Why MLK Day Matters to Christians

The church must be reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state.

            Martin Luther King Jr.

When Martin Luther King Jr. fought for the equality of all people, he wasn't just working for the transformation of America, he was working for the transformation of the Church.

A dying man's last words are often his most important, and in the 17th chapter of the gospel of John we read the last recorded prayer of Jesus before going to the cross. Our Savior could have prayed for a lot of things here. He could have prayed for the overthrow of the Romans, or the spread of the gospel, or for... himself. But He didn't. In some of His final moments on this earth, Jesus prayed for us and for the unity of His Church. Not just a church, but the Church: all believers on the earth.

“... I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one - I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me." John 17:20-23

Did you notice the "if/then" statement that this passage clearly makes? The Church should be unified "so that the world may believe that you have sent me..."and "Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me."

Jesus says the unity of the Church causes people to believe in Him. Unity is evangelistic! It is so evangelistic that Jesus made it His final prayer. I guess this means He actually did pray for the spread of the gospel. And, tragically, we must assume that disunity in the Church has the opposite effect.

Disunity in the Church causes the world to not believe in Jesus. 

Disunity is... anti-Christ? I'm afraid so, and you don't have to look far to confirm it. Because of this, I agree with author Philip Yancey that racism in the Church is one of the most vile sins of all.

"It took years for God to break the stranglehold of blatant racism in me - I wonder if any of us gets free of its more subtle forms - and I now see this sin as one of the most poisonous, with perhaps the greatest societal effects." Philip Yancey, Confessions of a Racist

Most of us think segregation ended long ago. But do you know which day is the most segregated day of the week? Sunday, of course. Obviously, segregation is no longer legislated; today it's voluntary. Even worse.
Now I'm not saying that this is just a white problem, or that we all need to go to the same church. Disunity occurs for many reasons. However, I do believe we all have the responsibility to somehow respond to the prayer of our Savior in John 17.

But how do you respond? What can one person do?  What can you and I do today? Pastor Beau Hughes address this in a recent blog post for The Village Church.

Of course, it’s too easy and ultimately unhelpful to merely point out the continued existence of racial discord in our midst, especially for Christians. As Pastor Frank Reid noted in an article for Christianity Today, “We’ve made a sport of pointing out racism, when what we should be doing is focusing our prayers and actions toward creating congregations that proclaim Christ’s lordship over his entire church.” We need to move past hopeless observations about racism and look to God for hope and direction.

You can begin the same way Jesus did, looking to the Father in prayer. Praying for other churches and pastors by name, praying for other ethnic groups, praying for racial unity in the churches of your city and most of all, for unity in your own heart. We never know what prayer will change around us, but we do know that it always changes us. Ask God to fill your heart with His unconditional love and compassion for all of His family, your brothers and sisters. Pray that you would be the Church Jesus prayed for, so that the world would believe in the Him.

Read the rest of Beau's article here: The Gospel and Racial Harmony

Why I Cried at The Miserables

I took my parents to see Les Miserables a couple of nights ago. Dad fell asleep twice, I did once, and Mom wasn't sure what to think. Needless to say, our ride home looked nothing like the video below, but if you haven't seen it yet, you must. This is AWESOMAZING!

There was crying in our theater, however, it came from me when I realized that they weren't going to talk between the songs. Isn't that what normally happens in musicals? They speak, then burst into a catchy song about their favorite things or sweeping chimneys or a really fast car, then they speak some more as if that is normal behavior. Look, I saw The Sound of Music, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang AND Grease. I KNOW musicals! About two minutes into this movie I thought, "Seriously? They're going to sing this whole thing? For nearly three hours? REALLY?" When people sing for three hours straight, mostly lines that do not have a melody or rhyme, isn't that called an opera? I know that this isn't the popular opinion. Everyone is raving about the beauty and the grandeur and this timeless story. Based on what I've been seeing in the blogoshpere, I should be writing an article on how the message of redemption is magnificently displayed in this epic production, then tie the whole thing into the gospel. SPOILER ALERT: That's not gonna happen here.

Now before I get any hate mail, let me clarify that I'm not calling any of that into question. I can appreciate it all. However, personally, I was too distracted by the mode of presentation(or medium) for my heart to deeply be touched by the message. I freely confess that this is largely due to my failure to appreciate some of the finer of the fine arts. Ten minutes into my first ballet I asked, "Are they really just going to just dance the whole time?" Fortunately I'm not alone in my cultural depravity. Particularly here in East Texas. On a broader scale, I know that many people have a similar problem when watching foreign films with subtitles. For them, there is simply a disconnect in the method of communication that they cannot overcome. Which led me to this question: "How often do people fail to hear the gospel, the  greatest redemption story of all time, not because the story is lacking, but because the presentation doesn't connect? Maybe it's culturally irrelevant to them. Maybe it seems like they're hearing it in a foreign language. Maybe it's just bad storytelling?

I've heard it said of gospel presentations, "The medium may change, but the message stays the same." I completely disagree. This notion flies directly in the face of what media genius Marshall McLuhan said nearly a decade ago when he coined the now-famous phrase, “The medium is the message.” Point being that how we communicate something plays as much a role in it's impact as what we are trying to communicate. If people don't "get it," our presentation may be more at fault than the state of their hearts. As believers, it is much easier to blame hard hearts or credit a sovereign God than to scrutinize our own efforts. I would go one step further and say that it takes much more creativity, investment, effort and research to present a message that connects well than one that does not. As a pastor who has prepared many sermons, I can certainly attest to this.  It is much more expedient to just rehash something you've done before, or another church did, or possibly worse,  recreate a low budget Christianized version of something the world did five years ago. And when I say research, I don't just mean of the scriptures, but also of the people we are trying to reach with them. In ministry we rarely, if ever, do any research or follow up with our target audience in order to discover how well they comprehended our intended message, why they did or didn't like it, or how they think we could present it better. I'm not talking about changing the message to appeal more, I'm talking about changing the presentation to communicate better. We could easily believe that something is amazing and heart touching because that's how WE perceive it, while all the while it has little to no impact on those who need to hear it most. In the commercial sector, Research & Development is often one of the largest budget items. Products are tested, revised and retested. Movies are screened multiple times, rewritten and reshot, often at a massive expense, based on audience interviews. Have you ever heard of a church with an R&D department? Have you ever heard of Community Research as a line item in a ministry budget? I can tell you this: if it's not in the budget, it's not important. Your budget says more about your values and mission statement than your website. Why is it that we, who believe that our "customers" have the most to lose, spend little to no time or money researching how well we're connecting with them? How can we do this better? I'll be digging in to that and more on Monday. Until then, enjoy your weekend, and maybe even go see Les Miserables if you haven't. But don't say I didn't warn you. They sing for the entire movie... almost THREE HOURS!

Life Savers

The Golden Gate Bridge has always been famous. It was the world’s longest suspension bridge when it was completed in 1937. Since then, it has become an iconic landmark of San Francisco and, tragically, one of the most popular places in the world to commit suicide. Few know this better than Kevin Briggs, a sergeant with the California Highway Patrol who has talked hundreds of people out of jumping. 

 

I recently saw this video, Guardian of the Golden Gate Bridge, and was profoundly impacted. Take five minutes and watch it now.

I couldn't help but think about what it means to be a "guardian" of the gospel. Seargent Briggs' focus, dedication and determination convicted and inspired me. "How often am I living completely focused on the mission, the Great Commission, that I have been given?" "Am I on the lookout for people around me who need to be rescued?" "Am I sacrificial, committed and patient with them, unwilling to just let them go?" 

"When I talk to someone, I try to dig into them and see whats going on."
"I try to get them to raise their head up."
"I actually went down on my knees and said, "Look, I got nothin'.""
"I tend to talk about my life, because I've been through a lot."
"Hey, I've been through some of this also."
"I like to lead them with dignity."
"That's what we do, that's why we're here."
"What was it, after all those hours, that you finally decided to come back?"
"Kevin wouldn't give up."

"To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some." 1 Corinthians 9:22

"Be merciful to those who doubt; snatch others from the fire and save them; to others show mercy, mixed with fear—hating even the clothing stained by corrupted flesh." Jude 1:22-23

^"This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers." 1 John 3:16

So You Wanna Start a Riot?

In an election year as polarizing as this one was, starting a riot is not a difficult thing to do. Throw in last summer's Chick-Fil-A day followed by Louie Giglio bowing out of the inauguration and it becomes clear that a culture war is not something looming on the horizon, it is in our midst. 

This battle of values is something that many Christians are eager to sign up for. Recently, while surfing hundreds of channels and finding nothing to watch, I landed on the show of a well known TV preacher. I tuned in just as he was reaching the crescendo of his message, "We are soldiers in the army of the Lord! And we are fighting a culture war for the soul of a nation!" As he wiped the sweat from his brow, the congregation responded with resounding cheers and amens. Hands were raised in support throughout the room. I was perplexed. I could not argue with his first point, although childhood memories of singing, "Onward Christian soldiers, marching as to war..." still creep me out a little. However, the second half of his mission statement put me on edge. Are we really called by God to engage in a culture war? Is the mission of the church to fight for the soul of a nation? Could I please have some New Testament scriptures to support this? 

Ironically, a decade ago I would have joined in the cheers and high-fived the tv screen. I was an American and a Christian, therefore it was my God given duty to defend her honor and help get this country back on track. However, around the turn of the millennium, a conversation with a good Christian brother would leave me troubled and questioning my deeply held convictions. In short, he was a pacifist while I was a member of the NRA. He was from the northeast, I was from Texas. At first I thought it was just a geographical issue. However, what I really couldn't shake, what annoyed me the most, was that his convictions, though vastly different than mine, were based on scripture, not just culture, patriotism and "good ol' common sense". He also pointed out how these ideas could be seen exemplified by the early church. When he asked me for scripture to support my beliefs, I had none. Literally, nothing. After my initial defensive reaction (surmising that he was just another unpatriotic commie-pinko-liberal who had infiltrated the church), I began to realize that much of my world view had been shaped through the environment I grew up in: the Bible-belt south. Although he didn't completely convert me to pacifism, this conversation was the catalyst to a journey of seeking out what the Bible teaches about how a Christ follower relates to the world around them. I realized that I could no longer blindly embrace the views of my community, my parents, a political party, or even a church. I must seek to know God's truth myself and continually ask, "what does Jesus say about my mission on earth?", and "how do I see that lived out by His early followers?" While many of my perspectives were changed greatly through all of this, it only took one unexpected conflict to instantly reveal the "work in progress" my heart still is....Read the complete article here: