One thing that we in the PCA-- and in the broader church-- must be careful of is the difficulty of sectarianism. Frankly, it is something that we have been far too careless about, and that must change for the church to move forward in this century in the United States.

When I say sectarianism, this is what I mean: when we are quick to dismiss, divide from, or decry because of a disagreement over ANY issue, large or small, we might be sectarians. When our nuances are different from someone else’s, so we determine that they are wrong by default, we are being sectarian. When we decide that we understand what someone else believes better than they do, and we castigate them for those beliefs, we are acting in sectarian ways.

Let me illustrate: the position of the Westminster Confession of Faith-- our denominational confession-- on the observance of the Sabbath, is fairly straightforward. Essentially, the Sabbath day must be preserved from ALL activities apart from worship and passive rest (the one accepted exception to this being “deeds of mercy”). Basically, a Christian ought to return home from corporate morning worship and retire to his prayer closet until rejoining the congregation for evening worship, according to the WCF.

This raises a lot of questions, like what should a Christian do about meals? Must they be simple and plain, requiring the sparsest of work? Is a parent who attends to the needs of an infant child sinning because of the work involved (or is this a deed of mercy)? How does this apparently strict observance of the Sabbath square up to the New Testament portrayal of the Lord’s Day as a time of celebration, feasting, and delight?

Consequently, I don’t know ANYONE who is ordained who doesn’t take some exception to the WCF’s position on the Sabbath; the classic exception is phrased something like, “I think it’s okay to throw the baseball with my kid in the backyard.” In some (many?) presbyteries, this is not even considered an exception of any substance; in ours, for example, this is normally judged as an exception of primarily semantic nature (although I’m personally confident that the Westminster Divines-- the guys who wrote the WCF-- would not agree).

In other words, we have nuances to our theological convictions. Here’s where sectarianism comes in: when my nuances are different from your nuances, I am acting in a sectarian manner if I say that your nuances are wrong by default, simply because they aren’t just like mine. I am sinning when I do this, in several ways: I am exhibiting pride in my nuances, rather than a humility that acknowledges that I could be wrong; I am failing to exercise biblical discernment in considering the position of the other; I am dividing from my brother over what is (often) an issue that should not break fellowship, rather than preserving the unity the Christ Himself emphasized ought to define us.

Yet, sadly, this happens all the time in the PCA. In fact, it happens all the time in much of the church. It has defined the manner in which several denominational debates have played out over the past decade or so. It has caused harm to the reputation of the church both within and outside of her walls.

Another illustration: a friend of mine was one of the speakers for the Conversation on Denominational Renewal a little more than a year ago. (Actually, a few of those guys are friends, and I won’t say which one I speak of now.) This same friend had presented the same ideas that he offered at the Conversation at another meeting, where 50 or 60 key leaders in the PCA were gathered. Afterwards, my friend was talking privately with one of the bigger names in the PCA-- known inside our denomination and outside of it as a man of some stature, whose name you would probably know if I offered it (but I won’t).

My friend said to this man, “Whether you aim to or not, you are one of the few people in a position to shape the future of the PCA. Here’s what I want to know: is there room in your PCA for a guy like me?”

After a moment’s pause, this leader responded, “I don’t know.”

This is sectarianism at its fullest. My friend is openly and publicly inviting others to consider with him how the PCA could be better: more biblical, more united, more loving in our presentation of truth, more faithfully living out our theology. Yet for this leader, there might not be room for such a guy-- because my friend doesn’t “look” exactly like him.

This is what causes denominations to splinter over reasons that make no sense a hundred years later. This is why there are more than 44 Reformed denominations in the United States alone. This is what keeps us from having a vital ministry of evangelizing the lost: because we’re too busy killing and eating our own people, and others look on that and wonder why they would ever want to be a part of it.

It’s not unique to the PCA, either. Mark Dever’s recent rant about things he cannot live with, including Universalism, Racism, and Infant Baptism (which he further qualified by describing what a sinful practice infant baptism is) is another example of rampant sectarianism (not to mention irony).

Sectarianism is the real sin here-- and I believe it is a sin that we ought to exercise church discipline for.

Tags: PCA, Church Universal, theology, General Assembly, presbyterians, community, love, PCA Polity

I mentioned a while back that I would talk about our “Ministry Focus” soon, so I’d better do it!

Our Session (the body of the Ruling and Teaching Elders, gathered to lead the church) has decided that we will establish a “Ministry Focus” for each church year, where we will focus on one aspect of spiritual life and formation and order the ministries of our church around it. We are committed to doing the following as a part of this:

• Providing specific resources related to the Ministry Focus for individuals and households
• Enfolding the Ministry Focus into our existing congregational ministries and activities
• Developing new events, activities, and ministries to advance the Ministry Focus as necessary

Our Ministry Focus for 2009 is Prayer, obviously.

As an example of how our Ministry Focus is going to take root, here are a few things we’ll be doing over the coming couple of months (if not already) to integrate a Ministry Focus of prayer into our worship:

1. We have expanded our Prayers of the People a bit, including a few new elements that we will pray for weekly.
2. I will take a moment to briefly describe a part of our corporate prayers immediately before the Prayers of the People.
3. We will have several sermons and sermon series on prayer during the course of the year.
4. I will be including prayer in my explanation and/or application in every sermon.
5. During the liturgical season of Lent, we will focus on personal and congregational mourning and repentance of sin, and will utilize prayers of lament during our time of corporate confession of sin.

I’m very excited about the idea of Ministry Focus in general, the Ministry Focus on prayer in particular, and how things are already beginning to develop. Keep a watch for regular posts on prayer.

Tags: prayer, community, Faith & Life

I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone— for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. ~1 Timothy 2:1-4

Scripture clearly portrays the faithful follower of Christ as one who extends respect, submission, and regular prayer to the leaders and authorities that God has placed over him or her. In our Ministry Focus on prayer this year, one of the lessons we might learn is how to pray for the President of the United States, who God has sovereignly and providentially given to us.

Here are some ways that you might be in prayer for the President:

• That, above all else, he would humble himself in the sight of the Lord, and be exalted by the victory of Christ on the cross to atone for his sins and bring him into a reconciled relationship with God the Father.
• That he would love his family faithfully, and in the face of the pressures and stress of the presidency remain committed and able to be the husband and father that God has created him to be.
• That God would grant him wisdom, courage, and commitment to lead and serve the citizens of our country faithfully and well, and that he would not bow to the idols of esteem, power, or pandering even when all around him beg him to do so.
• That his presidency would be marked by love, mercy, justice, and truth at every turn and in every decision.
• That he would be quick to repent, publicly when necessary, owning his failures and fallibility and resting in the grace of Christ, not in the illusion of moral, ethical, or political perfection.
• That God would grant him humility and repentance in the face of wrong policies and positions, and that he would search the Scriptures, his own conscience, and the counsel of the Body of Christ for wisdom and discernment in each decision, policy, signing of law, or other act; and that, with a teachable spirit and humble mind, he would readily reverse even his own decisions when convicted by the Holy Spirit that he erred in them.
• That God would use him as an instrument of grace, justice, truth, and reconciliation, both within our country and across the world, and that he would be known more as a man of peace than a man of the sword.
• That he would know his own strengths, and that he would use them for the good of the country and the world, not merely for the good of his own political agenda or that of his political party.
• That he would know his own weaknesses, and that he would own them freely, granting room for those whose strengths complement his weaknesses and humbly delegating leadership to them for the good of the country and the world.
• That he would find love, respect, and support from Christ’s church as we fulfill the commands of Scripture, and that we, the church-- through our actions, our attitude, and our prayers-- might encourage him ever closer to Christ.

Tags: Faith & Life, prayer, Politics, love, community

One of my former co-workers once said to me, “I don’t get this whole Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.”

I said, “Have you ever read, listened to, or watched his ‘I Have a Dream’ speech?”

“No,” he replied.

That explained it all to me.

This year, MLK Day has peculiar significance, as you know. If YOU don’t “get” it, then let me offer the following as an introduction to what makes it so important.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Christian Pastor and preacher, and was compelled by the convictions of his faith to speak out against the oppression and racism that was so prevalent in his day, and in many ways remains so in ours (if perhaps more subtly at times). His speech-- almost a sermon-- entitled, “I Have a Dream,” draws on the heritage of our country and what the ideas and principles behind the constitution stand for; more importantly, though, it draws even more heavily on biblical themes, particularly themes of redemption, love, and longing for glory, and is a heralding call to everyone-- ESPECIALLY Christians-- to live out these biblical principles.

In short, King responded to racism, hate, and oppression by calling for MORE Christianity, and a closer adherence to biblical Christianity.

Here is the text of “I Have a Dream”:

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.

But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. And so we've come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.

In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the "unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds."

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we've come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.

We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. And there will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.

We cannot walk alone.

And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead.

We cannot turn back.

There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their self-hood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating: "For Whites Only." We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until "justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream."

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. And some of you have come from areas where your quest -- quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.

Let us not wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends.

And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of "interposition" and "nullification" -- one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; "and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together

This is our hope, and this is the faith that I go back to the South with.

With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

And this will be the day -- this will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning:

My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.

Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim's pride,

From every mountainside, let freedom ring!

And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.

And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.

Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.

Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.

Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.

But not only that:

Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.

From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:

Free at last! Free at last!

Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!

Here is the speech on video:

Tags: Faith & Life, Cultural Discernment, rhetoric, Church Universal, love, community

I agree with 99% of what Michael says here about “what [he] means by Post-Evangelical.”

I find much of the baggage of evangelicalism stifling to my faith, my ministry, and the life of the church. I appreciate his gentle critique, and find it helpful to have some new categories to think in.

What do you think of it? Could you consider yourself a “Post-Evangelical” according to these criteria?

Tags: Faith & Life, Pastoral ministry, Church Universal, community

Happy Thanksgiving to all!

I trust you and your families are resting, feasting, and enjoying the community and fellowship of family and friends. We are having a small but delightful family gathering here in Oakland-- my sister came down from St. Louis to join us for the weekend. We’ll have turkey, rice and gravy, green bean casserole, pineapple and cheese casserole, yeast rolls, and pie. This afternoon will be about rest, football, and feeding babies.

I apologize for the general slowness of posting here lately. I hope you will excuse me for putting pastoral ministry and family above blogging. I plant to resume more regular/frequent posting in the next week or so.

Meanwhile, here’s a recent shot of the twins-- they are growing fast.

Tags: love, community, Faith & Life, family life

Not long ago, I discussed a key psychological and social factor that often keeps churches smaller. Today, let’s talk about what it takes for a church to become bigger.

If the factors I mentioned are at play, it is easy to see why churches remain small. To refresh, there appears to be an inherent limit to the number of relationships we can actively “manage” in our heads, and that number is somewhere around 150. Many more than that, and evidence shows that people naturally begin to break into smaller groups. This built-in limit, I suggested, is the reason why churches often seem to hit a wall around the 150-200 size and cannot easily grow larger than that.

Back in the 1970s, some smart men began to study the idea of church growth, and their studies realized about the same thing: without (apparently) applying the sociology and psychology that I mentioned in the last post on this topic, they nevertheless arrived at 200 as a cap for what they called “small churches.”

[An aside: why 200, instead of the sociologically-proven number of 150? Here’s my reasoning: in a church with 200 members, it’s easy to imagine that 50 or so are not actually a part of the regular social and relational life of the congregation. There will always be home-bound and shut-in folks who are elderly, sick, or otherwise unable to regularly attend worship and other activities. There will inevitably be a few households where part of the family-- maybe the wife and children, but not the husband-- are more active than the rest. And there will be others who are considered members of the congregation-- and even consider themselves as members-- but are either in the process of switching to a different congregation or their commitment to participation in church has ebbed. So a congregation with a membership of 200 probably has 150 or less people in active participation.]

This study eventually became known as the Church Growth Movement, led by Dr. Donald McGavran. Now, this movement has its fair share of critics, and in many cases the critics make important points. Let me be clear about this: I’m not promoting the Church Growth Movement, or suggesting that I accept and promote all of the theories, principles, or methods of that movement. I do believe, however, that there is much to learn about the life of the church from them.

One of the men who has written more recently as a part of that movement is Gary McIntosh, a professor at Talbot School of Theology, which is the seminary of Biola University in California. McIntosh is a prolific writer, but the work of his that I want to focus on here is called One Size Doesn’t Fit All, and details the differences between the different-sized churches.

McIntosh breaks all churches down into three categories by size:

• Small churches-- 15-200 worshipers
• Medium churches-- 200-400 worshipers
• Large churches-- more than 400 worshipers

Now, it’s worth mentioning here that 80% of all churches in the U.S. are smaller than 100 in membership (which means they are even fewer than that in worship attendance), while more than 90% of the churches in the U.S. are 200 or less. So the second and third categories that McIntosh describes represent less than 10% of all churches in the U.S.

Still, these are helpful categories because of what McIntosh goes on to develop in terms of how each category differs in how it must be led. For example, McIntosh says that the structure of a small church is as a “single cell” while a large church is a “multiple cell” structure. The leadership in a small church resides essentially in key families, while in medium churches it resides in committees, and in large churches it resides in select leaders. Decisions in a large church are made by staff and leaders and are driven by vision, whereas in a medium church they are made by committees and driven by changing needs, and in a small church they are made by the whole congregation and driven by history.

I won’t get into details about any of these; I won’t even try to present the whole paradigm to you about how the sizes differ. But I want to draw out a key, crucial point about this that McIntosh develops: the “medium church” size is almost always a transitional stage. In other words, small churches that are growing and reach that size will typically either continue to grow and eventually hit “large church” size, or they will reach the struggles of the “medium church” for a season and that will push them back to a small size.

What are the struggles of the “medium church” that either force continued growth or natural reduction? Here are some of the things that McIntosh points out: since decisions are driven by changing needs, things always seem to be changing which brings a sense of instability. The obstacles to growth for a medium church are inadequate facilities, inadequate staff, inadequate finances, poor administration, and increasing complexity-- all of which demand a change in status quo. Consequently, the strategies for growth in a medium church are: develop a distinct identity, add additional staff, use facilities multiple times or expand facilities, offer multiple worship services, write a long-range plan, and improve the quality of ministry.

You can see how implementing these growth strategies could result in the congregation soon becoming a “large church”. On the other hand, failure to address the growth obstacles and other difficulties that a “medium church” faces will bring a natural reduction in their numbers-- which, by returning them to “small church” size will bring the stability that the members and leadership craved during the struggles of medium church status.

This is why, historically, churches are usually big or small. However, some churches and other ministries have tried to find another way-- and I’ll discuss that in a future post.

Tags: community, Pastoral ministry

Many people struggle with weight-- either being overweight (most of us) or, in some cases, being underweight. In some cases (on either end), the struggle is a truly dangerous one.

To combat the problems and struggles of being overweight, our culture offers us a number of “solutions.” (Sadly, our culture doesn’t offer any real help for the struggles of being underweight.) You can take pills that will suppress your appetite. You can have the fat literally sucked out of your body, and even have your digestive system permanently altered so that you are physically unable to eat “too much.” You can buy into a “subscription” diet program where every bit of your diet is prescribed for you. All of these will cause you to lose weight-- and there is nothing inherently wrong about any of them.

But none of them address the real problems of overeating. With some relatively rare exceptions, every chronic overeater does so for the same sets of reasons: as a coping mechanism, because of lack of self-control, out of greed, or even because of boredom. How does a person overcome these?

A friend of a friend asked exactly this question. He had been a collegiate wrestler, and this had completely messed up his metabolism. When he found himself significantly overweight not long after college, he determined to deal with it in a manner that is a consistent outgrowth of his Christianity. He called it “felling the idol.”

Man’s nature, so to speak, is a perpetual factory of idols. ~John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, vol. 1, ch. 11, sec. 8

The real solution to the problem of overeating is to turn away from the idols in our hearts and find our hope in the Lord. What does that look like for an overeater? Maybe realizing that Christ alone will pacify the sadness and turbulence in her heart. Maybe owning that a biblical view of moderation will make us more satisfied in the long run, not less. Maybe in finding outlets for our boredom in a creative endeavor rather than only in food. Maybe relearning how to eat in moderation, enjoying the delights of food that God made (and that He made good). (As programs go, Weight Watchers does a good job helping with this.) Maybe starting an exercise program that improves your health and complements a healthy and moderate diet.

The bottom line here: Christians must learn to face the sin and fallenness that causes them to overeat and struggle against that-- not simply treat the fruits of that sin and fallenness with solutions that don’t get to the heart of it. What if eating in moderation was your natural inclination, the fruit of the Holy Spirit granting you self-control?

This can only happen if we think and live like disciples, not like food vessels that expand and contract mechanically.

So it goes...
The same is true for other perpetual struggles. For example, over the past 15 years there has been a substantial rise in use of pornography, even among Christians (and the struggle isn’t unique to men, either). One recent statistic suggests that as many as 50% of Christian men and 20% of Christian women are addicted to pornography (comprehensive statistics here.) The rampant availability of pornography on the internet accounts for much of the increase in this problem, while our over-sexualized culture easily accounts for the rest.

So, what is a Christian to do about that? Well, the “stomach-stapling” solution is to simply activate the filters and blockers that are built into many computers, or perhaps subscribe to a similar (but more effective) service that offers the same. And there’s nothing wrong with doing that. But this is treating the symptoms, not the root problem.

You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. ~Matthew 5:27-28

A service like Covenant Eyes is a step or two in the right direction: beyond mere filtering, Covenant Eyes offers internet accountability, where a report of your internet activity is regularly e-mailed to one or more accountability partners, who (one would presume) have agreed to exercise true accountability if they see something amiss. As I said, this IS better-- it puts in place a system and structure that allows real growth and healing through accountability.

Even better (perhaps in addition to using something like Covenant Eyes) is to get deeper. God has created sex (and sexuality), and He made it good and pleasurable. He also designed it for certain contexts and relationships. A biblical treatment of the problem behind pornography (and addiction to it) is to face the sin of addiction, the struggle of lust, the indignity of objectifying others, and the neglect of God’s beautiful and perfect design. We must fell these idols in order to truly deal with a struggle with pornography.

Christians can do this-- it isn’t impossible to overcome addiction or a struggle with pornography. Resources like New Man magazine and Mark Driscoll’s e-book Porn-Again Christian are good places to start. The church can help, too, by making it safe to discuss this struggle (and other “taboo” topics) honestly and without fear of judgment or ill-treatment. What if desire and lust were checked quickly, and dignity and God-honoring treatment of others instinctively came to mind, as the fruit of Christ at work in you to restore a righteous view of people and relationships?

This can only happen if we learn to live like disciples instead of amoral, sexually perverse creatures.

Broadening the application...
So, if we deal with overeating only by treating the symptom through stapling our stomachs or denying ourselves food, we’ve missed the point. Likewise, if we deal with a struggle with pornography only by cutting off our connection to it, we haven’t truly dealt with the sinful lust in our hearts.

I would argue that we would do the same by making the outlaw of abortion our sole approach to dealing with the sin of abortion.

Make no mistake: I believe that abortion is a sin. I am appalled by the statistics related to legal abortions in the United States, and long to see it eradicated as a practice. I believe that, as a nation and a culture, we all have blood on our hands and ought to be regularly on our knees in repentance.

But if our agenda for dealing with the sin of abortion is simply to make it illegal, we’ve ignored the sin behind abortion. In short, we’ve become Pharisees-- who were utterly concerned with the appearance of righteousness, but inwardly were indifferent.

Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cummin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. ~Matthew 23:23

What about the sin of immorality that led to many of the pregnancies that were aborted? What of the sins of selfishness and lazyness that drove some to abort because a pregnancy-- let alone a baby-- would be too much of an inconvenience? What about the sin of those around an aborting mother, who allowed or even drove her to believe that abortion was her best option? What about the sin of a culture that leaves so many children languishing in foster care and orphanages because we won’t step up to adopt? What about the sin of a world that tolerates a highly-sexualized culture-- even participates in and encourages it-- that persuades children to take sexual relations so casually?

There is great sin involved in abortion. Be assured of this: if we do not attend to the litany of sins wrapped up in abortion, we will not reduce abortion substantially simply by making it illegal. Abortion wasn’t invented in 1973, and it wouldn’t be eliminated by the passing of legislation.

But if we fell the idols of abortion, we create an environment where abortion is reduced or even eliminated because it isn’t necessary. Women and men alike take sexuality seriously enough to not engage in it lightly, and they take responsibility for their actions if she does get pregnant by not aborting (and by giving the child up for adoption if they cannot properly care for him or her). The culture around them supports this out of an inherent value of all life, and few children who need adopting aren’t adopted, few mothers who need spiritual, social, and financial support lack it. No one who faces the struggle of being pregnant at a young age or out of wedlock becomes a pariah, because all acknowledge that their sins are just as severe-- and yet neither do they go without loving accountability.

What if abortion was essentially eliminated from our culture because there was no need for it?

It can happen if we learn to think and act like disciples, rather than political activist culture warriors.

Tags: love, community, Politics, Cultural Discernment, Faith & Life, Health, worship

I read a lot of blogs. Some of you know this, and have asked about it-- specifically, why do I read so many blogs, and what sort of blogs do I read?

First, the “why”-- I consider most of my blog-reading to fit into the category of “personal development,” in the same way that someone might read a newspaper or a trade journal. Maybe a dozen of the blogs I read are written by friends and strictly for the purpose of keeping me informed of their lives. The rest are related to something I am or that I do: ministry, writing, technology, productivity... plus a small handful of news blogs and feeds. This post is a perfect example of why I read blogs.

Now, a few more words about what sort of blogs I read. Here are some key factors for deciding whether I’ll continue to read a blog or feed:

• Teach me something frequently. A lot of the blogs that have earned a longstanding, permanent place in my feed reader* are there because they regularly give me something to chew on-- even if it’s “just” a quote or a short snippet of an idea. If you want me to look forward to seeing a new post from you, give me something to think about.
• Write with humility. Help me see that you don’t think you have the final word on a topic, unless it is your own opinion-- and in that case, help me see that you don’t think that yours is the only opinion that matters.

As importantly, here are some things that almost guarantee that I’ll drop your blog from my reader:

• Spending all of your energy selling me something. I won’t deny any blogger the right to make some money from their blogs, but don’t make it all about that. Just yesterday, I removed a feed because every post was centered around a book that was linked to (through an Amazon affiliate link) and the gist of each post was, “to REALLY learn about this, buy this book...”
• Toot your own horn often. It’s great to hear about something you’ve done that is praiseworthy. If more than half of the posts in a given week or month are all about your accomplishments (especially if they read like, “let me tell you about the great thing I just did...”), you can bet I’ll stop reading soon.
• Focus often on a topic that isn’t germane to your blog. It’s one thing to offer an occasional comment or idea about something that is apparently outside your normal field of topics; it’s another to spend a lot of time (yours and mine) on it, especially with a tone or voice that suggests that I should take your word as more than just another opinion. During election season, I dropped a couple of blogs from my feed-- one from a popular Reformed writer, and another that is supposed to be a news source for our denomination-- because both spent at least every other post hawking the editors’ personal political views.
• Put yourself forward as the watchdog for a particular group or cause. Someone recently said, “commentary is, sadly, always a few notches below creativity.” One thing I’ve come to despise is the set of blogs from folks who spend most of their time pointing out where everyone else is wrong. I tried reading some of the blogs that offer frequent discussion about matters in the PCA, but I just couldn’t stomach it.
• Write with no concern whatsoever for grammar or style. There are a few blogs that I would read regularly, if only the writers would use decent punctuation, capitalize properly, and break their text up in to paragraphs. As much time as I spend staring at a computer screen, if my browser is suddenly full of text that looks like an unbroken string of characters from top to bottom, my eyes glass over and everything goes fuzzy.

So, for whatever it’s worth, thats a quick summary of why I read blogs, and what sorts of blogs I read (and what sorts I don’t).



*I use a piece of software called a “newsfeed reader” that handles all of my blogs and other feeds. The one I use is called NetNewsWire. I only read blogs that offer an RSS feed (or something like it, that my reader can use)-- these notify me of new content and automatically summarize it for me. If a blog doesn’t offer a feed, I won’t read it with any regularity.

Tags: reading, Cultural Discernment, love, community

Scot McKnight is a college professor who writes a wonderful blog called Jesus Creed. Among several factors, one thing that makes Jesus Creed wonderful is that it is a true online community: there is a tight group of regular readers who read almost every post, comment frequently, and have actually gotten to know one another online. The tone of their discourse is civil and gracious, even when they disagree. Scot is a prolific writer, but he is also a master at moderating comments and regularly interacting with them.

In my view, Jesus Creed has become as close to an online “church” as it is (currently) possible to do so-- the readers are the congregation, and Scot is the Pastor, and he regularly feeds them from the Word and encourages them in the growth of their faith, while they learn and grow together in fellowship and discussion.

Scot recently had the opportunity to expand the reach of his blog, and after careful consideration, he took it. When he announced the changes that would take place (which included “moving” the blog to a large online community called BeliefNet), he got mixed reactions. Here is an example:

My concern about a lowered level of dialogue remains also. There is thoughtful, quality commentary in many of the actual articles on Beliefnet. But perusing the comments and looking at those ads mentioned above, Beliefnet feels more like the fast food station in Wal-Mart, while this blog has felt like a cozy community-owned cafe that has its own community-shaped culture. Maybe rather than the McDonalds in Wal-Mart, the Starbucks in Barnes and Noble is a more fair analogy to Beliefnet, I don't know. I'd still prefer the locally owned coffee shop with its own community based culture over the corporately created ambience of the B&N Starbucks. I hate the fact that this sounds snobbish. But the level of discourse here is one of the reasons I come, and if in order to find one thought provoking comment I have to wade through multiple posts that don't follow the basic rules of logic or show an awareness of how to make a point cogently while trying to ignore obnoxious advertisements, then I'll probably come less often.

This comparison-- small vs. big, community-based vs. corporate, local vs. chain, etc.-- reflects a common posture toward the church today, and one that is the fruit of social, psychological, and anthropological constructions. While the Jesus Creed blog isn’t a church, it presents an interesting case-study that helps us understand why churches are usually big and growing larger, or small and staying so.

It turns out that we have built-in levels of capacity. Seven happens to be the highest number of memorable digits-- which is why the Bell company originally chose seven digits for telephone numbers: they wanted the highest number of digits possible that would still be something easily committed to memory. Psychologists have tested this and proven that, by and large, this is a built-in limit for most people. They call this “channel capacity.”

Our built-in limits to handling information affects us relationally, too. Anthropologist Robin Dunbar has developed extensive theories about what writer Malcolm Gladwell calls our “social channel capacities.” Here’s Gladwell describing Dunbar’s findings:

If you belong to a group of five people, Dunbar points out, you have to keep track of ten separate relationship; your relationships with the four others in your circle and the six other two-way relationships between the others. That’s what it means to know everyone else in the circle. You have to understand the personal dynamics of the group, juggle different personalities, keep people happy, manage the demands on your own time and attention, and so on. If you belong to a group of twenty people, however, there are now 190 two-way relationships to keep track of: 19 involving yourself and 171 involving the rest of the group. That’s a fivefold increase in the size of the group, but a twentyfold increase in the amount of information processing needed to “know” the other members of the group. Even a relatively small increase in the size of a group, in other words, creates a significant additional social and intellectual burden. [Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping Point (New York: Little, Brown and Co., 2000), pp. 178-179.]

This inherent increase in complexity explains why growing groups appear to struggle, while static groups seem to be more consistently content: there is an intellectual and social challenge attached to growth that is correlated in an exponential way to the addition of members. For every single person added to the mix, that represents an additional challenge of much more than one more relationship-- and that addition increases with every new member.

Gladwell continues:

[Quoting Dunbar] “The figure of 150 seems to represent the maximum number of individuals with whom we can have a genuinely social relationship, the kind of relationship that goes with knowing who they are and how they relate to us. Putting it another way, it’s the number of people you would not feel embarrassed about joining uninvited for a drink if you happened to bump into them in a bar.”Dunbar has combed through anthropological literature and found that the number 150 pops up again and again. For example, he looks at 21 different hunter-gatherer societies for which we have solid historical evidence, from the Walbiri of Australia to the Tauade of New Guinea to the Ammassalik of Greenland to the Ona of Tierra del Fuego and found that the average number of people in their villages was 148.4. The same pattern holds true for military organization. “Over the years military planners have arrived at a rule of thumb which dictates that functional fighting units cannot be substantially larger than 200 men,” Dunbar writes. [Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping Point (New York: Little, Brown and Co., 2000), pp. 179-180.]

So we’re beginning to get the point: we tend to cluster into groups of 150 or smaller. Does this apply to churches too?

Yes it does. One more quote from Gladwell:

Then there is the example of the religious group known as the Hutterites, who for hundreds of years have lived in self-sufficient agricultural colonies in Europe and, since the early twentieth century, in North America. The Hutterites (who came out of the same tradition as the Amish and the Mennonites) have a strict policy that every time a colony approaches 150, they split it in two and start a new one. “Keeping things under 150 just seems to be the best and most efficient way to manage a group of people,” Bill Gross, one of the leaders of the Hutterite colony outside Spokane told me. “When things get larger than that, people become strangers to one another...” At 150, the Hutterites believe, something happens-- something indefinable but very real-- that somehow changes the nature of community overnight. “In smaller groups people are a lot closer. They’re knit together, which is very important if you want to be effective and successful at community life,” Gross said. “If you get too large, you don’t have enough work in common. You don’t have enough things in common, and then you start to become strangers and that close-knit fellowship starts to get lost.” Gross spoke from experience. He had been in Hutterite colonies that had come hear to that magic number and seen firsthand how things had changed. “What happens when you get that big is that the group starts, just on its own, to form a sort of clan.” He made a gesture with his hands, as if to demonstrate division. “You get two or three groups within the larger group. That is something you really try to prevent, and when it happens it is a good time to branch out.” [Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping Point (New York: Little, Brown and Co., 2000), pp. 180-181.]

This explains why the readership on Scot McKnight’s blog are antsy about the changes that will draw more readers and, by implication, commenters (who will become members of this online community). They have felt the struggle of that exponential increase in social/intellectual challenge before. They realize that it will happen again-- to a community that they love. They are acting on instinct.

This is also what happens in any church-- especially an historically small congregation-- that experiences rapid growth. The original members push back instinctively. Pastors and leaders tend to dismiss this as a poor attitude toward growth, but what Gladwell wrote above suggests that it is more than that, and far more unconscious and innocent than that.

I’ll continue this post tomorrow next time, when I’ll bring in the idea of churches that are big, how they got that way, and why some grow big while others don’t.

Tags: Pastoral ministry, community

This is an interesting and moving video. The power of connection and community is amazing.

Tags: community, love

UPDATE: Marcie reminded me of another good piece of information on poverty-- see the Miniature Earth link below.

Today is “Blog Action Day” according to someone. The point is to bring awareness about poverty to those who read our blogs. I think it’s a good idea.

My friend John Allen recently posted an amazing set of myths and facts on his blog (which he himself copied from the Food Bank of Northeast Louisiana), and I’m shamelessly copying it here:

Myth: They are not hungry. They are fat!

Fact: This is called the Obesity Paradox. The population that is forced to live on cheap, starchy foods are, in many cases, fat. In some cases they are morbidly obese. They are getting a lot of calories and little real nutrition. The end result of this is all kinds of health problems.

MYTH: They do not need help– they get food Stamps.

Fact: According to studies done by America’s Second Harvest, 40% of the people eligible for food stamps do not receive them. And , almost 84% of the families contacted for the 2000 hunger study reported that the food stamps they receive last for three weeks or less.

MYTH: Low-income families who need help do not work.

Fact: Seventy-one percent of low –income families work. In fact, the average annual work effort for low-income families is 2,500 hours, equal to 1.2 full time jobs.

MYTH: The kids get enough food through school lunch and breakfast programs.

Fact: These programs do not provide an evening meal the vast majority do not provide food during the summer, school breaks, and holidays.

MYTH: Low income families are illegal aliens, or immigrants.

Fact: Seventy-two percent of the low-income families have American-born parents only.


I’ve heard some of these statements (complaints? excuses?) used to justify inaction toward addressing poverty. We’ve got to stop. We have to begin to own the fact that Jesus himself spoke far more frequently about loving the poor and needy than he did about marriage, homosexuality, abortion, or war (incidentally, Jesus didn’t speak directly to either abortion or homosexuality, though other parts of Scripture-- all God’s Word-- do address these). Jesus-- and the New Testament apostles-- were equally as concerned with right belief AND right practice, the latter of which James summarizes as caring for those who are marginalized and without means (James 1:27).

For another look at the reality of poverty and wealth, this video from Miniature Earth is amazing.

Here’s my encouragement: check out these very helpful documents that the PCA offers, thanks to the amazing ministry of Randy Nabors:

• Biblical Guidelines for Mercy Ministry
• Principles for Giving Assistance
• Five Common Questions for Evaluating Need

Find more at the PCA’s urban and mercy ministries page under “Resources.”

Tags: Faith & Life, community, love, Orphans & Widows

This quote was mentioned to me recently, and it brought to mind some important ideas regarding logic-- thus, a continuation of my Logic for Theological Discussion series:

From a profile on CNN anchor Campbell Brown:...when you have Candidate A saying the sky is blue, and Candidate B saying it’s a cloudy day, I look outside and I see, well, it’s a cloudy day. I should be able to tell my viewers, ‘Candidate A is wrong, Candidate B is right.’ And not have to say, ‘Well, you decide.’ Then it would be like I’m an idiot. And I’d be treating the audience like idiots.

The difficulty is that there are different sorts of sentences that a candidate (or anyone else), and the media wants to categorize all of them into the same group when they aren't.

It is possible for a sentence to not be a "statement" or a truth claim. In logic, the term "statement" denotes a sentence that can be said to be true or false. Questions, exclamations, and declarations of opinion are not considered to be statements.

A real statement also can be subcategorized, into what we would call "supported" and "unsupported" statements. Those that need further verification in order to determine their truth value are considered supported, while those that are self-evident are unsupported.

Some sentences appear to be supported statements but are actually matters of opinion. For example, "it is cool in here" is only supported if the temperature is low-- let's say, close to freezing, or below 50 degrees. If it is 65 degrees, I might consider it comfortable while someone else may think it cool-- but it is then a matter of opinion. Meanwhile, some sentences are supported regardless of someone’s preference. For example, “That closet is dark when the light is off” is something that can be verified to be true, and no amount of opinion or preference for darkness will change that.

Furthermore, the difficulty with supported statements is that they are often made with reliance on evidence that itself is often questionable. So, if an expert in the field of economics, say, wages an opinion about the status of our financial crisis, his declaration may be quite credible (since he is an expert) but is nevertheless a matter of opinion. Someone else may offer a true statement about the matter, relying on the word of that expert as the supporting evidence for their statement. But this supported statement is based on expert opinion, which can be scrutinized, challenged, or counter-argued by other experts.

And here's the kicker: by far, most of the statements made by political candidates are either supported statements or declarations of opinions. So, for Campbell Brown (or any other journalist) to complain about whether they are allowed to report on them is spurious. NO journalist can adequately report these things with anything other than verbatim quotes, without becoming something of a wonk. It would simply take too much fact-checking and explanation to accomplish it in a journalistic way that is also reliable.

How does this apply to theology? Because we often do the same thing with theological matters. It is essential to see what claims are unsupported statements, which are supported statements, and which are not statements at all but simply matters of opinion.

Consider the following:

• Everyone understands that there is right and wrong. (Unsupported statement)
• When Paul refers to the body as the temple of the Holy Spirit, he means the body of Christ. (Supported statement)
• The writers of the Westminster Confession would not have seen playing catch on a Sunday as permissible. (Opinion)

All of these are claims that might occur in a given theological discussion. Yet, they must not be treated with the same weight of authority, because they cannot all be taken in the same manner. An unsupported theological statement may be assumed in a way that the supported ones may not. My opinion may be correct, but you must come to that conclusion because of reasons that persuade you of it, not simply because I have said it.

How might we deal with different types of claims and sentences in theological (and other) discussions?

• Determine which type of sentence(s) you’re being offered-- or, that you’re offering. This alone can be all the difference in recognizing how acutely you need to deal with the truth claims involved.
• If the claim is an unsupported statement, is it true? This may seem like a simple question at first, but it isn’t. Does everyone really understand that there is right and wrong? Is darkness really dark? At least at a philosophical level, many such truth claims cannot be taken for granted these days. (Perhaps another time we’ll discuss how to address assertions of relative truth.)
• If the claim is a supported statement, ask yourself, “What evidence and supporting information would be needed to demonstrate the truth of this claim?” Then find out if that evidence and/or information is available. If the claim is yours, can you demonstrate its truth with support? If the claim is someone else’s, ask them key questions that would reveal how well-supported the claim is. In other words, make sure that enough is disclosed to verify the claim being made.
• If the claim is a statement of opinion, be constantly aware of this. Upon what is that opinion based? How much of an “expert” is the person waging the opinion? How vital is the reliability of this opinion in the overall argument? We place far too much weight on opinion when there is no merit for it; don’t allow this to become the deciding factor for you too easily.
• Keep this in mind: if you’re dealing with the opinion of someone else, you’re probably not going to change their mind in a single conversation (or maybe ever). Especially if they have arrived at an opinion through some significant consideration, they will remain unmoved for some time. There’s nothing wrong with this-- but you don’t have to share their opinion. By and large, conversations and discussions that boil down to one person’s opinion vs. another’s-- with little evidence or reason involved otherwise-- only bruise relationships. If you want to change their mind, ask if you can discuss the things that led to their opinion, and be willing to do this in small, incremental units.

Tags: theology, logic, love, community, Faith & Life, Language, Politics

Not long ago, I was talking with an acquaintance about the liturgy at Hickory Withe Presbyterian Church. I specifically mentioned that we were beginning to make use of the liturgical calendar more intentionally. He wrinkled his nose, furrowed his brow, and replied, “I don’t know... that’s sort of like the Roman Catholic and orthodox churches.”

I said, “Sort of.”

He responded, “But aren’t you a Presbyterian church?”

Even though we talked about it for a few more minutes, I could tell the conversation was over at this point.

This fellow, and many like him, approach such matters from the same perspective: they are inherently suspicious of anyone-- or anything-- that is different from what they understand and practice. In this case, his experiences and personal practices had suggested to him that all Presbyterians had plain, unadorned, even stoic worship that varied not by season nor circumstance. Therefore, he concluded, any church that diverged from this path, even though they may be Presbyterian, was not practicing proper Presbyterian worship. They-- and in this case, we-- must be in error.

Why must this be the case? Is it so that the Roman Catholics or Eastern Orthodox are utterly wrong? Could it be possible that they might teach and/or practice some things with which we might disagree, but not all things? Couldn’t the same thing be true of other Christian traditions?

When faced with questions such as these, I’ve found that “Suspicion because of difference” will grant my premises. Yet, when it comes to actually practicing this, they have no interest, and in fact they are sometimes fearful.

This is natural, I think: we are all fearful of what we don’t know and understand. Most of us are insecure enough to interpret differences as a conscious and active condemnation of our point of view, rather than simply a thoughtful and purposeful acceptance of another point of view. And we are prideful enough to look on something that is different from what we do, think, or feel as wrong by default.

But we must be careful when our default position is to be suspicious of something simply because it is different. Look at it this way: most, if not all, of how you spend your time today, what you think about, and the beliefs that you hold, are inherently different from what you did, thought, or believed a decade or two ago. In many of us, the differences are drastic-- and we are grateful that they are! In fact, if someone cannot honestly say that this is at least somewhat true of them-- that they are a good bit different today than 10 years ago-- then they either aren’t being honest with themselves or they haven’t demonstrated any personal growth over that time.

If I, 10 years ago, had met the “me” from today, would I even recognize myself? Would I be suspicious of the differences I saw in this other person? If that is true of me-- and you-- then shouldn’t we give those who are different from us some benefit of the doubt?

What are we looking for when we demand conformity to our own images in this way? Are we simply looking for affirmation? Are we attending to some deep insecurities that cause us to second-guess ourselves, and therefore others as well?

Or are we asking for some shibboleth that Scripture itself doesn’t require? Tim Keller once said, “No matter where you are, there is someone to your right, as it were, who thinks you sold out the Gospel.” Is this what we’re getting at when we get so suspicious so quickly?

Two nights ago I had a conversation with someone who noted that, in visiting a different Presbyterian church, he had observed a surprising number of things that harkened back to Anglican, Eastern Orthodox, and Roman Catholic practices. He was surprised.

“Why?” I asked him. “I think John Calvin and Martin Luther would have wanted it that way.”

“Do you really think so?” He asked.

“Yes-- after all, Luther and Calvin didn’t want to not be Roman Catholic-- they simply wanted the Roman Catholic church to be biblically faithful.”

But we forget that. And we forget that our differences-- whether they be about worship practices, liturgical calendars, theologies of baptism, or how actively we must pursue a certain social agenda-- ought not be something that we are inherently suspicious of.

One of my favorite TV shows was (and is!) The West Wing. In one episode, a group of Chinese refugees were trying to flee religious persecution in their homeland, and President Bartlett (played by Martin Sheen) was seeking affirmation that they were legitimately Christians and not just being coached. Meanwhile, China is demanding that the refugees be returned.

Instructive. After all, this is the sum of it, and any further shibboleth that I construct is wrong. Let’s be a bit less suspicious.^*


*Don’t get me wrong here: I’m not suggesting that it is wrong to have theological standards for, say, ordination-- but simply that when I don’t “get” the way another Christian practices their faith, I must be careful not to assume that their faith therefore isn’t real.

Tags: Faith & Life, love, Liturgy, community, Church Universal

My daughter wrote on the sofa the other day. It wasn’t an accident-- it was a letter “p” and a little design beside it. When Marcie and I discovered it, we were naturally upset. We asked her about it, and she said she did it “because she wanted to.” She confirmed that she knew she wasn’t supposed to do this sort of thing. So we disciplined her for it, and talked with her about how writing on anything other than paper is very bad behavior.

But here’s the thing: throughout the discussion and discipline, I noted in my head how many times we also affirmed that we loved her so much, unconditionally, and no amount of disobedience would cause us to stop loving her. After the discipline was done, she wanted to snuggle, and though she cried for a moment she did not withdraw her affection or affirmation that she trusted our love deeply.

I read something not long ago surrounding a discussion of how the church treats homosexuals. This particular comment came from someone who professed saving faith in Jesus Christ, and who also stated their inclination toward homosexuality. It was clear from his comment that he had been treated with varying degrees of “badly” over the years, particularly by the church.

The discussion they were participating in focused on how the church ought to treat those who are homosexuals, or who are inclined toward homosexuality. One phrase that kept coming up was the old standby: “love the sinner, hate the sin.” This fellow, though, responded strongly to that, saying, “I hate ‘love the sinner, hate the sin.’ If you hate my sin of homosexuality, then you hate me.”

I can understand how he might have arrived at this conclusion. Chances are good that some of those who he had encountered in the past had done a poor job of loving the sinner while hating his sin-- it probably didn’t feel much like love OR a differentiation between the sinner and his sin.

But, just as we faced when we disciplined our daughter for her sin, it is possible to love the sinner deeply, forgivingly, even unconditionally, while despising their sin and its effect. Had we overlooked Molly’s sin and disobedience-- had we simply said, “that is no big deal” and not addressed it at all-- we would have loved her less, not more. I think we instinctively know this about parenting; often, the judgments that are waged against “bad parents” are focused on their willingness or ability to discipline their children.

But we don’t seem to instinctively know this in other relationships. Somehow, loving another in a non-parental relationship implies that we overlook their sin and error more than we address it. In fact, the precedent suggested by this hurting young man creates an environment where it is impossible to love someone AND keep them accountable.

Luke 6:41-42 is often invoked in defense of that view. How dare we discuss the speck in our brother’s eye? Of course we must deal with the log in our own eye first. But a more careful reading of Luke 6:42 reveals that, in the end, both the log in my eye and the speck in yours are removed.

What would it look like to love those who’s sins are highlighted in our Christian culture? How do we love the sinner and hate the sin, when the sin is child abuse or molestation, or adultery, or homosexuality? And are we right to elevate those sins above the others as sins we hate?

Tags: Faith & Life, love, community, Sin & Repentance

Another core idea in Logic-- in general, as well as in logic for theological discussion-- is Consistency.

The fundamental definition of consistency is this: two or more ideas may be true at the same time, in the same context. If two statements can both be said to be true at the same time and in the same context, they are said to be consistent.

All of us are inconsistent. One of my philosophy professors pointed this out in a profound-- and humorous-- manner: “everyone is inconsistent; even a determinist will ask you to pass the salt!”

But our inconsistency matters the most when we attempt discourse and discussion-- particularly when there is disagreement involved. This is because our inconsistencies undermine our more salient points by causing others to question, second-guess, or even outright doubt all of our points.

A couple of recent political events demonstrate inconsistency well. For one, John McCain stood up on Monday, September 15, and declared that our economic system is “fundamentally sound” while addressing the concerns about the Lehman and AIG failures. (He has since backpedaled on that statement, which further underscores the inconsistency.) Meanwhile, Senator Obama (and the rest of the Democrats in congress) have strongly supported a bailout plan approaching $700 billion-- money which will effectively buy off the financial problems of the wealthiest of Americans-- while simultaneously demanding an increase in taxes for the wealthiest Americans. (I guess that is their plan to pay for the bailout.)

Similarly, the entire financial crisis is being blamed largely on the economic policies of President Bush, while President Clinton’s presidency and economic accomplishments have been lauded and praised. But the crisis we are facing now is the fallout of poor policies of a decade ago, just as a significant amount of the economic prosperity of the Clinton presidency was the fruit of the presidencies that preceded him. It turns out that what we do today actually has impact on tomorrow-- go figure.

A good example from the theological discussion world covers the debates of the past decade or so in the PCA. Back in 2002, the debate du jour was over “good-faith subscription” vs. “strict subscription.” A number of guys opposed the idea of good-faith subscription because, some of them said, it would open the door for too many differing positions on various theological issues. Fast-forward to 2006, and the new debate has turned to a theological view called the “Federal Vision” position-- which was, and is, a variation on the historic position on the prominence of individual salvation. Ironically, many of those who came under fire during the Federal Vision debates, and who took cover under the “good-faith subscription” blanket, were some of the same guys who opposed the passage of the good-faith subscription amendment. In short, many of the same men who would end up benefiting the most from the good-faith subscription vote were those who spoke most vehemently against it.

The difficulty about consistency is that it can’t easily be corrected or improved. Unlike bad argument styles, for example, you cannot simply evaluate arguments by asking a set of questions that will reveal the problems of consistency. To recognize inconsistency in your own arguments, you must begin to learn how to see how ideas connect. You must also develop a memory of what you have said and done, and recognize how those things affect the next thing.

Unlike fallacies, however, defeating inconsistencies doesn’t really require strategies or counter-examples. It simply needs to be pointed out. Once you’ve shown someone to be inconsistent, they will often make things worse by disclaiming, excusing, or digging deeper.

Tags: logic, Language, community, theology, love, Faith & Life, Politics

Continuing my Logic for Theological Discussion thread, here are a couple of fallacies that are very common.

I had lunch with a pastor-friend recently, and he told me of a man in his congregation who has begun to doubt. Specifically, these doubts have focused on the man’s belief in a literal Hell-- the man doesn’t believe that there is literally a place that is Hell as the Scriptures describe.

As a consequence of this, the guy thinks he must abandon the rest of his beliefs in biblical truth as well-- in fact, he is beginning to wonder whether this doubt should compel him to abandon his faith altogether. His rationale is that, because he has serious doubts and even disbelief about one teaching of the Bible, he must abandon his belief in all of the teachings of the Bible.

This man is falling into the trap of the Fallacy of Composition. This fallacy follows a basic and common pattern: what is true of the parts that compose a thing must also be true of the whole thing. The tricky part of this fallacy is that the line of thinking is sometimes true-- but we are inclined to believe that it is true all of the time, because it is true some of the time (which is, itself, a Fallacy of Composition).

So, we reason: every blade of grass in my yard is green (true), therefore my lawn is green (also true). If that is true, then it must also be the case that: taking one pill from the bottle of prescription drugs is not poisonous, therefore, taking all of the pills at the same time would also not be poisonous. Or, every atom that makes up my body is invisible to the naked eye, therefore my body must be invisible to the naked eye.

As you can see from these examples, you cannot rely simply on the pattern of thought processes in the argument to determine whether an argument is sound or not. Therefore, this young man’s fallacy goes like this: I doubt one particular teaching of the Bible, therefore I must doubt all of the teachings of the Bible.

A closely related fallacy to Composition is the Fallacy of Division. It is the converse of the Fallacy of Composition, and follows this line of thought: what is true of the whole of a thing is also true of the parts of that thing.

Once again, because it is sometimes true, we often assume it to be always true. But that is not the case. Consider: An airplane can fly through the air for miles and miles; therefore, this hunk of metal I took off of an airplane can fly through the air for miles and miles. Or, I am able to see my desk without help from magnification, so I ought to be able to see the atoms that compose my desk without magnification.

Clearly, as you see, it doesn’t always hold up. Here’s what is interesting: these fallacies are based on the same kinds of conclusions, or inferences, as stereotypes. In other words, based on what we believe to be true of a whole group, we infer an opinion about the members of that group (Division); OR, based on our observations of members of a group, we infer a general principle about that group (Composition). Sometimes these inferences are true and sound, while at other times they are not. This is what makes stereotypes so dangerous.

So we might reason thusly: Everyone I know who has installed Microsoft Vista thinks it is awful; therefore, Vista must be a bomb. (Fallacy of Composition or not? It depends on how you measure it. On the one hand, several hundred million copies of Vista have sold, making it an inherent financial success. On the other hand, as of August, Windows XP -- the six year old predecessor to Vista-- was still outselling Vista, and the numbers of people who have switched to the Apple Mac platform have increased substantially.)

Or this: Presbyterian churches are stuffy and dull; so this Sunday’s worship at Hickory Withe Presbyterian Church will probably be stuffy and dull, too. (Fallacy of Division? I hope not. Although it is true that some Presbyterian churches-- and some other churches, as well-- are stuffy and dull, this may be an unfair stereotype. It also may be an inference made out of ignorance: someone who is uninterested in worshiping God might find ANY church worship service dull, and even stuffy.)

So what do we do about the fallacies of Composition and Division? It all comes down to a simple question:

What is the justification for making that inference?

In other words, why do I feel safe in drawing the conclusion I have? What are the unstated factors in the argument? Is there a point of data-- or more than one-- that connects the part and the whole? If so, does that data hold up as good reason to draw the inference I have?

In the Microsoft example, there are points of data that might support the conclusion, but you still might question whether the starting point is the best one.

With the young man who doubts the Bible, the connecting points that are unstated are likely based on someone teaching the guy that he had to believe the whole Bible to be a Christian. While the Bible is the Word of God, and we cannot know the truth about salvation apart from it, attaching a required belief onto the saving grace of the gospel makes it into works salvation. While I want every believer-- and every unbeliever too-- to hear and receive Scripture as God’s Word, I cannot deny others their doubts. In short, one can be a Christian and not believe that everything written in Scripture is true.

Tags: logic, Language, love, theology, community, Faith & Life

When I was in college, I took a public speaking class (didn’t everyone?), and my last assignment was to present a persuasive speech. The topic had to be approved by the professor, and I wrote a proposal to deliver a speech on the topic, “Why we can trust the Bible.”

My professor denied my topic, because, as he said, in order to speak on that topic I would have to appeal to the authority of the Bible, and he wouldn’t allow that. Imagine my surprise when one of the first speeches given by one of my classmates was on the topic, “The Bible is just a bunch of myths and legends.”

(What made it worse was that the guy basically appealed to the fact that the contents of the Bible has been referred to as, “the greatest story ever told,” and we all know that a story is fiction. Yep, that was the gist of his argument-- persuasive, right? See my forthcoming post on the fallacy of equivocation...)

This is a classic example of what I call the “you can’t, but we can” argument style. The essence of it is this: one party declares a certain topic, appeal, source of authority, term or phrase, or whatever, to be off-limits. The other side agrees. Then the first side proceeds to appeal to that topic, phrase, etc.; but when the other side brings it up, they are reprimanded for speaking on an off-limits topic.

This has plagued the political campaigns this year. Senator Clinton committed it when she castigated others for holding her gender against her, only to turn around and declare that a vote for her is a step of progress for women everywhere. Senator Obama has done something similar with regard to race (and his “youthfulness” as well). Most recently, the McCain/Palin campaign has employed it, first saying that Governor Palin’s pregnant daughter should be “out of bounds” for political discussion, then parlaying it into a mark in her favor as a Pro-Life candidate.

But it happens in the church, too-- and that’s where I’m even more concerned about it. A good example is this excerpt from one of my favorite books on the sacrament of Baptism, William the Baptist by James M. Chaney. This is a dialogue between William, a devoted Baptist, and his wife’s Presbyterian pastor, on whether immersion is a biblical mode of administering the sacrament (from pp.30-32):

William: ...I cannot express my astonishment to learn that you regard immersion as an unscriptural mode of baptism. You will find but few who will agree with you in that extreme view.

Pastor: Immersionists are zealous in their labors to make such an impression, but it is very erroneous. The ministers of our Church, as a body, agree with me. A few, regarding it as a mere external, look upon it with such supreme indifference that they can scarcely be said to have an opinion on it; and such may sometimes make concessions which our opposers are very quick to catch up and use to their own advantage. I have know a few who would push this question of indifference to such an extreme that, while unhesitatingly declaring immersion unscriptural as a mode of baptism, would yet, on request, administer the rite in that way. The Presbytery of Lafayette, in answer to a memorial, declared by a unanimous vote that, “it is inexpedient and IMPROPER for a Presbyterian minister to administer the rite of baptism by immersion.”

William: Such facts are new to me. But are you not mistaken as to the number of those who make such concessions? I have heard many sermons on the subject by immersionists, and by their quotations and statements they succeeded in making the impression on me that all Pædo-bapists agree in concessions that would seem to render the further discussion of the question unnecessary.

Pastor: Such concessions form the burden of their books and sermons on the subject. Some years ago I put myself to some trouble to hear a Baptist minister, who proposed to discuss the subject purely from a Bible standpoint. I was anxious to know what a man could say in favor of immersion, in three sermons an hour each, who would confine himself to the Bible, and let lexicons and Pædo-baptist concessions alone.
A worthy Baptist minister introduced the services by an earnest prayer, the burden of which was praise to God for His Word, for the clearness of its revelations, and its sufficiency in all things. I was delighted with the prayer: I regarded it as a prelude to a Bible discussion, and thought that a desire, long entertained, to hear such a discussion, was about to be gratified.
A gospel song was sung, and the minister, with only the open Bible before him, began his task. For about fifteen minutes I was charmed with an eloquent eulogy on the Bible. It was in the spirit of the prayer that preceded it. The massive Book, with its pages opened, was held up to our gaze; and “here,” said the speaker, “not in Creeds and Confessions of Faith, but here, in the Word of God, are we to look and find the mind of the Lord. TO THE LAW and the TESTIMONY if they speak not according to this word, IT IS BECAUSE THERE IS NO LIGHT IN THEM.”
What more could I desire? A Bible discussion of baptism! what I had so longed to hear.
As the sound of the speaker’s voice (in giving the quotation) was dying away, in a most reverent manner he gently closed the sacred volume, and with as much reverence as the case would admit of, he slowly pushed the source of light to his extreme left, taking one step to enable him to get it sufficiently far. The movement was inexplicable. But, in less time than it requires to tell you, the speaker was almost hidden behind books, large and small, which he piled before him, and on his right and left.
And now the Bible discussion!! For two hours we were treated to a learned dissertation-- by one who knew nothing of the Greek language-- on the meaning of “baptidzo.” Greek lexicons and Pædo-baptist commentators and writers were the sole witnesses. The Bible was wholly ignored. It was not mentioned once. No text was quoted from it!!
If it had been but a human production, I could but pity it on account of such treatment. Sacred volume, lifted so high to fall so low!
My disappointment was great, but I went to hear the second and third discourses, “et ab uno, disce omnes.” The discussion of the subject, in all, occupied more than five hours, and only at the close, and then only for about fifteen minutes, did the Bible receive any notice, and then all that was done was to quote a few favorite passages, taking it for granted that they were conclusive in favor of immersion, but making no attempt at proof.

William: In all the books I have read on the subject, and in all the discussions to which I have listened, I have noticed that such was their method, and I think it proper. It served to establish me in my views. with such concessions, and the plain teachings of the Bible, I have come to regard the question as removed from any debatable ground, and I cannot express to you my astonishment that you would intimate that a Pædo-baptist would undertake to uphold his views from the Bible alone! Am I correct in drawing the inference that any one would undertake such a task?

Pastor: Do you think any other method legitimate and satisfactory?

William: I certainly thing such a method best; but I see no objection to other aids, especially to the ad hominem arguments to which you have referred.

The gist: the Baptist pastor asserts “no creeds or confessions of faith” are admissible, but “the Word of God alone”-- in other words, “you can’t use your creeds or confessions” (which is convenient, since the Baptist church is ostensibly a “non-creedal” body). Yet, out come the commentators and Baptist resources-- perhaps what we might construe as the confessions of faith for a group that eschews confessions of faith.

So, here are some questions to ask to avoid this argument style:

• What are the topics, terms, phrases, ideas, appeals to authority, etc., that I consider “off-limits?” Why do I regard them as such?

• Is my desire for such a limitation an emotional response, or do I have reasons for it? What are the reasons?

• Is my perspective on these topics, etc., fair and just? Do I consider them “off-limits” because I am trying to cripple my discussion partner? If I allowed them into the discussion, would I simply have more work and research to do, or would I be admitting a harmful element into the debate?
• Am I willing to subject myself to the same (or similar) limitations? Have I represented my position and/or argument as one that IS subject to the same limitations, but have failed to fulfill that?
• Is the limitation I am proposing a matter of vital importance, or simply a difference of opinion? Would my discussion partner categorize it in the same way? (And what is suggested by an answer of “no” to that last question?)

Tags: theology, logic, love, Language, rhetoric, community, Faith & Life, Politics

In a (very) brief trip to St. Louis, I had the pleasure of staying with my friends Craig and Megan, and their lovely girls. We met these sweet people as they were moving to St. Louis to begin seminary a couple of years behind us, and they have become dear friends.

I’ve stayed with them before, and each time has been similar: I come in late, displace someone from their bed, visit briefly with them in the morning, and leave. I’m sure their girls (who are growing up so fast!) think I’m a little crazy (maybe I’m the Mr. Edwards of this half-pint house) but they are gracious and loving, never complaining about the fact that I took one of their beds.

My friends have moved into a new house, and it is great! They have a lot of good space, and they’ve already done some pretty fantastic work to make it theirs. They have a good vision for the place too, so I’m sure it will be a great home for them for years to come. (Megan, I still think the pinstripes will do best. Maybe a medium-dark blue with white pinstripes?)

I’m so grateful for you, my friends. Thanks for being so inviting-- you are the very model of a house of hospitality.

Tags: community, love

Following up (again) on my recently completed series on the Lord’s Supper, I thought this brief (< 1 min.) video from Tim Keller might be another helpful summary of what happens in the sacrament of Communion.

Tags: Faith & Life, worship, community, love

When I was in college, I took modern Hebrew as my foreign language. I had it in my head that this would give me a head-start on seminary (and it did, to a degree).

As a result, I learned a lot about the Israeli and Hebrew culture. For one thing, my university required that we take a history class that was related to one of our disciplines-- and I chose a “History of Judaism” class that was taught by one of the local rabbis. For another, my Hebrew teacher was an Israeli herself-- she married an English Literature professor when he was doing a sabbatical in Jerusalem-- and she had a good sense that the connection between learning a language and learning a culture was essential.

One of the key “meta-lessons” I learned from this (apart from the interesting stuff about the culture of the Hebrew-speaking people) was how important it is to learn the “language” of a culture. By this, I mean the words, phrases, and concepts that have particular and special meaning to that culture.

This is as true in the church as it is anywhere. The church is a culture (and sometimes it degrades into a sub-culture; more on this another time), and the people of that culture have their own language. Sometimes this is almost comical, but in the ways that it is serious and important, we must learn the language of that culture.

I’m thinking about terms and phrases like these:

• Justification
• Salvation by grace alone
• Atonement
• Propitiation
• The inerrancy of Scripture

Are these familiar to you? Can you offer something in the way of a basic definition of these?

Here’s the thing: these are words taken straight out of the Bible. They aren’t just lingo for stuffy theology professors, but are supposed to be the stock-in-trade of the Christian. There are others, too-- and you ought to learn them.

No one takes up a hobby without expecting to learn some new terminology. If you know what a Birdie is to a golfer, if you can describe a car’s differential, or if you understand what RAM does in a computer, then you bothered to learn terms that were, previously, esoteric and irrelevant to your life. Why would you treat your faith-- which is what grants you eternal life and security-- with less appreciation for the terms and language that accompanies it?

Along those lines, Michael Horton and R.C. Sproul discuss this idea briefly in part of their conversation from a recent episode of the White Horse Inn, a (normally) audio resource that is available in podcast form. Here is the interview:

Tags: Faith & Life, community, Language, theology, worship

As I wrapped up a brief sermon series on The Lord’s Supper yesterday, I thought it may be helpful to summarize the applications, or “answers” to the questions I posed about the sacrament (which were, “what is it?” “when is it?” and “how is it?”):

• The sacrament of the Lord’s Supper is a covenantal meal, which means it is a family meal-- thus, it’s not primarily an individual thing, but much more of a group thing, and in a mysterious spiritual way, it is a time of true, living fellowship with God Himself, through which He nourishes our souls with grace.
• The sacrament is something that we should be devoted to doing: devoted to doing it in the context of worship, accompanied by Word and prayer, because these are the spiritual food that God has given us for nourishment; and devoted to doing it often-- as often as we are able-- because we long to be fed and nourished all the more on the grace of God.
• The sacrament is something for believers gathered together, not for unbelievers: if we know salvation through Christ alone, we are welcomed through the Gate to take part in this spiritual feast; but if we approach it wrongly-- in an unbelieving way, whether because we misunderstand what the sacrament is for, or because we presume on it meaning that it doesn’t have-- then we are warned of the consequences of judgement being increased on us.

Tags: preaching, worship, Sacrament, Bible, theology, community, Faith & Life

I once worked for a church where a member of the pastoral staff and I didn’t fully agree on theological matters. He might have defined himself (in comparison to me) as more broadly evangelical, while I might have defined myself (in relation to him) as more traditionally Reformed. But when it came to him defining me, the choice was simple.

He called me a “TR”.

If you’ve never encountered the label “TR” before, it means “Totally Reformed” or “Truly Reformed”. This wasn’t the first time I had encountered the label, but it was the first time I had been called one. (And the last, as far as I know.)

When someone is called a TR, it doesn’t really define a clear meaning of who they are, what they think, or where they stand on a position. Rather, it is a judgment waged entirely on one person’s thoughts relative to another person.

So many will use the label TR as a pejorative term: “He’s such a TR” (meaning, “he’s more ‘Reformed’ than me). Others will use it with a sense of theological hubris: “I’m a TR” (meaning, “I’m more ‘Reformed’ than you”). In neither case is the term helpful.

For years, the terms “liberal” and “conservative” have had clear and straightforward associations. Over that time,
they have served as categories that we might safely place ourselves (and others) within, which lends great understanding of what we (and others) think, believe, agree or disagree with, etc.

I believe that time has passed us by. I think these labels, like “TR”, are no longer helpful, but are simply used in either pejorative or haughty ways.

As I recently read a book entitled, A Handful of Pebbles: theological liberalism and the church, this idea (that the labels no longer serve a useful purpose) kept coming to mind. It wasn’t unclear what the author meant by it, but it was clear that he supposed that what he described as “theological liberalism” was all that there was to it.

Is it possible that there are liberal ideas and ideals that (so-called) conservatives might also embrace? Or that there are conservative ideas and ideals that (so-called) liberals might embrace? Whether we are discussing theology, politics, social issues, or economics, I think the lines are blurring.

For example, we have any number of people in political office today who are called “conservatives”-- yet these people are not “conservative” in every way: some may be fiscal conservatives, but social moderates and theological liberals. Similarly, there are many who are categorized as “liberals” who are socially and theologically conservative, but are politically liberal.

And, of course, there is the matter of degree. Whether a person assumes the mantle of conservative or liberal, or more or less “Reformed”, they are doing so in comparison to others. And the problem with association by degrees was best articulated by Tim Keller:

No matter what you believe, there will always be someone to your ‘right’, as it were, who thinks you sold out the Gospel.

Keller went on to illustrate by talking about living in community. So you think you know what vulnerable community is? he asks. Look at the Amish-- they blow us away when it comes to living in an intimate community.

But, Keller says, a people-group like the Auca indians (the group that Jim and Elizabeth Elliot sought to reach as missionaries) will look at the Amish and write them off. You think you know intimate community? How can you-- you have walls! It turns out that the Aucas live in dwellings with no walls, and everything that anyone does is announced. When Elizabeth Elliot left her dwelling to go to the bathroom, someone would announce, “the white woman is going down to the river to urinate”.

We have many, many categories and labels that are quite useful-- but we have a good number (more than we should) that aren’t. So, how can we evaluate our labels? Here are a few questions to ask:

• Am I labeling an idea, or a person? If I am labeling a person, am I being hasty in casting them into a group that they do not deserve to be in?
• Why do I feel the need to apply a label or category to this person or idea? Will applying a label or category truly help me (and others) understand their point of view?
• Is my use of labels or categories gracious and kind, giving credit where credit is due? Or is it something that tears another down or builds me up (or both)?
• Is the label or category I am using an objective qualification of a particular view or idea? Or is it simply a means of comparing myself or someone else to others?
• Does my use of labels or categories drive myself and others to Christ and to orthodoxy? Is speaking of someone or some idea in this way a credit to the Gospel?
• Is my use of labels or categories something I would gladly say to the person I am speaking of? Could I say this to them without embarrassment or qualification? Would the feel honored and understood by my use of the label or category I am applying to them?

Tags: theology, logic, love, rhetoric, community, Language, Faith & Life, Politics

Closely related to my ongoing discussion on logic is the concept of argument style, which is really a part of rhetoric. As I can, I’ll explore that concept as well. Here’s the first installment.

One of the problems that face us when we’re dealing with arguments and dialogue is that, quite often, one side of the argument has done a good bit more consideration on the topic than the other side. This frequently leads to what I find to be a common problem in theological discussion: the Bait-and-Switch.

The Bait-and-Switch looks like this: Two thinkers walk into a discussion. Thinker one (we’ll call him Tom) is quite familiar with the topic of the discussion, while thinker two (who we shall call Ann) is only vaguely aware of the major points.

In fact, Tom is not only familiar with the topic, but is well-convinced of his position, and has ready access to multiple articles and books that support his view. Ann, on the other hand, has perhaps encountered Tom’s view before; maybe she has even read an article or two. It may be that she has a few reasons to question whether Tom’s perspective is right, but she is, at very least, unwilling to be quick to change her views of what she considers orthodox.

So when Tom encounters Ann, he tosses out a casual question to her that is phrased in such a way as to suggest that the question-- and (here’s the important thing) the intent of the question-- is objective. Perhaps the question is worded ambiguously, or maybe it contains an asking phrase that requests the opinion of the other in an apparently sincere way.

Ann takes the bait. She answers with a sincere statement of her opinion. She probably shoots from the hip to a fair degree, and she may very well disclaim exactly that. Her answer is brief, but it probably states a good bit (even all) of what she might have to say about the matter.

So Tom sets the hook. If he’s really good at this, he might ask a few follow-up questions that are similarly ambiguous, again appealing for her honest answer. Then he reels her in: she is suddenly blasted with an overwhelming amount of information. It might be in the form of an article cut-and-pasted into an e-mail, or a series of quotes (lots of them-- 15 or more) posted in the comments of a blog post, or the spoken dialogue switches to monologue for a time. The actual form doesn’t really matter-- it’s the result that does.

If Tom gets his fish, then the result is that Ann is sucked into a discussion that she can’t possibly win, and Tom will eventually demonstrate that he is right because his opponent cannot sufficiently out-argue him. (If Ann is smart, she jumps off the hook at the point when the first wave of overwhelming information comes.)

Here’s what is wrong with the above style of argument:

• It begins with deception. Tom presents himself as sincerely interested in Ann’s opinion, when he is not. He asks a question or makes a statement that is worded to imply objectivity when none is present. Tom has set out to convince someone of his point of view, but acts like he is still arriving at it.
• From deception it moves to a psychological move on the order of Cialdini: because Ann has invested time and energy into this discussion, she feels obligated to continue. Tom capitalizes on this psychology, binding her into what amounts to a sales pitch.
• Tom then beats her up and presents her as the defeated foe, which is a straw man fallacy (more on this in a future post). Ann never set out to be his foe, and she never presented herself as a representative for the “other side” of the topic. Yet Tom trumpets the “other side” as defeated because Ann has been defeated.
• Overall, Tom has forsaken the loving fellowship that he might have with his sister in Christ for the sake of making his point. Deception, head games, and beating her up in argument is not the way to build a friendship, and surely Ann feels like she has been used and abused. Hardly a brotherly model.

I won’t judge Tom’s motives behind this, and I’m sure that what is in the heart of those who frequently employ this approach is not uniform. But I would suggest that one way to counter this instinct is to ask ourselves the following questions:

• What are my motives in asking the questions I am asking? Have I presented myself as undecided about something that I am actually decided on? If so, why?
• Am I aware of whether or not my discussion partner(s) are as well-versed on the topic as I am? If they are not, have I graciously extended patience to them as they get up to speed? Have I been careful not to overwhelm them with too many different points of information, or simply too much information?
• Have I been easy to disagree with? That is, has my spirit been forbearing and gracious toward them, so that they still feel cherished and valued as a fellow believer?
• Have I represented our discussion as being more than it really is? Have I inappropriately positioned myself or those with whom I am discussing as the final representative of a position or view?
• Am I willing to be wrong, if I could be shown from Scripture or from other evidence that my perspective is incorrect? If I have succeeded in demonstrating that someone else is wrong, have I been gracious and loving in the way that I exposed error, not lording it over them in a haughty manner?
• Overall, have I dealt with my discussion partner(s) in a manner that reflects love for a brother or sister in Christ? Would they gladly engage in another discussion with me in the future, even if they knew we disagreed? Would others inside and outside the church consider my manner of dealing with them as a credit to the gospel?

Tags: theology, logic, love, community, Language, Faith & Life, rhetoric

Picking up on the discussion about fallacies, let’s talk about a very common one: the Slippery Slope fallacy.

The basic idea behind the Slippery Slope fallacy is that one event is simply a step along the way, and it will lead to another and another and so on until we inevitably arrive at something dire and drastic which no one wants.

Slippery Slopes assume that there is a fixed path in one direction for every choice, and that they first step along that path always and inevitably leads to the end of the path.

A good example from the Deaconess/women in diaconal ministry debate (which has become a good case study for understanding logic-- and logical error-- in theological discussion) is the following argument, which I’ve heard or read a number of times over the last several months:

If we allow women to be ordained as Deacons, it will only be a matter of time before we are ordaining them as Ruling Elders and eventually Pastors!

Now, this argument exhibits more than one fallacy (it also contains a “False Cause” fallacy, which we’ll cover another time), but it is a clear Slippery Slope. I’ll demonstrate why in just a moment.

How do you argue against a Slippery Slope fallacy? There are essentially two ways:

• By counter-example: a counter-example is an argument that follows the same form or concept of an argument, but arrives at a different conclusion. A good counter-example will expose a Slippery Slope’s error.
• By severing the link: a Slippery Slope depends on the assumed link between the “steps” down the slope; break that link, and you’ve demonstrated the error of the fallacy.

To illustrate: a counter-example might be, “Both the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARP) and the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America (RPCNA) have ordained women as Deacons for decades, and both of these denominations are becoming more conservative in their theology in general, not less.”

Meanwhile, here is a severance of the link: “Your argument assumes that the office of Deacon and the office (or offices) of Ruling and Teaching Elder are essentially the same, and that a Deacon is merely an Elder-in-training or something of that sort. But Scripture makes it clear that one is inherently different from the other-- and that it is not the case that a Deacon is simply a ‘Junior Elder.’ If the offices are different, then one doesn’t necessarily lead to the other.”

Tags: theology, community, logic, love, Faith & Life, Language

A friend of mine recently posted a series of notes on his social network discussing his concern for the fact that our national motto, “In God We Trust,” is being moved from the face of coins (as is common today) to the sides, or edges, of coins in some proposed future designs.

My friend’s concern is that, once the motto is moved to the edges of coins, it won’t be long before it is removed entirely. This is a Slippery Slope argument, but that’s not what I’m concerned about here. Instead, I’m bothered by my friend’s insistence that this bodes badly for the spiritual state of our nation.

He asserts that we see all references to God being systematically removed from the “arenas of our culture.” This, he says, is a problem because, as with the motto on coins, this removes from the consciousness of the culture the truth of the Biblical God. I think he assumes too much in this.

We in the church are accustomed to seeing the word “God” and immediately associating it with Yahweh, the God of the Bible, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the trinitarian God. But I think the idea of “god” has become so vague and passé outside of the church that there is little or no association with the Christian God in the word itself.

For that matter, in a culture like ours-- where almost everyone has had some exposure to more than one religious belief system-- the notion of “God” may, as often as not, conjure up an association with Allah (the god of Islam), Gaia or some other pantheistic idea, Hinduism or some eastern religious concept, or even some personally-invented idolatry or paganism. It is clear from the studies that have been done that, while a very large majority of the population of the U.S. say they “believe in God,” the idea of god that those respondents hold is frequently anything other than an orthodox understanding of God.

In stark contrast, I get the sense from my friend’s posts that he considers the presence of our national motto as a great boon for the spread of the Gospel. While this might be an interesting conversation starter that could lead to an evangelistic opportunity, I’ve never heard of anyone who actively inquired about spiritual truth because of the U.S. motto on currency. I could be dead wrong on this one, but I rank the motto on a coin as several notches below bumper stickers, t-shirts, and coffee mugs as tools for outreach.

So here’s my point: should my friend be up in arms? I don’t think so. In fact, I think it is time and energy that is misplaced, that could have been spent doing actual ministry of evangelism and outreach. (So, too, is this post-- consider me sufficiently convicted.)

Tags: Faith & Life, Cultural Discernment, Politics, community, Evangelism

Continuing my “Logic for Theological Discussion” series (which I will henceforth label “LTD”), I’d like to talk today about fallacies: what they are and how they work.

A fallacy is a part of an argument. Specifically, it is a part that is able to be shown to have a logical problem or flaw. Once that flaw is demonstrated, the whole argument fails. (When this is so, the argument is said to be “fallacious.”)

You would be astonished at how frequently fallacies occur in arguments, from the most casual and conversational to the most articulate, meticulously word-smithed presentation. They are as common as the rain.

When a fallacy occurs, it is usually a subtle, and can be hard to detect at first; this is often because more than one fallacy occurs at the same time, and one masks the other. Fallacies come in the form of matters of relevance, vague or ambiguous use of words or ideas, matters of correlation or cause, or exploiting some sort of emotional element in the listener.

A good (and very common) example of a fallacy is the Ad Hominem fallacy. There are actually several different forms of an Ad Hominem (which is Latin, meaning “to the person”), but they all amount to something along the same lines: when you cannot strongly attack the argument itself, attack the person doing the arguing.

For example: in the discussions surrounding the issue of women as deacons/deaconesses, something the “pro” side (in other words, they were for some form of diaconal service being open to women) would often say is, “The reason the PCA’s Book of Church Order is the way it is can be traced back to the reactionary tendencies of the PCA’s founders.”

(Mea Culpa: I’ve said some form of this statement before.)

Let me first point out how this is an Ad Hominem fallacy: rather than addressing the argument-- namely, that the Book of Church Order as written prohibits any ordination of women to church office-- the response attacks the arguer. In this case, it means either, “The writers of the BCO were wrong because they were reactionaries,” or, “If you agree with the BCO, then you are wrong because, since the writers of the BCO were reactionaries, so are you.”

Neither of these is relevant to the question of whether the BCO is correct in its interpretation and application of Scripture when it comes to women in diaconal service. Therefore, claiming that the writers were reactionaries has no real bearing on the soundness of the argument.

How do you deal with an Ad Hominem fallacy when one is thrown at you? There are several strategies:

• Take the higher ground: ignore the fallacy and stick to the facts and real arguments. Give other listeners the benefit of the doubt in being able to recognize the fallacious quality of the argument. (Best when the Ad Hominem is obvious and blatant.)
• Address it briefly: suggest that there is no reason to get distracted by name-calling, and request that you stick to the subject at hand instead of getting distracted by irrelevant opinions. (Best when the audience is neutral about whether the Ad Hominem is true, and/or when the Ad Hominem is based on a highly opinionated perspective rather than something more factually-based.)
• Force them to work it out: ask them probing questions about their claim, requiring them to explain the direct relevance of what they have said and gradually exposing their argument as a fallacy. (Best when the audience is favorable toward the fallacious position.)

Tags: logic, Language, theology, community, Faith & Life, love

Following up on my previous post, I’ll continue my reflections from the fascinating conversation I got to be a part of earlier in the week.

At another point in the conversation, one of these formerly legalistic teenagers commented on the damage that was done through this oppressive environment. Specifically, she said that she felt like no one was given any sense of their right to read the Bible for themselves. Instead, they were told what the Bible taught and what it meant for them.

This is oppressive-- and brings to mind a significant part of the Protestant reformation, which was to translate the Bible into the language of the people (instead of only into Latin), so that people of than the priests and bishops could read it. There is an essential aspect of the faith that comes from reading Scripture; it is the Word of God for the people of God. And it is important that people know their Bibles so that they can test the teachings of others against the Word of God (remember the Bereans, who were praised for this in Acts 17:11).

At the same time, the approach of the leaders in the legalistic community are a good example of how we tend to take sound principles too far, when there is actually a “middle ground” balance needed.

Christians today too often take the “democratization of the Bible” too far; because the Reformers saw that it was important that people other than only the authorities of the church be able to read Scripture, today we have many who have decided that their interpretation of the Bible is as good as anyone’s-- and maybe better.

In fact, not everyone can interpret the Bible equally. Some have been trained extensively for interpreting the Bible-- learning the original languages of Hebrew and Greek, studying the history, archeaology, and peoples of biblical times, training in methods and approaches of how to study and interpret Scripture, and other ways of being trained. Others have read and studied their Bibles many times over, and they simply know the Scriptures well. Still others are, frankly, not familiar enough with the Bible to make the confident assertions of interpretation that they do.

This isn’t to say that not everyone ought to read their Bibles and, yes, make efforts at interpretation. But it is to say that all of us ought to remain teachable about even those biblical texts that we feel the most familiar with. And when we recognize that an interpretation we have made is at odds with an interpretation that others have made, we ought to be willing to hear the reasoning behind their interpretation with an open mind.

Imagine, if you will, the person who dogmatically insists that his translation of a text, though totally at odds with everyone else, is the accurate one:

Dogmatist: This is what I believe the text is saying...
Elder: I don’t see how you got that from Scripture; instead, I think the text says this...
Dogmatist: You’re wrong. It says what I said.
Elder: Well, let’s consult these commentaries, written by contemporary scholars... and, yes, they disagree with your interpretation, also.
Dogmatist: It doesn’t matter. I’m sticking with what I said.
Elder: Okay, but now I’ve consulted with the historical confessions, and they all assert that your interpretation is incorrect.
Dogmatist: That’s what they think. I know what my Bible says.
Elder: But look here, where the early church fathers wrote about exactly that... and they all say the text means something different.
Dogmatist: They can say what they want, but I still say it means what I said.

This sounds a little far-fetched-- but I’ve actually met people who were so convinced that their interpretation (and it always seems to be a “new” take on something) is right that they are willing to disagree with pastors, scholars, and others over 2000+ years of church history and interpretation of the Scripture. A wise pastor once said to me, “if your interpretation is in complete disagreement with 2000 years of church history, you’re very likely wrong.”

This is one of the reasons why I find the presbyterian approach to “doing church” so helpful. As presbyterians, the default position is that my voice alone is not the final word, nor is anyone else’s. Instead, we constantly defer to one another with humility. As presbyterians, we trust that God is at work in the others in our congregation, our presbytery, our synod, or our assembly, at least as much as He has been at work in us to reveal the truth. There will always be times when it is possible that the larger bodies are wrong-- but then we turn to the greater history of the church and test our perspectives against that. The deference to the higher bodies is always present, and always keeping us accountable for our interpretation.

We must read our Bibles, and we must work at interpretation. But we must also be ready to be shown that we are wrong. If we aren’t, then we have made ourselves the author of Scripture-- for only the author can be utterly certain of the meaning of a text.

Tags: Bible, community, Leadership, Faith & Life, presbyterians

The other day I was with a group of people who were talking about an especially legalistic environment that some of them had been a part of as teenagers-- a place where they were literally told what to believe, and that if they disagreed they would go to Hell. The leaders in this environment were, clearly, abusing their authority and making claims that no one person or group has a right to make.

One person commented on the fact that I should get a lot of sermon illustrations from these stories! (He was right...) That got me to thinking about what the real applications really were. I’d like to reflect on two broad applications here, over two posts.

At one point I asked the question of this group: how did your parents (who were all Christians) continue to believe that it was good for you to be a part of this? After all, I said, you would surely come home and tell them all about it.

Their first response demonstrated how powerful the authoritarian environment was:

No, we were told that if we reported on them we would go to Hell.

[Note, by the way, the similar nature of this environment to a classic abusive relationship-- where the victim is told that THEY (the victim) would get in trouble if they told.]

But as they went on, something else became clear. One of them said:

I was glad to be there. I needed a place where I could belong, and this place felt safe-- partly because of the rules.

And there I saw my first sermon illustration: when it comes down to it, we all gravitate toward legalism. We are all legalists.

When we’re offered an environment where the rules are known, it becomes very easy to settle into that. We know where we stand in the pecking order; we are then able to proclaim with confidence precisely why we have merited the favor of God and men.

I think this is what makes grace so threatening, so terrifying to all of us. If the work that earns us favor isn’t our work (through legalism) but Christ’s work imputed to us (by grace), we are actually dependent on something (grace) and someone (Christ) other than ourselves.

This also illustrates why even communities that are defined by Christ’s grace (namely, churches) quickly return to legalism. Dependence is very uncomfortable. Dependence is often humbling, sometimes awkward, and frequently at odds with pride. Someone who is dependent has just reason to lose some confidence in themselves.

Here’s the irony in it all: we are always dependent. Even when we think we have every reason for confidence (as with the group of teenagers who knew exactly their place in the social order of that legalistic community), we are still dependent on something: for the legalist, it is the rules and laws that we subscribe to, and the authority who creates and enforces them.

Legalism-- that idea that “I can earn merit/favor/righteousness through obedience, and take confidence and pride in myself”-- is a lie.

Tags: Bible, Faith & Life, community, Leadership, Grace

One of the fundamental ideas in logic is that in an argument, you have two sorts of ideas (statements) being presented: a conclusion, and one or more premises.

The conclusion ought to be fairly self-evident in definition: that point which the whole of the argument is attempting to demonstrate to be the case.

The premises (and there is almost always more than one) are those phrases or sentences (also known as statements) which are asserted as reasons to believe the conclusion.

Now, let’s talk about truth and what is called “truth value” for a moment. whenever a sentence can be said to be true or false, that sentence has a “truth value”-- and the truth value is whether or not it is true or false. Some sentences cannot be said to be true or false. A question, for example, or an exclamation cannot be disputed as untrue. But a premise MUST be a sentence that can be said to be true or false.

However, it is technically incorrect to say that an argument is “true” or “false”. This is because there is more to whether an argument is a good one or not than simply the truth value of its statements. Rather, an argument can be said to be two things: valid (or invalid), and sound (or unsound).

Validity (whether an argument is valid or not) is based on form alone, not on content. I know what you’re thinking: “is it possible for an argument to have premises that are both true, and a conclusion that is true, and the argument still not be valid?” Good question-- and the answer is yes. In fact, any of the following are possible:

• A valid argument whose premises are true and conclusion is false.
• An invalid argument whose premises and conclusion are true.
• A valid argument whose premises and conclusion are false.
• A valid argument whose premises are false and conclusion is true.

Of course, it’s also possible to have a valid argument whose premises and conclusion are all true. When that is the case, we say that the argument is “sound.” (All other cases are examples of unsound arguments.)

Validity is a complex thing, and I won’t get into it in detail now. I may dedicate a post or two to it in the future. Let’s assume, for now, that the arguments presented are valid (which is a treacherous assumption in many cases).

The tricky part about soundness in arguments is that there is often one or more premises that are left out-- either because they are implied within the argument, they are unknown factors (either to the arguer or the listener), or because to state them outright would expose the argument as unsound. It is the last case that gets us into the most trouble when it comes to theological discussions.

For example, I overheard a discussion at General Assembly about the meaning of the phrase, “their wives must be women worthy of respect” in 1 Timothy 3:11. Of the two people discussing the matter, one (we’ll call him Fred) was convinced that a naked reading of the English as rendered in the NIV was plain in its meaning-- clearly, thought he, this verse means that the verse is speaking of the wives of Deacons, not women in general. The other fellow (who we’ll call Joe) thought that, since the English is a translation from another language, we must be careful to assume that a naked reading is always accurate; he also felt that the naked reading was problematic because of what is in the original Greek (specifically, that the word translated as “wives” can also mean simply, “women”). The dialogue went something like this:

Fred: Clearly, 1 Timothy doesn’t suggest that a woman may be a Deacon or Deaconess.
Joe: I’m not sure that we can say that with such certainty. Doesn’t that assume a lot of what the translation ought to be?
Fred: Like what?
Joe: Like, what about the fact that the word translated “wives” can also mean just “women”?
Fred: Don’t you think that the Bible is clear?
Joe: Well, I was reading a commentary by a scholar I trust, and he said it wasn’t so cut-and-dried.
Fred: Some have their opinions about what this verse means, but I for one don’t think we should undermine God.

So, here’s the argument as it was stated:

Premise 1: Some people have theories about what 1 Tim. 3:11 means. (Truth value= true)
Premise 2: We shouldn’t undermine God. (Truth value= true)
Conclusion: 1 Timothy does not suggest that a woman may be a Deacon or Deaconess.

So, assuming the argument is valid, is this argument sound, or unsound? Look at the argument in the original dialogue again; is there a missing premise?

I would argue that there is-- though my guess is that even Fred doesn’t realize that it is there. I think the argument really goes like this:

Premise 1: Some people have theories about what 1 Tim. 3:11 means. (Truth value= true)
Missing Premise: My opinion about what it means is the same as God’s opinion about what it means.
Premise 2: We shouldn’t undermine God. (Truth value= true)
Conclusion: 1 Timothy does not suggest that a woman may be a Deacon or Deaconess.

See the problem? Now, this argument (as presented in the “full” version) has lots of problems, including the use of several “fallacies” which we’ll get into next time. But I hope that, even in this brief example, it is becoming clear how arguments work and how the truth can be easily missed or even distorted.

Tags: theology, Language, logic, love, community, Faith & Life

I’ve recently read two posts from bloggers who, somehow, have managed to candidly capture in their posts the shock, the depth of pain, the sense of loss that they have experienced.

Amazingly, both of these writers appear to have written their words even during their experiences. Their words are as beautiful as they are tragic, in part because they are so vulnerable and exposed in them. They are also beautiful because they seem to be inviting others-- not to share their pain, but to understand it.

So many Christians I have known are afraid of pain, many because they have been so sheltered from it. But our world is full of pain, and it is quite likely that more than half of the people you encounter today are facing suffering of some sort. What would you do if you knew of it? How would you come alongside them in their pain? As one friend (who pointed me to one of these posts) wrote, “I am currently working on a doctorate in biblical studies... a Ph.D. does not address this.”

I think the heart of these two ladies is right: to come alongside them, we must understand their pain. We don’t have to share it-- I think many who are the midst of suffering feel strongly that the only way others can understand IS to share it, but I disagree-- but we must understand it. I’m grateful for the vulnerability of these two who, in the moment of their suffering and pain, invite you and me to have a glimpse of what pain looks like, that we might understand.

I invite you to read the stories of:

Rae (AKA SmockLady) who faced her first miscarriage
Denny (AKA Songstress) who lost her husband at age 33

Tags: love, Faith & Life, family life, community, Grief

Many readers will know that while I was in seminary, I taught at a small school just outside of St. Louis. Two of the classes I taught were Logic and Rhetoric. (I won’t go into a lot of detail about Rhetoric, but “Rhetoric” means a lot more than the way we hear it thrown around on the news; the study of Rhetoric is actually the study of persuasive communication, which obviously includes a great amount of the communication we have today.) I taught those classes because I had a fair amount of training in both areas, and over the years I’ve picked up a lot about how language, reason, and sound thinking work (and don’t work) in discussions, both formal and informal.

Since beginning seminary, I’ve also noticed a good bit about the nature of theological discussion and debate, as well. In short, I’d have to say that at least a simple majority of the discussions, debates, and conversations I’ve witnessed fairly butchered many of the fundamental ideas of basic reason and logic.

So one of the things I want to do is to start an occasional series of blog posts that look at logic and how it ought to guide theological discussions. I think that a large part of the problem is that many people don’t know what makes an argument for or against a particular position or viewpoint a good or bad argument. That’s a problem that we can fix-- and we should.

(For some people, I did something in the previous paragraph that was a new idea: the notion that an “argument” is actually a neutral idea, and that some may be good and others may be bad. Many of us have been taught implicitly that “arguing” and “fighting” -- or “arguing” and “bickering” -- are essentially the same thing, when they are not. One can offer a good, well-reasoned argument for or against something that is loud, vitriolic, and abusive; another may offer an unsound argument that is pleasant, civil, and gentle. Or vice-versa.)

For starters, here’s a fundamental concept of logic: The way we say things is just as communicative as what we say.

By “the way we say things” I mean their form. Lauguage offers us a number of forms that are important to consider; to name a few:

• Grammatical form-- often a misplaced comma or a poorly understood semi-colin can change meaning drastically.
• Syntactical form-- word choice (syntax) is also important, since words usually have a great variety of meanings.
• Logical form-- moving beyond grammar and word choice, by this I mean the way that sentences, paragraphs, and communication on a much larger scale fit together-- in themselves, and when connected to each other.
• Forms of ethos and pathos-- how we are sensitive (or insensitive) to embodying character (godly character, sinful character) and emotion in what we communicate, not only by words but by how we say them.

These are just some examples of form. To get a sense of how form matters as much as content, consider the sentence below:

I know you didn’t mean it.

Now, think of how placing accent behind one or another word in that sentence might change its meaning:

• I know you didn’t mean it. (Implying that others may not know.)
• I KNOW you didn’t mean it. (Suggesting that it may have seemed like you did.)
• I know you didn’t MEAN it. (But it hurt anyway.)

Get the picture? Words are powerful. But language is much more than words-- it’s also about how we use them. That’s a fundamental principle of logic.

More on this soon.

Tags: logic, Language, love, community, theology, Faith & Life

I read the following comment recently on a website discussing the report that the 2008 General Assembly voted NOT to form a study committee on deaconesses and women in diaconal service, which the Philadelphia Presbytery (and others) had overtured the assembly to do:

I ponder the intention of the Philidelphia Presbytery in bringing this to the GA. Is it women seeking power over men, as was part of the Genesis curse, or is it men cowering from their mandate to lead the church?

Friends, you have before you a classic example of the logical fallacy known as the “Either/Or Fallacy,” the “False Dichotomy Fallacy,” the “False Dilemma Fallacy,” or “Bifurcation.”

In essence, this fallacy asserts that there are only two options to choose from, possible directions to move in, or answers to a question-- AND that both of them have been represented in the argument.

[An aside: the meaning of the prefix “di” is that there are two-- if there are more than two, that would change the prefix. For example, C.S. Lewis famously described a “trilemma” when he talked about the fact that Jesus was either a liar, a crazy person, or who He said He was.]

Now, it’s possible for there to be TRUE dichotomies, dilemmas, and either/or situations. We often face these-- this is one of the reasons why this fallacy so often appears acceptable. But when there is more than two options, it is fallacious to suggest that there are only two. (Thus, such a dichotomy is false.)

Very often, the false dichotomies or fallacious either/ors will be one (or more) of a few types:

• An over-simplification of a situation, attempting to categorize all of the options or choices into just two (or maybe three) ideas
• A misunderstanding of the full range of the problem, which leads to falling short of understanding the solutions or answers.
• A misunderstanding of the full range of the answers or solutions, often because of innocent ignorance or insufficient familiarity with the issues at hand.
• The result of a substantial bias which blinds the arguer from understanding the problem or issue, the answers or solutions, or both. (See the above example.)

Clearly, all of these can contain some innocence in the situation-- in other words, false dichotomies are not always willful attempts to deceive (though they sometimes are). What it all boils down to is this question: is there an option present that is not contained in the argument?

So, here are some ways to prevent false dichotomies in your own arguments. Ask yourself:

• Do I have a full understanding of the problem or issue I’m discussing? Self-awareness of the limit of your knowledge-- whether due to a lack of study, a lack of experience, or the presence of bias-- is the best place to start.
• Have I been fair to the issue at hand? Would an “opponent” in this argument agree that I have dealt with all of the options clearly and fairly?
• Do I have a full understanding of the options, answers, or solutions to the matter at hand? Like the first question, this gets to the issue of limit of knowledge. This can be a more difficult question to answer, and might require consulting another person to verify your answer.
• Have I attempted to categorize or group ideas that don’t fit well together? Have I forced one or more options into subordination under another for the sake of my argument?

And here are some responses to the presence of false dichotomies in other peoples’ arguments:

• Identify what other options are truly present. If you recognize options that aren’t presented, note them to yourself.
• If possible, draw connections between the missing options and the reason(s) for them. Likely, it will be one of the four types or reasons given above.
• Present both ideas at the same time. It’s best to do this in a question. For example, someone might say to the person who wrote the false dichotomy about the Philadelphia Presbytery: “You clearly stand on one side of this argument. Is it possible that your determined position has prevented you from seeing other options? It seems to me that the Presbytery might have had other issues that brought the discussion about, such as...”

Tags: theology, logic, community, love, Language, Faith & Life

Following up on my comments about health and risk, the next question about personal health assessment-- regardless of how you scored on the tests-- is, “what are you going to do about it?”

This is where a recent post from Michael Hyatt, the CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishers, is very helpful. Michael gives a concise yet complete guide for creating a “Life Plan” which is a self-assessment of how things are in your life, how you want them to be, and how you will get from one to the other.

For example, Michael talks about assessing his own health-- which he is generally happy with (Michael has completed two half-marathons in the past 18 months, so he’s in pretty decent health)-- and where his concerns are. He says:

here’s what I wrote a couple of weeks ago in my Health account: • I feel great. My stamina is great. It's been a long time since I have been sick. • I feel good about my weight and my overall fitness. • I am running (or cross-training) four days a week for at least 60 minutes. • I am not presently doing any strength training. I am concerned this will eventually catch up with me. • I am eating pretty well, but I could be more consistent in choosing more healthy foods.I would share more, but, frankly, it’s too personal.

Michael has a lot of good report of what he learned from doing his life plan, and he even offers a basic template you can download for creating one of your own.

I think this is a solid idea; whether it is related to health, family life, career, church and ministry involvement, or other areas of life, most of us don’t put enough thought and reflection into what lies ahead-- or how easy it will be to get there. Thanks, Michael, for giving us some great food for thought.

Tags: Faith & Life, family life, Health, love, community, Career

I mentioned a few weeks ago that Philadelphia Presbytery has submitted an overture to the PCA's General Assembly asking the GA to erect a study committee on Deaconesses. That overture has been echoed by the Western Canada Presbytery, and if I'm able to read this sort of thing at all, the committee will almost certainly be erected.

It may be needless to point out that this issue has caused quite a bit of stir and discussion. The PCA's own magazine, byFaith, has posted a summary of the announcement of the overture and that has generated quite a bit of discussion in the comments. Other, less "official" sources have also hosted a significant amount of discussion as well. A good bit of the discussion is quite helpful, offering finer points and perspectives that would simply be impossible to gather were it not for this Internet/Information Age that we live in.

Sadly, a lot of the discussion has also deteriorated into mostly or totally unhelpful rant, name-calling, and fear-mongering. A few of the points of discussion may be summed up as follows:

• "Scripture is clear on this matter (OR, arguing that Scripture isn't clear is a sign of our cultural liberalism and feminism)." The thought process here: because the NIV translates 1 Timothy 3:11 with reference to "their wives" instead of (the equally possible) "the women;" and because it translates "diakonos" Romans 16:1 as "servant" because it refers to a woman, then the issue is clearly settled. But who is to say that these translations are filled with cultural bias or the influence of a historical patriarchalism? Anyone who says, "Scripture is clear" has probably only been looking at English translations.
• 
  
• "The Book of Church Order (BCO) already prohibits ordaining women as Deacons." The line of thought here: The BCO is a finished, completed document that is utterly faithful to Scripture and never need be changed or amended to be brought closer to the Bible. This is difficult to reconcile with (common sense and) the Westminster Confession of Faith, which says, "All syonds or councils since the apostles' times, whether general or particular, may err, and many have erred; therefore they are not to be made the rule of faith or practice, but to be used as an help in both" (WCF 31.4).
• 
  
• "The word that is translated 'Deacon' in the Bible for men is obviously translated as 'servant' for women." Thought process: meaning changes substantially, even fundamentally, based solely on gender. This is an interesting foundational principle-- and one I'd like to hear more support for by other examples before accepting, which the arguers haven't provided.
• 
  
• "The Apostles' recognition of Phoebe, and other women in the New Testament, was a function of their cultural role-- something that doesn't apply to us." The appeal here is to the historical context, which of course is a fundamental principle in Bible interpretation. The problem is that these same folks will argue that historical context trumps literary context (or the language of the text itself-- see previous bullet) when Phoebe is mentioned, but when dealing with, say, 1 Timothy 3:11, quickly jump to the next argument...
• 
  
• "The historical context doesn't apply, since Paul was writing normative principles to Timothy about the qualifications for Deacons." Line of thought: somehow historical context is disposable for any normative portion of biblical text. The problem with that is that it would rule out the context of the deliverance and redemption of Israel out of Egyptian slavery as the setting for the 10 commandments, for example-- which most would agree poses some problems about a classic Reformed understanding of the 10 commandments.
• 
  
• "Allowing women as Deacons (even if the Bible permits it) will inevitably lead to handing over all authority in the church to women." The thinking here is a classic slippery slope notion: if one thing is bad or prohibited, then we dare not go near anything close to that thing. (This was a problem that the Pharisees often had, by the way...)
• 
  
• "Allowing women as Deacons is granting them authority and leadership that is unbibilcal." The thought trajectory in this argument is that Deacons have authority of the same sort that Elders have, and the Bible forbids women to have such authority. The problems here are rooted in the (mistaken and unbiblical) idea that Deacons are some kind of "Junior Elder" and therefore share in the role of authority with the Elders. But two problems immediately arise from this line of thought: first, the BCO itself defines the office of Deacon as "one of sympathy and service" (BCO 9.1) while it defines the Elder as office of exercising "government and discipline" (BCO 8.3)-- very different roles, one with clear distinction of authority and the other with, at best, less clear distinction. Secondly, the Deacons are "under the supervision and authority of the Session" (BCO 9.2), which begs the question: what authority do they have that, for example, a Sunday School teacher or WIC (Women in the Church) leader doesn't also have?
• 
  
• "We already have the WIC; what do we need women as Deacons for?" The idea here being that the WIC serves as a functional body of "Deaconesses" and we should simply let things remain as they are. Here again, there are two problems with this: first, Scripture does not define for us something like a WIC, and if we desire to pattern our bodies of leadership after Scripture then we should be careful about casually assuming that the WIC fulfills a role that Scripture defines for women. Secondly, and more importantly: the WIC is a ministry of leadership, structured specifically to minister to the women in the church; yet, the office of Deacon is broader than just women. Frankly, I learn a lot from women and have benefited from the ministry and teaching of many women-- and I find the suggestion that women should only minister to other women (and children) short-sighted.
• 
  
• "We ought to just do like ____ [insert name of a very large PCA church in the south] with the way they handle Deacon's assistants." I was surprised to see this argument made by more than one or two people. The thinking here: So-and-so has figured it out, and they should set the pace for all PCA churches. Again, problems arise: setting aside the very big assumption that the leadership there really has figured it out and has hit upon the perfect biblical solution, what does this have to do with what the BCO says about Deacons and women? But a closer look at the proposed practices reveals the truth: said PCA church's solution is to hire out the work of "serving tables" to outsiders (many of them unbelievers, all of them African-Americans).

I'm not convinced that blogs and discussion boards (mine included) are completely helpful in matters like these. It seems to me that folks are getting so entrenched in their positions, long before GA, that the possibility of healthy, profitable discussion on a study committee-- and even a good appointment of that committee-- is diminished.

I'm not decided about the matter. I've held back from my inclination to dig into the issue and study it to the point of deciding what my mind is about it-- though I'll take the time to do that before GA. But I am struck by this: most of the arguments against the study committee (summarized above) go against my logical inclinations-- committing fallacies and demonstrating inconsistency frequently-- and these weaken the case against a committee significantly. So I'm obviously in favor of erecting a study committee, even if I'm not decided on the issue of women as Deacons/Deaconesses.

Maybe I shouldn't be, but I'm surprised that brothers and sisters in the PCA can't have a more constructive conversation about all of this. As much as anything, reading some of these discussions have caused me to grieve the lack of brotherly love and charitable grace within our denomination, and my heart has frequently been heavy about it over the past few weeks. Why is an overture to study ANY part of the BCO to consider if it is fully and truly based on Scripture so threatening?

One commenter (Scott Truax of Peace Presbyterian Church, Cary, NC) at the byFaith page summed it up the best: "If we follow Scripture, we have nothing to fear."

Tags: Bible, Biblical Theology, theology, PCA Polity, Systematic Theology, PCA, Pastoral ministry, Politics, community

Apropos to the wrap-up of the series on the cross yesterday-- the cross in our suffering, the cross in our glory-- I find this quote from the late James Montgomery Boice, who faithfully pastored 10^th Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia for over 30 years before succumbing to liver cancer:

If God does something in your life, would you change it? If you’d change it, you’d make it worse. It wouldn’t be as good. So that’s the way we want to accept it and move forward, and who knows what God will do?

(HT: Paul Bankson)

Tags: Faith & Life, community, theology

Two ideas I've recently encountered that might get some discussion going about what it means to be "poor."

First, Jeff White of New Song Community Church in New York city recently spoke at a conference called A Conversation on Denominational Renewal in St. Louis (click here to find audio for all of the talks from that conference). All of Jeff's talk was great (as were the rest of them), but one thing he said stood out as an interesting idea: Jeff said he would like to expunge the church of the term "mercy ministry" because to extend mercy in a biblical sense means to give someone a second chance even though they don't deserve it, and this does not apply to poor people in most ways.

Second, the humor blog Stuff White People Like did an interesting post called, "#62: Knowing what's best for poor people." A big idea from the post: "It is a poorly guarded secret that, deep down, white people believe if given money and education that all poor people would be EXACTLY like them. In fact, the only reason that poor people make the choices they do is because they have not been given the means to make the right choices and care about the right things." And, as is apparent to these bloggers, making "the right choices" and caring "about the right things" are, in white people's minds, always identical to what white people (in this case, upper-middle class white people) choose and care about.

Both of these ideas, in their own way, represent challenges to the way I think about the poor and those in need. What do you think about these quotes and ideas?

Tags: Faith & Life, Cultural Discernment, community, Stewardship

"I hate to meet a man whom I have met ten years ago and find that he is at precisely the same point, neither moderated nor quickened nor experienced but simply stiffened."
~Oswald Chambers

I recently saw this quote on the blog PastorHacks, and it reminded me of how much some people really do change over the years, while others surprisingly don't. It also reminds me that sometimes, the change is not 100% for the better.

I was once interviewing for a ministry job and, naturally, had mentioned one of my good friends as a reference. This particular friend had been a PCA pastor for some time, and had been to seminary with the Senior Pastor at the church I was interviewing with. My friend, who was then and still is a wonderful, humble, and godly man of grace, had exhibited less gracious tendencies while in seminary, and this Senior Pastor remembered that well. "If you hold yourself out as someone like 'so-and-so' then I don't think this will work out," he said to me point-blank. What a shame that this man hadn't bothered to get acquainted with the great man that I knew.

In a similar incident, a man I know was interviewing (also for a staff position) with a Senior Pastor who had gone to seminary with the fellow's former boss. While the former boss was a good guy, he had softened over the years to the point where he had become a poor supervisor, yet according to my friend the boss was unwilling to accept any of the responsibility for the failures of those he supervised poorly. It happened to be that circumstances involving this poor supervision had led to my friend leaving this position. The two former classmates talked to discuss my friend, and naturally the Senior Pastor took the boss's word about the young candidate-- even though he other references contradicted the boss's account. As far as the Senior Pastor was concerned, the boss was still the same great guy he knew in seminary.

I think of people I knew 10 years ago-- especially people I served in ministry, sometimes poorly. How would they receive me today? Would they extend me grace, expecting and looking for ways that God had matured me since they last knew me well? A verse comes to mind as I consider this...

[Love] always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
~1 Corinthians 13:7

And then I think of the guys I went to seminary with. Some of them were great guys who were a bit too full of themselves; others had a touch of immaturity to shake off. I'm sure I struck many of them in similar ways. How will the Lord mature them over the coming years? How will he change me in that time? I pray that I would be able to see them with fresh eyes down the line.

To rest in the fact that "love always hopes" (or as another translation phrases it, "love hopes all things") encourages me that those who knew me when I was not yet the man I am today might, in love, see me without prejudice-- and that those who know me today, when I am not yet the man I will, Lord willing, become, might also.

Tags: community, love

I was briefly distracted this morning by our church's list of Pastors-- the succession of Pastors through the 173-year history of Hickory Withe Presbyterian Church. If you haven't taken the time to look through this list, you should; it's a fascinating list of men.

I am the 28th Pastor of Hickory Withe Presbyterian Church. Of the remaining 28, 22 of them served the church for less than five years, and three more served for right around five years. Only three Pastors in 172 years have served this church for more than five years.

One of these men is my new hero: Pastor S. S. (Scott) Gill served Hickory Withe Presbyterian Church for 44 years, 2 and a half months, from 1861-1905. Noticing those dates, I'm struck by the fact that, in his first year of ministry, Rev. Gill would have begun shepherding his flock through the difficulties of four years of the War between the States. Following that, he pastored them for another 40 years-- a simply astounding tenure in our day, and from the looks of the aforementioned list, an impressive tenure in his day as well.

I heard mega-church Pastor Rick Warren comment recently that, in his preparation for ministry, he contacted the 100 largest churches in the U.S. and asked them, "what makes a church healthy?" (Whether you agree or disagree with Pastor Warren's choice of source for this information, I hope you'll agree it's an interesting perspective to pursue.) One thing emerged from them: in all of these churches, the Pastor had been there for a long time. Thus, Pastor Warren began to pray specifically about his pastoral call: "Lord, I'll go anywhere you want, as long as you take me there for life." He and his wife Kaye said that, when they went to plant Saddleback Church, they were 25 years old and made a 40-year commitment to that area.

Marcie and I have long hoped for the same thing: that we might move only once after seminary. While we're barely four months into this pastorate-- let alone 40 years or more!-- and I still face ordination trials (tomorrow, by the way), I'm renewed in my desire for that by the example of Scott Gill.

Tags: Pastoral ministry, Faith & Life, community, family life

There are a lot of great causes that I think are important. Be they social causes, political movements, efforts for promotion of ideas, many people are involved in many things that give value to our culture and world. Some of them are things that, in another life, I would be willing to step into and personally assign my name to, either in support or in opposition.

But I won't do it. Not now, and not as long as the Lord has called me to serve Him in pastoral ministry.

A Pastor is, by profession and function, something of a "face" for the church, especially his local congregation. In some cases this is taken way too far-- and in almost every case, it is something that Pastors must be diligent to keep in check. They are not the church, or even in charge of the church, but they are the most prominent leaders in the church. And in many people's minds, they are the face that people think of when they think about the church. This is even more true outside of the church than it is inside it.

Thus, as a Pastor I must not be an activist. Why? Because an activist puts a priority on something other than the centrality of the Gospel and the faithful teaching of Scripture.

This isn't always bad-- there are times when an issue needs to be the front-and-center concern, and the Gospel's relationship to it must be secondary in that discussion. There are issues of political or social change that the Scripture doesn't directly speak to, and those who try to make the discussion all about the Scriptural principle that indirectly relates only serve to muddy the waters.

(Let me make this disclaimer: I'm not saying that Scripture is insufficient to give guidance for godly thinking and living in all spheres of life; Scripture IS sufficient for that. But Scripture isn't exhaustive in offering prescriptive conceptual thinking about all issues that face us today, and it is irresponsible to assert that it does.)

Some examples: while Scripture offers help in understanding the concept of just war, it doesn't directly speak to whether a particular war or military action is just. Scripture does discuss the stewardship of our world and environment, but it doesn't offer direct teaching about global warming. And although Scripture speaks to how a believer ought to behave in relation to his governmental officials, it doesn't address whether we should be in favor of states' rights over federalism.

And here's where the divide comes for me, as a Pastor: if my charge is to proclaim the truth of Scripture in season and out of season; if I am to preach, not myself, but Christ as Lord and myself as a servant; if I am to know nothing before my flock except Christ and Him crucified-- if these are what I am to be about, then I MUST not be an activist. To take an activist position would be to turn my focus away from this charge.

If the church is charged with demonstrating the historical marks of the church-- Word, Sacrament, and discipline-- and only that, then a church must not assume a particular position on an activist cause. And I, as the Pastor and "face" of the church, must not do so either.

Scripture DOES teach a lot about how we might think about social and political issues, and over the course of my ministry (and even over the course of the next year or so) I will address these as they present themselves in Scripture. But I must stop short of waging judgment on particular political leaders, individual social causes, or specific political or social issues (and whether I agree or disagree with them).

I have opinions on them, and I'll even share some of my observations at times. If I'm doing my job well, however, you'll walk away without certainty about what my exact political and social positions are. That is as it should be-- because I am not an activist, I am a Pastor.

Tags: Pastoral ministry, Politics, preaching, community, Cultural Discernment

Well, a lot happened recently, and even today. Here's a quick glimpse at what is going on...

Memphis ranks #1 again this week. The Tigers continue their amazing season; will they ever lose? (Hickory Withe insiders say, "no.")

Obama gains major ground in the Democratic primary. Whatever your political convictions, you have to admit that Barack Obama's campaign is building a head of steam that (for now, at least) looks like it might carry him all the way to Pennsylvania Avenue.

Louisiana Presbytery faces a formal indictment, and consequently Auburn Avenue Presbyterian Church withdraws from the PCA. Personally, I see this more as a call to mourning than a resolution to the controversy that the Federal Vision has become.

Baptist group woos moderate views. Does this strike anyone else as ironic?

President Bush predicts "no recession." I don't understand how $300 per household will really prevent one (especially since, if you adjust the value of the dollar in comparison to international currencies, we are already in a recession!), but here's hoping he's right.

Tiger wins another, ties Arnold Palmer's record. He's amazing-- but why anyone is surprised by this, I don't know.

Legos bricks turn 50. Just about everything-- including a Lego church-- has been built out of these gems. Happy Birthday, Lego!

Tags: Cultural Discernment, Faith & Life, community

I overheard a young first-year seminary student talking with a couple of others in the bookstore a few years ago. He was talking about his sense of call to ministry, and they asked him if he wanted to be a Pastor when he finished. Yes, he did, but he quickly (and haughtily) clarified: "I'll go overseas to do missions, of course. The U.S. is way too full of churches and Pastors."

This video is a good presentation of a bunch of amazing statistics about the church in the U.S., and in a matter of minutes utterly refutes this young man's jaded viewpoint. (HWPC folks, may I ask that you be sure to take a few minutes to watch this?) What's clear from the data presented is that the local church has never held a more important place in the community, even if most of that community doesn't realize it.

While it is clear that the statistics are presented with an intent to promote church planting, they offer great insight into the mission and importance of established churches, as well. In my view, those figures regarding the established church's less effective outreach are simultaneously an indictment and a call to action.

What struck you as the more interesting aspects of that presentation?

Tags: Evangelism, community, Faith & Life, Pastoral ministry

Two of the big debates that resurface every time there's an election are immigration and Social Security. Everyone seems especially concerned that Social Security will face difficult sustainability concerns, particularly now that the "Baby Boomers" are reaching retirement age. There are figures and documentation that show how drastically the system has changed over the years-- the ratio of taxpayers to Social Security recipients has practically inverted since the program's inception. Naturally, there's a question about whether we can continue to pay everyone the rates we are with much fewer taxpayers on the other side of the ratio.

In a different (seemingly unrelated) discussion, immigration is a perennial concern. Most people who promote tightening immigration restrictions seem to argue one (or both!) of two sides: either the concern is that an increase in immigrants will result in great upsurge of welfare, Medicaid, and Medicare recipients, or that the immigrants will rob existing citizens of jobs-- especially low-wage ones. I even recall hearing both arguments made by one politician at the same time, which could be contradictory since wage-earners are often not the primary recipients of social programs.

I was talking with Russ Campbell this morning, and I echoed the sentiment that my friend Jon once mentioned, wondering why no one ever thought another baby boom would solve the Social Security problem. After all, if the problem is essentially not enough taxpayers, one obvious solution seems to be to increase the number of taxpayers! As Russ and I talked about it, we had the thought (mostly Russ's) that one benefit a looser immigration system would bring would be an instant increase in the number of taxpaying citizens. Welcome to the United States!

Obviously there would need to be some restrictions, particularly for older immigrants-- but these are largely already in place, since no current citizen is vested until they've paid into the system for 10 years. And you (allegedly) get back something in proportion to what you contributed anyway; that's why we get those statements every so often that remind us how much cash we've dumped down a hole how much we've contributed to our retirement future.

Would this work? I'd love to hear feedback on why this idea shouldn't be some candidate's winning ticket to the White House this year...

Tags: Politics, Cultural Discernment, community

For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake.
~II Corintians 4:5

Yesterday at lunch, Jack asked me, "Daddy-- are you in charge of part of the church?"
What a profound question! I'm thrilled that Jack is asking questions like this, and thinking about these things. I wonder how many people have actually thought about this question...
Here's how the rest of the dialogue went (roughly!):
Me: "Jack, daddy's job is to be the Pastor at the church, which is not about being in charge, it's about serving them."
Jack: "What does 'serving them' mean?"
Me: "It means that I help them when they need help, I encourage them if they are sad, and I teach them about Jesus and how He is what they need."
Jack: "Sometimes it seems like you're in charge..."
Me: "Well, sometimes people act like they want me to be in charge; but when they act like that, what they really want is for me to teach them how Jesus is in charge."
Jack: "That's good."

Tags: Pastoral ministry, community, Faith & Life

We're a long way from the 2008 presidential election-- indeed, we're still a good ways off from many primaries. Right now, it's anyone's guess who will emerge as the final set of candidates a little under a year from now. Based on the way things appear now, I wouldn't be surprised if something like Montgomery Brewster's "None of the Above" campaign could gain some serious momentum over the next 11 months.

That said, here's an early read on the status of the current leaders. [Disclaimer: This is IN NO WAY an endorsement of any candidate, personally or as an organization. I certainly do NOT speak on behalf of Hickory Withe Presbyterian Church in this assessment, and even personally this is not a claim of how I will vote or even my inclinations. This is merely an assessment of how I see the race taking shape.]

The candidate that will win the 2008 election must find a way to appeal to the all-important middle-ground moderates-- a growing segment of our population. At the same time, they must strike certain chords with either politically conservative or progressive voters on certain issues; ideally, the candidate would be able to appeal to both extremes on some issues. I think it's safe to say that no Americans (or at least, very few) want to see the country divided as strongly as the 2000 Bush vs. Gore race.

Right now, the front-runners of the Democratic Party-- Barack Obama, Hilary Clinton, and John Edwards-- are not leaning enough toward the center to woo as many moderates as they will eventually need to court. This is probably because they are (smartly) thinking primarily about the next vote only: they realize that they must win the nomination of their party in order to move ahead. (I recall hearing President Bill Clinton making this argument at some point-- maybe on David Letterman?)

But many voters from all points on the political spectrum are paying attention to both sides. Perhaps more than ever, the claims made during Primary campaigns will matter throughout the general election. Thus, any of these Democratic front-runners are in danger of marginalizing themselves with general election voters, or appearing to waffle on important issues down the line.

On the Republican side, many of the candidates are doing the same thing, in a slightly different way: some are following the same path and skewing too far to the right for a lot of moderates (I think Mitt Romney and Fred Thompson fit this category), while others (Rudy Giuliani and John McCain?) have moved to the middle so much that they have made a lot of the "far-right" conservatives uncomfortable.

Mike Huckabee, however, seems to have found a bit of balance here: he resonates with the conservatives on a handful of key issues, but appeals to moderates (and even some of the more "liberal" voters) on others.

Huckabee still has a long way to go. If he continues to succeed in his campaign, however, it may prove interesting to see if my read on this is accurate. Back in 2000, I thought a really interesting race would have been John McCain vs. Bill Bradley-- both were moderate enough to pose a significant "threat" to the other in the middle-ground. Will we see the same thing this year? Maybe Mike Huckabee vs. Bill Richardson...

Keep in mind, I'm not talking who should win, but who could. Often, "should" and "could" are different, at least in politics. Why? Because "should" is inherently subjective; my idea of "should" is inevitably different from yours. So the only way that "should" will win (or become "could") is if enough people generally agree with me (of course, that may mean that "should" doesn't win from your vantage point).

So why does this matter? To begin with, Americans-- and especially Christians-- tend to think far too individualistically about the world, including politics. I've heard too many times from Christians, "if so-and-so is elected President, I'm moving to Canada." Why is that? Aside from the fact that these Christians may not like Canada's leadership any more than the U.S.'s, perhaps they need to ask why they believe the election is all about them.

In fact, elections aren't about anyone in particular-- they are about all of us together. Sometimes what is best for a community is not what is necessarily best for any particular individual member of that community. So it is with a nation, as well. I'm all for contributing to the costs of paving roads I'll never use, and police and fire services I hope I won't have to use, because those roads, policemen, and fire fighters keep other people safe. And I need to realize that the best man-- or woman-- for President of the United States may not be the one among all candidates who will "benefit" me the most.

So "could" matters, even if the pundits tell us that we shouldn't vote based on electability. Rather than a "take my marbles and go home" attitude, Christians should lead the charge in supporting electable candidates who are good for the nation, state, and local community-- even if their worldviews differ somewhat from ours.

Tags: Cultural Discernment, Faith & Life, community, Politics

Marcie and I celebrate our 10-year anniversary on March 7. (I'm not actually posting this on our anniversary, since part of my anniversary present to her is to turn all computers off for the day!)

Over that time, we have seen the Lord carry us through many amazing transitions. Here's a glimpse:

• Seven moves. Yes-- we've lived in seven different homes over that time.
• Eighteen jobs. Seven of them are Marcie's (including one stint as a stay-at-home wife-- in Roanoke and one ongoing position as stay-at-home wife AND mom). The rest are/were mine.
• Four cities. For all of those moves, we've actually only lived in a relative few places.
• Two children. That's not many compared to some of our friends-- but plenty for us! (At least for now...)
• Two degrees. Both mine-- undergraduate and a master's. (Marcie already had both by the time we got married.)
• Seven vehicles. Believe it or not, we still have one that we started with. (Long live the Bronco!)
• A handful of "I'll never's" recanted. When we got married, we never thought we would ever own a minivan, serve as a solo Pastor, live in the midwest, teach school, or homeschool our children.

Through all of this (and so very much more), I could not have asked for a better partner in family, ministry, and life. Marcie, you are indeed my favorite companion and my heart's true friend. Thanks for 10 years of patience with me! I pray for 50+ more, and an eternity together in the New Jerusalem.

Tags: love, community

I've always been fascinated with technology, and over time I've developed a lot of thoughts and ideas about how faith and technology collide. A few of these thoughts made their way into an article that I recently wrote for ByFaith magazine, which ended up being called, "Looking for Love in a Few Wrong Places". That article, which focuses particularly on how technology and the Internet allow communities to be built in new ways, is now available on the ByFaith website, in case you're interested.

By the way, if you don't already subscribe to ByFaith, I would highly recommend it (and not just because I write for them)-- it is a good magazine that offers a helpful look at many diverse topics.

Tags: writing, community, Science & Technology, Faith & Life

Yesterday, Marcie and I were planning to do some Christmas shopping after we drove the kids to school. Out of the blue, she said to me, "do you think that store would have that thing?"

"What?!?"

We smiled and laughed, and eventually she gave me enough hints to decipher what she meant.

But it got me to thinking: a lot of times, one of us (in the church) will say something we think is entirely clear, and it will come across to others like Marcie's statement did for me. It's way too easy for misunderstandings to occur, and we need to be willing to give the benefit of the doubt in times like that-- and quickly work toward understanding.

Tags: community, Faith & Life

Marcie has mentioned Kate Snodgrass to many of you; Kate is someone we know from a St. Louis church where we were members. She has been battling cancer for some time now, and she has chronicled her struggles (and the lessons God has taught her through them) on a blog.

If you're interested, you may read Kate's blog at this link.

Tags: prayer, community

My friend Megan posted a challenging post on her blog a few days ago. It turns out that Megan read an interesting article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch about the struggles that many food banks and food pantries face around this time of year: they simply run out of food, and are forced to limit their services or close doors altogether.

The article points to the unexpected downside of our technological advances: the accuracy of inventory systems in grocery stores means that stores seldom over-purchase, and food packagers don't over-produce, in the quantities that they used to. The net result is that food banks and food pantries don't have the supply of food from the grocery stores and food packagers that they used to. As a result, they run out of inventory themselves.

Megan asks a hard question: what is their personal family responsibility for this problem? I love this question, as it reveals Megan's faith as real and practicable. I also love it because it forces me to consider this for myself, and my family.

In her post, Megan invites interaction about this subject, and I wanted to bring that discussion here, as well. I've also invited my friend Russell Smith to join the conversation. I'd like to work together toward some real answers to this problem-- something that we (as a community) can put into practice on a regular basis.

What do you think? We have a food pantry right here, through Fayette Cares-- my guess is that they are facing the same struggle. How can we answer? What should our personal responsibility in this problem be?

Tags: Faith & Life, love, community

Part of yesterday's Sunday School class on Donald MacNair's The Practices of a Healthy Church included discussion about the spiritual growth of others in our church. Specifically, Dr. MacNair asks, "are many in our church evidencing spiritual growth?"

As we talked about that, we realized that we can't answer this question unless we are involved in each other's lives. How can I know if others are growing spiritually unless I am around them regularly, unless I know them well enough to see the growth in their lives? I have to be invested-- as we all do-- to recognize spiritual growth in others in the church.

Do you know your fellow church members this way? What are some ways that you could get to know them better?

How about any of the following as "starter" ideas for getting to know each other better: speak to someone you don't know very well after worship; invite someone to have supper with you; offer to meet them for lunch or breakfast; find out their birthday and send them a card or note; call them on the phone for no particular reason; ask if they could help you with a project around your house (or offer to help with one of theirs); sit with someone new at the pot-luck dinners (or other events).

These are just a few ideas. What ways do you know of to get to know someone better?

Tags: community, love