My son recently told me that he wants to “do karate”. So I took him to a local dojo, at an Afrikaans school. I decided to sit in on the class to see what the sensei, a Japanese word meaning “person born before another” or “teacher”, would impart into my precious son. Unfortunately the sensei gave the little ones over to one of his students. This youngster opened the class with his aspirant novices sketching the following scenario,

“What would you do if you are walking down the street and a man pulls a gun or a knife on you and your mommy?”

Jesus once said the blind cannot lead the blind. This scenario didn’t compute well with his audience of five-year-olds. For the rest of the class the blind sensei taught the little kids how to defend against a knife attack. He showed them how to turn a knife back on an assailant. Needless to say, the class unraveled from that point.

It was not my brightest parenting moment.

As we drove home, Liam and I reflected on his experience. He voiced his distaste,

“I don’t want to knife anyone dad!”

Back home Liam went to his room, closed the door, and started sobbing. It was the kind of crying that heaves the whole body in swells of sorrow. After he calmed down he confided in me why he wanted to “do karate”,

“Daddy I like the karate clothes. Can I wear the clothes and the cool colored belt without training in karate?”

Liam desired the clothes without the training.

This got me thinking about Christianity and what it means to be Christian. What does it mean to “do Christianity”? I realized that many times I want Jesus clothes without the training of Jesus (Eph 4:20-24).

In contrast to Liam’s “instructor”, Sensei Jesus invites me into a dojo of love, it is a process called discipleship. In this dojo I learn how to bless those who curse me, love my enemies and turn the other cheek. It is a dojo wherein I train to love God, others and myself within God’s kingdom of love.

Jesus once said that when a disciple, “is fully trained he will be like his teacher.”(Luke 6.40). If I want Jesus clothes, I am invited to become a disciple and train in Jesus’ dojo. The church is supposed to be this dojo.

My dojo day with Liam reminds me that to be a Christian means training with Jesus. The question is, “Am I willing to train?”.

He starts the chapter with a quote by a counsellor,

“The kindly way of well-bred people who welcome all in their company who have a sense of humour and don’t raise their voices when they talk – seems an inadequate basis of maintaining membership in a movement which claims to be revolutionary in its impact.”

What do you think about this quote? Do you agree? Where have you seen this work or not work?

I personally think the work done in sociology regarding centred and bounded sets can be helpful here. Trueblood desribes the two tensions of dogmatism and empty freedom and the continuum between these two poles.

He then describes the distinct disciplines of different groups and states,

“There is not one unique feature that can be predicated of the practical life of the average member of the Protestant church … It is not a forgone conclusion that they are scrupulously regular in attendance at anything ..” p85.

Elton reckons that in the wake of secularisation the church became captive to a success ethic, which translates faithfulness to growing numerically. In order to attain this,

“Members are eagerly accepted in order to swell the rolls and give an appearance of success, when there is no serious attention to either belief or conduct. This way lies the very futility to which a redemptive society should provide an alternative”.p87

Which alternative communities have you seen or experienced?

Trueblood calls the lack of discipline “our popular cult of freedom”.p87

He explores different communities and their rules of life in the rest of the chapter and then surmises that they share similarities,

Firstly, “All agree,…, in the importance of of absolute faithfulness in both public and private worship.”
Secondly, “Another point of agreement is the emphasis on solitude”.
“A third point of agreement concerns silence, especially group silence”.
“A fourth point of agreement among experimenters is the necessity of social concern. The whole disciplinary enterprise is a failure if it succeeds only in producing people who cultivate their own private spirituality”.

He ends the chapter with a suggested “minimum discipline”,

- Worship
- Solitude
- Silence
- Humanity, ‘the concerned Christian must be identified with the sufferings of his fellow men and active in the lifting of burdens wherever found”.p.102
- Austerity

What would a minimum discipline look like for your community of friends?

I am posting some comments on Elton Trueblood’s amazing book, “Alternative to Futility”. You can read the previous posts “the habit of adventure” and “being a demonstation”. In the third chapter Trueblood builds on his argument that faith needs to be embodied in a redemptive adventurous and experimental society. In this chapter he discusses the vital importance of a fellowship or order that takes membership seriously. I first came across Trubloods’ name when we revamped membership in Claypot in 2005. He wrote the foreward to Church of the Savior’s book, “A call to commitment.” But now back to the chapter. He states that,

“The chief reason why the church as we know it is not more effective than it is, is the fact that membership has become almost meaningless. Once “member” wa a glorious word, signifying a real interpertation of lives for a noble purpose, but now the figure of speech has worn smooth. Membership is now largely paper membership”.

He therefore proposes,

“If we seek renewal of life one way to advance lies in the direction of veracity in membership”. Let us begin, therefore, by outlining the minimum conditions of membership in the new order which is coming into being so rapidly and which some of us aspire to belong.”

What do you think, do you agree that we need a veracity in membership?

He proposes five minimum conditions for membership:

• commitment – “willingness to take the plunge, to run the risk of seeming ridiculous if we turn out to be wrong … We seek groups of genuinely committed men and women, men and women who continue to be perplexed and doubtful in many areas of their experience but who are willing to follow onemajor clue wherever it may lead.” We are commited to following the clue of Jesus.
• witness - “If it is the whole company of committed souls who are the salt of the earth, it follows that they must be unapologetic in making their witness before the world p.65… What we seek then is the Fellowship of the Unashamed.”p.68
• fellowship – “Unless it involves fellowship that is deep and inclusive, church membership is always nominal rather than real.”p68 “If a redemptive society has reality, the members will not allow one single member to struggle alone with a financial difficulty”p.72
• vocation – “It means that all true members must be fountains, not cisterns. It means that all true members must be willing to think of himself (herself) as engaged in the ministry, by a divine imperative. If ‘member’ is to regain positive significance in our vocabulary, we must think of all recruits as entering a new estate, beyond clergy and beyond laity. In the new order there are no clergymen and no laymen, but all are engaged in the same divive vocation, which means putting the claims of the Kingdom of God first, no matter what profession one may follow. The formula is that vocation has priority over profession.”p73
• discipline – He discusses discipline in the next chapter …

What do you think of these four criteria? What would you add, or take away?

How are you influenced by memberships in different spheres of your life?

“Without adventure civilization is in full decay – Alfred Whitehead”

In this chapter, Trueblood builds on his thought that a movement needs a redemptive society(you can read the first post here). In previous years Emmanuel Katongole has called this society “wild spaces”. He asks why is the church a domesticated space? And why are so many people leaving the church? (remember he wrote this in 1948).

“There is no denying that many of the best people are outside the churches precisely because they are the best people. The fact that they’ve been disgusted is something in their favour, at least it shows that their standards are encouragingly high.”

The reasons Trueblood offer for the domestication are,

• insipidity – Lacking flavor
• little imagination
• dull, lifeless services

He laments, “We are in a time of crises when we need a dynamic fellowship to turn the world upside down; what we are offered is a stereotype” (p43).

The word Trueblood chooses to break from the stereotype is adventure,

“It (the church) is in full decay because it lacks the element of adventure. It is not the adventurous fellowship which can redeem society.It is something else.” (43) and “In the spirit of adventure, and by the use of disciplined imagination, we might be able to encourage a new growth, within the existent churches. We might be able to inaugurate a redemptive movement that could take our dry bones and make them live.” (45)

The images he use to describe this redemptive adventurous movement are, imagination, dreaming, modest experiments, boldness, courage, radical, real membership. But above else,

“Whatever else may be the character of the redemptive society which the crisis of our time demands, it is at least clear that the society must make the habit of adventure central to its life”.(49)

This adventurous imaginative experiment is not the formation of a new denomination but a fermenting within the current church. It is a movement or order crossing boundaries.

“The essential experiment we need to make in our day is an experiment in radical Christianity. The redemptive society we need is an order within the Church Universal, devoted to the recovery and fulfillment of radical Christianity.”

In the first Chapter entitled, “Beyond Diagnosis” he describes the characteristics that are essential for sustaining movements. In order to describe these characteristics he uses the movements of Naziism and Communism (I imagine it was quite provocative for a 1948 publication). So what is necessary for a movement?

“ … a faith which can dignify the average little life by grounding it in essential bigness, but without divisiveness of class, race or nation.”

When I read this for the first time, my friend JR Briggs reflected on the most important 4 minutes of a movie, I loved his post, I sometimes sit after watching a movie and reflect on all the names scrolling up the screen. Every name represents an investment in the story and I can imagine those people taking pride in their part in making the movie. It is the same with any successful movement, people get the chance to interpret their story in the bigger Story.

Trueblood continues in this chapter with his thoughts on a faith that becomes an alternative. For him this faith is not enshrined on individually professed beliefs but in a redemptive, embodied community. He wrote,

“The world needed a saving faith and the formula was that such a faith comes by a particular kind of fellowship. Jesus was deeply concerned for the continuation of his redemptive work after the close of his earthly existence, and his chosen method was the formation of a redemptive society(p29) … The idea of a redemptive fellowship, so amazingly central to Christianity, involves an entire philosophy of civilization. How is civilization changed? It is changed, early Christianity answers, by the creation of fellowships which eventually becomes infectious in the entire cultural order.” (p31)

I find this very compelling. How am I part of a redemptive society? How do I believe a society changes?
Trueblood then challenges any abstract engagement when he states,

“What we require is not intellectualising or even preaching but a demonstration. It is not enough to say simply “turn to Christ and all is well”. There’s only one way of turning loyally to Christ and that is by trying to create the kind of fellowship which He required of His followers. Abstract or unembodied Christianity is a fiction” (p33–34)

How do you think we can move from abstraction to demonstration? Do you have examples of this happening? I would love to hear your thoughts.

I think the idiom, “beggars can’t be choosers” is a way for powerful people to control others through limiting choices and diminishing their dignity. In the most recent example this saying was used by someone who got angry at a poor person who refused food with an expired label. The poor person chose not to be demeaned by receiving expired food. I think the person’s choice not to receive old food is a step towards dignity. Development is after all an exercise in giving people the ability to choose, to give them the freedom to choose the kind of life they want to live.

I am more convinced than ever that our domestication of God has a huge correlation with the buildings we construct our theologies in. We create a comfortable air-conditioned God in the same comfortable air-conditioned buildings.

When we ascended the mountain we met a holy man. His name is Thomas and he hiked up the mountain to pray. On his own. Seeking God in prayers and supplication. Fervently. We hiked with our sophisticated gear, he walked with a small bag slung over his shoulders. Simplicity.  We slept in tents designed to weather any storm. Thomas slept in CrowsNest cave. Flexibility. All the time singing and praying. With outstretched arms he sought God. Earnestly. “I pray for rain”, he said. I was supposed to facilitate a spiritual formation experience; Thomas lived it.

In the person of Thomas I recognized a certain longing – a desire. A flickering. On Tuesday morning i woke at 4:30 and when I gazed towards his cave I saw a fire burning. Thomas was already praying. Inspiration. As the sun rose Thomas prayed with outstretched arms. As we left the mountain for Johannesburg he asked me for a Bible. He wanted to read more so that he could animate his faith further. Thomas was one of the ways in which I met God on the mountain. He embodied my longing.

Over the last decade I have been part of numerous meetings wherein the future has been discussed in terms of Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. These meetings would then discuss different aspects of the church and analyze it. Four columns with these headings would then be used to ,

“ask and answer questions that generate meaningful information for each category (strengths, opportunities, weaknesses, and threats) in order to maximize the benefits of this evaluation and find their competitive advantage.”

This morning I pondered the Nativity scene and imagined the Trinity’s interaction with the Four columns prior to Jesus’s incarnation.

Imagine Father, Son and Holy Spirit discussing the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats in sending God to earth in the womb of a fourteen year old who could potentially be stoned for having a baby outside of wedlock. Imagine the Father starting the analysis, “what are some of the strengths in our plan to send Jesus as a newborn?” Imagine Jesus adventurously pontificating on the exciting opportunities inherited in the plan to become man”. Imagine the Spirit elucidating the ways in which weaknesses and threats will be overcome.

When I think about this I am amazed at the alternative analyses of the Trinity. God interacts differently with a SWOT analyses. In God’s eyes strengths might be weaknesses and opportunities might be threats. In God’s eyes things look so different.

When I ponder this I have a suspicion that if we would invite God into our SWOT analyses things might be turned upside down and inside out. For a SWOT analysis in the presence of God invites us into the wild adventure of God’s kingdom.

Every now and then I think I know whatthe conversation is about and then I would start a sentence with “you are talking about ….” I would guess, and mostly wrong. In these moments of guessing I am invited to switch to a more humble position of asking questions without appearing to know what is going on. Questions like “what are you talking about?” places me in a position where I can listen and learn instead of speak and pretend. Two of my Brazilian experiences elucidated this further. The first was my friend Eduardo’s Tuesday rhythm where he learns the skill of tennis. His teacher (professor) is a young man who started at the tennis club as a ball boy and by listening and learning he grew into a tennis coach. The young man lives in a favela [1]. On Tuesday’s Eduardo listens and learns from this professor.

Another example is Eduardo’s church service where he divides his chuch community into small groups to speak to each other during the church service. This is a practice we also engaged with during our Claypot days. This is a deliberate move that exercises the community’s listening and learning muscles. Because churches are so used to the pastor doing the teaching and speaking we have to be retrained to speak and teach and listen and learn from each other. This is hard. It is hard to keep the rhythms of listening and learning alive; but it is essential for our growth in Jesus.