Moses: The Cross Cultural Litrugical Church Planter: Surveying the Urban Landscape

Our story is a familiar story in some ways. We all have heard aspects of this story read from our lectionary readings or we have heard this story in our Sunday School or Children's Church classes in various ways. My mother was in charge of Children's Church in the ole Pentecostal church I grew up in. She used the flannel board and flannel graph to tell the story. Now days, kids see the story through the eyes of vegetables or other various cartoons.

How can we forget Charleston Heston comin' off the mountain with gray hair and two tablets of stone with the Ten Commandments written with the fiery finger of God? Even Disney and Dreamworks brought the Story of Moses to life through their epic animated feature: The Prince of Egypt. We have been saturated with the Life of Moses, so saturated that the stark reality of the story gets lost in our romantized renditions. I believe as we journey with Moses and step into the story and the let the text narrate our lives; we can see with new eyes where God is workin' in our cities among the poor and the oppressed and how we can join Him in his mission.

Our story begins in Exodus 1-2:1-10. The Hebrew people are in a different state than when we left them at the end Genesis. In the closin' chapters of Genesis, a Hebrew named Joseph saves the Empire and his own family is favored in the midst of famine. Ah, but when we read the openin' verses of Exodus, a daunting phrase that introduces a change in their status: "There arose king who did not know Joseph."

About four hundred years had passed and this band of nomadic shepherds livin' in the ghetto of Gershom - Egyptians did not take too kindly to shepherds, they felt that they were unclean - had grown numerous in the fulfillment of the promise God gave to Abraham. These few folk that the previous Pharaoh had let in were now a threat to the Empire. Egypt had an Immigration Problem!

Joseph was a foreigner, an ex-con, a fugitive without a bond who had been favored by God to preserve the elect of the promise and as a by product saved the Empire. Now what would have happened to the Empire if Joseph hadn't showed up? What would have happened to our little band of nomads if Egypt did not give them refuge?

There are about 3-12 million undocumented immigrants in the United States. There are those who say we have an Immigration Problem or that we need Immigration Reform, and there is spirited debate on both sides of the aisle in order to deal with this issue. However, we must ground our response to this issue in the Scriptures. We must ask a Two-Fold Question: How does the Church respond on a Macro-Level: How do we reform the system in a fair and just way? The Micro-Level Response: How do we respond to individuals in our urban communities who may be in our midst.

Pharaoh had a plan, his reform was twofold as well: Enslave the masses for the Empire and let them to build the glories of the Empire. (I wonder how much blood, sweat, and tears built the Egyptian pyramids that we love to go and see as tourist attractions. Just a thought!) Kill the individual male babies so that the masses cannot rise up and revolt. Doesn't it seem ironic that he is killin' his labor force in fear of revolt. I guess he understood the complexities of his problem!

With all tongue and cheek aside, we as the Church need to know not only the complexity of issues such as immigration but the ones I will discuss below as well. We need to know the complexity of responses that national, state, and local government give and how they affect and impact the communities you are serving. This brings me to three other major issues that Urban Church Planters will face: Poverty, Violence, and Broken Families.

Our Hebrew families in our story are expericin' slave labor to the fullest extent. They were caught in the trap of governmental and societal systems that oppressed them to the point of non-advancement. Today in America we have about 39 million folk who live in poverty where African Americans and Latinos around 25% living in poverty. The unemployment rate has hovered around 9.7% with the actual rate bein' higher if we factor the working poor. Sometimes White American and the predominantly White Evangelical Church look down on the poor and say, "Why can't they pull themselves up by the boot straps and help themselves?" Then we quote: "God helps those who help themselves" as the Gospel not realizing that this does not come from the Bible but from Benjamin Franklin. This saying reflects more of a Pelegian ethos than the Gospel of grace that empowers works to be carried forth. If the Church is the vehicle of the Gospel of Grace, then the community will be empowered to good works in all its fullness and complexity.

We must exegete our culture and see the systems that prevent jobs, and allow the Holy Ghost to inspire us and empower with apostolic ideas to create jobs and raise up leaders.

Violence is another issue that our text talks about. Pharaoh systematically slaughtered all the boy babies so to wipe out any threat to his Empire. We in the Evangelical Church love to preach on texts like this because we relate it to abortion in our day and age. We love to diatribe about being Pro-Life which means we protect unborn children. Yet, let's talk about what it really means to be Pro-Life.

Being Pro-Life means we fight against any destructive forces that that threaten the Gift of Life that Abundant Life that overflows from the Triune God and that Jesus promised and gave to us through the Incarnation, Death, and Resurrection! The same destructive forces that drive abortion are embodied in murders, gang violence, drugs, prostitution, etc. We must be willin' to engage the powers and the systems that paralyzed our communities and families and drives these destructive forces in the community. We must be Pro-Life from the womb to the tomb. As you can see, this is more than being Anti-Abortion, it is fightin' for the unborn and the born whose lives are being snatched away by the forces of death and destruction at ten, twenty, thirty, fifty, or ninety years of age!

The final problem that our urban church planters will face is broken families. Notice in out text the courageous role of the women! The midwives refuse to give the male children over to Pharaoh's army. Moses Mom and Miriam keep him safe and then strategically place him in a basket down the river towards the heart of Egypt, riskin' and yet savin' his life! About 12 million of American homes are headed up by single parents with 83% of African American homes headed up by a single parent. Most of these parents are single moms but numbers of single dads is on the rise as well. The women who run the homes in our urban communities do all they can to save their babies and yet at times they still see their babies slaughtered by the violence we have spoken of earlier. Yet there are those who are like Moses Mom and Miriam who sacrificially do all they can to save their babies so that they can have a better life.

I know a mom who is divorced and unemployed; her oldest son is mentally disabled due to the fact that he was born with only half of his brain. She is the primary care giver and has spent many days in the children's hospital with him. She also has a teenage daughter who has been blessed to receive scholarships to go to a private school because of the gifts God has given her. She also helps take care of her brother. The mom sent her daughter down the proverbial river so she can receive a better education and break the cycle of poverty. Yet I spoke with the mom in the local Starbucks in my community, and she told me how tired she was and how she is holdin' on to God in the midst of the adversity; yet she is blessed despite of her mess.

However, not all babies get out so those called to urban ministry need to be equipped to empower all to overcome by improvin' education and other systems that seem to hold down instead of help out.

We have touched the surface with all these issues and I will say that there are no easy answers or slick solutions. Not everyone agrees on the best way to resolve these issues. Church Planters who may come into these situations may have preconceive notions that may need to be adjusted and perceptions that may need to be changed. Folk who live within these communities do not agree on the right resolutions to these issues. Therefore we need to exegete -to draw out-to interpret the context like we interpret the Scriptures to draw out the meaning and application for our situation. We need to agents of reconciliation who come to the table with folk not with answers but listening hearts.

Here are some suggestions for exegeting your community.

1. Build relationships and hear stories. This will give you the history of your community with personal reflection from those who live there.
2. Find the assets in the community. Look at what the community already offers and has in places, resources, gifts, and folk.
3. Get to know the other pastors in the community to see where God is already working and where you can plug in if there is something lacking.
4. Be Present in your Community. Live in your community, shop in your community, hang out in places where everybody likes to gather.
5. Look at demographics to see the breakdown of your community race, ethnicity, class, crime, etc. This will give you the macro view, which stories you hear from your community will give you the micro view.


Resources to look at: http://www.ccda.org/ for more information about exegeting your community. www.census.gov to look at current statistics on poverty, unemployment, etc.


What is the community that God has called you to? What are their assets? What are the resources and gifts they have? What are the problems and issues? Who can you build relationships with? Let's talk about it.

Hearin' God in the Midst of Silence

I work in Starbucks and morning rush is fastpaced and crazy with folk complaining that their 1 1/2 splenda Latte may actually have 2 splendas. God Forbid! However, I had just got off from work and I was waiting for my 18 shots of espresso. I saw this little boy and he is handicapped. He had a trache in his throat and I could tell he had some swelling on the brain because of the abnormal size of his head. He was dancin' and swayin to the music; and he was on beat. It was like ballet and yet cappauella the brazillian martial arts/dance..First, this put my day in perspective. What do I have to complain about my day when I see this little boy. Dammit it's just coffee folks can get over it and in the eternal scheme of things it does not mattter; yet he held a wisdom that was about to be revealed.The guy who was his guardian was waiting for his drink, and noticed that I was watching the little boy. He told me that the little boy could not hear. Yet he was in perfect timing with the music! This is when the Holy Ghost told me that though we cannot hear the voice of God (if I had a witness in the house right now), you can still move with me..We can still move with God, be guided by his Spirit even when we can't hear a Word from God...Because of what Christ did on the cross, and because he was resurrected and sits at the right hand of God, humanity has been invited into the Divine Dance of the Triune Deity. The Eastern Fathers calls this Perechorisis, and the outgrowth or our participation and partnership in this Divine Dance is called theosis - being caught up into the Divine Life. As we dance with the Triune Deity we are transfigured and transformed into his image and likeness...Baby, we just don't dance with the stars, we dance with the Creator of the Cosmos, and even when we can't hear his Word for us, we can still dance with Spirit in the midst of the Silence.

It has been a while

Hello my fellow Exiles,

It has been a while since I have posted; but I have two friends at church named Brainerd and Esther who have a blog and it has inspired me to blog again. I pray all is well with you my friends. It seems as though we are truly in an exilic state where empires are being reshaped, power structures being deconstructed, economic famines, and yes the Church, the Ecclesia is in diaspora, we are dispersed and yet regathered in new ways. To paraphrase the Didache, we are like grain scattered abroad only to be regathered into one Loaf. These are transtional times and yet we have a God who is a Missional Deity who goes with us in our journey and yet at the same time and more importantly we go with Him and His Agenda. In so many ways the Church has been on her Agenda which looks curiously like the Culture's Agenda; and we have capitulated Christ to a consumerist culture. The American Dream and the Kingdom of God has become one in the same; while we are lullabied to sleep by the values of this culture. Yeah we talk about confronting culture. Both sides of the divide speak of this in the Church; and yet each has sold its soul to the Pervasive Power of Public Opinion; though it is cloaked in Religious Rhetoric. Yet, each has sold out the Kingdom of God like Judas betraying our Lord. The Kingdom of God is drenched in the blood of God's only Son, and yet we have dyed it with the glitt and gold of American Individualism; and then we attached the name of Jesus to it. We build our own Kingdoms and then add Jesus as an appendix so that we are still Christian.

The Church who is the firstfruits of the Kingdom in Christ; has become an instrument of the state and not the voice of the Missio Dei in the world! It is my heart to know where is the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost working and how can we as the Church work with God where he is working. Some who a spouse this doctrine feel that we have no need for the Church; but Scripture shows that the Elect has a reponsilbility to the world to proclaim the Kingdom of God in both word and deed! This is our baptism mandate and our confirmation responsilbility!

My Exilic Ecclesia, Let us join our Missional Deity: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in the proclaimation of the Kingdom of God and renewal of creation with the Gospel.

So It Begins

I am a man in search of home.
A place where I can experience the presence of God.
I feel like an exile in the church settings I am currently in
I sing the songs... listen to sermons... pray the prayers
But I sense that there is more
I am troubled by this discontent that lies within my soul
Discontent at what? I do not know
This restlessness plagues me and I long to run to familiar ground
But here I am walking into unknown territory
Trusting God to lead me home
Asking God to give me ears to hear and eyes to see what the Spirit is saying
I want to know Jesus.

Let the journey begin......

The Divine Tension of Nay

My fellow Exilic Ecclesia,



Since Christ the King, Sunday is this week and we in the liturgical tradition celebrate the consumation of all things when the Kingdoms of this world become the Kingdoms of the LORD and his Christ by the Holy Spirit, I would like to address an Exilic and Kingdom theme which I entitle: The Divine Tension of Nay.



Where did I get this from? This term comes from many places. Many folks who comment on the Kingdom of God says that we must embrace the Divine Tension, I believe among others this can be attributed to MLK Jr but the theme is rooted in the fact that the Kingdom of God is here and not yet. This idea also comes from a book: Tortured for Christ, a story about Richard Wumbrand and his terms of imprisonment for the Gospel in Communist camps. He relates a story from Jewish folklore when the Egyptians were drowned in the Red Sea, the Angels rejoiced with the Israelites and Yahweh rebuked them saying that these are my people too, let them celebrate but do not join in. Wumbrand then relates the Story of Joshua.

After Joshua and the people cross over the Jordan to Promise Land; Joshua meets a strange figure who has a sword drawn out and Joshua inquires whose side was this figure on. Was he on the side of the Israelites or the Jerichoites. And in good King James Fashion, the figure said Nay, I am the Captain of the Lord's host. Joshua asked what was the word of Yahweh. The Captain; take off your sandles for this is Holy Ground.

There are some things that we got to notice from this text. First Joshua, was in the middle of a battle where there are sides to be taken. Second Joshua thought that he was goin' to get a word from God about his situation, and yet all he gets is the the divine figure telling him to take off his shoes because what! this is Holy Ground. In the midst of the rhetoric, in the midst of side taking, God creates Sacred Space; a realm of Nay; where it is God who calls shots and transcends sides, and we bow in humble adoration and faith in the unknown or uncertainty.

In our society where social issues is about sides and rhetoric we need a Word that cuts through the rhetoric and says Nay. If I can get my neo-orthodox brothers to help me out; they say that thing are always in dialetic. What is the answer to these social issues: they are Yes and No and stand under the judgement of the Cross. Now I know that one is going to say that Brother Paul in the First Corinthians says: For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by me and Silas and Timothy, was not "Yes" and "No," but in him it has always been "Yes." For no matter how many promises God has made, they are "Yes" in Christ. And so through him the "Amen" is spoken by us to the glory of God. Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ." How can we say that we live in the Divine Tension of Nay when the Divine Word who is Jesus says that all the promises that are in him are Yes and Amen. How can we reconcile these two contridictory statements? You don't, you keep them in tension; because when a word of promise is yes to us who are joint heirs to the promise, then that means there is a No or Nay uttered against those who are not of the promise.

My sisters and brothers, let me tell you something, American Capitalistic society ain't heir to the promise of the Kingdom, neither is American Christianity that caders to the culture on both the right side or the left side of these issues. To paraphrase Abe Lincoln. He said, they ask me if God is on our side, and I tell them Nay, I want to be on God's side. We have passed political legislation and called it the Kingdom. We who are in Exile know that we live ambiguities when it comes to these issues. Does this mean that we do not have held convictions. Nay! Does it mean that we do not have different convictions. Nay! What it does mean is that we put our convictions, our sides and submit them to the Spirit who knows how to keep them in Divine Tension because he creates the atmosphere. When we tout against certain rights and for other rights and yet do not take in account the lives that live in the liminal space of these issues, the Divine Tension ,then we lose sight of the Gospel that reaches out to the gray areas. When we do not take in account the peoples lives and be willing to live in the liminal with them and interceding for them and with them even when they may not change in the way we think; then we are not truly acting as priests and mediators of Divine Reality.

We need to live in the Divine Tension of Nay! This is the realm of Exile. This is where when the Divine Word that is uttered cuts through the rhetoric of our culture, and even the rhetoric of what looks like church, talks like church but may not be church. We are called my Exilic brothers and sisters to wrestle with the Angel of the Divine Tension of Nay because is where we get our name as those who travel in the Exilic Way who is Jesus.

Blessed are those who Mourn....

My fellow Exiles,


We have all lost something or someone in our lives. Maybe we have lost a loved one who died unexpectedly or after a long illness. Or maybe, we have lost a loved a relationship that went wrong. Or maybe we lost a job in the height of our careers. We have all experienced the pain of loss. What have we done with this pain, or what do we do with this pain? Do we stuff our pain deep down inside when a tear of times past trickles down our faces as a glazed stare captures us for a brief moment. Do we deny the pain and numb it with endless activities lest we have to embrace the existential emptiness? This brings me to my question: Do we know how to mourn? Do we know how to embrace mourning as a state of being.


In America, we do not know how to mourn, we do not know how to truly grief a loss. We pay lip service to loss through memorial rituals where we shed some tears and then it is business as usual. Walter Bruggeman addresses this point in Prophetic Imagination where talks about the destruction of the temple. The prophets embodied the mourning of Exile. Yahweh tells Ezekiel not mourn his wife's death, Jeremiah could not get married, and Hosea marries the town prostitute. Why? They embody the grief of situation but also embody the grieving of Yahweh and how his heart breaks. The Church should mourn in Exile like Zion mourning the death of a new born child. Yet we embrace false prophets who pontificate that all is well and gives us seven steps to live this life now. And yet my brothers and sisters we need to live the life of Exile and that means to mourn.


We need to embody the pain and grief of our society and lament its tragic state. We need to embody the grief of God over the state of his Kingdom as his Church who is its first fruits bears fruit of thistles and thorns in the name of a Saviour who was crucified with a crown of thorns. We have to be a sign of contradiction that the world and the established church sees that there is a remnant an Exilic Ecclesia that understands the true nature of our times and the narrative that expresses it. This is not a pity party, though grieving involves anger, frustration, and despair. We must push through these to the resolution, if there is such a thing and this resolution is called lament. We lament and grieve the possibilities and the past mistakes in this present moment. We embrace the pain that we are so afraid to feel or to embrace.


The last part of Jesus's saying is that if we mourn we shall be comforted. We love that latter part of the verse and quote it as numbing antidote to our pain. We want joy in the morning light without the mourning of the dark night. Weeping, brother and sisters may endure through a long dark night of the soul of the Church and the Culture. We are only comforted through community. We comfort each other with the Scriptures, the traditions, the liturgies, the poetry and the lives of others who gone before us and yet our co-labourers in growing a community in Exile. We need to reach out to each other, who who have been used to the wilderness metaphor feel like we mourn alone with no hope of being heard. We need not sorrow alone my beloved sisters and brothers, but we need to sorrow with each other.



The Spirit knows how to pray and intercede for us when we do not know how to pray. In his inarticulate utterances that groans in the community and grieves in us the loss we cannot put our finger on but we know its pain. Let us grieve together, and comfort one another with the Blessing of mourning in Exile. Let us pray...




Come Holy Spirit who proceeds from Abba
Help us to embrace mourning in this Exilic State
Help us to enter fully into the grief which you groan within us,
as we intercede for the Church and for our Culture.


Come Priestly Spirit, grant us strenght to embody the pain and bear
existential angst that plagues our society that Christ, the Great High
Priest's sufferings may be completed in us.


Come Prophetic Spirit, grant us courage to face the fear of emptiness and
uncertainty as we challenge those structures that falsely serve fullness
and certainty in the name of prosperity.


Come Poetic Spirit, help us to express the loss of the Church and the Culture,
through the songs of Zion, the narratives of the ancestors, the liturgies
of worship, and symbols and art. Grant us eyes to see and ears to hear
those who are in Exile so that with our words and deeds we may comfort
each other.



In the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit world without end. Amen

Exile--something new?

I think exile is all around us--we just have to open our eyes to it. There are places where we are accepted, too. And there are places within exile where we feel included and places where we are dominant but feel outcast. People tend to meet God in those spaces of exile. Sometimes when we get caught up in being dominant, power distracts us. Oh well.

Most of the time, I feel more comfortable when I'm in an exiled situation. I like a challenge, and if I feel too conformed to the establishment set before (in my context and background), I feel like I'm not doing anything of importance. I feel lazy.

But here, in exile (which is where I feel I mostly am right now), I'm tired and ill and having to work too hard, and all I want to do is complain about it. But as I complain, I smile a little bit, and when I sleep I sleep well. And it's not as easy for me to get fat. Love that.

Happy b-day to the "arch."