Christmas is for Waiting

"Can I open it?" 

(2 minutes later) 

"Now, can I open it?" 

(30 seconds later) 

"I open my gift now?"

Conversations like this have become a regular institution in my household since my wife and I became foster parents to an amazing five year old several months ago. The new experience has taught me a lot. And maybe now, with interactions like the above those lessons are being tailored for Christmas.

Just as my kid doesn't like waiting to open his presents, I don't like the waiting inherent to the Christmas story as well. But Christmas, at the deepest level, is about expectant waiting.

There's the relational arc: Waiting to see friends and family after long separation.

There's the consumerist arc: Waiting for deals and Amazon boxes.

There's the fictional arc: Waiting for a jolly man to commit some reverse B&E to your home.

But, there's also a divine arc of waiting. 

The first half of the Christmas story is about waiting for an arrival. It starts millennia before a manger in Bethlehem when a promise was set forth in Genesis 3 that a Rescuer would one day undo the work of the serpent and heal the enmity between man and God and all creation. Clues about the identity and work of this Rescuer were given throughout the centuries and God's people waiting for this Person to come. For generation after generation after generation, people lived and died looking forward and believing that God would one day send Someone who would undo all that was evil and broken in the world. Finally, this culminated in the arrival of Jesus in an inconspicuous city. He was born to a young girl, fled as a refugee, and raised in a backwater area no one believed to be of any consequence. But this was it, the end of the waiting. The Rescuer had come and he indeed did work rescue.

The second half of the Christmas story, where we find ourselves today, is about waiting for a return. From the point of Jesus' ascension onward, His followers have been waiting for this Rescuer to arrive once again. He promised that though he was leaving that one day he would appear and set all things right. That he would wipe every tear away from our eyes and make an end to all war and death and oppression. He promised that we would see him face to face and be in his presence. His return is to bring with it fulfillment of every good thing, an answer to our every cry of pain, despair, and hurt. Christmas is about remembering the waiting of others and engaging in waiting of our own, waiting for this God to come and live with us.

I don't know about you, but 2017 was hard for me. The dignity of my community and worth of my neighbors was assaulted from the most powerful officials in our nation. On a weekly basis, I held a crying child in the middle of the night to assure him it would be alright (not knowing if I could ever truly protect him from those fears). I saw lives torn apart again and again and again by sin, systems, and choices. I saw friends reach incredible triumphs only to have their whole foundation crumble under their feet. And I had to digest all that into my own psyche and ask, "What is there to hope in?"

So, this Christmas, what are we waiting for? 

The great hymn "O Holy Night" gives us one glimpse. In the third verse the song proclaims, thinking of the coming of this great Rescuer, "And in his name all oppression shall cease." This Christmas, our waiting can be embedded into this lyric. Whatever it is that you are waiting for, the Coming King stands ready to answer. We put our hope and our waiting in him, even if we don't know when it is that he will answer.

We can sing, "And in his name all depression shall cease."

We can sing, "And in his name all chronic pain shall cease."

We can sing, "And in his name all defamation of the Image of God shall cease."

We can sing, "And in his name all sin and consequence shall cease."

At Christmas, we wait. At Christmas, I invite you to fill in the blank. We remind ourselves that millions of our brothers and sisters sat in expectancy for lifetimes and one day saw the fulfillment of the coming Rescuer, so we too can have the strength to put our hope in him.

For we know that he has come, we know that he lives still, and we know that he is with us in our waiting. His second arrival is promised and while we wait we can call upon his name.

Come Lord Jesus.

The Cross and the Arch

Above is the cover from the upcoming issue of the New Yorker. It is poignant. It is well crafted. It is all too true. Not just of St. Louis and our current challenges, but true all across the nation. When I first saw it posted on Twitter, I enlarge the picture and stared at it for a few seconds (which in Twitter-time is the equivalent to hours). I appreciated it and I was saddened by its accuracy.

Below is a revised version of the picture I saw the next day. I reacted similarly to it.

When viewing this image, there are a couple of possible reactions.

One is the view the picture and want to dismiss it as trite and overly simplistic. I think this is false.

The cross of Jesus Christ isn’t a mere symbol of religious devotion or Polyanna, kum-ba-yah optimism. The cross is an instrument of death. It is a tool of capital punishment. It is an artifact of the actual, historical killing of Jesus of Nazareth.

The Cross isn’t weak or trite, it is costly. Specifically the cost of death and shed blood.

The Cross, in its brutality, in its savagery, in its torturous death-bearing, is about much more than convenient “solutions” and upbeat worship songs. It’s about much more than man being brought close to God (though this is essential!). It’s even about much more than the fact that, as Tim Keller puts it, I’m far worse than I’d ever imagined and far more loved than I ever dared hoped.

The Cross is about the tearing down of walls. The tearing down of the wall of separation between man and God. The tearing down of the wall of our guilty status before a righteous God. The tearing down of the wall of hurt and pain and brokenness from our past. And the tearing down of the walls between ethnic and racial groups.

Hear Paul in Ephesians 2:11-22:

Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands—remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For He himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that He might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

Without launching into a full exegesis that would fill dozens (hundreds?) of pages, I can say this, the Cross is about healing ethic and racial divides.

Is that all it is about? No.

But that is exactly and primarily what the above text is talking about. Two groups of people. Separated ethnically, culturally, religiously, and socially being brought together under the headship of and by the blood of Jesus Christ to become one, unified people.

A humanity that strives together. That mourns together. That prays together. That worships together. That considers the other better than oneself. That sacrifices for one another. That listens to one another.

The Cross is the answer. The costly Cross where Jesus died so that the dividing wall of hostility would be torn down.

But there’s one other way this image could be interpreted. Another way to interpret it is indeed simplistic. Too simplistic. It looks at the bridge of the Cross and it relates, “Yes! Jesus is the answer. Now let’s host a joint worship service with a church that doesn’t look like ours. Let’s get lunch with someone of another race once a month and pursue genuine friendship. Let’s buy Lecrae’s latest album.”

And you should do ALL of those things. All of them. Seriously, go do them!

But, as you do them, don’t believe that will “fix” it. In Divided By Faith, a book I have discussed extensively here, the authors refer to a belief many Christians cite that the authors call “the miracle motif”, which simply is that if everyone became a Christian, all racial and ethnic problems would cease.

Once again, to limit this to paragraphs rather than dozens (hundreds?) of pages, I will only touch on the main points here, but personal relationships and church fellowships won’t erase the problem. The problem didn’t develop overnight, nor will it be healed overnight.

There are hundreds of years of history to reckon with first. There is the reality of systemic injustice to be wrestled with and ultimately deconstructed. There is the fact that the relationships and friendships I recommended above are really, really hard.

The solution isn’t just around the corner, but it is present with us. Jesus Christ cares about injustice. Jesus Christ cares about tension. Jesus Christ cares about division.

And He died to heal it.

Love for the Immigrant

"Do not oppress an immigrant; you yourselves know how it feels to be immigrants, because you were immigrants in Egypt." Exodus 23:9

This is a topic I have thought about a lot. This is a topic I’ve written a lot of blog posts in my head about. This is a topic I want to be very careful with.

As I seek to be careful, a few clarifying notes, I am writing to those who identify as followers of Christ. I am writing to those who believe the words of the Bible. I’m writing in the hopes that we, as the body of Christ, would be a people who can listen, who can empathize, and who can seek to be consistent.

And I’m hoping to keep this brief.

I have the least confidence in that last hope.

I won’t be taking a single policy position. I won’t mention any politicians or political parties. I have three key words: Command, Image, and Kingdom.

Command

The verse quote above is not a proof-text (meaning, the process by which one grabs a verse out of context and uses it to prove their view). You can “prove” almost anything by prooftexting. Seriously, I’ve had conversations about Bigfoot where prooftexting was used. It’s not a good practice.

On this topic, however, the Bible is chock full of references. It’s not an ancillary topic.

In Scripture, the plight of the immigrant (possibly, alien, sojourner, or stranger depending on your translation) is deeply tied to the concept of justice. And the topic of justice is also by no means a sidenote. Some have termed there to be a group called the “Quartet of the Vulnerable” in the Hebrew Bible, it is made up of the widow, the orphan, the poor, and the immigrant. God’s people are commanded again and again and again to show particular care, compassion, and love to these groups.

Don’t take my word for it. Read it for yourself. Follow this link to take the “I Was a Stranger . . .” Challenge, which walks through 40 key Biblical passages dealing with the immigrant.

Image

To be human is to be made in the image of God. This image has been vandalized by sin, no doubt, but it remains. All humans, no matter their moral state, no matter their nationality, no matter their religious beliefs, and no matter their legal status still retain the image the God.

This means that the immigration issue in the United States of America is first and foremost not political nor economic, but theological. If it’s about people, and people are made in God’s image, we must train our minds and hearts and heads to see it that way.

This is about people. This is about image bearers. That doesn’t mean we will all agree. That doesn’t mean we will all be thrilled with the outcome. But it does absolutely rule out certain types of speech, thought, and posts on Facebook.

Don’t insult God. God made people. God put his image in humankind. When we malign other persons, we malign God.

Let us all strive to speak of God’s beloved creation as just that.

Kingdom

In two parts: as we assess important policy and human implications, let us all strive to ask ourselves, “What Kingdom am I living for?”

If our views are fueled by fear or by economics or by nationalism or by some view of racial superiority, let’s seek to check them.

All of us need to do this. (About every issue and decision too, not just hot-buttons.)

The reality is, if you are in Christ, your life is hid with Christ on high. Your life and your well being here matter to God, but His Kingdom is Supreme.

There’s a Kingdom called the United States. There’s a Kingdom called Economic Security. There’s a Kingdom called Self-Preservation. There’s a Kingdom called My Family.

All of them need to be secondary to the Kingdom of God.

Let us all ask ourselves, “Who is on the throne in my heart?”

(By the way, even if we prefer the American Kingdom, the numbers might not be what we expect.)

Second, Acts 17:26-27 reads, “From one man [God] made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each of us.”

I believe God is sovereign over all things. Including the above. Immigration is a discipleship issue. God is moving and directing and placing people. He has placed millions of people in this country from all different backgrounds and nations. Perhaps he has placed them here to be discipled. Perhaps he has placed them here so that some of them might “reach out for him and find him.”

When they reach out, will we be a people who reach back and invite them to know Jesus?

    *    *    *

I sincerely hope all that I have written above is marked by humility. If anything written strikes you as flippant or sarcastic, I ask your forgiveness. I desire that anyone reading this would read carefully, prayerfully. I don’t claim to know that much, but what is written above about Command, Image, and Kingdom is a hill I’m willing to die on.

It’s that important.

Humble Suggestions For White Christians

I call 911 sometimes.

I’d bet I call 911 more than about anyone else reading this.

But in the last week, I've noticed new streams of thoughts running through my head that I’d like to invite you all to consider along with me.

In fact, let me just walk you through my morning.

Today is the first day of school in Jacksonville. A wonderful occasion, a new year, full of hope and excitement and brimming with potential for growth, learning, and new beginnings.

I woke up at 6:18 to my house alarm going off (it was a false alarm). The Safetouch dispatcher over the two-way intercom asked, “Do you want me to call the police?” My immediate thought, “NO!”

This was because 1. I knew it was just a system error and 2. I wasn't sure what would happen next.

Here’s the thought process my (always very active) mind went through: An officer will show up, he or she will ask to see my ID. I will realize my driver’s license is on my bathroom counter and will have to lead the officer through the serpentine path from my front door, through a hallway, through my bedroom, then around a U-shaped bend to my bathroom where I would get my wallet. But what if, while I’m doing all this, my roommate who is a 23 year old black male with tattoos wakes up and groggily comes out, shirtless, to see what’s going on. What if he walks in a little too quickly or loudly or yells something (as he sometimes does). What if . . . something goes bad.

So, no, I didn't have them call the police. Not entirely or even mostly for that reason, but that whole thought process all crossed my mind.

I then made sure a middle school girl caught her bus in time and came back home and took my Bible out on the back porch. There I noticed that overnight someone had kicked in the door of the abandoned house behind my residence. I ran through the same thought process. “Oh, I should call that in . . . but what if . . .” 

Am I right to think this way? No, I don’t think so. At least, I really hope not.

But the thought process is there nonetheless.

The thought process is there because I've spent enough time and invested enough of myself in the community of Brentwood that I can’t help but think from the point of view that dominates the mindset of my friends and neighbors.

Before I go any further, let me be clear. Let me be crystal clear, I know multiple police officers in Jacksonville, who want nothing but the safety, protection, and flourishing of all parts of the city. I know officers who care about people, who give them second chances, who work with people instead of treating them as enemies to be contained or defeated. I know this. These people are out there. I’d even be hopeful to say they are the vast majority.

But, I also know city officials have used the term “human blight” to describe people in my community. I know people who have been put in squad cars and questioned for walking down the sidewalk. I know people who refer to the Jacksonville Sheriffs Office (JSO) as “Just Shot One”, meaning shot one of us, not we shot at them. I've been to Bible studies where people hearing about Jesus before Pilate compared it to their own experience with law enforcement in this city.

There is not an inherent trust of authority in this community. And it definitely has a lot to do with race.

Yesterday, my pastor included in his sermon advice about how young people should interact with authority. The stated reason wasn't so they could get good grades or land that job during the interview, the stated reason was because knowing how to do so could potentially save their life.

I've never heard that in a sermon in the suburbs.

I also know that in Jacksonville, “authority” doesn't necessarily just mean your boss, law enforcement, or principal, I know that in Jacksonville “authority” means “anyone with white skin”, because here, if a white man asks you to turn your music down and you don’t comply, you might just get killed.

This is a reality I have chosen to allow myself to experience and come to understand.

But, for millions of other Americans, this is a reality that they live and walk with every single day.

America is experienced very differently by those of non-white skin color.

There’s the statistics that show even though white-owned vehicles more often have contraband, black-owned vehicles are more often stopped and searched. There’s the statistics that show drug sentencing being highly disparate by race. There’s the fact that a white mass murderer is labeled a “brilliant, yet troubled mind” while a black victim is questioned about “What they did to deserve it.”

All this is very real. And all this is very invisible to most white folks.

Too often though, I can be prone to get lost in the conceptual, the outrage, or (worse) cynicism. But, today, I want to write, more pragmatically.

So, what can be done?

If you are a white Christian reading this, I have some humble suggestions.

1. Pray. 

Ask the Lord to move in supernatural ways to bring about repentance, reconciliation, equity, and justice in our country. I firmly believe that these are spiritual issues, but good news, Jesus Christ is reconciling all things by His work on the Cross (Colossians 1:20), so He has a vested interest! He died to bring these things about, let’s not fool around thinking we can do it without His power in the lead.

2. Learn about the systemic. 

White evangelicals love relationships, when asked how to deal with injustice or racial reconciliation they have a one page playbook: Build friendships with people not like me! 

And that’s great. It is the only way there will be real understanding and real repentance and real reconciliation, however, without accessing and truly empathizing with the systemic factors in play, this will be cheap and (potentially) paternalistic reconciliation.

The reason white and black America have very different outcomes and experiences is largely the result of systemic structures (some of which I outlined above). Also, the reason white and black Christians usually don’t have these “real relationships" is the result of these systemic factors. To truly move towards one another, these systems need to be understood. I’d encourage you to educate yourself. I’m going to link to a series of resources at the bottom of this blog. Some are books, some are articles. Some are very long. If you really want to understand this and be an ambassador of reconciliation, I would STRONGLY recommend you bookmark this blog and read these articles over the coming weeks. Try it! Read one a week. I challenge you.

3. Experience. 

Put yourself in situations where you actively experience what I discussed above. I stole these items from this blog:

• Choose a new church home and sit under the preaching of a black preacher for two years.
• Choose a new neighborhood where your fate is intimately tied to the fate of people of color.
• Go back to school and take a history class from a black professor where your academic success lies in the hands of a person of color.
• Choose to be mentored by a person of color every week. You do what they say, when they say it. No excuses.
• Choose to go places where you see the stories behind the statistics, where someone can connect history to the present for you.
• Send your kids to a black or brown school.
• Need the wisdom of people of color to survive.

All of above is hard.

But, Jesus has already done the hard work for us.

In Ephesians 2, the Apostle Paul addresses the very issue of race and the church and he does so by pointing to Christ and saying this:

For He Himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in the flesh the law with its commandments and regulations. His purpose was to create in Himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace, and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which He put to death their hostility, He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit. 

Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus Himself as the chief cornerstone. In Him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in Him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by His Spirit.

Resources:

Five Things You Should Know About Race In America: Self Explanatory.

Black Bodies, White Souls: A plea for how white Christians should respond to injustice.

Michael Brown and Black Men: NYT Op-Ed about being a black man in America.

Segregation Now . . . : A profile from The Atlantic about school segregation. Spoiler: It's worse now than before Brown v. Board of Education.

On Michael Brown, Two Americas, and the heartbreaking reality of how we view people: Blog from a Pastor in Chicago.

The Case for Reparations: This is the advanced course. Lots of history. Lots of despair.

The Letter From a Birmingham Jail: THE primary document of the Civil Rights Movement.
This American Life Harper High School Part 1 & Part 2: Everyone should listen to these two radio stories profiling a high school in Chicago.

Divided By Faith: The definitive book for Christians about race. (Here's the blog series I started about it if you want a preview, oldest posts at the bottom)

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness (also a book)

REPOST: The Olympics and Eden

Note: This is a repost of a blog I originally wrote in August 2012 during the London Summer Olympics. While my official position about the Winter Games is this: "All they do is remind me of how much better the Summer Olympics are." I think reposting this is timely and worthwhile. So, while I look forward to 2016, let's all look forward to Something much greater.

I like the Olympics.

That was an understatement.  I love the Olympics.  They are invading my dreams.  I get edge-of-my-seat nervous for the results of people who I'd never heard of 5 minutes earlier.  I've never felt more appreciative towards the British.

It's a beautiful relationship.

I've also realized the Olympics have great potential.  Positive and negative.

They can show just how nationalistic I am on one hand.  Though glued to the screen for most everything, as soon as an event starts without an American in the running, I've lost interest.  Further, I may or may not have clapped when a Russian girl fell off the balance beam the other night . . . admit it, you did too (at least mentally).

But, also, we find striking positives in the Olympics.  No matter what their perspective or worldview, all onlookers talk about the Olympics as a "testament to the human spirit" or a "great example of worldwide unity", etc, etc.  It doesn't matter who, American, Chinese, post-modern, traditionalist.  There's a thread that runs through people's understanding and view of the Games.

"Isn't it wonderful that all these countries can lay aside their differences and come do this?"

"Isn't it amazing that all these people from different cultures and backgrounds compete with honor at the same thing?"

This view of course is helped along by NBC's use of touching back stories and perfectly edited time-delayed evening broadcasts.

But, I think there's a greater truth to this than mere editing or emotionalism. I began to see it when I saw this quote by J.R.R. Tolkien the other day:

We all long for Eden, and we are constantly glimpsing it: our whole nature...is still soaked with the sense of exile.

 We are marked by a sense of exile.  We live in a world where every one of us has some sense that "it ought not be this way."

It shows up in subtleties like a minor wound from a friend or weeds growing in our lawn and it shows up in catastrophes like divorce and mass shootings.  No one looks at the injustices and terror of the world and says, "That seems about right."

No one.

This is because we are, as Tolkien puts it, exiles.  We were made for something different.

The New Testament will tell us that we are "aliens and strangers" here and that our true citizenship lies elsewhere.

Where is that other place? Or from what or where do we feel exiled?

I think the Olympics provides us a hint at it.  A foretaste of a world where people from every nation, people speaking every language, and people from every culture come together and live harmoniously in relationship with one another.

We love the Olympics not because it is warm and fuzzy, but because those warm fuzzies point the compass of our hearts back towards Home.  A place where injustice is set right, a place where peoples become a People, a place where our bent hearts are made new.

A lot of people misconceive Christian teaching about The End.  No one is headed for an existence, antiseptically floating on a cloud.  No one is headed for a castle in the sky all to themselves.  No one is heading to a place that fulfills my hopes and my dreams and my desires (as you know if you've read this blog much, because, it's not about me or you).

The End takes place in a city.  A New City.  But very much a physical, real, tangible city.  A place.

A place that our human words and metaphors can barely even attempt to describe.  A place marked by this:

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them.  They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.  He will wipe every tear from their eyes.  There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.  I am making everything new."  Revelation 21:3-5

Let our pangs for different, better, and right point us towards a reality that is to come.  A place that is to come.  A city where a God who loves his human creation so much has assured that this perfect home won't be complete until all aspects and peoples are included.

That'll be way better than some games.

Sank Like Lead

The Exodus is the great picture of the Hebrew Bible. No event is more referenced in the history of God's people than their delivery from slavery in Egypt. Throughout the prophets and poetry books, God's identity as the deliverer is front and center.

However, when we read the Hebrew scriptures through the eyes of the Gospel of Jesus Christ suddenly this story takes on a whole new dimension. This is not just a grand historical account. This is not just a highlight displaying God's attributes of love, sovereignty, and faithfulness.

No, the Exodus becomes a direct picture of the life of those who call on the name of Christ.

Just like Israel, called out of slavery in Egypt, God's people in Christ have been called out of slavery. But not a temporal slavery to a nation, instead we have been called out of eternal slavery to sin. We have been called to appropriate the overcoming of sin and death, by the great work of the true and better Moses, Jesus Christ, our deliverer.

I love this reality.

So, when I read the Hebrew scriptures through these eyes, it changes everything.

Here's, perhaps, my favorite example.

Give Exodus 15:1-21 a read. It is the Song of Moses and the Song of Miriam. I'll wait. Really, go read it. Pick you translation: NIV, ESV, NLT, the Message. Any of them.

Curious, no? Do Moses and Miriam seem a bit preoccupied in these poems?

By my count Moses' poem has 10 references to the death of the Egyptians in just 18 verses. And Miriam only wrote two lines and one of the two is about the death of the Egyptians.

Check it out:

• "Horse and rider hurled into the sea" (vs 1)
• "He has hurled into the sea" (vs 4)
• "The best of Pharaoh's officers are drowned in the sea" (vs 4)
• "The deep waters have covered them; they sank to the depths like a stone." (vs 5)
• "Shattered the enemy" (vs 6)
• "You threw down those who opposed you" (vs 7)
• "It consumed them like stubble." (vs 7)
• "The sea covered them." (vs 10)
• "They sank like lead in the mighty waters." (vs 10)
• "The earth swallowed them." (vs 12)
• "The Lord brought the waters back over them." (vs 19)
• "The horse and rider he has hurled into the sea." (vs 21)

See?

There is a seeming obsession with death. From a historical point of view one may claim this is a war song, a victory song, or a fight song like those of many colleges, just with much higher stakes. 

But, here's the problem. While the Egyptians were certainly God-hating, slave-owning, wicked oppressors God has told us in no uncertain terms that he "takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked" (Ezekiel 18:32). So, this is not a case of God's people lauding and celebrating death and destruction. That story doesn't add up.

What are we to do with a passage like this? Further, with the eyes of the Gospel, how do we read these two songs?

Romans 6 unlocks the passage for us. Romans 6 unlocks a lot of things for us. I recommend reading it also (I recently read it every single day for two months).

In Roman 6, we see the unconditional declaration of the death of our non-Egyptian slavemaster: sin. Paul makes this blatant. 

Verse 2: We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?

Verse 6: For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.

Verse 11: In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

These are present tense. These are an invitation to follow a new path. Further, these are a parallel to the Exodus.

Just as the Egyptian oppressors are at the bottom of the sea, just as they sank like lead, just as they were shattered, so too is the power for sin for those who belong to Christ. 

Anyone who is in Christ is dead to sin.

This is a profound truth. And honestly, I know that it does not feel true. I very clearly feel that sin is alive. But the Bible doesn't say that sin is alive. Nor does it say sin is weakened or that it is on the run.

The Bible says that sin is dead. Dead as a coffin nail. Powerless. So, while it may not feel true, if we are pitting my feelings against the Bible, I'm siding with the Word of God.

So, Moses and Miriam? Yes, Egypt is gone and not coming back, but even more so, sin is dead. It's at the bottom of the sea. It's not coming back. It cannot defeat us, even if we get scuba gear and try to pull it back up, it is dead.

Hallelujah, the waters overcame sin and death.
Hallelujah, the earth swallowed them up.
Hallelujah, sin was thrown down and sank like a stone.
Hallelujah, there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
Hallelujah!

Botany

I'm not sure people know it exists. And I kind of like that about it. So, I’m hesitant to make this place publicly known. But my third favorite place in Jacksonville (feel free to speculate about #1 and #2) is the Arboretum.

It contains a lake (the best kind of body of water). And a creek (which is the river family, which is the second best kind of body of water. Sorry oceans). And green deciduous trees (the second best kind of trees to Autumn-y-colored deciduous trees).

It’s pretty great.

Last time I was there, I took a path to the most secluded part of the park and discovered a sign describing the area in front of me as a “depression marsh”, which just sounds discouraging. I’m a guy who took “History of Science” and “Gems: The Science Behind the Sparkle!” for his college science credits, so take my botanical musings with a grain of salt, but here’s the basic idea of a depression marsh.

When certain types of soil, clay, and sand gather in one area sometimes it will create a wetlands environment where standing water begins to collect in the center. Water plants will begin to grow in that area followed by successive rings of gradually more arid-loving (that’s the technical term) plants going out from the center. So, water plants followed by grasses followed by woodier bushes (often thistles and thorns), and finally the outer ring will be made up of pine trees.

I ought to add this. While depression marshes occur naturally, this particular marsh was impacted by titanium mining that took place on that spot in the mid-twentieth century where the use of man-made heavy machinery has changed the makeup of the area.

A marsh is very similar to a lake (the best kind of body of water) so I found a bench and sat by the water for awhile. While I was there I started reading a few passages from the Bible aloud and eventually came to Isaiah 55, one of my favorites.

In this chapter, God gives a tremendous invitation, promising to freely and graciously welcome the hungry, the thirsty, the wicked, and the frustrated. Further, He discusses His greatness and holiness above humankind along with His promise to sovereignly work all things so that what He wills will be accomplished.

All these ideas and promises have been extremely powerful to me in the practical and the theoretical, so I was greatly enjoying reading this divine poem and then I got to the last verse, which had never been that powerful to me in the past. It reads:

Instead of the thornbush will grow the pine tree,
    and instead of briers, the myrtle will grow.
This will be for Yahweh’s renown,
    for an everlasting sign,
    which will not be destroyed.

Here I was looking at this marsh surrounded by thornbushes. A marsh that had been run over and dug up and industrialized by man.

And here Isaiah 55 was playing out. 

The pine trees in their ring were moving in and overtaking the thornbush. God’s creation and the way He designed nature was undoing man’s work of stripping the earth. It was healing itself. And in doing so, it was pointing forward to the promise that one day the whole earth will indeed be healed.

The next passage I turned to was Revelation 21-22 where direct echoes of Isaiah 55 are found, where now in eternity future, God once again puts forth His invitation, using a loud voice to declare, 

“I am making everything new! It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty, I will give the drink without cost from the spring of the water of life.”

The same God who is redeeming and restoring the depression marsh promises that he will one day completely redeem and restore the entire earth.

This is just a foretaste.

He has ordered nature to give hints. He has ordered our hearts with a sense of oughtness, a feeling the world is not as it ought to be, and a sense that it should be restored. He has given us a longing for Eden.

And better yet, He promises to restore it all! From the marsh to the thornbush to the pine tree. The social, the physical, the psychological, the spiritual, and the systemic. All things, great and small, all that is corrupted will be set right!

Grace Bombing #9

At the cross, Jesus became dead to sin. At the Resurrection, He rose again, neither the penalty of sin nor the power of sin had any claim on Him. We are in Christ, meaning we have been united in His death to sin and resurrection to new life. We have been fully forgiven of sin's penalty, but also fully freed of sin's power. Just as we must not add to the finished work of justification, nor should we add to the finished work of emancipation. The old man has no claim on you! None! Let us live in the finished work of the Savior.

Sources: The meat of this argument is found in Romans chapters 6-8 consider 6:2, 4-14, 7:24-8:4, 8:9-11,13-15. Further, Colossians 2:12, 3:3-10, Galatians 2:20, 5:24. 6:14, 1 Peter 2:24, 2 Peter 1:3,4,9.

Grace Bombing #8

There is no resource of which you are short. This isn’t some health and wealth claim. This is Bible truth. The God of peace, who has torn down the wall on enmity and has power so complete that He proved it by coming back from the dead, has equipped you with everything good for doing His will. There is nothing He asks that He hasn’t already provided the means for. Further, He has already given us everything (that’s in the Greek, not me saying it) we need for life and godliness. No challenge you could ever face and no ungodliness or immorality or divine command is too big for Him to handle by the power He has already placed within you.

Sources: Hebrews 13:20-21, Ephesians 2:14, 2 Peter 1:3, Acts 1:8

DBF: The Whole Gospel

(This post is part of a series exploring Michael Emerson and Christian Smith’s excellent book Divided By Faith)

Last post, I explained the concept of a toolkit: a collection of assumptions, beliefs, and views shared by a group. I explained that all groups have toolkits and that the white evangelical toolkit specifically impacts the way this group views race. Further, a toolkit limits a group or individual in the possible explanations or conclusions they can draw, so therefore a toolkit may close off an entire set of realities, simply because the beholder cannot fathom something outside of their group’s viewpoint.

In specific, white evangelicals have a strong attachment to accountable free will individualism, anti-structuralism, and relationalism. I argue that this toolkit is the greatest factor causing white evangelicals to actually do more harm than good when approaching race and will be looking at those reasons in the upcoming posts.

In specific, there is a significant theological error embedded within this standard toolkit. It is found in the value of anti-structuralism.

The helpful framework of Matt Chandler’s book The Explicit Gospel opens up a clear path to see this error. Chandler states that there is one Gospel of Christ, but that for it to be fully understood it must be seen from multiple vantage points. He calls these the Gospel on the Ground and the Gospel in the Air.

First, the Gospel on the Ground. Chandler labels this in four components: God. Man. Christ. Response. In brief, God made everything, owns everything, knows everything, and desires it all to reflect his goodness and glory, but man’s condition is a fallen one. Mankind has rebelled against God and twisted the goodness he gave us. We have chosen sin and self over him. This requires a response by a holy and just God, and ultimately if we will be made into worshippers who do give God the glory that he deserves, we must be made right with him and our sin atoned for. Thankfully, Christ was sent as this redemptive substitute, lived the righteous life we couldn’t and died the death we deserved. All of this calls mankind to a response, whereby each of us must either turn to God in repentance and faith or refuse and continue on our path of rebellion, sin, and self.

Looking at this, do you see the white evangelical toolkit?

It’s everywhere. Accountable free will individualism and relationalism are all over the the paragraph above. We can see them in every element. God is relational. Our relationship with him has been broken. We are going to be held accountable. This accountability will be for free will choices we made. This accountability will be applied to us as individuals. Jesus will not accept your religious aunt’s faith as yours, you need to have faith individually! In fact, the whole would not even make sense if not for those elements from the toolkit.

To me it seems that the white evangelical toolkit is largely drawn from looking at the Gospel on the Ground in a vacuum and then drawing implications out from it. 

However, I believe these implications go too far. For example, when Emerson and Smith performed interviews and asked if there are structural or institutional forms of racism or discrimination, many of their evangelical respondents replied that, "Racism only exists insofar as an institution is simply a group of individuals and if the individuals make sinful choices, then those sinful individual decisions will lead to institutions that do harm. So, no, institutions aren't a problem, individual human hearts are."

I disagree with this line of reasoning. In fact, while fully assenting to the Gospel on the Ground (I believe it and would “die on that hill” for every part of the framing above), I believe that this Gospel is too small. Further, I believe many evangelicals view the Gospel on the Ground as the totality of the Gospel. To do so robs God of glory, misrepresents the message of the Bible, and edges on heresy.

Because the Gospel is not only on the ground! It is in the air as well!

Chandler frames the Gospel in the Air in four components as well: Creation, Fall, Reconciliation, Consummation. In brief, God created the whole world, every person, plant, relationship, system, and mind. But, sin has horribly marred every person, plant, relationship, system, and mind. Sin means people hurt one another, plants get diseases, relationships end in divorce, systems propagate injustice, and minds are plagued by anxiety, depression, and insecurity. This is just the smallest sampling of the effects of the Fall. But, there is good news, Colossians 1:20 tells us Jesus is reconciling all things by the cross! All of this is being restored and made new. In fact, if we belong to Christ we are called ambassadors of reconciliation and are invited to join him in his mission. The final element is our hope for the consummation of all these things. That one day, Christ will return and he will set all things right. The world will be complete shalom, justice, and righteousness. Everything in creation will function and flourish as it was intended.

This is the Gospel in the Air! It does not and need not conflict with the Gospel on the Ground. They are simply two vantage points to look upon the same good news.

The Gospel is both! It is individual. It is cosmic. We need to understand, preach, and apply both!

Sadly, the white evangelical toolkit cannot assent to all of the Gospel in the Air. 

From the air, we see that the Fall broke everything. Not just individual hearts, but literally everything would no longer function as it ought to after the Fall. In the Fall, our social systems and institutions broke. Not just the people within them, but the systems themselves. Our economic system is marked by the Fall. Our educational system is marked by the Fall. Our legal system is marked by the Fall.

However, the white evangelical toolkit’s emphasis on anti-structuralism precludes the possibility that intuitions and systems could be broken. Anti-structuralism says that systems are never to blame. The Gospel in the Air says, "Yes, they are! They are broken. But they are being redeemed and Christ will reconcile all things, including structural, societal elements!"

If we hold strongly to the white, evangelical toolkit however, we will never see this. But if we dare to look at the complete story and the whole Gospel, it will be clear as day.

This was illustrated recently, by the incident and discussion that lead me to finally decide it was time to start blogging about race. The Trayvon Martin verdict.

The morning after the verdict, Christian spoken word/hip hop artist Propaganda (who is an absolute beast) weighed in on this very issue via Twitter saying:

2. I'm Disillusioned by the amount of folks (specially fellow Christians) that are CLUELESS to systemic injustices.
— propaganda (@prophiphop) July 14, 2013

If you can get your mind around depravity, as in inherited sin, you should get systemic issues
— propaganda (@prophiphop) July 14, 2013

I honestly don't think most are racist. I think their just unaware. Which is understandable.you don't know what you don't know
— propaganda (@prophiphop) July 14, 2013

Last 1. The gospel has fa show replaced the blood in my veins. I just see christ thru Black American male eyes, Lets trade eyes sometime.
— propaganda (@prophiphop) July 14, 2013

These statements capture the exact sentiment that the white evangelical toolkit stands in opposition to. If you want to be consistent theologically (rather than picking and choosing what parts of theology you believe, which is theological liberalism by definition) you must see the connection between sin and the systemic. To deny it is to misunderstand the Fall and in doing so to misunderstand the fullness of the Gospel.

Propaganda also hits on another key point in the last tweet I copied here, he's aware that he too has a toolkit ("Black American male eyes"). The reality however is most white folks are unaware of their toolkit and assume the way they see the world is normative and even moral. When one is in the majority they have the luxury of not having to consider such questions, but I assure you there are very few black Christian crowds in America that would object to a theology of systemic injustice and sin. White Christians however are both blinded and protected from having to consider such things. 

We cannot afford to miss this because the systemic impacts of race in America are pervasive. The failure to acknowledge them (or even see them) will only result in continual talking past one another, no matter how many individualistic approaches are attempted. 

The Gospel is personal. The Gospel is cosmic. To make it only one or the other is to misrepresent it. It is both. It needs to be both.

Take It Personal Part 4: The Intellect

If I ever visit your house, apologies in advance. If there's a bookshelf in the living room, chances are I will be zoning out for my first five minutes in the room.

I'll be eyeing that shelf. Seeing what's on it. Looking for similarities, looking for books you have I wish I'd read. Looking for books you have I don't think highly of (remember, I started this warning with an apology). And based on what I see, I will almost assuredly make some judgment of you, your personality, and your compatibility with me as a friend.

I am certainly prone to this, but I think it is common amongst American and Western Christians in general. We don't just do this to evaluate people, but also to project faith or the lack there of. I'd label this practice: informationism.

This is the fourth in a set of six . . . or seven examining common faith surrogates. I contend that Biblical faith is placed most highly and primarily in a person, Christ, and that while all people have faith in something, many Christians have placed their faith in a number of things other than Christ. My hope is that Christians would have their presuppositions challenged and that outsiders of Christianity would gain a greater picture of what true Christianity is, but moreso, what it is not. Namely, that it is not the political, the cultural, the family, the collective, or today, a set of thoughts.

Informationism would teach that the core of Christianity can be found in a set of right beliefs (orthodoxy) and that faith is adopting and assenting to those beliefs. 

So hear this. I am nearing the completion of a yearlong theological training course. I do believe that there is such a thing as historic Christianity and orthodoxy  I believe theology is terribly important (I'd even say I love doctrine). I believe some theology is better than others (and that some is flat-out wrong). Further, I believe that there is false teaching masquerading as Christianity all over the place, but I'd also point out that informationism itself is a well-disguised form of this false teaching because true Christian faith can be placed no where but in a person, the person of Jesus Christ.

When it comes down to it, the mark of a follower of Christ is not who they've read. It's not what they can dialog. It's not what they can articulate or even what they can understand. 

It is who they follow.

A follower of Christ, a true believer, is someone who has been confronted by Jesus and chosen Him. One who has said, "Yes, I'll go with him."

The first few chapters of the Gospel of John illustrate this beautifully. In chapter one, the word follow is used liberally. Andrew and another begin to follow Jesus. Peter begins the follow Jesus. Philip and Nathanael begin to follow Jesus.

In chapter three, a Pharisee named Nicodemus comes to Jesus with a set of theological questions, Jesus' answer basically only confuses the matter, but we learn later on that Nicodemus begins to follow Jesus.

In chapter four, a Samaritan woman is met by Jesus at a well and she uses a theological question as a shield when Jesus brings up her questionable relationship history, but Jesus' response isn't about the question, instead he basically says, "I don't care where you worship, what matters is who you worship. And I'm God and I'm standing right before you. So, the ball's in your court . . ." (verse 22-26). (The Samaritan's were huge into tennis, so this idiom would have really spoken to her.)

And, my favorite, in chapter six, Jesus makes a passing reference to what sounds like cannibalism and blood-drinking, which scares off a good part of his crowd. But, it doesn't scare off everyone. Because some of them aren't committed to his miracles, his charisma, or his teaching, but they are committed to Him. Jesus asks his remaining followers if they too will leave and Peter nails it. I mean, absolutely perfect, because he was a man who got it.

Peter responds, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God."

Peter doesn't talk about rival or more palatable teaching, he doesn't bring up the challenge of the Trinity, he responds with what he knows, and what he knows is a who. It is a person. 

For faith to be real, it is about a person. Not teachings about or of a person. Part of the wonder of the Resurrection is that we don't relate to a God of a book, we don't relate to a God of the past, and we don't relate to a God who is distant, but a God who can be described as this: He is alive, He is present, and He indwells us even now.

Faith that is real must be marked by an intersection. A point where my story and His collided. A point where there was a commitment to follow Him or to not, there aren't half measures or empty intellectual assents here. It's follow me. Or follow elsewhere.

Let's be those who drop our nets.

Lavished

Brennan Manning died this weekend. I paged through his most well-known work, The Ragamuffin Gospel, late Saturday night and was reminded how hugely influential this man was on my faith early on.

The book shows marks of wear. My copy is stained, water-damaged, and marked up on every page. Mostly because I carried it around in my backpack for the better part of a year in college. Not because it took me a long time to read it (I devoured it), but because I wanted to always have the book on hand to share, encourage, and remind myself of the message.

Brennan was my earliest teacher of the nature of the Christian life. Namely, that we grow by realizing God's greatness and holiness is far greater than we ever dared imagine and that our sinfulness and depravity is far worse than we ever feared, but that His grace and love has made the way. And further, that this way is not just a door we walk through or a prayer we pray, but it is the way and the path we are called to pursue with our entire life.

Brennan imagined a situation where we might flippantly come before Jesus, thinking we know the answers, and ask him to "Lay a new word on me. I know the old one.":

And God answers, That's what you don't know. You don't know how much I love you. The moment you think you understand is the moment you do not understand. I am God, not man. You tell others about Me--that I am a loving God. Your words are glib. My words are written in the blood of My only Son. The next time you preach about My love with such obnoxious familiarity, I may come and blow your whole prayer meeting apart. When you come at Me with studied professionalism, I will expose you as a rank amateur. When you try to convince others that you understand what you are talking about, I will tell you to shut up and fall flat on your face. You claim you know I love you.
Did you know that every time you tell Me you love Me, I say thank you?
When your son comes to you asking, "Do you like Susan more 'cause she skates better and she's a girl?" are you grieved and saddened over your child's lack of trust? Do you know that you do the same thing to Me?
Do you claim to know what we shared when Jesus withdrew to a deserted place or spent the night on a hillside alone with Me? Do you know from where the inspiration to wash the feet of the Twelve came? Do you understand that, motivated by love alone, your God became your slave in the Upper Room?
Were you grieved by the divine command to Abraham that he slay his only begotten Isaac on Mount Moriah? Were you relieved when the angel intervened, Abraham's hand was stayed, and the sacrifice was not carried out? Have you forgotten that on Good Friday no angel intervened? That sacrifice was carried out, and it was My heart that was broken.
Are you aware that I had to raise Jesus from the dead on Easter morning because My love is everlasting? Are you serenely confident that I will raise you, too, My adopted child?

Ephesians 1:7-8
In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God's grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding.

1 John 3:1
How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!

Praise God that our brother Brennan is right now in the very presence of Christ, fully experiencing his adoption, security, and belonging to his Father in a way that far surpassed any experienced of this lavished love he knew here. Praise God for a life redeemed. I pray that we would press in and experience ever-deeper this God who is unspeakably, head-over-heels in love with these created beings who can't do anything to fix our estate.

Okayness

"Where do you get your sense of okayness from?"

A few months ago a friend of mine challenged me to answer that question.

What is it that if you had it, achieved it, or attained it, you could look at your self and say, "I'm ok. I'm alright.  I'm acceptable."?

I believe we all have a myriad of possible answers to this question and that they will all fail to satisfy. Daily I'm confronted with the false fronts and hopes I'm placing my acceptability in, but I can tell you one clear path I've discerned.

Here's one surefire place of okayness.

In Mark 1, Jesus gets baptized. As he is coming out of the water a voice from heaven declares, "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased."

Again, the voice says, "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased."

Now, other Scriptures will tell us that those who put faith in Christ have been adopted by God (read: made his sons and daughters) and fancy theological words will tell us that those who put faith in Christ are looked at by God the Father in exactly the same way He looks upon Christ, God the Son.

So, when the Father beams at the Son and declares "You are family. I love you. I am thrilled with you." . . . those words can apply to you.  And me.

I know a lot of things that will fail to make me OK.

But I also know that the more this voice can be internalized, and the more this voice can speak into my mind and heart, the more truly OK I will actually feel and experience life.

"You are my child. I love you. I am well pleased with you."

Lament, Cynicism, and Despair

I used to be an optimist.

I took the Strengthsfinders test and when personality test nerds (a group I absolutely do not claim membership to) would ask, “What are your Strengths?!” with their trademarked analytic inquisitiveness, I would always tell them, “Positivity.”  And no one was surprised.  Ever.

I also had a friend in college, who wasn't like me.  He’d often use the phrase, “I’m not a pessimist.  I’m a realist.”

About 2 years ago, I found myself using his catchphrase on a regular basis and if asked what my strengths were I just started saying, “I’m a very different person than when I took that test.”

The fact is though I had dipped below realist and into cynic.

And while I’d be quick to tell you I do believe there’s something called a “healthy cynicism” that can be used to disarm false hopes and idols (i.e. a healthy cynicism towards the political, which in a sidenote-within-the-sidenote is not the same as withdrawing from the political realm), the reality is that cynicism (and its cousin despair) are against the will of God.*

In fact, both of them are distorted forms of a helpful Biblical distinctive, lament.

The lament is one of the most common genres of Psalms and there’s even a book of the Bible called Lamentations.  My favorite definition of lament is “a prayer out of pain.”  The lament is a wonderfully freeing art form.  It is honest at its core.  In a lament, no punches are pulled, you find the author telling God exactly what they are thinking and feeling.  And because He’s God and He has no self-esteem or insecurity issues. He can take it.

Trust me.  I've tried.  He probably won’t just sit there and take it, He’ll fight back . . . and He’ll win.  But that’s another blog post, I've tried that one too.

Lament is the proper, righteous response to hardship.  There is no blind, Pollyanna optimism in the Bible.  In fact, I’d make a case for the opposite. In Genesis we are told that this entire world is broken and never works properly. Exodus is the story of a people who get rescued from slavery and end up wandering in the desert until their whole generation dies off.  And in the New Testament, every book provides at least some mention that Christians should expect to suffer.

We will face hardship.  Life will be hard in general.  So, our response is both inevitable and important.

Lament is marked by 1. Honesty 2. Redirection and 3. Realization.

First, we are honest.  We tell God what we are thinking.  We don’t hold it in.  We don’t push aside or stuff our feelings.  We acknowledge this world is broken and that the havoc of that condition is daily before us.

Second, we must redirect.  This is marked by a turning of the eyes.  We take our eyes off of ourselves and look Heavenward.  We see who God is over and above our circumstances.  This doesn't mean we ignore or deny the hardship before us, but that we must also acknowledge who God is.

Third, we realize.  As we acknowledge who God is we begin to realize that there is an indescribable hope in him.  He has promised that he will work all things for the good of those who love him (Rom 8:28) and he has promised that he will one day set everything right and make all things new (Rev 21).

I used to be an optimist.  But, back then, I didn't know how to lament.

But, as optimism diminished, I didn't learn how to lament.  I learned how to despair and how to be cynical.  Neither of which is lament.  They are both distortions.

Despair is lament without hope.  It is like lament, but fails to believe that anything will ever improve.  It declares that “This is the end!” and fails to recognize that our Author and Perfecter is the only scribe who gets to declare “The End” and he’s already told us what that looks like . . . and it looks nothing like despair.

Cynicism is lament without faith.  It sees the bad things (and imagines some new ones).  It might even hope that things will get better someday, but it’s merely a wishful hope, it lacks any faith that these hopes will come to fruition.  So cynicism turns its nose upward at the world and looks down on everything.

I need to learn to lament.  I need to learn to hope.  I need to learn to have faith.  We all need to learn the practice of lament.  And it’s not easy.

*          *          * 

I wrote this two weeks ago and honestly, in the past two weeks I could give at least a dozen examples of despair and cynicism in my life, but not one clear example of lament.  The evidence that my faithfulness and my hope are not enough is overwhelming.

The great news here is well articulated by Rick McKinley in his most recent, most fantastic book A Kingdom Called Desire: “What makes the good news really great is that my assurance of faith doesn't rest on my faith.  My assurance of faith rests in Jesus alone.”

 

He goes onto write, “The cross cries out that Jesus knows that you may be unfaithful, but his love for you is unconditional.”

I should respond with lament, I should reject despair and cynicism.  In fact, doing so is strong evidence of the Holy Spirit at work, but thanks be to God that my faithfulness is not the record that God will keep track of but that the ledger of my accounts is filled by the the perfect, already accomplished faithfulness of Christ alone.

*Note I am using very nuanced definitions of these words.  I am aware that the word “despair” is used repeatedly in the Bible and am not trying to go after that at all.

Paraphrasing

I don’t have the verbatim words, but I was listening to a Tim Keller talk from a conference and he made this important point about idols and culture while speaking on Acts 19.  To give you a little context.  In Acts 19, Paul is in Ephesus, a rather important commercial city of the Ancient World.  

A city best known for the Temple of Artemis, which was one of Seven Wonders of the World.  The temple and the fervor that surrounded it drove both a tourist and religious economy that was highly profitable for the city's businessmen.  Paul's message obviously was not jiving with Artemis' deity and the legitimacy of this temple.  So with that, a paraphrase:

In Acts 17 we see the Ephesian business community get so upset at the Christians that they have a riot.  This is presumably because the existence of Christians in Ephesus was bad for their business prospects.  The city's Christians were confronting idolatry and the city of Ephesus had thrived on selling idols and drawing visitors to see these idols. 

In 2010, 34% of Americans statistically would say they have had a born-again experience.  I don’t know this for sure, but I think it is very safe to presume that the percentage of the population that claimed it was Christian in Ephesus was nowhere even approaching 34%. 

So, why would a small group in Ephesus create such uproar, yet a large group can exist without incident in America alongside a culture that idolizes money, power, education, and control?  Further, how can it exist when this idolatry creates pervasive injustice?  

And how can Christians' lives be marked by the same idolatries as the culture at large while adding on idols of family, morality, theology, and religiosity?

It is because confronting idols is challenging.  In Ephesus, the confrontation of idols led to a riot.  In America, we just chose to not confront them.”

The Olympics and Eden

I like the Olympics.

That was an understatement.  I love the Olympics.  They are invading my dreams.  I get edge-of-my-seat nervous for the results of people who I'd never heard of 5 minutes earlier.  I've never felt more appreciative towards the British.

It's a beautiful relationship.

I've also realized the Olympics have great potential.  Positive and negative.

They can show just how nationalistic I am on one hand.  Though glued to the screen for most everything, as soon as an event starts without an American in the running, I've lost interest.  Further, I may or may not have clapped when a Russian girl fell off the balance beam the other night . . . admit it, you did too (at least mentally).

But, also, we find striking positives in the Olympics.  No matter what their perspective or worldview, all onlookers talk about the Olympics as a "testament to the human spirit" or a "great example of worldwide unity", etc, etc.  It doesn't matter who, American, Chinese, post-modern, traditionalist.  There's a thread that runs through people's understanding and view of the Games.

"Isn't it wonderful that all these countries can lay aside their differences and come do this?"


"Isn't it amazing that all these people from different cultures and backgrounds compete with honor at the same thing?"

This view of course is helped along by NBC's use of touching back stories and perfectly edited time-delayed evening broadcasts.

But, I think there's a greater truth to this than mere editing or emotionalism. I began to see it when I saw this quote by J.R.R. Tolkien the other day:

We all long for Eden, and we are constantly glimpsing it: our whole nature...is still soaked with the sense of exile.

 We are marked by a sense of exile.  We live in a world where every one of us has some sense that "it ought not be this way."

It shows up in subtleties like a minor wound from a friend or weeds growing in our lawn and it shows up in catastrophes like divorce and mass shootings.  No one looks at the injustices and terror of the world and says, "That seems about right."

No one.

This is because we are, as Tolkien puts it, exiles.  We were made for something different.

The New Testament will tell us that we are "aliens and strangers" here and that our true citizenship lies elsewhere.

Where is that other place? Or from what or where do we feel exiled?

I think the Olympics provides us a hint at it.  A foretaste of a world where people from every nation, people speaking every language, and people from every culture come together and live harmoniously in relationship with one another.

We love the Olympics not because it is warm and fuzzy, but because those warm fuzzies point the compass of our hearts back towards Home.  A place where injustice is set right, a place where peoples become a People, a place where our bent hearts are made new.

A lot of people misconceive Christian teaching about The End.  No one is headed for an existence, antiseptically floating on a cloud.  No one is headed for a castle in the sky all to themselves.  No one is heading to a place that fulfills my hopes and my dreams and my desires (as you know if you've read this blog much, because, it's not about me or you).

The End takes place in a city.  A New City.  But very much a physical, real, tangible city.  A place.

A place that our human words and metaphors can barely even attempt to describe.  A place marked by this:

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them.  They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.  He will wipe every tear from their eyes.  There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.  I am making everything new."  Revelation 21:3-5

Let our pangs for different, better, and right point us towards a reality that is to come.  A place that is to come.  A city where a God who loves his human creation so much has assured that this perfect home won't be complete until all aspects and peoples are included.

That'll be way better than some games.

The Bible is Not a Roadmap

As I wrap up this series, Your Bible is Wrong, I want to remind us of the main premise of the past five posts.  We, as modern (mostly) Western people, bring many cultural, societal, and personal influences into our daily lens and in particular into our view of the Bible.  The truth of the matter is that the Bible is not a book about us, nor is it a rulebook.  We are also mistaken if we believe it will make us better or serve as a solid source of role models.

In fact, the Bible is primarily one grand narrative about God and more specifically it is the story of how God is redeeming a people for Himself through the redemptive work of Jesus.  That's it.

The whole thing.

Don't get it twisted.

So as we look at this, one final reminder is this: The Bible is not a roadmap.  This could be considered a side-point from the idea "the Bible is not about you," but requires some more nuance.

Many well meaning people view the Bible as "the answer source", exhorting others to dive into "the Word" in seeking direction and discernment.  Other folks may view the Bible more along the line of my first post (as a good luck charm) and turn to it at times of need, where a crossroads has been reached and a decision needs to be made.

But there's a problem with all this.  And I've said it before.

The Bible wasn't written to you!  It's not about you!

So don't read yourself into it!

If I look to the Bible with important questions such as . . .

Should I take that job in Baltimore?


Should I marry Jenny Miller?


Should I buy this house in this or that neighborhood?


 . . . I do the Bible a disservice.  The Bible does not answer any of those questions.  It does not intend to either.

How do I know?  Because the words Baltimore, Miller, and neighborhood never appear in the Bible  (I just checked, so trust me on that).

Does God care about the important decisions in your life?

Absolutely.

Should you seek His council and will in those?

Absolutely.*

But please don't turn to Scripture and seek for it to justify what you're looking for, because (say it with me) the Bible isn't about you!

The Bible is the story of a God who is hopelessly, head-over-heels in love with people who can't do anything to help themselves.  But this God, reaches out to those people and sends his Son and accomplishes for them the full requirements of everything necessary for those people to stand before this God fully forgiven, fully redeemed, and complete in Him.

This is the story.

This is what the Bible is about.

And I'd venture to say, this too, is what all of life is about.  It's not about you.  It's about Him.

Every last portion, iota, and story.

As is usually the case Tim Keller (one of my all-time favorite humans) has nailed this topic.  So, I'll let him do the talking.



*And of course, the Bible is our greatest, clearest indicator of who God is, but my point is that we should never confuse our decisions with the overall, grand direction of Scripture.