June 30, 2009

Gospel Coalition or Expedition?

by David Fitch

The Gospel Coalition (TGC) has been galvanizing many younger evangelicals to re-think their theology and practice. I applaud this new theological energy. But I wonder (given its moniker) whether TGC will be a force for coalition or expedition.

"Coalition" describes the coalescing of a group of people or nations in order to defend some boundary or prepare for war (think Pres. Bush's "coalition of the willing"). "Expedition," on the other hand, is the organizing of a group to prepare for an adventure into unknown territory. Will TGC be a coalition for hardening doctrinal lines to defend boundaries and/or launch an attack against those who don't agree with its take on Reformed theology? Or will TGC be a force for preparing missionaries (in doctrine and practice) to engage the unknown territories of post Christendom?

Let me be explicit that I value and have learned much from each of the TGC writers/thinkers/preachers, and that I do not disavow the Reformation. Nevertheless, I am concerned that TGC's approach is ill-suited to engage the cultural challenges of post-Christendom.

Here are five statements that encapsulate what I think TGC is implying in their work so far. If true, each of these positions will inhibit, if not prohibit, TGC from being a cause for Christ in the engagement of the new post Christendom cultures of the West.

If we purify our doctrine, the rest will follow.
I have observed an impulse in the TGC that says if we just get our doctrine right (which means a certain version of Reformed orthodoxy), then mission and church renewal will follow. But this is not 16th-century Europe, where the majority Catholic population, under the influence of a corrupt Roman Catholicism, needs doctrinal renewal. This is not the 1920's North America, where the majority mainline Protestant population, under the influence of modernist liberalism, needs doctrinal renewal. In post-Christendom territory there are very few Christians of any kind left who have any doctrine to be renewed.

We must return to the Reformation.
The Reformation gave birth to the solas, especially sola scriptura (Scripture alone) and sola fide (faith alone), which in their time called people to renewed purity and personal commitment to the gospel. Today, however, those same impulses, aligned with the Enlightenment, have given birth to a modernist individualism, Christian relativism, Cartesian rationalism, and experientialism that have become modernity, protestant liberalism, and the current manifestations of evangelicalism that TGC appears to be critical of. We must be sober about the doctrinal problems of the Reformation that elevate the individual and isolate Scripture (as an authority and conceptual document) away from the church and a way of life.

Women cannot be pastors.
I characterize the view of women in ministry in the TGC as 1) based in an inerrancy view of the text, which 2) latches on to texts as if they were isolated units of universal teaching on women, which then 3) leaves them blind to the New Testament's overall elevation of women into ministerial authority in the church. To me, this robs the church of the new politics that was birthed in Jesus Christ. I have spoken against the egalitarian form of politics I believe has been adopted naively by some evangelical feminists at the expense of both women and Christian marriage. But I believe that the New Testament calls women into full participation in the new authority of the Kingdom unleashed in the church (this means I affirm the full ordination of women). I believe TGC will be impotent to engage the culture of post Christendom if it cannot give witness to the new "politics of Jesus" in its gender politics.

The new perspective is our enemy.
John Piper and Don Carson have energetically sought to dismantle the "new perspective" on Paul. I believe it is a mistake to see the new perspective as the enemy. The Reformation tendency has been to separate the justification of the individual in Christ from the justice of God and the new social order God inaugurated in the world through Christ. As long as we keep doing this, we will forever be hindered from socially embodying the gospel in post-Christendom. Maybe worse, emerging Christians will continue to make the error of separating social justice from the redemption of the individual in Christ.

The megachurch still makes sense.
Because of their tendencies to individualize the gospel, the reading of Scripture, and salvation and to separate doctrine from "way of life," TGC does not see the problem of the megachurch for the future. Megachurches worked well within Christendom's modernity. Now, however, the gospel must take root in a social communal embodiment, where the gospel can be seen, heard, understood, and experienced by those completely foreign to our faith in Christ. This kind of communal embodiment is nigh impossible in mega sized organizations (although I've seen it at least once). The TGC is convinced that good solid preaching and culturally relative apologetics will gather post-Christendom into its churches. I fear TGC then becomes a force for coalescing mega-size churches that preach to the already initiated.

For both historical and theological reasons, I believe the neo-Anabaptist missional impulse has much to offer the dwindling churches of North America in their efforts to engage the new post-Christendom cultures of the West, and that TGC and neo-Anabaptists should be in dialogue together. So I am open to dialoguing and even being proven wrong about my interpretation of the five positional statements above. Where am I right? Where am I wrong?

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 30, 2009 | Comments (20) | TrackBack

June 25, 2009

Ur Video: Consumerism and Church Buildings

Skye Jethani's new book, The Divine Commodity: Discovering a Faith Beyond Consumer Christianity, outlines what happens when the consumer worldview and the Christian worldview collide. In this video, Jethani is interviewed by Marian Liautaud from Your Church magazine about the impact of consumerism on ministry space design.

Hear more from Skye Jethani about overcoming Consumer Christianity at the STORY conference October 28-29 in Chicago. Learn more about the event at storychicago.com.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 25, 2009 | Comments (7) | TrackBack

June 24, 2009

Scot McKnight: The Story Called Us

by Scot McKnight

At the end of his lecture and after answering a smattering of questions, the pristine and aged New Testament scholar, Bruce Metzger, asked Doug Moo if he could share something on his heart to the seminary students gathered that day.

With the moral vigor and verbal clarity Metzger was known for, he looked at his audience and simply said, "Stay married."

I can't remember the last time I heard a sermon called "Stay Married," or even a sermon that dealt with reasons to stay married. I suppose we can guess why this is so. At the top of my reasons would be a fear to offend the many - some say as many as 50 percent of evangelical Christians - who are giving money and serving in the church who are already divorced.

Next on my list would be our awareness of those listening to the sermons who are struggling with a spouse who is borderline abusive, or at least a creep. We know well that such marriages will likely dissolve.

Probably next would be that we have family and friends, some of whom are leaders and pastors themselves, who are divorced. I'm thinking we might come up with a half dozen or more other reasons that make us cautious about preaching on staying married. I hope not to offend this audience in what follows but, for the sake of the holiness of the church and the potent witness of a good marriage, I want to offer a pragmatic reason for staying married.

But first a biblical reason.

The ageless commandment of Moses which was repeated by Jesus is where we begin: "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." Jesus fleshes out the implication: "Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate" (Matthew 19:6). Written into the fabric of creation and into Law is an ontological and permanent union of a man with a woman.

I'd urge more pastors not only to preach on the permanence of marriage and need to stay married, but to think through the comprehensive significance and pragmatic value of staying married.

The funniest and quirkiest reason for staying faithful that I've heard came from a Bible professor. If you've been driving a Volkswagen all your life, he explained, you may never know it is a small car until you've experienced a Cadillac. But once you drive a Cadillac, you may become dissatisfied with your VW.

On to more helpful insights.One pragmatic argument on which I have reflected is the value of memory. Kris and I have been married for thirty-five years. We grew up in the same community; our fathers coached together; we were boyfriend and girlfriend in grade school and junior high. We got serious as sophomores in high school and got married as sophomores in college. (Not what we recommended for our two kids.)

Here's my point: nearly everything about each of our lives is known to the other. Furthermore, in our daily conversations, we draw on our collective memory of our thirty-five years of life together, and it is now rare that one of us says something about the past that the other one doesn't already know. Our stories are reminders, not revelations, of our past together. They glue our stories into one story. Admittedly, that we grew up together gives our collective memory a dimension that most don't know, but my point is not so much about marrying someone from your hometown as staying married.

From anthropologists to theologians to those who write technically about story-telling, thinkers today remind us over and over that who we are emerges from the story we tell ourselves. Our identity swells from our story. Divorce inevitably rips chapters and pages and paragraphs from the identity-shaping story that guides our everyday. Those who are divorced, in the presence of a variety of audiences, are driven to modify or silence chapters of their story. In effect, they can only be partially visible in many, if not most, contexts. They can tell only parts of their story.

A good reason to stay married, I am contending, is to keep your story intact and to let that story develop over time by adding new chapters that deepen earlier ones. Good stories have drama, and perhaps the rough patches in a marriage will someday be redeemed by the memory that those patches, too, were part of the story we wove into one story, the story called Us.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 24, 2009 | Comments (20) | TrackBack

June 22, 2009

Do It, Don't Blog It

by Dan Kimball

I was a guest speaker at a church, waiting for my time to go up to the platform. That's when I saw something curious. The staff person responsible for coordinating the worship service was busy typing away on her laptop. Perhaps a last minute change to the PowerPoint, I thought. But as I walked behind her, I saw that she was consumed with typing a message on someone's Facebook wall. It felt out of place to me, given that she was the person responsible for leading God's people in worship but she seemed mentally someplace else.

I had a similar experience while visiting a Christian college. Sitting in the back of the classroom, I noticed that about a third of the students were surfing Facebook or MySpace while the professor was passionately teaching the New Testament. He probably assumed they were busy taking notes.

I cannot be too hard on the worship coordinator or the college students. I've noticed the same tendency in myself lately. A few Sundays ago, I was heading home after preaching three times. I was tired and looking forward to opening my laptop and reading my favorite blogsÑparticularly ones focused on missional theology and leadership. Just then I received a text message from a friend. He was inviting me to a club to see a band with a number of non-Christians, including one I had been trying to build a relationship with.

I suddenly faced a decision. Do I go home and read blogs about being missional, or do I go to the club and actually be missional? It sounds like an easy decision, but it wasn't. In all honesty, part of me truly wanted to go to the comfort of home and just sit in front of my laptop.

That moment forced me to begin reflecting on how much time I spend on blogs, Twitter, Facebook, and other online social networking sites. I wondered, If I spent less time online, could I be spending more time building friendships? Have I become so consumed with reading about mission that I've forgotten to actually engage it? As these questions arose, I started to get uncomfortable.

Don't misunderstand me. I find blogs quite encouraging. I've learned a lot about missional living by reading insightful bloggers. I have even gotten reacquainted with non-Christian friends from years ago on Facebook. But in truth, the bulk of my Facebook time is spent conversing with Christian friends and other church leaders. And most of the missional discussion I read online does not include stories of people coming to faith, but theoretical definitions and debates about what being missional actually means.

Theories and definitions and debates are good, and they have their place, but could they be getting in the way of actually being on mission? After reflecting on my own habits, I concluded that in my life they were. I realized that I had subtly gotten drawn into the very thing I found so troubling about the Facebooking worship leader and the inattentive college students. I still read blogs and write one, too. But I'm trying to be much more intentional about finding balance and keeping my priorities right.

After wrestling with whether to go home and blog or go to the club and engage with my non-Christian friend, I finally came to the right decision. When I walked into the club, my friend saw me and immediately brought over a drink. We caught up on life, and after the show, he thanked me multiple times for coming. When his tour ends, we have plans to spend more time together. A friendship was deepened and an opportunity for the gospel was expanded, all because I chose to be missional rather than just blog about it.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 22, 2009 | Comments (25) | TrackBack

June 19, 2009

Putting Programs in Their Place

by Brandon O'Brien

In some circles, the term "church programs" has become an epithet for all that is wrong with the institutional church. For a generation hungry for authenticity and community, "programs" feel staged, impersonal, and cold. For a generation increasingly skeptical of government, big business, and corporate machinery in general, "programs" reek of institutionalism, bureaucracy, and insensitivity to human need. Programs may not be the problem, but they are certainly a symptom. They give us something to throw stones at.

To a certain extent, these feelings are justified. After all, programs are the means by which we draw people into our churches. Once they're in, we get them involved by participating in or leading our programs. Participation in programs becomes the way we judge how "involved" people are - if they're engaged in our programs, we call them "committed." Programs become a means by which we judge our effectiveness as ministers - we can know we're doing a lot for Jesus, because we're running so many successful programs. In some churches, it appears the congregation exists to serve the church's programming.

Some folks have responded to this reality by eliminating programs all together. "We're about people, not programs," they say. Instead of investing in formal ministries, they would rather invest in human relationships. And I agree: the church is the physical body of Christ on earth; an organism, not an organization. Even so, programs are biblical, if they are done the right way.

One of the places in the New Testament that most clearly addresses anything like church programming is Acts 6:1–7. The short and long of it is this: the church is growing, but the Grecian Jews are complaining to the Hebraic Jews because the Hellenistic widows are being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. (Daily food distribution is a program, right?)

This passage offers a corrective vision of what a program should look like.

It begins with a community need that is theologically justifiable. All the widows weren't being fed. This has serious implications. To begin with, the problem was creating a problem in the fellowship - it threatened to destroy the unity that was a primary marker of the Christian church. Furthermore, the early church knew that gospel compelled them to care for widows (James 1:27). In order to be faithful to their calling, then, they needed to do something. So…

It is overseen by qualified folks. The apostles decided that the church should choose 7 men whom they considered "full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom." Presumably, such men (in this case there were only men) would be concerned about the things the Spirit was concerned about - the unity of the church and the care of widows. And their service would free the apostles to do what they were called to do: "prayer and the ministry of the word."

It leads to the expansion of the Kingdom. Because of this program, Luke tells us, "the word of God spread" and the "number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly." I imagine this was because the church was doing what it was supposed to be doing and the apostles were doing what they were supposed to be doing.
I've pastored a couple of churches and served on countless committees, and I can say with relative confidence that if we subjected all our programs to these three criteria in any of those churches, we would have cut our number of programs considerably.

Instead of beginning with a community need that's theologically justifiable, we tended to run programs because we felt we should ("The church growth books say you need a small group program if you want to be successful.").

Instead of finding folks to lead who are "full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom," we'd enlist any poor sucker with a pulse and a guilt complex to oversee a program they felt no real commitment to. When we had burned through enough volunteers, the staff would take over the program, which kept them from prayer and the ministry of the word.

And instead of leading to the expansion of the kingdom, programs selected and run this way tended to use people up, overtax the staff, and result in exhaustion, bitterness, and a dearth of resources.

In other words, I don't think programs are the problem. The problem is the way we choose them and the way we run them. It's hard to deny that the church should serve people through formal ministries. Whether you call them co-ops, initiatives, or whatever, at the end of the day they're still programs.

But maybe I'm missing something. How does this strike you? Are there other criteria you use to decide what programs to launch and which ones to trash? Does Acts 6 affect the way you think about programs in any way?

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 19, 2009 | Comments (8) | TrackBack

June 17, 2009

The Sometimes Surprising Price of Success

No, this post isn't about growing pains as your church gets bigger and bigger or what to do with the budget surplus all that extra tithing is leaving you with (though if your problem is the latter, email me).

I've been thinking this week about the cost we pastors and our communities pay when people actually begin to do what we're asking them do to: "Go in peace to love and serve the Lord."

So far this year, we've had a hard time making budget just about every month. And as a smaller church, that matters. As I looked at the numbers, I began to wonder what was happening. Were people giving less because of the financial crisis? Were we angering people and provoking a "hold back" response in giving?

But as I tried to see the big picture of where our community is, I realized we're actually just paying the price of success.

Recently we've sent some wonderful folks around the world - One family to Glasgow, Scotland, for church planting. One couple to Sudan to do medical and relief work for some of the poorest of the poor. Another couple to Bangladesh to rescue women from the sex trade and to help people begin businesses that will enable them to pull themselves out of poverty.

All these people have taken with them not just the hearts and prayers of our community. They've taken our financial support and the financial support of many members of our community.

In other words, giving isn't down. I have a feeling that, on the whole, we're actually giving more. It just doesn't show up on our books.

We started a Kiva group to enable Evergreen people to participate in micro loans to the poor around the world and so see the standard of living of some of the world's working poor increase. What can a $25 or $50 dollar loan do in Africa or South America? A whole lot, it turns out.

But that's $50 that won't come through our church's budget, right?

Of course, the cost isn't simply financial. These folks we've sent out represent some of the most committed, most Jesus-loving people I've met yet. We recently sent one of our elders to be the teaching pastor of a church in another state. Another is working in Pretoria. For each, a unique hole has opened in our community. Our community won't benefit from these wonderful, Jesus-and-people-loving folk anymore. But other communities will.

And there's more. I began to realize that often the reason we have a hard time getting folks out to things, to commit to serving here or there, is that they are already busy serving elsewhere, here in our own city. Our people are running community gardens, they are helping establish low cost counseling centers, providing medical and dental care for the poor. Beyond serving in places as far and wide as Haiti and South Africa, they are praying and working for the peace of our city, right here. Looked at that way, it becomes a bit harder for me to ask the question "When are we going to DO something?" We're already "doing" a lot. Just not in a way our church may be able to take credit for.

We ask people to love their neighbors. But what if that means they need to be less involved in church activities? Is that okay? Of course it's okay. But for us - internally - is it okay?

I remember a lot of talk in seminary about the 80:20 problem. You know, 20 percent of the people do 80 percent (or more) of the work in a church community, leaving the other 80 percent doing...not much. It had been my hope in starting Evergreen to do church in such a way that turned the 80:20 thing on its head. The picture in my mind was of a community where 80 percent of the people did about 100 percent of the work of ministry and the other 20 percent was comprised of new folks on a journey towards Jesus and just getting started, people recovering from significant hurt, or in some other situation that made our community say, "Just rest right now. Don't feel like you have to do anything."

It's a great mental picture, but it's just not reality. Why? Because the fact is many of those people you consider part of the 80 percent of folks in your church who don't do much are someone's 20 percent. That is, they may be in the 80 percent of folks in our community who don't make much happen, but that's probably not true in every area of their lives. Whether at work, in their extended family, in school or civic organizations, I'm finding these folks are doing a lot that matters there. And that means they can't do it here. They are out there, living out the love of Jesus in very practical ways. And more and more I'm realizing that it is okay. In fact, it's fantastic, and I'm trying to find ways we as a church community can highlight, support, and celebrate missional living by our people.

If you are truly successful as a church, the result may not necessarily be "more people" and "bigger budgets." It may even, at times, look like the opposite.

Jesus describes the Spirit like a wind that blows where he wills, and blows us where he wills. Sometimes he blows people into ministry within the church "walls." And sometimes he blows them (and their money) out into a needy and broken world.

Be careful before you challenge people to follow God out into that broken world to "live missionally." They may just take you up on it.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 17, 2009 | Comments (10) | TrackBack

June 15, 2009

Urban Exile: Gran Torino

By David Swanson

Clint Eastwood taught me something the other day. The veteran actor and director's latest film sheds light on the tendency by many of us to seek the cultural values of homogeneity, stability, and comfort rather than finding God in the midst of our confusing, painful, and volatile circumstances.

In Gran Torino the 79-year-old actor and director plays a newly widowed retiree. A veteran of the Korean War, Walt Kowalski has spent his life in the same Michigan town, raising a family and working for the Ford plant. Surveying the neighborhood from his front porch, it's clear that much in Kowalski's life has changed. His neighbors are recent Hmong immigrants, people whose language and customs incur Kowalski's derision. Crime has become commonplace and rival gangs cruise the streets staring menacingly at Walt who, while drinking beers from his front porch, is all too happy to glare right back. The neighborhood is not what it used to be and the old man's sons repeatedly try to convince their father to leave it behind and join them in the suburbs.

Gran Torino is set in Highland Park, just outside of Detroit, but the dynamics of evolving neighborhoods can be found around the country. As new immigrants move in, previous residents find comfort outside the city limits. Those of the majority culture are made nervous by the arrival of ethnic minorities and eventually move to neighborhoods and suburbs that reflect their culture and skin color. Walt Kowalski is the anomaly; his obstinate decision to remain in the old neighborhood utterly confuses his comfortably suburban family. The world has changed too quickly for Kowalski leaving him bitter, racist, and cynical.

Eastwood's character is no role model, but his story represents the demographic and cultural shifts that characterize America's cities. One of the most significant such changes in my city of Chicago took place in the early 20th century. The period of time when African Americans moved to northern cities, hoping to leave Jim Crow behind, became known as the Great Migration. This development precipitated another vast people movement: white folks who left their urban neighborhoods and newly arrived neighbors for the suburbs. Like Walt Kowalski, many urban churches found themselves in unfamiliar territory as everything around them drastically changed.

It has been many years since the Great Migration and subsequent white flight, but the ghosts of this era can be seen in shuttered cathedrals and abandoned chapels throughout the city. At one time these buildings were lively gathering places for the neighborhood faithful but their decline became inevitable when these churches no longer related to their neighbors. Some congregations decided that survival meant moving the entire operation to the suburbs where their people now resided. Capitalizing on the powerful desire for homogeneity, many of these churches thrived in suburbia with no shortage of land, modern facilities, and plenty of parking for their mobile congregations.

And what of those congregations who stayed, those who expected mission and ministry to continue despite unpredictable and difficult conditions? Last fall I attended a friend's ordination service at a Baptist church on Chicago's South Side. As the only white person at the service, I wondered about the church's history. Afterwards, during the requisite basement potluck, an older woman proudly told me, "We were the first black family to attend this church." She went on to describe how the demographic changes in the church mirrored what happened in the neighborhood: from all white, to integrated, to its current predominately-black status.

Over dinner this woman talked at length about her church, but nothing seemed as significant as the white pastor who first welcomed her family into the congregation. As the neighborhood changed many of the established members challenged the pastor to move the church to the suburbs. After all, many had already moved and now had to drive into the city for Sunday services. "But he wouldn't do it," this woman fondly recalled. She went on to describe how, upon his retirement, the pastor turned over the pulpit to a black minister from the neighborhood.

Admittedly, this church isn't much to look at. Its building and programs pale when compared to its suburban kin. The pastor's decision could not have been easy as he watched other churches move to greener pastures, their members and budgets increasing as a result. And yet, because of his refusal to move, today a faithful and vibrant community of Christians exists in that neighborhood.

A powerful and redemptive life change awaits Walt Kowalski at the end of Grand Torino. His bitterness and racism are subverted by the kindness and affection of the neighbors he once distrusted. While his suburban family enjoys their life of relative comfort and stability, Kowalski's existence is transformed in part because those very things have been taken from him. His redemption is found in the distress and pain that comes from staying put. Surely this is the untold story of many faithful congregations around the country who, despite unpredictable and difficult changes, have ignored the siren calls of stability and measurable growth.

A congregation's decision to remain loyal to its neighborhood despite social upheaval is not limited to urban churches of a bygone era. Sociologists continue to point out the increasingly large movements of people from city to suburb and vice versa. As the cost of living skyrockets in many cities, suburban churches are faced with neighborhoods made up of new ethnic and class diversity. Additionally, the landscape of suburbia has changed - land is no longer plentiful or cheap - and the greener pastures are now to be found even further from the city.

The temptation to leave the old neighborhood is powerful when we mistake Kingdom values with the cultural standards of homogeneity, comfort, and stability. But surely the Body of Christ is to be known for its more satisfying fruit. Our decision to stay - to seek the will of God despite the confusion and anxiety that comes with significant change - is witness to our radically alternative life in Christ. As we reject consumer comfort and choose to love our neighbors - new and old, well known and unfamiliar - we demonstrate the scope of the Gospel for all people. And like Walt Kowalski, our decision to stubbornly and faithfully remain could result in redeeming work of God, in our neighborhoods and our lives.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 15, 2009 | Comments (8) | TrackBack

June 12, 2009

Out of Context: Staff Culture

The editors of Leadership are finishing the summer issue due out in July. Here's a preview excerpt from John Peacock found in a report by Collin Hansen, "The X Factor: Most of the highly celebrated, experimental worship services launched in the Nineties to reach 'Gen-X' are now gone. What have we learned from the rise, decline, and renewal of next generation ministries?"

"Your staff culture has to represent the culture you're trying to create in the wider church. That's one of the biggest misses in contemporary church work. You have a business-run, top-down, bottom-line culture yet you're trying to bring around a loving, transformative culture in your community. It just doesn't work."

-John Peacock leads the Axis ministry at Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, Illinois. Read more in the Summer 2009 issue of Leadership journal. To see the quote IN context, you'll need to see the print version of Leadership. To subscribe, click on the cover of Leadership on this page.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 12, 2009 | Comments (4) | TrackBack

June 10, 2009

Piece be With You

Two weeks ago an armed man entered Reformation Lutheran Church in Wichita, Kansas, and shot Dr. George Tiller. On March 8, a gunman walked into the sanctuary of First Baptist Church of Maryville, Illinois, and killed senior pastor Fred Winters. Last summer a man walked into a church in Knoxville, Tennessee, pulled a shotgun from his guitar case, and opened fire on a children's performance. Two people were killed.

The news reports are horrifying, but despite the wide publicity these crimes garner, there have been less than a dozen church shootings in the U.S. in the last decade. But that is little comfort for some church leaders who are seeking new security measures to protect their flocks
and themselves.

Pastor Ken Pagano from New Bethel Church in Kentucky is encouraging his parishioners to bring their guns to church for an "Open Carry Celebration" to celebrate the Fourth of July and the Second Amendment. "We're not ashamed to say that there was a strong belief in God and firearms," says Pagano. "Without that this country wouldn't be here."

Other churches are hiring armed security to patrol their property on Sunday mornings to create an atmosphere of safety. But there is an increasing number of churches using armed vigilantes--volunteers with nothing more than a concealed weapon permit--to deter any assailant. These people are the ecclesiastical equivalent of the air marshals who anonymously fly commercial airliners.

But are these security measures warranted? And are churches unknowingly creating more risk, not less, by encouraging members to carry concealed weapons?

Richard R. Hammer is an attorney and the editor of Church Law Today, a resource of Leadership Journal. In this video Hammer explains why armed vigilantes at church is a bad idea, and offers helpful suggestions for churches still concerned about safety.

What is your opinion about guns at church? Should we be encouraging members to exercise their Second Amendment rights as a way of deterring violence? And what about hired or volunteer security--is it a practical necessity in our fallen world or an overreaction? And does the presence of armed security give worshipers peace of mind, or will it only deter visitors seeking an oasis from the values of the world?

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 10, 2009 | Comments (52) | TrackBack

June 9, 2009

Advance 09: The Conclusion

by Chad Hall

The final day and a half of Advance 09 built upon the themes started on the first day, brought another talk from Mark Driscoll, and marked the arrival of the Baptists - researcher and author Ed Stetzer, local Durham pastor J.D. Greer, the one and only John Piper, and Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary president Daniel Aiken.

I'm still not entirely sure what to make of the Acts 29/Southern Baptist connection. I know there's a Calvinist resurgence among Southern Baptists, but they still seem like strange bedfellows to me.

The juxtaposition was clear on Saturday morning. When the worship team from Mars Hill Seattle gave the platform over to Daniel Aiken, I experienced some mental whiplash. The group from Mars Hill offered a loud mixture of Green Day and the David Crowder Band. Then Aiken offered a fine sermon, but in a style and substance straight from an old-school Baptist revival or pastors' conference - complete with the voice inflections that southern preachers have been perfecting for going on a century now. Having served the North Carolina Baptist Convention for nearly a decade, I can understand a fringe of Southern Baptists overlapping with Acts 29, but Aiken is at the center of Southern Baptist life and didn't seem to fit the conference.

Meanwhile, one of the best talks I've heard in a while came from another Southern Baptist, Ed Stetzer, who spoke on the church as a sign and instrument of the kingdom of God. Two of his best comments went something like this:

1) "Some of you here need to get over the man crush you have on Driscoll and love the church you are in." Wow.

2) "Conferences like this can be a sort of pornography that promotes an unrealistic image of the church - one that is sure to leave you disappointed and feeling that you deserve something better than the church you serve back home." Wow number two.

He went on to say, "Most of us here are not going to serve a hip church filled with cool people. So stop wishing and waiting for a church that's cool enough to deserve you and start serving the church you're in." Someone needs to say this at every conference.

Speaking of Driscoll (if I dare, after Stetzer's comment and the heat some Out of Ur commenters threw out over the weekend!), he gave his second talk about some of the idols that plague churches and leaders. Two of the seven were especially powerful.

The first idol was money. He said that two theologies make an idol of money: the prosperity gospel (which says those who have money are holy), and the poverty gospel (which says if you don't have money you are holy). I couldn't agree more. I just don't see "God's preferential option for the poor" in the Bible.

The other idol Driscoll mentioned was "truth." - when we make a certain truth into an idol, we place that truth above the gospel (bad enough), but we also must demonize others who hold a different truth. He used Calvinism and Arminianism as an example. Then the clincher: "Some of you will say, 'Pastor Mark, don't you do this?' and I have to respond, 'I am the chief of sinners.'"

The guy I was most curious to hear was Piper. I confess that I have never read any of his books, listened to any of his sermons, or even seen a picture of the man. But his name and quotations are all over the place, plus he's currently in sort of a nice-guy theological slapdown with N.T. Wright, so I wondered what the fuss was about.

Piper gave two talks, both of which dealt with missions and the need to once again engage in worldwide missions to the peoples of the earth. His talk on the second day, on prayer, was much more engaging and helpful. The apex was his comment: "You cannot know what prayer is for until you know that life is war." He built upon the war imagery by saying that when it comes to prayer, we've taken a wartime walkie-talkie and turned it into a domestic intercom. So instead of calling in God's armies to help us overtake a dangerous enemy, we treat God like a butler and ask him for little favors associated with our comfort.

I'm in no danger of developing a "man crush" on Piper (and his strangely permanent smile is still freaking me out just a bit!), but I did appreciate his thoughtful engagement of the topics and his obvious zeal for God. I think the same can be said for the conference as a whole - it was engaging, thoughtful, and mostly concerned for God's mission for the world and our place in that mission.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 9, 2009 | Comments (22) | TrackBack

June 5, 2009

Live from Advance 2009

by Chad Hall

A few months back, I noticed that a big conference featuring John Piper, Mark Driscoll, Ed Stetzer and others, and sponsored by the Acts 29 Network, was coming to a neighboring city. I don't quite consider myself Reformed enough to be a part of Acts 29, but I signed up for Advance 09: Resurgence of the Local Church anyway. Thursday was the first half day, and here are some highlights and reflections.

Speaker # 1 Mark Driscoll
I guess the way to get a few thousand conference attendees to show up on time is to have Driscoll kickoff the conference exploring the question "What is the church?" He threw a few jabs at emerging church folks, and poked fun at some virtual church, pajama wearing pastors (nothing too serious) before settling down to explore eight aspects of a true church: 1) regenerated church membership; 2) qualified leadership; 3) gather for preaching and worship; 4) sacraments rightly administered; 5) unified by the Holy Spirit; 6) discipline for holiness; 7) obey the great commandment to love; 8) obey the great commission to evangelize. (These points may be covered in Vintage Church.)

Driscoll said that preaching is first priority for a church, and too many preachers are cowards who offer suggestions rather than commands. He noted that the church was birthed with a man yelling and still requires a man yelling. He also quipped that churches should drop Sunday school because it keeps unchurched people away. He got a boo or two, but I couldn't agree more.
Another good line was a warning: "Don't be so creative that you become a heretic. If you have to choose between faithful and cool, choose faithful."

And I cannot remember exactly how he said it, but he said something akin to "leadership without control is not leadership." Still chewing on that one.

Speaker #2 Tyler Jones
Jones is the pastor of Vintage 21 in Raleigh and a guy I've known and liked for years. He offered an expose` from Ephesians on the decline of the local church and what a resurgence requires. Very helpful talk. He said that all the reasons we can give for the decline of the church can be boiled down to two: 1) culture has changed and become hostile to the church; 2) culture has changed and the church hasn't changed with it. He said the problem with both camps is that they make the issue about "them" - the culture at large - instead of "us." The primary issue is that we need to center on Jesus through a lifetime of "active repentance."

Jones hit another high note when he said allowing gospel-centered virtues (such as morality, doctrine, social justice, or tradition) to replace the gospel as the primary focus makes idols of those otherwise godly concerns.

Speaker #3 Bryan Chapell
Chapell is president of Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis. I was impressed with his approach to the topic of communicating the gospel through preaching. The core of his intro (love for Christ fills our hearts and pushes out all else) reminded me of Dallas Willard's discussion of the "gospel of sin management" in The Divine Conspiracy.

Chapell talked at length about how any and all scripture texts (including the Old Testament) connect to Christ in one of four ways: predicting, preparing, reflection or the result of Christ's coming and work. So all preaching must have Christ at its center.
Chapell also echoed a theme from Driscoll and Jones that grace is the fuel for obedience.

Speaker #4 Matt Chandler
Like Jones, Matt Chandler (pastor of Village Church in Texas) took a look at the church in Ephesus, but drew from Acts, Ephesians, and Revelation. I hadn't heard Chandler before, and I found him to be a highly engaging speaker who spanned a range of emotions and thoughts to nail home what caused the church at Ephesus to go from boom to bust in about forty years. In sum, the church had lost their first love, which had three characteristics: 1) fear of the Lord and worship of his name; 2) a culture of sin confession; 3) they destroyed their idols.

Chandler said that most preaching today is centered on pragmatism, because preachers assume people know the character of God. But preaching on the nature and character of God is vital if the church is to be true to our first love.

Aside from the particulars of the talks, I found the militaristic logo for the conference interesting. Also a lot of war, battle, fight language from a few of the speakers. Not sure what to make of that. I was also surprised at the high number of women at the conference. For a group that is clear in their conviction that church leadership is for men, there were plenty of women who evidently agree.

I look forward to seeing what the rest of the conference brings. I'll offer more highlights and reflections at the conclusion of the conference.

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 5, 2009 | Comments (35) | TrackBack

June 2, 2009

Preach Dirty to Me

For a couple of years now, long-time pastor and theologian John MacArthur has been critical of Mark Driscoll's use of crude language in the pulpit. In the end, MacArthur believes Driscoll has crossed a line, and it's time for him to step down from ministry. MacArthur's comments have ignited a heated debate in the blogosphere (as you might suspect).

At the 2009 Basics Conference last month, another long-time pastor and theologian, John Piper, fielded a question about this debate. Piper, who along with Driscoll, is a card carrying Calvinista, offered a measured and thoughtful response. While strongly disagreeing with Driscoll's language and dismissing the necessity of swearing to be relevant, he does not believe the Mars Hill pastor needs to resign. You can listen to Piper's response here.

In related news, Ed Young posted a video on his blog yesterday about pastors using profanity.

In the video Young says:

We must be very, very careful not to offend anyone with bad language. The Gospel is offensive enough without having to throw in the "hells," and the "damns," and the "sucks," and the "I'm screwed," and the "crap" every other breath.

What do you think? Is cussing in the pulpit ever justified?

Posted by UrL Scaramanga at June 2, 2009 | Comments (95) | TrackBack