Announcement video for our youth group
27 Feb
Archive | February, 2009
No Bias. No Bull.
25 Feb
This was the supporting phrase that was on an ad for Campbell Brown’s new segment on CNN . I can’t help but think that it is such a crock. It is impossible for anyone, and I do mean anyone, to present “facts” with no bias. Am I the only one that thinks this? Bias is not always a bad thing. Of all the children that I know, I have a personal bias to my own two little girls. Is that bad? I guess it depends on the context. We are all shaped by our personal experiences. It’s part of what shapes our worldview. No bias? Sounds like they have already violated the “no bull” clause already.
Disclaimer: I have never watched that segment; so it very well may be that they always share both sides of the story. I realize that the no bias is probably an appeal in response to the liberal tag that the media got tagged with this past election. It’s advertising…but that doesn’t make it true. 
What do we really mean when we talk about “community”?
24 Feb
I have heard some interesting dialogue going on lately dealing with an enigma. This enigma is labeled community. I have read/watched bloggers talk about this recently, most notably the interaction on Out of Ur between Shane Hipps , Scott McKnight , and recently Anne Jackson . Generally speaking, this dialogue on community is solely revolving around online communities. Hipps contends that to have community you have to have history, permanence, proximity, and a shared vision of the future. McKnight differs with Hipps, based upon his personal experience as a blogger. Today, Anne Jackson (flowerdust.net ) added her observations. Jackson contends that it is connection and not community that happens online.
OK, so I have whittled this little debate into its empirical form. However, there is one question that is yet to be answered. McKnight closed his response while pointing directly to this. To declare what is and is not community, community has to be defined. In the Church, if asked for a definition of community many would quickly point to the book of Acts. This is an example of a community, but this isn’t necessarily a prescription or a how-to. It is the example for what communal living looks like. Perhaps if there were defining guidelines, there would be no debate. If we look at the definitions of community that can be found on Wikipedia and at Merriam-Webster, it shows us that the word community can be used in several different ways. But the one that seems to apply best to this topic is this:
Community (from the Greek word koinonia) – communion by intimate participation
Communion by intimate participation is very broad. I think that we tend to we think of intimacy as being physical proximity rather than an emotional state of mutual vulnerability. For intimacy there has to be a shared dialogue, knowledge of each other, and a sense of reciprocity. It is give and take. In my opinion, we CAN have this online. Hipps says that since God ultimate revelation came in the form of the person known as Jesus. Therefore, humanity was the chosen medium for the Gospel. In my view this doesn’t change with the use of technology. The message remains the same. It is still intended for people. The technology is a tool not the end. Without human beings sharing personally with each other, the Internet is useless.
What do you think? How do you define community? According to your definition of community, is that attainable online or in a virtual environment?
What is grace…exactly?
20 Feb
I pondered this question while preparing for a message last week. You may think that it is a silly question; however, I have been spending the better part of the last four years of my life trying to figure out what it is that I really believe about the beliefs that I inherited. This is because I never had true faith experience as the foundation of my faith. My beliefs were based upon inherited beliefs and not upon experience.
So this puts an interesting spin on the question about grace. Did I not really know what it was because I had truly experienced it? Was it because it was nothing more than a belief? Troubling, isn’t it? I have often heard grace used synonymously/interchangeably with mercy and/or forgiveness. And that is all well and good, but what even mercy and forgiveness are not synonymous. I just wasn’t clear on it. So in my prep for last week, I settled on this definition for grace…”enabling power significant for progression.” For some reason that definition stuck in me. Grace is that power that is enough to push us beyond our hopelessness and selfishness. Grace is that force that allows us to become someone that we cannot even fathom ourselves becoming. So, when you talk about grace, what is your understanding of it? Has your understanding of grace changed at certain points of your life, or has it stayed the same?
