What's blowing in the wind?

Tony Stiff has a thought-provoking post he's written at the 'Conn'-versation blog. It's an article entitled: "Mere-catholicity: What’s blowing in the wind?" It's somewhat academic in nature, so won't be everyone's cup of tea, yet very practical and pertinent so some will be sure to find it interesting. He concludes the article by saying:

Is it possible to promote a ‘safe-space’ for theological conversation carried out in the spirit of mere-catholicity in our churches without opening the door to either cultural accommodation or theological compromise? A ‘safe-space’ conversation where the missional labors of the emerging leaders of our churches will not be suspiciously scrutinized for their lack of confessional literacy or appeal; where questions marks are placed on their epistemic accommodations before they speak; and inquiries are manufactured by ecclesial tribunals to explore their assumed narratival neurosis’s? I believe so, but it’s not enough to raise the question of, can change be welcomed.

These younger emerging pastors must ask themselves can their inherited or adopted tradition be maintained thoughtfully and honestly as they seek to be faithful to their Post-Christian contexts. Will they abandon the classics for ‘chick-tract’ theologically shaped innovations, while stepping over the bodies of their father’s polemical labors in estrangement to the dangers their father’s felt, only to stock up on the collapsible IKEA social conventions of their times? Will they ignore the Standards of old Tradition, only to find themselves’ putting on a false sense of relevancy, a Standard of their new Missional proclivities out of conversation with the past? I believe they can absolve themselves from this, that mere-catholicity as a way of maintaining community actually governs them away from this sort of reaction.

There is a way out of this dilemma but it will require the “long obedience” of discipleship modeled by men like Eugene Peterson; a bold, daring, and risk-taking obedience – a humble obedience. These times require a theology that abides in contextual conversation with these emerging pastors Post-Christian setting, as well as a theology that is in chastened-agreement with Westminster Standards. What would such a theology be called, well how about Conversational Confessionalism: A vintage thread for a post-everything times. Where the very curvature of these emerging pastors convictions provoke interest, intrigue, and imagination in the minds and cultural landscapes of their neighbors; while the threading retains the fibers of vigor and truth, the Westminster Standards were meant to cloth them with…

Community

Beautiful fall day here in Boston! I've been fortunate to have a nice relaxing morning with a good cup of ethiopian coffee and some excellent reading. Unfortunately, Katie hasn't had the same. She is on an elective week, which is supposed to be a great week working Monday to Friday, 9-5pm and weekends off. However, a stroke of unfortunate circumstances with some of her classmates has resulted in her filling in on a late call on Thursday and a working a 12hr shift in the bone marrow transplant floor today. We had plans to go hiking with friends today and then have a couple couples over for dinner from our community group. We're making the best of it though - we plan to hike tomorrow and we are still going to have our friends over for dinner - just now I'm cooking! Yikes! We'll see how that goes. Should be a fun time of community though.

Speaking of community (a smooth transition, I know), that is something I've been thinking about some recently, especially how fortunate Katie and I are to have been gifted with such great Christian community. Dietrich Bonhoeffer says in "Life Together" speaking of Christian Community:

It is true, of course, that what is an unspeakable gift of God for the lonely individual is easily disregarded and trodden under foot by those who have the gift every day. It is easily forgotten that the fellowship of Christian brethren is a gift of grace, a gift of the Kingdom of God that any day may be taken from us, that the time that still separates us from utter loneliness may be brief indeed. Therefore, let him who until now has had the privilege of living a common Christian life with other Christians praise God's grace from the bottom of his heart. Let him thank God on his knees and declare: It is grace, nothing but grace, that we are allowed to live in community with Christian brethren.

Through Christ, in community we have a spiritual reality in which we can experience encouragement and joy, hear the Word of God shared and see the Word lived out. John Piper in a recent Q&A also brought out the point that in community we have our identity shaped and our gifts developed and affirmed. He says:

My identity arose in community. You can’t go out into the woods and figure out who you are. It is just totally ambiguous. So you stay in the church and you love people and you do what you love to do and suddenly you start to discover who you are - in community.

"How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity!" Psalm 133:1

Two if by sea

As the famous poem about Paul Revere's midnight ride goes:

one if by land, two if by sea

we would have had to hang two lights from the Old North Church Tower (if you are not following me here, you need to review your American Revolutionary history) to welcome Jon's parents and sister, Megan. They were able to arrange a cruise out of NYC to Nova Scotia and New Foundland that had a port day in Boston that coincided with my day off - truly monumentous as my schedule seems to maximize the social engagements that I have to miss due to being on-call!

Although their visit was brief, we took advantage of the 80 degree September sunshine and toured the city via the famous Boston Duck Tours, which take full advantage of the WWII amphibious craft and include a ride on the Charles River.






Here we are in the reflection of the Handcock building. If you zoom in, you might just pick out Jon leaning over the side to snag this photo!



After a brief stop at our apartment and dinner at a nearby Belgian Pub which is quickly becoming one of our favorites, it was back to the ship for the seafarers and off to Maine.

Meanwhile, Jon and I are enjoying what has been billed as the best season in Boston! Warm sunny days and cool nights and just the hint of color change on the leaves has marked our first experience of fall in New England. Jon is hundreds of pages of reading deep into his course on the Pentatuch and I am enjoying a week of elective(aka a normal 40 hour work week, which explains why I'm updating you) sandwiched between my last four weeks in the medical intensive care unit and my three week tour in the emergency department.

Autumn Nears

With yesterday's 90º+ day, it might not seem like fall is arriving, but signs are pointing that it truly is on the horizon. People have different signs that tip them off to the changing of season - maybe it's Labor Day passing, the beginning of School, the start of the NFL season or possibly its your calendar showing the fall equinox on September 23rd. Not for me. For me, it's when the first update appears on the Foliage Network! Yesterday was that day. Been a bit of a dry summer here in Boston, so hopefully we'll get some rain here in September and have some great foliage here for our first New England fall.

Yesterday Katie and I headed into downton Boston so we could visit the Farmer's Market at Haymarket. There were a ton of vendors setup and really great prices. We'd heard that indeed there would be cheap prices, but that you had to be ready to eat the fruit and vegetables within a couple days or it goes bad. Most of what we got (including possibly the world's largest avocado) actually looked pretty good though, we'll see how it looks in the next couple days!



Katie looking for a deal


The Market

I close with a quote from a book I just finished titled "When Sinners Say 'I Do' " by Dave Harvey:

"But sinners who say "I do" have a different road to travel (that is the road of unmet needs focused on me, me and more me). It is the road of astonishing, undeserved grace - a grace so remarkable that is shows us the problem and then delivers the solution. Have you ever been on a scenic drive so beautiful that it was hard to keep your head from spinning from one vista to the next? The road of undeserved grace is like that. It is distractingly beautiful, because all of our true needs are met in breathtaking array in Christ."

Back to School Time

Back to School time has arrived as can be seen by the stream of students that are returning to the city. It was a good weekend for UHaul, and a bad weekend for driving (as we found out Sunday morning on the way to church)!

Been a while since our last post and as usual, we've been keeping busy and trying to make the most of the last of this great weather! Although, last weekend when Sarah and Ryan visited, it wasn't so nice, but scorching hot and humid! We still managed to make the obligatory Freedom Trail tour:

Saturday evening we took a 2+hr trip to western Mass to Tanglewood, the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. We saw John Williams direct the Boston Pops in their annual Film Night. We had lawn seats and got there early with some from our community group so we could have a nice picnic dinner. A lot of fun was had by all. It was good having Sarah and Ryan, and hopefully next time they can stay a little longer (I think they felt they almost spent more time on the bus than here in Boston!)

Dinner on the lawn.

The Boston Pops (fortunately they had some screens so could see what was going on!)

Katis has started back on a rotation that is Q3 overnight (translation: every third day she has to pull a 30hr shift). They are often rough days, but the good news is we often have more time on her non-call days in the evening. The bad news is the other days she doesn't come home (like today!). On a side note, Megan is having her first Q3 weeks of many to come! Her and Katie will be able to empathize with one another.

I spent a couple days last week down south visiting a coal power plant. They are amazing structures - so intricate and jumongous (somewhere between jumbo and humungous). On my interview day, their was one part of the job they failed to mention. Silos. Large silos (to hold ash). Very tall silos. Silos they want me to climb. The first site we went to had a 130foot silo. I wasn't sure how I was going to feel about climbing to that height. Fortunately, to my surprise this silo had an elevator (although if the sketchy elevator had stopped - which I heard it did the week before - I would have quickly wish we took the stairs!). When we got to the top we had only one flight of stairs to climb. As I climbed them, I quickly came to the conclusion, that I like dirt a whole lot better than standing on gratings 130feet in the air. The following day, we visited a site that had a silo a 'mere' 100feet high. Unfortunately, no elevator. Just stairs, made of grating so we could look straight down and a handrail on either side. I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to make it all the way up, but somehow I did! And in hindsight, it wasn't that bad, so hopefully a few more trips and I will feel a little more comfortable. Until maybe we get to the 180feet silos, that could be another story...

The "short" silo.

We did have a nice view once we got to the top though!

So, that's a little what has been going on here. We hope all is well with you back home and around!