To My Daughter as You Prepare for College, “Be Not Afraid!”

As you go off to college you will be blessed with meeting all kinds of people.  I know you won’t be afraid of getting to know them, and I’m excited for the opportunity that awaits you.  What I do encourage is that you be unafraid of asking questions and of being asked questions.

Your fellow students and the faculty(!) are there to learn and so are you, and you will not learn all you can unless you question everything and everyone.  Others will not receive the full benefit of your friendship and/or your presence at the university if out of fear you refuse to ask and be asked tough questions.

Do not be afraid to ask, Why?  Why do you do that?  Why do you think like that?  Why do you choose to live that way?

Do not be afraid to question those in authority!  In the famous words used by Ronald Reagan, “Trust but verify.”

 

 

Trust that your professors know something of what they’re talking about.  Trust that they’re interested in the subject enough to have studied it.  But remember, they’re human beings, prone to unwitting blindness as well as willful distortions of the truth.  Check it out for yourself.  Follow the Renaissance dictum, “Back to the sources!”

Question yourself, and let yourself be questioned!  Don’t blindly trust yourself, verify!  Remember you too are human, prone to unwitting blindness and willful distortions of the truth. 

Be not afraid of those who criticize views they don’t understand!  If someone can’t say in their own words the reasons why someone would hold an opposing view you know they have not sought to understand, and you should ignore completely whatever criticisms they bring against that view.  I don’t care how distinguished a person they may be.  They may be the faculty head of a department!  Who cares!  Be not afraid!

Finally, be not afraid if your questions lead you to more fully affirm your faith.  I’ve known the faith you’ve had as a child, and the questions you’ve had as a teenager.  Be not afraid of your questions leading you to real answers!  As you know, I’m convinced that much of what passes as intellectual doubt about faith is really fear, fear of it all being true and believing that if it is true it means a diminished life.

The assumption (usually unexamined and unacknowledged) is that if there’s a personal-infinite God who has spoken so as to be known life will be less fun, less exciting.  The origin of sin is to believe that fullness of life (including fun and excitement) is to be found in  determining life for ourselves apart from God (the point of Genesis 1-3). 

Don’t be afraid of believing the promise of Christ, “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full” (John 10:10 NIV), and then making the leap into his arms.

Of course this belief will be different because of your questions.  It will be a more mature faith, one based on evidence, but be not afraid of the evidence!  Be not afraid of being led to believe!  Who cares what other people think!  Doubt their doubts!  Doubt your doubts!  Verify!  And having done so, jump!  Don’t hold back.

Of course you can and will have intellectual doubts.  It’s when people stay there, refusing to understand, that creative doubt becomes pathological and ultimately a form of rebellion against the truth.  For if Christianity is true (and I believe that it is) then in the final analysis settled unbelief is simple rebellion against the truth because the God of Christianity is a God who wills to be known.  Jesus said, “Everyone on the side of truth listens to me” (John 18:37 NIV).  Either that’s true or it isn’t.  It’s as simple as that.

A quote from Kierkegaard (father of existentialism) fits here,

“People try to persuade us that the objections against Christianity spring from doubt. That is a complete misunderstanding. The objections against Christianity spring from insubordination, the dislike of obedience, rebellion against all authority. As a result people have hitherto been beating the air in their struggle against objections, because they have fought intellectually with doubt instead of fighting morally with rebellion.”

Looking forward to having some good arguments in the future!  Blessings to you on your new adventure, and remember, Be not afraid!

Dad

To My Daughter as You Prepare for College, “Be Not Afraid!”

Images in the Church?

"You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God" (Exodus 20:4-5 NIV).

"And make two cherubim out of hammered gold at the ends of the cover" (Exodus 25:18 NIV).

Reformation Protestants have been of two minds on the use of images.  Strict Reformed Protestants have opposed any use of images.  An extreme example of this is the plain, white meeting house of the Puritans.

Lutherans and those influenced by Luther have retained images as a means of instruction and as pointers to the divine realities of which the Bible speaks.

Who is right?  I think Luther is.  In Exodus God on the one hand commands that no images be made of “anything in heaven above” and then just five chapters later he commands the Israelites to “make two cherubim out of hammered gold” for the cover of the Ark of the Covenant.

The key is the second half of God’s command in Exodus 20:4-5, “You shall not bow down to them or worship them” (NIV).

The cherubim on the cover of the ark were not to be worshipped.  They were to serve as pointers to divine reality. 

So it is at Salem (the church I pastor) that we have pictures of Christ at the back of our sanctuary (no strict Reformed Protestant would do that).  We have statues in our cemetery.  We put up a big manger scene during Advent and Christmas.

While we don’t have crucifixes there is nothing inherently wrong with them.  It’s true that Christ is no longer on the cross, but people who object to crucifixes for this reason usually don’t object to manger scenes.  They seem to forget that Christ is no longer in the manger as well.  No, the crucifix is not wrong, it’s a powerful reminder of all Christ went through to accomplish our salvation, even as a manger scene reminds us of his humble birth.

I thank God for images, for the rich symbolism and artistry I get to enjoy and especially for the truths they represent.

Images in the Church?

And the Gift goes on …

On the day of Pentecost the apostle Peter said,

“And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.  The promise is for you and your children …” (Acts 2:38-39 NIV).

Through Peter God made the promise that the gift of his presence in the person of the Holy Spirit would continue.  Indeed, the gift would be given to the children of believers.  In the second half of verse 39 Peter tells us why.  He says the gift is for “all whom the Lord our God will call” (NIV).

We have God’s promise that he will continue to call our children to himself.  This is a direct promise of God, and the way he does this, of course, is through the preached word.  Romans 10:17 is key.  It reads,

“Faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word about Christ” (NIV).

This month, on May 19th, Pentecost Sunday, we will be holding a service of confirmation for the children of our church.  Confirmation gives children raised in the church the opportunity to express their faith in Christ.  Children at Salem undergo two years of preparation.  The first year they study the Old Testament (viewed through the lens of Christ).  The second year they study the New Testament and survey the history of Christianity.

At the heart of the confirmation service is the actual rite of confirmation when the elders and the pastor lay hands upon the confirmand asking God to grant them the Holy Spirit.  This follows the practice of the early church when the apostles would lay hands upon new believers.  We know that in the centuries following this practice continued.  Why do we believe God will answer our prayer today?  Because he’s promised to do so, and we’ve been told that if we ask for anything according to his will we have that for which we’ve asked (1 John 5:14-15).

Please plan to join us May 19th at the 10 am service for this special moment in the lives of nine young people of this church, and may God pour out his Spirit upon us all!

Pentecost blessings to you!

And the Gift goes on …

My Prayer at the Indiana House of Representatives

Today I was privileged to serve as the minister of the day for the Indiana House of Representatives.  Below is the text of the prayer I offered before the opening of today’s session.

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Members of the Indiana House of Representatives I bring you greetings from Darmstadt, Indiana in northern Vanderburgh County and from the people of Salem Church of Darmstadt where I serve as the pastor.  I thank you for the privilege of serving as your minister of the day and for the opportunity to pray for you as you begin your work.  I thank Representative Thomas Washburne for inviting me and for representing us in House District 64, and I thank all of you for your service to the people of Indiana.

Would you bow with me for prayer?

Gracious God, truly it is a privilege to pray for these legislators for as a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ I am reminded of the command of the apostle that prayers be made for all people, especially those in authority (2 Timothy 2:1-2).  That same apostle said that you ordained governing authority for our good and that those who govern do so according to your plan (Romans 13:1-7).  And so I pray this day that you would pour out of your grace wisdom and insight upon these who serve that they may act with confidence upon the things to be brought before them.  Grant them courage and boldness to do the right thing, following their consciences as they have been formed by your law written upon the heart.  With them I pray for the people of this state and of this great land of the United States of America, praying for the many needs that face us as a country, both at home and in our relations with the many nations of the earth. 

Together we pray especially for those affected by the recent events in Boston, Massachusetts and West, Texas.  We mourn the loss of life and pray for those whose lives have been forever altered.  We ask that they would know the peace only you can give.  We praise you for the bravery displayed in the first responders and for the work of the dedicated firefighters, police officers, medical personnel, and special agents.  May their acts of heroism and dedicated service serve to inspire us to greater faithfulness in the tasks to which we’ve been called.

It’s in Jesus’ name that I offer this prayer, thanking you for the privilege of praying for these servants whose duty it is to work for greater justice and peace and opportunity for the people of Indiana.  Amen.

My Prayer at the Indiana House of Representatives

Forgiveness is by grace; Trust is by works.

“Forgiveness is by grace; trust is by works.”

--Rick Warren

Christians often confuse forgiveness and trust.  Forgiveness means releasing someone from their past.  It doesn’t mean investing them with an unearned trust. 

Jesus made it clear that we earn trust by being faithful with what we’ve been given.  Once we’ve proven ourselves faithful then we are entrusted with more (Matthew 25:23; Luke 16:10).

Grace means giving people the opportunity to re-earn our trust.  It doesn’t mean letting people walk all over us.  Indeed, there comes a time when we have to let some people go.  Their actions reveal they are not trustworthy. 

Grace holds out the hope (and the offer) of renewed trust, but faith entrusts them to God, recognizing we can’t change other people.  They are responsible beings.  All we can do (and all we’re expected to do) is make the offer of renewed fellowship and trust.  The rest is up to them.

Forgiveness is by grace; Trust is by works.

Expect Rejection

“Fear not the reproach of man, nor be dismayed at their revilings.  For the moth will eat them up like a garment, and the worm will eat them like wool; but my righteousness will be forever, and my salvation to all generations” (Isaiah 51:7b-8 ESV).

As Christians we can expect the reproach of people around us, not because we’re seeking it out but because Christ’s values will come into conflict with the world’s values.  It’s inevitable.  Jesus said, “'No servant is greater than his master.' If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also” (John 15:20 NIV84).

In today’s reading from the Old Testament Isaiah reminds us that we should stick with God’s servant (Jesus) because his righteousness will be forever, his salvation to all generations.  Human standards of righteousness will come and go.  Human acceptance (salvation) doesn’t last.

Indeed, Jesus warns us, “Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for that is how their fathers treated the false prophets” (Luke 6:26 NIV84).  And Jesus’ brother James says, “Don’t you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God” (James 4:4 NIV84).

If and when we realize we’ve compromised with the world the answer is not to try harder to be faithful.  The answer is to despair of ourselves and trust Christ and then arise by faith to be the faithful people he’s called us to be, believing that he will enable us to endure the rejection of others as we seek first his kingdom and his righteousness.

Expect Rejection

Our Help Comes from the Lord

“But the Lord God helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced; therefore I have set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame” (Isaiah 50:7 ESV).

Today’s daily lectionary reading from the Old Testament is an amazing prophecy of God’s suffering servant, a prophecy fulfilled in Jesus.  He is the one who can say,

“I gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting” (Isaiah 50:6 ESV).

The prophecy reveals the source of Christ’s ability to endure the cross.  It is the “Lord God” who helps him, a reminder that Christ acted as a man empowered by God (i.e., the Holy Spirit). 

While Christ is both God and man he acted as a man while on this earth.  The eternal Son of God limited himself that he might be our perfect substitute.  At his baptism he was empowered with the Holy Spirit that he might fulfill his mission. 

As those baptized into Christ we too receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.  The promise is for us and for our children and for “all whom the Lord our God will call” (Acts 2:39).

This means we’ve been empowered for the mission God has for us.  Let us receive that power by faith.  In that power we can bear witness to Christ in word and deed, enduring whatever cross we might have to bear.  We can do it because the Lord God helps us, the same God who helped Christ helps us.  Indeed, Christ himself is in us.

You are not alone!  You have been baptized into Christ, and Christ dwells in your heart by faith through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.  Therefore you can do all things through Christ who strengthens you and you will not be put to shame!

Our Help Comes from the Lord

Known by God

“Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you. Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands” (Isaiah 49:15-16a ESV).

Today’s Old Testament reading from the daily lectionary contains one of the more beautiful promises in the Bible.  It speaks of God’s love and care for his people.  When it was written it was meant to comfort those who had been taken into captivity in Babylon.  They were living as exiles from the promised land and were tempted to think that God had forgotten them.

Today, as believers in Christ we know that all the promises are made more certain because of him (2 Peter 1:19).  We know all the more that God can be trusted for he has fulfilled his promise in sending Christ into the world.
 
As a believer you can say, “God knows me.”  A person who is resting in what Christ accomplished is in fellowship with God.  That’s God’s promise (1 John 2:23b).  You are God’s child because of Christ and all the promises belong to you!  You can say with the apostle “all things work together for my good.”  And “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” (Romans 8:28; Philippians 4:13).

Remember this today: God knows you.  He has not forgotten you.  He is always with you.

Known by God

Video Blog #1

Video Blog #1

Emil Brunner on Posers

“Every human being, in all that he deliberately wills and for which he strives, in that which he most seriously determines to be, has something of this poseur, of this mask of the persona; even the most genuine people are no exceptions to this rule.

Even he who imagines that he wants to be simply himself, to be ‘real’ as he can, is no exception to this rule; he too, poses as the natural, undivided human being who is in harmony with himself.”

Emil Brunner, Man in Revolt: A Christian Anthropology

We’re all posers.  That’s what Emil Brunner says.  None of us is really him or herself, because none of us lives in our intended state.

We were made for unhindered fellowship with God.  Through the power of that relationship we were to know genuine freedom, genuine humanness, but we don’t know that relationship (apart from Christ).

To the degree that Christ has taken control of our lives we know the life we were meant to live. 

“Men and women in whom Christ has taken form victoriously [Galatians 4:19] no longer possess a striking type of character; the only ‘striking’ thing about them is their naturalness.”

Ibid. 

Emil Brunner on Posers

Joy at Thanksgiving (Not a Hallmark Movie)

“A good meal does not arouse joy; it merely gives pleasure; if I eat with joy it is because my spirit is turned in a certain direction, to that which is true, or good, or beautiful, which is connected with the act of eating, as indeed the Apostle is able to say: ‘whether ye eat or drink, do all to the glory of God.’”

Emil Brunner, Man in Revolt: A Christian Anthropology

“Everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving.”

1 Timothy 4:4 NIV84

'Tis the season for Hallmark movies.  You know what I’m talking about.  Every year Hallmark rolls out made for TV movies in an attempt to capture the spirit of the season (and viewers).  They can do this because there really is something good about the things we associate with this time of the year. 

Family is a good thing.  Friends are good to have.  Feasts are wonderful.  Yet behind these things (and often implied in Hallmark movies) is something bigger.  Hallmark movies try to capture this “magic” with story lines that include a sudden coming together of circumstances.  Someone couldn’t make it home, and then, as luck would have it (the secular version of providence), the long-lost relative appears.

“Joy” is the Christian word for what we feel in response to this sense of there being something bigger.  C.S. Lewis spoke of his conversion as being “surprised by joy”.  The psalmist says of God, “you will fill me with joy in your presence” (Psalm 16:11 NIV84).

It was out of this knowledge of God’s larger plan that the apostle could say, “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!” (Philippians 4:4 NIV84).  In that same chapter he said, “I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation” (4:12 NIV84). 

You see joy, Christian joy, is ultimately not tied to earthly circumstances but to heavenly reality.  Time and again Jesus and the apostles point to heaven as the only source of stability (something about “laying up treasure in heaven”).  If we seek our joy in earthly things we’re going to be disappointed.  Some years the long-lost relative just can’t make it home! 

This Thanksgiving I pray you have a Hallmark holiday experience, but if you don’t that’s okay.  As a Christian your joy isn’t tied to that.  You’ve got something much more reliable.  You’ve got the one who said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5 NIV84).

Joy at Thanksgiving (Not a Hallmark Movie)

Arise by Faith

“… by faith arise to a new life.”

The Evangelical Catechism, Evangelical Synod of North America

Most folks at my church know I love our church’s catechism.  I love its brief, to the point answers.  I love its unique mixture of Lutheranism, Reformed Protestantism, and Pietism.  I love its arrangement of Christian doctrines.  I just think it’s a great statement of basic Christian beliefs.  It’s not a perfect statement, but what statement is?  At our church such statements are merely guides.  The Bible alone is the rule. 

From time to time as I’m going through the catechism, teaching children or adults, I’ll be struck by a certain phrase.  Lately, I’ve been struck by the phrase, “by faith arise to a new life.”  I love that.  I think of all the times Jesus commanded people to arise, calling on them to do something they couldn’t do before.

Like those miracles of Jesus the new life is a gift you receive.  By faith you arise expecting to be able to live differently because Jesus says so.  You may not see how it is so, but you trust because of who it is that calls.

Paul said in our baptism we died to sin (Romans 6).  That’s a fact.  He then says we should consider it to be so and act accordingly.  That’s what Christian living is all about, by faith receiving what is now ours because of Christ.

Arise by Faith