I Corinthians 13 Guide to Culture - thanks to YWAM KnowledgeBase

This version of 1 Corinthians 13 was written especially for people going to work in another culture, and it goes to show, love wins every time.


If I speak with the tongue of a national, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.

If I wear the national dress and understand the culture and all forms of etiquette, and if I copy all mannerisms so that I could pass for a national but have not love, I am nothing.

If I give all I possess to the poor, and if I spend my energy without reserve, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love endures long hours of language study, and is kind to those who mock his accent; love does not envy those who stayed home; love does not exalt his home culture, is not proud of his national superiority,

Does not boast about the way we do it back home, does not seek his own ways, is not easily provoked into telling about the beauty of his home country, does not think evil about this culture;

Love bears all criticism about his home culture, believes all good things about this new culture, confidently anticipates being at home in this place, endures all inconveniences.

Love never fails: but where there is cultural anthropology, it will fail; where there is contextualization it will lead to syncretism; where there is linguistics, it will change.

For we know only part of the culture and we minister to only part.

But when Christ is reproduced in this culture, then our inadequacies will be insignificant.

When I was in Britain (Korea, the US....), I spoke as a Brit, I understood as a Brit, I thought as a Brit; but when I left Britain I put away British things.

Now we adapt to this culture awkwardly; but He will live in it intimately: now I speak with a strange accent, but he will speak to the heart.

And now these three remain: cultural adaptation, language study, and love.

But the greatest of these is love.

• Based on work by Kevin Colyer and others.
 
• Content is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License unless otherwise noted.

"The Disciple," by Lucy Peppiatt - and my thoughts on sermons...

I am reading a book by my friend Lucy Peppiatt, called "The Disciple". It is a really good book about being a Christian, written in a chatty, kind of flowing way, which carries you along. There are loads of good and often funny stories about incidents in people's lives, including Lucy's own family - and since I know them a little bit, it is fun getting those inside glimpses.

She talks about having what are traditionally called "spiritual disciplines" in your life, but she prefers the term holy habits, and she says that there is no point whatsoever doing them if it is out of a sense of duty, or to win points - but rather, if you have met and loved Jesus, you'll want to know him more, and these are the ways... She isn't saying the holy habits are dispensable, rather that, you can only really do them if you have the will and yes, a bit of willpower, but, then doing them will bring so much reward, so once you start it will become easier and more exciting. And you'll see transformation in your life. You do what you can, and then the Spirit of God will do ALL that He can - and there will definitely be results!

At least, this is what I am getting out of it... So far...

There is a section on the gift that God's Word is to us, and how we receive it in various ways including hearing preaching. She writes a bit here about how in many of the less traditional churches, there is an inclination towards abandoning the preaching - because it has come to be seen as irrelevant and boring in our entertainment age. She bewails this as preaching is still so important. But, there is a problem when preaching does become dull and long and out of touch. And I must admit, I have listened to so many dull, deadly sermons, I had begun to despair of the sermon slot myself. Until we started going to our church, St Andrews in Churchdown. The vicar there, Jonathan Perkin, is so gifted at preaching - I actually, honestly look forward to his sermons every week. Which is a miracle. He manages to be very easy to listen to, profound, and encouraging, week after week. (I also enjoy the curate's sermons too, - they are enjoyable and have humour in them.)

Of course, for those of you who know Dan, you'll know that his sermons are always entertaining and far-reaching, quite out of the box, and definitely teach you things. So I never despaired of his...

So, Lucy includes this brilliant quote from Martin Luther in her book, which I have to reproduce because it made me laugh and it is so true:

"Cursed be every preacher who aims at lofty topics in the church, looking for his own glory and selfishly desiring to please one individual or another. When I preach here I adapt myself to the circumstances of the common people. I don't look at the doctors and masters, of whom scarcely forty are present, but at the hundred or the thousand young people and children. It's to them that I preach, to them that I devote myself, for they too need to understand. If the others don't want to listen, they can leave... we preach in public for the sake of plain people. Christ could have taught in a profound way, but He wished to deliver His message with the utmost simplicity in order that the common people might understand. Good God, there are sixteen-year-old girls, women, and farmers in the church, and they don't understand lofty matters."     Luther's Works, quoted in Lucy Peppiatt, The Disciple: on becoming truly human, (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2012) p 39.

OK, so maybe things have changed a little bit now... but Luther's point stands! Only a few weeks ago I sat in another evangelical church with my children and their little cousins filling the row in front of us, while the preacher spoke seriously and deeply for thirty minutes, without one reference to their presence nor one sentence they could understand. It was almost beyond belief.

Preachers, please don't be boring and irrelevant! And if you have heard a lot of dull preaching, don't worry, there are still great preachers out there, and when you hear one, it is like water falling on dry thirsty ground.

Do I Look Like a Morning Person?

This was written on a mug I was given a cup of tea in today and it made me laugh. I am not...

Finding it hard to get up in the mornings, has plagued me all my life, whether I go to bed early or late, whether the day ahead is going to be fun or not - it is just a thing I have.

But in the days when I am also feeling low, there is an added emotional or psychological component. I loved Ann Voskamp on this, because, even though she is amazingly spiritual and able to encourage others, she writes honestly about still feeling depressed sometimes (at least, when she was writing the book), and about the daily struggle of having to push back the wave of darkness every single morning before you can even get out of bed.

I have that sometimes. I wake up, and as well as feeling fuzzy and groggy and leaden-limbed, there is also a layer of dark cloud that wants to stay over me in the same way my duvet does. Even if the day ahead holds fun things and people, not to mention my own husband and children, (and dog!), there is a creeping little sadness that lurks beyond, wanting to slide over it all.

It requires a great mental effort to shrug that off, to reject it, and to wake up to the day.

So a short while ago, I prayed that God would give me something to help me first thing in the morning.

And Bible verses have been coming to me, some of them ones I haven't read for ages and ages.

First one was: "He is my strength and my shield." This was just what I needed! Strength to get up and get going, and a shield to guard me from whatever the day might throw at me. It was perfect.

Another one was a Stuart Townend song from the concert we went to: Everlasting Love

Another one was: "In all things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us." More than conquerors. That was a promise and encouragement that helped me through that busy day.

There are probably loads more in there, in the armoury - these ones have helped me already.

Just thoughts

This is going to be very much half-formed and I will hope to feel clearer on these things as time goes by...

Last week in our small group we were thinking about the well-known and very helpful words, "What more does the Lord require of you, but to act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God?" If we are only asked to do these three things (which, granted, are very broad), then, they must be highly important in God's eyes. The so-called Golden Rule is very similar if you think about it: "Love God, and love your neighbour as yourself".

So, acting justly is the first thing required. And yet, for many Christians, justice is seen as a kind of hobby-horse for some, like green issues are for others. I think. Lots of evangelical Christians would see spreading the gospel as more important than fighting for justice in the world. But, here it is in black and white as the very first requirement.

When we discussed the implications of the words for us (asking the question, So what? as in So what does this mean for us?) -  we talked a lot about shopping ethically, Fairtrade etc, and about treating everyone equally and kindly in our daily lives, not wasting resources, and we moaned a bit about the unfair secondary school system in this country and how we don't think we should use our children as tools for the gospel so we go along with the coaching for the grammar schools test etc etc. But then I think we felt a bit stuck. I made the comment that in Uganda, it was so easy to see the justice issues, they were in our faces every day: low pay, people with zero opportunity to escape poverty, injustice in the courts and at the hands of the police, bribery, and the list could go on. And living there, we could on a daily basis do a little bit, to help a few people. Whilst here, on the surface there is a pretty high standard of justice for most people: a fair minimum wage, healthcare paid for by taxes so that it is available to all, schooling for everyone, social services of all kinds to protect the voiceless and disadvantaged.

Apart from buying fairtrade products, and signing a few petitions on facebook(...!), and maybe supporting a child through Compassion, what else should Christians in say England be doing?

Dan and I have made friends with some Redcliffe colleagues, Andy and Carol Kingston-Smith, who have set up a justice inititative called JusTice, with a webpage which seeks to network about all kinds of international and UK justice issues, and also holds seminars from time to time, and they also teach an MA course on Justice in Mission at Redcliffe. This is the link to their blog:
http://justiceadvocacyandmission.wordpress.com/author/akingstonsmith/

So I sat beside Andy at lunch at Redcliffe on Thursday, and told him about our group's discussion. Understandably, he rolled his eyes somewhat, and pointed out that the fact that often Christians are SO unaware of all the justice issues all around us, is a huge part of the problem. In fact he referred to it as the great sin of omission in our time. By being woolly and unaware, we are not just being woolly and unaware, we are actually sinning.

Now I begin to defend myself! I have signed up to their blog and read some of the articles (being honest). I did live in Africa and did a bit to help in Africa's development through higher education. I do try to buy ethically, locally, and not wastefully. I am interested in justice for women, equality, and in preserving the environment for future generations (if there are going to be any).

But I am in no way an "activist"nor am I very well versed in politics, asylum issues, labour issues, etc etc.

And, whilst the Bible is very clear that our God is a just God, who clearly desires and requires justice of us, there are also some ambiguous bits, like the parable of the workers in the vineyard where the farmer pays the workers as he decides and not according to how many hours they had worked, and, Jesus saying, "The poor you will always have with you" as if we don't have to work our socks off to eliminate poverty. But then again, Jesus was born amongst the poor, and mainly ministered among them. And the song of Mary says: "The poor he fills with good things while the rich walk empty away." The first shall be last and the last first. It is harder for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven than a camel to go through the eye of a needle. The upside-down kingdom (I need to read that book.)

But I think there is going to be a new me! I am a convert to the Micah principal. What more does the Lord require of us, after all?

I would be very interested to hear any of your comments, by email if not on here,  - any light you can shed, or suggestions for living "justly" in our western societies...

Jonah, a Beautiful Stone and a Jolly Bishop.

Saturday felt a bit off. Even though things are going well, and the weather was better - weak sunshine and a degree of warmth -, and  we had a free day and I had things I wanted to do, and Alex had an invitation to a friend, and I even knew what I was going to make for supper - I still felt that pulling-down feeling in my stomach, as if something was holding its two bottom corners and tugging downward. Going to church on Sunday we had an excellent talk on Jonah, and the word that stuck out was "Surrender." Jonah, sinking down, surrendered himself to God, and see what God did. I don't know particularly what was getting me down, but I can surrender life with all its good things and its down days, and that feels better.

On Sunday afternoon we all had a great gardening session. We clipped and yanked out ivy and trimmed the trees in our hedge, and now the middle of the garden is full of huge piles of greenery, and the edges look clearer and much more open and light. In the process of cutting back ivy from one overgrown corner, I discovered an interesting, stripey rock, with two holes carved or worn through it - clearly someone's possession at one point, but long lost under dark green curtains.

It made me think of the unexpected treasures you can discover when you cut back the junk that grows and overwhelms. But then again, in other paces where we stripped off ivy, we uncovered an ugly cement block wall - so, you can tell me the parable behind that...!

In the evening we went to a Baptism Renewal service, because Dan had to go and wanted us to accompany him. To be honest, none of the rest of us were very enthusiastic about going...(Abby and Alex haven't even been baptised yet), but it was actually very jolly and quite good fun. It was just what you might imagine - the baptism words and vows were repeated and we were asked if we wanted to reaffirm them for ourselves, we were given tall candles, we sang nice hymns, and the best bit was when the Bishop of Tewkesbury walked among us very gleefully spraying us with water from a basin using a large rosemary branch. We got pretty drenched!  

Good Friday thoughts

To be honest this Lent I haven't spent a lot of time thinking about Good Friday. And I haven't given anything up, in fact, I have been letting myself be quite self-indulgent, especially with the Dairy Milk Chocolate...

Usually in the past, a lot of my pre-Easter thinking has been wondering how Jesus felt about his upcoming death, how he could do it, what it took for him to accept that path and allow it to happen, how he anticipated the pain, and how he felt about the humiliation and nakedness, and whether knowing it would be just for one day helped (as in a woman anticipating labour). This year when I began to think about it at the start of this week, I realised I couldn't put my mind into that place this year. It was too hard. So then I thought, shall I mentally take this Easter off?, as I pretty much have done with Lent. But then I thought, maybe I don't need to put myself into Jesus' place, maybe that's the wrong thing to be doing anyway. Jesus didn't ever expect me to die in public for the whole world. (Well, probably not.)

So in church this morning at a lovely service we went to at Trinity Cheltenham, I decided just to be in front of the Cross and be thankful for it.

That is why when I looked at some images of the crucifixion this afternoon, I loved this one I have posted, because my eyes are immediately drawn to the women, almost throwing themselves on the foot of the Cross.

But really, thank goodness for the Resurrection! I'm looking forward to Sunday!

Palms...

Back in England for Palm Sunday... Once again I feel underwhelmed by the palm crosses we are given in church here.

I know they are palm leaves picked in the Holy Land, dried and specially folded for us... and at least they are not the three inch ones that we had for a couple of years, but a decent size...

But, I much preferred in Uganda when we picked real four foot long palm leaves in our garden on our way to church, or were given them in church. I loved how the whole congregation was a green sea of waving branches during the Palm Sunday service.

To me, it brought one so much closer to the original scene, of Jesus being welcomed and waved gladly into Jerusalem by the Passover crowds.










The hoisting and vigorous swishing of hundreds of palm branches during each hymn just impelled one to grin and sing joyfully - how could you be solemn while all that was going on. It was so fun.

A fuzzy picture but it gives the impression I remember, ... and some familiar faces...

The joy and sweetness of the Palm Sunday worship is so poignant because the original welcoming crowds changed their minds by the end of the week and shouted for Jesus' death. So I just can't help wondering while singing "Ride on, ride on in Majesty" every year, whether by the end of the week I would also have been shouting, "Crucify him." Honestly, I am not a very brave person, so I fear that I might have joined in to save my own skin. But I hope not, because I feel as though my faith in Jesus and my gratitude to him is deeper than that.

Two images I enjoy of the first Palm Sunday:

I love icons, but don't really know much about them - I would love to learn about their symbolism one day. I know that that is Zacchaeus in the tree, and there are people laying down their cloaks in front of Jesus - but no real palm leaves in evidence - I guess the Russian artist didn't know what they looked like?