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Quite often I circle around in somewhat melancholy musings about my vocation, generally wanting more:  more impact, more opportunity to work on every front that's important to me or where I think I have something to offer, more of this, more of that, more of whatever. The malaise thickens a bit when I ponder the intractable world circumstances in which we all exist and try to serve. There is no pure, undiluted act in a world as fallen and convoluted as ours. We are constantly and unavoidably enmeshed in systems of all sorts - economic, institutional, legal, etc. - that, when amplified by the complexities of faith, make me wonder whether we can ever make any genuine progress. Setbacks seem to lurk around every corner. My motives never get to a sustainable place of purity that allows a sustainable sense of satisfaction and "well done". This is not despair and I don't think it's depression. It's simply, among many other things I'm sure, a chronic malaise. As I once again mulled these matters over my lunch today I was reminded of the simplicity of our vocations; simple in that we are called - I am called to be where I...

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Posted at: 08:22 PM | 0 Comments | Add Comment | Permalink

Ask just about any teacher or professor how they feel about grading and chances are high they will tell you they hate it. One of the more common aphorisms goes something like this; "I teach for free. My pay is all for grading." I confess to having had, and still struggling with these sentiments. Why? Well, there are some reasons that don't make me feel too guilty. For example, it's rather numbing and boring to read paper after paper, year after year, on the same subject. Additionally, it's draining and distracting to spend lots of grading time trying to understand and correct poor writing. With those and other understandable frustrations in view, I have had to rethink my attitude toward grading over the past few years. Here is what I have realized, if I'm really honest.

Grading often bores me because I'm more interested in what I have to say than what students have to say. Not only must I own the unfiltered narcissism involved here, but I have to recognize how much I can and need to learn from students who have insights and experiences I don't have. I have important lessons to learn from them even if they don't...

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Posted at: 04:18 PM | 0 Comments | Add Comment | Permalink

In recent years a number of people have written thoughtful theological reflections on the subject of work.  Among them (and my favorites) are Darrell Cosden's The Heavenly Good of Earthly Work and Miroslav Volf's Work in the Spirit.  My good friend Bill Morgan and I developed a curriculum on this subject back in the early 90's and are dusting it off to re-present to our current congregational home, Centennial Covenant Church in Littleton.  In preparation for this the pastoral leadership distributed a congregational survey to see how people felt about their work and what questions/struggles they have about the subject.

The results of the survey were not surprising but still somewhat disheartening.  Repeatedly, our sisters and brothers articulated struggles that are rooted in the dualism that so pervades evangelical life.  Seems like many still perceive their work as "second class" if it's not allowing them to share the Gospel or is not ostensibly "Christian" in some way.  Here's to a working theology of work that grows from a creation framework and sees all of life (even under the curse) as potentially integrated through the redemptive work of Christ in creation.  What makes work "worthwhile" or "eternal" is not its subject matter...

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Posted at: 08:49 PM | 2 Comments | Add Comment | Permalink

My pickup is not much to look at; which makes it all the better. The little Toyota beater is just the right amount beat up! It serves me well and I don't have to be too careful or protective about it. It gives me immense pleasure, both from the using and the having. Yes, St. Augustine(?) was right. As beings who are more than material, we cannot be satisfied with material things. Yet, that notion has been thrown around for so long within pietistic traditions, apart from a theological framework, that it has contributed to a covert (sometimes not so covert) gnosticism. It sounds like an extremely theological statement to make. It sounds so *%&@# pious but leaves us feeling disconnected, full of melancholy, incapable of finding satisfaction in the world around us.

My pickup will never be able to function as God, but it most certainly can be a kind of sacrament by evoking the response of a created, embodied being to my Creator through an engagement - a thankful, tactile engagement with creation. We who are committed to the powerful reality of the Incarnation and are willing to draw at least some stanzas (however modified) from Irenaeus' recapitulation Christology...

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Posted at: 08:39 PM | 1 Comment | Add Comment | Permalink

As I am reading Gordon Smith's book The Voice of Jesus, I wonder why more overt training in how to live in the Spirit and respond to the Spirit is not part of theological training and formation.  Of course, some churches and denominations can point to their own practices and say, "We do that!  Where have the rest of you been?"  But I'm curious what it would take to get that into the places where it currently is not.  I'm increasingly convinced (partly from the deficit of my own life in this area) that there is no genuinely Trinitarian (ergo "Christian") life or ministry unless we do more than give biblical and theological lip service to life and ministry in the Spirit - and make that accessible for those not charismatically-oriented!  Without trying to bottle the Spirit somehow, what might that look like?

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Posted at: 08:44 PM | 0 Comments | Add Comment | Permalink