Tuesday, March 9, 2010 at 6:10 am

Spirituality of Glory or a Spirituality of the Cross

Posted by Kyle Strobel | Comments (0) |

In the words of Jean Vanier, "Grace should always perfect our nature...it should make us more human, not take away our humanity." In claiming this, I suggest, what Vanier does is to help establish a Spirituality of the cross. I am taking this distinction from Luther who worried about a theology of glory, and suggested, in contrast, a theology of the cross. I think the same can apply to Spirituality. Grace, therefore, does not simply orient us to heaven, where we now turn our attention away from the world and on to glory - far from it - grace, and through it, true humanity, is tied to Jesus' life. Jesus is the true vision of humanity - humanity at its highest perfection. It is true that one day we will know of another kind of perfection, but that is not available to us this side of glory. We are pilgrims, albeit justified and sanctified pilgrims, we are pilgrims nonetheless.

Spiritual formation therefore, if it is to be truly Christ-oriented, must understanding grace as perfecting us in such a way that we become like Christ. We do not become like Christ in his glorified body, not yet. In this side of glory, we become like Christ as he proclaimed the kingdom of God, as he ministered to the broken, needy and hungry, and as he understood his specific calling and oriented his life around that. A Spirituality of the cross necessitates seeing the cross as the ultimate shape of life. Our leadership plans, church services and formation theology should be conformed to Jesus and the organic message of true Spiritual, and therefore cruciform, growth, rather than the wordly counterpart of success, winning and vision.

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Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 4:47 am

Knowing God for Us

Posted by Kyle Strobel | Comments (0) |

One of the aspects of a truly spiritual theology is to highlight the reality that our knowledge of God must correspond to who God is and what God is willing. In other words, knowing God as an object, albeit a mighty, transcendent and eternal object, is still not knowing God. Furthermore, in knowing God in Christ, our knowledge must be truly spiritual - which means, I suggest, that we know God as beautiful - or, as I put it here, that we know God for us.

Knowing God in Christ means that we not only know him as true. It is necessary that we come to know that God is true, that God assumed flesh and dwelt among us, that he atoned for the sins of the world, that he died on the cross and was raised by the Father to glory. But that knowledge can very well exist external to ourselves - what might be called "academic" knowledge. Likewise, we may come to the realization that not only is it true that God did these things in Christ, but that it is good that he did so. We might come to know God as a good God - that his plan for the redemption of mankind is not only true, but truly good. But again, that is not what it means to know God in Christ. This knowledge is necessary, but not enough.

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Thursday, February 18, 2010 at 6:37 am

Spiritual Formation and Church Services

Posted by Kyle Strobel | Comments (2) |

I have been thinking a lot lately about the role of church services and spiritual formation. It seems to me, as I am musing about this, that the most dangerous thing to do in a church service is to get people excited. Out of all the emotional experiences we go through, it seems to me that excitement is the most potentially fleshly and easiest to manipulate. Excitement is easy to use from the pulpit as a way to manipulate people to do what you want them to, whether that is giving money, getting involved, evangelizing, etc. This goes back to the blog I did earlier, suggesting that much of the evangelical church has bought into a kind of prosperity gospel. We do not orient our values around money, but around experiences of excitement.The revivals seem to have been predicated on excitement, and the wake of the revivals was faith that did not last but flashed brightly only to fade quickly.

In light of this, is there a "safe" ethos to create in church services, or an ethos that leaves less room for the flesh to prevail? I worry about excitement because, while it is certainly a part of the Christian life, it often is tied together with victory, which the Protestants have tended to push against replacing it with the cross. Humility, rather than victory, is the proper end of man, because the victory is not ours but Christ's.

Do we just leave this up to the shepherding task of the pastors, who, through a true knowledge of their flock can faithfully discern where God is moving in their congregation, or is there a general ethos we should help create in our church services? Any thoughts? 

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Thursday, February 18, 2010 at 12:10 pm

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Monday, February 8, 2010 at 6:22 am

Evangelicalism and Spiritual Formation

Posted by Kyle Strobel | Comments (3) |

I have become convinced (and you can push me on this) that inherent to what we now consider "evangelicalism" in America today has either genetic or ideological links with the revivals arising from the first and second great awakenings in early America/New England. "Religion" took a decisive shift in this era, and, in many ways, the American identity itself was forged in the revivals - where "we the people" became the battle cry over "they the clergy." It is also out of the revivals that evangelicalism developed "sure fire methods" for conversion, which paved the way for the modern seeker movement and the megachurches which institutionalized revivals.

It is interesting therefore that this group has grown interested in spiritual formation. As an evangelical myself, I realize that there are some immediate dangers here. First, just as the revivals under Edwards started as an organic and relational movement of the Spirit within the body of Christ, but quickly moved to more para-church (and even anti-clergy) movements that sought to develop clear cut steps and means for conversion, so the various groups speaking of spiritual formation has been tempted (with some succumbing to the temptation) to develop sure fire tactics for growth. The church, all too often in my opinion, has be willing to hand out programs, methods and promises, but has been much less willing to wrestle with the messiness of spirituality with its people.

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Saturday, February 13, 2010 at 8:30 pm

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Monday, February 1, 2010 at 2:26 am

Augustine on the Frenetic

Posted by Kyle Strobel | Comments (0) |

"Accordingly, dearest friends, it falls to us in our neediness and poverty to grieve over those who think they are prosperous. Their delight, you see, is like that of people who are frenetic. Well, just as a mad person frequently gives vent to joy in his frenzy, while the same person cries for him, so we too, dearest friends, if we have received the remedy that comes from heaven (for we too used to be delirious), as those who have been saved because we no longer love the things we used to love, so we too groan to God for those who are still frentic. He is powerful enough, after all, to save them as well. And what they need is to take a good look at themselves and to dislike what they see. What they want, though, is to be seen, and they do not know how to see what is going on in themselves. For if they were to turn their eyes on themselves - just a little bit - they would see how mixed up they are. Until that happens may our interests be different from theirs, may that which holds the attention of our souls be different. Our sorrow is more worthwhile than their delight."

- Augustine, Homily on John 1:34-51

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Tuesday, January 26, 2010 at 1:49 am

Life Practices

Posted by Kyle Strobel | Comments (3) |

I'm not all that savvy when it comes to doing things strategically. Those who know me might be surprised by this, but its true. I've always been able to float through situations and just "make it up as I go along" and do pretty well. The problem though, is that pretty well isn't always all that good. Sure, I've survived, but in the end, I've reaped what I've sown. I've just finished reading a book I mentioned in an earlier post, Desiring the Kingdom by James K. A. Smith, which is thoroughly enjoyed (even though I think his case is overstated). The focus of the volume is on life as liturgy. All life, he argues, is being formed by a certain liturgy, worldly, Christian, buddhist, whatever. We all live in a world whose liturgy, whether we like it or not, is forming us at an incredible rate. Our loves, he argues, are formed through these liturgies, and therefore the church must form a liturgy of a different realm, of an unseen world whose values cut against the flow of the world's.

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Thursday, January 28, 2010 at 2:00 am

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Monday, January 18, 2010 at 5:28 am

Election and the Dark Night

Posted by Kyle Strobel | Comments (6) |

I was recently listening to theologian Stephen Holmes on itunes university talk about spirituality and Calvinism (talk given in Covenant College Chapel). He admits the reality that these two do not, in our day, often go hand in hand, and does a wonderful job explaining the reality of a Reformed understanding of spirituality, which made me think a bit about election and the dark night of the soul (generally speaking). In seeking to talk about the reality of a Reformed understanding of the world, Holmes notes that doctrines like election and grace turn our attention away from ourselves onto God, in Christ, and the work of the cross. The difference, he argues, between Peter and Judas, is not that Peter was so much better and well informed, in fact, they are more similar than not. Judas denied the Lord by selling him out, and Peter denied him by, well, denying him. The key difference is seen in their subsequent action. Judas takes his own life, allowing despair to reign, while Peter runs to the tomb when he hears of Jesus' disappearance and when he sees Jesus at the end of the Gospel of John, we are told that he dives into the water to swim to him.

For the Reformed, the doctrine of election isn't a way to figure out who is in and who is out - it is a way to highlight the sovereignty of God in all things - to focus on the reality that God is the alpha and omega. So what does this have to do with the dark night? 

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Thursday, January 21, 2010 at 4:00 pm

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Monday, January 11, 2010 at 3:48 am

Human Beings as Lovers

Posted by Kyle Strobel | Comments (2) |

I've been reading a fascinating book lately by philosopher James K. A. Smith called Desiring the Kingdom: Worship, Worldview and Cultural Formation. In it, Smith argues that in the modern era we have adopted a misunderstanding of human persons. In his mind, and I think he is right, we have come to believe that persons are primarily thinking or believing things rather than, with Augustine and the ancient church, lovers. As primarily lovers or desiring beings, we need to educate, form and train accordingly. But do we do so? I would suggest, with Smith, that the primary church model we've adopted assumes that humans are thinking and believing things rather that lovers, and that churches tend to try and change people's loves through their brains. If Smith is right, it is no wonder that our model has tended to fail miserably at helping to form people into the image of Christ - the true lover of God.

Any thoughts about this? 

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Friday, January 15, 2010 at 2:59 pm

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Friday, January 8, 2010 at 1:48 am

The Danger of Our Pet Projects

Posted by Kyle Strobel | Comments (0) |

I'm just now getting settled after holiday travel (and jetlag), and have started going through our mail. After opening the packages and Christmas cards (the things I want to open), I turned my attention to things like bills and end-of-the-year donation requests (which, after being gone for several weeks, are a bit out-dated). One of these has left me a bit confused. I receive ministry updates from a ministry I will leave unnamed, who had an offer on their website which I took advantage of about a year ago, and now find myself forever on their mailing list. The current piece of mail I've received is something of an end-of-the-year review and request for money as they move into the new year.

Don't get me wrong, I don't have a problem with ministries asking me for money. I know what it is like to be on the other side of that situation, and I know how difficult and delicate of a situation it is. But what struck me about this given letter was that Christ wasn't named once. The name "Christ" was mentioned in passing, but only because it was a title of something. Instead of a focus on Christ and His gospel, the focus was so radically on their own project that at any given time you could replace their ministry purpose with "gospel" or "Christ." In other words, the focus has become some fully on their projects that they no longer see Christ as above, beyond, and, in fact, in judgment of what they do.

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