I am back with a vengence :)

So a good friend asked me if I could answer some questions on his blog, I figured I could do that, and I could do it here as well since I am writing:

I am going to put up the whole email, but take only a portion at a time, probably once a week.

I thought for the blog I'd give a brief intro about you, for people who don't know, and then ask if you could tell a little bit about how your journey led you to the kind of community you're a part of now.  Here are the other questions I had, stuff people have been bringing up and discussing with me as I've shared you're blogs and other things.  I've had long back and forth discussions with a couple Pastor friends about the first one, and after our meeting this Friday, I spent a lot of time discussing what the Kingdom means with people who were worried I was basically setting them up, or trying to work on them with an agenda to convert them.  

1) Rev, a question that has come up a few times after the blog I posted, and after I put a documentary about you up on Facebook a while back, is what you mean when you say that as a Christian Anarchist you "submit your life to the teachings of Jesus, and not to anything else."  Aren't Christians taught to submit to the leaders of the Church?  Didn't the early church have Bishops, Apostles, Elders, and Councils?  

2) Another question people have asked, and that maybe ties in, is the idea that Anarchy means chaos, lawlessness, and rebellion against the established order.  A few people have asked me how that can be compatible with the kind of communities you've been a part of, which seem to be about loving and serving those who have been marginalized by society.  

3) Another thing that's come up recently is what the Kingdom of God means.  I used that phrase a few times in my blog, and didn't realize that others might hear it very differently than I do.  What does the Kingdom mean for non-believers?  How do people who are trying to set it up here on earth share the Kingdom, or even the Kingdom work, with those who don't believe in God?  Should the goal of Christians be to convert them so that they can be saved, and share in this Kingdom?

4) Finally, I wanted to ask what it means to live this stuff out.  Are there different approaches for Kingdom living?  How do we work on becoming a part of God's Kingdom?  Any thoughts or advice you have would be great.  

so, I will start with a post about the story of mr and mrs rev and how we got to where we are now.  I will post this tomorrow.  And then I will get into those questions.  Hope you will join in, and ask questions of your own as we go.

rev