Motivation!

"As members of the new covenant community we serve as tokens of the new creation, and live out the promise of a thornless, tearless, world. Knowing far, far less than this, Noah got out of the ark as the first step to a new world. Knowing what we know now, ought at least to make our getting out of bed each morning just a little more worthwhile!"

Philip Greenslade, A Passion for God’s Story, p. 142

The Technique of Prayer

There has been considerable debate in the blogosphere about what prayer techniques are acceptable for Christians. There are those who demand that we find biblical justification for any form of prayer.

With the exception of the “Our Father,” Jesus has little to say about the form of prayer. He has a lot to say about the attitude of prayer. But his message seems to be primarily, “Just do it.”

Of course, we need to always remember that prayer is spending time with the Father. It is not just a technique to relax or center ourselves. But it seems to me that if we spent more time with the Father, we would spend less time arguing with others about how they “do” prayer.

What do you think?

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Missing the Point

While thinking about the power Jesus promised us through prayer, we must not lose sight of what is most important. Prayer is first of all about a relationship with God.

Just before Jesus performed one of his most spectacular miracles, the raising of Lazarus, he prayed the following prayer, "Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me" (John 11:41-42).

What is Jesus saying? He is saying that he knows the Father intimately and knows what the Father wants to do. He knows this because he has been stealing away to spend time with the Father. The primary purpose of prayer is to get to know God.

How do we get to know another person? By spending time with him or her.

(I almost deleted this post. Because I’m not really saying anything new.)

If we are focusing on prayer in order to obtain spiritual power, then we’re missing the whole point. Besides, getting close to God is more valuable than any amount of spiritual power.

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Self-righteousness

I’ve been listening to some sermons by Tim Keller. (You can find a good list of audio files and documents at D. J. Chaung’s site.) He was talking about the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector (Luke 18:9-14). But he made a point that we are all subject to self-righteousness.

If we are not aware of our own tendencies to self-righteousness, we are like the Pharisees who claim to be able to see and thereby put themselves beyond Jesus’ ability to heal their blindness (John 9:41).

Like the Pharisee in the parable we pray, “God, I thank you that I am not like other people, those who

• don’t preach the true gospel.”
• are lost in emotionalism.”
• are too intellectual.”
• are legalistic” (double irony!).
• are not passionate about their faith.”
• are bound by traditional ways of doing church.”
• are unkind in their treatment of people with new ideas.”
• have a flawed theology (one different than mine).”
• say bad things about the people I like.”
• are people pleasers and say good things about the people I don’t like (teach ‘error’).”
• don’t care enough about the poor.”
• spend all their time focusing on social issues instead of focusing on the gospel.”
• aren’t clever like me.”
• don’t spend enough time doing spiritual disciplines.”
• practice the wrong spiritual disciplines.”

I could go on. But you get the point. We all justify ourselves in our own eyes. (If you just said, “I don’t do that,” gotcha!) But the point is not to call out others. The point is to expose our own drive to justify ourselves. We who have the spiritual oversight of others need to be especially careful (Galatians 6:1). And we who appoint ourselves as “prophets” to point out the errors of others on the Internet need to be even more circumspect.

So what do you think?

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Prayer or Magic?

(To catch up with the argument read this, this and this.) Here’s another idea to throw into the mix. If prayer worked the way many expect it to, then it would not be prayer. It would be magic. It would be a way to manipulate God. C. S. Lewis had some insight on this:

Invariable ‘success’ in prayer would not prove the Christian doctrine at all. It would prove something much more like magic—a power in certain human beings to control, or compel, the course of nature.

Then he points out that Jesus’ original request in the Garden of Gethsemane was not granted. And Paul had his request denied three times (2 Corinthians 12:8-9).

What is the difference between a mature believer who has her prayers answered consistently (and positively) and a (hypothetical) person who is able to manipulate God to do what he wants God to do?

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Training Required

Whenever people handle powerful (and therefore dangerous) things we usually require a certain level of maturity and often require special training. In many circumstances we even require a license, to verify that a person is qualified to use the dangerous object or substance.

You can think of many different examples. We don’t let children drink alcohol. We require drivers to be 16 and pass a competency test before they can legally operate an automobile. Doctors must take years of schooling and receive other professional certification before they can prescribe powerful medicines.

What would happen if God let everyone exercise the full power of prayer without spiritual maturity and without training in how to use it?

This seems to hint at an answer to why our prayers tend to lack power. Does this make sense? What do you think?

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Powerful=Dangerous

This statement by Dallas Willard got me thinking. I’m beginning to develop a satisfying answer to why our prayer seems to lack the power Jesus said it should have.

One good public answer to our prayer might be enough to lock some of us into weeks of spiritual superiority. Great power requires great character if it is to be a blessing and not a curse, and that character is something we only grow toward.
Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy, p. 368

What do you think?

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

The Power of Prayer

Jesus said some rather audacious things about the power of prayer.

He said, “I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it” (John 14:12-14).

He said, “So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened” (Luke 11:9-10).

He said, “I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you” (Matthew 17:20).

Yet we do not experience this power in our own lives. At least I don’t.

Why do you think that is? Why do our prayers seem to have little impact compared to the prayers of Jesus to the Father? He said that we would accomplish even greater things. So why don’t we?

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Preaching to the Choir & the Cynic

To whom should the pastor address his message? The Saddleback/Willow Creek model solves this problem with two kinds of “services.” On the weekends, they address the “seeker.” During the week, they instruct the believer.

There are some difficulties with this approach: many never make the transition from the weekend to the weeknight; seekers are not exposed to how Christianity works; believers often feel “under-fed” at the weekend “services;” the “world” assumes that what is being taught on the weekend is “all there is” to Christianity.

Tim Keller argues quite persuasively that evangelism and worship should be happening at the same time.

Here are the three concerns one must address to accomplish this:

• Making worship comprehensible to unbelievers
• Getting unbelievers into worship
• Leading to commitment

I know that sounds like “watering down the gospel.” (Before you make that judgment, read Keller’s biblical argument based on 1 Corinthians 14 and Acts 2.)

Tomorrow we’ll look at some of the practical issues involved in pulling this off.

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Looking for a Fight

For those of you who are visiting from Reflections of the Times, Pyromaniacs or BalylyBlog, welcome. Feel free to look around and make comments. But this is not the place for verbal fighting. If you want to debate me on some issue raised at those other sites, keep the discussion there. If you want to debate my controversial post at Behind the Scenes, I’ll gladly indulge you.

This blog, however, is like your mother’s living room. There are too many things that might get broken. So if you wanna fight, let’s go outside. Otherwise, let’s place nice.

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Seeker-Sensitive Remixed

The Willow-Creek Saddleback model has come in for a considerable degree of criticism. There are those who resisted it from the beginning. There are others who believe that its time has come and gone. I believe that much good has been done for the cause of the kingdom by these churches; however, there is unavoidable baggage when attendees are trained to think as consumers and start their journey toward Christ expecting to be entertained.

Some have rejected the slick, highly-produced presentation of the gospel and gone to the other extreme of rough-edged, spontaneous, “authentic” gatherings.

In New York City, Redeemer Presbyterian Church is following a “third way.” It is lead by the gifted Tim Keller. (This guy makes me feel like a pre-school dropout.) He suggests that the pastor speak to believers and unbelievers at the same time. In fact, he says, “Speak to your whole community, not just the ones in the seats.”

Traditional services tend to assume that the listeners have lots of biblical knowledge and are familiar with the insider jargon. They also tend to use “we-them” language. Consequently, the Christians who attend the service know that their non-believing friends would not feel welcome in the service.

Instead, a pastor should try to create an environment where the Christian attendee would say, “Oh! I wish my non-Christian friend could see (or hear) this!”

But this does not involve “watering down” the gospel. But it does involve presenting the gospel in different terms. The gospel has traditionally been presented as “forgiveness from sin.” But in a world where people don’t accept the concept of sin and say they don’t believe in moral absolutes, this approach falls flat.

Keller suggests that sin be explained in this fashion, “Sin keeps you from being free as you need to be, and therefore it enslaves and de-humanizes you.” The gospel shifts from being a gospel of forgiveness to being a gospel of freedom.

Now there is nothing unbiblical about this. We have been so conditioned to think of the gospel in terms of a legal transaction, that we have failed to notice all the other ways the gospel is presented in the New Testament. (See Three Gospels.)

Non-believers value freedom. They see religion as “restrictive.” They need to hear the need for the gospel is these terms, “You are actually being religious, though you don’t know it—trying to be righteous in a destructive way.”

Then they can hear the good news that Jesus Christ redeems us, frees us from slavery.

Tomorrow I’ll look at how Keller suggests that a pastor can speak to believers and non-believers at the same time and be effective with both groups.

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

One Gospel in Action

Pastor Tim Keller explains that the three different descriptions of the gospel are in reality just three different perspectives on the same gospel. But most Christians only see the gospel from one of these perspectives.

The first view could be called the Salvation Perspective. Most evangelicals have reduced the gospel to “getting saved.” They try to get people “converted.” Then they try to encourage these converts to “grow” as believers, but the most important work has been done. They are ready to go to heaven when they die.

The second view could be called the Kingdom Perspective. This is similar to the old liberal Social Gospel. It had a gained new life with the Emergent Movement. This view encourages believers to participate in the Kingdom of God as it takes on the kingdom of this world. Individuals are “recruited” to repent and accept Jesus as their Lord and King. This includes spending eternity with him but focuses on advancing the Kingdom now.

The third view could be called the Grace Perspective. This view is emphasized by one of my favorite authors David Benner. The Apostle Paul is talking about this in Galatians when he asked, “After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort?” (Galatians 3:3). The focus here is on learning to rely on God’s grace. This is also reflected in Paul’s statement, “When I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:10).

So what do you think? How does your view of the gospel affect how you go about your life?

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

One Gospel

In a previous post, I asked you to pick the real description of the Gospel from among three very different explanations. By now you’ve probably realized that all three are true and accurate descriptions of the one true Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Some might quibble over my attempt to summarize each perspective in one paragraph. Others might have a sectarian ax to grind. But in general, each of these is a more-or-less accurate explanation of the Good News.

Unfortunately, most Christians tend to emphasize one of these explanations at the expense of the other two. At best, this leads to an unbalanced approach to Christianity and evangelism. At worst, it causes a distortion of the gospel and leads to battles between Christians.

With the exception of a small but vocal group of Christians, everyone agrees that God gives humans the opportunity to choose whether to accept the gospel. (Please keep the debate over this issue at the other blog. Such comments here will be deleted.)

So let’s focus on the choice that one makes in response to God’s call from the three different perspectives.

From the first perspective, God’s call focuses on what Jesus Christ has done for us in his death and resurrection. He calls us to put our trust in Christ and receive eternal life (Romans 10:9, 10).

From the second perspective, God calls us to join the kingdom he is establishing in Jesus Christ. He calls for us to repent and submit to a new Lord, working to advance that kingdom starting right now (Luke 9:23).

From the third perspective, God calls us to accept his unconditional love. He calls for us to give up the impossible effort to make ourselves good. He calls us to live a life of grace (Ephesians 2:8-10).

The interesting thing is that most Christians interpret all three of these passages in the context of the first perspective.

But these three perspectives suggest three different approaches to how we go about living “in Christ.”

We’ll explore that tomorrow.

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Not a Balance

The metaphor of the two thieves may cause us to think that we need to strike a balance. But how can you have a balance between legalism and lawlessness? Between moralism and relativism? Proclaiming the gospel is not a balancing act between emphasizing God’s mercy and his holiness. It is something entirely different.

Tim Keller:

The gospel produces a unique blend of humility and boldness/joy in the convert. If you preach just a demanding God, the listener will have "low self-esteem"; if you preach just an all-loving God, the listener will have higher self-esteem. But the gospel produces something beyond both of those. The gospel says: I am so lost Jesus had to die to save me. But I am so loved that Jesus was glad to die to save me. That changes the very basis of my identity—it transforms me from the root.

I can't tell you how important this is in all mission and ministry. Unless you distinguish the gospel from both religion and irreligion–from both traditional moralism and liberal relativism–then newcomers in your services will automatically think you are simply calling them to be good and nice people. They will be bored. But when…the gospel is communicated in its unique, counter-intuitive balance of truth and love, then listeners will be surprised. Most people today try to place the church somewhere along a spectrum from "liberal" to "conservative"–from the relativistic to the moralistic. But when they see a church filled with people who insist on the truth, but without a shred of superiority or self-righteousness–this simply explodes their categories. To them, people who have the truth are not gracious. People who are gracious and accepting say, "Who knows what is the truth?" Christians are enormously bold to tell the truth, but without a shred of superiority, because you are [a] sinner saved by grace. This balance of boldness and utter humility, truth and love–is not somewhere in the middle between legalistic fundamentalism and relativistic liberalism. It is actually off the charts.

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Three gospels

Which of these is the correct expression of the gospel of Jesus Christ?

• Every person who ever lived has sinned and fallen short of God’s righteous standard. But God loved the world so much that he sent his Son to earth. Jesus lived a perfect life and died on the cross in your place, so that you wouldn’t have to pay the penalty for your own sins. In order to receive the eternal life now made possible through his sacrifice, you must repent of your sin and accept God’s gift of grace. If you make this decision then you are reborn and will spend eternity with God in heaven.

• God created a good world and put humans in paradise. But they rebelled against him and, in the process, became enslaved to sin and to the kingdom of evil. Jesus came to redeem God’s creation and establish God’s kingdom on earth. If you want to participate in this kingdom and enjoy an eternal kind of life, you must submit to Jesus as your Lord. This kingdom overcame evil in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. But the ultimate victory will not come until Jesus returns to inaugurate the new heavens and the new earth. In the meantime we work to advance God’s kingdom and oppose evil in every form in which we encounter it.

• God loves you unconditionally just the way you are. There is nothing you can do to make God love you more than he does now. There is nothing you can do to make God love you less than he does now. However, pride gets in the way of God’s love. The only way we can experience God’s love is to come to him in our brokenness and sinfulness. When we do this, we receive his grace. We cannot earn his love. But because we are loved, we allow God’s spirit to work in our lives to produce the fruit of the Spirit.

So what do you think? Which is the true gospel?

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Wesleyan "Onion"

This is too funny not to share. Consider it a little comic relief from our serious discussions. Enjoy.

Avoiding the “Two Thieves” part 3

Here is more application of the metaphor of the two thieves from the Web site of Sanctuary Church in Seattle (reformatted slightly):

Self-control:
Moralism tells us to control our passions out of fear of punishment. This is a volition-based approach.
Liberalism tells us to express ourselves and find out what is right for us. This is an emotion-based approach.

The gospel tells us that the free, perpetual grace of God "teaches" us to "say no" to our passions (Titus 2:13) if we listen to it. This is a whole-person based approach, starting with the truth descending into the heart.

Ministry in the world:
Moralistic religion will insist on converting others to their faith and church, but will ignore social needs of the broader community.
Liberalism tends to emphasize only amelioration of social conditions and minimize the need for repentance and conversion.

The gospel leads to love, which in turn moves us to give our neighbor whatever is needed--conversion or a cup of cold water: evangelism and social concern.

Worship:
Moralism leads to a dour and somber worship which may be long on dignity but short on joy.
Liberalism leads to a shallow understanding of "acceptance" without a sense of God's holiness and can lead to frothy or casual worship. (A sense of neither God's love nor his holiness leads to a worship service that feels like a committee meeting.)

But the gospel leads us to see that God is both transcendent yet immanent. His immanence makes his transcendence comforting, while his transcendence makes his immanence amazing. The gospel leads to both awe and intimacy in worship, for the Holy One is now our Father.

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Avoiding the “Two Thieves” part 2

Here is more application of the metaphor of the two thieves from the Web site of Sanctuary Church in Seattle (reformatted slightly):

The physical world:
The moralist is afraid of or indifferent to physical pleasure and wholeness.
The hedonist makes it an idol.

The gospel leads us to see that God has invented both body and soul and so will redeem both body and soul. Thus the gospel leads us to enjoy the physical and fight against sickness and poverty.

Relationships:
Moralism makes relationships into a blame-game and a never ending need to earn our love; often creates "co-dependency,” a form of self-salvation through neediness.
Liberalism reduces love to a negotiated partnership for mutual benefit.

The gospel leads us to sacrifice and commitment, but not out of a need to convince ourselves we are acceptable. So we can love the person enough to confront, yet we stay with the person when it does not benefit us.

Suffering:
Moralism takes the approach of Job's friends, laying guilt on the self. "I must be bad to be suffering."
Liberalism lays the fault at God's doorstep, claiming he is either unjust or impotent.

The gospel shows us that God redeemed us through suffering. He suffered not that we wouldn’t suffer, but that in our suffering we could become like him.

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Avoiding the “Two Thieves” part 1

Here is some application of the metaphor of the two thieves from the Web site of Sanctuary Church in Seattle (reformatted slightly):

Multi-culturalism:
The conservative approach is to idolize some cultures.
The liberal approach is to relativize all cultures.

The gospel of grace leads us to be:
somewhat critical of all cultures,
morally superior to no individual,
hopeful about any individual, and
respectful and courteous to each individual.

The poor:
The conservative elites tend to scorn the poor as failures and weaklings.
The liberal elites tend to scorn the religion of the poor and see them as helpless victims needing their expertise.

The gospel of grace leads us to be:
humble, without moral superiority knowing we were saved by grace,
gracious, remembering our former deserved spiritual poverty, and
respectful of believing poor Christians as brothers and sisters from whom to learn.

Difficult emotions:
The moralizing say, "You are breaking the rules-repent."
The psychologizing say, "You just need to love and accept yourself."

The gospel leads us to say: "Something in my life has become more important than God, a pseudo-savior, a form of works-righteousness.” The gospel leads us to repentance, but not to merely setting our will against superficialities.

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”

Two Thieves

Here’s a powerful metaphor from the thought of Tertullian, through the message of Pastor Tim Keller of Redeemer Presbyterian Church as reported in a blog archive by J. V. Moore:

The early Christian theologian Tertullian once said that just as Christ was crucified between two thieves, so the Gospel (the message of Christ) is crucified between two opposite errors. These two “thieves” can be understood as moralism (usually conservative) and relativism (usually liberal.)

Moralists tend to stress truth without grace, for they say we must obey the truth in order to be saved. As Tim Keller once said: “This view will lead either to a) self-hatred (because you can't live up to the standards), or b) self-inflation (because you think you have lived up to the standards). Moralistic people can be deeply religious--but there is no transforming joy or power.”

Relativists on the other hand tend to stress grace without truth, for they say we are all acceptable to God (if there is a god) and we have to decide what is true for ourselves. Relativists tend to prefer “liberal” religion. They may talk a lot about God’s love, but since they do not see themselves as morally deficient (“sinners”) God’s love costs him nothing.

The Bible describes Jesus as being “full of grace and truth” which is why he never seems to fit comfortably into either the conservative or liberal stereotypes.

The ironic thing about moralism and relativism is that they are both ways of avoiding Jesus as Savior and keeping control of our lives. And the result is either pride (because we have lived up to our rules) or despair (because we have failed to keep them.)

How different the biblical Gospel, which cannot be co-opted by either conservatives or liberals, for on the one hand it tells us we are far more sinful than we ever dared imagine, but on the other hand we are far more loved than we ever dared hope. It will surrender neither truth nor grace, but unites them both in the person of Jesus.
(Emphasis added and edited for brevity.)

Be sure to weigh in on the Three Gospels.

Pastor Rod

“Helping you become the person God created you to be”