my safe little world for the moment.  One is Dr. David Instone-Brewer book "The Jesus Scandals" and the other is Robin Meyers "The Underground Church: Reclaiming the Subversive Way of Jesus."  Instone Brewer is a Baptist minister who has such a great literary flair to his writing.  He is a researcher and knows how to take dry academic studies and put teeth and bite into them.  Robin Meyers is a self-described liberal preacher but actually cuts through a lot of the conservative-liberal rhetoric and gets straight to the heart of issues better than I have seen in a long time.  Both books encourages people to be radical disciples of Jesus or non-status quo revolutionaries for God.  I dare you to read them.  These books will not let you stay where you are and will challenge you in fresh ways.  Be warned, these books are not for the spiritually timid!

Seeing God in Everything

I recently began reading, at the inspiration of the post by my friend here, Meister Eckhart (Meister is German for Master - just read that today in the introduction to the Complete Mystical Works of Meister Eckhart).  (Interesting side note - Meister is not his first name.  In the Eckhart book, which is an older work, the translator said that after the title of Meister was given to Eckhart, he was then known (from that time on) as Meister.  My observation is I am not aware of any other individual known by that title from antiquity.)

Anyway, I first purchased the older work and its first chapter is a series of talks.  The main emphasis just in this chapter alone that is very challenging is to see God in everything, and Eckhart means everything.

So I also purchased and read On Becoming a Mystical Christian.  I read this before I got the Eckhart book.  So I am reading English's book and he references this song.  Not even a Christian band, but wow what a work of Art.  It took me a few times to "get" the whole video, but God is there in it.

So I am going to post a few posts of various things that draw me to God.  Right now it is going to be new songs/music that God comes through to me.