JD Miner

My Dad is in a band called Jd Miner. And they totally rock. You need to check out their website jdminer.com. At their website you get the opportunity to buy their CD - it is really good.

How Shall We Worship?

I have begun reading a book called How Shall we Worship? by Marva Dawn. It looks like a really interesting book. I have just read the introduction but Marva is already asking some good questions about worship and the church. Here are a couple of the questions that you might want to struggle with. I would love to hear what you think.
Does our worship enable us to be ready to die for the sake of God's glory?
Why do so many who say they are "spiritual" want nothing to do with our churches' worship?
Are we really encountering God?

Worship

Last Saturday we had our annual meeting as a church. I rather enjoyed the meeting. Though I did find it interesting that there was not a lot of discussion...except for on worship. When the topic of worship got mentioned then there was lots and lots of discussion. Actually most of the discussion was not about worship in general but about music. People are very passionate about music. This has been an on going discussion in our church for a long time (and one I do not think is going to go away over night). But there have been some people who have been expressing a desire for sometime to make a significant shift in our music on Sunday. Since this has been talked about for so long our chairman decided that we should have a meeting in which we will discuss this issue. In light of this up coming meeting (not sure when) we thought it would be good to give the people in the church the resources they need to study the issue of worship. Also we are hoping that we can get people to discuss this issue before the meeting.

So... I have decided to post an article on worship. I am also encouraging you to share your thoughts - on worship in general and on the article in particular. Please note that even if you are not a part of the church I would love to hear what you have to say.

I am just posting a portion of the article (click to read the rest). This is from Freedom and Framework, Spirit and Truth: Recovering Biblical Worship, by NT Wright

My third urgent point concerns the relationship between worship and culture. The great Christ-and-culture debates of the last century have taught us that we cannot simply go with the flow of a particular culture on the one hand, nor yet simply renounce our own culture as being opposed to the gospel.[20] Each aspect of culture must be assessed on its own merits. This, too, is a subject for another time.[21] As C. S. Lewis never tired of saying, there is nothing in God’s world which cannot be redeemed; but there is nothing which can simply be embraced as it stands. Everything must be brought to the bar of the gospel, of the cross and resurrection of Jesus the Messiah.

It is not, then, simply a matter of working out how, in worship, to bring together the traditional with the contemporary. That is important, but it is equally important to ensure that the tradition is celebrated through the lens of the gospel, not uncritically, and that the contemporary is adopted likewise through the lens of the gospel, not just because it is new. What T. S. Eliot called the “easy commerce of the old and the new” is not, as the poem makes clear, achieved easily or without struggle; but it is there if we will work and pray at it.[22] It is not a matter of slavishly adopting a particular culture, whether that of sixteenth-century Europe or of twenty-first-century America; nor, equally, is it a matter of slavishly renouncing the one or the other. (In England this sometimes acquires the dark overtones of class snobbery, both regular and inverted: some people would not want to be caught attending a worship service led with guitars and drums for precisely the same reason that they would not want to be found watching a soap opera, and other people would avoid cathedral-style worship for the same reasons that they would avoid black-tie dinners. This cultural prejudice, which can easily disguise itself with plausible theological language, must be smoked out and repented of.)

Nor is it a matter of working out “what this congregation will be comfortable with.” Who says you ought always to be comfortable in the presence of Almighty God? But nor should one simply ask “what does this congregation need to wake them up?”; who says it is your place to shock and startle the people of God? There will be shocks, of course, and there also will be the deep comfort of the familiar. Good liturgy, planned carefully week by week and year by year, will bring the two together so that they complement and reinforce each other and, most importantly, build up the worshipers in the knowledge and love of God and send them out refreshed for their kingdom-tasks in the world. And if we know what we are about this should mean that in our worship, in its music and readings, in its drama and movement, in its silence as well as its speech, we are not only reflecting different cultures but contributing creatively and in the power of the Spirit to the culture which our God is bringing about in our own day.

7 wonders of the world

Can you name the 7 wonders of the world?
I was not able to. In fact I was very sure that the great wall of China was one of the wonders of the world. But it isn't. 6 out of the 7 wonders of the world have been destroyed (a very long time ago). Which totally sucks because one of my goals when I was a little kid was to see the 7 wonders of the world.
However all is not lost. They are naming a new 7 wonders of the world. In fact people get to choose the wonders by voting. Check out 7 new wonders. I am going to vote for pyramids (I think they should get in because they are really cool and they are the only ancient wonder left standing) and for the great wall (that way I can be right - I will just say that I was prophesying).

The Christian Right = Fascist?

Last night on The Hour with George Stroumboulopoulos there was an interview with Chris Hedges. Christ claims that the Christ Right are a bunch of fascists and should be resisted.
Watch the interview American Fascists

What do you think?

Why Men Hate the Church

I just finished reading the book Why Men Hate the Church, by David Murrow. His basic argument is that men hate the church because the church is feminine. Men he states feel that by attending church they will become less masculine. His solution is to make the church more masculine. David says we can do this in a few ways. First is to offer challenge. David states that the church is big into comfort. Men do not want comfort they want challenge. Second men need a man that they can follow. They need examples. And they need to become examples to other men (specifically to younger men). Third men need a band of brothers. They need a group of men who will hold them accountable and push them to be better.
David states that as a church we are losing the men.
What do you think? Have you read the book?
Even if you haven't read the book what do you think? Do you think that the church is more feminine than masculine? Do you think that as a church we need to challenge more?
Are we losing the men?

Missionfest

Missionfest was this past weekend. If you did not get a chance to go you really missed out. It great to hear what God is doing in the world. I went in on Saturday night with some friends. We wanted to hear Steve Saint. He is the son of Nate Saint. Nate was killed by natives when he went to share the gospel with them. Steve's family (he was just a kid when this happened) continued to love and share the message with this tribe. Many have given their lives to God including some of the men who killed Nate Saint. It is an interesting story. The DVD is called End of the Spear. Well Steve had a good message. He called for us Christians to be active in sharing our faith.
A couple of other things happened at Missions Fest which were highlights for me. One was finding a book written by a Jim Cunningham. Jim attended the church that I grew up in. He would occasionally preach. I still remember one of his sermons. It constantly challenges me. I have not seen him in many years. Another highlight was meeting a missionary who was in the Philippines with us. We did not specifically with him but we meet him and his family a couple of times. It was really neat to hear about what God is doing in that country.

Star Trek

The other night I watched the first episode of Enterprise. This was the first time I had ever seen this series. I know that I am behind the times (since the series has run for three years and was cancelled last year). But I just have peasant vision so I don't get to see some of the new shows.
Now the first episode was not too bad. However it did not really have a Star Trek feel. The music was wrong. But the my biggest problem with it was that instead of promoting diversity like some of the other Star Treks this one just felt like a bunch of cowboys on a space ship.
Everyone is just the same. In Star Trek the original series they had a Russian and a female African- American on the bridge. Now this was in the 1970s. That would be like putting an Iraqi Muslim on the bridge. Star Trek gave a positive picture of the future. Which I thought was totally great.
Well I will have to see where this series ends up going.

Cuban Friends

As I mentioned in my last post one of the highlights of the Cuba trip was meeting new people. Specifically for me it was meeting one family - actually it was a family and two friends: Guy and Kathleen (not sure if that is how you spell her name), their son John and their friends Kieth and Dirk. They were a really cool group of people. We spent a fair amount of time together - eating together, hanging out in the evenings, playing games. It is really too bad that they live really far away from us (map quest says it is about a 20 hour drive). I am not sure what drew us together. But I felt really comfortable hanging around them. It will be neat if we keep in touch with each other.

Cuba

Last week Cindy and I went to a resort in Cuba (Blau Colonial - which I highly recommend). It was totally awesome. We had a great time swimming, playing games, dancing, hanging out with each other and meeting other people. Cindy has posted some pictures on her blog (I do not have any on my computer - so check them out there).
One of my highlights was meeting new people. We meet all sorts of interesting people. We meet a forensic psychologist, a Russian who moved to Canada and married a Cuba (they were interesting because when they were first married they both did not speak english that well and also did not speak each other's language - Russian and Spanish), a couple of young british men, a couple who were on the honeymoon, a family that brought a toy dinosaur with them on all their vacations (the dinosaur's name is Eldon - we are hoping to get him to come to visit us but he is going to Peru with some other friends), Cuban workers (they organized crazy games for us to play every day and gave dance lessons as well as did performances in the evening).
As we meet people one of the things that I found interesting was the responses people would give when they found out I was a pastor. Many of them were shocked - some of the facial expressions we got were priceless. I wondered why people were so shocked that a pastor was in Cuba having a good time. Do they think that as a pastor I am not allowed to have any fun? And if the leadership is not allowed to have any fun what does that say about the religion? About God?

Guys

Guys like to show off. Specifically we like to show to women that we want to impress. Now I am maddly in love with this one woman. She just happens to be the smartest, best looking, all around coolest person in the entire world and she is my wife (which makes me the luckiest guy in the entire world). With me being so in love with this wonderful woman (Cindy) I will at times show off trying to impress her. Now my attempts at showing off can sometimes be dramtic but most often they just small little things. Little things that let her know that I am smart, cool, powerful, graceful ... you get the idea. Anyway all of this should help explain what happened to me today.

At lunch I was riding my bike across a parking lot. One important thing that you need to know before I carry on is that it is January and I am living in Canada - which means it is freezing cold and icy out. So I am riding my bike and I see my wife driving in her van. Now I get this great idea that I should catch up to her on my bike and say hi (ok so it may have something to do with showing off how fast I can ride my bike - which is not fast at all in reality). Well I start peddaling hard across the parking lot. As I pick up speed I notice that my wife has to stop at a stop sign and there are some cars coming so she is going to have to wait. Great I think this is going to work. The plan is that I am going to pull up beside her (casually and without huffing and puffing to much I hope) and say hi. However as I come racing up behind the van I hit a patch of ice. Yep that's right I totally bail (thankfully I did not cream into the van). My wife did not see a thing (or pretended not to) she just carried on to her appointment. I was left lying on the road in pain and my pride broken into little bits.
So much for showing my wife how graceful and athletic I am. At least until the next time...

Best of 2006

Every year my wife puts together our best photos for the year. If you want to see (and vote) the best of 2006 check out her blog Cindy Street

The Prophetic Imagination

I just finished reading The Prophetic Imagination by Walter Brueggmann. This is one of the best books that I have ever read. I highly recommend people to read this book.
Walter says that the prophet job is to do two things: first to proclaim that the system that runs the world is dead - that it cannot (and never could) keep the promises that it gave. The system that we live in does not bring life. Thinking about our world right now we live in a system that states that by consuming things we will be happy. Most of us live very well. Better off then most of the people in the rest of the world (and of the people in the past). We truly do live like Kings and Queens. However there is depression. Buying things has not made us happy it has made us jealous. Walter states that the role of the prophet is to announce this through grief and mourning. The system we exist in is dead.
The second thing that a prophet is to is to energize the alternate community that Yahweh is bringing forth. The prophet does just speak about death he speaks about life. Yes, the system we live in cannot give life but Yahweh can. There is a hope for newness because Yahweh is free from the control of people (this includes the church) and he will be faithful. This newness comes to the ones who are oppressed (the outcasts). Walter says that this is because they are the ones who are willing to accept that the old system is dead.
Well that is a very brief summary of the book. I highly recommend to everyone to read this book.

Hate

"I call on you not to hate, because hate does not leave space for a person to be fair, and it makes you blind and closes all doors of thinking,"

This quote accurately describes the effects of hatred. Hatred is a poison to our souls. It causes us to become the very thing that we hate. Most people hate because they (or someone else) has been wronged - that wrong can be real or imagined. A person who hates believes that they have not been treated fairly. This hate blinds us and causes us to treat the person that we hate unfairly - so we become that which we hate.
Now I want to state that I have never hated anyone passionately. However that may not be true. In fact it would be just a denial of the truth (and I would really like to deny this truth because good Christians do not hate). I can think of a person in my who I really loathed, I would like to say that it was not hate (more denial?) My feelings toward this person did exactly what the quote said it would do. It made me treat them unfairly - always expecting the worst and always seeing the worst. It made me blind to possibility that they could change. It truly closed all the doors of thinking. Yahweh took me on long journey to forgive this person and to learn to love them.

An interesting note about this quote. It comes from Saddam Hussein. You know that evil dictator who is sentenced to hang. In light of his execution he wrote a letter. In the letter he stated the above quote and also said "I also call on you not to hate the people of the other countries that attacked us". I was a little bit shocked to hear Saddam say these things. But then I realized that I really know very little about him and everything that I do know comes from the media.
You can read about it at cbc. (By the way I found it some what interesting that this story is already off the front page of their website)

Making Disciples

In my past couple of posts I have been exploring what I think are the three foundational things about Christianity: Loving God, loving others and making disciples. I have been asking the quesiton what would this look like. To be totally honest I think that the first two questions are actually easier to answer. This is often what our church talks about - loving God and loving others. And I want to say that this is a good thing. However we sometimes leave out the whole making disciples thing. Or prehaps it would be better to say that we leave the making disciples to the some of the minstries in our churches and do not feel responsible to do it ourselves.
Well if we are going to explore what does it mean to make disciples than we should know what a disciple is. So what is a disciple of Jesus Christ. A disciple is a person who loves Jesus and wants to follow him (which means that they will love people). Now a lot more couple be said on this whole issue but I am not going to do that right.
So what does it mean to make disciples?

• This is everyone's responsibilty not just the pastors or the leaders
• A willingness to challenge people
• A willingness to encourage people when you see good things
• Praying for people
• A willingness to share our stories about how God has worked in our lives
• Sharing with people what we are learning from the bible
• Studing the bible together
• Praying with each other
• Helping others know and follow Jesus
• Being intentional in our families
• Willingness to talk about our whole lives (not just the safe things)

Well these are a couple of the things that I can think of. Any other thoughts?

Loving others

In my last blog I listed some things that I think would be evident if we loved Yahweh more and more. Today I am going to explore what would it look like if we truly loved each other. Once again I am going to just ramble (which means I am going to post things in the order that they come to my mind and not in the order of importance).
What would it look like if we truly loved each other:

• We would be praying for each other
• We would work for the best of the other person
• We would serve the other person
• We would see the good in the person and not just the bad
• We would build them up and not tear them down
• We would let other people know that we love them
• We would be honest with each other
• We would confess our sins to each other
• We would bless others and not gossip about them
• We would spend time together
• We would laugh and cry together
• We would help each other
• We would welcome the stranger in
• We would care about the poor and the outcast
• We would see Jesus in other people
• We would challenge each other
  

I believe that the essence of it is that we would live in real community with each other, a community that is open and loving, supporting and challenging.
To live like this will take God in us.

The future

So in my last post I mentioned that the church's foundation is loving Yahweh, loving others and making disciples. I said that this really needs to get fleshed out. Perhaps a way to flesh this out is by asking what would it look like if we were doing this?
Now by asking that question I feel like I am beginning by stating that we are not doing this. I am not sure that is the case. I believe that programs in our church are built out of the conviction that we need to be doing these things. My intent in asking this question is not to challenge what we are doing but to look into the future.
So what would it look like if we loved Yahweh more and more? Now I am just going to start to ramble out some thoughts that I have (feel free to state what you think and to challenge what I am writing down).

• We would have a desire to learn more about who he is
• We would not get caught up in our little wish list but rather get caught up in Yahweh's wish list
• We would be engaged with the people on the edges (just like Jesus was)
• Our worship would be full of life (regardless of the style)
• We would have a longing and desire for the Bible
• Our service would be characterized by dedication and commitment
• We would tell other people about him
• We would want to experience him in real relationship
• Our creativity would be unleashed
• We would be more confident because we will know that Yahweh loves us
• We would be willing to take risks for him
• We would seek to hear his voice and obey him
• We would pray
• We would pray in groups and with others
• We would do whatever it takes to get closer to him (this includes things like fasting)
• We would begin to see Yahweh everywhere (in the news, in our friends, in our enemies)
• We would be more critical of our culture
• We would be more gracious and loving

Looking over this list I see that I am no where near to where I should be. The next question is how do we get to where we do love Yahweh more and more?
But I think before I even begin to explore that question I will explore what would it look like to love others? And what would it look like to make disciples? For I believe that all three of these are very inter-related.
What are your thoughts?

The DNA of a church

I have been doing some thinking about why I am a pastor? And what is the church? And what does it mean that I am a leader within the church? Why am I doing what I am doing?
Fall has been a very busy time for me. It has left me feeling like I am doing many things to just stay afloat. Instead of energizing and being a catyalst for the church to move into future I feel like I have been kind of maintaining the status quo. Don't get me wrong. I think that there are many good things happening within the church - assisiting the new comer families, working in prison ministry, children's ministry, youth ministry, ect. Wonderful things are happening within the church. I just want to become more intentional in my role within the church. With Pastor Gary leaving I can see that there are going to many things that need and should be done. Which means I need to know why I am here and what I am suppose to be accomplishing. Right now I do not have the answers.
However I heard Robert Logan describe the church and state that the DNA (the building blocks, the essentials of life) for the church are three things: Loving God, loving others and as we go making disciples. I believe he is totally right. So when I think about extending the Kingdom of God it means loving him and others and making disciples. This is the basics that I have often been taught. But it is good to come back to this and build upong these things. They are going to have to be fleshed out for me. But they give a place to start.

Advent

This Sunday is going to be the first Sunday of Advent. It is hard to believe that the fall has gone by so quickly. I personally feel like it should still be September (though the snow and cold weather bring me back to reality). Advent is a season of expectation. We wait with expectation for the coming Christmas. In fact in my house my girls did a count down to when they got to begin to open their advent calenders (which was this morning. They were up at 6:30 - I don't want to image what time they will be up on Christmas morning).
However advent is not just about waiting for Christmas it is celebrating that God came into the world, that God is in the world, and that he is coming into the world. Advent is about expecting God - finding him in the past, finding him the present and waiting for him to come again. The question that I am going to try and ask my self this advent season is where is God right now? Where is he working right now?

Baptism

On Sunday night our church had a baptism and communion service. It was totally awesome. There was a good group of people there. The people getting baptized ranged in age from a teenager to 87. It was amazing. I love hearing the stories about how Yahweh is working in the lives of people. It is these stories that let me know that Yahweh is real and is at work in our world.

One of the great highlights of the evening was that my daughter had communion for the first time. I was serving communion so I did not get to be right with her when she took but her mom walked her through the whole thing. I know that she is still little but it is totally awesome to see her taking steps to draw closer to Yahweh. I am so proud of her.
It was a great evening. One that I will remember for a long time.