‘Tis the season for a steady diet of well-wishing, nostalgia, prayers and pleadings for sanity all wrapped up in Christmas cheer.
In tech circles it is the dreaded “busy season” where we say good-bye to our families and friends after Thanksgiving and return to them on January 3. For that reason, we tend to focus on how to not lose Jesus in the middle of Christmas or something of that sort. I actually like those articles, but I want to share something different—a meditative reflection, of sorts, in the form of one of my favorite quotes.
It’s not really rocket science. If you are a Christian, your leader, your shepherd, your King, has already given you a vision.
It sounded like this: the Kingdom of God is like…
And then He lived it in a way that you could imitate.
Boom! Vision! (what the future will look like if you follow the leader)
But just as importantly, within the red-letters is the story of who we really are and what we’re really about. To the degree that our lives are shaped by that story is the degree that we form the tribe of Jesus.
Life is a series of goodbyes. We say goodbye to childhood friends and childhood places, first girlfriends and High School fun. As we get a little older, our friends move on to other jobs or churches. Our kids grow up and leave the house. Older still, and we have to permanently say goodbye. Life is a long road and it both narrows and expands as we progress.
This is the post that did not want to be written, even though I wanted to write it. As my friend DB remarked, once you say goodbye, it makes it real in a way you were pretending you didn’t have to admit. And this is a real issue. Almost everyone I know has left a ministry assignment at least once in their lives. We all say goodbye, either from leaving or being left behind. We don’t always get to say everything we want to.
Electronic Arts Booth at the 2005 Game ConventionI know I talk a lot about change and Christianity. Because, well, like it or not, it’s here. You can change or be left behind. But I never advocate change for the sake of change. We are in the middle of intense cultural transformation. I want to see the church lead the way, because I believe we know The Way. My concern, and why I keep beating this drum, is this: if we keep fighting for an illusion of past cultural significance, influence, and glory—that doesn’t even matter!—we’ll miss what does matter: people who need Jesus.
Forewarned is forearmed
I’m going to make a giant logical leap in this post. I am going to take an article about ‘Gamer’ culture and apply it to church culture.
Why?
Because I believe the cultural challenges we face as church people are not all that different than cultural challenges faced in other areas of life and spheres of influence.
I am hoping that by showing the futile energy being spent on an outdated paradigm in ‘Gamer’ culture—and that being something most readers don’t relate to or care about (and thus, have no pre-built defenses)—I can then help you see that the same scenario (an outdated paradigm and the futile energy being spent on it) is at work in the church today.
I am hoping that this very real-life analogy will jar some into understanding who otherwise couldn’t get there.
Technically Thinking 