as conferences go i must say that this one has been pretty beefy. wrestling with concepts of narrative theology and implications of the eucharist and how the body of Christ (the church) needs to actually embody the eucharist—not to mention how we also need to find ourselves within the eucharist. fairly deep and tasty treats. it’s been a very refreshing look at the church giving hope where hope is lost, reinvigorating dreams that have faded, and restoring a love for the bride of Christ despite the bruises and scars that she bears.
if i had come into this with a poor view of the church, or at least as something ugly and hopelessly irredeemable—i’m fairly certain that i wouldn’t be leaving that way and i truly hope that the many that may be here with those views leave with a completely restored hope in the mission of the church and with a vision for how it can be a redeeming, transformative part of their community whereever that may be.
maybe one of the greatest things that i took away today was the “permission” to ask difficult questions without feeling the need to come to an immediate resolution. it’s okay to “be in process” and living for a time in the sacred tension between resolution and unresolution as you search for and wrestle with God in those moments. that was rather empowering—especially considering that i tried this once and was burned pretty bad with it. (and in fact was labelled a heretic for it—and still am branded that way. but that’s a story for a later date.)
i also appreciated the several conversations (or “talks”) in which rob bell discussed handling criticism—”it’s better to have a bunch of 5′s and 1′s than 3′s.” or basically, on a scale of 1 to 5 it’s better to have a bunch of high scores and low scores than middle of the road scores… because it’s only then that you know you’re not mediocre.
but maybe most of all i’ve enjoyed my time hanging out with mcclane and ewaskowitz as we drive from the hotel to building talking and discussing, spending time together in the tension of ministry, life, and the hopes and dreams we have for the church. it’s probably been those conversations that have been the most rewarding, the most inspiring, and the most hopeful of them all as together we journey through and wade into the waters of church and ministry life.
more to come tomorrow… i’ll certainly try and blog some stuff earlier in the day.
Related posts:
- a postmodern meditation on romans 12. (part 5)
- lost.
- ordinary radical…
- status-quo worship
- ::::aaron’s musings::::
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