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Change. Happened. Here. Palm Sunday

// April 2nd, 2009 // No Comments » // My Communties, church

The God Debate: Deep Dive Live

// March 26th, 2009 // No Comments » // My Communties, church

The God Debate: Science and Religion

// March 19th, 2009 // No Comments » // church

Going Beyond the Argument

// March 19th, 2009 // No Comments » // My Communties, church, random

This concept of going beyond the argument is a really important part of our God Debate series. Arguable (irony intended) the most important part.

The sexy part, the part I’m personally really looking forward to most, is having Dr Lamoureux down to talk about Jesus + Evolution this Sunday night because I really feel there are far too many people who see science and evolution as some kind of barrier to exploring the Jesus story. For those of us that not only accept, but are fascinated by, and find beauty in, a concept like evolution, I think it’s important to acknowledge that this doesn’t have to be a barrier to spirituality. I may write some more thoughts about this later but the ability to move past the argument and past sound bites is, in my opinion, the more important concept for us to understand as a community, because the skill with which we do that will determine our ability to engage in meaningful dialogue regardless of where we personally stand on the “issues”. Without that we run the risk, in a very real way, of missing the point.

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The God Debate: Going Beyond the Argument

// March 12th, 2009 // No Comments » // church

Preview – The God Debate: Faith and Reason

// March 5th, 2009 // No Comments » // church

What I believe

// March 5th, 2009 // No Comments » // church, theology

Part of what we need to work towards at Westside is a statement of faith. I have been reluctant to work towards definitive statements for myself in the past because they are far too often used in a negative context to exclude rather than as a center of gravity to pull people together.

The problem is without that centering idea, it’s tough to give context to decisions and their impact in community.

So here’s the language I’ve been using for the past year or two in my own mind to understand Jesus.

Jesus is God, stepped into history (for me this is about the divinity of Jesus – it’s what makes sure my faith stays Christian and not just Jesus-based enlightenment)

To save us from ourselves (this is about sin, but trying to understand it not as a list of taboo actions or ideas but as worst tendencies inside me. It’s about the hard edge of Jesus teaching – you’re way is death)

To show us a new way to live (this is enlightenment for me. Jesus is not just religion, Christianity is not just mental ascent to ideological principles. The Jesus way is a new way to live and grow and become)

To dismantle the infrastructure we’ve built between ourselves and God (this is about religion. Jesus comes to help us step over it, to move from the life we’re living directly towards the life we were meant to live)

And invite into relationship with our creator (this is about experience for me. My faith is logical and rational but never completely defined by empirical evidence. There is, always will be, and must be, the personal non-transferable relationship that exists between myself and God)

Still needs work…

More than Comfortable

// January 22nd, 2009 // No Comments » // church

This weekend we talked about setting goals that shoot towards more than the obvious

January 18

Yes and No

// January 16th, 2009 // No Comments » // church

un’ed.i.ted spirituality for Jan 11, 2009
Via Sacra Part 2: Yes and No


Death of Jesus: Part 4 of 4

// October 30th, 2008 // No Comments » // church, collected thoughts, theology

Obviously the metaphor of Christus Victor was born out of the context the early Christian church found itself in, facing directly into an unprecedented barrage of persecution. It was shaped by the struggles they were facing and the cultural context in which it was born. These early Christians were giving imagery and metaphor to help them articulate their fundamental belief that through Christ they had been reconciled to God.

This is part of the healthy way that the church has evolved throughout its history in a continual effort to find new and meaningful ways to talk about their faith. That process of cultural evolution has continued.

Substitutionary Atonement
The predominant metaphor that is heard today as the evangelical church talks about the atonement is one we call substitionary atonement. Sometimes we call it vicarious atonement or propitiation or judicial theory or penal substitution, but all of these subtle variants are a form of a metaphor that paralleled the development of the modern legal system. This framework focuses on the divide from the diagram earlier (see Part 1). Paul writes to the Roman church and says, “for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” and we are disconnected from God by those shortcomings. The theory of substitutionary atonement lines this reality up against the model of the developing legal system. We have transgressed the standard that God has set for membership in his social order much the same way a criminal transgresses the social order that society has set for itself. Similarly to when someone breaks rules and must be penalized through fine or imprisonment, God has set a penalty for our transgression, and that penalty is death. Now that is a bit of a kludge on the metaphor, which has been articulated much more eloquently to reflect the nuances of the relationship between God, law and sinner by better theologians. However, in its most basic form, substitutionary atonement is a legal picture of our relationship to God. The twist comes in because God sends his son, to pay that penalty for us. In his death he saves us from the consequence of our own actions by stepping into the gap for us.
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