filtered truth

do be 5, originally uploaded by jonnybaker.

grace on saturday was amazing... when you arrived you were given a set of home made glasses with either red or blue filters. an exhibition was hanging with a set of images and texts to look at and you had to keep your filters on. a discussion ensued and people found they were looking at the same things but seeing something totally different. for example one of the texts if you looked with red said blessed are the peacemakers and if you looked with blue said i have not come to bring peace but a sword

taking off filters isn't a possibiity so we need people with other perspectives to help take our blinders off, to open up a fuller view of who god is, of the world.

it concluded with an invitation to reflect on being and doing like christ in the season of lent with an invitation to take a red or blue marked wafer to signify that you needed the whole body of christ and not just the parts like you...

plenty of photos will get added to the gracelondon group on flickr no doubt. steve gave it a nice touch by donning the minor propherts with sets of specs

the art work was all done by joel and it looked and worked better than any of us had dared imagine.

i am making the whole idea worship trick 83, series 3

[update: this service was expanded and developed for the big top grace service at greenbelt 2010. it included dyeing bread red and blue and picking up on andrew's suggestion in the comments here of having a liturgy in red and blue - see purple for links to those pieces]

Comments

[Andrew Sillis]

Hi Jonny,

Really enjoyed and was inspired by Saturday's worship - Do Be.

Perhaps the planning group thought of this and discarded it, but as an additional worship trick on this theme, we might have had a responsorial liturgy, where those with glasses of one colour would have been unable to read the phrases being said by those with the other colour. Or a prayer read together, where the words mostly coincided for both groups but occasionally differed.

On Saturday, as we contrasted apparently contradictory statements from Jesus, it made me focus on the different ways he treated people - to some he was harsh, to others gentle. Made me think about what he would say to me...

Thanks again, Grace is an important resource for my ministry and discipleship

Andrew

[jonny]

that is a brilliant idea. you should join a planning group! if you fancy drafting a liturgy let me know.