Journal
Week 1


A discussion in class between a student and John gave me the “revelation” of the context that we live in. There is a tension between what is happening in our world and what is happening to our world. God has been proving faithful in the personal orientation of my faith and the way that God is functioning in my world view and the world around me. The book “Constants in Context” by Beveans and Schroeder is showing how the six constants of Theology are understood through out history. The three types of Theology are A, B, and C. This is the way the three types of Theology are understood in the book. I can all ready see how the people in my class are going to struggle with the Idea of Theology as a discipline of human perspective in different contexts. So often we approach God as though we can think about God from an Objective perspective. I am learning how understanding self is understanding God and visa versa. It is important for me to reflect on my context in which my world view was formed. Than I can understand why I view God in the way I do.

I grew up in Souderton. My foundation is based on a missional view of living. My father and mother raised me with the understanding that I am responsible not only for my life but the lives of those on the fringe of society. This was proven to me in the way they treated my friends. Growing up most of my friends where not raised in the “Christian” context. Now I find myself once again surrounded by people that do not fit into the “Christian” context in a community which is holding onto the bubble of faith as an image. There are so many people that hold onto their “Christian” perspectives as though they are objective and not influenced through their context. The language used in the Christian culture is so full of clichés it is hard for me to listen with out judging some of the people in my class.

When John talks in the language of the emergent church, my mind is tracking and my heart is warmed. I have spent the last 5 years trying to get into the world of the emergent church and I find myself in a place that has invited me in through “biblical”. God has proven himself faithful when I sit and listen to the words of John and hear what causes great tension in others. I have lived in the tension of “what is the point?” Why are we doing this?

Journal 3
Third Week

The past two nights I talked to a youth group about the “the story we find ourselves in” How this Story is the greatest gift we could ever given. It is our talent. My reading in the “Character of Theology” has messed up my mind. I can not give the answers like I used to give youth. In fact I have not spoken formally to youth in over a year. Thank God. I realize now that I have had so many questions with out a way to organize them in my brain. Reading “the Character of Theology” is giving me some organizational structures.

Reading and talking about “Constants in Context” has given me words for my thoughts. I have not been able to communicate how my Christology, Theology, Ecclesiology, Eschatology, because I have not had any such thing. Sure I might have had thoughts about God, Christ, Church and the point now in relation to the End, but I was lost. I have more questions than I have ever had, but thank God for a map, at least a working map.

Here is the thing I know. I know that we are going to move beyond our thinking about the six constants like Theology, but we have to move. When we sense to move we die. I died. I mean that, my soul was dead, and it is beginning a re-birth. I do not know how God determines who goes to heaven and hell, but I know that it isn’t simply a prayer that converts humanity. It has to be an act of God. Indirect Revelation gave me great insight to the way we know God.

We can not know God the way we know each other. There is too much baggage we bring to the table. We could be the most brilliant person in the world and we are still bankrupt in the economy of knowing God. That is why my good friend who feels like an Agnostic, who has a degree in Religious studies from Villanova still does not claim to know God. He does not even know if he is a Christian.

It is obvious that we all have our own perspectives and contexts that form our hermeneutic, so it is impossible to have a foundation that will last for ever. The foundation will shift with the experiences of life and the cultural shift takes place faster and faster as we progress in this culture.

When I talked at the youth group the first night I was scared. I did not want to share this message I believe. I did not want to share how my story has shaped my belief in God and I did not want to share my perspective on why so many people have a tragic story. My story used to be tragic. I did not see myself as in the Story of God, where the Triune God is the main Character.

I might have even stopped believing in the Triune God, but thanks to our discussions in Theo class and my readings, I see the Triune God as an imperative in the Faith of Christians. I am a follower of the teachings of Jesus as stated in the Bible through my own culturally coded lenses. When I live out beliefs based on this knowledge that penetrates my soul, I am changed. I am different.

For example, during the talk the second night, I stepped out and believed in the Triune God. I believed that it was not on me. I can not make anyone understand or believe it is God. But half way through I could see it, I could feel it. The Spirit was revealing God to the group. This was confirmed later that night, when my friend Aaron and I were sharing a drink and he looked at me with piercing eyes of Hope and said, “That’s the Kingdom”. His eyes filled with passion as he explains two experiences that night. He shared how for 2-5 seconds it all became clear and it was though he saw for the first time.

I will spend the rest of my life in the passionate pursuit of the “Kingdom”. The good news is the “Kingdom” has come. So I say, “May your will be done.”

Faith and Community
A poem by Scott Hackman

At times in life it is impossible to have faith.
All one has to do is look at the world to chaos and calamity.
Governments full of greed and deceit.
Communities treating leaders like gods they fall morally.
Faith in an individual is futile and there is need for change from this perspective.

There is need for individuals believing in more than their abilities to see beyond their own paradigm.
There is need for churches that proclaim fanatical blessings and personal fulfillment to cease.
There is need for institutions who want your time but not your whole person to be brought low.

Society dangles the carrot as though a person can attain fulfillment with enough consumption.
A culture based on personal fulfillment and giving into any desires one might have as a way of life.
No need for faith is something greater than self, when self fulfillment is the greatest goal of mankind.
A contributor to the collective mass, who has ceased to think, ceased to dream other than for personal fulfillment.
Individualism is god and technology is the glue holding people together.

Faith is needed in a transformational community.
When a group of people believe in a greater Kingdom there is hope.
When a group of people believe for the overlooked and under resourced.
There is need for a group of people to see themselves on a mission.
There is need for people to place themselves in the care of a community.

We do not get to pick the people involved in this community.
Those who want to be involved are involved, those who want to believe, believe.
When a community of believers joins a community of unbelievers miracles can happen.
When one person dares to love another not for any personal gain, just because they are human, the Kingdom has come.
Where is such a community of faith?

We are intentionally involving ourselves in one another’s lives. Daring to believe we can create culture in a depraved world. Daring to believe the Kingdom will come on Earth as it is in Heaven.

If all we have is today, how will you live?
If life is the gift, how will you live?
If death is the future, how will you live?

This group is intentional because we get together on purpose.
This group is missional because we are doing this to provide a safe space to ask questions and belong to the Kingdom.

What consumes your thoughts?
What helps you sleep at night and get up in the morning?
What is the driving force in your life?
Who/what do you have faith in?

A missional approach
Makes sense

A missional approach makes a difference in a persons life when they accept this perspective as more than an ad on to their life/church/program etc. This has taken place in my life through a series of paradigm shifts. In this response I will share how three significant paradigm shifts moved me into a missional perspective of how to live, approach ministry, read the bible, understand the church, envision the Kingdom, and understand the Gospel.

The Paradigm shift from life on a mission to life a participant in God’s mission has had a profound impact on the way I understand all of the foundations of Christianity and its practices. For example my view of pastor as moral citizen, holder of Godly truth has shifted to pastor as human being, participant in the community as a learner and cultivator, similar to a Gardner.

In my opinion the pastor can no longer stand on his high moral pulpit and preach down to the congregation. No one is listening and no one will listen outside of the Christian cultural worldview. Even if the pastor gets hip and trendy and makes his church look like a Starbucks meeting the entire consumer needs of his congregation. The church is dieing at an alarming rate in North America and there is a need for the rebirth of the mission shown through Christ’s life/death/resurrection.
The missional approach has had an impact on how I understand the church. I no longer see the church as a place people go to on a Sunday morning. The church is no longer a building people meet in. The definable qualities of a church are found both in the history of the church and in the Biblical example of followers and believers in Christ and Christ’s teachings. The missional view of the church can be understood as a “sent group of people into their local context to witness to the Kingdom of God, joining in the Missio Dei,” according to Guder. The necessity to join fellow believers for a time of worship is birthed out of a shared life and a shared mission. Worship gatherings become missional in their purpose.
How I understand church has changed how I read the Bible.

The missional approach to reading the Bible has greatly changed my perspective. I now read the Bible understanding my own biases and perspectives which influence my interpretation and application. The way I used to read the bible was more like a descriptive manual on how to live life. Although it still holds truth and is teachable for a life lived according to biblical teaching it is not the soul source of how I understand truth. I no longer believe I can hold the key to absolute Truth by reading, studing and understanding the “right” perspective on the bible. I still believe the bible is inspired by God, but I no longer hold the foundations of my upbringing as absolute truth.

The missional approach to reading the bible simple states, “What is God’s mission according to… fill in any book of the bible”. When I read the bible from this perspective, I am able to question some of the foundational beliefs which I once held up as gods. The missional view of the Bible has been formed by my missional approach to ministry. I have not always functioned in a missional way in ministry. I used to see missions as something I did, like evangelize. Now I see life as missional and ministry as an extension of a missional life. Here is story about the paradigm shift from mission as apart of ministry to mission as life and ministry as an extension of that life.

The paradigm shift from bible as absolute Truth, to God as holder of absolute Truth and bible as inspired word of God used through out history to transform lives has help me live more missionally. God is the word, and the word is God. The words written down and explain over thousands of years have changed. God’s word remains the same, because the word is God. We are humans, so we approach the bible with such a finite perspective. This has changed my view of God.

My new paradigm is shifting from God as a Dad or friend I have to persuade to do things my way, to unknowable yet personal through the Triune relationship. God has become a paradox I will follow till I die. This shift has caused me to approach the Gospel as something to live out, and share through community. I approach God in contemplative prayer, spiritual disciplines and a community of believers and unbelievers who share the purposing of bearing witness to God’s Kingdom through God’s Mission.

The Kingdom has become something shared between believers and unbelievers when they participate in the action of witnessing God’s mission. This does not mean I stop proclaiming the transforming reality of Christ through belief in His death resurrection and triune relationship with the Father and the Spirit, nor does my statement mean I believe in universal salvation for all people. I am still in a major shift in my paradigm and I know it will keep happening as God reveals His Kingdom through everything and anything He wants.

The best way for you to understand how I could go through such a shift would be to sit down and have a cup of coffee or brew. Since we can not do that I thought I would give you a piece of my story and you can take it for what it is. A story shared from one person’s perspective, trying with all his might to follow after God, revealed through Christ and given power through the Spirit. This is the story of a life slowly slipping into what looks like a missionary in the North American context instead of a boy trying to fulfill his dream of being a famous youth speaker/pastor.

Paradigm Shift
Five years of youth ministry

My world view was rocked in my five years as a full time youth pastor. I learned how youth in this next generation are not interested in me having all the answers to their questions. They do not need me or my answers to believe in God. This came as a surprise, because I had been taught by most of my mentors and all of my Christian education how I was going to be the bearer of good news. I was taught how defend the truth and develop honest, moral citizen. This is not a bad motive; however it is not the Gospel, at least how I understand the Gospel.

Most youth I encountered did not doubt the existence of God. They were not interested in apologetics or systems they could build truth on to hold up against the evil society they lived in. They asked me a lot of questions but very few were about anything I was taught in my education and leadership formation.

I was taught how to do ministry from a rational, practical, implicational, definable, and quantifiable way. This was challenged greatly at the turn of the millennium. It was during this period of history when youth began to have access to more information than ever before. The end of the world was coming according to some religious fanatics and there was more access to the information showing the corruption and depravity of man.

The youth had a perspective beyond what my teaching had given me the ability to handle. With in three months of my first job I became what I now call a “missionary in the North American context”. I started asking the kids in a conversational way, what they thought about topics like the: church, God, Christ, religions, sex, drinking, friends, death, etc. It was in this experiment my paradigm shifted from pastor/teacher to pastor/learner. I became a person longing to understand their perspective and their world view. I no longer assumed I new what was going on in their life. I no longer assumed I had the answer for them.

This is why I believe there is a need for “Christians” to find their way into the minds and hearts of people outside the western “Christian” worldview. There is a need for missional believers to communicate the Gospel through the incarnation of truth in a way the Holy Spirit can be proud to show up in. There is a need for a new kind of Christian, believer, follower of Jesus, Missionary, Evengelist, Apostle, Leader, Pastor, Teacher, Preacher and Prophet.

By the end of my five years in youth ministry I barely had any faith left in the church as we now know it. Thanks to the grace of God through the people who have helped me put words to the paradigm shifts I have gone through in the past couple years, along with the missional approach I have been given freedom, life and hope again. I believe this kind of life only comes from the redeeming reality of Christ in a life lived as a participant in the Missio Dei.