I've been reading this book by a guy named Friedman called "the world is flat"... he has gone on and on for over 15 chapters explaining the in-depth reality of globalization. At first i could care absolutely less, but the more i have dug into it the more interesting it is starting to get....

Anyways we have this professors that is teaching us all about the importance of writing in APA style... which seriously chaps my ass because i could care less, but he is convinced that is crucial to our education. The last couple of classes he totally warned us that if we are not careful we will end up finishing grad school knowing a wide base of information that lacks the depth grad school is all about developing. He highly advised us to pick a subject emphasis and then in every class we are in... globalization, social justice, cross-cultural psyc, women and children at risk... whatever subject ... and tie it all back to this "emphasis", thus become an expert on it!

i spent some time praying about it... and was surprised at how quickly this whole idea of the "emergent church" came into my mind... i don't even know how it popped in my head, because i totally thought i would pick something more like "urban youth development" or "poor women at risk" or "developing communities in 3rd world poverty" ... but let me say, over the last two weeks i have completely been distracted by the idea of knowing all i can know about the emergent church...

i'm still trying to wrap my mind even around defining the most basic of terms like "what does emergent church mean?" i have been reading gobs of articles and started two books about it and it all really is deeply interesting... i think because so much of what i am reading about reminds me of the work i got up to in England... which i loved... but to it pushed even beyond the model of what i did in england... which so fascinates me.

but i think something that really hit home in helping me start to wrap my mind around the emergent church was when i was reading the aforementioned friedman text. He was ranting on and on about how good the flat world is... how a more connected world on the most random of subjects was making this incredibly solid fountain. Then he likened the new globalized world we live in, to be like pizza. Pizza is the most popular food world wide... why? because of how basic it is. Make a good dough and then regardless of what culture you are in you can whack whatever you want on it... in america it will be the classic pepperoni, in japan sushi pizza, in lebanon mezzo pizza... the possibilities are endless because of the simple genius behind pizza. Anyone, anywhere can have a piece of the pie and now more then ever they can have it tailor made to satisfy even the most unique of taste.

And tho friedman was totally describing the powerful impact globalization is having own our world today, i couldn't help but be excited by the simplicity behind what he was describing. I recognized how, for so long, churches have been making up these great pizzas and offering them, ready made, to whoever wanted... the only catch was that you had to like the pizza the way they made it. The beauty in the emergent church is how they embrace, just as globalization has, the simply genius of making a good pizza dough... establishing a good foundation and then allowing and encouraging people to be as diverse and creative as they can. Pushing people to get involved in making their own pizza... its still pizza, but the combination of toppings is endless!!

The church is still the church regardless of the rituals that are used, just like pizza is still pizza regardless of what toppings are put on it.... what makes it is the dough... just like what makes the church is her foundation in christ. I highly encourage the pizza church! its totally the way forward... so bring the dough emergent church, cuz what this world needs more then ever is to get involved in making pizza church that will show how big our God really is.