Axioms of a Great Commission Resurgence
Click play. Go away for awhile so it loads fully. Come back when you have an hour to remember and revision what it means to be a Southern Baptist.
by Dr. Daniel L. Akin. You can download video and audio here.
Not Catholic, Not Eastern Orthodox
Scot McKnight writes a nice friendly piece, Why I am not a Catholic or Eastern Orthodox.
Among his many other reasons:
Now here’s my point: both the RCC and the EO have captured the Spirit in the Church so that Church too often has become Authority. One example, hardly foolproof, illustrates my point: RCCs and EOs talk about Church; Protestants talk about Scripture. It is their emphasis that I like — and I wish each talked more of Spirit.
All the Best Commentaries
Announcing the launch of a new website designed to help ministers, ministerial students, and Bible students everywhere. BestCommentaries.com polls the most referenced commentary lists (and throws my own list in for good measure) and provides rankings and reviews. If you know John Dyer, give him a virtual pat on the back for providing a truly useful site for those who love good commentaries. Thanks, John.
Bookmark BestCommentaries.com today.
My King - Do You Know Him
If you’ve never heard S. M. Lockridge preach the “My King” (also known as the “Do You Know Him”) sermon, you owe it to yourself to visit this site where you can download or listen to an mp3. You can also watch a video slide show with the straight audio (w/o background music other sites add). Enjoy - and Praise God.
(Thanks, 4:14!)
Martin Luther on Preaching
From my friend (and worship professor) Greg Brewton over at Biblical Worship, a quote from Martin Luther on preaching:
“If Peter and Paul were here, they would scold you because you wish right off to be as accomplished as they. Crawling is something, even if one is unable to walk. Do your best. If you cannot preach an hour, then preach half an hour or a quarter of an hour. Do not try to imitate other people. Center on the shortest and simplest points, which are the very heart of the matter, and leave the rest to God. Look solely to his honor and not to applause. Pray that God will give you a mouth and to your audience ears.
I can tell you preaching is not a work of man. Although I am old [he was forty-eight] and experienced, I am afraid every time I have to preach. You will most certainly find out three things: first, you will have prepared your sermon as diligently as you know how, and it will slip through your fingers like water; second, you may abandon your outline and God will give you grace. You will preach your very best. The audience will be pleased, but you won’t. And thirdly, when you have been unable in advance to pull anything together, you will preach acceptably both to your hearers and to yourself. So pray to God and leave all the rest to Him.”
(Here I Stand, Bainton, 273-274)
Even in my short time as a preacher, I have had all these experiences. God gives the grace, to him be the glory.
An Ideal Husband
I’m not in the habit of favorably quoting Maureen Dowd, but you’ve got to give folks their due when they do well. I think the following NYT op-ed is worth reading…
An Ideal Husband by Maureen Dowd, Published: July 6, 2008, NYT
This weekend, we celebrate our great American pastime: messy celebrity divorces.
There’s the Christie Brinkley/Peter Cook fireworks on Long Island and the Madonna/Guy Ritchie/A-Rod Roman candle in New York.
So how do you avoid a relationship where you end up saying, “The man who I was living with, I just didn’t know who he was” — as Brinkley did in court when talking about her husband’s $3,000-a-month Internet porn and swinger site habit? (Not to mention the 18-year-old mistress/assistant.)
Father Pat Connor, a 79-year-old Catholic priest born in Australia and based in Bordentown, N.J., has spent his celibate life — including nine years as a missionary in India — mulling connubial bliss. His decades of marriage counseling led him to distill some “mostly common sense” advice about how to dodge mates who would maul your happiness.
“Hollywood says you can be deeply in love with someone and then your marriage will work,” the twinkly eyed, white-haired priest says. “But you can be deeply in love with someone to whom you cannot be successfully married.”
For 40 years, he has been giving a lecture — “Whom Not to Marry” — to high school seniors, mostly girls because they’re more interested.
“It’s important to do it before they fall seriously in love, because then it will be too late,” he explains. “Infatuation trumps judgment.”
I asked him to summarize his talk:
“Never marry a man who has no friends,” he starts. “This usually means that he will be incapable of the intimacy that marriage demands. I am always amazed at the number of men I have counseled who have no friends. Since, as the Hebrew Scriptures say, ‘Iron shapes iron and friend shapes friend,’ what are his friends like? What do your friends and family members think of him? Sometimes, your friends can’t render an impartial judgment because they are envious that you are beating them in the race to the altar. Envy beclouds judgment.
“Does he use money responsibly? Is he stingy? Most marriages that founder do so because of money — she’s thrifty, he’s on his 10th credit card.
“Steer clear of someone whose life you can run, who never makes demands counter to yours. It’s good to have a doormat in the home, but not if it’s your husband.
“Is he overly attached to his mother and her mythical apron strings? When he wants to make a decision, say, about where you should go on your honeymoon, he doesn’t consult you, he consults his mother. (I’ve known cases where the mother accompanies the couple on their honeymoon!)
“Does he have a sense of humor? That covers a multitude of sins. My mother was once asked how she managed to live harmoniously with three men — my father, brother and me. Her answer, delivered with awesome arrogance, was: ‘You simply operate on the assumption that no man matures after the age of 11.’ My father fell about laughing.
“A therapist friend insists that ‘more marriages are killed by silence than by violence.’ The strong, silent type can be charming but ultimately destructive. That world-class misogynist, Paul of Tarsus, got it right when he said, ‘In all your dealings with one another, speak the truth to one another in love that you may grow up.’
“Don’t marry a problem character thinking you will change him. He’s a heavy drinker, or some other kind of addict, but if he marries a good woman, he’ll settle down. People are the same after marriage as before, only more so.
“Take a good, unsentimental look at his family — you’ll learn a lot about him and his attitude towards women. Kay made a monstrous mistake marrying Michael Corleone! Is there a history of divorce in the family? An atmosphere of racism, sexism or prejudice in his home? Are his goals and deepest beliefs worthy and similar to yours? I remember counseling a pious Catholic woman that it might not be prudent to marry a pious Muslim, whose attitude about women was very different. Love trumped prudence; the annulment process was instigated by her six months later.
“Imagine a religious fundamentalist married to an agnostic. One would have to pray that the fundamentalist doesn’t open the Bible and hit the page in which Abraham is willing to obey God and slit his son’s throat.
“Finally: Does he possess those character traits that add up to a good human being — the willingness to forgive, praise, be courteous? Or is he inclined to be a fibber, to fits of rage, to be a control freak, to be envious of you, to be secretive?
“After I regale a group with this talk, the despairing cry goes up: ‘But you’ve eliminated everyone!’ Life is unfair.”
Challies Case Study for Commentary Recommendations
The increasingly famous Tim Challies has added “commentaries” to his long list of book reviews and recommendations. I’ve often been impressed with what seems to be his desire to help his readers pursue spiritual formation (rather than simply pontificating). That said, he falls into the traps that most commentary list makers do not take the time to avoid. I offer the following critique for future aspiring commentary list creators.
1) What is the criteria for the list?
Challies give us two commentaries for each book of the NT. How did he decide? What makes a good commentary in his opinion? He does warn readers to choose commentaries “appropriate to your education and expertise.” What is the education and expertise of Mr. Challies? How can I know if my requirements for a commentary match his requirements for a commentary so that I can have any confidence that his recommendation will mean anything at all to me? Why does the NICNT “appear to be the best complete New Testament set”? What sets it apart?
Is this list anything more than “stuff I like”? Tell us why - the readers need to know how you are choosing volumes so that they can gauge how appropriate your selections are to their situation.
2) What makes any of these particular selections worthwhile?
This is related to (1), but what I am referring to here is the lack of any annotation for each recommendation. Whereas (1) is a critique of the lack of selection criteria, (2) is a critique of the lack of its application. Why is Fee better than Garland for 1 Corinthians? Is it because of Fee’s commitment to a charismatic interpretation? Does Challies like Fee’s proposed construction of the early Corinthian church? Why would a volume from 1987 be a better choice than the survey style BECNT from 2003?
3) Who would actually be helped by these recommendations?
Challies takes a few positive steps toward answering this question. He does warn readers to be aware that not all commentaries are equally useful for everybody. He also acknowledges that he is a non-scholar who enjoys studying God’s word.
However, the lack of any additional qualifications leads us to this basic understanding of these recommendations’ usability - “A list for people who like to study the Bible.” While admirable, this doesn’t really narrow the field down much. Will Bible study leaders or Sunday school teachers like this list more than non-teachers? Does it matter if you have a college background or not? Is this a list for people who just like to know a bunch of facts or do its members genuinely help readers in translating biblical principles to practical godly living? Tell us who the list was created to help: pastors, educated laypeople, the “everyman” - who? By not guiding his readers to understand the intended audience, Challies leaves his readers with little more than a few clues for better guesses - and I expect his intention was to help more than that.
4) What was the extent of the comparison?
Though usually my primary critique of a commentary list is (1), this “extent question” looms large over Challies list. He refers to his “attempt at thorough research” and his “extensive research,” but nowhere details what that research included beyond references to a few online commentary recommendation lists. Did he only look at commentaries reviewed by these sources? Or perhaps only those that appeared on two or more of the lists? If we do not really know anything about the extent of the “extensive research” then how can we have any confidence that these recommendations are actually the best recommendations for any particular biblical book?
Further, the striking admission that Challies was “relying almost entirely on secondary sources” suggests that he has no practical knowledge of the volumes he is recommending. Readers are left with the impression that all he did was uncritically compare a few relatively random lists and make guesses as to what books would probably be good purchases, maybe.
Conclusion
I applaud anyone’s desire to help others not waste money on books, especially commentaries. There are lots of intelligent, informed, discerning people on the web making recommendations (Challies may very well be one) - but if they do not give us any basis for their advice, then they are simply adding their voice to the “because I said so” cloud of the internet. Such is useful as far as it goes, but most people who desire to make wise commentary purchases would be so much better served by list creators simply answering for their readers the questions detailed above.
For my money, the most useful all around commentary reference guide is John Glynn’s Commentary and Reference Survey (newly updated in 2007). It is thorough, instructive, and will save you money. If you cannot afford that one quite yet, you are welcome to download my own Basic Reference Commentary Set (first commentary recommendations) for free.
(Also, watch for a “Best Commentaries” comparative website to launch around mid-August. I’ll post a link when “they” get it up and running.)
All Children Need a Laptop
From my Starbucks cup this morning (#273):
All children need a laptop. Not a computer, but a human laptop. Moms, Dads, Grannies and Grandpas, Aunts, Uncles – someone to hold them, read to them, teach them. Loved ones who will embrace them and pass on the experience, rituals and knowledge of a hundred previous generations. Loved ones who will pass to the next generation their expectations of them, their hopes, and their dreams.
– General Colin L. Powell
Founder, America’s Promise – the Alliance for Youth.
Field Observations
From Jason Cruise, Director of the Outdoor Ministry Network, a view about what’s wrong with evangelical churches:
We duped ourselves when as evangelicals we thought we could force reform of behaviors and attitudes as a way to steer the Church back to God. I’m a full on conservative, but I believe what happened was that we told the churches that just by adopting a line of “conservative” thinking that it would result in spiritual transformation. We duped ourselves there. It’s just a substitute for real discipleship. Look, I’ve been a leader in the church world for over 18 years now, and while that is not a lot of time in comparison to others ahead of me, it does at least give me a track record of time to observe the fact that what evangelical churches are calling “discipleship” is really behavior modification.
He is first to claim that he does not have all the answers, but he does have a few spot-on insights.
LifeWay Profits
I am not impressed by the amount LifeWay “gives back” to the Cooperative Program. My church budget is dwindling through increasingly higher priced materials that are increasingly not applicable to my small church situation. Don’t get me started on the insane shipping and handling fee structure. LifeWay privileges large churches with multiple specialized ministries that can be planned far in advance. I am starting to understand the voices at the last few convention meetings calling for an increased focus and applicability for the small churches.
Rather than LifeWay the For-Profit Megalith donating a few extra dollars to the missions fund, I’d like to see LifeWay the SBC Agency Denominational Publishing House serve the churches of the Southern Baptist Convention by helping churches like mine perform local missions with high-value low-cost outreach and education materials.
It is getting to the point from a cost/benefits perspective where it no longer makes sense to support LifeWay. It is now worth my time to shop around for the best curriculum and best materials for the best price. Problem is, I have generations of people trained to privilege LifeWay out of denominational loyalty. Now, if I want to make changes, I’ve got to train and educate my congregation on why LifeWay no longer delivers value for our stewardship dollars. This puts me into the position of encouraging Cooperative Program style denominational commitment while denigrating an associated agency. I do not have a full complement of lifetime Southern Baptists - our folks come from all over - and this mixed message creates confusion and lowers overall enthusiasm.
I thought there was supposed to be this big LifeWay revolution under Rainer. But the website is still hard to search and navigate, the prices are still high, the kitch is still strong, and the curriculum still draws complaints of biblical insufficiency and non-applicability from my teachers. Perhaps it takes longer than I think to resolve some of this. If so, it would be nice to see some Baptist Press about what is actually going on in Nashville that might give some of us out on the frontier some hope. When the president “co-writes” a book called Simple Church, you might expect his organization to be slightly less byzantine and quite a bit more responsive to the many small congregations whose money it takes and whose denominational name it carries.
James, Polycarp, and the Perfect Result
Sunday’s sermon was actually pretty good. The primary illustrations were from church history and the Scriptures themselves. The preaching was expository and emotionally applicable. The introduction and conclusion were a wrap around that felt very natural given the subject matter. And, the whole thing was done in a reasonable amount of time. I had a very firm time goal and I found that forcing myself to keep it made my sermon much more lively and sharp.
Though I do not usually commend my own sermons online, I think this one might be worth a listen, especially if you are someone who is struggling - either with life or to maintain your sense of closeness to God in the midst of life, or if you want to hear a sermon that assumes the book of James is more integrated than scholars give it credit for.
Listen here: James 1b: “The Perfect Result”
Shadow Whispers, Pregnant Cheerleaders, and the Loss of Right
From First Things:
Even though Church Day was voluntary, and those who declined to attend suffered no penalty on or off the field, the ACLU urged the university president to end the practice of Coach Bowden taking his team to church. This practice of legal intimidation, directed at both individuals and organizations who affirm traditional values, we label as SLAPP, for Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation. The ACLU ploy is not new; it invokes the requirement of pluralism to secure submission to the doctrine of a secular, naked public square. Anything religious, especially if it is associated with the religion with which nine of ten Americans identify, must be denied public salience. The free exercise of religion becomes synonymous with theocracy, and its practice declared to be a threat to democracy and the public order.
Epiphany - God Wants Us Too
This past Sunday was Epiphany. This is not a day widely celebrated by Baptists, but it should be. Of all the traditional Christian liturgical feasts, it is the most concentrated on missions and the need for personal evangelism.
Epiphany celebrates the visit of the Magi to the infant Christ. More to the point, it celebrates the fact that the Christ was manifested to the Gentiles. Even as a baby, Jesus was the Messiah who would die for the sins of the whole world, not just for one race or nation or people. Traditionally, Christians are to meditate on the meaning of Christ’s manifestation to the gentiles and what it means for our responsibility to make him known throughout the earth and to all peoples.
I have just recently begun to explore the celebrations and meditations of Epiphany and shared a few of my insights in last Sunday’s sermon. I’ve actually never heard a preacher preach on the subject of Epiphany. If you have not either, then take a listen to my offering here. The audio is not top-notch, but you don’t mind so much toward the end.
My favorite section is this:
“The mystery is that the gentiles are fellow heirs of the promises of the Messiah! What do we, who live in Camp Verde, Arizona have in common with the the Chinaman who lives on the other side of the world? the African who still dances his traditional dance? the tribal people in the jungles of South America? We are all non-Jews! We are all Gentiles who live in lands that have for ages been covered in darkness. We share the kinship of those who have had no hope. But now the light has come, and as it has come, it has come for everyone - and we say, ‘Hallelujah!’ We may be late to the feast, but, by God, we’ve got a seat at that table.”
To God be the Glory. I hope you enjoy it.
Theological Big Words
I can’t blockquote any of Thad’s excellent post over at The Pulpit & The Pew without stealing the entire thing. It is not long, but it is very good. You owe it to yourself to read Intellect or Passion? Overcoming Resistance to Theological Education.
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