Connection between love and unity
Joel at “The Double Edged Sword” continues his series on unity in his post “Gathering in Unity: Part 3.” One paragraph of this post is one of the best things I’ve read on the relationship between love and unity:
I believe part of our error has been we see love as weak. We think to love will surely make us a push-over. If we all only love, who will stand for what is right? Who will defend God’s end of things? Who will come against the scores of error and false teachings that are within the so-called “church”? I used to feel that it was my role in all circumstances. I’m learning that it is, in fact, not. I somehow felt like I had to seek out error, expose it and pass it on to everyone that I came into contact with (just peruse 50% of my older articles written over the past three or four years). In the midst of this season, I realized something that really changed my view. It’s the simple fact that I can easily judge and condemn, even “righteously” – it does not take much effort and absolutely no restraint. I did it for years. It comes “natural” to me. Error abounds in the Body and it only takes a few seconds to sit down and find a “ministry” to criticize and find fault with. Even a non-Believer with the ability to only read the Bible could do it properly. It is being loving, forgiving, patient and tenderhearted that requires patience, self-control and determination, for me.
I think Joel is on the right track… what do you think?
Get out of the tree… and away from the keyboard
Dave Black (Friday, May 7, 2010 at 9:15 pm) issued this challenge to students. I think it would be helpful for more to read:
Jesus is not looking for spectators but participants. Don’t be an onlooker when it comes to the Great Commission. Don’t be up a tree when you could be down in the crowds serving Jesus. Frankly, I’m tired of bloggers and others who do nothing but criticize and pontificate. Secure in the cyber-trees, they never come down and do anything for the Cause of Christ. Their job is to look, observe, criticize, and do everything they can to maintain their status as bibliobloggers. They are onlookers, period. What a waste. As long as Jesus’ work is unfinished, ours is too. He said to His disciples, “You must be My witnesses.” It was that truth that changed the life of Hudson Taylor. It was that truth that changed my life. There is an unfinished work of Christ. Blogging can assist that work but it can never replace it. It is a scandal for us to talk about the battle when we refuse to enlist in the army.
When God calls us, we had better come down from the tree.
By the way, if you are a child of God, then he has called you. Who are you serving today? Who are you discipling today? To whom are you being a witness today? (These are rhetorical questions, meaning I don’t expect anyone to answer them hear. But, I think we should all answer them for ourselves.)
Four Very Good Questions
My friend Adam at “Adamic” has asked four very good question in his post “In my mind.” Here are his questions:
- Should churches be smallish, totally participatory, and more “organic”? Or does the Bible teach a more structured church gathering, with a preacher and (mostly) without verbal participation from the congregation? Or does it teach neither and allow for either?
- How much “liturgy” is unhelpful? Is there a place in a Baptist church for regular, even if not weekly, recitation of an ancient creed and/or the Lord’s Prayer?
- On a related note, how can we Baptists point to the collective, universal church in our services? And should we broaden our corporate prayer to include more intentional prayer for those outside of our church and even outside of the Church?
- And, here’s a fun one, what exactly is the gospel? Is it primarily about how we’re saved, or is it that Jesus is Lord?
Why not jump over to his blog and share your own answers?
Check out these posts
Here are a few of the posts that I enjoyed in the last few das. I think you’ll enjoy them too.
My friend Eric at “A Pilgrim’s Progress” has written several times about the descriptive/prescriptive question. His post “Sola Scriptura: The Protestant Position on the Bible” mentions this problem as well.
Another friend, Dan, has started blogging again at “Hollow Again.” You should read his posts “Reminder to self: quit being a jerk” and “Buildings and Churches.”
Meanwhile, Dan’s wife Stephanie as started blogging at “Dead and Domestic.” I really liked her post “Love and Guts.”
Finally, Joel at “The Double Edged Sword” has written a great post called “Gathering in Unity: Part 1.”
Living life as foreigners
Art, from “Church Task Force,” once again left a comment that I think needs to be shared. He wrote this in response to my post “Church in a coffee shop“:
Deb and I lived on Okinawa for 3 1/2 years, living in a small village for most of that time. Different languages, customs, dress, food, values, etc. We were always “gaijinâ€â€“foreigners, outsiders, no matter how much we made friends, no matter how well we fit in. It was not our true home, it wasn’t where we belonged if you will.
If/when another American came by, even if they weren’t from Altruria Street in South Buffalo, it was like finding an old family friend–someone you had an instant connection and familial feeling for, and they for you.
That connection, that feeling of kinship, that desire to encourage and help one another, that feeling of finding someone from “homeâ€â€“that is something like how we might act/see ourselves/feel when we meet with other believers, anytime, anywhere.
In that framework, we would want to know what has brought us here, what God is doing in and through us, how we might help each other, what are our struggles–all without being divisively interested in determining first what precise flavor of Christian we are.
What do you think about Art’s description?
Am I willing to go “back to square one”?
Sometimes I like to read Dave Black’s blog posts. Sometimes I don’t. I haven’t decided how I feel about one of his latest entries (Today, Wednesday, April 21, 2010 at 4:30 p.m.):
I realize that many of my readers are committed to following Jesus and His model for the church, yet we seem to get bogged down in the practical application of biblical truth. What would happen if we went back to square one? What if we recalibrated our thinking so that The Cause of Causes (the Gospel) became the main passion of our lives? If and when we put Jesus first – being His hands and feet in the world, offering even our enemies a warm embrace in His name, being willing to engage in Dangerous Discipleship – don’t you think that everything else in terms of church reformation would fall into place? The real problem in our churches is not that we are mired down in traditions. The real tragedy is that we have gotten our eyes off of the world for whom Jesus died. For instance, if we really believed that there are over one billion lost souls in this world who have never even heard about Jesus, then we would automatically begin rethinking how we spent the Lord’s money. Do we really need those Sunday School curriculum booklets? The answer is “Yes” if we put our church first. The answer may well be “No” if we consider the needs of the world. Calibrating our church budgets in light of the mandate to evangelize the whole world takes the focus off of ourselves and our comfort and spotlights the crying and dying needs of others. Moreover, a missional focus takes our eyes off of “our” kind – our churches, our denominations, our missionary programs – and unleashes holy havoc across the world as we intentionally adopt a cooperative model of serving King Jesus and building His kingdom of love.
Yeah I know, none of this is news to you. But that’s part of the problem. We so easily forget first things and make second things first things. So let’s rethink our church structures and priorities, not because someone tells us to, not because “the denomination says so,” but because Jesus calls us to radical, scandalous love for the nations! Praise God for the work He is doing in the hearts of His people in North America who are beginning to reach outside of themselves in order to make disciples of the nations. Think about it. When the church acted like this in the days of Acts, the entire culture was changed. The Holy Spirit is a pyro at heart and wants to set us ablaze with the Gospel wherever we go in this world. May God raise up a new generation of passionate and compassionate Jesus followers in our generation. And wherever we go and whatever we do, may we preach The Cause of Causes and its Savior more than we preach anything or anyone else.
I mean, he’s absolutely right. I’m not struggling with this because I disagree with it (mentally), but because I’m not living it.
A great post on the community aspect of the church
Jack at “Flight Level Musings” has written a great post called “What is Community?” It’s hard to find just one part to quote, but I’ll start with this paragraph, where Jack talks about Jesus exchanging blood family for God’s family:
Here Jesus broke with the blood family and established God’s family. Since people of that time already understood strong-group family culture, it was not a difficult shift for them to embrace their new family of believers. Now, the blood of Jesus was what tied the family together not their earthly family blood. For those of us in the west, this is not our culture nor is it our lifestyle. We are very independently minded and individual focused; not community focused. So for the most part you do not see much community life in Christianity. We attend our buildings on Sunday mornings and sit in our pews. Then we go back and do whatever we do. There is very little interaction outside of the building.
I hope you read Jack’s post and think seriously about your brothers and sisters in Christ. Are you living as if they are truly your family?
Some people need to lighten up about the Great Commission
Yeah, it’s true. Some people need to lighten up. Did you read what Dave Black said about the Great Commission? (Sunday, April 18, 2010 at 7:57 a.m.)
The Great Commission is the church’s marching orders. Period. It sums up the mission of every individual follower of Jesus and every believing family and every church and every Christian organization. It even sums up our marriages. The first task of every Christian is to extend the kingdom of Christ among every people group in the world. Everything else must be subordinate to that purpose.
That’s so all-encompassing.
[sarcasm]Is compromise really that bad? I mean, everything in moderation, right? I went to church today, isn’t that enough? I even gave to foreign missions. Sheesh… it’s like he expects me to be a missionary.[/sarcasm]
It’s so much easier being a cultural Christians than it is to really follow Jesus Christ.
A great post on homeschooling
Wes at “a mission-driven life” has written one of the best homeschool posts that I’ve read in a long time. It’s called “Homeschooling and Classical Education: What are you doing to your kids?” Primarily, I like that Wes has removed the Christian, holy, godly, etc. rhetoric that some add to the idea of homeschooling. Read the post. It’s worth the time.
We decided to homeschool our children 7 years ago. The reasons that we chose to homeschool are personal, and may not apply to anyone else. We never planned to homeschool, but we’re glad that we did. If you’re interested in homeschooling and need help getting started, read Wes’s post. If you still have questions, leave me a comment or send me an email. I don’t have all the answers, but I can tell you some of things that we’ve done over the past 7 years.
What’s the name of your church?
I couldn’t help but chuckle at some of the church names listed in the post “A Church by Any Other Name.”
I also find it funny when people name their churches after biblical locations: Corinth (are they really that divisive and immoral?), Philippi (they sing songs in jail?), Bethel (oh… so that building is the house of God?), etc.
What happened to the true biblical designations for churches? You know… the church in X city, or the church that meets in Y’s house.
Would that ever work today? Or, are we beyond those simple designations?