Vanity vs. Virtue

Living here in Louisville's been an experience thus far. Basically, it's starting all over and having to reassemble a life in a completely new place. One of these areas that is of great importance but I'm finding to be amazingly difficult is finding a church! Now you'd think that being Louisville, the seemingly veritable seat of evangelical conservatism that it would be reasonably easy to find a church to commit to, work within, and rejoice in. For what it's worth, so did I. Maybe I'm either unlucky, too picky, or otherwise inhibited from finding such a place here thus far, but it's been really hard to do so. It begs the question, "why?" Why is it so difficult for me to find a church that just seems to fit? Admittedly it could be that "I'm just too picky," but I don't honestly think that's it. So what then is the problem? Boiled down, I'm becoming increasingly more convinced that it's a problem of vanity and it's conflict with true virtue. Vanity, Vanity... ... and we're great at preaching it. Has it ever occurred to anyone the senseless nature of preaching that focuses on a problem of humanity in a moral context to which those who are His (by the Holy Spirit) are usually already aware? We preach against sin with such a drive - which isn't bad in itself - but we do so in a manner that is completely incomplete. What do I mean incomplete? So many of the sermons I hear - even in the so called "conservative" churches are so man centered and full of vanity its a wonder they grow at all. Here's an example. Last week myself and three other Texan "Theo-Refugees" went to a "conservative" church (that will remain nameless) and watched a man preach what I will call one of the most vain and man-centered sermons I have ever seen. It was loosely based on the an assortment of Scripture, and it's main intent was to get us to "declare our independence from sin and from bad behavior." Again and again throughout the service, the emphasis was on what we needed to do to be free from problems and how we could achieve all we could have in freedom from these things; (in a corporate-model, goal-oriented fashion I might add.) Ick. Where to start... I was so grieved by the end of this tragedy that I could barely speak. So we're to declare independence from sin and that's it? Find what's wrong and make a self-centered, driven, committed effort to change it? Oh Help us Please Lord. During the service a line kept going through my head, "The virtues of Christ are enough!!!" I don't want to stand up in my pew in all my arrogance and say "I CAN!" in unison with equally devastated people. That's not what cleanses me, restores me, or encourages me. If ever there were a more antithetical sentiment to the Gospel express from the pulpit I dunno what it is! And it's rampant - from church to church to church you can go and hear the same thing: "be good, be moral, God will help you but it's up to you to make yourself into what you need to be." Oh what death is this! Effectively this serves as a divorce from God in a pursuit of righteousness - and it makes such a pursuit our own. It doesn't matter how many "by Grace's" or "Through Faith's" you throw into the declaration. The vocabulary matters very little at all when the result is simply telling people to stand up, do it better, try harder, commit more, you can do it, etc... All that does is prop us up on our own and further harden our resolve to fix ourselves. It leads to legalism, self reliance, pride and ultimately death. Moral, righteous, "Godly" acts are of absolutely NO value when pitted against the unsearchable righteousness, untainted Glory, incomparable worth, and unmitigated joy of Christ. And Virtue? Consistently through Scripture we are afforded the idea of human decrease. And as a disclaimer, proof text fans, I will not be doing exegesis during this entry, so if it's not readily apparent that what I am about to say is 1000% biblical teaching, do the digging on your time. You'll have a lot of material, I promise. So where was I? Ah, human decrease... We by nature seem to mess things up. So the skeptic would say to me "then you think we should preach softly?" By no means, but we should preach completely. The call isn't to stiffen your upper lip and forge ahead in your "independence." It's to fall on the floor and admit you can't. It's to die to one's self, to look upon Our beautiful Jesus and be so compelled by His beauty, by His righteousness, by His incomparable value to sell all we own so that we may have Him as treasure. Human virtue is an oxymoron - to to pursue it would be by definition striving after wind- vanity. Some will say this is placating to emotions. To those I would challenge to show me a man who passionately pursues joy in Christ who makes a bad husband. Where is the woman who has dipped her hand in the sweet fountain of living water who settles for meager drinks of sex and selfishness? Where is the teen that would rather submit to popular culture than proclaim the life-bringing Gospel of Grace and Beauty with every fiber of his being? I submit that such people do not exist. They do not exist because any that would haven't tasted the richest of fair. I get tired of saying it, but not so tired that I will cease; We were not "saved" to be moral. We were justified to enjoy Jesus and resonate His Glory. We are not called to forge ahead in our own self-determined independence, but to depend, to hide, and to be transformed by Him. It is arrogance alone that would differ from this assertion. It is understandable that some fear a lazy church - backsliding, morally empty and culturally dictated. Is not the Church Christ's Bride? Were we not secured for Him by Him? Are His virtues not efficient in washing us in the water of His Word? Perhaps He needs us? Arrogance - and leading to frustration, grinding, and death. A hard heart can still do miracles but they still end in Hell. Oh for churches that preach completely! To the objectors who think that morality should be our chief concern and that such talk from me or anyone else from the pulpit would leave us morally bankrupt and un-glorifying to God, on top of what I have already said to you, I leave you with this: Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. Now if the ministry of death, carved in letters on stone, came with such glory that the Israelites could not gaze at Moses' face because of its glory, which was being brought to an end, will not the ministry of the Spirit have even more glory? For if there was glory in the ministry of condemnation, the ministry of righteousness must far exceed it in glory. Indeed, in this case, what once had glory has come to have no glory at all, because of the glory that surpasses it. For if what was being brought to an end came with glory, much more will what is permanent have glory. Since we have such a hope, we are very bold, not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face so that the Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end. But their minds were hardened. For to this day, when they read the old covenant, that same veil remains unlifted, because only through Christ is it taken away. Yes, to this day whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts. But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.
~2. Corinthians 3:4-18

The Postmodern Pied Piper

The tune plays on, and on we whip and whirl down a road that leads to a place both "strange and new." On and on we go till we're hidden away like the rest behind the door of irrelevancy. Some laud it, some cheer it, others quietly accept it and others couldn't be bothered to notice it. We should - Christians should. I like a quote I heard once from ( I believe) a Dr. Thomas R. Schriener, though I confess the specific source escapes me at the moment. While probably misquoting him (which I hate doing) the general message was:
One cannot be postmodern and be Christian, you may very well be "postmodern" and hold to some confession of belief, but it cannot be a Christian confession.
And he's absolutely right. But convince the average mid-size (or larger) contemporary church of that. When I was doing my undergrad - Christian Ministry - we were encouraged to look to the culture to determine how best to form our approach to scripture, how to determine relevant truth, and base our scriptural conclusions on how the culture we're in is viewing things at the time. Now, before you agree... Did you hear that? Did you hear that? Instead of starting with the Bible, instead of starting at the sound doctrine of 2000 years of the objective view of truth and scripture - I should look to culture FIRST when determining "what is relevant truth" to a people! Now I'm not referring to exporting our American version of Christianity, I'm talking about what helps someone determine what is truth - and there are apparently many "scholarly" people out there bent on redefining what the ultimate source of truth is. That teaching is, and those that prescribe it are 'anaqema' - for those lest Greek inclined, it's accursed, damned, submitted to God for judgment. Anathema. Ouch! How can you say that Bob? We're not supposed to judge! " I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ, for a different gospel; which is really not another; only there are some who are disturbing you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed! " -Galatians 1:6-9 Want Islam and Christianity to worship the same god? Sure! Want God to be no more knowledgeable, no more able than you? Okay! Want Salvation to be 50% willpower and 50% grace? Sure *cough - Pelagian - cough* Okay, enough dramatics. Church, ecclesia - You who have been called from darkness and transferred into light - you know well who you are. If you live in North America, this fight is certainly before you. The time for falling back on anecdotes and "nice and churchy" colloquialisms is over. I am ashamed there ever was a time that they were tolerated. I'm not a defeatist, and I am certainly no optimist either. I don't think we've got a mandate biblically to be either. What I do know - is that there are churches and seminaries, bible schools and bible studies, purpose books and prosperity preachers all more interested in topical, milky, exhortation light messages intent on having you continue to trot to the tune of the postmodern pied piper. "Don't confront! Don't upset! Don't rebuke and Don't you fret! Teach away your happy tales and leave alone the Word that impales!" The Gospel - the real one - is sharp. It rends, and cuts, and cleaves the people of God from the rest of the world. It is divisive, it is afflicting, and it's not meant to merely make us comfortable. The fact that the "church" largely seeks to find what is relevant from culture is a testament to the grim reality that indeed the tickling of the ear is more important that the piercing of the heart to many. So where is this going? I cannot really tell you, except that I pray earnestly that your heart is burdened for the Bride of Christ. We dine so often in this culture on a perceived "spiritual buffet." Some have actually spun that like it was good - a precarious tune to hear indeed. There's another word for it, if you ask me. Idolatry. May You cause our hearts to dwell richly in Your word. May You make us stay, and fight, and fight to be renewed by it!. Christ rend our hearts and expose the soft and painful parts. Pierce our minds and cleave away our thought that anything else than you can satisfy. Make us walk in a might that does not wait to be asked but that attacks things we know to be deception and vice. Align us to Your will, and as always make the Glory of Your Name be the obsession that moves us to really live! Give us fists to fight, and make us love Your word so that we've weapons forged for that very purpose. -For Your Glory, May it be so.

When the Grass Really Is Greener

Well, it has indeed been awhile, and much has transpired since my last report on this particular blog. I got accepted to Southern, and am now living in Louisville! And in brief, the grass really is greener up here. Of course I don't just mean that literally, as the grass can get quite brown in Texas this time of year, but as an analogy of life-change.

Lots of changes and lots of un-learning are to come. Expect more blogs to come!

Lord, Help Me Believe!

Now for some honesty. I am in the application process for entering The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary - and it's not an easy season for me. When I attended Hardin-Simmons for my undergrad, I had such high hopes for growing in theological education in general. Now if you didn't know, my opinion (shared by a larger community) is that HSU's Logsdon School of Theology is a very "freely academic" institution. The other word I would use less carefully is "liberal." In my time at HSU I had to battle Pelagianism, Humanism, Open-Theism, Relativism and Universalism (to name a few) submitted by Theology professors as acceptable belief and practice. It was frustrating, wasteful, woeful, and heartbreaking just about every day. By the way, to those who might come across this blog and beg to differ about those viewpoints with me, let me save you the energy of debate with a simple word on my perspective: No. To my shame, I honestly let it get to me. The first semester in wasn't so bad, but with each successive semester I became increasingly disgruntled and shortsighted. I argued with professors on previously universally accepted tenets of orthodoxy and biblical merit (like the foreknowledge of God) often. Classes were devoid of joy and edification, unless it was a negative reaction from the garbage that was being thrown out. To be fair, there were gems in that hard landscape - some things that I got out of that all that made it tolerable - but on the whole it was a very difficult place to want to grow in ministry. To compound this, I started having rather pervasive health issues - migraines, severe allergies, and all the associated complications. Throw in a absurdly trying relationship -that the Lord orchestrated - and you have a mixture for calamity when it comes to one's "Academic Performance." My grades dropped, I was exhausted constantly, and I was held over the precipice for what seemed like ages. It was the darkest, hardest, loneliest, most eroding best thing in my life. It was horrible, but it I can't honestly I could trade it for an easier path. came to adore scripture, rest in God's grace and ultimate control - and I learned to plead for Him. You know (or maybe not) those late nights where you just pound your fist against the floor and can't even fashion words more than "mercy... Oh please have mercy." There were a lot of nights like that. There's a line in the song "Table for Two" that says "... And You know the plans that you have for me; And You can't plan the ends and not plan the means." Another theological way of saying it is, "The heavy door swings on small hinges." For Job, it means "Naked I came from my mother's womb, And naked I shall return there. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away. Blessed be the name of the LORD." For a psalmist it meant "Not to us, O LORD, not to us, But to Your name give glory Because of Your lovingkindness, because of Your truth. Why should the nations say, 'Where, now, is their God?' But our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases. " On and on it goes. For me it goes like this too. Sometimes brutal, sometimes gossamer; sometimes with dancing, sometimes with sobbing; always beautiful. Here's the honest part. I am once again confronted with the reality of present circumstances. Here I am, with a decidedly spotty academic record, waiting to be accepted into what can only be characterized as my dream school. It feels so right, so rich and promising. There is much that seems on the line, my relationship of 2 years, my heart, my further education, my career possibilities, many of my close friendships - the list is intimidating. It's hard to trust, make no mistake... It's very hard to believe when you've got a brain like mine that loves little details and is not given over easily to floating optimism. This quirk normally keeps me grounded, humble - but of late it's kept me kind of anxious. If I don't get in to Southern, it's fundamentally back to square one with much of my life. Relationship, future, place, friends, congregation, and home - a pretty "all in" bet if you're playing Texas Hold'Em. When my head pleads with my heart, "You know you live in the Father's House, trust!" and my heart shudders with wanderings like, "What if?" and "What about?" I have to go back to pleading, "I don't deserve it, I can't earn it, I can't control it, please... please do Your will and help me Love it." I am not often scared, but I think it's safe to say I am now. The other part of that is that my Theology would cover it, wouldn't it? Some of the more antagonistic would certainly use that as a weapon to attack. What can I say, understanding and practice are not often equally yoked. So in all of this, my confession of late has been pretty simple. I need grace to either believe He's have me at Southern, or I need the grace to trust Him in the event that 90% of my life's familiarities change right in front of me. Either way grace is what I desperately need, and either way I find myself in the same position as the father in Mark 9:22, who said to Jesus about his tormented son; "But if You can do anything, take pity on us and help us!" The response is great. "And Jesus said to him, " 'If You can?' All things are possible to him who believes." Immediately the boy's father cried out and said, "I do believe; help my unbelief." I do believe Lord, Help my unbelief. That's pretty much it.

Fine Words From a Friend

I'm not normally one to plug bands and whatnot, but after borrowing my girlfriend's copy of "I See Things Upside Down" by Derek Webb - I've gotta pass some of it along. Those that know me are aware of some of my criticism of North American popular "Evangelicalism." So when a talented guy like Derek Webb comes along and expresses the same sentiment in a way I wouldn't be able to, it feels quite nice. So, since I am short on time, and the words are good - here's a little bit of lyrics from a song entitled "Ballad in Plain Red" from our friend Derek Webb.
ballad in plain red(words and music by derek webb)
i’m robbing peter, i’m paying paul \ i’m changing my name back to sau \ i got to them and you know i’ll get to you... i’m turning shepherds into sheepand \ leaders into celebrities \ it’s holy sabotage, just look around you...
chorus
‘cause everything’s for sale in the 21st century \ and the check is in the mail from the 21st century
don’t want the song i want a jingle \ i love you Lord but don’t hear a single \ and the truth is nearly impossible to rhyme... but i know the songs with all the hooks \ and i know some lies that will sell some books \ so grab ‘em fast, i’m running outta time... just keep selling truth in candy bars \ on billboards and backs of cars \ truth without context, my favorite of all my crimes...
chorus
bridge what works verses what's right / hey what's the difference tonight?
take out the sign, forget the meal \ we’ve got a gym and a farris wheel \ i swear it's just like the country club down the block... ‘cause you can make your life look good \ you can do what Jesus would \ but you’d be surprised what you can do with a hard heart...
chorustag
i think you’ve got trouble in the 21st century / so welcome to the struggle, it’s the 21st century / i never thought i’d make it to the 21st century / Lord, i love the 21st century
i write these words from the grave \ ‘cause it’s the only place that i’m safe \ and only the dead are permitted to speak the truth...
(Speaks for itself, doesn't it?)