Hallelujah for Saturday night TV

Confession: I have been known to get a lump in my throat during the X-Factor. Okay, maybe once or twice I might have got a little moist in the corner of my eyes too. Yes, I know, street cred in tatters etc etc. Last night, as most of the nation knows, was the grand final of the 2008 series, and round at the Wilson household events were carefully planned around it. Would the night end in the indignity of a little Irish munchkin scooping the prize or would a contestant with a bit of genuine talent eventually triumph?
Well, as it happened the former scenario was thankfully evaded as Eoghan was ditched at the first hurdle leaving solo artist Alexandra and boy-band JLS to battle it out for the top spot. And then things got interesting. For some baffling reason (perhaps the same baffling reason behind last week's performance of 'Amazing Grace' by Italian quartet Il Divo?) the final head to head song turned out to be Leonard Cohen's 'Hallelujah'. The classic Simon Cowell line, "Who on earth chose that song for you?" does spring to mind at this point. And yet it was a truly inspired song choice. Yes, this dark/light, folk/gospel, poem/ballad seemed to totally make sense, even on prime time Saturday night TV. The response of the studio audience and the judges to wave after wave of the song's 'Hallelujah' chorus belted out with passion and sincerity was probably the closest most people in this country are going to get to Christ this Christmas. Unless they go out and buy the single that is; because then they could have their very own dark/light, folk/gospel, poem/ballad worship time in the comfort of their own home. Which is actually quite exciting.

Atheists Going Public

You may or may not have heard about the British Humanist Society's plans to begin advertising on buses with the catchy slogan "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life." It's an interesting development within the larger debate that's been rumbling on for some time now - whether or not faith is a public or private matter. I'm a passionate advocate for the place of faith in public life. Privatized beliefs are utterly pointless, I mean, why bother believing anything if it has no connection to the way you live your life and if it isn't worth sharing with someone else? Books like the God Delusion and poster campaigns like this one (which probably doesn't even need to run now as it's attracted so much publicity already) bring the God conversation into the public realm and I love that. Faith is such a deliciously juicy subject to discuss and that's why it drives me nuts that it's too taboo to bring up in polite conversation. If only people could get beyond their cultural conditioning that schools them to resist any situation in which their worldview might be challenged. Pesky memes, they spoil all the fun.

For an interesting look at the 'Probably' bit of this poster see my review of the book 'Deluded By Dawkins'.

Small Ritual

Every now and again I find something on the internet that is jaw-droppingly cool. Yesterday I was having dumb fun generating geeky pictures of myself (not hard) at www.yearbookyourself.com. Today I was simply letting my eyes dance and my mind race as I flicked through the pages of Small Ritual. It basically combines two of my favourite things in the world: kick-ass graphic design and forward-thinking Christian faith. Bookmarks at the ready...

Everything Is Spiritual

Binging. That word looks wierd when you spell it out doesn't it? Binge. Come to think of it that's not much of an improvement. Anyway, whatever the word used to describe it, today I may have had a bit too much Rob Bell. Now I know what you're thinking - 'Matt Wilson suggesting you can have too much Rob Bell?' Well no, you'll be pleased to hear that my Rob Bell groupie status is still intact. It's just that I'd taken a break from the spectacled wonder for a little while and now I'm realising again why I liked him so much in the first place.
Everything Is Spiritual is the name of the new DVD Rob has released, an hour and a bit of one man theatre theology produced off the back of his 2007 tour of the same name. I actually bought it because I thought it would be a great way to stretch the minds of some of our gap year trainees. Now having watched it (3 times!) I'm pretty sure it would just go right over their heads. The material in it is just superb - from theology to cosmology, blending observational humour with philosophy, bringing quantum physics to life with doodles and wisecracks... "because we all know how exotic leptons can be right?"
For everyone who worries or wonders about the shallowness or the narrowness of the arguments on both sides of the faith / science divide this really is a feast. For everyone else, well, there's a reason they don't stock this at your local Blockbuster.

The Best Song Lyrics In The Universe... EVER!

OK, so we all cringe during the adverts at yet another over-hyped compilation album promising to whip us up into a frenzy of ecstasy/nostalgia/romance. And of course how can they ever deliver on these promises. But I wonder what songs would be on a compilation album that put together the 10 best opening song lines ever written? I love words, especially lyrics, with a passion (which is probably why I hate the majority of contemporary worship songs) and so having been blessed with a long weekend of doing not very much I have a few suggestions to make. I'd love to hear what yours would be.

1. Depeche Mode, Enjoy the silence: "Words like violence break the silence, come crashing in, into my little world"
2. Oasis, What's the story morning glory: "All your dreams are made when you're chained to the mirror and the razor blade"
3. Coldplay, Clocks: "Lights go out and I can't be saved, tides that I tried to swim against"
4. U2, Crumbs from your table: "From the brightest star comes the blackest hole"
5. Prince, Sign o the times: "In France a skinny man died of a big disease with a little name"

Mañana

Tomorrow the Wilson's will be heading off to Spain for a fortnight - I can't wait, the last few weeks have been seriously hectic! Apart from lots of family time and sampling a few fine Rioja's I'm looking forward to spending a couple of days at the ContraCorriente youth festival which will be taking place just south of Madrid. I so wish I'd persevered at my last attempt to learn Spanish but after weeks of listening to podcasts before my last trip out there I fell to pieces within about 1 minute of trying to chat to a taxi driver taking me from the airport to my hotel. One day I'll crack it though - I hate being a stereotypical monoligual Brit abroad. Speaking through an interpreter should be fun though, I'm planning on keeping my talks very visual using props and stuff to get the points across. How my story of nearly getting struck by lighting on an Indian beach will translate I'm really not sure!
The day before the Euro 2008 cup final (which I really hope Spain get to and win) I'll be taking a group out onto the streets of the town to do a bit of face to face mission with the local youth. I'll be seeing how a little idea I've used here in Manchester travels across the cultural divide. One of the challenges in short term mission in getting over the superficial 'How ya doin' and into a more meaningful conversation. It struck me a few weeks ago that maybe a cool way to get chatting to people, especially young people into the alternative scene would be to offer to do them a tattoo, with body paint. So I came up with some tribal designs and a bunch of words in gothic text and took them out to an event. It went down a storm and it was such a buzz to see young people walking round proudly displaying on their bodies words like: LOVED... CHOSEN... ETERNAL... HOPE.... It's a bit like being a hairdresser or something, they just sit there and happily chat until the job's done. The whole thing has a totally prophetic dimension too, it's a declaration of God's truth right there as close as you can possibly get. Part of me wishes I had a proper needle kit so they wouldn't be able to wash it off later! Anyway, I've had a translation done into Spanish and we're going to give it a whirl. Who knows, maybe it'll work ;-)

Wayside Pulpit

Driving around the city on a daily basis there are all sorts of things that catch my eye. Some of these things are clever, or beautiful, or original. Some aren't. In the second category are those gaudy, florescent signs found outside churches aka the 'Wayside Pulpit'. Just down the road from my house a new sign has gone up, bright yellow background with black writing in foot high block caps: "ALL WELCOME HERE" It's perhaps the most unwelcoming sign imaginable. And herein lies the problem. It's not just that local PCCs or whoever commissions these signs seem utterly unaware that technology has moved on to the extent that a full colour digitally printed poster would actually be a cheaper solution. No, there is a common tone of voice that seems present wherever the Wayside Pulpit is found.
I was driving down the A6 through Stockport the other day and saw a sign that must get at least 100,000 cars driving past it everyday: "JESUS CAME INTO THE WORLD TO SAVE SINNERS". It was classic of the paradigm within which all these posters seems to exist, US vs THEM. A line is drawn and rather than stepping over it in an outwards motion the slogans expect the reader to cross over and move inwards. The Stockport sign is a classic example. How different would the tone of voice be if the whole of 1 Tim 1:15 was quoted, "Jesus came into the world to save sinners - of whom I am the worst." Rather than emphasising to passing commuters just how different they are, SINNERS not SAVED, a message like this might just be able to build a tentative association... "YOU + US, we're not that different, we have stuff in common, it might be worth us taking this conversation further..."

Information Overload

I've spent the past couple of days in London. While I was there I got chance to take a look at the Cans Festival 'Exhibition' which is just a short walk from Waterloo Station. It's the kind of place you could easily spend a whole day, but I only had about half an hour to spare so it was the briefest of glances. As you walk through the tunnel the colour, wit and propaganda leaps out from every painted brick. Most of the pieces in the 'fat end' of the tunnel were pretty large works, painstakingly executed. But at the far end, just beyond the bend and back in the daylight, was a whole patchwork quilt of smaller stencils, hardly a single square inch of the concrete was visible. I reckon there must've been a few hundred artists who'd gone to town on it. 

As I stood there taking in a 360 view I sensed my mind beginning to 'zoom out'. There was just too much information, it was too much to process. I started wondering if I was actually surveying not just a randomly assorted mish-mash of artists but actually a single, powerful, metaphor of the world we now inhabit. Our senses are struggling to cope with information overload. There are so many messages, so many voices demanding our attention. Yes there's a heck of a lot of crap - but it's such well packaged crap - how do we begin to discern the good from the bad, the worthy from the pointless? And perhaps most relevant to a blogger like me, if we feel we actually have something to say, how do we cut through the crap and get noticed? 

Dream Big, Live Small

Last week whilst he was with us in Manchester Shane Claiborne used a really catchy little phrase that I think I'm going to adopt as my own: 'Dream Big, Live Small'. My thoughts have been quite occupied recently with how I prevent my life getting 'bigger' year on year. I think this may be because last year was such a dramatic year of growth, which bugs me. Our growing family meant we moved from a little 2 bed apartment to a full blown 3 bed house, and in the process I bought a new car, which happened to be bigger than the old one (again a family thing, boot space etc). But basically I'm hoping that this is as big as we'll get. I'm hoping that the Wilson's have 'topped out' in terms of bigness. Indeed I'm even thinking about how I can take a benchmark of our current bigness (e.g. utilities used, recycling achieved, miles driven etc.) so that I can actually prove to myself that I'm not still expanding 2 or 3 years from now but hopefully contracting and reducing. 
Yesterday I was surfing from blog to blog, following the links to see where I'd end up and I stumbled upon a sort of cool, American emerging church type with a motto emblazoned on his header image: 'LIVE VENTI'. For those unfamiliar with Starbucks lingo it's the biggest size they do (20 oz / 600ml) - it's their equivalent of McDonald's Supersize (now banned I think). There was a photo of this guy, looking cool, not fat at all. It was then that Shane's catchphrase popped back into my mind. If Shane were to go all Starbucks on us tomorrow (which isn't likely to happen is it) that would mean he might start saying 'DREAM VENTI, LIVE SHORT' (short being Starbuck's smallest size). And therein lies a profound difference. 
If we're to live lives inspired and informed by the life and Spirit of Jesus we will indeed aspire to great things, venti things - but not for our own gratification. This isn't about my venti house, my venti car, my venti coffee, my venti anything! In an over-crowded, under-resourced world we should dare to dream venti dreams, like seeing wars end, clean water for all and trade becoming just. But we should also to take a long hard look at our own footprint on the world and ensure that we're not undermining our own aspirations with our default venti consumer lifestyles. Let's have a revolution of thought like the one brought about by the famous 1960 VW ad that flew in the face of the zeitgeist of the day and showed another way...

American Idol does Hillsong

I think I should be happy about this but instead it just gives me the creeps. Can anyone offer a diagnosis as to why?

Passion Week

I'm really looking forward to the BBC miniseries due to start on Sunday. There is no greater drama than those scenes surrounding Jesus of Nazareth during that fateful Passover festival 2000 years ago. For a few short days the Jerusalem air was filled with a heady cocktail of parody, irony, anger, love, justice, corruption, betrayal, loss, hope and belief. The world has never been the same.

Douggie hits the Top 40!

What a glorious day, the most persevering of would-be popstars Doug Walker has finally made it into the Top 40! Am I happy because now I can claim some kind of cool-by-association? Well yes, I probably will dig the wedding video out of the basement, not everybody has a Top 40 artist singing for them (yes OK Anna you pulled KT Tunstall out of the bag which has yet to be bettered). No, I'm really happy because Doug is a top bloke who has invested in his God-given talents as a musician and a songwriter and has reached the place where he is producing material that belongs in the Top 40, Top 20, Top 10 even. In particular I could wax on about the lyrics all day because he's really caught something special but instead I'll just invite you to:
a) listen and enjoy, and
b) go straight to iTunes and buy The Mystery now!

"...but this is a Christian nation!"

"...but this is a Christian nation!" So ends another whining diatribe against the latest secular or islamic or humanistic or homo-erotic or politically correct initiative / incident / news story.
Two things collided this week to remind me again just how misguided these passionately held sentiments are. Firstly, I've been reading the Old Testament books of Jeremiah and Daniel, alongside Brueggemann's 'The Prophetic Imagination'. Then, midweek, Channel 4 showed 'Kingdom of Heaven' and whilst the film as a whole was largely a disappointment to me it was still thought provoking on a number of levels. At one point in the film Jeremy Irons delivers a line about Jerusalem (and I wish I could remember it) that evokes the contradiction at the heart of that much used phrase "Christian nation." The blood that has been shed over that dusty bit of land is utterly heinous. Jesus himself made it absolutely clear that his intention was not to establish a Kingdom with geographic borders but a Kingdom defined by a Way of life, exemplified by people of every ethnos living in relationship with him and harmony with one another.
And where do Jeremiah and Daniel fit into that? Well they are just two of the characters we meet in the grand timeline of biblical history who are doing exactly what we (Christians in 21st Century Britain) ought to be doing - working out by our daily choices and actions exactly what it means to honour God and live for him in the midst of a society that revolves around a very different centre of gravity. The quirk of global history known as Christendom is over and we find ourselves living out the same question as our biblical forebears - those who sweated in Egypt, wept in Babylon and faced down Caesar's lions... "How can we prove the value of our convictions over-against the current socio-political backdrop?"

The Power of Ikea

I'm reading Walter Wink's The Powers That be: Theology for a New Millenniumat the moment. It's an interesting book that has a lot to say about the interaction between the spiritual and the material. Wink believes that every organisation, has a 'spirit' - not an actual celestial being like an angel or a demon - but a personality of sorts which once it has been given life then begins to will and act through the entity of the organisation. These 'spirits' can often be tangibly felt by those with a modicum of spiritual discernment. I must admit, whilst his writing is communicated with a good deal of biblical coherence I was struggling to make the mental leap necessary to take his ideas on board. Then I went to Ikea.
What is it about Ikea? The place makes me feel so uncomfortable (which must be the ultimate irony considering its a furniture store!) The minute I walk in the place I start to get a creeping sensation of rage. And every Ikea store I've been in seems to have the same effect. It's like there's a mass-hypnotism in progress, people just aren't themselves. From the car park to the checkout it seems that the blue and yellow beast has its wicked way with otherwise ordinary citizens. Is it just me or can anyone else relate to that???

Is virginity the last taboo?

I was surprised by the affirming stance taken in this article which was printed in Sunday's Observer... what do you think?
"In our hyper-sexualised, ultra-liberal society, virgins are perhaps the only sexual sub-culture left with the power to shock us. You can be as gay or as fetishy or as promiscuous or as transsexual as you like; you can be a regular at Cake parties and on the dogging scene; you can be part of an open relationship, and we won't bat an eyelid. But a virgin? Are you serious? We simply don't expect to encounter them any more. We certainly don't expect to meet attractive, assertive, well-dressed, professional, celibate Christians in their late twenties. But it seems that they do exist. And furthermore, they reckon there are hidden benefits to their choice."

CLICK HERE for full article

The Hope Dilemma

I'm not much of a telly addict but there are some shows that hook my attention. Top Gear obviously. Heroes has been the recent fave. And a little while ago, Lost, until it moved to Sky. But wahey, my sister bought us the complete Season 3 box set for Chrimbo so now every night Grace and I can get our fix. Last night we watched two in a row (very nearly three!) the second of which had a really fascinating bit of dialogue. Hard-man Sawyer was trying to talk his love interest Kate out of escaping from the cages they're being held in. Kate couldn't understand why he had suddenly become so resigned to his fate.

KATE: Go! Get out of here, run!
SAWYER: You're out of your cage. Why don't you run?! Because me? I ain't running, 'cause there ain't no place to go.
KATE: What are you talking about?
SAWYER: We ain't on our island. We're on another island, like Alcatraz, couple miles off shore. So unless you're a mermaid, or you got a boat, there ain't no point.
KATE: When were you planning on telling me this?
SAWYER: Never.
KATE: Why not?! Why wouldn't you?!
SAWYER: 'Cause I wanted you to believe we had a goddamn chance.

This stood out to me because I've had similar thoughts myself. The circumstances of life can make us feel caged. We yearn for escape and form both personal and collective beliefs about when and how we will get out to a better place. But what if one person finds something out that has serious implications for the hope held onto by another one or many? Should that person share it and shatter the hope, or keep quiet, allowing the fragile but life-giving hope to live on?

Brand vs Dawkins

In so many ways this clip from Russell Brand's Radio 2 show last Saturday night is so much more than a comedian talking to a scientist, it illustrates the great paradigm shift of our times - from modernism to postmodernism. I'd love to know what you think of it - leave me a comment.

Bring Back God

One of the 'fleshly' appetites I have to try hard to keep in check is my love of designer clothes - I'm not into flash but I really love quality and I have some brands that I'm pretty loyal to. This is now compounded by the fact that fashion is an industry not exactly renowned for its ethical record - right now as I speak GAP are reeling from recently being busted (again) for using factories that employ child labour. But check this out - a designer with not only an ethical but also a spiritual conscience! London based Katherine Hamnett made her name in the 80's with those oversize T-Shirts saying 'CHOOSE LIFE' as worn by Wham. As with everything in fashion what goes around comes around but in the last 25 years the cultural goalposts have shifted. The new range of slogans include the superb 'BRING BACK GOD'. Her website describes the idea like this:
"Why isn’t there just nothing? Nobody knows how life started. Darwinism is just part of the answer and all other possibilities have to be considered equally valid including a supernatural one, including a creator. The right to believe in a God is one of our civil liberties."
So will I soon be cleansing my label conscience in one of these organic cotton tees, printed in the UK with water-based, environmentally friendly printing inks? Not at £40 a pop I won't!

Belonging then and now

Following on from my last post I thought it might be a good idea to insert the quotation from The Missional Leader that got me thinking about this in the first place:
"In the time of Tertullian, someone wanting to belong to the church had to go through a rigorous period of training focused on behaviour (how daily life was actually lived). In other words, to belong to the community of Jesus, a person was mentored in practicing change in habits. Today leaders talk about the need to create a safe, non-threatening, low threshold of belonging in order to draw people into the church. Note the two radically different ways in which the same language is being used. These approaches suggest contrasting sources of understanding. In the latter case and in our contemporary context, the source of this thinking is not theologically, biblically formed imagination but the latest marketing strategies that come from polls and studies about what people are looking for when they join a group... Tertullian's primary concern as a leader was formation of people around a specific set of habits and practices that came out of his engagement with scripture."

The quote is from the beginning of Part 2 of the book, which is probably the place to start if you're gonna read it.

Forrest Gump Christianity

Forrest Gump was an endearing character and when the film came out in 1994 it took the world by storm. It won 6 oscars (nominated for 13), it had a top selling soundtrack, it tapped into something. Yes, he was slow, simple and made sense of the world around him through his mothers childish proverbs. But as Forrest Gump blundered through life amazing things happened to him and he did amazing things.
And that touches us deep inside.
Because we yearn for simplicity in a complicated world.
We shrink from the responsibility of being grown up.
It’s comforting to believe that we’re OK as we are, that we don’t need to change, that good things will happen to us because we’re good people.
And so we can make a nice comfortable theology for ourselves by plucking verses from here and there; that we don’t need to worry because God clothes the flowers of the field, or that we must simply come to him as little children, or that his house has many rooms and one day he’ll come and take us there… but who are we trying to kid? Jesus did not live a Forrest Gump style existence! Neither did he appear on the earth as a finished product - an all-knowing rugrat revealing universal mysteries at the Bethlehem mums and tots group. He needed to grow into all his human potential just like we do. The bible says that he, "grew in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and men." (Luke 2:52) Later it says that "in all things" we need to "grow up into him". (Ephesians 4:15)
No matter how much we want our growing pains to come to an end we should just think first what it really means to stop growing... it means we start dying.