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They’ll Know We Are Christians by Our Love: Some Thoughts on the GCR

2010-03-11T18:00:16Z

In the summer of 2008, B&H Academic published an excellent book by David Dockery titled Southern Baptist Consensus and Renewal: A Biblical, Historical, and Theological Proposal. There is much to commend about this book, but one thing I especially appreciate is how Dockery demonstrates that conservative Southern Baptists are not monolithic. This is an idea that Dockery has advanced for years in a variety of forums, and one I’ve emphasized in my own teaching, conference speaking, and writing. We are quite diverse, which in a democratic denomination is to be expected, though it often leads to tensions in our efforts to cooperate with one other.

Dockery argues that there are at least seven different subgroups among conservative Southern Baptists, with both internal variety within those subgroups and periodic overlap between subgroups. I have reproduced his list below from page 11 of Southern Baptist Consensus and Renewal:

Fundamentalists
Revivalists
Traditionalists
Orthodox Evangelicals
Calvinists
Contemporary church practitioners
Culture Warriors

I think Dockery does a fine job of pointing out some of the key stakeholders in the SBC. The point he was trying to make with his list is this: if the SBC is to have a viable future, each of these groups must commit to a basic theological consensus around which they can all cooperate for the sake of renewal, despite honest differences in many secondary and tertiary matters. The remainder of Southern Baptist Consensus and Renewal is devoted to suggesting a consensus that would, Lord willing, result in renewal. I highly recommend you read the book.

I deeply resonate with Dockery’s vision for the future of the SBC. In many ways, it complements the vision articulated by Great Commission Resurgence advocates over the past three years (at least this GCR advocate). But I confess I’m afraid that this vision is imperiled right now because some SBC conservatives aren’t getting along very well with each other. Some don’t seem to want consensus.

The debate over the GCR, especially the Task Force’s interim report, has magnified some of the differences among various conservatives. In particular, there is considerable tension between those who primarily identify with the state conventions (a subgroup I would add to Dockery’s list) and those who identify more with the “national” SBC. Some remarkably mean things have been said by those on both side. Much of the invective has been spewed in private forums and through personal communication (which, naturally, almost never remains private). Others have made public accusations about their fellow Southern Baptists in blogs or even traditional media like Baptist Press.

Social media like Twitter and Facebook sometimes exacerbate the tensions. I have read some pretty nasty comments—by folks on both sides—over the past few weeks. This is not counting the rude (and often sophomoric) comments by those wannabe prophets who take the “a pox on both your houses” approach to the whole debate. I cannot help but think that there are some Southern Baptists, including some relatively well-known ones, who will one day grow up a bit and regret the foolish things they’ve said on Twitter and/or Facebook.

We have some real differences of opinions, to be sure. There are some folks out there who want us to do very little besides urban church planting. There are also some who think we don’t need to streamline much of anything, and perhaps add even more layers of bureaucracy. There are some who almost exclusively talk about engaging unreached people groups, and others who question the entire strategy of focusing on unreached people groups. There are some who fear the Task Force is really a political movement that is mostly concerned with getting some of their own members in the vacant agency presidencies. Others complain that state convention leaders only care about perpetuating the present status quo at all costs. There are some Southern Baptists who clearly don’t care a great deal for the Cooperative Program, others who come close to arguing the CP = cooperation, and others who aren’t sure what they think about it. This is just scratching the surface of some of the opinions I’ve heard with my own ears or read with my own eyes.

I think every Southern Baptist who cares strongly one way or other about the Great Commission Resurgence needs to step back and take a deep breath. Despite our differing opinions, we are all on the same team. We all care about the health of our denomination. We all care about reaching the lost, both here and abroad. We all care about defending and commending sound doctrine, including traditional Baptist distinctives. We all want Southern Baptists to be characterized by thousands upon thousands of healthy local churches that are marked by gospel faithfulness and gospel urgency. We all say we love the Lord Jesus Christ above all things and we all claim a desire to follow his lordship in all things. So why do we sound so much like the world as we debate the relative merits and pitfalls of the GCR?

I can’t remember where I first read it, but I’ve seen some bloggers argue that we will not have a Great Commission Resurgence without a Great Commandment Resurgence. Ronnie Floyd said something very similar in the Task Force’s interim report. No matter what you may think about the relative merits of the interim report’s suggestions, surely we can all agree that we need to do a better job of cultivating Christian love among the brethren in the midst of denominational debate.

Southern Baptists must stop questioning each other’s motives and assuming the worst about those with whom we differ. We must stop painting the “other side” in a bad light, be it through intemperate language or through faulty assumptions. We must stop trying to score points with “our side” by dropping snarky sound bites that elicit “amens” and “attaboys” from those who already agree with us. We must honor God in our words and actions, even as we carry on a real debate about important issues that affect the future health of our denomination.

There’s an old hymn that says “they’ll know we are Christians by our love.” What do our words and deeds communicate about our love for one another and our love for Christ? I think this is a crucial question at this time in SBC history. It is my hope and prayer that every engaged Southern Baptist, whether they are for the GCR or against it, will guard their tongues and check their actions in the coming months before Orlando. Southern Baptists are a family, and we must love one another in the midst of this important family discussion. To do anything less would bring shame upon the name of Christ, regardless of who “wins” the Great GCR Debate of 2010.

Beth Moore's Dangerous Bible Twisting

2010-03-10T21:23:58Z

I recently reviewed two segments of Beth Moore's "Bible teaching" on my radio program and I must admit I was bowled over by just how bad and dangerous her teaching really is. I know she's popular but this woman is NOT rightly handling God's word. Instead, she is twisting the scriptures to her own destruction and the destruction of her hearers.

Take a listen for yourself. Not only is this bad, its downright dangerous false teaching!

Click on the Menu button on the player above and you can embed this radio segment on your blog or website.

Rick Warren's Gospel Train Wreck

2010-03-09T21:15:00Z

• What Does Someone Who is Mature in Christ Look Like?
• Rick Warren's Gospel Train Wreck
• Sermon Review, "Experience: Julian of Norwich" by Scott Hodge, The Orchard, Aurora, IL

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Jim Elliff Interviewed About House Churches

2010-03-10T12:00:00Z

Click here for an interview on house churches Todd Friel (of Wretched Radio) did with Jim Elliff.

FYI: Since this interview, Jim has come to see that there were churches in buildings prior to Constantine, at least in the mid 200's.

www.CCWtoday.org

D. A. Carson on the Scandal of Easter

2010-03-10T07:30:47Z

(Author: Tyler Kenney)

D. A. Carson's new book Scandalous just arrived in our mailbox from Crossway. As you can see in the image above, the title is written in woodgrain letters spattered with blood, illustrating the scandal (and the subtitle): The Cross and Resurrection of Jesus.

This relatively little book has five chapters, each one eyeing the scandal through a particular passage of Scripture:

The Ironies of the Cross: Matthew 27:27-51a
The Center of the Whole Bible: Romans 3:21-26
The Strange Triumph of a Slaughtered Lamb: Revelation 12
A Miracle Full of Surprises: John 11:1-53
Doubting the Resurrection of Jesus: John 20:24-31

If you're looking for some reading to help prepare your heart and mind for Good Friday and Resurrection Sunday next month, this looks like a great choice.

Check out Crossway's Scandalous page for more, such as browsing the entire book online or downloading a sample.

How Roasting Coffee Helped Me Understand Technology and Theology

2010-03-10T11:15:09Z

Adventures in Coffee Roasting

Five or six years ago, I was a textbook Mountain-Dew-fueled web developer who didn’t really like coffee. But coffee was quickly turning into a social standard, and I realized needed to start developing a tolerance. So I drove over to Starbucks and ordered up a cup of regular coffee. Sadly, it tasted like burnt turtles.

I was disappointed, but I knew if I didn’t overcome this I would miss out on all the coolness that happens when people “get coffee.” So I kept trying coffees and eventually found something that I liked. Then I bought a small coffee maker and started making it at home. One day, a coffee snob friend told me that coffee tasted better when it is freshly ground. So I bought a grinder and some fresh whole beans, and gave that a whirl. It definitely tasted better, though maybe not quite as much better as he told me.

Then I heard about something really special. Not only can you grind beans at your house, you can roast them. Another friend said if I bought a popcorn popper from eBay and got some beans from a place like www.sweetmarias.com, I could have coffee as it was meant to be experienced – freshly roasted.

If you want to know how it works, below is a silly video I made a few years ago (with Window Movie Maker, yikes!).

Borgmann’s Device Paradigm

Before we get back to the coffee, I want to tell you about an idea called the “Device Paradigm” coined by philosopher Albert Borgmann. In his 1987 book, Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life, Borgmann observed a shift that happens in society as our tools and technology get smaller and smaller.

As technological development progresses, we take basic life processes like getting food, making heat, and communicating, and we compress those processes down into what Borgmann calls a “device.” A device is a technology that makes the end result of a process available at the press of a button. For example, the process of gathering wood, starting a fire, and tending to it is compressed down into a box which makes heat come out whenever we need it. The process of killing and skinning an animal, planting and harvesting vegetables, preparing and cooking a meal is compressed into a drive through window. The process of going to a concert is compressed into an iPod, and so on.

This is all great except that a sneaky thing begins to happen as devices get smaller and more complex - we can no longer see the processes they perform. Over time, since the processes are hidden from us we stop valuing those processes. Eventually, our values shift to where we only appreciate the end result, and we almost shudder at the thought of going back to the process.

Borgmann argues that to experience the fullness of life we sometimes need to restore what he calls “focal things and practices” – those things that take time and work, but offer a richness not available from a device. For him, the process itself gives meaning and significance to the consummation.

From iPods to Concerts

Creating the perfect playlist on an iPod is fun, but earbuds cannot compare to being at a concert with its unpredictability and spontaneity. Communion at a high church with its preparation and waiting feels more important than the prepacked variety at many efficient evangelical churches. Mom’s apple pie is good not just because of the pie itself, but because of the person from whom it comes.

In relationships, God designed the most intimate human physical encounter to come through a process of courtship, commitment, care, and finally consummation. Marital consummation is wonderful not only because of the encounter itself, but also because of the journey to get there. When this encounter is made available at the click of a mouse, it becomes inhuman and destructive.

Coffee as a Device

When I hear the word “coffee,” I usually picture a mug with black liquid in it like the image above. I don’t picture the orchard of coffee plants, the pickers in the field, the machines that process plants, or the roasting process. In other words, when I think of “coffee,” I only consider the end result (a cup of coffee).

Moving backward from the cup to brewing, then back to grinding, and back to roasting restores some of the processes that technological society and modern devices hide. Now, it would be terribly convenient if I could tell you that the home roasted coffee in the video above tastes like the nectar of the gods compared to what you’re drinking. But truthfully, while it’s really good coffee, it’s not that good.

Yet there is something special about roasting coffee that goes beyond the taste. After roasting the beans, letting them cool, grinding them, and brewing the coffee, the consummation event – actually tasting the coffee – is somehow given significance by the process. The coffee itself (the ends) might not be that much better, but the experience of drinking it is heightened by the work leading up to it (the process).

Redemption as Process

Probably every Christian has wondered why Jesus hasn’t yet returned to fix everythin – Why is he so slow, we wonder (2 Peter 3:9)? Theologians ponder why God would allow the Fall to happen in the first place – Why not just create us as we will be in the new heavens and new earth, free from sin and stupidity?

Perhaps the answer is that for God, the process of creation, fall, redemption, and restoration is as significant as the end itself. Of all beings, God himself could certainly have the push-button like experience of instantaneously taking us to the eschaton. But it appears that moving through time and space and doing work of the process of redemption is itself valuable to God. The final union of Christ and his bride is made significant because of the work Christ did leading up to the consummation of all things.

Little things like moving from buying coffee to grinding it and from grinding it to roasting it are small ways of restoring processes that can both offer intangible benefits and remind us of the journey on which God is taking us. Coffee is of course just an example, you’ll have to find your own places where you can treasure the process as much or more than the ends. If you’ve got an idea, I’d love to hear it.

Picking Fruit Off of a Tree by Deepak Reju

2010-03-10T14:49:45Z

One of the ideas I've learned on our staff is to be strategic about the men I disciple and invest in. One of our staff pastors has often talked about being deliberate in investing in low-hanging fruit---men who show a lot of potential, who demonstrate a teachable heart and desire to grow, and with a little investment will themselves be able to invest in others. These low-hanging fruit quickly become disciple-making disciples!

The nature of pastoral ministry is that you get all types of requests for help---bad marriages needing attention, wives struggling with depression, young men and women sorting through who to marry and what to do with their life, physical sickness and hospitalizations, etc. Pastors tend to spend most of their time investing in high-hanging fruit--those situations which take a lot of time, energy, prayer, love, and investment, and often reap very little fruit. Without trying, you'll get plenty of these situations come across your door.

Don't get me wrong---to be a pastor is to be a shepherd. A fundamental part of your job is to care for the sheep, both through their good and bad days. Yet, what often happens is that a pastor's schedule can get over-run with high-hanging fruit, and we rarely take the time to deliberately invest in the low-hanging fruit. We spend our days investing in that which reaps very little harvest, without spending any time picking the low-hanging fruit.

So, here's my question for pastors: How deliberate are you at investing in the low-hanging fruit?

Are there men in your congregation who are FAT (faithful, available, teachable) and with a little investment might also be reaping greater fruit for the kingdom? Are you strategically investing in men who might one day become elders and one day come alongside you to shepherd the flock? Look at your schedule and consider if you are always reacting defensively to the problems that arise in your church, or are you deliberately scheduling time with the members who seem to be low-hanging fruit?

Both parts of necessary for pastor ministry, and yet one (high-hanging fruit) tends to get much more attention in our schedule compared to the other (low-hanging fruit).

Funeral Flap: Justices Weigh Religion, Speech Rights

2010-03-08T19:59:56Z

The Supreme Court agreed Monday to delve into the sensitive question of whether the First Amendment protects anti-gay protesters carrying placards outside military funerals, bearing “America is Doomed,” “Thank God for 9/11″ and other volatile slogans, like “Thank God for dead soldiers.”

The messages and picketing are part of a Kansas church’s belief that the United States’ tolerance for homosexuality is cause for soldiers’ deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The case the justices decided to review Monday tests the boundaries of free speech versus freedom of religion — doctrines both embodied in the First Amendment.

Without comment, the justices agreed to review last year’s federal appellate decision that overturned a $5 million verdict (.pdf) in favor of a Baltimore man who sued the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka and its pastor, Fred Phelps, in 2006. The father of Marine Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder was awarded damages for, among other things, invasion of privacy and emotional distress for the events that occurred outside his son’s funeral at a Catholic church in Maryland.

“Whether the freedom of religion and assembly is subordinate to the freedom of speech is an important question because by necessary implication, one of the tenets of the First Amendment is undermined,” (.pdf) lawyers for the soldier’s father, Albert Snyder, told the high court in a filing.

His lawyers told the justices that the presence of Phelps and a handful of others “created a negative and circus-like atmosphere during a solemn and religious occasion” and “added insult to injury during a time of grief and mourning.” The protesters also displayed a banner depicting two men engaging in anal sex.

Lawyers for Phelps, however, urged the court to stay out of the case, saying the deaths of U.S. soldiers are a matter of public concern and debate.

“How these soldiers are living and dying is a topic of substantial public interest and dialogue, at least nationwide, probably worldwide. The prevailing view is that the soldiers are heroes, and that God is obligated to bless America,” (.pdf) Phelps’ lawyers wrote. “Those views clash with the Bible, in respondents’ sincerely held religious opinion, and when these funerals are used to express those viewpoints, respondents feel duty-bound to provide a countervailing message, to wit, if you want God’s blessings, you have to obey him, and if you want the soldiers to stop dying, you have to stop sinning in this nation.”

Photo: The Rev. Fred Phelps prepares to protest outside the Kansas Statehouse in Topeka in 2006./Associated Press

The Message of the Resurging Calvinism

2010-03-08T18:00:00Z

I recently had the privilege of guest lecturing at the University of Texas on the topic of the Resurgence of Mission & Reformed Theology in America. Eileen Delao-Flynn, Professor and Religion writer for the Austin American-Statesman, was kind enough to extend me the invitation to address her Journalism & Religion class. The entire lecture would be too long to reproduce here. However, I have included a section on “Resurging Calvinism” below.

The "New Calvinism"

In an article entitled “10 Ideas Changing the World Right Now,” TIME magazine numbered the "New Calvinism" as the third most influential idea changing the world in 2009. In an effort to explain this "New Calvinism," New Calvinists are laboring to shake off a fundamentalist, religious image and articulate the old gospel in fresh, biblically faithful ways. They are making five important distinctions:

1. Gospel/Religion:

New Calvinists point out that the Gospel is not Religion. This came as a surprise to some of the students. Religion says, “You must impress God,” but the gospel says, “Jesus impressed God for you.” Religion says, “Perfect yourself and God will be happy.” The gospel says, "We are all imperfect people, but Christians cling to a perfect Christ who obtains the pleasure of God for them." The gospel is good news, but religion is burdensome news. Religion tells us to perform for God, but the gospel reminds us that Jesus has performed perfectly on our behalf. The Gospel is not Religion.

2. Us/Them:

The Gospel makes a distinction between arrogant separatism and humble evangelism. It doesn't exaggerate an Us/Them mentality. New Calvinism doesn't evangelize out of superiority but empathy. We recognize that we all need Jesus before the judgment of a holy God. The only difference between true Christians and non-Christians is that Christians are recipients of God’s grace in Christ. But we all are equally in need of that grace. There's not one person in this world who needs God's saving grace more than anyone else. The New Calvinism does not pit the human race against one another—Us versus Them—but views all humanity in light of our standing with God.

3. Big/Small:

New Calvinism is recovering a gospel that is bigger than "fire insurance" from hell. It is articulating the gospel as “good news” for the whole world—society, culture, people, and the environment. The gospel is not an LCD, a lowest common denominator of the bare minimum facts you have to believe to get into heaven. Rather, it is a TOE, a theory of everything that addresses God’s purpose for humanity, society, culture, cities, environment, justice, and the future. It possesses an explanatory power that addresses everything from human motivation to environmental concerns. New Calvinists are embracing all goodness, truth, and beauty as God’s truth, goodness, and beauty, and redemptively engaging those things that are false, ugly, and evil. The gospel is much bigger than people think, but it is not smaller than personal redemption.

4. Conservative/Liberal:

New Calvinists are distancing the gospel from politics. They are not preaching a political gospel, though the gospel does have political implications. In short, Jesus is not a Republican or a Democrat.

5. Urban/Suburban:

New Calvinists are returning to the city, to engage the beauty and brokenness of urban life. They are recovering a commitment to justice and mercy in the city, returning to cities from the white suburban flight.

Where Do These Distinctions Come From?

These distinctions are the direct result of a high view of the sovereignty of God—his reign over all of life, not just in so-called religious matters. These distinctions flow from a big gospel that can be articulated as the good news that Jesus has defeated sin, death, and evil through his own death and resurrection and is making all things new for those who hope in him. The dying-rising-from-the-dead Messiah alone has the power to break the back of evil, redeem sin, and exchange life for death. It is the gospel that awakens us to this marvelous news.

Continuity from the Old to the New Calvinism

Much more could be said regarding this resurgence. One student asked what remains the same between the "Old Calvinism" and the "New Calvinism." There is much more continuity between the New Calvinism and John Calvin than with some of his followers. However, what essentially remains the same is the soteriological core—God's sovereign grace in redeeming broken sinners, which has been popularly captured by the TULIP acronym: total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, and perseverance of the saints (limited atonement appears to be more negotiable among the New Calvinists). This understanding of God’s sovereignty over salvation extends into a life lived under his sovereignty post-salvation.

The TULIP is flowering more vibrantly than it has for some time in the U.S. The Reformed resurgence has led to a missional resurgence that is set on holding the formerly "liberal" and "conservative" agendas together with the gospel, promoting robust engagement of social, cultural, and spiritual spheres of life. In this regard, the New Calvinism has more in common with the Calvinism of Abraham Kuyper, who argued that Calvinism is not merely a soteriological system, but an entire life- and worldview. The New Calvinism is broader than some of its narrower conceptions. All in all, I believe this resurgence is a very positive resurgence, a winsome Calvinism for the 21st century that advocates a whole gospel for the whole person and country.

Re:Sound

The musical arm of the Resurgence offers music that is theologically unified, stylistically diverse, and musically excellent. Find out more.

Our Best Is Yet To Be

2010-03-08T15:52:14Z

: Dr. Johnny Hunt
SBC President, Senior Pastor of First Baptist Church Woodstock

As President of the Southern Baptist Convention, I must confess I have never been more excited about our future as a family. The needs that we see arising is a constant reminder that none of us can do alone what we are called to do as a community. I believe as each individual state and local association begin to share their personal needs, it will help all of us to realize that we must once again embrace the true meaning of sacrifice. I am only one pastor, but I must not shrink from my personal responsibility to lead the people that I influence to engage in an Acts 1:8 strategy.

Some of our state conventions will seem at an overwhelming loss, especially as it pertains to the cooperative agreements. However, as we address these issues together, especially as it pertains to our pioneer states, I believe the cry will be heard, maybe more clearly and louder than ever, for Southern Baptists to rise and meet the greatest challenges ever. I believe we are positioning the Southern Baptist Convention, as it pertains to funding, in such a way that will create greater generosity.

We have known great days in our Southern Baptist Convention, but it is more than just mere words when I say, “our best is yet to be.” It has been said, “God rarely requires what is easily released.” I feel Southern Baptists have been in somewhat of a comfort zone. Now many are listening and watching to see just how serious we are about the unreached, unengaged, and the under-served of this nation and the nations of the world. I pledge with all of the loyalty of my heart to challenge every pastor that will listen to do their best in supporting our Cooperative Program, believing that it will cause the entire convention to rise, even in this economy, to give their greatest gifts ever. All of us must do more, and as we do, we will have greater resources to pierce the darkness for the express purpose that God may be glorified, His kingdom may be enlarged, and the church will be edified.

God help this to become a reality for it is more than just words. It is a voiced prayer in Jesus name. Please pray with us that God give us wisdom from heaven as we work together as a family to embrace the Great Commission in a way that God will be glorified.

God Bless,
Pastor Johnny

What Does Luck Have to Do With It?

2010-03-08T15:17:00Z

by Jim Elliff

Joni Eareckson Tada is one of the most gracious and effective Christians in the world. She has lived with the results of a diving accident that broke her neck during her teen years. In her 50's she continues to radiate Christ to a listening world. Joni is known by thousands of Christians, perhaps millions, through her books, radio program, and conference speaking.

Once my brother asked Joni how she made it through the difficult battle with her paraplegia. I later heard her give the same answer in a large conference in Orlando. Her reply will surprise you. "I suppose what helped me get through this more than any other thing" she said, "was reading Loraine Beottner's Reformed Doctrine of Predestination."

Now that caught you off guard, didn't it?

What she was saying was that she came to understand through this book that God is in control. And if God is in control then her accident wasn't just a fluke, but a purposeful arrangement by a loving God. She could trust a God like that. That accident cost her freedom and brought chronic suffering. But to Joni, that diving accident was a huge gift from God—a platform for speaking to the world about her favorite subject, Christ.

I know that it might seem insensitive to say that God is in control. But this is what the Bible teaches, like it or not. When we analyze national tragedy we sometimes recoil from the notion that God could be in control of His world. We seek to protect God from such an accusation. But the Scriptures don't do this.

The Bible teaches that all good things, as well as all tragic things, come from God. (See Lam. 3: 37-38) They usually come via secondary sources, that is, they are delivered on your doorstep by other people or through the convergence of events and complex connections. Without being a tempter or evil (James 1:13), God determines all things, while still leaving men responsible for their actions.

Complicated? Sure. But true nonetheless.

A clear illustration of this can be seen in the death of Christ. Is the death of Christ a good thing? Of course. Did God just "hope" that everything would work out to accomplish the greatest event of the universe? Did God feel lucky that it all worked out as He projected?

The early Christians did not think it was luck that brought about Jesus' redemptive death. Here's the way they put it in a prayer meeting:

For truly against Your holy Servant Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, were gathered together to do whatever Your hand and Your purpose determined before to be done. (Acts 4:27-28)

We can think of all events, tragic or good, under two categories. They are either for the punishment or for the benefit of the person, but they're all in the end for the glory of God.

Now think carefully. First, realize that everything that happens to a non-believer is a tragedy. Even mercies from God, if sinned against, work out for the worse to the non-believer. Every apparently good thing coming to a person who will finally reject God, only serves to make his judgment more severe. (See Rom. 2: 4-6)

But for the child of God, life works out exactly the opposite. The Bible says, "All things work together for the good of those who love God, the called according to His purpose." (Rom. 8:28).

So, when a difficult thing comes into the life of a believer, as in Joni's swimming accident, then the end result is good. It is for a loving purpose. Even discipline from God toward true believers is for the good. And when sinful people are involved, we can say with Joseph, "You meant it for evil; but God meant it for good." (Gen. 50:20)

As one theologian said, "Tragedy is anything that happens to a non-believer." And we can add, "Good is anything that happens to a true Christian."

This can only be said because God is in control. And luck, well, it isn't even there.

Christian Communicators Worldwide, Inc.
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including author's name, title, complete content, copyright and weblink.
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On Reimagining the Gospel Afresh for Every Age

2010-03-06T07:40:00Z

Your weekly dose of Spurgeon
posted by Phil Johnson

The PyroManiacs devote some space each weekend to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive. The following excerpt is from an article titled "Progressive Theology" in the April 1888 issue of The Sword and the Trowel. Reading it, you might think Spurgeon was dealing with today's "New Perspectives" and assorted Emerging novelties. That simply reflects what we've been saying for the past five years: The controversies in the church today are not new; they are all basically reruns. And Spurgeon sometimes speaks more cogently to our age than all the leading evangelical pundits of today combined. We ought to pay better attention to what he said:

he idea of a progressive gospel seems to have fascinated many. To us that notion is a sort of cross-breed between nonsense and blasphemy. After the gospel has been found effectual in the eternal salvation of untold multitudes, it seems rather late in the day to alter it; and, since it is the revelation of the all-wise and unchanging God, it appears somewhat audacious to attempt its improvement. When we call up before our mind's eye the gentlemen who have set themselves this presumptuous task, we feel half inclined to laugh; the case is so much like the proposal of moles to improve the light of the sun. Their gigantic intellects are to hatch out the meanings of the Infinite! We think we see them brooding over hidden truths to which they lend the aid of their superior genius to accomplish their development!

Hitherto they have not hatched out much worth rearing. Their chickens are so much of the Roman breed, that we sometimes seriously suspect that, after all, Jesuitical craft may be at the bottom of this "modern thought." It is singular that, by the way of free-thought, men should be reaching the same end as others arrived at by the path of superstition. Salvation by works is one distinctive doctrine of the new gospel: in many forms this is avowed and gloried in—not, perhaps, in exact words, but in declarations quite unmistakable. The Galatian heresy is upon us with a vengeance: in the name of virtue and morality, justification by faith and salvation by free grace are bitterly assailed. Equally a child of darkness is this New Purgatory. It is taught that men can escape if they neglect the great salvation. No longer is the call, "Today, if ye will hear his voice"; for the tomorrow of the next state will answer quite as well. Of course, if men may be gradually upraised from sin and ruin in the world to come, common humanity would lead us to pray that the process may go on rapidly. We are hearing every now and again of "a night of prayers for the dead," among certain priests of the Establishment. Nor is it among Ritualists alone, or even mainly, for the other day, at a meeting for prayer, an eminent believer in this notion prayed heartily for the devil; and his prayer, upon the theory of the restitution of all the sinful, was most natural. Prayers for the dead and prayers for the devil! Shades of Knox and Latimer, where are ye? How easy will it be to go from prayers for the dead to payment to good men for special supplications on their behalf! Of course if a devout person will spend an hour in praying a deceased wife out of her miseries, a loving husband will not let him exercise his supplications for nothing. It would be very mean of him if he did. "Purgatory Pick-purse," as our Protestant forefathers called it, is upon us again, having entered by the back-door of infidel speculation instead of by the front entrance of pious opinion.

Nor is this all; for our "improvers" have pretty nearly obliterated the hope of such a heaven as we have all along expected. Of course, the reward of the righteous is to be of no longer continuance than the punishment of the wicked. Both are described as "everlasting" in the same verse, spoken by the same sacred lips; and as the "punishment" is made out to be only "age-lasting," so must the "life" be. Worse even than this, if worse can be, it is taught by some of these "improvers" that even the blessed of the Father are by no means blessed overmuch; for, according to the latest information, even they will have to undergo a sort of purgatorial purification in the world to come. There are degrees in the inventiveness of the nineteenth- century theologians; but, to our mind, it is the license given to this inventiveness, even when it is most moderate, which is the root of the whole mischief. What is to be taught next? And what next?

Do men really believe that there is a gospel for each century? Or a religion for each fifty years? Will there be in heaven saints saved according to a score sorts of gospel? Will these agree together to sing the same song? And what will the song be? Saved on different footings, and believing different doctrines, will they enjoy eternal concord, or will heaven itself be only a new arena for disputation between varieties of faiths?

We shall, on the supposition of an ever-developing theology, owe a great deal to the wisdom of men. God may provide the marble; but it is man who will carve the statue. It will no longer be true that God has hidden these things from the wise and prudent, and revealed them unto babes; but the babes will be lost in hopeless bewilderment, and carnal wisdom will have fine times for glorying. Scientific men will be the true prophets of our Israel, even though they deny Israel's God; and instead of the Holy Spirit guiding the humble in heart, we shall see the enthronement of "the spirit of the age," whatever that may mean. "The world by wisdom knew not God," so says the apostle of the ages past; but the contrary is to be our experience nowadays. New editions of the gospel are to be excogitated by the wisdom of men, and we are to follow in the wake of "thoughtful preachers," whose thoughts are not as God's thoughts. Verily this is the deification of man! Nor do the moderns shrink even from this. To many of our readers it may already be known that it is beginning to be taught that God himself is but the totality of manhood, and that our Lord Jesus only differed from us in being one of the first men to find out that he was God: he was but one item of that race, which, in its solidarity, is divine.

It is thought to be mere bigotry to protest against the mad spirit which is now loose among us. Pan-indifferentism is rising like the tide; who can hinder it? We are all to be as one, even though we agree in next to nothing. It is a breach of brotherly love to denounce error. Hail, holy charity! Black is white; and white is black. The false is true; the true is false; the true and the false are one. Let us join hands, and never again mention those barbarous, old-fashioned doctrines about which we are sure to differ. Let the good and sound men for liberty's sake shield their "advanced brethren"; or, at least, gently blame them in a tone which means approval. After all, there is no difference, except in the point of view from which we look at things: it is all in the eye, or, as the vulgar say, "it is all my eye"! In order to maintain an open union, let us fight as for dear life against any form of sound words, since it might restrain our liberty to deny the doctrines of the Word of God!

But what if earnest protests accomplish nothing, because of the invincible resolve of the infatuated to abide in fellowship with the inventors of false doctrine? Well, we shall at least have done our duty. We are not responsible for success. If the plague cannot be stayed, we can at least die in the attempt to remove it. Every voice that is lifted up against Anythingarianism is at least a little hindrance to its universal prevalence. It may be that in some one instance a true witness is strengthened by our word, or a waverer is kept from falling; and this is no mean reward. It is true that our testimony may be held up to contempt; and may, indeed, in itself be feeble enough to be open to ridicule; but yet the Lord, by the weak things of the world, has overcome the mighty in former times, and he will do so again. We cannot despair for the church or for the truth, while the Lord lives and reigns; but, assuredly, the conflict to which the faithful are now summoned is not less arduous than that in which the Reformers were engaged. So much of subtlety is mixed up with the whole business, that the sword seems to fall upon a sack of wool, or to miss its mark. However, plain truth will cut its way in the end, and policy will ring its own death-knell.

What is the Missional Gospel? Part 5: The Evangelical Missional Church

2010-03-05T10:00:26Z

What is the Missional Gospel? Part 5: The Evangelical Missional Church

By Keith Whitfield

At a recent conference, Tim Keller addressed the challenges of evangelism in a post-modern context and gave six principles on how to pursue evangelism in this context. The first principle was “Gospel Theologizing,” and what he meant by this is phrase that all theology should articulate the gospel message. He says our theology should be an exposition of the gospel, and our presentation of the gospel should be situated within the biblical story. In order to engage the post-modern society, he argues, the gospel must fit into a coherent story that interrupts all of life. Ed Stetzer echoes this point as he emphasizes the need to be aware of the changes in our culture and the need to realize that proclaiming the gospel in the West is like cross cultural missions.

The Gospel in the Evangelical Missional Church

In the evangelical missional church, there is an effort to recast the message of the gospel. The recasting does not involve a change in the nature of the gospel, but it rather involves situating the historic orthodox gospel message within the Christian worldview so as to make the gospel clear, coherent, and holistic. Mark Driscoll models this when he writes that to “understand the doctrine of Jesus’ death on the cross, also known as the atonement, we must connect it to the doctrines of God’s character, God’s creation, human sin, and the responses of God to sin and sinners” (Listening to the Beliefs of the Emerging Churches, 29).

What you find in Driscoll’s words is that the gospel message entails the doctrines of God, sin, and God’s response to sin. He affirms that a historic fall affected all humanity, leading everyone to committing sinful actions. He affirms God’s holiness and just punishment towards sin. He affirms that God deals with the problem of forgiving sin by satisfying His holiness and justice through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus. He argues that this view of the atonement matters because “Salvation is defined as deliverance by God from God and his wrath” (Listening to the Beliefs of the Emerging Churches , 34).

This approach to the gospel is related to older approaches to gospel proclamation, like The Four Spiritual Laws booklet: (1) “God loves you and offers a wonderful plan for your life,” (2) “Man is sinful and separated from God,” (3) “Jesus Christ is God’s provision for man’s sin,” (4) “We must individually receive Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord.” However, the new trajectory among missional evangelicals is to situate gospel truth within the story of redemption. The evangelistic impact of this approach is that it offers a story that can confront and challenge the alternative stories people are trying to live.

In a short article, “How Can I Know God?,” Keller argues that the gospel requires that people understand three things: “who we are,” “who God is,” and “what you must do.” The story of redemption tells us that we are created by God and for Him, but we have sinned against him. It also tells us that God is just and loving, and these two characteristics of God come together in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Finally, the story of redemption tells us what we must do, which Keller captures in the words “repent,” “believe,” “pray,” and “follow through.”

Regarding ministry to our changing culture, Driscoll asks, “In our fast-paced and ever-changing culture of insanity, many Christians are prone either to cling to yesterday or to run headlong into tomorrow searching for a home. What’s our goal?” He answers himself,

The gospel requires us to proclaim and embody the full work of Jesus’ death and resurrection. Jesus has accomplished four things which people long for. First, Jesus takes away the sins that separate us from God so that we can be connected to God, which fills our spiritual longings. Second, Jesus takes away the sins that separate us from each other so that we can be reconciled to each other as the church, which fills our social longings. Third, Jesus forgives the sins we have committed, thereby cleansing us of our filth, which fills our emotional longing for forgiveness. Fourth, Jesus cleanses us of the defilement that has come upon us through the sins of others, which fulfills our psychological longing for healing, cleansing, and new life (The Radical Reformission, 82).

Evangelism in the Evangelical Missional Church

One of the key features of the missional approach to evangelism is a shift from program-driven and attractional evangelism to relational and missional evangelism. This shift is stimulated by the realization that people are not able to convert from one worldview to another by a mere decision. Rather, they need established relationships where the credibility of the gospel can be demonstrated. Stetzer and Putman write,

What we are discovering is that those who are effective in breaking the code understand that there has been a radical shift in how we do evangelism. We can no longer just appeal to people to come ‘back’ to an institution of which they do not remember being a part. With this fading memory, proclamation evangelism has decreased in its effectiveness. Asking people to literally change their worldview after simply hearing the gospel, with no previous exposure to a Christian worldview, is usually unrealistic. While churches that effectively evangelize the unchurched/unreached do not abandon proclamation evangelism, they set it in the context of community, experience, and service (Breaking the Missional Code, 84).

With this cultural change, the evangelical missionals realize that they cannot simply ask people to say yes to a presentation of religious truths. The task of evangelism is pursuing the process where people’s thinking and worldviews change. Evangelism then must become more process-oriented and relationally based, where the gospel truths are lived out before their eyes in the lives of others and the gospel reality is worked out in their own lives. The process approach assumes theological convictions. First, it maintains a belief that God is at work in the lives of lost people. Next, Christians should build relationships with people and value them. Third, it is important to listen and learn where God is at work in people’s lives. Fourth, we depend on God to lead us in how to share with people about the gospel and help them connect the gospel story with their own story.

“Missional,” for the evangelicals, is a strategic disposition towards its culture that directs how the church seeks to fulfill its calling. Stetzer says, “missional means being a missionary without ever leaving your zip code” (Planting Missional Churches, 19). Driscoll captures this vision in these words, “a radical call for Christians and Christian churches to recommit to living and speaking the gospel . . . to continually unleash the gospel to do its work of reforming dominant cultures and church subcultures” (Radical Reformission, 20). For Keller, missional means attempting to communicate so that non-Christians will understand the gospel. Its vision involves retelling the culture’s stories with the gospel, training lay people to “think Christianly” in public life and vocation, and creating counter cultural Christian communities. Keller sets forth this vision to demonstrate that what God is doing in the church through the gospel is radically different than what is happening in the culture around the church (“The Missional Church”). The gospel that he is referring to has at its center a substitutionary atonement and a call to repentance, and thus, for the evangelicals, being missional demands pursuing the spiritual conversion of individuals.

Keith Whitfield is pastor of Waverly Baptist Church in Waverly, Virginia, and a doctoral student in theological studies at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. This post is fifth in a series of six articles.

Biblical Doctrine: The Trinity - Series Recap

2010-03-05T18:00:00Z

The ESV Study Bible is our Bible of choice. To show how good the notes are, we’ve posted some free study notes on the doctrine of the Trinity—the oneness of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, equal in essence, distinct in function.

Posts in this series:

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Memo: How to smoke out a Calvinistic pastor in your church

2010-03-05T00:57:00Z

Yesterday I was sent the following 3 documents that have been circulating in Western Tennessee among some Southern Baptist Churches. It seems that they were distributed at seminars being held for churches to teach "how to find out if any of your staff are Calvinists and how to get rid of them." Since receiving them I have communicated with others who have verified that they are being made available to Southern Baptist churches in Tennessee, not by any official denominational worker, but by zealous people who view the doctrines of grace as heresy. I am trying to contact one or more of those persons in hopes of better understanding what has provoked this mission.

The first document is in the form of a memo and is entitled, "Reformed Red Flags." It contains a list of 16 "behaviors" to look for when seeking to smoke out Calvinistic pastors. Number 3 on the list is "use of the ESV Study Bible." Someone should alert Crossway immediately. Founders made the list, as did John Piper, Jonathan Edwards, RC Sproul, James White and the first Southern Baptist confession of faith (which is still used at Southern and Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminaries, and which even the famous non-Calvinist Paige Patterson has signed), the Abstract of Principles.

To read the documents in a larger size, click on them.

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The second document is entitled, "Theological differences between Traditional Southern Baptist and Extreme Calvinists." It seems to be a warmed over version (and perversion) of some of the things that Fisher Humphreys put in his book, God So Loved the Word: Traditional Baptists and Calvinism. Most of the depictions of Calvinism in this document are built on the caricatures found in the previous one and many of the views described as "Traditional Baptist" are held by all evangelical Calvinists. Granted, I know the document purports to deal with "Extreme Calvinists," but I defy anyone to capture and put on display such a creature as described below. Are some Calvinists unbalanced? Yes. Are some jerks? Yes. Is there a danger that the profile given below of extreme Calvinism is sweeping into Southern Baptist churches? No. The kind of inaccurate and distorted representations are easy to make (anyone who reads blogs knows this) but they violate the 9th Commandment and should be renounced by anyone--Calvinist or not--who genuinely takes the Bible to be the Word of God written.

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The last of the documents is recommended to churches to use with new pastors and staff members. The desire expressed in this document that a pastor be forthcoming in doctrinal convictions is commendable. It assumes, however, that the church to which it is recommended does not have a historic Southern Baptist confession of faith (most notably, the Charleston Confession, Abstract of Principles or New Hampshire Statement). A case can even be made that the Baptist Faith and Message is largely a Calvinistic statement, though not as explicit as earlier Southern Baptist confessions. The problem with many of our churches is not that pastors are coming in and trying to teach some "new" doctrine. Rather, it is that they often have drifted from their own stated doctrinal foundations through neglect or liberalism or pragmatism. When a pastor begins to restore those foundations, what he teaches can sound new when in reality it is fully in accord with the church's own doctrinal statements.

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Much could be said about the wickedness and ignorance behind a campaign to "smoke out" Calvinistic pastors using these dubious tools. However, I want to conclude by issuing a plea to my fellow pastors who may be more reformed in our understanding than others in the SBC. Though these documents promote caricatures and distortions, they are a sad reminder that this is the way that at least some people perceive us. As I have indicated, I don't know anyone who fits the profile that these documents present. I doubt such a person exists within the SBC. Nevertheless, this is how some people perceive us.

What shall we do? Protest and return fire with fire? Point out the practical (and sometimes, doctrinal) Pelagianism of our less Calvinistic brothers? Become defensive and try to answer each accusation point-by-point? I don't think that response is called for. Saying nothing of Proverbs 26:4 for the present, I instead recommend that we take the opportunity to examine ourselves and our ministries and see if there are any kernels of truth whatsoever in the accusations on which the caricatures are built. Enemies can help us even when they are trying to destroy us. Learning from them does not mean that we agree with the charges or judge them fair.

Caricatures die in the presence of long, consistent evidence to the contrary. Our agenda is not to be set by accusations (or even affirmations). We have the Word of God for that. Let's examine ourselves in the light of that Word and determine to live wholeheartedly for our crucified and risen Savior. Critics will come and critics will go. What ultimately matters faithfulness to our Lord expressed through obedience to His Word.

Arizona and the GCR progress report

2010-03-04T21:26:36Z

In case you have not heard …

The long-awaited initial progress report from the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force has been posted. You can find it at www.pray4gcr.com. Here, you will have an opportunity to review the report as delivered by GCR Task Force Chairman Ronnie Floyd to the SBC Executive Committee.

To say the least, this report has generated many more questions than answers. I want to take a few more lines and defend my last statement. The reason the statement is true is that the GCR Task Force cannot possibly give complete answers to everything they recommended. It’s not their fault … it just happens whenever a major report is given in summary form.

And Ronnie Floyd was not asked to give a detailed report, only to share a progress report in preparation for a final report. And so we do need to give the Task Force some time to further communicate about their more detailed understanding of the report.

With that said, it does appear that if the report is adopted, it will definitely impact the work of the new-work states like Arizona. At this point, we do not fully know what the implications will be for all of us, but it does seem to suggest that things will be different.

If the progress report stays intact, it will recommend the current Cooperative Agreements will go away after four years. And it appears that the North American Mission Baord will move to a regional approach that will be their attempt to get closer to the field.

What the report does not specify is how NAMB will relate to the work in Arizona, the rest of the West, and the remainder of the nation that is under-reached. We hear from certain persons that it means that NAMB will do their own direct missions. Others counter and say NAMB will enter new agreements with the new-work areas that will enhance their work and bring greater support. The million dollar question is which do you believe? I guess it depends on which blog you read on a given day.

One thing is certain at this time: the answer to the above questions will not be finalized during one vote in June. Rather, it is my belief that we are on a journey that will unfold, step by step, over a multi-year period.

Here are some crucial markers for you to watch:

The final May report of the GCR due May 3rd. This will have the final recommendations for the annual SBC in June.
Whatever is passed in June, who NAMB elects as president will be critical to this process of “putting meat on the bones” of the recommendations of the GCR.
It will be the responsibility of the NAMB Board of Trustees and their new president to implement the implications of the report as adopted. From this journey, NAMB will begin the process of rolling out how they will relate to state conventions in the future.

And so … here is my commitment to God, His Kingdom and our work in Arizona. We are going to remain focused on our vision to evangelize and “church” our state. We are also going to remain committed to the development and training of God-called leaders and to the disciple- making process of fulfilling the Great Commission. And we are going to enter a time of prayer and planning in order to respond (notice, I did not say “react”) to potential scenarios concerning what these changes may mean to us in Arizona.

In the meantime, I am going to communicate with the leaders of our SBC and the GCR and share with them our field-driven strategy of hearing from our churches on a yearly basis concerning evangelism, church planting, disciple-making and leadership development. And I pray that when it comes time for our Southern Baptist family to think and pray about the best way to reach Arizona, that they will join us as partners. Don’t expect the answer to come overnight, for it will take several years for it to come to light.

Meanwhile, share the Gospel with your next-door neighbor.

Another Approach to Preaching God's Love

2010-03-04T20:47:59Z

(Author: John Piper)

The video below is a message I gave last Monday in chapel at Westmont College. It is a rethinking of an old idea. I used to ask, How is it loving for God to make so much of himself and do everything for his glory? Now I ask: Why does God reveal his love for us in such a way that it turns out to be for his glory?

Or: I used to say: Do you feel more loved when God makes much of you or when he frees you to enjoy making much of him? Now I say, "Why does God make so much of us in a way that winds up making much of him?"

It may not sound very different. But I think many will feel a significant shift. See if it helps.

Do You Love The Law?

2010-03-04T08:00:00Z

Is God's law a delight, or a drag? You would probably say the answer is a little complicated. Many of us who work hard to remain focused on the gospel as our hope before God have an almost visceral reaction to "the law," particularly when it is presented as a means of obtaining or maintaining peace with God. This is good. The law is never our hope. Jesus is.

However, the law is "holy, righteous and good" (Romans 7:12) and Scripture tells us how "blessed" is the man who "delights" in the law (Psalm 1). The Psalmist says, "Oh how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day" (Psalm 19:97). The apostle Paul also says, "I delight in the law of God in my inner being" (Romans 7:22). Why do (should) the people of God love the law? Here are 3 reasons.

1. In the law we have divine direction.

God has not left us alone to figure out what is right and wrong. He has graciously spoken clearly, and we now know the difference between good and evil. In the law we see the character of God and his will to be carried out on earth as it is in heaven. For example, we not only know that God calls us to do good to others in some general sense, but more specifically that we should be hospitable, loving, generous, and patient. He tells us what he desires of us. This is itself grace. We can delight that God has been kind enough to tell us what he requires of us (Micah 6:8).

2. Through the law we uncover our sin.

The law of God not only shows us God's will, but it also acts as a mirror that exposes our sin and falsehood. In the law we see God's standards and commands, but we also see how quickly we break them (Romans 7:7-25). As we have broken the law, it breaks us. The law is used by God to afflict our conscience so that we feel the weight of our guiltiness. And this is a reason to love the law, as it can eventually destroy our pride and any confidence we put in our ability to measure up to God's standards.

3. By the law we are led to the gospel.

In showing us the will of God, and our inability to keep it, the law leads us to see our need for mercy and grace. As many like to say, before we can know and embrace the "good news" of redemption and restoration in Jesus, we must first know and embrace the bad news that we are condemned as law-breakers and under the curse of God. It functions as one of the tools that God uses to prepare us to meet Jesus. So, we love the law as it leads us to see our need for grace and the beauty of the gospel against the backdrop of our guilt and corruption.

But here's the rub: we can only love the law after it has been fulfilled by Christ on our behalf. The law will only be a delight to us after we have found life by the gospel.

For without the gospel, in the law we only find standards unmet and guilt without relief. We wind up sharing Martin Luther's frustration with the call to "love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind," and say with him, "Love God? Sometimes I hate him!" Apart from the gospel the law leaves us broken and needy.

It is in the gospel where God's standards are met, his law is fulfilled, sin is forgiven, and we are restored to him. The reality of our justification before God through Christ liberates us from the law's condemning power and produces in us a delight in God's law and a motivation to keep it for God's glory and our good.

Is the law our delight? It really depends on whether the gospel is our hope and boast. If it is, then the law does not condemn us, but guides us. It shows us God's way, reminds us of our need for the gospel, and as we walk in it the law leads toward the good of our neighbors and praise of our God (Matthew 5:16). That is our delight.

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What is the Missional Gospel? Part 4: The Emerging Missional Church

2010-03-04T10:00:28Z

What is the Missional Gospel? Part 4: The Emerging Missional Church

By Keith Whitfield

Brian McLaren announced in 2004 at “The Billy Graham Center Evangelism Roundtable” that “we are in need of radical strategic rethinking of our current strategy as gospel-oriented Christians seeking to follow the Great Commission” (“The Strategy We Pursue,”). He argues that this need is urgent and apparent given the low church attendance by people in our culture, the number of Christian kids dropping out of the church after high school, the “mean-spirited, afraid, racist, and isolationist” attitudes of many Christians, and finally, the biblical mandate to make disciples. It is time for the church, according to him, to “Admit we may not actually understand the good news, and seek to rediscover it.” This conviction is repeated by Brian McLaren and Tony Campolo, in Adventures in Missing the Point (2007), where they call for the church to “reboot” its understanding of the gospel.

The Gospel in the Emergent Missional Church

The emergent church maintains that viewing the gospel as facts to believe in order to save one’s soul and go to heaven misses the point, so they propose an alternative approach. Their proposal is:

the gospel has something to do with the kingdom of God and perhaps the Kingdom of God is not equal to heaven after death, but rather involves God’s will being done on earth, in history, before death, in the land of the living (A Generous Orthodoxy, 3).

This position is built on their view that salvation is not mainly about the individual. The ultimate goal is being formed into and knowing Christ in the here and now. In Everything Must Change, McLaren writes, “All who find in Jesus God’s hope and truth discover the privilege of participating in his on going work of personal and global transformation and liberation from evil and injustice” (80). Salvation is then not primarily about having one’s sins forgiven, but it is about being rescued from maladies, distress, fear, violence, and enemies.

This approach to the gospel shines light on the emergent missional church’s position on the atonement. They are critical of the traditional evangelical view of the gospel and salvation that is “atonement-centered,” or at least, they are critical of how this view overemphasizes penal substitution as the “center” of the doctrine of the atonement. The emergents have moved away from substitutionary atonement being the center of their understanding of salvation and the gospel, because they moved away from salvation being from sin and alienation from God. McLaren explains why Jesus is important when he writes, “Jesus came into the world as the Savior of the world . . . . Through his life and teaching, through his suffering, death, and resurrection, he inserted in human history a seed of grace, truth, and hope that can never be defeated” (Everything Must Change, 79)

In a biographical statement, McLaren confesses,

But as precious and indispensable as this perspective [reconciliation to God and inheritance of eternal life] is for me, over the years a feeling grew within me, usually vague but sometimes acute, that I was missing something, perhaps something important. Jesus’ cross in the past saved me from hell in the future, but it was hard to be clear on what it meant for me in the struggle of the present. And more importantly, did the gospel have anything to say about justice for the many, not just the justification of the individual? (A Generous Orthodoxy, 48)

This sentiment has not just shaped McLaren’s view of the atonement, but it has also shaped the view of the atonement of many proponents of the emergent model. What makes this a workable view of the atonement is that their “primary reference point is no longer their former alienation but their present and future identification as part of God’s new order, which was inaugurated with the first coming of Christ” (Emerging Churches, 54). They argue, therefore, that the gospel is not restricted to a message about individual assurance of eternal destiny. The cross of Christ offers an example of sacrificial love as well as the means for reconciliation to God. They say that the kingdom is the path to the cross and the kingdom is the pathway Christians walk throughout their lives with the cross, as those who have died to self with Christ to live in his grace and power. This, for them, is a retrieval of the gospel.

How does God save in this view? God saves by judging, by forgiving, and by teaching. Through Jesus, God intervenes into history as savior. He judges by naming evil for what it is and confronting self-denial and delusion. McLaren described the process in these words,

The consequences of our bad behavior loom over us, we hear God’s judgment and realize we’ve done something stupidly wrong and we have second thoughts about what we’ve done. As we repent, as we become truly sorry, as we have a change of heart, God goes further by forgiving us, thus bringing salvation in an even fuller sense. Salvation is what happens when we experience both judgment and forgiveness, both justice (exposing the truth about our wrong) and mercy (forgoing the negative consequences we deserve) (A Generous Orthodoxy, 95).

The judgment is first for those who are doing evil against others, and can also be for those who are being saved. God judges by revealing the evil character and actions of people through the light and truth of Jesus. Jesus both judges and brings forgiveness. McLaren says, “This is the window into the meaning of the cross,” namely, that Jesus takes the worst humanity has to offer and after experiencing it, He offers grace and forgives. Then, the third way that God saves is by teaching us. “[B]ecause we are so often ignorantly wrong and stupid,” says McLaren, “Jesus comes with saving teaching, profound yet amazingly compact: Love God with your whole heart, soul, mind, and strength, Jesus says, and love your neighbor as yourself” (A Generous Orthodoxy, 97).

Evangelism in the Emergent Missional Church

The proclamation of the gospel in the “emergent missional church” is not primarily informational but relational, and inviting people into a relationship with a King and with members of a Kingdom whose foremost concern is wholeness for a broken world takes priority over sharing how someone may have security in their eternal destiny. The gospel, McLaren explains, starts “with God’s concern for the world, in which God creates a community called the church, comprised of persons who stop (or repent of) being ‘part of the problem’ and choose instead to join God as ‘part of the solution’—thus simultaneously entering a mission and a community in which one is accepted by grace, through faith in Jesus” (“The Strategy We Pursue”). The focus is to create a culture of the kingdom and to allow God to do the work. It is this conviction that sets the course for the emergent missionals. They are critical of what they view as a preoccupation with eternal salvation of the conservative evangelicals because of its overemphasis on beliefs, and at the same time, they are critical of the liberal Protestants because their good deeds serve their civil religion. They, however, seek to find the balance in defining the gospel by their conception of the kingdom of God.

Their focus is on recruiting people who will follow Jesus by faith as disciples and who will participate in God’s mission in the world. Their approach to the gospel results in a collapsing the difference between “evangelism” and “social action,” which is reflected in McLaren’s proposal to “Recenter the Great Commission in the Great Commandment.” Thus, the gospel is contained in words embodied in good deeds. The logic of this statement is tied closely to their view of the gospel as the realized kingdom of God.

Evangelism is the calling to become a part of the kingdom of God by becoming disciples of Jesus. This position opposes the missionary vision that the church is taking God to the world. Rather, it is God who pursues redemption of everything in creation that needs direction and repair, and the church is an active participant in God’s mission. This vision of evangelism re-envisions the church as a community that shares in a mission with God, but a mission that God is already working out in the world. When the church refocuses its attention to becoming a community and being deployed to serve, it then becomes a community that is open and welcomes strangers as Jesus welcomed sinners.

PowerPoint Preaching is Not Prophetic

2010-03-03T20:08:23Z

Alan Kurschner

These brief comments are not intended to give a list of pros and cons for using PowerPoint to supplement pastors' sermons (or for the more enlightened pastors who use Mac's Keynote). I just want to consider one con, probably the most important one. I simply do not find sermons supplemented with Powerpoint conducive to the qualities of soul-grabbing, prophetic, anguishing preaching.

I think it is safe to say that the main reason why pastors who use PowerPoint is to induce a bullet-point memory in their congregants. But that goal sets the bar too low for God's people. Preaching requires much higher demands on its people. In addition, there is just something about a cold, large projector screen vying attention away from the flesh and blood countenance of the pastor that diminishes my reflective soul to hearing God's Word. And I do not have a short attention span, so I cannot imagine the affect on those who do.

I know I said above that I was going to consider one con, but I will mention a second one, while on the subject. I have not pinned down why exactly, but after a pastor puts his most recent bullet-point on the screen, there is this atomizing affect that disconnects it from the other points. I am a big discourse analysis guy (aka "arcing"). Expository preaching is not about preaching bullet points, so why communicate it as if it were, in PowerPoint? Expository preaching is about explaining the author's argument---whether that is found in Jesus' parables, Paul's epistles, or Revelation's apocalyptic prophecy. Gordon Fee aptly once wrote: "For the sermon to have integrity as a proclamation of the intent of Scripture, it should focus on this question [the intended author's reasoning], and all its parts should serve that focus."

So jettison the PowerPoint and quit worrying about whether the congregants will remember the "three main points" of a sermon by Wednesday, and focus on edifying their Christian soul at that moment with soul-grabbing, prophetic, anguishing preaching.

(Case in point: John Piper does not use PowerPoint when he preaches. If he did, I am convinced that it would diminish the soul-grabbing, prophetic, anguishing quality of his preaching. But not just the latter quality, but it would also diminish his explanation of the expository-argument. I have observed that Piper does a masterful job in interweaving his discourse analysis into his sermons, which just goes to prove that DA is essential to good expository preaching.)