Going back home, but not to my eternal home

This week I will return to my roots, briefly. I have never been ashamed of being from the South, but I no longer identify deeply with its culture.  Linda and I vainly attempted to introduce our children to grits, cornbread, and turnip greens, but their comfort food will always be Mexican. 

Nevertheless, it will be good to spend time with my brother and some old friends from college and the church I grew up in.  

What does this have to do with worldview?  It's easy to forget that this world is not our home. When we take the commands of God seriously, then we can appreciate the labors our ancestors poured into making the places we call home prettier, more habitable, more prosperous, and more convenient.  When I go back to the South, the passage of time gives me a perspective on the changes - mostly for the better; some, not so much. 

Some of the photos on this page show the things Marietta can be proud of: aesthetic, historical, and cultural. But whenever a Mariettan needs to be humbled, just remind him or her that the only thing most people outside of the Atlanta area know about Marietta is that it's home of the Big Chicken.  

The point is that we ought to fulfill God's dominion mandate by improving the places in which we live. But worship of the labors of our hands or a piece of geography is still idolatry, and this world is ultimately not our home... 

Knowing the real deal - when we see it

I have mentioned in a previous blog that I am a regular subscriber to Breakpoint, and always find their commentaries stimulating. Since the passing of Chuck Colson, Eric Metaxas has become the primary contributor, and I found one of his posts this week particularly intriguing.  Here it is, in part:

Here’s a particularly egregious case [of Christian curmudgeoning] in point: the recent campaign to remove a great movie, The Blind Side, from the shelves of LifeWay Christian stores. Remember, The Blind Side was denounced as Christian propaganda by many liberal critics.

It explicitly depicts an affluent white Christian family devoting itself to helping an impoverished black kid because it’s the Christian thing to do.

The film’s offense, according to a Florida pastor who started the campaign to have LifeWay stores pull the DVD, is that the movie contains “explicit profanity, God's name in vain, and racial slurs.” It doesn’t seem to matter that the objectionable language is used to depict the palpably unpleasant world from which the young black man, Michael, was rescued by his adoptive family.

What seems to matter to this pastor is that if we “tolerate” the presence of this movie in Christian bookstores, our children and grandchildren will “embrace” this kind of behavior. I’m not making this up – this is the exact reason given by the pastor. And frankly, I think it’s insane. I saw the movie myself. I even let my 12-year-old daughter see it. That’s because it is a great film and I recommend it highly.

But sadly, LifeWay caved in and removed the “offensive” discs from their shelves.

For outsiders looking in, the moral of the story is that “there is no pleasing Christians. They always seem to be looking for something to be mad about.”

We complain about the calumnies and caricatures of Christians on the big screen; and then, when an Academy Award-winning film shows us at our very best, we complain that scenes depicting harsh, inner-city reality are too true to life!

We are, in effect, making our participation contingent on all our possible objections being met beforehand. Since there are many people who would be happy if we stayed within our cultural and religious ghettos, it’s difficult to imagine how we Christians can hope to be taken seriously in cultural discussions and debates with this kind of an approach.

Concerns about the language in the film also miss the larger point: what made the Tuohys — the family depicted in the film — such great Christian exemplars wasn’t their non-use of profanity; it was their willingness to reach out and embrace someone in need.

If we Christians can’t get this, then maybe we really should refrain from commenting on culture in the first place.

For more on this subject of Christians in the arts and culture, visit BreakPoint.org.

The People I was Writing about Yesterday

So I stumbled across an ad for a new line of clothing bearing this logo. The slug on their web page read "We are not ashamed. We are not afraid." This, of course implies that shame and fear may exist, constructs which are patently impossible in a mechanistic universe controlled by Darwinian selection. Most meaningless of all is their logo, left, which draws on all kinds of deistic history, symbolism, and imagery. It calls to mind what Doug Wilson always says about the thinking of atheists:

Two things atheists believe:

1. There is no God.
2. We hate Him!

In regard to the abundant revelation of God - natural, special, historical, etc. - one can't help picturing a child with his hands over his ears, yelling at the top of his lungs, "I'm not listening!  I'm not listening!  I'm not listening!"

Equipping ourselves - Messianic prophecies

It is emotionally very difficult for some Christians to accept our minority status in today's culture. The demeanor of the unbelieving world around us ranges from aggressive and willful indifference to unmasked hatred of God. So inured are we to this rejection of God's revelation, that we are apt to fall prey to the baseless presuppositions and cynical attitudes of the society we live in.

In The Silver Chair, Jill and Eustace had a real and unmistakeable face-to-face encounter with Aslan himself, and yet, when faced with hardships in fulfilling the task He had set for them (rescuing the trapped Prince Rilian), they still succombed to the "real world" thinking of those around them - worrying about shelter, hot baths, and food. 

Aslan had thoughtfully provided the antidote for this in advance: repeating the "signs" which were to guide their mission. Any reader who has enjoyed this story can remember the frustration one feels when they gradually cease repeating the signs. "The signs!" one wants to scream. "How could you forget?"      

But we are a forgetful people, which is part of the reason for the Sabbath - a cycle that forces us out of the survival rat race and back into contemplation of the eternal. I ran across a site today which reminded me of our tremendous need to "repeat the signs."  With skeptics being interviewed on talk shows and podcasts who question the very historicity of Jesus Himself, it is easy to forget how dramatically God prepared the earth for the arrival of His Son. 

You can go here to enjoy a list of over one hundred specific prohecies of the Messiah from the Old Testament  which were clearly fulfilled in Christ.  These are the kind of signs we should be repeating to ourselves daily as we dwell in the midst of a wicked and perverse generation. The Holy Scriptures have been provided for us for just such a purpose as this - and because we are forgetful.

Remember: 

It isn't that we lack historical evidence.

It isn't because there is evil in the world ("How could there be a God!?")

It isn't because the Bible contradicts itself (when clearly taught).

It isn't because it produces bad fruit.

It isn't because "all so-called Christians are hypocrites."

It isn't because it doesn't make sense.

It isn't because of any of these things that people do not follow Christ. It's because we live in a fallen world, which is at enmity with God. We must live faithfully, stick to the mission, repeat the signs, and trust God for the outcome.  Faint not!

A Prayer for our Nation

ALMIGHTY God, who hast given us this good land for our heritage; We humbly beseech thee that we may always prove ourselves a people mindful of thy favour and glad to do thy will. Bless our land with honourable industry, sound learning, and pure manners. Save us from violence, discord, and confusion; from pride and arrogancy, and from every evil way. Defend our liberties, and fashion into one united people the multitudes brought hither out of many kindreds and tongues. Endue with the spirit of wisdom those to whom in thy Name we entrust the authority of government, that there may be justice and peace at home, and that, through obedience to thy law, we may show forth thy praise among the nations of the earth. In the time of prosperity, fill our hearts with thankfulness, and in the day of trouble, suffer not our trust in thee to fail; all which we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

from The Book of Common Prayer, 1928

Readying for the Holy Spirit

I have never been a big fan of Eugene Peterson's The Message, although one of my sons is somewhat fond of it. I recently learned that my friend Cole Palmer's father was Peterson's roommate at Seattle Pacific University at some point in history. When my friend Dave Rhodes was giving away books as he downsized his life in order to be able to travel around the country in his RV, I claimed a bunch of them for our nascent church library. One of them, Peterson's Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places, was one title I was pretty sure I was not interested in enough to read.

But eventually it worked it way to the top of the box, and when I was recently stranded somewhere without anything else to read, I thumbed through it. Petersons' style, overall, is a little too informal for me, and is reminiscent of many of the twentieth century "stream-of-consciousness" writers like Faulkner. Not only is Peterson informal, he is somewhat mystical. Like most Reformed folk, I mistrust the subjectivity of mysticism. But in his chapter on how Jesus prepared the disciples for the coming of the Holy Spirit, there were some jewels. Here, for example: 

"The conversation is rambling and unsystematic. This is not what we ordinarily think of as good teaching. But Jesus is not making things clear, smoothing out ambiguities; he is making them vivid, pulsing. What the conversation does is immerse us in the presence of another, the presence of Jesus readying us for the Spirit. We are soon listening more to who he is than what he says; we are drawn into this seamless web of relational attentiveness, leaving and sending, sensing within ourselves the pervasive, soul-permeating continuity between the absent Jesus and the present Spirit.

And there is also this about the conversation. It is exceedingly spare in imperatives. Jesus is not telling us how to practice spiritual formation, 'how to do it' - he is telling how it is done. Spiritual formation is primarily what the Spirit does, forming the resurrection life of Christ in us. There is not a whole lot we can do here any more than we can create the cosmos (that was the work of the Spirit in creation), any more than we can outfit Jesus for salvation (that was the work of the Spirit at Jesus' baptism). But there is a great deal that the Spirit can do - the resurrection community is the Spirit's work. What we can do, need to do, is be there - accept the leaving and the loss of the physically reassuring touch and companionship. Be there to accept what is sent by the Father in Jeus' Name. Be there, receptive and obedient.  Be there praying, 'Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word" (Luke 1:38)."