On friendship

In the last few days, my thoughts have been drawn again and again to friendship.

Yesterday was the funeral of Correne, a friend from my church. Despite being at the crematorium, which can be impersonal and cold, it was a moving service and a privilege to be there and to have a part to play.  Correne spoke the truth as she saw it, with a no-nonsense boldness.  When I’d been part of the church just a little while, over lunch at a group one day people got round to talking about vicars, priests and ministers. Not everything people said was very complimentary!  As several voices listed the faults of church leaders and clergy I thought I should remind people that I was one of them. “Oh not you’re not,” said Correne, in a voice that wasn’t accepting any disagreement, “You’re one of us.”  Nothing said to me by any church, before or since, has had quite such an impact on me.

The day before the funeral, a friend phoned from halfway across the world to ask me to listen for a few minutes as he talked about his marriage, work and life.  Though separated by many miles and by different cultures, faith and circumstances, our friendship was strong, real and there when we needed it.

Three weeks ago N and I met friends from student days who we hadn’t seen in many years.  We shared some of the old jokes and memories. Realising then how stupid it is to let good friendships wither, we are determined now not to leave it so long before we spend time together again.

Oh and I watched The Big Chill again (the film, not the festival).  Someone - actually it’s Kevin Costner though you never see his face! - has died and his friends gather for his funeral…  It’s of its time but still a good film about friendship. And the music is superb.

There are too few good friends in this life for us to let friendship die of neglect.

What does a minister do?

  

A short while ago graphics like this one were all the rage in social networking sites.

Of course we all know that ministers wear their collars back to front and lead church services.  Except that my church doesn’t have any services. We don’t have any mid-week Bible studies or half-nights of prayer. We no longer have a youth club. We don’t have a Mother’s Union.  We don’t have a building. And I’ve never worn a clerical collar in public (that’s got you thinking, hasn’t it?)

So, it’s not easy to see the pegs on which Joe or Joanne Public would hang their ideas about the regular content of my diary.

The fact is that most people do not know what ministers/pastors/priests do with their time.  My friend Les tells everyone that I’m on holiday every week (thanks, Les).  

A while back, in a rash moment, I promised to offer my church a kind of “Week in the life of….” glimpse into my diary.  Every time I have attempted to do this, I have ended up asking questions about what is a typical week - and when was the last time I had a typical week?
  

So here’s what I did in a recent week.  Is it a typical week?  No. This is just a week. Next one will be different.  I:

• accepted one and turned down two preaching invitations for the autumn.
• blogged
• checked Facebook (wouldn’t know what was happening in church without)
• countersigned a passport application
• dealt with (who knows how many?) emails, telephone calls, text messages, post – three-quarters of it unimportant
• drove twice to the edge of London for work-related meetings
• gave apologies that I couldn’t be with either of our Monday night groups for a while owing to other appointments
• held the hand of my dying friend
• home-cured some bacon for colleagues coming to breakfast next month
• listened to my son’s advice and enjoyed his company before he went back North.
• made ‘to do’ lists and tried to make progress in ticking off completed tasks
• organised, encouraged, schmoozed and ranted to get some people to do things 
• parted the waters of the Thames Estuary*
• played Warcraft: Orcs and Humans (it’s a good vs. evil thing)
• prayed
• read a couple of books
• read from the Bible
• reminded a few people in the church why we do what we do
• reviewed a theology book for an online magazine
• shared Communion
• spent time sharing life with the cell community that meets in my home
• spent time with colleagues in other local churches: listening, talking, planning and problem-solving
• spent time with our Life & Faith group, sharing lunch, talking and praying
• spent time with people who were grieving.  Didn’t say too much; just shared their company and their pain
• started to write some small-group teaching resources for the autumn
• started, with others, to dream some dreams about what next for our church – nothing ruled in or out.
• tackled bits of administration that arise from managing a charity
• took a family member to hospital for her oncology and audiology appointments
• took a friend to a half-day cardiology appointment
• took part in a team meeting
• tried to do some thinking
• visited hospital several times, to be with others who were caring for our dying friend.
• telephoned my friend H in her long-term hospital
• visited some people from church – nothing heavy, just tea and catching up with life
• walked five Rhodesian Ridgeback dogs
• went to the pub for an hour
• worked with my close colleague on managing current pressures in the church
• worked with people from 3 other churches, exploring what God might be saying about their next steps together
• wrote two detailed papers aiming to release a substantial amount of money for mission among a group of churches in Essex

Now you might be thinking – not all of that is work is it?  Some of that isn’t 'sacred', it’s everyday. Which is why ministers are paid a stipend as ‘holders of an office’, not a salary – an allowance to enable us live a way of life which isn’t 9-6.  Most weeks it’s a 50+ hour week, some of which will look like work and other parts not. One reason is that people don’t have their spiritual encounters or crises by appointment or during office hours alone.

I wrote this list because people asked me what I do, not to make myself look good or to seek approbation.  I chose this way of life. There are times when it's the best way of life in the world and others when it doesn't feel like that...

*This only happened in my head

A feather on the breath of God

My reality ‘rests like a feather on the breath of God‘.  It is because God speaks, because God loves and for no other reason.  And if we want to know what it is to say that I am, the only answer is that ‘I am because of the love of God’. And when I seek to justify, defend or systematize what I am, I become ‘serious’.  I cease to be a feather on the breath of God and gravity draws me down into darkness.   

Rowan Williams, 2008, Not being serious

Inclusion and discipleship

Twice this week I’ve been challenged by friends about whether the church of which I am a part maintains a right balance between being ‘inclusive’ and living a life focused upon being followers of Christ. The following are my initial (and personal) thoughts; they are open to comment and challenge. They are not official church policy nor the last word.  If you think I have got it wrong, please set me right (but understand that I enjoy the rough-and-tumble of debate!).

Church from Scratch holds a very strong set of Christ-centred values at its core but has very low barriers to entry, meaning that all are welcomed and encouraged to journey further-in towards the Person at the centre. In this approach, people who might find it difficult to engage with more usual forms of church can find a spiritual home. 

We prize this openness. No one is excluded on random grounds of gender, race, marital status, sexual orientation, disability and so forth (nor should they be).  We often have people of no faith among us and sometimes people whose beliefs conflict with ours. Their welcome is in no doubt but they know of our determination to follow Christ.

We are inclusive because God loves all people and the good news of Jesus Christ is offered to all, no matter who or what.  The only basis for encouraging anyone to move on from this church is if their persistent behaviour undermines other people’s inclusion or their desire to be disciples of Christ. We are not interested in community for its own sake but in sharing our lives among those who desire Christ at the centre.

Yet the open and inclusive welcome extended to us all is actually an invitation that daily requires us to choose Christ’s way of life or our own: 

• His values, attitudes and choices (or ours). 
• His decisions about money and spending (or ours). 
• His values about who we have sex with (or ours). 
• His decisions about how to spend the time available (or ours).  
• His choices about what newspapers to read or opinions to hold (or ours)
• His choices about who we like (or ours)
• Ultimately, it’s his life (or ours)

Theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer summed it up by saying that “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.”  We find that quote in his book The Cost of Discipleship -  an apt title since the cost of keeping his focus on Christ was to die at the hands of the Nazis. 

His words simply reflect the words of Jesus:  “If anyone wants to follow me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” (Luke 9:23). Each day we are confronted with a range of choices and, if we are his followers, we take those that he would take.  Inclusiveness and welcome are not an invitation to see how Christ can be bolted-on to our existing ideas, attitudes or behaviours.  They need to be killed off so that our only ideas, attitudes and behaviours are what we believe are from him, always accepting that we understand in part and make mistakes.

As the Apostle Paul says “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in this body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20). 

  

I want our church to be committed to being inclusive because the Christ I try to serve welcomes everyone. 

I want to challenge social injustice because each instance is a denial of the true value of human beings created by God and for whom Christ gave his life. Yet the same Christ calls all those whom he welcomes to overturn the direction of their lives and follow him.

It’s good to be inclusive. Yet Jesus' desire to please God drove people away from him as much as it drew people to him. Maybe it still does...

Moby, The Maltese Falcon and Schindler's List

Like many others I enjoy reading novels, listening to music and watching films. These are all popular forms of our culture yet it would be hard to say that they always sit easily with being a follower of Christ.

For example, I enjoy the rather gory detective novels of Val McDermid – which we also see on the television as Wire in the blood - looking at life through the eyes of psychopaths.

I love films.  I like spy and detective stories, especially the films noirs of the 30s and 40s, like The Big Sleep or The Maltese Falcon.  I like heartwarming, moral (some might say syrupy) tales like It’s a wonderful life or Mr Smith goes to Washington or fun films like (wait for it!) The Wizard of Oz. 

And I have also watched Schindler’s List, and The Passion of the Christ and Shadowlands, though I probably wouldn’t want to see them again.  Films affect people differently.  I saw The Passion at the cinema with a guest, a young Muslim man, who spent the film weeping profusely at what he saw, while in the row in front of us four girls laughed and munched their way through bags of crisps while making and receiving mobile phone calls throughout.

I also like a wide variety of music, including some that more traditional Christians might find strange or even distasteful.  While there are many Christians who think that ‘real’ music finished in 1950 or even 1850, I am interested in the way that modern music – garage, trance and ambient - can speak to the emotions and the mind, even if I find the message it contains requires careful filtering.

I remember as a teenager that the prevailing attitude within the church was that modern culture was something largely to be avoided or shunned.  Christians didn’t listen to rock music.  They didn’t dance or smoke or drink.  We were the people who “came out from among them and were separate”. We removed ourselves from society, finding alternative community and culture behind the walls of our local church. 

But now I am sure that it’s right that the followers of Jesus should engage with culture.  After all, the Jesus that we worship and honour not only created this world; he ordained that we are made in God’s likeness and therefore we should be sub-creators in it. Like us, Jesus was born into a defined culture and worldview; a locatedness in time, space and outlook.  Jesus could not escape or ignore his culture; neither can we stand aloof from ours. 

Which is why I was glad to spend time recently, at his request, sharing an experience with a Christian friend in his 20s. He wanted to explore the spiritual content of the music of Moby, in the style of contemporary music known as ambient electronic.  Moby is a professing Christian whose music and lyrics, though not apparently explicitly Christian, are now used very extensively in modern entertainments and in films.  You may not have heard his name but if you heard just some of his music you would probably recognise it as he is still, I think, among the most licenced of artists for use in films and adverts. My friend asked if it would be possible to explore a sample of Moby’s work and see what conclusions we came to, having experienced this material together.  It was an interesting and challenging project.

Paul’s Letter to the Philippian church can speak into situations where we look our culture hard in the face. Written in his prison cell, Paul is confronted by the realities of living in the first century Roman Empire.  He believes he is in the closing days not only of his ministry but also his life. It is hard to imagine a situation more disturbing to the mind or soul.  But Paul doesn’t focus on his current discomfort or his imminent death.  Instead, he writes to offer encouragement to one of his churches. And at the heart of his message is the belief that Christians may know peace amid the pain and trouble of the world as they focus on the beauty that lies on the other side of what presents as reality in our culture.

“Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” Philippians 4:8

We too live in a culture that has a dark side. The pain of the world is brought nightly into our living rooms.  Our newspapers’ circulations are sustained by tawdriness.  TV news bulletins lead on disasters.  Bad news is sent by text updates to our phones.  This continuing bombardment of darkness can lead us down a path towards despondency or even despair.

The way of Christ, as taught by Paul, stands in stark contrast to society’s fixation on the negative and narcissistic aspects of modern culture.  If we are to find the peace of God, we need to look beyond our culture to a firmer reality. In place of despondency we are called to celebrate and enjoy all that is good and uplifting.  In our society, this is profoundly countercultural.

As someone once said, whatever else popular culture is it is not trivial, because it is an expression of faith and worship.  If the people among whom we live (and often we ourselves!) are immersed in the culture of our times, in its outlook and its ‘worship’, then clearly we must seek to understand that culture if we are to speak the good news of Christ in relevant ways. 

What Paul is suggesting here is that Christians must guard themselves against simply soaking up the prevailing culture, so that we lose any distinctiveness. So what practical steps for daily life can we draw from this?

Well, firstly, we look for opportunities where we can experience popular culture in the company of friends and family (both Christian and non-Christian) in ways that lead to discussion both of the merit of the work and the values that underpin it. Encourage yourself and others to be discerning of the signs of the times, as reflected in the culture you enjoy together.

Then, remember that not all that culture offers is meaningful or worthy of our attention. Much popular culture can be frothy or vacuous. But don’t be put off:  there are stories, films, music that have depth to them and which contain clues that underpin the lives of others.  Don’t be afraid to sample widely; reject most; revel and immerse yourself in little.

As you do so, enjoy those things which are beautiful and which lead you towards the beauty of God.  And when the Christian looks at hurtful things, as look we must at times, do so with the eyes of one who looks beyond them and sees the Christ who enters into the hurt wanting to transform and remake them into something beautiful.

What did I make of Moby and his music?  Well, of the 18 tracks I sampled, there was a small number that I found moving but mostly I thought the music rather thin and the lyrics inwardly focused upon some dark emotions.  I probably won’t be returning to Moby.  But I have no regrets about sampling.  I now have a basis from which to comment from the perspective of experience (not an uninformed bigotry, as is sadly often the case).  It would be far worse not to engage at all.

Now, when I watch a film, listen to an album, read a novel or view some art I hope I am not afloat on whatever current prevails.  Because I am now grounded in seeking the true, the honourable, the just, the pleasing, excellent and praiseworthy. And reflecting upon such things.