Baraka...

I remember some of the conversations I used to have with colleagues when I lived overseas. Sometimes they would speak long & passionately about their desire for seeing the Gospel spread like wildfire among Muslim peoples. These were people with Big vision who were focused on engaging in activities that would release church planting movements. Often the image that would be evoked in my mind was of the good news being some kind of unstoppable tsunami. I am uncomfortable with that image.

 

Rick Love* says he doesn't like the term 'mission' because too often it misrepresents the peaceable way of Jesus. He suggests that rather than conquering the world for Jesus, the presence of the gospel among a community of people is one of blessing and transformation. He says the pattern of God's intention for people is imprinted in God's first conversation with Abraham, "Leave your country, your people & your father's household & go to the land I will show you. I will make you into a great nation & I will bless you; I will make your name great and you will be a blessing. I will bless those you bless you and whoever curses you I will curse; and all people's on earth will be blessed through you " (Gen 12:1-3). In the New Testament the Apostle Paul makes the direct connection between Abraham, blessing & the gospel, "The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: "All nations will be blessed through you" (Gal 3:8).

 

The presence of the gospel among people is like a little yeast in the dough. It is subversive & revolutionary bringing fundamental change but its arrival is often subtle & below the radar… mostly birthed in weakness. It is also like a radiating tiger balm bringing healing and reconciliation, justice and generosity ...deeply satisfying and purposeful living.

 

The presence of the gospel is creative and industrious movement among communities of people responding to the blessing of the kingdom of God.

 

Rick Love says, "So no more talk of conquering… those who follow Jesus are commissioned to bless".

 

Outwards & Downwards,

 

Glenn

 

*Rick Love is the International Director for Frontiers, a missional movement focused on blessing Muslims.

'Baraka' is the Arabic word for blessing.

The Edge that Belongs in the Middle II...

Communion is the sacrament that takes us to the deep heart of the
gospel. Communion says that when you engage in the simple concrete
actions of eating bread & drinking from a cup you reached an edge, a
boundary. You have entered the threshold of a sacred space - a place
of holy paradox.

The beauty of the torn edge. It is that boundary place that is formed
between living and suffering. Communion takes us to that place, to the
Cross on a hill on the edge of Jerusalem, where Jesus was broken for
you & for me.

It is the torn edge where brokenness & spilled blood becomes the balm
of healing, where Jesus' unspeakable pain & abandonment enables
wholeness & intimacy, where God gloried through the death of Jesus
brings light and transformation to peoples' profound selfishness,
where death & resurrection becomes the pathway to birthing something
new.

Communion is the safe place where we can allow ourselves to be
pierced, to be penetrated, to be held and to be humbled, to bow our
heads and find we are accepted in the presence of Almighty God.
Communion the edge that belongs in the middle.

The Edge that Belongs in the Middle...

The other day I was walking along the beach. It was one of those warm
afternoons that beckon people from their workplaces & homes - out onto
the sand.

There is something profoundly soothing about the repeated action of
waves breaking onto the sand. There is that momentary stillness where
the water reaches its edge before it is pulled back into the sea.
Always, that edge is shifting - never quite the same. There is
tremendous energy in waves breaking onto the shore & constant change -
where one moment your step can be etched precisely into the beach and
the next moment erased by a sudden gush of water.

I find exquisite unpredictability about this edge place where waves
meet sand. I was walking along with my two sons when the retreating
water revealed it's treasure - a rather large crab. I thought it was
dead so I picked it up to show my boys. All of a sudden the crab was
trying to scramble from my grasp. It scared the 'fregeebas' out of me,
while the boys roared laughing in delight.

Why is it that so many people are energised by this kind of place ?
Why is it that when I look in the Real Estate window the most
expensive houses are always those closest to the beach ?

I wonder if people are drawn to the beach on warm winter days because
there is freshness and newness in such a place, because people can
re-center and recreate themselves away from the busyness of the
everyday. Mostly edges form borders & boundaries - marking out where
one thing finishes & another begins. However, for people who inhabit &
dwell in close proximity to these places, they can become the heart -
the edge that belongs in the middle.