Out the Door

Love Wins

Rob Bell makes one of the most passionate pleas for trusting in God's grace that I have ever encounter.  His telling of the story of the prodigal son opened my eyes to a new perspective on this parable.  In Bell's understanding the father refuses to accept his sons' stories.  The younger son view of his life story is that he is unworthy to be called his father's son.  The story he tells himself is that his father may forgive him enough so he can get in on the benefits of being a part of his father's household.  He can hope for nothing more.  His father, however offers a different ending to the prodigal's story.  He is welcomed back with open arms and everything the father does communicates that he indeed is very own son.

The older brother, according to Bell sees himself as a reluctant slave of the father from whom he expects only the bear minimum of love.  And even this little bit of love he believes he fails to receive.  He also believes that because his father treated his brother with such grace, he himself has been cheated out of what is rightfully his.  "He thinks he's been wronged, shorted, shafted.  And he's furious about it." (p. 167)  His father offers a different perspective.  Everything the father had was available to the elder son but his misguided understanding of his father prevented him from benefitting from his father's resources.

I like that understanding of this parable.  Bell comments:

We are free to accept or reject the invitation to new life that God extends to us.  Our choice.

There are consequences for for the old brother, just as there are for us.  To reject God's grace, to turn from God's love, to resist God's telling, will lead to misery.  It is a form of punishment, all on it's own.  This is an important distinction, because in talking about what God is like, we cannot avoid the realities of God's very essence, which is love.  It can be resisted and rejected and denied and avoided, and that will bring another reality.  Now, and then.  We are that free (p. 176 & 177)

Here Bell proclaims the wonderful gift of free will, the ability God has endowed upon human beings to accept or reject his love.  I couldn't agree with him more!

However, later Bell appears to reverse his position and takes that freedom away from humans.

On the cross, Jesus says, "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing" (Luke 23).  Jesus forgives them all, without their asking for it.  Done. Taken care of.  Before we could be good enough or right enough, before we could even believe the right things.

Forgiveness is unilateral.  God isn't waiting for us to get it together, to clean up, shape up, get up--God has already done it.

It is absolutely true that "God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8).  God's forgiveness isn't based on our goodness.  But that doesn't mean that forgiveness is unilateral.  If it is then all the talk about human freedom is nonsense.  If we are not free to refuse God's forgiveness, then we are not free to accept it. 

Jesus' first proclamation according to Mark was "Repent and believe the good news" (Mark 1:15).  God's love, forgiveness, mercy, and grace demand a response from us.  We have the choice to believe the good news or not believe.  We can repent and live in God's grace, or we can continue in our sin and live outside of grace.  And God in his love won't force us to choose the former. 

Either way, love wins because all have experienced God's love if in no other way than the ability to reject it.

Here is the New There: Rob Bell's "Love Wins"

It's very common to hear talk about heaven framed in terms of who "gets in" or how to "get in."  What we find Jesus teaching, over and over, and over again, is that he's interested in our hearts being transformed, so that we can actually handle heaven.  To portray heaven as bliss, peace, and endless joy is a beautiful picture, but it raises the question: How many of us could handle it, as we are today?  How would we each do in a reality that had no capacity for cynicism or slander, or worry or pride? (Love Wins p.50)

I'm not drawing any final conclusions about Rob Bell's ideas since I've only read chapter one, but I am challenged by this paragraph.  Jesus said, "Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life." (John 3:36a)  Note that Jesus speaks in the present tense.  He says "has" not "will have."  If we were not living in the reality of eternal life in the present, that is a life without cynicism, slander, worry, or pride, why do we think we will be able to live blissfully in that reality in the future?  Do we think that when we die all the negative characteristics which have made up our personhood will suddenly be wiped away?  I've said in more than one sermon, "the only thing you can take with you to heaven is your character."  If that's true, and I believe it is, then what about those parts of our character that are not God-glorifying?  What happens to them?  I'm not sure of the answer, but these seem like questions worth pondering.

The irony of the pro-choice movement part 2

I took Carlos & Wayne's advice and checked out what Adam Hamilton says about the Newsweek article on his blog.  I also read the chapter on abortion which has been posted.

I have to say, I find little in the chapter that I can take issue with.  My questions about how anyone can be pro-abortion remain.  Abortion stands in such stark contrast to the image of a life-giving God.  Hamilton affirms that belief, I believe conception is a miraculous event in which we have become cocreators with God, and is to be violated only under the most extreme of situations. (page 159)

There may be extreem situation such as when the mother's life is in danger that terminating the pregnancy is justified.  But note I use the word "mother" for that is who she is.  The child she carries is not just a fetus.  I've never heard a wanted child referred to a fetus.  Nor have I ever seen a woman wearing a shirt that said, "Fetus on board."  Whether an unborn child is wanted or not does not change his/her status as a human being.

Because I based part one of this post on misinterpreted information from what I thought was a reliable source, Newsweek, I have chosen to delete it.  I don't want to perpetuate the misinformation and would refer my readers to the book itself.  Thank you to Carlos and Wayne for pointing me in the right direction.

Not Disciples, Friends

I'm reading Leonard Sweet's book The Gospel According to Starbucks.  Something he wrote really struck a cord with me.

Jesus didn't christen us servants.  He chose to call us friends.  Usually there is a halo effect over anyone's last words, so you'd think the church would listen especially hard to Jesus' final instructions.  He had to choose his concluding words carefully.  And he chose to say this: God wants a relationship with you, not as servants, but as friends.  "I no longer call you servants...instead I have called you friends."  John Wesley's Aldersgate experience was his transformation from being God's servant to being God's friend.

Jesus' final directive is not a work assignment: "Serve."  Jesus' final directive is a renaming embrace: "Friends."  Think of it; the Savior of the world wants me not to be his servant but to be his friend, even his child.

The motto for New Sharon UMC is "Love God.  Love others.  Make disciples."  These are based on the great commandments of Jesus and his great commission.  Maybe it would be better if it read, "Love God.  Love others.  Make friends."  I believe that Jesus expects us to make disciples.  But who are the disciples of Jesus, is it not anyone other than his friends? 

What would happen if instead of talking about evangelism in terms of making disciples, if we talked about it in terms of making friends?  Years ago I heard while attending a Cursillo (the predecessor to Walk to Emmaus),someone say something like, "Evangelism is becoming a friend, being a friend, introducing your friend to your friend Jesus."  Evangelism starts with us being friendly to someone who isn't already a friend.  Once a friendship is established then continuing to act as a friend.  Finally, pointing out your friend Jesus to your other friend.

Webster defines a disciples as, one who accepts and assists in spreading the doctrines of another: a convinced adherent of a school or individual.  In other words, discipleship has to do with beliefs.  While beliefs are crucial, what Jesus is looking for is a relationship, a friend.

In our 21st century post-Christian culture where what a person believes is very much an individual choice and where seeking to persuade someone to believe what the persuader believes is viewed as immoral proselytizing; maybe we need a new way of talking about evangelism.  There is something a whole lot less threatening about introducing someone to a friend, Jesus, in comparison to trying to convince someone that Jesus is the answer to all their problems.

Many Christians say that don't know how to evangelize, thus the church spends a lot of time and energy in trying to teach them how to make disciples.  All of them, however, already know how to make friends and have introduced their friends to other friends. 

Think of it this way; when I help out a friend I don't do it because I feel obligated to serve my friend, but because I enjoy spending time with him and it makes me feel good when I can do something kind for him.  Working together strengthens the bonds of our friendship.  Thus we need to re-frame Christian service not in terms of something we must go in order to call ourselves Christians, but in terms of strengthening the bonds of friendship with Jesus.   As we deepen our friendship with Jesus, the natural outcome is that we want our other friends to know this friend.

So what do you think, which is a better motto, "Make discples" or "Make friends"?

Your God is Too Safe

I've started reading Mark Buchanan's book Your God is Too Safe.  He doesn't waste any time but gets right to the heart of the matter in the very first chapter.

Most Christians I know are stuck.  We feel caught in jobs we barely endure and often despise, in relationships that plunder us and baffle us and deepen rather than remove our aloneness, in activities that are soul wizening in their triviality and yet insatiably addictive.  We squander jewels and hoard baubles.  We experience harrowing emotions over mere trifles and can barely muster a dull ache over matters of shattering tragedy.  We feel we've no time and no energy for the things that we know matter deeply, even eternally, but waste much time in silly stultifying diversions:  We are impatient with our child's longing to spend ten minutes with us at bedtime, but then fritter away and hour in idle telephone chatter or two hours watching the latest studio-produced inanity on video.  We gossip, even though we've made repeated resolves not to.  We envy, resent, judge, avenge, sulk, and overeat.  We read "People" magazine--maybe even "Playboy"-- and "FutureShop" flyers, but not our Bible much.  We feel that everyone else has more money, longer vacations, newer cars, nicer clothes, and fewer things going wrong with their hot water tanks, automobiles, and children than we do.

We wonder where the freedom is for which Christ set us free.  And this secret fear haunts us:  Is everyone else fulfilled, and I'm the only one who's not?  Or even worse:  Is no one fulfilled, and we are all just playing out a charade that we are?

Buchanan paints a bleak picture of the average Christian.  Sadly, I think there's more truth in his words than I care to admit.  I know I have frittered away time on trivial things and then complained I don't have enough time for the important things.  I have envied the "good life" that others seem to live rather than counting my blessings.  I have wondered why pictures of starving children don't move me more, while I can throw a tizzy-fit over the most meaningless problems.  And the only hope I see of ever changing is by throwing myself at the mercy seat of God's throne.

Lord, He Went

I just finished reading Lord, He Went, a biography of Bill Hinson by Stanley Copeland.  For 19 years Bill Hinson was the senior pastor at First UMC of Houston, the largest congregation in Methodism.  Hinson died in December of 2004 at the age of 68.  Just a few months before his death, he made one of the boldest, most prophetic speeches in the history of Methodism.  During this speech he called for "an amicable separation" to take place within the United Methodist Church.  In the years since, Hinson has often been misquoted or statements taken out of context.  It may be one of the most talked about speeches that came out of any General Conference that so few have heard or read in its entirety. 

From time to time I have echoed Hinson call for an end to all the fighting through an amicable separation but not nearly as eloquently or as powerfully as Hinson himself.  Here's that speech as reprinted from Lord, He Went pages 97-99.

All of us have poignant moments when deep sadness sweeps over our souls.  I recall as a young preacher when our church was the largest Protestant denomination in America, and a the time first began to lose members.  I've always thought numbers were important because they represent people.  Have you ever noticed that people who run numbers down never run them up?  Mine is the last generation of United Methodist preachers who can remember when we were a growing movement.  Trust has been broken, violated, disenfranchised.  They say, "Seek autonomy."

I've felt another poignant moment of sadness on the morning I learned that Karen Dammann had been acquitted.  For the first time in my life I wasn't so eager to go out and face the world with the announcement that I'm a United Methodist pastor.  Last Monday night when six of us met with fifteen persons who are of a different perspective, my sadness took on a new dimension.  We took turns talking in that circle about the church and where we were coming from.  At the end of more than two hours my feelings had coalesced to the point that I was fully persuaded we cannot bridge the gap separating us.  I was and am profoundly saddened by that conviction.

Our friends in the Western Jurisdiction have left us.  Our covenant is in shreds.  And when I speak of covenant I'm not talking about the trust clause.  I'm talking about a sacred trust that is much deeper and more binding.  Through the years such a trust could be counted on to keep us faithful to what we have discussed, voted on, and placed into our Book of Discipline.  All of that has now changed.  More than that, our friends who have broken our covenant feel that they themselves are broken; because the votes of this Conference have largely gone against them, they feel disenfranchised, they feel we are doing spiritual violence to them, and have told us clearly that we are not truth tellers.  In addition they are seeking autonomy from the larger body.  They garnered more that 300 votes in an attempt to do things their way with regard to ordination in the Western Jurisdiction.  Let's set them and ourselves free to pursue our highest aspirations.

No sincere person can rejoice in another person's pain.  No one enjoys stepping on another person's dream....No earnest Christian enjoys seeing another human suffering.  I believe it is time for us to end this cycle of pain we are inflicting on each other.  The thought of hurting another makes us sick.  They hurt us by defying the covenant, and we hurt them with our votes to uphold the Discipline every four years.

There is a great gulf fixed between those of us who are centered on the Scripture and our friends who are of another persuasion.  Repeatedly they have spoken of the need to get our church in step with our culture.  We, on the other hand, have no desire to be the chaplain to an increasingly godless society.  Rather, our desire is to be faithful to the Word of God....

For many, truth is still evolving.  They sincerely believe that the  world has the wisdom we need and we should relativize the Bible so as to bring our thoughts into harmony with whatever the current worldly wisdom suggests.  We on the other hand believe that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever.  And the grass withers and the flowers fade, but the Word of God shall stand forever....

Let me confess that there is a deep yearning in my heart as strong as when I first began to preach to be caught up in the wave of God's Spirit that is sweeping the earth, especially in the global south.  Just this week I had dinner with two of the bishops from Africa to listen to them speak of the mission and ministry being accomplished in their areas.  To hear them speak is to make the heart homesick for a place in the world revival...

Now my earnest desire is that my church, which exists to spread scriptural holiness across the earth, might be free to recapture our mission and refocus on the Great Commission to make disciples of all nations.  I dream of men's women's and youth's movements grounded in the Great Commission.  As someone stated, "It's not that life is so short, it's that eternity is so long."  There are people out there dying; and God wants to use us to share the Good News.

We cannot fight both church and culture.  Our culture alone confronts us with more challenges than we can, humanly speaking, confront and challenge.  That struggle, combined with the continuous struggle in the church, is more than we can bear.  And our people, who have been faithful and patient, should not have to continue to endure our endless conflict.  I believe that time has come  when we must begin to explore an amicable and just separation that will free both sides from our cycle of pain and conflict.  Such a just separation will protect the property rights of churches and the pension rights of clergy.  It will also free us to reclaim our high calling and to fulfill our mission in the world.  Therefore, let us, like Paul and Barnabas, agree to go our separate ways.

Review: A Whole New Mind

At my dad's recommendation, I checked out from the library A Whole New Mind by Daniel Pink.  It's subtitled, "Moving from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age." 

Pink's contention is that there are three factors which make it imperative for Americans to move from left-brain directed thinking which is sequential and logical, to right-brain directed thinking which is emotive and creative.  These three factors are; Abundance, Asia, and Automation. 

Those who live in the western world are experiencing unprecedented abundance in history of humankind.  This has opened the way for millions to begin searching for more than material security.  They are searching for meaning and purpose.  This may be the most important message in this important book for those in the Christian community.  Christianity at its very foundation is about finding meaning and purpose beyond the confines of this world.

The second and third factors, Asia and Automation, are and will continue to change the way American live and work.  Jobs which were once done by high paid engineers, MBA's, doctors and factory works are being outsourced to Asia or completed by computers.  American workers can't compete with these relatively inexpensive alternatives.  Thus Americans must develop "a whole new mind."

For Pink, this whole new mind involves six senses. 

Design; It no longer enough simply enough to build a better mouse trap, its has to look good while catching mice.

Story; Humans are hardwired for stories, and in the 21st century where a world of facts and information is as close as the computer screen, information is not an expensive commodity.  Stories that help make sense of all the information are an invaluable asset.

Symphony; Recognizing patterns and bringing together diverse information, like directing a symphony is a unique skill of right-brain directed individuals.

Empathy; Being able to "weep with those who weep, and rejoice with those who rejoice," is an ability that in a land of abundance and one where people are searching for meaning will be in high demand.

Play; Pink quotes Brian Sutton-Smith, professor of education, U of Penn., "The opposite of play isn't work.  It's depression.  To play is to act out and be willful, exultant and committed as if one is assured of one's prospects."  Play and laughter are essential to one's health and well-being.  And how well one plays may have a profound impact on the degree of success they experience in the 21st century.

Meaning; Freed from the struggle for survival that the vast majority of our forebears faced, we have the luxury of seeking the high elements of Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

This is a book I'd highly recommend anyone in any field of endeavor read.  My wife who's a teacher said there are pages she wants to copy and give to her principal.  I read it quickly, over one weekend, now I feel the need to buy my own copy and go back through it with a highlighter and absorb even more of the gems of wisdom contained within.

The Barbarian Way

I just finished reading Erwin Raphael McManus's new book The Barbarian Way.  In it he calls us to leave behind a civilized, safe religion and join with Christ in a spiritual revolution.  There are many thoughts worth quoting, here's one:

The barbarian revolt is an insurrection that defies the treaty between civilization and the powers of the dark world.  We will not stand by and watch humanity sell its soul to gain the world.  We will not be seduced by the comforts offered us if only we would compromise.  We cannot pretend that all there is, is what we can see.  Barbarians know the world of spirit.  We know there is a darkness that subversively corrupts the hearts of men, and to do nothing is to be complicit.

I long to follow the barbarian way, to throw off the fashionable attire of respectability and let loose a great battle cry.  However, I don't think I would keep my job for very long if I did.  I like most mainline pastors that I know serve a civilized congregation.  We have been seduced by comfort and sold our souls to gain worldly admiration.  We've become "nice" people and have become complicit in the corruption of the world.

The church needs leaders like J.R.R. Tolkien's Strider.  There was an aura of mystery and danger that surrounded Strider when the hobbits first encountered him in Bree.  Civilized people were suspicious of this ranger from the north.  When he lead Frodo and his friends out of Bree, he took them into the wilderness.  The going was hard and uncomfortable for the unadventurous hobbits.  Strider had no time for a second breakfast or the other self-indulgences the hobbits were accustomed to.  He was undeterred when they complained and when they questioned where he was taking them.  Strider knew what needed to be done and was supremely confident that he could get them where they needed to go.

A barbarian leader in the church who desires to take the people to a new place will face complaints and questions.  Congregations that have been domesticated and civilized aren't comfortable in the wildness of mission and ministry.  The question I find myself asking is "Do I believe enough in the barbarian way to lay aside my fears and follow Christ wherever he may lead?"