Church Voices

A few days ago I felt like reading The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe to my 4 year old duaghter.  I figured we would read a chapter or two every night.  My wife was in the room as well and so it ended up being the whole family listening to the story (not that the youngest two knew what was going on).  Last night as I was waiting for everybody to get in the room so that I could continue reading, I realized how enjoyable reading to my family is.  This surprised me, especially since I read to my children quite a lot.  But there is something special about reading a longer story to the entire family (I suppose it also helps that it is a classic children’s story).

If you’ve never done it, try it.  Turn the TV, computer, and game systems off and grab a book for the whole family to enjoy together.

Recently, at my alma mater a professor left her infant in her minivan and the infant died (there will be no linking to story or names used due to the remarkably brutish nature of many of the comments that have accumulated on news stories).

Many of the comments I’ve seen on the various news articles are quick to condemn this woman, and one particular way of condemning this woman quickly emerged. The particular condemnation leveled is that this woman was obsessed with her career and the money it brought in, so much so that it directly lead to her forgetting her infant in the car.

This theme strikes me as remarkably silly. Its been a few years since I attended this school, and I was never privy to a list of names with a salary next to them, but I was close enough to several professors that from various things they said, along with their type of lifestyle I know that there’s a good chance you’re making more than they do. The professors who teach at this school don’t teach in order to build a career and buy gold plated rocket cars, they do it out of their passion for building the kingdom of God. They have effectively chosen to pass up an opportunity for prestige, and a higher standard of living to teach there.

In this woman’s case she earned a PhD from Purdue in counseling. I’m sure she had the opportunity to teach at larger schools that would have given her the ability to earn more money, research more and teach less and so publish more papers, and build that career the commenters are writing about. Or at the least she could have gone into her field and built a business around her ability to counsel, a career track that certainly would have brought in more cash than academia.

Of course, none of the commenters seem aware of these circumstances. One commenter comicly demonstrated ignorance about what neighborhood the school is located in by proclaiming sagely that if the school were located in that neighborhood which it is located in the swat team would have been dispatched to round her up and imprison her in Guantanamo Bay for daily waterboardings.

Which brings me to the whole point of this. The more distance there is between two individuals, the easier it is to heap up mountains of condemnation. When you are separated by ideology, education, race, marital status, and have never met the person its easy to demand a public lynching.

Perhaps, especially as followers of Christ, it would be wisest if we withheld condemnation on people and circumstances we know nothing about. Especially since the God we worship, who Isaiah tells us has ways and thoughts higher than our own as the sky is from the ground, and who Paul tells us is the only one who is holy, didn’t come into the world to condemn it, but to save it.In other words, God has the distance and the moral high ground to condemn us, and instead sent Christ to save us.

Should we show any less grace to others?

If we don’t do what we are taught in scripture, does it have any value for our lives?  What does it take for us to love our neighbors?

Being in the middle of a high impact natural disaster (I live in a small town on the Mississippi river that will flood most of the buildins on Main St. by next week), I’ve been thinking a lot about questions like the above.  After the second day of sandbagging, I finally had to quit early and so I got some time to finally watch Rambo (the new one) which we’ve had from Netflix for days.  I was surprised at how intensely the film dealt with similar issues and questions I have been thinking on. 

I was surprised to very quickly learn that this Rambo wasn’t really about John Rambo, is about the suffering of the people of Burma.  Stalone often likes to say something meaningful in his films, and for this one he found out about the awful situation (pre-natural disaster, so you can imagine how much worse it is now) of the Burmese under the rule of the military.  Of course, there’s lots of gory action, but I’d still recommend any adult to see it, partly because the gore is not out of place.  In fact, you’ll find some tame pictures on the sites listed below that provide the evidence for the brutatlity visualized for you in Rambo. 

The most convicting part of the film was the dedication to action of the Christians in the film.  One thing that gets me, both locally for our flood, and globally for situations like Burma, is how churches and christians can sit around and do nothing yet people who do not know the grace of God through Jesus Christ do everything from helping to fill sandbags to save a few homes to struggling for the lives of people half a world away.

Father, forgive us for walking on the other side of the street pretending not to see the need of our neighbor.  Create in us a heart of compassion.  Use us in your work to transform us into little Christs.

Watch the movie if you haven’t seen it yet.  In the mean time, check out these websites:

www.uscampaignforburma.org

www.freeburmarangers.org

If you’ve ever been anxious to hear a movie review that goes something like this:

If Christianity were a zombie movie then we’re all Carlton waiting for the zombie kids to devour us while we futilely pound on the door to the Kingdom of God, thank God Jesus plays the part of Susan who graciously lets us in though we deserve a good zombie munching.

You might try checking out Movie Watching Messiah.

Well, the incredibly misguided, wrong, and profoundly un-Christlike folks at Christian Research Network (formerly Slice of Laodicea) are at it again.

Check it out:

In an odd turn of events, or perhaps with something to promote, Mike Jones – the man former president of the National Association of Evangelicals Ted Haggard allegedly committed adultery with – paid a visit to New Life Church where Haggard was once senior pastor. In this report filed by the Associated Press we see that ”Jones, who has a forthcoming book, told The Denver Post that several people shook his hand during the visit Sunday and told him, ‘God bless you.’” It wouldn’t appear that the Gospel, if it was even preached, had any effect on Jones. The wise person might wonder just how much blood will be on the hands of so many megachurch pastors.

This seems like a total non-sequitur to me. How is greeting warmly the guy who exposed the sin of your former pastor anti-gospel? If anything it seems very gospel to me. You know, loving those who want to do harm to you and all that.

If you told me the man responsible for bringing down the leader of a large group was going to visit the large group I’d expect resentment, and controversy to be the result. Instead we saw just the opposite. And all this without armed guards.

Shocking.

Does it strike anyone as odd that there doesn’t seem to be much in the way of Christ or research at Christian Research Network?

This entire article can be found at http://www.charismanews.com/a.php?ArticleID=10927

“The authors of the best-selling Left Behind end-times thriller series call the new apocalyptic NBC mini series ‘unbiblical’ and ‘weird.’ Jerry Jenkins, novelist of the “Left Behind” series, which has sold 62 million copies since its debut in 1995, said Revelations is ‘a mishmash of myth, silliness, and misrepresentations of Scripture.’”

Just thought I’d give a heads up about what is perhaps the latest wave of spirituality to come across the wire. finally rented the movie What the Bleep Do We Know? I had heard some buzz about it. It didn’t do too well in the theaters, but it has been developing underground cult status since its recent release to DVD. I found the format of the movie to be somewhat riveting as it cuts in and out between the storyline, testimonials from experts and rather interesting CGI graphics. What The Bleep attempts to answer question, “What is the meaning of life?” beginning the dialogue with quantum physics and ending in some sort of new age/scientific mumbo-jumbo.

The film begins with basic quantum physics and questioning what reality really is. It then leads into a discussion concerning the power of our minds to affect what we think reality is. Finally, we are told that it is we who play the role of God in this world- that there is no good or evil; it’s up to us to determine right and wrong [by the way, I think it was CS Lewis who wrote that everyone's a relativist until you touch what's theirs]. Yeah, pretty interesting stuff. The movie falls short of what it claims to accomplish, answering no questions, while offering pie-in-the-sky theories and additional deep questions.

I do, however, think this is a movie that Christians need to see. I can see lost people flocking to this film to help them figure their lives out. This movie is a perfect hybrid of modern science and postmodern philosophy, giving it a broad base of appeal. The storyline will most likely resonate among those seeking ways to fulfill the spiritual longing in their lives.

I’d be interested to hear what those who have seen the movie think about it and how we, as Christians, can thoughtfully respond to the questions it raises.

More can be found at the movie’s website: www.whatthebleep.com

More Rational Killings

Well, we’ve got another instance of a student killing spree. This time, on a Native American Indian reservation school, with the perpetrator being from a horribly broken home (as opposed to the upper middle class Columbine students). I don’t intend to portray these killings as a good thing, but without question they must be deemed a rational thing.

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_world/view/138768/1/.html

I was struck at how the media organizations immediately begin searching for some means of demonizing the individual by connecting him to as many obscure beliefs and practices as they possibly could. He had ties to neo NAZI ideologies, and was said to have worn a black trench coat. Beware that infernal black trench coat… those people will shoot your kids to death. When looking for a problem in this young man, I think they’re missing the mark. It’s difficult to find demonstrable hopelessness or a slide to nihilism and the consequent desire to attain some modicum of significance, or just disappear, or both (as is the case here). Why is such a thing so hard to mark? Well, it is found in oh, about half of all teens today. If we honestly begin looking for “the warning signs” in any given teen, I think we’re likely to find them in abundance. Here’s the big surprise. We allow kids to operate under the assumption that there is no God, no eternal significance, no purpose in this life except what we/you compose, and we are shocked when they live out the reasonable implications of this worldview. I’m referring of course, to Sartre’s dilemma of why we should choose life over death in light of our knowledge that there is no eternal significance to our existence. Sartre excused his silly desire to continue to live with a rather pathetic dodge, saying that he did not want to use his freedom (to die) to take away his freedom (universal). How he deemed “freedom” to be “good” is clearly the result of the fact that he had popularity, money, and relative autonomy. Seldom does a teen have such boons.

Here we have a prime instance of a very rational non-theistic life and death. His father committed a somewhat less rational suicide years before and therefore did not make international headlines. This student (obviously ready to die), determined to leave a mark in his passing and no one could argue that he failed. Unfortunately his worldview did not, I’m sure, entail eternal consequences to temporal actions. So he’s experienced a bit of a rude awakening, thinking that the bullets that he put into himself would be the end of life’s misery… only to find himself birthed into misery unending.

Well, I’ve been lazy, and so here are three weeks worth of audio lessons. As always let me know if you’re having any technical issues with them. They sounded great for me.

Church History
Martyrs
The Church

The worship of God is not exactly a new practice. Nor is it one confined to a single culture. As a result the ways that God has been glorified are diverse and innumerable. Song is perhaps one of the most often used techniques. I have to admit that the technique within song that impresses on me the awesomeness of God the most is the image of angels worshipping God.

“I saw angels fall down
at the glory of the Lord”.

That song always makes me stop and consider the glory of God.

I’m not a huge spiritual warfare guy. I don’t wander around wondering what angels do when they’re not hacking apart demons ala Frank Perretti. I don’t have a guardian angel bumper sticker on my car. In fact, angels don’t often factor into my theology much at all. The most play they get in my “God-thoughts” is right around Christmas when I think about shepherds getting knocked off their feet by the Christ child’s heavenly birth announcement.

But for some reason the idea of angels worshipping God strikes me as particularly powerful.

The sound of angel’s awe
The sound of angel’s songs
And all this for a King
We could join and sing
All to Christ the King

Excellent.