The Right Side of the Trinity

Where do you belong?

2010-08-25T10:00:00.006-05:00

This question cuts to the heart of the divided nature of the Western Church. The culture that some would like to believe "embraced" Christianity actually did much to strangle it. Faith became an elaborate call sign to distinguish friend from foe-- a set of ornate clothes to wear for an hour to broadcast to all who could see, "I am a citizen in good standing."

But our culture demonstrates the mutual incompatabilty of human creations with the Kingdom of God. While our culture created and the church blessed incredible instruments which discipline the human mind and channel human creativity in ways that have literally re-created the world in our own image, they do not discipline the human spirit, or point people in the direction of the God of Abraham, Moses, and David Who came to earth in Jesus Christ.

Culture is interested in using Christ to reach its own ends. We can mark time from His birth at year zero; we can mark our money "In God We Trust," but that does not mean that the money is more spiritual or that Christ rules our time. Christ wants us to follow Abram's lead, and "leave your home... for the land that I will show you." We can't take our culture with us.

Christians found what seemed to be a good compromise half-way through the first millenium after Christ: to belong to a culture which publicly declared that it belonged to Christ. But that belonging is at least one remove away from Biblical faith-- we are either strangers and aliens on this earth, or this earth is our home. We are either passionately in love with Jesus Christ Who has saved us, or we truly do not know Him. There are no apron strings to draw us into Christ's embrace. Our primary comfort and allegiance cannot be to the nest we have been born into if we were created to fly.

This dilemma is not new-- it is as old as the apostles, and it has never changed. Not even in 1950's suburban America.

Do you belong to Christ? Do you belong in heaven-- or do you belong in your house, in your city, in your church, in your family? All the other belongings fade away. Only Christ stands the test of time. And if Christ is your primary allegiance, pride, place, class, race no longer matter. This culture is waiting to encounter that Church.

Saying Goodbye to Christendom

2010-08-10T15:47:00.005-05:00

How much time does it take to accept what our senses tell us? I am continually amazed at the anguish that rises from Phyllis Tickle or the last prophet proclaiming what anyone who has eyes to see and ears to hear and a mind to think can easily perceive: this culture has made its peace with separating from its Christian roots.

This process has taken well over a century. We are not talking some sudden movement! But the final fall is still a traumatic experience. For those who lead the Church in this time, though, we should not be surprised. We need to be able to embrace the opportunities that open up even in this funereal time.

Becoming a Minority means we are no longer responsible for anyone or anything other than ourselves. The Christendom Church felt like the "moral policeman" of the culture it inhabited. Law was the way Christians thought they could lead the culture; if some sin was made illegal, we had somehow accomplished our evangelistic purpose. Christian faith became a kind of cultural self-improvement project-- not only YOUR best life yet, but OUR best life yet. But didn't anybody notice that it didn't work out the way we intended? Jesus always preached saying "those who have ears to hear, let them hear," meaning that some would not hear. AND HE WAS OK WITH THAT. We cannot save this culture. Law cannot change the human heart, or teach it to love. Say goodbye to lawmaking and coercive power. Good riddance.

Becoming a Minority means that we must know where the Church stops, and Culture starts. Wilbert Shenk said that "the Christendom model of church may be characterized as church without mission." Church was just another social instititution responsible to comfort and edify "our" culture. Witnessing makes people uncomfortable; the Gospel might make somebody angry; self-emptying servanthood is dimetrically opposed to "our" culture of self-fulfillment. So we stopped these offensive activities, and fell back into what William Sloan Coffin coined as our mission: "assuaging the conscience of the law-abiding prosperous." And as we did this, the Church disappeared, even as huge stone barns to store people for an hour a week rose across the country.
This is not my culture. This world is not my home. Who I want to be is not determined by the commercials I see, or the appearance or possesions of those around me. I want Jesus. I want to decrease, so that He can increase. I want the same mind in me that was in Christ Jesus, and anything and everything is loss in comparison. Say goodbye to the conforming "church." Good riddance.

Being a Minority means that we must accept irrelevance. The Christendom Church had to be listened to because the people who populated it held the cultural power to force a hearing. But there is no power or glory for Christ in our 15 minutes of fame. Pope John Paul II in his days in Communist Poland led one service of prayer as the loudspeakers began to blare a speech by Stalin over the public address system. Though no one in the room could hear him any longer, John Paul refused to stop praying. In the end, whose words were louder?
We must keep praying and speaking, lovingly, not frustrated at the decibel level of what is shouted against us. Our words have a power beyond what CNN or FOX news can even imagine. Say goodbye to the publicity-chasing "relevant" church. Good riddance.

I believe we are blessed to be alive and called to lead the Church of Jesus Christ in this time, for we are blazing a new trail whose end we shall not see. May those who arrive look back, and find us faithful in these challenging times when things fall apart.

This Little Babe

2010-07-13T20:04:00.003-05:00

This little Babe so few days old
Is come to rifle Satan's fold;
All hell doth at his presence quake,
Though he himself for cold do shake;
For in this weak unarmed wise
The gates of hell he will surprise.

With tears he fights and wins the field,
His naked breast stands for a shield;
His battering shot are babish cries,
His arrows looks of weeping eyes,
His martial ensigns Cold and Need,
And feeble Flesh his warrior's steed.

His camp is pitched in a stall,
His bulwark but a broken wall;
The crib his trench, haystalks his stakes;
Of shepherds he his muster makes;
And thus, as sure his foe to wound,
The angels' trumps alarum sound.

My soul, with Christ join thou in fight;
Stick to the tents that he hath pight.
Within his crib is surest ward;
This little Babe will be thy guard.
If thou wilt foil thy foes with joy,
Then flit not from this heavenly Boy.
Robert Southwell

I'm Tired of Being Afraid

2010-07-13T16:08:00.003-05:00

Now that the 219th General Assembly is over, I (like a lot of others) am trying to figure out what happened, what I think about what happened, and what I should do next. One thing is crystal clear to me: I am sick and tired of being afraid.

I am tired of being afraid that I don't have a place. Christ bought my invitation to this party with His blood. No one's going to tell me I don't belong here.

I am tired of being afraid of losing votes. No matter what the decisions that come out of General Assembly, this is where I was planted. This is where I will bloom-- as a minority voice of dissent, or as a gentle voice in the middle, I will speak whether or not I am heard, whether or not my views prevail.

I am tired of being afraid of the fearmongers. Fear seems to be a great opener of wallets on all sides; it is a great form of discipline to keep people in line; it works well as a motivator for the next line of gladiators. But John tells me that "there is no fear in love;" fear is the opposite of what we are to live out of and what we are to give to the world. In Christ, I can love anyone without condoning their actions. There is too much fear in those with whom I agree. We seem to have lost our faith in the God who writes history.

I am tired of being afraid of what God is going to do next. Whether it was the vote to send a revision of G-6.106b to the presbyteries again, or the vote to defer the vote on changing the definition of marriage, I found myself strangely at peace. I trust God for what will happen, and for where I/we will go. I don't have to know, I don't have to understand. Wherever God's plan leads us, I will go without being afraid, and I will testify to the Truth (as I understand it) in Love the whole way.

On the Minority Report of the Marriage Committee

2010-03-25T14:50:00.006-05:00

As the 219th General Assembly draws nearer, the only question that I have heard raised about the committee whose name is too long to mention is the differences between the committee report and the minority report.
Some suggestions of those differences have emerged lately that need some rebuttal. The minority report is basically an alternate introduction, conclusion, and recommendations; the body of the report is identical.
The minority of the committee opposes the existence of the conflict within the Church; its proposal is that there is one view of sex, marriage and family life (with which I happen to agree). The difficulty with the position of the minority is that the existence of the disagreement is not something to support or oppose: it is simply a fact.
I can oppose the rising of the sun, or its setting-- but that opposition simply leaves me in the position of trying to deny what is plainly clear to everybody who has eyes to see. The sun will continue to rise and set while we spend our time debating whether or not it can or can't-- facts, as someone once said, are stubborn things.
The committee report documents the fact of conflict over how the Church of Jesus Christ reaches out to LGBT people with the Gospel message of hope and transformation. That documentation requires that both the traditional doctrinal understanding and the understanding which is challenging it be acknowledged.
Acknowledging facts is not the same thing as endorsing views-- neither those who oppose equivalency of marriage nor those who support it can avoid the conversation that is well-represented in the majority report.
I hear in the minority report the same voice I heard in so much of our feedback-- how can this be where we are? How can we be debating what is so clear? I would challenge those who are dismayed to remember a few things:
1) Either God is the God of history, or He isn't. God is not looking over our shoulders at where we are saying, "how on earth did this happen?" God wrote the pages that led us to this moment. We are not off the map, or out of the book. God is the God of history; we got here because for some reason, God wanted us to get here. We are not forsaken.
2) We need to mature into a willingness to acknowledge that unity and uniformity are not the same thing, and that Love in this life and in this world is always spattered with dirt and blood. Loving as Christ loves is not clean or comfortable. It is not easy, and often it requires us to accept the unacceptable, to see the invisible, and to believe the unbelievable.
3) One hundred years from now, we will be dust on this earth, and together worshipping Christ in heaven. Wouldn't our short time here be better spent bringing more voices to the choir than trying to shout each other down? Is Christ not enough to keep us together?

That is the real question that the committee report poses-- and none of us knows the answer. The God of history will reveal it in time. Until then, no matter what happens, we will have to learn how to deal with-- HOW TO LOVE-- one another.

Reflections on the GA Special Committee Experience

2010-02-05T16:26:00.004-06:00

So, now that others have weighed in on what they perceive the work of the 218th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA)'s Special Committee on Civil Unions and the Definition of Christian Marriage to signify, I think I can safely comment here on the experience without trying to defend myself or what we have done. Some random reflections:

It is really hard to talk to somebody when you know that you are being watched, and your words are being recorded. Some conversations are difficult when they are put into a gladiatorial arena. Part of what I feel best about what we accomplished is our ability, which grew over time, to not give in to the crowd, but to actually talk to one another without concern for the spectators.
Disagreements, even disagreements which are impossible to resolve, do not have to devolve into warfare. The fundamental disagreement among us did not require any of us to forsake relationship, or worship, or fellowship with each other. Just because we cannot agree does not mean that one subset of us has to leave.
I am heartbroken, but thankful, to learn how much I do love and appreciate being a part of Christ's Church, the PC(USA), in which for 30 years I feel that I have been perceived as a dangerous stranger. I hope and pray that something of what we have said and done will bless this Body of Christ, if not now, then some day.
I cannot even begin to plumb the depths of my first statement when Frances picked me up from the airport-- "I am SO GLAD to be home!" So much of what Oak Cliff Presbyterian Church has taught me is in what I wrote; so much of how I participated in this process (that I participated at all!) was due to the witness of the saints who worshipped and fellowshipped, and built friendships across racial barriers even while their own neighborhoods were falling apart in fear and anger. I am home here. I know where I belong.

We tried to call the Presbyterian Church (USA) to remember our First Love, that Love that has broken down the walls of hostility between us. Those who have ears to hear, let them hear.

Answers to My Questions to the Moderator, and Thanksgiving

2010-01-05T15:12:00.002-06:00

A couple of posts down, you will find 3 questions I asked the Moderator of Presbyterian Church (USA), Bruce Reyes-Chow. I've put his answers in to that post, to keep it all together. I do not have many words today. The best friend I have ever had, my sister in Christ Donna Gann, who brought us here to this wonderful place, and did so much to heal so many (including me) with a heart filled with unconditional love, is no longer sitting in her office opposite me. She is with Jesus Christ, after only three weeks' notice of what we had hoped would at least be one more year.
The hole is agonizing, and huge for all of us. But two people today can see who were blind (thanks to her retinas). What a perfect end to a Christ-filled life. Pray for her husband James; daughters, Shannon, Jamie; Gene and Byrdie (her parents); and Joe, her brother

Time for Light to Shine

2009-12-17T12:02:00.002-06:00

In his interview with Presbyterian Outlook, Stanley Hauerwas makes a particularly sharp observation: "The church has lost its ability to be a disciplined community because we’re now, religiously, in a buyer’s market. Christianity has to bill itself as very good for your self-realization, and that’s killing us because we’re not very good for your self-realization. We’re good for your salvation, which is not the same thing."

It is time for us to stand up and dare to believe that Jesus Christ knew what he was doing when he called us to come and deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow him. Christianity CANNOT bill itself as very good for your self-realization-- that's like saying something is very good for developing heart disease.

We do not peddle a better drug-- we represent the cure! And the cure is hard-- "Come and die to yourself, and understand that you cannot realize who you are, or who you were made to be, until you are surrendered to me," says Jesus Christ.

Dr. Hauerwas sees the negative-- I see the opportunity. If we will stop mouthing the cultural mush that passes for "spirituality" or even Christianity, we can stand and open the door for this nation of addicts-- to work, sex, drugs, alcohol, exercise, status, shopping, _____-- to find REAL life, REAL freedom, REAL peace.

We are not, religiously, in a buyer's market. We must live with the fact that not everyone, perhaps not anyone who we want to, will hear what we say, or do what Christ asks. If we stopped caring about the results and consequences, and just LIVED in the freedom Christ has given us, the Lord will lead those whom He is calling to the light.

Life is pain-- anyone who tells you something different is selling something (The Princess Bride). We have nothing to sell. We are bought, and that at a very high price. It is only Christ's freedom that leads us out of the imprisoning intoxication with self.

Maybe Tiger Woods needs a call from that kind of friend these days. He is legion; the field is ripe for harvest, but the laborers are few. Shine, and watch what Christ can do.

Questions for the Moderator

2009-12-07T16:35:00.003-06:00

No, I didn't die... but life has gotten marvelously complicated in some wonderful ways. We are making some progress on bringing the congregations of Oak Cliff together, new staff folks are pushing OCPC's mission forward, and we are growing in number, in depth, and in mission. But I am no longer young-- I've taken my first unintended naps sitting up.

Anyway, Bruce Reyes-Chow on his Moderator's Blog asked for questions. Here are mine, some of them as old as my presence in the PC(USA)-- that's 30 years. Yikes.

Here are my 3:
1)Being Presbyterian in the PC(USA) seems to have been reduced to political rugby, with the ones who have the power making the rules. How do we change the game? How do we get back to the work that Jesus Christ called us to do?

While I would hate to generalize that everyone in power right now does not have God's greatest hopes of us at heart, I do agree that it seems as if we are still locked in a battle that will require a winner or loser regardless of the outcome of theological or ideological polity issues. The game must simply be played differently by those that wish do to so. The hard part is that until enough see and live a different way of being church, there will be a huge amount of tension and resistance. At that point I suppose it comes down to really knowing what we are fighting over and if it is worth it for anyone, because in the end, if we are taking away any power of the collective presence of the Body of Christ in the world, all of our energies for any of this is for naught.

2)How do we build bridges on issues that are NOT salvation issues, instead of raising our disagreements to become salvation issues?

Hmmmm . . . interesting question. Again, it will take people willing to step outside of traditional ideological camps and take some risks to be in community with people with home we disagree with those things that, at the end of the day, are NOT salvation issues. Again, intriguing question.

3)Why is it so hard for Presbyterians to talk about Jesus in the second person familiar?

I am not sure that is true in some parts of our church. The bigger issue is whether we do that individually or corporately. I think the most healthy congregations are ones that can unabashedly and faithfully do both.

I'm supposed to put his answers here when they come, so stay tuned. I will try to pick up a little bit more on the blog as other commitments wind down to a close. If anyone out there is still reading, thanks for checking in.

Navigating IS the Destination

2009-08-20T16:01:00.002-05:00

Goals, goals, goals.... Have you set your goals yet? If you've accomplished something, then what's your next goal? What do you want to do? What are you going to do next? What do you want out of life? So much of the way we ask questions like these seems to me to lead us farther and farther away from the only One Who is The Answer.
Our questions focus on us-- on what we can see and touch and measure. It seems funny that we never see Jesus struggling with goals and objective statements. "So... my first year of ministry is behind me; what's next...hmm... give me a pad of post-it poster paper and let's figure this out."
For Jesus, all that was necessary was constant communication with His Abba. Whatever came from his intimate contact with God is what He knew to do. Could it be that THIS is the real reason we are to "pray without ceasing"?
We are so busy with our slide-rules trying to figure out where the ball will hit next that prayer becomes a distraction. I will admit I do this all the time, and God is slowly convicting stubborn me of it-- my teenage children will come and sit down on the couch, and start talking to me just when I've gotten absorbed in some silly TV program. God help me, I almost always make the wrong choice, vacantly saying to them, "uh-huh, uh-huh" while trying to keep up with what doesn't really matter, but has captured my interest.
In our trying to figure things out, are we so captivated by our plans, by the intricacies of our strategizing and the drama of our situation, that all God gets from us is "uh-huh"?
I am tired of hearing that the Presbyterian Church (USA) must split, has split, by the arm-chair quarterbacking of what so-and-so ought to do next, by hashing and re-hashing old stories as if we will finally find the missing clue that will tell us what to do next...when God is speaking NOW. How many of us are listening? What would it take for us to listen?
I think that there is a path God would have us walk, that is not on any affinity group's map. So, I guess I will walk where I believe God is leading. It will be interesting to see what happens next-- all I know is that it will come from God's hand.

Reconciliation IN CHRIST

2009-07-10T13:19:00.000-05:00

In a recent Outlook article, Princeton Seminary demonstrated why I get so much grief from my brothers and sisters when I begin to talk about reconciliation. Like "justice," reconciliation has lost its primary defining characteristic, and become some sort of self-defining end on its own.

Reconcilation is not about understanding the other; it is not about warm feelings. Justice is not about the world living up (or down, as the case more usually would be) to my standards of fairness. Neither reconciliation nor justice mean anything without their defining referent: in Christ.

Reconciliation in Christ is not about being proud of my identity; it is losing my identity, and being solely identified with Jesus Christ. I am not a white Christian; I am a Christian who happens to be white. I am not an Anglo-Saxon Christian; I am a Christian who happens to (predominantly) be Anglo-Saxon. The fact that our identity puts Christ LAST should tell us about His true place in Christendom; for reconciliation to be real, Christ must be FIRST. Christ must be ALL.

So many of our problems as a denomination come from this most toxic vestige of the church as a social policeman-- that Christ is only an appendix to our cultural identity, rather than the identity which leads us out of our own culture, and into the Kingdom of God. Instead of celebrating what we were, reconciliation is a recognition that culture is our identity no longer-- that Christ has transformed us so that there is no Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female. If we are ever to be one, it is only oneness IN JESUS CHRIST.

This is the radical reformation of our time in Western culture-- to preach that the blood of Jesus Christ can cleanse all sin, heal all divisions, and unify all peoples. The blood of Jesus Christ is God's plan for the fullness of time, to bring all things back together in Him. That radical reconciliation is only possible through the Savior-- but if the Savior owns us, we are that reconcilation's ambassadors.

What We Found Around the Corner

2009-07-09T15:24:00.002-05:00

Thanks for the prayers out there!
What we found out today is that nobody is absolutely sure what actually happened to Nell in December after the surgery-- which makes me feel a little bit better about the intern doctor who tossed us down the fast chute to hell that midnight after Nell's stroke-like symptoms surfaced. Two doctors seem to see a "residual deficit"-- a weakness that would say that what happened was not transient ischemia, but actual damage-- a stroke.

Dr. Sacco explained more of what neurologists are looking for in some of the arcane tasks they give to the person they are examining. From his description of what he would be looking for, what the other doctors claim is "residual deficit" may just be relative strength of each side of her body, and not a deficit at all. So, maybe she had a stroke-- maybe she didn't.

So with that clear as mud, we go to the pictures...which show beautiful new arteries forming a fern-like pattern out of the artery that now lies on the top of her brain. December, that half of her brain is dark-- no arterial flow at all. Now, it is almost as bright as the right. It's beautiful. As we left, I gave Dr. Sacco a compliment-- it turns out surgeons aren't any better at receiving them than I am! He had obviously been in surgery that morning, and was tired-- but he explained all that we needed to know. Whether he will accept it or not, he's pretty amazing. Thank you God for David Sacco.

Prayers Appreciated

2009-07-08T17:02:00.002-05:00

Hey out there in cyberspace--
Six months flies by quickly. It's time to find out how Nell's surgery is working, so tomorrow we go in at 7am for the next MRI, and then have doctors read the results. What a blessing it is that now the scans are all electronic, not film. So, we turn another corner tomorrow, and we get to see where the path leads this time.
Everything we see is good, but...I've been surprised too many times turning corners to let my guard down too far. Tomorrow, we will see....

No Despair

2009-07-01T14:16:00.002-05:00

Oh for five smooth stones-- and for a battle where five smooth stones were all that I needed. It's been a long time between posts if anyone is still reading out there-- a lot has been happening at OCPC, in Grace Presbytery, in the General Assembly work I was called to do, and in the work to bring some economic revitalization to the southern sector of Dallas. Between leaky roofs and water heaters, conversation groups, committee meetings and reports, time just disappears. I wish I felt like I had something to show for it.

I think that's the reason most of us leave the intractable problems alone-- we fall into despair. One of my heroes was a captain in the Royal Navy early in the 19th century, after Britain outlawed the slave trade. His life was spent in the frustrating reality that laws do not actually govern human behavior. Just because selling people into bondage was illegal did not mean that the merchants stopped doing it; slavery was, and still is, one of the most profitable trades. All his working life, the captain attempted to stop and seize ships engaged in this evil trade. Some he stopped, but many were too swift for him to catch; and he knew that there were many whose sails he never even spied. In this thankless task, he drove his crew on with a simple motto: "Nil Desperandum"-- No Despair.

This is a time for thankless work-- for clearing ground, laying foundations, digging ditches for a new Church that will rise from Christ's work in later generations. Nobody signed on for this; we all have grown soft from the sordid luxuries of Christendom. But it is time to work-- to again declare that Christ is a new identity, trumping race, glass, gender-- trumping EVERY other identity. And if we are in Christ, then we must be about Christ's business, and we must begin to find Christ's way to be one voice with one Gospel proclaiming one Hope and living out one Love across all the boundaries which have too long clung so closely to us that we have forgotten how to run the race set before us.

No one may follow-- but that cannot stop our preaching. No one may approve-- that cannot stop our obedience. No one may believe that such a future can exist-- that cannot stop us from working toward it. However long it takes, however many generations work, whatever comes of my life given to the work-- even if it is nothing-- the Word prods on: "Do not be afraid. No despair." For we work not for the reward from the work of our hands, but for the reward that is ours, given from His nail-scarred hand-- "take my yoke upon you, learn of me, and you will find rest for your souls." When I see Christ, that will be time enough to rest. On with the next meeting, the next paper, the next Bible Study, the next sermon. Nil Desperandum.

Unwinding a Past that Holds a New Church

2009-05-28T14:09:00.004-05:00

"Do not be deceived," the Word of God says. "God is not mocked, for you reap whatever you sow." We certainly are reaping a bitter harvest for the last 25 years of conspicuous consumption; and the harvest is far from over. The consequences of the economic bankruptcy of the U.S.A. have not even really begun to be felt-- and already many are asking, "is it over yet?" This will unwind for years-- perhaps decades-- as the generations that did not enjoy the excesses that generated the debt receive the privilege of suffering to pay it.

Do not be deceived. God is not mocked. We are watching a venerable-- perhaps in American history, the venerable-- institution of Christendom slowly evaporate. The Presbyterian Church (USA) and all its preceding branches once represented the strong Christian current that de Toqueville said flowed through American life. As that stream abandons its former course, venerable stone piles become nothing more than available real estate, thousands of bright-eyed young folks bankrupt themselves to discover that there is no institution ready to embrace their dearly-bought pastoral skills, and many middle-managers in the gleaming GM corporate superstructure at 100 Witherspoon and 173 presbyteries find out that there is no place for them.

But do not be deceived. The vast current that de Toqueville described is still present-- at the moment it flows underground. But there are places where, like an Artesian well, the Living Water is bubbling to the surface. Serving in such a place, with such a people, is an amazing privilege. Christ is still opening hearts and minds, healing lives; the Holy Spirit is still breathing through the Word into homes, offices, schools(!) and communities.

The PC(USA) is unwinding-- it will take years, maybe decades. We, who did not enjoy the heyday will spend our working lives in the dusk and night that have succeeded it. But even now, glimpses of dawn are visible on the periphery, here and there. You reap what you sow-- "preach the Gospel at all times, when necessary use words," as Francis of Assissi put it. The opportunity to obey Christ and to sow seeds of eternal life is always right in front of us. The Holy Spirit that created the vast current on which we have lazily floated is still moving. Join Christ where He is active around you on this Pentecost, and trust that when harvest time comes, neither Christ nor you will be disappointed.

Faith in Christ vs. Sinful Reality of Things

2009-05-22T13:20:00.002-05:00

The one thing that trips up and stunts Christians in growing closer in their walk with Christ is the stunningly unchanging ugliness of the reality of things. No matter how much soap and disinfectant one can muster and effectively administer, this world defies our ability to clean it up.

I have the privilege of watching this both in the larger part of the Church to which I have been called, in the congregation, in our city, and even in myself. I am trying to find a way to connect Christian folks to one another across theological divides in the PC(USA), across racial divides in Dallas and in OCPC, and trying to find healing for my own sin-stained soul. In each case, there is plenty of evidence to support the case that despair is the only logical outlook.

We talk happy talk while presbyteries, congregations, and pastors continue to die in the midst of these calamitous times. I have sat through six months of meetings on how to improve our neighborhood, happy talk and hope that somebody will rain money down on us and make everything better being our preferred solution-- when the pastors in our neighborhood won't talk to one another unless there is a camera or some other form of reward present. Black and white, the congregations just keep on doing what they did, telling Jesus that talking to the other person is somehow Christ's work, not ours. The old truism that"there's a black Oak Cliff, and a white Oak Cliff..." is just crushing my ability to shout back, "in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, black nor white..."

We talk love, and we live comfort. We talk reconcilation, and live out-- at best-- measured revenge and isolation. We praise Jesus Christ for taking the weight of our sins, and then decide He won't mind if we add a little more to His burden. We thank God that we are right, and at best pray for the miserable sinner who disagrees with us, "Lord I thank you that I am not like other people, like that....there." We continue in the pastors' union to, as William Sloane Coffin put it, "assuage the conscience of the law-abiding prosperous" and to measure ourselves by their self-satisfied happiness.

In the face of all this, what is the faithful Christian to do? Faith which finds its reward quickly is rarely ever genuine. Faith in Christ leads to the cross, not the throne. Yet we are constantly needing Peter's reminder, "do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that is taking place among you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you." Like it or not, running into reality with your heart filled with Christ's love always feels strange.

This world's power to hurt and destroy will never cease to take our breath away. Our job is to not stop breathing. This world will always have an uppercut that can put love on the mat in one vicious, powerful contact; our job is to get up again, and let the world land the next blow saying as it has said to all of us, and to the One Whose path we follow, "Prophesy! Who is it who struck you?"

Christ alone can clean this miserable sin-stained world. Christ alone cleansed my sin-stained soul-- He alone can keep it that way. So, I get up, catch my breath, and go out to help a young man who has mountains to climb before he can reclaim a life on this earth, and an old man whose son he cannot help as the son's wife struggles with a cancer that may shortly take her from this earth. And the only thing I have is, "be not afraid...Christ is here," and to say with Him, "Take courage, and be of good cheer-- in this world you will have tribulation. But I have overcome the world."

That's all I need. Saddle up your horses, as Steven Curtis Chapman sings. We've got a trail to blaze.

Quiet Miracles

2009-05-14T16:03:00.002-05:00

When Matthew records resurrection, the world shakes and thunder drowns out the everyday sounds of the world. But, in my life, resurrection has just snuck into the world on cat feet, as Carl Sandberg put it. Sometimes, even the person giving the news doesn't hear it.

Waiting in the waiting room today for a young man (21 years old) in stage 4 congestive heart failure after a virus left his heart mortally wounded, I was reminded of 6 months ago. We waited for hours, and then, a person calls on the phone who has so honed the gifts of heart, mind, and hand to routine habits of sight, thought, and action that they can reconstruct hearts. In simple graceless fact-filled sentences, they hand a life back to an astonished family grateful beyond words. It is just another day for the surgeon and the nurses, but for Eddie it is a new day-- a whole new life.

I sit listening to the blogosphere, reading and trying to process all the churn of information and analysis that I swim in every day, and I wonder where the quiet resurrection is happening in me, and around me today. Preaching on the parable of the sower at Grace Presbyterian Village ( a retirement home nearby), then visiting those who cannot get out of bed to come to the service has a way of opening my eyes. So, a sower goes out to sow... quiet miracles.

In Other Words...

2009-05-06T10:35:00.004-05:00

My mentor, Oswald Chambers, sums up the path that I, and I hope we, will walk through this time to arrive at God's purpose and place for us:

A spiritually minded man will never come to you with the demand - "Believe this and that;" but with the demand that you square your life with the standards of Jesus. We are not asked to believe the Bible, but to believe the One Whom the Bible reveals (cf. John 5:39-40). We are called to present liberty of conscience, not liberty of view. If we are free with the liberty of Christ, others will be brought into that same liberty - the liberty of realizing the dominance of Jesus Christ.

Always keep your life measured by the standards of Jesus. Bow your neck to His yoke alone, and to no other yoke whatever; and be careful to see that you never bind a yoke on others that is not placed by Jesus Christ. It takes God a long time to get us out of the way of thinking that unless everyone sees as we do, they must be wrong. That is never God's view. There is only one liberty, the liberty of Jesus at work in our conscience enabling us to do what is right.

Don't get impatient, remember how God dealt with you - with patience and with gentleness; but never water down the truth of God. Let it have its way and never apologize for it. Jesus said, "Go and make disciples," not "make converts to your opinions."

The Magnificent Opportunity

2009-05-05T12:10:00.004-05:00

On her blog comments, Viola Larson wrote: Clay I would like to see you enlarge on this, "We have a magnificent opportunity to witness to the power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ if we can find a way to keep Christ in the center of progressives and evangelicals." And please say exactly what you mean.

This blog has been enlarging on this subject for the past few months. So, now I will attempt to define the opportunity in front of us. The structure of this definition is: thesis, illustration, application.

THESIS:We have an opportunity to prove to this culture that those who have every reason to fear/avoid/antagonize each other can live in the love of Christ together. We can be one Body, even when we are unable to be of one mind.

ILLUSTRATION: In the early 1970's, Federal courts ordered the desegregation of schools across the USA by forced busing. In 1975, the first African-American family walked through the doors of Oak Cliff Presbyterian Church. Protected and discipled by their pastor, Tom Currie, they rooted in the congregation, and soon were joined by other African-American families that were moving into the neighborhood.

As people yelled epithets at each other, whites literally gave away their homes to escape "them," stores closed, malls failed as whites "gave up" on the south of Dallas, kids-- both white and black--endured gauntlets of abuse entering strange schools they were told to attend, Oak Cliff Presbyterian Church continued to become more colorful. Sure, there were times when a black man walked into the men's room to catch the end of a "n---- in the woodpile" joke; there were people who left because "they weren't comfortable anymore," or "it's too long a drive" from where they moved up north.

As Dallas, like every other city in the US tore itself apart in the whirlwinds of social change, OCPC prayed together, worshipped together, ate together, cried together, rejoiced together. After 35 years, the congregation is still stably 45% African-American, 45% Anglo, and now 10% Hispanic as the neighborhood begins to change yet again. It is a lighthouse of hope to all who look to education as a leg up, to all who need the love of family in Christ. We are an anchor of hope and stability for those black neighbors who now fear the new folks moving in-- we can say to them, "it can be done. The blood of Christ really does cleanse all sin-- so what if they speak another language? We can find a way to be community together. We've done it before, we can do it again."

No one was asked to betray their culture; the only assimilating power was the love of Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, a higher allegiance than culture or clan. In that higher allegiance, we have found not only hope for us, but for all of our neighbors-- we have found Good News that is good news to anyone with eyes to see, or ears to hear. Walk in to worship with us, and you can SEE our mission.

APPLICATION: What if we could find a way to live and worship, to love, cry, rejoice together in Christ our highest allegiance? What if, instead of dividing as this "Big Sort" set of generations prefers, we held on to one another, even--ESPECIALLY-- when we cannot agree with, or even understand one another? What if, instead of leading the yelling in this culture, we prayed with each other? What if we trusted one another because we trusted Christ, not because it was logical or easy?
SO, the next presbytery meeting you go to, (if you're like me) find someone wearing a rainbow stole, and share your heart with them, and ask them to share their heart with you-- and then pray. Look at the face of the person who is speaking ill of you and love them as Christ loves them; don't water down what you believe, but speak it in love, and expect to learn something from what you hear in return. In humility, regard the person who disagrees with you as better than yourself.

We have a magnificent opportunity to be Christ's witness in the way that we love one another. Is that clear enough, Viola?

It Does Not Yet Appear What We Shall Be

2009-04-29T12:02:00.002-05:00

I know I'm not the only person who, when we get wrapped up in a novel loaded with suspense, skips ahead to make sure that we know how it turns out. Somehow knowing the end of the story gives us the confidence--the control?-- to be willing to negotiate the 4-G turns that get us there.

The problem with this approach in real life is that life is not a novel; the narrative is not ours; we each just have a bit part in it. But we have become so arrogant in our belief in "spin" that we really believe that we write what is by the way we "package" it.

The other day, when we were out picking up trash, I had my first face-to-face encounter with TV journalism. The reporter showed up in the TV van, and somehow I got appointed to be team spokesperson. I came up to the reporter and told him what we had found: a small homeless encampment in the woods. I asked him if he wanted to see it. Horrified, he exclaimed, "No!"

He had his piece in his head, all he was looking for was pictures and a couple of sound bytes to go with it. I tried to tell him why we were out, what we were trying to accomplish, but he kept shaking his head. He asked some question about the President, I responded, he said, "well, we have our sound byte for the day," and left. He got to talk about President Obama for 1 minute 20 seconds, and we provided the pictures. But the two actually had nothing to do with each other.

So much of the conflict over human sexuality in the church plays out on this same line. Both sides declare victory, work on their narrative story lines, spin results, push for the next step. Perhaps we have made such a hash of the PC(USA) because God keeps refusing to follow our story lines. It does not yet appear what we shall be-- God is working on us.

Maybe it's time to shut up, to start listening to each other and to God, and to see what step God would have us take next. The results can't be worse than our work so far, and they could be a lot better. "Be still, and know that I am God."

Changing the Conversation

2009-04-24T12:02:00.002-05:00

In his USA Today editorial (thanks, Jeff Alsup!) Jonathan Merritt speaks for a lot of us who believe that there is a more excellent way through the conflicts of this time. There is too much shouting, and not enough listening to allow any of us to be able to accurately figure out where we are, much less where we are collectively going.

The Big Sort effect of our herding behavior protects us from having to work hard at listening to others, and enables us to simply identify, as small town folks still do, those who "aren't from around here." Human beings seem to have a need to draw small circles, and to be able to identify the stranger as an alien-- a danger.

Christ preaches against this human instinct with real power and devastating force, just as God in the Old Testament rails against Israel for neglecting the stranger and the alien. Both sides of our current bout of culture wars are guilty of this behavior, while claiming to live out Christ's love/justice/ultimate purpose.

What could happen if we could learn to talk, rather than yell? What paths could we see if we stopped living with shark-like eye protection rolled over our eyes and our jaws wide open? I'm not talking namby-pamby kum-ba-ya campfire happy feelings. I'm talking honest and truthful discussion. I don't know where it might lead-- it might lead nowhere. But my point is, nobody who claims the name of Christian seems to be willing to try it. Christ must weep at that.

Enough wrestling; we have thought and fought and manipulated ourselves and Christ's Church into this mess. Maybe loving and obeying Christ might show us Christ's way out. What this means:

Choosing to be patient and kind
Refusing to allow pride to control us, approaching one another in humility
Rejecting rudeness and anger toward those we identify as "them"
Refusing to keep a record of wrongs done to us or to those we love
Losing ourselves by bearing all things, hoping all things, believing all things

What could happen if we committed to Paul's prescription for the Corinthian church?

Now That the Voting Is Over

2009-04-22T12:10:00.002-05:00

What an interesting sense of humor God has. As Amendment 08-B moves to defeat, I was sure that the Puerto-Rican presbyteries would deliver the coup-de-grace. But instead-- it's SAN FRANCISCO?! I think that it's time to examine all the ideas and attitudes that have been slain by this vote.

1) Conservative/Evangelical confidence in inevitability. Walking in, I think most of us assumed that rejection would be a slam dunk-- that the total would go up from 2001, and that we could assume that the PC(USA) had found a form of stasis: General Assemblies go wildly liberal, and the presbyteries stay solidly conservative. We could just wait until the liberals died off, and then it would all be over. WRONG.

2) Liberal/Progressive confidence in inevitability. This is still thrashing around, but it's throat is cut. Hegelian dialectic philosophy notwithstanding, it is impossible to look at this vote without seeing that the PC(USA) is hopelessly divided. Liberal/Progressives read the increased vote as a sign that they have almost achieved their goal of having the PC(USA) to themselves. WRONG. Next time it will not be over, even if the votes change some more. Conservative/Evangelicals will still be here-- and will still be half of this denomination.

3) The Book of Order is the means to a solution. One would think that this would already have been obvious to everyone after at least vote #3, but no. Why this dumb idea won't die is beyond me. Who thinks that we have managed to solve anything by this waste of time, other than to squander dwindling resources of public esteem, and our time, attention and treasure to prove to ourselves that those who disagree with us really do disagree? Does ANYONE actually think that anything has been accomplished, for all the blood spilled?

Let's spend some time outside of our own echo chambers, not acting like this is a football game and we are just "fans" of our side. Instead of figuring out a strategy of beating "them," why don't we find out who "they" are, and what they want? Why don't we act like we are not competing for some prize, but that we are trying to be faithful to Christ? The voting is over-- let the learning begin.

Marketing is No Mission

2009-04-21T13:46:00.003-05:00

If you haven't been reading Michael Kruse's analysis of Bill Bishop's book "The Big Sort," click on the link, and this post will make a lot more sense to you. In this post, Kruse reviews the catastrophic error that the leaders of the Church in North America made about 25 years ago.

Only, Bishop and Kruse don't quite get to the heart of the error. Like attracts like is a natural truism in sinful humanity-- using it to bring people together does not necessarily lead to the disastrous spiritual condition of the Church in North America. The statement that "mission morphed into marketing" is closer to the heart of the problem.

Marketing became the last "iron lung" for the paralyzed Christendom Church to be able to exult in its empty gospel of fellowship, numbers, and influence. But like all drugs, its efficacy was short-lived in treating the symptoms of what has been killing the Church. Worse, it not only has not treated the underlying disease, it has metasized it, making it worse by several orders of magnitude.

Christendom had already divided the Church into competing shops, each subgroup with its own "brand;" marketing took this to its logical extreme by enshrining it as gospel. Sam Saddleback and Sally Saddleback are the only icons in Saddleback Church. Before, it felt vaguely wrong to separate from those who were different from us; now, after marketing, it is a commandment to separate. What was once vaguely wrong has been transformed into the ultimate good.

Whoever disagrees with you is now a roadblock--an obstacle. Success, justice, happiness, growth (whatever your word for the ultimate good is) requires that the obstacle disappear. This is the same spirit that breathes through our debates for when we win, "and it will all be over." Those who disagree with us will simply spontaneously combust, or the ground will open underneath them, and all will be well. Marketing took a broken Church and turned it into a childish broken Church, where fear of differences is the actual organizing principle.

But the Church that Christ founded was built on a different principle: "love one another as I have loved you," Jesus said. That love has nothing to do with whether we agree or not, whether we look/dress/act alike or not. Christendom, even hepped up on marketing steroids, is a weak and dying thing. But the Church that loves with Christ's love ("greater love hath no man than this: that he lay down his life for his friends") has transforming power that can change the world with 12 people. Nothing-- not the fall of empires, the death of languages and cultures-- can stop the love of Jesus Christ.

What would that Church look like in this culture at this time? What would happen if we put aside marketing, and our own control-oriented anxieties, and did what Jesus Christ commands us to do? The big mistake is not irrreversible, if we get about our Father's business.

Trash Attack

2009-04-19T13:23:00.005-05:00

Law AND Love

2009-04-17T10:03:00.002-05:00

There's a pastor in Decatur, Illinois who's done more to strengthen and rebirth more congregations in the PC(USA) than anyone else I know, and you've probably never heard of him. His name is Jack Pitzer, and in his congregation's newsletter is a prophetic piece of wisdom that illuminates the way forward. Read it, and it will change the way you think about sitting on the fence.

The Church dies when it settles paradoxes that Christ means to be unsettlable-- and there is no greater paradox than the one of a Holy and Righteous God in relationship with sin-filled, sin-defined, sin-confined humanity. There is no easy way to keep these two opposites in the same place at the same time-- someone's going to have to die. To make the way to hold both, Jesus died; to proclaim and live into the way that Jesus opened, we must die-- die to self, die to pride.

In the conflict over homosexual practice, both sides are standing in path of lightning bolts when we settle on a solution of law or love. Law by itself kills, and has no ability to give life; love by itself rots, and fosters the corruption of the soul. Law AND Love practiced together are the narrow way-- rocks can fly from both sides. But life flows from those who walk the narrow way.

Witness

2009-04-16T14:47:00.002-05:00

The tragedy of Hamlet turns on one simple statement: "The time is out of joint: O cursed spite,/ That ever I was born to set it right! " Torment and pain and tears ensue.

We on the evangelical end of things are sure that the time is out of joint; as Noel Anderson puts it, the Barbarians are on the sofa! As Viola Larson reports it, even young children are being dragged into the debate. What then are we to do? Set it right? And exactly how does that work, Hamlet? The Big Sort becomes an even bigger one; the divides already huge just get bigger. Christ weeps.

Noel can say that if others had done what looks clear to us with 20/20 hindsight should have been done 30 years ago, we wouldn't be in this situation. That may be true, but here we are. Viola may feel for the parents who now have to take the point for their faith in a way that we didn't when our children were in 1st grade, but here we are.

We can weep, object, that the time is out of joint-- but remember Who is the keeper and maker of time and history. God is in this somehow. What would happen if we stopped crying out to heaven about how out of joint our times are, and started obeying God into witnessing in the midst of them?

My brother BW can say that it is hopeless-- that the only thing that can come out of these conflicts is more conflict. But it is important to remember that the spiritual powers that be in Birmingham, Alabama and across the South (Black AND White) said the same thing in 1955:THINGS WILL NEVER CHANGE. That's why they pushed a young preacher to the front of the local racial disturbance-- he was sacrificeable. And he knew it; he told all around him that he wouldn't live to see 40 years old. And he didn't.

But because he, and a quiet bookish worker, didn't move when they were required to move, thousands of people found the courage to walk to work rather than ride the bus-- to pray outside their pastor's bombed-out home rather than riot. Martin Luther King, Jr. basically spent his life talking and walking. Rosa Parks only refused to get up. And because they did, we live in a different country.

So, now is our time. We may not enjoy comfort and status. Following Jesus could push us down the socio-economic ladder rather than propel us up it. Perhaps it is unfair that older generations didn't deal with this before we had to; perhaps no one will respond, and this is a fool's errand to stand for Christ in Love and in Truth. What difference does that make? The time is out of joint-- no tolerance for spite. Only Jesus Christ can set it right-- and whatever He tells me to do, I will do. Call me a fool, I don't care.

On Education/Passion, Growth/Decline

2009-04-14T15:37:00.002-05:00

Over on Carol Howard Merritt's Blog there is an interesting discussion of the place of education in the spiritual formation of pastors that demonstrates something that Michael Kruse is talking about from another angle. We are rapidly degenerating into separate cultures in this country that do not talk to or understand one another.

The Big Sort that is characterizing this era in our history is a continuation of the conflict set in motion by the upheavals of the 1960's, which shook us loose from almost every steadying anchor in every part of our communal life: Christendom, Victorian morality, Post-War Bipartisanship, rigid family life and sex roles.... One part of America shook loose, and another part of America hung on for dear life to each anchor; other parts did a little of both. Now these fragmented Americas are struggling to find a way to live in the same country together. The preference at the moment seems to be another form of "separate but equal," where we have places that one part of America can live, but other parts are not welcome. My favorite picture from Bill Bishop's work on The Big Sort is a picture of a woman in full angry protest mode holding a sign that says, "I moved here to get away from people like you!"

And we, mainliners but especially we Presbyterians, are caught in the middle. We are being torn by each side. I have a response to Carol and to the not-so-civil discussion in the comment thread: it is our negative responses (fight or flight) to this conflict that have killed mainline churches all these years. Congregations ebb and flow, yes-- but 50 years of ebbing is more than a natural life cycle. We have not come up with a creative response to the conflict that is more and more rapidly balkanizing us into self-affirming echo chambers of cultural, educational, and socio-economic homogeneity.

This is the time to think and act anew. Not everyone will understand or appreciate it, but it is time for the Church to do what Christ did-- not to run! Not to fight! Stand, love, and take the punishment-- open our hearts and hands, and let them be scratched, bitten, nailed, broken. We must speak and live out love into the face of the whirlwind. We must hang on to each other-- whether we think the other lacks passion or that they lack intellect; whether we think that progress is on our side, or that time will prove us right.

What a witness a church that stayed whole while its native culture divided would be!

Death is Dead, and Dying is Bearable

2009-04-09T14:42:00.002-05:00

Faith without deeds is non-existent; we prove what we believe by how we live. I had a chance to see Keith Green on Viola Larson's blog and I was reminded of the joy of giving my life away to Jesus Christ, day by day, moment by moment.

We know this joy as children-- when we assume our dependence, and the dependability of those who love us. But knowledge is a dangerous thing-- we learn that we cannot depend on those who love us-- they fail us; they are human, after all. And we retreat into an impossible search for safety-- security-- insurance that somehow this world will not destroy us.

But Jesus says, we must enter into the Kingdom as little children-- assuming our dependence, and the dependability of Him who has proved His love for us. It is in that joyful, expectant letting go that worship finds its passion and power; it is that absolute dependence that keeps our hearts open to Christ and to one another.

It is no accident that so few in this society know what it is to love, and to be loved. We are not mirrors for one another, so that we can regard ourselves in another's eyes. We are not valuable because we can protect, provide, or get the right answer. Our fear of the stranger, our need to surround ourselves with those who agree with us, our never-ending battle with the chaotic consequences of time are all searches for what we most need, and do not know how to find.

Watching Keith Green, I was reminded of what we can be when, like little children, we leap into the abyss, knowing that somewhere in the shadows are the strong arms of Christ, who never fails to catch one of His own. Jesus's invitation is simple, and almost impossible for American ears to hear anymore: "Come and die with me."

You cannot preserve, or even really protect your life. Stop trying. The highest walls you can build do nothing more than leave you alone with the beast that you most fear: death. Die with Christ. Let your life go. If there is any better day to die, I don't know what day that would be. Jesus lives! What do you have to lose? Sinners of the world unite-- all you have to lose is your chains.

Thinking the Unthinkable

2009-04-03T12:03:00.007-05:00

Jesus teaches that motivations are the prime source of action, and that action takes a back seat in importance to motivation. In his reinterpretation of the ten commandments in Matthew 5-6, Jesus makes it clear that the sin in breaking the commandments is not the action-- it is the motivation, the intention. Nursing the anger in your heart that motivates one to kill is breaking the commandment not to kill. The danger to the individual is not in exterior action, but interior motivation.

I write this to mention the unmentionable, and think the unthinkable inside the merry-go-round of retribution, anger, fear, and violence that is our current all-too-comfortable home: there is something radically wrong with our motivations on all sides of the current church wars.

We watch the presbytery count, and despair or exult; we lobby and cajole, press and spin to try to manipulate "victory" for our side, longing for the day when "it will all be over." All this action has one central statement that shouts more loudly than the smoothest maneuvering: "THERE IS NO GOD."

All of this debate is about us; even though we all say it's about "us" and "them," it's really all about us. We are the central and most dramatic actors; our actions shake the foundations of the church. We have become so mindlessly, arrogantly self-referential in our dealings with creation and with Christ's new creation that we truly believe we have the power to create or destroy it. Timeframes collapse into the panicked present; history is only useful if you can find a good bat in it to beat "them" with; and the future is nothing more than a confident projection of what we want/hope/expect it to be.

Where is God in all this? Nowhere. Perhaps that is why people are continuing to leave our congregations, drifting into a more sincere form of the atheism or agnosticism that our narcissistic actions of these last 30 years have preached to them.

Is being in Christ's hand more important than proving that I am right? If I truly trusted that I was doing what Christ commanded, and that Christ was leading me to do it, would I be worried about whether it "worked" or not? If Christ is Lord of my life, doesn't He set the standards for my success as a disciple, and not the membership roll/Book of Order/seminary? If Christ is Lord, am I not called away from all these good, but lesser, things?

What would a church that lived out the agony of this disagreement without violence look like? What would happen if I gave up trying to control the present and the future, and actually ACTED on my supposed belief that this is God's world, and that God holds all history-- individuals, denominations, worlds-- in His hand? What if I don't know what's going to happen, and THAT'S OK, because I trust that the plan God has for me is not for my destruction, but for my welfare, to give me--and you!-- a future with hope?

Is it any accident that these "new thoughts" in our control-obsessed "battle for the church" question every action, every overture, every argument that has characterized our life together in the PC(USA) for lo these 30 years? Is it any wonder that those who have read the motivations for our actions have walked away from Christ for these 30 years?

I have no solution for our disagreement-- that's not my job. I have no idea how this is going to end-- that's not my job. I know that no human being or group of human beings can kill the church, anymore than we could kill Christ and keep him in the tomb. I am called to love my brothers and sisters, who sometimes look like Samaritans to me-- whose skin is different-- whose take on life is different-- whose hopes for the future are different than mine. Christ holds me, so I reach out to you. That's all I know-- and brother, sister, that's all you know, too. Why don't we try it, and see what happens?

Death and Resurrection-- What the World Needs and Seeks

2009-03-31T11:46:00.003-05:00

Reflecting on the events of this weekend has taken some time, but now that the wounds have scabbed over and I have gotten some rest, I can see in better perspective the powerful Hope and Call of the events that I have just witnessed.

Grace Presbytery gathered ready to fight on Saturday morning-- I know because I seemed to always be crossing the road when one of those loaded on a mission roared up and ran over me. But standing with them, insisting I would not fight, but I would not run, slowly they all-- left and right-- ground to a halt and noticed that those weren't speed bumps that they had been thumping over. They were people-- left and right.

The vote went as it did-- and facebook friends, please be clear, my hurt was not the result. My hurts came from being run over before the vote ever happened. And they were worth it-- because by allowing them to hit me, I forced them to see me as a person. Because they hit me, they went into the room less willing to hit each other. The hurt was more than worth it.

We shall have to deal with each other as brothers and sisters. If we cannot do that, we do not deserve to survive as a part of Christ's Body-- if we cannot love our brother and sister whom we can see, how can we possibly love the God Whom we cannot see? What is destroying the PC(USA) is an unbridled willingness to treat each other as things. This is not the church. Means determine ends in the economy of Christ-- and the means which we have used these 30 years, no matter who was winning and who was losing, lead to one end-- death.

Sunday night, Oak Cliff Presbyterian Church was packed to the ceiling-- not a seat left empty in the sanctuary-- balcony full-- parking lot full. People had come from miles away to hear one thing-- the witness of 34 women at the closing worship service of Oak Cliff Great Banquet #18. They heard one woman confess her faith in Christ for the first time, many who had let go of burdens, and all of whom had been born again into a life full of hope by Christ's rising from the dead, and His risen presence through the power of the Holy Spirit. They stood before us different people than they had been just 72 hours before. And the world was beating down the door to see it.

One day, I hope and pray that when Grace Presbytery meets, the world make take notice for the same reason-- as Tertullian said the Roman world took notice of us: "see how they love one another." We will not solve our differences. We must learn to die to self, to rise in Christ, and live with our differences. Saturday, I hope Grace Presbytery began to learn how to become the Body of Christ again. Sunday night, Christ animated a group of women and the world saw and heard Christ speak in power. Arise, bridegroom of Christ. Arise, shine, for thy Light is come!

What Is the Middle Way?

2009-03-26T15:32:00.003-05:00

I stand in a place few would envy, advocating for a position most reject. I believe I truly stand in the middle, advocating a middle way. For my conservative/evangelical friends, this means I am a traitor; for those on the progressive/liberal side, I may be a "useful idiot," as Lenin called capitalist traders.

I believe that I am neither-- and that there is a true middle way through the bloodbath that we have endured for these 30years. That middle way is not a "harmonizing" that the pollyanna optimists of 1978 thought would happen-- it is a combination of two mutually contradictory truths:

I cannot agree that homosexual practice is not sin.

I cannot agree that those who believe that homosexual practice is not sin are not my brothers and sisters in Christ.

The poverty of the PC(USA) shows in our need to control and understand outcomes. We too often are functionally atheistic, making our determinations on what we analytically deduce without leaving room for the God for Whom nothing is impossible. I wait for that God-- in the middle.

I stand in the middle, reaching out to those who disagree because Christ calls me to; I will not move from the middle, because Christ called me there. The middle way is not a shrugging "I don't know" but a determined holding on to the stranger in Christ. It is the place of crucifixion, not a safe seat with those who have power to crucify.

The middle way is the way of suffering. William Sloane Coffin years ago said that Christ was not on any side of any war-- He was in the middle, and every bullet and shell tore through His body before it reached its intended target. The middle is the place of witness to a Way the world cannot understand, Truth beyond my comprehension, and Life that no suffering on this earth can destroy.

I stand in the middle, ready to speak the truth as I understand it in love, ready to listen to what is said to me-- and ready to stand there even if I do not, or cannot agree. What an opportunity we have wasted in these 30 years to be a witness to this my-way-or-the-highway culture! Whatever the rest of the PC(USA) does, I will not let the opportunity go by anymore. I love you, brothers and sisters hurt by the decisions of this Body. I cannot agree with you, but I recognize that I cannot be the witness Christ has called me to be without you. If beating on me will assuage your anger, have at it. I accept that as the cost of standing where I stand. But I can do no other, God help me. I will not leave. I love you as Christ has loved me. I will not move.

Living in a Changed and Changing Culture

2009-03-20T17:36:00.002-05:00

Last night, as the plane I was in was making its final approach to DFW, we entered a cloud bank. I was looking out the window, looking at the ground, and then all of the sudden a grey/white opaqueness blocked my sight. The water vapor was moving in a thousand directions; there was no fixed point of reference to cling to. As I kept looking, I realized I was starting to get motion sickness, and stopped looking out the window, and looked straight ahead to remind myself that the plane was not moving with the clouds, but through them.

As the exponential pace of change continues to accelerate in our culture in this time, a lot of Christians are getting motion sickness. We are scanning for a horizon that can't be seen through clouds whose movement seems to deny a coherent direction or purpose. The one sense that we have always used to guide us is leading us astray.

We Presbyterians are proud of our education: one of the best lines of A River Runs Through It is when the pastor/father's prejudices against other Christians are exposed: Norman narrates that "my father said that Methodists were Baptists who could read." We talk of the mind-- we worship the products of the mind-- we are always looking for the "new idea" that will improve every situation and reinvent humanity.

But the mind is easily fooled by too much information. When ideas are flying a thousand different directions and there is no fixed point of reference, it is possible to think to the point of sickness. It amazes me to think that I have already lived through three technological worldshifts-- and the last two were only a decade or so apart. How do we maintain our sense of who and Whose we are?

We cannot think our way out of our current muddle; when we stumble in our relationship with Christ, we think ourselves deeper into the morass. The only way out is to obey-- to do what we are commanded to do, whether it makes sense or not, whether we fear the consequences or not. Do the duty that lies nearest.

So, I love Christ and I choose to trust my brother/sister who says they love Christ, too-- even though I may not be able to make sense of that. I choose to look to Christ Who has me under His wing, and Who is setting the course and speed for my life-- even when I like neither what I see of the destination nor what I perceive of the speed.

My college professor used to say that faith is a way of knowing. The psalmest heard it better from the Source:
"Be still, and know that I am God. I am exalted in the heavens; I am exalted in the earth." The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge. Psalm 46

Murder in the Cathedral

2009-03-10T15:42:00.004-05:00

Every now and again, events occur which should focus our attention. Three articles, one in the Christian Science Monitor, one in USA Today, and one from Barna Research all have such a common resonance with the events of this Sunday, that Fred Winters's death may echo with as much significance as Thomas a Becket's. Becket's death came to be seen as the perfect expression of the end of the Church's domination of political power in the Roman Catholic west; Winters's death may herald the end of the Church's place as a publicly respected and privileged, "safe" institution in American society.

It's been coming for a long time-- it is a wonder that we didn't see it (a lot like the mathematical geniuses who brought us credit/default swaps didn't see what was coming.) We have raised two or three generations in Materialistic Therapeutic Deism, which promotes the ideas that belonging to Christ means being nice to people, putting in time and effort to stay awake in worship, and being happy; and that God is our Cosmic Jeeves to provide us means to those ends. The Monitor piece lays out the reasons for the evangelical collapse with devastating simplicity-- but the best line is this: We fell for the trap of believing in a cause more than a faith.

Warren Buffett says that the economy has fallen off a cliff-- perhaps the Church has fallen off a cliff, too. Maybe for both it was about time. We can't pass on a prosperous economy to our children if we never say no to our appetites, and save; we can't pass on a faith relationship with Jesus Christ without suffering anything for being willing to say something.

It is time to see some horrible truths: that this culture now sees Jesus Christ as a promoter of hate; that they see that hate as centered in churches, personified by pastors; and the most important fact-- they see NO DIFFERENCE between Baptists at worship and Unitarians at worship (remember the shooting in Tennessee?). We are all seen as the same target, no matter how many times we have anathemetized each other. Church is church is church, and all of it is bad.

In both falls, there is a rising, but rebuilding is long and slow. I saw a commentator asked when we would return to valuations that we last saw in 2000, and the commentator suggested that values would not reach those heights for 40-50 years. It may take two or three generations, but the Lord will raise up a new church centered in the good that will stand as the wind and waves turn against us:

Denominational lines will fall-- believers in Jesus will see that the space between us (no matter how much we disagree) is not even close to as large as the chasm between us and the world. God who made us, Christ who saved us, and the Holy Spirit who speaks to us through the Scriptures binds us into one living Body.
Jesus Christ lives-- we are not promoting a dead ideology, or simply acting as curators in a museum of what Christ has done. He is still doing it-- and where Christ lives, there is liberty. Free men and women will come together to witness-- and to suffer for that witness.
Privilege is a comfortable prison-- but a prison nonetheless. Perhaps, when those who follow look back, they will give thanks that we were expelled.

Thankfulness for suffering always rings false, or crazy. But crazy times call for crazy responses. Perhaps what is happening to us, which comes from the hand of God, is good-- even in its sufferings. For Fred Winters's wife and kids, and for the people of First Baptist Church in Maryville, ILL I hope and pray that it is, and will be.

Following Jesus

2009-03-03T16:12:00.002-06:00

Now that 50 doesn't seem so old, it's interesting to look back and see where Christ has led me. If you would have told me the story of my life 30 years ago, I would have told you you were crazy. So many of the most important relationships in my life just began-- no seeking, no analysis, no understanding-- just WHAM! Here's your wife. WHAM! Here's your brother. WHAM! Here's your calling. My life is a pinball hitting the bumpers-- and when I hit, I go all the way to TILT.

So, I'm off on a new (old) trajectory, asking questions and suggesting answers that seem to bother a lot of people older than I am. I see a mission field that is desperately in need of Christ's love, God's redemption, and the Holy Spirit's direction through the Word, and I see those who claim to have meeting that need as their purpose getting their kicks from kicking each other, pointing out each other's weaknesses and taking their ability to criticize the other's weakness as a demonstration of God's strength.

I see children, now not just one or two, but five or ten or fifteen, with no one in their corner-- no one who will help them learn, no one who cares when they fall, too many of them with no one who feeds them physical food, much less emotional or spiritual food. And all the adults are on diets.

I see a culture, a church, obsessed with entertainment and distraction while we send young men and women to die for us, we allow the state to kill for us, we watch as we kill ourselves with booze and pills, and babies unborn never see the light of day. Death is all around us, but we are too busy playing to pay attention, much less to see what we can do to alleviate the suffering, much less to sacrifice, to die for another. "Greater love hath no man than this...." Where is that greater love?

Where is it in the Church? Is that greater love in Robert's Rules? Is it in our debates? Is it in our fine buildings filled with good people who are afraid of the little one who hasn't had a bath in a week, or the man who is strung out? Each of us called by Christ has a purpose-- a mission, and that mission will never involve gold dust and a spot light. Follow Jesus and you will end up in cold, dark, desperate places-- that's where the need is.

My mission at the moment seems to be to find someone who thinks I'm an idiot for opposing Amendment 08B, and to love them. Yours may be to find someone who is a banana peel away from the edge of death, and to love them into life. But following Jesus doesn't keep your fingernails clean. Service for Jesus doesn't leave you laughing and relaxed, saying, "that was a good show." Loving Jesus means that I am ready to be emptied, not to be filled-- to understand, not to be understood-- to love, not to be loved.

So the voting, the posturing, and the positioning go on; they will always be with us. Follow Jesus, and don't be afraid of what the posers think-- follow Jesus into the places and to the people you fear, and watch Him wipe away your fears as He dries their tears. There is work to be done. Let's get to lovin'.

Christ in the Center

2009-02-26T11:51:00.003-06:00

Last Sunday, we sang: "Stony the road we trod, bitter the chastening rod, Felt in the days when hope unborn had died; Yet with a steady beat, have not our weary feet Come to the place for which our fathers sighed? We have come over a way that with tears has been watered; We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered. Out of the gloomy past, til now we stand at last Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast."
The words of James Weldon Johnson still echo; but their power is in their vision. In the midst of the time when black soldiers who had tasted the basic dignity given them in France but denied them in the land of their birth were being lynched in record numbers, Johnson still saw that progress had been made. The path was hard, painful, and marked by the blood of those who had died walking it-- but Johnson directs our eyes not to the path, nor to the cost, but to the destination, "where the white gleam of our bright star is cast."
There is a bright star-- the brightest star in the sky-- that is still guiding us, even through the stormy night of these days of dissension, decline, and depression. We all want to be like the children in Johnson's hymn, coming to the place for which those who went before us sighed. But as I look, I think we are the generation that has sighing to do-- longing for a new and different church, a changed culture and world.
I sigh for Christ in the center of us-- Christ in our hearts and minds, where all those of us who have watched human love fail and die love one another as brothers and sisters from the heart, not with human sympathy, empathy or compassion, but with the love of Christ Himself. I sigh for a day when I will greet everyone who acknowledges Christ's claim on them as family, even if we do not worship the same, we do not look the same.
I sigh for a day when this culture will look at those who follow Jesus Christ and say, "see how they love each other!" I sigh for a day when every man, woman, and child who encounters the Church will experience a radical love, a clear eye, an open hand, a living sacrifice. I sigh for a day when we will argue our disagreements and dissensions on our knees before the cross, with hands and hearts open to God and therefore open to one another.
If my life's blood is only useful for being poured out to mark the path that others behind me will tread, so be it. I want my children's feet to come to the place for which I sigh. The journey will be long and hard-- and its hardness is already pretty well impressed upon me.
I've only ever seen one Broadway show-- but it is my favorite. At the end of Les Miserables, all those who have sacrificed their lives for something, Someone greater than themselves sing behind the veil, and it lifts, and they sing to the audience: "Who will join in our crusade? Who will be strong and stand with me? Somewhere beyond the barricade is there a world you long to see?"
Can we not put Christ so in the center of our lives that we can join in His work-- that we can see the place for which we sigh? Is it not enough to spend a lifetime struggling, suffering, sacrificing to move one step closer? Who will walk that path with me?

Random Conclusions

2009-02-25T12:03:00.004-06:00

I have always been impatient; perhaps now is not the time to be drawing conclusions. But I've seen, heard, and read enough to know a few things for certain:
1) We shall have to live with one another, no matter what happens. There is no escape from the conflict over human sexuality. We cannot create hermetically sealed churches and denominations where we do not have to acknowledge one another's existence. Even if we could do this, we are only feeding the secularizing atheism that our intransigence spawned in this culture in the first place. If Christians can't love those who say they are Christians, how can we love the drug addict-- the prostitute-- the sinner looking for love, not knowing they are looking for Christ?
2) We are too proud to stop feeding our anger. Mark Twain said, "temper gets us into trouble, but pride keeps us there." No one wants to be the first to admit they don't actually have all the answers, are not just victimized, but also victimizer. We hang on to our bloody shirts, recounting the wounds inflicted upon us, and will not accept the simple truth that the bloody shirt waved in our faces by the one arguing against us is as real as ours is. Pride keeps us asleep so that the nightmare simply plays on. No one wants to wake up.
3) No side will "win." If anything should have taught us this, the reawakening of the Gnostic heresy after almost 2 millenia should have. One side "won;" the other side buried their texts rather than doing as they were commanded and destroying them. But Gnosticism never totally died because it appeals strongly to human pride and human thought. Even if the church police had burned every copy of the Gospel of Thomas, its basic teachings would still be knocking around the churches of the world. If a conflict 2,000 years old in the church is not solvable by law/violence, how likely is it that this conflict can be erased with the same tools? Those who hope for triumph constantly point to slavery, and say, "see, we passed a law and it stopped. The Bible is wrong-- slavery can be eradicated." And there are more slaves in the world right now than there were in 1860-- when millions in Brazil, the United States, and Russia were still in legal servitude. The fight against slavery will go on as long as there are three human beings on the planet-- slavery is a fundamental expression of human will and human power. No law can perfect the human heart. Those whose hope is in a conclusion will always be disappointed until Christ returns.
4) Since the Garden of Eden, there never has been an era of easy peace. We keep harking back to good old days, when it seemed that conflict wasn't there. But the golden age of the 1950's is the era of Joe McCarthy, of the ramped-up violence of those who tried to nip the Civil Rights movement in the bud. Those years only look peaceful and happy because the 50's were compared to the 30's and 40's-- and almost anything would look peaceful and happy in that comparison. Living out our faith in Christ is a constant daily struggle individually and collectively. It has always been thus, and it always will be.

Being a Minority: Celebrating Being Different

2009-02-17T14:47:00.002-06:00

The church, my church history professor used to say, was run by "good little boys and girls" who enjoyed following and enforcing rules. At the time, I remember thinking that his comment was a little harsh-- but after 20 years, I'd have to concede that he had a point.

Church can be a lot like high school-- only you never graduate: peer pressure rules all, and leaders are simply those who have the natural or delegated authority to enforce what peer pressure decrees.

Maybe that's why this course of being a minority comes more naturally to me-- I never fit into the mold of my peers. Every minority struggles with this same reality. We are the natural exceptions to the rules-- rule-breakers by our just being who we are. And in a culture where breaking the rules is the worst form of behavior, we easily find ourselves on the outside looking in.

This experience is frighteningly new to the good little boys and girls of conservative/evangelical conviction in the PC(USA). It is rather like the quarterback and the head cheerleader being shunned-- those who have without a thought assumed a position of power are forced to think by such turns of events.

The major mind shift that must occur is to embrace the gift of being different, even if--especially if!-- the majority shuns you. I had a chance to visit a foreign land a couple of months ago at a very prestigious country club north of the Trinity. The co-chair of the PNC that called me to OCPC had been invited, and as usual gave me a chance to go with her. She loves to introduce me as her "other" son, and watch the confusion as people look at me (so caucasion my skin is almost transparent), and look back at her, beautiful and black.

We walked into a group of people I would have rather run away from, and she simply began introducing herself. In each pair of eyes read the words, "who are you and what are you doing here?" And Opal simply smiled and talked normally to them, meeting their unspoken peer pressure with the assurance, "here I am. I am me. I am different, and I'm proud of being different." She didn't ask their permission-- she didn't need it. We weren't there to disrupt anything; we weren't trying to cause a scene. We were just being who we are.

So, conservative/evangelical brothers and sisters, it is our turn to be different. There's no need to make a scene, or respond to the spoken or unspoken peer pressure around us. Just smile, take your place at the table and be who Christ is calling you to be.

It's amazing how liberating it can be, even for good boys and girls, to learn that conformity is just another passing human power. If we just take responsibility for our own discipline and demonstrate a different way of living in the midst of people who do not like it or understand what we are doing, we may have done more for the cause of Christ than all that we have ever preached or taught.

Our real witness to Christ is not what we say or what position we hold. Our real witness is who we are. Christ has made all the difference in my life-- I am not who I was. If that makes me stand out awkwardly, I hope to be able to summon Opal's grace and calmly BE what Christ has made me.

Testing, Testing: Howling is a Given

2009-02-13T10:35:00.002-06:00

One of the hardest lessons I have ever had to learn as a pastor is that people will not only not like me, but may hate me when I follow what I believe Christ is calling me to do. We in the pastor's union too often have all the backbone of a chocolate eclair, as Teddy Roosevelt once put it.

There are a couple of things to clarify about yesterday's post: one person said, "I do not agree with your conclusions" because that person stands in the "other camp." I am not drawing conclusions; I am walking out into no-man's land. You can doubt my motives-- but you cannot doubt my action. I am seeking a means to move forward, and stepping out to a place in the middle where I can stand. All I am asking is to see if you can step out to where you can stand, and if we can reach each other across that distance.

This is not a fix-- it is not a resolution. It is a means to go forward together. Resolution may not come for generations, just as it will not come quickly or easily across the scarred divisions of race in our country. Someone's got to begin the healing process. It is the task of our time to begin-- my children's children may have the joy of seeing the conclusion, whatever God will ordain that to be.

Another person said, "but the shouters will keep shouting, the litigators keep litigating..." Yes, yes. This work must be begun in the midst of much verbal violence. It is not the first time, nor will it be the last.

My hero is Connie, and all those like her who were willing at 8 years old to walk through a wall of hate to find a new future for themselves. In his book, "The Spiritual Life of Children," Robert Coles lets her tell her story: "I was all alone, and those [segregationist] people were screaming, and suddenly I saw God smiling and I smiled. A woman was standing there [near the school door] and she shouted at me, 'HEY you little nigger, what you smiling at?' I looked right at her face and I said, 'at God.' Then she looked up at the sky, and then she looked at me, and she didn't call me any more names."

Both sides have their yellers-- both sides have their names to call each other. There are segregationists of left and right in this conflict-- those who want to impose their way on the whole. I'm going to walk down the middle toward the future that the Lord has in store for us-- finding that future is the only thing that will make God smile. All I'm looking for is someone who can step toward me close enough that we can hold hands and walk the gauntlet together. Any takers?

Testing, Testing: A Route to Coexistence

2009-02-12T12:50:00.002-06:00

I feel called to raise this trial balloon-- let's see if it flies. Evangelicals and Progressives in the PC(USA) are struggling for dominance; if we are to look for a path to coexistence with our differing points of view on human sexuality, I believe that several strands of thought need to weave together:

We must accept that we are a minority-- ALL of us, whatever side we take in the current disputes-- inside this culture. The culture and the church are no longer coexistential, if they ever truly were. We follow the Christ the head of the church, not the culture.
None of us truly knows what God is up to in this time. We all have our guesses, our timelines, and our storylines that prove that we were right all along. But no one really knows God's timeline or storyline. God is going to have to sort this out in God's own time.
We have to start finding ways to move toward each other, instead of doing the easy thing, which is lobbing bombs and rallying "us" to fight "them."

So, a path to coexistence probably has a good chance of being rejected by both Left and Right; it will not necessarily be acceptable culturally. The only people who will find it are people who are willing to look for it; the only way to look for it is to look together, "us" and "them;" and both the looking, and the uncomfortable coexistence, are going to last for an indeterminate amount of time. I am ready to accept these realities, coming from the evangelical side of the PC(USA).

So, with those ground rules, I move toward those who disagree with this idea: let issues of sexuality and ordination be issues of church discipline; and let us make our peace that church discipline will be exercised at different levels in different cases in different places.

What does this mean? It means an acceptance of the people shaped by the culture that we live in, without making undue accomodation to that culture. An example is divorce. We accept that people divorce in this culture, even though Jesus is overtly condemning of the practice. But that acceptance of divorced people into ordained office is done person-by-person, not always with the same results. There are persons who will be ordained despite being divorced, and there will be persons who are not ordained because they are divorced. Decisions are made pastorally by those upon whom the spiritual responsibility of deciding has been placed. In some places, divorce may never be seen as an issue in ordination, while in others, it is always an issue.

But if the Church should declare that a service celebrating divorce shall be offered, that divorce is a gift of God, and that there is no sin in divorce, the issue of divorce has moved from a matter of church discipline into a question of whether divorce is a positive good. If the PC(USA) were to mandate such a change, I-- and I believe a lot of others concerned with following the Scriptures-- would not be able in good conscience to comply.

Let differing bodies exercise their responsibility to discipline and decide as God leads them; let those who disagree with their decisions have a place at the table. Let conscience on both sides be held in peace, and let Jesus Christ the head of the Church judge the work of each in His time, as He will. But for this path to work, issues of sexuality and ordination must remain matters of church discipline.

Living as a Minority: the Future for all Americans

2009-02-11T11:51:00.002-06:00

Sometimes I wonder why no one argues with me in the comments on these blogs. I figure that most of the few who read these must think either a) there is nothing much to disagree with here or b) that what is here is so hopelessly wrong/irrelevant that there's no point.

But the point of talking about looking at life from a minority status is not only relevant for evangelicals in the PC(USA), it is also the future for all Americans, no matter what pidgeon-hole the census puts you in. Within 20 years, there will be no majority culture in the USA; our country will, for the first time in its history, become a marketplace of minority cultures.

And the people who are most unready for this transition are the keepers of Anglo culture-- the mainline and other traditional churches. We are being challenged at the very base of who we believe we are: are we white/gay/black/hispanic Christians, or Christians who happen to be white/gay/black/hispanic? And the whole history of the church in this country condemns us to living out the same hyphenated existence, with Christ on the wrong side (the second-priority side) of the hyphen.

The test of whether Christ is on the right side is what we are willing to give up of our cultural heritage to live for Jesus Christ. Because of Christendom's poisonous compromises, most white Christians still make the same deadly assumptions so many missionaries did in the last centuries: surrender to Christ means that others become like us. It is this toxic majoritarian mindset that is killing us. To become like Jesus means that I, too, just like everybody else He calls, must leave home.

So, what would YOU be willing to give up to follow Jesus Christ with your brothers and sisters who don't look/speak/act like you? Is there any identity that is more important to you than your identity in Christ? Can you let that identity go?

That is the question that is before us-- shall we become once again "the third race" of our apostolic beginnings, neither Jew nor Greek, yet both Jew and Greek-- ONE in Christ Jesus?

Living as a Minority: Trade No One Evil for Evil

2009-02-10T13:54:00.003-06:00

Retaliation is always justified in the mind of the retaliator. Insult or injury was given, so insult or injury must be returned. But as Mahatma Ghandi once said, "trading an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind." For a minority, though, because we have fewer eyes, we go blind faster. And blind rage is the ultimate prison for the human soul.

I marvel at my heroes and heroines for their self-control in the face of persecution-- for their smiles at hate-filled faces, their kind words spoken into the high-decibel screaming of the culture they were born into. There are a few synthetic strands in their learning and their teaching, and the power of self-control is one of them.

To exert such self-control, one must know who one is; one must be able to stay within the bounds of what one can stand, and one must at the same time not cease to reach out to the offender, no matter how they respond.

The only way for a minority to win at the zero-sum games of worldly power is not to play-- and if one is forced to play, not to play by the world's rules. Jesus Christ taught this first and best (Thoreau, Ghandi, and King were only good students). Asymmetrical response throws off the plan of the aggressor, and forces thought to occur before violence can continue. Self-control defends that silent space/time for the aggressor to fully appreciate the humanity of his/her victim, and the true moral character of the action. Turn the other cheek is not simply a way of giving a new target-- by refraining from retaliation, the person who is the target gains the moral upper hand. To hit again, the aggressor must own the aggression.

This doesn't stop aggression-- Christ was crucified, after all. But in God's time, the blood of the martyrs becomes the seed of a renewed Church.

We are willing to speak for Christ, but we are not willing to bleed for Him. We are willing to give of ourselves in His service, but we are unwilling to give ourselves wholly to His service. Jesus does not need new members of His Church-- He needs witnesses to His glory. The word "martyr" comes from the Greek word, "witness." That is what Jesus Christ is asking us to be.

My heroes and heroines were raised to be witnesses to Jesus Christ. The harsh majority could not strip them of the noble dignity with which He clothed them. Victor Frankl wrote that everything can be taken from a man except one thing: his response to the insult or injury. That cannot be coerced or controlled. There is nothing in being a minority that can strip from us our ability to witness to Jesus Christ.

Nothing will stop me from declaring His praise, from preaching repentance as preparation for His coming Kingdom, or from loving every person as He has loved me. No one ever will stop me, as long as there is breath in my body.

Living as a Minority: Reach Out and Live, Pull In and Die

2009-02-06T10:32:00.004-06:00

Health in all living things is a balance, where our immune system can push back with equal force against the creatures that would destroy or compromise our ability to function. The same is true in groups of people: health is a balance between the group's ability to reach beyond itself to the larger world, and its need to maintain its own cohesion. Groups grow when they can spend more time reaching out than on internal cohesion; they shrink and die when they spend more time on internal cohesion than they do in communication with the rest of the world.

The fact that these posts are incoherent to someone who does not know the struggles of the PC(USA) I think pretty clearly demonstrates where all our energy has gone these last 40 years. It is no accident that there are half as many of us as there were 40 years ago. We have so lost the ability to cohere that we have not even noticed that the world has changed. We are a 21 st century Rip Van Winkle, tripping over a beard that we're not used to being there, angry that the people whose names we are calling are gone, the customs of dress and conversation make us feel as if we are strangers in the land of our birth.

We conservative/evangelicals in and beyond the PC(USA) seem the most incensed and uncomprehending. We react in fear and anger to the world's bewildering ability to dismiss and belittle us, to walk its own path and ignore what we say. The temptation is to pull in behind strong walls, to rigidly enforce conformity within, and to expel and shoot those who look like/sound like they are from without. Groups, like individuals, have a survival instinct. Minority survival instinct is to pull in and defend the perimeter. Better to be safe than sorry.

But there is no future in safety. The walls built for safety harden into a shell that cannot be penetrated, and the Gospel meant for the whole world becomes the idiosyncratic cultural tic of a group of people whose oddity makes them incomprehensible to the vast majority of the world. Minorities walled off from the majority simply become new variations on the Amish theme.

To be African-American in America is to live with the tension implied in the hyphenated word. It is to be part of what easily can become two entirely separate worlds: a cultural world which, at 10-15% of the population, is and will always be a minority, while also being among those who by simple seniority (the average African-American family has been here almost 200 years longer than the average European-American family) have the deepest claims to the identity of the whole.

To reach out to the majority requires a confidence in common identity that enables the group to know what can be compromised, and what cannot. It requires a courage that masters the fears that never truly subside: fear of the group's death, its loss of identity-- that mixing will dilute it into oblivion.

The strength of these fears is the real reason why, as Martin Luther King, Jr. preached in his last regular Sunday sermon at the National Cathedral, that "11:00 on Sunday morning is the most segregated hour in America." It takes an intense courage and a deep faith to trust enough in the love of Christ to give up one's identity to culture and pick up one's identity in Christ.

I stand in awe of my heroes and heroines here at OCPC, who were willing to challenge us to meet them in the middle; I give thanks to my fellow Anglo faithful, who were willing to let go of what was the native cultural inheritance of this part of the Body of Christ to meet them in the middle. My hope and prayer is that somehow, we can do the same thing with the cultural/theological conflicts that beset us now. But both sides must be willing to reach out, recognizing that relationship requires both to lose in order to love.

Living as a Minority: Know Your Boundaries

2009-02-04T11:22:00.002-06:00

One of the hardest realities of being a minority is that the majority has a thousand ways to hurt you, and you have but two or three ways to defend yourself. The most important defense that must be continually deployed is to know where your pain threshold is, and to withdraw when it gets hit. Minorities end up on the fringes of the majority because that is where there is enough freedom and enough space to be able to heal up from the wounds that are all too often mindlessly inflicted.

When we were in construction phase in 2004, one of the last subcontractors I had to deal with came to put in a condenser unit. He was no more than 25, with red hair and an aggressive attitude in dealing with people he didn't know. His conversational tic was that he called all men he ran into "young man" when he encountered them.

Now, at 40 years old, I wasn't wild about being called "young man." But I wanted the job done, so I just smiled and went on with showing him what he was dealing with. We were in the kitchen, looking at the main breaker panels in the storage room, and Crumpton walked in to tell me something. Our subcontractor looked at him and said, "Hello, young man--" and Crumpton spun around on his heel and walked very quickly out the door.

The only alternative was to tear that young man a new hole. There are a few boundaries you don't cross with my heroes, especially. Don't ever even get close to calling any of them "boy." It is too painful and angering to live with the memory of being diminished for so long, that anyone who gets near that wound will set off an explosion of anger that is not containable.

Crumpton not only left the kitchen, he left the building. He knew that he needed time and space to recover, because a boundary had been mindlessly violated. When he returned, no discussion was had; he just went on with what he had to do, and he stayed away from the real young man who was now outside the kitchen working.

Living as a minority means that self-care is the most essential component of self-control-- we have to know what we cannot tolerate, and push back from it before we explode. The majority is not responsible to care for us; they will not, human beings being what we are. We must care for ourselves enough to be able to set and keep boundaries that enable us to be constructive when we can, and absent when we cannot.

Living as a Minority: You Must Know Who You Are

2009-02-03T14:32:00.006-06:00

We are not that far removed from a world that believed that dark skin meant few brain cells. The residual effects of that prejudice still linger, but in nothing like the strength they held in the Anglo community 50 years ago.

It was in that world that so many of my heroes and heroines here at OCPC grew up. They are the generation that made Barack Obama's life possible. And everywhere, they were a minority, surrounded not by an indifferent, but a hostile majority.

And each of them tells a similar story of what they internalized in the midst of real persecution, and emotional and physical intimidation and violence: you cannot let white people tell you who you are. You have to know who you are so deeply, so strongly, that no person however important, powerful, or intimidating, can change it. You must know who you are no matter how many people deny it, no matter what facts they have to prove it.

Every one of my heroes knows who they are. In the world I grew up in, knowing who you were was a minor obstacle: it meant that you weren't pliant enough to fit into the environment. Majoritarian thinking is always asking, "what does everybody else think/feel/want?" This is death for the minority; the majority always believes it is right/beautiful/normal/appropriate. The minority must be the exception to their rules.

To be an exception, and to be an exception for a lifetime, one must be exceptional. One must be willing to be a living infraction of the rules, and one must be able to do that with grace. That grace is receiving from an internal source all the approval one needs to be able to face the world and look the majority in the eye.

Do you know that Christ holds you in the palm of Your hand? Do you know that your name is written down in the Book of Life? Does Jesus walk with you? Listen to the heart conversation inside my heroes and heroines, and in everyone of them, it is the triumphant and certain YES! to those questions that is the essential spine of their lives. It doesn't matter what the majority says-- it doesn't matter what the majority does. It doesn't matter what the majority wants. I know who and Whose I am, and therefore I know what I'm supposed to do-- and I know what I want. And that's all I need.

Never, never, never compromise yourself. Never give anyone or anything any inroad to who you are. No one but Jesus has the right to say.

Living as a Minority

2009-02-03T14:04:00.005-06:00

The hue and cry of anguish in this time for those of us who are evangelical inside the PC(USA) is that the world is coming to an end. And, in a way, it is. The facts are simple: ordination of Ministers of Word and Sacrament who are openly homosexual is a fact in a few presbyteries across the country. Candidates have been approved in others, and ordinations have been restored on the basis of "scrupling" sexual standards of behavior.

This is not something that will happen if 08B passes-- this is happening already, and it has the approval of General Assembly without the vote of the presbyteries. Western North Carolina has massively reversed course, and other presbyteries with thin margins in 2001 may do the same. If the world is defined as the place where evangelical positions hold the high ground, then that world truly is coming to an end in the PC(USA). Being an evangelical now in the PC(USA) means that one must embrace minority status, or leave.

There are some amazing gifts that come with being the pastor of OCPC. One of the best is this: when I came into the office today, I was explaining all this, and my beloved older brother Crumpton had the patience to listen. Crumpton rose in the world through the only institution that would let him rise: the U.S. Army. He and his family were the second neighbors who crossed a lot of barriers to open the doors of OCPC to African-Americans in 1975.

Crumpton looked at me and said, "some of us know all about being a minority. It's not the end of the world." So, for Black History Month, I'm going to let them do the teaching. We who hold to the faith as handed down from the saints have much to learn about being a minority from them.

The Real Challenge

2009-01-30T13:07:00.007-06:00

Session was meeting; we were one hour into our time, greasing the machinery of the church. At the door-- visible because the Session room is glass-walled, as is the South entrance-- stood two young black men, not exactly dressed for church.
Because we had had a big shindig that day, the door was unlocked and many people were coming and going. One of them came to the door, and let the two young men in. Watching this unfold behind the elders' backs, I looked at the circle of elders, and I said to them, "someone needs...." Before I could get the call to serve out of my mouth, one elder was at the door, going to them. She began to talk to them, and one of the young men began to cry. She took them to the library; we could hear her telling them, "we need to pray for you." I said, "Jesus sent us out two by two..." and another elder jumped up and followed her to the library. Our parish associate went with him.
Our meeting continued, wheels were greased; but I was watching as person after person went by loading their cars, hearing the cries, dropping everything, and heading to the library. Within a few minutes, piles of bags had stacked up at the entrance door, and I could just see through the cracked open door of the library young and old, new and veteran Christians, black and white, on their knees with their hands on the backs of the two young black men.
At the end of the meeting, an hour later, they were still there; I went in and prayed with them, and heard their story. Abandoned by their parents, raised by grandparents who had recently died, fathers of children they did not really know and could not really help to raise-- they were little boys in men's costumes, trying to act like they knew what they were doing, when they were totally lost.
It had finally gotten bad enough that they simply started walking, looking for the doors of a church that would be open at 3:00 on a Sunday afternoon. Our building is on a street of churches, but we are a ways north of most of them. They had started at the southern end of the street-- we were the only door that was open.
This is a parable for our time: I have never felt more joy as a pastor than I felt that day, watching Jesus Christ use this community to hold on to those two young men, and help them to get their bearings in a world that did not seem to care if they failed or succeeded.
While we are inside arguing, a generation of young men is dying all around us. While we play at spiritual things, a generation is growing up ignorant of them. This is the real challenge of this time. It is time to as they say, "man up:"
For I am not ashamed of the gospel; it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who has faith, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Romans 1:16

Shedding Dead Ideas

2009-01-28T15:38:00.005-06:00

Dust is amazing stuff. Look at your computer keyboard, or the top of the monitor-- it piles up fast not because we're slovenly, but because we are alive. Dust is mostly made up of our discarded skin cells. We shed our skin just like snakes do; we just don't shed it all at the same time. We shed a little each day, imperceptably replacing our outer shell until we notice that gray detritus around where we live and work.
Wouldn't it be nice if change in the Church of Jesus Christ could work the same way? I know of a man who wanted his congregation to have a unified pulpit in the center of the chancel; his way of making this change happen was to drag the pulpit to the center, one inch per week. That'll fool'em, won't it?
But eventually, someone is going to ask, "why is the pulpit in the middle of the chancel?" And when they do, the whole subterfuge explodes in the face of the leader who spent so much time and energy inching the piece of furniture across the floor.
History has turned the lights on mid-move on the Church in western culture. We have been exposed for what we are and what we have been: a people more interested in comfort than the call of Christ to self-sacrificial love, more concerned with being a target for the bullies of culture than with becoming the demonstrably different witness to Christ who transforms culture, and the world.
We face an increasingly stark choice that many of us by training and experience are totally unprepared to make: do we blend in, or do we stand out? We cannot choose by simply finding a safe place to live, or a job to hold: everything (and now, in this economic climate it is literally everything) is in flux. There is no solid ground to sit down on and not move.
So, how do we move forward?
FIX YOUR EYES ON JESUS. Worship and prayer are the oxygen of the Christian life-- they are the vehicle for communication, without which no relationship can exist.
ABSOLUTELY TRUST THE BIBLE. This may not get you applause from the PhD's, and it will elicit more than one eye-rolling sigh from those who consider themselves the arbiters of intelligence, but the Scriptures are the one compass that will never lead you astray. Listen to what God tells you in His word, and do it.
LET ALL THINGS BE DONE IN LOVE. If you ever find yourself with hammer and nails in your hand and a wrist in front of you, you are in the wrong place. If there is pain to be borne, be the first to bear it rather than the one to inflict it. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all Romans 12:18.
If we can learn to do just this, we can find our way through this shattering time.

How Do We Go Forward?

2009-01-27T14:43:00.009-06:00

After reading this post from Viola Larson, and an interesting conversation at lunch with my evangelical brothers in the PC(USA), I am left with the same question I've been asking for almost 4 years now. How do we (pastors in the denomination) go forward?
I have stuck my neck out, and tried to reach across the aisle to promote a "no action" vote on 08-B, which my evangelical brothers have graciously received by handing me my head. It seems that reaching across the aisle propels one out of one's seat on this side. I asked them the same question, and I got back a variant of this Long Island pastor's answer: "...Personally, I will stay in the PCUSA and pastor my flock as I fulfill my call - not to be faithful but because I have not found a way out yet. But should God ever open the door to a call away from the PCUSA, I will be gone in a heartbeat; shaking the dust from my shoes as a testimony...even if I have to wait until honorable retirement to do so..."
Being a minority is hard on the soul. I see it all around me in the community I live in, one of the few places in the USA where African-Americans have majority status. The privations of the southern part of Dallas are perceived to be entirely the work of "them," the rich white majority north of the Trinity; but the desire to separate is on both sides of the river. Separation is the last defense of any minority; it is a way to survive the crushing forces of conformity to the majority. Minority cultures can survive no other way.
This is why OCPC is such a strange and wonderful community. We are all refugees from our cultures of origin: to come here and be part of this family, everyone has to leave home. And yet, the relationships that bind us, first to Christ and then to one another, make this place in no man's land home, too. It was home when white flight emptied the neighborhood of good "Presbyterian" families; it was home when busing scarred the lives of young people who went to school knowing that they were not wanted. It was home as it changed from an Anglo congregation where African-Americans were welcome to a more integrated congregation with a lot of people for whom the word "church" did not engender warm memories of being welcome.
I live as a minority now; our family is one of 3 Anglo families in our neighborhood. So how do we live as a minority, my evangelical brothers and sisters who are reading this? I made a suggestion of what to do with 08-B that might open some lines of communication. You didn't like it. What's your idea?
We cannot stay and leave at the same time.

Dead Idea #5-- Power is Better than Love

2009-01-23T11:15:00.014-06:00

Power does not demand love. Power demands submission and respect. An underlying current of the poisonous river that has worn away the inner strength of the Church of Jesus Christ is the exchange of love-- absolute and total trust, self-giving, self-sacrificing-- for power.
The world and its cultures know only power; the ability to coerce or persuade is the only power that there is. A worldly Church, a Church that is culturally captive, comes to believe the same thing.
From the top, the organization of the church becomes defensive (hang on to what you have), rather than expansive. Leaders of this church demand to be respected and spend their lives acquiring and defending their respectability. Power expresses itself differently at the grassroots level of the church, but no less poisonously. The average pewsitter demands to be seen as good, and spend their lives acquiring and defending their goodness.
This church will argue to the death over doctrine; it will excoriate the surrounding culture for its bad acts, and evil proclivities. But it will not engage the sinner-- it will spend money, but no blood to save the lost. James says that faith without deeds is dead; this church is dead, even when it is filled to the brimming with treasure and talent.
Love does not coerce, Love invites. Love is easily mocked, easily ignored, easily rejected. Love suffers rather than inflicting suffering; Love embraces rejection, rather than rejecting. Love is present not when everyone says it is, but when everyone LOVES. Love is messy and chaotic, and costly. Love serves. The pastor who serves in love is easy to hurt, mock, and demean. The people who serve in love are easy to question about their motives, and easy to dismiss for their "ignorance" and weakness.
But the Love of Jesus Christ that compels the believer transforms the blood and toil of their self-emptying sacrifice into Christ's own blood, which washes away the sins of the whole world. I have watched Christ's love wash away a lifetime of disrespect and prejudice, of death-dealing self-hatred and bitterness. When I get up in the pulpit of Oak Cliff Presbyterian Church, I look out on young and old, black, white, hispanic, rich, poor, sober and recently sober-- all who are seeking to love Jesus Christ with all their heart, soul, and mind, and to love their neighbor as themselves. That may not be enough power for a journalist to believe that love can change the world-- but it was enough to change us. Who truly knows how far that Love can go in changing the world until we, the Church, take all our worldly power and possessions, and try?

About Nell

2009-01-22T13:44:00.003-06:00

Sorry that I haven't updated Nell's status on the blog, but that's because things have been astonishingly normal. The next MRI (magnetic resonance imaging)/MRA (magnetic resonance angiography) is in 6 months, so life goes on, and we wait.
Life is good, and we are adjusting to the newly discovered realities of this time. I live each day quietly watching to see if anything happens, and asking questions if something does happen. It is hard to live inside that vigilance, and hopefully time will erode it. But it is a new twist of this 13-year journey that takes some time to adjust to. We appreciate your prayers, and know that God's purposes are being worked out, even if we do not know what they are. God is good.

Dead Idea #4-- Permanence is more Important than Performance

2009-01-21T11:31:00.003-06:00

Every established religion-- that is, every religion given privilege and power by the culture that surrounds it-- becomes enamored with bricks and mortar. Establishment gives a faith worldly resources that are most easily used for worldly ends, so faith is literally set into stone.
From every European city's cathedral to the square windowless mall-like warehouses of Dallas, the power and prestige of Christian faith is proclaimed by buildings no one lives in, built with great sacrifice by the common people, so that the culture at large cannot look across the skyline without having to encounter a cross on a spire.
But faith cannot be set into stone. The story can be told, yes-- but faith is written on human hearts. How many of those stone cathedrals now are warehouses for chairs in Europe? How many of the great stone piles put up in the flush times of the last century with names like Presbyterian or Episcopal on their signs sit empty across America?
Established faiths play on the impermanence of human achievement to garner riches to build these piles. Give your money to the church, and a stained glass window with your name, your beloved's name, will stand in the sanctuary, and people will remember you, and them. Buildings testify to us.
But Jesus says that we are to be witnesses to HIM! Obedience matters more than memory-- performance of Christ's commands matters more than the permanence of one's achievements. We have much to learn from our older siblings, especially the Jews of Europe. No great cathedral is necessary for the performance of our obedient love for Christ; all that is needed is a room, and the Book, and faithful people gathered in His name.
The true Church, the great congregations of this and every age, are not those that leave behind the largest sarcophagus in which their faith is buried. The true Church, the great congregations are those that so live out their faith and pour out their lives that the law of Christ is written anew on hearts young and old, of every race, station, and circumstance. The true Church does not leave anything behind it-- the true Church through obedience plants that which will succeed it.

Dead Idea #3: Respectability=Piety

2009-01-17T11:18:00.006-06:00

For the denominations given pride of place in Christendom, this dead idea is at the core of their decline. As Christianity ceased to be a faith to be embraced and became a mark of belonging in the larger culture of which it was claimed to be a part, faith practices atrophied, and cultural markers replaced them as evidence of Christian faith.
For many centuries, faith practices and cultural markers remained joined at the hip, reaching their apogee in the Victorian era. Be a good citizen, grow wealthy, be good to your spouse and children lived happily side-by-side with prayer, Bible Study, and doing what Christ directs you to do. But as doubts were raised about the Christian part of Western culture, the markers began to diverge from faith practices.
The final rupture between respectability and Christian piety began in the 1920's, as did so many of the cultural trends that continue today. Living in cities divorced from generational family ties, younger generations developed new ways of being "respectable," with the Christian faith practices more and more as a model for the way NOT to be respectable.
Christian faith became an object of dirision, as Clarence Darrow sought to humiliate William Jennings Bryan on the stand during the Scopes Monkey Trial. Faith practices were "backward" in a time confident that human scientific knowledge would lead to a better world. Those who practiced their faith in ways recognizable by the generations of faithful before them retreated from the culture at large into a dark corner, while those who had followed the path of respectability came to fear and despise those faith practices as the ways of the poor and the ignorant.
Respectability as a faith practice, though, has one major drawback-- it is not transformational. Respectability is the mark of the majority, the mark of belonging, and as such is always a moving target. To chase respectability, one must look like everybody else. It is dangerous to stick out in a respectable crowd. If respectability is one's aim, then one must always be a follower, wherever respectability leads.
So, now that respectability decrees that sexual practice is a matter of indifference, and that, if one is not indifferent to practices that the Scriptures call sin, then one cannot be respectable, those who have no Scriptural knowledge to fall back on, who know nothing of the real practice of the faith they profess, simply follow the rules of their culture. Their children abandon the "faith" they were raised in, and their denominations die.
Practicing the historic Christian faith now in the upper reaches of this culture is embracing downward mobility; it is a great way to lose the respect of respectable people.
But praying to Christ Jesus will change your life. Reading the Bible, believing God's promises, heeding the Spirit's call will save your life. Worshipping Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior in daily life will open your eyes to your life's calling. Jesus Christ transforms every life He touches-- and no life, however rich in respect and the things of this world can compare with knowing Jesus.
Let goods and kindred go, Martin Luther wrote so long ago; this mortal life also. The body they may kill, God's truth abideth still-- His Kingdom is forever.

Dead Idea #2: God is an Intellectual Concept

2009-01-15T11:08:00.004-06:00

There were many consequences to the Constantinian Compromise, which made Christianity the mascot of Western Culture, but the atrophy of the most basic functions of faith is the most dangerous.
Cultures of all sorts fall victim to Dellacroix's dictum, "effort and pretension are everywhere." And when following Jesus Christ as Lord became fashionable, the fashions of the world slowly overgrew their foundations, encrusting faith with a mantle of intellectual sophistication that, by the middle of the 20th century had become the challenge of making theology inaccessible to the average person. Perhaps the apogee of this form of "study" is Karl Barth, whose sentences can run for pages without a period.
Theology in this Babylonian Captivity to Western culture became the study of concepts and systems, until God Himself became just another idea. The entire "God is Dead" movement of the 60's and 70's was simply the popular expression of this: if God is just an idea, then ideas have a shelf life. Perhaps God was an idea whose time had passed.
John Shelby Spong and his disciples embraced this "idea" and promoted it. In my theology class at Princeton Seminary, I was publicly rebuked for thinking of God as a person, not a concept. It has now become "tacky" to speak of God as person-- it is the intellectual equivalent of being bare-foot and pregnant.
This is why, dear brothers and sisters, Bishop Robinson in New Hampshire says that Rick Warren prays "to a god I do not know." Christians are now using the same words, but meaning very different things. One group talks about God, and means to have an intellectual discussion of ideas, while the other group talks about God, and means to share experience and understanding (however limited) of the One who was, Who is, and Who is to come.
The first group will continue to dwindle because its task is simply an interesting hobby; the second group will continue to grow, because each one who is touched by the reality of God knows that life and death are at stake in the sharing. The idea group at best sees Christianity as a lifestyle; the revelation group at its best knows Christianity to be the Way, the Truth, the Life.

The Challenge of Disenthralling Ourselves

2009-01-09T11:09:00.007-06:00

In her review of Matt Miller's book, Kathleen Parker in today's Washington Post is bringing forth the great challenge for us in this time: we must disenthrall ourselves, as Abraham Lincoln put it in 1861. What is killing us right now is not the death of precious ideas-- it is our unwillingness to think anew, and act anew. We will not let go of what is gone, so we cannot grasp hold of what is coming.
What is going is traumatically so drastic that to let go of it, we must let go of some essential pieces of what it has meant to be an American in the last half-century. Miller lists six such dead ideas, but the PC(USA) has others to contribute to the list. What I intend to do for a while is to list and describe these dead ideas.
Dead Idea #1: the Church must follow wherever the Culture that gives it status leads.
This idea is the most deadly holdover from the Christendom era. When the Church and its surrounding society cooperated in perpetuating the lie that the entire culture was Christian, the Church received power and status in return for tacit obedience to this central idea. Hence, at the beginning of World War I, every army was blessed by its pastors, priests, and bishops to go out and kill the other armies. Christians were blessed by the Church to go out and kill other Christians, because the cultures were at war.
The PC(USA) has been done in by this same phenomenon from the 1960's, when the culture that gave the PC(USA) status declared war on the rising youth culture of the time; we are now almost 50 years into that war, and it still hasn't ended.
So much of what is happening inside the Church is still being driven by this principle. In an argument over whether the Church should bless gay marriage, the winning trump in my brother's hand was this: "don't you realize that in 20 years, every state in the union will recognize gay marriage?"
My response: "So what?"
All I received was a dumbfounded look.
The Church is not bound to follow this culture-- it is bound to follow the Lord, led by the Word. When the Church follows the Lord, preaches the Word, and obeys, it will lead Culture, not follow it.

Deckchair or Lifeboat?

2009-01-08T12:41:00.007-06:00

Now that I am down to about 5 kleenexes/hour, and the coughing only lasts the first 2 hours of the day, I am trying to get back in the swing of things. Nell has been at school for the first two full days, but I'm afraid she's caught this bug now, so she's taking it easy (which is hard for her). Ruth heads back to college on Monday, and everything goes to full speed next week at Church (we're at about 1/2 speed this week).
As I've been reading the blogs, I've been thinking about Bruce Reyes-Chow's challenge to define a center that can hold inside the PC(USA), about Beau Weston's assertions that the tall-steeple pastors should re-form their "establishment" to form that center.
The image may be brutal, but I think it is apt. It doesn't matter whether you are partial to the port side, starboard side, bow, midships, or stern of the Titanic. There is no sense in arguing where is the best place to gather together. All parts of the ship are headed in the same direction. The ship turns out to not be "unsinkable" after all. If this last six months should have taught us arrogant Westerners anything, it should be that no human creation is unsinkable, or too big to fail.
All of the foundational institutions of "the American Century"-- corporations, unions, health insurance, pensions-- are coming apart. The question is not how to save them, but how to create what comes next. In that context, the question of a "center" makes sense.
This is the great enterprise of this time-- and it will not be engaged in by those who are on the deck, with their shoulders to the wheels of the old system as it grinds its way into oblivion. The grand enterprise will start as a collection of lifeboats, not some sheared-off portion of the old ship. This is why I believe that Dr. Weston is mistaken. The real creative energy of a new center is not going to be found in the first class saloon of the old; it will be found in those striking out in new directions around the periphery. If there is a hope for something new to salvage the precious treasure bound up in the old, it is in the lifeboats.
Let those who want to yell about whether the iceberg was on the left or the right of the ship, whether if we had turned to port or starboard things might have been different-- let them argue on. There are new horizons to be explored with those ready to get in a smaller craft. I see no reason why Bruce and I cannot explore that new horizon with our two boats together. In fact, sticking together makes MORE sense in a lifeboat than it does in a deckchair. The era of the modern American Titanic is over, for good or for ill. Let's save what we can of her, and see what the Lord will lead us to build to replace her.

Digesting

2009-01-01T15:48:00.004-06:00

My eager desire and hope being that

I may never feel ashamed.

But that now, as ever, I may do honour to Christ

In my own person with fearless courage. Philippians 1:20 (Moffat)

As I am trying to feel my way through the fog of this time, I picked up Oswald Chambers and began another year of My Utmost for His Highest. The Scripture above is the first Word from the book. I think I understand more now what it means.
This process is an education in the nature of the world. It is breathtaking in its cold, cruel and senseless beauty. All the picket fences and locks, security systems and 401(k)'s and health insurance cannot protect us from its dead, remorseless progress. It has no care for negotiation, no rules it must follow. Being good is no protection. All the routines of our lives do not send it scurrying away.
It is this essential senselessness of the world that I think Heath Ledger captured in "The Dark Knight," which we watched on Sunday (thank you, David and Michael). He and Two-Face are the two faces of our natural reaction to it: a selfish delight in joining in the destruction, or a rage-filled demand for fairness, for some sort of sense. Both reactions simply fuel the cruelty.

There is another reaction that is possible. It is to stand and fight-- not to win, but simply to fight-- to fight the cruelty, the coldness, the senselessness with the one abiding power that has no human explanation, and is just as visceral as the hate, fear and rage: love. But that now, as ever, I may do honour to Christ In my own person with fearless courage.

Courage to stand with Nell, and not lie, but speak the truth that Love will not lose-- it WILL be ok, even if it seems that all is lost. Courage to pick up a light instead of cursing the darkness. Courage to love in the face of the hatred and cruelty of those who know the world, and in resignation or selfishness feed its powers, indifferent to the suffering around them. Courage to live in a world terrified of dying.

If we walk down the path and Nell's eloquence is swallowed in silence too early, or the work we do in Oak Cliff bears little fruit, or all that I cherish is taken from me-- I still choose to love. And when this world has ground me into the dust, then with Christ

I WILL RISE.

Home Again

2008-12-31T16:01:00.003-06:00

Nell is home, but we are chastened now by the experience of this week. Everything seems a little bit different; while the house hasn't changed, we have. Sleep is a real need for all of us. Thank you, Lord, for the people of OCPC, for the rest they are giving us for this weekend.
There is a lot to digest right now; it's hard to believe that it's only been two days. It feels like about 10. We thank the Lord for each of you who is with us on this journey. For those who have the urge to call, please resist it. I'm getting bronchitis, and Nell and Martha need to sleep. We appreciate all the concern, but the best way to show it is to just keep praying.
I'll keep you posted in the new year.

Whiplash

2008-12-30T19:36:00.002-06:00

Thank God that doctors can be wrong.
The DWI profile (nothing to do with arrests, but a MRI protocol that spotlights strokes in the brain) is apparently not as foolproof as the doctor who read it at 12:00am said it was. This morning, all the grey heads came together, looked at the films, and explained what was there. Neither of the two bright objects in the DWI profile was a stroke. Praise God.
But... (on this road there is always a but) what happened last night was what is called transient ischemia, or a series of T.I.A.'s, or transient ischemic attacks. This is usually the prelude to a major brain attack, or stroke. The doctors agree that this is why we did the operation last week in the first place.
So, this is what is happening: Nell's left brain is starved for oxygenated blood. We put a new artery down to bring blood to that part of her brain, but the brain must grow the capillaries to tap into the supply. This takes time (3 months). In the meantime, the starvation goes on. So, we are in a horse race between supply and demand. At least supply has a week's headstart.
Thank you for the prayers. One of my favorite quotations:

As night alone enables us to see the stars,
so suffering alone illuminates
the brightest truth of God.

Night brings out the stars
As sorrow shows us the truth.

In the nightmare of these last 24 hours, your prayers have been the truth of God to us. God has granted us rest through them, strength in them, and hope when it seemed all hope was gone. We have been able to breathe deeply through the pain and fear because of the Holy Spirit's power breathing through you. Never, NEVER doubt the power of prayer. Never stop praying.

The New Road

2008-12-30T00:30:00.002-06:00

At 6:15, while she brushed her hair, Nell began to have two strokes. One is in the speech center, near the surgical site, the other is deeper in the brain in an area that controls touch and skin sensitivity. The doctors are confident that she should recover from both, but at this point hold out little hope that this is the last of them. This night has put two new moments into the horrible picture album of pain that is this path the Lord is leading us on.
Nell is in ICU at Children's. We are breathing on your prayers. Lord, have mercy on Nell. No more words.

Home for Christmas

2008-12-25T14:31:00.002-06:00

It's 2:30, and we're all home on Christmas day. Everyone is very tired, but very happy. This present was enough to unwrap today. We rest in Christ's peace. May that peace bless you this day. Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas

2008-12-24T12:44:00.003-06:00

Nell is out of ICU, eating and drinking, putting on her clothes, getting her IV's out, and getting ready to come home, maybe even tomorrow. I thought that just having her ok today was enough, but God has given us more than we could expect or deserve.
Some have been asking me, "do you HAVE to preach tonight, on Christmas Eve?" Yes, I have to preach-- if I didn't I would explode from the need to praise Christ my Lord, to share His love, and to declare His presence.
Emmanuel, You have proved Your name once again. You are God with me, with Nell-- with all of us. Come, Lord, into the heart of every person who darkens the door of any place of worship this night, and fill them with Your light, Your love, Your life, so that this Christmas may be for them what it is for us-- a celebration of joy for hope that cannot fail, life that cannot die, truth that cannot change, family that cannot dissolve. Bring them into Your presence, O Lord, and make them part of Your family not just for one holiday-- make every day they live holy, set apart for You. Thank you, Lord for giving more than I deserve or could ask. Merry Christmas to each of you out there, and for anyone reading this who is privileged to preach tonight-- bring them to Jesus.

Good News

2008-12-23T19:22:00.003-06:00

It's been a long day-- got on the road to get back to the hospital literally 5 minutes before freezing rain drove 4 trucks off 67 into the ditch and closed the road for a couple of hours. At 7, Nell was in the ready room, and we had a chance to pray together. Neither Nell nor Martha had slept much.
5 pastors came by, and the General Presbyter prayed with me as we waited the 4 1/2 hours the surgery took after 1 hour of preparation. About 1:45, Dr. Sacco came out, gave us Nell's hair that they had had to shave, and put the most amazing photograph in front of us. "It all went well," he said. "Here's what we did..." and with a picture of Nell's brain opened up, he showed us the intricate stitching and path that he had taken the artery on as he had sewed it into her brain.
After one gets over the shock and awe of looking at the picture, the reality of the artistry of this surgery overwhelmed me.
Nell was moving all her limbs, and when we got to see her about an hour later, she was talking and doing well. Her first questions were to make sure that Martha had eaten breakfast and she had slept in the waiting room. At least she ate breakfast!
So many nurses and doctors took such good care of us. Nell is sleeping in ICU, having already drunk some apple juice. She is in some pain from the head clamp she had to wear, and from her neck. But all is well. All we need to do now is make it through the next 24 hours without complications, and we are well on the way to recovery.
Praise God for your prayers, and for the wonderful way Christ has held us in the palm of His hand. Praise God for David Sacco, who has found his calling, a high calling, and exercises it with such compassion and precision. Praise God for the piece of Belgian lace that he tatted into the wonder of God's blessing to us: Nell's mind.

Long Day of Waiting

2008-12-22T19:25:00.002-06:00

We got to the hospital at 9:00am, negotiated the admissions process by 11:00am, got settled in the hospital room at noon. The I.V. got put in at 4:15pm, and when I left at 7:00pm, the first bag of saline solution was being hung.
Everything is kind of in slow motion in this Christmas week. So many little children; so many loving parents. So much service and sacrifice. Being at Children's Hospital is like being admitted to a strange kind of co-op apartment building, where the kids don't know the rules not to talk to strangers, and the parents all recognize in each other's faces that we share a bond not all parents share. Short conversations that hold much more than words bind us together. It is a special place, where a lot of the blinders that we can afford to wear in the "normal" world are too expensive and impossible to keep on. We look at the reality of how fragile our beloved is, and all of the sudden we discover that our love for them, their love for us, is power enough to keep going through the next treatment/appointment/adventure. And in short rides on an elevator, smiles in the hall, or conversations in the parents' kitchen, we find out that love is power enough to make us family with people we've never met before.
After the slow motion of today, we've been pushed to the front of the line tomorrow-- kickoff is 7:00am now, with surgery starting at 9:00. I'll communicate once we're on the other side. We are living on your prayers.

The Facts

2008-12-18T13:20:00.003-06:00

Here's what's happening next week: our daughter Nell goes in to Children's Hospital on Monday for pre-operation prep (the dreaded loss of hair on the left side of her head). At 10:30 on Tuesday, she begins a 5-hour procedure that will involve cutting a 3-inch diameter hole in her skull, shaping two smaller holes into the skull and the 3-inch diameter circle, sewing the vein that runs along the surface of the skull to the brain, and then re-attaching the 3-inch circle with the smaller holes aligned to protect the vein.
Nell will be in ICU for approximately 24 hours after the operation, and then will be in a room until she can eat, drink, and do all the other things every human being's body does in a given 24-hour period. Then she will come home, probably Friday. The major risk/side effect is stroke; so please be praying with us that we get to Christmas without Nell having a stroke.
Now that we are almost "in the chute," there are lists of things to do and get, lots of boxes to check, and enough chores to keep us busy and not thinking too much. Sometimes work is a blessing! I will be updating this blog as events unfold (probably won't be able to do that until evening/night), so stay tuned. Send on the blog to others who may want to know. The one thing we need from you is prayer; if you know of any prayer chains, feel free to pass on a prayer request for Nell.

O the Deep, Deep Love of Jesus!

2008-12-16T16:35:00.003-06:00

What a day. I am ashamed to admit it, but I started this day at work the way I do too many-- frustrated at people slow on the uptake, driving for a finish line on business and not paying very much attention to who I have to run over to get to it.
Wretched man, that I am, who will save me from this body of death? But thanks be to God... for the one who came in and delivered us from a secret need; for the prayers that I can feel pouring over us as we all get more and more nervous, and try not to show it to each other.
And so I come to the end of this day with one prayer, one awesome vision that has never left me since I was changed 30 years ago: O, the deep, deep love of Jesus! Vast in measure, boundless, free-- rolling as a mighty ocean in its fullness over me-- over Nell-- over the O'Neil family, Marlene's family-- over Oak Cliff-- Dallas-- the world.
Whether I ride the wave happily or unhappily, He carries all of us homeward. And as I ride the wave, I watch those dying on the banks, thinking that being dry is being safe, and my heart breaks for them. Wretched man that I am-- but I am a man. Take my life, and make it Yours, Lord! Fill me with Your love. You are all I need! I surrender all of me.

Getting Bigger in the Windshield

2008-12-15T12:16:00.003-06:00

We are now at D-day minus 8 to the next adventure in the great school of our lives as a family. When our daughter Nell was 4, she was diagnosed with Neurofibromatosis, a genetic disease that causes tumors to grow along the nerves of the body. The most interesting cases (may you never be interesting to research doctors) are centered in the brain, where Nell's has always been.
I call our struggle the great school because Jesus Christ has taught us all so much through the terrors and trials and frustrations and miracles of this journey. My standard summary of blessings has been that the lessons are invaluable, but the tuition is very, very high.
Suffering is the great school; there just might be a connection between the spiritual immaturity of the average American Christian and the fact that we spend more on pain relief in one year than what would be necessary to guarantee every man, woman, and child on the earth safe drinking water.
We must pick up our cross if we are to follow Jesus. I have been reflecting as Nell's surgery comes closer on December 23 on the cherished illusions we use to deflect our call to pick up the cross.
Nell should not be, by all medical studies and probabilities, who she is. Almost all NF kids have severe learning disabilities; Nell is #1 in her class. Almost all NF kids are of extremely short stature; Nell broke through 5 feet before she stopped growing. God has miraculously removed 3 threats to her short life, which no doctor could adequately explain.
I grew so confidant of triumph, that I thought we had crossed into the promised land when puberty finally passed, and what had been described as the worst that this disease could throw at us was in the rear view mirror.
This neurosurgeon has brought us back to the reality that there is still a lot to face in front of us. Every suffering that we have weathered was dismissed by a brush of the hand, a sigh, and an exclamation of "Boy, I'm glad that's over!" We now have to face the reality that that exclamation is just another illusion. There's always going to be something else.
The Lord led me to a new understanding of what Paul is talking about in 2 Corinthians 12: Therefore, to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given to me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.’
The cross stays with us, to remind us that we are weak-- that Christ is our strength. Three times I have thought that we had left this disease behind us. No matter what happens next Tuesday, Your grace is sufficient, Lord. Let your power be made perfect in our weakness.

Learning to Converse Again

2008-12-12T12:53:00.003-06:00

One of the lost arts in the last 25 years has been the art of talking, even arguing, with those with whom one disagrees in civil conversation. It is possible to love those with whom one strongly disagrees, contrary to the evidence of our current institutional life.
Civil conversation is, like all the great arts of life, learned through modeling and practice more than through formal instruction. That is why the lack of conversational modeling and practice are the accelerant to all the destructive forces in church and society.
At Oak Cliff, it is precisely this modeling continued through the generations that has enabled us to embrace a mission of racial reconciliation in Christ. Some lessons I have had reinforced here:

We have two ears, and one mouth. To be used effectively, they must be used proportionately. Listen twice as much as you speak (hard for pastors).
We must assume that everyone belongs at the table-- it is God's job to judge, and none of us deserve the invitation we have received from Christ to belong.
Our identity in Christ can only be embraced if we let go of all lesser identities--even (especially) the good and cherished ones.
We are each created, saved, and called individually-- we have to come to know each other the same way.
All forms of group judgment are ultimately lazy ways out of the hard work of loving. Hard work produces a greater reward.
The hard work of loving is impossible without the hard work of praying, studying the Word, and living in total obedience to what our study reveals to us.

Rebuilding a civil society at this stage is going to be a long haul. I probably won't live to see it, but I will spend my life to build it in the hope that Christ's Church can grow vibrant and strong again in the public square in America.

Changing the Game

2008-12-11T12:40:00.003-06:00

Now Newsweek is adding its 2-cent deficit of thinking to the gay marriage debate. SIGH. I am tired of yelling, "no, it's not!" as much as advocates must be tiring of yelling, "yes, it is!"
It seems to me that Jon Meacham's editorial is a perfect example of the only lasting gift of the Baby Boom generation-- meaningless, endless self-referential, self-righteous destruction. Winning is everything-- anything that has to be destroyed for me to win, burn it up, bomb it, tear it down. If I think you're wrong, that means I don't have to understand what you're saying, I have to stop you from being able to say it. And all this destruction is so that I can stand on the ash heap of Western civilization after I have destroyed the last "enemy" and shout out into the desert wilderness that was once a living world "yes it is!" and have that be the last word.
Enough. God save us from another Baby Boomer President; did it really matter whether he was a Democrat or a Republican? God save us from our current cultural and institutional leaders. Being right does not confer power to ignore the commandments of God; the toxic way this debate rages on drives out the faithful, and leaves only the loud, the brash, the brazen and violent. No one wants to be part of any institution that has as its core value, "I'm the leader and I'm right, so you either tell me I'm right or I will banish you." Life played out as a zero-sum game has no winners. Everyone loses.
Let's find a quiet corner to put the Baby Boomers, with enough round-nose scissors, construction paper, crayons, and glue to occupy themselves until they can run off to retirement and get on with the task of rebuilding what they have spent their working lives tearing down.
And for Boomers on both sides of these issues: we who are younger are not with you, on either side. We're tired of circular firing squads and bracing games of Russian roulette, where you always seem to be the coaches, and you expect us to be your team. Enough.
Let's get on with the business at hand. And Boomers, if you want to help out, do us a favor: sit down, find some humility, and try listening for a while.

No Way Back-- Look for a Way Forward

2008-12-10T12:25:00.002-06:00

I missed the Moderator's modcast http://www.mod.reyes-chow.com/ yesterday for a good reason. I was trying to find a way forward. I've read Beau Weston's paper, and am an avid follower of his blog, http://gruntledcenter.blogspot.com/. But the paper, and most of our conversation, hit on the major reason we can't find our way: history, especially recent (last 500 years) history, is not a guide. It is an obstacle.
Our terms of conversation are still wrapped up in a Christendom Christianity which has no traction or power in our current circumstances. Why does the church exist? In Christendom, the right response is, "how dare you!?" That doesn't work now. The idea of respect for tradition's sake has never had a great deal of credence in America-- there must be more of an explanation for the hope that is within you than that it was in your parents. The Presbyterian Church (USA) is not a Scotch/Irish Cultural Heritage Society. But we lack a vocabulary to talk about first things-- we get queasy when we have to talk about Jesus-- see my other posts below about being different.
Beau is right-- we have to create a new centripetal force inside this denomination, something (I would say Someone) who/which draws us together, holds us in the midst of serious disagreements, and creates a common language which can remind us we are not strangers or enemies, but blood relatives. That something/someone will not be an establishment that through the gravity of its Charleton Heston voice and sociological peer pressure says, "Come!" It will be a voice that calls to all who have ears to hear, "Go! And go together!"
I hope that what Shannon Kershner and I did yesterday is a start on that task in Grace Presbytery. Shannon and I do not see eye-to-eye on the major issues before us: but I respect Christ's call on Shannon's life as a preacher of the Gospel. I appreciate her willingness to serve Jesus Christ with all that she has, and I believe that that appreciation and respect are mutual. If Grace is willing to open up that communication and respect, then we can learn to talk again. If we can talk, we can come closer to understanding one another. If we understand, we can support one another's ministry with integrity. If we can support one another, we can encourage our growth individually and communally in Christ as we seek to re-evangelize a culture that believes it has been there, done that, bought the T-shirt and found Christendom Christianity to be a false religion.
"By this shall all people know that you are my disciples," Jesus said: "if you have love for one another." The path of the past is a trip to nowhere. We're on untrodden ground-- the last footprints the Church left here are almost 2,000 years old. If there's any history that can guide us, it is in that ancient apostolic age, where the only establishment was for tentmaking.

A Tale of Two Cities

2008-12-06T11:05:00.004-06:00

Dallas, Texas and Detroit, Michigan have a lot in common. Both cities are dominated by minority populations, while the Anglo majority lives in a safe series of suburbs outside the city limits. Both cities are deeply divided by race and class; both live with the anger, pain, and fear those divisions create. For both cities, the 1960's represent a tragic acceleration of those evils which still scar them both.
But for Detroit, the 60's are memories of burned down businesses, blacks and whites murdered in cold blood, whole neighborhoods bulldozed, and hate spewed back and forth across the divisions until the hate talk was the only talking done.
In Dallas, no business (that I know of, correct me if you know more) was burned. The anger, pain and fear drove white flight, but did not erupt into widespread physical violence.
In Detroit, I know a white pastor who walks and prays his neighborhood with his congregation, seeking to love in Christ his neighbors who are not like him. Their ministry of reconciliation in Christ is struggling; he has been threatened at gunpoint for knocking on the wrong door.
As I write this, teams of two are out walking our neighborhood, white and black together. No one has ever been threatened; they will pray with many neighbors today if the past is any predictor. The Lord is blessing the ministry of reconciliation in Christ here, as OCPC grows in numbers and in depth of understanding of Christ's call and commands.
I write this for this reason: the conflicts on the homosexual ordination issue inside the PC(USA) will resolve one day. If the way we fight is with guns and bombs (rhetorical and sometimes all too real), the wounds from this conflict may never heal. While it may seem to many to be betrayal, I believe that a moderated, reconciling response to this conflict is the only Christ-like response to this time in our history in the PC(USA). If we cannot heal this division, let us at least live through the conflict inflicting the least amount of damage possible.

How to Be Different in the Midst of the War

2008-12-05T13:14:00.002-06:00

I am convinced that the personal and private instruction of Christ has impact on public ministry, not the other way around. We can't play by the Lord's rules in the closet of prayer, and go out and play by the world's rules and expect either individually or collectively to grow.
But playing by Christ's rules in the public sphere is not a recipe for respect or for success; to love one's enemies is considered treason. To turn the other cheek looks like playing the patsy. To hang from the cross and forgive your crucifiers is lunacy. But isn't each of these a commandment, in word and in deed, from Jesus?
I have sitting in front of me an invitation to sign my name to Harry Hassall's ad in the Presbyterian Outlook supporting the fidelity and chastity amendment (G-6:106b to those poised beside the Book of Order). Sign me up; it's in the mail, Harry.
And Tuesday, I'm meeting with the Presbytery Life Committee in Grace Presbytery (think meeting planners) to join a pastor from the more liberal side of things in suggesting that Grace simply take no action on the amendment 08B (if I have to explain this to you, it takes too long). A "no action" vote will still count as a "no," but it will possibly enable us to not spend a whole meeting throwing the same rocks at each other.
Some will say that these two positions are contradictory; but I would say that they are both faithful uses of the power of the office to which I am called. The first is declarative; it is important to publicly stand for Biblical truth. The second is ministerial; I am not here to help the PC(USA) destroy itself. I can stand for truth without having to hate or fear those who oppose that truth, and this presbytery must find a way to cohere at this point in its life. As a servant of the church, I need to be part of that glue. If anybody is reading, fire away.

I Bless Your Name

2008-12-04T13:12:00.004-06:00

Too often we think that praise comes from good feeling. Why is it that only the winning believers praise the Lord in sports? Why does God only get praise when something good happens?
The great secret of praise is learning to bless the Lord's name in the midst of suffering and loss. This is a difficult time of year for me, now that my family of origin has disintegrated. In many ways, when Christ came into my life He began the process of making me an orphan on this earth while all who were once part of my family circle still live. I have blessed His name with the deep grief from each broken relationship, even as I pray for reconciliation.
Our middle daughter's life has hung in the balance since she was 4 from a disease for which there is no cure this side of the cross. This Christmas, she will have a new form of neurosurgery. We will spend Christmas day at Children's Hospital in Dallas, and today what is looming in the windshield is finally shaking loose the tears for her suffering, the fears for what future years may bring... and I will bless the Lord at all times, His praise shall continually be in my mouth, even as the waves of grief drift over me.
Nothing will stop me from praising the Lord's name, as long as there is breath in my body. Praise is His strength in me, His hope for me, the shelter of wings that can hold me even if the worst comes. Being different is not a choice-- it is the only hope that stands when death shakes the foundations, and the mountains of one's own life fall into the sea.
Each time that I fall on my knees before the Lord, and find the comfort and strength that the Holy Spirit provides I am reminded of how many do not know Who I know, what I know. Each time a wave crests, I am reminded of the waves of pain that flowed from wrists and feet up the cross through the heart and mind of the One Who comforts me.
The work of ministry is not a recreational side light to "real life." This is real life. This is for all the marbles-- for life itself. How can we not share Who we know? How can our lips stay silent, waiting for rocks to claim the great joy--even through tears-- of lifting our voices in praise of the God Who made us, Who loved us enough to die for us, Who comforts and sustains us even through the valley of death?
Sing praises to the Lord this day-- no matter what this day brings to you.

Being Different Part IV-- Hoarse Voice

2008-12-03T11:43:00.004-06:00

There's an old joke: "what do you get when you cross a Jehovah's Witness and a Presbyterian? Someone who will knock on any door, but if it opens, has nothing to say." Or perhaps you've heard the famous line about Walter Mondale, who was said to have a peculiarly dull charisma that was a cross between a Presbyterian parson and a tree.
We don't speak the name of Jesus; it is tacky. Certainly, we do not speak and use "Jesus" and the second person familiar pronoun in public, even in prayer. That is beyond tacky; that is vulgar to Presbyterian ears. Vulgar after all means, "of the lower classes;" so many who now claim the name of Presbyterian have spent their lives running from or seeking to avoid such a dire fate as to be identified with the many.
Our hands are so clean because our mouths are so shut; we will not witness. But the passion that the living Christ instills in human hearts makes it impossible to be silent. The passion that Christ brings to life makes it impossible to live behind the barbed-wire fences of race, class, and lifestyle.
Who knows the hope that is within you? How many times have you had an opportunity to share that hope, and have decided that "it wouldn't be prudent"? How many people have you thought you were witnessing to when you said to them, "come to church with me"? The average person out in the world is no longer interested in crossing the threshold of a sanctuary; they want to know the Gospel from YOU. What do you believe? Who is Jesus? Why did He come? Why did He die? Where can I read about what you've told me?
There is a lot of explaining that needs to be done right now-- and you are the only person that your neighbor/coworker/friend is talking to. We need to be able to meet that need-- and no number of anonymous good deeds can take the place of those spoken words. Witnessing is not an optional practice that is too "vulgar" or "tacky" for us to do. It is the baseline expectation of every believer, and if we do not wish to stand speechless before a world that has tired of our dull charisma, we have to learn to talk about Jesus till our voices grow hoarse from declaring His praises, and sharing His love.

Being Different Part III-- Calloused Hands

2008-12-02T14:02:00.005-06:00

When I served a small congregation in Western New York's grape farming country, my hands were always the giveaway to the fact that I "wasn't from around here." They were too soft, too clean; they hadn't seen years of work or any great amount of use.
Calloused hands are the sign of hard labor over long periods of time. And the PC(USA) has hands that are too soft, and too clean. We have revelled in the pride of place and position, looking to money to do our work for us-- but the work of making disciples cannot be outsourced, no matter how much money one has.
Disciples are made by example; the Word is preached by the life that stands behind the words of the preacher. Love is hard work, and Christ teaches us that hard work is good.
Paul in 2 Thessalonians 3 states a simple fact of life: those who will not work will not eat. Without the hard work of making disciples, the Church simply starves to death. But do the hard work, and the God who fed the Israelites for 40 years across the wilderness with bread from heaven will feed us with Bread of life that we may feed on here and now, and live forever.
It is only when each of us does the work to which Christ calls us that we are individually and collectively fed. The manicured hands of a priviledged denomination are no longer something to be admired. On the mission field, clean hands are the sign of idleness. It's time to get out into our neighborhoods and communities and get our hands dirty doing the Lord's work. No matter how hard it is, the Lord's work is always good.

Being Different, Part II-- On our Knees

2008-11-28T12:57:00.003-06:00

If there is one way to tell how sick the PC(USA) is, look at the exercise of the discipline of prayer. We pray because someone is going to check the minutes of the meeting much more often than we pray because we are moved to come together before Christ.
Prayer has always been foolishness to the world; it is doing nothing when one could be doing something. The fact that we whom Christ has called often view prayer similarly tells us just how close Cindy Rigby's description of the PC(USA) as "of the world, but not in it" truly is.
So let's get down to the nitty-gritty: what does it mean to be the change we seek? It means to truly become a people of prayer. Not five minutes before you get in bed prayer, or nodding to heaven while we read a list prayer, or the pretentious and affected prayers that pass for liturgy too often in the one hour a week we do what we are supposed to do our whole life long.
Prayer is a constant conversation with God; it is checking with God even the smallest details of our day. Prayer for the people of God is taking seriously the power of intercessory prayer, and becoming intercessors for the sick and those in need.
How many people in your congregation pray like that? How many have you taught to pray like that? How much of a model are you? Does your congregation have an active intercessory prayer list? If not, start one. Invite people into the ministry of prayer-- especially those who physically cannot give to Christ what they once had to give. Our best intercessor hasn't stood on her feet or spent much time out of the bed she lies in for 5 years. But she prays without ceasing. Prayer ministry can be taught in the home, through a family prayer circle every night. E-mail and the internet make prayer requests more reliably transmittable and accessible.
What is the first thing to do when confronting a problem? Form a committee? Organize our support/opposition? Where is that in the New Testament? First and last, it is always God. First and last, it is always Christ. First and last, it is always the Holy Spirit that will guide. Pastors who do not know the tears and sighs too deep for words in the private closet of prayer cannot lead because they cannot accurately follow Jesus Christ; where you are privately in your closet with Christ is where you will be publicly.
What would a praying congregation look like? I have a good view of one at OCPC. But what would a praying presbytery look like? I long for the day when we in the pastor's union in the PC(USA) really pray for one another. Both of you who follow this blog, I hope you know that I am always praying for you. I need your prayers, too.
Start being different-- learn to pray without ceasing.

Being Different in the PC(USA)

2008-11-27T14:56:00.005-06:00

As a Confessing Church pastor (for those who don't know PCUSA politics, that's code for "evangelical"), I have watched and participated in the debates through the last 20 years that will determine the shape of the part of the Body of Christ that I was born into when Christ came into my life as a 14-year-old in Washington, D.C.

I am watching and listening now as the next installment of this crusade plays across the presbyteries, and I have come to a conclusion. Not only is this no way to be the Church, this is no way to stand for Christ against those who no longer seem (to me) to be brothers and sisters in the same family.

The coldness of progressive "Christianity" has always been a problem for me. All head, little heart, lots of pride masked by good deeds and good intentions. It would all be hard to take, if the same could not be said for the conservative "Christianity" that takes the opposing viewpoints and plays by the same rules.

It seems to me that both are trying to find some way back-- back to the time when the Mainline was the mainline and not a silly sideline in this culture. Progressives believe that if they just leap ahead of the culture, they will be seen as its leaders again. Conservatives believe that if they just hold on rigidly to what was handed on to them, that "being right" will translate into cultural leadership when everyone comes to their senses.

Both are wrong. There is no way back to that time-- thank God. The Church was captive in a culture that bowed to the cross, but did not follow Jesus, even if everyone was in their places with bright shining faces.

A new Church will arise out of the ashes of Christendom-- and it won't be the nightmarish vision of either of the camps that is fighting over Christendom's rotting corpse. The new Church already hears Christ's call to let the dead bury their own dead, as for you, go and proclaim the Kingdom of God (Luke 9:60).

The Church's addiction to power must now be broken, because power is out of the Church's reach. We are going through delirium tremens Left and Right these days-- but when the Church finally sobers up, puts away numbers and the luxuries they generate, and gets back to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, a new Church will arise.
The call now is to be the change we seek to see-- to become a pilgrim Church whose knees are worn by falling on them in prayer and worship, whose hands are calloused by Christ's using them to do His work in the world, whose voice is hoarse from shouting into the din of this culture real Good News.

My Mission Statement

2008-11-21T13:04:00.001-06:00

You go to pastors, and hear them talk about all the programs and all the numbers
and the money and all the buildings. But you almost never hear them talk
about how the lives of their people were so demonstrably different that people
had to pay attention to the cause of Christ and take it seriously. George Barna

Until the day I die, my purpose is to be so demonstrably different that people pay attention to the cause of Christ and take Him seriously.
That means:
1. My prayer life must be always first—I must seek out Jesus in my life, my relationships, and my work. Seek FIRST the Kingdom.
2. My submission and obedience to the Lord must grow—I must trust the Word and the Holy Spirit more deeply each day so that I decrease, and He increases in me.
3. I must accept suffering, loss, humiliation as the simple cost of taking the journey. There is no resurrection without crucifixion—there is no crucifixion without pain.
4. I must fight with endurance against all the forces within me, within my culture, from my past that would pull me away from my call—I must put the world behind me if I am to keep the cross before me.
5. I must engage the world and the worldly as Jesus did—in simple authentic truth. I must accept their rejection or acceptance with my eyes firmly on Jesus, never on me.
6. I must lead others to pursue this same course with passionate conviction, so that the presence of Jesus Christ can once again be felt within this culture.

Confession is Action

2008-11-20T12:27:00.002-06:00

When I was young and new at ministry, I thought that faithful service to Jesus Christ began with building complex institutions, proposing overtures, moving congregations between presbyteries, making well-greased machinery run flawlessly, and culminated in preaching to thousands with a television "ministry" and a couple of honorary doctorates on the wall. That would mean my life had made a difference.
What is success in ministry? The longer I live, the less sure I am that anything listed in the paragraph above causes the heart of Christ to leap for joy. All those wonderful things offer comfort to me by banishing my fears of my own insignificance and unworthiness. But the world is filled with such preachers and teachers-- Dallas is practically drowning in them. Has it changed Dallas appreciably? I would be hard-pressed to be able to say how it has, other than the fact that everybody knows those preachers' names and faces.
I find it fascinating that we don't know what Jesus actually looked like. No one ever thought of getting him to sit down, like George Washington or Abraham Lincoln did, and having a life-cast bust made, or finding a great painter to paint his picture. Surely the disciples could have found the money to pay for that. We know Caesar; we know Constantine.
But Jesus could walk up to me today, and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't know it was him. He left no army, no great crowd of disciples. The crowds were a flash in the pan-- the only people he left behind were the 12, and one of them betrayed him while the rest forsook him and fled. So why was Jesus's ministry successful in God's eyes? I'm drawn to the simple definition of work that Jesus gives in John:
Then they said to him, "What must we do to perform the works of God?"Jesus answered them, "This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent." John 6:28-29
Confession is my primary action. I am called to believe-- which means to obey down to the last detail of my own life what the Lord tells me through the Word. That call to obedience constantly humiliates me with the reality that I cannot do even that one task, and constantly calls me to confess my need for forgiveness and mercy.
My life is lived in continuous prayer, continuous need, continuous communion. Whatever flows out of that life-giving relationship is what gives God joy.
I probably will never be a doctor of anything. I won't be on TV (I really hate the lights anyway). OCPC will probably never be a megachurch (can't tell God what to do, but with my worldly eyes, I think I'm probably right). No one on earth may have any idea who I am (but I guess I have enough vanity to be writing this-- there is work yet to be done). But my life will make the difference that Christ wants it to make if I place my life in his hands. If I can come to the end of this day and say, "Lord, whatever this day was, I lived it believing in you with all my heart, mind, and strength," that is success. That life, lived that way day by day, makes a difference.

One Jesus

2008-11-18T16:40:00.002-06:00

The beginning of the disintegration process in progressive theology can be traced to one key assumption: that there is a difference between “the historical Jesus” and “the Jesus of faith” presented in the New Testament. Once Jesus has been dis-integrated, torn from our understanding of the Scriptures which cannot be trusted to show us who Jesus is, then Jesus becomes very quickly, “my Jesus.”
The troubling events of the General Assembly this year rely in no small measure on this disintegrated understanding. When anyone would bring up the Scriptural support that flew in the face of cultural imperatives, they would be told that “my Jesus would never say/do such a thing,” even if the Scriptures say He did. The real Jesus is the Jesus of my experience—in essence, a figure of my imagination: my Jesus.
The Church, too, has been part of this disintegrating impulse. As soon as the Word was made flesh, controversies innumerable sprang up. Theologians came to call this series of problems the scandal of particularity: to become human, Christ had to enter a specific culture as a specific person. He was a Jew, not a Gentile; he was a man, not a woman. And each particular part of humanity, divided from the others, wishes to claim Jesus Christ as its own: our Jesus.
But there is just one Jesus Christ. We believe that the Scriptures testify to who He is from beginning to end, and that that testimony can be trusted. No culture can contain Him, even though He lived on this earth as a Jewish man. Jesus Christ IS risen—that means He lives. And He lives for one purpose, best put in his prayer in John 17:11—“Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.”
There is no chauvinist Jesus, no feminist Jesus, no black Jesus, no white Jesus, no “my Jesus.” There is only the Lord and Savior of the world, Jesus Christ, to Whom the Scriptures testify. Born into one culture, His command transcends all cultures; for He came to earth to reunite and revivify what was divided and dead from our fall into sin. There is only one Jesus Christ known in one Book, testified to by many witnesses. Thanks be to God that He claims us.

The Reality of Redemption

2008-11-18T13:49:00.002-06:00

No one who believes in the innate goodness of people lasts very long in ministry. The reason for this is not that ministry is hard (even though it is). No one can be at the work of redemption long who does not come face to face with the reality that for human beings it is impossible.
I have been working for almost six years now trying to cross boundaries amongst those who claim Jesus Christ as Lord, who say we worship the same Savior, yet have different colors of skin and different cultures. If I was doing this because I thought it was a good idea, I would have quit a long time ago.
Doors slam more than they open; time is wasted on dead ends and frustrated hopes. But every now and then, a door opens and small expenditures of time and love and energy come back 30 fold, 60-fold, 100-fold. Every time I come to the end of my rope, I find Jesus Christ there waiting for me.
My mentor and teacher Oswald Chambers spent a great deal of time teaching on this one central truth-- the reality of Christ's redemption, the reality of our redemption, the reality of this world's redemption. To trust in one is to trust in the others; to trust in one, our living must prove that we know that all three redemptions have already been accomplished.
I do not know whether I will ever see the congregations of Oak Cliff come together in witness and ministry. I don't know whether I will ever see the blood of Christ cleanse Dallas and this nation from its original sin of slavery. That is not what is asked of me.
"I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?"

The Current State of the PC(USA)

2008-11-14T10:49:00.004-06:00

A tree stands by the strength of its core; trees can be alive, full of leaves and seemingly healthy when in fact they are structurally fragile and prone to collapse. The tree's core is its heartwood-- the hardest structure of the wood within it. Its growth is in the sapwood underneath the bark, but a growing tree that cannot support its weight or stand against the winds that blow around it will not be tall for long.
The PC(USA) is growing, on the fringes, but is there enough heartwood left so that it will continue to stand as it has for 200 years? I think we have all heard the loud cracks this year as the winds of this culture continue to batter us. The tree is falling because its heartwood is gone. But that does not mean it is dead, or that all who are part of its growing edge are lost.
I am not a Panglossian optimist. I see different congregations growing, but I also know that this tree is going to fall. Too many of my evangelical brothers and sisters insist that that means that all is lost-- it is not. As Isaiah sees (Isaiah 10:33-35)
This very day he will halt at Nob, he will shake his fist at the mount of daughter Zion, the hill of Jerusalem. Look, the Sovereign, the LORD of hosts, will lop the boughs with terrifying power; the tallest trees will be cut down, and the lofty will be brought low. He will hack down the thickets of the forest with an ax, and Lebanon with its majestic trees will fall.
But that same God has a purpose in His destruction, for in the next breath Isaiah says that
A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. The spirit of the LORD shall rest on him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD.
The tree may fall, but the shoot will live. God is not done with us yet.

Bottom Up, Inside Out

2008-11-13T12:02:00.002-06:00

How does the PC(USA) reform itself? How will it be reborn? I have friends I talk to and facebook groups I participate in who believe that the way to reform and rebirth this denomination is to rewrite the Book of Order, to create better advertizing, to restructure the bureaucracy. I know pastors who move from theological fad to theological fad looking for the silver bullet that will bring back 1950, when everybody streamed into congregations and the company of pastors was a respected calling by everyone in this society.
That day is gone, and it's not coming back.
I think that the PC(USA) will be reformed and reborn the same way we individually are; we are changed from the inside out. Church growth folks talk about people acting their way into believing, but the New Testament demonstrates that Christ changes individuals, who then begin to act differently in the world. Jesus Christ alone changes hearts and lives; that change then is worked out into the life we live in the world.
If you want to see signs of what Jesus Christ is up to in the PC(USA), don't look to Louisville, or the NFOG task group, or any of the alphabet soup of groups that each presbytery churns out of its committees. Jesus Christ is changing the Church from the bottom up, from the inside out.
Here's the change I see from my place on the fringes: I see a congregation that was afraid of its neighborhood, afraid to pray out loud, afraid of speaking the words "Jesus Christ" in a normal conversation now going door-to-door in that same neighborhood asking neighbors "what can we pray for you?" and when they receive an answer, praying with them. I see old and young, new members and longtime members praying with the kids who now come in from around the neighborhood on Wednesdays, and sharing their faith in Jesus Christ. I see hopeless addicts who now stand with Christ, pray and study the Scriptures, who are leading others in that same hopelessness to the Source of all hope. I see a congregation in Oak Cliff that knows exactly what to do when someone comes up and says, "sir, we would see Jesus."
Race doesn't matter. Origin doesn't matter. Generation doesn't matter. Even congregation doesn't matter, as the Great Banquet Ministry becomes a bottom-up and inside-out model for ecumenical Christian witness and action.
We're not unique; we're just not in the limelight. We are speaking; we just don't have control of the microphone. Jesus Christ is reforming and rebirthing the PC(USA) from the bottom up, from the fringes in, from the inside out.

Beyond Identity

2008-11-12T14:22:00.004-06:00

It seems that one of the most human of activities is dividing up into discrete groups. We do this on the playground, in the classroom, in neighborhoods. Oak Cliff and other "red-lined" areas of America's cities are the evidence of how profound this practice is. Whole generations are blighted by the separation that the baby boom generation has moved from just being about race and class to now include "lifestyle" segregation.
We justify this by celebrating our identities, celebrating our music, our culture, our behaviors and daring anybody to say anything against our demonstrations. And when they do, we cry out that we are being attacked, thus stimulating more fear on the part of those who understand us, and thus a blinder loyalty to the tribe. Fear rules us, no matter which side of which battle we fight on.
This cycle is not new to the post-Christendom world; it is not unique to the West. This is the same world that Christ entered-- only Christ tranformed it by his death and resurrection. Where is the Church-- not congregations, but the Church-- in a world so polarized by those who derive joy and purpose from the crusade?
Is not serving Jesus Christ losing one identity, and being born into another that is greater than race, greater than class, greater than sexual identity? "From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we know him no longer in that way. So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!" 2 Corinthians 5:17-18
One of the reasons the Church of Jesus Christ grew in its first centuries was because it was known as "the third race," not Jew, not Gentile, but each and every race who no longer prided themselves on their separateness, because they were all in Christ.
Where is that Church today? Why can't we be that Church?

The Hope Within Us

2008-11-11T15:00:00.003-06:00

As Toby Brown hangs up his blogging suit, I guess it's time to try one on for size. There is too much hot air out there right now in the PC(USA), and not enough light. I hope that this blog will be salt and light to all who trust in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, and who seek to serve Him in Dallas and beyond.
The Trinity River is the "great divide" in Dallas between rich and poor, brown skin and white skin, the comfortable past of a homogenous culture, and the thrilling adventure of the hodgepodge of cultures which is (and will soon be in all of this country) our current context. South of the Trinity is seen as a dangerous place by those who live north of it. For those of us who love the adventure that living here brings, we offer no apologies.
We are the future of America-- where there is no cultural majority, where we must learn to love one another or we will die, where the politics of division is a poison to be counteracted rather than a means to a chosen end.
We at OCPC are also a minority; we are a growing congregation inside the PC(USA). Christ is on the move here, and we will not apologize for what He is doing. As a congregation that has been desegregated (50% Anglo, 50% African-American) for 30 years, we are becoming a congregation integrated in Christ as brothers and sisters, reaching out to our Hispanic new neighbors, and watching the Lord provide the growth.
Welcome to the right side of the Trinity. God is not done with Oak Cliff, or the PC(USA) yet. Let's see where the Lord of the Church and His sword, the Word of God, shall point and lead.

One Gospel

2008-11-11T14:41:00.000-06:00

After 9-10 centuries of making the Christian faith complex, intellectually arrogant, and difficult to understand, God seems to be simplifying things once again. Just like the simplification going on in the business world right now, God’s simplification procedure is neither fun nor bloodless; there is a high cost to it. But God’s purposes accomplished by these harrowing crises are the hope of the world.
So what is God up to right now? I wish I knew. But I can see small glimpses of something new being born; through the rest of the year, I will take this space to share what little I can see.
The first thing I see is that the Lord is pushing us to see the Gospel, not our gospel. In Christendom, the Church sold its soul to become a cultural mascot of the various tribes who were willing to force on all their members a superficial obedience to the Lord’s commandments. The Church became “branded” by tribe, by theological nuance, and then within the competitive environment of American capitalism, became branded by race, class, socio-economic level. All these divisions brought arguments and persecutions based around the false premise that our version was “the real Gospel,” while theirs was a “false Gospel.”
As Paul tried to make clear to the Galations, this thinking is false and destructive. There is only one Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ—and everybody has gotten it a little bit wrong. The one Gospel is a radical, unfair and incomprehensible forgiveness on God’s part of anyone who will accept it. This forgiveness is not cheap; it is bought by God with the blood of His only son. There are no preconditions to accepting this forgiveness, this new life—but the transaction is as radical as the gift itself: life for a life. To accept the gift, I must surrender the one thing I truly possess (for a while): my life.
There is no Black Gospel; there is no White Gospel; there is no Presbyterian Gospel, Baptist Gospel, or Methodist Gospel. There is one Message, shared and seen from different angles by different people. But if the Church is to emerge with its Spirit-led missionary voice in this culture, we must all come to see we preach one Gospel.