Postmodern Renaissance Culture Revolutionary

This from the, "Take it for what it's worth" category. Last week I visited my 5 year old son's school for his Easter party. Being in Oklahoma, it is still acceptable for a school to have an Easter party. As long as we only talk about Easter bunnies, and eggs, and candy. Don't bother with that historical Jesus event. Anyway. It came time for the egg hunt. They kids all grabbed their baskets and trooped outside. My son has inherited my non-competitive nature. He leisurely wandered around the playground, not bothering with the objective of finding and gathering eggs. That were obvious. It's not like it was hard to find them. 18 seconds later, all the eggs had been found. My son had 2. Out of 500. Luckily one of his friends was a merciful type and shared from his bounty. But the point of the story is that when they got back to the room, the kids had to pool all of their eggs and then the eggs were redistributed equally to everyone. And I scratched my head. And I l...

There are some weeks where an image or an idea seems to follow you wherever you go. The past couple of weeks, the idea of hypocrisy seemed to be everywhere. I have been reading unChristian where they are discussing the attitudes of outsiders toward the church. In it they explore the opinion outsiders have of Christian's being hypocrites. We also had the very obvious case of Governor Spitzer: crusading law man turned simple, albeit it affluent, john. The word has also popped up in conversations I have been party to. Hypocrisy is a definite issue for the church to face and be honest about. The original understanding of the Greek words for hypocrite and hypocrisy come from the Greek theater. The hypocrite was the actor who performed a role behind the mask of a character. Hypocrisy was used in a broader sense. It could apply to any type of acting or faking. When we think about a hypocrite or hypocrisy in today's language, we think about someone who says or does one thing while hol...

One of the catch phrases of the emerging church movement is experiential worship. The substance of experiential worship is to move from recipient to participant. An experiential worship service attempts to draw everyone in the congregation into some aspect of worship beyond just singing or reciting prayers. It may call participants to touch or smell something that connects the people's lives with the message of the Gospel. It may have them actively respond to the worship or prayer through movement or an activity. It may move worship away from a traditional setting by going to a different place or changing the environment of the a familiar place. Last weekend I served as the worship leader for a confirmation retreat. A retreat setting always provides the opportunity to draw people into a more experiential service due to the unfamiliar or less familiar setting. But I was also asked to design more experiential services for two worship times. Since the retreat was for youth, I felt som...

Last week I got into a very opinionated conversation (Christian euphemism for an argument) with a friend over the issue of sharing our faith story with others. The substance of the argum....um conversation was whether our witness should be a life lived in the fullest sense of Christian faithfulness or should believers verbally witness to their faith with others. The context of the conversation was evangelism and youth. I came down on the side that believers should develop the skill to verbally express their faith with anyone who asks for the reason of their faith. I believe that includes other believers who want to learn from you as well as non-believers. As we discussed the positions, we were deadlocked in our position. Now that the moment has passed and I have had time to reflect I can see my friend's position. Our witness should be a life lived in faithful obedience to God through Christ. I can't deny that how we live is critical to our witness. If our outward life is not an...

Late last year 13 year old Cori Baker disappeared. An 18 year old man has been charged with her disappearance and likely death. There have been searches throughout the Tulsa metro area. The searches have been struggling to find volunteers to expand the search. The family is understandably distraught over not knowing what happened and move toward closure. The latest development in the search involves the use of a psychic medium to discern clues to what happened to Cori. After watching the press conference with the medium I am really concerned about how this case will proceed. First, the medium reserved divulging information until the press conference. If this family's emotional well-being were at the forefront, I have to wonder why search teams were not coordinated with maps prior to the event. It appeared from the press conference that he was withholding all of the information he had for that time. Second, the medium was allowed access to the suspect to "interview" him on...

I have been highly uninspired, unmotivated, uncreative (actually I believe that is non-creative, but I'm going for alliteration points here), and unproductive over the last few weeks. I believe it may be a bit of SAD. SAD is seasonal affective disorder. I have noticed that over the years I have hit "low" times during February-April. During these times I would experience a sense of lack of motivation. My energy levels would dip very often. Sometimes I would have full blown episodes of depression. I always believed that it had more to do with school (college and seminary). I attributed it to overload or burnout. But after seminary, I saw the same patterns occurring in my role as pastor. Again, I attributed to overload (post Christmas burnout, working with curriculum deadlines, etc.). But I believe that SAD may lie behind this. The hypothesis regarding SAD is that light plays a role in the affective condition of a body. The idea is that because of diminished light during win...

Credit to Locust and Honey (where I see some great videos).

I was pointed to this artist today. Watch the entire clip. It's over 5 minutes but worth it. I don't care for modern art. I'm more of a traditionalist when it comes to artwork. I like the masters. I'm also a fan of Remington's cowboy art. So I had to be patient with this.

On Tuesday, the Elders of the Oklahoma UM Conference convened for the annual observance of the Covenant Service. This was followed by the semi-annual lecture. The Order of the Elders meet to fellowship, embody the connection of the annual conference, and to offer edification of the body. This year I believe we also met with the Local Pastors (I wasn't really clear on that). During the course of the day I experienced fellowship, worship, accountability, and frustration. I'll deal with each in turn. Prior to attending the meeting, a gang of colleagues descended upon Abuelo's in Bricktown. Around a table, eating chips and salsa, we experienced fellowship. There were different age groups, different backgrounds, different college affiliations, and different styles of ministry appointments (theologically we were fairly close together). But it wasn't about what made us different that made the fellowship great. It was that we all took the time to come together and share around ...

Totally indebted to Locusts and Honey What if God Had a MySpace Posted Jun 17, 2006 This hilarious video answers the age-old question, "What if God had a MySpace account?"

I have finished the three books of Philip Pullman. The Golden Compass is the first book in the series. I thought I would chime in with my final thoughts on the book. First, let me say that I decided that I would not go see the movie. After reading the novels, I didn't feel that the I could agree with where the story was going to go. I am sure that the movie is a wonderful cinematic piece. But I chose not to see it. The second and third books develop the story of the main character, Lyra, as she continues on the adventure that was begun in The Golden Compass . The story continues to show the opposition of Free Thinkers versus the Church. Lyra, and her new companion Will, seem to be caught between the two sides. Lyra was raised by the church (although she never fit in) but doesn't want to give over completely to her father's anti-church opinion. Along the journey to find Lyra's father, Will acquires a remarkable knife that enables the wielder to travel between worlds...

There is quite the little controversy bubbling up in Tulsa. In Saturday's Tulsa World there was an article about the prayer that opens the regular city council meeting. Tulsa has a tradition (like many other cities) of asking religious leaders to come in an lead the gathering in prayer before the business of the meeting is dealt with. According to the article, persons representing the Tulsa Interfaith Alliance approached the chaplain who coordinates the religious leaders who volunteer to pray. They approached him in the interest of inclusiveness. Karl Sniderman said that he and another TIA board member attended a council meeting that was opened by a person who prayed in Jesus' name. Sniderman goes on to say, "I'm Jewish and she's Muslim, and it kind of irked us." This conversation led to the decision by the coordinating chaplain to not allow prayers that were prayed in Jesus' name. Anyone who could not in good conscience abide by this condition is being as...