Random thoughts on advent two...

Last night I couldn't go to sleep.  I wasn't exactly anxious, just caught up in thoughts about how to best serve God's people in our faith community during Advent.  And two ideas kept swimming back into my consciousness every time I started to doze off...

+ First, we've been doing a "one minute of silence each day with those you love" prayer as part of our way of embracing the lost art of waiting.  Now for me all three parts of this discipline are important:  a) one minute - 60 seconds - out of 86,400 seconds each day for quiet reflection in the land of busyness; b) silence - waiting rather than doing or asking - in the realm of hyper-activity and super-productivity; and c) with those you love - could be lovers or animals or who knows - whomever or whatever shares life and space with you, ok?  We got to do this 4 times last week... not great but better than half... but I'm the pastor and it was my idea!

We talked about what keeps us from resting in the quietness of God's love - what gets in the way - and the biggest thing was forgetting.  Without other small quiet rituals, like eating supper together, it is too easy to wind up at the end of each day with no time for consciously resting in God's grace.  We are so used to being in control that even this tiny practice feels enormous - and that makes me glad we are sticking with it.  Like an old spiritual director once said, "Don't promise God that you're going to fast for a week and crawl a mile to prayer on your knees.  Just light one candle - and return thanks.  Do that over time - and other small rituals - and before long you'll be a soul in prayer.

+ Second, I have just about finished Douglas John Hall's book, The Cross in Our Context, a work I've been reading on and off for about six years.  At the heart of his wisdom is the "light tradition" born of Luther:  a theology - and ecclesiogy - of the cross. In the penultimate chapter, "On Being Christian Today," Hall explores a modest and tender way of being disciples in the 21st century that both buries our former "theologies of glory and power" by acts of compassion but also unifies our mission with our ethics.  He wonders what it might be if we were committed to Christ as faithful ambassadors of hope and love?

Of all the metaphors Jesus uses to depict the community of witness that he is preparing through his teaching and example and will bring to fruition through the later witness of the Paraclete... are metaphors of smallness: little things that perform some essential service for bigger things - salt, yeast, a candle, a little town on a hill in a dark night, a pearl, a mustard seed... (pg. 189) What (then) would adherence to the theology of the cross mean for a theology of mission?  Perhaps a theology of faith (not sight); of hope (not finality) and love (not power.) (p. 193)

Faith is modest - we see and trust but do not possess truth - for now we see only as through a glass darkly.  Faith in our lives is not infallible - it invites dialogue - and listening.  For "if I am conscious of the fact that my own stance is one of faith, not sight, I must at least be open to the possibility that the other - a human like myself - has something to bring to our meeting... because my faith is trust in Another - neither self nor system" it is all about humility.

Hope is about this moment - not finality or the end of times - but living as a light in the darkness for this day.  It is about invitation not trial and judgment - and shares an abundance of grace and gratitude, too.  Because, hope is born of love not power - and love is "patient, love is kind, love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude, it does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful." (I Corinthians 13)  What, asks Hall, would happen if our mission were to be shaped by faith, hope and love? (pp. 189-199)

I realize that such a proposal is bound to seem naive... no doubt it will be said that such a criterion of authentic Christian mission is impossibly Utopian, idealistic and even discouraging from the outset... but why could it not happen, without naive idealism, that love - God's love, the love that we, being first loved, are learning to show - should be understood by serious ecumenical churches as the first and only unqualified ground for our mission? (pp. 198-199)

Well, that set me off on a thinking jag that lasted way too long into the night:  For over a year I've been wondering if our next all-church act of mission might not be something playful and modest like a regular supper and short jazz concert?  We might have NO set agenda, just some good food and improvisational music that models for us the importance of listening and engaging one another with respect.  If we set aside a little time to see where the Spirit might be leading us, who knows where we might end up?  We might extend a special invitation to artists - and the LGBTQ community - and returning vets and who knows who else?

After our Playfull Living study - and a similar idea born of Parker Palmer's experience - I've been keeping this in my heart and pondering it like Mary.  We're all already too jammed and committed to all the important things we HAVE to do.  What would it mean to be about mission born of faith, hope and love - playful - and open to the spirit in modesty? Hmmm....