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Rob's Blog
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Church Life
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Monday, 20 February 2012 13:02 |
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 I was reading Acts 2:40-47 the other day. Allow me a quick sketch the ten point skeleton of it:
| Those who received the word were baptised |
(people got saved, repented and wet) |
Continually devoted themselves to the
apostles teaching and fellowship |
(Bible study and hanging out) |
| Breaking bread and prayer |
(communion and prayer meetings |
| In one accord in the temple |
(larger, unified expressions of the church) |
Divided what they had among them
as anyone had need |
(generosity and sharing) |
| Breaking bread |
(mentioned twice, I never noticed that) |
| From house to house |
(house meetings or cell group) |
Ate their food with gladness
and simplicity of heart |
(sharing meals and the KISS principle) |
| Praising God |
(gotta have worship hey?) |
| Having favour with all the people |
(yes the outsiders were afraid of them) |
I don't know what your history has told you. Maybe you are all for mega church, or building oriented church services feel toxic to you. Maybe you love house church, simple church or you've left all together - just out there on your own. But as I read Acts 2, I am challenged. To whatever extent this represents a valid picture of "church" it represents a great template to compare ourselves against. So how are we doing?
At Storm Harvest we meet every fortnight from house to house. The other weekend is supposed to be family based worship/prayer/bible study. We've got a Monday night Bible study and a Thursday for the kids at high school. Prayer meeting Wednesdays. So what's missing? I reckon we lack communion (though recently God commented that we do "the eating and fellowship" pretty well!) Got that covered. The congregations in my town suck at doing stuff together (but are super good at synagogue style service). So far we've experimented pretty heavily in community and living together - having all things in common etc. We're also pretty short on favour with "those outside" and seeing baptisms (only had one last year). There's work to be done for sure. How about you?
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Church Life
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Saturday, 10 December 2011 11:23 |
 Today we held church in the park. Sometimes we meet for worship, sometimes for a BBQ at someone's house and most Mondays a selection of us meet at a Bible study. Back a month ago Mario and I were praying about how to "do church" and felt he said this to us:
"Church is about several things:
- Worshipping me [including dance and music];
- Learning my ways, submitting yourselves to my teaching [you have many teachers];
- Having fellowship, submitting to one another out of reverence for me [this includes ministry to one another and prophecy];
- Testimony, sharing in one another's journey; and
- Communion [eating and drinking over a meal] - and you do this very well.
I want you to remember the purpose of my church: to GO into all the WORLD [and all the rest that entails]."
"Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always." (Matthew 28:19, 20 NKJV)
So again we sought the Father about this, and I believe this is what he said:
"The first place I want you (collectively) to be and do and build church is at home [as families]. Let me ask each family individually...
- Do you pray together and one by one [parents with each child or grandchild]?;
- Do you worship together and one by one [on your own]?;
- When you are sick, is there ministry [at home is there ministry]?;
- Do you practice hospitality and show love to strangers there?;
- Do you have Bible study [regularly]?
Go back and see what my advice to Moses (and through him to my people) was: during daily life parents should disciple their children.
"You shall diligently teach my ways to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up." (Deuteronomy 6:7 NKJV) |
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Church Life
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Thursday, 15 September 2011 08:18 |
Rod Denton - xlink conference
 What an aweful state to be in, to know about God, but not to know him. But stand as a minister of a gospel that has not, itself transformed you. To expect from others an outcome we outselves have not grasped- and this is the terrible danger of a preacher. What an alarming condition we have when there is more knowledge of the truth than experience of its power. Even worse, to be someone who knows the truth but is waiting for something to happen... something outside ourselves...a sign. But instead, we procrastinate.
"My Father is always working and so am I." (John 5:17 NLT) If God is at work, the key is to find out what he is doing, and join him there. Learning to pray "God what are you doing today? Where are you at work? What is the one thing I must not miss today, what is the thing I need to join you in?"
Don't settle for some one else's testimony about God's work. Go and experience it yourself! Allow their testimony to challenge you forward. Be like Jesus, watching for the father at work, right now, in the midst of what we are doing. "Bring your experience up to the standard of Scripture, don't lower Scripture's testimony to the level of your experience." Henry Blackaby
Jesus models for us the perfect communion and relationship with the Father. He was a prophet, mighty in word and deed before God and all the people (Luke 24:19) He knew the Scripture, the flow of testimony and he then walked it out. He breathed reality into the words by walking them out. The thing is, Jesus challenged the status quo, and he intersected the ordinary with heaven's agenda - and it cost him. "He made himself as nothing, and took on the very form of a servant" (Philippians 3:10). It cost him sleep, loss of relationship with his family, ridicule in his home town and ultimately crucifixion. There's a cost. "I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings." Philippians 3:10 |
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Church Life
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Wednesday, 03 August 2011 08:07 |
Part III - Dr. Gregory House
 When I say someone is my hero, I do so knowing they have flaws, and not everything in them is worthy of mimicking or copying. Not everything is a good model - but the truth is that all good things come down from the Father - so what is good? In what way are they reflecting the Father? Everyone is made in the likeness and image of God, they have value because he created them. This is not true of fictional characters - because they were made by the minds of men, and so it is with today's character, the fictitious Dr. Gregory House.
I see strong parallels between House and Sherlock Holmes (the fictional detective character created by Arthur Conan Doyle):
• They have an identical home address (221B Baker Street).
• They both battle drug addiction (House battled a Vicodin addiction - Holmes was a recreational cocaine user).
• They both play an instrument (House plays the guitar and piano - Holmes plays the violin).
• They have a talent for accurately deducing people's motives and histories from aspects of their personality and appearance.
• They each have one true friend (House has James Wilson - Holmes has John Watson).
House is a true misanthropist. I really enjoyed Season 1 and 2 and parts of Season 3 in this blockbuster American series. It ranked between 7 and 8th most popular in the US, and hit #1 in Australia. Why? He makes you laugh, and cringe, and want to be able to confront people so breathtakingly. He constantly, relentlessly pursues the truth and knows human tendency to view the world through filters and lenses. With a hammer he smashes those lenses. He constantly challenges himself to remove his own bias. House tries and tries to get a clean, objective view of things. But he is also quite dismissive of human emotion, response and behaviour.
Prophetic people are supposed to have the first trait, and the opposite of the second. They are supposed to see straight through ruse, smash our ordinary filters and help people see truth. But they are also supposed to do so in love - with compassion and deep empathy for the human condition - something I rarely see displayed in Dr. House. |
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Church Life
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Tuesday, 21 June 2011 10:53 |
 Jesus was a genius at helping people reconsider their ordinary understanding - the story they were telling themselves about life. He was a master at reframing:
* When Mary was deeply upset at him for arriving late, she charged at him, loaded up with disappointment and fear - accusing him of coming late and now... Lazarus was dead. He lead her gently to trust him,and prove God had a very different agenda afoot.
* When Nicodemus came to him at night, seeking salvation through the law Jesus reframed the discussion in terms of being born again.
* When the Pharisee asked about bedience to the Law, he pointed out that David ate the show bread reserved only for priests. When confronted later about breaking sabbath, he pointed out that priests ritually broke sabbath by sacrificing on the day.
"Think again, evaluate your assumptions, look for a different way to think... the way you are believing right now is limiting you, and cutting you off from God's best for you." I think the most outstanding example is the woman at the well in town of Sychar:
* She talks about water to drink from a well; he reframes the conversation to living water giving eternal life.
* She starts talking about which mountain to worship on; he reframes the conversation to address worship in spirit and truth.
* He touches on her five past husbands, she perceives he is a prophet and is provoked to ask him about the Messiah;
* He introduces her to eternal life!
By the way what do most readers (and indeed most pastors preaching from this passage) make of the woman. What kind of person is she? Out at the well at midday... clearly an outcast; speaking to a single man... clearly very bold and unashamed; has five previous husbands... clearly she is - a loose woman right? Divorcee, harlot or could she be a prophet? Yes, John Sandford puts forward the possibility that she is a prophet. Reframe! How else do you explain her passion for worship and righteousness in finding God correctly? How else do you explain her statement that Jesus "told all about her life" or the way in which everyone in her town took her testimony seriously and came to Jesus at her request? Her five husbands? They probably died like Tamar's husbands.
You see how easy it is to bring prejudice to theology, to find what you are looking for in the first place. Reframing is a tremendously helpful practise both in spiritual life and in conversation. Check in with your assumptions every time. |
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Church Life
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Friday, 10 June 2011 15:25 |
Cognition is the process of thinking (or knowing) that is going on in your head: the buzz of neurons making "thoughts". Metacognition is the process of thinking about the fact that you are thinking. Knowing that you know something. It is the conscious mind being able to step above the brain and think about thinking. This is one of the amazing things about being human, and so far as we know, we are the only species with the consciousness of this kind.
We are also capable of thinking about someone else's metacognition: to think about what another person is thinking. We can consciously place ourselves in their shoes and think about what they think about. This is called having theory of mind (ToM) - being able to create another person in your mind and inside that, create their mind. It turns out that a region in the temporo-parietal junction (TPJ) is involved in reasoning about the contents of another person’s mind.(1) Which brings me to the prophetic. I suppose the psychic community might use the term clair-metacognition (the prefix clair simply means at a distance, or being physically removed) - the ability to hear what someone else is thinking about. I would prefer to use the term "psi-metacognition" - by the Holy Spirit being able to hear what another is thinking. (I wonder if the temporo-parietal junction is used when that happens? I bet no research has been done on it!)
Jesus displayed this power to know what people were thinking (Matthew 12:25; Luke 6:8; Mark 2:8). It happens to me often enough too. One day Dean and I are returning home from a day at the race track. We come across the railway lines and I hear him say to himself (in his head), "Maybe I should ring home and see if my wife wants us to pick anything up at the shops." Hearing this I made the suggestion out loud, which caused him to double take, then laugh. Another day I was teaching about this subject on the Gold Coast when the pastor's PA started to wonder (in her head) about what she needed to order for lunch. Again I replied out loud, "Two pies if you please, one with pepper, the other with steak." Again this drew nervous laughter (as people began to wonder if all their thoughts might be visible/accessible). But I assure you, they are not. We do not "peer" into other people's business.
Footnotes
1) "People thinking about thinking people in 'theory of mind'” R. Saxea & N. Kanwishera
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