Stuff Out Loud

Thoughts on the Elephant Room

2012-01-26T13:16:00.001-05:00

A friend recently asked me on Twitter if I was going to the Elephant Room, and why (or I suppose why not, depending on the answer to the first question). Rather than try to cram it into a DM on Twitter, I decided to answer here.

The answer is “No, I didn’t go,” though late last week I re-tweeted a tweet offering free airfare, entry, and lodging to a randomly drawn winner. I was willing to win and actually go because I think it would be interesting on several different fronts, even though I intentionally live in a far different theological and ecclesiastical world than most of those participating.

(I say “most” because I can’t speak for all of them, since I don’t know who all is there. And I am perfectly willing to let them answer to God for wherever they stand.)

But I didn’t win. So I didn’t go because, in addition to not winning, (1) it’s too cold to play golf in Illinois right now (though it would be cheaper than the entry fee to ER), (2) it’s expensive, (3) it takes me away from my family when I would rather be home, and (4) a couple more reasons given below.

To start off, let me say that I like the idea of the Elephant Room (ER). Getting men in the same room to interact face-to-face about their differences is a great idea. Participants could present their positions, discuss them, ask questions, and answer questions, give nuance, correct misrepresentations, etc. No more making stuff up.

We see far too many people addressing caricatures of others’ positions. I have seen blatant lies, half-truths, and subtle (or not so subtle) innuendo offered in the name of “taking a stand.” It needs to stop. It needs to be repented of. By all sides.

Sitting down together to talk about differences is not sinful. It is not partnership or fellowship. In fact, it gives the chance to explain why one is not a partner. It provides an avenue in which biblical obedience can be carried out because we are talking directly to people about where we believe they are wrong rather than talking about them. In such a context, we can challenge the position of others. It may not be wise in every situation (though it may be in some), but it is not sinful in every situation either (though it may be in some).

However, I think ER is too narrow in its scope to be of great value. All of the participants come from a fairly narrow stream of modern, American, Christianity. This one branched out a bit (perhaps even outside of Christianity, a problem in and of itself), but it was still pretty narrow. IMO, getting a bunch of guys to challenge each other who already agree for the most part isn’t all that engaging, helpful, or interesting, at least not for the amount of money it would take to get there.

If you want a good ER3, get Driscoll, Chandler, Hybels, MacArthur, Dever, Trueman, and me.

Okay, leave me out. But get the other six. And then actually ask tough questions and allow discussion.

The challenges I saw in the clips from ER1 were rather weak, IMO. So I didn’t have high hopes for this one.

Those hopes were not surpassed if the reports I read from yesterday’s ER2 (Trevin Wax, Tim Schraeder) are accurate. They seem to show that challenges were virtually non-existent this time.

And it raises the question: What is the point of having differing viewpoints in order to challenge each other if no challenges take place?

The most direct challenge I recall from the notes was in the exchange between Driscoll and Graham over the topic of how many churches were actually planted in Haiti, and how many would be around in five years. It’s a good question, and should have led to more interaction about the nature of church and the gospel, particularly in third world countries. Driscoll could have even pointed out that there were no nationally known pastors in Haiti, and someone could have challenged him on that because he certainly needs to be.

But the number of lasting church plants in Haiti seems a rather small matter compared to the prosperity gospel and Word Faith doctrine of T. D. Jakes which apparently went unmentioned, and even his views on the Trinity were not really hashed out much. Apparently it’s all cool because Jakes says there is “very little difference” between Driscoll and him on the Trinity (as Wax reports). Driscoll’s closed-handed issue of complementarianism didn’t even come up.

The number of churches in Haiti after five years also seems small compared to the Code Orange revival which apparently was mentioned only by Furtick in a reference to baptizing his son. What was going on there? Why did you think that was going to bring revival? What is revival? How would we get it and how would we know it if it actually showed up?

The number of churches in Haiti after five years seems small compared to the resignation of MacDonald from the Gospel Coalition council while fellow ER participant Crawford Loritts remains on the council. Now there’s an elephant in the room. Why didn’t anyone challenge that? What actually happened? Why does MacDonald think TGC is wrong?

Where were the prophetic voices to speak into this?

You have a group of men known for being bold proclaimers of truth, writing books, and calling out all manner of stuff. Yet here they suddenly came down with lockjaw?

Why? Scared of being called haters in Furtick’s next video?

Scared of pulling the main post out of the big tent and causing a gigantic crash of the ER?

MacDonald didn’t have any problem taking a few shots at fundamentalism. Why not take a shot at the prosperity gospel? Why not take a shot at the circus church mentality? Why not take a shot at the crudeness of Driscoll?

This failure is interesting to me. And concerning.

And it’s why I am not enamored with the ER. And it’s why I didn’t go.

So to sum it up, while I thought ER2 would be interesting, I didn’t think it would be worth the time, money, and effort to go. Now, my reading confirms that I made the right choice for me.

Were it free and local, I would probably go. Were it cheap and local, I would be tempted because I find the conversations interesting, and I don’t mind getting out of the office in the winter time.

But as it stands, it is too broad in who it calls Christian leaders, it is too narrow in perspectives represented, it lacks real challenges to issues of significance, and it costs too much money to offset any of those problems.

So I didn’t go.

So what do I make of hosts MacDonald and Driscoll?

Actually, not much. And what I mean by that is not pejorative. I just don’t think about them much. It’s like the pastor who asked his pastor friend, “What are they saying about me over there?” The answer came back, “Nothing. They’re not even talking about you.”

Neither one, in fact no one on this panel, has particular influence in my present sphere of ministry. I doubt one person connected to my church would know them. So I don’t think about them very much.

I do think there are some significant concerns on some issues of real substance, Driscoll in particular, which demonstrate that they do not serve a vital role in public ecclesiology and theology. I wouldn’t recommend them or their ministries as models to be emulated.

We can learn from them, and indeed should. In fact, we should learn both good and bad from them, and there is some of each.

I will rejoice in people that are saved and lives that are changed. But that won’t alleviate my concerns.

I don’t need them to be faithful to the task to which God has called me and therefore I don’t think about them.

And I don’t feel compelled need to drop a half a grand on entry fees, hotel, food, and travel to go hear them.

The Lasting Impact of Church Preaching

2012-01-23T11:05:00.001-05:00

Out of Ur has an interesting article today on “The Religious View of 20-Somethings.” You can read the first two parts to catch up to this one.

The particularly notable part of this article is at the end:

Very few of my students could identify any way religion might impact their daily lives, specifically their future personal and professional goals. Even the students who consider themselves committed Christians failed to recognize what difference their faith made, say, in their marriages or careers. They could point to superficial things—like wanting to be married in their church, which meant they had to marry a fellow Christian—but couldn’t go much deeper than that.

This is troubling. I suspect some will blame preaching and teaching that doesn’t focus on life application. But I’m not so sure. I wonder if the problem is actually too much emphasis on the practical. Evangelicals have had a tendency for the last twenty years or more to distill the Scriptures into five-principles-for-happy-marriages and three-promises-for-raising-great-kids. If we spoke of the Christian life more in terms of the inner life—spoke of the Holy Spirit’s work of transformation, of the pursuit of godly virtue, spiritual gifts and fruit, etc.—if we truly focused on growing Christians, and not just good citizens, maybe our young people would have an easier time identifying how their faith affects the rest of their lives.

Around the Horn

2012-01-20T06:57:00.001-05:00

Here’s a good article on evangelism. It reminds me of an old idea called the 3x5 rule, the idea of which is to contact five people a day, or 35 a week (for those who are math-challenged) with the goal of getting three sit down meetings to talk about the gospel. People who talk about evangelism but don’t talk to unbelievers about the gospel are not serious about evangelism.

Here’s a good article on heavy-handed leadership. Unfortunately, this is the default for many, and not just in fundamentalism. Leaders have to be bold, but humble. As I tweeted recently, you can’t lead if you aren’t willing to disappoint and even infuriate people, but do not do it lightly. Too many leaders have an arrogance that they know it all. They are unwilling to let people differ with them.

Here’s a good post by Sean Lucas on the age-old homiletical question about the difference between preaching and teaching. He says,

“Whereas my major goal in lecturing is information, my major goal in preaching is transformation. And because this is the case, I don't feel the burden to give people as much information as possible; rather, I feel the burden to give people the information necessary about the text so that they will see the connections to their own lives and be moved to seek God in Christ as a result. Application is the major focus of the sermon.

I think he is right here. Pastors, don’t fall prey to the tendency to tell everything you know about a text. It makes you long, boring, and confusing. Since there is a rather large chance that your congregation doesn’t need to know there are four interpretive options for something, just tell them what they need to know in order to do what God has said. Save the rest for a teaching time, such as a midweek Bible class. My general rule is that if an interpretive option is obvious in the text or shows up in the translations that I know people carry, then I give a brief word about it. Otherwise, I just say what I think it says.

Lastly, a few posts on David and Goliath have been making the rounds recently. Matt Chandler kicked it off with this explanation. Over a year ago, I posted my take on David and Goliath here. I think Chandler’s view is moralizing—a sanctified moralizing since he put Jesus on the front of it, but moralizing nonetheless. You can read a few other takes here and here. I think Jesus is clearly and obviously in the OT, and I think we should preach that way. But I think Chandler is headed down the wrong path.

And as a bonus, what in the name of anything good and decent was Chandler doing at Furtick’s Code Orange Revival. That was disappointing.

A Little Story

2012-01-16T07:54:00.001-05:00

There was once a poor man who wanted a million dollars.

He had the opportunity to get fifty-thousand dollars.

He refused because he wanted it all.

So the million dollars went to someone else.

And he got nothing.

On Changing the Name of a Church – Part 4

2012-01-13T06:00:00.000-05:00

Previous articles: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

In considering our name, we need to consider our philosophy of church growth. In the last article, I talked about how a name attracts people who already know what it means, and repels people who don’t, or at least repels people who have a certain conception of what it means.

I wonder if part of the problem here is an underlying belief that churches are built (at least in part) by trading sheep, so when someone dissatisfied with the Baptist church down the road starts looking, let’s have “Baptist” in our name so they will come to us. If we don’t have “Baptist” in the name, they may go looking somewhere else. (I am not just speaking hypothetically here. This statement has actually been made before.)

It is a view that may have merit, but there are some concerns. First, the lesser concern is this: If they are dissatisfied down there, what will they be two years from now at our church? Maybe fine. And maybe not.

The greater concern, in my mind, is this: What about the people who are unchurched? Why should we be more concerned with dissatisfied believers than with unconverted people?

I know there is some debate about how much the church should be sensitive to unbelievers in our community.

The truth is that I want unbelievers coming to our church, and not just once, but week after week. I believe in the converting power of the gospel consistently preached. I believe that if we expose people to the clearly taught word of God week after week, it will have an effect. And if some unbeliever will come to our church for six consecutive months, I will take my chances with that because I know that over six months, they are going to hear the gospel preached week after week as the Scripture is preached both to believers and unbelievers. That doesn’t mean I design services for unbelievers. It means that I expect unbelievers are going to be there, and I am going to address them at some point (or usually at several points) during the service.

When we are considering our community, we need ask the question, Are people, unbelievers particularly, more likely to visit our church if it does not have the name “Baptist” in the church name?

If the answer is Yes, then we should strongly consider that in establishing or changing the name of the church.

Some people charge that removing a label such as “Baptist” is a matter of honesty and integrity, like we are hiding who we really are in order to get people to come in. I don’t think this is necessarily true since there are a lot of things about our churches that do not show up on our signs, things that are part of our core identity.

For instance we are committed to the inerrancy and complete authority of the Bible as God’s revelation. That means, among other things, that we are cessationists who use a modern version. This commitment is, in fact, prior to our Baptist commitment simply because being Baptist arises out of being committed to the Scriptures. Yet nowhere in our name is that commitment or its implications held out.

By not having “ICABGRACWUMV” on our sign, are we hiding who we are in an attempt to get people in? Hardly. Yet when someone comes to our church, that is exactly what they will hear. And it is what they will see in our doctrinal statement.

The fact is that when someone comes to our church, they are coming to a Baptist church regardless of what’s on the sign. And they are going to hear and see the gospel regardless of what’s on the sign. And if they come long enough, they are going to be taught Baptist polity and doctrine as the Scriptures are unfolded.

Having a label, or not having a label, won’t change any of that for us.

And having a label, or not having a label, won’t change anything else either. So if you have bad preaching, or bad breath, or unfriendly people, or bad music, or a dirty and smelly facility, it will all be the same.

So before changing your name, try to figure out what the actual problem is at your church.

In conclusions, each church should think carefully before removing (or adding) a denominational label to their church name. There are a host of factors to be considered, such as community, area churches, strength of church tradition, whether or not the label is actually a barrier, etc. And the only way you can assess these things is by careful thought and study.

A pastor and the leadership team of the church must work very carefully through these issues before dropping a denominational label. It may be a good thing to remove a label, but it should not be entered into hastily.

If you have denominational commitments, then don’t be afraid to own them. You don’t have to do it in a sign, and in fact, it may be wise not to. But your guiding documents should clearly state what you are, as should your new members’ orientation or your membership classes.

Concerns about Missional

2012-01-10T08:40:00.001-05:00

While the idea of missional ministry has some strengths, there are some legitimate concerns. The Tall Skinny Kiwi (Andrew Jones, whom I found to be a very gracious person in some interaction some years ago) highlights one of these for us today, only for him it’s not a concern.

But I think it should be.

He says,

But now it's 2012 and while some young, enthusiastic people are out there planting churches like its 1997, others are focusing on launching more sustainable, more holistic, more measurably transformational Kingdom solutions.

One of the biggest trends in church planting that I observed in my recent 30+ country trek is the SHIFT AWAY FROM planting churches towards NOT planting a church at all but focusing on a wider range of transforming Kingdom activities. Some church planters are delaying the worship service piece of the pioneer missional ministry for as long as possible and sometimes indefinitely. (Emphasis his.)

Much could be said about this, and I will resist that temptation, at least here and now.

But it raises the question of why didn’t the apostles and disciples in the first century focus on “launching more sustainable, more holistic, more measurably transformational Kingdom solutions”?

They thought they were supposed to plant churches. And so they did.

Indeed, it is very instructive (or at least it should be) that those who walked with Jesus, heard his preaching about the kingdom, learned from him how to live and preach, witnessed his death and resurrection, and received his commission first hand went out to plant churches.

They didn’t think Jesus was calling on them to focus on “launching more sustainable, more holistic, more measurably transformational Kingdom solutions.” I am sure Jesus could have called them to do that. But he didn’t.

No, they thought Jesus was telling them to plant churches.

One of the concerns that many have had with the missional movement, and in fact one of the key issues inside the missional movement, is the relationship between church and kingdom, between gospel words and deeds. I won’t rehearse all that history here.

Suffice it to say that the NT model of ministry is not “launching more sustainable, more holistic, more measurably transformational Kingdom solutions” than the church.

The NT model of ministry is planting and growing churches.

There are a lot of ways to do that, and it can look a lot of different ways. But in the end, it is churches that Jesus has called us to plant and build, to be a part of and to serve.

Any model of Christianity that does not have local churches at its center is a defective model of ministry, even if it looks like people are getting helped by it.

Andrew goes on to say in the comments that “the word "church" is tricksy [sic] so i apologize for any confusion, but i am using it here to refer to the typical worship service attractional strategy that most church planters employ to start and grow their church.” He later clarifies it even more, along the lines of the “Church Inc.” mentality.

But I don’t think that helps. I think there are some problems with the way people plant churches on both the attractional and the missional end. But the answer to that is not to not plant churches in favor of “more sustainable, more holistic, more measurably transformational Kingdom solutions.” The answer is to plant churches the right way.

And attractional will be a part of that, as will missional. (Which reminds me I should get back to that series I started a long time ago.)

By the way, as an aside (or perhaps an addendum), this is why the doctrine of the kingdom is actually important. If we don’t know what the kingdom is, or mistake it for something it’s not, we end up pursuing things like Andrew talks about here.

It’s pretty much in vogue for views of the kingdom to take a back seat, and I think this is the ultimate end of that. It’s why I think we can’t relegate eschatology to the back pew. I am not saying it needs to be in the front pew. But it matters.

Whosoever Means Whosoever

2012-01-09T11:57:00.001-05:00

In December I was treated to another complementary copy of a fundamentalist newspaper. On the front page, just about the fold, is an article by the editor entitled “Whosoever Means Whosoever.”

As you might suspect, the article sets out to show a supposed flaw in Calvinism.

Now, I don’t write to convince you of Calvinism. I don’t really care one way or the other.

I write about it here because I know that some, maybe even many, are convinced by the kind of argument that is put forth by this author.

I write to warn us all of bad arguments, and of the danger that comes from the misuse of Scripture.

Even if the author is right in his belief about salvation, he is wrong in how he uses the Bible to try to prove his point. And that’s the worst problem.

Follow me here.

He says, “In an attempt to show themselves more knowledgeable (smarter) than the rest of us …” (Why did he have to define “more knowledgeable” as “smarter” for his readers? Does he not think they are smart enough to know what “more knowledgeable” means?)

But I digress.

He says, “In an attempt to show themselves more knowledgeable (smarter) than the rest of us some folks, including the Calvinists, garb their ideology in the robes of a misguided scholarship. With something that is so clearly defined by the Bible itself, it is necessary for Calvinists to work the academic angle so that the spurious doctrine they espouse will not be immediately dismissed.”

What follows in the article are twelve examples of the use of “whosever” in the Bible (at least the version he uses).

He concludes by saying “Whosoever in the Bible literally means all of us—red, yellow, black, and white; tall, short, rich, poor, young and old alike! … ‘Whosoever’ just simply means ‘whosoever’!”

However, when we take a quick glance at the twelve examples, not a one of them means “all of us” without exception. All the examples (“all” here really means “all”) contain a qualification.

For instance, Proverbs 20:1 speaks of “whosoever is deceived is not wise.” Solomon is not saying “all of us” are not wise. He is saying that the “not wise” people are all of a certain group—those who are deceived. So it is not referring to “all of us—red, yellow, black, and white; tall, short, rich, poor, young and old alike!” It is only talking to that portion of “all of us” who are deceived by wine and strong drink.

Matthew 7:24 speaks of “whosoever heareth these sayings of mine.” Here again, it is not referring to “all of us—red, yellow, black, and white; tall, short, rich, poor, young and old alike!” It is referring that portion of all of us who hear the words of Jesus, and probably here it is not referring to the aural experience, but those who receive and believe Jesus’ words.

And all the examples he gives contain the exact same problem. The “whosoever” is defined by the text of Scripture as a group with certain characteristics.

Yet the author omits from his argument those parts of Scripture which tell us who the “whosoever” is. He fails to read and explain the words in their contexts.

And, on top of that, he doesn’t even accomplish its goal of showing Calvinism unbiblical.

The Bible says in John 3:16 that “whosoever believes will have everlasting life.”

Here, “whosoever” does not refer to “all of us—red, yellow, black, and white; tall, short, rich, poor, young and old alike!” In the verse, it refers to those who believe.

And every Calvinist that I know believes that “whosoever believes” will have eternal life. Every single one of them. No one who believes will be refused eternal life. That is standard Calvinist theology and has been for two thousand years, long before it got Calvin’s name attached to it.

You see, John 3:16 is a promise of actuality: All who believe will have eternal life. Every single one of them.

The question that this author should be addressing is why some people believe and others do not. That, in my opinion, is the real crux of the issue.

So friends, be cautious of spurious scholarship that fails to actually deal with the words of God in his Bible. Strong speech and dogmatic preaching are no substitute for saying what God says, not even when it’s on the front page of a newspaper.

Refuse to be a Calvinist, if you wish. God will let you do that.

But don’t make bad arguments, even in a good cause.

A Good Word About Being Against Things

2012-01-03T18:42:00.000-05:00

Here is an article on The Danger of Defining Yourself by What You Are Against that is well worth some consideration.

Unfortunately, it's the kind of thing that I fear a lot of people don't see in themselves. They are too busy saving the world from what they are against that they do not realize what they have become.

It's a good reminder to be cautious.

It’s That Time of Year Again

2011-12-31T15:22:00.001-05:00

Yes, all over the blog world, it’s that time of year when bloggers all over have been posting their “Best of 2011” posts. They are linking to their most read, most commented, most favorite, and on-and-on.

It reminds me of my own ”best of” post from just about a year ago. I thought it was a pretty obvious parody of a widespread practice, a practice that I have no problem with. But I thought I would have a bit of fun with it last year.

However, shortly after that post appeared, word got back to me about a certain pastor who labeled my post “childlish [sic] and unpastoral behavior” towards a particular person. It was called an “ungentlemanly approach to discussion [that] is beyond the perview [sic] of Christian practice” and an “abandon[ment] Christian principles of argumentation.” On top of that it was called “vicious and childish.”

Pretty strong words for a parody piece.

Here’s the funny thing: My post wasn’t even directed towards a particular person, but to a common practice of a number of people.

Here’s the bad thing: Not one of these comments was directed to me. It could have been cleared up in sixty-second phone call, or a short one-paragraph email. I could have directed this pastor towards any one of a couple of dozen blogs with a “best of” post of some sort that would have shown what I was talking about.

But I never had that chance.

You see, rather than emailing me or picking up the phone and calling me to find out what it was about, or even just ignoring it, this pastor jumped to conclusions and then made these fairly harsh comments about me to others.

My suspicion (based on some others things that were said) is that he had first listened to gossip by someone else, and rather than shutting it down and telling the other person that he would have no part of it, he listened to it and believed it. In the words of Proverbs, “he answered the matter before he heard it.”

On the one hand, it didn’t bother me all that much because I knew the truth about it, and I think many others did as well. Plus he doesn’t answer to me, nor I to him. So I kind of laughed about it.

On the other hand, I don’t like this kind of misunderstanding and I certainly don’t like the kind of personal comments that were made.

So when I got word about what this pastor had said, I picked up the phone and called the guy to try to straighten it out person-to-person. It was an easy fix. Or at least it should have been.

Would it surprise you to know that this guy refused to talk to me and never returned my call?

I would like to say I was surprised, but I wasn’t. I am not much of an idealist anymore. I have been around long enough to know how these things turn out. I know how often people find it easy to throw around attacks without basis, and then refuse to deal with things straight up, person to person. They are unwilling to even consider that they, or the people they have believed, may have been wrong. It’s the MO of far too many people.

The blogosphere has made this attack culture both easier and harder at the same time. It’s easier because you can spread the word faster and wider. And it’s harder because people can see the truth for themselves, and there are always going to be people who know more than you do, particularly about their own words.

So why do I write about it now?

Because I am reminded of the bad way that people tend to handle things, people who should know better. I started to say “handle problems,” but it wasn’t even a problem. It was a silly parody post that led to personal attacks behind someone’s back for no reason other than ignorance. He just didn’t know the truth and didn’t bother to find it out. He immediately thought the worst.

As we close one calendar in favor of another, let us all resolve to pursue a better way.

Don’t jump to conclusions, particularly bad ones, especially when you don’t even know the person you are talking about.

Remember that there are some things you might have missed.

Remember that hearing one side of the story is always dangerous because it is frequently biased.

Remember that you might be wrong, or might be being mislead by someone else.

And having remembered this, temper your response.

To be honest, I haven’t lost any sleep over it because it wasn’t that big of a deal to me. I think of it now only because of the plethora of “best posts of 2011” that are peppering the blogosphere.

And the memory makes me chuckle a bit.

I know I have made my fair share of blunders and sins in the blogosphere. I write as one who has been grieved over some things I have said, or the way I have said them, and when I have, I have tried to own them and deal with them righteously.

I have no personal axe to grind with this man. I don’t know this pastor personally, and I rejoice in the apparent fruit of his ministry.

But I wish he would have found out what it was about before trashing me to other people.

Let’s all learn to desire the truth before we speak. And to hold our tongues when we don’t know.

Brooks' Three Rules for Pastoring

2011-12-28T13:49:00.000-05:00

"These three rules seem to have in them the practical sum of the whole matter. I beg you to remember them and apply them with all the wisdom that God gives you. First. Have as few congregations as you can. Second. Know your congregation as thoroughly as you can. Third. Know your congregation so largely and deeply that in knowing it you shall know humanity."

Cited in Rummage, Planning Your Preaching, 175.

Rummage on Expository Preaching

2011-12-27T17:59:00.003-05:00

"Some pastors who preach through books make the mistake of loading their messages with irrelevant details about the background of the passage or the technicalities of the biblical language. This turns the sermon into a dry commentary on the text rather than a living and dynamic explanation and application of the Scripture. Such preaching is monotonous and hard to get used to. In fact, no pastor should force his congregation to become accustomed to such boring preaching."

Stephen Rummage, Planning Your Preaching, p. 78

On Changing the Name of a Church - Part 3

2011-12-21T08:42:00.001-05:00

See previous articles: Part 1, Part 2

Another reason why a church might change their name is to try to remove perceived barriers to the gospel. This is most often the idea behind the dropping of denominational labels. There is a belief that denominational labels are a barrier to people who do not self-identify with that denomination. Thus, the label becomes a stumblingblock other than the gospel.

Is this true? Well, it’s undeniably true in some cases. These are anecdotal cases to be sure, but true nonetheless. But is it true in all cases? Who knows.

What makes it difficult to study this issue meaningfully is the fact that there are no two identical churches in identical communities, one with a denominational label and one without. There is no church that both has the label and does not have the label. Even if the churches are substantially similar, they have different pastors, different members, different gifting among the members, different guests, different locations, etc. And even if everything was the same except the name, that won’t tell you anything about your church and location. So any studies are always comparing non-identical things.

The best way to study the big picture is probably to ask questions of a lot of people in a lot of different places, even though responses to denominational labels probably differ from place to place. Ed Stetzer’s has done that and found that the name is at least a factor for SBC churches, particularly for younger people. How big a factor? Again, it is hard to tell. More importantly all of Ed’s questions won’t tell you anything specific about your ministry context. And in order to minister in your community, you need to know your community.

And you need to know yourself and your motivations. Why are you doing this? Of course, people around you will be quick to chime in and tell you why you are doing it, and you need to think carefully about it.

For some critics, dropping a denominational label is an automatic sign of compromise and deception, of hiding who you really are in order to attract more people.

For some proponents, dropping a denominational label is a no-brainer. In fact, someone (who works for a major Baptist organization) in identifying me as a “fundamentalist” said, “Do you still have Baptist in your name?” When I answered affirmatively, he said, “Well there’s that,” with “that” meaning the label Baptist was a sign of being a fundamentalist.

Now, make no mistake. I am a Baptist by conviction. I am a Baptist because Jesus said to be one (and remember, he only blessed babies; he didn’t baptize them).

Okay, so that’s (only) a bit tongue in cheek. But I am a firmly committed Baptist. And I don’t lower my voice when I say that. And our church name is still Grace Baptist Church. And I am Baptist enough to believe that a local congregation has the sole authority to determine what name their church goes by.

But the reality is that there are a lot of people who see a label on a group or building, and they have no idea what the label means, but they know it’s not them because if they were one of those they would know it. This is common in our Baptist churches. People see the name “Lutheran” on a church, and they have no idea what Lutherans believe or do, but they know they aren’t a Lutheran. The chance of getting them into a Lutheran church is slim-to-none, so long as the label is on the building. Is that good or bad?

Others see the label and they do know what it means, at least in their minds. So “Baptist” means Fred Phelps to them. Or “Baptist” means the churches who have pedophiles, or buses blowing horns outside their window on Sunday morning at 8:00 a.m. when they are trying to sleep. Or “Baptist” means their grandmother’s church that was whacky to them. And they want nothing to do with any of that.

And who can blame them. I don’t want anything to do with any of that either. (Which is a good reason to be a Baptist; I don’t have to have anything to do with it.)

What is keeping these people, humanly speaking, from hearing the gospel isn’t the cross or the call of Jesus. It’s the name on the sign that they associate with certain things. They are judging a church based on something that has nothing to do with you.

Is that what you want? I don’t.

I don’t want people who God has called us to reach to reject us simply because of a denominational label that they may not understand.

And that is part of the core issue in this consideration: Who are we trying to reach? I imagine that, for most people, denominational labels only mean something to people who are already “in.” They mean little to nothing to the unchurched.

That means if someone is a Baptist already, having “Baptist” in the name may be more attractive to them (though I confess it would not matter to me). Newcomers to the community may be looking for a particular type of church and will look no further than the label.

But we have to ask the question: Has God called us to reach people who already agree with us?

If they answer is no, then we need to ask what, humanly speaking, is keeping us from reaching the people God has called us to reach.

Religious Irony

2011-12-17T20:44:00.001-05:00

On the night in which Jesus was arrested and tried, the Jews sent Jesus to Pilate, but refused to enter Pilate’s palace so as not to defile themselves before the Passover.

How strange that such religious ritual was persuasive to them.

They could kill the Son of God on the basis of lies and injustice without defiling themselves, even though their law forbade it. But God forbid they come to close to the Roman government. (John 18:28-38)

Are we scarcely much different?

Are we persuaded that our own religious rituals buy us indulgences against greater blasphemies?

This and That

2011-12-08T06:57:00.001-05:00

Here’s an article on music. He probably says more than he intends to. But it is interesting. And while I am on this topic, I recently watched a bit of a teaching session Bob Kauflin did on music. During this session Kauflin plays a number of samples to illustrate his teaching. At one point, he plays a song in a particular style to make a point. His point? That the style he was playing at that moment didn’t match the words or message of the song at that point, and it should be played a different way. And I thought to myself, that’s what the “conservatives” say … that certain styles of music or presentation do not match certain messages in the lyrics and are therefore inappropriate vehicles for the song. It seems to cede the point that music is not neutral.

Challies writes on book reviews. The whole article isn’t that interesting (unless you were wondering why he doesn’t do as many books reviews anymore). What is interesting are his comments about “sheer repetition.” I tend to agree. Christian publishing seems like a huge market.

Last week, for the first time in who knows how long, I wrote out a sermon outline by hand. What a joke that was. It was very hard since I couldn’t go back and add something in, and I am not sure I can actually read it because the lack of handwriting means I can’t write legibly.

And it leads me to this question: Would we have nearly the number of books if we didn’t have computers? If people still had to write out manuscripts by hand, would the Christian publishing industry be where it is today?

I don’t know. But I do know that a lot of book titles I see seem to be very similar. They seem almost too easy to produce.

Here’s an offering from megachurch pastor Steven Furtick. It reminds me of a couple of things, one of which is that not everyone is gifted to rap, and if you don’t have it, you should get someone in your church to frequently remind you that you don’t have it so you don’t do stuff like this. It also reminds me that those who criticize haters are doing the very thing they don’t like. For people like Furtick here (and elsewhere), they don’t want to be criticized, but they don’t mind criticizing others. The good news is that Furtick says, “I feel completely confident as I move forward. And you should too.” Well, that’s good. So if I feel completely confident in criticizing Furtick, is that okay?

Furtick is evidence that we live in an age of narcissism and boundarylessness, and the only sin is actually employing your mind to think about issues of the day, and perhaps even to disagree with someone who is “successful.”

And speaking of criticism, here’s an article criticizing criticizers. Again, it’s ironic to be sure. Apparently criticizing someone who denies inerrancy in some way is a bigger sin than actually denying inerrancy in some way. The fellow in question I don’t know and have never heard of. But it appears the main argument is that this guy wrote a good book and tells people about Jesus so we can’t say anything about his views on inerrancy. I think that’s a dangerous position to take. So I am criticizing the criticizer who criticizes criticizers.

In general, I think we need to be very cautious with criticism. Just this week, I have read some almost absurd criticism, the type that makes you think someone is playing a joke on you. But I doubt it.

We need to remember that each of us stand and fall before the Lord. But we also need to remember that one of the gifts of the body of Christ is the kind of fellowship that should step in with confrontation and correction when we go off the rails.

I think inerrancy is pretty big. In fact, even ETS who doesn’t even require you to be an evangelical (strangely enough) requires you to believe in inerrancy.

A Word about Women

2011-12-06T10:09:00.001-05:00

In Galatians 4, Paul uses two women to talk about two covenants, and he qualifies it by saying “This is allegorically speaking” (Galatians 4:24). This passage is sometimes used to show how the NT uses the OT non-literally.* It is therefore used to give license to the modern interpreter to also use the NT non-literally.

Have you ever thought about why Paul said, “This is allegorically speaking”?

Might it be because had he not qualified it, no one would have caught it?

Had Paul’s method been as standard as some would have us believe, there would be no need to say it. But because Paul was doing something out of the ordinary, he said it in order to keep the readers from treating the text literally, just like they were accustomed to doing.

So far from a license to use the OT non-literally, it is actually a reminder not to use it non-literally.

_______________________________

*“Literal” means normal, as opposed to literalistic. Literal recognizes the use of figures of speech, but recognizes them as figures of speech.

Watch Your Head

2011-12-05T11:40:00.001-05:00

Two “when pigs fly” news stories today:

BJU Board Approves Pursuit of Application Process for Regional Accreditation

BJU to Participate in Intercollegiate Athletics

IMO, these are good things.

Except for the added air traffic.

It could get messy so watch your head … and your step.

Around the Horn - Football Edition

2011-12-05T09:33:00.001-05:00

A list of the fifty worst NFL coaches highlighted Josh McDaniels, a name that Bronco fans will recognize (though no one else will because he was coaching Denver). As an interesting side note, the list revealed that somehow there are four coaches worse than Rod Marinelli, something even Rod Marinelli was probably surprised by.

But most notably, this writer says that “Tebow could easily wind up the biggest bust of the 2010 draft.”

Oops.

Cuz’ Tebow did it again yesterday. Pretty amazing. The Broncos are now 6-1 under Tebow, having been beaten only by the Detroit Lions.

Speaking being beaten by the Detroit Lions, the Lions managed to even beat themselves last night. What a joke. They were flags flying like it was July 4th, and there were a few fireworks. I kept looking for the barbeque grill. And the flags were (almost) all well deserved. The only thing missing from that game was a “running into the punter” foul.

But fortunately for the University of Michigan, that call got made on Saturday night when MSU got the short end of the stick. Typically, when a player is blocked into the punter that call isn’t made, and that player was clearly blocked into the punter, who might get an Oscar nomination this year for that dive. But other than that, it was a great game.

While I have no love lost (or gained) for anything in Big 10 football, simply because I just don’t care, I think MSU was robbed there. But if Kirk Cousins had made a throw or two on the previous possession, that call is no issue, which is usually the case. If you take care of business for 59 minutes, one minute won’t hurt you.

And since MSU lost, the BCS has done its magic once again. Typically, I think the top of the BCS usually does a pretty good job at getting the two best teams. I don’t know if they did this year. I think Oklahoma State has a good case, especially after the hurtin’ they laid on Oklahoma Saturday.

The egregious part of the BCS was the selection of Michigan for a BCS bowl. What a joke. Michigan did not even win their division. They are at least the third best team in their own conference, and have two losses only because they didn’t play Wisconsin and they didn’t play well enough to get into the conference championship.

In fact, Michigan only beat one ranked team all year (#17 Nebraska). Michigan barely beat ND, scoring 28 in the fourth quarter, and scoring with two seconds left to win 35-31. MIchigan also barely beat a very bad Ohio State team, giving up 34 points. How they ended up in the BCS is almost criminal, except it doesn’t really matter. The Sugar Bowl passed over four higher ranked BCS teams to get to Michigan.

Did MSU deserve that spot? Perhaps not, but hardly anyone thinks Michigan deserved it, probably not even Michigan fans who are not typically known for clear thinking anyway. They are among the biggest homer whiners in the country. I think even the die hard Michigan fans would find it hard to keep a straight face while arguing that Michigan deserved that bowl bid. Certainly no one around them would keep a straight face listening to them try.

No, Michigan got the bid based on the old bowl rules, namely, “Which team will bring a lot of fans and a lot of money?”

Hey folks, you can’t have it both ways. If you want the BCS to have meaning, then stand against this kind of stuff. The presidents aren’t listening, but hey, talk anyway. If you want this kind of stuff, then go back to the old way.

Michigan fans were all upset when they didn’t get a rematch against OSU in 2006, even though they lost what amounted to a tournament game the week before when they knew what was at stake. They hated the BCS then. I doubt we will hear that kind of whining from them this though.

It’s hard for one football team to get robbed twice in the same weekend, but MSU did. They got punished for for being blocked into the kicker, and then they got punished for making, and barely losing, their conference championship game.

Should we have a tournament in college football? I still say no. Let’s go back to the old way. Let bowls do what they want.

And end college football on January 1.

All for now … And keep those Doritos close by during bowl season, because we all need some exercise while watching football.

Books on Proverbs

2011-11-17T09:03:00.001-05:00

I just finished a short series of messages on the book of Proverbs entitled “Solomon Says.” It was a topical series designed around exploring the wisdom that Solomon gives. It included titles like “Solomon Says Listen to Me,” or “Solomon Says Get Busy” (work), or “Solomon Says Drink Your Own Water” (marriage and sexuality), or “Solomon Says Watch Your Mouth” (the tongue), or “Solomon Says Get a Grip” (emotions), or “Solomon Says Be Careful” (money).

In this series, I came across a couple of new books, and reviewed some old ones.

Anthony Selvaggio’s A Proverbs Driven Life is an excellent book I ordered on a whim because it was on sale. It is good not just for preaching or teaching, but also for general reading. Anyone would profit from this book. I recommend it.

John Crotts’ Craftsmen: Christ-Centered Proverbs for Men also had some helpful sections in it. This, like Selvaggio, is organized topically, though a few less topics than Selvaggio.

H. Wayne House and Kenneth Durham’s Living Wisely in a Foolish World is a good resource, though it is a bit more dense than these other two, and IMO, not as easy to read.

I continue to think that Peter Steveson’s A Commentary on Proverbs is one of the best verse-by-verse treatments of Proverbs. The downside is that it uses the KJV as its primary text cited at the top of each page, but the upside is that it seems that it actually closely tracks the NASB in its explanation. Unlike some other commentaries (e.g., Hubbard, Communicator’s Commentary), it deals with each verse sequentially, so if you want to know what Proverbs 18:13 means, you can find it easily. It is more helpful than Kidner (TNTC), IMO.

A final book for this list is Donald Orthner’s Wellsprings of Life. It is essentially a topical outline of Proverbs, assembling various proverbs under their topics. It is not sequential, but topical. It is helpful in that it helps to find verses on a topic that might not be found by a concordance search.

Around the Horn

2011-11-04T13:42:00.001-04:00

At first base, the Gospel Coalition has a good article today about Calvinism and the gospel. I warn you, however, don’t read it. It was ruin all your arguments against Calvinism.

I am convinced that most people reject Calvinism, not because of overwhelming biblical arguments, but because (1) they listen to what the opponents of Calvinism say about Calvinism (they are usually wrong), and (2) they watch how Calvinists live (which isn’t all that different than how ~~Arminians~~ non-Calvinists live. We both tend towards disobedience.). Neither is a particularly good way to learn about Calvinism. If someone asks me how they should learn about Calvinism and the gospel, I say just read the Bible. It has all you need to know.

At second base, speaking of Calvinism vs. Arminianism, one of the common refrains from people is “I am neither.” A couple of interesting articles by admitted Arminian Roger Olsen dispels that notion. He says,

I wish the Baptist Arminians would quit running from the word. Frank Page claims he’s neither a Calvinist nor an Arminian. I heard that all the time among Baptists in the South especially. And the only reason for it is a wrong impression of what it means to be Arminian. As I have demonstrated in Arminian Theology: Myths and Realities, one can be fully and authentically Arminian and believe in inamissable grace (so-called “eternal security”).

Here’s an self-professed Arminian saying, “You believe what I do.” So quit running from the label. It won’t change what you are.

Rounding third base, Todd Rhoades posts this letter on church discipline. He calls it a nightmare and says it is a tad bit off edge, though he doesn’t say why. Perhaps it is because, as the first commenter says, this church is saying that the man is not a Christian. I wouldn’t say a person isn’t a Christian. I would say, and have said, that a person has no reason to have assurance that he or she is one so long as they continue in this pattern of unrepentant sin. After all, isn’t that what church discipline is? Church discipline is saying that a person is not acting like a Christian and in fact, those whom he covenanted with have no valid reason to consider him as a Christian. Men with more heft than me, like Mark Dever and Dave Doran, have said essentially the same thing. Perhaps it is a wording thing. The church is for people who carry the marks of Christianity to at least some degree in their lives. No one expects you to be perfect. As I often say, I have no problem with people who struggle. It’s the people who don’t struggle that I worry about.

The home run today is the new 9 Marks E Journal on Church Revitalization. I am interested in this since I have lived this life for about thirteen years. As I told someone recently, thirteen years ago I had no real direction or idea about what I was getting into. I didn’t know people who had done it. I wasn’t familiar with books or e-journals on it. I am not even sure I recognized how great the problem was. I sure didn’t know what to do. I had the “Field of Dreams” approach to church. If you preach it, they will come. They didn’t. So I have learned a lot on the fly, and perhaps some day I will write my own thoughts about it here at Stuff Out Loud. But for now I will read this with interest.

And today, a curtain call for John Acuff at Stuff Christians Like who reminds us that “you don’t need a plane ticket to be distant from your family.”

Around the Horn

2011-10-28T09:06:00.001-04:00

You aren’t supposed to laugh at pregnant women, but this is pretty funny. (HT: Challies).

Stetzer is on to something here. “Issue Christians” are rarely able to be taught, and are usually bad for a church that that is not an issue church. It’s possible for sincere and faithful Christians to differ on some issues (some, not all). It is usually impossible to work together. You don’t have to be ugly. Just help them find the door.

Here’s a good site for those who want to know what’s in books, but don’t have the time to read them. Of course, it’s only good if these books are ones you want to know about. But it might trigger your interest to read one of them. I have found some of them helpful.

And in honor of the Detroit Tigers, we are going to end with a triple, because they couldn’t seem to get people from third to home against the Rangers. And that’s all they needed. It reminds us of one of the fundamental truths of life that we would all do well to keep in the front of our minds: Leaving people on third is a good way to go home before the World Series.

But I am going to get out of the gate early for next year, and predict that the Tigers will win between 50 and 120 games, and finish somewhere in their division.

And when it happens, you can remember you heard it here first.

All for now …

Thoughts On the Death of a Friend

2011-10-15T18:16:00.001-04:00

When the phone rings at 7:30 am on a Sunday morning, it is supposed to be someone calling to tell me they won’t be at church to make coffee, or to teach their class, or to play an instrument. Those things I can fix. It’ll be inconvenient, but I can deal with those.

That phone call is not supposed to be the brother of one of my best friends telling me bad news. That I can’t fix.

I was totally unprepared. Stunned. Speechless. It never crossed my mind until the moment I heard the words.

“Passed away.”

It seems so innocuous when you say it that way.

But it’s not. It’s death. It’s final. And it seems so premature.

Forty-two years old. Yes, sick, for a decade. Violently sick at times. But only forty-two.

Surely I had misunderstood. After all, the tearful, breaking voice on the other end was hard to understand and my mind was in another world, getting ready to sing and preach, to lead worship for our local body of Christ. Perhaps it was a dream that I would wake up from. Perhaps a clarifying phone call would come soon.

As Sunday wore on, the comments piled up on Facebook and the phone remained silent, and it became clear there was no misunderstanding to be clarified, no dream from which to be awakened. There were no more phone calls.

It was death.

People I know don’t die at forty-two. Those stories are someone else’s. You read about them in a newspaper. And when you read of a forty-two year old husband and father dying, it is sad; it is sobering.

When it is your friend, there are no words for it. There’s just a dull fog. There’s numbness. There are tears that come of their own accord.

I am forty-two. We hurt sometimes. But we don’t die. Not yet.

We are in the prime of life. We are stable. We have lives. We have houses. We have families. We have careers. We have a future.

Now, all we have are memories. And there are a lot of them, to be sure.

Years ago, it was sports, band, classes, girls. (Not necessarily in that order, mind you, and that should ease the minds of both the girls and the teachers.)

We used to play tennis until midnight. We played golf until we couldn’t walk anymore or at least until we couldn’t see anymore. We shot hoops on the rim over the garage door. We played duets at church. We double dated. We worked at camp together. We ministered in church together.

What memories.

They are filled with laughter and joy. Sometimes tears and frustrations. Now and then, sorrow and pain. We walked through some dark days back then. But far more good than bad.

More recently, separated by seven hundred miles, we were reduced to phone conversations. But they were regular, though not as often as I would have liked in retrospect. I just thought we had more time.

We talked about family, church, school, theology, people, ministry, houses, cars, kids, discipline. Then more theology, preaching, church philosophy, pastoral leadership, youth group, teenagers. Then more theology. And round and round we went.

You name it, we talked about it.

Right up until that last Tuesday night. Just five days before Sunday.

When we hung up after more than an hour and a half, I had no idea it would be the last time.

It wasn’t supposed to be. We had more to say to each other. We had more problems to solve. We had more messages to prepare and run by each other. We had more stories to tell about the kids.

We also had Wednesday morning that we had to get up for, and it was late, so we said, “Goodbye.”

We said, “Talk to you later.”

We should have said, “If the Lord wills, we will talk later.”

You see, sometimes God has plans he hasn’t vetted with us. And those plans always seem to win over ours.

And this was one of those times.

Our hearts cry out, “Why?” With millions of people in this world with no care for God, who have abandoned their spouses and children, why my friend? Why do they have good health? Why do they live on? Why do they prosper? They hate the Giver of all good things, and yet the Giver gives them another day.

Why would one who loves God have their life cut off at forty-two? Why would one who loves God have to bury their spouse at forty-two? Is there no worse person in this world? Is there no better candidate for early death?

There are no answers.

Not in this life anyway.

The preacher, Solomon himself, with all his wisdom couldn’t find an answer. He said all this is vanity. It’s puzzling. It makes no sense. So walk carefully. (Ecclesiastes 7:15).

The one thing that softens the impact of answerless questions is the unchanging and sovereign love of God for his people. He who did not spare his own son but delivered him over for us all, how will he not with him freely give us all things? (Romans 8:32).

Yes, freely give all things, even when it seems he is taking them away. Yes, freely give all things, even when the pain seems unbearable.

Surely He will not abandon us now. He already gave His Son for us. What greater commitment do we need?

Oh yes, there is also the promise that our God is in the heavens doing whatever He pleases (Psalm 115:3). And this, as much as it troubles us, was pleasing to God or He wouldn’t have done it.

Yes, yes, He is the one who did it. And I think my friend would agree with me. Especially now.

While that is unsettling for some, if I thought for one minute that God was up in heaven earnestly desiring to hold back the powers of death from His child, my friend, but ultimately unable to, I would never preach again. I would have nothing good to say about a God who is so loving as to not want people to die a physical death, but so impotent as to be unable to stop it. What assurance can such impotence give of a future resurrection and hope? That would be a God unworthy of the very lives we wish to preserve. That would be the doctor who was in the ER that night. He meant well. Tried hard. Did all he could do. But fell short.

Worthy of thanks and gratitude, to be sure. But worthy of worship that bows down and offers a life? Surely not.

Last Sunday, God, for reasons sufficient to himself in his providence and wisdom, declared the life journey of my friend to be completed.

He decided it was time to free my friend from the shackles of this broken world, and the chains of his broken body.

And so, last Sunday, God called him. He said, “Come. It’s time. You’ve had enough.”

And he was gone.

And that, dear reader, is grace to my friend. And it is, in some measure, grace to those who suffered with him, who cried when he hurt, who now rejoice that his broken body no longer toys with his daily comfort and even his very existence. He is in heaven, and his broken body is destined for glory.

The good news is that when we hear for ourselves the voice of God saying, “Come. It’s time,” and we join my friend in eternity, the answers won’t matter anymore. The questions will not even be thought of.

Jesus will shine far too brightly for such concerns that weigh so heavily now. And the suffering and sorrow and tears and pain and death so prevalent in this age will have passed away. God will wipe every tear from our eyes. All things will be made new (Revelation 21:4-5). And with clear, unclouded vision, we will see the Savior who makes this life worthwhile. And we will join my friend and the rest of the redeemed in singing, “Worthy is the Lamb.”

And that brings a smile in the dark. It brings an end to hopelessness.

But for now, in the second full week of October, 2011, we are brutally reminded that life can be short, its end unexpected.

We are reminded of the brokenness of life in a world filled with sin.

We are reminded that there are no guarantees of tomorrow.

And we are reminded, as Pastor Mann so clearly stated yesterday, that while relationships in life are important, the only relationship that really matters is the one that you have, or don’t have, with Jesus Christ.

Being a good man, as my friend was, is great as far as it goes. It just doesn’t go far enough.

Being friends with a good man, as many of us were privileged to be, is a true blessing in this life. It makes life easier to live and to enjoy. But it will not fix our deepest problems.

Only Jesus can do that, and Jesus did that when he died and rose again.

My friend had that relationship with Christ. He believed Jesus, and so he followed Jesus. That relationship changed his life so greatly, and it challenged me constantly.

It reminds me that the gospel of Jesus Christ that has changed us now calls for continual transformation.

My friend was the willing and continual recipient of that transformation. And it showed.

On Thursday night, hundreds lined the hallway at the funeral home, snaked back and forth, and then stretched out the door while they waited to see the family. They had been affected by that transformation.

Yesterday, more than five hundred gathered at Lebanon Baptist Church because they knew my friend and were the benefactors of God’s grace through his transformation.

And so we said goodbye.

We carried his body to a sloping hillside. Pastor Mann read Scripture. He prayed. And then the crowd dispersed.

I waited at the cemetery, with just a few others, watching until the red dirt thudded onto the casket with the dull sound of earthly finality.

And then I drove away in silence.

Heaven is a little bit closer today, and a little sweeter. Earth is a little more foreign, and and a little more empty.

I miss you already, old friend. Except you weren’t old.

I loved you, though far too little. And I thank you for loving me. We walked through a lot of life together—good days and bad. And one day we will walk in the sunshine of glory together because of Jesus.

I know others love you and miss you more than I do, and with good reason. They shared a home and a life with you. And my heart hurts for them. They are my friends too.

My heart hurts for a grieving wife, widowed way too early.

My heart hurts for two young children, who will grow up with only a heavenly Father. In His grace, surely He will be enough for them. He said He would be.

My heart hurts for parents and a grandmother, for in-laws. They are supposed to be on the other side of the casket at family funerals with their grown children, grandchildren, and even great-grandchildren greeting friends and loved ones on their behalf. Parents aren’t supposed to bury children. But sometimes, that’s what happens in a broken world.

My heart hurts for a church family, along with these loved ones, who will miss the daily conduit of God’s grace that was my friend.

But my heart finds joy in the great promise of God that one day all things will be made new. We will be freed from this broken world and made inhabitants of a new heaven and new earth where righteousness dwells, and where death has met its final match. And this because Jesus lived, died, and rose again.

Until then, let us walk faithfully, if only ploddingly, in the footsteps of our Jesus, our Savior, and in the shadow of those who, like my friend, have gone on before.

Let us trust, as my friend did, that Jesus has done everything to make us acceptable to God, just as Jesus did for my friend.

Let us, along with my friend, embrace the gospel of Jesus, with all that it entails, and live for the next world because this one will be over.

And it may be sooner than expected.

It Is Not Death to Die

2011-10-10T07:49:00.001-04:00

It is not death to die
To leave this weary road
And join the saints who dwell on high
Who’ve found their home with God
It is not death to close
The eyes long dimmed by tears
And wake in joy before Your throne
Delivered from our fears

O Jesus, conquering the grave
Your precious blood has power to save
Those who trust in You
Will in Your mercy find
That it is not death to die

It is not death to fling
Aside this earthly dust
And rise with strong and noble wing
To live among the just
It is not death to hear
The key unlock the door
That sets us free from mortal years
To praise You evermore.

Malan/Bethune/Kauflin

Some Thoughts on Life

2011-10-09T08:54:00.001-04:00

Life is a gift from God, but for some, it ends way too soon, at least from our perspective.

Forty-two is too young.

Sunday morning is too sudden.

The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away. Blessed be the name of the LORD (Job 1:21).

Blessed be the name of the Lord, even in tears and grief.

Do not boast about tomorrow, For you do not know what a day may bring forth (Proverbs 27:1).

A Word Worth Hearing

2011-10-04T09:14:00.001-04:00

There is an Athenian love of novelty abroad, and a morbid distaste for anything old and regular and in the beaten path of our forefathers. Thousands will crowd to hear a new voice and a new doctrine without considering for a moment whether what they hear is true. There is an incessant craving after any teaching which is sensational and exciting and rousing to the feelings. There is an unhealthy appetite for a sort of spasmodic and hysterical Christianity. The religious life of many is little better than spiritual dram–drinking, and the “meek and quiet spirit” which St. Peter commends is clean forgotten (1 Pet. 3:4). Crowds and crying and hot rooms and high–flown singing and an incessant rousing of the emotions are the only things which many care for. Inability to distinguish differences in doctrine is spreading far and wide, and so long as the preacher is “clever” and “earnest,” hundreds seem to think it must be all right, and call you dreadfully “narrow and uncharitable” if you hint that he is unsound!*

This is a good word for this day, when people are amused and aroused by circus performers, standup comics, and musical shows masquerading as church.

It’s a good word where numbers and passion are the indicators of leaders that we should honor and esteem.

It’s a good word where creativity is a key part of church philosophy of ministry, where arts and media teams seem among the most important feature of preparation for the weekend services of a church.

It’s a good reminder that manufactured success is not lasting success.

It’s as good a word today as it was more than a century ago when J. C. Ryle wrote it in Holiness.

So, to channel the words of Paul, be careful how you build the church. It doesn’t belong to you. (1 Corinthians 3:10-17)

Random Thoughts on the Elephant Room

2011-10-01T12:33:00.001-04:00

I watched some of the first Elephant Room and found it intriguing. I think it is a good idea. Getting people together to explain their own view and then challenge and be challenged on it is a good thing.

I think the selection of people for the first one was way too monolithic. It was, for the most, megachurch pastors who agreed by and large about church and ministry. There was no real challenge on some of the core issues about theology and ministry philosophy. Mixing in Trueman, Horton, MacArthur, or someone like that would be interesting.

I think this is one type of forum where I think some latitude on associations should be granted since the whole point is challenge and confrontation. These men are invited to create tension and controversy, and to challenge each other. More of that is needed, not less. So if the participants speak up against Jakes to his face, that is a good thing, not a bad thing.

To the point of controversy, MacDonald made a big mistake inviting Jakes as a “Christian leader” (or as anything else for that matter). MacDonald made a worse mistake by defending it. He should withdraw the invitation immediately, and clearly affirm that denial (or at best obfuscation) of the Trinity by a Christian leader is a compromise of the gospel.

This isn’t a matter of unintentional confusion by Jakes. Driscoll is right that the ear is more forgiving than the eye; we all say things that are wrong or ill-considered at the time. But Jakes does not fit into that category. He has a publicly available doctrinal statement that is heretical. It appears that he has been given numerous opportunities to clarify his views and he hasn’t. If you are going to have a conference of Christian leaders, then the bottom line should at least be set at being a “Christian” leader. In

Driscoll says this is close-handed matter of Christian orthodoxy. He is right. He also says we should let Jakes speak for himself. Hasn’t he? What else does he need to say?

But on to a bigger point. Driscoll is pretty smart. And doesn’t mind confrontation. He revels in it and creates it. So why not confront MacDonald on this?

Mark, if this is a matter of orthodoxy (as you say), and if Jakes has denied it (and you make a good case that he has), then your friend MacDonald has just affirmed a heretic as a Christian leader. Why give your friend a free pass? Perhaps you have challenged James privately, and I hope you have; but you publicly backed him when you could have at least said nothing publicly and challenged him privately to withdraw the invitation. I am not saying you should rip him publicly. But public affirmation?

Lest you think this is just the musings of a rabid fundamentalist, many have publicly commented and expressed their disatisfaction with MacDonald’s choice. Thabiti Anyabwile raises not just the question of separation regarding Jakes, but the question of secondary separation concerning MacDonald. It is a valid consideration and interesting coming from a member of the Gospel Coalition (TGC) council.

TGC is now in a tough spot. One of its council members is apparently affirming either that a fundamental doctrine (the Trinity) is not necessary to be a Christian, or that he can’t understand how and why Jake’s explanations are inadequate. Either problem is serious.

So what will the Gospel Coalition do? MacDonald is not someone who merely signed up and attended the conference. This is a plenary speaker and a council member. I hope there is some private challenge and strong urging to MacDonald to withdraw this invitation. If that is refused, I hope there will be a call for MacDonald to step down.

This is the question raised by many, including Iain Murray in the Unresolved Controversy. As Mark Minnick puts it, what are you going to do when someone reaches outside the box? MacDonald has reached outside the box. Now what will his friends do? Driscoll gave him a pass. Others have criticized, both privately and publicly. What next?

For the others invited, this is a one-time gathering intended to be confrontational. If Dever, Driscoll, Graham, and others are willing to confront Jakes and pin him down, then I have no problem with them going. But they better speak up.

Some Thoughts on Pastoral Theology

2011-09-30T21:37:00.001-04:00

John Piper has an article in Christianity Today on racism, his personal story, and the gospel. The line that catches my attention most is this one, near the end:

I am not a good example of an urban pastor. Because of the way I believe God calls me to use my time, I don't have significant relationships with most of my neighbors. Nor does our church reflect the diversity of this neighborhood.

There is diversity, but nothing like the statistics above. Probably I could have been far more effective in immediate urban impact in this neighborhood if I had not written books or carried on a wider speaking ministry. Some thank me for this ministry, and others think I have made a mistake. Again, you may see why I cherish and cling to the gospel of Jesus.

The reason this line sticks out at me is because of the pastoral theology built into it. I think many seminarians would like to pattern their ministry after Piper’s.

I think they are misguided.

Even if Piper was right to do what he did in his ministry (and I am not questioning that), most seminarians and pastors are not gifted that way. The sooner we realize that, the freer we will be to be and do what God has called and gifted us to do.

The better path to pastoral ministry is the one Piper didn’t take—the one that builds significant relationships with people, does the work of an evangelist, and knows and love those who live in your neighborhood.

Carl Trueman has a related post, related at least in my mind. He quotes an letter or email sent to him this week, and concludes with this:

These people need to realise that, in the current context, if you come preaching a message which doesn't draw attention to yourself, doesn't make your name a brand, doesn't pull in huge crowds and doesn't bring in the big money, there's only one thing that they will do to you.

They will crucify you.

This continues the theme of my previous post, namely, that most of us are just going to be ordinary pastors. And that’s okay.

We aren’t going to build megachurches after starting with two stray dogs and a dead cat. Our congregations will not double every six months. Our entire church budget will probably be less than a congressman’s salary. And most years we will fall short of that congressman’s salary

And that’s okay.

We are going to work hard, preach faithfully though probably not very eloquently, and get to know the people in our church and our neighborhood. We are going to cry with them with they grieve and rejoice with them when they dance. We will welcome their babies, marry their children, and bury their parents. We will weep over their marriage troubles and pray over their major surgeries. We will be able to scan the congregation on Sunday morning and see who’s missing. And we will do all this because we know them.

And that’s okay.

We won’t be invited around the world to speak to large crowds. No one will ask us to sign their Bibles afterward. We won’t have our own section in the bookstore. We will never even get published.

And that’s okay.

We will carry out the charge given to a man hardly anyone has ever heard of. In fact, if I didn’t give the man’s name, you probably wouldn’t even be able to tell us who he was.

This man was told:

"Take heed to the ministry which you have received in the Lord, that you may fulfill it." (Colossians 4:17).

And if we do that, it will be okay.

Thabiti and Me on Multi-Site

2011-09-28T15:05:00.001-04:00

“Thabiti, what arguments for multi-site have you found persuasive?” My articulate response: “Uh, none.”

Thabiti Anyabwile enlarges on the reasons why he is unconvinced about multi-site churches here.

I agree with him for the most part, which no doubt means nothing to him. And very little to you. But I thought I would say it anyway.

This article highlights my concerns with the celebrity culture and maybe even ego (as the poster mocks) in the modern day church world. There seems, among the multi-site model, the idea that a church in X city cannot grow by means of a local pastor-teacher. We need to transmit the Big Guy in to teach and leave the little stuff to someone local who can’t preach all that well, but can pray with the sick and take up an offering.

And the Big Guy has to agree to it, which is where the go comes in. He is convinced that no one in that city can do the job as well as he can.

One megachurch pastor spoke of one of their campus pastors who was a campus pastor because he could only speak to about 350 people. After that, he couldn’t do it. (I am not sure why.) So they made him a campus pastor and piped the Big Guy in on DVD.

The reality is that multi-site works in a lot of cases. As one guy said, “People follow communicators.” Which is why spinning off a congregation usually doesn’t diminish the attendance at the Big Guy’s site.

But is it a good idea? I am less than unconvinced. I think the dangers and issues I raised a while back when I wrote on the modern day bus ministry still exist. In the old days, bus ministry brought the people to the pastor. The modern form of bus ministry takes the pastor the people via means of video.

For all of us ordinary guys out here, there can be a tendency to get discouraged, to wonder how we can measure up, to wonder why God isn’t blessing us like that, to wonder if we got a second-hand video camera if we might be able to have more influence. To wonder if we are doomed to either DVDing someone else or surviving with mediocrity. We might even wonder if we should at least imitate a multi-site guy to get better results.

At these times, if you are not firmly committed to your calling, to the garden in which God has you planted, and to the belief that God is the one calling shots, these temptations can become overwhelming.

In these days, we need a fresh dose of being An Ordinary Pastor. It is okay to be ordinary.

Don’t worry about celebrity pastors and multi-site churches. These you will always have among you, to borrow a line from one Guy.

Let us be faithful, passionate, involved in the lives of our people, teaching and preaching the word to the ones we have without undue concern over the ones we don’t have. Let us pray and be diligent, even if we never get a conference invite. Let us labor week after week, year after year, and let God do his work in his church.

On Changing the Name of a Church - Part 2

2011-09-22T06:00:00.000-04:00

Following up on part 1 of this series, let me address a second reason why a church might consider changing a name, namely, to distance yourselves from problems of the past without going so far as to actually reconstitute.

Every church (or organization) is has a history, and most histories of any length are probably going to have some unsavory moments in them. Some of these issues, depending on their visibility, can cause a church to develop a reputation that is not good for the gospel in a community.

It may be their history of financial dealings. It may be a string (or single occurrence) of unethical or illegal behaviors by high profile leaders or members. It may have to do with the stance on community relations or racial relationships. It may have to do with a previous pastor’s ministry emphasis. And the possibilities go on.

Sometimes, these things can be dealt with by public statements and restitution where possible. And as much as possible they should be.

But on occasion, these things have so badly damaged the testimony of the church in the community that renaming the church may be a very wise thing to do.

Renaming your church can provide a fresh start and some distance from the past. It can say, “We are a new old,” or “We are an old new.” It can change away from the focus from “The church where the youth pastor molested a girl” or “The church where the pastor stole $100,000 and left the creditors unpaid.”

However, this must not be used as a way to avoid legal or moral obligations. Neither should it be done while retaining the people or policies that were either cause or contributor to the problem. In other words, this is not an “easy way out.”

Changing a name for this reason is, in my opinion, more controversial that closing a church and restarting it. It runs several risks.

First, it runs the risk of simply being wrong on the issues. Some pastors lead churches to apologize for things that weren’t necessarily wrong. Just because someone differs on philosophy of ministry does not mean that they have compromised the gospel or hurt the church.

Second, it runs the risk of attacking faithful believers by implicitly (or explicitly) accusing them of something that they didn’t do, or that wasn’t wrong for them to do. It can become an attack on the heritage of godliness that has preceded a particular ministry at a church.

Third, it runs the risk of shaming the gospel and the church by becoming just another church that finds fault with everyone who doesn’t do things their way. It can become the pastor pursuing his pet issues without respect for the larger body of Christ.

Fourth, it runs the risk of further damaging the church’s testimony in a community because it can appear to be a rather transparent way to avoid problems, like putting lipstick on a pig.

So tread carefully here, and consider whether some other tack may be more effective for the gospel.

Name Change – Interruption

2011-09-21T12:49:00.001-04:00

In the midst of my series on name changes, let me highlight two recent articles by Ed Stetzer on the consideration of changing the name of the SBC (with actual numbers about how people view the name of the SBC) and the name change of Campus Crusade to Cru (with a link to the page where CRU describes its motives and process for its name change).

Consideration of labels, particularly denominational labels, is the subject of the third part of my series, so I wait to talk more about it.

Reading Cru’s explanation should remind us all to take a step back before blasting some group for a name change.

On Changing the Name of a Church - Part 1

2011-09-21T06:00:00.000-04:00

These days it is somewhat common for churches to change their names. Particularly common, it seems, is the dropping of denominational labels. Even presently, the Southern Baptist Convention is considering a name change for itself.

Is this good or bad? Well, it depends on who you listen to. And why you do it.

I think there are good reasons to change names, and bad reasons to change names. In this series of posts, I want to discuss some of the reasons why a church should, or should not, consider changing its name, beginning with reasons why a church should consider changing its name.

Leading off, and perhaps the most obvious, I think name changing is a good idea when you are restarting a church. It creates a new identity. Studies have shown that a church’s greatest period of growth is in the first five years. There is a “try it out” attitude that people have. It’s not “old hat” anymore. A church that is being restarted is probably a church that has been around for some time, and been in decline for a variety of reasons. Adopting a new name creates some freshness, even if the building and people are the same.

One of the things I found here was that there were (and still are) a large number of people in our community who are familiar with Grace because their grandma and grandpa or mom and dad went here, and they went here as kids. It is old hat to them. They know what it is (or at least what they think it is), and they are not coming back to try it again.

Changing a name removes that barrier. No one can say they grew up in a church that was started last week, or last month, even if it is a restart.

The downside of changing the name of a church is history. When I started at Grace, we had ninety-five years of history. Now we have almost one hundred and ten years of history. You can’t get that overnight. Theirs is something significant about saying “We have been in this community more than a hundred years.”

Each situation is different, and requires different considerations. Restarting a church (disband and reconstitute) can give new life into an old congregation. And changing the name probably is a wise thing to do in that case.

A church may try to rebuild without restarting. But even in this, a name change may be a good thing, even if the name is similar.

As a side note, restarting a church can also give good and faithful people an gracious exit ramp if they are simply attending church out of a sense of history rather than a sense of mission. Many old-timers feel a sense of commitment to a church, not to a mission, and not to a community. Providing them with a grace-filled way to exit that honors their commitment without guilting them is a valid consideration in some cases.

More to come …

A Word About Fatherhood

2011-09-16T23:21:00.001-04:00

A few months ago a postcard came to my house addressed to someone I have never heard of and who has never lived here at least in the last fifty or more years. There is no indication of who might have written it. No return address. No personally identifiable information.

The front of it is covered with Snoopy graduation stickers.

The back of it reads:

Just reaching out again. I know I told you about his graduation but since we didn’t see or hear from you for his b-day, I wanted to remind you its this Friday July 10th at 4 pm at his school. He keeps asking about his daddy. It’s been over a year since he saw you so please try to make it. He would love it.

I wanted to cry when I first read it.

I still want to cry.

It is a sad reminder that way too many children are growing up without a dad to hug them, tuck them in bed at night, and wake them up in the morning. Every night. Every morning.

And it is a challenge to remember that we, the church, should take seriously the chance we have to impact these young lives. The men in their lives up until now have let them down.

Where we have opportunity, let us do good to them for Jesus’ sake and for their own sake.

Around the Horn

2011-09-13T07:49:00.001-04:00

Here are some interesting pictures from 9/11. The scale of size is hard to grasp for me. But the pictures and fascinating and sobering.

Dave Doran has some good thoughts on ministry here. I think one of the downsides of the the CEO/business model of ministry is that it can lead to an in-depth organizational chart that looks great on the wall with its line and boxes, but it sends the message that ministry is a place on the chart. Furthermore, in small church ministry (and perhaps in large church), there is no practical way to get an org chart that big if I wanted one. Even more important, a place on the org chart in the church probably (usually) removes people from real ministry outside the church in terms of reaching friends and neighbors with the gospel. Simple church has a lot of appeal. Quit creating positions on the org chart in the name of “ministry.” Encourage people to find someone and serve them.

Kevin Bauder comes strong with this list of characteristics of hyper-fundamentalism. The book they are found in should be interesting. Andy Naselli links to some online discussions of it. Of particular interest to me were the comments at John Stackhouse’s blog. Like most comment sections on blogs, they reveal an awful lot.

Speaking of blog comments, check out this article and see what people say about it. Pretty interesting to get a little window into the minds of some, or perhaps a window into the little minds of some.

A bonus base for the pennant race. The Detroit Tigers have reeled off ten straight wins for the first time since 1968. And you know what happened in the fall of 1968 right? That’s right, I was born. Is this an omen of more good things to come?

Broken Justice

2011-09-05T09:03:00.001-04:00

A story hit the Detroit Free Press recently about a man wrongfully convicted and imprisoned for three years for a sexual assault.* Apparently, this man committed this sexual assault while he was dictating medical records on the dictaphone. Very talented he is.

Or at least the jury thought so. They convicted him on the word of an accuser and her boyfriend, in the face of physical evidence that he was actually doing something else at the time they swore he was assaulting her. They sent him away for more than a decade, leaving a wife and children behind.

Turns out this particular piece of evidence about dictating during the time frame was presented at trial, and the problems with the timeline were shown.

The jury, however, was unable to figure the time line out. So they simply disregarded it. How thoughtful of them.

Now this piece of evidence doesn’t mean that he was innocent. He may have been guilty and the accuser was simply wrong on the timeline. But the fact is that a key piece of evidence was simply disregarded by people who are supposed to be seeking the truth.

On top of that there was a letter from a priest, seeking justice for the accuser by imprisoning the accused. Turns out it was forged.

But why was the priest writing a letter? Why wasn’t he showing up in person and taking the oath? Why didn’t the prosecutor subpoena the man and compel him to testify? Why didn’t the judge compel the man to come and testify?

Later, the accuser’s boyfriend had a twinge of conscience for lying on the witness stand and fessed up. The prosecutor wired him and now has the evidence that the accuser was laying on the stand.

The accused and convicted man spent three years in prison before being released after pleading to a lesser charge.

Now the prosecutor is trying to determine whether or not to charge the woman with perjury.

Really? Still trying to decide? What is the missing piece of evidence that will push you over the edge on this one?

And this is only one story of many. Others are detailed by The Innocence Project.

This should remind us all of the weakness of a jury trial. Simply put, a jury trial is a horrible way to get at truth. It is made up of a two sides, each presenting only arguments that favor their position. They have a vested interest in hiding certain things. Neither side is dispassionately interested in the truth. The defense attorney wants his client to go home. The prosecuting attorney has already staked his claim that this man is guilty and he has to see it right on through. And losing sex crime convictions is never a good way to get re-elected next time around.

A jury trial is overseen by a judge whose sole purpose is to make sure that the evidence is presented properly. He has no role in making sure that proper evidence is presented, or that proper consideration is given to the evidence. He can’t interject when attorneys or witnesses say stupid things, or make bad arguments.

It is based on the judgment of twelve people who, most likely, have better things to do than sit in the courtroom. While we would like to appeal to their noble side and think they would do their best, most people are very ill-equipped for the type of thinking that is necessary to process trial evidence. On top of that, in most cases they are not allowed to question the witness themselves. So they can’t even satisfy their own minds about questions. They can only judge on information that is presented.

If I were being tried (and for those who are linguistically challenged, I am not guilty of anything since “if” is a hypothetical, not an indicative), I don’t think I would want a jury trial. I know too many people. I know what they are like. I know the level of critical thinking in our society. And I can’t imagine the horror of trusting my life to a group of randomly selected people from Wayne County, or any other county.

This jury was utterly inadequate for the task. The prosecutor was utterly incompetent, and probably downright dishonest; knowing the timeline discrepancy, this should never have come to trial; it is hard to imagine any honest person could have ignored that. The judge should be impeached for allowing this. He is there for a reason, and he failed in the basic reason of controlling the trial to make sure it was a fair trial. The moment that the timeline was questioned and physical evidenced presented, if the prosecutor did not immediately back away from that line of reasoning, he should have intervened and declared a mistrial. A man’s freedom and family was on the line, and he stood by when he knew better. That is dereliction of duty. It is unfortunately made by a man with no consequences. The judge, the prosecutor, and the jury will never have to face any consequences for this. And that makes it a lot easier to be cavalier with the facts and the truth. After all, it’s only someone else’s life.

Some suggest that you only want a jury trial if your case depends on emotion. If your case depends on facts, you want a bench trial. Why? Because judges are better with facts and reasoning. Juries are better with emotions.

If I were guilty, I wouldn’t want a bench trial. Judges are too smart; they are usually highly educated; they are quite often attorneys who have been through law school. They are more likely to be committed to the law, and less likely to be deceived by personalities on the witness stand. I would rather take my chances that there is at least one person on the jury that can be persuaded.

If I were innocent, there’s no way I would want to trust twelve random people from my community. Or your community. Because it’s not about the community. It’s about the nature of people.

In the final analysis, we should always remember that jury actions are forensic in nature. They are the conclusions of a group of people who make a legal determination, not necessarily a factual one.

______________________

*This article comments only on what was reported in the Free Press. It does not take into account the totality of evidence, since I have read no trial transcripts. However, the facts as presented in this article were enough to cause the prosecutor to free the man.

School Year's Eve Reflections on Fatherhood

2011-08-29T21:49:00.000-04:00

Today is the day I have been dreading all summer. It is our first School Year's Eve. My little buddy heads off to kindergarten tomorrow. I can't believe it. And I am hating life.

I love being a dad. I remember the day he was born. I remember just staring at him for hours. I was amazed. Terrified. Overwhelmed. Scared. Amazed. Fearful. Astounded. Petrified. Over and over, the same emotions just kept running laps through my little head. They still do, though a little less often. Now, there's a lot more laughter. And a different kind of fear and a different kind of care, hopefully more mature. And of course, there's a few tears now and then.

Back then, I couldn't hold him long enough. Until he started crying, and then I couldn't get rid of him fast enough. Daddy didn't do well with crying babies back then. Still doesn't.

But I still wanted to hold him, and never let him go.

Of course, I know the big point of parenthood is to raise kids who can live without you—to grow 'em up and let 'em go. They are supposed to go, to branch out on their own—a few hours a day at first, then more and more, until they have a job, a place of their own (including a refrigerator that they put food in), and then they can repay you. Or at least not mooch off of you any longer. Hopefully by this time, they have a coherent worldview built on the foundation of loving God and loving others, of living the gospel and serving Jesus.

In the early days, though I loved him to death, I didn't enjoy him much. I didn't know how. So I was still living the old life. Then, one night while tickling him on the couch, I heard him laugh. And I loved it. My wife said he was doing it all the time; I was just never around to hear it.

Then we started playing. Just making faces and laughing at first. Then little stuffed animals, peek-a-boo (or peek-ooo as he called it), a stuffed baseball or football here and there, and a truck or two.

Then he learned to walk on Father's Day weekend in 2007 in Grandmamma's house in South Bend. I wish she had been there to see it.

After that, it all just kind of blurs together.

I remember the old days of watching other people's kids doing silly things, and being a bit embarrassed for them, both the parent and the kid. Today my kid does these silly, embarrassing things, and I just smile real big, sometimes laugh out loud, and say to myself, "He's just a kid. He'll get over it one day."

These days the playing is better. It's baseball in the backyard, sometimes soccer. We play golf together. Well, at least we go to the course together and hit balls at the chipping green.

He finally got brave enough to ride his bike this summer, and now he rides like a wild man. He almost ran into the curb tonight looking at me. He has already learned to skid his tires on the pavement, which I guess is better than running into the side of Uncle Jim's truck like he did a few weeks ago.

He learned to swim, and he worked up the courage to jump off the diving board, though that took momma pushing in him a few times.

We still tickle on the couch. I don't know how long that will last, but I will enjoy every minute of it.

Tonight, bed time will be early. And tomorrow we will drop him off at school and drive away.

And that big loud wailing you hear just after 8:00 a.m. tomorrow will probably be me, not my son.

So just smile real big, maybe laugh out loud, and say, "He's a new dad. He'll get over it ... one day"

And remember, this is what fatherhood is about—preparing your child to live without you, and teaching them to love Jesus while they do it.

I Know What You Did Last Summer

2011-08-17T08:08:00.001-04:00

Imagine the possibilities when you cross this with this.

Given the life (both past and present) of the average college student combined with ability to see things and the willingness to call them out, this should be a real barnburner.

The good thing is that, as he informs us, he doesn’t talk about it.

Except he did.

That’s why there’s both an audio file and a transcript.

Of course, I jest … a little.

On a serious note, and perhaps I will write more later, this “seeing things” is the reason why a solid doctrine of biblical authority is so important. And it’s why I think cessationism is the only consistent position.

Once the door is open to visions, impressions, prophecies, words of knowledge, or the like, there is little reason to stop.

Now some do stop, to be sure, but as I say, there is little reason to stop. Saying “It doesn’t pass the smell test,” puts way too much authority in your olfactory senses.

In general, I am opposed to demonstrating absurdity by being absurd. I don’t think it either wise or fair to run to the extremes to argue against a position. And it would be hard to say this example by Driscoll is anything other than extreme.

But I don’t really want to talk about Driscoll here (though someone who engages with him regularly told me recently that he thinks Driscoll is more humble and teachable now than he was five years ago).

But for those who are continuationists, how would you refute Driscoll on this one? Or do you agree with him?

I suppose you could say you are “open but cautious.” Driscoll certainly wasn’t cautious here. And your caution would cause you to stop short of this. But what biblical basis would you invoke for such caution?

I also wonder about the import of 2 Timothy 3:16-17. If everything necessary to make us adequate for every good work is found in the inspired writings, then what purpose do these visions serve? Or the impressions?

If I understand 2 Timothy 3:16-17 properly, it means that Driscoll was equipped for the good work of counseling these people by the Scriptures. The visions were unnecessary. And I think that is significant.

Furthermore, by his own admission, they are sometimes wrong. I am going to go out on a limb and say that a wrong vision will undermine your credibility as a counselor. Imagine trying to counsel a husband you have just accused of adultery based on the TV screen in your head when he knows you aren’t telling the truth.

In fact, I think this issue of “being equipped for every good work” is an undervalued piece of the discussion about cessationism and continuationism, at least in the stuff I have read. I think we cannot have a full-orbed and robust theology of revelation if you don’t reckon with these verses and their impact on ongoing revelation.

If we define “every good work” as being every thing God has called us to be and do, then we need only the Scriptures and the wisdom found in them as applied to life.

That doesn’t preclude the use of common grace wisdom in application. Nor does it preclude the involvement of the arts and sciences in daily living.

But I think more serious consideration needs to be given to 2 Timothy 3:16-17. If the inspired Scripture equips us for every good work, then it is hard to see what role these other types of sign gifts play for us.

A Word for Preachers

2011-08-09T09:01:00.001-04:00

My friend Marty links to Al Mohler’s interview with recently departed John Stott, and concludes with this:

Remember these words brothers. A Bible, a pen, and a note pad make a man powerful for the duties and challenges of our task. Even if the pen and the note pad are replaced by a screen and a keyboard, there is no substitute for

time brooding over a text

in submission to the authority of the text

under the guidance of the One who inspired the text

for the glory of the One to whom the text points.

PS - The interview with Stott is worth reading.

In the Mailbag

2011-08-05T16:26:00.001-04:00

In cleaning off my desk, I came across a mailer for the 2nd Annual Youth Conference entitled “Smash the Trash.” It was hosted by “One of America’s Most Exciting Churches” (for yet another year, we must not have made the list).

The Holy Roller was there.

I had never heard of it.

Fortunately they had a picture.

The Holy Roller is a monster truck.

And then we wonder why kids leave the church when they get out of the youth group.

It’s because the Holy Roller can’t fit in the auditorium for Sunday morning worship.

Praying for a Car Race

2011-07-28T10:20:00.001-04:00

NASCAR still opens its left turn festivals with prayer. Perhaps that’s good, though I have my doubts.

A recent prayer by a pastor has strengthened those doubts, though perhaps the problem is not so much with praying for a race as it is with pastors who have no spiritual discernment and reverence.

In the midst of this prayer, he thanked God for his “smokin’ hot wife.” He then claimed he was trying to be like Paul (the apostle, not the driver … That’s a bit confusing though because I didn’t think Paul had a wife.)

Perhaps the most disturbing thing is that some people think it was acceptable. And some even think it was good.

One hapless commentator said this was “a prayer that at worse [sic] praised a man's wife for being sexy.”

Seriously?

This person even thinks this is a positive for the church.

What?

This is a guy who uses a public prayer to hold up his wife as some sort of sex symbol, and that's a positive for the church?

Now I don’t want to be a crank. I really don’t.

But "smokin hot" is an advertisement for a strip club, or July in Detroit, not a church. This is a blight and embarrassment to God and the gospel. And I am a man, but I would think this would be an embarrassment to his wife.

In the Bible, and in civil society, women are honored for their character and virtue, not their "smokin' hotness." (See here and here for some thoughts on this.)

While Nelms wanted to use this prayer for publicity for the church, to draw people to the gospel, attracting people to your church because of a pastoral prayer like this ain't exactly holding up offense of the cross of Christ as the dividing line.

But in a church world gone mad over relevance and being cool and hip which has confused attraction and novelty with evangelism, this shouldn’t be surprising.

God help a church, or a believer, that thinks this is a good thing for church attention and growth.

And God help a pastor who thinks that this is appropriate for public prayer.

In the Diner

2011-07-28T10:00:00.001-04:00

I am sitting here this morning waiting for my three eggs over easy, potatoes, white toast, and strawberry jam. The big storms over night have passed, and the air feels as wet as a shower, only without the refreshing part of it.

The radio is on today. It’s playing a country song called “Tomorrow.” It tells the story of a man who has been in some sort of relationship with a woman. He knows it’s bad, that they are not good for each other. They need to split up. But tonight, let’s have one last time. Tomorrow we will stop.

This is one of sin’s great lies. It’s why addictions never get broken. It’s why sinful relationships never end. It’s why procrastination rules the day.

“There’s always tomorrow. And tomorrow will be different. But today, it’s one last time.”

One person quipped about the addiction to the nicotine in cigarettes, “Quitting is easy. I have done it a million times.”

So it is with us. Quitting is easy. It’s staying stopped that’s hard.

And that’s why the grace of God in the gospel is so important. Paul reminds us in Romans 5 that where sin abounds, grace much more abounds, that where there is sin (no matter how much), there is always more grace. It frees us from guilt that our last time wasn’t.

But that grace does not leave us there. As Paul reminds us, the grace of forgiveness is not the same as permission. “May it never be” that we should “sin so that grace can abound” (Romans 6:1-2). No, indeed the grace that saves is also the grace that teaches (Titus 2:11).

Some of us are slow learners. We have played the “one last time” card over and over again. And, in one sense, that’s okay. God’s grace is big. Bigger than our most recent “one last time.”

But for all of us, it is time to graduate. There will always be sin to deal with in our lives so long as we live in this fallen world.

But by God’s grace, we can be freed from sinful patterns of living and find hope in the gospel that Jesus died to free us from the chains of bondage and to walk in newness of life (Romans 6:4).

This and That

2011-07-28T08:03:00.001-04:00

David Sitton has a good article on the call to missions. He says,

“The missionary call is not like a prison dog that tracks us down, sniffs us out, and hog-ties us for the nations. That is silly-talk and really bad theology. Nowhere in Scripture is a mysterious (supernatural) call a prerequisite before we can respond to the Great Commission. The opposite is actually true. … Dramatic calls to ministry are the exception. If you have it in your heart to go, then go. Then, lean on the sovereignty of God to get you where he wants you in the harvest. Don’t worry about “running ahead of God.” You aren’t that quick!”

Man, have we ever overcomplicated things in some ways. I remember times of living in fear of missing the “will of God” rather than just going out and laying it on the line, loving life, and telling people about Jesus. Overanalysis is usually not a good thing if you are thinking about vocational ministry (though underanalysis can be bad as well). Get busy now, and the future will probably take care of itself. And wherever you are, be all there. Don’t be looking for the next big thing.

My friend Andy Naselli has written a dissertation and a book on Keswick theology. For those who have time for neither, he now has a short article that is worth your time. (Unfortunately, the book is only available in the Logos format. Fortunately, Logos has a free version which is enough to read and use basic features.)

There are some things that I just don’t know what to say about. This is one of them. If you have any suggestions, I am not sure I want to know about them.

And one other question: What’s wrong with the other 54%?

All for now.

Ministering From and For the Long Term

2011-07-22T13:08:00.001-04:00

Some years ago in ministry I made a horrible decision. It didn’t disqualify me or split the church. I didn’t kill anyone, or preach heresy. But it was a bad decision.

I didn’t make this decision based on the memory of past years . I didn’t make it in anticipation of future years. I made it on the basis of six months. And I made it out of anger, hurt, frustration.

And I regretted it.

Oh, I didn’t regret it then. I was hurting too bad. And I wanted to make a point. I washed my hands. I was done.

In fact, I didn’t regret it until three years later when an event in my own life made me see starkly what I had done. And I realized that it hadn’t been worth it, even if I had been completely right (and I wasn’t).

It took three more years to work up the courage to pick up the phone and call.

The fact is that had I been thinking about the past twenty-five years, I would have never done what I did.

Had I been thinking about the next twenty-five years, I would never have done what I did.

But I wasn’t. So I did.

The reality is that my decision flowed out of my core values, values that I still hold. And I think those values are correct (which is why I still hold them, even though I would apply them differently today, in a way that might not have changed things even then).

The problem was that my decision took place in the context of fear. You see, for six months I was scared. It was actually longer than six months, but those six months were the killer. I just didn’t want to deal with it. I kept papering it over with avoidance when possible and weak smiles when necessary.

I lived out of fear, rather than out of care. I lived for immediate convenience rather than extended ministry. I lived out of hurt rather than courage. I lived out of isolation rather than partnership. And so I did it.

I have made a lot of bad decisions in my life, but this is one of the ones I regret the most. To this day, I still choke up when I think about it or talk about it, as I did just this week in a conversation.

Back then, in the heat of the moment, a mentor asked me, “What have you learned from this?”

I said, “I learned that problems don’t go away. You have to deal with them, and the sooner the better.”

And that is an important lesson.

Now, some years later I have learned another lesson to add on: “Don’t minister out of the moment. Minister from and for the long term.”

You see, my choices closed a door back then, a door that had stood wide open for more than two decades, and a door that would take years to reopen.

Sure I made my point … to me only. And now I know I didn’t even make the right point.

Now I also I know that long after this moment (whatever it holds), ministry can continue.

So don’t kill it by living out of fear and hurt.

Nurture it by living out of grace, courage, and commitment.

Quotable – On the Olivet Discourse

2011-07-09T12:14:00.001-04:00

It is unfortunate that Harold Camping, for all his claims to teaching the Bible, never grasped what Jesus made clear in Mark 13 as evidenced by this excellent word from James R. Edwards:

Most importantly, Mark 13 admonishes readers against attempts at constructing timetables and deciphering signs of the Parousia. Disciples are admonished to be alert and watchful (vv. 5, 9, 23, 33, 35, 37), reminded that they do not know the time of the end (vv. 33, 35), and warned not to be led astray by even the most obvious signs (vv. 5, 6, 21, 22), for the end is not yet (vv. 7, 13). No one is either encouraged or commended for attempting to be an eschatological code-cracker. That is folly, for even the Son of Man is ignorant of the End (v. 32). The premium of discipleship is placed not on predicting the future but on faithfulness in the present, especially in trials, adversity, and suffering.

(James R. Edwards, The Gospel According to Mark, The Pillar New Testament commentary [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002], p. 386.)

Faulty Missions Mind-set?

2011-07-09T09:40:00.001-04:00

Recently I linked to a series of articles on missions in South America in the middle of the 20th century which I found interesting. There is a new, and interesting, installment.

Read it all, but here are two interesting lines.

First, their understanding of the call of God as primarily to a location soon leads to the question: ‘How fast can I get there?’ However, an understanding of God commissioning us to a particular kind of work would lead to a completely different question, namely: ‘How well equipped will I be for the work when I arrive?’

I admit to not knowing a lot about modern missions preparation. I am convinced that we do not do particularly well in domestic situations of getting men in places where they can succeed, and then giving them helpful and serious mentorship.

Equipping prior to getting there seems like a high priority. I know of one family currently doing a short-term stint in a creative access country to help some other families get adjusted through helping them think through ethnography and mission-related issues. I remember a discussion about this where one person was questioning whether or not this was necessary. I think it absolutely is necessary. And I think this probably needs to start before you spend months or years raising support, only to get somewhere and find yourself frustrated and discouraged because you aren’t ready.

In the future, one thing I want to know from prospective missionaries is this: What have you been doing to get ready? How seriously have you studied the culture and language of your prospective field? How long have you been doing this? What books have you read on the culture you are going to? What kind of ethnographical research have you done?

My friend Dave, who knows a thing or two (get it and watch it, and make sure you watch the interview) about missions, puts it this way:

What you should really ask is “What do I need to learn before going to the field, why, and what source or combination of sources can teach me most efficiently?” Those are not easy questions to answer, so you have to seek help from a multitude of counselors—especially those who have proven themselves faithful and fruitful.

Here’s a second quote from the Speared article:

I just want to point out that the two major interpretations of the Commission – ‘take the Gospel to every person that hasn’t heard it’ versus ‘take the Gospel to every people that hasn’t heard it’ – lead to radically different strategies.

I think (as the blogger says), that both of these are important. But which is the Great Commission? The word “nations” (ethne) seems to indicate the latter—people groups, though it does not exclude the individual people in the groups.

Paul’s pattern described in Romans 15:19-23 of leaving a place fully evangelized to go where “Christ was not named” is equally instructive, at least in some respects (with due respect to this perspective).

By having ‘fully preached the gospel’ he surely did not mean he spoke to every person. He rather meant that he had established a gospel presence that could now continue on without him.

“Pioneer missions” is certainly different than going to places with gospel works already established. And I confess that when it comes to mission support and encouragement, I would rather see missionaries go to unreached people groups or gospel-less areas rather than pile in on gospel preaching churches just because they have a “burden” or have a little different doctrinal perspective than a church already there.

That is not to discount going to evangelized places. If that is the desire you believe that God has placed in your heart, pursue it. But realize that when you try to get me to support you, you will need to convince me that you have a legitimate place there—that you are not merely duplicating the work of someone nearby.

And realize that if I have an option between you and someone going to an unreached people group, you are starting a step behind.

I realize that most communities could stand more gospel witness, not less. And so by going, you will be a help in many ways.

But I am reminded of two things. First, the gospel and Great Commissions is for all nations because Jesus died to purchase people from every tribe, tongue, people, and nation (Revelation 5:9-10).

Second, I am reminded of the old parable that if a bunch of people are carrying a log, consider helping out on the end where there are fewer people.

Over-informed and Under-educated

2011-07-04T07:12:00.001-04:00

I was recently studying in a relatively public place after a beautiful morning that started with a long walk covering eighteen holes. The sunrise was beautiful.

In this public place Fox News was on.

I was not paying much attention to it, but I noted that every two to three minutes the story changes. It was frustrating since it grabbed my attention a bit, wanting to know what I was missing “now.” And “now” was every couple of minutes. The reality is that it wasn’t anything I actually needed to know. It was just clutter.

It reminds me that we live in a culture of soundbytes. We crave information. But we crave it on the surface. We want to know a little about a lot, but pretend that we know a lot about it.

It’s generally bad for civil discourse.

It’s worse for actual knowledge and informed opinions.

It certainly can’t sustain a decent culture of any sort.

It’s why Carson says we need to read the internet less and books more.

But I gotta keep this short so I will leave it at that.

Quotable

2011-07-04T07:02:00.001-04:00

Read a great deal less on the internet and a great deal more of books.

Don Carson on how you can become a better theologian and better pastor if you are a young pastor or a middle-aged pastor who can’t return for more schooling.

Piper’s comments on reading that follow Carson’s quote are also fascinating, such as when he says that we have been taught not to read by teachers who assign twelve books for one class.

Was It Necessary?

2011-07-02T14:33:00.001-04:00

Here’s a series of short articles (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3) on the death of ten missionaries in the middle of the 1900s in South America. It is interesting to read this perspective on why these deaths probably were not necessary, but rather a waste. It is probably not a popular view.

Here’s a line that sticks out at me from the third article.

Jim Elliot’s team in Ecuador was afraid of attracting too much attention to their efforts in the jungle, because they thought that too many outsiders would serve to further alienate the Aucas. For this reason, they were extremely secretive with their plans, going so far as to use a code to prevent leaking the details. Unfortunately, this commitment to secrecy kept them from sharing their plan with some of the people that may have guided it to a better end.

And later,

The nail in the coffin was a mission board that prided itself on letting the missionaries do whatever God ‘led’ them to do. From all I can tell, there was virtually no accountability. Three of the missionaries were with a mission board that reminded the missionaries that they were not answerable to any man – only to God.

In missiology and church growth, there is a common belief that the older generation has had their day and their mindset and methods not only no longer work, but that are not even to be considered as having legitimate perspectives on present day ministry.

It is true that the older generation is, at times, a bit stuck in their ways and unwilling to consider the possibility of generational shift. This is (perhaps) one factor in the post I made recently about churches. “We have always done this” becomes the mantra of a church that is slowly dying, or at least only maintaining.

But it is equally true that there is much more to missionary strategy than youthful energy and zeal, with “outside the box” thinking.

Young people would be wise to seek (and actually consider) the input of the “grizzled veterans.” Those lines in their faces and the gray in their heads did not come from vacations at the beach. They came from time served in the trenches.

Your good ideas may simply be recycled nonsense. It may not be. But it won’t hurt you to ask. It may save you a lot of grief if you direct some of your energy toward asking someone who has been there before.

It usually helps to have some experienced eyes to look things over with you.

Just Mail It In

2011-06-28T15:07:00.001-04:00

Crank alert. Rant warning. Consider yourself notified.

Ben Wright quotes Mark Driscoll:

Pre-recording 2 sermons today. Allows me to go to Zac’s baseball tourney with my family rather than not seeing them on Father’s Day.

This is, as Ben says, a “minimal and rational step” when you conclude that you don’t need a pastor to preach to an assembly to have a church, though this goes a bit beyond “I can’t be there to preach because I am over here preaching the same message to a different assembly.”

Apparently, preaching on video in order to get to a baseball game is the only way to clear up a few hours to spend with the kids on Father’s Day.

And while I am here, If Driscoll is all about redeeming culture, why not start with little league baseball tournaments? Why not get them moved off of Sundays?

Listen, I love sports. I played them growing up and I coach them today. I had my 5 year old son over hitting golf balls at the range last week after his swim meet, and took him swimming last night. I was out Sunday night at the ballfield pitching to my son and then chasing him to first base when he hit it. So this is not an anti-kids sports rant. Nonetheless, I remain unconvinced that kids’ sports are a good reason to miss Sunday worship, even occasionally, particularly if you are the pastor.

Furthermore, once we start this where does it end? What are the boundaries? Why not record the preaching video on Saturday when it’s raining so you can take the kids to the lake on Sunday when the sun is shining (cuz you know we need family time, right?)?

Here’s another thing: One of the things Driscoll recently claimed, in his table talk with Dever and MacDonald, is that they (Mars Hill) are raising up all kinds of pastors who can preach.

Apparently all of them were at baseball games or something, too.

Interesting that out of the 10,000+ people at Mars Hill, not a single person with the gift of preaching was going to be able to show up to handle the preaching on Father’s Day.

Which raises the question: Why do you need to train up other preachers if you can just video yourself? I suggest it’s an unhealthy, dare I say ungodly, celebrity culture.

I wonder how Driscoll would respond if those 10,000+ all decided that Father’s Day meant they needed to be somewhere else, so they would just watch the service later online? And fax in their offering checks?

I would say I am speechless, but if you have gotten this far, you know that’s not true.

Seriously, this reminds me that ecclesiology remains a weak subject for the modern church.

Hyles, Hybels, Driscoll, and Warren (and lots of others) have taught us that all the stops can be pulled out to draw the crowd. And we can pull out a few stops to avoid the crowd if we have a better option.

There is, among these leaders, an admirable goal to reach people. I am challenged by it.

Hybels says something like, “We are not just seeker-driven; we are seeker-obsessed.” I think most of us could stand a little dose of desire to reach the unreached. Hyles had a similar philosophy, as do some others I know of, though for my dollar, I am not sure that the pop music, drama, and stage show at Willow Creek are all that much worse than the live goldfish swallowing, southern gospel music, and stage show at FBC Hammond. The preaching surely can’t be any worse. If I am going to endure some nonsense in the name of evangelism I would just as soon do it at Willow Creek than FBC Hammond. At least I wouldn’t have to wear a tie at Willow Creek.

Of course, some will be offended that I even make that comparison. It won’t bother them that I mentioned Hybels. It will only bother them that I left the “b” out.

But I digress.

I think we need a stronger ecclesiology, one that includes interaction with the question of whether or not the preacher should actually show up to preach.

On the other hand, perhaps Driscoll is on to something here.

I have a lot of friends I could play golf with on Sunday morning. If I video myself, I can go play golf on Sunday mornings, and still get home in time to see my family.

I could even take my wife, and we could call it a date, ‘cuz you know I am pretty busy the other 167 hours during the week and I gotta take care of my marriage.

And besides I need someone to carry my bag.

But don’t worry ‘cuz I tip good.

A Tale of Two Churches

2011-06-23T09:43:00.001-04:00

This past week on vacation, I took the opportunity to visit two different churches. I found these two churches to be an interesting contrast.

One church was predominantly young. There were only a few hoary heads in the place, from what I could tell. I felt like an old guy. The other church seemed like at least half, if not more, of the people in attendance were older than me. To be fair, the latter church was a Sunday PM service, so I am not sure what effect that might have had, though I doubt that there is enough young people in the AM service to offset this factor.

So I wonder why this difference.

I think there is some merit to the idea that churches tend to reflect their leadership. One pastor is 30ish, and the other is probably close to 60. It is probably unlikely that the older generation will flock to hear a younger man preach every week. At the same time, the younger generation probably feels a bit disconnected to an older man. Of course, these are generalities. But I know as a pastor, I definitely feel these relational issues.

Let me tell you about these two churches.

Comparing the churches, there was a very distinct difference in the atmosphere of the service. One church had a piano, organ, full orchestra, and a choir. The other had a piano, an organ, a strong lead voice with two backup singers, and a recorder/flute player.

One church sang gospel songs from the early 1900s (including Love Lifted Me, All That Thrills My Soul is Jesus). The other sang a mix of modern hymns, Sovereign Grace, and old hymns (including And Can It Be and Be Thou My Vision).

One church sang songs in succession, with no speaking in between; there was only an instrumental transition. The other church took breaks for some instruction (welcome people on this next verse, ladies sing the second, everyone sing acapella, etc.).

Both churches featured a sermon from an OT text. In one church, the pastor took great lengths to labor in the text (a very difficult text), pointing carefully to words, verses, and constantly referring to the overall argument of the chosen text. In the other church, the pastor gave what seemed a fairly brief and surface overview with some applications that made me uncomfortable in terms of preaching the text faithfully.

In one church, there was a quick mention of Jesus at the end of the message. In the other, there was an more extended discussion of Christ and the gospel towards unbelievers.

Now, two caveats:

1. I realize some could suggest my description is prejudiced. And that may be true. I was asked by a friend at one of the churches to critique the service, and I will send him some thoughts. But I am trying not to be critical. In fact, when he asked me what I thought, I hadn’t thought of anything to say really. He needled me to give him more.

2. Even though my description above is randomized in terms of presentation, I imagine that most of you could put the service together and get all the right pieces in the right church.

So why is one church younger and one older? What are the dynamics and factors of age in church?

I wonder.

Any thoughts?

Thanks for Fifty Years

2011-06-17T09:49:00.000-04:00

June 17, 2011

Dear Mom and Dad,

Today, we celebrate fifty years of your marriage. In a world marked by popular fads, passing trends, and quick fixes, which too often treats marriage as a matter of convenience to be entered at one’s leisure and ended at one’s desire, your marriage shines as a marriage to be honored and an example to be followed. So today I say, “Thank you.”

Thank you for your example of love and commitment to one another. Through everything that God has brought your way in life, you have walked through it together, showing us what it means to love and ቶ commit to a life lived with your spouse “for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, ‘til death do you part.” In both joy and pain, you have served each other faithfully and well. Thanks for showing us what it means to love.

Thank you for your example of longevity. Fifty years is an amazing milestone, one that has become rare in a time where integrity and permanence are too easily exchanged for ease and immediacy. Fifty years ago you made promises, and for fifty years you have kept them. Thanks for showing us what it means to do what you said you would do.

Thank you for your example of following God. Through the years of our lives, we have been constantly shown the importance and centrality of following after God. You have loved God, his Word, and his Church, and you taught us to do the same. You have taught, not just in word but by life itself, that there something bigger that we must live for and follow after. You have believed that God was supreme over all things, and that life belonged to him, and you lived that way. Thanks for showing us what it means to be a Christian.

You have left to your children and grandchildren a legacy that will not be easily surpassed. It certainly will never be forgotten. It reminds us that it is possible to have a marriage lived the way God designed, lasting for a half-century and longer.

Should I reach the age of 84, may it be said that by God’s grace I loved and cared for the same woman for fifty years because I saw it in my parents who taught me by example what God said marriage was to be.

We honor you today as an example of loving God and your spouse more than yourself.

I love you both.

Quotable on Preaching

2011-06-17T06:00:00.000-04:00

Great sermons are not prepared. At least they do not become great by preparation. They are great because they issue from a preacher whose littleness has dissolved in the immensity of God; from such a life nothing that is little or without consequence can spring forth.

…

Great sermons are not born in illustration books but in the needy lives of preachers. Here, where the preacher’s inwardness is fashioned by yearning and desperation, is the womb of important preaching.

Calvin Miller, Marketplace Preaching, pp. 9-10

This and That

2011-06-16T10:22:00.001-04:00

At breakfast with a friend this morning: Good times. We talked about a lot. One issue was the fact that Spurgeon, for all his acclaim, was not a particularly good model for preaching. In fact, no one should preach like Spurgeon.

Which reminds me there are a lot of ways to get the job done, and the fact that a way works does not mean we should emulate it. Work hard at studying and understanding the text. When it comes to delivery, listen and pay attention to a lot of people (particularly those known for their communication abilities). Then develop your own style rather than copying someone else.

We also talked about the politics in church and theological circles. It’s not just “fundamentalism” that plays politics. Evangelicalism does too. Neither should. A guy who can bring visibility and money does not deserve a place on the board for that reason. A guy who can bring students and money does not deserve a place on the chapel platform for that reason. I am sure that I will have neither. Which is usually fine with me. Until my pride rears up.

But I am also glad that no one sends me emails about what I do or where I go. No one questions who endorses my books. And I like that.

Listened to some preaching recently: It reminded me that cute alliterated outlines, modified sword drills (turn over here with me), stories of your experience, and attempts at vigor and fire are no substitute for actually explaining the text. Tell me to look at the verse and tell me what it means. Show me where what you are saying is what God said. Engage me by engaging the text. Tell me a story only if absolutely necessary to help me better understand.

Browsing through a library recently: Came across a book entitled Great Preaching on Patriotism. Seriously. Seriously? Why would we preach on patriotism? Do we not have something better? Along this line, I recently saw an American flag in a church prominently displayed. I wondered how those from other nations would respond to that. I wondered how those from our nation who are not particularly enthralled with what it does at times would respond to that.

Walking across a well-manicured place recently: Reminds me that first impressions matter. Things looking good and being well-cared for are always better than the opposite. Our grounds and facilities should look at nice as we can make them. And by all means, be nice to people. In your organization, everyone should speak to or at least smile at every single person they see. It makes a difference.

Frame on Sola Scriptura

2011-06-11T12:52:00.001-04:00

Here’s a word from John Frame about sola Scriptura in writing about the Regulative Principle of worship.

Nobody has ever claimed that Scripture is sufficient for every detail of life. Scripture is sufficient, not as an encyclopedia of laws or facts, but as the Word of God. To say that Scripture is sufficient (in public worship or elsewhere) is simply to say that Scripture contains all the divine words that we need. Scripture is sufficient for the civil magistrate, not by telling him exactly how much to collect in taxes, but in giving him all the divine norms he needs to make his decisions. [Frame is responding to T. David Gordon in his reference to taxation.]

…

People violate sola Scriptura, not by asserting that there are truths to be found outside of Scripture, but by claiming that there are extra-biblical words that have the same authority as Scripture, or higher. Those who believe in sola Scriptura hold that no extra-Scriptural words have divine authority, and therefore supreme authority. People violate the principle when they claim that their ideas, their norms, their political philosophy, their view of taxation, etc., have authority equal to or greater than Scripture.*

From A Fresh Look at the Regulative Principle.

Say It Ain’t So!!!

2011-06-09T08:02:00.001-04:00

Word is in: USC* Stripped of 2004 BCS National Championship

What a tragedy for college football.

What a blight on the BCS.

What a joke.

I am going to go out on a limb and say that not a single one of those 55 points USC scored on January 4, 2005 are coming off the board. And Oklahoma will still have their 19 today, and a hundred years from now.

Somehow I don’t think the players on the 2004 USC team will suddenly change their story. In fact, they probably don’t care. The truth is that they got what they wanted—a chance to play in the game and a victory. Their celebrations are over, and they will always be able to say, “I was on that team that won.” And they will always be able to point and say, “Scoreboard.”

On a related note, I met a guy this week who showed me his national championship ring from the Texas Longhorns team he played on in 1969. It was a relatively small ring by today’s standards. If you saw it on his hand, you wouldn’t take a second look. But it is something he treasures because, in his words, “It was neat to be a part of something bigger than yourself.”

It was a pretty unglamorous ring, to tell you the truth. In fact, most class rings (the one’s you buy to congratulate yourself for graduating) are bigger. Perhaps after four decades or so, some of the gold has worn off. But not so much that you are unable to read “Texas Longhorns National Champions” on it. And that’s what made it special.

He told me he couldn’t imagine how someone could sell their ring like the players at OSU did in the recent scandal that landed Jim Tressel in the back of the line that 9.1% of the American public are already standing in.

Of course, that’s the unemployment line though I doubt The Sweater Vest will be seen down at the welfare office anytime soon. I imagine he has enough to tide him over for a while, and perhaps his boy Terrell can slip him a couple of Benjamins to get him through, and maybe give him a lift down to Kroger for a bag of rice and some bagels. Besides, I imagine he will be employed somewhere soon.

And his players will go on with their lives. Just like Reggie Bush and the rest of the USC gang has.

And there will be some who, like the man I met this week, are still proud to be part of something bigger than themselves and won’t their souvenir from that event for a tattoo, or a used car, or anything else.

College athletics are big business.

If you want to crack down on this type of stuff that got OSU, USC, SMU back in the day, and lots of of other schools in trouble, the death penalty is probably the only way to do it.

End the USC football program for five years for this offense, and warn them that next time it will be ten years. And fine them the gate receipts for the seasons in question.

You see, the penalty has to be a deterrent. It can’t be worth it to succeed when you cheat.

Oh, and the standard will be a civil trial standard: preponderance of the evidence as considered by a jury made up of your rival’s season ticket holders.

I like that plan.

Any chance of it passing?

____________________

*For my friends in my home state, the USC here is University of Southern California, not University of South Carolina. It is probably obvious since we are talking about football national championships and only one school in South Carolina has one of those. Truth be told, the last time that USC sniffed a national championship was probably the exhaust from the plane when Notre Dame flew over SC on its way to it's bowl game in 1988.

Gleanings

2011-06-04T09:15:00.001-04:00

I am starting a new category of posts called “Gleanings.” They will be posts of selected quotes from various articles. I will highlight certain quotes, usually without intending to pass judgment on the context of the quote. Some will have my thoughts attached; others will be presented without comment.

This article is entitled “In Defense of My Coach.” Ohio State football coach Jim Tressel has been under fire recently for the goings on in the OSU program. This past week, he resigned from his job. Jon Thoma, a former player, wrote this article giving a different perspective on Tressel.

It is always sad to see a hero fall. – When people look up to you, you have a higher responsibility. Teachers are always judged by a higher standard (James 3:1). As a leader we should caution people about heroes who names aren’t “Jesus of Nazareth,” but we have to realize that people look up to us. Carry that trust carefully.

I am furious they cast aside our symbols of brotherhood and victory for a few hundred dollars. – There are some things you just can’t put a price on … unless you are young and immature. Then you will trade your heritage for a mess of pottage. What in the world caused a future millionaire to think that a tattoo was worth a national championship ring?

Show an 18-year-old some money and give him some power, and you have a recipe for disaster. – Enough said.

My freshman year he approached me, a mere walk-on back-up punter, and asked me how my parents and two sisters were doing. He referred to them all by name! We had about 120 players on the team and he knew every person in all 120 immediate families. He knew because he cared. – Leaders must care about people. Nothing says “I care” like knowing about the people under you.

We had a responsibility to present ourselves in a positive way, as we were representatives of so many things so much bigger than ourselves. – Self-centered people never see the things “bigger than themselves.”

He wanted to put us in the best position possible to succeed. – Leaders must try to get people in places that they can succeed according to their gifts and abilities. Nothing is more discouraging being in a position you aren’t gifted for. Leaders should push people, get people to try new things, but your ultimate goal as a leader is to get people to be successful. In my short ministry life, I have seen people get frustrated and ultimately fail because they were in a position they weren’t gifted for, and no one had the courage to say, “You have a great heart to want to do that, but you should consider doing this because it fits better into your gifting.”

On your best days be great. On your worst days, be good. Every other day, get better. – Nothing will take the place continual learning. Stagnant minds can never lead others.

Around the Horn

2011-06-03T09:12:00.000-04:00

Here are two quick hits:

Justin Taylor reminds me of this funny passage from Moises Silva that reminds me of just how bizarre some exegesis and preaching is. I tend to take the simple view, which means I might miss out on some great word associations. It also means I might not say things that aren’t true. Sometimes a word is just a word.

I would encourage caution in appealing to these ancient meanings and word pictures or associations. Modern translators usually do a pretty good job of getting the meaning right.

And think about how we use language (both as the speaker or author and the hearer or reader). In all but the fewest cases, we aren’t thinking of deep meaning in words. We are simply using conventional language. It should not stretch credulity to think that the biblical authors did the same thing.

Rick Thomas has a good post on resources today. I think the emphasis on resources might be a short cut, a cheater’s way, a lazy man’s guide to the universe.

In an age where books are being published at an astounding rate, we are constantly looking to someone else’s homework instead of doing our own. Even good resources can stunt our growth.

I wonder if reaching for a book instead of taking time to think things through ourselves is actually helpful.

I think resources are helpful, but perhaps we need to be more judicious in our use of them. Sure, we might not keep up on the latest and greatest books out there, but our personal growth and ministry might be more fruitful.

Knowing the Bible and knowing people might be a better resource than a bibliography longer than your arm.

Parenting

2011-06-03T09:08:00.001-04:00

I am no expert parent by a long shot. In fact, sometimes I think I am barely a parent. But I have two kids that live in my house and I am pretty sure I am responsible for them.

Having said that, here’s an article that interests me.

In what has become an annual event close to graduation, another lawsuit was filed about prayer at graduation. Here, a couple in Texas said “their son would ‘suffer irreparable harm’ if anyone prayed at the graduation.” And the judge agreed.

Seriously?

You have had eighteen years to raise your son, and a short prayer at a graduation is going to push him over the edge?

I am going to go out on a limb and suggest this isn’t a prayer problem. It’s a parenting problem.

For You Conspiracy Theorists Out There

2011-06-01T18:22:00.001-04:00

This book, The Man Who Knew Too Much: Hired to Kill Oswald and Prevent the Assassination of JFK, was a very fascinating book when I read it back in the 1993 or so when it first came out. There is apparently an updated version now.

I came across this synopsis of it today and it jogged my memory about Richard Case Nagell who, in September of 63, went into a federal bank and fired two shots into the ceiling in order to get arrested because he wanted to be in jail when Kennedy was shot so that no one could blame him for it. The rest you will have to read for yourself.

I tend to be a skeptical person, though I prefer that you call me discerning (or wise wouldn’t be a bad option either).

But no matter what you call me, if you have any interest in the Kennedy assassination, this book will be interesting to you.

Writer urges Internet junkies to 'switch off' and think

2011-05-30T09:30:00.001-04:00

For those of you guilty of what this article talks about, here's something to add to your guilt while exacerbating your problem.

Writer urges Internet junkies to 'switch off' and think

Great Hope in the Gospel

2011-05-28T09:50:00.001-04:00

What then shall we say to these things?
If God is for us, who is against us?
He who did not spare His own Son,
but delivered Him over for us all,
how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?

Romans 8:31-32

Around the Horn

2011-05-26T08:30:00.001-04:00

Here are a few interesting links.

The Unchurched in Church – I think we need to think about how our corporate gatherings look to people who are not “one of us,” or even people who may have just become “one of us.” In a recent community group, I was reminded that our “church language” doesn’t work well with people who didn’t grow up in church. It was a great reminder to speak in language everyone can understand. This article should help us think about how to connect with people who are not “one of us.” This is anathema to some who consider that any accommodation to unbelievers in church is compromise. It isn’t.

The Dirty in Church – The old saying is that a church should be a hospital for sinners, not a hotel for saints. If your church doesn’t have some dirty laundry, a little ugliness, some broken marriages, some addicts, some profane people, some hurting lives, you should be questioning what kind of gospel you are preaching.

Success in Church – Here is a great reminder that gifting is no substitute for holiness. There is a constant emphasis today on the gospel. And that is great. But we as pastors and leaders must remember that the gospel is not a permission slip that allows us to sin with forgiveness (Romans 6:1-3). It is a call to walk worthy. It is true that we are completely accepted by God because of Christ alone. It is also true that we are to pursue holiness without which no one will see the Lord.

Statistics in the Ministry – Thabiti lists a number of statistics concerning pastors. Of course we all know the old lines about statistics. But some of these ring true for me, and no doubt they ring true for some of you. I recently had the opportunity to preach on motivation in pastoral ministry. I took as my text Titus 2:11-15 to encourage us to be motivated by the appearance of God’s grace and appearance of God’s glory. These are things that will never change. They will never let us down. They will help us to not be one of these statistics.

E. B. White on Reading and Writing

2011-05-25T08:41:00.001-04:00

Andy Naselli has a short post today about author E. B. White’s book Charlotte’s Web. He (E. B., not An.dy.) is also the author of one of my favorite books growing up, The Trumpet of the Swan. as well as children’s favorite Stuart Little.

Andy’s post reminded me of a post I almost wrote about a year ago.

At that time, while sitting in the jury room awaiting my opportunity to serve my fellow citizens (is jury duty missional???), I came across a book of interviews of authors, published by the New York Times (I believe).

I was unfamiliar with most of the authors, but I am almost sure that one of them was E. B. White. The reason it stuck out to me was because of White’s comments about reading. He said he barely ever read anything.

I can’t seem to find the book now, but I did find a few other articles about E. B. White that were interesting.

In an interview with the NY Times, he said, “I was never a reader. I was arriving at conclusions almost independently of the entire history of the world. If I sat down to read everything that had been written--I'm a slow reader--I would never have written anything. My joy and my impulse was to get something down on paper myself.”

I tend to believe this a good reminder for pastors preparing sermons. As bad as it sounds, I think we should do less reading, at least in the early stages of sermon preparation. Spend your time in the text, hours just reading, rereading, jotting notes, drawing lines, underlining words, making connections between verses and ideas. At this stage, use outside sources only to clarify meanings of words and to establish basic historical context where necessary.

Only after this work should we go to commentaries.

White also makes some other fascinating comments about writing.

A writer has the duty to be good, not lousy; true, not false; lively, not dull; accurate, not full of error. He should tend to lift people up, not lower them down. Writers do not merely reflect and interpret life, they inform and shape life.
(Writers at Work, Eighth Series, Penguin, 1988) (Here).

It is my belief that no writer can improve his work until he discards the dulcet notion that the reader is feebleminded, for writing is an act of faith, not of grammar. Ascent is at the heart of the matter. A country whose writers are following the calculating machine downstairs is not ascending--if you will pardon the expression--and a writer who questions the capacity of the person at the other end of the line is not a writer at all, merely a schemer. The movies long ago decided that a wider communication could be achieved by a deliberate descent to a lower level, and they walked proudly down until they reached the cellar. Now they are groping for the light switch, hoping to find the way out (Here).

And are a few bonus quotes from the NY Times piece. I repeat them here because I think they are great, but don’t really fit the theme of reading or writing.

"I lived in an age when parents weren't scared of their children; they commanded respect, enforced discipline and maintained an orderly household. It can still be done, but the motor car and the TV have clearly added to the burden of the task of discipline and of communication."

I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve (or save) the world and a desire to enjoy (or savor) the world. This makes it hard to plan the day."

I do have a tremendous respect for anyone who does something extremely well, no matter what. I would rather watch a really gifted plumber than listen to a bad poet. I'd rather watch someone build a good boat than attend the launching of a poorly constructed play.

Quotable

2011-05-19T22:43:00.001-04:00

Ed Stetzer writes on How to Offer Criticism.

Criticism hardly ever goes well when you do it in a hurry. To do criticism in grace may cause you to miss the moment in blogtown, but it is better to take the time and do it well.

This is a point well worth considering. Perhaps I will offer some criticism … tomorrow. This this is part three of this series. It is worth reading.

Russell Moore writes on the Pre Tribulational Rapture.

Dispensationalists still hold to a distinction between the church and Israel, but the idea of two peoples and two programs, is almost wholly abandoned by contemporary dispensationalist theologians, evacuating the primary theological reason for a pretribulational rapture.

Interestingly, my systematic prof (Dr. McCune) was saying this fifteen years ago when I was sitting in his class.

Overall, my belief in a pre-trib rapture is not shaken by Moore’s writing. The arguments offered by Moore have been pretty well answered, IMO. They are not persuasive to me. At the end of the day (or the age), if I am wrong, I will gladly change my position. At the end of the day, if Russ Moore is wrong, it will be too late to change his .

Trueman on Picking Your Battles

2011-05-13T06:00:00.000-04:00

Carl Trueman, in the latest issue of Themelios, has some helpful comments on engaging controversy.

Interestingly, and correctly in my estimation, one of his emphases is the matter of the controversies relation to our local sphere of ministry. He comments that the Internet makes the world appear smaller than it really is and warns about the danger of “introducing certain errors to people who would otherwise be blissfully unaware of them.” He uses Rob Bell’s recent book as an example where many people were taught about a heresy by addressing something they would have likely never known about.

I am increasingly convinced of the centrality of the local church and local ministry. Obviously, the internet age has changed this somewhat, but probably not as much as most people think.

The truth is that people involved in real ministry do not need to concern themselves with every thing that happens all over the globe. Know the people you minister to, and minister to them. And I am going to go out on a limb and suggest that many people who blog prolifically are not involved in real ministry. (No, spouting your personal opinions and attacking other people to faceless blogrolls is not real ministry.)

Another helpful emphasis of Trueman is that of competence. A lot of people speaking up in controversies are simply incompetent. They are not equipped to render a legitimate viewpoint on the matter at hand.

Of course, this will bring charges of elitism.

And I plead guilty.

I am an elitist. I am one of those narrow-minded bigots who think you ought to know a little bit about something before pontificating on it.

Today, the blogosphere is filled with armchair theologians, armchair psychologists, armchair attorneys, armchair political scientists, armchair cultural critics, and armchair blog commenters.

And honestly, at the risk of appearing elitist, some of these people seem barely qualified to mow my grass. That’s about the only thing I am not elitist about. And I have a yard I will let you mow. And I will minister to you by keeping you busy for a while so you don’t get involved in something you should not get involved in.

So pick your battles wisely and carefully. And don’t pick them all.

Here’s a Guy Who Doesn’t Get It

2011-05-12T06:00:00.000-04:00

Several weeks ago, Kwame Kilpatrick, former Detroit Mayor and current prison inmate, said this regarding his perjury about the text message scandal that brought down his corrupt administration.

I certainly believe that telling the truth right would have saved my own butt and would have saved a lot of turmoil and trouble, but I don’t know if I would have done anything any different, because I was trying to stand up for my wife and children at the time.

This is unfortunately all too typical of the kind of thing that passes for husbands and men these days.

The notion that you are protecting your wife and children by lying about another woman is beyond bizarre. It comes only from a sense of entitlement that you should get what you got at home, and get some on the side as well. It is the sense of entitlement and arrogance that underlay the whole sordid mess known as the Kilpatrick Administration in Detroit.

If you had been wanting to protect your wife, you would have limited yourself to her. You would have kept the promises and the commitments you made to her when you married her. There would have no been no text messages, no relationship with your chief of staff, or other women.

You would have taught your boys by example that a real man loves the woman he married and he keeps the promises he made to her.

The truth is you were trying to protect yourself from your wife, from the possibility that she might infringe on your fun, take your family and your life savings, and leave you behind.

And now your boys are growing up without their daddy.

Now, the Detroit Free Press runs another story with this as the lead paragraph:

Carlita Kilpatrick says her husband is distressed and depressed, angry and resentful, has trouble sleeping and fears the future – mainly because his text messages were released, according to a now-disclosed interview with a psychiatrist.

Again, this is just evidence that he, and she, just doesn’t get it. The problem isn’t that the text messages were released. The problem is that there were text messages to be released. His anger, fear, resentment, trouble sleeping, and depression is because he did something wrong, he knows it (which is why he wanted to hide it to begin with), he got caught, and now is paying the price for it.

Here’s the cold hard truth: If you don’t want salacious text messages or emails being made public, then don’t send them.

Instead, cultivate a heart of respect for the woman you married.

It’s a hard lesson to learn, I guess. And one that more than a year in prison has not yet taught him.

His mother, former Congresswoman woman Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick chimes in calling it “judicial misconduct” and “prosecutorial misconduct.” She says it’s “helplessness and slavery,” which is an embarrassment to her and disrespect to generations of African-Americans who were actual slaves for reasons other than getting caught sending illicit text messages to someone they weren’t married to and lying about it while spending $9 million dollars of someone else’s money to hide your own mess.

Fortunately, the gentle congresslady is unemployed now.

Unfortunately, she’s living off her government pension, which means you and I are paying her to pontificate like this..

And by the way, Kwame, your greatest fear should not be the already released text messages.

It should be the federal corruption trial that awaits you and some of your cronies.

Because long after your sentence on perjury and violation of probation has passed, your sentence for corruption and bribery will keep you away from your family.

And my bet is that you still won’t get it.

But let’s not kid ourselves. This is not a Kwame problem. It’s not a Detroit problem. It’s a human problem.

All of us have within us the seeds of self-destruction that have manifested themselves in incredibly ugly ways in this situation.

We are sinners by nature. We are possessed by an extreme sense of entitlement and a deep and abiding gullibility.

We are tempted to satisfy our own lusts and then cover our tracks with dishonesty—whether implicit or explicit, whether only to ourselves or also to those around us.

We would all do well to consider the instructions of Proverbs: Guard your heart with all diligence for from it flow the springs of life (Proverbs 4:23).

Only the gospel can save us from ourselves.

So run to Christ.

Civil Rights and the 60s

2011-05-11T07:47:00.001-04:00

On Monday night, I watched American Experience on PBS. It was about the civil rights movement in America and the freedom riders. It was a fascinating and disturbing episode.

I was born in 1968, which was the year Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated, so for much of the civil rights movement, I was not even alive.

It boggles my mind that these conditions existed so recently.

It boggles my mind that people could make the kind of statements that were made (and still are in some places).

It boggles my mind that many churches were so late to the fight on this topic.

It makes me wonder what the big issues of our day are.

What is it that our children will look back on with embarrassment because we did not step to the front and use our voices?

Stott on the Cross of Christ

2011-05-08T07:15:00.001-04:00

The concept of substitution may be said, then, to lie at the heart of both sin and salvation. For the essence of sin is man substituting himself for God, while the essence of salvation is God substituting himself for man. Man asserts himself against God and puts himself where only God deserves to be; God sacrifices himself for man and puts himself where only man deserves to be. Man claims prerogatives which belong to God alone; God accepts penalties which belong to man alone.

John Stott, The Cross of Christ, p. 160

On College Chapel

2011-05-07T14:05:00.001-04:00

We might as well abandon chapel at our Christian Colleges and Seminaries. We fill them with drivel. Announcements about campus thing this, or denominational thing that, or district thing this, or student/faculty thing that. We let speakers speak who seem to be interested in entertaining or promoting rather than exalting the Risen Savior. Enough.

This is what my friend Marty writes about chapel on college campuses. If you schedule the preachers for your college, you desperately need to hear his words. If you are on the schedule to preach at a college, you desperately need to hear his words.

Don’t let just anyone preach there. Only let those communicators who can enthrall the heart of our brightest minds with an intoxicating vision of Jesus.

Make chapel a “can’t miss” experience for every student. Inspire them with a vision of Jesus that makes them go out the door saying, “I will do anything, I will go anywhere, I will endure anything for the glorious Lord and Savior I just saw in the message of that chapel speaker.”

And pastors, do that every Sunday. Make that your goal every Sunday. Some will hate you. Do it anyway because Jesus is worth it.

College students hear enough nonsense that they don’t need more of it from the chapel pulpit. They don’t need to know how well you can alliterate, or how good a story-teller you are. They don’t need to hear about your mystical experiences of God telling you do this or telling you not to do that. They don’t need you to be funny. They don’t need to you be creative.

They need you to unfold the text of Scripture for them and point their hearts to God and the gospel. They need you to challenge their highest aspirations with Jesus, the King of kings and Lord of lords.

College chapel speaking should be about more than how many students you send there, or how well connected you are. It ought to be about Jesus.

So make it about Jesus.

The Defense of the Faith

2011-04-27T12:57:00.001-04:00

Why is it that the defense of the faith is sometimes confused with defense of the fathers?

An Exercise in Foolishness

2011-04-22T22:45:00.001-04:00

Florida pastor Terry Jones was going to hold a protest today in Dearborn against Sharia law in the United States. He apparently does not know what Sharia law is, but hey, why let that stop him.

However, the city of Dearborn refused to give him a permit for the place he wanted to hold it, and so the matter ended up in court where a jury agreed with the prosecutors that the protest was likely to cause a breach of the peace, thus breaking a little used law written before Lincoln was president (Abraham Lincoln, that is). The prosecutor wanted a $45,000 “peace bond” to pay for the costs of police overtime and other costs to the city. The judge set the bond at $1 and ordered Jones and his assistant to stay away from the mosque for three years.

There are some interesting things here.

One is the issue of free speech. Can a protest be restricted? Jones said no. The jury said yes. Historically, free speech has been given a pretty wide berth. Not today, however.

Here’s the rub: They were being restricted based merely on the possibility that someone else might do something—namely, disturb the peace. To me, it’s a strange thing that the court was tied up trying a case that hadn’t even happened. There were no facts for the jury to consider. It was all based on speculation.

Dearborn can say this wasn’t about content (and they are). But they were worried that the content of his speech might incite a “breach of the peace.”

I think there’s a good case that this should have never gotten to court to begin with.

And the irony is that if it would not have gone to court, things would have actually been better because in the end, taking Jones to court in an effort to preserve the peace didn’t work. A crowd of several hundred people gathered in a counter-protest, thus requiring the police presence that the peace bond was was supposed to pay for. Except the bond didn’t get paid.

And then Jones went to jail for refusing to pay the bond for a protest that had not yet happened. In other words, he went to jail for something he had not yet done, and was not even required to do.

The crowd that gathered was pretty rude and loud, both at the courthouse as well as at the police station. The anger and hatred in the crowd was probably worse than the protest would have been.

I think this is a place where Proverbs 26:4 takes over. Terry Jones is a fool. By answering him, the city of Dearborn gave him not just fifteen minutes of fame, but a whole day, and more to come.

Had they not taken him to court, the rains would have severely dampened any protest. And ignoring him would have been the worst thing you could do to him. He wants publicity. And this gave him far more than a little protest in Dearborn would have given him.

You see, there are some things in life that you make worse by responding to.

This was one of them.

My bet is that this isn’t over.

Dearborn’s effort to save a few thousand dollars on a protest is going to end up costing them a lot more by the time this is litigated.

And Jones got what he wanted. He got a lot of publicity for his cause (more than he ever would have gotten through a simple protest). He also gets to claim the city of Dearborn is being run by Sharia law and is acting unconstitutionally.

All in all, the jury made a bad mistake. The City of Dearborn made a worse one.

The loser is the constitution.

The winner is, believe it or not, none other than Terry Jones.

How Conservatism Almost Lost the World to Tyranny

2011-04-20T08:47:00.001-04:00

Flyboys is James Bradley’s account of American pilots in WWII in the Pacific. It is a fascinating story, unbelievably gruesome at times, but engaging on many different levels.

It begins with a short history of the Japanese Empire, followed by a short history of the development of aviation as a legitimate military weapon in the years between WWI and WWII. It contains descriptions of some unspeakable atrocities.

And it contains a short account of a war that was almost lost before it started.

Billy Mitchell was the first American pilot to fly over the enemy lines in war (WWI) and he and his men delivered valuable intelligence.

Following The Great War, Mitchell saw the value of aviation during a time when sea power (namely, the battleship) was viewed as the key component of national defense.

He argued for developing aviation because he foresaw that the Japanese would use air power as a means towards broadening their own empire. In fact, he predicted a Pearl Harbor type attack in the 1920s.

But the powers that be did not agree with Mitchell. They would not devote resources toward the development of this unproven mode of warfare. They resisted Mitchell’s ideas.

Bradley recounts,

When asked to give his opinion as to why airpower was stillborn in the U.S., with little funding or interest coming from the army or navy, [Mitchell] replied: “Conservatism … You see, the army and the navy are the oldest institutions we have. They place everything on precedent. You can’t do that in the air business. You have got to look ahead.(p. 46)

Mitchell lost. He was court-martialed.

But Mitchell’s view eventually won and the world was saved from German and Japanese domination.

Yet a congressional action to reverse Mitchell’s court-martial was rejected on the same day he entered the hospital for the last time before he died in 1936.

Why do I say this?

Recently, some have been writing about conservatism and its importance.

And in the main, I agree with them. I think conservatism is important. Things have stood the test of time for a reason, and we are right to give priority to conserving that which has been handed down. Fads are a horribly inadequate way to foster lasting values and to build sensible societies.

My fear is that conservatism becomes the goal. And I am unconvinced that conservatism should be the goal.

The goal of all things is genuine love of God and love of fellow man. Those are, after all, the two great commandments.

The question should be, How do we do that?

A people who fail to wrestle with current challenges will never be prepared to meet them.

Notice I did not say that people who fail to adapt to current challenges will never be prepared to meet them. By saying “wrestle,” I am saying we at least need to ask the questions and come up with some answers.

In many cases, I am convinced those answers will push us to conservatism. But if they do not, we must follow the higher aim.

Last month, B2 bombers flew nonstop from their home base in Missouri to Libya and back, something that was unthinkable when Mitchell was flying piston-powered airplanes with open cockpits during WWI.

It is something that was impossible for conservatism.

It is something that is indispensable for modern life.

Jesus and Eternal Life

2011-04-18T06:00:00.000-04:00

When the rich young ruler came to Jesus in Mark 10:17-31, his question of Jesus is significant.

He didn’t come asking what it meant to be a disciple, or how to take the next step now that he was serious about following Jesus. He wasn’t looking for a fire to throw a stick in, or a mountaintop experience to fire him up for another year.

No, he came to Jesus asking about how to have eternal life.

Jesus’ ultimate answer was to sell what he had and follow Jesus.

The man was saddened, apparently because although he wanted eternal life, but he wanted his riches more.

What is interesting is Jesus’ response.

Jesus refused to change the terms of the gospel in order to assure a man that he had eternal life. (I alluded to this in a previous post.)

There are some today who talk much about the evil of changing the terms of the gospel.

And I agree.

Changing the terms of the gospel is an egregious offense that presents a false gospel and a false hope. And one reason I agree is because I see Jesus refusing to change the terms of the gospel.

What is interesting is that those who scream the loudest about changing the terms of the gospel seem often to deny the very thing that Jesus says here.

They say that calling on people to repent of false gods and commit to following Jesus is adding to the gospel.

Jesus, on the other hand, said it is what is necessary for eternal life.

Usually, the tack taken by these folks is to say that what Jesus was talking about here was some extra level of discipleship, some second level of commitment that you take after you have believed and are saved, and you take this step if you really want to get serious about living for Jesus.

But “eternal life” is not some extra level of discipleship. It is heaven instead of hell.

Say what you will, but Jesus raised the stakes and did not offer this man assurance.

He did not negotiate with him about his affection for this world.

He did not offer him entry-level Christianity.

Neither should we.

On the Spectacle of Scandal

2011-04-16T09:33:00.001-04:00

On April 11, 1945, fifty-five years ago this week, the Allied forces liberated Buchenwald, one of the Nazi prison camps of WWII.

Buchenwald had imprisoned almost 240,000 people during the eight years of its existence from 1937-45. It is estimated that more than 55,000 were killed there.

At its liberation in 1945, the Allied army marched almost 2,000 residents of the nearby German town of Weimar five miles up a steep hill so that they could see firsthand the atrocities of Buchenwald. These were crimes against humanity that had been committed right under the noses, to which they had pleaded ignorance.

Video footage, such as seen here or on World War II: The Lost Color Archives reveal the revolting sight that awaited both the Allied liberators and the German neighbors.

Even today, seeing this video footage or the photographs found at sites like the Holocaust Research Project is troubling to all but the most calloused. In fact, “troubling” is an understatement. It is hard to find a word that adequately captures a truly human response.

This parade of German citizens through Buchenwald could have been considered prurient, unnecessary, and something that people did not need to see. It was truly unfit for human consumption. It is staggering to the human mind to consider what depths of depravity had to exist for this type of environment to exist.

But it would awaken the people to what had happened while they stood by. It would open the eyes of the people who supported the Nazi regime, whether knowingly or because of deception, to see the type of abuse, mistreatment, and murder that had gone on right under their nose.

Only by seeing this abuse could they be shown the depths of depravity.

Only be seeing this abuse could future generations be reminded the cost of totalitarianism.

Today, there are those who say that scandals should not be exposed. It hurts the cause. It exposes well-meaning people. It unfairly labels people who did nothing wrong.It lumps too many people together. It does not resolve anything. It does not repair the damage.

And all of that is true.

And all of that is mostly irrelevant.

Public exposure of the atrocities of Buchenwald, Dachau, Auschwitz and Birkenau, Mauthausen, Treblinka, or any other prison camp would not bring back one single life. It would not reunite one single family. It would not undo one day of torture or abuse. It would not provide one meal for the malnourished prisoners. It would not remove the stench of disease and death.

But it would bring a lifetime of reminders, an image stamped so deeply on the human mind that the world should resolve never to let it happen again.

The uncovering of atrocity is an astounding spectacle.

But the scandal is worse.

May a generation arise that refuses to tolerate scandal and its cover-up, that treats victims with grace and mercy, that remembers the atrocities of past generations so that future generations can be spared.

On Intemperance in Argument

2011-04-13T07:32:00.000-04:00

I came across an article recently by Dan Wallace about the history, methods, and critique of the Majority Text theory. I have no real desire to discuss the issue of the article.

What jumped out at me though was this paragraph about Burgon.

Recent MT proponents frequently claim that Burgon’s arguments have never been answered. Yet in part the reason for no point-for-point rebuttal is due to Burgon’s acid pen. Westcott once commented: “I cannot read Mr. Burgon yet. A glance at one or two sentences leads me to think that his violence answers himself.” Had Burgon tempered his arguments, perhaps the discussion would have proved more profitable for both sides. Unfortunately he generated more heat than light. Equally unfortunate, his attitude set the tone for later generations of MT advocates.^{^[1]}

I am reminded by this that many good points can be lost in bad attitudes.

I read a lot of blogs, probably too many to be honest. On the upside, I don’t actually read them. Most I just scan the title and a few lines to see if I am interested.

In many of them, I notice in them a particular attitude at times—an attitude of bravado and bluster. It is the apparent belief that strong words and invective can strengthen an argument.

In general, a bad argument cannot be made better by being a jerk.

And a good arguments are rarely enhanced by being a jerk.

^{^[1]} Daniel B. Wallace, “The Majority-Text Theory: History, Methods And Critique,” JETS (1994): 189.

Uh-Oh

2011-04-12T06:00:00.000-04:00

Word is that an “Indian ‘living god’ [is] in critical condition.”

This guy has apparently performed miracles including raising people from the dead. He has also “a string of hospitals that claim to be able to cure ailments beyond the capabilities of mainstream medicine.”

He is also “believed to produce sacred ash every day.” (Hmmmmm.)

He is also one whose “his reputation has also been damaged by allegations of sexual abuse and paedophilia.”

It should make people think about the things we call gods. And the loyalty we offer to men.

Quotable

2011-04-11T22:27:00.001-04:00

File under “Change Takes Time”

A congregation’s potential is like an egg. You can’t hatch an egg with a blowtorch. You must wait for the egg to mature. But it is also true that unless the eggs are warmed continuously, they will never hatch …

Stetzer and Dodson, Comeback Churches, p. 172.

In the News

2011-04-11T08:30:00.001-04:00

Nothing says “Great presidential election season” like Donald Trump running for president.

Anytime The Donald is involved, you know it’s gonna be good. Here’s a recent letter to the editor published in the NYT.

Even before Gail Collins was with the New York Times, she has written nasty and derogatory articles about me. Actually, I have great respect for Ms. Collins in that she has survived so long with so little talent. Her storytelling ability and word usage (coming from me, who has written many bestsellers), is not at a very high level.

Typical Trump, great spin, and funny stuff.

The trifecta.

Wow

2011-04-06T22:14:00.001-04:00

I don’t even know what to say about this.

An elderly Georgian woman was scavenging for copper to sell as scrap when she accidentally sliced through an underground cable and cut off internet services to all of neighbouring Armenia.

There’s gotta be a joke in there somewhere.

But I will wait to tell it until Armenia gets internet service back so they can laugh with us.

Best Team?

2011-04-04T22:44:00.001-04:00

Evansville, Milwaukee, Wright State, Milwaukee, Valparaiso, Youngstown State.

What it this you ask?

It is the list of teams that beat one of the teams playing tonight in the NCAA “Championship” game. (And you get bonus points if you know there are only three states represented there.)

It’s also a list of teams that didn’t make the NCAA tournament.

It’s not quite as bad as it looks though because at least the team that beat them twice actually made the NIT tournament, and then promptly lost to Northwestern in the first round.

The other team in the championship game actually finished 9th in their league.

Yes, you read that right. Ninth … as in 9th.

It sounds really bad until you consider that their league has sixteen teams. That means they were at least better than seven teams. It also means that they finished first … in the bottom half of their league. (Spin isn’t just for politics.)

That means that the “best team” in college basketball is a contest between a team that lost to Evansville, Wright State, Valparaiso, Youngstown State, and Milwaukee (not once but twice) and a team that was worse than eight other teams in their league.

That, friends, means compelling basketball. (As I write, it is 22-19 at halftime. If you took the “under” at 100, you might be retiring tomorrow on your winnings. You might get the under at 80 the way this thing is going.)

And that, friends, is exhibit A in the case against an NCAA football championship.

Here’s why: One-and-done tournaments are great for excitement, fans, and money.

They are bad ways to determine the best teams.

I doubt there is anyone who hasn’t been drinking since lunchtime that wants to suggest that UConn and Butler are the two best teams in the country. There’s a reason why, only 72 people out of two million+ (according to one bracketeering website) had these two teams in the finals.

Part of that reason is that people don’t know anything about college basketball but still want to get in the office pool on the off chance that three minutes clicking team names might lead to that $50 gift card to Red Lobster. So 72 of them came up with Butler and UConn, though they probably can’t find either on the map, what with Butler not being a state and Conn being a small one with a long name that doesn’t fit on the map).

The other part of that reason is that people do know something about college basketball. And they knew that these two teams were not good bets.

UConn was 12-9 against tournament teams. Butler only played four tournament teams and they lost to three of them.

Oh yeah, and there are a few alumni of Butler and UConn who are unashamed homers. Which is a great thing about college sports: Your diploma comes with a free pass for stupid tournament picks.

The reality that a tournament is exciting. There’s no tomorrow. So you play differently. You don’t save anything because you can’t take it home with you.

The reality is also that tournaments highlight flukes. Anyone can get a good break from the officials (remember the Big East tournament, the Butler-Pitt ending, and a dozen others). But you won’t get thirty games worth of breaks.

Any mediocre player can get a hot hand for a game or two, and a good player might have an off night or two. But neither will have thirty.

Over the course of the season the officiating, the hot hands, the injuries, and the coaching mistakes even out. And over the course of a season is is pretty easy to see who is good and who is not.

And it doesn’t take 68 teams to sort it out. It only takes that many to make 73 bajillion dollars.

So why have a football playoff? Because fans love tournaments.

Unless your football team is number 5 in a four team playoff. Or number 9 in a eight team playoff. Or number 17 in a sixteen team playoff. Of if your team loses its conference championship because it lost to a team the conference champion didn’t have to play because of the luck of the draw.

Then you will whine about a tournament the same way you whine about the lack of a tournament.

A tournament in football will not determine the best football team in the country anymore than a tournament in basketball determines the best basketball team in the country.

The only thing it will do is cause talk radio hosts to have to come up with hours of stuff to talk about because the rankings won’t matter anymore.

Is college football perfect?

Of course not.

But all in all, it’s not that bad. And not having a tournament makes it more important to win every game. And if you win them all, chances are you will have a say in who is the national champion.

And you can spend the next seven months arguing about it.

And the NCAA football schools can enjoy the 73 bajillion dollars they make without a tournament.

After all, it’s all about the education, you know.

Right.

FYI – The Parable of the Mustard Seed

2011-03-31T19:47:00.001-04:00

Jesus tells the parable of the mustard seed in Matthew 13:31-32; Mark 4:30-33, and Luke 13:18-19. The mustard seed is called the smallest of all seed and yet grows larger than the garden plants and provide a nesting place for birds in its branches.

This, Jesus says, is what the Kingdom of God is like.

So what does it mean?

The mustard plant was a very small seed that grows very rapidly (in a matter of weeks) into a decent sized plant—usually around four feet, sometimes perhaps ten feet high or so, and on occasion fifteen feet. It had branches that would be stout enough to hold bird’s nests.

So what’s the relation to the kingdom?

Jesus’ point is not about the size of the kingdom. The mustard seed is not a particularly large plant in comparison to other tree, though it is large in comparison to other herbs (mustard is an herb). While the kingdom of God will be large (as in worldwide) that is not the meaning of this parable. Some suggest that the birds in the branches represent the Gentile nations incorporated into the kingdom. That may be the point of the branches; it may not be.

Jesus’ point is neither about the timing of the kingdom. The parable does not teach that the seed is planted and then slowly grows into an overwhelming kingdom encompassing the whole world during the church age. If anything, it would be the opposite, that the kingdom actually grows very quickly because that is what a mustard plant did. But that is not the point.

The point of the parable is that even though the kingdom of God looks to the disciples as if it is small like a mustard seed, it will assuredly come and be great. The small seed produces a plant out of proportion to its size.

Jesus is using the mustard seed in order to assure his disciples of the success of the kingdom.

To disciples being sent out on mission, and soon to be with out their leader, they needed the encouragement to know that their work was not in vain.

Sure, it seemed small and hard to them. Jesus was being rejected by many. In fact, the parable of the sower which is told immediately before this in Matthew, Mark, and Luke reveals to us that a great many professors will in fact not be true believers. They will fall away for various reasons.

Yet the disciples must not lose heart. Even though their kingdom work might seem to be having little effect, almost insignificant, they were part of a bigger promise.

They must not lose heart.

So it is that the church to whom this parable was recorded in the gospel needs to be reminded of the kingdom promise in times of persecution and difficulty. The church was not being encouraged that the kingdom was gradually coming, or that it was already and not yet (though that may be true in some sense).

The church was being reminded that the mustard seed does grow.

Our labor is not in vain, though it may appear hard and even hopeless at times.

The kingdom will come. Jesus will reign. It will be worth it all.

On Forgiveness and Prayer

2011-03-26T08:13:00.001-04:00

When you pray with unforgiving heart, you are asking God to do for you what you are unwilling to do for others. You are asking him to give you something you don’t deserve while refusing to give someone else something they don’t deserve (Mark 11:25).

Census, Cities, and the Gospel

2011-03-24T13:10:00.001-04:00

2010 Census numbers are slowly being released (with a picture of one of my favorite restaurants).

Last time Detroit was this small (1910) Henry Ford had not yet started paying workers $5 a day (1914). Some apparently think Ford’s (as the old-timers say) would like to return to $5 a day. But I think that rumor has been greatly overstated.

What isn’t overstated is the sad state of the city of Detroit. The only city in the country to lose a great percentage of it’s residents in the last decade appears to be New Orleans. And they had Katrina. Before you blame the auto industry problems, remember that most of the autoworkers lived in the burbs, not the city. In other words, Detroit’s problems are not separate from the auto industry, but neither are they identical. They are worse; they are deeper; they are systemic.

And there really are no meaningful solutions to the problem. Mayor Dave Bing is trying to downsize the city by getting people to move into selected areas, thus relieving the city of providing services to such a huge area (the city of Detroit is almost 140 square miles). Other areas would be turned into urban farms.

Mayor Bing is also trying to come up with another 40,000 people in order to reach the 750,000 person threshold for certain state and federal aid. That will help get more money—other people’s money—to solve problems Detroit is not willing to take on and solve themselves. Let’s face it: As long as Uncle Sam will shove some dough your way, you can keep wasting money on political enterprises instead of fixing the problems. So 40,000 more people is important to keep the political enterprises healthy.

“Cynical,” you say? Sure, but well founded.

Given Detroit’s ability to work the numbers in the budget, I have no doubt that they can come up with 40,000 people on a census, because as everyone knows with the budget, numbers are just numbers; they do not actually need to correspond to anything in reality.

Now, if they can only find a way to tax these 40,000 people. Except those 40,000 probably don’t have jobs and that will raise the already atrocious unemployment rate (put by some as high as 50% in the city of Detroit). But they will be mythical people so it really won’t matter anyway.

And at the end of the day, whether 713,000 or 750,000, Detroit will still be a failing city with small-visioned leaders who lack the character and political will to solve the problems.

The Detroit public schools are failing beyond belief and the newest solution apparently involves 60 student classrooms. The school board who got the schools where they are (in part by turning down a $200 million dollar charter school grant) is complaining about the guy who is trying to change it and has taken him to court multiple times. Which goes to show that education is a talking point, not a task, not even a goal.

The house vacancy rate in Detroit is said to be about 22%. I think that’s actually lower than the real number. But it means more than one out of every five houses is empty. Probably 1 of the remaining 4 is probably in a very bad state of disrepair. Burned out houses are more common than you might think, particularly in certain parts of the city (like Delray that I drove through last Friday on the way to Armando’s for dinner).

And when I drive through I wonder, What is the place of the gospel in a city like Detroit?

Detroit doesn’t need more churches. It has churches all over the place. What it needs is more gospel—a gospel rightly defined, a gospel boldly preached, and a gospel practically lived out.

I think there are some good gospel works going on in the city by friends of mine and others whom I don’t know but know about. But I don’t sense there is a big push towards urban church planting or church revitalization in Detroit.

Some years ago I had a “Ten in Ten” concept going on in my head. Ten churches in ten strategic areas (think the parish concept) in the city of Detroit. Start some preaching points and see what develops.

I would still love to see it happen, but it’s going to take some committed people who are willing to live in what amounts to a North American version of a third world country.

“Harsh,” you say? Sure, but well founded.

Drive around a bit in Detroit.

And when you do, look at the faces of the people and dream of a church being built out of them. Dream of the litter of idols smashed by Jesus rather than the litter of trash left by citizens. Dream of the reclamation of lives destroyed by drugs and violence rather than buildings destroyed by time and neglect.

And look for places for gospel churches to meet, where the hope preached doesn’t rest on the city council, the mayor’s office, or the courtroom.

And pray for the souls of these people who are hopeless and trapped, and who mistakenly think living jobless in drug and violence ridden Detroit is their worst problem.

And pray for workers to go out into the harvest. Perhaps gospel people can give “urban farming” a new spin.

A Word About Modesty and Parents

2011-03-22T11:27:00.001-04:00

Let me first note that if a guy lusts after a girl, it is his fault. He is responsible for his wickedness. If a man rapes a woman, it is his fault. He is responsible. He cannot blame it on the woman. There are no exceptions and no excuses.

But, there is a reason that the Bible has commands to women about modesty. That reason is because women have a duty, an obligation, to themselves, their husbands (future husbands if they are not yet married), to their daughters, to their sons, and to whoever else might see them to dress modestly. They are to make sure that only their own husbands enjoy their God-given enticements. And when their dress acts like a flashing red light and loud siren, it should sound very foolish to claim they have no responsibility.

Having said that, I point you to The Wall Street Journal today which has an article entitled “Why Do We Let Girls Dress Like That?”

This author says, “Why do so many of us not only permit our teenage daughters to dress like this—like prostitutes, if we're being honest with ourselves—but pay for them to do it with our AmEx cards?”

This is not authored by some raving fundamentalist pastor whose wife looks like she just barely survived a bout with a buffet and Mike Tyson. It’s not written by a Mennonite with a headcovering, or a Muslim in a burqa. It’s not even written by a reformed sex offender who just got out after doing his fifteen for crimes against an attractive young girl.

It is authored by a Moses (Jennifer Moses that is). A woman. And apparently a Jewish woman. And like many Jews and many women, she is worth listening to.

She, like the ODG that shares her name, speaks a word that needs to be heard by parents, by teens too young to get it, by school headmasters responsible for classroom decorum, indeed by anyone who breathes and has a beating heart.

Here’s that word: Dress your age. And save something for the wedding night and the years that follow.

I think we live in a world where teen girls grow up too fast and teen boys grow up too slow.

Thirteen year-old girls are dressing like their twenty-five year-old man-hunters desperate to catch some man’s eye like he is the last single man living … though being single isn’t much of a requirement these days.

And thirty year-old boys are working part-time jobs at McDonald’s (this week at least), playing video games, and mooching off mom and dad for refrigerator privileges and living space (if they happen to even make it home at night).

Then when this thirteen year-old grows up and enters a relationship with this now thirty-five year old, she wonders why he only seems to want her for her body and makes her go out and get a job so they can eek out enough money to get a $300 apartment with stained carpet and loud neighbors.

And then three kids and a frazzled decade later, she wonders why he sits by the apartment pool with sunglasses on all summer long, spend hours on the computer though the browser history is always blank, and gets text messages at strange hours but never seems to have any texts on his phone.

She should remember that she attracted a jerk by using something wrongly. And he will be completely at fault for his sin. And so will she.

For God’s sake, and for your husband’s sake, and for your children’s sake, for men’s sake, for women’s sake, cover up a bit.

Girls, be thirteen for at least a year of life, preferably the year between twelve and fourteen. Develop a little self-respect. If you want men to like you for your mind, then spend a little time on that and not so much in front of the mirror. Because you will find that men who like you for your body will soon find another, and yours will stop being “thirteen” and become “thirty-five and three kids.”

And then what?

Moms, insist that your daughters act their age. And by that, I don’t mean telling them to grow up. I mean tell them to stop acting like they are twenty-five. And dads, be a dad. Tell the girls in your life what they can and cannot wear. You know how teenage boys think, because you used to be one, and probably still think like one at times. So help out. It’s what dads do.

And dads, insist your sons act their age. Teach them to be a man, sooner, not later. No young man will suffer irreparable harm because he scrounges up some spending money by raking yards or mowing grass rather than playing whatever the newest video game rage is. And missing the latest Fox cartoon will not send them to an asylum. Teaching them to wash dishes, sweep and vacuum, pick up clothes, and the like will not cause cancer, either for you or for them, though it may be painful for a while. And moms, with dad’s help, insist that your sons treat you like a lady, not a maidservant.

And dads, while I am here, I cannot think of any reason why your wife or your daughter needs to have something plastered across the back of her sweatpants or jeans. My guess is that you can’t either.

But you probably know exactly why it is there and exactly what young men (and old men) are thinking of when they try to read it … again and again and again.

Yes, legalistic I know.

But a generation depends on it.

And we have already lost one.

It’s time to reclaim the next.

Why Paul?

2011-03-21T06:00:00.000-04:00

Paul was an apostle who was “untimely born” (1 Corinthians 15:8). This means that he did not meet the only stated New Testament qualification for an apostle: One who has “accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us—beginning with the baptism of John until the day that He was taken up from us— one of these must become a witness with us of His resurrection" (Acts 1:21-22).

The eleven disciples apparently had picked up along the way with Jesus this idea that a “witness to the resurrection” should have been there all along the way.

Paul was not.

Why did God choose Paul and thus make such an exception to the will of the eleven apostles gathered in the upper room?

Perhaps the answer is found in 1 Timothy 1 where Paul gives the briefest of biographies (something a number of testifiers could learn from). He says he was a blasphemer and a persecutor.

Yet he found mercy so “Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience as an example for those who would believe in Him for eternal life” (1 Timothy 1:16).

In other words, Paul’s salvation and subsequent ministry is a reminder to us all that God is not limited by our past, and Jesus is bigger than our past.

It is a reminder to us who have sinned (and who among us hasn’t).

It is also a reminder to us about those to whom God has called us to minister.

Let us not forget that if God saved Paul and used him to turn the world upside with the gospel, whoever you are working with is not beyond the reach of that kind of mercy.

Quotable

2011-03-19T09:27:00.001-04:00

James Edwards commenting on the story of James and John requesting places at the right hand and left hand of Jesus who remains in the middle, the central place:

The brothers hope to honor Jesus while honoring themselves. How easily worship and discipleship are blended with self-interest; or worse, self-interest is masked as worship and discipleship.*

We would do well to consider our own selves.

Selfish ambition, pride, and self-righteousness is so deceptive. We can easily think that we are worshipping Jesus when we are in fact blending in our self-interest, or masking our self-interest as worship and discipleship.

______________________

*James R. Edwards, The Gospel According to Mark, The Pillar New Testament commentary (Grand Rapids, Mich; Leicester, England: Eerdmans; Apollos, 2002). 322.

Church Size Dynamics

2011-03-18T08:40:00.001-04:00

I was recently reading this article by Tim Keller on “Leadership and Church Size Dynamics.”

There is a lot of good and helpful stuff in it, I think. And it helps us to think about some broader issues.

First, church size isn’t everything. It is something however. And a larger church is something to strive for because a larger church means the Great Commission is being carried out.

Remember, the Great Commission is not only preaching. It is making disciples. And it is going into all the world to make disciples of those who weren’t previously disciples, and so that means numerical increase.

That may not be true in every single locale. There may be places where disciple-making is particularly hard and disciples are few for a variety of reasons. But the goal is more followers of Jesus, and that means that numbers matter, at least to some degree.

There are two ends to this spectrum. Some pastors and churches chase after more people and more people and do whatever it takes to get them there. They become sinfully pragmatic. Other pastors and churches are content with what they have, and have lost their passion for evangelism. They become sinfully apathetic.

Keller talks about the fact that some people attach spirituality to their desired church size. It happens both for big churches (spiritual because they are really growing and reaching people) and small churches (spiritual because they are standing firm against the tides of compromise and people just won’t come for that because they don’t like truth).

(And then there’s the pesky medium sized churches who claim that a church over a certain size should be planting a new church rather than continuing to grow the present one.)

Some pastors believe that if there aren’t more and different people there this week than there were last week, they have failed. Other pastors believe that if there aren’t more and different people there this week than there were last week, it doesn’t matter. So long as there is someone there to give in the offering and listen to his preaching, things are fine.

I would challenge both pastors to consider their task, their definition of success, and their heart for people.

The first pastor, who always wants more, can be driven by the idol of the crowd rather than being driven by the heart of the individual. He may need to repent of seeing people for the sake of their part in the congregation and begin to see people as individuals.

The second pastor, who is content with the same, can be driven by the idol of stability rather than by a heart to reach hopeless sinners with the hope of Jesus. He may need to repent of his comfort zone and begin to see people as possible Christians, meaning someone in whom God might be working to bring them to faith in Christ.

It is true that people do prefer certain church sizes, and are not comfortable in other church sizes. Pastors are not excluded from that. The good news is that there is nothing wrong with that, unless church size becomes your idol.

As a church member, rather than chasing a church of a certain size, find a church that you can worship, learn, evangelize, and serve in. Forget the size; love the church.

As a pastor, develop a heart for the people who are not there, alongside of a heart for the people who are there. That won’t make you two-hearted. It should make you big-hearted.

If you are constantly measuring success by numbers, you should probably take stock of who you are really serving.

And if you never measure success by numbers, you should probably take stock of what you are doing.

Tragedy and Mercy

2011-03-17T22:02:00.001-04:00

This past Sunday I took the opportunity to preach in light of the earthquake and tsunami that has devastated Japan.

I did this because (1) it is on people’s minds, (2) God said something about situations like this, and (3) I will be here this week to preach what I was going to preach last week.

I addressed the topic from Luke 13:1-9 where Jesus addresses two kinds of human tragedies. The first was brought to him by people apparently questioning how the Kingdom of God could be here if Pilate is killing worshipers in the act of worshiping. Does Jesus have an anything to say about that, they wonder?

Turns out he does.

And it’s pretty simple: “Do you think you are better than they are, simply because you were not one of them? Your main concern should not be the worshipers that were killed, but yourselves.”

You see, they want to question Jesus about the kingdom and justice. Jesus wants them to question themselves about their own state.

Jesus then raises another issue. This one is not some sort of religious genocide, but accidental tragedy. A building falls and kills eighteen people.

Again Jesus calls their attention to themselves.

In both of these cases, Jesus turns our attention, not to perceived injustice but to the condition of us all. He turns us not to sympathize with hurting families and destroyed communities, though that would certainly be an appropriate response to the plight of hurting images of God.

And this is difficult for some.

In the midst of tragedy we want a prophetic Jesus that cries out against injustice and disaster. We want Jesus to stand up and proclaim Pilate to be a terrible ruler, unjust and declare the innocence of the victims. We want Jesus to stand up and declare the accidental deaths to be the fault of someone somewhere who failed in their job.

And Jesus does that elsewhere.

But here Jesus does no such thing. He rather directs our attention back to ourselves.

For Jesus the question is not “Why” or “why them?” it is “Why not us?”

We are not better than the people in Japan, or Haiti, or China, or Cambodia, or Europe, or Jerusalem. Surviving is no evidence that we are okay. It may be merely evidence of God’s merciful opportunity for repentance.

The bigger point of the parable, the thrust of it, is that God has mercy on people who should have already repented. The continued existence of sinners, whether Jew or Gentile, is not evidence of God’s approval or acceptance of them. It is rather evidence of his mercy. He should have already cut them off for failing to bear fruit. But he waits.

“Repentance is not something you put on a list of things to do some day. Time is short. You are in the midst of a desperate effort to save your soul. Repent now, or perish now. God’s grace has given you another chance.”^{^[1]}

^{^[1]} Trent C. Butler, Luke, Holman New Testament Commentary; Holman Reference (Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 2000). 221.

Does Hell Matter?

2011-03-14T10:41:00.001-04:00

Rob Bell’s new book, Love Wins, hits the shelves this week. It is fairly widely regarded by those who have read it as some sort of denial of the traditional conception of hell as eternal conscious torment. Whether it is universalism, inclusivism, or some variant may be more hard to tell. Reviews are coming out from people like Tim Challies, Kevin DeYoung, and Ed Stetzer. Al Mohler is weighing in on the book and doctrine as well.

I doubt I will read the book. I have things to read that I am actually interested in, books about things that are actually controversial. Hell is not.

So here’s my take on the question of hell.

Hell matters because God matters. Hell is the only reasonable punishment for sin against God. If you doubt that, you either don’t understand God or don’t understand sin.

Hell matters because God says it exists, it is horrible, and it is eternal. If hell doesn’t exist, isn’t horrible, and isn’t eternal, then God lied. And that’s a pretty big deal.

Hell matters because Jesus says it exists, it is horrible, and it is eternal. If hell doesn’t exist, isn’t horrible, and isn’t eternal, then Jesus lied. And that’s a pretty big deal too.

Hell matters because Jesus died, and I doubt the love of a Father who kills his own Son to save people from something they were never in danger of anyway.

Hell matters because Scripture matters. If Scripture is wrong on the very important point of hell, what else might it be wrong on?

Hell matters because heaven matters. Hell and heaven are both said to be eternal. If hell isn’t actually eternal, and heaven is the same, then heaven isn’t actually eternal. This then leads us to some form of annihilationism, both for the just and the unjust.

Hell matters because the church matters. The church is an “assurance factory” for those who profess to follow Christ. If there is no hell to avoid, then there is no reason to seek the affirmation of the church as a guard against our own idolatries leading us into hell.

Hell matters because the resurrection matters. Jesus died as victor over death and hell. It is all useless and vain if there is not a real death and hell, not the kind of death when the body stops to function, but the kind of death that is eternal.

Hell matters because suffering matters. The Bible promises that those who seem to prosper now in the persecution and tormenting of Jesus’ followers will one day have a far greater torment that will be the just recompense of their unbelief. The hope of gospel-driven suffering is that the inflictors of suffering will one day have a far greater suffering that will be evidence of God’s righteous judgment.

Hell matters because justice matters. Scripture laments the fact that sometimes the righteous perish and the wicked prosper. If there is no hell, then this obvious injustice goes unaddressed. Hell serves as the eternal scales where injustice is repaired by bringing the just reward of sinners on their own head in a way that the society of humanity could never achieve.

Hell matters because preaching matters. The biblical basis for preaching is, at least in part, to warn people to flee from the wrath to come. Neither God, nor Jesus, nor the prophets, nor the apostles were so sophisticated as to pretend that hell was not real, not horrible, or not eternal. Neither should we.

Hell matters because hell matters.

Quotable

2011-03-14T08:51:00.001-04:00

Self-help appeals to the will of the people by challenging them to apply biblical principles without necessarily applying the gospel to their hearts. In self-helpism Christ as example is placed above Christ as Savior … Self-help preaching does not take the pervasiveness of sin seriously because it assumes that people want to obey and can obey, they just need to be told how to do it. Such preaching is not biblical because completely discounts the reality of human resistance to obeying God.

Self-help preaching many times makes the Bible character “like us.” We are David, and our problems are like Goliath, and so forth. A straight line is drawn directly from the character’s struggle or victory to us without connecting any of it to the person and work of Christ.

Thus, it produces consumeristic, shallow people because it does not bring them face-to-face with God.

— Darrin Patrick,Church Planter, p. 139.

Saturday Night Gospel

2011-03-05T19:37:00.001-05:00

Here’s a message that should be challenging to all. I think it contains a good reminder of the gospel.

Some of you might not like it. You should listen anyway.

I hate to feel like I have to offer all kinds of disclaimers here, so I won’t (either hate it or offer it).

Love the gospel in it.

Feel free to want your goat if you wish.

But realize why some people aren’t listening to you.

This and That

2011-03-04T07:33:00.001-05:00

From around the blogosphere:

For fun, here’s some dogma for you courtesy of Ed Stetzer and friends. Even if you don’t like Ed, you should find this funny.

Now on a serious note, Kevin DeYoung writes about liberal theology. What’s interesting to me is how familiar it sounds, not to those who know history but to those know who know the present. If you didn’t know the names and didn’t know that the title of the book from which he is quoting includes the dates “1805-1900” there is little to make you think he is writing about anything other than today. Surely the Preacher was right: There is nothing new under the sun.

C. Michael Patton writes about Rob Bell and expectations:

Frankly, when I heard that Bell might come out on the side of universalism, I thought to myself, “Oh, I thought we already knew that.” I don’t expect much these days from popular writers who don’t screen their thought through historic Christianity and contemporary Evangelical scholarship.

Time may reveal that some jumped the gun on Bell’s universalism, but there little’s doubt that Bell long ago left orthodoxy in some pretty major ways. (See DeYoung above.)

Louis Markos writes about cellphones:

I refer more broadly to the coarsening of manners and the increase in narcissism that heavy cell phone usage has both created and facilitated. …

If the offenders in these scenarios were to be called to account for their behavior, they would all offer the same basic excuse: they had to take the call; it was “urgent.” And therein lies the essential (spiritual) danger of the cell phone. We live in an age that has lost not only its moral compass but its right ordering of values. With each year, we grow less and less able to distinguish between that which is important and that which is trivial, between the lasting and the ephemeral, the vital and the frivolous, the sacred and the secular. …

But the measure for that now is neither ethical nor philosophical nor theological. It is, instead, personal, subjective, and egocentric. I want it now, and so I will have it now—even if it corrupts rather than nurtures, degrades rather than edifies.

Goats and Hell

2011-02-26T16:17:00.001-05:00

@Rob Bell — At least the goat on the stage was merely weird, not heretical.

Why preach if no one is going to hell anyway?

What did Jesus die for?

Always Ready

2011-02-25T09:16:00.001-05:00

The old saying for pastors is “Always be ready to preach, pray, or die.”

Yesterday I went to the funeral home to visit a family in our church who had lost a sister to a sudden heart attack of some sort. She was 61 years old. On Sunday morning she got off her night shift as a nurse and went to her car. She drove only a few feet before it happened. Doctors worked on her until early afternoon but could not stop Death.

It was sudden. It was unexpected.

At the funeral home, I was asked if I would give a short message.

This too was sudden and unexpected, but obviously I agreed. Perhaps, sadly, I was more prepared than she was.

I had not thought about it at all until that moment, but I am always willing to help out wherever possible.

So I grabbed a Bible and spoke for about ten minutes about the confusion and questions that unexpected death often arouses. Life doesn’t seem to make sense when a 61 year old lady in seemingly good health with lots of great friends drops dead.

It is the sort of question addressed in Ecclesiastes where the Preacher tells us that there are a lot of questions and not very many answers about how to make sense of life in this world.

In the face of confusion, there has to be some way to find hope. That hope cannot be found in trying to make sense of the seemingly unexplainable.

I pointed us to Colossians 2 where we are told that in Christ are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

Christ is the only way to make sense of life in this world. He is the one who gives shape to the lives that we lead. He is the one who can give us hope in the midst of confusion.

That hope is found because Jesus lived, died, and rose again for us to save us and give us eternal life in heaven.

The life that he gives will last for longer than 61 years. And it won’t end on Sunday morning after work in a parking lot, or on an operating table.

The bad part of the occasion was that five or six people approached me afterward asking about where our church was an expressing some interest in attending.

And I did not have one card with information about our church on it.

But perhaps some people will consider Jesus because of it.

Jesus and the Rich Young Ruler

2011-02-18T12:21:00.001-05:00

Jesus looked on him with compassion and said to him, “Oh, you don’t want to leave your money? No problem; just believe in me. The whole ‘Lord’ thing is overrated anyway” (Mark 10:17-31, esp. vv. 21-22).

Confession

2011-02-18T09:11:00.001-05:00

Dear Reader,

I confess to you that I am sorely tempted by clear blue skies and 50 degree temperatures to leave my office today and go play a few holes of golf. I would do it solely for good reasons … to enjoy creation and see if I can still make contact with the ball.

Please help me with this intense struggle.

Is it okay if I promise to gain no personal enjoyment from it?

Signed,

Afflicted and feeling the pains of withdrawal in the face of early opportunity.

Stop Talking and Go Do It

2011-02-18T08:58:00.001-05:00

Here are some helpful and challenging thoughts on evangelism.

Preaching the Gospel from the OT

2011-02-18T07:56:00.001-05:00

There are a few blogs kicking around the idea of preaching Christ and the gospel from the OT. The Gospel Coalition will focus on this topic this year. Just this week, The Gospel Coalition announced a website devoted to this topic.

One blogger commented that he had preached five messages from the OT and mentioned Christ only once. Another blogger responded that such was appalling. But why was that appalling? I don’t know what the texts were, and until I do, how I can pass judgment on the content of the message? Can we automatically say that the absence of something in a sermon is “appalling” if we don’t know what the text was?

In my view, if one is committed to preaching the text, the question of what we preach is derived from the Scriptures, not from a precommitment to preach Jesus.

Just yesterday I saw a blogger talk about finding help in determining the Christological interpretation of an OT text.

Yet absent is any reason why one should look for a Christological interpretation.

If such interpretation exists, it should arise naturally from the exegetical process. It is found in the words of the text. Only when we study the text can we determine whether or not it is appalling to not mention Jesus.

I know this sounds like rank heresy to some, but I would simply ask, what warrant do we have to use a text to preach something that is not in the text. Everyone who reads this blog would say that there is no warrant to preach something that is not in the text.

Many critics of fundamentalism have lamented (and rightly so) the tendency of some preaching to “take a text and depart therefrom,”—ito use the text as a springboard for their personal topic.

If I were to stand up and preach that the story of Genesis 6-9 means that every “man of God” should have a boat, everyone would object that I am not preaching the text because that text says nothing about the watercraft ownership obligations of preachers.

Yet I would suggest that all some are doing is sanctifying that tendency by inserting “Jesus” or “our greater David” in the place of having a boat or “hairstyles” or “britches on women.”

Is it really okay to use a text to declare something the text doesn’t say? I don’t think so. And I don’t think that changes just because we have good intentions.

I think it greatly prejudices the study process when the outcome is decided. I fear that for some, the main study question is, “How do I get to Calvary from here?”

Spurgeon’s old quote about finding roads and jumping hedges is a great and powerful quote. It’s also bad exegetical method and worse preaching method.

You see, when you use the text to say something the text does not say, you ultimately undermine the authority of the preacher and often, the authority of the Scriptures.

When we study a text, we need to study it on its own terms.

Jesus never declared that everything in the OT was about him. What he said was that everything in the OT that was about him was actually about him. In other words, it wasn’t that the every OT passage spoke of a Messiah. It was that everything in the OT that spoke about the Messiah was speaking of Jesus of Nazareth.

The men on the road to Emmaus were not confused because they didn’t know the OT spoke of the Messiah. They were confused because they did not know that the OT message about the Messiah was about Jesus of Nazareth.

So in my view, we do not need a greater commitment to preaching Jesus and the gospel. We need a greater commitment to preach the text. Often, Jesus and the gospel will arise out of that. And often, Jesus and the gospel will be the answer to the problem presented in the text.

But we must not start there. We cannot start with “How do I find the Christological interpretation of this text?” We start with “What does the text say and what does it mean by what it says?”

Stetzer on Teenage Rebellion

2011-02-17T08:01:00.001-05:00

Ed Stetzer writes on “The Myth of Teenage Rebellion.” It’s not earth-shattering and it’s not new. But it’s interesting.

The sound-byte of note is this:

Thinking it is normal for children to raise themselves and become well-adjusted in their teen years only in partnership with their peers often creates the problem, not solves it.

This should continue to challenge us (or start to challenge you if you are behind so far) about the way we do “youth ministry” in the church, and about the way we do parenting in general.

I believe that we all need friends in our own generation. We need people around our age and life context to do life with. The Bible often applies to teens in a way that it does not apply to young marrieds, middle-aged single moms, or retirees. We need to have contexts where each is addressed.

But if all your friends and relationships are within a year or two of your age, you are severely limiting yourself. You are damaging your potential for growth and ministry. You are ultimately hurting the body of Christ.

Most of us need to be much more intentional about cultivating intergenerational relationships, particularly in the church which, in my view, is the main building block of relationships in life. We need to purposely connect younger with older. It needs to be a building block of life as a church.

I am not against youth groups and I am not for family integrated churches. I think both approaches have some issues.

My encouragement is to remember that teenage rebellion is a fact of life because all ages are rebellious. It’s part of being in Adam. And it’s really no different than the rebellion of the “terrible twos” or the “mid-life crisis.” It is the expression of self-lordship in the context of our lives.

The question is, What is the best way to address rebellion?

I am convinced that we do not best address teenage rebellion by locking them all up in a closed room with each other and bringing them out when they are nineteen in hopes that Jesus still works miracles.

No, it will take much more than guarding the door of the youth room to make sure they don’t get out and mess up the real church.

We need to expect people to act their age, but that involves teaching them how to act, training their affections both by biblical counsel and by personal relationships of example. And that can only take place when we connect younger with older.

We should let kids be kids. But we should not let “kid-ness” continue past its “sell by date.”

Let’s help young people grow up by expecting more and cultivating more.

Around the Horn

2011-02-16T07:48:00.001-05:00

This week is the official beginning of hope. Spring training has started, everyone is a potential World Series champion, and warmer days are just around the corner.

In honor of baseball, here are a three bases and a home run from around the blogosphere.

At first base, Ben says, “Sometimes, the Bible doesn't say everything we wish it said, even if our wishes are motivated by our desires to defend it.” This is in response to a discussion about whether or not Genesis 1-2 teaches something about the length of the creation days and weeks.

This past week, I preached from Mark 10:1-12 about marriage. A thought that I had (and probably said) rings true here. Ben is right that sometimes the Bible doesn’t say everything we wish it said. But often, it says far more than we are willing to admit, whether about creation or marriage.

I think Genesis 1-2 is pretty clear. There is really no other way that God could have communicated six successive twenty-four hour days. There are, on the other hand, much better ways to communicate long periods of time.

At second base, Mark set off a bit of a firestorm with some comments about Christ in the OT. Here’s the funny thing: I think what Mark said about separation in the OT is far more controversial than what he said about Christ in the OT. Of course, I say that in light of Mark’s helpful clarifications both in the comments there and in this subsequent post. I post my “mostly agreement” with Mark here instead of at his blog so that no one will see that I agree mostly with Mark. There is no doubt that Christ is in the OT, in the Law and the Prophets. But I also think that there is no doubt that Christ is not nearly so omnipresent in the OT as many people seem to think. Perhaps later I will write a bit on my take on Christ in the OT, but suffice it to say that if we are going to preach the text as the text, Christ will not be preached as the meaning of the text all the time.

I think the whole “Gospel-centered preaching” from the OT is well-intended, but I fear that it adds a pious slant to old moralism, such as Dave indicates here. Interesting, a long time ago I started a post quoting the same thing Dave quotes because I was astounded that Tim Keller actually said this. I didn’t take time to transcribe it but you can read it for yourself. I think the lectures where Keller gives this illustration are excellent, and helpful in so many ways. Just don’t use his examples.

At third base, a couple of parables showed up on the internet this week, along with a complaint by someone that he couldn’t understand one of the parables. This included a demand for an apology for the parable. I think he means an explanation, but perhaps in a moment of sensus plenior, he actually means something else. I wonder if he holds Christ to the same standard, demanding an apology for His parables.

And for the home run, just when you think it can’t get any more bizarre, I happened upon a discussion about the KJV and Revelation 16:5. A commenter, ironically (or perhaps prophetically) using the handle of “Faith” says:

ANYWAY, this being the situation, the decisions of faithful translators simply ARE evidence equal to the manuscript evidence. OBJECTIVELY equal. This isn’t just an arbitrary thing I’m saying. There is very good manuscript and version support for Holy One in 16.5, including previous English versions by faithful translators, but nevertheless Beza chose against it and gave reasonable support for his decision, and the KJV translators followed him rather than the other line of evidence.

BOTH LINES HAVE TO BE CONSIDERED FAITHFUL TO GOD’S WORD because there is no objective way of deciding one way or the other. Beza COULD have been right in his conjecture that the verse once read as he corrected it to read. WE CAN’T KNOW.

What we learn is that manuscript evidence doesn’t matter so long as a “faithful translator” (apparently defined as someone who translated the KJV) inserted some words into the text. Of course, words inserted by someone other than a “faithful translator” don’t count. They are perversions and corruptions.

What we also learn (in what is perhaps a bit of a Freudian slip), is that two contradictory readings can both be considered “faithful to God’s word,” which destroys the whole movement this commenter is apparently trying to save.

I think what we learn most of all is that a segment of KJVOnly proponents have no clue what they are talking about, and regularly participate in and propagate beliefs and arguments that have the potential of destroying the Christian faith.

And now, in honor of spring training (and Jim Rome), I’m out.

Quotable

2011-02-15T08:27:00.001-05:00

You can only minister to people you see regularly.

Knute Larsen from [I have no idea,
but I jotted it down because it was thought provoking]

How We Got Here

2011-02-14T08:48:00.001-05:00

Scot McKnight links to this letter from the Presbyterian Church (USA) calling for new way to go forward.

This line sticks out to me:

How we got to this place is less important than how to move forward.

It sticks out to me because I think it misses one of the fundamental facets of change and that is asking the question, “Why are we here?”

A friend told me years ago, “Life is an accumulation of choices.”

And so it is.

We are where we are because of the choices we have made. The PC(USA) is where they are at (as described in the letter, which shows just the tip of the iceberg) because of the choices they have made.

To ignore that history, to refuse to ask how we got here, is to risk charting a course that repeats it.

If we want to be somewhere else, or go somewhere else, we have to make different choices. But until we study the choices we have made, we have no idea which ones to change because we don’t know the choices that got us here.

I liken this dilemma to current discussions about “how to move forward” in fundamentalism.

There are some, it seems, who want to ignore how we got here. They just assume it is right that we are here (wherever “here” is). And so they insist that everyone be “here” and if you are somewhere else it is because you are compromising, or at least in danger of compromise. They insist that any change is evidence of the jettisoning of Scripture. They are unwilling to accept that they may be the ones who have wrongly applied Scripture to the present day. They also fail to recognize that the very people they cite as authorities and patterns did not act this way.

There are others who also want to ignore how we got here. They just assume it is wrong that we are here (wherever “here” is). And so they insist that you must change, that if you continue to be “here” you are legalistic, uninterested in unity (whatever that is), and unwilling to obey God.

For some, their history is too short because it only starts 30-40 years ago. For some, their history is too short because it only starts 3-4 years ago.

I believe the way forward has to include a history that started 2000 years ago, and includes the events of the last century where scriptural doctrine came under attack. We have to understand the battles that were fought then against the present day situation now.

We have to return to the authority of Scripture rather than the authority of tradition.

I am reminded of the line by Brother G. I. Barber in his sermon on Hairology: “As fundamentalists, we know this is right because this is the way we have always done it.”

When you hear him say it, it is hilarious.

When you see people practice it, it is heartbreaking.

I wrote recently of failure on the part of some to take seriously the need to study the Scripture. They return only to their own recent history and in so doing, affirm that “How we got here is less important.”

I think we need a return to the authority of Scripture in practice, not just in word.