April 16, 2008

T4G's 5,001 Theology Freaks

I’m sitting at the airport in Louisville, Kentucky, heading back home after spending two days with 5,000 theology freaks, and I mean that in mostly a good way. Together for the Gospel (“T4G” to the initiated) is the second gathering of the friends and fans of Al Mohler, Mark Dever, Ligon Duncan, C.J. Mahaney, and their very systematic theology (there are XVIII Articles in their doctrinal statement).

The first T4G event in 2006 drew over 3,000 of the “young, restless, and reformed” (Collin Hansen’s nicely turned phrase and title of his new book). The event this year was so large it had to be held in Louisville’s International Convention Center.

This year’s feeding of the 5,000 was a series of addresses on theology, specifically Calvinist theology--yes, total depravity was the topic of an entire session, as was “The Curse Motif in the Atonement”--but, interestingly, traditional Reformed emphases of infant baptism, the covenant, and presbyterian polity were missing.

Each presentation was followed by an informal conversation between Al and Mark and Ligon and C.J., and all 5,000 of us got to listen in to their insights and inside jokes, their questions and affirmations. It’s an engaging mixture, at least for the left-brained, and if the couple dozen people I talked to are representative of the whole, these 5,000 aren’t just casual about their theology. They love exploring, dissecting, and applying this stuff!

The conference bookstore takes up almost as many square feet as the meeting space, and it’s all books! If you’ve been to other conferences recently, you’ll recognize how bizarre this is—no videos, no music CDs, no resources (unless the ESV Study Bible counts). And many of the books are written by authors who aren’t available for autographs—mainly because they’ve been dead for awhile (Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Carl Henry) or quite a while (John Calvin).

The most intriguing session for me was Mark Dever’s session on “Improving the Gospel: Exercises in Unbiblical Theology.” Since Leadership and Christianity Today are in the midst of a year-long Christian Vision Project focus on “Is Our Gospel Too Small?” I figured Dever would find some points to differ with (which is a spiritual gift that did NOT cease with the apostles among this crowd). He didn’t disappoint.

Mark identified five “cries” of our day that he considers unbiblical efforts to “add to the gospel” and thereby confuse people and diffuse the gospel’s power. Let me summarize them.

1. “Make the gospel public.” Dever cited N.T. Wright’s emphasis on how the gospel is not just a private matter and should affect the laws of the land, and observed “there’s none of that in Scripture.” While conceding that there may be implications of the gospel that should affect legislation, Dever insisted, “We must distinguish the gospel itself from the implications of that gospel. Otherwise the message of God’s fully sufficient work in Christ will be mixed and confused with human works…. Never substitute good works for the good news of the gospel.”

2. “Make the gospel larger.” Dever pointed to Charles Colson as showing signs of an overly enlarged gospel by suggesting that “Christianity is a way of seeing all of life and all of reality. It’s a worldview.” Mark’s warning: There are lots of good things that Christians should do (working for justice, for instance, or practicing hospitality), but they’re not the gospel. By bundling such good works with the gospel, we risk confusing the actual gospel with the way people choose to live it. Dever, who has a degree from Duke, observed of southern Christians before the Civil War: “Those who believed the gospel and supported slavery still shared the gospel with us, even if they were wrong about its implications.”

3. “Make the gospel relevant.” When the gospel is linked to efforts to make evangelism more effective, it leads to pragmatism, which leads to liberalism, said Dever. “Of course we should contextualize the gospel—not to make the gospel more palatable or acceptable to the sinner,” he said, “but to make the offense of the gospel clearer.” He insisted: “Don’t try to improve the gospel by making it more relevant—you’ll lose the gospel.”

4. “Make the gospel personal.” Dever pointed out the dangers of a strictly “me and Jesus” relationship, which leads people to view the church as an optional spiritual accessory. “The idea of being fundamentally identified and submitted to the authority of one particular church is as alien as eating locusts and wild honey. Too many see church as just a plural word for Christian.” I couldn’t quite tell if Mark intended to bundle the gospel with formal membership in a local congregation, but it sounded that way.

5. “Make the gospel kinder.” God’s purpose involves both the salvation of sinners and the damnation of sinners for his own glory, said Mark, and it’s a mistake to assume that God’s purpose is to do the greatest good for the greatest number, and therefore we should reach as many as we can. That leads to pragmatism, and “pragmatism is a greater danger than open theism ever will be.”

Dever wrapped up by saying, “Keep the gospel clear—free from distortions. Don’t try to improve it.”

I’d never considered the question, “Is Our Gospel Too Large?” But in light of Dever’s session, I might have to. I sure don’t agree with everything I heard at T4G (the spirit of finding points of disagreement is contagious), but the energy of the theological interchange was even more contagious. Consider me Theology Freak 5,001.

Posted by Marshall Shelley at April 16, 2008 | Comments (43) | TrackBack

March 20, 2008

N. T. Wright on the Resurrection

At the National Pastors Conference in San Diego, our friend at PreachingToday.com, Brian Lowery, got to interview N. T. Wright about his latest book—Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church—and how it relates to preaching. Since we are all in the midst of the Easter journey, his words are timely, challenging, and above all else, hopeful. Here are a few excerpts. Read the full interview here.

Bishop N. T. Wright: [Studying] the Resurrection for an earlier book, Resurrection of the Son of God … ended up rubbing my nose in the New Testament theology of new creation, and the fact that the new creation has begun with Easter. I discovered that when we do new creation—when we encourage one another in the church to be active in projects of new creation, of healing, of hope for communities—we are standing on the ground that Jesus has won in his resurrection.

…

For me there's no disjunction between preaching about the salvation which is ours in God's new age—the new heavens and new earth—and preaching about what that means for the present. The two go very closely together. If you have an eschatology that is nonmaterial, why bother with this present world? But if God intends to renew the world, then what we do in the present matters. That's 1 Corinthians 15:58!
…

The line I often use—which makes people laugh—is: "Heaven is important, but it's not the end of the world." In other words, resurrection means the new earth continues after people have gone to heaven. I put it this way for my audiences: "there is life after life after death." People are very puzzled by that.
…

So many people think preaching the Resurrection means doing a little bit of apologetics in the pulpit to prove it really is true. Others simply say, "Jesus is raised, therefore there is a life after death." This isn't the point! Those types of sermons may be necessary, but there's more to it than that. To preach the Resurrection is to announce the fact that the world is a different place, and that we have to live in that "different-ness." The Resurrection is not just God doing a wacky miracle at one time. We have to preach it in a way that says this was the turning point in world history.

Read the full interview with N. T. Wright at our sister site, PreachingToday.com.

Posted by UrL at March 20, 2008 | Comments (9) | TrackBack

February 25, 2008

Pop Quiz

If you've already taken the quiz and gotten your score, post your comments below. How well did the quiz describe you?

If you haven't already taken the quiz, now it's your turn. You can find "The Hermeneutics Quiz" here.

Then come back to this page and comment. Let us know what you learned.

Posted by UrL at February 25, 2008 | Comments (47) | TrackBack

February 14, 2008

Is the Pastorate Pagan?

I appreciate it when a writer shows all his cards at the beginning of a book so I don't have to guess at his presuppositions. Frank Viola does just that in the opening line of his newly re-released Pagan Christianity: Exploring the Roots of Our Church Practices (Barna, 2008). He starts like this: "Not long after I left the institutional church to begin gathering with Christians in New Testament fashion…" You can imagine the tone of the pages that follow.

Viola argues in his preface that the "practices of the first-century church were the natural and spontaneous expression" of believers indwelt by the Holy Spirit that were "solidly grounded in timeless principles and teachings of the New Testament." Regrettably, he maintains, most practices of contemporary churches—including everything from having a professional pastor to meeting in a church building—are at odds with New Testament teachings. Worse yet, those extra-biblical practices were adopted from pagan culture. This is unsettling, Viola sympathizes; but it is also "unmovable, historical fact." The remainder of the volume is an argument from Scripture and church history to support this thesis: "the church in its contemporary, institutional form has neither a biblical nor a historical right to function as it does."

In the interest of full disclosure, I should confess that I'm a member of a historic denomination that worships with the liturgy. Not only that, it was only after dutifully searching the Scriptures and Church history that I moved toward—not away from—a more hierarchical tradition. So, I'm incurably biased. You judge the following for yourselves:

One of the contemporary church practices Viola denounces is "The Pastor" (chapter five). Although "by and large, those who serve in the office of pastor are wonderful people," Viola argues, nevertheless, "it is the role they fill that both Scripture and church history are opposed to.” He makes the following argument from Scripture: 1) The word "pastor" appears only once in the New Testament, in Ephesians 4:11. 2) The word for pastor in Ephesians 4 is plural, which suggests there were more than one pastor at each church. 3) The word means "shepherd," and does not, therefore, refer to a formal office, but simply a function of the church. 4) Finally, the passage "offers absolutely no definition or description of who pastors are."

Wait; it gets better.

After a dubious journey through church history documenting the development from New Testament shepherds to contemporary pastor, Viola concludes that the "unscriptural clergy/laity distinction has done untold harm to the body of Christ" (136). Allow me to list his grievances. The contemporary pastor-role has:

· "divided the believing community into first and second-class citizens"
· "stolen your right to function as a full member of Christ's body"
· "overthrown the main thrust of the letter to the Hebrews—the ending of the old priesthood"
· "rivals the functional headship of Christ in His church"

In short, "nothing so hinders the fulfillment of God's eternal purpose as does the present-day pastoral role.”

Originally released in 2002, Pagan Christianity has been revised and updated with the help of George Barna. In my opinion, it's Barna's endorsement alone that makes the volume worth talking about. As angry and disillusioned as I was about institutional church six years ago, I would have enthusiastically digested Pagan Christianity in 2002 had it made waves big enough to reach me in Arkansas. With Barna's help, the splash it makes in 2008 may be considerably larger. Add to the new endorsement the growing unease with institutions in general, and Pagan Christianity, with its angst and pseudo-academic format, may just find a market this time around. I’m no longer sure that's a good thing.

Brandon O'Brien, Leadership assistant editor

Posted by UrL at February 14, 2008 | Comments (81) | TrackBack

February 1, 2008

McChurch: I'm Lovin' It

"Church plants," "sister churches," and "satellite congregations" may be a thing of the past. In 2008, the language of missiology is changing, so look for "church franchises" in your town.

Eddie Johnson, the lead pastor of Cumberland Church, espouses the franchising concept when it comes to the relationship between his church in Nashville, Tennessee, and North Point Community Church in metro Atlanta. On his blog, he states, "Just like a Chick-fil-A, my church is a 'franchise,' and I proudly serve as the local owner/operator."

According to Johnson, his job is to "establish a local, autonomous church that has the same beliefs, values, mission, and strategy as North Point." He completed a three-month internship at North Point and continues to receive training and support. He claims to rarely deviate from the "training manual."

"Just like that Chick-fil-A owner/operator," he says, "I'm here in Nashville to open up our franchise and run it right. I believe in my company and what they are trying to 'sell.'"

The pastor says people who are already familiar with the North Point "brand" will find a local congregation with the same fit. For those who have relocated from Atlanta, they'll get a taste of home and know what to expect in their new church.

According to Johnson's website, the "Strategic Partnership Churches" exist in such diverse locations as Florida, Pennsylvania, and Colorado. And by 2010, North Point plans to plant 60 new churches.

Is this the future of the Western church- franchised congregations of megabrands in every city with pastors serving as the local owner/operator? Many of us have seen this coming, but it's rather shocking to see the model and language of the franchised church so enthusiastically embraced as it is by Eddie Johnson.

What do you think? Are Cumberland Church and other franchised congregations the wave of the future? Are Chick-fil-A and McDonalds the right model for the church to be emulating? Are franchised mega-churches going to be the denominations of the 21st century? Or, is this consumer Christianity taken to its logical and disturbing extreme?

Posted by UrL at February 1, 2008 | Comments (78) | TrackBack

January 24, 2008

John Ortberg Takes the Quiz

As expected, the blog has been abuzz with people’s opinions about Scot McKnight’s hermeneutical quiz in the new issue of Leadership. Some of the heat is coming from the assumption—primarily by those who have not seen the quiz—that it is a scientific instrument of high precision and accuracy. That was not McKnight’s intention when he created the tool. He writes in the introduction:

This quiz is designed to surface the decisions we make, perhaps without thinking about them, and about how we both read our Bible and don’t read our Bible. Some will want to quibble with distinctions or agree with more than one answer. No test like this can reveal all the nuances needed, but broad answers are enough to raise the key issues.

Earlier we posted the scores and responses from three Leadership contributors. Today we have another. John Ortberg has taken the Hermeneutics Quiz and scored 68—on the borderline between Moderate and Progressive. His comments about the quiz are below.

I was struck by how often the statements that were placed on different places on the continuum actually seemed compatible or even mutually dependent to me. For instance, "The Bible is God's message for all time" and "The Bible is God's words and message for that time but need interpretation and contextualization to be lived today." These are BOTH statements that I would fully endorse; and its precisely the truth that the Bible is God's message for all time that makes it cry out for careful interpretation.

Also it occurred to me going through the statements that there is a difference between 'conservatism' and 'orthodoxy,' although in evangelical circles we often equate the two. For instance, since classical liberalism is associated with a denial of the divinity of Jesus, 'conservatism' tends to be associated with an emphasis on his divinity, even at the expense of his humanity. So docetic teachings about Jesus may be 'conservative' in that sense, but are clearly not 'orthodox.'

All of which is to say that the 'conservative-moderate-progressive' continuum is an interesting one. We tend to want to put people into a box and label them with these words, but I wonder what other kinds of frameworks might be developed to help us examine our approach and faithfulness to the text.

It also struck me how difficult it is to measure the kind of belief that really matters. Take Jesus' teaching, "It is better to give than to receive..." The hard question is—am I actually the living what I 'really' believe?

If you haven't already taken "The Hermeneutics Quiz," you can find it here.

Posted by UrL at January 24, 2008 | Comments (5) | TrackBack

January 21, 2008

The Hermeneutics Quiz

As you read this, the winter issue of Leadership is hitting mailboxes. One of the more provocative features of the issue will no doubt be a hermeneutics quiz created by Scot McKnight. The issue’s theme is, “Is Our Gospel Too Small?” To help answer that question, we invited McKnight to develop a simple tool to assist church leaders in diagnosing their own biases and blind spots with Scripture. In the introduction to the quiz, McKnight says:

I’m curious why one of my friends dismisses the Friday-evening-to-Saturday-evening Sabbath observance as “not for us today” but insists that capital punishment can’t be dismissed because it’s in the Old Testament.

The quiz is comprised of twenty multiple-choice questions designed to surface the decisions we make, perhaps without thinking about them, and how we both read our Bible and don’t read our Bible. Here are a few sample questions:

The Bible’s words are:
A. Inerrant on everything.
B. Inerrant on matters of faith and practice.
C. Not defined by inerrancy or errancy, which are modernistic categories.

The commands in the Old Testament to destroy a village, including women and children, are:
A. Justifiable judgment against sinful, pagan, immoral peoples.
B. God’s ways in the days of the Judges (etc.): they are primitive words but people’s understanding as divine words for that day.
C. A barbaric form of war in a primitive society, and I wish they weren’t in the Bible.

The command of Jesus to wash feet is:
A. To be taken literally, despite near universal neglect in the church.
B. A first century form of serving others, to be practiced today in other ways.
C. An ancient custom with no real implication for our world.

After answering all 20 questions, your score is plotted on a hermeneutic scale ranging from Conservative (20-52), Moderate (53-65), and Progressive (66 or higher). McKnight offers helpful analysis concerning the strengths and weaknesses of each of these ways of interpreting Scripture, and he reveals how his own use of the quiz produced some surprising results. He writes:

I was surprised by the low score of an emergent friend and the high score of a professor at a very conservative Christian college. Some answer progressively on one controversial issue (say, women in ministry), while answering conservatively on others (homosexuality, for example).

We invited a few regular Leadership/Out of Ur contributors to take the quiz and report their scores. Here’s what they had to say.

Dan Kimball is pastor of Vintage Faith Church in Santa Cruz, California, a columnist for Leadership, and the author of a number of popular books including The Emerging Church. QUIZ SCORE: 62

I wasn't too surprised that I came out in the moderate category. I think the score represents me well. This was a great little survey as Scot causes us to stop and actually ponder the way we view Scripture. Too often we simply make assumptions and draw conclusions without really thinking about why. I am giving this quiz to our staff and elders. I think it will be a great discussion.

David Fitch is a pastor at Life on the Vine Christian Community in Long Grove, Illinois, a professor at Northern Seminary, and the author of The Great Giveaway. QUIZ SCORE: 67

I find myself unhappy with my score on the quiz because it labels me a "progressive" (but just barely). I am unhappy because a progressive is described as a person who doesn’t believe in the plain and literal meaning of the text. Yet I certainly do. I just don't believe the plain meaning is always immediately evident to each individual reading the text all by him/herself (and this includes even the most brilliant historical critical exegetes among us). Indeed that plain meaning is best preserved through the ongoing community of the church carrying out its apostolic task to faithfully transmit the gospel both in the community's preaching and its living. If that makes me a progressive, so be it.

I also must protest that seeing the Bible as "historically shaped and culturally conditioned" somehow makes me a progressive. For there is no more conservative view than believing in the incarnational nature of the gospel that has come in the particular person of Jesus Christ. This means that Truth necessarily comes via history and culture. The fact that I believe this should make me a raving lunatic conservative in these times where everyone wants to find God in the universal. All in all, I enjoyed taking this quiz and I say thanks to Scot. But I still wonder, how can this quiz help evangelicals escape the hermeneutical categories (of modernity) that individualize and dehistoricize the ways we seek to interpret Scripture?

Bryan Wilkerson is the senior pastor of Grace Chapel in Lexington, Massachusetts, and a regular contributor to Leadership. QUIZ SCORE: 59

The quiz put me squarely in the Moderate category, which feels accurate and comfortable for me. While I would agree with McKnight's description of the Moderate as "flexible," I see flexibility in terms of applying scripture to a wide range of issues, rather than allowing freedom to pick and choose which commands to obey and which to dismiss. Similairly, what McKnight describes as the moderates’ "struggles...to render judgments," don't feel like struggles to me, but rather like reasonable and defensible principles for interpreting difficult issues.

Recognizing these distinct approaches to the Bible (conservative, moderate, and progressive) helps to explain the difficulties we often have resolving controversial issues in the congregational. When wrestling with issues like women elders or modes of baptism, healthy debate and biblical discussion doesn't always lead to resolution because sincere believers are operating from different hermeutical perspectives. Awareness of these categories can defuse some of the tension, and reminds church leaders of the importance of teaching and modeling sound biblical interpretation.

If you haven't already taken "The Hermeneutics Quiz," you can find it here.

Posted by UrL at January 21, 2008 | Comments (33) | TrackBack

November 26, 2007

Heresy on Tour?

Since late September blogs have been buzzing about Mark Driscoll’s remark at the Convergent Conference labeling Rob Bell a heretic. Bell’s broad popularity (due primarily to his books, NOOMA videos, and podcasts) make Driscoll’s accusation all the more serious. Out of Ur has stayed out of the fray—until now. Rob Bell was in Raleigh, North Carolina last week as part of a 22-city tour. Leadership correspondent Chad Hall was there to report on the event.

When the babysitter arrived the night before Thanksgiving, she asked of our plans for the evening. Last week it was a concert, and three weeks before that we were headed to dinner and a movie. Tonight, my wife and I were going to…. I stumbled for words to describe Rob Bell’s latest tour. I could tell by her eyes that she stopped caring about thirty seconds before I stopped trying to describe the event.

Bell’s “the gods aren’t angry” tour packed about two thousand souls into Raleigh’s Memorial Auditorium for what wound up being a 90 minute sermon.

Bell is a popular writer, speaker and pastor, and I found it easy to see why he’s so popular. As a friend commented after the event, “The dude has some mad communication skills.” Wearing an all black outfit (save a bright white belt) that could have placed him as a member of Green Day, Bell presented an insane amount of information in a style that held my attention and quickened my spirit.

In a nutshell, Bell talked about how humans – since the earliest cavewoman and caveman – try to appease the forces that bring or withhold life. These human attempts led to formation of god concepts and religious practices, which grew ever more sacrificial and eventually led people to harm self and sacrifice children in bold attempts to assuage anxiety about the gods’ opinions of us. Like some sort of Ken Burns without a camera, Bell incorporated tons of tidbits and insights from history, cultural anthropology, theology, sociology and literature to weave a compelling story of religiosity that’s led to the anxiety-riddled human condition wherein we wonder, “Have I done enough?”

Into this system where humans guessed at what the gods want and then trying to give it, God spoke to Abram. Now the deity did the initiating. And the word from God was for Abram to forsake his father’s household: which Bell equated with forsaking the old system of trying to appease the gods. Rather than trying to bless the gods, Abram’s role was to be blessed by God. This was big revelation number one.

According to Bell, big revelation number two came in Leviticus. He said that this strange and seemingly backward third book of the Bible is best understood as a gift from God to help alleviate people’s anxieties. Rather than leave us guessing and grasping for some elusive set of conditions by which God would be pleased, God presented Abram’s lineage with an exact recipe for living and sacrificing, thus removing all doubt that God was not angry with them.

Bell said that big revelation number three came in Jesus. The sacrificial system outlined in Leviticus became corrupt and only led to more anxiety than it relieved. So at just the right time, God revealed that he never really needed our sacrifices anyway. Using quite a bit of humor, irony and pure wit, Bell painted a caricature god who is not complete without what people can provide or perform. Using various sayings from Psalms, Micah, Jesus, Paul’s letters and Hebrews, he drew an alternate picture of the divine: a God who is not dependent on what we do, but who freely loves and pours blessing on us.

The problem, according to Bell, is not that God is angry with us, but that we think God is angry with us. Thus, Jesus’ purpose wasn’t to change God’s mind about us, but to change our mind about God: to notify us of God’s lack of anger and to free us from the prison of our misconceptions so that we can truly live well. The place of church and religious ritual is to remind us of our standing with God and freedom to live lives of sacrifice and service.

This tour stop still has me thinking. The sense I got from Bell is that the whole problem to be solved is a mental one: people are not aware of the already-true fact that God is not angry with them. I’m wrangling with the notion that what Jesus changed is not God’s opinion of me, but my opinion of God. For some reason, this makes me think of Jesus as a Post-It note from God telling us what has been true rather than making it true. I’m ready to dismiss this as too insignificant, except that Bell convinced me that the alternatives leave us with a small god who needs sacrifice to be appeased.

I’m not ready to canonize Rob Bell, nor am I ready to fire up the Driscollian flame thrower and burn him a heretic. I chalk up my questions and concerns to the fact that no sermon – even a 90-minute one delivered with incredible veracity – can cover everything.

Chad Hall is an executive coach with SAS Institute Inc. in Cary, NC. He’s also the co-author of Coaching for Christian Leaders: A Practical Guide and Vice President of The Columbia Partnership.

Posted by UrL at November 26, 2007 | Comments (120)

August 23, 2007

Thus Saith the Radio

Sola gratia, sola fide, sola scriptura,…sola radio? The following conversation is based on true events.

Church member: “Pastor, I’m very disturbed by something you said in your sermon yesterday.”

Pastor: “I’m glad you came to talk with me about it. What’s bothering you?”

Church member: “In the sermon you mentioned Erwin McManus.”

Pastor: “That’s right. I quoted something he said about church membership.”

Church member: “Well, I’m very disturbed that you would reference someone like him in a sermon! McManus is part of the emerging church, and I have serious problems with their theology based on what I’ve heard on the radio.”

Pastor: “You do know Erwin McManus is a Southern Baptist, and I’m pretty sure his theology is quite orthodox. In fact, our denomination invited him to speak at our convention two years ago.”

Church member: “Yes, I know they did, and I’m very bothered by that as well. McManus is part of the emerging church, and the emerging church is involved in all kinds of heresy.”

Pastor: “The label ‘emerging church’ is used to describe a lot of different things, and I know some emerging church leaders are pushing the envelope with their theology, but I don’t think Erwin McManus is one of them. To tell you the truth, I’ve never really considered McManus part of that movement. I think his books are just packaged and marketed to that crowd. I don’t think you have to worry about his theology. Have you ever read one of his books?”

Church member: “No, but I don’t have to. I listen to Chuck Colson on the radio and he says the emerging church is dangerous. It’s not something we should be messing around with, and the fact that you’d quote an emerging church pastor in your sermon is very alarming.”

Pastor: Well, I’d encourage you to read up on what McManus teaches and believes, and if you find something problematic, let me know. I’d be happy to talk with you about it.

Church member: “I don’t think you heard me. Colson said on the radio that the emerging church is full of heresy. It’s dangerous. Why would I read one of those books?”

Pastor: “I haven’t listened to Chuck Colson’s program, but I can assure you in my study I’ve found nothing wrong with Erwin McManus, and neither have the leaders of our denomination.”

Church member: “Yes, but Chuck Colson is on the radio. I’m just letting you know it really bothered me yesterday. I hope this isn’t the start of a trend. I don’t know what I would do if this church started becoming emerging.”

I’ve recapped this conversation for you because it jives with something Brian McLaren wrote a few years ago. He said:

Sometimes I think that the most powerful and popular denomination in America is a stealth one. It’s not the Baptists or the Catholics or the Methodists or the Assemblies of God. It’s "radio-orthodoxy"—the set of beliefs promoted by religious broadcasting. Do you doubt the power of radio-orthodoxy? Just try contradicting it.

I’ve had my share of confrontations with Christians that adhere to radio-orthodoxy. I recognize they measure every sermon I preach against what is beamed through the airwaves. But I have yet to discover a pastoral way of handling their unquestioning faith in the disembodied voices they hear on the commute to work everyday.

I’m not calling for a revolt against Christian radio stations (although I don’t listen to them personally). I recognize that many people are blessed and encouraged by the programming offered through the radio. However, the voices coming through the speakers seem to be monotone. Without multiple perspectives and thoughtful dialogue around important issues facing the church (social, political, missional, or familial) listeners are left to believe the Christian position is cut and dry, black and white. And those who dare to question this perspective, as I did with my disturbed church member, are given a verbal lashing that ends with “thus saith the radio!”

What is a radio-heretic to do?

Posted by UrL at August 23, 2007 | Comments (42)

June 29, 2007

Justice, Do It

Nike has gotten a lot of marketing mileage from its straightforward motto, “Just Do It.” In part two of David Fitch’s post on social justice his message for church leaders is equally simple—just do it. Fitch argues that instead of focusing on national or global justice causes we must begin by acting locally. To accomplish this requires pastors to teach justice as a practice, something we actively do, rather than simply a concept we agree with.

If we are to avoid making justice into another program in the church we must resist the urge to make justice primarily about national politics, and only secondarily about local politics. For inevitably we get caught up in national politics believing that finally we are doing something. This then becomes an easy program to establish in our churches, and the work of local justice becomes an after-thought because political activism is always easier than living as a presence with the poor. It may be admirable and glamorous to help Jars of Clay fight Aids in Africa or Bono fight for Third World Debt Relief, but in the end I would ask us how much is accomplished if we cannot witness to a way of life that compels justice in our own back yard.

The main culprit here is that we pastors teach justice as a concept instead of a practice. For instance, we often make justice about the concept of individual rights or equal opportunity. It's an easy default move when we don't have visible justice going on in the local body itself. Yet defining justice in this way, as a concept born out of democracy and capitalism, individual rights or equal opportunity, too easily enables us to forget about doing justice in our local church by deflecting attention to national arguments. If we wish to see justice take shape in our midst we must go beyond rights to seek the simple righteousness of God fulfilled in our immediate locale.

I remember becoming an advocate (along with others in our church) for someone who was poor and an ex-convict who was unable to pay the rent. He and his wife were being evicted out of their apartment. We could have advocated renter's rights. We could have brought the person to a point of contention between himself, the owner of the apartment and the church. Or we could bring everyone around a table to discuss the situation (even though the building owner had never been to our church gathering). We could pray, confess sin, seek reconciliation, offer to step in and make things right. We did the latter, with coffee and pastries. The building owner was amazed. He forgave two months rent. I saw a miracle happen there that changed the ethos of our entire church. Perhaps now we were ready to make a statement about renter’s rights on a larger scale.

Now before every body gangs up on me, I still believe we must pursue justice outside the church. I am all for the efforts to make our social system and national politics more just. But what we must see from scripture is that justice in God's eyes is about a horizontal transformative reconciliation that brings people into restored relationship with one another as a result of the concurrent healed relationship we share with God. If we read the accounts of justice in Ezekiel 18:5-9, Isa 58:3-7, Amos 5:21-24, Micah 3, this kind of righteousness, both vertical and horizontal, is at the core of what justice means for the Hebrew mind of the OT. We therefore should engage in practices of horizontal reconciliation for one another and those outside in our neighborhoods before we go trailblazing on the national political scene.

I contend therefore that we should reverse the normal order of priority we often find in Christian politics: we should put our local politic first and national politics second. Others will surely argue that they can do both at the same time. However, I believe that without a Bodily presense in the world, there is little true engagement with the world except via individualist arguments. In other words, until we have communities of Christ’s justice living His justice, it's just Jim Wallis arguing against Jerry Falwell.

To this end let us institute practices of Christ’s justice in our communities. These practices might include a.) the sharing of excess wealth around the Table, b.) the practice of engagement with matters of injustice in our neighborhoods with the processes of reconciliation, and c.) the feeding of the poor and then inviting them over to our houses for a meal and fellowship. Let us be “justice-ified,” not merely justified. Let us pursue righteousness as a way of life, not just a nation’s individual rights. And let us cultivate a politic of justice at home in our communities before we advocate a politics nationwide.

Read part one of Fitch's post on social justice here.

Posted by UrL at June 29, 2007 | Comments (20)

June 26, 2007

Justice-ified by Faith

Recently we discussed Scot McKnight’s belief that the gospel typically preached by evangelicals is too individualistic, and how it actually makes the church an unnecessary part of following Christ. David Fitch, pastor of Life on the Vine Christian Community in Long Grove, Illinois and a professor at Northern Seminary, shares McKnight’s perspective, and in this post he reflects on how an individualistic gospel makes our attempts at social justice a peripheral program of the church rather than an integrated part of our faith.

When we pastors think about leading God’s justice in the church, our first inclination is to organize a ministry. It could be a soup kitchen or an outreach event to the poor "down in the city". Sometimes we will find ways to become active in policy making on the local or national governmental level. We are tempted to make justice into another program of the church.

If we are to avoid turning justice into merely a church program we must first resist the urge to make salvation "about me." Evangelicals (of which I am one) often describe salvation as a personal relationship with God. It is intensely individual. In Christ I am justified before God as an individual. And then, after being justified through faith in Christ, I pursue a personal daily relationship with God as well as personal holiness and then of course (if we get to it) social justice. It is an add-on. In this way we split personal salvation and social justice.

It is this split which allows us to essentially turn social justice into a program. Yet imagine what it would be like in our churches if there were no such division. If we were not invited to go forward as individuals to receive a packaged salvation from God that gets us out of hell, but instead came forward to become part of what God is doing in the world through Jesus Christ—the reconciliation of all men and women with Himself, each other and all of creation (2 Cor 5:19), which BTW inextricably must still include my own personal reconciliation/relationship with God.

There are two theological culprits that make possible this separation of personal from social salvation. The first is a narrow "penal" view of the atonement. The forensic penal view of the atonement defines the work of the cross in terms of Christ paying a penalty for my sin whereby I no longer am held liable for the just penalty of death for my sin. I have no desire to get rid of the substitutionary view of the atonement but there are many rich understandings of how Christ’s sacrifice satisfied God’s wrath within the ancient history of the church that avoid the potential to commodify (make available as a transaction) what Christ did on the cross. I think we should mine these resources.

I also think we should adhere more closely to the Christus Victor (Gustaf Aulen) and Classical Views of the atonement where Jesus is seen as the Victor, the King, the one who has defeated sin, death, and evil and now reigns in anticipation of the Final Kingdom of God. For here we cannot possibly receive salvation and enter into a relationship with Jesus as victorious Lord without participating in the victory of God and the Reign of Christ over sin, death, and evil. Here personal and social are so entwined we cannot distinguish them.

The second theological culprit is the Pauline doctrine of “justification by faith.” Because here justification is often presented in terms of the individual standing alone before God receiving pardon by faith. I think we should pay heed to some broader understandings of what the apostle Paul means when he describes “justification by faith.” In this regard, I believe the "new perspective on Paul" can help us. I am not in total agreement with all this literature, but I believe that Stendahl, E.P. Sanders, James Dunn and NT Wright have all helped us see that Paul's doctrine of justification by faith was not about the individual's battle to be good through self-effort through the law. Rather Paul's' doctrine was an argument against the exclusion of the Gentiles from salvation apart from becoming a Jew.

For the Jews of Paul’s day, the law was the covenantal badge for being a member of the people of God. Paul claims that marker is now changed in Christ. The badge is now justification by faith as entrance into a new righteousness won by God thru the person and work of Jesus Christ. And so for Paul justification is not about relieving the individual Jew’s guilty conscience (ala Martin Luther) who is always striving to maintain the standard of God's law. It is about the establishment of a new righteousness of God among a new people through Christ. This righteousness (justice) is both a vertical reconciliation with God as well as a horizontal reconciliation of all humanity and creation.

Once we see justification in this light it cannot be separated from being part of the new justice/righteousness God is working in the world. As a non-individualist (American) reading of 2 Cor 5: 17ff proclaims, “For anyone united in Christ, there is a new creation: the old order has gone, a new order has already begun. (REV). We have entered into the marvelous world of God reconciling all things to himself (vs.18) that we might become the righteousness (justice) of God (vs. 21).

If we are to resist the urge to make justice into another church program, then we must overturn this split between the personal and the social. We must go from preaching “accept Christ as your personal savior” to “you are invited to enter a relationship with God through Christ that changes everything”. We must go from being justified, to being justice-ified. Justice should no longer be something we do, but who we are.

Posted by UrL at June 26, 2007 | Comments (15)

June 12, 2007

Is Your Gospel Robust?

A few weeks ago Scot McKnight shared how the gospel we preach is having an adverse impact on the church. Last week at the Spiritual Formation Forum he spoke in greater detail about this problem. He called the standard evangelical gospel, outlined below, “right, but not right enough.” Essentially, we’ve watered down the good news in a way that has marginalized the church in God’s plan of redemption.

This fact was driven home recently by a friend of mine who teaches at a Christian college. He said a hand in the class went up in the middle of his lecture about the church and culture. The student, in all sincerity, asked, “Do we really need the church?” My friend was struck by the question, and by the fact that the classroom was filled with future church leaders. Something is amiss when even Christian leaders are questioning the necessity of the church. That something, according to McKnight, is the gospel we’ve been preaching.

Scot McKnight summarized the “Standard Gospel Presentation” this way:

God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.
Your problem is that you are sinful; God can’t admit sinners into his presence.
Jesus died for you to deal with your “sin-problem.”
If you trust in Christ, you can be admitted into God’s presence.

He went on to say that the problems with this popular evangelical gospel include:

1. No one in the New Testament really preaches this gospel.
2. This gospel is about one thing: humans gaining access to God’s presence.
3. This gospel creates an individualist Christian life.
4. This gospel sets the tone for the entire evangelical movement.
5. This gospel leads to spiritual formation being entirely about “me and God.”
6. The evangelical gospel has created a need for evangelical monasteries.
7. The evangelical gospels turns the local church into a volunteer society that is unnecessary.
8. The evangelical gospel is rooted in Theism or Deism, but not the Trinity.

In contrast to this anemic gospel, McKnight believes a more accurate and “robust” gospel presentation would include the following features:

1. A robust gospel cannot be “tractified” (meaning, reduced to a formula).
2. God made you as an eikon (Greek for “image”) to relate in love to God, to self, to others, and to the world.
3. The “fall” cracked the eikon in all directions.
4. Bible readers cannot skip from Genesis 3 to Romans 3.
5. Genesis 4-11 reveals the “problem” of sin: the climax is a society of eikons trying to build their way to God.
6. Genesis 12 begins to restore the eikon by a covenantal commitment and forming the family of faith. The rest of the Bible is about this elected family of faith.
7. The “problem” is finally resolved in “four atoning moments”: the life of Jesus, the death of Jesus, the resurrection of Jesus, and the gift of the Holy Spirit.
8. The “locus” of resolution is the family of faith: three big words in the Bible that describe this family of faith are Israel, the Kingdom, and the Church.

This understanding of the gospel does not marginalize the church, but instead makes the community the heart of God’s work in the world. Is McKnight’s more robust gospel better than the pervasive "4 spiritual laws" version? Is the tract gospel the source of our diminished ecclesiology and individualism? Are we even open to a wider discussion about the nature of the gospel, or is such a thing taboo—to only be permitted in “emerging” circles?

Posted by Skye Jethani at June 12, 2007 | Comments (18)

May 9, 2007

Getting the Gospel Right

A few weeks ago Dave Johnson questioned our adherence to a gospel that does not call forth or expect transformation in our lives. In this post professor and blogger extraordinaire Scot McKnight continues the discussion. He contends that many of the problems facing the contemporary church can be traced to the individualistic gospel we preach. Both Johnson and McKnight will be featured presenters at the upcoming Spiritual Formation Forum in June.

When I was in high school, my youth pastor – may his soul rest in peace – opened his home to me and my girlfriend, Kris (now my wife). David King became our personal theologian and one thing that impressed me deeply at the time was this contention of his: he often contended in a rather robust manner that every problem that he encountered as a pastoral counselor could be traced to a “spiritual” problem.

Most of us would not agree with this conclusion, but many of us would contend that we do need to do more “systemic” analysis to find the underlying issues that give rise to many of the problems we now face in the Church. I’d like to suggest a significant underlying issue that gives rise to more than one problem today.

Because of some research I did on the “gospel” in the Bible, leading to a book called Embracing Grace, I have come to a conclusion not unlike that of David King: namely, when I see “problems” or “issues” in the Church, I often say to myself, “What kind of gospel would have been preached and responded to that would give rise to this kind of practice, problem, or theology?” At the bottom of lots of our problems is a “gospel” problem. Students of mine that grow up in Christians homes often admit to me that the gospel they grew up was this: Jesus came to die for my sins so I could go to heaven. This parody of the biblical gospel, I contend, is at the heart of many of our problems.

Example #1: We often hear pastors today wondering why Christians are not more committed to the local church and seem to have so little time for anything extra?

Example #2: We routinely are reminded that 11am on Sunday morning is the most segregated hour of America’s week.

Example #3: We often observe that there are far too many Christians who “have it together” with God but are “relationally a mess.”

Example #4: Many evangelical Christians feel “most spiritual” when they are praying or reading the Bible and do not see their marriage relationship, their parent-child relationships, their sibling relationships, or their relationships with others – in the Church and outside the Church – as part of their “spirituality”. Instead, those elements are at best “implications” of their relationship to God (which is the focus of spirituality) rather than central to that spirituality.

But, we must be more willing to ask this question: Why all the emphasis on love and peace and reconciliation and community in the Bible if these elements are not central to the spiritual life? Is not the Bible’s emphasis less on the individual being transformed than the community being created in which that individual finds transformation? Do our spiritual formation courses adequately address community formation?

My conclusion after studying the Bible on the meaning of “gospel” is that one of the major reasons for each of the above examples is a gospel that gives rise to (1) a radically individualistic understanding of the meaning of life, (2) a non-communal perception of what the gospel is intended to accomplish, or (3) a God-only understanding of the gospel.

Let us not suppose that any of these examples has simplistic explanations, but let us think a little more systemically: if we preach a gospel that is entirely focused on “getting right with God” but which does not include in that presentation that God’s intent is to form a community (the Church) in which restored persons live out this Christ-shaped and Spirit-directed spirituality, then we can expect to hear lots of pulpit rhetoric exhorting us that the Church matters. And, if we discover on Sunday morning that everyone in our church is the same ethnically and economically, we can be sure that we are preaching something that is attracting only those kinds of people. And if we are hesitant to admit the implication of this ethnic, economic reality, then we need to be more honest with ourselves. We get what we preach. And we perform what we preach. How we live reveals the gospel we responded to and the gospel we believe.

Let me suggest, then, a more complete view of the gospel – one that focuses much more on the community of faith – that, if we give the permission to seep into every inch of our ministries, will perhaps lead to the day in our lifetime when these four examples will not be our present problem but our history’s memory. Now a definition: The gospel is the work of the Trinitarian God (a community of persons) to create the community of faith in order to restore humans (made in God’s image) through the life, death, and resurrection of Christ as well as through the empowering gift of the Holy Spirit to union with God and communion with others for the good of the self and the world. And all of this to the glory of God.

What then is Christian spirituality? It is the person who is restored to God, to self, to others and the world – all four directions for all time – by a gospel that emerges from a “communal God” (the Trinity) to create a community that reflects who God is. Do we preach a gospel that gives rise to holistic restoration and that can create a fully biblical spirituality?

Scot McKnight is the Karl A. Olsson Professor in Religious Studies at North Park University in Chicago. He will also be a presenter at the Spiritual Formation Forum in Milwaukee June 6-8. You can learn more and register at the Spiritual Formation Forum website.

Posted by UrL at May 9, 2007 | Comments (19)

January 18, 2007

The Gates of Hell

In part one of his post, Shane Claiborne challenged our assumptions about hell. Is it merely something people experience after death, or is hell a living reality for many on earth? Claiborne continues by proposing an offensive rather than defensive posture for the church toward hell.

C.S. Lewis understood hell, not as a place where God locks people out of heaven, but as a dungeon that we lock ourselves into and that we as a Church hold the keys. I think that gives us new insight when we look at the parable of Lazarus or hear the brilliant words with which Jesus reassures Peter: “The gates of Hell will not prevail against you.” As an adolescent, I understood that to mean that the demons and fiery darts of the devil will not hit us. But lately I’ve done a little more thinking and praying, and I have a bit more insight on the idea of “gates.” Gates are not offensive weapons. Gates are defensive—walls and fences we build to keep people out. God is not saying the gates of hell will not prevail as they come at us. God is saying that we are in the business of storming the gates of hell, and the gates will not prevail as we crash through them with grace.

People sometimes ask if we are scared of the inner city. I say that I am more scared of the suburbs. Our Jesus warns that we can fear those things which can hurt our bodies or we can fear those things which can destroy our souls, and we should be far more fearful of the latter. Those are the subtle demons of suburbia.

As my mother once told me, “Perhaps there is no more dangerous place for a Christian to be than in safety and comfort, detached from the suffering of others.” I’m scared of apathy and complacency, of detaching myself from the suffering. It’s hard to see until our 20/20 hindsight hits us—but every time we lock someone out, we lock ourselves further in.

Just as we are building walls to keep people out of our comfortable, insulated existence, we are trapping ourselves in a hell of isolation, loneliness and fear. We have “gated communities” where rich folks live. We put up picket fences around our suburban homes. We place barbed wire and razer-wire around our buildings and churches. We put bars on our windows in the ghettos of fear. We build up walls to keep immigrants from entering our country. We guard our borders with those walls—Berlin, Jerusalem, Jericho. And the more walls and gates and fences we have, the closer we are to hell. We, like the rich man, find ourselves locked into our gated homes and far from the tears of Lazarus outside, far from the tears of God.

Let us pray that God would give us the strength to storm the gates of hell, and tear down the walls we have created between those whose suffering would disrupt our comfort. May we become familiar with the suffering of the poor outside our gates, know their names, and taste the salt in their tears… then when “the ones God has rescued,” the Lazaruses of our world—the baby refugees, the mentally-ill wanderers, and the homeless outcasts—are seated next to God, we can say, “We’re with them.” Jesus has given them the keys to enter the Kingdom. Maybe they will give us a little boost over the gate.

And in the New Jerusalem, the great City of God, “on no day will its gates ever be shut.” The gates of the Kingdom will forever be open. (Revelation 21:25)

This article was reposted with the permission of PRISM—America’s Alternative Evangelical Voice. Visit their website to learn more.

Posted by UrL at January 18, 2007 | Comments (33)

January 16, 2007

Loving the Hell Out of People

Last year Brian McLaren shared his views about hell in a series of three posts on Out or Ur. This year we welcome a new voice on the subject. Shane Claiborne is a founding member of The Simple Way, a new monastic community in Philadelphia, and the author of The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical. In part one of his post, Shane discusses his childhood memories of preachers “scaring the hell out of him,” and reflects on a more Christlike alternative.

I figure anytime you are about to talk about hell it’s good to start with a joke, so here we go….It was a busy day in heaven as folks waited in line at the pearly gates. Peter stood as gatekeeper checking each newcomer’s name in the Lamb’s Book of Life. But there was some confusion, as the numbers were not adding up. Heaven was a little overcrowded, and a bunch of folks were unaccounted for. So some of the angels were sent on a mission to investigate things. And it was not long before two of them returned, “We found the problem,” they said. “Jesus is out back, lifting people up over the gate.”

I remember as a child hearing all the hellfire and damnation sermons. We had a theater group perform a play called, “Heaven’s Gates and Hell’s Flames” where actors presented scenes of folks being ripped away from loved ones only to be sent to the fiery pits of hell where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth, and we all went forward to repent of all the evil things we had done over our first decade of life, in paralyzing fear of being “left behind”… the preacher literally scared the “hell” out of us.

But have you ever noticed that Jesus didn’t spend much time on hell.

In fact there are really only a couple of times he speaks of weeping and gnashing of teeth, of hell and God’s judgment. And both of them have to do with the walls we create between ourselves and our suffering neighbors. One is Matthew 25 where the sheep and the goats are separated, and the goats who did not care for the poor, hungry, homeless, and imprisoned are sent off to endure an agony akin to that experienced by the ones that they neglected on this earth. And then there is the story of the rich man and Lazarus, a parable Jesus tells about a rich man who neglected the poor beggar outside his gate.

In the parable we hear of a wealthy man who builds a gate between himself and the poor man, and that chasm becomes an unbridgeable gap not only with Lazarus but with God. He is no doubt a religious man (he calls out “Father” Abraham and knows the prophets), and undoubtedly he had made a name for himself on earth, but is now a nameless rich man begging the beggar for a drop of water. And Lazarus who lived a nameless life in the shadows of misery is seated next to God, and given a name. Lazarus is the only person named in Jesus’ parables, and his name means “the one God rescues.” God is in the business of rescuing people from the hells they experience on earth. And God is asking us to love people out of those hells.

Nowadays many of us spend a lot of time pondering and theologizing about heaven on earth and God’s Kingdom coming here (and rightly so!), but it seems we would also do well to do a little work with the reality of hell. Hell is not just something that comes after death, but something many are living in this very moment… 1.2 billion people that are groaning for a drop of water each day, over 30,000 kids starving to death each day, 38 million folks dying of AIDS. It seems ludicrous to think of preaching to them about hell. I see Jesus spending far more energy loving the “hell” out of people, and lifting people out of the hells in which they are trapped, than trying to scare them into heaven. And one of the most beautiful things we get to see in community here in Kensington, is people who have been loved out of the hells that they find themselves in—domestic violence, addiction, sex trafficking, loneliness.

This article was reposted with the permission of PRISM—America’s Alternative Evangelical Voice. Visit their website to learn more.

Posted by UrL at January 16, 2007 | Comments (28)

September 29, 2006

Old Men Will Dream Dreams (Revisited): Was it really the voice of God?

Last month we shared the disturbing late night experience of Pastor Nick Overduin. While sleeping in his study Overduin had a frightening encounter with “The Voice.” His experience started a conversation about our openness and skepticism toward the supernatural. Nick Overduin is back to respond to many of your comments and concerns, and to keep the conversation going.

I appreciate the comments that were made in response to my Aug. 18, 2006 article “Old Men Will Dream Dreams.” I have searched the links regarding “sleep paralysis,” and definitely resonated with those descriptions. I think, physiologically, this was my experience. However, according to my understanding of God as the Creator, such a scientific diagnosis does not eliminate the possibility that God was saying something to me precisely at such a time.

I believe God reveals himself through the normal processes of the world he made. If God would speak to us at all, it would usually be through phenomena that already exist, and that could include psychiatrically-tinged events such as “sleep paralysis.”

People mentioned numerous reservations and red flags. I too have many. If everyone would start reporting events like this, I would likely become very skeptical of the whole business. One writer said, “What if it was the devil, trying to keep people from praying?” Good question. But as another writer said, the issue is “How did the experience stack up against the word of God?” The verse about God being irritated by long hypocritical prayers was, for me, a confirmation of the Voice’s authenticity. But I concede, of course, that I will never know.

One writer asked, “What did you DO about it?” I emphatically refrained from using the experience as a piece of ammunition. At the time it happened, I was in the middle of an intense denominational controversy that lasted about four years. I did not feel it would be fair to bully anybody with what I thought I heard. I kept totally quiet about this experience. Now that the battles have subsided, I feel more comfortable with sharing.

Did I have a vested interest in my experience, e.g. was it my own subconscious speaking to me? Was I elevating my internal conviction to the heights of Sinai? I do not think so. I had not had this thought on my own (namely, that the official “Prayer of Repentance” was too long). Also, please note that God does not actually commit himself to any viewpoints or particular sides in our church conflict during the experience that I had. He simply demonstrates (if this was God) a loathing of hypocrisy, which is consistent with the character of Himself that he reveals in Holy Scripture.

What did I do with this experience? Personally, I have allowed myself to be deeply affected by a God who can love us so very much that we are not consumed by his anger. Also, I felt more brave in the midst of the conflicts. My conviction was confirmed that God cared deeply about authenticity and compassion regardless of people’s opinions on the issues at stake.

In conclusion, I like the line one writer gave, “We need a consummate, complete, grounded theology on the supernatural.” That would be wonderful. It is absolutely amazing how many people, of many faiths, have bizarre experiences. I’d welcome a more systematic study of this. Every pastor knows parishioners who have gone through strange things. And Christians should be more encouraged to share how they’ve encountered God, and in such honest comments, we will find wisdom.

Posted by UrL at September 29, 2006 | Comments (19) | TrackBack

September 20, 2006

Eat, Drink, and Be Merry: Clergy holiness codes miss the point

Last week a study was released by economists called “No Booze? You May Lose.” Researches found that people who drink alcohol make more money and may have an advantage in social settings. But does the same hold true for pastors? Author, professor, pastor, and regular contribut-Ur, David Fitch is back to discuss the popular restriction on clergy to abstain from alcohol and tobacco. Are such rules helpful, and could they possibly be making us fat?

On August 25th, Chicago Sun Times religion columnist Cathleen Falsani wrote a piece entitled “Weighty Matter: Is religion making us fat?” In the piece, she recited Adam Ant’s lyrics in the 80’s “Don’t drink, don’t smoke, what do ya do?” She raised the question whether those Christian denominations that prohibit drinking and smoking are abusing food as a substitute for these other prohibited pleasures. For support, Falsani quotes a Purdue University study that concluded (after accounting for several other factors) that some kinds of churches seem to encourage the problem of obesity. In fact, the study states that churches where drinking alcohol, smoking, and even dancing are prohibited, “overeating has become the accepted vice.”

My denomination, along with others rooted in the old holiness movements, still hangs on to the holiness codes that prohibit alcohol and tobacco for its clergy. I consider this to be “an adventure in missing the point,” to quote Brian McLaren, and I believe Falsani helps us see why. Let me explain.

If we prohibit certain behaviors for pastoral ministry, are we not really revealing the fear that we lack the mature character for ministry in the first place? If drunkenness and chemical addiction is what we fear, why not name drunkenness and addiction as the symptoms that require discernment? By totally prohibiting alcohol and tobacco we are not really dealing with the issue of whether our clergy has mature character. We are just providing conditions to displace the lack of character (if it exists) to some other object that is safer, i.e. from tobacco or alcohol to food.

I want to be careful here about painting a broad-brush stroke across all of us who have struggled with weight. That’s not my point. I am someone who’s had food and weight problems. And I’ve had my own recent crisis with diabetes as a result. Rather, what I am trying to show here is how the holiness codes of my denomination and others do not address the issue, they merely reveal the symptom of the “Real” underlying problem.

Slavoj Zizek, post postmodernist (if there is such a thing) cultural critic, is famous for helping us see the ways cultures can manifest symptoms of the “Real” in ways that surprise us. I might just suggest a Zizekian view of our denominational holiness codes—over eating is the symptom of the Real. The zeal of evangelicals to be different than culture by forbidding alcohol and tobacco, has in essence revealed that nothing is really different. Instead the “hard kernel of the Real” has erupted in the obesity epidemic in our holiness coded churches. As a result, the holiness codes reveal the Truth. In Zizek’s words, “we overlook the way our act is already part of the state of things we are looking at, the way our error is part of the Truth itself.

In the end, character is about the ordering of one’s appetites towards God’s purposes in creation through a purified vision of Christ and His glory. If such desires are not ordered, if such desires are not integrated, holiness codes can only cover up the existing problem. The holiness codes then become a case of misrecognition. And as Zizek states, “the Truth arises from misrecognition.” Thus we have obesity as an epidemic in our churches.

More and more, the new generations cannot stomach these holiness codes. I have regularly met with outstanding candidates for ministry who raise their eyebrow at my denomination’s persistence on its holiness codes for clergy. This is because these codes are not holy. Instead, they trivialize holiness. The real question for us holiness denominations, if we are ever to be taken seriously by the postmodern generations (and our credibility slips everyday we hold onto to these “legalistic and unbiblical” codes of behavior—e.g. there is no Bible verse prohibiting drinking alcohol, quite the contrary), is whether we have the wherewithal to be sanctified in such a way as to be trusted with a drink or a stogie.

The real issue that our denominational leaders should focus on concerning the fitness of clergy is the commitment to a holy life and what that looks like in community. Obviously this refers to issues like drunkenness, addictions that reveal our lack of dependence upon God including tobacco, pornography, gambling, and yes, food! But this should also include how we handle money, how we engage the poor, how we speak to our neighbors, whether we engage in conflict in holy and Christ like ways. We should not resort to legalism! To the postmodern generations, “no alcohol, no tobacco” speaks only of rules, not holiness.

Posted by UrL at September 20, 2006 | Comments (50) | TrackBack

August 18, 2006

Old Men Will Dream Dreams: This pastor doesn’t advocate hearing voices, but he happened to hear one

All pastors are crazy; I’ve known that since seminary. Some pastors, however, have fewer cards in their decks than others. Nick Overduin, pastor of Toronto First Christian Reformed Church, began to question his own sanity after an experience that was beyond explanation.

Overduin now believes God was in this encounter. You may believe otherwise. In either case, reading Nick’s account has made me wonder—as more church leaders are rethinking the nature of ministry in a post-Christian culture, is it also time to rethink our assumptions about the supernatural, and its place in our communities?

Who wants to be known as a crazy nut-case preacher that hears voices? I don’t advocate hearing voices; I just happen to have heard one.

I did not hear any strange “voices” in my first church. Nor did I feel distracted by the supernatural during my second charge, a University Chaplaincy. In my third posting I was perhaps too busy to hear any divine whisperings. My congregation had 800 members. My fourth church is conceivably the most implausible setting for a semi-mystical deviation. Many of its 120 members are certified experts, executives, or independent entrepreneurs. My wife Nandy and I have been married 25 years, and at first I didn't tell even her. I am writing the episode now partly because I believe it could be sinful to keep it to myself.

About three years ago I woke up one night very suddenly. It was as if I had been jerked from deep sleep into alert wakefulness in less than a second.

I was surrounded by a darkness that seemed thicker than usual. It felt like something or someone ominous was in the room with me.

The blackness around the bookshelves in my office where I had fallen asleep was so substantial that I could see nothing. The space was filled with a conspicuous and crushing sense of dread. My fear increased when I realized that I had been rendered immobile, as if a great weight had been placed over my entire body. I was pinned down.
I began to pray with every fiber of my being. Wouldn’t almost anybody have done the same, whether they believed in God or not? Physically, the prayer required fierce resolve just to bring my hands together. I knew it was permissible to pray without folding hands, but for some reason I wanted desperately to fold my hands. I felt I would be completely destroyed if I demonstrated the nerve to pray without first taking up this humble posture.

“What’s wrong, God?” I asked when my hands were finally clenched. “Are you angry about something?”

That is when I heard the voice. It was calm but deliberate and focused. It was not loud but clearly audible. I do not know if it was outside the room, inside the room, or just inside my heart. In any case, there was no mistaking what it said. It said, “THE PRAYER OF REPENTANCE.”

I was frozen by apprehension, riveted to the bed. Was God angry about the Prayer of Repentance?

I am very proud of the fact that my denomination, the Christian Reformed Church of North America, in 1999 had mandated all congregations use an official Prayer of Repentance for our failure to show sufficient love to homosexual people. As a denomination, we had committed ourselves in 1973 to an official policy of “love the sinner, hate the sin,” but we had not demonstrated enough resolve in showing the genuine compassion we had promised. So, in 1999 we urged all the churches to use this well-known Prayer of Repentance. The Synod did not wish to change our biblically-based denominational approach, only encourage greater focus on pastoral love. Many of our congregations in North America, alas, defiantly refused to use the resource liturgically. Now, to my surprise, it seemed that maybe God (if this was God) was not pleased with the official Prayer of Repentance either.
The prayer reads as follows:

Lord, our gracious God,
We have sinned against you.
We have not done the things we ought to have done.
We have not kept the promises we made.
Instead of trying to become a place where persons who love you
and are homosexual could find a gracious dwelling,
We confess that we have continued to build walls.
We have avoided them.
We have been cruel.
We have called names and used insulting language.
We have wished that they would just go away.
Truly, Lord, there is little health in us.
We have wronged these children of yours,
these brothers and sisters of ours,
And we repent of our sins.
We are sorry for what we have done
and for what we have left undone.
Lord, forgive us our sins through the blood of Jesus.
Dear heavenly Father, we love you.
We love you for keeping your promises,
And we want to be like you.
We want to keep our promises.
Help us, Father, to do so.
Help us to love our gay and lesbian sisters and brothers.
Help us love with words and deeds.
Strengthen our resolve to listen to their stories,
to share their pain,
to learn from others,
to walk together on life’s journey.
Lord, we have questions.
We do not know everything.
Give us the grace not to act otherwise.
Give us the humility to attend to what we do know.
We do know that life is more complicated than we wish.
We do know that we need your forgiveness for the past
And your grace for the future
As we continually struggle to be the church,
Faithful to your Word,
Faithful to each other.
In Christ. Amen.

“What is wrong, God?” I prayed again. “Why are you angry about the Prayer of Repentance?”

Then the Voice came again. Not loud, but terse and deliberate: IT’S…TOO…LONG.

It is only now, three years later, that I can see some humor in this encounter. But when it happened, I truly felt I was going to die. I did not dare to relate this event to my council or church. I also did not have the courage to tell my wife or best friends.

I truly felt I was going to die. One thing I vividly recall, with genuine gratitude, is that after the voice spoke, the overwhelming terror in the room slowly dissipated. The level of darkness returned to the range that is normal for 4:00 a.m. And the heavy weight on my body receded. I was able to stop folding my hands.

I lay there wondering if this could have possibly been God. I felt that I had been spared from some kind of obliteration, but I did not have a joyful sense of contentment or relief. I had always imagined that having an actual encounter with God would be more beautiful, not something so frightening.

As a pastor in the Christian in the Reformed tradition I have always believed we should be distrustful of anything that allegedly comes from the Spirit of God if it is not based on the Bible. So I was intrigued by the verse that popped into my head while recuperating from the encounter: “When you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.” (Matthew 6:7, NIV)

Three years later I can begin to appreciate the humor in this story. The Prayer of Repentance is indeed tediously verbose. It has become quite obvious to me that the prayer is frankly pompous, arrogant, paternalistic, and long-winded. I say this without intending in any way to be mean-spirited towards my denomination, which I deeply love and cherish.

I believe, despite all my scholarly, emotional, and religious reservations, that I may have been given a message by God for the sake of others. But who wants to be known as a crazy nut-case preacher that hears voices? I don’t advocate hearing voices; I just happen to have heard one.

Posted by UrL at August 18, 2006 | Comments (19)

June 6, 2006

Is Jesus the Answer or the Question?: rediscovering the role of mystery in our faith

Recent posts on Ur have focused on the nature of Emergent—is it liberal Christianity recast for a new generation, or simply a forum of conversation for those looking for a better understanding of their faith? Critics have accused Emergent’s better known participants, Tony Jones and Brian McLaren, of being evasive with answers to pointed doctrinal questions. In response, Jones and McLaren have pointed to the importance of dialogue and thoughtful questions over definitive answers.

Ed Gungor’s new book, Religiously Transmitted Diseases (Nelson Ignite, 2006), equates definitive answers with “dead religion.” In this excerpt from the book, Gungor affirms the life-giving role of mystery within our faith.

I think Christianity is supposed to be the unreligion. That’s because the strictness and predictability of religion causes simple, pure faith to become diseased. If not stopped, religion can even kill living faith. And dead things just aren’t very interesting. Case in point…

I was eleven years old the first time I dissected anything. I was on a scouting trip. Armed with flashlights, a few of us wandered into the woods after dark to explore. Joe was the first to spot him. He was a pretty good-sized frog. And he was quick. Flashlights and size 8 feet darted every which way as we scrambled to grab him. Something in us boys wanted to know what was inside that frog, what made that living thing alive.

“Don’t kill it!” Joe cried. “Take him alive.”

I’m sure that frog had no idea he was going to stumble into the midst of a gaggle of earth giants that night, and he did his best to flee, but to no avail. I got my hand around him as he tried to hop between my feet. Then we each whipped out our scout-issue jack-knives and begged to be the surgeon.

In a few moments the frog lay dead, his inner secrets uncovered. But to my surprise we didn’t gain any greater understanding of Froggie when we opened him up. We had lost something. The interest that had charged the air during the hunt completely disappeared when he lay open and lifeless before us. Dead things aren’t nearly as attention-grabbing as things that are alive. Only in the presence of life does mystery exist.

My quest to dissect continues to this day. It is as though I am uncomfortable with wonder. I find something full of life and, instead of enjoying the mystery of it, I want to dissect it, to figure out the how and why. But dissecting life results in death. And once death comes, the mystery disappears.

Religion, too, is all about dissecting. It is the nemesis of mystery.

But religion does have its attraction. It is so neat, so organized, so repetitive, so habitual, and oh-so-predictable. It makes God look more like a clock than a person – ticking and tocking in a perfectly ordered way. Life isn’t nearly so conventional. It is messy and full of surprises. Repetitious? Yes, but certainly not predictable.

I have conducted more funerals this year than in recent memory. We often say that dead people “rest in peace.” I think we are fooled by the way they just lie there. No complaining. No whining. Just nice and stiff and orderly – religious, really. That’s because religion is antilife in some ways. It demands order and fixation, just as rigor mortis demands of the dead.

Religion may be attractive on one level, but it always strives to remove all the mystery that congests life. It has answers for everything, because questions are way too untidy. “Jesus is the answer.” Right? But what if Jesus isn’t the answer? What if He is the question?

Posted by UrL at June 6, 2006 | Comments (33) | TrackBack

May 11, 2006

Brian McLaren’s Inferno 3: five proposals for reexamining our doctrine of hell

In this final installment of his interview on hell, Brian McLaren provides more insight into how he understands the teachings of Jesus, and offers five suggestions for rethinking our traditional understanding of hell.

Let me offer five suggestions on how we could re-approach this subject by looking at the Scriptures in a fresh light. After all, my opinions aren’t worth two cents compared to what the Scriptures actually say. First, I’d suspend the common assumption that every time the word judgment occurs in the Bible, it means “going to hell after you die,” or every time the word save occurs, it means “going to heaven after you die.”

Second, I’d encourage people who say, “Well, what about Matthew 25:41?” or some other specific passage to also pay attention to the reasons those passages give for people experiencing those negative consequences. Jesus never says, “If you don’t believe in a particular theory of atonement . . .” or “If you don’t accept me as your personal Savior by saying the sinner’s prayer . . .” then you’ll experience the lake of fire. That’s not what he says. I put a table in the book that tries to help people attend to what the texts actually say, and in case after case, they simply don’t say what many Christians commonly say they do.

Third, we need to re-sensitize ourselves to Jesus’ use of figurative language. We act as if “metaphorical” were a small thing, and concrete/literal were a big thing, but that’s the reverse of what I see in Jesus’ teaching. I think about John 6, for example, where Jesus talks about people eating his flesh and drinking his blood, and then says his flesh and blood are real food and drink. They take his statements non-metaphorically and concretely, and they miss the point.

Or there’s Nicodemus not getting Jesus’ language about being born again. Or when he’s talking about the leaven of the Pharisees and the disciples assume he’s talking about physical bread. There’s so much going on metaphorically in Jesus’ teaching about hell and judgment, and I think we often misinterpret it by reducing it to the concrete just as the disciples did.

I’m an old English major, so I’m sensitive to genre, and the highly metaphorical genre of Jewish apocalyptic literature was pervasive in Jesus’ day. We need to let him use language in the richly metaphorical way his contemporaries did. N. T. Wright, Walter Brueggemann, and many others are writing very helpfully on this subject.

Fourth, we should consider the possibility that many, and perhaps even all of Jesus’ hell-fire or end-of-the-universe statements refer not to postmortem judgment but to the very historic consequences of rejecting his kingdom message of reconciliation and peacemaking. The destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 67-70 seems to many people to fulfill much of what we have traditionally understood as hell.

Jesus, along with the other apostles too, seems to be much less focused on the post-mortem destiny of individual souls and more focused on the end and rebirth of the Jerusalem/Temple/sacrifice-centered world as they knew it, and on the constitution of a new people of God that includes Gentiles with Jews. People should re-read the texts with this possibility in mind. After all, when the Old Testament prophets used apocalyptic language, we know they were referring to historic events—like the attack by Assyria, or the exile in Babylon for example.

Finally, I think we can leave some theoretical questions unanswered because what we need to know is very clear: God is love. God is gracious. God is just. God is holy. And these things are never in tension, but are always perfectly integrated. God’s love and mercy are always just and holy. God’s justice and holiness are always loving and merciful. God shows his perfect integration of love and justice through sending his Son to live and die as one of us. We see God’s love and justice perfectly expressed as the Word-made-flesh spreads out his arms on the cross to offer himself as the perfect sacrifice for all sin, once and for all, saying, not “Father, repay them for their evil deed,” but “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

Our proper response to that view of God is not to speculate on who will, or will not, be forgiven. Instead, Jesus makes our proper response very clear: if God treats those who hate him with such love, then we should love our enemies, not repay evil for evil, turn the left cheek after being struck on the right, walk the second mile, stand naked by giving away our undergarment if someone takes our outer garment, and so on. I trust God’s goodness and wisdom in judging others, just as I trust myself into God’s care; I don’t feel he needs my help.

This is where my reflections on this have been taking me in recent years. Some people thinking I’m going astray, but I know that I’m seeking the truth. And I know I still have a long, long way to go in my search. I hope people can understand that some of us show our love for God by seeking better answers when our current answers seem unworthy of God. Maybe we’ll be proven wrong in the end, but I can’t see what faithful alternative we have other than to ask, seek, and knock ... trusting God will respond and doors will be opened.

Posted by UrL at May 11, 2006 | Comments (34) | TrackBack

May 8, 2006

Brian McLaren’s Inferno 2: are we asking the wrong questions about hell?

In part one of this post, Brian McLaren and Tony Campolo tried to deconstruct the traditional evangelical view of hell. Here, McLaren continues to outline his view as neither universalism nor an exclusivist understanding of hell. And he pushes us to reconsider the questions we pose versus what Jesus really says.

McLaren: Tony [Campolo] and I might disagree on the details, but I think we are both trying to find an alternative to both traditional Universalism and the narrow, exclusivist understanding of hell [that unless you explicitly accept and follow Jesus, you are excluded from eternal life with God and destined for hell].

Tony is presenting the inclusivist alternative. The fact is, many people who claim to be exclusivists are actually inclusivists and they don’t know it. For example, if you ask them if they believe all babies who die before or shortly after birth go to hell, they’ll say no, that children who die before the age of accountability are included in Christ’s saving work. They’ll say the same for people who are mentally incompetent, and so on. So really, strict exclusivists are rather rare.

My approach is a little different. Although in many ways I find myself closer to the view of God held by some universalists than I do the view held by some exclusivists, in the end I’d rather turn our attention from the questions WE think are important to the question JESUS thinks is most important.

We obsess on “who’s in” and “who’s out.” Jesus, however, seems to be asking the question, “How can
the kingdom of God more fully come on earth as it is in heaven, and how should disciples of the kingdom live to enter and welcome the kingdom?”

Universalism can unintentionally dis-empower the church, because it says everything’s going to be okay in the end, regardless of our responses. That can be a very pacifying answer, and lead to attitudes that are not faithful to Scripture and to Jesus. As I see it, all of Scripture affirms that yes, you can really waste your life . . . you can play on the wrong side and live very destructively.

On the other side, exclusivism can spin off all kinds of terrible problems, too. It can create a view of God as vengeful torturer, and that has played a role, I believe, in horrible behavior on the part of Western Christians—from anti-Semitism to slavery and racism and holy-war mentality. In other words, if we can identify some people as God’s enemies, hated by God for all eternity, we can find ourselves directly disobeying Jesus’ clear teachings about loving our neighbors and our enemies.

Most people aren’t willing to reopen these issues with an open mind, and those who do find the process painful and socially dangerous in many of our churches. In the end, I suppose I am truly an evangelical Protestant in the sense that I believe we must go back and search the Scriptures and look at them afresh and see if there isn’t something better than what we have been taught. Ironically, we could stand before God and have to answer for our judgmentalism and heartless attitudes that were, to a significant degree, consequences of a popular and longstanding misreading of the Scriptures on this subject of hell.

For example, I think God will be far more displeased by our carelessness toward the poor, or by our lack of peacemaking, or by our unrecognized racism and nationalism than he will be about whether you’re an exclusivist or not. I think many of us should tremble in light of what God says about caring for the poor, the fatherless, the vulnerable.

So you are saying that we’ve spent too much energy analyzing the aesthetics and environment of hell, and we’ve lost the clear scriptural call to proclaim and teach about Judgment?

McLaren: Absolutely. But even there, we don’t preach judgment to create fear, so that people see God as enemy. Actually, in the Bible, especially in the Psalms, people are often praying eagerly that judgment will come. That’s because they weren’t thinking in the binary terms of heaven and hell after this life. Instead, they were looking for God to intervene in history so that the oppressors, the warmongers, the greedy, the abusers, the violent, the careless toward the widow and orphan and poor would be stopped, exposed, and frustrated, so that justice and peace and joy could flourish.

I don’t think it’s insignificant that Revelation ends, not with us going up to heaven (or down to hell) with the earth being “left behind.” Instead, John has a vision of the New Jerusalem coming down to earth. The new heavens and new earth mean, I believe, not the replacement of this world, but its redemption and liberation from injustice and sin.

Some people think you’re simply being evasive and not answering plain questions clearly. But you would say that you’re not satisfied with the questions we’re asking because you don’t think we’re asking the questions the Bible is trying to answer. It also sounds like you feel we need to pay more attention to the ethical dimensions of Jesus’ teaching, and that some of our theological discussions distract us from what Jesus focused on.

McLaren: Yes, that’s it exactly! I keep coming back to Jesus and his teaching. In the Sermon on the Mount, he says that God is good to the righteous and the unrighteous, and for that reason, we should love everyone, including our enemies. He says we shouldn’t judge or we’ll be judged. That’s a very different attitude than I see so often in our Christian circles, where there’s always this in-group/out-group mentality. And those in the out-group we treat with distance, disdain, or disrespect. How would we like it if God decided to treat us as we’ve treated others?

Posted by UrL at May 8, 2006 |