I Shaved Today

I had the best shave I have ever had today. Seriously, it was amazing. I used the MACH3 POWER. It vibrates….yyyyeeeeeaaaaaaa…….

There are so many different razors out there, some good and some bad. We’ve got one blade, two blades, three blades and four blades. We have disposable razors and electric razors. Everyone likes a different type of razor for different reasons. Personally, I think the MACH3 POWER is best.

I think that razors are like churches. They are different, but in the end they all do the same exact thing. Some are better than others. And some leave annoying razor burn. We try to look and feel different but in the end we just cut hair.

I hope we become more like the MACH3 POWER though. They say that with the vibrations the hair stand up, thus shaving closer. Let us shake the foundations of the church. All the variations of the church!!! Even the new one called “The Emergent Church”! Let us cut into the church closer than anyone has been able to cut before.

We WILL still fall short, but damn it…at least we know it.

Community of the Church Haters

From day one I have felt called to reach far from God people. People who still to this day do not want anything to do with the church or even Jesus Christ. Or people like myself who have been turned away from what churches have become, closed and cold or open yet demanding. I constantly ask myself what it really means to live in authentic community with others but also wreak of being inclusive. Can true community really exist?

For instance, I have one sixteen year old girl who comes to church practically every Sunday who rarely talks but when she does speak up, she tries to disprove everything we are discussing. After church she passes out her Anarchist literature to the rest of the youth group. She is searching. She has something to say. Should she be silenced or embraced?

I hang out with a bunch of guys my age that are not Christians and have absolutely no desire in becoming one. The first time I met these guys they wouldn’t look me in the eye because they knew I was a pastor. Through many months of just hanging with these guys where they normally hang, we be have become closer and closer. Now we are great friends. I never initiate any conversation about my job or my relationship with God, but it always comes up. These guys are searching. They have something to say. I was just recently told by one of these guys that, ”The best thing about you Josh, is that you have never invited me to your church.” You see, I met them in their “community” and never asked them to leave.

There is a man I know in the church that forfeits time with his family, friends, pleasure, rest, life, etc. for a life lived in the church. He works more than eighty hours a week for the church. He is looked upon as having a great sense of calling and that he understands community. Though when you want to develop a relationship with him you quickly find that he just doesn’t have the time because he is too busy with “church work”. He desires community but morphs community into tasks. I don’t envy him a bit.

Can community truly exist? Or does community exist within our shitty attempt at it? Can true “community” become a reality? In and out of the church we struggle to make this work.
What do you think?