DownshoreDrift

Hinduism, India, Jesus, and Thanksgiving Prayers

The Hindus just began a sacrifice of 250,000 animals in Nepal.  As you know, there are about 1 BILLION or so Hindus in India, the country where our church does the majority of its mission work. They are sacrificinng animals for a Hindu festival honoring the goddess Gadhimai.

The world's biggest animal sacrifice began in Nepal today with the killing of the first of more than 250,000 animals as part of a Hindu festival in the village of Bariyapur, near the border with India.

The event, which happens every five years, began with the decapitation of thousands of buffalo, killed in honour of Gadhimai, a Hindu goddess of power.

With up to a million worshippers on the roads near the festival grounds, this year's fair seems more popular than ever, despite vocal protests from animals rights groups who have called for it to be banned. "It is the traditional way, " explained 45-year old Manoj Shah, a Nepali driver who has been attending the event since he was six, "If we want anything, and we come here with an offering to the goddess, within five years all our dreams will be fulfilled."

Crowds thronged the roads and camped out in the open, wrapped in blankets against the cool mist. The festivities included a ferris wheel, fortune-telling robots and stalls broadcasting music and offering tea and sugary snacks.

As dawn broke, the fair officially opened with the sacrifice of two rats, two pigeons, a pig, a lamb and a rooster in the main temple, to cheers of "Long live Gadhimai" from spectators pushing against each other for a better view.

The article goes on to say,

Chandan Dev Chaudhary, a Hindu priest, said he was pleased with the festival's high turnout and insisted tradition had to be kept. "The goddess needs blood," he said. "Then that person can make his wishes come true."

Every time we visit, we go to the Hindu holy city of Rishikesh on the Ganges River. This city is full of temples, idols, holy men, ashrams, yoga centers, and pilgrimage sites. It reeks with incense and sacrificial prayers. Bells are constantly ringing to awaken the deities from their slumber in the thirteen story high Kailashananda Ashram on the banks of the Ganges. Westerners flock to this place to study yoga and fulfill their search for enlightenment. But, darkness is all they find.

"The goddess needs blood."  This is true about every religion. Blood, sacrifice, and our offerings are required to awakent the gods and goddesses to our plight and give us good fortune. Religion tells us that we can get to God through what we do. This is the spell that the Hindus are under. But, the Bible declares this perspective to be patently false. We can never get to God, no matter what we do.  Yes, blood is required because our sins are great and they require punishment. But, we are incapable of paying the punishment of our sins. A sacrifice is needed, but the blood of bulls and goats is not sufficient. We need a Perfect Sacrifice. This is who Jesus is. He was the atoning sacrifice for our sins. The full wrath of God was satisfied by the punishment that was laid upon Christ. We do not have to continue to offer sacrifices for our sins to to gain good fortune. We must only look to Christ in faith in what He did for us. His death and resurrection is sufficient.

Hebrews 9:11-15 says,

¹¹When Christ came as high priest of the good things that are already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not man-made, that is to say, not a part of this creation. ¹²He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption. ¹³The blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are outwardly clean. ¹⁴How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!

 ¹⁵For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance—now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant.

Religion tells us how we can climb to God. True Christianity tells us that God has come to us to rescue us and make things right. We must only respond to what God has done for us in Jesus Christ in faith and repentance. We must look to Jesus. Hinduism only keeps people in perpetual bondage. Christianity sets people free. People who say that all religions are basically the same know nothing of what world religions teach. They are as fundamentally different as night is from day. As Christians, we no longer have to make sacrifices or perform rituals for salvation, but rather, we must only believe in Jesus Christ, the One that God has sent.

And for that I am truly thankful.

 

 

Spiritual Formation In Christ

Last year, I blogged through most of The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard. Dallas Willard and Eugene Peterson are my two favorite contemporary authors regarding the topic of spiritual formation, how we follow Christ, and the shepherding of souls. I do not agree with all that they say on every issue, but their writings are a deep well of wisdom from which I regularly draw refreshing water for my soul. I find them to be particularly Christ-centered and solidly rooted in the work that God alone can do in the human heart.



An excellent book that deals with being formed into the image of Christ is Dallas Willard's Renovation of the Heart. I am reading through it now and am excited that our church will have a class on this starting in January. The most important task of the church is to be fully devoted to Christ and to make disciples of people. Spiritual Formation (disicpleship) has been long neglected and cannot be relugated to a class, although that can be a good starting point. We need spiritual direction and spiritual directors who major in the care and development of souls under the authority and empowerment of Christ. Everything starts with the heart.



Willard says,



"The revolution of Jesus is in the first place and continuously a revolution of the human heart or spirit. It did not and does not proceed by means of the formation of social institutions and laws, the outer forms of our existence, intending that these would then impose a good order of life upon people who come under their power. Rather, his is a revolution of character, which proceeds by changing people from the inside through ongoing personal relationship to God in Christ and to one another. It is one that changes their ideas, beliefs, feelings, and habits of choice, as well as their bodily tendencies and social relations. It penetrates to the deepest layers of their soul. External, social arrangements may be useful to this end, but they are not the end, nor are they a fundamental part of the means.



"On the other hand, from those divinely renovated depths of the person, social structures will naturally be transformed so that 'justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream' (Amos 5:24). Such streams cannot flow through corrupted souls. Conversely, a renovated 'within' will not cooperate with public streams of unrighteousness. It will block them - or die trying. It is the only thing that can do so."



So, our desperate need is that our hearts be conformed into the image of Christ so that our entire lives are affected. In thinking about this, however, I think that it is helpful to begin with the Reformed view of Justification by Faith in that we recognize that our righteousness is Christ's alone and that we are only righteous as we look outside of ourselves to the objective, finished work of Christ on our behalf. This is essential. A contemporary author that I have found helpful on this is Jerry Bridges and his book The Gospel for Real Life. He clearly explains the facts about what Jesus has done for us and helps us to re-orient our lives around the basic, objective truths of the gospel.



I am writing on this because I think that we need constant reminders in the church that the Christian life is fundamentally about Christ and being conformed to who He is. The Great American Heresy is that the Christian life is primarily about us and our lives being blessed and happy. That lie is insidious and is tearing us apart. A continual focus on spiritual formation reconnects us with what God truly desires for us - a dependent relationship with Christ Himself. May this focus mark our lives and ministries.

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Post-Secularism and the Role of Christianity in the Fall of Communism and the Remaking of Europe (and America)

Communism fell in Eastern Europe 20 years ago and the church in America is largely unaware of the role that Christians played in its demise. I wrote about the role of Christianity in the fall of the Berlin Wall on Tuesday and today I ran across another article on this subject. Adrian Pabst in his article for The Guardian (UK) entitled Christianity Ended the Cold War Peacefully writes,

The Velvet Revolutions of 1989 are commonly associated with the uprising of secular liberal dissents against atheist Communist regimes. But the extraordinary events that brought down the Iron Curtain are perhaps best described in terms of the victory of religious resistance which foreshadowed the emergence of a post-secular Europe. As such, the resurgence of religion has more to do with 9/11/89 than 9/11/01.

Without Christianity the cold war would not have ended peacefully. Across the East, churches and religious organisations brought together workers, students and intellectuals. Under totalitarian rule, church services and religious festivals often provided the last bastion of freedom and resistance.

In Poland, the opposition frequently gathered during Catholic liturgies and celebrations. They were inspired by Pope John Paul II's rallying cry to all Christians in the Soviet bloc at Gniezo on 3 June 1979 – exactly 10 years and one day before Solidarnosc won semi-democratic elections that ended Communist rule in Warsaw.

Similarly, the famous Monday demonstrations (Montagsdemonstrationen) in the former GDR took place after prayers for peace at the Nikolai Church in Leipzig. Both dissidents and ordinary citizens enjoyed the crucial support of both Protestant and Catholic churches which, according to Markus Meckel, the GDR's foreign minister in 1990, were "the only free space for free communication and thinking".

Even in the Soviet Union, the Orthodox church – benefitting from Gorbachev's glasnost and perestroika – constituted a core pole of resistance against the official state ideology of "scientific atheism". In 1988, the millennial anniversary of Russia's Christianisation saw an upsurge in popular celebrations of Christian traditions and the re-opening of ancient churches and monasteries. In turn, Patriarch Alexy II and the church were decisive in defeating the attempted putsch in August 1991 by KGB hardliners against Gorbachev.

Crucially, 1989 saw the triumph of civil society over totalitarian states. And behind civil society stood the churches and religious organisations which defended and promoted workers' associations, professional guilds, intermediary associations, educational establishments and communal welfare. As such, 1989 marked an unprecedented opportunity to overcome the bipolar order of the communist east and the capitalist west, building a genuine "third way" beyond centralised bureaucratic statism and unbridled free market capitalism.

Add to this the peaceful Christmas resistance led by Christians in Romania in 1989 in defense of the pastor Laszlo Tokes in Timisoara and you can make a strong case for the essential role that Christianity played in bringing freedom to millions of oppressed people throughout Eastern Europe and the former Soviet bloc. Prayer, dependence upon God, a heartfelt desire for peace, freedom, and justice, and a righteous stand for the freedom of the gospel were the sparks that ignited the populace to revolt against the oppressive Communist regimes in Eastern Europe. The fact that these movements were ignited by men like Christian Fuhrer and Laszlo Tokes is not an historical accident, but rather indicative of the hand of God in their personal lives and in the shaping of nations. We give too little credance to the power of prayer and peaceful, non-violent resistance to the powers and principalities that have set themselves up against the knowledge of God. 

Pabst goes on to say,

However, the post-1989 secular consensus is already unravelling. The ongoing economic crisis once again highlights that the primacy of individual freedom over communal justice is undesirable and unsustainable. Similarly, value-pluralism alone can neither secure the integration of religious minorities nor solve ethical questions like assisted suicide because it negates universal principles such as cultural cohesion around religion or the sanctity of life.

We are entering a time of post-secularism because the secular ideals of individualism and unending prosperity and advancement continue to unravel on every front with the economic collapse of 2008-09 being the latest example. The stories of the Fall of 1989 and the role of Christians in remaking Europe should be told again and again. While the influence of cultural Christianity in America wanes, similar movements of change can begin by handfuls of Christians living out their faith in the midst of opposition from a culture that is steeped in opposing values.

Pabst concludes by saying,

Twenty years after the collapse of atheist communism, 2009 has seen the failure of secular capitalism. There is now a unique opportunity to enact a new socio-economic settlement centred on human relationships, families and communities rather than the binary, secular logic of the individual and the collective. Together with other faiths, Christianity in Europe will be a formidable intellectual, cultural and social force in arguing for alternatives to the post-1989 secular consensus.

Is Christianity capable of the same "intellectual, cultural, and social force" in defining the future of a multicultural America? Most definitely. But, we will only take part in this when we stop trying to reclaim an America that has passed, if it ever actually existed in the first place, and start working to create an America that is not yet, but could one day be.

What Really Brought Down the Berlin Wall

Prayer.

On November 9, 1989, the Berlin Wall separating East from West fell, as East Germany allowed its citizens to travel to West Germany unfettered. A great deal of unrest had preceded this decision. I was 15 at the time and followed the story closely, but I had no idea about what led up to the dramatic events surrounding the sudden collapse of the Iron Curtain in Eastern Europe and the end of the Cold War that had paralyzed the world for 40 years.

Starting September 20, 1982, East German pastor Christian Fuhrer began "Peace Prayers" that were held every Monday in the Nikolai Church in Leipzig. The prayers focused against the Cold War. This went on for seven years and was seen as sedition by the East German government, while the Lutheran Church approved. By 1989, more and more people were joining the "Peace Prayers" and peaceful, candlelight marches began to flow out of the church in September. These prayer meetings turned to peaceful marchers were called the Monday Demonstrations and the world was forever changed. Alan Nothnagle explains what happened:

Why Leipzig?

Before the Revolution of 1989, Leipzig was best known as the city of Bach and Mendelssohn-Bartholdy. But in 1982, Pastor Christian Führer of Leipzig’s historic St. Nicholas' Church had begun conducting “Monday prayers for peace” at five p.m. in the spirit of Gandhi and Martin Luther King. He conceived this event as a non-violent protest against the nuclear rearmament programs of both the Warsaw Pact and NATO, which  had been planning for decades to unleash full-scale thermonuclear war on German territory if the status quo in Central Europe were disturbed. Non-church members (along with a generous sprinkling of Stasi informants) also used to take part in this peaceful protest, where concerned citizens met to discuss matters of current interest. After all, the church was the only remaining institution that was largely free of direct government supervision and interference.

Führer had scheduled his prayer service carefully. By five o'clock, most ordinary people were already off work and could thus spend their leisure time as they wished. Monday evening was ideal, since nearly all communist party members were busy attending their weekly meetings at the factoryor office. Moreover, downtown shops were still open, which meant that groups of people congregating in the streets outside the church did not stand out to the police and the Stasi. This would later prove to be a convenient time for West German TV journalists to smuggle footage of the demonstrations across the border and broadcast it on their evening news programs.

"We are the people!"

On September 4, 1989, the traditional Monday prayers for peace swelled into a demonstration by several hundred participants for freedom of travel and political reform. Two other Leipzig churches joined in, and the authorities did nothing to stop them. 10,000 assembled on October 2.² Then, on October 9, following the debacle in Prague and the departure of the first "Freedom Trains" to West Germany, the event exploded into a demonstration by 70,000 citizens in this city of half a million. And these demonstrators were armed, too, but not with knives or guns. No, these counterrevolutionaries (as Honecker called them) came equipped with the most dangerous weapon of all: a brilliant slogan.

“Wir sind das Volk!” (“We are the people!”³), the demonstrators chanted. They passed out lighted candles and began parading through the streets. They sang protest songs, including the communists' own Internationale, and marched right past Stasi headquarters itself shouting “No violence!” These “enemies” certainly didn't look very violent. As Pastor Führer pointed out in an interview for Deutsche Welle earlier this year, when you carry a candle, you need two hands – one to hold it, and one to protect the flame from the wind. You have no hand left in which to carry a weapon.

The next Monday, 120,000 demonstrators met in Leipzig. The next Monday? Over 300,000. The peaceful demonstrators put so much pressure on the East German government that by November 9, the Berlin Wall came down and Communism was effectively dead in Eastern Europe. It all happened without the firing of a shot. After the West spent billions of dollars on armament and military defense, the Iron Curtain came down as a result of the rising tide of peaceful demonstrations of people who met under the threat of violence and death. It all began with a prayer meeting to the Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ.

This story is rarely told. Today, on the 20th anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall, it needs to be told again and again.  It all began with prayer. Who would have thought it? Who would think it now?

All things are possible with God. 

3, er, 5, no, 7 or Whatever, Steps that Guarantee Successful Missional Church Leadership!

The other day, Andrew, a friend of mine, called me and asked me a question about strategies for missional church leadership (being missional simply means that you live as a "sent" representative of God in the world - a missional church is a church that does not depend on attractional programs to reach people, but rather, it sees its people live dynamic, "sent" lives for Christ in the world as His ambassadors). He is a student in seminary doing a paper on this for a class, and he had to interview a pastor that was seeing his church step out missionally and engage their community and their world. He asked me about strategies and vision and plans. He reads this blog, so let me first of all say that his questions were very fair and I completely understood his assignment. This isn't about the questions. It is about my answers.

My answers were pretty pathetic if you were looking for coherent strategies in the way that most "church" experts talk about strategy.  But, I think that God is showing us some things and while my answers may seem kind of Sunday School-ish, I think that that they are right. Maybe we need some simplicity in this type of discussion.

Putting Away the Sunday School Jesus

Russel Moore has a good review of the movie Where the Wild Things Are. He says that the problem with it is not that it is too wild or dark, but that it is not wild enough and is not as good as the book because it does not properly deal with the existence of evil. He says that Christians are upset by the movie and are saying that it is not appropriate for kids because it is too scary, but Moore says that it is not scary enough. Evil is real and kids know it and they want something done about it. I haven't read the book or seen the movie, so I can't really comment on that, but there is something that he said that I think is important that we can all reflect upon. He compares what was done with the book to what we do with the Bible for children by saying:

Too many of our Bible study curricula for children declaw the Bible, excising all the snakes and dragons and wildness. We reduce the Bible to a set of ethical guidelines and a text on how gentle and kind Jesus is. The problem is, our kids know there are monsters out there. God put that awareness in them. They’re looking for a sheep-herding dragon-slayer, the One who can put all the wild things under His feet.

A couple of months ago a few of us went to hear Alan Hirsch in Mobile, Alabama and he said the same thing. He was talking about our different false images of Jesus and how they keep us from encountering the true Jesus. One of the images that he took on was the Sunday School Jesus. This Jesus is sugary sweet and is not a threat to anyone. He calls all the little children to come to him and he is just an overall nice guy. He was crucified for being a nice guy and if we believe in him, we can be really nice people too. The church is nice and everyone is nice. I think that it is wonderful to be nice, but that is a very incomplete version of who Jesus is. Yet, we do this with many of our Bible stories that we adapt for children.

A lady (who works with children) spoke up and opposed what Hirsch was saying. She said that it was important to have Bible stories for children and that many of them, like Daniel and the Lion's Den, were appropriate for children. Hirsch was not against telling children Bible stories, but he said that we needed to be careful to not sanitize everything so that the real story is lost. I agree.

Let's look at what REALLY happened in some of the Bible stories that we reserve for children:

• Adam and Eve? No, we don't tell that story too often. They are naked.
• Noah's Ark:  Usually a nice story about animals going two by two onto a big boat. It even has a rainbow! But, we often leave out the fact that the entire human race (save one family) along with every other animal drowned and died a horrible death. I'm not saying that you have to go into great detail here, but you can't leave out God's judgment on sin and stay true to the story.
• Joseph's Coat of Many Colors: Joseph was betrayed by his brothers and sold into slavery. Kind of scary.
• The Parting of the Red Sea (Exodus): The first born in Egypt died and the whole Egyptian army drowned.
• Giving of the Ten Commandments: 3,000 people were killed by Levites wielding swords after the Golden Calf incident (more than died in 9/11).
• David and Goliath: David cut off Goliath's head and held it up for everyone to see. Kind of gory.
• Daniel and the Lion's Den: Daniel was saved because he trusted God, but his false accusers were thrown into the Lion's Den along with their wives and children and they were dead before they hit the floor. The Lions were hungry.

It goes on and on. Even the birth of Jesus was attended to by filthy shepherds and pagan astrologers and was accompanied by the slaughter of all of boys under two years old in and around Bethlehem. The Bible is not exactly a book for kids, at least the way that we think about what a proper book for kids is. It is filled with violence, death, and human struggle. Sin is real, as is suffering, disappointment, rejection, and loss. When we sanitize it, we strip judgment, pain, and death out of Scripture and we learn to not fear God. We see God as the one who makes everything better all the time. It is wonderful that we provide comfort and safety for children, but should we do so by creating a false understanding? Does the fact that we have done this with children for the past couple of generations have anything to do with lack of fear of God that we currently have as adults? Or, the unbiblical views of God that affect us so deeply? Perhaps.

Hear me: I am not saying that we should fill our Bible stories for children with blood, gore, and horror. But, I am saying that we need to find ways to tell the stories as realistically as possible so that our children can see that evil is real, that God judges sin, and that Jesus' coming meant something more than he was nice and kind. We do not do our children or ourselves favors when we sanitize everything to the point that we make a baby nursery out of scenes from the almost total extermination of life on the planet because of judgment over vile sin (Noah's Ark) and we fail to consider what we are doing and the story that we are telling.  Without understanding, at least on some level, judgment for sin, it is impossible to understand and appreciate the redemption that we have in Jesus. 

As best we can, we need to read and tell the stories of the Bible rightly. Do our children need to hear everything when they are 4 years old? No. But, they need to hear that God is good and holy and that sin has consequences and that there is evil in the world, but God delivers us and protects us when cry out to Him. These were the stories that the Hebrew people told their children and these stories inspired courage and confidence in their God. May we do the same.

 

What Pain Can Teach Us

I originally wrote this the night of September 3. I was very discouraged and I started to write and my writing turned to worship and in worship, God made Himself known to me. I was not attempting to be overly dramatic or melancholy, but I often feel things that I can't articulate until I begin to write and that night submerged feelings and memories turned to words and words described pain and pain was brought to God. And, God heals. Tonight, I sit in my room instead of on a plane to India with the team that left this morning from our church to continue our work there. I am home because of the same continuing abdominal wound I wrote about here. I am continuing to struggle with it. Since I wrote this, I have been going to a wound care specialist and I am getting no better. This morning when I went to the doctor, It bled so much I had to go home and change my pants after blood poured all over them at the waist. I am in pain and I am tired. But tonight, I thought of this post that I saved and never published and I read it and God showed up again reminding me that no matter what situation I am in, I can rejoice in Him because He is all that matters. We rejoice not in what we do or in who we are, but in who He is. If you have ever suffered through a trial that you don't understand, I hope that this will encourage you to fix your eyes on Jesus. Even though I am 6 weeks further along in this and things are only getting worse, I can honestly say that I am encouraged because of Christ, not because of the circumstances. He is enough.

Since the end of June, I have been going through quite a physical ordeal. Over two months ago I had out-patient surgery to correct an umbilicial hernia that had occurred a couple of months before. I don't know how it happened, but it just did. So, I was supposed to have a fairly simple procedure and would heal up in about 10 days or so. First of all, the pain from the surgery was unreal. I actually have a pretty high pain tolerance, but this was pretty bad. When I would lean forward, it felt like my stomach was ripping apart. So, this went on for a few days until I began to heal and recover. All went according to plan until the end of July when my body began to push the stitches out and "overheal." That's what the doctor called it. I began to produce a great deal of granulated tissue and it got in the way of my stomach actually healing. Basically, it became a mess. The worst part was the intense muscle pain that I've been going through as my stomach involuntarily contracts all day long trying to hold the wound back from any contact.

Book Review: Church Turned Inside Out By Linda Bergquist and Allan Karr

In 1997, my wife and I had just arrived in the San Francisco Bay Area for me to attend Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary. We moved onto campus in Mill Valley (North Bay) and I quickly got a job and started attending classes. I was pretty busy, but knew that I wanted to do ministry in the City during my time in seminary. In March, I was invited to a church planting party at a home near Golden Gate Park. It was a really interesting night where Erika and I met people that would challenge us and shape us for the years to come. One of those people was Andrew Jones (TallSkinnyKiwi) whose storefront church on Haight Street we would start attending a few months later. But, the party was hosted by Linda Bergquist and her husband Eric.  Linda was the church planter strategist for Baptists in the Bay Area and Eric ran the Page Street Baptist Center near the Haight-Ashbury District. This couple would eventually have a profound influence on the way that I thought about church and people who were far away from God.

I worked with Linda and Eric on many different occasions while I was in SF and have continued to keep in touch with them over the years.  My daughter, Ashtyn, and I even stayed in their home for 5 days this past March while we enjoyed a Daddy-Daughter visit to the city of her birth. They are wonderful people. So, I am really excited to begin reviewing Linda's first book that she has co-authored with Allan Karr, the associate professor of missional/church planting at Golden Gate. The book is entitled The Church Turned Inside Out. I am still reading it and plan to start reviewing it in full next week, but until then, here is the description from the back cover to get started:

There are no sacred models of church, no specific molds into which God pours blessings, and no special leadership styles that are holier than others. Too often, though, church leaders attempt to pattern their ministries after either tradition or the successes of a few prominent trendsetting congregations.

In Church Turned Inside Out, Linda Bergquist and Allan Karr push back on the one-size-fits-all approach. They invite leaders of all kinds of churches—new and existing, megachurches and microchurches—to walk through an inside-out design process. Instead of starting with models and methods, they insist that every sphere of church life resonates with and communicates what you really believe.

As the book unfolds, it moves from abstract concepts toward concrete suggestions. It considers the uniqueness of individual leaders, their teams, and their particular communities, cultures, and contexts while taking seriously both spiritual and practical dimensions. This process results in more potent and effectively organized churches. Perhaps more important, it helps church leaders discover ways to live and work more wholly and faithfully, according to how God created them. It really is possible for a church to be so beautifully designed that every structure, program, and relationship reflects what it intends. Sometimes this requires a whole new design, and other times it only takes re-aligning or refining what already exists. This thoughtful and systemic approach opens a wider array of possible church paradigms than most people ever imagine, but the real goal is not innovation but transformation.

Using a blend of theology, biblical imagery, and metaphors from culture and creation, Church Turned Inside Out provides respectful ways to consider adaptation and change. It offers a hopeful vision of what the church can and must become. It not only positions the church for its future mission to the twenty-first century but offers timeless principles for the church of today.

Linda is absolutely brilliant, by the way, and thinks on more levels than I can keep up with. One of my favorite parts about my trip to SF back in the Spring was sitting at Linda and Eric's kitchen table at night and talking with them until we could not keep our eyes open anymore. Like a fascinating kitchen table conversation, this book is opening me up to her (and Allan's) experiences and insight. It is especially helpful for church leaders in the South who have not yet experienced the full weight of the cultural change that is coming, but will very soon. More on that later . . .

Full review coming next week.

We Aren't Supposed to Invite Jesus Into Our Life

Yesterday, I was talking with our Sunday School class about the big picture Redemption Story that God has initiated and how, by His grace, we are called up into that. We were looking at the narratives in Genesis and how God was the main character and how Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Joseph only gain significance because God called them to be a part of His story. Then we talked about how we often get that backwards. What I mean is, we say things like, "I invited Jesus into my life," and "I'm making God a part of MY life." I don't dispute that God is interested in our lives and that he knows how many hairs we have on our head and that the Holy Spirit comes to live within us and all that, but I really don't think that it is accurate to say that we invite Jesus into OUR life as though he becomes a part of our life, like he is a decoration that we hang on the wall or something. I know that people mean something biblical by what they are saying but it's like we're saying that we invited Jesus into our house and we ask him to sit over there in a special chair just for guests and we'll get him something to eat in a minute, but we kind of hope that he doesn't stay too long so that we can get back to watching our favorite TV show that he probably wouldn't like much anyway.  I don't think it works that way and I'm not saying that we mean things exactly that way when we say that we invited Jesus into our life, but that is how it sounds, and how something sounds is more important than we like to think it is.

In reality, God has invited us into His life, which is a much better proposition, I think. We are partakers of the Divine Nature and we are adopted into His family. Yes, He comes to live within us, but I really don't think that He would be very much at home in my life as it is. My life tends to be a mess. If God moved into my life, He would start rearranging the furniture and telling me to put away my clothes and get more organized. Well, I guess that God does do that, but at whatever level that He does come into our life, He completely changes things. He doesn't just hang out and help us accomplish our own goals so that we have high self esteem. Rather, He completely takes over. Still, I think that it is better to look at it another way as though we are being brought into God's life so that there is no confusion as to who is in charge. 

God is gracious enough to call me into His life and He sent His Son Jesus so that I might be reconciled to God. God is not reconciling Himself to me as I am. God isn't going to become like me. He has made a way for me to become like Him, which is much better by far. I'm not talking about the Incarnation here. Yes, Jesus put on flesh and became sin for us so that in him we might become the righteousness of God, but Christ isn't dying for sins again and He certainly isn't becoming sin again so that He can enter into my life. He has already done all of that. Now, He brings me into His life. Colossians 3 tells us that Christ is my life and that my life is now hidden with Christ in God. I know that Colossians 1:27 says, "Christ in you," but I think that that means something a bit different than the effect of saying that I have invited Jesus into my life.  Are we meaning that we invite Jesus into our life and we are completely transformed? If so, we are not far from the truth. But, if we see Jesus as an add-on to our lives or as a means to a happy life, then we have problems.

And, that really is the biggest problem I have with saying that I invited Jesus into my life (other than the fact that it isn't really a biblical concept - where do we see people "inviting Jesus into their life" in the Bible?). It is far better, I think, that we have been called to participate in God's life and that we have become characters in God's story than it is that He becomes a character in our story. It is better to be God-centered than me-centered and that is really what I am getting at. I don't know about you, but my story when I live in my own strength is not that interesting. It involves me being tired a lot, running around like crazy, being selfish, feeling pretty insecure most of the time, and wondering if I am making a difference in the world while I contemplate how to best procrastinate and waste time. But, when I see myself as a character in God's story and I follow God's direction, everything changes. I have purpose. I am not nearly as introspective. I live for God and for others. I spend more time praying about what God's will is than trying to get my own requests answered. My struggles and insecurities take their proper place and bow the knee to Jesus. I learn what it means to say that Jesus is Lord and I get to see what life looks like inside God's Kingdom. It is beautiful.

So, it really is silly for me to say that I am inviting Jesus into my life. Don't get me wrong. I am not denying the Christ lives within me. I am not denying that the Holy Spirit has taken up residency within me. But, at that point, it isn't really my life anymore, is it? I belong to Him. "I am crucificed with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself up for me" Gal. 2:20. It is better for me to understand that He has extended great mercy to me by adopting me into His family and bringing me from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of the Son He loves, in whom I have redemption, the forgiveness of sins (Col. 1:13-14). I have significance because His story is much better than mine (He is God, after all), yet He calls me to participate in His story with Him. What mercy.  What amazing grace.

At the end of the day, if I am the one in charge, then it is my life. If God is in charge, then it is God's life. I don't invite Jesus in to my kingdom, but instead, I enter into His kingdom by faith. That's the essence of what I am saying and even though it might appear to be semantics, I think that it is an important distinction to make, even if we are just trying to clarify things.

The Big Story of the Gospel

Joe Thorn quotes Michael Horton from "A Gospel Driven Life" with the following:

I just started in on Michael Horton’s new book, The Gospel-Driven Life: Being Good News People in a Bad News World. The Introduction was good enough to pull a few quotes from. Here’s one where Horton explains the gospel in terms of our story, and The Story.

The Good News is not just a series of facts to which we yield our assent but a dramatic narrative that replots our identity. Think of it in terms of a theatrical play. Each week we come to church with our own scripts. If yours is anything like mine, it’s “the show about nothing.” Yet God descends to give us a new script: a rich plot in which our original character dies and is raised with the lead character. Instead of trying to find a supporting role for God in our play, God writes us into his script as a part of a growing cast for his new world. The script does not offer a blueprint for a new creation, if we will only follow certain steps for realizing it. Instead, through this gospel the Spirit sweeps us into the drama, into the new creation that has already been inaugurated.
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Dan Brown on Tatooing and Control

I picked up Dan Brown's new book, The Lost Symbol and ran acros this excerpt on tatooing:

"The goal of tatooing was never beauty. The goal was change. From the scarified Nubian priests of 2000 BC, to the tatooed acolytes of the Cybele cult of ancient Rome, to the moko scars of the modern Maori, humans have tattooed themselves as a way of offwering up their bodies in partial sacrifice, enduring the physical pain of embellishment and emerging changed beings.

"Despite the ominous admonitions of Leviticus 19:28, which forbade the marking of one's flesh, tatoos had become a rite of passage shared by millions of people in the modern age - everyone from clean-cut teenagers to hard-core drug users to suburban housewives.

"The act of tattooing one's skin was a transformative declaration of power, an announcement to the world: I am in control of my own flesh. The intoxicating feeling of control derived from physical transformation had addicted millions to flesh-altering practices . . . cosmetic surgery, body-piercing, bodybuilding, and steroids . . . even bulimia and transgendering. The human spirit craves mastery over its carnal shell."

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ME: Although I disagree with the premise of Dan Brown's books (especially Da Vinci Code), he is a decent writer who often has some interesting insights. This is an example of that. If tattooing, body-piercing, etc., is an attempt to exert contol over our own flesh, then it makes sense that the practice would proliferate along with our culture's abandonment of God.

Many say that getting a tattoo is simply a means of self-expression. It is not in my interest to condemn anyone who has one. I just think that anthropological and sociological insights that are related to cultural practices are interesting when it comes to what we are really looking for spiritually, relationally, and emotionally. This was one of those insights that might enable us to look more deeply at what is happening in the human experience.
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Drip-Drops of the Kingdom

Last night, I was talking with some of our small group leaders. A couple of them had started new groups and we were seeing some reforming of another group. We talked about life cycles and how you can see that in small groups in our church. We had one group that got too big and the leader went to some folks and asked if they'd like to start a new one. Then, another couple wanted to start an outreach group. They did that and now have five other couples coming who either weren't coming to our church or who had just visited. The other group has invited their neighbors. I think that all of this is pretty amazing and it happened pretty spontaneously. Birth - Life - Reproduction - Life, and yes, death is a part of that at different times.

We kept talking and the idea of celebration and throwing parties came up. We talked about how many times we see festivals, parties, feasts, and celebrations in Scripture. From the Old Testament feasts to the Wedding at Cana to the Kingdom parables where Jesus talks about the Feast of the Father to Jesus dining with "sinners" to the Lord's Supper to the Marriage Supper of the Lamb, we see feasting, celebration, acceptance, rejoicing, and a different view on the world.

Tim Keller talks about this in The Prodigal God. He says that the celebration feast at the end of the parable of the prodigal son points to this ultimate welcome-home feast that we get to have with God. Those who receive the Father's love through Jesus will enter in. Those who reject the invitation will be left out.

What if our small group gatherings and even our church gatherings reflected this "welcome-home feast" that we see in Scripture? What if the Kingdom is dripping into our lives whenever we gather together and we get a foretaste of what things are really going to be like in the eternal reality that is waiting for us? Formalism and a modern idea of church as ritual, entertainment, presentation, and program has stripped the Biblical perspective of homecoming, love-feast, and celebration. Of course, all of this is only possible because Jesus paid the full price for our sins to bring us to God. I am not talking about forsaking seriousness when it comes to our sin, but I am talking about embracing an on-going, hopeful recognition that there is nothing left for me to pay for or work off - Jesus has fully consumed the cup of God's wrath.

So, if our small groups reflected the Kingdom reality of celebration, what would that look like? Friends gathering, people being accepted, God being worshipped and obeyed, laughter, joy, sorrow when needed but with awareness that God is near - in essence, we would get to taste of Home.

Our larger church gatherings can be that way too, but that is another post for another time. Thoughts?

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Leadership from the Center or from the Edges?

I had an interesting conversation with another minister today. Our church is experiencing some growth and I wanted to pick his brain on some leadership issues. He said something very interesting. He said that the purpose of leadership and organization is to help facilitate the movement that is happening. Administration fuels the movement, not the other way around. For many churches, I think, the movement serves the organization. Everything is centralized and has to be funneled through one vision. But, what if things worked differently?

What if the leadership of a church really happened on the edges? What I mean by that is, what if things were just happening spontaneously as people followed God and the purpose of the actual, formal leadership was to serve, equip, and resource the movement that was taking place already? Are the people of God capable of initiating ministry themselves? I'm not saying that an agreed upon framework is not provided or that there is no central church. I am thinking of this within the context of a local church. But, what if people ran with things, initiated ministry, and took ownership over the direction of the church?

At Gateway, we say that our vision and mission statement is, "Loving God, Loving People, to the Ends of the Earth." That is who we seek to be and what we seek to do. But, how does that happen? We have different ministries and different connection points through small groups, classes, ministries, and our mid-week gathering, but it only has life when people run with it themselves. We can lead from the center of the church, but little happens unless movement and initiation is occurring at the edges.

Ideally, it seems that real movement and leadership should happen at the edges of the church where people interact with the lost and where daily life occurs. The middle of the church should provide shepherding, discipling, and support. And the core servant-leadership should exist to point the church to Jesus, teach the Word, equip the saints, and hold high the ethic of following Christ. This is how it seems to me at this point.

This means that leadership does not consist of coming up with a ministry vision and selling it to the congregation. It means that you seek God together about what each person should be doing. It doesn't mean that you try and plug people into your ministry positions, but rather, it means that you seek the Lord about how people should serve. Obviously, certain things need to be done, but we trust God to provide.

The most dynamic leadership should happen at the edges where the church interacts with the world and where we all meet daily life. We should be leading out into our communities and the nations instead of keeping all of the leadership within the church. If we staff, it should be to mobilize and lead the body out to interact with and minister to a lost world.

These are just some thoughts, but I am really beginning to see church leadership upside-down from what I have been taught.

Still thinking . . .

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Sunday Worship: Matthew Smith "All I Owe"

I went to see Matthew Smith and Indelible Grace last night at a local church. Amazing concert. They take old hymns that are Christ-centered and update the music. I got several CD's and would like to use some of the songs in different ways in our worship at church. You can find a lot of their stuff on Youtube. Here is a song that really spoke to me last night.  It is called, "All I Owe." The words are from Robert McCheyene, I believe. I am preaching on holiness tomorrow and I cannot do that without recognizing that I have no holiness in myself. Everything I have, I owe to Christ. He is my holiness and He defines what holiness is.

Random Thinking: Jimmy Carter, Kanye West, Calvinism, Health Care, Tim Keller, Learning Your "Fours," and a Host of Other Things

I have not had time to sit down and think through anything remotely interesting to blog on latey. My brain has kind of been a pile of mush the last few weeks when it comes to writing. So, I thought I'd throw up a bunch of random thoughts, twitter style, and see which ones stick. Comment as you wish.

• My health insurance for my family and me costs around $1000 per month. I had a minor surgery this summer to repair a hernia and another minor surgery to fix what wasn't fixed to begin with. I'm still having problems because the wound won't heal. I'm also facing mounting medical bills for these "minor" surgeries even though I had insurance. I'm not for government run health care, but something needs to be done to bring reform to this system. It is just unsustainable.
• Kanye West was out of line. End of story. Why do people give him any attention? Uh oh. Why am I giving him attention? He needs Jesus and I need to pray for him. 
• By the way, what's up with all the outbursts lately? Kanye West. Joe Wilson yelling out "you lie" to President Obama (I know, Democrats booed President Bush - both sides need to chill on that kind of thing). Then, you have Serena Williams. Excuse me? As John McEnroe would say, "Are you serious?" There seems to be a lot of anger building these days all over the place.  
• Jimmy Carter pulled the race card by saying that opposition to Obama is rooted in racism. I'm not saying that there aren't racists out there, but him saying that is the same thing as Republicans saying that those who opposed the Iraq War were unpatriotic. He needs to be denounced and this kind of rhetoric from both sides needs to end.  We need to have a vigorous debate over the issues and not demonize one side or the other. 
• I preached on election and God's foreknowledge this past Sunday. I'm not a Calvinist, but I see these doctrines in the Bible. I also see the Bible saying that God wishes all people everywhere to be saved. So, I proclaimed the mystery that declares both human created positions in this debate to be incomplete. It went over well, but there has been a lot of discussion about it since then.  I'll preach on 1 Peter 1:3-12 on how Christ is our Living Hope. I'm looking forward to it.
• We are still working on our building project for our church. I've spent WAY more time on it the past week or so than I have wanted to, but some minor changes needed to be made, which is harder when you have work crews trying to get stuff done and they are waiting on you to make a decision.
• Have you seen the Acorn scandal being reported on Fox News? Sadly, I think that there is corruption everywhere. It is just being exposed here. I hope that someone will clean this kind of thing up. By and large, we have become a pretty corrupt society, I think, so this kind of stuff is happening all the time.
• Caelan, my 4 year old son, learned his "fours" in preschool yesterday. He learned how to write the number 4 and everything. I told him that was a pretty big deal. It really is. Think about it. What if you had never learned your fours? You end up using them your whole life and it is pretty awesome to be able to come home and say, "Guess what I learned today? My FOURS." I didn't learn anything nearly that significant yesterday.
• We have been going through a study on Wednesday nights on Tim Keller's The Prodigal God. It has been outstanding. If you have not read it yet, I highly recommend it. It blew me away.
• My 2nd grader, Peyton, was talking to my 5th grader, Ashtyn, about the Fibonacci Sequence on the way to school this morning.  He was saying that his teacher likes to teach them things that are way beyond their level and Ashtyn said, "Yeah, you aren't supposed to learn that until you get to college." And he said, "Yeah, and then you'll be using really big numbers like 300 or something." Smart kid.
• We'll see a couple get baptized this Sunday. I performed their wedding this past Sunday. Amazing story of God's grace, guidance, and restoration. I love stories like this and hope to write a full post on what happened next week.
• My wife is awesome. She is going to graduate school, leading a massive fundraising project for the PTA at our kid's school, leading the Sr. High youth girls small group at our church, working a couple of days a week to make some extra money, and raising 4 kids while doing an amazing amount around the house. She apologized to me this morning for not helping me out more lately.  WHAT??? I'm thinking I need to go home and do some laundry tonight.
• I am seeing God's miracles all around me. In my kids. My beautiful wife. My church. People are encountering God. Lives are changing. I don't deserve what I am getting to witness. Sometimes, I take my eyes off the ball and miss it. I thank God that He is always working, though (John 5:17), so there is always something new and fresh happening right in front of me if I only have eyes to see. My prayer is that I be conformed to the image of Christ. That's a big prayer and I find that the most unruly terrain that I encounter tends to be my own heart.

That's it for right now. Lots of stuff going on. It is hard to keep up with everything. More than anything, I find myself in need of the Sabbath rest that Jesus provides. I need to be more attentive to the leading of the Holy Spirit and to prayer. Spiritual change only happens in spiritual ways.

God is working everywhere. The Kingdom of God is breaking in.

The Heavens Declare the Glory of God: Pictures from the Hubble Space Telescope

I am completely mesmerized by the pictures that the Hubble Space Telescope keeps sending back to us. We see a universe in motion that is more vast than we can possibly comprehend - and more beautiful. God is an artist and His creativity knows no bounds. Take a look at this one:

I saw where they were calling this a space butterfly. Basically, streams of gas are being shot out from a dying star for billions of miles and Hubble captured it. What beauty. In the vastness of space, God is painting a picture. This has been going on for aeons, but we are only just now able to see it.

Hubble has been sending back many amazing pictures of the beauty and vastness of the universe. Just seeing these pictures causes me to think about how small we are, how unfathomably large the universe is, and how much God loves us to do all that He has done for us. Amazing (click on the picture below for a bigger view).

The beauty and diversity of God's creation is beyond my comprehension. The heavens truly declare the glory of God. How can we not praise Him?  How can we not see?

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It is always shocking to meet life where we thought we were alone. "Look out!" we cry, "it's alive". And therefore this is the very point at which so many draw back - I would have done so myself if I could - and proceed no further with Christianity. An 'impersonal God' - well and good. A subjective God of beauty, truth and goodness, inside our heads - better still. A formless life-force surging through us, a vast power which we can tap - best of all. But God Himself, alive, pulling at the other end of the cord, perhaps approaching at an infinite speed, the hunter, king, husband - that is quite another matter. There comes a moment when the children who have been playing at burglars hush suddenly: was that a real footstep in the hall? There comes a moment when people who have been dabbling in religion ('Man's search for God!') suddenly draw back. Supposing we really found Him? We never meant it to come to that! Worse still, supposing He had found us?

C.S. Lewis ~ from Miracles.

Six Keys to Save the Church in the West :: almost an M

http://almostm.com/2009/09/six-keys-to-save-the-church-in-the-west/comment-page-1/#comment-83

This was the summary of Alan Hirsch's talk yesterday at theNines web conference. I didn't hear it, but another blogger put this together and it provides the cliff notes for the conference that I heard him in a few weeks ago. Much more succinct than my 6 posts written over 9 hours of presentation!

The Body of Christ and the Beauty of the Kingdom of God

On Sunday, we opened up the floor for people to share testimonies about where they saw God working and moving in their lives. Building off the theme from the week before, "Rejoice in the Lord, Always," we did just that. We rejoiced and gave thanks for what God was doing in our everyday lives. A man came up and shared about how God had been working through him at his work place to lead a man to Christ and witness to another man. Another man shared how he had seen God move in his family through the illness of his father and through the doctors and nurses in the hospital. A teenaged boy shared about how he had seen God work in his life at Scout camp this summer. Another man shared about how he had seen God work in his marriage of 62 years and another praised God for his marriage of 16 years.  A lady came forward to share about how God was working in her life through some very difficult trials.  I then preached on the end of Philippians 4 saying that we could be content in any situation because our focus was on Christ and that as we were in the place that God wanted us to be, we could do all things through Christ who strengthens us. Then, we are to be generous givers and as we give, God will supply all of our needs. He is trustworthy!

After the service, a couple that I had counseled with during the week displayed their desire to commit their lives fully to Christ and obey Him in everything. It was beautiful. The Kingdom of God was breaking through and people were talking about God's work everywhere. After the service, people stayed and stayed just to talk and hang out with one another.  A couple invited several folks over for dinner after church and one young man confessed that he did not know Jesus. We are praying for him. We are seeing more and more African-Americans visit our church and they are expressing a desire to join with us. Praise God! This has been a major prayer of mine that our church would reflect our city racially and culturally, displaying to the world that there are no barriers in Christ. It is happening! And, believe it or not, that is an amazing thing in Montgomery, AL.  Heaven and earth are colliding.

People keep mentioning the basketball ministry that we have been doing with the teenagers in our community. They are curious about it and keep asking how we did it. One man told me recently that Gateway is known throughout the city for our outreach. I told him that honestly it really wasn't that big of a deal. We have probably had 10-15 people tops take part in the ministry, and not all of them at the same time. Basically, we put some basketball goals out in the parking lot, prayed, and have tried to love the guys that come to play. God keeps working through it, though, and His work is what is making the difference.

I really am amazed at what I see God doing. We are not the biggest church in our city. Far from it. We have about 250 people or so. But, we have really big dreams and we serve a really big God and we are bold enough to think that nothing is impossible with God - so we just keep pushing on obstacles until they come down. And, you know what? They do. This is the attitude that we have toward our work in India. The gods and goddesses of Northern India are going to bow the knee to Jesus one day, just like the gods of racism and consumerism in America will bow the knee as well. So, in the name of Jesus, we push on these strongholds with full confidence that we are doing God's will. And, little by little, people held in bondage are set free and people walking in darkness begin to see the light.

Jesus is central. With Him as our point of reference, everything else comes into focus. We are far from perfect, but that is the point, isn't it? We are not the Savior. Jesus is. We need Him today just like we did years ago when we first met Him. We never stop needing Him and He never stops changing us or bringing glory to Himself through us.

What a privilege.

The Audacity of Leadership by Jay Lorenzen

Jay Lorenzen blogs at onmovements.com and he is brilliant. If you don't read his blog, you should. Here is a post from a couple of weeks ago that I ran across on leadership. He highlights Edwin Friedman's, The Failure of Nerve, and Harper Lee's To Kill a Mocking Bird. I'm going to have to take a look at this book. Here's Jay's post:

The Audacity of Leadership »

By Jay Lorenzen on Aug 20, 2009

Since my last post, I’ve been underlining every other line in Edwin Friedman’s The Failure of Nerve. I’ve read a lot of books about leadership–most are about the techniques of leadership (vision-casting, team-building, communication skills) or the character of leadership (integrity, trustworthiness, servant-like, loving).

Friedman’s book, however, has the ability to completely reshape one’s perspective about leadership. It goes to the very nature of leadership and how it works.

When I wasn’t reading Friedman, I was listening to Sissy Spacek’s reading of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. Atticus Finch, the lawyer in this Pulitzer Prize winning novel, kept reminding me of Friedman’s description of the “well-differentiated leader.”

If you don’t remember the novel, Atticus Finch is a lawyer in Maycomb, Alabama in 1932. He puts himself and his children at risk by defending a black man accused of raping a white woman in Alabama. Atticus Finch sets a standard of morality that no other character in the book comes close to matching. His “self-differentiation” from the rest of the people of Maycomb gives him the ability to cope with the unreasonable and highly emotional elements of the town. Taking a stand against the injustice of racism, he serves as an “immune system” resisting the invasive and destructive viruses infecting the community.

For Friedman, a true leader (like Atticus Finch) resists the “chronic anxiety” around him or her. By his or her presence, the self-differentiated leader possesses a modifying, non-anxious, and often challenging presence. The crucial issue of leadership, Friedman argues, may not be how much power leaders exercise but how well their presence has been able to preserve that society’s integrity. By the integrity and audacity of their own self-possession, they keep societies (institutions, churches, movements) from “dis-integ-rating.”

Unfortunately, Friedman argues, most leaders lack nerve, becoming co-opted by the highly reactive, often regressive atmosphere of chronically anxious, dysfunctional societies. He defines chronically anxious societies as:

Reactive–the vicious cycle of intense emotional reactions of each member to events and to one another
Herders–a process thru which the forces for togetherness triumph over the forces for individuality and move everyone to adapt to the least mature members
Blame displacers–an emotional state in which members focus on forces that have victimized them rather than taking responsibility for their own being and destiny
Quick-fixers–members have a low-threshold for pain and thus constantly seek symptom relief rather than fundamental change.
Lacking well-differentiated leaders–a failure of nerve in leaders that both stems from and contributes to the first four characteristics.

Maycomb, Alabama in 1932 was one of those chronically anxious Southern towns trying to emerge from the racism of its past.

In Friedman’s terms, no one but Atticus Finch has the capacity to separate himself from the surrounding emotional processes. No one else has the courage to be clear about his or her principles and vision. Only Atticus is willing to be exposed and to be vulnerable, is able to persist in the face of inertial resistance and able to regulate his emotions in the face of reactive sabotage. Atticus represents a kind of non-anxious, well-principled presence that is at the heart of true leadership.

According to Friedman, such “self-differentiation” in leadership is the key to the kingdom.

Here’s a couple quotes from the book that illustrate Atticus’ well-defined self:

Atticus to his son, Jem:

I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It’s when you know you’re licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do.

An exchange between Atticus and his daughter, Scout:

“This case, Tom Robinson’s case, is something that goes to the essence of a man’s conscience — Scout, I couldn’t go to church and worship God if I didn’t try to help that man.”

“Atticus, you must be wrong . . . “

“How’s that?”

“Well, most folks seem to think they’re right and you’re wrong . . . “

“They’re certainly entitled to think that, and they’re entitled to full respect for their opinions,” said Atticus, “but before I can live with other folks I’ve got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn’t abide by majority rule is a person’s conscience.”

In another exchange with Scout:

“There are some things that you’re not old enough to understand just yet. There’s been some high talk around town to the effect that I shouldn’t do much about defending this man.”

“If you shouldn’t be defending him, then why are you doing it?”

“For a number of reasons. The main one is that if I didn’t, I couldn’t hold my head up in town. I couldn’t even tell you or Jem not to do somethin’ again.”

Miss Maude Atkinson about Atticus:

“What I meant was, if Atticus Finch drank until he was drunk he wouldn’t be as hard as some men are at their best. There are just some kind of men who-who’re so busy worrying about the next world they’ve never learned to live in this one, and you can look down the street and see the results.”

‘Whether Maycomb knows it or not, we’re paying the highest tribute we can pay a man. We trust him to do right. It’s that simple.’

Bob Ewell (the antagonist) to Atticus Finch:

“What kinda man are you?”

Rejoice In the Lord Anyway

I preached through Philippians 4:4-9 last Sunday and I have to say that it is one of my favorite passages of Scripture. By nature, I am an analyzer. I am pretty good at picking out what is going wrong with something and in giving recommendations for how to fix it. I might not always be right, but I am always thinking about how to improve things and address problems. Sometimes people think that I am being negative, but I really am able to engage in this most of the time with a light spirit and joy in my life. In other words, I can focus on what is going wrong without being obsessed by it.

Most of the time.

But, sometimes, I can drift into just being critical. I can become negative. I can be overwhelmed by problems and not see a way out. I know this about myself and when that happens I find that I have taken my focus off of Christ and I am staring straight at the problem. I can go blind with it, just about. So, this is why a continual reminder to rejoice in the Lord is exactly what I need. We are not told to rejoice in our circumstances. Sometimes our circumstances stink. Sometimes things are not working out the way that we want them to at all. But, God never changes. He never stops working. We can rejoice in Him even when everything else around us is falling apart. He is above all of it and faith helps us see that.

Rejoicing in the Lord does not mean that you put on a smiley face that covers the twitch you have developed because your nerves are shot. Rather, it means that you can stare massive problems in the face and praise God anyway because you recognize that He is bigger than your problems and He is more than able to handle whatever you are going through. You actually begin to look past your problems and look to the God who is more than able to deliver you. And, even if things don't work out, God is not surprised and He is still working, still redeeming, and still holding you close to Himself. We are going to have trouble in this life. Jesus told us that. But, he also said that he would overcome the world.

Since I started this blog it has been my desire to chronicle where I see God working in the world around me. Sometimes, I focus on problems. God works through problems. Other times, I focus on really good things. God works in that too.  God works for the good in all things for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose. The Bible says that. So, we can know that no matter what we are going through, God is still worthy of our praise. Knowing that and actually believing it changes things.

Rejoice in the Lord all the time. No matter what. Always. Easier said than done sometimes, but just a moment in real worship of God changes everything and you see that He is more than able to carry your burdens.