In the Midst of It All

“For: The Institute of Contemporary and Emerging Worship Studies, St. Stephen’s University, Essentials Blue Online Worship Theology Course with Dan Wilt.”

God is LOVE.

1. In the beginning God created heaven and earth. In the beginning God created humans to be in the depths of relationship with him, to love and be loved and in turn to love one another.

2. Near the beginning humans began to wonder if they could aspire to more than human-ness, but this was selfishness and pride, not motivated by love. Death entered the world because of human pride; because humans wanted to be like God. When death entered the world, all the effects of death came; sickness, injustice, disease, relational breakdown, pain.

There was severing between God and humans, because of the consequences of human pride. God was saddened and yet his LOVE remained. God began to make ways to restore his relationship with his people again. The Old Testaments are story after story of attempts at relationship restoration, covenants of relationship, and of promises for new covenant.

3. And so Jesus came. He came as one who could overcome death, because he was God. He could make it all right. Jesus made a new relationship between God and humans, by willingly giving up his own life to death.

Jesus started the process of bringing back LIFE to all of creation and bringing LIFE to every human being.

4. Those who believe the story of Jesus Christ, will have restoration of relationship with God. Love will override all else.

Relationship with God hasn’t fully been restored yet, but it has been started. The story is not yet over. The new creation began at Jesus’ death and resurrection; but it could not yet fully implemented. This time of new creation is the Kingdom of God, it is God’s will being done on earth as it is in heaven.

“For: The Institute of Contemporary and Emerging Worship Studies, St. Stephen’s University, Essentials Blue Online Worship Theology Course with Dan Wilt.”

To start a discussion about being Fully Human, one must begin with some of ideas from Jean Vanier and the l’Arche community.

The spirit of community can be found in the discovery that beauty exists in every person… Community forms when we discover that we are interdependent and that every person has gifts…Humans are not set on earth as a pyramid, where the bottom is crushed and the top is alone, but each being is an essential part of the whole…We must seek to be fully ourselves; no fear, no hierarchy; to be fully loving one another…Growth in love happens with gift of self… Giving of ourselves brings us back to community and of imitating the way Christ. [1]

There is a connection with these themes of creativity, community, justice and spirituality to a place where many have become more fully human, including myself. This place is Flatlanders Inn. [2] A place where creative expression of ideas find their way into the physical realm and are shared because of a culture of acceptance, safety and mutual support which all originate from the Spirit of God. This is relationship, creativity, spirituality and justice. There is art, music, relationships, arguments, frustrations and crazy antics in this place; all creative expressions of being human. Flatlanders Inn is a place where we seek “right related-ness” (righteousness) to each other and with Jesus Christ. A place where there are no pyramids, where each person is an essential part of the whole, fully human, loved and accepted no matter their worldly label.[3]

To be fully human is to move beyond the labels of our society. There are no rules defining who can and who can’t be creative. We are each a reflection of the image of God our Creator, making us essentially creative.[4]

To be fully human is to be interdependent, where we each have something to give and we each need one another; true community. [5]

To be fully human is to recognize the injustice in the world and to work to change it, to flatten the pyramids and create circles of life.

To be fully human is to know that the Spirit is powerful and true. Spirituality gives us the energy and life to be alive in the physical world. Spirituality allows Christ to inspire and guide us and encouraging our participation in the on-going story of creation actively bringing heaven on earth through our journey of becoming more fully human.

1. Jean Vanier, Growth and Community (Paulist Press, 1989).
2. www.winnipegcentrevineyard.com
3. Andrew Wood, It’s a Flat World After All (Draft Thesis project for the Masters of Ministry, St. Stephen’s University, 2009).
4. Dan Wilt, Essential Worship Theology: The Nature of Human Beings, e*b Video.
5. Scott Peck, The Different Drum (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1987)

www.bekwood.wordpress.com

“For: The Institute of Contemporary and Emerging Worship Studies, St. Stephen’s University, Essentials Blue Online Worship Theology Course with Dan Wilt.”

For the past year, as I have been reading Simply Christian, the Lord’s Prayer has become an integral part of my life and understanding of the world.

“Your kingdom come. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” Matthew 6:10

Part II of Simply Christian shows how God, through Jesus Christ, has rescued and is rescuing humanity and indeed all of creation. The Kingdom of God has come here on earth. The presence of heaven is not allocated to some place in space for our souls to come to rest after death.

The Kingdom of God is available to us in the here and now, on earth as it in heaven. In glimpses we see the world put to rights, we have connection with God through the presence of the Holy Spirit. God’s presence is not separated to a place in the temple, accessed only by a select few, but his Spirit is present within us.

Humanity is not doomed. Even though Greenland is melting, and innocent people are being destroyed, there will be a re-creation. Right now, the presence of God, the Kingdom of God is making its way in the world now. In fact, we, those who believe in God the King, Creator, Spirit and Saviour, are workers in the renewal of the earth to make the way for the Kingdom of God to be fully established, a new heaven and a new earth.

Here is the challenge for me right now; my dad died a few months ago. He was only sixty. I cannot help but to think daily of heaven. Often, I can’t imagine anything good, anything heavenly, on earth. My dad’s life is over, my mom feels as if her life has also ended. Grief is deep.

However, I hold on to the belief that God has a Rescue Plan and it has begun. This is also what I believe to be a profound idea for the next decades of life on earth. We are not sentenced to death but we are brought into this Life. God is rescuing humanity now. The earth is not doomed. Death does not reign. The King reigns and his love overtakes death. Christianity is the belief that the LIVING GOD accomplished His promise – to find, to save and give new life to his creation and his children- in Jesus (Wright, p. 92).

Wright, N.T. Simply Christian. New York: Harper Collins. 2006.