Hope for the Future?

We've been reading the New Testament together as a church this year. My sermons have come from our readings, and starting in a couple of weeks, our small group lesson will also follow our daily Bible reading schedule. The readings are posted on our website, complete with a link to the reading itself on biblegateway.com. I didn't realize until yesterday that you can click on the speaker icon in the top left corner and LISTEN to the text read (by a talent reader with a British accent, because people with British accents just sound smarter). So it it helps to listen to the text read to you, then there you go. As a bonus, if you select the gender-neutral TNIV (Today's New International Version), you get a bonus-- the reader is female... though she doesn't have a cool British accent.

Mike Cope had a version of this video on his blog earlier this week. I found this one with people that I like better. If you are into hope for the future (rather than the belief that we're heading to hell in a hand-basket), you might find this video encouraging. If you aren't into hope, then you aren't into encouraging anyway, so just skip the whole thing.

The Way of the Cross

The church has always had problems. We may talk about "restoring the church of the first century," but we really don’t want to do that. At least, we don't want to restore any of the churches of the first century that we know about! The reason we know about specific first century churches is because they had severe enough problems that a letter had to be written to them to address their problems. Who in their right mind would want to restore the Corinthian church (we begin 1 Corinthians today in our daily Bible reading).

As Paul begins, he suggests that many of the problems at Corinth are caused because the Christians there are trying to look at things like the world sees them. They saw things from the perspective of philosophers seeking logic and wisdom and Jews who were seeking miraculous signs. Now Paul will do both of these-- logic and miracles. But listen to what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 1:18-23 (from the NLT)

18 The message of the cross is foolish to those who are headed for destruction! But we who are being saved know it is the very power of God. 19 As the Scriptures say,“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and discard the intelligence of the intelligent.” 20 So where does this leave the philosophers, the scholars, and the world’s brilliant debaters? God has made the wisdom of this world look foolish. 21 Since God in his wisdom saw to it that the world would never know him through human wisdom, he has used our foolish preaching to save those who believe. 22 It is foolish to the Jews, who ask for signs from heaven. And it is foolish to the Greeks, who seek human wisdom. 23 So when we preach that Christ was crucified, the Jews are offended and the Gentiles say it’s all nonsense.

The church was looking for philosophy (wisdom) and religious experience (signs). Several years ago, I heard Jack Reese suggest that the church still tends to seek God through wisdom and signs. What follows is my take on these two ways (so don’t blame Dr. Reese here).

• The Way of Wisdom: We are a people of the book who “speak where the Bible speaks.” The problem is that we not always “silent where the Bible is silent.” We developed a system of received interpretations and entrenched traditions based on inferences that were not necessarily necessary and examples that were not apostolically approved. Every detail of how to do church from how to do our music to how to use our church buildings were deduced and systematized and made tests of fellowship. We defended our system was if it were holy writ itself. That is the way of wisdom.
  
  
• The Way of Signs: May rightly came to reject this head-only religion that argues over every issues as if it were the issue. They seek a more relational of God, and that has to be a good thing. But what is not good is when a willingness to leave behind the controls scripture in order to chase a religious experience. The “if-it-feels-good-do-it” approach fails theologically as well as it fails ethically. The genuineness or our worship and church experience is not tied to how it makes us feel. That is the way of signs.

Paul rejects both the way of wisdom and the way of signs for a third way— the way of the cross. In fact, it is the cross that is both God’s wisdom and sign, “Christ the power [signs] of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Cor 1:24). When Jesus’ enemies asked him for a sign, Jesus said, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days” (John 2:18). Their sign would be the cross and the resurrection. The message of the cross was both foolishness and a stumbling block to the world, but it a foolishness that saves those who believe (1 Cor 1:20). You don’t hear much about the cross stressed by the prosperity preachers on religious TV or touted by political pundits (on both sides) who cherry-pick scripture for proof texts. But Paul said that the message of the cross was all he wanted to talk about (1 Cor 2:1-2)

When I came to you, brothers, I did not come with eloquence or superior wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

The way of wisdom and signs caused the divisions in Corinth where they argued about their preachers and their rights (wisdom). They argued about who had the best spiritual gifts (signs). The message of the gospel is that God's ultimate wisdom and sign in Jesus Christ and His cross.

That message didn't impress the wise men and the scholars of Paul's day; it won’t impress them today. But that message is the essence of the gospel and the center of who we are to be.

Unity, Restoration and Romans 14

KFC used to say that they were the best because they did just one thing. If you concentrate on just one thing, then you can do that better than anyone else. So their slogan was, “We do chicken right.” But from the very beginning of our movement, we’ve tried to do TWO things.

• Unity: The Restoration Movement began as a unity movement. The desire was to unite Christians of all denominations in one body that could work and worship together. Denominational divisions made that unity difficult, we needed to leave behind those loyalties and see unity as “our polar star.” (Barton W. Stone)
  
  
• Restoration: We saw the restoration of simple, congregational, non-denominational Christianity as the key to unity. If creeds and confessions separated believers, we would set them aside. We would go “Back to the Bible” and just be “Christians Only” who would “Speak where Bible speaks and be silent here it is silent.” The slogans were easy, but focusing on truth while maintaining unity wasn't so much!

It wasn't long before we found those issues as being in competition with one another. The more we found a certain view to be TRUTH, and harder it was to maintain any real UNITY with people who disagreed. So we eventually gave up the quest for the unity of all Christians and focused being right on the forms and formats of the faith. And our tribes divided and multiplied and got smaller.

In our reading today in Romans 14, Paul deals with how to deal with disagreements about how to do faith while maintaining unity. If there is a lesson that the church needs to learn today, it is this lesson of unity despite differences. The issues discussed in the church at Rome seem minor to us-- eating meats and observing special days. But these issues went to the very heart of the differences between Jewish and Roman Christians in a world divided. If we can’t find some more modern issues that fit Paul’s template here, then we just aren’t trying hard enough. Paul says four basic things about dealing with basic differences in the church--

• First, accept others without looking down on them (14:3). We don’t have to agree on all the issues—in fact, we can’t agree. Would Jewish and Roman Christians ever see all food issues exactly alike? Will high-church Presbyterians and happy-clappy Pentecostals ever view worship the same? We will never agree. Ever! But we must respect one another’s faith! Always! We will never really “accept one another” until we can learn to “respect one another.”
  
  
• Second, refuse to judge the motives of those who disagree with you (14:6). Even if we disagree on issues, we can share motivation to glorify God. We can fuss and feud about our preferred styles of church music… or we can thank God for our a mutual desire to praise Him! We must get much better job at looking past our issues to our motives. What we tend to do is impugn the motives of those who disagree with us. It’s too easy to dismiss someone with, “You would think that, you Bible-hating liberal!” Paul here assumes that our differences arise from a mutual love of God! We’ll get better at this church thing when we are grateful for the faith of people with whom we disagree on the details.
  
  
• Third, give up trying to CONTROL others (Rom 14:22). Why does Paul tell Timothy to stay away from “foolish and stupid arguments?” (2 Tim 2:23). It wasn’t that Timothy didn't enjoy a good tussle ever now-and-again; it was because he enjoyed it too much! That the "evil desires of youth" Paul warns against in 2:22! To constantly argue over issues only serves to drive wedges between us. There is a time to patiently study difficult issues and share our findings with others. We need to be better at that! There’s also time to treasure our beliefs and our liberty and keep them both to ourselves! Paul defends our right to private beliefs, but he wants them to stay that way!
  
  
• Fourth, we love each other MORE than we love getting our way! (14:15). The point of church is to help us get to heaven—not to make it harder! Paul says that his freedom to eat meat means that he is also free NOT to eat meat. Does that mean that UNITY more important than TRUTH? Well, maybe not… but it’s more important than me getting my way on what I see to be the truth on an issue that may or may not be all that important in the grand scheme of things. And frankly, those are the issues that have divided our churches.

Here’s the irony— this text is most often used as ammunition during the very church disputes Paul is trying to mitigate. Paul is pleading the church for unity despite there differences in perspective and background, and we tend to use it in an attempt to make the other side give in! One side may say, “Paul says that I’m not judged by your conscience and I have liberty in Christ, so you have to be quiet!” The other side replied, “Paul says that you can’t do anything that causes me to stumble, so you have to quit!”

It’s kinda funny when you look at it that way, isn't it? No, it’s not funny at all!

The Kingdoms of God and Men

David Lipscomb was prominent voice in our movement during and after the Civil War. He was a Southerner who stridently opposed the war and discouraged all Christians from entering it. In fact, Lipscomb oppose all Christian participation in government at all—no serving in the military, no being a police officer, no running for public office or voting for those who ran. Lipscomb saw all human government as a sing of rebellion against God’s rule (1 Samuel 8) and an abuse of power that contradicted Jesus call to love and serve (Matt 20:24). Lipscomb had what Richard Hughes calls an “apocalyptic worldview” totally focused on the kingdom of God. That kingdom was advancing, and it was opposed by the kingdom of men. Lipscomb denied we can be citizens of two kingdoms, so we must choose whether we are going to live a citizens of the kingdom of God or the kingdoms of men.

James Abram Garfield was a preacher who contemporary with Lipscomb. When the Civil War broke out, he enlisted and was made a colonel in Union army. He recruited 250 students from Hiram College, a preacher training school in Kentucky. Garfield won several battles and fought at the Battle of Shiloh. Like many army heroes, Garfield went into politics after the war, being elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. Garfield was then elected 20th president of United States, still the only president elected while in House. So Garfield’s view of the Christian and government was just a bit different from Lipscomb; he saw politics and government service as an extension of faith and a blessing from God Himself.

So who was right—Garfield or Lipscomb. What is the Christian's relationship to the government? Should we avoid all contact like Lipscomb or grow up to be president like Garfield? Jesus said, “Give to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s…” But just what belongs to Caesar? Can I vote and be a faithful Christian? Must I vote to be a faithful Christian? Must I vote a certain way to be a faithful Christian? That depends on whether you ask Lipscomb or Garfield! If you ask Paul in today’s reading in Romans 13, you will get a pretty generic answer.

Paul’s words in this chapter on our relationship to the government can be summed up in three words—OBEY and PAY. We are to submit to the government as if we were submitted to God, obeying the law and refusing to be lawbreakers. That specifically means that we are to pay our taxes to the government, even if our tax money is used in ways with which we personally disagree. The king Paul mentions is Nero who was neither a nice guy nor careful spender of tax revenue; some of Paul’s tax money went to support the gladiator games in the coliseum; if Paul wanted to start a tax payer revolt, he missed a great chance here! Obey and pray. In writing to Timothy in the church in Ephesus, he adds one more Christian responsibility to the government-- PRAY (1 Tim 2:1-2).

The Bible’s focus is always on the kingdom of God, not on the kingdoms of men. There really is a fundamental difference in those kingdoms (Matt 20:25-28). The Kingdom of men is based on rule by power and force; the kingdom of God is about service and a cross. Lipscomb was right in that there is and always will be a fundamental tension between these two kingdoms. Garfield was right in that God can use His people for good in BOTH kingdoms. Both were wrong in seeing their views as being the essentially Christian view on the government.

No One Wins Until Everyone Wins

I remember reading somewhere of a missionary who (for some reason) tried to teach the game of croquet to the native people with whom he was working. They just couldn't get it. He laid out the wickets, explained the rules and showed them the basic skills. What they couldn't get is what happened when they hit an opponent’s croquet ball. He showed them how to place their foot on their ball and then “send” the opponent’s ball off the field. (That is the best part of croquet, sin't it?) The natives were completely confused, “Why would we want to do that?” Competition of this kind was unknown in their hunter-gatherer culture that depended on cooperation. Croquet for them became a cooperative effort; the game wasn’t over until everyone made it through all the wickets. No one won until everyone won.

That is a good description of church, “No one wins until everyone wins.” Sometimes we turn church into a contest of wills where there is a winner and a loser. The issue can be anything from worship styles to what color we paint the auditorium. We use influence and church politics to get our way so that our side wins. But church was founded by God’s love and on Christ’s cross. The way the church is supposed to operate is by love and sacrifice. When it becomes a competition where someone wins and someone loses, then it stops being the church. No one wins until everyone wins. Paul says this in our reading for today in Romans 12:14-18

14 Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. 15 Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. 16 Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited. 17 Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody. 18 If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.

Sure this is really lousy advice if you want to win a competition. But this is a critical command if you want to live as the church of God. No one wins until everyone wins.

On Justifying Ourselves

In his book The Seven Deadly Virtues, Gerald Mann tells the story of a preacher in the south who courageously took a stand on the subject of racism at a time when that was not generally done among white, southern preachers... at least those who remained employed. Following the sermon, he was cornered by one of his members and taken to task for the lesson. The man demanded, “Well, if I ain't better than a (N-word) then who am I better than?”

“Then who am I better than?” That is likely a question that we have asked in some form at some time or another. You see, religion is often based upon the doctrine of “justification.” I’m not talking here about the great Biblical doctrine of justification by faith but the decidedly unbiblical desire justify ourselves. We know we are sinners, and that makes us uncomfortable. So we want to find ways to justify ourselves, and often the easiest way to feel justified is to point to our good points in comparison to the bad points of someone else. We have the right worship, the right doctrine, the right date on our cornerstone… the right rites. And that makes us right… right?

Wrong! That may make us FEEL right. Generally, when we say someone is just trying to “justify themselves,” what we mean is that they are making excuses for their bad behavior so they won’t look or feel so bad. I forgot my anniversary because I was so busy at work. I lost my temper because I didn't get enough sleep. I didn't gossip, I was sharing a prayer concern. All of that may "justify myself" in the sense that it makes me feel better. But I'm not justified.

Sometimes our religion is too much about justifying ourselves. Maybe that why a guy I know who hadn't been to church in years argued so strongly (obnoxiously) with a co-worker over the doctrine of baptism. It made him feel justified. Maybe that's why a guy I heard about put some extra bucks in the collection on Sunday ever time he had a rather rowdy Saturday night. It made him feel better. Maybe that's why some of us point so strongly to our right worship/doctrine/church and point our how others are doing it so wrong. Hey, if I ain’t better than a Baptist/Pentecostal/Catholic, then who am I better than?

But we can’t justify ourselves. No amount of good works can make up for the rebellion against God that the Bible calls sin. No matter how hard I try to do good, be good or worship good, I’m just not going to be able to justify myself. Paul says at the end of our reading today, “Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin.” (Rom 3:20). No amount of doing good, following the rules, and doing the right rites rightly will ever justify us. Only Jesus can do that.

21 But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. 22 This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 25 God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— 26 he did it to demonstrate his justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus. (Romans 3:21-26)

Maybe we need to stop trying to justify ourselves and live as those who justified by faith.

One View From the Pew

Denbigh has for many years now partnered with Denbigh United Christian Outreach (DUCO). This association of churches in the Denbigh area serves as something of a clearinghouse for benevolent work done in the Denbigh and surrounding areas. Maria Cory serves as director of this fine work, and she occasionally visits DUCO’s member churches’ worship services. Maria was here with us Sunday, and she sent the following email to me on Monday morning. This was so encouraging to me that I thought I would share it on my blog. It is always helpful to see yourself through the eyes of other people. It is helpful to hear people who have complaints and criticisms— like the guy who told me once, “I’m from out of town, but I would never come to church here; you’re a lousy preacher.” (Those were his exact words; believe me, I remember!) But it sometimes also helps to hear people who appreciate what you are doing and who are pointed to God by it. Maria is obviously not from our religious tribe, but she is a committed follower of Jesus. Her words warmed my heart; I hope they warm yours--

Where do I begin? My heart is simply exploding with incredible emotion and inspiration after having worshipped with the Denbigh Church of Christ family this morning! While I am not searching for a new church home, it is a pleasure to visit and grow in relationship with our long-time DUCO Covenant Partner.

Today’s experience has been an enormous blessing with so many anointed branches interlacing in one beautiful vine! Glorious music reverberates throughout God’s home at 205 Denbigh Boulevard—and, surprisingly to some, all without instrumental accompaniment. Having had the wonderful opportunity to share in and appreciate a multitude of worship settings and styles, I can honestly say that DCOC’s music ministry is among the most magnificent I have ever heard. What a splendid blend of traditional and contemporary hymns. If I have ever contemplated how the heavenly hosts would sound, it would be the angelic voices that excited my soul today. It truly was “music to my ears.”

Pastorally, the DCOC community is so very fortunate to have the shepherding of Tuck and
Roger (two gentlemen whose voices I still confuse when they answer the phone). The
Christ-passion, energy, skill, wit and humor from the pulpit and through the music leadership are divinely God-given gifts and talents. In our humanness, it is no small feat for pastors to keep one’s congregation alert, attentive and inspired throughout the service and the message. As would be said, “Well done my good and faithful servant.” My eyes did not once blink in fatigue; my mind did not once wander off our purpose this morning. I was so enthralled in the God-moment that I didn’t even notice (until Tuck pointed out) that there were no windows through which light would normally shine in a sanctuary. It did not matter; stained glass was not needed; the Light was clearly present.

In addition to praising the All in All, this morning included reflections of thankfulness for being among brothers and sisters in the faith. It always warms my heart to see Jacob
Peterson, your faithful volunteer who regularly visits DUCO with your gifts to equip our pantry. He is undoubtedly one of the most positive, upbeat people who has graced my life. And Roger…he has faithfully dedicated his time, for so many years, counseling people one-on-one when they come to DUCO for emergency assistance. In addition to his wise counsel, if the ministry’s challenges cause our spirits to lag, rest assured, comedic Roger will reenergize us (at the expense of ribbing Maria). ;-) We, of course, are also grateful for neighbor Lynne Bean who continues to serve as your committed DUCO Liaison.

There were so many other positive points—from the invitational and encouraging prayers lifted up by various members to a great instructional piece in the bulletin guiding guests regarding what to expect during worship.

The Denbigh Church of Christ family is a treasure to the Denbigh community and beyond.
Thank you for our sharing this morning and for your unwavering support of our ministry together through Denbigh United Christian Outreach!