So it seems the whole mission thing could be about deep water. Getting into it. There's our mission. Not the shallow end of the pool but the deep end. Hmmmm.
So perhaps we've got the biggest lesson in mission we ever need here. Should we be using Alpha or Living the Questions? Wrong question. Should we be mixing politics and religion or telling the stories of Jesus? Wrong question. Should we be up to our necks in the deep waters of where people are in life? Right question.
It seems, perhaps, that mission is not about what we preach or teach or even threaten folk with but simply the daring to be out there in the deep waters, the dangerous places, the places of the biggest questions rather than the shallow end of easy responses where really all we are doing is getting our toes wet with faith.
When we can be seen to be up to our necks in faith-ing then we're doing the mission thing because it really is about salvation then, about redemption, and trust. People see us go to the limit of these things and then stretch a wee bit further reaching out to all. Not holding back in taking one more step into deep water in order to bring people into justice and grace and compassion. So where do we find ourselves out in the deep faith-ing it? It's always been the big questions God's interested in. Perhaps not with answers, but with living the questions, living in the deep places where the ground as much as the answers aren't so clear.
Now is there a hymn that takes us to these places, and a way of reading the passage or some music that may engage us in the deepest places...
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