"thanks to you" by: copeland

well, it has been quite a while since i have had access to a computer. i've spent the last four days back home in huntington. on friday night i was fortunate to be able to participate in bethany's recital. i was co-emcee for the event, sang a duet with bethany, and then participated in two group songs. it was SO GOOD to sing again, to be challenged with learning and memorizing new material, and then to PERFORM. oh it was awesome. i must make room in my future adult life to perform in some capacity whether it be community theater or church productions or whatever. anyways, that was friday. then on saturday i spent the day in fort fun and found two awesome bargain book stores. my catch?

"desire of the everlasting hills" by thomas cahill
"death on a friday afternoon" by richard john neuhaus
"Jesus Christ for today's world" by moltmann
"dangerous wonder" by mike yaconelli
"the secret message of jesus" by brian mclaren
"the sacred way" by tony jones
"real sex: the naked truth about chastity" by lauren winner
and two youth ministry curriculum books from doug fields for a dollar apiece

all of that for around $30. wow! then on saturday night i watched the ufc ppv with my good friend dan. good times were had as we were able to catch up with each other. this morning was church and we had a very intriguing discussion on civil disobedience. the question posed for the class was, "at what point is civil disobedience expected from Christians?" and a couple examples were given: one of harboring slaves in the mid-1800's and the other harboring jews during nazi-occupied germany. my response came from Jesus' teachings to give to caesar what is caesar's and to god what is god's. in the two examples, the civil disobedience is concerned with human life, something that i believe we can all agree would be god's above of caesar's, thus the civil disobedience is expected. now matters such as taxes i believe should be of much less importance to christians. when suffering and cruelty exist in the world, how dare we look past that in favor of fighting a battle over taxes?? unfortunately, the discussion in class moved to the recent trend of "tea parties" all over the nation and several people advocated for those. their reasoning was that we give taxes to the government and trust them to do the right thing with it, so shouldn't we rebel when our tax money isn't being used how we want it?? someone then brought up how the constitution is being perverted and we must fight to protect it. my friends, again and again i wonder: what would happen if we got as upset about Godly matters (such as injustice) as we do about frivolous issues such as these?? I tell you what would happen: a revolution.

...but i digress.

i wanted to throw in this little tidbit on civil disobedience but couldn't due to time constraints, so i'll bring it up here: i read a book recently that described baptism as a form of civil disobedience. i immediately felt a resonance to that description. baptism is our initiation into a different way of living, in stark contrast with our culture. thus, it is a direct act of civil disobedience. i love that image, what do you think?

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the very first book i opened from my haul was the winner text "real sex." not completely sure why i jumped to that one first, but so far i am happy i did. i am four chapters in and am being sufficiently challenged by what she has to say about the virtue of chastity and the role of the church in advocating that virtue. look forward to some discussion of this book in future blog entries.

for tonight, though, i want to follow through on my previous entry and continue our discussion on what it means to be missional. so far we have discussed how missional means a different way of evangelizing and how it means we look at the human race in a much more optimistic light, that God is at work in redeeming the imago dei that exists within each of us. tonight i want to touch briefly upon the missio dei. missio dei, much like imago dei, is a latin phrase meaning the "mission of god," or "sending of god." the missional church is the body of Christ united together in the fulfillment of the missio dei. missio dei is the understanding that God has intiated his mission in the world: the redemption of the world. he sent his son for this purpose and sends the church for the same reason. missio dei is one of the very key foundational aspects of missional. it implies an active working of the church, in contrast to the passivity that can be seen in many branches. align this with my first entry in this series, about how the missional church goes to the people instead of expecting the people to come to them. this happens because of the missio dei. God sends. and it is God that has this mission, not the church. the church participates in the missio dei, it does not initiate it. our God is a sending god, and the church must be an active participant in that mission.

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another old poem (this one i am proud of!):

"I Reached" by: jeremy daniel bixler (10/20/2004)

I reached into my pocket
And found yesterday.
Dirty and disgusting it was,
Covered with thorns and bristles.
I quickly covered yesterday
And threw as hard as I could,
Watched it darken
And slowly disappear.

I reached into my pocket
And found today.
Beautiful, yet blemished it was,
Imperfections throughout.
I carefully covered today
And placed upon the altar,
Turned my back
And walked away.

I reached into my pocket
And found tomorrow.
Shining and shimmering it was,
A kind of beauty not known.
I lovingly covered tomorrow
And wrapped in fine lenin,
A gift for you
And for us.

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"I'm waiting to give you whatever the world may bring. I'd give you my life, cause I don't own anything. It seemed like the bottom was all that I had until now. I'd give you my life if you'd give me yours somehow."

"jane" by: ben folds five

oh what a wonderful evening i had tonight. it all started with 2 hours of ultimate frisbee with my young friends at the park. highlights there included getting tackled while jumping for the disc by a freshman, getting single-leg taken down by an 8th grader and losing red rover. (i hit the ground a lot tonight! and by kids half my size and half my age, hah!! i'm not ashamed!) after that we headed to steak n shake where i was thoroughly embarrassed by matt talking to our waitress about me (sensing a trend here?) although it was in a harmless fun way, giving updates from the rest of our group in denver right now, and my personal favorite: trading our favorite poop stories. after that, i took a couple kids home and we rolled down the windows, played the unforgettable chicago love ballad "you're the inspiration" and sang along at the top of our lungs while driving through the "ghetto" of kankakee. again, what a wonderful night!! it is nights like these that make everything involved with this occupation worth it. just good old fashioned fun.

i am having a very odd week. to follow up on my entry about "thawing out," that process increased tenfold in the past couple days. i heard from a couple old friends that fell away years ago. a strange happening indeed. i wonder why... i wonder what God is trying to tell me. updates to come.

on to part two of my discussion on the missional church now. if you recall yesterday i blogged a bit about how the missional church goes TO the people and does not expect them to come to us. recall the "lobster-trap" analogy of getting them in and then dropping the trap and making them accept Jesus. well, tonight i want to discuss briefly on the restoration of imago dei. the term imago dei is latin, meaning literally "the image of God." the imago dei describes the initial state of humanity prior to the fall in which man was created in God's image. sin entered the world and distorted that imago dei and the domino effect continued all the way up to today's world.... blah blah blah. if you want more on how the imago dei was perverted and evidence of that, i will be happy to go further on that. i am assuming, however, that my audience (or lack thereof) is well acquainted with the doctrine of fallen human nature. i want to focus here on something a little more positive, though. the missional church believes that the initial imago dei can indeed be restored to its prior glory. this belief looks at humanity in an optimistic "glass-half-full" light. viewing humanity in this way leads us down some very productive roads. first off, the missional church finds it easier to forgive. understanding that the imago dei can indeed be redeemed, the missional church chooses to see humanity as essentially good and having inherent value and worth. further, we recognize the ongoing restoration of the imago dei in our own lives as well. thus, we can more easily forgive the transgressions of others by choosing to look at the value of all humanity. second, belief in the restoration of imago dei brings more responsibility. i would like to borrow from the apostle paul on this note: "Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." Belief in the restoration of imago dei means constantly looking forward and taking responsibility for the state humankind is in. being missional means taking responsibility not only for the restoration of mankind in the kingdom of heaven but also seeking the restoration of that which God has entrusted to our care. society could possibly describe this in literal terms as "going green," but it means so much more than that. it means taking responsibility for our planet, our relationships, our habits and behaviors, etc etc and striving to see each of those individual systems in our lives be redeemed by God's holy hand. we choose to never embrace complacency, for complacency only results in failure.

choosing to embrace imago dei means a total shift in how you view others. for example, i saw the image of god today in:

matt's humor
sam's innocence
lindsay's smile
sara's love
scott's enthusiasm
ami's devotion
rob's laughter
dave's passion
patrick's new friends
andy's way of saying things
brittany's helpfulness
kelley's care for her friends
patty's love for her family
dan's self-knowledge
ben's concern for a friend

i truly believe in the inherent good of all God's people. this is missional thinking.

so today's topic was imago dei. i cannot guarantee when the next entry will come as i am visiting family in indiana for the upcoming weekend (and visiting family means no internet), but i can guarantee that the next time i write, i will touch on the missional church's understanding of another type of dei: missio dei.

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seeing as i did promise old embarassing poems, i must deliver:

8/1/05 (written while working in a general motors assembly plant for the summer, ironic given the current state of GM):

"beauty and the beast" or "blonde beauty" by: jeremy daniel bixler

from the moment i saw you, i was captivated.
in the midst of the darkness, you were illuminating.
your smile, exciting,
your face, electrifying.
you symbolized everything this place was not...
you, my Blonde Beauty.

in my mind's eye, i saw things to come
i caught a glimpse of a dream.
you and i were together.
you and i were happy.
all my doubts were washed away...
for i had you, my Blonde Beauty.

as i awoke from my stupor, i finally decided
the time was now..
i sucked in my breath,
gathered my thoughts,
prayed that God would look over me...
and approached you, my Blonde Beauty.

the bell sounded and break had arrived.
i cautiously drew near to the area
and saw what words could not describe...
my dream shattered and my heart collapsed,
for there, inhaling the filthy smoke
was you, my Blonde Beauty.

it's a shame to see such beauty wasted,
decisions made that change everything.
maybe my hopes were too high
or my heart too eager
but i will never forget the shock
of seeing my Blonde Beauty...

...devoured by the Beast.

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"there are no more tears. we've used them all so now we'll rely on our laughter and the faith that pain brings joy..."