Following Christ 08: Human Flourishing

If I don't get some of this recorded on my blog, the days between then and now will be too numerous for me to recall them well. This InterVarsity Grad/Faculty conference (and Jenny and I have attended all three, Ellen having attended 02 and Chuck, who stayed home with Karen so we could go, 98 and 02) was in my judgment the most practical for its young attendees. My quick report is divided into three parts:

1) the women's day-ahead mini-conference at which I was a small group leader. If I hadn't been asked to serve in this way, I would not have gone. Sharon Gartland and her team put together a marvelously well-thought through day of restoration considering, "Finding Space for God." Using a hands-on craft of creating a bowl that represented the space and time in our lives, paralleled with three commissioned dramas that powerfully explored Mary's response to God's word in her life overlaid by common professional women's experiences, a Nigerian poet's shared work, Renaissance art explained by an art-historian, worship (music, though not enough), exercise and time spend in small groups with scripture study and crafting and conversation, they both gave opportunity for restoration and challenges. Even those women who came in saying, "Crafts? I'm not crafy," went out refreshed.

2) the plenary evening sessions. Here the speakers were simple, direct and powerful. I'll try to convey the main points of three of them. The first woman, MaryKate Morse from George Fox U. Seminary, exhorted the often-fearful, anxious graduate students (and faculty) to resist the spirit of fear by "eating this verse: 'For God has not given us a spirit of fear but of power and love and a sound mind.'" One of the young gals in my day-ahead small group knew that MaryKate was speaking straight to her. The second, Jeff VanDuzer, is the dean of the School of Business at Seattle Pacific. He shared how his department is putting together a mission statement straight out of Genesis 1, countercultural to the greed model that has gotten our nation and world into so much disaster. The last to speak was Francis Collins, the former head of the Genome Project, who gave his conversion testimony and spoke of his confidence that believing scientists can embrace creation and evolution because "science is a joyful form of worship." He ended by playing a relatively new hymn (I wish I had copied the title), accompanying himself on his new guitar that is decorated with a double helix.

3) the expositions of three passages from Colossians by N.T. Wright. As usual, Wright is dense--if you let yourself drift off for a second, you've lost a point or two and maybe a thread that holds his lectures together--engaging and profound. I told the young gals who roomed with Jenny and me just to hold on to a point that means something to them and not worry about the rest. My friend Tom Trevethan, who always has his bunk-meter running, said to me that you could disagree with Wright about (say) the details of justification, but how could you listen to him and conclude that he is wrong in his sweeping conclusions. He urged the delegates to take up their tasks of bringing a fresh understanding of Jesus' power for the planet. From Colossians he looked first at God's Wisdom. To be genuinely human, you need wisdom and to get wisdom, you need Jesus. Through Jesus all things were made and will be reconciled. Humanity rescued and restored is humanity as it was meant to be." The next morning he took up the theme of Glory. He said that the Jews of Jesus' day understood the glory of God to be present in the Temple but of course understood the tensions inherent in the fact that the temple was not as it ought to be. We too live with the tensions of the fallen world and the promise of ultimate glory restored in creation. The theology of glory, he said, is rooted in the crucifixion, the tension only resolved with the appearing of Christ. This raises the question of mission in which Christians must bring together worship, justice, beauty and evangelism. His last exposition was of the notion of Virtue in Colossians. His cavet was that virtuous living is only by grace, not by self-help formulas. We become more human after our salvation because of we experience more of God in us through the spirit. Rules matter, he said, but they are not the principle thing nor the reaction to rules that says, "I'll be true to myself." The eschatological ethic is dying to self and being raised to the heavenly realities that enable you to be citizens of heaven and earth. Heaven is not 'up there' but "just on the other side of the thin veil of reality that we pierce with prayer and worship and service." We are a pilot project of the new world and must practice the instruments of the primary virtues of faith, hope and love.

And if I may add one other facet of human flourishing: friendship. I was able to meet and spend some (if not enough) time with dear friends from forty years ago and friends made while in Turkey and Egypt three years ago, good time with Jenny and the two (very) young grad students who shared a room with us, who discovered in each other the possibility of a deep friendship. Praise God!