Boundary and Grace

I was exploring the less-traveled side of a nearby mountain town - a beautiful bedroom community that, like much of Colorado's front range, is turning all-too-quickly into a bustling city.  In the middle of the mountains, museums and monuments that make the town special - I found this street sign.

What significance might be found at the corner of Boundary and Grace?

As I stared at this lonely sign ignored by the locals and only useful to the rare tourist without a GPS, I remembered the way God has related to people throughout the Bible.

Boundaries.

Now there's a word that inspires!  For me, "boundaries" always meant lines and limitations and longings to linger where I was forbidden to do so.  But boundaries are so much a part of how God relates to us, and how he expects us to relate with others.

God relates to humanity through covenants.  Covenants are much like contracts, where God says "You do this, and I'll do that."  Covenants contain promises that God makes to us (great promises, in fact!) and rules that create boundaries for our thoughts and actions.

Rules - another way of saying boundaries - are an integral part of God's way of dealing with us.  And so, boundaries are really quite good for us in life and in relationship with God,

Think of the Adamic Covenant - the agreement that God made with Adam in Genesis.  In street terms, God basically said "Adam, you and your kin can eat from any tree in this garden.  And that's no small thing sir, because the produce from one of these trees in particular will keep you alive forever!".

That was the great promise of the Adamic Covenant.  Eat from that tree and have Eternal Life?  I'm sure that sounded really good to Adam, as it would have to me.

But the Adamic Covenant also contained one very important rule, or boundary, that ended up making all the difference in the world.  "Eat from any tree," said God, "except that one...".

And you know the rest of the story.  Adam and his wife stepped over the boundary.  Sin and it's ugly brother Death came into God's beautiful world and we've never been the same since.

Every other covenant God has made with human beings follows the same structure - promises and boundaries, boundaries and promises.  It's just the way it is with our God.

But boundaries aren't the only thing we see in the scriptures.  We see, almost like we're looking into the sun, the powerful Grace that God has always given to his children, and nowhere is this grace more evident than in the person and work of Jesus, and in his New Covenant.

Grace.

I've heard it defined as "unmerited favor".  And grace is well-understood in that way.  But here, I'd like to call out grace as "the ability to do something hard, and make it look easy".

Take, for example, a world-class figure skater, or sculptor or violinist.  These individuals have all mastered some complicated and difficult skills.  And when they're at the top of their game, they make it look easy.

When I watch a graceful ballet dancer, or downhill skier or high-level rock climber - a master in the middle of practicing their art, I'd swear that "I could do that!".

Well, not so much.

But the grace bestowed by our Father come to us in the person of his Spirit - who lives in us.  In Ezekiel 36:27, God promised that in the New Covenant he would put his "Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.".  By his Spirit, God gives us the grace to do what seems hard, and even make it look easy.  

Every once in awhile I find myself in the Jeep up in that town - brakes squeaking to a stop there at the junction of Boundary and Grace.  

Father, thank you for the deposit of your Spirit in me.  Please grant me the grace to follow your lead, maybe even to make something tough look easy.

Lord, Remember Me

One of God's weekly smiles comes in the gathering of believers that meets in my home.  We've become like family to one another in many ways.  We eat together, we study the scriptures together and we recreate together.  Best of all we find that we're growing together in fits and starts to better bear God's image in the world.

Last night we talked a bit about grieving loss and pain.  Each of us have lost some things in our lives that were dear to us - perhaps some things we held too dear - but whatever, we've lost some things, some influence, some possessions, some relationships, some vocations or some dreams.  We've been hurt and we've hurt others.

We talked a bit about how to process grief, and how the ancient Jewish poets reckoned losses and hurts they were experiencing with God's great promises to them.  We call those songs "laments".  

A lament simply starts with expression of deep sorrow or grief.  No holds barred and nothing held back.  All the hurt, all the pain - get it out on the table for God and the world to see.  The great lament Psalms as well as many of the prophetic books are beautiful examples of how real people got real with God - no sugar coatings or trite happy sayings or giddy denials of reality.

But because of their great God, and his saving work in their lives in the past - they had faith.  Even still, given their pain and loss - those folks held on to some core beliefs in their all-powerful-always-good God and his great promises of a bright Kingdom future for them.

So their laments ended not in some nihilistic abyss, but with hopeful expressions of their faith.  And thus their souls were soothed.  They made sense of their lives and after the mourning and grieving - they got up.  They got up with the strength of heart and mind to build and rebuild and go back at life again in hope.

That's how laments worked for them, and I'm finding that's how they work for me.

Here's a beautiful lament song that I can't stop tearfully singing.  Andrew Peterson's Remember Me comes from the place of the thief on the cross hanging next to Jesus.

Check out how the song begins in grief.  

"There is none righteous, no not one,
We are prodigal daughters and wayward sons
We don't know the half of the hurt we've done
The countless we have killed"

But then, look how it ends...

"But before the breath there in the tomb,
before our joy sprang from the womb,
You saw a day that's coming soon.

When the Son will stand on the mount again,
with an army of angels at His command,
and the earth will split like the hull of a seed,
wherever Jesus plants his feet.

And up from the earth, the dead will rise,
like spring trees robed in petals of white,
singing the song of the radiant bride..."

Oh man - that's gonna be a good day indeed...

Is He Worthy?

I've spent much of my life subtly and sometimes not so subtly trying to avoid pain and loss.

I tend to narrow my focus to what I think are my problems, and I tend to compulsively lurch toward supposed solutions that let me believe and behave however I want or that require no loss on my part.

I tend to avoid judgment at all costs.

In the fifth chapter of Revelation we find John in deep distress as he's witnessing a vision of the great Day of the Lord - the final judgment God's prophets and poets had known for centuries would come.  

The Day when evildoers would be put to rights.  

The Day when the oppressed would be set free.  

The Day when ugly, despotic power structures would be unmade.    

The Day when Yahweh would set everything straight.  

But John's not agonizing like I might be - scared silly of what I might lose or of some pain I might face.  No, he's weeping because no one can be found worthy to break the seals of that great judgment scroll.  No one can be found worthy to read it's pronouncements and no one can be found worthy to render them.     

John saw what I'm coming to see.  That is, that God's judgment is nothing to be afraid of if we're following Jesus as Lord.  If we are following after Messiah, then the Day of the Lord is for us that great day when we and the whole wide world are ridden completely of the effects of evil.  

John was weeping because if no one could open the scroll, then nothing in this world of pain could ever be changed.  Nothing could ever be made truly and deeply and forever Good again.

If no one could open the scroll, then pain and sorrow and sadness and lack and loss would always be the cruel taskmasters of what God had made to be so beautiful in the beginning.

But of course, John then heard what he'd so been waiting to hear:

"Stop weeping; behold, the Lion that is from the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has overcome so as to open the book and its seven seals."

So rather than fear that Day - we can know deep in our hearts as did John - that's the Day we've all been waiting for...

On that Day, we'll finally be rid of the nasty bent to protect ourselves at any cost, to grab for ourselves whatever we can and to hurt others whenever we are hurt.

On that Day, we'll be rid forever of fear, doubt, selfishness, greed and all their ugly siblings.  We, and the whole wide world, will all be made totally and completely New.

Andrew Peterson has put this grandest of all scenes to gorgeous melody - to which I cannot stop listening.  It's truly beautiful.

In fact, his Resurrection Letters: Prologue and Resurrection Letters: Volume 1 are now on constant play in my ears and in my heart.  

Overlap of the Ages

Time for contemplation has come rarely this year, and little contemplation time means little fodder for witty blog posts.  But this season affords for a few moments of contemplative reflection - so here we go...

When I was a younger man, I thought that perhaps there could be a concept that, if it were carefully engineered and if it were presented just right, would take the world by storm.  Perhaps the field of politics would produce.  Maybe education would enlighten.  Surely religion would rectify, right?

And of course, the reality is that all these and more contribute to our diverse and interesting planet. 

But the older I get, the less faith I have in any of these fields, and the more hope I have in the singular event that will change everything.  This event holds the potential to so radically change our politics, so thoroughly educate us and so radically satisfy our religious yearnings - we won't know what hit us when it happens.

Wouldn't it be awesome if today was the day?

"He who testifies to these things says, 'Yes, I am coming quickly.'  Amen.  Come, Lord Jesus."  - Revelation 2:20

Resurrection, Again...

Resurrection is a frequent topic for discussion among those of us that try to see the bigger picture of the Judeo Christian worldview.  I mean, what could be a more appropriate and exciting thing to talk about - what with the Kingdom of God having already been inaugurated back there in the first century, and what with the promise from the Lord that he will return and one day bring that Kingdom to our planet fully.

But even with that great promise - the promise that makes the Judeo-Christian story the greatest story ever told - there are many times I've been left asking "What about today?".

So about today, I'm reminded of one of my favorite Psalms.  In it, David is dealing with the everyday dangers of being king of a fledgling nation.  He was, as he was often, concerned with the enemies of Israel.  He was concerned with his personal enemies.  And finally, he cried out to Yahweh to look at him and to lift him above his oppressors.

At the end, though, David expresses his faith in God in a most beautiful way.

I remain confident of this:
I will see the goodness of the Lord
in the land of the living. 

Wait for the Lord;
be strong and take heart
and wait for the Lord.

So I think I'll follow David's example today.  I'm waiting to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living... 

Violence Visits bin Laden: Is Might Ever Right?

I apologize in advance for the length of this post - but the recent American military action bringing Osama bin Laden to justice, and the ubiquitous interpretation of the event from Christians prompts me to write, and perhaps write too much.  :)

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"The Bible says..."

If there's one thing I've learned from the brilliant Third Quest theologians, it's that we must guard against the all-to-common habit in Christendom of taking a bit of the Bible and arbitrarily turning it into a "timeless truth".

The main reason we must guard against this habit is that the Bible is not merely a book of "wise sayings", such as "Confucius says, 'Don't eat yellow snow!'".  

Osama bin Laden, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and N.T. Wright

I hear you.  How on earth can I justify putting those three names anywhere near each other?  Well, hang with me for a bit - I'm processing the interesting international events that have unfolded over the last few days and this is just how it goes with me!

As the news of Osama bin Laden's demise spread far and wide, I thought of Tom Wright's excellent book Simply Christian.  It's aimed at both everyday Christians trying to make sense of the world around them, and at non-Christians that may wonder why we make all the fuss about Jesus and the Judeo-Christian story.

In Simply Christian, Tom identifies a few universal human traits that he calls "echoes of a voice" - echoes, in fact, of the voice of God.  I thought today of one of those echoes that has many times reverberated off the walls of my heart during the last troubling decade.  That is, the longing for justice.

Tom reasons that our longing for justice - the universal desire we have to see wrongs righted, to see criminals thwarted, to see the innocent protected - is a steadfast pointer to the voice and will of God himself.  These impulses are remnants, he says, of Adam's original vocational call - to steward the Earth and all its inhabitants with wisdom and justice for all.

To me, that's not only brilliant but emotionally satisfying as well.
 
But I'm also drawn to Dietrich Bonhoeffer's provocative situation and viewpoint as I ponder how the world will respond to bin Laden's death.  For me, Bonhoeffer's Ethics, on which I've written a few times around here, is the gold standard on justice and dealing with evil.  

I have great respect for Bonhoeffer, as do so many Christians, because of the unique perspective (smack in the face of Hitler's Evil) from which he reasoned.  Theorists and practitioners alike pay homage to him because of this.

FYI, World War II began with Bonhoeffer as a pacifist, and ended a few weeks after his execution for helping to plot Hitler's assassination.  

Immanuel

Israel's history is a saga of triumph and distress, of conquest and defeat. As the great Davidic nation dissipated into shadows of its former self, the chronic national despair known as the Exile threatened to turn into fable God's great Kingdom promise.

As the Assyrians swept into Palestine in the 8th century BC, the great prophet Isaiah told a frightened King Ahaz to stand firm and refrain from making alliances with the invaders.  God, he said, would take care of his people. 

Self-Defense, War and Jesus for President

This summer, as I always do, I've been using "The Big Picture" of Judeo-Christianity to help students understand what the whole story of the Bible really says about this or that.

One confusing topic for the students is the appropriateness of using physical force to fight evil - whether in war or in personal protection or in the defense of others.

So what does the Bible really say about God's plan for the history and future of mankind? Is violence ruled out?

How is it that in the Old Testament God repeatedly commanded Israel to use violence against the pagan nations, yet Jesus commanded his followers to "love their enemies"? And then, what are we to make of God's obvious use of force in Revelation, where in the future he defeats all enemies forcefully and subdues all the kingdoms of the earth?

With all that in mind I thought I'd resurrect a book review I wrote last year. Maybe this'll help shed some light on this interesting subject!

Kingdom...Now?

I've dealt with a lot of death over the last few years.

Over the last few years, my mom and dad both passed away due to illnesses that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy.

Over the last few years, my oldest sister Karen died from complications due to another nasty disease.

If you've been near situations like these - you know how utterly sad they can be. Just how do you deal with such a thing - how do you make sense of it?

The only place I can go with this reality (the reality of the brokenness and evil and sickness and heartache and death in the world) is back to my fundamental worldview. I have to reason this stuff out from that basic position.

The story of my worldview goes something like this:

"The Judeo-Christian worldview proposes that God made the world and its inhabitants to be his family (ultimately, his kingdom). At first, there was no sorrow, no heartache and no death to deal with.
But people very soon decided to break their agreement (covenant) with God, and did so repeatedly such that sorrow, heartache and death were the natural results. In no time, the earth was full of these.
God then communicated more specific details of the agreement to bring mankind back into his kingdom. For awhile, it appeared that those people to which he was speaking (the nation of Israel) would rise to that occasion, and ultimately be the vehicle through which the entire world would be brought back into the original utopian state.

But alas, it was not to be - for those people also chose not to abide by the agreement. Exile from the kingdom was the result.

God then said that he would act to fix the entire situation by fundamentally changing the equation, changing human nature by placing his spirit inside people and by placing the details of the agreement inside them, rather than leaving those details as a set of external requirements.
The kingdom would be re-established, the earth would be rejuvenated and ultimately death would be removed as a factor on the earth.

This was all to be accomplished by Messiah, a mighty king that would bring this judgment and justice to the entire world.

Christians believe that Jesus of Nazareth (born, died and resurrected in the first century) is that Messiah. Jesus proved that he was master over sickness, death and the natural world (earth and elements) via many miraculous events.
He proved he "has the goods" to be Messiah, especially via his resurrection.

The rest of the story states that Messiah will return and complete the renovation of the earth that was inaugurated during his first visit. At that time, sickness, death, war and the ravages of injustice that plague the world will be dealt with conclusively.
He will resurrect all people, either to membership in his eternal kingdom, or to "non-membership" (clearly an unpleasant proposition) based on their position relative to the covenant agreement during their lives.

Thus, God's original plan for the earth and its inhabitants will be fully realized."

So all you Christians out there - isn't this the story we all pretty much believe? Of course it is! For the rest of you - it sounds like a fairy tale, doesn't it?

I know - it's easy to write such a story off as the wishful thinking of ignorant peasants.

But I choose to believe it. But what about all the death my family's had to deal with lately?

Consider this.

What if sickness and death were reversed every time we prayed "really hard" or said just the right words to God in just the right sequence, or went to church 24/7 or gave 10%+ to the church - or when we believed with allllll our hearts?

What if any behavior of ours could bring miracles with any regularity? Well, then the Kingdom, in its fullness, would be now!

Do you see the silliness of believing that there is some magical combination of words, actions and lifestyle that will bring miracles regularly? Miracles absolutely must be rare in this period before Messiah returns!

Miracles, by their very nature, cannot be commonplace. If miracles were commonplace, we would be living in that Kingdom we described above - the Kingdom which we are waiting on Messiah to bring!

Friends, the book of Revelation tells us that the Kingdom we've been describing is not going to fully exist until Messiah returns! Of course, you are free to hold whatever view you like, but I think you'd be wise to consider it against the Christian worldview story we all agreed to up above.

I believe Messiah Jesus will one day make everything new and fix Death once and for all. And as for today, I believe God does all kinds of miracles. But I believe that they are rare for good reason.

That is, we must wait patiently for Messiah to appear, resurrect his followers and judge the sinful world. His removal of sin will ultimately remove Death from our world.

So don't lose your faith if God doesn't heal today that person you've been praying for. He's promised to work everything out for good in the end!

What do you think?

The World Next Door

I went to summer camp once as a kid.  If memory serves me, the amenities at that place included a silty pond in which to drown and rusty farm implements upon which to be impaled.  It wasn't my thing and I never went back.

Camp Kivu is in another universe from that old Camp Silty Rust.  Waverunners, kayaking, rock climbing, zip lines, mountain biking -  and on and on and on.

Camp Kivu is, ladies and gentlemen, the coolest summer camp on the planet.  At least that's what my 16 year old son told me on the way to school today.  He's really missing the friends, the fun and the spirit of Camp Kivu.

But Camp Kivu isn't just the coolest summer camp - it's even more.  We connect teenagers to global causes with spring break missions trips.  Click here to find out how you can join our March 2010 trip to the Philippines.  The excitement's building and my kids can't wait to go.

With global issues in mind - I visited a very cool ministry that is making a huge difference in the lives of hundreds of young girls rescued from the disgusting evil of human trafficking.  They're doing this amazing work in Cambodia.

Funny thing is, they're based right down the street from us in Joplin, MO.  Check out http://www.raphahouse.org to see what Rapha House is doing to stop the horror of human trafficking and bring new life to those precious girls that God made in his image.

Rapha House - yeah baby!

On Fallen Church Leaders

You know, I'm an average person for the most part. I do average things to try to get through fairly average days while keeping my family, my relationships and my vocation intact.

But there is one way in which I'm special. I'm in a very small, very select and very unique group of people.

Unfortunately, this particular "claim to fame" will never add anything to my bank account. It will never bring me into higher social strata, or make me any new friends. In fact, membership in this group has, over the years, tended to cost more than it pays - that's for sure.

Because you see, the particular unique group I'm talking about is that small group of students that attended Jimmy Swaggart Bible College during 1987 and 1988.

Just let Google be your friend if you don't know Mr. Swaggart's story.

So while you, or more likely your parents, were watching Jimmy Swaggart confess his sin on national TV - I was sitting a few feet from him at Family Worship Center in Baton Rouge.

I'd arrived just a few months before - thrilled to be in an environment where my faith and knowledge could grow - expectant of great things in the future.

And then right out of the gate - WHAM! - this mess blows up. Let's just say that classes like Life of Christ, Greek I and Bible Study Methodology were a LITTLE hard to concentrate on during those thrill-a-minute days.

I'll tell you that my dorm room walls heard every possible opinion on the question "What should be done with a church leader like this?". And after a little while, when the depression began to set in - then came the corollary questions:

"What am I going to do?"
"How do I handle this in the normal course of ministry?"
"Who's going to believe what I have to say about Jesus, when his famous representatives are so obviously messed up?"

and then finally, like a brick it hit us - the most difficult question of all:

"Do I have any seeds of this in me, seeds that could one day bloom into a filthy mess that knocks me out of the race?"

That experience changed me in all kinds of ways. And I learned a bunch in Baton Rouge for which I'm thankful to this day.

I learned lots of theology, philosophy and technique. And I made some wonderful friends that are still part of my life.

But I'm most thankful for the huge upheaval and restructuring of my thinking on human nature and church government. That was the biggest deal for me.

So what's my conclusion? Well, I conclude that the Church is just one more human institution run by flawed (dare I say stupid?) people. And before you get offended - yes, I fully realize I'm in that category as well.

Our gross stupidity is NOT related to the sinning preacher and the sinful acts themselves (although that is all very stupid - for sure). No, the gross stupidity is how We The Church allow anyone that can fog a mirror to be a "Christian Leader".

I mean, if he's a decent speaker, if he "seems like a nice guy", if he's in some way attractive - well then, boom - he's in!

Some of us award bonus points if the "leader" has several letters after his name, like "PhD" or "MDiv" or "DMin". But other than that - what evidence do we have that "God's Latest Gift to the Church" isn't just one more whack-job?

How do these people gain our trust? Why are we so willing to hand over the privileged places in our hearts and minds to people about which we have no real clue?

I've been through this too many times now - it's getting to be reaallllllly costly.

I want to be above reproach. I want to be a part of a team that's above reproach. I want those who care for my children to be above reproach.

Most of all, I want the Kingdom of God to advance in strength and in purity on Planet Earth without the constant black-eyes, ridicule and shame brought by these situations of gross weakness.

I'm praying for the fallen leaders. I'm praying for all those that have been hurt. I'm praying for universal Church of Jesus Christ, 'cause she's the one that always ends up beaten and bruised by this sort of thing. Yes, I'm praying.

But I'm also thinking through and validating something new - a fresh way of dealing with this "elephant in the room". Some friends and I are working on real, repeatable and trustworthy ways in which we in the Body of Christ might head this kind of thing off in the future.

So stay tuned if the issue of corruption in church leadership means anything to you!

Father, grant us the wisdom and good judgment to keep accountable those in whom we place our sacred trust. Give us the courage to seek and the intelligence to find new and better ways to raise the bar - to be a glorious Church without spot or wrinkle.

Doing Good

I'm teaching on the topic of doing good works in the Institute today. So I thought I'd resurrect this post on the subject. I love this stuff!

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Christians all agree to some extent that "doing good" is the right thing. What we often disagree on is why.

Some suppose to do good in order to salve their conscience from past sins. Others to perhaps earn favor with God. Still others, really, just because their priest, pastor, or parent told them to.

Of course, none of that will work for me - I've gotta have something more substantial.

Here goes.

Paul, in the context of outlining how the Kingdom is to be cultivated and grown, says:

"According to the grace of God which was given to me, like a wise master builder I laid a foundation, and another is building on it. But each man must be careful how he builds on it. For no man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

Now if any man builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each man's work will become evident; for the day will show it because it is to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man's work.

If any man's work which he has built on it remains, he will receive a reward. If any man's work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire." - I Corinthians 3:10-15

Notice the phrase "the day will show it". He is speaking eschatologically - referring to "the day of the Lord". The Hebrews had, for hundreds of years, expected a judgment at the end of the age. Christians of course believed the same, and still do. That judgment is what Paul is referring to.

That judgment will eradicate the "wood, hay and straw" work that we've been involved in. Ouch! But think about what he says next.

Those works of ours which are built on the foundation of Jesus (who is the Messiah of the Jews and the King of the Cosmos) will remain.

Put another way, the noble things you do (conceive, create, draw, build, paint, teach, sculpt, write, support, lead) which are built upon the foundation of Jesus' fulfillment of the Messianic expectation and his lordship over the whole world - these things will pass through the judgment to come!

They will remain.

Got that? Let it sink in for a moment.

I can't, of course, predict exactly how this will work. I'm just processing what I read in the OT prophets, in Jesus' own words, in Paul and in Revelation regarding the Kingdom to come. And as I've covered many times here and elsewhere - the Kingdom that's coming is not some fuzzy place on a cloud, or out in space or in some other dimension.

Those fuzzy thoughts would have been laughed off in the first century, and should be in this century as well! Rather, Jesus taught us to pray "Thy Kingdom Come...On Earth!", and that means a real, physical kingdom with a real physical resurrection cranking out real physical bodies that will live forever. Study the Jewish expectations for Messiah and his kingdom, and then read the last few chapters of Revelation if you don't believe me.

And again, the noble work that we do now - the gold, silver and precious stones - will in some sense remain and be represented in that Kingdom. Just the thought of such a thing is overwhelming.

So then, why do I seek to do good works? Just because? Just because my pastor told me to? Just because I feel subconsciously guilty and need a soothing?

Nope, none of that. I seek to do good works so that I may build now what may remain then.

Like most of us, I want to leave a mark - to change the world in some way.

And the Christian story - read rightly - tells me that I can do works, including (conceiving, creating, drawing, building, painting, teaching, sculpting, writing, supporting, leading) that produce (ministries, families, songs, companies, paintings, people groups, architectures) that will remain in the Kingdom to come.

So can you. Yeah, baby!

Ted Haggard is Dazed and Confused

But that's not the real problem.

Anyone that's gone down the nasty road he has, preaching and lobbying as he did about the very sin that so easily beset him - it's a miracle he's still breathing.

I think it's noteworthy that he could even appear on TV - even though all he could do was stutter out that grab-bag of theologically and philosophically incoherent mumbo-jumbo.

In last night's Oprah debacle, Oprah pushed her nonsensical view that "we can't deny ourselves" and thus we must, I suppose, just give in to whatever our basest desire are.

Then poor Gayle Haggard tried a few times to argue for what is obviously the truth - that responsible people exhibit self-control every day (Christian or not!). But Ted and Oprah finally beat Gayle into quiet submission.

This garbage is to be expected of our corrupt culture - so I'm not shocked about Oprah, nor even the dazed and confused Ted Haggard.

What I'm shocked at is the ignorance of most of the "Christians" that commented after the show on the blogs and news websites.

"Ted sins, we all sin..."
"His church crucified him instead of loving him back into fellowship..."
"Jesus accepts everyone, no matter what..."

And on and on and on.

And as we all know - the divorce rate, the pornography rate and the rest is about equal between "Christians" and non-Christians.

Brothers and sisters - here's a news flash. The way we today must relate to the God of the Judeo-Christian Bible is fundamentally the same way the Jews and real Christians have related to him throughout history. That is - through a covenant.

A covenant has stipulations (rules, laws, requirements, etc) that must be kept. The Old Covenant had 'em. The New Covenant has 'em, though they are indeed different from those in the Old.

BUT BY DEFINITION - WE'VE GOTTA KEEP 'EM TO STAY IN COVENANT!!! I'm sorry - I see that I'm shouting.

I woke up this morning praying, "Father, teach me to yield to your Spirit inside me - that I may keep Messiah's commandments, and thus please you."

This prayer is what every Christian SHOULD be praying. Then, they should strive to live within covenant to the best of their ability. The story says that the promise of the New Covenant is the Holy Spirit living inside us, giving us the ability to keep our side of the covenant.

When we fail to keep the covenant, as I do on occasion - then the well-documented process in the New Testament is to go to Jesus, our high priest, and ask forgiveness. He will pardon us, thank God!

But if you, Oprah, Ted Haggard or any other wingnut thinks that you can "be gay", or a philanderer or a liar or a cheat or any number of other things listed by Messiah or his rabbis (Paul, Peter, John and the rest) - if you think that you can "practice sin" and yet somehow stay in covenant with God, and then still somehow retain membership in his kingdom - well - you're in for a shock at the judgment! Check out 1 John for goodness sake.

So please read the Bible - read the whole story - and note that the overall story requires obedience to the covenant God has made in order for us to enter into the kingdom when Messiah returns.

Check out this post to see a bit more about exactly how to do this. This all seems so obvious to me, but apparently it eludes the "Christians" I've been tracking on the web.

Let's discuss...

Doing Good - But How?

We've been talking about the rationale for doing good works in our weekly studies. It's been eye opening for sure.

We know now that what we do is inextricably woven with what we believe. There is no sensible way to justify living any other way. We've talked about how the Spirit was sent to live in us so that we can fulfill the righteous requirement of the law (Romans 8).

Doing good, then, is not optional if membership in the Kingdom is important to you.

All right - you say - but where to start? Well, it depends on whether we want to invest our time, our talent or our treasure to extend the Kingdom.

If it's treasure - one place we give to is TheGive5.com. These guys take a minimum $5 donation per month and distribute the cash equally among ten relief organizations that are dealing with the nastiest problems our fallen world has to offer. Check 'em out and let me know what you think.

And then let's discuss a bunch more options at our next Tuesday meeting. OK?

Must We Sin?

"For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man, in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit.

Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace..."

- Romans 8:3-6

Related to this post on actually doing what Jesus commands and this post on the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives, let's talk about actually living the Christian life - every day and in every situation.

I was talking to a friend at lunch the other day. He'd asked me whether or not I believed homosexuals can "make it into heaven". During the conversation, he said something that shocked me. He said, "I lie every once in awhile - I can't help it...".

Now I'm not shocked that a human being can tell a lie. It happens a thousand times a day with the world the way it is. But I was shocked because this statement came from a brother in Messiah.

His premise was that, since all Christians sin, then what stops a practicing homosexual from "making it into heaven"? If every Christian sins, then what's the difference between a "homosexual Christian" and a "lying Christian"?

Hmmm... There's just too much questionable thinking in there to cover in one blog post. So let's just take the idea that Christians must sin, because after all, they're human.

Might someone kindly read the two posts hyperlinked above, and then the above passage from Romans 8, and then please tell us whether or not you can stop sinning, and whether or not you must stop sinning? If you believe you can stop sinning, tell us how. If you believe you cannot stop sinning, tell us why not.

Thanks! :)

It's Deja Vu

all over again. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

:)

Passive Evil

As far as I can tell, two categories of evil are manifesting in my situation.

First and most obvious is the active-aggressive evil that I spoke about in the last few posts. This kind of evil is fairly easy to identify, both in ourselves and in others. It's the kind that makes headlines - the kind that makes for a better-than-average movie of the week.

But the second is a less obvious form - the passive-aggressive evil. This kind of evil is harder to identify because it's couched in calm words, it's exercised with a smile and the victim often feels quite comfortable as the deed is being done.

To me, movies about passive evil are bland. If I had it my way, they'd never appear in theaters - they'd go straight to the Lifetime channel, bypassing even DVD.

Oldtime preachers, by the way, distinguished between these two forms of evil as "sins of commission" and "sins of omission".

So I've been piecing together data on the filthy river and those floating downstream in it - linking comments and actions to complete a jigsaw puzzle of human behavior. The script might actually make a decent B-grade movie.

I see plenty of active-aggressive activity. It's the kind that's been so obviously hurtful. And in fact, this is the kind of evil I'm most tempted by - like the retribution I spoke of earlier. It's the main reason for the prayer in my last post.

But I've found that passive evil is even more well represented. One example is the nasty little accusation posed as a "question" or a "concern".

I think the antagonists have learned by experience that an initial direct assault on another person's character often fails. It's much easier to sell an aggressive lie later if you pave the way first with a few passive accusations. For maximum effect, pose them as questions.

Or even better yet, why not humbly suggest praying about a "concern for someone's welfare". It's a sure-fire way to paint yourself as benign and benevolent. It puts the antagonist, regardless of their proven history of bad behavior, in a position to be trusted.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer did serious theology work in Germany during the rise of the Third Reich. He is famous for wrestling with the issue of the German church committing passive evil by neglecting to address the torrent of aggressive evil rushing across Europe from the bowels of Hitler's regime.

Bonhoeffer was ultimately killed by Hitler just a week or so before the German demoniac took his own life.

Ethics, yet unfinished at the time of his death, is perhaps the most challenging thing I've ever read on dealing with evil.

And now that I've written this far, I realize there's no way I can adequately summarize Ethics in a blog post. So I'll deal quickly with just one point.

It appears the German church justified its lack of confrontation with evil by holding to the belief that spiritual things were spiritual things and earthly things were earthly things.

So when Hitler skinned a Jew and sewed the resulting birthday suit into a lampshade - that gruesome evil was, for the church, an "earthly" thing that the church shouldn't involve itself in.

Bonhoeffer spent alot of ink convincing the German church that the universe exists not in two realms, but in just one. He said that when God became flesh in Jesus Christ - God engulfed the carnal and the spiritual in Jesus. God thus made it clear that His concerns are with the profane, the holy, and everything in between.

As a result, Bonhoeffer argued that the Church must actively engage in exposing and defeating evil, because defeating evil is the passion of God Himself. If we don't expose the evil, Bonhoeffer argues strongly that we become part of it ourselves. In my metaphor, we jump in the river by default.

Let's note Paul's words in Ephesians 5:

"For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as
children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness,
righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have
nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose
them."

Exactly how to expose evil in particular situations is a topic for another day.

Father, "search me and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me". Give me strength to face and reject my own evil, and the courage to lovingly expose it in those around me - so that your glory may be evident to all.

Evil and the Justice of God

I read N.T. Wright's Evil and the Justice of God a few months ago. I have to admit - at the time I wasn't as impressed with the book as I've been with Mr. Wright's other works.

At the time I read it, I was trying to reconcile my understanding of the present and coming kingdom of God with America's struggle against terrorism in the wake of 9/11. I was left wanting a more comprehensive solution than Wright proposes. And so, the book took its place alongside the many others in my library and I moved on.

But over the past week, the evil surrounding the otherwise victorious death of my mother has brought several insights given in the book to the forefront. I'll deal with only one of them here.

In the recent events - as the title of my last post hints - I've received a particularly vivid understanding of where evil is and how evil works. Also, no less important, I have a particularly deep feeling of the effects of evil.

First, to the questions, "Where is evil and how does it work?". Wright masterfully points out that evil is not a problem of me (the good guy) versus them (the bad guys).

Rather, evil is a problem that runs like a polluted river right through me, you, Mother Theresa, Adolf Hitler and everyone in between.

But for now, let's take the focus off me for a bit and use you as an example.

Let's say, hypothetically, that you are slandered. Let's say that heinous lies are perpetuated about you for the benefit of the slanderers. What is your "natural" reaction? Well, if you're anything like me, and you have similar skills, you'll likely want to use those skills to systematically destroy those slandering your good name.

And "why not?", you might ask yourself, "they're doing the slandering, they're doing the lying!". Then, if you're like me, you can actually plan and visualize the retribution. What's more, you know that you're capable of taking that retribution to shocking and debilitating levels.

But if - and this is a big "if" - if your moral compass still works, you realize that evil is "crouching at the door", to use a phrase from a particularly ugly family situation in Genesis 4.

So where, then, is evil? That filthy river is indeed running right there next to you. The antagonists are swimming in it, for sure. In fact, they've found a way to channel it right through them, through their thoughts, words and actions. It runs out of their mouths.

And the temptation for you to do the same is almost beyond resistance. You dip your toe in and much to your surprise, the water's warm. Sure, there's rot and feces and every manner of vile putrefaction floating by - but strangely, you don't retch.

That's how close evil is to you, to me, to the antagonists and even to the heroes.

How does it feel to be in such proximity to evil? Well, in this case, I have two very strong sensations. The first is utter loneliness, brought on I think by the shape of this particular evil.

Truth is, I deeply enjoy a certain kind of loneliness, the kind I recently felt for 6 days spent solo backpacking in a remote section of the Rocky Mountains. But this is not that kind of loneliness - evil this close to home does indeed hurt.

But the second sensation is unexpected. It is that of pity - pity for the antagonists.

Not a self-righteous pity born of a "me-good, they-bad" mentality, but a deep, slow sigh born from the knowledge that I was able by the power of the Spirit to pull my toe out of the river, yet the antagonists were not. For whatever reason, they surrendered themselves to its current.

It's just really, really sad.

Wright reminds us that one day Jesus will set the world fully straight. His kingdom will come, for real, on the earth - and he will rule with utter justice.

In fact, there's a very different river in store for those of us that can keep from being overcome. In the last chapter of the Bible the Apostle says:

"Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal,
flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great
street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing
twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the
tree are for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be any curse."

Father, give me strength to stay ever farther from the filthy river so that I may enter your coming kingdom, and experience that river which waters the tree of life.

Mom's Death and the Nature of Evil

I've been away from here for some time - dealing with the downward spiral and eventual death of my mother last Tuesday. My brother and I spoke at her funeral yesterday. And I have to say this experience is unlike anything I've ever been involved in.

It's not the stress - reorganizing major chunks of AT&T's information technology space was far more stressful.

It's not death itself - I've been preparing for my mom's death in one way or another since I was 8 years old.

It's not even giving that sermon at her funeral - it felt like the most natural and appropriate thing I could possibly do in the situation.

Mom was well prepared both spiritually and emotionally for her death. I'm quite proud of her handling of the whole thing. She's suffered stage 4 cancer since the summer of 2005 with as much dignity as one could ever expect given the horrors of treatment that she's gone through.

And now I believe she's taken the next step toward the resurrection, and the eventual coming kingdom of God on earth. So in and of itself, Mom's death is a really beautiful story.

Nah, I'm not shocked at any of the above.

Rather, what I am taken quite aback by is the way that evil expresses itself even in the midst of triumphs like Mom's - through those of us in the periphery, through words and actions - through the hidden thoughts and intents of the heart that are brought to the surface under this particular kind of pressure.

Father, give me strength to pursue a path of both peace and justice in this dim and dry place.