Continually obscuring what is clearly and permanently transparent

An up front recognition before we delve in the matter itself: there are a few good folks who are returning to Detroit and there are also churches who are working for the benefit of their community and the motor city: but I am suggesting in the following that more could be done: even if we just start with aiming for a positive vibe: which in turn generally leads to action: a negative vibe somehow tends to dismiss the ideas and subject under discussion:

Following Jesus was historically an urban movement: of this there is little room for debate: Just read the book of Acts and Paul's letters for clear and reasonable proof: Paul took the message of a risen Savior to the major cities of the day: he went into towns and cities on his journeys: not out: and then, having set up various house churches in major cities in the area: he apparently thought that this strategy and these infant house churches were enough in and of themselves to eventually reach the outlying areas: his journeys and the many church planting activities and eventual churches he planted, seem to bear witness to his philosophy or strategy: into town: and not out:

Paul's thought process being that once the town had been reached: the town would then reach the outlying areas: today, we see the reverse in action: far too many cities have yet to recover from the flights to suburbia: or flights even further out into the boonies: now where one chooses to live is of course the result of many factors: place of birth: though less relevant than a few decades back: financial wherewithal: always relevant: where one's employment is located and options for making the commute to work a viable proposition: (if you're still blessed enough to actually have a job to go to that is): and ultimately if money is of little concern in the monthly budget: and location can be bought because you have the money to buy it: freedom of choice: oh, for freedom of choice: I feel as if my life is being permanently painted into an ever decreasing corner: it's lack of option is seemingly relentless: and it's as if there is now nowhere left to turn because I'm stood on the last square foot of unpainted corner on one leg, because there isn't room for both of my size nines.

Detroit is painted into a corner: it's collapse crept up on us all like a super slow motion katrina and covered the city in crap: it's almost imperceptible demise didn't become obvious until we all saw what was and now is: and remains the clear and permanently transparent case: insert internal combustion engine explosive expletive of choice here: for that's how far Detroit is now painted into a corner. It's a rowboat being paddled up the street in search of a river.

For those who have been able to access to the near imaginary 'over the rainbow destination' of freedom of choice: it meant pulling up the ladder and moving out: and has done for the last 40 plus years : once the city began its post apocalyptic decline: those left with choice, chose to leave in droves and so the decline sped up: and the monster ate itself: now we all know that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction: so the 'escape from Colditz' emptying of the city also condemned those who still remain: condemned them once for not having the finances, the wherewithal or the gumption to get out and condemned them twice for leaving the remnant to take care of itself: so rather than the city retaining a critical mass population staying and helping in the caring and the rebuilding of the infrastructure: the houses: the local job market: and the resultant vibe on the streets: all of which would be in better shape had less flights occurred: have not happened: most of the folks that could have pulled up their ladder and left: I have come to the conclusion: after living on this side of the pond for 5 years that, for some, the scariest word in the English language is in fact: 'Detroit'.

Now if memory serves: those of us with faith haven’t been given a spirit of timidity: but one of power: power it would seem to overcome most things: but not this negatively charged endemic mindset regarding Detroit: if you're born in the burbs in south east Michigan: it would seem you are also born with a timidity regarding even the mentioning of the name of the city in the same way that superstitious 'luvvies' refuse to mention by name a certain play by a certain overrated playwright from Stratford: clue: MacBeth:

Detroit has acquired the status of the black sheep of the family: a distant cousin who was involved in an 'incident' some years back: and although we all know what we're thinking: and how disgraceful it all was: it never comes up for discussion: there's a faint nod of recognition once in a while: but no more.

Mike Myers said in Wayne's World that folks in the burbs were issued with Peter Frampton Comes Alive at birth: I'm thinking that inside the record sleeve must've been a document listing all the reasons to take Detroit's own Robert Clark Seger's advice: and if you'll excuse the messing with the lyric: get out of 'Detroit' as fast as possible:

This mindset of ignoring the first post apocalyptic post consumerist post everything wasteland seems distinctly not of the gospel to me: I was handed the latest report on Detroit population figures on Sunday: seems the last vestiges of those who can get out are in fact doing just that: why then do I find myself so drawn to the place? And why do some high profile major church denominations have seropresence in Detroit? Do they think that if they put their fingers in their ears and hum a little contemporary worship tune: while adopting the appearance of the correct patronizing pious posture: and never looking at the city whose name must not be mentioned: that Detroit will cease to exist?

Sincerity: you must absolutely be able to fake sincerity.

It seems to me that it is not readily possible any longer to continually obscure what is clearly and permanently transparent: Detroit needs help: it's not even on life support anymore: no-one is rushing for the crash cart and the paddles to keep it alive: the city stands as a great metaphor for the inherent consumerist selfishness that is habitual and part of us all: even those who claim to have been given new life and would therefore triumphantly 'amen' the fact that they have been given a spirit of power and not one of timidity: are oxymoronically turned to stone by mention of Detroit: now either the gospel is a lie: or our actions and faith are? For if in fact we do have a spirit of power: why is it that timidity and outright fear reign supreme? Most folks just pay sincere lip service to caring about Detroit: I know folks who almost freeze in terror at the idea of driving into Detroit: the question I find myself asking is this: where is the presence of Jesus, their professed Lord and Savior in their life and in that particular mindset? Absent: that's where. Joshua fought the battle of Jericho: Yes he did: but they say: 'if you think I'm even considering getting out of the car and fighting the battle of Detroit: forget it: Jesus will have to compel someone else: but not me': for you see: while Paul may well have taken the gospel into town: most believing folks within current orthodoxy prefer and support the construction of monolithic soulless buildings on the outskirts of town: where the new MO is as follows: instead of going into town: folks in the inner city now have to come out of town: to our swanky new build for a 'blessing': am I being hopelessly naive here? Surely to reach the inner city: you actually have to go into it?

Others state categorically that nothing can now be done: it is game over: routinely blaming corrupt politicians: or blaming the big three: or blaming the automotive workers: or blaming the tax structure: all of which are need of major reform: hell, everything in Detroit is in need of major reform: so here's a thought: maybe those who have been transformed by the renewing of their minds might have a slight advantage when it comes to thinking outside the generic box for ways to begin to go about fixing things: for that's where one generally finds Jesus isn't it: outside the box: starting with a little love: and then offering the same love: over and over again: yesterday: today and forever. Maybe if there was a forward lean of love: imbued with a sense and a spirit of power rather than timidity: Jesus could walk the streets: bringing freedom from oppression: condemnation and judgment and Kick royal ass.

What if you're the ass kicker He is compelling? Do you develop selective hearing? Most folks while listing their own preferred version of 'responsible parties for Detroit's decline' never mention the churches: why? There's been enough of them: maybe even too many: 65 Detroit churches went bankrupt last year: where was the coming together? The logical answer is that to a large extent it was missing: too many churches in too many towns sell you their version of the gospel: sure Jesus is in there somewhere: but that's just it: He's only in there somewhere: along with the other 'thing' that is the 'thing' they are 'selling'.

Let's change track for a minute: I am from London: and the worst place to drive in London: apart from the whole of the city itself: is around a giant intersection in the south west: in a place called Hammersmith Broadway: I always used to say that everyone learning to drive in England should be forced to learn to drive in and around that intersection: the last thing it resembles is driving down a country lane: it's complete madness: despite the addition of traffic lights some years back: if you drive there: you either cut your teeth on the experience and ante up and by default become a better reader of traffic: a better reader of the random danger: and a better reader of how to handle your vehicle: and really become a 'driver': or you don't: for if you can't drive in this set up: you can't really drive: you're only pretending: the gulf in approach and ability as you either cut the mustard or not: is as the night is to the day: you become by default either the cool incarnate Steve McQueen in Bullitt or Barney Rubble and Fred Flintstone: The gap is as unbridgeable as jumping the ice rings in Cassinni's Division.

To adjust and to eventually master the proceedings of driving in and around Hammersmith the following is required: driving in power and not timidity: note: I didn't say driving with reckless abandon: I said power: as in 'assured'. If I am your passenger I would be assessing your driving on the approach to the intersection and would either have some 'blessed assurance' that we'll survive the ordeal: or I'd demand to get out and walk: and meet you on the other side: that is if you make it.

Jesus is supposed to remove fear and timidity and enable us to engage as readily as Paul did. Jesus is sovereign and building His church: fighting an urban spiritual guerilla war: fighting to transform our hearts, minds and actions: Jesus the one mediator between God and man: is urging us to love: enable: empower and advocate on behalf of everyone:everywhere: wherever and however they live: even the folks who live in Detroit: for we are not called to judge: but to love and help: there are deeply wounded folks wherever you look: but there is more hurt in our post apocalyptic inner cities: because that’s simply where the ‘more’ live: even though Detroit is now under half the population it once was: I guess when your city gets broken: or your heart gets broken: or your heart for the city gets hardened and dismissive: you see all the reasons why responding to the hurt is a waste of time: but Jesus always responded to the hurt: and He never thought it a waste of time: He was never too busy to stop and spit in someone's eye: He came for the sick: not for the folks with the manicured front lawn and in ground sprinklers: the cracks in the life of a city are far more obvious: for they exist one step away from your front porch: the daily grindhouse combo of massive unemployment and nuked infrastructure: the never ceasing 24/7 of it all: the lows: the injustice and the human tragedy that lies in the litter strewn gutters can just as easily harden our hearts as soften them: and there has been an en masse hardening towards the city of Detroit: surely the mission of the church is to make sure that this hardening of heart stops: and stops right now: but too many churches have a navel gazing inward focus: or pick the 'thing' that is going to be the 'thing' that they major on: and then they major on that 'thing' to the detriment of all the other elements of the gospel: and the 'thing' they generally choose to major on isn't the 'thing' that trumps all other 'things': and that thing is love:

Love.

For if and when we collectively by default: or by design: or by lack of foresight: or by lack of care: or by endemic corruption: close down our hearts to an entire city: everyone suffers: for there is indeed an inescapable network of mutuality that we find ourselves birthed into: and like it or not: we can't stop the world and get off: but when we do our best to paradoxically escape from this inescapable network of humanity: it's interwoven-ness and it's mutuality: we are the ones who weaken the chain: sure, we might feign interest: and deliver erudite intellectual homily stating that something must be done: for we feel that's what we are called to state: to ensure we maintain the grand illusion of giving a damn: all the while knowing deep inside that we have no intention of stepping up to the plate: when vast percentages of the church give up on a city: we are all the weaker for it: or am I missing something? and are you going to tell me that Jesus isn't interested in Detroit? Not interested enough to prompt you to action? And that the idea of being there for our neighbors is really more allegorical in exegisis than practical in application?

Jesus didn’t intend to be glorified primarily through us as individuals: Jesus is part of a social triune Godhead: so he created a world in which we will work more effectively when the doing and being gets done in relationship: community trumps isolation: if you’ve ever been lonely: if you’ve ever felt in need of support and had nowhere to go: you will know the following to be the case: we were not made to attempt making it through the stuff of life all on our own: it can’t be done to any acceptable measure: we are in need of a state of grace: brought into being in our lives by Jesus presence through relationship with folks who actually really do give a damn about us: and show it: any fool can talk the talk: I 've been on the receiving end of talker and the receiving end of walkers: the difference is cavernous: what happens when Jesus asks you to walk it?

For an organic community to work as it hopefully should: bearing the fruit of familial and relational DNA over the more traditional authoritarian and hierarchical approach: we must be open and honest with each other: and we must do all we can to refrain from a mindset that enables us to cast an entire city of potential relationships aside: and as always seems to be the case: the primary area needing our attention is relationships: our western culture has birthed in us all a modus operandi to think in individual rather than communal terms: the suburban sprawl: individual: the city: a collective: but much harder work: so to the relative safety of the suburban sprawl we retreat and retreat until the sprawl is never ending and the city has its heart torn out: and if money is of no consequence to our own little bit of Christendom, for we have more than enough: we build a magnificent Hearst castle or a log cabin in the boonies: depending on whether you like killin' stuff: or hanging stuff that other folks have killed on your wall: but the west has long since been settled and the rugged individualistic approach to life that is held in mythic status by so many: ends up bringing into being an en masse 'to hell with everyone' mindset by default: not that any one individual is that callous and careless: but the end result of a mass exodus of folks acting in 'pull up the ladder' splendid isolation: means by the universal law of cause and effect: denying the inescapable network of mutuality that does indeed encompass us all: it means that we have arrived at the junction of apathy and downer: where we find that a Manchurian candidate 'I don't want to engage' mentality is burnt into far too many mindsets: and our family: our street: our village: and ultimately 'our' city: we all suffer from the disengagement brought about by iconoclastic rugged individuality: I am known for being an outlier: for I am one: but even I get that I can't make it on my own.

The Trinity lives and thinks in familial and relational terms: the Trinity is in fact the supreme example of relationship: so the question we must always be asking ourselves is where and how do we intend to play our part? Seems to me that it is difficult to play your part and be as communal as the Trinity if you have next to no neighbors? Seems to me that spending your time at home on the couch for a decade or two doesn’t really count: and neither does stipulating to God where, when, how and if you will respond to His call when you hear it: (bargaining with God about only serving Him in 'such and such' a location is folly): so while recognizing that we all need time out from the grindhouse 31 before we reach burn out: we also need to recognize when our 'time out' is in danger of becoming our permanent modus operandi: when we’ve gone spiritually AWOL for long enough: we no longer recognize His voice: and if we do: we bargain that we will only respond to His calling in places that suit our fancy: maybe where the view is nice? Some mountains would be lovely darling: or, if you're a little more buff: somewhere where there’s a beach to surf: to show off the six pack: to hang ten and catch some rays: stipulating the location of one's service to one's Savior isn't service is it: it's living one's faith as if ordering by menu: it's having the brass balls to respond with clearly defined and stipulated caveats before the throne of grace: and as more and more folks live their faith in this manner: there is a domino principle that takes effect: we all suffer as a result: and we are all suffering right now: who are you going to turn to when there's no-one left to feel your pain? There are urban areas across most western countries that Jesus has a plan for: that plan is love: what if you are part of that plan? have heard His call but are currently in denial mode: because the call doesn't fit your portfolio of requirements. Because you walk in timidity and not in power.

The new testament understanding of an organic church body never considers living life in isolation: as we walk and work out our faith: encouragement: advocacy: empowerment: support: compassion: acceptance: permission: sustaining love and grace are all needed: these characteristics are all must haves: bringing about a ‘me/we’ mindset: for the self cannot be self without other selves: MLK Jr: Jesus releases us: and we in turn help each other: but He ultimately does the releasing: we may well be the vehicle used: in a single conversation that resonates with another human being while waiting to pay for groceries one morning: or we may be used over a longer period of time: in an ongoing dialog with someone for the majority of a lifetime: sometimes we get to see the impact of these conversations first hand: and sometimes we will never know what impact: if any: we had: but if we approached the encounter in love: we will do no harm: loving without caveats is not up for debate: we are to love as unconditionally as Jesus loves us: He must have a reason for it: oh yeah, I remember now: it works.

But for the mutuality to be real: the love to happen: the inescapable network to be a network that you don't want to escape from: you have to do two things: you have to show up: and then you have to love: unconditionally.

For whatever else the church may be known for: exemplifying distinctive radical: self-sacrificial love to those who believe or those who don’t isn’t one of them. Institutionalized orthodoxy has not left folks with the impression that His followers are unique in the way they attempt communicating the unsurpassable worth given by God to each and every individual: we are made in His image/essence: but current orthodox wisdom has a tendency to obscure this actuality and divine reality: the persistence of this institutionalized and generally unquestioned thinking and approach is the fuel enabling the continuance of ignorance: the continuance of sanctimonious dialog and bad communication: the fuel enabling the continuing irrelevant fight over obscure points of dogma and semantics: compared instead to answering the call to love: the largely irrelevant dogmatic obsession with supposed hot button issues: this fuel is the combustible material that helps to continually obscure what is clearly and permanently transparent: God is love: I need help: you need help: for we all need help: ergo: Detroit needs help: for we are indeed caught in an inescapable network of mutuality: for God so loved the whole world: correct? And more importantly: He didn't come to condemn the motor city: or any other city where the tarmac is in meltdown: Jesus walked on water and He walks the 'hood'. He owns it.

We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them:

Albert Einstein