This is the last installment of six focusing on living centered in Jesus. As previously blogged, I stated that “to be missional is to have Christ Jesus as the center of our purpose, focus, and direction (heart), to have Jesus as the center of our spirituality and meaning making in our lives (soul), to have Jesus as the center of all our living and in all what we do (strength), and to have Jesus as the center for our thinking and speaking (mind).”
To be missional is to have Christ Jesus as the center of all our thinking and speaking.
I relate this perspective to loving God with all our mind.
What does it mean to think and speak Jesus? One thing it does not mean is that we use Jesus’ name in every sentence or conversation – but rather that our thinking and speaking is centered in what Jesus would think and talk about, not so much content-wise, but the manner in which he addresses God’s desire for the wholeness of all humanity and creation.
A couple of years ago during Lent, the congregation I serve focused on Anabaptist spirituality using a resource by David Augsburger entitled, Dissident Discipleship: A Spirituality of Self-Surrender, Love of God, and Love of Neighbor. The first practice that Augsburger identified was the practice of Radical Attachment. He expressed that “radical attachment to Jesus is not believing something about Jesus (a pietistic experience), or believing in Jesus (a conversionist experience), but believing Jesus (in discipleship) and believing what Jesus believed (in imitation)” (p. 23).
To think and speak like Jesus has to do with believing Jesus and believing what Jesus believed. Jesus is more than the object of our faith – in which it could be argued that we set the tone of what or how we believe (in Jesus). To believe Jesus – to not only listen to him, but to be influenced by him, and to believe what Jesus believed – to be shaped by his belief in God, his mission, his love for humanity, his worldview, is to be transformed in all that we are and do – also transforming how we think and speak.
Do we think and speak in ways that place the agenda of our lives ahead of others, even ahead of God’s missional agenda for the world? If so, then we are thinking and speaking in ways which are not centered in Jesus. To think and speak centered in Christ is, in no matter what we do because all life is not wrapped up in Sunday worship, is to have the eyes of Christ – to grow noticing what Jesus noticed when Jesus took notice of people and situations all around him. It is also to have the ears of Christ – to grow hearing what Jesus heard and how Jesus heard as he gave attention to the people that he encountered. It is to have the mind of Christ – growing thinking about how God’s reign addresses and engages normal everyday events. It is to have the speech of Christ – speaking in ways that give voice to God’s passion for humanity, in ways that reveal the presence and concern of God in a broken and in need of healing world.
To think and speak centered in Jesus is to live being very conscious of the presence of God, through the Spirit of God, in every aspect of our living. Even though life is about caring for ourselves, our families, etc., it is not merely about us – we have been called out of the world to be a new human community demonstrating the purposes and mission of God in the world – living in such a way that we demonstrate God’s relationship with us and we with God, and living noticing and naming what God notices, expressing and extending the compassion, grace, and hospitality of God in every encounter we have.
To think and speak centered in Jesus is to realize that we are always on the lookout for where God is showing up. It is living an intensely God-aware life which shapes our worldview, our thinking, and our speaking.
I think this is what Paul was alluding to in his letter to the Church in Rome when he talked about “being transformed by the renewing of your mind,” a transforming that reframes us in ways that we no longer conform to the pattern of this world (cf. Romans 12: 2) – in everything, including our thinking and speaking
This Christ-centered way of thinking and speaking is also expressed in Paul’s letter to the Church in Colosse – “set you minds on things above, not earthly things. For you died and your life is now hidden with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:2).
Thinking and speaking centered in Christ changes the way we are and changes the way we are with others. May we be open to love the Lord with all our mind, being ones who are grasped by the Spirit of God to think and speak in such ways in the world that we express what and the way Jesus expressed hope and grace to a world in need of shalom.
Showing posts with label Loving God. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Loving God. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Vol 2:26 Being in Mission: Living Centered in Jesus – Loving God with all our soul
As previously blogged, I stated that “to be missional is to have Christ Jesus as the center of our purpose, focus, and direction (heart), to have Jesus as the center of our spirituality and meaning making in our lives (soul), to have Jesus as the center for all our living and in all what we do (strength), and to have Jesus as the center for our thinking and speaking (mind).”
To be missional is to have Christ Jesus as the center of our spirituality and meaning making in our lives
I relate this perspective to loving God with all our soul.
For me the crux of the question of “soul work,” as some persons have expressed it, is who or what is at the center of the spiritual work we are trying to do in our lives. In conversations over the years I have discovered that Jesus is often seen as merely a resource for the work of spirituality and meaning making we are doing in our lives – indicating that in fact we are at the center of the work we are doing in our lives. Spirituality then becomes our work, rather than what God is accomplishing in our lives. Such a spirituality is shaped by our interests, is more rooted in psychology, in which we make the determination of what we open ourselves to in shaping who we are as people. Therefore, rather than being a spirituality that is rooted in God, it is in fact more rooted in ourselves.
What does it look like then for Jesus to be the center of our spirituality, for Jesus to be the center of our meaning making in our lives?
For one, it means that we enter into a relationship with Jesus Christ where Jesus shapes the spirituality of our lives, where Jesus shapes us. In being a follower of Christ, we seek to be shaped and oriented around ways of living that exemplify the purposes of God. I.e., we seek for our lives to be shaped by what is important to Christ, rather than merely what is important to us.
Second, it involves us participating in this relationship with Christ as his disciples – ones who learn from him, ones who are open to Christ setting the agenda in our lives, ones who seek to live in obedience to him and his ways, recognizing that in doing so we ultimately discover who we are more than any agenda we may develop for ourselves. When we are in charge of our own spirituality, we seek to discern on our own the meaning and direction of our lives – and I have discovered that I am my own worst master. There are too many things in my life that distract me from living into that which Christ desires for me.
Third, it involves learning to see myself the way God sees me. It is through serving God in Christ, in worshiping God through Christ, that I begin to catch glimpses of the meaning and purpose that God has for me in loving me. Rather than thinking that I am enslaved and less human in serving God, I indeed have discovered that I am more enslaved and less humane when I seek to serve myself and be the sole director of the direction of my life. In serving God, in worshiping God, I am indeed liberated, more so than I can ever imagine.
I once conversed with a friend who was going off for a few weeks to do some soul work in his life, to sort through some inner child issues, to come to grips with some relational problems he was struggling with. He named the kind of work that he needed to do in his life as spiritual work. Now I recognize that we cannot compartmentalize our lives and all the work we do in our lives is indeed spiritual work, but the question I raise is who is doing the work in us – is it work God doing in us, or work we are doing relying on God as a mere resource along with other resources? I asked him a question as he was describing the work he was seeking to do in his life – I asked, “where is the ‘I have been crucified with Christ’ self or soul work he was seeking to do?” or “where is the ‘it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me’ self work that he was purposing to embark upon?” We need to do psychological work in our lives, but it is not spiritual work unless it is work that we yield to Christ to do in us – for sure in partnership with us, but it is work that we the direction of over to Jesus.
When Paul talks about in Philippians 2 that we are to work out our own salvation, it is not meant to work out our salvation on our own – but to be intentionally in relationship and in discipleship with Jesus who is accomplishing the work of God in us.
There are probably more things I could say on this, but the point I want to get at is that immersing ourselves in Christ is probably the best soul work we can engage in – it is work which yields ourselves to the transforming work of the Spirit of God in us, and equips us to be active participants with God in God’s redemptive mission in the world.
To be missional is to have Christ Jesus as the center of our spirituality and meaning making in our lives
I relate this perspective to loving God with all our soul.
For me the crux of the question of “soul work,” as some persons have expressed it, is who or what is at the center of the spiritual work we are trying to do in our lives. In conversations over the years I have discovered that Jesus is often seen as merely a resource for the work of spirituality and meaning making we are doing in our lives – indicating that in fact we are at the center of the work we are doing in our lives. Spirituality then becomes our work, rather than what God is accomplishing in our lives. Such a spirituality is shaped by our interests, is more rooted in psychology, in which we make the determination of what we open ourselves to in shaping who we are as people. Therefore, rather than being a spirituality that is rooted in God, it is in fact more rooted in ourselves.
What does it look like then for Jesus to be the center of our spirituality, for Jesus to be the center of our meaning making in our lives?
For one, it means that we enter into a relationship with Jesus Christ where Jesus shapes the spirituality of our lives, where Jesus shapes us. In being a follower of Christ, we seek to be shaped and oriented around ways of living that exemplify the purposes of God. I.e., we seek for our lives to be shaped by what is important to Christ, rather than merely what is important to us.
Second, it involves us participating in this relationship with Christ as his disciples – ones who learn from him, ones who are open to Christ setting the agenda in our lives, ones who seek to live in obedience to him and his ways, recognizing that in doing so we ultimately discover who we are more than any agenda we may develop for ourselves. When we are in charge of our own spirituality, we seek to discern on our own the meaning and direction of our lives – and I have discovered that I am my own worst master. There are too many things in my life that distract me from living into that which Christ desires for me.
Third, it involves learning to see myself the way God sees me. It is through serving God in Christ, in worshiping God through Christ, that I begin to catch glimpses of the meaning and purpose that God has for me in loving me. Rather than thinking that I am enslaved and less human in serving God, I indeed have discovered that I am more enslaved and less humane when I seek to serve myself and be the sole director of the direction of my life. In serving God, in worshiping God, I am indeed liberated, more so than I can ever imagine.
I once conversed with a friend who was going off for a few weeks to do some soul work in his life, to sort through some inner child issues, to come to grips with some relational problems he was struggling with. He named the kind of work that he needed to do in his life as spiritual work. Now I recognize that we cannot compartmentalize our lives and all the work we do in our lives is indeed spiritual work, but the question I raise is who is doing the work in us – is it work God doing in us, or work we are doing relying on God as a mere resource along with other resources? I asked him a question as he was describing the work he was seeking to do in his life – I asked, “where is the ‘I have been crucified with Christ’ self or soul work he was seeking to do?” or “where is the ‘it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me’ self work that he was purposing to embark upon?” We need to do psychological work in our lives, but it is not spiritual work unless it is work that we yield to Christ to do in us – for sure in partnership with us, but it is work that we the direction of over to Jesus.
When Paul talks about in Philippians 2 that we are to work out our own salvation, it is not meant to work out our salvation on our own – but to be intentionally in relationship and in discipleship with Jesus who is accomplishing the work of God in us.
There are probably more things I could say on this, but the point I want to get at is that immersing ourselves in Christ is probably the best soul work we can engage in – it is work which yields ourselves to the transforming work of the Spirit of God in us, and equips us to be active participants with God in God’s redemptive mission in the world.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Vol 2:25 Being in Mission: Living Centered in Jesus - Loving God with all our heart
I am back from my month-long reading sabbatical and grateful for the time granted me by my congregation for time for reading, reflection, and a little bit of relaxation as well. In future blogs I want to focus on how some of my reading is shaping my on-going missional engagement, but I realize that I was in the midst of a 4 or 5 part blog on living centered in Jesus – but I am sure some of my thoughts generated from this sabbatical will find their way into my comments.
I mentioned in a previous blog that “to be missional is to have Christ Jesus as the center of our purpose, focus, and direction (heart), to have Jesus as the center for our spirituality and meaning making in our lives (soul), to have Jesus as the center for all our living and in all what we do (strength), and to have Jesus as the center for our thinking and speaking (mind).”
To be missional is to have Christ Jesus as the center of our purpose, focus, and direction
I relate this perspective to loving God with all our heart.
What or who we place at the center of our lives has a way of shaping everything else that we are and do. If Christ is compartmentalized in our life, then he serves whatever we have placed at the center. This language of loving God with all our heart is language of worship and it is in a worshipful attitude that we need to explore what it means for Jesus being the center of our purpose, our focus, our direction in life.
Another voice in this exploration comes from one of the books I read during my sabbatical – Walter Brueggemann’s Praying the Psalms. He talks about the Psalms as being disorienting and reorienting. The Psalms challenge our old orientations in which we rely upon ourselves, we trust in ourselves and as a result see the difficulties or vanity of life all around us. This challenging of our old orientations is mean to disorient us, to knock us off of what we hold as centers in our lives in order to see the inability for such centers to sustain us as human beings. In response, the Psalms reorient us to a new center – a center that is God, trust in God, reliance upon God – the One who alone is God (YHWH) – who alone can lead us in ways that shape us to be who we were created to be.
When something or someone else besides Jesus is the center of our lives, our lives will continue to be disoriented – we will come face to face with life’s struggles and not know how to get passed them in a healthy way. In centering our lives in Jesus our lives are reoriented to the things of God and around the things of God. Our lives are reoriented to notice what God notices, to see what God sees, to see what God is doing, to hear what God is saying. In our lives being centered in Jesus, all of who we are and what we do is reoriented around the purposes of God – which guides the living of our lives in radically different ways, than when something else has been the center.
Being missional is more than being about the task of engaging in mission, or being incarnational – it is first and foremost about loving God with all our heart. Such a loving is founded upon a reorientation of our lives that only happens as we are rooted and centered in Jesus Christ.
May we live in such a way that we are always open to the reorienting love in God shaping and directing our living.
I mentioned in a previous blog that “to be missional is to have Christ Jesus as the center of our purpose, focus, and direction (heart), to have Jesus as the center for our spirituality and meaning making in our lives (soul), to have Jesus as the center for all our living and in all what we do (strength), and to have Jesus as the center for our thinking and speaking (mind).”
To be missional is to have Christ Jesus as the center of our purpose, focus, and direction
I relate this perspective to loving God with all our heart.
What or who we place at the center of our lives has a way of shaping everything else that we are and do. If Christ is compartmentalized in our life, then he serves whatever we have placed at the center. This language of loving God with all our heart is language of worship and it is in a worshipful attitude that we need to explore what it means for Jesus being the center of our purpose, our focus, our direction in life.
Another voice in this exploration comes from one of the books I read during my sabbatical – Walter Brueggemann’s Praying the Psalms. He talks about the Psalms as being disorienting and reorienting. The Psalms challenge our old orientations in which we rely upon ourselves, we trust in ourselves and as a result see the difficulties or vanity of life all around us. This challenging of our old orientations is mean to disorient us, to knock us off of what we hold as centers in our lives in order to see the inability for such centers to sustain us as human beings. In response, the Psalms reorient us to a new center – a center that is God, trust in God, reliance upon God – the One who alone is God (YHWH) – who alone can lead us in ways that shape us to be who we were created to be.
When something or someone else besides Jesus is the center of our lives, our lives will continue to be disoriented – we will come face to face with life’s struggles and not know how to get passed them in a healthy way. In centering our lives in Jesus our lives are reoriented to the things of God and around the things of God. Our lives are reoriented to notice what God notices, to see what God sees, to see what God is doing, to hear what God is saying. In our lives being centered in Jesus, all of who we are and what we do is reoriented around the purposes of God – which guides the living of our lives in radically different ways, than when something else has been the center.
Being missional is more than being about the task of engaging in mission, or being incarnational – it is first and foremost about loving God with all our heart. Such a loving is founded upon a reorientation of our lives that only happens as we are rooted and centered in Jesus Christ.
May we live in such a way that we are always open to the reorienting love in God shaping and directing our living.
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Vol 2:5 In the Midst of Mission Let Us Not Forget to Love God
Last week I was at the Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminaries in Elkhart, IN for a week-long Pastor’s Conference. Two things shaped me that week that focus my thoughts this week.
I picked up Stanley Hauerwas’ Hannah’s Child: A Theologian’s Memoir, which I read whenever I could find a place to sit down to read. Also, on Thursday morning, Leonard Dow, a Mennonite pastor from Philadelphia, preached reminding us not to forget to say “I love you Jesus” in the midst of our living.
In walking with Hauerwas as he reflects on his life journey and being reminded to say “I love you God,” I was reminded how human we are in the midst of our living – and how God is with us in the midst of our humanity. We are not alone – God is with us; we have been and are being set free from all that seeks to destroy us through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ; we are sustained as the Holy Spirit dwells within us; we are loved by God!
We are loved by God and God involves us in God’s mission because God loves us.
One of the things I have noticed about me is that in being missional I can quickly be caught up with the task of being involved in mission. I recognize that God is the initiator and accomplisher of God’s mission, but I realize that I am so caught up in “doing mission” that I forget to love the Lord my God. I may think it at times, but I find myself not saying it to God – hardly ever. I do love God, very deeply, and with all of my being – but in being caught up in mission I have forgotten to say these words outloud:
“I love you God, I thank you for all that you are doing in me, for wherever you are leading me, that you are leading me. I love you. I thank you that, as inept as I am, you trust me more than I trust myself in participating with you in seeing your will being done on earth just as it is in heaven. Jesus, I love you. You are with me – I am not alone – you sustain me, your flood me with your grace, your peace – and in times of loneliness or self-doubt you are with me, loving me. I love you Lord.”
Our involvement in mission is not to be a task, nor being a missional people is to be a mere duty-filled act of obedience. Our involvement in mission, in participating with God, is an act of worshiping God, an act of loving God. If it is not, no matter how engaged in mission we are, no matter how we move back into the neighborhood, we will miss revealing that God is redeeming the world because God loves the world – that God so loves the world that God sent the One and Only Son to be with us, not to condemn the world, but to set all humanity free (cf. John 3:16-17).
Our being a missional people is a call that is lived out in response to worshiping God, to loving God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, with all our strength. We are so good at doing – Lord help us to express our love to you with our words, with our voices, with our lives, and with our actions.
Join me in expressing our “I love you" to God.
I picked up Stanley Hauerwas’ Hannah’s Child: A Theologian’s Memoir, which I read whenever I could find a place to sit down to read. Also, on Thursday morning, Leonard Dow, a Mennonite pastor from Philadelphia, preached reminding us not to forget to say “I love you Jesus” in the midst of our living.
In walking with Hauerwas as he reflects on his life journey and being reminded to say “I love you God,” I was reminded how human we are in the midst of our living – and how God is with us in the midst of our humanity. We are not alone – God is with us; we have been and are being set free from all that seeks to destroy us through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ; we are sustained as the Holy Spirit dwells within us; we are loved by God!
We are loved by God and God involves us in God’s mission because God loves us.
One of the things I have noticed about me is that in being missional I can quickly be caught up with the task of being involved in mission. I recognize that God is the initiator and accomplisher of God’s mission, but I realize that I am so caught up in “doing mission” that I forget to love the Lord my God. I may think it at times, but I find myself not saying it to God – hardly ever. I do love God, very deeply, and with all of my being – but in being caught up in mission I have forgotten to say these words outloud:
“I love you God, I thank you for all that you are doing in me, for wherever you are leading me, that you are leading me. I love you. I thank you that, as inept as I am, you trust me more than I trust myself in participating with you in seeing your will being done on earth just as it is in heaven. Jesus, I love you. You are with me – I am not alone – you sustain me, your flood me with your grace, your peace – and in times of loneliness or self-doubt you are with me, loving me. I love you Lord.”
Our involvement in mission is not to be a task, nor being a missional people is to be a mere duty-filled act of obedience. Our involvement in mission, in participating with God, is an act of worshiping God, an act of loving God. If it is not, no matter how engaged in mission we are, no matter how we move back into the neighborhood, we will miss revealing that God is redeeming the world because God loves the world – that God so loves the world that God sent the One and Only Son to be with us, not to condemn the world, but to set all humanity free (cf. John 3:16-17).
Our being a missional people is a call that is lived out in response to worshiping God, to loving God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, with all our strength. We are so good at doing – Lord help us to express our love to you with our words, with our voices, with our lives, and with our actions.
Join me in expressing our “I love you" to God.
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