Sermon Ascension Sunday

Click on this link to hear "Ascension Sunday" sermon

What is the meaning of Ascension?  Jesus meets with his disciples and after commissioning them he is taken from them and disappears in the clouds.  We often struggle to make sense of how to understand Jesus ascension.  What does it mean that Jesus has now ascended into the heavens and is seated on the right hand of God as the creeds declare?  This sermon looks at some of our misconceptions and challenges us to understand this story anew.  

Ascension Sunday

Jean and Alexander Heard Art in the Christian Tradition
Vanderbilt Divinity Library

Ascension Sunday celebrates an event that was likely met with renewed sadness on the part of the disciples of Jesus, who, having seen and lived with him for forty days must now again see Jesus depart.    They remain gazing into heaven perhaps with a feeling of "what are we suppose to do next?", but they are jolted by two messengers with a reminder, "why do you stand looking up to heaven?"  They were reminded of the message that Jesus had given to them, that they were to be witnesses of the Risen Christ not just to Israel, but to the world.  The hopes of the kingdom of God cannot be locked into any one nation with its political ambitions, the message of the kingdom of God transcends national identities with a message of the love, grace and peace of God.  Jesus now reigns as Lord, not just of the church, but Lord of the world and intercedes on behalf of the world and calls his disciples to participate in the mission, yet it does not depend on us, it is not dependent on our help and cooperation, nor identified with our efforts and achievements.  Rather they go and wait for the Spirit, remaining only in prayer and community.  

A Gnostic Sampler

Gnosticism is a very broad group of religious philosophies spanning centuries and continents.  This article is primarily concerned with the gnosticism that adopted into its system forms of Christian belief or Christian communities that absorbed into its system gnostic beliefs in the first several centuries of Christian church history.  A great deal of scholarship has been devoted to exploring the relationships between gnosticism and Christianity.  Gnosticism had no definable set of doctrines due to the fact that there were many variant manifestations of gnostic teachings and theories.  In some ways it mirrored some Christian beliefs but included esoteric knowledge that led to salvation, (usually as an escape from this world), and produced numerous apocryphal gospels and literature that carried its spiritual wisdom.  Some very general characteristics are the emphasis on the salvation of the soul (as opposed to the body), that matter or the created world was deficient, that the spiritual was good and the material evil.  It stood quite apart from the orthodox teachings of the church and many of the early treatises produced by early church leaders addresses the heretical tendencies of the gnostics.  While some aspects including an elevated role for women or emphasis on an internal spirituality are not completely out of place, as a whole, gnosticism presented some problems with respect to Christian doctrine which is why it was rejected by the church that produced the canon of scripture.  The following quotations are a small "gnostic" sampler intended just to give some flavor of gnostic thought…

From Valentinus writing in "Incarnation" Second Century Christianity, cited in Clement of Alexandria Stomata, Book III chapter 7

Jesus certainly didn't do that...

"Having endured everything he was continent; thus Jesus exercised his divinity.  He ate and drank in a peculiar manner, not evacuating his food.  So much power of continence was in him that in him food was not corrupted, since he himself had no corruptibility."

Early Christian Writings

From "The Gospel of Truth" the Nag Hammadi Library

Speak concerning the truth to those who seek it and of knowledge to those who, in their error, have committed sin. Make sure-footed those who stumble and stretch forth your hands to the sick. Nourish the hungry and set at ease those who are troubled. Foster men who love. Raise up and awaken those who sleep. For you are this understanding which encourages. If the strong follow this course, they are even stronger. Turn your attention to yourselves. Do not be concerned with other things, namely, that which you have cast forth from yourselves, that which you have dismissed. Do not return to them to eat them. Do not be moth-eaten. Do not be worm-eaten, for you have already shaken it off. Do not be a place of the devil, for you have already destroyed him. Do not strengthen your last obstacles, because that is reprehensible. For the lawless one is nothing. He harms himself more than the law. For that one does his works because he is a lawless person. But this one, because he is a righteous person, does his works among others. Do the will of the Father, then, for you are from him.

He revealed himself as a Pleroma, i.e., the finding of the light of truth which has shined towards him, because he is unchangeable. For this reason, they who have been troubled speak about Christ in their midst so that they may receive a return and he may anoint them with the ointment. The ointment is the pity of the Father, who will have mercy on them. But those whom he has anointed are those who are perfect. For the filled vessels are those which are customarily used for anointing. But when an anointing is finished, the vessel is usually empty, and the cause of its deficiency is the consumption of its ointment. For then a breath is drawn only through the power which he has. But the one who is without deficiency - one does not trust anyone beside him nor does one pour anything out. But that which is the deficient is filled again by the perfect Father. He is good. He knows his plantings because he is the one who has planted them in his Paradise. And his Paradise is his place of rest.

Gnostic Library On Line

On baptism from "The Gospel of Philip", 

If one go down into the water and comes up without having received anything, and says, "I am a christian" he has borrowed the name at interest.  But if he receive the Holy Spirit, he has the name as a gift.  He who received a gift does not have to give it back, but of him who has borrowed it at interest, payment is demanded.  This is the way (it happens to one) when one experiences a mystery.

By perfecting the water of baptism, Jesus emptied it of death. Thus we do go down into the water, but we do not go down into death, in order that we may not be poured out into the spirit of the world. When that spirit blows, it brings the winter. When the Holy Spirit breathes, the summer comes.

From "The Gospel of Thomas"

These are the secret sayings that the living Jesus spoke and Didymos Judas Thomas recorded.

49. Jesus said, "Congratulations to those who are alone and chosen, for you will find the kingdom. For you have come from it, and you will return there again."

75. Jesus said, "There are many standing at the door, but those who are alone will enter the bridal suite."

77. Jesus said, "I am the light that is over all things. I am all: from me all came forth, and to me all attained.  Split a piece of wood; I am there.  Lift up the stone, and you will find me there."

90. Jesus said, "Come to me, for my yoke is comfortable and my lordship is gentle, and you will find rest for yourselves."

108. Jesus said, "Whoever drinks from my mouth will become like me; I myself shall become that person, and the hidden things will be revealed to him."

110. Jesus said, "Let one who has found the world, and has become wealthy, renounce the world."

114. Simon Peter said to them, "Make Mary leave us, for females don't deserve life."
Jesus said, "Look, I will guide her to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every female who makes herself male will enter the kingdom of Heaven."

Gnosis Library - access gnostic literature

Note: the Pleroma is the totality of divine powers, the godhead emanates pairs of lesser deities of which Sophia and Jesus are a pair.  The Demiurge creates evil out of foolishness.  An Aeon is an emanation of god.

from "The Apocryphal of John"

"And the Sophia of the Epinoia, being an aeon, conceived a thought from herself and the conception of the invisible Spirit and foreknowledge. She wanted to bring forth a likeness out of herself without the consent of the Spirit, - he had not approved - and without her consort, and without his consideration. And though the person of her maleness had not approved, and she had not found her agreement, and she had thought without the consent of the Spirit and the knowledge of her agreement, (yet) she brought forth. And because of the invincible power which is in her, her thought did not remain idle, and something came out of her which was imperfect and different from her appearance, because she had created it without her consort. And it was dissimilar to the likeness of its mother, for it has another form.

"And when she saw (the consequences of) her desire, it changed into a form of a lion-faced serpent. And its eyes were like lightning fires which flash. She cast it away from her, outside that place, that no one of the immortal ones might see it, for she had created it in ignorance. And she surrounded it with a luminous cloud, and she placed a throne in the middle of the cloud that no one might see it except the holy Spirit who is called the mother of the living. And she called his name Yaltabaoth."

On the Resurrection

[35] But in the night in which the Lord's day dawned, when the soldiers were safeguarding it two by two in every watch, there was a loud voice in heaven; [36] and they saw that the heavens were opened and that two males who had much radiance had come down from there and come near the sepulcher. [37] But that stone which had been thrust against the door, having rolled by itself, went a distance off the side; and the sepulcher opened, and both the young men entered. [38] And so those soldiers, having seen, awakened the centurion and the elders (for they too were present, safeguarding). [39] And while they were relating what they had seen, again they see three males who have come out from they sepulcher, with the two supporting the other one, and a cross following them, [40] and the head of the two reaching unto heaven, but that of the one being led out by a hand by them going beyond the heavens. [41] And they were hearing a voice from the heavens saying, 'Have you made proclamation to the fallen-asleep?' [42] And an obeisance was heard from the cross, 'Yes.' [43]

Gospel of Peter

A few parting thoughts
So, why does this matter?  Take the example of Marcion, one of the first declared to hold to heretical teaching, he couldn't explain away the contradictions scripture.  He would later revert to teaching about a dualistic god, one good and the other 'judicial' in order to explain evil in the world.  Justin, Tertullian, and and Irenaeus all wrote against Marcion's position (Justin Apology, Irenaeus, "Marcion's Two God's").  Why?  Gnosticism has a tendency to side step difficulties in scripture and in life, creates a dualism between the material and spiritual, designating the material as evil and the spiritual as good.  Seeing evil in the material world sends people down a thought path that usually ends with disdain for creation and humanity. 

• Scholarship is certainly bringing more information of the theological diversity that existed in the first couple centuries of the Christian communities existence and certainly a knowledge of these groups is essential in a clearer picture of the development of Christianity, and this is a good thing because it helps us to understand the issues then and now better.

• The effort of the church to maintain an orthodox teaching did not always 'get it right' as illustrated on how it went about dealing with heretics in the Middle Ages, so while inquisitions and burnings do not come about till quite a bit later, the quest for orthodoxy stand as a warning about the importance of freedom of conscience and the critical need for the church to struggle with orthodoxy and heresy. 

• Orthodoxy still matters because what the early leaders were trying to preserve (although imperfectly) was a certain kind of spirituality, one that did not deny the goodness of the creation, that recognized the importance of maintaining an engagement in the world in which we live, one that recognized that faith could not be simply reduced to another celestial world, one that kept faith and works together, no easy way out for a call to social justice.  In a day when we are seeing enormous consequences to the poor as a result of economic policies of western countries, environmental decline and degradation, rise of political unrest, violence, and deterioration of human rights, it is more important than ever that the faith we profess is one that is true to the world we live in, not just for the world to come.  

• A focus on individualism at the cost of community, an inner spirituality without a corporate spirituality, a denial of the physical all leads to a host of serious political, social, and theological pitfalls.  In the above select readings, one can see some of the good emphasis in Christian charity in Gnosticism which is similar in Christianity.  But to this day, within many Christian circles, some of the same ways of thinking that negate between the material and spiritual or that over emphasizes a personal spirituality abound.  It is more important than ever that we are open to an assessment of our beliefs so that we can look back to where the church of the past set her boundaries so many centuries ago not because we are trying to get some set of propositional truths "right" but because it grounded the church in a faithful expression of the kind of spirituality that was engaged in the love of God and neighbor and always pointed to the eminent Kingdom of God not as a place far away, not skirting past pain, suffering, and injustice, but as a reality that had arrived and meets humanity right where it lives. The church doesn't always get her doctrine correct, but understanding the issues the early had with Gnosticism is essential in the task of understanding theology today. 

PBS Frontline "From Jesus to Christ" on the Gnostics

Sermon "Abundant Life"

click on this link to access sermon "Abundant Life"

Two essential portions of the Gospel of John link this sermon together, the first Jesus is identified as the "Good Shepherd" that leads us to God, emphasizing that he and the Father are one, Jesus likewise states that those that keep his commandments will also be one with the Father.  "If you love me, you will keep my commandments" and "on that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me and I in you" ( John 10:1-10 and John 14:15-21).  Being "in God" is the abundant life that Jesus brings us to in a mystical union, a future and present hope, and a 'holy communion.'  This is rooted in a concrete command that we follow Jesus in the path of discipleship to love as we have been loved.  Comforted with the promise that we cannot do this in our own strength, we are promised the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, who empowers the church for her mission.

MLK an antidote for Gnosticism

"Gnosticism"is a word that all Christians should understand if just at a basic level.

While so much more needs to be said than can be said in this limited space, a basic description of gnosticism is in order. Gnosticism is a heresy that, in the epistles and in the early Christian communities, was cited as a dangerous misunderstanding incompatible with orthodox Christian thought and practice.  Ancient gnosticism was varied and in modern times forms of gnosticism continue to permeate Christian thought.  Ancient gnosticism comes from the Greek word "gnosis" for knowledge, and held that salvation of the soul was based on possessing this intuitive "knowledge"and rendered those with this "knowledge" as superior beings. 

In its ancient form dichotomies were also created between soul and body, flesh and spirit, good and evil.  At its core, modern forms of gnosticism likewise stem from a tendency among some Christian interpretations of scripture to see the natural created world or material substances as being essentially evil.  For example, everything from wine, or tobacco, to art, music, drama, and film, have all been seen as being part of the "world", and therefore essentially evil.  A second tendency is to create a false dichotomy between the spiritual and the material placing greater value on the "spiritual".  The spiritual or other-worldly is good and the material is evil.  Sometimes this is expressed in words like the song "this world is not my home."  We can become so caught up in the future hope of an afterlife, that we dismiss the gospel's implications for the social realities in which we live, or put another way, the hope of the resurrection for us today and in for our society is denied.  While the result varies for different Christian denominations the result is always the same.  This is partly the reason that in some corners of Christianity social problems such as racism, poverty, crime, economic inequality, the lack of concern for environmental and social justice are neglected in the preaching or practice of congregations. 

Rev. Martin Luther King reminded the Christian community by both his words and actions to stay grounded in a faith that is not gnostic but rather a faith that engages its belief in the action of love towards our fellow humanity.  The following excerpt illustrations MLK's keen understanding of a very orthodox, non-gnostic approach to Christianity…

"Let me rush on to mention my other disappointment.  I have been so greatly disappointed with the white church and its leadership.  Of course, there are some notable exceptions.  I am not unmindful of the fact that each of you has taken some significant stands on this issue.  I commend you, Rev Stallings, for your Christian stance on this past Sunday, in welcoming Negroes to your worship service on a non-segreated basis.  I commend the Catholic leaders of this state for integrating Springhill College several years ago."

"But despite these notable exceptions I must honestly reiterate that I have been disappointed with the church.  I do not say that as one of the negative critics who can always find something wrong with the church.  I say it as a minister of the gospel, who loves the church; who was nurtured by its bosom; who has been sustained by its spiritual blessings and who will remain true to it as long as the cord of life shall lengthen."

"I had the strange feeling when I was suddenly catapulted into the leadership of the bus protest in Montgomery several years ago that we would have the support of the white church.  I felt that the white ministers, priests and rabbis of the South would be some of our strongest allies.  Instead, some have been outright opponents, rising to understand the freedom movement and misrepresenting its leaders; all too many other have been more cautious than courageous and have remained silent behind the anesthetizing security of the stained-glass windows"...

In the midst of blatant injustices inflicted upon the Negro, I have watched white churches stand on the sideline and merely mouth pious irrelevancies and sanctimonious trivialities.  In the midst of a mighty struggle to rid our nation of racial and economic injustice, I have heard so many ministers say, "those are social issues with which the gospel has no real concern," and I have watched so many churches commit themselves to a completely otherworldly religion which made a strange distinction between body and soul, the sacred and the secular."  ("A Testament of Hope" Letter from a Birmingham Jail 299)

"A Strange distinction between body and soul" to quote MLK is an example of how a modern form of gnosticism can easily begin to seep into our thinking and our actions.  When Jesus tells his disciples, "if you love me, you will keep my commandments" Jesus is inviting us into a kind of Christian thinking that links together a real concrete love of neighbor with that of love of God.  One cannot exist without the other.  Where it does, the Gospel teaching should stand as a dire warning that we are beginning to tread down a path quite unknown to Jesus.

The Trouble with Kids Today: A Baptismal Sermon by Kim Fabricius

A sermon by Kim Fabricius

  
Text: Luke 18:15-30



The following is a sermon published by Kim Fabricius, pastor at a reformed church in Swansea in the South of Wales.  This sermon touched my heart and I re-post it by permission of the author so that it might be a blessing to others.  One note; this sermon was preached quite some time ago, and the use of the word 'queer' is not meant in a derogatory sense given the particular cultural usage and context.  It is set in a context of the acceptance for all LGBT+ in the church of Jesus Christ.  May this sermon bless you as it did me. 

“The trouble with kids today…” “When I was their age…” “Remember the days when…” 



Get the picture? Old people talking about young people.

And ever has it been so between one generation and the next. Old folk look back and see the time of their own youth if not as a golden age, then certainly as a better age than the world of today’s little creeps. We tend to view time from the then to the now as one of decline and fall. And young people, in turn, look at grown-ups and see people out of touch, who don’t understand them, who don’t understand anything. One word sums it up: we’re “boring”, and, if you’re parents, you’re “embarrassing” too. “The young think the old are fools, and the old know the young are fools” – that’s one George Chapman, writing four hundred years ago! Plus ça change, plus la même chose.*  “Whatever,” teenagers would add!



Me, I think this is a healthy state of affairs – at least for the young. Kids who don’t go through a period of viewing their elders with – well, the range is from condescending hilarity to lofty contempt – kids who don’t go through a stage of alienation and – yes, rebellion – they’re missing out on an essential part of the human experience. Indeed a younger generation that doesn’t set itself against their elders bodes ill for the time when they will become the older generation. For does not every generation of young people have something to be angry about and rebellious against? Has not every generation of parents left their children a world in a worse state than the one that was bequeathed to them by their parents? Do we not therefore warrant the accusation that we have screwed things up, and today, given the ominous state of the ecology, screwed things up big-time? The rebellion of the young, I’m suggesting, is, at heart, of moral significance, with its idealism, energy, and can-do optimism, in contrast to the quite immoral cynicism and complacency that, alas, inevitably seems to set in with thinning hair and sagging bottoms.



Which is why I am a worried man. No, not because my hair is thinning and my bottom has long since sagged and dropped – though that is true! No, I am worried by what I take to be a distinct lack of rebelliousness in today’s young people. Instead of repudiating and bucking the system, the system has sucked them in. They’ve become its biggest fans. The in-your-face self-expressiveness of young people, always an essential element of their identity – it strikes me as so conventional, conformist even, it smacks of the manufactured and manipulated. By whom? By us older people, of course! By the marketers, advertisers, and commercial providers. Young people have become, fundamentally, economic units, consumers, defined, indeed defining themselves, by their spending power.


(Are you aware, by the way, just how recent a phenomenon youth culture is? It only started after the Second World War, and only began really to kick in during the late-fifties and sixties. Pocket money and ever-increasing amounts of it – that is, available capital, purchasing power – and the rise of a distinct youth culture: they go hand in hand.)

Does the irony escape you? We lament that children today grow up too fast when in fact the whole project is being funded by adults! Check out the magazines kids read: they’re adolescent versions of the glossy world of fame, fashion, and ersatz beauty that obsesses and drives the twenty-to-fifty-somethings. And so the advertising industry quite rightly treats the purchasing public as such as children. For the flipside of children growing up too quickly is adults not growing up at all – we have become infantilised. That’s what money and ennui will do to you. But savvy kids should know better.



Which leads me to point out the interesting juxtaposition of passages in today’s New Testament reading. On the one hand, there is the story of Jesus blessing the children who come to him; on the other hand, there is the story of the rich man who walks away from Jesus. The juxtaposition is hardly arbitrary, and it’s one of contrast and critique.

Jesus is talking about how a person enters the kingdom, or reign, of God. Not how to get to “heaven”, but how to become part of the world God wants it to be, a world of peace, justice, and love, the world Jesus came to announce and inaugurate. How? Answer: by receiving it like a child. But what particular childlike quality does Jesus have in mind? Not, I can tell you, innocence or humility. We’re talking real kids here, not Teletubbies! There was nothing sentimental about Jesus’ view of children; Jesus was no Victorian romanticist. Indeed if the text suggests anything about children it is their weakness and helplessness – they have to be brought to Jesus. No money, no possessions, no position, no power – these are the things that make them role models for the kingdom. Interesting that. We’re always banging on about children needing adult role models, whereas our Lord thinks just the reverse: it’s adults who need children as role models.

And this interpretation – that it’s children’s pennilessness and powerlessness that make them role models for the kingdom – this interpretation is confirmed by the following story of the rich man. For here is the proverbial man who has everything – and observe that he is a good man too, he keeps the commandments, he is a pillar of the community, a member of the Rotary Club or the Round Table – yet so possessed is he by his possessions that he is quite unable to enter the kingdom of God, which demands dis-possession – demands weakness, not strength, demands helplessness, not control.



But as I have suggested, today’s kids would seem to have more in common with the rich man than the child. Just look at the possessions – from designer clothes, to mobile phones, to personal computers. And odd though it may at first sound, they’ve got the power to go with them – and it comes by via the tacit permission of their parents. Just think of the manifesto of the famous Spice Girls – Girl Power – and think of their target audience, the target audience, for that matter, of all girl and boy bands: ten-to-twelve-year-olds. And think of how parents, in oblivious obeisance to the market economy, and to keep the domestic peace, collude in turning their children into shoppers. 

I know, I’m beginning to sound like the old man I began with: “The trouble with kids today …” I don’t mean to. Rather I’m simply trying to sketch out the reality of youth culture today, which strikes me as virtually the same as the virtual reality of adult culture today. Consumerism is the common theme: the commodification of everything that moves, the itching and scratching of restless, insatiable desire, the celebration of ever-expanding choice, choice, and more choice. Isn’t this our common reality? It is little Matthew’s reality too.



HOWEVER: whenever we baptise a child in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, baptise him/her into Christ, we initiate him/her into a different reality, an alternative reality, a counter-cultural reality we call the church. At least that’s the theory. Because you and I both know that, in practice, on the whole, Christians are as mesmerised as non-Christians by the idol of consumerism. 



NEVERTHELESS: here you are, and here a few of us come, week by week, to see and hear the church “fess up”: to laugh at the pretensions of consumer capitalism’s ridiculous little gods, to expose the lies the world lives by, to tell it like it is to each other in love, even when it hurts, and to practice the quaint and lost arts of forgiveness and peacemaking when violence and vengeance make all the running with the good guys and bad guys alike. And there is no bouncer at the door. All are welcome here without distinction – saints and sinners, losers and winners, the poor and the wealthy, the ugly and the beautiful, the queer and the supposedly normal. Because here the good news of God’s foolish, prodigal, disarming love is proclaimed, as we try to keep alive the rumour of an altogether different God from the one you will find anywhere else, the God who passes judgement on wealth and power, valorises the vulnerable, and calls us into a community of belonging, need, and care. 

And so today we not only baptise little Matthew, we also hold him up as the very embodiment of the gospel of Jesus Christ. If we want to enter the kingdom of God, we will get in line behind him.

Reposted from Faith and Theology

Faith and Theology

* an epigram by Jean Baptiste Karr meaning "the more things change, the more things stay the same"

Reprinted by permission of Myers and Fabricius
Article by Kim Fabricius
Faith and Theology linkOther articles by Benjamin Myers and Kim Fabricius can be found at the "Faith and Theology" blog at the link above. 

Check out other articles, book recommendation, books, and musings of two humble but great theologians at the link "Faith and Theology" 

Some Thoughts on Fellowship and Outreach

By Rick Wilkinson

Unity as Fellowship

The most powerful, and most essential, expression of our faith to the public is our unity, and our solidarity.  It is of course a unity in Christ.  Outreach is an invitation to participate in this unity, to begin and build human relationships.  It is the kind of relationships God created us for and designed us to have.  It is what scripture means by “created in his image.”

In the course of every day life, everything is expressed and accomplished through relationships: God’s love for us, our love for God, our love for each other, the strengthening of our faith, spiritual growth, identity, purpose, and completeness.  We recognize an inescapable need for each other even while we realize all the difficulties and challenges this will bring.

Relationships begin with familiarity and moves toward intimacy through change driven by the Holy Spirit as we endeavor to follow Christ.  We all want growth and growth by definition means change.  Relationships change as they strengthen and deepen.

Relationships building require efforts.  We should continually be mindful of where there is harmony and where there is discord and work to understand this dynamic through the collective thought and study of God’s word.  Also, we should not mistaken relationships for polite, well-mannered, friendly company.  Loneliness and despair can abound in such a pleasant atmosphere.

A Theological Understanding of Fellowship

Being practiced at verbally articulating ones beliefs to another communicates a genuine seriousness and importance about ones faith.  Yet how can we expect anyone to take our theology seriously when we don't appear to take it seriously enough to bother understanding it or to be knowledgeable of it ourselves?  By being practiced I don’t mean to imply being accomplished.  We do improve over time but we will continually be bothered by dissatisfaction with our current level of understanding.  Fortunately this is a source of humility as well as an opportunity to appreciate God’s grace. 

Scripture tells us that God intends his word to be the very fabric of our lives.  But we have a nature that reduces it down to an incidental part of our lives.  We should be mindful of this and find it troubling, even disturbing.  Our Christianity should express a struggle with it as well as a sympathizing with others for having the very same nature. 

Support and encouragement as well as discernment from each other are vital to our pursuit of God’s truth for direction in our lives.  Ones effort in study is not just for the benefit of oneself but a contribution to the collective unity.  Understanding theology is a struggle.  Being a Christian is a struggle.  But then, outreach is to us as struggling, humans a looking for fellowship with other humans who share this common struggle. 

Witnessing as Intercourse

We are ambassadors for the gospel not marketing agents for the church.  Outreach is not a solicitation for more offering givers and church supports.  It is more of a search and rescue effort.  Yet, even that description is inadequate.  It is when we offer our hand in friendship to the lonesome soul.  This is a mutual friendship realizing as much a want for relationship with them as they for us. 

Though we are the privileged partners in this relationship in that ours is the treasure, which is, the kingdom of heaven, it is not an opportunity for condescension.  We are not spiritual therapists busied with fixing spiritual deficiencies of those “weaker” or less advantaged than ourselves.  As a wise author once wrote: “For each must find for oneself that pearl of great price.”

So, I ask, then, what does intercourse void of agenda look like?  This is a good starting point for a discussion.  It is my observation that a great weakness of contemporary Christianity is our tendency to avoid this kind of intimacy and these kinds of questions.  When it is attempted it too often is unproductive at best, or worse, counterproductive.  Perhaps, this area is what should merit our best efforts and focus in unraveling the task of Christian fellowship and outreach.