A People, Not a Place

I'm reading through Mark Dever's What Is a Healthy Church? for assistance with a Bible Study on Wednesday nights at Edgewood and I wanted to share a quote from chapter 2, dealing with the thought that the church is a people, not a place.

Remembering that the church is a people should help us recognize what's important and what's not important.  I know I need the help. 

For example, I have a temptation to let something like the style of music dictate how I feel about a church.  After all, the style of music a church uses is one of the first things we will notice about any church, and we tend to respond to music at a very emotional level.  Music makes us feel a certain way.  Yet what does it say about my love for Christ and for Christ's people if I decide to leave a church because of its music? 

Or if, when pastoring a church, I marginalize a majority of my congregation because I think the style of music needs to be updated?  At the very least, we could say that I've forgotten that the church, fundamentally, is a people and not a place.

I know that this could open up a slew of other thoughts, especially if you've left a church over music, on either end of the spectrum, but I fundamentally believe in what Dever is saying.  The church is a people, not a place.  There is too much leaving going on in our local churches over issues that shouldn't be leaving issues.  There is also not enough cooperation and fellowship between different local gatherings over issues that shouldn't be dividing issues.

Feel free to join us on Wednesday nights at Edgewood Baptist Church, as we ask the question, What is a Healthy Church?

The Homework Ninja

This Homework Ninja was found on the back of a quiz I collected...

Free Francis Chan!

No, he's not a prisoner somewhere... but his books are free on Amazon.com right now!

      

I've read all three of these books and have loved each one of them.  If you haven't read them, please consider doing so, since they are free for the Kindle right now.

Christian or Deist?

Are you a Christian or a Deist?

I recently read an article on The Gospel Coalition blog that was titled, Deists who love Jesus (and talk like Freud).  I found it to be really enlightening and relevant to many discussions that I've had lately.  One of the most important parts, the part that grabbed my attention, was a definition of something called Moralistic Therapeutic Deism.  Here are a set of beliefs associated with this form of deism:

1. A god exists who created and ordered the world and watches over human life on earth.
2. God wants people to be good, nice, and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible and by most world religions.
3. The central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about oneself.
4. God does not need to be particularly involved in one's life, except when God is needed to resolve a problem.
5. Good people go to heaven when they die.

What I find to be alarming about this set of beliefs is that so many people I know, who would call themselves Christians, would hold to these beliefs.  I have talked to countless teenagers who would hold to these beliefs.  The majority of people that I meet would hold to these beliefs.

What about you?  Are you a Christian or a Moral Therapeutic Deist?

Electoral Bumpkins

John Calvin on Elections:

When elections have to be made, just as today the governors have to be elected, and tomorrow and the day after and throughout the week the estates of this city and the judicial order have to be provided for, how many are there who think of God when they undertake this, which is such a religious thing?   

The most solemn of all the elections is due now -- but those who will come to it, where are they, most of them?  I met some of my bumpkins (I could easily point them out by name,  but there is no need, for we all know them well enough); some of them were going up to the Bourg de four, and others were coming this way.  They thought they would have no time for breakfast unless they chose service time.  I saw this with my own eyes as I was coming to church.  And is it not a crying shame?   

So when it is plain that we who ought to be well learned in the Word of God, seeing it is preached to us intimately every day, are still so stupid -- more, that we have such a spirit of brutishness in us -- is not this a great shame? 

Now then, let us consider that we are not told without good reason that, when we are going to elect men to some public position, we must set about it reverently and carefully.  For we shall provoke God's anger if we pollute the seat of justice, putting men in it who have neither zeal nor interest to honor and serve it... we must learn, (if we do not want to spoil everything) to do better than we have done so far, to be really serious and take care when elections have to be made, so that God may reign among us and that He may bring it to pass that all are governed by His Holy Spirit and that they may have zeal and love for His Word.

From Portrait of Calvin by T.H.L. Parker.  You can also find this book on the Desiring God website for free.

Seven Feelings Rise In My Heart

I've received a double punch in my studies over the last couple of weeks.  The first punch came from my study in Ephesians for last week's sermon.  Eph. 2:11-22 deals with race relations and its connection to the cross.  The second punch came through Bloodlines by John Piper.  I received the book as a gift from my wife for Christmas, but didn't pick it up to start reading until I was preparing for the sermon.  I thought it might add some extra insight into my perspective of this passage.

This two-punch combination left me filled with a whirling turmoil of thoughts and feelings in regards to race relations in America.  More importantly, it has stirred up some emotions in regards to race relations in Danville, IL.

Here is a quote from Bloodlines that both explains and furthers my thoughts on this subject:

When I step back from this controversy over personal responsibility versus political and community engagement with systematic racism, I have at least seven different clusters of thoughts and feelings. 

First, I feel regret for my own sinful contributions to the seemingly intractable problems of race relations between black and white in our land.  Second, I feel sorrow over cycles of despair and hopelessness, and over the ruin of so many lives.  Third, I feel anger at the sins I see on every part of the landscape of race relations and race discussions and racial intervention -- all sides.  None of us is righteous, no, not one (Rom. 3:10).  Fourth, I feel frustration over the untold layers of complexity that make every proposal for improvement seem thanklessly embattled.  I empathize with Harvard social scientist Nathan Glazer when he says that behind the racial troubles of our day are "factors in infinite regress."  Fifth, I feel empathy with the truth and the emotion of both sides of the controversy.  Sixth, I feel a great longing to see the gospel of Jesus proclaimed, with the power of the Holy Spirit, into this situation and this controversy.  And seventh, because of the power of the gospel, I feel hope that there are breakthroughs possible that human strategies from either side have not achieved.

Race and the Christian

A livestream even on March 28th, that I would like to watch at my house. (If I'm not still on vacation...)



Anyone interested in watching this with me?