Pigs and chickens

This post is sort of a follow-on to my last one. It's a bit more on the organizational structures that I'm seeing emerge in both my day job and my church world (and how much they have in common), and it also explains why the comic strip at the top of my last post starred a pig and a chicken. In case you were wondering.

There's a software development methodology called Scrum. It's named after a play in rugby matches. I like it. I believe it works well, in some contexts. It's possible that some of those contexts have nothing to do with software development.

One Scrum concept is the idea of "pigs and chickens". The idea comes from this joke:

A pig and a chicken are walking down a road. The chicken looks at the pig and says, "Hey, why don't we open a restaurant?" The pig looks back at the chicken and says, "Good idea, what do you want to call it?" The chicken thinks about it and says, "Why don't we call it 'Ham and Eggs'?" "I don't think so," says the pig, "I'd be committed but you'd only be involved."

I've been reflecting on this in relation to church polity/leadership issues, and have come up with some tentative thoughts.

The first thought has to do with why I'm a dyed-in-the-wool congregationalist. I've long known that I feel strongly that church congregations ought to have very broad freedom in determining just about everything for themselves. One reason why I feel this way is this: the folks in the local congregation are "pigs", when it comes to issues of worship, leadership, ministry, discipleship, mission, etc. for that congregation in particular. Bishops, presbyteries, external trustees, denominational executives - anyone who aren't active members of the congregation - are inevitably chickens. And, well - screw you, alls y'all chickens. Not that I don't want to hear your voice - I do. You're welcome to be "involved". But the reality is you're only involved. The people living this thing every day are (hopefully) committed.

My next thought has to do with one reason I'm not a fan of "lay"/"clergy" distinctions. Take a congregation of 100 people. Let's say three of them are full-time paid clergy, and the rest are lay people. Three people (who happen to be the folks expected to lead this thing) are depending on everybody else for their livelihood, to put food on their family's table, not to mention their sense of vocation. They have a very vested interest in leading the congregation in such a way that ensures said food keeps heading toward said table. As for everybody else - well, they'll keep participating as long as it makes sense to them to do so. Now who's pigs, and who's chickens?

I'm just a big believer in two things, I guess: power to the pigs - and everybody in the barnyard is invited to put their bacon on the table.

photo by Kevin Hutchinson (rights)

Self-organizing teams

Just a few words about self-organizing teams. This is the world I swim in: on my day job (especially singe we've started experimenting with Agile Software Development practices) and on my church life in the "emerging church" milieu.

As this article says, leadership is not obsolete in self-organizing teams! It's different, though, in that leaders are chosen by the team. Probably not democratically, either; instead, it's something more like consensus. Also (and this is key!) the leaders must be held accountable by the team. If they aren't needed in that role (or if they're even harmful to the team), they need to know it, and either adjust their patterns or find a different role. I can't emphasize enough how important that team accountability smackdown is to making this work.

And it's only under certain conditions that such a team dynamic is possible:

• It needs to be a culture that truly values humility and service; not a highly-competitive culture.
• It needs to be a culture in which the average team member truly feels empowered and envoiced.
• It needs to be community of exceptionally high "quality" members. By "quality", I don't mean some kind of fundamental worth - all humans are made in God's image and likeness and hence are fundamentally of the very highest quality imaginable. I mean it in a very specific, utilitarian sense: people who are capable of making a real contribution to "the business at hand" ("BAH"), whatever that is. I would break that down even further to mean people who are:
  
  
  1. Gifted in ways that can directly contribute to the BAH.
  2. Not apathetic about the BAH - in some sense, they find it interesting and worth their while.
  3. Not completely self-centered; rather, they are concerned at some level with the common good.

I'm crazy-blessed that, in my church and work lives, I'm surrounded by people who are extremely high-"quality" in these ways, and part of cultures that very much meet those other criteria - cultures of humility and empowerment. It's dawning on me that I thrive in an environment like this, and would probably FAIL spectacularly in a different environment.

But just to say: not every culture, context, and environment is suited for Scrum, or for "emerging church". Not yet, anyway. Not until we take over the world. Muhahahahaha! ;-)

Code = Poetry

I was just reflecting on the strong commonalities between these two art forms: poetry, and code (i.e., computer programs). (If you don't think code is an art form, either you aren't a coder, or you are a coder and consider "art" to be a somewhat pejorative term.)

Both are, ideally, elegant and powerfully expressive applications of language.

Each form values both beauty (simplicity, elegance, etc.) and "correctness" (i.e., conforming to practical rules), though probably to differing degrees. A poem may perhaps be valuable if it is beautiful, but conforms to no rules. A program, in theory, may be valuable if it's correct, but ugly. I believe both cases are very rare.

Both are, by virtue of the process that creates them, greater than the sum of their parts (i.e., their words and characters). A good program accomplishes some practical task; a good poem evokes some emotional or spiritual response.

And other stuff, too.

That's all I have to say about that, today. :-) Here are some Perl poems, including:

# Perl Haiku by Bob Meyers

use strict; my @love;
my $wounds = open(FLAME, "of_passion");
foreach () {
push @love "fully";
}

And you can buy the shirt up top right here.

Nexus

Likely this will fascinate nobody but me. But it fascinates me.

I probably have too many Facebook friends. I've made it a practice to accept friend requests from anybody who "friended" me, unless there was no discernable non-commerce-related reason why they would do so. For the most part, folks whom I don't know who friended me have been one degree of separation away, and part of the "emerging/missional church" conversations in some way shape, or form. It's seemed, well, unfriendly to ignore those friend requests, and so I haven't.

But over time I've gotten more requests from folks who are not just friends of friends, but friends of "friends", if you know what I mean - i.e., two or more degrees of separation away, connected to me only by other folks I don't really know that well, if at all. Still, I've tried to err on the side of "friendly", and it's actually been pretty interesting - seeing, through the status updates of folks I don't really know, what's going on in the Church in a wide variety of contexts. And also seeing frequent updates from chatty folks who rave or rant about things I really just don't need to know about. (Sorry. Luckily, Facebook has ways of regulating that without necessarily un-friending people.)

Anyway, now I have lots of "friends", intersecting with the rather more significant blessing of many real-life friends, many of whom are not, alas, on Facebook. But I'm fascinated with exploring how my Facebook friends relate to each other. Who are they friends with? What do they have in common? How do clusters of friends from different "spheres" of my life intersect? Who are the "bridge" people in my life? The picture afforded by Facebook is very imperfect, what with all the "friends" on FB that I don't really know, and all the dear friends in real life who aren't on FB. And also, lots of people who know each other in real life aren't the Facebook sluts that I am, and haven't necessarily friended one another. But anyway. This fascinates me.

And aiding in my fascination is this cool tool called "Nexus". Here's the link to the interactive version. I think you can access that without being me, my friend, or even a Facebook user, but in case I'm wrong, here's a less-enlightening flat version (click to embiggen):


And here's the flat version, annotated to mark out "clusters" of my friends:


See? I told you I was going to find that a lot more fascinating that you do. But if you use Facebook, you might find it interesting to generate your own graph.

Wisdom

So like most of us us who were there, I think I'm going to be processing this past weekend in Philly for a while. But two of the things I'm chewing on most of all are these two quotes.

The first, from our guest of honor, the inimitable Peter Rollins (roughly paraphrased - who could keep up with the man's words?):

Whenever a circle is drawn defining insiders and outsiders, us and them - the Christian is the one who always steps outside that circle to identify with the outsiders.

(If anyone can improve my remembrance of that idea, please help. There will be a podcast, I think.)

The second quote is from Bob, our gracious host (we crashed at his house), a wise and unbitter escaped pastor:

Money almost always presupposes control.

I keep turning over and over those two ideas. Maybe eventually I'll make something of them.

DC Emergent Cohort - tomorrow, Tuesday the 11th

From Sara at the Cohort blog:

Hey - We will meet at 7pm at the Front Page Resturant on Dupont Circle in Tuesday November 11 to get the low down on the Emergent Mid Atlantic gather that took place over the weekend in Philly. Yours truly was not able to go, but I'm hoping that those of you who did (hint, hint) would be willing to give us and update of what happened, what was said, etc.

That "hint, hint" was partially directed at me, so if you attend, you may get to see me attempt to re-create the experience by imitating a manic, fast-talking, wildly gesticulating Irishman with more mind-bending, life-changing theological brilliance than two continents' worth of tweed-bound systematic theology profs.

But probably not.

On having little to say

I used to blog a lot. March '08, not so long ago, was a banner month for my blogging output, in fact.

Now I don't blog so much. I was thinking, this morning, about why that might be. I think it's mostly because my thoughts of late - about church, theology, community, culture, etc. - are muchly in a swirl of speculation, and rarely seem to crystallize enough to warrant a blog post. It's been like this:

• I do what I do (church stuff, family stuff, day job, etc.).
• I think I perceive a pattern or something.
• I have some conversations about it with friends.
• I realize that the reality is more complicated than I was thinking.
• The pattern grows indistinct.
• I do not blog it. Return to first bullet point.

I think this is good. There's nothing bad about this. I'm learning, and listening, and tentatively experimenting. I've had phases like this before, and I feel like with all the cultural change that's swirling about us, this sort of thing is pretty appropriate right now. If you're paying attention, it becomes clear that "paying attention" is a good game plan these days. Or so it seems to me.

In other news, I switched feed readers. Sayonara, Bloglines - you've served me well. I may come back to you one day, but for now I'm lured by the siren call of Google Reader, with its much superior mobile interface, integration with Blogger, and general feature set.

Also, I'm proud of my country right now. I don't think I have crazy expectations, but it doesn't feel bad to indulge in some smile for this deeply flawed, idealistic human enterprise we call the USA, with its huge potential for good, as well as evil.

Peace.

Next Northern VA Cohort gathering - tomorrow (Monday) night in Falls Church

From the NoVA Cohort Blog:

Time: November 3, 2008 at 8pm
Location: Starbucks at Falls Plaza
Organized By: Northern Virginia Emergent Cohort

Event Description:
So we're hoping that we can get a good showing this coming Monday night for a conversation. Our friend Mike C. has proposed a couple conversations and I think one of them is perfect for this coming Monday.

"The Emerging Church in [McCain/Obama]-led America"


We are changing locations to hopefully draw a few more people. We will be meeting at:

Starbucks at Falls Plaza
1218 W Broad St, Falls Church, VA‎ - (703) 534-3111
8pm, Monday, November 3, 2008

Orange Line Accessible - West Falls Church Station

This is true

Same goes for smartphones. Thanks, xkcd.com. :-)

Evangemergent

(Note: The diagram above, IMHO, is BS. I love it when people draw "orthodox Christianity" in such a way as to exclude the VAST majority of Christians who would fit traditional definitions of orthodoxy. But it is BS that was helpful to someone, so yay.)

(Note #2: OK, Stav, fine, here's the blog post you made me promise to write.) ;-)

So: lots of folks in the Emergent world have been a-twitter over the new network being formed by some folks who have been active participants in Emergent Village and the wider "emerging church" conversation. The concern, I think, has been along the lines of: "Why? Why a new network? Why not stay committed to the one we've got? The diversity of the existing conversation is its strength!"

But to me, it just seemed like a natural thing. In many ways, the new network seems like it's just "Evangemergent". It's a network of folks who are, de facto and by association, part of whatever this "church that is emerging" is becoming - but who don't want to give up on some of the cherished distinctives of their traditional background.

In that sense, it's like the denominational networks that Phyllis Tickle calls the "hyphenateds", such as Anglimergent (Anglican and Emergent), Presbymergent (Presbyterian and Emergent), Luthermergent (g'wan, guess), etc. Just as the folks in those networks are part of this emerging thingamajig, but don't want to give up on the structures, organizations, and traditions of their denominations, the folks in this new network will (it seems) be part of the broader conversation while remaining committed to some of the core distinctives of the evangelical tradition (notably: the primacy of evangelism, and a commitment to doctrinal statements - in this case, the Lausanne Covenant.)

Though I have somewhat mixed feelings about the "hyphenated" networks, I'm an active participant in Anglimergent, and in general I think these networks serve a valuable purpose in widening and broadening the conversation. On the other hand, it is worth noting a difference between this new evangelical network and the other "hyphenateds": in rallying around the Lausanne Covenant, one strongly suspects that this new network is at least partly motivated by a desire to connect with evangelicals who would explicitly divide with folks who do not affirm a proper evangelical doctrinal statement. This is different, I think, from the networks that affiliate with the more mainline denominations: though those denominations might (due to lack of knowledge or competing priorities) have little interest in engaging with the "emerging church", they would, generally speaking, not draw their "circles of orthodoxy" in such a way as to exclude it. (See, in contrast, the diagram above.)

But really, I think that's fine. Folks like Scot McKnight and Dan Kimball have stated that they intend to maintain their connections and friendships within the existing "emerging" conversation. And if they do that while also engaging with folks who would be leery of connecting with some "emerging" folks due to a perceived lack of doctrinal clarity, then yay. The conversation has been widened, and broadened. And that's fine with me.

DC Emergent Cohort - tomorrow, Tuesday the 14th

This just in from Sara and Jason:

Are YOU ready for the election??

The DC Cohort will meet TOMORROW Tuesday October 14th at 7pm at the Front Page. Jason Mack will lead us in a discussion about the politial times and the church. Seeing as the election for our next President: Commander and Chief is around the perverbial corner, we thought it would be good to flesh out what everyone is thinking about the state of things as it relates to the church.

Our next gathering (November 11th) will take place after the election so at that time we will really be able to take stock and talk about what the future might hold.
We hope to see each of you at the Page at 7pm TOMORROW night, Oct 14th.

(The Front Page is across the street from the Dupont Circle Metro. We are the motley crew with the large table in the corner)

peace and grace,

Sara and Jason

Mortgage monster

Is it ever OK to demonize someone? How 'bout if it's not a specific someone but just a vague class of people, not including anyone you actually know? No? How 'bout if that class of people is fairly objectively responsible for an awful lot of pain and heartache among your friends and neighbors? Still no? How 'bout if it's Halloween?

Probably not, I guess. But when Whitney pointed me at this Monster Maker from the San Antonio Express News (See? Newspaper websites do so make a valuable contribution to our culture!) - well, this is just what jumped out. I didn't set out to make him, but kinda like the golden calf - shazzam! There he was.

I'll get to work repenting now.

Hollywood calls YOU to responsibility as a citizen of Empire

The Hollywood pantheon has spoken. It's cute and cheeky, and frames issues in a very liberal-entertainment-wing-of-the-Empire sort of way, but I have to say I agree with the basic message: to fail in this fundamental exercise of civic responsibility is to deny our complicity in the heartless and horrible acts that Empire commits in our name.

Where I am

The New Hampshire Highland Games,
Sept. 19-21, 2008

In case you were wondering.

It's all Scottish here. No crap.

9/11 and the emerging church

I haven't been through what Fred Burnham's been through, but I found his story moving in the extreme. Please watch this video and listen to the story.

This is why I'm a part of the "emerging church" movement. It's why I'm passionately and whole-heartedly committed to a particular community within that movement.

There are communities that embody the loving relationships and self-organizing faithfulness that Fred describes. If you're not a part of one, brother or sister...find one.

(Embedded video below.)


9/11 and the Emerging Church from Steve Knight on Vimeo.

DC Emergent Cohort - tonight!

Re-posted from Sara's email:

Join us TONIGHT September 9 at 7pm at the Front Page in Dupont Circle as we try to answer the question:

Church Leadership and Governmental Structures: How can we become more post modern?

What will leadership look like in our churches and denominations as the church begins to live into a more emerging, first century model??

Mike Croghan and Mike Stavlund will lead our discussion. We look forward to seeing you all there! For more info go to the blog http://www.dccohort.blogspot.com

Also: Update on the Emergent Mid Atlantic Conference. It is now a one day event, Saturday November 8 - still in Philadelphia and Pete Rollins is still the speaker. For more information and to register go to http://emergentmidatlantic.com/

NEW: Emergent Southeast Gathering 2008 will take place in Birmingham, AL Oct 31 - Nov 2 Come spend All Saints Day with like minded Christians! For more information and to register go to http://emergentsegathering.pbwiki.com/

See you tonight!!

Blessings! Sara and Jason

Sometimes I doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion

Just re-watching one of my favorite movies, and thought I'd share.

My legs, they keep moving!

So tonight I jogged about 3.7 miles (about 6 km) without a pause. I guess that means that if I can keep at roughly this level of conditioning, I could "run" a 5k. This may not sound very impressive to you, but never before in my life have I had reason to believe this was the case.

(I put "run" in quotes because what I do is definitely jogging - it took me just over 45 minutes to complete that course, which means my average speed was not quite 5mph. But it ain't about the speed for me right now, baby. At no point did I stop, or walk. Though when I did stop, all four limbs felt like jello.)

(BTW, I measured my course using this. Handy. I did this course and this course, concatenated together as a single run. I mean "run".)

Now if I could stop eating so much fried and fatty crap, I might be on the road to healthyville!

I'm 37! I'm not old!

I sleep now. Er, after a shower.

Quotes

I have decided to make a blog post out of my "Favorite Quotes" entry from Facebook. Because I thought you might find them amusing and/or enlightening. Let me show you them.

"Not every need is a call" - Amy Moffitt, Amy's friend, Amy's friend's therapist, and Francis Schaeffer (not necessarily in that order)

"Belief, for me, is a stake in the sand." - Deanna Doan

"Personally, I don't have the guts to follow Jesus, so I often settle for being a Christian." - Rick the Sushi Addict

"I've done everything the Bible says - even the stuff that contradicts the other stuff!" - Ned Flanders

I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable. - Dwight Eisenhower

The best is the enemy of the good. - Voltaire

The person who says it cannot be done should not interrupt the person doing it. - Chinese proverb

No matter how far down the wrong road you have gone, turn back now. - Turkish proverb

Opposites are not contradictory but complementary. - Niels Bohr

All models are wrong. Some models are useful. - George Box

Whenever there is a hard job to be done I assign it to a lazy man; he is sure to find an easy way of doing it. - Walter Chrysler

There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all. - Peter Drucker

Always listen to the experts. They'll tell you what can't be done and why. Then do it. - Robert Heinlein

There are two kinds of fool. One says, "This is old, and therefore good." And one says, "This is new, and therefore better." - John Brunner

Good theology and other idols

I've been mulling over a thought for (at least) a couple of weeks, since a friend said to me, "The theology behind 'X' is sound." The "X" she was referring to happened to be something that had caused people I love (and me too) some not-inconsiderable pain, in the real world. But she was right. The theology behind it is very sound. It's excellent theology; right and good and joyful theology. Which makes it all the sadder, from my point of view, that we turned it into a damned idol.

So here's my thought. It's not all that original, but it's been taking up space in my head:

GOOD theology, when codified, legislated, and ossified, can very easily shackle, choke, or smother the gospel. This is idolatry, and the devil finds it delightful.

This happens all the time. Allllll the time. In "liberal", "mainline", "high church", etc. contexts, the ossification is typically in the realm of structure and practice (but also doctrine). In "conservative", "evangelical", "low church", etc. contexts, the ossification is typically in the realm of doctrine (but also structure and practice). Charismatic-types typically have a mix of practical/doctrinal idols, and all kinds of permutations occur all over the Church (including the "emerging church".)

In so many of these cases, the underlying theology is good. It was good, contextual, appropriate God-talk driven by sound, faithful interpretation of scripture, tradition, and Spiritual inspiration in a particular place and time.

But then we dumb monkeys did what we always do: we made an idol. We started thinking not like Christ, but like Caesar, and decided to do our fellow members of (some segment of) the Body, present and future, the enormous favor of deciding stuff on their behalf, and putting in place structures to guarantee that they would not have to bear the burden of re-thinking that stuff. (Of course, we spared them not only the burden, but the freedom to do so.)

So we made doctrinal statements, and confessions, and canon law, and constitutions, and books of [prayer/discipline/whatever], ensuring that the firm foundation of our real, good, wise wisdom (or, more likely, that of the generation or two just preceding us) would not just be available to future generations, but constrain them. Like the grasping stone hands of a centuries-old graven image.

* * *

A frequent criticism of the "emerging church" is that we're too critical: we're too much about what we're against, not what we're for. We live too much in reaction to the past, not in hope for the future. Frankly, in my experience with this "emerging" conversation, that is sometimes, but not generally, a fair critique.

But quite honestly, I do feel like this is a needed calling within the Church: Pointing out these idols we've created, gently opting out of their grasp, and by that example showing that they are indeed idols, not "real" gods, however good and true and helpful the theology that birthed them.

And, paradoxically, I think it's hopeful. Freedom from these calcified statues of theologies past is a good thing. It opens up all kinds of possible futures for the gospel and the kingdom. And, it doesn't have to mean abandoning the richness, the wisdom, the goodness of the theology at the core of these artifacts. It gives is the freedom to build on those theologies, or to cultivate new growth from their soil. It's not just hopeful, it's, like, giddy-hopeful.

But it's painful, too. We love our church-idols. They make us feel safe and secure. A lot of the time, we don't even know they're there, but they are; they surround us. Breaking free of them seems almost always to be a cause of suffering. It takes a lot of love and grace. A lot. More than we've got. Loving God, help us.

And Loving God, please guard us "emerging" monkeys from the idol-making that we too find ooooh-so-tempting.

Amen.

Image credit: zen (rights)