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Posted on Jun 15, 2011 in church stuff, down we go, incarnational, spiritual formation, the refuge | 16 comments

ascent vs. descent

ascent vs descentlast wednesday at our house of refuge we kicked off our summer journeying through down we go: living into the wild ways of Jesus.  at first i wasn’t really excited about the reality that it won the vote (the group decided together what to do for the summer), but after the idea settled in i realized it was a great opportunity to practice together.  we also have some new friends joining us for the summer & they bring new life and perspective that will make it extra fun.

the biggest overall theme in down we go is the idea of a life of descent as opposed to a life of ascent.  what does that really mean?

for me, the theology of ascent is where we travel “up” toward God and away from life, pain, and our problems and become more and more “spiritual” in the process.  it is about rising above, working toward success, seeking comfort & security, and working toward “more, better”, whatever that may look like. there’s a high level of certainty in this theology, clear answers & prescriptions for moving forward.  it’s deeply embedded into not only much of church thinking, but also the ethos of the world.  we are subtly & directly taught that life is about upward mobility.

a theology of descent is the journey down into the muck & mire of people’s real experiences, into the places that Jesus seemed to go, trusting in God’s grace and redemption. it’s about entering into pain instead of avoiding it, engaging in the grit of real life instead of trying to escape it.  it’s about letting go of comfort, predictability, and the drive for “success” and instead turning our attention, lives and hearts toward engaging in more meaningful relationships with people in the here and now.

in down we go, this is what i say about downward mobility:  “it is a matter of the heart, not financial resources. it is losing our lives instead of protecting them. giving away our hearts instead of insulating them. intersecting with pain instead of numbing it out. entering into relationship with people different from us instead of staying comfortably separated. learning instead of teaching. practicing instead of theorizing.”

on wednesday night we brainstormed lists of characteristics/reactions/thoughts associated with both of these, from our experiences.  these aren’t all inclusive but just some unedited ideas that we popped out there together.

ascent:

orthodoxy, not good enough, “once saved always saved”, hypocrisy, victory, we are deserving of hell, hierarchical structure, legalism, banging the Bible/Bible thumping, certainty, never ending ladder, “in Jesus’ name”, if you don’t believe ___, then ___”, defined gender roles, living for the level up, us vs. them, separation, arch of safety or “bubble of protection”, addiction to spiritual high, all about your relationship with God

descent:

disillusionment, free to be you, practical, tension, process, journey, time, humility, realizing our humanity, God within us, less shaming, despair and loss in community, de-programming, back to basics, life-giving, transforming, serenity prayer, psalm 46:10-“cease striving and know that i am God”, equality, more about your relationship with God through others

to me, the central difference is in a life of ascent, there is a striving, working harder, trying harder that is somehow built on pride.  at our group a friend described it like a ladder where just when you think you’re almost there, it extends.  in a life of descent, it’s about a letting go, realizing our humanness & limitations, and is centered on an attitude of humility.

i am struck, more than ever, how much easier a life of ascent really is.  it does offer some protection from the grit and grime of real life and centers on our “personal relationship with God”.  oh, that is so much easier!  a life of descent strips away the protection and forces us to be tangled and mixed up with the riff-raff (our own & others!) and through those relationships we are spiritually formed–hopefully more and more into Christ’s likeness, embodied by love & hope.

yeah, it’s a wild paradox that the journey down somehow brings us up, closer to God & others & ourselves in all kinds of beautiful, unexpected ways.

i do not want to dismiss for a moment that an ascent theology works for a lot of people. i don’t want to dishonor the ways that is what people are looking for or sometimes need.  but for me, it outlasted its usefulness, and God beckoned me down.  i am very thankful.

for you, what are some of the differences between ascent vs. descent?

 

 

 

 

 

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Posted on Jun 13, 2011 in church stuff, down we go | 1 comment

radio ramblings

doug pagitt radioyesterday i had the privilege of being part of doug pagitt’s sunday radio show to talk about down we go.  it was fun.  don’t laugh too hard at the end when i’m talking mid-sentence and that’s the end.  it’s the first part of hour 2, about 20 minutes long, the same amount of time it often takes to read one of my long posts, ha ha.

you can listen to it here.

it was a good lead-in to my next blog post that’s ruminating from our conversation at last week’s wednesday house of refuge (we’re processing through down we go together this summer) & the difference between ascent & descent.  coming wednesday.

if you listen, i’d love to hear your thoughts, any ideas it stirred up.

 

 

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Posted on Jun 9, 2011 in spiritual formation | 17 comments

more than the leftovers

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yesterday was the june synchroblog focused on faith, feasts & foreshadowing & the connections between the jewish celebration of shavout & the christian celebration of pentecost.  there are some really good posts, check out the links below.  i have had a nutty week and didn’t think i was going to participate and then yesterday, as i re-read some of the passages, a few thoughts (that might be a little on the well-that’s-a-stretch-to-make-that-connection-but-it’s-just-what-i-thought-of) came to mind.

i haven’t studied the ins and outs of all of the different jewish celebrations, but i am always fascinated by their incredible rich traditions of honoring God in creative & deeply meaningful ways. shavout is a celebration of the giving of the torah & has various traditions associated with it. the timing was connected to the harvest & so part of the celebration was the offering of their first-fruits.  to honor this celebration, they brought the best stuff from their harvest to God as a symbol of gratitude.

pentecost is the marker in the christian story of the coming of the holy spirit. i love the wildness of it all & even though i have never been a charismatic in the typical  church-y sense of the world, i am a firm believer that the holy spirit is alive & well at work in our lives, moving us, challenging us, prompting us, strengthening us, encouraging us, convicting us, calling us to love.   the holy spirit stirred up some radical moving in this story in acts 2, and the result was a whole bunch of people who said “this is The Way i am going to follow”.  their hearts were united in far more than just spirit, and they gave up much of what was familiar to share freely their hearts, resources, and lives to lean into their new contagious faith together.

many of us often talk about the need for the church to be like “acts 2″.  we should eat together more, pray together more, share together more.  i completely agree.  i know that even though our community is very dedicated to life together, there are so many ways that we fall short of the deep, desperate connection of needing each other for real survival like the early church.  many of my friends are still on government services.  we live all over the place in denver.  even though in some ways we are interdependent, in many others we are still extremely independent.

i think for so many of us it’s because we have been taught to give our “leftovers” instead of our “firstfruits” when it comes to all kinds of things related to faith.    i know as i’m saying this, i am in danger of sounding shaming (especially for those who have been beaten over the head by churches to give more, serve more), and that’s the last thing i mean.  the part that i resonated with as i reflected on shavout & pentecost  is how so much of our contemporary christian life is about fringe behaviors that keep us somehow “doing God stuff”  but don’t really challenge us to something far more sacrificial, humble, and ultimately free.

we care on our terms

we keep our hands from getting “too dirty”

we like things our way

we don’t want to hurt or be inconvenienced

we work hard to stay in control

often, we keep our pride & independence intact as much as possible

 

to me, these are all ways that we give our leftovers because it’s much easier than giving our firstfruits.  we give when it works for us.  we love when it’s easy.  we share our bread & pasta with the hungry instead of our meat and fruit.  what it comes down to, i think, is that we do what we can to not be too desperate, or too poured out.

the wind & fire of pentecost stirred in the people there a desperation & desire that i long for–and am really scared to embrace. i’m reminded how God is not tame.  God is wild. love is wild.  God calls us to wild things, wild love, too. and as much as i like to talk about the wildness of God, often, when i’m honest,  i prefer things a little more tame. domesticated, a little more on my terms.

tame keeps me in control.   more comfortable, more protected.

wildness feels out of my control.

and usually doesn’t come from the leftovers.

it comes from  the sacrifice of the firstfruits, from bravely stepping out and into all kinds of ways of giving, loving, sharing, being, doing that require the wind of God to move us.

these are just a few of my thoughts in the moment; i realize as i write them they are half-baked, but that’s okay because that’s what blogging is all about, the ability to process & consider things out loud without having anything all wrapped up.

i’d love to know what are some of the ways you are touched, moved, and challenged by pentecost.

* * * * *

other bloggers sharing this month, check them out…

 

 

 

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Posted on Jun 2, 2011 in down we go | 14 comments

here we go, down we go!

blog down we gowell, it’s finally here, one day late!  the release of this wild & fun project i’ve been working on since last fall–down we go: living into the wild ways of Jesus. it’s been a crazy ride getting here, all starting with a call from jonathan brink last year that said “you need to do this.” i hemmed and hawed (“i like my blog just fine,” i said).  but he stirred up the reality that even though i had no big desire to write a book anymore, i did have a deep longing for something more cohesive to share with folks who were interested in practice not theory & some better ideas on how to really try.  so in the midst of back surgery & my son leaving for college & my husband on a 3 month temporary military deployment & the ongoing nuttiness of day to day life in the refuge, this project emerged.

much of what is part is from this blog but in a more comprehensive way.  there are all kinds of beautiful stories from my friends.  each chapter has personal reflection questions and group discussion questions.   the entire middle section also has practical “ways to….” for those who really want to make some shifts in more tangible ways.  here are the chapter titles to give you a taste:

section 1 – downward mobility

1. it stinks down here but i really love the smell

2. dreams are prettier when they are just dreams

3. there is no “us and them”, only us

4. “the kingdom isn’t going to just drop out of the sky”

section 2 – creating life down here

5.  extending love, mercy, and compassion

6. welcoming pain

7. honoring doubt

8. diffusing power

9, practicing equality

10. pursuing justice

11. expressing creativity

12. celebrating freedom

section 3 – staying the course

13. beautiful and hazardous

14. we may look like losers

15. we may be crazy but we’re not alone

16. born again and again and again

who is down we go for?

“Down We Go is for people who are hungry to see the Kingdom of God now, in the least likely of places, just below the surface of everyday life.  It is for people who are tired of ascent and all the ways it seems contrary to the ways of Jesus.  For friends who are tired of talking about God in theory and now just want to do something.  For pot-stirrers who know it’s time to shake up the status quo and live out something far more dangerous than they’ve ever tried before. For lovers-of-people who want real relationships instead of superficial ones. For those secretly bored of going to church every week, listening to the same message and leaving feeling lonely and disconnected from the power of the Gospel. For activists dedicated to creating new systems and structures that diffuse power and free the marginalized. For dreamers who dream of what could be and are ready to strap in for the bumpy, scary, beautiful ride down and then help lead others there as well.” – from the introduction

really, i wrote it with all of you in the forefront of my mind–the lovers-of-people, pot-stirrers, activists, dreamers.

i hope you like it. i hope you will process it together with other people. i hope you will interact with me on it here (and in the fall i am going to facilitate a fun online class for anyone interested in processing some of the ideas more intentionally).  i hope it will stir up some challenge and hope for each of us.  i know for me, in the thousand-times-reading-it-through-during-the-editing-process, i was reminded yet again of what i deeply believe and how tricky it is to really live it out.  and how downward mobility really is worth it.

thanks for reading.  thanks for buying one (or 2 or 3 or 4 or a whole bunch more, ha ha).   thanks for dreaming with me.

best place to order right now is on amazon! (it’s available on kindle, too).  barnes & noble/nook coming in a few days.

 

 

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Posted on Mar 29, 2011 in church stuff, dreams, incarnational, jesus is cool, spiritual formation | 10 comments

descent.

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“…the society in which we live suggests in countless ways that the way to go is up. making it to the top, entering the limelight, breaking the record – that’s what draws attention, gets us on the front page of the newspaper, and offers us the rewards of money and fame.  the way of Jesus is radically different. it is the way not of upward mobility but of downward mobility. it is going to the bottom, staying behind the sets, and choosing the last place! why is the way of Jesus worth choosing? because it is the way to the Kingdom, the way Jesus took, and the way that brings everlasting life.” – henri nouwen

we’re working on the final cover for down we go and in the process of looking for images that portray the downward descent, the editor made an interesting discovery–an overwhelming amount of the images point toward ascent, not descent.

this revelation is not big or exciting but it is telling.  the world (and i’d add, often “the church”) cries out for security, bigger, better, stronger, faster, more-put-together, upward mobility, and rising up whatever ladder we happen to be climbing.

no one wants to be on the losing team.  we want to be on the winning one.

the wildest part about church culture is that it has become the opposite of the kind of life Jesus points us to.  he says that to find our lives, we have to lose them.  that the first will be last and the last will be first.  that the losers are actually the winners.  that the messy, complicated ways of love win over the technicalities of the law.

i think one of the reasons the church has gotten so messed up is because it has replicated this idea of offering people what they want instead of what they really need.  we want ascent, but we need descent.

the “prosperity gospel” is one of the fastest growing messages in third world countries, growing by leaps and bounds because it taps into the idea that with enough spiritual belief & effort, we can somehow make it to the top of the heap (or at least give a lot of our money to the person at the top of the heap who will remind us how good, faithful, and trusting-in-God we are).  i also don’t think that people flock by the thousands into mega-churches to hear a downer message about giving up our life of comforts and the faith that goes with that for a wild, unprotected, unbound, poor one.    we go to hear an inspirational message that strikes a chord in our hearts but lets us stay safe from the muck & mire of “those people”.

downward mobility is not popular.

the tug “up” is so strong. i feel it all of the time.   trying to find ways to make money, to work in the trenches in poverty and pain but somehow feel like a bigger paycheck is supposed to be tied to it.  wanting security.  vying for “success”, whatever that’s supposed to mean.  finding the perfect formula that will make everything click perfectly into place and provide a smoother road.

these are all things i often “want”.

but what i really “need” is to be deeply known and to deeply know others.  to be loved and to love others.  to use the short time i have here on this earth to intersect with real people with real problems in need of real hope.  to use what i have on behalf of others.  to read the gospels over and over again and remember that Jesus’ called us to the weirdest, wildest, doesn’t-make-sense-in-the-world’s-eyes kind of living,  to let go of trying to move up & embrace that the life Jesus was talking about is on the journey down.

yeah, my hope is over time the church will be more brave, be willing to look like losers, and try to cultivate ways to give people what we really need instead of wasting time, energy, and lots and lots of resource on what we think we want….

safe, predictable, comfortable, easy, smooth, secure.  those were never words that Jesus promised. so why oh why is that so deeply engrained in me as the goal somehow?

hard, challenging, bumpy, scary, risky, weird, crazy, wild, unpredictable, against-the-grain.  these are all elements of the downward descent and part of Kingdom living. so are surprising moments of grace, love, healing, beauty, and goodness in the midst of this, which would never be seen if we never took the road down, Kingdom style.

God, show us more and more what downward mobility really means….

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