Chris Seay spent the day with some of our leaders as well as other church planters from around SoCal. He is the lead pastor at Ecclesia in Houston, President of the Ecclesia Bible Society which is working on The Voice Project, co-founder of The Advent Conspiracy (a movement towards compassion rather than consumption during Christmas), and author of several books including The Dust Off Their Feet, The Gospel According to Tony Soprano, The Gospel Reloaded, among others.
Here are some insights from that day:
Luke 5—living in the tension between fasting and feasting—not just live in the middle where you do neither—but embrace both. Wrestle with the tension of self sacrifice AND living well with family and friends. We should be throwing parties and serving the poor.
Maslow’s theory of church planting–What are people’s felt needs? Staff is here to meet their needs—creates consumer Christianity. “We don’t care about your felt needs; we will work on your real needs. If you want to figure out how to love God and love people better, I will drop everything and help you figure out whatever you need.”
Chris was asked, “What do you do with the Christians who come into your community but have consumeristic mindset?”
He responded: “Every healthy organism has a colon. We need to keep what is healthy and regularly expel what isn’t.”
Most people who are depressed, upset, etc. are simply self absorbed and need to care for someone else.
Discipleship—have one hand holding someone in front of you and one hand holding someone behind you. Christianity is about putting the others first.
Hans Kung: The two fatal flaws of the church are syncretism (blending secular and Christian worldviews) and sectarianism (pulling out of the culture in isolation).
Most Christians do incarnation like a trip to a public restroom (get in and out without having to your hands dirty). Too hard to wade into culture and find redemption.
Pastors often taught to take a story from Jesus and for us to tell people what he really meant (three propositions) Like Jesus wasn’t articulate enough to say what he meant. Story is powerful and complex. The last thing you want is for people to leave your church thinking they have it all figured out. Good sermons don’t give people answers but poke people in the eye. Storyteller, Prophet, Poet, Disrupter—good art—true and worth hearing—Not scientific method.
Figure out what your authentic voice is rather than mimic other voices. See the scene from Walk the Line with Johnny Cash and Sam Ash)
Great thoughts! Thank you so much for sharing these. I’ve got quite a bit to ponder on.