I have spent a good deal of time lately thinking about the "Future"-- partly because I have been forced to think about the future of my family. What is God calling us to do? Where are we headed? What is the next step for Katie and I?
But this has lead me to reflect on the future in general: what it is, how we set our sights on it, how we get there, and when does it begin? The scope of this is obviously quite broad. That is, thoughts on the future are in many ways as vast as the future itself. Additionally, as someone who hopes to be vocationally involved within the faith community "in the future", in areas of teaching, discipling, pastoring, church planting and leadership development, "the future" is something I have a personal stake in. Thus, how I conceive of the future and how I intend to lead people toward it is of critical importance.
Furthermore, our thinking about the future becomes more difficult when we realize that we have to conduct our evaluation in two spheres: thinking about the church in terms of the future; and thinking about the future in terms of the church. Actually, my contention is that we have to choose which way we are going to think about the future, and that our chosen path has a myriad of implications for how we live our lives in the present.
I have been laughing throughout all of this, as my mind has constantly been drawn to thoughts of Dr. Emmit Brown, the flux capacitor, and the space-time continuum which he was so deliberate not to tinker with. For those of you that
don't remember Robert Zemeckis' 1985 film, Back to the Future, you can read a brief synopsis here. Not that I remember a whole bunch from the film, or could clearly articulate the philosophical presuppositions that under-girded it-- but I do remember that the multiple plot lines were driven not by looking at how we move toward the future; but that the future was already what it was as a result of miniscule events from the past and present. That is, we are creating the future now. We have been creating the future for a long time. Therefore, the best way for us to build the future for the church is not to evaluate the church in terms of the future. Rather, we determine the future through our actions and interactions in the present.
I must confess at this point that my thinking as of late has been profoundly impacted by Erwin McManus' book, An Unstoppable Force.
McManus' contention throughout the whole book is that the way we move toward the future is by "unwrapping the present". For example, he says,
The paralyzing fear for many who are clinging to the past is moving into an unknown future. There's an irony in this. While we think we're moving into an elusive future, all we're actually doing is moving into the already existent present. The great leap of faith isn't from the present to the future but from the past to the present! All we have to do to discover the future is unwrap the present (McManus, 91).
and
The future is full of hope. God has placed it there for those who will follow him into it. Yet the only way we'll ever receive so great a gift as the future is by unwrapping the present (McManus, 93).
All this has done for me essentially is to remind me that the future is for God alone to determine. This is not to say that shouldn't talk about the future, or speak with (humble)authority on where we want to be in the future. But this is merely a trajectory. God is the architect of the future. What he has called us to do is, in faithfulness and obedience, architect the present. This reminds me of the words of my college professor Carla Waterman, "You will be what you are becoming." Not that these words originated with her, but they did serve as the infrastructure of her view of spiritual formation. The future starts right now. The way Katie and I can confidently plan for the future and the way the church can confidently move toward the future is through faithfulness in the present.
sometimes you make my head hurt.
Posted by: Mike Daling | January 26, 2005 at 03:14 PM