Milan Homola is a long-time friend of New Wine. Since his days at Multnomah Biblical Seminary, and now with his good work as Executive Director of Compassion Connect, we love to think and dialogue with Milan about how he sees and lives in the world. He originally posted at Compassion Connect, but gave us permission to repost it below. Let us know what you think!
EDITOR’S UPDATE: You might also enjoy a roundtable discussion between Paul Louis Metzger, Rick McKinley, and Rob Hildebrand which addresses engaging tensions such as Milan suggests below. Click here to listen to the audio of that discussion.
“Bon Voyage…”
“Farewell…”
These are words that create a mental picture for me. The same way that “Your Excellency” creates a picture of someone bowed low to receive a king.
With “farewell” or “bon voyage” I picture an early 20th century scene. A large passenger ship pulling away from a pier filled with people looking back at the familiar audience left standing on the dock. The family members wave back and forth wishing “bon voyage” or “farewell.” The atmosphere is filled with love, longing, and good.
\fer-‘wel\ = a wish of well-being at parting
Recently “farewell” has taken on a new meaning. It has been used in a way that means exactly the opposite of its literal meaning.
In one short message (Pastor John Piper’s Tweet) that circled the world, ”farewell” had its meaning flipped. In <140 characters, the world received a message that was bigger than the message itself.
In a world of hyper-fast communication, using the most universal mediums with the fewest characters possible, we have to be aware of the complex messages we create and communicate in 140 letters. Today the message is much more than the message, if you know what I mean.
On February 26th Pastor John Piper sent a tweet that has spread like wildfire: “Farewell Rob Bell. http://dsr.gd/fZqmd8”.
This was his response to Pastor Rob Bell’s new book Love Wins, which wouldn’t be released for another two weeks. It seemed clear that Mr. Piper had drawn some conclusions, and he wanted the world to get his message. Of course “farewell” meant something in this message… but what? And more importantly, what is the larger ripple effect of such a statement?
I’m definitely not writing this reflection to debate the content of Bell’s book. That has been over-debated already. I’m actually arguing that a more important debate should arise: “Does it matter how Christians communicate with one another and to the world?”
There are two problems with Piper’s message to the world.
First, to say “farewell” is to suggest that somehow Piper is standing in one place (a place of authority/knowledge/etc.) while wishing “goodbye” to Bell, who is headed to some other place. We aren’t sure to where Piper was wishing him farewell.
Is John Piper the standard by which we measure the debate? Is he the man who can stand in a position to “wish” farewell to someone else? Piper’s message communicates to the ever-watching world an authority structure that may not, or shouldn’t, exist. Is Piper the schoolmaster who sends the dunce to the corner?
It raises an important topic, hopefully to be discussed later, about the structures of authority within the universal Church. Is there one? Should there be one? If so, what does it look like in a 21st century global world that is ever increasingly anti-authoritarian? There is a clear biblical standard for authority, but we have divided ourselves to the point that each man or each tiny denomination is its own ultimate authority.
Second (and much more significant than the first), the most damaging aspect of the actions taken in the tweet is the negative impact on the overall Christian witness in the world.
I do know scripture enough to know that John 13:35 does NOT say: “By this all men will know you are my disciples, if you have the proper view of hell.” Instead, it actually says they will know you follow Jesus “if you love one another.”
Any good Bible scholar can find loopholes and ways to wiggle around the blatant truth proclaimed here. You can parse it out and go to the Greek and even redirect attention by focusing on “speaking the truth” or the “watchtower” mentality against heresy. But at the end of the day the statement remains clear. The world will know more about us and what we stand for by how we treat each other than by the explanation of our nuanced beliefs. Therefore, the way in which we treat one another (members of the body of Christ) matters significantly in communicating the truth of the Gospel.
To flippantly send someone away is to communicate to the world that we aren’t even capable of first loving one another. If we don’t love one another even in the worst of times/conditions/shattered theologies, then it is a symptom of a wretched disease. That disease is disunity which in essence is screaming to the world that a loving God isn’t all that real.
Who is this Jesus guy? Does he really impact my thoughts, my message… my tweets?
I have no doubt that both Pastor Bell and Pastor Piper love Jesus. If together we love Jesus then our greatest priorities in life are living for Him and making Him known. And believe it or not, that comes before debating theology, amassing huge followings, even tweeting. I love Dr. Paul Louis Metzger’s interpretation of the Apostle John’s vision at the end of his book Consuming Jesus. Metzger sees a banquet table that includes men from opposite sides of the debate sitting together with Jesus, from MLK Jr. to Jerry Falwell. If Jesus will bring us together to sit at the banquet table tomorrow, then it should impact how we see each other today. At the very least, we should be able to love one another so that the world might know this profound love of God.
