Making Pens and the "Nashville Statement"

I have a friend who makes pens on a lathe. I have another friend who makes pens by hand carving. Both make pens that work. Often times they critique each others pens but they don't talk about their different process they use to make the pens. The one who uses the lathe does not understand why the hand carvers pens use such "boring" wood colors (it is because some woods are softer and easier to hand carve). What is overlooked is that the process drives how the pens will look. 

Photo by Dominik Scythe on Unsplash

Both style of pens are different, but they work to achieve the goal of writing. Some of the pens more comfortable than others and some are more stylized than others, but every pen puts ink on the page. 

Within Christianity we like to critique each others positions, but we don't critique the processes that we use to get to these positions. One side cannot understand why the another person would take such a position, so we try to change their position. The issue is that unless we change the process by which we come to these decisions, then we will not be able to change the positions. 

Pointing to a position and then arguing for or against it misses the point of talking about the process used to arrive at that position. 

I am tired of talking and listening to positions. I desire to talk and hear about process. Talking about positions are less interesting to me than how you arrived to that position. Because if we know how we arrived at the position, then we have a clue to how to invite each other to move from that position.

A UMC Problem: Authorities in an Age of Authority

Church historian Phyllis Tickle (1934-2015), has argued that every 500 years the culture goes through an upheaval, and the last upheaval was called the Great Reformation. For those of you counting, this year marks the 500 year mark since Martin Luther nailed his theses to the Wittenburg door. If Tickle is accurate, then we are right in the middle of a new upheaval (which she calls a "new rose"). 

Tickle also makes it clear that a core issue in these upheavals is the question, "Where now is our authority?" Here is a three minute video that makes the point from Tickle herself:

If you did not watch this video, Tickle sates that Luther's theses were at their core an argument that the Pope was not the authority any longer because the office had become corrupted. As such, Luther argued, the old authority is not longer authoritative. What he offered as the new authority was the scripture (Sola Scriptura).

This new authority has held, according to Tickle, for 350 years but is now facing the same situation the Pope faced with Luther. Sola Scriptura is no longer culturally identified as authoritative as it was because it has become used by so many for corrupt purposes. (Note I am not saying scripture or the Pope are corrupt but have been used for corrupt purposes).

Now that we are in the middle of this 500 year upheaval, the question is the same - "Where now is our authority?" And just as Luther offered a new locus of authority, others today offer their own sense of where the authority is now. Here is a short list of examples as I see them (please note these are generalities and I am aware of the shortcomings of making generalities):

• Non and Post-denominational Christians elevate scripture as sola authoritative [When a church calls itself a "Bible Church" (as though other Christian churches are not) it is sort of a give away.]
• Secularists and Democrats elevate science as sola authoritative
• Academics and Technocrats elevate reason as sola authoritative
• Conservatives and Catholics elevate tradition as sola authoritative
• Pentecostals and Relativists elevate experience as sola authoritative

Again, there are great exceptions to this short list, and truthfully I am sure that I can be wrong on the diagnosis, but I believe the point stands - in the upheaval, every camp is claiming an authority and the more there is unrest the tighter each camp will cling to their declared authority. Which leads to the problem in the United Methodist Church: The UMC does not claim an authority. The UMC claims authorities.

The founder of Methodism, John Wesley, was a man who placed a preimum on Scripture, but also understood there were other authorities that were valid and gifts from God. Wesley was a priest who did not want to break from the Anglican Church (thus upholding tradition), he was a product of the Enlightenment (thus upholding reason) and he had a number of powerful personal encounters with God, such as when his "heart was strangely warmed" (upholding experience). Wesley knew of the value of holding these authorities in tension and the danger of putting all authority in one source.

The UMC faces the problem of holding onto the community of authorities that guide us while living in a time where people want/need/desire to collapse all authority into one source. When things are complex, there is a desire to simplify things and seek one authority source. The Christian witness of the Trinitarian God is that the mystery and interconnection of a community of authority is where we find God.

Now if we could just hold on.

The Church's One Foundation (Guest Post) - Kevin Anderson

A few posts ago, I put links to other clergy in the Central Texas Conference who are doing some blogging. I have invited these folks to be a guest contributor on this blog. This blog is not a huge platform but large enough to share and so over the course of the next few weeks I invite you to hear (and even follow) other clergy voices around this Conference. Here is a guest post from Cory Moses - Fearfully and Wonderfully Made.

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Our family has started a nightly routine where all of us journal for a few minutes each day. Kathy, Carson, and I write and Courtney draws pictures, and then we all talk about our day and how we felt about the day. I was reading scripture and came across this passage from 1 Corinthians 3:

"For we are God's servants, working together; you are God's building. According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building on it. Each builder must choose with care how to build on it. For no one can lay any other than the one that has been laid; that foundation is Jesus Christ."

Carson was confused by what this verse meant so I explained it through the story of the three little pigs and how the pig who built his house out of brick is the one whose house survived because it has a strong foundation. This verse reminds me of a hymn about the nature of the church: The Church's One Foundation. The hymn starts with this line: "The church's one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord; she (the church) is his new creation by water and the Word."

When we talk about our own faith and our own church we must begin with a foundation of Jesus Christ. If we do not begin with that then we have already lost. We can serve, we can work together to build the church but if we don't have a foundation of Jesus Christ then we will not succeed and we will not prevail. Christ's church was created centuries ago and as generations have come along people build upon that foundation. Sometimes aspects have to be rebuilt and sometimes thinks have to be re-invisioned but the foundation must stay the same. Christ must be at the center of all the church does, period. We must choose how to build and we must do it carefully with a mindset to be Christlike. A mindset that takes into account the life, the ministry, the death, and the resurrection of Christ. We must be of the same mind as Christ and be willing to learn, to teach, and to sacrifice for others at various times. If we don't then our church is going to be left blown away by signs of trouble.

This weekend there were signs of trouble in our country as events unfolded in Charlottesville, Virginia. You can call it want you want: white nationalist or white supremacist or racist but what is unmistakeable is that it sought to minimize others who are not like those who were protesting. Call it what is is, it's evil and just a reminder that hate and evil exist in our world. And sadly I am reminded of that each and every day.

So how do we move forward? It's about knowing and speaking what is right and what is wrong and what happened in Charlottesville was wrong. But we do know that storms come and will continue to come. If you don't believe me then believe Jesus. At the end of his sermon on the mount in Matthew 7:24-28 Jesus says these words:

"Everyone who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house but it did not fall because it had been founded on rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not act on them will be like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell-and great was the fall."

Jesus never said living out the gospel would be easy. And sometimes it isn't easy. I rewrote my sermon this weekend to speak about what happened in Virginia because even by not saying something we say something and something needed to be said. There were people who lost their lives because they wanted to peacefully protest something that was wrong. They stood against people who sought to divide. You see, Jesus knew storms would come and would continue to come. And He knows there are those who will take heed of his words and listen and there are those who won't. When storms come we better have and better be prepared to stand on a strong foundation and listen to Jesus words. Our foundation must be built on nothing less than the gospel of Jesus Christ. A gospel of love and acceptance. Not a gospel of anger, hatred, and intolerance.

Spend some time in scripture today. In particular spend some time reading the stories of Jesus and his gospel of love and acceptance. And I pray that you (that all of us) will be more like Christ today than yesterday and everyday moving forward.

Grace & Peace
Kevin