Heaven is a Place on Earth

Those of us who have grown up in the church have been programmed that this world is not our final home. We’ve been taught that heaven is our eventual destination. What if we were wrong?

In my informal survey this week, everyone I talked to about this agreed that ultimately heaven comes to earth. But we don’t talk that way, think that way, or act that way.

What if Belinda Carlisle was right? Ooh, Heaven is a place on earth! (“Now the dwelling place of God is with men…” Revelation 21)

Join the conversation, add your voice and your knowledge to the discussion, as we explore the thought that life after life will come to earth.

• If you had another life to live, what would you do differently this time?
• If God created earth for his own dwelling place, would you treat it any differently?
• What is the point of being a follower of Jesus?

Sacrament: Holy Communion

Because of its long-standing place in civilized society as a staple food, bread has become the iconic symbol of the basic needs of life and living. It is the personification of provision and sustenance.

A person who earns the money in a household is called the “breadwinner.” Such a person is charged with “putting bread on the table.” The words “bread” or “dough” are used as euphemisms for money.

As an element of Holy Communion, the bread represents the body of Jesus which was broken for each of us. As we celebrate Communion, in addition to celebrating the sacrifice of Jesus, we also acknowledge our dependence on God for sustenance.

Join the conversation as we discuss the Sacraments of the Church.

• What does the smell of bread baking make you think of?
• What do you think of when you participate in Communion?
• How can we bring glory to God this week?

Fire, Wind, Earth, Water

Before modern Chemistry and the Periodic Table of Elements the ancients believed that everything in creation was made up of the Four Classic Elements: Water, Wind, Earth, & Fire.

It is interesting that the Holy Scriptures represent God the Holy Spirit as three of these: Water, Wind, and Fire. The fourth classic element, Earth, is reserved for man. We are made from dust—from dust we came and to dust we shall return.

Jesus commanded that his followers (made from dust) be baptized (immersed) in water. This identification with Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection is an outward manifestation of an inward transformation.

As a side note, it is interesting to realize that dust immersed in water becomes clay. Perhaps the obedient act of baptism is the beginning of our transformation into his likeness as we become clay in his hands.

• When and how were you baptized?
• Why did you choose to be baptized or why not?
• How did your baptism make you feel?

brain-dump

sorry to interrupt our regularly-scheduled Continuing Conversation posts, but I’m taking the liberty as self-described blog admin to throw out a few random things that are colliding around in my head this morning.

I’ve been doing a lot of emerging blog reading lately, and I came across this post by David Fitch about The Courage to Be Protestant - a book in which David Wells argues that emerging and mega-church-marketing are similar in that both contextualize or “water-down” the gospel to fit culture. a quote from Fitch:

Wells sees the answer to the current lacks in evangelicalism as a return to Classic Protestantism. I see most of the inherent lacks of evangelicalism as seeded in the very structure of Classical Protestantism. Evangelicalism, as I see it, is the outworking of the inherent contradictions latent in the Protestant reformation that allowed for the individualizing, interiorizing, privatizing of the Christian gospel that we have today.

I’m with Fitch on this, even more-so because I have lately been exploring a lot of Catholic theology and teaching, and have so far found it very attuned to my own spiritual (re-)discoveries.

Imagine a Community …

Starbucks Corporation has become one of the largest businesses in the world by meeting one need—the need for a “third place.”

In 1998, sociologist Ray Oldenburg reported in his book The Great, Good Place the need for “third places” where people can gather, put aside the concerns of work and home, and hang out simply for the pleasures of good company and lively conversation.

Like Oldenburg found, there is an innate desire in all of us for true community. This need and the kingdom message of Jesus are inseparable. The Church was to be that true community.

Join the conversation and add your voice to the ideas as we try to Imagine a Community…

• Where is your favorite “third place?”
• What do you see as our common purpose as a community?
• What does the dandelion illustration say about enlarging the community?