What a metaphor for the failing institutional church in the west today. While literally millions abandon the "legacy institution" of the church every year through deconstructing practices, we seem clueless as to what to do about it.
I've seen basically two responses: One denies any problem at all. Groups that generally consist of old white men that hide behind walls they have spent a lifetime building and haven't been in touch with the world outside their doors for decades.
The other group are the sensitive types. They know their precious institutions are in serious trouble, so they commission surveys and employ the same old tired thinking experts that put them in this mess in the first place to try and find their way out. Their intimate goal is to still preserve the institution, without a second thought given to the fact that the institution IS the problem.
What's the answer? God will preserve His church, and it probably won't look anything like what we have here today. In a dialectic that would make Hegel proud; the current institutional "thesis" has run headlong into the deconstructing "antithesis". The result will be a new synthesis which will start the process all over again.
Or, as my Sunday school teacher once told me, "When you don't know the answer always reply with one word, Jesus."
thank you much Mark for these wise words.. I've been in quite the wilderness the last two weeks and this is encouraging.
Transformation took place in the wilderness for Abraham, Issac, Jacob, Moses, Joshua, David, the prophets, Jesus, Paul, John. The
I am also mindful that Paul spent three years* in Arabia (*not everyone parses the text thus; I do).
What a metaphor for the failing institutional church in the west today. While literally millions abandon the "legacy institution" of the church every year through deconstructing practices, we seem clueless as to what to do about it.
I've seen basically two responses: One denies any problem at all. Groups that generally consist of old white men that hide behind walls they have spent a lifetime building and haven't been in touch with the world outside their doors for decades.
The other group are the sensitive types. They know their precious institutions are in serious trouble, so they commission surveys and employ the same old tired thinking experts that put them in this mess in the first place to try and find their way out. Their intimate goal is to still preserve the institution, without a second thought given to the fact that the institution IS the problem.
What's the answer? God will preserve His church, and it probably won't look anything like what we have here today. In a dialectic that would make Hegel proud; the current institutional "thesis" has run headlong into the deconstructing "antithesis". The result will be a new synthesis which will start the process all over again.
Or, as my Sunday school teacher once told me, "When you don't know the answer always reply with one word, Jesus."
Transfo