Undisciplined Versions: Seeing and Being Jesus in the World
A book project on cultivating the radical welcome of Matthew 25 as a family
“Undisciplined Versions” will (hopefully) be the Tuesday posts of some of what I’m working on around the dissertation, and whatever other kind of research I’m doing that has to do with religion and race…gender, purity, etc. and other things. I’m hoping that this will 1) keep me accountable to making this work broadly accessible, meaningful and useful for understanding how to engage religion especially in people, places, and spaces that are unexpected. Because religion is everywhere! And it’s so interesting. When it’s not terrifying, I think.
“Undisciplined” comes from Frances Tran’s work to think with and beyond disciplinary borders and boundaries in order to imagine different ways of being and belonging in the world. I think, too, about how so much of this work is translation: a version of another version, and a conversation within a larger conversation. And, of course, I’m thinking unruly, rebellious, alternative.
I mentioned maybe somewhere recently that I had a book project coming down the pipeline: here it is—tentatively titled:
Seeing and Being Jesus in the World: How to Live the Radical Welcome of Matthew 25 as a Family.
It’s the result of “the Office of Christian Formation of the Presbyterian Mission Agency [the Presbyterian Church (USA) who] received a grant of $1.25 million from Lilly Endowment Inc. to come alongside parents, caregivers, churches and worshiping communities to provide skills, opportunities for connection and relationship building, and the resources needed to enhance and prioritize sharing faith in households.” One of the projects includes working with Westminster John Knox Press to put out books and resources around a variety of topics.
It seems that the books I’ve written (or edited or co-written) have followed my life’s trajectory in some ways, so perhaps it’s fitting that this next book will be about family life together, church and faith, and practices of justice.
I’m excited to delve into this work!
Like so many of you, I often lay awake at night wondering how to keep our kids safe, but even more, how to encourage in the next generation a vision of a better world where schools and streets are not sources of anxiety, and they, too, can in fact be a part of building something beautiful in meaningful ways.
"We can do no great things–only small things with great love." ~ Mother Teresa
I’m a Presbyterian Church (USA) minister, and part of a denomination that has a long history of working towards the common good, especially reaching out to the most marginalized and vulnerable in our world. One of the ways, especially recently, I’ve been inspired by our denomination and its efforts is through an initiative organized around Matthew 25.
It’s perhaps a familiar passage to many for the apocalyptic imagery of a king and all the nations, and this invitation: “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me” (v. 34-36). But “the righteous” who were welcomed in wondered, when did we see you? Jesus says: “when you did it to one of the least of these…”
Indeed, “the least of these” is often the focus of Matthew’s gospel, that is, those who are constantly on the margins, invisible or invisibilized by structures of marginalization, oppression and violence. In Matthew we are oriented to the world through genealogies and traditions—he gives us right at the start a “genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham” (v. 1). But “the least of these” are the ones that Matthew’s Jesus uses to persistently widen and broaden the genealogies whether it is giving them to us as an example of God’s kingdom (look at everyone from the magi to women to children) or including them in the work (our fishermen disciples).
Jesus helps us see that those who belong to and are kin to God are consistently those we least expect and those who are working for the good of all.
And so, the Matthew 25 movement seeks to build on this work of radical welcome through three specific areas—eradicating systemic poverty, dismantling structural racism, and building congregational vitality—and then, expanding outwards into those intersecting issues that emerge around what they call “priorities”: gender justice, climate change, and militarism.
These may simply seem like a tangled miscellany of progressive and liberal social-political issues, but there are meaningful through lines in all of it, one of which is simply: faithful living in the world. We are living in and through a moment in history where we see how we are not only “connected” whether that is through digital and media technologies, and we have access to so much information about so much of the world, we are “inter-connected.”
This means that we faithfully consider how all we do impacts what happens in the wider world. We are entangled with one another. There are no single issues. We are compelled to address climate change if we are to talk about the economic impact on conditions of labor for certain populations all around the world. When we talk about labor conditions we cannot avoid the issue of gender equality and the impact of the heteropatriarchal systems on the LGBTQIA+ community. When we consider the lives and dignity of those who identify as LGBTQIA+ we have to make space for issues of race/racism and poverty. Faithful living asks us to see the threads between it all, and to shape a response with and through our whole lives.
Matthew 25 gives us a way to not only ask these questions, but orient ourselves to the world in such a way that we see hunger, thirst, and need for connection all around us. It helps us to see and compels us to respond with joy.
What I love about Matthew 25 is how it articulates a vision for churches to serve Jesus by engaging not only within their faith communities. It gives us a possibility of what that might look like when we do this work at home. We are not only called to serve the “least of these” but to labor with “the least of these” in making this world a place where all thrive and flourish in God’s kingdom. It strikes me that some readers might have experienced or experience food insecurity, lack of clean water, trauma from the effects of militarism, discrimination based on identity, and more. We do this work in community, and always alongside and with others. So it makes sense to learn with and from some of the most vulnerable in our society: our children. Like Kathryn Green-Ross at Second Presbyterian Church in Indianapolis, I am inspired by a Matthew 25 vision in what she calls a “child forward” approach, which is making sure spiritual concepts are accessible for children:
Adapting the concepts of faith to language “that fits in the mouth of a child” is especially important to Green-Ross’ ministry. Children are invited to wonder how they can become caretakers for Christ through a litany that goes: “I wonder what I can do for someone who is hungry. I wonder what I can do for someone who is thirsty. I wonder what I can do for someone who is homeless. I wonder what I can do for someone who is shivering. I wonder what I can do for someone who is sick. I wonder what I can do for someone who is in prison.”
With Matthew 25 we can find inspiration to create new programs and practices, and design liturgies and spaces to give rise to these perspectives. But it is at home with our family—however that may be defined—that we enact these ordinary acts of compassion in daily life, and especially with the next generation where these conversations about the possibility of a better world can find grounding in something tangible. The evocative images in Matthew 25 are accessible to all, and an entry point into conversations that can shape not only a child’s imagination, but all of ours as we work together towards good for all.
This book doesn’t materialize out of a void. I’m not the originator of these ideas and practices around parenting, faithful living and justice. What I am is a regular parent—a soccer mom, a PTA volunteer, and finder of socks—and a follower of Jesus, and like many of you, trying to find inspiration for helping my children follow God through loving others and caring for this planet.
This project is a part of a much larger conversation and takes and will distill what I’ve learned from pastors, practitioners, and parents, and all those who are doing the work in their corners of the world as they’re able within their communities. It also will engage and integrate the incredible labor of educators, activists, social workers, and artists—their perspectives, their voices—because they’re out there doing the most nitty-gritty work of untangling pain and bringing healing to people every day. My work is deeply shaped by disability activists and scholars with their emphasis on justice and accessibility.
We don’t need a critical mass to do this work. As civil rights activist Grace Lee Boggs wrote in The Next American Revolution: Sustainable Activism for the Twenty-First Century: “Movements are born of critical connections rather than critical mass.” We have an opportunity to build a movement by developing these “critical connections” with one another, with our children, and within our families. They are critical because they are important and significant, they make space for inquiry and dialogue—these connections necessary for both human and planetary survival because we also see the ways we are at a critical juncture when it comes to survival.
And I can’t think of a better time to start this work, or for many of us, I hope, perhaps continue this work in new ways because the time is always right…right now, here and now, to do the work for and with our communities. This isn’t just for Presbyterians, but for all of us, for those of us who love Jesus, and love people, and love this world, and who want to instill this same love in our children. And we start where we are, and small, as Mother Teresa tells us, with small things, everyday things with love, hope, and joy right where we are in this world.
I’d love for this next book to be collaborative with readers, practitioners, parents/caregivers, creatives, teachers, and others who are looking for pragmatic sources/resources for the practice (and cultivation of inquiry and practices) towards what it means to live out a wider belonging and more radical welcome. Not an answer or book of solutions but I hope a useful way into this daily work.
If you’re interested in participating in individual or group interviews, zoom conversations, or have resources, ideas, activities that you would like to share with a wider audience, let me know! My work is never closed, I see writing as a conversation starter, a catalyst, a spark, I hope, for work wherever you find yourself in the world.
Here’s a Google Form to let me know of your interest and/or availability.
Thanks so much for reading and engaging this work.
Love this so much and I can't wait to read this book (or more thoughts from you about this in the meantime)! It's something I think about a lot as an ordinary mom trying to raise my kids to intimately know, experience, and model the radical welcome that Jesus extends to all, especially the least of these.
Congratulations friend!