Theology Blog

I found this quote in my notes, and I cannot seem to find or remember the source, but here it goes:

“Forgiveness is costly. Forgiving people must give up the right to get even. … Forgiving people let God run the universe.”

There is a lot of truth in this statement. I think forgiveness is so hard because it is in fact so costly. We have a great sense of justice and fairness in our culture today, but those values that we hold so high, even in the church may not be as Biblical as we assume they are. We focus so much on our rights and so little on the needs of others. The irony is that we know and readily admit that our unforgiveness hurts us more than it hurts the person whom we cannot seem to forgive. Unforgiveness then may be more about control than it is about pain.

What are your thoughts?

This blog is based on a sermon I wrote recently. It is something I am still developing and hope later to publish as an article. I welcome any thoughts, feedback, or contribution and ask that you not use any of this material in a written or typed form.

The American church today is in decline. It is dying. This is especially true in mainline denominations. We are not reaching the world, in fact, we are doing just the opposite. The postmodern culture is hungary for something bigger, for community. We have what they need, if only we could get back to being who we are. Below are what I call the three great tragedies of the American church today.

The first great tragedy of the American church today is that we fail to embrace mystery. We have a great need for knowledge and answers in our culture. Our increased access to instant information has only furthered our expectation that questions must be answered. We are uncomfortable with unanswered questions, with things that do not make sense. Perhaps it is our deep desire for knowledge, or the insecurity and fear that comes with the lack of control that questions create. In our attempt to understand God, we have packaged our faith. It has been said that God created us in His image, and we have returned the favor.

The second great tragedy is that we have suffered a loss of identity and the world has changed the church. When I first arrived here at Bethel a little over eight months ago, we held a couple game nights at our house where the high schoolers came over for games and snacks. Other than the product we offer there is little difference between the church and McDonalds. We have started to approach the church in many of the same ways we approach other things in life, as consumers. Since arriving in Colorado Springs 5 years ago, I cannot tell you how many times I have heard the phrase “Church Shopping.” This phrase is very problematic, especially when we look at what the scriptures have to say about what the church is. We come to services (and I too confess that I have done this) and say things like, the music was too loud this week, or I did not like the sermon this week, or did you see that the service went 10 minutes over. I have actually been in church environments where folks will base their attendance on who is preaching. This is a worldly way to look at the church, not a Biblical one. We cannot come to church simply to consume…this is a value of our world, not a value of our God. The church is not at all about us, it is about God. Somehow we have imposed the consumer, corporate, democratic, and capitalistic mindsets of the world on the church. The church is supposed to be different, a leader and a light in the world. This is not to say that we should not learn from the ways of the world and learn how to apply them to our churches, but the pendulum in the American church has swung in such a way that the world has changed the church and not the other way around.

The third great tragedy of the American church today is that we have forgotten the source and our purpose. The biggest contributing factor to the decline of churches in some of the larger denominations today is due to this tragedy. Church after church, and denomination after denomination are walking away from the source—that is Jesus Christ. The Bible, meant to be the authoritative word of God has been turned into another fiction book seen as light reading and good stories. Jesus has become a good teacher instead of God’s son. It pains me to see that this is happening, because trying to be the church aside from the truth that is Jesus Christ is like trying to live without water. While the church itself will never die, if our churches in denominations in America continue to walk away from the source, church, as we know it will die and have to be reborn. The image in the Gospel of John of the vine is an important one when thinking about the church. This is the image of the church, and of our relationship with Jesus. If we do not remain in Him, we cannot have the full and abundant life that is promised to us. We must stay connected to the source. We must be willing to go where the source takes us.

There is hope, and we can overcome this. There may be some pruning, even some death, but in the midst of that, God’s Spirit desires to birth something new.

To be continued…

God redeems all things. The good, the bad, the ugly. The seen, the unseen. God takes it all and redeems it—that is that God makes all things new. There is no denying it even though we cannot always see, understand or experience it. Sometimes to see it or experience it we need to look for it. The problem is that it can be very hard at times to stop and look for it, especially when we are in pain. So, how  do we connect to the redeeming work of God when the reality of our lives make that work so hard?

Lent is always a powerful time for me. I never know what to expect other than God will show up and I will grow deeply. This year was no exception as nothing went as I planned and it turned out that most of it was far beyond my control. So the quote above is what came to me during this Lent season as my learning.

Lent is about a lot…its about reliving Jesus last 40 days as well as a symbolic representation of Jesus’ time in the desert. It is also a time of reflection and sacrifice as we journey to the cross then to the resurrection. There is probably no limit to all of the meanings that can be experienced from the season and practice of Lent. This Lent as I failed and my failure was beyond my control. It was in that experience that I realized that we as a people are terrible about living in failure. We hate to fail and in our healthy hatred of failure, we deal with our failure in unhealthy ways by blaming others, ignoring our failure etc. The heart of the matter however is that we are imperfect and our failure is normal. Holy Week was filled with failure, by the government, the disciples, and others. Why are we so afraid of failure? What is it so hard to deal with failure when we have the hope of Jesus Christ that redeems our failure? Perhaps Lent is the place where we can live in and recognize our failures and still remember and know something is on the other side.

If Jesus is not the Son of God, if Jesus is not fully man and fully God, then what does that mean for the world? If Jesus is only a way instead of the way, if Jesus is just a good teacher then what hope do we really have for all of our burdens? What answer and hope do we have for our failure and pain? Where do we find redemption in the midst of the perils of life?

We reduce Christology to a set of risky religious beliefs, but its more than that. If our Christology is false what does that say about the cross? The resurrection? If the resurrection is not real, if there is no atonement, how do we find hope?

Perhaps there is much more at stake in our Christology than just a theological concept and an academic understanding of a religious faith.

What is your theology of community? I am not sure that I even have a complete theology of community myself. Perhaps its because I have never really taken time to intentionally think about it. We don’t think about community as living in community is work enough. Yet, the Bible is full of imagery around community. It is full of stories of community and Christ himself modeled all of the realities of community with his disciples and those that he encountered. Its unfortunate that we do not think through our theology of practice of community more intentionally. It is a task I hope to soon undertake because as a father and youth minister community is the only way I can live out those callings.

What does it mean to be a Christian? What is truly the story of faith, the good news? Last night at youth group, I gave a “salvation/good news message.” It was the first time in many years that I had the opportunity to do that and I really wrestled with it. My kids in youth group do not know the story, some get it, others do not, some have never heard it. For many, confirmation has been the means of salvation/connecting with the good news. the thing that I wrestled with in my preparation was how to share the good news. What did i really believe about the good news and how do i communicate it? thats why I am looking forward to wrestling deeper in this course with this issue. I hate how it has been packaged in our modern world as some sort of transaction. I am disturbed that the good news has been reduced to “fire insurance” and made to be about heaven and hell, because there is way more to it than that…we do not think enough about this life! I have not liked how the evangelical world has manipulated that word to mean something other than the true meaning (sharing the good news of Jesus) and making it about a set of beliefs and behaviors. the postmodern context has changed how we need to communicate the message as well. All this said, I do not think the truth has changed, but how do we go at this…and in this case, how do I go at it in a way that teenagers understand. I wrestled for weeks. I could not get something down. when I finally did the day before, I still felt unsettled. Then I settled in. Once I got up to talk, I started sharing—and I was way off script. It was a good thing…a holy spirit moment, and that perhaps told me the most about how we do this–that it is not about us or what we prepare, and that it is never told the same way, just like all good stories. I shared that there were pieces to the puzzle. It was about what we believed, because Jesus is irrelevant if we did not believe, but that there was more to it than that. Yes, it is about relationships, but a relationship with someone you do not believe in…and we are created to be in relationships. We need God. I also shared that even that is not quite the whole puzzle. We need transformation, and we can believe and be in relationship and have nothing be different, and if that is our case, what is the point? So that was the start of my conversation with the youth. I am not sure what they thought, or if it even will result in some change, but we need to keep telling the story.

I don’t know about you, but I have questions about God. Better yet, I have questions for God. Then there is the short list of questions…when I come face to face with God, I have this short list. My first question:

Free Will? Are you sure about that? God had a choice, He could give us choice or control us like puppets. I am glad I have choice-most of the time. The consequences that come with choice, however, I could do without those. I think about this often, and the thing that got me thinking about it was the quote I read in my CS Lewis devotion this morning. Its called ‘Second Guessing God’s Wisdom.’ Perhaps I should just shut up now…his answer profound. Its easy for us to come at God instead of seeing ourselves coming from God. It would be easier if the world was a puppet theater (and at times it does look like a puppet theater in church and government) but where would the abundant life be. This has been my biggest question of faith for many years–why free will? Lewis has an answer; I am not sure I like it. I am not sure if the question is still on the short list or not, but when I think of the alternative world; all that I am would be stripped away and for all the pain I have created and bore; it still seems worth it for all of the moments of joy and transformation, the relationships, the call…and the God who started it all.

We are redeemed. We are being redeemed. Redemption continues in our lives, community, and the world. We are called to redeem others, to redeem our world. We take our redemption for granted. We also do not fully believe our redemption. We do not posture our lives in a way that demonstrates our redemption. What drives out your happiness? Is it broken relationships? Failure? Fear? Finances? How can you open up your heart and live in those area(s) so that they may be redeemed to a place of joy?

There always seems to be one more piece to the puzzle and often pieces that we just cannot find a place for. Even when the puzzle is finished, we do not always feel as though we are finished; there are more puzzles to wrestle with, to solve, to experience. This quote by Rohr is the very definition of discipleship, of transformation. Our faith is a journey, until we arrive in Glory, we never arrive. It is usually when we get comfortable that the challenges come. The devil always finds the most opportune time. We may feel full at times, but we are always hungary. We stop growing in our faith the moment we stop embracing and working through the challenge. Sometimes it would be nice to have a break, but true followers of that radical man from Nazareth know that there is always more. The scriptures provide constant evidence and story to that effect. The disciples never completely got it and nor will we. Perhaps that is part of what Jesus was talking about in John when he offered the promise of full and abundant life.