No More Fat A$$ People In Ministry Weight Loss Challenge

Brent over at InWorship jumped on board with this and set out the weight loss challenge for fellow bloggers and people in ministry. I think that its funny how the most overweight people are working in either minstry or health care…two people who tell you that your body is a temple and how to take care of it.

So here we go! I, in typical Hawaiian fashion, have simply been continuing to gain weight and put this challenge off for later. Well, later started today.  Here are the Brown Kid’s stats for you:

I’m 6′ 1″. I weigh 217 lbs. My chest 45″ and my waist is 42 1/2″. I would post a picture, but I don’t want to make the ladies stumble (that’s a joke).

So I see a pattern developing in myself that I seem to have a comfort zone of 215-220. I hope to get down to 205 before or by september-ish. It doesn’t help that I work at St. Arbucks and am surrounded by deliciousness of the “Reduced Fat” Strawberries and Cream Coffee Cake…and caramel Machiatos…and Grande Hazelnut and Vanilla Lattes…and strawberries and cream blended creams…and, oh who am I kidding, I want to put it all in my mouth because it’s all good. So here is what I am going to do. While I am working out and eating healthy, I will only drink black coffee and unsweetened black Iced teas. Also, no sweets until the cheat days. Yes, I said cheat days. It will be my day of free for all eating so I don’t go crazy.

Here are a few of the other bloggers on board:

James
Brent
Kristen
Joe
Buddy
Dan
Rick
Brandy
Deborah
Joel
Theresa
Steven
Love
Tawny
Kelly
Jen
Ron
Darla
Theresa
Heidi
Lynn
Natalie

Care to join? It should be a piece of cake. mmmm. cake. I miss you already sugary mistress of deliciousness.

Happy Easter!

He is risen indeed! When I was a kid, I didn’t grow up in a religious home so instead of Jesus and church, we used to get an easter basket filled with peeps, Robin Egg candy, Jelly Beans, and a big chocolate bunny which would all get lost, tangled, and stuck in the annoying fake “grass” that my mom would be continually curse because she would have to clean it out of the vaccum cleaner throughout the year. Sometimes there was another present of some kind for us like a kite or something, but soon the Easter Bunny got stingy and lazy. What a jerk.

As my Easter basket present to anyone who reads this blog, I want to share with you my new favorite site: Garfield minus Garfield. Here is the site description:

 ”Who would have guessed that when you remove Garfield from the Garfield comic strips, the result is an even better comic about schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and the empty desperation of modern life? Friends, meet Jon Arbuckle. Let’s laugh and learn with him on a journey deep into the tortured mind of an isolated young everyman as he fights a losing battle against loneliness in a quiet American suburb.”

Here is a comic from the site to give you an idea of what these comics look like:

 

And Now, Why I Dislike the Emergent Church

I have already written why I love the emergent church, but as I had mentioned, I have a love/hate relationship with it. I didn’t want to say that I Hate the Emergent Church, because it is such a strong word, so instead, here are a few of the things that I dislike about the emergent church:

The Acknowledgement of Story: With this big push for story, sometimes it seems that the emergent church has forgotten the actual use of scripture. In an attempt to use Story to show how the bible relates to our lives, I’ve heard “emergent” people using words and phrases like, “somewhere in (insert book of the bible here) they said…”. Who are they? What are they trying to say? I guess this is where I differ, because I like to have a reference point of what they are talking about. Maybe I’m more conservative that I thought, but I had also heard of an emergent conversation where a person was lamenting their missing of reading the Bible and “being in the word” and the emergent christian wonder aloud “who even reads the Bible anymore”. 

The Retrieval of Tradition: Sometimes when retrieving the tradition it can totally disconnect from people. While looking at why we do things, the emergent church sometimes take from other traditions, celtic for example, which don’t really relate to a lot of the people who are just discovering this movement of the church or even church (It can also disconnect from races which I will explain later). Maybe that is something that is strange about the Emergent church and their look at tradition is that they are looking to tradition more than Jesus. Have they traded Jesus for candles and iconography? Sometimes, NOT ALL, I believe that they may.

Acknowledging that Worship is more than song and sermon: In acknowledging the song and sermon epidemic the emergent church has strayed so far away from song and sermon that people don’t understand what is going on. Let’s take Lectio Divina for example, Average Joe doesn’t know what this means and, 9 times out of 10, sooner or later I think he will disconnect from what is going on. This goes back to the earlier conversation of candles and iconography. Maybe sometimes the song and sermon may be an okay and acceptable way to teach about Jesus.

We are not the only voice: Sometimes I think the emergent church believes that they are the only voice. I see a shift in the emergent church now that is realizing that there is a reason for Joel Osteen that they don’t understand or agree with, but they realize that if God can talk out of Balaam’s ass then he can talk out of Joel Osteen (Okay that was a low blow, but I thought it was funny).

Also, as a Brown Kid, I see that the emergent church is mainly filled with middle class white people. This is the disconnect in tradition that I was talking about earlier. I read an article, that had to be fake, but it spoke greatly into this disconnect that I am talking about. Maybe the emergent church is truly a “white thing” in america and should be added to the website, Stuff White People Like. Maybe that’s what it is, maybe we’ve taken the Emergent church and again have bastardized it into an American form of what was once (and still is) a beautiful movement.

I hope that right now you are either thinking, steaming, disagreeing, or agreeing. I just hope that you are contemplating about this and that we can talk more about this. What are your thoughts? Is this the Emergent Church? Do you dislike it? What are your thoughts.

Why I Love the Emergent Church

I have found that I have a love/hate relationship with the emergent church.  I woke up thinking about it this morning and here are some reasons why i love the emergent church:

The Acknowledgement of Story: The Emergent church has made a big push for story. I am talking about the story of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation and how we are still a part of this story. I liken the bible to one of those pictures that was splatted with paint and it is folded in half and both halves make a picture of something like a butterfly.

The Retrieval of Tradition: The emergent church has been asking the questions. The questions are generally, “why are we doing this?” Emergents have been seeking to find these answers and not settling with what they’ve been given. They continue to push the envelope and wonder “why?”.

Acknowledging that Worship is more than song and sermon: I loved Leonard Sweet’s EPIC acronym that he started in Aqua Church (EPIC is kind of his battle cry now in his other books).  Sweet says that in order for the church to become relevant today, it must become Experiential, Participatory, Image driven, and Communal. These help us to get beyond song and message but instead help us to experience God in new and different ways from the past. It can help the whole congregation to participate instead of watch. The image driven thought helps us to participate through sensory worship.

We are not the only voice: I love the fact that the Emergent Church was/is willing to look to other voices such as various philosophers, theologians, and religions. They are not so conceited to think that they are the only thought and voice of wisdom out there. They take from French philosophers such as Derrida or Foucault. They read from people such as Nietzche. They read christian philosophers such as Kierkegaard or even further back, the desert fathers. They even take wisdom from the Dalai Lama or Confucious. It can be looked at as a universalist thought, but sometimes I see it as a thought of peace that threads through all of these voices who are willing to question and have a civilized conversation.

These were all my first thoughts on why I love the Emergent Church. I know that we will either agree or disagree on them. I am actually going to be working on “Why I Dislike the Emergent Church” as a follow up, but before I do I would like to know your thoughts about the above. Do you agree or disagree with the emergent church? why?

God, Peace, and Ghandi

I found this on Stephen Covey’s website. Steven Covey wrote “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People”. I’ve never read any of his books, but on his blog he talked about his favorite Mission statement. This missions statement came from Mahatma Ghandi:

“Let the first act of every morning be to make the following resolve for the day:
* I shall not fear anyone on Earth.
* I shall fear only God.
* I shall not bear ill will toward anyone.
* I shall not submit to injustice from anyone.
* I shall conquer untruth by truth. And in resisting untruth, I shall put up with all suffering.”

Most people think that peace and pacifism is not possible or achievable, especially living as christians today. Ghandi was proof that you can turn the other cheek and still have your message heard in the world when he led nationwide campaigns for the alleviation of poverty, for the liberation of women, for brotherhood amongst different religious and ethnic groups, for an end to untouchability and caste discrimination, and for the economic self-sufficiency of the nation, but above all for the independence of India from foreign domination. I believe that anyone, Christian of not, can learn a great deal about peace from Ghandi, especially if they live by his mission statement and apply it to their own lives…now how and where do we start? 

peace,

ron

Missional Church Quickie Thoughts

So earlier I asked the question, “What does the gospel look like?”, but I was in class so I couldn’t really answer it. I was hoping that someone else would. Here are some thoughts that I had of why we can see the gospel rather than hear it.

When the disciples were living and showing the gospel here are some common things that they all shared in their lives and message: 

1. It was about Jesus. Jesus was the center of everything they did. Jesus was the end of all conversation.
2. They lived revolutionary. The things that Jesus did when he lived were not for him but for God’s Kingdom. His followers made a great statement in following the example that Christ gave and contextualizing it wherever they went. People wanted to hear about Jesus because of his message about personal transformation and not personal happiness.
3. The lived in a communal life. This defined their movement in sharing what they had and enabled them to move from place to place. Jesus fed the thousands with what they had. They were able to share what they had to build community.
4. They were focused. They were intentional about establishing signs of christ and not signs of a Utopia. Their hope was in the coming of the kingdom.
5. They were long suffering. We know from the martyrs of the New Testament and even beyond. They were long suffering and still went out to help the diseased and destitute. They were willing to become witnesses to their culture.

Thoughts?

Missional Church Quickie

Here’s a question: What does living out the Gospel look like? Christians often talk about sharing the Gospel with others, but what does it look like? We spoke today about the tongues of fire in Acts 2. Somebody said that the tongues were how the gospel looked not how it sounded. hmmm. It was an interesting thought. Think about it and let me know what you think. Yes, this is a challenge for you and I to think and share. do it…do it.

The New “Thou Shalt Nots”

A couple more sins were added by the Catholic Church. Check em out!

What a Great Day.

Today ended up being a great day. This morning at Roosevelt was what, as a worship leader, I like to call the perfect storm…but in a good way. The sermon matched the content of the singing, which doesn’t really matter but it only aided what the speaker was saying. It was one of those moments where even though the setlist was planned over a month ago, the songs and their content aligned perfectly. I think what really hit home for me was leading the congregation in singing and looking to my right and seeing a lady weeping as she sang, “You give me life/You give me breath/You give me a heart to love you with/All I can do is worship You”, knowing that right now in her life she is carrying a lot of baggage. It’s that reminder that God can and will remember and redeem her, and she knows it. Oh, what a wonderful and powerful moment to witness!

After church, I watched “Balls of Fury” and edited devotional entries from my church. As another form of worship, we make devotional journals written by people in our congregation and press them and copy them. It’s an actual liturgy or work done by the people. If you would like a copy, or want to know more about the Devotional Journals, let me know.

Next I drove down to Bakke Grad School in Seattle and am staying in the Baroness Hotel with Cameron Garcia preparing to audit the class on the Missional Church. First off there was no traffic! Second, I’ll be blogging about the class while I am here for the next 3 days so keep checking in. I’m pretty excited to see what God is going to show me. I also finished “The Shaping of Things to Come”…wow! I have been avoiding this book like the plague because of the sources who told me it was great, but after reading it in preperation for this class, I think that this book is legit. Great stuff being said in it. I’ll blog about it later.

Finally, I went to Matt’s blog and read a great conversation on pacifism and our christian stances on different issues. Seriously, Matt is the smartest guy I know but he’ll never let you know that he is a secret genius. We have been friends since we were under appreciated interns/youth directors who took up space in an oversized church and office. Go over to his blog and join in on a conversation well worth your time.

How was your day? Was it at all as cool as mine?