Tuesday, July 30, 2013

The Journey of Ascent: stumbling and falling ...



The Journey of Ascent is not a straight, linear path. It is full of twists and turns, treacherous rocks and sometimes falling back.


For a righteous man falls seven times, and rises again

Falling down and getting back up. THE MISSION
Just before this scene (below), Mendoza loses his footing and falls about 15 feet with a heavy weight of baggage tied to him. Below that, there is a montage of Petra with clips of Sam and Frodo, falling and getting back up,from LOTR.



THE HARDER WE FALL - FRODO/SAM




Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Ultimate Desire and the Journey of Ascent - Part 2

 Eventually, at age 29, I became involved in a project to start a church. This was not something I had ever considered doing, it came to me quite unsought. Nevertheless, it worked, and after six years we had a wonderful little spiritual family gathered. This was a community of people who wanted to love God and love one another and do their part to make the world a better place. My intense desire for the ultimate had found a specific focus: planting churches to advance Christ’s kingdom on earth.

In 1983, my father invited me to go with him on a mission trip to Mexico. I got sick (Montezuma’s revenge), lost ten pounds and worked my ass off in a construction program. But it bugged me that I could not understand Spanish or read the signs and I was intrigued with the culture. When we got back, I began to study Spanish. A few years later, a friend invited me to go with him to Colombia. While there, I fell in love with the country and the culture and began learning Spanish in earnest. My drive to learn Spanish was powerful and unstoppable: another aspect of my particular journey was clicking into place!

Eventually, my wife and I with our four children moved to Bogota, Colombia where I was an exchange student at Los Andes University. We all became fluent in Spanish over a two year period. I LOVED it … I loved the culture, the city, the language and the people. A church grew up around us, almost without trying, effortlessly. Another aspect of my journey had clicked into place; not only the call to plant communities of faith, but to do that cross-culturally and in Spanish.

As I said, I loved it there, and could have stayed in Colombia the rest of my life but my journey lay elsewhere. Colombia was just a turn in the path. Circumstances forced us to move back to the U.S.A. (finances, and Debbie’s dad’s poor health). Within six months we arrived in Miami.

At this point, I started extrapolating my journey, making assumptions based on my previous experiences. I assumed I was supposed to start a church because that is what we had done first in Ohio, and then in Colombia. I also assumed that it would be cross-cultural; for Spanish speakers. We met with some other missionaries and spoke with some people at Latin American Mission who were doing demographic studies of the greater Miami area. We found an area on the far west side of Dade County called West Kendall with 80,000 residents and no churches. So, we set up shop there.

I had just finished my bachelor’s degree (after twenty years of off and on studies!) at Ohio State University in Romance languages. My major was Spanish with a minor in French with a few classes in Portuguese.  While I was at Los Andes University in Bogota, I had also taken two years of classical Greek. I loved language study and I loved Latin America.  It was like a new world for this sheltered farm boy from Ohio.

As I was doing research on Miami-Dade County, I became aware of Florida International University. I was fascinated by the “International” in the name and went to the campus to walk around.  There was a center on the campus called the Latin American and Caribbean Center! That “drive” within me once again became activated and I found myself thinking about getting a master’s degree at the LACC program. I sought some advice from a respected friend who advised me not to try to start a church and get a master’s degree at the same time, advice that in retrospect I now disagree with.  Nevertheless, I reluctantly turned away from my ‘desire’ and the LACC center and wandered off into a ten-year ‘church planting’ detour that almost cost me my family and my sanity. 

To be continued …

Monday, July 15, 2013

The ultimate desire and the 'Journey of Ascent'

    Psalm 37: 4, Delight yourself in the Lord; And He will give you the desires of yourheart.
So far I have been posting quotes about the mystical idea of the journey of ascent, especially in several Abrahamic religions. Let me get a little more personal.

Somewhere in my childhood, an intense desire was implanted in my soul. It is a desire that is hard to describe. I could call it a ‘desire for God’, or a ‘desire for Truth.’ It could also be described as a ‘desire to make the world a better place’, or possibly a ‘desire to help people.’

This desire was inchoate for most of my first thirty years. I restlessly tried this and then that, trying to understand what was the insatiable desire within me that would not allow me to rest.  In my late teens an early 20s, I helped start several communes and was involved in protests against the Vietnam War. I read a lot of utopian literature. I was attracted to the idea of forming a just and equitable society, where all men and women are treated with dignity and respect, where everyone had ample opportunity to fully realize their potential. For a while, I even became a Trotskyite socialist!

I eventually married and had my own mystical experience with divine agape love. This agape love came to
me in the form of my sweet Debbie and was revealed to me to be Jesus of Nazareth. Thus, a new aspect of my journey of ascent began … and became more focused on the Ikon of God, the divine Logos.

We became involved with a Christian “community”, initially not unlike the communes that I had started. A group of people, banding together to make themselves (and the world) a better place, only under the authority of Christ, and with the empowerment of his Spirit.

I gave myself to serving in mundane ways.  Setting up chairs, being an usher, taking charge of the sound equipment. I put myself under the discipline of a spiritual guide. I strove (jihad in Arabic) to allow God’s Spirit and his Word to form my flawed human character more closely according to the example of Christ.
Why did I do all of this? Because of that intense, undying desire within me that drove me onwards (and upwards) that I am calling the journey of ascent.

To be continued tomorrow! 

Sunday, July 14, 2013

Medieval Jewish mysticism and the Journey of Ascent

(again, from Karen Armstrong's book, The History of God)

 “Just as Christians imitated Christ in an attempt to draw near to God, the Hasid imitated his Zaddik, who had made the ascent to God and practiced perfect devekuth. He was a living proof that this enlightenment was possible. Because the Zaddik was close to God, the Hasidim could approach the Master of the Universe through him. They would crowd around their Zaddik, hanging on his every word, as he told them a story about the Besht or expounded a verse of Torah. As in the enthusiastic Christian sects, Hasidism was not a solitary religion but intensely communal. The Hasidim would attempt to follow their Zaddik in his ascent to the (Kindle Locations 7179-7183) which focused upon the description of the heavenly chariot (Merkavab) seen by the Prophet Ezekiel and which took the form of an imaginary ascent through the halls (hekhaloth) of God’s palace to his heavenly throne. Tikkun (Hebrew) Restoration. The process of redemption described in the Kabbalism of Isaac Luria, whereby the divine sparks scattered during the Breaking of the Vessels (q.v.) are reintegrated with God. (Kindle Locations 8612-8615).
 Quoted in Rachel Elin, “HaBaD: the Contemplative Ascent to God,” in Green, ed., Jewish Spirituality II, p. 161. Armstrong, Karen (2011-08-10). History of God (Kindle Locations 9301-9302). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Saturday, July 13, 2013

The Muslim 'Journey of Ascent'

(From Karen Armstrong's book again)

"The love of God became the hallmark of Sufism. Sufis may well have been influenced by the Christian ascetics of the Near East, but Muhammad remained a crucial influence. They hoped to have an experience of God that was similar to that of Muhammad when he had received his revelations. Naturally, they were also inspired by his mystical ascent to heaven, which became the paradigm of their own experience of God."


~Armstrong, Karen (2011-08-10). History of God (Kindle Locations 4894-4895). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Friday, July 12, 2013

The Journey of Ascent - Part II

This is an extended quote from Karen Armstrong's awesome book, The History of God about the journey of ascent in Jewish, Christian and Muslim mysticism ... and probably among Buddhists as well!


.....................
"Although it is clearly culturally conditioned, this kind of “ascent” seems an incontrovertible fact of life. However we choose to interpret it, people all over the world and in all phases of history have had this type of contemplative experience. Monotheists have called the climactic insight a “vision of God”; Plotinus had assumed that it was the experience of the One; Buddhists would call it an intimation of nirvana. The point is that this is something that human beings who have a certain spiritual talent have always wanted to do. The mystical experience of God has certain characteristics that are common to all faiths."


Armstrong, Karen (2011-08-10). History of God (Kindle Locations 4728-4733). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

The "Journey of Ascent" - Part 1

I saw an entry in Debbie's journal from August 2006 today. She wrote ...

Book: "The Long Journey Home"

I don't know if she was thinking of naming her book with that title, or if it was something else. However it got me thinking about the "Journey of Ascent." 

Most of the Christian (and Jewish and Muslim) mystics talked about an experience that was common to them of taking an upward journey to God. They viewed it as a “Return home” to the source of where they had come from.

This made me think of a few bible verses… and a few movie scenes, such as the one below from Lord of the Rings
We all find the metaphor of climbing up a mountain against gravity and great odds to be deeply stirring. Why? Is it a collective archetype? a human myth? more to come on the "Journey of Ascent"

I will close with a quote from C.S. Lewis:

LAST BATTLE
The Last Battle Quotes (showing 1-17 of 17)

“I have come home at last! This is my real country! I belong here. This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it till now...Come further up, come further in!” 
― 
C.S. LewisThe Last Battle

Friday, July 5, 2013

Pub Theology and emerging groups - Part 2

Here is part 2 of the extended quote from Phyllis Tickle about the life cycle of emerging churches and groups. One of three things, according to Tickle, will eventually happen to a spontaneously self-organizing organic group:

But at some point, it will do one of two or three things. It may grow in such a way as not only to exceed the barkeep’s tolerance but also— and more importantly— to exceed the psychology of a small group approach and, as a result, will need to become something nearer to a self-aware group. As such, it may— and probably will— go looking for space to rent where worship can be more candid and more liturgical and where others can more easily be included in the circle.
Or it may break apart. More accurately said, the original pub group will simply drift apart from one another in much the same way that a milkweed pod breaks open in the fall, sending dozens of its seed-laden parachutes out into the surrounding countryside. Where originally there had been one group in one pub, there now will be, as if by accident and certainly without announced intention, a clutch of three or four groups scattered around and about the area.
Or the group may just cease, period, end of story. It will have served its purpose, fed the Christian life of those who composed it, and will now become less than what they have grown to need. Friends will remain friends, and acquaintances, acquaintances, but it’s time to move   on. It may safely be said here that institutions cannot even begin to think that

~Tickle, Phyllis (2012-09-01). Emergence Christianity: What It Is, Where It Is Going, and Why It Matters (Kindle Locations 1210-1229). Baker Book Group. Kindle Edition.

Wednesday, July 3, 2013

'PUB THEOLOGY' AND THE EMERGING CHURCH

I am reading Phyllis Tickle’s book, Emergence Christianity: What It Is, Where It Is Going, and Why It Matters, on my kindle. Here is a selection that caught my eye near the end of the book on the unpredictable and “organic” nature of emerging churches:

Another considerable part of the reason for the disparity in thinking between inherited church and fresh expressions church is that measuring by numbers, visibility, and influence presupposes, to some greater or lesser extent, a tomorrow that is not only more significant than today but that is also obligatory. Permanence, long-range planning, and longevity are virtues for any institution. They are burdens for Emergence, burdens whose maintenance ultimately and inevitably will become taskmasters, not to mention threatening impediments to the mobility and immediacy that are required if the kingdom of God is to be served on this earth.

'Thus, a pub theology group may be deliberately started or, more likely, it may simply happen because the pub is, after all, a neighborhood pub and conducive to serious talk. As a group, this one may gather together a dozen people, or perhaps even three dozen people, all of whom are modestly curious about religion, or are royally annoyed with the Christianity they see around them and want a place to say so, or are looking for authentic Bible discussion with somebody else who truly cares as much. Or perhaps they simply are passionate about worship that is authentic. Or maybe they just seek the familiar company and sustained, personal prayer support of other devout Christians. Or maybe they are just somewhere in between all of those. Whatever they are, that group will become what the Spirit and the members make of it in prayer and participation.”
~Tickle, Phyllis (2012-09-01). Emergence Christianity: What It Is, Where It Is Going, and Why It Matters (Kindle Locations 1210-1229). Baker Book Group. Kindle Edition.

~ Tomorrow I will post the section following this. Her description of pub theology group reminds me of our 'god party' group that started in Homestead in Stick & Stein's bar 6 years ago. I read this passage to our group last night and we discussed it and possible outcomes.