Emerging Church Port Elizabeth

Emergent Church Port Elizabeth

1. Redefining Sin
   

   Life in the Garden!

   Genesis 1-3 tells us that God created man on the 6^th day. He created us, male and female, in His image so that we can know him and be known by Him. As God is spirit it meant that the core identity of man is a spiritual one and yet man stands unique in creation in that he is a spiritual being with a physical manifestation in the material world that is an inseparable part of himself. Spirit and matter, the formless and the form created in perfect balance rooted in the Source of all life. God calls man to rule over His creation, to be the physical manifestation of Him in whom all of creation moves and has its being.

   God establishes His order, as in the spirit, the formless, so in the physical world, the form. God does not declare one to be more than the other but true life can only flow from the Source, the formless Spirit, to the world, the form, and not the other way around. Man shall live out of relationship with God as it is the only way in which man can manifest the image of the eternal Source to the physical world. God forbids man to eat from the tree of knowledge thereby providing man with a physical action to manifest his internal, spiritual decision to live out of relational obedience to God. AS IN THE SPIRITUAL SO IN THE PHYSICAL!!!

   On the 7^th day God and man rested and in the cool of the evening. God walked in the garden and had fellowship with man. God did not start off by having man do and then judging the results before revealing himself, no he starts out by confirming and affirming man before man has done anything, embracing the being before the doing (Genesis 1:31). Out of this spiritual affirmation man is empowered to live life from the inside out. Because he is affirmed at his core by the source of all that is as being very good (complete, pleasing, satisfying) man is able to rule in the physical world without dominating, able to give without needing anything in return.

   After giving sacrificially of himself, man is again met by God in the cool of the evening, reaffirming the worth of the being, refreshing, restoring the spirit and body of man. God establishes the rhythm of life where doing flows from being in relationship with God, where a man can sacrifice for his wife irrespective of how she responds, where a wife can sacrifice for her husband whether he loves her or not because they are motivated, empowered by who they are as eternal spiritual beings resting in the secure embrace of the source of all life.

   On a practical level it means that Adam can provide for his family because it is his nature to do so. Providing for their spiritual, physical and emotional needs is something that comes naturally to him because it is part of his spiritual identity/nature. He has inherited a spiritual DNA from his Spiritual Father, God. Doing provides him with a deep sense of joy and fulfillment because it flows out of his true self. In providing for them his physical actions (the form) are aligned with his spiritual identity (the formless) and everyday actions like going to work becomes a spiritual act of worship empowered by God Himself. In this place every thing he does, opening the mail, doing the dishes, playing with his kids, making love to his wife carries an eternal spiritual dimension that impacts the world around him in ways he cannot even begin to imagine. He is the revelation of the heart and mind of God to the world.

   HE IS NOT BEING GOOD!!! He is simply being himself. Although his joy in providing for his family can be enhanced by a positive response from them, their lack of response cannot diminish it because he does not do it to get a response from them but to be true to himself. It is critical to understand that he is not being motivated by the need to be good. GOD MADE HIM GOOD!!! He cannot improve himself through his actions nor does he desire to when he is living in this amazing relational place with his Father. Like God he is motivated entirely by the joy and love he knows in relationship with Him, that which flows from being in and with Him. He draws others to himself, friends, a wife, children not to receive from them but because he wants to give to them, share with them the love and joy that flows through him from God.

   The Fall.

   Into this wonderful relational creation enters the temptation of knowledge. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil was not only created by God, he planted it right in the middle of the garden (Gen. 3:2) where neither human nor fallen angel could miss it. It was not put in some really obscure place that was hard to reach, like the medicine cabinet which my wife hides so high up to keep from two prying pairs of small hands and eyes that not even a migraine can make me venture to those dizzying heights, no it was in everyone’s face the whole time and if you know anything about logistics you will already know where the best place would have been to live. That’s right, in the middle of the garden right in its shade where it is kept foremost in your mind by dint of the fact that it is the only, only, only tree in the whole wide world that you may not eat from. Worse still, you do not know why. Sounds a bit like another creation story that goes something like this; “Here’s a box, it is VERY important but never ever, EVER!! open it.” Interesting that this box was given to a woman as well.

   Did they think about this tree? Of course they did! When Satan starts to question the woman in Gen. 3:1 he refers to trees in general and she responds by turning the focus from trees in general to the enigma that she has thought about a lot. “ God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die’.” Did God say she must not touch it? No, but try and picture a very worried Adam standing over a very curios Eve, waging a finger in her face and saying,” I’m serious, Eve. Don’t even think about it, just touching it will kill you.” And can you see Eve demurely nodding her head while at the same time wondering when Adam is going to water the pear trees again. You know, the ones on the other side of the banana plantation, the one you can’t see the house through? Did we ever need Satan for what was to follow? In my own humble opinion he was just the gentle breeze that toppled the tree in the direction it was already leaning.

   The Enemy convinces man that by focusing on the knowledge, understanding of what is right and wrong man can become like God. This was true as God confirmed in Gen. 3:22, He does know good and bad, but it was only the half truth hiding the lie, the bait hiding the hook, so to speak. Satan implies that it is this knowledge that is the SOURCE of God’s life and that once man has this knowledge he will have life independently of God and “ surely, you will not die.”, verse 4. As we all know never trust anyone that calls you Surely.

   Man is enticed to shift his focus away from his spiritual identity, his sense of being to understanding, to finding the SOURCE for his life in his Mind, in the thought processes of the physical body. Man tries to invert the order of life imposed by God by trying to find the source for his whole being in the physical, chemical reactions that is his mental, cognitive ability to understand form based concepts such as good and bad, right and wrong. In so doing man cuts himself of from the Source his spiritual being is rooted in and dies like a flower cut off from its roots.

   Although God made man in His image, we are utterly dependant on our relationship with God for the maintenance of that image. Death was not God’s punishment for disobedience but the consequence of the inner shift in focus that manifested itself in the outward action of eating from the tree. Man’s sin is not eating from the tree but the inner choice that rejected life rooted in God in favor of life rooted in the self. SIN IS THE REFUSAL TO LIVE OUT OF A DEPENDANT RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD!!! THE REFUSAL TO TRUST HIM WHO DECLARES THAT IN HIM WE ARE WHOLE/HOLY!!!

   The only choice that man had in the garden was whether or not he would remain in a dependant relationship that God initiated. Not eating from the tree of knowledge was the outward manifestation of the internal spiritual alignment with God. When that changed, eating the fruit was a simple, unavoidable consequence of abandoning his relational position with God by choosing to believe the enemy.
   
2. Unity - One Faith or Faith in One Person?
   
   
   We are bombarded by thoughts over the "emergent church". I meet with Christians who are in denominational churches waiting with bated breath to see what this "new" church will look like. I have also heard pastors refer to the emergent church in general and the new house church movement in particular as the work of Satan. Why this controversy over something that has been happening since the "church" has started laying down the law through doctrine?

   People have and always will be dissatisfied by the status quo. I believe this to be the ultimate albeit only blessing of the ego, false self or unconscious self. We will never agree on everything with everyone. At best we will only agree on most things with a few. As long as we base our belonging on agreement over doctrine we will always be a body divided.

   The only solution that I can embrace for myself, the only person I can ever really speak for, is to surrender myself and every other believer to Jesus. Our unity lies in our spiritual DNA. Do you believe that Jesus is capable of guiding you to consciousness? If you do, then you must believe that not only can he do that for others but that he is indeed doing so.

   Consciousness/salvation is a gift, an act of grace. If I am conscious it is because of Him restoring my self awareness to that part of myself that is God breathed. At that place every believer is seated at the right hand of Jesus in the heavenlies/spiritual realm RIGHT NOW! That is the place where faith is born, that place where deep cries out to deep with unutterable groaning. This is who we truly are and our journey is not about becoming what we were meant to be but embracing who Jesus reveals us to be when we embrace our Devine heritage.

   When we embrace the ultimate reality and freedom of being the beloved children of God in whom He is well pleased, when we are able to see others that way we can embrace "other" because they are "like" me. They are no longer "just broken sinners saved by grace" but eternal beings in whom I can see the family resemblance of our older brother, Jesus.

   We can no longer view the "other" as someone to distrust but as someone to support in this journey of rediscovery. We, I actually mean me, are called to continuously point our brothers and sisters, not to doctrine but, to Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith. When we realise that those conscious people around us no longer, like Paul, want to sin at all we are free not only to not try and provide motivation for their change (control) but to trust that He who has brought them this far is more than capable of taking them further.

   We will hopefully be able to start asking who I AM revealed to be in Jesus, the only QUESTION God will really answer, rather than who should every one else be, the answers to which are counted in the billions and growing daily. To questions such as "gay rights", baptism, denominational or non-denominational or whatever, the answer is simple, "what is Jesus saying to you?"

   It is only by living out of obedience to our inner voice that flows from that place of unity (not sameness but likeness) with God that we can a live a life of faith. It is by living out of this sacred place where the fire always burns and yet never consumes that we, like Moses, become instrumental , co-workers with God in leading people from bondage to freedom.We are able to embrace each other in spite of our differences because I trust the work of Jesus in you more than my understanding of doctrine and theology.

   And what about the unconscious, I hear you ask? When my view of life and religion was rooted in my ego/false self I needed to be right as if my very life depended on it, which it did, the one I am called to die to. By arguing with me you would have raised my anxiety levels by attacking and or diminishing my false sense of self. I would not have been open to "the truth" but would have felt superior if I "won" the argument or humiliated if I had lost. In neither instances would I have been drawn into that egoless void where your consciousness calls out to mine. Your very insistence on being right would have empowered my false self.

   It is vital to remember that Jesus did not approach the "lost" multitudes with doctrine but with a compassion and respect that dared them to re-value themselves, that offered no empowering resistance to the false self by attacking their beliefs or theology. It is only by being present to people, not as they should be but as they are, that we can become co-initiaters with Jesus of consciousness/salvation. We see the powerful effect of this non provocative conscious approach on people very clearly when Jesus refuses to defend Himself against the taunts of the "criminal" crucified with Him. The egoless vacuum that he creates called out the consciousness of the other and brought him to a life lived in the "presence of God" even while he was still hanging on the cross.

   More than anything else, the church needs believers to stop calling out the false self/ego by making doctrine the foundation of our unity. We, and I mean me, need to repent of trying to usurp the headship of Jesus over our fellow believers. We need to confess our calling of believers to come and worship at the feet of our understanding. Let us joyfully surrender our fellow believers to Him who remains faithful to them even when we do not!