Our journey back was long but it was a time to continue learning. We went past the Arch in St. Louis even as we were listening to Craig Mortenson's book, "Three Cups of Tea". It is a must read for anyone interested in cross cultural dialogue. The protagonist, Craig Mortenson is a mountain climber/nurse who falls in love with the Pakistani people who nurse him back to health after a mishap climbing K2 Mountain. He decides to build a school for the people who helped him and the one school project grows into many. It is a great book about a person with a dream learning to adjust and adapt his dream to the culture and people and needs around him and discovering that as he does, that the dream is bigger and more wonderful than he could have imagined. It sounds a lot like ministry to me! He also learns to interact with another culture and to slow down and appreciate the people more than the task or project. Sounds like a good lesson for me as well. As we are listening to this book on tape, I continued reading Miroslav Volf's compilation of articles, "God's Life in Trinity". The article I read by Ronald Thiemann, "Beyond Exclusivism and Absolutism" talked about how we can be firmly rooted in the Christ centered, trinitarian understanding of the Christian faith and still not enter into the kind of religious paranoia and exclusivism that seems to start wars and fuel fear. He challenges us to read the gospels with eye open to the "other" (ie. the Canaanite woman, Samaritan worman, Roman centurion, the Magi, Gerasene demoniac) who are outside the tradition and still seem to have an understanding of who this Jesus is. He challenges us not only, not to fear other traditions but also to learn from other traditions. I was reminded of the story of the Canaanite women who asked Jesus for the bread crumbs that fell under the table and how Jesus, even Jesus, graciously accepted her contribution to his teaching. If Jesus can learn and grow from another, then I am sure that I should be able to. It's fascianting, in "Three Cups of Tea", Mortenson (a child of missionaries) is the "Infidel" and yet several of the Muslims he encounters learn from him even as he learns from them. We can all learn from each other if we can get past the fear and arrogance that get in the way.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Long Journey Home
Our journey back was long but it was a time to continue learning. We went past the Arch in St. Louis even as we were listening to Craig Mortenson's book, "Three Cups of Tea". It is a must read for anyone interested in cross cultural dialogue. The protagonist, Craig Mortenson is a mountain climber/nurse who falls in love with the Pakistani people who nurse him back to health after a mishap climbing K2 Mountain. He decides to build a school for the people who helped him and the one school project grows into many. It is a great book about a person with a dream learning to adjust and adapt his dream to the culture and people and needs around him and discovering that as he does, that the dream is bigger and more wonderful than he could have imagined. It sounds a lot like ministry to me! He also learns to interact with another culture and to slow down and appreciate the people more than the task or project. Sounds like a good lesson for me as well. As we are listening to this book on tape, I continued reading Miroslav Volf's compilation of articles, "God's Life in Trinity". The article I read by Ronald Thiemann, "Beyond Exclusivism and Absolutism" talked about how we can be firmly rooted in the Christ centered, trinitarian understanding of the Christian faith and still not enter into the kind of religious paranoia and exclusivism that seems to start wars and fuel fear. He challenges us to read the gospels with eye open to the "other" (ie. the Canaanite woman, Samaritan worman, Roman centurion, the Magi, Gerasene demoniac) who are outside the tradition and still seem to have an understanding of who this Jesus is. He challenges us not only, not to fear other traditions but also to learn from other traditions. I was reminded of the story of the Canaanite women who asked Jesus for the bread crumbs that fell under the table and how Jesus, even Jesus, graciously accepted her contribution to his teaching. If Jesus can learn and grow from another, then I am sure that I should be able to. It's fascianting, in "Three Cups of Tea", Mortenson (a child of missionaries) is the "Infidel" and yet several of the Muslims he encounters learn from him even as he learns from them. We can all learn from each other if we can get past the fear and arrogance that get in the way.
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