jonnybaker

jesus' empire of the mustard seed - tom sine is back in classic fashion

the word conspirator apparently comes from con-spiritus which means to go with the spirit, at least according to karen ward's endorsement of tom sine's new book the new conspirators: creating the future one seed at a time. so being a new consiprator sounds like a good thing!

it's a great book - i really enjoyed it. it's vintage sine really combining all his passions that have woven through his writing over the years -

• a love for mission and new stuff especially the edges of what younger leaders are creating,
• powerful critique of the western dream of the good life,
• a stunning ability to think out of an alternative imagination as to how christians might dream and live out a dream of a different kind of good life shaped by the kingdom of god,
• an ability to read the times and future with a global perspective,
• a love for the poor and broken,
• a passion for great parties,
• and a wonderful vision of the future healing of creation when christ returns,
• and plenty of ideas and encouragements for how to join in practically one mustard seed at a time

how can you go wrong with those themes? i have tracked tom through the original mustard seed conspiracy, wild hope, living life on purpose and other writings, as well as catching him and christine speak at greenbelt, blah... and other places over the years. i have no idea how old tom is - maybe in his seventies now? but what an inspiration. i really hope i can be that full of energy and passion and love for the new things god is doing and offer a bit of wisdom when i hit those mature years...

so what's new? well tom maps the current new things happening with a mapping of four movements whose edges are blurred and overlap - emerging, mosaic, new monastic, and missional and he is enthusiastic about them all (i agreed with shaine clayborne's hesitation in the foreword that the book runs the risk of making some of us young tykes look too good, better than the reality - but what a refreshing change!) weaving stories he has gleaned into the mix. he does carefully issue a few challenges on the way - for example he loves the creativity in emerging church but wonders why it tends to get focused on worship and church rather than taken outside the walls. he also wonders if those of us who like the postmodern world haven't got our imaginations too shaped by the consumer dream of cool - these are great challenges and need to be responded to.

he follows the opening section mapping the new conspirators with conversations about culture and what the future challenges might be. woven into this is a view of god's future that is wonderfully inspiring. in much the same way as i enthused about tom wright's book a while back, this book also lays out a vision of a future for the earth that is healed when god's kingdom comes. one of the things i have always found challenging and inspiring about tom and christine is their imagination. in the face of the consumer culture and the busyness and drain on resources so many of us face they suggest communal responses in relation to housing, resources, and neighbourhood. it takes courage to take these on board, but this is precisely the kind of imagining christian communities should engage in. in fact the last section of the book, taking our imaginations seriously, was definitely my favourite - story after story and idea after idea are laid out so that you can't help feeling that as tom puts it all of life is a design opportunity to be co-creators with god. at the end of it, because the whole approach is inspired by jesus' story of the mustard seed where something grows from a tiny seed, you think that even i could do something really really small and see what happens...

i actually hope groups of people read this book and talk about it because i feel the real challenge of working out how to live out of a different dream to the consumer one is something that is just so difficult to tackle on your own...

if you are in the US you can get the book for only 10 dollars in april from the mustard seed associates website. tom and christine are in the UK in the autumn doing a few gigs - nearer the time i'll blog about them once they are finalised. but they are definitely booked to do something at cms in oxford on 25 september which i'm looking forward to.

i'll end with the paragraph from the book that for me captured the essence of sine and i am going to be using the phrase the empire of the mustard seed i suspect as a result...

when jesus began teaching he made it clear that his new empire would be unlike any empire the world had ever seen. it came on a donkey's back. it's imperial council was comprised of a handful of unemployed fishermen, a couple of IRS agents, a prostitute and some hangers on. jesus demontsrated how to wield his imperial power by washing feet, telling stories and playing with kids. jesus' empire is based on the absurd values that the last should be first, losers are winners, and the most influential in the empire should clean the toilets. members of the empire are instructed to love their enemies, forgive their friends, always give twice as much as people ask of them and never pursue power or position. jesus insisted that those who are part of his empire shouldn't worry about finances, but simply trust god. the resources to run this empire were basins, towels, and leftover lunches. this empire also developed a reputaion for constant partying - almost always with the wrong kind of people.

seriously is this any way to run an empire? imagine what would happen if you ran a political, economic or religious institution with these bizarre values. clearly it wouldn't have much of a future. these values might even get the leader assassinated...

whack on the side of the head 25th anniversary

imagine writing a book and twenty five years later it's still as good as ever and selling! well that's the case with roger von oech's whack on the side of the head. the 25th anniversary edition is about to be released (this week i think) revised and updated. i have a real soft spot for this book. i read it at a time when i was just getting going in youth work and had relied on a friend's creative ideas. but he was due to move on so we couldn't rely on him and had to get our creative juices flowing. whack provided the inspiration, so much so that we got known for our creative approach. and i have loved creative thinking ever since. i have actually given awaay or mislaid or leant my first copy so was really pleased to get hold of it again.

it's an easy book to read - oech outlines 10 mental locks to creativity and illustrates with lots of stories, puzzles and illustrations how each of those locks can be unlocked. the locks are things such as 'play is frivolous' or 'the right answer' or 'that's not logical', things that we have in the back of our minds that stop us being creative. we all think in patterns, and make assumptions that mean we see and think in particular tracks. we need a whack to knock us out of that particular groove.

creativity and imagination are wonderful things. and they are particularly important when in a season where we have got in a rut, or stuck and need to change. that's why i think that the current challenge the church faces of change in a postmodern culture is one which needs plenty of creative thinking encouraged. church planters, leaders, missionaries and so on should get training in creativity and improvisation. i got to know roger via his blog a couple of years back and we have exchanged to and fro since. i was interviewed on his blog in dec 2006 and in answer to the question what i do, my answer was that my job is to give the church a whack on the side of the head! i follow his blog in my reader - he often comes up with gems. i liked his thoughts recently on when you get ideas i could relate to the feedback that pressure/necessity is one way people get creative (i know a deadline focuses my mind) but equally so is playing around. so as roger puts it necessity may be the mother of invention but play is certainly the father.

i also have the creative whack pack - a series of cards  with creative strategies. i have used them on my own sometimes when i'm in an ideas  phase. and i have used them with groups. they are also really worth getting.

the last lock in the book is 'i'm not creative' - this is perhaps the most subtle but powerful. so many people tell themselves that they are not a creative person, or don't have that gift - but it's precisely beieving that that makes it a self fulfilling prophecy. if you think you are creative you will be. you'd better believe it...

the good news of post modernism for the church - or what would jesus deconstruct?

every so often i look at the pile of books i have been sent and think i must review them for the blog. occassionally i actually buy a book!

by far the most stimulating book i have read on mission in postmodern times for quite some time is john caputo's what would jesus deconstruct? and yes, i paid good money for it...

there are a couple of things that struck me about the book. the first is that he knows what he is talking about. i don't mean this flippantly. it made me think that this book is the result of years of work - it has a mature feel about it, which isn't the case with all the books around in this area. it made me think that if i were to try and write a weighty kind of book i should wait at least another 10 years!! (by the way i'm not so don't worry). the second is that it is so refreshing to have such a positive engagement with postmodern theory. so many people are so suspicious and critical of it and i suspect a lot of those people haven't even read the likes of derrida but tend to just refer to the well known soundbites (and yes that is exactly what i do too!). third it made me realise how influential caputo (and derrida?) is on pete rollins!

the book is part of series, the church and postmodern culture, published by baker academic and edited by jamie smith. the aim of the series is to feature high profile theorists in philosophy and theology but getting them to write for a non-specialist broad audience interested in the impact of postmodern theory on the faith and practice of the church. this book does that perfectly - it has real weight and depth but is very readable, in fact delightful to read, and is accessible whlst not being too dumbed down. the first book in the series also did this very well.

the crux of caputo's argument is that deconstruction is the hermeneutics of the kingdom of god, i.e it helps us get at the prophetic spirit of jesus. invariably jesus radical vision of the kingdom of god gets domesticated by the church, by us, by politicians, by leaders. after all which of us can cope with the sermon on the mount really? but encountering jesus in the scriptures invariably calls us to a vision beyond what we have - i.e. it deconstructs in order to pursue the vision of the kingdom which is bigger and more radical. jamie smith suggests in his intro

the church doesn't need jacques derrida in order to be deconstructed because it's got jesus!

caputo kicks off by playfully engaging with the book in his steps from which the question (and bumper stickers) wwjd - what would jesus do? emerged. he does suggest that the first thing jesus would deconstruct is WWJD itself, the whole money making enterprise! but the interesting stuff is when he gets into jesus and deconstruction. i don't know what you know or think about deconstruction but here are a few samples of the choice ways in which caputo talks about it and its themes...

deconstruction is a theory of truth in which truth spells trouble. as jesus does. the truth will make you free but it does so by turnng your life upside down.

deconstruction is memory... it helps us sketch a portrait of an alternative Christianity, one that is as ancient as it is new, one in which the dangerous memory of Jesus is still alive, deconstruction being as i conceive it a work of memory and imagination, of dangerous memories as well as daring ways to imagine the future, and as such good news for the church.

among the many names under which deconstruction travels I number justice, the gift, forgiveness, hospitality as the most important of our present purposes.

he weaves elaborately with words so it's quite hard to just pull out quotes, but it gives a flavour. the church is always going to be deconstructed because it is a construct and the kingdom of god beckons us to move beyond it, to remake it where we have domesticated jesus and his message. caputo doesn't quite say this but the current shifts around emerging church and so on at best are part of this beckoning to  recover truth and the dangerous memory of jesus (i hope).

one further thing to mention that i love and need to mull over a bit more is the way caputo describes the scriptures. he wants to get away from systematics or dogmatics as a way of reading. so he suggests that the new testament is an archive, a deposit of memories, which presents a certain way to be. this is a "poetics of the kingdom" which then calls us to translate it into reality. i think this is a very rich way of thinking about how scriptures can function as a fund for imagination (to use a brueggemann phrase). and to give caputo credit he does (as becky garrison described it to me recently) land the plane - i.e. he tackles directly some issues head on - abortion, homosexuality, racism and power so this does get earthed. it won't surprise you to know that the christian right in the US are not going to like this book!!! but it is an absolute gem, deilghtful, as the subtitle of the book says - the good news of postmodernism for the church.

if you are really keen and can cope with long blog posts (something i confess i'm not good at - somehow the internet doesn't suit as a medium long pieces or maybe i don't have enough time or attention?) churchandpomo had a whole series of engagements with the book including a very long response from caputo -

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | response

btw these are the other books on my pile that i hope to review/mention in the next few weeks/months -
the primal vision - john taylor
mission in the 21st century: exploring the 5 marks of mission - cathy ross et al
the fidelity of betrayal - pete rollins
the new conspirators - tom sine
ancient future worship - webber
a christlike ministry - steve griffiths
mission shaped questions - steve croft et al
a whack on the side of the head 25th anniversary edition - roger von oech
the new spirituality - gordon lynch
a community called atonement - mcknight
enough - john naish
exilio - mike frost's missional course based on exiles
and i think tony jones new christians is on its way...

video sharing on flickr and blurb

well flickr have added video sharing which seems like a good idea. the videos can be up to 90 seconds and under 150mb - i suspect it won't be long before that gets lengthened. it will be interesting to see if this takes off...

on the subject of photos has anyone tried blurb yet? it's another web 2 self publishing company that enables you to create your own books with photos included. it looks good, like it gives you plenty of creative control...

i have done books with lulu and myphotobook and qoop, all of which came out pretty well...

tinkering

i have just been at a gathering organised by trinity wall street considering young adults spirituality and religious practice. by way of preparation people attending were invited to read robert wuthnow's book after the baby boomers: how twenty and thirty-somethings are shaping the future of american religion.

one of the points that i found interesting in the book was that young adults have an extended period before getting married and having children (if they do). this means that there can often be a 10 year period of extended young adulthood. church attendance in this age group has been in decline, but the most interesting part about that is that the young adults who are attending church tend to be married with kids - church somehow is appealing to and catering for families better than single people. so this extension of young adulthood compounds the decline.

the second point and this doesn't come as a surprise is that the way young adults make meaning is by tinkering (or bricolage if you want the cultural studies term). i was invited to give a presentation on this theme... here's a couple of quotes i pulled out...

The single word that best describes young adults approach to religion and spirituality - indeed life - is tinkering. A tinkerer puts together a life from whatever skills, ideas and resources that are readily at hand... Tinkerers are the most resourceful people in any era. If specialized skills are required they have them. When they need help from experts they seek it. But they do not rely on one way of doing things. Their approach to life is practical. They get things done and usually this happens by improvising by piecing together an idea from here, a skill from there and a contact from somewhere else.

Like the farmer rummaging through the junk pile for makeshift parts the spiritual tinkerer is able to sift through a veritable scrap heap of ideas and practices from childhood, from religious organisations, classes, conversations with friends, books, magzines, television programmes and web sites. The tinkerer is free to engage in this kind of rummaging...

i'm sure most of us recognise this sort of approach to lots of areas of life. i explored this theme a bit when i was doing my MA drawing inspiration from de certeau's ideas of making do and developing a set of tactics to negotiate the practice of everyday life. wuthnow adds that life's uncertainty these days makes tinkering a necessity as we constantly face scenarios that require creative improvising. further, the electric information environment has meant we can access and draw on the resources from diverse sources, traditions, networks and institutions without relying on experts and freed from institutional constraints.

so the 48 hour gathering was a reflection on this and what it implies or what questions it raises, in this case, for episcopalians.

a few of the questions i raised were:

can we view religion as a cultural resource? (david lyon raises this question in his book jesus in disneyland) i.e. are we prepared to take the risk of putting the insights, treasures, liturgies, theologies etc out there for people to weave into their lives as they tinker? and how might we go about this?

what skills do people need to be able to tinker? and related to this do people need some spiritual capital or theological capital to tinker? this is a challenging area. i think the answer is yes but often people don't have a lot - they think google is enough! a parallel could be drawn here with improvisation in music which will be much richer and more creative if the person knows the traditions and has done the work in terms of learning their craft - that will free them up. the same is true for spirituality - those that know the tradition, the scriptures, the theological takes, spiritual practices, liturgies, other improvisations that have been made etc will have much more to draw on. the problem for churches is that their tradiitions often feel like they are heavily policed, something to be protected rather than something to be creatively opened up, made open source and tinkered with.

if there is this extended period of young adulthood where there are little support structures in place (young adults see friends as key in terms of navigating life's choices ) could mentoring or being a soul friend help? is this an area where the church could make a creative contribution?

and lastly how can we encourage communities of tinkerers? i have found being a part of a community like grace amazing in terms of friendship, support, faith development and creative spirituality. it's located in the church but with space to explore and tinker (not that we have ever used that term!).

i talked about tinkering with worship, sharing stories from alternative worship;
tinkering with church - emerging church, fresh expressions and all that and the way that a set of permissions has been created in the church of england so that can happen within the life of the church;
and tinkering in mission - stories of mission in the emerging culture

it was a good time, as ever at these things the best conversations happen in the gaps. i hope the guys there will be enabled to do the imaginative work and negotiate space for creative ways to explore this further. it was at trinity's retreat centre which is in conneticut in an amazing setting, with the most incredible food. i now have 24 hours in new york before my flight...

what women want - part 2

the most comments i have ever received on a blog post was a post written by jenny - the only one she has written on here - what women want.

well it's time for part two! jenny wrote an article rediscovering heart that was published in youthwork magazine and is going to be in christianity magazine as well. it is in response to the plethora of writing on gender and the so called feminisation of the church. it is on the sophia network web site. it's a really good piece. the gender spin surrounding this is becoming pretty widespread in certain circles of the church. so this is a welcome response - here's a quote:

Something holy and strong happens when men and women make the effort to live, work and play together rather than in competition with each other. This should be most evident within the church, but at the moment faith communities seem to be the place where women and men are most cut off from each other. We need to allow the difference debate to draw us closer together in co-operation and understanding not enclose us in stereotypical boxes.  We need to work to break down barriers, challenge each other towards wholeness and rediscover the complementarity that God intended for us.

jen has just read the myth of mars and venus by deborah cameron and reviewed it and has kindly said i can publish her review here so here it is:

The Myth of Mars and Venus by Deborah Cameron, pub by Oxford University Press
Review by Jenny Baker

Whether they’ve read John Gray’s books or not, everyone knows by now that women and men communicate differently. Women talk more than men and they are more verbally skilled; men talk in order to get things done while women talk in order to make connections to people; men use language competitively while women use it cooperatively. These differences mean that men and women struggle to understand each other, and need help to communicate. And, according to recent books by Simon Baron Cohen and others, these differences are based not on the way we are brought up, but on differences in our brains; it’s the way we were made.

Or is it? In this excellent book, Cameron, an Oxford language professor, examines the evidence behind these beliefs and finds it seriously lacking. One by one, she tackles the myths in the paragraph above and discovers that none of them are substantiated by research. The belief that women talk more than men, for example, was boosted by a book called The Female Brain by Louann Brizendine which claimed that women utter 20,000 words a day while men utter 7,000. The claim got huge publicity because it made great soundbite science, but was not based on any actual research. When the author was challenged to reveal her sources, she admitted that there was no evidence for the claim and withdrew the statistic from subsequent editions of the book. But in terms of perpetuating myths, the damage has been done and the ‘fact’ of women’s talkativeness has entered our common mythology.

And what about the competitive/cooperative difference? After the 1997 general election when a record number of women MPs entered Westminster, there was speculation that their presence would improve the quality of debate in the House of Commons because they would be more cooperative, more interested in listening and more open to negotiation. In fact, research has shown that female MPs are just as adversarial, competitive and assertive as male MPs in terms of contributing to debates. There is one major difference, however, in the way that female MPs communicate; they rarely contribute ‘illegally’ by interrupting, heckling or interjecting comments while others are speaking. Although illegal, these contributions to debates are actually a powerful strategy that enhance MPs’ reputations and bring them to the attention of those in power. Cameron argues that women are less likely to ‘break the rules’ because of the power dynamics of the House; they know they are there as interlopers, forming a small minority in a historically male institution. They keep the rules to show they are worthy of belonging, but in fact that underlines their insecurity and relative powerlessness. In the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh, the same researcher discovered that the rule-breakers are as likely to be women as men because it’s a new institution and women have played an active rule since the very beginning. Cameron argues that differences in communication then, are less to do with nature or nurture, but rather more to do with power. Rather than accepting them as a given, we should be asking why they are there and what can be done about them. I’d love to see what she would make of the way that women communicate within the historically male institution of the church.

So why do these myths have such resonance if there is little evidence to back them up? Cameron argues that we typically pay most attention to things that match our expectations while failing to remember or register counter-examples. Her dad firmly believed that women were terrible drivers so whenever they were out in the car, he would point out with glee all the mistakes that female drivers were making. When, in return, Cameron pointed out good female drivers he was genuinely surprised to see them, not having noticed them before; when she pointed out bad male drivers, he would always maintain that they were an exception to the rule – that they were yobbos or Sunday drivers. When we hear that ‘women talk more than men’, we think of stereotypes of gossiping or nagging women and forget the real people – both men and women - that we know who don’t conform. Cameron points out, as I have done, that there can be far more difference between one woman and another than between an ‘average’ man and an ‘average’ woman.

It’s a fascinating and thought-provoking book, although I would have liked to have heard more about how Cameron would respond to the equally compelling evidence in Baron Cohen’s book The Essential Difference. Cameron’s book underlines the need to question assumptions, and to look for evidence. One of the things that concerns me in this whole debate is that Christian writers, such as John and Stasi Eldredge and those writing about the feminisation of the church, have latched onto these communication myths with little critical analysis and use them to uphold equally pernicious, but now Christianised, myths about men and women that maintain the competitive and divisive status quo and ignore the real issue of power. There’s a need for deep thinking, solid research and informed critique that recognises what we have in common, celebrates our diversity and honours the image of God in women and men.

surprised by hope

tom wright's latest book surprised by hope is brilliant. it's also a great book for easter...

tom wright slams popular 'christian' notions of salvation as going to heaven when you die, of it being away from the world. he provides a quick tour of hymns and popular songs sung in church suggesting that they have a vague fuzzy optimism that things will work out all right in the end rather than the sure and certain hope of the resurrection of the dead. these don't chime with the christian vision in the scriptures of the renewal of all things, of a renewed heavens and earth, of new creation, of resurrection bodies in a healed creation. i have gone on about this on the blog in my own way several times - what i have referred to as escapology theology. the reason it's important is that a vision of resurrection and a future hope for this world suddenly makes sense of developing all areas of life and culture, of the kingdom of god coming now on earth as in heaven, of being human, of hope (as opposed to a view that this world is going to be destroyed so what's the point?). mission in this way is joining in with god's mission of the healing of creation as we look forward to the day when it will be fully freed from its bondage to decay when there will be no more injustice, racism, brokenness and so on.

like all his books it's not thin but i really recommend it. preaching at a funeral earlier in the year really focused my mind on hope and what the christian vision of hope is as we stand in the face of the final enemy 'death'. and tom's book was a really good reminder of that. it's a theology i was introduced to at st matthews church in bath many years ago and totally reshaped my understanding of what faith was all about. it's encouraging that this theology seems to have regained currency at least in many circles in the uk. there is of course still a load of utter tosh espoused through the likes of the left behind series!

if you are preaching on easter sunday (which i'm not) this should inspire you...

rising from the ashes - nudging the conversation about emerging church onto the mainline

rising from the ashes: rethinking church is a book by becky garrison exploring what it means to be church in the emerging/postmodern context we now find ourselves in. the content is collated from interviews with about 30 people and these interview segments are cut in to form thematic chapters. i am one of the interviewees - it was nice to be asked though it's kind of weird seeing an e-mail exchange on the pages of a book. it was good to meet becky at greenbelt this year too.

this is the crunch: for a number of reasons the conversation about emerging church has begun in the US out of the evangelical world, probably because it was birthed out of young leaders network which was a mix of vineyard and baptist guys as i understand it. the church in the USA seems quite polarised for a number of reasons which other people would be better placed to comment on than me. so when conversation gets located in one place it is sometimes hard to nudge it into another part of the church. this it seems is becky's agenda - to nudge it into mainline circles. she is excited about the challenge of re-imagining church but wants to see that sparking the imagination of episcopal and other mainline churches. this is a great quest and i wish her and others with the same heart all the best as they make that journey. when i reviewed emergent manifesto i saw this trajectory as a positive move. brian maclaren has also worked really hard to help do this i think with his generous orthodoxy amongst other things. adam cleaveland has encouraged presbymergent, karen ward has encouraged anglimergent so it really feels as if things are positively moving. i blogged before about the grace and generosity of god who is often surprising us in terms of where he/she is at work. alan roxburgh shares my concern that the emerging church doesn't rubbish the denomination or local churches because they contain within them the seeds of renewal that can be watered by the spirit to bring new life and of course we need pioneers planting new churches as well.

becky has been inspired by the uk and she is not the first. i think the reason for this is multiple but the c of e and methodist churches report mission shaped church being an official report has meant there has been a culture of permission for newness in places within the structures of denominational churches. fresh expressions, emerging church, alternative worship and other things have found space to breathe in and around the edges of the  structures (not exclusively which is also good). and dare i say the likes of cms, an anglicanish mission agency, church army and others has also helped. (things probably look better from across the atlantic too as it can be pretty frustrating here at times!) 

so...

if you are in a mainline church in the usa get the book and pass it around. if you are on in the emergent village encourage your fellow travellers as they try and work it out in the denominational context. the style of the book may not be to everyone's taste, though emerging churches by ryan bolger and eddie gibbs and spencer burke's book a few years back took a similar approach. i actually found it pretty interesting. phyllis tickle is one of the people interviewed and she sounds very hopeful about the possibilities. cheryl lawrie and karen ward have extended pieces in there, both of which are really good. nadia bolz weber, kester, pete rollins, shaine clairbourne are also interviewed.

one person i don't know, martha grace reese, is asked what concerns she has about the emerging church to which she responds that she thinks some of it is high octane and may be in danger of splitting off and doing its own thing with teh sort of attitude that says "i get some hot idea and then i want to split off from these old idiots who don't get it".  the worst that could happen for the denominations is to see the emergent church go off to its own planet and the worst for emergent would be to cut itself off . she concludes saying "we need each other". i think that's a wise comment and hope it is possible in the usa...

tony jones is also interviewed. tony is a friend and one of the key people in emergent. so it pains me to say this but a couple of his answers made me wince. i have since noticed i am not alone in this. in complete contrast to martha he talks about rolling up your sleeves to overthrow organisational structures. in a book aimed at mainliners this just comes across with so much the wrong tack or tone. i just don't get why you would say that when you are the ambassador for emergent - take off the boxing gloves! tony has a new book out the new christians which i haven't seen yet but must lay things out and his vision much more comrehensively and in a different tone. some of his other writing celebrates and draws on the practices of the tradition (soul shaper and the sacred way) so that's why i was surpised. i guess it's just the nature of e-mail interviews?... anyway i hope martha's approach wins the day.

my favourite line in the book is from someone else i don't know , rick fabian, who says "tradition is a storehouse for participation"  - like that a lot and will use it myself i think...

i noticed andrew jones review here that may also be of interest.

40 book - hot off the press, laudamus from COTA and lent resources

i just had a delivery yesterday of '40' the book. many of you will know si smith's wonderful illustrations of jesus journey into the wilderness. i have used them a load of times in worship. they are fantastic for all ages and perfect for lent. if you haven't seen it the movie is available on proost.

well chris goan wrote a script to go with them and contacted si and to cut a long story short have turned 40 into a book - on one side of the page is one of si's illustrations, and on the other is chris's reflection. rather than using lulu which we have done for the pocket liturgies we have done a small print run ourselves. it's available as a download on proost for free if you are a subscriber but it's the kind of book you will probably want in print. so you can order them through proost as well and it's only £7.

this was part of our january release on proost.

the other new january item is laudamus, an album from karen ward's church of the apostles in seattle. this follows a service of morning prayer and evening prayer. cota have led worship at greenbelt and people have really enjoyed what they have done.

i put a list on the front page of the proost web site of resources that we have that are particularly suitable for lent so you might want to have a look at that as well...

revisiting relational youth ministry

i have just read andrew root's revisiting relational youth ministry. it really is an excellent book. if you teach youth ministry or are doing it or both i suggest you get a copy. his main argument/point/passion is that relationships are not a means to achieve an end goal. they are valuable in and of themselves. to make them about influence (i.e. a means to influence people) cheapens them. this may sound obvious when you say it but as he argues relational youth ministry is often guilty of being a means to an end.

now i must diverge slightly at this point to clarify terms. relational youthwork in the uk has been a term that has been around for quite a while. there were some relational youthwork gatherings maybe 15 or 20 years ago that explored an approach to working with young people that were outside the reaches of the church - the terminology probably shifted to incarnational at a later stage. but this was all about being there alongside and with young people. this book would have been welcomed in those circles i am sure. but andrew picks out some examples from california of what he sees as being called relational youth ministry that is this influence driven approach and it is something completely different. this is going to make this book complicated to cross the atlantic which is a shame. the relational youthwork he describes has a very negative stance towards culture and it's just worlds apart form what has been called relational here. in fact i couldn't understand as a piece of research how he has got away with talking to just 5 youthworkers in one location to build his argument but i guess it was originally a phd or something. in the introduction he says he will show how incarnational ministry has been built from the pillars of cultural engagement.... etc but it badly needs some much more substantial research to carry more weight. it's also a shame he doesn't dialogue with the material written at that earlier time  (e.g. the book called relational youthwork). all of that sounds a bit negative but it is important from a uk perspective.

but having said that the argument goes something like this...
(after two opening chapters tracing the historical development of relational youth ministry in the US that you might want to skim read if you are not in the US)
the evangelical world that youth ministry grew up in has a negative view of culture broadly speaking and part of the role of youth ministry in that world is to influence young people positively by modeilling something different for them and persuading them to join an 'in' group by converting and finding their identity in that sub culture. relationships influence them in that direction. (pete ward's insights about evangelical youth ministry running under the logic of safety - youth minister's are employed to keep kids safe - has some parallels here)  this has very little in fact to do with the incarnation even though the word incarnation gets used.

root then uses bonhoeffer (bonhoeffer is really his only theological source) to suggest that the incarnation, crucifixion and resurrection of christ could give a theological framework for understanding relational youth ministry as 'place sharing'. god is already active and present in the world - we don't need to relocate somewhere else to find god. relationships are the presence of god in the world - transcendent - rather than an end to a third thing. the goal is simply to be faithful to the humanity of the young person who is of course made in the image of god. the crucifixion means that we should follow christ by being prepared to both suffer and share in the suffering of the young person. the resurrection means that in that encounter there is always the possibility for newness though it is not forced.

it reminded me of a quote that cathy ross used at grace last week on hospitality from henri nouwen:

Hospitality… means primarily the creation of a free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend instead of an enemy.  Hospitality is not to change people, but to offer them space where change can take place. 

so transformation is longed for, hoped for, prayed for - that we all become more human. but it is not forced on anyone...

there are some case studies/stories at the end that are helpful to show how this works and then a suggestion for how a church might develop a ministry that encourages adults and young people to develop these kind of relationships. andrew himself has done one to one relational work with tough young people and the book seems to be born out of that experience. the skill to develop relationships of depth and trust and vulnerability is not an easy one and takes a maturity on the part of youth ministers.

anyway it's a good book even if the semantics are confusing for uk readers. i did find it a helpful challenge on what we mean when we describe ministry as incarnational - that patterning it on jesus isn't enough.

this is a typical blog post for me in that i have to write something quickly having read the book or i know i'll never get round to it. but it could be a whole lot better (my review that is) if i took more time that i don't have! i have just looked andrew up to add a hyperlink above and realise we have met a few years back at an iasym conference - great book andrew if you read this...

i'd be interested to hear what anyone else thinks if you have read it...