Disciplines Of Simplicity

This post from GodFirst Blog seemed to chime in harmony with my last two posts on simplicity and sustainability.

It is a summary of key practical disciplines for a simpler life, drawn from Richard Foster's seminal work, Celebration of Discipline, which first appeared in 1978. I reproduce a few below, with echoes from Basil of Caesarea sixteen centuries earlier.

* Buy things for their usefulness rather than for status. Basil: 'When I enter a house and see it shimmering with every kind of crass trinket, I realise that the owner may have given what was soulless a facelift, but he has an unbeautified soul'.

* Develop a habit of giving things away. Basil attacks the 'strange madness' whereby, 'when wealth overflows, it gets buried in the ground in secret places, "in case they need it one day".' And this, while the poor and hungry clamour at their gate.

* Reject anything that will breed oppression of others. Basil castigates the rich: 'How many people could one of your gold-encrusted fingers release from debt? How many broken-down homes could be rebuilt? You say you are doing no-one an injustice, yet you plunder so much for yourselves!'

* Learn to enjoy things without owning them. Basil: 'The world was created for the common benefit of all. The animals use in common the plants that grow naturally from the earth, and all living creatures permit each other to satisfy their need for food. But we hoard that which is common, and keep for ourselves what belongs to many others.'

Return To Simplicity

Basil of Caesarea wrote his sermon To the Rich sixteen centuries ago, but the context was strikingly similar to today. 'Those who have recently grown rich desire more of the same... They ought to be happy and contented, but immediately they yearn to be equal with the super-rich.' Meanwhile, 'thousands huddle in misery in doorways.'

But a time of crisis had struck, in the form of a great famine. Everyone was afraid of what might come. Social structures were under threat, established patterns of life could not be trusted. Not unlike the global threat of terrorism today.

Basil used the opportunity to press for justice, mercy and equality, but above all for simplicity.

"The soul becomes like the things it gives itself to," he writes in his Homily on Humility, "and takes the character and appearance of what it does. So let your demeanour, your dress, your walking, your sitting down, the nature of your food, the quality of your manner, your house and what it contains, aim at simplicity.

"And let your speech, your singing, the way you relate to your neighbour, be in accord with humility rather than with vanity. In your words let there be no empty pretence, in your singing no excess sweetness, in conversation be not ponderous or overbearing. In everything refrain from seeking to appear important."

Most of all, Basil pressed for a voluntary redistribution of wealth and resources, as in the first Church at Jerusalem. As this writer sees it, Basil 'saw it as a rule of life for all Christians. Moved by the extreme social needs of the population, and enlightened by the Scriptures, Basil insisted that the produce of the earth was intended for all. While God the Creator had indeed distributed it unevenly, he had done this with the intention that the rich should share with the poor.'

To Basil, a refusal to embrace simplicity and sustainability is a crime. "Someone who steals clothes off someone’s back is called a thief. Why should we refer to the one who does not clothe the naked, while having the means to do so, as anything else? The bread that you have belongs to the hungry, the clothes that are in your cupboard belong to the naked, the shoes that are rotting in your possession belong to the barefooted, the money that you have buried belongs to the destitute. And so you commit injustice to so many when you could have helped them." (Homily I Will Tear Down My Barns)

Back To Sustainability

Continuing the theme from the last post, that 'the pendulum is swinging back to community', I have been considering the evidence. There aren't many indications, from what I can see, of people saying "let's move in together and share everything". But there are definite signs of thinking Christians reaching out for particular strands of what make up community.

One of these is sustainability: the belief that there are enough resources on earth to provide for its population, if only these resources could be used wisely and equally. The Breathe Network (see last post) is "a Christian network for simpler living, connecting people who want to live a less consumerist, more generous, more sustainable life". Their clip "Enough" will give you a flavour (read the comments too).

So, is sustainability in the New Testament mandate? It is certainly the thought behind 2 Corinthians 9:8. God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that you may always have enough of everything and may provide in abundance for every good work.

But there is a much stronger tie-up with the monastic community vision. Basil, bishop of Caesarea (c.330-379), wrote at some length on this issue. In his sermon "To the Rich", he writes:

"But how do you make use of money? By dressing in expensive clothing? Won’t two yards of tunic suffice you, and the covering of one coat satisfy all your need of clothes? Is it for food’s sake that you have such a demand for wealth? One loaf is enough to fill a belly."

Basil inveighs against those "who leave grain to rot but will not feed the starving", who choose ivory sofas and silver tables when ordinary wood is just as suitable. This is more than cheap swipes at material wealth. For Basil, a man steeped in the Christian community vision of the Desert Fathers, the inherent sin of such behaviour is its refusal to accept simplicity for the sake of sustainability. It is as much a sin against the earth as it is against the poor.

This is the context in which Basil in his day, and concerned Christians like the Breathe Network today, saw the devious lie of consumerism and turned against it. To this we shall return.

Looking For Community

The latest issue of Jesus Life Magazine has just reached me from the Jesus Fellowship/Jesus Army. Always a challenging read, but one particular line jumped out at me:

"The pendulum is swinging back towards community"

The speaker is Mark Powley, co-founder of the Breathe Network, who represents a new generation of thinking, activist Christians - concerned about the environment, concerned about consumerism gone mad, keen to recycle, to live simply, and to explore community. He has recently published Consumer Detox, in which he explores how the tyranny of consumerism can be decoded, subverted, and outlived. The upbeat tone is well expressed in the final section, "adventures in generosity".

Powley isn't the only voice wondering whether Christian community (even community of goods) might be coming "in" again. Pastor and academic Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, a leader in the 'New Monasticism' movement, who himself lives in Christian community, has recently published <em>God's Economy , in which he critiques the 'prosperity gospel' so prevalent in Western (especially North American) churches, and offers a more just model.

The Jesus Army is finding this too, as churches and groups in many parts of the world make contact, having searched for an alternative to personal health and wealth preaching, which they instinctively mistrust and which simply does not work in their culture. The Jesus Army's relational model, with community living, offers a new direction which many are keen to explore.

So thank you, Mark, for the watchman's cry from the battlements: "the pendulum is swinging back towards community". I hope over the next few posts to explore elements of this subject.

Beautiful Church - a New Hymn

Reading up on the Blumhardts and their developing, at times divergent, views of the kingdom of God and the Church, I remembered my own musings on the correlation a couple of years ago. I looked at Christian hymnody and more recent choruses and found there either Church or Kingdom, but very little that related them properly in God's plan for the earth.

The result was that I had a go at writing a hymn myself! The starting point was the opening line of an obscure hymn by a Victorian high Anglican clergyman, E L Drown. This line, and several others which struck me as beautiful, I kept. Drown, however, goes on to sketch the beauties of church furnishings, liturgy and offices. I wanted rather to place Church within the wider 'kingdom' plan of God for a testimony to, and blessing for, the earth.

Beautiful Church of Christ below,
Radiant in this world of woe;
Welcoming gate to Heaven above,
Sanctified house of God I love.
He who was slain on Calvary
Founded this Church eternally.

Harried and tried by Satan’s horde;
Hated by men who hate her Lord;
Clothed in His righteousness alone,
Seeing in faith His glorious throne;
Bearing His cross she walks His road,
Finding His grace to bear the load.

Temple of Jesus, called the Way,
His human face she dares display:
Grieving at imperfections shown,
Making her intercessions known;
Bearing with brethren, loving all,
She manifests the Kingdom call.

Beautiful hearts this Church adorn,
Giving their lives for God’s Firstborn.
Salvation’s Ark she opens wide,
Beckoning all to come inside;
Bringing new sons to second birth,
She is a praise in all the earth.

Church, the abode and rest of God;
The path that saints and martyrs trod.
Baptism her ensign, Christ her light;
Souls here made glorious, robed in white.
Fitly adorned as Christ’s own Bride,
She reigns for ever at His side!

© Jesus Fellowship Songs / CopyCare Ltd, 2009,
adapted from E. L. Drown, 1863, Public Domain

God's Kingdom Here And Now

"We Christians think of a heavenly kingdom; I came to see that God intended an earthly kingdom, or rather, a heavenly kingdom on earth. God's name was to be hallowed on earth, His kingship seen on earth, His will done on earth. The earth should announce eternity: God on earth."

In a number of writings, Christoph Blumhardt presented his understanding of the kingdom of God and how it is forever breaking in to life on earth - for that was always God's intention.

"The angels have God in heaven, I have not - I want to pray down here. I must have God here. The earth is the stage set for the kingdom of God, because the kingship of God is in direct relationship with this earth: the Saviour, down here. God's intention is the here and now: Jesus challenging poverty, sin and misery on earth."
[my own translation (and in parts paraphrase) from the German]

Here you will find a further meditation by Blumhardt on the in-breaking kingdom of God - and the amazing but urgent opportunities that gives for Christian witness.

The Church And The Kingdom

As Johann Blumhardt lay dying in 1880, he spoke a blessing over his son Christoph (1842-1919). The blessing was that Christoph might conquer in the strength of Jesus, the Victor (see previous post).

Christoph, like his father, had trained as a pastor. He was, by all accounts, a fiery preacher. The novellist Hermann Hesse recalls him saying that a Mohammedan with a real and honest heart is closer to God than many Christians.

Blumhardt grew increasingly disillusioned with the established church, so he returned to Bad Boll and assisted his father with the work there until Johann's death passed the mantle to him. He held healing crusades, which carried the same power his father had known.

But Christoph was on a different, more radical road. "A Christian must be born twice", he wrote: "once from the human to the spiritual, and once from the spiritual to the human". In other words, a spirituality or church commitment which had no interest in addressing the sufferings of people and the ills of society was a comfortable lie.

In a letter which he kept secret for years, he reproached his father for three failings:

1. His individualism. Johann had compassion on each person, and for that person to know the healing power of God was sufficient evidence of the in-breaking kingdom of God. Christoph had a more developed notion of God's kingdom: a rulership that included all things, the universe, the earth, nations and structures.

2. His view of the Church. Johann was too accepting of a religious system which his son had come to see as a preserve of the middle-class, concerned only with power and influence.

3. His view of mission. Christoph saw his father's model of outreach as simply feeding a church which was a mere extension of imperialism. His son saw the more 'cosmic' aspect of the kingdom of God - that it was a Body hastening the return of Jesus Christ by shining as a light in darkness, a 'city on a hill' (Matthew 5:14). His father had acted as if the Kingdom was part of the Church; for the son, the Church is part of the Kingdom.