It would be an understatement to say that the conversation between the Christian community and LGBT community has gone poorly over the past few years. Grace and understanding are both in short supply, which is why a book like Caring Beyond the Margins is so important. Guy Hammond, founder and executive director of Strength in Weakness Ministry has written a courageous, easy to read book that provides intelligence and insight for a conversation that Christians need to be better prepared to have.

Guy shares his story, and his struggle, as a man of faith dealing with an unwanted same-sex attraction. He explains that the Christian community is often missing the point of biblical instruction on human sexuality. “The goal is not heterosexuality. The goal is holiness [through Jesus.]” (p. 35) Guy explains that the Bible teaches that each of us is tempted in various ways to make “idols” the focus of our identity. Your looks, your real (or imagined) professional hockey career, good food, popularity at school, sex, anything other than Jesus will fail if you try to make it the ultimate point of your existence. Idols will always fail to satisfy. He writes that, “having a heterosexual orientation is hardly a prerequisite to salvation … the goal that Jesus has for [same-sex-attracted person] is not that they live a problem-free, temptation-free existence, but rather that they have a relationship with Him.” (p. 69)

Guy defines his terms carefully, which in turn helps to clarify the debate. Guy describes himself as “a person with unwanted same-sex-attraction” and he subsequently defines a person who is “gay” as a person with same-sex-attraction that celebrates a homosexual lifestyle as a way that leads to human flourishing. This distinction clarifies the situation immensely. Guy goes on to explain that the Bible teaches that an actively homosexual life is sinful but being attracted to the same gender is not. An opposite-sex-attracted person (married or otherwise) must also manage unwanted sexual attraction every day with people they are not in covenant relationship with. They resist these temptations because they violate human design. If these temptations involve someone whom they are not in a covenant relationship with, indulging them will not lead to fulfilling intimacy. It is a broken cistern, a source of satisfaction that will not ultimately satisfy. The same is true whether the attraction is same-sex or opposite-sex. Guy’s point however is clear: temptation is not the sin, indulging it is. The goal is not opposite-sex-attraction, the goal is a life of holiness in the power of the Holy Spirit.

Because of this, Guy adds, “God is not ashamed or embarrassed of same-sex attracted Christians. Their value and worth to him and his church are not based on that criterion.” (p. 15)

In addition to providing thorough biblical teaching on human sexuality Guy also provides practical advice for how to address a same-sex-attraction in your own life in a way that glorifies God and also how opposite-sex-attracted believers can support same-sex-attracted believers honour their commitment to Jesus. I highly recommend this book for Christian leaders and educators. Faith communities everywhere are bound to have members who are struggling with this issue. In addition we all have opportunity to “give reasons for the hope that we have” with our broader community. Our hope does not lie with our sexual orientation, whatever that may be, but rather in Jesus.

A post for my preacher buddies. What an awesome age we live in!  We don’t have flying cars or robots that make supper but technology has brought some amazing blessings that can be used for ministry.

I attended an online conference this morning (right from my desk) that was hosted by Forge Canada, a missional cooperative that provides resources and connects people with influential voices in the missional conversation. It was all on GoToMeeting, an amazing tool.  Even out here in the country, our marginal Internet connection at church was able to keep up.

About 24 ministers and lay leaders heard from Mark Buchanan this morning.  He has worked with New Life Community Baptist Church in Duncan BC for the past 17 years.  He has written six books, including one called The Rest of God: Restoring Your Soul by Restoring Sabbath.

This conference was of particular interest for me because this book was of such vital importance for me.  A couple of years ago with the help of this book I began to observe Sabbath, for the first time in my life. I started to recognize that I had leisure time but God was absent from it.  As a result, I found that it did not restore me or nourish me.  Even when I had a “day off” it was encroached on all sides by a number of distractions.  Everyone says, “just block the day out,” but I have always had trouble knowing how to do that.  Does that mean block out family?  What about school work?  How do you keep from getting dragged into tasks that are urgent but not important.

During the webinar Mark had some real gems.  He describes the practice of Sabbath as “52 snow days a year.”  The Canadians on the call got the idea: a day that comes to you, clear of agenda.  It is a day that you do not take care of; it takes care of you.

Mark says that in order to truly experience Sabbath you need to develop a “Sabbath Heart”: an absolute trust in the sovereignty of God and in God’s capacity to nurture and provide for you.  Keeping Sabbath means practicing God’s sovereignty.  You need to ask yourself, “Does God run the Universe or do I?”  Does God manage your church, your ministry context or do you?  If God is not sovereign then you had better get your butt off the couch and worry because it is all falling apart.  If God is sovereign, however, you can rest in his promise (Rom 8:28) that He is working everything for good. Practicing Sabbath means acting like you really believe that God is large and in charge.

When I am not rested I am more than just tired.  I find that in the weariness, I become less than myself.  I am more sensitive, more bitter, and less balanced.  Sabbath rest, a stillness that is practiced in light of who God says I am, makes me more like God’s preferred person for me.  I become more aware of my limits, more comfortable in my own skin, and more able to respond appropriately to criticism.

St. Augustine once said, “Lord, deliver me from the lust to vindicate myself,” and this prayer is one that comes from a heart that is at rest in God. When I am rested I am more certain of the sovereignty of God, and better able to let God deal with my critics. Psalm 92 is called “a Psalm for the Sabbath day,” and it’s easy to see why.  It starts with the assurance that God is powerful and capable, and then talks about how God’s enemies will get what’s coming to them.

The practice of Sabbath is in some way acting better than we know. Sometimes our hearts and our minds have trouble being at rest in God – not fully believing that God will do what he says He will do.  We mentally know that God has it all under control but we just can’t relax enough to believe it.  This is one way how our bodies can instruct our minds.  Practicing Sabbath is living like God is in charge. As we live into that reality through receiving God’s rest , pray that your mind will slowly be convinced  by the obedience of our body.

So my prayer for my colleagues in ministry and for anyone who is following the call of discipleship is to schedule a day, soon, where you will put everything down and just receive the day.  Read, sleep, take a walk, spend time with friends.  For one day act like it really isn’t all about you.  Secondly, take advantage of all the great resources that are out there.  Check out Forge Canada and their partners.  There are some great resources out there for you.

NCW

The guys at Blimey Cow have this for all the future songwriters out there.

I recently figured out how to get people to read my blog!  Two blog posts recently addressed the flagging fortunes of my tribe and got massive amounts of feedback – Good, bad and ugly.  So all I have to do is talk about the Churches of Christ disappearing and the readers will come!    I wanted to make some remarks about both posts so here goes:

Last November Joe Beam wrote an interesting article where he defines a series groups most people in a Church of Christ fit into. This upset some people, raised some eyebrows, but on the whole created some dialogue, mostly good.

I am not sure a new set of labels helps things but what I took out of the article is that, generally speaking, the extremes have shut down the dialogue, with all the groups in between.  I think Beam is spot on there.  There has been a decline, it seems,  in our capacity to hear and talk with each other when we don’t agree, particularly when it comes to speaking to people at either extreme.  This has been my experience for the past 10 years.  It seems like we as a fellowship are losing the ability to talk to each other (Left, Right and Centre).

No matter how you read the Bible, Jesus makes it clear that unity is primary for us moving forward as a fellowship.  We aren’t going to agree on lots of things but Jesus still invites us into dialogue with each other.  It must break God’s heart that we can’t even talk about cooperation with other church groups, innovations in worship, women’s role in public worship, communion practices, etc.  One extreme or the other is so outraged, or so hurt, that they won’t even talk . Here’s what I wish:

1. I wish we could recognize that, for some of us, these issues are intensely painful to discuss.  It’s going to be slow going so can we be gentle with each other? It’s going to take a long time but can we lovingly wait for each other and take the place of the servant? We might not agree but surely we can love each other anyway.
2. Jesus’ death on the cross paid for all my sin – all of it.  And that includes my theological sins.  All those things I am wrong about: praise team, cooperating with other denominations, women making announcements before the closing prayer, etc . As God as my witness, with a clear conscience I have supported these things and even  if I am wrong I am still forgiven.  God’s grace is abundant and true.  God will forgive me for these things and he will forgive you too.

The second blog post that caught my eye is related but different.  James Nored wrote a post yesterday on the Missional Outreach Network website titled “Why are Churches of Christ Shrinking?” I may be over simplifying here but what he says is that a 21st century culture is looking for a more experiential worship service. That’s true. 20’s and 30’s don’t just want to hear 5 hymns, a reading, a prayer, communion and a three part sermon. They want a multisensory experience so that means the lights may be dimmed; there might be a video that sets a theme for the day’s worship. They may need to get up and participate at some point. What Nored is saying is that 20’s and 30’s aren’t going to fight about this. If they are part of churches that refuse to do these things they aren’t going to debate and proof-text resistors, they are just going to leave.
You can say that they are being childish and inconsiderate, whether you’re right or not, Nored’s suggestion for moving forward misses the point. Nored suggests (I am over simplifying here) that we need to have more experiential worship services. Use video and lights more, make things more visually appealing and more experiential. I don’t disagree. Those are helpful for reaching 20-somethings but this isn’t why Churches of Christ are shrinking.
I am reluctant to make sweeping generalizations because no matter how you qualify your statement there are going to be some Churches of Christ that defy your categorization. And the truth is that our tribe has not cornered the market on declining denominations. Churches everywhere are hurting. I will go “big tent Christianity” on this and say, in general, churches are shrinking because we have forgotten the gospel.

We have forgotten that we are loved by a God that treats us better than we deserve. When we consider a worship style as an unforgivable sin we have forgotten how it is that we have been saved – by grace! If not having a praise team is necessary for right standing before God then it is your stance on praise teams that saves you – not the gospel.

If playing a video in worship that has instrumental music in the background is going to be an unforgivable sin that is charged to your account, then you are saved by your righteous use of media and not the gospel. I am not trying to be trite or offensive to make a point (forgive me if this offends, it was not my intent) but if we are saved by grace (Eph 2:8-10) then no worship practice, or doctrinal opinion can make us inelligible for salvation. If it did then having the right doctrinal opinion would be our salvation and not Jesus.

Many churches have forgotten their first loves.  Look at Rev 2:1-7.  The church in Ephesus was legit.  They were doctrinally sound.  They had great leadership and were diligent in weighing people’s conduct against the word.  But Jesus wrecks them on not having a heart that loves him.

Hip and Funk worship will not satisfy forever.  We need to lead worship with excellence.  Yes.  We need to be effective in reaching people who are more experiential and visual. Yes. But we will be the clanging gong or resounding cymbal with out love (1 Cor 13:1).  Love for Jesus and love for each other

I was sorry to read a viral story this morning about a waitress who posted a receipt online on which a pastor crossed out an automatic tip of 18% and wrote in 0% with a comment “I give God 10% why should you get 18%.” Lots of ink has already been spilled on this today and the story has continued to unfold. The waitress was fired from her job later today for “violating their guest’s right to privacy” and the Pastor in question was subsequently tracked down and has apologized saying she “has embarrassed herself and her church.”  So what can we learn about this?

What is actually going on when I tip a waiter or a waitress? Am I trying to save two or three dollars or am I making a statement about who my money really belongs to? I think there is more going on here than meets the eye.  Each one of us preaches a wordless sermon every time you pay a bill at a restaurant. If I flinch at adding three dollars to lunch at the coffee shop am I clutching cash a little too tightly perhaps? My tip is a demonstration of just how much (or perhaps how little) of my heart Jesus actually has a hold of. How well do I understand grace if I can’t let a couple of dollars go?

Len Sweet tweeted today “What if all Christians tipped 50% on 21 May, National Waiter/Waitress Day?” This got me thinking about the missional implications of going to restaurants and coffee shops.

Firstly, whether you are in ministry or not you should make a habit of going to the same places of business (same restaurants, same coffee shops) just so you can get some practice making friends and being a blessing to people.  Particularly those of us in full time ministry need to be extra aware that we represent our faith, and our church community, every time we go out.  I met someone today (whom I thought was a stranger) who told me (you taught me in VBS when I was 4 years old).  Yikes!

As an expression of grace we need to be the best tippers our baristas, waiters and waitresses  have.   We owe it to Jesus to the best customers our local coffee shops have!  Would people roll their eyes whenever Jesus walked in for Carmel macchiato? Extra foam and no tip again? Ya thanks a lot you cheap carpenter!

As a demonstration of how God’s radical generosity toward us has changed who we are, I challenge you to tip extravagantly whenever you can. It will do your heart good and may give you a chance to make Jesus look great too!

If you’ve got two and a half minutes free and want to acquire a splinter in your mind then watch this.

That’s a cool thought! No one on earth has all the knowledge to make a computer mouse.  In the (post)modern world we are necessarily dependent on each other.  So what does this mean?

This got me thinking about how nobody stands completely alone. We all stand in some way on each other’s shoulders. What we understand about the world, and God, and faith, is dependent on what someone has already told us. Nobody has all the information first hand.

I guess what I am trying to say is that if we can accept that none of us have all the answers first hand, maybe we can get better at living in healthy tension with one another. Can you and I be friends and disagree about something? Instead of building our friend groups and faith communities out of people with the exact same opinions on everything, maybe we can cultivate and belong to groups where we don’t agree on everything and that’s O.K.

I’m not saying that faith doesn’t matter or that there is no such thing as absolute truth. What I am saying is that in the 21st century we need to embrace the fact that you and I can belong to a church together and have different opinions and share them with each other in love, and we don’t have to pit our ideas against each other like an ideological cock fight and see which one wins. Fifty years ago my grandparents were kicked out of a church because they had a different opinion about how the Holy Spirit communicates with a believer. Can we agree to disagree about issues of intense personal opinion and still be brothers? Can we still be friends?

Today is the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, issued in the middle of the US Civil war, which abolished slavery in the ten southern states who were still in rebellion against the Northern Union. Freedom for slaves in other states came a few years later but anyone familiar with American (and Canadian) history knows that abolishing slavery and eliminating it are two different things.

The nature of slavery in the twenty-first century is more elusive and vague. By virtue of a much, much larger global population today, there are more slaves in the world now than any time in the past (as many as 27 million), and most of the modern day slaves are trapped by poverty in some form of sexual predation or economic bondage. In the twenty-first century, the chains are invisible.  The chains are extortion, coercion, and a systematic denial of economic rights, and it doesn’t just happen in other countries.  It happens here in Canada and the US.

At 17 years old, Eve escaped her trafficker after two and a half years of sexual slavery, but instead of hiding she went to the police. She led them to where her trafficker kept another 14-year-old girl in a motel room. As a result, the police arrested Imani Nakpangi of Niagara Falls. Eve’s courage led to Canada’s first ever human trafficking conviction in May 2008. However, Nakpangi only received a sentence of five years in prison. Nakpangi earned more than $360,000 over the time in which he exploited Eve. His illicit profits were used to purchase himself a BMW and a large home in Niagara Falls. Nakpangi brutally controlled Eve by assaulting her and threatening to kidnap her brother if she ever “got out of line”. Stories like this continue to happen, (click here, here or here) especially in border towns between Canada and the US.

Christians would like to point to people like William Wilberforce, British member of Parliament who led the abolitionist cause in the UK in the 19th century, and say that the church has been at the center of freeing slaves for over 200 years but the truth of the matter is that “the slave trade was driven largely by Christians for Christian consumers.”  Geoff Tunnicliff of the World Evangelical Alliance recalls a visit he made a few years ago to Ghana. “There was a castle where slaves were held downstairs. Right above them was a church. Here you had a group of worshiping people and below them were a thousand slaves! That’s a kind of bifurcated view of the world we sometimes have.” Christians need to confess our involvement in slavery today and choose to be part of the solution, but how?

When I can buy a shirt at Walmart for $2.99 I need to ask myself, “who is paying for this shirt?”  This shirt costs more than $3 so either the retailer is taking a loss (it’s marked down to make room for new stock) or it is likely that someone out there is being underpaid to make that shirt.  Is it made in a sweatshop by children? A pound of name brand coffee grounds costs $6 and the same amount of from a fair trade brand is $12. Why such a difference?

You can easily drive yourself mad questioning every purchase you make wondering if it economically disadvantages someone.  I am resigned to the fact that I can’t know everything about every product I buy but there are some small things I can do that can help.  Julie and I have decided that we will no longer buy coffee unless it is certified to be fair trade.  Fair trade certified coffee is grown in economic partnership with farmers in a way that is environmentally responsible, in many cases carbon neutral, and sustainable for the farmer.

The Emancipation Proclamation is a political document, a product of the US Civil war, but it is also a reminder of a promise to oppose human objectification in every form.  It was a promise that Kevin Bales, author of Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy reminds us that we have to continue to keep, “When I looked closely [at slavery] I realized we didn’t finish the job. We didn’t carry through on our commitment. That’s something I had to think through carefully as a spiritual person and carry that question to my faith community and ask, ‘What are we going to do about the fact that we made a promise?’ ”

In the past Christians helped lead a campaign to abolish slavery.  It’s time to do it again.

• Canadian Nation Action Plan on Human Trafficking
• Trafficking Fact Sheet

Blogger Craig T. Owens tweeted a couple of weeks ago, “Jesus didn’t say, ‘Poor people and other outcasts, find yourself a church!’ but ‘church people, find yourself the poor and the outcasts.’”  I love that quote.  It captures what I meant a couple of  weeks ago when I said that the missional shift requires churches to give up a sense of entitlement and control. In the 21st century, it is becoming increasingly true that the church is not the cultural center of the community.

That’s what Christians are really upset about when a court ruling says that you can’t have the 10 Commandments in the courthouse, or when you can’t start a town council meeting with the Lord’s prayer. We are grieving our loss of control.  The church used to call the shots.  It used to be near the center of cultural power, but now, in places that don’t have Chick-fil-a restaurants, it’s not (more on that later).

Missional theology is often described in contrast to an “attractional” approach to church. Attractional church says, “come and see” while missional church says “go and be.” With attractional church, it is the church that calls the shots.  We have home court advantage.  We invite “outsiders” in and get them to do all the border crossing.

Missional church goes out and yields control to the surrounding community. A missional church does not call the shots but seeks to discern what God is up to and then join in.  A minister friend of mine took a role as the team pastor in a local softball league.  Rather than trying to dictate a more biblical title (I am told that the word  ‘pastor’ is not in the Bible) he accepted the role as an invitation by Jesus Christ to be salt and light in his community.

Whatever your model (attractional or missional), the key is not to make church look great but to make Jesus look great.  Our hope is not found in relevance, but in Jesus Christ – and that is going to require us to experiment a little, and bravely let go of the wheel. Control is over-rated.

One insight for churches and church leaders caused by the missional shift is how they view evangelism; not how the DO evangelism, but how they see it. Missional churches have a clearer picture of what evangelism looks like in the 21st century. Communications has changed in the past 50 years. Transportation has changed in the past 50 years. Technology has changed (!?!?!) why wouldn’t evangelism change?

God has not changed and the gospel has not changed but the handles that people use to grasp it have changed. For teens and young adults especially, they need to be reached through a ministry of word AND a ministry of deed.

A ministry of word is the proclamation of the Gospel. It is preaching, or conversation, or discussion about the gospel. Too many churches think this is where evangelism starts and ends. When post-moderns see a church practicing a ministry of word only, they interpret it as a sales pitch. They say to themselves, “these people are only interested in growing their own church.” When evangelism is practiced as a ministry of word only, your surrounding community will only see evangelism as recruitment and an effort to consolidate power.

A ministry of deed is serving the needs of your community. It is feeding the hungry, advocating for those who don’t have a voice. A ministry of deed is being the hands and feet of Jesus Christ. Some churches think this is all there is to evangelism. They serve in the name of Jesus but fail to give people a reason for the hope that you have (1 Pet 3:15). Evangelism as a ministry of deed only, fails to give hope.  Jesus called this “bread that spoils” (John 6:27). Don’t get me wrong! I believe evangelism includes deeds, I might even argue, in a post-modern context, evangelism must start with deeds, but deeds are not enough.

Evangelism in the 21st century needs both: word and deed. When you do both, they interact and stimulate each other. It is hard to do both. No matter who you are there is always one you are tempted to neglect. Being a disciple maker (our primary calling according to Matt 28:19-20) involves doing both deed and word ministry.

But don’t take it from me! Tim Keller, minister to the Redeemer Presbyterian Church of Manhattan has tons of advice on how to be evangelistic in the 21st century.

A couple of people responded to my post last week by asking me to define what I think missional means, at least when I use it.  So here goes:

Being a missional church means participating with God in what God is doing in the world.

There are a couple of assumptions buried in that definition that bear explaining:

God is active in the world. My mom used to teach Grade 1 and I have visited her class on occasion.  It was fun watching 6 year-olds suddenly realize that my mom had a life outside of the classroom.  “You have a son?  You have a house?  I thought you lived here in this classroom!”  Because the kids never saw my mom outside that classroom, never thought of her outside that classroom, they thought, acted and lived like she didn’t exist outside of that context.

I’m sure that we all agree that God is not caught inside of our church buildings. No building can hold God (Acts 7:48-49) but most of us live and act as though God lives at church and we visit Him on Sundays. How do we describe our work week?  Like a perilous run through temptation and oppression relieved by a respite on Sunday.  I hear people all the time talk about coming to church to “recharge their batteries.”  Church as a fueling station assumes that God (and life and energy for the journey) is only found in the church building.  The church building is God’s domain.  The big, bad, Monday – Saturday world belongs to the Devil.

What if God lived everywhere and was actively engaged in the salvation of the world? (Consider Eph 1:3-10)  What if God was involved in the events of your neighbour’s life setting you up to provide comfort and care in a time of need? That is what being missional is all about.  It is living in anticipation of what God is actively doing in your surroundings.  It’s living attentively.

But how can we see what God is up to?  That’s what the Holy Spirit is doing (that’s a subject for another blog post entirely).

The Church is not the mission of God. We have slipped into a backwards way of seeing the church. For too long we have believed that setting up the Church was point of Jesus dying on the cross.  The church then, has a mission: to go and add everyone in the world to the church.

Missional theology corrects this misunderstanding:  David Bosch writes, “mission is not primarily an activity of the church, but an attribute of God. God is a missionary God.” (see p. 389 of Transforming Mission). Jurgen Moltman adds, “It is not the church that has a mission of salvation to fulfill in the world; it is the mission of the Son and the Spirit through the Father that includes the church.” (p. 64 in The Church in the Power of the Spirit)

The church doesn’t have a mission, God does.  Jesus Christ is the cornerstone of that mission and, as we are added to the community of faith that believes in the word of Jesus Christ, we begin our participation in that mission.  Alan Hirsch describes the church as “agents of God’s mission” (see p. 82 of The Forgotten Ways). God’s mission comes first, and the church is part of that mission. More about missional theology, church, and our need for control later.

This radically changes how we view power and influence.  If the church was the point of God’s interaction with the world then shrinking churches is a HUGE problem.  It means that God is losing the struggle for control of the world!  On the other hand, if God’s mission is moving forward and the church is shrinking, that means that the church (or more accurately, our part of that church) is becoming less and less involved in God’s mission.