how it all went down

death

This year I've meditated a lot on the concept of death.

It might sound like a morbid activity to get involved in, almost unhealthy to willingly subject your mind to the idea that one day you will rot in the ground and the world will move on in your absence. Even stranger to think that in 100 years it is unlikely that anyone will even know you existed.

But it is a reality, and I think an important idea to actively let permeate into our thinking and every day activities. Everything is temporary. Every relationship has an end date. Time is all we'll ever have and to give some to another person is a huge gift.

To me, death illuminates life. It brings life into sharp focus, reminding us that existence is a miracle and people are unique and worth wonder.

Funerals are often the moments when we are reminded of the fragility and temporal nature of life. And the immenence of death often aligns our priorities to where they should be or reveal where they truly are. I almost feel that if we surpress the reality of our mortality, we sentence ourselves to a life of walking the earth with our eyes half open. Conditioned to pay respect to the mundane and necessary, allowing ourselves to forget the weightiness of the world we live in and the incredible people we know.

One relationship that has become far more important to me through this musing is the friendship I have with my dad. I remember when I took off for England alone for a year at the age of 18, the first time I'd really left home, I cried for a significant portion of my journey, realising that my dad was the most significant person in my life and I hadn't made the most of him. I have thought about the temporal nature of this relationship so much that it has begun to have an impact on every conversation I have with him - I'm always making the most of it. It makes it easy due the fact that he is a really good guy.

I want this to permeate into all my relationships though. Into every interaction with other human beings. To completely and fully appreciate any time I am given by another, knowing that they will never get those minutes back, and they chose to spend them with me.

It brings with it a certain melancholia, a certain sadness. But much beauty. Long live the sermon of death, the misunderstood preacher. The one who shouts "Live with your eyes open! Existence is not yours to control!" He is the one who walks with you and reminds you of what you have while you still possess it, before he calls you to march after him out of this world.

I want to hear more of death's voice.

And on that note...


ED'S STORY It Ain't Over from Flannel Staff on Vimeo.

Jesus: Don't be a fan. Be a disciple.

Rick is the Pastor of Spiritual Formation at Windsor Park. This hard out job title means that he is the Jedi Master when it comes to being a Christian, so you should listen to his talk from Sunday here:

TED TALK 5: Sam Burrows: Is the Age of the Monologue Over?

I began my little spiel by explaining that I am seldom engaged in the ‘teaching/preaching’ part of a church meeting because I feel like I’ve heard it all before and can even predict the points the preacher is going to get to before they give a whiff of them. But more than that, sitting and listening is not how I, or many other people learn. Research shows that people only retain 10% of what they hear in a monologue, but if a visual factor is introduced, most people will retain 20%. If they are able to listen, view and write then most people will remember 40%, but there will be an 80% retention if they can talk about it on top of that. The question then becomes, why do we simply stick to a monologue?

Social media has ushered in the age of dialogue over monologue, and this was what the early church was like by and large. The NZ curriculum has responded to this and encourages teachers to take on more of a facilitation role within this new information landscape and to let students find content themselves. I encouraged people to think about creative ways in which we could go about teaching and learning in a church environment in acknowledging this information. I suggested different group activities and experiences in a service to engage people better when learning.

Feedback

Most people welcomed the ideas presented, expressing a dislike for being talked at and agreeing that interaction is better for engaging with material. There was an openness to a change of format and a desire for question and answers and for chances to get involved in what is said from the front. Some suggested that multiple monologues may work well instead of just one from one person.

There were some questions raised as to how this would actually work in a big church, and that is a good question. There doesn’t have to be huge amounts of change though, more of an acknowledgement for a need to be more conscious of people’s attention spans and to have them more involved somehow, rather than just passive listeners. People were also (rightly) concerned about a move away from preaching from a centralised base of authority to more of a dialogue based environment, unsure of how that was to work in relation to heresy. How do you encourage discernment within this?

Where is God in the Winter times?

We had another hilarious night on Sunday. Not only did we have a great discussion about God in tough times, but we learned that Sam likes to trash his friend's rooms in his spare time, Cill has bad handwriting and plays the same songs on the piano over and over again, and Sean was the most mature person in the preaching team. Church is fun.

Listen here!

TED TALK 4: Brook Warner – Church and the Place of Social Media

Brook suggested that social media is scratching an itch in the 21^st century, and the itch is essentially the desire for authenticity, community and active engagement. People want businesses or institutions to be transparent and personable, we want to move away from staunch individualism and join in bigger stories and causes (seen in the Kony campaign) and we want to participate in making a difference and not just being spectators.

Social media is here to stay. The question then becomes: how do we engage with it well? Brook said that he believes that the Holy Spirit is tickling (yes, tickling… I know…) people to crave authenticity, community, collaboration and participation in something bigger than ourselves. But no one is doing the social media thing well, and the church is playing catch up. Brook ended by challenging us with the question: what does it look like for church to lead this movement of engaging well in the world of social media?

Feedback

People were highly engaged with what Brook presented and were pleased that there was some good understanding of it and deep thinking about the subject that hasn't really been tackled in church.

In terms of ideas and suggestions for engaging well in social media, people suggested that all church events should aim to be made visible to everybody in and outside the church and all of it needs to point to real authenticity and community in church in real life. There was a strong emphasis on not letting it replace any part of vital community life.

There was, however, a fair bit of disagreement with the underlying assumptions of the presentation. There were a few groups of people that argued that social media doesn’t actually scratch an authenticity itch, it just gives the illusion of doing so. People still have the option of creating personas online, putting their best side forward and so authenticity is simply not a requirement in the online world. These people pointed out that the reason they were at this discussion night was because of friends asking them to come, not because of an online invitation.

The question still remains: how do we engage well online? And could it be argued that the itch has been created by social media in order to scratch it in its own way? How do we live out the gospel faithfully online?

Nicodemus.

If you missed Amanda's talk on Sunday, here it is! Are we letting God disorient us in our ideas so that he can reorient us again? All about staying teachable. Boom.

TED TALK 3: Jill Rice – The Church Meeting

Jill essentially argued that church meetings have become unnecessarily predictable, formulaic and programmatic. She suggested that meeting have become too religious and can easily become a club or spectator sport, but the real measure of a community isn’t what you get out of it, but what you contribute. She drew our attention to her own personal experience of a home church she was part of, a flexible little community that was more about supporting one another and enjoying company than running a program.

You can’t have a church meeting/discussion night without a good anagram, and luckily Jill provided one of her own, being WORD FRED to describe the values she felt was important for when we meet together. It means:

Welcoming

Organic

Relevant

Dialogue

Friendly

Relaxed

Expression

Discussion

The point is to paint a picture rather than set to set out a linear meeting that is clearly building towards an end, all meant to promote participation and a strong sense of ownership among everyone there.

Jill’s final challenge was that church meetings should have something to say about people’s vocations, their jobs, rather than seeing them as a means to get by. She argued for a strong undercurrent of connectivity between all of life instead of a sacred/secular divide that confuses many people and leads to an impression that the ‘real’ work of the kingdom is found within church programs.

 Feedback

Some people said they would like more shared meals and intergenerational events, and there was a strong message coming through of wanting to move into stuff that was less programmatic when meeting together. People said they would like to see more acknowledgement that every Christian is in full time ministry wherever they are, and would like to hear more about what it means for the gospel to shape our industry areas.

A few groups did mention that this is particularly hard to foster in a big community like ours and so we would have to get really deliberate and creative with informal gatherings and places to enjoy community with each other in different settings. There was also a concern that with too much informality over meals we would need to make sure it didn’t descend into the trivial and we need to remain intentional about discussions together.