Let us suppose that you have already decided that the first priority of your life is Spirit maturity.\u00a0 Let us suppose that you are like that man in Jesus\u2019 parable that found a valuable treasure hidden in a field and then sold all that he had to buy that field.\u00a0 Let us suppose that for you Spirit maturity is like that treasure; it claims priority over all else.<\/p>\n
Secondly, let us suppose that you have decided to make Christianity your religious home.\u00a0 There are many good reasons for doing this: familiarity, experience of its healing strengths, or simply finding in this heritage the Spirit poetry with which you have (for whatever reasons) fallen in love.<\/p>\n
Next, a third decision comes into view.\u00a0 What sort of Christian religious community do you need?\u00a0 The Symposium on Christian Resurgence for Century Twenty-One came into being to focus on this issue.\u00a0 This research group has given a name to the Christian community needed: \u201cThe Christian Resurgence Circle.\u201d\u00a0 What is the Christian Resurgence Circle?\u00a0 It is the Circle you need.\u00a0 If it is not the Circle you need, it is not the Christian Resurgence Circle.<\/p>\n
This means that the Christian Resurgence Circle is not a program invented for \u201cother\u201d people.\u00a0 It is a religious practice needed by its inventors.\u00a0 If we who are inventing this Circle don\u2019t crucially need it, it is not a Christian Resurgence Circle that we are inventing.<\/p>\n
Most awakening Christians have become clear that the typical local congregation of Christendom is not what we need.\u00a0 Perhaps it provides a good sermon from time to time.\u00a0 Perhaps it provides a good study group from time to time.\u00a0 Perhaps from time to time it allows us to meet other searchers.\u00a0 Perhaps from time to time it engages us in doing something meaningful for others.\u00a0 But in the main, it nauseates us with its obsolete language; with its preoccupation with avoiding controversy in order to retain members and money; with its emphasis on swallowing incomprehensible beliefs; with its unwillingness to hear honest questions and respect honest doubts; with its lack of intimate circles of safety in which we can share our actual life struggles without meeting misunderstanding, rejection, and even contempt.\u00a0 Perhaps we are also discouraged with the lack of support for \u201cthe priesthood of all believers\u201d \u2013 the understanding that every member of \u201cthe body of Christ\u201d is a potential source of Spirit inspiration for every other member.<\/p>\n
All these negative reactions to the Christian communities we have experienced are clues to finding the Christian community we need.\u00a0 The most obvious clue is the vision that we need an intimate Circle.\u00a0 We need to be sitting equidistant from some center of focus rather than in rows listening to voices from a raised pulpit.\u00a0 We need to be small in numbers (24 or less; 12 is ideal, even 3 or 4 will do).\u00a0 We need time together on a regular basis.\u00a0 We need to have processes that allow honest sharing, honest probing, honest and relevant challenges from one another. We need a Circle.<\/p>\n
The quality of this Circle is also an important aspect of what we need.\u00a0 We can quickly discover that we need a Circle that meets weekly for a couple of hours.\u00a0 We need to attend this Circle every week except for very important exceptions.\u00a0 We need to come prepared to do Spirit exploration and make Spirit commitments that affect all of our living.\u00a0 We need to give leadership and receive leadership from others.\u00a0 We need to become Spirit leadership.\u00a0 We need to become Spirit followers.\u00a0 We need to keep Spirit and Spirit maturity central in our Circle activities.<\/p>\n
And we need, if we are serious about being a Christian Circle, to study and hopefully master\u00a0 the very best of Christian theology.\u00a0 We need to know how to liberate the Bible from its contemporary literalistic misunderstandings.\u00a0 We need to know how to translate the ancient metaphorical language of the Bible into the sort of religious poetry that makes contact with our lives today.\u00a0 We need to know how to say what we mean by \u201cGod\u201d in such an obvious way that anyone can grasp what we are talking about.\u00a0 We need to know why and how Jesus was an event of importance in the history of the world.\u00a0 We need to know what calling him \u201cthe Christ\u201d meant then and means now.\u00a0 We need to know what we are pointing to with \u201cThe Holy Spirit\u201d and with each aspect of this Spirit: Faith or Trust, Freedom, Love or Compassion, Peace or Tranquility, Bliss or Joy.\u00a0\u00a0 We need to know what we mean by the opposite of all these qualities: by delusion, bondage, and malice, by escape, estrangement, and despair.\u00a0 In a word, we need to recognize \u201cthe sickness of sin\u201d when we see it, and we need to recognize the healing of \u201csin\u201d in our lives.<\/p>\n
Such competencies require that each Christian Resurgence Circle see itself as part of a larger community of Circles and experienced Spirit Guides.\u00a0 The Circle we need is not just another group like many of the groups we have already experienced.\u00a0 The Circle we need is a Spirit Body.\u00a0 As pointed out in a New Testament saying, when two or three gather together in the manner needed, Christ is there in the midst of them.\u00a0 We become the Body of Christ.\u00a0 We become the Resurrection.\u00a0 We need to know what this means and recognize it when it happens.<\/p>\n
So if you are someone who has chosen to make Spirit maturity a priority in your life and want to do this through some sort of relevant Christian practice, we invite you to contact us about attending one of our continental Symposium meetings and\/or organizing in your local place the Circle you need.<\/p>\n