Involvement

 

Hey, Cobblestone,

     Every once in a while, somebody will ask me if I think Christians should be involved in politics. It’s usually in the autumn of an even-numbered year, kind of like right now. And it’s an odd encounter, in the sense that I’m asked what I think. What I think matters very little, but I’m happy to relate what Scripture says:

     Yes.

     First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth (1Timothy 2:1-4).

     I was especially glad for a reminder Andrew gave us in his sermon last Sunday. He said when we look into Scripture, don’t be looking first for where we are; rather, be looking for where God is, and that’ll keep us from getting all sideways in holy writ. In the passage above, where is God? Ahead of what we may think about kings and all who are in high positions, what does God say about himself in the passage?

     First, he is God our Savior, and we may take that to mean that the kings and high position-holders are not. Romans 13:1 says, Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. From the same verse in the King James Version, we get the term the powers that be. The powers be, all right, but they wouldn’t be if God hadn’t be’d them. If we get confused or frustrated over why certain people hold certain offices, we can do no better than check with the one who put them there, and try to find out what the greater purpose is.   

     The passage also tells us there’s something pleasing in the sight of God our Savior. If pleasing God is important to us, we’ll want to know what that is. It’s in the preceding sentence: that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. Now we know what is pleasing in his sight. And how might we manage this? Here it comes: First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions.

     A Christian’s involvement with politics begins with prayer. Prayer precedes all other involvement, when the involvement is done right. Anything other than prayer-forward devolves quickly into nothing more than the “sharing” of opinions – and we’ve all heard enough crude clichés about opinions to know that everybody’s got at least one. By looking for God first in this passage about prayer, we can keep opinions down-ticket where they belong. I might not want to pray for certain office holders because I don’t agree with what they’re saying or doing. Doesn’t matter – if God would be pleased with me praying only for the office holders I agree with, he would have said so. The fact is, he said all.

     Many of you are, no doubt, already better at this than I am; but still, I’m compelled to give a tutorial of sorts on praying for all who are in high positions. For office holders who are Christians, I pray for the Holy Spirit – “the Spirit of truth” (John 16:13) – to well up in them and affect everyone around them. For office holders who aren’t Christians, I pray salvation first of all. For Christians and non-Christians alike, I pray protection from the devil’s schemes, safety for them and their families, and some reasonable level of peace and privacy even though they’re living in a fishbowl. That’s not all I pray, but it’s not a bad set to start with. Do I ever pray for certain issues to be advanced and some to be halted? Absolutely – but here’s the thing, and the tricky part, and quite honestly, what I have to work hardest at: to separate the issue from the souls of those who are advancing it or opposing it.

     One whole lifetime ago, Kay and I were in a pickle. It seemed very likely we would be on the losing end of a power struggle, and the loss would directly and negatively affect our family in a big way. But my bride, praying girl that she is, looked for God first. She called me one morning as I got to the shop, hadn’t even got out of the truck, and urged me to look into Psalm 20 – Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God (verse 7). That verse changed our lives and our family forever. Putting God first, making his name highest, brought about better outcomes than any of us could have imagined.

     I’ve talked with a couple of Christians lately who are considering running for public office on the grounds that we need more people making decisions who can think like Jesus. I agree (as if it matters what I think!) – as long as prayer is the first particle of involvement. To broaden the concept to, well, all of us who have the mind of Christ (1Corinthians 2:16), the same applies from our own houses to the White House and beyond… or to simply stepping into a voting booth. Will we trust in the name of the LORD our God?

     For at least the past ten years, in political arenas large and small, loud-and-overbearing has been the go-to tactic. Debates, by and large, became uncivil shouting matches that no second-grade teacher would allow in a classroom or on a playground. And how’s that working out for us? Is there a better way? Scripture says Yes, and calls the people of God to lead peaceful and quiet lives, godly and dignified in every way – lowly and unassuming, yet supremely confident in the name of the LORD our God. 

  

Grace and Peace (and trust, well placed),

 

John   

Adjectives

 

Hey, Cobblestone,

    How would you like to knock out a whole book of the Bible in less than three minutes? Two-forty-five, actually, at an unhurried pace – I timed it. If you’re not on the boss’ dime at the moment, you could even do that right now. Go to Paul’s letter to Philemon, and I’ll see you in a few.

     The synopsis: Philemon is a Christian in Colossae, known to Paul, who wrote the letter from Rome. Philemon’s bond-servant, Onesimus, has fled Colossae, possibly taking money or property that belongs to his master. Philemon would be wanting him back, for obvious reasons. Moving heaven and earth, God brings Onesimus into contact with Paul, and Onesimus becomes a Christian. A dilemma takes shape. What will Paul do? Which party deserves his higher loyalty?

     Understanding a storyline involves understanding a good deal about the characters as well. How should we describe Philemon (other than what I’ve already offered)? How should we describe Onesimus or Paul? If we had to put together a bunch of adjectives, adverbs, and nouns to fill out the storyline by painting a clear picture of the players, what would those words be? Would our choice of words be influenced by what we already believe about integrity and loyalty – or slavery and Christianity for that matter?

     Of course they would.

     The question is this: How much influence should those beliefs have? Answer: a great deal, indeed, and for we who are Christians, those beliefs can provide all the insight we need into the proper choice and placement of those words. Problem is, we don’t always use the mind of Christ (1Corinthians 2:16) to put our words together, or to give them the proper weight. Paul’s letter to Philemon gives a priceless lesson in setting the priorities straight. Let’s do an exercise to see if we can pick up the lesson.

     Describing Onesimus, some of us would say, “He’s a lying, thieving fugitive slave.” This man, at the least, had an indentured-servant arrangement with another man, but broke the contract and stole from his master (charge that to my account, Paul wrote in verse 18). If we believe integrity is the most important consideration, then Onesimus has to go back to Colossae immediately, reenter the master/slave arrangement, and make restitution.

     Describing Philemon, some of us would say, “He’s a cold-hearted, closed-minded, tight-fisted slave owner.” What makes him think he can hold such power over another human being, anyway? If we believe slavery, or even indentured servitude, is always wrong, then Philemon needs to get over himself, and Onesimus gets to live and work wherever he pleases.

     Statistically, most of us will go with the second description. Paul should let Onesimus stay in Rome, and indeed wanted to: I would have been glad to keep him with me (verse 13). But that’s not what happened. Writing under the direct inspiration of God, Paul made a completely “other” proposition. It wasn’t the first description or the second. To be sure, it was nothing that ever would have occurred to the natural mind. Something supernatural was in play.

     Remember: by the time Paul wrote the letter, Philemon and Onesimus both were Christians. Though there were many traits and criteria to take into account, Paul put child-of-God status ahead of them all. Paul says to Philemon, I have derived much joy and comfort from your love, my brother (verse 7), and appeals to him to receive Onesimus back no longer as a slave, but more than a slave, as a beloved brother (verse 16). Notice: Paul didn’t order Philemon to emancipate Onesimus outright. That’s a big deal – it demonstrates Paul’s belief that adoption by God is infinitely better than emancipation from any man, and the gospel of Jesus Christ can redeem even a master/slave arrangement.

     Quite simply, Paul put the adjectives in their proper place. That’s the supernatural part. It would be easy – and natural – to describe Onesimus as “an enslaved Christian” and Philemon as “a slave-holding Christian,” and move on to the next hot-button situation. End of story – except it leaves no room, no epilogue, in which the power of the gospel does its glorious work.

     To the pollsters, I’m a post-middle-age white guy living in a blue-collar neighborhood in Midwestern fly-over country. The pollsters don’t bother with me, thinking, I suppose, they’ve already got me figured out. At times, I’m tempted to think they do. But then, I engage the mind of Christ. “Christian” has to be set in the front, by supernatural means, trusting God in letting the adjectives and adverbs fall in line behind.

     The recently departed theologian, J.I. Packer, had, I’ve heard, a nearly daily ritual. Early in the day he would remind himself, “I am a child of God. God is my Father. Heaven is my home, and each day is one day closer. My Savior is my Brother, and all Christians are my brothers and sisters too.” As top-notch as his theological skills were, as well studied as he was, he still wanted (and probably needed) frequent reminders of his simplest, most secure, and most important titles.

     I could quote a few other dead English guys with two letters in front of their last names – Chesterton, Lewis, Spurgeon – could bring you their insights on what it means to be a child of God plunked down in actual history and geography. And I’m tempted, I really am – they wrote some good stuff, almost prophetic. Instead, I’ll leap past their centuries and back into Paul’s, since his stuff has the clearest application for our times – and is altogether prophetic. We’re heading into a season, this being the autumn of an even-numbered year, in which we’ll be compelled to put the adjectives up front – to think and speak and act (and vote) according to labels and descriptors that should by no means hold first place. Philemon was given a chance to Refresh (Paul’s) heart in Christ (verse 20) by receiving Onesimus back as a brother. Confident of your obedience, I write to you, knowing that you will do even more than I say (verse 21). Notice: “in Christ” – Paul’s heart would be refreshed “in Christ.”

     This election coming up is being called the most significant in our country’s history – right… as if twenty or thirty others haven’t been. Politically, it’s no bigger or smaller a deal than any other. But from the perspective of God’s kingdom, this is the most important one for Christians to be engaging the mind of Christ. And the one after that will be more important still, simply because the kingdom will be two years closer to consummation, and I imagine God expects more cooperation from his people as the time draws nearer. “Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” – absolutely, and all the quicker as more of God’s kids begin to think like their eldest Brother.

     Over the next couple weeks, I’m going to work on getting us some practice.             

 

 Grace and Peace (refreshing one another’s hearts in Christ),

 

John

Behave Yourself

 

Hey, Cobblestone,

     You’ve probably noticed, but in case you haven’t, these letters I write each week have, for the past twenty-two months, tracked with our all-church Bible reading plan… mostly. Like the Sunday morning teaching schedule, the choice of topics has been highly influenced by the pace and placement of Scripture. Except… like over the four previous weeks: we were base-camped in Colossians for the “Replacing God” series – and ended up missing both letters to the Thessalonians, both letters to Timothy, and the one to Titus. Philemon flew by yesterday. Oops. Unable to keep pace with the plan, I nevertheless reserve the right to revisit the letters I missed, because we simply have to see what’s in them.

     Paul’s first letter to Timothy is the “quick start guide” for any church who recognizes Jesus as Lord. From eldership to family to weeding out false teaching, no essential subject of the church is left untreated. And in this week’s letter to you, I’ll probably be most helpful if I go straight to the purpose of Paul’s letter, the reason for his writing. Having set Timothy as a leader and liaison in the Ephesian church, he wrote back with more instruction:

I hope to come to you soon, but I am writing these things to you so that, if I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of the truth (1Timothy 3:14-15).

     You gotta love the so-that’s. I am writing these things to you so that… no guesswork, no hypothesizing over “Gee, why did I get this letter?” If the reader gets anything at all, whatever comes immediately after the so-that must be got. Paul, breathing in what God breathed out, wrote so that you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God.

     Some years back I wrote a report for Cobblestone’s elders, precociously titled “A Short History of the Contemporary Church”. It was a serious work (in my world anyway); only the title was precocious (or maybe presumptuous). In it I described how the Christian church in Western cultures, given a chance to engage the divorce boom of the 1950’s, made matters worse instead of better. Along comes the sexual revolution of the ‘60’s. Same. The drug culture of the ‘70’s. Ditto… again. Instead of moving outward with truth the church turned inward, not trusting the truth to hold its own in the big bad world. Those three decades gave rise to the Me Culture of the ‘80’s (which is with us still, and causes no end of troubles), and the separation of church from everybody else was mostly complete. Forty years of radio silence had caused culture to look for some semblance of the truth in the wiggly world of pop psychology. Meanwhile, somebody in Christendom – I won’t venture to assign credit to any one person, though a few prime candidates come to mind – figured the best way to reach culture was to meet people where they were, and the race was on.

     Sermons in contemporary churches – or “coffee churches,” as I sometimes call us – ran quickly to the self-help genre, their titles often beginning with “How to…” The successful speaker would make the gospel “accessible.” I remember participating in outreach projects described as “low-risk/high-grace”. (Did you catch the contradiction in terms?) At a conference, I heard a hot-selling Christian author and pastor brag that a newcomer had been in his bar-styled church four months before realizing it was a church. To break out of its self-imposed isolation, the church became like non-church culture. Honestly, it was fun for a while – and a necessary stage, I’ll still say – but the whole strategy had outlived its usefulness in less than twenty years. Way less. Problem is, coffee churches, historically, have had a hard time letting go and moving on.

     Enter: First Timothy, and Paul getting all up in our faces about behavior. Having become an adopted cousin of pop psychology, the contemporary church wanted to skip behavior altogether. The slogan was: “We’re looking for heart-change, not behavior modification.” Dude, behavior is a mighty solid indicator of heart-change… or lack thereof. Without omniscience, what else we got?

     Paul was given three names for the church, which he has passed on to every reader of his letter: 1) the household of God, 2) the church of the living God, and 3) a pillar and buttress of the truth. And here’s how much we can trust God: when we know those names he’s given us, and own them on a heart level, the behaviors will follow. We will trust the truth to hold its own. As the Twenty-Third Psalm says, He leads (us) in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake (verse 3). Our God will forever and always bring glory to his name. The hardest part for us to get, it seems, is that he uses us, his namesake, to accomplish the goal. Not all at once, but surely.

     As a kid/teen/young adult in the Sixties/Seventies/Eighties, I was witness to the weirdness that had become the Christian church in Western culture. I saw the beginnings of the name-it-and-claim-it, blab-it-and-grab-it Prosperity Gospel. I saw the rise and fall of the most audacious televangelists. When the Third Wave of Pentecostalism came ashore, I was a quiet observer. As a yet-to-be-saved person living among mostly saved people, I couldn’t imagine this was what Jesus had intended for his Church. Something had to give. And something did. And something will again, since the Bridegroom is constantly sanctifying his bride.

     At times I’m tempted to think the Church could have taken a different path than the isolation of the Fifties through the Eighties. Maybe the Church could have stuck with being a pillar and buttress of the truth, come what may. I’m also tempted at times to think we could have chosen a better strategy than becoming just like culture, falling into all the same whirligig commotions. But no. Jesus knows what he’s doing. Like planting a tree, the best time to do that was twenty years ago, and the next-best time is right now. The only thing worse than having regrets is being stuck in them.

     If practicing godly behaviors, whether you feel like it or not, is the only way you have right now of knowing if you own the title “child of God” on a heart level – by all means, have at it. The same apostle who wrote to Timothy said to the Christians in Rome that by testing we would know what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect (Romans 12:2). In the same letter, he wrote, hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us (5:5). Coming up on my fortieth “Christian birthday,” I can tell you that the feeling precedes the action at times, and other times the feeling follows. Best I can tell, the Father is not displeased either way.

     Meanwhile, a godly example is set – and an oh-so-appealing example it is – for a world that has been left too long in the swirl of moral chaos. Absent the mind of Christ (1Corinthians 2:16), there’s no reason to expect unbelievers to think and act like Christians. On the flip-side of that same coin, since Christians do have the mind of Christ, there’s no reason for us to keep on thinking and acting like unbelievers. How does a person – how does a church – make a difference? By being different.

     If First Timothy didn’t make much of an impact last time you read the letter, I’ll urge you to go through again – this time pivoting on the so-that of 3:14. God was willing to let one whole book of the Bible hang on how one ought to behave. I can’t find a good reason to take it otherwise.         

  

Grace and Peace (and a sharp eye for the so-that’s),

 

John     

 

  

Replacing God, Part Four: Ahab's Compass

 

Hey, Cobblestone,

     When I turned fifty I committed to reading the classic literature I had shunned as a younger man. Rarely have I been disappointed – it’s amazing what you can learn by getting out of your own century – and often I’ve found the authors, whether on purpose or accidentally, to be prophetic to an uncanny degree. Next chance you get, pull your copy of Moby Dick from the shelf and give special attention to the chapters named “The Quadrant,” “The Candles,” and “The Needle.” Been a while since you read Herman Melville’s 1851 masterpiece? Here’s the long and short of it…

     Ahab is the crazed captain of the whaling ship Pequod, in search of the great white whale (title character) that chomped off his leg. Starbuck (the man, not the coffee shop) is his even-keeled first mate. Ahab overshadows the crew with his own mania, and holds them mesmerized. Starbuck, along with the ship’s next two officers, are not so affected – caught in the middle trying to keep Pequod afloat and the crew alive. Now comes the prophetic part…

     Contrary to all the best practices, Ahab steers by whatever feelings are generated by his tormented mind – he goes where he wants Moby Dick to be. His best instrument for navigation, the quadrant, he cursed – along with the sun, from which the quadrant draws its readings – because they disagreed with his wishes. “Curse thee, thou quadrant!” – and stomped it to pieces with his whale-bone leg. Then, in the teeth of an Indian Ocean typhoon, he refused to have the ship slowed by lightning rods. Even when lightning struck, and Pequod’s mast heads burned like candles, Ahab claimed mastery over the power of the heavens. “I know thee, thou clear spirit, and I now know that thy right worship is defiance… I own thy speechless, placeless power” – and grounded himself to the ship’s rigging as a human lightning rod. Surviving the storm, next morning it was found that the ship’s compass had been damaged by the lightning strike. No problem – Ahab would make his own.

     Taking a sail-maker’s needle for a pointer, Ahab went through some delirious proceedings to convince the crew he had properly magnetized it, and placed it on the spindle of the compass. “Men, the thunder turned old Ahab’s needles; but out of this bit of steel Ahab can make one of his own” – and ordered the helmsman to steer by it. Though the ship’s prow (nose) plunged straight toward the early morning sun, the new instrument read west. And still, Ahab bragged, “Look ye, for yourselves, if Ahab be not lord of the level loadstone!” It’s important to know, at this point of the story, that home was to the actual west, but Moby Dick kept spouting and luring far off to the actual east.

     Whether he realized it or not, Herman Melville foretold a time when many Ahabs would make customized compasses. Where is your hope, Christian, and from where do you draw your bearings? Is there some point of navigation that outranks all others? If not, the next Ahab to come along will have you for a crew member. (Spoiler Alert: Pequod’s crew didn’t fare so well.) Hard enough to not be Ahab yourself.  

     Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving. See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ. For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority (Colossians 2:6-10).  

     This is the fourth and final installment in the series of letters titled “Replacing God.” We’ve been base-camped in Paul’s letter to the Christians at Colossae in the first century AD, looking at some of the similarities in our own century. There was a false teaching let loose on the church there that offered options, other than God, as creator and sustainer of all things. Though scholars are still looking into the details, the general effect has become clear enough. The idea of replacing God has had opportunity, in fits and spurts, since as far back as the eleventh chapter of Genesis, and each episode has met its end. But the current push, best I can tell, is the most sustained and concentrated effort yet to put the man of dust on the throne of heaven.

     At some point God only knows, this episode too will meet its end, and probably in more glorious fashion than any of the others. The idea for us is to not be caught reading the wrong compass. The best directions come from Scripture:  

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory (Colossians 3:1-4).

     You’re already anchored there. Pull in along that line.

     Among the many fatal errors Ahab made, on the morning of the new compass he mistook the glare of the sun for the sun itself. In the lingering haze and intermittent clouds of the previous night’s typhoon, morning was a hard thing to make out. Even gravity took some concentration, ebbing and flowing with the ocean’s swells. Looking west at the glare, and wanting to go east anyway, Ahab saw the sun rising. In our time, the same sort of mistake is made: human ingenuity is mistaken for sovereignty, and preference rules over all.

     The whole unsaved world steers by Ahab’s compass. When the direction is unhappy, out comes another sail-maker’s needle. Sorry about their luck? No, that can’t be the Christian response. The reason we’re here, and not home in Nantucket, is to rescue precious souls from Ahab’s delusion. In closing his letter to the Colossian church, Paul wrote:

    Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone (Colossians 4:5-6).

     Once we get clear of being Ahabs ourselves, our job is to be the voice of reason, not contention. I’ve tried enough wrong methods, self-propelled, that I’m finally ready to rely on the Holy Spirit’s leading in every conversation. If those conversations are going to be full of grace, seasoned with salt, could there be any other way? Truth has an amazing way of bearing itself out, and all the quicker if I don’t muss it up.

     At one point, Starbuck thought long and hard about murdering Ahab – had a musket in hand, standing at the captain’s cabin door. Seeing the fault in his method, he backed away. Lacking any better method, he too fell under Ahab’s spell. If you and I were to collaborate in a rewrite of Moby Dick and provide an alternate ending, we might have Starbuck presenting the gospel of Jesus Christ to Pip, the cabin boy, who, having received the good news, conveyed it to doughboy, the cook – all the way up to the quarter-deck, where Ahab himself stands with his peg leg steadied in a hole in the planks. Pequod would come about, steering for home and hearth by way of faithful sun and stars.

     God-replacers don’t come to a good end on their own, but stand as good a chance as anyone when met by a faithful representative of the one true, limitless and irreplaceable God.

  

Grace and Peace (and truth to steer by),

 

John