This Blog has Moved

I’ve decided that WordPress isn’t good on the gas mileage any longer.  Blogger = the hybrid.

So you can catch me Here from now on.  Hope to see you over there!

+ Matthew

Springs and Bats

In the opening of his book, Velvet Elvis, Rob Bell pulls out a trampoline to illustrate the fluid dynamic of doctrine and right-living.   (Personally, I would have pulled out a bat to make the same point, but maybe a trampoline is a better sport-related metaphor.)   The springs of the trampoline are our beliefs and the jumping represents the way we live. “The springs,” Bell says, “aren’t Jesus.  The springs are statements and beliefs about our faith that help give words to the depth that we are experiencing in our jumping” (p. 22).

My alternative, bat solution (which is a more traditional way of looking at this) might go like this: “The bat isn’t Jesus.  The bat is the statement we make about our faith that help give words [to the person we hit] about the depth we are experiencing as we bat them.”  Those who pick up the bat are prone to use it.  But maybe Bell is right; perhaps we need a new metaphor for this fraternity of faith and works.

What’s the use of learning what to believe if it doesn’t inform the way we live?  We skirt around the trampoline, testing each spring to make sure it will hold us.  Occasionally we put a hand on the mat as an act of faith, but we don’t get on.  With a sigh of relief we finish checking every spring.  Everything seems to be in order.  But just before we’re about to put those springs to use, some of us begin to wonder if the springs are really as strong as you remember them.  It’s prudent to go around and check them again…and again…and again…

If you find that you’re still holding on to a bat, maybe it’s time to let go.  If you find you’re nervously circling your trampoline, maybe it’s time to get on.  Those spring-beliefs are useless if you never test them with your whole weight.  And that bat you’ve been swinging like the “professionals” isn’t very fun, is it?  You’ve clenched your faith so tight you’re choking it.  And no one admires the God of a bat-wielding Christian.

Trampolines are where it’s at.  No one ever condemned a person on a trampoline.  It’s too much fun.  You can’t jump without those springs, and without the jumping the springs are useless.  So get on and jump.  Exercise those beliefs and you’ll find that you’ll jump higher than ever before.  You might even like it.  And if you like it, maybe someone else will too…

Lewis on Postmodernism: The Abolition of Man

The words “C.S. Lewis + Quotes” are probably the most googled words by last-minute sermon writers, as it seems that once a month the local pastor is letting one of Lewis’ buttery either/or quotes to slip off of his tongue (the most famous, I’m sure, is the either Jesus was the Son of God or a poached egg argument in Mere Christianity). But Lewis’ beauty is in his subtlety, if not his complexity. And it seems that no book has escaped the average Christian more than The Abolition of Man.

The Abolition of Man is Lewis’ scathing on modernism and on the deconstruction of traditional values, which he calls the Tao. “It is the doctrine of objective value” as Lewis says. The Tao is the universal, shared morality that has always existed despite a lack of shared culture (in some cases). For instance, Lewis notes that “the law of good faith and veracity” was shared by the Babylonians, the Anglo-Saxons, Chinese, Norse, Romans, Greeks, Hindu, Egyptians, and, I would add, the Jews. This importance of a society built on mutual trust was everywhere, and some of these cultures had very little interaction so that its prolific veracity cannot be identified as transferred values.

But Lewis is outraged that the Tao, or system of shared, universal values, is under attack by modern man. To contemporize, Lewis is saying that to educate in postmodernism is to educate in the destruction of society. He warned about what would be the result of unhooking our moral mores in society.

This move by the modernists (Lewis calls them conditioners) in seeking to deconstruct the Tao (or, if you prefer, Natural Law) are seeking to control Nature. These people claim to have deconstructed everything except their ability to deconstruct. Lewis said, “If you ‘see through’ everything then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To ‘see through’ things is the same as not to see.”

“Each new power won by man is a power over man as well,” Lewis said. We create airplanes to travel from place to place but airplanes can also demolish buildings. We create bombs and are frequently bombed. And the more humanity learns to control nature the less in control humanity will really have. We know more about psychology now and yet seem less in control of our minds as advertisers use psychology to exploit us. More and more, fewer and fewer men control mankind. Who is able to avoid being bombed except those able to do the bombing?

But good and evil, duty and taboo, vice and virtue, etc. (the Tao) is something subject to and deconstructed by these few men. Since good and evil are beneath their authority, they cannot rule by what is good and what is evil. There is no objective law for them to base their decisions on. So how do they act? How do they determine which is the best way to control their subjects? Having become men without chests (that objective rationality which connects the intellect to the appetite and defines us as humans) we therefore become animals ruled by nature. For when reason was the rule we truly controlled Nature, but in claiming reason is a subjective thing we have destroyed it. Human beings then will be ruled by appetite and instinct and, having rejected the tools to determine which appetite to follow, will be blown about in the wind. Thus, in man’s efforts to conquer human nature we have inevitably subjected the whole of us to nature. We have used our science to deconstruct our humanity and found we were no longer human.

“We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst.”

Christ, Kimball, and Culture

I’ve been reading Dan Kimball’s book, They Like Jesus But Not the Church, lately and it’s been thought-provoking. Kimball shares the story of how he was a typical Christian caught in “the bubble” of Christian subculture. At one point he woke up and realized he was speaking “Christianese”, hanging out with only Christian friends, and spending so much time doing Church things that he had no relationship with those outside the church.

Kimball’s whole argument unfolds from that point: If we’re in the bubble, we’re not fulfilling the Great Commission and thus we’re not really Christ’s church. The solution is for the church to focus on secular culture and, instead of rejecting it, embrace it. This idea is a radical shift from the church’s practice that has gone back to the Enlightenment, but it has gained traction as we become a global village. Many Christians have lived uncomfortably with double lives for a long time now, and the idea that secular culture can be embraced is a huge relief.

So how are Christians supposed to relate to culture? Perhaps Richard Niebuhr is the most famous 20^th century theologian to tackle this question. He proposed 5 ways in which Christians can/do relate to culture in his famous work Christ and Culture (1951):

1. Christ against Culture: Christians view Culture as the enemy, leading to a monastic desire to be separate and avoid sinful entanglements that come by participating in Culture.

2. Christ of Culture: On one hand, Christians “interpret culture through Christ” and favor those elements which seem in accord with Christ. One the other hand, “they understand Christ through culture” – emphasizing the aspects of God that are most in line with the culture.

3. Christ above Culture: Christians do not see the culture as all bad and believe that culture is part of God’s plan (Cf. Romans 13; 1 Peter 2). We obey God first but participate in the culture we are so long as it doesn’t interfere with our relationship with God.

4. Christ and Culture in Paradox: Christians view culture and Christianity in constant tension, so that to move towards one is to walk away from the other. The Church and Culture are two separate, God-given entities that are both necessary (like law and grace) but can never be reconciled. The idea is to find a good balance between the two.

5. Christ the Transformer of Culture: Christians should seek to transform Culture in order to create a Christian state. In this way Culture is Christian and thus no difficulty should exist. Christian principles provide the framework for social innovations driven by men continually transformed by the Spirit.

No doubt you have a hard time choosing which approach is best. Philip Yancey once wrote: “I remember that Niebuhr’s book left me feeling enlightened, but as confused as ever. All the approaches seemed to have something to contribute, and in fact, I could point to biblical examples of each one”[1] Yancey’s right, we can make a Biblical case for each one of those models and yet it would be awkward to combine them all. Angus J. L. Menuge, in Christ and Culture in Dialogue, summarized Niebuhr’s claims in three points:[2]

(M1) All five models are sometimes appropriate at different times of history

(M2) No one of the models is exclusively correct

(M3) It is impossible to find one correct answer to the Christ and culture problem.

We can certainly sympathize with such an agnostic conclusion. So how will we know if Kimball’s proposed shift in Church-Culture relations is right?

---

[1] Yancey, “A State of Ungrace,” 33.

[2] You can find the relevant excerpt here: http://www.mtio.com/articles/bissar26.htm#56

Christ the [emerging] Cure

After I was done presenting at the Seminary Scholarship Symposium at Andrews University I got to hear someone pose the question: What ever happened to pastoral counselors?  While I couldn’t agree with all of his conclusions about modern psychology, I did agree with him that the role of the pastor has diminished considerably in this area.  For most of Christian history, the bishop/priest/pastor was the one you went to for most of your advice when you feel depressed, unwanted, etc.  And as the Emerging conversation gets more interesting, I can’t help but wonder that we might see the social importance of the pastor restored someday.

It couldn’t come at a more needed time, either.  I’m convinced that Christ is cure for so many of our mental/spiritual maladies.   The message that Jesus sent at the cross has astounding implications of our own self-worth.  C.S. Lewis puts it this way: “Christ died for men precisely because men are not worth dying for; to make them worth it.”  But sin has cheapened us.  When I choose something over God I am defining myself by that sin.  If I pass someone by on the road who needs help, I am claiming first that I am too  important to stop and that they aren’t worth my time.  I’ve then told God what I think I am worth and what I think the other person is worth too.

The farther we travel in Satan’s realm the more the message of Christ will heal hurting people.  Christians have the message that all people are worth eternity.  It’s true, Christians have always believed this, but our diminished social effectiveness mitigated our message.  At some point down the line we were perhaps more worried about being right than being love.  A recent Barna (9-27-07) poll shows that 87% of people think Christianity is a judgmental religion, 85% call it hypocritical, and 78% say it is old-fashioned.

We’ve got to do something about it.  The religion of infinite love is perceived as the religion of intolerance, condemnation, and hypocrisy.  Now is the time to join the growing conversation and start sharing each day what God thinks they’re worth: eternity.

Ex-Adventist Incarnational Ministry

Shasta Burr (now Nelson), the Net 98 darling co-host, has popped up on the radar more than a few times the last few years. Her latest incarnation is the most interesting however. After leaving Anchor Point church (and the denomination) in Seattle with her pastor-husband Greg Nelson, she moved to San Francisco to start a new Christian community, Second Wind. Like make emerging, incarnational ministries, Second Wind emphasizes personal spirituality and community over doctrine and hierarchy. Shasta claims that such a ministry was needed because traditional churches are failing when it comes to representing Christianity. She says:

“I just read this author’s statement in how he says there’s over 998,000 different religions and he said it’s ironic that, almost without fail, almost every single one of them says that they have the truth and are right – so it’s not just that those other people are wrong, but that they’re evil in some way. And I thought about that and I said ‘that is so sad.’ That even with the best of intentions all of these religions are trying to help people ‘have this truth’ and I guess for us it was more about wanting to love people – the relationship was more important that being so arrogant to think that what I believe is what you need to believe.”

Greg Nelson agrees:

“Nobody has a corner on this thing called truth…and we wanted to not have in our vocabulary the idea of inside/outside…you can’t have real community to say ‘you have to be this way or believe this way.’”

It's very true that no one has a complete grasp of truth and that no one should pretend to either. But what is the big deal about 998,000 religions all claiming to be right? Do you honestly believe that it's possible that everyone can be right? And so what if some obscure tribe (or major religion) believes that everyone outside their community will someday burn alive for not accepting the truth...that's expected. In apposition to that idea, Shasta claims that "I guess for us it was just about wanting to love people." Yet Jesus, clearly a rather divisive figure, served as the greatest model of love. He clearly believed that He was right and that everyone else was not only wrong but would one day be punished for being wrong.

True community has boundaries. You belong to the NRA if you believe what the NRA believes. You belong to the condo association if you own one of the condos. Show me a community without boundaries! You're wrong, Greg, when you say "you can't have real community to say 'you have to be this way or believe this way.'" That's what community is! I don't think anyone has a functional family that operates like Shasta and Greg seek for their church. Families condemn wrong behavior and yet still serve to love unconditionally. That's the balance Jesus had and I think that it's the model for our community.

I totally applaud the work of these two pastors in breaking down prejudices and for rightly criticizing traditional Christianity on so many points. I think that this approach encourages authenticity and honesty and that it'll be a template for many of us for the rest of our ministry.  I can't emphasize that enough!  Traditional Christianity has failed in so many ways and I acknowledge that. It pains me deeply. But in our resourcefulness in finding a reply, let's make sure that what we do really is better than what we had - and not just a knee-jerk reaction that goes to the opposite.

Hymn Hystery: Mine Eyes Have Seen…John Brown’s Body?

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword;
His truth is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! His truth is marching on.

Those are the famous lyrics set to the old “Battle Hymn of the Republic” tune that was popular among the Union soldiers in the America Civil War. But this tune has the unusual distinction of being written for Christian use in the revivals of the 1750’s, then appropriated for secular army songs, and then turned back into a Christian marching song. Whew. And to think that so many people consider the possibility of Martin Luther’s “A Might Fortress” tune being derived from the bar scene to be scandalous. When the army got a hold of this old revivalist tune they turned it into a song called “John Brown’s Body.”

John Brown’s body lies a-mouldering in the grave;

John Brown’s body lies a-mouldering in the grave;

John Brown’s body lies a-mouldering in the grave;

His soul’s marching on!

A little morbid, for sure. The John Brown song was originally composed good-naturedly about a comrade-in-arms whom they loved to pick on (and probably make uncomfortably by singing about his death). When civilians heard it, they thought that the soldiers were singing about John Brown, the famous Kansas Abolitionist who was executed by the South for his raid on Harper’s Ferry. Shortly, the Union soldiers added more verses and the hymn became about the latter John Brown.

Near the end of the war, “Mine Eyes” became one of Abraham Lincoln’s favorite hymns. It is said that he cried when he heard the hymn. Perhaps instead of complaining of the origins of the tune, we should stand and be amazed at the power of Christian truth to overwhelm whatever it comes in contact with.

A Sabbath Meditation I

This selection is from G.K. Chesterton, one of the most luminous minds of the 20th century. It’s a poem he wrote entitled, “A Poem for Night”:

Here dies another day

During which I have had eyes, ears, hands

And the great world round me;

And with tomorrow begins another.

Why am I allowed two?

Christian _______ Institute: The Sabbath

Hank Hanegraaff, the self-proclaimed “Bible Answers Man” falls quite short in his treatment of Seventh-day Adventists (SDA’s) and Seventh-day Baptists (SDB’s) on the issue of the Sabbath. What follows are some excerpts and my comments on an article found on his website, Christian Research Institute, written by James A. Borland. (Background: the CRI was originally started by Walter Martin, author of Kingdom of the Cults and one who was intimately involved with the Questions on Doctrine controversy in the Adventist Church. Since Hanegraaff took over in 1989 following Walter’s death, the Martin family has distanced themselves from CRI and specifically Hank Hanegraaff’s leadership.)

“There is no question that the Bible teaches that God made the seventh day, blessed it, and sanctified it. All this can be learned from Genesis 2:1–3; however, there is no further mention of the Sabbath in Genesis, or in Exodus…”

How about the Ten Commandments? Or even Exodus 16, which you acknowledge below…

“We never read that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, or the patriarchs ever kept the Sabbath for even one day.”

We never read that the patriarchs were against gambling and drugs, either.

“In that final state of God’s kingdom, which Revelation 21:3 tells us will have no need of sun or moon, there will be one perpetual day. John added that ‘there shall be no night there’ (Rev. 21:25). How then could there be a cycle of seven days that would allow for a literal Sabbath?”

Actually, John is talking about the New Jerusalem and the point he is trying to make is that we will no longer have to depend on the celestial bodies for warmth, light, etc. We will be dependent on Christ. Either way, it’s ultimately a moot point due to the amount of speculation required on both sides.

“We do not read of Adam and Eve having a barbeque prior to the Fall. After the Fall, however, they had to offer animal sacrifices. The sweet and delicious aroma of roasting meat would have filled the air.”

OK, this has nothing to do with the Sabbath, but I find it extremely offensive. I find it difficult to believe that Adam and Eve, born in a perfect world and formed by the very hand of God, would consider roasting meat “sweet and delicious.” Do you think that when the Lord killed the first animal to make them tunics of skin that they said, “Oh, finally! Now we can have hamburgers”? More likely they associated the eating of meat with the result of their sin, like a lot of other things, and thus it likely didn’t hold great pleasure for them.

“What would Sabbath keeping look like today if one were to practice it? Let us not discuss Pharisaical perversions or additions to the Sabbath, but just what God’s Word teaches. According to Exodus 16:29, God required strict home-abiding on the Sabbath for all Israelites. In today’s economy the airlines, buses, trains, and roadways would be empty….Nehemiah took stern action against buying and selling on the Sabbath (Neh. 10:31; 13:15–22). Department stores and the malls would need to remain closed. Restaurants and individuals would fall under the ban on baking and boiling food (Exod. 16:23). Seeking and finding one’s “own pleasure” and doing one’s “own ways” were also prohibited on the Sabbath (Isa. 58:13). Death was exacted on any violators, including whoever performed any work (Exod. 31:14–15; 35:2), even gathering sticks (Num. 15:32, 35).”

Notice how James Borland portrays biblical Sabbath-keeping in this age. Can you imagine it? Trains, buses, stores, restaurants and, gasp, you can’t even gather sticks!

1. Ex. 16:19 does NOT command people to stay home. No Jew has ever believed this. The command was given in the context of the Israelites were not to go out on the Sabbath and look for manna.
2. No buying or selling? That’s not so bad.
3. Ex. 16:23’s ban is on baking or boiling food (in ancient times, a very long and laborious process) on the Sabbath because it was meant to rest.
4. The same thing with getting sticks, or wood for the fire. It could be labor-intensive or at least time consuming. The principle of the Sabbath was to spend time with God and find Him in community with fellow believers…not to go to your job or hunt for firewood or to be cooking all day

I understand that Sabbath-keeping is a minority thing. But I am alarmed that such literature as quoted above is coming from an organization called the “Christian Research Institute.” They made some fair points, but too often these were supported with the most biblically-illiterate examples and statements that it totally blew me away. I like some of their other articles but this one is remarkably lacking in any serious research. Henceforth, I shall refer to it in all blog posts as the “Christian _____ Institute” until they get back on track.

Tentative Theology: The Nature of Christ

Former PUC professor Dennis Priebe, in his notable sermon/paper against past G.C. President Robert Folkenberg and the “QOD-adopters” has really polished his rhetoric when it comes to the nature of Christ. The nature of Christ is a hotly contested issue among so-called “Traditional” Adventists and their “Evangelical” Adventist brothers. Priebe claims that the only difference between the Evangelical understanding of the nature of Christ and the Catholic understanding of an immaculate conception is “one generation removed.” With this he poo-poo’s the idea that Jesus was born with Adam’s pre-fallen nature, as QOD suggests.

The idea of a pre-Fall Christ threatens LGT in two ways: (1) If Christ had Adam’s nature, then he couldn’t be tempted like us; (2) If Christ had Adam’s nature, then His example of a sinful life is not available for us to emulate (because Christ had an unfair advantage). It all boils down to privileged perfection vs. earned perfection.

But the idea that Christ had Adam’s pre-Fall nature does not necessarily nullify the fact that Christ was “tempted in every way” (Heb. 4:15, NIV). Regardless of what nature He had, it is obvious that He wasn’t tempted with every single temptation anyone has ever faced. Likely, we can interpret “in every way” as being tempted in principle to lie, cheat, steal, murder, etc. More basically, we can just say that Christ was tempted to sever His connection with the Father in one way or the other. If that’s true, then He can identify with us perfectly. Even sinless Adam was tempted. That’s how we got into this mess in the first place. How can you say it’s an unfair advantage? Clearly it wasn’t for Adam.

“If Christ did not take our fallen nature,” Priebe argues, “then who in the universe has yet proved that Satan is a liar?” If Adam wouldn’t have sinned, he would have proved Satan a liar. Thus, if Christ, as the Second Adam and standing in his place, can conquer where Adam failed then He can prove that God’s law can be kept. Ellen White wrote: “The nature by which the enemy was overcome is the same nature over which in Eden he obtained an easy victory” (12MR 410). I rest my case.

As to the second point, on the potential for human sinlessness, I am unsure. Personally, I think the whole debate is framed incorrectly. I think “perfection” needs to be carefully defined. One can be perfect and sinless, or one can be perfectly in Christ, abiding in Him. Noah, for one, was called perfect though he had committed sin. (More on this later.)

I’m not sold on the nature of Christ yet. It’s a tough issue. I only seek to prove by this post that Priebe’s desperate presuppositions are ultimately shallow. I could easily rebuke the other side while I sort this out. This is theological teething…