Is this Calvinism's Default Position?

I’m sitting in a hotel room tonight enjoying a family weekend and catching up on twitter while trying to get the kids to go to sleep, and in doing so I run across this from Pastor Steve McCoy this afternoon:

“I’m not clear on most things about God, but Calvinists anger me.”

- An Absurd Number of People

(@SteveKMcCoy, June 7, 2013, at 2:36 PM)

Steve (pastor of an SBC church in the Chicago area) and Bill Kinnon went back and forth a bit on Twitter after that tweet, Bill suggesting that it was a bit judgmental to suggest that people who aren’t Calvinists “aren’t clear on most things about God”, and Steve saying that he didn’t mean that everyone who hates Calvinism is unclear, but that “an absurd number” are. Their conversation trailed off before they came to any resolution.

Then there was this stunning quote from the Founders.org website, for which SBC pastor Tom Ascol is a primary leader:

In the first place, Calvinistic Christianity is nothing more and nothing less than biblical Christianity. It follows, then, that the future of Christianity itself is bound up in the fortunes of Calvinism….

…For whoever believes in God’s redemption through Christ and recognizes his own utter dependence on God, whoever recognizes that salvation is of the Lord, whoever seeks to glorify God in his worship and life, that person is already implicitly a Calvinist, no matter what he calls himself. In such circumstances, to make the person an explicit Calvinist, all we are required to do (humanly speaking) is to show the believer the natural implications of these already-held fundamental principles, which underlie all true Christianity, and trust God to do his work, that is, trust God to reveal these implications to the person.

Did you get that? Calvinism is “nothing more and nothing less than biblical Christianity”. And if anyone recognizes salvation from the Lord, and seeks to glorify God, then that person is implicitly a Calvinist! And all the Calvinists need to do is explain it in a way that the unknowing Calvinist might understand.

Now, I’m not suggesting that all proponents of Calvinism would make such presumptuous, arrogant claims, and I won’t claim for an instant that there aren’t some really God-ignorant Calvinism haters like Steve is talking about. I’m sure I don’t speak for the group of progressive bloggers who have been very vocal in recent weeks about their concerns with Calvinism and certain highly visible Calvinist groups. But I can speak for myself.

I’m not particularly progressive. I accept the Bible as God’s authoritative, inspired Word, but I don’t think that means I have to read the first bits of Genesis literally. I believe, based on what I read in the Bible, that homosexual behavior is wrong, but I’m in favor of the state sanctioning same-sex marriages and I believe Christians have done a pretty poor job of loving homosexuals over the last several decades. I voted for Bush twice and then Obama twice. I try to not post about politics on Facebook.

I also don’t think I’d fit into Steve McCoy’s category of being “not clear on most things about God”. I grew up in a very conservative Christian home, did 12 years of AWANA, attended a Christian university that required a bunch of Bible classes, have served as a deacon and an elder in a Conservative Baptist church and helped plant another CBA church that eventually became an Acts 29 church. I read widely in theology; my last couple years of reading includes Baptists, Anglicans, Catholics, Lutherans, Arminians and Calvinists alike.

And here’s the thing: (well, two things:) I’m not a Calvinist. And some of what I’m seeing out of some of these key Calvinists does anger me.

The big fuel on the fire lately has been the recent statements about CJ Mahaney and the sexual abuse lawsuits brewing against several folks from Sovereign Grace Ministries churches. Calvinist leaders like Albert Mohler, Mark Dever, Don Carson, and Justin Taylor have put out statements supporting Mahaney, and erroneously claiming that Mahaney was accused of no crime (he was accused of conspiring to keep the abuse claims quiet).

That men of such intellect and reputation would publish a statement with such obvious mistruths in it angers me. That after posting it on Facebook and getting dozens of disapproving comments, they deleted the statement and the comments frustrates me a lot. That then they, without comment, revised it to remove the claim that Mahaney was never accused, and posted it on their organization’s website while disallowing comments infuriates me.

That Justin Taylor would claim, on twitter, that continuing discussion with divisive folks is a sin (a not-so-subtle explanation, one would assume, for why he was keeping comments closed), only to delete the tweet a couple days later once people called him on it, makes me want to bang my head against the nearest immovable object.

I don’t hate these guys. I have, in the past, respected them a lot. Which is why it’s all the more infuriating and disappointing when I see them taking indefensible positions like these.

I don’t want to assume that this circling of the wagons and declaration of Calvinism as nothing more or less than true Christianity is the default Calvinist position. I want to believe that there are Calvinist brothers and sisters out there who are as horrified by the alleged abuse and cover-up, and by the ridiculous arrogance of the Founders.org statement as I am.

But where are they? Why are they quiet?

Where is the Calvinist brother who is willing to publicly suggest that it would be wiser to not have CJ Mahaney still regularly preaching and on the conference circuit while allegations about the cover-up remain unresolved?

Where is the Southern Seminary graduate who is willing to say that while he personally believes Calvinism to be the truest expression of Christianity, he would never dream of asserting that every Christian would claim Calvinism if only they understood it better?

Without those voices many of us are left with few options but to believe that these are the default Calvinist positions. I beg you, my brothers, speak out and give us more options. God’s church deserves better.

Where are the voices? Boz Tchividjian has strong words on the SGM mess.

Boz Tchividjian (grandson of Billy Graham, law professor at Liberty University, and former state prosecutor in Florida) weighs in on the SGM abuse allegations and this week’s troubling statements on that topic from The Gospel Coalition and Together for the Gospel.

The allegations, Tchividjian says, are horrifying, and based on his experience carry the hallmarks of truth and seem highly credible. So, he went searching the internet to see if Christian leaders were saying anything.

I searched online hoping to find statements by Christian “leaders” speaking out about this case or at the very least expressing grave concerns regarding the very disturbing facts alleged in the lawsuit. I was never looking for, or wanting, anyone to throw CJ Mahaney under the proverbial bus. I was simply hoping to hear statements that expressed horrors about child sexual abuse and with institutions that are not transparent about such offenses. Initially, all I found was silence from these leaders.

As some of us have been noting for several weeks, the silence has been deafening. So, what did he actually find?

What I did find was a lot of statements by Christians claiming that all of these individuals were innocent until “proven guilty by a jury”. Sadly, that is not the only time I have heard such a response from the Christian community when allegations of child sexual victimization are brought forward. What is ironic, or better yet, down right disturbing is that these same individuals don’t approach any other sinful crime in such a distorted manner…

I have personally gotten similar reactions when the topic has come up on Twitter, and I’ve seen many others get that reaction as well. Few “leaders” are saying much about the horror of the crime; what they’re saying is “nobody’s proven anything yet”.

He then makes four observations about the TGC and T4G statements:

  1. Neither statement makes mention that the heart of this lawsuit is about a systematic church effort to discourage and eventually prevent the families of children who were allegedly (and repeatedly) sexually victimized by church officials from speaking out and reporting to law enforcement. A statement that fails to mention that this lawsuit is less about the abuse and more about an institution that took steps to protect itself and its reputation over the victimized souls and bodies of little ones. Omitting such fundamental facts from these statements speaks volumes about the inability of the authors to grasp the eternal significance about which they write.
  2. Neither statement mentions that CJ Mahaney was actually the Senior Pastor at one of these churches where all of this horrific abuse allegedly occurred AND where these families were discouraged from bringing this matter to the God ordained civil authorities? Including this would simply state a known fact without implicating Mr. Mahaney in any wrongdoing. Omitting such a fundamentally important fact from this statement is extremely disturbing to me and very disheartening to so many others.
  3. The statement by T4G fails to mention that this lawsuit was dismissed for one reason and one reason only…expiration of the statute of limitation. Isn’t it tragic that the reason why this suit was dismissed – taking too long to file – was the very objective of these church leaders allegedly had when they discouraged these individuals and families from stepping forward.
  4. The statement by the members of the Gospel Coalition says the following as it relates to the statute of limitations and the dismissal of the case: So the entire legal strategy was dependent on a conspiracy theory that was more hearsay than anything like reasonable demonstration of culpability. As to the specific matter of C. J. participating in some massive cover-up, the legal evidence was so paltry (more like non-existent) that the judge did not think a trial was even warranted. Does this sound like a statement that even appears to make an effort to be objective?

The whole piece is worth a read. I hope and pray that more Christian leaders will make their voices heard.

T4G and TGC break their silence on Mahaney

One of the great frustrations of those trying to bring the allegations of rampant child abuse and cover-up in Sovereign Grace Ministries (SGM) churches to light has been the silence of those who have long been founder CJ Mahaney’s greatest supporters - Al Mohler, Mark Dever, and Ligon Duncan of Together For The Gospel (T4G) and Don Carson, Justin Taylor, and the rest at The Gospel Coalition (TGC).

In the past 24 hours, in light of the dismissal of the majority of the civil suit against SGM folks (due to the statute of limitations), and in what appears to be a coordinated move, both those groups have issued statements of their continued support for Mahaney.

Together for the Gospel

The T4G statement came out last night on Facebook [Update: statement has been deleted from FB; It is also on the T4G website, which doesn’t allow comments.] and is troubling. They first seek to cloud the water about the civil lawsuit:

Claims presented in a civil lawsuit seeking financial compensation are beyond the ability of the public to render judgment. Often, such claims are even beyond the ability of a court to deliberate.

So if even the courts don’t have the ability to render judgment in these sort of issues, who can? Paul seems pretty clear in Romans 13 that God has established the civil authorities to bring punishment to wrongdoers.

They go on:

If a Christian leader is accused of any wrongdoing, those to whom he is accountable must investigate the charges and then deal responsibly with the evidence. If a criminal accusation is made, Christians have a fundamental duty to inform law enforcement officials. This does not, however, preclude or mitigate the church’s responsibility for biblical church discipline.

This is a key point. To whom was CJ Mahaney responsible? It has been made abundantly clear from the brouhaha around Mahaney and SGM polity over the past couple years that Mahaney was essentially accountable to no one. When it was deemed best that he step down from leadership, he didn’t stay at his home church, under discipline; instead he left to attend Dever’s church in Washington, DC, then went to start another church in Mohler’s backyard in Louisville. If anyone was in position to hold Mahaney accountable, it was Dever, Mohler, and Duncan, but to all appearances they have completely failed to do so.

A Christian leader, charged with any credible, serious, and direct wrongdoing, would usually be well advised to step down from public ministry. No such accusation of direct wrongdoing was ever made against C. J. Mahaney.

This almost defies belief. Mahaney was accused, in the lawsuit, of conspiring to keep the abuse covered up. At a bare minimum, he failed to report the abuse accusations to the authorities, even though he was in a position where he was legally required to do so. So are those charges not credible? Not serious? Or not direct? It would appear that Mohler, Duncan, and Dever are saying either that (1) the charges against SGM aren’t credible, or (2) that failure to mandatorily report child abuse is not a serious or direct charge. Really?

Those who minister in the name of the Lord Christ bear an inescapable duty to live and to minister in a way that is above reproach.

Finally, we get to a place where we agree. What I’m led to wonder is if the term “above reproach” means something significantly different to Pastors Mohler, Dever, and Duncan than it means to me.

The Gospel Coalition

TGC’s statement (“Why We Have Been Silent about the SGM Lawsuit”) was published this morning as a statement from Don Carson, Justin Taylor, and Kevin DeYoung. It’s slightly less troubling than the T4G statement… but only slightly.

They acknowledge up front that their silence could indeed feel like a betrayal to those who suffered abuse, and that pastors hold a responsibility to obey all civil mandatory reporting laws in addition to overseeing church discipline. (This is a lesson that, by all accounts, SGM badly needed to learn.)

However, then TGC turns on the alleged victims, claiming that the conspiracy charges against Mahaney were underhandedly and unfairly manufactured, and praising the statute of limitations as “an important feature of our legal system”.

My question is this: why should church leaders be so happy to escape due to the statute of limitations? Regardless of the legal limitations, shouldn’t the charges be fully investigated by the church, and discipline enacted accordingly? God is not restrained by any statute of limitations.

TGC goes on to encourage us to let the litigation to play out, to hear both sides, to not assume all allegations or false, and to not assume that all defendants are guilty. Good stuff. I could’ve almost been happy with their statement until this final paragraph:

Reports on the lawsuit from Christianity Today and World Magazine (among others) explicitly and repeatedly drew attention to C. J., connecting the suit to recent changes within SGM. He has also been the object of libel and even a Javert-like obsession by some.

And there we are. “Javert-like obsession.” TGC has now turned the tables. The victims of abuse are now the accusers, and Mahaney, the head of an organization that allegedly let the abuse run rampant, is the victim.

For shame.

“Be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the ear in the inner rooms will be proclaimed from the roofs." Luke 12:1-3

“If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea." Matthew 18:6

"…the truth will set you free.” John 8:32

[Update at 9:30 Friday morning]

The T4G statement has been removed from Facebook in its entirety. I’ll link to a copy of it if I can find one.

[Update at 10:06 Friday morning]

The T4G statement is available on their website. Commenting is not allowed.

Biblicism and the Reformed Evangelical magisterium

One of the long-term hallmarks of the American evangelical church has been a congregational independence free from strong denominational ties. Sure, the denominations exist as broad placeholders with certain doctrinal distinctives, but the range of actual beliefs and practices among churches even within a single denomination is often large. In practice, theological interpretations mainly happen at the individual congregation level. This seems reasonable given that the popularly accepted definition of evangelicalism includes “biblicism” as one of its four key characteristics. [ref]Per British historian David Bebbington as referenced in this Wheaton College post. The other three characteristics are conversionism, activism, and crucicentrism.[/ref]

Within less-evangelical denominations that have a well-defined hierarchy, doctrinal disputes and practice are better kept in-house; the Presbyterians are more than willing to govern their doctrine and practice, and the Catholics have their magisterium - the teaching authority of the church which speaks authoritatively on doctrine.

While Reformed Evangelicalism is still loosely grouped into tribes (Acts 29, The Gospel Coalition, Southern Seminary alumni, etc.), I think we are seeing the emergence of a Reformed Evangelical magisterium of sorts. Its hand has been evident the past several months in the reaction to, among other things, Rachel Held Evans’ new book. I don’t want to address the book in this post - I did that previously - but rather the reaction to it.

Let me say up front that I have great respect for everyone I’m going to mention here, and that I have learned much from and appreciated the teaching of nearly all of them. My goal here is not to suggest that they have nefarious intents or are necessarily intentionally working to form this sort of authoritative cabal, but that its emergence may point to a lack of confidence in the sufficiency of the tenet of biblicism.

Seeing the organization of this Reformed Evangelical cabal isn’t difficult. There is a nicely defined structure that includes:

  • theological institutions (Southern Seminary being the chief example)
  • theologians - D. A. Carson, Albert Mohler, Wayne Grudem, John Piper, Mark Dever
  • charismatic teachers - Mark Driscoll, Matt Chandler, Voddie Baucham, Josh Harris, C. J. Mahaney
  • mouthpieces - The Gospel Coalition website, Desiring God’s website, and The Resurgence website, among others
  • inquisitors - Tim Challies and Kevin DeYoung being the prime examples
  • councils - we call ’em conferences, though. Desiring God holds a big one every year, T4G is every other year, and so on.

If a member gets too far out of line, this group is quietly self-regulating. See: Acts29 moving from Driscoll in Seattle to Chandler in Dallas. See also Mahaney leaving his Maryland church of nearly 30 years under a cloud, only to re-emerge as pastor of a new church in Louisville, KY, safely in Al Mohler’s backyard.

Among the larger group of individual pastors that follow these leaders, doctrinal alignment is maintained by conferences and publishers. As an aspiring author, your first book likely won’t get a look from one of the big names, but if Challies reviews it positively, your second one might. A cover blurb from Driscoll, Keller, or Chandler will help ensure that your book gets accepted at the book sales room at the next conference, and from there you’re all set on your track to successful blogging, authoring, and maybe even your own speaking gig at the next conference!

Get a vote of disapproval, though, and you’ll be on the outside looking in, anywhere from just being ignored (which I’d imagine is bad for an author’s prospects) to having the full court press turned against you (as Rachel Held Evans has had the past few months).

Now, from one perspective, this sort of unity seems like a positive thing, right? We have Baptists, Presbyterians, Free Church-ians, and independents of every stripe coming “Together for the Gospel”. And indeed, this tent is apparently big enough for diversity on sacramental issues like baptism and communion. But touch one of the “third rails” like women’s roles or origins and you’re gonna get dropped like a hot potato. (Recently a professor at Cedarville College got fired because he believed the “right things” about Adam and Eve but not for the right reasons.)

A few of the authors who go where angels fear to tread are given a grudging pass, typically because their academic credentials are too impressive to totally ignore. Think here of Scot McKnight, whose Junia Is Not Alone argues hard for the egalitarian position, but who also taught at TEDS alongside D. A. Carson. And also, oh, that N. T. Wright guy who says some amazingly liberal stuff on social gospel and the environment, but who wrote some stunning stuff on Jesus.

Academic credentials don’t ensure asbestos underwear, though. Pete Enns (a tenured professor) got run out of Westminster Seminary, Philadelphia, back in 2008 after publishing his book Inspiration and Incarnation, which argued for a re-evaluation of how we read and interpret the Bible - and especially the early parts of the Old Testament. And if you’re a woman without a theology degree, like the aforementioned Evans, well, sorry. You’re toast.

Ask any of these guys (or your local adherents to their creed) why they put the big focus on these specific doctrinal issues, and what you’ll probably hear is this: “the gospel is at stake”. I think it’s clear, though, that what it really means is “our version of the gospel is at stake”.

And this is where the idea of a magisterium comes in. In the Catholic tradition, the magisterium is the teaching authority of the church. The church leadership speaks an authoritative interpretation of Scripture, and the matter is settled.

In the evangelical tradition, however, we don’t have the strong denominational and hierarchical structures to pronounce and enforce Scriptural interpretation. And even though we love the Scripture (a pastor I know and love proudly says he has such a high view of Scripture that “it’s not bibliolatry… but *wink* it’s just almost bibliolatry.”), it’s apparent that while we also love our congregational independence, that independence is just insufficient to protect the evangelical doctrinal turf. And so evangelicalism falls back on its informal magisterium.

I don’t think one can conclude from all this that a magisterium is a bad thing, nor can one conclude that the solution is to move our evangelical churches into some hierarchical denomination. But what is clear is that no matter how loudly some leaders of evangelicalism may cry that we need to simply “believe what the Bible says”, it’s never quite that simple.

Advent... or not

‘Tis the season of Advent, or at least lots of church bloggers are telling me. A time of anticipation, longing, and waiting. Even evangelical churches that aren’t big on use of the church calendar seem to mark out the time for Advent.

It’s curious in a way. We evangelicals don’t observe much of the rest of the traditional church calendar. Christmas? That’s a single day. (That 12 Days of Christmas song is just some weird anachronism.) Pentecost? We remember the story, but don’t mark the day. Lent? Heck no, that’s a weird Catholic thing. Ascension? Is that even a thing we remember?

The churches I grew up in didn’t follow the church calendar, so the only taste I got of it was when visiting my grandparents’ Lutheran church on occasion. 17th Sunday after Pentecost? What the what? It’s not until this past decade as I’ve gained friends in more liturgical denominations that my awareness has been heightened to the greater observance of the calendar. (Kari, for instance, has done some lovely posts on Advent, Lent, and Ordinary Time.)

Seeing how the larger church observes the calendar helps me understand some of the celebrational whiplash that I feel throughout the year. Why do they do Lent for 40 days but then Easter is just one day? Oh, Easter is actually supposed to be celebrated longer than just the day? *lightbulb*

It also helps me explain the dissonance I felt on the first Sunday in December when our church worship kicked off with Angels We Have Heard on High. (It was assuaged briefly this past week when we opened with O Come, O Come, Emmanuel, but quickly returned when we closed the service with Joy to the World!.)

Don’t get me wrong - I love the Christmas hymns. But it does feel like we miss something when we bypass all the anticipation and spread our Jesus-is-born celebration across the whole month of December.

Could it be that the anticipation of Advent is the tension that stretches the boundary between heaven and earth so thin that when we finally do reach Christmas Eve, our hearts can glimpse heaven breaking through?

At the end of Sally Lloyd-Jones’ beautiful Jesus Storybook Bible, she writes about the revelation to John, and she says this:

One day, John knew, Heaven would come down and mend God’s broken world and make it our true, perfect home once again.

And he knew, in some mysterious way that would be hard to explain, that everything was going to be more wonderful for once having been so sad.

In the same way, Advent makes Christmas more wonderful, if only because the heightened anticipation makes us keenly ready to celebrate Jesus’ birth.

Let us anticipate together His coming.

Closely intertwined

I think it may take the American evangelical church another decade or so to really realize how closely intertwined they are with the Republican party, but my prayer is that the realization hits sooner rather than later. What compounds the issue is that our view of American exceptionalism makes us prideful enough that we are resistant to learn from our brothers and sisters in other parts of the world on the topic.

-- me, in an email a few minutes ago

Some thoughts on Matt Chandler's move to lead Acts 29

So, it’s official: Matt Chandler will be taking over as president of the Acts 29 church planting network, moving the A29 headquarters from Seattle to Dallas. Pastor Matt will be taking over from Mark Driscoll, the fiery pastor of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, who helped found the network over a decade ago. While others have served as president of Acts 29 at various times over the past 10 years, it is still Driscoll (and, to a lesser extent, Darrin Patrick of The Journey in St. Louis) who primarily comes to mind when you say Acts 29.

The move from Driscoll to Chandler is a significant one, for several reasons:

  1. Strong enough to bring about change. In an evangelical ecosystem already dominated by leaders with strong personalities, Matt Chandler comes in to this leadership position as an already-established “brand”, separate from Acts 29. His story is fairly well known within evangelical circles, reluctantly accepting the pastorate of a dying Baptist church in the Dallas area only to turn it into a thriving multi-campus megachurch. More recently, his diagnosis of brain cancer and the following struggle through surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy have been the subject of many a blog post and tweet over the last two and a half years. In short, Matt’s standing within the evangelical community is strong and distinct enough from Mark Driscoll’s that Matt has a reasonable chance of effecting real change where it’s needed, rather than just existing in Driscoll’s shadow.

  2. Leaders set the culture. While Chandler’s theology is close in line with that of Driscoll and the Acts 29 network, culturally the lanky Texan will provide a sharp contrast to the Seattle spark plug. Over the past decade, young Acts 29 church planters have picked up not only Driscoll’s theology but also his personal style. There seems to be a contractual obligation for Acts 29 pastors to love Mixed Martial Arts, tattoos, beer, and alternative music styles. Now, I don’t know whether Chandler is a fan of MMA or not… but that just illustrates my point. If Pastor Matt can help separate the cultural stylism from the heart of Acts 29 ministry, it will be a very good thing.

  3. Some distance from the controversy. There have been a couple of widely-discussed controversies in the past few months concerning Mars Hill Church in general, and Mark Driscoll’s leadership strategies in particular. I don’t want to comment on them here other than to say that it appears less than coincidental that the Acts 29 move comes on the heels of those issues. Maybe this move will help provide some distance and perspective for Acts 29 pastors who may be finding themselves uncomfortably trying to deal with these controversies.

  4. Room for Pastor Mark to refresh and grow. Whether you love him or hate him, you’ve got to acknowledge that Mark Driscoll has been one busy dude over the past 10 years. Taking a church from zero to thousands, writing a gazillion books, teaching all over the evangelical conference circuit, and founding and growing a church planting network of 400+ churches, all while trying to also be a good husband and father to a growing family is enough to run anyone ragged. Add to it the stress from being a flashpoint for some contentious cultural issues (Don Miller named him “Mark the cussing pastor” for a real reason, after all), and maybe it’s time for Pastor Mark to back it off just a bit and recharge. Bringing in Pastor Matt to fill a prominent role could help that happen.

Time will tell how this move affects both pastors, their churches, and the Acts 29 network as a whole. We should take the time today, though, to lift up both of these men, their families, and their churches in prayer, asking God’s blessing and protection on them as they serve.

15 Reasons to Show Grace

A couple of days ago I posted a link to Rachel Held Evans’ “15 Reasons I Left Church” on my Facebook wall, along with this comment:

While we may not agree with all of Rachel Held Evans’ reasons, or her conclusion, those of us who are church leaders should be aware that Rachel is not alone - there are undoubtedly people sitting in our pews thinking the same things.

To lay my cards on the table: I resonate with 7 or 8 of the 15 reasons that Rachel lists at my current church, and have been there with another couple of them at previous churches. On a few of the items I disagree with her doctrinally, and the frustrations I’ve had over some of these issues haven’t driven me to leave my church… but that may be because I’ve chosen to simply be quiet about some of the topics rather than being vocal and stirring the pot. So I was curious to see what sort of responses I’d get on FB, and I wasn’t disappointed.

The responses ran the gamut that I sort of expected; a couple friends identified with it quite strongly; a couple more felt the pain and frustration in her post but materially disagreed with most of the content or with how she said it; one graciously said that she “didn’t get it at all”, but that it was unhelpful whining. A college acquaintance reposted the link and got several responses from other college folks universally accusing Evans of whining and “making it all about her rather than about God”.

I’m not surprised by these reactions any more, but I am significantly saddened. Questioning is not sin, and wrestling with theological issues is a sign of healthy, involved, real faith, not a pointer toward apostasy. As Chaplain Mike over at InternetMonk.com so eloquently ranted a couple of weeks ago:

It is Islam that sets forth submission and unquestioning acceptance as the ultimate in piety — not Christianity nor our parent faith as expressed in the Hebrew Bible. The faith we follow is one of lively dialogue between the Creator and his creatures. We question, complain, express our anger, cry out in pain, and bargain with God. Sometimes, if you believe the Bible, God even changes his mind at our behest. Like Jacob, we refuse to let him go until he blesses us. Like Moses, we argue with God. Like the psalmists, we groan and hurl curses toward the heavens. On the other hand, preachers like [name redacted - that’s not the point] want us to get in line and behave. They rebuke our messiness, our humanness. They use the sovereignty of God to shut us up.

Maybe you wrestle with doubt and questions on a daily basis. Or maybe you’ve gone to the same church your whole life and never had the slightest inclination to doubt or argue with what is taught. Maybe you’re somewhere in between. No matter where you are on that spectrum, though, the first response has to be grace.

Grace allows us to disagree with a brother or sister but embrace them anyway. There is a time for teaching and correction, but for the hurting brother or sister, that time comes after love has been lavished and healing has begun.

Jesus didn’t rebuke the doubters; he encouraged them. Even Thomas, who after three years of following Jesus around really had more faith - even Thomas Jesus graciously called close and encouraged him to believe. The rebukes were reserved for those who thought they had it all together and were judging those who they thought didn’t. Judging by the reaction I’ve seen over the past few days, it’s time to go back and learn that lesson again.

Are we overly focused on the cross?

There’s a thought-provoking post by Bo Sanders up on Homebrewed Christianity today wherein he asks what might be to many a startling question: have we overdone the crucifixion?

Sanders thinks that we may have. He observes that, for evangelicals on the blogosphere (and, I’d add, in the current publishing market) it’s “all atonement theory, all the time”.

He goes on:

Here is my concern: in the resurrection God spoke a new word over the world. I would like to live into that new word and participate with God’s Spirit who was given as a gift and a seal of the promise.

To obsess on the cross and related atonement theories is to live perpetually in the old word and to camp in the final thing that God said about the old situation.

As I reflect on my own journey, I can see how the churches in which I grew up did focus on the cross and atonement to the great neglect of the resurrection. Not that we didn’t have amazing Easter celebrations, but somehow we never connected the dots between Christ’s resurrection and our own eternal future. That omission is the reason that when, at age 30, I finally read N. T. Wright’s Surprised by Hope, it so rocked my theological world.

So I think it’s a question worth thinking about. Do we overly focus on the cross as opposed to the other symbols of our faith? Is the focus on the cross a reflection of the evangelical personal sin/death/redemption focus, whereas a focus on the empty tomb and resurrection might drive a more corporate kingdom/social perspective?

To look at it another way: one of my daughter’s favorite stories from the Jesus Storybook Bible (highly recommended if you have kids) is the one on the crucifixion. But if she requests that story, I make sure we have time to read two stories, because I refuse to stop reading with Good Friday; I want to get to resurrection morning. Is our focus on the cross a grown-up theological equivalent of continually reading the Friday chapter without the Sunday chapter? Food for thought, for sure.

[Homebrewed Christianity]