The Church
Conversion not Acceptance

Relationships are important to the emerging/emergent movement types. And that is not a bad thing. We need to open our churches to all folks in the postmodern world. But, we must take care that fulfillment is not found in our human relationships instead of in Christ. Too often our relationships are for affirmation and value; for feeling good about ourselves. Belonging to the softball team, YMCA, Rotary Club or any other group can be good for self esteem. Lots of groups give us affirmation. The Church, however, is not about affirmation and value. It is about change. It is called conversion.

Accepting and including others is a step to conversion but not an end. We need to introduce others to the “good news” that they do not have to be as they are. They can be a new creation in Christ. The old passes away; the new has come. 2 Cor. 5:17. Acceptance and inclusion is not the Gospel. The Gospel is about radical change. Dead people are now alive. The unvarnished Gospel is not about keeping people as they are but about changing them forever.

The emerging/emergent folks want to embrace the postmodern idea that we need to understand the times, and who can argue with that? But we are not to embrace the times. Jesus was counter cultural. He was accepting of people but not their behavior whether it be the woman caught in adultery [go and sin no more]; the Pharisees [you brood of vipers] or the rich young ruler [give up all that you have]. Christ wanted folks to be different from the way they were. The sinners obvious to the world, the religious types and the prominent people all needed to be changed, not affirmation and acceptance.

Jesus knew the culture would change when those who affect it change. He did not say…”well, this is how people are, so how can we make the message relevant to them in that situation?” No, He wanted them to see that they must be nailed to a tree, but the good news is that they do not have to be. He did it for them. John Murray’s wonderful book Redemption Accomplished and Applied is the Scriptural punch line. Jesus paid it all and through faith you can apprehend His work. That is a radical message that is not in tune with a self-centered culture where people want to be comfortable in their sin. They do not want to change…they want to be accepted just as they are.

When people come to Jesus and encounter His grace and mercy, they are never the same. He is an Agent of change. He died for those the Father gave Him. He did not die for folks to remain as they are. The Church is about the Church not the culture the Church finds itself located, wherever or whatever that is. The Church is not about acceptance. The Church is about conversion.

Global Warming
Hurricane Studies

One of the favorites with the “gw” crowd is the position that climate change is creating more numerous and intense hurricanes. Those who have the apocalyptic view of gw are persistent with their arguments that the catastrophe that is gw is played out on the tropical cyclone front. It is kind of a taste of what’s to come. Well, two recent studies seem to take the wind out of their sails [Sorry for the bad pun!].

The first report is in Geophysical Research Letters. The study was conducted by three scientists in the Department of Atmospheric Science at Creighton University. Their work was funded by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. They studied tropical cyclones in the Eastern Pacific near the Mexican coast. Their finding was that tropical cyclone activity is statistically decreasing. And, as to an increase of intensity, there is no upward tendency there either.

The Journal of Climate published a second study conducted by Francis Parisi of Standard and Poor’s and Robert Lund of the Department of Mathematical Sciences at Clemson. They looked at hurricane strike data from 1900 to 2006 and found that despite the active seasons of 2004 and 2005, there is no increasing trend in hurricane strike frequencies over the period of time studied. The report specifically states: The hypothesis that hurricane strike frequencies are increasing in time is also statistically rejected.

I wonder if we will hear Heidi Cullen of the Weather Channel report on these findings? Oh, I know, neither study was specifically of the Atlantic Basin. But, at least the studies look at actual date and make scientific and mathematical conclusions. Could they be wrong? Yeah. But, how about Al Gore, could he be wrong? And, does this prove there is no man made global warming? No. But, at least it makes one pause when looking at the poster promoting Gore’s movie…a hurricane pattern from a smokestack emission!
Connections between gw and hurricanes must be shown by data not imagination and media hype. One prediction is certain, these two reports will not slacken the drum beat for drastic action to avert the catastrophe that is awaiting us all from gw!

The Church
Belfast Northern Ireland

I never thought in my lifetime I would be in Belfast, Northern Ireland. This past summer I was there with Susan, Lucas and oldest grandson Zach. It is a tough city. Although there has been only one bombing incident since the accords of peace were signed in 1998, the symptoms of the “troubles” are everywhere. Fences toped with barbed wire still separate Protestant and Catholic blue collar neighborhoods. Murals are painted on buildings commemorating green and orange “heroes” and evidencing the deep seeded animosity, even hatred that still exists. Neighborhoods are marked with flags of their particular cause. And, in Protestant neighborhoods wood was being gathered for the annual march and bon fire of the Order of the Orange on 12 July which is the celebration of the Williamite army of Wm. of Orange’s victory over the Jacobite army of James II at the Boyne River in Ireland.

So, while there is peace at the moment, always fomenting below the surface is the distrust and rejection of the religion of the other side. The government is run by a coalition of Protestants and Roman Catholics. But both sides express unhappiness that they have to share power with hoodlums and criminals of the opposition. When you ask the man on the street is the peace with hold they reply, “I hope so.” There exists a stability that is uncertain and uneasy.

But, more astounding was the opportunity to worship God in Belfast in a Reformed Presbyterian Church that has been in existence at the same location for 150 years. A church where the roof was blown off by an IRA bomb blast in the 1990s! The congregation went on worshipping in their building without a roof until it could be replaced. What a rich experience to worship with Covenanters who have stood for what they believed in a hostile environment for all these years. To hear the Psalms sung without accompaniment, RPC fashion, in Gaelic tones and accents is a rare treat. And, the pastor preached on Phil 4:6: “be anxious about no thing.” This message preached in a city that displays anxiousness aplenty.

Not many years ago, there was doubt that peace, even the fragile peace of today, would come to Northern Ireland. We should take heart at what has happened there. While the political parties in No. Ireland surely remain sectarian, I seems for the present they recognize that the government must provide peaceful existence for both Roman Catholic and Protestant alike. One can more fully appreciate the concept of separation of church and state. Paul instructs Timothy that prayer must be offered on behalf of kings and those in high places “that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.” [1 Tim 2:2].

So, we must pray for the governing authorities in No. Ireland. May they provide the peace and quiet that permits folks to worship God…be they Protestant or Catholic. A peace that will allow a godly and dignified life to be lived by all. It may take generations for the flags and painted murals to disappear and the fences to come down. But, by the Grace of God this will finally occur and the battle for the hearts and minds of the people will be fought with weapons of truth and life and not weapons of death.

The Church
Emergent/Emerging Movement

A little over a month ago, Dave Andrianoff and I stood on the streets of Athens and discussed the emerging/emergent church movement. We had just worshipped at the Greek Evangelical Church and witnessed how it was having an impact on a culture where evangelical Christianity is a “foreign religion”. We discussed how the emergent/emerging folks may be in a similar position in our culture. I had some misgivings that we discussed with a promise to begin reading and thinking about the movement and commence a discussion with Dave. This is my preliminary thinking as put to Dave in an e-mail after the jet lag lifted on our return to the Eastern Continental Divide. We will have more to say about this subject in the coming months.

Dear Dave--------Your question to me in Athens about the emerging/emergent church as well as your embracing of A Generous Orthodoxy put me to more serious thinking about this movement [I call it a movement because, as we discussed, there is no authority or discipline structure which is necessary to be a Biblical Church.]. There is good that has come from the movement. Examples:

1. Enunciating the problem that the evangelical [whatever that is!?] church in the USA is, in large part, wedded to politics and nationalism. They have accurately pointed to this factor adding to the angry judgmental spirit of many “Christians” to domestic social issues and international relation/security matters.
2. The movement has exposed the anti-historical view of the modern evangelical church in the USA and the resultant lack of continuity with the ancient/apostolic/universal [real Catholic] church. Christopher Lasch who wrote The Culture of Narcissism says the failure to face the past is indicative of deep despair in a society that cannot face the future. In some ways that may be why modern evangelicals in the west cannot deal with those who are “different” from us. We look at the future of the church and blanch. We must become reconnected with the past to understand how to move forward in the future, a position this movement has promoted.
3. The movement has reacted to modernity’s change of emphasis from God to man and it’s commitment to reason and empiricism. We are all modern people and the emerging/emergent folk have rightly pointed that out. The cultural conditioning of evangelicalism in the USA means the modern church “thinks” it has it figured out [another reason why history is irrelevant] and that its modern understanding is “the way it is and must be”. Coincidently, this understanding comports with the ease, comfort and pleasure of the culture and a pre-tribulation, pre-millennial eschatology which takes the western Christian out before “real trouble” begins. These folk have been effective in pointing out this problem.

With all the good, however, I think the bad is the adaptation to post-modernity. The church must strive to make the Gospel intelligible but that does not mean adapting to the post-modern mindset: no overarching truth; no sin [not even the neuroses of modernity]; and no meaning. These do not represent the reality of Holy Scripture and so should not be part of a church’s belief system. The church is always reforming but never conforming to culture. We are countercultural…not modern or post-modern. Now it is true, post-modernity gives ear to the Gospel as another story which modernity did not, viewing it as pre-modern, miraculous, non-scientific hooha.

As we discussed, a large part of the problem with post-modernism, and the embracing of same, is epistemological…How do we Know? What can we know? Our knowing must always be driven by Holy Scripture, not cultural moods. Yes, we are all influenced by the culture we live in, yet for a Christian that culture does not define our belief system. As David Wells says, the Biblical God is an outside God, self-defined through revelation. He stands apart from His creation and is the standard of Truth.

The emergent/emerging movement seems to be rejecting that concept through swallowing post-modern epistemology. That may be why it is easy to know what they are against but difficult to know what they believe. In an appendix to the recent book The Supremacy of Christ in the Post-Modern World, John Piper relates a conversation he had with two emergent/emerging leaders, Doug Pagitt and Tony Jones. Piper is frustrated by their conversation. This is what he says:

…committed relationships trump truth…To ask “What is the gospel underneath, supporting the relationship is a category mistake. And so I keep going back on my heels, saying I just don’t understand that way these guys think. There are profound epistemological differences—ways of processing reality—that make the conversation almost impossible, as if it were just kind of going by each other. What is the function of knowledge in transformation? What are the goals of transformation? We seem to differ so much in our worldviews and our ways of knowing that I’m not sure how profitable the conversation was or if we could ever get anywhere….[a]s far as their beliefs on certain doctrinal issues, I can’t tell, because as I pushed them on them. I could tell that their attitude was: “That’s not what we do. That’s not what do here. We don’ try to get agreement on the nature of the atonement. That is alienating to friendships to try to do that, so we don’t do that.”…Paul insists on establishing the gospel, whether there is a good relationship or not. [p. 155].

Piper’s experience seems to be indicative of the movement buying into the Grenz/Franke Beyond Foundationalism thesis that there is no epistemic access to the real, objective world but only beliefs fashioned and determined by our particular circumstances. Therefore, we cannot contend for any Truth with others just try to understand their circumstances and resulting belief systems. But, is that Biblical?

While Biblical truth is more than propositions, it is not less. Scripture is full of warnings, promises, commands and assertions, and they are all inerrant and infallible. This content is Truth because it points to the Truth…Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior…the only way to salvation. This is unacceptable to both a modern and post-modern view of reality and the church should not buy into either schema. I fear that the emerging/emergent movement has done just that with post-modernism. If Scripture does not represent the overarching Truth, the meta-narrative that stands apart from all other stories, then how can we come to know the way, the Truth and the life, to which Scripture points us? We proclaim the Gospel because its Truth changes all those who hear and believe. That is the real, objective Truth this world needs to hear.

I eagerly await your comments on this topic since it ultimately affects how we all evangelize in this undeniable post-modern culture.

Blessings-------wck

Election 2008/Modern Culture
Image or Word

In 2008, the majority of advertising for candidates is on television. It is the projecting of images. Images can show a reality of sorts, but they do not allow discerning or interpretation. Words are required for that. TV images are usually accompanied by “sound bites” not explanations of positions. And, it is because of the image driven political culture that there is more of an emphasis on personality than character. How many times have you heard people say: “I like ________” but when pressed about what _______’s policies, beliefs or character is, they draw a blank. Why, because we really do not know the people we elect today.

Warren Susman wrote an article some time ago entitled “Personality and the Making of 20th Century Culture”. In it he opines that in the image driven culture of the 20th century we moved from character formation to personality formation. Instead of using nouns to describe someone, we now use adjectives. We can know so few people in a crowded world. If we want to appeal to more than our immediate family and community, personality instead of character is required. Public Relations came on the scene in the early 1900s as a way of managing a person’s image. It first was used with the new burgeoning motion picture “stars”, but was adapted to all public persons. Now, it is the most important aspect of modern day politicians.

We have had the “debates” [where the questioned often fail to answer the Q asked resulting in another preening sound bite] and candidates still make “stump speeches” [carefully crafted for the audience consuming the speech] but the overwhelming exposure voters have to candidates is the sound bite image on TV. And, we have become image consumers. Images do not explain themselves, cannot be interpreted by themselves nor describe the inner makeup of the image if it is a person. Images are for the folks who do not think and do not want to know anything more than what this candidate can do for me. Images give the voter the opportunity to choose without much work. Images massage your desires and wants making you feel like the empowered consumer but cannot tell you what you are buying. There is no precision with images; they emote. We are not taught by images. It’s what grandma used to say about “buying a pig in a poke.” You really do not really know who or what you are voting for.

Mass media is all about commodifying everything for the consumer. And, that extends to political choice. You are manipulated into a position where you think you are the sovereign and can unleash your personal freedom to vote for _____________. This is an especial problem for Christians because we are people of the Word, not image. For Christians there is a theology of language. God “spoke” creation into existence; Adam was given the task of “naming the animals”; God’s identity is tied to His Name [“I am”]; Jesus is the “Word” made flesh; we are baptized in the “Name”; and there are to be no “images” of God because Christ “revealed in the Word” is sufficient for man. Contrary to modern theorists, language did not evolve. We speak because God is a speaking God from the beginning of time.

So, during this election time, and in all of life, Christians are to be about understanding what is said and believed, not just what is portrayed. We are to be interested in character not personality. We are to be interested in depth not superficiality. We have been receivers of grace and we are not consumers of images. We need to make a discerning and wise choice not as a consumer of an image but as a believer in truth and goodness.

Living in the World
The Archbishop and Sharia law

Dr. Rowan Williams created quite a stir on 07 Feb. when he was reported as saying Sharia Law should be implemented in parts of the UK. As reported at www.Spectator.org Dr, Williams stated that there need be “a constructive accommodation with some aspects of Muslim law as we already do with some kinds of aspects of other religious law," His reasoning is that Sharia law is little different from other legal codes, and as such should not be seen as threatening. He declares that "it's not as if we're bringing in an alien and rival system.”

Thankfully, the Archbishop of Canterbury is just that and not the PM.. In the interview he admits not being an expert on Sharia law but gave his opinion anyway. With that no one can quibble…after all he is in the UK and not Saudi Arabia where contrary opinions are not countenanced. [I wonder why?] But, the sensibility of his statement must be questioned. If Muslims in the UK can have certain law forms for them only, several questions are raised. Does this cover all Muslims? When Sharia law and UK law conflict, which prevails? But, most importantly, since Sharia law makes non-Muslims second class citizens, how does this impact Muslim/Christian relations in the UK?

Dr. Williams must be overlooking the fact that Sharia law is for all of life. There is no separation of church and state in Islam…all is one. That is why non-Muslims are second class citizens. The UK is a fragmented place [as Williams acknowledges] Why add to the fragmentation? Should not all people in the UK be under one law and be assimilated into one society? How can separate social and legal systems work legitimately in one society?

The last post I entered was on “change” and the new tolerance. Here, Dr. Williams represents he worst of both. Introducing Sharia law into UK society is certainly change. But, is it change that is for the better of society? In addition, this represents the new tolerance. Not acknowledging Sharia law as different and tolerating it as such but looking it as an equal to UK law, especially when it applies to Muslims in the UK. The position is that what may be true for you may not be true for me in the context of a society where we live together. What does that sound like?

These statements of the Archbishop are symptoms of a larger problem. It indicates our willingness to give up on western civilization. Not because it has show itself to be unworthy but because we have not stomach for it any longer in this age of pluralism. Many in the West are willingly rejecting the importance as well as the virtues that flow from the spiritual, cultural, historical and legal legacy of a common civilization. We all are infected by the postmodern ethos and the desire to treat all ideas as equal in merit and therefore application to the society in which we live. That should be anathema to Christians like Dr. Williams. Instead, it is indicative of living in the world today.

Postmodernism / Election 2008
The New Tolerance

There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace.

General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!

Ronald Reagan at the Brandenburg Gate, West Berlin, 12 June 1987

The above words were spoken on the day before my 40th birthday. All my conscious life the USA had been in tension with the Soviet Union. It was called the “cold war”. It was a struggle between two ways of life…freedom for folks in the USA and repression for those in the Soviet Union. The Soviet rulers had their boots on the throats of their people.

When the Soviet Union began its rule, many hailed it as a new way of bringing equality to all the people, especially in the economic sense through socialism. But as the years passed, it became apparent that the communism espoused by Marx and Lenin was not possible and was clearly not the way it was in the Soviet Union. Yet, to avoid a “hot war” there was a “peaceful coexistence” that developed between the ideals of the Soviet and American rulers. Many wanted to take that to the level of “moral equivalence”. Thankfully that did not happen. Enough folks in the USA, including Reagan, believed we were right and the Soviets were wrong although we “tolerated” their position to avoid a nuclear holocaust.

But, as evidenced by he remarks above, Reagan and others never gave up on pressing for a change in the Soviets…a change that would promote freedom for the people under Soviet rule and thereby peace among state adversaries. DA Carson has opined that a big change that postmodernism has brought is a redefinition of “tolerance”. That is, it used to be that we acknowledged differing positions held but never gave up the belief in right/wrong or true/false positions and our need to advance the right and true. We “tolerated” other positions even though we knew them to be invalid.

Today, that has changed. Postmodernism with its views that “truth” is constructed culturally and is not universal, now demands that all positions be “tolerated” as TRUE. You know all the catch phrases: “what’s true for you is not necessarily true for me”, or “its all relative”. This is real “moral equivalence” because no one can impose their ethical system on another because there is no one right and true system, idea or proposition.

I for one am glad Reagan was not a postmodern president. Without delving into his theological reasons, he never quit striving to point out that the repression of freedom by the Soviets was wrong and their system was an invalid expression of a state in human history. This is an important point to consider in the 2008 election. Who wants to press for the good, the true and the beautiful? Who wants to see the dignity of man enhanced?

I am not talking about programs that make us more reliant on government or shifts resources from one person to another. These are political gimmicks to buy votes to stay in office. I am talking about the candidates approach to ideas and propositions that enhance the well being of all citizens and not special interests or segments of the population. Are the policies and positions of a candidate going to change our way of life; our view of family, land, and faith; our security and safety, all because the candidate believes we stand for nothing but the expedient and pragmatic? And, what we once stood for is not better than any other ideal or system in this world? When a candidate talks of “change” what is it he/she wants to change? Let us beware of candidates who would become postmodern presidents.

Modern Culture
In the Year 2525

I graduated from college in 1969 at the end of the decade many call the cataclysmic decade of change in the culture of the USA. Columnist George called the year before, 1968, “perhaps the worst year in American history” and sixties as “the most dangerous decade in America’s life as a nation.” Interestingly, in 1969 a haunting tune was released that seemed to be both warning and prophecy. I recently heard the song on a trip to a Presbytery meeting. It was “In the Year 2525” by Zager and Evans.

Denny Zager and Rick Evans were students who met at Nebraska Wesleyan University in Lincoln, Nebraska. They were two guitar pickers who were trying to make a buck in the Lincoln area. Evans wrote the song in 1964 and they released it themselves in 1967. Two years later RCA picked up the record and released it nationwide. It rocketed to #1 here and in England and one million singles were sold in a two month period. It remains the biggest one hit wonder of all time in the recording industry reputedly selling over 20,000,000 copies worldwide!

It appears that all the success is keyed to the desire folks had living in a crumbling culture to understand what is happening. The lyrics are as follows:

In the year 2525If man is still alive.If woman can survive, they may find.

In the year 3535Ain't gonna need to tell the truth, tell no lies.Everything you think, do and say, is in the pill you took today.

In the year 4545Ain't gonna need your teeth, won't need your eyes.You won't find a thing to chew.Nobody's gonna look at you.

In the year 5555Your arms hanging limp at your sides.Your legs got nothing to do.Some machine doing that for you.

In the year 6565Ain't gonna need no husband, won't need no wife.You'll pick your son, pick your daughter too.From the bottom of a long glass tube. Whoa-oh

In the year 7510If God's a-comin, he oughta make it by then.Maybe he'll look around himself and say.Guess it's time for the judgment day.

In the year 8510God is gonna shake his mighty head.He'll either say.I'm pleased where man has been.Or tear it down and start again. Whoa-oh

In the year 9595I'm kinda wonderin if man is gonna be alive.He's taken everything this old Earth can give.And he ain't put back nothing. Whoa-oh

Now it's been ten thousand yearsMan has cried a billion tears.For what he never knew,now man's reign is through.

But through eternal night.The twinkling of starlight.So very far away.Maybe it's only yesterday.

In the year 2525If man is still alive.If woman can survive, they may find.
I
n the year 3535 {fade}

Here is the intriguing part. Two young men of the sixties generation are pointing out the potential harm to the human race from technology because it leads to dehumanization. The song also does not shrink from mentioning that Divine Wrath and that Judgment Day may be appropriate because of the self-destruction of man. Now, I am not endorsing the theology of Zager & Evans but the fact that such a tune indicating those themes and floating them for thought came out of 1969. There was great angst about where man was headed then, even at the end of decade where there was so much degradation of conventional cultural norms…including music.

Could this happen today? Would a record like 2525 be released by a major producer, a record that questions progress and technology and asserts that the wasting of life itself invites Divine wrath? Seems unlikely except possibly in country and western music or contemporary Christian music, which are niche markets. This is indicative of how improperly Christians have responded to deteriorating culture. Instead of trying to be an influence on all culture, we have established our own “little cultures”. The result is no more songs selling 20,000,000 copies that strikes back at the world’s norms being available to question those norms. And, isn’t that the first step to confronting the world with the Gospel? How are worldly men, slaves to the system of the world to know that they are heading to destruction unless the world’s systems are questioned? That was needed in 1969 and is needed today.