e-Community of Christ

Book Review

2006-08-18T18:38:00.000-07:00

Gutsy Faith - Jeff Edmonson

this book is a quick read and very hard to put down. The book has an easy to follow conversational tone. Jeff covers a number of topics where it would be very easy to start preaching to the reader and he does a very good job of keeping the tone friendly.

There are 3 main pieces of this book that I thought truly make it stick out in my mind for a book in this genre.

1. Scripture
2. Updated Language
3. Questions

1. Scripture - Each chapter of this book starts with a selection of scripture to help set the tone of the chapter.

2. Updated Language - This is related to the first point, as each chapter begins most of them are started with the scripture that was referenced. Jeff has taken the time to interpret the story into more of a modern prose form. He does a great job of painting the scene so it is a very vivid image in your mind.

3. Questions - Each chapter is ended in some questions to consider through there is not adequate room to write in your answers you can jot down some trigger ideas in the space provided.

The questions also help to present the material in a way that would be great to host a book study and have some really good discussions.

All in all I would recommend this book to those who are solid in their faith but looking for ideas to expand their spirituality, I would also recommend this book to new believers as a way to expand their faith.

Reunion

2006-07-28T20:42:00.000-07:00

I don't know how you guys are feeling but I am not well. I got back from reunion a little while ago, a place where I should be able to minister and be ministered to, and I heard some great sermons and had a couple of really good conversations, and yet I feel more burnt out about my own congregation than I did before I went. It just seems like there is a ton of planning going on but no doing. Does that make sense? I get the feeling that people say they want things to happen but (a) either they are too afraid to do them or (b) they don't really want to do them they just say that they do. I am afraid that if I stay too long I will start to fall into that (b) category.

I don't really see myself as someone who is afraid of change but I do see myself as somewhat of a lazy person, I will be the first to admit it, those of you who went to school with me will know that I am the king of the procrastinators I didn't finish one of my pre-reqs until the class that it was for was a week away from completion. So I think that I could fall easily into the void of just doing nothing and becoming complacent, that scares me. What should I do? Seriously, if you don't feel like posting you know how to get a hold of me.

Aaron

Sunday, Gone

2006-06-04T22:37:00.000-07:00

Today came and went and I didn't ask my questions, instead I did my tame talk so as not to ruffle any feathers. I think I should run some of those questions by my Pastor but the unfortunate part is that they will have some cut and dry answer for them but it isn't as easy as that, I want them to think about it to mull it over to pray about it to wrestle with it like I am. Maybe they already have. P says the congregation isn't ready to do that. I agree with her, but that doesn't make my questions go away. I guess that is life right. A bunch of unanswered questions.

Up Front

2006-06-02T20:47:00.000-07:00

I am scheduled to give the communion message, on Sunday but I don't know if I am in the proper mindset to do that. I have been doing a ton of reading lately as you might know if you can find me on myspace and I have a bunch of questions that I thought it might be interesting to do a talk all based on questions. So I started writing some of them out and it got to a point where I was reading them to myself and I felt that this isn't appropriate at this time. This will scare too many people, and as I said we are having a confirmation on Sunday as well so probably not a good idea to scare a new member with some questions that really don't have any good answers at least not for our congregation. Oh well, so back to the drawing board for that one.

Model

2006-05-31T16:31:00.000-07:00

Well I found a site that is along the lines of what I would like this to become. It is Open Source Theology. I really the like play on words there with the tech and the church, in that it takes a group of people to truly find the meaning behind things, not just church or not just technology but all things.

Let me know what you think of it. I actually found it through blogger's search.

Back at It again

2006-05-30T19:17:00.000-07:00

Wow has this month flown by. I remember thinking at the beginning of the month hey I have a sermon coming up. Now it is this next Sunday. I am so totally not ready for it. This next Sunday is Pentecost, so that is always cool. However it is the first Sunday of the month so that means that it is communion Sunday, so that makes my time shorter so I am down to 15 Min now. On top of communion there is also a conformation (second part of 2 part baptism) going on in the same service, so now I am down to like 7 min depending on who does the confirmation, I may be down to about 5 :) oh well what can you do right. I have always been a man of few words so I will do my best in trying to consolidate my thoughts into a 5 min talk, and hope that the congregation will follow what I am saying.

Well, I guess that didn't go as planned

2006-05-25T16:50:00.000-07:00

I had hoped to put more stuff up here recently but as it turns out, my blogs are the first thing to go when I get busy so I do apologize about that. This is something that I want to grow and develop, maybe into a full on web-site someday so, other members keep that in mind. If you have suggestions for things to cover or to get more idea rolling out of here post them either in the comments or on the site itself. For those of you who aren't publishers for the blog but have some ideas you would like to see talked about or posted here then shoot me an e-mail and we will talk about it. You can reach me at aaron(dot)beebe(at)gmail(dot)com. Replace the stuff in the () with what it should be. This is just to stop spam. Let me know what we need to do here to keep people coming back.

Book Review

2006-05-02T18:04:00.000-07:00

I don't know how much a review this is but I would highly recommend A New Kind of Christian, by Brian McLaren Here This book will change the way that you think about how secular life and Christian culture blend and mix to form the theologies that we have today.

Aaron

Torn

2006-04-19T20:42:00.000-07:00

Maybe it is just me, but has anyone ever felt that a situation that was handled wrong needs to be corrected but the people that handled it think that everything is ok? I am so tired of politics in churches that is not the place. What can be done? I just keep having this feeling of something more needs to happen, but what is it? Who needs to do it? Is it me? Is it someone else? AAAARRRRRGGGH. Thanks for listening.

Aaron

Shannon Recommends

2006-03-07T09:37:00.000-08:00

I took a great class in January called “Theology and Popular Culture” and was exposed to some very interesting popular culture items. Imagine a class where watching TV and movies is actually your homework! It was great. So, I thought I’d pass on some movie recommendations.

Next time you’re at the video store, how about renting something that will give you some food for thought, or stimulate your inner theologian? I’m not saying all of these are perfect movies, I’m rather ambivalent about some of them in fact, but try them out and see what you think. And I'll play with some colour too, just for fun!

The Station Agent – this movie is a little slow at times, but well worth it. While watching, think about the idea of salvation through relationship.

The Year of Living Dangerously – good education on a historical situation and a way to think about what is important.

Romero – This movie is a great introduction to the ideas of liberation theology, and an inspiring, though heartbreaking story.

Garden State - one to watch while thinking about the questions of “what do we need to be saved from?” and “what saves us?”

Crash – not only is this thought-provoking, but it also won a number of academy awards and was written by a Canadian!

Jesus of Montreal – perhaps a little too “Catholicky” (pun intended) for some, but definitely a good one for stimulating you to think about what the Jesus story would look like set in today’s context.

What’s Cooking? – from the director of Bend it Like Beckham and Bride and Prejudice (both are also great films) What’s Cooking looks at the Thanksgiving dinners of 4 families in LA who are from different cultures. Maybe this one isn’t heavily theological, but families and food both figure prominently in the Bible, so it kind of fits.

Questioning

2006-03-02T19:44:00.000-08:00

I have been doing alot of questioning lately which is half the reason I created this blog. Hopefully in writing some of these out the answers will come.

During a meeting of I don't know if you would call it a cell group or not but we thought about starting what is called a CDG (Covenant Discipleship Group) I thought this sounded like a good idea. My only problem is what do they do. I guess that is what the training is for.

While I was setting up a computer tonight I was surfing around looking for a web site that I had seen about 6 months ago that was all about cell ministry it is called the living room. So I decided to e-mail the owner of the site to see what he has to say and maybe we can get some ideas from there. So anyway one of his posts dated Oct 28th talks about BYO Worship. "Bring your Own Worship is always a meaningful night where each person is invited to bring something to share around a particular theme." I thought what a cool idea. So I had to make sure that I wrote it down and poof here it is on this website. So I figure during one of our next planning meetings I will bring this up to our leaders and see what they think about it perhaps it is something that will have to wait until the CDG's are running.

Aaron

Podcasting

2006-03-02T19:37:00.000-08:00

I'm not dead just hiding.

This post is a little lighter than normal for me, everybody needs some levity every now and then.

Are you guys into this? I got an iPod for Christmas and have been hooked on podcasts since. One of my recent favorites is The Bored Again Christian. "Where Christian music gets saved." It has all of the greats from times of yore, like Grammatrain, and Anberlin plus some new stuff that I hadn't heard of yet. If you want to hear some different types of music check it out.

See you soon

Aaron

CDG?

2005-11-23T20:35:00.000-08:00

Oops, what was I thinking

2005-11-07T18:12:00.000-08:00

Well I was supposed to write a sermon last week, and I got lazy. The theme was even a good one but I just couldn't get myself to sit down and actually put pen to paper. So I did something that I am not very proud of. I scoured the Interweb and I cobbled a few different peoples thoughts on the scripture and presented it as my own.

Now the bad part is that I didn't feel bad until now a day later but maybe that is what life does to you. You grizzle up so that injustices don't hurt as much. How sad is that? We can look at something we know is wrong and we won't even wince to think about doing it ourselves, or perhaps we apply our own circumstances to a time or place and think, "Aww just this once, no one will care, or notice". But in the back of our mind we notice and God notices.

So what can we do about these things? Do we try to forget about them? Do we try to cover them up, bury them in the dark corners of our minds? Or should we let them out for the entire world to see, so that we can clear our minds and free our hearts of the burdens that we bear?

I think the first thing to do is to admit to ourselves that we know what we did is wrong, and then if that action may have hurt someone, apologize. Don't make excuses there is no good reason for doing that thing, it doesn't matter what the circumstances were. Your personal reasons will mean nothing to the offended party. Instead speak to their world find out more about them. Take this opportunity of defenselessness and let someone in for a change. It may make all the difference in the world to that person.

Aaron.

Prayer

2005-08-23T21:02:00.000-07:00

'P' and I went to Cedar Point this summer with some friends. We were having a good time. My friend Joe and I decided to go to the car to get stuff for swimming, really it was 'P' and Joes' wife who decided, anyway, on our way back into the park I saw something that I had never seen in person before. There was a man in the parking lot between two cars on his hands and knees facing to the east, praying. This struck me today. How many of us go through the hustle and bustle of out lives and at the end of the day we just stop and go to bed? We are too busy, or too tired, to pray. I don't claim to know all of the answers but when I saw that man in that parking lot between those two cars at 2:00 in the afternoon taking 15 min out of his "vacation day" at the park to stop and pray it hit me, life is not about going here and going there. It is about taking time for the important things. Stopping to thank God and to worship Him all throughout the day, not just the morning and the night, not just when life slows down. I know that I myself am guilty of doing this. After seeing that it made me realize how much of an excuse "I'm tired" or "I'll do it tomorrow" really is.

Do you remember growing up? In my parents house one thing we always did before shutting off the lights and going to sleep was to say bedtime prayers. It got to be so much of a habit that I couldn't get to sleep without doing it. Then as I got older and went to college. It seems to me that the older you get the faster time goes. Life got hectic and prayer became less and less a part of my life. It seems to be that as something like that falls away it becomes harder and harder to start doing it again. So much so that you get to the point of questioning weather or not it is even worth it. I know the Bible says give everything to God but there is always that feeling of needing control. How many times have you said "Here God, here is this part of my problem but I am going to hang onto this part just in case."

Did you ever do that and then stop to think, just in case of what? What can we handle that God can't? I have a hard time though letting go of that other part and giving anything totally to God. This is something that I will be working on.

Aaron.

Catching Up

2005-07-13T10:57:00.000-07:00

So I had this whole thing written up durring sunday school a couple of weeks ago and it took a ride through the washing machine. Needless to say it is no longer with us. So I have to start from scratch.

I do have some notes from conference somewhere at home maybe I will dig them out and update later.

My feelings about conference. I went into conference very leary about the whole situation. In fact you can talk to Nathan and Kari about it. We had dinner with them a couple of nights before conference started and while we were there the council was having a dinner in the private room of the restaraunt. I said to Nathan, so should I go in there and tell them "Just to let you know I am here to vote no." I was only half kidding.
After the announcement was made that they had chosen Stephen I just had a bad feeling in my gut about the whole thing. I had other names come to mind immediately people that I thought would do a great job, I will keep those names to myself.

However, after going to the Aaronic Ministries Cauccus I was able to hear other peoples experiences with Stephen and some people that felt a confirming spirit even though they had never met him. It was after Gail's personal testimony that I was truly conforted and I knew that we were going to be doing the right thing. It was still hard to settle with but I knew that for the direction that the church is headed that we need someone like Stephen right now.

So that is how my experience with conference went and I know it is kind of anti-climactic but that is the basics of what went down, at least in my head.

Hello World

2005-06-18T21:24:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone, I know I got onto Shannon at conference about not posting anything and here I sit 2 weeks later and I still haven't posted my thoughts. Well I have my reasons but they are mostly just excuses so I am not going to give them, but know that I will post my feelings on the conference soon, maybe tomorrow but that being fathers day, no promises. I thought I should put something here though to let you know that more is coming. See you soon.

world conference reporting

2005-06-09T12:07:00.000-07:00

Hi Friends!
So Aaron, when will your play-by-play report of conference be posted? ;)
Hope everyone is doing well.
I had a really enjoyable time at conference this year. I was happy to see so many familiar people I haven't seen in awhile and to catch up with folks I've lost track of. It was nice to see Precia and Aaron - I missed you Troy! We had almost the whole gang there!
I will be interested to see what things stood out for other people, but for me some of the important aspects were:
- lots of talk about how we are all human and need to be more willing to acknowledge our own sinfulness and frailty. Also I appreciated the emphasis on the fact that our leaders are human too and need the support of the church for their work.
- I really appreciated the people who raised questions about the fact that our church leaders are almost all white, middle-class, Americans, even though our church body is much more diverse. I think it was an important consciousness-raising question to bring up. In discussions later I learned that the church is working at training new leaders to replace the ones that are perhaps ready to be called into other leadership positions in the church.
I am realising more and more how important it is for everyone in the church to take it upon themselves to become knowledgeable, well-trained disciples, ready to take on whatever task they may be called to.

President/Prophet Pt. II

2005-03-15T23:21:00.000-08:00

Well the council has nominated a person for Prophet/President of the church. Stephen M. Veazey. This was announced on March the 4th. I know that this has been a hard time for many in the church and that will continue up and most likely through conference. I still do not know how to feel about the councils decision discernment of the call. I think the part that I don't like about it is that they are not giving the Conference a choice on the leadership of the church. I would be more at ease if two people had been selected and it was left to the Conference Delegation to decide. What do you think? -post in the comments.

Conference

2005-01-06T01:16:00.000-08:00

Since the conference has been announced I have made the arrangements to go. So, Precia and I will be in Independece during the week of the conference. No cost has been given yet so we do not know if we will be able to be delegates but we will be there. I will try to keep this updated for those that cannot make it and are interested in what is happening.

President/Prophet

2004-12-29T18:41:00.000-08:00

Well, this was bound to come up sometime here so I thought why not now. Our prophet has stepped down and it is now our turn to select the next leader of our church. These are trying times for the community and for the world, there are many things happening in each of our lives. We need to to be sure to take the time, and earnestly pray for direction in these times of questioning.

meeting saint nicholas and seeing Jesus

2004-12-24T21:30:00.000-08:00

Today I spent some time learning about Saint Nicholas. My interest came about from a Sojourners newsletter that I was reading this week. It is fascinating to find out how this saint evolved into the jolly coca-cola santa we know today. I found a website that you should definitely check out if you are at all interested in learning another way to re-claim the Christian part of this over-commercialised season.

Saints are a fascinating way to learn about what it means to be a person of faith, they are amazing examples of how to love God with your whole life. Saint Nicholas gave of all that he had to help the poor and less fortunate people around him. He protected people, and prayed fervently for people, people he hardly knew. That's the kind of thing we should be celebrating this season. Jesus shows us the way we should live our lives, Saint Nicholas did a good job of that, can we strive to live up to that example as well?

John 14:23-29

2004-12-21T19:00:00.000-08:00

I know this isn't part of the Christmas story but I used it in one of my last talks and I thought it was very reassuring so I thought that I would share it with you along with some thoughts. This comes from the NASB:

... "If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him. He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine, but the Father's who sent Me. These things I have spoken to you while abiding with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you. Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful."

Because the disciples were still expecting Jesus to establish an earthly kingdom and overthrow Rome, they found it hard to understand why he did not tell the world at large that he was the Messiah. Not everyone, however, could understand Jesus' message. Ever since Pentacost, the gospel of the kingdom has been proclaimed in the whole world, and yet not everyone is receptive to it. Jesus saves the deepest revelations of himself for those who love and obey him.

Jesus promised the disciples that the Holy Spirit would help them remember what he had been teaching them. This promise ensures the validity of the New Testament. The disciples were eyewitnesses of Jesus' life and teachings, and the Holy Spirit helped them remember without taking away their individual perspectives. We can be confident that the Gospels are accurate records of what Jesus taught and did. The Holy Spirit can help us in the same way. As we study the Bible, we can trust him to plant truth in our mind, convince us of God's will, and remind us when we stray from it.

The end result of the Holy Spirit's work in our lives is deep and lasting peace. Unlike worldly peace, which is usually defined as the absence of conflict, this peace is confident assurance in any circumstance; with Christ's peace, we have no need to fear the present or the future. If your life is full of stress, allow the Holy Spirit to fill you with Christ's peace.

--Life Application Study Bible (NASB pg. 1854-1855)

First Post

2004-12-20T18:54:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the Brand new eCofChrist this is a site dedicated to the Community of Christ faith for all of those members that are needing something during the week and for non-members that are searching in general.