The Wright Site

Why We Worship

2012-02-27T08:50:00.002-08:00

When Christ Gets Bigger Our Preferences Are Smaller

2011-12-30T10:46:00.000-08:00

I remember getting the flyer in the mail, a postcard, really. The advertisement began with a question, “Fun at church?” and the question was answered, right there, on the card: “Yup.” On the back the card read like the church’s liturgy, err, I mean, what the “new church” offered:

Free coffee,
Free rockin’ music,
Free fun for kids.

This new church was “church done differently” followed by a list of adjectives to describe its worship and fellowship: “casual,” “contemporary,” “biblical” (apparently this ranked third in importance!), “friendly,” and “meaningful.” Featured on the card were pictures of young, attractive, white, middle-American people smiling from ear to ear.

I wasn’t persuaded to attend. (For one, I didn’t think I had the wardrobe or the model good looks to pull it off). But, the postcard did reveal to me the extent to which consumerism has infiltrated the mindset of the church. This church had a specific demographic: young, white, affluent families who happen to be interested in coffee, rockin’ music, and fun for their kids. These consumers of religion want to make sure that the church will serve them, and this church was more than happy to oblige.

Consumerism is an ideology - an ideology that believes personal happiness is advanced through the acquisition, consumption, and enjoyment of material possessions. Consumerism is an ideology that now takes up 70 percent of our economy! Consumerism is an ideology that has become idolatry.

Consumerism as an idol has spawned a new type of false gospel. (No, I’m not talking about the health-and-wealth gospel, although that is clearly one false gospel consumerism has spawned. But, no, I’m talking about another, more insidious false gospel). Consumerism as an idol has produced a “Christian” culture of selfishness.

D.A. Carson in his book, The Gagging of God, wrote: “The truth of the matter is that the consumer mentality authorizes people to judge all matters religious and theological by the simple criterion of whether or not they have been ‘helped’--and the only people equipped to assess whether or not they have truly been helped are the people who claim to have been helped. Questions of truth, long-range effects, and purpose are all shunted aside,” (p. 465).

The church is called to preach, teach, administer the Lord’s Supper, to baptize and discipline disciples, and, most of all, glorify God in all that it does. The church is not called to meet the felt needs of every imaginable demographic group or to offer its customers (note: I did not say “Christians”) hot cappuccino and a scone on Sunday morning.

We Christians need to remind ourselves that the church does not exist to serve us, but rather we exist to serve her. If we were to adopt such a mind-set, we would begin to see the true prosperity promised in the gospel. And we will also become true Christians and real churches when we put our idols of consumerism away.

I was reminded of this recently with the words of NPR commentator and writer Heather King, a recovering alcoholic who has come to faith in Christ. This is her reflection on her initial experience with the church:

“My first impulse was to think, My God, I don't want to get sober (or in the case of the church, worship) with THESE nutcases! (or boring people, or people with different politics, taste in music, food, books, or whatever). Nothing shatters our egos like worshipping with people we did not hand-pick …. The humiliation of discovering that we are thrown in with extremely unpromising people!—people who are broken, misguided, wishy-washy, out for themselves. People who are … us.

“But we don't come to church to be with people who are like us in the way we want them to be. We come because we have staked our souls on the fact that Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and the church is the best place, the only place, to be while we all struggle to figure out what that means. We come because we'd be hard pressed to say which is the bigger of the two scandals of God: that he loves us—or that he loves everyone else.”

There you have it: It’s about Christ; it’s not about me.

We will never be free of the idol of consumerism, manifested in contemporary Christianity with the vulgar and sinful notions of “church-hopping” and “church-shopping” until we seek Christ. When Christ is bigger our Preferences are smaller. We will never know life -- real life, eternal life -- until we repent and rid ourselves of such idols.

Oh, and, by the way, if you want to stop by Santa Clara Church, and check us out, we are offering free coffee, free rockin’ music, and free fun for the kids! . . . (Sorry, just trying to drum up some “business”!)

Wes

Youth on Point

2011-11-03T13:56:00.000-07:00

What happens when a church refuses to offer "youth ministry as usual"? . . . What happens when a church gets serious about discipling its youth? . . . What happens when a church trades in dodge-ball and gross-out games, and teenage babysitting, and instead opts to teach theology and ministry and real world discipleship? . . .

I'll tell you what happens. You get kids living like Christ, for Christ, on mission for making a real difference in their world for Christ's sake. You get kids, like the ones here at Santa Clara Church who take their faith seriously, realize they are the church now, and expect (and will) change the world.

Check this out: http://vimeo.com/31551993

The youth are hosting this city-wide event to get informed, trained, and make real difference. This is the effort to move against sex trafficking in our area. As it happens, the I-5 corridor is one of the most trafficked highways in the U.S.

I am so proud and amazed by the way our youth are working to make a difference. They are a real credit to the ongoing ministry of Santa Clara, and they lead the rest of us (adults) and challenge us in so many ways.

Great job, kids! You ARE the church today!

Is it possible to love Jesus and not be committed to the local church?

2011-10-27T08:54:00.000-07:00

A really important video about why commitment to the local church matters.

In a world of church-hoppers, consumerism, and pseudo-Christianity, commitment still matters.

Check it out: http://www.9marks.org/blog/new-videos-mark-dever-local-church

We All Want the Good Life . . . But at What Cost?

2011-10-11T09:14:00.000-07:00

We all want the good life, but at what cost? . . . In preparation for a preachers’ study group, I’ve been working my way through Luke 16:19-31, commonly known as the parable of “The Rich Man and Lazarus.”

It is an intriguing, humbling, and convicting story on a number of levels. As I was thinking through the parable, I remembered Robert Farrar Capon’s book, The Parables of Grace, in which he works through this parable. Before I get to a quote from Capon’s book, consider this.

The thing that strikes me first is that this parable is about the attitude of the rich and successful toward their own lifestyle and their view that they are life’s “winners.” The larger context of Luke 16 begins with another of Jesus’ parables - the parable of “The Unrighteous Steward.” It begins much the same way as that of the “Rich Man and Lazarus,” to wit, Luke 16:1 reads: Now He [Jesus] was also saying to the disciples [and to the Pharisees who were listening in -- check out Luke 15:1], “There was a certain rich man . . .” The parable at hand begins the same way: “Now there was a certain rich man . . .” (Luke 16:19).

The reality is that I am a rich man. . . . No, I’m no Bill Gates or Warren Buffett. But I am an American and by my standard of living, I am one of the richest people on earth. . . . And, so are you, by the way. . . . The poorest among us (as Americans) are among the richest people on the planet. There is no getting around that.

This gets to the Capon quote. He writes:

As I have observed a number of times now, if the world could have been saved by successful living, ti would have been tidied up long ago. Certainly, the successful livers of this world have always been ready enough to stuff life’s losers into the garbage can of history. Their program for turning earth back into Eden has consistently been to shun the sick, to lock the poor in ghettos, to disenfranchise those whose skin was the wrong color, and to exterminate those whose religion is inconvenient. Nor have they been laggard in furthering that program. On the whole, they have been not only zealous but efficient: witness, to name only a handful of instances, the AIDS crisis, the South Bronx, the apartheid policy in South Arica, and the death camps under Hitler. (Robert Farrar Capon, The Parables of Grace, Eerdmans, 1988, 154).

Stunning words, I think. And, I stand convicted. Oh, it’s not that I’m a Hitler (and I’m sure we could think of more recent examples). It’s that, like these powerful, successful, rich examples, I can completely ignore Lazarus outside my door. I sadly confess that I am really good at it. . . . Oh, how I stand in need of the mercy and grace of God! . . .

Just a few days ago I had a truth pointed out to me that has haunted me, and I confess, I have been mentally deliberating how I might ignore the truth of the issue. Over at the blog: rageagainsttheminivan.com, a blog I was completely oblivious to, there was this October 6, 2011 post entitled, “Here, Let Me Ruin Halloween for You.” (I strongly recommend that you read it. Find it at: http://www.rageagainsttheminivan.com/2011/09/here-let-me-ruin-halloween-for-you.html.

The blog raised my awareness to the fact that along the Ivory Coast and other African countries there are an estimated 284,000 children working -- many if not most as slaves -- in dangerous conditions, to provide rich Americans like me with our need for chocolate! . . . For chocolate, for goodness sake! . . .

In the words of the blogger: “Many of them have been taken from their families, or sold as servants. U.S. chocolate manufacturers have claimed they are not responsible for the conditions on cocoa plantations since they don't own them. This includes Hershey, Mars, Nestle, and the US division of Cadbury . . . who collectively represent pretty much every snack-size candy bar that will be available in stores this Halloween.” (Emphasis hers).

I shall now assume the name “Dives,” (the name given to the rich man in the parable).

Ok, Dives, do you see that poor child outside your door? . . . Look carefully, she is the one who was sold as a little girl. She is the girl, younger than your daughter who is consigned to carry bags of cocoa weighing more than she does. She will never go to school. She works for nothing but what food she can get. She’s a slave. She’s a slave being worked to death to provide . . . Hershey’s kisses for you.

The blogger goes on:

“The connection between most major candy bar manufacturers and child slavery is one of the world’s best kept secrets. It has been going on for years, but I only learned about it last year. The US government is currently being sued by the International Labor Rights Fund for failing to enforce laws prohibiting the import of products made with child labor, and the chocolate industry has blown by numerous deadlines set by Congress for regulating. A few major chocolate companies have done a great job in the last year with some smoke-and-mirror campaigns . . . either offering an obscure fair-trade chocolate bar or making a show of giving to charities that support farmers. But these actions do not change the fact that they don’t want to be accountable for human rights abuses of children.” (Emphasis mine).

Ok, so I just found out about it myself. . . . So, . . . now what? . . . We all want the “chocolate covered” good life, . . . but at what cost? . . . It cost Dives his soul. . . . I’m just pointing that out.

Mind Over Matter

2011-10-06T08:10:00.001-07:00

Good stuff here, at the To the Source blog.

https://mail.google.com/mail/#inbox/132d769221ae3cf4

A Call to Clarity

2011-09-29T14:15:00.000-07:00

Some are given to the idea that “Life is a journey, not a destination.” Which, if you think about it carefully, is both true and false. It is true that life is a journey, however, to use Laurence J. Peter’s words, “If you don’t know where you are going, you will probably end up somewhere else.” . . . And that means, of course, that the destination is every bit as important, and ultimately more important than the journey itself. . . . But, most in our culture have lost sight of this. Few begin with the end in mind. And they wander off to mindless ends! . . . And that is a real tragedy. That is a wasted life.

This could also describe a church, whether local or catholic, if it has lost its sense of the Transcendent, its sense of the consummation, its sense of what its purpose in the world is. To wit, I strongly encourage everyone to read Dr. Timothy Tennent’s Convocation address to the faculty and student body of Asbury Theological Seminary.

You can find it here: http://www.patheos.com/community/bibleandculture/2011/09/25/the-clarion-call-to-watered-down-evangelicalism/

A Painful Depressing Read

2011-09-20T15:33:00.000-07:00

The following represents the too often sad and wounded spirit of a preacher's wife. My friend and preacher Aaron Earlywine passed this on to the members of our preacher's study group. It's a humbling thing to think about what the church in America sometimes is -- even a "cool" church like Courageous Church Atlanta. But it does give fuel for thought so I thought I would pass it on. But be warned, as Aaron wrote: This is a painful, depressing read.

The article below is located at: http://raiking.com/this-is-probably-a-manifesto-leaving-courageous-church/

Warning it is painful, depressing read....

Leaving Courageous Church
I told myself I’d give myself until today, and then I will be detaching myself from all things Courageous Church. For the sake of my family and my own sanity, we’re going on hiatus. But first, I have to release the tension of these last few months.  I’m afraid I’m full of frustration. If you don’t want to hear that, you should stop reading now:::::::

I’ve tried to write this several times already, and am really struggling with finding the words to say. I always shoot for clarity and a level of elegance in my writing, but I’m thinking I’m going to miss the mark on this one no matter how hard I try, so I’m instead going to shoot straight from the hip.

This past week,-as Shaun has gone back and forth in considering his resignation-has been emotionally trying on so many levels. I have been hurt for him, hurt for us, but mostly, I’ve been hurt for the people of Courageous Church. I think I’ve known for a while now that he needed to resign. But the reality of it has been way more difficult that I ever anticipated. Here’s why:

I have never loved leading this church. Ever. I didn’t want to plant it and have had just a hand full of days since planting it that I felt like it was worth it.  Shaun, however, has loved this church with his whole heart from the moment he conceived it. Before one person set foot in anything called Courageous Church, he dreamed about it, prayed for it, and worked around the clock for monthsgetting it off the ground. He contacted church planting organizations and sought their financial support. He went through their assessment centers, filled out their paperwork, went to their meetings, emailed their leaders.

**I will never forget laying in the bed of our little townhouse dog sick and pregnant with Savannah while Shaun sat on the floor of our room and built the very first Courageous Church website. I remember when he held a contest for a designer to create the Courageous Church logo. I remember him asking my opinion and me telling him that I liked the one with the simple cross in the middle-the church’s logo today.

**I’ll never forget when he first started using facebook and twitter to reach out to hurting people. One of his first acts as the “facebook pastor” was mobilizing people to lend their support to a man who had decided not to commit suicide just because he had been ministered to by Shaun through facebook that day. Our church as a social media church, was born right then- and we hadn’t even held one service.

**And I remember me, Sophie, and Jason ordering, collecting, and wrapping Christmas toys for the kids of Stanton Elementary. I remember us scouring the Internet looking for just the right toys to meet each kids wish list. I remember the news was there. I remember Willis performing a Christmas rap for the kids. I remember Avril filming a beautiful video of it that went really viral on the net. I remember being so proud of my kids because their excitement at watching the kids of Stanton open their gifts was palpable- even though they would be receiving nothing for themselves. We did all of this before ONE service was held.

**I’ll also never forget our first launch team meetings. They were really sparse. They basically consisted of me, Shaun, Jason, Sophie, our kids, their kids, Willis, and Jinean. I remember Adam Beane even came randomly to one and I thought ‘he is never coming back because there are only like 3 other people here.’ But 2 1/2 years later, he’s still here. That’s so funny to me.

**And I will always smile at the memory of Antwon dressed up as a super hero along with one of my co-workers at the Morehouse/Spelman homecoming.  We gave out HUNDREDS of free buffalo wings to any student who gave us their contact information. I’ll NEVER forget that!

Shaun had a very distinct vision for the church God wanted him to plant.  It would be a church that did more than provide weekly lip service to people who already knew God and were content with just that- they knew Him. They’d heard about Him all their lives. Couldn’t say they’d ever done anything bold in His service, and couldn’t say their lives resembled anything Christ-like (unless Christ to you is the blond haired, blue-eyed picture of meek Jesus holding a lamb…because Christianity is about being nice, right?). Shaun thought that if people witnessed courageous leadership, and listened to edgy, courageous teaching, they’d be inspired to get out and be the hands and feet of Christ themselves and provide life changing power and solutions to a dieing and hurting world….Um, FAIL!

Instead, you know what we quickly became?  We became the COOL church.  We were the hip city church that was predominately African-American, but with some sprinklings of white folks, and even 1 Asian. Our pastor was ethnically ambiguous, so that provided a little mystery.  We often rapped during worship, and our leaders wore jeans and collared shirts with the funky crosses on them. We even had a dj who scratched tracks instead of a band.  We were so damn cool! We had former drug dealers attending our church, and rappers who still talked about getting high showing up every Sunday morning because they liked Shaun’s preaching.  Does it get any cooler?

Truth is, we liked being this church.  We had t-shirts made, created a twitter handle, ran advertisements on facebook. We even started serving a free breakfast to get folks out to this cool church. And guess what, it worked!  People actually came. Our kids ministry went from 2 adults in a room with their own kids to having 2 directors and teachers in individual classrooms for kids of every age. By the end of our first year we were up to 2 services. Shaun preached, Dorothy sang, Willis rapped, I taught, Jason set up chairs, Sophie sang, Shaun preached, I taught, and then we all sang some more.  And some more. And some more.

And then at some point we looked up and realized, hey, you know, we haven’t done any outreach in a long time.  People are here. They come and listen every Sunday, but we haven’t done anything outside of these walls in a while. So then we started an initiative called Choose Your Own Adventure. We dedicated several services filled with funny skits and quirky videos getting people to sign up for an outreach program of their choice. And yes, people signed up, but a couple of months into it the outreach consisted of little more than offering water to folks who didn’t want it and wrapping peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and passing them out to homeless people who could do better than that by themselves...Fail!

At the time I thought it was just poor leadership of the programs. I thought we probably weren’t organized enough and strategic enough in our efforts, and that’s why people didn’t support these outreach initiatives.  So, we tried harder.  The ATL floods came and Shaun and Jinean and Jason mobilized a huge effort to get people to the church to volunteer. They collected donations, helped clean out houses, provide meals, etc, etc.  They created schedules, and work teams.  We were on the news for it. Shaun used his handy flip camera to film a video about it. We really made a difference. But you want to know the hard truth about that? Most of the volunteers were random, unsaved people who didn’t even go to our church.  For the most part, Courageous Church folk were nowhere to be found.

Still, Shaun preached, Dorothy sang, Jinean prepared service scripts, I taught, Shaun preached, Dorothy sang, I taught some more. And some more. And some more.

Then came the Haiti earthquake. A Home in Haiti was created. We collected tents. We raised and sent money to Haiti. Actually, WE meant Shaun, Jinean, Jason Woody, and 2 or 3 other consistent volunteers. By this time church attendance was at an all time high. We were packing it out. But volunteers for A Home in Haiti could be counted on one hand.

So 2 years into it, after 300+ sermons, who knows how many songs, people coming, people going, stressful lead team meetings, raising money from outside sources because the people who attended the church didn’t actually give enough to support the church, Shaun got frustrated, a few leaders got tired and left, and Jinean got sick of being the only “crazy” person in the room and started serving God on her own in Mexico.

Thus Shaun had a vision for “the shift”…as it has come to be known. After searching the scriptures and seeing Christ’s ministry for what it really was we decided we no longer wanted to participate in the spectator sport we Christians call CHURCH. So we said, let’s stop meeting every Sunday. Let’s instead, meet in small groups in each other’s homes. Let’s share a meal and learn how to be true disciples of Christ.  Let’s all serve together. Let’s have each small group belong to a cause group that addresses a need in our city. We talked about it, met about it, argued about it, preached about it, sang about it, and read books about it for months.  And for the most part, people were buying it. As a matter of fact, the month before the shift, when Shaun was preaching the hows and whys of what were about to do was our highest attendance and our highest offering in all of 2011. We thought that meant people were actually ready to be radical and courageous. 4 months later, it’s clear that what that meant was that people love HEARING about being radical and courageous. It gets our juices flowing and makes us feel all powerful. Then we leave the service, get in our cars, pick up some chicken for lunch, go home, and watch Basketball Wives until the T.O. Show comes on, and then the Falcons game. Then there’s work, and depression about our sucky job, and disdain for our sucky marriage, and then Sunday comes, and we get to be happy again-even if for just a few hours. And then……..you know the routine.

So we said, let’s do less of that so that we can create time to serve God instead of serving ourselves by getting high off of church services. If people aren’t in church every Sunday, maybe they’ll serve instead.…FAIL!  What most people did after “the shift” is go to another church on the Sundays we didn’t meet.

I thought the problem was that we weren’t organized enough. Maybe people weren’t serving because we’re not organized. So this summer we went into super churchy, extra responsible, grown-up church mode. But after months of church meetings, and the ridiculous antics of electing a board, and forming ministry teams, we’re the most organized we’ve ever been, and STILL, no one shows up to the cause group meetings and outreach initiatives.

Here’s what we’ve learned this summer: It’s not organizations with boards and secretaries who record the minutes that change the world. It’s not even dynamic leadership that successfully leads the board with the secretary who records minutes. It’s PEOPLE WITH HEARTS BROKEN FOR CHIRST and His people. Before we had 1 service we stopped a man from committing suicide and bought 500 toys and uniforms for school kids in the inner-city. We didn’t need dynamic leadership, by-laws, and committees to do that.  We just needed to care.

Am I frustrated? CLEARLY!  Am I overstating the irrelevance of the Sunday morning song and dance? Probably. Did people come to Christ and renew their relationship with God because of what Courageous Church did for so long on Sunday mornings? Absolutely! But, then what?  Glad we baptized you, glad we helped you believe in church again and feel all warm and fuzzy about your creator, but I’m sorry we failed to actually make the vast majority of you into disciples.

We’re leaving because we will not go back to the stress and relative lack of actual disciple making of the every Sunday model. Sunday morning has its place. I too missed the gatherings, but I will never again participate in a model that replaces the real work of Christ with the mundanity of 2 songs and a feel good sermon.

I actually feel I owe Shaun and apology. For so long I have put all of the church’s problems off on him as a leader. I complained that he wasn’t organized enough. So time and time again he devised and implemented strategies to make the church better organized. Then I complained that he didn’t spend enough time on his sermons. So he’d hunker down and study more and preach more well thought out sermons.

Time and time again you shape shifted, made adjustments, bent, folded, and worked yourself crazy into the leader I and everyone else told you you needed to be. I’m sooo sorry for this! My heart aches when I think on this. The truth is, there are churches with pastors who preach like TD Jakes and are as organized as all the Andy Stanley ministries, but are still making disciples out of a good 1% of their attendees (just using those preachers as examples…don’t really know a thing about who does what in their churches).  It’s not about any of that! It should not be this hard to motivate people to serve Christ. It’s not about you, Shaun. For me to have pointed the finger at you and say you and all of your flaws is the reason we didn’t catch the vision takes away people’s own responsibility in their faith walk.

The truth of the matter is, Shaun is simply exhausted. Pastoring people has been 10 times better than my best hopes and 100 times worse than my worst nightmares. Unless you’ve done it, you will NEVER understand it.  It looks one way from the outside looking in, but trust me, you don’t know the half.  Pastors are the sickest, loneliest, most depressed people in church. That’s why they have affairs, that’s why they die at the age of 42 from heart attacks and drug over doses. That’s why every time you turn on the TV there’s a new scandal, and a fresh news story about the latest greatest to fall from grace. Taking criticism day in and day out from people who swear up and down they know better is exhausting. Having people leave for stupid, selfish reasons is exhausting. The divorce rate for pastors is among the highest of any other group in the country.  Shaun and I have decided we’d like that to not be our story.

For those in Courageous Church that are hurt and blind-sided by our decision to leave, I’ll say I’m truly sorry.  You are the reason I haven’t slept well in several weeks. I’ve thought about everyone who truly believed in our ability to see you through this transition, and I’m sorry we either couldn’t or are simply too exhausted to make it work. It’s so hard to fight against cultural norms and what’s comfortable, but some of you have really tried.  You’ve lead the cause group, hosted the small group, and shown up to do “outreach.” You’ve given your tithe, and attended the meetings.  A handful of you have done all of these things, and I’m sorry if you now feel abandoned and hurt by us leaving. I’ve cried many times over the last few days thinking about how our decision would affect you.

And if you’ve found yourself angry about us stepping down (which very few people have expressed, actually) I can tell you to kick rocks. Your anger is rooted in selfish self-righteousness. You’re mad because you “stuck around” and now we aren’t. But truthfully,your sticking around meant next to nothing.  Most people who are angry can’t name one thing they did to be active in their cause group or support their discipleship group.  You were content to take and take and take, and never give, and now you’re mad that we’ve decided not to play that game anymore. Your anger is misguided and you’ve diluted yourself into thinking that you care more about this church than we do because we’re leaving and you haven’t. If you’ve stayed, but never really bought into the principles, you’re hurting the church, not helping. And you should repent right now for being unable to muster one ounce of compassion and concern for the man that has put all he has on the line to lead you closer to God over these last few years!! This paragraph is only for a select few. YOU know who you are.

I hope you don’t receive this as me putting all the blame for the failure of Courageous on everyone else. Shaun and I and our team of leaders have made enough mistakes to write a “church planting for dummies” novel. If I could turn back time, oh, the things we would do differently! We were just a few really crazy people trying desperately to follow God’s heart. We got lost in the shuffle of being cool, and by the time we realized that the church was watching 3 or 4 people be courageous instead of joining them, it was too late to fix it.

It looks like the church will go on. And at first that was my hope- which is why we asked our best friends to remain and help lead it. But now, I’m actually very sad. What the board has decided the church will become bears little resemblance to the church we intended and now wish we had planted.

To close, I want to be clear that Shaun and I haven’t given up on “church.” We’re just finished with church as usual. There must be churches out there getting it right. Evidenced not by how big and cool they are, but by the fact that they’re actually making discipleswho are recapturing the world for Christ.

As I stated at the beginning of this, I never really wanted to plant this church.  I’ve been in church my entire life, and had an idea of the stress that would come with it. But even though I didn’t want to lead you, I actually found it very easy to love you (well, most of you anyway). This whole thing probably sounds angrier than I mean it to, and I’m sorry for that. What I actually feel when I think of most of you is love and appreciation. We’re all just flawed vessels trying to see our way through. I’m going off the grid for a while. I hope Shaun plans to do the same. We both need a time of refreshing. I will be praying for each of you in the days and weeks to come.

Touchstone at Twenty-Five

2011-09-08T14:55:00.000-07:00

Touchstone -- A Journal of Mere Christianity -- is now celebrating its twenty-fifth anniversary. Quite an accomplishment for a little journal of such depth and quality. I have been a subscriber for ten of those years and have found the journal to be an ever-increasing source of enlightenment. It challenges my thinking and my faith like no other magazine or journal.

From the opening editorial of the most recent edition, entitled, “We, the Enemy,” I find myself even more thoughtful about the role of the Church in today’s Western climate. James Hitchcock reminds us of what George Orwell called “the herd of independent minds,” with these words: “What George Orwell called ‘the herd of independent minds” all quickly come to agree on issues as diverse as embryonic stem-cell research, smoking, homosexuality, health care, and foreign policy.”

Hitchcock is commenting on the ever-driving theology of the media-church. It seems that with ever-increasing force and ever-increasing ability it is the media that channels its new gods into the life of American culture. This spills over, Hitchcock reminds us, into all of our institutions, chiefly schools, but also “charitable agencies, philanthropic foundations, professional societies, and even groups like the Girl Scouts.”

And so we discover in a “post-modern” world which devalues meta-narratives, that this is really a myth. There is an over-arching, over-reaching meta-narrative. A new orthodoxy is afoot; one that cannot, must not be sinned against. “Thus, the ongoing story of American religion is almost always told in accord with a particular ‘master-narrative’--open-minded liberals struggling to persuade their various churches to adjust to modernity, with those who resist such accommodation portrayed as unenlightened, possibly stupid, often malicious.”

And so it seems, Orwell got it right. Media-church is driving the values, the morals (or immorality) of the culture. Government, government schools, agencies with differing levels of power and persuasion -- even the Girl Scouts -- are co-opted to evangelize the land, pushing an ever-increasing secular theology and mythology of atheism, Darwinism, and barbarism.

Even churches - orthodox and true to Scripture - are under relentless pressure to sacrifice their values, the integrity of Scripture, and the gospel itself to the cult of media-church. And, having spent some time reading some of the “trendy” church-bloggers, it seems media-church is bearing fruit among many within the evangelical Christian world. An accomodationist attitude prevails. “If the culture wants abortion, we should surrender it and try to be nice. If the culture wants a Darwinian worldview, we should accept it and be nice. If the culture wants . . . whatever it wants . . . we should embrace it and be nice. Then, maybe the culture will want to be like us, since we will be so much like media-church.” . . . Really? . . . If that is our course of action, why bother. Why not close up shop now and join the Bacchanalian revery?

Then again, maybe we should be what we have always been -- salt and light in a putrefying darkening world. And then, maybe one by one those enslaved to the media-church culture will look to the light and be saved.

Thanks, Touchstone, for all your years of faithful service to the Church. May your tribe increase!

Wisdom from the Ancients - On Staying True to Community

2011-08-30T09:28:00.001-07:00

When you experience conflict or pain in a church setting, don't run away to another church. It's often better to stay put and work through it. That's the advice from two early Christian sources.

An anonymous 4th century Christian leader wrote:

“If a trial [with other people] comes upon you in the place where you live, do not leave that place when the trial comes. Wherever you go, you will find that what you are running from is ahead of you. So stay until the trial is over, so that if you end up leaving, no offense will be caused, and you will not bring distress to others who live in the same neighborhood.”

In the 12th century, Anselm of Canterbury compared a restless believer to a tree that can't thrive because it's "frequently transplanted or often disturbed." Anselm warns: "If he often moves from place to place at his own whim, or remaining in one place is frequently agitated by hatred of it, [he] never achieves stability with roots of love."

Jonathon Wilson-Hartgrove, The Wisdom of Stability (Paraclete Press, 2010), pp. 82-83, 149

Mark Batterson - Primal

2011-07-27T13:30:00.001-07:00

Mark Batterson’s book, Primal: A Quest for the Lost Soul of Christianity, is his fourth and perhaps most interesting book. Nothing earth-shaking here. But it does contain some very good commentary on what it means to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Or, as Batterson puts it: “Compassion, wonder, curiosity, and energy are nouns. It’s our job to turn them into verbs. It’s our highest calling and greatest privilege,” (p. 171).

Reading Mark’s books are a treat. He is an excellent writer with a gift for communication. He excels at putting the text in its biblical context and into the context of our lives.

I confess I have been something of a fan since the moment I picked up his first book, In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day. I mean, who could resist a title like that? The book is even better than the title. And I think that is true of Primal as well. It reads very much like, and I am sure it was, a series of messages Mark delivered to his church, National Community Church, in Washington, D.C.

He tells us his aim: “My aim in this book is to take you to new places intellectually and spiritually so that you discover new ways of loving God,” (p. 8). He accomplishes this by taking us through the Great Commandment, step by step. I don’t want to give too much away, but rather encourage you to read the book by offering a few “teasers.”

The heart of Christianity is primal compassion. Mark writes: “The problem isn’t Christianity at large. The problem is you and me. The problem is that we’re not great at the Great Commandment,” (p. 17).

The soul of Christianity is primal wonder. I think it’s true that we have lost our sense of awe. We are sadly lacking in our ability to understand the awesomeness of God. Or, as Mark puts it: “One of the great mistakes we’ve made in modern Christianity is approaching God deductively as an object of knowledge instead of approaching Him inductively as the cause of wonder,” (p. 53).

The mind of Christianity is primal curiosity. “Learning isn’t a luxury; it’s a stewardship issue,” (p. 90). Loving God with our minds has become a lost spiritual discipline that the church desperately needs to recover.

The strength of Christianity is primal energy. “So many Christians are so bored. So many Christians are so frustrated by the gap between their theology and reality. The way to close the gap, and the way to experience the holy rush of adrenaline again, is to break a sweat serving others,” (p. 135).

There is a lot to chew on in this small book. I recommend it to your reading. It’s easily read, devotional in thought, and just might transform the way you love God!

Wes

I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review.

And the Search Goes On . . .

2011-07-20T15:27:00.000-07:00

Several months ago I ran across this story (and frankly cannot remember the direct source) about a family’s 11 year search for a church home. That’s right, after 11 years, this family of five -- husband, wife, and three small kids -- have not been able to successfully find a church in the Dallas, Texas metroplex.

Since beginning their search 11 years ago, the family claims to faithfully attend a church until it becomes obvious to them that they are not of the same mind. We know scripturally, we are to be of the same mind. The father cites Philippians 2:2, “make my joy complete by being like-minded.” They also referred to 1 John 3:10. “If people don’t love us, they are children of the devil.” The wife added, “You can’t always see it at first, but if you watch carefully, you will know in your spirit whether the people of the so-called ‘Church’ are children of the devil. I can discern fairly quickly whether they sincerely love us.”

Their practice has been to visit a church. Then, after the service is over convene for a meeting in the family car. They keep notebooks, jot down some informations, and compare. About two years into the search (before any of the three children were born), they developed a checklist. They admit to tweaking it over the years to give churches a better chance. The writer of the story was able to acquire a copy of the current first-hurdle checklist:

1. Bulletin typos: 3 maximum
 2. Every family member personally greeted by the pastor 
3. Asked all our names: 1 minimum, 3 maximum 
4. “We’re so glad you came” statements: 1 minimum, 5 maximum 
5. All restrooms are clean and have both papers
 6. Praise instruments: 3 minimum, 6 maximum
 7. Temperature: 68 minimum, 73 maximum
 8. Church does not have “Calvary” in the name 
9. Hands raised during worship: 3 minimum, 8 maximum 
10. “Lord” or “God” said during closing prayer: 12 maximum  

A single mark eliminates the church from further consideration. “It’s a good thing we’ve kept careful notes. During the last 3 years, on more than one occasion, we’ve entered a new church only to discover that we’ve heard this pastor before at a previous church, maybe 7 or 8 years earlier,” said the father.

If a church meets all 10 basic hurdles, the family then separately rates the church on the four dimensions of Compassion, Love, Sincerity, and Cleanliness. “We come to the same conclusion almost every time. Unfortunately we’ve always eventually found something that glaringly stands out as unscriptural,” says the mother.

The two older children have become helpful as of late. After years of hearing numerous post-service discussions by their parents, the two older children have apparently also become excellent discerners of church imperfections. “I chuckle every time I think of Marcie’s first experience with church discernment when she was only 4,” said the father. “We were about to begin our usual van discussion, but before Mom or I could say anything, Marcie spoke up and said, ‘it smells.’ We immediately looked at each other and knew we didn’t need to discuss this church further. We still chuckle when we think of that. We’re proud of the deep spiritual discernment our children have developed. We are happy that our family is able to grow spiritually despite the lack of true Biblical churches. We know we’re doing something right.” . . . Ah, yes, “a child shall lead them,” or something. . . .

The shortest they have attended a church is 12 minutes. They knew almost immediately that there was a problem with the Church when child number two was about one year old and a nursery worker gave early warning signs. “She seemed annoyed when she had to stop changing one baby to help us with little Jamie,” explained the mom. “This was not the proper respect that we, as first time visitors, deserved. We were also offended by the sign on the door stating, ‘We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.’ It was sacrilegious.”  

The longest they have attended a church is 10 consecutive weeks. They just knew they had found a church home in the spring of 2003. “We were properly greeted by the members. The handshakes were true and honest. Not too friendly; neither did they ignore us. The bulletin seemed in order with less than three mistakes [the maximum they will tolerate and still consider themselves of the ‘same mind’]. There was a mix of hymns with some gentle praise choruses. That first day, the Pastor invited us to eat out at Ryan’s. We received Tuesday night visitation from three deacons. We received a well-written letter from the Children’s Minister inviting us to a Saturday afternoon Slip-n-Slide party. We really felt the Spirit so we kept coming back. But after three weeks, things started to change. You could tell this was not a deeply sincere church. It had all been surface. The warm greetings subsided and turned into simple nods on some days. No more personal invites from the Pastor after week seven. The pastor obviously had time, but chose to take out other visitors rather than us. By the ninth week, he stopped answering his cell phone on the first ring. Only two deacons visited each time after the initial home visitation. We received no more letters, only a monthly newsletter that everybody got. We knew then that we were wasting our time with another insincere group. We no longer felt special. They were like all the rest. I just don’t understand it,” said the father.

Mom continued the sentiment, “We want to be part of a group of people just like us. We are open, honest, loving, and accepting of true Biblical behavior. We just can’t seem to find people of the same mind. There is so much insincerity out there. Believe me, we’ve tested numerous churches. We long for spiritual maturity in a church. We need to feel the presence of God and His power. We’re just not feeling it anywhere.”

You might think that story is fiction or at least an exaggeration. But it’s not. It is true in every respect, and not far off the attitudes that many church shoppers entertain. A recent survey by Lifeway showed that 98.7% of those who changed churches, did so because (1) they felt like the church was not helping them develop spiritually, (2) they felt like the church was not helping them engage in meaningful work, (3) they felt like the church was not judging them properly, (4) they felt like the church was changing things they didn’t like, (5) they felt like the pastor wasn’t preaching well, (6) they felt like the congregation was not treating them well (7) they felt like they couldn’t feel the Spirit there, (8) they felt like cliques were running the church, (9) they felt like people were hypocritical, and (10) they felt like the pastor was judging them. The remaining 1.3% said they changed churches over disagreements concerning Biblical truths.

And so, the search is on, and goes on, and on, and on as such folks who claim to the name of Christ. Yes, they call themselves Christians, and yet, I can’t think of a single verse of Scripture that would support their “spiritual search.” Which leads one to wonder: Are these Christians or consumers? . . . And no, they can’t be both.

At least, that’s what I think,

Wes

Hypocrisy and Devotion

2011-07-06T10:02:00.001-07:00

I was rereading some words by John Ortberg, in which he wrote:

“Why are Christians so often so mean to each other? I think it is because we do not care enough about truth. I think its because we do not get clear about what we believe.” (Taken from Christianity Today International/Leadership Journal, online, April 18, 2011).

He is referencing Romans 12:9, which reads: “Let love be without hypocrisy.”

Some have translated this: Let love be sincere.

That seems to be crystal clear. How we relate to one another within the body of Christ has far great ramifications than we dare to imagine. Just today, as I was scanning the musings of my friends on Facebook, I ran across a quote from Catherine deHueck Doherty. Here it is:

"To follow Christ is a tremendous risk. To follow Christ is to tear out by the roots the shrubs of one's own will and put them into a fire that really consumes."

But how many of those who follow Christ are really willing to “tear out by the roots the shrubs of one’s own will”? . . . If we do that, that would mean all our decisions would be guided by the Words of God, and that would mean allowing Him access to every part of us, and that would be, well, a little personal.

Romans 12:10 carries this even further: “Be devoted to one another in brotherly love.”

But, Paul, by devoted do you mean we actually have to care about our brothers and sisters in Christ? . . . Does that mean that I have to actually be devoted to my church (my church family), and that I can’t just treat the body as a place -- a place where I go to have my needs met? . . . Does that mean I have to be “devoted” to the same people week-in and week-out? . . . I mean, are we talking about an actual commitment here? . . . What if they do things I don’t like? What if some of them are a bit weird? What if I don’t like the leadership’s decisions? What if I’m not getting my needs met? What if I don’t like the music? What if I don’t like the preacher? What if someone hurts my feelings? . . . Does that mean I have to be devoted to them anyway? . . . I thought this was all about ME! . . .

Ah, there it is again. Is this thing called Christianity about ME? . . . Or, could it actually be about Christ? . . . If He is Lord, then the “me” has to be set aside. And then, paradoxically, what “me” needs (really needs) is answered in that unswerving devotion to Christ and His church.

Or, at least, that’s what I think.

How do you measure the health of a church?

2011-06-27T11:55:00.000-07:00

I’ve been thinking about that question for awhile (years, actually). And I am indebted to David Fitch and his book The Great Giveaway for the seed thought and for some of the material that follows. David discusses the possibility that “going from ten to a thousand members in five years is the sign of a sick church.”

Sounds odd, don’t you think? But, I think he has a point.

I don’t know of a church leader who doesn’t understand the following “dynamic” that is at play in many churches -- large and small, and everywhere in between.

Imagine a church of 1,000 attenders. That sounds great. That’s a church larger than 95% of all the churches in America. That church must be doing something right. . . . Yeah, maybe. But there can be a discrepancy between the size of a church and the lifestyle of individual members within that church. The church may actually be a gathering of “believers” (which for our purposes I will define as people who believe in Jesus and have made a decision for Jesus), and “disciples” (which again, for our purposes, I will define as someone who has been baptized and is observing all that Jesus commanded -- see Matthew 28:19-20).

The point is: Numbers miss the measurement of how well a church is functioning as the body of Christ. Numbers do not say anything about discipleship. That is, numbers give a quantitative measurement (how many people are in the building), but fail at giving a qualitative measurement of how the church functions as Christ’s body. And in this, a church that appears to be a success (numerically speaking) may be a failure in terms of its actual mission to be a faithful local body of Christ making real disciples (again, see Matthew 29:19-20).

Think about this church of 1,000. If it is typical of many churches, the church sees a large statistical turnover of people every year. That is, people join and people leave -- at an alarming rate (some actual churches of 1,000 see around a 60% turnover a year!). Out of that 1,000 “believers,” there is likely a core group of around 100 people -- representing “59 giving units” (as they are called) accounting for 95% of church giving. The other 900 “believers” give the remaining 5% of the money, are likely working 60-80 hours a week to support an indulgent and consumer driven lifestyle, while neglecting the poor and disenfranchised right outside their own doors, they still have sex outside of marriage, and have abusive relationships. They expect the church to meet their needs in terms of religious education for their children, have entertaining worship, a comfortable environment, and be ready to intervene in any personal crisis.

My question is: Is this a church of a hundred or a church of a thousand?

Numbers alone cannot answer that question. Only Scripture can. I propose that the size of the church, and its health, is best measured by the number of people committed to spiritual formation -- real discipleship. You know, the kind outlined in Scripture. Take a look at 1 Corinthians 12, Ephesians 4, and Romans 12. Do any of these texts even remotely look like what passes as a “healthy” church today? Do these texts describe the “healthy” Christians you know?

Back to our church of 1,000. If we define the church as a place -- a place for those who gather on Sunday morning for worship, a place that provides basic spiritually oriented services (including counseling, marriages, funerals, etc.), as a place to gather for those who have made a “personal” decision for Christ, then this church is one of the larger, more successful churches in our country. On the other hand, if we define the church as the people of God -- the body of Christ -- whose members are committed followers of Christ, who give of their finances to the kingdom of God and the building up of the body, who choose to follow Christ’s purposes for their moral lives, who submit to one another and are fundamentally committed to each other’s wellbeing through church discipline, who teach and disciple one another into maturity in Christ, who reach out to all who are strangers to Christ with the gospel, participating in the mission of Christ, then this church of 1,000 is an abysmal failure.

I am beginning to rethink how we use the terms “believer” and “disciple.” We have a lot of believers in Jesus these days (by the way, that also includes all the demons -- James 2:19), but I wonder how many disciples we have -- those who are not consumers of spiritual goods and services, but truly devoted to Christ and His church.

I will have to do some serious self-reflection on this. Perhaps you should too.

The God I Never Knew, by Robert Morris

2011-06-23T12:41:00.000-07:00

So, as you may have noticed from my occasional blog that I even less occasionally review a book. This is part of a shameless way of receiving new books at no charge! Having been invited by “Blogging for Books” to write reviews with the understanding that I post them on my blog, I receive new books. After reading and reviewing my selection, I can make another selection. They send it to me free of charge for another review, and on it goes. It’s a pretty cool deal, and I enjoy doing it.

For the months of September and October I am working on a series of messages concerning the third member of the Trinity -- the Holy Spirit. And so it was with some anticipation that I selected this most recent book, an advance copy of The God I Never Knew, by Robert Morris. The subtitle, “How Real Friendship with the Holy Spirit Can Change Your Life,” is what caught my attention. A fresh perspective while doing my own research for my new series of sermons was compelling.

I read the book. It has its interesting moments. Morris tells some great stories and weaves them into each chapter theme in a meaningful way. However, I was a bit under-whelmed at the material. I am not trying to be too critical here. It really is an easily read book and has some valuable insights that I think will benefit many. It’s just that I thought the book could have been so much more.

At the same time as I was reading Morris’s book I had been rereading Francis Chan’s book, Forgotten God. And, while it’s probably an unfair comparison, I would say that if I had the money to spend on only one of these two books, I would choose Chan’s.

And that’s all I have to say.

Assessing the Sick Society

2011-06-16T15:40:00.000-07:00

A few days ago I put this quote on my Facebook site: "It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society," Jiddu Krishnamurti (quote taken from Salvo's "Incoming" Summer 2011). Of course, when I posted it I was thinking about American culture in general. And then, after some more reflection, it occurs to me that this same statement equally applies to the church, most specifically the church in North America.

I love the church. I always have. I cannot enumerate what the gracious people of God have meant to me. Still, there is a profound sickness that has infected the church; a disease that is no less invasive than a cancer. It really is deadly to the church in general, to the church local, and to Christians who are the “carriers.”

I once knew a lady whose sickness became her identity. Her identity is wrapped up in her malady. She is sick and everyone who is in relationship with her must come to her through her sickness: understand it, acknowledge it, and know that it defines her every thought and action. Her sickness is her life. If she were ever cured, she would not know what to do with herself. She would not know how to relate to the world, to her friends, or even to herself. Sad, really. Very sad.

The church is a lot like my friend. We have become so wrapped up in the disease, the cancer, that is stripping churches and Christians of their power and witness and glory, that I suspect most Christians would not know how to react if you put your finger on the disease and called for the cure.

The cure is available. The cure is repentance. But, repentance itself has been left out of the church’s vocabulary. Most Christians feel no need of repentance of any sin, let alone this most deadly disease.

I will name it. This disease, this sin, this cancer that has seriously infected the church and most Christians within it is consumerism. . . . And I know, we have all heard sermons about consumerism. But few do anything about it.

I recently read Kent Carlson and Mike Lueken’s book, Renovation of the Church, in which they address this candidly as they tell their story of leaving the “seeker church” agenda and drawing their church back into “spiritual formation.” It’s a fascinating book.

They write: “For a very long time we have been trained in our country to be consumers. We have an almost endless amount of opportunities to consume. The entire economic system of our country is built on the consumption of goods that we, for the most part, don’t really need. By the time our children reach elementary school, they are fully formed consumers. The look at their lives from a consumer perspective. Speaking to North Americans about consumerism is like talking to fish about water. It is an all-encompassing part of our daily existence and usually too close for most of us to even notice its pervasive presence.”

They go on to say: “The issue is that the church in North America has, for the most part, embraced this insidious monster of consumerism in the most pragmatic manner and has used it as a principle foundation for church growth.”

The result is that we have trained a whole generation (really three whole generations) to be consumers rather than to be Christians. The contention is that as consumers we shop for the church that fits our “needs” or “wants” or “desires” -- none of which gets us what we really need -- which is to be formed into the image of Christ. So this generation of Christians is simply not interested in being formed into the image of Christ. Rather, they are most interested in the “church of what’s happening now.” And really, it doesn’t matter if the church is even interested in truth. It only matters that the church has the thing - whatever that thing is - that I think I am most interested in. And so, Christ gets crucified again for not being “hip” enough at the church they are leaving.

I recently got into a discussion with an elder who was telling me about running into another man who also used to be an elder in our church. This particular elder had left our church because his children had left our church for another church because the second church had a “really great youth program.” Three generations being moved by a particular youth program. I attempted to humbly point out that, being fully aware of the particular youth program, this particular theology of youth ministry is in keeping with what every church observer knows to be a complete disaster. (I’m not knocking this particular church, only the philosophy that drives its and the majority of churches’ youth ministries). Youth ministry in general - as we have done it, in offering the latest greatest whatever - has produced disastrous results. Statistically it is held that 75% of the youth in that particular program would not be following Christ within two years of their graduation from high school. Why? . . . Because these young people were not being given what they really need, they were simply being treated like customers at a restaurant. There was no real theological formation going on. They were simply being entertained.

Eugene Peterson once wrote: “If we are a nation of consumers, obviously the quickest and most effective way to get them into our congregations is to identify what they want and offer it to them, satisfy their fantasies, promise them the moon, recast the gospel in consumer terms: entertainment, satisfaction, excitement, adventure, problem-solving. . . . There is only one thing wrong: this is not the way in which God brings us into conformity with the life of Jesus . . . The cultivation of consumer spirituality is the antithesis of a sacrificial, ‘deny yourself’ congregation. A consumer church is an antichrist church.”

Ouch! . . . But dead on! . . . We, as church leaders, pastors, preachers, elders, missionaries, etc., are responsible for infecting the church at large with the cancer of consumerism. And we know the pain that results from it. As Carlson writes: “Many pastors struggle with a growing cynicism, or at least a kind of disengaged distance. We know that those who love and praise us today are often the ones who will be leaving us tomorrow.”

So long as such a sad state of affairs continues, so long as the cancer continues to spread, the church and the Kingdom of God at large, will continue to lose ground to our consumer culture. We will have become the monster -- the anti-christian church -- and we will have produced generations of anti-Christs.

On a hopeful note: As Christians make real commitments to Christ and His church, the church can and will triumph. Carlson adds a good perspective here: “It’s quite obvious that pastors and churches are filled with flaws and shortcomings. And often the critiques and perspectives and opinions of disgruntled laypeople are dead-on accurate, presenting a needed corrective to a church’s ministry. But this can be pursued in the context of a committed relationship. It is one thing to sit down with an upset person who I know is not going to leave the church. It’s another thing altogether for someone to use the threat of leaving as a kind of hammer to get what they want.”

We could use such committed Christians. But it will take the courage of Christian leadership to begin producing genuine Christian disciples who love the bride of Christ as much as they love Christ Himself.

Some Atheists Get It; Some Christians Don't

2011-06-06T08:50:00.000-07:00

I was reading a few thoughts from the Preaching Today website and found a couple of quotes from well known atheists. The quotes illustrate that many atheists are unbelieving, not for intellectual reasons but for volitional reasons. That's something I have argued over and over again. Belief or unbelief are really a matter of the will, not the intellect or the emotions. That's not a new thought, really. It is, I believe, the central idea to Pascal's Pensees, ("The heart has its reasons that reason does not know"). Oh, how I wish he had lived long enough to put those thoughts forward in completed form!

Here are the quotes.

First from Thomas Nagel, from his introduction to philosophy, What Does It All Mean? He writes: "I want atheism to be true. . . . It isn't just that I don't believe in God, and naturally, hope that I'm right about my belief. It's that I hope there is no God! I don't want there to be a God; I don't want the universe to be like that."

Note the "wanting" in Nagel's own words. It really is not about the intellect. It's about the want, the will.

Second, from the formerly unbelieving Mortimer Adler (who was baptized at age 81), talking about why he had rejected commitment for most of his life. He said it was because it "would require a radical change in my way of life, a basic alteration in the direction of my day-to-day choices as well as in the ultimate objectives to be sought or hoped for. . . . The simple truth of the matter is that I did not wish to live up to being a genuinely religious person."

Note again the "wishing" and what would be "required" of a person choosing to be "genuinely religious."

And this is the point. Why is that these two atheists (one a former atheist) understand the requirements of Christian discipleship better than some Christians? . . . They both know that if they were to be people of faith, there would be "a radical change in my way of life." They intuitively understand the requirements of faith. And yet, there are a whole host of "Christians" who are people of "faith" but whose lifestyles, life choices, decision making, etc. are completely foreign to Scripture. That is, they call themselves Christians but live like the rest of the world.

Where in your life and mine is it evident that we are people of faith, living under the lordship of Christ? . . . If there is no direct evidence, in the way we live, relate to one another, relate to the world, the church, and the mission of Christ, are we really self-deceived? . . . It is becoming increasingly evident that some atheists get it and some Christians don't. And one begins to wonder, who the real believers are.

Just thinking,

Wes

Radical Together, David Platt Part 2

2011-05-26T09:57:00.000-07:00

"How can we in the church best unleash the people of God in the Spirit of God with the Word of God for the glory of God in the world?" . . . That's David Platt's question in his "sequel" to Radical. In his previous book, he calls on Christians to reconsider what it means to be radically devoted to Christ. In this follow-up, Platt takes his message to the church. I think the sequel is better than the original! (Not that the original was not good. It was! And I strongly encourage everyone to read it). By better, I mean, or it seems to me, that he addresses the issue to the proper audience, namely, the church. I think this is important for one reason: It is the church that has received the commission to exalt the glory of God among the nations. And, while the church is made up of individual Christians, it is the church -- the gathered community of individual Christians -- that has been called to carry the commission to the world.

In chapter after chapter, Platt, almost sermonically, details the higher calling of being radically devoted to Jesus Christ. He writes six brief chapters that all hit the mark of the high calling of Christ.

Chapter 1. Tyranny of the Good - One of the worst enemies of Christians can be good things in the church. Sacrificing the great call of God to all the good things we do in church may be our biggest blind-spot. And Mark points that out. ". . . if we are not careful, we will spend our lives doing good things in the church while we ultimately miss out on the great purpose for which we were created," (p. 8). To which I respond, "Guilty!" I like better his definition of the church: "A church is a community of individuals who have lost their lives to follow Christ" (p. 10).

Chapter 2. The Gospel Misunderstood - The Gospel that saves us from work saves us to work. Here Platt does a marvelous job navigating between the twin errors of thinking our works (active faith) have nothing to do with salvation and our works have everything to do with our salvation. And, while I might not agree with everything he writes in this chapter (his Calvinism does show through), I think he is spot on.

Chapter 3. God Is Saying Something - The Word does the Work. I really liked this chapter and found it refreshing that Platt calls us to depend on the Word, and the World alone, as the real power to bring the gospel to the world. "God has designed us to depend on his Word to lead his people in ways that are utterly disproportionate to who we are," (p. 43). The job of the church is not to entertain an audience, but to announce the gospel. The Word is all we need.

Chapter 4. The Genius of Wrong - Building the right church depends on using all the wrong people. By far, the best part of a very good book. It is the people, not the performance, the place, the programs, or the professionals that are the plan of God to announce the glory of God to the world. This chapter alone is worth the price of the book.

Chapter 5. Our Unmistakable Task - We are living - and longing - for the end of the world. While I might question his use and exegesis and theology of Matthew 24:14, I will not fault Platt for his encouragement to help us understand that we have a responsibility to the world. He brings a needed corrective to those who are opposed to short-term mission trips. And he helps us to understand that the "accident" of the place of our birth is really the blessing of God, and God expects us to use that grace and mercy to help those who have not been so blessed.

Chapter 6. The God Who Exalts God - We are selfless followers of a self-centered God. This chapter provides a fitting summation of all that he has been saying. He writes: "And the last thing we want to do is raise up people who are casual in the worship of God as they sit back and enjoy their lattes. Instead, we want to raise up people who are so awed, so captivated, so mesmerized by the glory of God that they will gladly lose their lattes - and their lives - to make his greatness known to the world," (p. 107).

I commend this book to your reading. It is not a small thing to say that the reading of this book and Platt's first book has caused me to radically reconsider my role as a pastor/teacher.

Wes

I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review.

Reading and a Waste of Time

2011-05-24T08:26:00.000-07:00

Books are being published at a phenomenal rate these days. I don't even know the numbers, and I suspect few really do. And now that there are self-published electronic (cyber?) books hitting the web at an ever-increasing rate, there is probably no way of knowing how many "books" are being published on a daily basis. It puts one in mind of Ecclesiastes 12:12 -- "But beyond this, my son, be warned: the writing of many books is endless, and excessive devotion to books is wearying to the body." . . . . I suspect "The Preacher" had no idea how prophetic his words are under today's circumstances. Chalk one up to inspiration!

Of course, The Preacher was not saying that one should just forgo reading altogether; rather, one should be circumspect in what one chooses to read. But what to read is not easy to discern. Recently I was reading a review of Edward Feser's book, The Last Superstition. (On a side note, one good strategy to follow in discerning what books to read is to read reviews of those you trust). Graeme Hunter is the reviewer, and the review is found in the May/June 2011 Touchstone journal. I found myself disciplined and encouraged by what he wrote. So, I want to quote him at length. This is what he writes:

Richard Dawkins Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, and Christopher Hitchens are the big four among a group of militant anti-religious writers who have come to be called "the new atheists." What is "new" about them is not their ideas. It is the strident, adversarial tone of voice in which they shout about old-fashioned atheism. Their aggressive style has made atheism newsworthy again, in bestselling books like Harris's The End of Faith, Dawkins's The God Delusion, and Hitchens's God Is Not Great. If such blustering titles make you think of adolescent rebellion, you can skip the books. You have already got from them most of what they contain.
Christians who bother to read these books come away with mixed feelings. On the one hand, their sheer stupidity seems to make intelligent rejoinder impossible On the other hand, seeing the new atheism atop the bestseller lists makes us long to respond. But how? The arguments offered against faith are so weak and patronizing that sneers of derision seem more appropriate than careful refutation. The loud, accusatory tone the new atheists adopt makes you want to shout back at them, rather than waste your breath on reasoned argument. But shouts and sneers do not a rejoinder make. So you resign yourself to maintaining a dignified silence.
Almost. But then you recall that if our Christian heritage had not been so neglected, such books would have no readers.

Having wasted my time reading the books of the above "new atheists," I felt a bit chastised. It's that last sentence that is the striking one. ". . . if our Christian heritage had not been so neglected, such books would have no readers." Truth is, we are not lovers of truth. We are lovers of what is convenient. We are lovers of the cheap laugh, the one-liners, and sound bites, rather than lovers of thought and matters of the mind.

But all this does cause one to pause and wonder. What books should I be reading and what is best left unread? Above all, reading should not be a waste of time. So, take care what you read. And by the way, I have added Feser's book to my Amazon "Wish-List" because it sounds like one of those books worth the reading.

Forgiving the Church

2011-04-28T08:23:00.000-07:00

Henri Nouwen wrote: "When we say, 'I love Jesus, but I hate the church,' we end up losing not only the church but Jesus too. The challenge is to forgive the church. This challenge is especially great because the church seldom asks for forgiveness."

One of the responsibilities that belongs to the Christian is the responsibility of forgiveness. Our Lord was quite direct on this one. ". . . forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. . . . For if you forgive men for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions," (Matthew 6:12, 14-15).

That should probably be enough, but it rarely is. It seems that many want the benefit of Christ's forgiveness -- Christ as Savior, but none of the responsibility of forgiving others -- Christ as Lord. But if He is Lord of our lives, then the responsibility of forgiveness is as much a part of our walk with Christ as is the forgiveness He offers us.

When Christians get "cross-wise" with one another, under the lordship of Christ, they have a responsibility to rebuild the relationship. That responsibility is worked out before the watching Lord and the watching world.

We are never more like Christ than when we forgive and restore what is broken. I, for one, believe that the vitality of faith can only be restored when Christians learn to forgive one another, restore fellowship with one another, and return together to worship Christ the Lord.

The Problem of Private Faith

2011-04-26T11:48:00.000-07:00

There was a time when privateers were the terror of the open seas. A privateer was a private person or ship authorized by a government by letter of marque to attack foreign shipping during wartime. Privateering was a way of mobilizing armed ships and sailors without having to spend public money or commit naval officers. Privateers were the fore-runners to what we commonly refer to as pirates. Pirates were “privateers gone to seed.” That is, they were the criminal, commercial enterprise of a few to rob, cheat, and steal from legitimate trading vessels on the high seas. Which is to say that there was not a lot of difference between a privateer and a pirate. One, at least seemed to be operating legitimately -- robbing under the pretense that they were working for some governing authority; while the other was simply an outright attempt to thieve for personal gain. Privateers operated out of private ships -- privately owned; pirates did the same (although, often the ships were also stolen). Both were personal attempts at making economic gain at someone else’s expense.

I would like to connect those three terms: privateer (or “private”), pirate, and personal. All three represent a radical individual enterprise whose sole beneficiary was to be the one making economic gain at someone else’s expense. These terms are historically related and from the beginning had a significant negative definition.

I was thinking about this in my reading of Mike Erre’s book, Death by Church. Mike does a marvelous job of helping us to understand the significance of the church biblically defined versus the church defined by contemporary Western (American) culture. Of significance for this musing was his understanding of the ongoing “worship” battles being fought out in churches across the country. These battles, to my mind, are a sad state of affairs. We as a church should do better, especially in how we handle one another in a worship context. In the midst of a chapter in which Mike discusses “The Confessional Church and the Subversive Jesus,” in the context of writing about how everything the Christian and church does is, by design, subversive to the culture, he demonstrates our failure at this very operation by illustrating our worship battles. To wit, he writes:

“The debates between hymns and choruses, choirs and drums, contemporary or traditional completely miss the point. It reveals a sickness in the American church that must be cured. We have divorced worship from justice and obedience, and we often substitute slick, planned-to-the minute song lists that are poor alternatives to the presence and power of the Holy Spirit. The Scriptures talk more about the kind of worship that God hates than the kind of worship He finds acceptable.” (p. 150).

Mike is referencing such texts as Isaiah 1:10-17 (I would encourage the read to read through verse 20) and Amos 5:21-27. In the Isaiah context, of course, Sodom and Gomorrah had long sense been destroyed, so Isaiah is referencing Judah and its Temple worship here by calling their worship of no more value than the Sodomites “lack” of worship.

The problem Mike is illustrating is that much of the church’s worship -- and it doesn’t matter if it is contemporary or traditional -- is “me” centered. It is private. It is a personal, pirated copy of real worship. In other words, it is stealing true worship from God because it is self-motivated, self-aggrandizing, and self-seeking. When we see our faith as a private preference, we dishonor God. And it really doesn’t matter what form that worship takes. If I like to worship the traditional way or the contemporary way, it is still “I” who is the focus, not God. And that is piracy.

As Mike goes on to write: “Our likes and dislikes take the place of radical engagement with God, His community, and His world. Because of this, people are now more concerned with being fed in worship (and teaching) than in encountering the living God and honoring Him in any way they can.” (151).

True worship is subversive -- but not in a privatizing, pirating, personal way. It is subversive because we encounter the real God, whether we are corporately gathered or are witness to His glory in our every day lives. Every part of our day and week is worship. The church takes worship to the world, giving glory to God in every way. And so, worship has a very practical and public character. One last quote: “Among everything else the church ought to be, in its confessional worship it is a place that simply tells the truth about the world and its destiny. This is a group of people who resist the values of greed, consumerism, materialism, revenge, power, manipulation, lust, and self-indulgence. It proclaims and embodies a new and better way.” (152).

I am convinced that if the church, any church, cures itself of piracy, that church will changes its community, and in short order, will change the world.

Radical by David Platt

2011-04-21T08:38:00.000-07:00

Platt does an amazing job in this brief book in offering a valid critique of the church growth methodology of the past twenty or so years. He is himself a pastor or a “mega-church.” Platt writes about the “marketing strategies” of the church that has turned a Christian culture into a consumer culture:

“Jesus apparently wasn’t interested in marketing himself to the masses. His invitations to potential followers were clearly more costly than the crowds were ready to accept, and he seemed to be okay with that. He focused instead on the few who believed him when he said radical things. And through their radical obedience to him, he turned the course of history in a new direction.” (p. 2).

Platt calls us to “consider the cost” of following the Jesus of Scripture versus “a nice, middle-class, American Jesus.” At first read, one might be tempted to think that Platt is preaching a “Christian utilitarianism.” And it does sound like that. But I think Platt has a more balanced perspective on this. I do not believe he believes every American Christian should sell everything they have to follow Jesus. He realizes that Jesus’ demand on different lives, even within Scripture, required different sacrifices from different people. But he does hold us up to the words of Jesus and ask, “What if . . .?” Our level of devotion is found in the answer. What if . . . we had to give up our buildings, sound systems, instruments, video screens, and comfortable chairs? . . . Would we still gather for worship as do many of our brothers around the world, in secret, huddled together with shared Bibles, standing or sitting on concrete floors for hours on end, just to hear the Word? What if . . . ?

How much of what we do as a body do we do in our own power, with our own resources, in our own terms? And in “doing ministry” in such a way, how connected are we to Jesus, who clearly tells us we can do nothing apart from him (John 15:5)? Is it the Lord who is adding to our churches day by day, or are we gathering consumers of religious goods and services on our own strength and marketing strategies?

Platt reminds us that biblical Christianity cannot be summed up with the message that is played all too often in our ears: “God loves me.” Platt writes:

“The message of biblical Christianity is not ‘God loves me, period,’ as if we were the object of our own faith. The message of biblical Christianity is ‘God loves me so that I might make him -- his ways, his salvation, his glory, and his greatness -- known among all nations.’ Now God is the object of our faith, and Christianity centers around him. We are not the end of the gospel; God is.” (pp. 70-71).

From that point on, Platt encourages us to get real about our faith and the call of our faith to go to the world; to live sacrificially so that all might hear the gospel and have opportunity to be discipled. He calls us to reexamine our lives financially, physically, spiritually, and to get back to what we have been called to do in the first place.

I believe we are seeing a spate of young authors, pastors, and theologians that are calling the church to the right side, the biblical side, the faithful side. I believe everyone who has eyes to see recognizes that the church at large is in desperate need of an awakening to biblical ideals. The church in America is at a theological crossroads. Will we go the way of mainline protestant liberalism of old -- ultimately, the way of irrelevance; or, will we go the way of Christ and get back to what the call of Christ is really all about, and so begin living the life of Christ before the watching world. I believe this way is the only way to recover what has been lost after two or three decades of Americanized Christianity. It’s time to return to biblical Christianity. Folks like David Platt have done us a service in calling us once again to the root of our faith. That’s Radical.

Wes

I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review

not a fan

2011-04-19T08:53:00.001-07:00

I'm anticipating Kyle Idleman's new book, Not a Fan, coming out next month, having read the first chapter, and having visited the notafan.com site. Are we fan's or followers of Jesus? . . . This is a fleshing out of being "radically devoted to Christ," (see previous post).

And then I ran across this quote from Francis Chan (from Francis Chan, "More Than a Follower," Relevant, 21 August 2008, http://www.relevantmagazine.com/god/deeper-walk/features/1472-more-than-a-follower).

This is what Chan wrote:

"You passionately love Jesus, but you don't really want to be like Him. You admire His humility, but you don't want to be that humble. You think it's beautiful that He washed the feet of His disciples, but that's not exactly the direction your life is headed. You're thankful He was spit upon and abused, but you would never let that happen to you. You praise Him for loving you enough to suffer during His whole time on earth, but you're going to do everything within your power to make sure you enjoy your time down here. In short: You think He is a great Savior, but not a great role model."

So, where do I find myself? . . . Where do you find yourself? . . . Are you simply a fan of Jesus, or are you a follower of Jesus?

What Kind of Church?

2011-04-18T07:28:00.000-07:00

There is a great blog post over at Church & Culture. You can find it here: http://www.churchandculture.org/blog.asp?id=1034. In order to be the church of Jesus Christ, we must be fundamentally committed to God, each other, and to the world at large.

To borrow from Pete Wilson: Here at Santa Clara Church we have a staff and leadership who are trying to create a church that is radically devoted to Christ, irrevocably committed to one another, and relentlessly dedicated to reaching those outside of God's family.

I know that's a hard sell for many within the body these days who are more committed to their own agendas, creature comforts, and independent lifestyles (independent of the church as a community, independent of God - unless they need goods and services). But that is what we are after anyway. After all, barring those three things, what is a church for? . . .

Wes

Rob Bell and Love Wins - 4

2011-04-07T10:15:00.000-07:00

OK, so I’ve been slow in finishing the posts on Rob Bell’s book. Sorry for that. I will attempt to wrap it up now. I finished reading the book last Friday (while Sami was at dance class). And here is the thing. As I have said before, Rob is a great writer. I really appreciate his pastoral intent, his obvious concern for his people as well as for those outside of Christ. I realize he is attempting to build a bridge for the gospel, to help people connect with Christ. That is, he is writing evangelistically, attempting to draw people to Christ while at the same time attempting to persuade Christians to stop talking about that one thing that seems to be some people’s biggest hurdle -- hell. I understand that. I can even sympathize with that. Still, by refusing to deal with the whole truth of the gospel you end up with half a gospel, and in reality, no gospel at all.

I was reading another person’s brief review, who said something very interesting about all this. He wrote: “You know the old quip about lawyers? ‘Always confident, sometimes right.’ That's an almost perfect description of Bell in Love Wins; he writes with amazing confidence about certain facts (word meanings, Jewish backgrounds, historical issues), and yet if you just pick up a dictionary or google a quote, you realize that what he's saying is simply wrong. Pointing these things out isn't just a matter of ‘picking on’ Bell, either. It's a matter of doing our best to make sure little errors don't become part of our atmosphere. Otherwise, before we know it we'll have people in our churches saying, as if everybody knows it already, that Luther was a universalist and that the Bible doesn't have a concept of ‘forever.’” (Greg Gilbert). Greg goes on to point out issues I have already raised in my previous posts.

Bell argues that Jesus does not use hell to compel people to go to God. What then are we to make of Luke 12:1-5? . . . If I have to decide between Bell and Luke, I’m going with Luke, who makes it quite clear that this is exactly what Jesus did!

Bell attempts to make the case that we are all part of the family of God, and God doesn’t get what He wants when He judges, and that if we wait around long enough, God will show compassion on all of us, because, well, because that’s what Bell wants Him to do. Bell’s stringing together of texts tells us that he uses a concordance rather well, but this also reveals that he has little ability to actually deal with these texts in their specific contexts, or with the truth they are obviously teaching.

For example: Look at how Bell reads (or better yet, ignores the reading) the Bible. He argues that in heaven the gates of the New Jerusalem never shut, and therefore everybody eventually finds their way in, the opportunity for salvation is never closed. But Bell has apparently failed to read the preceding chapter which includes a very clear statement of God’s justice: “And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire,” (Revelation 21:15). Yes, the gates of New Jerusalem are never shut, but this happens only after the final judgment.

Bell seems to think that Christians believe the line between heaven and hell is “believing the right things.” That, of course, is yet another half-truth. See Luke 13:25-28 and Matthew 25:10-12. The issue is not “right belief” but right relationship. Those “outside” are those to whom He says, “I do not know you,” not “you didn’t believe the right things.” This is about having a right orientation toward the God of the universe, having a right self-understanding. The God of the universe, out of His great grace and mercy says, “I will forgive you if you will accept My gift and understand your need for this gift.” This God takes our place on a cross as our substitute offering us complete and total forgiveness.

At the last, and to draw this to a close, it seems to me that Bell has gone down the path of historic Protestant liberalism. Following the lead of theologians like Friedrich Schleiermacher who “re-wrote” Christian theology to appeal to its “cultured despisers,” and Harry Emerson Fosdick who was, perhaps, its greatest orator (in America), Bell seems intent on reducing, surrendering, re-writing the obvious truths of Scripture to make it more palatable to those who find the truth of Scripture hard to accept.

I find this to be the case with much of the “emergent” movement. I suspect, given time, the result will be the same. As Albert Mohler has written, “At the end of the day, a secular society feels no need to attend or support secularized churches with a secularized theology. The denial of hell did not win relevance for the liberal churches. It simply misled millions about their eternal destiny.”

I think Mohler’s summary says it well. Allow me to end with his summary:

“As a communicator, Rob Bell is a genius. He is the master of the pungent question, the turn-the-picture-upside-down story, and the personal anecdote. Like Harry Emerson Fosdick, the paladin of pulpit liberalism, Rob Bell is a master communicator. Had he set out to defend the biblical doctrine of hell, he could have done so marvelously. He would have done the church a great service. But that is not what he set out to do.

“Like Fosdick, Rob Bell cares deeply for people. It comes through in his writings. There is no reason to doubt that Bell wrote this book out of his own personal concern for people who are put off by the doctrine of hell. Had that concern been turned toward a presentation of how the biblical doctrine of hell fits within the larger context of God's love and justice and the Gospel of Jesus Christ, that would have been a help to untold thousands of Christians and others seeking to understand the Christian faith. But that is not what Bell does in this new book.

“Instead, Rob Bell uses his incredible power of literary skill and communication to unravel the Bible's message and to cast doubt on its teachings.”

Sadly, attacks on the body of Christ -- on the church, and on Christians in particular -- are most devastating when they come from within. We are in the midst of another war -- a war for truth. Fortunately, we have truth on our side!

Rob Bell and Love Wins - 3

2011-03-31T10:15:00.000-07:00

Someone once said that a little Greek is a dangerous thing. That can be fully illustrated in Bell’s third chapter of Love Wins.

Bell begins with a rapid overview of the texts that mention the biblical terms that are generally translated as “hell.” His understanding the the term “gehenna” is accurate. Gehenna was, indeed, Jerusalem’s garbage dump, the “valley of Hinnom.” It might have been helpful if Bell had done a little scriptural research in reference to this valley, as he would have gained some valuable insight as to why that particular valley became the city refuse pit. Take some time to read Jeremiah 19 if you want to get an understanding as to why this particular valley became loathsome in the eyes of the people. This was the place of child sacrifice, and so became a metaphor, a reference, to the worst place imaginable. Hell on earth, indeed!

The chapter moves on to a promising note, focusing on the “hell on earth” that we often create for ourselves. Bell understands the use of metaphor here as to why Jesus would use this place as a reference to the eternal place of the off-scouring of the universe (although Bell never quite makes that connection).

Bell understands the remorse of the “rich man” in Jesus’ story of “the Rich Man and Lazarus,” but again fails to make the connection that the Rich Man is lost and without hope. But Bell does redeem himself when he writes: “There is hell now, and there is hell later, and Jesus teaches us to take both seriously.” (Sorry, I can’t give the page references as I am reading the kindle edition).

After this, almost as if on cue, Bell makes a strange turn into what can only be described as seriously confused thinking. He quotes Jesus in Matthew 10, “Truly I say to you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment, than for that city,” (Matthew 10:15), and gets Jesus precisely WRONG. Bell says, “More bearable for Sodom and Gomorrah? He tells highly committed, pious, religious people that it will be better for Sodom and Gomorrah than them on judgment day? There’s still hope?” . . . And, of course, Jesus does nothing of the kind.

A little context might be helpful here. First, Jesus does not say this to “highly committed, pious, religious people.” He says this to His disciples as He is sending them out to prepare the way for His travels through those various cities. He bases His condemnation on those who fail to show hospitality to His disciples as they move through those cities. But, nowhere does Jesus suggest that Sodom and Gomorrah are given “hope”!

On to Bell’s Greek (and Hebrew) “scholarship.” Bell bases much of what he writes on the use of the Greek term aion which scholars translate a number of different ways, but most commonly means “eternal.” He references the Greek term kolazo which he translates as “pruning” or “trimming,” which are certainly in the range of meaning for the term. But kolazo most commonly means “destruction.” He also references the Hebrew equivalent term here, olam, as “forever” and references Psalm 90, particularly, verse 2: “Even from everlasting [olam] to everlasting [olam], You are God.” That text, I think, establishes fairly clearly what is meant by the term! And yet Bell writes: “But ‘forever’ is not really a category the biblical writers used.” . . . Um, . . . Rob, what are you talking about?! Clearly “forever” and “eternity” IS a category they understood and used, and used often. . . . Had Bell even had the hermeneutical skill of a second year Bible college student, he might have looked up, just a couple of verses, to Psalm 89:52, “Blessed be the Lord forever!” (emphasis mine). The Hebrew term translated “forever” is olam (or, at least from that word group--the verb form of the term, to keep from getting too technical). And what is more, the LXX uses aion to translate it! So, are we to suppose, then, given Bell’s expertise, that the psalmist was not referencing God’s eternal nature, but was simply saying, “Bless God a long time”? . . . What nonsense.

Now, it’s true both aion and olam can be used to reference “a period of time” rather than “forever.” But that is where context comes into play and good hermeneutics (the practice of interpretation) must be practiced. Bell is right, for example, to reference Jonah and his three days in the belly of the fish as an olam, a period of time, or in Bell’s vernacular, “a particularly intense period.” That’s a case of “context is king.” But to extrapolate from this event a general meaning for the term, and to force upon it the idea that the biblical writers had no concept of eternity is, well, bizarre.

The problem here is Bell’s insistence that these terms can only mean “age” or “a particular intensity of experience.” It’s rather like taking, say how I might use the English term love. I might say, “I love my wife,” and, of course, I mean by that, that she is the one to whom I am devoted in a covenant relationship of mutual self-giving, sacrifice, and devotion for so long as we both shall live. And then I might say, “I love hamburgers.” And someone like Bell comes along and says, “Love, in the language of Wes Wright, can only mean that he really likes to eat hamburgers. Wes has no concept of self-giving, covenantal devotion.” And so, when I say, “I love my wife,” I, given Bell’s word study, must really want to eat my wife for lunch! Using Bell’s problematic biblical language skills leads to all kinds of such problems. I offer just a couple:

Romans 16:26 refers to God as “the eternal God.” Does Paul mean what Bells insists he must mean, that Paul calls God “the God of a particular time,” or does Paul mean, “the particularly intense God”? . . . No! Paul means what the words means in the general use of the term that God is eternal, plain and simple.

In 2 Corinthians 4:18, Paul uses two terms to point out opposites. He writes: “. . . The things which are seen are temporal [proskeira], but the things which are not seen are eternal [aionia].” Does Paul mean, “Some things are temporary and other things are temporary a little longer, or temporary in a more intense sort of way”? . . . What nonsense! But these are the kinds of nonsense ways we have to understand the terms given Bell’s “expert” analysis.

To be sure, the terms aion and olam can reference limited lengths of time. But again, context must determine those understandings. And those understandings are rare. They are the exceptions that establish the rule.

I would like from here to go on to unpack Bell’s understanding of kolazo, but I see I have already written far too long. And, I suspect that Bell will return to this term later. If that be the case, we will unpack the term there.

Mark Batterson - Soul Print

2011-03-29T14:15:00.000-07:00

A few years ago I picked up Mark Batterson's first book, In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day. I mean, with a title like that, how could I resist? And, I was not disappointed. It's a great book and well worth the read. Not long after I read his second book, Wild Goose Chase, and was again gratified by his encouraging style. Today I just finished reading Soulprint: Discovering Your Divine Destiny. And again, it was well worth the read.

Using the life of David, Mark encourages us to be the unique person we are to be all that God created us to be. Uniquely designed, uniquely loved, and given the unique opportunity to live that one-of-a-kind life God has called each of us to live. (I know that sounds redundant, but there you are).

Mark encouraged to think of our past, our present, and even our future as providential gifts of God to us to help us become all that we are intended to be. For example, concerning our past, he writes: "Every past experience is preparation for some future opportunity. God doesn't just redeem our souls. He also redeems our experiences. And not just the good ones. He redeems the bad ones too -- especially the bad ones," (p. 22). And then again: "Part of discovering your soulprint is seeing the purposes of God in your past experiences. the past is not circumstantial. The past is providential," (p. 61).

Looking at the life of David, through his ups and downs, triumphs and tragedies, successes and sins, Mark calls on us to see and to understand how God redeems us and sets us up to be the unique individuals He calls us to be, uniquely loved, uniquely gifted, uniquely called to God's glory and our good.

I think you will find Mark's encouraging words to be especially powerful as you seek to be the you God intended you to be. So, I commend this book to you. I know you will be encouraged.

Wes

I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review

Rob Bell and Love Wins - 2

2011-03-25T11:01:00.000-07:00

First, by way apology, I am still getting used to this ipad and its keypad along with the Kindle ap. So, lots of typos and no time for editing on the first post in this series. Also in my defense, I wrote the first post at 11:00 pm while in a hotel room in Portland. No excuses, just the facts.

Now on to Bell. I must say, chapter two, "Here Is the New There," is really terrific. Consider these quotes:

"Our eschatology shapes our ethics. Eschatology is about last things. Ethics are about how you live. What you believe about the future shapes, informs, and determines how you live now."

"A proper view of heaven leads not to escape from the world, but to full engagement with it, all with the anticipation of a coming day when things are on earth as they currently are in heaven."

"This helps us understand the exchange between the rich man and Jesus. Jesus wants to free him to more actively participate in God’s good world, but the man isn’t up for it. And his unwillingness, we learn, leads us to another insight about heaven. Heaven comforts, but it also confronts."

"To say it again, eternal life is less about a kind of time that starts when we die, and more about a quality and vitality of life lived now in connection to God. Eternal life doesn’t start when we die; it starts now. It’s not about a life that begins at death; it’s about experiencing the kind of life now that can endure and survive even death."

Terrific stuff, really. And, while I would not agree with everything in the chapter, this one chapter alone is worth the read.

"Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven," is about the Christian responsibility to bring the reign and rule of Christ into our everyk day, here and now lives. Heaven starts in the here and now.

Good stuff!

Rob Bell and Love Wins I

2011-03-23T12:36:00.000-07:00

Rob Bell and Love Wins

Rob Bell is a terrific writer. His writing is compelling and lucid and draws the reader’s attention in so many ways. He is easy to read, enlightening, and compelling. . . . I only wish he read as easily as he writes!

I am reading Bell’s new book, Love Wins, which as I said is really compelling reading. However, I am just getting into the book and I am already confused. I am confused that one who is so compelled to offer grace to the world can be so confused in his own thinking and reading -- especially when it comes to Scripture. I understand that Bell is seeking to advance understanding. I also understand that different Christians throughout history have had varying opinions on certain doctrines. But in coming to terms with these varying opinions, one should not be intent to mislead those who are reading, misquote those who have written, and misread the Scriptures themselves in an effort to advance his thesis.

It seems to me that one part of clear writing is to “play fair.” And Bell does anything but “play fair.” For example, Bell writes:

“A staggering number of people have been taught that a select few Christians will spend forever in a peaceful, joyous place called heaven, while the rest of humanity spends forever in torment and punishment in hell with no chance for anything better. It’s been clearly communicated to many that this belief is a central truth of the Christian faith and to reject it is, in essence, to reject Jesus. This is misguided and toxic and ultimately subverts the contagious spread of Jesus’s message of love, peace, forgiveness, and joy that our world desperately needs to hear.”

This is a strange argument, given in an ad hominen way. Logicians call this “poisoning the well” (in its popular expression). Bell’s rhetoric is meant to shape the reader’s mind into a certain opinion about those who have made such arguments about hell without allowing those who make such claims to give reason for their claims. Even if Bell is right, this is disingenuous.

Later Bell asserts his opinion on how awful God would be to send someone to hell forever “for things they did in their few finite fears of life.” This is a legitimate question that needs a legitimate answer. But Bell’s rhetoric fails to account for any answer other than an emotional outpouring against such condemnation without reference to reason. He asks the wrong question. At issue is not a person’s “few finite years of life,” but the issue of rebellion against a holy and righteous and infinite God. And, while offering no answers (yet) to this issue, I think Bell is again poisoning the well to what is at stake.

These types of issues can be quoted and responded to over and over again. But for brevity’s sake, let us just say that Bell has a lot of explaining to do as to his process.

As I was reading the first chapter, my initial reaction was that it reads a lot like a Richard Dawkins book given his atheism. Both seem to revel in quoting Scripture out of context, without reference to the whole of Scripture, and without counsel into what Christians actually believe on the issue. They then ramble on about what some fringe Christian might think about it, and make that view representative of the Christian view at large. This, of course, is the genetic fallacy. It’s rather like saying, “The multiplication table is evil. It is now and has always been evil. I will prove it to you. Adolf Hitler believed in the multiplication table. There, that settles it. Anybody who believe in the multiplication table is evil like Adolf Hitler.”

The truth of Scripture does not stand or fall on what a particular Christians or group of Christians say about the subject. The truth of Scripture stands or falls on its own terms, just as the multiplication table stands true on its own terms.

One last note on this first chapter. Bell references Paul’s conversion experience on the road to Damascus. And, of course, Paul was not converted on the road to Damascus. He was converted IN Damascus. Worse, Bell misses the point of the story. The issue is not just Paul’s conversion, but Paul’s mission -- to preach the Kingdom to the Gentiles. Given Bell’s thesis, God and Paul are wasting their time. In fact, everything past the gospels is a waste of paper. Why should Paul have bothered to preach the gospel if the gospel need not be preached and everyone somehow, some way, gets saved?

Bell quotes Matthew 18 concerning leading little ones astray. Indeed that is a warning everyone, especially Rob Bell, should take note of.

Functional Unbelief

2010-12-28T14:49:00.000-08:00

I’ve been reading the newest edition of Salvo (Winter 2010, Issue 15). In particular I’ve been thinking through Regis Nicoll’s piece: “Functional Unbelief: There Are No True Agnostics.” It is well worth the read, especially in terms of the reality that there are no neutral positions when it comes to God. One is either a theist or an atheist, and agnosticism is really either weak theism or weak atheism. And, functionally, it is by most accounts weak atheism.

As good as his reasoning is on the above (and I highly recommend that everyone read it), it was on a secondary issue that Nicoll really got my attention. As he summarizes his points, Nicoll says, “Faith is confirmed not in what we say (our beliefs), but in what we do (our behaviors).” This is an important point, and one I think all professed Christians need to take to heart. Nicoll goes on to say: “To the most important question in life--‘Does God exist?’--a person can answer ‘Yes,’ ‘I don’t know,’ or ‘No.’ But in practice, a person must live as if God either does or does not exist; there is nothing else to do, except perhaps to oscillate schizophrenically between the two.”

Again, that’s an important point. There are many Christians, so called, who really live as functional atheists. You can recognize it in their actions--as more important than their words. Nicoll writes: “Behavioral studies by various pollsters (Barna and Pew, to name two) suggest that many Americans who self-identify as Christians are functional non-Christians--if not atheists--because their lives reflect neither the teachings nor the example of Jesus Christ. By their words, they profess faith in Christ, but by their actions, they reveal that their faith is in something else.” I think this is telling. Many Christians so-called, or self-identified, live with little relation to the actual teachings of Scripture.

I recently got into a conversation with a self-identified Christian who had been considering leaving his church for another (not his church for mine, or mine for another). I asked him how he thought such a behavior comported with the teaching of Scripture. And, he looked at me as though I were speaking a foreign language. I tried again. How was it possible for a person to break off fellowship with one body of believers for another given the teaching of Scripture? Again, I got a blank stare. I tried a third time. What does the Bible say about our responsibilities to one another in the body of Christ, and how does breaking fellowship with one’s community of faith play into that discussion?

My friend admitted that he had never really thought about that, but that the decision to leave his current church “felt right.” I asked again. Where in Scripture does “feeling right” about leaving a church legitimize the decision? Again, no answer.

Now, I am not suggesting that my new friend is, in fact, an atheist. I am only suggesting that he is living like one. That is: His behavior is that of an unbeliever, even if he profess faith. The Words of Scripture and the lordship of Christ are irrelevant to his life, and so, while he professes faith in Christ as Lord, he is living in rebellion to his “Lord.”

I understand that there are areas in all of our live in which we betray our allegiance to Christ as Lord. I am certainly not immune to sin. But, when it comes to such major decisions, it seems to me that the Scripture is quite clear.

And then, I recently read Jim Putman’s book, Real-Life Discipleship (NavPress, 2010), and he helped me to understand the discipleship process in clearer terms. And he helped me to understand how it is that some can make such clearly unbiblical decisions. He proposes that inside the Christian life, one is either in one of four positions: An infant, child, young adult, or parent. And, he also proposes that many Christians do not have an accurate self-assessment as to where they are in that process. And it was just there that I was able to identify my friend as to where he was in his spiritual journey.

It was not that my new friend was an actual atheist. I do believe he is a Christian. But I have also to come to understand that, while he had been a Christian for many years, he was trapped in the “child” phase of discipleship. While by this time he ought to have been a parent, he was a perpetual spiritual adolescent. The author of Hebrews said it like this: “For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil,” (Hebrews 5:12-14).

Putman describes the “child” or spiritual adolescent as the self-centered Christian. He writes that they can be identified by their words: “A spiritual child says such things as ‘I love my small group--don’t add anyone to it’ and ‘I am not being fed at my church, so I am going to go to one that meets my needs better.’” Putman goes on to say: “Notice what word is used in each of these phrases: I. Believers at this stage often talk in terms of I because they are focused on their own perceived needs and opinions. They have not progressed to the point that they have become servants of others; they still believe that the world revolves around them. . . . Some spiritual children have been Christians for years and have a lot of Bible knowledge and years of church involvement but inside remain immature.”

That is where my new friend was. He wasn’t an atheist--even if he was living, making decisions (even spiritual decisions) like one. He was simply immature--even if he had been a Christian for many years. Still, to the outside world, he would be perceived as no different than any atheist. His actions spoke louder than his words. He was more into self-worship than Christ-worship. He could not be bothered with the Lordship of Christ, or the Words of Christ. I only hope he finds within himself the true love of Christ and comes under His lordship, and thereby outgrows his adolescent faith. After all, the world is watching. And when Christians behave like atheists--even spiritual atheists--the world mocks the living, loving Christ Who seeks to save them. For the world’s sake, may we give up functional unbelief and live what we say we believe.

Wes

A Portrait of Paul - 4

2010-10-28T14:39:00.000-07:00

The Origin of Paul’s Ministry

“Of this church I was made a minister according to the stewardship from God bestowed on me for you benefit that I might fully carry out the preaching of the word of God,” so Paul writes in Colossians 1:25, the key text for Ventura and Walker’s fourth chapter.

Paul, they point out, was that reluctant convert, and more. He was a serious antagonist to the church of Jesus Christ, who had to be radically confronted on his way to Damascus and converted in the city itself. “Paul was not a volunteer for this task,” (p. 53). Indeed, he was not! After his calling his life was no longer marked by the authoritarian, power-hungry man that he once was. Now he identified himself as a minister, a servant of the Christ and of the church.

“Christ reverses the expectations of the world, and this is a lesson that Paul . . . learned well. His greatness lies in serving as Christ’s did. The true man of God leads by serving,” (p. 54).

Paul views ministry as a divine stewardship—a covenant responsibility that he took seriously before God and exercised earnestly before the church, as one who would give an account. In the words of the authors:

“The minister is not a free agent or a loose cannon. It is not his own will or whim that governs him. It is not even the will of whim of a particular church that directs him. It is God’s gospel that he preaches, and he is free to preach no other. . . . His ministry, message, and methods are all subject to God,” ( 57).

After quoting Christmas Evans’ description of what he imagined Satan would look like if he came to church, which is really worth the read, the authors remind us that many times it is the faithful who seem to reflect that description:

“How many pastors have preached with such glaring, glowering, growling faces before them? How does a faithful man hold to his course under such circumstances and preach the gospel simply and earnestly? Only through a binding sense of his stewardship before God.

“There are also true sheep who are still learning, saved sinners who are sinners still. They may embrace the idea of a faithful ministry in principle, but they do not always enjoy it in practice, especially when it comes close to home. Their ignorance and arrogance can lead—even unwittingly—to their working at cross-purposes to the Scriptures, and sometimes a violent eruption follows. It is the pastors who often bear the brunt of such eruptions. . . . It is not unknown for even true believers to resemble that Satan figure described by Evans, seated front and center, huffing and puffing and slamming down their Bibles in exasperation as the minister—though a sinner himself and with many flaws of his own—sets out to press home needful but unwanted truth to their souls, seeking by the application of the gospel ruler to make straight some warped part of their life,” (p. 59).

And then, to the “Fellow Christian”:

“How do you think of your pastor?” (p. 60). He has been providentially put in your life. “Have you considered, then, that the Lord has given that particular man ‘for you’? . . . How do you think of him and pray for him? Do you give thanks for him? Do you pray for his sanctification? Do you ask the Lord that he might see from Scripture more of what it means to shepherd the flock of which God has made him an overseer? If you do not, will you from this moment on?” (p. 60).

Reminding the Christian that God will deal with faithless shepherds, this does not mean that each individual Christian can live independently of the church or the minister God has put in that position. Each and every Christian has a servant’s role to play in the body of Christ.

To the “Fellow Pastor” the authors remind us of who we were before we became Christians and indeed before we were called to ministry. The mystery of God’s grace on our lives is indeed profound and humbling. This makes our calling all the more important, and the calling to our faithfulness to the stewardship God has given us so compelling. Then they quote what John Brown of Haddington wrote to a newly ordained student:

“I know the vanity of your heart, and that you will feel mortified that your congregation is very small, in comparison with those of your brethren around you; but assure yourself on the word of an old man, that when you come to give an account of them to the Lord Christ, at his judgment-seat, you will think you have had enough,” (p. 64).

Then in a parting salvo that all ministers of the gospel must come to terms with, they add:

“God willing, you serve in a faithful church of sheep hungry to know and do the will of God. But even then, you will find many who—for various reasons—are governed too often by their own wills and interested more often in their own ways than in the will and way of the Lord. There will be many who, in some area or other of life are—ignorantly or otherwise—swayed more or less by rationalism, traditionalism, pragmatism, or fatalism than by the Word of God, constructing and working out their own flawed agenda in the life of the church. They will have varying degrees of influence, authority, and power, . . . Sometimes there will be battles to fight, tensions to resolve, pushy people to face down, rocky business meetings to negotiate, angry reactions to sermons to handle, explosions in or after pastoral visits to manage. In all this, a sense that you are a steward of the house of God, commissioned by the Head of the household for the discharge of His good and perfect will, will make you circumspect yet bold, wise yet faithful, gentle yet determined, humble yet definite, in pursing the ends for which Christ has given you to His church,” (pp. 64-65).

Indeed, if we are stewards of the grace of God, if we answer ultimately to Him and Him alone, if He is the origin of our service, we stand or fall before Him. May we take that to heart as we lift Him up and lead His people.

Wes

A Portrait of Paul - 3

2010-10-28T11:13:00.000-07:00

The Hardships of Paul’s Ministry

“Have you known any martyrs? . . . In some parts of the world, death at the hands of the enemies of Christ’s kingdom is all too common.” (p. 37).

This, the shortest chapter of Ventura and Walker’s book, is (at least so far) the most powerful—especially if you are a minister of the gospel. It is an exposition of Colossians 1:24, specifically the phrase: “I do my share . . . in filling up that which is lacking in Christ’s afflictions,” a difficult passage, to be sure. After listing the various “understandings” of this phrase, the authors get right down to its pastoral nature. And, indeed, I think this is the only way the phrase can be properly understood.

Of course, Paul is NOT saying that he somehow adds to or fulfills what is lacking in Christ’s grace upon our lives. Of course, we are save by grace and grace alone. However, in a very real sense, if not in a salvific sense, he does, ministers do, and all Christians as well, “fill up that which is lacking in Christ’s afflictions.” “. . . the sufferings of the body of Christ—the church—are the sufferings of Christ Himself (1 Cor 1:5; 1 Pet 4:13), not in a redemptive, but nevertheless in a real sense.” (p. 42).

Consider Revelation 12, in which the dragon, being unable to kill Christ, turns his attention “to make war with the rest of her offspring, who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus” (Revelation 12:17). Clearly this is a reference to the church. And so I agree with the authors that Paul is referencing:

“. . . the mystical union that exists between Christ and His people. The apostle’s sufferings are ministerial sufferings as a man of God, not mediatorial sufferings rivaling or contributing to those of the sinless Son of God. The only thing that can be considered in any way lacking in the sufferings of Christ is the ongoing afflictions that God’s people experience on Christ’s behalf in our flesh (Col 1:24) at the hands of evil men. Such men have to settle for persecuting the Lord’s people, because the physical person of Christ is out of their reach.” (p. 43).

Consider Christ’s confrontation with Paul himself on the road to Damascus. As Paul (then Saul) opens a new front on his war on Christians in Damascus, on the way he is confronted with the living Lord, and these words: “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?” (Acts 9:5).

As we consider the hardships of Paul’s ministry, put them in the context of Acts 9 and Colossians 1:24, but do not neglect to read 2 Corinthians 4:7-12. “Paul knew why he did what he did, why he lived as he lived, and why he was ready to die as he died.” (p. 46).

All of this sets up the most powerful part of this chapter which is first, the authors’ challenge to the “Fellow Christian” and then even more powerfully, in their encouragement of the “Fellow Pastor.” I take each in turn.

To the “Fellow Christian”:

“How do you feel about the church of Jesus Christ? What do you think of her? What is your commitment to her? . . . The call to suffer for the sake of other saints may have particular resonance for a gospel minister, but it has broad application to every member of the body (see 1 Corinthians 12).” (p. 47).

And I would add: Notice the “we” in Acts 14:22.

And knowing that the minister bears the brunt of the abuse of the world, the authors call the fellow Christian to “Therefore, stand with and pray for your pastors. Recognize their calling and support and encourage them in it.” (p. 47).

To the “Fellow Pastor” these words:

“If you serve Christ faithfully, you will suffer.” (p. 48).

And then, I cannot help but to quote them at length as I found these words to be both powerful and profound, as well as humbling and encouraging (indeed, they brought me to tears):

“You may labor week in, week out, and feel that you inch forward and slide back. You may live longing for an outpouring of God’s Spirit on you and your ministry and the people whom you serve that you will never see. You may be in a country where your Savior is virulently hated, and people attack you with swords; you may be in a country where your Redeemer is arrogantly despised, and people attack you with words. You may live under threat of your life, or no one may care whether you live or die. You may be ignored; you may be rejected; you may be loathed. You will scratch and struggle and strive. There will be mountains you wish to conquer and hills you can barely climb. You will long to see feeble saints assured, and you will watch them struggle to their graves with the light of the gospel seeming barely to reach them. You will long to see the arrogant Christian humbled, the lazy made diligent, the lonely drawn in, the old fruitful, the young vigorous, the careless engaged, the fearful bold, the miserable joyful, the downcast lifted up. You will rejoice over your every small gain and be disappointed at your little progress. And you will keep going.

“You will often be unappreciated by the people you serve; they will wonder what you do with your time to such little effect. You will ask the same question of yourself. . . . You may be ready to resign on many Mondays, and you will stand to preach again every Lord’s Day. . . . You will feel isolated, and you will nevertheless stand in the gap. . . . You will see men and women whom you love bruised and broken and battered by the assaults of the world, the flesh, and the devil. . . . You will see the hosts of hell and all the expressions of satanic malice the world can conjure flung against the church of Jesus Christ. And you will put your soul, your strength, your mind, your heart, your very body, between them and the church. And one day it will kill you, whether swiftly or slowly, and you will lie with your strength spent in the battle, and you will cross the river to your reward.

“Why will you do it? Why do you do it? Because the church is the body of Christ, and every member is precious to Him.” (pp. 48-49, emphasis mine).

The call of the minister is to fulfill the challenge of 1 Corinthians 16:13, “Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong.” Again, “Why will you do it? Why do you do it? Because the church is the body of Christ, and every member is precious to Him.” Paul answers for every faithful minister to every church, large or small, good or bad, faithful or failing: “For who is our hope or joy or crown of exultation? Is it not you [the church], in the presence of our Lord Jesus at His coming? For you are our glory and joy,” (1 Thessalonians 2:19-20).

Wes

A Portrait of Paul - 2

2010-10-28T10:07:00.000-07:00

The Focus of Paul’s Ministry

“Our world is full of selfishness. Wherever we turn, people boldly assert themselves in pursuit of their own wants, preferences, and rights,” (p. 21).

No doubt, we do live in one of most selfish eras of all time. But ministers of the gospel are called to forego selfishness for service. See Matthew 20:25-28; Mark 10:45; John 13:12-17). What does that service mean? It means being faithful to the call of Christ by focusing on the church of Christ for the glory of Christ and the good of the church.

“True disciples of Christ are to be characterized by self-denial rather than self-assertion, by sacrificial obedience rather than self-centeredness. Self-assertion, self-determination, and self-actualization are the world’s obsession.” (p. 23).

What follows is the authors’ analysis of Colossians 1:24, which reads: “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I do my share on behalf of His body (which is the church) in filling up that which is lacking in Christ’s afflictions.”

Following this the authors list passage after passage of Scripture reflecting Paul’s pursuit of service on behalf of the churches of Christ. Romans 1:8-10; Colossians 1:3; 2 Corinthians 2:4; Colossians 2:1; 2 Corinthians 1:6; Ephesians 3:1-2, 13; 1 Corinthians 9:19-23; 10:33; etc., etc.

In summary: “Here is a man sacrificial in love, selfless in service, earnest in labor, honest in dealing, conscientious in duty, sober in warning, fierce in defense, faithful in prayer, fixed upon Jesus, pouring himself out as a drink offering on the sacrifice and service of the faith of the church (Phil 2:17), (p. 29).

Again, returning to 2 Corinthians 12:15, they write: “The faithful gospel minister is so determined to do good to the church of Christ that he is willing to be despised by the people he serves in order to do them that good.” (pp. 30-31).

To the “Fellow Christian”: “A true pastor is a man committed to the well-being of Christ’s church, even if the well-being of the church must come as his own expense.” (p. 32). When searching for such a minister, consider his selflessness—in the way he treats his wife and family, his friends and neighbors. And consider that in terms of his service to you. “Are you willing to be pastured by a man who loves you enough to tell you things that may not always be pleasant to hear?” (p. 32).

To the “Fellow Pastor”: “We must ask ourselves hard and pointed questions: Why do I do what I do?” (p. 33). Are our efforts a means to our own ends, or are our efforts truly for the cause of Christ and the betterment of His church? “We cannot atone for our people nor are we called to do so, but we re to work out a life of cross-centered service for the sake of their immortal souls. That means preaching a crucified Christ from the pulpit, but it also means following a crucified Christ out of it.” (p. 34).

Selfishness has no place in the service of God.

Wes

A Portrait of Paul - 1

2010-10-28T09:26:00.000-07:00

From my college days on I have used James Stewart’s classic book, Heralds of God, as the standard text for what a Christian minister is and is to do. I used to read it annually as a sort of spiritual tune-up in helping me to stay on track personally and professionally as a minister.

Years later, I added Eugene Peterson’s book, Working the Angles, as an annual read as Peterson gives a definitive “job description” to what a minister is and is to do. The job description is simply this: First, to pray; second, to study; and third to preach/teach. Everything else is subsidiary to these three. If we are not about these three, everything else we do is jeopardized.

Currently, I am reading Rob Ventura and Jeremy Walker’s book, A Portrait of Paul. I became interested after reading a review describing the book as a must read for ministers and for churches seeking a prospective minister. I am only a couple of chapters in, but I must say, this is a terrific book (so far).

From the introduction the authors ask: “How do we recognize true ministers of Christ?” They go on to list the subjective criteria: corporate or even carnal measures of success, converts from previous ministries, how big the previous congregation was, academic credentials, etc. And they suggest that while these may have some bearing on calling a minister, they are the least important issues to examine. Instead, the authors turn to Colossians 1:24-2:5, which constitutes “a distinct unit of thought in which the apostle discloses several distinguishing marks that characterize a biblically faithful minister and ministry.” The rest of the book, as I understand it, is a careful exposition of this text.

Chapter 1 deals with “The Joy of Paul’s Ministry.” This chapter tackles first and foremost the suffering of Paul. I quote: “The life of a faithful minister involves suffering. False prophets often win the affection of men; truth speakers will incite evil speech from many.” (See Luke 6:26). Shortly into this section the authors get to 2 Corinthians 12:15, which has always been a text that has haunted me. They write that Paul:

. . . declared himself ready “very gladly [to] spend and be spent for you” and in the same breath delivered this sad testimony: “though the more abundantly I love you, the less I be loved” (2 Cor 12:15). The Corinthians flung Paul’s love and labors back in his face. There are few things that cause more agony for a minister of Christ than to pour out his soul on behalf of Christ’s people, only to have his motives misinterpreted, all kinds of sin imputed to him, and his earnest entreaties and heartfelt efforts ignored, rejected, and even sometimes angrily despised and hurled back against him. (From pp. 8-9).

I have noted in the margin: “But it happens A LOT!” And so it goes. One does not have to be in pastoral ministry long before being exposed to the strange affliction that seems so prevalent in American churches of the “members” who for the slightest of reasons will abandon a congregation to search for another. Ministers can pour their lives into a family for years only to watch them leave for the slightest of reasons. It is truly painful.

But there is the other side of ministry.

Whether internal or external, whether on his own behalf or on behalf of others, the suffering of a servant of Christ is real and often brutal. However, the joy associated with such suffering is just as real and unusually sweet. (p. 11)

And that is just as true. There is nothing like the ministry when it comes to the joys of seeing a person’s life truly transformed by the gospel of Jesus Christ. Paul would suffer his own death to be witness to such transformations. Such things make all “real” and often “brutal” sufferings of the minister worth it.

At the end of each chapter the authors address the “Fellow Christian” and the “Fellow Pastor.” And so as the first chapter ends, the authors ask:

What kind of man do you want as an undershepherd? . . . Let him be a man filled with stable joy rooted in the person and work of his Savior. . . . This is not about the constitution of a man, but the conviction of a man. (p. 15)

To the “Fellow Pastor” the authors ask:

Are you ready to suffer? . . . You will, if you love Christ and His people, feel and pray and respond and act for the glory of the Savior’s name and the health of His body, the church. And you may well have it all flung back in your face. (p. 16)

Indeed there is much more within this chapter that made it both a blessing and a challenge to read. I was once again reminded of the very real pain involved in ministering the gospel, as well as the certain joys that bless the life of being a faithful minister of the gospel.

Wes

I will be posting chapter by chapter responses this book over my next several blog posts, although I reserve the right to go “off topic” when the mood strikes me.

Respect

2010-10-21T11:34:00.001-07:00

I have been a regular follower/subscriber to Rebecca Hagelin's weekly e-letter which can be subscribed to for free at www.howtosaveyourfamily.com. I thought her most recent letter was particularly instructive. And, with permission, I have posted it below.

Dear Wes,

We're losing control of our public schools.

Gangs and drugs are on a steady rise from elementary school to high school. Good students are tossed in with the "bad apples" and expected to feel safe and learn.

And, despite billions and billions of dollars pumped into the public school system, government seems unable get a grip on the deteriorating conditions.

I write about this tragic trend in this edition of the Culture Challenge of the Week:

Culture Challenge of the Week: Classroom Chaos

Two veteran public school teachers "lost it" last week over student misbehavior.

A Tennessee algebra teacher tried vainly to quiet his class as students talked, laughed, walked around and mocked him. Finally, he said, "You want entertainment?" and then promptly smashed a desk and hurled chairs.

He was placed on administrative leave. In New York, a music teacher "snapped," pushing a misbehaving student against a locker and throwing a backpack at him. He too is on administrative leave.

And it's only October.

While the teachers' loss of control is unacceptable, so too is a classroom environment that makes learning impossible.

Certainly, the litigious atmosphere in schools is partly to blame--teachers have few options for dealing with unruly students. (Typical classroom "behavior contracts " offer rewards for good behavior, but no consequences for bad behavior.)

But, a large measure of responsibility falls on our shoulders as parents. When even good students text during class, talk out loud, or speak disrespectfully to teachers, it's a failure of parenting more than a failure of the schools. It's up to us to hold our children to a higher standard; one that shows respect in dress, tone of voice, words and actions.

And, it all starts at home.

How to Save Your Family By Teaching Respect

Walk through the halls of nearly any school and you are likely to see motivational posters declaring the need for "respect" in the school community. But, posters do little good when students don't have a clue what "respect" looks like.

That's our job.

Label respectful and disrespectful behavior for your child. Eye-rolling, heavy sighs, and body language should not be tolerated at home. Insist that your child listen to others' viewpoints, and express his or her own views, with a thoughtful demeanor. Because the pop culture models sneering sarcasm and disrespect as the norm, it's easy for our children to assume that the norm is acceptable.

The earlier you teach a child the right way to behave, the more likely they are to live that way throughout their lives.

Children's TV shows and videos feature wisecracking adolescents whose one-liners and sarcastic comebacks dominate any conversation with adults. It seems the child always gets the last word.

That was called "backtalk" when I grew up.

Point out that sometimes respect is best conveyed by silence--not saying the very thing that comes to mind. It takes maturity to restrain the impulse to toss off a funny comment, just to get a few laughs from their peers, when that comment undermines the teacher's authority.

A teacher friend of mine reminded me that parents should guide their "good kids" to make a difference in creating a classroom culture of respect. Some of our children are gifted leaders. Their leadership is meant not only for the sports field, student government, or clubs but also for the classroom, supporting a culture that takes learning seriously.

If the smartest student in the class openly brags how little time she spends on homework, it suggests disrespect for the teacher and the value of education as well. While the bright student may skate by on natural brains, the less gifted child who displays the same attitude is likely to fail.

Similarly, a classroom leader who chooses to text in class or check sports scores on their cell phone erodes the climate of respect within the classroom. Alternatively, a well-timed encouragement for others to "Listen!" can make a difference. Remind your children that when they step up to the plate and demonstrate respect for authority, it sets the tone for others to follow.

Lastly, if your child is in a school where the principal and teachers have lost all control and refuse to foster a civil environment, then your best bet may be to home school, or find alternative means of education.

After all, if a school does not teach that Golden Rule, then they have little hope of teaching anything else.

Our society has turned government into the "Nanny State." No where is this more true than inside public schools.

People use schools as a surrogate for all the functions a traditional family is supposed to provide.

Society is increasingly reliant on schools for children's sexual education, meals and even as a substitute for day care.

All of this puts pressure on teachers who are already at their breaking point with standardized tests, wasteful meetings and the constant fear of being sued.

But, it is not the responsibility of government to raise our children.

It is our responsibility.

If our children hope to have any hope inside a government-run school system, it is going to be through getting parents actively involved in the education of their children.

I'm assuming that if you're reading my newsletter, you've made a commitment to your children to be there for them. But, there is more that we can do. Try to convince other parents to get involved.

Our schools are in trouble, and government won't be able to save them.

It is up to us.

In my book, Home Invasion: Protecting Your Family in A Culture that's Gone Stark Raving Mad, I have chapters on Parent Directed Education and Civility in an Uncivil Society - both of which contain tips and encouragement on how to equip your children in any classroom setting. In my most recent book, 30 Ways in 30 Days to Save Your Family, I further address the way to build respectful hearts and attitudes in the hearts of our children. Both books are available at a discount price through www.HowToSaveYourFamily.com--and I'll even autograph them too.

Warmly,

Rebecca

Thanking God for His Provision

2010-09-30T10:12:00.000-07:00

Providence is an old word. We need to bring it back into regular use. G.W. Bromiley defines providence as "the divine governance whereby all possible events are woven into a coherent pattern and all possible developments are shaped to accomplish the divinely instituted goal," (International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. 3, 1020).

Think for a moment at "all possible events." Then again, is it possible to think about "all possible events"? . . . I rather doubt it. Consider the one tragedy that occurs--a car wreck, a cancerous diagnosis, something on that order. Is it not also possible and indeed probable that for every tragedy, there are countless others that are averted by God's providence? . . . I am not making light of the tragedy, neither am I suggesting that God could prevent all but this one. I am only suggesting that we have no way of knowing all possible contingencies, and all possible events that have been prevented by the providential care of God. While those He allows by His sovereign hand may still be awful, they pale in consideration to what might have been had God simply let go of His constant, watchful, and wise provision over our lives. The truth is, we fail to be thankful for God's providence partly because we are ignorant of the myriad of ways He is providentially caring for each and every one of us.

Randy Alcorn has a good take on this. Consider his words:

"Focusing on God's 'big miracles'--like curing cancer and making brain tumors disappear--causes us to overlook his small, daily miracles of providence in which he holds the universe together, provides us with air to breathe and lungs to breathe it, and food to eat and stomachs to digest it. Years ago when I became an insulin-dependent diabetic, it dawned on me that I had never once, in the fifteen years I'd know him, thanked God for a pancreas that had worked perfectly until then." (Randy Alcorn, If God is Good . . ., 329.)

Thank God for His providence--His daily provision of all we need and His constant protection from those "possible events" that might have tragically affected our lives.

Here is an experiment: Take a breath, . . . exhale, . . . and remember that that breath is the providential gift of God. Take your pulse, . . . feel the movement of each pulse of blood carrying life-giving fuel to every cell in your body. Each pulse is a providential gift of God. His "little providences" surround us in ways unimaginable. Thank God for His provision.

Wes

Tyranny

2010-09-29T09:11:00.001-07:00

"There is no worse tyranny than to force a man to pay for what he does not want merely because you think it would be good for him." --American writer Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988)

moral leadership

2010-09-27T07:46:00.000-07:00

"If gold ruste, what shal iren do?
For if a preest be foul, on whom we truste,
No wonder is a lewed man to ruste;
And shame it is, if a prest take keep,
A shiten shepherde and a clene sheep."
(Chaucer, Canterbury Tales, ll. 500-504)

Battling Leprechauns

2010-09-01T15:27:00.001-07:00

Randy Alcorn says in his book If God Is Good something I've been saying for years. Only, he says it far better than me, to wit:

"In arguing against God's existence, atheists often display anger at God, but why be angry with Someone who doesn't exist? Many atheistic books and blogs seethe with anger, Remarkably, the authors do not limit their anger to Christians. They seem most livid with God.

"I don't believe in leprechauns, but I haven't dedicated my life to battling them. I suppose if I believed that people's faith in leprechauns poisoned civilization, I might get angry with members of leprechaun churches. But there's one thing I'm quite sure I wouldn't do: I would not get angry with leprechauns. Why not? Because I can't get angry with someone I know doesn't exist.

"Though I see why atheists get irate at Christians, I don't understand why they seem so furious with God--unless, deep inside, their atheism isn't a rational denial of God as much as an attempt to retaliate against him.

"Andrea Weisberger, an atheist philosopher, argues that the problem of evil makes it irrational to believe God exists. She wrote an article evaluating an online debate, explaining she refused to call God 'he,' and would only say 'it.' Then she says she will not even capitalize God, but render him (it) as 'god.' [quoted from David Wood, "A Reply to Andrea Weisberger, Part 5," The Problem of Evil, March 24, 2007, www.problemofevil.org/2007_03_01_archive.html.).

"I find this extraordinary. Dr. Weisberger believes that God does not exist. He (it) is a mere fiction. But surely she doesn't refuse to capitalize Ebenezer Scrooge or Sherlock Holmes, both fictional characters. Or Zeus, Poseidon, or Hera, all fictional gods. I am left with the eerie feeling that demoting God to the lower case might be her way of taking grammatical revenge against a deity who has profoundly disappointed her. The fact that she doesn't bother exacting such revenge against Thor or Odin suggests that she believes he's different from those fictional gods.

"How might he be different? Well, perhaps he actually exists."

[From Randy Alcorn, If God is Good . . . : Faith in the Midst of Suffering and Evil, (Colorado Springs, Multnomah: 2009), 136-37.]

Indeed, all such atheists bely their wills, not their intellects. To paraphrase Pascal, the head and the heart always follow the will.

Wes

Why the Christian Worldview Matters

2010-08-19T11:52:00.000-07:00

I am constantly and as consistently as possible pushing those who name the name of Christ to understand and live out of a Christian worldview. These things matter, they really do. Case in point is a recent article posted by Timothy Keller on www.leadershipjournal.net, entitled “Preaching Morality in an Amoral Age.” Keller writes with great pathos and terrific insight into one of the particular challenges of living (and preaching) the Christian worldview in a church context that is ripe with lots of Christians living what I would describe as the basic plot-line of the book of Judges, namely: “. . . everyone did what was right in his own eyes,” (Judges 17:6).

He begins with a series of brief anecdotal illustrations of real life people in his church: one is participating in a ménage a trios relationship (without her boyfriend’s knowledge), living with the excuse, “But what we have is so beautiful. How can it be wrong?” another is bringing her formerly lesbian lover to worship for the first time. How do you speak the gospel in integrity and with grace with such an audience? And, while these might see to be “extreme” cases, they really are not.

I have written before that I do not believe there are any non-moral areas in the Christian’s life. I would add that it is also true that there are no a-moral areas in the Christian’s life. Many (and one is too many) Christians are living a lie, believing they are somehow exempt from the lordship of Christ. I suggest that this is a dangerous way to live. Attempting to live in a world without absolutes is rather like attempting to defy the law of gravity by trying to fly a car over the Grand Canyon. The end result is sudden and undesirable.

“In such a new and confusing situation, what is a Christian preacher to say?” asks Keller. He suggests, and I think rightfully so, that we must avoid the two dangers of pragmatism and moralism.

In speaking of pragmatism, allow me to set forth one of Keller’s real life congregants and his “dilemma.” Keller writes:

“I think of Joseph, one of our first and most enthusiastic new converts. Joe announced his new allegiance to Christ to his employees and decreed that henceforth the company's business practices would conform to Christian morality. At a Madison Avenue advertising agency, this was a courageous and potentially suicidal choice. No more lying to clients or the public, no billing of hours not actually worked, no shirking responsibility or blameshifting for failure—it was a recipe for disaster.

“To Joe's delight (and the surprise of us watching this experiment in obedience), his business prospered. Clients who were ready to drop the firm for bigger agencies were delighted with the straight talk they got. One angry client, who had been ready to sue, was so flabbergasted by Joe's honest confession of failure that he reversed his decision and gave him two new accounts. Revenues hit and then passed the $1 million mark. Joe began bringing employees to church, telling them, ‘You know it's true, because it works.’

“But when romance with a married woman became a possibility, Joe abandoned his profession of faith. ‘I know I'm doing something you think is wrong,’ he said, ‘but I want to be happy, and that's that. Love is more important than your version of morality.’"

If I can paraphrase what Keller says next, the preaching of pragmatism, “Try Christianity because it works,” creates a false “product” of the Christian faith. It’s true the Christian faith “works” and is the most practical, humane, loving, and wholesome way to live. But, that is not what we are after. We are preaching a radical new worldview, one that demands the absolute allegiance of its followers. We name Jesus as Lord of all of our lives, not the genie who lives to serve our personal wants and needs. Jesus as our personal genie is idolatry at its worst. It is self-worship and it is deadly.

Keller puts it right: "Christ will 'work' for you only if you are true to him whether he works for you or not. You must not come to him because he is fulfilling (though he is) but because he is true. If you seek to meet him in order to get your needs met, you will not meet him or get your needs met. To become a Christian is not to get help for your agenda, but to take on a whole new agenda—the will of God. You must obey him because you owe him your life, because he is your Creator and Redeemer."

That is the gospel. When folks come to me with questions like, “Can I ____ and still be a Christian?” The answer is always, “No!” . . . The whatever is in the blank is irrelevant at that point. By merely posing the question the person is saying, “Can I exercise my own lordship of this particular area of my life, without reference to Christ?” And that is where the idolatry of self-worship enters. So a question like “Can I get a tattoo and still be a Christian?” is no different than the person asking “Can I wear orange shoelaces and still be a Christian?” I know one sounds utterly ridiculous but, after all, some people are inclined to get tattoos. . . . (That’s a joke, sorry, they don’t get any better). The answer to both questions as asked is, “No, unless . . .” And the “unless” is important. It is “unless you are first going to do the serious study of determining the will of God on this matter.” Sadly, most Christians are not interested in what their lord might require of them. They are only interested in what they want to do for themselves (note: “for themselves”). God never seriously enters into the decision.

Kellers advice to those of us who pastor is critical here: “. . . once you have drawn in people with the amazing relevance and practical wisdom of the gospel, you must confront them with the most pragmatic issue of all—the claim of Christ to be absolute Lord of life.” And I find myself hoping and praying that I am faithful in doing just that.

I have to quote Keller again at length here.

Earlier in my ministry, I often preached about sexual issues with baptized pragmatism. In a sermon fifteen or twenty years ago, I declared, "Emotionally, pre-marital and extra-marital sex destroy your ability to trust and commit to others. Socially, sex outside of marriage leads to family and social breakdown. 'Do not be deceived; God is not mocked. A man reaps what he sows.'"

Nothing about this paragraph is untrue. But it overemphasizes the practical benefits of Christian morality. (It also assumes a respect for Scripture not present in our culture now.) Today, I approach the same theme differently:

"Some people say, 'I reject Christianity because its views on sex don't fit me—they are too narrow for me.' But if a doctor prescribes an unpleasant medicine, what do you do? If you are truly sick, then you take it. It is just as wrong-headed to taste-test Christianity as to taste-test medicines. How silly to evaluate Christianity on its sex ethic!

"The real question is, 'Is Jesus really the Son of God?' Is he really who he said he is—your Way, Truth, and Life? Has he really died for you because you are a sinner? If he is and has, who cares what he asks you to do or not to do? You should do it! In a sense, the gospel does not let you talk about anything else first. It says, 'I won't talk to you about sexuality or gender roles or suffering or anything else until you determine what you will do with him. Who he is determines everything else.'

"You see, until you decide if there is a God, if Jesus is the Son, and other matters, how can you make an intelligent decision about what is right and wrong about sex? Christians believe what they do about sex not because they are old-fashioned, or because they are prudish, but because Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life."

“This newer approach takes longer. But it comes closer to my goal to preach truth instead of pragmatism. Christian morality is not true because it works; it works because it's true.”

You see, your worldview—how you understand the world to work—matters. And if we are Christians we know the world works best if we live under the lordship of Christ.

Morality works the same way. There is so much moralistic preaching in the church today that one finds it hard to distinguish between Christian morality and that of any other religion. But the difference is profound.

Again Keller writes with great simplicity:

“Deep weariness etched every line of Joan's face and body. ‘I just can't do it any more,’ she said. ‘I can't live up to what a Christian is supposed to be. All my life I've had people telling me I had to be this or do that in order to be accepted. I thought Christ was supposed to bring me freedom from that, but instead God turns out to be just one more demanding taskmaster—in fact, he's the worst of them all!’

“That conversation underscored for me that Christian moral teaching is both similar to, and very different from, that of other moral and ethical systems.

“At the end of The Abolition of Man, C. S. Lewis demonstrates how the major religions agree on certain moral absolutes. Christians find that in today's culture wars, they often are on the same side with believing Jews, Muslims, and Hindus. The Christian preacher seems to be saying, ‘Be moral,’ along with exponents of other philosophies.

“But when we ask, ‘Why be moral?’ the other systems say, ‘In order to find God,’ while Christianity says, ‘Because God has found you.’ The Christian gospel is that we are not saved by moral living, we are saved for it. We are saved by grace alone, but that grace will inevitably issue in a moral life.

“Many sermons tell people to say no to immorality. Often the reasons are ‘it is against the Bible’ or ‘it will hurt your self-esteem’ or ‘it's against our Christian principles,’ or ‘your sins will find you out.’ Those things are true, but they are inadequate and secondary motives. Only the grace of God, Titus says, ‘teaches’ us to say no. It argues with us: ‘You are not living as though you are loved! As his child! It is not because he will abandon you that you should be holy, but because at inestimable cost he has said he won't ever abandon you! How can you live in the very sin that he was ripped to pieces to deliver you from?’

“See the grace of God argument? It is the only argument that cannot be answered.”

Your worldview matters. And those who name the name of Christ are called by grace and the gospel to live a life that matters, to live an abundant life that bows to the lordship of Christ and rises to live in grace—grace that can be seen, felt, and measured in every detail of life.

At least, that’s what I think.

Wes

The Parable of the Piano

2010-08-02T10:11:00.001-07:00

There once was a family of mice who lived all their lives in a large piano. To them in the piano-world came the music of the instrument, filling all the dark spaces with sound and harmony. At first the mice were impressed by it. They drew comfort and wonder from the thought that there was Someone who made the music—though invisible to them—above, yet close to them. They loved to think of the Great Player whom they could not see.

Then one day a daring mouse climbed up part of the piano and returned very thoughtfully. He had found out how the music was made. Wires were the secret; tightly stretched wires of graduated lengths that trembled and vibrated. They must revise all their old beliefs; none but the most conservative could any longer believe in the Unseen Player.

Later, another explorer carried the explanation further. Hammers were now the secret, many hammers dancing and leaping on the wires. This was a more complicated theory, but it all went to show that they lived in a purely mechanical world. The Unseen Player came to be thought of as a myth. But, . . . the Player continued to play!

The Deniable Darwin

2010-06-22T07:12:00.000-07:00

I just got back home from a quick trip to Missouri where I conducted the wedding ceremony for Steven and April Corley. Congratulations to both! April was a beautiful bride, and while I know I'm prejudiced on that order, I don't think anyone could possibly doubt that. We in the Wright household love her lots and hope the best for this new family. A long history with a family through good and bad times makes me especially blessed to be part of this day of celebration. Bobby and Lu (parents of the bride) are two of the finest people you could ever know and I count it one of my life's greatest blessings to be able to call them friends.

Anytime I go anywhere for whatever reason I always take along three or four books to pass the time, and to continue the discipline of challenging my mind. On this particular trip I took three books. One, a very new book on evangelism, which, frankly was a waste of time (so I won't mention the author or title). A second by S. Michael Craven entitled Umcompromised Faith: Overcoming Our Culturalized Christianity (NavPress, 2009) was a great read. Very readable, concise in thought, and a excellent introduction to the issues facing Christians at large and how and why they are important.

The third book is a collection of essays by David Berlinski entitled The Deniable Darwin (Discovery Institute, 2009). As already stated, this is a collection of essays by Dr. Berlinski written between 1996 and 2009. Dr. Berlinski is something of an enigma--a reformed Jew with no particular interest in theology or metaphysics in general and therefore an atheist or most probably a mild agnostic (I'm not quite sure which), he offers some of the most well-thought-out, absolutely devastating arguments against Darwinism in all its forms. A brief review on the "About the Author" page details his intellectual pedigree which is quite impressive.

My first introduction to Dr. Berlinski were the few video snippets from the recent Expelled documentary. I also recently read his book, The Devil's Delusion: Atheism and Its Scientific Pretensions (2008), and have since found his writing style and polemics fascinating, challenging, and absolutely hilarious. I am only half way through the book (which makes this a sort-of "half" review), and have found it one of the best books I have read in recent memory.

His 1996 essay of the same title is worth the price of the book, especially when coupled with the following essay "Denying Darwin: David Berlinski & Critics." His postscript to the essay is brilliantly written and a hoot to read.

A few quotes just for fun:

"[T]he process of peer review by which grants are funded and papers assigned to scientific journals, is, by its very nature, an undertaking in which a court reviews its own decisions and generally finds them good." (p. 14).
"Molecular biology should be comprehensible to someone who knows nothing of modern science, continuity, or the calculus, and who can reckon only to the powers of ten--a Harvard graduate, say." (p. 31).
"In remarks that have by now become well known, Jacques Monod observed with some sorrow that under Darwin's theory, it is chance that plays the crucial role in the emergence and evolution of life. Mr. Dawkins proposes to deny this. His views and those of Monod are in conflict, a point clear to anyone able to read the English language. Mr. Dawkins's continuing insistence that two contradictory propositions are mutually consistent is evidence of an alarming logical deficiency." (p. 109).
On discussing the Second Law of Thermodynamics, the idea that "Things fall apart," and how is it possible for life to exist given such, Dr. Berlinski comments: But if things fall apart, they also come together. Life appears to offer at least a temporary rebuke to the second law of thermodynamics. Although biologists are unanimous in arguing that evolution has no goal, fixed from the first, it remains true nonetheless that living creatures have organized themselves into ever more elaborate and flexible structures. . . . How so? The question has historically been the pivot on which the assumption of religious belief has turned. How so? "God said: 'Let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let fowl fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.'" That is how so. And who on the basis of experience would be inclined to disagree? . . . An act of intelligence is required to bring even a thimble into being; why should the artifacts of life be different? (p. 48).
"When I asked who on the basis of experience would be inclined to disagree with the account of creation given in the Book of Genesis, my aim was rhetorical; but I stand by the question. Our experience is overwhelmingly in favor of the thesis that complex objects arise as the result of a deliberate act of design. It may well be that the thesis is false; but it is what experience suggests. Mr. Gottlieb has come to the conclusion that in science it is rarely pertinent to ask why? Why are the equations of physics expressed as quadratic forms? Why is the orbital spectrum of the hydrogen atom discrete? Why does darkness fall so quickly in the tropics? Why does the earth not spiral into the sun? Why do women outlive men by seven years? Why do cat's eyes contain a nictitating membrane? And why did Sheldon Gottlieb not think more carefully before conveying himself into print?" (p. 127).

Well, much, much more awaits the interested reader, myself included.

Wes

The Deeper the Intimacy the Greater the Understanding

2010-06-15T13:51:00.000-07:00

I recently posted a couple of articles on my Facebook site concerning "Body Modification" (BM), and had good responses from the back and forth as I "stirred the pot" on the issue of tattoos, piercings, etc. You can find the links to the original articles here:

http://americanvision.org/2745/body-modification-the-return-to-paganism

http://americanvision.org/2752/body-modification-and-a-christ-rejecting-culture

As a result I've been trying to think about this in terms of our relationship with God and how that affects our everyday decisions, as well as decisions concerning BM.

A friend of mine was speaking of his marriage of 42 years. He said, “I’ve loved and been loved by Ethel for more than 42 years, and I’ve learned, because of the intimacy of the relationship down the years, what it is that pleases or grieves her. Some of that knowledge comes without her having to spell it out. I’m not saying words ever become useless, even less that they are despised; but I’m saying that there is an intimacy that transcends words. Not only do I understand who and what she is through her words, I understand who and what she is through the intimacy of our relationship, and that helps me understand her words at a level strangers can’t.”

It’s no news that the best and most sensitive interpreter of a loved one’s words and movement in life is the one who loves and is loved by that person. And it’s hardly profound to say that the most sensitive and best interpreter of the Spirit is one who loves and is loved by the Spirit. The deeper the intimacy, the greater the understanding.

One of the results of loving intimacy is that a few words yield more truth to the lover than a library of books reveals to the stranger.

Let me give you an example. All the way back in Leviticus 19 the ancient Israelites were told: “When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the very corners of your field, nor shall you gather the gleanings of your harvest. . . . you shall leave them for the needy and for the stranger,” (Leviticus 19:9-10).

No text precisely defines these “corners” or “edges,” or who “the needy” are for that matter. This lack of precision is a regular occurrence in Scripture. The compilers of the Jewish Mishnah even have a booklet called “Corners,” which deals with gleaning and harvesting any area that the Torah left unspecified.

How close to the edge is allowed? . . . The text doesn’t say. So, are we left in the dark? . . . They weren’t. Some farmers might have come out with measuring rods and slide rules, but that wouldn’t have helped since no length was legislated.

Why didn’t God specify? . . . Because He didn’t want to! . . . But, how could He expect people to obey if He didn’t get specific? How were they to follow without details?

At the end of verse 10, and this particular law, He simply said, “I am the Lord your God.” And that was what they were to use as a measuring stick. This “Lord” was the One who, in lavish grace, pitied them, delivered them from captivity, blessed them abundantly, and now lived among them, receiving them as His people. He was saying, “Do what I would do.”

They were to look at the poor, look at their fields at harvest time, and act like God.

For those who come out with slide rules, grammars, lexicons, and various translations of the text—an exhaustive detailed, line-by-line interpretation wasn’t their problem.

Lovers don’t need an exhaustive, codified, defined word from the Spirit! The desire to please God and not oneself makes good interpreters.

There was a time when His peers claimed they weren’t certain if Jesus was speaking the truth. They problem, they said, lay in His teaching. It was all a matter of “truth.” They had to have “the truth.” They could hardly submit to His words if they were not “the truth.” And, since He had not been under the guidance of a recognized rabbi, they couldn’t be sure (John 7:15).

And Jesus said: “My teaching is not Mine, but His who sent Me. If anyone is willing to do His will, he will know of the teaching, whether it is of God or whether I speak from Myself. He who speaks from himself seeks his own glory; but He who is seeking the glory of the One who sent Him, He is true, and there is no unrighteousness in Him.” (John 6:16-18).

They had the law of Moses, which they insisted was truth, and they were ignoring that. Jesus didn’t claim His teaching was His own—the reverse was true. But He did claim to seek the honor of the One who sent Him, and this was the assurance that what He was speaking He had heard from God. They had received the law from Moses but continued to speak on their own. They were not listening to Moses, so why should He expect them to Him? (John 5:41-47).

“His hearer,” said Leon Morris, “had raised the question of His competence as a teacher. He raises the question of their competence as hearers.”

The genuine desire to obey enables us to see things we would have missed and answers most of our theological questions with genuine submission.

There are many things about our Creator that we will never understand this side of eternity. But of one thing I think is clear: I am certain He cares about the decisions we make, but I am also certain that His main concern is the kind of decisions we make rather than what decisions we make.

Think of this in terms of the following dialog.

“Lord, I’m thinking of changing my job, and I was wondering what Your will is in the matter.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Well, it’s an honorable job and would mean more money. I would be able to support my church and missions to a greater degree, and it would give my family some more security down the road.”

“Well, that sounds good.”

“On the other hand, it would mean more time away from my family, and I would have to pull out of some activities that I think are good for the church and the community.”

“Well, you will need to consider it carefully then, won’t you?”

“Yes, that’s why I’ve come to You, Lord. What do you think I should do?”

“Hmmm, what do you think you should do? It’s up to you.”

“You mean you aren’t going to help me decide, Lord? I’m going to have to do it by myself?”

“Of course not. I am helping you. Who do you think enables you to weigh these things? Who do you think has made you sensitive to different needs and commitments, and how you should respond to them? I’ve been helping you make such decisions, even before this specific decision came up.”

“But what if I make the wrong decision? What if I don’t make the choice You want me to make?”

“What makes you think I care which choice you make? You know I care about the kind of choice you make. But we’re having this conversation because you wish to please Me. That’s all that matters.”

“But, Lord, what if the move turns out bad? Will You not keep me from making the wrong decision?”

“Sometimes I keep people from making ‘wrong’ decisions, but that’s only in special cases. In this case, there is no ‘wrong’ decision. If things do work out ‘bad,’ that is, not as pleasant or as advantageous as it looks like they could, you and I will work it out together. In the meantime, your heart and Mine are together in this—you want to please Me, and I’m pleased that you do. So make your decision, and I’ll work with you, whatever the result.”

“Lord, this sounds as if You don’t care what I do.”

“Oh, that isn’t true. Of course I care what you do. If this were a choice between good and evil, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. But it isn’t. You’re someone who wants to please Me, and I’m telling you that it pleases me for you to make the choice that seems most pleasing to Me as well as advantageous for you and others. I care about what makes you and your family happy, so if pleasing Me and adding pleasure to your lives at the same time is an option, get on with it. As by My grace you grow in the image of Christ, your decision making will be purified and enriched, so I am always with you to help you make decisions.”

“But what if the decision I make is not Your will?”

“You’re assuming I have a preference in these matters. What makes you think that? Look, if I choose to hinder your move, or prevent it, I’ll do it. I’m quite capable of doing that, so you don’t need to worry on that score. Where we aren’t dealing with issues of good and evil, you set your heart to please Me, and make whatever decision looks wisest and best to you. I’m content with that. Don’t worry that you might decide something when I have already decided something else. You have no reason to think you might.”

“Yes, but will You let me make a decision that would later bring pain? See, I’m asking You to keep me out of trouble.”

“Oh, I thought we were talking about how to please Me. If you’re asking Me to make sure you won’t get hurt, that’s a different thing altogether. I allow My people to make decisions that end up bringing them pain, so I won’t undertake to keep you from that. I will and do help people make good decisions that very often keep them from heartache. But even good decisions might be costly.”

“So, You have your moral and spiritual will, and You will help us discern it and live within it, but in all these other areas, You have no particular preference? I should just ‘get on with it’?”

“That’s about it. If I have any specific things I want done that require you to be at a given place at a given time to do a given thing, I’ll get it done. No decisions you make to please Me can cause you ultimate loss. Not while I’m looking after you.

“But you will find as you grow in My likeness that you will not only think better, you will think differently. Questions about houses, jobs, moves, investments, recreation, time management, felt needs, personal wishes, and other matters will become more important or less; categories will change places. The only thing that won’t change, except for the better, is that you will be seeking My reign and My righteousness. The rest is ‘up for grabs.’”

“Well, how about if I make up my mind and give You the opportunity to close the door on it, if You wish. If You don’t close the door, I will take it that You will it.”

“If I wish to shut the door, I will. But I don’t want you putting Me on a timetable. Nor do I want you to claim I willed your purpose because it suited Me to allow it. If you choose this action, you take responsibility for it. Don’t say, ‘God willed it,’ because that isn’t true, and truth is a thing I take very seriously.”

I think this is something like how we interact with God in such decisions, except that we usually don’t listen for His counsel. But if we truly desire to please Him, I think we have to know Him intimately. Then, the corners of our fields will become evident.

This is my point in all of this: I don’t think there are any “non-moral” areas in the life of the Christian. The nuts and bolts of our lives are parts of our lives as a whole, and the whole of our lives belong to God. I think all our decisions should be affected by our relationship with God. In fact, I don’t think any decision the Christian makes is made outside of that relationship—whether it be strong or weak. The question is: Are we really serious about what pleases Him? . . . If we answer “Yes!” most of our decisions are rather simple. And as Paul wrote: Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God, (1 Corinthians 10:31).

These principles hold:

1. The deeper the intimacy, the greater the understanding.

2. It’s not what decision we make, but the kind of decision we make.

3. Pleasing Him is our only priority.

At least, that's what I think,

Wes

Searching for a Good Reason to Walk Away from God

2010-06-03T13:48:00.000-07:00

We have all heard or read stories that end "so after that, I couldn't believe in Christianity anymore." Many of them are like the story I heard of a man who stopped attending church when a close friend's two daughters died tragically in a car accident. "For him, God just couldn’t allow such a thing and still be worthy of worship and praise," my friend writes. (This story has a happy ending; not all do, of course.)

To my wholly subjective impression, this seems to be one of three main kinds of "de-conversion stories." Most of these stories are patent fakes, told by someone who clearly had about as much Christian involvement as I have in the government of China. (To wit, I can spell "China." See? C-h-i-n-a.)

Another tries a more rational approach, claiming Science or contradictions or the like.

A third comes from the other direction, telling sad stories that amount to "not feeling it" anymore for one reason or another.

All of the stories have in common that the God of Christianity let the person down. And that was that.

As I said, most of these stories I simply don’t believe. A great many of these stories range from paint-thin rationalizations, unable to withstand thirty seconds of rational analysis, to cut-and-paste alibis. They're concocted or borrowed simply to cover up an overruling love for a particular sin or sin-pattern. And that's just about as deep as it goes.

Now of course, the person in question would invariably deny that analysis, insisting on the nobler-sounding, more solid-sounding cover story. But if there really is no God, why bother with a cover? Just get on with it, no explanation necessary, especially if you really are no more than matter-in-motion in an amoral, careening, meaningless universe. But I digress.

So let's ask: when would it be a good, valid time to leave the God of the Bible? The answer is simple: if He does not keep His promises.

Read that again: if He does not keep His promises.

I realize that is a bold statement. But I think God Himself drives us to it when He voluntarily enters into covenant, as we see in Genesis 15 (read the story). After all, what is the symbolism of only the smoking fire pot and the flaming torch passing between the sacrificed animals? What is God saying when He swears by Himself (cf. Genesis 22:16-18; Isaiah 45:23; Hebrews 6:13-ff.)?

All of the sad stories I've heard, by contrast, amount to this: I left God because He did not meet my expectations. Let's try on a few of the more popular specifics:

Death might be a good reason to leave God if He had promised that men and women would never die. But, He did not.
A tragic death might be a good reason to leave God if He promised to prevent all tragic deaths. But, He did not.
Any death might be a good reason to leave God if He lacked the right to deal out both life and death. But, He does not.
Misfortune might be a good reason to leave God if He promised His children, let alone everyone, exemption from misfortune. But, He does not.
Inexplicable (by us) tragedy might be a good reason to leave God if He promised to prevent all such tragedies from happening. But, He does not.
Hard events befalling believers of which no sense can immediately be made, and in which no good can immediately be seen, might be a good reason to leave God if He promised that such would never happen. But, He does not.
Apparent contradictions in Scripture, even ones for which we have found no solution, might be a good reason to leave God if He promised that all Scripture would be simple, and immediately transparent to every reader. But, He does not.
Evidence that forces the unwilling to convert against their will might be a good reason to leave God (A) if such were even possible by definition, and (B) if God promised to provide such. But, He does not.
Evidence that no one can possibly pervert, ignore, twist nor deny might be a good reason (A) if such were even possible by definition, and (B) if God promised to provide such. But, He does not.
God's failure to meet expectations we put on Him might be a good reason if He promised to be the servant of our expectations. But, He does not.

I know the dogged disbeliever's response to this, because I've heard it: "You're stacking it in such a way that there is no denying the God of the Bible. You're saying we should just believe God because He says we should."

To that, this:

Assuming that God is as the Scripture says He is; what would you expect? And, . . .
Assuming that God is as the Scripture says He is; to what higher authority could any appeal be made?

Since Genesis 3:6, fallen humanity's agenda has been the pursuit of one goal: to make the world safe for sin—a goal that will surely and certainly fail in the end.

The Christian is the person who is led by God's grace to admit and embrace that truth now, thus doing willingly what all will do one day.

That's the difference. Saying it out loud is about the most offensive thing the unbelieving ear can hear, because it rips the cover right off of his dearest, doomed damned aspiration.

But that's our calling, so let’s get on with it.

Wes

(Thanks to Dan Phillips for the original idea for this post)

The Closet(ed) Atheist--Part 1

2010-05-13T11:16:00.000-07:00

At the outset, I would like to thank Joel McDurmon and his Biblical Logic in Theory and Practice for much of this material.

Within every worldview rests a belief about reality—what is “really real.” This is true of Christian theism and secular atheism, and every worldview. Autonomous worldviews—those outside of Judeo/Christian theism—rest upon certain assumptions concerning what is “really real.” This is what I mean by “autonomous”: self-defining, self-unifying, self-directing. And at the outset, I will say that autonomous worldviews are rebellious worldviews—rebellious against the truth and the ultimate grounding of truth—God.

The Apostle Paul teaches us that fallen man has rejected (rebelled against) and continually suppresses the knowledge of God and His revelation (both general and special). He also teaches us that fallen man still must ground his experience in some ultimate principle. As Augustine famously confessed, “O Lord . . . You have formed us for Yourself, and our hearts are restless until they find rest in You.” Paul explains how autonomous man wrestles with this restlessness:

For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures. Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. (Romans 1:21-25).

This gets to the incoherence of naturalism or materialism as a worldview. The most apparent logical incoherence of this worldview is that it is arbitrary and as a result dogmatic.

The naturalist explains away alternative views of the universe as to its origin and organization from within the confines of, and using the limited tools of, his own worldview. Since he has by definition excluded any miraculous event or supernatural intervention by definition, no evidence of miracle could logically change his opinion. Why not? If ever confronted with a miracle—say the resurrection of a dead man—the naturalist will still attempt a naturalistic explanation. It’s either that, or the naturalist will attempt a “naturalism of the gaps” argument, asserting that while naturalistic science has no answer to such a phenomenon, in due time and with more research, one will arrive. The dogmatism of his position stands out at this point: he would essentially argue, in the face of a miracle, that if any explanation is to be given of the event, that explanation can only be a natural explanation.

And so we see that “nature” and “evidence” do not form the basis of the naturalist’s worldview (in spite of his claim that it does); rather, his unproven assumptions form the unchallengeable basis of his worldview.

Jesus speaks of such a problem with unbelievers in His parable of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31). Jesus tells the story of a rich man who ignored God during his life, and after death finds himself in torment in hell. In the midst of his suffering he calls out to Abraham to at least send someone back from the dead (Lazarus in particular) to warn his brothers of the torment that lies ahead for them if they do not repent. At this point the dialog teaches an important lesson about the limitations of miraculous evidence:

"But Abraham said, 'They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.' "But he said, 'No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent!' "But he said to him, 'If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.'" (Luke 16:29-31).

According to Abraham, a man unmoved by the supernatural power of God’s word will also remain unmoved by supernatural interventions in nature, even one so moving as a resurrection. Evidence will not move them because their fundamental (and dare I say “religious”) commitment is not to nature, but against God. (As an aside, this is why “evidential” apologetics is usually ineffective. We have all heard the laughable arguments of atheists during debates that are along the line of, “If God is real, let him [insert miracle here] and I will believe.” But of course, they would not and could not because of their pre-commitment to naturalism. But I digress).

From this perspective, the naturalist essentially creates his own intellectual limitations and then arbitrarily (autonomously) defines all of reality as falling within those limitations. This behavior is like locking oneself in a closet and then arguing that the rest of the world does not exist because I can’t see it. Hence, the “closeted atheist”: He has arbitrarily/autonomously closed or “closeted” his mind from anything outside of his pre-determined (self-determined) limited perspective.

Examples of this type of rationalizing abound in the literature of secularists and atheists. For example, atheistic philosopher Daniel Dennett has created a metaphor to describe what types of explanations we should accept when talking about the origins of the universe. What kind of explanation do we need to do our intellectual “lifting”? To answer, he contrasts “skyhooks” and “cranes.” Quoting the Oxford English Dictionary, Dennett defines a “skyhook” as “An imaginary contrivance for attachment to the sky, an imaginary means of suspension in the sky.” (This material is taken from Dennett’s book, Darwin’s Dangerous Idea). Notice the repetition of the word “imaginary” and the inclusion of the word “contrivance.” Dennett adds, “Skyhooks would be wonderful things. . . . Sad to say, they are impossible.” Rather than refer to the supernatural directly, Dennett uses his metaphor to categorize any explanation of nature that does not creep along step-by-step according to Darwinian theory. In other words, any non-Darwinian, non-rationalistic explanation of the universe is by definition (according to Dennett) imaginary, contrived, and impossible. But notice, Dennett merely assumes that anything beyond his definition cannot exist.

The arbitrariness of this position is readily apparent. Dennett has no justification for choosing a natural versus a supernatural explanation for ultimate reality (the existence of all of nature and nature’s “laws” and constants). Rather, he chooses his assumption autonomously, based on his own personal experience. With this presupposition of naturalism as the norm in place, he erects the false dichotomy of “skyhooks” versus “cranes” to pronounce the possible acceptable types of explanations. He has loaded his worldview into the very definitions to start with and so “stacks the deck” against anyone countering him. His categories of skyhook and crane do not fairly represent the difference between theism and naturalism, as he has naturalistically conceived both definitions. To accept his metaphors would be to concede naturalism up front, aside from the fact that this method commits the logical fallacy of begging the question.

It is in this way that the naturalist self-imposes his own intellectual limitations on others. Having stuck himself into a closet of his own presuppositions, he limits his knowledge as well as the range of assumptions he can make about all other knowledge. Dennett depends on his naturalistic standards which he has derived from his assumption about naturalism, in order to define and support his naturalistic worldview. Reasoning does not get any more circular than this. But then again, and in his defense,when you stick yourself in a closet, you do tend to limit your options.

Wes

Some Thoughts on the Obvious Fallacies of Design Critics

2010-04-22T16:54:00.000-07:00

This is how science normally proceeds. It involves a sequence, namely, observation, hypothesis, prediction, testing (by existing knowledge or experiment)—the prediction(s) leading to verification, modification, or falsification of the hypothesis. I will call this approach to advancing knowledge “the hypothetic approach,” using “hypothetic” to mean “pertaining to hypothesis” as distinct from “hypothetical.” Of course, there are times when science, being a human activity, “over-flies” this process due to sudden inspiration that might illuminate our perception of the world by flashes of insight, etc. Nevertheless, without the hypothetic process science as we know it could hardly exist.

But there are hazards in working with hypotheses. The most obvious (1) arises if I become too eager to prove that my hypothesis is better than yours. This happens when researchers allow their biases to slip into their research, even though they attempt to be unbiased. We tend to select (cherry-pick) evidence that supports our hypotheses and ignore evidence that militates against it. (This is why new clinical drugs are always tested in a double-blind trial).

A second hazard (2) is more subtle. There is the real danger of arguing in a circle. If, for example, I begin with the assumption (hypothesis) that “a God exists who created all things,” I cannot subsequently use the existence of the universe as an argument for the existence of God. The following is invalid:

A God exists who created the universe.
The universe exists.
Therefore it must have had a creator (a God who created the universe).

We see the same error by some atheists who presume that “science disproves the existence of God.” The assertion is based on the claim that science presents no evidence for the existence of supernatural forces or phenomena. It sounds plausible until you look a little more closely. The argument runs as follows:

Science is the study of the physical universe.
Science produces no evidence for the existence of non-physical entities.
Therefore non-physical entities such as God do not exist.

Premise 1 excludes by definition any consideration by science of non-physical causes or events. The premise then argues from the silence of science concerning non-material realities that such realities do not exist. By this definition, if you define birds as “feathered creatures that fly,” there is no such thing as an ostrich. It’s fairly obvious in this example whose head is in the sand. The correct conclusion, of course, is not that ostriches are mythical but that (on your restrictive definition of “bird”) they are not birds. In the same way, to define science as the study of the material universe simply prohibits science from making statements about a non-material entity like God. If the remit that science (so defined) tells us nothing about God, it has no bearing whatever on his existence or non-existence, as most scientists recognize.

This leads to a third (3) hazard—that of the “hidden premise.” Consider:

(Hidden premise) Nothing has objective reality that cannot be experienced by our natural senses.
Science is the use of our natural senses to study objective reality
Science produces no evidence for the existence of non-natural causes or entities.
Therefore non-natural entities (for example, God) have no objective reality.

The hidden premise (1.) is quietly and fallaciously assumed in premise 2 so that science is no longer just the study of the natural-physical-material universe (as in the previous example) but becomes transmuted into the study of reality as opposed to non-reality. This is a return to the old and debunked philosophical theory known as “logical positivism” (the idea that the only meaningful and non-tautological statements are those capable of being verified by our sense experience). It claims that what cannot be verified by science has no reality, and implies that in studying the material universe science actually encompasses all legitimate knowledge. This idea quickly fell out of favor among philosophers as soon as it was discovered that the principle of verification itself could not survive its own scientific test for truth. In spite of this, many philosophers recognize in the “new atheism” of writers like Dawkins, Dennett, Harris, Stenger, and Wolpert a reincarnation of this discredited school of thought.

This logical error in particular can be laid at the feet of Victor Stengel in the case of his book, God, the Failed Hypothesis. Science has its limits. This is well understood by most scientists . . . with the exception of a few folk scientists like Victor Stenger and his ilk. The prestigious US National Academy of Sciences has gone on record with the following statement: “Science is a way of knowing about the natural world. It is limited to explaining the natural world through natural causes. Science can say nothing about the supernatural. Whether God exists or not is a question about which science is neutral.” The fact that Stenger (and Dawkins, et al.) disagrees, has more to do with his disagreement with science in general rather than those who believe in God. After all, if science proves the non-existence of God, how is it that most of the leading scientists for the past 200 years never noticed?

Let’s look at some of Stenger’s logical fallacies.

Fallacy One: All hypotheses are scientific.

This, of course, is nonsense. Stenger has himself defined his method to be searching for universal truth through the use of our senses and scientific instruments, using material processes alone. What Stenger is proposing is that scientists today choose not to invoke God when they build scientific models of the universe—which is fine, so far as it goes. God is, after all and by definition, not a material entity subject to model building. But this does not stop scientists from using these material means while at the same time declaring, as Johannes Kepler did when he discovered the mathematical laws of planetary motion: “O God, I am thinking your thoughts after you!” Why should our physical senses be able to detect God if, as Jesus said: “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth”? (John 4: 24). To dismiss the existence of spiritual entities because they don’t show up on our radar screens is like denying the existence of beauty because nothing answering to that description emerges from the chemical analysis of a cut diamond. We can discern the effects of abstract concepts—beauty, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, etc.—on human behavior but the spiritual concepts themselves are accessible neither to our senses nor our scientific instruments. But they are undeniably real.

Stenger’s error is obvious. He conflates all hypothetic ideas to scientific hypotheses, but clearly all hypotheses are not scientific hypotheses. His irrationality runs thus:

The hypothetic approach is applicable to God.
The hypothetic approach is integral to science.
Therefore all hypotheses are scientific hypotheses.
Therefore the hypothesis of God is a scientific hypothesis.
Therefore the hypothesis of God can be tested by scientific experiments.
The data gathered by scientific experiments do not reveal the existence of God.
Therefore God does not exist.

The fallacious statements are: 3. 4. 5., and 7, for reasons that are obvious. Let’s move on to a second fallacy.

Fallacy Two: My opponents are ignorant

Important question: When can the construction of a “straw man” be called a fallacy? Answer: when the constructor thinks the straw man is real. Otherwise he is guilty of falsehood rather than fallacy. Dr. Stenger is atheism’s Don Quixote, enthusiastically (and let us hope ignorantly and innocently) tilting at windmills and riding down straw men. Examples:

“The fossil record, the existence of transitional species, and the actual observation of evolution in the laboratory falsify the hypothesis of a God who created ‘kinds’ or species of life-forms at one time in history and left them unchanged since.” (God the Failed Hypothesis, 51-52).

Leaving aside the contentious issues of transitional species and exactly what kind of “evolution” is observable in the laboratory, Stenger’s straw man here is the claim that Christians believe that the created “kinds” in the book of Genesis: (1) were species as defined today; and (2) have remained unchanged ever since. Even among the most fervent creationists, I know of no one holds either of these views. For example, I know of no creationist who would disagree that all canine species (wolf, dog, fox, etc.) have probably descended from a single biblical “kind.” What creationists deny is not the occurrence of mutations and natural selection, nor their ability to generate change, but the absolute power of such mindless haphazard processes to manufacture the teeming life on planet earth starting from some primeval soup or elementary spark of life.

Another wildly spectacular, and . . . well, . . . invented straw man:

“Before the age of science, religious belief was based on faith, cultural tradition, and a confidence in the revealed truth in the scriptures and teachings of holy men and women specially selected by God. As science began to erode these beliefs by showing that many of the traditional teachings, such as that of a flat earth at rest at the centre of a firmament of stars and planets, were simply wrong, people began to look to science itself for evidence of a supreme being that did not depend on any assumption about the literal truth of the Bible or divine revelation.” (p. 48).

This synopsis of the history of Western thought is commendably brief. It is also completely wrong. First, religious belief has not undergone a transformation since the “age of science” dawned; it is still based on faith, tradition, and revelation, all of which retain a vigorous validity to this day. Second, science has proved remarkably ineffective in eroding “those beliefs” for reasons already stated above from the US Academy of Sciences. Third, the only “traditional teachings” that had a “flat earth at the centre of the firmament of stars and planets” were those of ancient China—Western and Middle Eastern cosmologies have never combined these elements.

To further elaborate: Fourth, not since Aristotle (at least) presented evidence for a spherical earth in 330 BC, observing that southbound travelers see southern stars rising higher above the horizon, has anyone thought of the earth as “flat.” In 240 BC, Eratosthenes even calculated the Earth’s spherical circumference. In his treatise The Reckoning of Time, the venerable Bede (c. 672-735 AD) explained the varying duration of daylight in terms of “the roundness of the earth,” and continues, “for not without reason is it called ‘the orb of the world’ on the pages of Holy Scripture and of ordinary literature. It is, in fact, set like a sphere in the middle of the whole universe.” And anything Bede wrote was required reading for the priests of his day. Even when Columbus set out for the Indies by going West, the arguments against his success were not that he might “fall of the edge of the world,” but that the world was too large and the ocean too vast to make the voyage. And indeed, those who opposed Columbus were right and Columbus was wrong. Fortunately for Columbus, however, he ran into the American continents first. If they had not existed, Columbus and his crew would have starved long before reaching China.

Geocentricity is a different matter. As the quote from Bede indicates, Dr. Stenger correctly observes that the ancients believed in the Earth-centered universe. But, the geocentric system was the product not of religious faith but of Greek science. Anaximander (6^th century BC) taught that the Earth was a cylinder situated at the center of the universe. The Pythagoreans disputed the centrality of the Earth, holding that it was in motion around an unseen fire, but Plato (5^th century BC) believed that the Earth was a sphere, stationary at the center of the universe and orbited by the stars and planets. Greek astronomy eventually settled for the geocentric “Ptolemaic system”—proposed by Claudius Ptolemaeus during the 2^nd century AD, and this was believed to be the fact of the issue until the “Copernican revolution” in the 16^th century.

In sum, Stenger sires an orphan child (by Greek science out of Chinese mythology), rejects it, and leaves the baby at the Bible’s doorstep. In fact the Bible is innocent of such teachings—nowhere does it discuss the shape of the Earth or claim that it lies at the center of the universe. It frequently describes the universe as observed from Earth (don’t we all?) but it does so without a hint of geocentric dogmatism.

Fallacy Three: Simplicity begets complexity

Dr. Stenger next takes on “the illusion of design.” He spends a mere 13 pages in dismissing Paley’s watch, creationism, Intelligent Design, irreducible complexity, information arguments and even the legal definition of science. How is it possible to do all this in a mere 13 pages? By making assertions rather than advancing arguments. I realize that this is a large endeavor—to deal with all of the above in a single book. But remember that his book claims to prove the non-existence of God. And if a book is intended to do such, I think we, the readers, are entitled to proofs not assertions.

The closest Stenger gets to such an argument is his time spent with Michael Behe’s “irreducible complexity.” Behe’s argument is intended to demonstrate that complex biological systems cannot evolve by natural selection. His mousetrap illustration is now well-known. As simple as the mousetrap is, if any one of its five constituent parts is missing, the mousetrap is simply not a mousetrap. The same is true of biological systems within the cell. If one part is missing, say of a flagellar motor within a bacteria, it cannot work and the useless parts become a liability to survival rather than a help. Natural selection cannot account for these irreducibly complex machines. To change the metaphor, natural selection may help the speedier rabbit survive the pursuit of the fox over the “less speedy” rabbit. That’s all well and good. But how might cabbages outrun the rabbit? After all cabbages don’t have legs. And if they did, they would no longer be cabbages—but would be sure proof of evolution! My point here is that in asking how an irreducibly complex system could arise, we are not asking how rapid-rabbits might evolve from the also-rans, but how a cabbage might grow legs.

Stenger’s rebuttal of Behe’s “irreducible complexity” argument boils down to asserting (note: not arguing) that the component parts of the biological systems with which Behe illustrates his case may already be waiting in the wings—but serving unrelated purposes. If all the parts are already present in the organism, all they have to do is get together and then create a novel functioning entity. These new machines are supposed to arise spontaneously.

But of course, this is a “just so” story of enormous proportions. Dr. Stenger has obviously never purchased a piece of flat-packed furniture from say Ikea. I can assure him from my own experience that having all the components together in one place and moving them around randomly is most unlikely to assemble anything that works. Each flat-pack component is already specifically adapted to fit the “design,” but it still takes tools, instructions (you know, like DNA), AND intelligence to assemble the parts into a functioning whole.

At the risk of doing disservice to Sir Fred Hoyle’s illustration of assembling a 747 from a junkyard, I would go even further to say that even if all the component parts are present but are busy fulfilling different roles, the probability that an irreducibly complex biological system will spontaneously self-assemble is comparable to the chance of a tornado in a Boeing components warehouse creating a 747. All the necessary component parts are there, even the blueprints are available, but it takes something more intelligent than a tornado to put them together. And if such an assembly process didn’t involve teleology (that is, purpose), why should it occur at all?

So, strike three for Stenger. His hypothesis of the failed hypothesis has failed.

One final thought. Doesn’t Dr. Stenger’s idea that simplicity begets complexity totally contradict Richard Dawkins’ argument that God, having created an exceedingly complex universe, must be even more complex and thus highly improbable? According to Stenger’s principle, a simple (and thus highly probably) God could create a complex world. . . . But then, consistency never was atheism’s strong point.

Wes

Atheism Is a Matter of the Will

2010-04-07T13:58:00.000-07:00

Atheism is first and foremost a matter of the will, not a matter of the intellect. Witness the following:

“I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and well-informed people I know are religious believers. It isn’t just that I don’t believe in God and, naturally, hope that I’m right in my belief. It’s that I hope there is no God! I don’t want there to be a God; I don’t want the universe to be like that.” - Atheist philosopher Thomas Nagel, The Last Word

On the Tenth Amendment

2010-03-25T16:41:00.000-07:00

The powers not delegated to the United States by

the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states,

are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

The authority of our Constitution is not based on the authority of the people of the nation or the Union, but upon the authority of the respective States. This is what the Tenth Amendment is all about. Even the Federalists had to admit again and again in debates concerning the Constitution and its ratification that the opening words of our Constitution, “We the people of the United States” did not reference, nor was it intended to mean the people of the United States as a united whole.

I know we are living in a day and age when such history and facts of history are conscientiously withheld from students in government schools. Still the evidence for this is quite clear. The Revolutionary War was fought to achieve the independence of thirteen individual colonies (states). The Declaration of Independence clearly proclaimed the independence not of a new nation but of thirteen “free and independent” states. The Articles of Confederation (our first constitution) was framed by representatives of those thirteen states and ratified by those thirteen legislatures independently. The Articles united those states under a national legislature which, by definition and design, left each state free and independent to govern itself. Our Constitution was likewise framed by representatives of those thirteen states, who voted as states (not individual representatives) at the Philadelphia Convention. Once the Constitution was finished it was not put up for popular vote of the United States population as a whole, but was ratified within each individual state legislature.

The process of ratification is what gives the Constitution its authority as our fundamental law. Each state had to ratify the Constitution. This meant that each state held a ratification convention made up of delegates chosen from various districts of each particular state. Each state debated the document and its various provisions, voted, and determined whether or not to ratify the Constitution. As Madison said in Federalist No. 39, “Ratification is to be given by the people, not as individuals comprising one entire nation, but as composing the distinct and independent States to which they respectively belong.” Again, he said, “Each State, in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body, independent of all others, and only to be bound by its own voluntary act.”

So our Constitution was framed by representatives of the states who voted as states, and was ratified by representative bodies chosen by the people of each state. The people of the nation, as such, had no part in either of these legal activities.

In the process of ratification the people of the thirteen states delegated a small part of the authority of their respective states to the new central government established by the Constitution. In that compact the people of the states also forbade the states to exercise certain specific powers. But that was all. They neither delegated more authority and powers to the central government nor denied their states the authority to exercise additional powers.

This is important to understand. The Constitution did not replace or superimpose anl authority over state governments. Nor did the Constitution give the central/national government the authority to meddle with the corporate identities of the peoples of the states. The Constitution was plainly not intended to do either. As Madison said in Federalist No. 39, although the operation of the powers which the central government does have is national, the extent of its powers is not. In the extent of its powers “the proposed government cannot be deemed a national one; since its jurisdiction extends to certain enumerated objects only, and leaves to the several States a residuary and inviolable sovereignty over all other objects.”

The process of ratification gives abundant testimony to our founding fathers intent to keep the central government within its constitutional bounds and to keep each state's rights exactly where they should be kept, within the state. Above all they spelled each state’s right to defend its liberty against the central government’s injustice or tyranny. (This is, after all, why the states rebelled against England in the first place). At least three of the states—Virginia, New York, and Rhode Island—in their ratification documents made it clear that they had the right to take back the powers which they had delegated to the central government whenever those powers were perverted by the central government or whenever it should become “necessary to their happiness.” Tellingly, those states ratification documents also guarded against self-interested misconstruction of the Constitution’s wording to imply that Congress is entitled to any powers not stated in the Constitution. New York’s ratification instrument stated it plainly: “that every Power, Jurisdiction and right, which is not by the said Constitution clearly delegated to the Congress of the United States, or the departments of the Government thereof, remains to the People of the several States, or to their respective State Governments to whom they may have granted the same . . .”

This, of course, is the essential idea of the Tenth Amendment: protection of the powers which the states had neither delegated to the national government nor forbidden to themselves in the Constitution. The Tenth Amendment provides protection from the central government—to keep it from overstepping its authority by taking to itself powers that belong only to the individual states. The people of the states whose representatives framed and ratified the Constitution insisted that the authority of their states to govern their own internal affairs, and the powers necessary to accomplish that end, remain in the hands of their respective state governments.

When the central government oversteps its authority it is up the independent States themselves to protect themselves from surrendering their authority to a central government. Such powers belong to the free and independent States that have freely joined the Union. And, I would add, it is the duty of the elected governments of these free and independent States to protect its citizens from encroaching central government control.

At least, that's what I think,

Wes

The Stuff of Resurrection

2010-03-23T14:33:00.000-07:00

After reading much about “the death of the church”—in the West, or wherever—posted by erstwhile post-moderns and self-appointed prophets of church and culture, I could not help but to reflect on Eugene Peterson’s analysis of the parable recorded in Luke 13:6-9.

When one hears reported such dialog as: “We don’t serve the cause of Christ . . . we serve Christ,” and other inanities meant to direct criticism towards the church, I cannot but shake my head. I know we are all “creatures of our time.” But for some—especially those who attempt to “lead the way” for Christendom—to be so completely unaware of the cultural influences on their own thought, one begins to wonder if they are capable of any independent thought at all.

If there is one thing history and the providence of God has demonstrated over and over again it is that God knows what He is doing with His church (and it is His church). Humility suggests that those who “weep over the church” for its lack of understanding, lack of being as smart and forward thinking as they are, such would do well to weep for themselves.

In his book Tell It Slant, Eugene Peterson uses the short parable in Luke 13:6-9, a parable about manure--of all things, to talk about our need to practice resurrection in everyday life. I think it is also a telling parable about the church and its critics, and about the need for grace that needs to be exercised even with the church. This is Jesus' parable: "A man had a fig tree which had been planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and did not find any. And he said to the vineyard-keeper, 'Behold, for three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree without finding any. Cut it down! Why does it even use up the ground?' And he answered and said to him, 'Let it alone, sir, for this year too, until I dig around it and put in fertilizer; and if it bears fruit next year, fin; but if not, cut it down.'"

This is what Peterson writes: "Instead of goading us into action, [Jesus' Manure Story] takes us out of action. We have just come across something that offends us, some person who is useless to us or to the kingdom of God, 'taking up the ground,' and we lose patience and either physically or verbally get rid of him or her. 'Chop him down! Chop her down! Chop it down!' We solve kingdom problems by amputation."

That's a pretty good commentary on the way the all-knowing critics within the church attack the church today--"Chop it down!" . . . Nothing really new here.

Peterson continues: "Internationally and historically, killing is the predominant method of choice to make the world a better place. It is the easiest, quickest, and most efficient way by far to clear the ground for someone or something with more promise. The Manure Story interrupts our noisy, aggressive problem-solving mission. In a quiet voice the parable says, 'Hold on, not so fast. Wait a minute. Give me some more time. Let me put some manure on this tree.'

"Manure?

"Manure is not a quick fix. It has no immediate results--it is going to take a long time to see if it makes any difference. If it's results we are after, chopping down a tree is just the thing: we clear the ground and make it ready for a fresh start. We love beginning: birthing a baby, christening a ship, the first day on a new job, starting a war. But spreading manure carries none of that exhilaration. It is not dramatic work, not glamorous work, not work that gets anyone's admiring attention. Manure is a slow solution. Still, when it comes to doing something about what is wrong in the world, Jesus is known for his fondness for the minute, the invisible, the quiet, the slow--yeast, salt, seeds, light. And manure.

"Manure does not rank high in the world's economies. It is refuse. Garbage. We organize efficient and sometimes elaborate systems to collect it, haul it away, get it out of sight and smell. But the observant and wise know that this apparently dead and despised waste is teeming with life--enzymes, numerous microorganisms. It's the stuff of resurrection."

Ah, "the observant and the wise," rarely do we see these in combination, and rarer still among the church's critics. . . . One crucial thing I have learned in nearly 26 years of pastoral ministry is that it is the church--sometimes fruitless, but cared for; sometimes invested in the dirty, smelly work of the "despised"--that always and without fail produces the best result. . . .Every church? No, not every church, don’t lose sight of the big picture. But the church at large is made of better stuff than most dare to envision—even when it smells.

I have become somewhat critical of the church's critics. It seems to me, at least, that their cultural myopia clouds their minds. And, while their motives are noble, and I believe genuine, their inherent commitment to pragmatism and to "what's happening now," gets in the way of them offering any clear observations on the current state of the church, and infringes on them offering any real advice (or real service) to help the church move forward. Or, at least, that's my critical evaluation of the church's post-modern critics.

Wes

True Love

2010-03-09T16:14:00.000-08:00

What love is . . . depends. It depends on whether we are using our culture’s definition as our standard, or Christ’s definition as our standard. The culture’s definition is that love is best defined as self-worship. This is eros—my heart’s desire. Christ’s definition is love is best defined as self-sacrifice. This is agape—serving the other’s desire. Eros is “I love you because you are beautiful, good, righteous, etc.” Agape is “I love you because I want to do you good.” When Jesus commanded us to love one another—His ONE and ONLY command—He clearly was talking about agape (as the Greek indicates), over eros. But eros is what we are most drawn to, even in the church and I think this is quite evident.

An example of our cultural bias can be seen in those who leave a church because they don’t like the way the leaders lead, or the way the teachers teach, or the way the preachers preach, or the way the worship leaders lead worship. All such folks have a serious deficit in understanding the Christian doctrine, and the Christian requirements of love.

This is a failure to understand what the church is and does. The structure of a church’s corporate life together is tightly tied to the content of the gospel. Submitting oneself to a local church is what a true believer does, just like a true believer pursues good works, loves his or her neighbor, and so forth. As Jonathan Leeman writes: “Someone who refuses to join—or better, to submit to—a local church is like someone who refuses to pursue a life of righteousness. It calls into question the authenticity of his or her faith.”[1]

We don’t often think of the shape of our community life together in the church as being so intimately tied to the gospel we proclaim, but there it is. Over and over again the Scripture calls us to genuine community—to make real family connections—with the “one another” passages of Scripture. Paul was talking about the union of two very different cultures in Ephesus when he gathers Jewish believers and Gentile believers into one church. He writes: “But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall, by abolishing in His flesh the enmity . . . thus establishing peace, and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross . . . So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household,” (Ephesians 2:13-19, I encourage you to read the whole chapter in context).

Our life together matters. We are to be a distinct people, especially before a watching world where commitments are held lightly, if at all. Would anyone deny that we live in a culture that is increasingly licentious, shallow, meaningless, directionless, and grossly narcissistic? But what happens when those same attitudes and worldview infiltrates a Christian’s thinking?

This is where the world’s definition of love (eros) has supplanted Christ’s definition of love (agape). Eros, self-love, fits many Christian’s idea of what the church is for—to cater to ME. “I” is the ultimate idol. God is dethroned—even in the church. To borrow more from Leeman: “We are all free agents, and every relationship and life station is a contract that can be renegotiated or canceled, whether we are dealing with the prince, the parents, the spouse, the salesman, the boss, . . . or, of course, the local church. I am principally obligated to myself and maximizing my life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Among my various relationships, I may choose to identify with another party, but only so long as doing so is demonstrably conducive to personal advantage. I retain veto power over everything. When in the course of human events it becomes necessary to dissolve the bands which have connected me to others, I dissolve them.”[2] Notice the emphasis on the “I.”

Is this cultural assumption not something that keeps Christians from taking church membership seriously?

Several years ago Joshua Harris wrote a terrific little book entitled Stop Dating the Church. I wonder if he got the idea for the book from sociologist Erich Fromm who observed that the Western idea of “love” had taken a “consumeristic” turn. Fromm suggested that people had shifted their focus from the “faculty” of love to the “objects” of love. In other words, we are more concerned about who loves us than we are about loving.

This idea captures even “Christian” minds in terms of their involvement in the church. Consumers focus on the desirability of the object of love, rather than the process of loving. Now, maybe this is the fault of preachers (like me) who have failed to teach Christians that love begins with our ability to love rather than with the various objects of love. It seems, rather, that Christians develop their understanding of “love” in the shopping mall and then transfer that understanding to their church lives. And so, when they worship they evaluate their experience rather than their hearts. They judge the church rather than letting God’s Word judge them. In all of this they fail to realize that they are not loving their neighbor as themselves (see James 2:8).

When the idea of a binding commitment is removed from the definition of love, churches become places where personal sacrifices are rarely made, so the gospel is rarely pictured. (After all, being in a covenant relationship with other sinners—i.e., the church—requires self-sacrifice, agape). Instead, folks come and go—“church hop”—with little care. They don’t stop to weigh the consequences of their departure on others. They don’t feel the weight of their responsibility to others. They don’t discuss the reasons for leaving with their leaders. They just go. And, sadly, they fail to recognize their breach of the one commandment Christ gave to His church—“love one another just as I have loved you”—even though they may affirm this commandment in their minds.

“This is My commandment,” Jesus said, “that you love one another, just as I have loved you,” (John 15:12). It IS a command, the “law of Christ” Paul calls it; the “royal law” is how James puts it (Galatians 6:2; James 2:8). This is the where law and love come together—real love (agape) and real law. Jesus did not mince words here. This is a real command and He expected it to be obeyed. And we know why. The primary reason we institute laws is to protect something precious. It’s against the law to murder because life is precious. It’s against the law to steal because property is precious. It’s against the law to lie because truth is precious.

Judgments rightly follow the transgression of a law. If no penalty or judgment follows the transgression of a law, whatever that law is guarding must not be worth much. For example, we know our culture thinks lightly of marriage when we instituted “no fault” divorce. Laws about marriage are rendered meaningless because they offer no real protection and therefore marriages are deemed worthless.

What about Jesus’ commandment within the church—“love one another, just as I have loved you”? To break this law is to disregard His lordship. Saying no to God is saying, “What you think doesn’t mean much to me because you don’t mean much to me.” What the penalties are for such disregard and sin against the mandate of Christ, I leave to you. I am reminded, however, of the old Puritan prayer: “Let me never forget that the heinousness of sin lies not so much in the nature of the sin committed, as in the greatness of the Person sinned against.”[3]

For His own reasons God has called us to the fidelity of love—especially within the church. My prayer is that we are operating in terms of His love (agape) rather than in terms of the world’s love (eros).

Wes

[1] Jonathan Leeman, The Church and the Surprising Offense of God’s Love, Crossway, 2010, 16-17.

[2] Ibid., 44.

[3] From the prayer entitled, “Humiliation,” in The Valley of Vision, Westminister, 2002, 143.

Brief Thought on Hume’s Skepticism

2010-03-04T10:31:00.001-08:00

“If we take in our hand any volume of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance, let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames, for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion,” (David Hume, 1711-76, An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, section 12).

That’s how Hume challenged all theologies and metaphysical ideas. Only mathematics and experimental reasoning—the scientific method, that is—can lead to anything meaningful and true.

Of course, his book, and this quote in particular, fails his own “test” and would thereby suffer the same fiery fate! . . . And Hume knew it. He was well aware of the paradox that if anyone agreed with his statement, they would never read the book in which it was written as it contains nothing of mathematics or experimental science. But Hume, like most people who stake their lives on a false worldview, could not live what he believed.

He could demonstrate no natural necessities in things, but believed there were some.

He could not find that he had any such thing as a continuing self, but he believed he was one.

He could make no sense of the idea of a continuing substance, but he believed that trees and chairs and houses continued to exist nonetheless.

Perhaps most important of all, he could not even justify thinking that the future would be reasonably like the past, but he did not hesitate to get out of bed in the morning without wondering if the floor was still there.

So much faith from such a skeptic—the father of skeptics even! . . . But then again, all skeptics like all believers live by faith.

Wes

“Whatever Is Not from Faith Is Sin” Romans 14:23

2010-03-02T15:18:00.000-08:00

John Piper really got me started on this one.

Our greater enemy is not Satan but sin. We know this is true because the only way Satan can destroy us is by getting us to sin. Satan, if given room by God, might hurt us (as in Job’s case); he might even kill us (see Rev 2:10); But Satan cannot condemn us or rob us of eternity. Only sin can do that. And so, Satan’s greatest aim is to get us to sin.

All of Satan’s “tricks”—sickness, lost car keys, “apparitions,” and various intimidations—can do us no harm, unless they lead us to sin. So Satan’s main business is to advocate, promote, assist, titillate, and confirm our bent toward sinning. Paul wrote: “And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is working in the sons of disobedience,” (Eph 2:1-2). When we sin we “give the devil an opportunity,” (Eph 4:27).

The only thing that can condemn us at the judgment is unforgiven sin—not sickness or afflictions or persecutions or intimidations or apparitions or nightmares. Satan knows this. Therefore his great focus is not primarily on how to scare Christians with weird phenomena (though there’s plenty of that), but on how to corrupt Christians with worthless fads and evil thoughts.

This is the point: All sin comes from failing to live by faith (Rom 14:23). And that means that the number one aim of Satan is the destruction of faith.

Now we know why Jesus prayed for Peter just before Peter’s greatest temptation. Jesus said, “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail,” (Luke 22:31-32). Satan’s aim was to sift the faith out of Peter.

Paul implied the same thing in 1 Thessalonians 3:5, when he sends Timothy to check up on the church there to “find out about your faith, for fear that the tempter might have tempted you, and our labor would be in vain.”

And Peter writes to the churches of Asia Minor to warn them that Satan is always prowling around “seeking someone to devour.” And so he adds, “But resist him, firm in your faith,” (1 Peter 5:8-9).

This is also why Paul talked about “the shield of faith” that is “able to extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one,” (Ephesians 6:16).

Understand this: Failing to have faith in God’s grace, failing to be satisfied with all that God is for us in Jesus, is the root of all sin. Satan knows this; and it shapes his whole strategy of how to get people to sin. Faith is our counter-strategy to escape “the snare of the devil,” (2 Tim 2:26). Misplaced shame, anxiety, despondency, covetousness, lust, bitterness, impatience, pride—these all sprout from the root of unbelief in the promises of God.

Let me see if I can illustrate in a practical way what this all means. Paul said in 1 Timothy 6:10 that “the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil.” What did he mean? He couldn’t have meant that money is always in your mind when you sin. My suggestion is this: He meant that all the evils in the world come from a certain kind of heart, namely, the kind of heart that loves money. You see, money is simply a symbol that stands for human resources. Money stands for what you can get from man instead of God. Isaiah 55:1 says, “Ho! Every one who thirsts, come to the waters; and you who have no money come, buy and eat.” God’s resources are free, by faith; money is the currency of human resources. So the heart that loves money is the heart that pins its hopes, and pursues it pleasures, and puts its trust in what human resources can offer. So love of money is virtually the same as faith in money—belief (trust, confidence, assurance) that money will meet your needs and make you happy. Therefore the love of money, or trust in money, is the underside of unbelief in the promises of God. Jesus said, “No one can serve two masters . . . You cannot serve God and money,” (Matthew 6:24). Belief (faith) in one is unbelief in the other. So when Paul says that the love of money is the root of all sorts of evil, he implies that unbelief in the promises of God is at the root of every sinful attitude in our heart. He says this plainly in Romans 14:23, “Whatever is not from faith is sin.”

The absence of faith gives rise only to sinful motives and acts. This may sound extreme. But it is simply a clear expression of Paul’s radical God-centeredness. What does not come from satisfaction in God, and through the guidance of God, and for the glory of God, is God-less—it is sin. As Job says, “If I have put confidence in gold, and called fine gold my trust, . . . and my heart became secretly enticed, and my hand threw a kiss from my mouth, that too would have been an iniquity calling for judgment, for I would have denied God above,” (Job 31:24, 27-28).

And so you see, our most dangerous enemy is not Satan but sin. Where faith in God stands the power of sin is broken. Think about that in terms of everything you do. This goes to relationships and things and hopes and dreams and present and future activities. Do not allow Satan to “sift” faith out of you. Faith in our gracious God is all we really need. Only sin can condemn us. And faith is the answer to sin. Live—really live—by faith!

Wes

We have been set free.

2010-02-25T14:29:00.000-08:00

Somebody sent me this story and you have to hear it because it offers great instruction about the problem with preaching law and moralism as opposed to preaching the gospel. This is the story.

A minister decided that a visual demonstration would add emphasis to his Sunday sermon. Four worms were placed into four separate jars. The first worm was put into a jar of alcohol. The second worm was put into a jar of cigarette smoke. The third worm was put into a jar of chocolate syrup. The fourth worm was put into a jar of good clean soil.

At the conclusion of the sermon, the Minister reported the following results: The first worm in alcohol—Dead; the second worm in cigarette smoke—Dead; third worm in chocolate syrup—Dead; fourth worm in good clean soil—Alive.

So the Minister asked the congregation, “What did you learn from this demonstration?”

A little old lady sitting in the back, quickly raised her hand and said, “As long as you drink, smoke, and eat chocolate, you won't have worms!”

That pretty much ended the service. . . .

God, save us from turning grace into religion; from changing liberty into law; from do-gooders and fixers, who are as mixed up and messed up as the people they are trying to fix. And if I ever stand before a congregation with four jars and worms—literally or metaphorically—I hope somebody will do everyone else a favor and walk up there and slap me silly! . . . It could happen! . .

I overheard some people talking about the church I serve one day. That’s dangerous business because God is gracious, and He usually only lets you hear the bad stuff. But on this occasion He allowed me to overhear a visitor talking to a church member, and for once, I was glad to hear it. The visitor was having trouble describing my church. (As an aside, someone has said that Eugene’s ecclesiastical picture is like a grid with different shaped holes. Those who are round go to one church, those who are square go to another, and those who are rectangular go to still another. Those who are left go to Santa Clara. . . .)

The visitor had made some very positive comments about the church and wondered why the church was so different. My fellow church-member said, “The secret is that our pastor has given us permission to be free.” . . . I have to say, upon hearing that, I was reduced to tears. I had to leave the store. I thought, Dear God, they get it!

Paul wrote: Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty, (2 Corinthians 3:17).

And at the end of Galatians, Paul is reinforces that idea. I like The Message translation here: Now, in these last sentences, I want to emphasize in the bold scrawls of my personal handwriting the immense importance of what I have written to you. These people who are attempting to force the ways of circumcision on you have only one motive: They want an easy way to look good before others, lacking the courage to live by a faith that shares Christ's suffering and death. All their talk about the law is gas. They themselves don't keep the law! And they are highly selective in the laws they do observe. They only want you to be circumcised so they can boast of their success in recruiting you to their side. That is contemptible! For my part, I am going to boast about nothing but the Cross of our Master, Jesus Christ. Because of that Cross, I have been crucified in relation to the world, set free from the stifling atmosphere of pleasing others and fitting into the little patterns that they dictate. Can't you see the central issue in all this? It is not what you and I do — submit to circumcision, reject circumcision. It is what God is doing, and he is creating something totally new, a free life! All who walk by this standard are the true Israel of God — his chosen people. Peace and mercy on them! Quite frankly, I don't want to be bothered anymore by these disputes. I have far more important things to do — the serious living of this faith. I bear in my body scars from my service to Jesus. (Galatians 6:11-17, The Message).

Don’t you just love that? We have been set free.

Wes

Sturgeon Fishing Trip on the Willamette

2010-02-19T14:09:00.001-08:00

Sally Jenkins on Tim Tebow's Super Bowl Ad

2010-02-04T11:21:00.000-08:00

Sally Jenkins of the Washington Post has something important to say about the Tim Tebow Super Bowl ad that has a certain political correct crowd tied up in knots. And, even though she gets some of the details wrong (i.e., Tim’s eye black did not read “Heb 12:12” but “Heb 12:1-2,” but you get the point), she makes a good point in respect the issues involved.

Tebow's Super Bowl ad isn't intolerant; its critics are

By Sally Jenkins
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, February 2, 2010; D01

I'll spit this out quick, before the armies of feminism try to gag me and strap electrodes to my forehead: Tim Tebow is one of the better things to happen to young women in some time. I realize this stance won't endear me to the "Dwindling Organizations of Ladies in Lockstep," otherwise known as DOLL, but I'll try to pick up the shards of my shattered feminist credentials and go on.

As statements at Super Bowls go, I prefer the idea of Tebow's pro-life ad to, say, Jim McMahon dropping his pants, as the former Chicago Bears quarterback once did in response to a question. We're always harping on athletes to be more responsible and engaged in the issues of their day, and less concerned with just cashing checks. It therefore seems more than a little hypocritical to insist on it only if it means criticizing sneaker companies, and to stifle them when they take a stance that might make us uncomfortable.

I'm pro-choice, and Tebow clearly is not. But based on what I've heard in the past week, I'll take his side against the group-think, elitism and condescension of the "National Organization of Fewer and Fewer Women All The Time." For one thing, Tebow seems smarter than they do.

Tebow's 30-second ad hasn't even run yet, but it already has provoked "The National Organization for Women Who Only Think Like Us" to reveal something important about themselves: They aren't actually "pro-choice" so much as they are pro-abortion. Pam Tebow has a genuine pro-choice story to tell. She got pregnant in 1987, post-Roe v. Wade, and while on a Christian mission in the Philippines, she contracted a tropical ailment. Doctors advised her the pregnancy could be dangerous, but she exercised her freedom of choice and now, 20-some years later, the outcome of that choice is her beauteous Heisman Trophy winner son, a chaste, proselytizing evangelical.

Pam Tebow and her son feel good enough about that choice to want to tell people about it. Only, NOW says they shouldn't be allowed to. Apparently NOW feels this commercial is an inappropriate message for America to see for 30 seconds, but women in bikinis selling beer is the right one. I would like to meet the genius at NOW who made that decision. On second thought, no, I wouldn't.

There's not enough space in the sports pages for the serious weighing of values that constitutes this debate, but surely everyone in both camps, pro-choice or pro-life, wishes the "need" for abortions wasn't so great. Which is precisely why NOW is so wrong to take aim at Tebow's ad.

Here's what we do need a lot more of: Tebows. Collegians who are selfless enough to choose not to spend summers poolside, but travel to impoverished countries to dispense medical care to children, as Tebow has every summer of his career. Athletes who believe in something other than themselves, and are willing to put their backbone where their mouth is. Celebrities who are self-possessed and self-controlled enough to use their wattage to advertise commitment over decadence.

You know what we really need more of? Famous guys who aren't embarrassed to practice sexual restraint, and to say it out loud. If we had more of those, women might have fewer abortions. See, the best way to deal with unwanted pregnancy is to not get the sperm in the egg and the egg implanted to begin with, and that is an issue for men, too -- and they should step up to that.

"Are you saving yourself for marriage?" Tebow was asked last summer during an SEC media day.

"Yes, I am," he replied.

The room fell into a hush, followed by tittering: The best college football player in the country had just announced he was a virgin. As Tebow gauged the reaction from the reporters in the room, he burst out laughing. They were a lot more embarrassed than he was.

"I think y'all are stunned right now!" he said. "You can't even ask a question!"

That's how far we've come from any kind of sane viewpoint about star athletes and sex. Promiscuity is so the norm that if a stud isn't shagging everything in sight, we feel faintly ashamed for him.

Obviously Tebow can make people uncomfortable, whether it's for advertising his chastity, or for wearing his faith on his face via biblical citations painted in his eye-black. Hebrews 12:12, his cheekbones read during the Florida State game: "Therefore strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees." His critics find this intrusive, and say the Super Bowl is no place for an argument of this nature. "Pull the ad," NOW President Terry O'Neill said. "Let's focus on the game."

Trouble is, you can't focus on the game without focusing on the individuals who play it -- and that is the genius of Tebow's ad. The Super Bowl is not some reality-free escape zone. Tebow himself is an inescapable fact: Abortion doesn't just involve serious issues of life, but of potential lives, Heisman trophy winners, scientists, doctors, artists, inventors, Little Leaguers -- who would never come to be if their birth mothers had not wrestled with the stakes and chosen to carry those lives to term. And their stories are every bit as real and valid as the stories preferred by NOW.

Let me be clear again: I couldn't disagree with Tebow more. It's my own belief that the state has no business putting its hand under skirts. But I don't care that we differ. Some people will care that the ad is paid for by Focus on the Family, a group whose former spokesman, James Dobson, says loathsome things about gays. Some will care that Tebow is a creationist. Some will care that CBS has rejected a gay dating service ad. None of this is the point. CBS owns its broadcast and can run whatever advertising it wants, and Tebow has a right to express his beliefs publicly. Just as I have the right to reject or accept them after listening -- or think a little more deeply about the issues. If the pro-choice stance is so precarious that a story about someone who chose to carry a risky pregnancy to term undermines it, then CBS is not the problem.

Tebow's ad, by the way, never mentions abortion; like the player himself, it's apparently soft-spoken. It simply has the theme "Celebrate Family, Celebrate Life." This is what NOW has labeled "extraordinarily offensive and demeaning." But if there is any demeaning here, it's coming from NOW, via the suggestion that these aren't real questions, and that we as a Super Bowl audience are too stupid or too disinterested to handle them on game day.

The Religiously Illiterate Society

2010-02-03T17:02:00.000-08:00

One of the most challenging books I have read of late is Sociologist Christian Smith’s, Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005). It was, to say the least, disturbing, enlightening, and challenging stuff. Luke McFadden, my Youth Guy here at SCCC, said, “A good way to interview a potential Youth Minister would be to ask him two questions: 1) Have you read Smith’s book? And 2) What are you going to do about it?” . . . Hmmm. . . . I should have asked Luke those questions. Then again, having noted his competency in his work with our youth, I think he would have answered those questions well.

Smith uncovers the astounding biblical illiteracy of so much of today’s Christian youth that one wonders about the biblical literacy of the adults. But, I have my suspicions as to what the answers there might be. In our day of radical postmodernity, Smith argues, based on his findings, that our youth do not need “radically new ‘postmodern’ type of program or ministry” (p. 266). What they need is to be challenged to consider why they believe what they believe and to learn how to articulate their faith. I think he is right in that. And I think adults need the same.

The biblical illiteracy and general lack of religious knowledge of this generation—especially among Christians—is arguably unparalleled in American history. The French observer of American society of the 19^th century, Alexis de Toqueville, gave an intriguing understanding of American culture from his trip here. And he also gave a stern, and I think prophetic, warning regarding a biblically illiterate society:

When religion is destroyed among a people, doubt takes over the highest regions of the intellect, and it halfway paralyzes all the others. Everyone becomes used to having only confused and unstable notions about the matters that most interest his fellow men and himself; men defend their opinions badly or abandon them, and since they despair of being able, by themselves alone, to resolve the greatest problems that human fate presents, they are reduced in cowardly fashion to not give them any thought. (Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, Hackett, 2000, p. 179).

Indeed, in a day when most shun any discussion of “religion and politics,” especially in the public square, it appears that Alexis was right. Our biblical illiteracy has led to a day in which most Christians are confused even about their own faith and so now we cower from any discussion of it.

On the other side of things, those who claim to have a facility for biblical literacy are often so awash in poor study habits that they suffer from hermeneutical myopia—misunderstanding and mishandling the truth of Scripture that leads to further error. It’s a sad state of affairs. But, this is a call for those of us who preach and teach to get serious about our God-given calls.

How often are we tempted to cry out to Jesus for a word, a message, some revelation, some dream or vision, but make no serious effort to understand the deep things of Scripture, the very Word of Christ. I don’t know how many times Christians have come to me in search of counsel for some problem, but when I ask if they have searched the Scriptures relating to the issue, I get blank stares.

There really isn't a lot of disciplined submission to the apostles' Word in the contemporary church. We treat the Bible mainly as a kind of spiritual prod to boost our emotions. But the practice of submitting all our ideas and attitudes and habits day by day to the scrutiny and absolute authority of the Bible is very rare.

It is no coincidence that reformation and renewal came to the church in the 16th century because John Calvin and Martin Luther returned to the grammar and syntax of Scripture. When preachers began to deal with the text, and laymen began to read the text, with attention to its words and phrases and logical connections and thread of thought and immediate context, the Bible broke loose from its bondage to fog and changed the world.

I know that I have a long way to go before I become the preacher I want to be. But I do have a goal. It is my goal for me as well as for every Christian within my charge. My goal is this: That we not only say we believe the Bible is authoritative, but also submit our minds and hearts to it by reading with precision and care and disciplined attention to the meaning of words in context, and intended relationships among sequences of statements, and the coherent thread of thought through whole paragraphs. (I’m talking about serious study here). This is not optional. It is not an esoteric game for scholars. It is a matter of humility and submissiveness to the Word of God.

It is poor reading, poor hermeneutics, poor understandings that have led the church in this country to retreat and surrender territory that belongs to the Lord Jesus Christ. Some churches have retreated inward and have established a legalistic culture forming Christian “ghettos.” Others have called for retreat, abandoning the Christian heritage of a nation saying, “Why polish brass on a sinking ship.” Such is the half-baked hermeneutic of dispensationalism that has, in my opinion, bankrupted Christian truth in this country. Still others go the way of license—reinterpreting all of Scripture to “fit” the cultural fads of the moment. If we take any of these positions we abandon the call of God.

Our hope lies in nothing less than a return to biblical literacy—again seriously engaging in the study of hermeneutics and then into the distinctive Christian doctrines—theology proper, Christology, stoeriology, and epistemology—that turned the world upside down and established the greatest nation in the history of the world. God help us to wake up and show up for the cause of Christ.

At least, that’s what I think.

Wes

Report from Haiti

2010-01-26T07:59:00.001-08:00

I know many of us have friends and co-workers extending themselves in ways they could never have imagined before. They are heroes working under unbelievably primitive conditions to offer whatever help they can.

I just received an email from the daughter of Gene McCoy (Gene is the minister of the Memorial Christian Church in Mountain Home, Arkansas. His daughter's name is Heidi. She is in Haiti, and this is her brief email report:

You just would not believe the things i have seen. people everywhere with missing limbs. 2 babies died today. one man died with a pulmonary embolism (blood clot) bc they ran out of heparin. our team brought heparin. they are sick and lying on stretchers and bleeding. one nurse broke down today and said that last tuesday they were just cutting people limbs off that were crushed and they had nowhere to dispose of the body parts so they stacked them in front of the hospital for days. when the smell became too much someone took care of them. these people are young. younger than me. i havent seen an old person yet. avg life expectancy is 51. i feel so horrible. they don't have what they need and we are watching them die. the nurses in haiti are terrible. they don't know how to care for their patients. i have worked since we arrived at 2 with a short break to eat at 8. i went back to check on my icu patient's and the nurse that was caring for them was fast asleep. i am learning pediatrics quickly. so many babies that are sick. some patients don't have food to eat. the hospital cannot feed them so if family does not bring food they simply do not eat. i dont even want to eat. the smells and sights have been overwhelming. it is so primitive and i am having to be creative with supplies. today i made a tourniqet with a rubber glove as i pinned a whaling 9 year old down. they shaved skin from her thigh to graft skin to the lower section of her leg. she left the or with no iv access. i had to get a line in her to medicate her. her parents were no where to be found. i wanted to talk to her to calm her but i can't understand the language. even those fluent in french say it is no help. the creole and slang is way too different. i finally took a shower. it was a slow drip and cold, but it was water. i have sweat all day. the hospital is a humid and hot building. i think my comfort at this point is so menial. pray for us and that more supplies will arrive. we are in desperate need of medicines. pray that i can be quick on my feet. pray that my headache will go away and that the nausea will stop.

i love you all. i will try to keep in touch. the internet is patchy here.

heidi

For Heidi, and for so many other caregivers, and especially for those in need of care, let us offer our prayers our resources, whatever we have available to help.

Wes

Power and Freedom

2010-01-07T14:36:00.000-08:00

I was on my way home to Vandalia, Illinois from some errand in St. Louis and happened upon two women standing on the roadside beside their broken-down car. I stopped to offer to take them on to Vandalia to a mechanic and to a remedy. They gratefully accepted.

Once in the car one noticed the college ring I was wearing—blue stone with a cross and arch embedded in the stone. I told her I was a Christian, a minister, in fact, only to discover that they were lesbians, partners in a “committed relationship,” and wiccans (witches). They were “performance artists” and travelled around the country selling hand-made crafts and “performing” wherever they could.

Now, I had never met two Wiccan lesbian performance artists before and thought this would make for interesting conversation. I was curious and they were open to discussing their beliefs and lifestyle. The fact that I was a Christian and a minister didn’t seem to bother them much. So we had lots to talk about.

I’ve forgotten most of the conversation, but I do remember our discussions concerning one particular topic. Their analysis of what was wrong with the world revolved around what they called “Power Over.” Some people have power over other people. That is the genesis of all of our troubles. We are all meant to be radically free and self-determining. Power Over is therefore a fundamentally illegitimate situation. If we could do away with it, then Eden would be reconstituted.

They were kind of fuzzy on how to handle things when I pointed out that the relationship between parent and child, employer and employee, and even our relationship there in the car were all examples of Power Over that hardly seemed escapable. I had power over them simply by virtue of the fact that I could tell them to get out of my car and drive away, leaving them on the side of the road. There was also no way in their system of thought to deal with evil people bent on doing bad things, or selfish people ignoring the rights of others. To my mind it wasn’t a very cohesive worldview.

It is, however, an increasingly common worldview. Or at least it commonly informs many people’s worldviews, however inconsistently. Barthian theologian Jacques Ellul, a so-called “Christian Marxist” whose views informed the theology behind Willie Young’s book The Shack, was one who believed that Power Over, or hierarchy, is intrinsically evil and unjust. We see this peeking out when Young’s version of the Triune God claims not to even have the right to exercise power over his (her? his/her?) own radically free creatures. (pp. 201-207 in the edition I read.)

However, that is not the Biblical worldview. The Bible prescribes, describes, and circumscribes human relationships of unequal power. Creator/creature, parent/child, husband/wife, master/servant, and shepherd/sheep are all relationships of unequal power. God has given some people legitimate power over others. Appropriate exercise of that power is an unvarnished good. It is, by Christ’s own definition, loving my neighbor as myself. Nowhere is this clearer than in the Fifth Commandment. “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be prolonged in the land which the Lord your God gives you,” (Exodus 20:12). We see this in the church as well. Hebrews 13:17 enjoins upon every Christian to: “Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they keep watch over your souls as those who will give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with grief, for this would be unprofitable for you.”

I got to thinking about this for two reasons. One: I have been working on a series of sermons from the book of Galatians—a “Declaration of Independence”—as it were from religious busy-bodies and legalists and religious “fixers” who are more than willing to reign in our Christian liberty. And two: a sad, rather one-sided discussion I had with a Christian brother who could not see clear that God’s prescribed Power Over structures and our Christian liberty were really “two sides to the same coin.”

As an aside, I don’t particularly like the terminology “Power Over,” and would prefer the terminology of “Authority Structure.” But I’ve been trying to think this through in the terms my two new friends were using.

It seems to me Jesus was clear that in the Kingdom Power Over structures are truly upside down. After all He said, “For even the Son of Man [the King of kings and Lord of lords!] did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many,” (Mark 10:45). In other words, in this “upside down Kingdom” the King is the servant and His hierarchy is one of service, and that is where real power is found.

So, when the Bible talks about Power Over (and I know, those terms aren’t actually used, but you get the point), it’s really talking about freedom, or, how freedom is achieved in the Kingdom. We are really free and that freedom comes to us as the “powers that be” exercise the kind of power Jesus exercised the power of serving. So when I say: “The Bible prescribes, describes, and circumscribes human relationships of unequal power. Creator/creature, parent/child, husband/wife, master/servant, and shepherd/sheep are all relationships of unequal power. God has given some people legitimate power over others,” what this means is that those powers have a responsibility to serve those under their authority in such a way as to set them free.

And so, when we read texts like Titus 2:1-15 concerning sound doctrine, and giving descriptions (not prescriptions—laws) concerning behavior within the church and within the Christian home and within work relationships, etc., we recognize the over-arching message of the gospel, the message of grace. Paul was not giving rules so that those in power could manipulate those under their control. He was giving descriptions of how servant leaders set people free. And this is why Paul can write in the same letter how, for example, women are to be “subject to their own husbands” (Titus 2:5 written in descriptive terms) while at the same time commanding (prescribing) Titus to “avoid foolish controversies . . . and strife and disputes about the Law, for they are unprofitable and worthless,” (Titus 3:9). Submission—a husband’s to his wife, and a wife’s to her husband (Ephesians 5:21) is not about law but about grace. Power Over really means Power Under and that’s how we are set free.

My point is, the Power Over of the Kingdom is really Power Under—not law, but gospel; not legalism but grace. And it’s there to set us free.

Just thinking,

Wes

The Manhattan Declaration

2009-11-24T11:10:00.001-08:00

I commend to everyone the reading and signing of the Manhattan Declaration.

Read it at: http://manhattandeclaration.org/

It is time for Christians to speak and live what they believe.

Wes

Don't Block the Light

2009-11-18T08:33:00.000-08:00

We all know the story of the innkeeper who turned Mary and Joseph away: “And she gave birth to her first-born son; and she wrapped Him in cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn” (Luke 2:7).

As I read the Christmas story this year, I didn’t focus so much on the shepherds, or Zechariah, or the Wise Men. They all knew; they all worshipped; they all understood. My focus—and believe it or not, my heart—was turned toward the innkeeper, not because he was so bad but because he was so lost and didn’t even know it.

As we enter into this Christmas season I want to say a good word about the pagans—the innkeepers of the world—who just don’t know.

I know. I know. They have secularized Christmas and taken it from the believers. We have (according to the Supreme Court) created a holiday around Christ’s birth, one that has become so pagan that we are allowed to celebrate it because it has long since ceased to be “sectarian and Christian.” And so, we have permission (because it no longer has religious overtones) to celebrate it in our public institutions.

We have come to celebrate a holiday that has no meaning . . . sort of a celebration to celebrate. The happy feelings are . . . just happy feelings about being happy. We give gifts to one another because, well, just because. We have parties to have parties. No reason. It’s just something we, as a culture, have decided to do. After all, it is winter—Christmas breaks the monotony and gives us a reason to have another drink.

Now, how could they have done that to us? . . . Don’t they know “Wise men still seek Him?” Don’t they know that we measure our years before and after the birth of Christ? Don’t they understand the importance of the Incarnation? Don’t they know that Jesus loves them?

No, frankly, they don’t. And so, herein lies my brief for pagans. Maybe it is a reflection of the “burden” God is beginning to give me.

I’ve been thinking about it and have decided that it is wrong for those of us who are Christians to be upset that unbelievers have such a good time at Christmas. One person said that Christians know unbelievers aren’t going to have any fun after they die, so we want to take the fun away from them before then.

If you have ever done ministry among the very poor among us, you know how difficult it is. I remember talking to a friend of mine who regularly delivers food and other necessities to the poorest of the poor in his community. Sometimes he would take one of his daughters along to deliver the boxes of food. Now, I’m talking about taking food to little more than shacks, newspaper over cracks in the walls, dirt floors, tin or tar paper roofs. (If you don’t think such places exist you have led a very sheltered life). What most amazed my friend’s little girl is that all of these houses had, believe it or not, BIG televisions and cable! And she would say, “Will you look at that! Can you believe it! They can’t afford food and a decent place to live but they have a bigger television than WE have!”

On those occasions, my friend would say, “We should not begrudge the poor a television. It’s probably their only escape from what must be a very hard life.”

Maybe we should think something like that about unbelievers’ celebrations of Christmas. They don’t understand but I’m glad that they’re finding a respite from what must be a very hard life. They don’t know about Jesus and how much better it would be if they knew. They just don’t know.

So, I’m glad for their parties and their fun. I’m happy that Jesus, even if they don’t know Him, has provided them with an excuse to be happy . . . if only briefly.

Every year I get a letter or into a conversation or a phone call with someone that I don’t even know, and he or she will say that Christians have blasphemed (or something like that) Christ by celebrating with a tree and presents . . . which, as all good Christians ought to know, are pagan practices. Some well-meaning Christian—again, one I don’t even know—will tell me we shouldn’t celebrate Christmas at all because Jesus didn’t tell us to.

I always answer such folks and such questions with the serious comment that when we use pagan symbols in our celebration of Christian events, we are demonstrating the fact that Christ is King of kings, and Lord or lords. Often, I will say that pagan symbols are quite appropriate because Christ has conquered and He who conquers is always free to use the spoils from those who have lost the war. (After all, we use mathematical principles like the Pythagorean Theorem all the time, and Pythagoras was a cultic nut-case).

But that isn’t what I want to say. What I want to say is this: Will you lighten up a bit? I think you’re causing Jesus to blush. If you must be so self-righteous, go do it in a cave somewhere. You’re blocking the light. I don’t say that, but I want to.

This is a long way “around the barn” to say something important: I hope you have a joyous and wondrous time this Christmas. It is my prayer that you rejoice and laugh and sing so much so that your Christmas parties make pagan parties look like funerals.

After all, we have reason to celebrate: God demonstrated His unconditional love for us that first Christmas. Christ has come, and we are forgive and loved. If we do that, innkeepers may even want to check out our party. And that would be a very good thing.

Wes

Revolve

2009-11-03T16:07:00.000-08:00

For centuries it was commonly believed that the earth was the center of the universe. Ptolemy proposed this idea, formally, around 140 AD. Then, in the year 1514, Nicolaus Copernicus proposed the idea of a heliocentric universe (the sun being at the center of the universe rather than the earth). His proposal consisted of a six-page, hand-written theory on the subject. This set off what is known today as the “Copernican Revolution.” Johannes Kepler then, taking his lead from Copernicus, developed the astronomical system of the universe that is accepted today.

In simple terms the ideas are these: First, folks thought everything—sun, moon, and stars, revolved around the earth; next, folks thought everything—the earth, moon, and stars revolved around the sun; and today, folks believe the sun to be one of many stars in a colossal universe, etc., etc.

So, why the science lesson? . . . It seems to me that the Christian life is often like this. We begin our walk with God as we come to recognize all that God has done for us—or, for “me.” I call this the “God-infatuation” stage, which, like romantic infatuation is largely self-centered; our walk with Christ tends to be “all about me.” It seems as though it’s all about God, but the focus is still mostly taken up with how I am doing in my walk with Christ. I become thrilled with all that my faith has done for me. And some of us (many of us?) get stuck right there—for years, and years!

But God calls us to discard this infatuation and move on to a mature friendship with Him. In a true friendship, it’s no longer “all about me.” It’s about partnering with God to build His kingdom. That means, first, being “fire-tested” and, second growing in ways that we are not naturally inclined to grow.

We have to have a spiritual “Copernican Revolution,” moving from a me-centered life to a God-centered life. Instead of focusing on our desire for God to answer our prayers, spiritual maturity leads us to faithfulness and service—God-centeredness, and others-focused.

When God calls us to Himself, He calls us to His church, to a purpose bigger than ourselves. This may sound shocking to some, but biblically, living for God means living for His church. A spiritual revolution occurs in the individual’s life when they finally take hold of this truth. We live a God-centered life; not a me-centered life. Rather than the believer being the sun around whom God, the church, and the world revolve in order to create a happy, easy, and prosperous life, God becomes the sun around which the believer revolves, a believer who is willing to serve, suffer—even be persecuted—and lay down his or her life to build God’s kingdom and serve God’s church.

The question is: Are we living a God-centered life? . . . Really? Or, are we still caught up in the me-centered life, and maybe don’t even know it?

I read about a man who thought he had planned the perfect date with his wife: “For Valentine’s Day,” he wrote, “I decided to take my wife out for a nice romantic dinner, and all she did was complain. Next time I want to eat at Hooters, I’ll go by myself.” . . . We can bring that same self-centeredness into our relationship with God. Much of what we say, or even think, we’re doing on God’s behalf is really being done for ourselves.

Ultimately, spiritual maturity is not about memorizing the Bible and mastering the spiritual disciplines. These are healthy things to do, but they are only means to a greater end, which in itself is learning to love God with God’s love and to serve God with God’s power.

So, look around you to see how your world works. Does God revolve around you, or do you revolve around God? A good place to look is to see who, how, and where you are serving . . . or, being served (as the case may be).

Wes

The Pleasure of Pride

2009-10-28T14:13:00.000-07:00

"The pleasure of pride is like the pleasure of scratching. If there is an itch one does want to scratch; but it is much nicer to have neither the itch nor the scratch. As long as we have the itch of self-regard we shall want the pleasure of self-approval; but the happiest moments are those when we forget our precious selves and have neither but have everything else (God, our fellow humans, animals, the garden and the sky) instead." C.S. Lewis

"Humility Follows God Like a Shadow"

2009-10-21T14:03:00.000-07:00

“Humility follows God like a shadow.” That’s how John Piper describes it (Future Grace, 85). That’s an astonishing thought. His point is that humility can only survive in the presence of God. When God goes, humility goes.

I think this gets to the spirit of our times. Take God out of the equation (science, politics, education, . . . church) and you lose humility. With the loss of humility comes a new god with new values. Man becomes his own god, and what follows are posturing and pride.

We see this pride in politics when those in power award each other prizes—not for accomplishments, but for “good intentions”—defined as those intentions that agree with a particular political viewpoint. We see it in Hollywood where actors award each other prizes for popularity. (See earlier post: “And the Oscar or Irrelevance Goes to . . . [2/23/09]).

You can hear the liturgy of this new god and the new worship in the posturing and pride of religious atheists. Pride and posturing drip from the pages of their books. And I don’t say this as an ad hominem. I say it simply because it is so. Alister McGrath, in his book, The Dawkins Delusion?, got it right:

“Dawkins simply offers the atheist equivalent of slick hellfire preaching, substituting turbocharged rhetoric and highly speculative manipulation of facts for careful, evidence-based thinking. Curiously, there is surprisingly little scientific analysis in The God Delusion. There’s a lot of pseudoscientific speculation, linked with wider cultural criticisms of religion, mostly borrowed from older atheist writings. Dawkins preaches to his god-hating choirs, who are clearly expected to relish his rhetorical salvoes and raise their hands high in adulation. Those who think biological evolution can be reconciled with religion are dishonest! Amen! They belong to the ‘Neville Chamberlain school’ of evolutionists! They are appeasers! Amen! Real scientists reject belief in God! Hallelujah! The God that Jews believed in back in Old Testament times is a psychotic child abuser! Amen! You tell them brother!” (11-12)

It follows, then, that pride is a form of unbelief. I’m thinking here of Henley’s Invictus as sort-of the pledge to pride and posturing.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my SOUL.

In John 6:35 Jesus said, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst.” Believing in Jesus means going to Him in order to be truly satisfied. Unbelief is turning away from Him in order to seek satisfaction in other things. And pride is, specifically, unbelief turning away from God in order to find satisfaction in self.

Pride is not so much the root as it is the essence of unbelief. And humility is the way back to right belief—the way back to God.

In the midst of cultural collapse, Jeremiah is God’s prophet, and in his crying out over the on-coming destruction of Judah, God says through Jeremiah: “They bend their tongue like their bow; lies and not truth prevail in the land; for they proceed from evil to evil, and they do not know Me,” (Jeremiah 9:3). There is only one remedy offered—humility: “Let not a wise man boast of his wisdom, and let not a mighty man boast of his might, let not a rich man boast of his riches; but let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the Lord who exercises lovingkindness, justice and righteousness on earth; for I delight in these things,” (Jeremiah 9:23-24).

G.K. Chesterton said: “What we suffer from . . . is humility in the wrong place. Modesty has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been exactly reversed. Nowadays [Chesterton was writing in 1924] the part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not to assert—himself. The part he doubts is exactly the part he ought not to doubt—the Divine Reason” (from Orthodoxy, Image Books, 1959, 31).

Atheism is simply a manifestation of pride. The safest way to be “master of your own fate” is to deny any other Master. C.S. Lewis said, “A proud man is always looking down on things and people: and, of course, as long as you are looking down, you cannot see something that is above you.” (from Mere Christianity). “The wicked, in the haughtiness of his countenance, does not see God,” says Psalm 10:4, “All his thoughts are, ‘There is no God.’” Ultimately, the proud must persuade themselves that there is no God.

Pride does not like the sovereignty of God. Therefore, pride does not like the existence of God, because God is sovereign. Atheists are those “who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,” (Romans 1:18). And Paul explains to us how this pride works: “For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools,” (Romans 1:21-22).

What is the answer to pride? Humility—real humility. I like to think of humility as “real reality.” Humility is a real look at self plus real trust (faith) in God. “Clothe yourself with humility toward one another,” wrote Peter, “for God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you,” (1 Peter 5:5-7).

Isaac Newton had it right: “I do not know what I may appear to the world but to myself I seem to have been only a boy playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.” We would do well to follow his example because “humility follows God like a shadow.”

Wes

Felix the Flying Frog

2009-10-08T10:26:00.000-07:00

I am indebted to Steve Brown of KeyLife Ministries for this parable.

Once upon a time, there lived a man named Clarence who had a pet frog named Felix. Clarence lived a modestly comfortable existence on what he earned working at the Wal-Mart, but he always dreamed of being rich. "Felix!" he said one day, hit by sudden inspiration, "We're going to be rich! I'm going to teach you to fly!"

Felix, of course, was terrified at the prospect. "I can't fly! I'm a frog, not a canary!"

Clarence, disappointed at the initial response, told Felix: "That negative attitude of yours could be a real problem. We're going to remain poor, and it will be your fault."

So Felix and Clarence began their work on flying.

On the first day of the "flying lessons," Clarence could barely control his excitement (and Felix could barely control his bladder). Clarence explained that their apartment building had 15 floors, and each day Felix would jump out of a window, starting with the first floor and eventually getting to the top floor. After each jump, they would analyze how well he flew, isolate the most effective flying techniques, and implement the improved process for the next flight. By the time they reached the top floor, Felix would surely be able to fly.

Felix pleaded for his life, but his pleas fell on deaf ears. "He just doesn't understand how important this is," thought Clarence. "He can't see the big picture."

So, with that, Clarence opened the window and threw Felix out. . . . He landed with a thud.

The next day, poised for his second flying lesson, Felix again begged not to be thrown out of the window. Clarence told Felix about how one must always expect resistance when introducing new, innovative plans.

With that, he threw Felix out the window. . . . THUD!

Now this is not to say that Felix wasn't trying his best. On the fifth day, he flapped his legs madly in a vain attempt at flying. On the sixth day, he tied a small red cape around his neck and tried to think "Superman" thoughts. It didn't help.

By the seventh day, Felix, accepting his fate, no longer begged for mercy. He simply looked at Clarence and said, "You know you're killing me, don't you?"

Clarence pointed out that Felix's performance so far had been less than exemplary, failing to meet any of the milestone goals he had set for him.

With that, Felix said quietly, "Shut up and open the window," and he leaped out, taking careful aim at the large jagged rock by the corner of the building. . . .

Felix went to that great lily pad in the sky.

Clarence was extremely upset, as his project had failed to meet a single objective that he had set out to accomplish. Felix had not only failed to fly, he hadn't even learned to steer his fall as he dropped like a sack of cement, nor had he heeded Clarence's advice to "Fall smarter, not harder."

The only thing left for Clarence to do was to analyze the process and try to determine where it had gone wrong. After much thought, Clarence smiled and said, "Next time, I'm getting a smarter frog!"

A number of years ago, I realized that I was, as it were, trying to teach frogs to fly. . . . Frogs can't fly. Not only that, they get angry when you try to teach them. The gullible ones will try, but they eventually get hurt so badly they quit trying. And the really sad thing about being a "frog flying teacher" is that I can't fly either.

Let me tell you a secret. If one is a teacher trying to teach frogs to fly, nobody ever bothers to ask if you can fly. In fact, if you pretend that you're an expert and tell a lot of stories about flying . . . ; if you can throw in a bit of aeronautical jargon about stalls, spins and flight maneuvers; and if you carry around a "Flight Manual" and know your way around it, nobody will question your ability to fly. You just pretend you're an expert and tell stories, and the students will think you can fly.

The problem is that you become so phony you can't stand yourself.

So I've repented.

Now I just send them to Jesus and try to get out of the way.

Wes

Wrongful Birth?!

2009-09-24T08:36:00.000-07:00

From Salvo, Autumn 09:

"Deborah and Ariel Levy of Portland, Oregon, did not want a baby with Down syndrome, so they instructed doctors to take a sample of tissue from the placenta to help them determine whether or not to have an abortion. Though the test came back negative, their child was in fact born with the developmental disability, and now the Levys have decided to sue the Legacy Center for Maternal-Fetal Medicine for burdening them with an unwanted baby. They are seeking more than $14 million to cover the cost of raising the little girl, plus an undisclosed amount additional money to cover her lifelong expenses. Legal experts agree that the couple will almost certainly win the lawsuit."

Wow! I don't even know where to begin with this one!

Christless Christianity and the Invention of iChurch

2009-09-15T12:45:00.000-07:00

Having just finished reading Michael Horton’s book, Christless Christianity: The Alternative Gospel of the American Church, I could not help but be a little disturbed. I found myself reflecting on my own values as a Christian, and whether they were Christian values or “baptized pagan” values I had put in place of God’s values. William Willimon sets the tone in his preface to the book, “We just can’t stand to submit to the machinations of the God who is determined to have us on God’s terms rather than on ours, so we devise a god on our own terms.” Is it true? Have we become a people who measure everything by our happiness rather than by God’s holiness?

Horton writes: “God is not denied but trivialized—used for our life programs rather than received, worshiped, and enjoyed.” He borrows a phrase from Christian Smith who calls this “Moralistic Therapeutic Deism” (MTD) which reduces God to a life coach, or a divine butler and cosmic therapist. And churches are established for consumers rather than for the glory of God.

My mind went racing back to all too familiar conversations I have had with “Christians” in the past. I’m sitting in my study when Barry and Rachel—a couple I had worked with for years (not their real names) stop by unannounced for a visit. “We’ve decided to leave MACC,” Barry says. “We’ve been church shopping for the past few months.” Church shopping—who knew there was such a thing? “We really love MACC. It’s been a great church for us over the years, but our children prefer the music/program/[you can fill in the blank] at First Church.” Having played the trump card “our children” Rachel sat back in her chair believing no further discussion was necessary.

“What will you do when the children are grown and gone?” I asked.

“I’m not sure,” says Barry. “Maybe we’ll come back to MACC.”

“I hope you don’t,” I say, meaning no disrespect. “I hope that you commit yourself to First Church—and by commit, I mean by the biblical definition, not the cultural one—that you establish real relationships this time, use your gifts, and participate in that church’s mission and that you could never see yourself leaving that church.” I really believe God can only grow us when we are truly, biblically committed to a community of faith.

We visited a bit longer. I prayed for Barry and Rachel, and watched silently and with sadness as they drove out of the church parking lot.

Christian critiques of consumerism usually focus on the dangers of idolatry—the temptation to make material goods the center of life rather than God. This, however, misses the real threat consumerism poses. As contingent beings, we must consume resources to survive. The problem is not consuming to live, but rather living to consume.

Barry and Rachel are intelligent, motivated, and as far as they understand, solid Christian people. I have no doubts about their Christian convictions. I do, however, have doubts about their own self-awareness. I suspect that they and many like them (including myself) are suffering from MTD. They don’t know it (and I don’t know it sometimes too), but they are living to consume. Their faith is no longer about sacrifice and surrender. They have chosen the easier path of comfort and consumerism.

Scripture never comes up in such conversations. “Did you pray as a family about this decision?” No. “Did you involve your small group or seek the wisdom of an elder in the decision?” No. “Did you investigate the church’s doctrine, history, philosophy of ministry?” No.

And they really can’t help it. They have been raised this way—captured by the culture, yet completely unaware of it. Personal enrichment and fulfillment of desire is the highest good. As a result, they chose the church that best satisfies their family's preferences without bothering to consult their community, the Bible, or the Holy Spirit to gauge the legitimacy of those desires. After all, in consumerism a desire is never illegitimate, it is only unmet.

Roger Finke and Rodney Stark, co-authors of The Churching of America, 1776-1990, argue that ministry in the U.S. is modeled primarily on consumerism. Faith, like the buying of material goods, became a matter of personal choice. And “where religious affiliation is a matter of choice, religious organizations must compete for members and … the ‘invisible hand’ of the marketplace is as unforgiving of ineffective religious firms as it is of their commercial counterparts.”

First Church is way bigger than MACC and offers a variety of services—for worship, children, youth. And MACC can’t compete with that. Ironically, Barry and Rachel had come to MACC years earlier from a smaller church. What goes around, comes around.

In consumer Christianity, however, church leaders function as religious bartenders, supplying spiritual goods for people to choose from based on their preferences. Our concern becomes not whether people are growing, but whether they are satisfied. An unhappy member, like an unhappy customer, will find satisfaction elsewhere.

According to George Barna's book, Revolution, 20 million Americans are no longer satisfied with the options available at institutional churches. Instead they're “choosing from a proliferation of options, weaving together a set of favored alternatives into a unique tapestry that constitutes the personal ‘church’ of the individual.” We see this manifested in the “home church” movement.

It’s the logical conclusion of consumer Christianity: iChurch.

Any resentment I had toward Barry and Rachel quickly fades. Like many others at my church, they were simply doing what they had been formed by American culture to do. I may as well be angry at a fish for swimming. The truth is I failed them. I failed to teach them that the core values of consumerism are incongruent with the Christian life. That making choices to satisfy immediate personal desires is not the goal of life.

The church does not exist to supply comfort, ease, and convenient services to religious consumers. And God is not a commodity that exists to make you feel better.

Perhaps I failed Barry and Rachel because I was too busy being a spiritual bartender rather than a protective pastor. Whatever the reason, because of my failure, that responsibility now rests with the leaders of First Church.

And I resolve to repent of my own iChurch tendencies and to be a better pastor, next time.

Wes

Trip to Crater Lake

2009-08-26T08:25:00.001-07:00

On Faith and Family

2009-08-24T08:54:00.000-07:00

I just had to put up this telling quote from Rebecca Hagelin:

"There is a pattern here and it will not change as long as we don't recognize that our little girls are being used. The mass marketers of Hollywood hype know that today's youth spend some 200 billion dollars a year of their own money on trinkets, music and all the accessories that go with it. They also know that pre-teen girls are easily manipulated and that more than anything else, want to be popular as they grow into young adults. So, they discover cute, talented young girls, make them superstars by playing on your daughter's dreams of glitz, and morph the 'wholesome' starlets into trampy sex stars as they grow older, hoping to take the dollars of your girls with them. ... History repeats itself. You know what happened to teen idol Britney Spears. America's little girls and their moms swooned and spent millions on Britney fashions. However, just as the Britney wannabes reached critical mass, the star's light started to short circuit. Her sexy ways quickly turned into bizarre behavior, drug problems and a raunchy attitude. Not to worry, High School Musical's Vanessa Hudgens was there to take her place. But just as Vanessa hit her zenith in the eyes of our little girls, nude photos and other sexual revelations about her captured the headlines. Down came Vanessa and up went the posters of the twinkling, sparkly Miley Cyrus. Now Miley has made the transition to tramp too. And millions of preteen girls have, once again, been manipulated into believing that being trampy is not only normal, but is the only way to succeed. It's time for moms to wake up and protect our little girls from being used. Find other moms who are sick of the abuse -- it only takes a few friends to create your own sub-culture within the madness of the crazy pop culture. Finding allies is one of the most effective ways to fight back and win."

Culturally Prescribed Racism

2009-07-16T14:59:00.000-07:00

Today America’s Black culture is under attack as it never has been in the past. I don’t mean to sound alarmist, but the facts are clear. And, it’s not even a conspiracy. It is out in the open. It is transparent. There are three reasons why we do not see this plainly. The first is that we are so caught up in our own immoral “purple haze” that we refuse to see how our own rationalization of moral sin is killing us. We abort babies so we can have our sex without consequence. Second, we have drunk so deeply from the well of science that social engineering is considered business as usual. Killing in the name of progress seems justified. And, third, we have elected a black president to preside over this national holocaust.

I’m not making this up. Consider these statistics from www.blackgenocide.org:

• Between 1882 and 1968, 3,446 Blacks were lynched in the U.S. That number is surpassed in less than 3 days by abortion.
• 1,452 African-American children are killed each day by abortion.
• 3 out of 5 pregnant African-American women will abort their child.
• Since 1973 there have been over 13 million Black children killed and their mothers victimized by the U.S. abortion industry.

Our Supreme Court is in on the action. And I’m not just referring to Roe v. Wade. In an interview that was published in Sunday’s New York Times Magazine (July 5, 2009), Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said she thought the landmark Roe v. Wade decision on abortion was predicated on the Supreme Court majority’s desire to diminish “populations that we don’t want to have too many of.”

As Mark Alexander, publisher of the Patriot Post, points out: “This comment was not some senile blunder from an aging jurist noted for nodding off during High Court deliberations.” No, indeed, these words are establishment terms that our government has been dealing in for decades. Justice Ginsburg is simply returning to the texts of our modern social engineering era kicked off by Margaret Sanger the atheist social activist who established the American Birth Control League, today known as Planned Parenthood.

One of Sanger’s major objectives was what she termed “The Negro Project,” an attempt to eliminate the black population, or what she called “unwanted ethnic breeds.” Her proposal? Sterilization.

Mark Alexander put it together well: Sanger asserted that ministry to the poor, a fundamental tenet of Christianity, is responsible for excessive numbers of “unwanted” ethnic breeds. “Those vast, complex, interrelated organizations aiming to control and to diminish the spread of misery and destitution and all the menacing evils that spring out of this sinisterly fertile soil, are the surest sign that our civilization has bred, is breeding, and is perpetuating constantly increasing numbers of defectives, delinquents, and dependents. My criticism, therefore, is not directed at the failure of philanthropy, but rather at its success. These dangers are inherent in the very idea of humanitarianism and altruism, dangers which have today produced their full harvest of human waste.”

Ah, yes, “human waste.”

Sanger characterized the poor as “human weeds, reckless breeders, spawning . . . human beings who never should have been born.”

And now of most recent note, our new president has set in place John Holdren as our new director of the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy, and he also will serve as the co-chair of the president’s Council of Advisors of Science and Technology. . . . So what, you say? This is the so what: FrontPage Magazine did its homework on our president’s new advisor. As it turn out John Holdren is the radical, freethinking heir of Sanger. Writing with Paul and Anne Ehrlich, Holdren says: “there exists ample authority under which population growth could be regulated.” Hiding behind the passive voice, they note, “it has been concluded that compulsory population-control laws, even including laws requiring compulsory abortion, could be sustained under the existing constitution if the population crisis became sufficiently severe to endanger the society.” (Emphasis added.) To underscore they mean business, they conclude, “If some individuals contribute to general social deterioration by overproducing children, and if the need is compelling, they can be required by law to exercise reproductive responsibility” (This material taken from Paul Ehrlich, Anne Ehrlich, and John Holdren, Ecoscience: Population, Resources, and Environment (San Francisco: W. H. Freeman and Company, 1977, pp. 837–838). Moreover, if the United States government refuses to take proper measures, they authorize the United Nations to take compelling force.

Who would have thought that our first black president would wittingly or unwittingly be complicit in one of our nation’s greatest moral failures, the abortion/murder of an entire category of people deemed inferior only due to their skin color, by a president of similar origin no less?

In 1931, futurist H.G. Wells wrote of Sanger's ideas, “The movement she started will grow to be, a hundred years from now, the most influential of all time. When the history of our civilization is written, it will be a biological history, and Margaret Sanger will be its heroine.”

Apparently, Obama's director of White House Office of Science and Technology Policy is prepared to do his part to sustain Sanger's legacy. Welcome to our Brave New World.

Just Thinking

Wes

The State of Compassion

2009-07-14T15:59:00.000-07:00

I live in Oregon (been hear about a year and a half). Oregon is the State of Compassion. How do I know? Well, in Oregon we are a compassionate community of people who respect the rights of individuals. If a person wants to raise and use marijuana, the mayor of Eugene (my particular city) will support but not endorse your decision by showing up at a pro-legalization of marijuana rally. (She supports rather than endorses, though she never quite got around to defining the difference). And if you become disabled for your lack of brain cells from said marijuana, not to worry. We will “redirect the assets” of productive citizens to pay for your disability so that you can, I suppose, further disable yourself.

Yes, we are the State of Compassion. Our state was the first to legalize assisted suicide. So, if you decide you no longer wish to live because of some vaguely defined disability (maybe too much marijuana?), our doctors are fully expected to write a prescription to help you remove yourself from life. We are the State of Compassion where “death with dignity” is a core value. We are the State of Compassion thriving on a culture of death.

You don’t believe me? Consider the case of Barbara Wagner (now deceased). Barbara, sadly, had recurrent lung cancer. Chemotherapy is an option that would extend her life, but not cure the cancer. Barbara asked for the chemotherapy treatments. However, Barbara was dependent on the state for her healthcare. And, such treatments were deemed too costly by the state “for the limited extra time” it would likely provide. But never fear! We are the State of Compassion. So, the government informed Barbara that when she was ready, we (the State of Compassion) would gladly and with compassion pay for Barbara’s assisted suicide.

See what I mean? We are the State of Compassion. We care. We will not compassionately extend your life, but we will happily end your life. (The "evil" drug company stepped in and offered its treatments free of charge. Those evil drug companies, how dare they!)

An isolated glitch in the state’s wheel? No, not really. As with Barbara’s case, other such “glitches” have slowly begun to be uncovered. Randy Stroup, suffering from irreversible prostate cancer received a similar letter. The State of Compassion became, I guess, less compassionate, and reversed its decision when he took his story to the press.

I realize that many are in favor of PAD (“physician assisted suicide”) because they do not want to be a burden to family or society, they do not want to suffer, and they want to be in control of their destiny. I understand that. However, theologically, I also understand that my life is not my own. It belongs to the One who made it and will return to the One by whom it was made, and it seems to me, should be done so on His terms, not mine. But that aside, it seems that our State’s actual practices in its compassionate care of those who are dying clearly reflects the materialist values of our Nation of Compassion.

So, come to the State of Compassion. We care so much, we will even kill you if you want us to.

Something to think about,

Wes

The Challenge of Following Our Awesome God

2009-05-06T14:15:00.001-07:00

I have been doing "sermon research" on the challenges of truly following our Awesome God. I've been challenged like never before to examine and repent of my own lifestyle, choices, etc. I must say, following Jesus all the way is daunting, demanding, and amazing.

As I'm preparing for this series I find myself borrowing, stealing, plagiarizing (duly footnoted) material from some great young Christian writers like Mark Buchanan (The Rest of God), Francis Chan (Crazy Love), and Eric Ludy (The Bravehearted Gospel). These young guys with amazing ministries do not appear to be at all affected by the post-modern nonsense that has become the latest Christian fad. I can hardly wait to get my hands on Tullian Tchividjian's new book: Unfashionable: Making a Difference in the World by Being Different. These guys along with "older" writers like John Piper, Steve Brown, and others are really challenging Christians to rethink what it means to be a disciple. I'm excited for the series and can hardly wait to start writing the sermons.

Wes