One Voice For The Generations: Conversations of Faith and Culture

June 27th, 2009 4 comments »

A short while back, I asked you what Christian writers or speakers you would like to hear from on key cultural questions.  Based on your feedback, I created the concept of “One Voice for the Generations”–a series of interviews that will address 5 questions that are shaping our Faith and world.

The Goal

More and more Christians are getting their spiritual guidance from internet resources. In our diverse culture, there are many misleading voices; which claim the name of Jesus, yet offer a deceptive Gospel. The mission of this interview series is to engage the on-line generation in an intergenerational dialogue to discern the Gospel of Jesus Christ and its application to our changing world.

The Format

The interview will consist of 5 questions. The same five questions will be asked of all interviewees who participate in this series. Answers to each question, along with a biographical sketch, will be posted on “More Than Cake” and YouTube.

The Questions

Q1:There are many “hot-button” issues facing the church in the West; abortion, gay marriage, gender equality, social justice, healthcare, terrorism, war, human rights, poverty, etc… For increasing numbers of Christians, politics has become the primary battlefront for the resolution of these challenges. Is it possible for Christians to engage in the political debate without compromising the Faith? What guidance can you offer the millions struggling to address these issues?

Q2: The Postmodern philosophy continues to have a strong influence on the church. In what way has postmodernism been a positive influence on the Christian Faith? In what ways has it been a negative influence?

Q3: The Christian market is being hit with a spate of books that criticize, or outright condemn, what some call the “institutional” or “traditional” church. Many of these same books promote some alternative form of “house” or “simple” church. What are your thoughts on tone of the debate? What insights can you offer to those who are seeking a biblical ecclesiology?

Q4: Since the time of the Apostles, there have been false teachers who have promoted a distorted Gospel. The Apostle Paul warns about their influences throughout his writings to the 1st century church. What is the best advice you can give the coming generation that will help them discern the truth of Jesus Christ?

Q5: Our world is changing at a seemingly exponential rate. With each passing day, there comes a persistent push against our approach and practice of theology. Some change has been positive for the church, some has been destructive and the impact of some change is yet to be determined. Calling upon your lifetime of experience, look to the future and pinpoint the one theological issue that will play the most significant role is shaping the church. How should the coming generation prepare for this change?

The Participants

shackshrtbannerThe first interviewee is with William (Paul) Young.  You may know him as the author of the Shack.  Our conversation took place over the phone and his answers to the questions above will go up in three parts starting on Monday.  I learned a lot about Paul and he has some great things to say.  See you monday!

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Posted in Culture

Michael Jackson Dead at 50

June 25th, 2009 2 comments »

At the age of 50, the talent and, tragedy, of Michael Jackson (1959-2009) has come to an end. Jackson was a man who thought himself the master of his destiny, but he never quite found the driver’s seat. My thoughts of Jackson are memorialized in this poem.

I am recognized the world over,
but see a stranger in the mirror.
I’m made in the everlasting image of God,
but surgery failed to bring me nearer.

I hide behind a surgical mask,
but everyone sees my pain.
I live in a land of fantasy,
but ghosts are never slain.

I search for joy in childlike things,
but peace eludes my plaintiff quest.
I was crowned by all ‘The King of Pop’,
but never found a place to rest

I destined my life
I stayed in control
I was the master of my fate;
The captain of my soul*

———
* The final two lines of this stanza are adapted from William Henley’s poem “Invictus” which, according to Justin Taylor, was quoted by Jackson in one of his ablum
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Posted in Poetry

Simple Church ™

June 25th, 2009 4 comments »

Inspired by my friend Alan’s post “Go Make Disciples ™“, I am convinced that church is meant to be simple.  All the institutional stuff  has really hurt our Faith.  Here is my new motto:

Church–So Simple That Anyone Who Follows Me Can Do It!


Why do we hold men above Christ?

Seminary trained pastors set themselves up as experts by writing books that teach us all kind of pagan things about leadership and community when all we truly need is the Bible.  I am so convinced that the Bible is ALL we need, that I am commissioning a team of writers with no seminary training and who have never lead anything to write a book that everyone should read.  This team of experts (with names you are sure to recognize) well give everyone all they need to know about how not to be a leader and how to avoid training so you can start a Simple Church.  Oh, and we will have a magazine too!!

Why do we need all those conferences for “professional” clergy?

Those conferences are corrupting the church and taking away the priesthood of all belivers.  To counter this spiritual-tragedy, I would like to invite everyone to a new conference starting next year.  The conference will be titled, “No More Conferences“.  We will feature worship bands (unprofessionally led of course) and lecturers who will teach us how sermons are bad because they feature just one guy talking with everyone in chairs facing forward.  Our conference will be held in a theatre where everyone will have nice chairs facing the stage so they can enjoy our featured experts.  Come to the conference and you will get trained by our totally uneducated and fully untrained experts on how to be a Simple Church leader.

Why do we make paid preaching/teaching the center of our faith?

I think it is terrible that we listen to sermons and download them and sell them when the Gospel should be free.  If you want to learn more, check back tomorrow and I will have a recorded talk you can download for a small fee or you can always order the CD.  The Apostle Paul never sold his letters to the church and next year I will also have a new copyrighted book out on Amazon that will tell you all about it for just $9.99.  These teachings will explain how we are destroying the church by trusting preachers who sell stuff all the time. (BTW, since I am not a paid preacher, I am allowed by the New Testament to sell this stuff… besides, my motives are pure unlike those other guys.)

Why have we made it so difficult to be the Spirit-led Church?

Men have put themselves out as leaders and make us think that unless we read what they write, we cannot be a valid church.  That is just not how God words.   So I am announcing the launch of a new blog that will feature all my books and all my recorded messages from conferences and weekly posts.  My site will teach you how not to follow after the teachings of men.  Trust only the Holy Spirit and follow me.

Why do we follow denominations?

Simple church will be all about rejecting denominations and seeing everyone as our brother and sister in Christ.  To help you figure out which churches are truly simple, and not heretical like those institutional ones, we will set up a network of Simple Churches.  We will have memberships and everything and promote our approved network of churches from our website.

Why do we meet in big buildings?

Anyone who reads the New Testament, or church history, knows that aside from meeting in public buildings or in Synagogues or caves, the church only ever met in homes.  If your church is meeting anywhere but a house, you are corrupting God’s simple church because the house is God’s designated place for church meetings.  A house is the only place that does not restrict the moving of the Spirit and A house is the only place where people won’t get corrupted by all the bad stuff.  (You will learn more about this at next years’ big conference)

Church is Simple and anyone can do it!!  So keep reading. listening, conferencing, networking, meeting in homes and downloading my stuff and I will teach you all the things you need to know about how to keep church simple and avoid the institution.

Oh, and don’t forget, if you don’t read all my stuff and listen to all my messages and go to my conferences, you will never know what stuff is forbidden by the New Testament and you will never be free from all the institutional stuff that holds you back.

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Posted in Church Planting, Discipleship, Ecclesiology, Emerging Church, Humor, Leadership, Religion

The Church is Not Your Sugar-Daddy

June 23rd, 2009 15 comments »

The church in the West is undergoing rapid change.  We are shifting from an Enlightenment worldview to a Post-modern philosophy.  The positive side of change is a stripping away of cultural encumbrance that has kept us from fulfilling the Gospel.  The downside of our current transformation, is that we are all-too-often exchanging one cultural norm for another.  One form of church is torn down, only to be replaced by a newer more culturally acceptable form.   One set of political mores, is replaced by another.

One example of transformation comes under the rubric of Social Justice (ie. poverty, homelessness, AIDS, etc…).  In serving the needs of the world, one of the key purposes of the Church–Evangelization of the lost–has been replace with the purpose to befriending the lost.  The call to demonstrate the mature love of Christ has been supplanted by a childlike fascination with wordly-compassion.

Tokunboh Adeyemo writes a salient response from an African perspective in this article entitled, “Contemporary Issues in Africa and the Future of Evangelicals”

To the world, the Church has the responsibility of witnessing for Christ and discipling the nations (Acts 1:8; Matthew 28:19). This does not preclude works of charily which are an intrinsic part of the good news. However, caution needs to be exercised in this area. The Church is not an organisation for social and political asylum, nor are we to use divine resources to bribe people into God’s kingdom. Since the Church is in the world but not of the world, she should not be indifferent to the social, political, and economic struggles of mankind; neither should she sacrifice her ambassadorial function at the altar of social involvement. Our Lord Jesus Christ liberates the total man: the material and the non-material. Thus he says: ‘If the Son, therefore, shall make you free, you shall be free indeed’ (John 8:36). The Biblical sequence begins with an internal spiritual regeneration and reconciliation of man to God, manifesting itself in an external physical transformation and reconciliation of man to man in society. The task of the Church therefore is to confront (not maintain dialogue with) the world with the claims of Christ as deposited in the Bible. This mission, central to the heart of God, his Son, and the apostles, must be the mission of evangelicals to the world. The New Testament Church was a missionary Church; and so must be ours. We must go forth (i) with a thorough-going Biblicism which does justice to the claims of the Scriptures, and (ii) with a Biblicism that is both contemporary and relevant.

* World Evangelical Fellowship. Theological Commission., vol. 2, Evangelical Review of Theology : Volume 2, electronic ed., Logos Library System; Evangelical Review of Theology (Carlisle, Cumbria, UK: Paternoster Periodicals, 2000, 1978), 12.

Does the love of Christ include tangible expressions of kindness? Yes! But, our mission is more than alleviating the temporal pains of this world. We, the followers of Jesus, have a greater call to give the world a hope beyond the ‘now’.  We are ambassadors of God’s Kingdom to this passing world and we must live accordingly.

Lest we forget…

Thirst is not quenched by micro-loans for building wells, but by the eternal wellspring of the Spirit.

Jesus replied, “Everyone who drinks some of this water will be thirsty again. 14 But whoever drinks some of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again, but the water that I will give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up to eternal life. (John 4:13-14))”

The hunger for meaning is not satisfied by wheat–bread, but through Jesus–bread.

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. The one who comes to me will never go hungry, and the one who believes in me will never be thirsty. 36 But I told you that you have seen me and still do not believe…

50 This is the bread that has come down from heaven, so that a person may eat from it and not die. 51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats from this bread he will live forever. The bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

52 Then the Jews who were hostile to Jesus began to argue with one another, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” 53 Jesus said to them, “I tell you the solemn truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in yourselves. 54 The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. 55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood resides in me, and I in him (John 6:35-36; 50-56).

The longing for love is not fulfilled in giving trinkets and bobbles, but in the person of God who IS love.

Dear friends, let us love one another, because love is from God, and everyone who loves has been fathered by God and knows God. 8 The person who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 By this the love of God is revealed in us: that God has sent his one and only Son into the world so that we may live through him. 10 In this is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.

11 Dear friends, if God so loved us, then we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God resides in us, and his love is perfected in us. 13 By this we know that we reside in God and he in us: in that he has given us of his Spirit. 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world (1 John 4:7-14).

I know how some folks will respond, “this kind of faith is not practical.”  But therein lies the problem.–Faith in the West is impotent.  The power of Christ, through His Spirit, to transform the world has been entrusted to preachers, politicians and pop-stars.  The church must not give Her grand place in the Kingdom to become the Sugar-Daddy to the world.  Do we really believe it?  Are we able to live it!

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Posted in Culture, Ecclesiology, Emerging Church, Missiology, Religion