Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Themes

So as we enter the last quarter of the year it is worthwhile to start thinking about themes. During the last few meetings, we talked about three themes that would carry us through the end of the year:

1. Everything Must Change: This series would carry us through election day. the series would take a look at the great change that our society is going through and how we deal with crisises facing our world and our faith.


2. Spirit and Place: This will be a brief series that ties us into the spirit and place events that are happening at the church.

3. Advent: This will take us from the end of november through christmas.


What do you think?

10 comments:

Jordan said...

i like it - but will the "everything must change" idea be too close to supporting one particular candidate?

Papa Joe said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Papa Joe said...

My thoughts went to what Jordan said; however, both major parties are calling for changes from "outside the beltway." Maybe the theme is subtle enough.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-7 is a good "non-partisan" passage.

Coming up to the election is a good time to remind all to practice the slogan "In God We Trust" rather than placing our trust in any particular candicate, party, political system, etc. If we trust in God to bring about change, how do we live that out?

Joe

Mike Oles III said...

The Times are a changin'
mr. robert zimmerman.
ie. bob dylan


Come gather 'round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You'll be drenched to the bone.
If your time to you
Is worth savin'
Then you better start swimmin'
Or you'll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin'.

Come writers and critics
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won't come again
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin
And there's no tellin' who
That it's namin'.
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin'.

Come senators, congressmen
Please heed the call
Don't stand in the doorway
Don't block up the hall
For he that gets hurt
Will be he who has stalled
There's a battle outside
And it is ragin'.
It'll soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin'.

Come mothers and fathers
Throughout the land
And don't criticize
What you can't understand
Your sons and your daughters
Are beyond your command
Your old road is
Rapidly agin'.
Please get out of the new one
If you can't lend your hand
For the times they are a-changin'.

The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is
Rapidly fadin'.
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin'.

Mike Oles III said...

everything must change isn't political--in the partisan way. it comes from brian mclaren's book everything must change. here is his take on the book:

This book in many ways is a sequel to The Secret Message of Jesus, although people can begin with either book. It asks two essential questions: What are the world's top crises, and what do the life and message of Jesus say to those global crises? I spent a few years researching the global crisis literature and tried to synthesize the best thinking on the subject. I developed a metaphor to help people understand global crises - a machine with four moving parts, corresponding to the four critical crises that create so much human suffering. Meanwhile, I was studying the gospels in a concentrated way, seeking to understand how Jesus' original hearers would have heard and understood his message of the kingdom of God. The two pursuits enriched each other in ways that I will probably never fully be able to communicate. This book is by far my most ambitious project yet, and I can't imagine ever writing anything that is more important and urgent.

Mike Oles III said...

the cool thing is that brian mclaren will be speaking in indy on saturday and sunday after the elections. there is an all day training that saturday at st. lukes. and it kicks off the spirit and place festival.

so the cool thing is that it would provide an awesome segway into the spirit and place festival theme too.

just some thouhts.

Philip said...

sounds good. regarding the everything must change, a lot of that which needs to change is partisan politics and labels; I want to make sure we are avoiding allegience to a particular party and offering allegience to the Christ. the blog from which I read some in July could be explored again, Claiborne really got into that well. And Tony Jones gets into it well in his New Christians; he describes the emergent church beautifully in an apolitical way. I think like page 78 or 80 or something. We could read that too somehwere in this series and insert LC in place of emergent...

Philip said...

I wrote that comment before Jordan's yesterday, but just clikced to publish it today. Sorry if it seems out of order. I know that it is not partisan, but we sound too partisan at times, like we are trying to craftily say something between the lines. If I was home I would post the Jones quote...

Anonymous said...

in terms of the partisian politics things.

the real question here is how do you speak (and live) truth to power? that must be the goal of the church.

i think jesus is pretty clear on things like war and poverty and loving your neighbors and loving your enemies.

the key is how do you be prophetic (speaking truth to power) and pastoral(developing transformative relationships with otehrs) to those who might not agree with our social understanding of the gospel.

i think the key thing is to not preach a watered down gospel where you can't say the iraq war is wrong or that homophobia is wrong.. but where people will get our church by the way we live our lives, do our ministries, and relate to each other.

i do not want for people to get up and rail against george w. bush or republicans...we can talk about politics without talking about partisian politics.

the revolutionary nature of the gospels will be easier for the nonlefty to get if they see it in our lives and how we do church together.

Philip said...

True. The section of Jone;s book to which I was referring starts on page 80 and is titled "an emergent voters' guide." It is helpful I think and is a road map for where I would like our church to go politically, but the 4 pages go deeper than we would want to read, and I don't have time right now to pull out snippets. It's a good guide though, and I would hope that in most places you could replace Emergen with Lockerbie Central and still have it make sense.