If you’ve been around churches for any length of time then you’d know that we are taught to try and ‘follow Gods plan’ for our lives, a phrase that may be somewhat misleading as it implies that at every moment God has decisions he wants you to make in order to be in ‘his will’. This is accompanied by the idea that the ‘best or safest place to be is in the centre of God’s will’.
If this is your idea of how guidance works the chances are you may feel a little anxious. It’s a big ask to be able to tune into God with this kind of precision – to continually locate yourself at the centre of Gods plan, especially if he isn’t saying much. (And sometimes he does go quiet for long periods – just read the Psalms…)
But it’s ok – I don’t think he is actually asking this. God isn’t a micro-manager.
It’s a good thing to desire to follow Gods plan, but if we try to listen for every breath he breathes then we won’t go anywhere fast. I believe it’s better to think of God’s plan as the redemption and restoration of the world – and it is this plan that I organise my life around. I have a degree of autonomy in giving shape to that life. We are called to be his disciples and to be formed in his image, but that can take shape in many ways.
So how do we deal with the very valid question of what does God want me to do?’
I see what we sometimes call ‘guidance’ operating in two ways. The first and the most dominant is by seeking wisdom. When faced with decisions that are complex or life altering the first base is to do as James writes of in Ch 1 ‘If any of you lacks wisdom then he should ask of God who gives generously to all without finding fault – but when he asks he must believe and not doubt…’ James goes on to speak of the difference between earthly wisdom and heavenly wisdom – one is self seeking and inward focused, while the other is peaceful, humble, considerate and submissive. (3:13-18)
The Bible speaks of using wise counsellors as guides – of making significant decisions in consultation with others and of being patient. It’s harder to make a really bad decision if you have shared it with a number of others and sought counsel. (It’s one reason we need the church.)
Of course, some decisions don’t require any wisdom. Museli or toast for breakfast?… I don’t think God cares… Wanna go to the movies or dinner? Same – a non issue unless you are hungry…
Wisdom is however needed for vocational / life commitment decisions, think marriage, career, financial management and the like. So don’t wait for a burning bush to chart a course for you. Get on and live wisely. And if you don’t know how to do this then talk to someone who can walk with you and help you.
Make good decisions by following a good process.
I tend to feel most decisions are made thru wisdom. In fact I would suggest we always ‘lead with wisdom’ and trust that as we use our God given brain to think thru an issue that he is ‘shining wisdom on us’. Wisdom means praying, listening, but then doing some work yourself to find the answer.
Then occasionally in life you will have a burning bush moment, a road to Damascus experience – (or as I like to call them – a Jerry Maguire moment) an encounter with God that cuts you open and calls you to an action that may not have been in your field of vision. These moments are insane and incredible!
I would guess that in all of the decisions I have made over 60 years I have had only a handful of moments where I could say with conviction ‘God spoke to me’, or ‘God is calling me’. But by and large this is not my experience. I don’t hear God speaking every day. In fact more often than not it’s pretty quiet on the God front.
So good ‘godly’ decision making most often comes down to wisdom and then possibly courage because God may well call us down a path that is unfamiliar or maybe even disturbing.
So if you are sitting around waiting for the leading of the Holy Spirit – a dream about a man from Macedonia – or the like – then I suggest getting on with what you can do and drawing on what wisdom is available to you. If you do that then you’re probably 90% of the way there. You may have a God experience as you follow your chosen path. You may even interpret something as God that is pure coincidence…. I think we do that sometimes (and it’s ok – God smiles on it). I also think that sometimes God does form a path for us… Which one is it? That’s where some practiced discernment is invaluable – but that takes years to feel confident in. If you want to see an example of that kind of discernment at work then read this post about the day I didn’t sell my crazy dog after finally convincing the rest of the family that it was a good idea.
One piece of ‘dad wisdom’ I will shoot your way for free is simply that ‘life is always a series of trade-offs’. Want to own a home, settle down with a wife, 2 kids and a dog? Then chances are your other dream of travelling the world in a yacht will not come off… It’s the way life is and you can’t beat it, so the key is to learn what you value and live from that, content in knowing that you are choosing path ‘X’ and as a result path ‘Y’ you will not be able to follow.
As for ‘feelings’ and where they fit into decision making – that probably depends on who you are. I resonate with the statement that says ‘we are emotional beings who occasionally think things thru.’ Danelle is a feeler and I am a thinker, but we cross over plenty. I feel like it’s good to listen to your gut but moreso to be careful about letting it call the tune. Feelings can be a powerful intuition towards the right path. They can also be fickle and deceptive.
Start with wisdom.
And if you’re worried that you may be that guy James speaks about who doesn’t have enough faith, then I’d suggest that he may be addressing the person who prays for wisdom but never actually acts on the wisdom received because they hate the idea of getting it wrong. Better to act on some wisdom and trust that God has been in the process than to spend your life wondering about which path to take.
So if you’re sitting around and prevaricating as to what this year should hold for you then my bit of wisdom for you is to start moving towards the direction you feel you should be heading and then trust that God is leading you – but he also expects you to use the brain he has given you!
This evening our ‘Life’s great big questions – with the friends’ group (LGBQ-WTF for short) re-convenes and the subject is simply around the question of ‘how much is enough?‘ For a bunch of people in their 50’s & 60’s it’s a very pertinent question as the ‘earning years’ are possibly coming to an end and we are then dependent on whatever superannuation we have stashed away, as well as whatever government pension we may be fortunate enough to receive. I know it’s a lurking issue in my own consciousness and while I want to ‘trust God to provide’ I’m also conscious that my own initiative is required in some way as well. This is not an issue where I can be passive. So this blog is essentially a fairly unrefined brain dump to help me get in the zone for conversation tonight.
It arose as F & I chatted one day about how much we’d like to see in the bank as a fund to draw on in ‘retirement’. If you have read my blog for any time you would know that I feel ‘retirement’ is a social construct – not a ‘law’, or an ‘essential’ of any kind – certainly not a biblical concept – so I may never ‘retire’. However as we discussed the idea the magic ‘million’ dollars was the first bid to land on the table. A simple 5-7% interest would give $50-70K alone. That’s enough to live on if you are frugal… That said, I would like to be able to travel and eat out with some freedom so that would mean either chewing into the capital or earning more $$.
So maybe 2 million?…
It’d be nice to have a holiday house or 2… a yacht… I think we got to pondering $13 or $14 million as the conversation wove on and we laid out our crazy visions. Those figures will certainly never be a reality for me, but they may be on the table for others.
We are in an interesting phase of life. Having sold a business that was very profitable and allowed us to live well and resigned from our stable income church roles, we are now in a place where we are reliant on our other caravan business as well as any ad hoc church work I get or admin work Danelle picks up. It’s a massive drop in income, but we still seem to have ‘enough…’
Of course there is the question of ‘who gets to define what we mean by enough?’ My ‘enough’, may feel ludicrous to someone on a high income, but equally silly to someone living on the pension. Last week we were in Busselton and I cycled into Dunsborough past a whole heap of lavish beachfront homes that are probably someone’s ‘holiday shack’. I’d like one of them. It would be nice to know that at any moment you could down tools and a luxury beachfront home in the south west would await you. I had a few moments of envy as I passed those homes… Western consumer culture keeps trying to disciple me into its ways. Some days I resist, while other days I find it’s tentacles have wrapped around me more than I had hoped.
‘Enough’ may also vary at different stages of life. For my parents in a nursing home their need for cash is greatly diminished. For a young family with mortgage, kids and toys it is increased – of course we do get to choose our mortgage and how we spend our money, so I don’t have much sympathy when someone tells they have stretched to the limits of their income and now have mortgage stress. Simple solution – buy only what you can afford.
When I run the question of ‘enough’ thru a biblical lens, there is no part of scripture that calls me to pursue wealth as a priority. Paul speaks of ‘learning how to be content whether he has plenty or little’ (Phil 4:11) and to me that is one of the keys. ‘Contentment’ is notoriously elusive because we have been led to believe it lies just over the next hill in the next purchase or acquisition. I imagine Paul had periods of high income as well as periods where he lived frugally.
Of course you can’t consider this question without thinking of the story Jesus told in Luke 12 of the man who stored up excess grain in his barns and then thought ‘I will take it easy because I can…’ and that night his life ended. Jesus clear warning is to not invest our time building earthly wealth but to seek ‘treasure in heaven’. What does he mean by that?… Whatever it is, we can know confidently that Jesus is not endorsing wealth accumulation and being ‘financially self sufficient’ as a goal to pursue.
My own contribution to the evening’s pre-reading was from the sermon on the mount where Jesus calls us not to worry.
19 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust[e] destroy and where thieves break in and steal, 20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
Matt 6:19-21
This is probably the clearest teaching from Jesus on how we are to approach wealth and life in general. We are called to hold it lightly and not make it the focus of our affections. That doesn’t mean we can’t be wealthy. In fact we in the western world we can’t avoid being wealthy just by virtue of where we live. A family with two parents both on minimum wage are still in the top 10% of wealthy people in the world. We have just been so conditioned to desire ‘more’ that we never feel that our wealth is sufficient. We have been trained to ‘compare up’ and never ‘compare down’. When we do that we feel like we are lacking – but it’s simply a marketing ploy.
Jesus went on to say:
22 “The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light, 23 but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!
Matt 6:22-23
He refers to our eyes – our sense of focus. A healthy focus means a body will be full of light – a focus on the things that matter to God allows us to live freely and easily as we trust him to care for us. But eyes focused on acquisition and accumulation of wealth are rarely going to be satisfied and Jesus refers to this as a ‘great darkness’. Simply put, when our lives are focused on money and driven by money we will lose focus on the God who provides whatever we need.
He finishes with:
33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
Matt 6
It seems Jesus simple advice is to be in relationship with God and to let our focus in life come from that connection, rather than being buffeted by the culture. It’s easy to say – harder to implement.
Along the way we will most likely accrue wealth – because we live in a world where that is possible. Our homes will increase in value, we will save some money and our superannuation should have a few dollars in it. I’m conscious that even in this wealthy society there are some who live on the edge – just enough for rent or mortgage – scraping by on bills and food and little left over for pleasures and toys. Here’s the thing though – that feels tough, and one level it is, but on another level, when compared to the vast majority of the world we would appear to have it very good. It all depends on where our comparison lies.
So how much is enough – probably less than we think. I like Yoel Frank’s book, The Barefoot Disciple, that is full of common sense financial advice that you would find in its namesake book The Barefoot Investor, but it also has the edge of pushing you to consider what it would look like to seek first the priorities of Jesus and then trust him to put $$ in the bank.
As I sit here today I am conscious that I am ludicrously, even obscenely wealthy by world standards and yet my culture keeps whispering to me that I am actually discontent… I don’t sense there is any figure that will ever suffice when we are seeking to prop ourselves up with our own muscle, but the other option of trusting a good God to provide is equally challenging as it is less about our effort and more about following the path he sets us on. It may lead to un sought after affluence or it may lead to downward mobility – both are possible. Yet in both the mental state of ‘learning to be content’ and ‘of seeking first the kingdom of God’ are the keys to keeping grounded.
I wrote this 4 years ago, and while I am no longer in a regular paid pastoral role, the content is still as simple and as visceral as ever. Even before Steve Mac wrote his excellent book on some of this exact challenge… Originally posted in 2019, this is slightly edited for 2024
Back in the days when I owned a boat I would often use it for getting to a distant reef break to surf, or some remote diving, even the odd sad, pathetic fishing venture. We would head out a few kms, maybe even 7 or 8, but at no point did we lose sight of land. It wasn’t so much fear that kept me close, but simply that I had no need to go further. (I could fish just as badly 5kms off shore as I could 20kms off.)
However I imagine there would be something a little chilling about losing sight of land in a 5m runabout – losing your most primal bearing and being afloat in a very, big and unpredictable ocean. You would need tools for keeping your bearings and a steely crew not easily unsettled by the absence of that clear source of guidance and comfort.
In that sense I have a feeling the ‘Christian’ boat is losing sight of land – and it’s not heading back any time soon. If ‘land’ is the security of a society that both recognises and affirms the Judeo-Christian story then my sense is that we are headed for the horizon at an ever increasing pace.
The growing secularism we are living in is fast taking us away not just from the structures we are familiar with, but also from the story we claim to align with. The question I am currently pondering is how we speak to the challenge of forming disciples of Jesus in this fast shifting and disorienting culture.
Each year at this time, as school holidays end and people settle back into regular routines we (as pastors) ‘rally the troops’. For some its ‘Vision Sunday/s’ and we do our own version of this, except every year we say the exact same thing albeit in slightly different ways.
‘Follow Jesus – do it – don’t talk about, think about it, whine about it – just do it.’
It’s not very nuanced. I don’t believe in the need to shape a new vision each year or to inspire people with a fresh picture of the future. If there are new things there to get excited about then all well and good, but the primary task of the church never changes – ever.
It is to form people into Christlikeness and send them into the world while praying ‘your kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven.‘
That’s the pastor’s ‘job’ and it needs to be taken very seriously. There is nothing more important in the world than that task.
The unique challenge at this time in history is that we seem to be moving further and further from an old and familiar (albeit tired) Christendom towards a seemingly hopeful and glossy secularism. As the church our strongest inclination may be to sail the ship back towards Christendom – back to land – to ‘safe and familiar’. But while there was much that was good in that time, (and some stuff that wasn’t so good), it is definitely not the form ‘Christianity’ will take in the years to come.
Simply put – we no longer have the same authority in society. In fact we are often cast as the ‘bad guys’, (2024 edit – I said it first Steve Mac – or maybe I heard you say it… 🙂 ) the ones standing in the way of a world that could be. A real danger in this space is that in the absence of a ‘Christian heritage’ to appeal to, we will find ourselves aligned with either the left or the right side of politics and we will see this as pivotal to shifting society back towards a Jesus like posture. We will look for sources of power to leverage and with Christendom dead in the water those sources are most likely going to be political parties.
I don’t believe we don’t want to go that route.
Back in 2019 my son came to me and told me about a 16th C protestant group called The Levellers, a far left group who practiced ‘Christian communism’ based on their reading of Acts 2. One of his school friends who is an ardent Green supporter pointed him to them as an example of ‘Christians who had got some stuff right’. The levellers were an interesting mob, but as we talked I found myself again saying that the answer is not in any political ideology.
While these may seem to be our only ‘visible’ options at the moment the answer has been and always will be the kingdom of God as it takes form in local churches. Yes – the local churches bit really matters because it is the tangible, local and visible expression of God’s rule and reign. The kingdom of God is neither ‘left’ nor ‘right’, (although both can put their cases for it being better represented by them). Instead this will be the way in which the world will be changed – as ordinary people give their lives to a ‘powerless’ way of living that inspires by its Jesus like qualities rather than its ability to rule and exert power.
So for a pastor preaching to a garden variety suburban church at this time of year I’d suggest your focus be on preparing people for a world that is going to be increasingly unfamiliar and unforgiving – a world that at times will be openly hostile. It will be to encourage people to find strength in the tools of faith that have always been there – the spiritual practices that form us into Christlikeness and to prioritise being together as the church to encourage and support one another to follow a different story.
I won’t be encouraging anyone to head back to land. (I don’t believe ‘Christendom’ was ever the answer.) Rather I will be equipping people to sail confidently and humbly into the world trusting that the spirit of God is able to work thru a church that no longer has its position in society to appeal to, but rather only has the lives of its people as a credible witness.
In my first few years of teaching I spent 4 years at a parent controlled Christian school – meaning (theoretically) that all of the kids came from homes where at least one parent had faith. These kids were raised in families where following Jesus was the most important priority. And part of that involved sending their kids to a school where their education would be shaped by the values of Jesus and the kingdom of God. What could go wrong?
So one day I decided to test this ideology…
Each morning we had a 20 minute ‘devotional’ space – where the intention was to give the kids a biblical idea to reflect on. I remember I often spent more time preparing for this space than for my other lessons, (ok – I was a phys ed teacher so understandable 🙂 the first hint that my future wasn’t going to be permanently in high school teaching.
It was early days of my rethinking the ‘aspirational western career’ script and my articulation of ideas lacked the nuance I would give it today. But I remember taking a significant amount of time to discuss with these students what they were going to do in their future. Of course we heard that some wanted to be teachers, engineers, doctors and so on.
But – no one was putting their hand up for overseas mission work, aid and development work, pastoral ministry or any form of mission / ministry for that matter – and this was in a Christian school… I got the impression (and I still do) that we naturally gravitate towards regular careers and professions with the idea that if God wanted us to commit our life to Christian mission / ministry then he would need to YELL – to ‘call us out’. Now I’m not at all suggesting we go the dualistic route of seeing an either / or situation (mission / secular work), because reality is that many people’s vocations take them into service in regular jobs. We need Christian plumbers, lawyers and retic blokes just as much as we need pastors and missionaries. That is a recurring theme of this blog – so please don’t think I have jumped ship on that one.
However in those morning devotions I suggested to these students that they consider mission and ministry work as their first calling/priority with a ‘regular career’ as a valuable back up if mission work didn’t go to plan. I pushed them to envisage themselves firstly as missionaries or ministers of some form which generated some interesting conversations and push back from concerned parents who wanted their kids to pursue ‘good careers’. Sure – they could follow Jesus, but all things in moderation… right?… I admit my presentation lacked nuance and was full of 24 year old bluntness – but I really wanted to challenge the dominant paradigm in a strong way. It had the desired effect… It generated some heat. It ruffled some feathers. But I don’t think it made a difference to where the kids headed.
Right now I see a dearth of emerging Christian leaders. Maybe I’m just looking in the wrong places, but the notion of devoting your life to mission and ministry feels somewhat of a bizarre concept to most people under 30. I don’t come across many young people at all who have a life of Christian service anywhere on the radar.
Why is that?
Have we followed the aspirational western script so closely that now it’s indistinguishable from the call of Jesus? I have vivid memories of my teen years being challenged regularly by missionaries and preachers to ‘lay down my life for Jesus and the gospel’. I remember wrestling with calling and at times considering giving up my Phys Ed degree to pursue vocational ministry. It wasn’t an ever present wrestle – because I was also being formed by the ‘script’ when I wasn’t hearing the challenges from those who had stepped into vocational mission. But it was a genuine wrestle and my subsequent path forward probably reflected that.
I believe with all my heart that we need Christians present at every place in society as salt and light, but I also believe that there is a place for vocational mission and ministry. It’s often said that we need to let people mature a little before heading in this direction, but I’m not so sure. I get the sense that the longer we allow people to fall in line and pursue a career, the harder it is to lever them out.
So this is part me thinking out loud about what I am seeing and part me saying to younger people to revisit the notion of career and replace it with vocation. Then within that consider deeply what it would look like for you to give your life to the work of the gospel either here in Australia or overseas.
As a young person I sat thru many a missionary sermon that culminated with those words in Isaiah – here am I – send me!’ And the question was asked if we would respond to God with similar heart. It was a clear call to a life that wasn’t concerned with career advancement and personal achievement but that was focused on following Jesus wherever it led.
This year I turn 60 and we are in a time of significant transition – but that idea of first following Jesus is still as deep and strong as ever – and I’m grateful for those preachers, prophets and missionary speakers who were willing to speak the strong words and articulate an uncompromising vision of seeking first the kingdom of God – and letting life fall into place after that.
Maybe someone needs to hear that message again today. Maybe you need to revisit how your life is formed and what your vocation is. Maybe you can observe your own life and see that you have fallen in line and swallowed the ‘blue pill’. So consider this a challenge to ‘take the red pill and see how deep the rabbit hole goes’. Perhaps God has hopes for you and your life that go way beyond a nice career, a happy family and a well funded retirement!
If you are a cricket fan then you would be well aware that there are few things more pointless and dis-spiriting on the fifth day of a test match, than watching a team intentionally playing for a draw’ – seeing out the required overs and quietly accepting that there would be no winner. It feels utterly lame and no one wants to watch a game like that. On the other hand when a situation is finely balanced, or even looking dire, there are few things more inspiring than watching a team giving it all they’ve got in an effort to overcome the odds and win. In fact it’s still inspiring even if they don’t pull it off, because they actually had the courage to make the attempt.
But these kinds of initiatives don’t happen by accident. At some point you have to decide IF and WHEN you are going to make this your focus. There is no point thinking you may just pull off a surprise win when you are 9 wickets down with 200 runs needed. That’s just dumb. But if there is a day to play, 300 runs needed and still 4 wickets in hand, then a brave captain may just say ‘ let’s give it all we’ve got, take some risks, play aggressively and maybe just maybe, we will pull it off!” The other option is give instructions to shut up shop, take no risks and hopefully escape with a draw. (In which case you may still lose anyway…)
What is it that makes some teams rise up in these situations while others only have enough imagination and courage for at best a slow, dull finish ?
As I was reflecting today I got the sense that many Christian churches are ‘playing for the draw’. All over the country there are churches in serious trouble with aging congregations, declining numbers and a correlating decline in finances. We are ‘6 wickets down, on a sticky pitch’ and unless there is a significant change we are gonna be bowled over quickly and easily. I think we could call the situation ‘dire’… (remember the bowls club in the movie Crackerjack?…)
Many of these churches facing extinction are simply muddling along as best they can, keeping Sundays happening, but realising that one day they will eventually all die… and that may be the way things play out… Once there is no one left to turn the lights on it will be ‘game over’. But until then we will just keep the Sundays ticking over and hope for revival. You would think the most critical purpose of a church was to run Sunday gatherings…
The choice then is to either take some significant risks to turn the tide of decline or to simply hold the fort , play for the draw and eventually close the church. I sense ‘playing for the draw’ is our default modus operandi. It seems we are wired for minimum risk and maximum comfort. We seem way too willing to “go gently into that good night.”
Of course the big difference between church and cricket is that we aren’t actually ‘playing for a draw.’ It just feels like that. To choose a draw is to actually allow for defeat – just a slow defeat. There are no draws in the kingdom of God. And if we choose to just prolong the inevitable then we have to ask who that is serving.
For churches in this space it is a challenge to genuinely consider what it would look like to go after the ‘win’. In essence it means listening to the Spirit’s leading, doing a realistic stocktake of existing resources and then asking how they could move from a defensive stance to a genuinely missional posture, all while accepting that whatever risks are taken may not work. The possibility of victory – seeing the church re-invigorated and healthy – involves risk – genuine risk that may not pay off. A church may still close.
But why oh why would the people of God choose anything less than a full tilt at a ‘win’? (It’s not rhetorical…)
Someone may ask ‘How would we know if we are playing for a draw?’
Probably one clue is that a post like this catches you off guard and you think ‘Us? Really?…’ If you aren’t aware that this is an issue then you are already in trouble – maybe worse trouble than you know. Perhaps other clues are to look at what a church spends it’s time and money on. Are there missional initiatives happening – planned and unplanned because that is the culture of the church? Is there genuine missionary concern for the local community – or is there greater concern for the songs sung on Sunday or whether the sermon was expository or topical?
So this is the question many churches are facing – is it better to play for the draw – or to go after the risky win?
And what are some practical implications of a choice like this?
Staffing for mission rather than survival – choose people for staff who will prioritise mission over maintenance and admin. I don’t mean ‘abandon Sundays’ (as is sometimes heard), but I am saying that our best energy should be directed outwards and to equipping people for the world they live in day by day.
Giving permission to leaders to fail in whatever mission work they attempt. Not everything we try will work – in fact chances are we going to fail more often than we succeed. But if we never try new ideas then we are already cooked. Let leaders risk and fail – more than once!
Accepting that a short term outcome may be a further decline in both people and finance. That’s easy to say – but it is like a kick in the guts when it happens. Not everyone wants to play for the win. Some like a slow, meaningless (religious) draw… and they can take their bat and ball to another dying church and keep playing for a draw elsewhere.
Teaching that inspires and provokes people to missional action in keeping with their own life. I don’t think we need to create any more ‘missional programs’. We do need to help people embrace their missional identity in their life as it is.
Telling stories of hope – not just conversion stories but real, authentic moments of connection and of seeing the Spirit at work. Sharing our small wins.
Championing risk takers and innovators – at the same time being wise enough to reject simply foolish ideas.
Anyway this idea of ‘playing for the draw’ lobbed into my mind over the weekend and just seemed to have a somewhat relevant and prophetic aspect to it. As we often say ‘if the cap fits wear it’ and if it doesn’t then scroll on by. But maybe if you’re a pastor or leader who has been playing for the draw then it’s time to to spend some days in prayer and reflection to figure out how you can again lead a church that is willing to risk all for the good of the kingdom.
Anecdotal evidence suggests that 80% of churches planted fail in their first few years of existence. Ouch… maybe that’s why so many people avoid church planting. No one likes to fail and it seems it is more likely than not in this sphere. I know our first attempt way back in 2003 fizzled after 6 or 7 years, but recently we had the fifth anniversary of our Yanchep church (no longer a plant) and it was great to celebrate and note some really cool things:
a) The church is alive, healthy and growing. It has found its niche in the community and is in good shape. It isn’t a huge gathering but it is a committed and relationally strong crew of 60 or so who would call Yanchep home. It’s a broad diversity of people too, which is reflective of the suburb itself.
b) Every single one of the original founding members (except for my mother in law – who passed away) are still there and involved. I remember reading an article from a Vineyard newsletter many years ago now that stated you could expect that none of your existing team would still be present in 5 years time. We have managed to completely upend that prediction by having those same people present now. How? I think we have been conscious of the priority of our relationships, so we have sought to ensure these are healthy. We also try hard to not burn people out. It’s just too easy to get people serving and active and we can sometimes ask too much of them. Ours is a low bar church on that front – which isn’t to say we don’t ask people to step up. We just don’t beat them up if they drop the ball or can’t make things work.
c) I imagine a church could be considered healthy if the pastor or key leader was taken away and the community kept on rolling. I sense Yanchep is at that point, with some fantastic leaders and deeply committed people all who have many years of life & faith experience. Ryan has done a great job of faithfully and wisely leading the crew. It has been great to see him navigate the challenges of a senior role without getting burnt out or without hitting major roadblocks. It is a simple and sustainable community.
If I reflect on my previous church planting experience with Upstream back in 2003-2008 then I observe some significant differences. Back in 2003 we were trying to live as a missional community while figuring out what church may look like for those people. All of us were fresh from an attractional church environment so we were hardwired for church in that vein. We just didn’t have a broad enough imagination to operate in a missional way. We flickered and spluttered for a while but just never caught fire. We had understood the theory of being ‘missional’, but it takes a number of years of ‘practice/unlearning/relearning’ to embed the actual natural practice of it into your own life. I would approach that first venture very differently now with the knowledge that has come over the last 20 years.
The other thing I realised was that we were just too ‘different’ by way of meeting format for other people to lob in and feel like they could settle. Some folks missed the ‘worship’, others were seeking the services of a cranking kid’s ministry or youth ministry and that just wasn’t in our field of vision at that time. We were trying (perhaps too idealistically) to have all age worship and learning which wasn’t always easy and certainly put potential new attenders off.
I have come to accept that Sunday is almost always going to be the day on which people worship. And chances are that if a community grows we will end up sitting in rows. It’s just a pragmatic reality that we fit better. So some things just form themselves. I don’t feel a need to fight that. I do feel we can shape culture by allowing people to interact and engage rather than simply delivering monologues, but at the end of the day the gathering is a bunch of people in a room focused around Jesus . Form is fluid and sometimes it needs to be radically different, while other times it can simply ‘look like a church’. That is ok.
In spite of the seating arrangements, we still have the scope to form culture in unique ways and in expressions that are very much appropriate for the people present. For example – there is no offering sermon. Just a reminder that you can give by putting money in the box by the kitchen or by tapping your card on the machine. We say ‘if you’re part of the family and you eat from the fridge then it would good if you can help with restocking it.’ People get the analaogy.
d) Having a central focus we can all participate in really galvanised the community. We were due to start the church in August 2018 and while I was on holidays and still the team leader, I had a call from a person who was in another local church at the time. She let me know that her church ran a food distribution program in Yanchep, but they were going to have to give it up. Did we want to pick it up?…
You have a week to decide…
Do we want to launch this fledgling community, none of whom know each other well at this point, into a weekly commitment to both collect and distribute food to those in need within our community? It was a big ask – every week without fail we needed to pick up, sort and distribute.
We watched the existing church run the program over one evening to get the idea, but by that point it just felt like the right thing for us to do and we knew we were ‘in’. We would figure the logistics out on the fly. I immediately located a suitable Merc van on Gumtree for the vast sum of $5k and we jumped in the deep end figuring it out as we went. It has been possibly the single most valuable program I have ever seen a church run. Big call I know – but for a church as local as Yanchep – to be able to serve locally and do it weekly (now biweekly as we do it on Sundays also) it meant we found a way to be present among those in need – to genuinely serve and to build friendships.
The project meets a significant community need – we are known as ‘the church that gives people food’ – (I like that moniker). But it also gave a small community of people a specific project that they could invest in together, that was local, simple and where the skill level to participate was very low. Now on a Tuesday evening there are often 20 of our church gathered to set up, distribute and pack up. But prior to that a couple of people have spent the morning in a van together gathering the food from the suppliers. On the evening some serve as distributors behind the tables, while others of us just mingle and chat with the crew who are there. While there are a few rosters, people know they can come and go as they need to. As a result it seems a very healthy community has formed around this event.
It was a line ball call in the heat of the moment, but it’s been a winner. When churches talk of missional activities it can often be difficult for more than a handful of people to participate eg. Alpha is great – but you can’t stack a home with churchies or it defeats the purpose. This is an intentionally missional activity where people can come and take a very back seat role, just lifting crates and moving stuff – or others can use their pastoral gifts to love and care for those who turn up week after week. I’m not a fan of churches setting up missional projects just to tick a box and be able to say they are ‘doing stuff’, but if it can be a simple, low bar to entry activity that gives permission to virtually anyone (Christian or not) to help out and serve then I can’t imagine why we wouldn’t do it!
So there you go – just some reflections on church planting 5 years on from the start of the Yanchep Community Church.
As one of the most northern most churches in the metro area of Perth we have the real advantage of functioning in many ways like a small country town with a lot of local ownership and buy in. My hope is that one day we will plant another church out of here. The obvious place to look is the curious suburb that is Two Rocks – just 10ks up the road – but another even more discrete community. At this stage it’s hard to see a church being sustainable up there given the small population and the tendency for those folks to come to Yanchep, but I hope in a few years time as development catches up that we will be dreaming again and hearing the Spirit calling us to a new adventure.
If you want a book to mess with your neat and tidy ideas of how mission and evangelism should be expressed then the Poisonwood Bible is your go to.
Set primarily in the 1960’s it follows the journey of one Baptist missionary family who feel the ‘Lord has called them’ to missionary service in what was then the Belgian Congo. Nathan Price, his wife Orleanna and their 4 girls all set off to bring the good news of Jesus to the ‘backward’ tribes of a tiny Congolese village called Kalanga.
It’s a story with many interwoven threads and if you don’t pay attention you could easily get lost between the ‘family’ story and the bigger story in which the book is set (Congolese independence and the political wrangling that accompanied it). The story is narrated thru the eyes of the 5 women but we never hear from the Reverend himself, unless it is in his ‘sermon voice’, or thru the mouths of the family as they quote him.
This is one of those books that every aspiring missionary should read. Why?… Because in brief summary it reflects on:
The curious idea of ‘calling’
Sometimes we can misconstrue God’s voice with our own inner desires and we can use him to sanction the things we already intend to do. Nathan Price had a burning ‘calling’ to go and preach to the African tribes, who he regarded as uncivilised heathen savages. We discover that his ‘calling’ comes as much from a tragic incident when he was serving as soldier, as it does from any voice direct from God. There is a mix of guilt and penitence driving his approach to Christian mission – neither of which are good reasons to pursue a vocation of this sort (in case you didn’t know…) And the outcomes are correspondingly catastrophic for him, his family and the local people.
As I have got older I have often wondered about my own ‘calling’ experiences at different times of life. Was it really the voice of God or was it simply my own desires that I wanted permission to proceed with? Did God really direct and lead us, or did he allow me to pursue my own dreams while I corralled him in to lend a bit of authority?
I don’t think we will ever answer that question properly as everything we do is done with mixed motives. But perhaps it just needs to be said… If you use the language of ‘calling’ then it just bears mentioning that it is usually muddied waters and very rarely a bolt direct from God himself.
The nature of the gospel.
For Nathan Price, a hardline fundamentalist (not a lot of fun but pretty damn mental) the gospel is almost purely about getting people to ‘convert’ – by which he means agreeing to follow ‘Tata Jesus’ – and then to a place of water baptism. It’s a contractural arrangement that he is seeking to broker between the people he perceives as uncivilised and ignorant savages and an angry God whose wrath he hopes they can avoid (although it seems he is more intent on negating the divine wrath he feels is coming his way)
Unfortunately the absence of any love whatsoever emanating from Price means he really is a clanging gong and every time we hear him speak it’s with a sense of his message completely missing the mark and grating terribly. His is a condescending, colonising voice, coupled with a refusal to learn from those around him. There is no ‘listening’ to the local people and hearing their stories and their journeys before launching in with a sharp and utterly tone deaf spiel about his narrow and jaundiced view of who Jesus is.
No doubt there were points of connection with the people at Kalanga, but he was never going to find them. Ironically his predecessor ‘Brother Fowles’, was a much loved presence in the community. He ended up taking an African wife, but was ironically fired from his mission role for ‘fraternising with the natives’. Fowles learnt the language and the customs, loved the people and became their friend, but he gets treated coldly by Price, as he is seen as a compromiser and heretic.
There is much we could say about the nature of the gospel / good news, but it just bears saying that despite his best intentions and his ardent endeavours he simply failed to communicate the reality of who Jesus is to these people. He spoke ‘facts’ as best he knew them, but he didn’t recognise his own cultural formation and as such couldn’t accept that the gospel may take a different form in this new culture.
For every missionary its a challenge to ask afresh ‘what is the gospel and how is it best communicated to the people amongst whom I am living?’ Because it changes…
The appropriateness of foreign missionaries even entering a space where people already had their religious and spiritual practices.
This idea has emerged as a critique in a few places lately, but perhaps the best known is the story of John Chau, a young evangelical American who felt God had called him to go as a missionary to the unreached people on India’s North Sentinel Island, a part of the world previously untouched by western ways of life. These people were known to be hostile to anyone who entered their space, but Chau was convinced God had called him and he was equipped with all he needed to do good work there. He had been inspired by the story of Jim Elliot and his small band of martyrs who were killed in Ecuador mid 20th C attempting a similar venture. Chau knew the risks, knew exactly what he was doing, but chose to go there, believing that if no one spoke to Sentinelise people about Jesus that they were spent eternity in Hell.
He was killed by the island inhabitants before he made any progress with his hoped for mission work. A doco movie has been made about his life and his expedition and while I haven’t seen it yet, I believe it doesn’t portray him as a crazy person – just a young man with a burning desire to serve God no matter the cost.
We could mock him and his foolishness, but I wonder where our passionate young leaders are these days? We seem to have fewer and fewer people stepping up to the plate of Christian service, especially costly sacrificial mission work. It’s way easier to poke fun at those silly people than to learn from them and be inspired by them. My own teenage and young adult years were the richer for reading stories of Jim Elliot, Jackie Pullinger and Hudson Taylor. Who are our modern day inspirational leaders in this space? Why do we have so few younger leaders aspiring to a life of sacrifice and service? Yes – it’s hard – but it’s this kind of leadership and service that inspires others to rise up also. Maybe it’s you that needs to drop your cynicism and cleverness and just jump in boots and all to serve and learn?
We can certainly question mission work done in the style of Nathan Price – ego driven, culturally bound and lacking in love. But there is simply no question that the core of the Christian message is to ‘go and make disciples – baptising and teaching them to obey Jesus’ words’. It is to lead people away from false ideas and false Gods and towards truth. Depending on who you are talking to that can be seen as offensive and intrusive, (even within Christian spaces) but this was Jesus’ mission – to ‘seek out and save the lost’. We don’t need to go about it using crass methods, but we do need to come to grips with the fact that at some point the gospel calls people out of one way of living and into another.
I remember hearing Dave Andrews say that in every culture there are Jesus symbols and motifs – and these are our connection points – our common ground to communicating the person of Jesus. There are also going to be points of conflict and disconnect and it requires both courage and wisdom to confront these both cross culturally and locally.
And yes – inevitably that involves calling some things ‘right’ and wrong’. It risks offence and it involves the willingness to take a stand. If missionaries came to Australia from other cultures they might be shocked at our lack of communal living – our prioritising of individualism and of our addiction to buying products which will apparently make us happy. Any missionary would have to challenge these behaviours as not in line with life in the kingdom of God. We don’t make offerings to the Gods like you would find in Bali, but we have our own cultural idols. Idols differ from place to place, but they never stop being idols.
So maybe we should ask; ‘Are we better off to stop cross-cultural mission work and leave people to their own spiritual devices?’ Should we leave Muslims as they are, Buddhists to do their own thing and so on?… I don’t think the New testament gives us any option here. If Jesus is the way to encounter God and he is truth then we are responsible for helping people engage with that truth. It means advocating for one way to meet God, but if that is a sticking point then you may need to go back and examine your own theology.
Contextualisation is everything in mission work.
Why won’t the people in Kalanga get baptised? Nathan Price feels it is hardness of heart – a refusal to bow the knee to Tata Jesus, but in actuality its because the river is full of crocodiles and very dangerous. As a result they perceive him as a danger to their community! If only he had taken the time to listen and figure that one out. His whole ministry comes under a cloud because they see him as a threat!
Then as the political clime turns towards liberal democracy where people can vote for what they want, the village decide to take a vote on whether they will follow Jesus. Jesus loses the vote, but Nathan still doesn’t get it… He is living in a different culture and has to tread gently and humbly. At one point the village chief lets him know that they managed just fine before he came along- and they will do just fine when he leaves. In the meantime it is they who are being patient with him – when all along he feels his own patience is being tested.
All mission is happening within a broader socio-political space and if we miss that context then our ‘gospel’ could just be white noise.
Right now we cannot speak of Jesus without paying attention to what is going on in the global political realm. The Russia – Ukraine war, the US Trump phenomena and the Israel – Palestine conflict all give shape to the world in which we live. Close to home we have had the Voice referendum impact our context, the Royal Commission into sexual abuse, as well as the challenge of wondering what alignment the church has with conservative politics and how that influences our message.
We don’t speak of Jesus in a vacuum. If Nathan Price had paid attention to the massive runctions taking place in Congo he may have made some very different choice. He may have been wise enough to get out of there. He may have been humble enough to accept that his western ways are not superior – just different to their own ways.
Sadly he misses all the cues and his end (spoiler alert)
is to be burned at the stake by the very people he was trying to save. No doubt he saw it as being persecuted for the gospel.
There is a price to pay for missionary service – and this family pays heavily.
I admire our missionaries – wherever they are – in Africa, Thailand, the Middle East or right here in Australia, because these people have stepped up to a very unique vocational challenge. To enter a culture as guests, to listen and to learn for a long time and to love graciously.
Some do it with their children and their kids end up stuck between the two worlds when they come home. Where do they belong? They aren’t sure… This can have both good and bad effects. Some kids resent their parent’s sacrifice and drop faith like a hot potato. Some kids are inspired and follow in their parent’s footsteps asking how they can build on the work and continue to serve.
But you don’t do what the Price family did without cost. Along the way there are significant impacts on each member of the family as they come to grips with their Africa experience. Truth be told had their father been a different man they may have thrived in Africa rather suffering PTSD and suffering in various ways.
I know of missionaries who have lost children in tough missionary environments, of others who have come home shell shocked and with a faith in tatters because they were not remotely successful at what they set out to do.
It requires boldness and some serious courage to take the cross cultural path and to immerse yourself in another world for an indefinite period of time – even in the middle of a countries internal fracturing. Nathan Price may well win a prize for being the world’s worst missionary. What is scary is that I saw some of my younger self in him as I observed his black and white view of the world, his dogged determination to succeed at all costs and his belief that his view was right in every way imaginable.
I’m glad to be a bit older now and to have been formed a bit more into Christ. But I grew up in an era of Nathan Prices and I could so easily have been him.
If you haven’t read the book then do yourself a favour and invest the time!
I’m not a fan of the dentist – never have been, but an experience of a failed extraction where the anaesthetic didn’t work around 9 years ago seriously scarred me. I never wanted to go back… Not having ever had an extraction before I just presumed it would hurt to some degree. Apparently it’s not supposed to hurt at all… I know that now.
On that occasion the dentist I visited dosed me up with anaesthetic right to the point where I simply couldn’t have any more – and still it hurt like crazy. After 40 minutes of wriggling and whining and getting nowhere I remember saying ‘just go as hard as you can and I’ll suck it up…’ After what felt like 10 seconds but was more likely 3 or 4 I tapped out. It was sheer intense agony. I dunno how people do it in countries without the facilities we have. She left me on a cheery note ‘don’t worry you can come back next week and we’ll have another try…’ Yeah right…’ I went to our church bloke’s group where I sat zombified for the next 90 minutes – happy to be out of there but in disbelief that I still had to do it all over again.
As it turned out the dentist on the return visit was a grade above the apprentice who was working on me and she got it out – but I lay rigid, frozen with fear, the whole time.
I have had 2 teeth extracted in the last month both at our local Yanchep Dentist and on both occasions I have been dreading the events. Fear lingers. That one event marked me.
However these times were different. What really impressed me wasn’t the skill of the dentist – although both were very good at getting the teeth out and keeping me ok during the event. But I was struck by the dental nurse who clearly picked up my anxiety. (I was trying to lie still and be touch but I think I was like a tin soldier.) On the first occasion she gently rubbed my hand and my brow and told me it would be ok. I was conscious of it feeling like an odd thing to be on the receiving end of – a 59 year old man afraid and uptight – but at the same time I was aware of her care easing me and calming me.
It was quite beautiful.
As I went in today for what was apparently going to be a ‘complicated extraction’ (cue the fear meter to register off the chart) I saw her there and she seemed to recognise me too. I felt better straight away knowing I had her. As the dentist looked into my mouth, he identified a wisdom tooth that had shifted since my last visit. ‘Right – let’s start here’ he said. I had come in for a different tooth, but now there 2 that needed extracting… As he poked around my mouth, I called a halt to proceedings and began to talk of general anaesthetic, getting the two done in one hit – waking up with it all over…
The crazy cost almost seemed worth it, but then my other side kicked in and said ‘ok let’s just do this thing…’
We agreed to the ‘complicated tooth’ with the wisdom tooth saved for another day. Joy.
Again as the dentist’s tools did their yanking and cracking in my mouth her hand was on top of mine, her fingers gently calming me – and it genuinely eased my fear. I didn’t realise human touch could make such a difference, especially from someone I didn’t know and before whom I felt weak and vulnerable. So thank you to S for not just being efficient and good with the tools but for seeing people for who they are – even anxious older men who you may expect to be tougher than that…
I’m not. But I’m also not dreading future visits anything like I have been
i think we all sometimes wonder how we ‘make a difference’ at work. Here’s a case in point. Learn from S and just see the people in front of you for who they are and respond to them as they need it – even if they don’t even know that they need it. I didn’t go in hoping the nurse would be kind and compassionate – would stroke my hand – but I left grateful that she wasn’t inhibited or restrained by any social conventions that ruled out physical touch with a client.
Growing up in Belfast I was well aware that Protsestants (us) and Catholics (them) didn’t get on – in fact we were raised to despise one another and think the worst of one another. We even felt a little proud of our ‘good guy’ status, aware that while the IRA were the baddest of the bad, you really just couldn’t trust a Catholic no matter what.
This was the tribally divided world I grew up in. It appeared the tribes were formed around religious convictions, but as I was later to discover this was simply a means to an end – a way of identifying those we were conditioned to hate.
When I retuned to Ireland in 2014 I did some serious historical reading and discovered that the ongoing persecution and marginilisation of the Catholic population by the British / Protestant government was actually at the root of much Catholic anger. I had to acknowledge that ‘my tribe’ had treated these people terribly, so they were angry and the emergence of the IRA seemed like their only way of resisting and protesting. As a result several Protestant paramilitary groups formed (UVF UFF and the like). They met Catholic terrorist activity with their own brand of terror.
Remind me again – who are the ‘good guys’ and who are the ‘bad guys’?…
It’d be easier if the bad guys were all bad and the good guys all good, but of course it’s much messier than that.
I’ve been following the developments in Gaza closely over the last 2 weeks and increasingly it appears that the only ‘good guys’ left are the people forced from their homes and living in fear of their lives. Even if Hamas had the best interests of the Palestinian people at heart (which is very hard to imagine) their actions in Israel can only be condemned. There is no excuse, or valid reason for the slaughter of innocent civilians. It was a cowardly, but also provocative act. And while it hurt Israel, the rebound effect on their own people is now exponentially worse.
Much like the British government’s oppression of the Irish Catholics, the Israeli Government have created what some have described as an ‘open air prison’ in Palestine. So there is anger and unrest. There is seething rage at lives being wasted and recently that rage was expressed in extreme violence. It doesn’t validate it or excuse it, but it does give it a context.
Angry oppressed people seeking to bring some normality back to their lives respond in rage and hurt their oppressor.
And it did hurt. It still hurts for the Israeli people. Every day their family members are held hostage is another day when they haven’t come home alive. Every ‘forward’ step by the Israeli army may come at the cost of a hostage’s life.
And of course in the midst of this thousands of Palestinian people – already pushed to the edge – are now homeless and have lost everything.
Whatever Hamaas were thinking on Oct 7, it wasn’t concerned with the safety and lives of its own people. Whatever Israel are thinking, it is clear that even if they continue on the path they are on and succeed in completely erasing all sign of Hamas, it will only be a matter of time before a new resistance leadership emerges in search of justice and freedom.
I have been reading one news article regularly as it appears – the Gaza Diary, the ponderings of Ziad, a 35 year old Palestinian man who had been moving from home to home, just trying to find shelter, food and water in the middle of the madness. There are now 14 entries and if you want an insight into daily life for a Palestinian person in the middle of this then it will give you context. It’s bizarre to even contemplate the terror of living in that country at this time.
And as each day passes the legitimacy of Israel’s actions are increasingly under scrutiny. It seems that within the country there is anger at the amount of lives lost and from the perspective of an onlooker, Israel would appear to be responding way above and beyond what would be considered ‘fair play’ in a war situation. The casualty rate has been enormous (9000 +) with the vast majority innocents.
Even so the calls for peace and a ceasefire are being ignored, as Netinyahu seeks to act ‘strongly’ and without any concession. Whether their mission (the complete elimination of Hamas) is even achievable is debatable, but the sheer cost in human life to get there seems to be lost on the Israeli PM. He has commited the ‘strong-man’ position so it’s hard to imagine him backing down.
No one would deny Israel legitimate anger and rage at the barbaric way Hamas dealt with their people, but it seems that blunt force is not the best tool for this situation. Besides the risk of hurting hostages who may be used as human shields, there is also the cost of Israeli military lives – young men and women literally in ‘kill or be killed’ scenarios – with now 23 dead.
And then there is the the question of who else may choose to stick their oar in and the consequences of that. Lebanon, Iran and more specifically, Hezbollah have already spoken up and of course there is the US and associated allies supporting Israel. We (Australia) notionally support Israel, but I sense the word ‘support’ is being stretched well beyond its breaking point at this moment.
How anyone can endorse the degree of damage being inflicted on both people and infrastructure is beyond me. There’s ‘necessary evil’ and then there is simply evil that is not done out of necessity but out of a desire for ‘extreme revenge’.
My prayer is that someone can talk sense into Netinyahu. so that the troops are called off and a peaceful resolution is found. It’s an ambitious hope because Netinyahu has clearly stated his intent to wipe our Hamas completely – whatever it takes.
Is there a ‘third way’ that can take away the revenge drive and replace it with a restoration intent? I imagine there is, but it may now appear politically weak to pursue that path. It may be off the table for the Israeli leaders, but it is probably the only way to find peace and some semblance of friendly interaction.
So – we pray – for those directly impacted – hostages, Gaza residents/transients, we pray for the military to reconsider their actions and for the leaders of our world to act peacefully and wisely. And when i say ‘pray’, its not a euphemism for hope – it’s an actual choice to pray each day for cool heads and wise spirits to win the day. Someone suggested to me yesterday that prayer was not enough – but I am convinced it’s our best tool in the craziness. It’s calling for the spiritual power of a good God to be present and overpower the evil that is running amok at present.
Whatever side of politics you sit on – whatever your beliefs about where this conflict began – the immediate prayer is for a ceasefire and longer term for peace and healing to take place in such a divided land.
This week I am teaching at our morning gathering of QBC and I chose this part of the sermon on the mount (Matt 5) as the focus of my reflections.
43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that?
I chose it intentionally because it’s confronting and ludicrously specific in how we are to respond to those who mistreat us, or with whom we are in significant conflict.
I also chose this passage a few days before Hamas did their terrorist thing in Israel. Which begs the question, how does this play out in situations where there is obvious and terrible violence being perpetrated and where to not retaliate may see further deaths and injury? Hamas have it as part of their charter to ‘wipe out Jews everywhere’, and that isn’t changing. If Israel put down their guns then they would be most likely giving up their lives.
Are we to take Jesus’ teaching to that extreme?
And of course I am aware that Israel have their share of responsibility for the animosity that exists between them and Palestine. But that isn’t the question I am pondering. Where I am struggling is to think of a Christlike response that ensures the best for both groups. A solution similar to the Irish ‘power-sharing’ agreement may work, where each side puts down their guns and seeks to work co-operatively. But it’s hard to envision it…
Was Jesus just off with the fairies the day he said these words? Did he have in mind that the Jewish people should respond to Roman oppression with love and prayer? Did he see this as applying purely to personal relationships? Or was he just speaking aspirationally? He finishes with the words ‘be perfect as your father in heaven is perfect’, so there is a degree of aspirational thinking at play here.
I wonder if we would be better off if he had left detailed instructions for dealing with International conflicts? Although I doubt we would follow those rules any more than these ones.
The application of ‘love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you’, is complicated in these international long term struggles. Hatred and suspicion has been so deeply entrenched in people’s thinking that it has become a way of life.
But I am left wondering how do we disentangle this terrible mess of animosity and hatred. Is it even possible?
‘Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you…’
You just made it sound really easy Jesus…
No reference to issues of justice or how to protect the innocent, just some unmistakeable instructions that sound way too absurd to have any bearing on reality. Or is it that we have moved so far from the kingdom of God in our way of being in this world that it is our thinking that is tainted and marred. Is it like trying to see a path forward when your windscreen is literally covered in mud?
As is his style, Martin Joseph a self declared pacifist sings a powerful song referring to the Russia / Ukraine conflict titled ‘I’d take you out’. He literally says that if he were left alone in a room with Putin and a gun he’d shoot him dead. ‘I’d lose my soul’, he sings, ‘But I’d take you out.’ I imagine your soul would take a serious toll if you were to kill another human being while trying to protect others. Bonhoeffer of course found himself in an assassination plot to rid the world of Hitler. Is this a better of two evils ethical issue?
If Jesus puts it out there then I can only believe that it is achievable, but maybe we just don’t want it that much. It’s easier to choose a side in a conflict and align with a group of powerful people. It’s harder to refuse to fight, to seek the best for the other and to pray for them, because then you get in the middle and you get hit from both sides.
If there were easy answers to these conflicts then we would have found them by now. Happy to hear your thoughts…
