BillyCalderwood.com

Too many church planters plant in their heads and not in their communities. This happens in two ways. Some are Bible-only types, and others are model-inspired - and both make the same mistake of ignoring their culture.

It is easy to develop a solid, theological grasp on the essential components of the church, and the nature of the gospel without understanding the ways in which a biblically-defined church will look and function in differing cultural contexts. The Bible-only folks are convinced they only need to know Scripture in order to reach the people in a given community. I think we all need more scriptural fidelity, but unless they can also exegete the culture they will be ill-equipped to identify idols and understand the ways in which sin has brought ruin to the community.

Others see an effective model of church flourish in one context and believe they only need to replicate that in order to reach the people in their context. They too avoid the hard work of studying their culture, and instead seek to import the work and conclusions drawn from a different context. Both types are hard at work primarily planting and leading in their head instead of their communities. This is bad missiology that disregards the importance of knowing and engaging culture.

Calling for Contextualization | Christianpost.com.

“…the resurrection is not, as it were, a highly peculiar event within the present world (though it is that as well) it is, principally, the defining event of the new creation the world that is being born with Jesus.

“…though the historical arguments for Jesus’s bodily resurrection are truly strong, we must never suppose that they will do more than bring people tot he questions faced by Thomas, Paul and Peter, the questions of faith, hope, and love.  We cannot use a supposedly objective historical epistemology as the ultimate ground for the truth of Easter.  To do so would be like lighting a candle to see whether the sun had risen.  What the candles of historical scholarship will do is to show that the room has been disturbed, that it doesn’t look like it did last night, and that would-be normal explanations for this won’t do.  Maybe, we think after the historical arguments have done their work, maybe morning has come and the world has woken up.  But to investigate whether this is so, we must take the risk and open the curtains to the rising sun.  When we do so, we won’t rely on the candles anymore, not because we don’t believe in evidence and argument but because they will have been overtaken by the larger reality from which they borrow, to which they point, and in which they will find a new and larger home.  All knowing is a gift from God, historical and scientific knowing no less that that of faith, hop, and love; but the greatest of these is love.

…The intellectual coup d’etat by which the Enlightenment convinced so many that “we know that dead people don’t rise,” as though this was a modern discovery rather than simply the reaffirmation of what Homer and Aeschylus had taken for granted, goes hand in hand with the Enlightenment’s other proposals, not least that we have now come of age, that God can be kicked upstairs, that we can get on with running the world however we want to, carving it up to our own advantage without outside interference.  To that extent, the totalitarianisms of the last century were simply among the varied manifestations of a larger totalitarianism of thought and culture against which postmodernity has now, and rightly in my view, rebelled.  Who, after all, was it who didn’t want the dead to be raised? Not simply the intellectually timid or the rationalists.  It was, and is, those in power, the social and intellectual tyrants and bullies; the Caesars who would be threatened by a Lord of the world who had defeated the tyrants least weapon, death itself; the Herods who would be horrified at the postmortem validation of the true King of the Jews.  And this is the point where believing in the resurrection of Jesus suddenly ceases to be a matter of inquiring about an odd event in the first century and becomes a matter of rediscovering hope in the twenty-first century.  Hope is what you get when suddenly realize that a different worldview is possible, a worldview in which the rich, the powerful, and the unscrupulous do not after all have the last word.  The same worldview shift that is demanded by the resurrection of Jesus is the shift that will enable us to transform the world.

Think of Oscar Wilde’s wonderful scene in his play Salome, when Herod hears reports that Jesus of Nazareth has been raising the dead.  “I do not wish him to do that,” says Herod.  “I forbid him to do that.  I allow no man to raise the dead.”  There is the bluster of a tyrant who knows his power is threatened, and I hear the same tone of voice not just in the politicians who want to carve up the world to their advantage but also in the intellectual traditions that have gone along for the ride.

But Wilde’s next, haunting line is the real crunch, for us as for Herod:  “Where is this man?” demands Herod.  “He is in every place my lord” replies the courtier, “but it is hard to find him.”

-N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope

I don’t normally give a second thought to words that come out of the mouths of shock tactic junkies and alarmists conservative or liberal.  However, this nugget from Glenn Beck and the response below by the Rev. James Martin are too interesting to pass by.  I believe that Beck’s perspective is certainly not isolated. The idea that Churches should be focused on caring for concerns that are primarily “spiritual” certainly fits nicely within people’s boxes.  However, the Church, to the extent that it actually embodies its role as the community of the Kingdom of God, recognizes that the Kingdom of God is exactly that: a Kingdom!  In this kingdom it is not only souls that God cares about, (although he certainly does!) but about things like “daily bread” as well.  Some people prefer that Christians would keep quiet about about religion and politics. Over and above this, true Christians recognize that the great commandment “Love God with all your heart soul mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself” demands that we think about and practice true love for God (some call this religion) and true love for our neighbor (which requires a polity framework of some kind).  Sorry Glenn, I take Jesus way too seriously to abandon churches that actually preach and attempt to practice the Gospel of the Kingdom!

Rev. James Martin, S.J.: Glenn Beck to Jesus: Drop Dead
Glenn Beck said last week on his eponymous show that Christians should leave churches that preach “social justice.” Mr. Beck equated the desire for a just society with–wait for it–Nazism and Communism.

The true preaching of the gospel of salvation by grace alone always leads to the possibility of this charge being brought against it. There is no better test as to whether a man is really preaching the New Testament gospel of salvation than this, that some people might misunderstand it and misinterpret it to mean that it really amounts to this, that because you are saved by grace alone it does not matter at all what you do; you can go on sinning as much as you like because it will redound all the more to the glory of grace. If my preaching and presentation of the gospel of salvation does not expose it to that misunderstanding, then it is not the gospel. –Martin Lloyd Jones

HT Jason Lomelino

FRONTLINE/WORLD . Dispatches . iWitness . Swaziland: The King and the Web | PBS

Click for video…

Hey Red Friday Group Members!

Thanks for joining and participating in our first Red Friday! I’m happy that so many folks joined this group in its first 24 hours! Those of you that joined know that the idea behind Red Friday is borne out of a willingness to embrace simplicity and generosity in a culture where the days news includes a story about a person trampled to death by shoppers trying to get good deals on flat screen T.V.s. After spending a few weeks in rural villages in Southern Africa earlier this month, the phrase “live simply so that others may simply live” has taken on new meaning for me personally.

I know each of you have joined because somehow you feel something similar and desire to help create a more just world.

With this in mind, lets stay connected!

First, would you consider sharing your Red Friday story on the site. (Instead of shopping, what did you do and where did you give?) This would help to inspire all of us through the reminder of the Holiday Season.

Second, if you have a desire to be a part of a longer term movement that pushes back against the cultural phenomenon that created “black friday” in the first place… Would you let me know?

I’m excited to see where we will be a year from now!

Love to you all!
Billy Calderwood

As many of you may already know, I just returned home after spending 2 1/2 weeks in Swaziland with an organization called Advocates for Africa’s Children.  I will be sharing much more with you in the future but here is the bottom line:  The need is enormous but so is the potential for powerful change!  Swaziland has the highest HIV/AIDS prevalence and the lowest life expectancy of any nation in the entire world.  (Let that sink in for a second).  There are 100,000 orphaned children in a country with a population of around 1 million.  In the face of this crisis, African Churches are taking extraordinary steps to care for orphaned and vulnerable children holistically in their communities and to fight the HIV/AIDS pandemic.  Advocates for Africa’s Children exists to partner with and support these churches in their mission.  It is a grass roots movement that has the power to face the crisis head on where other interventions have failed.  If you are meaningfully involved already in activism and giving around the OVC HIV/AIDS crisis is Southern Africa wonderful!  (And by meaningfully involved I mean you doing more than buying (RED) shirts at the gap!)  If not please consider becoming an advocate!  This video provides a quick snapshot of many of the projects AFAC has already initiated in partnership with Swazi churches.  To get involved immediately, you can email me personally or visit the AFAC website at www.afachildren.org.  Also, if you are on facebook, please join the cause by visiting www.causes.com/afac.  More to come soon!

Energy, Consumerism, and the Economic Crisis
…we have to face up to the reality that we are ourselves major culprits in the financial fiasco that has befallen the nation and the world.

Seduced by brilliant advertising, we are a people who have bought into affluent lifestyles that have us living beyond our means. We spend almost all that we earn and save very little.
What is worse is that, with our credit cards and ATM machines, we spend money that we don’t even have—borrowing from hoped-for future earnings.

More than 50 years ago, America’s most famous economist, Harvard’s Kenneth Galbraith, warned us that an economy built on buying on credit would one day collapse. Now that it’s happened, we are ready to blame everyone but ourselves.

I need not go into all the biblical passages that would call us to live simply, if for no other reason than that others might simply live. Facts and figures condemn us. We are 6 percent of the world’s population but consume 42 percent of the world’s goods. We all know that we Americans spend more and more money to buy more and more things we don’t need in order to impress more and more people we don’t know. In short, we have turned away from the lifestyle prescribed by scripture, failed to be good stewards of God’s creation, ignored the needs of the poor, and, in the words of scripture, “spent our money on that which does not satisfy.”

If blogging is not your thing but you would like to keep up with people on the internet, you really ought to get a facebook page. It’s got all of the social aspects of blogging without the heavy lifting of designing and maintaining a regular blog. Plus, the pieces of flair app is awesome.