Protestant Pastors and Creation Care

Interesting new research from Ed Stetzer & Co. A LifeWay Research study breaks down protestant pastors' views on most divisive environmental issue as well as how often they address creation care from their pulpit. Clear divisions among political and theological lines. Read the study news release.

Has your pastor ever addressed creation care from the pulpit? If so, what kind of church do you attend?

Marquees and Messages

On my way to speak at a college retreat in St. George Island this past February, I stopped to refuel in Carabelle, FL. It was a quaint little seaside town that was more Georgia than Florida in many ways, not the least of which being the ginormous trucks filled with rednecks aplenty. As I was walking into the gas station to pay for my overpriced octane, I happened to glance up the road and see First Baptist Church Carabelle. It was a small, red brick building with a modest white steeple. It had all the architectural features that come standard on Baptist churches, including a hand-loaded marquee out front.

I was walking at a considerable pace until I read the marquee. I stopped dead in my tracks as I read the message:

"The wicked shall be turned into hell,

And all the nations that forget God"

The only thing missing was:

"XOXO,

FBC FAMILY"

As a lifelong Baptist, I was embarrassed; as a follower of Jesus Christ, I was saddened.

When I posted this on my Facebook status and called them a "clueless Southern Baptist church," the comments were heated. One person noted that they were only "as clueless as the writer of Psalm 9" because the marquee was merely quoting Psalm 9:17. Another asked, "Isn't God's word powerful enough to reach today's younger generation?" Another commented that if the marquee reaches just one person, then it was worth it.

But these comments really miss the point, don't they? The point isn't whether or not the message was from the Bible. I can think of several Old Testament verses about stoning gays or avoiding sex during menstruation that I wouldn't place on a marquee with no context or explanation. The point isn't whether or not God's word is powerful. The power of God's word is in the message of God's word. That message is that our sin demands a Savior, and Jesus was the Savior that was sent to give us hope for eternal life and a purpose for living. Does Psalm 9:17 with no context accurately reflect that message? No. The point also isn't whether or not we can reach "just one." I can only imagine the person who made that comment going into an advertising firm and coming up with an offensive ad campaign. When she is asked if she has lost her freakin' mind, she says, "Well, if it reaches just one person, it will be worth it." That kind of logic is grounds to be Donald Trumped. Even if that marquee could reach one, and I think that would be a feat, would it be worth the masses who will be turned off to the faith forever?

The point is this: As followers of Jesus Christ, we are on this earth to share the Gospel and serve others. Sharing only about our sin is sharing a half-Gospel. In a time when people are looking for hope, preaching a half-Gospel is not only ineffective, it is poor stewardship of the message we have been given. Don't get me wrong. The fact that we are all sinners is important. In fact, it is critical because it stresses our need for a Savior. But alone, it is only a message of discouragement and condemnation, which fails to communicate the central tenet of our faith.

I love the words of Cornelius Plantinga, President of Calvin Theological Seminary:

"To concentrate on our rebellion, defection, and folly--to say to the world, 'I have some bad news and I have some bad news'--is to forget that the center of the Christian religion is not our sin but our Savior."

A marquee, a mass mailing, a web site--these are primary touchpoints for people in the 21st century. You may only get one shot at telling someone what following Christ means, and what you say might shape the way they view the Church, the gospel, and even Jesus Christ for the rest of their lives. What message will you choose? A message of condemnation or a message of salvation? Will you give them only the bad news or will you give them the good news?

Silly Pastors, Tricks Are for Kids

Faith and politics often collide, but this time massive legal fallout seems imminent. Tomorrow, a group of 30 uber-conservative pastors backed by the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal organization, will endorse Republican Presidential Nominee John McCain from their church pulpits. Jerry Falwell is smiling from the grave.

What is their goal? Is it to drum up support for one candidate in a tight race? Is it to guide their congregants to a more educated decision come November? No. Their stated goal is to incite a court fight with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) regulation which forbids tax-exempt entities like churches from doing such things. (See "Pastors Buck Ban on Pulpit Politics" for the full story.)

Perhaps the IRS regulation is unfair or unconstitutional. Perhaps not. Regardless, this surely isn't the best way to engage the issue. As a Church-loving follower of Christ, I am disturbed for a couple of reasons. 

First, this stunt is stupid. I wish I could think of a more eloquent way to say it, but I think "stupid" works well. The actions of these pastors put their churches in jeopardy of losing their tax-exempt status. If that happens, they will rob their congregants of the tax break that they would have earned from their contributions.

Even beyond the stupidity, this stunt runs contrary to the ministry calling. The call to ministry is a call to unite, not divide. And it is a call to engage all who need the Gospel. Don't we want to minister to Democrats or only Republicans? By endorsing Senator McCain from their pulpits, these podunk pastors slam the church door in the face of all the Democrats in their community. 

This self-serving, self-glorifying stunt is a not-so-subtle reminder that there is still a cohort within the church that aligns itself with a particular political party and alienates those who don't fall in line. These people act with utter disregard to the message of the Gospel, the ministry of Jesus Christ, and the consequences of their actions within the community. Sad.

What do you think?

Convergent . . . Whatever that means

I hate labels. Evangelical, emergent, emergING, post-modern, conservative -- each of these has become so nebulous and subjective that they have little meaning left in them. Unfortunately, no matter how much we loathe them, contemporary language is so saturated with labels that they are really inescapable. Therefore, we need to understand what they mean (as best we can).

Some of the most misunderstood words among Christian commentators and laypersons are "emerging" and "emergent." Perhaps, they are familiar least of all to Southern Baptists. Southern Baptists often exhibit some kind of skiddish, toy terrier-like fear about addressing or even acknowledging anything from anyone they consider to be a part of one of these two camps (not that most of them could tell you the difference between the two).

You can imagine how surprising it was when Dr. Danny Akin decided to host a conference (ambiguously named "Convergent") dialoguing about the Emerging Church on the campus of Southeastern. Aside from the name, one must commend both Dr. Akin and the Southeastern staff for having the guts to put on such an important event. At least some Southern Baptists are willing to get in the game! Southern Baptists have begun a significant conversation, and it is imperative that is ongoing.

Guests included Ed Stetzer (Missiologist / Director of LifeWay Research), Mark Driscoll (Progressive Pastor of Mars Hill Church / President of Acts 29), Danny Akin (President of Southeastern), Tyler Jones (Pastor of Vintage 21), JD Greear (Pastor of The Summit Church), and Alvin Reid (Professor of Evangelism, Southeastern).

Perhaps the most surprising moment was the 1+ hr. lecture given by Mark Driscoll that included a polemic against Emergent leaders like Doug Pagitt, Brian McLaren, Rob Bell and others. I encourage you to download it and judge for yourself.

For those of you who did not attend, I am listing some of the more memorable quotes. Please leave me your reactions to any of this.

Mark Driscoll
-"I believe total depravity is for optimists -- that's how much of a Calvinist I am."

-"It is always best to pick dead mentors because they don't disappoint."

-"When God speaks, we are not to converse. We are to obey."

-Responding to Brian McLaren's refusal to comment on homosexuality for fear of "huting someone on either side": "Then I say, 'Now you have hurt God' because God has spoken on this issue with great clarity."

-"Brian McLaren now has an organization called 'Deep Shift.' I think someone inadvertently put an 'f' in there."

-"There is now no clarifying, theological doctrine that defines evangelicalism."

-"If you are thirsty for theology, may I suggest that you not drink from the toilet even though there is water there."

-"It is foolish reductionism to say that culture equals worldliness."

-"The world is not full of good guys and bad guys; It is full of bad guys and Jesus."

Danny Akin
-"The needs of others will outweigh the desires of my own heart."

-"We have a Biblically illiterate church . . . especially within the SBC."

-"Love is the fulcrum that balances freedom and responsibility."

-"We are raising a generation that is theologically ignorant . . . and our churches are suffering."

Ed Stetzer
-"Think about your friends who first embraced comtemporary church culture. Are they still welcome in Southern Baptist Convention life? Mine aren't."

-"People never change until the pain of staying the same grows greater than the pain of changing."

-"The reason there is an Emerging Church is because the Church in North America is failing . . . people are calling for a new expression of the Church."

-"John Maxwell is like Jesse Jackson for white people."

-"The bride is not pretty right now, but you cannot love Jesus and hate his wife."

-"People are losing confidence in the church and then losing confidence in the Gospel."

-"We have got to move away from anything that furthers the try harder mantality in the church. The Gospel is not try harder. It is die to self and live freely."

Mark Leiderbach
-"The Great Commission is more important than beer."

JD Greear
-"Love is probably the most affective apologetic."

-"There will be much joy in our cities when our message is accompanied with tangible acts of its beauty."

Now's Your Chance; Take a Swing

It is almost trendy these days to take a jab at the church. Floods of books have come out from gentle restoratives to outright polemics. Some regularly take her to task on public blogs while others just give her a good pop when no one is looking. Regardless, it is undeniable that there is a generation of disgruntled, dissilusioned followers who feel like the church could be doing a lot better job fulfilling its divine roles. If you are dissatisfied with the church in any way, I want to give you a voice.

I am working on an article for RELEVANT called "The Battered Bride." It is going to address all the charges that our generation is bringing against the church. For those of you who think the church has broken down, this is your chance to play the mechanic and diagnose the problem (minus all the fabricated stuff you'd trick old people into thinking is wrong if you really were a mechanic). If you feel like the church has let you down or somehow hasn't met your expectations, now is your chance to vent. Leave me a detailed explanation of your feelings, longings, opinions.

Do you feel like the church is Christlike?

Is the church greedy?

Is the church too political?

Does the church really care about the needy and the helpless?

Do you ever feel like other people of other faiths unknowingly and more accurately display a Christlike lifestyle?

Can the church be redeemed? What must be done?

How Big is God? Bigger than an Elephant?

I don’t believe God is politically partisan. I know we like to shore up our egos with visions of God marching with us to the ballot box and guiding our hand to vote one party exclusively, but the older I get the more ludicrous that seems.

Like many evangelical children, growing up I demonized Democrats as venomous reprobates—they were “Godless” as Ann Coulter has so gently described them. If a Democrat ever made it into office, then I naturally thought the inmates would be allowed to roam the streets and communism would choke out democracy in the West. With Democrats in power, I thought, citizens would be required to take the mark of the beast and our society would disintegrate into something reminiscent of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. The names that scared me most growing up were Michael Dukakis, Bill Clinton and, of course, Ted Kennedy.

It is ironic that the person who would change my warped perspective would actually BE a Kennedy. This week, I had the pleasure of speaking on the telephone with Kathleen Kennedy Townsend. Kathleen is the eldest daughter of Robert Kennedy and a woman of deep faith. Her manner is disarmingly generous and amicable.

I have just finished reading her book, Failing America's Faithful: How today's churches are mixing God with politics and losing their way, and found it to be convicting and compelling. I do not recommend every book I read, but I do recommend this one. Though her theology and politics are often disagreeable, the book will challenge you to think no matter how you vote or where you worship. And believe it or not, she is often very balanced.

Here are some examples of her insight:

"...the good life did not come just from following the rules and resisting temptations--after all, Jesus did not follow the rules--but from taking our faith out of our houses of worship and putting it into practice."

"...evangelical churches in some ways have the opposite problem: They touch people personally so they are growing by leaps and bounds; they have helped many people turn their lives around; they have created communities where members feel a great deal of connectedness and spirituality, and where they are given help with real life issues...Any yet they, too, are building up walls of fear, protecting these "sacred" communities from the more profane influences of modern-day America."

"The right pretends that virtuous activity occurs only in the sphere of private behavior, not through governmental intervention. In fact they seem to think governmental intervention is appropriate only for overturning previous governement decisions that they disagree with--e.g., ban on school prayer...The well-organized and politically-attuned Religious Right pointedly ignores Christ's admonition that we should care for the "least among us" when it withdraws from those arenas where government has had a traditional role, such as civil rights, adjusting tax policy, and supporting social programs that can improve the daily life of the poor. Among the leaders of the left, we find a different malady. They are obsessed with keeping religion out of the public sphere, demanding a perfect purging of faith from public life far beyond what our Founding Fathers meant by "separation of church and state." This obsession with secularism weakens their moral authority...It makes leaders of the left sound intellectual but without passion. The danger of not engaging religious teachings in the drive for social reform might be worse than condemning them."

Kathleen offers a sobering charge to those of us who wave the banner of our faith but refuse to fulfill Christ's call to care for the less fortunate and unprotected. We cannot only support governmental intervention to enforce the two or three issues we feel flow from our faith--abortion, stem cell research, etc.--and refuse to support progressive policies that are just as ingrained in Christianity--justice, generosity towards the poor, protecting the environment, etc. We cannot blindly support a war on terror and change the channel when the anchor speaks of Darfur. Furthermore, we cannot live as though the party we support has a monopoly on God's blessing. Not every Democrat is "Godless," and God is bigger than donkeys and elephants.

I Go to Church in My Boxers

The morning comes too quickly. Barely awake, you drag out of bed to get ready to go to school or church or work. You don't remember much about the ride, it is almost as if you warped to your destination. Just when you walk into the business meeting or get up to give your book report, you realize you aren't wearing any clothes! Your body jolts as you snap back to reality (thanks for the line, Eminem) and realize that you were having a nightmare. Everyone has had that dream or one like it, but modern technology is making it a less-terrifying reality.

Online courses really hit the scene in the late 1990's. Soon these popular, user-friendly programs made schools like Strayer University and University of Phoenix multi-million dollar educational operations. Now, people go to school without their clothes on everyday. Advances in occupational networking and increased commute times leads many employers to offer telecommuting to employees. Telecommuters can simply roll out of bed and attend virtual meetings in pre-shower pajamas.

The one place that has not gone fully e-friendly was the Church - until now. With the emergence of online communities like Church on the Net and i-Church, one can join and be active in a "church" without ever meeting the pastor or stepping foot in a building. These bonified, non-profit church communities come with many of the benefits of traditional churches: a pastor, opportunities to give, electronic places to interact with others and resources for growth in Christ. They are even affiliated with reputable denominations, and both have healthy budgets respective to conventional church plants.

The appearance of these churches raise at least a couple of questions for Christian leaders. First, there is the question of competition. These churches will appeal to time-constrained individuals looking for a church they can custom fit to their schedule. There is also the question of competance. Can these churches fulfill the obligations of a New Testament church?

I don't really find the first question all that enticing. After all, if church leaders sit around all day and worry about every new kid on the block, they will likely lose their focus and their minds. The second question is quite important, and that is where I would like to get some insight. Let me give you my thoughts and you can give me yours.

I can think of at least two crucial church obligations that a fully online community would not be able to fulfill: discipleship and fellowship. Perhaps you'd make the case that these churches could do both to some degree. For example, through reading articles and assigning virtual accountability partners the church could disciple others, and through chat rooms and online communities it could assist in online fellowship.

Yet even a full utilization of available technologies would only achieve a shadow of these things. For example, it is hard to imagine Peter, James and John developing into the spiritual giants they became had they only known Jesus electronically.

While we find no direct Biblical mandate for church membership, we do find some guidelines. The author of Hebrews, for example, tells us not to neglect gathering together, and he certainly is referring to a physical fellowship. However, there were no first century computers, so to draw the conclusion that electronic fellowship is prohibited seems to use the text to answer a question the author was not asking.

All things considered, I think an online church would be acceptable in a few cases. For example, a missionary with no access to a local body or perhaps as an accessory to a local body. But this is not a viable substitute for the local church.


What do you think is required to be considered "a church?"

Would you be open to attending a church like this?

Additional reading? Try "Revolution" by George Barna

(I am doing some research for a RELEVANT article. Comments may appear in print.)