I have been ranting for several years about the fact that America has entered a generation where for the first time in its history, there are people in our own neighborhoods that fit the evangelical description of missions rather than evangelism. If evangelism means sharing Jesus with those who don't believe in Him, and Missions means sharing Jesus with those who don't know there is a Jesus to believe in. Now there are folks living down the street from you who don't know there is a Jesus to believe in; especially college age and younger. Their parents were apathetic about the gospel and like an unimportant anecdote from childhood, they've never passed it along.

We teach cultural difference and tolerance so as to prepare potential missionaries in the foreign field while we condemn the culture in our own country and grow angrier by the minute with the behavior of our neighbors. We see "them" as the enemy rather than the harvest.
I have ranted in my own work environment that to continue to teach evangelism in terms of convincing people to behave according to what they already know is right, is outdated and no longer effective. Almost invariably, I hear people talking as if those with whom they are sharing already believe what we believe, but just have to be convinced to behave accordingly. Why else would we be so angry with non-believers when they act like non-believers? Why else would we not see them as the harvest? We have got to realize that these people are not consciously behaving contrary to their beliefs, but in fact, see nothing wrong with their lifestyles. We assume that they share our beliefs. I am constantly offended by bigots who spout off to me with all kinds of racial slurs and comments as if I too feel as they do. I see it as arrogant, uneducated, and simple-minded. I recently saw a bumper sticker that read, "Don't assume I share your prejudices". I want that bumper sticker. I also saw a bumper sticker that read, "Jesus, save us from your followers".

We ask, "Do you believe that Jesus is the only way to God"? And we argue, "but Jesus said, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life, no man comes to the Father but by me". This argument is cyclic, a strange loop, and to someone who doesn't believe either, neither statement proves the other. My training to be a teacher taught me that I can't use procedures that don't serve my objective. I can't convince someone of something they don't believe by arguing something else they don't believe. My training to be a learner has taught me to see everything as a symptom of a problem rather than the problem itself. Then I will trace the symptoms to the root. It is much easier to treat a symptom and pretend we've fixed the problem. We argue against homosexuality with scripture. That assumes that the homosexual believes scripture. We stand on the street corner and tell them that they will suffer God's wrath. We assume they believe in God and therefore are concerned about His wrath. We have to treat behavior as a symptom so that we can identify its cause. I can't imagine a doctor who would say, "get rid of that itch and come and see me so we can treat your poison ivy". Of course we know that the itch is caused by the poison ivy and that treating it, will rid us of the itch.

We don't let people see our burden for them because we don't have a burden for them. People "heard" Jesus because they felt that He truly cared for them. They responded to His love, and therefore trusted what He said.

Christians like to claim that "all you need is the Word". We see billboards emblazoned with a stolen advertising slogan, "Got Jesus"? Or "Jesus, He's the real thing", or with bold letters, "John 3:16". Since all you need is the Word, we've done our part to fulfill the great commission. We never have to actually do what Jesus did and get to know, create trust, show true burden and compassion for people. We just spout out clever sayings or scripture references and claim that "they are without excuse". We put plastic stick-on fish outlines on our cars and think we are witnesses.1

This would probably have been effective ministry 150 years ago when people behaving badly were often feeling guilty about it because they knew better. I've often heard older people make comments like, "Oh, what could one little nip hurt?" Or, "when you've sawed as many logs as I have, one more is not going to make any difference". These statements imply a conscious decision to behave in opposition to what they believe is right. To behave "badly" implies that there is a right way to behave. These people often felt, "I should clean up my act and get back into the church where I belong." In this culture, clever reminders of their straying might be enough to prod them back.

Welcome to a culture without a conscience. This does not necessarily mean that they are so "bad" that they don't have a conscience. It means that they don't know the "right" that opposes their "wrong". They are not being rebellious. That implies a conscious act in opposition to right. They are behaving according to what they know and believe. To approach this generation with behavior oriented preaching, runs the risk of neglecting the Truth that causes people to act rightly.
The challenge to Christians is to love those whom we thought were the enemy; to show our burden and concern so that they will trust what Jesus said to be true. We must stop saying to ourselves, "if only we could cut down all those weeds, we would be able to go out there and preach the gospel". All those weeds are the harvest, my friends. They are not the obstacles to the harvest. They are not the enemy, the enemy is Satan who wants us to believe that enemy are the very ones we need to reach.
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While it is very important that we, as Christian Americans, be devoted to and love our country, it is not our home. We are on a journey, and by God's grace and mercy, we've been born or brought here temporarily. We who know Christ and are bought by His blood are on our way to heaven.
All too often it seems that we develop an attitude that we are blessed by God because we are Americans; or that we deserve God's blessing because we are Americans. We forget that God has given us what we have and He has created who we are. God doesn't give to us because of what we already have or we are. In the Old Testament, God created a nation out of His people, He didn't choose a nation and call them His people. We sometimes seem to be saying, "God, look at us, we are America, bless us." We find pride in that Godly people founded our nation on Biblical principles and expect that we are assured God's continued blessing on our nation. I don't believe God wants us to turn to Him for the sake of our nation. I believe that our nation can be blessed for our sakes. Our nation will be strengthened when we are a God-seeking, praying nation of believers. It is for the sake of God that we should seek Him, not for what He can do for our country. When we as a nation seek God, He will bless us. When we desire God rather than blessings, we will be blessed. When we seek God, we will find grace and mercy.
It seems that if we are moving toward God and our heavenly home, and realize that all we have here, including our country, is temporary, then we will find more pleasure in the temporal. God will reward us along the road that leads to Him; but He must be the goal. All the blessings along the way are by-products of hearts that are pure and single-minded in pursuit of God.

rod

Happy Sentences

Ever wonder why after going to the Bible and finding guidance from scripture, things don't work out like you had been led to believe they should? Though you followed what you learned from the scripture verses, things didn't work out like they said it would.
It seems that all too often, we make a decision, or have worked out in our minds how we feel about something and then go haphazardly through the scriptures looking for passages that support our conclusion. The problem with this exercise is that a preconceived notion about what we expect the scripture to tell us, will cause us to find scriptural sound bites that support our views. In fact, I'm not sure that what I call "happy sentences" can always be applied as scripture. Though they are quoted from the inerrant, Spirit-breathed word of God, we often take them out of context even of the sentence in which they are found. Perhaps we should ask ourselves if the words are spirit breathed, or if the meaning is Spirit breathed. If it is the words that are inspired, then yes, they will apply anywhere and mean anything that you want them to. If this is the case, then only the original language is inspired. No need for translations. If it is the meaning and teaching that is God-breathed, then they can't be applied to anything outside the contextual meaning in which they are found. This context always has a lesson that God intends for us to learn. All too often we miss His lesson because we are preoccupied with using it to answer unrelated questions that we have for Him. Christians often use the scriptures as a magic eight ball. We are using them to support what we already believe to be true, rather than reading them to find out what is True, what to believe. This is why one can use the Bible to either condemn homosexuality or condone it. One simply takes his preconceived opinion and finds an out-of-context passage to support his views. This is also why so many skeptics find contradictions in the Bible. They are using the Bible as a reference text rather than a method book.
I hear things like, "I didn't know if I was good enough to win the tennis tournament, but I remembered my favorite scripture, 'I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength'". News flash: That passage has nothing to do with tennis tournaments; nor does it have anything to do with God giving you the ability to accomplish your goals. What it does mean is that through Christ's strength, one can learn to be content in whatever circumstances he finds himself. "Through Christ's strength, I will rejoice in a loss in this tennis tournament." In Christ's strength, I can be content in times of plenty; in Christ's strength, I can be content in times of need.
This type of dependence on scripture is, I believe, a symptom of desire to learn only what we want to learn; to learn only what we can see will help us immediately. God desires a relationship with us that is long-term. He doesn't want us to always seek specific answers to specific problems, or to seek encouragement for specific challenges, or to gain "soundbite" knowledge of scriptural happy sentences that we apply to our lives haphazardly. God wants us to listen to what He is saying through His word, to let Him apply His wisdom to the areas of our lives that He sees need work. He wants us to live and learn and grow in Him so that when we face challenges, we can draw on the vast amounts of wisdom that He has implanted in us through a life long relationship with Him. Seldom as a child, did I ever ask my Dad specific how-to questions. I never asked him how to mow the lawn, or change the oil or wire a light switch. But from being around my Dad and having a relationship with him, these things were passed on to me, ready know-how for when I needed them.
Topical applications may kill the germs on the surface, or provide temporary relief of pain associated with a problem, but they cannot rid one of the underlying infection. This requires surgery. Sometimes God's surgery can take years to complete, but rest assured that when He is finished, you will be spiritually well, wise, and confident. All you have to do is trust Him that through your faith, He is growing you, preparing you and cleaning you.

©2002 by rod lewis, all rights reserved

On the Gender of God
and ensuing thoughts

Ok, I've finally realized that I can only think of one thing at a time; that is why when something enters my mind, I think that it must be connected with what is already there. I don't have room for several topics, so I just combine them all. Its up to you to decide if there is anything in one that leads to a deeper understanding of the other. So there, I've shirked the responsibility of organization.
Or perhaps I can only think about anything by free association.
At any rate, here is the current thought process:

Several days ago I read somewhere, a religiously oriented blurb that I thought was theologically and philosophically sound until at the end when in reference to God, the writer used the pronoun "it". I thought to my self, "gee, where did this person get such sound theology about the God I know? Evidently from the same scripture through which God has revealed HIMSELF to me." Thing is, in this scripture, through which we have learned of God, God refers to God as "Father". No doubt, most of us know the "Lord's Prayer", spoken by Jesus, who while a human walking about on earth, was a male. He begins his prayer, "Our Father". Now I'm not saying that God has human gender, that God has boy parts. I am saying that God chose to use the relationship of a Father to his children to help us understand His relationship with us. This, I believe is important. God refers to us as His children throughout scripture. I have a hard time understanding my relationship as a child of 'it'. I feel we miss a very important understanding of a concept God wants us to have of Him if we separate Him from the metaphor that He has given us.

So I started thinking of other situations in scripture that are gender oriented, and how I understand concepts based on them. It occurred to me that, as with so many things in scripture, a single analogy can deepen my understanding in two ways. God uses the concept of which I have some understanding to bring to light something about Himself and His love for me. When I begin to get a better grasp of that, I begin to learn through better understanding His love, how better to love. In other words, my understanding of the human concept he used to reveal Himself is deepened through His revelation of Himself.
An example of this, I think, is Jesus as the Bridegroom and the church (of which I am a part), as the bride. Gender is an issue here, by the way. Though I, as a man, may be reluctant to think of myself as a bride, I do have some knowledge of her role in a relationship with the groom. Perhaps even, as a man, I have strong, deeply felt ideas of what I expect my bride to be. I therefore have a better understanding of what Christ expects of me as His bride. A woman contemplating this spiritual relationship is helped by her desires of how deeply and purely her ideal groom would love her. She more deeply understands Christ's love for her because he used her ideals to explain it to her.

Now that the human concept of marriage has deepened my understanding of Christ's love for me, that understanding teaches me to apply His example to my own marriage. "Husband's love your wives as Christ loves the Church." A deeper understanding of His love for me, teaches me to love in general more deeply and unselfishly. "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all of your soul and with all of your mind and love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments". So when asked what was the greatest commandment in the law, Jesus gave that reply. Does that not mean that the single most important thing for us to learn from scripture is how to love Him, and from learning that, how to love our neighbor? Isn't it fascinating that God uses our love for our neighbor to teach us of His love for us and how to love Him; and He uses His love for us to teach us to love our neighbor. That is why these two commands are presented as the answer to the question as to the single most important command. Not only does one not truly exist without the other, each is required to grow in other. "Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness".

To be continued...
rod

©2002 by rod lewis, all rights reserved

Having been confronted by much legalism lately has caused me to search for the cause of it. For me, an introvert, a learning process involves not dealing with a single issue until it is sorted out, but contemplating, studying and researching several issues at once until they begin to make sense of each other.
For some time I've been dealing with the passage from Philippians 2:12, 13. "Work out your Salvation with fear and trembling" It seems to me that this passage could cause one to rely on his goodness for retention of his salvation, and thus lead to legalistic ideas and behavior. C. S. Lewis refers to the passage when he says that it is only by trying harder and harder (and failing) that we can come to the place where we truly realize that we cannot possibly keep God's law. It is at this point that we look to Him and say, " You have to do this, I can't" . I love this commentary on those verses. It speaks to salvation in the past tense for one who is reaching a point of complete surrender and dependence on Christ for his salvation; but it also speaks to salvation in the present tense, for one who is growing in Christ and being changed into His likeness.
This idea of "being" must be understood. I am reminded of another passage from Paul that uses this terminology. In 2 Corinthians, 2:15, 16, Paul writes, "for we are to God the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing". Here, being could be read as if there are many people in succession are coming to know Christ. "There were many people being saved." It could also be read as if each person was being saved. " He was being saved". The latter implies that salvation is a process that takes place over time. This means that salvation is not completed at the point where Jesus blood is applied to one's condition and his name is written in the Lamb's book of life, and that his being made into the image of Christ does not necessarily immediately happen at that point. Salvation is bigger than that.
Even with this interpretation one could become legalistic by trying to be like Christ on his own as a result of his behavior. But it seems that legalism more often results from the smaller view of salvation as only having been saved from hell. Once that has been accomplished, "working out your salvation" could only mean trying to stay out of hell.
Jesus said, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God."
I like the explanation that pure of heart means single minded in PURSUIT of Christ likeness. That's why I feel that one is where he is supposed to be when he is moving toward that goal; not only when he has attained it. That can't happen in this life. To be within God's will, to me, at this point, means single minded, pure of heart, focused on Christ. Also, I've recently entertained the notion that Christ didn't just die for me, but also for Himself, because that is the only way that I could be brought back into the relationship for which I was created. Our having been created for a relationship with Him predates our need for salvation, therefore His role as friend predates His role as savior. Doesn't that mean that His plan for our salvation is just a means to an end that is to bring us back to friendship with Him, and that His friendship with us is the ultimate goal. Past tense salvation (being saved from hell) is just the first step. Our growing relationship with Him (present tense salvation) is the goal. So many are just locked into past tense salvation and never get to know God. That's why so many are concerned with not doing the wrong thing, instead of "doing the right thing". It's not just semantics. It's a matter of heart and motives. One who is stuck at past tense salvation remains selfish; his desire for Salvation is only fear of hell. And while it is of Ultimate importance, living with the purpose of staying out of hell keeps our focus on ourselves and avoiding eternal damnation. Living victorious in Christ means that our desire for Salvation starts us on a growing friendship with God (his plan all along). This takes us beyond that first step and into a freedom that causes us to forget about us and strive only for Him. Then we do the right things for the right reasons. Like David, we may still do the wrong things, often even, but they are less detrimental and debilitating to our walk because our sense of morality was not focused in avoiding them. If I walk with the sole purpose of not falling down, when I fall down I will have failed. But if I walk with the purpose of getting somewhere, when I fall down, I just get up and keep going. I've not failed if I get to where I'm going. Trying not to do the wrong thing is a distraction to God's will for us. If our focus is on doing right, then wrong is merely a mess-up, not a failure; and like David, we can trust God, accept His forgiveness, get past it and go on toward Him.
Being victorious in Christ does not mean that we are enjoying having been victorious. (Paul says, "not that I've attained, but I press on toward the mark of the high calling of Christ"), but are in the process of being victorious each day of our lives.

I was recently asked to speak about using music as a tool for evangelism. I had my eyes opened. I spent the first 15 minutes of my lecture distinguishing 3 separate functions I serve as a christian; 1. to worship and praise God and lead others to do so, 2. to comfort, encourage, and uplift my brethren and sistren, and 3. To go into all the world and preach the gospel. As a musician, my music should serve the same 3 purposes. But the same songs can't serve all three purposes. I am constantly hearing and reading interviews in which CCM artists express their purpose and intent as spreading the gospel. But they aren't. They are singing songs targeted to Christians. At best, they are encouraging and inspirational, and this is good; at worst they are fluffy, formulated, insular, industrially sterilized icons of Pop Christian Culture that perpetuate a dangerous complacency among believers. The fact that christians have issues is completely ignored. Anyway, I'm not writing to rant on Christian Industry Music. I'm writing to distinguish it from music who's purpose IS to reach non-believers; it looks, sounds, feels, and smells very different from the other stuff. Evangelical's music is most often not evangelical. Until christians "get it" and realize what evangelism is, even those who get it will not be as effective because they are not getting prayer support from the church and they are spending most of their time defending themselves against the same attacks and condemnation that Jesus suffered.
A Christian singing christian songs is NOT NECESSARILY evangelism. But a Christian singing christian songs to Christians, is usually the only music that is recognized by the church as "christian" and those singers are usually the only ones recognized as "christian musicians". I'm glad we don't consider missionaries secular just because they go to minister to non-christians. But you've heard this rant many times before. I'm sorry.
I'm just constantly discouraged that most don't "get it".
When confronted with questions about my style of music, and methods of evangelism, I am often asked, "but what about the older people who are being left out while all is geared to young people?" My response is that God has equipped me with gifts and tools that are effective in sharing Christ with a specific group of people. If all those whom God has equipped accordingly were using their gifts, no one would be left out, and the gospel would be reaching all ages, cultures, colors, etc. The responses to my answer usually make it clear that the question had nothing whatever to do with outreach. Most often it is merely a complaint about the contemporary worship choruses they are singing in church on Sunday morning. I can talk until I am blue in the face, clear and concise, and yet not been able to even bring some folks outside the doors of their church; to give them any vision at all that there is a whole lost world out there who could care less if they enjoy the church music or if hymns are going the way of the buffalo. They are blindly falling off a cliff into a burning hell and we are worried about the style of the music.

Being about Christ's business means getting outside our Church doors as well as being fed inside. Often there is kingdom work needing done outside at the same time that something is scheduled inside. But be careful, no one inside will see you reaching people outside. They will be concerned that you are not being spiritually fed. Boldly do what Christ has asked, don't cast aside corporate study and worship, and fellowship with other believers, but don't allow it to move your focus off kingdom business. Assure the skeptics that you have food about which they know nothing.
We have become so deceived, misdirected, insular, and selfish that we think that Christ's church exists to preserve our idea of style and entertain us with what makes us comfortable.
But that's just my rant, I'm sure you have yours. I will keep doing my little thing, looking for who I can reach, doing what I can to reach them, ride on the prayers of those who share my burden and pray for those who don't.

Forgive me,
rod