More than I ask or imagine. . .

New Clothes for Easter: A Sign and Seal of Something More

I wrote this following article for our Newsletter at Lycoming Centre.  After I told my Mom that I got a new suit for Easter, she and Dad came up for Easter as a surprise, but it just shows how much they taught me through even something like clothing.

I remember my brown suit.  I was 4 or 5 and the pictures show me standing proudly in my Easter suit.  In my early childhood, I can remember wearing new suits every Easter and my sister having a bright and beautiful Spring dress.  My parents always dressed us up for church, but on Easter, that was a game changer. We wore bright-colored new clothes that were only fit for weddings or Christmas if we had not grown out of them by then.

Easter, from my earliest memories was about color and newness. I have no idea about the origin of pastel colors and Easter, but my parents entrusted me with a great worldview by communicating the newness and uniqueness of Easter. The greatest central fact of our faith is the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from Death on the Cross.  The resurrection is his enthronement celebration where God declares before the watching world that- Yes, He is the Son of God! This is not some random coincidence or aberration in history, but the very beginning of a new history.  All things are being made new now in King Jesus' lordship, and his primary means of that work of newness is you and me.  The Church's calling is to be a New People.  Granted, we are sinners, but the Holy Spirit that raised Jesus that first Easter is raising us in Him as well. We are no longer dead in our sin!

In the first few centuries of the Church, new converts were baptized on Saturday night or Early Sunday morning before Easter.  After the baptism, they would be given new white robes to wear for the Easter service. Easter was celebrated for 7 weeks culminating in Pentecost Sunday. So every Sunday, these newly Baptized believers would remind the Church that they are new people and have a new calling.

This Easter, consider where are you called to bring the newness of Jesus' Kingly New Reign. Where is God calling you to die to your selfishness and pride and to live a resurrection life? How can you, your family and this church show our community that Jesus is renewing all things? Let not just your Easter apparel show that something is special about April 8 this year, but let your conduct, your repentance, your generosity, your forgiveness and your newness of heart be a witness to Christ's resurrection!

How Can I Change the World? It begins in the Sanctuary of the Lord.

I have always been a big fan of the idea that you live how your worship.  I firmly believe that worship services train us as God's people to live for him.  Below is an article by Mark Horne on How to Change the World?  Hope you enjoy it.

10 things a church can do to change the world

by Mark Horne

The principle to keep in mind is that we have to change ourselves first.

1. Participate in the Lord’s Supper Every Sunday in Worship
The Kingdom is again and again a feast. The Church is the beachhead of the Kingdom. Does Jesus ever tell a parable comparing the Kingdom to a lecture hall? Does he ever compare the Kingdom to a music concert? Then lets not stop up the Kingdom at the source. Lets get it right. Lets eat and drink.

2. Drink Wine in Church
Duh. How else would you worship a glutton and a drunkard? The Gospel is New Wine that bursts wineskins–not grape juice that sits there inert. You want to know if God can forgive a sinner like you. Get it in a cup and drink it down and you will know. That changes everything.

3. Sing the Psalms
By sing, I mean chant. Don’t remake the Psalms to fit a rhyme scheme. Sing the words that are there according to an accurate translation. What would happen if we did this? For one thing a ton of bad theology would be exorcised.

Arise, O Yahweh
O God, lift up your hand;
forget not the afflicted.
Why does the wicked renounce God
and say in his heart, “You will not call to account”?
But you do see,
for you note mischief and vexation,
that you may take it into your hands;
to you the helpless commits himself;
you have been the helper of the fatherless.
Break the arm of the wicked and evildoer;
call his wickedness to account till you find none.
Yahweh is king forever and ever; the nations perish from his land.

4. Pray the Psalms
Arguably this is redundant with the point above. But I want to stress that God wants us to pray things like:

judge me, O Lord, according to my righteousness
and according to the integrity that is in me.
Oh, let the evil of the wicked come to an end,
and may you establish the righteous—
you who test the minds and hearts,
O righteous God!

There are people and whole churches who claim to be Bible-believing who think this is sinful to pray. You can’t change the world for God if you think He is really a Pharisee unless he has the help of your styleguide by which to edit his prayers.

5. Tell people in church that God has forgiven them.

Don’t preach that God forgives some people somewhere some time. Tell the professing Christians in front of you, and their children, when they confess their sins together, that God has wiped each one of their slates clean. The good news that is going to change the world is not that God forgives someone somewhere at some time.

(Yes, God forgives them at other times, including when they pray apart. But these things are not opposed. Rather, one helps the the other. Those who are trained to believe that God hears and forgives them will be encouraged to trust God for the same at other times and places.)

6. Believe the whole Bible and teach it like God really meant it.

Because saying, “You’re getting too much of your theology from the parables” mostly means, “Jesus was a stupid peasant who told misleading stories that we have to carefully strip down to a single point that we found in Paul’s Epistles”–or rather, “that we found in Westminster Confession” (or, “… the Councils of Trent” or whatever). I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that God isn’t blessing churches who don’t like the Bible.

7. Preach Jesus as King but Avoid Petty Politics

Jesus is Lord and he wants a visible unified entrance to the Kingdom (Church) as a witness to that fact. We have to obey what Jesus says, but we also have to recognize how divisions and arguments actually can undermine the theocratic Faith. So find some highly obvious points in the public square to harp on (i.e. abortion), but try not to get bogged down in minutia (don’t preach Christian libertarianism, socialism, or whatever from the pulpit).

8. Let the Great Commission be your commission

If you think you know what this means, go read it, and ask yourself what this says about being “born again,” “faith,” or “evangelism” compared to what it says about obedience, theocracy, baptism, and ongoing teaching/training of everyone.

9. Worship like the Bible matters

Does it not strike anyone as odd that, if you want to attend a worship service that took you systematically through Scripture, you would be better off in an Episcopal, formal Lutheran, Roman Catholic, or Eastern Orthodox service rather than a Baptists, conservaitve Presbyterian, or “Bible Church” assembly? Is God supposed to speak to us in the Church or not? If not, how are we supposed to see anything change, let alone the world?

10. Live Corporately like Matthew 18 is in the Bible

I mention the whole chapter on purpose, by the way, because it is obviously focused on humility and forgiveness, and in that context gives directions for accountability and purifying the Church. I think that is important because, while not one church in a hundred includes Matthew 18.15-19 in their real canon, some that do can be so zealous (I’m using a euphemism) about it as to reinforce the temptation to neglect it. But it is in the Bible and it is an operating instruction from the Lord Jesus. So obey Him.

My Credo Part One: Too Many Influences Make Me a Theological Mutt

Yes, I am a mutt and a theological one to boot. What I mean is that I have a Presbyterian tradition and call, but my background and theological outlook is much more broad.  Recently in my transition to the PCUSA, I had to write up my theological commitments in about a page.  This practice showed me how influenced I am from many different angles by such a diverse amount of traditions.  Below is a list of influences historical and literary that have formed my view of theology, Scripture, and the Church. My next few posts will be paragraphs from that theological summary.

Methodism- In my formative years, I attended a UMC church that said the Lord's Prayer and Apostle's Creed every week.  This had its effect in my having these truths drummed into me at a very young age. The power of repeated words said in unison gave me direction in my prayer.

Fellowship of Christian Athletes- You may have heard that the Christian faith is about a "relationship not a religion".  Now I consider it cliche but it was very powerful for me as a teenager. It was through this ministry that I began to learn to repent of my sin, even intentional and premeditated sin.

Thomas A Kempis- At Vanderbilt, I read "On the Imitation of Christ" for my Class on Reformation History. It was the first textbook that I read that grew my faith.  His mysticism intrigued me when I thought everything was about a re dedication of your life.

John Calvin- I remember reading the "Institutes" for the same class above and thinking, "This man knows a God much bigger than Max Lucado".  Granted I did still love Lucado, but the capacity and vision of God's power turned my world upside down. I am a Presbyterian today because of that encounter.

Westminster Theological Seminary- I graduated in 2004, and am still amazed at how the whole program from Biblical Studies, Counseling, Church History, Apologetics, and Theology formed one whole worldview and Biblical view. 

James Jordan and Peter Leihart- These two Westminster graduates took me to a place of appreciation of the whole Christian tradition including some elements of Anglicanism, Catholicism, and Orthodox.  They were very keyed into the symbolic worldview that dominates the Hebrew Mind.  I am continued to be encouraged by their agrarian worldview, biblical theology, and sacramental practice.

NT Wright and Karl Barth-Although these guys are very different, I saw them both as suspect at one time, but now see tremendous amount of gain in interacting with their thought.  I do not sign on to everything they say, but I do find they help me think through the truth of Scripture.

The Jack Miller Movement- This is a renewal movement out of Westminster Theological Seminary that emphasized Sonship and understanding the blessings of salvation to such an extent that your functional theology would be the same as your formal theology.  So if you really believe that you were justified by Christ's work and not based on your own performance, you would be less defensive, less self-righteous, but more loving and trusting. This movement was influential to Tim Keller and the ministry of the PCA.

Eugene Peterson- The author of The Message has given me a view of Pastoral practice that I will never exhaust and never recover from.  As a college in the PCUSA, I have found his view of pastoral ministry to be so appealing and so church affirming. From his series on Spiritual Theology to The Contemplative Pastor, I have learned how to see my calling and see my story to be about God's Story in Christ.

GK Chesterton and Charles Spurgeon-My two fat Englishmen!  I cannot tell you how influencial both of these men have been.  One is Catholic and one is Baptist, but both enjoyed life and the romance of orthodox belief.  I guess in many ways I am right in the middle of both of these men, but tremendously indebted to them. How can I love both liturgy and freedom in worship?  Because I have been so influenced by both of these men.  I highly recommend Orthodoxy by Chesterton and Morning and Evening by Spurgeon to begin.  I could go on for hours about these guys, but that is another post.

Friends and Family- The diversity of my geography and network have opened my eyes to see life through many different windows, and even recommended the above influences. I am a product of all of those and am full of thanks for all of you.

Stop your Convicting Jesus Powers, Eugene Peterson. It's too much! But I do need it.

Casually reading Eugene Peterson is oxymoron. I tried to do that with his book The Contemplative Pastor.  I happened upon this paragraph, and it hit a little to close to home.

"It was a favorite theme of CS Lewis that only lazy people work hard. By lazily abdicating the essential work of deciding and directing, establishing values and setting goals, other people do it for us; then we find ourselves frantically, at the last minute, trying to satisfy a half dozen different demands on our time, none of which is essential to our vocation, to stave off the disaster of disappointing someone." p 19.

Wow, let's just say that has made me reevaluate what it means to be an un-busy pastor.  Thanks be to God that He gives me little windows like this to see my sin and trust in Christ for radical forgiveness. Now, I can see it, own it, and turn joyfully to live my vocation.

Happy All Hallow's Eve! Celbrate Christ's Victory over Death and Mock Evil!

 It comes up every year.  What do you do for Halloween?  I tell people, "I mock evil."  I take my stand with the rest of Christian history.  This day is not just about Reformation, candy, getting scared, or the paranormal. This day is the eve of All Saints Day, which is basically Christian Memorial Day. We celebrate those who have come before us and even died for their faith in Christ. 

As James Jordan points out in his article on Halloween:

The Festival of All Saints reminds us that though Jesus has finished His work, we have not finished ours. He has struck the decisive blow, but we have the privilege of working in the mopping up operation. Thus, century by century the Christian faith has rolled back the demonic realm of ignorance, fear, and superstition. Though things look bad in the Western world today, this work continues to make progress in Asia and Africa and Latin America.

The Biblical day begins in the preceding evening, and thus in the Church calendar, the eve of a day is the actual beginning of the festive day. Christmas Eve is most familiar to us, but there is also the Vigil of Holy Saturday that precedes Easter Morn. Similarly, All Saints’ Eve precedes All Saints’ Day.

The concept, as dramatized in Christian custom, is quite simple: On October 31, the demonic realm tries one last time to achieve victory, but is banished by the joy of the Kingdom.

What is the means by which the demonic realm is vanquished? In a word: mockery. Satan’s great sin (and our great sin) is pride. Thus, to drive Satan from us we ridicule him. This is why the custom arose of portraying Satan in a ridiculous red suit with horns and a tail. Nobody thinks the devil really looks like this; the Bible teaches that he is the fallen Arch-Cherub. Rather, the idea is to ridicule him because he has lost the battle with Jesus and he no longer has power over us.

Because Christ has won, we also remember those who are currently being persecuted today.  My church honor those around the world who are persecuted for their faith.  Below is a video from Voice of the Martyrs describing Christians being persecuted all over the world.  What drives my prayers for my brothers and sisters in the midst of persecution is that Christ has and will triumph.  God will wipe away the tears from their eyes, and reveal himself to be the true King of the world.  Happy Halloween!  Happy All Saints Day! Praise God for his victory in Christ Jesus!

 

Three New JD videos just in Time for July 4th

Two New JD Videos Uploaded

Marriage as a Community Commitment

Just posted a new post on our church's blog site on the role of community in a marriage.  These thoughts developed after the exciting event on Memorial Day when my sister-in-law Charis got engaged. Congratulations to them!  May the Lord continue to bless them and all the memories they make!

NLD Theology

My sister-in-law, Charis, got quite the surprise on our trip to Williamsburg, VA.  In the midst of a lively orchard, her boyfriend, Gus, dropped to one knee and popped the question.   It was an exciting time, and all the magic and hope of a life spent together brought joy to all of us who witnessed it.  Of course, now begins the planning and hysteria of an actual wedding. I am grateful to my future brother-in-law. Gus made a wonderful gesture to us by including Charis’ family. 

We Fall Down

My boy, JD, is like his Daddy in many ways.  One of the most obvious is how clumsy he is.  At 16 months, he has mastered walking, but he is learning to run on the run.  He falls down…almost every day.  Last week, I believe he had 4 visible bruises on his head.  Several times during one of these falls, I was right there seeing him stumble.  My reflexes were too slow to dive down and grab him. He cried like I made him fall, and then cried some more.  I felt like a horrible parent. The truth is: I cannot keep him from falling.

Even more so, I cannot keep myself from falling either, but this falling is into sin.  Sin is not just doing the bad stuff or being a bad person.  Sin is an alienation from our Creator and a lack of conformity to his Law of freedom.  It is a state of being, not just an act.  The acts of sin remind me of the deeper more sinister truth about the darkness of my soul.

Often, the isolated incidents of sin are falls letting me know that I have yet not learned to walk.  I may feel pain, get angry, and even hurt others in my falls.  But the goal for me spiritually as well as for my son, is to learn how to fall correctly. 

My son needs to learn not to fall head-first.  I need to learn not to fall pride-first.  When I fall pride-first, I think “I cannot believe I did that!”  When I fall grace-first, I think “I cannot believe what wonderful grace is mine in Jesus!” As a human, we will all fall: we will all fail.  God knows this and knows all the darkeness of the human heart.  He sent Jesus not for people to live better, but to fall better. 

Jesus is a soft place to fall.  One of my favorite hymns is “Jesus, What a Friend for Sinners.”  He does not come to make the strong stronger or moral person more moral.  He comes to make weak sinners powerful pictures of his Grace.  It is only when we fall down in Christ that we reflect his love and his patience.  Fall Down in the Grace of Jesus Christ, so that his power would be made perfect in a flawed weak sinner.  Fall grace-first.

Jerry's Birthday Kindle

My sleep mode screen saver is a person under a tree on a hill.  It gives the definition of the word "kindle": Light or set fire. Arouse of inspire (and emotion or feeling):  a love of art was kindled in me...

This was my expericence at my first exposure to the Kindle.  It was early 2008, and I went to my favorite Internet time waster: Amazon.  I have always loved the reviews and the selection to browse at any time. But this day, I saw what was to be the "ipod" of books. Excitement shot through my imagination.  I, then, watched the Oprah episode about the Kindle.  One of my college students had one for his text books and my coveting heart was kindled.  Last February, this same student told me about a Kindle 2 just released.  I watched all the videos, and told myself that it would be cool but not for me because it was $400.   

Also, I thought most of my reading is what my friend Matt calls "Godbooks" so there would not be that many "Godbooks" on the Kindle. I buy most of my books from Hearts and Minds and WTSbooks, and will be a life long customer to those stores too.

What happened in the last half of 2009? Well, the cost dropped to $260.  It seemed as in the relm of reality.  I learned too about all of the thousands of digital books online that were free, including the classics of literature, philosophy, and history.  Also, Amazon allowed for PDF's to be read without conversion. I read many things on PDF's.  I hate reading many things on the labtop. Then, the back breaker was a friend who was able to get a significant discount on bulk Kindles. 

What was funny here is that I told my friend I wanted to purchase one from him.  So, after they were delievered, I called him to see if we can meet up for the Kindle.  He informed me that I was too late in getting back and he already sold it.  I was crushed!  I realized how my coveting and my Kindle lust were grabbing my heart affections.