Pastor's Blog
Feb 6, 2012
The Arab Spring
God created man in His own image, male and female he created them. And because we were fashioned in the image of our Creator, we are uniquely capable of enjoying a relationship with Him in a way that no other living being can. God has given us the unique ability to know Him, to understand His self-revelation, and to consciously worship Him. He created us to be worshippers, and that’s exactly why everywhere we look we see that mankind does in fact worship.
Every great society has had its gods and temples and religious ceremonies, but the same is true of the most primitive civilizations as well. Indigenous and isolated peoples of the Amazon basin, whom we are still discovering, are profoundly spiritual. They worship. Their religion is animistic, a belief that objects in the natural world have souls and associated spiritual power, but it is unabashedly worship.
It’s true of modern people as well. The major world religions, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism and Islam engulf the entire globe, and though we increasingly feel the pressure of aggressive and evangelistic atheism here in the west, the truth is that the modern world is very religious and very fervent in its worship of the divine. This most glaring observation often escapes the western secular-humanist.
For instance, when widespread riots began to break out last year across the Islamic world and very quickly toppled a notorious list of corrupt and tyrannical strongmen, the western media glorified it as a new awakening, calling it the “Arab Spring.” Even President Obama trumpeted the rapid accomplishments unfolding across North Africa and assured us that the angry Muslim youths clashing with government soldiers in Egypt’s Tahir Square was the inevitable opening of a new chapter in world freedom. The New York Times led us to believe that Jeffersonian democracy was breaking out across the southern Mediterranean. The manifest destiny of global human liberty and equality was taking one giant leap forward. We were witnessing a Middle Eastern political and personal renaissance.
But one year later, we see that Tahir Square is still aflame in violence and protest, and that recent Egyptian elections have yielded a windfall for Islamic fundamentalists. The Muslim Brotherhood now controls a solid majority of parliament and they openly speak of cutting all ties with Israel and revoking the historic Sinai Accords of 1979. The Israeli embassy was looted and burned as the ambassador and his family fled for their lives. Even pro-democracy groups from the United States have been harassed and are currently being held and prevented from leaving the country. So much for springtime, it looks like late autumn.
How did the liberal press and the U.S. State Department and the President get it so wrong? Because their secular-humanist worldview would not allow them to see the underlying truth undergirding all of these movements. The hardcore Muslim is an avid worshipper, and he wants to worship Allah according to his religious conviction. And since Islam has no organic concept of separation of church and state, the revolutionaries are merely taking their religious convictions to the street in order to establish Islam at every level of culture and society.
The Arab uprisings were not primarily about implementing human freedom and liberty, they were about casting off self-serving, hypocritical despots who impeded a broader Islamic awakening. Hosni Mubarak was hated for his accommodation of Israel as much as he was for his shameful excesses. When the first acts of Egypt’s newly formed parliament were meant to demonize Israel, we could see that a rainbow of peace was not looming behind the black clouds of upheaval.
When the first acts of Egypt’s newly formed parliament were meant to demonize Israel, we could see that a rainbow of peace was not looming behind the black clouds of upheaval.
Conservative Christians who looked at the Arab uprising and saw it primarily in colors of religious conviction were dismissed as biased and naive. We couldn’t see the collective goodness of man and his cry for freedom bursting forth from the stone-throwing mobs in Tahir Square. But as events continue to unfold, it becomes obvious that the Muslim Brotherhood is cementing it’s place of leadership and that the Arab street is lending it’s full support. This revolution is about Islam’s absolute claim to mind, body, and soul. It is political because it emanates from a religion that demands total domination.
Don’t look for good news coming out of the Arab spring. This is not a movement heralding freedom and democracy, it is a movement of worshippers who demand to worship according to their Muslim conscience. Israel will be the first to feel it’s chilling affect, just as they did when Gaza used its nascent democracy to elect the self-avowed terrorist organization Hamas.
Western secular-humanists can’t bring themselves to admit that man is, at his most basic level, a worshipper. He doesn’t want to believe that who and what a person worships will determine everything other aspect of his collective effort, from art to culture to politics. But it’s true. We have been created to worship, and we will either worship what is true or we will worship what is false, and every other facet of our being will spring from that decision, including the Arab spring.
Jan 13, 2012
Offense And Defense
Though I’m not an old man by any stretch, I quite often feel that way when I tell my kids how much life has changed in these United States since I was their age. We had a five and dime store in our little town, a big pack of M&Ms was a quarter, and a genuine milk shake at the local drive-in set you back 75 cents. My children can’t believe that while still very young we used to ride our bikes all over the neighborhood and even down to the grocery store without adult supervision. They get the same storybook sensation when watching It’s a Wonderful Life where George Bailey works the counter, serves up ice cream, and makes home deliveries for Mr. Gower’s drug store at the tender age of ten. My children wonder if life really used to be like that or if it’s just the fanciful imagination of a fictional story.
In today’s world of internet pornography, registered (and unregistered) sex offenders, human trafficking, and child abductions, I can’t imagine sending my children across town unaccompanied to deliver sundry goods to strangers. In our collective distrust of the unknown, modern American parents now feel compelled to hunker down behind gated communities, in private parks, and among neighborhood watch programs as we personally shuffle our children back and forth to carefully selected activities from the safety of our armored SUVs. We maintain diligent surveillance of our offspring constantly, because although we like to assure one another that life is getting better, we know that the number of domestic threats to these precious little lives is growing daily.
Public life has changed empirically and dramatically in American Society over the last fifty years, and the amount of money we spend on locks, security systems, and guard dogs only testifies to the fact. Every grammar school now sits behind a defensive line of chain-linked fence, as we dutifully protect our children not from a foreign enemy, but from ourselves.
Every grammar school now sits behind a defensive line of chain-linked fence, as we dutifully protect our children not from a foreign enemy, but from ourselves.
Okay, society has experienced a quantum leap of lurking dangers for our little ones over recent decades and we therefore have to guard their well being, but what does that mean for the individual Christian and for the church? Should we also hunker down in a defensive posture or should we embrace the style and flow of modern life with an eye on simply influencing it for good? We know the threats are real and increasing, but what response would the Lord have from us?
I think it’s vital that we in the church step back, evaluate, and make sure that we as Christian parents and church leaders are protecting our children from the predatory nature of this world while still maintaing a diplomatic reach to it so that we might fulfill the great commission of Christ. We must engage the world, but we must also protect ourselves, especially our children from not only physical dangers, but the ever encroaching spirit of the age.
The Lord calls us to be salt and light to an insipid and veiled world, which requires personal interaction and investment. But it is also imperative for us to recognize that our children are impressionable, vulnerable, and easily entangled in the web of contemporary culture. Social media, the all-pervasive-internet, and a national addiction to cable TV have allowed worldly concepts and definitions to infiltrate the most dedicated Christian families. No one is immune.
And part of that susceptibility is by design. God created us to be influenced by our community. We all speak with an accent, and that accent has been determined by the rhythm of language filling our ears from early childhood. I prefer scrambled eggs and toast for breakfast and not rice and miso soup precisely because I was raised in California and not Tokyo. The culture of our community shapes our tastes, appetites, and thinking.
So how do we remain effective purveyors of the gospel to a godless world and still protect our children in their budding faith? How do we guard their minds and their hearts from the pursuant evil without moving into cloistered communes and cutting ourselves off from the outside world? It’s a tactic that has been tried countless times in countless ways, and the results are almost always disastrous doctrinally and spiritually.
Christian parents and church leaders can learn a valuable lesson from the world of sports, which also happens to be very biblical. Most forms of competitive athletics have both an offensive element and a defensive one. Players learn the two roles and their fundamental differences from the earliest stages of athletics, as little basketball players discern between shooting the ball for two points and stealing the ball from the other team. Offense requires one method of thinking and reacting, while defense demands another.
And so it is with the Christian life. When it comes to influencing this world, to preaching the gospel, and to making disciples, we are on offense. We must go into all the world, including our own hazardous culture, and declare the salvation of Jesus Christ. Our children can see and learn that our families are engaged in the proclamation of the gospel in a very offensive strategy. But we also need to teach our children to play strong defense. When we see that the world is alluring us to think in an unbiblical fashion, when it entices us to live and act after our sin natures, we need to assume a full-court-press mentality. That’s when it’s time to protect and encourage one another in the faith.
Just as with athletic teams of every sort, it’s difficult to hold these two strategies in balance. It’s easy to strengthen one and let the other atrophy on the sideline. But I think the best way to begin, especially with our children, is defense. Teach them the scriptures, help them to know why they believe what they believe, and ask them repeatedly why the definitions of this world are categorically wrong. When they have established a sound and credible defense from the pages of scripture, the Lord can then ease them out into the arena of offense. Because as soon as they begin to claim Christ publicly in an overt fashion, the attacks will be ruthless. And just like that little beginner on the basketball court, they’ll recognize when to transition from offense to defense.
American culture is steadily “slouching toward Gomorrah” as Robert Bork said in his book of the same name, and the dangers are everywhere, especially for our children. Many young Christians are being savagely overthrown by the enemy as they walk away from their faith in Christ. But if we will teach our children to recognize the difference between offense and defense, when to influence with the gospel and when not to be influenced away from it, they’ll have a tremendous understanding of the Christian life. Jesus preached the kingdom throughout Israel, but he defended himself against attack from Satan with the word of God. He knew both strategies well, as we must know them too. Let’s teach them effectively to our children so that they might flourish in their life and service to Jesus.
Jul 8, 2011
Christian Freedom
Across the United States, the month of July is known for hot weather, family vacations, and of course the ubiquitous celebrations of Independence Day. The Fourth of July happens to be my favorite holiday. From backyard barbecues to fireworks exploding across the night sky, America loves the fourth. Besides being the day that I asked my wife on our first date, I love what it symbolizes: Freedom! We as a nation declared our independence from Britain and told King George III in no uncertain terms that the bonds between us were now dissolved. We were our own nation and we were free to establish our own form of government.
Neither King George nor Parliament found this new national identity and irreverent declaration very amusing. The Revolutionary War would rage for another seven years and cost tens of thousands their precious lives. Freedom always has a price.
But I also love the 4th of July because it paints a wonderful spiritual portrait for those of us in Christ. Just as we celebrate nationally the freedom attained by a declaration that we did not write and a war that we did not fight, so in Christ we rejoice over a spiritual freedom we did not initiate and we did not earn. Our freedom from sin, from Satan, and even from our own flesh nature was paid in full by Jesus upon the cross of Calvary. We are the undeserving recipients of God’s grace and we cherish a resultant freedom that our own spiritual poverty could never have consummated. We love him because He first loved us.
And although our freedom is highly esteemed among us both as Americans and Christians, I think it’s time to admit we have gained a very lopsided understanding of freedom itself, both nationally and spiritually. Our culture now sees freedom as purely license, the right to do whatever we want, whenever we want, and however we want. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco just “ordered” the U.S. Government this past Wednesday to cease enforcing the ban on openly gay members of the military. Why? Because freedom now, even in the minds of highly educated and articulate judges, means pursuing personal happiness via any path any individual chooses, no matter how absurd or perverse. As long as we don’t harm the environment or discriminate against race and gender, we are free to indulge every passion. So even the armed forces must comply with this new understanding of freedom, no matter how deviant or offensive.
This new understanding of freedom is pouring into the church as well. The predominant attitude among young evangelicals is that their freedom in Christ is indubitably parallel to the freedom of secular America, except that we go to church on most Sundays and we verbally acknowledge a Galilean social-worker named Jesus. The list of new Christian leaders preaching holiness, separation, and tangible sacrifice is short and getting shorter. The new and repeated emphasis from the pulpit is contextualization and generous orthodoxy. After all, the last thing our Christian freedom could ever entail is perceived exclusivity from secular culture.
Real freedom however, has nothing to do with unbridled personal fulfillment. It is not the lack of restraint or the dissolution of restriction. Freedom means having the unopposed opportunity to do what I ought to do. It is the ability to love and serve and live for my Creator as He has commanded me, and to do so without formal interference. Christians that understand their Bibles know that sin and the ability of sin to capture and imprison the flesh is the greatest obstacle to spiritual freedom. Sin is addictive, compelling, and enslaving.
Freedom therefore, means having the shackles of sin broken off my life. It means being loosed from the bondage of this world to live a life wholly pleasing to the Lord. That’s why only Jesus gives us true freedom, because only He gives us the power to overcome sin.
May we as Christians see that freedom comes from Christ, that it is the liberty to pursue righteousness, and that it must be closely guarded and preserved. Using our freedom to drive on the same freeway but one lane over from the world isn’t freedom. It’s imitation and it ends at the same destination. Jesus has freed us to live for him in a manner that is above and beyond this world. As Christians we have commandments, prohibitions, and the power of God, and because of it, we have freedom.
Jun 24, 2011
Helping the Needy and Homeless
The learning curve in ministry is very steep. I have not yet been a pastor for three years, and everyday I am learning something new about the ministry and something new about people. When I became a pastor I knew that one of the areas of ministry I would certainly encounter was that of helping the needy. And what I have discovered will probably come across as a shock: the local church’s general approach to helping needy and homeless people has only exasperated their misery and complicated their recovery.
I know that there are many great ministries doing a very good job in this critical area of spiritual service, but from my limited perspective, most of the local churches are making a terrible hash of it. Though their motives are undoubtedly genuine, they are enabling and prolonging the very lifestyle that keeps the needy and homeless in bondage to their debilitating sin.
Our church is located on the west side of Turlock, and we tend to have a much greater concentration of needy and homeless people than one might see for instance, near the University. And since our church is situated right in the middle of a neighborhood, we tend to get frequent visits from indigents, especially on Sunday mornings.
And what is striking to me is the number of needy and homeless people that emphatically demand our assistance. A man approached one of our elders after service and said that he needed money for his kids. He didn’t want to come to church, he didn’t want to come into our fellowship hall, he didn’t want food that we made available to him. He wanted the cash without any encumbrance.
When our elder rightfully explained that we don’t just hand out money, especially to people who have never attended our church or sown sacrificially into this ministry, he became irate and started cursing God, the church, and the elder. He wanted the money and he wanted it now. If this had been one isolated incident we might chalk it up to a singular exception. But sadly, this incident has repeated itself numerous times with only slight variation. One woman came in and boldly declared her need for $20 so that she might see a dentist (that wouldn’t cover her time in the waiting room). Another man wreaking of alcohol came in one Sunday and wanted to speak to the pastor. I gladly took him aside to hear his concern, and he too wanted $20 for gas money to take his son to the doctor. When I gently explained to him that we don’t hand out cash but did offer him some food, he became visibly irritated, as though I had just broken some sort of established contract.
And of course we have received countless requests and calls for help with mortgages, rent, clothing, food, and travel expenses from total strangers. Now some may say “You can’t blame them for trying. Who isn’t looking for a little help?” And some may even say “As a church you should help them, and then use it as an opportunity to share the gospel.” But what we are witnessing is an increasing population of needy and homeless people who want nothing to do with the gospel and yet have no qualms about demanding money from the church. They not only want financial help; they insist upon it, as though it is their right and our responsibility.
It got me thinking. How did we go from a culture that respected and rewarded hard work to one that so shamelessly demands a handout? Certainly the government with its entitlement-driven programs takes its place among the usual suspects, but surprisingly the line-up also includes an unusual suspect, the church itself.
Too many ministries are trafficking in mere temporary consolation, handing out food and clothing and even money to the needy and homeless, without tying it to eternal substance and lasting hope. Where is the gospel? Where is the accountability? Where is both the message and the means for changing a person’s life? If we continue to simply give physical sustenance to people on the streets without effecting an alteration of heart and habit we are simply perpetuating the problem.
Churches must stop handing out charity without reasonable demands of accountability. We are inevitably teaching people that the Body of Christ is one more category of the welfare state. It is not. Let us give people the necessities for physical life while we teach them the hope of everlasting life. If the needy person rejects those conditions, then let their stomach be a powerful motivator to return and hear the gospel in all of its glory. We will feed your belly, as long as you’ll let us feed your soul as well. That’s all we ask.
Apr 2, 2011
Love Wins
When a religious subject hits the Modesto Bee you know that the story is either really old or really big. The headline read “What is hell? Book sets off discussion,” as the article covered a subject that is arguably both old and big. The story dates back to the Garden of Eden when Satan tempted Eve with the challenge “Has God indeed said?” But it’s also a very new story sparked by Pastor Rob Bell and his recent book, “Love Wins.” The story gained national momentum last week when Pastor Chad Holtz posted a Facebook message supporting the book and was then summarily dismissed from his pastorate at the United Methodist Church in Henderson, N.C.
Family feuds always titillate the press, especially a scrap within evangelical Christianity. In his book, this young mega-church pastor presents numerous propositions that openly question the traditional biblical understanding of eternal punishment, namely hell. His work spurred the Associated Press to ask its readers pointedly, “What does hell mean to you?” That question spoke volumes as the secular media unwittingly exposed a very flawed doctrine. Rob Bell isn’t presenting a careful exegetical examination of hell from the pages of scripture, but instead is asking his readers to look deep within themselves and consider the true meaning of love, heaven, hell, punishment, and consequence. It becomes a subjective matter of the heart and not the mind. He writes this:
A staggering number of people have been taught that a select few Christians will spend forever in a peaceful, joyous place called heaven, while the rest of humanity spends forever in torment and punishment in hell with no chance for anything better…. This is misguided and toxic and ultimately subverts the contagious spread of Jesus’ message of love, peace, forgiveness, and joy that our world desperately needs to hear.
Apparently this line of thinking has struck quite a chord with an American religious audience. Last week, “Love Wins” was the fourth best-selling book on Amazon.com, and the best-selling book in the religion category. It has spurred thousands of responses from pulpits, to Twitter, to Facebook, to weblogs. It is sure to make Rob Bell a notable and sought-after voice within Evangelical Christianity and will no doubt generate millions of dollars in revenue.
The crux of his argument is that God’s love can and will triumph over every humanly contrived circumstance, including, he leads the reader to believe, the sin of a lifelong rejection of Christ. It’s compulsory heaven for all, or almost all. Perhaps even Rob Bell believes that Hitler, Stalin, and Genghis Khan are consigned to a place called “hell.” But who really knows?
This comforting doctrine of “heaven for all,” also known as “universalism,” is a sweet seduction inviting us to reach out and grasp a tempting but forbidden fruit. Let’s just believe that God’s love is so fantastic that it will ultimately override man’s choice, the reality of sin, His own justice, eternal consequences, and the clear teaching of scripture. After all, love in 21st century America doesn’t punish evil and it never demands justice. Modern love is a fairy tale that embraces diversity and tolerates every ideology as consequentially equal. Of course it hasn’t exactly produced utopia here on earth, as our prisons continue to swell with violent offenders, but how cheery to know that this new doctrine of love will be enthusiastically received by popular culture.
But anytime a “new wind” of doctrine blows through the church, we need to step back and ask ourselves if it is biblical. The apostle John wrote, "And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire” (Rev 20:15). Jesus said, "The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth” (Matt 13:41).
And of course the early fathers of church history embraced and taught a doctrine of hell both literal and punitive. A cursory reading of the works of early American Pastor and Theologian Jonathan Edwards reveals a solid belief in hell as the eternal portion for reprobate sinners.
So if Jesus presented us with the doctrine of hell, and the apostles agreed and expounded upon it, and historic Christianity has repeatedly affirmed its existence in literal terms, where is this new doctrine coming from? And why is it having such a far reaching effect?
Could it be that the American church in the broadest sense has drifted away from the technical teaching of the Bible to embrace a more selective and relativistic doctrine that attempts to soften the bluntness of the gospel? Could it be that the culture is infiltrating and shifting the philosophy of the church more than the church is influencing the culture?
Rob Bell and the emergent church represent a generation that has been reared in a consequence-free idealism. Grade school teachers reward self-esteem no matter what the effort. Youth sports ensure that everyone wins and that participation trumps victory. High schools grade on the curve, and one phone call from an angry parent is sure to get the administration involved. Colleges regularly inflate their grades. The courts have permitted an avalanche of law-suits that shield people from even the most basic sense of personal responsibility. And if somehow you still manage to slip through the myriad safety nets and actually fail, the United States government will come to the rescue with a host of regulations and spending packages that ensure success. Your sex, age, disability, race, sexual orientation, geography, or ancestry will surely highlight your victimization and shield you from the consequences of personal choice.
“Love Wins” is simply the Bible recast in the narrative of a consequence-free generation. They honestly expect every official entity to buffer them from negative results. Certainly God is required to do the same. Certainly we can live like hell and still expect heaven. But tragically, even spoiled brats eventually face the harshness of reality. In the end, God’s judgment will play out exactly as the Bible explains. And Rob Bell will be the pied piper who lead far too many people down a very wide path called “destruction.” Love does win, but it’s God’s love received God’s way. And His saving love is only received by faith in Jesus Christ.
