Fewer Moments of Truth...

Fewer Encounters With My Atheist & Agnostic Neighbors

I've been blogging less and less lately, and several of my regular visitors have e-mailed, asking "Where've you been? Why aren't you writing?"

I have the canned answer that lets me sleep at night: "Oh, well, work and seminary are really kicking my butt, so I'm spending every spare moment possible with my wife." Sounds good, right? Very noble... but not entirely true.

Yes, I'm busier these days than I've ever been. And work and seminary are most certainly taking a great deal of my time.

...but I'm starting to realize that a huge and underlying reason I haven't been blogging or writing (working on my book) lately is that I'm not spending much time with non-Christians. I haven't been getting out of my own bubble. Monday through Friday I'm working eleven hour days with online homework in the evenings. Weekends, I'm just trying to decompress... usually I go to church on Sunday mornings. Any social time my wife and I spend is with a few friends from church.

When I'm only around Christians, my life doesn't just feel out of balance, it is out of balance. In fact, I believe there are things God wants to say to me that will only be said through non-Christians. For whatever [numerous] reasons, I am not stretched fully without my atheist, agnostic and "other" friends. I need them.

On my friend Jim Henderson's website www.DoableEvangelism.com, we had a discussion about whether a Christian pastor could "pastor" (verb) non-Christians, or members of other religions. We were thinking about the concept of the Catholic and Anglican parishes, and how the priests assigned to these areas were responsible for serving the needs of everyone - even those who didn't attend the church. What a concept!

So in a pluralist, postmodern setting, can I be a pastor/disciple/brother/counselor/shoulder-to-cry-on for my atheist/agnostic/pagan/Buddhist/Islamic/Hindu/Wiccan/Star-Trek-fan brothers and sisters? I already believe the answer is most certainly "yes," (it MUST be!) but how does it look in practice? ...and how do I avoid being excommunicated from my Conservative Pentecostal church while practicing this scary pluralist pastoring.

I mean, didn't Jesus kind of model this?

please read more about my thoughts on the evolution of Christianity at http://emergingchristianity.blogspot.com