missio Dei

Here is the boys attempt at trying to define our practices as 21st Century followers of Jesus.

Prayer
The Practice…
One hour of listening prayer by yourself…
Prayer with another person…
…each week.

The thoughts…

• Making time to hear from God, and then submitting to what he says.
• Prayer is not a matter of asking God for things, but being changed by God to do His will.
• Therefore we need to learn how to listen to God (taking into consideration the fact that we “hear” in different ways because of personality, experience etc).
• To listen, we need to (a) make time and (b) make spac.
• To this end,we developed the practice.

Bible
The Practice…
Read a set number of chapters each week.

The thoughts…

• Reading alone is difficult. So we have common readings.
• We can then get together and share our insights/questions as a result of our collective reading. This will create a good learning environment.
• When the “Teachers” in our midst are called upon to “teach”, there is a much greater chance of learning occurring because everyone has done some prior work and has questions and comments to include in the learning experience.
• In order to do this, we need to make (a) space to read it and then, just as importantly (b) space to discuss it.
• Each person within missio Dei gets a chance to nominate a book of the bible that we will read.
• When the book is selected, we simply divide the number of chapters in that book by four. That number becomes the number of chapters that we will read each week, for that month. (Eg: If someone Picks Jeremiah with 52 chapters, we need to read13 chapters a week. If someone picks Lamentations for the next month with 5 chapters, we read a little over 1 chapter a week.)

Inner Transformation
The Practice…
When we gather for accountability, we ask each other the question, “how have you offended and how have you brought pleasure to God this month”? We then proceed to answer honestly.

The thoughts…

• Good old fashioned confession.
• There are two broad groups of people. The pessimists who believe that they are always failing God and that there is nothing they can do to please him. So they are invited to consider how they might have actually brought God some pleasure and joy through their actions and efforts.
• The optimists who reckon they are real good at serving and walking with God are invited to consider how they may have in fact, offended or hurt God.
• Both bases covered and the activity is not simply one of punitive action, but hopefully life giving.

Outer Transformation
The Practice…
One act of outward transformation (social justice, evangelism, ecological concern or vocation alignment) and then time to reflect on the action.

The thoughts…

• We will gravitate towards one or two and avoid the others. We need to be encouraged to practice all.
• The action will possibly issue out of our time of listening prayer (see above).
• We need to use our accountability time not just to ascertain whether or not the practice was conducted, but also to reflect on what we have learned about God, ourselves and the world as a result of this action.

Stuff
The Practice…
One act of stewardship, choosing from (a) giving something away or (b) eating with someone at your expence.

The Thoughts…

• We give of our time or money. Our poverty is of time, and a lack of generosity, so both are good practices.
• We can either invite someone over to eat a meal that we prepare, or we can take someone out and shout them. The intent here is intentional invitation to fellowship and hospitality.

So, here ends the musings of the blokes. Can I just say that doing this stuff with the boys was sensational. I learned heaps from them and reckon we have come up with some good, God inspired stuff here.

I was doing the weekly recycling and I found a whole bunch of butchers paper. Remembering Jen’s request for the definitions that we came up with for the compass, I thought I would rifle through them and lo and behold, I FOUND ‘EM!

So, if you check out the newly revamped missio Dei dna & Practices page, you will find our collective definitions of the compass. Try them on and see if they work. Also, can those of you in the group that did Justice let me know if that is an accurate reflection of your work? I couldn’t find a neat definition like the rest of the groups.

Also cast your eye over the original explanations of the practices as well. As we turn them into SMART goals, it will be good to reconnect with the roots of the work done.