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Good Friday Reflections

April 10, 2009 by Leave a Comment

It’s Good Friday and for me, it’s been a good day so far.  These days are always kind of interesting because you’re trying to balance the sacred with the practicalities of life.  So far I’ve spent time doing some beautiful things, like hanging out with the family, trivial things like taking out the trash, and spiritual things like reflecting on the significance of this day.  

Indeed there is a heaviness as I remember what our Savior did for us.  I also reflect on my loved ones that have passed on and imagine myself thinking about them had Christ not died. I imagine how it would feel if they were not Christ-followers.  I’ve thought about a lot of things today.  What about my loved ones who are still living and the difference the cross makes for our new son and the new lives that were brought to this world since last Easter.  I reflect on the people that I don’t know, the ones that don’t like me, and the ones that I don’t care for. 

There’s a joy too.  I know, understand, and love the meaning of the Resurrection – a dead man lived again.  And this man was God and his name was Jesus and he extends this same life to me.  It’s a mind-blowing story. 

I read a few things today, John 15 & 16, Jesus the Final Days by Craig Evans and N.T. Wright (CT has an exert from Wright’s concluding chapter here), and a couple of blog posts:

Tony’s post – Why Jesus Died.  

Evan’s post, What You’ll Probably Hear at Church this Easter Weekend (but I Hope you Don’t).   It’s excellent.  I’d like to add John 10:10 and it’s context to his point, “…I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full”.  

And the always moving poetry of our dear friend, Thomas.  Here’s the opening verse of The Day Before the Last

The day before the last,
when bread is just bread,
and wine is just wine,
there is a chance, a facet
of hope to cling to, for us gathered.

The online world is part of my community.  Tonight, I’ll gather with my church and we will worship and reflect on the meaning of this day.  Praise the Lord for his unconditional love.

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What Jack Bauer Would Say to Stanley Hauerwas

April 3, 2009 by 10 Comments

I can hear Jack saying now, “With all due respect professor, I must torture this terrorist in order to save innocent lives.  I’ll kill him if I have to.”  I can see Dr. Hauerwas shaking his head and saying, “We were not created to kill one another, we were created to commune with each other.”  I’ve heard it said over and over from theologians to professors to pastors that we want theology to be accessible to the common man.  Well friend, this is what it looks like – great theological figures in imaginary dialogue with fictional television characters.  I’ll refrain from that but here’s what I am thinking.

At ephiphaneia’s Amidst the Powers Conference, Dr. Hauerwas asked, “What would the pacifists do if they got a world in which they wanted?” I have spent two weeks falling in love with that idea and I like that image more and more.

He also asked, “When was the last time you went to see a movie that was about peace?”  I think for me, it was when I took Susan to see “He’s Just Not That Into You” around Valentine’s Day.  I am grateful he didn’t ask, “What were the last three movies you saw about peace?”  And if I’m being honest (which is one of the vows, I decided not to make for Lent), my first answer probably doesn’t even suffice because that movie is not about peace, it’s a chic-flick void of physical warfare. 

I’ll tell you the truth, though it would mean that I would go to less movies, I would gladly trade my beloved Braveheart and your beloved Star Wars if it meant that we could eliminate the war narratives and their violent results that have permeated our culture.   While I’d like to imagine refocusing our imagination and efforts from warfare to addressing some of our other world crises, I know this is not our present circumstance.  Discovering how it could be is obviously a long unending discussion that I am not ready to dive into here.

The strength of  Dr. Hauerwas’s message was how we as a “civilized” people have moralized war.   It may be helpful to insert here that I am not a pacifist but like most people, I hate war. I do believe there is righteousness in just-war theory.  I do not equate the pre-emptive strike in Iraq.  I do credit the Bush administration with the safety of our country of having no terrorist attacks since 9-11.  I pray against living in a situation like Israel where I would think twice of taking my wife and son out to the grocery store.  This imperfect, self-contradicting reality comes with significant prices and I think all of us need to have the integrity of not over-simplifying the problem. 

While it may bother me that Hauerwas writes these words from the safety of his office at Duke Divinity School, and I get to write these words from the safety of my home and you get to read these words in the presumed safety of your workplaces and coffee shops, this is where we should remember Jack Bauer.  Jack Bauer makes it possible for us to believe in pacifism.  Further, I am not sure one can truly be a pacifist if they live in the safe police-protected middle class American suburbs.  The point of this post is not to give license of who can and who cannot be a pacifist under what circumstance.  That would be even more self-righteous than I already am (and I am trying to cut back on that).  But seriously, if a Palestinian citizen tells me he/she is a pacifist, I’ll listen.  

To be fair to people like Dr. Hauerwas, it is that Palestinian or that Rawandan that he’s speaking for but here in the West it’s become too convenient to identify with being a pacifist.  Would we be pacifists though if the opposite views were not symbolized by characters like George W. or Jack Nicholson’s’ Colonel Jessup in A Few Good Men?   Would we be pacifists if our enemies were attacking our soccer games on Saturday mornings? Would we be against all forms of torture if we had a terrorist in custody that admitted to planting a bomb in our elementary school but refused to disclose its actual location.  Meanwhile our children are learning their multiplication tables … perhaps for the last time.  On that day, I am praying for Jack Bauer. 

Again, I mention this because if we are being honest, it’s easy to be a pacifist today here in the West in 2009.  I want to know if you’re still one when the serial killer is trespassing through your home and is not interested in your material wealth, he just wants to see you and your family suffer.  On that day, I wish I was Jack Bauer.

This season on 24  has been entertaining.  Hauerwas’ words echo as we watch Jack suffer and lament the many people he has killed and the person he has become.  As I think about this, I think it’s just as fair to ask what if Jack became convicted at Stanley’s lecture during “Amidst the Powers”.   What if Jack Bauer became a pacifist?  (If this has already happened, know that I haven’t’ watched every season.  If it did, umm, he’s regressed).   I can picture him sitting in between Evan and I hanging in his head as Dr. Hauerwas told the story of his friend Roger who explained that killing and then being asked to return to normalcy was the hardest part of war. 

What would it look like if Jack Bauer became a pacifist?  It’s almost comical because I cannot divorce the violence from him.  He’s a one-dimensional character. I cannot see Jack taking up gardening and discussing Wendell Berry with Thom.  I am not even sure he can enjoy going to a baseball game for the paranoia of vulnerability would drive him crazy.  Nor could I see him opening a coffee shop with Tony Almata.  They would have a back up in line and Jack would yell into his Bluetooth, “Chloe I need more espresso beans NOW!”  

This is Hauerwas’s point.  War robs too much from men and women.  Survival, though obviously significant, is only part of them dilemma, re-acclimating is truly another part. That is something that we can agree on, pacifists and non-pacifists.  Some days, I am not sure if there can be a compromise between the two.  Being “only a little violent” or “non-pacifist when necessary” are among the reasons for the creation of just-war theories.  Perhaps another post, I’ll speculate on what Dr. Hauerwas means when he says, “The Christian alternative to war is worship” and “Because of the cross of Christ, war was abolished.”  It seems we can learn a lot from Dr. Hauerwas and even Jack Bauer but I find it difficult to think of one and not the other.  Who knows, maybe Jack would be relieved by the ideas that people like Hauerwas promote and maybe he’d say to Stanley, “Thanks.”

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Reflecting on Out of Ur's Trouble Brewing

March 28, 2009 by 1 Comment

There’s a great discussion on the Out of Ur blog called Trouble Brewing concerning the alcohol consumption of church leaders.  One of the questions that was posted was if Jesus were here today, would he have changed the water into wine?

One of the key aspects in understanding Jesus turning the water into wine was that was an important thing at a Jewish wedding 2000 years ago. 

I believe that if Jesus was in our churches, he’d change what came out of those terrible 100 cup coffee peculators, and hand out fair-trade, French-pressed coffee.  Perhaps he would have also changed the Welch’s grape juice to wine for our communions. 

If Jesus were attending the Super Bowl and they ran out of water on the sidelines, I’m not sure he would have changed the water into wine.  He probably would have changed into Gatorade (or he would have cleared this American temple but I hope not because I love the NFL and hope God does too).

I speculate that if Jesus was walking through Africa, he may have changed the dirty water into pure water or if he were in Vancouver, he may have changed the soda into hot chocolate.

You can see that I’m not as quite committed to the wine but I do not want to dismiss it entirely either.  I think Jesus liked wine and it’s worth noting.   While not everyone needs to like or consume alcohol, it’s a topic that we should reflect on.

Below is what I posted on the Out of Ur post:

Worthy topic to discuss here. It’s hard to disassociate ourselves from our American-evangelical context (not that there’s anything wrong with that), but I think considering the worldwide Church community is helpful. Like some have already alluded to, drunkenness is condemned in Scriptures, not the consumption of alcohol. In light of the liberty described New Testament and the countless tragic stories many of us have experienced, we cannot be trite here. Indeed some have stumbled by the alcohol use of others, while some doors have been opened by the exact opposite. I know I’ve experienced both and again, this is why we should avoid being dogmatic about this. I think among the problems is that local congregations have been too one-sided favoring one side while demonizing the other. Conversations would be helpful here.

Filed Under: Christianity, Reflective

Reflecting on Walter Wink's Lecture at epiphaneia #ep09

March 27, 2009 by 3 Comments

Not knowing much about Walter Wink, I didn’t really know what to expect.  In the introduction, it was said that because of his health, it’s been difficult for him to attend these types of gatherings and it was special that he was able to come today.  That was affirmed by those around us with nodding heads, polite cheers and light clapping.

It’s cool to like the old guy whose spent decades writing and teaching ideas that inspire so many.  It’s similar to cheering for the MLB player who performed so well but never won that World Series (because he played in Boston.  Yes, I am talking about Wade Boggs, the first former Red Sox player that I saw with my own eyes as not having horns). Anyway, here I am a week later still cheering for this gentlemen.  He had a kind voice but despite his health, it wasn’t weak.  I appreciated his inflections as he read his lecture and you could sense the heart behind it.

The lecture opened with he and his wife reading a fable about being citizens that the king has commanded to slay the beast and bring back a claw.  The citizens represented by Walter says that the king is a liar, the beast has no claws and cannot be killed, thus he killed the king.  But when he did that, the beast was still among them.  They put a doll on the throne but still the beast was there. 

That became the theme of the lecture.  The beast is in the powers and the powers must be redeemed.  For we all deal with the powers (and are a part of them).

I’ve been thinking about this most of the week – what would the powers redeemed look like?  My mind immediately goes to the utopias that movies have created.  Sci-fi movies like Star Wars come to mind, but of course, movies like the Matrix have sober me from those images.  One of my favorite parts Walter warned was, “…to focus on redeeming them leads to utopian disillusionment, their transformation takes place in the limits of their fallen natures”.  I’ve been thinking about that.

Of course, I’ve also been thinking about what this would look like in the Church.  (This post could get long).  While I know the Church can never be perfect, what would it look like if we allow ourselves to be led by the Spirit in the hopes of redeeming it alongside our collective fallen natures?  Indeed, indeed, many have been pursuing this.  However there are times when I feel that some have interpreted the church’s mission as an island they are trying to get off, throwing as many people on the lifeboat as possible, picking up a few of the drowning along the way, and waiting for the divine coast guard to bring them aboard.  Meanwhile the boat that crashed on the island can be repaired.  It won’t be as perfect as it was when it was new, but certainly more effective than a lifeboat.  (Yes, this illustration is the product of 5 seasons of Lost). 

Seriously, what if we did try to fix the boat?  Doing so while knowing though we have God’s calling and strength, we could not restore to its original wholeness.  Has God not saved others like this before?  Thinking about how the redemption of the powers in the Church can redeem society and the individuals and institutions contained within has been a worthy and motivating idea to reflect on.  I hope to do more.  Til then, I’ve updated the notes that Evan and I too here.

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Stanley Hauerwas at Amidst the Powers Conference #ep09

March 21, 2009 by Leave a Comment

Just like the last post, these are just rough notes taken at the Amidst the Powers Conference.  I hope to reflect on them later.  Here’s the twitter feed if you are interested.

Stanley Hauerwas at #ep09

War is a moral practice.

By no means am I saying it is a good thing.

(Rightly suggests that such powers are perversions …)

If war is not just, what is it?  Let’s call it slaughter.

For many war is a great profit…

Everyone professes that war is horrible but we continue to have war.

Sometimes we must be willing to go to war, it’s when you know you are in the midst of a power.

We cannot get rid of war because it has captured the habits of our imagination.

When was the last time you went to see a movie about peace?

War is a power that inhabits our lives making it impossible to imagine a world without war.

What would the pacifists do if they got a world in which they wanted?

Pacifisms and non-violence are inadequate positions in the Christian life.

Peace is a deeper reality than violence but if it’s true, we need to locate the peaceful practices in our lives. 

William James : if it is to be abolished we need to find a moral equivalent to war

            His position is inadequate.  There are virtues of war …

The Christian unease of war is liturgical.

War is the alternative church.  (TG – I wish he would have spoken more about this).

If Christians are serious, we are the alternative to war.

Christians believe that the cross is the end of sacrifice.

The enduring attraction to war is this – it can give us what we long for purpose meaning for living.

Trivia dominates our conversation and airways, war is a great elixir.

It gives us a reason to be honorable.

“One bloody death – Christ – must be accompanied by others like it.”

Southerners were so desperate to kill, they even did it in WW1 for the Yankees.

If you want to know what being controlled by a power looks like, it’s revealed in this statement, “I now belong to the flag”.

The more sacrifice is made, the more sacrifices that must be made – that is the moral logic of war.

It also requires that we sacrifice our normal desire to kill.

Grossman noted that some soldiers have more intimacy with each other after killing than they do with their wives.

Killing is more intimate than sex.

War is about killing others …

The language of war helps us deny what war is really about and helps us make it morally palpable

Soldiers need to be re-entered into society.  They need to be told they did the right thing (the practice of doing the right thing)

Return to some kind of normality.

Veterans seldom want to talk about war. 

No sacrifice is more dramatic than the sacrifice of those being sent to war.

That is the sacrifice of asking them to kill.  Even more, those who have killed being asked to return to normalcy.

If you want to know why modern, industrialized Christianity is declining, it’s not because of Darwinism, the rise of science, it’s because we don’t die for what we believe.

The Christian alternative to war is worship.

Christians called to non-violent not because it’s a strategy to end wars but instead we are called to be non-violent because we cannot imagine being anything other and that may make the world more violent.

We were not created to kill one another, we were created to commune with each other.

Even when we kill in a just war, our bodies rebel.

Those who kill being reconciled with those that they killed.

The sacrifices of war are no longer necessary.

Christians must be free of killing from where the powers rely

Because of the cross of Christ, war was abolished.  

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Walter Wink at the Amidst the Powers Conference #ep09

March 21, 2009 by Leave a Comment

Hey friends, these are just rough notes taken at the Epiphaneia’s Amidst the Powers Conference.  I hope to reflect on them later.  Here’s the twitter feed if you are interested.

Evan and I took the following notes.  Keep an eye on his blog in the coming days for his thoughts about the conference.

Walter Wink

Power is more than people – it is institutions and structures we make for ourselves, for good or for ill

the Powers also include the spiritual dimensions at the core to these systems and institutions.

The powers can hurt, destroy, manipulate, target, exploit,

However sometimes they can help. 

The powers are not always evil, some people enjoy their jobs, provide good, provide life-enhancing products/services.

They do both good and evil – a complex web …

Powers shape our present and dictate our future

please don’t find the next minister without discovering [your local church’s] angel (based on Rev. 2-3)

Nations, cities have angels,

If the demonic comes from loss of vocation – we can’t exorcise the demon; we must bring the angel back to its vocation

Everything has a physical and spiritual aspect.  If we went to the change the systems, we need not only to the outer forms but their inner souls as well.  Everything has a core.  Everything is answerable to God. [we think of this quality generally only in individuals but rarely as institutions.  It may help us from demonizing so many social structures in the forms of governments, agencies, companies, etc.).

Unjust systems perpetuate themselves through violence

Sometimes the social institution becomes evil and in an attempt to reform it becomes doomed. 

How can we overcome evil without doing evil and without becoming evil ourselves?

            + consistent non-violence

            + can massive institutions be reformed?

Businesses exist to serve the general welfare, profit is a means to an end. (according to 18th century capitalist philosopher Adam Smith)

It is up to church and prophets to remind the businesses that profit is not the bottom line. 

We are not to cast out the demons but to recast the angels to its divine task. 

He used an example of a trip to Chile to observe the powers, he became so angry with the oppressors, oppressed, physically ill and overwhelmed by despair.

He had gone to observe the powers found he became their captive. 

In his despair he wondered how the NT writers could insist that Christ, in the midst of the evil was still sovereign over all the powers.  He wrestled with this assertion.

What he found was a thin thread of hope that he clung to but it could not be crushed. 

But then something gave him energy to unmask the powers and that’s when he began to write, write, write.

From that beginning a whole new sense of Biblical understanding of the powers.

It’s a neglected emphasis in Biblical study. 

Quoting Romans 8:38 – “I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels nor demons, nor future nor powers …”

How can we overcome evil without being evil ourselves?

How can the institution ever be saved?

What chance do we have to take the beast and reform them for how God desires to use them?

Madoff, just one man, hurt so many.  We can put him in jail but the beast is still there.

Nixon had it

Bush is no longer in office but the beast is still there.

Can the powers be redeemed?

Are the powers intrinsically evil?

The powers are good

The powers are fallen

The powers (can and) must be redeemed

            + these statements must be held together

The powers are a part of God’s creation.

            But to focus on redeeming them leads to utopian disillusionment, their transformation takes place in the limits of their fallen natures.

South Africa

+ Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, and other Christian leaders brought reconciliation to the region so much so that they are now seen as some of the most significant humans of our time

+ the resilience of the powers continues since the powers are simultaneously good, fallen, and redeemed

The solvers must put the others’ interests above their own.

no matter how greedy or idolatrous a system becomes, it cannot escape the care and judgment of whom for it was made

Fallen = not depraved (as our Calvinist friends say), but none of us are who we are meant to be

            + the situation is not without hope

We must be careful not to demonize those who do evil

            + some “isms” like Nazism or sexism can only be reformed by being abandoned

            + powers are created in and for the humanizing purposes of God

+ it doesn’t God endorses certain systems, but humans need a way to be in society with one another

+ God wills that sub-systems would serve human need

Recognizing this (the powers are good, fallen, need to be redeemed), frees us that we do not have to demonize the powers (institutions, people).

We must be careful here, God did not create capitalism or socialism.

Humans must be socialized – there’s no helping it – at some point we must become ourselves. 

People need economic structure, we need government, we need society.

God-willing there be sub-systems to serve people.

God can liberate us from the powers

Also can liberate powers from their demonic focus as well.

We aren’t liberated by striking back at the powers that bring evil upon us but by dying out from under its command.

We must die to the domination system in order to live justly.

Why does Scripture speak of dying as breaking away from the powers?

Rebirth is not just an inward moment, but we must also die to the domination system in order to live authentically (e.g., those born in poverty may miss life by never feeling human at all)

Personal redemption cannot take place apart from the redemption of our social structures

            + cf. Rev. 21

The Gospel then is not … but about redeem an entire world right down to its basic structures. 

The powers are good, the powers are fallen, the powers can be redeemed – this means that within the limits of our fallen world fundamental change is possible – hope that another world is possible, a city of God = God’s domination-free order.

—-

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Regarding the Coming Evangelical Collapse

March 20, 2009 by 1 Comment

First, well done Mr. Spencer, your post, The Coming Evangelical Collapse was a very interesting post. I had bookmarked Internet Monk but I now regret not adding it to my RSS feeder. I will remedy that. It is not my intention to refute his post, just adding to the conversation. Also check out Evan Curry’s post, “Dear Mom, the Evangelical Collapse is Coming”.

Indeed change is in the air. I agree with the consensus, it’s coming but I don’t think the “collapse” will happen within the next 10 years. My main reason is the Boomer Generation is not yet old enough and they still have enough money.

Consequently, I see the following happening within the next 30 years: “Collapse” is too overstated, I see it more as a evolutionary, and we’ll look back and cal it the “Renaissance of Evangelicalism”.

I mean no offense by this, though there is a strong attraction to the Roman Catholic, Orthodox, and Anglican faiths, their current approach to family ministries will not be relevant enough to the children of young X’ers and Millennials. This will result in the aforementioned evolution of evangelicalism.

Agreed, there will be a drop off political ideology in the evangelical world. Meaning, there will be less and less of an assumption that evangelicals are republicans.

Agreed that the mega-church will stick around in the coming years. There will be fewer and fewer mid-size churches (600+) There will be fewer and fewer of the less than 100 people churches in their traditional role. They will more likely be house churches, or cell churches.

Agreed that we will not be speaking about the “emergent church” but not because it failed but as so many have pointed out, it was a segue to different conversations that did not create their own brand or denomination (praise God).

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How I Came to Appreciate Lent

February 26, 2009 by 3 Comments

Here we are in Lent and I am among the heathens who did not go to any formal Ash Wednesday service, still drinking coffee, eating meat, and listening to U2’s new album non-stop.  Later, I’ll post on what I am doing for Lent.  

As most of my friends know, I come from a conservative Protestant background.  Lent was deemed a “Catholic thing”, and we all knew what that meant.  Well, actually we didn’t, that’s why we are so interested in it now.  There are many beautiful aspects of the way the Catholics (and main-line churches) celebrate their faith.  And while there are reasons why I am not Catholic (and fewer of not being a main-liner), among them, you don’t need to be Catholic to observe the practices of the Church prior to the Reformation, I am grateful for the many beautiful traditions they celebrate and practice.  Among my hopes is that they too would be blessed by many of the Protestant aspects as well. 

I think some of my evangelical Protestant friends believe that Lent was invented just 10 years ago with this emerging church thing.  It came right along with Lecto-Divina, Henry Nouwen, and the Holy Spirit.  For some, they just won’t get it.  That’s fine, there are a lot of things that I don’t get (like country music), and I am content that they practice their faith the way that Spirit leads them.

The first church I began working at observed the Advent-Lenten seasons.  It was an independent, conservative, Protestant church and its doctrinal statement is virtually identical in terms of belief to where I serve now.   Combined with the emergent books that I started reading then, it’s not that great of a mystery that I haven’t given up these traditions.  That’s interesting to me but I’ll move on.  Each year, we would have an Ash Wednesday service where we would actually perform the imposition of ashes.  We even used the palm branches from last year and mixed them with oil that was from a catalog that had a picture of the Holy Lands on it (we weren’t complete suckers).  Truth be told, it was one of my favorite services and one year, the senior pastor was too ill and I had the honor of leading it.

It is clear to me how observing Lent has blessed my celebration of Easter.  In all honesty, I was glad to leave that church but God showed us a lot during those 5 years.  Combined with the great friendships we made, the experiences we had, and connecting with some of these traditions were a great blessing to me and I am grateful to continue in some way.  An example includes the worshipful moment of doing Ash Wednesday in our Senior High youth group last night.  (Maybe I’ll mention that later.)

If you haven’t, I’d like to encourage you to do something for Lent, even if you begin today or next week. Whether it be reading a devotional, giving up something or serving in some new capacity or the many other ideas, I think you will find it beautiful in connecting it to this time where we reflect on the cost of our sins and the resurrection of our Savior.

 

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Reflecting on Colson's comments regarding Obama, abortion and postmodernism

February 11, 2009 by 2 Comments

Chuck Colson wrote on his breakpoint post yesterday (No God Condones What) that the breakdown of today’s society is based on postmodernism:

 

At the National Prayer Breakfast last week, President Obama seemed to signal that he has seen the light and is abandoning his radically pro-abortion agenda. At least, that’s the only reasonable conclusion one could make after hearing the President, who says he’s a Christian, also say: “There is no God who condones taking the life of an innocent human being. This much we know.”

 

So I could only surmise that the President now concludes that “no God” would condone the 1.6 million abortions performed each year in America—1.6 million innocent lives destroyed.  But I’ve checked the White House website, and it’s very clear that God’s disapproval hasn’t changed the administration’s agenda one bit.

 

Here’s what the White House website says: “President Obama understands that abortion is a divisive issue, and respects those who disagree with him. However, he has been a consistent champion of reproductive choice and will make preserving women’s rights under Roe v. Wade a priority in his Administration.”

 

Well, in one way I’m glad I wasn’t at the breakfast this year—I was speaking instead at Moody—because I’m not sure I would have been able to stay in my seat.

 

How can a President of the United States say that “there is no God who condones taking the life of an innocent human being,” when he himself favors a woman’s right to have an abortion under virtually every circumstance? How can he say that, when, as an Illinois state senator, he voted against the Illinois Induced Infant Liability Act, which would have protected the lives of babies who survived late-term abortions? When he even had the audacity to describe the act as “One more burden on a woman . . . I can’t support.”

 

President Obama is a highly intelligent man with a huge job on his hands. I know what the White House is like, and I pray for him fervently every day. But how does such an intelligent man make a statement like this without understanding its implications for his own pro-abortion policies?

 

The only way to explain it is to understand the intellectual environment, called postmodernism, in which President Obama and his peers have been raised. Generations of Americans have now been taught that truth is subjective. You have your truth, I have mine. And, even worse, I can’t “inflict” my version of truth on you. The law of non-contradiction has been suspended.

 

So politicians can tell us over and over that they can’t allow their personal faith to affect their views on public policy. Or they can take two completely opposing positions at the same time: like believing that no God condones the taking of innocent life and at the same time, condoning—even promoting—the taking of an innocent life.

 

The problem isn’t simply President Obama and his views on life; the problem is a postmodern culture which believes that truth is merely a matter of opinion, and that therefore the sanctity of innocent human life is simply an expression of one viewpoint among many.

 

I have argued for the last 20 years that postmodernism would lead to the unraveling or our society. The fact that so few noticed the contradiction in what the President said and the policies he pursues tells me that we’re far along in the unraveling process.”

 

–        

Now first, there is a lot I appreciate about Chuck Colson but it’s these statements that frustrate me because I do not find them to be fair.  Call it whatever you want, but the modern evangelical culture, or the infamous 1950’s or the “Good Ol’ Days” were not the days of the Garden of Eden. 

Second, I am not an Obama fan-boy (but I will support the president).  My convictions are pro-life but I do not want to villianize every person who either believes in pro-choice or has had an abortion.  And while I wish everyone would be pro-life, I think these typical statements made by Colson have failed as a starting point and only serve to rally like-minded individuals. At the same time, I wish those that are pro-choice but also hate abortion would at the very least, participate in pursuing ways to limit the number of abortions.  

Colson is a brilliant, well-educated righteous man.  I do not presume nor dare to correct such a godly man, but with all due respect, postmodernism is not the problem, the selfishness of the human condition is .. and this is not new. 

This is part of the problem with how we as conservative believers engage the world.  It seems to me that we refuse to actually engage the world.  It’s like we’re saying, “We’ll play basketball with you, but we’re not going to acknowledge this 3 point line thing, or this shot clock thing because we used to not have it and we liked the game better then.” 

Yes I know this analogy is not sensitive to the complexities of culture but if we are serious about engaging others, we need to do more then point the finger.  I’m not going to make it another four years if all I am getting from my conservative leaders is negative sound-bytes and pessimistic daily readings.   

My input is that we need to get realistic of how “good” days of old were.  Second, then, we should forget about them (because they are not a standard of entitlement).  Third, engage the culture we are in Christ-like ways.  Fourth, learn to handle the disappointments in Christ-like ways (I could use some extra grace on this one) and lastly, be believers who are committed in pursuing the Kingdom over personal preference or agenda.

Filed Under: Abortion, Christianity, Culture, Reflective Tagged With: , , ,

Ask Not if Pete Rollins Believes the Resurrection, Ask If he’s Made a Good Point.

February 6, 2009 by 3 Comments

Pete Rollins was asked if he believed in the resurrection during a time of presentation and discussion at Calvin College (which by the way, I think it’s great that Calvin invited him).  He blogs his answer and many are still talking about it.  Like many, I read it on my RSS Feeder and my first thought was, “Here we go again”,  second was, “He really does this paradox thing well.”  I loved Thomas’ (who just had a post picked on The High Calling blog) post about it yesterday and it’s been brought to my attention a couple of times now too (and I suppose I may have brought it to a few people’s attention as well).

Thomas got me thinking though.  After the Mid-Atlantic Conference he sat in my living room and we conversed and he was gracious enough to listen to my questions.  I’m not name-dropping here, he talks to anyone.  Anyway,  to one he responded, “I think it’s crazy if people take me too seriously.  I’m just trying to add a point here and there …”  Now maybe that was an understatement, but I appreciated that he didn’t say something like, “People need to wake up and listen to what I am saying …” and act as if he had it all figured out.  Because he writes/speaks from that humble posture, I think it’s wise to, at the very least, consider the point he’s trying to make.  Like the point that Bono was making when he dressed up as MacPhisto (the devil-character he created on the Zoo TV tour, he wasn’t endorsing the devil but quite the opposite).  In fact, if Rollins has a problem is that this thought is not original though he just does a great job in echoing it today.  Paul says in I Corinthians 13, that “…  but have not love then I am but only  a clanging cymbal.” 

I do not know really the context nor the person who asked the question.  For all I know, it could have been Sam Harris or John McArthur or Brian McLaren or a student  or professor.  It could have even been one of Pete’s friends planted in the crowd to give us something to blog about it.  In my history of attending conferences, numerous times there has been the person that wants to “expose” the speaker as a heretic. Then there’s the guy who needs to ask these questions in order to trust the speaker.  I’ve been that guy, may we be given wisdom for the journey.  But to the former, I remind you to be careful that you do not resemble the Pharisees that were trying to trap Jesus (like in John 8).

Now I’m told that Pete does believe in the literal, physical resurrection (so there are two of you reading this that are relieved), but what if he didn’t believe or stops believing it one day or stops one day and believes it again on another?  While I want to say that it would be an utter shame if he didn’t believe it, I think another shame is to miss this point.

Regarding his statement, I believe his argument is valid.  What point is it to believe in the resurrection if we don’t believe in all the words of the One that was raised?  What point is it to believe in the One that encompassed perfect love if we don’t share it in witness in the forms of words and action?  What point is it to believe in the abundant life, if we ignore those barely living and dying around us? 

I believe the Spirit uses that answer even if Pete denies the resurrection to promote the resurrection!  Let me ask it in this way. Can we not gain from his point? I say from my perspective he’s wrong on that point while he may be right that I neglect the needs around me, thereby demonstrating his point!

Let’s forget about this hyper-caffeinated, Irish philosopher for a second.   How important is the resurrection to us as believers?   We may be quick to say that it’s the central tenant of our faith but is it? Here’s something interesting to me, I wonder how many more people would believe in the resurrection if we did in fact care more for the marginalized in the many, many ways they appear.  Is this not a great conversation?

Filed Under: Christianity, Theology, U2 Tagged With: , ,