Grumble, grumble...

Adam: "Hi, I'm Adam. I'm a grumbler."

Everyone: "Hi Adam."

Sponsor: "Adam, welcome to grumble-a-holics anonymous. You're amongst friends here. You can be honest."

Adam: "Thanks. Well,...um, I guess I'll tell you what led me to be here tonight. What made it obvious to me that I had a problem was jury duty..."

Everyone: *groans* *murmuring* *grumbling*

Sponsor: "Friends, let's not go there. Please continue Adam."

Adam: "Thanks. I got the letter saying I was scheduled for jury duty. Now I've never had jury duty here in Maine so I had no idea that you are essentially 'on-call' for two months and could serve on multiple trials. I was both surprised and annoyed. So...well,... I grumbled. A lot."

Everyone: *murmurs* "It's OK." "We've all been there." "Please continue."

Adam: "I grumbled to my wife. I grumbled to my friends. Then I grumbled to the other people on jury duty. Then I got home from jury selection and posted a 'grumbly' Facebook status."

Everyone: *murmurs* "I love grumbling on Facebook." "The internet is a great place to grumble." "I Twitter-grumble."

Sponsor: "People! Adam, go on."

Adam: "I realized it was a problem when people started responding to my Facebook status. I had a Christian friend post about how she found jury duty fascinating. I had another friend tell me her brother was in the exact same jury pool I was in - he got placed on two juries while I was only placed on one. Then a friend of mine - I'm not sure where he is spiritually - commented on my status too.

"I was OK with it my grumbly status until I put my kids to bed. I was reading to them from a Bible storybook and the verse in the story was Philippians 2:14-15, "Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe."

Everyone: "Ouch."

Adam: "Yeah. I felt exposed, naked, guilty - I am a grumbler. And I sure wasn't shining like a star. There was nothing in my attitude that made me stand out, or any different from those around me. Then, as if to add insult to injury, I stumbled upon this commentary about that verse:

"Paul is quoting from Deuteronomy 32 when he says 'a crooked and perverse generation.' It’s a reference to the Israelites who made complaining and grumbling their full time occupation. On the heels of the greatest redemption to date, with the Red Sea splitting and all, the Israelites were masters at complaining. No meat, no water, etc. They were so focused on what they didn’t have, that they didn’t see what they did have – a great God who rescued them in a great way. The Egyptians couldn’t keep them enslaved, the Anakites couldn’t demolish them, but grumbling and complaining killed the nation of Israel...

Be distinctly different! Where it’s natural to complain, shine by giving thanks! The child of God is to be radically different from the world in our outlook! If we grumble and complain, we not only lose our shine but become part of the darkness."

Everyone: "That's a punch in the gut."

Adam: "I realized; what kind of witness was I to my friend on Facebook who may not know Christ? What kind of an example was I to other Christians? What kind of an example was I to the other jurors? What kind of an example was I to my children and family? Was I shining, or just part of the darkness?"

Everyone: *uncomfortable shifting in their seats*

Adam: "Then I recognized that this attitude of grumbling was not isolated to just jury duty, but pervasive throughout my life. I would 'pride' myself on doing something I didn't want to do, but then would grumble the whole time. Sure, my actions were right, but my attitude was wrong. My wife would want to do something I didn't want to and I'd say 'yes' - thinking what a great husband I was. However, then I would grumble the whole time making her and everyone else miserable. The right actions are important, but the wrong attitude is deadly."

Sponsor: "Well Adam, it sounds like you have come to some good realizations. You've admitted you are powerless over grumbling, but now you must confess there is a power greater than yourself who can restore you to sanity. You daily must make a decision to turn your will and your life over to the care of God and to be thankful. One day at a time."

Adam: "Yes, one day at a time. Thanks. You guys are great. Now if you just made better coffee."

Discussion Questions - The Core: Angels, Demons, and Satan

We began the sermon by watching this "Nightline Face Off" video clip. You can hear the full audio of this clip in the sermon mp3.

07/12/09 - Discussion Questions - The Core: Angels, Demons, and Satan

What images come to your mind when you hear the word “angel”? How about when you hear the word “demon”? How about “satan” (or “the devil”)? What books, images, ideas, and media have shaped your concepts of these things? How accurate do you think the world’s concepts are?

In The Screwtape Letters, C. S. Lewis wrote of the two most common errors people tend to make about Satan: "There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. They themselves are equally pleased by both errors, and hail a materialist or a magician with the same delight." Have you ever observed either of these errors? How might we protect ourselves against them?

Heb. 1:14 and Ps. 91:9-12 speak of the ministry of angels to humanity. The presence of angels is not always obvious for Heb. 13:2 instructs us to welcome strangers because some “have entertained angels without knowing it” (cf. Gen. 18:1-5; 19:1-3). Have you (or someone you know) ever been aware of angels? How about the presence of demons/spirits (cf. Eph. 6:12)?

Read Gen. 3:1-6. How would you define temptation? What place does deception play in it? Read Gen. 3:11-13. We’ve all heard the excuse, “The devil made me do it.” Do you think the snake made them eat from the tree? (cf. Jam. 1:13-14) Why do you think this is such a common excuse?

How did Jesus stand against the devil’s temptations in Lk. 4:1-13? According to Heb. 2:18 and 4:15-16, what is the benefit to us of Jesus’ temptations? How have you experienced Jesus’ help in the midst of your temptations? How does Jesus teach us to pray regarding temptation in Matt. 6:13? How do you think we can apply the instruction of Eph. 6:10-11?

What does the Biblical imagery that pictures Satan as a lion (1 Pet. 5:8) and a dragon and serpent (Rev. 12:9; 20:2) imply about his power and ways?

During Jesus’ temptation in Luke 4:5-6, what do we learn of Satan’s authority? The Bible also calls Satan “the ruler of this world” (Jn 12:31; 14:30; 16:11; 1Jn. 5:19); “the god of this world” (2 Cor. 4:4); and “the prince of the power of the air” (Eph. 2:2). According to Jn. 12:31; Col. 2:15; Heb. 2:14-15; 1Jn. 3:8; Rev. 11:15, what did the cross of Christ do to the devil’s authority?

Why does 2 Cor. 11:14 teach that Satan is so deceptive? However, what does Satan always speak according to Jn. 8:44? What do you think are the biggest lies that Satan has told today’s world? What methods does he use to tell his lies?

Be more Christian

I enjoyed the insights of a new article on ChristianityToday.com titled: "Ministry Lessons from a Muslim."

In the article, Muslim professor Eboo Patel encourages a group of seminary students to be more Christian. Setting up a hypothetical dilemma concerning Somali Muslims working in a small town meat packing plan, Patel asks the students to imagine a local reporter has come to them, as a local pastor, for their perspective.

For fifteen minutes the students debate the matter, fluctuating between constitutional rights and economic realities. Finally, Patel interrupts.

"I'm hearing you articulate two grand narratives. First, the narrative of American freedom. And second, the narrative of capitalism and productivity. But remember, the reporter is not calling you because you are an expert in economics or constitutional law. He's calling you because you are a minister. Don't be afraid to answer the question as a Christian. Answer out of the Christian narrative."

The irony of a Muslim challenging a group of pastors to be more Christian was not lost on the students....

[The conversation is redirected to evaluate the scenario through the Christian narrative.]

I want you to see what just happened," he says. "I want to affirm this. You are using the grand Christian narrative to respond to an interfaith conflict. First, I heard the Christian story of loving God and loving your neighbor. Second, I heard the Christian story of the Good Samaritan and the call to love the stranger. By using these stories, you are defining reality through the Christian narrative.

"Remember, the three most powerful narratives on the planet are narratives of religion, narratives of nation, and narratives of ethnicity/race. You cannot afford to forfeit that territory by talking about economics or the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Don't be afraid to be Christian ministers. If you don't use the Christian narrative to define reality for your people, then someone else will define reality for them with a different narrative."

Patel's call to stand firmly on the Christian narrative isn't what most students expect to hear from a Muslim professor.

Beautiful. What we are to do as pastors (and Christians) is interpret the world through the Christian narrative - and we dare not loose that. Fear would have us (myself included) try to be more "relevant" - considering solely the social, economic, psychological, scientific, civil dimensions of a situation. Make no mistake, it behooves us to have insight into these areas. However, our specific calling is to bring the Christian narrative to bear upon the understanding and interpretation of world events, discoveries, conflicts, questions, etc.

The fear is that when we bring the Christian narrative to bear upon world events, we enter into a marketplace filled with competing religious narratives. We are tempted within these interfaith dialogs to one of two extremes: a) a winner-takes-all slugfest to prove that we are right; or b) a love-in because either we all really believe the same thing (or in the end we're all just right). But is there another way?

Meyer and Patel believe there is another way. Somewhere between religious relativism and religious fundamentalism is a third option—what they call religious pluralism. This is the foundational principle of the seminary course.

"Religious pluralism is different than relativism," one student tells us. "Relativism says you cannot make exclusive truth claims, that everyone is right. Pluralism simply recognizes that we live in a very diverse culture; there are a lot of different religions. Pluralism means talking about how we can live together and still maintain our own religious identity. Truth claims are okay."

We must be secure and unambiguous in our identity as Christians without becoming arrogant, combative, or disrespectful. I wrote about this in my post: An Unambiguous and Unassuming presence. In that post, I quoted Henri J. M. Nouwen and his insightful book Reaching Out: The Three Movements of the Spiritual Life

Hospitality is not to change people, but to offer them space where change can take place.... When we want to be really hospitable we not only have to receive strangers but also to confront them by an unambiguous presence, not hiding ourselves behind neutrality but showing out ideas, opinions, and life style clearly and distinctly. No real dialogue is possible between somebody and a nobody. We can enter into communication with the other only when our own life choices, attitudes and viewpoints offer the boundaries that challenge strangers to become aware of their own position and to explore it critically (p. 71, 99)

We can avoid the extremes of combativeness or neutrality and instead speak respectfully and unambiguously from the Christian narrative. As the students in the article said: "Pluralism means talking about how we can live together and still maintain our own religious identity."

In doing so we find that we might work alongside those who differ from us without compromising our identity. As I say in my own personal statement of faith:

In order to promote God’s will on earth, Christians should also be ready to work with all men and women of good will in any good cause, always being careful to act in the spirit of love without compromising their loyalty to Christ and His truth (Matt 13:24-30, 37-43; 13:33; 13:47-50; Mark 9:38-41; John 17:14-19; Acts 17:22-31; 1 Cor. 5:9-10; 1 Cor. 10:23-11:1). Any means and methods used for the improvement of society and the establishment of righteousness among humanity can be truly and permanently helpful only when rooted in the regeneration of the individual by the saving grace of God in Christ Jesus (2 Cor. 5:17; 1 Tim. 4:8).

We need not water-down nor ignore our differences. Rather, let us affirm and embrace them - standing unashamedly within the Christian narrative. But let us always do so "with gentleness and respect" (1 Pet. 3:15) recognizing the pluralistic world we live in. May we never stop bringing the Good News to bear upon the world news. May we learn to be more Christian.

lex orandi, lex credendi

I'm back from speaking at the Boston Youth Conference - always a great time with a group of old friends (I've been speaking at the conference now for eight years).

While I was there, enjoying a time of loud and passionate worship with the combined High School / College & Career groups, I couldn't help but think lex orandi, lex credendi.

OK, I don't really think in Latin.

Lex orandi, lex credendi is roughly translated: "the way you pray determines what you believe."

I was reading from Alister McGrath's Christian Theology: An Introduction today (I read from 500+ page theology tomes just slightly more often than I think in Latin). McGrath writes:

In recent years there has been a rediscovery of the fact that Christian theologians pray and worship, and that this devotional context shapes their theological reflections. This point has been appreciated since the first centuries of the Christian church. The tag lex orandi, lex credendi... expresses the fact that theology and worship interact with each other. What Christians believe affects the manner in which they pray and worship; the manner in which Christians pray and worship affects what they believe.

Did you catch that? How we worship influences what we believe. Arguably, the theology of our church is shaped just as much by our worship as by my sermons. It is why I take the songs we choose for worship so seriously.

As most of you know, I love worship songs that elicit an emotional response - not because the response it sought or manufactured - but because of the song's theology. The Sunday morning before I left for the conference, I was reduced to tears by the song the "Power of the Cross." The truth of that song - the theology of Christ on the cross - left me thankful, grateful, and utterly broken.

As has been said, "Good theology should always lead us to doxology" - or "Right words about God should always lead us to worship God."

So this weekend, as I stood worshiping with brothers and sisters at the conference, I noticed they sang many of the same songs that we sing. However, mixed in with those there were some songs that brought to mind the criticism leveled by the Internet Monk in "The Coming Evangelical Collapse":

In what must be the most ironic of all possible factors, an evangelical culture that has spent billions of youth ministers, Christian music, Christian publishing and Christian media has produced an entire burgeoning culture of young Christians who know next to nothing about their own faith except how they feel about it. (emphasis mine)

Should we sing the truth about how we feel about God - or rather should we sing the truth about God and allow that to impact how we feel? Good worship should move us emotionally - it should be passionate and engaging, often driving us to joy or tears. But we won't get there by singing about how we should feel, but rather about Whom and about why we feel. This type of worship not only fulfills the heart, but nourishes and grows the mind. lex orandi, lex credendi

A Dialog Somewhere Beyond Death...

In 2006, our church put on a production of Between Heaven and Hell: A Dialog Somewhere Beyond Death With John F. Kennedy, C. S. Lewis & Aldous Huxley - a book by Boston College professor, philosopher and theologian Peter Kreeft.

C.S. Lewis, John F. Kennedy and Aldous Huxley all died on the same day, November 22, 1963. And all three believed, in different ways, that death was not the end of human life. Suppose they were right and they met after death in an ethereal stopping place somewhere between heaven and hell - how might their conversation go? Below is a brief YouTube clip from the production.

Now some of you may have noticed that on June 25, 2009 both Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett died. Barely two days earlier, on June 23, 2009, Ed McMahon died.

I couldn't help but wonder: suppose these three met after death in an ethereal stopping place somewhere between heaven and hell - how might their conversation go?

McMahon: "Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeere's Johnny!"
Jackson: "It's Jacko. So Beat it."
McMahon (to Jackson): "Didn't I meet you on Star Search?"
Fawcett (to McMahon): "Oh, wow. Did I win the Publisher's Clearing House sweepstakes?"
McMahon: "You are correct sir!...er, ma'am. I like your 'Farrah Do.'"
Jackson (to Fawcett): "Are you an angel? Can you heal the world?"
McMahon: "No, she's one of Charlie's Angels... what a TV Blooper and Practical Joke!"
Jackson (to newcomer): "Are you Billie Jean?..."
Billy Mays: "No, I'm Billy Mays." (OxiClean pitchman who died June 28, 2009).

The bottom line is that this spate of recent "high profile" deaths should remind us that life is fleeing. Just the other week, during the Wednesday night study we opened Psalm 39. Psalm 39:4-5 says:

"Show me, O LORD, my life's end
and the number of my days;
let me know how fleeting is my life.

You have made my days a mere handbreadth;
the span of my years is as nothing before you.
Each man's life is but a breath.

We are reminded often in the Scriptures of the brevity of life. Later, Psalm 39:6 says, "Man is a mere phantom as he goes to and fro: He bustles about, but only in vain; he heaps up wealth, not knowing who will get it" (sounds similar to the parable Jesus told in Luke 12:16-21 or the wisdom of Ecclesiastes 4:8). Psalm 78:39 also compares human life to a passing breeze: "[God] remembered that they were but flesh, a passing breeze that does not return." Elsewhere humanity is compared to the grass that grows and dies quickly: Psalm 90:5-6 - "they are like the new grass of the morning— though in the morning it springs up new, by evening it is dry and withered" (see also, Psalm 37:2; Isaiah 40:6-8).

In light of the transitory nature of human life, Psalm 90:12 instructs: "Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom."

It might be apocryphal, but the story is told that in attempting to recruit John Sculley, the 38-year-old President of Pepsi-Cola, Steve Jobs, Founder of Apple Computer, issued a tremendous challenge: "Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to change the world?"

How will you spend your days? What will you be remembered for? The moonwalk? Your hair? A sweepstakes? A cleaning product? All sugar water. Or will you make a real difference?

Discussion Questions - The Core: Sin

06/28/09 - Discussion Questions - The Core: Sin - Gen. 3

Why do you think modern society has so much trouble talking about sin? Why do you think the idea that we are “sinful” from birth is so disdained?

How have you observed each of these human disciplines to address the problem of sin in our world: politics? education? sociology? business? the arts? What do these approaches have in common? How do they fall short?

How would you explain “sin” to a friend? (Where does sin come from? Who does it affect? What does it do? What is the result? What can we do about it? What did God do about it?)

Gen. 2:25 says that before sin entered the world, “The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.” Now read the result of sin in Gen. 3:7, 10. Relationally, what do you think it means to be “naked and unashamed” before one another? Relationally and morally what do you think it means to be “naked and unashamed” before God?

How have you experienced your relationship with God to be affected when you sin? Have you ever had an experience as David describes in Psalm 32:1-5? Read Isa. 59:2, Ps. 66:18, Rom. 5:10; Eph. 4:18; and Col 1:21 - How would you explain what these passages teach about the affect of sin on our relationship with God?

How have you experienced your relationship with other people to be affected when you sin? How do Matt. 22:36-39; Rom. 13:10; and James 4:1-3 speak to this?

Read Gen. 3:1-6. How would you define temptation? What place does deception play in it? Can you share an example from your own life where you were tempted? How did you respond? Why?

Read Ge. 3:11-13. Why do you think we are quick to play the blame game?

Does Gen. 3:1-24 lead you to any response—such as confession, thanksgiving praise, request, asking forgiveness from another person, forgiving someone, changing an attitude, or resisting a temptation?

Randomness? Providence? Redemption?

I randomly (providentially?) stumbled upon an interview on the New York Times site titled: What Are The Odds? The interview is with a physicist at California Institute of Technology and the author of many books and articles, a number of them on the science of probability, Leonard Mlodinow:

Dr. Mlodinow has a particular, and personal, interest how the most painful events can sometimes yield unexpected results. In the first chapter of his best-seller, “The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives,” he writes of a conversation with his father, who tells him of how he came to survive his time in the concentration camp in Buchenwald:

It struck me then that I have Hitler to thank for my existence, for the Germans had killed my father’s wife and two young children, erasing his prior life. And so were it not for the war, my father would never have emigrated to New York, never have met my mother, also a refugee, and never have produced me and my two brothers … The outline of our lives, like the candle’s flame, is continuously coaxed in new directions by a variety of random events that, along with our responses to them, determine our fate.

Randomness? Providence? Redemption?

You can read more of my reflections on the mystery of Evil, God's Sovereignty and the goodness of His redemption in my posts: Evil, Suffering, Redemption, and Tomatoes and Redemption.