How do we understand history? Straight Lines ? The myth of progress of course and other brands of progressivism tend to regard it as a linear movement along straight lines towards some goal. Begbie however directs us to consider how musical temporality is structured upon layers of metrical waves of ‘intensification and release. Directionality is one thing; one-dimensional linearity is another’ (59)
fig 1.Metrical wavesHe further notes how linear models:
1. mask or downplay the role of discontinuity
2. linear metaphors often had the effect of minimizing the place of radical and qualitative novelty, which creates a view of the future in mechanistic terms.
3. such also tends towards uniformity. Homogeneity can effect how we understand transience.
Rather then, ‘Musical time is thus not about a line split into equal parts but about waves of tension and resolution.’[i] It is therefore not so much concerned about moving in a straight line, but a varied wave in which there is a sense of ‘carrying from’ and a ‘reaching beyond’ through each present. Musically this means that the wave patterns and the multi-leveled connections of the matrix ‘the first wave lives on in the second, the first and second in the third and so on.’ In that sense therefore the past is not lost forever.
Therefore past and future can be experienced in and with the present. Time is viewed as interpenetrating – a constant intertwining, unlike the old concept of time being seen as 3 exclusive elements. ‘The present is no longer the ‘saddle’ between the two abysses of past and future, but rather that ‘in which’, ‘now’, ‘not yet’, and ‘no more’ are given together, the most intimate interpenetration.’ (63)
It seems to me then that if we consider time differently and our lace in it historically in whatever emergent way you care for the church today, then
1. we can consider God’s newness among us differently. As Brueggemann states in Texts that Linger, Words that Explode , regarding Jeremiah 31:31-34 and the ‘new covenant’. I a context of grief and bewilderment comes the extraordinary articulation of new covenant. The old one, which they broke, cannot be counted upon. ‘But the new covenant! The term is clear. It is “new” If it is new, then there is indeed a season of discontinuity between what was old with Yahweh and what is now given’ (10) He notes that we can see it is re-newal or a revivifying what is old, but that would merely assert continuity. We often speak of renewal, but I wonder if our time perspective would awaken us to a sense of ‘newness’ and so discontinuity even for those of us within institutional frameworks.
2. the creative novelty throughout emerging churches will follow a different rhythm and melody. It will mean for instancve I think, that we begin to lay aside in mission and emegring, reforming missionary churches notions of progress that I am tentative about suggesting are a part of our fabric and nature and we are not yet free of. IS this part of our deeper issues today?The interweaving of times would truly see the church as an eschatological phenomenon which may bring and extend newness beyond itself in mission. Do we see this in what more and more people are stepping into, even in the institution in places?
3. We would live with the lack of uniformity. Is this a danger in any movement of newness? But more significantly, beyond merely saying each context is different, we will begin to appreciate more the transience in life and plug into the cultural climate of the ‘spiritual’ in real and meaningful ways for and with Christ. There are also implications for understanding worship afresh and positively as a kairos experience.
4. I think throughout all this is a call to live in the ‘in-between’ as kingdom living invites us to that place of tension and resolution with a sense of direction, which I think is what we lack today in mission.
1. mask or downplay the role of discontinuity
2. linear metaphors often had the effect of minimizing the place of radical and qualitative novelty, which creates a view of the future in mechanistic terms.
3. such also tends towards uniformity. Homogeneity can effect how we understand transience.
Rather then, ‘Musical time is thus not about a line split into equal parts but about waves of tension and resolution.’[i] It is therefore not so much concerned about moving in a straight line, but a varied wave in which there is a sense of ‘carrying from’ and a ‘reaching beyond’ through each present. Musically this means that the wave patterns and the multi-leveled connections of the matrix ‘the first wave lives on in the second, the first and second in the third and so on.’ In that sense therefore the past is not lost forever.
Therefore past and future can be experienced in and with the present. Time is viewed as interpenetrating – a constant intertwining, unlike the old concept of time being seen as 3 exclusive elements. ‘The present is no longer the ‘saddle’ between the two abysses of past and future, but rather that ‘in which’, ‘now’, ‘not yet’, and ‘no more’ are given together, the most intimate interpenetration.’ (63)
It seems to me then that if we consider time differently and our lace in it historically in whatever emergent way you care for the church today, then
1. we can consider God’s newness among us differently. As Brueggemann states in Texts that Linger, Words that Explode , regarding Jeremiah 31:31-34 and the ‘new covenant’. I a context of grief and bewilderment comes the extraordinary articulation of new covenant. The old one, which they broke, cannot be counted upon. ‘But the new covenant! The term is clear. It is “new” If it is new, then there is indeed a season of discontinuity between what was old with Yahweh and what is now given’ (10) He notes that we can see it is re-newal or a revivifying what is old, but that would merely assert continuity. We often speak of renewal, but I wonder if our time perspective would awaken us to a sense of ‘newness’ and so discontinuity even for those of us within institutional frameworks.
2. the creative novelty throughout emerging churches will follow a different rhythm and melody. It will mean for instancve I think, that we begin to lay aside in mission and emegring, reforming missionary churches notions of progress that I am tentative about suggesting are a part of our fabric and nature and we are not yet free of. IS this part of our deeper issues today?The interweaving of times would truly see the church as an eschatological phenomenon which may bring and extend newness beyond itself in mission. Do we see this in what more and more people are stepping into, even in the institution in places?
3. We would live with the lack of uniformity. Is this a danger in any movement of newness? But more significantly, beyond merely saying each context is different, we will begin to appreciate more the transience in life and plug into the cultural climate of the ‘spiritual’ in real and meaningful ways for and with Christ. There are also implications for understanding worship afresh and positively as a kairos experience.
4. I think throughout all this is a call to live in the ‘in-between’ as kingdom living invites us to that place of tension and resolution with a sense of direction, which I think is what we lack today in mission.
___________
Footnote [i]
Begbie uses tension in the general sense of character of a music event which arouses a sense of anticipation, that matters cannot be left as they are. Resolution is then the closure or dissipation of the tension. This dynamic can be a process, but also a place.
