Tag: servant

Episode 17 Shane Claiborne on the hunger for community

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Evangelical Seminary is proud to host Shane’s talk. Click the image and learn more about a school that teaches and promotes incarnational servant leadership at a core level.

Shane’s Bio:

Shane Claiborne graduated from Eastern University and did graduate work at Princeton Seminary. In 2010, he received an Honorary Doctorate from Eastern. His adventures have taken him from the streets of Calcutta where he worked with Mother Teresa to the wealthy suburbs of Chicago where he served at the influential mega-church Willow Creek. As a peacemaker, his journeys have taken him to some of the most troubled regions of the world – from Rwanda to the West Bank – and he’s been on peace delegations in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Shane is a founder and board member of The Simple Way, a faith community in inner city Philadelphia that has helped birth and connect radical faith communities around the world. He is married to Katie Jo, a North Carolina girl who also fell in love with the city (and with Shane). They were wed in St. Edwards church, the formerly abandoned cathedral into which homeless families relocated in 1995, launching the beginning of the Simple Way community and a new phase of faith-based justice making.

Shane writes and travels extensively speaking about peacemaking, social justice, and Jesus. Shane’s books include Jesus for President, Red Letter Revolution, Common Prayer, Follow Me to Freedom, Jesus, Bombs and Ice Cream, Becoming the Answer to Our Prayers – and his classic The Irresistible Revolution. He has been featured in a number of films including “Another World Is Possible” and “Ordinary Radicals.” His books are translated into more than a dozen languages. Shane speaks over 100 times a year, nationally and internationally.

His work has appeared in Esquire, SPIN, Christianity Today, and The Wall Street Journal, and he has been on everything from Fox News and Al Jazeera to CNN and NPR. He’s given academic lectures at Harvard, Princeton, Brown, Liberty, Duke, and Notre Dame. Shane speaks regularly at denominational gatherings, festivals, and conferences around the globe. Follow him online at:

Facebook: ShaneClaiborne
Twitter: @ShaneClaiborne

 

Shownotes (with links) from my conversation with Shane Claiborne

MIN 4:00

About 15 years ago Shane Claiborne and a few friends founded The Simple Way in the poorest section of Philadelphia where drug and sex trafficking became the main “industries” when the factories closed. Ever since then, he and his friends have been living in a communally within the neighborhood and serving the residents there in many ways.

I ask Shane, How have they sustained their communal lifestyle for so long?

Shane shares some things that have helped:

1. We are not attached what it should look like in expression or form as much as we have chosen to love each other and Jesus well and allow community to flow out of that.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

“If you are in love with your vision for community you will actually destroy it.”

2. Allowing it to change over the years, from a house with 12 people sleeping all over the place in one house with one bathroom to a village of 10 or 20 houses all in the same neighborhood.

3. Helpful wisdom from the outside from others who’ve been doing communal living for a long time (The Benedictine order, for instance: 1,600 years)

6:10

What is “new monasticism” anyway? Shane explains.

6:30

“Folks are really hungry for community.”

7:20

“In Western culture we’ve lost the art of community.”

In other parts of the world this is how people have survived.

7:40

Economically impoverished communities can be community-rich (places) because they need each other.

7:50

“It’s no coincidence that in some of the richest places in the world we have the highest rates of loneliness..and depression, and suicide.”

8:00

“We are made to love and be loved.”

8:20

Even the mega-churches put in a lot of effort into making small groups work well (because that’s how you find community).

8:40

New Monasticism (as lived out in the U.S. or other wealthy Western countries) connects us with an ancient practice that continues on (and is “life as normal”) in many places in the world.

9:20

What communal living in Christian communities looks like in different contexts…

“Sometimes it’s about renouncing materialism and the Kardashians.”

10:00

What happens when people pilgrimage to The Simple Way to learn what it’s about.

Click for resources from The Simple Way

10:30

On the romantic notions of The Simple Way…

Mother Teresa said, “Calcuttas are everywhere if we only have eyes to see. Find your Calcutta.”

11:00

There is a wisdom in learning from other communities. Shane and others set up a network called the community of communities on the web which lists other communities like his. Example: Reba Place Chicago.

11:35

MissionYear.org

This way can get rid of the romanticism and allow people to experience communal living first-hand.

Monthly open houses at A Simple Way are on ramps (to learn about community).

12:20

It’s about not just believing the doctrinal statements but about living differently and finding out what that looks like.

13:15

We are called to not be conformed to this world. God wants us to use our gifts and talents.

“Non conformity doesn’t mean uniformity.”

13;30

On the 2007 fire that destroyed his home and many other homes–leaving about 100 families with nowhere to sleep and live. Shane was left in need within the community he helped.

The very surprising statement the Red Cross relief worker told him.

14:00

There are 700 abandon factories and 20,00 abandon houses nearby.

15:30

Their community has built a park, a greenhouse, green spaces for gardens. See photos at TheSimpleWay.org

16:20

How the neighborhood pulled together after the devastating fire of 2007.

16:40

Shane:
As Jesus said, “Don’t worry about tomorrow. Don’t stock up your treasure that moths… and fires… can burn up and destroy.”

17:10

Ministry is mutual and if we don’t have needs we can’t be blessed. (Lisa)

18:30

One of Shane’s favorite quotes:

“If you’ve just come to help me, you’re wasting your time. But, if you’ve come because your survival and mine are bound up together, then let’s hold hands and we’ll work together.”

18:40

This quote comes in and corrects the posture by which we’ve often come on a mission to help people and thinking with a wrong perspective.

19:20

His friend says, “We are born on third base, but we think we’ve hit a triple.”

21:30

We don’t need has much as we think we do.

21:40

On Shane’s take of the story of “the rich young ruler”:
He wants to inherit the kingdom (entitlement thinking).

(QUICK LINK: Read the short Bible story HERE.)

22:10

“For folks that are independent and self-sustaining it’s hard for us to know that we need God and other people.”

22:30

“Independence is not a gospel value. We need interdependence. It’s good to need other people and to need God.”

23:30

Besides people wondering what happened to his dreadlocks, people ask Shane this question the most.

24:20

Sometimes we have to challenge our location. (The places) where we (live) end up or are built around (that which) counters (opposes) gospel values. Like “suburban sprawl” which was created to get away from the urban problems (we should work to fix) and keep us from doing good for others who need it most.

It’s about living a life, not where we do great things, but where we do small things with great love (Mother Teresa). It’s not how much we do, but how much love we put into every act (of serving God).

25:00

We must ask:

What are my skills and passions and how might they connect to this world’s pain and injustice?

Whether it’s being a doctor, lawyer, plumber, or whatever, simply do your part.

26:00

What REALLY happens to the “dreds”.

 

Thank you, Shane! Blessings to you and your work. May we find our place to do good too.

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Want to answer the Question of the Day?

QOTD: What is the “Calcutta” near you and what gift might you bring to it ?

(okay, that WAS technically two questions.)

The Lens of Self

DFW

This (below) is audio from you tube of a commencement speech given by David Foster Wallace.

Towards the end of Part I DFW refers to the cliché that has richer import: “The mind makes a wonderful servant but a terrible master.”

In Part II DFW avoids blithe encouragement and instead chooses to impart wisdom about culture and maturity, and what a good education gives a person. (Not that one can readily find this at a learning institution these days. But the ideal is worth adventuring for at any age and in any environment.)
He made this speech only 3 years before he took his own life. Chilling qualities aside, I share this with you now because his address to graduates is not the sort of thing you hear at commencements. It’s potently honest and unwraps what it means to “be taught to think”…and what adulthood is really like and other great stuff.

I think hearing it is deeply beneficial and I truly hope you enjoy it, friends.

 

Part II.

To read the transcript click here.

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Reduce Me to Love: Jesus scrubs feet

Servant Leadership!

I’ve snagged another bit of classroom notes from my esteemed professor Dr Tim Valentino.

How about this for leadership studies!
(more on the program here)

It was simply too good to not share. Tim’s blog is here, if you’d like to read more from Tim. (You’ll enjoy that too!)

 

cropped-Washing-Feet1.jpg

 Enter Tim:

“So he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist. After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.” (John 13:4-5)

 

A powerful picture of authentic, servant leadership, which we considered last week.

 

But why does Jesus do such a humble, menial task? I think we have a hint in Luke’s account of the same event. In Luke 22 we learn that the Twelve come to this dinner arguing about who’s the greatest among them. It’s not the first time they’ve had this quarrel, but they sense that something big is going to happen this weekend, so the debate is re-opened.

 

“The kingdom of God is going to come,” they reason, “and Jesus is going to be the king. But who’s going to be his co-regent? Who’s going to be his secretary of state?” They argue about it. James and John had their mother weigh in on the matter months ago. Remember Salome? “Lord, grant that my sons will get to sit at your right and left in the kingdom.”

 

John says, “Hey, why not? I am, after all, the disciple whom Jesus loves.” Peter fumes and says, “Hold on, dude, who do you think Jesus gave the keys of the kingdom to? Me! Remember?” (O.k., that’s a paraphrase, but use your sanctified imagination to re-create the tussle!)

 

These guys aren’t wearing halos yet, and they’re certainly not ready for the stain-glass window. They fight, they argue, and they pick at each other. They can be carnal and fleshly like anybody else. And here in the upper room there’s real tension. But Jesus doesn’t scold them. He redirects them.

 

  • You want to be great in my kingdom? Then you have to serve.
  • You want to be first? Then you have to be last.
  • You want to be highest? Then you have to be lowest.
  • You want to be the most? Then you have to be the least.

 

And while they’re sitting there at that sacred feast, arguing about who’s the greatest, Jesus shows them what true greatness and true leadership look like.

 

In those days people wore open sandals—much like our flip flops. They didn’t wear socks. Most of the roads were not paved, so they walked on the hot dirt roads under the blazing Mideast sun—roads used by people and animals. Their feet would become hot, sweaty, sore, and covered in mud—maybe even animal dung, too.

 

Most people in our culture—even with a daily shower and “Fast-Actin’ Tinactin”— have nasty feet. The last thing anybody wants to do is clean somebody else’s. That was even truer in the first century.

 

At the low, U-shaped table where Jesus’ disciples recline, there are 24 dirty feet pin-wheeling out from the center—each one revealing a self-centered heart. (It’s not just their feet that are soiled.) Jesus takes off his outer garment. Bare-chested now, he wraps himself with a towel, just as a slave would do. And, grabbing the water jug and basin over by the door, God-in-human-flesh kneels down, takes the feet of the men he created, and begins to scrub them. He takes the dirt and dung off the feet of his own creatures.

 

Some kingdom.

 

Even Judas gets his feet washed—which is way over the top, don’t you think? If you knew that tonight was your last night, that tomorrow you were going to be executed, and that the guy setting it all up was in your cohort, would you have asked him to come over for dinner tonight? Would you have loved him, fed him, treated him with dignity, and then washed his crummy feet?

 

It’s hard to put ourselves into that scene. It’s one thing to be kind to our friends, but to be kind to our enemies—now, that’s a whole other level of kindness! How many of us would have poured the water over Judas’ head, and then whacked him in the face with the basin? (Thank God I’m not Jesus!)

 

But why does Jesus do it? Is Judas ever going to change? Is he ever going to repent? Is he ever going to love God in return? No! So why wash his feet? It’s not going to make a bit of difference. Pragmatically speaking, it’s not going to “work.”

 

So why do it? Jesus washes Judas’ feet because that’s what God is like.

 

God is slow to anger, abounding in love. God is patient and kind. God is scandalous in grace. And so is his Son, who has come to reveal the Father. So there in that upper room, Jesus washes the feet of the one who will betray him tonight, and arrange for his murder tomorrow.

 

It’s as if Jesus is saying, “I’m not scrubbing Judas’ feet for Judas; I’m scrubbing Judas’ feet for my Father. Judas may never appreciate this, but my Father does. Judas may never deserve this, but my Father does. I do this not because it will be successful or get noticed. I do this not because it will be a good investment of my time, energy, and emotions. I do this because God does feet. I do this because I lead by serving. I do this because I lead by loving.”

 

That’s the kingdom. And that’s our king. Amazing.

 

What can I do in response to such a scene but pray, “Jesus, reduce me to love.”

Is God our Cupbearer?

From the poem of Mechthild (of Magdeburg, 13th century) translated “The Flowing Light of the Godhead” we get a fascinating picture of God-Three-in-One (in Book II).

God as Cupbearer

[Cupbearer] noun chiefly historical or poetic/literary
a person who serves wine, esp. in a royal or noble household.

At first blush it may seem insulting to consider God in this servant role. Yet, God has always treated his people like royalty. He has always been the God who serves.

Former slaves in Egypt, the wandering Israelites were to be donned in fashions or regalia of the priestly class, and participate in many temple priestly rites and rituals, no matter their social class or gender. Unlike the pagans gods of the region, Yahweh–the living God–instituted numerous festivals and feasts, not for his pleasure and consumption, but for his people to enjoy.

A cupbearer tastes the drink and food before the king does. Utmost loyalty and devotion are required. If food is spoiled or poisoned, the cupbearer will pay the price, saving the King from harm. Didn’t God do this for us with our sin?

A helpful image in worship and prayer may be to envision God (Trinity, three-in-one God) as Cupbearer, Cup (becoming a broken cup pouring out life for us, in the sacrifice of Jesus the Christ) and the Wine from the Cup, as the healing presence of the Holy Spirit.

It is because God has served us so well, become broken and died from the poison we should have gotten, that we may be healed and redeemed by his Spirit, like healing Wine.

Have you heard this comparasion before? Does this visual help you? why or why not?

Thoughts? Comments?

Foot Washing (The Maundy Thursday observance)

Maundy Thursday

Today, I’m tossing a lateral pass on writing. My friend, Doug has recreated the Last Supper in a short story form that is both potent, amusing, and contemporary, and thereby worth your read. I think you’ll like his take here:

Excerpt:
Jesus bolted from the dinner table – didn’t even say “May I be excused?” – stripped to his boxers and started washing everybody’s feet. Peter made a fuss, of course, but Jesus said, ….

“Maundy” is derived from the Latin word, “Holy” (set apart).
Do you celebrate “Maundy Thursday”…or remember the events of the the night of the Last Supper, or Christ’s action of taking the role of a slave and washing his students’ feet? Reflection on that today, for at least a few minutes.

Read today’s Scripture below:
AND if you’d like share your spiritual reflections here:

Jesus Washes the Disciples’ Feet

JOHN 13:1 Now nbefore othe Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that phis hour had come qto depart out of this world to the Father, rhaving loved shis own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.  2 During supper, when tthe devil had already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, to betray him,  3 Jesus, knowing uthat the Father had given all things into his hands, and that vhe had come from God and wwas going back to God,  4 rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, xtied it around his waist.  5 Then he ypoured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him.  6 He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, do you wash my feet?”  7 zJesus answered him, “What I am doing ayou do not understand now, but afterward you will understand.”  8 bPeter said to him, “You shall never wash my feet.” Jesus answered him, c“If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.”  9 Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!”  10 Jesus said to him, “The one who has bathed does not need to wash, dexcept for his feet,1but is completely clean. And eyou2 are clean, fbut not every one of you.”  11 gFor he knew who was to betray him; that was why he said, “Not all of you are clean.”

12 When he had washed their feet and hput on his outer garments and resumed his place, he said to them, i“Do you understand what I have done to you?  13 jYou call me kTeacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am.  14 If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, lyou also ought to wash one another’s feet.  15 For I have given you an example, mthat you also should do just as I have done to you.  16 Truly, truly, I say to you, na servant3 is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him.  17 If you know these things, oblessed are you if you do them.  18 pI am not speaking of all of you; I know qwhom I have chosen. Butrthe Scripture will be fulfilled,4 s‘He who ate my bread has lifted his heel against me.’  19 tI am telling you this now, before it takes place, that when it does take place you may believe that I am he.  20 Truly, truly, I say to you, uwhoever receives the one I send receives me, and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me.”