I know it is a leap - but given that you buy into the premise from the earlier post, what are the implications for youth ministry of reconciling a divorce between a rational and systematic theological approach with a more holistic faith and practical theology? That is the topic I would like to make an attempt at addressing here.

1. Restoring doubt as a companion to faith
For too long, doubt has been demonized in Christianity. Doubting Thomas has been ridiculed, doubt is perceived as sin and at times the reason why our lives go awry or prayers unanswered. The problem with this - is that besides being inaccurate, it introduces unneeded stress to young people causing them to wonder, “if I doubt, have I fallen out of relationship with God and Christ?” The opposite of faith is not doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty. In the face of a certain thing - faith is not necessary. We know without faith it is impossible to please God - so faith is absolutely essential in this journey of the Christian Faith. With faith - hoping in the face of uncertainty - doubt will accompany us. This is what we must help young people understand - that when we doubt, it provides the opportunity to exercise trust in our Good, Great and Merciful God. Our teaching must move away from making our faith “bullet proof” and allow for the shadows, the mystery and the dark corners that result in being in relationship with the God of the Universe (who was a “cloud” by day and pillar of fire by night - both images don’t provide the incandescent certainty we might desire!?). Such a view of doubt will allow for young people to enter a relationship built on genuine trust and faith (rather than facts and certainty - that are really not possible this side of eternity).

2. Versus verses - recapturing the narrative
In the past 100 or more years we have surgically dissected the bible transforming it from a narrative to a prescription of points, propositions and principles (NOTE - most things dissected are no longer living?!). It isn’t unusual for a youth pastor or preacher to build a whole message on the basis of one or two verses - out of which a number of points and “living principles” might be taught. While this isn’t the end of the world - I don’t think it gets at the intended purpose of why God gave us the revelation contained in the Older and New Testament. The narrative of the Bible shares one over arching story told to us through hundreds of smaller stories. I would encourage us to get back to relearning and helping young people encounter and begin to live within this story that continues to unfold. I think we need to get beyond the numeric verses to the whole story. Seeing our story shaped by God’s story of creation, incarnation and recreation - this I believe is the purpose of God’s revelation and what can begin to transform individuals, communities and our world.

3. Beyond spontaneous prayer
In the traditions I affiliated for most of my Christian life - praying was a spontaneous affair (aside from the occasional recitation of The Lord’s Prayer). It wasn’t unusual for people to be labeled as ‘great prayers’ (which actually seems sort of odd - for it wasn’t a designation signifying that they prayed effectual prayers - merely that they were great at saying a memorable and cogent spontaneous prayer). My sense is that prayer is 1. more than saying the first things that come to mind and 2. more than talking to God. Prayer is 1. an act and declaration of faith, 2. a surrendering of our will and way to God’s will and way, 3. communication and communion, and finally (at the very least) 4. an offering of our worship.

If that is a true representation of prayer, then there is room for our prayer to go beyond spontaneous spoken prayer. This makes room for all people (those good at spontaneously speaking to God and those not so good at that discipline) to come before God using written prayers (there is a great heritage of written prayers to be mined from the Church’s history). Written prayer provides a great opportunity to teach us what to pray for and how to pray. Written prayers also allow for us to meditate on the ancient words and allowing for space to listen for God’s voice in the midst of our meditation. Written prayers are a wonderful corporate discipline - helping a community find it’s identity in common prayer and having the encouragement of hearing one another recite the words of faith to God who is listening. Finally, a prayer life that employs both spontaneous and written prayers gains the advantage that when we don’t have words to pray (in life’s disappointments, or moments of doubt, or times of stress) we can rely on those oft recited words we have learned through written prayers.

4. Returning the baptismal and table to a place of prominence
The final implication that I will point out in this post is that a reconciled faith (that brings both the head, heart and hand together under a narrative theology) allows room for mystery and the “unanswerable” (ie. the mystical). In youth ministry we need to push the lectern (or music stand) out of the center of our meeting spaces and allow room for the baptismal and the table. We need to see spiritual formation as a process that takes place outside of just our brain. Right beliefs are important (we need to rightly understand that the God of the Universe is good, gracious, great and faithful) - but equally important is a right will and right behaviors and right relationships.

For too long we have educated individuals into the community of Faith, but this in my estimation is wholly inadequate. Jesus invited by both example and command to honor the practice of baptism and the Lord’s Supper (Eucharist) as practices that would shape our Christian identity. In too many places these rites have been stripped of any enduring power to transform our lives and relationships and become merely acts of obedience. Baptism has lost any sense of identity formation and become a way to testify to the world of our changed relationship to God and Communion (Eucharist) has become a monthly remembrance of Christ’s death on our behalf (a memorial). While I wouldn’t argue that those are wrong reasons to practice baptism and communion - I would say that there is much more to the story. I would argue that Baptism ushers us into a new relationship with God that allows us to be IN God and God to reside IN us (we rehearse and participate with Christ in his death, burial and resurrection). I would suggest that in communion we do remember the death of Christ, but that in that meal we are also ushered in a mystical way into the very presence of God that is unique to sharing the bread and wine. We commune with God in this meal - we are ushered INTO God and God resides IN us - it’s a paradox, a mystery, a new way to relate to God (each time we partake of this meal).

The sacraments of Baptism and Communion need to find new space and new meaning in our youth ministries. These practices need to be seen not merely as symbols - but also practices instituted by God to restore us to our original image.

Again, enough for now. Peace.

I may be slow on the uptake. It is a realization as I grow older that I am not as quick to change my ways as I would like to think. The latest way this has dawned on me is in my thinking and appropriating the reality of my evangelical/traditional upbringing. I have heard for years now and even at times taught about the intellectualization of the Christian Faith. I have at times been very adamant about the detrimental effect of making the Faith a rational and verifiable enterprise. Yet, the older I get the more I realize the roots of one’s tradition are very difficult to uproot?!

Recently, the implications of this rationalized faith have become even more graphic to me as I began to see how a faith that is unduly focused on right belief and doctrinal purity begins to erode a faith that finds any moorings in emotion, intuition or behavioral practice. In the evangelical world I grew up in and was educated in - the premise was our Faith had reasons. Our entering into a life with Christ was no “leap in the dark” I was told - Christianity was a rational faith that was soundly rooted in facts verifiable by science and history and archeology and, and, and… The result of such a presupposition was that our Faith moved away from the story of Scripture to be situated on premises, principles and propositions taken from Scripture. Our theology moved from the story of Creation and Promise; Incarnation and Atonement; and Community and Restoration to one of Justification and Sanctification among other theological constructs (now I know that this is not necessarily incompatible - but the move away over time can become one that is irreconcilable). I grew up in a faith that taught me to trust in my positional standing before God on the basis of a forensic justification. Right belief provided me a right standing - and it was something that was true - the evidence demands a verdict.

A faith that is proportionally more situated in the head is one that over time grows to be a faith that is cold, less relational more rational, focuses on being right more than living at peace with others and seems to more easily slide into a lifestyle of legalism. A broad brush stroke I admit - but in my experience a brush stroke that contains a good deal of reality (exceptions aside). In this move among conservative Christians moving from a faith rooted in God’s story to a faith rooted in rational, scientific study a divorce has take place - between the head and heart; between Systematic Theology and “Practical” Theology; between scholarship and spirituality.

Over the past ten to twelve years I have noticed a resurgence of concern regarding this “divorce.” I have read much and become hopeful that a reconciliation between Systematic Theology and Practical Theology (would we call this Narrative Theology?) can take place. What I would like to suggest is that a new (really an ancient) conception of faith is needed. Doubt is not the opposite of faith. Certainty is. Our Christian Faith is not first and foremost a provable enterprise that we can know with certainty. If so - than we are not in the business of faith. Faith does demand an element of trust in the midst of UNcertainty (and if that is true doubt seems to be the companion of faith?!). The ancient conception of faith was a holistic acceptance of God’s existence, God’s nearness and God’s involvement in Creation that demanded a response of head, heart and hand. The ancient conception of faith shows that because we believe that God spoke we therefore align our behavior and relationships on the basis of our trust in God’s goodness, greatness and faithfulness (think the birth of Isaac, the blood on the door frame, the walking into the Red Sea and the Jordon, the fire consuming the sacrifice, the Virgin birth, walking on water, etc.) How does this faith grow - I would say it is a wedding of right belief AND right relationships AND right practices. For too long we have emphasized belief with very little concern for the place of practices and community in the development of our spiritual lives. The place of a mystical union with God and the community of God’s people has a necessary part in restoring God’s image in each of us. The place of right practices (baptism, eucharist, biblical worship, serving others and spiritual discipline) also must be elevated to new heights if we are to see God’s people move beyond head knowledge to be transformed into those who are marked with the image of God.

Well I have diagnosed more than prescribed for sure in this post - hopefully I will return to this theme and look at the ramifications such a reconciliation would have in youth ministry.

But, enough for now - Peace.

Whenever I stumble through life and walk away from a person who I consider a “real saint” (ie. a person who seems to regularly encounter the living God and our world is profoundly better because of it) it always messes with my head. At first glance these “saints” don’t have haloes or angelic choruses “ahhing” every time they enter a room, they seem to face many of the same frustrations that we all face (filling out tax forms, insurance papers, headaches, and dead car batteries), and I have a sneaking impression that they cuss under their breath when they miss the nail and hit their thumb. So in fact, I wonder how many “real saints” I walk by every day. It seems a rarity that I have the experience of hanging out with a Saint - but it may be due to my not getting past “first glances” (but that is not the topic of this post!).

Anyway first glances can be deceiving. For what I don’t see on first glance, and what really has me shaking my head and wondering, “Are they an Angel?” is bumping first person into the richness of the fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 6) in flesh and blood. When we spend time with such a saint we enjoy the luxury of spending time with a person who has turned theology into biography, who lives out, in most moments, the fullness of life to the glory of God, and who unselfishly loves their neighbor. When I am fortunate to encounter such holy ones I often wonder, what are the differences - between me and thee? (Verily, verily King James just seems right in such “holy” musings).

I think much of the difference stems from our disconnect between theology and spirituality. Put another way - we focus on self and our experience over God and His great work. Too often when I approach God and (especially the Bible) I am focused on what can I learn and what can I “glean” from this reading to put into practice (to win over the blessing of God/or impress my neighbor?!). Is that a bad thing (not all bad I guess), but there is a different approach that I think the “more saintly” among us take. For them God is not an object to study (and master) nor an Other to appease or “win over;” for those saints among us, God is at work among us and worthy of our contemplation (or being with and join with). While the result of such an approach is counter-intuitive Herbert McCabe explains it this way, “not like an increase in knowledge, but if anything, an increase in ignorance. We become more acutely aware of our inadequacy before the mystery as we are brought closer to it. So it is God’s initiative that is needed. Not that we should speak more about him, but that he should speak to us.” (from God Matters, p. 29) Saints are humble enough to let God be God… to yield to the voice, heart, will and way of the One who has made us. From this place these “holy ones” begin to bring forth the Fruit that can only spring from the Spirit of God.

Truth comes to us - not from our interrogation, but by that which interrogates us. “The greatness of the Christian saint lies in their readiness to be questioned, judged, stripped naked and left speechless by that which lies at the center of their faith.” (Rowan Williams, The Wound of Knowledge, p. 17) The saints among us are those who come to us in the same manner that they approach Almighty God - open, honest, transparent and with humility. That reminds me of something Jesus said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit… for they shall be filled”

It is a prayer of depth, reach, gratitude and mission - now that is a prayer. I pray it sometimes without thinking about it - which is tragic (and which Jesus warned us about). Ahhh, but those times I pray it from the heart it transforms my whole way… and day. I think of this prayer often in the Spring. When I seen the newly planted spring flowers and plants develop each day, I think of this prayer. When I see the sun shining down and the plants reaching up, I think of this prayer. As the young plants reaching for the sun begin to stand tall and open wide their petals, I think of this prayer. It is an amazing time of year (and thus, an amazing time to pray this missional prayer?). Unfortunately too often I walk by the spring flowers and growth without noticing, but those times I do, it causes no small amount of wonder and I become again mindful of this prayer.

It is a prayer that causes me to tremble in fear and in gratitude (and maybe it will bring an equal response from you). I hope you will join me in praying this lovely closing prayer from Morning Prayer found in the Book of Common Prayer.

Lord Jesus Christ, you stretched out your arms of love on the hard wood of the cross that everyone might come within the reach of your saving embrace: So clothe us in your Spirit that we, reaching forth our hands in love, may bring those who do not know you to the knowledge and love of you; for the honor of your Name. Amen.
(BCP p. 101)