Monthly Archives: November 2009

Sunday Reflections – Psalm 3

Posted on by
2

lament 250x300 Sunday Reflections Psalm 3Psalm 3 calls us to pause for a moment to be aware of God’s attention to our troubles knowing that He protects us and answers our prayers. Psalms like this one are direct speech about a realistic faith that traffics in the extremities of human life and human experience. Life is not always one of symmetry and equilibrium. Life is also marked by disequilibrium and unrelieved asymmetry. Yet our voices are ones of wishful optimism, denial, cover-up which is an odd inclination of serious Bible users, given the fact that most of the Psalms are songs of lament, protest, and complaint about the incoherence that is experienced in the world.

I think that serious religious use of the lament Psalms has been minimal because we have believed that faith does not and should not embrace much less acknowledge negativity. We tend to think that negativity is somehow an act of unfaith, as though to speak in such a way is to concede that God has somehow lost control.

The point I am making is that the psalms of lament may be judged by some as acts of unfaith and failure, but for the church, they are bold acts of faith. Because it is in this way that we insist that the world must be experienced as it really is and not in some pretend way. To withhold this part of life is to withhold part of life from the sovereignty of God. Everything must be given a voice if we are to find our voice in the Psalms.

But it really is no wonder that we intuitively avoid these Psalms. They lead us into dangerous acknowledgement of how life really is. They lead us into the presence of God where everything is not polite or civil. They cause us to think unthinkable thoughts and utter unutterable words.

Paul encouraged the early Christians to encourage one another with “psalms and hymns and spiritual songs” (Eph. 5:19; Col. 3:16) so to conclude our gathering last night I asked each one to write their own Psalm of Lament. The only requirement was to stay honest and open. Below is an example.

Lord, My God. I struggle to control the direction of my life instead of looking to you to show me the path I should follow.

Lord, you want to guide each footfall. You want this because you want me to be more like you.

Why don’t I trust you?

Why after I have struggled to fix and carry the burden of my decisions, I lead myself to a place where I am pressed into a corner, in danger on all sides.

But you are just and true and provide a path to safety.

You ask me to trust and I know I should when I see beauty poor from you every time.

Now, use the comments to write your own Psalm of Lament.

I am Second

Posted on by
Reply

4x6Postcard 300x200 I am SecondBWelch1920x1200 300x187 I am Second

I stumbled across this web site yesterday – I am Second. An I am Second Group “is a gathering of people who want to put Jesus First in their lives.”

Simple yet profound. Being Second means that you have placed yourself under Jesus’ authority in order that He will speak and act through you to touch the lives of others. The goal of an I am Second group is to “impact a person’s sphere of influence so that others will want to know more about Jesus.”

Sounds like just another name for small groups. And I hear you, but this seems from the surface to be something deeper. The website is full of crisp, high-quality videos of people sharing their pasts, including pain and redemption. Pastors, soldiers, rock stars, movie stars, pro ball players, politicians, college students, pageant queens, and housewives all tell their stories. Although they come from very different backgrounds, they all have one thing in common: Jesus and his grace, restoration, and love. They are all stories anyone, anywhere, can relate to. In this way, I am Second is able to use that commonality as a platform. It is this thread that allows people to come together and know that although we may look different, we aren’t so different after all.

Anyone can log onto the site to connect with a live person either by phone, chat or e-mail 24-hours a day. And there are tons of FREE resources to guide someone in starting I am Second groups as well as helps to the most common questions/objections to Christianity.

Are you Second?

Sunday Reflections

Posted on by
1

Last night we began our new teaching series, “Finding our Voice in the Psalms.” The underlying intent of this series to find our voice as a people who are living on the edge of their lives, sensitive to the raw hurts, the primitive passions, and the naïve elations that are at the bottom of our life. I am asking that we depart from the closely managed world of public survival, to move into the open, frightening, healing world of the voice of the Holy One.

I feel that the agenda and intention of the Psalms is considerably at odds with the normal voice of most people – the normal voice of a stable, functioning, self-deceptive culture in which everything must be kept running smoothly. The voice of the Psalms is abrasive, revolutionary, and dangerous. They announce that life is not one of well-being and equilibrium, but a churning, disruptive experience of dislocation and relocation.

So as a way to introduce this series we turned to the introduction of the book of Psalms – Psalm 1. There are two important functions that Psalm 1 plays:

  1. Psalm 1 defines the wicked and the righteous and their respective ways of life.
  2. The righteous are those who are firmly planted in the Word of God. They are the ones who meditate on the word and because of that do not accompany the wicked and because of that they thrive.

With these two functions in mind, we concluded the evening with the following time of guided prayer and meditation. This time consisted of the reading of a verse, a thought, a question, and a way to pray.

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers (Psalms 1:1).

There seems to be a progression in this verse—a descent into hell—from listening to the advice and ways of sin all the way to mocking what is true and good.

Examine your life: what you listen to, what you look at, whom you identify with?

Confess now the ways you walk with the wicked, stand with sinners, and sit and the seat of scoffers.

But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night (Psalms 1:2).

Sin is directional: It only looks around horizontally, but not up. The advice of the wicked, the society of sinners is all it knows.

Righteousness is directional as well: It looks up to God and meditates on his ways, his truth, his word. It has an eternal view of the world.

Again examine your life. Do you spend quality time in the Word of God? Is it your delight? Pray it will be.

He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers (Psalms 1:3).

Remember that we must be sustained for the long haul. Pursue the life of meditation and prayer the way tree roots seek water.

Your choice is either to flourish like a well-watered tree – to allow yourself to be a person of substance or to be shallow and hollow inside. Pray that God will help you choose well.

To pray is to meditate, to hear God and answer God. To hear well is to pray well. We would never speak to God unless God had first spoken to us. Your prayer life will never go further than your grasp of God’s word.

Right now ask God to speak his Word with its full and proper impact into your life.

The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous; for the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish (Psalms 1:4-6).

Mission-the key to the grand narrative of Scripture

Posted on by
Reply

It is not controversial to claim that the Bible tells a story of the world in which we find our place and role. The controversy comes when we say that this story is a metanarrative about the meaning and destiny of universal history. Scripture, as N. T. Wright puts it, “offers a story which is the story of the whole world. It is public truth.”

Furthermore, God’s mission to redeem world is the main story-line of the narrative that the Bible tells. Christopher Wright “sees the mission of God (and the participation in it of God’s people) as a framework in which we can read the whole Bible. “Mission he says “is a major key that unlocks the whole grand narrative of the canon of Scripture.” While a traditional interpretation of the missio Dei revolves around ‘sending’—the Father sends the Son, who both send the Spirit and the church is certainly true, Christopher Wright would rather speak of God’s mission in terms of his long-term purpose or goal to restore people from all nations and the whole creation. This is helpful in that we can often be shortsighted. Thus, the “Bible renders to us the story of God’s mission through God’s people in their engagement with God’s world for the sake of the whole of God’s creation.” The mission of God’s people, then, is our participation in God’s mission, playing our role in God’s redemptive purposes: “Fundamentally, our mission (if it is biblically informed and validated) means our committed participation as God’s people, at God’s invitation and command, in God’s own mission, within the history of God’s world for the redemption of God’s creation.”

Therefore, the horizon of God’s mission to the ends of the earth is central to the biblical story from the beginning. God’s purpose and intention is to restore all nations, all peoples, all cultures, indeed all of the creation from the sinful rebellion of humanity and its effects. In this way, God’s redemptive purpose is comprehensive, putting to death sin, rebellion and idolatry.

From Michael W. Goheen, “Notes Toward a Framework for a Missional Hermeneutic“

Praying with Walter Brueggemann

Posted on by
Reply

incense 218x300 Praying with Walter BrueggemannPraying the Psalms depends on two things: (1) what we find when we come to the Psalms that is already there; and (2) what we bring to the Psalms out of our own lives. [W]hen we come to the Psalms we shall find their eloquence and passion and boldness in addressing the Holy One. [W]hat we bring to the Psalter in order to pray is a candid openness to the extremities in our own lives and in the lives of others, extremities that recognize the depths of despair and death, that acknowledge the sheer gift of life.

The work of prayer is to bring these two realities together – the boldness of the Psalms and the extremity of our experience – to let them interact, play with each other, tease each other. The work of prayer consists in the imaginative use of language to give the extremities their full due and to force new awareness and new configuration of the reality by the boldness of speech. All this is to submit to the Holy One in order that we may be addressed by a Word that out-distances all our speech.

Walter Brueggemann, Praying the Psalms: Engaging Scripture and the Life of the Spirit, 17.

Sunday Reflections

Posted on by
5

Commitment – [kuh-mit-muhnt] –noun

  1. the act of committing.
  2. the state of being committed.
  3. the act of committing, pledging, or engaging oneself.
  4. a pledge or promise; obligation.
  5. engagement; involvement.

Covenant – [kuhv-uh-nuhnt] –noun

  1. an agreement, usually formal, between two or more persons to do or not do something specified.
  2. Law. an incidental clause in such an agreement.
  3. Ecclesiastical. A solemn agreement between the members of a church to act together in harmony with the precepts of the gospel.
  4. Bible. The conditional promises made to humanity by God, as revealed in Scripture.

God’s plan sets out a thesis that is important for us. John Walton in Covenant: God’s Purpose writes,

God has a plan in history that He is sovereignly executing. The goal of that plan is for Him to be in relationship with the people whom He has created. It would be difficult for people to enter into a relationship with a God whom they do not know. If His nature were concealed, obscured, or distorted, an honest relationship would be impossible. In order to clear the way for this relationship, then, God has undertaken as a primary objective a program of self-revelation. He wants people to know him. The mechanism that drives this program is the covenant, and the instrument is Israel. The purpose of the covenant is to reveal God.

Covenant is central to our understanding of God’s character, what he wants for his church, and how he plans to carry out his ultimate purpose for his church.

So that they might be with him

Posted on by
Reply

It is written of Jesus and his disciples—And he went up on the mountain and called to him those whom he desired, and they came to him. And he appointed twelve (whom he also named apostles) so that they might be with him and he might send them out to preach (Mark 3:13-14, ESV).

Jesus called to him those he desired, enabled them to respond, and he appointed them so that they might be with him and to send them out.

It is certainly true that these men needed Jesus, but they also needed one another, and by their response to the Jesus’ call they constituted themselves a fellowship. Later, when they were ready to go out, “he [Jesus] called the twelve and began to send them out two by two” (Mark 6:7, ESV).

This indicates their dependence not only on Jesus, but also on one another. This is why the rest of the New Testament commands church members to bear one another’s burdens, encourage one another, exhort one another, pray for one another, confess our sins to one another, speak the truth in love to one another, admonish one another, build up one another, teach one another, comfort one another, submit to one another, serve one another, patiently bear with one another, be hospitable to one another, greet one another, live in peace with one another, regard one another as more important than ourselves, care for one another, exercise our spiritual gifts to serve one another, be kind and tenderhearted to one another, be devoted to one another, accept one another, forgive one another, and to love one another.

In calling out his church, Jesus had purposes of far reaching importance in his Kingdom. Some of these will only be realized in eternity. But he had one immediate purpose which can and should be fulfilled in the present experience in each of us who claim to be his follower – fellowship. Jesus knows our need for community – a place to belong. He knows our need for friendships that go beyond “Hey. Hi you doing? Nice weather we are having.” He knows our humanity and provided the fulfillment of these needs through the church.

Consumerism

Posted on by
Reply
peanut butter cup 225x300 Consumerism

From "The 60 Worst Christian T-Shirts Ever"

The following is an excerpt and adaptation of an article by Barry Diamond, “Consumerism vs. the Missional Church.” As this article states, I believe consumerism is one of the greatest challenges facing the American church. With that said here is the article.

Consumerism could be described as a belief that our own personal happiness can be achieved with the purchase and consumption of certain material possessions. It is the tendency for us as people to identify with the specific products and services that we consume, especially that which we believe may give us status or value in the world around us. Values such as community, integrity and spirituality have diminished and shifted instead towards materialism, careerism and individualism as people seek instant gratification to improve their perceived social status and self- worth.

How big is the problem of consumerism facing the church? Alan Hirsch surprisingly declares,

I have come to believe that the major threat to the viability of our faith is that of consumerism. This is a far more heinous and insidious challenge to the gospel, because in so many ways it infects each and every one of us. I have little doubt that in consumerism we are now dealing with a very significant religious phenomenon. If the role of religion is to offer a sense of identity, purpose, meaning and community, then it can be said that consumerism fills all these criteria. Consumerism has all the distinguishing traits of outright paganism and we need to see it for what it is.

Here’s the bad news – consumerism is very much alive and well in the American church. Churches in Western culture have become filled with consumerism. Many churches have unintentionally (and some intentionally) bought into becoming suppliers of religious goods and “services.” This of course has produced masses of American believers who have become properly trained in the art of spiritual consumption. Many come to a church building to “get fed” and much of church life and programming is organized around various life stages and felt needs causing inviting someone to church to be equal with evangelism. So people come to hop and shop and look for their needs to get met. The church becomes just another step on the path and pursuit of the American dream.

By and large, consumerism has become toxic to our faith and deforming to us spiritually. As David Goetz states, the good life has produced “spiritual cripples.” In the long run, we have become “bloated spiritual consumers.” But it doesn’t just stop there. When our focus is on consumption and getting our own spiritual needs met, we then become ignorant to the world around us.

It certainly doesn’t seem like we can make disciples for Jesus with the American church squarely focused upon consumption. Ultimately, what we will produce with the current model will only be spiritual consumers. As Hirsch concludes,

I have come to the dreaded conclusion that we cannot consume our way into discipleship. Consumerism as it is experienced in the everyday and discipleship as it is intended in the scriptures are simply at odds with each other.

Now the good news. Herein lies the power of the missional church. I am persuaded it holds the antidote to cure consumerism in the American church. I am confident that the missional church has the ability to take us from the shallowness of cultural consumption into the deeper waters of true discipleship. As the church is refocused and repositioned itself around the mission of God, I am convinced this is the vital key in changing the consumeristic mentality so prevalent in the American church.

I believe this is the great calling, context and challenge before the missional church in the 21st century, as God raises up new leaders that call the church away from consumption and on towards mission in the world around us. This is the condition we must address and deal with if we hope to be effective in engaging and transforming the host culture we find ourselves a part of. The church has most certainly been called to transform culture, not to be overcome or absorbed by it.

Meaning, Mission, Message

Posted on by
3

Meaning, Mission, Message

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the function and nature of the church. Simply stated, to think of the church is to think of Jesus. For the church has no meaning, no mission, no message apart from Jesus. The message is what the world truly needs. The message is the only thing that can solve the problem of the world’s sin, heal the world’s divisions, secure the realization of peace, and reconcile creation and Creator in perfect obedience and enduring love. The church’s message is a person, and that person is Jesus.

The prophet Isaiah, anticipated the coming of the church’s message and exclaimed: How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns” (Isaiah 52:7, ESV).

If you are a church member, these feet are yours.