Hey, Ya Know What?

Alter’d State Announces 100th Show!!!

On July 18th, at the Woodstone Deli, we will be celebrating our 100th show. We hope to make it a big party and a great time with our family, friends and fans. It will also mark 3 years to the day that we started this crazy project that is Alter’d State with our first live, public gig. So mark your calendars!

We thank you all and look forward to seeing you soon. We will post more info about this show in the coming weeks…

God in School?

{rant alert}

Ok, this is not going to be a debate on whether we should or shouldn’t have prayer, etc in school between Christians and non-Christians. So if it starts, I promise to kill it. This is directed at “church folk” and the way we tend to waste time and money on things we shouldn’t while our houses are not in order.

I got a few invites on Facebook to join a cause. (For the record, I don’t join these causes on FB. Nothing personal, it’s just not something I want to keep up with.) This cause was about putting Jesus BACK in schools. Here is my view on it as a Christian.  God is everywhere. Even in public schools. And he is there whether the government sanctions it or not.

So, a few comments. Get mad! :)

#1 Jesus did not leave the schools and even if he did we couldn’t put him back there. He is God after all, and well, we are not. Can we get over ourselves?

#2 News Flash! Your kid can STILL PRAY AND READ THEIR BIBLE AT SCHOOL. It does not have to be sanctioned. Just because they do it alone and not as part of a proselytizing service doesn’t diminish it at all.

#3 Most churches, even those big huge ones that everyone goes to, need to be talking about putting Jesus back into their church. It’s not just those “evil, liberal churches”. He’s been gone a while if you follow the line of thinking that he can disappear from a place at all. He’s been replaced by awesome music, political activism, cool Sunday School Cliques, er Classes, family centers, AWANAs, Upward Sports and a host of other things that have us taking our eye off the ball…

#4 What would happen if we took the time and money we use on prayer in schools, 10 Commandments in public, Gay marriage, and all of our other little pet issues and spent it on something worthwhile? You know, like the poor, or our communities, or on creating positive relationships with other. Or maybe on marriage help since we divorce as much or more as those who don’t believe the way we do. That would be good for our kids wouldn’t it? Better than this whole “put Jesus back” business…

So really, can we spend some time on some real problems? Can we get our house in order before we start worrying about all those “filthy sinners” and the fact they don’t want Bible lessons and prayers to Jesus in public schools?

Technorati Tags: Prayer in Schools. Facebook,Disappearing Jesus

Missional Without Incarnational III - Comfort Zones

{This post will take a little different form and won’t point to the subject of the series till I wrap up at the end of the post.}

I had a great conversation with the One Church guys the other morning about the idea of “getting out of our comfort zones”. I got really agitated because I agreed that the idea of asking people in church to “get out of their comfort zones” and do something for Christ is silly. If your deal in life is music, why not just be who you are and do music. Don’t make that person help in children’s ministry when that is not God’s plan for them. This is something that has bugged me for years in churches.

However…

I got to thinking more about this and decided there are times in church when we should ask people to get out of their comfort zones. And many times we do. These things have nothing to do with giftedness either. These are things that all Christians should be expected to do and live out. And for many, it will take a step out of what makes them feel comfy. Here are a couple of examples that came to mind…

The church is no more “post-racial” than the whole of our country is. But shouldn’t we be taking the lead on this? It’s tough because everyone chooses to stay comfortable and mostly associate with people, and other Christians, just like them. Having one friend of another race and pointing back to that is not stepping out of your comfort zone. Choosing to place yourself in a minority situation for the purpose of learning about and getting to know “the other” is. God can and does use different methods and cultures to speak to us, but I can’t believe he is happy with a mostly segregated Church who won’t even visit with each other. My wife is African American and even I am the chief of sinners here…

The poor. We talk about the poor. We pray for the poor. We even give money to the poor. But it is so awkward to hang out and get to know them that we just choose not too. We avoid the parts of town associated with them. Heck, some of us don’t even know where those parts of town are! Again, is God happy with a Church who can not even hang out with the people that Jesus associated himself with and told us that they were where we’d find him? Caedmon’s Call has a song lyric that goes like this “the least of these look like criminals to me, so I leave Christ on the street.” We have to remove ourselves from our comfy suburban homes sometimes to find Christ.

Finally, being missional and incarnational generally takes us stepping out of our comfort zones. Here in the US we are not built to reach out. We live in suburbs with garages and no front porch so that we can get away from it all. You can literally get home and be out of site before your neighbor sees you. You never have to speak to them. We basically live in social bunkers. Being incarnational is really hard to do within a comfort zone because you can never truly learn what it is to be like ______. You can’t get onto the same level as those you reach out to unless you strip away all those things that make you socially safe. Comfort and safety are not things that lend themselves well to a missional life.

Technorati Tags: Comfort Zones,Missional,Incarnational,One Church

Missional Without Incarnational II

{Please remember I do posts like these from what I see as an every day person’s point of view. I haven’t been to seminary and probably won’t quote lots of fancy authors. I exist where the rubber meets the road and pour out my thought in that vein.}

Let’s do a little more on the ground work side. John 1:14 says:

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us (ESV)

The Message puts it this way:

The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood.

I love that. The Word as most of us know is Jesus. When God sent his son on the rescue mission of all rescue missions (eat your heart out Johnny Rambo), he sent him as one of us. I am sure that being all powerful he could have sent him in anyway he wanted (I know some theologies won’t agree with that, but let’s not go there. God is bigger than theology and we should never say he can do anything in only one way. That’s ridiculous. We can’t put limits on God.) But he didn’t send him as a super hero. Jesus was born as the rest of us are. He had to eat, just like us. He slept. He could feel pain and be tempted. He cried. He laughed at a good joke. While he was fully divine, he was also, mysteriously, fully man. That seems crazy, that God would take on our form, but he did.

John 1:14 is the definition of incarnational. Jesus came to rescue us and all of God’s creation. AND, as importantly, he became like us when he carried out the mission. He ultimately had to die as atonement. He had to live as we do for that to mean what it did. In all of this, he gave us a blueprint.

Going with assumption that we tend to execute “missional” in a weakened state, it is almost always because we are not being incarnational in the way we carry it out. So next I will talk about putting the two together for a more complete expression of the Gospel and the Kingdom.

Missional Without Incarnational

Missional is all the rage. It’s a word that has been around in Christian circles for a long time, but now it’s at “buzz word” status. I love the conversation going about being missional. I think it is great that we are stepping back and talking about going to people as opposed to waiting for them to come to us. I think it is awesome that we want to reach our communities for Jesus. But I think the conversation is lacking somewhat.

I find it true that many churches HAVE been missional in the strictest sense of the word. Here in my town churches are always reaching out and doing things for the community. The problem isn’t so much the doing, but in how it’s being done. Something is missing. I plan to do a few posts on this missing element over the next few days. I see not only those who are not in the missional conversation missing this element, but many of those who are in the conversation and are purposing to be missional.

{for those not familiar with the word “missional”, defining it is a bit like nailing jello to the wall. a good place for a primer on this topic can be found by clicking here.}

Technorati Tags: missional,incarnational