Can You Really Become Unoffendable?

The following book review of Brant Hansen’s book Unoffendable was written for The Gospel Coalition. You can read the complete review on their website here.

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Brant Hansen. Unoffendable: How Just One Change Can Make All of Life Better. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2015. 214 pp. $15.99.

WARNING: You might not want to read Brant Hansen’s Unoffendable: How Just One Change Can Make All of Life Better because, as you read it, you’ll have more opportunities to practice being unoffended. 

Buy on Amazon

At least that’s what happened to me several times. As a teaching pastor in a local church, there always seems to be a cluster of people who run a low-grade fever of disappointment with me. Recently, the fever spiked. And despite my “warning” above, I was thankful to have Unoffendable coach me along the way.

At least that’s what happened to me several times. As a teaching pastor in a local church, there always seems to be a cluster of people who run a low-grade fever of disappointment with me. Recently, the fever spiked. And despite my “warning” above, I was thankful to have Unoffendable coach me along the way.

But this isn’t just my life, is it? Likely you’ve also found ways to offend others. It’s not hard to do; it’s natural for us as sinners. Moreover, our world—sometimes even Christian subculture—trains us not to have a chip on our shoulder but a lumberyard. We see this when the predictable cultural “buttons” are pushed concerning issues like abortion and marriage, and now bathrooms, but also in less expected ways. Consider John Piper’s article last winter on guns and self-defense. The volley of response articles revealed his article didn’t simply touch a nerve; it grabbed one with tweezers and yanked.

And surely this presidential election year, as it has already, will continue to multiply opportunities for offense. How shall we respond to these provocations? I loved how Russell Moore responded to Donald Trump when Trump tweeted that Moore is “A nasty guy with no heart.” Moore replied:

[This is] one of the few things I agree with Donald Trump on. I am a nasty guy with no heart. We sing worse things about ourselves in our hymns on Sunday mornings: we’re a wretch and in need of God’s grace.

But where does this ability to be unoffendable come from? Is it as simple as making a choice to not be offended? And backing up a bit, should we really seek to be unoffendable? Isn’t there a place for legitimate, non-sinful anger?

Good questions. Hansen offers provocative answers to both.

Do You Have a Choice?

Let’s start with the first question. This is where Hansen opens Unoffendable. It’s also the central idea behind the subtitle.

It seems the answer is yes and no. I do think we can choose not to take offense. This choice, however, isn’t made in isolation; the choice to be unoffendable is an interlocking one determined by our answers to a host of other questions. To use an analogy, is the choice to run a marathon just one choice? Well, yes and no. To be sure, it’s a choice, but it’s not a choice made in isolation from other choices about diet, sleep, training, and rest. The same can be said about choosing which car to own. It’s a choice, but one contingent on other things, such as career and income and family size and comfort with debt....

[Click here to continue reading on The Gospel Coalition's website.]

Opening a Church Bookstore

In Ephesians 4, when describing the many good gifts that Jesus Christ gives to his church, one of the gifts listed is the gift of “teachers” (v. 11). Some of these teachers are the godly women and men who teach primarily in the context of their local church. Others, through their speaking and writing, have a wider ministry. Regardless of the breath of a particular teacher’s ministry, what I’ve always thought is that if God gives his church teachers (which he has certainly done), than I want to be a learner.

And one of the great ways for us to be learners is through books.

But if you’ve been to a Christian bookstore recently, then you might have been overwhelmed by the amount of stuff there, especially because there is often a small portion of the store filled with . . . how shall I say this . . . junk—religious paraphernalia and authors with suspect doctrine.

Of course, among the garbage there is also gold. But I sympathize with those who find it hard to tell the difference. On first glance, it’s often hard for me to tell.

That’s why two weeks ago our church launched a bookstore. I don’t think, however, we’ll be putting our local Lifeway (a national chain of good Christian bookstores) out of business anytime soon. Our bookstore is really just a bookshelf that sits in the café. We filled it with 25-30 Christian books that were handpicked by our elders and staff. We are selling each book a little below cost (i.e., we’re not trying to make money!) at $10 each, except of course for Grudem’s Systematic Theology which is actually $20, but that’s because it’s the size of four books!

We organized the books by favorite authors and category. Our three favorite authors, in no particular order, are Timothy Keller, John Piper, and Kevin DeYoung. And our four categories are (1) Bible & Theology, (2) Marriage & Family, (3), Christian Living & Miscellaneous and (4) Apologetics & Evangelism.

Please scroll through our list below, and in the comments section, let me know what books we missed!

[Also, CLICK each book cover for more information.]

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FAVORITE AUTHORS

 

Timothy Keller

 

John Piper

 

Kevin DeYoung

 

BY CATEGORY

 

Bible & Theology

 

Christian Living & Miscellaneous

 

Marriage & Family

Apologetics & Evangelism

[Photo by kazuend / Unsplash]

Pastor, Over Prepare for Job Interviews

During the last 12 months, I’ve been posting some tips to help pastors find the right job in a local church. This post is a continuation of the series. In it, I discuss “why” and “how” to get ready for job interviews.

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However much time you think that you need to prepare for a job interview, double it. I don’t say this because you need more busywork. Preparing for job interviews isn’t busy work; it’s mission critical.

As a candidate, you need to make sure you are truly prepared for interviews, and to become “truly prepared,” I advocate getting to the place where you feel as though you have almost over prepared. In my experience, if you get to the place of feeling “over prepared,” in reality, you’ve probably prepared adequately.

I learned this principle during my experience as a young engineer, not necessarily in the context of interviewing but the principle still applies. At the construction company where I worked, we billed every hour of design directly to a particular project. For my first year or two, this led me to feel tremendous pressure to complete my jobs as quickly as possible.

When it came time for installation, however, let’s just say that the union construction workers were pretty good at letting me know that I hadn’t tried hard enough. Not only was this humbling, but it was not even a good use of company money. It didn’t help the bottom line for me to “save” one hour only to have ten guys stand around for that same one hour while they fixed my mistake. This happened often enough that finally I got so frustrated that I began to “over engineer,” as I called it, all of my designs.

And what was the result? Adequate engineering.

So, to get to this place of adequate readiness for your job interviews, focus on “over preparing” in these four areas.

1. Over prepare to know the particular dynamics of your interview type

The first thing you need to know is what type of interview you are about to experience and what are the potential pitfalls of it. Here are some of the typical interview options for pastors in a local church.

1. Paper application with short answer essays

2. Telephone interview with one person

3. Telephone interview with more than one person

4. Video conference interview with one person

5. Video conference interview with more than one person

6. One-on-one interview, in person

7. Group interview, in person

8. Candidating weekend

For any job that you interview for, if you continue in the process all the way to the end, likely you’ll experience all eight of these types of interviews—some of them more than once. Therefore, think through what issues might arise with each and be ready for them.

For example, with a phone interview, if their call surprises you, which it might, plan beforehand to ask if you can call them back in 30 minutes, or whatever time makes sense. This extra time will prove valuable, especially if you are pursuing several jobs simultaneously, because you’ll want time to refresh to make sure you’re keeping them straight. Typically, requesting to call them back won’t be an issue to the potential employer, but if you haven’t planned for this scenario, you’ll likely just take the call when it comes and stumble through it on the fly.

Here’s another example of a potential challenge inherent to a certain interview format. In a video conference interview (often done with Skype, Google Hangouts, or FaceTime), expect slight delays due to poor internet connections. Trust me when I say from experience that these delays often cause people unintentionally to interrupt each other. “You go first—” “No, no, you go—” “Okay, okay, I’ll start…” Know as well that these delays often make attempts at humor difficult.

Over-preparing will help you foresee these types of challenges before they trip you up.

2. Over prepare to make your interview answers short

If you are like most people, including me, when you are not adequately prepared, you tend to ramble. Your answers are not crisp and clean; rather, they meander. This isn’t good for interviewing. It makes you look indecisive, like you are guessing. Rarely does anyone improve their answers through length (whether on written applications or in verbal interviews).

Besides looking indecisive, long answers don’t help for another reason, perhaps a surprising one. Frequently I have observed that those who are asking the questions in interviews are almost always more interested in asking their next question than they are in listening to you drone on and on about the current question. This is especially true in group interviews when the questions are asked from different people. It’s selfish, I know, and it’s a reflection of our hearts, but it’s just how it is. So remember, shorter is better.

3. Over prepare to nail the expected interview questions

When you know that something about you will likely generate questions from the employer, make sure you are ready for them.

These can be neutral things. For instance, if you are accustomed to living in southern California and the potential job is in Maine, the search committee will want to know if you have really thought through what it would be like to live with four months of heavy snow. Now, maybe you lived in Maine as a child and are excited to get back, or maybe you have no idea what it will be like, but before they ask, anticipate the question and prepare a response.

Some things about you might generate questions that are, shall we say, less than neutral. For example, were you fired from your last job? Or have you been previously married? Or are you currently in a liberal denomination (or seminary) but looking for a job in a conservative church—or vice versa? Or are you unable to move for six months because of a contractual agreement with your current employer? Or are you far younger than other people applying? Or not as formally educated?

If any one of these is true of you, or a hundred other possibilities that only you know, then prepare for the associated questions; have your answers ready.

Often, any potential concerns a church might have will be assuaged with a good explanation, if there is one. And if there isn’t, say so. The gospel, which teaches that Christians are sinners saved by grace, allows us to take ownership of our past because, in the end, our past doesn’t define us—Christ does.

4. Over prepare to end the interview well

Of course you should close the interview by thanking people for their time, but beyond this, you may have questions for them that you don’t want to forget. Perhaps you want to know when you might expect to hear back from them, or when they expect the new hire to begin employment.

It sounds silly, but if you haven’t prepared for how you’ll end the interview, you might just keep talking and talking and talking. I’ve seen it happen. In the moment, people get excited and just keep going on and on. You don’t want to do this. You don’t want to end the interview rambling about this or that, telling an anecdote about your new puppy or your new car or maybe about how you were recently injured while training for a half-marathon—which by the way was your first half-marathon—but this injury isn’t gonna stop you from being a great new hire and preaching great sermons, that’s for sure, because you’ll be ready for that, just like the time when… Yet all the while, everyone else in the interview will be thinking to themselves, “I wish he knew when to stop.”

[Photo by Jeff Sheldon/ Unsplash]

Thank You Salem Church

While in seminary, my family and I attended Salem Evangelical Free Church in St. Louis, MO. In a few days, as I complete my first five years of ministry, thankfulness for their investment in me is bubbling over. Here’s a copy of a letter I recently wrote to them.

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May 26, 2015

Salem Evangelical Free Church
2490 Pohlman Road,
Florissant, MO 63033

Dear Salem Evangelical Free Church:

“I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith” (2 Timothy 4:7). Those words are from the Apostle Paul. He wrote them, not after 5 years of ministry, but a lifetime. I can’t say what he said. But I can say that I’ve finished a certain milestone. And I’m writing to you, Salem Evangelical Free Church, to tell you thank you so much for helping me get there.

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AMELIA AND JEFF SCHULTZ WITH BROOKE AND I THE NIGHT OF MY baccalaureate FROM SEMINARY.

My wife, Brooke, and I were at Salem while I attended Covenant Theological Seminary. Five years ago, when we left Salem for my first job as a pastor in Tucson, AZ, we had 3 children: Noah, Hudson, and Eden. Now, we live in Harrisburg, PA where I’m a teaching pastor at Community Evangelical Free Church, and we have 2 more children than we when left: Izzy and Judah.

While at Salem, you graciously gave me a scholarship, so that (along with the help of others) we were able to finish seminary without debt. I can’t thank you enough for that.

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Graduation Night with my friend Marc.

And not only did you help us financially, we also received support in many other ways. There was encouragement and discipleship from Pastor Jeff. There was friendship with Tom, Brycen, and Marc (and Brooke with Kacey, Amelia, Megan, Esther, and Paula). There were young adults to share small group Bible studies with, people such as Andréa, Brycen and Kacey, Megan and Allen, Marc and Esther, and Sarah and Trafford. Then there was the men’s ministry, who listened to my occasional lesson. And of course, there were plenty of trees to drop leaves so that I could work on my “leaf raking skills” each fall!

I was also blessed by my opportunities to preach. Do you remember the time I preached Judges 19-20 during Advent? Yikes. Who lets a seminary student do that? And then there was the time I led a three-week Sunday school class on the Bible, homosexuality, and culture. If I remember right, in the class there were a few people in their 80s, and at one point, I had us looking at lyrics to a Lady Gaga song.

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Picture with some friends from seminary (Todd, Bryan, Rick, [my son hudson], Nathan, and me)

You also taught us about the importance of membership in the local church. In fact, I remember when we pursued membership, Pastor Jeff and Joe Fey came to our house for the interview and they listened to how the gospel message had changed, and was continuing to change, us. To this day, when Brooke and I think about what it means for the local church to be the “body of Christ,” we think about the time when our son Hudson was born. To say the least, things didn’t go well. But you, Salem, were there: ready to help, ready to serve.

And do you remember the time you threw us a going away party? We thought we were going to our last small group meeting, and as we rounded the corner in the church basement, my young daughter was so surprised to see the whole church that she dropped the bowl of chopped pineapples we had brought! For the party you even bought us ice cream cakes from Doozles, our favorite! And then there was your attendance at our annual Christmas party and cookie decorating competition (which, by the way, continues in it’s 11th year).

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Brycen at our Annual Christmas party. Notice the shirt he made for the Night!

You’re commitment to us continues to bear fruit. In the last 5 years, I’ve helped launch 40 small groups and preached 55 sermons; I’ve officiated the premarital counseling and weddings for 9 couples (with 4 more to go this year); I’ve written 107 blog posts, 3 poems, 2 short books (with 1 more to come soon), and 1 worship song; and I’ve cried countless tears—some were tears of joy, others were not.

A seasoned pastor once told me that he wants to write a letter to everyone who listened to his first 100 sermons to say “thank you for tolerating them.” I have 45 to go, but even now, I understand what he’s talking about. It takes faith in God to allow opportunities for a young pastor to grow and faith in God to be gracious to him when he messes up. Thank you for having this faith in God.

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First Day of Work on June 1, 2011 in Tucson, AZ at new Life Bible Fellowship Church.

Finally, I want to make sure I specifically thank Tom Reidy. Tom, in your message to me at my “sending service,” you prayed that there would be those in my life who would hold up my arms when I was too exhausted to hold them up myself (even as Moses needed this in Exodus 17). Church, you should know how faithfully Tom has done this for me. He has continued to read everything I write, listen to every sermon I preach, and, almost without exception, send me a note of encouragement once a month. Oh, and a few times a year, I get a book in the mail from one of my favorite authors. What a friend; what a brother! I loved the times we spent together before work at the “golden arches”—and not just because, for some reason, Tom always said it was “his turn” to pay.  

In truth, I don’t remember most of the specifics of the scholarship you gave me. But I do remember one stipulation, namely, that I had to continue in ministry for at least 5 years, and if not, I had to pay it back. On Wednesday morning June 1, 2011, I started my first day of fulltime, vocational ministry in a local church. In just a few days, it will be June 1, 2016. I’m sticking this letter in the mail a bit early so that it gets there on time. I hope you’ll forgive my presumption!

Again, I am so thankful for all you have done and continue to do.

Grace and Peace,
Benjamin Vrbicek

[Family photo, Marti Aiken Photography]

He’s Not a Tame Lion

This summer, we are preaching through 1 Samuel. Rarely do I post my sermons on this blog, but today I’m making an exception. This sermon is about how God—as C.S. Lewis famously writes of Alsan—is not tame, but he is good.

You can download and listen below.

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They call it an “epigraph.” An epigraph is a short quote at the begging of a chapter or the whole book, often by someone famous. It’s designed to suggest a theme for the chapter or book; it’s to prepare the reader for the ideas that follow. A month ago, at a book sale, I picked up a commentary on 1 Samuel for $1. (I knew we would be preaching it soon.) I pulled it out this week and found this quote in opening:

“The hope of a broken world is to find men big enough to mend it.”

- John Buchan, A Prince of the Captivity [1]

I wrote in the margin, “What?! No!” I wrote that because that’s not the hope of the world. And it’s especially not the hope offered in 1 Samuel. As I read the commentary for about four more pages and got more mad, I was reminded of something I was once told: “Not all commentaries are created equal.”

As we turn to our passage this morning in 1 Samuel, I find that quote especially interesting because of what happens. In this passage, all the major characters in the book (Samuel, Saul, David) and all the minor characters (Hannah, Eli and his sons, Jonathon, and others), they all disappear. And God become central; God is the main character of this passage—not behind the scenes but center stage.

As we preach through the book this summer, this passage (chapters 4, 5, 6, and the beginning of 7), is the second largest passage we’ll take. It’s going to take me about 10 minutes to read it. I’ll do my best to read it well, if you’ll do your best to listen well.

But just to help you out, let me summarize it for you. The story centers on God’s conflict with both the Israelites and the Philistines. The Philistines are one of several enemies of Israel in the Old Testament. Most likely they came from across the Mediterranean Sea and have infiltrated the coastal regions and beyond. And they are constantly pressing further inland, and they have done so with some success for many, many years. And as this happens (they push in), Israel is constantly trying to press them out.

In this passage, there’s a battle and Israel loses. So, what do they do? They “fetch” the ark of God. The ark was a wooden box about the size of this communion table. In it was a copy of the Ten Commandments and a few other items. In the Old Testament, it was the physical manifestation of God’s presence among his people; it was the closest thing Israel had to an incarnation.

Though they fetched the ark, they lose again. This time, three religious leaders are killed. Their names are Eli and Hophni and Phinehas. If you weren’t here last week, that will perhaps seem harsh. But in previous chapters, God pleaded with them to change their ways. But they did not. They ran the temple like they were mafia and they needed to be disposed of.

Continuing: After the battle, the Philistines take the ark home and God goes to war against them. When their god Dagon had enough and when all of their cities had enough, they send the ark away. And when it comes back, sadly, Israel still mishandles God and people die. So they send the ark away—again.

Scripture Reading

If you have a Bible, please follow along with me as I read 1 Samuel 4:1b-7:2 [Because of length, I have not included the passage here. You can read it here.]

Prayer

This is God’s Word. Thanks be to God. Pray with me that he would be our teacher. Pray with me as we study this together . . . 

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The outline for the rest of our time is simple. Only two questions. First, what is our God like? Second, how should we respond to him?

1. What is our God like?

We’ll start with the first question. What is our God like?

Let me qualify this, though. When I say we are going to talk about what God is like, I don’t mean what God is like in an exhaustive sense. I’m not going to try to say everything. In fact, in the future, in the “forever life with God,” we won’t exhaust God, which is why the new heavens and the new earth won’t be boring. It will be a place of increasing delight.

What I mean in asking, “what is our God like?” is to say that I want to talk about what this passage says in particular about God. I want to highlight, albeit briefly, two attributes of God that are heightened in this passage.

Two introduce these attributes, let me read famous passages from the book The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. I know what I’m about read has almost become cliché because Christians have referenced it so much . . . still, it’s just that good. Also, while it’s familiar to some, still there are others who need to be introduced to it. Speaking of Aslan, the lion character and the Christ figure in the book, we read this:  

“Safe?” said Mr. Beaver . . . . “Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.”

And then in another place,

“He’ll be coming and going . . . “One day you’ll see him and another you won’t. He doesn’t like being tied down . . . . Only you mustn’t press him. He’s wild, you know. Not like a tame lion.”

Not tame, but God. Not safe, but a good king. So with Aslan (a symbol of Christ), so with the ark (a symbol, in some ways, of Christ). These are the two attributes we see about God in this passage.

1. (a). God is not tame.

If I said, let me show you were God is un-tame in this passage, then you might be able to ask, where isn’t this shown? It’s everywhere. Let me pick a few places.

First, there is the statement in 4:4, 

4 So the people sent to Shiloh and brought from there the ark of the covenant of the Lord of hosts, who is enthroned on the cherubim . . .

Who is enthroned? Only those who have a throne, only those who have a kingdom, only those who are kings. God is enthroned; he has a kingdom; he’s a king, the king of the whole jungle, and he has a strong paw.

Let me show you what I mean by “paw.” Did you notice as I read the passage the repeated references to the “hand of the Lord”? There were eight of them (4:8; 5:6, 7, 9, 11; 6:3, 5, 9 [and 7:13]). For example,

They sent therefore and gathered together all the lords of the Philistines and said, “Send away the ark of the God of Israel, and let it return to its own place, that it may not kill us and our people.” For there was a deathly panic throughout the whole city. The hand of God was very heavy there (5:11).

Again, that was one. There are eight. God has a strong, heavy paw. And he’s not been declawed.

And then consider the Dagon story at the beginning of chapter 5. Generally speaking, I’m leery of war and battle language in sermons because it tends to be either overdone or domesticated. (For example, I think “prayer warrior” is too liberally applied and rarely do people die in “worship wars.”)

However, the story of the ark vs. Dagon calls for such battle language. The ark goes into the octagon, and in round one, Dagon is knocked to the ground. He can’t pick himself back up, so his trainers do so for him. Then, in round two, it’s a technical knockout. No hands, no head, Dagon’s done. And like humpty-dumpty, all of Dagon’s priests and all of Dagon’s worshipers, couldn’t put Dagon back together again.[2]

But there is more about this untamed lion. Consider the way the ark goes on something of an anti-victory parade. If in October, the Philadelphia Phillies win the World Series of Baseball this year, then in early November, there will be a parade through downtown Philly to show off the spoils of war.

In this story, the Philistines “win” the ark but their victory parade becomes an anti-victory parade. Everywhere he goes, God’s hand is heavy. “Hey, we don’t want the World Series Trophy; send it to Baltimore!” Then Baltimore doesn’t want it. “Hey, send this thing to Pittsburgh!” And on it goes.

To be sure, from beginning to end of this story, God shows that he is not tame. In this way, we have a foretaste of the second coming of Jesus. When Jesus comes again, he will crush all impostors to the throne. In the New Testament letter of Philippians we read (2:9-11),

9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

“Every knee will should bow.” What does this mean? It means that every Christians, every Muslim, every Hindu, every Jew, every secular atheist, everyone who has ever lived (including me and you) will one day bow the knee before Jesus, The Lion of Judah (Genesis 49:9; Revelation 5:5). Some will do it gladly and joyfully as a continuation of what they were doing in this life. Everyone else will be in for a terrible surprise.

Did you ever think about how God knocked Dagon over? I have. I don’t know the answer, but I wonder if he just breathed on him. Look at this verse from 2 Thessalonians 2:8 and how it describes the way that Jesus will one day destroy the Evil One,

And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming.

One day our Savior will destroy the Evil One with the breath of his mouth. The way you and I take a pizza out of the oven and blow on it, that’s how God destroys evil.

Be sure about this, church, he’s not a tame lion.  

1. (b). But he is good.

But this of course is not the only attribute we see in our passage, and thankfully so. God is also good.

Now, when we speak of God’s goodness, we could mean many different things (true things, helpful things, biblical things). In these verses, when I say “God is good,” what I mean is that God has a special love and care for his chosen people. Let me show you where I see this.

You’re familiar with the Exodus story, right? The story where God, with a strong hand delivered his chosen people from Pharaoh? It’s the story of when Pharaoh would not comply, that God’s crippled the entire nation of Egypt with 10 plagues and thereby delivered his chosen people from the most powerful leader of the most powerful nation on earth. You know this story, right? It’s famous, right?

Well, it’s famous to the Philistines, too. Twice in this passage, it’s mentioned. First in chapter 4 when the soldiers refer to it (4:8). Then, later in the story, the priests of Dagon refer to it (6:6). The gist of both references is this: let’s not let happened to us what happened to Egypt because even we pagans know that God loves his people and he won’t let anything stand in their way. God is good towards his chosen people.  

And consider this one. Consider the cows that bring the ark home. The Philistines say, “Let’s come up with a plan, and if it works, then we’ll know that God is God.” So they do. They take cows that have never pulled a wagon, cows that are nursing their young, and they set them loose. (By the way, rookie cows that are also new mothers, wouldn’t ordinarily pull well or leave their young; this is like giving a 10-year old keys to the stick shift and seeing if they can make it to Allentown.) And where do these cows go? Straight back to Israel. As the passage says, “They turned neither to the right nor to the left” (6:12).

But we can be more specific. The cows (and you might not have realized this), they go back to a city called Beth-Shemeh. Did you know that in the book of Joshua, that this city is listed as one of the cities that is a headquarters for Israelite priests (Joshua 21:16). Think about that. God could have gone anywhere. He could have left Israel altogether as he left Philistine country. But where does he go? He goes back to his people, his priests. He’s saying, Let’s try this again.

Did they deserve him? And would they treat him the way he deserves when he gets there? No and no. And we don’t either. But our God is good. He loves his chosen people.

It’s as though God is saying to us in this passage, even when it looks like my grace is harsh, even if I must let you flounder for a time, I’m coming back. I love my people. I love you.

He’s not tame, but he is good.

2. How should we respond?

Well, we should get on to my second point or we’ll never finish. If this is what God is like, how shall we respond? As with the above point, I’m not attempting to be exhaustive. We can’t. But certainly we can learn from the negative examples in this passage.

How do people respond wrongly to God in this passage? Two ways. I’ll just lump them together because they are almost inseparable. The two ways are

1. Superstition, not rightly esteeming God’s heaviness.
2. Addition, not full submission.

Let me say them again. The two ways the people respond wrongly to God in this passage are,

1. Superstition, not rightly esteeming God’s heaviness.
2. Addition, not full submission.

What do I mean? They treat God so lightly that they think they can superstitiously manipulate him. As for addition, what I mean is that rather than turning from all other gods to worship the real God, instead people try to “add God” to their lives, as though YHWH was “in addition” to their other gods.

Consider the statement in 4:3,

3 And when the people came to the camp, the elders of Israel said, “Why has the Lord defeated us today before the Philistines? Let us bring the ark of the covenant of the Lord here from Shiloh, that it may come among us and save us from the power of our enemies.” 

The King James Version of “Let us bring the ark” says, “Let us fetch the ark.” They are treating God like a rabbit’s foot that can be fetched. Rather than the hard, prayerful activity of individual and corporate repentance, they so lightly esteem God that they try to manipulate him into giving them what they want: victory.

And consider the detail about Eli and his “heaviness.” Did you catch that? He’s an overweight guy and his own heaviness, in a sense, kills him. He’s crushed under the weight of his own glory. That might not seem like a big deal, but did you know that the words for “glory” and “honor” and “heavy” are all the same. It’s the word ka-vowd. And the name Ichabod (4:21), which means, “Glory departed” or “glory exiled,” is Ick-ka-vowd. In Chapter 2, Eli is rebuked for not treating God’s word as heavy. He honors something above God.[3] And so a heavy man dies under the weight of his own heaviness because he did not esteem God and his glory as heavy.

This leads me to ask: Is God heavy in your life? Is he a weighty thing? Or is his word something easily ignored. Is the Bible a light thing to you? Or is God and his word something you bend your life to? When he challenges you, do you bend to him, or do you bend him to you?

And then there is the detail at the very end of the passage. When the ark finally comes home, they mishandle it. They “looked upon the ark of the Lord” (6:19). We don’t know exactly what they did, but we know it was wrong. I think it’s a little like this. What would you think if I saw the power of Three Mile Island, this nuclear power plant that looms so ominous on the Harrisburg horizon, and as I saw the tremendous power that it generates, I said, “I think I’m going to have a little looks-y at the reactor’s core, maybe get up close and handle some of the uranium.”

What would you think? You’d say, “Woah, woah, woah. Slow down. You don’t understand. That is power that is ‘for us.’ But we don’t play lightly with it.”

Finally (and this is my last verse to quote), look at 5:5,

5 This is why the priests of Dagon and all who enter the house of Dagon do not tread on the threshold of Dagon in Ashdod to this day.

This, to me, is the saddest verse in the passage. Why? Well, we don’t know exactly what their motivation is for not stepping on the threshold, the place where Dagon was defeated. But we do know, as they knew, this: it’s the place where Dagon was defeated.

And every time they stepped over the threshold they are in some superstitious way acknowledging that this is the place where their God was defeated. And in this strange way they are not giving full submission to the “God of gods” but rather they seek to add a totem of respect to this God—just like they pay a totem of respect to all of their gods. That is, they go for addition not full submission. They go for superstition, not esteeming God’s heaviness.

And this is so sad to me because of what the verse should say, or could say. It should say, “And to this day, this is why the priests of Dagon no longer worship Dagon but they worship the Lord.” If I could talk to these priests, perhaps I would say something like, “Go deeper, Philistines! Press your worldview further! And when it fails you, when you have to glue your god back together again, don’t ignore this! See the failure of your worldview as an opportunity to grasp the real thing!”

And we can do this, too. We can be content to “add Jesus” to our life and give him superstitious homage. We can live our own lives, but “sprinkle a little Jesus on top” so we won’t go to hell. We must repent and get the real thing. Church, if you god is letting you down, don’t pick him up. Replace him with the real God who will never fail.

Conclusion

Earlier, I said that there were parallels between this story and the second coming of Jesus. That’s true. But did you also catch the parallels with the first coming of Jesus? Oh, church, as we close, let me encourage you with this.

Think about it: in this story, the king is surrounded by sinful, dysfunctional leadership and sinful, dysfunctional people. And this king—in the Samuel story—allows himself to be captured. He allows himself to brought by force behind enemy lines. And there, all by himself and all alone, he works a victory. And then, he returns to his people.

This is the gospel story. Jesus came to a sinful people, allowed himself to be captured, and when he died on the cross (alone and behind enemy lines), he worked a great victory. And now, anyone and everyone who comes to him in faith can become his chosen people, his royal subjects. What a story. He’s not tame, but he loves you.

The hope of the broken world is not that we have “men big enough to mend it” but rather the God-man Jesus Christ to save it.

Notes

1. Found in Andrew W. Blackwood, Preaching from Samuel, Baker Books, 1975 [original 1946]; quote from John Buchan in A Prince of the Captivity.

2. My expansion on of an insight into the passage from Dale Ralph Davis, 1 Samuel, p. 60.

3. See the interplay of these verses: Honor: 2:8, 2:29, 30!, 9:6, 15:30 / Heavy: 4:18, 5:6, 5:11 / Glory: 4:21, 22, 15:29 / Ichabod: 4:21.

[Photo Stefan Rayner / Unsplash]

YOUR BEST LIFE NOW by Joel Osteen (FAN AND FLAME Book Reviews)

Joel Osteen. Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential. Warner Faith, 2004 (original). 310 pp. $14.99.

 

Joel Osteen is the pastor of Lakewood Baptist Church in Huston, Texas. He’s been the pastor there since 1999. Osteen is extremely popular. His sermons are broadcast all over the world. He even has his own Sirius radio station that plays 48 sermons a day (Channel 128, if you’re interested). And he has almost 4.5 million followers on Twitter. I’m one of them.

Yet for all this popularity, lots of people don’t like him. Some of those who don’t like him do so because he smiles a lot and has a huge church (I mean, huuge!). I think these are poor reasons to not like the guy. I’ll point out some better ones in a minute. But before I do, I’ll say that in Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential, I actually appreciate several things. For one, I appreciate Joel’s repeated expressions of affection for his father, the late John Osteen to whom the book is dedicated. At one point, I even teared up as Joel recounted the last time he saw his father alive (pp. 247-8). I also appreciated Osteen’s belief in the supernatural; our culture is losing this. “We serve a supernatural God,” he writes. “He is not limited to the laws of nature. He can do what human beings cannot do” (p. 127). I suppose I agree.

However, all of us know people who speak well of their father. And all of us know people who believe in the supernatural. Neither of these—alone—makes a person a Christian. And this gets at my real frustration with the book: Your Best Life Now, though it fashions itself as a Christian book, is not.

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This probably sounds strange, even impossible, to some. I mean, the book has frequent mentions of God and the Bible. It offers a relentless pursuit of happiness and an inspiring plea for good deeds. This is what it means to be Christian, right?

No, it’s not. These things, by themselves, are not necessarily Christian. Your Best Life Now is missing the thing that real Christianity has: the gospel.

The gospel is the good news that sinners can be made right with God through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The gospel answers why things are wrong in the world and what God has done, is doing, and will do to make them right again. And it’s this gospel message that is the basis of what it means to have an abundant, eternal life with God. Without the gospel, Christianity wouldn’t be Christianity. Therefore, because Your Best Life Now is missing the center of Christianity, any overlap or similarity with the real thing is only superficial.

At this point, I’d love to tell you more about why I’m reading Osteen at all (some might be surprised at this), but the long story is for another day. Suffice it to say, I think real Christianity, because it has the real gospel, has so much more to offer than its counterfeits. As Albert Mohler has said, “The biggest problem with prosperity theology is not that it promises too much, but that it promises far too little.”

Even though Your Best Life Now was on the New York Times bestseller list for 200 weeks and has sold millions of copies, here are four ways that it promises not too much, but far too little.

1. Osteen overemphasizes the “NOW”

The title for the book is fitting. This book is about “now”—this moment, this earthly life. That’s fine, I suppose; some of the Bible is about this moment, this earthly life. But the impression that Osteen gives is that all of the Bible is about the now. And that’s not true.

The Bible is about your best life “then.” It’s about the Holy Spirit being given to believers now as a “guarantee” or “down payment” (Ephesians 1:14) of a future life with God—a “then life,” which will last forever. Jesus said, “In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). And Paul told young believers “that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 16:22).

Osteen gets this emphasis wrong in so many places and so many ways, especially so as he talks about generosity. Osteen wrongly implies that if you give generously, God—who is watching closely—will repay you back in the “now.” In the Bible, you won’t find this Karma-like view of God, one who only—or even mainly—rewards and punishes in this life (1 Corinthians 15:19).

2. Osteen describes sin as merely mistakes and imperfections

Hey, nobody’s perfect, right?

Whenever Osteen describes sin, this is the extent of his description. For example,

The truth is, we all have areas in which we need to improve . . . . You may not be perfect—nobody is! Sure, you’ve got some flaws—we all do! But to be truly free, you must have a healthy respect for yourself in spite of those “imperfections” (p. 66).

Or when talking about King David, Osteen writes, “David wasn’t perfect. He made mistakes . . .” (p. 192). David made mistakes? I’ll say!

What the Bible actually teaches, is that not only are we imperfect, but apart from Christ, we “were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked . . . . and were by nature children of wrath” (Ephesians 2:1-3).

This is why the real gospel message is better. The real gospel offers hope not for people who need to overcome their mistakes but hope for people who are spiritually dead. In the real gospel, God looks into the blackness of our hearts, the areas that are so dark we might be tempted to think there is no cure, and says, “I fully know your disease and my gospel-solution is more than sufficient to heal you; in fact, I delight to make enemies my sons and daughters.”

3. Osteen teaches that words are more powerful than they really are

It’s true that our words and thoughts have power. Proverbs says, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue” (18:21). But in Osteen’s theology, they are too powerful, that is to say, words and thoughts become god-like, the authoritative determiner of one’s destiny. A positive outlook, he seems to argue, will always lead to a bright future; a negative outlook will always lead to a dark future.

Consider these statements,

“You must conceive it and believe it is possible if you ever hope to experience it” (p. 4).

“If you will change your thinking, God can change your life” (p. 32).

“The truth is, you will never rise above the image you have of yourself in your own mind” (p. 56).

There are dozens of these in the book. In several places, Osteen says that our thoughts can actually “stop God.” He writes, “When we focus on our disappointments, we stop God from bringing fresh new blessings into our lives” (p. 180). Really? We can “stop God”?

It’s the frequency, and the strength, and the unqualified nature of these statements that I find so frustrating, so un-Christian. In real Christianity, God is God, and our thoughts and our words, while powerful, are not God.

4. Osteen is telling the wrong story

I’d love to tell you more about why Your Best Life Now is not a Christian book. I’d love to point out the way Osteen makes moral demands but does so without the gospel as the initiator, the generator of these good deeds.

And I’d love to talk about the way that Osteen uses the Bible, especially the Old Testament, as merely a book of moral lessons for us to follow.

And I’d love to talk about how Osteen is at the top of his own pyramid scheme, how he and his family are the exemplars and the proof texts for his own view of prosperity.

And I’d love to talk about how in several of the passages where Osteen extolls the virtues of “hard work,” what he actually is depicting is an idolatrous worship of success.

And I’d love to talk about how in the Bible the interplay between sin and sickness is far more nuanced and careful than Osteen’s “one-for-one” approach.

And I’d love to talk about Osteen’s ambiguous use of the pronoun “you”; Osteen extends the blood-bought promises of God to everyone regardless of whether they have become a Christian or not. The result is that millions of unregenerate people try to live the Christian life without actually having it. Tragic.

And on.

And on.

But as I said above, maybe another day.

This last point (“The Wrong Story”) is my catch-all. When you compare the story that Osteen tells with the story that the Bible tells, they are just not the same. The Bible, though it has much to say to us, is not a story about us, most certainly not a story about one’s best life now. Rather, the Bible is The Story of God and his initiative to create a beautiful world, redeem it from brokenness, and exalt the glory of his grace.

This difference is profound; it’s the difference between Christianity and everything else. It’s the difference between heaven and hell. And it’s the difference between Your Best Life Now and true Christianity.

[Photo @JoelOsteen]

How Taking Out the Trash Teaches us about the Lord’s Supper

I’ve been reading through the book of Judges. It’s a sad book. The refrain in the book is that God’s people “do what is right in their own eyes” (Judges 17:6; 21:25; cf. 14:3).

This morning I finished the book before church. As I finished, what struck me is how scary the ending of the book is. It’s scary in this way: the book is full of activity by God’s people—full of commotion, even some apparent piety—but God is missing. God is either an afterthought or a casual mention before the people do what they really want to do, namely, that which seems right in their own eyes. So they make plans; they attempt to correct sin; they fight a war; they “solve” a tribal problem—but they don’t remember God. They mention God, of course, but they don’t really remember him. And that’s scary. Lots of activity, little remembering of God. 

What Does it Mean to “Remember?”

But “remember” is a funny word, isn’t it? What does it mean? What does it, biblically speaking, mean to “fully remember”?

Consider this. If you are at my house on a Tuesday morning at 7:30 AM, as we sit at the kitchen table and eat breakfast, from down the street, you’ll be able to hear the noise of a huge machine getting closer.

And closer.

And closer.

The machine is coming up the south side of the street, the side my house is on.

When you hear the noise, you might then also hear my wife ask me, “Honey, did you remember to take out the trash?” What’s my wife really asking? What does she mean by “remember”?

If I say, “Yes, last night I remembered that I was supposed to take out the trash. However, I did not actually take out the trash.” Is that remembering? Well, not really.

To remember to take out the trash is to remember in such a way that it produces a response—the appropriate response. Consider also what it means to remember to lock the door or bring your passport to the airport. No, remembering—in its full biblical meaning and often its full cultural connotation as well—does not mean to simply and briefly recall something to mind so that you can then do all the other things you want to do with your day—and your life.

True remembering is remembering in such a way that it produces a response. This is how Paul uses the word remember in Galatians 2:10 when he speaks of being eager to “remember the poor.” Surely, this is not merely calling to mind that poor people exist but rather an action that produces care and generosity for them.

Do This in Remembrance of Me

In the gospel of Luke, when Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper, he told his disciples, “Do this in remembrance of me” (Luke 22:19; cf. 1 Corinthians 11:24). In fact, we have this statement carved on the wooden table that we use for the Lord’s Supper.

There are several views on what takes place in the Lord’s Supper, and the view that we hold, one that many Protestants hold, is called “memorialism.” The idea of a memorial is that we remember someone or something. And a memorialist view of the Lord’s Supper focuses on remembering what Jesus has done for us in the gospel.

But we should not misunderstand this memorialist view. When we ascribe to this view, we mean the full connotation of “remember”—to remember in such a way that it actually produces something within believers when they participate by faith. That’s why our own denomination, The Evangelical Free Church of America, states that

the Lord’s Supper [and baptism] . . . visibly and tangibly express the gospel. Though they are not the means of salvation, when celebrated by the church in genuine faith, these ordinances confirm and nourish the believer (EFCA Statement of Faith, Article 9).

Your Response?

My aim this morning is to help us remember the saving death of Jesus Christ as neither an afterthought nor a pretense of piety. Rather, let us remember the death of Jesus in such a way that it produces a response.

As we pass the elements, what response do you need to make this morning? Is there a sin that you need to forsake? Is there a good activity that you need to reinstate? Is there joy in the gospel message that needs to be revived?

I’m so thankful for the Lord’s Supper. It’s God’s periodic invitation to forgetful people to remember the good news: the good news that God loves us and through his death and resurrection he has expensively purchased for us everything we need for life and godliness.

Two Quick Things

Just two more quick things. First, this is a meal for Christians. If you are not a Christian, we are so glad that you are here with us. However, we ask that you not participate because by participating you would be saying something untrue of yourself, namely, that you are a Christian who has been changed by the gospel. We would never want to put you in a place where you felt pressured to do that. Perhaps you can use this time to think about what it might mean to begin to follow Jesus and to experience his love for you.

Second, as we pass the elements. We will be passing the bread and the cup at the same time. By this I mean that both are in one tray; we’ve put two cups together, one on top of the other. So as the tray comes by you, please make sure you take both of them. And then please hold them until we have all been served.

[Communion is served while a song is played . . . ]

The Bible records that on the night that Jesus was betrayed, as they were eating, and when he had given thanks, Jesus took the bread and broke it. And he said, “This is my body which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me” (Luke 22:19). 

[While holding up the bread . . . ] “The body of Christ, broken for you. Take in faith.”

In the same way, after they had eaten, he took the cup saying, “this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Matthew 26:28; cf. Luke 22:20).

[While holding up the cup. . . ] “The blood of Christ, poured out for you. Take in faith.”

Let’s pray . . .

 [Photo by A Yee / CC]

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RESISTING GOSSIP by Matthew C. Mitchell (FAN AND FLAME Book Reviews)

Matthew C. Mitchell. Resisting Gossip: Winning the War of the Wagging Tongue. CLC Publications, 2016. 192 pp. $13.99. 

Recently on Tuesdays at our church, over the course of six weeks, a few of us skipped lunch and prayed together. We prayed about evangelism; we wanted to ask God to make us better sharers of the Good News Story of Jesus.

One thing we all noted repeatedly throughout the six weeks was this: because evangelism was something we were constantly thinking about, seeking inroads for, and praying towards, all of us tended to notice more opportunities around us for evangelism. The opportunities were everywhere. 

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As I read Resisting Gossip: Winning the War of the Wagging Tongue by Matthew C. Mitchell, something similar happened. No, I didn’t start gossiping more (I don’t think). I did, however, notice that gossip is everywhere, and not just from other people—from me too. This is one of the great helps of the book: highlighting a sin so common that we hardly notice it. Our inability to recognize gossip is especially tragic, because, as Mitchell writes, “technology has made it possible for us to gossip long distance” (p. 23). Oops, there goes a tweet, a post, a share, a message. Gossip is white noise to us.

What’s interesting about not noticing gossip, however, is that we certainly still notice when it hurts us. (He said WHAT about me!?) Mitchell, a pastor of Lanse Evangelical Free Church, remembers when gossip hurt him. “One time, when the gossip was at its worst,” he writes, “I thought seriously about quitting the pastorate altogether” (p. 17). Maybe you’re not in full-time ministry, but likely you can relate to a time when you were hurt by gossip and perhaps even wanted to walk away from a particular school, job, or church. Sticks and stones can break bones but names can never . . . .

Resisting Gossip is structured in four parts, moving from a definition of gossip (I), to how we resist gossip (II), then to our response when others gossip (III), and finally, what to do when we regret the words we’ve spoken (IV). There are discussion questions at the end of each chapter, a bibliography for further reading, and a bonus chapter for church leaders on creating a culture that resists gossip.

The book is full of stories about the damage gossip inflicts. Of course, to protect the guilty, the names have been changed, except for when Mitchell is the culprit. Even as he encourages us to be changed by the gospel to resist sin, he models this gospel-change that allows him to own his sin. In a more humorous moment (at least for readers), Mitchell recounts a time when an extended family member visited, and through thin-walls and under doors, his gossip leaked. “I complained long and hard to [my wife] about our relative [who was in another room] . . . . It was chilly at our place the next morning!” (p. 83).

My favorite chapter was Chapter 3: A Gallery of Gossips, where Mitchell offers five profile sketches: The Spy, The Grumbler, The Backstabber, The Chameleon, and The Busybody. In a way—and this is in part what I liked so much about this chapter and the whole book—it thoughtfully engages the book of Proverbs, another book with much to say about wagging tongues. “The words of a gossip are like choice morsels; they go down to the inmost parts.” (Proverbs 18:8, NIV).

Another favorite section came near the end of the book as Mitchell contrasts the difference between a distinctively Christian approach to how sin is forgiven and how it is done in every other religious or secular system. He gives the example of a Jewish author who teaches that if you, as a guilty gossiper, find yourself in a place where you are tempted to sin again, and “you do not repeat the mistake [of gossip] . . . not only are you forgiven, but it’s as if you never made the original mistake.” Mitchel writes, “No. This is not how it works! . . . Christians are forgiven and cleansed only because of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ” (p. 147). On our own, the scales will never balance. Jesus said, “I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak” (Matthew 12:36). We need a savior who absorbs the punishment for our “careless words” and gives us credit for his perfection.

For sinners like us, it’s speaking gossip that comes easy and resisting gossip that comes hard. But, by the grace of God and for the glory of God, we have to do it. Matthew C. Mitchell’s book Resisting Gossip is a good book to help us recognize and resist this common sin.

[Photo by Josh Felise / Unsplash]

What Does it Mean to “Glorify” God?

Recently at church, we had a dedication service for several children, including our son Judah. Our church gave us the children’s devotional book Thoughts to Make Your Heart Sing by Sally Lloyd-Jones, illustrated by Jago. We’ve not completed it yet, but just like The Jesus Storybook Bible—which is also by Lloyd-Jones and Jago—it’s fantastic. (I reviewed the Jesus Storybook Bible here.)

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At times, my family has struggled to have consistent family devotions. There are several reasons for this, I’m sure. In part, our lives are constantly changing—new kids coming and older kids getting older. Also, we’ve struggled because I’ve been more ambitious than was probably sustainable. This led to good spurts but not consistency.

But whatever the reasons were, since we were given this book, we’ve had good success. About three or four times a week, I read one of the short devotionals during dinner. I try to make the reading as interactive as possible, which isn’t hard because the material lends itself to discussion, and . . . well . . .  I have five very “active” kids.

Below is one of my favorite entries so far. It answers the questions “what does it mean to glorify God?” and “why does God even ‘need’ us to glorify him at all?” Obviously, the answers to these questions could get deep fast, but Lloyd-Jones has a way of making the complex simple—for children and adults.

After I read this one, I asked my kids questions like, “What does it mean to glorify basketball?” “And what does it mean to glorify a book . . . and a friend . . . and a sunset?”

Then, when I came back to the question of what it means to glorify God, which according to Lloyd-Jones, means “to make much of Him,” my kids understood. And my heart sang.

*     *     *

GLORIFY!

God tells us to glorify him. “Glorify” means to “make a big deal of.” When someone makes a big deal of you, it fills up your heart with joy.

But why does God need us to make a big deal of him? Why does he need us to get joy?

He doesn’t. In the beginning God the Father and Jesus, his Son, together with the Holy Spirit, were already there—a loving family, glorifying each other in this wonderful Dance of Joy.

No. God didn’t create us so he could get joy—he already had it.

He created us so that he could share it.

He knows it’s the thing your heart most needs to be happy. When God says, “Glorify me!”, he’s really saying, “Be filled with Joy!”

He’s inviting us into his Forever Happiness.

[Photo by Jasper Boer / Unsplash]

ALSO BY SALLY LLOYD-JONES

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A Response to "Why Men Should Not Be Pastors"

Last week, Sojourners released a short video that explains “7 Reasons Men Should Not Be Pastors" (watch here). Perhaps you are one of the millions of people who watched the video in your Facebook feed, maybe even one of the 32k people who shared the post or the 16k who hit “like.”

I didn’t hit “like,” but I did watch it a dozen times.

Here are the seven reasons, according to Sojourners, why men shouldn’t be pastors.

1. Men don’t need to be ordained to help in the church; they can always help in children’s ministry.
2. (Some) men are too handsome to be pastors; their good looks will distract.
3. Men are too emotional—have you seen March Madness!?
4. Men who have children will be sidetracked from pastoring by their family responsibilities.
5. Men can’t be trusted to lead because Jesus was betrayed by a man.
6. Men, about once a month, get really cranky.
7. Men, again, don’t have to be pastors to help in the church; they can help in other stereotypical male ways, such as leading worship on Father’s Day and fixing the church roof.

You see what they are doing, right? The video isn’t about why men shouldn’t be pastors. It’s about all the silly and sexist reasons that people tell women that they shouldn’t be pastors.

And with this, I agree. It’s wrong, even sinful, to fabricate arbitrary and sexist reasons why women shouldn’t be pastors. It’s been done, and I hate it. I’m sure all thoughtful Christians, especially ministry-minded women, must hate it, too. God hates it.

But who are we kidding? This isn’t the only message, nor even the main message of the video. The main message is not that women shouldn’t be excluded from the pastorate for silly and sexist reasons, but rather that women shouldn’t be excluded from the pastorate for any reason—come on, it’s 2016, people! Moreover, anyone who has any reasons for excluding women—including reasons based in Scripture—is likewise silly . . . or something worse (insert words here like “social dinosaur” or “patriarchal misogynist.”)

Complementarism v. Egalitarianism

In the history of the church, there are two main theological positions on men’s and women’s roles. They go by the names of “complementarianism” and “egalitarianism.” It will be helpful to briefly explain these views, specifically what both of these views affirm, and then mention how they differ.

Both views affirm that men and women are created equally in the image of God, and consequently have equal dignity, value, and worth. Also, both views believe that women and men can, and should, participate significantly in Christian ministry.

And yet, there are differences in the two positions. Egalitarians believe that there should be no distinctions in roles in the home and the church that are based upon the innate qualities of gender. Rather, egalitarians believe that any and all roles should be decided only on the basis of competency. In other words, if you are good at something, regardless of your gender, then you should be able to do it. If you can preach—preach it, sister.

Complementarians don’t believe this. They believe that manhood, in distinction from womanhood, means something—something beautiful. And complementarians believe that womanhood, in distinction from manhood, means something—something beautiful. Complementarians believe that roles are not determined only by competency but also, even mainly, by the good, enduring design of the Creator. In short, maleness and femaleness has meaning beyond “plumbing”; at our soul-level we are not androgynous but irrevocably and invaluably gendered.

Are There Bible-Reasons Why Pastors Should Only Be Men?

I don’t think I am a patriarchal misogynist, but I’m sure I sound that way to some. Regardless, I do think there are biblical reasons that men, and only men, should be elders in a local church. [1]

Because this is such a controversial point, allow me to mention seven of the biblical reasons for this view.

First, God gives Adam responsibilities of leadership before the fall, that is, Adam’s responsibility to lead is not a result of sin after Genesis 3. For example, before the fall, God creates Adam first and then Eve as a “helper fit for him” (2:18). Also, God gives Adam the responsibility of naming the animals, and then later Eve (2:19-20; 3:20). Additionally, God instructs Adam regarding which tree he should and should not eat from (2:15-17). This instruction took place before Eve was created. The expectation, then, is that Adam was to teach God’s moral instruction to Eve, thus implying a role of spiritual leadership.

Second, although Eve also sinned (even sinned first), God does not charge Eve with the responsibility of plunging the human race into sin and enmity with God. Rather, this is Adam’s responsibility, as taught in places like Romans 5:12-21.

Third, the way that Satan chooses to approach the woman in Genesis 3, also hints that Satan knew that God had placed Adam in a leadership role, and he deliberately chose to assault it. To use an analogy, if two nations are at war and one side chooses to deliberately bypass the President during negotiations, instead choosing to speak only with the Vice President, an insult is delivered. Satan insults the created order in bypassing Adam to speak with Eve.

Fourth, throughout both the Old Testament and New Testament there is a pattern of spiritual leadership being placed mainly among men (e.g., priests in the OT and the apostles and 12 disciples in the NT). This is not to say that at times women didn’t lead, but the primary pattern of male leadership is undeniable.

Fifth, there are many parallels between male leadership in the church and the headship of men in the home. This is taught in places like Ephesians 5, Colossians 3, and Titus 2.

Sixth, there is no explicit mention of women pastor-elders in the New Testament. If Jesus or his authorized representatives in the early church had desired women to be pastors, they didn’t make it clear. [3]

Finally, it would seem that specific passages, like 1 Timothy 2:8-3:7 and Titus 1:5-9, actually require elders to be males.

Why is This So Hard to Accept?

There are probably many reasons this view is unpopular. For one, the abuses of sinful men who treat headship like a right and privilege. This should not be the case, but sadly, it happens. Spiritual leadership is not a right or privilege, but a responsibility to be carried out humbly and sacrificially, the way Jesus carried it out (Ephesians 5:2, 25).

But there is likely another reason we chafe against this, one often not mentioned, namely, that complementarism assaults a certain cultural idol. It’s commonly held today that you can’t have differing roles without also having differing intrinsic worth. If someone does a different role, even especially if one is prevented from doing a role, then they must, according to the culture, be inferior. Thus, if women shouldn’t be pastors then women are by extension inferior.

But this is not what the Bible teaches, most especially demonstrated in the Triune relations between the Father, Son, and Spirit. Is the Son of God less than God the Father because the Son does his Father’s will (John 6:38)? Is the Holy Spirit less than God because he is called “helper” (John 14:26)? Orthodox Christianity has always said, no. Differing roles among the members of the Trinity do not necessitate a difference in value. Actually, quite the opposite is true.

At our church, as you might have guessed by now, we do not have women pastors. But we do, however, try our best to not over apply this.

For example, last Sunday at our worship services a woman read the closing benediction of Scripture. As well as, several women led songs during the worship service—and no, it wasn’t Mother’s Day. And at our church, the current head of the Finance Team is a woman (and the whole team, by the way, is made up of two women and two men). Just yesterday, in fact, I sent her an email asking if she could help direct me and the other elders about how to use certain funds—not a small or insignificant role. Of course, there are many other important ways women lead at our church; these are just a few. [4]

Making a distinction between men’s and women’s roles is especially controversial in our day. But this is nothing new. Throughout history, it’s often been the case. We see this even in New Testament times. We shouldn’t have a romantic view of the early church. They too needed to work through the issues, just as we do. Thankfully, God did not leave the early church to fend for themselves. Even though some considered it foolishness, God gave them his wisdom, just as he has given it to us (cf. 1 Corinthians 1:18-25; 2:14-16).

The final line in the Soujourners’ video asks viewers to “support women in the church.” I couldn’t agree more. I, however, think we do this best by not asking women to fill a role that God didn’t intend them to fill. “And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good” (Genesis 1:31).

*     *     *

[1] Of course, not just “any man” can be an elder, but only those men who fit the qualifications for elders as described in places like 1 Timothy 3:1-7, Titus 1:5-9, and 1 Peter 5:1-5. Also, throughout this post I’m using pastor and elder interchangeably because the Bible does.

[2] The decision we interpreters must make is whether this pattern is merely a product of their cultural norms or something with trans-cultural purpose (i.e., a God-given design for all time). I favor the latter. Male spiritual leadership existed in 116 AD and continues to exist in 2016, not because of cultural norms (sinful or otherwise) but divine design.

[3] And no, I don’t think Galatians 3:26-28 actually flattens all distinctions, though it does reinforce what is taught in many places, namely, that neither ethnicity nor gender can keep people from full status as children of God.

[4] And on a personal level, just this last week, I’ve been reading a detailed history of the prosperity gospel, which is written by a very gifted historian who also happens to be a woman. I thank God for her scholarship and I’m praying her book benefits many people.

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:

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How Did People in the Old Testament Live So Long?

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We are in our second year of a church book club. Last year and this year, we picked eight novels to discuss, focusing conversation on the themes of dignity and depravity, ruin and redemption, as well as the craft of writing. (You can see the list of books below.)

On Saturday, we discussed Perelandra by C. S. Lewis, which is Book II in the Lewis Space Trilogy. One person described Perelandra as a “theological treatise in a sci-fi context.” I think that’s probably a helpful way to look at it. The discussion leader for this particular book did a fantastic job; as you can see from the picture above (click to enlarge), his notes were very thorough!

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I don’t want to give away any of the book, but I do want to quote a section from the very end. It’s just one example of the many, many places where Lewis invites readers to consider biblical ideas afresh.

In this section, the main character (Ransom), is discussing an injury that he suffered and what will happen to his injury upon his subsequent return to earth. Because Perelandra is paradise-like, the king (named Tor), essentially says to a third character (named Tinidril), “I think Ransom will be okay because when someone has been here [the planet Perelandra], it takes a while for ‘paradise’ to get out of his or her system, even when one returns to a fallen planet.” 

The connection is then made to the “long livers” in the book of Genesis, and the way that, after the fall, it took a while for paradise to get out of our system.

I don’t know whether this is the best way to answer the question of “how did people live so long?” but I like it. And I thought you might, too.

*     *     *

Ransom looked down and saw that his heel was still bleeding. “Yes,” he said, “it is where the Evil One bit me. The redness is of [blood].”

“Sit down, friend,” said Tor, “and let me wash your foot in this pool.” Ransom hesitated but the King compelled him. So presently he sat on the little bank and the King kneeled before him in the shallow water and took the injured foot in his hand. He paused as he looked at it.

“So this is [blood],” he said at last. “I have never seen such a fluid before. And this is the substance wherewith Maleldil [the God-like character] remade the worlds before any world was made.”

He washed the foot for a long time but the bleeding did not stop. “Does it mean that [Ransom] will die?” said Tinidril at last.

“I do not think so,” said Tor. “I think that any of his race who has breathed the air that he has breathed and drunk the waters that he has drunk since he came to the Holy Mountain will not find it easy to die. Tell me. Friend, was it not so in your world that after they had lost their paradise the men of your race did not learn to die quickly?”

“I had heard,” said Ransom, “that those first generations were long livers, but most take it for only a Story or a Poetry and I had not thought of the cause.”

*     *     *

Book Club List, 2015

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
The End of the Affair by Graham Greene
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
Peace Like a Rive by Leif Enger
Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Book Club List, 2016

My Ántonia by Willa Cather
Perelandra by C. S. Lewis
Winesburg Ohio by Sherwood Anderson
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson

Some Favorite C.S. Lewis Books

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Sin Is Like Cobalt-60 - Don't Touch It

In Hebrews 3:13, the author uses the phrase “the deceitfulness of sin.” “But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called ‘today,’ that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.”

What does this phrase—“the deceitfulness of sin”—mean?

It means that sin lies. It’s dishonest; it’s a fraud. Sin leads astray. We might even say that sin “seduces.” That’s the sense the same Greek word has in other places, as a temptress and a seducer (e.g. Mark 4:19). Sin whispers, “You will not surely die. This will taste good; this will satisfy; this will make you alive.”

But, it doesn’t! It does not make us alive; it kills. Our hearts may beat faster for a moment but then comes the flatline. In this way, sin is like radioactive material—any contact, even a little, is deadly. That’s why those who handle uranium wear special suits and gloves.

A few years ago, some guys in Mexico stole a truck that was carrying Cobalt-60, and, unfortunately for them, after the getaway, the men opened up the sealed containers on the truck. They, however, were not wearing special suits and gloves.

When I saw the news story break, it sounded like the men weren’t going to make it (here and here). If acute radiation syndrome, as it’s called, had already begun to set in, then the cells in their bodies had begun to stop dividing. They were nauseous and vomiting. Their skin had begun to turn red. And quickly, the effects would become neurovascular, which meant that as the news story was breaking, they were probably already feeling dizzy. Very soon, they would lose consciousness. They needed treatment—and treatment now!

Getting such treatment, however, would first mean their sin had to come into the light, and turning themselves in would have had its own kind of pain. When a truck of stolen cobalt goes missing and then becomes international news, you can’t just enter a hospital in the same town and say, “I have a tummy ache”—especially if your skin is cherry red!

When sin stays in the dark, its power grows and its infection spreads. Bringing sin into the light, however, stops the spread. In the light, sin can’t lie, can’t deceive, can’t seduce. The apostle John speaks to this when he wrote,

But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin . . . . If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:7, 9)

Friends, if sin has seduced you, run to the light! Don’t wait until your hair falls out. Don’t hide in the dark allowing your acute radiation poisoning, your sin, to kill you. Instead, confess your sins to God, and he will cleanse you.

The forgiveness offered in Jesus is real. His death on the cross is sufficient; his Easter resurrection was victorious. Don’t be seduced. The pleasures of sin are fleeting. Come to the light, and find superior satisfaction in the love that God has for you.

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HOW TO READ A BOOK by Mortimer Adler (FAN AND FLAME Book Reviews)

Mortimer J. Adler and Charles Van Doren. How to Read a Book: The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading. Touchstone, 1972 (revised edition). 426 pp. $16.99.

In 1940, Mortimer J. Adler published How to Read a Book: The Art of Getting a Liberal Education. Since the original publication, the book has undergone several revisions and expansions, even adding a co-author (Charles Van Doren). And in this time, it’s become a classic—hence, the new subtitle: The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading.

I read a lot of books; maybe you do, as well. Thus for me, reading How to Read a Book seemed like a helpful tool to improve my reading of all books, a “sharpen the axe before you cut down a forest” sort of thing.

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Adler writes in the first chapter, “Our subject, then, is the art of reading good books when understanding is the aim you have in view” (p. 10). He goes on to explain, over the next 400 plus pages, how to achieve this understanding, the kind of understanding that allows for critical engagement of the book and author.

In this post, I’m not going to do a full review. A review of any classic, let alone one on reading books, seems beyond my ability. Harry Callahan, played by Clint Eastwood, famously said, “A man’s gotta know his limitations.” Instead, what I want to do is simply share with you a few of the key questions that Alder believes a reader must be able to answer about a book before he or she can say they have reached understanding of the book’s arguments. You can find these questions below.

But before I share them with you, let me explain what Alder believes these questions are for. Alder argues that if you, as a reader, are able to answer these questions, then—and only then—can you say, “I understand this book.” And he argues that understanding must come before we can say whether we agree or disagree with it, like or dislike it . . . and make a hundred other informed observations. Without this understanding, a reader’s judgments remain superficial.

I found his list of questions very helpful for writing book reviews. Sometimes, I fear that my reviews become too fixated on things that either thrilled or annoyed me. These types of observations, while interesting and maybe even helpful to others, should be secondary to the primary task, namely, the task of engaging the author’s main argument.

I know many of you might not ever write a book review, but maybe there are some books, take the Bible for example, where you want to grow in your ability to understand. If so, these questions certainly will prod you in the right direction.

*     *     *

I.  The First Stage of Analytical Reading: Rules for Finding What a Book Is About: What is the book about as a whole?

1.       Classify the book according to kind and subject matter.

2.       State what the whole book is about with the utmost brevity.

3.       Enumerate its major parts in their order and relation, and outline these parts as you have outlined the whole.

4.       Define the problem or problems the author has tried to solve.

II. The Second Stage of Analytical Reading: Rules for Interpreting a Book's Contents: What is being said in detail, and how?

5.       Come to terms with the author by interpreting his key words.

6.       Grasp the author’s leading propositions by dealing with his most important sentences.

7.       Know the author’s arguments, by finding them in, or con­structing them out of, sequences of sentences.

8.       Determine which of his problems the author has solved, and which he has not; and of the latter, decide which the author knew he had failed to solve.

III. The Third Stage of Analytical Reading: Rules for Criticizing a Book as a Communication of Knowledge: Is it true? and What of it?

A. General Maxims of Intellectual Etiquette

9.       Do not begin criticism until you have completed your out­line and your interpretation of the book. (Do not say you agree, disagree, or suspend judgment, until you can say “I understand.")

10.   Do not disagree disputatiously or contentiously.

11.   Demonstrate that you recognize the difference between knowledge and mere personal opinion by presenting good reasons for any critical judgment you make.

B.  Special Criteria for Points of Criticism

12.   Show wherein the author is uninformed.

13.   Show wherein the author is misinformed.

14.   Show wherein the author is illogical.

15.   Show wherein the author's analysis or account is incomplete.

(Adler, How to Read a Book, pp. 161-2)

[Photo by Patrick Tomosso]

ANSWERING JIHAD by Nabeel Qureshi (FAN AND FLAME Book Reviews)

Nabeel Qureshi. Answering Jihad: A Better Way Forward. Zondervan, 2016. 176 pp. $14.99. 

 

Last summer, I met a Muslim mother. I’ll call her Asah. Asah had a young daughter who had recently become a Christian. As we talked, I was fascinated by what Asah told me about her daughter’s faith in Christ. She said something like, “I don’t want my daughter to have to be a Muslim. I want her to be free to choose, to make up her own mind.” Then she added, “I’ll be happy with whatever religion she chooses.”

The conversation was surreal and made me realize that Christianity is not the only religion that faces challenges with both nominalism and syncretism. Nominalism is when “followers” are followers in name only. Syncretism is the blending of orthodox religious beliefs with various other worldviews—in this case, the blending of Islam with the tenets of pluralism.

On the other end of the spectrum from Asah, however, are the radicals, the extremists, the mujahideen, the men and women who wear vests fitted with shrapnel and C-4 that explode in crowded markets filled with people shopping for dinner. On this end of the spectrum are the jihadists. 

And it’s these two extremes which leave me—and millions of other people—with questions. Is there such a thing as “peaceful Islam”? Surely, there are peaceful Muslims; I know them. And if there are peaceful Muslims, who are the “real” Muslims, that is, which Muslims are authentic to the faith expressed in their canonical texts?

Answering Jihad

Last Sunday, a man in our church handed me a copy of Answering Jihad: A Better Way Forward by Nabeel Qureshi. He told me that he was on the “launch team” for the book and he’d like me to read it. As a pastor, I have a stack of books a dozen high which I am to read. But after I looked at it closer, Answering Jihad didn’t go to the bottom but moved to the top.

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I had heard of Qureshi because of his book Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus, which has received much attention (becoming a New York Times bestseller, for example), but I didn’t realize his erudition, his impressive educational resume. Qureshi is a speaker with Ravi Zacharias International Ministries, holds an MD from Eastern Virginia Medical School, an MA in Christian apologetics from Biola University, an MA in religion from Duke University, and is pursuing a doctorate in New Testament studies at Oxford University.

Why This Book—Now?

In the preface, Qureshi tells some of his own story. After the 9/11 attacks he was forced to think about his Muslim upbringing like never before. In the end, Qureshi saw himself with only three options: apostasy, apathy, or radicalization. He chose apostasy and embraced Christianity. Although outspoken about his faith, until a few months ago, he never desired to address jihad publicly because the issues are so charged. “For the sake of keeping my message and intentions clear,” he writes, “I had decided to answer such questions on an individual basis rather than publishing a book on the matter” (p. 9).

But on November 13, Paris was attacked. Then on December 2, there were shootings in San Bernardino. Then on December 7, Donald Trump proposed a temporary ban on all Muslim immigration, specifically in light of the over four million Syrian refugees seeking asylum in the West. Then on December 15, Wheaton professor Larycia Hawkins was placed on administrative leave over her controversial actions and statements about Islam and Christianity. Now, Qureshi felt he had to write a response, to chart a “better way forward, a way that upholds both truth and compassion” (p. 11).

Answering Jihad is structured in a Q&A format around 18 relevant questions. The questions are broken into three parts. In Part I: The Origins of Jihad, he answers questions such as “What is Islam?”, “What is Jihad?”, and “Was Islam spread by the sword?” In Part II: Jihad Today, he answers questions such as, “What is radical Islam?” and “Who are al-Qaida, ISIS, and Boko Haram?” (Aside: After reading the scope of the violence, especially done by Boko Haram, I wrote in the margin of this section, “No words.” There really aren’t.) Finally, in Part III: Jihad in Judeo-Christian Context, he answers questions such as “How does jihad compare with the Crusades?” The book also has several appendices.

The Main Point

The rise of radical Islam is the result of a complex blend of 50 years of geopolitics, but Qureshi argues, radical Islam is not a “new” Islam, but rather a reformation to the original of the original, a return to the roots. Thus to the question, “Is Islam—true Islam—a religion of peace?” Qureshi says no. True Islam, the Islam most consistent with its canonical texts, is not peaceful. Therefore, as part of a better way forward, Qureshi advocates seeing a distinction between the teachings of Islam and Muslims themselves, who for various reasons may (or may not) hold to some (or all) of the violent aspects of Islam. Obviously, this is controversial and offensive to many. But in the context of his detailed, historical overview, this conclusion seems fitting.

I appreciated many things about the book, including how quickly the book was published. It has the contemporary relevance of a blog post yet the quality ensured by the gatekeeping of traditional publishing, which typically takes as long as 18 months. You don’t publish this book in a month or two without a team of motivated people and a gifted author who has thought deeply about the topics for a long time. Additionally, I appreciated how Qureshi rejects endless equivocation. In a fuzzy culture of supposed tolerance, he draws conclusions and makes recommendations, all without feeling like he has an axe to grind. If anything, the prose feels understated and calm, in an appropriate way.

I think many readers, especially Christians, will find Answering Jihad accessible, thoughtful, and a help as we seek to “love God and love people” in a complex and sometimes violent world. It’s not a book on public policy, though it can and should certainly inform those who craft it. “My suggestion,” he writes, “is that we engage Muslims proactively with love and friendship while simultaneously acknowledging the truth about Islam. This is not the final step in answering jihad, but it is the correct first step” (p. 148). And it’s a step I, personally, want to continue to take. 

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The Owlings by D.A. DeWitt (FAN AND FLAME Book Reviews)

D.A. DeWitt. The Owlings: A Worldview Novella, Book I. Theolatte Press, 2014. 98 pp. $10.99. 
___. The Owlings: A Worldview Novella, Book II. Theolatte Press, 2015. 142 pp. $10.99. 

In the evenings, after dinner and before bedtime, a few nights a week I read to my family. Last year we read three of the seven books in The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis.

If that sounds idyllic, just know that between most paragraphs, and certainly most pages, my wife and I have to parent. And by “parent,” I mean we have to tell our kids to stop talking or jumping or punching or playing with my iPhone. For reasons like these, I’d say that one out of every five reading nights ends prematurely with a frustrated Dad. Regardless, we pushed through the back of the wardrobe and explored almost half of Narnia. By years end, we hope to battle through to The Last Battle (pun intended!).

Our family, however, needed a break from Lewis. And last fall, when a friend of mine shared on Twitter that one of his friends just released the second book in his series of children’s books—books the author called “worldview novellas”—I was intrigued. So I bought both books, and last week our family finished them.

The books are The Owlings, Book I and Book II by D.A. DeWitt. DeWitt is the dean of Boyce College (the undergraduate school of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary). At Boyce, he teaches courses on worldview, philosophy, apologetics, and C. S. Lewis. He has written several books, most recently, Christ or Chaos (Crossway, 2016). He also blogs regularly at Theolatte.com. (I’d encourage you to check him out; I enjoy his weekly “Weekend Worldview Reader” email).

In Book I, we meet a boy named Josiah who has lost his father. He and his mother live on a farm. My children giggled each time Josiah’s mother calls her son, “Sugar booger,” which she did frequently. Josiah and his friend and neighbor, Addi—with the help of four talking owls—work through the prospect of moving, a significant challenge for a young boy. In Book II, more characters are added, including Matt and Megan, and a bully named Cody. (After all, what would a childhood be like without a bully?!)

Each book engages a different aspect of an atheistic worldview. In Book I, the issue is naturalism. Josiah has a substitute teacher named Sam (after notable atheist Sam Harris), who teaches the class that “Nature is all that there was, is, and ever will be”—an allusion to Carl Sagan’s famous quote. Through a family struggle, Josiah meets four talking owls who help him learn that there is more to our world than nature; preeminently, there’s a Creator who cares deeply about his creation.

In Book II, the issue is—what might be called—scientism. In this view, science is not so much “helper of man,” but rather a god. This story takes place during a field trip to a local museum. It’s here that the museum’s director, Dr. Russell (who is named after famous atheist Bertrand Russell), repeatedly seeks to teach the students that “What science cannot teach us, we cannot know.” Again, with the help of the owls, Josiah learns the limits of scientism, even as he seeks to solve the case of who stole his lunchbox.

From a literary standpoint, I don’t think The Owlings is on the same plane as The Chronicles of Narnia—but what series is?! However, considering my children’s level of enthusiasm, I’d say The Owlings certainly generated more healthy discussions among them. DeWitt plans to write five books in the series. I’m sure our family will be reading each as they are released.

 Books by D.A. DeWitt

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Smoke the Curve

Recently, I’ve been posting some tips to help pastors find the right job in a local church. I’m currently working to compile all of the posts (and more) into a book. Here is the proposed introduction to Chapter 2. It’s a story from my track and field days.

*     *     *

Chapter 2: Smoke the Curve

In track and field, the 200m race is a sprint. It’s only half a lap. It takes the best men in the world just under twenty seconds and the rest of us somewhere in the twenties. You start the race on the curve and finish on the straightaway.

When I was in high school, my sprint coach was Coach Grosso. He was a short, intense Italian man. He could bench press all of the weights in the gym, and he perennially wore a tank top, even in winter (at least inside). I remember many of the things that Coach Grosso taught us but especially how to run a 200m race.

And what was his secret?

Coach Grosso would pull us in close and in a raspy, passionate voice he would say, “Boys, if you want to run a fast 200m, ya’ gotta smoke the curve.”

Smoke the curve is track-speak for “start fast.” What he meant is that you need to get out of the blocks clean; don’t hold anything back because if you hold back at the start, it won’t matter how fast you can finish.

I don’t know if this remains the best coaching advice for running the 200m or not. I wasn’t ever very good at the 200m, but that’s because I was slow not because I was poorly coached. Regardless, this is what you’ll need to do if you want to find a job in Christian ministry: ya’ gotta smoke the curve. When the gun goes off, you need to be ready to run because if you don’t start strong, you won’t get a chance to end strong; the process will be over.

When I was looking for my first pastoral job, I thought I knew how important the initial contact would be. However, I wasn’t ready for what I experienced.

After I sent my cover letter and resume to one church, I called to see how the process was going and to let them know I was interested. The kind woman who answered the phone said, “It’s so nice of you to call. The search is going great.” When I asked how many people had applied, she said, “I think it’s up to 300.”

A few weeks later, I applied to another church, and in that search, I later found out I was one of 600 candidates from eleven different countries! See what I mean? If you don’t start strong in this process, you might be a great candidate, but they are moving on—without you.

Now I’m several years removed from these experiences. Now I can say (both as a candidate and someone who has been on search committees) that the size of those searches is on the high end of the spectrum. But they are not unheard of, especially for the large church that posts a well-crafted job description on a major website. In Chapter 2, I’ll show you how to get ready to run this race and maybe even how to take a few quick steps around the curve.

Always include a short, custom cover letter.

To start off, we need to talk about cover letters, resumes, references, family bios, and recommendation letters . . .

[Photo by Thomas Brasington / CC BY] 

Darkness Is My Only Food

I’m at a theology conference. It’s dinner time and a wonderful looking spread has been provided in the foyer of the mega-church hosting the conference. Just one thing left to do. I look for someone who seems to be in charge. I find a man and woman sitting at a desk. I ask if there is someone here from the catering company because I just need to ask a quick question.

He responds, “They already left. Can I help?”

“Maybe,” I say. “I just need to know about some of the ingredients. I have a few food allergies.”

“Oh, what are you allergic to?” he asks.

I lowered my head and began to walk away. “Thanks,” I mumbled, “I’ll just call the caterer myself.”

Tonight, I’m not in the mood to answer this question because sometimes—as my family jokes—it’s easier to talk about what I am not allergic to than what I am allergic to.

Classic Allergies vs. Delayed Allergies   

I’ve written a little bit about the development of my food allergies (here). But that article focused on typical allergens, things like dairy and gluten. As well, since the time of publication, I’ve learned more about my own issues (which I’m often asked to explain). For all of these reasons, it seemed like it was time to write this follow up.

When most people think of allergies, they think of what are considered “classic allergies”—you eat something and in less than two hours, you’re in trouble. In a non-food context, a classic allergy looks like being allergic to cats: you visit a home with cats, and in less than two hours every orifice on your face starts oozing. Classic food allergies are called immediate-onset allergies, or IgE-allergies.

But there is another kind of allergy called delayed-onset allergies, or IgG-allergies (that’s IgG not IgE). As the name suggests, they don’t occur right away. Delayed allergies show up somewhere between four hours and four days after consumption. This makes them very difficult to identify. Additionally, delayed allergies tend to have a cumulative effect; slow and steady, they stack.

These delayed-onset allergies are a symptom, some doctors think, of having a “leaky gut.” (What a terrible sounding thing, right?) A leaky gut means you have permeability of the intestinal wall, which is a fancy way of saying your “pipes” have tiny pinholes in them. These pinholes allow trace amounts of food into your body, which in turn, causes inflammation. This inflammation can manifest itself in a variety of ways, including things like irritability, bloating, constipation, unexplained fatigue, and “brain fog” (the inability to think clearly).

This is all very new to me, so please forgive me if my explanations are fumbling a bit. (Just blame it on brain fog!) It’s hard enough to understand what has happened to me, let alone explain it to others. And to make matters more difficult to describe—and this part is just my impression—it seems there is little established consensus on these things in the medical community, both in diagnoses and treatment.

The good news, so one theory says, is that delayed allergies can go away if you do two things. First, seek to repair the pinholes by taking a good probiotic, which is a collection of bacteria helpful to your digestive system (naturally occurring in things like yogurt and sauerkraut). Second, stridently eliminate all of the foods you are allergic to from your diet. On this point, the analogy is made to a fire: If you stop putting kindling on a fire, it might smolder for a bit, but eventually it must die out. Without fuel, eventually even a barn fire becomes a bonfire becomes a campfire, and so on.

Taking the probiotic—Step 1—is the easy part. It’s food elimination—Step 2—that proves difficult, especially if you’re like me.

So What Foods Must I Avoid?

There is a specific blood test to determine your “delayed” reactivity to 96 different foods. Really, the test includes far more than 96 foods because a positive test for, say, oranges (like I had), actually includes everything in the orange family: cuties, tangerines, mandarin oranges, blood oranges, navel oranges, etc.

When my results came back, I tested positive for 32 things! You can see all of them in the chart below, as well as my relative reactivity to each.

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As you look at the chart, there are a couple of things worth pointing out. First, my reaction to “all things dairy” is so strong that it’s likely this fire will never go out. For me, dairy is probably in the category of a classic allergy. (From multiple experiences last year, I think this will probably prove true.)

Second, the difficulty of avoiding each food varies: Some are easy to avoid and others are not. Rarely, if ever, did I eat lobster or radishes, so these are easy to eliminate. Other things, however, are exceedingly difficult—and not only from an enjoyment standpoint. They are hard to eliminate because they knock out whole isles of a grocery store. I’ll just list a few of the more problematic ones.

1. Dairy
2. Eggs
3. Wheat-Gluten
4. Soy
5. Sugar (processed, not the kind naturally found in grapes or agave)
6. Almonds
7. Potato (white, but not sweet)

If you want to play a fun game, go into your pantry and try to find something without these ingredients. If it’s in a box or has a wrapper, it won’t be easy.

Currently, in our pantry, we have three boxes of Lucky Charms. (I think they were on sale.) Some mornings, and even some evenings, I just stare at them. I’m so hungry that I want to eat Lucky Charms not by the bowl but the box. You might not have guessed this, but they’re actually gluten-free, as are many cereals from General Mills, but it’s the sugar that makes them off limits. Seriously though, try finding any cereal other than rice-puffs that does not have added sugar. Not Cheerios, not Wheat Chex, not Kix, which is “mother approved.” They all have it. My wife, Brooke, once found a $6 pouch of granola that I could eat. It would have lasted me two, maybe three, normal bowls. Like Matt Damon on Mars, I rationed it to five.

Some meals, I’m fine with all of this. With the help of my wife, we figure it out. Other meals, my heart rages. I just want to eat like everyone else; I want to feel “full” after a meal, a feeling much harder to come by these days. But it’s still social settings that are the most difficult for me. I’ve yet to find a way to explain all of this easily. Also, we saw an immediate 20% increase in our monthly grocery bill and—though this is impossible to quantify—at least the same percentage reduction in taste.

It used to be, back when I thought I was only allergic to dairy, that I could enjoy a good many meals just by chance—they were meals that didn’t rely on dairy, and if they did, it was only some small part of the whole, which was easily avoidable. Now, however, no random collision of ingredients can produce something edible for me, something nonflammable. Instead, great intelligent design is required to produce a meal because of the irreducible complexity; every meal is finely tuned. 

This has made it almost impossible to eat at restaurants. At Chipotle, a personal and family favorite, I’ve learned there are only three things on the menu (of all they serve), which I can eat: corn tortillas, plain lettuce, and fajita veggies. Not exactly your traditional burrito.

And at our small group Bible study, where we often share a meal, we recently discussed how it will be better if I just bring my own food or eat beforehand, which wasn’t a decision pushed upon me; I suggested it as my favorite option. I just don’t see another way.

An encouragement, though, is that there happens to be another member of our small group who has similar food issues, only her allergies have improved over time. She’s further down the road to recovery, which gives me some hope that there may be food at the end of the tunnel, at least more of it.

Darkness is My Only Food

Now, I want to come back to the title of this post: “Darkness Is My Only Food.” This phrase is an allusion to Psalm 88. The last line of the psalm ends with like this: “Darkness is my closest friend” (v. 18, NIV).

The psalms are filled with laments. This is to say, they are filled with people pouring out their struggles to God. These laments often end with notes of both praise and hope—as they should. God is our God.

Psalm 88, however, is unique in that it does not end on a note of hope but rather despair. The specific details behind the author’s troubles are not included, yet we do know something of the magnitude. This person’s trials were so great, that twice he says that he fears his trials are the result of the wrath of God being upon him (vv. 7, 16).

But I should also point out, that even in this dark psalm, there are glimmers of hope. The author is convinced that God is, and will be, his savior (vv. 1, 9). Additionally, this psalm is situated within the canon of Scripture, which repeatedly affirms that those loved by God are never without hope.

Why Am I Writing This?

I’m not writing this so that you can feel sorry for me. And I’m not writing this so that you’ll send me emails telling me that your Aunt Sally had this too and when she stood on her head to eat and rubbed essential oils into her belly button that after 14 days, she could eat nachos for breakfast.

I’m writing this because darkness has become my only food, and like the psalmist, I’m often discouraged. And when my discouragement bottoms out, I do know that God holds me in his strong arms, even as he holds my wife and family. I know God won’t let us go.

But sometimes I don’t feel this. So I need your prayers.

Roses Are Red, A Tired Cliche

On Sunday, which was of course Valentine’s Day, I shared a short poem before my sermon. The poem—in both a goofy and I hope serious way—critiqued the sappy view of love we have in culture today. And I hope it encouraged us to look to God’s love as the model of true love, whether we are single or married.

If you’d like to hear all of the introductory comments about the poem, which I think would be very helpful, you can listen to the first nine minutes of my sermon below.

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Roses Are Red, A Tired Cliché
Benjamin Vrbicek

Roses are red. Violets are blue.
Sugar is sweet. And so are you.

Are these our poems? “Violets are blue.
Sugar is sweet”? I guess that’s true.

Our poems are lame, in culture today.
Romance is cheap, like pots of clay.

We need much more—old truth made new.
God sent his Son, a love rescue.

Think how better, our poems could be,
If from above, this love we’d see.

The flame of the Lord flashes,
Love neither quiet nor quaint.
Its heat dashes and smashes
The sappy portraits we paint.

Loves draws lines in wet cement.
In the furnace of trials,
Marriage vows harden and set.
And love, though strained, still smiles.

Now of singles: in culture today,
“Singles are weird,” so they say.

Not in Scripture. Paul wanted more,
Singles to serve, so love will soar.

Jesus is real. Single was he.
His church his bride, trust him and see.

Roses are red. Violets are blue.
Love more than sweet? God’s love for you.

Faithful God stays, with love like glue.
When Gospel meets, sinners like you.

* Special thanks to my wife, Brooke, for help with a few of the sticky lines.

OTHER POEMS

When to Play the Field and When to Date Exclusively

Recently, I’ve been posting some tips to help pastors find the right job in a local church. This post is a continuation of the series. In it, I encourage pastors looking for a job to think about when it is appropriate “to play the job field” and when they need to “date a job exclusively.”

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Know when to play the field and when to date exclusively.

I don’t really like the dating analogy, but to a point, it fits.

There is a time when it’s acceptable, even expected, to be in simultaneous conversations with multiple churches. If you are a graduating seminary student, people expect this. But even then, you’ll need to know when to cut those many conversations off so that you can focus on just one church at a time.

There’s not an exact formula to figure this out, but there are some boundaries which I believe most would agree upon. If you are sending cover letters and resumes to churches, especially those doing open searches, then it’s probably fine for you to be in conversation with several churches at once. It’s like having casual conversations in the cafeteria, anyway, not like holding hands in a fancy steak restaurant over a candlelight dinner.

But on the other end of the spectrum, you certainly don’t want to be in the place where one weekend you have the final candidating interviews at one church, and then, on the next weekend plan to do the same thing at another church. This type of promiscuity helps no one, and more importantly, it doesn’t please God.

The further into the hiring process you are, the more hearts (both yours and those searching for a shepherd) will become invested, especially as the prospective church introduces you to more people. And if you continue to play the field, at some point it becomes like cheating.

Our role as candidates, throughout the hiring process, is both to trust in the goodness and sovereignty of God, and at the same time, to practice the golden rule—doing unto churches what you would want churches to do unto you. Think about it like this: I know you don’t want to be on a candidating weekend at a church, only to find out later that on subsequent weekends, three other candidates are doing the same thing at the same church. Churches and candidates shouldn’t choose each other the way the groom on the television show The Bachelor chooses his bride.

Finding a job in Christian ministry is a spiritual endeavor, an endeavor that requires godliness and trust. It’s not the “Miss Universe” competition. If you are unsure about where to draw the line, between talking with many churches and talking with just one church, ask trusted friends. You shouldn’t have to figure this out alone, for as Proverbs teaches, “In an abundance of counselors there is safety” (11:14; cf. 15:22).

When in doubt, err on the side of too much disclosure with a church, not too little. Rarely will this hurt your chances of future employment anyway.

And, if it does, so what? You did the right thing. That’s the important part, because God will be pleased.

On Telling People You Are Leaving

Recently, I’ve been posting some tips to help pastors find the right job in a local church. This post is a continuation of the series. In it, I encourage pastors to think about who, when, and in what order to tell people you are taking a new job.

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Know who, when, and in what order to tell people you are taking a new job.

Few things have the potential to harm relationships like finding out important information from the wrong person and at the wrong time. For example, if your girlfriend decided to breakup with you, but she told a bunch of other people first, you’re not going to forget this.

Likewise, in the church, it’s important to think through the details related to announcing your transition. When done well, more often than not, transitions can and should be celebrated—not simply endured, or worse, become harmful to the church.

Therefore, when you know you’ll be taking a new job (or that you very likely might be taking a new job), you’ll also want to know whom to tell, how soon to tell them, and in what order to tell them. This means you’ll have to understand your current ministry context and what is appropriate in that context. Are you about to graduate from Bible college? If so, who you tell and in what order you tell them, will look very different than if you are the lead pastor of a mega-church about to leave for another pastorate.

When I was completing seminary, figuring out who to tell and when to tell them wasn’t difficult. The church I attended was a good church, but it didn’t have a full-time position open, nor would it in the foreseeable future. Therefore, it was easy for me to talk openly about job opportunities. In fact, it made for an encouraging season; I could share prayer requests and job updates publicly.

If your context doesn’t allow for such openness (and most won’t), I would encourage you to consider telling others in terms of concentrically expanding circles. The first circle, the inner circle, might consist of key leadership figures. Perhaps this is your senior pastor and the elder board. The next circle may include ministry friends and those in whom you have invested or worked closely with in ministry. Finally, in the last circle, there are those generally in your congregation and those outside your church.

If you tell people in this order, I believe God will be honored.

The only caveat I’ll add to this concentric, expanding circle principle is that there might be a few people—though they won’t be many—who you tell before you tell the senior leadership, perhaps your closest friends and a mentor or two. These might even be, in fact will often be, people outside your church system. These people are the ones who will coach you all along the transition, perhaps even before you’ve identified a new calling.

And when it does come time to make the announcement public, if you have time, go out of your way to tell as many people as you can in person, especially those with whom you were close. The last thing you want is someone in whom you’ve invested (and they in you) to find out you’re leaving when they open the weekly church bulletin.

When I left my last church, there were some constraints on the timing of how we were going to announce it to the whole church body. There always are. As I worked with the church leadership about when to make the announcement public, it turned out that I had merely 48 hours to tell friends and ministry partners before it was publicly announced at our weekend services.

But that was okay; I was so thankful I even had that. And I used it well. I made a list of everyone that I thought might be hurt by hearing the announcement cold, and then I called or met with as many as possible. It made for a busy two days, but I wouldn’t change a thing.

Again, I can’t prescribe exactly how this should look in your context. But what I’m stressing is that love and respect for individuals, for the Church (with a capital “C”), and for God’s reputation must be your motivation for how and when you inform people. If you have the goal of only protecting your own interests, you’re in sin (Philippians 2:4-5). But if you seek to love others and honor God, as I said above, more often than not, your transition will be a season of encouragement for yourself, your family, and the churches involved.