All institutions belong to the category of principalities and powers. They are not inherently evil. The principalities and powers are, like all things, created. We are to have dominion over them, not them over us. They are to serve us. Not us them. This includes the institution we call the church.
A few weeks ago I attended what we might call a house church of young adults (here and here). I was asked to come and share with them some of my thoughts. We met in a living room. There was food and wine. It was fun. And we had communion, had a theological discussion, and there was prayer. What was missing was this sense of expectation that an institution imposes on people. There was no overriding agenda that had to be met. And these young people were free of the constant surveillance that the church often exercises over its members. Their spiritual condition was their own personal responsibility, and they gathered occasionally to encourage one another. They didn’t come hoping that this would fill a void in their own lives. We just gathered as friends. And even though there was a recognition of commitment and even love, I came free and left free. I realize that it is easier to achieve this without a building, staff, budgets and charters, etc. But it was refreshing.
This isn’t easy to accomplish. It means constantly challenging the principalities and powers, the institution, to humble itself, relinquish its vision and agenda that is often dehumanizing, and serve us.
Cartoonist.
Artist.
Spirituality Coach.
Writer.
Speaker.
one of the only other enduring and utterly successful groups that i witness like this is AA/12-step transformational spirituality. it seems they have some inherent essence that embraces the challenging of of principalities and powers of the institution to humble itself for the sake of those frail beings on the journey of transformation who gather and who are within its sphere…
i often think our imaginations are flattened via our conceptions of demons, angels, spirits, principalities and powers…and in that almost selfish viewpoint we anthropomorphasize them and mis-percieve their essence and being…and its probably a bit arrogant to think their being is too much like mine…
anyway, i really appreciate your thoughts david…
To quote you, substituting one item…
Monkeys are not inherently evil. The primates are, like all things, created. We are to have dominion over them, not them over us. They are to serve us. Not us them.
Do you see where I’m heading?
“Man, last Friday I visited friends who didn’t have a large male chimpanzee in their living room like we do at home. It was so peaceful and refreshing. I wonder how my house could be like theirs? Oh God, time to wash the monkey again.”
Mark, I’m kinda dumb sometimes, mind explaining what you’re saying a bit more?
To NPs post: You made me think of how Jesus said: Sabbath is for people, not people for the Sabbath.
Dave went and enjoyed some time with folks apart from the institution and enjoyed it. He said that the institution (even of his church for example) is a power and principality but was not inherently evil and we have dominion over it. So on the one hand he is glad when he is free of it, and on the other hand he returns to it.
I was just thinking of some other things that are not inherently evil that we have dominion over, but keep owning and operating even though they are driving us into the ground. Monkeys were the funniest to me.
He has to return to it or he wouldn’t have a job! Anyway, one usually has a certain loyalty to a particular known community of people. Your analogy was hopelessly unanalogous btw because a monkey is an individual.
An individual with the traits of an institution. Can be taught to do tasks inefficiently. Needs attention or gets unruly. Eats resources that could go to the family. Looks like human life but is not. In company, distracting.
Job. It always comes down to that. He wants the monkey, they want the monkey. But they secretly hate the monkey.
Mark
Methinks youve been playing with your monkey too much. Havnt you gone blind yet.
Half blind. Got rid of the monkey (that’s the point of my posts).
Mark VH: I think that whenever people gather together intentionally it becomes a kind of institution. Like a family is an institution. However, there are ways of overcoming the ambitious tendencies of the principalities and powers. The refreshing group I went to will have its problems. Same as my church here. There are refreshing times, but other times the principalities and powers have sway. That’s what I meant.
david
I’m just messing around, and kind of killed a joke that would have been better as a cartoon. I’ll grant that there are degrees of institution in any gathering. But once we grant that there are degrees, we recognize that we also have some choice in how many complications we heap on our plates, or more optimistically, how many complications that we can shed corporately.
Mark VH,
I like the way your mind monkeys around and goes a little bananas with ideas. :^) We don’t have to stay locked in the cage crossing the monkey bars and playing Monkey See, Monkey Do all day, do we? It’s refreshing when we realize that the jungle is ours to explore!
Have you been influenced by neo-Calvinism at all, David? (I mean the Kuyper / Dooyeweerd tradition, not the New Calvinism of Driscoll et al) If so, what do you think about Sphere Sovereignty etc?
that line “sense of expectation that an institution imposes on people” I interpret to mean that when you attend a traditional church worship service you worship according to form of worship that church follows-for me personally when I was attending a traditional Presbyterian church service on Sundays I always felt I was not being natural-I was not being me as a Christian-it sounds like what you experienced among those Christians was more natural-how we naturally act as Christians-let’s be real-lovers of the Lord Jesus Christ-peace Jonny
“And these young people were free of the constant surveillance that the church often exercises over its members.”
I have been a member of a church for 15 years and I have never seen that happen, at all, in all that time.
I feel terribly sorry for people who attend churches where the freedom of Christ is not foremost in the theology.
It is the Word of God that keeps us where we ought to be. Over and over and over again…we fail…and are forgiven. That’s the life of a believer.
steve,
Really curious as to where you attend church that you’ve never seen that in 15 years.
Christine,
I attend a small (150 members) Lutheran church in Southern California.
We are a traditional, confessional, evangelical, Luthern congregation.
Got to run…late for work!
Ciao!
Paul Robinson: I have certainly been influenced by Calvinism, having prepared for ministry at Knox Presbyterian college in Toronto and Presbyterian College at McGill in Montreal, being ordained in the Presbyterian Church in Canada in 1987 and serving that church for almost 10 years. I am very influenced by Reformed theology, especially the Barthian kind, as well as Barth interpreted by Thomas Torrance to some degree. I have never been a fan of Dutch Calvinism, although the Sphere Sovereignty idea has some excellent insights. So I would say I’m more Reformed than Calvinist or neo-Calvinist.
I see, thanks. (Just call me “Paul” please! Only teachers and police have called me “Paul Robinson”, it’s never good!)
i just did that so people would know who i was answering. thanks paul.