disruptive grace

We need a vocation that is more that is not our jobs, but which makes sense of our jobs. (This is true how ever religious or irreligious I jobs appear to be). What we need is an all embracing sense of vocation that allows everything to have its proper place. If we do not have this we will end up rushing around from one activity to the next, doing the dutiful thing with no real understanding of what we are doing or why we’re doing it.

Here is a commendable vocation, which can operate in such a way. “We want to be the co-operative friends of Jesus living constant lives of creative goodness in the power of the Holy Spirit.” (thanks to T. Hunter)

With this vocation in heart and mind we can live rightly, peacefully, and powerfully with intention. Knowing when to rest, play, work and pray. Acting not on our own impulses or the circumstances we find ourselves in, but responding to the Spirit of God.

I discovered this video today (from another off the map project). This video describes a similar thinking to what provoked this blog, and how I want to be living in a faith community.

There’s some lovely observations in this video, Jeff describes some categories of ‘church type’ people, and as uncomfortable as we all tend to be about being put in to categories, and as limited as that approach is, I think we can see ourselves and friends in the terms he describes. Personally, I think I could quite easily be ‘church alumni’ – if it wasn’t for the fact that the church (organized-structured-church) I’m part of has plenty of opportunities to practice practical ways of loving those in our city, particularly to those marginalized due to economics and addictions.

I have friends who sit in each of the categories Jeff describes, and all who have found ways to practically love others in the manner of Jesus. So, in many ways these friends are my church* — a faith community — we courage each other in this way of life, we eat together, we care for each other. It is a church that intersects organized church structures, yet it is not fully defined by those structures, it works within those structures and without them. This is the nature of the kingdom, you can’t point to it and say here it is and there it is, for the kingdom is among you… in your midst.

So, let us keep practicing this life of embodying the way of Jesus, and let us encourage one another to do good works, let us keep meeting together in whatever context we can: around the dinner table, at the pub, in the coffee shop, in worship gatherings, over games of poker, and in the street.

There is a presupposition that runs through theses posts which can be distilled to some thing like: the good life is a life caught up with the love of God and the love of neighbour.’ The last post touch a little on how the way we use love means the word gets tainted with self serving meaning. The following is a nother thought provoking quote concerning this:

“Love, love — the word is always ringing in our ears, but when is it not mixed up with something else? Love and the desire to possess, love and the need to control, love and the need to be needed, love and the lust to absorb, love and condescension, love and narcissism. In the Christian mystery love itself must be crucified, must die to be reborn as the grace of communion, as love set free.”

[from: Meditations on the Passion of St. John, Martin L. Smith]

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I wrote to a friend today (concerning a particular piece of writing) saying:

‘all i want to do is “add to the stock of available reality” – i think personal stories and dreams are a perfect way of doing this. As we hear each others stories and dreams it releases us to dream also.’

“Adding to the stock of available reality” is a phase I picked up from the Image Journal — there Gregory Wolfe writes about how good art gives us fresh idioms, through new juxtapositions and new forms that spark our imaginations. I’ve been thinking how here the stories of others, their successes and failures work in a similar way. As a result I’m trying to encourage others to write and report on their stories, and dreams. Watch this space.

Listening to Steve Chalke talk on the Mars Hill podcast helped me today. I highly recommend a listen it. Look for: ‘Stop the Traffik’ by Steve Chalke over at Mars Hill – he tells his own story there on how and why he ended up doing what he’s doing. Let your imagination be ignited.

From Henri Nouwen: Trusting in the Fruits

We belong to a generation that wants to see the results of our work. We want to be productive and see with our own eyes what we have made. But that is not the way of God’s Kingdom. Often our witness for God does not lead to tangible results. Jesus himself died as a failure on a cross. There was no success there to be proud of. Still, the fruitfulness of Jesus’ life is beyond any human measure. As faithful witnesses of Jesus we have to trust that our lives too will be fruitful, even though we cannot see their fruit. The fruit of our lives may be visible only to those who live after us.

What is important is how well we love. God will make our love fruitful, whether we see that fruitfulness or not.

Eugene Peterson notes that in contrast to the tower buidling of the Chaldeans and the Egyptians – Abraham, when arriving in the land promised him, digs wells. In starting this site – the temptation was there again to build something – create something, or achieve something. But, again I’m drawn back to digging well’s. Well’s are spaces of abscence which can accept Presence – not because of anything they do – but because of the absence created. When the wells are filled, it is then that they can bring life to others. The trees that bear fruit are also the trees that are well watered.

[Also links with... 'Faithful' and 'Watch the fields']

Very few things explain the purpose of this ‘disruptive grace’ thing than this mp3/podcast from my brother’s community in Northampton – covering stories relating to Isaiah 58.

Walter Bruggemann authour of ‘Prophetic Imagnation’ offered these ‘19 Theses’ at a conference a couple of years ago. They continue to provoke me. The list is below – as I read it I’m challenged again to live out a counter script (to the dominant script of our society) though symbol and praxis.



1. Everyone lives by a script.
2. We get scripted through normal nurture and socialization.
3. The dominant script of our society is that of technological-therapeutic-militarist-consumerism.
4. This script promises us safety and happiness.
5. This script has failed.
6. The health of our society depends on moving beyond this script, but we resist this.
7. Ministry must de-script this dominant script.
8. This task is accomplished thru alternative scripting, or the funding of a counter imagination.
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[note: I keep finding myself editing this and making adjustments]

This is a space for those of us who have been captivated by Jesus’ message of the Kingdom of God. We want to see this good news lived out in our every day lives.

We believe in God who is restoring the world with his radical embracing grace. This God of grace disrupts our everyday lives and inivtes us to live with the conviction the Jesus is Lord and the systems of this world are not.

This embracing grace is changing our whole lives, reconnecting us to God, to the earth, to each other and to ourselves. Restoring us to who we were created to be.

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