jonnybaker

new uses for old technology

had a great time in bath catching up with jon and gareth, dreaming dreams, talking ideas for cms and proost. i love this little photo of jon with his ibook. it's a great example of reusing old technology. the chair was made by clare's granddad with a wooden thing that slots across so that her grandma could do her embroidery. well jon has put this old technology to good use by finding it the perfect set up for his computing!!!

also met dave wiles for a drink in the evening. dave leads fyt whose web site has just had some updating. i had a scout around. i came across a couple of wonderful articles, both from the seventies but don't let that put you off, by jim punton - the community of shalom (pdf) | mission (pdf). there are others as well but i haven't yet read those...

manipulation or mission?

great post from barky on how engaging in community transformation can become manipulative if it's just the clothes hiding an agenda to convert people... as barky points out in the comments the place to find a theology that resonates in these kinds of contexts is from the likes of the dave andrews of this world...

I think it’s disappointing that at this period of history, having learnt so much from overseas missionaries and their aggressive approaches towards conversion, evangelism and obliterating local cultures that we still have people involved in community work in the UK who act as ‘Vampire Christians’ (a good Dallas Willard phrase – Christians who are only interested in the blood of Jesus) or Christians involved in their communities in order to see their churches increase. It just leaves me feeling dirty, needing to scrub the manipulation away from me.

while on barky's blog take a look at the post before the one mentioned above that links to a selection of articles on networks. this is an absolute gem he has unearthed. network logic is a collection of essays by leading thinkers on networks. all the essays are available to download including an afterword by manuel castells. it's published by demos think tank.

catching up...

tallskinnykiwi starts a teaching series on new media on may 1...

headspace have just got a web site (minimal - no pictures!)...

the dark looks like an intriguing installation in london until may 4. they have an interactive version of it on the web from may 14... i'm off to visit so will no doubt report back...

btaa 2004 advertising awards dvd is available - send a cheque for £20 to btaa (address on web site)

and if you like stencils, street art and all that here's a great bunch of links to follow from streetlogos

amazing grace on oxford street

ben bell sent me this photo that he took on oxford street to add to my grace in unlikely places photo album (see left). thanks ben!

you have to look quite closely but you can see the words amazing grace on the bus stop itself...

youth ministry and spirituality

following on from my enthusing about mark yaconelli's article (see a couple of posts below), i thought it would be worth adding a bit more about what he's been up to for the last eight years...

he pioneered the youth ministry and spirituality project which has experimented in introducing spiritual practices to youth ministers and groups in north america. the results unsurprisingly have been transformative. have a look round their site and in particular the resources/practices page may be useful. this is how they describe it...

The Youth Ministry & Spirituality Project started with a number of questions: How do we keep youth ministers from burning out? How do we move youth discipleship beyond fun & entertainment? How do we keep youth ministry from being isolated from the adult congregation? How do we address the constant anxiety that seems to infect most youth ministries? Can youth programs have spiritual depth? And most importantly, how do we keep the companionship of Jesus at the center of the ministry?

We wish we could tell you that we answered all of these questions. Instead we struggled upon some life-giving possibilities. Here you'll find all of the principles, practices and processes that we've developed in our exploration of youth ministry and Christian spirituality. This is our attempt to articulate a way of ministry that seeks a growing attentiveness and presence to both God and young people.

i hesitate to call any of these things worship tricks as it sounds like it trivialises them but they are practices that have worked down the ages in enabling people to pray, read the bible and encounter god. so i am making this list of practices worship trick 83. but you can't rush through this stuff - you have to stop, pause, slow down, linger, reflect, not grab it at the last minute off the shelf....

there is a symposium on youth ministry and spirituality in san fransisco in june. i am gutted that this doesn't co-incide with my visit - it looks great!

in the last iasym journal kenda creasy dean wrote an article of what she saw as the hopeful trends in youth ministry. one of them was this engagement with spiritual practices. it's like a quiet revolution that is taking place. i'm excited about it. i enjoyed tony jones book soul shaper that introduces some practices to youth ministry. in the uk my wife jen is currently editing a book on contemplative prayer and youth ministry - it's called tune in chill out. we (proost) are producing a CD Rom to go with it that is shaping up nicely with a mix of music/meditation tracks, flash animations/reflections, video, and written pdf sheets...

and i think this whole area is not really just a youth ministry thing. often what you see as the edge in youth ministry gives you a clue for where the church may be headed when it plays catch up. so this is probably a healthy direction that large portions of the church will be heading down (i realise some have been there for years but you know what i mean)....

psalmstrip

psalmstrip has been added to smallritual. it's the psalm steve did for grace psalm service a while back....

spam filter too efficient...

if any of you have e-mailed me in the last couple of weeks and not had a reply, i have just discovered that my BT spam filter is over efficient and has been filtering out some messages that i wanted to receive. i'm now going to check this folder. but my guess is i have missed some e-mails in the last few weeks. so please resend if this is you.... sorry!

new articles link

i have added a link on the right hand side to a list of articles by other people. this consists of articles i linked to on my old blog plus a whole bunch of other stuff and sites/pages i have come across with a good selection of articles.

i have created a list of these for the same reason as i added a list of worship tricks in one place. i thought originally that type pads categories would enable me to track articles but in fact it's useful for me (and hopefully some of you) to have one place where i link to them all.

do feel free to leave comments if you think there are pages/articles i might like to add...

i am aware that the link to forgotten fire is broken, but i am hoping to retrace it which is why i have left it on the list...

one new article is which i have added is life creates a bridge (pdf) by mark yaconelli. i have blogged about it before when i read it in the lectures from princeton's youth ministry seminar/conference 2003 but at that stage it hadn't been added to the web site. well last year's are now up there and also tom beaudoin's lectures which had disappeared for a while are back. i really liked this article by mark and quoted from the start of the article before about the need to do nothing and learn to wait. here's a few from the second half of the article where he suggests that in the post-modern world the stations of the spiritual life are being amazed, letting go, and resisting:

On being amazed:
In youth ministry we set up programs to help control, manipulate, and manage young people. We buy into the conventional wisdom within the Church that young people are problems that must be solved. They need converting. They need to be in worship. They need confirmation. They need better moral training. They need Bible study.We don’t have time to be “amazed” by young people. We have no space in our lives to stop and notice how God is alive in youth. We have work to do. We have a ministry to run. Is n’t it a relief that Jesus didn’t start “Jesus Christ’s World-Wide Ministries”? Isn’t it a relief that Jesus didn’t write a book series or curriculum called “Here’s the Way!” It turns out, contrary to what we see in most of our churches, Jesus wasn’t running a ministry program. Instead of directing ministry Jesus spent most of his life in wonder. He stood in wonder at the beauty of the natural world, the suffering of people, the questions of strangers, and
the presence of the poor. He stood in wonder at the presence of the little ones, the marginalized and discarded children. Stopping and doing nothing is what prepares us for wonder and amazement. When we stop and slow down we are open and available to see the miracle of living and the power of God’s presence in the world...

On letting go:
When people brought their children to Jesus, the disciples tried to control the crowd. They tried to
respond to the longings of the crowd. Jesus, noticing that the disciples had placed themselves at the center of the ministry, became indignant. He called the disciples to stop. He called the disciples to listen. He called them to notice what they were doing. He called them to turn or repent. He was calling the disciples to let go. When Jesus called the disciples to turn their attention to him, he was calling them to let go of their activity, their concerns, and their ministry. We understand how difficult this must have been for the disciples. We can understand why they didn’t want to turn and face Jesus. First of all, who could trust Jesus with the ministry? Jesus had no order, no system for effective ministry. “Let the children come!” he exclaimed. No straight lines, no organization— just kids climbing everywhere. When we turn to Jesus, chaos seems to break loose. We lose “control.” People get upset and confused. There’s too much ambiguity. Why should we let go of our ministry and trust Jesus when he’s so unpredictable?...

On resistance:
Youth today are growing up in Babylon, they are growing up in ancient Rome, they are growing up in a culture that is saturated in a materialistic understanding of life. To counter an understanding of life reduced to buying and selling we need to embody a spirituality of resistance. When young people enter a Christian community they should experience a way of life that is deeply resistant to the values and mores of North American market culture. To be Christian necessarily means to relate to material goods differently and to understand and value families differently. It means we experience time, neighbors, strangers, and the earth in very different ways than those presented by the media culture that surrounds us. Unfortunately, most churches have been co-opted by the culture of hype— the culture of buying and selling. Most ministries mimic the surrounding cultural practices in order to make the faith more palatable. As a youth minister I regularly re c e i ve charts and grids from Christian music companies to help sell Christian CDs to the youth I know. These charts list secular bands and then match them with comparable Christian artists. Why do we need the comparison? Why can’t Christians produce music without seeking to appeal to the mass market? Worship services are becoming more like television. Participants can sit back passively and watch beautiful images roll across video screens while a Paul Schaefer-like band performs inspiring Christian rock ballads. Resistance means that we refuse to participate in the culture’s addiction to greed...

summer evenings round the chiminea

fantastic weather in london this weekend. it feels like summer is here. it's funny how being in the blogosphere gives you a sense of connection round the world with the bloggers down under writing about the onset of autumn!

anyway one of the things we love to do in the summer is get our chiminea going. i've mentioned it to a few people and thought i'd take a picture of it so you can see what i'm talking about. it's a big clay mexican burner. you put a layer of sand in the bottom and can burn wood or charcoal on it. we also have a grill that goes in it so we can cook on it. it's the same aesthetic as sitting in front of an open fire... and it makes the evenings last outdoors that bit longer. and now that we have wireless of course the option is there to sit outside and update the blog or whatever...

last summer we had quite a few grace planning meetings outside round the burner - i'm sure we'll do the same again...

spotted a banksy!

spotted a banksy stencil on lower marsh round the corner from where i work today....

virtual becomes 'real'

great to meet anna today for coffee to chat abut youth ministry, emerging church and all that... a growing experience for me is meeting people via blogs, e-mail etc and then meeting them in real life. i am looking forward to doing the same with bob in may when i visit california and adam in nashville... and who knows who else.....

network church

network church part 3 from smallritual. if this is new see part 1 | part 2. this is great stuff....

vanunu released

mordecai vanunu is released today after 18 years in prison for blowing the whistle on israel's nuclear weapons. he did it because of his christian faith. 11 years were spent in solitary confinement - i find this unimaginable. what does that do to you?....

guardian story | prison letters | bbc story

even after his release there are restrictions on him so that he cannot leave israel. pray for him...

24-7 lands space in london

24-7 lands space in london - link sent from moya...

worship trick 82: subversive poetry in a postmodern world

a while back i blogged about brian walsh and sylvia keesmaat's targums. you know what it's like... you come across these things and have a quick read and blog about them and move on... (in fact this is a real danger i think in the busyness of contemporary life that we never linger with things, people, books, thoughts, long enough - there's always something else to read, someone to meet - i am always saying to myself i must read that book again and do i?....). well for a change i have revisited these pieces because when i first looked at them i thought they were some of the most stunning things i had read in quite some time. so if you didn't catch them first time download targums.pdf and linger with them.

this is going to be a bit of a long post for me and i hope brian and sylvia don't mind extensive quoting but here are some extracts to give you a good flavour... targum 2 is a stunning piece and i am making it worship trick 82

from targum 1: Rehearing Colossians 1.1–14 in the Context of Disquieted Globalism
But here is the rub. Everything in this monolithic culture of McWorld globalization is allied against you and will try to keep your imaginations captive, stripping you of the courage to dream of alternative ways to live. So may you be strengthened with all strength and empowered with nothing less than the weighty power of God in this disempowered culture of unbearable lightness. May your vision, your stubborn refusal to allow your imaginations to be taken captive, have an endurance, an ability to hang in there for the long haul and a patience that doesn’t need to aggressively and triumphalistically realize the kingdom of God now because it has the faith and trust to work and wait for a miracle, for the coming of God’s shalom to our terribly broken world.

targum 2 : subversive peotry in a postmodern world col 1:15-20 :
In an image-saturated world
a world of ubiquitous corporate logos
permeating your consciousness
a world of dehydrated and captive imaginations
in which we are too numbed, satiated and co-opted
to be able to dream of life otherwise
a world in which the empire of global economic affluence
has achieved the monopoly of our imaginations
in this world
Christ is the image of the invisible God
in this world
driven by images with a vengeance
Christ is the image par excellence
the image above all other images
the image that is not a facade
the image that is not trying to sell you anything
the image that refuses to co-opt you
Christ is the image of the invisible God
the image of God
a flesh and blood
here and now
in time and history
with joys and sorrows
image of who God is
the image of God
a flesh and blood
here and now
in time and history
with joys and sorrows
image of who we are called to be
image-bearers of this God
He is the source of a liberated imagination
a sub-version of the empire
because it all starts with him
and it all ends with him
everything
all things
whatever you can imagine
visible and invisible
mountains and atoms
outer space, urban space and cyberspace
whether it be the Pentagon, Disneyland,
Microsoft or AT&T
whether it be the institutionalized power structures
of the state, the academy or the market all
things have been created in him and through him
he is their source, their purpose, their goal
even in their rebellion
even in their idolatry
he is the soveriegn one
their power and authority is derived at best
parasitic at worse
In the face of the empire
in the face of presumptuous claims to sovereignty
in the face of the imperial and idolatrous forces in our lives
Christ is before all things
he is sovereign in life
not the pimped dreams of the global market
not the idolatrous forces of nationalism
not the insatiable desires of a consumerist culture
In the face of a disconnected world
where home is a domain in cyberspace
where neighbourhood is a chat room
where public space is a shopping mall
where information technology promises
a tuned in, reconnected world
all things hold together in Christ
the creation is a deeply personal cosmos
all cohering and interconnected in Jesus
And this sovereignty takes on cultural flesh
And this coherence of all things is socially embodied
in the church
against all odds
against most of the evidence
In a “show me” culture where words alone don’t cut it
the church is
the flesh and blood
here and now
in time and history
with joys and sorrows
embodiment of this Christ
as a body politic
around a common meal
in alternative economic practices
in radical service to the most vulnerable
in refusal to the empire
in love of this creation
the church reimagines the world
in the image of the invisible God
In the face of a disappointed world of betrayal
a world in which all fixed points have proven illusory
a world in which we are anchorless and adrift
Christ is the foundation
the origin
the way
the truth
and the life
In the face of a culture of death
a world of killing fields
a world of the walking dead
Christ is at the head of the resurrection parade
transforming our tears of betrayal into tears of joy
giving us dancing shoes for the resurrection party
And this glittering joker
who has danced in the dragon’s jaws of death
now dances with a dance that is full
of nothing less than the fullness of God
this is the dance of the new creation
this is the dance of life out of death
and in this dance all that was broken
all that was estranged
all that was alienated
all that was dislocated and disconnected
is reconciled
comes home
is healed
and is made whole
everything
all things
whatever you can imagine
visible and invisible
mountains and atoms
outer space, urban space and cyberspace
every inch of creation
every dimension of our lives
all things are reconciled in him
And it all happens on a cross
it all happens at a state execution
where the governor did not commute the sentence
it all happens at the hands of the empire
that has captivated our imaginations
it all happens through blood
not through a power grab by the sovereign one
it all happens in embraced pain
for the sake of others
it all happens on a cross
arms outstretched in embrace
and this is the image of the invisible God
this is the body of Christ

from targum 4(re)citing Paul: Colossians 2:8-3:4 meets postmodernity :
You see, my friends, the postmodern incredulity toward all metanarratives is well-founded. The modernist metanarrative of civilizational progress manifest in an aggressive conquering of colonized peoples, so-called scientific objectivism, a technological will-to-power and a market capitalism that would commodify all of life, deplete creational resources and create an ecological nightmare, was a tall tale – a lying, self-justifying, ideological narrative. The problem, however, is that humans are constitutionally story-telling creatures. And any local narrative will necessarily and invariably function as a metanarrative in the lives of those who hold it as their story. So the issue isn’t whether to live out of a metanarrative or not, but which metanarrative, and whose grand story? Without a grounding and directing story, no praxis is possible. That is why the crisis of storyless postmodern people, animated by little more than media and market produced images, is a crisis of moral and cultural paralysis. But that’s not the way it is with you, is it? You know which metanarrative brings life, don’t you? You know whose grand story has set you free, don’t you? Remember that I have already told you that in Christ you have died and were buried and have been raised to new life. His story, is your story!

happiness is...

The Observer has a piece about happiness. In it someone speaks about thre approaches to life - the pleasant life, the good life and the meaningful life. Here's a quote:

But the most underrated of all, says Seligman, is the meaningful life - devoting oneself to an institution or cause greater than oneself. In a now classic exercise Seligman calls 'Philanthropy versus Fun', psychology students in one of his classes undertook to engage in one pleasurable activity and one philanthropic activity, and write about both. The results, he claims, were 'life changing'. The afterglow of the fun activity (watching a film, eating ice cream) paled in comparison with the effects of the kind action (volunteering at a soup kitchen, helping at the school fair). The reason, Seligman suggests, is that kindness is a gratification. 'It calls on your strengths to rise to an occasion and meet a challenge. Kindness is not accompanied by a separate stream of positive emotion, like joy; rather, it consists in [sic] total engagement and in the loss of self-consciousness.'

link via worthwhile...

wi fi hotspots round the world

www.jiwire.com enables you to find wi fi hotspots round the world. not many (in london at least) appear to be free but could come in handy....

3D online church

With pews made from pixels, the congregation logging in from their home computers and the collection sent in by mobile phone, the world's first 3D online church is going to be church like never before.
church of fools is an experiment from ship of fools in online church... should be fun. launches on may 11...

london marathon

congrats to my brother steve and to vicar steve for completing the london marathon today. it's actually pretty hard spotting anyone when you are watching as there are so many people doing the race and you're not quite sure where anyone is. but we managed to spot my brother at least as he sped past big ben and the houses of parliament into the home strait...

chelsea tickets!

we have chelsea membership so i spent a while on the phone trying to get tickets for chelsea v monaco in the champions league semi final. i had a sense of deja vu as i'd spent hours a weeks or so back trying (unsuccessfully) to get glastonbury festival tickets. so imagine my delight when someone actually answered the phone. so the godd news is we (me, joel and harry) are going to the second leg game on may 5 (hooray!) and i even managed to get child ticket prices for them....