Simulation of Triumph

Preserve me, O God, for I take refuge in You.
I said to the LORD, "You are my Lord; I have no good besides You."
As for the saints who are in the earth, 
They are the majestic ones in whom is all my delight."
(Psalm 16:1-3)

Therefore strong peoples will glorify you; cities of ruthless nations will fear
 you. (Isaiah 25:3)

The Crisis of Evangelicalism

Original title: “Political Dealing: The Crisis of Evangelicalism”

Initial Publication April 20, 2018

 “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross.” (Phil 2:5–8)

 This was speech was given by Fuller Seminary President Dr. Mark Labberton at a private meeting of evangelical leaders held at Wheaton College in Chicago, Illinois, on April 16, 2018. The following has been edited from his notes for clarity and to give context to excerpts that have been disseminated elsewhere.

…

This gathering is not an occasion for celebration of evangelicalism, however. This gathering emerges instead from worry, sorrow, anger, and bewilderment—whether we are Democrats or Republicans.  Christians in both parties found the others’ candidate patently unacceptable, leading to fierce division. Many felt cornered without a genuine choice when the issues represented are complex and fear is justified. This is not the first or last time the body of Christ has gathered in lament.  When evangelical leaders like us gather, it is often with a spirit of optimistic hope, known for “pressing on” in the work of the gospel. For me, this is not a time of pressing on. I feel a personal urgency to stop, to pray, to listen, to confess, and to repent and want to call us to do the same.

Only the Spirit “who is in the world to convict us of sin and righteousness and judgment” (John 16:8) can bring us to clarity about the crisis we face.  As I have sought that conviction, here is what I have come to believe: The central crisis facing us is that the gospel of Jesus Christ has been betrayed and shamed by an evangelicalism that has violated its own moral and spiritual integrity.

This is not a crisis imposed from outside the household of faith, but from within.  The core of the crisis is not specifically about Trump, or Hillary, or Obama, or the electoral college, or Comey, or Mueller, or abortion, or LGBTQIA+ debates, or Supreme Court appointees. Instead the crisis is caused by the way a toxic evangelicalism has engaged with these issues in such a way as to turn the gospel into Good News that is fake. Now on public display is an indisputable collusion between prominent evangelicalism and many forms of insidious racist, misogynistic, materialistic, and political power. The wind and the rain and the floods have come, and, as Jesus said, they will reveal our foundation.  In this moment for evangelicalism, what the storms have exposed is a foundation not of solid rock but of sand.

This is not a crisis taking place at the level of language. This is not about who owns or defines the term “evangelical,” and whether one does—or does not—choose to identify as such.  It is legitimate and important to debate if and how the term “evangelical” can currently be used in the United States to mean anything more than white, theologically and politically conservative. But that is not itself the crisis. The crisis is not at the level of our lexicon, but of our lives and a failure to embody the gospel we preach.  We may debate whether the word “evangelical” can or should be redeemed. But what we must deal with is the current bankruptcy many associate with evangelical life.

This is not a crisis unfolding at the level of group allegiance, denomination, or affiliation.  The varied reality that is American evangelicalism is evidenced in this room.  We have no formal hierarchy, leadership, or structure and form no single organization, but are sorted and divided today as we have been—for better and worse—for much of our history.  Some might wish for a clearer distinction between those who call themselves fundamentalist and those who call themselves evangelical. We might look to varying traditions or geographies to explain our division. These distinctions matter but can easily devolve into scapegoating or blaming, diverting us from our vocation as witness to God’s love for a multifaceted world.

This is not a recent crisis but a historic one.  We face a haunting specter with a shadow that reaches back further than the 2016 election—a history that helps define the depth of the sorrow, fear, anger, anxiety, and injustice around us. Today’s egregious collusion between evangelicals and worldly power is problematic enough: more painful and revealing is that such collusion has been our historic habit. Today’s collusion bears astonishing—and tragic—continuity with the past.

Right alongside the rich history of gospel faithfulness that evangelicalism has affirmed, there lies a destructive complicity with dominant cultural and racial power. Despite deep gospel confidence and rhetoric, evangelicalism has been long-wedded to a devastating social self-interest that defends the dominant culture over and against that of the gospel’s command to love the “other” as ourselves.  We are not naïve in our doctrine of sin that prefers self over all, but we have failed to recognize our own guilt in it.

Our professed trust in Jesus has not led evangelicals to die to ourselves, but often to justify our own self-assertion—even when that means complicity in the suffering and death of others. The scandal associated today with the evangelical gospel is not the scandal of the Cross of Christ, crucified for the salvation of the world.  Rather it is the scandal of our own arrogance, unconfessed before the Cross, revealing a hypocritical superiority that we dare to associate with the God who died to save the weak and the lost.

In order to be concrete about this, let me choose what I believe to be the top four arenas in which this violation of spiritual and moral character has shown itself:

First is the issue of power. 

Our primary confession that “Jesus is Lord” is a statement about power.  “The gospel is the power of God unto salvation, to the Jew first and also to the Greek” (Rom 1:16).  This is our hope and confidence, and as those who seek to live in the kingdom of God, we profess that Jesus is Lord and all other power must be reframed in light of this reality. The Apostle Paul says it this way:  “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross” (Phil 2:5–8).

In much of the last century, American evangelicalism has had a complex relationship with power.  On one hand, it has felt itself marginalized and repudiated, defeated and silenced. On the other, it has often seemed to seek—even fawn over—worldly power, mimicking in the church forms of power evident in our culture. (I remember being at a conference where it was announced we should all be back after dinner for “an evening of star-studded worship.”) An evangelical dance with political power has been going on from the time of Billy Graham, through the Moral Majority and the religious right, to the Tea Party, and most recently with the white evangelical vote—the result being, as honorary Chairman of the Lausanne Movement Doug Birdsall has said, “When you Google ‘evangelical,’ you get Trump.”

This points to an evangelical crisis over so many issues of power: racial, political, economic, cultural, right against left, Republican against Democrat, rich against poor, white against black, men against women, and so on. But winning power was the goal of Judas, not Jesus. A Faustian pact between evangelicals and power—even when claimed on behalf of the kingdom—cannot be entered in the name of Jesus Christ without betraying the abdication of power inherent in the incarnation. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son . . . .” (John 3:16)

Abuse of power is central in the national debates of the moment.  Whether we think about US militarism, or mass incarceration, or the #MeToo movement (or mistreatment of women in general), or the police shootings of unarmed, young, black men, or the actions of ICE toward child and adult immigrants, or gun use and control, or tax policy—all this is about power.  The apparent evangelical alignment with the use of power that seeks dominance, control, supremacy, and victory over compassion and justice associates Jesus with the strategies of Caesar, not with the good news of the gospel.

Second is the issue of race.

 The Bible knows all people to be fully human, fearfully and wonderfully made in God’s image, knit together in our mother’s womb. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, not just those who arrive as poor, hard-working immigrants fleeing violence or those wasting away in private prisons.  All are dead and in Christ made alive, and the evidence of the resurrection is that the peculiar body of God’s people, a new humanity of Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female, are to be the evidence of a resurrected God. This is the glory of creation and new creation.

Those of us who are white evangelicals must acknowledge that our story is intertwined with, and often responsible for, much of the violence and oppression around racial injustice in our American story.  The stories of Native American, African American, Latino/a, or Asian peoples in the history of the United States cannot be told truthfully without naming the role of white evangelicals who testified to a God of redemption but whose theological, political, social, and economic choices contributed to suffering and injustice.  Stories of devastation are often absent from a happier white evangelical narrative of promised-land life, or buried in a sanitized story that claims that past injustice is not relevant for people of color today—despite the fact that nearly all people of color experience racism and its implications every day around the nation, including those in this room today.   

This unreckoned-with reality of white evangelical racism permeates American life, and its tinderbox was lit on fire by the rhetoric of our national life in recent years—whether in reference to Ferguson, or Charlottesville, or “shithole countries” deemed without value. White history narrates the story of America’s heroes, and white evangelical history views those “good guys” as the providence of a good and faithful God.  When some white evangelicals triumphantly pronounce that we now have “the best president the religious right ever had,” the crisis it underscores to millions of people of color is not an indictment of our President as much as it is an indictment of white evangelicalism and a racist gospel.

Third is the issue of nationalism.

One of Israel’s particular temptations was to suppose that because the God of Israel was great, the people of Israel must be great, too.  No wonder God needed to remind them, “It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the LORD set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples . . .” (Deut 7:7).  In the greatness of the God of Israel we are reminded of a national life to be centered not in its own greatness, or as the right of its people, but fixed in gratitude and faithfulness and humility before God and, from the New Testament, in service to the God who gave his Son out of love for the world.

By dramatic contrast, nationalism gives pride of place to ourselves, to regional or national assertions of primacy and the quest for power and success, control and dominance, legitimizing violence and pressing for victory.  Nationalism reveals that we have mis-ordered worship. Religiously motivated nationalism simply turns God into our “godling,” a deity subject to our bidding.

In the complex world of global politics and economics, religion and militarism, markets and globalization, nationhood is part of the shifting landscape of human powers and forces.  In a Christian hierarchy of kingdom values, nationhood has a legitimate place, but not a central or a top-tier one—and never one that displaces the authority of God.

For white evangelicals to embrace a platform and advocacy that promotes, prioritizes, and defends America above all and over all is to embrace an idolatry that has only ever proven disastrous.  Respect for nationhood, including borders and immigration, the rule of law, both internally and among the field of nations, are surely legitimate and defensible values. However, identification with the use of demeaning rhetoric toward other nations, not least nations of color that are facing the challenges of poverty and war, is not only confusing but violating to the dignity, value, and truth of the gospel. It is, as well, violating to the people we otherwise claim to see, serve, join, and love—nations to which, ironically, American evangelicals annually send millions of dollars for mission and evangelism.  A legitimate debate about immigration laws and practices is surely necessary, as difficult as it may be. But that debate is distorted if it begins with nationalistic assumptions.

The current administration’s rhetoric may be odious, pejorative, and totalizing against our international neighbors—yet we, too, demonstrate a gospel of fake good news when we ignore any needs or concerns that threaten our self-interests.  In a pluralistic population, debates over such things as immigration policy are legitimate and bound to be contentious. But when it seems that white evangelicals endorse self-interest through political speech that is nationalistic and demeaning to others, our central commitments do not reflect Jesus Christ, but rather a cold, white heart.

The people of God are to follow an enemy-loving God, as exemplified by the life of Jesus.  This is part of the call to our new and peculiar life. This is not meant to dictate national foreign policy, but to hold the people of God to a more severe and demanding standard, calling on our conscience when it comes to foreign policy in relation to the citizens of foreign, militarized, even violent states who are equally loved by God.

Fourth is the issue of economics. 

It is very hard to read the Bible and ignore God’s heart for the poor and the vulnerable.  Built into the faithfulness to which Israel is called are boundaries on personal wealth, stewardship for the common good, and relief and provision for the poor, the alien, and the widow.  Long before free market capitalism had developed, the God of Israel, the God revealed in Jesus Christ, was shown to bend toward mercy, with justice for the poor. It was one of Israel’s most distinctive priorities and practices. 

The life of Jesus underscores these themes throughout his public ministry. The dangers of power and greed, stoked by the biases of money and wealth, distort our lives.  The faithfulness of Christians in our economic and social vision and practice are to be reflective of God who reorders all these to the purposes of the kingdom. The social practices of the church are to demonstrate the presence of God as light and salt in an otherwise dark and savorless world.

American evangelicals have often divided over the significance of life this side of eternity, sometimes understanding the eschaton in ways that marginalize the significance of economics or race.  Yet the gracious magnanimity of God’s heart should be visible by the same magnanimity and grace we taste at the shared table and that is demonstrated toward our neighbor.

When white evangelicals in prominent and wealthy places speak about what is fair and beneficial for society, but then pass laws and tax changes that create more national indebtedness and elevate the top 1% even higher—while cutting services and provisions for children, the disabled, and the poor that are castigated as disgusting “entitlements”—one has to ask how this is reconciled with being followers of Jesus.  The complexities of social support for the vulnerable in our society certainly can and should be debated, but when the instigators of change are serving elite interests and disregarding the 99%, it is very hard to recognize the influence of the gospel narrative on compassion, let alone justice.

Still Evangelical or Yet Evangelical?

Absorbing all this, I am forced to kneel in confession, with trust that “the One who has begun a good work in us will bring it to completion in the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil 1:6).  Though I would like to think all this has little to do with me or with my evangelical point of view, I know I am among the guilty. The condemnation of a gospel life poorly lived sticks to me closer than I can see or know. It has significant implications for what it means to be president of an esteemed evangelical theological seminary—one that is highly racially diverse and yet predominantly white-cultured (not least at the senior levels of leadership); that has 70 countries represented in its student body but is still too Western-oriented; that strongly affirms women in ministry and leadership yet falls short in empowering their voices.

What brings me hope is something recorded at the end of the gospel of Matthew.  Matthew 28 contains the great commission and clarion call of our evangelical identity, but often less noted is the sentence just before the commission itself. The text simply says, “Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted.” It was to fewer than the full 12, and to these not-so-sure believer/doubters, that Jesus gave the Great Commission anyway.  From the start, he called believer/doubters to the task, so perhaps he can also still use American evangelicals as well. Rather than take a defensive posture, may we open ourselves to the repentant and hopeful posture that God will make us yet truly adherents to the “evangel” at the heart of our association. The evangelical mission is God’s from start to finish.

The Lord Jesus Christ gathers us here for real work.  May it be a work of grace that moves us to repentance, leading to personal and systemic change.  May it move us deeper into the life and heart of God.

Source: https://www.fuller.edu/posts/political-dealing-the-crisis-of-evangelicalism/

The Ancient Jews Carried Trauma And Joy Into Their New Lives. We Can, Too

 

Blessings and greetings from the Sinai Peninsula.  There are profound Biblical and historical perspectives being here in all the five senses…well six (+ spirit too).  For virtually everyone on this dear planet, life has been difficult and traumatic as the events of the era we’re living in continue to assault our hope, our health, and our peace.  I came across a helpful commentary in this week’s Sinai/Israel headlines that blessed me with a fresh dose of perspective and hope.  As much as it blessed me, I hope it blesses you too.  Blessed Passover and Easter Fam (1 Corinthians 5:7)! 

The Ancient Jews Carried Trauma And Joy Into Their New Lives. We Can, Too

by Jessica Ullian, March 30, 2021

“Passover, the Jewish holiday that commemorates the ancient Jews’ liberation from slavery in Egypt, arrived three weeks into our 2020 quarantine. We adapted last year, moving our family seder dinners to Zoom — quickly learning its limitations with group singing. On the second night of Passover, we began counting the Omer, the 49-day period that’s connected to the harvest and to the holiday of Shavuot, when the Jews received the Torah at Mount Sinai.

It’s difficult, already, to remember the specifics from those early weeks of the pandemic. Uncertainty and fear colored every moment. Each day brought a new, terrifying milestone as COVID-19 cases and deaths rose, and our return to school and work was delayed indefinitely. But back then, 49 days seemed just distant enough to hold promise; maybe, I hoped, the pandemic would be under control in those seven weeks, and we’d be back to normal.

Instead, our quarantine year anniversary has passed, and a second Zoom Seder with it. I’m counting the Omer again this year, with a new blend of emotions: grief, resignation, a touch of superstition — should I repeat my rituals from 2020, or consider them cursed? Yet I’m also counting the days with a stronger sense of hope. I don’t believe in “back to normal” anymore; with all the losses of this year, normal is a state many of us can’t reach. I do believe in better, though, and these days I wake up knowing that some version of better lies ahead.

At Passover, we re-tell the story of the ancient Jews’ escape from Egypt: the plagues raining upon Pharaoh, the Jews fleeing so quickly there wasn’t time to let the bread rise, the Red Sea miraculously parting to let them through. When we begin counting the Omer on the second night, we’re continuing the story: we fled Egypt as a group, but didn’t become what most of us recognize as “the Jewish people” until we received the Torah at Mount Sinai. That’s what we celebrate on Shavuot, after counting those 49 days: the moment we agreed, collectively, on the shared identity and principles that bound us together.

This year, I find myself wondering about that in-between time in a new way. I’d always envisioned the ancient Jews leaving Egypt with joy and excitement about a life of freedom. In truth, many must have been terrified and unsure. They probably worried about what lay ahead, and doubted their compatriots along the way. Counting the Omer, and celebrating Shavuot, are a reminder that it’s not always so easy to emerge from trauma; it takes time to heal, and trust in one another to become whole again.

This past year, we have all been living through trauma, and it feels hard to become whole. There has been so much loss, so much bitterness, so much disappointment and distrust to bear. We’ve battled our teachers, our neighbors and our family members. We have not embraced, sufficiently, a shared sense of identity and responsibility for each other.

By counting the Omer this year, I’m allowing myself to sit with this darkness, even as we move toward some light. Taking it day by day, I find myself more patient with the process, more grateful for how far we’ve come already. At this time last year, our playgrounds were blocked off with caution tape; this weekend, my children played for hours, masked, with friends. Last year, we worried about finding groceries; now, we’re adept at scheduling curbside pickups. Last year, we held two Seders on Zoom; this year, we braved the rain and gathered in our backyard for the holiday's second night, in a small group at a safe distance.

It wasn’t anything like normal, but it felt like a moment of triumph, and a reason for joy.

When the ancient Jews received the Torah, it didn’t bring the story to a neat and tidy ending. The pandemic won’t have one, either. There are losses we won’t ever get over; many of us will be hurting for a long time. But with each passing day, I know that I’ve held on this far, and can hold on a little longer. By the time we finish counting the Omer in May, we’ll have long days of warmth and light waiting for us. This year, that’s enough. 

 1"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, 2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3 Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart." (Hebrews 12:1-3)

Tom Skinner Urbana 1970

https://youtu.be/bvKQx4ycTmA 

Going Beyond the Gun Debate

By Jim Daly, President of Focus on the Family

Jim Daly has said what I have tried to articulate in my own heart. "We have a tourniquet-level problem – a sick culture, crumbling families, and an abandonment of basic values and decency – and we’re attempting to treat it with band aid solutions that do nothing to address the cause." 

Photo courtesy of www.PBS.org

Last week’s extraordinary public debates about guns, both at the White House and at CNN’s Florida Town Hall, were highly emotional and contentious events. Over a week after the catastrophic carnage in Parkland, Florida, debate concerning what to do about it is raging red-hot, and understandably so. People committing violent acts with guns is a growing epidemic, particularly in schools. Since early January, in addition to Florida, there have been school shootings in Texas, Louisiana, Kentucky, Alabama, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

In response, students around the country have been marching in protest and sharing their thoughts, demanding that legislative action be taken to end the escalating violence. At the White House, Andrew Pollack, an understandably distraught father whose daughter Meadow was murdered in Parkland, Florida, pleaded with President Trump.

“How many schools, how many children have to get shot?” he asked. “It stops here, with this administration and me, because I’m not going to sleep until it’s fixed.”

These parents and students are asking reasonable questions. They figure that doing something is better than doing nothing.

It’s wise to examine existing gun laws and ask if there changes or additions that need to be made, and also ask whether the myriad of relevant laws already on the books are being adequately enforced. This is the role of our legislature. But if the debate starts and stops there, the heartbreaking and horrific events of February 14th will happen again.

That’s because at its core, the current debate has to be about more than guns. What’s being protested is a symptom of a much larger problem. You cannot legislate away evil. No laws on the books can change the human heart.

What these students should be protesting and discussing is the lost culture they’ve inherited from us. It’s a lost culture that mocks or ignores God and His timeless teachings, living for only carnal pleasures and temporary thrills.

These students now protesting are demanding we talk about and enact more gun control legislation – because we live in this lost culture where increasingly people can no longer control themselves.

History suggests that freedoms are taken away from people who cannot manage them.  This is how freedoms die, when a culture is no longer morally able to exercise those freedoms in a proper and responsible manner.

We’re living through a moral freefall, but few in positions of influence are willing to talk about it. Instead, we hear much talk about its symptoms (like gun violence), and many of these same people want to ban the very things that will lead to healing and revival.

Those with a fervent and sincere faith are mocked and marginalized rather than respected and uplifted for their deeply help religious convictions.

Vice President Mike Pence was maligned the other day by Joy Behar on ABC television for acknowledging that he prays for wisdom and waits to hear for guidance from the Lord.

“It’s one thing to talk to Jesus,” Behar told her audience. “It’s another thing when Jesus talks to you … That’s called mental illness … Hearing voices.”

It’s ironic that the popular television host is lampooning the idea of God communicating wise counsel. I would point out to Ms. Behar that Jesus preached against murder – yet many think it’s illegal for high school students to hear that teaching.

I also can’t help but note that many of those who are demanding more gun laws in an effort to protect innocent life find it entirely acceptable that 4,000 innocent lives are lost each day at the hands of abortionists. More than 55 million babies have been legally killed in the U.S. in the last few decades, and yet our societal elites seem genuinely befuddled why life is viewed so cheaply by those who resort to those shocking incidents of violence.

I realize this is a complex discussion, but let’s get it all out on the table. Where is the Left’s grief for these children? Senator Schumer (D-NY) was high-fiving his colleagues after blocking a vote on the pain-capable bill limiting abortion to the first twenty weeks of development. Most developed nations don’t allow abortion past 12-13 weeks.

What’s more, those who champion the ideal of families with both a mother and a father are regularly dismissed as being hopelessly out of touch with modern mores. Yet, six of the deadliest mass shootings committed in the United States since 2005 were committed by young men without fathers in the home. In addition, studies show that young men without dads are roughly three times more likely to carry a gun and deal drugs than those living with a father.

The opioid crisis is devastating the country on numerous levels. In fact, experts identify it as the primary factor in causing life expectancy in the US to drop for the first time in many years. At the same time, those of us who oppose the legalization of marijuana are somehow socially square and standing in the way of progress.

We have a tourniquet-level problem – a sick culture, crumbling families, and an abandonment of basic values and decency – and we’re attempting to treat it with band aid solutions that do nothing to address the cause.

It was John Adams who famously remarked that “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

Was our nation’s second president foreshadowing our current crisis? Was he pointing to the fact that someday – maybe today – we would no longer be trusted with these freedoms because we can no longer control our wrong impulses to harm others?

President Adams was identifying the key issue which undergirds all our freedoms. I pray that we heed his warning. History is clear: godlessness and immorality leads to an outbreak of evil.

Source: http://jimdaly.focusonthefamily.com/going-beyond-gun-control-debates/?refcd=594702&utm_campaign=594702&utm_medium=email&utm_source=announcements

Satan Eats Faith for Breakfast

by John Piper

"Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers." (Luke 22:31-32)

"John Piper talks about the epic daily warfare for your faith. Satan wants to devour you, but the risen Jesus promises to pray for you. With Satan against you, and temptation around every corner, how do you know you will be a believer tomorrow morning? Piper reminds us from 1 Peter about the seriousness of Satan’s desire for you and the absolute security we have in Christ."

Source: http://www.desiringgod.org/articles/satan-eats-faith-for-breakfast

5 Stupid Things the Church Needs to Stop Doing to Make Progress

By Carey Nieuwhof

“Sometimes criticism aimed at the church is unfair. Other times, we shoot ourselves in the foot.”

The church has more than its share of critics these days.  Sometimes the criticism is unwarranted. People project their issues onto a congregation or onto the church, which is never healthy.  And, of course, the church will inevitably run into criticism.

What we’re doing is counter-cultural and will never be met with universal applause. The Gospel, even when powerfully shared, got John the Baptist, the Apostle Paul, Jesus and the prophets killed, just to name a few. While it seems strange to say it, even love, when seen fully and magnificently, gets rejected.

But other times, we absolutely deserve the criticism that comes our way.  Often these days, it seems, we’re not ridiculed or persecuted because we’re fighting nobly. Nope, sometimes we just shoot ourselves in the foot.

Here are five things that, in my view, would help the mission of the church become more authentic and more effective if we could just stop doing them. 

1. Being So Weird Online

Too many Christians come across online as either:

--Toxic  (Hello angry ranters, trolls and haters);

--Cynical  (Yes, we know you’re disappointed with everyone all the time and no one gets it as right as you); or

--Syrupy  (So sweet we can’t stand the taste and are not really sure you live in the real world).

Why do so many Christians think their social media feed is a place to show the world their weirdness?  It gives the impression that if you’re going to follow Jesus, you also need to become socially awkward.

I know people might say, “No, I’m just being authentic.” But being authentic does not mean being weird. (I shared my personal criteria for what I share online in the name of authenticity in this post.)

I think a general rule is, if you can’t imagine saying it in real life to a person, you shouldn’t say it online.  If you go to post something and you think, well, that would be braggy if I said that to someone, that’s a healthy check. It means you’d be bragging. So don’t post it.

Similarly, if you think, “Well, people would just walk out of the room if I said that in real life,” then maybe don’t say it.  If you’re always angry or cynical or all you do is complain online and you think, “Well, I wouldn’t want to be friends with someone like that in real life,” then that’s a clue that maybe you shouldn’t say it, or be like that.

And if you think, “Well, then I’ll have nothing to post,” then you’ve likely put your finger on a deeper issue.  Christians, let’s just stop being so weird online, OK? 

2. Commenting on Politics

Part of the weirdness is political.

God is not a Republican or a Democrat, or in my country, a Conservative, Liberal or New Democrat. Nor is God an independent.

God is God.

When your church becomes a mouthpiece for a political party, you cease to be the church.  Your job is to share the Gospel, not to change the government.  As I shared in more detail here, Jesus and Paul spend surprisingly little time trying to influence the government. Jesus completely rejected the idea of becoming the government when people asked him to become their political leader.

I know some will say, “Well, God has opinions about things happening today.”

I’m sure he does.  But when authentic Christians sincerely share different views on subjects, we should be very careful about speaking for God.  And, after all, when God happens to have all the same opinions you do, you’re probably not even worshipping God anymore.  You might be worshipping yourself.

3. Handling Conflict So Poorly

The church should be the best in the world at handling conflict. We were taught by Jesus exactly how to do it.  Yet we often side-step.  We gossip.  We talk about other people rather than to people.

We avoid conflict.  Or we run into it like a bulldozer claiming we’re all about truth.   If we just handled conflict humbly, gently, introspectively and bravely, we would be so much better.  If you really want to see how to restore someone in love, listen to this message by Andy Stanley on judgment and helping others who are sinning.  It’s brilliant.

If we handled conflict more healthily, our churches would be so much healthier.

And a healthy church is a church that can help other people get healthier.

4. Ranking Sin Selectively

Christians have become fairly good at focusing on the moral failings of others while ignoring their own.

We pretend that the worst sin you can commit is sexual. And—don’t get me wrong—sexual sin has serious implications.

But so does gossip. And divisiveness. And quarrelling—sins Christians routinely ignore. Mostly because we commit them.

I would suggest that just as many congregations have been ruined by gossip, divisiveness and quarrelling as have been stained by sexual sin. But you’d never know it given the way we talk about sin.

I’m all for surrendering our sexuality to Christ. But I’m also all for submitting our propensity to gossip, our divisiveness and our quarrelling to Jesus and dealing with that seriously.

Imagine what the church might look like if that happened.

And we haven’t even touched gossip, gluttony or envy yet, all things with which Christians routinely self-medicate their pain.

Maybe if Christians humbly confessed their sins first, the world would be more likely to come to terms with their sins.

So here’s an idea. Instead of pretending someone else’s sin is worse than your sin, confess your sin.

You’ll be in such a better place if you do that. And so will they.  You might actually be able to help them.

5. Judging Outsiders

As I outlined here, we in the modern church have largely ignored Paul’s injunction to stop judging non-Christians. Even Jesus said he didn’t come into the world to judge it, but to save it.

I completely get the urge to judge our neighbours and even the world. Things bother me too.

But I have to refrain. Our faith in Christ demands it.

Before ministry, I was a lawyer. In first-year law, I remember having a crisis because I couldn’t imagine representing a client I believed might be guilty.

I stayed after class one day to talk to my criminal law professor about it. He assured me of a few things. First, if your client tells you he’s guilty, you can’t ethically enter a non-guilty plea.

That made me feel better.

But then he told me that almost every client says they’re not guilty.

I got nervous again.

“Well, what if you think he’s guilty but he says he’s not … doesn’t that put you in a horrible bind?”

I’ll never forget his answer.

             “You’re confusing your role, Carey.  You’re not the judge.  You’re his lawyer.  Your job is—ethically, morally and legally—to give him the best day he can possibly have in court.  The judge will decide whether he’s guilty or not.”

            I felt like the weight of the world was lifted off my shoulders.

So … Christians, the world has a judge.  And it’s not you.  He’s fairer than you.  More just than you.  More perfect than you.  And far more accurate.

In the meantime, do your best to help reconcile your brothers and sisters in the world to their heavenly father through Christ.  That’s your job.  Take some comfort in that.  And for all these reasons and more, stop judging.

What Else?

Any other self-defeating, stupid things you wish we’d stop doing in the church?

Source: http://www.churchleaders.com/pastors/pastor-articles/258403-5-stupid-things-church-needs-stop-make-progress.html/4