Imagination in these times

Imagination in our society works hard to seduce us into thinking that we can always control our own destiny and thus manage our lives so that there will be no surprises, no mystery, no future without our having decided what it shall be.

Congregations sometimes imagine a future by expecting their youth to rescue them from present problems. When I ask local church pastoral search committees what gifts and attributes they would like in their new pastor, they often respond, "We want someone who can work with youth because you know they are the future of our church." They are surely the future of the church, but they are also present members of the church. Youth already have gifts, talents and visions from their own faith experiences that can shape the life of the church’s witness today. Too often adults want the youth to recover the past witness of the church because the adults have lost the will to face the new challenges before the church.

Youth, like adults, are struggling to live a faithful life. Youth also dream about what their future lives will be like. On two weekends in March, the Ohio Conference and Eden Theological Seminary are sponsoring two events for senior high youth. They are invited to Pilgrim Hills to explore what it means to live a Christian life. These weekends will encourage the youth to explore the "calling" for their lives.

William Sloan Coffin writes in his book Passion for the Possible that "Professor William May of Southern Methodist University has pointed out that the words ‘car’ and ‘career’ come from carrera, the Latin word for racetrack." Coffin suggests that a car and career both have you going in circles rapidly and competitively. A car is an auto-mobile, a self driven vehicle. It frees you from traveling with others. To Professor May it represents "glass-enwrapped privacy as you speed down public thoroughfares toward your own private destination."

"’Calling,’ on the other hand," Coffin suggests, "comes from the Latin word vocatio (vocation), from vocare (to call), which is defined by a 17^th century puritan divine as "that whereunto God hath appointed us to serve the common good." Coffin concludes, "You might say that a career helps one win the rat race; a calling reminds you that even if you win the race, you’re still a rat."

Christian persons are called to share a vision of an alternative way of life in the culture inspired by the ancient witness of the Bible. The prophets of old sought to break free from the themes of the dominant society by offering a vision of life different than the one they had been programmed to follow. Jesus invited a rethinking of reality and eventually a reliving of reality. Jesus imagined a new future.

It is hard for us to struggle with alternative visions of how we should live our lives. Often we see issues like sexual orientation, abortion, sexism, racism, militarism and many others as problems rather than as opportunities for theological inquiry, as opportunities to discern what God is asking us to do in these times. Just as God challenged the ancient prophets, so also I believe God places these issues before us to cause us to struggle with our theologies.

Conservative folk often want to recover a past view and seek to keep it as the dominant theme for our time. Liberal folk want to open doors to new ideas and have their views become the normative view for society. Both are fraught with disaster if we never talk reasonably with one another. I agree with Brueggemann that "the church needs serious conservatives who are about the evangel as the offer of a new world and serious liberals who care deeply about the transformation of society, serious folk who have gifts to give one another and gifts to receive from one another as we commonly, in generosity and good faith, work our way beyond the irrelevant categories and misleading tensions of modernity." Far too often it comes down to people arguing from only their own set assumptions and deciding that they have to be winners of the arguments. In my view, both liberal and conservative folk are at fault if they are not willing to listen and struggle together in discerning God’s vision for these times.

We all get uncomfortable in these discussions and wish many times that they would just go way. Am I uncomfortable engaging in these tough discussions? Of course I am. But I don’t believe God ever promised us a comfortable life when faced with important questions of faith. What God did promise is that God would be with us in the struggle for faithfulness. "For the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart from you, and my covenant of peace shall not be removed, says the Lord, who has compassion on you." (Isaiah 54:10)

I believe that God is doing a new thing by challenging us to discern how we shall witness in new ways. I believe God challenges us to stop the insane violent confrontations taking place in some of our churches because we are unwilling to talk, listen, and share our faith understandings with respect for one another.

The ancient record of the Bible is the story of how God intervened in history and challenged people to witness by words and actions that God was in charge of the world. Today, too many of us want to sit in the judge’s seat rather than in the witness box. Too many of us want to talk about the issues rather than living with the people who are imprisoned by the issues.

Youth often observe this "theological warfare" and wonder, do these adults believe in a gracious and compassionate God? Do they believe in the loving God they have told us about? Youth in our churches need to ask adults why we believe what we do. But adults feel more comfortable answering how to manage the problems rather than answering the why questions of faith. The church needs youth who ask the probing questions about faith experience so that they can fashion their own understanding of who God is calling them to be as persons of faith.

This rather long article is a way of trying to stimulate the readers of this piece to invite and encourage senior high youth to experience a weekend of discovery of their call and sharing in the storytelling of faith-filled conversations. Encourage the youth you know to attend one of these two weekends. It may well change their lives. (To learn more, watch the video, Start Something, God’s Calling You, that your congregation has received. It describes what will take place at Pilgrim Hills in March.)

I believe God is doing a new thing. I pray we have the courage and the faith to respond.