Sermon: A Few Good Men and Women

This is sermon 9 in The Story series that I am preaching at Bethlehem Church in Austin, MN. 

 As God's people we are to be separate from the world. 

What can we learn from Israel's example in the book of Judges to help us be set apart from the world?

 

We Can’t Go Back

 On Monday evening I posted a screen shot of a tweet from comedian and libertarian Dave Smith to Facebook.

I think we need to ponder this reality.

No matter how much we want to go back to “normal” we can’t, things have changed.

Now it is true that things are always changing, but usually they are gradual and you don’t notice the change taking place. In this way you  are slowly conditioned to accept the change. 

Because of social media, reporting around President Trump, and especially the pandemic, the pace of change has accelerated, which has caused us to take notice of it. 

Rather than having these things happen slowly over time, they hit us right in the face.

A good example of this is Sunday worship attendance. Attendance has been trending down for years as congregations grow older and younger people stopped coming. Because of lockdowns, masks, and other restrictions, many churches have experienced a sharp decline in attendance from where they were just last year. 

These people were leaving anyway, the pandemic just made it happen faster.

Since we know we can’t go back, all we can do is to plan to go forward. As we plan to go forward we have to realize that what worked in the past will not necessarily work in the future.

Here are some of my thoughts about moving forward:

1. We need to think smaller rather than bigger. This is true for the church, where we need to concentrate on smaller gatherings. Smaller gathering are not only helpful in discipleship, but they are also helpful when limitations are put on gatherings. When things are smaller our plans are not as easily disrupted. I also think going smaller is the key to moving forward politically. One of the overlooked checks to the federal government’s power, and I believe the most important check, are the states. Washington’s power is rendered useless when the states decide not to comply with the Feds wishes. We see this as individual states legalized marijuana. The federal government doesn’t have the resources to enforce its laws across the individual states. Washington depends on the states to enforce its laws. As one of my favorite podcasters, Brion McCallahan, says, “Think locally, act locally.”
2. We need to diversify our thinking. Too many people think in binary terms. Republicans and Democrats, progressives and conservatives, racist and inclusive, etc. As someone who tends to live outside the binary bubble, I can tell you things are not that simple. When it comes to following Jesus we need to move past the tendency to judge a person’s faith and commitment to Scripture based on a few pet doctrines like the age of the earth or a premillennial interpretation of the end time. We need these different perspectives to gain a greater understanding of the Bible and following Jesus (now, this doesn’t mean everything is open to interpretation, but it does mean that when there are different perspectives we should be able to listen to them). When it comes to politics we need to break away from the strangle hold of a two party system. Having only two major parties lead to corruption as people hungry for power manipulate the system. Also, there are thousands, if not millions of people who do not line up with either a Republican or Democrat view of the world. I am one of them, and consistently we go unrepresented. Let’s bring more voices to the table and spread the responsibilities of governing to many different parties, rather than just two.
3. We need come to an understanding of the role social media plays in our lives. This is a new technology, and we don’t understand all the different ways it is effecting us. It is certainly shaping our opinions of things and making it seem like there is a greater divide between people than really exists. That is one of the reasons for the hostility that we are seeing. Social media is being used to divide us and cause us to see the other side as evil. The responsible use of social media is key to moving forward.

No matter how this election turns out, we need to understand that we aren’t going back to the way “things used to be”. 

Things have changed, and rather than complaining about that reality, we need to find a way forward.

Vital Importance

I have been trying to write this pondering for many days now, but it just hasn’t come. 

So to move on from it, let me bullet point my thoughts on this quote:

• Many Christians see the main benefit of salvation and following Jesus as “going to heaven” when they die. This causes them to miss out on the difference Jesus makes for our lives today.
• When we believe that faith is mainly about believing the right things and that believing these things is the key to salvation, then we have little to no motivation to change the way we live. Instead we become concerned about having the right doctrines and less concerned about living the right way.
• It is crucial for us to understand what God is up. God doesn’t need to save us so we can spend eternity with Him. Remember God created a good universe. He created human beings in His image so we can rule this world along side of Him, displaying His goodness and demonstrating His character along the way.
• Jesus is the perfect sacrifice because He alone was able to display God’s goodness in the way He lived. For us to live out our design, for us to be true to the image of God, we need to be conformed to the life of Jesus.
• To be conformed to the life and teachings of Jesus takes intentional effort and time. This is the role the spiritual disciplines play in our lives. The disciplines are like the drills during basketball practice or the scales that are rehearsed during piano practice. The drills are not the game and the scales are not the performance, but they help the player and the musician be better prepared for the game and the concert.
• It is vitally important that we take following Jesus seriously and don’t just sit around waiting to go to heaven. God created us for so much more. In fact, we prepare for eternity with God by conforming to the life of Jesus now.

Just some quick thoughts on this passage.

Hopefully they were helpful to you. If not, you got a peek at how my mind works.

Voting Advice

 

One of the great questions that I have wrestled with in my adult life is the relationship Christians are to have with politics. I think politics hold a danger for followers of Jesus that isn’t widely talked about or even acknowledged. It is just assumed, at least in the United States, that Christians should be politically active and vote.

To merely suggest that there might be a different way to look at things invites comebacks such as, “Elections have consequences.” 

It is true that elections have consequences, but that doesn’t answer the question about the proper role politics is to play in the lives of Christians. 

Remember, what we think most about naturally becomes the most important thing to us. Thinking too much about politics allows it to become the most important thing about life (which it has, because we live in a culture where every things is political). This just one of the real dangers Christians face when getting involved in politics.

When thinking through these questions I find it useful to go back and discover what earlier Christians thought and taught. Recently I came across the above advice from John Wesley and thought it was worth considering.

What can we apply to our lives from this advice from John Wesley?

First, our vote must be a principled vote and not given because of what a candidate has promised. Government in the United States is based on constitutions. There are the individual state constitutions and there is the federal constitution. Rather than voting for the person who promises to do the most stuff (which I would consider voting for a reward), we should cast our vote for the person who promises to remain true to the Constitution.

Second, we judge a person's worthiness for political office by two factors. The first factor is whether or not they follow the constitutions that are to be the restraints placed on the government. Romans 13:1 says, "Everyone must submit to governing authorities. For all authority comes from God, and those in positions of authority have been placed there by God." I believe that in a Constitutional Republic, the governing authorities are the constitutions. This is why a person's worthiness to represent you should be based on their willingness to uphold and defend the constitution. The second factor is their integrity. A person's character is an important factor to consider when determining whether or not they should represent you.

Third, it is crucial to remember that everyone is created in the image of God and therefore deserves our respect. You may not agree with the other side, but that does not give you the right to talk evil about them. In the long run, it is far more influential to provide a reasonable defense for your ideas then it is to declare the other side's candidate as evil.

Fourth (which I think is the most crucial piece of advice on the list), guard your heart. There is a danger that is lurking in politics for us who follow Jesus. We have to be very intentional to not dehumanize people or see people who disagree with us as the enemy. This happens all the time on Facebook, people who follow Jesus, yet when it comes to politics, they call people who disagree with them politically idiots, mentally ill, and even demonic. This is wrong. Christians need to do what we can to avoid falling into the trap of making enemies out of our political opponents. Not only does it damage our ability to demonstrate God’s character in this world, it also opens our hearts and minds to the corrupting influence of Satan.

Politics, like all things of this world, needs to be approached carefully. Followers of Jesus need to remember that there is a danger in putting an emphasis on voting and politics, because when they are mishandled they end up warring against our soul. This is why it is important for each of us to think through the role politics has in our lives.

John Wesley provided good insight for how we should vote, may we have the ears to hear what he has to say.

What We Think About Most

 

On Thursday I wrote a post about being a persuader.

Last year I had a Barnes and Nobel gift card and one of the books I bought was Win Bigly by Scott Adams.

Win Bigly is a look at President Trump’s ability to persuade. Whether you like him or not (I personally do not support President Trump, but I am willing to admit he has done some good things).

After writing the post I Thursday I took Win Bigly off my shelf and flipped through it, looking at the  highlights I made. The above quote caught my eye.

In persuasion it is important to get people to think about things you have said. The more they think about what we say, the more it influences their thinking. 

This is why repetition is not a bad thing. When we repeat something there is a better chance of it getting lodge in the mind of someone. 

There is a secondary reason why I shared this quote with you. It reminds us that we need to be mindful of what we allow ourselves to think about.

Remember, the key to transforming our lives is changing the way we think:

Romans 12:2
Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.

Changing our thinking is key to changing our behavior.

This is the reason that I am concerned about the person who shares only political posts on Facebook or the person who only talks about sports. This reveals that their thinking is dominated by “the behavior and customs of this world.”

One of the key disciplines that God’s people have practiced over the years is the discipline of meditation. In earlier times meditation was crucial because they did not have access to their own copy of Scripture. They had to rely on what was said during their times together, and then remember what was said.

In this way they were able to memorize God’s word and bury its wisdom in their hearts.

Because of our easy access to the Bible the practice of meditation has fallen by the wayside. We are content to get our daily Bible reading in so we can move on to the next thing on our agendas. In the process we are not really thinking about what we read and how it applies to our lives.

I have found it helpful to do a longer reading of Scripture (I have been reading the the New Testament in 90 days, which is about 3 chapters a day) and then a shorter reading, which is just a few verses. With the shorter passage I can take time to think about it, ask questions about it, and even pray it. That way it has a chance to become a part of  the way I think.

I challenge you these next few days to pay attention to what you are thinking about. 

Are your thoughts godly and loving? Are they based behaviors and customs of the world? How can you be more intentional in directing your thoughts to things that are good, noble, and pure (Philippians 4:8)?

Understanding persuasion can help us be better persuaders and it helps us to identify things that are working on us.

Be mindful of what you let persuade you.

 

The Spirit and God’s Image

The opening chapter of the Bible tells us a very important truth about humanity.

Genesis 1:26-27 (NLT)
Then God said, “Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us. They will reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground.”
So God created human beings in his own image.
In the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.

To be created in God’s image means that we are designed to demonstrate His character in this world, to rule with His love, grace, and wisdom (here is the Bible Project video on the Image of God). 

How are we able to do that?

To correctly bear God’s image in this world requires that we are connected to Him. We need God’s wisdom, love, and grace coming into our lives so it can influence the choices we make and the things that we do. 

This is why God walked with Adam and Eve in the Garden. That was essential for Adam and Eve to live out God’s image in their lives.

The problem is that sin severs that connection we have with God. 

Through our sin we declare that we have the ability to define what is good and bad, what is right and wrong, on our own and in the process we turn our back on God.

This is why we need to be rescued.

God needs to pursue us and make a way for reconciliation, a way for our connection to Him to be restored, to happen. All the different covenants we read about in the Bible remind us that God is making it possible for us to be reconciled to Him.

Jesus opened up the way for us to be reconciled to God. Through him we are able to once again experience the life God created us to live.

John 15:5 (NLT)
“Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing.”

Jesus is not saying we can do nothing useful apart from him. We constantly see people who are not followers of Jesus do things that are useful, loving, and gracious. What Jesus is saying is that we can’t fulfill our work for the Kingdom apart from him. 

In order to bear God’s image we have to be connected to Him, like a branch is connected to the vine, so we can receive His life. 

What is the source of life that we need from God?

His Spirit.

Galatians 5:22-23 (NLT)
But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!

Look at the description of the fruit the Spirit produces in our lives. To live guided by the Spirit means that we are empowered to bear God’s image in the world.

This is one of the main themes of Scripture: to restore humanity to our original design. That can only happen by repenting of sin, trusting Jesus, and being guided by the Spirit.

Being a Persuader

Part of my job is to persuade people.

That is what I seek to do when I preach or when I teach (yes, there is a difference, but that is for another post). I want to convince people that there is a change the need to make in their lives.

This is not an easy task. 

If I had to base it on percentages, I would guess more often than not I fail to persuade people the way that I should. Yes, they may leave agreeing with what I said, but they won’t be led to make in changes in their lives.

At the end of August Michael Malice tweeted this:

I have pondered this thought off and on since then.

Here are a few of the thoughts I have had about persuasion.

First, persuasion happens when a person is ready to make a change. That is what happened to me when I shifted away from a standard Rush Limbaugh conservative Republican worldview to a libertarian/Christian anarchist worldview. It was 2008 and I noticed more and more inconsistencies with what the Republicans were doing and the limited government beliefs I was told Republicans had. I remember a phone conversation I had with my brother when I told him about my frustration and he said, “Check out this guy named Ron Paul.” I did and the rest is history.

That change happened because I was ready to make a change.

Second, persuasion is easier when there is a trusted relationship. All my brother had to say was, “Check out Ron Paul,” and because of our relationship I did it. This means a good relationship is an important part of being able to persuade another person. When you trust the other person you are more likely to listen to what they have to say.

Persuaders need to do what they can to build relationships with people.

Third, there needs to be a level of expertise involved. It is hard to persuade people when a quick Google search reveals the holes in an argument. Two people who have influenced me intellectually have been Tom Woods and N. T. Wright. Part of the reason is I accepted their arguments is because of a level expertise they bring to their work. That helps me trust what they have to say

Persuaders need to demonstrate that they have a good understanding of the subject they are talking about.

Fourth, persuasion is a journey. More than likely, the beliefs you hold didn’t magically develop overnight. Rather, the came into place over a period of time as different influences shaped those beliefs. We can’t expect people to take they same journey that we took in the course of a single conversation or a 30 minute sermon. We need to be willing to take people along one step at a time. In my early days of being a libertarian I was quite obnoxious, everything seemed so clear to me, and I thought if I could just be loud enough people would see it too. Big mistake.

Persuasion takes time as we walk people through the process of changing their mind.

Fifth, persuasion takes integrity. When we see that the person lives what they believe, it helps us to listen to them. In college, my Christian Ethics professor’s wife had Alzheimer’s Disease. He brought her to class  each day. The way he treated her made an impression on the group of friends I was a part of and we all talked about having that level of love for our wives someday. He influenced us because he lived the Christian life that he taught.

Persuaders need to have integrity. Nothing causes a person to loose influence faster than discovering that he/she doesn’t live what they teach.

If you want to persuade people to make a change in their lives, take some time to think about that process. Persuading is not as easy as it sounds, but it is worth the effort to figure out.

Sermon: The Battle Begins

 This is the sermon I preached on October 24, 2020 at Bethlehem Church. It is sermon 8 as we go through The Story.

Be the Evidence

Questions are an important part of having a conversation.

They help us find out more about the other person and they provide us with information that we didn’t have before.

If I am going to have a conversation about God, then certain questions are going to come up. 

Truth be told, while I am a pastor, I am not a “Bible Answer Man.” There are many things about Christianity, the Bible, and God I have questions about.

The process of answering questions helps us think through what we believe and provides us the opportunity to look at the world from a new perspective.

This particular question is a common one. It would be reasonable to assume that if God wanted everyone to know Him that He would make it easy for people to find Him. 

I think at the heart of this question is this statement: "God if You would just reveal Yourself to me then I would believe in You." They justify their lack of faith because God, if He even exists, hasn’t made it obvious to them.  

I can understand why this is a difficulty to believing in God. There are times in my life that I wished God would just prove His existence. Yet, I suspect that wouldn't impact my long term faith very much.

Think about two Biblical examples of people who experienced God in a miraculous way: 

• The nation of Israel in Exodus. These people had experience slavery at the hands of the Egyptians. They witnessed God deliver them from slavery through the use of ten plagues, the parting of the Red Sea, and the miraculous provision of guidance and food through the wilderness. They saw how God revealed Himself to the entire nation at Mount Sinai. Moses went up the mountain, and when he doesn't return (forty days and forty nights) the people got antsy. They gather some gold together and made a golden calf to worship. In their worship they proclaimed this is the god who led them out of Egypt (Exodus 19 -32).
• Jesus' disciples. These men heard Jesus teach, witnessed his miracles, and saw him over a 40 day stretch after his resurrection. As Jesus prepared to ascend into heaven he took these followers to a mountain in Galilee. Matthew 28:17 saws; "When they saw him, they worshiped him--but some of them still doubted!" (NLT)  

It is amazing that Israel doubted God and disciples doubted Jesus after all they experienced. We tend to think if we were in their place and were able to witness miracles and see the risen Lord face to face that we would not doubt. I am not certain that would be the case.

These examples show us that a faith built on the evidence miracles is not a sustainable faith. Time has a way of eroding our experiences. Given enough time even the most awesome miracles would loose their impressiveness.

Aside from what theologians call general revelation (the evidence of God discovered in nature), God doesn't make Himself known to everyone. It might be impressive for God to reveal Himself in all His Holy splendor, but how long would that make an impression on people? At the very least it would be something He had to do every generation.

There is nothing God can do, except what He will do when Jesus returns, that will convince everyone that He is real.

That doesn't mean God keeps Himself hidden from people.

Then God said, “Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us. They will reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground.”

So God created human beings in his own image.

In the image of God he created them;

male and female he created them. (Genesis 1:26-27; NLT)

God created human beings in His image. To be created in God's image means that we are designed to be His representatives in this world, to demonstrate His character. In other words we are to be walking, talking, and breathing revelations of God. The world should know God because of His people.

This is why Jesus told his disciples: 

“So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.” (John 13:34-35; NLT)

The world will know that God exists through the lives of His people. May we be the evidence people need.

Presidents and the Constitution

We are a week away from determining the president of the United States.

While there is always a big push to get people out and vote, there seems to be more of an urgency every 4 years when it comes time to elect a new president. 

This is sad. Not because I think more people should be voting, but because of the great emphasis put on this one position. 

The founding generation feared a powerful executive and tried to make it so one person did not have so much influence.

That reality has eroded over time.  

Now the president has so much power that every presidential election becomes about determining which direction the country will move.

Gone are the days when we should really be asking one question when it comes to electing a president: "What is he/she constitutionally allowed to do?"

Historian and author, Brion McClanahan puts it this way in 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America:

 

Is "constitutionally permitted to do" even a category we think about when it comes to evaluating presidents and electing new ones? Was that challenge even offered during the debates? 

The more power we allow presidents to have the more we move away from the constitutional republic created by the founders and closer we become to being a dictatorship. 

This is why it is crucial for us to know that Constitution of the United States, so we are able to point out when it is not being followed. Apart from that, it doesn't matter who becomes president, we will just mover further down the road to tyranny. 

 

Keep Making Progress

 

This year has been, at least emotionally, the most difficult year of my life.

It started last November with a difficult situation within our church community that caused me to doubt my leadership abilities.

Then we moved into winter, that dark time of year that causes depression in many people, myself included. My heart, mind, and soul were heavy.

We all know what happened as winter began to turn into spring - pandemic and lockdowns. I was faced with trying to pivot and provide online worship and resources for people, while not being able to meet face to face to figure things out.

In May my right leg began to hurt. I lived with the pain for a week, trying to convince myself that it wasn't what I knew it was - a blood clot. This was my second clot and I knew that I would now be on blood thinners the rest of my life.

During this time came BLM and protests, and the added pressure of trying to figure out the right things to say about an important moment in America. One of the difficulties of being a pastor is the expectation to have a position or at least a thought about everything that happens.

As things began to open up we had the great mask debate and the discussion of whether our not churches should follow the lockdown orders. After all, I was told, President Trump declared churches as essential, so we should be meeting in person.

This was followed by several families informing me they were leaving. Which again had me doubting my ability to do this job as pastor.

Even during the summer, when I am usually depression free, I found myself sinking deeper into depression.

By the end of August, I realized I needed to make a change. Not only was I depressed, but my health was being affected. I was the heaviest I had ever been in my life, I was not sleeping well, and the simplest activities were exhausting me.

The change started with my wife Jenny telling me about an app from Ransomed Heart that was created in connection with John Eldredge's book Get Your Life Back (which I haven't read) called One Minute Pause. I started doing the app every day, usually more than once a day. It helped me to reorient my life back to God.

Doing The Pause app reminded me that through the Wild at Heart website John Eldredge has a resource of prayers. I began daily praying the Daily Prayer for the Head of Households. This practice helped me to start reading the Bible daily again.

After about a month of putting prayer and Bible reading back into my daily rhythm of life, I was ready to start focusing on my physical health. There were a couple of false starts as I tried to figure out the best way to implement what I knew I was supposed to do. Even though I knew the right things to do I was having trouble doing them.

That is when I found out about another app called Noom. This app/program is designed to help you make a lifestyle change so that you can live a sustainable healthy life. Last week one of the readings that Noom had me read dealt with understanding that there would be setbacks and struggles through this process. To combat that reality I was asked to write an "Oh well" statement that I could use when I stumbled. Mine is, "Oh well, I am still making progress." 

The next day I saw this Dave Ramsey tweet:

It is a wonderful thing that we can decide to make changes in our lives. We can make today the day that change begins. It is crucial to remember this.

I also think it is crucial to remember that change is hard. It doesn't happen over night and it doesn't happen just because you know the right thing to do.

Things like overcoming depression, losing weight, getting out of debt, or decluttering your house takes time. If we expect this change to go smoothly, for our habits to shift right this moment, and for our life to be perfect tomorrow we are setting ourselves up for failure.

Making these positive changes in our lives requires time and effort, and more than likely we are going to have a moment or two when we binge on Moose Tracks Ice Cream or put a shopping spree on the credit card, or do something else dumb that we have trained ourselves to do.

That is why we have grace. 

God is not expecting us to be perfect. After all He made allowance for repentance and confession. What God is after is our continued progress towards being like Jesus.

I believe in our quest to make changes in our lives the best thing we can do is to give ourselves grace and to remember that we will stumble along the way. Understanding this helps us to own up to our failure and move on by saying, "Oh well, I am still making progress."