Erwin McManus, the dreams of God, and the domestication of the truth

I've been flipping through a book by a guy named Erwin Raphael McManus here recently...either considering it for the youth gathering in my church community, or something that could be used for small groups in the future, and I've been struck by the passion with which McManus talks about life in Christ. As I've considered some of Erwin's points of emphasis, I had a conversation with a great guy for an hour at seminary today, and over the course of our discussion, we talked about the goals most churches set for our lives, and how they live up to the dreams God has for our lives.

To sum up the conversation, we agreed the goals we've received from our church communities are woefully inadequate. Tell me if I'm painting with too broad of a brush here, but here are a few of the goals churches seem to set up more than most:

1) Don't drink
2) Don't smoke
3) Have a good solid moral foundation
4) Give your money to worthy causes

First, those goals aren't even Biblical, and second, I am convinced that the church is dying on the vine in America today because we have defined the goals of our existence in this passive, empty, institutionalized, fashion. God is essentially a means to an end; if he "blesses" me with a consistent middle-class lifestyle that allows me to drive an SUV, have a good job, a wife, and a couple kids, I'll "follow" Him. If I struggle, God doesn't answer my every whim, and life actually throws a couple curveballs, I'm packing it in; screw God and the church. One of my friends calls this god (small case because it's a false god) the MTD god (obvious parallel in negative connotation to STDs).

M=moralistic (all that hubbub over the Ten Commandments in Alabama and/or schools across the nation)
T= therapeutic (welcome to Joel Osteen's world)
D= deistic (God wound up the universe like a toy and stepped away from it till the very end)

This is the god of America. Newsflash: it's not the God of history.

My thoughts:
1. We need to recover the reality that committing ourselves to following Christ is a starting point, not the finish line. This decision is the beginning of a whole new world to be explored, a race to be run.
2. Being a Christian is not a matter of "God being in my life," or "Jesus is my personal Lord and Savior." Those are modern phrases, not Biblical truths. We choose to fundamentally submit our lives to the plans and desires of God because of gratitude for what God has delivered us from: ultimate death. It's not a case of God coming to us because we deserve it; God initiates the love relationship purely out of His goodness...it's us getting the reality that we are desperately in need of truth and life into our tough-to-crack heads and pride. We choose to follow God because this pursuit is the fundamental longing of our hearts. And in this turning in of the old way for the sake of the new, better way, there will be pain.
3. God is not a means to an end. God is the end. Worship should be God-centered; the witness of our words and lives should be God-centered.
4. As followers of Christ, we need to commit ourselves to local communities and ride out the storms of disagreement and conflict that are natural to our humanity for the sake of true community, true accountability, and growth. We cannot truly challenge each other if we aren't truly committed to helping one another grow.
5. God doesn't expect faithfulness from us based on the bottom line as defined by our society. It seems to me society has two driving, defining motivations. The first is self-preservation. Everything's cool as long as everything's good in my life; if your quality of life gets in the way of mine, however, you're up a creek without a paddle. Especially if my weaponry outranks yours. Many a conflict or war has been started with bluff and bluster from friction experienced from competing desires and miffed individuals. The second is financial security. If you feel like God is asking you to step out in faithfulness in your life in a way that will potentially badly harm your portfolio and/or cause you to drive a smaller car or get a smaller house, it's clearly not God talking. Call me crazy, but Jesus addresses both of those driving motivations head-on. Neither should be close enough to even sniff at our willingness to surrender all for God and life in God's kingdom. Now THAT'S big love and big commitment.
6. Following Christ is about passion...here's a quote from McManus that struck a chord in me.

"When I was fifteen, I was a coward. In my heart, I longed to do great things. I was a tragedy of dreams not only unfulfilled, but unattempted. I was living proof that without courage you will never live the life you dream of. I realize now I was running from the shadows. Like a child afraid of the dark, I was afraid of what I could not see...dream great dreams and have the courage to live them. If your dreams don't terrify you, trash them and begin again...it is only here that you will turn to (and depend on ) God who creates us to dream and ask Him for the courage required."
from Uprising

We see neat little pithy quotes all over the place in life like, "Hitch your wagon to a star," "The only way to have a friend is to be one," or "Finish each day and be done with it; you have done only what you could," and they leave us nice and fuzzy but never take us anywhere; never spur us towards transformation because there's no drive. But as McManus suggests, God has dreams and desires for our lives that can take place when you and I make the decision not only to desire transformation and dream dreams in the Way of Christ, but to have the courage and the will to carry out this calling. I'm praying and endeavoring to see my life speak in such a manner; that others would see me as one never satisfied with where I'm at; one whose life is offered in complete service to Christ.


Hold me accountable, if you would. You and I need the opportunity of challenge, the pain of falling short, and the willingness to keep running. We are dependent on God, for whom we have been created to pursue.

Movies that make you go hmmmm......

sideways closer

I've seen two movies in the past week ("Sideways" and "Closer") that have really messed me up...it's hard to put a finger on the reasons why, specifically, these movies struck deep, but I'm willing to take a stab at what's been going on inside my head since the viewings.

I'll just state right off the top that both of these movies made me extremely sad and yet profoundly touched at the same time, although Closer has engaged my mind much more than sideways. In addition, Clive Owen (I wanted to deck him in the face), Natalie Portman (her sadness KILLED me) and Paul Giamatti (I wanted to walk with him through his depression...LOOK at his face in that picture above...he's SEARCHING and not finding over and over and over again) inspired the most intense emotions in me since Joaquin Phoenix played Commodus in Gladiator (thinking of his role in that movie has ruined every other role I'll see him in for forever and a day). Uggg...just writing that last sentence raises my hackles..."Am I not merciful!" No, Commodus, you're not; and you're an incestuous, misguided, petulant, murderous baby; why don't you buck up and face your insecurity instead of always spinning the conversation and issues off on others? (that would've won me rave reviews in the Emperor's court)

I'd have to say that more than anything else, both of these movies drew out in sharp relief how twisted our societal conceptions of love, intimacy, sex, and relationships have become. The flip-flopping of love as desire, love as intimacy, love as perfection, love as manipulation, love lost through jadedness, love that allows one to get laid multiple times the week before marriage, etc runs so deep in our society, and clearly showed the swamp we more often than not are willing to wade through in life that often swirls us deeper into self-doubt, lack of intimacy, and coldness instead of drawing us deeper into relationship with one another. The older I get, the more I sense the core longing I have for knowing God and being known by Him, and everything society tosses at us to cover over and inoculate against this longing built into us all. It was horribly painful to me (especially in Closer) to see that the decisions each individual made over the course of the movie built a wall higher...brick by brick...between themselves and others.

Do you remember the poster in health class in high school that had the guy with all that black junk all over his face and bruises and stuff and it said, "If you knew what your insides looked like on the outside from smoking, would you still do it?" For some reason that poster came to mind for me, and I wondered what it would be like if the emotional wounds we all carry showed themselves outwardly on us through bruises and lacerations and stuff. Would we be more willing to recognize our woundedness and need for healing, or would we all walk around and pretend like they weren't there like we do today? To be honest with you, the reality of that picture in my mind has haunted me for a few days now. To see Natalie Portman's character shredded emotionally time and again, the temptation and consummation of her sense of vengeance and desire for justice by sleeping with Clive to get back at Jude, and her confusion over what love means instilled in me a deep sense of sadness that's taken awhile to dissipate. It's even more sad knowing that so many people are in this state (including myself from time to time). Why do we think we can be self-sufficient, treat others like dirt, see relationships as a means to an end, and ultimately find we've only been wounding ourselves?

The last few days, as I've read of the relationship Adam and Eve had in the Garden with God...the relationship that was intended to last; I've felt my heart tugging and longing for that place and that reality...walking with God in the cool of the evening. Knowing who I was. Knowing my life was valued. Seeing the beauty of what relationship was intended to be. I want to live like that with others...and above all, to be honest with who am I with God. I don't need to pretend to be something I'm not; He knows the truth anyways.

Why all the smokescreens and deception?

On pacifism and radical love...

I've been working through discussions with others regarding the life and witness of Tom Fox, the Christian Peacemaker Teams activist (a modern-day martyr) on a website I am a part of called theologyweb.com, and springing from that, I've had a rousing discussion with others on the site on the nature of pacifism and nonviolence, and the consistent witness of Christ to this pathway. I'm a pacifist, not because I think it's common sense, but because Christ has called us as his followers to radical, forgiving

love. The early church's willingness to walk this path is a tremendous example for us in this day and age (in America) where a commitment to Christ usually means a commitment UNLESS your life is threatened, or UNLESS it seriously disturbs the status quo of your life, or UNLESS it makes you less financially stable, etc. Tom Fox (who happened to live near me, and went to the Summer Peacebuilding Institute at the University where I am at seminary) exemplified this boundless love Jesus called us to that transcends the human bottom line.

Here's the discussion thread I've been on the last several days...I go by GreatWhiteHype2 on this website.

Putting in a good word for the Newsboys...

newsboys in roanoke, va

Here's a pic of one of the most consistent, most Christ-centered worship bands around these days. Many folks I know who are concerned about serious discipleship as followers of Christ are also greatly concerned with the predominantly me-centered lyrics of the majority of the worship music being written today in the contemporary scene. Each time I am exposed to the Newsboys, I'm struck by the depth (not even necessarily the lyrics from show to show) of commitment to Christ and to the church the Newsboys carry.

At the concert last Thursday, the lead singer of Newsboys, Peter Furler, spoke very transparently with gathered pastors and youth pastors about how the band has struggled to maintain consistency in seeking vision and impacting the world. I was struck by this comment (paraphrasing), "Just over a year or so ago, we struggled in the band with what we were really accomplishing in the long-term for the kingdom; so we got together and as we prayed, we really caught a vision for how we can minister not for the sake of entertainment, but for the ultimate goal of 1)focusing our worship on God instead of ourselves, and 2)building God's church. Because when it comes down to it, events and concerts are nice, but following Christ is a daily commitment, and we want to link up with each person doing that work."

I think that's a tremendous vision; and gives a strong picture that the members of Newsboys aren't focused on the success of their group, but on worshiping God (*cough, hear that Third Day?*). I hope other groups see them setting the pace and link up with that vision.

On Authority (Jesus, Scripture, Tradition, Community)

I was doing some reading for my Systematic Theology class today (I know, sounds fun), and the writer, James McClendon, in writing about the subject of Authority, has brought up significant food for thought in my mind...thought I'd share a little.

I must say, when it comes to systems of thought, I would label myself clearly as a postmodernist who continues to struggle with the polemical debating going on between those who find freedom in postmodern approaches vs. the modernist camp that tends to write off postmodernity.
Oftentimes the folks who reject postmodernity as a legitimate development and system of thought couch their arguments in the primacy of Scripture (inerrancy and infallibility); accusing post-modernists of relativism and an unhealthy suspicion of authority. These folks also often cast suspicion (sometimes rightly so) on the postmodern emphasis on the primacy of experience. Being stuck in the middle (struggling with how to approach authority, recognizing the reality of experience) is clearly an uncomfortable place to be. But it seems right...and McClendon addresses well, by my estimation, the heart of these issues.

On Experience

He writes,
"While experience is essential, it cannot of itself be foundational for Christians...Peter Forsyth highlighted that experience is real enough, but necessarily points away from itself. It is an experience of the love of God, but deeper than love in God's nature is holiness, which embraces even love and entails it. By holiness, Forsyth understood a claim laid upon one's life such that one knew oneself both condemned of sin and forgiven. God's holiness was a claim that transformed the life that it claimed into one that could only confess itself so condemned, so claimed, so forgiven. If that is the content of experience, then experience has nothing of its own of which to boast, nothing save the authority of the Holy One that it meets in Christ Jesus.
Only that experience that points away from itself and toward a holy and loving God as its author and final authority deserves the claim made for it as its (proximate) authority. To qualify experience in this way is to presuppose a formative community of interpretation (church) with its definite history (Bible and its tradition); thereby the entire triad we are investigating here (experience, Bible, community) could be invoked."

I think McClendon's made an excellent point. In the local church community of which I am a part and the larger church community, I sense often that folks have exalted their experience to a place in their lives that nothing else can touch. That strikes me as wrong, and if we took the time to analyze it, is terribly subjective. My experience is clearly different than others around me...am I right or are they? Instead of holding each other accountable, our society has settled on pluralism (That's true for you, but not for me). That's clearly relativistic and wrong. But if we are given only one other option (inerrancy) as faithful Christians, I think I would choose the primacy of experience myself...please hold your opinions for a bit till the end.

McClendon continues, remarking that,
"Once we recognize its narrative quality, the primal authority claimed for Christian experience readily falls into place. It can neither be idolized as though itself God, nor be dissolved into human subjectivity...it is Jesus Christ who is the center of Christian faith. Authority as Christians know it will be found in the center if it is found anywhere. Nor is it an absentee Christ who exercises this authority. Christological understanding begins with the present Christ- one who confronts Christians in their spiritual worship and their kingdom work, in their common witness, and in Scripture's holy word."

The reality, then, of life in Christ, goes beyond the two opposite poles of suspicion of authority and uncritical claims of inerrancy (when it comes to Scripture). Paul gave us an incredible picture in Romans 6 that we have been delivered from one realm (sin and death) to another (freedom in Christ), and in his argument clearly showed that though we are now free, we are called to submit to the authority of Christ in our lives (a fun little play on freedom and servanthood). As followers of Christ, there is no other Lord in our lives but him, but there are many voices that can inform us as we move forward.

On Scripture

When it comes to the authority of Scripture, clearly we must subordinate ourselves (beyond our built in suspicion of authority in our day) to the reality that the Bible is the central authority on how God revealed himself to us his people and live from this first premise. Because we affirm that Jesus is the reason why we have been freed from the chains of sin and death in the first place, we must submit to the Bible asI emphasize again that inerrancy is not part of this first premise, by my estimation. In the river of the greater family of God, my stream has been that of Anabaptism, and the early Anabaptists had a clear way of approaching their lives as followers of Christ that strikes me as beautiful and wise.

1) They took Scripture's role to be the provision of broad models for Christian teaching and church order
2) In finding these models they decisively subordinated the Old Testament to the New, and
3) they sharply distinguished, though in differing degrees, the outer word from the inner, or the letter from the spirit.

The emphasis here on their approach should be on the words "broad" and distinguishing the "letter from the spirit." How ironic that Paul would write that the "letter kills," yet in seeking to be true to the intent of the Bible, we have found ourselves imprisoned either in drinking the inerrancy Kool-aid or tossing out a trust in the Scriptures either because of the excesses (and obvious contradictions) of the inerrantists or (probably more accurately) the distrust we carry of authority in general in our lives.

I've said enough to clearly ramble here, but it seems to me (and I'm sure I'll wrestle with this further), that our roots as followers of Christ exist in trusting the Bible as a (secondary) guide, the community as a (secondary) guide, tradition as a (secondary) guide and giving primacy to God centrally revealed in Jesus Christ as the fullness of the life we are called to. Jesus, the apostles, the early church, and faithful followers throughout the centures have given us clear evidence that a life lived in compliance with the commands of God by its very nature is revolutionary and world-changing...a submission to Christ is a clear pillar of such a lifestyle.