Rummage Anyone?

In, The Great Emergence, writer Phyllis Tickle mirrors the thoughts of Anglican Bishop, The Right Reverend Mark Dyer. Tickle describes Dyer's summation of the current changing landscape of North American Christianity, writing:

"...the only way to understand what is currently happening to us as twenty-first century Christians in North American is first to understand that about every five hundred years the church feels compelled to hold a giant rummage sale....as Bishop Dyer observes about every five hundred years the empowered structures of institutionalized Christianity, whatever they may be at the time, become an intolerable carapace that must be shattered in order that renewal and new growth may occur."

I recently declared that I believe God’s chosen instrument of transformation in the world is the local congregation. Having served in churches of every size, and having been privileged to create a team which helped to establish one new congregation, I am convinced that the best days for strengthening the mission and ministry of the local church are before us. What I am not prepared to declare is that the transformation of God's world will take place through a church which is determined to remain static, unwilling to morph, change and diversify; refusing to recognize the myriad opportunities which are ours if only we will seize them.

Rummage can be defined as, "to find something by searching". If our searching is intended only to create the "new and improved church" then I am afraid we are no better off than those who attempted to construct the great tower known by Jews and Christians as Babel. If the church is compelled every five hundred years to hold a rummage sale, then who is the instigator of the compelling? Like the ancient architects of Babel we are prone toward believing that WE are the compelling ones. But the story of our salvation history demonstrates that this kind of thinking and living rests on a false foundation. Maybe Bishop Dyer is asking us to celebrate the falling of our spiritual self-centeredness which leads to the possibilities of resurrection. Maybe God is holding a rummage sale in 2009 - searching like the woman of Luke 15 for her lost coin (church). I can almost hear the sound of hammer on wood as the emerging signs on the front lawns of our churches read: I HEART RUMMAGE

Let the rummaging begin!

In Christ,

Jon(the methodist)