growing an organic community
05.04.2009 06:31 PM
| culture, core values, theology, leadership
| permalink
one of the ways i often describe the shaping of eikon is "organic." by this, i mean natural growth. growth that isn't forced or contrived. it's growth that allows things to grow in ways that aren't foreign to their environment.
to flesh this out a little more in real life terms, i view organic growth as non-"gimmick" growth. while we certainly plan on using various streams of branding and marketing, we don't want to turn to gimmicks that misrepresent the church and mislead people. i also use organic to work alongside the idea of being incarnational. in other words, jesus lived with the people he reached, looked like the people he reached, ate with the people he reached and engaged in the culture of the people he reached. of course, all this is in the context of being organic and natural—not in some contrived way. we don't want to force our way into some kind of foreign culture, but rather, we hope to assimilate in an organic way. additionally, i use the term organic to move away from the idea of program/attraction-driven models that solely rely on big events and impressive displays to attract people. again, we certainly hope to create spaces that draw people in and create opportunities for people to meet and interact, but we want to do this in the context of relationships and generative friendships. there are many, many more ways to define my use of the word organic, but these are a few that help to illustrate the point.
sometimes the word organic is misused or misunderstood by some people to mean "fly by night" or "whatever happens happens" or some other similar derivative. in fact, growing an organic community is a very strategic and thoughtful process that requires a significant amount of work and commitment. julie clawson, self-described "mom, writer, activist, dreamer", on her blog, one hand clapping, spent a little time thinking about this very issue of organic community. in talking about her and her daughter tending to their organic garden at their home, she stumbles upon some great analogies about growing an organic community. she writes:
...I am spending more and more time pulling the weeds that choke out the life of the food and attempting to do something about the bugs that are eating my food. I don’t want to dump toxins onto the land, but I really don’t want to be sharing my swiss chard with the critters either. So I’m experimenting with organic pesticides. Yesterday I made up a batch that was pretty much a mixture of pureed garlic and habanero peppers. I could barely stand being in the kitchen with the stuff my eyes stung so bad, so I hope the bugs have the same aversion to it. We shall see.All that to say, organic gardening is work. Growing my own food and doing so in sustainable ways that doesn’t harm the environment or my kids takes works. It reminded me of...how all too often we speak of organic leadership or organization as if it is this nebulous unstructured thing. People who despise brands or hierarchy will suggest organic systems instead. But...organic gardening is hard - it takes a lot of deliberate effort. No organic gardener is going to go in without a plan, without knowing when to plant. They aren’t going to let pests or weeds take over the garden if they care about actually producing food. It’s just that as they go about their work they do so in loving, careful, and considerate fashion without imposing unnatural elements onto the garden. Understanding that work...really helps me understand more the spiritual metaphor of what an organic community should be like.
i think she presents a beautiful metaphor. while i'm not a gardener, i can really appreciate this palpable analogy that really expresses the care and love needed to grow organically. to produce something as natural as possible, it takes diligence and care and an informed plan. we hope to be a similar kind of gardener—as julie describes—at eikon.
one of the beautiful pieces of julie's story is that she tends to the garden in community. specifically, she and her daughter oversee the garden. we hope to do the same at eikon. i (ryan) don't want to reign over eikon as some kind of dictatorial gardener, but someone who cares for the growth alongside others. we don't want to build needless hierarchies or divisive systems, but rather hope to come alongside people as co-laborers and co-sojourners. certainly, we'll have leaders (which i'll begin to talk about very soon), but we hope to build the leadership team (as we've already been doing for quite some time) in an equally organic way. so, we want you to begin to think about whether or not you think you have a part in this thing called eikon. as we grow organically, we need people to partner with us to help in the work of gardening.
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questions for eikon?: follow-up
05.01.2009 02:23 PM
| core values, theology, information, leadership
| permalink
several weeks ago, i posted this entry in an attempt to offer people an open invitation to ask some of the questions they may have about this thing we're calling eikon church. in the past several months, more and more great questions have been flowing in and the blog post was an extension of that reality.
in the blogosphere, it's often difficult to entice people to leave comments. understandably, it "commits" you to an exchange that some people aren't interested in pursuing. after that particular post, we had a lot of email questions and many more from just personal interactions. one brave soul, though, chose to leave some questions in a comment. :)
so, i thought i would answer these in this public forum (whereas other email/personal questions were answered in the same manner). here goes:
1. Is Eikon in any way inspired by Rick McKinley's Imago Dei Church in Portland (also home to Donald Miller)?
the simple answer is no. here, though, is a more sufficient response.
i am certainly familiar with imago dei and similarly familiar with rick mckinley (founding pastor of imago dei). further, one of my favorite books of all-time if donald miller's blue like jazz. so, i am somewhat versed in what they do.
the reason i say no, though, is that while i'm familiar with them and like many of the things they do, it wouldn't be an accurate response to say that i have specifically modeled or been inspired by their community of faith. it's probably safe to say that we are theologically different from them in various ways (although not any major differences) and probably have some differing theological roots.
by all means, i do consider them to be a great community of faith and would recommend them to friends in the portland area. one of the things i absolutely love about them is their commitment to and emphasis on the arts—visual arts, writing, filmmaking, songwriting, etc. i hope and plan to have a similar emphasis and hope to—much like they do—build networks of artists and writers and filmmakers and craftsmen and the like.
so, while the answer is emphatically no, i certainly like many of the ways they've organized their community.
2. Is Eikon actually a church, or more of a community movement toward God?
in some ways, this question is a bit of a catch 22. what i mean by that is that semantics seem to get in the way for many people (although it certainly may not for the person asking these questions). for some, the word church has negative connotations. certainly, i interchange the words church and community of faith often. i think the term community of faith elicits much more fruitful and biblical connotations, but i don't have a problem with the word church.
with that said, in the broad and most generally connotated sense of the word, yes, eikon is a church. "officially", it is eikon church. we certainly hope that—much more than just a bunch of people who sit in a building once a week and call it a church—there is a community and network and movement of people throughout little rock that follow and know jesus. i have little interest in creating an organization, but i am driven and called and motivated to engage our surrounding culture with values that reflect jesus.
more to the point, we will have a building where we meet regularly (hopefully more often than just sunday). we will have leaders (which i'll talk more about very soon). we will have various ministries in which we engage as a community. we will do all the things that are "traditionally" associated with "church." BUT, we hope to do it an a bit of an alternative manner. we think that we in the american church need to be honest and admit that we have mistakenly prioritized and de-emphasized some things that are central to a community that claims to follow jesus. ultimately, we hope to do church and a be a community in a way that directly reflects jesus and trims away some of the non-essentials.
3. How does Eikon work in light of (or shadow of, as you may prefer) the 1st Century New Testament Church, acts, etc.?
that's a pretty big question for a blog post answer, but let me see if i can distill that down a little. :)
i think the best place to go is—as you pointed out—the book of acts. specifically, acts 2 sheds some great light on the way the church can and should look.
They committed themselves to the teaching of the apostles, the life together, the common meal, and the prayers.Everyone around was in awe—all those wonders and signs done through the apostles! And all the believers lived in a wonderful harmony, holding everything in common. They sold whatever they owned and pooled their resources so that each person's need was met.They followed a daily discipline of worship in the Temple followed by meals at home, every meal a celebration, exuberant and joyful, as they praised God. People in general liked what they saw. Every day their number grew as God added those who were saved.
here's what we see:
1) they placed emphasis on learning and theological discovery (committed themselves to the teaching of the apostles),
2) an important part of their community was life "beyond the four walls", so, in other words, they weren't completely "church"-focused/obsessed (the life together, the common meal, meals at home),
3) eagerness/willingness to engage in personal sacrifice in order to meet needs (they sold whatever they owned and pooled their resources so that each person's need was met),
4) spiritual engagement in community was vital (prayers, daily discipline of worship, praised god, celebration) and
5) assuming that these thousands of people described here have different starting points, worldviews and specific values, they were a community that were able to place friendships/mutual understanding above individual differences (all the believers lived in a wonderful harmony).
with all that said, we hope these traits are characteristic of eikon. naturally, we want to engage people in a way that is relevant and meaningful within the context of 21st century sensibilities, but i think the church described here in acts exhibits very broad and overarching characteristics that transcend time (much like most of the scenarios described throughout scripture).
so, whereas our context is, obviously, very different than the 1st century church, i hope that we will be able to learn from and exhibit the characteristics that shaped them.
4. How do you define Emergent?
wow, what a question...
well, i don't know if i do define emergent. :) if i've got to try, though, i generally "define" it much more as a conversation than a "way to do" church or a specific set of theologies. i think one of the beauties of the emergent conversation is that you see so many different expressions of church and faith involved. it transcends age, denomination and, again, specific theologies. that isn't to say that you don't see some connective streams and characteristics, but it isn't confined to simple, limiting definitions.
i sort of think of emergent as the indie music equivalent within the church/theological camps. of course, indie music began by exactly that: independent music. it was bands/artists that weren't signed to any major label (or any label, for that matter). indie music—in the last 10 years (or maybe more)—has shifted from a strict definition of "bands not signed to a label" into bands that exhibit certain qualities and characteristics. these qualities and characteristics, though, aren't easily definable categories. it's more of a feeling and a spirit. quite frankly, i can't really any verbalize what those specific things are, but i can certainly sense when a band is sort of indie in nature.
for example, i love jenny lewis (and rilo kiley, for that matter) and i would say she is an indie artist, despite the fact that she's signed to warner bros, a (very) major label (as is rilo kiley). she's clearly not truly "independent", but there's something about her lyrics and the delivery and the way she "does" music that gives off that indie vibe. now, you could certainly argue that she's not an indie artist, but so it goes with the term "emergent." who's emergent and who's not?
there's just a spirit and vibe and "energy" that connects people and churches under the umbrella term of "emergent." so, that may be the absolute most vague and unhelpful "definition", but that at least shared some of my thoughts. :)
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well, for those who have made it to the end and are not in a vegetative state due to my ramblings, i hope that serves to further the conversation and your ability to understand what this whole thing called eikon is all about. thanks for playing! :)
we'll be back very, very soon with some exciting information about our first ever collective gathering under the auspices of eikon. it should be a cool time and help to give you a more tangible grasp of what we're doing. check back soon for details.
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faith |||amp; culture: barton damer: graphics and god
04.07.2009 08:08 PM
| art, culture, core values, theology
| permalink
last week, i wrote about the beautiful and often messy intersection of faith and culture regarding christ thile and the punch brothers. specifically, i looked at thile's faith journey shown in the trajectory of his lyrics.here, i want to shift to another art form in which we find someone expressing their journey with christ in a beautifully creative and fresh way. barton damer is a motion graphics and print designer based in dallas, tx. he's the creative director at rt creative group which is responsible for such things as collide magazine, igniter media and echo conference. he blogs at www.alreadybeenchewed.net and you can also finding him hanging with his 3 children or skateboarding.
also, of course, you can find him producing some really amazing art that creates a pattern for the interplay between christ and art.
damer specializes in seemlessly blending the worlds of motion graphics and printed art. most of the time, it's difficult to differientiate between one of his 2-d pieces and a motion still. his ability to create a sense of movement and fluidity in a flat piece is incredible.
what's most incredible, though, is the way in which damer creates work that points back to a Creator without being explicitly "christian." now, damer—particularly with his work at igniter media—certainly does quite a bit of motion and graphics work that is made to be used in worship settings or in the context of the church, but the distinction is that it never feels cheap or reverts to the most mindless form of art (think thomas kinkade). rather, he creates beautiful and moving pieces of art that engage people and elicits response.
i think that's the kind of art christ followers should be creating. art that comes from a christ perspective doesn't have to cheapen itself by settling for the most literal interpretation or merely slapping the word "christian" in front of it. damer is able to convey beauty and depth even on something like a line of skateboard decks (which you see an example of below). it isn't like you suddenly look at one of his skateboards or t-shirts and say, "ooh, i think i want to accept jesus", but what it does is engage people with beauty and truth that expresses the nature of humans as created by the most gifted Creator.
so, here's to art that's goal is to move and engage people not in a one-sighted and cheapened way, but to show the beauty and work that's god's doing in the world.
here's a few more examples of his work. to check out everthing, go to www.bartondamer.com.
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faith |||amp; culture: thile theology
one of the values we feel most strongly about at eikon is the intersection of faith and culture. more to the point, we don't view this intersection with an "us vs. them" mentality or as some unfortunate circumstance which we avoid, but rather, as an opportunity to engage culture in a way that sees god at work in the world. we believe that because every person is created in the image of god—the creator—then, ultimately, our creativity flows from god. that doesn't mean that all aspects of culture—art, music, film, literature, etc—are specifically "christian", but that, ultimately, it points back to something bigger than or something beyond us (whether it be about love or pain or a journey or whatever).
with that said, there are musicians and artists and other cultural contributors that seem to create art that is particularly descriptive of this faith/culture intersection. one of these musicians is chris thile.
in my (ryan's) top five favorite bands of all time is nickel creek, of which chris thile is the most recognizable and arguably the driving musical force. flowing from nickel creek has been several other successful offshoots including solo albums from all three members (sara's album drops in a couple weeks), mutual admiration society, fiction family and punch brothers. along with nickel creek and these various offshoots, both thile's solo work and, now, work with punch brothers has been very spiritually charged.
beginning with 2004's believer and continuing with 2006's follow-up how to grow a woman from the ground, thile has played out his real life struggles with god and faith and life in musical public space. 2008's punch, by his latest incarnation punch brothers, is the most lyrically focused work to date for thile in which he sheds the mystery of his feelings toward christianity. when the veil is lifted, we find that thile—in the aftermath of a painful divorce—has all but walked away from the faith of his family and youth.
speaking about his upbringing, thile says, "I grew up in a very Christian household and was not a rebellious child…The religion of my youth was fear-based, and I think a lot of religion is. It’s left me with an overall fear of death, which I kind of resent. I feel that’s no way to really live." The unraveling of this childhood faith is captured in the sprawling 40-minute composition, the blind leaving the blind, which is the centerpiece of punch.
by the fourth and final movement, thile confronts his soured feelings toward religion, singing,
Where I was so concerned
We would be the ones who burned
The more scared the safer
The more grateful for the grapejuice
And the wafer
further, thile reveals the kind of god he has never known:
And I need to hear Him say
"You and your friends can come in
Your thoughts and that girl can come in
Your parents and brothers are here
I let them In
Who told you I wouldn't let you all in?
You are my children."
his lyrics clearly speak to the exclusive, single-sided legalistic faith that was offered during his childhood. thile, of course, isn't alone. here in the very early phases of the development of eikon, i've had the opportunity to share the vision for the church with many people and, likewise, enter into dialogue with people about their views of god and christianity, specifically. for many people, their journey from belief as a child to eventual disbelief after negative experiences or a personal crisis, has led them to see god as some cast-aside remnant of their former self. religion, at best—for many people—is a crutch rather than a vibrant part of their life.
for many of these people, though, the conversations we've had have turned much like the final stanza of thile's the blind leaving the blind. the epic track closes with,
And I sound done
And I feel done
But I'm not done
Unless you'd give up on a lost son
thile hasn't given up if god hasn't. it's a chapter that isn't closed. despite personal crisis, pain and near-complete disbelief, he's willing to continue a dialogical journey in which god is still a possibility. it certainly may not be the god of his childhood, but it is a god he's willing to re-engage.
i recently heard someone say that "doubt is the new faith" and certainly i think that may be true. in many ways, in fact, that may be a welcome reality that seems a bit more reflective not only of our current culture but also, in many ways, the great people of "faith" as presented in scripture. thile is a doubter, but his music speaks to a great hope and journey of discovery and possibility that we most certainly embrace at eikon.
as our faith community continues to unfold and grow, i invite you to engage in this intersection of culture and faith and life and doubt. just like thile, we're a long way from having it figured out, but "unless [he'd] give up on a lost son," we're not done in that process of growing and uncovering and seeking god.
listen to a clip from the blind leaving the blind: the blind leaving the blind: 4th movement
questions for eikon?
03.17.2009 07:28 PM
| humor, information
| permalink
slowly but surely, i've been able to have more and more conversations with people about what we're doing with eikon and at the same time, more and more people have begun showing interest (some even deciding to get onboard) and asking questions. at this point, the blog posts have been fairly broad and meant to disperse general information. there hasn't been a tremendous amount of concrete information—which has been on purpose. at these very early phases, we're much more concerned about sharing about our values and our goals as opposed to just dull facts about meeting places and other stuff.
but, we definitely know people want to know some of that information. so, i want to encourage everybody to let us know your questions. what do you want to know?? if you have questions, you can either post a comment or you can shoot me an email: eikon [at] beingryanbyrd [dot] com.
a friend of mine sent me a list of questions that might inspire you. he lives in a very rural and conservative setting and he decided to poke a little fun at the old school church culture that you may be aware of. maybe his list of questions will prompt your question-writing. :)
1) Will you have a steeple on this church?
2) Which version of the "New Hymns of Inspiration" will you use... vol. 11 or 12?
3) Will you have a Sunday School Hour and old fashioned Singins' the first Sunday of every quarter?
4) What about the structure of pot luck dinners? Any insights?
5) Will you allow your deacons to drink and say a restricted list of cuss-type words?
6) Will this church be officially known as the First Eikon Holiness Saints of the Order of Luke Trinitarian Community Church?
7) Remember, if you aint got two candles a cross and a very huge bible in front of your pulpit or other sacred desk type aparatus, it aint church.
8) Will you be encouraging your faithful, tithing members to go door to door, annoying the entire community?
9) Will you allow any form of cheese in this said fellowship?
so, what are you questions? post a comment or shoot me an email!
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