How do you distill years of thought on the church in exile into soundbites, tweets, or catchy facebook paragraphs?
How do you not end up just another site whining about the state of the Church in the 21st Century?
How do you tell people that what they’re going through is deeply connected to what God is doing and is coming to do, without them thinking you’re some kind of apocalyptic fruitcake?
I’m feeling my way through the answers to those questions as much as everyone else is. I wish someone had all the answers; I’d go and pick their brains. But I’ve found precious few who understand what we’re going through and why we’re going through it; why God has been silent for so long, or why the foundations we’ve held to for centuries are rapidly crumbling. Most people don’t even know we’re going through something! They just think this is life.
There are perfectly explainable reasons, of course – earthquakes happen, markets fluctuate, churches calcify, relationships can be tumultuous, sickness is part of a broken world. But I believe that above all of this sits God, not as passionless observer but as active participant. And in this blog I want to try and show, with my limited understanding, what he is doing and why he is doing it.
Every day I encounter people going through immense suffering – marital difficulties, physical pain, unbearable emotional stress. And most of them don’t have any answers to it. The only thing the Church has to offer that the world cannot is the reality of God. The Church is supposed to bring the reality of God into the suffering around us. But what happens when God decides to hide? What happens when he no longer speaks, or we lose the ability to hear? What if, for reasons we can’t fathom, we feel disconnected from the Church and abandoned by God? What if the Church abdicates its role to be the dwelling place of God so that people no longer hear Truth when we speak or encounter God when we meet together?
I have more questions than answers. But I know that something needs to be said – even if it’s just another question. And although today there is no end to the cacophony of voices all blathering on about something important, I hear little being said that connects the pain and hurt and sense of dislocation people feel with what God is doing and coming to do in the earth.
This blog is an honest, but obviously inadequate, attempt to address our place in what God is saying and doing today. Although the posts stand independently, they are not disconnected. Each one is a piece of the puzzle – the Church in exile and its preparation to be Christ’s spotless bride.
Why Stranded in Babylon?
The reasons for that should become apparent over time, but I will say that the title reflects both personal experience and the spiritual status of the Church.
“Babylon” has different connotations to different people. To some it symbolizes the culture and thinking of the world – a thinking that stands in opposition to (and is often an imitation or perversion of) God’s thinking and God’s culture. This is the Babylon of Revelation that most people are familiar with.
But this apocalyptic sense grew out of an understanding of Babylon as both the place of Israel’s captivity and God’s means of judging and purifying his people. It is to this Old Testament significance that God has repeatedly drawn me over the last two decades.
How does this blog fit within what God is saying to others elsewhere?
Well, that’s for you to decide. There are lot of fruit loops out there. I’m sincerely hoping I’m not one of them. You won’t find any shofar blowing, flag waving, doomsday predicting raptureology going on here. Well, not yet!
Some people get dreams. I’d love to have dreams. But, sadly, God doesn’t usually do that with me. I get scriptures and symbols, and Old Testament typology. I’m a detail kind of guy, but God seems to be giving me the big picture. It seems that he wants me to speak theologically about what’s happening in the world – to help people connect the dots of their lives and the dots of this crazy age we’re living in, with the dots of scripture.
So, I’ll leave the dreams and visions to others. I only have words to work with. In an age of visual stimulation, when people are tired of words, I feel like I got a bit of a rough deal. But there you go. I got what I got. Let the prophet who has a dream recount the dream, my task is to speak the word faithfully (Jer.23.28). I leave to you the task of weighing them against each other
These are my letters to us – the Church in exile.
gb
Disclaimer
The views expressed here do not necessarily represent the views of my church or any particular church that I have been a part of in the past. My thoughts are a work in progress and are, therefore, not devoid of context nor are they set in stone. They should be read accordingly.
Thanks
My grateful thanks to Nathan (you know who you are) for his advice and help in setting up this blog, and to all those who insisted I should just shut up and do it.