This is what idolatry looks like

Australia has its own permutations of this, but sometimes it can help to see just how ugly greed can be in a context a little distant from ours in order to help us to see our own context with fresh eyes.

The day after they've given thanks for all they have, people are trampling and even killing each other to grab more (largely unnecessary) stuff. I have thought for some time that the main antidote to the idolatry of consumerist greed is thankfulness, but reflecting on this juxtaposition in the US cultural calendar makes me question that assumption. While I have been thinking and teaching for many years that thankfulness is the path to contentment, perhaps I should be concentrating more on the cultivation of trust in God's future goodness as a more important source of satisfaction. Giving thanks may briefly shift my gaze from the next purchase to what is already in my hand, but if this is to be more than a momentary distraction from the insatiable hunger for more, we need a healing of the heart: a cleaning, filling and binding of the gaping wound that our purchases briefly and ineffectually seek to soothe. Indeed, sometimes what looks like thankfulness can merely be "entitlement in thankfulness clothing",* as our thanksgiving can serve to baptise our current level of affluence, neutralising any critical reflection on the purposes and consequences of that affluence. Perhaps this particular demon requires not just prayers of thanksgiving, but also fasting.
*A phrase from my friend Claire Johnston, who helped me rethink my understanding in a recent Facebook discussion of this video.

At a practical level, minimising exposure to advertising is critically important, since though we all deny being influenced by silly ads, corporations know that we're fooling ourselves and so willingly spend hundreds of billions of dollars each year on an industry designed to erode our contentment and corrupt our desires. But it is not just avoiding the negative messages; we need to soak in the message of divine truth, grace and delight. The healing of desire is a slow process and there are no shortcuts.

One final unrelated thought: there are omnipresent riot police for every peaceful demonstration, but where are the shields and paddy wagons for these mobs? Just to be clear: I am staunchly opposed to heavy-handed policing and think that the criminalisation of dissent is a grievous injury to any claim to democratic society. I'm simply noting an irony that the surveillance and security state manages to coordinate a massive police presence at any event that might threaten the culture of endless corporate profits, but seem largely absent at these far more violent spectacles dedicated to the pursuit of that end.

Ecological responsibility and Christian discipleship III: Recycle or repent?

The final piece of a three part series blogging a sermon preached at St Paul's and St George's 9 am service on 30th January 2011.

I. Human planet: Welcome to the Anthropocene.
II. The Community of Creation: Genesis 1.
III. Recycle or repent? Our response.

Recycle or repent? Our response
Mentioning Jesus reminds us that we're in a series on discipleship, on what it means for us to be called to be Jesus' disciples today. A disciple is a dedicated pupil and if we are to be disciples, it means devoting ourselves to learning everyday from Jesus, learning not just about God, but also about ourselves and our world. It means letting Jesus set the agenda for our lives, seeking to follow in the path that he pioneered. This isn’t a hobby or one aspect of life. Following Jesus requires every minute in our schedule, every pound in our wallets, every relationship, every thought, every breath. This doesn't mean that we spend all our time doing "spiritual things", but that we learn to see all that we do as spiritual.

And that includes our relationship to the created order, to the increasingly fragmented, polluted, scarred, strip-mined, deforested, acidifying, destabilised planet and its life systems that God still promises us is fundamentally good, fundamentally of value in itself, not just in what it can offer us. This too is part of Christian discipleship and demands our attention and reflection, our commitment, repentance and love.

We’re not just talking here about recycling and changing light-bulbs. We're not just talking about planting trees or cycling or taking public transport or flying less or shopping locally or eating less meat or switching to renewable energy companies or buying MSC-certified fish.

By all means, do these things – they are no-brainers. But behaviour modification barely scratches the surface. We need a heart change, which Holy Scripture calls repentance. Lying behind so many of the trends towards ecological degradation are our consumerist lifestyles and their export into the developing world. The whole world can't live at our levels of consumption. So out of justice, out of love, out of what it means to be human and a creature of God, we cannot go on living at our level of consumption.

We need to be turned upside down by the good news that Jesus died to reconcile all things to God. How can we preach the good news of liberation from sin without also proclaiming and pursing a life that turns from selfishness and respects the goodness and integrity of God’s world? How can we love our neighbours without considering their well-being as a whole: physical, emotional, social, spiritual and ecological? How can we pray that God’s will would be done on earth as it is in heaven and not pay attention to the earth for which we pray?

So composting and turning off the lights when you leave a room are just the tip of the iceberg. The good news of Jesus invites us into a whole-of-life creative resistance to ecological destruction.

First, be thankful. Christian discipleship starts in joy, not fear. It flows from peace, not anxiety. It is a liberation to do what is best, not being forced to do the minimum out of guilt. The world, however marred, is still good and worthy of our thanksgiving.

Second, repent of consumerism. We are not defined by what we buy. We do not need the latest fashion or the shiniest gadget. You don’t need meat every meal or international travel every holiday, we don't need to earn more and spend more. God gives us every good thing to enjoy, and so there is no need to hoard. We can learn contentment, which is grounded in step one: thankfulness. Smashing the hollow idol of endless consumption is not only good for the planet, but also necessary for the soul.

Third, embrace life. We belong to the earth. We are each members of something bigger than ourselves, bigger even than humanity: a creation awaiting its Sabbath rest in God. And so keep learning about the world, opening your eyes to the wonder, mystery and beauty – as well as the tragedy – around us. Find out what is happening to our planet. Mourn for what is being lost. And join with others in creative resistance. And then, perhaps, on a planet with all too many human scars, we may, by God's grace, become humans worthy of the name.
Readers with sharp memories may recall that I've ripped much of this post from the end of my related series on Why be green? Ecology and the gospel. What can I say? I love recycling! If you feel you've really missed out as a result, then try reading the expanded version: twelve easy very difficult steps to ecological responsibility.

On imagining the future: Human action is reaction

"Come now you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a town and spend a year there, doing business and making money.' Yet you do not even know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, 'If the Lord wishes, will live and do this or that.' As it is, you in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil. Anyone, then, who knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, commits sin."

- James 4.13-17 (NRSV).

If making confident assertions of the likely course of my personal life is arrogance that ignores the fact that I am not in control, then expanding such claims to society as a whole seems sheer hubris.

Nonetheless, it is important to note that this passage from James doesn't rule out all expectations of the future playing a role in decision-making. It is not that Christians are forbidden from considering the future or making plans based on such considerations, but that all our plans must be written in pencil, not ink. This requires a certain chastisement of imagination, or perhaps better, imagination's acknowledgement that it is imagination. The future is uncertain; it is an arrogant boast to confuse pictures of a possible future with our desires for the future and assume that we can (or must) ensure the realisation of those desires.

The future is not ours to seize and shape, but God's to give and take. Our role is humble receptivity, trusting thankfulness, loving perception and hopeful prayer.

Does this stance foster passivity, a resignation in the face of suffering and so a complicity in failure to secure liberation for the oppressed? It can and all too often has. But it need not. And a thorough account of human action will be more open, more honest, more creative and more effective for taking the priority of divine grace more seriously. God initiates, we respond. Human action is reaction. That is the lesson of James.

This does not require passivity, rather an openness to the unfolding possibilities of loving God and neighbour, an openness in which we take seriously our situation and take just as seriously the Spirit's power to breathe new life into hearts of stone.

Each of us is thrown into a concrete historical situation that is neither of our choosing nor our fashioning, born within a family and culture that we can only receive. Rejection or reformation are, of course, forms of reception. We do not begin with a blank slate, even if we wish to shatter or erase what is written. We are born amidst a broken glory. Unbidden, we both rejoice and suffer as a result. Our world, our selves and our time are not creatures of our will, to be made into whatever image we desire. We receive them. And we receive them as the gift of God despite the flaws evident in them, giving thanks for what is good, trusting that what is not is not beyond redemption.

No deficiency in my self or my shared world or the span of time for my life is excluded from this trusting acceptance because at the heart of the world, self and time which I receive lies Christ, who is the hope of healing, of new life in the deadest of ends, of space to breathe.

And so the gift received is my life: my self, my world and the time of the former amidst the latter. And the hidden centre of that gift is Christ, who is the image of my true self, the founding principle of creation and the alpha and omega of time. Human action begins in humble receptivity towards and trusting thanksgiving for that gift.

Yet I am also called to account for what becomes of my self, my world and my time. The gift brings responsibility. Not only is the gift to be received, but understood, entered into and explored. The gift invites not mere submission of the will, but the delight of the heart, the joyful harmonising of the affects. Coming to know this gift involves not simply the intellect but crucially love. Only a participation in God's passionate concern for his creation (whether or not this is how we conceive it) enables us to see what is actually around us. The dispassionate observation of objective inquiry is frequently a necessary step in this process, but it is a limiting of focus that occurs within a broader framework of care. We learn about the world and ourselves and the time available to us because we care what happens, who we are to become. We are responsible for the gifts we have received.

And having become responsible, we therefore care about possible futures, about paths that open before us, about the destiny of the good things entrusted to us. We face future prospects because we cannot do otherwise without closing our hearts and hands. And faithful imagination requires the abandonment of false hopes, as well as the rejection of myopic assumptions that things must remain as they are. The pursuit of responsible care for the gifts we have received may require of us the rejection of utopian fantasies, but also the questioning of the status quo. What we may hope for along the way is neither ease nor comfort, but that the road we walk will not, ultimately, be a dead end, that our labours of love will not be in vain.

The future is not ours to seize and shape, but God's to give and take. Our role is humble receptivity, trusting thankfulness, loving perception and hopeful prayer.

The path of faith, hope and love - that is, the path of true human action in the way of the crucified and risen Christ - is narrow, dangerous and often not immediately perceptible. It can only be walked with prayerful dependence and an ongoing openness to correction and further guidance. But it is a journey into life.

What shall we do? Twelve responses to converging crises

Responding to contemporary converging crises
Human society faces a series of converging crises in our economy, energy and ecology. It is very difficult to know exactly how these will interact and pan out. The depth and breadth of the problems can be overwhelming. Recently, a Christian friend asked me for personal advice as to what he can and should do to take these matters seriously. I made the following suggestions (what have I missed? Or how would you improve this list?):

1. Give thanks for the good world. There is so much going wrong with the world and yet it remains a good gift of the Creator. It is right to grieve, but a healthy grief requires the nurturing of our wonder and appreciation for the goodness of the creation that our actions are degrading.

2. Repent of the patterns of consumption and acquisition that lie behind so much of our destructiveness. Billions are spent every year in a largely successful effort to corrupt our desires, convincing us to covet the cornucopia of stuff that pours out of the world's factories. Learning contentment is at the heart of a good response, since it frees us from feeling the need to protect our toys or way of life and so enables us to focus on what is important and worth preserving (the glory of God, the welfare of our neighbour, communities of trust, the richness of God's creation, and so on). This may not end up "saving civilisation", but it helps us keep our heads when all around us are losing theirs.

3. Stay rooted in the gospel of grace, hope, peace and joy that celebrates Christ's death and resurrection so that you are free to grieve, yearn, groan and lament, that is, to pray. The temptation is to look away or harden our heart to the damage and the danger because it hurts too much.

4. Reject false hopes. We are not going to make it out of this place alive, either personally or as a society. The goal is not to secure immortality, but to love, trust and hope. Society is likely to change significantly or even radically during our lifetimes. The myths of endless growth, progress and individualism are likely to be unmasked for the illusions that they are (though this will be resisted because people hate to lose their dreams, far less to admit that their dreams were actually a nightmare). New illusions are likely to replace them. Survival is not your highest goal. Self-protection is a secondary consideration.

5. Assess your life and habitual patterns to see where your ecological footprint can be significantly reduced: eating less meat, flying less frequently or not at all, driving less or not at all, switching to a renewable energy provider, investing in insulation and local power generation, avoiding all unnecessary purchases and buying responsibly (e.g. food that hasn't been strip mining the soil, local products, durable products, and so on).

6. Invest in communities of trust. If and when things get difficult or there are significant disruptions to "normal", then people tend to distrust strangers, but to keep their friends closer. Get to know your neighbours and people in your local community. Strengthen your ties to a local church.

7. Engage organisations seeking to transition to a more resilient and less destructive society (such as the Transition Network, concerning which I'll have more to say soon).

8. Get out of debt, as far as possible. Debt is a bet that the future is going to be more prosperous than the present so that I can incur debt now and will have plenty to pay it off later. This assumption is becoming increasingly dangerous. Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another (Romans 12.8).

9. Petition governments and corporations as citizens, not simply consumers. The roots of our problems are far larger and more systemic than consumer choice or personal greed. Structural changes are required to reduce the damage we are doing. Here is a good example of a letter to banks that briefly makes the case for disinvestment in fossil fuel projects on both ethical and business grounds. Such engagement may begin with petitions or letters, but it certainly needn't end there. Civil disobedience has a noble history in reforming unjust laws and practices.

10. Learn to garden or some other useful skill that you can share with others and which keeps you grounded in the material basis of our existence.

11. Keep learning more about the world and its problems and opportunities. We live in a novel period historically and we currently have the benefit of a large and growing body of research into these matters. Having some idea of the major threats and what they might mean for you, your community, your society and the world helps to orient your practical reason and will make you a more responsible citizen and neighbour.

12. Proclaim the good news, using every means you have, that Jesus is the true and living way, the dawn from on high that has broken upon us who live under the shadow of death and ecological disruption, and which guides our feet in the way of peace.

Why be green? Ecology and the gospel III

A series in three parts
Part One: God the materialist
Part Two: The renewal of all things
Part Three: Three steps towards heaven on earth

Part Three: Three steps towards heaven on earth
Therefore, if the greatest moral challenge of our day is whether we will turn to Christ or anti-Christ, whether we will embrace life or remain in death, whether we will walk in faith, hope and love or remain imprisoned in their opposites, then we can only do so as creatures. Ecological responsibility is not an alternative or distraction from the life of faith, hope and love, but one non-negotiable aspect of it. Ecological concern is not the gospel nor does it stand in competition with the proclamation of the gospel. Rather, it is bound up in the proclamation of the gospel as one of the many spheres of life in which we need to repent and turn from the idolatry of consumerism and greed. How can we preach the good news of liberation from sin without also proclaiming and pursing a life that turns from selfishness and respects the goodness and integrity of God’s world? How can we love our neighbours without considering their well-being as a whole: spiritual, mental, emotional, social, physical and ecological? How can we pray that God’s will would be done on earth as it is in heaven and not pay attention to the earth for which we pray?

For those already inclined to ecological activism, the gospel provides a more sustainable basis in faith, hope and love, rather than the all too common motives of fear and guilt. For those who are apathetic, the scriptures warn us lest we join the destroyers of the earth (Revelation 13.18), and they invite us into freedom from thoughtless consumption and into concern for the least, who are usually the ones to suffer first and most from ecological disasters.

So, as creatures of the Creator, disciples of the risen Christ, filled with the Spirit who brings life and new life, what are we then to do? I would suggest three initial steps.

First, be thankful. Christian ethics starts in joy, not fear. It flows from peace, not anxiety. It is a liberation to do what is best, not being forced to do the minimum out of guilt.

Second, repent of consumerism. We are not defined by what we buy. We do not need the latest fashion or the shiniest gadget. You don’t need meat every meal or international travel every holiday. God gives us every good thing to enjoy, and so there is no need to hoard. We can learn contentment, which is grounded in step one: thankfulness. Smashing the hollow idol of endless consumption is not only good for the planet, but also necessary for the soul.

Third, embrace life. We belong to the earth. We are each members of something bigger than ourselves, bigger even than humanity: a creation awaiting its Sabbath rest in God. And so keep learning about the world, opening your eyes to the wonder, mystery and beauty around us. Find out what is happening to our planet. Mourn for what is being lost and become involved in movements that seek to nurture life.

Human actions continue to disfigure God’s creation, closing down possibilities and even threatening the viability of society. God doesn’t promise to stop us from destroying ourselves, but the good news of the risen Jesus reveals that he can bring new life even in the most deadly of ends. That is news worth sharing, news worth living.
These three posts were written as an article for AFES's SALT Magazine and are re-posted here with permission.

Grumbling vs Lament: how to complain faithfully

Do all things without murmuring or arguing.

- Philippians 2.14

Throughout the Scriptures, there are two streams of complaint. One is roundly condemned as grumbling or murmuring and the other is held out as a model of godliness and is usually called lament or groaning. The former is exemplified by the children of Israel in the wilderness wanderings and the latter is found throughout the Psalms as well as being at the centre of one of my favourite NT passages.

But what is the difference between them? Is it possible to lament without grumbling, to groan without murmuring? In both cases, the speaker is discontent with the present circumstances and expresses this verbally. In both cases, there can be strong emotions of anger and frustration, of pain and sorrow. But there are three key differences between healthy and unhealthy dissatisfaction.

First, a different basis. Grumbling can be based on a perceived lack that has confused a want for a need. I might wish I had more money, but I doubt that I actually need more money. Sometimes this very lack can be a gift of God to stretch our trust and mature our perspective. Our society has largely forgotten what contentment looks like, particularly material contentment. "Godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that." (1 Timonthy 6.6-8) "I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want." (Philippians 4.11-12) We don't need very much at all. That so many of us are massively wealthy is a blessing and a responsibility. But let's make sure that our complaints are not over something where contentment and thankfulness would be more appropriate. That said, when the Israelites complained for lack of food and water, this was a genuine need. So the basis of the complaint is not in itself sufficient to distinguish between murmuring and lament.

Second, a different primary audience. The children of Israel in the desert grumbled against Moses. The psalmist generally takes his complaint directly to God. When someone has a problem with me, if he just gripes about it behind my back, he does me a disservice and removes the possibility of a truthful and productive confrontation. He ought to either bear with my idiosyncrasy, or if it is a genuine fault, then he should speak to me with gentleness, humility and compassion, seeking to show me the problem, restore the relationship and help me grow. The last thing he needs to do is whinge about me to someone else. Similarly, if I have a beef with God, then that complaint ought to be brought into our relationship. God is big enough to handle it.

Third, and perhaps most importantly, there is a difference in temporal aspect. By this I mean that grumbling looks backwards at a real or perceived golden age and wishes that one were still back there while groaning looks forward to God's as yet unfulfilled promises. Compare these two examples:

“If only we had died by the LORD’s hand in Egypt! There we sat round pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.” (Exodus 16.3)

How long, O LORD? Will you forget me for ever?
    How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and every day have sorrow in my heart?
    How long will my enemy triumph over me?
Look on me and answer, O LORD my God.
    Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death;
my enemy will say, “I have overcome him,”
    and my foes will rejoice when I fall.
But I trust in your unfailing love;
    my heart rejoices in your salvation.
I will sing to the LORD,
    for he has been good to me. (Psalm 13)

The first example looks backwards to good old days (!) in Egypt; the second looks forwards to the day when the psalmist will be rescued from his predicament.

Grumbling assumes that we know what is best and that this corresponds to where we have been. Better the devil you know. Better to be trapped in Egypt and live than to risk life in the desert for the sake of an unseen promise. That is grumbling. It looks backwards and does not trust. But faithful complaint looks forward to what has been promised. It yearns and aches and earnestly seeks the coming of God’s kingdom and is not content with the compromises and brokenness of today. In difficulty, it doesn’t ask “why is this happening to me?” or “what have I done to deserve this?” but simply “how long, O Lord, until you fulfil your promise?”

So don’t look back with regret, wistfully remembering or imagining what life would be like if only you didn’t have to take up your cross and follow Jesus. Instead, look forward with hope, to God’s coming kingdom, to the resurrection of the body, to God’s ultimate victory over all that enslaves and pollutes his good world. When you complain, complain faithfully.

This is my body...

I've been pondering recently the words of administration used in Communion/Eucharist/Lord's Supper services when the elements are served to the communicants. I'm no sacramentologist or liturgical historian and don't really want to get into debates about real presence, however, a little piece of liturgical history might help give some context for those unfamiliar with such debates.

In his 1549 Book of Common Prayer, the first of its kind in English, Anglican Reformer Archbishop Cranmer instructed that these words be used by the minister "when he delivereth the Bread/Cup to anyone":

The body/blood of our Lord Jesus Christ which was given/shed for thee, preserve thy body and soul unto everlasting life.

These words are often read as referring to the identity of the elements so that (in some "physical" sense) the bread is Christ's body and the wine is his blood. However, notice that Cranmer's words are ambiguous. Taking the form of a prayer, they simply petition God for the preservation of the communicant's salvation (notice too the good resurrection theology implied in body and soul) through the broken body and shed blood of Christ. Nothing is said explicitly here about the status of the elements, leaving open a variety of different understandings about the relationship between the bread and wine being consumed and the body and blood which save.

By the 1552 edition of the prayer book, Archbishop Cranmer replaced the words of administration with this formula:

Take and eat this, in remembrance that Christ died for thee, and feed on him in thy heart by faith, with thanksgiving. ... Drink this in remembrance that Christ's blood was shed for thee, and be thankful.

The feeding upon Christ is now explicitly in thy heart and by faith. Notice again, however, that nothing is said explicitly about the status of the elements.

Part of Cranmer's genius in both formulations is to shift our attention from the status of the elements to the meaning of the act of eating them. This meaning is tied in with Christ's saving work in his death; to speak of shed blood and a broken body make a closer reference to the narrative of Christ's passion than simply mentioning body and blood.

In 1559, after Cranmer's execution, a third English prayer book was approved by Elizabeth I. The words of administration were simply a combination of 1549 and 1552:

The body of our Lord Jesus Christ which was given for thee, preserve thy body and soul unto everlasting life; and take and eat this, in remembrance that Christ died for thee, and feed on him in thy heart by faith, with thanksgiving. ... The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ which was shed for thee, preserve thy body and soul unto everlasting life; and drink this in remembrance that Christ's blood was shed for thee, and be thankful.

It's quite a mouthful, but it was this form that was picked up and used again in the definitive 1662 Book of Common Prayer, which continued to be the standard until a series of liturgical revisions across the Anglican communion in the twentieth century.

In Scotland, the words of administration were revised a number of time. In 1929, they were pared back to just the 1549 words, then a further revision in 1970 added this instruction: After the Words of Administration the Communicant shall answer Amen. The Words of Administration may be shortened at the discretion of the Priest. And then in 1982 (the current form still in use), a decisive shift occurred:

The Body/Blood of Christ given/shed for you.

Notice not only the capitals, but more importantly, the grammatical shift from petition to exclamation. No longer is a prayer being offered for the preservation of the communicant's salvation through Christ's passion. Instead, a nominal phrase (without a main verb) is substituted, which has the function of directing attention back to the elements themselves. More or less, these words say "Wow!" or "Look!".

However, having been to a number of communion services here in Scotland, I've noticed in both Scottish Episcopalian (Anglican) and Church of Scotland (Presbyterian) gatherings that even the narrative reference to "giving" and "shedding" are dropped, leaving simply the Roman Catholic words, which are short and to the point:

The body/blood of Christ.

Jesus: friend of sinners

Church: a place for broken people

Just as surely as God desires to lead us to a knowledge of genuine Christian fellowship, so surely must we be overwhelmed by a great disillusionment with others, with Christians in general, and, if we are fortunate, with ourselves. By sheer grace, God will not permit us to live even for a brief period in a dream world. He does not abandon us to those rapturous experiences and lofty moods that come over us like a dream. God is not a God of the emotions but the God of truth. Only that fellowship which faces such disillusionment, with all its unhappy and ugly aspects, begins to be what it should be in God's sight, begins to grasp in faith the promise that is given to it. The sooner this shock of disillusionment comes to an individual and to a community, the better for both. A community which cannot bear and cannot survive such a crisis, which insists upon keeping its illusion when it should be shattered, permanently loses in that moment the promise of Christian community. Sooner or later it will collapse. Every human wish dream that is injected into the Christian community is a hindrance to genuine community and must be banished if genuine community is to survive. He who loves his dream of a community more that the Christian community itself becomes a destroyer of the latter, even though his personal intentions may be ever so honest and earnest and sacrificial.

God hates visionary dreaming; it makes the dreamer proud and pretentious. The man who fashions a visionary ideal of community demands that it be realized by God, by others, and by himself. He enters the community of Christians with his demands, sets up his own laws, and judges the brethren and God himself accordingly. He stands adamant, a living reproach to all others in the circle of the brethren. He acts as if he is the creator of the Christian community, as if his dream binds men together. When things do not go his way, he calls the effort a failure. When his ideal picture is destroyed, he sees the community going to smash. So he becomes, first an accuser of his brethren, then an accuser of God, and finally the despairing accuser of himself.

Because God has already laid the only foundation of our fellowship, because God has bound us together in one body with other Christians in Jesus Christ, long before we entered into common life with them, we enter into that common life not as demanders but as thankful recipients. We thank God for giving us brethren who live by his call, by his forgiveness, and his promise. We do not complain of what God does not give us; we rather thank God for what he does give us daily. And is not what has been given us enough: brothers, who will go on living with us through sin and need under the blessing of his grace? Is the divine gift of Christian fellowship anything less than this, any day, even the most difficult and distressing day? Even when sin and misunderstanding burden the communal life, is not the sinning brother still a brother, with whom I, too, stand under the Word of Christ? Will not his sin be a constant occasion for me to give thanks that both of us may live in the forgiving love of God in Christ Jesus? Thus, the very hour of disillusionment with my brother becomes incomparably salutary, because it so thoroughly teaches me that neither of us can ever live by our own words and deeds, but only by the one Word and Deed which really binds us together--the forgiveness of sins in Jesus Christ. When the morning mists of dreams vanish, then dawns the bright day of Christian fellowship.

– Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together, 15-17.

Jesus was not ashamed to share company with tax collectors and prostitutes; he was called "the friend of sinners" and invited national traitors to join his renewal movement (Mark 2.13-17). If we would eat with Jesus, we too become friends with the friend of sinners and are revealed as those who are sick, in need of a physician. The company Jesus keeps is not with those who believe themselves perfect, or superior, or pure, but with those who know they need such a friend. The church is a place for broken people.

With whom do you eat?
Ten points for guessing the Sydney church building.

Jesus and climate change VI

And God made us to enjoy and care for his world. The picture in the opening pages of the Bible is one in which humanity was intended to extend God’s good order in the garden, to make God's good world more fruitful. Humans were to lead and join with the rest of creation in bringing glory to God through the abundant and thankful enjoyment of all that is good. This means that caring for the non-human created order is actually part of worshipping God since we are allowing creation to give glory to God as he intended.

Many people think of spirituality as downplaying the importance of the physical in favour of the ‘spiritual’. For Christian spirituality, the physical and what we do with it is spiritual, because it is God’s Spirit that brings life to all that lives. Or put another way, matter matters.

“In order fully to access, enjoy and profit from our environment, we need to see it as something that does not exist just to serve our needs. Or, to put it another way, we are best served by our environment when we stop thinking of it as there to serve us. When we can imagine what is materially around us as existing in relation to something other than our own purposes, we are free to be surprised, educated and enlarged by it. When we obsessively seek to guarantee that the environment will always be there for us as a storehouse of raw materials, we in fact shrink our own humanity by shrinking what is there to surprise and enlarge, by reducing our capacity for contemplation of what is really other to us.”

- Rowan Williams, Ecology and Economy lecture (2005).

UPDATE: Fixed broken link to RW's article, now that the Archbishop's website has been re-arranged.
Series: I; II; III; IV; V; VI; VII; VIII; IX; IX(b); X; XI; XII; XIII; XIV; XV.

Jesus and climate change V

Seeing "creation"
To speak of "creation" rather than "nature" or "the environment" is an exercise in creative fidelity of vision. It is a way of seeing that is similtaneously creatively different to the deadly vision of how we 'normally' look at things (a pile of resources to be exploited, an economic unit of production and consumption) and yet is also faithful to those things as they are, involving painstaking attention with self-critical awareness that results in admiration.

The opening page of the Bible says not only that ‘in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth’, but also that what he made was ‘good, very good.’

Here’s a little exercise. Think of things you love: a close friend, your favourite family member, your loyal pet fish, your home and comfortable bed. And think of activities you enjoy: eating a fabulous pasta, reading an humorous poem, hitting that perfect six playing cricket, growing basil on your balcony, learning how to speak Swahili - whatever it is that floats your boat. Everyone and everything you love, everything in which you find joy, is a gift from God. Every breath, every mouthful, every morning you wake up, is God’s gift to you. To think like this doesn’t come automatically. To receive each day as a gift of God’s love takes a certain kind of creative vision. The great diversity and abundance of good gifts, or the problems we face as we try to balance them, can distract us from noticing and remembering the giver. God invites us to live lives filled with thankfulness and dependence, to stop pretending that we are self-made, self-reliant. He invites us to stop being self-obsessed.
Series: I; II; III; IV; V; VI; VII; VIII; IX; IX(b); X; XI; XII; XIII; XIV; XV.

Fear

The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear?

- Psalm 27.1

Does the imminent approach of a large and unknown danger make our daily worries pale into insignificance? Do our quotidian, pedestrian worries fade away at the approach of a new and greater terror? On the contrary, the daily battle against insecurities and anxieties is where the action is at. A thousand little fears can shrink our lives far more effectively than an illness or tragedy.

Why is it possible not to fear? Because the LORD is my light: not the comforting night-light to hold back the shadows of the dark, nor 'the lantern which a traveller in the dark carries in his hand - but the glow on his face of the coming dawn' (Lesslie Newbigin). It is because we believe in this one that fear no longer makes sense.

What does it mean to not fear? It is to trust this Lord to do his will, not mine. It is to love those around me without being lost in self-absorption, to give myself wholeheartedly to my neighbour and not hold back in case the potential loss is too painful. It is to remain thankful despite great loss and refuse the easy temptation of bitterness. To refuse also the pull of despair and instead to groan in hope; to look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the age to come.

Let us fear not. This is our task and prayer.