They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.
—Acts 2:42

The central quality of a disciple of any kind is devotion. Someone who is devoted to chess, for example, pours his time, thought, and resources into the game. A true disciple of chess actually plays it, not just follows the exploits of the grand masters.

The first group of Christ’s disciples is described as devoted. Yes, they were devoted to some things (the focus of later posts), but it is important that we understand what is meant by devotion in the first place. Since we are ultimately talking about a devotion to Jesus, it is his definition that most interests us. This is how he characterizes it:

“No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other,
or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.”
—Matthew 6:24

For Jesus, true devotion is single and categorical; it can be offered only to one thing. This runs counter to the way we play it out. Think of devotion as a deck of cards. We tend to deal out our “devotions” to a number of players. My wife gets a few cards; my kids get a few; my job gets some; maybe my church gets a few; my hobby gets some too. We pass out the devotion cards in proportions according to the value we assign the recipients. But Jesus’s perspective raises a question: Once I’ve rationed out my cards which person has the deck? None of them. For Jesus, devotion is the whole deck, which is why it can’t be given to two masters. If you cut the deck (by even one card) it is no longer devotion.

This is a radical position, especially for us who live daily with divided hearts. To be frank, there is something freaky about a demand for total devotion. (We’ve all seen fanaticism run amok.) But aside from the issues of misapplied devotion, there is another question inherent in Jesus’s perspective. If I hand the whole deck over to God, thus fulfilling the greatest commandment, how can I fulfill the second greatest commandment, to love my neighbor as myself? There aren’t any cards left over.

The Apostle John answers this question for us (whew). He writes, This is how we know that we love the children of God: by loving God and carrying out his commands (1Jn 5:2). According to John, the way we love our neighbors is not by giving them a few devotion cards, but by handing the whole deck over the God. In fact, if I do hand any cards to them, I am not fulfilling the second commandment or the first!

All this may seem a game of words, but for anybody contemplating what it means to be a disciple of Christ, this is essential stuff. However, as we read in Acts 2:42, this “whole deck” devotion is not some abstract or fuzzy feeling; it is expressed in three important and definite ways. These are the focus of upcoming posts.

But next we’re going to take a look at what the first group of followers experienced when they were together, an experience that was both the fruit of and motivation for their commitment to play the whole deck.

]]> http://uchurch.wordpress.com/2008/04/28/playing-the-whole-deck/feed/ 4 Fred http://uchurch.wordpress.com/2008/04/21/the-three-passions/ http://uchurch.wordpress.com/2008/04/21/the-three-passions/#comments Mon, 21 Apr 2008 18:49:59 +0000 Fred http://uchurch.wordpress.com/?p=185 ]]>

Part 1

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.
—Acts 2:42

This past Sunday we started a series that focuses on the three passions of the early church. Our interest is in how the scriptures describe that first group of believers regarding its devotion to certain things and in what those things actually mean.

By way of introduction, we noted that the defining characteristic of disciples is devotion. And though we agreed that the early followers were devoted to Jesus, we also concluded that this devotion expressed itself as a passionate commitment to the following things:

• The apostles’ teaching
• The fellowship (and breaking of bread)
• Prayer

For the next few Sundays (and in the next few posts) we will explore the concept of devotion itself and take a careful look at the early church’s three expressions of that devotion. Our goal is to learn how authentic church life reflects and enacts these passions—and how U-Church might do the same.

It’s exiting to think that, by embracing these three passions, believers can live out in the modern world the experience and witness of that first spiritual collective. We will not attempt to “reclaim” the primitive church, but rather explore how their passions might express themselves through us today.

Stay tuned—and visit us if you like. The door is always open.

Read Part 2

At our last Sunday gathering we continued our look at the Gospel of Mark and made a simple observation. As we read the second chapter and part of the third, we noticed that Jesus kept insisting on the primacy of person over principle. Even when the principles were good—and sometimes Scripturally mandated—Jesus demoted them to submission. He viewed the religious statutes as servants rather than masters. Jesus did not devalue those religious principles but rather insisted on the unique nobility of the human person, a nobility which found its apotheosis in him. “So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”

As someone remarked that morning, “That’s so hard to remember!” And it is. What starts out as a vibrant relationship so easily devolves into a vague collection of numb obligations. Our intentions may be upright, but we so often drift from the dynamic of engaging the resurrected Christ. Rules are easy to take hold of, but a person eludes categories and quantifications. We are often left with a chronic, low-grade sense of absence.

That’s why it’s so good to gather together as believers. We remind each other that the whole Christian reality is founded on personhood, each of us encountering the others and all of us encountering the living Christ. The church, as a collection of redeemed people, objectifies our faith; we experience each other as others (along with all the hassles that entails) and are reminded that salvation is in knowing Someone Else. This is personhood as both the saved and the saving. Principles serve to guide our relationships, but they have no real substance in and of themselves. This Jesus knew full well.

It’s funny how the simplest truths are often the most profound and easiest to forget. Jesus himself is the way, the truth, and the life. He is the First Principle, if you like. And it is into fellowship that we are invited. At U-Church, at least, we have to remind ourselves of this over and over again.

I’m pro youth. Some of my own kids are youth. I’m not sure, but I think I used to be a youth myself a long, long time ago. In fact, I think most people have to move through youthness before they arrive—if they ever do—at some semblance of adulthood. So it’s probably safe to say that youth is a fact of life.

There are many things I like about youth: the exuberant hope, the marvelously irrational conviction that they will never die, the Zen-like embrace of the present, the envious ability to ignore implications, the boundless energy, the exquisite belief in a world that bows at your feet, and the persuasion that this is the best of all possible times. Youth is a heady cacophony of heroes, hormones, and hedonism—an all-too-brief Golden age that is to be celebrated; and if the Bible is any authority on the subject, youth is also something to be shaped by those who know better.

This post concerns that most precocious of church institutions, the Youth Group. There are many good things about Youth Group, including fellowship, some passable Biblical teaching every so often to keep the charter, and a boatload of relatively harmless, completely meaningless activity that adults need more of. (I’ll take burping contests over political games anytime.) Generally speaking, Youth Group offers kids from Christian homes a place to have some fun away from the bald-faced spirit of antichrist that pervades our culture, something for which their parents are grateful.

Of course there are some very real issues too. Many parents are concerned about what they see as a troubling encroachment into Youth Group by a worldly spirit. Values and practices formerly associated with the “world” have become integral to the fabric of Youth Group identity. Rather than nurturing a sense of holiness, of being set apart from the world for Divine purposes, Youth Group often revels in the attitudes and idols of an irreverent and blasphemous culture. The mandates of Scripture have been reinterpreted by a grace now defined by license rather than Christlikeness. And it often seems that it is the youth themselves who run the Group rather than those who have been given charge for their spiritual welfare.  What is more, for many parents Youth Group functions as a surrogate for their own deliberate involvement in their kids’ spiritual lives.

The result, with notable exceptions, is that the graduates of our Youth Groups, like so many of their parents, are spiritually sincere but also deeply conflicted. They have hearts toward God, but have been given little definitive direction. They have been repeatedly fed the smallest teaspoons of spiritual milk laced with lots of cultural candy, the effects of which are deep cavities in their Biblical, moral, and missional understanding.

Perhaps my biggest concern about the way we do Youth Group is that it can foster a fracture in the practice of family. Most Youth Group activities are designed to be away from Mom and Dad. I realize that kids need to have space to be kids, and I’m not talking about those special activities where parents might function as hosts or chaperons. I’m referring to the overarching Youth Group paradigm that assigns (though not explicitly) the central organizational responsibility for the youths’ spiritual development to outside the home. Youth Group often seems to compete with parents for their children’s attention, interaction, and filial allegiance. And when Youth Group has all the bells and whistles, the concerned parent can come across as an obstacle to fulfillment rather than a loving guide to lasting spiritual fruit.

If we must have our “youth pastors” (a trend that begs the question as to youth as an incompatible and separate spiritual “species”), I would love to see them spend more of their time figuring out ways to facilitate parent/youth interaction. I would love to see them direct the youth toward their parents by fostering at home gatherings, helping equip parents to input more effectively the lives of their children, and nurturing in the youth a desire to grow in the Lord with their parents rather than a desire to escape them.

Mostly, I wish to erase the culturally driven, Youth Group sanctioned divide between parent and child, a divide the Scriptures neither condone nor recognize. I would love to see parents and youth able to stand on the same ground in their relationship with God. This will require a major reassessment by parents of their real role in their kids’ spiritual lives. It will require churches to turn away from fostering our youth as a separate spiritual culture. It will require that parents lovingly impart to their own children the God-gifted distinctives of each family unit.

I firmly believe that God has given me my particular kids because he has entrusted to me something he wants me to entrust to them. If not, they would have been born to somebody else. Even I—though one of the most opinionated people on the planet—would never presume to tell other Christian parents how to raise their kids. I appreciate the efforts of churches to provide for our youth, but they cannot give to them what only God has given me to impart. I do not offer my children to the template of another’s values and practices, even if they are far more entertaining. If we can grasp this, and respond fully to it, then Youth Group will become what it should be, an adjunct to the home fires. Until then, I guess, it’s up to parents to rise to the call.

Go against the flow, my friends.

The images, fonts, and background texture that make up the U-Church blog header were carefully chosen and rendered to reflect the “spirit” of this endeavor and, as such, compliments our value emphases discussed here. I thought it would be interesting to elaborate a bit on the visual elements of our header and how we hope they somehow suggest U-Church’s perspective. Scriptural references are inferred, but you’ll have to look them up yourself if you’re interested.

First, on the left, is the rather strange image of a man who is wearing a kind of clerical collar and a halo over his eyes. He is dropping a piece of paper into the slot of a locked box. This box suggests that the slip of paper is either a ballot or suggestion. The whole image has an antique feel with its rough edges and scratched surface.

The collar and halo, as in traditional iconography, suggests sainthood, but, in this case, of a decidedly quirky kind. The halo, which implies holiness, seems too big for him because it has slipped down over his head—or did he put it on that way? Either way, the halo is still shining even though it is clownishly displayed. Has the halo obscured the man’s vision or corrected it? Maybe it’s all a matter of perspective. At any rate, he seems able to fit the paper in the slot. And what about that paper and box? Whatever is on the paper, it must be important to the man. He is submitting it (blindly?) into the box to be counted (ballot) or at least considered (suggestion). Clearly the paper is meant for someone else’s eyes. The box, however, is plainly locked. Nobody, not even the man himself, can violate the sanctity of this mysterious “ark” of exchange. Once the man inserts his input, it is subject to laws and forces beyond his personal caprice. And yet, the man’s actions suggest he can trust the process, even though the picture implies his profound ignorance of anything beyond his rather limited capacities. On the whole, it’s a rather humorous image of human limitation and faith. It might even be considered pessimistic if it were not for the buoyant portrait on the far right.

Facing our idiosyncratic saint is one of the most recognizable portraits in the Western world. It’s a detail from Michelangelo’s The Creation of Adam painted on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel around 1511. Here is the imagined face of God, swirling with creative energy and wholly attentive to his creation. His eyes are fixed in artistic concentration and his countenance radiates joy. He is both fatherly and enigmatic, approachable and elusive. Above all, his face reveals that his creation matters to him. He is engaged.

In the header, God’s attention is riveted on our clownish man. There is no hint of displeasure in the awkward saint before him. He seems delighted in the man and vitally interested in what the man is doing. Is it for him that the man’s slip of paper is meant? Is he the one who unlocks the box? In God’s divine, loving gaze the bumbling saint—even with his persistent imperfections—is transfigured as the object of God’s robust pleasure. This is inexplicable, irreducible grace.

Between the images of saint and God flares our name and “slogo.” The roiling, flame-like background bridges the gap and functions artistically as the connection between the them. U-Church is what unifies what would otherwise be two distinct and separate images. U-Church is the interaction of the saint and his God, but it does not define either of them, The two images on either side define the center frame. In this way, the header forms a kind of triptych, a tree-part image that conveys a story or spiritual reality. The font used for U-Church is a bit scuffed as if from rough and tumble use, but the symbol of its redemption is clearly visible, a treasure in a font of clay. Just beneath floats our slogo, rendered in outlines, which suggests our expectations about this strange and audacious experience.

Altogether, the header serves as our own little icon. As such, it signifies the often exciting, though many times mysterious character of our collective relationship with God. If you’re not into icons, that’s okay. We don’t genuflect before our header anyway. Still, since we don’t have a cathedral to speak of, it’s the next best thing to a stained glass window.

Success has ruined many a man.
—Benjamin Franklin

Over the years I have noticed that the biographical blurbs for the keynote speakers at most Christian conferences include a phrase something like this: “Pastor of the 7000-member Really First Church.” The idea, of course, is that one of the important factors validating the speaker’s credibility and authority is that he or she has a big church—in fact, a much bigger church than you do. Rarely, if ever, will you see a conference heralding somebody who is not the head of a large group or has not won wide acclaim through books or music.

On one hand this makes sense, I suppose. Conferences trade in attendance and admission fees; we are not likely to pay to see an unknown. Besides, why would I care to hear somebody talk about something for which he has little to show? No thanks.

And yet there is something troubling about our implied “standards” of excellence. There is no doubt that, as far as American church culture is concerned, bigger is better. Though we may not say it aloud, we regard the pastor of a church of 5,000 with greater esteem than we do one of 50. More than that, we may even suspect that the pastor of a smaller church either lacks spiritual gifts or is wanting in other areas. I myself have concluded this about small-timers, thinking that if they were good, they’d have a big congregation.

Considering that we’ve just launched U-Church—which can only be described as a nano-congregation—it might seem gratuitous for me to talk about this. The truth, however, is that over the years I’ve often wondered about our American veneration of the big and how it obscures and even discourages the profound value of the faith-fueled small. It also defines kingdom success by the aims of capitalism in which amassing resources is the highest good.

This is not to say that the kingdom of God should not grow in either numbers or spiritual “capital” (read: grace); if the lost aren’t added to the fellowship of believers, something is profoundly amiss. Yet it seems to me that growing in numbers or resources is—or ought to be anyway—a by-product rather than a product. Perhaps the real success is simply faithfulness. Maybe that’s all it ever is.

God I hope so.

Here’s how we do it:

To begin we turn to a Psalm. (We’re working our way through all of them. This week will be Psalm 3.) We then engage the Scripture using our “5-P” cloister walk. First we pronounce it, or say it aloud together. Next we perceive it, or briefly discuss what we see in the passage. After that we praise it, or ascribe to God what is revealed to us about him. Then we petition it, or apply these revelations about God to situations that concern us. Finally, we proclaim it, or declare by faith what we believe about the things we have learned and asked for. In this way we are allowing the Word to lead us through our worship and prayer times together. It’s amazing how we are often led in directions we could not anticipate. Our corporate worship and prayer times are adventures. More than once we’ve nearly used our whole time doing this without even knowing it!

After this we have a “Theological Moment” bought to us by U-Church’s own Little John. Each Sunday he presents a theological truth, showing us its Biblical basis and relating it to real life. It’s theology we can actually take hold of. We never know what he’s going to bring us, but it’s always been highly significant and profitable.

Then, if there’s time left (and a couple of times there hasn’t been), we finish with the next installment from our current series in the Gospel of Mark. It’s just another way God ambushes us with his love and truth.

This all may seem woefully unadorned, but for a vibe and show weary guy like me, our U-liturgy is a delightful breath of fresh air. There is genuine engagement with each other and with God. Of course, we’re not locked into this particular way of doing things; we like to explore and will probably introduce other kinds of worship expressions too. But we are enjoying this rock solid foundation for worship and fellowship. The Word is the good seed and we are the soil, and we’re looking forward to seeing his garden grow.

The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
—Mark 1:1

This past Sunday we started our look at the Gospel of Mark, noting from the first verse that the author considered all that followed as the good news. For Mark, the Gospel was not a bumper sticker slogan like “Jesus Saves,” but rather the whole life that Jesus lived. More than that, Mark begins his story with the prophet Isaiah and John the Baptist. They, too, are a part of the good news of Jesus Christ. The Gospel is a story that includes all those throughout history who have believed and obeyed. We are also a part of this ongoing story.

But it’s not only that we are a part of the story, the good news envelopes our whole lives. There is no holy and profane, no separate religious section of our beings as our culture insists. As believers, everything we do, everything we are is a vibrant part of the Gospel. Doing laundry, typing a memo, driving the kids to school, making dinner, raking the lawn—everything is transformed into the sacred.

Not everything is fun. There are tough times too: times of doubt, times of struggle, times of disappointment, times of grief. Nobody enjoys these seasons. Yet for believers they are as much a part of the good news of Jesus as is feeding the poor or singing psalms to God. The Gospel consumes the whole life and transforms it into sacrament. Our faith touches all things, even the least significant in our eyes, and turns it into the very good news we have believed.

As we together look through Mark’s narrative on Sunday mornings, we will discover not only the life of Jesus, but will discover the sacredness of our own lives in him.

Join us.

First, we’re going to begin practicing worship and prayer around the Scriptures. In keeping with our commitment to the centrality of the Bible in our corporate expressions, we’ll be learning to bring the Scriptures into an active role as we pray and worship together.

Second, we’re going to start a series of guided discussions on the Gospel of Mark. If we want to be authentic followers of Jesus, a record of his life is a great place to start. This will be a kind of hybrid between discussion, teaching, and preaching.

For time and place, check Happenings.

Then U-Church’s own “Little John” offered a moving (and surprising) “Theological Moment,” a promising regular feature of our Sunday morning gatherings. We then looked at the importance of our actual experience of God is. We concluded by looking at Is 43:10 and God’s intention for us to be his witnesses in the world. After some casual conversations (and some excellent homemade cookie) we migrated out into the chilly air and into the world at large, refreshed in Presence and purpose. Not bad for a first shot.

Of course you can join us too if you’re near Salem. U might like Church.