Mine and Ours

Over the last five years I've switched from long personal prayers to praying the Lord's prayer and just talking to God. Just another new season? Maybe. When Jesus' followers asked Him to teach them to pray, He taught them what we know as the Lord's Prayer. There are probably books and seminars that focus on a multitude of ways to make the Lord's prayer and other prayers work like some kind of magic. That's not where I'm going with this.

I noticed the other day (I'm a little slow) that when Jesus taught His disciples to pray He didn't teach them to pray using the pronouns "I" or "me" or "mine". He taught them to pray using "our" and "us," "Thy" and "Thine."

I wasn't going to blog about that but I picked up the next chapter in Children Matter (Chapter 7 - Children in the Faith Community). In the second section the authors draw our attention to Genesis 1:26. "Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness." (CHMT, p 128). They point out that God not only didn't leave man alone, but our triune God was a community of three to start with. We are created in the image of this triune God. Community is part of the image in which God made us. It would be an interesting study: where God uses "Me" or "mine" and where He uses "we" or "our".

The focus in Chapter 7 is on community with a terrific beginning about a church where a pastor made relationships important by his example and his focus. . . (CHMT, p. 126-128) It's worth reading.

At the end of a list of six qualities present in this particular congregation - all focusing on caring for, relating to, and empowering people whatever their age- the authors end their list with this: "Because children were present in every part of church life, they were formed by the faith of the members of the congregation." (CHMT, p. 128) Simple? Too simple?

We are not only an independent-minded people (I'm guilty) but the presence of extended family in one location is rare these days. An extended family that's interdependent on each other (assume the healthy version) may be a common occurrance in many cultures but not ours. For post-moderns, community and ministering to the whole person are important values - Biblical values. Maybe post-modern parents are the children of the remnant of the '60's and '70's - health foods, hippies, peer community taking the place of broken families. Ok. That doesn't apply to everyone. After all, the establishment prevailed didn't it for better or for worse, or we think it did. Maybe we should wonder. Maybe it didn't. Maybe God started something. And maybe He's not done.

It's interesting to see Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as the beginning of community. It's interesting to see an example of a thriving faith community where each individual feels loved, where each individual is important and yet each individual sees others as more important than him or herself. As this community extends hospitality to one another, they don't exclude children. They include them. That statement in itself isn't a very good picture of what the authors were saying. Their picture of a multi-generational funeral celebration to remember an elderly brother in Christ says something much stronger. (CHMT, p 127)