Daniel Rose: The Pastor Next Door

On my vacation I am reading! It’s great! I just finished The Prodigal God by Tim Keller and am going to wade into Peterson’s Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places next. But, I wanted to get some thoughts out about Prodigal first.

Tim Keller is the pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City. He is beginning to expand his ministry influence through writing over the last couple of years. He hit the scene popularly with his book The Reason for God. He has recently published a new book entitled, The Prodigal God. This is a short read (I read it in about two and a half hours) but the substance is much weightier (I have pondering it for three days!).



In a nutshell Keller tells and teaches the parable of the “Lost Son” from Luke 15:11–32. However, this is not your typical flannel-graph retelling. Keller takes the parable and flips it upside down, left, right, and under. The transformation of our understanding of the parable comes quickly when he challenges the typical understanding of the term “prodigal”. We usually think about it as a negative term which has come to mean someone leaving or running away. However, Keller redefines (or educates us about the true definition) as one who, “1 spending money or resources freely and recklessly; wastefully extravagant, 2 having or giving something on a lavish scale.” These definitions are often spun negatively and only applied to the younger son. However, it is the father of the story who is truly living out this reality.

Our understanding of the parable of the “Lost Son” has always focused on the younger son who wasted all that the father has given him. We shake our head at the older brother and his lack of grace. Keller wants us to see that the younger brother is the “tax-collector or the prostitute”, the older brother is the “religious person” and the father is “God”. These are common enough. However, the twist comes when he makes an excellent case for the fact that the key to the parable is the response of the father to the OLDER brother. Read the passage again. Notice, it is the OLDER brother that misses out on the banquet and grace of God. He has lost his soul by obeying. Keller spends most of his time driving this home. The more insidious sin of the parable is the hard-hearted, legalistic, arrogant, obedient, heart of the older brother.

The exegesis of the passage is well done. The target audience is broad so you won’t get the nuts and bolts of how Keller came to his conclusions. I would love to see an exegetically driven text from Keller that helps us understand how he came to his conclusions. That being said, this is a must read for anyone who is trying to understand the gospel and how it applies to their lives.

By means of application and conclusion, I will share with you what I am wrestling with. Friends, most of you reading this are of my ilk, the older brother. The prideful, arrogant, do-it-yourself, know-it-all, obeying-in-all-things, hard-hearted older brother. What happens when the father comes to us and invites us insider to celebrate the grace he has bestowed on another? Will we celebrate? Or will we stand outside in righteous indignation?

The sermon from July 19 was lost. So, I am putting up a manuscripted version of it for those that want to take a look at what was said but missed it. It’s not exact but hits the same points.

Hebrews 12:18–29

We don’t believe that God is who he says he is and therefore we we don’t care.

The question that we are answering this morning is this:

Why is there a deep apathy in the family of God? Why has there been no cry
or repentance for our nation’s sins just as Daniel did for Israel? Romans 1:18–32 speaks of God’s wrath against man because of his progressive downward spiral. Why no repentance?

This question is fundamentally about what we believe. A.W. Tozer said in his remarkable book, Knowledge of the Holy that “the most important thing about you is what comes into your mind when you think about God.” I think that is one of the most profound statements in Christian literature. Everything we do and say points to what we believe about who God is.

Consider what Annie Dillard says (from Teaching a Stone to Talk), “Why do people in churches seem like cheerful, brainless
ourists on a packaged tour of the Absolute? On the whole, I do not find Christians, outside the catacombs, sufficiently sensible of the conditions. Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we so blithely invoke? Or, as I suspect, does
o one believe a word of it? The churches are children playing on the floor with their chemistry sets, mixing up a bunch of TNT to kill a Sunday morning. It is madness to wear ladies’ straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing cr
sh helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares; they should alsh us to our pews. For the sleeping god may wake some day and take offense, or the waking god my draw us out to where we can never return.”

Friends, this is the issue that is at hand. What is it that we believe about who God is?

The letter to the Hebrews is in many ways a mystery. Nobody knows who wrote it. Nobody is really sure to whom it was written. What seems most likely is that it was a letter written by a pastor to his Jewish congregation somewhere near Rome. There was a large Jewish population there and it is likely that within the city there were multiple gatherings of Christ followers and probably one within the Jewish quarter itself. The pastor was writing to them on the eve of persecution. It was about to get bad in Rome and he wanted to encourage his people. He knew that they could avoid persecution if they would simply set aside this Jesus and go back to their old ways of believing. So, he set out to write a letter to encourage them to stand firm in their faith because Jesus is better than everything else.

So then we come to passage that we are going to look at today. Hebrews 12:18–29. Here the pastor is giving them a graphic image of the God whom they now serve. He brings to their mind the image of Mt. Sinai and the giving of the commandments. This is the key event in the story of the Hebrew people. It was here that their leader, Moses spoke directly to God and would return emanating God’s glory. The holiness, majesty, and glory of God was so real that they could not even touch the mountain or they would die. The God of the universe was present on that mountain and the people trembled in awesome reverent respect.

He is telling his people this is the God whom they are up close and in person with through faith in Jesus.

But, that’s not all look at what’s next: They come to celebration that is beyond anything they can imagine. They are inheritors of the living God! This is what it means to be a part of the assembly of the first born. It means that you are included in the inheritance.

The story goes on though. It comes with a warning. He says look at this majestic, holy, great God who has invited you into his presence as his own, will you faithfully follow after him? Will you listen to the call that is on your life? Will you refuse him? H
points to the return of Jesus and says that when that day comes the things that are not eternal will be shaken away and what is real and eternal will be all that’s left. Therefore we are to be grateful for being in this kingdom that will last forever.

What is his application? “Let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.” He says then, in light of all this, our response to the reality of God in us is that we are to acceptably worship God.

How can we acceptably worship God if we don’t really believe this?

I think that most of us live just like this from the film, Talladega Nights. Ricky Bobby and his family are illustrations of our silly attempts at making God manageable, trivializing him down to something small and meaningless. We seek to make him into something that we want. I think that Ray Ortlund describes it well in his brief essay, Jesus Jr.

“Our local deity is not Jesus. He goes by the name Jesus. But in reality, our local deity is Jesus Jr.

Our little Jesus is popular because he is useful. He makes us feel better while conveniently fitting into the margins of our busy lives. But he is not terrifying or compelling or thrilling. When we hear the gospel of Jesus Jr., our casual response
s “Yeah, that’s what I believe.” Jesus Jr. does not confront us, surprise us, stun us. He looks down on us with a benign, all-approving grin. He tells us how wonderful we really are, how entitled we really are, how wounded we really are, and it feels good.

Jesus Jr. appeals to the flesh. He does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him. He is not able to understand them, much less impart them, because Jesus Jr. is the magnification of Self, the idealization of Self, the absolutization of Self turning around and validating Self, flattering Self, reinforcing Self. Jesus Jr. does not change us, because he is a projection of us.”

Our lives, everything we do reflects what we believe about who Jesus is.

Why is there apathy? Why are we not seeing the repentance that we have seen in the past? Quite honestly it’s because we don’t really believe that any of this stuff is real. We minimize Jesus and create a reflected version of ourselves so that we can remain safe and comfortable.

We say we believe in prayer, right? Well, let’s see on average there’s two or three people who gather prior to the service to pray. I am not there either, but, I think it’s time I start showing up. Maybe most of us are praying on our way in, but I doubt it. We simply don’t really believe that praying is effectual. We don’t really believe that if we pray and ask God to move in our worship service that he will move in our service. No, we believe that we need a great band, a better speaker, maybe some entertaining videos and dramas. But prayer, well that’s not really doing anything.

We say we believe in the Bible right? Well, Romans 1:16 says, “the gospel is the power of salvation to those who would believe.” So, we boldly share our faith and invite people to encounter Jesus right? Oh, wait, no we don’t. We don’t want to offend them. We don’t want to make them uncomfortable. We don’t want to appear to be crazy Jesus people. We want our “lives” to “preach” the gospel to them. We think a slick ad campaign will bring them to Jesus. Except that Romans 10 tells us that it is by communicating, speaking our belief in Jesus that leads people to belief.

As Doug and I were planning one day at the Coffee Bean in Plymouth there was a man sitting near us. He eyed us up and down. He was listening to what we were talking about. He would walk in and out of the room. And finally he walked over and asked, “Are you pastors or something?”

“Yes we are.” Doug replied.

“Do you have any people in your congregation who are sick? With chronic pain? Maybe cancer?” The man asked.

“Yes we do.” Doug responded.

“Oh, man, then have you heard about medical marijuana? It will change their lives! It has healed me and it’s benefits are endless! You have to tell people about this and help them get the medicine they need!” Marijuana guy exclaimed.

He spent the next fifteen minutes proselytizing us concerning medical marijuana. He believed that marijuana would change the world and fix the core problems of our society.

Do we believe that Jesus and the life he offers is better than marijuana? Most of our lives would say that we don’t. Or consider this from a man named Penn Gillette. He is a devoted atheist and a comedian. You may have heard of him, he is the Penn from Penn and Teller. Well, after one of his shows a man gave him a Bible and this was Penn’s response (click here for the video).

Profound is it not? How much do you have to hate someone to not share the message of Jesus with them?

We look at the statistics of young people walking away from their faith after high school and we try to figure out a better program to make Jesus more exciting. Yet, what matters most is that kids see their mom and dad authentically living for Jesus. Second to that is having another adult involved in their life authentically living for Jesus. All of us desire to see children who love Jesus and are getting to know him, yet it’s the same handful of people over and over again who get up an hour early to teach sunday school. If we really wanted kids to walk with Jesus people would be lining up to volunteer and mentor young people.

We see that there are people hurting everywhere around us and then wonder when the “church” is going to begin a program to reach “those” people and yet we forget that we are the church. There is nothing “out there” that is going to do it for us. What will do it is us falling madly in love with our savior and really believing that we are so utterly broken that there is no hope apart from him. Until we really believe it then apathy and self-reliance will remain.

My brothers and sisters in Christ the reality that we must face is that we would prefer a manageable and safe deity of our own creation. If we say that we believe in Jesus and yet ignore him and choose to fill our lives with other stuff so that we are too busy to engage in his mission, then what do we really believe?

In this question there is a desire to see spiritual awakening take place. In a little book called Fireseeds of Spiritual Awakening, Dan Hayes lays out the five pre-requisites for awakening.

• God’s people must recognize that there is a desperate need for spiritual awakening.
• God’s people must humble themselves before Him.
• God’s people must confess their sin and repent.
• God’s people must continually and earnestly pray.
• God’s people must call others to join with them to meet these pre-requisites.

We are pretty good at number 1. It’s numbers 2–5 that we struggle with. It’s 2–5 where things get to close to home and we are faced with the necessity of real change in us and around us.

The bigger issue for me is that if we do these things then history tells us we can expect:

• Holiness of life for believers.
• Obedience to God and His Word.
• Increased power from God.
• A massive movement of God’s Spirit in evangelism.

When I am honest with myself all four of those things scare me to death and excite me beyond comprehension.

What would happen if we lived this out? What would happen if this kind of spiritual awakening took place? We wold be transformed. The world around us would be transformed. God would be glorified.

You see, when we come face to face with the God of the Bible, the God we meet in Hebrews 12:18–29 we are necessarily driven to our knees humbled, praying, gathering to pray, and calling others to join us.

So what do we walk away with? Well that’s really up to each of us. Will we believe? Will we bear out that belief by how we live? How will we choose to live in this world? Will we pray or will we simply go on living as happy, brainless tourists on a tour of the absolute?

If you are wondering about the effects of the much ballyhooed “Sexual Revolution” of the 1960s then I suggest you take a look at this article. If you are wondering whether or not things have changed in the world then I suggest you read this article. Friends, this is not your world anymore. The emerging generation has solidified a sexual and moral compass that requires us to help those who are Christ followers to find their identity not in the context of their generation but in and through the context of the Scriptures. We are not to get caught up in the modern/postmodern debate. That’s just silly. Postmodernity is here and will remain. The issue is how are we to live in light of the Scriptures and the new culture within which we find ourselves.

First, we must not desire the “good ol’ days” because quite honestly they were not that good. Second, we must be teaching and training kids from the cradle to love the Scriptures and teach them to study and understand, not just inoculate them with bed-time bible stories.The question before us is — will we engage (pun intended!)?

Marriage Still Fits Into Millennials’ Future…Eventually | Ypulse

I read this article this morning because I am always interested to see what people have to say about Michigan and Detroit. Usually it’s some sort of comedic piece or a good chuckle at the ineptitude of the city’s political structure. However, this morning when I read this Out of Ur post on Gran Torino I was moved.

You see, it’s not everyday that you see a snapshot of Detrtoit that points to the racial and the spiritual. But, here we do. I have worked in and around the city of Detroit for four years. My first three and a half took place on the college campuses and for the last six months I have been in the suburbs working at Grace Chapel, EPC. In my time here I have been amazed by what is happening in and around our city.

Many people look at 8 Mile and Telegraph, those grand dividers as the keys to what’s going on here. The reality is that they aren’t. There is a movement growing of the emerging generation to re-engage in a real way the very real problems that our city faces. They see the problems. They live the problems. Yet, when you go to Wayne State University or talk to people from Citadel (a multi-ethnic church in the heart of the city) you begin to glimpse a different picture: hope.

Whereas our parents generation was one “lost in space”, our generation is one that seeks to rectify those problems and change the future. Are we despairing? Yes. Are we frustrated with an institutional agenda that makes change difficult? Yes. Are we without hope? No.

As I think about what David Swanson says in his article I can’t help but think that this is the generation that will change the tide. We can only hope.

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I read this today and thought that the nine traits listed in Ed’s book are really insightful. What do you think?

http://blogs.lifeway.com/blog/edstetzer/

Creating Deeper Community
Churches that are effective at attracting and developing young adults place a high value on moving people into a healthy small group system. Young adults are trying to connect and will make a lasting connection wherever they can find belonging.

Making a Difference through Service

Churches that are transforming young adults value leading people to serve through volunteerism. More than being pampered, young adults want to be part of something bigger than themselves and are looking to be part of an organization where they can make a difference through acts of service.

Experiencing Worship

Churches that are engaging young adults are providing worship environments that reflect their culture while also revering and revealing God. More than looking for a good performance, young adults desire to connect with a vertical experience of worship.

Leveraging Technology

Churches that are reaching young adults are willing to communicate in a language of technology familiar to young adults. Young adults sense that these churches are welcoming churches that value and understand them, engaging them where they are.

Building Cross-Generational Relationships

Churches that are linking young adults with older, mature adults are challenging young adults to move on to maturity through friendship, wisdom, and support. Young adults are drawn to churches that believe in them enough to challenge them.

Moving Toward Authenticity

Churches that are engaging young adults are reaching them not only by their excellence but by their honesty. Young adults are looking for and connecting to churches where they see leaders that are authentic, transparent, and on a learning journey.

Leading by Transparency

Churches that are influencing young adults highly value an incarnational approach to ministry and leadership. This incarnational approach doesn’t require revealing one’s personal sin list so much as it does require that those in leadership must be willing to express a personal sense of humanity and vulnerability.

Leading by Team

Increasingly churches reaching young adults seem to be taking a team approach to ministry. They see ministry not as a solo venture but as a team sport–and the broader participation it creates increases the impact of ministry.

Is your church reaching young adults? If so, are any of these traits proving to me more instrumental than the others in your context?

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A week ago yesterday my bride received a phone call. It was one of those calls that you dread. Her dad, Dennis, was in the hospital due to a stroke. It was “minor” but for a man like Dennis and for a family like ours it is major. Dennis is an athlete (at times becoming a scratch golfer!). Dennis is the life of the party. Dennis is the picture of the entrepreneurial spirit. Dennis is the kind of man that other men want to be. This is seen in the respect that his four son-in-laws have for him and the tender love that he bestows on his four daughters.

Amy left Detroit early last Thursday morning and drove (I am sure more quickly than she cares to admit) directly to the hospital room in Evansville, IN where Dennis was beginning his recovery.

But wait, that’s not the whole backstory.

The beloved St. Louis Cardinals were about to finish their three game homestand against the hated Chicago Cubs. The Cards had won the first two games of the series and were in position to sweep and return to first place in the division. In business like fashion they dispatched the Cubs and welcomed to town their cross state rivals, the Royals for a weekend set.

Every single day there was baseball. Every single day there was time spent in a hospital room. Every single daay there was a conversation over lunch or dinner that took place between Amy and Dennis about the Cards.

You see baseball was the beginning of healing. It was normalcy brought into an abnormal situation. It was the pastoral balm that allowed father and daughter to sit and talk and be. Baseball. Not doctors. Not a golden tongued preacher. Not a good book. Baseball. It was the context. The rhythm of life that never stops. It’s six on, one off created rhythm that touches us deep.

Some say the season is too long. Some say the games are too long. Some say it’s boring. Some say it’s day in and day out grind take away from it.

I could not disagree more. It is redemptive. It is ongoing. It is always with you. It provides passion, joy, pain, sorrow, elation. Most of all, it provides time. Time for a father and daughter to be together. Time for them to get lost together and forget that they are in a hospital room. Time for them to be transported to that place they both love. That place where the buzz of the crowd, the warmth of the sun, and smell of the hot dog fill you.

Baseball.

Redemption.

A Hospital Room.

Beautiful.

Scot McKnight: Spiritual Eroticism | Out of Ur | Conversations for Ministry Leaders.

Above is a link to an article by Scot McKnight. As I read it I was struck by how pointed the article was. Do we love Jesus, no really, do we love Jesus with the kind of love that requires us to be in his presence? Or are we satisfied with the idea of loving Jesus?

Below is a letter that was sent to the Evangelical Presbyterian Church by Pastor Rufus Smith of City of Refuge Church in Houston, TX. It is moving. It is poignant. It is something that we need hear and consider. 

November 6, 2008

To: My Fellow Followers of “That Way”

From: Rufus Smith, Pastor, City of Refuge Church (Houston, TX)

As Chairman of the EPC’s Urban Ministry Network and the only black senior pastor in the Central South, may I ask you to consider pausing this Sunday or next to openly recognize the historic American election this past Tuesday? The question is not whether you or I voted for President-Elect Obama or not, but the issue is the potential capacity of his election to expedite the erasing of the stain, stigma and stereotype in the collective soul and psyche of an indigenous ethnic group and a nation.

Whether you agree with the election results or not, on Tuesday, something happened in the minds and hearts of a significant percentage of African-Americans in your cities, towns and churches. For many whom we are trying to evangelize and disciple, please acknowledge in some way this political seismic shift, atmospheric meteorite and divinely permitted event (Ps. 75:1–6); to ignore it with silence or inaction would be a setback and a squandered bridge building opportunity. Make a phone call, send a note, visit the office, issue a statement or whatever else the Lord may lead you to do to some African-American pastor or leader in your community.

As a Christian, I am NOT personally distracted from the first task of Glory to God via worship and making disciples of every ethnicity; for I deeply believe that our hope is salvation in Jesus not legislation through jurisprudence. As an American, I am prayerful for my President Elect and push for his success (I Tim. 2:1–5 as I did for President George W. Bush); As a Black American, I am as proud as a prancing horse. I was very somber Wednesday. Quite unusual for me. It seemed surreal. Time stood still as I savored what had just happened in my beloved country. 388 long years after the arrival of the Mayflower, the glass ceiling and, I believe, a national curse had been broken.

My 18year old daughter Rhoda called me at 10:45am on Wednesday in tears. “Dad, she said, you won’t believe the stuff I am seeing and hearing…Please come get me”. I warned her on our drive to school this morning of the backlash some would have today. Several of her classmates are dressed in black today to commemorate the destruction of our country and have hurled insults at her. She has been their classmate for 12 years at this highly esteemed Christian school. My wife Jacqueline went to share an off campus lunch with her, then take her back to school where she belongs to continue her maturation process. I don’t fully blame the kids, but their behavior is indicative of the work we still need to do in our society, even among Christians. We as elders know that the ultimate issue is sin not skin.

I don’t expect those who are not black Americans to share the SAME EUPHORIC INTENSITY of this HISTORIC DAY as I do. They can’t. At stake is how this atmosphere can be a time of bountiful harvest for the LifeGiver King and how it can hasten the probability that inner city churches and multi-racial churches like City of Refuge can become commonplace in our children’s lifetime.

I trust that a sacred and civil dialogue can begin for some and continue for others. This time can be a Kingdom building opening for those of us who name the name of Christ and are Christians first, Americans second, and African-Euro-Asian-Latino, Native Americans third.

No reply necessary.

 

Pastor Smith, I say thank you.

First, Dr. McKnight and Zondervan thank you for the advance copy.

–
The Blue Parakeet is a text that discusses how we actually read the Bible. Dr. McKnight brings up two key ideas throughout his short work. His first organizing principle is the concept that the Bible was written in a certain period’s time and ways. The second is that we are to read the Bible alongside of tradition as opposed to through it.

Dr. McKnight seeks to challenge some of the assumptions that we have regarding how we read the Bible. He begins with a discussion of his own history where people would “read the Bible and do what it says” even though as he began reading the Bible for himself he realized that they did not do all it says. This then leads to the dominant question that he seeks to answer: how do we read the Bible in our times and our ways?

The book is divided into four parts, “What is the Bible”, “What Do I Do with the Bible”, How Do I Benefit from the Bible”, and “Women in Church Ministries Today”. The first section provides Dr. McKnight’s organizing principles. The second and third sections discuss the proofs and ramifications for his new hermeneutic. The fourth section provides an application to a particular issue within the Christian church.

Dr. McKnight writes an engaging book. I think that he has provided a useful challenge to the assumptions with which we tend to come to the Bible with. He also provides a wonderful framework for understanding the Bible as story.

Many, no doubt, will struggle with his section on women. I am not sure that he proves his point fully. I would like to see this section developed more in a future work.

In conclusion, I would recommend this text for those who are thinking about how to read and understand the Bible in a post-modern, post-Christendom context. I would caution the reader to read with a critical eye as it easy to get caught up in Dr. McKnight’s winsome prose. This will be a text that will be at the center of the conversation for some time to come.

The Hansen Report: Where Are You From? | Out of Ur | Conversations for Ministry Leaders.

This article is quality. I think that the ramifications are huge for a congregation like the one that I am a part of. We live in a suburban setting and there are tons of church choices.

This reality makes implementing change very difficult. The reason for this is that instead engaging with the body in the midst of change the “I will go to that other church” card is played. This also frees people from having to engage with the church when there are deficiencies.

When my wife and I moved back to the Detroit area we decided to choose a church and not shop for a church. This meant that we never visited a different church. We came to our church and stayed. No matter what.We believed that any weaknesses in the church were things that God had for us to step into there.

It makes me pretty sad and a little angry when people play the “we’ll just go to a different church” card. If there is a weakness in your church stand in the gap, and be a solution.

This doesn’t happen, I think in part, because there has been a loss of catechism and a loss of commitment to the vows made in membership. I think this happens because people seem to think that the grass is greener. I think this happens because people are unwilling to truly engage with the body of Christ. I think this happens because in the end people are self-centered and unwilling to die to themselves.

One of my good friends, Jose, says “It’s time to Ride and Die”, indeed it is.

Thanks Derek…

A Savior on Capitol Hill | [derekwebb.net]

I’m so tired of these mortal men

with their hands on their wallets and their hearts full of sin

scared of their enemies, scared of their friends

and always running for re-election

so come to DC if it be thy will

because we’ve never had a savior on Capitol Hill

you can always trust the devil or a politician

to be the devil or a politician

but beyond that friends you’d best beware

’cause at the Pentagon bar they’re an inseparable pair

and as long as the lobbyists are paying their bills

we’ll never have a savior on Capitol Hill

[Bridge]

all of our problems gonna disappear

when we can whisper right in that President’s ear

he could walk right across the reflection pool

in his combat boots and ten thousand dollar suit

you can render unto Caesar everything that’s his

you can trust in his power to come to your defense

it’s the way of the world, the way of the gun

it’s the trading of an evil for a lesser one

so don’t hold your breath or your vote until

you think you’ve finally found a savior up on Capitol Hill

A Savior on Capitol Hill | [derekwebb.net].

This book looks like one I want to get a hold of. The excerpt is pretty good stuff. I wonder, what would it mean to UnLearn church for my local congregation? Hmmm….I need to ponder this….

UnLearn Church

The next grand installment is coming to Church Remix. Zondervan was offering about 100 free copies of Scot McKnight’s new book, Blue Parakeet, to bloggers. I am excited to announce that my copy is on its way and as soon as it does the posts will be rolling in.

I am also thinking that I will be posting thoughts, random or otherwise, from my Older Testament class this semester. I think that there might be some useful insights from those earlier incarnations of the people God. What do you think? Just maybe?

That’s where things are headed.

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[where: 48188]

My son and I were worshipping together on Sunday and being the first Sunday of the month we partook in Communion. As the elements came to us, he smiled at me and we had the following conversation:

Ethan: Do I get some of that?

Me: No son. We need to make sure that you truly follow Jesus by faith and that you believe that he is your Lord and that he has forgiven you.

Ethan: I do Dad.

Me: Well, you have to get up with Pastor Doug and tell everyone that you do.

Ethan: By myself?

Me: Yep.

Ethan: I’m not ready for that Dad, but I can’t wait!

Amazing! This ties the whole thing together for me. We have confused the sacraments. For believing children communion is the place for the public proclamation of their faith. For the new convert it’s baptism.

Can you imagine what that day will be like when he stands before the world and proclaims his faith in the risen Messiah and claims him as his own and then joins with the community through The Meal?

Infant baptism, communion, all tied together. This is the beautiful way. This is the covnenantal way of our promise keeping and ever faithful God!

I read this article tonight and it blew my mind. I think it’s precise, well said, and poignant.

Today’s culture is adrfit. There is no longer an oppressive meta-narrative keeping everyone in check. Everything changes, and everything changes fast. If you have to wait more than a couple of minutes for your fast food you get upset. If the lines at the self-checkout are long you can’t understand why they don’t have more. People change their relationships almost as often as they do their underwear.

Yeah, it’s a different world. The change that has taken place has left many disillusioned, frustrated, and wondering if there is anything left that matters, that will be what it says it will be.

Many of the college students that I work with are looking for stability. They are desirous that somethign will deliver. They can see through all the bull crap that’s out there and so they are cynical. Who can blame them? Every week it sems that another “holy” man has turned out to be a pedophile or morally degenerate in some way. Every week sub concsiously they exclaim with the little boy, after the Black Sox trial, “Say it ain’t so Joe!”

This is where infant baptism comes in. More than that this is where the covenant promises of the holy, triune God comes in. He brings about the things that he promises to bring about. He makes sure that they happen, because he can.

I had a conversation one time with a gal about baptism. She was baptised as an infant in a “liberal” “church” of some sort. She had been going to a church in town and they were pressuring her to be baptised now that she was walking with Jesus. They informed her that her “first” “baptism” meant nothing since she was a baby and didn’t choose it and that her parents weren’t even Christians. Yet, to me it is amazing that the day she was bapised her parents, the congregation, and the officiant promised to lead this girl to Jesus. They covenanted with God and he made good. The promise was on him to make happen and he did. As she reflected on that reality she was deeply moved and drew nearer to the God who had called her as a freshman in college.

As I think about my two kids and their baptisms I am amazed at how the Lord is making good already. Our pastor prayed during Ethan’s baptism that he would be an evangelist and that he would take the gospel to the world. His first few weeks as a kindergartner, the first time he was ever around kids who weren’t “churched” he began inviting his classmates to know about God. I didn’t tell him to. He did it because “they need Jesus like me dad.”

In a culture, a world where no one makes good on their promises. God does through this rite of passage into the covenantal community of believers. God shows his faithfulness over and over again to the child who is baptised in the triune name of God. It does not save them but it initiates them into the community.

I can hear the naysayers already, “it doesn’t happen for everyone”. I know. I don’t know why, it’s a mystery. It seems more often than not in my experience that these promises made in faith turn out.

The God of the Bible is a God who covenants with his people and includes the children in that covenant. He always has, always will. Why are we afraid to trust him for our children? Why act like he doesn’t care, when he does? Why not show a cynical world the beauty of our promise keeping God as we remind our children, our friends, and those around us of their baptism and the promise that God is making good on?

Oh, for the world to see promises kept generation after generation.

I am on vacation in beautiful North Myrtle Beach, SC. Today is the last day. We leave tonight for Louisville and then on to Evansville. I will miss the beach!!

I have begun emailing with a close friend about Baptism. So, I thought I would begin my thoughts here. This first post is rough and raw. It’s the baseline argument for infant baptism. It’s not as nuanced as I would like, but, that will come later, maybe. The point of the following posts hopefully will be to show it’s importance in our culture.

The basic argument from my perspective runs like this:

1. God is a covenantal God and works out his will through the work of covenants. The ultimate covenant being that of the new covenant in the person of Jesus. The sign of the covenant began with Abraham as that of circumcision. This was the marker of God’s covenant people and was applied to male infants at eight days old. In Christ the covenant was no longer with an ethnic people and so the marker of the covenant was moved to baptism, this is now the sign of inclusion in the covenant community.
2. The NT references to baptism consistently speak of household baptism which is most easily and normally understood to include children.
3. Jesus blesses the children.
4. There is no statement of change to the inclusion of children in the covenant community. A change this radical would require at the very least Apostolic teaching, if not Messianic teaching.
5. Believers children should be baptised as covenantal members of the community of God’s people.
6. This in no way means that they are saved, it is simply the outward expression of God’s promise to bring about their salvation and that their parents and the body of believers will bring them up in the fear and admonition of the Lord believing him in his covenantal faithfulness for their salvation.

The Baptist argument creates a distinction that I do not believe exists in the Bible between Old and New Testament. I believe that it is a coherent whole which builds upon itself and finds culmination in Jesus. The Baptist position seems to argue for a decisive distinction between Old and New where once the NT was complete the OT becomes obsolete and is understood as a relic. That’s a bit over the top, but, well, I am on vacation.

The covenantal understanding of the story of the Bible is the only one that stands up to coherently reading the whole story of God. The Baptist position does great harm to Biblical coherence. In so doing removes the children of believers from the community of God’s people. It also does harm to the significance of communion which is truly the sign, biblically, of the adult who has “searched himself” and partakes with Christ at his table. The Baptist position does harm here as well by making the Communion table something that means little more than a once a month, or so, ritual of saltine scraps and warm juice concentrate.

So, I was reading some blogs recently, alot of them, about the missional church. I have been surprised by how mean people are, especially those who claim to be gracious, open-minded, post-moderns. It came to a head with the debacle between Obama and Dobson. The anger and dare I say hatred expressed by many toward both men (in missional circles predominantly at Dobson, in attractional circles predominantly Obama) was amazing.

The vehemenance can also be seen in conversations that have to do with the mega-church movement. I just don’t get it.

I understand being frustrated with other believers who disagree with you. It gets hard to keep on communicating the same thing over and over and people “just not get it”. I think it’s sad though when there is not an open heart and open mind that goes both ways. It seems like folks on both sides of the coin forget that they are indeed on the same coin and part of each other.

Oh, would it not be awesome for kindness, gentleness, and respect to be a real thing in the conversastion between fellow Jesus followers and even people outside the community? The more I interact across the board with people from different traditions in the faith I am seeing more and more the wisdom of my father-in-law who makes some clear distinctions between what should be discussed publicly and what should be done “in the family”.

I hope that if I ever come across this way that I will get slapped upside the head and fast!!

My friend Tim challenged me to go deeper with this. So, I have been thinking about it for the last few days and meditating some more about why Communion is so significant right now in our time and place.

I keep going back to mystery and transcendence. So much of our world today is “real” there is no imagination. There is no mystery. Our movies leave nothing to the imagination when it comes to sex, violence, or anything…really. Neither do sports. I was struck by this when I heard a caller on the local sports station talk about his experience as a boy going to his first Tiger game. He said that when he would watch a game on TV it was black and white. He had to imagine the grass being green, the colors of the uniforms, and the color of the stadium. He said that when he walked through the tunnel to enter his seats for the first time he was blown away by the color, the green grass, the green seats, the whiteness of the baseballs, the brownness of the dirt, the blueness of the steel. It seared deeply in his memory.

We have lost that. Now we have ‘High Def’ TVs were you can even see the sweat drip off the foreheads of the players and the individual blades of grass sway in the breeze. Mystery is gone.

That is the beautiful thing about the supper. There is a mystery to it. There is something that we can’t get our hands around. There is an engagement of our imagination as we enter into the presence of the raised Jesus with us at the meal (or snack as it is now). If we will engage our imaginations in the mystery of this sacrament then we can regain something that has been lost. We can enter into the story of our faith and with the church invisible taste and see that the Lord is good. In a culture where our imaginations are stolen from us, actually, where we willingly give our imaginations away, this is our one opportunity to engage them again and embrace the mystery that is supping with the Lord Jesus!

The second thing is transcendence. It seems that much of the Christian life is considered to be humdrum and boring. But, oh, the supper is anything but. It is in this supper that we enter into an experience with Jesus that is beyond us and takes from the normal and we enter into communion, into fellowship, into the presence of our Jesus with one another.

People want to know what is so different about the Christian life? Is it any different from being a good Muslim, Buddhist, or Hindu? Yes, in every way! It is found in the transcendent reality of the supper. The supper should bring us into an experience that changes us and draws us into a passionate and emotional and physical and spiritual engagement with our Jesus. With the one who really died for us. With the one who looked at our sin and our turning away and went to the cross anyway. With the one who conquered death and thereby made us conquerors too. With the one whose love for the Father led him to that cross. With the one who sits at the right hand of his Father and intercedes for us. This is the transcendent reality that the Christian alone can experience as he or she eats and drinks with the Lord at his table.

Mystery and transcendence. These two things have been lost in our churches, our culture, and our world. They have gone the way of the dinosaur. It is in the Supper that we can reclaim them, reengage with them, and get lost with them again.

If you want a great picture of getting lost in the mystery and transcendence of the supper grab a copy of the Dawn Treader by CS Lewis. The interaction with Aslan and Lucy in the house of the Magician is amazing.

Tim, I know that this barely scratches the surface. I can hardly put all this into words. I am still processing and am thankful you keep pushing and drawing me deeper.

As I begin to write this I am feeling a bit like I am walking on sacred ground. In the Protestant tradition we only have two sacraments: communion and baptism. I have been thinking a great deal about the role of both. As I mentioned before communion is on the top of my mind because I just finished reading a book about it by Robert Letham. It was fantastic!

First, what I am not going to do. I am not going to argue for the merits of the Reformed version (read Calvin’s) of communion. I will leave that to the places where it has been dealt with in full. If you want to know the differences between Catholic, Lutheran, and Reformed understandings check out Letham’s text or the Westminster Confession of Faith.

So, what’s the big deal? We take communion once a month in our church and it’s a nice ceremony with saltine crumbs and a thimble of grape juice. This is the consistent mode of taking communion in any church I have been in. I have witnessed Catholic mass and also Lutheran communion. There really doesn’t seem to be much difference in “how” we go about doing it. There are obvious differences in why and what it means.

So, it’s a nice ceremony. The Elders always look good in their suits and the men and women who serve communion are very solemn. It’s nice.

But, is communion supposed to be nice? Is it supposed to be so solemn? Isn’t it supposed to be “communion” with the risen Jesus? If so, then so much of this ceremony seems to be a little askew from what it must really be.

Sitting in my chair I realized how individualistic communion is currently. Think about the first “supper”. The disciples and Jesus hanging out in an intimate setting, one of the boys even reclining on his chest. They were in a circle. They could see each other. They could smell each other’s nasty feet. I have been in a setting with college guys many times like this. My poor wife wouldn’t even go into our basement until I lit a match to “de-man” after Bible study.

I think that communion needs to be let loose. We need to realize what is really happening. We are coming into, entering into, the very presence of the risen Jesus. We take the “bread” and drink the “wine” and in so doing are united with Christ in community with other brothers and sisters in the body. I can’t see who is joining with me with Christ.

It’s me and Jesus.

This is not communion, not in its fullest sense.

In this culture we need to re-engage with the mystery, beauty, glory, and awe that communion necessarily is. We must elevate this sacrament back to its high, honorable, and lofty place.

It is mystical.

It is awe inspiring.

It is fearsome.

It is physically, emotionally, spiritually uniting with our Jesus.

Why don’t we use real bread? It’s inconvenient.

Why don’t we use real wine? It might be offensive.

Was the crucifixion convenient? Was Jesus blood spilled not offensive?

The “supper” is to bring us together to experience community with one another and with Christ. I think we need to move back into a mode of doing communion where we actually see each other. Where we rise and go to the front together. Where those under discipline can’t hid in their chair. Where the one outside the faith feels being left out. Where those in relationship with Jesus physically rise and stand shoulder to shoulder with their brothers and sisters.

Our covenant children watching and experiencing the longing to rise too.

The weight of glory as we together break bread and drink the wine. We would touch the broken bread. We would smell aroma of the wine and feel the warmth in our bellies as the wine hits.

In a culture that sees through the bull it is time that we return and embrace together the beauty and holiness of communion.

Think about it this way: What must communion have been like in the first century when the faithful were accused of being cannibals (eating the flesh and drinking the blood of Jesus) and of practicing incest (for they were ‘brothers’ and ‘sisters’) in the midst of their love feasts? Our communion doesn’t inspire this kind of response from a watching world.

I pray that we will embrace communion: the uniting of ourselves as the body of Christ with our head, the risen Jesus.

As I was catching up with my blog reading today in my quiet home, I thought, “It would be cool to link the blog to the stuff I am reading.” So, here it is: Stuff I am Reading

So, I have been writing a bit about the big picture of what missional is and exploring some things here and asking questions. Most of these questions I don’t have answers for, it’s a bit frustrating for a guy who usually has answers for EVERYTHING!

It’s hard to be in a place where you feel like everything is up for grabs. Where you are evaluating so much of what you believe and what you think. It’s good though because I am realizing how little I know and how little really matters. But, the things that do matter are critical.

In light of all this, I want to take a bit of a detour. I have been thinking a bit about two issues that seem to me as very important for our time.

Communion.

Baptism.

It seems that both of these issues are ones that either have been forgotten about (communion) or are taken for granted (baptism). Over the next couple of weeks or so I am planning on wrestling through why I think these two things are critical for recovery in this generation as we seek to engage with our God in his mission.

I just finished reading The Lord’s Supper by Robert Letham, so I will take up Comunion first and then Baptism.

The one questiont that I have been wrestling with in conversation with a friend and as a result of reading The Forgotten Ways is the issue of authority. What does it mean? Who is in authority? Is there leadership anymore? What does it all look like in reality, right here, right now? Are we all to do what is right by our own personal hermeneutic? Are we simply to do what feels good? Is it “just Jesus and me”? What is the role of the community of God’s people? What are the individual roles within that body? Are some called to lead? Are some called to follow? What do we do with the Bible? What do we do with our heritage of the visible church?

The answers are not easy in coming. But the list of questions continues to grow. Check out our conversation here.

So, I have begun thinking about “programming” in the church. It’s something that I have been wrestling with for a while and my thoughts are beginning to clarify a bit more. I studied some pretty large chunks of Acts this winter and spring. Something that really hit me was how “out there” the first and second generation Christians were (Paul is a second generation, let that one sink in for a moment).

They met together and ate food. They worshiped out in the open at the Temple. There was no real distinction in their mind of anything sacred or secular. There certainly did not appear to be any kind of “holy huddle” going on in the early church. There was rhythm to their life.

They broke bread, they served, they remembered the Lord, and they sat under the teaching of the leaders. They did all this in a culture that was just as pluralistic as ours. They did this in a culture where the Empire was more oppressive (atleast in the persecution sense).

The question I have been pondering: Why do we pull out so much? Why do we feel the necessity to program EVERYTHING. Why can’t we set aside a day for corporate worship, teaching, etc…Then the rest of the week what if we gathered together outside the walls of the church and followed Christ in community “out there” in the midst of a lost and dying world? What if we did more in our homes? What if we even invited our neighbors? What if?