PREPARATION
I knew the story and most of the words of the songs. I had seen this Lerner and Loewe production in the 1960's and I loved the movie. But, I was not prepared for the production I saw Friday night at the Artisan Theater.

In the past I had been an observer in the audience watching the performance on stage or on screen; on this night I become a participant on stage and an eager one I might add. The whole room was the stage and the play happened wherever there as an empty space. I was seated in seat in 5-C East, on an aisle, just a couple feet away from Alfred Dolittle's favorite hangout.

For this unique presentation of "My Fair Lady," I was one of an intimate number of people strategically placed on stage in the middle of the action. I wasn't a removed observer, I was in the moment. It happened to me; in me. Somehow the evening would not have been the same without the part I played in seat 5-C East.

As I walked away from the theater I celebrated the wonder; I had been surprised by an adventure in imagination. And, I loved it!

Are you ready for a few surprises, a little wonder? Do you feel like you are just an observer, or are you a player in the moment?

A prominent author in the business world stated, "If you don't like change, you're going to like irrelevance even less." As was recently reported in the national press, the context of faith in American churches is changing, whether we like it or not, the rules are being rewritten. Irrelevancy looms. God hasn't changed; but our narcissistic culture has.

Only God knows what is next, what mystery is just around the corner; but you have been strategically place in this new adventure of imagination. Surprise!

The unknown is all around us and it's frightening, but the unknown has always been scary. It does, however, produce adventurers and explorers, people who take advantage of the time, who break the rules and imagine a different life. These are people who see beyond themselves, who have learned how to adjust and enjoy. They can see the impossible, feel God's empowering lead, and imagine a new future.

If you are a man or woman of genuine faith, there is no opt-out button here. The spiritual world is always tied to the context of the physical world. So, what are you going to do?

INSPIRATION
Suppose--just for an example...

Take this imagination challenge: Imagine that the Internet is a new world that we are just beginning to inhabit. We are not in the audience watching the action, we are on the stage involved each step of the way.

We're like the original Europeans settlers in the America, living on the edge of the forest. Everything seems new and unknown and we're not sure what we need to do with this new world.

Do we pack climbing equipment, heavy coats, desert gear, canoes, or none of it? While the settlers may not have known what the geography of the New World was, they knew that there was a geography.

The Web, on the other hand, has no geography, no landscape. It has no distance. It has nothing natural in it. It has few rules and fewer lines of authority. Common sense doesn't hold there, and uncommon sense hasn't emerged yet.

So what's tomorrow on the Web going to be like? What does your imagination show you? Your experience, not your words, or your information, or your accumulated knowledge, is the new faith economy. If your new world faith isn't an experience, it isn't faith at all. Get ready for some surprises, some unknowns, some new adventures. Start by taking the wraps off your imagination.

MOTIVATION
Think experience! Talk experience! Look for examples of experience! Then imagine your response to: "Wouldn't it be great if..."

This isn't semantics. It is the essence of your faith life. We live in the middle of God's Big Show. We are not observers, we are participants. Like it or not, there is no curtain to signal beginnings and endings. Our spiritual world and our physical world are seamlessly interwoven. Real church is experienced outside the walls. There is no border or boundary. The play has already begun.

You are strategically placed on stage. So be the surprise; do something, NOW!

We may not know the next line or the next move, but we know how the show ends... and we like it.