New Wine, New Wineskins

Fifty years ago yesterday, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” Speech. That speech lives long in our memories, ringing in our ears, and hopefully, residing deep in our hearts as a dream we all share.

I am reminded this morning of that speech once again. May we all be judged by the content of our character and not the color of our skin—including my white hide. This is not to say that we should discount the color of our skin and hide it: we should value people’s skin color for how it adds to the richness of who we are in our multi-faceted diversity as God’s manifold creation, not for how it is used to devalue one another ethnically, economically, and spiritually.

This morning, I dropped my Japanese American son off at an African American man’s house in North Portland for an early morning fishing trip. The man in question fought valiantly in the Vietnam War for a country at war with itself on the question of race. I thought of the American flag hanging honorably and prominently in his front yard, noticeable even in the early morning darkness. It is well known that Dr. King spoke with great consternation about what he took to be the great evil structures associated with the Vietnam War: militarism, poverty and racism. Still, Dr. King would have honored this veteran for the content of his character.

My Japanese American son went fishing on the ocean today with three African American men I highly respect because of the content of their character. I have a dream that they will influence him so that he grows up to be the kind of American of whom Dr. King would be proud.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

This post contains the basic message I gave at Irvington Covenant Church in Portland, Oregon on the morning of  August 25, 2013. The church has been going through Paul’s letter to the Galatians. While drawing from other portions of Paul’s letter, I give special attention to Galatians 4:21-31 (the text for 8/25) in what follows.

Have you ever felt trapped in the past, that you could not get loose from the chains that grip you, the patterns and ruts and the memories that haunt you? The Gentile Christians in Galatia were starting to turn back to what they saw as the basic principles of the world (Galatians 4:9-11). They were trapped. What traps us today? What keeps us from living into the relational freedom we have in Christ, the basic principles of the kingdom of God?

Self-righteousness and self-condemnation are two sides of the same self-oriented coin. When we play into one or both of them, and they often play off of one another, we end up getting trapped and bound again and again and again. We must live into the freedom that is ours in Christ. We were born free in Jesus by faith. Let’s live into it rather than promote ourselves based on our works of the flesh or put down ourselves based on the failure to perform well.

This is easier said than done…

When I am asked to share my testimony, I will often say that I went from being Jim Morrison of The Doors to Jim Elliot who passed through the gates of eternal splendor. During my last year or two of high school, I worshipped Jim Morrison of the rock group, The Doors. Through a close call where I almost met my end, I came to trust anew in Christ and rededicated my life to him. During my Christian college years, I became impressed with the life of Jim Elliot, one of the missionaries who was martyred in Ecuador in 1956. Like Morrison, Elliot was not satisfied with coasting through life. He was always breaking on through to another side. The difference between the two of them concerned the focused destinations they were breaking through to in their lives. Enthralled with the example of Elliot, I graduated from my Christian college as someone who was expected to do great things for God. What I often omit when speaking of transitioning from Jim Morrison to Jim Elliot is that when I returned home from my out of state college to my old stomping grounds where I grew up, I was overwhelmed with thoughts and experiences of the past. It was if I had come to “The End” again. I went from being out of state to being out of my mind! I felt enslaved in my thinking, that my past had returned and was here to stay. I thought that the only side I could break through to now was the dark side of the force. No gates of splendor, only the gates of hell. A sense of unworthiness invaded my soul. I felt paralyzed and enslaved and condemned to my past. Thoughts of suicide tempted me. I had been born again free, born from above, but memories from my past were binding me and dragging me down.

Perhaps it was the case that all my attempts at being like Jim Elliot were simply a cover for trying to attain a sense of worthiness by Christian works and religious bravado. Self-righteousness and self-condemnation go hand in hand and they often feed on one another.

Perhaps you can relate? Whether they knew it or not, the Galatian Christians should have been able to relate. They were being led to believe that faith in Christ was not enough. They felt that they needed to add to faith; otherwise, they would not be found worthy. After all, they were lowly Gentiles. The irony is that if they were to now pursue worthiness by works–by being circumcised–they would then be found unworthy, and Christ would no longer be of value to them (Galatians 5:2). Instead of depending on the one who is worthy and faithful, who through faith in and from him makes us worthy, they would be depending on themselves and could never attain worthiness.

As I said above, these Galatians, these Gentiles, were now in the process of going back to their former ways–living according to the elementary principles of the world (Galatians 4:9-11) and the works of the law (Galatians 4:21) rather than living according to the promise by faith (Galatians 3:11). In the course of making his plea to the Galatians to live into the freedom that is theirs by faith in the promised one, Christ Jesus (Galatians 3:15-18), Paul makes use of the story of Hagar and Sarah (Galatians 4:21-31). Let’s read the text of Galatians 4:21-31:

21 Tell me, you who want to be under the law, are you not aware of what the law says? 22 For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and the other by the free woman. 23 His son by the slave woman was born according to the flesh, but his son by the free woman was born as the result of a divine promise.

24 These things are being taken figuratively: The women represent two covenants. One covenant is from Mount Sinai and bears children who are to be slaves: This is Hagar. 25 Now Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present city of Jerusalem, because she is in slavery with her children. 26 But the Jerusalem that is above is free, and she is our mother. 27 For it is written:

“Be glad, barren woman,

you who never bore a child;

shout for joy and cry aloud,

you who were never in labor;

because more are the children of the desolate woman

than of her who has a husband.”

28 Now you, brothers and sisters, like Isaac, are children of promise. 29 At that time the son born according to the flesh persecuted the son born by the power of the Spirit. It is the same now. 30 But what does Scripture say? “Get rid of the slave woman and her son, for the slave woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with the free woman’s son.”

31 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slave woman, but of the free woman.

As Paul makes clear, he is speaking figuratively here (Galatians 4:24). Hagar represents life according to the flesh whereas Sarah represents life according to faith. Abraham’s son Ishmael through Hagar was born according to the flesh, whereas his son Isaac through Sarah was born according to faith in the divine promise (Galatians 4:23).

The point Paul is making is not to demean the slave woman and her son back then, but to contend that none of us are slaves. All of us belong to the free woman, Sarah, who with her son Isaac are living signs of the promise. God took care of Hagar and her son and made Ishmael great as well (Genesis 17:19-22; Genesis 21:8-21), but Isaac alone is the Son of the promise (Genesis 17:15-22)–fulfilled in Christ, to whom Ishmael and all of us can belong through faith in him (See Genesis 12:1-3; Galatians 3:7-9).

So why does Paul make use of the story of Sarah with Hagar if he is not seeking to demean Hagar, the slave woman? While Paul is speaking figuratively, he bases his theological conviction on the historical narrative in Genesis: Sarah like Abraham were the ancestors of the family of faith who live by faith in the promise, even though Abraham often waivered, just like the Galatians were wavering now. Paul would never demean Abraham, the father of the Jewish nation and the family of faith, but he does draw attention to the fact that Abraham had two sons by different women. Of course, in his day, many men had many wives. But what is striking in the Genesis account is that Abraham grew tired and weak and wavered in waiting for God’s promise to be fulfilled that he would have an heir through Sarah, who was well advanced in years. So, he took matters into his own hands, along with Sarah. Sarah gave him her slave girl as a wife so that she could bear him a son who would be attributed to Sarah (Genesis 16:1-2).

Not only was that not what God had in mind, but also the plan backfired! Have you ever tried to help God out by getting ahead of him? I do it all the time. God never shows up late, but he never shows up early either. He always shows up just in time. Prayer and waiting on God is key. But Abraham and Sarah, just like us, took matters into their own hands. The result was that Hagar began despising her master’s wife, Sarah, since she had a son and Sarah didn’t. It led to great upheaval and divisions in the home (Genesis 16:1-6). As a result, God had Abraham send Hagar and her son, Ishmael, away. God took care of them–abundantly so, but the point Paul is making here is not about what happened to Hagar and Ishmael, but about what happens when we try and mix faith and works. Of course, faith involves works: true faith is active and obedient to God; but seeking to live by faith and by works where we find our identity by way of what God has done for us and by way of what we can do for ourselves always backfires. Life according to faith in the promise and life according to works cannot live together. One of them will end up getting kicked out of the house!

What causes people to try and combine them? In the case of the Galatians, I believe they were led to think that they were not good enough and so they tried to attain their righteousness by what they could do through such things as being circumcised (faith plus circumcision equals salvation, so some thought) rather than by faith in the one who loved them. As I stated above, self-condemnation and self-righteousness go hand in hand.

Hagar experienced self-righteousness and boasted in her having given birth to Abraham’s son Ishmael. Sarah, who with Abraham, was supposed to be the one who lived by faith in the promise that God would give her a son beyond the age of hope (Genesis 12:1-5; Genesis 15:1-6, Genesis 17:15-22) faced self-condemnation as a result. It was a huge mess. That’s the way it will be in the church when we live by works (such as seeking to attain righteousness through circumcision and its modern day parallels) rather than by faith in the promised one. We end up measuring others and ourselves based on how we measure up rather than based on the measureless overflow of God’s love in Christ and our identity in him.

Paul, like many other Jews, was concerned for family lineage and pedigree. Who’s your daddy? Who’s your mommy? Abraham and Sarah, not Abraham and Hagar! Abraham and Sarah are the parents of all who live by faith in the promise given to Abraham, the first Jew, who was a Jew by faith before he was a Jew by circumcision. Even so, Abraham faltered at times, just as we all do. Abraham tried to take matters into his own hands by trying to have an heir through Hagar since Sarah was well-advanced in years and supposedly beyond the age of childbearing. Knowing this about Abraham should comfort us and give us hope that even when we fail to live by faith our God who loves us will forgive us and lead us to respond by faith in his love anew.

In keeping with Paul’s line of reasoning, those who live according to works such as circumcision and the elementary principles of this world act as if Hagar is their mother. The results of trying to mix faith and works is disastrous, just as it was for Abraham and his household. If we try and live by works, we won’t experience the riches that belong to us by faith in the promised one, who is Christ Jesus. The irony is that by seeking to keep the law the Galatians and the rest of us fail to obey God, who called the Galatians and us, just as he did Abraham and Sarah, to obey him by living by faith (Galatians 5:7).

We belong to the family of the promise by faith, not the family of works by works. You and I belong to Abraham and Sarah by faith, not Abraham and Hagar by works. Don’t renounce your family of origins! Hold on to your birth certificate! We were born free. Live free! Live as the children of the free woman. Live as the children of the promise.

So, what bearing does this passage have on us here in our context in Portland, Oregon? Do we view and treat one another as slaves of this world system–the city of the world–or as citizens of the city of God, all of whom are born free and who live free together?

While Portland is a great city, it has a long way to go if it is going to move beyond being a city known for tolerance (which often masks indifference) to being a city known for sacrificial love. Its racialized structures of the past and its gentrifying ways of the present will not help the city get to where it needs to go. What about us? Where are we as the church? Can people find in the church such love, such unconditional love that motivates and mobilizes people to live by faith which leads to works of love?

Three places where people hope to find an identity outside of the enslaving structures in society that shackle them and put them down as insignificant and worthless are the home, the church, and the pub. So many people fail to find acceptance and belonging at school or the workplace or neighborhood that they hope to find it in the home and the church, but often end up resorting to the bar instead. In Christ, there is no division between Jew and Gentile, slave and free, male and female (Galatians 3:28). Since this is so, why do we often find just the opposite in the church?

The father of Black Theology, Dr. James Cone, writes in The Cross and the Lynching Tree that the African American community sought to attain freedom or at least relief from the updated slave laws of Jim Crow legislation in the home (at least in his family’s case, for he experienced security as a result of his parents’ sacrificial love and protection), in the church, and at the pub while playing, singing, and dancing to the Blues. The same may go for the rest of us. And yet, at least as it relates to the church, we sometimes bring the laws of segregation into the church with us.

How is it that we bring the updated laws of slavery into church with us–those of race and gender and class or other kinds of status divisions? All such divisions are rooted in the attempt to objectify one another so as to gain the upper hand.

When we lack security in Christ and the freedom that his love brings to the life of faith, we enforce high security prison systems within our hearts’ walls and also the walls of the church. Security in Christ leads to humility, which involves opening the doors to our hearts so as to let others in. Friend and fellow church member, Kari Dixon, shared with me the following reflection on Facebook in an exchange on the relation of self-condemnation and self-righteousness:

“But self-abasement is just inverted egoism. Anyone who acts with genuine humility will be as far from humiliation as from arrogance” (Stephen Mitchell). “Humility is just as much the opposite of self-abasement as it is of self-exaltation. To be humble is not to make comparisons. Secure in its reality, the self is neither better nor worse, bigger nor smaller, than anything else in the universe. It is – is nothing, yet at the same time one with everything. It is in this sense that humility is absolute self-effacement” (Dag Hammarskjöld).

Insecurity leads us to value one another based on our status as “Jews” or “Gentiles” or performance or failure to perform. Do we see one another for who we truly are–children of Sarah, the free woman, and as the people of the promise? Only this realization leads to true security and unity in the body.

Dr. John M. Perkins has exclaimed that the Black Church is the creation of the White man’s oppression. Whites need to stop oppressing and Blacks need to stop returning the favor. The repentance must start with Whites like me, since we have imposed structures of systemic oppression. Still, all of us must repent and move forward together, for we are all one in Christ Jesus (Galatians 3:28). The church belongs to the city of God, not the city of the world system, so let’s not operate according to its dehumanizing laws that cause us to objectify and enslave one another. Let us live into the promise of our future which has dawned in Christ Jesus, for we are already born free and belong to the city of God, the new Jerusalem that is from above.

So, how do we get there together? By realizing together that we are already there.

So, how do we live in view of the fact that we all belong and only and always by faith and never by works of self-righteousness and self-condemnation? By realizing together that Jesus alone is worthy and that he makes us worthy and by encouraging one another that we are worthy in Christ. Self-righteousness and self-condemnation involve playing the field with “Hagar” rather than staying true to “Sarah”. It involves demeaning Christ and demeaning his church, his bride. May we cherish Christ and one another. May this be the place where we can find acceptance and belonging from the laws in our society that would divide us and build us up only to tear us down. We need one another to help us live into the fullness of who we are in Christ rather than live the lie that we are on our own and we have to do it on our own.

I could have never made it on my own when shackled by the chains of of self-condemnation bound up with painful memories from my past. If it hadn’t been for dear friends and mentors like Pastor Samuel Mall and Dr. Philip Lueck, I don’t know if I would have made it. Just like my parents, they loved and accepted me and told me to rise up and get back on track, for Christ would not be enslaved to my past. Their Christ-centered confidence in me energized me to find new confidence in Christ.

We cannot make it on our own. You as my church family have helped my family and me find greater security in Christ. You have welcomed and embraced us and made us feel at home. May we continue to provide that love and assurance to one another and those who enter into our midst. Together, let us live free by faith in Christ through his love, for we are born free to love one another as equals with the eyes of Christ by faith.

We were born free in Christ, so let’s live free: “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery” (Galatians 5:1).

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

As you may know, I edit a journal for The Institute for the Theology of Culture: New Wine, New Wineskins called Cultural Encounters. We have a new issue out and I’d invite you to take a look. I’ve reprinted the Editor’s Introduction here, giving you a sampling of what is in this issue. If it piques your interest, head on over to the journal, subscribe, and read!

Was Moses a feminist? It all depends on what texts from the Torah one emphasizes and what one means by feminist. If one takes to heart such texts as Genesis 1:26–31 on male and female sharing in the image of God and lordship in the creation, Genesis 2:18, 20 on ezer, meaning “helper” (perhaps even “warrior”; the same word is used for God as a “strong helper”), and Genesis 3:16 on a man ruling over a woman because of the fall, one might think of Moses as a feminist. Of course, there are other texts that are taken by many interpreters to suggest that the society Moses helped form under God’s direction was patriarchal (See, for example, Ex 20:17; Ex 21:2–4, 7; Nm 5:11–31; Nm 18:1–7; cf. Ex 28:1). Still, even if one were to argue for patriarchy, God places limits on it to protect women’s rights in a post-fallen state (Ex 21:7–11). Feminist or non-feminist, Moses was no male supremacist.

The Bible does not have a lot to say about gender, but rather how we are to treat one another as those created in the image of God. There’s no talk about what kinds of toys boys and girls should play with or what colors they should like. Sure, there are those texts that say men should not dress like women or vice versa (Dt 22:5). But what then does one do with Scotsmen who wear kilts? Normally, we don’t think anything of it. We understand that such clothing is associated with masculinity in Scottish culture. Besides, I doubt anyone of us would have dared to mock William Wallace of Brave Heart fame for wearing one.

Was Jacob effeminate? He hung around the tents and did not hunt like his hairy brother, Esau (Gn 25:26–28; Gn 27:11). Yet God made him the Patriarch whose twelve sons became the heads of Israel’s tribes (Gn 49:28). What do we know about Samson’s masculinity? He seemed to be temperamental, moody, irrational, and brash (See Jgs 13–16); depending on one’s cultural norms, this could pass for stereotypes for men or for women. We don’t know much about Samson’s physique, except that he had long hair. He may not have been a big, brawny man, since his strength was associated with his length of hair and God’s presence (Jgs 16:17–20). Would that make Samson feminine? What about Jesus? Was he a real man? Did he hunt and fish? We know he was a carpenter’s son, but not much more. If we are taking Scripture to heart, we will realize that Jesus’ stance on women was radical in his day. Women accompanied Jesus along with the Apostles in Jesus’ ministry (Lk 8:1–3). They were permitted to listen to Jesus teach rather than be locked away in the kitchen (Lk 10:38–41). They also proclaimed the resurrection, as in the case of Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, who were given the task to inform the Apostles that the Lord had been raised from the dead (Mt 28:1–10; Jn 20:10–18). Jesus, who is the ultimate image of God (Col 1:18), is one with his body and bride (Col 1:15, 18; Eph 5:21–33) made up of men and women, to whom he gives himself sacrificially (Eph 5:21–33). His selfless giving stands in stark contrast to all the talk of men needing to be self-made and strong. It took a lot of strength for him to be so weak and give himself so selflessly in life and in death in order to make a new community not shaped by societal norms, but by his example in inaugurating the kingdom of God.

One finds talk in some Christian circles of real men being producers. What does that make of women? Consumers? A Trinitarian model of relationality involving dynamic relationality does not commodify and reduce men and women to quantities of production and consumption. Rather, men and women are communers who mutually produce and consume, but are not defined by such labels. What should define those of us who are Christians is a relational ontology shaped by Jesus’ radical example and union with his church noted above, but rarely noted in our day.

In this issue of the journal, we are not addressing such matters as church leadership, including complementarian and egalitarian themes, or sexuality, as such. There is quite a bit out there already in our circles addressing both subjects. We really wished to focus on gender. Not enough ink has been spilled on this issue, though a lot of blood has flown as a result of massive ignorance. Some of the articles in this issue of the journal set forth how gender and sexuality are distinct subjects, not one and the same. We are more interested in how the framing of gender impacts boys and girls, men and women of diverse ethnicities here and abroad, including on such subjects as sexual abuse, violence against women, and violence to men. One will find in the pages that follow that our views on gender have a significant, potentially painful, and even possibly dangerous bearing on how all of us approach maleness and femaleness.

The Editorial Board of Cultural Encounters maintains that Christian Scripture should always serve as our ultimate written authority as Christians in approaching any subject, including gender. In addition to Scripture, such subjects as sociology, including the comparison of various cultures on their views of gender, the historical development of a society’s and religious movement’s views on gender, along with such genres as film and science fiction, can also help us all think through our dominant cultural frames of reference on gender, provoking thought and constructive conversation. As you proceed in reading this issue of the journal, we do not ask that you agree with everything you read, but that you would be willing to reexamine your existing perspectives on gender in view of Scripture and the various sources studied. Take into account the various arguments involving Scriptural texts, statistics, definitions, and social groupings, along with the cultural reflections of women and men of diverse backgrounds who share their struggles on how views on gender have impacted them and countless others. Healing from trauma and compassionate and just action that flow from the sacrificial love of God can occur if we listen, look, and read well. In this light, consider how both biblically and missionally we can make our homes, churches, and societies more welcoming and inclusive spaces for cultural engagement as we seek to honor Christ, his church, and diverse peoples in our midst and across the globe.

Subscribe to and read this issue of Cultural Encounters.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

Ayn Rand was a most provocative and radical thinker, whom many leading Americans have claimed influenced their political and economic views.

Ayn Rand’s objectivist ethics frames morality in terms of rational self-interest or rational selfishness (Ayn Rand, The Virtue of Selfishness, Signet, 1964, p. xi). Among other things, she confronted altruism and hedonism (The Virtue of Selfishness, 33). Her interview with Mike Wallace reveals her convictions in precise and startling terms. Whether one agrees with her or not, one finds here a clear and creative communicator whose ideas must be taken quite seriously. As she makes clear in her interview with Wallace, she challenges what she takes to be the foundation (altruism) of Judeo-Christian ethics.

In my estimation, her ethical model of objectivism depends upon the ability and imperative of reasoning apart from emotional or experiential stimuli that otherwise impact rationality and upon a view of the self as autonomous. Can one reason in this pristine manner, and should one? And should one view the self as autonomous? If one answers in the affirmative, one would likely tend to affirm Rand’s objectivism as sufficiently rational and self-affirming. I don’t answer in the affirmative to either of these claims, and will discuss these matters further in future entries on the subject.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

Paul starts out all his letters with “Paul,” not “Dr. Paul” with a long resume of accomplishments attached, just Paul. He often refers to his being called by God to be an apostle–one sent by God (See for example 1 Corinthians 1:1). His calling and sense of identity were shaped dramatically by his Damascus Road experience and his time away in Arabia (See Acts 9:1-19; Galatians 1:11-24).

What shapes our identity and sense of mission? Do we sense God’s call? Or do we feel God has coerced us, or perhaps worse, that we are trying to coerce God and others to give us a free rite of passage? Paradoxically perhaps to some, no matter how hard we try to manipulate and outmaneuver God and others, we end up tying ourselves up in knots. 

I don’t get any sense from the letters in the New Testament attributed to Paul that he felt coerced by God. In fact, I come away with an overwhelming sense that Paul was overwhelmed by the fact that God would even choose him–of all people. This is a key indicator of those who truly sense that they are called by God and do not try to coerce God and others: they firmly believe the only right they have to serve God and others is God’s undeserved grace and mercy in their lives. Paul saw himself as abnormally born, as the least of the apostles, and as one who did not even deserve to be called one because he persecuted Christ’s church (1 Corinthians 15:8-9). Paul was a vivid example of the Lord’s words uttered to another pharisee being reversed: those who are forgiven much love much (Luke 7:47). The amazing love of God in Christ compelled Paul forward from the heart (2 Corinthians 5:14).

Far too many times in my Christian life I have operated from a sense that I deserve to serve as a leader rather than I only have a right to minister because God in his grace chose me and continues to choose me. I remember one occasion where I was talking with a colleague, complaining about not having the opportunity to minister in a certain context. After all, I had received a great amount of education and training to that point; I deserved to lead. My friend’s response blew me away: he wanted to stay clear of leading people because he was afraid that he would mess up their lives. He did not intend by his remarks to rebuke me. However, his words pierced me right between the ribs and showed me how undeserving I was of ministering before God to people. I wasn’t thinking about others, only myself. Those who minister from a sense of entitlement of deserving to lead will likely run over people and ruin their lives. While my friend needed to grow in his sense of God’s call on his life bound up with a Christ-shaped confidence in God (and he did), people were much safer with him than with me in ministry. May God continue to change my heart!

We will never change the world if God does not change us. Paul, when he was still Saul, wanted to change the world as much as he did when he was Paul the apostle. However, his framework completely changed: previously he would coerce and control others; he would enslave the church, taking Christians captive in chains to destroy them and the church. After his Damascus Road experience, Paul found it to be a great privilege to be put in chains for the church’s freedom and growth in Christ, for he was who F.F. Bruce called the apostle  of the heart set free. There were a lot of mundane moments along the way, no doubt, as Paul sat in jail cells in chains for Christ. But God used those chains and Paul’s confinement to unleash his church.

Have you ever met someone like Paul whose heart has been set free by God to obey God wherever God leads? My wife and I recently heard Loren Cunningham, the Founder of Youth with a Mission, deliver a message at a church one Sunday morning. After the pastor of the church introduced him with all the customary and appropriate words of respect, Cunningham began sharing of God’s personal call on his life to obey God. Cunningham didn’t talk about his accomplishments over the years, but of God’s intimate initiative and his response of faith in obeying God in various situations. The message was quite simple, though profound and refreshing. No posturing. No positioning. No sense of being coerced and no attempt at coercing. Just a sense of God’s call to obey and a delight in responding in faith to obey God.

I had the opportunity to interact with other YWAM leaders, such as Danny and Linda Lehmann and John Dawson, around the time of hearing Cunningham speak. I came away with a sense that like their movement’s founder these leaders are captured by responding to God wherever he might lead. That is the way movements are formed and sustained, and kept from turning into monuments for personality cults of people driven to build empires for their egos. I sensed nothing of such empire building during my time of interacting with them, simply a passion to respond to God’s call on their lives, even in the little things. Like Danny Lehmann’s book The Next Big Thing: How Little Choices Can Make a Big Impact makes clear, “Little choices to obey the next thing God puts in front of you, whether big or little in your eyes, can change and make history,” as long as our definition of big and little conforms to God’s own definition. Simple though profound and refreshing truths. No coercion, just a sense of calling to obey God in the little things. That’s actually quite a big deal.

Those who sense that they are called by this God who loves them will not try and coerce God and others in their desire to change the world. Rather than running over people in their passion to make a world-changing difference, they will become the world-changing difference in giving themselves up for others for Christ. As was said of the Lord hanging on the cross, he who saved others cannot save himself (Matthew 27:42). Are you and I who claim to be Christians trying to save ourselves by finding some grand call for our lives, or is Christ’s call of love to obey him in faith every step of the way more than sufficient to give us meaning and purpose? Only as we experience his call to obey him in the little and big things of life as defined by God will we be the kind of people who have anything of value to contribute to the church and the rest of the world.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

My friend, Tom Krattenmaker, has written an important new book bearing on concern for the common good titled The Evangelicals You Don’t Know. Krattenmaker, who is a self-professed liberal, hopes that progressives like himself will welcome the changing face of Evangelicalism. In a recent Huffington Post article, Krattenmaker has written to liberals about “6 Evangelicals You Don’t Know…But Might Want To.”

Only one of the individuals mentioned in that list is a woman, who is also a person of non-Anglo heritage, my friend and colleague, Lisa Sharon Harper. My statement is not intended as a criticism of Krattenmaker’s article. Rather, I intend to build on this point by highlighting that the article is suggestive of what stands out in Evangelical circles and is structurally symbolic of the movement even at this time.

In what follows, I am building on Krattenmaker’s claim on pages 9-10 of The Evangelicals You Don’t Know and calling for greater attention to be given to Evangelical leaders who are women and people of diverse ethnicity whom Evangelicals don’t know, or don’t know enough, and need to know better. Krattenmaker is sensitive to this subject. Here is what he writes on pages 9-10 of The Evangelicals You Don’t Know.

Many of the people and projects described in this book fit, roughly, a category you might call the “new evangelicals.” That is a term you’ll see often on the pages that follow, mixed in with variations like “new-century evangelicals” and “new-paradigm evangelicals.” Who are they?

Part of the answer is that the characters in this book are generally Caucasian.  Not to deny black churches the attention and credit (and criticism) they warrant, and not to imply that African American, Latino, and other non-white evangelicals are not participating in the course corrections necessitated by the changing times. But the transformations and correctives described in this book are generally seen in the ranks of white evangelicalism, a tradition that has largely been distinct (and, sadly, separate) from the black Protestant experience in America and that finds itself today with distinct challenges and imperatives for change.

In addition to being white, the new evangelicals chronicled in this book are generally, but not exclusively, young adults and adults in early middle age. Sharp-eyed readers will notice, too, that a disproportionate number of the central figures of this book are male. This parallels an unfortunate reality about this new evangelicalism (and the old one, too)—namely, the movement is largely led by men. By showcasing several women in the coming chapters, I hope to encourage more to step forward, and more men to accept their leadership.

In this spirit, Krattenmaker goes on to give prominent, chapter-heading roles to Lisa Sharon Harper, Julie Clawson, and Stephanie Tama-Sweet. Others who stand out to me and who need to receive consideration in future works include Andrea Smith, Mae Elise Cannon, Sandra Van Opstal, Mimi Haddad, and Carolyn Custis James. The list could and should go on, so please add more!

I have mentioned previously in my writing that my wife, Mariko, a native of Japan, has encouraged me and white, male Christian leaders like myself to share the microphone with others so that the body of Christ can become more well-rounded and whole. One area where such sharing of the microphone needs to occur increasingly is at Christian conferences. My friend and colleague, Soong-Chan Rah, recently spoke about how monolithic many Christian conferences are in terms of the diversity—actually the lack thereof—of keynote presenters. Of course, white male Christian leaders have something vital to contribute to the ongoing conversations around the church, the gospel, and the Christian life. Given the makeup of numerous conference speaker lists, it almost goes without saying that white, male Christian leaders are viewed as having something vital to contribute. What needs to be stated in increasing measure is that we need to hear from a greater variety of diverse perspectives and voices, including especially women and men of non-Euro-American ethnic heritages, so that our appreciation and understanding as Evangelicals of the church, the gospel and the Christian life can become more well-rounded and expansive.

As we Evangelicals get to know and hear from an expansive number of Evangelical leaders who are women and men of diverse ethnic backgrounds here in North America and across the globe, we will come to know better who we as a movement are and what the gospel of the kingdom entails for us in our day.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

What does it look like to live out the Christian faith in a multi-faith society? My recent Leadership Journal article titled “The One and the Many: Ministry that’s clearly Christian in a multi-faith world” begins with the following words:

We now minister in a multi-faith society. Our congregants are living and working in a multi-faith world.

Our congregants of Asian-American heritage may very well attend funeral services of Buddhist family members where incense is burned.

Our church members will probably be asked during a coffee break what they make of the Dalai Lama as a spiritual guide, or what they think of Islam.

Other parishioners might be enrolled in yoga classes or may have close Mormon friends. Our church members need to know how to talk about and interact constructively with those of other faith traditions… (The full article can be found online at Leadership Journal)

In addition to what I write in the article, where I draw from the examples of military chaplains, pastors and Dr. Billy Graham participating in multi-faith settings of different kinds in grace and truth-filled ways, it is important that we continue to reflect on how to live out the Great Commission in our day as we train those entrusted to our spiritual care. Such training will include teaching those we mentor to obey all that Jesus commanded, taking to heart the staggering claim that all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Jesus (Matthew 28:18-20). Jesus’ instructions included the Great Commandment of loving God with all one’s heart and the ensuing instruction to love one’s neighbor as oneself (Matthew 22: 34-40; Mark 12:28-34). Certainly, this is a tall order! What does such training look like for Christians seeking to live out the New Testament teaching that includes baptizing people in the singular name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19) in a multi-faith society in the twenty-first century? Certainly, Jesus and his followers like Paul lived in a multi-faith society. In many ways, ours is similar. In other ways, it is quite different. More on that in a later post.

What I write here is intended to stimulate ideas and cultivate conversation. By no means should these brief reflections be taken to be exhaustive. Moreover, I plan on writing a series of posts on this subject.

Teaching our disciples/parishioners to love God with all our heart and our neighbors as ourselves will move us beyond avoiding how to engage people of diverse religious backgrounds and beyond compromising our faith to engage them. So, where might one begin?

While one may be overwhelmed by the prospect of interacting with someone of another faith tradition such as Islam, Buddhism or Paganism if one does not know much about that particular tradition, one can still learn to ask good questions that invite rather than negate conversations. Inquisitiveness rather than an inquisitional posture is key. One can be inquisitive in a way that does not leave one’s own faith behind, and which is informed by one’s faith. In fact, the answers people of other faith traditions provide can shed light on parallels and also distinctive and unique features of the respective faith traditions that further inform one’s own faith.

Just this week I was in a conversation with a person of a different faith tradition, where I asked the individual in question what it is she believes and practices and why she finds her particular tradition so fulfilling. I asked simply out of a desire to understand. None of my questions were loaded, though I always welcome the opportunity to share the reason for the hope that I have in Christ in a manner that is hopefully gentle and respectful, as Peter commends (1 Peter 3:15).

If I care about my diverse religious neighbor as myself (and based on Jesus’ teaching in Luke 10:25-37, my neighbor is not simply the person who believes like me!), I will take an interest in what matters most to that person, just as I would hope the person in question would take an interest in what matters most to me. Taking an interest in what matters most to another person does not entail compromise. In fact, I may strongly disagree with this or that adherent of another faith tradition, and in the right context and in a gracious and truth-aspiring spirit, express how my convictions differ and why. Going further, far from compromising my faith, taking the views of another human being seriously is for me bound up with taking Jesus seriously, who knows intimately every detail of our human condition and all our aspirations.

More to come.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

I was invited to speak at the historic Hawaiian church, Kawaiaha’o Church, on July 7. It was an honor to be with their congregation and share this message. You can listen to me deliver the sermon or read it below.

Where do you belong? To whom do you belong? These are the kinds of questions with which we live all our days—from childhood to our elder years.

Back in 1998, when my son (our oldest) was 3, we were in Japan, hoping to land a job, after finishing my course of doctoral studies. To make a long and tumultuous story short, our perfect picture and almost certain plans for a future in Japan came to a surprising and crashing halt. We were living out of suitcases, staying with relatives for a few months in Nagano, Japan, until we decided we should return to the States. One day during our long wait my son said to my wife: “Mama, let’s go home.” My wife later cried as she shared his words with me: “We have no home.” No home in the States where I am from, or England where we lived the past three years while I pursued my doctoral studies, or Japan where she is from. But we did have one another…

A few weeks ago, my elderly and widowed mother in Illinois shared with me how much she misses my father and how hard it is to be in transition: having moved from their home of many years to a smaller place, where he would eventually die as a result of cancer. My mother shared with me that what brings her comfort now is that no matter the setting Jesus is her home…

In Luke 10, we find that Jesus and his kingdom are his followers’ home, even in the midst of uncertain and difficult journeys. The disciples were living out of suitcases—perhaps empty ones. They had no home. All they had was him, but they found in due course that he was ultimately all they needed.

In Luke 10:1-24, we find that Jesus sends them out on mission to go before him into all the towns and villages where he would go and proclaim the good news of the kingdom embodied in him (Luke 10:1).

As we will soon see, there is nothing about his followers to brag about. Jesus brags about his Father’s grace in revealing the kingdom’s mysteries to them (Luke 10:21). It is the one who sends them who gives them their significance: his disciples find their significance in relation to him. Given who God is and who we are, we dare not speak for him. But given that God sends us out in relation to Jesus and calls us to speak the good news of the kingdom, we must speak!

There were so many places to go in such little time. As they set out, Jesus calls on them to pray for more workers: the harvest is plentiful and the workers are few (Luke 10:2); the need is so great and the time is so short. Jerusalem and the cross are getting closer and closer as Jesus quickens the pace. The Lord tells his disciples not to take anything for the journey, but to depend on God and the people of peace who will welcome them on their way (Luke 10:3-9). Jesus tells them to bless those who bless them, for the kingdom of God is near in his coming (and he is coming soon!) and to warn those who don’t welcome them, for the kingdom of God is near in his coming (Luke 10:8-12).

We see here in this passage how desperate his followers are for him. They depend on Jesus’ word and find their identity in relation to his call on their lives and his promise to take care of their every need (cf. Matthew 6:33). How dependent on the Lord are we, or do we look to find our security outside his call and promise to care for us?

What is most striking to me about this passage are the comparisons and superlatives Jesus makes.

Jesus is not some pop psychologist who sets everyone at ease by telling them “I’m okay. You’re okay.” Jesus is no prosperity gospel preacher who tells people to give to others, even to God, simply to get. Rather, he is a fiery prophet who condemns the inhospitable. He tells his contemporaries that it will be better for wicked Sodom on judgment day than for the town that does not welcome Jesus’ followers who are identified with him. Sodom’s wicked inhospitality pales in comparison with such townspeople’s rejection of him and his followers (Luke 10:12).

Just like Sodom over inhospitable places whose people do not welcome Jesus and his followers, it will be more tolerable for pagan Tyre and Sidon on judgment day than for Chorazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum where Jesus performs miracles but to no avail. The people in these places reject Jesus and his message. Even Tyre and Sidon would have repented long ago if confronted with the miracles Jesus performed in the midst of these other places. Anyone who rejects Jesus’ followers rejects him, and anyone who rejects Jesus rejects his Father. That person’s fate will be most severe (Luke 10:13-16).

Are we like the people of Tyre and Sidon, or worse, Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum, when confronted with Jesus’ miraculous presence? Depending on how our lives answer that question, the outcome could be unbelievably wonderful or catastrophic.

The disciples return and are ecstatic as they share with the Lord that the demons submitted to them in his name (Luke 10:17). Jesus is not amazed, but rather matter of fact as he receives this news. He is not surprised. He’s been there and done that many times before; in fact, he’s done even better: he is there when Satan is cast from heaven like lightning. No wonder he has the authority to give them power over serpents and scorpions and Satan’s brood (Luke 10:18-20). But still, what should amaze his followers most is that Jesus has displayed his authority by writing their names down in heaven as their eternal destiny! This is where their hope should reside!

What defines us-casting out demons of whatever kind in Jesus’ name or being called and secured by Jesus? So often, I fear that I use Jesus for power encounters, getting my high from his power and anointing and benefits rather than from Jesus who truly benefits us. How I long to long for him from whom love and power and goodness flow. How I long to find my rest in him!

In closing, I wish to thank the church family here at the distinguished and historic Kawaiahao Church. There are no doubt many people who come through these church doors who long to experience the Aloha spirit that you have so graciously extended to my family and me this morning. Many who enter this memorable church may have homes, but don’t have anyone with whom to share life or who welcomes them home or who remembers them. Thank you for sharing your hearts and church home with all of us who visit here. I will never forget it. May all who enter here taste the Aloha of heaven and through your grace and care for them come to trust in Christ Jesus and journey to their eternal home.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

This is part of a series of posts on the topic of Hawaiian theology. Start with part 1 and part 2.

Some may fear the loss of authoritative control when considering the possibility of how orality may shape textuality and theology generally. Whether we are aware of it or not, orality and other forces shape our approach to texts. Those we deem authoritative shape our readings of texts. Schools of thought develop around those who are deemed authoritative.

Take for example Jesus. In Matthew 7:28-29, we find that Jesus is viewed as authoritative, as his teaching is compared favorably with the teachers in his day. No doubt, it had something to do with the nature of his claims, which were staggering in terms of how he viewed his uniqueness and his teaching’s import for their lives. Notice how he compares himself favorably with the Law–seeing his teaching and work as the fulfillment of the Law and how his disciples’ righteousness must surpass that of the religious leaders if they are to attain eternal life (Matthew 5:17-20). The wise build their lives on his teaching, which is to do the will of his very own Father, who is in heaven. Those who fail to build their lives on  his word do so to their eternal peril (Matthew 7:21-27).

As we move forward in Matthew’s gospel, we see more and more clearly how there is complete consonance between Jesus’ words and life. May that be true of all of us who are teachers!

I have noticed in the Hawaiian context how it is even more significant than it is in the continental U.S. that one is connected relationally–having relational authority, including the need to make relational connections to those with whom one speaks. Authority in this context is earned increasingly, as the relational connections are built. One needs more than degrees and titles and resumes. They have their place. But they can never replace what is of paramount importance–relational connections.

Authority can be imposed on people. But such authority does not win people’s love–only their spite and hate. In contrast, Jesus wins people’s hearts by laying down his life for them, not by ruling oppressively over them. The kind of authoritative orality arising from Jesus that forms his rabbinic school is shaped ultimately by his sacrificial life offered up for his students, not sophisticated rhetoric that may wow people’s intellect, but does not win their total trust.

Hawaiian theology as I envision it requires that its teachers give themselves, including their words. Only then are teachers truly deemed authoritative and their teachings worth writing about.

As challenging as it may be for those of us who teach in Hawaii (and elsewhere for that matter), we should become like Father Damien, the Catholic missionary who gave himself for the people at the leper colony on Molokai, not like the prototypical plantation overseer or luna. Only then are teachers truly deemed authoritative and their own teachings worth writing about.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

This is part of a series of posts on the topic of Hawaiian theology. Start with part 1.

The study of Hawaiian theology is a very intricate and fragile affair. The intricacies are bound up in part with the multi-ethnic reality of Hawaii. One must also account for the oral nature of communication historically and presently. One scholar here in Hawaii shared with me how difficult it is to study Hawaiian theology since Native Hawaiians have so often resorted to oral means of communication such as songs and chants to convey theological concepts.

How does an oral form shape a theology? For one, it suggests that personal connection to an authoritative link in the tradition of oral communication is essential. This authoritative link is viewed as a trustworthy and wise elder, not simply someone who has technical mastery of a skill or discipline in a particular field. Moreover, it requires that one take all the more seriously the recipient of the message’s own personal integrity and capacity to receive the communication. I recall the story of a discussion that took place between an elder in an indigenous community and his nephew. The nephew wished to receive wise instruction from his uncle. Before his uncle shared the information with the youth, he sized him up to see if he was mature enough and worthy of trust to share such instruction with him. The same level of scrutiny does not go into written forms of communication in that the personal connection is often lost. There is often no transmission from person to person, as in the case of person to person oral communication.

Moreover, the oral framing of theology suggests that there is greater flexibility since the process of communication is more dynamic and evolves more than with written communication. This statement should not be taken to suggest that there is no concern for precision in that in some contexts teachers and students go to great lengths to convey accurately the tradition. Nonetheless, oral communication involves a level of spontaneity and organic development often lacking in written communication. Once communication is fixed in writing, there is the tendency to fossilize it rather than see it as part of a growing, dynamic tradition.

One would hope that greater attention to the growing, dynamic nature of such a tradition would guard participants and students of such dialogical endeavors from becoming ideological and argue that their interpretation alone has validity. Rather, it is hoped that they situate themselves in a manner so that they listen to others’ perspectives and articulations of tradition in the effort to preserve and develop the tradition and keep the conversation going. It is my conviction that the dynamics that go into the making of Hawaiian theology convey a more open, egalitarian and less authoritarian posture than is found in many other contexts, for example, in the continental United States, for the heart of communication is talking story together in an ongoing, dialogical fashion.

Theological dialogues are more intricate and fragile than monologues in that there is give and take and response and differentiation as well as synthesis as the dialogue proceeds. Any relationship that is truly relational is intricate and fragile and any textually based theology could learn a thing or two from a model of theology that is based in talking story. For theology to live it must be spoken and practiced in dialogical relation to others. I would much rather talk theological story around a table with people of one heart and unique perspectives than dictate from podiums to blank slate brains. Besides, the latter do not exist. Everyone has something to share. The real question is: will I take time to listen, learn, and enter into the conversation in a vulnerable and transparent manner that involves risk for all people at the table? To be continued…

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

What is Hawaiian theology, and what goes into the making of it? The answers to these questions are far beyond my comprehension because there are so many facets to them. Still, they are worth exploring. This post begins to explore them. Along these lines,  it is worth addressing questions of cultural preservation as well as transformation and the contextualization of the gospel in the Hawaiian culture, as with any culture. Not that one ever answers fully such questions, but if one is not addressing them, it is quite likely that by default dominant and even hegemonic cultural forces that may be alien though present to the Hawaiian context (or any context for that matter) end up co-opting and reframing the categories in service to empire so that what is distinctively Hawaiian is lost.

These are not esoteric issues to me that have no pertinence to my life and work, or those for whom I care. I constantly reflect upon them wherever I am—whether in places like the Pacific Northwest, England, Japan, or in Hawaii, where I am teaching a class on comparative theology presently. In this course, I am analyzing categories and themes present in many forms of Western theology and Black theology, as well as giving sustained consideration to theology developed in distinctively Hawaiian terms. My ethnically diverse colleagues and I in the class are wrestling through these issues in a robust manner. I have found our discussions very enriching and thought-provoking.

We have noted the complexity of getting at a distinctive Hawaiian theology, and for numerous reasons. For one, there is the multi-ethnic texture of Hawaiian culture. It is not uniform. Given that such diversity is not separated out into various remote spheres, but is lived out in close proximity to other ethnic heritages on a small group of islands, one has to be able to articulate how the various ethnic strands distinctively contribute to the making of a uniquely Hawaiian theology where their particularity is accounted for in synthetic and dialectical relation.

Some Hawaiian jokes and songs reverberate with generalizations that speak to the cultural particularities and how they come together on these islands, such as “Mr. Sun Cho Lee” by Keola and Kapono Beamer. The song closes with words getting at how amazing it is that the various ethnic groups can live together given how much fun they poke at one another.

One cannot develop a theology based simply on such songs, although they do shed some light on the situation. Theology has to move beyond sound bites. As Hawaiians themselves say, people need to “talk story with one another.” In other words, people need to enter into dialogue to unpack the meaning of such songs’ lyrics, even challenging the generalizations where appropriate. People and their cultures are more than generalizations. While generalizations have some staying power because they get at certain dynamics that are present in a given culture, they are often reductionist in outcome. Thus, it is important to immerse oneself in people’s lives in given cultural settings, getting to know their stories and the songs and chants that arise from within their souls and what gives rise to them. Such inquisitiveness and curiosity do not convey weakness and an infantile mindset, but rather an expansive spirit. Moreover, such qualities are essential to the development of contextualized theologies against the backdrop of amorphous and hegemonic theologies of empire. To be continued…

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

This is part of a series of posts on the topic of racialized theology. Start with part 1.

We often look at Black theology as contextual theology, but fail to see that all theology is contextualized. It is all enculturated. White western theologians like myself present contextualized theologies, too. This statement is not intended to relativize a given theology or to say that it is unbiblical, but to say that there is no such thing as an unenculturated gospel.

Here I call to mind a statement by Lesslie Newbigin: “The idea that one can or could at any time separate out by some process of distillation a pure gospel unadulterated by any cultural accretions is an illusion.” (Lesslie Newbigin, Foolishness to the Greeks: the Gospel and Western Culture [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1986], p. 4). The Japanese Christian intellectual Uchimura Kanzo put the matter in the following way:

A Japanese by becoming a Christian does not cease to be a Japanese. On the contrary, he becomes more Japanese by becoming a Christian. A Japanese who becomes an American or an Englishman, or an amorphous universal man, is neither a true Japanese nor a true Christian (Kanzo Uchimura, “Japanese Christianity,” in Sources of Japanese Tradition, vol. 2, ed. Ryusaku Tsunoda, Wm. Theodore de Bary, and Donald Keene [New York: Columbia University Press, 1958]; reprint, H. Byron Earhart, ed. Religion in the Japanese Experience: Sources and Interpretations, The Religious Life of Man Series, ed. Frederick J. Streng [Belmont: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1974], 113 [italics added]).

Kanzo then proceeds to argue that the Apostle Paul, Martin Luther and John Knox “were not characterless universal men, but distinctly national, therefore distinctly human and distinctly Christian,” adding that Japanese saved as “‘universal Christians’ may turn out to be no more than denationalized Japanese, whose universality is no more than Americanism or Anglicanism adopted to cover up their lost nationality” (Ibid., 113-114).

It is critically important that we discern how culturally embedded we and our theological constructs are. If we are blind to this reality, we will be blind to the danger of imposing our theologies on others. Thus, it is important that we announce ourselves when we enter the room for theological conversations. Our own ethnic heritage, for example (and we all have one, not simply Koreans or Brazilians or African Americans, but also Anglos…), should be accounted for in the framing of our theological perspectives, as well as our socio-economic milieu, among other dimensions. As we enter into dialogue with theologians of other perspectives and cultural contexts, we will also become more aware of our presuppositions and situated theologies and be able to cultivate richer theological perspectives as a result of such conversations… To be continued.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

I am thankful for the midwives who helped us bring our children into the world. They didn’t create our kids or magically pull them out of thin air. They coached my wife and me as my wife took deep breaths and pushed them into the world while I held my breath, praying to Jesus all the way.

So many people today look at Jesus as a midwife, not God incarnate. Even those who view him as an incarnation don’t view him as the one and only incarnation of God. None of this is new. Søren Kierkegaard observed this trend in his own day. Kierkegaard spoke of this trend as “the Socratic view,” which he witnessed in aspects of Hegelian thought. On this account, Jesus is a midwife, like Socrates, helping humanity bring forth what has always been there within it, albeit implicitly, namely, its own participation in the divine nature. I shared Kierkegaard’s argument on this subject today in my theology class. You should have seen the looks on people’s faces, as they were giving birth to thought.

Kierkegaard says of “the Socratic view” that “Every human being is himself the midpoint, and the whole world focuses only on him because his self-knowledge is God-knowledge.”[1] From this Socratic perspective, as Kierkegaard reflects upon it, knowledge of the eternal is latent within humanity, needing to be awakened from its dormant state. On the Platonic view, reflected in Socrates, eternal truth lies within the human self, whose soul is eternal and which was eternally cognizant of the eternal forms prior to (but not since) birth.

In contrast to this perspective, Kierkegaard claims that we must look beyond ourselves for truth, for within ourselves we will only discover “untruth,” “for the learner is indeed untruth.”[2]  In contrast to the midwife who serves as an occasion for the awakening of truth or really untruth within ourselves, and not truth itself, Kierkegaard writes of the teacher who is not simply a teacher, but who is “the god himself.”[3] This teacher reveals truth and provides the basis for understanding, transforming the student in the process. The teacher—Jesus—is for Kierkegaard “savior,” “deliverer,” “reconciler,” “judge.”[4] This Jesus is the sole wisdom of God, but foolishness to the Greeks and their descendants. As much as I like midwives, Jesus is no midwife. The biblical Jesus is the Savior of the world.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

I remember Dr. John M. Perkins once saying, “There’s no such thing as a sophisticated Christian.” I have never forgotten those words. Dr. Perkins wasn’t saying that people should be simplistic or unskilled in their work. What I think he was saying is that people should be simple and pure in their devotion to Christ and other people.

My father was a simple man. In contrast, I grew up wanting to be sophisticated, and I wished my dad were that as well. How I longed to be marked by near-omniscience and hailed as a sage by my peers! While I have never received such accolades, one person was convinced early on that my father was one of the brightest men who ever lived: one of my nieces once boasted as a child to those at school that her grandfather (my dad) knew so many languages. She had witnessed as a little girl how he would strike up conversations with people from different countries. This impressed her. But she didn’t seem to know at that time that Dad knew only a few words in each of those languages, and that he was out of his depths once they responded. It gave my dad great joy to speak a few words of Japanese or Polish, for example, and watch Japanese and Polish people’s faces light up when they heard him speak to them. My dad had a way with a few simple words of greeting and with making people’s days brighter wherever he went.

On Father’s Day, I am thankful for Dad’s profound relational simplicity: he loved people, really loved them. As I grow older, I hope to be more and more like my late dad—not fixated with being sophisticated, but relationally pure and simple.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

I was going through a very difficult time in ministry and was facing some overt persecution. In sharing some of my angst with one of my closest friends and ministry partners, he referred me to Jeremiah’s lament recorded in Jeremiah 12 and God’s response recorded in verse 5:  “If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses?” Jeremiah had gone through an intense time of suffering and persecution on account of bearing witness to God’s Word in calling the people of Jerusalem and Judah to repentance. God responded by saying that harsher battles awaited Jeremiah. I believe God desired for his servant Jeremiah to view his present persecution as testing ground for greater spiritual warfare which was to come.

I don’t know if Jeremiah got frustrated with God for challenging him in this way. All I can say is that my friend often frustrated me when he lovingly challenged me to have greater confidence in God in the midst of my sufferings in and for the faith. The problem was not with my friend, but with my thick head and cold heart. For whatever reason, though, this time his words broke through and made total sense and led me to trust God in the midst of my very painful circumstances. My friend encouraged me to see my own sufferings as preparation for future challenges in taking on bigger prophetic assignments in response to God’s leading, if I would respond in faith and trust in the midst of my suffering in the present. While I may never experience the kind of persecution that Jeremiah faced for obeying and sharing God’s Word, I can have confidence that God will meet me in my hour of need.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was a modern day prophetic voice who suffered greatly for calling a nation and church to repentance for its sins associated with racism. At a time of unreal suffering, King cried out to God. God comforted King and gave him the supernatural courage to go on, assuring him that he would never leave or forsake him, as he did God’s will (Listen here). As a result, King did not simply run with men; he ran with horses.

Most likely you and I will never experience the kind of suffering that Jeremiah and King did, but we can experience the mercies of God who will strengthen us to meet any challenge he places before us. Don’t settle for running simply with men. Run with horses.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

I have joked that I am leading a Demon track, not DMin (Doctor of Ministry) track at the seminary where I teach. This is no reflection on my students, but on me. In fact, as I will share, there is hope for my track because of my students!

Perhaps the DMin Director’s little boy has picked up on the banter his father and I have engaged in regarding the wording DMin and demon in various settings. Regardless of where he picked up on “demon,” his Dad shared on Facebook about how his child was troubled over the fact that he was messing around with the dark side. My colleague had to assure his son that it was not demons he was working with, but people getting doctorates in ministry.

Those of us in ministry have to be on guard against being demons unleashed on the world to lash out and inflict pain. Those of us pursuing advanced degrees in theology and ministry must ask ourselves why we are doing it. As I have written elsewhere, while I have benefited greatly from getting a Master of Divinity degree, I will benefit all the more from being mastered by Divinity. The former does not necessarily lead to the latter. Nothing is spiritually guaranteed either with acquiring PhDs in theology (I fear that at times the abbreviation does not convey doctorate in philosophy/theology, but as someone once remarked “Pile it high and deep”) and DMins.

There is reason for hope for teachers like myself who across North America and beyond have students like the ones I do. My colleagues at my seminary have remarked about how impressed they are with their students as well. Numerous impressions have been made so far by my students in my D.Min. cohort in Cultural Engagement. I will share three of them.

First, they are committed to honing their ministry skill sets, not hyping their expertise. Whether one is in the first year of seminary or last, the last thing the church and world needs is for degree getters to present themselves as having arrived to get the job done, to fix people and solve all their problems. No doubt, there are problems to solve, but we will only be able to do that relationally and in community. As I have observed my students, I am sensing that the needs of the people far outweigh their own self-concerns, reminding me of what one leadership book remarked about good leaders.

Second, they have been engaged in ministry for quite some time and have had the stuffing and wind knocked out of them quite a few times. As a result of releasing all that hot air, they have come to realize that they are in great need of being filled with the Spirit of Jesus Christ. They are not their people’s relational solution. He truly is. My fellow travelers in this Doctor of Ministry track sense how great their need is for Jesus to show up as they engage culture in their various settings. Otherwise, they might as well shut it all down. In other words, they don’t take themselves too seriously, but the Lord Jesus extremely seriously.

Third, these students are learning how to be creative in their suffering. One of the students said about our cohort that it really is a co-hurt made up of pastors, chaplains, social workers and community activists who are coming together to be made whole by Christ. They see their vocation as inviting others to experience Christ’s healing as well, and in a variety of ways.

My students, these new colleagues, are encouraging and inspiring me. I am finding that Christ is continuing to heal my wounds from the hurts of life in ministry through engaging these D.Min. students, who are also my teachers. It is my hope that as we are unleashed on the world it won’t be as demons who unload a world of hurt on others, but whose skills are honed to bear witness to Christ’s healing broken people in a broken world and the loving hope one finds in his embrace.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

My family and I went out to dinner last night in Portland with Dr. John M. Perkins and his young assistant, Thad. During the dinner conversation, we spoke about Dr. Perkins’ long life, his pain and struggles bound up with justice, and his eventual passing into the presence of the Lord (he’s been talking about that topic more often the past few years). The elderly though full of life Dr. Perkins quipped that “Everyone wants to go to heaven, but no one wants to die.” On the way home from the dinner, my wife and I laughed at how true the statement was. We find people all the time who claim in one way or another that they want to go to heaven, but do not want to die. The same holds true for us.

Some people don’t want to die because of the pain they associate with death, or the uncertainty of what follows, or the fear of impending judgment based on having lived poorly, or because they love this life and the people around them so very much. There are many other reasons. No matter the reason or reasons, there is a good chance we all think about the end of our lives and what might await us. That’s something we all have in common with Dr. Perkins. What I’d also like for us to have in common with Dr. Perkins is living life well before God and with others. Surely, like us all, Dr. Perkins has some regrets. But those regrets pale in comparison with the rich relational accomplishments he has achieved.

It was amazing how much Dr. Perkins talked about people last night over dinner—his wife and children, his friends and ministry partners, among others. He talked with joy about my children sitting on either side of him and how he delights in watching the children of his friends grow and seeing how the relationships grow with them.

Dr. Perkins’ relationship with God has so shaped him to care deeply about people. Gratitude marks his life—gratitude for God and gratitude for others who have cared for him over all the years. The care he has received has provided him with a moral compass, he remarked. He wants to honor and steward well those relationships. From where I sit, I believe he has done a wonderful job of it. Unlike the rich old fool in Luke 12:13-21 who tore down his barns to build bigger ones to store his grain and live selfishly, Dr. Perkins is wise and rich toward God. All the “barns” he has built in community development have gone up to store and redistribute grain to the poor.

Dr. Perkins’ long life is slowly winding down like a beautiful sunset, but his wisdom and passion for life and love of people never set. They seem to be glowing ever brighter with the passing of the days and months and years. That wisdom and passion and love accompany his growing anticipation that he will someday see Jesus face to face. Just being around Dr. Perkins helps me develop more my own moral compass.

Tonight my mentor and friend and ministry partner will share at Multnomah University about the upside down kingdom of God and how to walk upright in our day in love and truth and justice. The first time he shared there was 2001 and it changed the way I view life. I look forward to interviewing Dr. Perkins and hearing him share this evening and enlightening minds and burning hearts with God’s love at the twilight of his long and distinguished life and career. Whether we live as long as he does, may we live this life to the full, like he has, in view of Christ’s communal kingdom, until that hour, when we stand before God face to face.

Please join us this evening for Dr. John M. Perkins’ address, “The Upside Down Kingdom: Beyond Charity,” June 3rd, 6:30-8:30p in the Joseph C. Aldrich Student Commons at Multnomah University. The talk is part of the Advanced Ministry Lectureship Series “Rigorously Orthodox, Progressively Missional” sponsored by Multnomah Biblical Seminary, Multnomah University.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

For those who still haven’t watched the movie, you might find here a spoiler or two.

Pulp Fiction is one celebrated, complex, multi-faceted, and troubling gangster movie. Celebrated in that it is considered one of the greatest movies of our time, complex in that the scenes do not go in chronological sequence and the dialogues are often rhetorically robust, multi-faceted in that there are multiple stories within the story, and troubling in that the foul language, drugs, violence, and sexual perversion are dark and heavy. It’s the kind of movie that one may watch again and again in order to get what’s going on and to see movie making at its best.

John Travolta plays one of the gangster hit men in the movie (Vincent Vega). He said of Quentin Tarentino that he would always be Travolta’s guardian angel for raising his career from the dead with his role in the film. Speaking of guardian angels, what strikes me most about Pulp Fiction is Samuel Jackson’s hit man character’s (Jules Winnfield) brush with death and how he is convinced that he and his partner (Travolta) were the beneficiaries of divine intervention. Travolta doesn’t appear convinced. Just like society as a whole, the jury’s out in the film on whether divine intervention is fact or fiction.

I didn’t expect deep theology in this movie, but there it was, even in the midst of Jackson’s creative expansion and distortion of Ezekiel 25:17 (Minutes 13-17) possibly inspired more by the Japanese movie, The Bodyguard (1973), than by Scripture .

Jackson’s hit man plans on leaving his hit man ways in view of God sparing his life, and now he wants to spare a stick up man’s life and walk the earth. Jackson tries real hard to be the shepherd he finds in his rendition of Ezekiel 25:17 rather than the tyranny of death and destruction that devastates the weak (in this case the stick up man who had pointed a gun at him to rob him). The biblical text that he stretches had always served as the starting point for his ending someone’s life. Now that text is being used to save someone’s life from himself.

It’s a powerful series of scenes about providence. Whether or not Tarentino or Jackson believe in providence, those who do believe in it and are conscious of God’s intervention in their lives tend to change their outlook and direction. It’s  scenes and events like these that lift this movie and life itself out of the pages of mere pulp fiction. No doubt, our perceptions of divine intervention impact the way we live life, even distorting or reframing our interpretations of biblical texts, perhaps not so different from what happens with Jackson’s character. At the very least, hopefully, a compelling sense of God’s intervention in our lives will lead us away from making a hit to taking a hit for others.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

I took my kids to see the movie 42 today. The movie is based on the real life story of baseball great Jackie Robinson, the first African American baseball player in the major leagues. Robinson wore the number 42 for the Dodgers. As I understand, the number 42 is the only number that has been retired for all major league baseball teams; it was retired in honor of Robinson and the values for which he stood. That doesn’t mean that racism has retired. Ongoing vigilance is key.

A few weeks ago, I was asked after preaching a sermon on justice what I believed the number one justice issue facing the American church and society is. While I cannot say that there is only one all-important justice/injustice issue, I did say that addressing racial concerns is high on the list since racialization (i.e., the impact of race on various domains) impacts so many spheres in American society today—from health care to job placement to where people live. The list goes on and on. And so the work to undo the racist policies of the past and their ongoing influence goes on and on.

After the church service that day, a young, well-intentioned man came up to talk to me. He indicated that he was surprised that I had made such a claim about race. He had been of the opinion that we are now living in a post-racist society. He asked me if I was making race a problem by drawing attention to race. While one can certainly cause further racial problems by attending to race in a problematic, non-redemptive manner, I shared with him that if we stop attending to race and racialization we will actually reinforce our natural, cliquish  inclinations to be with our own kind of people—a kind of separate but equal policy based on personal preference. And by the way, separate but equal is itself a myth since the predominantly white power structures in our country do not serve minority communities as well as the majority. Moreover, separate but equal fails to see that those who want it lose out on being enriched by those of different ethnicities. No cultural heritage is complete. We all need one another. Where would we be if Jackie Robinson had never played major league baseball? We are all better for it, not simply baseball.

The only way to move toward a post-racist society is by never ceasing to address racial tensions and personal comforts and inclinations that favor our own kind of people to the detriment of others, whoever they may be. It is an uphill race. If we try and coast, we will end up going in reverse. Standing still is not an option.

Once a year, on Jackie Robinson Day, every player on every major league team wears the number 42. I love the symbolism and intentionality. Whether or not the rest of us in America play or even like professional baseball (often hailed as the great American pastime), we need to wear the number 42 on our hearts. It’s more than a number, just like addressing race is about more than (not less than) quotas, and is itself about more than race. The number 42 is about celebrating the value of the inherent dignity and equality of all people for which we must all stand and push forward—never standing still.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

Paul was a world Christian. He not only traveled the known world of his day to places such as Corinth, Athens, and Rome, but also lived in the world, even though he was not of it. As a world Christian Paul did not go around his Christian convictions to engage those outside the church. Nor did he stop short at his convictions. Rather, he went through his convictions to engage those outside the faith.

In contrast to world Christians like Paul, worldly Christians are in the world and of it. As such, they lose sight of their distinctive identity in Christ and their distinctive Christian truth claims. Often their rationale is that they do not want to be a stumbling block to people, but in leaving their truth claims at the door, they keep Jesus from becoming the stumbling block so others can’t repent of their autonomy and respond to his loving call for relationship with them.

There is one other group—otherworldly Christians. These Christians are not really in the world. They stop short at their convictions and fail to connect with the people around them. These Christians will only engage those outside the faith if the latter are willing to change their views and accept Christ.

As a world Christian Paul engaged people where they were, though he did not leave them there. Take for example his interaction with the philosophers on Mars Hill. Paul was critical in mind, though charitable of spirit. We must not get these two mixed up: it is not good to be critical in spirit (where we are judgmental of people and do not hope for the good) and charitable of mind (where we do not critically discern if the perspectives of others resonate with Scripture). As a biblical Jewish monotheist, Paul grieved over the idolatry that surrounded him in Athens (Acts 17:16). But that did not keep him from thoughtful and gracious interaction with the philosophers on Mars Hill. He approached them in a spirit of charity, hoping to find points of contact even while discerning their errors in judgment. Along with his critical reflection and charitable spirit, Paul creatively engaged them. The statue of the unknown God served as a bridge for Paul as he creatively sought to build rapport and connection to Christ (Acts 17:23). There was already a connection from God in Christ, for as creator and redeemer of the world, he is in constant pursuit of us. And so, he had wired the pagan philosophers whom Paul quotes to say: In God, “we live and move and have our being” and, “We are his offspring” (Acts 17:28).

Paul continues to make points of connection when he speaks of God judging the world through Jesus, whom God raised from the dead. While many of those gathered there scoff at Paul’s teaching, some want to hear more (Acts 17:32). even those who do not cannot rightly claim that Paul distances himself from them, for God’s judgment of the world includes all people, including Paul (Acts 17:30–31). As such, Paul was not the stumbling block. He recognized that everyone’s rightful place was on their faces at the foot of the cross of God’s judgment on sin; as such, Paul had already stumbled over Christ and is here inviting others to meet him there.

We should not seek to avoid situations where people might scoff at our Christian truth claims involving Jesus’ death and resurrection. Jesus is the stumbling block, and when people scoff at him, they are only hurting themselves. They can only receive the life that Jesus offers by being humbled and stumbling over him and falling on their faces at the foot of the cross of God’s judgment on sin: Jesus’ foolishness and weakness are the wisdom and power of God, whereas our wisdom and power are foolish and weak in our self isolation bound up with our pride. Like Paul, we all must constantly recognize our need for Christ’s mercy as our judge who has undergone judgment for us. Paul moved through his convictions as a world Christian in charity of spirit, critical in mind, and creative in imagination. Paul made sure that he engaged people and led them to experience Jesus as the stumbling block. Will we do the same?

I preached on themes related to this post last weekend. Please take a listen!

Taken from the chapter, “Who’s the Stumbling Block—You and Me or Jesus?” in Connecting Christ: How to Discuss Jesus in a World of Diverse Paths (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2012), pp. 32-34.

Note to the reader: I don’t accept the claim that Paul ended up abandoning the approach he modeled at Mars Hill by the time he wrote his letters to the Corinthians based on what he says about philosophy to the Corinthians. Paul continued to use philosophical and rhetorical forms of robust argumentation, and there is nothing in Acts 17 that suggests that what he did was unfaithful to what he conceives elsewhere to be faithful witness. In fact, Paul’s particular emphasis on Christ in Acts 17 leads to the rejection of his message by many, though not all, of his listeners there in Athens. Paul is passionate in his commitment to the scandal of particularity—Jesus as the crucified and risen Savior of the world.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

Have you ever seen those old Charmin bathroom tissue commercials, where shoppers get addicted to squeezing the Charmin because it’s irresistibly soft? The shopkeeper tells them: “Please don’t squeeze the Charmin!”  The point of the commercials is to get people to buy Charmin because it’s softer than any other bathroom tissue brand.

Whether or not you have seen those commercials, you may be wondering what all this has to do with comparing religions. We tend to compare religions as if they are different brands of bathroom tissue: which is the softest?

All too often we load the discussion on comparing religions based on what facet or feature we find most endearing, such as softness, while ignoring the “selling points” of other traditions. But who said “softness” is the essential quality? I can think of bathroom tissues that may be soft, but not durable. Durability is also a quality to consider, as are economy and disposability (it won’t clog the toilet). There are all kinds of bathroom tissues that can get the job done.

By no means am I advocating for that form of religious pluralism, which claims that all religious traditions are more or less equally true and get the job done—that is, make eternal life accessible. In fact, not all religions or spiritual paths view their role as making salvation or eternal life with God available to people. Some emphasize a this-worldly orientation of living virtuously as the ultimate end, and apart from consideration of a transcendent, personal deity. What I am advocating for is to be careful about pre-loading the discussion on comparing religions based on factors that we prize and as a result prejudge negatively other “competing brands.” We need to guard against squeezing various traditions into what we as marketers spin and consumers demand that they deliver.

In keeping with guarding against pre-loading the discussion with prejudgments that skew open, honest consideration of various religious paths, I think it is very important that we guard against looking at religions as brands, like toilet paper or toothpaste. Unfortunately, in our current consumer-capitalist society, this is exactly how many people approach religion(s). Lesslie Newbigin has written about the free market transformation of religion in this way:

Different religious traditions lose their capacity to be the binding element of societies and become instead mere options for religious consumers to select for their own private reasons, reasons which are not to be argued about. Thus “democratized,” religions enter the marketplace as objects of subjective choices in much the same way as brands of toothpaste and laundry soap. {Lesslie Newbigin, “Religion for the Marketplace,” Christian Uniqueness Reconsidered: The Myth of a Pluralistic Theology of Religions, ed. Gavin D’Costa, Faith Meets Faith Series in interreligious Dialogue (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1990), 152.}

We tend to preload our comparisons of religions with democratized, privatized subjective preferences rather than approach religions based on what are considered to be ultimate questions about truth and morality, such as, “Is what I am studying and believing and choosing true and right, or is it a matter simply of personal preference and private opinion?”

In preloading our comparisons of religions, we also often bring assumptions about other religions to the table that are framed by our own traditions’ values. These assumptions and perspectives can distort or misconstrue what the adherents of other religions say about their traditions, or can simply be misinformed. By opening ourselves to truly inquisitive conversations with the religious other we refine our presuppositions so that we can engage more meaningfully in comparative analysis.

We need to be sensitive to how the various religious traditions (not brands) approach questions of truth and morality. In no way does such sensitivity convey a movement in the direction of relativism, but simply a listening ear and desire to hear the other tradition(s) out as to how they approach questions of truth and morality, grace and mercy, among other qualities and values. In the end, Christians may be right or wrong about what we believe. The same goes for Buddhists and Muslims, for example. But let’s not preload the conversation with subjective preferences and prejudgments as to which religion we find the softest, as if that settles it once and for all.

For example, I often hear Christians say that Christianity is the only religion that teaches grace. That is not true. Amida Buddhism promotes salvation or enlightenment by grace: simply chant the name of Amida Buddha to experience enlightenment. It is important to hear out what those who are devotees of Amida Buddha believe is entailed by grace. We need to do the same with Christianity. In orthodox Christianity, grace is determined fundamentally by the historical reality of Jesus Christ, including his death and resurrection. Amida Buddha is a fictional character or personification that symbolizes the infinite compassion of ultimate reality. One chants the name of Amida Buddha in Jodoshu toward the end of enlightenment through and beyond rebirth in the Pure Land (See for example; for variations within traditions centering on Amida Buddha, see the discussion on Jodoshu and Jodoshinshu).

I remember asking a Buddhist priest who represents a form of Amida Buddhism to share with me how she has experienced and learned infinite compassion from Amida Buddha. In my own tradition, I explained, the historical reality of Jesus is crucial to my ability to relate with his compassion. Given that Amida Buddha is a fictional character, I was curious how her experience of compassion was both similar to and different from mine. The question was not intended to dismiss the priest’s claim, but to try and understand how she saw the matter. Of course, I came at the question valuing historical realism, as I see it, but I did not intend the question as a conversation stopper, rather as a conversation opener. We need to try and understand various traditions on their own terms, ask for clarification as to their positions for greater understanding, and not approach them by way of self-imposed judgments as to softness, economic savings, and the like.

To me the issue is not whether or not Christianity is the only religion that promotes salvation by grace. Rather, Christianity is that religion that is centered on grace through faith as revealed in and through the person and finished work of Jesus in dying for our sins on the cross and in the new life he brings about through his bodily resurrection in history (See for example Romans 10:9-10; Ephesians 2:8-10). The key is to inhabit this story rather than pick and choose which parts of it I like based on predetermined prejudice and consumer preference. Moreover, we don’t win over anyone by showing them that our brand is better as in softer or less expensive or more durable. While from my vantage point there is a place for comparison based on internal coherence and external correspondence to reality, it must be based on growing awareness and comprehensive analysis of the various traditions, including how they see themselves. Even so, what wins people over to any tradition in the end is their being captivated by the all-encompassing embrace of the sacred stories which bind us and which we and others tell.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

Now that the venerable holiday—Mother’s Day—has passed, I would like to reflect upon what I will call the Holy Mother’s Day. Typically, Mary, the mother of the Lord, is honored at Annunciation, which occurred this year on Monday,  April 8, 2013. There is a sense in which every day should be this holy mother’s day, since she manifested the kind of radical obedience to God in honoring Christ that should be true of every Christian every day of the year.

Scripture records that when the angel Gabriel appeared to Mary and told her that she would be the mother of the Lord, Mary responded: “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word” (Luke 1:38, ESV). Every Christian—myself included—should respond in the same manner. Just imagine how unimaginable the call of the Lord was upon her life. No doubt, she was aware of the fact that her fiancé would be greatly troubled by the news that she was expecting a child and he wasn’t the father! No doubt, she was aware of the fact that people would gossip about her state long after the baby was born. No doubt, she doubted that she was up to the task of being the mother of the Lord, even as she marveled at the thought (Luke 1:46-49). Who wouldn’t doubt, given what she sensed? She is blessed among women, just as the fruit of her womb is blessed (Luke 1:42), and every generation will consider her blessed (Luke 1:48). How weighty and monumental!

Such blessings also bring with them burdens. As Simeon told her, a sword would pierce her heart (Luke 2:35), perhaps foreshadowing the sufferings she would endure in observing Jesus’ passion and death. It is likely that her son’s words and actions also pierced her heart, as he told her and his earthly father that he needed to be about his Father’s business (Luke 2:49), even if it entailed difficulties for them, and that those who obeyed his teaching were his true mother and brothers (Luke 8:21; cf. Matthew 12:49). As with the encounter with Mary in John 2 at the wedding at Cana in Galilee, Jesus wanted to make sure that his mother realized that he was not there simply to do her bidding: “Woman, what does this have to do with me? My hour has not yet come” (John 2:4, ESV).

Many of Jesus’ encounters with his mother sting and pierce the heart. It is hard to imagine one using these accounts as the bases for Mother’s Day sermons. Perhaps the best model text for showing Jesus’ care for his mother is the painful account of his crucifixion, where in the midst of his overwhelming affliction, the Lord commits Mary to his disciple John for him to take care of her from that point forward: “When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, behold, your son!’ Then he said to the disciple, ‘Behold, your mother!’ And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home” (John 19:26-27, ESV). It is a very moving scene. Still, would many mothers want this text to be the basis for a sermon dedicated to them on Mother’s Day? Neither this nor any of the other texts, including the account of Jesus’ dedication soon after his birth, seems quite fitting to many. Too troubling, morbid, disturbing.

In a Christian culture that often venerates the family to a position of near worship, it is very difficult to take to heart Jesus’ relationship with his mother. What Jesus and Mary make so clear to us in these accounts is that our ultimate focus must not be on our nuclear family, or some other love, but on God. As the close of Mary’s Magnificat makes clear, Mary and her Son saw that his birth and life would bring about the climax of salvation history that would benefit Israel and peoples everywhere, especially the lowly (Luke 1:50-55).

So often, we Protestants throw out the baby with the bathwater when critically reflecting upon the Catholic Church’s veneration of Mary. We would be wise to ponder that language such as “the mother of the Lord” and “bearer/mother of God” (theotokos) are Christologically accurate and astute categories: this language is intended to guard against such doctrinal heresies as Nestorianism (which teaches that there are two persons, one divine and one human, and that only the human side of Jesus is incarnate; in contrast to Nestorianism, the divine Word became human—John 1:14) and Adoptionism (which teaches that the divine Christ adopted the man Jesus for a time and then departed from him; in contrast to Adoptionism, the divine Word became human and is indissolubly joined with human flesh—John 1:14).

Going on, while folk Catholicism may be guilty of venerating Mary as a co-equal with Jesus to whom we turn in place of him, official Catholic teaching tends to moderate the mediation so that her co-mediatory role is very similar to how Christian saints serve as mediators in interceding for the church with Christ. From my own vantage point, Mary is not a co-mediator in any other manner than the rest of us are co-mediators, confessing our sins to one another and praying for one another so that we might be healed (James 5:16). Still, as the mother of the Lord of the entire church, Mary is the one who initiates this work of communal mediation in the church just as her radical obedience sets the precedent for what Christian obedience entails. In this sense, we cannot go far enough in honoring Mary as the first among equals in the church on Mother’s Day and every day throughout the year.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

Fundamentalism comes in all shapes and sizes. Liberals can be fundamentalists, too. I am not talking about doctrine, but an inflexible posture that makes dialogue impossible.

Tom Krattenmaker’s Huffington Post piece titled, “A Progressive’s Confessional Journey to Focus on the Family,” is a shining example of a secular progressive who is progressive on dialogue. I wish I could say the same for some of the respondents at the close of the article.

Of course, we Evangelicals are well-known for our fundamentalist ways. Perhaps we Evangelicals can learn a thing or two from Krattenmaker. He is willing to risk and see the good in the other and tell it the way he sees it, even if it will cost him in terms of how his secular-progressive camp views him. I have heard him say that his liberal constituents are going to kill him for certain constructive claims he makes about the enemy. How challenging: how many Evangelicals are willing to cross party lines to connect with people no matter their ideological stripe?

Regarding his latest book, The Evangelicals You Don’t Know: Introducing the Next Generation of Christians, Tom’s former literary agent had told him that he doesn’t have an audience. That’s because Tom is willing to risk and not take a clear cut side to build a following. Extreme news sells; moderation comes across as modest and boring. I can assure you that Tom and his book are not boring, that is, unless you are addicted to sensationalism. In my estimation, Tom addresses one of the most exciting developments in sections of our society: people who are willing to try and cross a vast chasm to get to the other side. Tom might not be the daredevil Evel Knievel, who risked life and limb to jump ramps and cross divides, but I find Tom pretty daring.

As I reflect upon the closing words of Krattenmaker’s The Evangelicals You Don’t Know, I am reminded of Jesus who was and is also pretty daring. Those who claim loyalty to Jesus, no matter if they are conservative or liberal, will realize that Jesus was crucified for reconciling opposing forces and replacing hate with love. He did not fit people’s expectations or label people the way the party line position makers demanded. Those who seek to be centered in him will reach out to the extremes.

With this in mind, I close with Krattenmaker’s reference to fellow Evangelical Jonathan Merritt’s comment at the close of The Evangelicals You Don’t Know. Merritt contends: “We can stand in the gap and claim loyalty only to Jesus.” Here’s the full context for Tom’s reference:

Opening up on the changing landscape of “post-Christian” America, in a culture where the 9/11 wars and a 9/11 world are fading in the rearview mirror, is a new territory where fellow travelers of goodwill are coming together. This is a “place” you might call the common good.

The young evangelical writer Jonathan Merritt calls his co-religionists to a metaphorical space that leaves the culture wars behind, that transcends the traps of politicized, right-wing Christianity that snared so many of their fathers and mothers. “We aren’t forced to choose a human-formed party with a systemized divide-and-conquer agenda,” Merritt writes. “We can stand in the gap and claim loyalty only to Jesus.”

The “gap” beckons those outside of Merritt’s evangelical tradition as well. This is a place where open-minded good-doers of any persuasion are welcome, are needed. This is not a safe, boring space in the mushy middle for the wishy-washy and commitment-phobic. It’s more like a no-man’s-land, offering none of the safety and comfort of permanent membership in one camp or the other but plenty of bracing fresh air for those who can handle some new company and the sound of the occasional missile passing overhead.

Not that you’d know it from the old culture-war framework and rhetoric, but you’ll find plenty of company there. Not that you’ll see much evidence of it in the latest news from the political campaign trails and legislative halls, but there seems to be more of a crowd forming there in that gap.

May it grow.

May Tom’s readership grow. Prove Tom’s former agent wrong and show that there is an audience for the book—everyone, that is, everyone daring enough to risk and read and cross the culture war divide in search of common ground.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

What is it about Charles Ramsey, the hero in the Cleveland kidnapping saga, that takes America’s imagination captive? Whether or not his appeal lasts a short or long period of time, his words and deeds have gone viral.

There are no doubt numerous reasons for Ramsey as a web phenomenon. One is how unbelievable the story is of his (and quite possibly others) freeing three women and a child brutally imprisoned for ten years in Ramsey’s neighbor’s house. It has all the makings of a horror/hero adventure film.

One also has to account for how unscripted and yet penetrating Ramsey’s words are. For example, the way in which he addresses America’s  racial fears of black men surprises and challenges us: “I knew something was wrong when a little pretty white girl ran into a black man’s arms. Something is wrong here. Dead giveaway … Either she’s homeless or she’s got problems. That’s the only reason she run to a black man …” (Take note of the reactions of those around him, including the reporter interviewing him, when he says these words.)

One must account for the fears that Ramsey is being exploited as a black man, as has been documented. While such fears must be accounted for, I also wonder if the rest of us should be afraid as to how often we as a society are exploited by manicured personalities and celebrity phenoms who script everything to increase their star-studded status. I couldn’t help but think of NBA MVP LeBron James’ much-debated-exit from Cleveland a few years ago for Miami, where he announced his “decision” on national television after agonizingly dragged-out suspense . Regardless of what one makes of James’ decision and exit from Cleveland, and regardless of how radically different his life is from Ramsey’s, I for one am not lost on how refreshing Ramsey is: he’s apparently more real than Reality TV.

I doubt we can bottle and preserve the Ramsey caught in those moments involving the rescue of the kidnapped women and child or Ramsey’s initial interview. No matter how many t-shirts bear Ramsey’s image and regardless of how McDonald’s with all its preservatives packages Ramsey’s reference to eating a Big Mac when he first heard the screams, this heroic story will have the most enduring impact if we can live in the moment like Ramsey did in coming to these victims’ aid—long before the reporters and cameras arrived. Perhaps we can also learn to be a little less scripted, a little more penetrating in our words, no matter if we are dishwashers with or without squeaky clean pasts like Ramsey, basketball starts like James, or doctors, lawyers, or candlestick makers.

What sparks heroism? What keeps the heroic flame going long after the candle of celebrity burns low? True heroism is not something that can be canned or manufactured. Whether or not Ramsey deserves all the attention and accolades he has received, or if others should share in the praise, true heroism doesn’t care. It responds in unscripted moments to needs around it, no matter who’s looking. As Ramsey says, “You do what you gotta do.” Do we?

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

What would you expect from a beat poet? Certainly not someone who stays on the beaten path. One of the ways in which Tony “The Beat Poet” Kriz goes off the beaten path as a Gen-Xer raised in the Evangelical Christian tradition is by finding spiritual value in what those from non-Christian traditions have to say and how they live. He wrote about this recently at Leadership Journal. It also shows in his book, Neighbors and Wise Men: Sacred Encounters in a Portland Pub and Other Unexpected Places. Here he differs from many Evangelicals from a previous era.

The other is by finding spiritual value in the Evangelical tradition in which he was raised and in closely aligning himself with his tradition, including its weaknesses. As an evangelist, Tony is shaped in part by his years with CRU (Campus Crusade for Christ) and holds a special place in his heart for the late Bill Bright. While he does not see them as exhaustive, Tony believes CRU’s Four Spiritual Laws are beneficial for evangelism and highlight key facets of the gospel. Not only though does Tony identify with what he takes to be strengths in the Evangelical tradition, but also he identifies with what he takes to be weaknesses and problematic forms of engagement in our witness to a watching world. In seeing value in traditional Evangelical institutions and also identifying with Evangelicalism in its weaknesses, he differs from many younger Evangelicals of the emergent sort today.

I have found Tony’s off the beaten path responses refreshing and missional. On the one hand, if we don’t see connections between Christians and those who don’t yet profess Christ, it is hard to build bridges for serious conversations about Jesus as the way, the truth, and the life.  On the other hand, if we don’t value our own tradition and also identify with it in its weaknesses (such as how it has often demeaned the religious and sexual other over the years), we won’t be able to be taken too seriously by those beyond our movement’s walls. To be precise, if we think of ourselves as better than those who come before us, we show ourselves to be as or more self-righteous than they may have been and won’t be able to guard against falling prey to further abuse when it is least expected.

In these and other unexpected ways, I find The Beat Poet to be a great dialogue partner in helping the church go off the beaten path and engage other paths well in Christian witness.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

No idea is bigger than a little life snuffed out. Eight year old Martin Richard was waiting yesterday with his mother and sister for his dad to cross the finish line at the Boston Marathon. Now we are waiting for information as to why someone or some group would set off bombs that would intentionally kill innocent civilians like Martin and seriously harm his mother and sister. No matter the explanation—no matter how big the ideology—the idea is still too small. Martin’s life was so much bigger.

I listened to U2’s song, Peace on Earth, the other day as I was driving one of my children and her friend home from an afternoon at the zoo. I looked in the rear view mirror as the song played while they played, thinking of Bono’s words about the violence in Northern Ireland where he grew up and how the people killed in the blasts and whose names were read over the radio were so much bigger than the ideas that led to their deaths. I was thinking of how ideology can drive us in the name of peace or justice or some other value to run over innocent bystanders whose faces and names we don’t even care to see. I pray that you and I will not allow our ideologies to consume us to the point of consuming others—those closest to us and those far away yet close to others.

The true marathon race to justice is a very long haul. There will never be true peace on earth as long as we destroy the lives of precious individuals for ideas we hold dear.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on April 11, 2013.

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It is off-limits—illegal—in some circles to look at the faces and listen to the personal stories of undocumented workers. Many in these circles fear that if you move it beyond faceless, nameless policies, you will make exception after exception. On this view, the claim is made that you should never base laws on exceptions, so you ignore the exceptions. But the exceptions have faces and names, wives and husbands, children and parents, fears and hopes, just like we do.

Jesus’ answer to the question—“Who is my neighbor?” (in Luke 10)—is not intended for generic policy position papers, but for each of the people who cross our paths. In Letters and Papers from Prison, Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes about monumental doctrinal themes like transcendence and the grand omnis of orthodox theology. Regarding relationship with God and our framing of these categories, he writes: “Our relation to God is not a ‘religious’ relationship to the highest, most powerful, and best Being imaginable—that is not authentic transcendence—but our relation to God is a new life in ‘existence for others’, through participation in the being of Jesus. The transcendental is not infinite and unattainable tasks, but the neighbour who is within reach in any given situation…” (Letters and Papers from Prison, Touchstone edition, 1997, p. 381).

Speaking of “the neighbour who is within reach in any given situation,” Jesus does not tolerate the religious scholar’s attempt to justify himself in Luke 10 by raising the question, “Who is my neighbor?” (Luke 10:29) Jesus’ answer suggests that the question is off-limits to Jesus, even illegal in view of the scholar’s intent to distance himself from taking responsibility for his neighbor. Jesus then tells the scholar who had come to test him on the essence of the law and its requirements for gaining eternal life (Luke 10:25) a story in which religious leaders like himself failed to care for their neighbor, who was within their reach in a given moment and situation. While it may have been ceremonially illegal for the religious leaders in the story narrated in Luke 10 to care for the man beaten and robbed and left for dead, Jesus does not let them off the hook. Only the seemingly illegal and immoral Samaritan fulfilled the law by acting mercifully in the moment (Luke 10:30-35).

We can live the entirety of our lives according to transcendental and legal policies that leave people dying on the road, but fail to care for the transcendental reality of the illegal person lying there before us. Such systems of justice will not judge us, but the transcendent Jesus who is dying on the road as the discounted exception to our rule will.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on April 9, 2013.

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Many people respond to questions about undocumented immigrants by saying that they must be deported if the law says so: always obey the law—no questions asked. But what if the law were to be changed to say that all people should be let into our country–no questions asked? Or what about if it were changed to not allow any immigration at all?

Hopefully, those who say under the current system that undocumented immigrants must be deported, no questions asked, would adhere with the same consistency to each of these alternative rulings (that is, no one should be deported or no one let in): the law is the law. If they balk at the new law and say we should disobey it by deporting or roadblocking immigrants or sneaking immigrants in, they would be inconsistent. But why are they inconsistent? Is their adherence to the current law based more on prejudice or lack of personal or profitable connection to the people in question than principle?

Then  there are those who only favor breaking the current law for how it benefits them and/or their community economically. What kind of justice is that? All people, including those who come here illegally, have inalienable rights as humans; their value should never be based on their presumed profitability. There are laws whose merit transcend market value and societal peace, among other things.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. told his fellow clergy from his Birmingham jail cell that an unjust law is no law at all. They pointed the finger at him for disturbing the peace, but for King, it was an unjust peace he was disturbing. There are laws, and then there are laws. We who are Christians must always be true to what we believe are the highest laws: those that confirm the Golden Rule (Matthew 7:12) and Great Commandments (Mark 12:30-31)–regardless of the consequences, no questions asked.

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I am grateful to the Christian Post for its invitation to me to write a piece calling for Evangelicals to develop a consistent pro-life stance that accounts for gun control. The following entry is my response to their invitation:

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops have exhorted Evangelicals to develop a pro-life stance on gun control. They argue that “the growing preponderance of lethal weapons on the streets” is a pro-life issue that deserves the same kind of attention as abortion. Christian conservatives have often resisted those environmentalists who have sought to brand mercury pollution as a pro-life issue. Will Evangelicals by and large resist similar attempts to view gun control as a pro-life issue in spite of the recent mass killings in Newtown, CT, and elsewhere?

In response, I believe it will be very difficult for Evangelicals to develop such consistency, and for a variety of reasons. Here are two reasons. First, we do not have a well-developed theology of life and/or public theology. Unlike Evangelicalism, the Catholic Church is known for its consistency in affirming a pro-life stance on a variety of issues, including abortion, euthanasia, capital punishment, and gun control. We are more agenda-driven than the Roman Catholic tradition given our failure to seek to provide a rigorous, sustained, comprehensive model of a theology of life. As a result, we are more prone to shoot from the hip on issues and ask questions later.

Second, another reason is that the Catholic Church has an authority structure in place that helps it craft a consistent series of platform positions on important ethical topics. While Catholicism has orders that began as movements, Evangelicalism as a whole is a movement without an overarching, orderly structure. Charismatic leaders, not cardinals, bishops, popes and ecclesial traditions, often serve to drive the Evangelical movement. Movements like this one experience greater levels of ambiguity and inconsistency as a result.

So, would it ever be possible for Evangelicals to move beyond shooting from the hip to develop a consistent theology of life? Might a more consistent approach start with a call not to take another person’s life? The Evangelical movement has often argued that it is wrong to take the life of a fetus. No matter if there are disabilities. No matter if there is a lack of opportunity awaiting it after birth. No matter if its environment will have a negative impact on it and through it on others. Apart from extreme circumstances such as a threat to a mother’s health or rape as the cause of impregnation, Evangelicals tend to shoot down arguments made in support of abortion. Why don’t we do the same with gun control?

Perhaps there is a place for arguing that one could own a gun and use it to kill an intruder who is trying to harm one’s family member; still, it only takes one bullet to do so, not thirty rounds. Legally, Americans have the right to own guns, but should we have the right to stockpile guns with multiple clips and ammunition? At least in the case of abortions, the person performing one–a doctor–is not doing so accidentally or randomly or in rage, as in the case of many of the senseless civilian gun deaths in our culture.

No matter what the United States government might say (and the founding fathers were not even thinking about semi-automatics or the likelihood of guns that someday will be able to fire nuclear bullets), the Lord Jesus does not say anything about the right to take up arms to kill anyone–not even exemptions! While Jesus does not talk about abortion either, he does say quite a bit about turning the other cheek (Matthew 5:38-39) and laying down one’s own life (John 15:13, for example), not that of another. Although what Jesus is recorded as saying does not provide answers for every question on ethical stances on gun control and abortion, his words should at the very least cause us some angst on using guns on others and stockpiling guns and ammunition as Christians. The greatest virtue, of course, is learning to wrestle with Jesus’ words and actions, rather than discounting them. Any efforts toward creating consistent stances and ethics should be, first and foremost, based upon Jesus’ teachings. I will admit that I often struggle to honor Jesus’ words, such as loving my enemy and praying for those who persecute me (See Matthew 5:44).

Before I close this post, I want to make clear my intent. I am not trying to shoot down in some random and pointless manner the arguments of those advocating against greater gun control. I don’t want to be guilty of shooting first, senselessly seeking to destroy the positions of those who argue differently than I do. Perhaps my arguments are not bullet-proof, but I do present them in good conscience and without intent to do harm. All of us, myself included, should open ourselves up consistently to sincere questions about our respective positions on policy and making it possible for healthy discourse on such matters as gun control. If we ever want to move our society beyond the rise in senseless deaths, we will need to become much more consistent on not meaninglessly shooting down other positions. With this point in mind, it is important that I state that I believe both sides–those who advocate for greater gun control and those who advocate against such control–wish to affirm the right to life and guard against senseless deaths. Which stance helps us get there more effectively, which stance is more consistent and more rationally sound, is what we should seek to discern and put in effect, pursuing truth wherever it leads us, regardless of what it spells for ideologies and agendas. Civil and constructive discourse that takes us beyond simplistic and illogical agendas to consistent and comprehensive positions is in order.

Still, in the end, after all the position statements have been written and intellectual consistency in whatever direction is attained, we still must account for the complexities and frailties of human life; human life is not a position statement. Even the adherent of the most consistent position must come face to face with the facts that one does not know how one will respond in the moment when faced with life and death scenarios. If we are not aware of the potential within each one of us for irrational reactions during crisis situations, we will likely be the ones most prone to shoot first from the hip.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on April 2, 2013.

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According to the New Testament, whether people are aware of it or not, they are living in Jesus’ matrix. This is how Paul sees things: Jesus is the firstborn of creation (Colossians 1:15) and the firstborn from the dead (Colossians 1:18). He has supremacy over all things, whether people acknowledge his reign or not (Hebrews 2:5-9).

As I wrote in the volume Connecting Christ: How to Discuss Jesus in a World of Diverse Paths,

All people cry out for God. They cannot get out of the matrix of God’s framing of life. Whether they are in confessional booths at churches during Lent or in confessional booths on Reed’s campus during Renn Fayre [as told in Donald Miller’s book, Blue Like Jazz: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality (Thomas Nelson, 2003)], they cry out for God. No matter where they go, in one way or another, they are looking for God. A statement often attributed to G. K. Chesterton puts it well: “every man who knocks on the door of a brothel is looking for God”—not just those who enter churches and confessional booths. In fact, some may even argue that we shouldn’t presume that all those who knock on the doors of churches are necessarily looking for God any more than those who knock on other doors. Some knocking on church doors might be trying to make sure that God is looking in their direction, trying to get him to take note of how righteous they are, and how great the need is for people like them. What they (and often I) fail to account for is that it is not the Pharisee in the temple standing proudly and thanking God for his self-righteousness who goes home forgiven and justified but the tax collector beating his breast and asking God for mercy (Luke 18:9–14).

Total depravity does not imply that we have lost the image or that we can never do anything that is good or true or beautiful or that we have no dignity. Rather total depravity implies that sin impacts every area of our lives, including the affections, will, and reason, and we can do nothing to cooperate with God to save ourselves. We are in a state of total desperation and dependence on God’s mercy for forgiveness, cleansing, and new life.

Having said all that, God is not left without witnesses in the creation. No matter how far we run away or how well we hide and pull on the wires, God pursues us and finds us and reaches out and rewires and restores us. In fact, as his creation we are wired to glorify him in one way or another—even though we have fallen. We cannot escape his goodness. Those of us who are Christians must repent of our brokenness bound up with religious pride and with it our failure to see the beauty of those who are not yet believers in Christ. We need to approach them—no matter their belief system and behaviors—with faith and hope and love, always hoping for the best (1 Corinthians 13:4–13), always longing for God to make all things and all people new. In view of God’s transforming work of the creation in and through Jesus in the Spirit, we must never look at anyone from a merely human point of view (2 Corinthians 5:16), be they Christians or not, for Christ’s work impacts all creation in various ways (Connecting Christ: How to Discuss Jesus in a World of Diverse Paths {Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2012}, pp. 43-44).

We Christians should not become arrogant based on the perspective that Christ reigns over all, whether or not people at present acknowledge his lordship. After all, the only basis for our bearing witness is God’s radical grace in the Spirit that makes it possible for us to witness to Christ. We do not have the capacity in and of ourselves. Just as we Christians should not be arrogant since our witness to Christ is dependent on God’s working in our midst through Christ in the Spirit, so too we should not be surprised when we find people outside the faith bearing witness to God in Christ from one angle or another. The same God who makes it possible for us to bear witness makes it possible for others to bear witness, whether they are cognizant of their witness or not. God in his grace makes it possible for them to bear witness. Moreover, all truth is God’s truth and originates with God’s living Word—Jesus—who is the universal logic that serves as the creative ground of all truths  (John 1:1-4).

I believe the Apostle Paul operated by way of an awareness of the Jesus Matrix. While he grieved over the idolatry he witnessed in Athens (Acts 17:16), he also sought to build bridges with the philosophers at Mars Hill in Athens, as he drew from their poetry and philosophy to make connections with them (Acts 17:28). He also made creative use of the statue dedicated to an unknown God (Acts 17:22-23). Paul did not shrink away from bearing particular witness to Jesus, his resurrection, and his lordship over all things (Acts 17:31). Many rejected what he said, but some of those gathered wanted to hear more (Acts 17:32-34).

In my experience, one of the best contemporary exemplars of seeking to guard against arrogance in Christian witness on the one hand and being attentive (rather than surprised) to the unexpected witness of those outside the church to Christ on the other hand is Tony Kriz, whom many know as the Beat Poet of Blue Like Jazz. His recent book Neighbors and Wise Men: Sacred Encounters in a Portland Pub and Other Unexpected Places (Thomas Nelson, 2012) and his fresh, fine article “Can a Muslim Be God’s Voice to Me” in Leadership Journal model well this posture. Readers of Blue Like Jazz will want to read what Tony has to say in these works. I have been blessed to know Tony, a gifted evangelist, who is part of a long list of model evangelical witnesses who have served in the Pacific Northwest, including Rebecca Pippert, Joe Aldrich, and Luis Palau. Portland is, as Tony has said elsewhere, a wonderful living lab to bear witness to Christ. Portland is our own Mars Hill, where we seek through Scripture as well as philosophy and poetry at pubs and cafes and on the street and in temples to bear witness to Christ in contemporary culture.

As America becomes more and more spiritually and ideologically diverse, and the Bible Belt shrinks around our collective waist in America, Christians will find Tony’s approach to be instructive and beneficial in their attempt to bear witness to Christ. Although Christendom will continue to shrink, the Jesus Matrix never will. We need the kind of humility and confidence that Scripture promotes and that is centered in Christ so that we can speak meaningfully as well as truthfully in these changing times.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on March 28, 2013.

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Today is Maundy (Holy) Thursday on the Christian calendar.  On this day, Christians remember the Lord Jesus’ last supper with his followers and his institution of the Lord’s Supper before he enters into his passion.

Holy and/or unholy passions are flaring today in our society over the debate in the Supreme Court over same sex marriage. Regardless of the outcome of the case(s), I have been intrigued by how many of my Christian brothers and sisters appear to view democracy, or better American democracy, as a holy form of government, almost as if it were installed by the Lord himself. Pope Pius IX was under no illusion as to the tensions between the Roman Catholic Church and secular democracy. He had harsh things to say about Enlightenment-influenced visions of civil society that praised religious liberty and freedom of conscience and that limited the influence of the Catholic church on a society’s citizenry. In his Papal Encyclical titled “Quanta Cura” (Condemning Current Errors) and promulgated on December 8, 1864, he writes:

For you well know, venerable brethren, that at this time men are found not a few who, applying to civil society the impious and absurd principle of “naturalism,” as they call it, dare to teach that “the best constitution of public society and (also) civil progress altogether require that human society be conducted and governed without regard being had to religion any more than if it did not exist; or, at least, without any distinction being made between the true religion and false ones.” And, against the doctrine of Scripture, of the Church, and of the Holy Fathers, they do not hesitate to assert that “that is the best condition of civil society, in which no duty is recognized, as attached to the civil power, of restraining by enacted penalties, offenders against the Catholic religion, except so far as public peace may require.” From which totally false idea of social government they do not fear to foster that erroneous opinion, most fatal in its effects on the Catholic Church and the salvation of souls, called by Our Predecessor, Gregory XVI, an “insanity,”2 viz., that “liberty of conscience and worship is each man’s personal right, which ought to be legally proclaimed and asserted in every rightly constituted society; and that a right resides in the citizens to an absolute liberty, which should be restrained by no authority whether ecclesiastical or civil, whereby they may be able openly and publicly to manifest and declare any of their ideas whatever, either by word of mouth, by the press, or in any other way.” But, while they rashly affirm this, they do not think and consider that they are preaching “liberty of perdition;”3 and that “if human arguments are always allowed free room for discussion, there will never be wanting men who will dare to resist truth, and to trust in the flowing speech of human wisdom; whereas we know, from the very teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ, how carefully Christian faith and wisdom should avoid this most injurious babbling. (under point 3)

Pope Pius IX goes on to say,

And, since where religion has been removed from civil society, and the doctrine and authority of divine revelation repudiated, the genuine notion itself of justice and human right is darkened and lost, and the place of true justice and legitimate right is supplied by material force, thence it appears why it is that some, utterly neglecting and disregarding the surest principles of sound reason, dare to proclaim that “the people’s will, manifested by what is called public opinion or in some other way, constitutes a supreme law, free from all divine and human control; and that in the political order accomplished facts, from the very circumstance that they are accomplished, have the force of right.” But who, does not see and clearly perceive that human society, when set loose from the bonds of religion and true justice, can have, in truth, no other end than the purpose of obtaining and amassing wealth, and that (society under such circumstances) follows no other law in its actions, except the unchastened desire of ministering to its own pleasure and interests?

Regardless of whether or not one finds Pius IX’s encyclical pious, one cannot question his alertness to the challenges secular democracy posed for orthodox religion in his day. A Protestant Christian would be mistaken to read Pius IX’s critique of secular democracy as simply a Roman Catholic thing. Anyone who wishes to see the Christian faith play a prominent role in shaping directly a citizenry and a government of a city or nation will experience consternation to some degree.

While the United States of America has always included a significant Christian population, it has also included significant representation of communities with other convictions. Thomas Jefferson and many others were of a deistic persuasion. They were influenced by forces in Europe that were by no means champions of Catholicism or Puritanism.

This complex historical reality should not cause Christians to lose hope in being vital witnesses for what we take to be holiness during Holy Week or during any other week of the year. What I hope an awareness of this complex historical reality will do for us is cause us to look anew to Jesus and his historical context, which was also quite complex. He lived in a society that included a residue of Jewish theocracy that was forced to negotiate space for adhering to Judaism under the heavy hand of pluralistic Rome. Jesus did not try and reestablish a theocracy or remove the Romans; rather, as he told Pilate, his kingdom is of another world. For Jesus, this state of affairs did not let Pilate off the hook in terms of God’s foreboding judgment; what this state of affairs did signify for Jesus was that he had come to inaugurate God’s kingdom community—the church, which would serve as the essential means through which Jesus would rule and accomplish his mission.

In the midst of holy and unholy passions flaring this week, let the community Jesus inaugurated and the meal he instituted lead us forward to advocate for political power of a higher order. What is that order? Under this state of affairs, Jesus hangs on the cross and calls us to carry ours, offering ourselves as living sacrifices, where our freedom in Christ becomes our ultimate freedom, regardless of whether or not we experience freedom of religion or speech. May Jesus’ speech bridle our tongues so that we speak truth in love, even if our fellow citizens’ speech turns to hate. May they know we are Christians by our holy love.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on March 26, 2013.

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This is not a post on what the Bible says about homosexuality, but about some of the questions I believe Evangelical Christians should consider when thinking about the Supreme Court’s decisions on Proposition 8 and the Defense of Marriage Act this week.

What kinds of ethical stances should we as Evangelicals seek to implement as laws of the land in our democratic society? I would assume most Evangelical Christians support adherence to speed limits in school zones for the sake of our children’s safety. Would we put forth laws that keep men and women from living together outside marriage? Why or why not? From a different angle, should we seek to support gay couples who have determined to live in monogamous relationships and who have adopted children, giving them stable homes rather than leaving them to grow up in foster care?

What kinds of ethical stances should we as Evangelicals take and seek to enforce in our post-Christendom, democratic society? While Christianity is still the largest representative religion and Evangelicalism may very well still be the largest Christian movement in the States, we live in a society where a large percentage of people don’t share what many Evangelicals take to be biblical stances on homosexuality.  Rather than seeking to enforce those biblical interpretations on others, would it be seen as more discerning to make sure that we of these convictions are not forced to go against our consciences to officiate same sex marriages in our churches?

What kind of missional stance should we Evangelicals take? Is it our kingdom calling to make America a Christian nation or the church truly Christian, including its approach to sexual conduct? Jesus did not make it his calling to take back Jerusalem, but to lay down his life for Jerusalem and build his church—a church that cared for people of alternative lifestyles while calling its members to holiness in all its relationships.

One of the fears I have as Evangelicals address the issue of the legalization of gay marriage is that we might win a battle on shooting down gay marriage and lose a war of building caring relationships with gay people. Will Evangelicals influence the morality of our culture on marriage most by enforcing its overarching view on marriage on others or by embodying its ethic of marriage and family in a way that demonstrates loyal love and self-sacrifice?

For a recent discussion of my view on what Scripture says about homosexuality and how Evangelicals should address the issue, see the chapter “Homosexuality, Holy Matrimony, and Hospitality” on this subject in Connecting Christ: How to Discuss Jesus in a World of Diverse Paths (Thomas Nelson, 2012).

This piece was originally published at Patheos on March 17, 2013.

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My wife, Mariko, has shared beautifully about the rainbow of love of her multi-ethnic experience. My rainbow of love experience is a bit different, and it breaks on through or rather past Jimmy Fallon’s impersonation of Jim Morrison of The Doors singing “Reading Rainbow.” The only books Morrison ever inspired me to read were those by the likes of Friedrich Nietzsche, Aldous Huxley, and Arthur Rimbaud.

I grew up in a strong Christian home and received Jesus into my life as a small child, but rebelled against what I would call “Churchianity”—a lukewarm and bourgeois Christian faith—during my high school years. The life and lyrics of Jim Morrison were significant forces that shaped me during this time. Even today, I appreciate Morrison for seeking to follow his convictions wherever they would lead him—perhaps even seeking to “break on through to the other side” through death.

After a few brushes with death and nihilism and the death of a friend, I came to realize after high school that what Jesus said was true at a very personal level: the thief comes to steal and kill and destroy, but Jesus has come to give life to the full (John 10:10). The potency of Jesus’ words woke me up after attending the wake of that late friend and I gave my life to bearing witness to Jesus who broke through death to the other side through his resurrection to bring us fullness of life. I went from being intoxicated with reading about the life of Jim Morrison to being inspired to follow Jesus from taking to heart the words of the martyred missionary Jim Elliot, who wrote of the Christian life in his journal: “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.”

Churchianity would have us try to hold onto our comforts at all cost whereas Christ’s church always calls us out and beckons us to take up our crosses, die to our comforts, and find our comfort through union with him and those shaped by the crucible of Jesus’ reconciling and life-fulfilling love. Fullness of life in Jesus involves being reconciled to God and one another. That is a tall order, especially in an alienated world where people who are different than us and who view us as strangers appear strange and ugly, as Morrison sang. It is very hard to find sanctuary in a world like this, where everyone who is different appears to lock you out and you return the favor.

We all need to be called out from our comforts that isolate and alienate us. We all need to be called into community, where we are no longer strangers and where we can find a home among friends who, whether or not they are like us, really work hard to love us. I am grateful for Irvington Covenant Church, where we are being called out from strangerhood today as members of this body. Irvington Covenant Church on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in Portland, Oregon is committed to offering reconciliation rooted in Christ where those who were once strangers—“those who are other”—can now become friends. Our church is a grand experiment—not with drugs and alcohol—but with tenacious love.

What brings us to Irvington and keeps us here is not its call to be Facebook friends, but friends in the biblical sense. Biblical friendship entails more than “likes” and “shares” and hanging out with those who belong to the same fraternity. It entails personal sacrifice and building community with those least like you. Through faith in Christ we are baptized by the Spirit into his death and raised through the Spirit into the fullness of his resurrected life so that we can break on through comfortable lives to his all-comforting love that gives us the courage to become what we already are—one in the rainbow of Jesus’ love—in community.

In the song “The Soft Parade,” Jim Morrison claims to have gone to seminary school. While I doubt he did, I undoubtedly did. Morrison claims to have heard in seminary that one could petition the Lord in prayer—a claim that he rejects. When I was back in seminary school, I also heard of petitioning the Lord in prayer. Now as a seminary professor, I speak of petitioning the Lord in prayer to make us one in view of Jesus’ prayer:  ^“I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me” (John 17:23). I want to believe with all my heart that I can petition the Lord to make this prayer come true. Irvington Covenant is a church I have always admired from afar. From afar, it is known as a beautiful experiment in race reconciliation. Certainly, it is beautiful. However, it is also very messy. Irvington Covenant—this beautiful and messy experiment—is not centered in a psychedelic supper but in Scripture and the Lord’s Supper, which beckons us to our Lord who got messed up to make us one.

The rainbow of Jesus’ messy, beautiful love (rather than Jimmy Fallon’s Jim Morrison’s “Reading Rainbow” or Levar Burton’s own rendition of “Reading Rainbow”) calls us to imagine and invest in the biblical vision of a world in which there are no divisions between Jew and Gentile, male and female, slave and free (Galatians 3:28). It calls us to envision and inhabit a kingdom that will appear in its fullness, where people of every tribe and tongue and nation will worship and commune together at the throne of God and the resurrected lamb (Revelation 7:9-10). I am grateful that our church is willing to take the risk and inhabit the Scriptures together and travel to that throne whose rainbow of promise and providential, holy love assures us that God will bring us through trials and tribulations (Revelation 4:3). Our story is still being written, as we find sanctuary here to ride through the storm and journey home.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on March 16, 2013.

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I was blessed to read that the new pope, Pope Francis, asked the people to pray for him before he blessed them. He also refused to be elevated above the cardinals on a platform. Not only that, when he was archbishop of Buenos Aires, he determined not to live in the archbishop’s palace, but in an apartment, and passed on taking a chauffeured limousine to work in favor of the bus. Known for his simplicity and for being a voice for the poor, it is quite fitting that Jorge Bergoglio chose as his papal name, Francis (in view of St. Francis of Assisi)—the first time this name has been used for a pope.

The new pope’s symbolic actions and characteristic traits are no doubt welcome signs to many. Among other things, the name Francis suggests that he sees his role as one of rebuilding the church, which includes embracing the traits already noted as modeled by the pope. For example, the heart-felt posture of humility noted above, which is essential to rebuilding the church, entails regard for dialogue. Although the new pope is known for being a resolute conservative on social issues, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said of Pope Francis that he shares common aims with the U.N. over advocacy for social justice and peace and that they “share the conviction that we can only resolve the interconnected challenges of today’s world through dialogue.” Certainly, concern for meaningful and sustained dialogue is key to addressing the various interwoven challenges the world faces today. Among other things, dialogue entails going beyond confronting ideological platform positions with ideological platform positions.

While I appreciate fellow Evangelical Gary Bauer’s affirmation that Evangelicals should care about the new pope, his reasoning for why Evangelicals should care about the new pope is based primarily if not exclusively on his conviction that “Catholics are our best allies in important cultural and political battles,” as his USA Today article’s tagline conveys. Indeed, there are many areas of agreement between Evangelicals and the Catholic leadership on social issues, for which I am very grateful. Moreover, Evangelicals have a long way to go in terms of developing a consistent and comprehensive theology of life and could learn a great deal from Catholicism, whose teachings on social ethics are exceedingly robust. Still, we may also be able to learn a thing or two about how to dialogue from the new pope, if as the U.N. Secretary says, he is committed to approaching the world’s many interconnected challenges in this way.

One area where dialogue is needed is with the Muslim world. With this point in mind, I wasn’t sure what to make of Bauer’s claim that “Catholics and evangelicals (and to a lesser extent orthodox Jews and Mormons) have formed a formidable partnership in recent decades against the threats of secularism, relativism and Islamism.” How is such a statement not read as fighting words to Muslims? Evangelicals have a long way to go in terms of building trust with Muslims in pursuit of resolving longstanding conflicts involving religion in our world today.

I would hope the main reason why Evangelicals would affirm the new pope is not his social conservative platform, but his posture and lifestyle of humility, simplicity, and care for the poor, along with what the U.N. Secretary-General claims is his commitment to dialogue. If his papal name is any indication, he wants to listen first and understand before being understood. The prayer attributed to St. Francis titled the Peace Prayer includes the lines:

O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled, as to console;
To be understood, as to understand;
To be loved as to love.

This past week, I was part of a dialogue involving Evangelicals and Buddhists on the subject of abortion and related social issues. What was striking was that for our various metaphysical and lifestyle differences, we chose to listen to one another wrestle through the issues based on our personal narratives and histories, not merely ideology. As a result of taking time to listen and share and complicating the issues, not as ideological opponents but as people with complex lives, we were in a better position to work through difficult topics and come to a greater sense of mutual understanding of one another’s positions and what needs to occur if we are to make headway on social ethics rather than label one another in the extreme.

The preceding statements should not be taken to mean that theology and ethical foundations don’t matter; they matter greatly. But the only way we are going to be able to make progress on divisive social issues is when we get to know our supposed ideological opponents as people, for whom the issues before us matter to them at a deeply personal, existential level, just as much as they do to us. By humanizing issues and complexifying ourselves, we are also able to simplify life to an extent: the solution to many difficulties involves cultivating greater understanding of people’s lives and positions rather than painting them in ideological terms of opposition, whether they are Muslims, Buddhists, secularists, Catholics, or Evangelicals.

Power religion paints people and positions in ideological terms. Why I welcome the new Pope most is because of his posture of humility, simplicity and the selection of his name Francis, which conveys the effort to understand and love before seeking to be understood and to be loved. In a world poverty-stricken for understanding and love, this pope may very well be a welcome sign.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on March 9, 2013.

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Today is my birthday. As I look back upon my many years of life and look forward toward the future, I wish and hope that I will pursue life more fully with an open hand, not a clenched fist.

So often, I find people, myself included, trying to clutch onto life to squeeze and suck as much juice out of the turnip of existence before it is all gone. As a result, we often if not always miss life in the process. It is very difficult to enjoy and experience life as it comes to us if we are trying to seize and control it.

As I pondered this theme earlier today, I was taken back to my reflections on Buddhism and Christianity from Connecting Christ: How to Discuss Jesus in a World of Diverse Paths. There in my chapter on Buddhism, I spoke of my appreciation for the complexity and internal consistency of Buddhist philosophy. There are also numerous practical insights in Buddhism that bear upon serenity and the sanctity of all life. Further to what was said above, all too often I grasp onto things, living with clenched fists and clenched teeth. However, my Christian faith and Buddhism inform us that we should not grasp and clutch onto things in this life. Compassionate existence evades our grasp and slips through our teeth when we live with clenched fists and jaws. We need to live with open hands and palm to palm.

For all the profundity in Buddhism and Christianity, these two historical religious traditions approach the subject of grasping from very different frames of reference and with different ends in mind. For Buddhists, according to my dear friend and colleague Zen Buddhist Priest Abbot Kyogen Carlson, enlightenment involves ceasing to grasp after things, which have no permanence. Nothing has permanence, not even personhood. This is the negative side of enlightenment. The positive side of enlightenment is to engage in a non-grasping way. The Noble eightfold Path of Buddhism helps the follower move beyond grasping. My friend, Kyogen, models a non-grasping life beautifully in so many ways, so much so that he can engage me openly–an Evangelical Christian–palm to palm.

Perhaps I will reflect further upon this subject in future posts. For now, however, I wish to reflect upon historic Christianity’s call to pursue permanence through interpersonal communion and what that means for me today on my birthday. I conceive of the Christian faith in relational and interpersonal terms. Personhood understood interpersonally and not individualistically involves interpersonal communion. It involves sharing life, not seizing it, finding ourselves in laying down our lives for others rather than taking life from others, enjoying the moment rather than trying to lock it up and putting it on display as if it could last eternally. All too often, I try and make an eternity out of time rather than allow time to remind me and prepare me for eternity.

The Christian faith claims that through the fall into sin and evil we entered into a state of mortality and impermanence, but that through Christ Jesus’ death and bodily resurrection we will be raised immortal (2 Corinthians 4–5). This is a bedrock conviction of orthodox Christian faith over the centuries. This conviction has a bearing on all of life, including how we respond to good and evil, personhood, and life and death.

To the extent we participate in the ultimate personal reality, namely, the interpersonal communion of the Father and Son in the all-powerful love of the Spirit through faith, we model effective and essential “relationality.” Relationality as defined here involves sensitivity and commitment to building community with all that it entails for self-sacrifice and compassionate coexistence and mutual care for one another. The triune God, who is three divine persons in loving and holy eternal communion as the one God, is the ideal personal ground for the possibility of authentic personhood and relationality.

Still, I find that I often fail to grasp this reality conceptually and, even more problematically, existentially. Jesus calls me to take up my cross and die to myself so that I can live, to put others first rather than myself, to share life rather than seize it. My Buddhist friend, Kyogen, has taught me a thing or two about non-grasping existentially. So has my Japanese wife, Mariko, who is a Christian.

Now that I am a year older, I hope I am not becoming like an old dog that is not able to learn new tricks or that I forget the ones I supposedly know. Relationality is not a technique or tool or trick. It is a way of life that takes a lifetime and beyond to master as one opens oneself to the Master of the universe, who laid down his life for you and me. My birthday wish is that I will open my life more to him and others today and beyond in view of his having opened his life for you and me fully with open palms, nailed to that tree.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on March 5, 2013.

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This essay is more academic in tone than my usual blog posts. I trust my readers will find it an intriguing departure.

Is Christian Zionism biblical? I suppose it all depends on what you mean by biblical. Based on a literal reading of the biblical text in its historical context, one finds support for a Zionist reading of Scripture. Of course, this interpretive move is not accepted by everyone. It is not my aim to defend or critique this position, but to contend against the stance held by some within Christian Zionism that the present state of Israel is the realization of biblical prophecy from this hermeneutical perspective.

Still, what is Christian Zionism? It entails the belief that God will restore Israel’s ancient fortunes as a nation in the Promised Land. Accompanying this claim is the conviction that Messiah Jesus will rule from Jerusalem and the Jewish people will believe on him. One of the arguments that is put forth by Christian Zionists is that the ancient prophecies, such as what Christians take to be New Covenant promises fulfilled in Christ set forth in Jeremiah 31 and Ezekiel 36 (See also Hebrews 8:8-12 where Jeremiah 31:31-34 is quoted and John 3:5-7 which alludes to Ezekiel 36:25-27, in my estimation), also talk about God bringing his people back to the land to dwell there permanently (Jeremiah 31:35-40; Ezekiel 36:1-24, 28-38). Based on a literal and historical reading, Christian Zionists claim that God’s people would have understood this to take place literally at a future point in history. Christians of this perspective often ask: if God does not fulfill his promises to Israel, how will we know if God will fulfill his new covenant promises for the church? Based on the presuppositions that support this position, the question makes sense.

What does not make sense is the position of some Christian Zionists that the church must do everything possible to bring about Israel’s return to the Promised Land. While the church should never curse Israel, and should always bless Israel (a claim made in keeping with God’s promise to Abram or Abraham in Genesis 12:3; we will return to nuance that point), a Christian Zionist claim of this kind is bound up with a view of the end times that maintains that God will inaugurate this state of affairs, and with no help from human hands. Moreover, on a pretribulational, premillennial reading of Scripture, the church will not even be present at the time of Zion’s eschatological emergence when Christ will reign over it. The church will be removed from this world prior to the great tribulation and Israel as a nation will be front and center once again in God’s kingdom purposes. When Jesus returns at the end of the tribulation, he alone will inaugurate his millennial kingdom and rule as God’s Messiah from Jerusalem. If one were to take a poll of Jewish people living in Israel today, one would hardly find universal support for this position. From this Christian Zionist reading of Scripture, the fulfillment of the ancient promises for Israel’s eschatological return as a nation has not yet occurred.

From a premillennialist perspective (of various stripes), the Lord will usher in the fulfillment of his eschatological kingdom apart from the working of the church, unlike with adherents of postmillennialism. Unfortunately, there are some Christian Zionists who are not satisfied with simply seeing Israel as having a special place in God’s eschatological program; they favor and support Israel in the attempt to facilitate the second coming of Christ. It is worth noting at this point that Dispensationalist theologian John S. Feinberg has cautioned against trying to speed the Messiah’s return through support of Israel: “Some are so excited about things to come, that they unfortunately think they can somehow bring them to pass sooner, rather than later—at least they want to try. Some well-meaning American Christians have even talked of sending rock and stone to help in rebuilding the Temple. If there is anything not needed in Israel it is more rock and stone. Even if there were such a need, contributing money to fill that need won’t make the end-times come any sooner than God has planned. Unless you happen to be the Anti-Christ, there is probably little you can do to make these events happen, and no one can move God’s sovereign timetable one moment faster or slower than he wants” (The quotation is taken from John Feinberg’s paper, “Dispensationalism and Support for the State of Israel,” {pg. 19}, which was presented at the “Christ at the Checkpoint” Conference, March 12–17, 2010, Bethlehem, Israel).

Another thing that does not make sense is Christian Zionists supporting Israeli hostilities toward the Palestinians. Yes, God blesses those who bless Israel. But not everything Israel currently does blesses God. Israel as a nation is hardly seeking the blessing of the Palestinians. According to God’s first promise to Abraham, all peoples will be blessed through Isaac’s seed, not cursed (See Genesis 12:1-3). Moreover, Arabs are descendants of Ishmael, Abraham’s son, whom God also blesses (See Genesis 17:19-21, Genesis 21:13, 17-18). Furthermore, many Palestinians are Christians, a point often lost on many Christian Zionists (Don Belt, “The Forgotten Faithful: Arab Christians,” in National Geographic, vol. 215, no. 6, June 2009). Those who believe in Jesus are sons and daughters of God, irrespective of their people group. In Galatians 3:28, we are told that in Christ there is no division between Jews and Gentiles as a result of Christ’s atoning work. As a result, all who believe in Jesus are children of the free woman of whom Paul speaks (Galatians 4:21–31), not just the descendants of Isaac who believe. As much as we should be concerned for all people and all Arabs, for all are blessed by God, our concern should be heightened for those who are fellow brothers and sisters in Jesus.

Speaking of Jesus, we find him often challenging his own Jewish people. Their national identity or ancestral connection to Abraham is not sufficient (John the Baptist makes a similar point—Matthew 3:9). He exhorts them to have the faith of Abraham (John 8:31–58). The Canaanite woman (Matthew 15:21–28) and Centurion (Matthew 8:5–13) are sterling examples of those who have the faith of Abraham. Those of Abraham’s faith are Abraham’s spiritual children, according to Paul (Galatians 3:7). We must also account for Jesus’ exhortation to the Jewish religious teacher who sought to test Jesus about what is required to inherit eternal life. Jesus tells him to love his neighbor as himself and shares with him the parable of a lowly Samaritan who exemplifies righteousness—caring for a man (likely a Jewish man) who was beaten and robbed and left for dead (Luke 10:25–37).

The point of referencing these biblical accounts is to point out that God loves all people and that God is no respecter of persons. While Israel is the people of promise, God blesses all people and calls everyone to account to believe like Abraham in the promised Messiah and to live like the unnamed Samaritan as people of the promise. To believe like Abraham entails living like the Samaritan. As Jesus the Messiah makes clear, my neighbor is not the person like me or the person I like, but the person in need—even my enemy.  I am responsible to care for him or her. Thus, as Christians, we are to promote concern for the well-being of all peoples and pray that the Jews and Palestinians will care deeply for one another.

Scripture specifies that Israel is to care for the foreigners in the land, granting them an inheritance and treating them as native-born (Ezekiel 47:21–22): How much more noteworthy is this text when the people in question—the Palestinians—have lived in the land for generations prior to the Jewish people’s return? Mark Bailey, President of Dallas Theological Seminary, maintains that “when Israel is restored to the land, they are to treat the aliens and strangers as if they were Israelites.” In this light, he challenges the modern state of Israel, as well as the Palestinian authority: “Do you know what is lacking in Israel? Just a minor, little plank in God’s program: treating others as you would like to be treated…The bottom-line principle is so powerful, so biblical: Israel needs to treat others as they would like to be treated. The Palestinian authority needs to treat Israel as they would like to be treated.  This applies to all peoples” (See Mark Bailey, “The Lord’s Land Policy in Israel,” in Veritas, vol. 2/3 {July 2002}, 4–5).

While Israel has a fundamental right to live in peace and security in the land, it must not take those rights from others—such as the confiscation of property and increase of settlements in violation of international law (See Donald Macintyre, “The Big Question: What are Israeli Settlements, and Why are They Coming Under Pressure?” in The Independent, Friday, May 29, 2009; John Glaser, “EU Report: Israeli Settlements Deliberate Strategy to Block Palestinian State,” in AntiWar.com, Wednesday, February 27, 2013; and “EU Report Slams Israeli Settlements, Calls for Economic Sanctions,” in RT.com, Wednesday, February 27, 2013) and building of walls and checkpoints that keep Palestinians from getting to their jobs and having access to healthcare.  (See Josef Federman, “Palestinian-Only Buses Set Off Uproar in Israel,” Time, Tuesday, March 5, 2013; and Karl Vick, “Why Israel Doesn’t Care About Peace,” in Time, Thursday, September 2, 2010.)

Of course, the Jews are not the only ones to blame. The Palestinians have themselves also been guilty of a multitude of injustices against the Jewish people and Israel (For an article discussing abuses on both sides, including Israel’s expansion of Jewish settlements and expulsion of Palestinians from their homes coupled with the murder of members of an Israeli settler family by Palestinians, see “U.N. Official: Israel Engaging in Ethnic Cleansing,” in Reuters/Ynetnews.com). In fact, many Palestinians do not care about peace. Indeed, groups like Hamas have long been known for wishing Israel’s destruction as a nation (For a discussion of Palestinian indifference and/or hostility as reflected in the actions of Hamas and other groups such as Islamic Jihad, see Seth Freedman’s article, “Jerusalem Bus Bomb Will Hurt the Palestinian Cause,” in The Guardian, March 24, 2011; For a recent discussion of escalating violence, see Lawahez Jabari, “Israelis, Palestinians Tense as Violence Escalates Along Gaza Border”, in NBC, Thursday, November 15, 2012). No party is innocent. However, a very large segment of Evangelicalism tends to be one-sided in its criticism of the Palestinians and looks past the injustices committed against the Palestinians by Israel.

Many Evangelicals have a strange view of what it means to bless and not curse Israel. To do what Egypt did to Jacob’s descendants in enslaving them is “cursing” Israel. Cursing in the biblical sense is not refusing to be in favor of all that Israel does. In this sense, the prophets could have been accused of cursing Israel. Related to this point, many Christians fail to place “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem” in its biblical context (Psalm 122). Praying for the peace of Jerusalem is never separated from biblical justice (See Psalm 122:5), including concern for those who reside in Israel’s midst (Ezekiel 47:21–22). The best way that we can bless Israel is to pray and call for Israel and the Palestinians to live together peacefully as equals in the land. In that way, whether Christian Zionist or not, all of us who claim to be Christians can be biblical.

For further treatment of these issues from which some of this material is drawn, please see my article in Cultural Encounters. (“Why Should We Care?” in Cultural Encounters, vol. 7/1, {2011})

This piece was originally published at Patheos on March 3, 2013.

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Upon reading news on the sequester, you might not know whether to laugh or cry. There have been so many predictions, so much name-calling and finger pointing. I am not sure who to believe.

Two items stood out to me in a CBS News article on the sequester. First, according to the article, “Most entitlement programs are exempt.” The article goes on to say, “During the negotiations that produced the sequester, Democrats successfully pushed to exempt most forms of politically sensitive entitlement spending from the automatic cuts. As a result, Social Security, Medicaid, veterans’ benefits, unemployment insurance, and food stamps will not see any reduction in funding. Medicare beneficiaries were also spared the axe, while Medicare providers will see only a 2 percent reduction in payments. Mr. Obama’s healthcare bill, some recall, also opted to slash payments to Medicare providers in lieu of targeting beneficiaries.” If correct, you might find this news to be a sign of relief, especially if you are one of the beneficiaries of these various programs.

Second, the article raises the question: does the sequester, as problematic as across the board cuts is, provide “an opportunity to target wasteful spending?” As stated in the article, some Republicans are grateful that, while problematic, the sequester “has begun a conversation” on what they take to be wasteful spending. Still, why couldn’t our federal government have engaged in constructive conversation earlier on what is wasteful as well as necessary spending and avoided the sequester in the first place?

It’s hard not to laugh and cry at the same time, when observing how our government is handling this crisis. It gets even worse, when you find that our nation’s leaders don’t necessarily know what to make of the sequester. According to NBC News, House speaker John Boehner has claimed that he doesn’t believe anyone quite knows how to resolve the sequester, if it’s going to hurt the economy, or how it will work.

Given that many people don’t know whether to laugh or cry over the sequester, is it any wonder that Saturday Night Live has gotten involved in the act?  According to a Saturday Night Live skit, Mrs. Obama will only do four television appearances a week from now on (down from seventy-five); air traffic control and border control will be severely impacted in comic if not cosmic proportions; astronauts will no longer have glass shields in their space helmets; three monkeys will be fired from the national zoo in Washington, D. C. and let loose on the streets of the nation’s capitol where they will wreak havoc; the list goes on.

Comic relief may be in order. But there is no time for finger pointing and hand-wringing. Whatever direction the conversation takes, the Democrats and Republicans will need to resolve their internal conflicts and work together to move us out of this mess. Inaction never leads to good governance. For our part, we will all need to learn to work harder together as citizens. The worst thing that can happen is for us to sequester ourselves from our nation’s problems and look out only for ourselves or our kind of people. We will need to make sure that whichever direction the conversation takes, we will advocate for those most disadvantaged; for example, cuts in public education will likely affect the most vulnerable student populations the most. Though the sequester will likely impact public education broadly, those who are more well to do can adjust more readily and provide other educational opportunities for their children. The poor seldom if ever have lobbyists in large part because they lack the necessary resources. How equitable is that in a democracy?

There is nothing funny about a country, whose more well-to-do citizens care only for themselves and who leave the most vulnerable to fend for themselves. Not only is there nothing funny about such inaction and indifference, but also there is nothing smart about it either: if we want to reduce poverty and build the economy (which everyone should affirm), we need to invest in the poor to benefit them and also so that they can help build our economy and help heal our nation.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on February 28, 2013.

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In “Jesus, Darwin and Donald Trump” (Part I), I conclude by saying that Evangelicalism may have been far more successful in generating support for the evolutionary supremacy of the market system than in challenging Darwin’s Origin of Species. There I was referring to Gordon Bigelow’s Harper’s Magazine claim that Evangelicals don’t simply assume the market’s gospel truthfulness but also promote it. In Bigelow’s estimation, Evangelicals have been responsible for cultivating the sense of scientific certainty around markets. If Bigelow’s assertion is correct, why might it be the case that Evangelicals have been responsible for cultivating this sense of scientific certainty around markets?

Could it be that many Evangelicals have bitten the big apple lie that individual effort alone leads to prosperity and the lack of prosperity reflects a lack of effort? Bigelow says of Evangelical convictions during the late 18^th and 19^th centuries that while salvation comes by conversion and faith for Evangelicals, nonetheless the suffering and pain of this mortal life was the result of original sin and bound up with our salvation. Evangelicals “regarded poverty as part of a divine program. Evangelicals interpreted the mental anguish of poverty and debt, and the physical agony of hunger or cold, as natural spurs to prick the conscience of sinners. They believed that the suffering of the poor would provoke remorse, reflection, and ultimately the conversion that would change their fate. In other words, poor people were poor for a reason, and helping them out of poverty would endanger their mortal souls” (Bigelow, “Let There Be Markets”).

Such a perspective may be bound up in part with a narrow reading of certain texts in Proverbs on such topics as laziness and sloth. While the Bible has nothing positive to say about sluggards, and exhorts people to work hard, the book of Proverbs provides us with general principles concerning how to live wisely, not statements of cause-effect relation for every situation. Proverbs 20:13 states, “Love not sleep, lest you come to poverty; open your eyes, and you will have plenty of bread” (ESV). How do you harmonize this type of exhortation with Scripture’s call to care for the poor? For example, Proverbs 29:7 says, “A righteous man knows the rights of the poor; a wicked man does not understand such knowledge” (ESV). Also, Proverbs 19:1 states, “Better is a poor person who walks in his integrity than one who is crooked in speech and is a fool” (ESV; see also Proverbs 14:31, 19:17, 21:13, and 22:2). One cannot be a sluggard and be a person of integrity; however, many poor people are people of integrity. Would the harmonization of Scripture’s various teachings on this subject of poverty suggest to you that not everyone who is poor is in poverty because of laziness? Why or why not? Moreover, in view of Scripture’s call to extend mercy to people (for example, God acts graciously and mercifully toward the lost, as illustrated by the father’s care for his prodigal son in Luke 15:11-32), how should followers of Christ care for those who make poor decisions and end up in poverty?

By the way, might there not be rich people who are lazy and/or who are unwise in their use of money? Concerning the matter of being unwise, consider Jesus’ parable of the old fool in Luke 12:13-21. Contrast him with Jesus’ disciples in the very next section of the chapter. Jesus’ disciples are holy fools. The difference between old fools and holy fools is that while old fools clutch their wealth with greedy fists, holy fools hold their resources with open hands. The latter do so because they are free to give their possessions to the poor because God’s kingdom belongs to them (Luke 12:32-34). How do we discern if we are old fools or holy fools today?

While we will return to such questions as these in future blog posts, one thing is for certain: we need to grow in wisdom in how we approach free market capitalism. No economic system can claim a monopoly on Scripture; however, Christian Scripture must be brought to bear on all economic systems. Otherwise, the Donald Trump fish of the survival of the economic fittest (and not the Darwin fish of the biological or genetic fittest) will end up devouring Christians.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on February 15, 2013.

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Some will say that Pope Benedict XVI’s decision to step down symbolized his incompetence and failure to lead the Roman Catholic Church forward through tumultuous times. Others such as myself find it an act of great competence that he chose to step down at this time because of his failing health. While it might remove some of the aura of seeming invincibility from around the Papacy, the aura of humility might very well take its place. A willingness to acknowledge one’s limitations and call for someone else to step in and take the reins in this case signifies that this pope has the best interests of his church and community at large in mind and is willing to acknowledge his frailties and weaknesses in his current state.

The Pope is certainly not incompetent intellectually or theologically. He is one of the brightest theologians around. Of course, he did face numerous challenges as Pope. Perhaps no challenge was more difficult than having to address the overwhelming numbers of scandals coming to the surface involving Catholic priests molesting children. While a full accounting remains, nonetheless he did tackle the issue head on. As a Wall Street Journal article notes,

Despite the church’s dismal record of covering up child abuse by priests, and recent questions about the future pontiff’s opposition to defrocking one such priest in 1985, Benedict was the first pope to both recognize the damage of this procession of scandals and to apologize for them, meeting with victims and introducing new procedures. This was hardly enough to satisfy the need for a full accounting, but it was an important first step nonetheless.

Evangelicals would be wise to learn from the Catholic Church and not pop off with criticisms about its struggles. After all, we have had our own share of scandals over the years, involving leading representatives of the movement such as Ted Haggard, among others. Humility, transparency, active repentance and accountability go a long way to safeguard against future abuses being committed, whether we are Catholics, Protestant Evangelicals, or others.

This past semester, a Roman Catholic priest spoke to my class on parish ministry. He was a shining example of what a parish minister should be about. A vibrant love for Jesus and his community and my class marks this shepherd of souls. My students, while perhaps originally wary based on doctrinal differences between Catholics and Evangelicals, warmed quickly to him. Not only were we blessed by his love, but also we were pained by what he shared about being spit upon in the street at times for being a priest. It is almost as if his collar that associates him with the church makes some people view him as nothing more than a dog. Whether or not my students will ever wear clerical collars, they share with this priest a passion for Christ and his cross. Whether accurate or not at every turn, they also sense that together we are facing greater opposition as Christians in our society than ever before. No matter how you slice the theology and the suffering, there is a lot more that we share in common with Catholics than there is that separate us—both the good and the bad.

We will all need to discern how to learn from our failures and to build on our strengths. There is strength in numbers, especially where that strength is focused upon cultivating a theology of life that concerns itself with protecting the most vulnerable, whether they are the poor, women and fetuses under duress, children, or those facing religious persecution, whatever their faith tradition, including our own. Such strength will need to be harnessed by humility, transparency, active repentance, and accountability. Otherwise, we will find once again how true it often is that power corrupts.

Evangelicals have no time to pop off on the Pope and Catholic Church. With the Catholic Church, we will need to lead and serve not from a love of power, but from the power of love. For as this pope so eloquently expounded upon theologically, God is love.

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This piece was originally published at Patheos on February 14, 2013.

Today is the birthday of my niece, Hannah, who passed away from leukemia several years ago. I wrote about Hannah in my book, The Gospel of John: When Love Comes to Town. There I quote from Karl Barth, who said:

“God shows Himself to be the great and true God in the fact that He can and will let His grace bear this cost, that He is capable and willing and ready for this condescension, this act of extravagance, this far journey. What marks out God above all false gods is that they are not capable and ready for this. In their otherworldliness and supernaturalness and otherness, etc., the gods are a reflection of the human pride which will not unbend, which will not stoop to that which is beneath it. God is not proud. In His high majesty He is humble. It is in this high humility that He speaks and acts as the God who reconciles the world to Himself.” (Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics: The Doctrine of Reconciliation 4/1, ed. G. W. Bromiley and T. F. Torrance {Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1956}, p. 159.)

I go on to say,

“It’s not only extraordinary theologians who get at this act of extravagance. Ordinary people living extraordinary lives get at it as well, living out the far journey close to home: sick kids caring for others, single moms working for their kids rather than partying to get their kicks, stay-at home dads staying home for their kids and corporate people choosing corporate solidarity with the people rather than the corporate climb. They do this because they see themselves as participants in God’s far journey through his Son.” (The Gospel of John: When Love Comes to Town {Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2010}, p. 222).

Even when battling with cancer, Hannah continued to care for others in their sickness, bearing witness to God’s light in dark places. The memory of her life brings the light of witness home to me today. May we all experience and bear witness to God’s far journey of humble love today.

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This piece was originally published at Patheos on February 12, 2013.

Last week I wrote a post requesting prayer for Richard Twiss. Now that he has passed into the presence of his Lord and needs no further prayer, all of us mourn a great loss. Now, I am requesting prayer for us. Of course, in Christ, Richard wins. “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” (1 Corinthians 15:55) He has gone on to his eternal reward. Death and the grave hold no power over this warrior, for his Lord is victor.

Still, the battle here below rages on. As Wiconi International’s website reads, “Historically, Native people have been underrepresented and underserved in mainstream America. Economic, cultural and social barriers continually limit access to viable resources, thus hindering many healthy community change efforts.” Wiconi International, the organization Richard co-founded with his wife Katherine, is a prophetic movement that aims in Christ to reverse the curse in Native communities:

Wiconi’s primary mission is to empower and serve Native people to experience a desired quality of life and a hope-filled future through authentic relationships and culturally supportive programs. We seek to live and walk among all people in a good way, as we follow the ways of Jesus—affirming, respecting and embracing the God-given cultural realities of Native American and Indigenous people, not rejecting or demonizing these sacred cultural ways.”

It is an uphill battle, but Jesus is victor. We can bear witness to Christ’s victory by partnering with Richard’s people at Wiconi International, his friends at the North American Institute for Indigenous Theological Studies, and related ventures.

Be warned: the more we get involved, the more risk there will be for our hearts to break over the pain and injustices committed against indigenous peoples here and abroad in the past and in the present. Our hearts may very well explode with joy as we see Native peoples celebrate Jesus in their indigenous cultural forms.

Many conservative Christians in the mainstream Anglo culture will be quick to reveal fears of syncretism, but will totally miss our own vivid syncretism with materialism in its various forms. Richard’s people have patiently taught me how to approach life in a more open-handed and holistic way. I have a long way to go. As Richard pointed out years ago, the God mammon in the form of consumerism weighs oppressively on mainstream Christian culture. Moreover, we are often blind to the victims of the ever-evolving consequences of our historic evils of cultural genocide. We even have the audacity to blame the victims of our injustices by placing them on reservations rather than go to jail ourselves. I have heard people say that the devil has those people, when the mainstream culture as we know it put them there. So, what does that make us? Demons?

While Richard endured our blindness to the structures that so heavily weigh upon his people, he never ceased working with us in long-suffering love to open our eyes so that we could truly see. His humor and wit could sting, but for those whose eyes and ears and hearts were opened, they served as healing balm to enter into an ongoing state of repentance and clarifying vision to partner with Richard and his people. Richard said, “The reason why they call it the land of the free is because they never paid us for it” and it still rings true today. So, too, does his statement that good white people have washed his feet, but the only thing that’s changed when it’s all said and done is that his feet are clean. The structures that oppress his people remain the same. Reconciliation without justice and full integration into a community of equals is no reconciliation at all.

I need to get my own feet dirty a whole lot more so that I can have a clean heart. The trail of tears is a bloody and dirty road that leads us to Golgotha and finally to the tomb, from which Jesus rose, and in his time, Richard will, too. For the rest of us, as we join Richard’s people on the march to justice, we will find that it’s a good day to die by living with them day by day, if they will have us. To our indigenous friends, please pray for us who have not gotten our feet dirty that God will cleanse our hearts and lead us on the Jesus path with you. Pray that we will have the passion, strength, courage, humility, and teachable spirit to join that justice march, not a sprint. Be assured that our hands and feet will get dirty and there will be pain, but victory awaits us all, if we stay on that justice path that Jesus made and which Richard walked so well.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on February 8, 2013.

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Please pray for Richard Twiss, Co-Founder and President of Wiconi International. Wiconi (“we-cho-nee”) means “Life” in the Lakota/Sioux language. Richard had a heart attack on Wednesday. Pray for his heartbeat, which beats for Wiconi—life. An update on Wiconi International’s Facebook page last night read: “Richard is on full life support for his heart and lungs. Right now the doctors are neither optimistic nor pessimistic about the situation, but they agree it is a serious situation. They are going to keep him sedated for a couple of days, at which time [they] will be able to determine the extent of any damage.”

Richard is loved by countless people for his love for life, the ways of Jesus, and justice for Native peoples. His heart breaks for the damage done to Native peoples in our country and longs for a hope-filled future for them. Here is the heartbeat or aim of Wiconi International, the work Richard co-founded:

“Our aim is to provide education, encouragement and offer practical support to Native American families and communities in creating a preferred future. Historically, Native people have been underrepresented and underserved in mainstream America. Economic, cultural and social barriers continually limit access to viable resources, thus hindering many healthy community change efforts. Wiconi’s primary mission is to empower and serve Native people to experience a desired quality of life and a hope-filled future through authentic relationships and culturally supportive programs. We seek to live and walk among all people in a good way, as we follow the ways of Jesus—affirming, respecting and embracing the God-given cultural realities of Native American and Indigenous people, not rejecting or demonizing these sacred cultural ways.”

Richard has touched my heart and life over the years. As a result of his own love of God’s distinctive handiwork in native cultures, I have come to love Jesus’ ways more. Richard has helped to teach me that Jesus is by no means homogeneous or generic. He speaks life into every culture through the Spirit—reversing the curse at Babel by bearing witness through diverse tongues at Pentecost. May God grant Richard life and may our own lives beat for life for Native peoples. Perhaps you will find what I have found—that one’s heart comes alive, as God destroys our idolatrous towers of cultural imperialism reaching to the heavens and builds his kingdom on the cornerstone, Jesus, with the bricks and mortar and living stones of many tribes and tongues.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on February 7, 2013.

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You may have watched the third presidential debate a few months back in which Governor Romney confronted President Obama on his dealings with Israel. Governor Romney argued strongly that the President had failed to sustain and strengthen strategic connections with Israel. Such negligence would impact negatively and dramatically America’s foreign policy in the Middle East.

I wonder what the six men charged with overseeing Shin Bet—Israel’s intelligence agency focused on protecting Israel from terrorism—would say of Governor Romney’s charge. I look forward to watching the new documentary, The Gatekeepers, which interviews all those who led Shin Bet the past thirty years.

Here’s what Richard Cohen of the The Washington Post has to say about the documentary:

“The film is a tough indictment of Israeli policy, particularly the continued occupation of the West Bank and the expansion of Jewish settlements there. All of the former officials are traditional Israeli secularists, and they show a commendable loathing for the religious militants that Israeli governments continuously pandered to. Above all, though, they are critical of government after government that lacks a strategy to somehow withdraw from the West Bank and instead relies on oppression. “You can’t make peace using military means,” says Ami Ayalon, head of the Shin Bet from 1996 to 2000 and a former navy commando.”

One doesn’t have to be an American or Israeli secularist to see that there is a problem with trying to make peace using military means. While many Israelis may be more concerned for making safety, not peace, can there ever really be safety without peace? Religious centrists can see there is a problem with using military means to make peace or safety without peace. Religious centrists also understand that religious militancy only leads to hate and more bloodshed. Evangelicals need to guard against religious militancy. African American Evangelical civil rights leader John M. Perkins said something to the effect of, “Why do we as Evangelicals have to love one kind of people and hate another kind of people? I don’t get it. I can love the Jew and the Palestinian at the same time.” Perkins knows how painful hate can be and how difficult it is to center on love. Perkins was the ‘beneficiary’ of religious and/or secular militancy over the years in the form of white supremacy. White militants beat him within an inch of his life in 1970 in Mississippi. While it has been a difficult and challenging road for him, the only thing Dr. Perkins is militant about is God’s centrist love revealed in Jesus that makes enemies out of friends. He did not respond in kind to his oppressors, but has worked to build peace between whites and blacks and other divided people groups here and abroad over the years. For him, love is the final fight.

We fellow Evangelicals need to take up Dr. Perkins’ charge to love Israelis and Palestinians, not to love one and hate the other, but to make love the final fight. While I think President Obama needs to be challenged on his Middle East strategy, I disagree with Governor Romney about who it is that the President has neglected. President Obama has been neglectful in his handling of the Israeli-Palestinian issue. He has failed to consider the well-being and fate of a people about whom our country cares, or should care. The President, like many American Evangelicals, has not shown adequate care and concern for the Palestinians. The President has not advocated nearly enough in support of the Palestinians, to the dismay of the Arabs. Of course, the President faces daunting challenges in advocating for a peaceful and just resolution to the conflict and other calls for freedom in the region (See for example these articles addressing Middle East problems). Of course, there is blame for all sides to bear. Still, in the ongoing conflict involving the Israelis and Palestinians, if the President does not challenge Israel more and advocate on behalf of both sides, it may not only be the Muslim and Christian Palestinians and other Arabs who are filled with dismay. Israel will never experience lasting rest, safety and peace, which I hope they too will find.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on February 4, 2013.

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I often see bumper stickers with a Jesus fish and a Darwin fish devouring one another. But I have never seen a bumper sticker depicting a Jesus fish fighting for its life with a Donald Trump fish. Regardless of how Charles Darwin or Donald Trump view(ed) Jesus or the Bible, they represent dominant systems of thought and life respectively: evolution-survival of the fittest; and market economics-survival of the economic fittest.

The Scopes Monkey trial in Dayton, Tennessee back in 1925 served as a key symbol of the fight between creation and evolution in America. If the results of the trial in American society were indicative of reality, the creationists lost, even though they won the court case. While Darwin has gone on trial repeatedly in Evangelical circles over the years, I am not sure the same thing could be said regarding free market economics. And yet, if Gordon Bigelow is correct, it is not religion or the biblical narrative, but economics that offers the dominant creation narrative in our day. Here is what Bigelow claims:

Economics, as channeled by its popular avatars in media and politics, is the cosmology and the theodicy of our contemporary culture. More than religion itself, more than literature, more than cable television, it is economics that offers the dominant creation narrative of our society, depicting the relation of each of us to the universe we inhabit, the relation of human beings to God. And the story it tells is a marvelous one. In it an enormous multitude of strangers, all individuals, all striving alone, are nevertheless all bound together in a beautiful and natural pattern of existence: the market. This understanding of markets-not as artifacts of human civilization but as phenomena of nature-now serves as the unquestioned foundation of nearly all political and social debate. (Gordon Bigelow, “Let There Be Markets: The Evangelical Roots of Economics,” in Harper’s Magazine v. 310, n. 1860, May 1, 2005).

If Bigelow is correct in asserting that economics (in particular, the model generated by the “neoclassical” school of economics) is the cosmology and theodicy of our contemporary culture, wouldn’t Evangelicals consider challenging it with the same kind of passion that went into the fight with Darwinian evolution? Perhaps the reason why Evangelicalism as a movement has not been outspoken on the issue is because it often assumes the free market economics narrative as gospel truth. According to Bigelow, Evangelicals don’t simply assume the market’s gospel truthfulness but also promote it. In his estimation, Evangelicals have been responsible for cultivating the sense of scientific certainty around markets. If he is accurate, the movement has been far more successful in generating support for the evolutionary supremacy of the market system than it has in challenging Darwin’s Origin of Species. Why? We’ll reflect on this and related questions in future posts on the subject.

This piece was originally published at Pathoes on January 24, 2013.

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You may know the song “People Are Strange” by The Doors that sings of people being strange and looking ugly when you are a stranger and alone. How people view you and me often shapes our views of them.

Do you ever encounter people who view you as strange? If so, how do such encounters make you feel? I would assume that such experiences don’t generate pretty feelings. Encounters I have where I am viewed as strange will cause me either to become hardened and view others as strange or to become more sensitive not to treat strangers in my midst as strange.

The Bible has a lot to say about not treating a stranger in one’s midst as strange, but to care for him or her. Exodus 22:21 states, “Do not mistreat an alien or oppress him, for you were aliens in Egypt.” Leviticus 19:34 says, “The alien living with you must be treated as one of your native-born. Love him as yourself, for you were aliens in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.” Deuteronomy 10:19 exhorts, “And you are to love those who are aliens, for you yourselves were aliens in Egypt.” Jesus tells the goats in Matthew 25:40-45 that they will suffer eternal torment as a result of not caring for him by failing to care for the least of Jesus’ brothers and sisters. In that context, Jesus declares: “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’” (Matthew 25:41-43)

How does this biblical material bear upon immigration reform? Whatever our political position on the subject, one of the things Christians must account for in addressing the matter is the Bible’s own claims. We must not mistreat the immigrant no matter their status. As fellow humans created in the image of God, we must show them respect. We must respect them, just as we would want to be respected.

However, we often forget what it’s like to be disrespected or mistreated or viewed as strange. The Israelites were to remember that they were once foreigners in the land of Egypt. Most if not all of our ancestors came from other lands. Our ancestors were once aliens. Perhaps we were, too. In one way or another, we have all been inside a stranger’s shoes. How would we have wanted our ancestors or ourselves as strangers to be treated, regardless of legal status? How would we wish to be treated if for some reason we had to depart for another land based on a personal or national crisis and with or without official papers?

No matter how we land in the end on the issue of immigration reform we need to make sure we personalize the issue so that we know what it is like to be people without a land and to treat others as we would want to be treated. Are you willing to step inside a stranger’s shoes—again?

This piece was originally published at Patheos on January 22, 2013.

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How can violence ever bring closure to violence? I considered this question while watching Zero Dark Thirty—the controversial movie on the hunt and killing of Osama Bin Laden. So much of the controversy around the movie centers on factuality and on whether or not it glorifies torture. From the standpoint of acting and cinematography, the movie is a great success. Moreover, regardless of whether or not the movie is accurate, it can prove beneficial for fostering important discussions. Here are two key questions. Should a democratic society such as the United States ever resort to torture to bring an end to mass killings and the perpetrators of horrific evil to justice? Moreover, can violence of any sort ever bring about justice and closure to injustice?

Yesterday we celebrated Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday. How might he have responded to the possible torture and eventual killing of Osama Bin Laden? He spoke out strongly against the Vietnam War and militarism. Would he have spoken out against America’s response to terrorism at the hands of Al Qaida? On a personal level, Dr. King was the victim of violence, but he never retaliated. He also encouraged those in his movement birthed in the church and centered on civil rights not to retaliate against their oppressors. Speaking of the church, how would King have responded to those who would claim that the response of a nation state will and should be different from the church when it is attacked? Tough questions. All of them went through my mind as I watched and pondered Zero Dark Thirty this holiday weekend.

Regardless of our answers to these questions, King’s life of civility and unswerving compassion and love even of his enemies brought justice to bear on torture and violence, exposing the darkness of hate, and bringing it into the light of day. King lived out what was true of his Lord and bore witness to how Jesus’ cross and resurrection absorbs evil and serves as the basis for the eventual eradication of all injustice. As G. B. Caird argued so King and his Lord lived and died, “Evil is defeated only if the injured person absorbs the evil and refuses to allow it to go any further” (G. B. Caird, Principalities and Powers: A Study in Pauline Theology, with a foreword by L. D. Hurst {Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2003 [1956]}, p. 98). In view of Jesus’ cross and resurrection, how will we live? Will we live in light of his cross and resurrection, or in view of Zero Dark Thirty?

If we live out Zero Dark Thirty in our lives and eventually destroy all terrorists around the globe, will we bring an end to the terror of hate and unforgiveness that so often rages within? Or will we only mask this internal terror, developing calloused hearts as well as fingers after pulling the trigger over and over again? In the end, will Zero Dark Thirty lead to a zero sum gain?