Healthy bodies in time of lockdown

Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus that the body of Christ (the Church) is one that moves, listens, shares, cares, and learns. In a broader sense, this is true of any healthy community. Any given person within the group may have a differentiated role, collaboratively ensuring that each function is working well and well-integrated, just as the human body is made up of different organs that work together. And, again, this is true of human society in general, with different personalities bringing different gifts to the party.

In times of lockdown, what might this look like, for us personally and in socially-distanced community with others?

Move

Am I getting enough exercise?

Am I getting enough (and not too much) sleep?

Am I eating as well as possible, given present constraints?

Within guidelines, can I shop for anyone? (or, who will shop for me?)

Listen

For those living with other people in households, are we taking time to listen to one another?

Is there someone who needs us to listen to them, on a phone- or video call?

Who is anxious?

Who am I listening to ‘out there’? Are they spreading fear, or hope?

How will I limit who I listen to, to a manageable volume? (do I need to restrict my social media use?)

Am I taking regular time to listen to God, in reading the Bible and in prayer?

Share

How might I bring some good news into someone else’s day?

(NB: not by bombarding them on social media!)

Care

Is anyone we know ill?

Has anyone we know been bereaved?

Is anyone we know struggling with their mental health?

Who can I phone (etc.) today?

Learn

What am I learning about myself?

Is there a skill I can take up? (learn to speak German ... to play the ukulele ... to bake bread ...)

Baptism and APEST

I’ve been thinking about baptism and the preparation of candidates for baptism, and also about APEST (apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds and teachers) recently, and find myself making the following connections between them.

In our liturgy of baptism, there are three symbols: oil, water, and a candle.

The oil comes first, as we mark the candidates with the sign of the cross, in oil, on their foreheads. This is an anointing. As such, we are recognising that the candidate has been chosen by God to fulfil a special role. It is a deeply Christocentric anointing – they are marked with the sign of the cross, the sign of Christ, along with the words ‘Christ claims you for his own’ – but it is the candidate who is anointed. That is to say, they are anointed into a share in Jesus’ calling.

Note that this comes before we get to the act of baptism. At this point, they are not yet identified with Christ as members of his Church, but rather are being identified with Christ in his humanity, as members of the human family. What we are recognising – what we are anointing – is a unique share in Jesus’ fully-human nature, his incarnation; and this anointing is for the purpose of taking a stand against all that rebels against the God-given commission that we should steward this earth.

According to Ephesians 4, there are five human impulses that Jesus perfectly expresses, and that we share in. These are:

the apostolic impulse to innovation and pioneering, to taking ourselves beyond the known;

the prophetic impulse to pursue justice and to protect beauty – and often, to use beauty to resist and overcome injustice;

the evangelistic impulse to share good news, wherever it may be found;

the shepherding, or pastoral, impulse to care for others, paying special attention to the most vulnerable;

and the teaching impulse to learn and pass on learning.

Each of us carries all five impulses to varying degrees, but we tend to have one or two that are primary. It is this Jesus-defined humanity we are recognising here. Where baptism candidates are infants, we have yet to (help them to) discover the role for which we are anointing them: we do so in faith.

Next comes the water of baptism. Here, we are identifying the baptism candidate with the saving work of God, who always comes to rescue us from chaos. The water of baptism, poured out three times recalls God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – drawing out dry land from the waters; saving Noah and his family during the Great Flood; bringing the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt through the Sea of Reeds, and, after many years in the wilderness, across the River Jordan into the Promised Land.

In baptism, we are symbolising the reality that God has ransomed the candidate. This finds its expression in Ephesians 4 in verses 8-10, which draw on Psalm 68 and the imagery of God descending on Mount Sinai and ascending Mount Zion, liberating captives and receiving tribute. We move from Jesus claiming us, as members of the human family; to God saving us, into the family of the Church…and then to Jesus giving us to one another and for the world.

The third symbol is the giving of a candle, lit from the Paschal Candle which represents Jesus the Light of the World. Here, we are commissioned to shine as lights in the world. Again, this is to have a share in Christ – lights, dependent on the Light. The baptism candidate has been anointed, passed through the waters, and is now sent out into the world, to make a difference. The person they are by Jesus’ involvement in their coming into being (Creation Order) is redeemed (Salvation Order), liberated to fulfil their calling, shining in the world according to an apostolic or prophetic or evangelistic or shepherding or teaching impulse.

The role of the Christian community – with parents and godparents often having special responsibility – is to support the baptised to grow in their understanding of what they have been anointed and liberated for, and where and how we are called to shine as a light. This is as true with adults who come to baptism as it is with infants who are brought for baptism. It is a lifelong journey made by faith, in community. It is a journey made in response to the call of Christ, from which we get the word vocation as a way of coming to our right selves.

I am convinced that the pattern of Ephesians 4 is key to our practices of disciple-making, and is therefore rightly there in the very liturgy of baptism – and all that brings us to that point, and flows out from it.

Jesus-given : Teachers

Over the past year, I have been writing a series of six papers entitled ‘Jesus-given’ in which I have been developing a nuanced understanding of apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds and teachers (Ephesians 4), as set out in the first paper; and exploring how we might disciple people in their particular gifting, or given-ness.

It was my hope that I would be able to complete these introductory papers before moving on from Southport, and I am very pleased to have done so, with the paper on teachers.

Thanks are due to all those who have encouraged me to write, especially Alan Hirsch; and also to those who have let me know that they have been encouraged by what I have written.

The full series can be accessed from the ‘Papers’ page at the top of my blog (just underneath the header), or below:

‘Jesus-given: living the life you were called to be’

‘Jesus-given: apostles’

‘Jesus-given: prophets’

‘Jesus-given: evangelists’

‘Jesus-given: shepherds’

‘Jesus-given: teachers’

Pastoral Care

Of all Scripture, the passage I most often speak from is Psalm 23. Most recently I spoke from it as I baptised a mother and two of her daughters, a young girl and a baby. There had been another daughter: last year, following her cot death, I had taken her funeral. We lit a candle in her memory, and as testimony to God’s faithfulness in dark times. After the baptism, the mother said to me, “Twelve months ago you told us that life would be good again; I couldn’t see then how that could be possible, but I can now.”

The Psalm draws on the experience of sheep. It begins in the low winter pasture; but the spring has arrived: the grass here is wearing thin, while the grass on the flat mountain top is lush and full of flowers, like a table-top spread with a banquet. The shepherd, sensitive to these things, leads the sheep up the ravine. The ravine is a hostile environment – a flash torrent could sweep the sheep away; predators hide in the rocks – but the sheep do not need to fear, because the shepherd carries two sticks: a crook, to guide – and, if need be, to rescue – the sheep;* and a club, with which to drive back predators.** At the end of the journey, the shepherd checks over his sheep, rubbing healing oil into any cuts.

But the mountain top is not the final destination: the shepherd will lead his sheep up and down the ravine many times as one pasture is depleted and another has regrown.

Psalm 23 is such a good funeral psalm not because it speaks of my life after my death, but because it holds out the hope of life (as opposed to mere ongoing existence), in time, after the death of one I have loved.

Life is change. Births, deaths, marriages. Children leaving home. Parents getting old. Jobs lost; jobs begun. For richer, for poorer. In sickness and in health. At a personal level; at a community level; at a regional, national, international, or global level. We can no more hold back change than we can step outside of time and space.

Life is change, experienced as rhythms of change. Advent is my favourite Season of the year; but if it were always Advent, where would Christmas, Epiphany, Lent be? There is much that I love – and much that I find a real challenge – about having young children; without wishing it away, I wouldn’t want it to last forever!

Life is change, as we are simultaneously and paradoxically passing away and being transformed from one degree of glory to another.

The good shepherd –

by shepherd I mean someone with a primarily pastoral impulse;

someone whose gifts relate to humanising our organisational structures and working systems;

whether within the church or anywhere within wider society –

the good shepherd:

recognises tipping- or turning- points;

leads a community (not just the most adventurous individuals) into the new season of life, via our dying to our common (communal) and personal self;

encourages, guides and protects in the inevitable and unavoidable stage of moving through the valley of the shadow of death;

and attends to the wounds that are picked up along the way.

Life is change, and change is always disturbing – even for those who enjoy change; and even for those who are moving from sadness to joy. It involves a leaving behind and a setting out on a journey. We might have made the journey before, but the journey – in particular, the out-workings of the dangers of the journey – is different each time. We need shepherds to guide us. And yet, at least within the church, shepherds have become the most change-averse of all. Too often, a shepherd:

accepts that the grass is not as green as it was, but tries desperately to find ways of extending the season in the pasture, believing that it will grow back if we stick things out;

ironically endangers the survival of the flock out of concern not to enter the ravine;

and, ironically, frightens the sheep by taking up the voice of a predator.

That is why shepherds, just as much as anyone else, need to be reminded that they are also sheep – and that they follow the Good Shepherd.

That there is a wolf hiding within them, too, needing to be confronted by the Good Shepherd.

That the ravine may be the place of death, but that the place of death is the very place where God is at work in and through the Good Shepherd to bring about new life.

*the crook also symbolises commitment to Covenant relationship between the Father and his children, between Jesus and his Bride...

**the club also symbolises commitment to Kingdom responsibility, to drive back the accuser...

Jesus-given : Shepherds

Over the course of the past year I've been working on a series of papers on discipling apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds (pastors), and teachers.

Here is the latest: my thoughts, for what they are worth, on shepherds. For those who are pastoral types, and those discipling them.

Translators : Midwives : Convincers : Enthusiasts

Here is a link to my latest paper in the ‘Jesus-given’ series, looking at discipling evangelists.

After Al Hirsch et al, my premise in this series is that the primary vocations of apostle, prophet, evangelist, shepherd and teacher are each nuanced by our secondary preferences, resulting in great diversity. In this case, I explore the cluster of evangelist expressions, which I term translators (Evangelist-apostles), midwives (Evangelist-prophets), convincers (Evangelist-shepherds), and enthusiasts (Evangelist-teachers).

The Next Instalment

Here is the next instalment in what I am writing – this paper on discipling prophets.  (I think there will now be a much longer gap until the next paper in the series.)

One of the things that is hinted at throughout, but which I don’t explicitly state (and perhaps need to in a revision) is this reason why we need prophetic intelligence:

We live in a society where certain voices – both for and against religious faith – are insisting that only the literal form of ‘truth’ (and, in fact, only a particular kind of literal: what is measurable) is ‘real’ truth, or at least it is the highest form of truth. This ought to be patently nonsense to anyone who has ever read a novel or been moved by music – but sadly is not – and what is most ridiculous of all about it is that it renders everything produced by humanity prior to the Modern Era as untrue.  What is literally true is true, of course: but it is the lowest and most empty form of truth, not the pinnacle. This is why we need the storyteller, the songwriter, the artist, to help us to explore the significance of the life we have learnt to measure but failed to interpret, to the extent that we can create for ourselves anything we want but fail to share with our brothers and sisters...

Writing Projects

One of the things I attempted to do in 2012 was to write a book manuscript, on vocation: the calling on each one of us to be someone in particular and to do something in particular; to receive ourselves as gift from Jesus and to offer ourselves back as gift to him and for the world.

This was a fascinating learning experience. I learned that I have allies, who believe that I have something to say that is worth saying – indeed, I embarked on the project not out of some need to do so, but because I was encouraged to do so by others whose opinion I value. I learned that people in the publishing world might take me seriously. And I rediscovered just how short and wide my attention span is, flitting from one thing to another. That I am not likely to write a full-length manuscript (at least without a sabbatical from any other commitments); and that a series of papers might in fact be a better way of saying the things that I want to say, creating a little reference library, each volume being a conversation-starter in its own right.

And so as the year comes to a close, I have put out the first and second in a series of papers online (with a permanent link from the sidebar of this blog).

The first paper is perhaps the bones and internal organs, as yet lacking the flesh we recognise as familiar; or the foundations and core structure, the visible building yet to be entered: things that are essential, but will remain hidden to most.

My intention over 2013 is to produce several much shorter papers, filled with stories that illustrate what different kinds of apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds, and teachers look like – to help us to see ourselves, in the nuance of our calling; to receive ourselves as gift from Jesus and to offer ourselves back as gift to him and for the world. The second paper looks at apostles.

Understanding Strength And Weakness

In Ephesians 4:1, Paul urges the believers in Asia Minor to live a life worthy of the calling they have received.  What is that calling?  Certainly, he speaks of unity and of maturity, but that is not our primary calling: rather, Paul goes on to speak in terms of specific calling – to be an apostle, a prophet, an evangelist, a shepherd or a teacher – a calling which is to be expressed in unity with the specific calling of other believers, for the purpose of attaining the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.  Paul knew his calling – to be an apostle – and urged others to discern their calling too.  How can we live a life worthy of the calling we have received if, unlike Paul, we don’t know what our calling is?

Here, at least in England, we run into a particular difficulty: a pious obsession that our gifts, strengths, and areas of competence are at worst a trap, causing us to operate without God; and at best irrelevant, because God’s strength is made perfect in our weakness.  After all, didn’t Jesus say this very thing to Paul himself?

No, he did not, and this pious obsession is a gross distortion of the passage it cites (2 Corinthians 12).

The weakness Jesus refers to in addressing Paul is a position of weakness that is caused by external opposition.  Writing to a church he established and where, in his absence, others have come in who oppose him, Paul recognises that this has been a recurring pattern in his ministry.  Indeed, he had broached the subject with Jesus no less than three times, making use of a scriptural phrase - ‘barbs in your eyes and thorns in your sides’ (Numbers 33:55, 56) – referring to people who, unless driven out, will lead God’s people away from him and into trouble.  In the past, Paul had followed the instruction of Numbers 33:55, 56, in persecuting the dangerous followers of the Way.  Such action is no longer open to him; instead he pleads with Jesus to intervene on his behalf.  Jesus responds (on the third occasion? repeated three times?), “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”  That the weakness he refers to is external is clear in Paul’s response, to “delight in weakness, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties.”

Commentators have tended to ignore the plainest meaning of Paul’s case, engaging in speculation as to the possible nature of a bodily condition that afflicts him (an eye complaint? malaria?).  While such suggestions are still distinguished from personality preference, they are sufficiently internalised as to facilitate the interpretation of ‘weakness’ as being ‘those things we are not gifted in’ and the case is therefore presented that God is more able to work through our incompetence.  If I had a Pound Sterling for every time I have heard such an argument, I’d be a rich man.

This may well tie in with a very English unease with competence (though if we are ever going to address that, the summer of our best ever Olympic performance – not to mention, delivering a spectacular Games – is as good a time as any).

Throughout history, God has looked for people to partner with him.  The idea that he would make you as a person with particular gifts and then prefer to ignore what he had made is ludicrous.

God will invite you to step outside of your comfort-zone, the sphere of your present competence, for a number of reasons including these:

because discovering what you are not gifted for is one of the ways in which we discover what we are gifted for;

because experiencing those things we are not gifted at is one of the ways in which we grow to appreciate the different gifts of others;

because persevering for a season in what is not our best preference adds depth and roundedness to our strengths;

because the starting place for all competency is incompetency.

However, Jesus’ intention for you is neither naive incompetence nor omni-competence.  It is that you discover your calling and grow into it, so that you can live a life worthy of that calling.  It is that each member of the body of Christ should fundamentally be the particular gift they were created to be, learning to work together as opposed to trying to be and to do what someone else was given to be and to do.

Too often we ask people to operate in what is not their calling, because that seems easier than identifying the person whose call is best suited (and, after all, Jesus’ power is made perfect in weakness).  It never seems to work in the long-term, but if we just do a better job of explaining why we need them perhaps we can keep them in that role longer...

When Paul wrote to the church in Asia Minor, he was experiencing the particular weakness of another external constraint: he was in prison.  This, however, did not equate to an undermining of his internal strength, his calling to be an apostle.  It simply meant that how that calling was worked-out looked different from when he was free – writing rather than travelling.

Right now, your external circumstances might be such as to put you in a position of weakness.  If so, know that Jesus’ grace is sufficient for you.

But that is not the same thing as having no regard for strength, for the gift Jesus has given you to be.

Play to your strengths.  Invest in them.  Allow the Lord to train you in them.  Let other people seek to constrain you with weakness if they so choose; but don’t give weakness your energy.  To paraphrase Jesus, “let it go: you attend to whom I have made you to be, and do it to the fullness of the gifting I have given you.”

Every One Carries Everyone

To begin, a paradox:

God created each and every living thing, including every human being (e.g. Psalm 139); and,

God created all living things to be reproducing, self-sustaining species, to be fruitful and increase in number (Genesis 1).

Every human being carries the code of life; a code expressed in them in a unique way; a code which can combine with the code carried in a corresponding other to create a new and unique life.

All but wipe out humanity, and we would begin again, according to God’s blueprint.  All but wipe out the Church, and she would grow again, according to Jesus’ distribution of his likeness through humanity.

Every human being is at a fundamental level created an apostle, a prophet, an evangelist, a shepherd or a teacher (abbreviation APEST; Ephesians 4); made to be a pioneer, a visionary, a recruiter, a nurturer or a trainer; as we share in the family likeness that is carried and perfectly expressed by Jesus, the one who has also liberated, and is liberating, his brothers and sisters.

Every human being carries the potential to be an apostle, a prophet, an evangelist, a shepherd or a teacher within them.

This coded matrix (APEST) configures in patterns that nuance the way in which we express the image of God; how, as we acknowledge him, we express the likeness of Christ – and this ‘nature’ combines in turn with ‘nurture,’ with the particular life experiences we live through, and the community contexts we are found in (for the person only exists in relation to other persons), to further flesh-out what Jesus-in-us (both personally and communally) looks like in the world.  In other words APEST is not merely a question of role (whether ‘in the church’ or ‘in the world’) but is core, in ways that we have yet to significantly explore, to person-ality and preference.*

And this potential is passed on, combined with another code, to create new persons.  So, I am a P who is significantly nuanced by A, and to lesser degrees by T, S and E; married to a S who is significantly nuanced by P, and to lesser degrees by T, A and E.  We have three children, still too young to know with any degree of certainty what they have been created to be – it could be any of the five, in any combination and variance of degrees, as we, as parents, carry and pass on the full potential – but we have the privilege of helping them discover and grow-into what Jesus has given them as, and for...

*I would love to see more mapping of APEST combinations against MBTI combinations.

Psalm 68

For anyone who was at the New Wine National Leaders Conference two weeks ago and heard Alan Hirsch so graciously honour me from the stage but didn’t know why, it was for my interpretation of Paul’s use of Psalm 68 in Ephesians 4:7-11.

Psalm 68 is a multi-layered depiction of God descending from Mount Sinai and ascending Mount Zion; a victorious figure returning home with those taken prisoner by his enemies, whom he has set free; leading a procession of captives, who present him with their tribute; and distributing gifts, including the gift of relationships and the gift of spacious and secure territory to settle, to his people.  As a result, God’s reign is extended over the nations, to his glory.

Why does Paul make use of this Psalm in this context?  My contention is that he is interpreting it as an image of Jesus’ incarnation and ascension, to explain how Jesus has set prisoners free, received them as tribute, and given them to his people, for the purpose of the expansion of his family and extension of his kingdom.

Moreover, the implication of this is that everyone being an apostle, a prophet, an evangelist, a pastor or a teacher – the text makes it clear that these are all people-as-gift – is not something that we become at the point of liberation but something we are, that is liberated.  In other words, being an apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor or teacher is what Jesus created you as; and – as a result of his incarnation and ascension, following the triumph of his resurrection – when we recognise Jesus as King, when we offer ourselves to his service (kingdom), when we are set free to be his family (covenant), then he gives us to his body (covenant relationships and kingdom purpose; being and doing).

Clearly there are those who pioneer beyond the known and reform the known, who pursue justice and creativity, who spread good news, who heal the broken, and who hand on wisdom to the next generation, who are yet to meet Jesus for who he is.

And this means that we need to re-frame discipleship:

from ‘following’ Jesus in an abstract sense to growing into our identity in him; and

from something that begins at conversion to something that begins way before that point.

Making disciples is about helping others discover who God created them to be, to step into and live in the freedom God intended, and to engage with the – at times messy – dynamics of inter-dependence.

TwoPointFive-Fold Ministry

It is well established that I am of the opinion that Ephesians 4:1-16 is key to the reimagining of our ecclesiology – what church is and does, both gathered and sent – that is needed as we move into a future of increased economic, political and social instability as the times God has called us to live in.

Ephesians 4:1-6 is concerned with unity: one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all.  Ephesians 4:12-16 is concerned with maturity: with the community of faith growing, more and more, into what it would look like if Jesus was present in and through us...I know of no Christian tradition or denomination or indeed persons who would argue that these verses are anything other than enduring, of as much relevance to us today as to the believers to whom they were first written.

Ephesians 4:7-11 present for us the Jesus-given means of growing from unity to maturity.  And yet, for a host of reasons, the Church has largely come to believe that these verses – unlike those that form their immediate context – are provisional; that they no longer apply; and that we can somehow expect to reach maturity while by-passing the process...

The context to which I am sent is the Church of England.  As a tradition, along with other traditions, we have made a number of moves.  We have claimed that apostles and prophets are discontinued, serving a limited role in the birthing of the Church, not an ongoing role in her maturing.  Their legacy is seen as contained in a body of writing handed-down and interpreted (controlled) by pastors and teachers, not the authentic reproducing of apostles and prophets.  We have also reapplied the role of pastors and teachers as being oversight positions, whereas the text itself speaks of apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers as encompassing everyone: it does not address oversight at all.  These are paradigm shifts away from the insight of Paul’s reflection on the body of Christ.

In practice, we have elevated a two-fold ministry model as our model of oversight, our criteria for selection and for job description.  Moreover, my observation (and I think I have observed enough over many years to offer this insight) is that we view the local on-the-ground in-the-parish role as that of the pastor, and the trans-local role (the apostolic and prophetic roles?) as that of the teacher (conference speaker, author).

[I recognise that there are linguistic grounds to combine pastor and teacher together in this text; but I do not think that there are theological grounds or phenomenological (observation of the church today) grounds to do so, and that linguistic grounds on their own are insufficient.  I would suggest that the majority of parish priests are not especially gifted teachers (whether in formal delivery, such as preaching, or informal settings, such as group discussion) and that a majority of clergy with well-developed teaching ministries are not especially gifted in pastoral care.  Where we do see the two together, I would want to speak of pastors with well-developed teaching skills (a good thing!) and teachers with well-developed pastoral skills (likewise, a good thing!), rather than pastor-teacher as something that comes as a given combined unit.]

So, I would suggest, the majority of our local church leaders are pastors.  And pastors are people-people.  That is, their particular and God-given focus is people.  As opposed to apostles, whose focus is shaping environments; prophets, whose focus is God’s voice, and the gap between God’s intentions for human society and our present structures and experience (as such, prophets are often considered idealists rather than realists); and teachers, whose focus is God’s written Word.  Pastors are focussed on people (and in particular their healing and nurturing)...and so are evangelists.  Evangelists are people-people too: that is, their passion is gathering and distributing good news, not for the news’ sake but for the benefit that it might bring to people.

Here, then, is what happens when a local church leader seeks to encourage their congregation to engage in mission to their parish:

As people-people, they most naturally look to that other people-person gift, the role of the evangelist (at any rate, apostles and prophets are ruled-out; and teaching has come to be seen as a technical role requiring years of training).  They may even see pastor and evangelist as two sides of the same coin – an inward and outward expression – though if they do, they are wrong: you can be a pastor to Christians and non-Christians alike; and an evangelist – someone who brings good news – to non-Christians and Christians alike; pastors and evangelists are different people-focused people types, not the same type in different contexts.  So they encourage – perhaps more with the stick than the carrot – the congregation to be evangelists (the PointFive in the TwoPointFive-Fold Ministry: what everyone who isn’t in oversight does to expand the community under oversight).  Which is a great permission-giving release into who God has made them to be for any evangelists...and ill-fitting armour for everyone else.

Just yesterday, I attended a meeting of representatives of the various Anglican churches in our town, where we were exhorted at length and with some passion that we needed to mobilise our congregations in evangelism – mission with no apostolic or prophetic strategy, no natural role for pastors or teachers.

In my experience across several churches, evangelists are relatively rare but nonetheless extremely effective in bringing people into the orbit of the life of the church community.  We do not need more evangelists – though at times and in places those who are not by fundamental nature evangelists may be called to do the work of an evangelist, and in so doing become more rounded in our Christlikeness (which is carried, in potential, in every Christian; but expressed most fully in community not isolation).  We need to release evangelists to be evangelists, and apostles to be apostles, prophets to be prophets, pastors to be pastors and teachers to be teachers...in order that we might do those works which God prepared in advance for us to do, and that the body of Christ may be built up.  One of the first things this does – not just in theory, I have seen this in practice – is release people from the burden of guilt of not being what they are not, into the liberating freedom of being who they were made to be.  Then, of course, comes the work of learning how to live in inter-dependent freedom.

This truncated and ill-conceived present understanding reveals the extent to which a reverse paradigm-shift in our imagination is required, if we are to recover the ways of being church that carries the potential to grow into maturity, defined not as head-knowledge of creeds and doctrinal statements but as the ongoing dynamic redemptive work of Jesus in his world.

The Permanent Revolution : A Personal Review

Alan Hirsch’s latest book, The Permanent Revolution: Apostolic Imagination and Practice for the 21stCentury Church - this time written in collaboration with Tim Catchim, and with significant contribution from Mike Breen – is the most comprehensive work yet written on the necessity to recover the roles of apostles, prophets and evangelists alongside shepherds and teachers, in order to restore ‘the inherent diversity in the body which provides us the essential resources and relational frameworks to grow into the fullness of Christ.’

The scope of the authors’ inter-disciplinary engagement – ‘biblical studies, theology, organisational theory, leadership studies, and other key social sciences’ - is an example of genuine genius; their observations thoughtfully nuanced; their reflections insightful and practical.  I am hugely thankful to them for this gift to the church.

Others will write overview book reviews.  At the risk of implying a limited usefulness, the best I can do is offer a personal interaction.  For an appreciation of the case Alan and Tim set out for their thesis you’ll have to read the book for yourself.  I recommend you do anyway.

Alan has long argued that while each one of us is at the most fundamental level called as an apostle, prophet, evangelist, shepherd or teacher, the motivation and expression of our ministry is shaped by the integrated interaction between these different callings.  Our unique call is composed by the unique combination of these five elements, through personality, gifting, experience...

For example, my own APEST (apostle, prophet, evangelist, shepherd, teacher) profile indicates that my primary motivation is as a prophet, with apostle as a strongly developed secondary; teacher also being well developed; with shepherd and evangelist being significantly lesser motivations and strengths (as such, I am a frustration to the institutional church, which struggles to see beyond the pastoral role for the spiritual health of the existing body and the evangelist role as the primary means of numerical growth).

Moreover, Alan and Tim suggest that our primary motivation is expressed through our secondary motivation (which may vary from season to season, context to context).  In Alan’s case, his call to be an apostle is expressed through his gifting and call to serve as a teacher, through his writing and speaking.  In my case, it would suggest that my call to be a prophet is expressed through my secondary call to be an apostle, which would certainly fit with the journey God has taken me on, including my alignment within an apostolic movement (The Order of Mission; 3dm; and wider relational networks).

Alan and Tim present a case for ‘dispersed intelligence’ in the body of Christ, whereby apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds and teachers are by design attuned to different things that the church must be aware of and hold in creative tension (just as eyes, ears, noses, taste-buds, and nerve-endings in our skin alert us to different kinds of information we must take into account).  Moreover, they offer real wisdom in how each one relates to the others.

As generative callings, apostle and prophet are particularly designed to work together.  Apostolic intelligence acts as custodian of the ‘DNA’ of the body, as the church goes out; while prophetic intelligence acts as guardian of covenant faithfulness, ensuring we go deep as well as out.  As a prophet, that is one significantly concerned with calling the church forward – energising - or back – criticizing - to covenant faithfulness, I find their careful mapping of prophetic ministry, including the potential pitfalls to be aware of, extremely helpful.

Their primary concern, however, is apostolic calling; and as a prophet whose prophetic ministry would indeed appear to be expressed through an apostolic calling – something I had not fully appreciated – I have found their work here too extremely helpful.  They offer a differentiation of emphasis (not exclusive) between Pauline apostles, called to cross-cultural extension of the church (one of the reasons I had not fully considered the apostolic element of my own calling, as I am not primarily called to pioneer in this sense) and Petrine apostles, called to renewal within the already-existing church.

They further nuance our appreciation of the apostolic by differentiating (again, not as exclusive categories) between apostles-as-explorers and apostles-as-catalysts (my limitations as a catalyst being another reason I had not fully considered the apostolic element of my own calling), presenting four broad fields of apostolic ministry anywhere on which we might locate the current or long-term emphasis of the work of any given apostle.  By observation, they suggest Pauline explorers, or pioneers; Pauline catalysts, or networkers; Petrine explorers, or miners; and Petrine catalysts, or mobilisers.

With this as a lens, I can locate myself, certainly at this given point, most fully as a Petrine explorer – and Alan and Tim’s observations would confirm that someone whose APEST profile is PATSE, and whose Myers-Briggs personality-type is INFP, is well shaped to be a Petrine explorer – that is, the particular form of apostolic ministry through which my prophetic calling is expressed is not primarily cross-cultural pioneering or networking, or direct mobilising, but is concerned with the renewal of the existing church through unearthing both those concealed things that are holding the church back from being all that God intends us to be, and those buried resources that Jesus has given us to that end.

While we must attend to the general things – the call to all of us to be and to make disciples, growing together in the character and competence of Christ – we must also attend to the specific things, our particular and unique role within the body.  From a personal perspective I am finding The Permanent Revolution to be the most helpful book I have read, in regard to the latter.  Reflecting on their insight into my experience has given me a greater level of understanding of who I am called to be and what I am called to do (insight that the institutional church I serve, and which seeks to shape me, is simply not equipped to help me discern).

But, sharing their understanding of the importance of this endeavour, I believe The Permanent Revolution is also one of the most significant contributions I have read to the general things we must attend to – offering a paradigm to imagine (so much more is covered, but I have not attempted a comprehensive review), and a vocabulary with which to discuss, what the church is called to be and to do.  Again, I am indebted to them; and again, I recommend their book to anyone concerned with the missional sent-ness of the church.

Advent 2011 : Day 23

I have been reflecting on the different ways in which we engage with waiting, as apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and today as teachers.  Apostles must wait for God’s timing, in preparation to bring to birth the new thing; prophets must wait in solitude, but not in isolation, in preparation to foretell the imminent arriving; evangelists must wait as they search out the good news, in preparation to proclaim the now-arrived; pastors must wait in order to defeat their demons, in preparation to nurture the new; and teachers must wait in patient study and costly response, in preparation to foster growing wisdom.

We don’t know exactly where the Magi came from.  They may have come from what is today Iran; the ancient records of Chinese court astrologers show that the most senior astrologer went missing – Absent without Leave – for a period of two-three years at around the right time.  We can’t know for sure, but these scholars sought out the place where received wisdom met current affairs, in order to read the signs of the times in which they lived and to know how to respond.  Then, they made plans, to go on an open-ended journey of discovery; a journey with provisional stops and re-calibrations of their own understanding; a journey not only to invest in their own development, but to share their treasures with another.  Their choice of gifts to share is, I believe, significant: showing the infant, who had emptied himself of all divine omniscience, what it means, what it looks and feels like, to be human.  Gold speaks of our material needs, for food and shelter.  Incense, symbolic of prayer, speaks of our spiritual needs, to forgive and be forgiven.  Myrrh, used to embalm the dead, speaks of our emotional needs, of love and loss.  The gifts play their part in Jesus’ own journey, as he grew in wisdom and in favour with God and his fellow men and women.

The Magi offer a role model for teachers in waiting.  Their study is corporate, a group activity – and one which drew on the work of others who had gone before them.  It is not confined to the court – to the place acknowledged as the location of learning in all ancient societies (and not much has changed) – but results in moving outward, away from privilege, to the margins, to the domestic scene, to the peasant home.  What they have been given – the fruit of their learning, their treasure – is invested in their journey (what would such a lengthy journey with such a large retinue cost?), and freely shared at the journey’s goal.

Teachers must wait, in order to discover that their knowledge (the interpretation of information) and their wisdom (the application of knowledge) is for passing on...

Advent 2011 : Day 22

Any community requires structures and agreed procedures in order to run smoothly.  Within any community – a school, or health service, or business, or neighbourhood, for example – pastors are those who act as guarantors that, in the necessary pursuit of the greater good, the needs of any given person are not ignored.  Without the humanising role of pastors, it is impossible to sustain healthy communities over any length of time.

Of course, as with apostles, prophets, evangelists and teachers, pastors too have their weaknesses, those opportunities for potential attacks.  For many pastors, their biggest battles lie in a natural desire to be liked (that is, natural to pastors, though not necessarily to other types); and in the false belief that they are indispensible, that without them everything will fall apart.  These weaknesses often result in unhealthy patterns of people-pleasing and taking on unsustainable workloads.  For the pastor, waiting involves the discipline of taking mastery over these tendencies.

Joseph provides us with a working study of a pastor at waiting.  Here is the man God has entrusted with enfolding Mary and Jesus in his protective embrace.  And so he must face his demons as he waits.  The demon of people-pleasing is faced down as he is asked by God to take on a part which will bring him into disrepute: in the eyes of his neighbours, is it pride or stupidity that motivates this righteous man to take on a woman abandoned, to raise as his own another man’s child?  The demon of indispensability is faced down as he accepts that he has no part whatsoever in the conception – he is, in a very acute way, absolutely dispensed of; in this instance God does not need the pastors involvement to fulfil his plan...and there will be other such instances, albeit less dramatic.

Joseph stands his ground in faith, and faces down and defeats his demons.  Throughout, he is attuned to God’s speaking into his life, in his case in particular through dreams; and is responsive in decisive ways that honour both God and others, especially Mary.  For pastors, waiting is a time of testing and of victories that will equip you for the tasks that lie ahead...