Was Jesus Really Serious?

Leave a reply
Share

A couple days ago, I started reading a book a friend gave me, The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical, by Shane Claiborne. This is one of the few “rock your world” books I’ve read. (For starters, think Mother Theresa meets Willow Creek Community Churchl; imagine the culture shock going from one to the other. Shane spent three months working with “Momma T” in a Calcutta leper colony, then did a one-year internship in Chicago with Willow Creek. At least he was able to see Jesus in both places!) As I’m reading, I’m struck by this guy’s radical belief that we’re actually supposed to take Jesus seriously! Do you mean to tell me that when Jesus told the righteous rich kid to sell everything he had and give it to the poor…he actually meant it?!? Claiborne seems to think so!

For the past year or so, I have been doing an unusual (for me) amount of thinking about wealth and poverty, freedom and oppression, West and East, America and Africa. I think it really started when our pastor at Imago Dei Community, Rick McKinley, did a series on Isaiah 61, a passage about freedom from oppression, which Jesus read in the synagogue and then had the audacity to claim was fulfilled in himself right then and there! Ever since then, my eyes have been opened to the fact that God actually cares about the poor…so much so, in fact, that he wants me to do something about it. And not just me, but all his people. This idea is rampant in the prophets (at least in Isaiah and Jeremiah, which are all I’ve read so for for school). Over and over again, God tells the Israelites to break down oppression wherever they see it. Surprisingly, it seems, it is the Israelites themselves – remember, those folks that were rescued by God from the oppression in Egypt – who are guilty of oppressing. And the ones they’re guilty of oppressing are, ironically, themselves. And, of course, it’s the leaders – the “shepherds” – who are oppressing the poorer ones. Hmmm…I guess there really isn’t anything new under the sun. What is grabbing me, though, is not just that God cares about freeing people, but that he wants me to work toward that end. And you, probably; certainly you, if you are in any sense a leader of God’s people.

Here’s a big part of the challenge for me, though: I’m clearly a part of that “oppressing” group – I’m white, I’m a guy, I’m a Christian (and, gasp!, an evangelical Christian), I’m American, I’m middle class, I’m wealthy (at least compared to most of the world), I’m a Republican (though that may change)…and I’ve spent the last 14 years in the financial industry, helping people get rich, invest their riches, manage their riches, and distribute their riches to their rich kids. Maybe I’m that righteous rich kid Jesus met!

Reflecting on his transition from Calcutta to Chicago, Claiborne writes, “I knew that we could not end poverty until we took a careful look at wealth. I was to battle the beast from within the belly.” That’s where I find myself…in the belly of the beast. The question I wrestle with is, how can I confront oppression from the inside?

To be continued….

When Prayer Doesn’t Seem Like Enough

Leave a reply
Share

I confess that I have had, since I was a boy, a “savior complex”; it’s tied in closely to my Type-A, take charge, “doer” personality, so when I see things going on around me and something needs to be done – like the wildfires in Southern California – I want to kick it into high gear.

Despite the fact that I grew up in a Christian home, with parents who have dedicated their lives and careers to faith-based ministry, I have somehow never felt that prayer was doing. It’s always seemed like what you do when you’re waiting to do something real, or when you can’t do anything else…sort of a time-filler, not really “doing” anything, just waiting…and wishing.

Having moved up from San Diego last year, and having experienced (to a limited extent) the devastation from the Cedar Fire there four years ago next week, the fires raging down there now are challenging both my faith and my savior complex. I want to pray (and I am praying), but I also want to do something more, as if that were possible. I’m not comfortable with the possibility that God may just want me to learn to pray, and quite frankly, I’m going to fight him on that a bit. Theological lessons aside, I want to see what we can do from here. Maybe it will be “just” praying, but maybe there’s something more. There are some very real, immediate needs – for doctors and nurses, coffee, cots, blankets, sun block, prepared foods…. There will be ongoing needs, for cleanup first, but also for rebuilding, refurnishing homes, replacing clothes and toys and dishes and couches and beds. (Many people haven’t even finished rebuilding since the Cedar Fire four years ago; others, I would bet, have already lost what they just rebuilt.) [For a look at real needs in real time – and to see what some people are doing – check out the blog for Flood Church in San Diego at http://www.diveintoflood.com/impactblog/?p=48.]

How might we mobilize ourselves, our professional associates, our clients…and their extended resources…to be of service in these fire-devastated areas? I’m open to your thoughts…and your prayers.

Black & White Living in a Color World

Leave a reply
Share

I’m working on a book. Writing one, that is. Okay, maybe it’s a bit presumptuous of me to suggest that. But I have an idea for one, and I’ve written a number of pages in my journal on the topic, and if I don’t run out of ideas or motivation or time or energy, then maybe…just maybe…I’ll write enough to eventually qualify it as book length. And…well, let’s not even mention publishers at this point.

I don’t really have a thesis yet, but the basic train of thought is the impact that growing up in an evangelical environment has had on my life as an adult. In fact, the working title for my book is “Growing Up Evangelical”…so don’t even think about beating me to that title! And no, I am not copying Stacia Brown, who wrote an article with that title in Sojourners magazine in June 2005. I just did a Google search for the title, and her article was the first hit, so I’ll be reading that sometime and may refer to it to see if my experience is at all similar to that of the people interviewed for the article…but I was thinking about the title before I came across her article. But enough of the disclaimers.

First let me say that I think growing up evangelical wasn’t all bad. I think it gave me a pretty solid theological foundation, even if I’ve had to go back as an adult to explore and test that foundation at several points. There are very few doctrinal points that I would say I’ve actually changed in adulthood, and where I have is all in what I would consider “non-essentials.” Some of my evangelical brothers and sisters would disagree with my analysis of what is essential, but alas, that is a part of the yin side of the evangelical yin-yang: we can’t even agree on what we ought to agree on! Hence the title of this post.

Perhaps one of the most significant impacts of growing up evangelical has been the propensity to view the world in black and white. That has a whole host of corollaries: right and wrong, us and them, liberal and conservative, saved and lost, evangelical and mainline, Republican and Democrat, Protestant and Catholic, heaven and hell…. Oops, maybe I shouldn’t have thrown in that last couplet; after all, I do believe – in fact, I’m quite convinced – that the Bible teaches a very literal heaven and hell. But I’m not so sure that the world can be so easily divided, whether theologically or spiritually or religiously or even politically.

Let me cut evangelicalism a little slack here and acknowledge that my personality is well-suited to these dichotomies. I like the whole A or B kind of distinctions; it makes things so easy to categorize, and if I know what category to put you in, then I know what to do with you. The problem is, life isn’t black and white. In fact, it’s quite colorful. And I’ve been learning over the past few years that people can’t be shunted off into one of two categories quite as easily as I’d like to do so. Oh yes, I know that Jesus will do just that at the final judgment, when he “separates the sheep from the goats” – see Matthew 25 – but I think he’s probably a far better judge than I am, so I’ll try to leave that to him and just focus on seeing a bit more color in the world.

When is “Innovation” Not Enough … or Too Much?

Leave a reply
Share

For the past year or so, I have been a regular reader of and commenter over at Monday Morning Insight (MMI), a website geared toward innovative church ministry (my description). Todd Rhoades, host of the site, seems to have a good head on his shoulders, a heart for reaching people through the church, and a passion for connecting pastors and church leaders with each other and resources that will help them reach people for God’s kingdom. I have appreciated most of what I’ve seen at MMI, especially the glimpses I’ve gotten into how people are doing church in other parts of the country.

Recently, Outreach magazine named the top innovative churches (which, as is to be expected, are all fairly large ones). A fellow seminary student decried the list – “Can you spot more than three innovative churches on this list???” Lists like this aren’t new. In fact, Elmer Towns wrote a book in 1991 called, 10 Of Today’s Most Innovative Churches: What They’re Doing, How They’re Doing It and How You Can Apply Their Ideas in Your Church. (Actually, it’s the last part of that subtitle that scares me…there are plenty of copycat churches around, and I would venture to say that few of them implement the “innovations” as effectively as the innovators.)
Still, lists like this make me wonder a couple things. First, what constitutes innovation? Does it mean meeting in a bar, as my friend’s church does? Or does it mean, for a hymn-based church, to experiment with using guitars and drums? For one church it may mean starting a homeless ministry, for another it’s an outreach into the porn industry. Certainly there is a degree of relativity to innovation; what is innovate to one person or in one setting will be old hat to another.

The second thing I wonder is, do we sometimes place innovation too high in our priorities? I don’t think Todd Rhoades of MMI or most “innovative” ministry leaders would suggest for a moment that that’s true, in spite of the fact that sometimes it may seem that way. Innovation is simply a fancy word for trying things that may not have been done before (at least in a certain context) in order to reach people for Christ who are not being reached by existing means. So innovation isn’t the goal, but rather the means to an end. We do need to be careful, though, that we don’t hold out innovation – or relevance, or authenticity, or any other of the recent buzzwords – as the key to the world’s salvation…or even as the key to drawing people toward Jesus. That position is still reserved for Jesus Christ himself.

Still, the fact is that we live in an attention-deficit world: sixty seconds is an agonizingly long commercial. We want bullet points, not paragraphs. We want our fast food in 90 seconds or less, and our latte in under a minute. We’re also a Frank Sinatra world; we want it our way: not just coffee, but a venti, triple-shot, extra-hot, no-whip mocha. Paper or plastic, debit or credit, for here or to go, traditional or contemporary, the now or the not yet. Innovation in ministry is necessary to reach this culture, but while innovation breeds innovation, it also breeds more of dissatisfaction with what is and what has been. Soon, innovation won’t be enough; it must be rapid-fire innovation. What’s new on Sunday will be old by Tuesday. Generations are no longer be measured in terms of four decades, but two.

And speaking of mochas, I recently read an interesting quote on one of Starbucks’ “The Way I See It” cups: “In my career I’ve found that ‘thinking outside the box’ works better if I know what’s ‘inside the box.’ In music (as in life) we need to understand our pertinent history … and moving on is so much easier once we know where we’ve been.” (Dave Grusin, award-winning composer and jazz musician) There is a timeless historicity to the Christian faith, and we need to cultivate a knowledge of that, to bring new believers up in that history. Perhaps in so doing, we can offer a firm foundation on which innovation may be built.

A Recovering Evangelical

Leave a reply
Share

(Originally posted on Jan 20, 2007 at randehle.com) I have at times described myself as a “recovering evangelical”. Recently I was asked what I meant by that, so I will take some space here to answer that question. First, however, I need to give credit where it is due. Roger Hedgecock, a conservative radio talk show host and former mayor of San Diego, describes himself as a “recovering politician”; I adapted the term for my own use.

So just what is a “recovering evangelical”? It is a person seeking to recover what is good in evangelicalism – primarily its essential doctrines – and recover from those aspects where evangelicalism has perhaps gone astray.

Recovering What Is Good – Doctrine
There is much that is good in evangelical doctrine, yet it is being called into question by some in the church today. Specifically, significant voices in the emerging church “conversation” are reevaluating their own roots and delving deeply into scripture in their search. This is certainly not a bad thing, but can become dangerous when these voices are taking with them less-well-rooted followers – or when they steer away from orthodox beliefs for fear of possibly “being wrong”.

I find three evangelical strengths in particular that need to be recovered:

  • Evangelicals have generally placed an appropriate emphasis on the rightness of scripture – a perhaps-less-divisive term than either inerrancy or infallibility. Evangelicals understand scripture to be right, true, and, as Paul wrote to Timothy, “useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness”. Without this base, Christianity is all but lost.
  • Evangelicals correctly hold to the paradoxical identity of Jesus as both all man and all God…even if we don’t always live out the impact of that belief (more on this below). Again, without conviction about the person of Jesus, we can neither have nor proclaim hope for the world.
  • Evangelicals understand the imperative of spreading the message of Jesus (specifically, of salvation in and through Jesus) to a world that according to scripture is lost without him.

Recovering From Going Astray – Practice
As is true of every religion at every point in history, what we believe (doctrine) is sometimes not well worked out in what we do (practice). Such is the case with evangelicalism. In two specific areas I think evangelical practice has gone off course, even if only slightly.

  • First, we have focused on conversion as a point-in-time experience, a “profession (or confession) of faith”, rather than recognizing that coming to faith is a process. Our evangelistic efforts (“spreading the message”) have not kept pace with the changing culture around us. Whereas not many decades ago even non-believers believed the Bible and what it taught about Jesus – even if they didn’t adhere to those truths in their hearts and lives – today there is a great ignorance of the Bible and an acceptance of a less-than-divine Jesus; while those of the former persuasion may respond to a four-step gospel presentation concluding with “the sinner’s prayer”, the latter need to be drawn toward a relationship with Jesus in which they will eventually place their faith in him. In many respects, this is the difference between “becoming a Christian” and “becoming a disciple.”
  • Second, we have unduly emphasized separation, expressed through a rejection of both activities (e.g., drinking, dancing, movies, etc.) and those who engage in them. Like the Pharisees in Jesus’ day, we seem to be afraid that merely associating with “sinners” will make us unclean. Of course, this was what they had been taught; it grew out of the Mosaic Law with its strict definitions of clean and unclean. In our day, we read James’ counsel that pure religion is “…to keep oneself unstained by the world” and understand that to mean just this separation.

As for what a recovering evangelical should do, I think I will leave that question for another post….