A guy called Ian posted this in a comment on my blog. Thanks.
May52011
May42011
Faithfully Retelling Our Story
If you have visited my blog on a regular basis you may have noticed that I spend quite a bit of time talking about narrative and story. We are part of an ongoing historical narrative that has been told from generation to generation about the God who has chooses to interact with us throughout time. It tells of our ancestors and it points towards our future generations. Long before we had doctrines we had the story and we are asked to retell this story and continue to live it in our daily lives.
Tony Jones blogged about a sermon delivered by Nadia Bolz-Weber on Easter Morning. Nadia blogs here and tweets as @Sarcasticluther. It is a while since I have visited her blog so I was really glad to be pointed back to it by @jonestony. I’ve just watched the video (about 53 mins in) and it is brilliant. There is something about the way in which Nadia retells our salvation history that is compelling.
This is a leader we can follow. And the thing that really cooked people’s noodles wasn’t the question “is Jesus like God” it was “what if God is like Jesus”. What if God is not who we thought? What if the most reliable way to know God is not through religion, not through a sin and punishment program, but through a person. What if the most reliable way to know God is to look at how God chose to reveal God’s self in Jesus?
I won’t repost her sermon in full. Please watch it. Continue to faithfully retell our story. Continue to faithfully live the next chapter of our story. Be inspired. Be renewed. Be changed. Be a “a people who still have the dirt from our graves under our nails, while we stand here shouting Alleluia! Christ is risen”!!
[Yesterday I spent a long time writing this blog post and WordPress ate it. If it does it again I am going to give this up and take to living on a rock just north of Holy Island.]
Apr282011
ASBO Jesus Rocks!!
Jon from ASBO Jesus posted on my Facebook wall saying “I’ve done an ASBO portrait of you”. I spent an hour or so looking for enough Internet connectivity to have a look.
Wealth and fame, a Jedi craves not these things!
(hope this works, I’m next to Hadrian’s wall using my phone to try and post this)
Apr222011
To God
You have got to love the humble man who heads the Anglican Church. A six year old girl asked “To God, How did you get invented?” in an RE lesson at primary school and her very witty atheist father emailed it to lots of church authorities. Rowan wrote back.
Dear Lulu,
Your dad has sent on your letter and asked if I have any answers. It’s a difficult one! But I think God might reply a bit like this –
‘Dear Lulu – Nobody invented me – but lots of people discovered me and were quite surprised. They discovered me when they looked round at the world and thought it was really beautiful or really mysterious and wondered where it came from. They discovered me when they were very very quiet on their own and felt a sort of peace and love they hadn’t expected.
Then they invented ideas about me – some of them sensible and some of them not very sensible. From time to time I sent them some hints – specially in the life of Jesus – to help them get closer to what I’m really like.
But there was nothing and nobody around before me to invent me. Rather like somebody who writes a story in a book, I started making up the story of the world and eventually invented human beings like you who could ask me awkward questions!’
And then he’d send you lots of love and sign off.
I know he doesn’t usually write letters, so I have to do the best I can on his behalf. Lots of love from me too.
+Archbishop Rowan
What a guy. Encore!!