In the midst of a church meeting last night discussing our church’s future plans, a question came up that I imagine we will be wrestling with in future weeks.  I’m not entirely sure what I think the answer is yet, so I’ll post it here to see if any of you have comments.

The question goes something like this: in the context of a church, which comes first?  Do people first have to get “the vision”, and then will respond with committment?  Or rather, do people first need to be committed to serve, and then begin to see the vision of the church ministry?

Still chewing on this one…

On my way home from work every day I pass a billboard that frustrates me. It’s a simple message, white text on a black background. It’s designed to look like a written note. The words:

One nation under Me.

–God

Undoubtedly this billboard was purchased by some well-meaning evangelical wanting to make a point about their beliefs that American was a Christian country, should continue to be a Christian country, etc, and remind us about the battle over the Pledge of Allegiance. I don’t want to debate those points at all. Not that I necessarily agree with them exactly, but there are people in my congregation that would wholeheartedly agree with them, and I don’t have time to write a full, thoughtful response to the ideas; nor do I want to offend them by giving a less than thoughtful answer. So let’s leave that particular question alone.

These signs with ‘messages from God’ aren’t something new – they’ve been a staple on billboards for the past several years, and on church signs for many years before that. Even the Life Magazine that came in today’s newspaper had a collection of photos of church signs, including the ever-popular “let’s meet at my house today before the game — God” sign. (As an interesting aside, one church is now using a reverse strategy: messages from Satan.) In general, my attitude is iffy-but-OK with this type of message. Many times they just come across as cheesy (such as the church sign example above), but sometimes they can manage to be thought-provoking instead.

But this particular billboard really bothers me. Why? Because, first of all, it’s not something God ever said. The “One nation, under God” phrase was added to our Pledge of Allegiance by Congress, back in the fifties. I guess it’s become all too common today to put our words in God’s mouth, but this seems pretty flagrant. Second, I’m not sure it’s a message that God would endorse. I don’t think God is worried too much about America becoming a “Christian nation” again. God is much more concerned with people, individuals, coming to Him and being a part of His kingdom. God’s focus is the Church, not the political system or national structure.

My call is that we set our priorities by His priorities. Sure, that’s easy to say, harder to work out. But there are some places where it can be pretty clear. Let’s put our focus on forwarding Christ’s kingdom, not in trying to restore a “Christian nation”. If God wills, our country will come around. If not, well, God knows what He’s doing. My guess it you’re not going to find out about it, though, from a billboard.

I’ve complained enough about bad customer service here on the blog (see: the OfficeMax debacle of a couple years ago) that I want to make sure I say something about really good service when it happens.

When I was in DC last week, I hit a shopping mall one night to wander around and pick up something for the girls. While I was in there, I ran across Paradise Pens, a neat little store specializing in, well, pens. They had everything from basic ballpoint to pens costing nearly $2000. I wandered in and struck up a conversation with a very friendly store manager. I mentioned an interest in fountain pens (I’ve often been curious, but never been to a store that sold them), and she took 20 minutes and showed me some different pens, let me try them out, answered my questions. Excellent service. I ended up buying a low-end fountain pen, cost about $40.

When I got back to the hotel and opened the pen, I found one issue: the pen cap, which is supposed to screw onto the pen body, was just a bit oversized. The cap wouldn’t screw on, it just slipped off. Well, that isn’t so good. I used a little bit of tape I had along to shim out the screw so it would hold, but that wasn’t a good long-term solution. And I didn’t have time to get back to the mall to return it.

Finally earlier this week I sent an email to the info address on the Paradise Pen website. After a couple of days I had no response, so I forwarded the email again. Who knows, maybe they are bad at checking email. Finally this afternoon I just decided to call the toll-free number they offered. So far, the service hadn’t been so good, huh?

I called the number, dialed the extension, and the phone was answered by a real person. She said her name was Carrie. I said “hi, my name is Chris Hubbs, and I…” and she started to tell me my story, that I live in Iowa and bought a pen in DC and the cap was too big. I was stunned. “So you got my email, I guess.” Yes, she said, she’d gotten both of them, and was surprised that the store hadn’t gotten back to me yet. I went and checked my email, and found that a message had just arrived from the store. The manager of the DC store was letting me know that they were sending me a new pen and a postage-paid envelope to return the faulty one.

I told Carrie that I had received the email, and that the solution was fine with me. She gave me her name, phone number, and extension, and told me in no uncertain terms that if anything wasn’t to my satisfaction, to call her directly. “I’m the one with the big stick,” she said. Wow, do I appreciate that attitude. I am looking forward to receiving my new pen and getting a chance to really use it. And I will now recommend Paradise Pens to anyone interested in buying a good pen.

Last week I traveled for business to Washington, DC. While my original plans left me little time for sight-seeing, I still managed to take a long evening walk and see the memorials along the National Mall. Then old man winter intervened and pushed my flights around, giving me an unexpected whole day to visit museums. Now, I could give you a step-by-step itinerary of my trip, but it would likely bore you to death. (Now I’ve set myself up to have to write something non-boring. Uh oh.) What I’d rather talk about, though, is the overall experience I had.

This was my first visit to Washington. Ever since I was a kid I’ve been a history and government junkie, so I was excited to get to see some of the places for real that I’d only seen in pictures. I wasn’t disappointed. It’s even more impressive to be there and see them. First, because many of the buildings are massive in a way that a photograph just can’t communicate. (The Supreme Court? Unbelievably immense.) But second, because all the buildings are so close together. You come up from the Metro, and bam! there’s the Library of Congress. Walk past it and bam! there’s the Supreme Court. Then turn the corner and whammo! the Capitol building. And on and on. Amazing.

As I started my journey down the Mall, I felt a little bit sheepish playing tourist; I seemed to be the only tourist around, everyone else was just finishing up work for the day. Still, I had fun snapping pictures and marveling at the architecture. Halfway down the Mall you reach the Washington Monument. Some 500+ feet tall, it’s a massive obelisk that dominates the skyline. I took a few pictures to try to capture the sunset off in the west and the ring of flags that surrounds the monument. I’m sure I didn’t really capture it, though – it’s just too much to take in with a camera lens. (At least, too much for me and my camera lens.) At the Washington Monument I finally saw a few other tourists, all doing the same as me, gazing up at this massive two-tone tower.

I continued my trek westerly across the Mall. From the Washington Monument you have a long walk past the reflecting pool until you reach the Lincoln Memorial. Coming from the east like I did, it isn’t immediately apparent what exactly the reflecting pool reflects. The pool is long, fairly wide, a few feet deep, and made semi-famous as the pool that Forrest Gump wades into at the end of the movie. (I heard two separate tourists that I passed on the walk mention this fact, so it must have been more memorable to them than it was to me.) It was also drained for the winter; there was just a little bit of water in the center of the pool where the snowmelt had run. It was anything but impressive as I walked by it in the winter dusk, but it made a comfortable walking path as I headed toward Lincoln.

The guidebooks all describe the Lincoln Memorial as the most popular of the memorials on the Mall. This was evidenced to me as I walked toward it that night – the frequent camera flashes reflecting off the inner walls of the memorial lit it up beyond the already-bright normal lighting. When I reached the Memorial, there was no shortage of tourists, even though it was nearly seven pm. Adults, small children, families, a school group, all in awe of the massive man of marble. And then I turned around.

As magnificent as the Lincoln Memorial is, what really captured me (and many of the others) was the view back across the Mall. So that’s why they have a reflecting pool: from the Lincoln Memorial you can see the whole Washington Monument reflected. Even in the snowmelt a patchy reflection lit the Mall. Far in the distance the Capitol was lit up brightly. What an amazing scene.

Now why do I keep bringing up the number of tourists there? Wouldn’t I have preferred there were fewer so there would be less crowding? Well, crowding wasn’t really an issue. But what got to me was this: even in these contentious political days, a diverse group of visitors could all stop for a few minutes and share the wonder. We could all appreciate the beauty and truth of Lincoln’s words engraved in the wall of the memorial. We could all feel thankful for past leaders like George Washington. We could all stop and feel the love of a free country, this country, our country. Amazing.

Rich Mullins summed up my feelings toward my country so well in his song Land of my Sojurn:

Nobody tells you when you get born here
How much you’ll come to love it
And how you’ll never belong here
So I’ll call you my country
But I’ll be longing for my home
And I wish that I could take you there with me…

A friend linked me to this story today, and it interested me enough to try to write down a few thoughts. According to the AP story, the National Association of Evangelicals has now decided to work with a leading scientific group to combat global warming.

“Whether God created the Earth in a millisecond or whether it evolved over billions of years, the issue we agree on is that it needs to be cared for today,” said Rich Cizik, vice president of government relations for the National Association of Evangelicals, which represents 45,000 churches.

Eric Chivian, director of the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School, agreed, saying: “Scientists and evangelicals have discovered that we share a deeply felt common concern and sense of urgency about threats to life on Earth and that we must speak with one voice to protect it.”

The NAE is thus joining a statement signed by 86 evangelical leaders back in February 2006 to “fight global warming, saying that human-induced climate change is real, that its consequences will hit the poor the hardest, and that Christian moral convictions demand an urgent response.”

I think this move by the NAE is a mistake on several grounds.

1) Global Warming – maybe. Human-induced? Not so much.

This is probably my biggest issue with the environmentalist global-warning folks as a whole. I will agree that depending on how you look at climate data, it appears that our earth is getting a bit warmer. I will also note a bunch of caveats to that assertion, including the fact that we have a limited amount of historic data, and that the conclusions you can draw vary widely depending on what data set you choose to interpret. Remember, the Time Magazine headlines back in the 1970’s were wondering if we were going to enter a new ice age.

That all being said, even if we can conclude the earth is warming by fractions of a degree, you’re hard-pressed to prove that the warming is human-induced. While certainly human industry and automobiles generate gases that are nasty, there are large environmental processes at work that we don’t totally understand that also cause changes. I just don’t think we’re at a point where we can conclusively say that humans are causing global warming.

2) Where is our priority?

If a Christian organization is going to spend major amounts of time and money on an issue, there needs to be some careful prioritization of resources. For any Christian organization, number one should be advancing the kingdom of Jesus Christ. In the news story, it seems a torturous bit of stretching to deal with this issue: basically they claim that global warming leads to suffering for the poor, thus necessitating action to relieve that suffering. But I’m skeptical.

If you want to relieve the suffering of the poor, send ‘em food and supplies. Speak out against repressive governments that are hurting their people. There are lots of missions doing very practical work to help these people. We can support those missions. In my cost-benefit analysis, spending money to lobby the American government to enact standards to reduce gas emissions by industry and automobiles that might in turn affect the climate is a lot more cost for a lot less benefit. Sure, maybe twenty years from now we’ll have managed to cool the planet by a degree or so. But that won’t have provided food or water or medical supplies for the millions that are currently starving and sick. They’ll just be dead.

3) Strange Bedfellows

I want to be careful with this one. I’m not trying to say there’s anything inherently wrong with Christians working with non-Christians to attain mutual goals. But I am saying we have to be very careful. Even if we have some present mutual goals, our motivations and perhaps some of our long-term goals are different. Environmentalists see man as a destructive blight on the earth and in an extreme view think the earth would be much better off without mankind around. A Christian view, though, tells us that God purposely placed us here, created the Earth for us, and now commands us to cultivate and use it. Very different perspectives.

I will grant that even amongst Christian denominations there are various views on environmental care for the earth. I’ve heard the opinion that “it’s all gonna just go downhill and then burn, so use it up, baby!”. There is another school of thought that says that part of God’s plan for the Kingdom is redeeming the Earth from the Fall, in which case we should care for the earth and work to improve it. I’m not quite sure yet where I fall on that spectrum. We should be good stewards of the world that God has given us. And just in a practical sense, if we are trying to show God’s goodness to the world around us, part of that should include a desire to make the world a more pleasant place, which includes caring for the beauty of creation. But let’s make sure we keep it in perspective, and not start worshiping the created Earth instead of the Creator.

So, when all is said and done, I think the NAE has gone the wrong direction here. There are far better ways their money and time could be spent than in trying to push an environmental agenda.

“The usual?”

That’s the question that was posed to me this morning. Now, it was just at the local Quik Trip store that’s on the way to work, but still, it made me think a bit.

The details of me having a “usual” are unremarkable. I am in the habit of stopping at that QT every morning on the way to work sometime between 6:30 and 7:00 AM. I have an older 52 oz mug that I fill with Diet Pepsi from the fountain. I usually add a shot of cherry syrup to sweeten it a bit. They upped the price on me several months ago; it now costs $0.93 once the state of Iowa taxes it.

So this morning I didn’t have to say “refill” or “yeah, it’s pop” (apparently some folks refill a 52 oz mug with coffee! Yikes!) – as I walked up to the counter, the guy said “just the usual?” and I said “yep” and handed him a dollar. Actually, I set the dollar on the counter; he was already pulling my seven cents of change out of the cash drawer.

There’s a word I’m heading towards here with this story, and that word is community. Now sure, maybe it’s a stretch to say that the Quik Trip guy knowing what I usually get is community. (Maybe it’d be better for me if I wasn’t drinking 50 oz of Diet Pepsi a day!) But when you start having consistency in an area to the point where you and your habits are known, and people start responding to you as a person they recognize, rather than just some random human they have to deal with today? That’s the start of an opportunity for a relationship; one that builds community and provides opportunities to interact about more meaningful things.

My hope is two-fold. First, that I will be a part of a community long enough that people will know me and what I am about. Second, that what I am about will be more meaningful than large daily doses of liquefied caffeine.

My mother-in-law asked the other day what I thought about this recent news story. In brief: Newly elected to the House of Representatives, Minnesota Democrat Keith Ellison has declared that when he is sworn in on January 4th, he will take the oath of office with his hand on a Koran instead of a Bible. Ellison is the first Muslim ever elected to Congress.

There have been varying reactions to Ellison’s decision. The loudest has been Dennis Prager on townhall.com, who declares that Ellison “…should not be allowed to do so — not because of any American hostility to the Koran, but because the act undermines American civilization.” A little more:

Forgive me, but America should not give a hoot what Keith Ellison’s favorite book is. Insofar as a member of Congress taking an oath to serve America and uphold its values is concerned, America is interested in only one book, the Bible. If you are incapable of taking an oath on that book, don’t serve in Congress. In your personal life, we will fight for your right to prefer any other book. We will even fight for your right to publish cartoons mocking our Bible. But, Mr. Ellison, America, not you, decides on what book its public servants take their oath.

Yesterday I was forwarded an email from the American Family Association that quoted the Prager column and then asked all the readers to

1. Send an email asking your U.S. Representative and Senators to pass a law making the Bible the book used in the swearing-in ceremony of Representatives and Senators.

2. Forward this email to your friends and family today!

So what is my reaction to all this?

Let’s deal with the easy one first. The AFA’s suggestion is clearly ridiculous. Any law passed by Congress requiring the oath to be taken on a Bible would be summarily rejected by the Supreme Court as an unconstitutional establishment of religion, and rightly so. Let’s just reverse the situation for a moment. Suppose a congressional majority of Muslims arose. Would I think it were then OK for them to mandate that all oaths be taken with a hand on the Koran? Of course not. Hence our protection of religious freedoms in the Constitution.

So then to the next question: what opinion do I have about Mr. Ellison’s intention? Let’s back up and look at the history of oath-taking in the USA. I’m sure I could go back further, but it’s easy to note that George Washington took the presidential oath of office on a Bible. Each President since then has taken the oath in similar fashion. The Bible is today used for oaths in a multitude of other circumstances, local and state offices, courtrooms.

In the initial case, President Washington used the Bible because he viewed it as a sacred book, and placing his hand on the Bible further solemnized the oath. Given the United States’ Christian heritage, this understandably became a tradition that continues to this day. My fear, though, is that somewhere through the years the solemnity imbued by the sacred text has faded into a tradition that carries little of its original weight. Let’s be certain of this: I’m all for politicians keeping their word. Too many these days seem to lose their care for ethics and the truth once they reach Washington; if any action can reinforce to them the need to keep their oath, so much the better. But it seems to me that if the Bible is being used simply as a traditional prop by those who don’t reverence it, it is more dishonoring than honoring to the Book. As one who believes the Bible to be the Word of God, that bothers me.

So where does that leave us? I have come to the conclusion that I don’t really care. I want Rep. Ellison and each of his fellow congressmen to honor the oaths that they take. If Rep. Ellison believes that the Koran will further solemnize his oath, I don’t have a problem with it. If a Christian congressman wants to use the Bible to solemnize his oath, he should use it. Personally, I’d prefer that if a person doesn’t respect or revere the Bible, they not use it at all. Let’s not turn the Holy Book into a prop.

With Thanksgiving being tomorrow, I thought I’d list a few things I’m thankful for. I encourage you to think about it and make your own list!

Family. I have had more opportunity this year to spend time with my brothers, sister, and parents than I have in several years. What a blessing to have a family that loves each other, loves God, enjoys making music together and living life together, and has so much fun doing all of it. Closer to home, nay, at home, we are one more in number than we were last Thanksgiving; it’s hard to believe little Addie Grace is over 8 months old now. What a blessing to have a loving wife and precious daughters.

Skilled Doctors. This one hit home a couple of weeks ago when I had to take Becky to the ER. It was one in the morning, she was very sick, I was very concerned and tired. What a blessing to have a wonderful nurse and doctor who were skilled and kind. That someone would pay for years of education just to get a job where they have to work overnights all so they can care for hurting people? Blessings on them.

God’s Provision. The leadership at Noelridge planned and encouraged a special Thanksgiving offering this year. We were all encouraged to seek God’s guidance in what He would have us give and then to trust Him to supply it. Our goal was $12,000, which is more than 3x what we receive on a normal Sunday, over and above regular giving. We took the offering last Sunday and the Lord provided over $15,000 in the special offering, on top of the regular offering. Praise Him!

Old Friends. Lydia and I were friends back in Jr High. When our family moved to Texas it pretty much put the damper on that and we drifted apart. I last saw her in 1994, and hadn’t heard from her in several years. But she tracked me down a couple of years ago and we have corresponded from time to time. Finally, last Sunday, she and her sister Candace made the three-hour trek from Illinois to Iowa to visit for a day. It was fun to meet Candace, to introduce Lydia to Becky and the girls, and to spend an afternoon catching up.

Good Music. Did you really think I could write a blog post without mentioning music of some sort? I will ridicule all the radio stations playing wall-to-wall Christmas music already, but I must confess I have had Christmas music of a sort playing repeatedly over the past few weeks. The sort in question isn’t your traditional Christmas stuff, but rather is Andrew Peterson’s wonderful Behold the Lamb of God. (You can stream the whole album from his website. Go listen to it.) The truth of the Christmas story told in an original way. Becky and I are headed to Omaha on December 1st to see Andrew and his huge cast of friends perform it. I can’t wait.

This is only the beginning of what could be a really long list. Lord, remind me to be thankful every day, not just once a year.

Dr. John Stackhouse of Regent College in Vancouver, BC, is in Cedar Rapids this weekend speaking. He’ll be at Coe College tonight, First Lutheran Church tomorrow night, and then at Noelridge and First Lutheran on Sunday morning. (Visit recminusa.org for more details.)

I got to meet him at lunch today. I was invited to a regular lunch meeting that my pastor has with some musician-types each Thursday, and Dr. Stackhouse was invited to join us all for lunch. He is a fascinating man; seeming to be equally conversant in music, politics, religion, and philosophy, he bantered with the group all the while engaging us in some serious thought.

At one point the discussion turned to politics, and one of the regulars was lamenting that so many people have started to view politics as single-issues; they’ll make their voting decision based strictly on a candidate’s view on, say, abortion, or gay rights. It’s frustrating to those of us who think there are multiple issues that are important. Dr. Stackhouse agreed that it is very difficult; in reality there may be 30 or 40 issues that a thinking person could be versed on, and vote around. What he suggested, though, was that pastors and other leaders should encourage their people to think around a rather short list, perhaps five or six issues that as Christians we should care about.

He only listed two for us:

• How will this issue affect the poor?
• How will this issue affect our ability to freely share the gospel?

He suggested that there might be just a few more. What do you think? Is this a reasonable framework around which to decide how votes will be cast? What items would you add to the list?

Dr. John Stackhouse of Regent College in Vancouver, BC, is in Cedar Rapids this weekend speaking. He’ll be at Coe College tonight, First Lutheran Church tomorrow night, and then at Noelridge and First Lutheran on Sunday morning. (Visit recminusa.org for more details.)

I got to meet him at lunch today. I was invited to a regular lunch meeting that my pastor has with some musician-types each Thursday, and Dr. Stackhouse was invited to join us all for lunch. He is a fascinating man; seeming to be equally conversant in music, politics, religion, and philosophy, he bantered with the group all the while engaging us in some serious thought.

At one point the discussion turned to politics, and one of the regulars was lamenting that so many people have started to view politics as single-issues; they’ll make their voting decision based strictly on a candidate’s view on, say, abortion, or gay rights. It’s frustrating to those of us who think there are multiple issues that are important. Dr. Stackhouse agreed that it is very difficult; in reality there may be 30 or 40 issues that a thinking person could be versed on, and vote around. What he suggested, though, was that pastors and other leaders should encourage their people to think around a rather short list, perhaps five or six issues that as Christians we should care about.

He only listed two for us:

• How will this issue affect the poor?
• How will this issue affect our ability to freely share the gospel?

He suggested that there might be just a few more. What do you think? Is this a reasonable framework around which to decide how votes will be cast? What items would you add to the list?