Bigger on the Inside: The #Tardis #Church

My church works hard to be community oriented and to be out in the neighborhood.

1 that runs a Neighborhood Farmer’s Market in our parking lot from May-Oct, completely thru volunteers

1 that arranges for free exercise classes (with babysitting) during the farmer’s market

A Market that book-ended by 2 Chicken BBQ fundraisers (the company cooks, we serve)

p.s. we put up great signs for these events. GREAT signs!

1 that puts on a health fair, plays, concerts, art shows.

1 that has done a clothing exchange, electronic recycling,

1 that has a weekly free playgroup and runs a 2, 3, and 4yr old Nursery School

1 that hosts over a dozen AA’s, 3 other congregations, 2 community choirs, an immigrant ministry  & the neighborhood association

When I talk to people about my church, the reach is far.

Our location is good, most people have stepped into our building at some point for various things

Our Farmer’s Market is well known, we are possibly the best small farmer’s market in the city

And everyone is shocked, I mean shocked by how small we are….they think we have 150 people at least

keep-calm-its-bigger-on-the-inside-1

Why is that?

Because we are bigger on the inside

That’s what happens when a church holds God and the Community in their hearts..

bigger

we end up growing in ways that we can’t even comprehend….

And God increases our efforts twofold/fourfold/tenfold

yoda

Its time to STOP thinking of ourselves as a small church, and to start thinking of ourselves as bigger on the inside

#MyQueerBible and The Hirmeneutics of Creation

“”the distinction between God and Human is also no longer simple to cut” Pieces are distinctly part of the whole…and it takes male and female to be whole

Alan Hooker's avatar

Last year for Fr. Shannon Kearn’s Queer Theology synchroblog I wrote about the image of God in Genesis and the potential to reimagine the dominant interpretation of the creation story otherwise (and some material from that has reappeared here in edited form). To queer creation is to reimagine from a perspective that’s not invested in upholding heavily binarized categories: man-woman, human-animal, creator-created, and so on.

There can be no doubt that the narratives of Genesis 1-3 (creation, the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve) have been weaponized and used against LGBTQ folk in order to delegitimize their existence, to name them as “unnatural” or “contrary to creation”. Transgender people, for example, are told that God created “man and woman”, and that to “tamper” with one’s “biological sex” is sinful and disordered; and those who are nonheterosexual often hear that clichéd refrain: “Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.” For many Christians then, Genesis…

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#LBQT Happy Coming Out Week, friendly note: don’t preach hate as gospel

Notes from my trans sister….

Important note about the evangelists on campus:
A reminder that that is NOT what Christianity usually means. Christianity is about love and grace, about finding and defining yourself and the world in relation to God and their love. Christianity does not have to mean hatred, exclusivity, or fear of retribution. In fact, the people for whom that is what Christianity means are generally the fringe minority.
Please do not judge this religion on its extremists.

Eugene Peterson’s Advice to Seminary Students

pastorin

Ivan's avatarLucid Theology

Eugene Peterson’s advice to seminary students:

Eugene_Peterson (1)“I’d tell them that pastoring is not a very glamorous job. It’s a very taking-out-the-laundry and changing-the-diapers kind of job. And I think I would try to disabuse them of any romantic ideas of what it is. As a pastor, you’ve got to be willing to take people as they are. And live with them where they are. And not impose your will on them. Because God has different ways of being with people, and you don’t always know what they are.

“The one thing I think is at the root of a lot of pastors’ restlessness and dissatisfaction is impatience. They think if they get the right system, the right programs, the right place, the right location, the right demographics, it’ll be a snap. And for some people it is: if you’re a good actor, if you have a big smile, if you…

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Banned Book Week

banned books

In Honor of Banned Book Week: A question I often ask people. The WHY is fascinating

I asked my husband it years ago…here is the conversation (back when the obvious choices were 1984, Fahrenheit 451 and Handmaiden Tale)
Which Dystopic society scares you the most?
Me: Fahrenheit 451….There are NO BOOKS!!!
Anthony: Handmaiden Tale…its the most realistic…
Me: that’s sad, and scary with the patriarchy stuff….but….still…..no books…nope still Fahrenheit 451

Loneliness & Church

Churches feel like lonely places. It is clear to me that one of the reasons that big churches do so well is because they don’t feel lonely, at least not immediately

•I have no doubt there are many reasons to explore about why churches are having trouble…therefore I am only tackling this one

But walking into an empty-ish church of mostly older age feels…lonely….

The loneliness is everywhere; and worse its palpable.

Here is the thing, pastors talk about this a lot…pastors tend to be lonely but little is talked about the layperson’s loneliness. The feeling that “we aren’t in this religion thing together” any more–we are in it alone.

Perhaps that is why the Spiritual but not religious label hits so hard….What do you mean you can do your religious thing by yourself? Where does that leave us…and me?

Religion can be a lonely place to be right now

I just watched Breuggeman’s Prophetic Preaching on the Old Testament which is wonderful

And he talks about how Prophetic Preaching is the breaking of the totalism (or hegemony), which is a SILENCE that leads to VIOLENCE with an outside voice

Good News is so important

Hope is so important

God is not a God who wants us to have to live and die and do everything alone.

Don’t let the emptiness of the church trick you.

Aren’t we the people of the empty tomb?

Aren’t we the people of the empty cross?

Didn’t God make the world out of the emptiness?

Didn’t God create space within God’s very self to give birth to us?

Didn’t God empty out her very self in the personhood of Jesus Christ to give us new and better life?
Churches don’t have to be lonely…don’t buy into it. The lie of death, the lie of not changing, the lie of security and worries about looks and judgements…..don’t believe these lies

God creates…we are called to create and be CREATIVE with God

To me that work is fulfilling, not lonely at all…

Behold I make all things new!