We’ve just started a sermon series in the spirit of Easter called Rewrite in which we talk about people from the Bible and from our church whose lives have been rewritten by God. Our first Biblical character was Abraham who really was just a regular guy that God decided to build a nation from. Abraham did some dumb things, like prostituting his wife to the Egyptian pharaoh and then impregnating his wife Sarah’s slave girl Hagar upon her request only... Read more
Yesterday I talked about Christian mansplainers who operate according to 18th century principles of epistemology. You might call them “objective” Christian mansplainers. But there’s a different category of Christian mansplainers that are actually more exasperating than the first kind. They prefer late 20th century French philosophers to 18th century field preachers. They are superior to you because they’re better at irony. This species is called mansplainer emergenticus. I am an expert in their nature because I live with one; I... Read more
Hey friends, so I’m going to do a series on most contentious Bible verses and I need your nominations. I was going to call it most abused Bible verses and/or most ignored Bible verses, but I wanted to keep it a little bit flexible and not set myself up as the perfectly (arrogant and) erudite interpreter of the scripture everyone else has screwed up. So whether the verse is contentious because it’s an obnoxious proof-text or it’s an embarrassment to... Read more
I witnessed a conversation on facebook last night where one of these young, restless, well informed Christian guys was being a mansplaining stereotype of himself. There is a particular form of Christian thought that causes people (usually men because of how we’re wired but occasionally women) to think they’re experts in the faith after maybe a couple of years of serious Bible study. Their expertise then gives them the duty to “mansplain” Christianity, e.g. do things like ask patronizing, predictable... Read more
I’ve just started reading James KA Smith’s new book Imagining the Kingdom. Smith’s basic argument is that our actions are not really based on conscious rational choices but rather on how ritual behaviors have caused us to imagine the world around us. Most Christian thinkers from the beginning have unconsciously bought into a Platonic “rationalist” conception of human nature in which our behavior is supposed to be regulated by our conscious rationality, and the fact that it isn’t reflects our... Read more
One of the litmus tests that evangelicals make when we evaluate a potential church family is to observe whether they are comfortable talking about sin. I often measure the authenticity of my relationships with other people according to the degree to which we can share our struggles with sin genuinely. If someone insists on keeping things positive and pleasant with me, even if I know a lot of information about their lives, I don’t feel like they’re being real with... Read more
A few months ago, a friend wrote a blog asking whether the teachings of Henri Nouwen are “incompatible” with Methodist theology. The way that Nouwen presents the gospel is to say that it’s about hearing God’s voice of love, learning to love ourselves, and leaving behind the sins that are ultimately an expression of self-hatred. When I encountered this teaching in the first Methodist church I went to, it was so refreshingly different from the ruthless perfectionist I thought God... Read more
Yesterday I experienced a new first: the first time somebody has made up an email address for the purpose of dissing me. Some guy wrote to tell me that my music sucked under the email address juststop@mailinator.com. His comment started off with those two words “Just stop!” There was something pathetic about the thought of someone going to all that trouble to insult me. It exuded a pathology endemic to postmodernity: getting off on the brilliance of your sarcasm. (more…) Read more
It was really good to take a break for Lent. I did a lot of reading, and I even read some fiction (!) by Reynolds Price and Joyce Carroll Oates. I wanted to share some ideas I have for series that I might run on the blog in the next few months and get your feedback on what you want me to write about. I’d like to be a little bit less haphazard with my topics. I’m also going to... Read more
Today is Easter. It’s also Cesar Chavez’s birthday. Google decided to put Cesar Chavez’s face on its search page today and all hell broke loose among the professional agitators who have made a career out of being offended. So now we have a “war on Easter” in addition to the “war on Christmas.” Because curious Google viewers could click on the bio of a Christian social justice activist whose life exudes the meaning of Easter. (more…) Read more
Mercy Not Sacrifice
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