Dave Ramsey, Sacred Cow

Earlier this week I posted a link on my Facebook feed: “What Dave Ramsey Gets Wrong about Poverty” - an opinion column by Rachel Held Evans. Little did I know the intensity of response it would receive.

Rachel is a polarizing figure among the evangelical blogging public these days. A progressive woman who isn’t afraid to speak her piece, she’s gained a significant audience in the past year or two. (This is not the first time she’s had a guest piece on CNN.com.) At the risk of over-simplifying her piece (which I recommend reading in its entirety), her main points were these:

  1. “Much of what Ramsey teaches is sound, helpful advice, particularly for middle-class Americans struggling with mounting credit card bills.”
  2. Ramsey’s “views on poverty are neither informed nor biblical”.
  3. A recent piece on Ramsey’s website “confused correlation with causation here by suggesting that [certain] habits make people rich or poor”
  4. “Ramsey’s perceived “direct correlation” between faith and wealth should be more troubling than his other confused correlations, for it flirts with what Christians refer to as the prosperity gospel, the teaching that God rewards faithfulness with wealth.”
  5. Ramsey “glosses over the reality that economic injustice is not, in fact, limited to the developing world but plagues our own country as well.”
  6. “People are poor for a lot of reasons, and choice is certainly a factor, but categorically blaming poverty on lack of faith or lack of initiative is not only uninformed, it’s unbiblical.”

Now maybe it’s just me, but these points seem fairly obvious and valid. So I was more than a little surprised at the vehemence of negative responses to my link and on the subsequent re-sharings of a few of my friends. It would appear that, among American evangelical circles these days, criticizing Dave Ramsey on anything is nearly as dangerous as commending President Obama for anything.

What is more striking, though, is the common thread I saw in the negative responses. The assertions were all along the lines of “I think she misquoted Dave” (though no one provided any specifics), and “Dave’s system worked for me, so people shouldn’t criticize him.”

And here we see a scary bit of illogic that is far too common these days - the immediate defense of the person under critique without seemingly no consideration of the points that were actually made. No one tried to argue that Ramsey’s views of poverty were biblical, or that his correlations of faith and wealth were incorrect, or that systemic economic injustice is not an issue. All they said was “it worked for me!”, which, incidentally, was the first thing Ms. Evans acknowledged in her column.

Now, I’ve been guilty of this tendency myself often enough. A critique of something or someone I generally support feels like an attack on that person, which in turn I take as an attack on me, and my first response isn’t a thoughtful, reasoned response, but instead a knee-jerk reaction.

This has got to stop.

We as American evangelicals have no hope of actually solving some of the systemic problems in our church and our country if we’re unwilling to examine, critique, and correct even our most popular sacred cows.

We must have wise awareness of the motivations of those who are teaching and selling to us, even when that message is clothed in the “safe” garb of evangelical Christian vocabulary.

We must understand that, outside of Jesus, no teacher is always right, and almost no teacher is always wrong. This will free us to wrestle with uncomfortable truths. When we do we will find surprising agreement with those whom we previously considered adversaries. We will also have the (very healthy) realization that even our most revered evangelical heroes are fallible humans just like us.

We must embrace God’s truth through whatever channels it comes to us. (Yes, that means I’m likely to write another post with quotes from the Pope’s latest exhortation.) We similarly need to be willing to discard error wherever we find it, even when we find it in those who we like and have found helpful.

Learn. Think. Act. Grow. Learn more. Think more. Humbly turn. Grow more.

This is our calling as followers of Jesus Christ.

A Pakistani cover of Brubeck's Take Five

OK, this is likely the most unique cover you’ve ever heard of Take Five. Very cool.

The Joy of the Gospel

Pope Francis published a new “Apostolic Exhortation” today titled “EVANGELII GAUDIUM”, which translated means “The Joy of the Gospel”. It’s a long read - more a book than a web page, about 50,000 words - and I only got about 10% of the way through it at lunch today. However, there is a ton of good stuff even in that first 10%. A few striking quotes (emphasis mine):

How good it feels to come back to him whenever we are lost! Let me say this once more: God never tires of forgiving us; we are the ones who tire of seeking his mercy. Christ, who told us to forgive one another “seventy times seven” (Mt 18:22) has given us his example: he has forgiven us seventy times seven. Time and time again he bears us on his shoulders. No one can strip us of the dignity bestowed upon us by this boundless and unfailing love. With a tenderness which never disappoints, but is always capable of restoring our joy, he makes it possible for us to lift up our heads and to start anew.

That’s a great reminder. Then there’s this:

There are Christians whose lives seem like Lent without Easter. I realize of course that joy is not expressed the same way at all times in life, especially at moments of great difficulty. Joy adapts and changes, but it always endures, even as a flicker of light born of our personal certainty that, when everything is said and done, we are infinitely loved.

“When everything is said and done, we are infinitely loved.” I need that reminder. Regularly.

In every activity of evangelization, the primacy always belongs to God, who has called us to cooperate with him and who leads us on by by the power of his Spirit… The life of the Church should always reveal clearly that God takes the initiative, that “he has loved us first” (1 Jn 4:19) and that he alone “gives the growth” (1 Cor 3:7). This conviction enables us to maintain a spirit of joy in the midst of a task so demanding and challenging that it engages our entire life. God asks everything of us, yet at the same time he offers everything to us.

God takes the initiative, God gives the growth, God asks everything of us and at the same time offers everything to us. Wow.

And one last one:

God’s word is unpredictable in its power. The Gospel speaks of a seed which, once sown, grows by itself, even as the farmer sleeps (Mk 4:26-29). The Church has to accept this unruly freedom of the word, which accomplishes what it wills in ways that surpass our calculations and ways of thinking.

It’s gonna take me a while to get through the whole thing, but I’d say it’s definitely worth a read.

Jim Belcher, "In Search of Deep Faith"

I first became acquainted with author Jim Belcher back in 2009 when I read Deep Church. It appears I didn’t review it here on the blog, but my Goodreads review gave it four stars: solid but not revolutionary. Now Belcher is back, with In Search of Deep Faith.

I feel like I’ve seen bits and pieces of this book already, having followed Belcher on Twitter for the past few years. In Search of Deep Faith reads like a travel journal crossed with Foxe’s Book of Martyrs, as Belcher recounts his family’s adventures through several months of “pilgrimage” in Europe. Belcher, his wife and four pre-teen children spent several months in Oxford, England, where he was a visiting scholar at the university there. They then spent time exploring European sites that were notable because of the saints who had lived there.

Belcher’s chapters bounce back and forth as he shares his family’s adventures in finding and exploring the locations - from Corrie Ten Boom’s house in Holland, to C. S. Lewis’ home in Oxford, to a fruitless search for the location of Bonhoeffer’s hidden seminary - and then interspersing the stories of these saints, with an emphasis on how their deep faith led them to be devoted even during times of crisis and under threat of death.

Belcher’s concern in this memoir seems not primarily for his own spiritual health, but for that of his young children. He reminds us (several times) of studies telling us that children with shallow faith roots will abandon their faith in adulthood. How, Belcher wonders, can he inspire the faith and spiritual understanding that will allow his children to remain firm in their faith throughout their lives?

In Search of Deep Faith is an entertaining read. Most readers will find at least one of the historical faith stories to be new to them - the full story of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer was particularly interesting to me - and Belcher drives the reader to reflection on the health of one’s own faith.

[caption width=“640” align=“aligncenter”] Cranmer burned at the stake[/caption]

My one big gripe with the book is Belcher’s style of driving his argument via what I’m assuming must be invented dialogue. Sure, some of the conversations on his trip probably happened as they are written, but even though page after page of his book is filled with quoted dialog ("‘why do you think he did that?’, my wife asked."), either he provided a script for his family to read their questions from, or he’s putting words in their mouths later as a device to move his arguments along. And while literature has been using the forced question-and-answer format at least since Plato did it in The Republic, after too many chapters of it from Belcher it just feels contrived.

In spite of that gripe I’d still recommend reading this one if you think you’re at all interested. Style aside, it’s an encouraging and educational read.

Disclosure: InterVarsity Press provided me a free ebook copy of In Search of Deep Faith in return for posting a review here and at Amazon.com. The contents of the review are mine alone.

The command to love my neighbour as myself still retains its claim upon me

I don’t always find myself warmed by the writings of Charles Spurgeon, but my friend Michael Terry sent me this bit yesterday, to which I can only give a hearty Amen!

We have seen such a one limping about with a long doctrinal leg, but a very short emotional leg. It is a horrible thing for a man to be so doctrinal that he can speak coolly of the doom of the wicked, so that, if he does not actually praise God for it, it costs him no anguish of heart to think of the ruin of millions of our race. This is horrible!

I hate to hear the terrors of the Lord proclaimed by men whose hard visages, harsh tones, and unfeeling spirit betray a sort of doctrinal desiccation: all the milk of human kindness is dried out of them. Having no feeling himself, such a preacher creates none, and the people sit and listen while he keeps to dry, lifeless statements, until they come to value him for being “sound”, and they themselves come to be sound, too; and I need not add, sound asleep also, or what life they have is spent in sniffing out heresy, and making earnest men offenders for a word. Into this spirit may we never be baptized!

Whatever I believe, or do not believe, the command to love my neighbour as myself still retains its claim upon me, and God forbid that any views or opinions should so contract my soul, and harden my heart as to make me forget this law of love! The love of God is first, but this by no means lessens the obligation of love to man; in fact, the first command includes the second. We are to seek our neighbour’s conversion because we love him, and we are to speak to him in loving terms God’s loving gospel, because our heart desires his eternal good.

This comes from Spurgeon’s book The Soul Winner. I love both the spirit and the sense of humor displayed here. Good stuff.

Today I did something I've never done before...

I bought two tickets to a big rock-and-roll show.

I’ve been an Arcade Fire fan for a few years now, but have never seen them in person. This morning their advance ticket sale went live for their 2014 tour, and after a quick consultation with Becky, I bought a pair.

Minneapolis. March 8. Happy early birthday to me!

And yeah, I bought General Admission Floor tickets. Because if you’re gonna go to a big show, why do you want a chair in a fixed location if you can instead be down on the floor?

Also: many thanks to Becky for being agreeable. She’s not a huge Arcade Fire fan, and not always one for big shows. Hopefully she’ll enjoy this one.

About those doubts and questions

From Marilynne Robinson’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Gilead:

I’m not saying never doubt or question. The Lord gave you a mind so that you would make honest use of it. I’m saying you must be sure that the doubts and questions are your own, not, so to speak, the mustache and walking stick that happen to be the fashion of any particular moment.

Sage advice, that.

Many Happy Returns

Just a quick note here today to say Happy Birthday to my dear mother. (I’ll call you later on today, Mom!)

Remembering her long annoyance on this day many years ago when us kids ran into church on a Wednesday night and breathlessly announced that it was Mom’s birthday and she was turning 40!, I’ll not mention her age here. (Maybe I can safely say is that while that event was on her 40th birthday, she and Dad have now surpassed their 40th anniversary.)

Mom invested the bulk of her life to raise and educate her five children, and remains an example of faithfulness, graciousness, and consistency to us all.

Happy birthday, Mom, and God’s blessings on you for this next year and many more to come.

Cue the Vangelis soundtrack...

One of the enjoyable things about going on business trips to various locations is the chance to get to do some running in locations I don’t usually get to see. I love that running gives you a perspective on a place that you don’t get from just driving past in your car, and when you can get that perspective on someplace new, that’s a treat.

A couple of past favorites include a run around Washington, DC, and another one in Ottawa, Ontario with a short excursion into Quebec. Tonight, though, I got to do my best Chariots of Fire impression on the beach outside of Melbourne, Florida. Can’t beat the sound of waves crashing on the shore as accompianament for your run.

I had to cut the run short because it was getting dark fast, but it was a great run; will definitely have to hit the beach this way again on my next trip to Florida.

The proper evangelical attitude toward sinful behavior outside the church

Here’s one for ya this morning:

The proper evangelical attitude toward sinful behavior outside the church should be one of wise resignation and acceptance. There’s no gospel call to change the world into the church by law. In fact, it cannot be done.

Roger Olson, from How to be Evangelical Without Being Conservative.

I find this thought compelling. It seems so backwards to the evangelical ear, and definitely runs afoul of Dominion Theology, but I think Olson is right.