Out the Door

Never Give Up

Thank you Vince Young and the Texas Longhorns for the lesson in perseverance.  In what was one of the most speculator comebacks in college football, the Longhorns dethroned the reigning Trojans.  It was a seesaw battle for most of the game, but the Longhorns found themselves behind by 12 points late in the fourth quarter.  After scoring a touchdown and then holding the Trojans on what would have been the game winning play, Young lead his team down the field and scampered into the end zone with only 19 seconds left on the clock to give Texas the national championship.  Of course, it was only a game, but the leadership and never-say-die attitude of Vince Young is an inspiration to all.

Jesus taught that one should always persist in prayer and never give up.  Unfortunately, we don't often take those words to heart.  We pray about something, and when the answer doesn't come the way we thought it should or when we thought it should, we throw our hands up in the air and say, "It must not have been God's will." 

Millions of faithful United Methodists pray for revival in the church.  Still the church continues to decline and be pushed towards irrelevance.  Millions of other United Methodist have given up and left the UMC.  Are they right?  After years of praying for a turn around in the church, which hasn't come, should we say it's no use and follow those who have left? 

I don't believe the final horn has sounded.  Time may be running out, but the game isn't over yet.  What we need are leaders who will step up and with faith and courage move the church forward.  Now without a doubt there will be forces both within and without who we try to impede any progress.  But remember the Longhorns, the mighty Trojans weren't able stop them and Jesus has promised not even that gates of hell can withstand his church.

Religious Trends of 2005

The Barna group has noted several religious trends arising in 2005.  They are:

• A profound lack of prayer as a priority within local churches.
• The increased use of technology within churches.
• The continuing demise of the black church.
• The influence of a new breed of evangelical pastors.
• The lack of Biblical literacy among churchgoers.
• A new kind of Christian, Barna labels "Revolutionaries."

While none of these come as much of a surprise, they offer both good news and bad news.  The good news is that the church is finally moving into the 21st century.  Businesses have been using personal computers as an everyday part of their world for 20 years.  The church is just beginning to understand the potential that new kinds of technology offer in the mission of spreading the gospel. 

It's also good news that new leaders are coming to the forefront of the church.  Pastors like Rick Warren have a great passion for winning people to Christ and then helping them to continue on their journey which leads to ministry and mission.  This mixture of evangelism and social action has always been at the heart of the gospel, but has often been out of balance.

Obviously, the bad news is the lack of priority of prayer among churches.  In Barna's research, he found that only 1 in 25 congregations list prayer as a priority.  No wonder that spiritual atrophy is wide spread among American Christians.  Prayer is the powerline that connects a person to God.

The other negative trend which impacts the most people is Biblical literacy or lack thereof.  Barna noted:
“American Christians are biblically illiterate. Although most of them contend that the Bible contains truth and is worth knowing, and most of them argue that they know all of the relevant truths and principles, our research shows otherwise. And the trend line is frightening: the younger a person is, the less they understand about the Christian faith.”

As Narrative Theology points out, how we live is directly related to the stories we tell.  Without knowledge of the Biblical story, there is no way for a person to live a God-lead life.

Let's pray that God will use these positive trends to build His kingdom and with the help of church leaders, both clergy & lay, that the negative trends will be reversed.

Where does the time go?

After a much appreciated break and the chance to see family, I'm back in the office today.  Between Christmas and New Year's Day Julie & I drove about 1,000 miles in order to see both sides of our family and to spend some time together.

During our travels, we stopped for lunch at Storm Lake.  That's where we met while we were in college and where we lived the first few years of our married life.  We moved away when I entered seminary.  While we've returned many times, for one reason our daughter is buried there, it has been more than 20 years since we were citizens of that community.  It's a very odd feeling.  Where have the years gone?

We had similar feeling when we picked up the 25th anniversary DVD of Neil Diamond's "The Jazz Singer."  Could it really have been 25 years since we first saw that film in the theater?

These experiences remind me just how contemporary the scriptures are.  Isaiah wrote 2 1/2 millennium ago, "All people are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field.  The grass withers and the flowers fall."  (Isaiah 40:6b-7a)

The beginning of a new year is an excellent time to reflect on where we've been and where we're going.  It's also an excellent time to remember our mortality and the briefness of life because if we don't time can slip away from us and we'll be left wondering where the time has gone.