God’s Word in the Age of Victimization

It’s important for all of us to understand those who are different from us. This makes us better people, better Christians, and better servants of Jesus. And often, this means trying to understand those of other generations–whether those who have gone before us or those who are coming after us.

In an effort to better understand the next generation, recently I’ve been reading a book by Jean M. Twenge titled iGen: Why Today’s Super-Connected Kids Are Growing Up Less Rebellious, More Tolerant, Less Happy–and Completely Unprepared for Adulthood. The book provides a statistical profile of what Twenge classifies a “iGen”: those born between 1995 and 2012. The members of iGen are now graduating high school and college and entering adult society. As a minister, these are the next generation of Christians believers and of unbelievers who need to hear about Jesus–and like any generation, they hold certain values and modes of thought that are different from Millenials like me and other generations before them.

There is much that could be discussed from this book, but I won’t do all of that here. If you are in ministry, or even if you just want to know more about how American society is changing, I would recommend that you pick up a copy. Twenge highlights several major areas in which iGen is different from previous generations, and it’s helpful for all of us at least be aware of these.

But for my purposes today, one idea especially caught my attention. In one chapter, Twenge shows that iGen is more concerned with safety that other generations had been. Many members of this generation have experienced greater levels of supervision at home, at school, and elsewhere, in order to make sure they are safe. In many ways, this concern for safety has had positive effects: Today’s teenagers and young adults are more likely to wear their seatbelts and drive safely, and are less likely to drink or get into fights.

An interesting wrinkle, however, is in the observation that safety has come to not only refer to physical safety, but to emotional safety as well. Just as people are cautious to not be physically injured, they take steps to avoid “emotional injury” too. Such emotional injury may come from someone’s words, or from being confronted with a viewpoint that offends or is at adds with yours. Twenge writes, “This is the flip side of iGen’s interest in safety: the idea that one should be safe not just from car accidents and sexual assault but from people who disagree with you.” All of this lends to the development of safe spaces, trigger warnings, and concern for microaggressions. More and more, people are anxious about being forced to confront messages that they do not want to have to confront.

One example of this trend helped me think on what this all means as a minister. She writes:

Some students have taken this notion even further–beyond offensive or extreme speech to anything that makes them feel uncomfortable or challenges them to question their actions. Everett Piper, the president of Oklahoma Wesleyan University, said a student told him he felt ‘victimized’ by a sermon on a passage in Corinthians about showing love. Why? Because it ‘made him feel bad for not showing love! In his mind, the speaker was wrong for making him, and his peers, feel uncomfortable.’ In this way of thinking, no one should ever say anything that makes a student feel bad, even if it might inspire him or her to do better.”

I read this paragraph to my wife and asked her what she thought about the student claiming to be “victimized” by the sermon. She responded, “Isn’t that conviction?” And I would agree. Conviction is one of the things God does, after all. Jesus said that the Holy Spirit would “convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment” (Jn. 16:8). The goodness of the gospel is so good because the badness of our sin is so bad. To understand what Jesus has done in rescuing us, we need to understand how we have failed. In addition, the process of sanctification requires that we continously be confronted by and convicted by the reality of our sin. Only in this way can we grow in Christ-likeness.

But it all poses challenging problems for those of us who teach or preach. If, for example, calling people to be more loving causes our hearers to feel “victimized,” how can we teach about sin? How can we help even believers grow in holiness and Christlikeness?

I don’t know that I have clear answers to those questions yet. But here are a few basic ideas that I’ve been tossing around as I’ve been thinking about this:

1. The problem isn’t entirely new

Granted, the language of victimization in place of conviction may be new to me. But the root issue isn’t really new: People don’t like to be told that they have been doing something. We recoil from the conviction that comes through God’s Word and the Holy Spirit. In the 60’s AD, Paul wrote, “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions” (2 Tim. 4:3). He also wrote of those “whose consciences are seared” (1 Tim. 4:2). When Stephen preached a sermon that challenged the Sanhedrin, they “stopped their ears” as they rushed at him to kill him (Acts 7:57). Even 800 years before Jesus, the king Ahab complained that the prophet Micaiah didn’t prophesy good things about him, but only bad (1 Kgs. 22:18). It’s a common element of human nature in all generations: We want to be patted on the back and told we’re doing everything right. We don’t want anyone (prophet, preacher, or God himself) to tell us that we have sins that need corrected. This element of our nature may be repackaged at different times, but its the same problem at its core.

2. The answer isn’t to tell people to suck it up

I have to admit: my first reaction when I read about someone like the college student in the example above is to say, “C’mon man. You’re not a victim because someone preached a sermon you didn’t like. Deal with it.” And while that may all be true, it’s probably not helpful in many cases. If our response to the changes in culture is to say, “They’re all just being stupid. They need to be more like me instead,” then we’re turning away our hearers before they ever have a chance to listen. We have to meet people where they are instead of expecting us to meet us where we are. Paul famously wrote, “I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some” (1 Cor. 9:22).

3. The answer isn’t to dull the Bible’s edge

Another possibility is to take the opposite track: If today’s generation doesn’t want to be challenged or made uncomfortable, then let’s just gloss over the challenging or uncomfortable parts of the Bible: “Let’s not worry about teaching about sin. Let’s not call people to die to their old selves and follow the way of Christ. Let’s just give people uplifting, inspirational messages that will help them feel good.” But to do this is to diminish the power of God’s Word. The Bible is by nature challenging. It makes us uncomfortable. It is “sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow” (Heb. 4:12). God’s Word is sweet in so many ways, but it can also be bitter (Rev. 10:10).

What do you think? What challenges does today’s concern for emotional safety pose for the church? How can we effectively teach God’s Word in today’s cultural context?

Ministry in Obscurity

This week I was fortunate to be able to attend the Preaching & Teaching Convention, which is held every year at my alma mater, Ozark Christian College. Conferences such as this are some of my favorite times of the year, and this week was no different. I love the chance to catch up with old friends; I love the worship and the sermons; I love the encouragement I get from hearing stories of how God is working through his people throughout the world.

But at the same time, these conventions often come with another side for me. It’s not fault of the conference itself or of any of the people there. Rather, it’s a result of the sinfulness in my heart. The thing is that I tend to compare myself to others. That’s an unhealthy habit in any situation, but perhaps especially so when in infects a context of ministry. I really do like hearing about and seeing others’ successes in ministry, but there is always a part of me that sees the people on stage or hears the stories of megachurch pastors, and I think, “Why aren’t I there? Why don’t I have those same opportunities?” And so even though I always leave weeks like this encouraged, there is a part of me that can easily become wrapped up in envy and jealousy.

With all of that in mind, this week I feel that God has impressed an important question on me. That question is this: Am I okay with obscurity?

That is, will I be okay with it if my picture is never on the back flap of a dust jacket? Will I be okay if my name is never on a course schedule? Will I be okay if I’m never invited to speak at a convention? Will I be okay if my sermons are never put on a podcast? Will I be okay if I never lead a church to double in size? Will I be okay if traffic on my blog is never very significant? Will I be okay without awards and honors? Will I be okay with serving God even if it means no one ever knows my name?

As I’ve been thinking through all of this, I have been reminded of the Fourth Gospel of the New Testament. Tradition holds that this gospel was written by the apostle John (and I think there are good reasons for thinking this). According to the other gospels, John apparently had a pretty big personality. He and his brother James were known as “Sons of Thunder.” When a village refused hospitality to Jesus and the disciples, James and John asked if they should call down fire from the sky to consume the villagers. And later on, they requested that they be given seats at Jesus’ right and left hand in the kingdom. They sought power, recognition, and honor.

But there is an interesting feature in the Gospel of John, and that is that John’s name never appears. Other disciples are named: Philip, Nathanael, Andrew, Peter, Thomas. But John’s name never shows up. The most common understanding is that the figure called “the disciple whom Jesus loved,” who shows up several times in the Gospel, is in fact John. But he never states this explicitly.

John had been one of Jesus’ closest disciples. He was one of the “inner three,” along with Peter and James. He had done miracles and preached the gospel. He was apparently the only one of the Twelve who was present at the crucifixion, and he was one of the first to witness the empty tomb. He had an impressive resume. And yet, when writing the story of Jesus, John didn’t identify himself by his accomplishments, deeds, reputation, or even by his name. Instead, his identity was grounded in the simple truth that he was loved and redeemed by Jesus.

John made little of himself but much of Jesus. And shouldn’t that really be the attitude God is seeking in those who serve him? The question before me is “Am I okay with obscurity?” And until we can answer that in the affirmative, why should God use us? Why would we expect God to utilize messengers who are going to steal the spotlight away from Him? As followers of Christ, we are like publicists: our job isn’t to highlight ourselves, but rather to point people to Jesus. And maybe that requires at least a willingness to live and work in obscurity.

It’s a lesson I’m learning. Like many lessons, it’s one I have a pretty good handle of in my mind, but also one I have difficulty allowing to seep into my life and heart. It’s counter to how our society so often works. We live in an age when business and leadership publications give advice on developing a “personal brand” (which is a weird idea in the first place, right?) A number of people (I think first of some athletes, but I’m sure others do too) have personal logos! This cultural mindset can so easily infiltrate our churches and ministries, and suddenly our work can become less about magnifying God and more about getting our name and face out there.

It’s a hard lesson to live. But we have a story of a Son of Thunder who became an anonymous gospel-writer. The Spirit of God in John produced humility and love and selflessness, and that same Spirit will continue to reshape our twisted and inflated egos when we allow Him to, and when we joyfully embrace the possibility of obscurity.

 

Forgiven and Sent

If you’re anything like me, you’ve often felt unqualified to serve God in any meaningful way.

And you’re probably right to feel that way. Each of us is woefully inadequate for the task of ministry (and by that, I don’t just mean being on a church staff or working as a missionary, but rather the various ways each of us serve God and others). We have sinful pasts, and we continue to battle temptation in the present (a battle in which we sometimes fail). We have flaws in our characters. We struggle to clearly perceive the will of God.

But that’s not a bad thing. In fact, it’s really the only way things can be. None of us have proven ourselves worthy of being used by God. And that’s sort of the point, I think, because the fact that God still chooses and calls us to his service is a means whereby we see his love most clearly put on display. Three examples from Scripture come to mind:

First, we read about the famous call of Isaiah in Isaiah 6. Here Isaiah sees a vision of the heavenly throne-room, where God is seated and is surrounded by worshipping angels. God calls out, and the entire room shakes from the power of his voice. And here Isaiah cries out, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (v. 5). After this, one of the angels touches Isaiah’s mouth with a burning coal, and God then sends Isaiah to work on his prophetic task.

Second, John 21 recounts a conversation between Peter and the resurrected Jesus. As readers of this text, we remember Peter’s recent failings with regard to his thrice-repeated denial of Jesus–an event that the gospel-writer himself recalls with the mention of a “charcoal fire” in verse 9 (cf. Jn. 18:18). As Jesus and Peter talk, Jesus asks Peter three times, “Do you love me?”, and each time, Peter replies that he does. This leads to Jesus giving Peter three instructions: Feed my lambs. Tend my sheep. Feed my sheep.

Third, Acts 9 includes the first telling of Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus. Even though Paul (then called Saul) had been “breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord” (v. 1), Jesus appears to him in heavenly light and sends him to Damascus, where Paul soon comes into contact with a Christian believer named Ananias and is baptized. When Paul later recounts the events in Acts 26, he tells that Jesus had also said to him, “I have appeared to you for this purpose, to appoint you as a servant and witness to the things in which you have seen me and to those in which I will appear to you” (v. 16).

That brings me to what stands out to me in each of these passages: In each one, forgiveness and commission are joined together. The prophet/apostle is in some sense reconciled with God, but at the same time he is given a job to do. This might sound like a rather insignificant observation, but I think it’s key to fully appreciating these passages and what they mean for us today as we grapple with our inadequacy before God.

When I read these three passages, I expect there to be more of a gap between the forgiveness and the commissioning. There should be some sort of “trial period” for the newly-appointed prophet. After Isaiah’s lips are touched with the coal (symbolizing the removal of his uncleanness), I expect God to say, “Okay, great…now get out of here for a while and prove to me that you’ve got what it takes. Go pray a lot, and help some people out, and don’t curse or smoke, and in a  couple months maybe I’ll call you back and we’ll see how we can use you.” But that’s not what happens. God cleanses Isaiah, and he sends him on his task. And it’s the same with Peter and Paul–the demonstration of forgiveness is tightly wound up with their apostolic calling.

I think this should help us be more comfortable with our inadequacy. In just these three examples, God calls and uses sinners, deniers, and persecutors. They haven’t proven themselves, and yet they are sent out as witnesses of God’s Word and of what God has accomplished through Christ.

God doesn’t forgive us of our sins only so that we can enjoy a reconciled relationship with him. As Paul writes in Ephesians 2:10, we are created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” God cleanses our sins, but he does more than this. He gives us a purpose. And stepping into God’s purpose for you is itself an experience of grace.

It’s amazing to me that God chooses to have a relationship with crummy, sinful people like me. And it’s equally amazing that he chooses to utilize crummy, sinful people like me.

But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. (2 Cor. 4:7)

Writing, Preaching, and the Need for Clarity

I was reading a book recently. Well, “reading” might not be the correct term. More accurately, I allowed my eyes to pass along the words on the page while I failed to comprehend most of what I was looking at. I guess that admitting my own academic ineptitude isn’t a wise thing for me to do as a Ph.D. student, but now I’ve already typed it and don’t have the energy to use the backspace key right now.

It’s one of the most frustrating experiences I go through — reading something that I just can’t understand. I get pretty angry about it. But as I was working through this specific book, I began to wonder where the disconnect between the text and myself really was. Was the problem on my end? Probably so, at least to a point. The material in the book (which largely focused on German philosophy of the past couple centuries) isn’t really in my wheelhouse. And besides, my brain may not be in the best shape for understanding complex arguments. (You can read a post I wrote last year about why that may be here.) I’m dumber than I was five years ago, and that’s probably my own fault.

But maybe the problem isn’t solely on my end. One thing I have noticed in my studies over the past couple months is that much of the way people (including myself) communicate is not particularly clear. It happens all the time in academic writing. The words used and the way those words are arranged in a sentence or in a paragraph are often inaccessible to who aren’t already deeply involved in the specific discipline under discussion. To the general reader, or even to the fairly educated reader, the result is total gibberish.

Last month The Atlantic published an article that identifies this very problem. Academic writings is frequently so opaque that its usefulness is extremely limited. How helpful is a piece of writing that requires the reader to pretty much be inside the writer’s head in order to understand what’s being communicated in the first place? Is this communication at all?

But this doesn’t just happen in academic circles. It can happen in just about any form of communication. It can happen in a blog post. It can happen in a sermon. It can probably happen in a conversation. And I don’t know if it’s because we just want to impress people who hear us, or because we don’t want to put in the hard work of making the thoughts in our heads clear and understandable to others, but far too often, communication is hindered by what the Atlantic article calls “needless complexity.”

One of my favorite writers is C.S. Lewis, and I think that many other Christians would also list him among their favorites. But why does he continue to be so influential and widely-read decades after his career? I think that it’s due to the fact that, despite his brilliance (actually, strike that…because of his brilliance), he was able to communicate complex ideas clearly to a mass audience. Lewis was a professor with immense knowledge of literature, philosophy, history, and theology. And while some of his works may be a bit more specialized and difficult for the average reader, most of them are accessible to just about anyone. It takes a special mind to be able to communicate profound Christian truth through the medium of a fantasy-tale for children, after all.

One of my favorite preachers to listen to is Matt Proctor, the president of my alma mater, Ozark Christian College. I think that Matt possesses the same type of gift that Lewis did. He has a brilliant mind, thorough knowledge of Scripture…but still, I’ve heard him preach a children’s church sermon about Joseph that, while simple to understand, communicated important theological truth. (“If you will just obey, God will make a way!”)

I write all of this as a encouragement, both to myself and to others who write or speak, to give attention to the importance of clarity in communication. Effective communication involves the ability to transfer ideas and knowledge from the communicator’s mind to the mind of the reader or hearer. A desire to impress others with inaccessible or wildly abstract language doesn’t help that process.

Yet even as I write all of this, I feel a tension. Yes, it’s important to communicate clearly and accessibly, but how do we do so without diminishing our language or reducing our messages to vapidity?

This is an important question because we’re living in a culture that increasingly makes communication, not just simple, but simplistic. A few years ago I bemoaned the fact that so much of our communication consisted of 140-character tweets, but now that seems like a bygone golden age. Today, so much of our discourse takes place through sharing memes or pictures. Just this week I read that the Oxford English Dictionary’s “Word of the Year” isn’t a word at all. It’s an emoji. Is this how we should communicate? Through smiley faces, thumbs up, and pictures? Aren’t we losing something through the diminution of our language?

Again, let me bring this back around to the art of preaching. A trend in a lot of churches in recent years is to avoid any “theological” language that might not be very familiar to the average person. So we avoid words like propitiation, eschatology, atonement, or justification. We do so for the sake of clarity–so that our messages might be understood.

The goal is noble, but I wonder if we’re losing something in the process. Of course we want (and need) our message to be understandable, but does this require a jettison of the language that offers exactness to our theology? Is the answer to avoid terms that may confuse people, or would we be better served by simply teaching them what they mean? How do we preach messages that are accessible but still theological and biblically robust?

There has to be some sort of balance here. We don’t want to be opaque in our communication, but neither do we want to reduce everything to an stripped-down form. And I suppose that’s one of the challenges of effective communication. It’s the type of balance that sets people like C.S. Lewis apart. And it’s the type of balance that is needed, especially in a world that includes the too-frequently-seen poles of needless complexity and needless simplicity.

Methods. And More Methods.

If there is one word that has been banging around in my head over the past couple months, that word is “method.”

That might sound strange, but there is good reason for this. This fall I have been taking two classes. The first is called “Research Methods” (You see, the word is right there in the name of the class). In that class, we’ve been talking about how we need to refine and understand the method that we plan to use in our research. When you write a dissertation, you’re expected to provide an entire section that describes your method, so it’s important to understand what that method is and why it is the correct method in answering your research question.

My second class is “History of Biblical Interpretation.” In that class, we’ve been talking about how the Bible has been approached and understood by scholarship since the Enlightenment. In a lot of ways, this is a survey of methodology in biblical studies, as each specific interpreter we bring up is the proponent of some method applied to the text of the Bible.

So when studying the Bible, we have this grab-bag of methods from which to choose: historical-criticism, source criticism, form criticism, redaction criticism, narrative criticism, discourse analysis, linguistic analysis, social-scientific approaches, rhetorical analysis, reader-response, canonical criticism, liberationist readings, Theological Interpretation of Scripture, and on and on and on. I realize that all of this sound like nonsense to many of you reading, and if I were to be honest, some of it doesn’t make much sense to me either.

All of us have some method that we use when reading and interpreting the Bible. In academic circles, you just have to be very explicit about the method you are using. But all of this has made me wonder: is it possible that we can become so invested in our method that we lose sight of why we read the Bible in the first place? Can we get so caught up in justifying the manner in which we read the Bible that we forget that this Bible is an inspired Word from God? That in reading it, we are encountering God’s message to his people?

But this can happen, not just in the academic study of Scripture, but also in ministry. Ministry, like biblical studies, is often infatuated with methods. Should sermons be one-point, three point, or me-you-God-you-we? Should our small groups be open or closed? Should they take a break after every three months or not? Are we going to be an Orange church or a Purpose-Driven church?

I’m not saying that any of these questions are bad. Actually, I’m saying the opposite. These are good and necessary questions to ask. We have to think about what methods will enable us to best share Christ with the world around us and to address the needs in our communities. But my hope for all of us, including myself, is that we don’t allow our attachment to methods to overshadow our attachment to Christ. We can’t let our hermeneutical methods in approaching God’s Word to overpower our love for God’s Word. And we can’t let our practical methods of ministry to overpower our love for God’s church. Methods are means to an end. They can (and often ought) to change over time. But what doesn’t change, or at least what shouldn’t change, is our love and concern for God and how he is using us in the world. When we lose sight of God, the methods we adopt will be ineffectual anyways, because we won’t know where those methods are supposed to take us in the first place.

I’m not willing to give my life to the defense of a narrative-critical reading of the gospels, even though I think this can be a profitable method of interpretation. And I’m not willing to give my life to the defense of sermons with a single main point, even though I think this is a useful means of communication. These are just methods. But I am willing to give my life to the defense and proclamation of the gospel of Jesus Christ, because it is that gospel that has the power to change the world. And in the end, I think that’s what matters most.

Our Ignored Heritage

Recently I read this in a book by Scot McKnight: “Make a decision to know our story from Adam to the newest baptized Christian in your church. We need more of us to be curious about our ancestors” (The King Jesus Gospel, p. 156). This got me thinking: How well do I know the history of the church — this family of believers of which I am a member? How well do my fellow brothers and sisters know that history? How well are we aware that we are buds in a family tree that has been growing long before we came on the scene?

Not well enough, I think. For most of my life, my knowledge of church history was limited to what I learned in World History classes in my public high school. I knew a little about the Crusades, and I knew the basics of Martin Luther and the Reformation. But that was it. It wasn’t until I went to Bible college that I learned anything of the rest of this history. Only then did I learn of Irenaeus, Origen, Augustine, Aquinas, Erasmus, Calvin, Wesley, Campbell, or any of others among my spiritual forerunners from the past two millennia. What this means, I assume, is that the average Christian believer sitting in a church’s pews on a Sunday morning also knows almost nothing of church history.

This may especially be a phenomenon in the church movement of which I am a part — the independent Christian Churches/Churches of Christ. We talk about having no book but the Bible and no creed but Christ. We want to restore the apostolic church as much as we are able. The book of Acts is our model for what it means to live out our faith in community today.  All of this is good, but here’s what often ends up happening: We live as though nothing happened between the time of the apostles in the first-century Roman Empire and the our time in 21st-century America. Because the Bible is our authority (as it should be!), we basically ignore the two thousand years of history that came before us. Bruce Shelley writes, “Many Christians today suffer from historical amnesia. The time between the apostles and their own day is one giant blank” (Church History in Plain Language, p. xv).  And in this, we are doing ourselves a disservice. To my own fault, I myself don’t know church history well, but I believe that all Christians should learn this “family story.” Here are a few reasons why:

1. Learning church history “culturizes” us into the church. As Americans like me went to school growing up, we learned American history. We were taught about all of the wars, the documents, the innovations, the politics, and so on. But why? Why do our schools systems take this time to teach children the history of their nation? Because it is a culture-making exercise. An American is, in part, someone who lives in light of the American story. We have a shared heritage, and knowledge of that heritage is designed to form us into good citizens of our country. So we don’t just learn about the founding fathers and the Constitution and then move straight to today. We learn about the early struggles in our nation, and about the Civil War and reconstruction and the World Wars and Depression and the Civil Rights Movement and so on. All of this is our story, and it’s a major component of creating an American culture.

It’s similar in the church. We too have a shared heritage, and it’s a heritage that is two thousand years long and includes so many ups and downs along the way. We should learn the history of the church because it is the history of us, and  it’s the story of how God has continued to work through his people in the centuries following the close of the biblical canon. By learning our history, we become more tightly connected, not just with our past, but also with our present.

2. Learning church history keeps us from reinventing the wheel every generation. One of the challenges of being a Christian is learning to live in light of God’s truth in the midst of a culture that is often antagonistic to that truth. The world consistently challenges elements of our faith, and we must discern how to best respond to them. But here’s the thing: Most of these challenges are not really new. They’re simply repackaged. And they are challenges that Christians before us have already wrestled with.

There are questions circling around today about the divinity/humanity of Jesus, about the nature of the Trinity, about the work of the Holy Spirit, about the role of works in a grace-based salvation, and about ethical issues ranging from sexuality to the relation between the church and government. But this issues aren’t new. They have been issues in the past, and Christians of the past have done much to answer these challenges. And granted, the words of councils, creeds, and theologians are not authoritative or God-breathed. Only Scripture is that. But wouldn’t these councils, creeds, and theologians be a good place to start as we seek to contextualize the words of Scripture to our contemporary world? Aren’t we wasting a valuable resource if we ignore the insight and wisdom of those who have gone before us?

3. Learning church history helps us avoid the sins of our past. It is often said that those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it. And it’s no secret that the story of the church is a bit of a mixed bag. There are many stories in our history to celebrate and emulate, but we also have our fair share of mess. (After all, how positive of words are “Crusade” or “Inquisition” today?). When we learn our own history, we see the damage that comes when the church makes its mission the attainment of political power over and against the spread of the gospel. We see times that we have been stood by silently as people who oppressed around us. We see instances in which racism and hatred rather than reconciliation and love have fueled our message. In studying our history, we at times need to own up to that history, repent of our past sins, and be on guard against the same wickedness taking root in our communities today.

4. Learning church history inspires us through the lives of those who have gone before us. I am a graduate of Ozark Christian College in Joplin, Missouri. On that campus, there is a hallway in which hang pictures of Ozark’s “Outstanding Alumni.” These are people who have done great things and made great sacrifices for the sake of Christ and his church. As a student, it was always so inspiring and encouraging (not to mention challenging!) to walk by those faces and be reminded of what they have done. The stories of these saints ought to inspire the next generation of students.

In the history of the church, we have a long hallway full of “Outstanding Saints.” As we learn this history, we find example after example after example of people who have exemplified what it means to follow Christ. From Polycarp to John Chrysostom to Saint Francis to Hudson Taylor to Dietrich Bonhoeffer to Jim Elliot, we can find stories of those who lived faithfully (several to their deaths!) and who have gone before us as an encouragement to do the same.

So what can we do? Let me end this already-too-lengthy post with a couple quick suggestions. First, if you’re a Christian believer who honestly doesn’t know much of the history of the church, let me simply encourage you to dig into this story. Grab a survey of church history off of Amazon and begin to familiarize yourself with our heritage. I would recommend Church History in Plain Language by Bruce L. Shelley, which I quoted above. It’s intimidatingly long, yet also very readable and interesting.

Second, if you’re a pastor or leader at a church, I encourage you to find ways to teach believers within your church about our history. I think it’s a good idea to have an occasional Sunday School series or elective class that on church history, and yet this is something I can’t really think of having seen a church do before. If believers don’t have opportunities to learn our story in our churches, then where else will they have an opportunity?

What do you think? What value, if any, is there in studying church history? How can we help ourselves and those in our churches come to know this history better?

Is “Religion” a Dirty Word?

People don’t like talking about “religion” much these days. And I’m not just thinking of the outspoken atheist or hardcore secularist. Even in the church, among Christians and pastors, the term “religion” has taken some heat in recent years. It’s almost as though “religion” has become a dirty word.

Look through the Christian Life section at Barnes & Noble or listen to a few sermons online, and you’ll probably see what I mean. Many of us have pitted religion against authentic Christianity. A few years ago, Jefferson Bethke published a popular book titled Jesus > Religion: Why He is So Much Better Than Trying Harder, Doing More, and Being Good Enough. The subtitle of Donald Miller’s Blue Like Jazz (which is one of my favorite books, by the way) is Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality. And many of us say that “Christianity is a relationship, not a religion” or that “Jesus is my savior, not my religion.” In writings and sermons, I myself have contrasted religion with Christianity.

All of this is done from good motives. Many people today have been burned by some religious group or person in the past, so we (rightly, I think) emphasize that the true gospel of Jesus is radically different than whatever painful experiences they may have gone through previously. So we use the word “religion” to denote systems whereby salvation is self-earned, where judgmentalism reigns, or where life is more about working hard to make God happy rather than accepting the invitation of his grace. In contrast, we say, true Christianity is grace-based, loving, and available to all, regardless of their history. By using terminology in this way, we seek to create a soft landing in which people who want nothing to do with religion might have a chance to meet Jesus. And that’s a good thing.

However, the more I think about this recently, the more I believe that our trampling of the word “religion” is unnecessary and actually rather confusing. Here are a few reasons why:

First, the way we use the word “religion” today can be confusing to a lot of non-Christians. When most people hear the word, I don’t think they immediately think of such a nuanced definition as outlined in the paragraph above. For many, “religion” is simply a system of belief about divine things or ultimate questions. People take comparative religion classes in college, where they learn the basics of these belief systems — Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and the list goes on. And while Christianity is unique in some very important ways, isn’t it still a religion in this sense? Isn’t it an answer to ultimate questions such as origin, suffering, sin, identity, and salvation? To contrast Christianity and religion the way we do may pique some interest to our message (and again, that’s a good thing!), but we then have to spend so much time redefining “religion” from its most basic meaning that it may not be worth the trouble.

Second, the contemporary suspicion of the word “religion” causes some trouble when reading or listening to any Christian works older than about 15 years. The supposed conflict between religion and Christianity is a recent phenomenon. For most Christians in past generations, to be a devout Christian was to be a religious person in the purest sense. And so John Calvin’s famous work is entitled Institutes of the Christian Religion. In Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis wrote, “Now God designed the human machine to run on Himself….That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there.” In the 18th century, Jonathan Edwards wrote A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections, in which he condemned “the deceitfulness of the heart of man” expressed in “spiritual pride and self-righteousness.” Edwards was pro-religion and anti-pride. For him, these were opposites and not the partners we assume they are today.

If we believe that the term “religion” by necessity implies something negative, we’ll even trip up when we read in our own English Bibles: “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world” (Jas. 1:27). Here Scripture itself seems to speak of religion positively, albeit religion that is expressed in a specific way. So for the apostles to Calvin to Edwards to Lewis, and many of our Christian forerunners besides, “religion” wasn’t a dirty word. It was a proper way of speaking of the Christian faith. If we abandon the word altogether, are we making it more difficult for ourselves to hear and understand these Christian thinkers?

Third (and most significantly, I think), by focusing on religion as an enemy of Christianity, we may be losing sight of what the real issue is. When you mislabel a problem, it becomes easier to miss the nature of the true problem.

I’ve often heard people say things like, “It’s okay that you don’t like being around religious people, but that’s okay. Jesus didn’t like being around religious people either.” But I would argue that isn’t altogether true. Jesus’ own parents presented the proper sacrifice at the temple after his birth (Lk. 2:24). After healing a leper, Jesus told him to go to the priest and submit to the Mosaic procedure for cleansing (Mk. 1:44). He commends the poor widow who gives a monetary offering in the temple (Mk. 12:41-44). After the resurrection, Peter and John pray in the temple at the appointed time (Acts 3:1), and Peter later prays in the afternoon on the roof of a house (Acts 10:9). The centurion Cornelius is noted for being “a devout man who feared God with all his household, gave alms generously to the people, and prayed continually to God” (Acts 10:2). All of these seem like religious people doing religious things. And granted, all of them needed salvation through Christ because their prayers and alms-giving could never save them, but at the same time, they are not condemned or even criticized for their religion. I think Jesus liked being around these religious people.

Of course, Jesus had some issues with other religious people, namely the Pharisees and priests of his day. But I don’t think the problem was their religion. Jesus opposed hypocrisy, pride, self-righteousness, judgmentalism, and empty ritualism. He confronted those who focused on pious acts at the expense of showing mercy, and those who put man-made barriers between people and God. These are the true problems, both then and now. So instead of using such a broad term as “religion” as the object of our criticism, maybe we would be better served by labeling the problem more precisely. Our problem isn’t religion. Our problem is a lack of love and grace, and a surplus of self-sufficiency, cruelty, and control.

What do you think? Is “religion” now a dirty word that should be abandoned? Or is there a clearer way to speak about these issues?

Give Me Fame and Fortune. Or At Least Just Fame.

I want people to know who I am.

You may think that seems like a selfish, egotistical statement, and you would be right. But it’s true for me, and I would guess that it’s also true for you. After well, we live in a selfish, egotistical era–one that is perhaps more saturated with self-promotion than any other time in history.

Not long ago I read something that suggested celebrity is the greatest desire among younger generations today. For many, the ultimate goal in life is to be famous. This is a shift from how past generations thought. I think that for most people in my parents’ and grandparents’ generation, the greatest desire may have been security. The typical American dream was to have a steady job with a good retirement plan, a loving spouse, a couple kids, and a nice house. People wanted to feel financially and socially “taken care of,” and it really didn’t matter if strangers knew your face or name.

But that has changed. Today, we’re not content with mere security. We also want celebrity. This is fueled by the advances that have taken place in digital technology and the effect such technology has made on all levels of our society. We are a YouTube generation, where people anyone with a webcam has a chance to go viral. Most of us have not just one, but multiple web pages dedicated to ourselves (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, blogs)–each with personal data, profile pictures, and broadcasted musings. We live in a world where people who aren’t particularly intelligent, talented, or even interesting get their own reality TV shows–their lives displayed on our LED screens–and some part of us thinks, “That could be me.” Many of us take more pictures of ourselves than we do of other people. We engage in personal branding, trying to figure out how our digital personas can merit the most likes, retweets, or shares. We want to collect “followers,” just as a pop sensation may collect paparazzi.

Am I overstating things a bit? Maybe. But I think there’s truth to this analysis of contemporary culture. I know this not just because I observe those around me, but even more so because I observe myself. I’m part of the very same culture I critique.

But I’m also a Christian, and this is where the rub comes in. I think it would be accurate to describe the Bible words as an anti-celebrity message. It talks about doing good in secret, where no one has a chance to see it and applaud you. It talks about looking to the interests of others before looking to your own interests. The heroes of its narrative are ones who say, “Stand up, I too am a man,” when others fall down at their feet.

There’s a great divide between the values of the celebrity culture in which we find ourselves and the Christian message contained in the Bible. A celebrity culture is all about being known. But the Christian message is about making known.

Here’s the difference: If my life is about being known, the object is me. But if my life is about making known, the object can be someone or something else. And as the Bible prescribes what my life is to be all about, it says that it’s not about being known. It’s about making Jesus known to others.

This is difficult, especially as I think about what this means for those in vocational ministry. To be a minister is to be in a public position (or, in some cases, a celebrity position?) When you are leading in a church, people know who you are. You may be up on stage preaching or leading worship. You’re teaching in a classroom or leading events. Your pictures and a short biography can be found on the church website. For most ministers I know, it’s not that they really want to draw attention to themselves. They want to tell people about Jesus. But as they do, people also recognize them and look up to them. In fact, the way it often works is that the more effectively you tell people about Jesus, the more attention you receive for it. How do we balance the public nature of ministry with the anti-celebrity nature of Christian ethics?

I don’t think there’s any easy way around this tension, short of anonymously preaching from behind a curtain like the Wizard of Oz. We can’t always control how much attention we may gain because of our work in God’s kingdom. But we can learn to control our own hearts. We can decide not to seek out attention to ourselves. Everyday we can pray the words of John the Baptist: “He must increase, but I must decrease.” And whether crowds applaud us or boo us, we can make it our continual mission to make Jesus famous.

I suppose this can apply not just to those who work in a Christian church but also to those who write Christian blogs, and believe me, I see the irony in this post’s very existence. So much of the blog-writing process is a prime example of what I critique above: The banner of my face at the top of the page. The web address, which is simply my name. The fact that once I finish typing this, I’ll share the link of Facebook. The truth that I really do hope people read this, like it, and share it.

There are reasons for all of this. My picture is at the top because I think that when people read a post, they want to know who wrote what they’re reading (plus, how am I going to ever get married unless I can attract a woman with a heavily-edited picture of myself?) The web address is my name because it’s easier for both others and me to remember. I’ll share this on Facebook because even my friends say that, while they like reading my posts, they don’t think to do so unless it’s on Facebook. And, while part of me wants a lot of hits on the blog because I’m an insecure human being who is part of this celebrity culture, my prayer is that most of me wants a lot of hits because I want to encourage and challenge people for the sake of Jesus and because I think we all improve in navigating life as we talk about it together. As I insinuated from the beginning of this post, I feel the celebrity/selflessness tension as much as anyone.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some selfies to take. Ciao.

Church and the Christian Life

Earlier this week, Donald Miller wrote a couple blog posts that caused quite a stir. In the first, he talked about how he does not usually connect with God through a traditional church service of preaching and singing, and so he typically does not attend church (you can see that post here. That post apparently caused a bit of a hubbub among many of his readers, so a few days later he wrote another post to further explain some of his thoughts (and you can check it out here). This week I have been thinking some about what Don writes in these two posts, so I thought I would share a few of my reflections.

But before that, let me say that I really like Don Miller’s writings. His books are among my favorites, and I’ve quoted him a number of times in my own blog posts. So while I have a few concerns about some of the things he has written this week, my goal is not to cast doubt on his Christian faith or to demonize him in any way. The truth is that he recent posts include a lot of good material that I agree with and that I think Christians (and especially church leaders) ought to heed. But at the same time, perhaps we need to work through what importance of the church a bit more critically. So here are four brief thoughts:

1. People connect to God in different ways

Don explains that he is not wired to connect with God or to learn through a traditional church service, which usually revolves around a sermon and singing praise songs. He writes that he is a kinesthetic learner more than an auditory learner and that church services are designed to appeal to auditory learners. Instead, he has found that he can worship God best when he is doing something–working in his business, teaching, etc. So why spend time in a setting where you don’t connect when you could spend that time in one where you do?

I think that Don brings up a good point here. Too often, church leaders assume that everyone else is pretty much like them. If I learn and worship through preaching and singing, then so does everyone else, right? Well, probably not. In his book Sacred Pathways, Gary Thomas identifies nine different ways that people may be wired to connect with God: (1) “Naturalists” connect best with God outdoors, immersed in God’s creation. (2) “Sensates” worship through the senses–not just by hearing, but also through smell, touch, taste, and sight. (3) “Traditionalists” love to worship through rituals and traditions that have been passed down in the church for years. (4) “Ascetics” are drawn to discipline, particularly silence and solitude. (5) “Activists” thrive in way may seem like contexts of conflict, as they seek justice for the hurting. (6) “Caregivers” worship by caring for those in need. (7) “Enthusiasts” embrace mysticism and celebration. (8) “Contemplatives” connect with God through silent adoration and meditation. (9) And finally, “Intellectuals” worship with their minds and love the study of the Bible, theology, and church history.

What both Don Miller and Gary Thomas help us see is that there are a variety of learning styles and spiritual wirings in our churches. The question that church leaders need to ask, then, is “How can we create environments in which people with diverse spiritual sensitivities will have opportunities to experience God?” For the most part, our churches are great for intellectuals (and caregivers–as long as they like working in the nursery), but they’re not doing much to help naturalists, sensated, ascetics, or others. Many churches need to reexamine the way they “do church” and to realize that not everyone fits into one mold of learning style or worship.

2. The church is a community I don’t create

One of the criticisms that Don Miller received against his first post is that without involvement in a local church, a Christian doesn’t experience the community that he or she needs for Christian growth. This is a key observation, because the Bible knows nothing of a “solitary Christian.” We are meant for community–to walk through the Christian life together with those on the same journey. Without community, a believer typically flounders and falls off.

In his second post, Don addresses this criticism by pointing out that he does indeed experience community, and that his community is important to him. It’s just not the community found in the traditional church. He goes on to write:

What I hadn’t realized before I read those comments, though, was that I had worked to create my community.Community is everywhere, and every church you’ve attended was a community that somebody sat down and created. I happen to think a lot of them look exactly the same and have no problem making mine look different, but it’s still a community. Millions of people who do not attend church have rich, meaningful communities that they created or have joined. You could create your own community out of your home in a matter of months.

But is Christian community something that a believer should “create” around himself or herself? One of the greatest blessings (and frustrations!) of the church is that it is a community that I DID NOT create. It was already there. And because I did not create it, it is full of people I normally wouldn’t be in community with. The truth is that when I “create” a community, it’s usually full of people who are pretty much like me. When you look at my circle of friends, you find a lot of 20-something, middle-class ministers (who also tend to talk like me, like the same movies and music as me, and think more or less like me). But in church on Sunday mornings, I’m in the pew with people with very different backgrounds, habits, families, and ideas.

Now of course, our American churches have not done a great job at “diversifying.” In his book Erasing Hell, Francis Chan says that the three places where racial division still exists are bars, prisons, and the American evangelical church. We need to do more to allow diversity in our congregations. But even as it exists now, there are many in my church who are very different from me, precisely because I don’t choose who is there. We need that, and it’s something that would often be missing without involvement in a local congregation.

3. Preaching is central to the biblical church

Don claims that to speak of a “biblical church” today is a misnomer, and he may be right about that. Every church (especially in my movement of churches) wants to be like the first-century apostolic church, but the truth is that none of us are. Our forms and structures are too different. But even so, there are certain principles and practices that are so clearly patterned in the New Testament church, and one of those is preaching.

There’s simply no way getting around how much preaching and teaching there is in the Bible. The book of Deuteronomy is essentially a long sermon (much of which is taken up by what seem to be scattered laws). Jesus was a preacher. Peter was a preacher. Paul was a preacher. Throughout the centuries, God used preachers, and if that is the case, it may be that he expects his people to listen to and learn from that preaching.

The challenge for preacher, in light of what I said above, is to realize that people learn in different ways. The traditional “get up at a podium and read from a manuscript” sermon is probably not the most effective. We needed increased creativity in our preaching, using auditory, visual, and even kinesthetic elements to help people connect with God’s Word.

4. The church brings spiritual authority

Because of my involvement in a local church, I am under the authority of others. The Bible calls instructs me to “be subject to the elders” (1 Pet. 5:5). Without the church, I would be more or less free to do as I please, and no one would be able to call me out on it. Sure, my friends, or the community I’ve created, may have some things to say, but I could take those as words of advice and evaluate for myself whether or not to follow. But in the church, it’s different. I have spiritual authorities over me. There are others there to guide and lead me. In fact, if I get really out of line, the church can discipline me!

Again, this may be something that has been lost in the contemporary American church. Most Christians don’t see their church leaders as truly having authority over them. They’re just the guys who set the church budget, right? And if church leaders start to say things that I don’t like, I can just go to the church down the street instead. But the failings in our contemporary approach don’t negate the principle. In the church, I am under the guidance of others. Without the church, I’m more or less free to do as I want–and that doesn’t seem to be the type of “community life” God pictures for his people.

What do you think? What would be missing from your life without involvement in a  local church? Is the church necessary to a healthy Christian life?

Parable, Story, and Preaching

It’s been quite a while since I have written anything. That tends to be how things go a couple times each year–late April and late November–when one day I wake up and realize, “Oh crap! I still have a semester’s worth of school work to do in just a couple weeks!” So that has been my life recently, and I apologize sincerely for the lack of new material. Until one of you volunteers to be my personal research assistant, this is just how things will have to be for a while.

I’ve been doing some thinking recently about stories. How does a story communicate truth? Why are stories such powerful methods of communication? Why is that it so many people are drawn to simple narratives over bullet-point statements? And what bearing does this have on how I understand the Bible and communicate God’s Word to others?

There have been a couple reasons that these questions have been in my mind lately. This semester I have been doing an independent study on Jesus’ parables–those little stories he so often told in his preaching. Stories like the Prodigal Son and the Good Samaritan and the Pharisee and Tax Collector. It’s an intriguing way to teach, isn’t it? Many of Jesus’ sermons didn’t sound like most sermons I hear today. He didn’t give the meanings of ancient words or back up his points with quotations from reputable scholars. Instead, he frequently just told stories about farmers and shepherds and servants. Most of the time, he didn’t even explain what they meant. He allowed the stories to communicate, and left it at that.

Another reason that I have been thinking about stories is that last weekend I saw the new movie “The Hunger Games: Catching” (which I thought was great, by the way). I read the book a couple years ago and felt the movie certainly did it justice. It was well-acted, well-directed, and represented the source material well. I’m fairly easy to please when it comes to movies, but for me, the difference between a good movie and a really good movie is that I’m still thinking about the really good ones for a while after seeing them. And I thought about this film a lot. I liked this movie because it’s a story that does more than entertain. It communicates. But how?

People are drawn to stories. We are perhaps most affected by the narratives we encounter in our lives. I learned a lot of things in high school that I don’t remember anymore–mathematical formulas, historic dates, Spanish vocabulary words. But I still remember the tragedy of Lord of the Flies, and the image of Huck and Jim floating down the Mississippi in Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Powerful stories have an ability to lodge in the hearer’s mind. It does so subtly, but once their, its themes and messages can permeate the thoughts of the individual.

For these reasons, we are attracted to stories. Just a few hours ago while I was working on my parables reading, I ran across this insight from Klyne Snodgrass: “Children (and adults) do not say, ‘Tell me some facts’; they want a story. Stories are inherently interesting. Discourse we tolerate; to story we attend. Story entertains, informs, involve, motivates, authenticates, and mirrors existence.”

So yes, stories are powerful, and stories communicate ideas. But the question I have been grappling with recently is this: “Do stories somehow lose their potency when they are explained?” Stories communicate, but they do so through subtext. That’s where their rhetorical force comes from. In C.S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Aslan never says, “Oh, by the way, children, I represent Jesus and his resurrection.” Instead, you read about a stone table cracked down the middle and a newly alive lion breathing statues to life. Or in The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins never writes, “Violence and war are horrific things in which no one really wins.” Instead, you get images of children forced to kill each other for the amusement of the powerful and wealthy.

This all relates to how the Bible communicates as well. I can make an abstract statement like “True faith is a willingness to sacrifice anything in obedience to God.” That is certainly true. But does it have the same affect on the hearer as “Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son” (Gen. 22:10)? Or, Jesus could have answered the scribe’s question “Who is my neighbor?” by simply saying, “Your neighbor includes even the person you have always considered an enemy.” But instead, he tells a story with the punchline: “But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion” (Lk. 10:33).

I should make a brief clarification here. Some Christians are very uneasy about speaking of the Bible as “story” or “narrative.” They view such terminology as a denial of the historical reliability of the Bible. And while some may indeed see story/narrative as opposed to true history, that doesn’t need to be the case. (I could tell you the story of how I met Mike Ditka in Times Square, and it would still be something that truly occurred in reality.) I believe that the narrative accounts of the Bible really happened in history. And by comparing the account of Abraham to Narnia or The Hunger Games, I don’t mean that it is fiction as they are. I only mean that, as narrative, it communicates in the same way–through subtext and imagery rather than through bullet points and diagrams.

It’s simply a fact that the Bible is largely narrative, and even the parts that aren’t narrative per se (epistles, legal code, wisdom literature) fit into an overarching narrative context. God could have dropped a multivolume systematic theology out of the sky, but he didn’t. Instead, he gave us a story of his interactions with specific people through history. So I don’t think it’s inappropriate to speak of Scripture as “story” or “narrative.” We are wired to respond to story.

The reason all of this concerns me is that, as a preacher, one of my jobs is to explain texts. I worry, however, that in my explanation, I may actually keep the text from communicating in the way it is designed to. For example, a couple weeks ago I preached on Jesus’ healing of the blind man from John 9. It’s a great story–one of my favorites in the gospels. But in talking about Greek words and parallel passages and general propositions about God, is the force of the story lost in some way?

It should be noted that the same also goes for other forms of communication. Like narrative, art communicates through subtle ways. To explain the meaning of a painting doesn’t have the same affect as simply viewing the painting and allowing its images to do the job of communicating. Or with poetry, the form is just as important as the content in communicating its ideas. And the Bible is full of poetry! That’s another area I struggle with. When I preach on Psalm 23, what can I possibly say that will help the words sink in more? Should I just read the passage and get off the stage?

What do you think? What does it look like to communicate and teach God’s Word in a way that is narratively shapes and does justice to the “story aspect” of the Bible? How can we be clear about the meaning of Scripture while still maintaining the affective force of its rhetoric?