Burke United Methodist Church is doing a campaign this fall called Jesus is My Candidate: I Vote for Him Every Day. A dimension of this campaign is thinking about how we “vote” for Jesus (maintain our allegiance and focus on Him) when all around us people are screaming for us to make either Barack Obama or Mitt Romney our Lord and Savior (or perhaps saying that the other guy is the anti-Christ but our guy is at least somewhat reasonable).... Read more
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This morning we kicked off our 8:30 am Wednesday morning prayer service for the fall. Basically what we do is listen to God through various means of prayer: liturgical, silent, extemporaneous, etc. We close by lifting up the concerns of the church. My favorite part happens in the middle when we read a scripture, meditate in silence, and then speak as the Spirit leads. It was during this time today that my sister Jacque said something that blew my mind.... Read more
James 3 opens with a statement that often makes me squirm: “Not many of you should become teachers.” Often this passage is used to say that Christians shouldn’t teach until their theological opinions are without error (“Your questions are welcome at our church, but if you want to become a leader, you need to have [our] answers instead of [your] questions”). I’ve had people question whether I should be teaching. I’ve been criticized for sharing my raw ideas on this... Read more
James 3 opens with a statement that often makes me squirm: “Not many of you should become teachers.” Often this passage is used to say that Christians shouldn’t teach until their theological opinions are without error (“Your questions are welcome at our church, but if you want to become a leader, you need to have [our] answers instead of [your] questions”). I’ve had people question whether I should be teaching. I’ve been criticized for sharing my raw ideas on this... Read more
One of the most obnoxious things for me about contemporary evangelicalism has been the neo-masculinist movement of Mark Driscoll, John Piper, and others like them. I think it brings up a lot of things from my past. The reason I sought out a savior in the first place was because I was the opposite of macho. I have always resonated deeply to the vulnerability Paul expressed to the Corinthians: “I came to you in weakness with great fear and trembling”... Read more
I’m really not trying to be a hater. This isn’t part of a subversive strategy to delegitimize Obama as a president. But there was a word he specifically avoided saying last night, and it made my heart hurt. When Obama said we must balance our support for Israel’s security with our support for peace, he couldn’t bring himself to say the word “Palestine.” I guess it’s because if he had actually said, “Palestine,” then the number of Americans who believe... Read more
One of the most disappointing political events I have witnessed this year as a Christian was the clumsy maneuvering yesterday by the Democratic National Convention to put “God and Jerusalem” back in their political platform after they had been taken out. I understand that they are desperate to prove that they are not less religious or committed to Israel’s absolute infallibility than God’s Only Party, but through this clumsy gesture, they have become part of the blasphemy by which God... Read more
A recent Atlantic Wire article describes a study that demonstrates our society’s moral decline by using the Google Books archive to track the decrease in the use of words “related to moral excellence and virtue” like character, decency, integrity, and righteousness. While I’m skeptical about putting too much stock in a word search, I agree that the dignity of American public discourse has undergone considerable decline. It’s not that brilliant, morally virtuous books aren’t being written today, but rather that... Read more
There’s been a lot of conversation in the blogosphere about whether or not Mormons should be called Christian. From what I understand, Mormonism is currently the fastest growing American belief system, even more fruitful perhaps than independent megachurchianism. Some people say that Mormons should be called Christians because they call themselves Christians. That was the argument of my American Christianity professor Grant Wacker. Others say that their unorthodox views about the Trinity, the afterlife, and the distinction between humanity and... Read more
Mercy Not Sacrifice
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