andygoodliff

Leeds Day 2

Day 2 of my Leeds trip. Spent a lot of time reading, watching Star Wars and visiting Christian bookshops. It's good to not have immediate deadlines or things I got to do for tomorrow.

Just discovered this interview with Stanley Hauerwas where he comments on The Passion of the Christ:

That Protestant evangelicals would leave Gibson's movie and say "gee, I didn't know he had to suffer so much for my sins"—quite frankly, that's to make yourself more important than you are ... the problem with saying "I didn't know he had to suffer that much for my sins" is it fails to do justice to the Trinitarian character of the Christian faith. What is happening in the cross is a cosmic struggle.
What did you think of the film?
[It was] an extended exercise in showing how much punishment a human body could take. It didn't help us understand why that punishment was correlative with the kind of life Jesus led. It becomes a kind of sadism that it's not wise to be exposed to.
Can't evangelicals still make an argument that we should think of Jesus as our personal savior, and think of the gospel in terms of how it affects individual people?
I really don't like the word 'personal.' It makes it sound like I have a relationship with Jesus that is unmediated by the church. They have the idea that "I have a personal relationship with Jesus that I go to church to have expressed." But the heart of the gospel is that you don't know Jesus without the witness of the church. It's always mediated.

Leeds Day 1

I've escaped Stevenage for a few days and come up to Leeds to hang out with my brother Nick and his fiance Beth. Hannah stayed behind to write her dissertation. not long after I arrived we decided to hit Brimham Rocks, one of my favourite spots in the UK. We went in February last year and you can see some of the photos in 2004 album. I've uploaded some photos from this year's trip (see left). We try and get some great shots of us jumping between rocks, it's not as dangerous as it looks.

McWorship

This post is a bit inspired by Brodie's post called All about me worship? and reflections from Easter w/d here in stevenage and visiting Grace's 'out of nothing' and Headspace's 'Icons of Easter.'

Last year saw the cinema release of Super Size Me, a documentary about a man who ate only MacDonalds for 30 days.  The result as you might expect from a diet of big macs and fries was a big gain in weight and damage to his liver. What does this tell us? – a diet of only MacDonalds is bad for your health - ‘Just as the Big Mac and Fries are filling, they are also somewhat uniform and bland and on their own hardly a wholesome diet.’ (Ward, 1998).

It got me thinking, what is our worship diet like? Are we feeding ourselves a proper healthy diet? Has our hunger for God resulted in a fast-food worship time, where we just want to feel that spiritual experience to get us back on an even keel?  Stackhouse suggests that ‘worship takes on an authority of its own so that only in and through the experience of worship, and the way we perform in worship, can grace be appropriated … worship as spiritual formation is sidelined in favour of worship as effect’ (Stackhouse, The Gospel-Driven Church, 2004, 48).  Do we need to be reminded that ‘worship is “for” God, which is not the same thing as “meaningful for us”’? (Hauerwas, A Better Hope, 2000, citing Marva Dawn).  We want McWorship, which is all about us and perhaps unwittingly all for us.  McWorship is homogenous and unsurprising, you know exactly what you’re getting before you get there.  McWorship is undemanding, it doesn’t ask too much from us.  McWorship is easily consumable – due to its sameness - and keeps us spiritually filled, as long as we don’t leave it too long before we come again.  McWorship offers us simple uncomplicated and down-to-earth theology, which focuses on the disembodied “you” where ‘Jesus died for me’ and ‘it’s all about him.’  McWorship is neatly packaged with a McChristian language. McWorship looks good and tastes ‘nice’.  In and of itself, McWorship is a quick-fix and not something we have to totally avoid.  However, I wonder if a regular diet of McWorship will not leave us like a man who only eats Big Macs and Fries.  David Lyon warns that this kind of world ‘trivializes truth, simplifies suffering, and sucks us into its simulated realities’ (Lyon, Jesus in Disneyland, 2000).

Has a diet of McWorship left us unable to walk the way of the cross? Has it left us lethargic and malnourished to be Jesus’ disciples? Has McWorship helped us forget who the God we worship is or reduced him to a series of romantic platitudes? Or to say the same thing another way, does McWorship give us a big enough picture of God or does it sell it us short with distorted doctrine?

We need to recover worship that breaks out of that which seeks to contain it as something which can be neatly packaged; worship that feeds our hearts and minds with a picture of our big God; worship that is not afraid to leave some things unresolved; worship that is for God; worship that transforms us to the image of Christ through whom we worship the Father, in the power of the Spirit; worship that speaks of God and not our feelings for him; worship that energizes and nourishes us to live faithful lives and walk the way of the cross; worship that is rooted in the Christian story – that tells us who we are - and the traditions of the Christian church (e.g. its calendar and liturgy); worship that is sacramental; worship that confronts and defies the commercialization of our lives.

windows on the cross

contemplate. reflect. engage. wonder. question. look again. confess. give thanks.

'windows on the cross' is completed.  Yesterday evening saw my team beginning setting up, while in room next door we got some young artists to do some fantastic artwork for us.  From 12-3pm today the church was open for people to come and walk the way of the cross.  We had different stations like others are doing.  The 1st was called echoes of the cross which look at some of the echoes of the old testament scriptures in the passion narratives.  The most obvious being psalm 22.  Tom Wright says 'the psalms has obviously coloured the story of the passion in other ways (Mk 15:24; Jn 19:24 = Ps 22:18; Mk 15:29 = Ps 22:7; Matt 27:43 = Ps 22:8) and these are best explained on the assumption that Jesus really did utter Ps 22:1 on the cross.' (JVG, p.601, n.217). 

Then we had a space for people to do their own artwork and an area where we had Jesus of Nazareth and The Miracle Maker playing on tvs.  In the centre of the room we had a giant cross. This was linked
to the 2nd station confessing the one cross which was based on chapter one of Tom Smail's book Once and for All. Tom writes: 'Just as it is impossible to look directly at the sun, so it is impossible to grasp completely what Christ is doing on the cross.' The cross will always be a mystery. I then stuck in a great sentence from Stanley Hauerwas little book Cross-Shattered Christ, where he says “Mystery” here does not name a puzzle that cannot be solved. Rather, “mystery” names that which we know, but the more we know, the more we are forced to rethink everything we think we know' (p.15). The cross leads to three confessions: the confession of faith, the confession of sin and the confession of praise.

The 3rd station was facing the cross-shattered christ which was based on David Ford's Self and Salvation.  I took part of the opening chapter where he talks about the face, before linking it to how do
we picture the face of Jesus? And how do we imagine the dead face of Christ?

The 4th and final station  was  called the journey into darkness.  We built a tunnel which led down in the empty and nearly covered baptistry.  I really wanted to
emphasise after reading Sarah Breuer's sermon from good friday last year that the cross is a dark place and in the person of Jesus, God comes to that dark and narrow place and that today is a dark place we visit.

Finally I need to note the excellent music my brother steve composed especially. You can listen to it here. The people who came responded well, which was encouraging and several people said they found it moving.  Those in the team who helped plan and worked with me all agreed that it was a positive time, which helped people connect with the events of good friday. We learnt a lot as well for next time.  I've put some other photos in an album (see on the left).

Catching Up

A quick post because I've not been on for a week. LIfe is a bit manic with the last few days of school term and my involvement in things during holy week.  Psalm Life service happened on Sunday and went well - people found it helpful - I'll blog so more details later.  I've got 2 lessons left before easter holidays start. I have 2 services left before I have a few days off in Leeds with my brother. On Saturday I'm dropping into London to visit the Grace exhibition and hopefully the church.co.uk exhibition too.

Good stuff I've read during the last week: Jonny's gracelent post called a desert planet; Chris Eerdman's post called Six Convictions and Practices for Leading Missional Innovation and Brodie's All About Me Worship post.

I heard today that Sam Wells, who recently published a fantastic book called <em>Improvisation</em> on Christian ethics, is going to the new dean at Duke University.

Psalm Life

I'm doing some work this afternoon on an alt.worship service I'm doing this sunday at bunyan. I get asked to do them ever once a while (click here and here for a previous service I've done).  This time I'm planning a simple, but hopefully meaningful service, on the psalms.  Borrowing Brueggeman's typology of psalms  - of orientation, - of disorientation, and - of new orientation, we'll explore some of the breadth of Israel's speech to God through readings, music, visuals and embodied reflection.

Brueggeman says this:
'... the church has continued to sing songs of orientation in a world increasingly experienced as disoriented; do we sing them in bold defiance to disorder … or does this reflect that we do not want to acknowledge or experience the disorientation of life?'

Our worship is almost devoid of lament, we don't know how to express our pain publically to God; we only sing happy songs to God.

6.30pm. Bunyan Baptist, Basils Road, Stevenage.

tenebrae: a service of shadows

Hannah and I made a trip up to Robinson College this evening to go to Maggi's tenebrae: a service of shadows service.  It was great! A mixture of ambient and choral (the choir were fantastic), silence and song, scripture spoken and scripture enacted. There was a richness there so often missing from the general weekly service.  The service was structured in eight parts - Christ's journey towards the cross. What I liked was how the service allowed the whole journey to take place, to hear and see the story in its fullness. So thanks Maggi for a great service - it was good to experience something different! 

Worshipping Trinity

Yesterday I picked up a new book called Worshipping Trinity by Robin Parry. Parry argues that the worship in our churches is not trinitarian worship and so not Christian worship. He then goes on to argue why a theology of the Trinity is so important and how we can develop a more trinitarian approach to worship. This is a book, to go with Holy, Holy, Holy by Chris Cocksworth and Worship, Community and the Triune God of Grace by James Torrance, that must get read. It's written in a very readable and simple way. Let's stop writing 'you' songs, which actually work to de-personalize our worship, because we never identify who this 'you' is, we never name God Father Son and Holy Spirit.

I've blogged in the past on the same subject, see here.

Lighter of lights

Lighter of lights – illumine us
Fire of fires – thaw us
Power of powers – strengthen us
Lover of lovers – warm us

Teller of tales – encourage us
Destroyer of darkness – save us
Touchstone of truth – examine us
Summoner of stars – amaze us

Wellspring of wisdom – weather us
Water of life – refresh us
Dancer of days – delight in us
Breath of the universe – bless us

by Ruth Burgess

(picture from designbygecko's new photo blog)

Considering the Role of the Youthworker

I'm running 3 evening workshops in my role as youthwork co-ordinator at Bunyan as a kind of youthwork training.  Last week we looked at Lessons from the Classroom, where we discussed managing behaviour and teaching with a difference.  Tonight we're looking at The Role of the Youthworker (and the Role of the Church) and in two weeks time I'm running a session called Theology Bitesize.

As I've been preparing for tonight, I've had a look through the books I have on youthwork for anything helpful on the role of youthworkers, but found nothing.  Jeremy Thomson's recent IASYM paper on this topic was helpful, but I was looking for something more in-depth. I am looking forward to his forthcoming book on the issue.  Anyway, I picked up Care in a Confused Climate: Pastoral Care and Postmodern Culture, (my friend Phil, wittily came up with an alternative title: Confused Care in a Cold Climate) which was written by my dad in 1998.  This is a book I've picked up now and again and used in essays as it has a helpful introduction to the contours of postmodern culture.

What I found in this quick skim read, was if you substitute the word 'pastoral care/r" for "youthwork/er" you find, I argue, a good description of the role and task of Christian youthwork.  Take the definition given for pastoral care:

‘the healing, sustaining, guiding, personal formation and reconciling of [young people] and their relationships to family and community by representative Christian persons, and by the church, who ground their care in theological perspective of that faith tradition and who personally remain faithful to that faith through spiritual authenticity’ (p.10) and add to the beginning 'youthwork is'

The book describes 4 metaphors for pastoral care, which equally suffice as metaphors for youthwork:

Youthwork as gift
Youthwork as proclamation
Youthwork as service
Youthwork as sacrament

To this list, I want to add Thomson's suggestion:
Youthwork as apprenticeship

The book then goes on to define the Urgent Tasks of Pastoral Care, which also appear to me to be the urgent tasks of youthwork:

1. Building Christian community
2. Creating relational health
3. Healing the wounded soul
4. Nurturing and sustaining faith

I think number 4. in terms of youthwork means: Teaching the Faith; Modelling the Faith; and understanding young people as apprentice disciples (Thomson).  What does this look like?  It means youthworkers should be (a) Telling God’s Story - read as much scripture as you can with young people;
(b) Be Imitators of Christ - as Thomson says 'the youth worker always provides some kind of role model (for good or ill) of an older person for the young person to consider' and I think in general, young people will learn more about being a Christian from studying their youth worker than anything or anyone else; (c) Facilitate inter-generational friendships - that is, young people will feel a sense of belonging from the church, if they know more Christians than just their youthworker/s (this is a hobby horse of mine!); (d) Mark transitions from child to young person and young person to adult; (e) Whole church involvement - the whole church has a role in church youthwork; youthwork is not something separate from the Body.

The book also sets out some Resources for Pastoral Care or for our purposes Resources for Youthwork.

i. Spirituality - as a youthworker what is the condition of your spiritual life? what is the condition of your young people's spiritual life? How do you encourage it and nuture it? Here the importance of Scripture, Worship and Prayer are highlighted.
ii. Training - the importance of learning the art of being a youthworker, we need to be continually learning and growing in our knowledge and experience.  We need to fight the assumption that any person in their 20s can be a youthworker and the other assumption that just because we not called to be a youthworker, that means we can avoid working with or being near young people!
iii. Theology - theology is 'indispensable rather than a luxurious option for the leisured few' (p.222).  I bemoan the fact that so many of our youthworkers (including and especially the trained ones) have such a limit grasp of theology. A McDonaldized theology, like a McDonaldized faith, won't do.  We need to delve deep into the theological sources of our faith.
iv. Care for the Youthworkers - if we're always looking after the young people, who's looking after us?  This an important and often neglected or forgotten question (although I must say not in my case).
v. Companionship - 'with all the resources of spirituality, theological reflection, training and supervisory care, there is still nothing quite as encouraging as companions on the way' (p.226) - youthworkers need to stick together, support and encourage one another; here also is the important role of spouses, family and friends outside of our "ministry," who keep us grounded. This also is a joy of being part of the blogger world.