What needs to happen for people to get over the idea that disagreement=division?

Why is modern thinking so binary? Why is every debate framed as a black and white issue of adversity where choosing a position means picking a team? It’s the case in politics. It’s the case in sport. It’s especially the case in the internal mechanisms of Christianity. And frankly. I’m over it. Life is complex. Life is a constant stream of sacrifice and compromise – tolerance even – so that we can love people despite our differences, not hate people because of them.

I don’t mean this in a wishy washy way – we are going to disagree on things, and though I’m sure some questions are more complex than others, there is, in most cases, a right answer, and in other cases, a better answer.

The answers we come up with to any problems are a product of the quality of the conflict, or debate, that produces them. Ideas are best clarified by criticism, by cutting out the rubbish, by considering new perspectives. Argument is part of the process. It’s profoundly part of being together, working together, and striving together.

This is profoundly, and obviously, true. Especially within teams, but also within, say, politics – a healthy debate where both sides are actually listened to, and both sets of political priorities (say – the concerns of employers, and employees) are properly considered – will produce better policy outcomes (though not necessarily from the perspective of the employer, or employee – because we act most naturally out of self interest. In fact, mitigating self interest, or special interests, is one of the best parts of healthy debate… And yet, there’s a certain stream of thinking so put off by the overly robust approach to argument, that equates disagreement with hostility, or put off by the sanguine approach to argument that merges all answers into no answer, that insists the answer is we must all agree on everything, if not at all times, at least in public – especially in the church.

This is dumb. It’s going to lead to a watered down and unhealthy church where the strongest willed wins. Where either the overwhelming will to move with the times, or the underwhelming will to stay exactly as things were 40 years ago, will win unopposed.

Disagreement, public disagreement, direct and robust public disagreement, is vital for the health of the church and its mission. Disunity can be unattractive – but disagreement isn’t disunity. Unless you say “this person is not a Christian” you’re ultimately not dividing over the issue that unites you – who Jesus is… so it’s not division. It’s debate. And the fact that we debate, in public, not only shows that we care, it brings others with us – others who are on mission with us, and others who are interested in what Christians think, and how they think, and how they make decisions.

Tone is important – speaking lovingly is important – but it’s not loving to pull a punch. It’s not loving to not express the seriousness of an issue in order to avoid the appearance of disunity. It’s like my old soccer coach used to tell me – if you’re in training and you go into a tackle with a team mate half heartedly – you’re both more likely to be injured. You put things in the wrong spot. Everything is askew. To continue the analogy – If all you do is train without tackling, the first time you’re properly tackled by an opponent will break you. But if you’re on the same team, you’ll pick the guy up after you smash him, and you won’t hold a grudge or be out to get him in a different context. Because hitting each other is part of the process of being on a team – and it doesn’t mean you don’t think you’re on the same team, and it certainly doesn’t mean you don’t like the person… if the principle is so easy to see in the context of team sport, why is it so difficult in the rest of life? Why are we so sensitive that at the first inkling that somebody might think someone else is wrong about something? Why do we assume that the only way to interpret any disagreement that is articulated is to assume the people who disagree don’t like each other?

It is, quite frankly, bizarre. And unhelpful. And, for Christians, profoundly out of kilter with what we know of how Christian community should work. As Christians our unity is in Christ.

Lets assume. For the moment. That the Bible is a public document – that it was written to be read as something other than private correspondence. Now read

The objection – that Paul rules out lawsuits amongst believers (1 Cor 6) – therefore any public disagreement is wrong – is an attempt to extrapolate a general principle from a specific example. I’d suggest this general principle is fatally flawed – and ruled out by 1 Corinthians itself. It runs counter to the fact that Paul is writing a public document that criticises the Corinthian Church on several fronts, and when he gets to the disagreement that’s happening in the church about food and being involved in temple life – he not only publicly takes a position (he takes the position that idols are nothing, all food is from God (1 Cor 8, 10), and they shouldn’t take part in emperor worship (1 Cor 10)), in what was obviously a public debate (the gatherings weren’t private, if they were, the Christians could have been charged as being a seditious and illegal association, he writes a letter to be read in the gatherings)… he also lays down the proper principles for disagreement – to make sure that unity in Christ triumphs over individual freedoms in those passages – he says do what is loving and doesn’t destroy people’s weak faith. He obviously doesn’t think discussing the disagreement, or suggesting a solution, is a threat to people’s faith – or that it should be.

He also names people who are doing the wrong thing, and spells out past disputes (Philippians 4:2, Galatians 2:11-14) where necessary.

Disagreement isn’t wrong. Public disagreement isn’t wrong. I’ve tried to make this case in many more words here…

Where those who have genuine concerns about debate have a point is on the question of manner – I don’t think the substance of a debate is the problem, provided both sides are representing one another clearly, and avoiding fallacies, is the problem if people are genuinely seeking the same goal, and operating from the same starting point. Wrong thinking should be sorted out pretty quickly by right thinking, all else being equal – this is the basis of our court systems, our democracies, and televised debates – unless there’s an unhelpful power disparity (which, incidentally there was when it came to law suits in Corinth), good and right answers should usually be reached, or at least. Adopting an unhelpful posture or manner is a rhetorical short cut, and it works. The reason strawmans, ad hominems, well poisoning – all those fallacies when you attack the person you’re debating, rather than the issue – the reason these keep being trotted out in arguments is because they are effective.

Tone matters. Paul makes this pretty clear in 2 Timothy 2.

“24 And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. 25 Opponents must be gently instructed, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, 26 and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will.”

Tone is a two way street. Or rather, charity is a two way street. One of the things that has struck me most about some of the criticism I’ve copped, public (in comments), or private (in rebukes sent to me personally) in response to what I thought was a fairly gentle and genuine post about Guy Sebastian was that the expectation that I should be nicer (based on assuming that I wrote sarcastically, which I didn’t), and that, in the case of the comments, this point was made in a fairly nasty way. It seems people will tell you in whatever way they see fit that you need to speak nicer.

It also seems that people don’t really like to read things charitably – several people jumped to the conclusion that I was sarcastically calling Guy Sebastian out, or picking a fight with him, over his decision to publicly describe where he’s at with God. That couldn’t really be further from the truth. It required a deliberately uncharitable reading of what I wrote, with little regard to interpretive tools like genre, context, tone, and intent – and with almost no interest in what I’m increasingly thinking is the essential interpretive tool – no regard to the ethos, or character, of the person producing the text. You can’t, I don’t think, assume sarcasm under every word on the internet. Sarcasm is usually indicated by context. I don’t think you can call somebody out on what they’ve written without first asking if they meant what they’ve written a particular way. I hope that when I read something I disagree with the interpretive mindset I bring to the table is “what is this person actually trying to say, what are the thoughts behind it, and what is the reading that puts their words in the best possible light?” I fail at this sometime. But it’s my goal. It’s a good rule of thumb for avoiding stupid quarrels on the Internet.

This isn’t the first time people have deliberately chosen to be offended – not necessarily at what I’ve said, but because I’ve said something that might cause division, or cause people to think that Christians aren’t united on every issue – there are several examples I could point to where I’ve written something that somebody doesn’t like, and rather than gently being corrected, I’ve been insulted, told I’m damaging the kingdom (in a relatively public setting), and then the clincher – unfriended on Facebook… Well. That was just one. Other people have just done the first two… sometimes publicly, sometimes privately. Pretty much based on some assumptions about what speaking graciously and lovingly is, and on what division is…

It’s all well and good to tell somebody to work on their tone – and I certainly need to be told that frequently, especially when I so often blog while I’m feeling passionate and engaged with some issue, rather than dispassionate and objective – but if you’re going to do that, it behooves you to make sure your tone isn’t just creating a prevailing sense of irony.

To conclude this rambling rant – I think a quote often misattributed to Augustine is a nice principle for writing, reading, and commenting on things as part of the process of conversation on the internet… and for thinking about how disagreement can happen without the idea that somebody is less than human or ‘the enemy’ simply if they happen to voice an opinion contrary to your own…

“In necessary things: unity, in uncertain things: liberty, in everything: charity.”

I no doubt need to work harder at this – but when I’m talking about other Christians, including the ACL, I assume they are Christians – and explicitly say that whenever it might appear that I’m bringing this into question – just Christians who are wrong. I assume they’re free to be wrong, but that I’m equally free to disagree – rather than unite with them, and I hope (though I often fail) to speak about people I disagree with, and read and interpret what they’ve said, with charity.

We’re not called to be united on every issue – we’re called to be united in Christ. This aspirational “unity on essentials, unity on uncertainty, unity on all things” mantra is unhelpful. We have our unity – most necessarily – in Christ. There are other necessary things, but without this foundation, they’re trivial. Unless somebody is questioning that unity or undermining its necessity some freedom to charitably disagree without one’s contribution to the work of the kingdom being called into question would be lovely.

That is all.

October 15, 2012

Blog mythbusting: is less more?

Someone gave me some advice about my blog yesterday – its advice you hear so often that its simply assumed to be true – I was told that I’d probably get more readers if I wrote shorter posts. Now, I think this person is an occasional reader, rather than regular reader, so I suspect his view on my typical content strategy is slightly skewed by the posts he’s read, and we’ll get to how that is relevant in a moment…

I’ve given this advice myself before. It seems sound. People digest information in relatively small chunks, and scan the internet relatively quickly. There are some stats that support this from my all time visit figures…

The average visit length here is just under 90 seconds. 78% of visitors “bounce” – they land on the page they come to, and click no further.

I wonder if this “myth” ultimately comes down to metrics – I think there’s probably something to it if you’re after comments and discussion – if you leave some things unsaid, people feel the need to say them for you – and that’s certainly been true of the discussions I’ve entered elsewhere. So engagement might be higher on short posts…

But if you’re interested in people reading what you have to say, and sharing it, then in my experience – it’s the longer posts where I’m attempting to provide something of value, or articulating something I think – usually on a timely issue – that traffic and sharing go through the roof…

Here’s my all time visitation in a graph… we’ll drill down in a sec…

Screen Shot 2012-10-13 at 12.22.26 PM

There are a couple of noticeable spikes there, one, around the 29th of September 2009, was a real outlier – I was Pharyngulated – visited by some of the internet’s angriest atheists after I wrote this post. That was a list. It got more traffic, and more comments than anything else I’ve written – except, now, for my guide to making Sizzler’s cheese toast. These two posts, together, account for a significant chunk of my all time traffic, 5% and 4.7%, respectively. Other popular posts have been tied to getting near the top of Google’s search rankings for planking, a fake Martin Luther King quote, a Thom Yorke shirt, Ehud, Things to do in Townsville, and Instagram web profiles.

Interestingly, thanks to the comments, the atheist post became a long form post – and people spend, on average, 5 minutes trawling through the comments. In fact, there’s an interesting trend in my top 30 posts, where people spend 3 minutes or longer on site, on average.

What gets more interesting is if we just look at 2012, so far…

Screen Shot 2012-10-13 at 12.35.12 PM

Something interesting happens around the 29th of February, the 22nd of March, the 11th of April, the 18th of April, the 16th of May, the 7th of June, the 8th of August, the 19th of August, the 1st, 5th, and 11th, and 27th of September and the 12th of October – those are the sustained 2-3 day spikes you see in the graph.

But why? Did I post a particularly funny youtube video? Share a pithy observation? A series of observations in the form of a controversial list? A fantastically popular “how to” guide?

No.

On the 29th of February I posted a couple of things – one, a video of two jumping Eric Cantona lookalikes who couldn’t sing or keep time, two, a lengthy piece on abortion and a controversial ethics paper that advocated after birth abortions – the first was shared five times on Facebook, which is significantly better than the average number of shares, the second, was shared 54 times on Facebook.

The first was 21 words long, the second, a staggering 2,881 words long.

What about the other days?

It seems from this data that there’s a fairly direct correlation (and, based on a more in depth look at my analytics – direct causation), between long posts offering some sort of substantial content, and increased sharing and traffic. Which are, I think, the best metric for my blog. Here’s the top 15 posts, by visits, from this year – this doesn’t include page views of the home page, it’s people who’ve clicked through to particular posts…

Screen Shot 2012-10-13 at 7.03.10 PM

I don’t really go out of my way to cultivate comments or foster discussion (though I enjoy it), I’m more interested in contributing to a conversation with a more “finished” product.

By this metric, longer is better.

This isn’t true for all cases – I don’t think every long post I’ve written has been worth reading, but I think most of the stuff I’ve written that has been worth reading has been in long form. Some posts have been worth writing, and are now in the resources tabs in the menu above, though they weren’t particularly widely shared at the time… I don’t think this post is as substantial as some of the posts it links to… but the conventional wisdom doesn’t really stand up to scrutiny.

Looking at the posts that have been shared widely there’s also a bit of a common theme – which is certainly something for me to think about as a content strategy… they’re generally substantial posts about a public Christianity/PR/ethics kind of issue.

I’ve got a plugin currently crunching some numbers to tell me what the average word count of my posts is, but I’d suggest it’s somewhere around the 100-200 word mark. I’ll update this paragraph when the count finishes. If it does. – turns out, at this point, I’ve published 1.52 million words in 5,639 posts for an average of 270 words per post…

The number one rule, I’d say, is to produce content that people want to read, word limits are arbitrary. Some of the posts above were, in my opinion, longer than they needed to be, but hitting the right content, at the right time, while saying the right thing, will always trump saying something in half the words but four days too late.

I’d say the myth is busted, but there’s also a good reason I don’t only post long posts, or only post about the same thing – I’d get bored, as would the readers who’ve been here for the long term, and I do think there’s something to be said about sustaining the discipline of blogging regularly – there’s a reason I’m still going after almost six years, while most of the blogs in my blog roll (except for a few, like Simone’s, Ben’s, Anna’s, Findo’s, Andrew’s, and Arthur and Tamie’s have been either sporadic, or died).

October 13, 2012

An Open Letter to Guy Sebastian about Jesus

Dear Guy,

I like you. Despite myself. I even kind of like your music. I can’t really admit that in public though, but you’ve essentially forced my hand here. Generally, I don’t really like the reality TV music career pathway, but you’ve proven yourself, your music has grown, and you’ve grown on me. I probably said or thought unkind things about your success in the past – and though you’ve never met me, I’m sorry about that…

I’m also sorry to hear that you’re “reconsidering your religion” as this article puts it – that’s a shame. But it’s not like people didn’t see it coming for a while – so it shows real integrity for you to acknowledge your struggles publicly. Thanks for doing that. It must be tough to disappoint the people who have invested lots in you on the basis of your “Christian” brand, but your honesty is refreshing.

Plenty of people will try to point out that not only would you be nothing without the God who gave you the musical talent that you rely on, but that you’d be nothing without the votes you won from Christians who like to vote for Team God, given the opportunity. I’m not going to go there – though I think God gave you your voice, he gives everybody life, breath, and being – and I think, all issues with the reality TV process aside, you’ve earned your musical career. So well done. You used to think this too. Remember when you told the ABC:

“I remember when I was young and um, and at Solid Rock and um, it was when I, I think I’d been to a few meetings already and slowly getting the point, slowly getting to this point where um, where kind of God sort of almost kicked me in the butt and said, you know, this is, this is what I’ve got for you and this is the future I have for you and you can take it or leave it.”

I’m sad to hear you’ve moved away from the spot you occupied during Idol, and the post Idol touring – you were so open about what your faith meant to you, and I always appreciated that. It has to be tough sticking with Jesus when fame, fortune, and opportunity comes knocking – especially in an industry where being a faithful ambassador for Christ, as Paul calls Christians, probably comes not just at a cost in terms of the things you have to say no to, but in the opportunities you might have to turn down, and the career sacrifices you might have to make – not to mention the pressure of consistently needing to turn the glory for your hard earned success back to God… The whole premise of “Idol” makes that difficult. But you were so humble, for so long, and I was really encouraged by that.

I’m sad to hear that you feel like you were lied to. It sucks when people lie to you, or manipulate you, especially when they do it while claiming to speak for God. The God card is no fun. I’m sorry if that happened, if you feel like your popular Christian personality was built on a lie.

You said:

“My views are more based on life and discovery and research than just what I’m told,”

“Because what I was told in regards to so many things was so wrong. I’ve gone from a place where I was told there was one way and only one way, to being more in a place where I don’t think anyone has the right to say what they believe is more important or more significant.”

I found that a pretty interesting take on things. For a couple of reasons… I also wonder why you’ve misrepresented people who oppose gay marriage like you have (you said: “I don’t think anyone has the right to tell someone who they can and can’t be in love with”), typically people who oppose gay marriage are saying something a little more sophisticated than that – they’re saying that being in love with someone isn’t actually the basis for deciding who can marry who… but lets get back to the lies you were told.

I’m really glad you’re interested in a journey of discovery based on research, especially when you say you still believe in God – that’s really the best kind of life – Augustine called it “faith seeking understanding” – I’d really encourage you to make sure you look at who Jesus was, and what he said, and whether the gospels are reliable – read the guys who don’t think that’s true, like Bart Ehrman, and then read the rebuttals… weigh up the evidence. Make a decision. The truth of Christianity hangs on whether Jesus was who he says he was, and did what people said he did – especially the resurrection. If you’re not going to buy that, then eat, drink, and be merry – because not only is Christianity not the way to God, there’s probably no way to God.

The person you’re really questioning when you were told there’s only one way to God is Jesus (well, you could question John’s account of what Jesus said too, but hopefully you’ve done that in your research above)… he says, in John 14:6:

“Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

That’s a big claim. An arrogant claim. But it’s the claim Jesus makes about himself, not one that people thousands of years later have made up to make some extra dollars out of their church by twisting arms out of joints, or manipulating people with any sort of intolerance building fear mongering.

Jesus claims Christianity is the only way. I think you’re right that we mere mortals can’t claim that. We don’t have that sort of authority – we should probably approach any truth claims with a degree of humility and uncertainty, especially those based on a faith that other people don’t share (that’s probably got some bearing on the gay marriage debate)… if anybody has a right to say that sort of thing though – to make an exclusive claim – it’s the guy who claims to be the son of God. A couple of verses before that quote, Jesus calls God “my father,” and in the next verse he says if people have seen him, they’ve seen God – it’s that sort of position that means, if you take his claims seriously, we have to speak about him as being the exclusive way to God.

You know all this – you’ve believed in God for a long time, you’ve been part of a church for a long time, you’ve called yourself a Christian for a long time (I’m partly writing for other people here – who are wanting to figure out what Christianity means in the context of your statements). I hope you can separate the need for Christians to be tolerant of other beliefs, and the people who hold them, while politely and graciously disagreeing, from the idea that all beliefs are equally valid. Because they can’t be – some contradict each other. It’s a shame that disagreeing with somebody is so often construed as not loving the person these days, don’t you think?

It seems you’ve struggled with the relationship between individual views, and Christianity’s exclusive claims for a while. I read some things you said when you were a Christian, stuff like:

“I think at teenagers at Paradise, they get a real sort of fresh way of looking at God, there’s so many different views on what God should be or what He is and I think it’s a real personal thing, so, so people come to a youth group and they sort of find this freedom and find this um, almost like a, “Ah, man, this is not what I thought it would be like,” and they meet some great people and, and have some great worship and stuff like that and so, yeah.”

That sounds a lot like what you’ve said today.

But then I found this video. Where you said:

“I can search for the rest of my life, but I know I’ve found, in Christ, everything that matters to me. And he is the reason why I do everything I do. He has saved me from a time when I called out his name, and he came and he gave me purpose and he gave me direction. And you know because he lives, and because I know that… we celebrate today that he rose from the dead. And out of that grave he didn’t only become a man, but became a man that took all my sins, took all my worries, and I know I can face any day, no matter what comes, because he lives.”

That’s such a clear articulation of the gospel… you even sound certain there – based on your experience of God’s faithfulness to you when you called out to him. It’s sad that you’ve lost that. It’s sad for the rest of us – we haven’t just potentially lost a brother, but a guy who was prepared to publicly champion Jesus, and what being a follower of Jesus involves…

I just want you know that I prayed for you tonight. That God would give you wisdom as you seek truth, and that you’d find truth at the heart of Christianity – in Jesus – rather than in what other people have told you is necessary. I’m sure others are too. But again, thanks for your honesty – if people were more open about what they believed, and more prepared to have conversations about faith, conversation in our country would be richer for it.

In him,

Nathan

October 11, 2012

My favourite cafe turns 2… congratulations Dandelion & Driftwood

This is a beautiful thing.

Dandelion & Driftwood from Liquid Light Film Works on Vimeo.

One of the things I miss most about the north side of Brisbane is our weekly staff meetings at Dandelion & Driftwood.

I know I have a coffee blog for these posts these days – but this place transcends that… plus, from a social media side of things – the way these guys use Facebook is well worth keeping an eye on…

October 10, 2012

Insane bike man does insane bike things

Pretty cool advert for WD40…

Via Kottke

October 10, 2012

Famously good last words from Peter Jensen

Peter Jensen is leaving some pretty big shoes to fill in the Sydney diocese. His final speech to synod as Archbishop is a cracker – it’s a model of engaging with the problems of our world, and presenting Jesus as the solution.

“If the gospel contrasts so favourably with individualism in community, family and death, why is evangelism hard? Precisely because it is a spiritual matter and human individualism is the love of self which it takes the Holy Spirit to make us abandon. Our society is even more in the grip of a malign individualism than ever before and its resistance to all relationships and especially an all demanding relationship with God is powerful indeed. But there us another side to this. I think that many people are tiring of the fruit of individualism and want to know the God who brings order and family and acceptance and relationship into the community.”

“I have never had such good opportunities in speaking to people about Jesus as in the last few three or four years. Our theory of Connect 09 is true – there are people everywhere who would like to know the gospel and will want us to befriend them. In particular lay people are ideally placed to quietly but confidently share Christ and show what a difference he makes. It may be that the evils of individualism will become so apparent that the world will be more open to the gospel, especially a gospel which stresses love in the face of community and family breakdown and hope in the face of death. In the meantime we preach a gospel which offers a radically different view of the world. After all this Lord did seize another communications revolution and turn it to good. He did hear Tyndale’s last Prayer and he did open the King of England’s eyes and so we have our English Bible and so here we are tonight.”

I think this bit is especially nice.

“I see the gospel becoming visible in the media. We will engage with the ideas of this generation and refuse to accept the censorship which is so easily imposed on Christianity. We must find ways of putting our case for Christ and making it natural to speak about God in the general community. The large mail I received after the recent QandA program showed me that once the gospel is visible, Christians in the workplace can and will make use of opportunities.”

I still have some questions about why Sydney needs as many incredibly trained people for its mission, if it is the place where 1/5 of all Australians live, it’d be nice to see some sort of proportional approach to the distribution of reformed evangelical workers in Australia where the other 4/5 live (let alone globally) – but I realise that this isn’t how denominations, particularly Anglicanism, work.

Here are two pertinent comments:

“We have proliferated workers. Many denominations are declining in workers, with people becoming part time and being older. For us the reverse is happening. The biggest expansion of workers has been amongst the ordained clergy where the numbers have advanced by an astonishing increase of 26% from 480 to 604. Our workers are better trained and higher quality in gifts than ever before. Most parishes are now using teams of workers, including a very significant number of women.”

“Furthermore we have started to move forward in creating new parishes. For years we have been gently stagnating at around 260 parishes, quietly amalgamating the dying ones, leaving suburbs unpastored and letting buildings go. We have now begun to go forward, refusing to close parishes or amalgamate them without the hope of re-opening them in the future, finding new congregations and uses for buildings and doing what we had forgotten to do – inaugurate new parishes. This changed mind-set must be permanent.”

I’d say there’s an inefficiency at play here, and it might be based on the “small church in every suburb” mentality that appears to underpin some of the visions of the future, I’m not sure that this model of thinking about and doing church (ecclesiology) is necessarily the best fit for how modern Australians will meet Jesus (missiology), which the Archbishop suggests is his goal. I’m sympathetic for the need for small churches for the people who want small churches, but there’s a reason that corner stores are making way for big shopping centres. There’s something to be said for an “incarnational” approach to church – where being part of a suburb is how we minister to it, but I don’t think it follows that if a suburb doesn’t have a building with open doors operating in it that the church isn’t part of the suburb – especially if you’ve also got an incredibly able laity (which the Archbishop notes in his piece). This seems to deny most of the realities of life in modern Australia – we work, rest, play, and live in very different locations every day of the week.

I’m not sure that if every Christian in Australia adopted a completely fluid commitment to their time, resources, and approach to Christian community, in the interest of the gospel, that the current lay of the land would be what we’d produce – in terms of how we think about what we do on a Sunday, who does what, and where it’s done. I’m certain there are essential aspects of our ecclesiology that don’t make way for “contextualisation” – like clear articulations of the gospel in everything that we do, and some space for the sacraments, but I’m not sure that reproducing more of the same is the best response to the changing Australian landscape. But I’m open to being convinced otherwise.

In the last 15 years I’ve been part of a small and very faithful suburban church, a small and faithful rural church, a medium sized church in a regional centre, and two bigger and equally faithful churches seeking to reach bigger pockets of a city – and while God works through his gospel amongst all this faithfulness, and we should prayerfully expect him to, the economies of scale in the bigger churches create opportunities that were less than a dream in those smaller ones.

I’m very thankful for the Archbishop’s faithful and gospel centred approach to his work in the last ten years, he’s going to be incredibly hard to replace – his performance on Q&A recently is fairly typical of the way he’s discharged his responsibilities with the great gifts God has given, and he’s certainly (along with a couple of others) the model I look to, and point to, when it comes to engaging our culture with the gospel… but as an outsider looking in (albeit with incredible vestigial, substantial, and direct and indirect ties to the work of the diocese in the past, and the Jensens and others in particular) – I’d love to see the Sydney Diocese think a little bigger, and a little differently about the work of the gospel in Australia.

October 9, 2012

World conquering ducks: A potential reason not to home school

This must surely be a joke. I’m assuming it is. The alternative is just too bizarre to fathom. There are much better arguments against gay marriage than this… This is from, allegedly, a 14 year old New Zealander.

 

Via the Twitters, @Leigh_howard

October 5, 2012

Off to camp

I’m speaking at a camp this weekend. I’ve never spoken at a camp before – I’ve never even written a series of talks before, my sermons have been one offs in other people’s series, or stand alone deals. So it’s been fun.

I’m preaching on 1 Corinthians. All of it. In three talks. I’ve also never written talks this long before – they asked for 40 minute sessions, I reckon they’ll get two 30-35 minute talks, and one 25-30 minute talk. Who doesn’t want extra free time on a camp?

It’s for a couple of Brisbane based Chinese churches, for their youth and young adults. I’m summing up the book as Paul’s guide to cross-shaped living, and the talks were billed as “Cross-shaped Succes”…

Anyway. Here are some of my slides – no idea if these are getting recorded, and the hours that went into my three keynote presentations will be wasted if I don’t share…

These ones have cool stories attached…

Meghan Vogel picked up the girl who was in the spot ahead of her in their 3,200 metre race, when she fell over 20m from the finish line, carried her to the line, and put her across the line first (though they were the last two to finish – Meghan had won the 1,600 metres race the day before). She did it because she puts Christ first (her words).

Sacrificing Success

This is “Team Hoyt” – Rick Hoyt, Dick Hoyt’s son, told his dad he wanted to run a marathon – they’ve now completed 1,000 long distance races since 1977.

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These ones have puns.

Getting a head in the Christian life

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October 5, 2012

Mind. Blown. Chips in a salt/pepper grinder

This is brilliant.

Via @Buzzfeed

There must be other foods this works for…

October 3, 2012

How to be less bad at instagram

There’s a bit of a rebuke in here for me… and my countless photos of Soph and coffee – but in my defence I use the coffee ones for my blog, and the Soph ones for the sake of having cool filtered photos of her on my computer. Maybe I should have an account just dedicated to those purposes…

There’s a bit of a swear word here. So block your ears if that offends.

Do you instagram? How do you instagram?

October 3, 2012

Grantland explains Muse’s The 2nd Law

Muse has a new album out. It’s better than I expected given the dub step promo, and a couple of songs at the end of the album where Bass player Chris becomes front man show that Matt Bellamy is the reason that Muse isn’t Nickelback… The middle half is the best.

Muse can be accused of taking themselves too seriously, or parodying those who take themselves too seriously – one can’t really tell, except that they do some pretty funny stuff like this position switch when told they have to lip sync for live TV:

Anyway. Grantland essentially over thinks the new Muse album in a beautiful way with the ambitiously titled: The Meaning of Muse: How a bloated, bombastic rock band explains our fractured futures.

What other pieces of musical criticism open with a paragraph like this:

We all know that the media has been decentralized in the past three decades and the audience has been carved up among countless, niche-oriented platforms. From a consumer perspective, this is mostly a big improvement. If it were still the bad old days, you wouldn’t be checking this website for pop culture coverage, because it wouldn’t exist. Instead, you’d be stuck with the lifestyle section of your local newspaper and forcing yourself to be interested in a story about Halloween decorating tips. The future is now, and it’s much more readable.

Which leads, a little later to this:

Looking ahead, it’s generally assumed that culture will continue to break down into an infinite series of hyper-specific subsets with finely detailed points of demarcation between micro-genres. But I wonder if we’re actually headed in the opposite direction, where genres will become so jumbled in our heads that they will cease to have meaning as distinctively different properties. Maybe all forms of pop music in the future will basically sound like the same nonsensical mess operating on its own sense of bizarre yet unerring inner logic; the only differences will be the headgear and footwear of the performers.

And then the Muse=Radiohead meme gets pulled out, and pantsed…

“Muse is a British trio that has been putting out records since the late ’90s and can be credibly called one of the world’s most popular rock bands. Critics frequently compare Muse to Radiohead and Queen, because front man Matthew Bellamy sings a lot like Thom Yorke, and the band affects a mock-orchestral grandiosity that borders on camp. But for the most part these comparisons are reductive; lazy writers decided these were Muse’s most appropriate reference points in 2003 and haven’t paid close enough attention since then to update them.”

And…

“Bellamy has describedThe 2nd Law as a “Christian gangsta-rap jazz odyssey, with some ambient rebellious dubstep and face-melting metal flamenco cowboy psychedelia.” Actually, it’s a lot more convoluted than that. “Panic Station” is like an outtake from an unreleased Rush album from 1986 produced by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, except really odd. The torch-y balladry of “Explorers” imagines a scenario in which Celine Dion performs Jeff Buckley’s Grace in its entirety while riding a flaming seahorse through downtown Las Vegas. The very pretty “Save Me,” one of two songs sung by bassist Christopher Wolstenholme, dials it back a bit, crossbreeding Led Zeppelin’s “The Rain Song” with the opening track from Jimmy Eat World’s Clarity.

This probably sounds awful, and some of The 2nd Law is exactly that. I consider myself a Muse fan, but I’d never argue this band gets it right most of the time. I find that the idea of Muse is often more enjoyable than Muse’s music.”

This isn’t all of it. Read the article. Grantland’s Steven Hyden pretty much sums up exactly how I feel about every Muse album since Absolution.

One-third of Muse songs are unlistenable, another third are merely ridiculous, and the final third are stupidly exhilarating.

Have you listened to The 2nd Law? What did you think?

October 3, 2012

The Presbyterian Church of Queensland on gay marriage

For the last 18 months or so my friend and co-worker Dave Bailey and I have been on the ethics and communications committee for the Presbyterian Church of Queensland. This committee is now called the Gospel in Society Today committee. Because everybody likes an acronym if you get my gist…

Our committee recently drafted this letter to Julia Gillard, CCd to Tony Abbott, on the issue of Gay Marriage. I think it’s fantastic. For obvious reasons. I wasn’t sure if I could post this – but Dave has on his blog – so it must be ok…


 

The thinking and wording in this letter reflects a changing emphasis that will go into a redrafted position paper on homosexuality and gay marriage at some stage in the near future.

I think one of the slight weaknesses of this letter is that it is potentially legislatively short sighted. I’ve said before here, and elsewhere, that we might need to shift the goal posts a little, by explicitly, rather than implicitly, arguing for our right to continue “discriminating” within the boundaries of the church when it comes to how we choose to define marriage, and the marriages we choose to celebrate, or officiate over.

What do you think?

October 3, 2012

Beam me up… how many lasers would it take to take down the moon

XKCD‘s Randall Munroe is, I reckon, the smartest guy on the Internet. Hands down. His What If Blog continues apace, and continues to blow my mind with its diversity.

If you want your mind blown – check out this comic called “Drag” from a couple of weeks ago.

Today he’s hypothetically putting a laser dot on the moon – turns out it’s pretty difficult, and doing it properly will have some deadly results…

Make sure you find out what led to this point…

Ok, let’s mount a megawatt laser on every square meter of the surface of Asia. Powering this array of 50 trillion lasers would use up Earth’s oil reserves in approximately two minutes, but for those two minutes, the Moon would look like this:

a field of megawatt lasers covering asia fires at the moon

The Moon shines as brightly as the midmorning sun, and by the end of the two minutes, the lunar regolith is heated to a glow.

a man in a hat suggests trying more power.

Ok, let’s step even more firmly outside the realm of plausibility.

The most powerful laser on Earth is the confinement beam at the National Ignition Facility, a fusion research laboratory. It’s an ultraviolet laser with an output of 500 terawatts. However, it only fires in single pulses lasting a few nanoseconds, so the total energy delivered is about equivalent to a quarter-cup of gasoline.

Let’s imagine we somehow found a way to power and fire it continuously, gave one to everyone, and pointed them all at the Moon. Unfortunately, the laser energy flow would turn the atmosphere to plasma, instantly igniting the Earth’s surface and killing us all.

Also, check out what happens if the population of the world rocks up at Rhode Island and all jump at the same time.

Also, just for fun… there’s a really small paragraph of text on the XKCD home page that reads:

We did not invent the algorithm. The algorithm consistently finds Jesus. The algorithm killed Jeeves.
The algorithm is banned in China. The algorithm is from Jersey. The algorithm constantly finds Jesus.
This is not the algorithm. This is close.

Here’s the fun answer about why it’s there.

October 2, 2012

10 propositions on the relationship between church, mission, and worship

This semester at college, in the wisdom of our curriculum setters, I’m doing some nicely overlapping thinking across three of my subjects – Church Ministry and Sacraments, Christian Worship, and The Modern Evangelical Movement . This is my attempt to integrate some of that thinking and give you some of the fruit of the grunt work I’ve put in on a couple of essays. I’ll post those essays at Venn Theology at the end of semester if you’d like to read more…

1. It starts with God – God is a relational God – both internally, within the Trinity, and externally – on his own mission – the Missio Dei (Mission of God in Latin). This mission is to gather a people to himself, who will glorify him for eternity – and he conducts this mission by sending Jesus and the Holy Spirit into the world.

2. The Church is on a mission from God – The church is the gathered people of God. We are instruments of God’s mission. United with Christ, equipped by the Spirit to take part in the gathering of God’s people. The church is a divine pyramid scheme – it exists to grow itself. Our union with Christ has an “incarnational” pay off, where when we act together as the Body of Christ we are being like Christ to the world around us. Mission is one of our primary tasks as a church, some have suggested mission is our human focused task, while worship is our god focused task,

3. This mission involves the proclamation of the Gospel in word, deed, and “being” by a priesthood of all believers– perhaps, after reading John Dickson’s Promoting the Gospel this week, “the promotion of the Gospel” is a better category. But we’re all on mission together. This mission will necessarily involve words, but it will also involve demonstrations of the truth of the gospel through how we relate to one another and the world around us as the people of God.

The church’s participation in mission to the world began in earnest with the calling of Paul (Acts 9:15), who defines his mission, which he invites his churches to partake in, as preaching Christ to those who have not heard (Romans 10:14-16, 15:17-21), as Christ’s ambassadors (2 Corinthians 5:20, Colossians 4:2-6), to bring them to faith (Romans 10:17, 16:25-26, 1 Corinthians 9:19-23), and present them mature in Christ (Colossians 1:25-29).

The church is called to be different (Col 3:1-17, Romans 12:2, 2 Corinthians 3:18), and its conduct and ‘being’ is a fundamental part of its mission (John 13:35, 17:14-18, 20-23, 1 Peter 2:12, Matthew 5:14-16, Romans 12).

Some see social transformation as the content of evangelism, emphasising the incarnation and conflating “setting the oppressed free” with “proclaiming good news” (cf Luke 4:18-19) – but the preaching of the good news is what truly frees the oppressed.

4. While how we do and think of church (ecclesiology) and how we do and think of mission (missiology) are very closely related – they must be distinct – we can’t collapse them into each other. Many modern “missiologists” see the church exclusively as a tool for mission, so the social context of the church shapes church. If the church is incarnational, and is an entity equipped by God to do certain things (teach the gospel, administer the sacraments, “worship”) – then there are certain things that are non-negotiable even if they’re culturally weird. This is particularly true because part of how we define the church is by looking to the New Creation – where there is no mission to expand the church because the people are already gathered.

5. The Reformers worked with a “mother” analogy for the church. This is helpful. Though mission wasn’t a big deal during Christendom, and was more the role of governments who were understood as God’s tool for expanding the Christian state, the idea that the church is simultaneously responsible for “begetting” the faith of believers and nurturing believers is helpful – especially in the light of discussions and debates about who Sunday gatherings are for – where a dichotomy between serving believers and serving seekers has been unhelpfully pushed in recent times.

6. Mission is worship. If worship is magnifying the work of God as we praise, glorify and serve him, and involves the sacrificial giving of ourselves and our gifts for others (which I think is the definition of worship) – then mission is a form of that. Perhaps the ultimate form of that in our time and space – though this changes in the New Creation.  Participation in the mission of the church, as a subset of the mission of God, can be understood as an extension of the God glorifying purpose of each individual believer for which he has given us gifts that we are to use to build the body.

7. Worship is God focused, but involves being “poured out” in the service of others – Paul frames glorifying God, worship, and service, as using one’s gifts to serve others (Romans 12:1-12, 15:14-17, 2 Thessalonians 3:1-5), and sees preaching the gospel as his service and priestly duty (Acts 20:19-27, Romans 1:1, 15:16, Ephesians 3:17, 1 Corinthians 9:15-18, Colossians 1:23-29, Titus 1:1).

God gathers his people to pour them out as gifts for others (Romans 12:1, Ephesians 4:1-16 (Especially if, following Carson, the church is understood as the “host of captives” cf the Levites (Numbers 8, 18)), Philippians 2:17, 2 Timothy 4:6).

Spiritual gifts are used in the service of others, to produce maturity (Ephesians 4:8-16, Colossians 3:12-17, Romans 12:1-16, 1 Corinthians 12, 14), and to proclaim the excellence of God amongst the pagans (1 Peter 2:9-12).

The language used of the church in these passages is the language used to define worship.

8. Worship is mission. This does not necessarily follow point 6, but when point 7 is introduced the argument becomes a little easier to make – the way the church worships God functions as a testimony to others, and thus, alongside point 3, leads to the conclusion that our explicitly God focused worship of God is part of our mission. Because it is part of who we are as God’s people, and who we are as God’s people is part of our mission. This is not its only function – because it is part of what it means to truly be human (if the chief end of man is to Glorify God and enjoy him forever), and we will continue worshipping after every knee has bowed to Jesus, and in the throne room of God after judgment – where there are no non-Christians to gather. But in the here and now – our decision to not worship ourselves, or our idols, is part of our testimony to who God is – and is the only right response to the gospel of Jesus’ Lordship.

9. So, Corporate Worship – the stuff we do when we gather – is also mission.  The tasks of the church – preaching, the sacraments, and ‘worship’ (in the what we do at church sense of the word) – involves making a clear and appealing presentation of the gospel of Jesus. Clarity requires some form of contextualisation. Paul’s argument in 1 Corinthians 14 seems to base the unbeliever’s response to the gathering in their ability to perceive the truth of the gospel in the clarity of the gathering – corporate worship, the sacraments, and identity shaping orientation in the form of the Sunday service achieve this goal, and simultaneously the goal of worship and mission – when they involve the gathered people of God sacrificially serving one another with their gifts in a manner that clearly demonstrates and declares the truth of the gospel of the crucified saviour. Both aspects of the “mother” role of the church are accomplished in this manner.

10. Clarity on what the gospel is, what mission is, and what worship is, should nurture Christians and encourage them to worship with all of their lives, by being on mission with all of their lives. The Sunday gathering of the church should do this, thinking of the church as the permanent community of God’s people, on a permanent mission, rather than just God’s people when they gather, and missionaries when they’re outside the walls of the gathering is also helpful.

None of this seems all that controversial unless you spend a bunch of time reading stuff by people who disagree with points 3, 4, 9, and 10. Most Christians agree with 1 and 2, while 5, 6, 7 and 8 are matters that are settled by how one understands what the church is, what the gospel is, and what worship is… the methodology I used in coming to these conclusions was largely to start with a look at how the Bible develops the concept of what it means to be the people of God, and how this people is called to interact with God, with each other, and with the world around them.

I think this is a pretty useful way of thinking about life, and church – and even stuff like music – does anybody have any qualms with the logic?

 

October 2, 2012

What Alan Jones and Mitt Romney can teach us about Public Christianity

It’s hard to believe that two almost identical situations have occurred so close to each other on the conservative side of politics. Alan Jones can’t have been ignorant of what happened to Mitt Romney when some graceless comments he made at function for party faithful found their way into the media. Which makes Jones’ simply awful comments about John Gillard even less excusable. If that’s even possible…


Image Credit: The Australian

Jones has apologised today, calling the remarks a “black parody” – and that’s the problem with “parody” – it’s almost impossible to tell the difference between “black parody” and the twisted things a shock jock thinks and chooses to express. Romney’s put down of almost half the people he’s hoping will vote for him will probably cost him any chance he had at the presidency.

But there are a couple of lessons here for anybody who speaks into a microphone, or in public, or even in semi-private, or private… first – there’s no such thing as off the record. Ubiquitous recording makes it likely that anything stupid you say in front of people will see the light of day. It’s not enough to not put dumb and damaging things in writing – you can’t even speak them if you don’t want people hearing them.

There is no private. No closed room. No off the record. And people will be quick to throw light on misdeeds. Even when you think you’re only talking to the in crowd.

The rule for company spokespeople used to be never say anything you don’t want people to hear in front of a mic or camera even if you think it’s off… the better principle is probably “never say anything you haven’t thought about that you don’t want being heard by everyone.”

It’s very easy to say that you were misquoted, taken out of context, speaking in parody – but at that point the damage is already done. It’s easy to make clumsy statements – to offensively compare people to the Nazis when they disagree with you, to make slippery slope arguments that disgust your opponents, or to draw unfortunate comparisons by linking different topics deliberately or otherwise… it pays to be careful with what you say, in any context. To “tame your tongue”  because it can be pretty dangerous – as Jones and Romney are learning the hard way, or as James puts it in his letter in the New Testament…

“5 Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. 6 The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.

7 All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, 8 but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.

James prefaces that statement with a particular warning for people who are going to teach others – which I think doesn’t just apply to what ministers of the gospel say from the pulpit, but what Christians say when they speak as Christians in public.

“Not many of you should become teachers, my fellow believers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. 2 We all stumble in many ways. Anyone who is never at fault in what they say is perfect, able to keep their whole body in check.”

This, on one level, is a pretty superficial solution – but it would’ve helped both Romney and Jones. A better solution goes to the heart of the matter. Verse 2 is also a great reminder that we’re all going to stuff up at some point – which is why it pays to apologise early, and often, and to be clear any time you speak that you’re speaking as a broken person only made clean by an external agent – Jesus.

The problem that Jones and Romney have exemplified, and the reason its so hard to swallow an apology after the fact – is that these guys haven’t been just pinged for wrong speaking, but for wrong thinking… the tongue, whether the brain is properly engaged or otherwise, reveals the heart. Or, as Jesus puts it in Matthew 15:

10 Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen and understand. 11 What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them….

17 “Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? 18 But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. 19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20 These are what defile a person.”

This works in both ways – both Jesus and James are keen for words to be matched by deeds, and hearts… it’s no good speaking good words from an unclean heart, as a later interaction with the Pharisees (who approached Jesus to question what his disciples do in Matthew 15)… from Matthew 23 demonstrates.

First, Jesus instructs the people about the Pharisees…

2 “The teachers of the law and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. 3 So you must be careful to do everything they tell you. But do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach. 4 They tie up heavy, cumbersome loads and put them on other people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them…

Then he turns to the Pharisees to proclaim a series of woes… here’s two of them…

25 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. 26 Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.

27 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean. 28 In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.”

A better solution than “don’t say dumb or harmful stuff where people can hear you” is “don’t think dumb and harmful stuff” – get your internals right, and the externals will follow.

Like James said – we’re always going to stuff up. It’s hard to tame the tongue. The real solution for people in ministry or doing public Christianity is to base everything on the work of Jesus, and God’s grace, in the light of our brokenness – so that we’re known for the gospel, and can point to our own stuff ups as evidence of the need for Jesus’ help, and his words as the basis of our words. If we’re known for that, rather than known for banging on about moral codes that we’ll all inevitably break without a generous act of God and the Spirit, it gives us something consistent to point to when we apologise.

An apology is more believable, and easier to accept, if what is being apologised for is not consistent with everything we’ve said before – and this is where Jones and Romney are going to struggle – Romney has a reputation for being out of touch with the lower class, his wealth, tax records, the aloof and out of touch things he says about life for the everyman, are going to make it hard for him to move past his 47% line, and Jones has a reputation for saying crass and shocking things to make a political point, especially when it comes to Julia Gillard.

This too is why it’s going to be harder and harder for Christians in Australia if we’re not known as people who love God, love our neighbours, and want to follow Jesus – but as people who want to protect “Christian values”… especially when we inevitably misspeak, or aren’t quick enough to distance ourselves from those who do… there’s tremendous pressure on Tony Abbott and the Liberal Party to distance themselves from Jones, just as there was last week with Bernardi’s unfortunate contribution to the gay marriage debate.


Image Credit: SMH

As James puts it…

9 With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. 10 Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be.

The aim is to use our tongue for the first, and avoid the second… while being wise (more from James):

13 Who is wise and understanding among you? Let them show it by their good life, by deedsdone in the humility that comes from wisdom. 14 But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. 15 Such “wisdom” does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. 16 For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.

17 But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere. 18 Peacemakers who sow in peace reap a harvest of righteousness.

Incidentally – if you didn’t read verse 14 after reading verse 6 – you might think there was a contradiction between what Jesus says about the heart being what “defiles” – because James says the tongue starts fires that “corrupts the whole body,” while Jesus says the tongue reflects what’s going on in the heart. It’s clear from this verse that James thinks the heart is the basis of the boasting of the tongue… his argument seems to be that an untamed tongue poisoning both for the speaker, and those who listen…

That is all.

September 30, 2012