The Aspen Grove

Living Process for LCOS

Note Planted: : 2024-06-27
Last Tended: : 2024-12-11
11 min read

🌱Seed 🙂Agree 🌳Thought-Tree

Importance: 10%

The Big Idea

Note Tree for various aspects as they develop LCOS Community Notes first part of the process undertaken: Opening LCOS Visioning Process

Related Notes: LCOS Community Notes Notes on the Nature of Order Thinking of Spatial Relationships as Centers LCOS Pastoral Practices and Perspective

John 6:32-33

Jesus then said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.

John 10:9-10

I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

Proverbs 15:22

Without counsel plans fail, but with many advisers they succeed.

Proverbs 25:15

With patience a ruler may be persuaded, and a soft tongue will break a bone.

Proverbs 27:1

Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring.

This document seeks to develop and enact a cyclical living process that can be used to structure our on going life together in a way that keeps us focused on our core ideals and purpose.

The elements of this effort are twofold:

  1. The laying out and initiation of a living process to guide the rhythm of our life together as a whole.
  2. The construction of a pattern language that will help us to continually ask and answer the question “Is this supporting or hurting our mission?” with tangible responses. A Scripture Based Pattern Language

Background reasons for using this approach can be found in this document: Mission and Visioning Potholes

A possible integration of my thoughts on rhythm with the idea of centers

Rhythms are the basic way of seeing the world

Wholeness and centers are the way we can notice and talk about these rhythms in the tangible world around us

Creation account

  • first thing Created us light and the basic rhythm of day and night
  • Later this rhythm is reproached but is put into a tangible form with light sources and heavily bodies
  • Day two is the creation of a spacial reality
  • Then other days flesh this out with land sea and animals
  • humans are spatial and time bound creatures in line with the rest of the creation Presence or God
  • spatially in temple starting at garden of Eden
  • time wise sabbath starting at the end of creation Centers and rhythms can then be thought of as was to reflect God and his presence some thing better reflect than others and some totally miss the mark

Process Flow

  • Word of God as Narrative and unfiltered Pattern source
  • We also have the “law on our heart” which correlates the Alexander’s idea of Deep Feeling. We all have an inherent sense of if something is rightly ordered or not we just sometimes ignore it or allow our minds to warp it. It is the good or bad order of the world around us actually effecting us viserally. Not our emotional response to things
  • Doctrine as regularized grammar
    • This is more abstract and has to do with what we believe
    • Think doctrine that God hears and answers prayer
  • Pattern language as a way to express the tangible order of the world and human relatedness that flows from the Creator
    • This is more tangible and had to do with how we live and what we do
    • Think public prayer
  • Form Language as the rules to actually compose the physical centers and lived rhythms of a pattern
    • Think the form of the litany in LSB setting 1
    • Form can be embodied in the shape of a physical center or a Chronemic rhythm.
    • For example a heart beat is based on both the physical make up of the heart that makes it possible as well as the rhythmic employment of each chamber

Living Process

Basically the idea that we want to facilitate a paradigm shift from mechanistic mentality of being after the right structure or mechanism but rather we are after the right pattern or wholeness

Changing the way we think of our work and future not as plans and goals

But as giving thanks for what we are and acting to bring to life the patterns we value

We are after to good order of the world and our lives accepting to the will of God

Not good order as defined by the world and culture

Or even the good order of the past only

But the good order of God’s will as best as we can understand and enact his patterns in the world around us

The work of the church as an unfolding whole

Mechanistic cosmology as the Aristotle of our day. Go look up Luther on Aristotle in Heidelberg dispute

Get opening discusión from unfolding whole

Also get mechanistic discussion from phenomena of life

Outline

  1. What is going well now?

    1. What keeps you at LCOS?
    2. What got you first connected with LCOS?
    3. What is the most meaningful aspect of LCOS?

  2. What is not going well now?

  3. Vision Exploration

    1. Perspectives
      1. Current or Past Leadership
      2. Young Families
      3. Recent Members
      4. Longtime Members
      5. Individuals with accessibility concerns
      6. Preschool Teachers/Staff
      7. Preschool Families

  4. Analysis

  5. Construction of Pattern Language

  6. Where have we been?

    1. Review Scriptural Foundation What is our purpose as a church?
      1. Two Kinds of Righteousness
      2. Two Commissions
      3. Mission Statement
    2. Review Past Activity
      1. Review written history summary
        1. As a counsel
        2. As elders
        3. Maybe in bible class
        4. As Preschool board
      2. What is cherished from this past?
      3. What are hard or disappointing parts of this past?

  7. Where are we now?

  8. Where are we going?

Pieces of Process

Pattern Language

🪴Sprout 🙂Agree 🟡Consideration

Importance: 10%

The Big Idea

The idea of a pattern language was originally laid out by Christopher Alexander (Architect, Author). He developed this idea deeply over the course of his career for the use of constructing building and other physical spaces. I believe that it can also be very useful for forming a clear shared picture of life together as a congregation within a local community.

Quote

If you can’t draw a picture of it, it isn’t a pattern.

  • Christopher Alexander

Here are some examples of Pattern languages for various Projects:

I think the reason we often have a hard time applying scriptural directives, commands and or methods is that we have gotten caught in western mechanistic thinking A Holistic versus Mechanistic Perspective.

A pattern language is a tool to try and bridge us back to thinking and applying things according to patterns like our ancestors naturally did. Some example is Luther’s treatment of the Ten Commandments expanding each commandments to logical and ordinary applications. Or Paul’s arguments from nature that he assumes are self evident.

Alexander worked from a concept he defined as Deep Feeling. This is not normal touchy feely emotion but is a sense of how a space works on or affects the person who encounters it. This puts the direction of causation in the external environment moving to the person. This is why he argues deep feeling is an objective realty rather than the inside out idea of emotions. He conceptualized this human reaction to a space’s “life” as a kind of objective steady reaction across cultures and individuals. See: The Quality of Life in Environments and Objects. Which I think can be helpful as far as it goes but as a community of faith our primary grounding is the word of God.

Therefore while a pattern language for use in a congregation can take into account deep feeling, wholeness and the needs of individuals as Alexander defines them. They should not be the primary foundation.

Therefore the construction of a faith based pattern language should start with Scripture. Patterns can then be drawn from areas that are clear with often repeated concepts for living and relating to others being given more weight than those that do not occur as often.

From that foundation more specific and smaller patterns can be developed that derive from these scriptural patterns but take into account the specifics of a community’s needs, culture, opportunities, etc. to guide a wholistic approach of deep feeling and good order. This secondary level allows for the needs and feelings of the actual community members to be integrated into the pattern language. While also remaining grounded in Scripture.

This follows the principle of the “primary process” that Alexander defined as differentiation which basically means that a good development or “unfolding” process should start from the big picture whole and then slowly differentiate and strengthen smaller wholes with each step. An example is how a human grows from a single cell but then grows by splitting or differentiating new cells.

This whole idea of a pattern language needs to be put squarely where it belongs in the Corom Mundo realm of relating with other humans and the world. It does not speak about our salvation relationship with Jesus. To clarify it is not our way to Heaven but a clear description of how we want our life together to look and how we stay focused on the primary mission of sharing the gospel.

Another way to think about the function of the pattern language is that every decision we make to move something forward or choose between options is driven by some kind of implicit pattern that is being worked toward. A big picture lifecycle pattern is the “work hard and then retire at ease.” If someone is working toward embodying this pattern they will make very different decisions than someone who is not. A pattern language helps make this kind of decision making intentional and specific.

Also it helps bridge our theology and doctrine to the real world needs and feelings of people in a practical way.

Structures to Start From

Use two commissions as basic identification of mission toward the created world and gospel mission

From Gospel DNA by Michael Newman

  • A deep and passionate love and care for People.
  • Multiplication of love, followers, and overall focus on spreading the Gospel.
  • Commitment to walking humbly in the Truth of Scripture.
  • Ability to be Adaptable and continually learning and growing.
  • Willingness to Self-Sacrifice for the upbuilding of the body of Christ and our witness to the world.

Table of duties maybe another option take things in a more vocational direction or the confessional documents Use two commissions as basic identification of mission toward the created world and gospel mission

The use Bonhoeffer’s Chapter of Life Together that Talks about Ministry. This is from the perspective of the Priesthood of all Believers and not necessarily from the perspective of the Pastoral office.

  • The Ministry of Holding Ones Tongue - Life Together, p. 91
  • The Ministry of Meekness - Life Together, p. 94
  • The Ministry of Listening - Life Together, p. 97
  • The Ministry of Helpfulness - Life Together, p. 99
  • The Ministry of Bearing - Life Together, p. 101
  • The Ministry of Proclaiming - Life Together, p. 103
  • The Ministry of Authority - Life Together, p. 108

Levels of Community Scale

The broad levels of scale from which to approach different conversations about the physical community surrounding and forming LCOS.

Level 0: California Central Coast

Level 1: Larger Santa Maria Area

Level 2: Orcutt Community Proper

Level 3: Immediate neighborhoods Surrounding LCOS
Level 4: Church and Preschool Communities

Levels of Scale for God’s Church

The broad levels of scale from which to approach different conversations about the Fellowship of Christians surrounding and forming LCOS.

Level 0: The Whole Church throughout Time and Space

Level 1: The Whole Church across the World Today

Level 2: Those Believers we are in Direct Fellowship with because of Agreement in Doctrine and Practice

Level 3: Those Believers we meet and interact with Personally from Our surrounding area and Community connections
Level 4: Our direct Church Family at LCOS

Interview or conversation with people What are things you feel like your board or group has to do?

What are things your board or group does well to support our mission?

What are things your board or group does that do not further our mission? Especially things that have been “drifted” into.

What are things you want to see your board or group do in the future to grow and further our mission?

  • What keeps you at LCOS?
    • The warm and supporting people
    • The willingness of people to help out

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