"From the fourth century onwards, there took place what some have termed the paganizing of the church. It adopted beliefs and practices that were wholly alien to the Gospel".
Jacques Ellul
"Be on your guard against the ferment, the teaching, of these men".
Jesus.
Last month, new evidence was released that a certain chemical used in common plastic items, including water bottles, can under certain conditions leach into the contents of the plastic container and end up within our bodies, causing a much higher likelihood of heart problems or cancer.
The very items we use everyday to help us keep healthy could in fact be responsible for major health problems and deaths, all because there is a fault with the container the 'healthy' product is provided in.
The same is so abundantly true regarding the very nature of the Christian church.
Why is it that the essential message of fundamental freedom (the redemption in Christ that once again allows us to love God and each other) is so buried beneath an unbearable weight of provisos and conditions which are strenuously advocated amongst the various 'traditions' (ancient or modern) in the majority of variations in Christendom? Why would an Apostle like Paul once again find himself standing almost alone if here today because of his bold and clear affirmation not only of the Gospel itself, but of the ramifications regarding Christian liberty, now so rigorously deemed 'outside' the remit of 'piety' assumed and shored-up within the niche of most churches?
The answer is because we have so often been told to avoid the plain statements of Christ and His Apostles and to place confidence in the leaching of folly into the instruction of leaders and institutions - poison which makes us numbed and dulled to the real power and nature of the vital Christian life.
Dualistic and Gnostic 'purity' has murdered our faith for centuries, and it must be denounced as the dark mesmerism which defrauds so many into swallowing whole a mime, a hideous and hollow imitation of a faith which wishes to drive deep into our flesh, our deeds, in a fashion that reveals mere external 'display' as a toxic, malevolent mantle.
The requirement of our generation, as we fast approach another anniversary of Luther's issuing of a thesis toward liberty, is to recognize the true responsibility of Christian discipleship, to stand sure in the freedom we have, and to teach and live from within that freedom, never again giving ourselves to the horror of dead religion.
Saturday, 11 October 2008
Monday, 6 October 2008
Connection
'The Photographer's Eye is perpetually evaluating (and because of this), can bring coincidence of line simply by moving his perspective by a fraction of a millimetre' Henri Cartier-Bresson.
"Prove all things and hold fast to those things which are good'. The Apostle Paul.
Isn't interesting how easily we can simplify and thereby totally empty things of their actual value?
I received the framework for my third year of studies in Photography today, and was quickly plunged in to considering the likes of Colour Formalism, New Realism, Gestalt Laws and their bearing on photographic composition, intent and balance. It was pretty heady stuff to start the day, so after lunch, I thought I'd do a search under 'Christian Photography' and see if I could find a few on-line spots where others of like faith may be seeking to engage in the realm and looking for mutual support....
Now, I have no particular liking for beer, but those who do would tell you just how plain dreadful it is when someone seeks to give you something other than the genuine article.
The point? Well, just what is the point of having 'christian' sites for 'nice' (inoffensive) photographic images (which appeared by the page load on my search)?
Well, some might say, our faith shouldn't contain anything 'unclean' - no violence, no profanity and absolutely no nudity, so that's the guidelines for 'Christian' things - art, photography, whatever.
In the early 16th century, German artist Matthias Grünewald brought comfort to those dying of leprosy with the production of his altarpiece depicting the crucifixion of Christ. The art is stark and uncompromising - an acute, furious expression of the agony of death, the debasing of a man by such cruel execution, the plain exposition of the naked death of the Son of God. The work achieves it's goal - to show the one who has so totally identified with our pain, our reality, and it is because of this that the image on the other side of the panel - that of a Jesus, bodily whole and resurrected- resonates so deeply with regards as to the essential nature of our faith in God's sure and certain promise - though this body is destroyed, yet in my flesh, I shall see God.
In the early 1990's, I found myself staggered when many local Christians I knew were vocally informing myself and others that we should not watch or encourage others to see the masterful Stephen Spielberg film, Schindler's List. What staggered me was that the reason for this boycott had nothing to do with the entirely legitimate theme of the movie - of redemption amidst a world gone mad - but simply because the work contained 'nudity'.
There is nothing more terrible than when we deny what we have been called to express.
Christianity is not against exposing the horror and darkness of what is here and why it exists. It is equally not anti the marvels and glories of natural human life - these are, in fact, the very aspects that are so inherent to God's work of redemption. What we hate is the lie that things are right and good without the life and breath of God. That is the murder which transpired in Eden.
Sin is that rotten, wasteful thing 'which prostitutes and wrecks that which should be fresh and full of life, generating a God-ignoring barrenness' (Calvin Seerveld).
There is, of course, nothing wrong with Christians sharing normal life together - that should be encouraged, and we certainly need to avoid union to any evil which undermines the truth of the Gospel, but that life should be in the world, in the arts, in the very fibre of society and culture, not so 'soft-centered' and besieged that the life we know is 'pure' to the point of dualistic detachment.
I did finally find a page where something more edifying was going on:
http://theaestheticelevator.com/2008/01/02/the-nude-figure-and-christianity/
But it took a while....
I wonder if others on this course, especially those without faith, would have been as persistent, or able to understand....
"Prove all things and hold fast to those things which are good'. The Apostle Paul.
Isn't interesting how easily we can simplify and thereby totally empty things of their actual value?
I received the framework for my third year of studies in Photography today, and was quickly plunged in to considering the likes of Colour Formalism, New Realism, Gestalt Laws and their bearing on photographic composition, intent and balance. It was pretty heady stuff to start the day, so after lunch, I thought I'd do a search under 'Christian Photography' and see if I could find a few on-line spots where others of like faith may be seeking to engage in the realm and looking for mutual support....
Now, I have no particular liking for beer, but those who do would tell you just how plain dreadful it is when someone seeks to give you something other than the genuine article.
The point? Well, just what is the point of having 'christian' sites for 'nice' (inoffensive) photographic images (which appeared by the page load on my search)?
Well, some might say, our faith shouldn't contain anything 'unclean' - no violence, no profanity and absolutely no nudity, so that's the guidelines for 'Christian' things - art, photography, whatever.
In the early 16th century, German artist Matthias Grünewald brought comfort to those dying of leprosy with the production of his altarpiece depicting the crucifixion of Christ. The art is stark and uncompromising - an acute, furious expression of the agony of death, the debasing of a man by such cruel execution, the plain exposition of the naked death of the Son of God. The work achieves it's goal - to show the one who has so totally identified with our pain, our reality, and it is because of this that the image on the other side of the panel - that of a Jesus, bodily whole and resurrected- resonates so deeply with regards as to the essential nature of our faith in God's sure and certain promise - though this body is destroyed, yet in my flesh, I shall see God.
In the early 1990's, I found myself staggered when many local Christians I knew were vocally informing myself and others that we should not watch or encourage others to see the masterful Stephen Spielberg film, Schindler's List. What staggered me was that the reason for this boycott had nothing to do with the entirely legitimate theme of the movie - of redemption amidst a world gone mad - but simply because the work contained 'nudity'.
There is nothing more terrible than when we deny what we have been called to express.
Christianity is not against exposing the horror and darkness of what is here and why it exists. It is equally not anti the marvels and glories of natural human life - these are, in fact, the very aspects that are so inherent to God's work of redemption. What we hate is the lie that things are right and good without the life and breath of God. That is the murder which transpired in Eden.
Sin is that rotten, wasteful thing 'which prostitutes and wrecks that which should be fresh and full of life, generating a God-ignoring barrenness' (Calvin Seerveld).
There is, of course, nothing wrong with Christians sharing normal life together - that should be encouraged, and we certainly need to avoid union to any evil which undermines the truth of the Gospel, but that life should be in the world, in the arts, in the very fibre of society and culture, not so 'soft-centered' and besieged that the life we know is 'pure' to the point of dualistic detachment.
I did finally find a page where something more edifying was going on:
http://theaestheticelevator.com/2008/01/02/the-nude-figure-and-christianity/
But it took a while....
I wonder if others on this course, especially those without faith, would have been as persistent, or able to understand....
Tuesday, 30 September 2008
The Enduring Truth
For everyone, in every age, and every generation...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1jUNZzIt3g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1jUNZzIt3g
Monday, 29 September 2008
Refuge
"I feel just like I'm sinking, and I claw for solid ground,
I'm pulled down by the undertow, I never thought I could feel so low,
In all the darkness, I feel like letting go". Sarah Mc Lachlan
We can have it all. Money, property, health, great vacations, everything the good life can provide,
and yet, we can be as empty inside as a vast, bare cathedral, where the only interruption is the noise of our own frantic thoughts as we rush to 'keep up' in the hollow thing we have foolishly tagged as 'life'.
It's no doubt unusual in this busy world - to stop and look upon this reality, but I often feel these days that this is a truth which haunts us just beneath the surface of our creaking planet.
So many live so frantically, because just below that veneer, where you can almost taste fear, they live so totally and entirely....alone.
In the days prior to our fall into this misery, something of the tragedy of this estate was, no doubt intentionally, touched upon in those earliest moments in Eden.
There, as the creative deeds of the Lord come to a crescendo, when all the 'furnishings' are in place and man is brought forth to focus the new order upon its maker- the universe, finely prepared to allow an expression of God's majesty and care, it is then found to be short of what is crucially needed to make it truly good.
Man simply cannot live alone amidst such a realm. To be truly whole and fulfilled, there must be another which is truly part of him, part of the world and also uniquely themselves as well.
The making of Eve brings about not only a physical completion to the life of the created order, it teaches us that our lives can only truly be 'complete' when they are part of something more than just ourselves.
Our actions, cares, passions and desires only become inherently enriched and vital when we see how they 'clothe' the life of those we care about, granting them the ability to flourish and know a measure of some degree of mending in parts of their time here.
Having lost many who are close to me, I still find that this 'work', this giving to bring a deeper beauty or joy, is one of the richest things we can do with our days here, and this is indeed the 'pattern' to which we have been called - to give that there may indeed be something deeper and truly enduring.
The poison of the fall from the garden means we all know the cold of loneliness. In a world where we have become so deeply severed from all that we were meant to be, where death and pain mark and shadow every waking moment, it could not be otherwise,
but as a song I once heard stated, 'He has hallowed this path of sorrow' - Christ has taken the very horror of our existence and made it the means of His victory, His giving of the life of God back to His fallen children. As we can know love, can share love, life and death can now become defined by something far deeper than our oh so real pain and sorrow.
The call though the 'valley' we walk is one to a table, richly furnished by grace, where our heads are anointed as welcomed children, where a sure and certain promise hurries us into His eternal goodness, His redeeming work towards us forever, and there is the refuge, the true haven, for all who are alone.
Jesus Christ, the one who brakes the power of our alienation, will be with us forever,
and in Him, all things are made new.
I'm pulled down by the undertow, I never thought I could feel so low,
In all the darkness, I feel like letting go". Sarah Mc Lachlan
We can have it all. Money, property, health, great vacations, everything the good life can provide,
and yet, we can be as empty inside as a vast, bare cathedral, where the only interruption is the noise of our own frantic thoughts as we rush to 'keep up' in the hollow thing we have foolishly tagged as 'life'.
It's no doubt unusual in this busy world - to stop and look upon this reality, but I often feel these days that this is a truth which haunts us just beneath the surface of our creaking planet.
So many live so frantically, because just below that veneer, where you can almost taste fear, they live so totally and entirely....alone.
In the days prior to our fall into this misery, something of the tragedy of this estate was, no doubt intentionally, touched upon in those earliest moments in Eden.
There, as the creative deeds of the Lord come to a crescendo, when all the 'furnishings' are in place and man is brought forth to focus the new order upon its maker- the universe, finely prepared to allow an expression of God's majesty and care, it is then found to be short of what is crucially needed to make it truly good.
Man simply cannot live alone amidst such a realm. To be truly whole and fulfilled, there must be another which is truly part of him, part of the world and also uniquely themselves as well.
The making of Eve brings about not only a physical completion to the life of the created order, it teaches us that our lives can only truly be 'complete' when they are part of something more than just ourselves.
Our actions, cares, passions and desires only become inherently enriched and vital when we see how they 'clothe' the life of those we care about, granting them the ability to flourish and know a measure of some degree of mending in parts of their time here.
Having lost many who are close to me, I still find that this 'work', this giving to bring a deeper beauty or joy, is one of the richest things we can do with our days here, and this is indeed the 'pattern' to which we have been called - to give that there may indeed be something deeper and truly enduring.
The poison of the fall from the garden means we all know the cold of loneliness. In a world where we have become so deeply severed from all that we were meant to be, where death and pain mark and shadow every waking moment, it could not be otherwise,
but as a song I once heard stated, 'He has hallowed this path of sorrow' - Christ has taken the very horror of our existence and made it the means of His victory, His giving of the life of God back to His fallen children. As we can know love, can share love, life and death can now become defined by something far deeper than our oh so real pain and sorrow.
The call though the 'valley' we walk is one to a table, richly furnished by grace, where our heads are anointed as welcomed children, where a sure and certain promise hurries us into His eternal goodness, His redeeming work towards us forever, and there is the refuge, the true haven, for all who are alone.
Jesus Christ, the one who brakes the power of our alienation, will be with us forever,
and in Him, all things are made new.
Friday, 12 September 2008
The Real State of Play
"If the origin of the solar system was brought about by accidental collisions, then the appearance of organic life was equally such, and our whole evolution derives from this.
If this is so, then all our thought processes are no more than the by product of the accidental movements of atoms...but if our thoughts are truly no more than this, why should believe them to be true? I see no reason why that one accident should be able to lead to a correct and understandable account of all further events". C S Lewis - God in the Dock.
Every once and a while, a chink appears in the 'hideous strength' that presents itself so pervasively as the incontrovertible philosophical edifice that is naturalistic scientism, the assumption that is vital to the manner of atheism strenuously confessed by certain Darwinists at present.
Just such a crack was expressed on The Humanist web page this week by Agnostic and Sociologist Steve Fuller, as a response to a pathetic review of his book, Dissent over Descent, which examines the validity of the challenge of Intelligent Design to the status quo.
You can read Mr Fuller's response for yourself here:
http://newhumanist.org.uk/1880
It really points to the fact that the issues and questions raised by our very existence are still far from being answered, and that the nature of Christianity's answer - that life here is far from an accident - cannot be ignored and must not be suppressed.
If this is so, then all our thought processes are no more than the by product of the accidental movements of atoms...but if our thoughts are truly no more than this, why should believe them to be true? I see no reason why that one accident should be able to lead to a correct and understandable account of all further events". C S Lewis - God in the Dock.
Every once and a while, a chink appears in the 'hideous strength' that presents itself so pervasively as the incontrovertible philosophical edifice that is naturalistic scientism, the assumption that is vital to the manner of atheism strenuously confessed by certain Darwinists at present.
Just such a crack was expressed on The Humanist web page this week by Agnostic and Sociologist Steve Fuller, as a response to a pathetic review of his book, Dissent over Descent, which examines the validity of the challenge of Intelligent Design to the status quo.
You can read Mr Fuller's response for yourself here:
http://newhumanist.org.uk/1880
It really points to the fact that the issues and questions raised by our very existence are still far from being answered, and that the nature of Christianity's answer - that life here is far from an accident - cannot be ignored and must not be suppressed.
Tuesday, 9 September 2008
Just not good enough
"For anyone stepped in an understanding of God as Creator, love and respect should surely be a natural characteristic. If we understand all matter as God-breathed, we will not merely view it as a vehicle for an idea, or an inconvenient, transitory 'veil' to be broken through and discarded.
We will understand that genius lies in seeing 'the general in the particular' and learn 'to see the world in a grain of sand and heaven in the wild flower' . Brand & Chaplin - Art & Soul.
It's something you seem to do more as you get older (or, at least become more aware of yourself doing it..!): musing on the nature, the value and the interplay of things which surround us and which so perfectly weave into the fabric of our lives.
During the almost unceasing gray that proved to be our summer this year, there was a single day where I found myself having the opportunity to facilitate a shoot for another photographer on a beach where my late wife and I shared many rich times.
The day arrived, and whilst the shoot progressed further down the shore, I took the opportunity to relish a day of bright skies in oh so familiar and friendly surroundings. It genuinely felt, as I clambered, swam and played, that I had come home, that friends I had taken there, and Kay herself, would appear at any moment and we'd have a picnic on the beach.
That, in essence, is what inherently defines our creation - a richness of life that delights God and thereby saturates a moment with significance.
That is why all the alternative definitions of who and what we are cannot satisfy.
They are essentially devoid of what really counts - an everlasting reality where life is infused with a deep and satisfying richness and significance that never fades, never falters, never ends.
Everything which surrounds us contains within it a reality, however currently tainted by human folly, that 'hints' and glints, like some flash into something astonishing in a fairy tale, that life here is good - very good, and that if we listen hard enough, we can catch a few notes of the song which tells us the day is not far off when that truth will pervade all of creation...
"We want", noted Lewis, "something else which can hardly put into words - to truly be united to the beauty we can see... to bathe in it...Someday, we will put on that glory of which nature as now seen is but the first sketch".
That, as echoed in that first day of refreshment at the end of the creation week, is exactly what will be elemental to a realm which will glorify God forever - the hope now ours, in Jesus Christ.
We will understand that genius lies in seeing 'the general in the particular' and learn 'to see the world in a grain of sand and heaven in the wild flower' . Brand & Chaplin - Art & Soul.
It's something you seem to do more as you get older (or, at least become more aware of yourself doing it..!): musing on the nature, the value and the interplay of things which surround us and which so perfectly weave into the fabric of our lives.
During the almost unceasing gray that proved to be our summer this year, there was a single day where I found myself having the opportunity to facilitate a shoot for another photographer on a beach where my late wife and I shared many rich times.
The day arrived, and whilst the shoot progressed further down the shore, I took the opportunity to relish a day of bright skies in oh so familiar and friendly surroundings. It genuinely felt, as I clambered, swam and played, that I had come home, that friends I had taken there, and Kay herself, would appear at any moment and we'd have a picnic on the beach.
That, in essence, is what inherently defines our creation - a richness of life that delights God and thereby saturates a moment with significance.
That is why all the alternative definitions of who and what we are cannot satisfy.
They are essentially devoid of what really counts - an everlasting reality where life is infused with a deep and satisfying richness and significance that never fades, never falters, never ends.
Everything which surrounds us contains within it a reality, however currently tainted by human folly, that 'hints' and glints, like some flash into something astonishing in a fairy tale, that life here is good - very good, and that if we listen hard enough, we can catch a few notes of the song which tells us the day is not far off when that truth will pervade all of creation...
"We want", noted Lewis, "something else which can hardly put into words - to truly be united to the beauty we can see... to bathe in it...Someday, we will put on that glory of which nature as now seen is but the first sketch".
That, as echoed in that first day of refreshment at the end of the creation week, is exactly what will be elemental to a realm which will glorify God forever - the hope now ours, in Jesus Christ.
Sunday, 31 August 2008
The Missing Explaination
"It is only by coming into contact with the reality of the eternal that the weight of this life is adequately felt". Mike Horton.
It's a truly marvelous situation - to be using creativity and skill to create something (in my case, images) that causes some people to pause, and it's even better when it provides an opportunity to discuss who and what we are.
Last weekend, I spent about four hours having a deep conversation with one of my muses and her boyfriend about the significance of Christianity. It always fascinates me how the same ol' excuses are arranged front and centre to seek to mitigate (dodge the bullet) of the message of the gospel...
'we're all 'divine' (part of god) and are more spirit than body'
'we all have a will to determine where we go'
'we're all capable of being good if we so choose'.
It's at moments like this you realize just how essential Jesus' teaching about what we really are is - how the Law needs to break such hard soil and convict us and then how the sole authority of Jesus needs to be recognized as THE Lord and Saviour.
It was a truly meaningful discussion, with my muse confessing, 'to really be different and to know the truth, we need a miracle'.
The miracle is that the same power which sustains every particle of this universe everyday, that gives us sunlight and rainfall, that can bring life to those who are dead - the same power that spoke creation into being, can speak into our lives and make them new.
Please pray that such a miracle comes to those we have the privilege of breaking and sharing the word of life with, and that we as children of grace can expel the canker of duality from our lives so that rather than impoverish this world, we can richly define God's true glory amidst the world He loves, that many may come, may taste and see.
It's a truly marvelous situation - to be using creativity and skill to create something (in my case, images) that causes some people to pause, and it's even better when it provides an opportunity to discuss who and what we are.
Last weekend, I spent about four hours having a deep conversation with one of my muses and her boyfriend about the significance of Christianity. It always fascinates me how the same ol' excuses are arranged front and centre to seek to mitigate (dodge the bullet) of the message of the gospel...
'we're all 'divine' (part of god) and are more spirit than body'
'we all have a will to determine where we go'
'we're all capable of being good if we so choose'.
It's at moments like this you realize just how essential Jesus' teaching about what we really are is - how the Law needs to break such hard soil and convict us and then how the sole authority of Jesus needs to be recognized as THE Lord and Saviour.
It was a truly meaningful discussion, with my muse confessing, 'to really be different and to know the truth, we need a miracle'.
The miracle is that the same power which sustains every particle of this universe everyday, that gives us sunlight and rainfall, that can bring life to those who are dead - the same power that spoke creation into being, can speak into our lives and make them new.
Please pray that such a miracle comes to those we have the privilege of breaking and sharing the word of life with, and that we as children of grace can expel the canker of duality from our lives so that rather than impoverish this world, we can richly define God's true glory amidst the world He loves, that many may come, may taste and see.
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