Revolution In The Spirit

Simplicity

2011-12-15T16:06:00.000-08:00

Is it possible to oversimplify simplicity? If you’re talking about the distinct idea of Christian simplicity, the answer is yes. Until I began to actually study the historical spiritual discipline, my concept of simplicity was fairly superficial – Smaller, fewer, quieter, more essential. Get rid of the luxurious, extravagant or unnecessary. That was simplicity. I envisioned a Simple Life: Time to think, time to engage in deep conversations, to linger with a friend over a cup of coffee. The ability to read my kids an extra bedtime story AND sit and talk with my wife afterwards. The freedom to go places and do things that the person with the cluttered life cannot do, because of course simplicity will bring margin. Get rid of the TV, pay off the credit cards, have one car, walk places… Of course this dream eluded me consistently.

While real simplicity might actually manifest itself in some of those ways – sometimes – I began to see that what I own or what I do, or in fact anything that is primarily external and visible, is not the essence of Christian simplicity. Reading Richard Foster’s classic Celebration of Discipline opened my eyes and helped me distill the concept into a single, pungent sentence: Simplicity is to seek one thing. It is a singular heart, a focused value system, an inward reality. Søren Kierkegaard summed it up nicely in the title of his book: Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing.

Like the Olympic athlete, having a single focus and a single passion informs and even determines what I will or will not give my time, energy, or resources to. The theology for this discipline comes from Jesus, as recorded in the Gospel of Luke, Chapter 12. “And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well. Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.”

A heart of trust that has joyfully become one with the Father’s heart and shares the Father’s priorities as a result is the heart that is Simple. And Free. Free from the bondage to possessions and status that marks Western society. Free to give to those in need and to share abundantly. Free to enjoy all of God’s good gifts without being bent towards the extremes of materialism or asceticism. Such seeking of the Kingdom is evidence of grace in the life of the seeker, and of course an ongoing pursuit, which is why the term ‘discipline’ is appropriate. May God’s people be set free with the gift of a single heart.

More on the Emergent gospel and social activism

2011-08-27T11:51:00.000-07:00

*Sigh*

I know some of you might wish this discussion would go away, but this was on my mind this morning and I just had to write it down.

Some forms of the Emergent gospel seem to indicate that the “gospel” is essentially living like Jesus; doing what Jesus did. Since the Good News indeed involves the coming Kingdom, it seems we usher in this Kingdom of peace and justice by living radically different and activistic lives, patterned after our Lord. But can a gospel that is fundamentally about what we do really be the gospel articulated in Scripture? Isn’t the point of the gospel, at least as it has been historically understood, that we can’t live like God requires and so need a savior?

And can an endless list of causes really be the essence of the mission of the church? Think of it this way: Instead of casting the many social causes in the usual negative light (“end sex trafficking”, “stop unjust labor practices”, “fight against irresponsible and unsustainable consumption”), what if those ideas were recast in a positive light? Would they still make sense? Try this: “Join the Campaign to get Everyone in the World to Love Each Other”. In my mind, such an appeal would soon collapse under the weight of its own absurdity if divorced from the obvious (to me) necessity of fundamental and supernatural heart change. This is why Jesus said “no one can see the Kingdom of God unless he is born again” (John 3:3).

The gospel is not about what we do, it’s about what was done on our behalf. What we do is the result of the gospel’s power in our lives.

My Review of Torq

2011-04-11T21:57:00.001-07:00

Originally submitted at Spire USA

Torq

Worth Considering

By Esteban from Chicago, IL on 4/11/2011

Pros: Comfortable, Durable, Attractive Design, Great Features

Best Uses: Computer, Commuting, Cycling, Travel

Primary use: Business

Let me start by saying that I really love the bag. There is nothing like it in the department-store world. It has great, practical features, is incredibly ergonomic, and overall a pleasure to use.

Having said that, there were a couple issues... The first Torq bag I got was fantastic, but I noticed shortly after purchase that there was a significant stitching problem on the inside of one of the straps - it was as if the fabric was cut too narrowly or the machine just missed a couple inches or something. If it had been a cheap department store bag I wouldn't have thought twice about it. But it wasn't. It was a nearly $200 dollar bag.

So I contacted Spire and they were absolutely fantastic, and the bag was replaced with an even better updated model with no questions asked.

So why three stars? It turns out that the Torq is one of the few imported bags Spire makes. I really feel that $170 was too much to pay for a bag with such a fundamental stitching error, and definitely too much to pay for an imported bag with such an error.

I almost hate to sound so negative, because I really admire the company and its products. It's just that at the price they're asking there should not be such problems.

(legalese)

"Parent Me" Json featuring J.R. (Official Video)

2010-12-20T11:20:00.000-08:00

The Good-O-Meter

2010-12-08T17:51:00.000-08:00

Church Needs Dudes

2010-12-01T18:58:00.000-08:00

Liberty and Sustainability

2010-10-20T10:52:00.000-07:00

It took thousands of years for the world’s population to reach one billion in around 1800. It took another 130 years for the population to reach two billion (1930) and just 30 years to reach three billion (1960). In the 50 years since then, the world’s population has more than doubled, to an estimated 6.8 billion at the end of 2010. To most thinking people, this does not appear to be sustainable. Even with the best management practices, the earth cannot sustain an infinitely expanding population with finite resources. This raises for me the specter of sustainability being achieved at the expense of liberty.

Consider this: When Europeans first arrived in the Americas they were greeted by an estimated total of between 50 and 100 million native people. The vastness of the two continents understandably seemed to them to be an inexhaustible bounty. Settlers in North America were encouraged to claim land and do as they wished, farming and hunting and exploiting the resources without the government giving any thought to what they were consuming or bothering to check in at all. Indeed, the government would not have been able to, and really had no mind to even if it could. In a big world with few people, consumption wasn’t much of a problem. But now, with rain forests disappearing and fossil fuels being consumed and land being gobbled up and other species being threatened, it becomes clear that multiple billions of people cannot continue to chop away or develop or exploit as they wish. Neither can they procreate unlimited numbers of children, because population growth is exponential.

I can only imagine a solution coming down from the powers that be that involves complete control over what we consume, how we use land and other resources, whether or not and how much we procreate, and even what we teach about these things in our religious institutions. In other words, I am imagining an inverse relationship between liberty and sustainability. The logic will be something like this: Freedom and lack of regulation have produced this catastrophe, and only control can deliver us from it.

Jesus and Justice

2010-09-08T13:41:00.000-07:00

Some thoughts...

Noel Castellanos’ “5 Elements of Kingdom Ministry”:

1) Incarnation: We must not only have the same message as Jesus but the same method. You really reach people when you enter their world, their hurt and pain. If you’ve incarnated God’s love into the community of a homosexual, for instance, he’ll realize, Oh, this guy is willing to enter my life. He doesn’t just condemn me. The he’s more capable of hearing our message.

2) Proclamation: We’re told to proclaim the Good News, so this is clearly an essential. Proclaiming the truth in love, and in the context of incarnation, is not forcing it down people’s throats. Proclamation is also about formation, describing the kind of people God shapes us into.

3) Compassion: The Good News is authenticated by our caring (Luke 4). And when we are truly incarnate among the poor, these folks are more than just statistics. They’re your neighbors. They’re your friends. And if you meet a person with a need, compassion leads you to do what you can to meet that need.

4) Restoration/Development: When you live in a neighborhood where the same needs emerge over and over again, then you have to look at the larger picture and begin to fix what’s broken. In Baltimore, a little church took over a struggling public elementary school and revolutionized that neighborhood. They’re not just doing compassion, handing out backpacks to kids. Instead, they saw these kids getting a poor education and said, “We’ve got to be about restoration and development.”

5) Confrontation: The best way to do justice work is to be incarnate in a community. As you work to meet people’s needs through compassion and restoration, you eventually come up against systems and institutions that are keeping people in those conditions, beyond their own irresponsibility or sinfulness. This is when you must identify and confront injustice. We might discover this injustice in our government or schools or police forces or even churches – no institution is immune to injustice.

Zacchaeus - Luke 19:1-10 (NIV)

Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. He wanted to see who Jesus was, but being a short man he could not, because of the crowd. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way. When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today." So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly. All the people saw this and began to mutter, "He has gone to be the guest of a 'sinner.'" But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, "Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount." Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost."

With Noel’s 5^th Element in mind, I want to suggest going a step beyond identifying and confronting the systems and institutions that keep people in positions of poverty and hopelessness. While it is true that we must look underneath the immediate circumstances of the poor and the oppressed in order to identify what beyond their own sinful choices is keeping them oppressed, I want to suggest looking even further. The institutions and entities that exploit people are themselves run and staffed by people. While some systems are inherently oppressive, many are only so by virtue of the posture and philosophy of the people sustaining them. We must ask ourselves if confronting the system or institution is the best and first and most biblical response, or whether addressing the lostness and darkness of the people in charge might be more in order.

Perhaps there is no dichotomy. Perhaps doing both simultaneously is a perfectly reasonable strategy, but I’m increasingly convinced that at the bottom of all of our problems, from the failure of institutions to interpersonal conflict, is simple human depravity. This, I believe, is why Jesus dealt with the injustice of the Roman-dispatched Jewish mercenaries known as Tax Collectors by winning the individuals guilty of the oppression. I am aware of no record of Jesus confronting the oppressive system. This is not to say we shouldn’t. There are other places in Scripture where people speak prophetically against corrupt systems. But the way Jesus dealt specifically with both Matthew and Zacchaeus, and particularly Zacchaeus’ response once he was converted, needs to inform our thinking of how to approach justice issues. Are we really getting to the root of the problems we see among the poor when we confront the systems holding them down, or are we not going far enough? If the system was reformed and laws were changed, would that bring transformation or merely relief? I agree that if relief is all we can get in the short term, then it’s worth working for, but if transformation is never addressed, and it can only be addressed by the Cross, are we not fooling ourselves?

An example of what I’m trying to say is the ending of the slave trade. Clearly, it is a good and great thing that Wilberforce worked to abolish it. He brought relief in the name of Jesus to a desperately unjust situation that was causing enormous suffering, and the hemorrhaging simply needed to stop. But the deep wound of racism still festers and bleeds to this day, because until the racist heart is changed by the Gospel, laws can only ameliorate the suffering and relieve the circumstances.

More examples could be cited. My point is that the way that justice and evangelism are connected is illustrated perfectly in the story of Zacchaeus. Jesus won the heart and soul of Zacchaeus. He “came to seek and save the lost”, and Zacchaeus was a very lost oppressor who became redeemed and showed it. When the lost are truly found (supernaturally brought to spiritual life from death and reconciled with their Creator through Christ), they think differently. They have repented of their mindset of death, whatever form it took, and have entered into the life that is truly life (John 17:3). I have a great deal of thinking left to do about this, but I believe I have discovered the core of where my thinking needs to spring from.

Quote of the Day

2010-08-23T13:16:00.000-07:00

"Jesus is not a nice old man in a button-up cardigan sweater and loafers singing happy songs while loading everyone onto a trolley headed to the Neighborhood of Make-Believe to meet King Friday like some Mr. Rogers clone. That god is the neutered and limp-wristed popular Sky Fairy of pop culture that wants to bless everyone, does not care what you call him/her/it/they, never gets angry, and would never talk about sin or send anyone to hell. This mythical Sky Fairy is increasingly mistaken for Jesus, however, by many young pastors and Christians I have met who don’t want the gospel to be the offensive and foolish stumbling block that it is. So they remake Jesus in to a feathered-hair fairy in lavender tights and take the sword of Revelation out of his hand, replacing it with a daisy." - Mark Driscoll

Why Short Term Missions Don’t Work

2010-08-20T12:59:00.000-07:00

Now there’s a catchy title! I don’t totally agree with that statement, but it has the potential to catch your attention, and this is an issue that is getting me a little worked up these days, so here goes…

Over the last 20 years or so, short-term missions trips have become one of Evangelicalism’s sacred cows. I spoke with a friend recently who took a youth pastor position at a large church out west, and from what I gathered, the lead pastor required him to plan one pronto. But a good question is why? Why is there such insistence that we get kids, often as young as junior high, onto the “mission field” for a few days when every American Christian is completely surrounded by unbelievers?

Big problems:

1) Most trips are in reality about the people going on the trip rather than the people being visited. In other words, they’re about the missionary more than the mission. This is the diametrical opposite of the idea of “mission”

2) In most cases, the people (especially kids) who go are not subjected to high expectations. In other words, they get to go and “serve the poor” or “witness about Jesus” when they rarely if ever do those things at home. (Would it not be better to save the money and regularly do all those things locally? Is the big incentive to go simply the fact that they’re taking a trip?)

3) The trips often have a patronizing feel to them; the people visited are rarely the determiners of who comes or what is done, and often are not even a significant part of the decision making process

4) Many trips cater to (often spoiled and rich) white suburban kids, and are treated like vacations or sightseeing tours. Thus the term “vacationaries”! I completely understand the need to understand the culture one is visiting and the importance of visiting cultural sites, but it doesn’t have to look like a Disney trip. Think about the extra logistics and cost, not to mention the additional burden often foisted onto the receiving churches.

5) An entire industry has been built around getting American Evangelicals onto the “mission field” quick, cheap and easy. Consider this ad from Teen Serve: You can take your junior or senior high youth group for the ride of their life. TeenServe workcamp missions trips are jam-packed with life-changing devotions, and cool activities like a COFFEE HOUSE & even an E-MAIL CAFÉ!

6) Often, these missions trips are populated, at least in part, by kids whose spiritual maturity is questionable at best. Many youth pastors see short-term missions trips as an opportunity to evangelize the participants as well as the people they’re visiting, which is profoundly backwards. Only the most focused, most serious, most mature kids should be able to go.

7) This thinking reflects a fairly recent development in evangelism strategy that says that if we get lost kids into our “loving Christian community” they’re going to want to be Christians. While there is some real value in exposing lost people to healthy Christian community, missions trips are a poor choice of venue considering the purpose (ostensibly) of the trip, and ultimately it takes more than just watching real Christians to be truly evangelized. One must be confronted with the claims of Christ and the truth of the gospel.

8) A recent article in Christianity Today on emerging adults (“Lost in Transition”) indicated that the hopes of significant spiritual development taking place because of going on a short-term missions trip do not seem to be well founded. For the most part, teens and young adults who participated in a trip seemed to have no advantage over those who did not regarding whether their faith “sticks” later on into adulthood.

9) At the end of the day, the whole business smacks to me of American hubris, patronizing attitudes, and self-centeredness – the opposite of everything the Christian life is supposed to be.

All that said, I am in reality a supporter of short-term missions trips, if they could somehow be salvaged and done in a far more biblical manner.

The paradigm of the 19^th and 20^th centuries was one of career missionaries who went to foreign and unevangelized lands and spent the rest of their lives there. While that is still viable in many cases, the realities of the 21^st century have shifted significantly, with Christians in the Global South far outnumbering those in North America and Europe. Furthermore, some of the colonialism and ethnocentrism that tainted missions of days gone by has at least been recognized and hopefully corrected in more and more cases.

I think this sets us up for a paradigm where short-term missions could be used very effectively, not unlike the “short term” trips Paul and his companions took in the first century. The key, I think, is developing real and lasting relationships between churches in the West and churches in the 2/3 world… relationships that would lead to lasting partnerships. These partnerships would be partnerships of equals, with resources flowing both ways. Things that Christians in the developing world have learned need to be passed onto Americans and other Westerners, and things Americans have learned as well as other resources could be passed onto our brothers in the developing world. This of course would require a posture of humility and openness to learning on the part of the Americans! “Missions trips” could be frequent exchanges of people with various skills over an extended period of time – an actual, ongoing partnership of working together for the mission of the Church. This would put a lot of commercial sending organizations out of business, but it would edify the church and promote the work of Christ in the world.

There is a real impact on most people who go on a short-term missions trip, not the least of which is an increased awareness of missions, but that simply cannot be the driving factor. The trip must be about the mission first, and whatever benefit comes to the missionary must be strictly collateral. Does anyone really think Paul went to Philippi for his personal spiritual enrichment? My guess is that if more beatings of short-term missionaries occurred, people would think a little harder about why they go. However, if we can find a way to do this right, both partners in the venture can be edified, and then I believe god will be glorified.

CT Article Lost in Transition: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2009/october/21.34.html

Wall Street Journal article: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122359398873721053.html

The Mission of the Church

2010-07-18T20:33:00.000-07:00

Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."

The mission of the church is not…

The church’s mission is not to live holy lives. It is not to fight for justice. It is not to evangelize and make converts. It is not to influence the culture, propagate orthodoxy, solve social problems, or change the world. It is not to end abortion or human trafficking. It’s not even missions.

The mission of the church, quite simply, is to make disciples of Jesus. This obviously involves evangelizing people, but then it means that after people believe that they are taught to obey everything Jesus commanded us. It means that we train people up in the redeemed life, to do what redeemed people do in obedience to Jesus. Disciples of Jesus evangelize. They live holy lives. They walk justly and love mercy and speak up for the poor and oppressed and work to see them restored. They influence the culture by a myriad of activities, not least of which is the very way they live. They do missions – spreading the gospel to the ends of the earth, which starts with our “Jerusalem”, goes to those who are our “Samaritans”, and never stops. They teach and proclaim and live out sound doctrine and stand on revealed truth. They believe God for great things and accomplish great things, and they change the world. And, of course, and most importantly, they make more disciples to join them in the mission.

Mark Noll said something profound in his book The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind. He said that “Christian thought presupposes Christians”. In other words, if we are to have Christian thought we must have Christians, which means we must have evangelism, or there will be no more Christians to think. In the same way, Christian justice presupposes Christians. Christian missions presupposes Christians. Anything distinctly Christian presupposes people continually becoming disciples of Jesus to carry on the mission, including the various subsidiaries of the mission.

As people are supernaturally united to the body of Christ (“For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body, whether Jew or Greek, slave or free…” 1 Cor. 12:13), they discover their various spiritual gifts. Some are gifted with evangelism, some with teaching, some with mercy, some with generosity, etc. If we were to function the way the body was meant to, we might see less diffusion of the mission.

How do we know this is the mission?

There are a lot of Bible passages that command a lot of things. How can we single out Matthew 28:18 as THE mission? Why not Micah 6:8 for example, which exhorts us that the LORD requires us to act justly and love mercy. Why not 1 Thessalonians 4:3, which says it is God’s will that we should be holy? Why not John 13:34: “Love one another”?

The simplest answer is that from Acts on, the New Testament is an inspired record of the early church’s understanding of its mission. While God expects a certain morality to be exhibited in the lives of His people, that is not the same thing as the mission they are to endeavor on. The New Testament displays a church that made disciples, and in doing so turned the world upside down. There were no competing agendas. We would be wise to pay attention.

What about purpose? (The church exists to…)

Rick Warren says the church has 5 purposes, perhaps the primary one being to glorify God. As much as he disappoints me in many ways, he is onto something there. But purpose and mission are not the same thing. Purpose is the reason something exists, while mission is the job it has to do. I know… lots of overlap there. I believe that being faithful to our mission is perhaps the greatest way to fulfill our purpose.

Something To Think About

2010-07-03T20:27:00.000-07:00

A story from a missionary to India...

My alarm went off at 4:30 a.m. this morning... way too early for my exhausted, jet-lagged body. But this was one morning I didn’t want to sleep in. I wanted to be on the River Ganges by dawn... I had traveled half way around the world to witness the sights and smells that were truly unbelievable.

By the time we arrived at the riverbank, thousands of people were already busy washing themselves in the filthy water. Hindus believe that if they ceremoniously bathe in this most holy of all rivers, their sins will be washed away.

But the waters of the Ganges are polluted by raw sewage, trash, dead bodies and ashes of cremated humans. Every day over 100 bodies are burned in Varanasi and their ashes sprinkled in the river. Hindus believe that this allows their loved ones direct access to heaven. I saw piles of wood . . . the smoke from the burning bodies . . . family members weeping . . . with little or no hope.

My heart was broken. Everywhere I looked there were people in the water, pouring water on their heads and actually drinking it. Some had brass pots where they scooped up water, held the pot over their head and slowly poured it into the river. Many folded their hands and prayed . . . Hindu holy men with painted faces and bright orange clothing chanted . . . music was playing in the background . . . all this was being sincerely done in an act of worship . . . asking for forgiveness.

As we glanced all around us at the masses of people . . . our hearts were broken.

Yesterday, we had met with about 70 of our World Help church planters in a secluded location. We had driven through over 100 isolated villages on our way to this meeting and I counted more than 75 Hindu temples and shrines . . . but no churches.

World Help’s senior vice president, Tom Thompson, brought greetings as we prayed with them, worshipped with them and encouraged them. They had seen over 5,600 new churches planted just in the last year in Northern India and thousands of new Christ followers have been baptized.

These church planters get together once a month for three days of training, strategizing and encouragement. They told us incredible stories of how God is building His kingdom in Northern India.

One of our church planters, Zul Fakar, was working in a very dangerous and persecuted area, when militant anti-Christians ambushed him in an alley and beat him to death . . . He died on August 10. He had been a believer for only 15 months, yet he already had 25 converts and two churches established in unreached villages. His wife, Rabia, was encouraged to deny her faith and come back to her home village. She said, "My husband died for his faith in Jesus Christ . . . the best way I can honor his memory is to spend my life serving the one he died for."

It was a sobering reminder that these church planters are in life and death situations every day as they take the good news to villages that do not have a church of any kind.

As I floated down the River Ganges early this morning, overwhelmed by the spiritual darkness that totally enveloped these truly "religious" people, I couldn’t help but think of these church planters. I was actually looking into the faces of thousands of sincere idol worshippers and realized that no one had ever told them that it was not the dirty, polluted waters of the River Ganges that washes away their sins, but only the shed blood of Jesus Christ. They have never heard of Jesus . . . they have never heard the Gospel . . . they are totally unreached.

And then I prayed for our church planters . . . asking that God would continue to give them boldness and courage and use them to shine the light of God into all of this spiritual darkness. Please keep our team in your thoughts and prayers and please pray for our church planters who pay such a high price to follow Jesus Christ.

Thank you and God bless you,
Vernon Brewer

A Visit With Uncle Logan

2010-05-30T11:55:00.000-07:00

I received news today that my great uncle Logan is in the hospital and is not expected to make it.

Logan is sort of the patriarch of my mom's side of the family - the Kentucky side. He grew up very poor in the back of a holler called Long Branch and worked very hard to put himself through college and become a successful businessman. He is also a veteran of World War II.

Realizing he is a family treasure and also realizing my time with him was limited, I went down to Kentucky 10 years ago with a recorder and asked him for all his stories. He spoke for almost two hours and I recorded it and my mother in law transcribed it.

The following is an excerpt from that document. I offer this so that you can know something of my uncle.

A Visit With Uncle Logan

In his words, as recorded by Steve Laughlin

October, 2000

Before Adams generation come to Kentucky, they lived in North Carolina, in the mountains. Seems we’ve always been in the mountains. In 18 and three, they lived in North Carolinar in Wilkes County on Roarin’ River and they decided to move and come to Kentucky. So they settled just out of Perry County up in the edge of Letcher County at Making in 1803. They stayed there several years and some of the young men was awful rowdy. They got in trouble and said, “We’d better move.” So they moved about ten or twelve mile away down to Blackie. That was completely out of the way back in those days. And the old man was named Cager John, our ancestor was. He had two brothers that come with him but I have no record of them. His name was Cager John. Well, they lived there at Blackie a few years and some more young men got in trouble and they moved to Perry County to Mason Creek and they lived there during the Civil War. Cager John, he had square dances and they said he could dance all night in a washtub. But they lived there during the Civil war and he had three boys that went into the war. Ben and Saul and John (Smoker John) Ben, they never did hear from him again. They never did know what happened to Ben. He never did come back. Saul was sixteen and he got run over by a horse and got out early. He didn’t see much fightin’. But Smoker John went through it all. He got captured and stayed in Andersonville nine months. He had typhoid fever and he said they was a starvin’ him to death. Had barbed wire around and he couldn’t go far. He found a patch of blackberries and he got in those blackberries and just eat all he could. He’d slip out there every day and eat blackberries. He said he started gettin’ better right then. He said he woulda died if he hadn’t found that blackberry patch.

(Steve: “He fought for the North right?”)

Yeah. Finally they turned him loose. But first let me tell you about Saul. They turned him loose in Georgia after he got run over by horses. He come to Atlanta and rode a train out to, (To Rose) What’s that little town where Leonard lives, about ten or twelve miles outside of Atlanta? They’ve grown together now. But he was on his way home and he finally got home and he married my grandmother, Elizabeth Hamilton. The Hamiltons were originally from North Carolina too and they settled in at the head of Trace Fork up there. He married her. They lived on Lankus Creek for awhile. In 1880 when dad was one year old, they moved to Cutshin, and lived up there at the mouth of Cowhead. Dad [Saul] had built a little leanto there agin the big rock and he set logs up agin it. He covered it over and stayed there until he got the cabin built . Then he went back and got his family. Dad said his Granddad [Cager John?] told them when they was children that there was twelve families lived on Cutshin Creek. It was said to be twenty five mile long and twelve families.

He said they didn’t know anybody. And a stranger would come, him and his brothers would run and run under the bed. They was afraid of strangers. But they lived there for several years up there at the mouth of Cowhead. Granddad got tired of farmin’ them hills. But, in the meantime, before he left here, he rode his horse to Irving. He got a pension, $6 dollars a month, Army pension.

(Steve: “Now this was Saul?”)

Yes. Brought a clock back with him. Dad said he was ten or twelve year old and that was the first clock he had ever seen. They lived up there at Cowhead. They lived there and they farmed those hills and all the soil washed off about it and they couldn’t grow much and they decided they’d buy them a farm in Laurel County, Black country.

But they got down there he farmed but the soil was poor and they didn’t have fertilizer in those days and he couldn’t raise any more corn than he raised here. One of dad’s sisters had a baby and she’s not been married. That was just unreal at that time in their culture. Women just didn’t have babies unless they was married. She never could find nobody to marry and finally she married an old man with five children. His name was Boss Shell. Aunt Betty was his wife, dad’s sister. They moved to Laurel County and raised those five children. The one she had out of wedlock, Granddad raised her. One of them boys growed up and they was down to the, (she may have been mean to ‘em, I don’t know where she was or not. I have no idea.) They was down at the milk house milking cows one evening and that boy grabbed a ax and chopped her all to pieces, killed her. That was sometime in the 1920’s. After that Granddad moved back up here and brought the place up there where Hayes Lewis School is. He stayed there until he died.

He give all his boys a farm apiece. But the one dad got was too steep to plow with a mule. We had to dig in the corn up there. Right across the creek from the mission over there. Very little places you could plow a mule. We stayed there till I was eleven years old. There were several fields in Long Branch that you could plow with a mule and dad traded places with Van Tilgen. We moved to Long Branch in 1930 and then dad started buying little adjoining properties. The first place he bought was four acres. That’s where the old man, I told you about the old man that said “Monroe, I’m not gonna tech that pen unless you buy me a sack of flour.” He couldn’t read and write and he had to make his mark and have a witness and he wouldn’t touch the pen until dad got him a sack of flour. Had to get on a mule and ride to the store and buy a sack of flour and bring it to him. Anyway he bought that place and got a deed for it. And then there was about thirty acres adjoined that. But before he bought the thirty acres, he bought what we call the Sam Grinestead place. That’s where the old house was there. You remember that. He paid $175 for a house and sixteen acres.

Then, a little later, he bought the place there where the chimney is. Land was the thing back then. Everybody wanted to accumulate all the land they could get. He bought that place. Then during the war he wrote me one letter hisself. He didn’t write much. He wrote me one letter and said this place here’s for sale, forty acres. You can buy it for $250. You can pay $25 down and $25 a year at 4%. I said “I like it,” Well, I bought that place. They lived there for years after that. But you couldn’t drive up there. They moved out to Wooton one winter and stayed down there and was real unhappy and as soon as spring come we moved em back up in the holler, and he raised a garden and was real happy when he got back home. But then April of 1973, he was about two months of bein’ 94, he died. Then three months later my mother died. Then, of course, Moore(?) went up there and divided the property. Stelle and Effie said, “We want a place on the road. We’ll take 12 ½ acres apiece here on the road. Each person had 25 acres apiece back where there was no road. The rest of us got 25 acres apiece, five of us did. Stelle and Effie got 12 ½ acres apiece. We then wrote a sale. One time I was up there. Willard(?) just started to build his house. He said, “You got a whole lot more land than I got, than I still have. Well, I said, “I’ll be glad to trade with you right now.” And he said “Well listen, I don’t want to trade with you.” Anyway that was home to me as long as dad and mother lived, but after they was gone, it really didn’t seem like home anymore.

(Steve: How many acres did they have altogether?)

About 150 and I bought 40 acres up there. I come back home and I was real fortunate. On the ship coming back we played poker seven days. It took seven days to come back and we played poker seven days and I won $600. That was the most money I ever seen in my life. I made about $27 dollars a month from the army. That was the most money I’d ever seen and I plugged my pillowcase and slept with it in there until I got home. I went down to finish paying my place off up there and I believe I paid two payments of $50 and I thought I’d get by with $200. “No siree, He said, I’m not takin that money. I’m gonna wait and get my interest.” I tried to give him money and he wouldn’t take it. I shoulda just brought it back and put it in the bank. I coulda got probably 3 or 4 % for it. But anyway I just gave it to him. Paid him interest and all. But that was I guess a good deal for me.

I may have left something out. I’ll start out on when I first remember. I nursed my mother ‘till I was three years old. The child that was the next one after me died, between me and Nell. So I guess she just left me alone. The first thing I remember was her makin’ me quit. She turned her back to me and she had a great big round mole on the back of her neck and I just picked that and she turned around and slapped me and that was a real terrible experience for a three year old. I remember that.

Let’s see, the next thing I remember was my mother cooked on the fire. We had a little one room cabin there, and I’m not jokin or lyin’ it looked like the cabin, the Clampett’s cabin there you see on television (this was around 1930). I’m not lyin’ to you it looked like that. And we had one room and a fireplace and a little kitchen made out of boards that dad had rived with a froe. It was cold in the winter a sight. My mother would cook on the fire of a evenin’ and dad built us a big room there out of logs next to that right up against it you know and cut a door out to go into the big room. It was 16 foot square. He set a big heatin’ stove right in the middle of it and that was the most comfortable place I was ever in. But we stayed there and my mother was cookin’ on the fire one evenin’ and I must of been four or five, I don’t know how old I was. But anyway she had a pot of boilin’ water settin’ on the hearth and I started to run across the hearth and put my foot in it. That’s the next thing I remember real good. The hide come off my foot when we took my shoe off and I seen dad run. He run out of the field. He was back in the field clearing ground, cuttin’ down the finest timber you ever seen, a rollin it up and burnin it, tryin to make a place to grow corn. But he run to the house and there was an old man named Doc Hawkin, herb doctor. And you know, I didn’t know if he had been to medical school but he had lived over in Cumberland. Him and his brother went to medical school and his brother got a license and practiced medicine there in Cholera. But Doc dropped out of medical school but he come to Cutshin and practiced medicine. I don’t remember what he done to my foot but he took care of it. If you didn’t have any money he’d take a few potatoes or whatever you had to give him. But anyway we lived there and I guess I got spoiled real bad when I burnt my foot. They’d have to lead me everywhere I went and I wouldn’t walk and the foot was well and they were still leadin. Homer jerked his hand loose from me one time and boy I got onto him over that. Pretended I couldn’t walk.

(Steve: “Homer was older than you?”)

Yeah. We lived there ‘till----Oh I’d better tell you this one too. I may have told you this before. There were two preachers come from New York. They was holdin’ a revival there at my Uncle Willies down the road about a quarter of a mile. Well I had to go to church every night and I was seven or eight year old I guess. Them was hell and damnation preachers and they had me scared to death and I didn’t know how to get to heaven hardly. I couldn’t figure it out. They said the Lord was a comin’ just any day and he was comin’ out of the east. Well, I knew where the east was because I had been told that was where the hoot sun come up, that was the east. But one day I was down at the barn lot playin’ with the pigs, chickens and cows. We had everything in the barn lot, a big lot fenced off. There’s an airplane come right over the hill where the sun come up. I thought that was the Lord a comin’ and it scared me plum to death. The cows was a bawlin’. It was real low down. The cows was a bawlin’, the chickens was runnin’ and hiding. Well I knew my dad and mother was two of the best people in the world. They was supposed to have been caught up and gone to heaven if they was alive you know when Jesus come and I just knew they’d be gone when I got to the house. But I got to the house and by golly they was still alive. And not a person in the neighborhood, now that was sorta in the middle twenties I’d say. Not a person in the neighborhood knew what that was. Nobody knew what it was. But there was a Boggs girl that lived here on the creek that had been in Harlan a workin’ and she’d come in one weekend and somebody was tellin’ her about seein that thing a flyin’. She said, “Well that’s an airplane. They light over there at Harlan all the time.” When I got over my scare eventually, I started goin’ to church up there in l936. That’s the year that Miss Shaw and them people come through.

Dumbest View of the Church I Ever Saw

2010-05-14T13:18:00.000-07:00

It's almost like a sport today for people to say they "love Jesus" but hate "the church" (which can mean anything from "religious hypocrites" to "Christian people" to "organized religion" to the actual bride of Christ I suppose).

In some cases, I feel their pain. What calls itself "the church" (and sometimes actually is the church) can be a pretty challenging entity. I'm nearly certain that Jesus is frequently grieved. Still, I'm increasingly bothered by what people thoughtlessly say.

I ran across one particularly annoying example recently when I looked at the profile of a commenter on one of my friends posts. We'll call him "John".

This is what he put for "Religious Views":

“I love Christ - can't stand his wife though”

Okay. Couple thoughts:

1) I’m assuming that “I love Christ” means that John would self-identify as a Christian (or Christ-follower or whatever). If that is true, John is part of the “wife” of Christ. So is it that he can’t stand himself, or is it just all the other Christians that are no good?

2) “Bride” is not the only analogy for the church. "Body" is a frequently employed metaphor in the New Testament as well. So what John identifies as the “wife” of Christ is actually part of Christ – His body. How can one “love Christ” and be unable to stand a significant part of Christ? After all, “we are his hands and feet”, are we not?

3) In Acts 9 Jesus asks Saul, “Why do you persecute me?” Of course, Saul had never met Jesus before, much less persecuted Him. Jesus’ obvious point was that to persecute the church is to persecute Him. Perhaps John should exercise caution with his words…

4) Do you really love me if you “can’t stand” my wife, who is one with me?

5) Clearly the church is deeply flawed. That is because it is made up of people. I’m assuming John is a person, and as such is also deeply flawed. I would expect a less judgmental attitude from a self-identified political liberal. Seems even they cannot escape human nature!

Focus

2010-05-09T20:09:00.000-07:00

"By and by, your attention becomes so intensely focused that you no longer notice the raw knuckles, the cramping thighs, the strain of maintaining nonstop concentration. A trance-like state settles over your efforts, the climb becomes a clear-eyed dream. Hours slide by like minutes. The accrued guilt and clutter of day-to-day existence – the lapses of conscience, the unpaid bills, the bungled opportunities, the dust under the couch, the festering familial sores, the inescapable prison of your genes – all of it is temporarily forgotten, crowded from your thoughts by the seriousness of the task at hand." – Jon Krakauer in The Devil’s Thumb

What parallels might there be for us in the Christian Life?

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words...

2010-05-05T13:55:00.001-07:00

Astonishing God

2010-04-14T14:03:00.000-07:00

“The God of the modern evangelical rarely astonishes anybody. He manages to stay pretty much within the constitution. Never breaks our by-laws. He’s a very well-behaved God and very denominational and very much one of us, and we ask Him to help us when we’re in trouble and look to Him to watch over us when we’re asleep. The God of the modern evangelical isn’t a God I could have much respect for. But when the Holy Ghost shows us God as He is we admire Him to the point of wonder and delight.” – A.W. Tozer

"I Am Sin"

2010-04-11T20:12:00.000-07:00

Martin Luther on Bible Study

2010-04-09T21:45:00.000-07:00

It is a sin and shame not to know our own book or to understand the speech and words of our God… especially in these days when God is offering and giving us men and books and every facility and inducement to this study, and desires his Bible to be an open book. O how happy the dear fathers would have been if they had our opportunity to study the languages and come thus prepared to the Holy Scriptures! What great toil and effort it cost them to gather up a few crumbs, while we with half the labor – yes, almost without any labor at all – can acquire the whole loaf! O how their effort puts our indolence to shame!

I Boast No More

2010-02-16T13:12:00.001-08:00

Whatever happened to Gospel-laden songs like these? What has become of our "worship"?

I Boast No More

Isaac Watts

No more, my God, I boast no more

Of all the duties I have done;
I quit the hopes I held before,
To trust the merits of thy Son.

Now, for the love I bear his name,
What was my gain I count my loss;
My former pride I call my shame,
And nail my glory to his cross.

Yes, and I must and will esteem
All things but loss for Jesus' sake:
O may my soul be found in him,
And of his righteousness partake!

The best obedience of my hands
Dares not appear before thy throne;
But faith can answer thy demands
By pleading what my Lord has done.

State of Corruption

2010-02-03T08:21:00.000-08:00

What I daydream about is creating a paradigm that does not encourage corruption as much as ours in Illinois does, and I'd argue based on a biblical notion of fallen human nature that the people in the Green Party are equally subject to sinful human nature as any Republican, Democrat or Libertarian. I think this is what Christians need to recognize.

Since we're all subject to our fallen natures, the only lasting solution is redemption through the Gospel. However, since we know that full redemption is yet future, the next best thing is a "best case scenario" paradigm - one which may not be able to eliminate corruption (only the Cross can do that), but at least does not openly promote it like the current paradigm does.

My simple suggestion is this: Remove the massive incentive of the current system to concentration of power and consequently corruption. Do this by 1) Term Limits: Limiting political careers to 8 years in any given office and 16 years total public service. Then they have to go back to the private sector. Then 2) Take away pensions.

If "public servants" actually have to make a sacrifice to serve the public, it might just be less attractive to those who lust after the power of office. It might actually attract those who want to make a difference.

Meanwhile, though certain aspects of various party platforms resonate with me, I am increasingly unwilling to give my loyalty to any one Party. I am a citizen of another Kingdom, so there will always be some level of incongruence.

I am appalled by politicians in general - most of them are egomaniacs in the first place, including third party - and I am appalled by the Republicans' lack of social conscience and consciousness, the Democrats pathetic belief that government is the answer for everything, the Libertarians idea that individual liberty trumps everything else, and the Greens utopianism and paranoia.

But back to my first complaint, though... the electorate for the most part can only parrot what it is fed by the media. It does not care much beyond who has the most enticing image and who can promise the most goodies for the lowest price. Is there really a political solution for that? We have undone the American Revolution and gone back to selling our bodies and souls to the king.

My How Things Have Changed!

2010-01-18T14:19:00.000-08:00

On this occasion of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, I thought I'd post Abraham Lincoln's 1863 proclamation of a National Day of Prayer and Humiliation due to the sins of our country that resulted in the Civil War. Try to imagine something like this coming out of Washington today! Here is the text:

By the President of the United States of America.

A Proclamation.

Whereas, the Senate of the United States, devoutly recognizing the Supreme Authority and just Government of Almighty God, in all the affairs of men and of nations, has, by a resolution, requested the President to designate and set apart a day for National prayer and humiliation.

And whereas it is the duty of nations as well as of men, to own their dependence upon the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions, in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon; and to recognize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord.

And, insomuch as we know that, by His divine law, nations like individuals are subjected to punishments and chastisements in this world, may we not justly fear that the awful calamity of civil war, which now desolates the land, may be but a punishment, inflicted upon us, for our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole People? We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us!

It behooves us then, to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness. Now, therefore, in compliance with the request, and fully concurring in the views of the Senate, I do, by this my proclamation, designate and set apart Thursday, the 30th. day of April, 1863, as a day of national humiliation, fasting and prayer.

And I do hereby request all the People to abstain, on that day, from their ordinary secular pursuits, and to unite, at their several places of public worship and their respective homes, in keeping the day holy to the Lord, and devoted to the humble discharge of the religious duties proper to that solemn occasion.

All this being done, in sincerity and truth, let us then rest humbly in the hope authorized by the Divine teachings, that the united cry of the Nation will be heard on high, and answered with blessings, no less than the pardon of our national sins, and the restoration of our now divided and suffering Country, to its former happy condition of unity and peace.

In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. Done at the City of Washington, this thirtieth day of March, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty seventh.

By the President: Abraham Lincoln

Composting

2009-12-11T11:44:00.000-08:00

Call me a nerd if you like, but I LOVE composting!

A couple years ago, a friend bought us an Earth Machine. We dump in hair clippings, egg shells, coffee grounds, banana peels, tea bags, paper towels, garden and yard waste, and other miscellaneous organic refuse, and - Voila! - out comes DIRT! Rich, thick, fertile dirt.

The picture above is the latest take - on a "warm" day in early December I got my shovel and wheelbarrow and emptied a good portion of my composter's contents, and got about 250 pounds of high quality garden soil!

So next summer when you are enjoying my plump red tomatoes, you know what they were grown in!

Americans Are Funny People, Part 1

2009-11-25T18:17:00.001-08:00

I was just thinking today, Americans are funny people!

We are increasingly developing a taste for a government that caters to our every need: We would like the powers that be to be completely responsible for our education, our healthcare, our employment, our personal safety and heck, even our happiness.

But we HATE PAYING TAXES!

In fact, complaining about taxes has become a national pastime. Here in Chicago, it seems to be in the news every day. But all that nannying comes with a price. Somebody has to pay all those government employees and fund all those programs.

So in other words, we want a Cadillac government at a Yugo price.

Anyone care to explain this?

God Expects More

2009-11-12T13:19:00.000-08:00

God indeed expects more out of Christians than the church in the West is currently aspiring to. He expects Christians to live holy lives (e.g. Eph. 4:17 - 5:20). He expects us to die to self; to offer our bodies as living sacrifices, to take up our crosses. He expects us to partake in making disciples of all nations, to love our neighbor as ourselves and to care for the least of these. He expects us to love the Lord our God with all our heart and mind and strength, but He has also empowered us to do so.

Living like that is the evidence that we have been born again, not the cause of us being born again. It is the evidence of real justification, not the means. Of course, as Paul says in Philippians 3, we have not yet obtained all this, but we press on toward the goal and we live up to what we have already attained (Php. 3:7-16).

The tragedy of modern American Evangelicalism is that we have dumbed down the Gospel and the Christian life to the point where I can have little more than a pulse and a profession and still be considered a Christian.

The Pleasures of Earth

2009-10-15T07:02:00.000-07:00

"It is not the banquet of the wicked that dulls our appetite for heaven, but endless nibbling at the table of the world. It is not the X-rated video, but the prime time dribble of triviality that we drink in every night. For all the ill that Satan can do, when God describes what keeps us from the banquet table of His love, it is a piece of land, a yoke of oxen, and a wife (Luke 14:18-20). The greatest adversary of love to God is not His enemies, but His gifts. And the most deadly appetites are not for the poison of evil, but for the simple pleasures of earth. For when these replace an appetite for God Himself, the idolatry is scarcely recognizable, and almost incurable." - John Piper

This is a strong word that cuts to the core of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus - to lose one's life in order to have true life. It is this inordinate love for this life - for created things - that blinds us to the poor, to the battle, to the mission, and most of all, to fully loving Jesus.

But as Piper points out, these things often are indeed gifts from God. How then does the disciple of Jesus use the things of this world, and even enjoy them, while counting all of it loss for the sake of Christ? How do our values come into line with what is actually valuable?

Think about it...

The Urban War

2009-10-02T16:00:00.000-07:00

This is a graphic picture.

It's a young African American man lying in a morgue, killed by another young African American man. It happens every day here in Chicago, usually completely invisible to the world outside the 'hood until somethng graphic like the beating that occurred last week captures our attention. For a minute.

I’m so weary of the same old tired 1960’s solutions being rolled out to address the violence problem (“Educate! Legislate! Regulate!”).

But the problem being faced by (mostly) minorities in urban America is far more complex than either the conservatives or the liberals let on. It involves systemic injustice alongside personal responsibility. It involves racism and historical disenfranchisement on the part of the majority culture alongside victim posturing and personal sin on the part of the minority culture. It involves bold-faced Satanic attack and other varieties of spiritual warfare. It involves the overreach of government alongside the apathy of government. I could go on...

It involves, at a significant level, the failure of the institutions of Church and Family. It begs the question, "where are the fathers?"

But with all that in the background, we must look at this picture and ask HOW DID IT COME TO THIS?

Force yourself to face this...

It's A Wonder We Ever Survived!

2009-09-26T14:17:00.000-07:00

To Those of Us Born Between 1930 – 1979…

First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked while they were pregnant.

They took aspirin, ate bleu cheese dressing, tuna from a can and didn't get tested for diabetes.

Then after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-base paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, locks on doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had baseball caps not helmets on our heads.

As infants & children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, no booster seats, no seat belts, no air bags, bald tires and sometimes no brakes.

Riding in the back of a pick- up truck on a warm day was always a special treat.
We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle.

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and no one actually died from this.

We ate cupcakes, white bread, real butter and bacon. We drank Kool-Aid made with real white sugar. And, we weren't overweight… WHY?

Because we were always outside playing...that's why!

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on…

No one was able to reach us all day. And, we were OKAY.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride them down the hill; only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem

We did not have Play stations, Nintendo's and X-boxes. There were no video games, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVD's, no surround-sound or CD's, no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet and no chat rooms.

WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents.
We would get spankings with wooden spoons, switches, ping pong paddles, or just a bare hand and no one would call child services to report abuse.

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, made up games with sticks and tennis balls and, although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them.

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment.

Imagine that!!

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law!

These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever.

The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all.

If YOU are one of them, CONGRATULATIONS!

You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated so much of our lives… for our own good.

While you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave and lucky their parents were.

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it?

Republicans and Health Care

2009-09-16T12:57:00.000-07:00

WHY are the Republicans suddenly so concerned about health care?

What I find interesting is that in light of the Democrats' effort to extend health care to all Americans, the Republicans are suddenly paying attention. It seems they're concerned about how we can get insurance to the significant percentage of Americans who have none without bankrupting the country, destroying the insurance industry, and careening towards 'soft' socialism and ever more governmental intrusion into everyday life.

And, mind you, it seems like they have some good ideas. Surely there must be a way to help the uninsured. Surely, in a society like ours, where health care is sophisticated and expensive, there must be a way for that society to care for those without means. And even more surely, the plans that the Democrats are forwarding are about as creative as the Great Society. (Read: 'Every problem is a Crisis, and the solution to every Crisis involves the Federal Government and your tax dollars.')

I would argue that, as is frequently the case, the Republicans have more practical and workable ideas than the Democrats do.

My beef is this: If Republicans cared so much about health care and the uninsured, why didn't they do something about it when they had the White House and both houses of Congress? (For YEARS!) Why are they waiting until the Democrats are in power and in a position to impose ever more government on the American people?

Here's my theory: The big problem with conservatives in general and Republicans in particular is that they are blind to the plight of those genuinely in need. They lump them in with the freeloaders who prey on peoples' compassion and pull the 'personal responsibility' card. This creates a vacuum that liberals eagerly fill. Liberals who tend to really care about the poor, but have ridiculous, abysmal, ideologically driven "solutions" for the problems.

Memo to the Republican Party:

Start caring.

Use your practical, workable market-based solutions to solve problems for people in need instead of reacting to what the Democrats do. Stop being blind to the plight of the poor and who knows? You might win some elections. And maybe even save us from the government in the process.

Some Perspective

2009-07-19T11:53:00.000-07:00

Hey, all

Sorry It's been so long!

I have not gioven up blogging, but summer is INSANELY busy for me and I simply have not had time to put anything thoughtful up.

I do have a pretty good piece written by a soldier regarding America's reaction to Michael Jackson's death, so I'll share it since I do not have any original thoughts...

OH - for those of you who might freak out - this is not a statement about Michael Jackson, but rather a statement about the values and priorities of the American people.

A Soldier's Take on Michael Jackson's Death: This is written by a young soldier serving his third tour of duty in Iraq.

Folks,

Okay, I need to rant.

I was just watching the news, and I caught part of a report on Michael Jackson. As we all know, Jackson died the other day. He was an entertainer who performed for decades. He made millions, he spent millions, and he did a lot of things that make him a villain to many people. I understand that his death would affect a lot of people, and I respect those people who mourn his death, but that isn't the point of my rant.

Why is it that when ONE man dies, the whole of America loses their minds with grief? When a man dies whose only contribution to the country was to ENTERTAIN people, the American people find the need to flock to a memorial in Hollywood, and even Congress sees the need to hold a "moment of silence" for his passing?

Am I missing something here? ONE man dies, and all of a sudden he's a freaking martyr because he entertained us for a few decades? What about all those SOLDIERS who have died to give us freedom? All those Soldiers who, knowing that they would be asked to fight in a war, still raised their hands and swore to defend the Constitution and the United States of America. Where is their moment of silence? Where are the people flocking to their graves or memorials and mourning over them because they made the ultimate sacrifice? Why is it when a Soldier dies, there are more people saying "good riddance," and "thank God for IEDs?" When did this country become so calloused to the sacrifice of GOOD MEN and WOMEN, that they can arbitrarily blow off their deaths, and instead, throw themselves into mourning for a "Pop Icon?"

I think that if they are going to hold a moment of silence IN CONGRESS for Michael Jackson, they need to hold a moment of silence for every service member killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. They need to PUBLICLY recognize every life that has been lost so that the American people can live their callous little lives in the luxury and freedom that WE, those that are living and those that have gone on, have provided for them. But, wait, that would take too much time, because there have been so many willing to make that sacrifice. After all, we will never make millions of dollars. We will never star in movies, or write hit songs that the world will listen too. We only shed our blood, sweat and tears so that people can enjoy what they have.

Sorry if I have offended, but I needed to say it. Remember these five words the next time you think of someone who is serving in the military;

"So that others may live..."

Isaac

Soul Nourishment First

2009-06-04T10:52:00.000-07:00

A Great Quote from George Muller:

"It has pleased the Lord to teach me a truth, the benefit of which I have not lost, for more than fourteen years. The point is this: I saw more clearly than ever that the first great and primary business to which I ought to attend every day was, to have my soul happy in the Lord. The first thing to be concerned about was not how much I might serve the Lord, or how I might glorify the Lord; but how I might get my soul into a happy state, and how my inner man might be nourished. For I might seek to set the truth before the unconverted, I might seek to benefit believers, I might seek to relieve the distressed, I might in other ways seek to behave myself as it becomes a child of God in this world; and yet, not being happy in the Lord, and not being nourished and strengthened in my inner man day by day, all this might not be attended to in a right spirit."

Thought of the Day

2009-05-29T17:33:00.000-07:00

“Run, run and do, the law commands
But gives me neither feet nor hands.
Better news the Gospel brings,
It bids me fly and gives me wings.”

Tattoos and Christians

2009-05-21T14:50:00.000-07:00

Let me start by saying I'm NOT for tattoos. However, there are bigger issues here.

People who oppose tattoos frequently quote Lev. 19:28: “Do not cut your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves. I am the LORD.” If we have to obey Leviticus 19:28, which prohibits tattoos, then we have to obey Leviticus 19:27, which prohibits haircuts. Furthermore, we are obligated to abstain from pork (Deut. 14:8), to abstain from all work between sundown on Friday and sundown on Saturday (Lev. 23:3), and if anyone does work on the Sabbath, we are required by law to stone him to death (Lev. 15:32-36). We are required to be circumcised (Ge. 17:10-14; Lev. 12:3), and any male who is not is to be cut off from God's people.

I could go on and on. If a Christian wants to use Mosaic Law to make a case against tattoos, then he is obligated to obey the entire law, along with everyone who agrees with him.

Christians constantly stumble over this. What is the place of Mosaic Law in the life of a believer? What about the 10 Commandments? Is the Old Testament still valid? Why do we eat pork and work on Saturdays but oppose murder, homosexuality, adultery, and coveting? Isn't that being selectively obedient?

Read Galatians! (And throw Romans 1-11 in for good measure!)

The Law points to God because it defines sin and reveals the character of God, but it also points us to Christ because it points out our complete inability to conform to the character of God and thus the need for a savior.

Josh McDowell put it best: Every law (precept) is based on an overarching principle, and every principle is based on the person (character) of God Himself. God wants us to conform to His character, and so the logic of the Law.

But as the Bible points out repeatedly, no one is capable of obeying the Law. So what to do?

Christ obeyed the Law perfectly. Christ fulfilled the Law (Mt. 5:17). Christ is the end of the Law (Romans 10:4) and through the New Covenant, made the Old Covenant OBSOLETE (Heb. 8:13).

When a person becomes born again, they are placed in Christ (1 Cor. 12:13). All that is Christ's becomes reckoned to the believer: His death, His burial, His resurrection, His righteousness, His sonship, AND his standing in regards to the Law! If I am in Christ, I am regarded as having obeyed the Law - I am JUSTIFIED! Declared RIGHTEOUS!

So why do we obey some laws and ignore others? It's really simpler than it sounds.

Principles never change. They are eternal and based on the character of God. How they are expressed CAN change – significantly. Precepts (laws) are expressions of principles. The principle behind "no tattoos" was separation from the Pagans, since the pagan nations around Israel ritually tattooed themselves. Same principle behind not cutting the hair at the sides of the head (which is why Orthodox Jews have LONG sideburns!). That principle still stands today. God's people are not to imitate the world (!!). If the Pagans were all cutting their sideburns as an expression of their devotion to Baal (or Krom or color TV or whatever) then God's people should not do it. We are to be separate in this sense.

We are still obligated to every principle expressed in the Bible, but not to Mosaic Law. We don't murder because people are created in God's image. That still stands. Homosexuality is wrong because it violates God’s essential design for human sexuality (Ge. 1:27) AND it mars God's picture through marriage of His relationship to the Church. We are still obligated to rest, and to set aside time sacred to God, but it does not have to be restricted to a single day or a specific form of activity. Hebrews tells us that our Salvation is a fulfillment of Sabbath rest! (So when I'm asked which day I celebrate the Sabbath, I respond 'Every day! I'm saved!')

Am I for tattoos? Absolutely not!

They arguably do mar and dishonor the body, though that is up for debate.
They are often a sign of impulsiveness and immaturity.
They are expensive, permanent, and a poor stewardship all the way around (think of how far that money would go in Africa or India).
It would be hard to convince me that a Christian would get one and not be in imitation of the pagans.
I also think they are most often an expression of REBELLION.
If my kid ever gets one I'll kill him!

But you cannot convince me that they are sinful in and of themselves (any more than trimming your sideburns is!) and you CANNOT appeal to Mosaic Law to make your case! (Unless you appeal to it on the basis of the principle it expresses: Separation)

If we're going to argue this stuff, let's argue on sound biblical thought rather than yanking verses out of the air (proof-texting). I could justify almost anything by doing that! There are plenty of good reasons not to get a tattoo without becoming legalists.

Remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free! (Galatians 5:1)

The State of the Church

2009-05-15T10:27:00.000-07:00

While this focuses more on the white, Evangelical church, its implications touch all of American Christianity. It's especially a must view for youthworkers!

Violence: An Approach

2009-05-03T12:38:00.000-07:00

Here's something that holds promise to address the root of the violence problem, and evidence that God is working...

Violence: A Parable (Part 2)

2009-04-28T09:56:00.000-07:00

A parable is a story that teaches a deeper truth by way of analogy. In this particular analogy, the yard is the city, the weed is violence, the grass is people and families, and the soil is the spiritual matrix those families and people grow in. Or don’t.

Now as with all parables, one cannot press the analogy too hard. The point is to illustrate the point.

So what’s my point? The spiritual soil many people in Chicago grow in is toxic. It’s poor at best and dead and barren at worst. This “soil” includes the way people relate to other people, the cumulative effect of both the sins committed against them and the consequences of the sins they commit, their emotional and social health, and especially the way they relate to God.

Violence comes from all kinds of people – rich and poor, white and minority, educated and uneducated. But it seems especially prevalent among the poor and minorities in blighted neighborhoods in the city. The soil these people grow in has been made toxic by everything from systemic disenfranchisement to generations of bad choices to corporate greed to exploitation by the record industry to open rebellion against God. It’s complex. Neither the liberals nor the conservatives have a corner on explaining the actual nature of the problem, which is often what happens when an issue becomes politicized and polarized.

But the problem at hand is that kids are dying, and all the awareness campaigns, candlelight vigils, prayer marches, gun legislation, prison sentences and educational initiatives have failed so far to make a lasting dent. Interestingly, this was not happening 40 or 50 years ago, even among the poor and disenfranchised. One would think people would ask themselves what has changed between then and now. Of course, people were killing each other back in the day. In fact, that has been happening since Cain killed Abel. But one did not see the devastated families and kids killing kids. I believe the increasing rejection of God is at the heart of this issue. Rejection by every level of society in Western culture. Humans have always been guilty of gross sin, and it always brings death, but the Western phenomenon of seeing God as quaint, even among professing Christians, surely causes us to forfeit His peace and order.

Nothing short of a spiritual revolution can change this problem. Even if the shooting stopped, the toxicity would simply manifest itself in another way. The bad soil has to be stripped away, rich, living soil has to be put down, and the grass needs to be able to grow healthy and strong. Families and people have to be healed. We must deal with the problem at its root. There is no solution that does not include the spiritual healing of families and people, and I just don’t see this happening unless the church rises up.

Violence: A Parable (Part 1)

2009-04-26T21:21:00.000-07:00

I have a fairly large back yard, at least for Chicago. We bought our home here on the western edge of Humboldt Park almost five years ago, and when we moved in the yard was about in the worst shape you can imagine. It was barren, with broken glass and bricks and concrete and weeds and sterile soil. Where a pool had once been, there was a large area of sand that was completely devoid of anything living.

Not long after we moved in, I set out to create the Garden of Eden in my back yard, starting with the grass. So my plan was to remove the concrete and paving stones, pull the weeds and bring in some good soil. I bought six yards of dirt from Farmer’s Market up on Elston Avenue – about a dump truck full – and on my vacation that year I roto-tilled the entire back yard, then painstakingly transported the dirt from the pile in the empty lot next to my house to the middle of my yard using a plastic wheelbarrow. When I spread the soil over my back yard, I came to realize that I had only purchased enough to cover the existing dirt by about 2 or 3 inches. Undeterred by such a small detail, I proceeded to plant nearly a hundred dollars of premium grass seed and waited for my yard to transform into a golf course.

So it did. The grass came up beautiful and green, and it looked like I was going to have the yard I had always envisioned – a paradise for my kids to play in and a relaxing landscape for my wife and I to develop our green thumb in.

But then the problems began. Significant areas of grass just couldn’t handle the summer. I had to baby them with extra water, and still they looked like they were from Arizona. The grass just wouldn’t stay thick, and wherever the grass was weak and thin, weeds would pop up. Finally I gave in and bought a bag of Weed-N-Feed from Menard’s and spread the toxic junk all over my yard. Within a week – voila! – Beautiful thick lush grass was taking over again.

Problem solved.

Well, maybe not. Winter came and went, and the spring found my grass struggling again – in the same spots. Right over where the pool had once been, where the sand was just a couple inches beneath the topsoil. I painstakingly reseeded the bad areas and added some more topsoil from a bag, and when summer came I used the Weed-N-Feed again, but I soon realized that my efforts were in vain. Every year, my grass struggles.

I figured out what my problem was… I have bad soil. In the places where the soil is good, which is maybe 2/3 of the yard, I never have a problem. The grass has been thick and healthy since 2004 and weeds only show up on rare occasions and are quickly dispatched. This leaves me with a couple options: I can keep playing the Weed-N-Feed game every year, and every April and September painstakingly reseed the same struggling areas and do battle with weeds all summer, or I can go through the monumental job of removing the top layer of soil, getting rid of all that dead sand, bring in about $1000 worth of good soil, and actually deal with the root cause of my problem.

So what is the meaning of the parable?

Chicago is plagued with violence, particularly among young people. Every summer, as if on schedule, the gangbangers start shooting each other and numerous innocent bystanders, and the newspaper editorials, the neighborhood activists and the politicians parade their obligatory outrage over the problem and suggest the same tired approaches to try to deal with it.

What seems to be remarkably missing each year from the dialogue is the elephant in the room: The fact that these communities and the people who populate them are, for the most part, profoundly broken.

Broken people break things.

Poverty, fatherlessness, substance abuse, dysfunctional relationships and hopelessness are the order of the day. Yet when the politicians and activists speak, all I hear is more talk about more legislation and more funding, blah blah blah. Chicago is under four layers of firearms legislation, for example. Federal, State, county and city. In order for a criminal to use a gun in an act of violence in Chicago, he has to penetrate all four layers of government and violate around a dozen laws, many of which carry felony-level penalties. Despite the fact that this historically has resulted in nothing regarding reducing violence, the politicians suggest that if we just do more of what isn’t working, it will work.

I believe many of them mean well, but it’s hard not to think that some of it isn’t just posturing in order to appear that they are doing something about the problem. This is, in fact, the Weed-N-Feed approach: Ignore the genesis of the problem and keep attacking the symptoms.

And what is the genesis of the problem? Whew, that’s a thick one. It's the "bad soil" part of the parable.

That will be the next post…

Has God Abandoned America as a Nation?

2009-04-23T19:51:00.001-07:00

I know some of you can't stand John MacArthur, but he asks some piercing questions here.

Don't Waste Your Life - LeCrae

2009-04-18T10:40:00.001-07:00

Which Method Is Best?

2009-04-04T10:19:00.000-07:00

While I believe there exist "best practices" in all kinds of endeavors, and I believe there is such a thing as poor methodology in ministry ventures of all kinds, I also think many Christians are a little too preoccupied with strategies and methods.

A good example is the approach to evangelism. Much ink has been spilled in the Evangelical world over which method is best, what is relevant to a given culture, and even whether there should even be methods. While some of these discussions certainly have merit, I am learning something. I have spent the last four months of my life teaching the book of Romans to a group of amazing college students and other young adults. We start chapter 4 tomorrow.

Yes, it's in depth.

I'm learning that the bigger issue is being intimately familiar with the Gospel itself. Not simply, "Jesus loves you and died for you", but rather the WHOLE gospel, articulated biblically. The more one is intimate with the biblical gospel, the better one is equipped to communicate it in a variety of settings using a variety of methods. I think we should be debating less about methodology and spending that time at the feet of Jesus drinking deep from books like Romans and Galatians and John until we are so familiar with the Good News that it simply pours out of us.

What I find fascinating is that the Bible portrays many methods of communicating the Good News. If you are intimate with the Gospel, chances are that you will be more skillful at knowing which method to use in which setting. It's true that different personalities lend themselves more naturally to different approaches, and that's fine. The body analogy exists for a reason. But I thought these examples from Scripture would be thought provoking:

6 Basic Approaches to Evangelism

1. Confrontational Evangelism
Definition - a bold, “in your face” straightforward communication of the gospel message.
Examples: Peter in Acts 2

2. Intellectual Evangelism
Definition - Using a logic & reason building a case for Christ to the hearer.
Examples: Paul in Acts 17

3. Testimonial Evangelism
Definition - using your unique story of what God has done in your life to introduce people to the gospel message.
Example: The man born blind in John 9

4. Interpersonal Evangelism
Definition - using creative strategies to help lost people develop relationships with soul winning Christians.
Examples: Matthew in Matthew 9

5. Invitational Evangelism
Definition - Actively inviting others to events where the gospel will be proclaimed.
Examples: The woman at the well inviting her neighbors to meet Jesus in John 4

6. Servant Evangelism
Definition - Intentionally doing good deeds, especially to the most needy, with the purpose of pointing them to Christ in the encounter
Examples: Tabitha in Acts 9

At the end of the day, the best method is the one applied well in the appropriate situation in the power of the Holy Spirit by a person who understands the Good News they bear.

The Coming Collapse of Evangelicalism

2009-03-28T12:08:00.001-07:00

I read a very interesting post over on the Culture Campaign's blog regarding a book by Michael Spencer called The Coming Evangelical Collapse.

Here's the snippet from their post:

We are on the verge – within 10 years – of a major collapse of evangelical Christianity. This breakdown will follow the deterioration of the mainline Protestant world and it will fundamentally alter the religious and cultural environment in the West.

-- From "The coming evangelical collapse" by Michael Spencer, posted on The Christian Science Monitor 3/10/09 edition
Within two generations, evangelicalism will be a house deserted of half its occupants. (Between 25 and 35 percent of Americans today are Evangelicals.) In the "Protestant" 20th century, Evangelicals flourished. But they will soon be living in a very secular and religiously antagonistic 21st century.This collapse will herald the arrival of an anti-Christian chapter of the post-Christian West. Intolerance of Christianity will rise to levels many of us have not believed possible in our lifetimes, and public policy will become hostile toward evangelical Christianity, seeing it as the opponent of the common good.
Millions of Evangelicals will quit. Thousands of ministries will end. Christian media will be reduced, if not eliminated. Many Christian schools will go into rapid decline. I'm convinced the grace and mission of God will reach to the ends of the earth. But the end of evangelicalism as we know it is close.
Why is this going to happen?
* We Evangelicals have failed to pass on to our young people an orthodox form of faith that can take root and survive the secular onslaught. . . .
* There are three kinds of evangelical churches today: consumer-driven megachurches, dying churches, and new churches whose future is fragile. Denominations will shrink, even vanish, while fewer and fewer evangelical churches will survive and thrive.
* Despite some very successful developments in the past 25 years, Christian education has not produced a product that can withstand the rising tide of secularism. Evangelicalism has used its educational system primarily to staff its own needs and talk to itself.
* Evangelicals have identified their movement with the culture war and with political conservatism. This will prove to be a very costly mistake. Evangelicals will increasingly be seen as a threat to cultural progress. Public leaders will consider us bad for America, bad for education, bad for children, and bad for society.
* The evangelical investment in moral, social, and political issues has depleted our resources and exposed our weaknesses. Being against gay marriage and being rhetorically pro-life will not make up for the fact that massive majorities of Evangelicals can't articulate the Gospel with any coherence.
We fell for the trap of believing in a cause more than a faith.
To read the entire article, CLICK HERE.
Also available is the full (original) writing by Michael Spencer

Even as pointed (and accurate) as this assessment is, it is still missing a critical piece – namely that not only are the majority of Evangelicals no longer able to articulate the gospel, but also that for some time we (especially whites) have put comfort over power and security over radical faith, and so we are both powerless and irrelevant to lost people.

For those of you who might be wondering what I’m thinking (… is the theology the problem?) I would say definitely not – essential Evangelical theology is very biblical, in my humble opinion. Besides, Mainline Protestants (of the conservative variety) as well as Catholics are experiencing many of the same problems.

We lost our way long ago when we began to love our lives here too much. The best doctrinal statement in the world is useless if at the end of the day we’re living for ourselves. Prosperity breeds complacency far too often. Loving my life is the death stroke of healthy discipleship and powerful witness.

The lesson in this is that the gospel itself is what once defined Evangelicals, and we have muddied it and co-opted the mission of spreading it so much in the last three generations that we no longer have either an identity or a mission.

There was a time when Presbyterians, Congregationalists, Mennonites, Baptists, Evangelical Free members, Wesleyans, and many others would work together for the gospel despite their differences on other issues. Diffusing our energy to various causes and focusing on filling pews rather than preaching the gospel has done untold harm.

Fortunately, the gates of Hell will, in the end, not prevail against the Church of Jesus Christ. The Church will continue to advance, but the once-great Evangelical movement may no longer be a part of that advance. It is a shame that so many will miss out on all God intended because we were not faithful.

BTW - there are more than three kinds of Evangelical churches. There are the ones who are faithful to the gospel. The problem is that they are the exception, it seems.

A Strong Word for the President

2009-03-26T10:32:00.001-07:00

Thought of the Day

2009-03-25T16:00:00.000-07:00

Mercy is hollow unless God is sparing you from something real.

Memorizing Scripture

2009-03-24T15:16:00.000-07:00

Got a GREAT post from a blog called Fallen and Flawed.

Check this out:

18 Tricks to Memorize More Scripture
Friday, March 20th, 2009 Christian Living

Can’t remember where you put your keys? Blanked on your child’s name and the church you go to? This isn’t a sign that you’re getting old.

Zaldy S. Tan, MD, director of the Memory Disorders Clinic at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, says it’s a sign of how busy we are: “When we’re not paying good attention, the memories we form aren’t very robust, and we have a problem retrieving the information later.”

If you struggle with the simple things of life, then memorizing John 3:16 probably seems intimidating. And putting away Romans 8 sounds down right impossible.

In truth, it’s not as hard as you think. Yes, it takes effort and time. But there are some simple strategies to help you.

Why Even Memorize Scripture?

Lately I’ve seen a lot of interest in memorizing Scripture. Tim Challies hosts his own Bible memory series. And Ryan Ferguson awes audiences with his dramatic recitation of Scripture.
But one of the most compelling reasons for memorizing Scripture I found in John Piper’s sermon If My Words Abide in You: memorizing Scripture shapes the way I view the world by conforming to God’s viewpoint.

So, whether you want to memorize one verse or an entire book, try these strategies to help you remember more.

1. Read it repeatedly. Did you know you can memorize Scripture during your morning devotion? Instead of zipping through your reading for the day, pause and camp on one verse for a long time. You won’t regret it.

2. Pay attention. Sounds obvious, but often ignored. Simply forcing yourself to be aware of what you are reading can help you internalize the words. Repetition will make the mind wander. What you have to do is bring it back.

3. Visualize what you are reading. Take Psalm 1:1 for example. “Blessed is the man who does not walk with the wicked nor stand in the way of the sinner nor sit in the seat of the mocker.” Your first tasks is to see the three actions here: walking, standing and sitting. If you can see the three main actions, then you can start to memorize the surrounding words.

4. Create anchor words. In the above example, your anchor words are “walking,” “standing” and “seating.” In Colossians 1:15, my anchor words are image, invisible and firstborn. Whenever I get lost while reciting a passage I look for my anchor words to orient myself.

5. Recognize patterns. In Psalm 1:1, after the first line, the next three sentences follow this pattern: a verb, a noun and a modifier. Think of each of these as a bucket you drop the appropriate word into.

6. Start with the easy. Now, some passages are easier to remember than others. Psalm 1, easy. A page from Romans, hard. On your first effort at memorizing large chunks of Scriptures, don’t tackle Romans. Build some confidence first by memorizing Psalm 1 or the Sermon on the Mount.

7. Stagger. Sorry, not like you were drunk. What I mean is memorize an easy passage then a hard passage then an easy. Give your brain a break. This way you’ll avoid burnout.

8. Build memorable associations. If you want to remember difficult section of scripture like Romans 1:18-20, it helps to imagine God hovering like a brooding mountain over the world to represent all three verses. This is a robust picture hard to forget.

9. Anchor memorable associations in chapters. These rich word pictures can also help you when you’re trying to memorize entire chapters of the Bible. They orient you on a larger scale.

10. Cheat a little. Once you’ve absorbed a hunk of Scripture, don’t be afraid to keep a sheet of paper nearby with keywords or section headings to help you out when you need a reminder.

11. Narrate. Sometimes it helps to describe in your own words what you are trying to memorize. This will also help you build memorable associations, spot keywords and develop anchor words.

12. Stick to a ritual. I find it easier to memorize Scripture in my car–I have a long commute–and before I sleep. Especially early on in the process of memorizing, I can’t remember my passage as easily anywhere else except these places. So, until I gain more confidence, I stick to this ritual.

13. Sing it. Try opera. Or a musical. The point is to be dramatic. As if you were in a play. [This is my favorite trick, by the way.]

14. Try mnemonic devices. Many of us learned ROY G BIV to remember the colors of the rainbow. Make up your own device to memorize anchor words or more. In Psalm 1:1, your device would be WSS, or walk, stand and sit.

15. Enlist your body. If mnemonic devices aren’t your cup of tea, use body parts. Classic example of this is Ephesians 6:10-18, the armor of God. Waist, chest, feet, forearm and head complete the armor and can help you navigate through this lengthy passage.

16. Repeat the alphabet. Say you just can’t remember that big word in 1 John 2:2. Run through your ABCs. When you get to P, it should trigger the word escaping you: propitiation.

17. Type it. One way to memorize something like John 1:1-3 is to type it into your computer. Not once. Not twice. But ten times. Maybe more. Your call.

18. Hear it. After you’ve typed it, next, read it aloud and record it. Then listen to the recording several times.

Don’t forget: As you work on memorizing, turn off the TV, unplug your iPod and shut down your computer. You’ll retain more.

BY THE WAY: April marks my two-year anniversary of staring this blog, and this post is my 100th post!

Faith, Context and Blindness

2009-03-12T14:08:00.000-07:00

The other night my 8 year old son was reading his “Pathway Reader” a really effective book published by the Anabaptists for the purpose of teaching reading to younger children. My wife, being a professional educator and a reading specialist, chose these books simply because their approach to teaching reading is excellent. We use them in addition to what our kids are learning at school and between them and my wife’s hard work, my sons are both reading at least three years ahead of their grade level. Yes, I’m proud of that…

But I digress…

My son was reading the 8th grade book, which includes a great deal of Christian history and specifically Anabaptist history which, as you may know, is full of stories of martyrdom at the hands of other Christians in Europe back in the 16th and 17th Centuries. He said to me, “Dad, I thought Martin Luther was saved!” I said that he was… or is.

“Why do you ask?” I asked.

He was reading about how there was organized Protestant persecution of the Anabaptists (from an Anabaptist perspective, obviously) and Martin Luther was not being painted in a very positive light.

It raised a very poignant question: How could Christians kill other Christians? Was one group not really saved? Were they both good illustrations of why religion is a problem? Was it an issue of blindness or blind spots? It reminded me of my own, similar questions regarding the execution by drowning of Felix Manz at the hands of Ulrich Zwingli…

I considered Zwingli a great reformer and almost certainly regenerate. And then I read my Christian History book. But does his role in the death of another Christian negate all he did for the Kingdom? Maybe it does…

This very paradigm brings me to today’s post. Essentially, if a Christian or someone else from history who was famous for great things is found to have done something we now see is horrible, do we dismiss that person completely? Does the bad not only outweigh the good as far as our historical assessment, but does it cancel it out completely?

I thought of this in relation to another historical figure of enormous proportion – Stonewall Jackson. Considered a hero by many, both north and south of the Mason-Dixon Line, Jackson owned slaves. White people cannot fathom how painful it is for African-Americans to sit in school and hear about heroes like Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, etc. knowing that these men, on their best day, saw Black people as less than human and as mere property.

So do we discard these men – the Founding Fathers? Do we discard men like Jackson, who by all accounts was a devout Christian?

Consider these accounts:

"Stonewall" Jackson (1824-1863)
Both in faith and in battle, he would not be moved.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/holidays/memorial/features/33h034.html
Thomas Jonathan Jackson was as thorough a Christian as he was a soldier. One writer described him: "He lives by the New Testament and fights by the Old." Orphaned at age 6, Jackson grew up poor and uneducated in foster homes. He entered West Point near the bottom of his class, but he graduated seventeenth. The second lieutenant then served in the Mexican-American war. Following the war, while Jackson was in the occupation force, his superior challenged him to study Christianity. He did, all the while struggling with intestinal problems. He wrote his sister that his digestive problems "were decreed by Heaven's sovereign, as a punishment for my offenses against his Holy Laws and have probably been the instrument of turning me from the path of eternal death, to that of everlasting life." He was baptized at age 25.
Five years later, his young wife and unborn child died, which devastated him but ultimately strengthened his faith. He remarried, and his second wife, Mary Anna Morrison, lived until 1915. Though baptized an Episcopalian, Jackson became a Presbyterian, and he was a noted tither to his home church. The Jackson family held prayers at seven A.M., and even servants were required to attend. Jackson never waited for anyone, not even his wife, to begin prayers. Following breakfast, Jackson would leave for his teaching duties at Virginia Military Institute (where his students called him "Tom Fool Jackson"). Jackson would return home for Bible study, which he did using a commentary.
Jackson believed that slavery was ordained of God. Strict but kind with his own slaves, he asked his wife to teach two slave boys to read. He even organized a Sabbath school for African-Americans in Lexington and taught a class for five or six years. "My Heavenly Father has condescended to use me as an instrument in getting up a large Sabbath school for the Negroes here," he wrote. "He has greatly blessed it."
In April 1861, Jackson prayed with his wife and his cadets, and then left for Richmond to assume his command. At the Battle of Manassas in July 1861, he took a green infantry brigade and turned the tide of the battle. During the fighting, Brigadier General Barnard E. Bee instructed his men: "There stands Jackson like a stone wall. Rally behind the Virginians!" The name stuck, and "Stonewall" Jackson soon became Lee's right arm in battle. He daringly moved large numbers of men quickly (some say too recklessly). In one sixty-day period, his troops marched over six hundred miles and fought five major battles and numerous skirmishes.
His military prowess earned him the fear of northerners, who regarded him as "a species of demon," "a fallen angel," and "a cold-blooded rascal." But Jackson never forgot where his abilities came from. After Lee commended his performance at Chancellorsville, Stonewall replied: "General Lee is very kind, but he should give the praise to God." On the battlefield, Stonewall Jackson maintained his devotional life. According to historian John W. Schildt, "His men saw him stumbling and falling over trees and rocks. They almost thought he had too much to drink. That was not the problem. He was praying with his eyes closed while he walked." Following every victory, Jackson ordered his chaplains to hold thanksgiving services. He was known to ride through the camps distributing tracts to his soldiers, and he often took part in his troops' religious meetings. Wrote Henry Kyd Douglas in I Rode with Stonewall: "And when he had reached the place of prayer, lo, the camp was there. Bowed heads, bent knees, hats off, silence! Stonewall Jackson was kneeling to the Lord of Hosts, in prayer for his people!"
Sundays were generally a day of rest. "Deacon Jackson," as his men sometimes called him, hated doing battle on Sunday. Jackson was rigid and stern, and he fought intensely with his subordinates. Some thought he was insane. But despite the way some writers have portrayed him, Jackson was not a fanatic. It's simply that, in one historian's words, his "primary interests" were "Biblical theology and Christian discipleship." Because of this, he could declare: "My religious belief teaches me to feel as safe in battle as in bed. God has fixed the time of my death." After being accidentally shot by his own forces, he died on Sunday, May 10, 1863. "I always wanted to die on a Sunday," he said.

From Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_Jackson
Little as he was known to the white inhabitants of Lexington, Jackson was revered by many of the African-Americans in town, both slaves and free blacks. He was instrumental in the organization in 1855 of Sunday school classes for blacks at the Presbyterian Church. His second wife, Mary Anna Jackson, taught with Jackson, as "he preferred that my labors should be given to the colored children, believing that it was more important and useful to put the strong hand of the Gospel under the ignorant African race, to lift them up." [15]
The pastor, Dr. William Spottswood White, described the relationship between Jackson and his Sunday afternoon students: "In their religious instruction he succeeded wonderfully. His discipline was systematic and firm, but very kind. ... His servants reverenced and loved him, as they would have done a brother or father. ... He was emphatically the black man's friend." He addressed his students by name and they in turn referred to him affectionately as "Marse Major."[16] Jackson's family owned six slaves in the late 1850s. Three (Hetty, Cyrus, and George, a mother and two teenage sons) were received as a wedding present. Another, Albert, requested that Jackson purchase him and allow him to work for his freedom; he was employed as a waiter in one of the Lexington hotels and Jackson rented him to VMI. Amy also requested that Jackson purchase her from a public auction and she served the family as a cook and housekeeper. The sixth, Emma, was a four-year-old orphan with a learning disability, accepted by Jackson from an aged widow and presented to his second wife, Mary Anna, as a welcome-home gift.[17]
After the American Civil War began, he appears to have hired out or sold his slaves. Mary Anna Jackson, in her 1895 memoir, said, "our servants ... without the firm guidance and restraint of their master, the excitement of the times proved so demoralizing to them that he deemed it best for me to provide them with good homes among the permanent residents." [18]
James Robertson wrote about Jackson's view on slavery:[19]
“Jackson neither apologized for nor spoke in favor of the practice of slavery. He probably opposed the institution. Yet in his mind the Creator had sanctioned slavery, and man had no moral right to challenge its existence. The good Christian slaveholder was one who treated his servants fairly and humanely at all times.”

Let me put it another way: A friend of mine was interacting with me on the issue of abortion during the 2008 campaign and indirectly agreed with me that Abortion is genocide. He stated it this way: “Abortion amounts to genocide.” In other words, the abortion doctor or the pro-choice people are not setting out to kill babies, though that is in fact what happens.

I understood his meaning, and he unknowingly helped me clarify my thoughts on Zwingli, Jackson, and other historical figures. They saw themselves as doing something good, even though in fact it was not something good.

The vast majority of abortionists and pro-choice activists really, truly do not see abortion as murder. That’s why it does not help us to call them “pro-death” any more than it does for them to call us “anti-choice” (or misogynists or bigots or whatever else they like to call us). They truly believe a baby is no more that a piece of tissue. They are wrong. So while they are still murderers in the sense that their direct, intentional actions lead to the death of other human beings, they are not murderers in the same way that Saddam Hussein or Adolf Hitler were.

But my question is, does their understanding of what they’re doing (or lack of it) mitigate how we assess them? The same principle and question apply to people like Martin Luther, Ulrich Zwingli and yes, Stonewall Jackson.

If you view the world through the lenses they had, just like if you view abortion through the abortionist’s lens, it helps you see things a bit clearer. Jackson, for instance, grew up in a world where slavery was a way of life and had been for hundreds of years. It was “normal”. In spite of this, he broke the law to teach his slaves to read and to evangelize them. He loved them and they loved him. How should that impact the way we look at him? Slavery and its long-lingering effects have been beyond horrific. Can there be any "buts"?

Think of Zwingli. His convictions were that the Anabaptists were imperiling the souls of innocent children. He was wrong. But if you could stand in his shoes, in a mindset that was just emerging from Medieval thought where everything was absolutely absolute, might you do the same thing? Or at least feel the same way?

Of course, I’m with the Anabaptists. They got it right – the Bible clearly portrays believer’s baptism if it portrays anything, and the Anabaptists were acting on their biblical convictions. They were truly martyrs. But looking through different lenses helps me see how one Christian could kill another, unjustified as it was. They were blinded by culture, bad theology and Medieval thought.

The list could go on… Luther, Thomas Jefferson, some of the Popes. You see what I mean. I feel we cannot dismiss historical figures because we now see certain things so much clearer.

Did they sin? YES! Will they answer to God? God is both just and impartial. They will certainly answer. But my guess is that the righteous Judge will take things into account that we cannot know. We may be surprised at some verdicts that are handed down on that Day.

Q: What do you think of historical figures that are regarded as heroes by many but got some things inexplicably and terribly wrong? Do we dismiss them in our “superior” moral perspective? Do we blindly praise their accolades while ignoring their evil? How do we process this?

Church Discipline

2009-03-11T15:33:00.000-07:00

This is a summary of our actual church discipline policy...

Our church has practiced church discipline for over 30 years, and I would argue with good results. Many more pros than cons. I also know that it's increasingly rare, and I wonder whether it's for theological reasons, philosophical reasons, or that our culture has lost its mind and even the church cannot confront problems in a biblical way among its own members for fear of offending someone.

Okay, so I'm opinionated.

I'm curious to hear what you all think...

Armitage Church Discipline
- Summary -

Definition and Purpose of Church Discipline:
As in any family, discipline in a church family that is done the right way can be an effective tool to help people grow into maturity. The Scriptural basis for this can be found in passages such as Matt. 18:15-20, 1 Cor. 5:1-13 and 2 Cor. 2:5-11. “Discipline” is a word that makes people nervous in contemporary culture, but in a biblical context it is rich with good meaning and is life giving. For our purposes, it denotes one of the significant processes by which disciples of Jesus are made. So in other words, discipline does not equal punishment. “Discipline” encompasses all the church does in regard to “teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness” (1 Tim. 3:16 NIV). So that includes everything from Bible Study, encouragement and accountability to confrontation and exclusion.

Goal of Church Discipline
The goal of discipline is ALWAYS Christlikeness. Consequently, even something as serious as exclusion is always done with restoration in view – never as punishment.

Means of Church Discipline
The concept of church discipline can be divided into two broad categories: Proactive and Responsive. The proactive side encompasses all the church does to grow disciples: Bible Study, Grow Groups, accountability, counseling, prayer, encouragement, mentoring, service opportunities, etc. The responsive side involves such actions as personal exhortation and confrontation, personal and/or pastoral rebuke, public rebuke, official warnings (usually through a letter), and removal from the church membership by exclusion.

Reasons for Church Discipline
The reasons for proactive discipline are fairly obvious: To equip the body to do the work of the ministry (Ephesians 4:11-12) so that the church can function in its biblical role. Responsive discipline takes place when a church member begins to pursue a course of action that is detrimental to his or her spiritual health and consequently the health of the church body. In such cases, all the means available for correction will be used, starting with the more basic, but all the way to exclusion if the member refuses to repent.

Ultimately, church discipline exists for these two reasons: 1) To protect and maintain the health of the church body and 2) To work restoration (sometimes through severe means) in a member engaged in sin. If we are to be serious about the idea of community and the charge to make disciples of all nations, then the health of the body is paramount.

Surefire Way to Build Your Church...

2009-03-05T16:42:00.000-08:00

And we wonder why things are the way they are...

Rat Report

2009-03-05T11:35:00.000-08:00

I killed them. All of them.

Unfortunately, I have no pictures to share. These particular rats were wary of traps - probably because the first few traps got sprung without a kill. Of course the rats from last fall were not as smart and I got them all with traps, and thus the lovely pictures from that post.

So once traps became a bust, I switched strategies and went to POISON!

It took awhile, but they eventually disappeared.

How do I know?

No more little tracks in the snow was one clue, but the acid test was putting chicken bones in my bait station. When those went untouched, I knew success was mine.

Check This OUT!

2009-03-01T19:13:00.001-08:00

So If We Are The Body...

2009-02-27T16:40:00.001-08:00

But if we are the Body
Why aren't His arms reaching
Why aren't His hands healing
Why aren't His words teaching
And if we are the Body
Why aren't His feet going
Why is His love not showing them there is a way
(Casting Crowns)

Good question. What is the problem with “The Body of Christ”? Why does it not seem to be doing a very good job of what its Head, Jesus, left it here to do?

Is there a problem with the Head?

Is this whole Christian thing just a bunch of nonsense and what we see is merely a reflection of what happens when people make up a religion?

No, the problem is most certainly with people!

I think a good question to ask ourselves is what exactly makes the body the body anyway? And who is part of it? Is it possible that what is being described in the song is largely not the body at all, and that is why is it is not functioning?

The body is another metaphor that Paul used to describe the church – both local and universal. It is a telling and helpful metaphor because it is very descriptive of what the people of God are supposed to be doing with Jesus physically absent.

I believe it was our dear Anglican brother John Stott who was discussing God’s problem of invisibility: God, in a sense, does have this problem. He cannot be seen or touched or detected by the five senses, as He is a spirit. How did He solve this problem? By becoming human – God in the flesh – Jesus Christ. Jesus himself said, “He who has seen me, has seen the Father.” (John 14:7).

But wait – there’s still a problem. Jesus was visible and could be touched and heard, but He left almost 2000 years ago, so we are back to the same situation.

Simply, God solved the problem with the church – it is the physical, visible, touchable body of Christ in the world.

But, you protest, look at the church! Hypocrites! Judgers! Lazy, good-for-nothing gluttons and materialists who mimic the culture around them! In defense of the church, we are at our best redeemed sinners who are in the sanctification process. But still, anyone who is paying attention to the church (in the West at least) has to admit the situation is far from ideal. What can explain the sad lyrics I posted?

I hinted at above, and let me share with you, loyal blog readers, my theory: Much of what we are calling “the body” is in fact not part of Christ at all. Like a prosthesis, it looks something like a real limb, but is dead. Its function is limited at best and detrimental at worst.

I know, I am so harsh…

I believe that the pathetic dumbing down of the gospel over the last several generations, primarily by Evangelicals (the supposed guardians of sound doctrine) has produced churches full of lost people who think they’re saved because they prayed a prayer to keep out of hell. Or to have a more fulfilling life.

Lest you think I’m picking merely on Evangelicals and/or conservative Protestants, theological moderates of the Mainline Protestant persuasion, not to mention theological liberals, have done even worse. They tend to define “body” as anyone who was ever baptized or in any way associates themselves with Christianity. Their “gospel” tends to be much more about temporal social change than about God’s wrath being satisfied by the sacrifice of Christ so that sinners could be reconciled to their creator and truly, fully redeemed.

So, what exactly makes a person part of the body?

Are Catholics part of the Body of Christ? What about Methodists? What about theological liberals? What about Baptists? They’re all part of the body, right?

Wrong.

Let’s take a look at Scripture…

“You were all baptized by one Spirit into one body, whether Jew or Greek, slave or free.” (1 Corinthians 12:13)

Who was Paul talking to? The Corinthian church – far from a model body of believers. He describes them this way, however: “To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ…” (I Cor. 1:2 ESV). THEY were baptized by the Spirit into the Body.

So there’s our first clue… in order to be part of the body, one must be baptized by the Spirit into it. The Spirit immerses us into the body of Christ (which does not involve water, with all due respect to my Lutheran brothers and blogging buddies). This is called regeneration. In order to be in the body, one must be regenerated, or made alive in Christ. Also known as being Born Again or Born from Above. If one is not regenerated, one is not part of the body.

So are Catholics part of the body? The ones who are regenerated are.

Are Baptists part of the body? Ditto.

What about Lutherans? Every regenerated Lutheran is part of the body, as is every regenerated Pentecostal, Presbyterian, Nazarene, Anglican, Methodist, Wesleyan, Anabaptist, Mennonite, non-denominational Christian or whatever. Heck, even Emergent guys who are regenerated are part of the body! Denomination was not a criterion when God invented regeneration! It does not determine our body status.

I submit to you that the reason the “body” tends to function so poorly is because many people call themselves Christians who are not, at least not by any biblical definition of the word. They are “dead in their sins and trespasses” (Eph 2:1) and try as they might, cannot do the works God requires (John 6:29; Eph. 2:10). They are not attached to the vine and so can bear no fruit.

Let us then go back to preaching the whole, hard and beautiful message of the cross. Apart from the true gospel is no power to save, and people become false converts. If we preach the whole message of the cross, we might be surprised at what happens…

Blogging 101

2009-02-24T11:48:00.005-08:00

If you want a good example of how blogging ideally works (in my opinion), check out my buddy Steve Martin's latest post. It's a raucous but respectful conversation on baptism:

http://theoldadam.wordpress.com/2009/02/23/sprinklingfull-immersiondoes-it-matter-to-god/

I have been planning a similar post (more regarding what "the body of Christ" means), but that will have to wait awhile.

Steve's approach demonstrates good blogring cultivation and edifying dialogue.

I'm sure he'd be happy if you jumped in... if you have the guts! Lol...

It's War

2009-02-20T19:08:00.001-08:00

I have declared war.

If you are an animal person or an anti-war activist, you might want to stop reading now.

Rats have invaded my back yard again, tunnelling under the foundation of my shed and taking over my bird feeders. But they didn't stop there: they have set up shop under my back porch in my basement. They have bored enormous holes near my back steps and are burrowing around the foundation of my house. That's over the line. So at the behest of my beautiful wife, I have unleashed the arsenal...

I now have SIX Victor spring traps - Made in USA. I baited them with peanut butter, chicken and refried beans.

This is the pitiful scene under the porch. You can see how they have chewed through my foam barriers, so now notice the glue traps and poison.

This is one place the foul creatures have made an entrance.

This is a rabbit trap baited with chicken. I am not playing.

Two more Victor traps by the basement door...

I'll keep you posted on my progress...

Church of Oprah: Don’t Drink the Kool-Aid

2009-02-12T15:46:00.000-08:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JW4LLwkgmqA

Al Mohler on the Future of Evangelicalism

2009-02-11T14:06:00.001-08:00

http://www.albertmohler.com/blog_read.php?id=3255

What do you think?

Parental Rights

2009-02-09T10:21:00.000-08:00

Emerging Urban Conservative

2009-02-04T07:45:00.000-08:00

Part 1 of an occasional series...

This morning I was reminded why I am a conflicted voter.

We got up at 6:45 to get our kids off to school. Now, school is 2 miles away and starts at 8:00, so some of you may be asking why we get up so early to start the process, but for those of you who have kids, you understand.

So every day we have breakfast with our four kids at 7 am. Our kids have never known anything else - it's normal for them.

But for many, many kids in the city (and increasingly in other places) having breakfast with your parents is anything but normal.

This is the source of my conflicted politics. Let me explain, using the Breakfast example.

Many people assert, and I would agree, that school is the place you go for education. Not for parenting, not for essential life skills, not for self-esteem or counseling, and not for breakfast. Back in the day, schools taught kids math and history and science and reading, and many kids brought their own lunches in cool metal lunch boxes with pictures of Speed Racer or some other hero (remember them?). Other kids got hot lunch that their parents paid for - because after all, that is what parents do right? They provide for their kids. So breakfast happened at home, courtesy of mom and dad.

But the reality for lots of kids is parents who do not or cannot provide. There are many reasons for this:

In some cases, both parents have to work in order to stay afloat, and leave home very early. Breakfast is nearly impossible to pull off.

Too many kids grow up with single moms, for a variety of reasons. Breakfast at home becomes a luxury.

Many more kids, like in my wife's old school, have parents who are still kids themselves, or absent, or drug-addicted, or completely broken in some way. The caregivers range from babysitters to Grandma or some other relative to friends of the family to nobody. Really.

Most of this mess is the result of someone's sin. From greedy corporate executives to generations of sinful choices regarding sex, drugs and alcohol, other people's sinful choices cave in on these children and rob them of normality.

Some of the mess is simply a result of difficult circumstances. Either way, it's the kids who pay.

So back to my politics...

My conservative, Republican side says that to saddle the schools with the responsibility to play a parental role is bad for a million reasons. It distracts from the mission of the school to educate, it absolves the irresponsible parent of responsibility, and it turns the government into something of a Big Brother... a Nanny. Those are all valid points, and one of the reasons I'm a Republican (albeit an uncomfortable one).

But the urban side of me recognizes that if the government, by means of the schools, does not feed these kids breakfast, they will not be fed.

We can pontificate all we want about how the church should be doing this and that, but at the moment it is not doing it, and kids need to eat today.

And I believe passionately that the Gospel breaks the chains of sin and irresponsibility and turns losers (like me) into functional people and great parents. I have seen it happen over and over again as people in the 'hood and elsewhere in the city get saved and experience the awesome sanctification of the Holy Spirit, and over time become highly functional people who give back to their communities and raise strong families. This is why I do what I do.

So I wish for a smaller, simpler government but recognize that current reality demands government intrusion in an ostensibly parental responsibility.

I wish for greater individual responsibility for sure, but recognize the reality that there is a corporate responsibility of a society for its needier members. I don't think there is a political party for those realities.

So I am an Emerging Urban Conservative

Conservative because I resonate with the essential tenets of political, social and fiscal conservatism: Small, effecient government with a limited role and great accountability to an educated electorate; taxation that allows essential governmental function without hindering businesses or placing an undue burden on taxpayers; and morality that places value on human life at all its stages and on the responsibility of the individual. I have a real theological problem with people trusting in government for everything. I do not believe it is biblically justifiable, especially for Christians who claim we must trust God.

Urban because the realities of the city cut to the heart of the human condition and cut through the political crap. You see the best and worst here, where the artificial glaze of suburbia is removed. It is in an urban environment that flawed ideology, whether left or right, gets exposed for what it is (even if it still clings to life, as Democratic nonsense does here in Chicago). Despite all my Republican convictions, the reality of the city shows me that life is too complicated for bootstrap ideology. There's a reason there are hardly any Republicans in Chicago!

Emerging because more and more people, especially Christians, are beginning to see that no political system solves all the problems or is substantially in line with biblical thought. There is a political ideology emerging among us that abandons old ideological and political loyalties and instead lives in a messy tension.

You should think about joining me!

Black Men

2009-01-27T11:03:00.000-08:00

Living in the city all my life and ministering alongside and among minorities for most of my adult life, I have come face to face with the enormous problems in the Black Community and have had to wrestle, as a White man, with all the questions and implications of where things are and how they got that way. I posted about this some time ago.

I have heard all the theories, seen many attempts to "fix" the problem, engaged in the arguments and debates, and at some small level actually put my hand to the plow for some kind of work toward a solution. Anyone ministering in the city has witnessed the parade of preachers and politicians and social engineers who hurl their efforts, seemingly in vain, at the behemoth of brokenness.

I think we're missing something.

The liberals tend to polarize toward a position that minorities, especially African Americans, are consummate victims. Racism, bigotry, poverty and the lack of education that results from them are the adequate explanation for the current mess. Conservatives polarize to the opposite side: Blacks are making excuses and are completely responsible for their present situation. "If they'd just pull themselves up by their bootstraps, everything would be OK" seems to be much of the conservative mantra.

In real life, it's much more complex than either of those positions. No thinking person can spend an hour in the 'hood and come to any conclusion other than that institutional racism has done devastating damage after 300 years. By the same token, I firmly believe that anyone who is objective cannot deny the role that individual and corporate responsibility play in the overall health of a community, and that these very things have become marginalized in large swaths of the Black Community - by Black people.

With all this in mind, I got this e-mail today. It was birthed in the Black community and contains the seeds, I believe, for real change. See what you think.

The Silent Genocide:Facts about the Devastating Plight of Black Males in America

Only strong, organized, committed and courageous Black parents can stop this genocide. Not the police. Not teachers. Not schools. Not preachers. Not elected officials. Not social service agencies. Join us on Saturday, January 17, 2009, to do the work of Black parents. Celebrate Dr. King's Birthday by doing Dr. King's work!

Facts about the Devastating Plight of
Black Males in America*

Education/Family:
In Chicago, only three out of 100 Black boys earn a college degree by age 25.
In 2006, only 37% of Black males graduated from high school in Chicago (near the U.S. average for Black males); only 19% graduated in Indianapolis and 20% in Detroit.
Just 22 % of Black males who began at a four-year college graduated within six years.
69% of Black children in America cannot read at grade level by the 4th grade, compared with 29% of White 4th-grade children.
The average 17-year-old Black student has the reading and math scores of the average 14- year-old White student.
7% of Black 8th-graders perform math at grade level.
67% of Black children are born out of wedlock.

Employment/Economics:
In Illinois, 47% of all non-institutionalized Black men do not have a job.
In New York City in 2003, only 51.8% of Black men ages 16 to 64 were employed vs. 75.7% of White men and 65.7% of Latino men.
At comparable educational levels, Black men earn 67% of what White men earn.
White males with a high-school diploma are just as likely to have a job and tend to earn just as much as Black males with college degrees.
Blacks make up only 3.2% of lawyers, 3% of doctors and less than 1% of architects in America. Many of these are Black women.
53% of Black men aged 25 to 34 are either unemployed or earn too little to lift a family of four from poverty.
Nationally, 72% of Black high-school dropouts are unemployed.
Black America lost between $72 billion and $96 billion in the recent mortgage fiasco.
The median net worth of a Black family in America is $6,100 vs. $67,000 for a White family.
White men with prison records receive more offers for entry-level jobs in New York City than Black men with identical records (and White men with a prison record are offered jobs just as often - if not more so - than Black men who have never been arrested).

Incarceration/Crime:
Murders of Black males between the ages of 14- and 17-years old rose by 40% between 2000 and 2007. During the same period, murders committed by Black males between the ages of 14- and 17-years old also rose by 38%.
In 2001, the chances of going to prison were highest among Black males (32.2%) and Hispanic males (17.2%) and lowest among White males (5.9%).
Blacks account for only 12% of the U.S. population, but 44% of all prisoners in the United States.
Blacks, who comprise only 12% of the population and account for about 13% of drug users, constitute 35% of all arrests for drug possession, 55% of all convictions on those charges, and 74% of all those sentenced to prison for possession.
In at least 15 states, Black men were sent to prison on drug charges at rates ranging from 20 to 57 times those of White men.
In 2003, 1,172 Black children and teenagers in the United States died from gunfire.
One in nine Black men between the ages of 20- to 34-years old is incarcerated and one in 15 Black men over 18-years old is incarcerated.
More Black children died in Chicago from gunfire in 2008 than Chicago soldiers died in Iraq.
1.46 million Black men out of a total voting population of 10.4 million have lost their right to vote because of felony convictions.

Only strong, organized, committed and courageous Black parents can stop this genocide. Not the police. Not teachers. Not schools. Not preachers. Not elected officials. Not social service agencies. Join us on Saturday, January 17, 2009, to do the work of Black parents.

Phillip Jackson will speak on these statistics and solutions to these issues on Saturday, JANUARY 17, 2009, on WVON radio on the Kendall Moore Show. You may visit www.WVON.com and click on "Streaming 24/7 WVON" to hear this show at 5:00 pm eastern time, 4:00 pm central time, 3:00 pm mountain time and 2:00 pm pacific time.

* These statistics were compiled from various sources by The Black Star Project. You may email us to request sources at blackstar1000@ameritech.net. To join the movement to save young Black men and to educate Black children, call us at 773.285.9600, email us at blackstar1000@ameritech.net or visit our website at www.blackstarproject.org.

Across the United States, the educational, social and economic outcomes for most Black children are a catastrophe! In the new global educational and economic order, many, if not most, Black American children cannot compete. If ever there were reasons for Black parents to take action, few are more compelling than the ones listed above:
Black parents are responsible for the well-being of Black children. Not the police. Not teachers. Not schools. Not preachers. Not elected officials. Not social service agencies. Black parents must hold the police, teachers, schools, preachers, elected officials, and social service agencies accountable for their actions to support the well-being of Black children.

We will only solve the problems of Black youth to the degree that we create strong, empowered and engaged parents for Black children. Our actions, or inactions, will determine the future of our race. Please join Black parents across America who know that if we are not organized, our children will not be recognized. If we do not speak up, Black children will have no voice. Black parents must advocate as well as educate. We must take responsibility for the education of our children. We will work in our homes, with our families, with our communities, with our schools and with our government to guarantee the proper and successful education of Black children. Passive parental involvement is not enough. Black parents must become active co-managers of our children's destiny. We must become the engineers of their success. We must and will actively participate in every aspect of their lives. Please join the Black Star Project's League of Black Parents and commit to a 90-minute meeting, one day a month, for the sake of your child and the future of our race. By joining the League of Black Parents, you will also join our community PTA chapter so that we can take advantage of existing resources.

Sheep and Goats

2009-01-24T07:47:00.001-08:00

WARNING: This is going to be a controversial post for some of you. Enjoy!

As I was walking up the stairs to my office this morning, one of the teachers from our school was commenting on how hard my job must be.

Which part? I asked. I do a lot of things.

The part about getting kids not to love the world.

She and her husband, a former youthworker, are doing some after school stuff with teenagers and apparently she's feeling the pain :o)

I told her that it's not hard at all!

Teenagers who are regenerate have this desire deep inside them to follow Jesus. They are sheep. They hear the voice of the Shepherd and they follow Him (John 10:3-4, etc.). They have AMAZING ups and downs, epic battles with the flesh (and parents), trouble of all kinds with the opposite sex, self image issues we cannot imagine, and yes, a fascination with all the world has to offer.

But I don't have to "get them" to love Jesus. There is this engine, the Holy Spirit, inside them that continually drives them towards God. I have watched this over and over again.

Because I'm not the one who has to "get them" to love Jesus, then I'm not the one who who has to "get them" to not love the world. I exhort them and counsel them and love on them and teach them, and sometimes deliver a godly kick in the pants, but they know innately that the world is hollow and ultimately Jesus is better. So they fall and get up. They land on their feet, even if it's a nail biter for a few years!

The problem, I told the teacher, is the goats. The youth group is full of them at the moment. Many churches are full of them, I believe. In fact, I fear that many pulpits have more than their quota of goats across the country, which explains to a large extent the condition of the church in America. For generations we have spouted a "gospel" that says that Jesus will take away all your problems and give you heaven if you say this little prayer. For generations, Christian parents have completely disengaged from their biblical mandate to disciple their children. For generations, youth ministry people have treated sheep like goats because the kid prayed a prayer at age 5 and we refuse to question his salvation, despite the mocking of God or whatever other deviant behavior we see.

And it's REALLY HARD to get goats to act like sheep. Really hard.

I mean, you can get them to for awhile, but when it really gets hot (like loving Jesus, let's say - or renouncing the world, or loving their neighbor) then they get really feisty. I have concluded, after almost 18 years of youth ministry, that the stupidest thing I can do is try to get kids who clearly are unregenerate to worship or be holy or live in any way like Christians. I need to love and evangelize them, and evangelism is surely the first part of the disciple-making spectrum, but I need to stop trying to disciple people who are not disciples.

Now I know, this whole regeneration thing is a bit controversial... we want to treat everyone like a "child of God". We don't want to "judge" anyone's salvation (and we shouldn't in a declarative sense, since only God knows the heart; but we can certainly question and inspect fruit!). We really want to think that getting the lost kid into a Christian community where he can see Jesus in action will win him. And I'll even go so far as to say that for someone who really knows they're not a Christian, this is probably a good strategy. But it does not work for the kid who thinks he's saved and is not. All it does is kill community in your group.

I have wasted far too much time trying to make dead people act alive. I am grateful that it is the Spirit of God that gives life, and that this life He gives cannot be taken away. My job is simply to fan the flame that God has already put in the soul, not to light the fire; and to proclaim the powerful gospel to those who are not yet lit.

Incarnational 101

2009-01-19T18:00:00.000-08:00

We are a foster family.

We recently had a little girl named Klaudia placed with us as a foster child. To be honest, our reasoning behing becoming licensed was because we wanted to adopt a second child, and we could not afford to do another private adoption, as we did with Anisa. By going through the foster care system (DCFS and its various contracted agencies - in our case ECFA) we could go through a foster-to-adopt process and actually be paid for the whole thing rather than going into hock. Nothing like your tax dollars at work!

A little boy named Venson was placed with us last summer, but he ended up being permanently placed with relatives shortly after we got him. So in September we got Klaudia at the age of four months.

Klaudia was born drug-addicted. As a result, she spent the first month of her life in the far from ideal environment of a hospital. Because her birth mom was trying to get her life together and was in rehab, she got her little girl back. Unfortunately, her mom worked a lot and Klaudia was left with various caregivers, which ultimately led to 11 fractures, including 5 broken ribs. Klaudia was removed and placed in the system, which led to our paths crossing.

Here's the hard part: Klaudia cries all the time. Often, she screams uncontrollably. When we first got her, she screamed so bad I honestly believe it could not have been worse if someone was sawing her leg off. It has gotten better, but it's still extrordinarily hard. Too frequently we are awakened to screaming at 5 am. Because of her drug addiction, hospitalzations and abuse, she has significant sensory issues and is delayed several months in her development. This results in weekly appointments with various therapists, representatives of DCFS and ECFA, various social workers, and of course the regular weekly visit with her birth mom.

Klaudia also has a condition called craniosynostosis, which will require cranial surgery later this month. Our lives have been consumed with doctor visits, consent forms, and tests at Children's Memorial. The surgery itself will require the turning upside-down of our entire lives (all 6 of us - me, my wife, my boys Klaudia and Anisa) for some time.

It's insane.

I was teaching on the concept of biblical love a couple weeks ago when I realized that I had not been loving Klaudia. In fact, I was looking very forward to the time when she would go back home. The thought of adopting her is really unrealistic since her mom wants her back and is working toward that end, and the emotional trauma of attaching only to lose her seems to be too much. I have even been contemplating getting out of the whole foster care business entirely and scrapping the idea of any more adoptions. It's just too much.

But I am a slave of Christ. Do I love only when it's gratifying? Do I make my own decisions about my life?

What about the thousands of kids in the system that need homes? After Klaudia, do I just get out for the sake of my own sanity?

Maybe...

But it's not my call.

I had something of an epiphany the other night when we went to a foster parent support group hosted by ECFA. I saw other couples that had 4 or 5 or 6 foster kids, all with significant issues. And they were doing it with love and joy.

At the very least, I need to be wide open. I need to be available to God. What, after all, does it mean to be the "hands and feet of Jesus"? It has to be something tangible, no?

I don't want to sacrifice the health of the rest of my family, and God knows how much we can take, but I am no longer willing to simply say no. Life cannot be about my comfort or what makes me happy if I am to call myself a disciple of Jesus.

So I am open.

And I am learning how to love a difficult little girl who lives in my life and my home.

Winter

2009-01-19T15:40:00.000-08:00

The other night I walked my dog over to a little park on Monticello Street at around 11 pm. It had to be about 5°F or so, and I was reminded why I love winter so much.

In the park there was about 15” or more of virgin snow. No one had been there for days. I had my big Sorel boots on and my long johns under my clothes, so I was up for a bracing plunge down the park trail. It is something else to break trail – to walk in the heart of Chicago in a place no one has touched. It is sweet and purifying and exhilarating to breathe the coldness of the air and see the sharpness of the stars and feel the bite of the wind on my face.

Perhaps the most amazing thing about the deep cold is the remarkable experience of having the city to myself. Nobody was out. No drivers, no gangbangers, no pit bulls to make my Yellow Lab nuts. On every street I walked down to get to the park – and back – it was just me and my dog. The cold quiet was enveloping and comforting and life giving. Think of it: In the ‘hood at night with no noise and no crowds and no concerns – just the cold and snow and quiet.

God knows my soul’s love for the wilderness. However, that is a life I am not called to. So He gives me a little piece of it once in awhile in the most unexpected of places.

Something Good...

2009-01-12T12:37:00.000-08:00

Pursuit of God Preface – A.W. Tozer

In this hour of all-but-universal darkness one cheering gleam appears: within the fold of conservative Christianity there are to be found increasing numbers of persons whose religious lives are marked by a growing hunger after God Himself. They are eager for spiritual realities and will not be put off with words, nor will they be content with correct "interpretations" of truth. They are athirst for God, and they will not be satisfied till they have drunk deep at the Fountain of Living Water.

This is the only real harbinger of revival which I have been able to detect anywhere on the religious horizon. It may be the cloud the size of a man's hand for which a few saints here and there have been looking. It can result in a resurrection of life for many souls and a recapture of that radiant wonder which should accompany faith in Christ, that wonder which has all but fled the Church of God in our day.

But this hunger must be recognized by our religious leaders. Current evangelicalism has (to change the figure) laid the altar and divided the sacrifice into parts, but now seems satisfied to count the stones and rearrange the pieces with never a care that there is not a sign of fire upon the top of lofty Carmel. But God be thanked that there are a few who care. They are those who, while they love the altar and delight in the sacrifice, are yet unable to reconcile themselves to the continued absence of fire. They desire God above all. They are athirst to taste for themselves the "piercing sweetness" of the love of Christ about Whom all the holy prophets did write and the psalmists did sing.

There is today no lack of Bible teachers to set forth correctly the principles of the doctrines of Christ, but too many of these seem satisfied to teach the fundamentals of the faith year after year, strangely unaware that there is in their ministry no manifest Presence, nor anything unusual in their personal lives. They minister constantly to believers who feel within their breasts a longing which their teaching simply does not satisfy.

I trust I speak in charity, but the lack in our pulpits is real. Milton's terrible sentence applies to our day as accurately as it did to his: "The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed." It is a solemn thing, and no small scandal in the Kingdom, to see God's children starving while actually seated at the Father's table. The truth of Wesley's words is established before our eyes: "Orthodoxy, or right opinion, is, at best, a very slender part of religion. Though right tempers cannot subsist without right opinions, yet right opinions may subsist without right tempers. There may be a right opinion of God without either love or one right temper toward Him. Satan is a proof of this."

Thanks to our splendid Bible societies and to other effective agencies for the dissemination of the Word, there are today many millions of people who hold "right opinions," probably more than ever before in the history of the Church. Yet I wonder if there was ever a time when true spiritual worship was at a lower ebb. To great sections of the Church the art of worship has been lost entirely, and in its place has come that strange and foreign thing called the "program." This word has been borrowed from the stage and applied with sad wisdom to the type of public service which now passes for worship among us.

Sound Bible exposition is an imperative must in the Church of the Living God. Without it no church can be a New Testament church in any strict meaning of that term. But exposition may be carried on in such way as to leave the hearers devoid of any true spiritual nourishment whatever. For it is not mere words that nourish the soul, but God Himself, and unless and until the hearers find God in personal experience they are not the better for having heard the truth. The Bible is not an end in itself, but a means to bring men to an intimate and satisfying knowledge of God, that they may enter into Him, that they may delight in His Presence, may taste and know the inner sweetness of the very God Himself in the core and center of their hearts.

This book is a modest attempt to aid God's hungry children so to find Him. Nothing here is new except in the sense that it is a discovery which my own heart has made of spiritual realities most delightful and wonderful to me. Others before me have gone much farther into these holy mysteries than I have done, but if my fire is not large it is yet real, and there may be those who can light their candle at its flame.

A. W. Tozer
Chicago, Ill.
June 16, 1948

Santa Claus: An Engineer’s Perspective

2008-12-22T19:14:00.000-08:00

I thought you could use something a little lighter...

I. There are approximately two billion children (persons under 18) in the world. However, since Santa does not visit children of Muslim, Hindu, Jewish or Buddhist religions, this reduces the workload for Christmas night to 15% of the total, or 378 million (according to the Population Reference Bureau).

At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per house hold, that comes to 108 million homes, presuming that there is at least one good child in each.

II. Santa has about 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems logical). This works out to 967.7 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household with a good child, Santa has around 1/1000th of a second to park the sleigh, hop out, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left for him, get back up the chimney, jump into the sleigh and get on to the next house.

Assuming that each of these 108 million stops is evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false, but will accept for the purposes of our calculations), we are now talking about 0.78 miles per household; a total trip of 75.5 million miles, not counting bathroom stops or breaks. This means Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second --- 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second, and a conventional reindeer can run (at best) 15 miles per hour.

III. The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized Lego set (two pounds), the sleigh is carrying over 500 thousand tons, not counting Santa himself. On land, a conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that the "flying" reindeer could pull ten times the normal amount, the job can't be done with eight or even nine of them--- Santa would need 360,000 of them. This increases the payload, not counting the weight of the sleigh, another 54,000 tons, or roughly seven times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth (the ship, not the monarch).

IV. 600,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance --- this would heat up the reindeer in the same fashion as a spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer would absorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy per second each. In short, they would burst into flames almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them and creating deafening sonic booms in their wake.

The entire reindeer team would be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second, or right about the time Santa reached the fifth house on his trip.

Not that it matters, however, since Santa, as a result of accelerating from a dead stop to 650 m.p.s. in .001 seconds, would be subjected to centrifugal forces of 17,500 g's. A 250 pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of the sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones and organs and reducing him to a quivering blob of pink goo.

Therefore, if Santa did exist, he's dead now.

The Fulfillment of Prophecy

2008-12-22T14:55:00.000-08:00

Bible prophecy is often pooh-poohed. I hear it from secularists, Muslims, Emergents, and even liberal Christians.

An example is from a book I recently read by a Muslim convert. He used to be a United Methodist deacon, had seminary training back in the 70’s (at Harvard, no less), and had become disillusioned with Christianity when he was exposed to higher biblical criticism. In his book, he devotes significant space to debunking the “fulfillment passages” in Matthew. He points out things like how the Hebrew word ‘alma’ found in Isaiah 7:14 could mean ‘young woman’ rather than ‘virgin’. That means that when Matthew asserts, “This took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: ‘The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel’ – which means, ‘God with us’”, he is obviously mistaken.

Another example is how liberal Bible scholars will give both Old Testament and New Testament prophecies later dates based upon little more that the idea that ‘they could not be predictive, since the supernatural is not possible’. This forces them, for example, to date the gospel of Luke between 88 and 93 A.D., since Luke 19:41-45 has a detailed prediction of the destruction of Jerusalem, which occurred in 70 A.D. Never mind that a more objective dating, based on internal end external evidence, renders a date of between 61 and 63 A.D. And never mind that Jesus actually said the words in something like 29 A.D. That will not even be considered.

So is Bible prophecy reliable at all? All those fulfillments that are cited in the Christmas story – are they for real? Are they even possible?

I decided to look at some prophecy that would be a little more difficult to dismiss. It needed to be something that is certifiably stated before the event. It needed to be verifiable that it was or is being fulfilled. But where to find such a prophecy?

(Actually, to be honest, it wasn’t so much that I set out to find such a prophecy as it found me. I was studying for a message on evangelism and stumbled across this delightful discovery)

How convenient that Matthew turned out to be the place!

In Mt. 24:14, in the middle of the ‘Olivet Discourse’ where Jesus is prophesying about the end of the age, He makes this remarkable statement: “And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.”

Whole world?

All nations?

This was a relatively obscure itinerant preacher speaking privately to 12 men on a hill, in an obscure corner of the Roman Empire some 2000 years ago. Lots of messianic-type leaders have come and gone, both before then and since. Lots of religious movements have been on the scene. Empires have fallen and risen. Even if this was made up by Jesus’ followers decades later, it was still a prediction that no one could have caused to happen.

But it did happen. Or perhaps I should say, it IS happening.

The gospel of the kingdom started in Palestine, spread to some key Roman colonies, eventually took over the Roman Empire, had some trouble for a few centuries during the Dark Ages but pushed on nonetheless. It got stuck in Europe for awhile, but on the front end of the Enlightenment, began to be carried across the globe by missionaries. Consider this chart:

Consider the ever-increasing reach of linguistics and translation work:

- Of the world’s 6900 languages, almost 4700 (68%) have some gospel witness potentially available to them (Bible portions, etc). The speakers of these languages total 6.2 billion, or 95% of the world’s population. (Source: Scripture Language Report)

- In the year 1700 (17 centuries after Jesus gave the Great Commission) Christianity was limited primarily to Europe, America and Australia. 300 years later it has circled the globe and over 60% of the people groups of the world have a gospel witness

In other words, what Jesus said almost 2000 years ago is in fact happening, and it’s happening before our very eyes. The gospel is circling the globe, and we’re closing in on the remaining languages and people groups who still have no gospel witness.

Is this just a lucky coincidence? Don’t bet on it.

For Christmas or for Missions, I’m putting my money on Matthew!

What is Generosity?

2008-12-22T11:18:00.000-08:00

An interesting piece written by self-professed liberal Nicholas Kristof in the Saturday New York Times makes the remarkable accusation that liberals are 'tightwads'. At least when it comes to spending their own money. Several studies cited show that conservatives tend to give significantly more of their personal income to charitable organizations than liberals do.

Seems that the political Left is very generous when it comes to spending someone else's money (mine), and it frequently gives the appearance of compassion because of its insistence on taxpayer funded programs for the poor.

To be fair, one place I break from Republicans and political conservatives is in my belief that as a society we have a responsibility to the needy among us.

But what I'm getting at here is the hypocrisy of the Left in casting their ideological opponents as uncaring and greedy scrooges when in fact it is they who are cheapskates in their personal lives.

I think Christmas is a good time for all of us to reassess where our money goes.

The Intersection of Theology and Experience

2008-12-18T12:25:00.000-08:00

I was recently chided for using my personal testimony to help make a theological point: "Here you go, using personal experience to define truth."

Now I'm the last person who wants to do that. One could have had a great experience with divorce or cohabitation or some dream that came true and use that to build a theological argument on. Very dangerous. Lots of trouble has been started that way!

But what if you have, say, this ongoing and amazingly transformational experience as a consequence of trusting in Jesus to save you? And what if you find out only later that that is what the Bible says happens to people who are born again and become new creations by faith in Jesus (e.g. 2 Corinthians 5:17)?

Then experience corroborates good theology. In other words, if some Holy Book says we can fly, but we aren't able to, then that might indicate a problem with either the Holy Book or one's understanding of it, which is part and parcel to theology. But if the Holy Book says we can fly and I jump off the roof and fly, then my experience is confirming what the book says. That alone perhaps is not enough to certify the theology as sound, but it's a good start.

I read a piece by Al Mohler relating to pastors and the theology they should be preaching that helps with the understanding of this intersection:

"Of course, the experiential nature of the pastor's confession does not imply that the authority for theology is in personal experience. To the contrary, the authority must always remain the Word of God. The experiential character of the pastor's theological calling underlines the fact that the preacher is speaking from within the circle of faith as a believer, not from a position of detachment as a mere teacher."

In other words, this thing I say I believe has actually impacted me and is a reality in my life.

Truth spoken from the platform of a life lived with integrity to professed belief is much more likely to be heard.

A Good Quote on Parenting

2008-12-07T11:56:00.000-08:00

"So many [students] are under-parented: their moms and dads have been ardent supporters of their pursuits in academics, sports, and music, but more as peer wannabes than as elders. They have been more interested in helping their children build a résumé than a character." – Ben Patterson

The Real Face of Communism

2008-12-06T16:15:00.000-08:00

This story below is from one of our missionary partners, Paul Hagelgans, who is evangelizing in the former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. His father recently died and he sent us a snippet from his dad's life.

The reminder is this: It is too easy to forget what a travesty Communism was and is. Too many people today, young people who never experienced the Cold War, are casting Communism as “not that bad”, and people like Ronald Reagan who fought it as possibly the actual bad guys. Let this personal testimony serve as a witness that Communism is not a friend to the Gospel nor to civilized humanity.

Here's the e-mail I received:

Dear partner in ministry,

I just want to pass this personal note on to you to let you know our field director of the FSU [Paul Hagelgans] got news while he was traveling with me in the USA that his dad had graduated to heaven. Yesterday I put him on the plane to join his family back in Germany, and I want to ask you to remember him and his family these next few days. I have included a note from him as well, but I wanted to share with you one of the stories he told me about his dad as we traveled these last few days:

Paul's father was 81 years old [when he died]. When he was nine years old, his father and 5 brothers where taken out and shot by the KGB for being believers, missionaries, and pastors. The parting comment of the KGB officer to his mom was "We will make it so that your last son will not even remember who Jesus is." With that his mom, standing tall at 4' 2", addressed the officer with her finger in his face "Who are you? You are not God". Of course, she could have been killed on the spot, but God spared her and she went on to raise her son and died when she was 87. Her 9 year old son, Friedrich, died last Friday at 81 years, 27 days. He will go and see his dad and mom and brothers in Heaven since he did know about Jesus and walked with him as well. He leaves behind a believing wife and 15 children (all but one are believers) Their families-even the family of the unbeliever--all know Jesus, and number just over 120 people. The question that begs to be asked is where is communism and this KGB officer? We know where Friedrich is. Please pray for this family as they celebrate the life of a faithful father.

Mark A. Reimschisel
Executive Director,
Bible Mission International, Inc.

NOTE FROM PAUL:

My dear Friends,

This is to inform you that on November 28, at the age of 81, my father went to be with the Lord Whom he was serving his whole life long.

For me personally and my family, this was not unexpected, we knew it was to happen soon, he had done the ministry the Lord had given to him, and he had kept living faithfully until the last minute of his life. Now he is even more alive than all of us who live here on the earth.On Friday, December 5, as the Word of the Lord tells us, we will give his body to the earth. It will not be a day of sorrow for us, but a day of victory. According to the words of the Apostle Paul in I Thes. 4:13-18, we will not separate from him, but we will be waiting to meet him again.

My father's life has not been easy; he was a faithful servant to God, to his family and to the people. Not all of it can be described in this letter. I will send you more about his life a little later. His example will be kept forever in the hearts not only of his family, but also of hundreds of people who were around him.

We thank the Lord for our father, and for all He did through him. I thank you for your prayers and support.

Yours in Him,
Paul Hagelgans
Field Director

Brave New World

2008-12-04T21:35:00.000-08:00

This is amazing. What are the implications for us?

Voter Illiteracy and the Media

2008-11-25T06:15:00.000-08:00

Some of you will take this as a slam on Obama, and I think that is the primary point of the people who produced the video, but that's not my point. I'm pretty sure most McCain voters would have answered similarly.

I want to highlight their secondary point: Voters are clueless beyond what they can articulate from the headlines, Saturday Night Live and MTV.

Quote of the Day

2008-11-24T09:43:00.000-08:00

“Behind the shameful apathy and lethargy of the church, that allows one thousand millions of human beings to go to their graves in ignorance of the Gospel, there lies a practical doubt, if not denial, of their lost condition.” – A.T. Pierson

For All You Pastors Out There...

2008-11-16T19:06:00.000-08:00

I'll let the video speak for itself

Both Sides Have Issues

2008-11-13T07:37:00.000-08:00

Yes, that's right folks. There are two sides revealed among Evangelicals these days. The (at least) two sides have been there a long time but were perhaps ignored or minimized before the Great Election. Now they're on the table, and maybe that is a good thing.

I have written about my disappointment with Obama.

I have written about my disappointment with Christians who voted for Obama.

I have written about my disappointment with Christians who don't understand why other Christians voted for Obama.

I have written about why that's a "personal paradox" for me.

Here's another thing I want to write about: How Evangelicals on both sides of this issue are wearing blinders to how the other side thinks.

It goes something like this:

McCain voter to Obama voter: "I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU VOTED FOR OBAMA!"

Obama voter to McCain voter: "I CAN'T BELEIVE YOU HAVE ISSUES WITH OBAMA!'

Okay, maybe that's a bit oversimplified, but you get my point.

You can see we won't get very far at this rate...

Another Election Thought... Sorry

2008-11-12T15:42:00.000-08:00

This is from John Ortberg. I saw it on Jeremy Del Rio's site (a blog ironically entitled “no more words”) and thought it was worth putting up.

I am truly dismayed at some of the small-mindedness of my fellow conservatives and Evangelicals. We are earning (or perhaps reinforcing) a bad reputation for ourselves. I have a long list of issues with Obama. As long as anyone else's. But there is so much more to this complex story, and Ortberg does a nice job of admonishing us. I am going to post at some point on my new term, "Emerging Urban Conservative". Maybe it's the bright future of our species!

Ortberg's Piece:

Lessons from the Election: Seven Deadly Sins of Evangelicals in Politics:

I want to propose the “Seven Deadly Sins of Evangelicals and Politics.” You may have a few of your own to add. But the spirit of such lists in the past was not to add to our store of information but to contrition. So feel free to confess while you read.

Messianism. The sin of believing that a merely human person or system can usher in the eschaton. This is often tipped off by phrases like: “The most important election of our lifetime” (which one wasn’t?); or “God’s man for the hour.”

Selective Scripturization. The sin of using Scripture to reinforce whatever attitude toward the president you feel like holding, while shellacking it with a thin spiritual veneer. If the candidate you like holds office, you consistently point people toward Romans 13: “Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established.” If your candidate lost, you consistently point people to Acts 4:10 where Peter and John say to the Sanhedrin: “Judge for yourselves whether it is right in God’s sight to obey you rather than God.” It’s just lucky for us the Bible is such a big book.

Easy Believism. This is the sin of believing the worst about a candidate you disagree with, because when you want them to lose you actually want to believe bad things about them. “Love is patient, love is kind,” Paul said. “Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices in the truth.” But in Paul’s day nobody ran for Caesar. There was no talk radio.

Episodism. The sin of being engaged in civic life only on a random basis. The real issues never go away, but we’re tempted to give them our attention only when the news about them is controversial, or simplistic, or emotionally charged. Sustained attention to vital but unsexy issues is not our strong suit.

Alarmism. A friend of mine used to work for an organization that claimed both Christian identity and a particular political orientation. They actually liked it when a president was elected of the opposite persuasion, because it meant they could raise a lot more money. It is in their financial interests to convince their constituents that the president is less sane than Jack Nicholson in The Shining. Alarmists on both sides of the spectrum make it sound like we’re electing a Bogeyman-in-Chief every four years. I sometimes think we should move the election up a few days to October 31.

One Issue-ism. Justifying our intolerance of complexity and nuance by collapsing a decision into a simplistic and superficial framework. [Though you know my thoughts on this one... SL]

Pride. I couldn’t think of a snappy title for this one. But politics, after all, is largely about power. And power goes to the core of our issues of control and narcissism and need to be right and tendency to divide the human race into ‘us’ vs. ‘them.’

What might happen if the world were to see those of us who claim to be the church vote, and speak, and campaign, and respond to the results in a humble and repentant spirit?

Indeed, John. What if?

The Church Invents the Gospel

2008-11-10T10:21:00.000-08:00

This is a response to the breathless reviews of the latest scholarly tomes that give a “fresh read” on the four gospels… essentially nothing more than the same old liberal saw on demythologizing.

If the church invented the gospel (or Jesus, or the resurrection…) as the brilliant liberal scholars suggest, then who invented the church?

I picture a scenario something like this happening in order to get to a place where the church invented Jesus and the gospel…

Peter: Hey, guys – I have a GREAT IDEA! We can leave our respectable lives as God-fearing Jews and working class fishermen and invent this cool new religion that will get us in huge trouble! What do you say?

James: Well, we’ll need some kind of folk hero that will really make simple people gravitate to our cause… a figure that’s controversial, compelling, likable… You know, a Messiah or something. We could call him “Jesus”. That’s a cool name. Doesn’t it mean “The LORD saves”? That’s perfect. We could come up with a great story, like he dies for his people and then comes back to life… That would make a pretty cool religion.

John: Man, you guys are brilliant! This is awesome. Hey, let me take it a step further so we’ll be sure to get ourselves kicked out of the synagogue and maybe even killed! We can say that Jesus not only rose from the dead, but that – get this – He’s GOD!! We can pretend that when Isaiah said that the Messiah will be Mighty God, Everlasting Father, etc., that he actually meant…

Peter: But wait! If he dies, won’t that kind of kill the whole Messiah thing? Isn’t the Messiah supposed to be a great conqueror and restore Israel?

James: No, silly! The resurrection will take care of that. Hmmm… we do have the whole lack of conquering problem, though… I know! We can make it a spiritual kingdom and then make it so he comes back to conquer LATER! We could say he died for the sins of people in fulfillment of the Levitical prototype. Hey, everyone wants to be forgiven, right? Wow, this is fun!

Or maybe it really was the other way around…

An Election Parable

2008-11-08T13:40:00.000-08:00

Jesus used parables to make a point. As I was driving into work today, I thought of one too. It may seem like a fairy tale, but I dreamed awhile and wondered what might be if we could get the point of a parable like this…

“Once there was a great nation that chose its leader every four years by popular vote. Election cycle after election cycle, various candidates would campaign across the vast nation, trying to convince the people to vote for him or her and stirring up and even revealing a great deal of division in the process. One particular year, the nation was especially divided over who should lead it and how such a leader should go about governing.

Even the Believers of that nation were divided, with some feeling very strongly that the candidate that ran on a “pro-life” platform should be the choice, since life was important to Believers; and others feeling just as strongly that the candidate who ran on a platform stressing unity and the inclusion of those traditionally disenfranchised should be the choice, since those things were important to Believers as well.

In fact, many Believers were themselves among the disenfranchised. They saw the importance of bringing justice to a historically unjust situation, and the candidate they favored, who was himself among the historically disenfranchised, seemed to be just the man to do it. He even identified himself as a Believer! The problem was that the other Believers, their brothers and sisters, had never experienced such injustice and had difficulty understanding how the Believers who had experienced injustice could overlook something as fundamentally important as life.

Lo, the election came, and indeed the man who stood up for the disenfranchised won. This was cause for great celebration, and even the historically disenfranchised Believers who did not vote for the winner felt a certain sense of progress. The problem, however, was that the Believers who had not ever experienced injustice, who were indeed part of the majority culture, simply could not understand how their brothers and sisters could vote the way they did. They felt bitter and betrayed.

In time, disunity began to tear at the Believers, with their political passions overcoming their bonds of brotherhood and faith. Indeed, this disunity revealed significant cracks in the body of Believers that had been overlooked or ignored before, especially by those who had never experienced disenfranchisement. Believers began to despair.

But then The Miracle happened. The Believers began to come together and pray for the candidate who won. All over the Great Nation, believers overcame their differences and prayed and fasted night and day that God would work in the heart of the new leader, to make him the kind of man that would care about all the things that are important to God, not just one limited set of ideals. There was repentance on both sides for voting political passion or expedience or raw emotion over Kingdom values, and there was much weeping and joy.

And then it happened. The new leader began to see the importance of life! In fact, he began to see the beauty of God’s design for every facet of human experience. The new leader began to see the importance of all of the values of the Kingdom of God, as God opened his eyes in gracious response to the prayers of His people. He repented of his blindness and sin and began to lead justly in all things. And lo, there was an even greater celebration, as believers were able to overlook their political passions and instead focus solely on the things that are valued by God. And the new leader became increasingly wise, and skillful, and balanced and compassionate, as God’s people, the Believers, continued to pray day and night for their elected leader.

In fact, they prayed so much, and God worked so profoundly, that the new leader became one of the greatest presidents in history, and was re-elected by a bipartisan landslide four years later, even though many in his own party and in the larger political establishment were dismayed at his radical change in values.”

A fable? A hopeless fantasy?

You decide.

Some Good Quotes

2008-11-08T10:08:00.000-08:00

“Men are not killed by a blow on the extremities… but by an injury to the vital parts. When God purposes to make us die to self, He always touches that which is the very essence of our life. He adapts our cross to each one of us.” – Fénelon

"There was a time when the church was very powerful – in the time when the early Christians rejoiced at being deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days the church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society… But the judgment of God is upon the church [today] as never before. If today’s church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the 20th century." – Martin Luther King Jr.

Race, Hope and Obama

2008-11-07T15:05:00.000-08:00

What I'm about to post may seem a little contradictory in some minds to what I have been saying about Obama so far. Especially if your thinking is primarily non-urban conservative, White and Evangelical in nature.

While I have stated my disappointment with Obama the man in no uncertain terms, I know that his victory has a great deal of good attached to it, and is very meaningful for minorities. It is particularly meaningful for African Americans - even ones who passionately voted for McCain and who oppose the political philosophy of Obama. It should be meaningful to anyone who cares about people or race or the work of Jesus in this world.

This creates a tension that those of us who are conservative must all live in, if we are to be responsible: We celebrate the accomplishment but not the man who accomplished it. We celebrate the historical moment even if the politics involved are abhorrent to us. A personal tension for me is that I really believe it was morally wrong to vote for Obama. I think that such a vote amounts to sanctioning his outspoken advocacy of abortion rights. Yet I feel compelled to stick up for Christians of color who voted for him.

But there is something else we must understand: What this means to those who have historically been disenfranchised. It is simply huge.

The post is from my friend and fellow blogger Shlomo, who is an African-American Jewish Christian. While I may not see things exactly the way he does, he has profound points, and he articulates the heart of so many African-Americans. Something it would pay all of us White Evangelicals to strive to understand.

Shlomo on Race, Hope and Obama

Wednesday, November 05, 2008
B"H
We Have Been Slightly Healed

Even though I don't hold to the notion that President-elect Obama will solve all of our racial ills, I do believe that merely by becoming our nation's next President he has already set in motion a course of events that will aid in our healing. The first level of healing that I believe we will experience is a restoration of hope.

Prior to this election, I don't think that most Afro-Americans actually believed they had a real stake in the American Dream. Surely there was real and sustained progress today in comparison to the horrors of the Jim Crow Era and legalized segregation and social exclusion. Surely there were examples of numerous Blacks who were now rich and famous, but this was not by any means the same Dream which most Americans aspired towards. Only one in ten thousand of the youth on the local basketball courts will make it to the NBA, and even fewer still will land a recording contract and earn fame and riches as a rap artist or a music legend. The American Dream that says, if you work hard and remain dedicated to the principles of self-sacrifice and deferred gratification, then no opportunity or goal shall long remain beyond your grasp. "You can do and be anything you want," is the standard refrain which usually fell on deaf ears.

With Barack Obama's success I believe that the Afro-American imagination has been slightly healed and started back on the path towards restoration and healthy hopefulness. There is a lot more work that remains yet undone. Past hurts and injuries will not simply go away by ignoring them. The prior policy of benign neglect has not been helpful, but rather has strengthened our sense of wounded self esteem and fortified our identity as perpetual victims. When we were faced with not only individual personal attacks, but also a systemic, and therefore institutional, assault via a string of legal decrees, we began to lose hope and our individual and collective psyche was damaged. The most potent aspect of this psychological wounding is known as internalized oppression (the situation where a victim agrees with his/her oppressor and sees himself as of lesser worth or value as a person).

Merely by acknowledging our former state of injury we are affirmed as real persons and thusly a slight healing can begin. In order to progress further we will need to find a means of remedy for the harm inflicted, but our proper starting place lies in facing the past honestly. Barack Obama has repeatedly stated that our national legacy of racial exclusion must be addressed and thus he speaks words of hope to the masses of black and other minorities. The hope is first hinted at by the clear statement that our Nation’s past actions were wrong and therefore need to be acknowledged as such. Such an acknowledgment would give a sense of dignity and worth to black people who were previously regarded as either 3/5 of a person or else mere candidates for chattel slavery (see the US Constitution Article One Section 2 and The Supreme Court Decision in the Dred Scott Case).

The second step on the path to a state of National Health and Wholeness is the forming of new partnerships, not built on the partisan divisions of the past, but rather on the realities of the present. E pluribus Unum – out of many, one (people). Our National unity is presumed as the backbone and foundation of our ideals. Although there are many different ethnic groups represented in our country, we must no longer see ourselves as Red States and Blue States, as White Americans and Black Americans, as Latino, Asian or Native Americans. Instead we must recognize that we are the United States of America. I believe that Barack’s success gives hope and substance to this new/renewed vision of modern America. It’s not the America that has been, but rather the America that should be. I feel that President-elect Obama has created the possibility for our country to have a new and honest conversation about race, and other such divisive issues, and to therefore move forward into the future together, as partners rather than as partisans.

Blessings,
Shlomo

http://www.xanga.com/Ps29v11

So Much for Change…

2008-11-07T11:22:00.000-08:00

Okay… I have given myself a couple days to truly bask in the progress America has made in electing an African American president. We all have had 72 hours to celebrate something really worth celebrating.

So now it’s time to take the gloves off and treat Obama like any other public official entrusted with the stewardship of office: He’s accountable.

It was announced today that Obama has named Rahm Emmanuel as his White House Chief of Staff. If there was ever a ruthless, partisan political hack on either side of the aisle, this is the man. He makes Karl Rove look like a schoolboy. He is the ultimate Chicago insider and a big player in the Chicago political machine and the Chicago-Washington power axis.

Is this the change you voted for?

Check out these compelling Chicago Tribune articles (the same Chicago Tribune that endorsed Obama):

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-transition_web_7nov07,0,4784287.story

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-07-nov07,0,4323182.column

This is a reminder once again why it is important to vote as close to Kingdom values as possible, and if not possible, then to not vote. I am with my brother and fellow Blogger Aaron on this one – I wonder if Christians should have just sat this one out.

For all my brothers and sisters who voted Obama because he for once offered real participation for minorities or because he is Black or because he promised change or because he somehow stirred “hope”, I hope this is not the shape of things to come…

On Abortion

2008-11-05T11:58:00.000-08:00

Nov. 5, 2008

By now, I have heard a number of Christians justify their support for Obama despite his strong stand for abortion rights.

Their support falls along two lines of thought:

1) The supposedly pro-life Republicans have done nothing to stem the tide of abortions anyway, and their policies may even increase the number of abortions
2) Obama has a heart for social justice, and being pro-life has to involve more than just pre-birth and end-of-life issues; it has to encompass all of life. A social justice stand is really pro-life for those who are already born. Besides, it is not reasonable to be a single-issue voter.

While there are some legitimate ideas expressed in those lines of thought, I believe both are fatally flawed, and while all this was on my mind, I thought it would be good to engage these ideas and sort of unpack some of the problems they present for Christians.

Before I do that, let me say four things:

First, I celebrate with all my heart the election of an African-American president! There is so much unqualified good in that. It fulfills the dreams and hopes of so many Americans and needs to be celebrated for what it is. Last night was truly historical, and regardless of Obama’s current ideology or future performance, it must be remembered as a great night in American history.

Second, I do not owe my allegiance nor put my faith in any political party or platform. My politics are increasingly informed by my theology, based in Scripture, which puts me at odds with various aspects of all parties and in agreement with aspects of most parties.

Third, I believe with my whole heart that there were no great choices for president this election. Nobody who ran really is facing the deepest problems of our country, which are materialism, greed, and humanism. I don’t know how much any man could even adequately address those issues. We have such a poverty of spirit in America that goes back first to our inherent depravity, but more recently to our prosperity after WWII. It ignores social, political and economic differences and pervades every level of our culture, and indeed has taken root in the church. If I did not trust a sovereign God, I would be in despair.

Fourth, I love you no matter who you voted for! I am certain God’s people almost always vote their consciences, and God knows our hearts. I am a little concerned about our heads, however.

But Christians supporting Obama specifically grieves me. I mean, I think we must all support him in his office as president, as far as Scripture commands us to be honoring our leaders. I respect the man to an extent, and I respect the office. My earnest prayer is that Obama will be a wise and discerning leader in a volatile world. Nonetheless, it is the starry-eyed infatuation with this man and the implicit sanctioning of his policies by voting for him on the part of people who believe the Bible that has me so very saddened. So let me answer the issues I posted above.

Regarding the charge that Republicans have accomplished nothing anyway:

I would argue that there has been progress in the effort against abortion under certain sincere conservative politicians (not all of them Republican) who have taken up the fight. South Dakota’s attempt at a ban would be a real-time example. But this is not even the central issue for me. To merely look at the body count and be dissatisfied with the lack of progress seems a bit pragmatic. I think the real issue is the moral viability of a society that tolerates killing babies in the womb at all. Voting for someone who tolerates abortion is bad enough, since it perpetuates the status quo at best. It makes peace with an abomination. However, voting for someone who is an outspoken advocate of abortion amounts to complicity. I know, that sounds harsh. I also know that there are many other issues relating to justice and life that are profoundly important, and I want to unpack that in my next point, but if one cannot get this one right, does he or she even have a legitimate voice in the rest? Killing babies is huge.

So, yes, I think that voting for people who oppose abortion, even if there is NEVER an impact on the actual number of abortions, remains a prophetic statement – a pebble in the shoe, so to speak – to a culture that blithely ignores the most fundamental expression of human life and dignity. I believe Christians should continue to vote pro-life no matter the outcome.

As for Republican policies actually increasing abortions… the last thing I want to do here is get into a messy partisan argument, so let me just say this: This is an illegitimate charge. It assumes that: a) Republican policies cause poverty and b) poverty causes abortion. In order for that to be true, the person considering an abortion has to have a thought process something like this: “My goodness, I’m pregnant! If only I could afford to raise this baby and give it a decent life, then I would keep it, but because of oppressive economic policies I’m stuck in poverty, so I must abort.” This of course reduces the most weighty decision most women will ever make to simple economic calculus. Do you really think that is what happens? What about WIC? What about Welfare, Medicare, Kid Care, and adoption? Women most often choose to abort because of the overwhelming thought of responsibility, shame, selfishness or pressure from the father, family, etc. I have no doubt that out of the tens of thousands of abortions, some are driven by economics, but I’m not sure that Republican fiscal policy is driving up poverty, and even if it is, I’m not sure that poverty is the driving force behind abortions.

Regarding the idea that Obama is for social justice, so his compassion on other issues outweighs his support of abortion:

If I said I was passionate about social justice, except when it comes to racial issues, would you believe me? Would that have an impact on my credibility? Of course it would. Why, then does Obama get a pass from Christians when it comes to abortion? Is not abortion a social justice issue? Isn’t it the biggest social justice issue of all? I would argue it is. So here’s my thesis: If you are for social justice, but not justice for the most vulnerable of all, then you are NOT for social justice.

Now I do agree that being pro-life has to mean all of life. And I do believe that Evangelicals and other conservatives have egg on our faces, because it seems that many of us care about people only before they’re born and after they die. Many of us (but not all, thankfully) at least seem to be able to stand by and let kids grow up with no hope of a decent school, or decent healthcare, or decent neighborhoods. We tend to turn a blind eye to the issues of justice that are still alive and well, especially in the cities. As a result, we have lost credibility, and so the power of our words weighs considerably less than it ought to.

People who are pro-life and care about other justice issues often vote for candidates like Obama because they see them as more balanced… as more caring for the larger number of important issues. But I would say that failing at the point of abortion disqualifies a given candidate completely. This is not to say that we should not be passionate about all issues relating to justice, but it is to say that abortion is huge. Just huge.

I think we can all agree on this: It would be nice to be able to vote for someone who truly reflects Kingdom values. That day may come (I’m not holding my breath), but until it does, voting will always be a contradiction and a paradox and a tension for Christians who wish to be biblical. But personally, I will never knowingly vote for a supporter of abortion, and I am loathe to vote for anyone who is ambivalent. And if the political process never delivers any results favorable to the pro-life movement, it does not matter. I believe it is an outrage to even appear to cheer someone on who will actively perpetuate our culture of death.

A Reason to Celebrate

2008-11-05T11:56:00.001-08:00

Before I post my next thought, which is a WHOPPER, I thought it would be good to simply celebrate the progress represented last night.

We have elected an African-American.

That deserves unqualified, unconditional celebration.

Ten Reasons I Did Not Vote For Obama

2008-11-04T07:34:00.000-08:00

I could not vote for someone who constantly talks about “change”, yet refuses to stand up to rampant corruption in his own party

I could not vote for someone who expresses concern for justice yet condones the indiscriminate killing of the unborn, denying them any chance at justice

I could not vote for someone who disingenuously blamed “failed Republican policies” for our financial difficulties, when the crisis was spurred on by both parties, with the Democrats in the driver’s seat

I could not vote for someone who was a product to the Chicago Machine, and accountable to it

I could not vote for someone whose approach to foreign policy is appeasement

I could not vote for a champion of “gay rights”. I simply cannot understand how “gay rights” is substantively different from rights for polygamists, pedophiles, and the incestuous. While I am bound by Christ to love all people and all sinners, and while I am certainly guilty of sin myself, I cannot bow to pressure to call the perverse “normal”, and I cannot vote for someone who does

I could not vote for someone worshipped to the point of absurdity by the national and local media. One has to be a little leery of someone so adored by journalists

I could not vote for someone so popular in Europe

I could not vote for someone whose only real accomplishments are raising a family, community organizing and getting himself elected

I could not vote for someone who reinforced the American bent toward style over substance

There were some things that impressed me about Obama… his concern for the disenfranchised, his ability to articulate ideas, his potential to serve as a bridge builder… Unfortunately, these were vastly outweighed by his leftist ideology and his unwillingness to confront the real issues related to change in our country

Election Day Eve

2008-11-03T15:04:00.000-08:00

For those of you who read my blog, please check out the important conversations happening on two dear brothers' blogs:

http://christopherbennett.blogspot.com/

http://markaaronroy.blogspot.com/

They're both also linked at the right of my page on my blog roll.

And comment, why don't you?

The Passing of a Friend...

2008-10-30T14:39:00.000-07:00

An Obituary . . .

Today we mourn the passing of a beloved old friend, 'Common Sense', who has been with us for many years. No one knows for sure how old he was, since his birth records were long ago lost in bureaucratic red tape.

He will be remembered as having cultivated such valuable lessons as:

Knowing when to come in out of the rain; why the early bird gets the worm; life isn't always fair; and maybe it was my fault.

Common Sense lived by simple, sound financial policies (don't spend more than you can earn) and reliable strategies (adults, not children, are in charge).

His health began to deteriorate rapidly when well-intentioned but overbearing regulations were set in place. Reports of a 6-year-old boy charged with sexual harassment for kissing a classmate; teens suspended from school for using mouth wash after lunch; and a teacher fired for reprimanding an unruly student, only worsened his condition.

Common Sense lost ground when parents attacked teachers for doing the job that they themselves had failed to do in disciplining their unruly children.

It declined even further when schools were required to get parental consent to administer sun lotion or an aspirin to a student, but could not inform parents when a student became pregnant and wanted to have an abortion.

Common Sense lost the will to live as the churches became businesses, and criminals received better treatment than their victims.

Common Sense took a beating when you couldn't defend yourself from a burglar in your own home, and the burglar could sue you for assault.

Common Sense finally gave up the will to live after a woman failed to realize that a steaming cup of coffee was hot. She spilled a little in her lap, and was promptly awarded a huge settlement.

Common Sense was preceded in death, by his parents, Truth and Trust. His wife, Discretion,
his daughter, Responsibility, his son, Reason.

He is survived by his 4 stepbrothers; I Know My Rights; I Want It Now; Someone Else Is To Blame; I'm A Victim.

Not many attended his funeral because so few realized he was gone...

Family Man

2008-10-30T11:50:00.000-07:00

Sorry, folks

I had to unashamedly steal this one from Chris Brooks! I thought it was really powerful, and simply watching it will bless you:

Of course, being Steve, I do have to analyze this a bit...

What do you think of the idea of Christians prioritizing family over, say, seeking first the Kingdom? I mean, nobody ever calls it that, but it certainly happens! I guess where is the line? How do we live in the tension of loving our families, like this video so beautifully portrays, and counting all things loss for the sake of Christ?

If we do not do this well, then we simply live for ourselves... we simply turn our family into an idol.

Maybe that's a little too much for this post! Maybe I should just leave the video as is and let it speak to you. But I thought some ruminating on this point might be strategic in light of the video content.

Passionately Pro Choice?

2008-10-26T19:12:00.000-07:00

If you had an hour to talk with this girl, what would you say to her?

Thought of the Day

2008-10-23T15:58:00.001-07:00

"Those who are wholly God’s are always satisfied, for they desire only that which He wills, and are ready to do whatever He requires. They are ready to strip themselves of all things, and are sure to find a hundredfold in that nakedness." – Fénelon

The Sex Talk

2008-10-15T10:00:00.001-07:00

I had the rather remarkable experience Monday of sitting down with my 8-year old son Benjamin at Baskin Robbins and having The Talk.

Not that I wanted to.

I grew up in the 70's, with The Waltons and Good Times and Little House on the Prairie on TV. John Denver and Stevie Wonder were on the radio. Families went camping for vacation. The raciest programming before Dallas debuted in the late 70's was Happy Days!

So I had no clue about sex whatsoever. It was actually a bike injury (don't ask) that prompted my stepdad to have The Talk with me. At age 11.

I love my little boy very much. It was a very short time ago that he held my hand crossing streets... that he still watched "Bob the Builder". I realize that he is in fact growing up very quickly, and that part of my job is to equip him for the real, fallen, world. But I resented having to have the talk now. I resented having to remove a layer of my oldest son's innocence.

And that's exactly what it was: I had to have the talk.

Everything around him screams of sex. And I can't even blame the TV, since my kids are limited to about two hours on Saturday and no more.

Every billboard, radio program, song, advertisement... everything seems to be screaming sex or showing nearly naked women. In fact, I found him once recently staring at a woman in the Chicago Tribune who was posed provocatively in her underwear for some bra company.

But get this: My kid got most curious by looking through the Bible he was required to have for school. Not the text of the Bible, but rather the notes the publisher puts all over the thing to help kids get what the text is saying. So this KIDS Bible was my son's most compelling introduction to the word.

And why did the publishers feel compelled to talk about sex in the notes of their kids Bible? Because they pretty much have to. Same reason I had to have The Talk with an 8 year old. If they don't, the reasoning goes, peers will. And they're probably right.

So I'm glad it was me talking to my son and not some teacher or peer. But I grieved a little nonetheless. I wished we could have had The Talk a couple years down the road. I wished that innocence could have been held onto a little longer, but my son's pressing questions could not be deflected any more.

So it's done. At least this installment of the conversation. It went well, as far as I can tell. And I'm sure that there will be many, many more installments to the Conversation.

But I have three more coming behind him.

Western Union Woes

2008-10-15T09:23:00.001-07:00

Today I had to transfer money via Western Union. I decided, foolishly, that doing it online would be faster and easier.

Silly me...

As I sit here writing, I am on the phone with the security guy at Western Union Customer Service who is asking me questions about the car I drive, my former employer, what street I live on, my shoe size, etc. This is after my credit card company (I have a Chase Platinum Master Card with a $19,000 limit) initially stopped payment and I had to call them to see why and to get my stuff reactivated. AND... that actually happened after the second attempt. My first attempt ended with a malfunction of the Western Union website. Ha...

Mind you, though I'm not rich I do have a good credit rating and no payments due on my card. I usually pay the whole thing off whenever there is a balance. They thought a wire transfer to Kenya looked fishy for some reason...

So I called Chase and got everything straightened out and then went back to the Western Union website to start the process all over, only to get to the end and find this notification that I had to complete my transaction by phone. Thus, the loooooooong phone call.

So the call is over now and my money is transferred. All $280 of it.

That's right. $280.

I appreciate all the security stuff, but I wasn't transferring a zilion dollars or anything. We have a partner church in Nairobi and I was sending them money to help a young man in their church finish school. Money our youth group had raised.

It took an hour.

I could've walked to a freakin' Western Union franchise somewhere in the neighborhood and done it faster. Heck, I could've taken the train downtown and back and done it faster.

Moral of the story: Don't use Western Union's Internet money transfer service.

Unless you have time to kill...

Is the Resurrection Really True?

2008-10-11T17:15:00.000-07:00

I teach a young adult class (18-25) on Sunday mornings that is gradually developing into a viable ministry in our church. Since January, we have been covering the book of 1 Corinthians in some detail, going through each passage exegetically, and to say the least it has been an educational experience for me.

So now we're covering chapter 15, which is basically Paul's apologetic on the resurrection. To stimulate discussion last week, I gave them a very critical article by John Spong, who demands that Easter be reinterpreted and completely dismisses any idea of bodily resurrection. Interestingly, he employs Scripture to make his case.

So the article caused a bit of a stir among my students, many of who had never encountered any serious higher criticism of the Bible. Talk about equipping twenty-somethings for the real world! I had my work cut out for me...

This class is remarkably intelligent - certainly more so than their teacher - with many students in very secular (and often hostile) college environments. As a result, our discussions have been very intense and everyone seems to come to class hungry. It's a teacher's dream! In an effort to really feed and equip these kids, I have written a very brief rebuttal to Spong's article. I have included it below.

Feel free to comment or jump in on the discussion...

What Spong is Saying and My Answer

Spong bases his argument against a bodily resurrection on a deconstruction of the four Gospel narratives. In other words, as expressed in his last paragraph, the Bible itself is the evidence against a bodily resurrection: If one looks at it in order and from the “right” point of view, one will clearly see that the bodily resurrection of Jesus grew into a myth over time.

I want to look at Spong’s main points and respond very briefly to each of them, but first I think it would be profitable to take a quick look at Spong himself to get an idea of what he thinks and where he’s coming from.

Here’s a sample from his website:

http://www.johnshelbyspong.com/
About Bishop Spong
John Shelby Spong, whose books have sold more than a million copies, was bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Newark for 24 years before his retirement in 2001. His admirers acclaim him as a teaching bishop who makes contemporary theology accessible to the ordinary layperson — he's considered the champion of an inclusive faith by many, both inside and outside the Christian church. In one of his recent books, The Sins of Scripture: Exposing the Bible's Texts of Hate to Discover the God of Love (San Francisco: HarperOne, 2005), this visionary thinker seeks to introduce readers to a proper way to engage the holy book of the Judeo-Christian tradition.

John Shelby Spong on the Terrible Texts of the Bible
RELIGIOUS BIGOTRY: [One of many examples]
"No one comes to the Father but by me" (John 14:6)
This text has helped to create a world where adherents of one religion feel compelled to kill adherents of another. A veritable renaissance of religious terror now confronts us and is making against us the claims we have long made against religious traditions different from our own.

This is from Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Shelby_Spong
Quoting Spong: “Martin Luther ignited the Reformation of the 16th century by nailing to the door of the church in Wittenberg in 1517 the 95 Theses that he wished to debate. I will publish this challenge to Christianity in The Voice. I will post my theses on the Internet and send copies with invitations to debate them to the recognized Christian leaders of the world. My theses are far smaller in number
than were those of Martin Luther, but they are far more threatening theologically. The issues to which I now call the Christians of the world to debate are these:

1. Theism, as a way of defining God, is dead. So most theological God-talk is today meaningless. A new way to speak of God must be found.
2. Since God can no longer be conceived in theistic terms, it becomes nonsensical to seek to understand Jesus as the incarnation of the theistic deity. So the Christology of the ages is bankrupt.
3. The biblical story of the perfect and finished creation from which human beings fell into sin is pre-Darwinian mythology and post-Darwinian nonsense.
4. The virgin birth, understood as literal biology, makes Christ's divinity, as traditionally understood, impossible.
5. The miracle stories of the New Testament can no longer be interpreted in a post-Newtonian world as supernatural events performed by an incarnate deity.
6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.
7. Resurrection is an action of God. Jesus was raised into the meaning of God. It
therefore cannot be a physical resuscitation occurring inside human history.
8. The story of the Ascension assumed a three-tiered universe and is therefore not capable of being translated into the concepts of a post-Copernican space age.
9. There is no external, objective, revealed standard writ in scripture or on tablets of stone that will govern our ethical behavior for all time.
10. Prayer cannot be a request made to a theistic deity to act in human history in a particular way.
11. The hope for life after death must be separated forever from the behavior control mentality of reward and punishment. The Church must abandon, therefore, its reliance on guilt as a motivator of behavior.
12. All human beings bear God's image and must be respected for what each person is. Therefore, no external description of one's being, whether based on race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, can properly be used as the basis for either rejection or discrimination.
So I set these theses today before the Christian world and I stand ready to debate each of them as we prepare to enter the third millennium.”

Criticisms
Gerald O'Collins, Professor of Fundamental Theology, Gregorian University, Rome,
argued that Spong’s "work simply does not belong to the world of international
scholarship. No genuine scholar will be taken in by this book. ... What is said
about a key verb St. Paul uses in Galatians 1:15f. shows that the bishop [Spong] has forgotten any Greek that he knew. [Spong argued his case based on a Greek word that is not in the passage[4]]... [my] advice for his next book is to let some real experts check it before publication."[5]

One critical book is entitled Can a Bishop Be Wrong? Ten Scholars Challenge John Shelby Spong, edited by Peter Moore.

Rowan Williams, the current Archbishop of Canterbury, wrote a response to Spong's 12 points in 1998, when he was the Bishop of Monmouth. Williams wrote that "... I cannot in any way see Bishop Spong's theses as representing a defensible or even an interesting Christian future. And I want to know whether the Christian past scripture and tradition, really appears to him as empty and sterile as this text suggests."[1]

My point is this: Spong has already decided that a supernatural god is a myth created by the primitive human mind, so he views all Scripture and theology through that lens. In other words, his predispositions color all of his thinking and make him anything but open-minded, and his interpretations of Scripture follow suit. He looks to Scripture to vindicate the position he has already decided on. This has to be taken into account when one reads Spong, just like the Evangelical assumption that there is a God who does supernatural things has to be taken into account when reading Evangelicals.

Spong’s Main Points:

1) Dating of the gospels in relation to Paul
a. The gospels were written after Paul died (late dating) so…
Most liberal scholars prefer later dates for the gospels. Some even a late as the 2nd century. One of the main reasons for this is the prediction of the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem (See Matthew 24:2; Mark 13:2; and especially the detailed passages in Luke 19:41ff; Lk 21:20). The reasoning is that predictive prophecy is not actually possible, and since the Temple was destroyed in 70 A.D. the Gospels must have been written afterwards. Such a position makes one blind to evidence to the contrary. There is abundant evidence and sound reasoning to date the gospels much earlier than liberal scholars tend to do. I can provide you with materials if you like.

b. Paul never read the gospels and so…
“Paul never had a chance to read the Easter story in any Gospel. The tragedy of later Christian history is that we read Paul through the lens of the Gospels” (Spong). Even if Paul never had access to the written forms of any of the gospels, this argument has very little credibility. There are two reasons for this: First, the material that the gospels were taken from was commonly known in the early church in the form of hymns and brief creeds, as well as eyewitness accounts and oral histories. Indeed, this is the very material Luke compiled to write his gospel. All of it was commonly known to all Christians before Mark ever wrote his first gospel, so even if the Gospels were not inspired by the Holy Spirit, Paul had plenty of access to all the material he needed if indeed he needed it. It is perfectly reasonable to read Paul through the lens of the Gospels. The second reason is that Paul claims he was given the gospel (Christ died for our sins, was buried, and rose on the third day, 1 Cor. 15:1-11) personally by Jesus Himself, and not from any person (Gal. 1:11-12, cf. 1 Cor. 15:3a). That means he neither relied on a hopped-up myth developed by the early church nor on any other accounts. Jesus gave Paul the same Gospel He gave to the Gospel writers. If this is not true, Paul was either a pathological liar or completely deluded.

c. Paul had a different view of the resurrection
I’ll talk a little more in the section on Paul’s “version” of the resurrection in the section on that issue. For this section, it is sufficient to say that Paul’s view is no different than John’s, Luke’s or anyone else’s. Spong’s dates are wrong, but even if they weren’t, it’s folly to think that the early church was confused about the resurrection. It was the central theme of all its preaching.

2) The bodily resurrection is missing in Mark, the earliest gospel
In Mark 8:31 and 10:34, Jesus predicts His death and resurrection. In Mark 9:9, He states it as a fact. The rest of the book assumes a resurrection (e.g. 12:18-27) and the very idea of resurrection assumes a physical body. In the Hebrew mind, man was a unified whole: Mind, body and spirit. To try to separate the idea of a physical body being raised in Jesus’ predictions of His own resurrection seems to be inconsistent at best. Even if the last few verses of Mark are inserted, the whole book is still a solid argument for an actual resurrection.

3) The resurrection account grew over the years
This position ignores Jesus own predictions of His resurrection in Mark, Paul’s insistence on a bodily resurrection of Jesus in 1 Corinthians (written around 55 A.D.), and the Old Testament prophecies of a resurrected Messiah (Psalm 16:10 cf. Ac. 2:27 and 13:35-37; Isa. 53:11). It also depends on a construct that is unique to liberal scholars who begin with the bias of antisupernaturalism. It is very fair to say that Paul and all the gospels agree on a bodily resurrection. The degree of detail varies from book to book, but that is to be expected in independent eyewitness accounts.

4) The underlying unreliability of Scripture in general and the Gospels in particular (e.g. inconsistent resurrection accounts, etc.)
One has to admit that there are apparent inconsistencies in the Gospel accounts, as well as other problems in Scripture. Taken on a superficial level, these are what account for all the claims of “contradictions” in the Bible from skeptics (though most skeptics would be hard pressed to cite specific examples). There is not sufficient space in this article to make a detailed case for the integrity of Scripture or to answer the specific charges that Spong makes in his article, so I will have to refer you to a wealth of materials that are available regarding both issues. Nonetheless, a few things are worth mentioning. Regarding the apparent inconsistencies in the Gospel accounts, it is noteworthy that external harmonization of the account was never done. If the discrepancies were so problematic, and since there were abundant opportunities to edit out discrepancies over the centuries, why was this never done? Why were the accounts never smoothed out? Brilliant minds have examined Scripture for centuries and yet no one has made a case so convincing that it could free the believing masses from their “delusion” (though infidels.org is really trying). I think the answer is that the accounts were different in the details because they were just that – eyewitness accounts. Nobody would expect four witnesses to any given event to have exactly the same account of every detail. People highlight the things that stand out to them or that they want to emphasize. Things like the number of angels or women at the tomb being inconsistent is not a problem at all, in my opinion. The different writers merely named the ones they felt needed to be named. They did not limit the number of people present. A lot of work has been done to set out an orderly account of the resurrection and post-resurrection appearances using all the information in the gospels, so I can make that available to you. One good resource is The Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics, as well as numerous scholarly works and commentaries. As for the integrity of Scripture, it is hard to deny the self-revelation God does to the one who actually believes and obeys Scripture (John 14:21). That does not win arguments, but it does bring peace and assurance! There have been so many excellent volumes written on the reliability of Scripture that it is not worth space trying to do that here. Here are some: The New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable? (F.F. Bruce); The Case for Christ (Lee Strobel); Systematic Theology Volume 1 (Norman Geisler); Evidence that Demands a Verdict (Kind of entry-level, by Josh McDowell); and many others.

5) What actually happened to the disciples after the crucifixion
Spong says this: “What Paul does suggest is that Easter meant that God had acted to reverse the verdict that the world had pronounced on Jesus by raising Jesus from death into God. It was, therefore, out of God in a transforming kind of heavenly vision that this Jesus then appeared to certain chosen witnesses.” And, “Something happened after the crucifixion of Jesus that convinced the disciples that Jesus shared in the eternal life of God and was thus available to them as a living presence. This experience was so profound that the disciples, who at his arrest had fled in fear, were now reconstituted and empowered even to die for the truth of their vision.” Even Spong has to admit that something really significant happened. It is difficult to imagine the early church preaching the message that it did (Jesus was raised from the dead) and suffering the consequent persecution for that message if they were not convinced of something very powerful. It is what that “something” is that is at stake here. So the disciples saw some kind of vision? An individual may be willing to die for a vision, but to convince thousands of individuals who did not see the vision to die for it is entirely something else. I think perhaps Spong needs to be a bit more skeptical, starting with his own theses. Does he really think that the massive changes wrought by the early church were a result of Jesus’ disciples having a group vision? Even a very convincing one? No. They were willing to die for the same reason we are: A very real and alive Jesus. It is true that I have not seen the risen Jesus in His resurrection body, but I have surely encountered Him nonetheless. Spong might say that is all that happened to the 11. But they also saw Him hanging on a Roman cross. And from the beginning they preached an alive Jesus – not a Jesus “raised into God”, whatever that means. The real problem is the persecution. It makes sense that the Jews would have an issue with the disciples for preaching a physically raised Jesus. What does not make sense is being persecuted for a “vision”. Spong is trying way to hard to demythologize something that is obviously supernatural.

6) Paul never mentions a bodily resurrected Jesus
Paul’s argument in 1 Cor. 15 is that: 1) The resurrection of Christ is fundamental and essential to the Gospel, 2) That if there is no resurrection from the dead, then even Christ has not been raised, and if so our faith is futile, and 3) The very nature of resurrection is a physical, supernatural, indestructible body. It is rather difficult to believe that Paul did not have Jesus in mind as well in his description of resurrected people; Jesus’ physical resurrection was his starting point. He even goes so far as to define in detail what that resurrection body is in the last half of 1 Cor. 15. In the 23 verses of 1 Cor. 15:35-58, Paul uses the term swma (sūma) “body” or sarx (sarx) “flesh” 19 times! (15 explicit, 4 implicit) How Spong gets no “body” out of Paul’s description of resurrection, I have no idea. If Spong is right and there is no bodily resurrected Jesus in any of Paul’s writings, then we must assume that Paul was making the bodily resurrection case for everyone except Jesus. That is not Scholarship on Spong’s part. That’s satire.

7) The Bible teaches that Jesus was physically resuscitated
This is particularly troublesome to me, since Spong must know that The Bible does not say this and Christianity has never taught this. He seems to be deliberately and irresponsibly misleading in his very thesis – he’s setting up a straw man he can burn down. Either that or he is working with a completely different set of terms and defining them differently, or, he is completely ignorant of what the Christian faith has taught for two millennia. The Bible teaches that Lazarus et al were physically resuscitated – that is, simply raised from the dead – and that Jesus was resurrected in a supernatural, physical body. So He was also raised from the dead, but very differently: In a body that would never die again. Spong seems to badly cloud the definition of these terms.

Some of Spong’s misrepresentations:

· “No one suggests that Paul ever saw a resuscitated body.” – Of course not. The use of the term “resuscitated body” is misleading and disingenuous. Paul saw the resurrected Jesus in His glory. First, the resurrection body Paul describes in 1 Cor. 15 is not “resuscitated” like Lazarus was. It is supernatural. Second, Jesus makes many appearances in His glorified form, such as in Daniel (Dan. 10:4-6), the Transfiguration (Mt. 17:1-13; Mk. 9:2-13; Lk. 9:28-36), and in Revelation (Rev. 1:12-17). Paul saw the risen, glorified Christ. Paul argues for bodily resurrection in 1 Cor. 15:35-58.

· “Here the distance between the Christianity of biblical scholarship and the Christianity of the fundamentalists opens and begins to widen.” – Spong makes it seem as if the clueless (i.e. not scholarly) fundamentalists are the only ones left who believe in a literal resurrection. This is bad information on two counts. First, the bodily resurrection of Jesus has been held by almost all Christians – Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant – for two thousand years. If anything, it is Spong’s position that is out of the mainstream. Second, Spong redefines fundamentalism. Clearly he is using it in a derogatory fashion to describe all Christians who believe in the supernatural, and the term is clouded enough in contemporary culture that he can get away with it. In reality, the term can be taken in two ways in the contemporary Christian lexicon. There are self-identified Fundamentalists (usually Independent Baptists) who are very conservative and somewhat isolationist. They represent a facet of conservative Evangelicalism. There is also the broader use of the term which describes the large group of Protestants that split off of Mainline denominations in alliance with many conservative denominations in response to the Modernist movement of the late 19th century. These people espoused the “Fundamentals of the Faith” and became today’s Evangelicals. Any other use of the term “fundamentalist” is derogatory and reflects the emerging secular understanding of the term, which is analogous to Islamic fundamentalism.

· “If the body of Jesus was not physically restored to life, the fundamentalists claim, then Easter is fraudulent.” – I already made my point about how misleading this wording is. The fundamentalists’ claim is that Jesus was resurrected, not “physically restored to life.” Spong is playing a semantics game that makes him appear to be making a point, but falls flat.

· “Paul did not envision the Resurrection as Jesus being restored to life in this world but as Jesus being raised into God.” – The first statement is patently false, as 1 Cor. 15:35-58 clearly demonstrates, and the second statement is Spong’s own unique construct. It’s not even clear what “raised into God” means, especially since Spong does not believe in an actual, theistic God. Paul certainly does not ever say Jesus was “raised into God”, and it seems doubtful that so many Christians would have been killed over preaching something so nebulous and innocuous.

· “Both Matthew, who wrote between 80-85, and Luke, who wrote between 88-92, had Mark to guide their compositions. Both changed, heightened and expanded Mark.” – This represents only one of many schools of thought on the dating of the Gospels, and it assumes one built on another. He of course automatically rules out any possibility that the texts were inspired. It is a classic position of theological liberalism and has been thoroughly answered many times.

Orissa Finally in the News

2008-09-28T07:05:00.001-07:00

Thank God! The persecution in Orissa finally made the U.S.News.

Here is a report in today's Chicago TRibune:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-india-clashes_barkersep28,0,2301134.story

Great Article on the Violence in India

2008-09-25T09:56:00.000-07:00

This article is from the Indian magazine India Today. It helps one understand the context all the violence is happening in.

http://indiatoday.digitaltoday.in/index.php?option=com_content&id=15074&sectionid=21&task=view&issueid=71&Itemid=1

Orissa Is Not Out of the Woods

2008-09-23T09:27:00.000-07:00

The violence continues in Orissa. Please watch this video...

You can find out more at: http://www.gfa.org/extremists-launch-attacks-against-christians?cm_mmc=GFA-_-Email-_-377991-_-080915

Pictures From Orissa

2008-09-15T17:32:00.001-07:00

I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

Answering Rob Bell

2008-09-15T17:26:00.000-07:00

The Rat Saga Continues...

2008-09-14T12:41:00.000-07:00

Steve - 2
Rats - 0

SUCCESS!

2008-09-12T19:46:00.000-07:00

In my last post on this subject, I was sharing with you, my faithful readers, how I set traps in my shed to try to catch the rodent population that is taking over my back yard. You must imagine my surprise when after several days I still had no customers, despite using peanut butter.

Then I realized... they were not coming into the shed because I had so cleverly sealed up the grass seed and bird food for so long that they had left that neck of the woods.

Still, they are building a subway system under the foundation of the shed, near the bird feeder, so I knew they remained a problem.

I realized I needed to revise my strategy... I needed to place the trap outside, near the entrance to their nest.

Needless to say, it worked. I awoke this morning to a FREAKIN' HUGE rat, quite dead next to the trap. There was a bit of mystery to make things interesting, however. Somehow this freak of the rodent world managed to get out of the trap. But he didn't make it far, as these images will show...

Aahhh... life in the city.

At What Point Do We Call This Guy a Heretic?

2008-09-12T13:41:00.000-07:00

We live in a free country, so I suppose Brian is free to come up with any belief system he likes. He is free to revert to some warmed over form of Pelagianism or Neo-Orthodoxy or even a spiritualized turn-of-the-century theological Liberalism.

But please, Brian, don't call it new and don't call it Christianity...