Tag Archives: faith

Why Are We So Afraid?

15 Feb

The other day I was thinking about the various things that the Church is crying out against in American society.  I talked with someone about a documentary he wanted me to watch about the rise of Islam, and he said, “it’s scary, scary stuff.”  That has just stuck with me.

Why are we so afraid?

It got me thinking about Jesus.  He struck fear in the heart of the religious leaders of his time and they influenced the political leaders to be afraid of him as well.  He was a threat to their power.  He was declaring a new kingdom and a new way of living with God the Father.  He was seen as a revolutionary and a threat.

Revolutionaries are always a threat to those in power.

Change is always a threat to those in power.

The Church is clearly seeing a diminishing of our “power” and influence in American society.  The responses that I am seeing more often than not boil down to fear.

Are we afraid of losing our “power.”

The really sad thing about all of this is that we blame society for our loss of influence in American society.  But the real reason that we have lost our influence is because we gave it away.  We stopped caring about being a force for good in society and instead huddled together in our little clubs.

Don’t blame the media, the president, muslims, or the Gays for our fear.  It’s our own fault.

How do we overcome our fears?

Engagement.  Engagement does not mean agreement.  Engagement does not mean debate.  Engagement starts with conversation.  Stop decrying the evils of american society to club members who already agree with you.  Get out and get to know a gay person.  Talk to a muslim.  Serve the poor.

Do something.  Don’t let fear paralyze you.

Jesus help me to not let fear paralyze me.

God Particle

15 Dec

Has your kid ever asked why is there stuff?

If not then you are pretty lucky because that’s a pretty difficult question to answer.

As a Christian I believe that everything had it’s origin in God.  But why is there matter and stuff and why does that stuff matter, that’s where things get complicated.

Scientists have been trying to find this thing called the Higgs-Boson particle that theoretically could give some understanding to why things have matter.  It is completely theoretical because no one has ever seen it.  It’s been called the God particle and as Alister McGrath explains in this article it’s actually a great place to begin the search for God.

I am going to paste the last half of the article in this blog becuase I think Mcgrath gives some helpful understanding for the importance of science and how it relates to Christian faith.  The two are not mutually exclusive.

Some tell us that science is about what can be proved. The wise tell us it is really about offering the best explanations of what we see, realising that these explanations often cannot be proved, and may sometimes lie beyond proof. Science often proposes the existence of invisible (and often undetectable) entities – such as dark matter – to explain what can be seen. The reason why the Higgs boson is taken so seriously in science is not because its existence has been proved, but because it makes so much sense of observations that its existence seems assured. In other words, its power to explain is seen as an indicator of its truth.

There’s an obvious and important parallel with the way religious believers think about God. While some demand proof that God exists, most see this as unrealistic. Believers argue that the existence of God gives the best framework for making sense of the world. God is like a lens, which brings things into clearer focus. As the Harvard psychologist William James pointed out years ago, religious faith is about inferring “the existence of an unseen order” in which the “riddles of the natural order” can be explained.

There’s more to God than making sense of things. But for religious believers, it’s a great start.

 

Stewardship [or] All About (all) the Benjamins

12 Dec

I am currently working on a series of sermons about Stewardship.  As a pastor, when I use the word stewardship the common assumption is that I’m going to talk about money.  If I say, I’m doing a series on stewardship, people hear, “Here come four week talking about money, give more, give more, give more.”

Can I be completely honest and vulnerable about something here on my blog.  (I’m going to anyway so deal with it.)  I hate this common understanding of stewardship.  I hate it because it is just too narrow.

Am I going to talk about money?  Yes.  1 week.  Am I going to talk about tithing and giving offerings?  Yes.

I have said before and I will say again, I will never apologize for talking about money at Creekside because no one is getting rich at Creekside.  If all of a sudden all the pastors pull up in Bentleys then we will start apologizing for talking about money so much.  (Just between you and me, we are so far from that becoming a possibility.)

Another part of my problem with the common understanding of stewardship is that all that matters is Tithes and Offerings.  These stewardship campaigns often feel like, the goal is simply to increase tithes and offerings.  To give a shot in the arm for the year to make sure that we keep making budget.  Ministry has expenses, there is no way around that, and at Creekside we try to run a pretty tight ship to make sure that we are getting the most of the resources that people have given in tithes and offerings.  So it’s important to talk about the importance of giving, and we do that every week.

But stewardship, and specifically talking about financial stewardship is more than just tithes and offerings.  God cares about every penny that you spend.  And he cares because he gave it to you, and he wants you to use it towards his purposes in the world and his purposes for your life.

Pay your bills, enjoy your life, there is nothing wrong with doing these things.  But stewardship is so much bigger than just making sure people tithe.  Tithes and offerings are a key indicator in spiritual growth and if people are truly trusting God, but so is whether or not you are spending wrecklessly on credit, or if you are neglecting your financial responsibilites.

All of that is also stewardship.

I think we would all benefit, church attenders and church leaders, to take into account that God has called us all to be disciples, not just on Sunday but every day where ever we go.  And not just with 10% of our gross income, but with every dollar.  God cares about all of our life, and how we are using all that he has given to us to advance his mission of grace to the world.  And he cares about the Benjamins, all of them, as well as the little copper Lincolns.

Science and Faith

30 Nov

I’m not very smart in a lot of areas, and one of those areas is science.  Because I never felt like I needed to learn science-y stuff.  I took chemistry because there was promise of explosions (thank Mr. Hilty).

But lately, I have been compelled to reconsider my understanding of faith and science and how they interact.  This has led me to have some really interesting conversations, but more importantly it has led me to trust God more and more as I talk about scientific investigations that some might feel could discredit my faith.  This has not happened at all.  My faith, I feel, has actually become stronger.

One of the blogs I read is from Professor of Philosophy Jamie Smith.  Smith was the prof. of one of the most impacting classes in my entire MATC at Northwest University.  He posted this blog about an organization called The Colossian Forum, which is trying to help foster conversations between science and faith.  I watched this video today and was encouraged about the science and faith discussion, and reminded that truly all things hold together in Christ.  If you are intersted in the Colossian Forum go check them out.

Colbert, Maron, Suffering, Faith, and Comedy.

2 Aug

As I’ve stated before, I’m working on a chapter for my thesis that examines Stephen Colbert and The Colbert Report.  I cam across an article from Rolling Stone and Colbert Talked about losing and finding his faith again, and I thought I should share this.  So here:

Did you ever go through a period where you lost your faith?

Yeah. It was a college angst thing. But once I graduated from college, some Gideon literally gave me a box of The New Testament, Psalms and Proverbs on the street in Chicago. I took one and opened it right away to Matthew, Chapter 5, which is the opening of the Sermon on the Mount. That whole chapter is essentially about not worrying. I didn’t read it — it spoke to me, and it was an effortless absorption of the idea. Nothing came to me in a thunderbolt, but I thought to myself, “I’d be dumb not to re-examine this.”

What caused you to go through that dark period?

Well, I had very sad events in my childhood. The death of my father and my brothers was understandably a shattering experience that I hadn’t really dealt with in any way. And there comes a time when you’re psychologically able to do so. I still don’t like talking about it. It still is too fresh.

Do you think experiencing that has helped what you do in any way? Or made it more of a challenge?

Not to get too deep here, but the most valuable thing I can think of is to be grateful for suffering. That is a sublime feeling, and completely inexplicable and illogical, but no one doesn’t suffer. So the degree to which you can be aware of your own humanity is the degree to which you can accept, with open eyes, your suffering. To be grateful for your suffering is to be grateful for your humanity, because what else are you going to do — say, “No, thanks”? It’s there. “Smile and accept,” said Mother Teresa. And she was talking to people who had it rough. That’s not how you make jokes, though.

 

Strauss, Neil. “The Subversive Joy of Stephen Colbert. (Cover story).” Rolling Stone no. 1087 (September 17, 2009): 56-110. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed July 7, 2011).  Digital version had not page numbers.

Colbert is one of the great comedic minds of our time, and he’s also very thoughtful.  His character on The Colbert Report seems very different from the man in this interview, but that’s all part of Colbert’s genius.

His thoughts on suffering I think are very important.  Particularly when we think about the arc of comedy the U-shaped plot line which follows Good Life, Low point in life, Restoration.  That low point in the story is incredibly valuable because it makes the characters more human and more relatable.  Suffering is a part of everyone’s life and it becomes increasingly more important to realize that your suffering doesn’t have to be the end of your story.

"Comedy saved my life."

Yesterday I was listening to the WTF podcast with Marc Maron.  He gave the Keynote speech at the Montreal Just For Laughs Festival.  His speech dealt with the low point of his life: divorced, a career that was dying, and thoughts of suicide.  But for him comedy saved his life, and he decided that the his suffering was not the end of his story. He began to take charge of his career, began a podcast where he reached out to other comics and began to process his pain.  Having listened to almost every episode (I know I’m a pastor but Jesus has heard cuss words before so I’m not too worried about it) Marc has come to understand who he is, he has examined spiritual issues, and really become a voice for others who are suffering to know that they are not alone.

I read this last night in the book Subversive Laughter by Ron Jenkins:

“In a world fraught with danger and despair, comedy is a survival tactic, and laughter is an act of faith.” (1)

That laughter is the reminder that this moment of despair is temporary.  This present suffering does not have to be the end of our story.

As a Christian and a Pastor, my purpose is to point people to Jesus.  Jesus suffered, just like we suffered.  And through the mystery of the incarnation.  Jesus, the eternal son of God, because of his suffering understands our suffering.  We don’t have to do life alone.  We don’t have to suffer alone.  We can embrace our suffering, learn from the moment and be transformed.  We truly can live a life of comedy even though we might feel like we are living a tragedy.

Don’t suffer alone.

___________ Christian

18 Apr

I have a friend who identifies himself as a reformed Christian. This is a new development in his faith journey, and he is very excited about all the implications of the Gospel, the Sovereignty of God, and all that amazing stuff. There is nothing wrong with the reformed tradition in my understanding of the tradition. I find myself more inline with the Reformed Tradition in a lot of areas of theology. There are some things that I just can’t buy into though. Mainly the L in T.U.L.I.P. (if you don’t know what that means then google it).

One of my concerns with the resurgence of the reformed tradition among young Christians is the way that they are identifying themselves. This was highlighted over a silly twitter dialogue about sports and idolatry. My friend at one point identified himself as a “Reformed Christian”. This set off an alarm to me. My fear is that those who identify themselves with this term are putting their tradition first and Christianity second.

Now, you may read that statement and say that I ma over reacting. To be honest I hope that I am over reacting. The problem to me is that those in the reformed tradition are using that term to create a division between their group and all the rest of the Christian Traditions. And the formed group are not the only ones who do this, they have been the most vocal lately. They have been the ones who have been drawing lines in the sand. But every tradition in the Christian faith has a tendency to do this. Charismatic Christian, Reformed Christian, Home-Church Christian, Social-Justice Christian, Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Baptist, Episcopal, Anglican, Arminian, etc. We have created labels, labels have created divisions between our traditions, and that has caused confusion in the world outside the church looking in.

I have long believed that Christian makes a horrible adjective, Christian Music, Christian Television Christian Dentist, Christian ________. Now I am also concerned with the labels that we are putting on our selves. ________ Christian might be helpful in creating groups that we find ourselves in agreement with. But all these divisions cause confusion to the world.

Did Jesus call us to be reformed, charismatic, Greek orthodox, etc.? Or did he call us to himself? Would Jesus identify himself with any of the labels that we put on him and his teaching? Why do you put them on ourselves. Why can’t we just be content with calling ourselves Christians? The kingdom is big enough for all of our traditions that look to Jesus the son of God, that believe in his death on the cross as the final sacrifice for all of our sins, that believe in his resurrection from the dead, that believe that Jesus is still alive, that he has called his followers to continue to build his kingdom, that heaven and hell are real (these are much more complicated than any of us can claim to understand).

They will know we are Followers of Jesus by our love for one another, not the labels that we put on ourselves.

Assurance vs. Certainty

20 Jan

I had a fun twitter debate (tweebate?) with my ol’ college pal Matt (@ireadtheology).

I posted this:

“There is a difference between assurance and certainty. Assurance requires faith. Certainty does not.”

This verse is part of what inspired the above statement:

Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.

Now The point is not that certainty is the opposite of faith.  Rather, certainty is not the point of faith.

1 Corinthians 13:9-12  9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. 12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

Some day God’s people will have absolute certainty, and our faith will be fulfilled.  Until that day we must be content with assurance that God is at work, that God has a plan, that God’s promises are true.  And God is trustworthy.  These promises and plans of God will come to pass.  I can have confidence in God through my faith.

The reason that this is important is because Certainty is a stumbling block for those who are seeking God.  Also Certainty is often used as a weapon towards those who disagree with you..  The rhetoric of Certainty builds walls instead of bridges to the world.

When we claim that we are certain then people expect us to have all the answers.  I can’t do that.

When we claim that we are certain we read the Bible looking for proofs and it becomes a science text book.  And I don’t think that’s the purpose of the Bible.

My Faith tells me that God Created the world.  If I’m completely honest with you, I’m not 100% certain how God did that.  The Bible gives us a 6 day creation.  I still don’t know how that happened.  If God created the world in 6 days, and rested on the 7th.  I have enough faith to say that God could do that (he is God after all).  But I don’t have enough certainty to fight someone over it.

The Bible tells me that Jesus died on the Cross for my Sins.  I have to accept that by faith because I really have no idea how that all works.  I don’t have a certain answer for what that would look like, and the process for how Jesus applies that grace to cover over my sins.  My faith is big enough to accept that though, and live in that promise.

Can I be honest with people and tell them I’m not certain how all this works, and I don’t have all the answers, and I have moments of doubt and confusion, where all I have to cling to is my faith.

Does that make me a bad Christian? Does that make me a bad Pastor?  Or is that exactly what Jesus wanted from his followers when he said”

2 He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. 3 And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 4 Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. (Matt 18:2-4)

My children are not looking for certainty in our relationship.  I have to live in a way that gives them assurance that I will always love them and always be there for them.  That assurance is pretty close to certainty for them because they have no reason to doubt it.

Example:  On wednesday morning my daughter woke up at 4:30 AM crying and came out into the hallway.  When I came to her I asked her what was wrong and she said, “I need a hug.”

In that moment I can be angry and tell her, “No, it’s night time, and you need to go back to bed.”  Or I can give her the hug that she’s looking for in the middle of the night and assure her that her daddy is always there to give her a hug.

So I gave her a hug and she went right back to bed.

Joss has assurance that I love her, and that’s all she needs right now.

We can have assurance the God loves us and has provided grace to us through the Cross of Christ.  And that assurance is good enough for me.

 

Matt Chandler – Faith and Boldness

8 Dec

I know everyone in the young pastor blog-o-twitter-sphere has already posted this video.  But I had some things to say too so I’m joining the party.

Matt Chandler is the teaching pastor at Village Church in Dallas Texas.  As the video explains he had a brain tumor, we don’t know if it’s caner or not, and his surgery successfully removed the tumor and he’s alive and doing well.  Watch this video and I want you to hear two things.  1) His faith that Christ is good even in the face of a surgery that could take his life, even in the possibility of cancer.  Matt’s faith is not shaken. 2) Listen for Matt’s boldness.  He’s not trying to be a jerk or to take this whole situation lightly.  Matt’s faith in the goodness of Christ is what leads to this boldness and confidence.

So what’s your problem?  What are you struggling with?  I’m willing to bet that most of us are not facing down a brain tumor, and yet we have the audacity to not believe that the goodness of Christ is bigger than the problems we are facing.

Matt is one of the pastors that I have learned a lot from.  I’ve never been to his church, I’ve never even met him, but he’s been a great example to me.

Here are some more video’s that I thought I would share with you.

Here’s some audio from a sermon that was put to graphics.

Here’s a sermon from the Desiring God Conference where he is encouraging all preaching to be Christ focused.

advice for young preachers

I hope Matt recovers quickly and if you are reading this please pray for his family and for a speedy recovery.

Vision Day 2008 Recap

3 Mar

Yesterday was our annual Vision Day, each year we have focused ona different aspect of our overarching vision and mission.  One Year, Mission Statement, Next, Purposes and Model, and this year we focused on our core values.

In case you are wondering our core values are:

  • A Course of Discovery
    • Creekside is a safe place to ask questions about your spiritual Journey
  • A Culture of Trust
    • Creekside is a place where believers can make meaningful decisions about their commitment to Jesus Christ and conforming their live to become like him.
  • A Community of Love
    • Creekside is a church that encourages people to build a strong relationship with God and others

In an effort to emphasize how each of these values play out in the context of our community we captured three different family stories on video and played them during the service.

Each story was an incredible display of God’s goodness in the midst of the messiness of life, and keeping with our theme that the church is the hope of the world, we saw how Jesus bride really came through for each of these families.  Pretty cool.

The whole sermon audio is available here.

Here are the links to the videos

All in all I felt like vision day went well this year, we had a few technical issues, but the impact wasn’t lessened by them.  If you were there I’d love to hear your thoughts, leave a comment.

Great post on Risk

16 Nov

From Ben Arment – here.

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