Increasingly the debate rages around calling oneself a christian or a christ follower. Jason Byassee weighs in with a great article. Jason writes,

This is especially important to reassert when we are tempted to say we’re with the head, but not the other parts of the body. We are all tempted to pick and choose our fellows, buffet-style. “I’m with Desmond Tutu, Nelson Mandela, and Mother Teresa, but not the Southern Baptists.” No! We’re part of this body, with all its dazzling glory and all its tragic flaws, and cannot claim the former without the latter. Further, we are responsible for those parts presently misbehaving, and for its misdeeds through time—if we want credit for its virtues.

This is the part that really irks me the most on eschewing “Christian.” It’s as though we get off scot-free for historical Christian sins (the crusades, racism, you name it) by just calling ourselves something else. Christians believe there is a way to forgiveness and purity—but it passes through confession, restoration, and repaired relationship. The much more costly way to disassociate from those who have done ill in Christ’s name is to set about loving as fanatically as they hated.

Thanks to Tim for pointing this out. Read full article here.

How is this for a garbage dump?

Another great article by Andrew Shamy over at Compass Conversations. Check it out here

This morning on my radio spot we continued our imaginary journey around the mall and explored the concept of the luxury good. To listen click here.

My old friend Nick Wight (surrender) pointed me to this very interesting article by Claudio Oliver entitled Why I have given up serving the poor. Check it out here

In this podcast we look at the story of ‘legion’ from the gospel of Mark, we explore the concept of trying to become more like Jesus, and ask a dangerous question ‘What is it to live a life of sanity in an insane culture?‘ Download or subscribe here.

You can download or subscribe through itunes here

Religious researcher George Barna has named a new Tribe on the religious spectrum, the Casual Christian. Barna writes,  

“Casual Christianity is faith in moderation. It allows them to feel religious without having to prioritize their faith. Christianity is a low-risk, predictable proposition for this tribe, providing a faith perspective that is not demanding. A Casual Christian can be all the things that they esteem: a nice human being, a family person, religious, an exemplary citizen, a reliable employee – and never have to publicly defend or represent difficult moral or social positions or even lose much sleep over their private choices as long as they mean well and generally do their best. From their perspective, their brand of faith practice is genuine, realistic and practical. To them, Casual Christianity is the best of all worlds; it encourages them to be a better person than if they had been irreligious, yet it is not a faith into which they feel compelled to heavily invest themselves.”

Read Full article here

Last Friday on my radio spot Clayton and I continued our imaginary wander around a shopping mall and this time we stopped at the Coffee shop. We discussed the cultural meanings behind Coffee and the Coffee shop. You can listen or download here.

Looks like this is turning into book recommendation week!

On Sunday at Church I showed a short video about Ed Dobson, who wrote the book The Year of Living like Jesus. I first heard about Ed’s book a month or so ago and rather cynically thought to myself ‘Here we go someone is trying to do a Christian version of A.J. Jacob’s The Year of living biblically.’ I expected that the book would be written by some cynical twenty something, who would chide the reader for their uptightness while he vibed out in a Jesus robe at the beach.

But then I actually picked up the book and found something completely different to my preconceptions. Ed Dobson is not an angsty young man, rather he is a middle aged former pastor who is dying of Lou Gherig’s disease. When Ed discovered that he would only have a handful of years left to live, he decided that what he wanted to do with the limited time he had left was to truly try and become like Jesus. Thus Ed decided to put aside all of the knowledge, theories and theologies that he had learnt and to truly walk and live each day like Jesus.

Ed first of all realized that to be like Christ he must immerse himself in Jesus’ world. He steps out of his comfort zone living as Jesus would have as a Torah observant Jew, he begins to pray at the Synagogue, to pray the Hebrew prayers that Jesus prayed. He listens to the gospels everyday over and over on his ipod. He begins to pick up hitchhikers, he gives away most of his clothes. You may not agree with everything that Dobson does but his desire to be more like Jesus is a powerful reminder of what it truly is to be a follower of Christ.

This book is a raw, honest, moving and at time heartbreaking story of a man’s attempts to follow Jesus as practically he can. For me this book has really struck a chord, firstly it reminds me that we cannot separate Jesus from his Jewishness, something that sadly Christian history has done again and again. But most of all it reminds the believe to borrow a term from my old boss and friend Alan Hirsch that we are committed to the conspiracy of little Jesus’. That God’s plan to redeem the world is centered around us each day getting up and asking the question how can I be more like Jesus today.

Often after I give talks people seem to sniff out the fact that I read a lot, so people come bounding up to me asking for recommendations of books to read. Often I am dumbstruck, this is normally because I am reading some obscure history book about some strange obsession that I have at that moment. I also find so many contemporary Christian books difficult to recommend simply because without wanting to sound judgemental, a lot of books these days seem like pop psychology with a thin Christian veneer.

However one author that I have been recommending to people is Margaret Feinberg. I had the privilege of meeting Margaret and her husband Leif earlier in the year, who besides being really interesting people, were incredibly helpful, giving this car less Aussie a lift back to my hotel, a journey which I had naively intended to walk ( I had not realized that being a pedestrian was against the law in Southern California). Margaret has a unique style, in which she manages to both be readable and profound at the same time.  Check out Margaret’s books  The Sacred Echo and The Organic God as well as her latest Scouting the Divine.