Workplace as formation
Posted by Paul | Filed under work
I wrote this back in October, but forgot to post it. It follows on from the post about Miroslav Volf’s book Work in the Spirit and connects into James K.A. Smith’s Desiring the Kingdom (the intro is downloadable from the Baker website) The two spark interestingly off each other. Let’s start with Volf’s observation:
Economic alienation … often directly or indirectly causes alienation from God. We read in Exodus, for instance, that the oppressed and exploited Israelite slaves “did not listen to Moses on account of their … cruel bondage” (Exod 6:9). Economic alienation hindered their believing God and grasping the promise of liberation.
Smith’s point is that we are not just formed intellectually, via worldviews and ideas, but we are formed by practices. Using generalised liturgy as his focus, he suggests
…we are the sorts of animals whose orientation to the world is shaped from the body up more than from the head down. Liturgies aim our love to different ends precisely by training our hearts through our bodies. They prime us to approach the world in a certain way, to value certain things, to aim for certain goals, to pursue certain dreams, to work together on certain projects. In short, every liturgy constitutes a pedagogy that teaches us, in all sorts of precognitive ways, to be a certain kind of person.
But if we bring these two observations together, I think we are led to conclude that our work, employment, daily activities become part of our formation. They are not simply value-free actions, but they change our underlying perspective of the world. In the case of the Exodus story, the oppressive work formed the Israelites in such a way that they could not hear the message of liberation. Which brings up all sorts of questions: how does our workplace form us? Can we operate in a way that makes it positive rather than negative? Etc.
Tags: formation, Miroslav Volf, work
column :: glory
Posted by Paul | Filed under columns
Another column from 360 magazine…
Has it ever struck you just how flexible the world around us is? Think about trees: pick the right bits and they can be painted, shaped, carved, eaten, played on, played in, played with… The possibilities could fill this whole column.
It is part of the incomparable glory of God that he hasn’t just made a world with ‘everything in its place’, but one that can be endlessly shaped, worked on and developed by others. And taking part in that shaping of the world is one way in which we bring glory to God; by exploring the possibilities He has left for us.
What does this mean? That we have the opportunity to worship whenever we sing, listen, play, paint, eat… In fact, whenever we explore the possibilities in creation. Now where did I put that stick?
Conversion (to wordpress)
Posted by Paul | Filed under service announcements
I’ve attempted to move this blog from Blogger to Wordpress. If you’re reading this then I guess I’ve succeeded. If you’re not then, um, oh forget that thought…
If you find any problems or broken links then please leave a comment on the bottom of this post and I’ll attempt to figure out what’s gone wrong!
column :: joseph
Posted by Paul | Filed under columns
Another slightly dated column, so to set the context: it was written around the time when reality show ‘Any Dream Will Do’ was working it’s magic…
Have you ever imagined how the story of Joseph might play out as reality TV?
Welcome back to Pyramids and Presidents. It’s day 3429 in Pharaoh’s jail and two of the housemates have had dreams. Joseph has revealed his talent for interpretation and now has break the bad news — one of them is for the chop. If you think the baker should get his old job back, text BAKER. On the other hand, if you think the butler is Joseph’s best bet for mentioning his case to Pharaoh, text BUTLER.
Umm, I suspect the viewing figures might drop after the first decade. We’re more into instant celebrity than long-term training. On the other hand, for those of us who will never achieve overnight success, it’s reassuring to know that God does things differently.
everything conference
Posted by Paul | Filed under uncategorised
I mentioned newfrontiers up-coming Everything conference a few posts ago. They’ve now added some interesting articles to the conference website. Also, some great images in the gallery. Looking forward to this…
portraits now and then…
Posted by Paul | Filed under uncategorised
Tags: art
A random walk over culture, art, christianity, etc. with occasional photographs...