Ashamed of the Gospel

I just came back the other day from Colorado Springs for my fourth EDGE summit. It was by far my favorite one for reasons I may or may not elaborate on further in the future.

One of the things that I brought back from summit was actually something I brought to the summit. We had to do a Bible study before we arrived, and it was on our calling to ministry. The first questions asked about verses that God used to call us. I’ve written about how God really put Isaiah 6:1-8 on my heart before on here, and this was of course one of the verses I’ve used. So, I went back read it. I decided to look at the whole chapter instead of just the first 8 verses (which is only an additional 5 verses). I was struck by the difference between myself and the person whose calling I kinda jackmoved.

After God asks who will go out for Him and Isaiah volunteers, God tells Isaiah the message he’s going to be giving. Verses 9 and 10 make it seem really hopeless. Blinding eyes, deafening ears, and dulling hearts is not a really good message. But Isaiah doesn’t say, “Gee, God, um, that’s not a really good message to be giving people. Maybe You wanna give them a more hopeful message.” No, that’s not what he said. His response? “How long, O Lord?”

Really Isaiah? “How long?” You hear what you have to tell people, and you ask God how long you should do it? No hesitation? I have a more hopeful message than that, and I’m hesitant to share it. I tell people that they can meet their maker, but not in a bad way. I tell people that God came down to earth to build a bridge between God and man. I tell people that they can live eternally with God, who cares for and loves them deeply. I tell people that there’s hope, love, grace, and peace. And yet, I don’t want to go up and tell people about that. That’s uncomfortable. That’s unnatural. That’s not what I wanna do. My natural response isn’t “how long?” It’s more, “Do I have to?”

This was on my mind a lot at the summit and still is. It got me asking a lot of “why” questions. Why am I ashamed of the gospel? I look at Romans 1:16, and it doesn’t make sense. Why should anyone be ashamed of the gospel? What’s there to be ashamed of? What aspect of the gospel is shame-worthy? People are ashamed of their pasts, of the things they’ve done, of the things they regret. I don’t understand why we are ashamed of the gospel.

Yet we are, and I include myself in that. I don’t quite get it. There are other things that I share with others so willingly, but the gospel? Uh, maybe later. That thing that gives life, that sets the captives free, that brings man to the relationship with God that he should have had from the beginning--yeah, that I’ll keep to myself.

Every summit, I buy a book that I fully intend to read but never do, and this summit was not an exception. While in the very popular Glen Eyrie bookstore, a John MacArthur book caught my eye. It’s called Ashamed of the Gospel. I bought it because I think it describes a current trend in the Church and in my life. I don’t want that to be true, but it is. I pray that this will stop being true. I want to love Jesus more than I love being comfortable. I want to be able to speak the words in Romans 1:16 with the confidence that I see in Paul. I don’t want Jesus to be ashamed of me because I was ashamed of Him.

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. -Romans 1:16

Real quick prayer request

I have an outreach thing going on tonight. Click here to see how you can be praying for it. Thanks.

Black is as black does

I'm a firm believer that very few good things happen after midnight (or 2:30 if you're on college student time). Here's a story supporting that.

Some time in the last week or two, I got off work at 3:00am. I wasn't too thrilled with this. But, whatareyougonnado, right? I'd gone on break early that night and was kinda hungry when I got off. I wrestled with whether I should just go straight home or stop by the local Fry's Food & Drug, which is conveniently open 24 hours a day. I went for the latter. I didn't want anything too big. Just a thing of cottage cheese (which is probably one of my favorite dairy products ever created).

So, I drive slightly out of my way to go to Fry's. I hop out of my car, and hear people in a nearby truck calling out to me. Remember, it's past 3 in the morning at this point, so while normally if this were to happen, I would do what you're supposed to do whenever "Stranger Danger" approaches (stop, drop, and roll, right?), I instead approached to see what these gentlemen wanted.

I never got their names, so I'll call them Anton and Tyrone. Anton, in the passenger seat, told me that he and Tyrone, the driver, were well overage to be purchasing alcohol, but Fry's for some reason would not accept their out-of-state licenses. Now, this store is about a mile and a half south of a campus that attracts many out-of-state students, so for them not to accept licenses from said students makes about as much sense as a vegan making honey barbecue chicken for dinner with a side of cheesy eggs and a glass of warm deer blood. I told them that I didn't think that that made sense, and they agreed. Anton then asked if I could be a dear and purchase said alcohol for him and his friend. While I did believe that they were of the legal age to drink, I politely declined their request, because I just wanted to get in, grab my cottage cheese, and get out. I didn't want to deal with anything else. Tyrone then asks, "Are you black?" I was confused at this question because I figured that his eyes worked fine since he was the driver and anyone whose eyes work even remotely can tell that I am. Because I was confused, I asked, "What does that have to do with anything?" Again, this is something that I probably wouldn't do had it not been 3:15 in the morning. Anton interjected, "Just answer. Are you black?" I told them what their eyes had already let them know--that, yes, I am indeed black. For some reason, we stayed on the subject of what race I was. "Black and what?" Anton questioned. "I'm just black," I clarified, wondering if they were maybe census takers in their down time. Tyrone then instructed me, "Then take yo' black self* on!" as they drove away to another parking spot to ask someone else to purchase their beverages for them.

I continued into the Fry's to purchase my cottage cheese (with pineapple!) and nothing else. I was very surprised at myself for giving the amount of attitude that I gave them, which usually would not happen if I weren't tired. I was also slightly annoyed and angry at Anton and Tyrone's insistence that I owed them some kind of favor because I'm black. Maybe I missed the black people meeting, but I don't see how I am in any way obligated to do something for someone else because we have similar amounts of melanin.

Let this be a warning to all reading this: if you are ever approached by 2 black fellows in a truck at 3:15 in the morning in a Fry's parking lot, don't go near them. Be sensible and stop, drop, and roll.

*Some words in the narrative have been changed for the readers' sake.

Letter from Zacchaeus

Dear Jason,

This is your car, Zacchaeus. I just wanted to write to you because of something that I think is cause for concern. Usually, I stay relatively silent (except, of course, for that sound I constantly make whenever you drive me), but I had to speak up.

Now, before I start, I want you to know that I like you. I really enjoy that you drive me, that you're concerned whenever I bottom out, and even that you call me by name. I really do enjoy all that. I'm glad I can be blessing to you by taking you wherever you need to go.

Yes, Thursday was not my best day. My left arm (I believe you called it my "front tire" or something like that) deflated. I needed a new one. Yeah, you were upset, but at the same time concerned. It's good to want to take care of things. It's called being a good steward. But I think there's a fine line between stewardship and idol worship.

Whoa, that's right, I went there! See, I remember when you first got me. You wouldn't listen to the radio because you were always talking to God. You would start yelling at other drivers and then stop yourself and pray for them. You would praise, you would confess, you would talk to God about stuff I didn't want to know. But it was good. You thanked God for your salvation, for your job, for me.

What happened? Now you just yell at other drivers while you listen to your radio. You talk to me more than you talk to God. I mean, I'm awesome. But I'm a car. I was made in a factory. The God of heaven and earth knit you in your mother's womb. You were woven by Him. He made you and knows you deeply. And you have a chance to talk to Him. And yet you choose to talk to me instead? You get what I say about idolatry?

I feel like my left arm got deflated because you weren't paying attention to God, and you know how jealous He is. He wants the glory. He deserves the glory. I was the blessing. He's the Fount of every blessing. So he took me away temporarily. But was that enough for you to turn to Him?

No, it wasn't. So He flattened my replacement arm. The next night. And you called Josiah to come pick you up, but he didn't answer. It was only then, when you were forced to walk about a half mile alone, that you talked to God. That's whack, man. Why did it take Him flattening my arm twice to get you to worship Him? Seriously, Jason, what made you stop relying on God and start relying on yourself? You've done it before. Plenty of times. And it never turns out well. If you're trying to live your life, go to the one who created it.

Honestly, Jason, I'm glad that you're driving me again and that you've turned the radio off. It's not bad to sing, but your priorities were out of whack. I'm glad to see they're turning back in the right direction. Please keep it up. I'll be really pissed if something more traumatic than a flattened arm has to happen to me for you to recognize God.

Sincerely,
Zacchaeus, the Wee Little Car

Here I Am to Worship

It's been far too long since I've posted. I apologize. I'm making a new (school) year's resolution to get on this more.

Anyway, I was talking with my homeboy Richdawg the other day. He and I were talking about worship at our Nav Nites and what it's gonna look like. I won't go into too much detail about what we talked about because if I told you, I'd have to kill you (and you don't wanna get killed, do you?), but we did talk about some songs that we like and some songs that we don't. Actually, moreso the latter than the former. We wanted to make a list of worship songs that we weren't going to be doing this year, whether we dislike the simplicity of the song, the incoherency, the cheesiness, or the theological implications. For example...

Come, Now is the Time to Worship
This is my all time least favorite worship song ever. I've heard someone remark that it sounds Universalist ("One day every tongue will confess You are God, one day every knee will bow"). That's definitely true if you're not familiar with Philippians 2, but I'm willing to overlook that since it's based on Scripture. My beef is the implications of what I'm singing. Essentially, I'm saying, "Yes, Jesus, every person living and dead will one day acknowledge your deity, but for those who recognize it this side of the grave are gonna have partay while those who wait too long are gonna suffer in hell. Sucks to be y'all!" At least that's how I feel when I sing it. I feel like "Still the greatest treasure remains for those who gladly choose You now" is the lyrical equivalent of spitting in the face of the lost.

Mighty to Save
I don't really dislike this song all that much, but there are a few things that are nigh unforgivable about it. For one, the verses don't rhyme. That's not the biggest deal, I know, but I feel like writing something that doesn't rhyme is kinda lazy. And it wouldn't bother me nearly as much if the song was coherent. You would think that "Mighty to Save" is about how God saves us throughout the song. But you don't really get that. The first part of the first verse talks about our need for compassion, love, and mercy. The second part does talk about our need for forgiveness, but "the hope of nations" doesn't really fit in right there. The second verse isn't much better. It talks about Him taking us as we are and then how we will surrender everything to follow Him. Even looking at the chorus, I feel like we're talking about how God is mighty, not mighty to save. Don't get me wrong. I like all the stuff that the song talks about. But it's not one coherent thought. It's all over the place. And if you're gonna be all over the place, at least rhyme.

Revelation Song
Richdawg and I actually agree that this is a really good song. We both like it a lot, except one line: "Clothed in rainbows of living color." What? Someone in a forum wrote that they imagine a unicorn prancing across the stage when we sing that line. There's a chance that we'll do this one at Nav Nite, but that line will be modified, like with what Crowder did with the "sloppy wet kiss" part of an otherwise good song.

Do you have a song I should add to the list? Or do you maybe have a reason for why one of these songs shouldn't be on the list? Let's discuss. What are your thoughts?

Who Am I?

One of my favorite stupid comedies of all time is Zoolander. In it, Derek Zoolander is dismayed when he loses the status of #1 male model to Hansel ("he's so hot right now"). After the ceremony that puts Hansel above Derek, he's seen walking the streets, not knowing what to do with his life. He looks at a reflection of himself and asks, "Who am I?" His reflection answers, "I don't know."

I think, although this is a wildly stupid Ben Stiller movie, that this scene speaks volumes about human thinking. Derek was so distraught that he'd been dethroned as the top male model that he questioned who he was. He was lost. He'd been at that spot for the past four years, and when that was taken away, so was his identity. He looked to his own reflection and wondered what, if not the top male model, was he.

God made us all different. He gave us all different gifts, different abilities, different interests. These are good things that the good Lord has blessed us with, and some of them can even help describe who we are. But when those good things of the Lord stop describing us and start defining us, we've misused those gifts. When our identity is wrapped in the temporal blessing rather than the infinite God who blesses, we're doomed to fail.

There are so many adjectives we use to describe ourselves that we can easily take on as our name. Black, white, fat, thin, tall, short, athletic, musically-inclined, gay, straight, student, minister, doctor, poet, author, blogger, hippie, Republican, Democrat, reader, gamer, sinner, saint, ugly, pretty, misshapen, whatever else you can think of to put here. Good or bad, we run into trouble when we let these define us, when these things consume us and we let them become all that we are.

In biblical times, names meant more than what they mean now. In Genesis 35, we see God change Jacob's name essentially from Deceiver to One Who Struggles with God. Later on in that same chapter, we see Jacob change his own son's name from Ben-Oni ("Son of my sorrows," given to him by his mother's dying breath) to Benjamin ("Son of my right hand"). I think these instances of renaming are beautiful pictures of what God does. We can take up as our names our struggles, or what we dislike about ourselves, or even what we like about ourselves. But God comes in and says, "No, I have something better for you. You are Mine. You are My beloved child, whom I love. I bought you with the blood of My one and only Son whom I love dearly. The cost was great, but I don't regret it. Shake off that old self; that's not who you are. I'll tell you who you are. You are a beloved child of the Most High."

I know I struggle with labeling myself by my talents or my failures or whatever thing I choose to listen to about myself. But, as Tyler Durden says in Fight Club, "You are not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet." Where Tyler fails to give a "You are" amidst all the "You are not," Jesus steps in and says, "You are My beloved."

For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, "Abba! Father!" The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. -Romans 8:15-17

Is there such a thing as too much grace?

I haven't blasted a public Christian figure since Pat Robertson's stupid comments on Haiti. I think it's time to remedy that.

I recently heard on Twitter, Facebook, and other social media that Ted Haggard was starting a church in Colorado Springs. He's a pastor that came into the limelight in 2006 when a male prostitute made it public that Haggard had been paying him for sex and drugs for three years. Haggard (wisely) stepped down from leadership in his megachurch and kinda disappeared for a while.

Well, he's back. What started off as prayer meetings in his house turned into St. James Church (even though he assured us in April that he would not be starting a church). At St. James, "Everyone is welcome: Democrat, Republican, gay, straight, bi, addicts, tall, short."

I read a blog by someone who actually knows Haggard. Mike, from People of the Second Chance, stated that "at the end of the day I believe in radical grace. And I will forever be a champion of second chances, seemingly lost causes, and the prodigals that no one believes in."

When you put it like that, it seems unchristian to disagree. We are all broken people that God chooses to use despite of, not because of, ourselves. Why should I deny Haggard the grace that I so often need and get?

The simple answer is I shouldn't. And I don't. I definitely don't think that Haggard should be denied grace. That would be playing God, something which I don't want to do and frankly am not good at. I just have to ask, how far do we carry this grace? Jason Boyett, a blogger and author who I read though I more often than not disagree with him, had deep trouble with Haggard's dishonesty with the whole thing. He also asked if 3 years was enough time to recover. I agree, and want to go a step further. I think a role in church leadership should be completely out of the question. Extending grace does not mean making just anyone clergy. God set up some rules for who should be considered an overseer of the local church. I don't see Haggard in that. Maybe he's learned self-control since leaving New Life Church. Maybe he's quit drugs and is sober-minded. Maybe he's learned how to handle his household (although I read that instead of trying to find a job he was asking for donations so he could support his family and take classes online). Verse 7, however is the real kicker, which says that the overseer should have good standing with those outside the church. I don't see that one happening. His sin was too public and hypocritical to be ignored. Furthermore, I would like to see what would happen if he joined another church and tried to join their pastoral staff. If this were to happen, and he got accepted instead of laughed at (if I were on that pastoral hiring committee, there would be much laughter), I would eat my right shoe.

I think we as Christians and recipients of such amazing grace should show grace to others who need it. But not so much grace that we are ignoring God's laws and ultimately causing harm to others. I think then we are showing a bit too much grace.