Response To Sin and Offence

My theology professor, Gerry Breshears, posted this blog on "Restoration." It seemed like a good process to think through when responding to sin and offence. Wadda ya'all think?

http://breshears.net/?p=519

The Man Who Is God - Deleted Scenes

Here’s another blog about ‘deleted scenes;’ thoughts that came to me as I was preparing this sermon but didn’t make the ‘final cut.’

The sermon was about Jesus, the Man who is God. Please go to the church’s website, download the sermon, give it a listen, and then come back to see what I did not put in ….

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As to this text that says that “all the people were being baptized…” I hope it is obvious, contrary to some preachers (and even teachers!) that “all” does NOT mean “all” all the time. We can see that in even the raw fact being that Jesus, at that moment, had not been baptized. Clearly Luke is engaging in some hyperbole to emphasize the fact that John was a Very Big Phenomena!

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Let’s get this heresy on and off the table very quickly. Some will say that it was this time that Jesus was “possessed” by God and became Messiah. “See? Only now does the Holy Spirit come into Jesus’ life!” This misses the point, ignores scripture, and is contrary to what orthodoxy has taught for two thousand years. This is not the first time Jesus experienced the Spirit. This is the Spirit’s anointing for Jesus to now commence his public ministry.

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Tradition tells us that Jewish men were not to commence their professional ministry careers until they had attained to their 30^th birthday. Priests had to wait (Num. 4:3), Joseph was 30 when he served in Pharaoh’s court (Gen. 41:46), and David was thirty when he became king (2Sam. 5:4). Interestingly, Jesus seems to honor that tradition and wait for that time in his life.

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There is a lot of debate about the two genealogies of Jesus contained in Matthew’s and Luke’s gospel. After a point, the genealogies diverge. One very common way to reconcile them is to suggest that one shows Jesus’ biological genealogy from David through to Mary to confirm that Jesus had royal blood, so to speak. Then, so goes this argument, the other line is from David to Joseph, Jesus’ adoptive father, to show that Jesus had a inherited right to sit on David’s throne. The problem with that is to come up with this solution, you have to mess with the black and white text of the Bible. You see, Mary is not mentioned in either genealogy while Joseph is mentioned in both. There may be other solutions to this problem, but it seems to me a Very Bad idea to make up words and insert them into the Bible to solve a problem.

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Sometimes we can forget that the people that made up Jesus’ family were real people, living real lives, and experiencing joys and pain:

Ø Adam – tossed out of paradise because he messed it up

Ø Seth – conceived out of profound grief over the first homicide; even his name means, ‘substitute’

Ø Lamech – lived under the curse of his forefather in fear, and continued his father’s homicidal ways

Ø Noah – the first case of alcohol abuse, profound embarrassment with ugly results

Ø Nahor and Terah – confused understanding of God

Ø Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Judah

Ø Salmon – married the former prostitute, Rahab

Ø Boaz – he and his wife, Ruth, had a beautiful romance

Ø David, son Nathan (named after the prophet)

Ø Joseph – a middle-aged guy swinging a hammer for a living, suddenly faced with a girlfriend who claims to have had visions of getting pregnant by means of God

Ø … and you thought you had a weird family!

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So why did Jesus have to be tempted? Well, the first thing to consider is that temptation happens all the time and it seems reasonable to conclude that Jesus had been tempted, and resisted, many many temptations before this episode. It seems to me that these temptations are all directed at Jesus’ role as Messiah.

Additionally, part of Jesus’ task was to undo the work of Adam. Remember that Adam faced temptation and failed. Jesus faced these huge temptations and came out a victor. Jesus is a victor over sin!

Distinguishing Work of Preaching and Baptism

“For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.” 1Cor 1:17

I've been poking along at first and second Corinthians for several months in my devotions. I will let you know that devotional time in the Bible is a confusing experience for me. Sure, I read prayerfully and let the Lord speak to me. But, as I read, then something in the text catches my attention and I’m off to the original languages, doing a rough translation, and digging into the technical bits (as much as I’m able) to chase down this conceptual rabbit that just popped out of the bushes. It's funny to me how I can pop from devotional to study mode in such a short time.

In any case, that’s what happened on this one particular morning. As I came across this verse, I was struck by the distinction Paul apparently makes between the preaching of the gospel (the task that Christ gave him), and the baptizing of believers (a task that was, it seemed to him, an add-on).

A few technical observations: 

1) most translations translate logou as “words,” but the Greek word is singular; 

2) the literal words here are “wisdom of-word;” that is, the “of” (genitive) is attached to “word” rather than “wisdom;” 

3) there is an interesting use of the first “not” which points to the negation of the infinitive clause rather than the infinitive word itself. 

As to the first and second points, it seems to me that Paul is talking about a mode of presentation (“wisdom of word”) rather than actual speech (‘words of wisdom’), which does provide a different shading of meaning than how this is usually translated – maybe somebody can help me understand the discrepancy. As to the third point, translations get this right: it clearly makes better sense grammatically (“Burton’s Moods and Tenses”) and contextually to translate the clause, “Christ did not send me to baptize…” rather than, ‘Christ sent me to not baptize….’

Now as to the potential theological point; does Paul here distinguish between the evangelistic work of preaching and the evangelistic work of baptizing?

As one thoroughly brought up – and still very much in agreement with – the Anabaptist teaching of ‘believer’s baptism,’ I have believed and taught that the New Testament many times uses the word, “baptism” as a catch-all word (synecdoche) for the whole work of conversion in a believer’s life. Much like a baseball commentator would say, “With that out; that’s the game.” Certainly there was much more to the game than one ‘out,’ but that one play wrapped up the destiny of the whole game.

So when Paul suggests a distinction between his preaching (clearly part of the conversion process) and baptism (seems to me to be the capstone of the conversion process), then I was arrested. Here’s how it sounded to me: 'I, Paul, was sent by Christ to pretty much just preach the gospel. All that baptizing stuff into Christ and the church – nope, that’s generally not for me. Other guys can do that.'

Another data point is a couple chapters later when Paul seems to say something very much like that in 3:6 – “I [Paul] planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.” You could read that and suggest that Paul had more in mind than a simple agricultural metaphor. Was Paul saying that he “planted” the good-news into the minds of believers, but Apollos “watered” them by baptizing them? That is, that there are somewhat distinct phases: preaching-planting, baptizing-watering, sanctifying-growing?

This would also say that “God causes the growth;” which in this sense means that God causes the ‘sanctification’ in believers. We know (even hard-core Calvinists would agree) that our ‘sanctification’ is in some way dependant on our obedience (Phil 3:12). But the very next verse, Phil 3:13, shows that God is the one at work in us; ‘causing the growth’ So this take on the analogy still seems to hold up.

Here’s my context. There is a debate among Anabaptist evangelicals regarding ‘early’ or ‘late’ baptism. The Early baptizers would argue that once someone has made a credible confession of faith in Christ, they should be immediately baptized and they cite the Ethiopian Eunuch (Ac 8:27-38) and Philippian Jailer (Ac 16:25-33) as Biblical examples. These folks tend toward the ‘Free Grace’ end of that debate. The Late baptizers counter that both of the examples are put in Luke’s text as exceptions to the general rule of delaying baptism. These tend toward the ‘Lordship Salvation’ end of that debate. The Late baptizers claim that it was the very early church’s practice to delay baptizing a believer until that person could really make both a credible confession of faith and was fully ready to “reject flesh, world, and the devil” to follow Christ wholly.

Late baptism was clearly the practice of the pre-Constantinian church. One reason was that too many churches had been betrayed by too-quickly baptized ‘believers’ who then, under ‘persuasion,’ gave the authorities information that allowed for the persecution of other believers.

To prevent these and other problems in the life of the church, the church had a training regimen called “catechesis.” A “catechumen” was a believer who was in the process between confession of faith and the conversion of their minds from a pagan to a Biblical world-view so that they would be prepared to enter into the full fellowship of the church via baptism (baptism, among other things, having an ‘initiation’ function). A very early and respected document, the “Didache” had this training function. Several commentators on 1 Peter believe it was written by Peter with just this new-believer-training-before-baptism purpose.

I heavily lean toward the Late baptism view – though am solidly in the Free Grace end of that debate. I believe that it is very important that a believer be baptized only if they can give both a credible AND informed confession of faith. It seems to me that this is both the testimony of scripture as well as the very early church.

So, yes, it does seem possible that Paul distinguished between his task of preaching and proclaiming the good news about Jesus, and the ‘follow-on’ work of pre-baptism discipleship and the performing of actual baptismal rites.

Paul Disobeys Jesus??

I hate it when I find stuff in the Bible that I don’t like. That really bugs me. This is not a typical example, but it is one that was rather arresting.

I’ve been reviewing the two epistles that Paul wrote to the Corinthian church for some time now. It somehow has seemed appropriate given my church, my newness to ministry, and some of the issues we all are facing over here. Some things in the letters are very affirming to our environment. For example, Paul’s clarity of teaching on the Lord’s Table – something very near and dear to our assembly. Some things in the letters are very challenging: handling conflict would be an issue for us – and nearly any other church. Some things seem pretty removed from our situation: not many of my brothers and sisters here are tempted to eat food offered to idols.

I came across a pretty unrelated section this morning. That is, unrelated to my church, but very much related to one of the infuriating themes in Paul’s dealings with the Corinthian church. I have written before of the church’s dysfunction and this church’s dysfunctional relationship to Paul (http://ericmesselt.blogspot.com/search/label/1%20Corinthians%206, http://ericmesselt.blogspot.com/search/label/1%20Corinthians%2010, and http://ericmesselt.blogspot.com/search/label/1%20Corinthians%2012). During all my reflection on the relationship that Paul had with this church, I nearly always put the blame for the dysfunction on the dorky believers in Corinth.

But there was this one episode that I tentatively suggested might be Paul’s fault. I wrote about that here: http://ericmesselt.blogspot.com/search/label/1%20Corinthians. I suggested that Paul may have made a ‘miscalculation’ in his insistence that he be so generous with the Corinthian church. That is, when he – out of grace and love and a desire to reflect the generosity of the gospel itself (2Cor 4:2) – did not make any demands or requests for the new Corinthian believers to financially support Paul (2Cor 11:9). We look at that decision and generally marvel in the giving and sacrificial posture that Paul adopted with these believers. However, this decision cost Paul – a lot. From that time to the writing of the two epistles, there was always an issue of Paul’s authority with this church (1Cor 1:12; 3:1-4; 4:1; 9:1-3; 2Cor 3:1-2; 10:8; 11:21-12:13) and the church’s inability to form a proper emotional bound with Paul (1Cor 4:14-16; 2Cor 5:13-12-13; 6:11-13; 7:2-4; 10:13-14; especially 2Cor 11:16-20). Even Paul acknowledges a potential problem when he states, “Or did I commit a sin in humbling myself so that you might be exalted, because I preached God’s gospel to you free of charge?” (2Cor 11:7) and “For in what were you less favored than the rest of the churches except that I myself did not burden you? Forgive me this ‘wrong!’” (2Cor12:13).

But as I was reading this morning, I came across this section in 1 Corinthians 9:14-16

“In the same way, the Lord commanded that those who proclaim the gospel should get their living by the gospel. But I have made no use of any of these rights, nor am I writing these things to secure any such provision. For I would rather die than have anyone deprive me of my ground for boasting. For if I preach the gospel, that gives me no ground for boasting …”

Paul remembers this right, of course: Jesus commanded that those who preach the gospel should earn their living from the gospel. He did this in Matthew 10:10. But then Paul says – this is astonishing! – that he did Not Obey Jesus! Instead, Paul turns Jesus’ words of commandment into a ‘right’ that Paul chooses to not exercise. Why? So Paul can “boast.”

The word that Paul uses for “commanded” is like a “specific arrangement,” or “direct order;” not a guideline, recommendation, suggestion, or discretionary policy. It is not the granting of a right. There is nothing optional about the word. There are other words for a softer ‘command’ and Paul didn’t use them. Commentators want to agree with Paul and so ignore this word or re-cast it as a suggestion.

I’m boggled by this. Paul seems to have made a deliberate choice to disregard Jesus’ plain arrangements for how the livelihood for preachers of the gospel is to be secured and, instead, embarked upon a frolic based upon the fact that it would make him able to boast about his generosity. To put it starkly: Paul chose between feeling good and obeying Jesus.

Now I can hear the howls of protest already. But let me remind you that Apostles are not infallible in their actions. We do affirm that Apostles were charged and functioned to accurately pass along Jesus’ teachings. Note the situation here: Paul DID accurately pass along Jesus’ teaching – Paul just didn’t obey Jesus’ teaching. And the result is that Paul’s relationship with the Corinthian church was pretty messed up.

Certainly not all of the dysfunction regarding the Corinthian church’s relationship with Paul can be laid at Paul’s feet. It is clear that the Corinthians were a pretty messed up church and they bear responsibility for their own sins. But it is worth noting that Paul’s relationship with the church was damaged based on his posture towards them about money. I’ve preached on this before: money and possessions have unexpected spiritual influence.

The lesson here is that if Paul had done his ministry as Jesus had instructed, it seems that his relationship with the Corinthian church would have been healthier.

Love One Another; Deleted Scenes

I preached a sermon in mid-August called, "Love One Another." I wasn't able to get all of my thoughts in so here are some that didn't make the cut...

I started my sermon by reflecting on the text in 2 Corinthians 6:11-13 “We have spoken freely to you, Corinthians, and opened wide our hearts to you. You are not restricted by us, but you are restricted in your own affections. As a fair exchange-- I speak as to my children-- open wide your hearts also” I commented on this odd emotional non-response that Paul received from this church he had planted.

This got me thinking about an often-ignored aspect of our spiritual lives: emotional health. We – especially in our movement – are very willing to acknowledge that we need to grow in -

• obedience – we need to act with discipline and self-control
• rational processes – we need to think clearly
• faith – to use our capacity for hope and future thinking to see what God will do

BUT we are suspicious of issues of the heart. Even though we really appreciate other believers who are emotionally mature and healthy, we have seen so many abuses of “emotionalism” and get a bit skittish when we talk about emotional expressions in the Christian life. We don’t like to talk about this stuff and we don’t know how to talk with each other about each other’s emotional health, and even more to the point, growth. Yes, it seems to me that we should be helping each other to grow emotionally.

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As to loving each other, there are three kinds of love that we can express in the church. No, these don’t relate to the three Greek words; these are ideas about loving each other:

• Justice – doing love in our community and society
• Truth – caring enough for somebody to tell them the truth
• Grace – usually what we over-emphasize: giving people a break, avoiding confrontation

- when we emphasize one of these to the exclusion of the other two, we get into trouble

I was thinking about how we can love each other in very pragmatic ways and thought of 1 John 3:17-18 “If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.” It occurs to me that James and John (especially in 1John where he hammers in the idea that we must love our brothers) are completely synched-up on this; it makes one wonder if they ever sat down over a coffee and shared their concern for pastoral compassion ministry…

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Valuing our “Community”

One of the hit TV series of the ‘90’s and new millennium was “Friends;” before that, it was “Cheers” (trading alcohol for caffeine). As our society and families break down, we have looked for a new sense of belonging, group, affiliation, and friends. Americans have famously been called, “a nation of joiners.” As much as we talk about ‘rugged individualism,’ we like coming together. And if this is true for Americans, the most individualist culture on the planet, it is even more true for the rest of the world: humans are social beings.

One of the things we sometimes forget to appreciate is that when we are converted, not only do we get a new heart that now wants to please God and live in obedience to him, but we also enter into a new community of spiritual brothers and sisters, the church: especially the local church – an assembly of other Christians who want to please God and live in obedience to him

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Conflict is one of the barriers to loving each other. It prevents love – puts a cap on it. Conflict among believers is so important that Jesus and Paul spend significant time on it in Matthew 5, Matthew 18, and 1Corinthians 6 – as well as several other shorter sections of scripture. Most Christian conflict resolution occurs through the common-sense application of these scriptures. Some of you in this room need to take these scriptures seriously and attempt reconciliation with your brothers or sisters: not that you will achieve it, but you must – in so far as it depends on you – live at peace with all men

God as “Daddy”

I have heard preached for many years the idea that we, as Christians, have a “Daddy” relationship with God. Here’s an example from a recent work I read:

Jesus constantly addressed the Almighty, eternal, infinite Yahweh as “Abba,” an intimate, warm, familiar word a child would use for “Daddy.”

So I decided to track that down and nail it analytically. After all, I’m a seminary graduate and such; I’ve got this very nifty Bible software; and I know a little about Biblical languages. I can nail down exactly how "constantly" Jesus used the word, "abba." My point wasn’t to find that this is not true, but to quantify it so I could preach something like: “85% of the time, Jesus address God as ‘Daddy’ and that should tell us something about the relationship that he has secured for us with our Creator…” – or something like that.

So here are the facts: there are two words for “father” used in the New Testament. The first is the word, pater (which is similar to the Latin) and the other is the word, abba. The idea as usually preached is that pater is a formal address (“My most honored father”) while abba is a very familiar address (“Daddy, my knee has a boo-boo!”). The message is that certainly we can address God with respect and honor, but we can also address him as “Daddy” who cares deeply for us. Therefore, according to this idea, the overriding message of the Bible is that there are two ways of relating to God, as father or daddy.

So I fired up my Bible software and turned on my Greek language Thinking Cap. And I prepared myself for slogging through all the occurrences of “Abba” in the New Testament. So I performed the appropriate word search. Here’s what I found:

• Uses of the word, pater: 167 (one hundred sixty seven).
• Uses of the word, abba: 3 (three: Mk 14:36; Rm 8:15; Ga 4:6).

Unfortunately, I actually read my Bible. Again, my seminary professor’s words rang in my ear: “Don’t read the Bible!! It’s a dangerous book and will mess up your theology!” And this from a Systematic Theology professor. Of course, he was being mercilessly ironic by saying that. In fact, his clear point (and now I say the same thing) is that you *must* read what the Bible actually says. And when the clear teaching of the Bible conflicts with your theological notions, your notions must yield.

So here’s the reality: Jesus overwhelmingly refers to God as pater (father) and only once as abba.

Opps. Hear the sound of a hundred sermons based on the point that Jesus “constantly addressed the Almighty, … as ‘Abba’” going down the giant dustbin of bad exegesis.

So. Hmmmm. That’s not good.

Now one thing that an educated man is supposed to learn is ignorance. That is, I learn more so I can learn how much I don’t know. When I studied both Greek and Hebrew in seminary, I learned that I really don’t know very much about those languages. So I went to a real expert in Biblical languages and asked him about the abba and pater difference. Here’s what he told me.

The idea that pater and abba somehow signal two different kinds of relationship with a father is false. The two words come from two different languages and mean the same thing. Exactly the same thing. Pater means father in Greek and abba means father in Aramaic. Aramaic was the day-to-day language spoken by people in the Middle East and likely the language that Jesus spoke most of the time. Greek children who had a cuddly relationship with their daddies could call him pater. Middle Easter children of that time who were in a strained relationship with their father could call him, Abba.

Now there is a particular gramatic form that abba communicates and that is the Vocative. For you non-grammarians out there, the Vocative form is used by some languages as a form of address. Examples might be: “Father – look out!” or “Daddy, can you come here?” or “Old Man, who do you think you’re kidding?” – the idea in the Vocative is that you are trying to get the attention of the person you’re addressing by using their name or title. And when you look at the usage of abba in the New Testament, that’s exactly how the word is used – as a form of address.

Conclusion: there is No Difference between abba and pater - they both mean father.

Now the question is why would Jesus and Paul use Aramaic in those three instances? Notice this: in each of those instances, they also use the Greek word (abba ho pater is translated, “Abba, father”). When Jesus uses the word, it may be that Mark is attempting to communicate that Jesus’ feelings were so authentic that he used the language of his youth. When Paul uses the word, it may be to make a connection to a mixed audience of Greek and Aramaic speakers.

Maybe some of you language experts out there can help me out. What do you think?

Worship – Deleted Scenes

I preached on some ideas about worship recently and did not include all of my thoughts and have since then realized I needed to make some clarifications.

First of all, preaching about worship is a tough sermon to listen to. I mean, it’s what we are supposed to be doing right now, even as the preacher is talking. So there’s a natural defensiveness that can affect us as we listen to a sermon on worship during a time of worship. We can ask: “Am I doing the right thing? Do I have the right attitude? Will he say something that I’m doing is wrong?” So this can be a weird time.

Something that I’ve recently become aware of is the linkage between worship and food. Yeah, it seems weird to me, too. But consider these passages: Ex. 24:9-11; Dt. 14:23, 26; 1Tm 4:1-4; Neh 8:9-10. There’s an odd, unexpected connection between worship and eating. In fact, the passage from 1 Timothy says that it is pagans – who don’t know how to truly worship – who will tell you to abstain from food. John Ortberg said, “In general, I believe we have underestimated the importance of pleasure in spiritual formation.”

I think that we underestimate the importance of joy and celebration in our worship. I spoke about the small steps I’ve made to be a better worshipper when I come together with the other believers at my church. I started by saying we need to engage our minds more and I don’t think that will meet with much resistance from this congregation.

I then said that we need to engage our hearts more (that is, our emotional life) in worship and used the Biblical example of David (a “man after God’s own heart”) who was clearly an emotional man, worshipped God emotionally, and seems to have been approved for that. That will leave some of you in the congregation cold. There is a strong feeling (isn’t that ironic?) that emotions are to be highly suspect. People trust their “heads” more than their “hearts.” Some people feel uncomfortable when they witness strong emotional expression.

As someone who is well practiced at trying to suppress my emotional life for several decades, I think I have some grasp on this phenomena. It seems to me that some people who are suspicious of emotional expression react that way NOT because they are not emotional people. Quite the opposite. They are VERY emotional people and realize that their emotional life gets them into trouble. So like the mythical Vulcans in the Star Trek legend, they work very hard at suppressing their emotions. Rather than allowing their emotions to be expressed in healthy and mature ways, they keep a lid on it. They probably pride themselves (there’s some emotional stuff right there) on being able to stay “cool.” And like those Vulcan characters, they are very uncomfortable with witnessing emotional “displays.” Why? Because it reminds them of their own seething feelings and they fear that they will lose control. Control is pretty important.

Now – and I’m speaking to myself, as well – the better thing to do is look at ourselves, realize our weakness, and not condemn those who do it better. That is, I may not be able to raise my arms far over my head in worship. But to those who can, and are doing so in an authentic manner, I should look to them as better worshippers than I. It’s alright that I’m not as further along. I need to recognize and admit that I am the weaker brother and strive to be stronger. My current weakness is no reason for me to insist that the stronger brother should be prevented from truer, better, and whole-hearted worship.

So if you find that you just can’t bring yourself to clap, raise your arms, or be very expressive in worship; really, that is OK! This is NOT the kind of church that insists that you must do those things to “prove” you are a real God worshipper. I am merely encouraging you to take the next, best step to increase your capacity for worship. I would further ask that as others are trying to take those steps for themselves, that you not prevent their expression of Biblical worship.

Give Your Pastor A Break

This is going to be a bit more of a rambling blog than usual. I had a weird experience this last weekend. And I need to be careful as I know this can be taken as being negative or critical of the very people I serve and journey with in my faith. That is not my intent.

We had a time of sharing and I mentioned, with some feeling, that I'd experienced a discouraging week. It had started fine, but a variety of things had not turned out well, there has been some criticism of the church (very unjustified), there are some painful decisions to make, and by the end of the week I was feeling a bit down.

As I was sitting there during our worship time, I was thinking through my little pity-party with a Biblical perspective. I remembered how happy I am to be here, what a privilege it is to do this kind of work, how graciously Jesus has provided for me and my family, how I have watched people in the last week go through gut-wrenching suffering and have been able to comfort them. Folks, I'm in the front row of what God is doing in some lives! To restate it, I came out from a hard week and into the room worshiping Jesus with my fellow Christ followers - and I could respond with joy. That was a great experience!

I shared from Psalm 13 which, like several other Psalms, has the same message: life seems bad, really is bad, but come into worship and you feel better. I was reminded of this and suddenly felt badly for those people who don't have the opportunity to engage in real worship, who do not have a vital relationship with Jesus, who do not (or even Christians who will not) take the time to worship and thereby are left to stew in their own minor miseries until the stew becomes a new misery of itself. Anyway, and I could go on – it was a pretty powerful moment for me.

The weird thing – well it seemed weird to me – is that people were reacting to the thought that their pastor was anything but happy, joyful, and content. Now, in the specifics I understand that there are reasons for some folk to over-react. But there can be some odd expectations of what a pastor's emotional health should be like.

Let me part the curtain a bit. Your pastor occasionally gets discouraged, even depressed. The only one who doesn't seem to be so afflicted is Joel Olsteen and I kinda wonder at that guy. But, hopefully, your pastor does not stay there in discouragement. How? Because of his own walk with the Lord and your prayers. But to think less of or, even worse, criticize your pastor for being occasionally down is very bad.

And it is more than – shall I say it – insulting to imply that your pastor who's had a bad week is not living in faith? If the apostle Paul could admit to his occasional discouragement and suffering, then you've got to look Paul in the face and tell him he didn't live by faith. And then he'll stand aside and you can talk to Jesus. Here was the person who was foretold to be a "Man of sorrows, acquainted with grief." Go ahead, look Jesus in the face and tell him that he lacked faith. Being sad is not necessarily an issue of faith.

I understand that we want our leaders, especially in the church, to be better than us. But setting up those expectations in an unrealistic manner will only encourage a great sin: the sin of hypocrisy. That is, rather than being honest or "authentic" with their discouragement, your leaders will just lie to you. Why? Because you want them to. Your unrealistic expectations will tempt your brother to sin. And they will eventually not be able to lead you because they can never tell you what is really going on in their heart.

Be mindful of the expectations you have of your pastor.

Michigan Transitions – E

I’ve been in southeast Michigan now for six months and a few other things have come on the “hmm, this is different” radar.

• One of the things that was actually attractive to us when we came to the area is that there are more people here. My wife and I grew up in metropolitan areas and we understand traffic, congestion, and suburbia. In a sense, coming to the suburbs north of Detroit was like coming home.
• Humidity – West of the Rockies, we just don’t get real humid weather. Even in the northwest where it rains frequently and moss grows on house rooftops, it doesn’t get as humid as the south and Midwest parts of the continent. Being here about half-way through the summer, I am reminded of a meteorological reality: summer rain is a regular thing. In southern California, you get your last rain in May and it doesn’t rain again until October. Even in the northwest, you’ll get summer showers, but they are brief and light storms. Here near Detroit, when it rains in the summer: it dumps in a thunderstorm and the puddles last for a couple of days.
• Additionally, as I was driving around, another reason there is so much water in the air is clear: not only is Michigan bordered by four of the five Great Lakes, but there are a gazillian smaller lakes and ponds scattered throughout the land. There is probably some study to show the percentage of water surface to land surface here and my guess is that the percentage is much higher here than anywhere in the west.
• The terrain is also different. It is flat here. Again, in the west you don’t have to search far to find a hill or mountain somewhere in your view. On one hand, this can be disorienting for me as during certain times of the day in certain weather (noon-ish with overcast skies), I can’t tell compass direction. On the other hand, it does give a wider vista. Somehow sunsets are more spectacular.
• The coastal northwest does one better, of course. The prevailing tree type is tall and narrow. Therefore, even driving along the Interstate, you can actually have your view of the terrain blocked by trees. In southern California, there aren’t many trees so your view of the terrain is remarkably clear.
• At least in this part of Michigan, this flatness translates to a pleasantly broad landscape. The roadways are built with wide margins between street surface and sidewalk. The notorious “Michigan Lefts” do have the benefit of creating wide medians along major streets.
• “Pop.” OK, this is pretty mundane but I grew up calling soft drinks, “soda.” Here, you go into a restaurant and when the waitress asks what you want to drink, saying “soda” is going to create confusion. “Pop” is the term. And there is a fairly important devotion to regional favorites. Vernor’s ginger ale is bottled locally and is a favorite (though not drunk as frequently as is claimed, I observe). Additionally, “Faygo” is a local soft drink bottler with their own brands and flavors.

A Modern Heresy

“For the body does not consist of one member but of many. If the foot should say, ‘Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body.” 1Corinthians 12:14-15.

I was reading this passage this morning and realized, as so often happens, that I was reading right past a significant understanding of this section.

Usually, when this section of scripture is taught or preached on, the emphasis is placed on one of several themes. The themes are the diversity of Christian community in a local church, the relative importance or unimportance of a specific manifestation of the Holy Spirit, or the kinds of manifestations of the Holy Spirit (“spiritual gifts”) that are legitimate. In these verses, it is the diversity theme that gets preached on and it pretty much goes like this: we’re all different, we all contribute in different ways, and we should not become jealous of other people’s contributions to the church that seem more glamorous than ours. Really, what gets emphasized here is a late-20th century feel-good egalitarianism. Now I’m not suggesting that emphasis isn’t valid and, indeed, is probably part of the teaching here. But it now occurs to me that emphasis is not the best interpretation.

One of the difficult tasks of interpreting any of the New Testament epistles is that you are reading only one side of the conversation. All of the epistles from Paul, John, Peter, James, or Jude are responses from some inquiry or event from a local church. That is, to properly interpret the epistle, you need to have an understanding of the back-story. Now, providentially, this is actually not that hard to do. Frequently, the writer of the epistle will restate the question that was asked or make it pretty clear what the issue was that they are now addressing.

As I was reading this section it occurred to me that the backstory wasn’t merely some people claiming that their spiritual gifts were more important than others, making them into some sort of spiritual elite. No, Paul is actually repeating something quite different. Apparently, there were people who were convinced (by whom?) that “If I’m not gifted like …” then; what?
That they aren’t ‘as important’ as those who are?
No!

These ‘non-hand’ people had been convinced that if they weren’t like a hand, then they were “not part of the body” at all. That is, somebody had been teaching or preaching that if you don’t have a specific spiritual gift, you are not a Christian.

In the next verse, Paul actually repeats the same idea for emphasis. If somebody was told, “if you’re not an ‘eye,’ then you’re not a Christian” and that person believed it. Paul repeats himself – ‘that’s just plain wrong.’ In fact, Paul goes a bit further and says that just because somebody doesn’t think they’re a Christian (because of this bad teaching about ‘litmus-test spiritual gifts’), that doesn’t make them not a Christian. Or to be more precise, 'If you're not a Christian, the reason is not that you don't have a particular gift.'

So, in current theological language, the issue was a bad teaching that “charismatic grace affirms salvific grace.”

And then, rather than spill ink on smacking down those who were teaching such weird ideas, Paul spends his time refuting the teaching and affirming the importance and diversity of everyone’s Spirit-empowered ministry in the local church. The closest he comes to smacking down the apparent sources of this bad teaching is when he says that “those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow greater honor” (v. 23) and “God has … [given] greater honor to the part that lacked it” (v. 25). That is, all those guys who think they’re so great because they are a ‘hand’ or ‘eye’ actually don’t realize how less honorable they really are.

So the point is that this indicates that the situation with this church in Corinth was actually much worse than is usually preached. There were people not only saying that they were more important to others because of their spiritual gifts; but apparently there were people saying that if you do not have a specific spiritual gift, then you really aren’t a Christian. And the sad thing was that there were people in the church who were believing this bad doctrine.

And Paul’s pastoral heart must have broken for these poor souls who were being told they weren’t really saved. Such a false teaching is profoundly unloving (as it rests on the sin of pride). Please note that Paul then turns the church’s attention from this false teaching to a much better understanding of the church’s diversity and then to “a still more excellent way;” that is, love. And after that, he then comes back to clarify the relative importance of certain spiritual gifts.

Folks, there are – today – movements within Christendom which teach the same error. They will say that if a Christian doesn’t have a specific spiritual gift, then that person is not part of the body of the church. This idea is just as wrong today as it was nearly 2,000 years ago.

Idolatry in the Church

I was reading 1 Corinthians 10 and Paul starts talking about idolatry – to a church! Well, that’s pretty strange right three. But what is even stranger is that he weaves all this talk about running away from idolatry with a doctrinal discussion of the Lord’s Supper.

Now what is going on here? Throughout the history of Yahweh-followers, there has always been a problem with ‘worship distraction.’ Sometimes it happens when leaders thought that God was just not around anymore (Exodus 32), or that worship of God was too inconvenient and sought to provide more convenient (and politically expedient) options (1Kings 12:25ff), or no longer believed that Yahweh was as powerful as the alternatives (1Kings 14ff). And, periodically, Yahweh would confront these delusions by sending prophets and displaying mighty acts to show the reality of the situation. One of the most scathing denunciations was spoken by the prophet Isaiah who mercilessly ridiculed those who would seriously worship their own creation.

But after Jesus came, surely (you ask) wasn’t idolatry a thing of the ancient past? Well, no. There were still people very actively worshiping other gods and expressing veneration to statues and images of those gods. All that’s fine, you might say, but we live in the 21st century where we just don’t do such silly things.

Again, no – our society is full of worship and especially of idols.

Now it would be too easy to suggest that the current popularity of “American Idol” feeds into actual idolatry. But to properly understand idolatry you must read what the Bible says about it. Idolatry is not only the worship of other gods than Yahweh in the form of statues and images – it is the worship of any thing or person other than Yahweh. That is, when you make a thing into a god, that’s when it become idolatry. And you know that you’ve made the thing into a god when you start engaging in functional worship of it. Worship is “veneration” and “sacrifice;” or – to put it another way: attention-dedication and money-time.

Paul says, in 1Corinthians 10 that people in the past worshipped feasting and sexual gratification. That is, they made food and sex into gods by giving food and sex the kind of attention and resources that rightly belongs to God.

And that’s how idolatry can get into a church. Paul, in other places, also tells us that covetousness (wanting what we shouldn’t have), evil thoughts, and even grumbling can all be idolatrous. In the 21st century we can easily see that materialism, pornography, addictions, celebrities, and even dysfunctional relationships can be sources of idolatry. Watch the average American Male on Sunday afternoons and you’ll see idolatry while they worship Rams, Tigers, Bears, Colts, Bengals, Cubs, Bulls, Bucks, Grizzlies, Orioles, Ravens, Blue Jays, Eagles, Seahawks, Giants, Pistons, Cardinals, Mariners, Marlins, Broncos, Texans, Lakers, Pirates, Vikings, Saints, and Kings - but (regional joke here) not Lions.

And that’s what Paul is warning the church about: when people who spend their week in functional worship of other ‘gods’ come in to church on a Sunday and then participate in the Lord’s Supper, they are doing a bad thing. Paul says that the Lord’s Supper is, in some way still not fully understood by Christian theologians, a union with Jesus as God. To engage in such a significant event while also worshipping other gods is disloyal, disrespectful, insulting, and delusional.

I’m now ministering in a movement that – rightly – takes the Lord’s Supper seriously. We weekly practice this reminder of Christ’s atoning death for our sin – a HUGE part of The Good News that we Christians should be talking about and acting out. This section of the Bible reminds us that we, even as “Jesus People,” can be distracted from true worship of God. And this reminds us that we must be especially attentive to the other ‘gods’ in our lives that attempt to worm there way into the place where only God should be.

Michigan Transitions – D

Once I’d been here and observed people and the environment, I tried to engage in a little amateur anthropology. Sure, being in the upper mid-west and being in the northwest, or even being in southern California aren’t really big differences. It’s not like I found myself in Zaire, after all.

But that’s the challenge, isn’t it? There are differences, even though they are subtle, and it is important to attempt to understand them in order to determine how you will respond to the differences.

Much of what I learned came from people already here. People who were born and raised here, but had travelled and spend significant time in the places I was formed in, were able to give me a perspective. “Where you’re from, things seem to be like this …, but around here, it’s more like ….”

I’ve had to come to grips with my “sub-culture perspectivalism.” That is, my perceptions are shaped by my formative environment. I was born and raised in southern California. That, right there, is a sub-culture apart from most of the rest of the nation of the United States of America. I am a “SoCal boy” and my formative years were spent living a mile away from the Pacific Ocean. The rest of the country was about football or hockey; we were about surfing and volleyball. Southern California, because of the movie and television industry, became the media capital of the country. Though all the media money was in New York, much of the creative talent was in my neighborhood.

I grew up in suburban sprawl, pleasant weather, and was surrounded by people who came from somewhere else. In fact, that “somewhere else” was a subliminal message: “Where I came from was not good.” That is, the east coast, mid-west, and south were places that were bad. California was the land of “opportunity,” meaning that the rest of the country were places of stifling tradition, oppressive conflict, and narrow-minded bigotry. That was the worldview that formed me.

So here are a couple more differences:

• One of the natives here in Michigan says that they are not an optimistic people. Life is hard, the future is not always bright or hopeful, and it is entirely possible that things will get worse. This is in stark contrast to the “California mindset:” life is good, the future looks better, and we can have hope. I’m not really convinced that mid-westerners are pessimistic, but there is a mindset of “toughing it out.”
  
• Mid-westerners are rooted people. They frequently live within 10 to 20 miles of where they grew up. They are in weekly physical contact with family members. Their friends have been friends since elementary school. By contrast, the west coast is full of people who got there by up-rooting and travelling to a mostly unknown place. West-coasters are mobile people who will not find it hard to move from Portland to San Francisco because of job relocation. “Our real friends will keep in touch and we’ll make new friends when we get there.” Family ties are a bit looser in the west – it is not as important to visit mom and dad every weekend. In fact, because family and friends are more scattered, it gives an excuse to travel frequently to visit.

Michigan Transitions - C

So our transition to Michigan first began when I started looking for a job. When I got a nibble from the church, I began investigating the area much more thoroughly. This involved research on the web and even talking to some people who’d lived in or even just visited Michigan and the Detroit area.

The next phase was an actual visit. This helped me to put together things that weren’t clear in my data-only investigation. Now I was able to see with my own eyes and hear with my own ears.
After a second on-site interview with my family, we compared notes and impressions and all of us had favorable responses. The area seemed very much like a flatter, yet prettier, version of southern California. There were more trees, the roads were wider and had more green strips, but there was still the energy and fun of being in a large suburban community.

The next phase of the transition was the acceptance of the ‘job offer’ and then solving the problem of how to get me relocated to Michigan. We decided that I would go, set up ‘camp’ in a small apartment, and get established in my job while the rest of the family would stay put and concentrate on getting the house ready for sale.

To do that, my wife and I took a cross-country road trip so that I could have my car with me at my new ‘home.’ That turned out to be much more of an adventure than we’d anticipated. We got right in the middle of a record-breaking storm and had awful weather all the way across the mountain and plains states. However, providentially, we were always able to travel during daylight hours. That’s not, “travel comfortably,” but we were able to make time and distance. Once we reached Chicago, my wife took a plane back to Washington and I continued on by myself arriving safely.

I was able to secure a condominium ‘house-sit’ and set up my bachelor life while getting oriented to my new job. About two months later, I flew back out to Washington and drove my wife and son across country (much different route, this time!) to join me.

During those couple of months while I was ‘bach-ing it,’ I certainly learned something about getting around in the snow. What was ironic was that this season was the worst snow in decades for the area. So it was a ‘baptism by snow.’ Fortunately, I learned enough quickly enough about driving in the piles of white stuff to avoid any accidents.

As one who was born and raised in the Los Angeles metro area, driving skills were Very Important. As I have travelled and moved place to place, for some reason I am very sensitive to the "car driving sub-culture." How people drive their vehicles is usually the first thing my mind registers as, "Hey, people do things differently around here."

A couple of driving-in-the-snow tips:

• your 4-wheel drive only helps you go in one direction: straight. It does not help you stop any better. You also need an anti-lock braking system to help you from skidding.
• Additionally, losing traction when turning is a common occurrence. Your tires are designed to start and stop in a straight line – they are not so good at holding you on a curve in slippery conditions. For the nerds: think "lateral forces."
• Different snow drives differently. Very cold, powdery snow is actually not so bad for traction; especially if there’s a wind: it acts almost like sand. The worst is melting snow – the combination of ice, water, and snow makes the road “slick as snot.” Typical was the snow that piles up before the plows push it away – it almost looks like stiff oatmeal as your tires go through it.
• I found that, generally, the colder the weather the better the snow traction.

General driving observations:

• There is an odd thing here: the "Michigan Left." In the Detroit area on major streets, the Wise Men of Traffic Control have decided that drivers can not be trusted to make left hand turns as the rest of the country does. They have very wide medians and expect you to first make a right turn, cross over all the lanes of traffic, and then pull into a special turn lane that is put into the median. If you check out Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_left) you can get the full scoop. Check out this animated website (http://www.michigan.gov/documents/mdot/MDOT_Roads-Travel_mich_left_213414_7.swf) to understand this more clearly. From my perspective, all this does is add milage to your trip and provide even more opportunity for accidents as you cross all those lanes of traffic or become confused as to how to handle an intersection - or even if there is an intersection.
• As mentioned before, the road conditions are much poorer than in the west. Whoever the road engineer geniuses are who devised the Michigan Left apparently wasted all that brainpower on making it more difficult to get from place to place rather than thinking of better ways to make a road bed less prone to pothole-ing.
• Drivers here, as befits residents of the Motor City, are more aggressive. But they frequently drive faster than they are competent. I say this not only as I observe driving behavior, but as I observe the pragmatic results. Already in our time here, we have seen one accident happen right in front of us and another that must have occurred less than two minutes before we got there, as well as seeing a few post-accident scenes on the streets here. Even after 30+ years in Los Angeles traffic, I don't remember seeing so many accidents in such a brief amount of time.
• On the freeways, tailgating is frequent. Sometimes its of the aggressive sort: "Hey, I wanna go faster - get out of my way!" But it is also of a nonchalant sort: "You're going 65 mph and that's a good speed. I'll go 65 mph, too - three yards off your rear bumper."
• Cell-phone use while driving has not be prohibited here, yet. And it does show. There are many times when somebody will be traveling slow in the fast lane, you pass them, and see that they are talking on their cell phone. The other tell-tale sign is weaving or poor lane placement (having the car way over on either the right or left part of the lane - or crossing it). It is true that distracted driving prevents you from concentrating on all the things you need to do to drive well in a fast-paced environment.
• People around here do use their horns more. On the west coast, it was rare that somebody would use their horn to "send a message" of contempt or anger. Horn use was almost always "Look out! Do you see me?" Here, there is more horn use of the "sending a message" sort.
• There are several controlled intersections where there is a small sign posted prohibiting turning right on a red light. The vast majority of these are unneeded (frequently posted in intersections that have left-hand turn light control) and seem posted to become a revenue-producing opportunity for the local law enforcement departments.