Changed By Glory

Panhandlers & Common Grace

This post is dedicated to my friend Quinn Smith, who has loved and served homeless and panhandlers with a devotion and compassion consistent with the Gospel.

Yesterday as I was walking down Pennsylvania Ave in Washington D.C. I encountered homeless person after homeless person. Partly to my relief I found myself to be without any cash or change to give to them. One woman in particular was in a sad state, smoking, dirty, in some sort of altered mental state. She saw me coming and called out, “I’ve been waiting for you all week! Do you have my money?” I apologized and told her I didn’t have any money, she continued to act like she knew me and as I walked on she said, “Alright, well bring me a new pair of pants. You know my size.”

Soon the awkwardness of that moment had faded, as it always does. When pulling up to a stoplight where someone disheveled, likely drunken, stands there asking for money it is awkward. We immediately shift into defense mode. We either try and pretend that we see it all the time and just ignore it, or we tell ourselves we can’t help them all, or more often than that we actually consider our disregard as virtuous, keeping them from being able to go and buy one more bottle of booze that will push their organs closer to failure or one more pornographic magazine that will twist their already ill mind. When faced with the grim social realities of sin in its most pitiful forms we often don’t know exactly how to respond.

How should we respond to panhandlers? How should we respond when we do have a little change in our pocket? As I considered those extremely poor, homeless, and in bondage I began to consider how my response to their plea might be informed by the grace that God shows to all every single day, even those that reject him. You see, as Christians, we act according to certain absolute truths, theology informs practice. Living life as a Christian is a profoundly theological task as we seek to reflect the image of the God who made us and redeemed us through the death and resurrection of His Son.

In Matthew 5:45 Jesus sets forth the truth that God “…makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.” Paul affirms this in Acts 17:25 “...[God] himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.” Everything that we have, even the breath we breath is given to us by God. As I consider that I immediately become uncomfortable with the realization of how often I take the things I am given, raw material to be used to magnify the grace and glory of my Creator, and I use it not only for myself but in twisted, sinful ways that are an affront to the very one who has given me everything. I draw in a breath, a gift from God, and I speak profanely, and yet God gives me another. I open my eyes to behold the glory of God in creation and in his word, but with that same sight I lust and covet after that which is not lawful to have. Let us not even begin to speak of those who openly blaspheme God, taking the good gifts he bestows upon them each day and use them to not only serve self but to defecate on the glory of their Benefactor. If God can give generously to all people, then who I am to judge whether or not I should give on the basis of fear that what I give may be misused?

What I want to clarify is that I am not suggesting that we should give when it is certain that our assistance will lead to their harm. But the question I am raising is if perhaps the reformation doctrine of “Common Grace” should inform our acts of charity. We should give to those that ask of us, freely and without suspicion (Matt. 5:42), because God gives to people many good things though he knows they will not give him thanks and they will often use what has been given them perversely. We are commanded to give to him who asks of us, it is up to God to render judgment on that person for the stewardship of what has been given.

Theology is deeply practical. The reality that God in his grace gives to all men good things, even when they turn and use those good things for evil, should lead us who are called to be imitators and image bearers of God (Eph 5:1) to reflect his grace to even the undeserving, giving though that giving may be abused. For those who are in Christ we realize that not only does God give us life and many other good things to enjoy, but we have received salvation from sin and its judgment. Yet we so often abuse God’s grace and live as if we were under the old regime of sin. This reality should lead us into lives of humble generosity.

I know right now the objections that might be raised to this, but we must submit ourselves to God’s word and orient our lives to his Gospel, even if it seems crazy at times. So next time I see a panhandler my prayer is that I will react in away that is consistent with the character of God and his working in the world.

May 22, 2014 0

God is Sovereign Over All or Not at All

I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the LORD, who does all these things.
Isaiah 45:7
I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose.
Isaiah 46:9b-10
Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.
Ephesians 1:4-6

The other day a person said something which I have often heard over the years. I probably would have said it at one point. That is I heard someone denounce the idea of God being sovereign over salvation, by that I mean they denied that the only way a person is saved is if God predestines, calls, and draws that person to himself, making them alive by the power of his Spirit while they are still dead in their sin. And then the person who denied this idea turned around ten minutes later and said that they were so glad they didn’t have to worry about the future because God is in control of the future. Do you see the problem with this?

The reality is that God is either sovereign over all or not at all. The impact of a regenerated soul leads to a changed life which leads to decisions that otherwise would not have been made. If I had chosen not to follow Christ then I shudder to think what kind of person I would be. As it is, daily I am shocked by the creativity of my abiding corruption! The moment a person is made alive in Christ there are butterfly effects set in motion, in fact a culture with a strong Christian presence enjoys the benefits of the redeemed living among them because changed hearts lead to changed lives. When God made me alive by his Spirit as a twelve year old boy on a farm, my life was set on a path different than if I had not been saved. Therefore you cannot disconnect the sovereignty of God over salvation from his sovereignty over everything else.

There is a great idolatry revealed in those that accept the sovereignty of God in certain spheres of life but not in others. Most common among Christians I find a belief that God is sovereign over the future, that God is sovereign even to the extent that he can guarantee my eternal security. But they refuse to believe that this God would also be sovereign over salvation. They don’t like a God that exercises the right to redeem and condemn on the basis of his sovereign good pleasure. They fail to see the depth of their sin that should leave them staggering that he would show mercy to anyone at all. They refuse to submit their hearts to the reality of who God has revealed himself to be. They want God to be sovereign in the areas that give them peace of mind and that is it.

The reality is he is sovereign over all or not at all. If he isn’t sovereign over the salvation of sinners then he cannot know your future and we are awash in a world of infinite possibilities outside of God’s control. If he isn’t sovereign over the beginning of your salvation then you cannot begin to hope that he is sovereign over the end of it.

History is weaved together so intricately that if God is not sovereign over all, including salvation, then the cross was a shot of luck and our future remains uncertain. If God is not sovereign over salvation then he is not sovereign over your future. You can’t have it both ways. Thankfully, the God of the Bible is good, just, and he is absolutely sovereign over literally everything.

April 1, 2014 0

The Problem of Parachurch

Definition: An interdenominational organization that exists outside of the local church or denominational structures, usually in order to facilitate or provide support for various ministry efforts. Especially in the realm of evangelism and missions.

Before you shut me off completely let me say that I am not vilifying all parachurch organizations. They can be helpful and much good has been done through many of them for the sake of the Kingdom. Please hear me on that. What I am concerned about is the need to be extremely cautious in the realm of parachurch and some encourage thoughtfulness as we consider their role in ministry, especially “Great Commission” work.

The existence of parachurch organizations, assisting the push for missions, have exploded in the past 100 years. Passionate men and women within the body of Christ have seen huge holes that needed to be met. They looked at the needs in the world for the propagation of the good news of Jesus Christ and they were determined to do whatever they needed to do to get it done.

The question of course that we must ask is if proclamation is so important, why was it not already being done? Was God waiting around for someone with the correct organizational skills to pull something together? The answer is no. I want to argue that the exponential growth of parachurch entities is, at the end of the day, an indictment on the church.

Local churches, not organizations, were to be the vehicles which would carry the Gospel to the ends of the earth. Christ bestowed his church with authority (Matt. 16, 18) in order to fulfill its mission on the earth until his return (Matt. 28). The church was founded upon the teaching of the Apostles and Prophets (Eph. 2:20) with Christ as the cornerstone. When Jesus commissioned the Apostles in Matthew 28 and Acts 1, he was commissioning the church which would be founded on their testimony. As they went out on their mission they went about establishing churches and appointing leaders who as they proclaimed the Apostles teaching would bear the same authority. The authority of the church is the authority of Christ who is its head and it wields that authority for the same purpose as Christ, to reconcile all things to himself to the glory of God (Eph. 4:15, Col. 1:20).

We see churches in the book of Acts wielding their authority to commission Gospel workers and to make decisions on matters of faith and practice as the Gospel went forth to new areas (Acts 13, Acts 15). As churches were established as a result of this work, we see a strong emphasis that appointed leaders, elders, hold fast to the message that was delivered to them (1 & 2 Timothy, Titus). This was extremely important because to lose the message was to lose the apostolic authority and even the hope of the Gospel. For better or for worse, the church was to be the vessel of the Gospel and the local church to be the dispenser of that Gospel into the world.

Sadly, throughout the history of Christianity the church has often misused and abused its authority and has neglected and at some times forsaken the mission that it was given that authority for. During the Protestant reformation there was a revival in the understanding that the authority of the church is not found in a mere man, but in a message. The word of God, given to us through the apostles and prophets. Once the church began to be reformed by this the church was also awakened to its mission that it was given authority for.

Many churches were ignited in the years following the revival of biblical, apostolic authority to be about the mission that they had been given. But as happens, the pull of sin and of the world has its influence. The church began to see the mission but it became content to contract out the Great Commission to those that were passionate about it, experts if you will, forgetting that the mission was not theirs to delegate but to own and pursue. Churches were given apostolic authority for an apostolic purpose. The church as the “colony of heaven” was a sent entity, bearing through authority of the King, through his Gospel, the authority to go into the world and command fallen image bearers to repent and believe in the good news.

The church wasn’t getting the job done. The church needed another reformation, one that oriented the authority it had been given toward the mission it had been given. But most reformation mutated and was cut from the body. Missions became the work of parachurch agencies and organizations. Organizations with no ecclesiastical authority sent on a mission that cannot be sustained without the exercise of that authority.

The message of the Gospel, which is the generator of the authority of the church, was now being handled by structures and entities with no ecclesiastical structures and generally not the plethora of gifts and personalities found in a properly functioning local church. What this led to often, and continues to, is organizational leadership that out of a genuine desire for fruitfulness is willing to sacrifice Gospel faithfulness for the sake of the mission. The problem is that with a decrease of emphasis on doctrinal purity comes an emptying of authority which leads to cloudiness of mission and eventual capitulation.

The local church sends money and people to these organizations, all the while using the golden bowl of Kingdom authority as a candy dish. Like many Christians who give and never evangelize, the church feels like it is doing its mission, when really it is hiring out its mission to someone who has no authority to carry it out.

Doctrinal ambiguity becomes the mark of many of these organizations, I know this from experience, as they claim that doctrine is up to local churches with ecclesiastical leadership and their job is support and mobilization. They are partly right, but the problem is that the churches are not using their authority to do apostolic mission and the organizations are doing mission without apostolic authority. The truth is, individuals are not given authority, the church is given authority, not to loan out, but to use.

The problem balloons until mission is no longer mission and the church then eventually views its authority, God’s word, as an unused part of the body, an appendix if you will, so when it starts to pain them they get rid of it and still imagine that they are whole. But they quickly die, because they have no reason to live and no heart to keep them alive.

Organizations tasked with mission without apostolic authority will spread the bounds wider and wider until the mission is emptied of its meaning because authoritative message has been lost because there was no authority in place to guard it.

The Church, whose authority and mission is wielded and carried out by local churches, needs a reformation where authority, which depends on the purity of apostolic doctrine, and mission, which is the spreading of apostolic doctrine, come together.

The authority of the church was not given to be loaned out, but to be spread. The mission cannot be carried out apart from that authority. Therefore, I will boldly say, any organization that does not submit itself to the doctrinal oversight of a specific church is illegitimate and damaging to the Kingdom of God, undermining the authoritative means that Christ established for the display and proclamation of the Gospel of the Kingdom.

Churches need to be renewed in their knowledge of why they have been given such great authority to steward and parachurch organizations need to realize that without being under that authority they can have no long term hope of sustaining the great mission of the church. For it is indeed the task of the church to guard the apostolic message (doctrine). And if we lose the apostolic message, we have no apostolic authority, which means we have no right to pursue apostolic mission.

The very meaning of parachurch is that they exist outside of this apostolic, ecclesiastical authority. With inclusion, rapid growth, and aggressive mobilization often being the aim of these organizations, without the protection of ecclesiastical authority the message will quickly begin to decay which leads to an unfocused mission, which leads to ruin of all sorts. This is the problem of parachurch.

March 31, 2014 1

“Facebook” Church

As I was running today, I was listening to a podcast that was talking about internet and Facebook addiction. This led me to ponder on the phenomena that is Facebook. And what I realized is that people approach Facebook in two ways.

1. They parade the best side of their lives onto the web for all to see.

2. They freely share every sordid detail of their lives behind a cyber shield.

In my time in the church, and even more so now as a pastor, I have come to see that people approach the local church in much the same way as they do Facebook. They want the social interaction, they want the community, but they want it one of two ways:

1. They parade the best side of their lives on Sunday (Friday here in the UAE) morning and on Wednesday night for everyone to see. Glossing over the realities of the week. Stub your toe at church and you grin and bear it. Stub it at home and out comes the four-letter words. Yell at your wife in the car, smile and be a saint in the sanctuary. When they gather with their family in Christ they are on their best behavior. They show what they want to show because they don’t believe people would ‘like’ the real them.

2. They do whatever they want and are never challenged because they walk into church with a sign on their forehead which says, “Don’t judge me.” They gather with others, but actually they are distant, encapsulated in a bubble of individualism. They makes sure and block comments from certain people and they never get real close to anyone, because of the comfort and lack of accountability that is found in anonymity. If they do get challenged they are quick to unfriend that person and might even rant about them to other people in the church,

A lack of Gospel is the problem in both of these situations. The first person fails to see that because Christ died for their ugliness, they don’t have to keep it hidden in the shadows. In fact, Friday (Sunday) morning and Wednesday night should be the one place where they can be for real, because everyone else should be equally vulnerable. They gather because they have the same problems and Jesus is the common solution. We are accepted by God because of Jesus’ perfection 7 days a week for around 33 years and because he has already seen and borne the guilt and shame of our ugliness.

The second person fails to see (and believe) that Christ was held account for sin that he had never done. They don’t see that he bore judgment for the sin that they protect. He was humiliated because of their pride and self-justification. They may not care what people think of them, Jesus didn’t either, but he cared what the Father thought and as the guilt of our arrogance and self-sufficiency came onto his shoulders, the one Person whose opinion mattered turned His back. They close themselves off from judgment, Jesus opened himself up to judgment.

We likely fall often into one of these categories, I think the first one is the most common and two are often mixed. We can fight against this by first of all being vulnerable when the body of Christ gathers. We can fight against this by allowing ourselves to be challenged by others in the church, putting down our defenses. But the Gospel must be the catalyst. Always trying to be on our best behavior at church shows that we misunderstand church and Gospel -we want others to justify us. Brazen indifference to accountability shows that we don’t see our need for the Gospel and church – we want to justify ourselves. Don’t be a Facebook Christian. Don’t parade your good side. Don’t flaunt your failures. Go to church this week humble and open as the worst version of yourself.

March 24, 2014 0

Don’t Try To Be The Holy Spirit… or do?

I have heard it said dozens of times “You can’t be the Holy Spirit in their life” or “Stop playing Holy Spirit with them.” I understand what could be meant by this. It would be blasphemous for any of us to pretend to take the Spirit’s place in penetrating to the heart of a person. Sadly, however, the attitude that is more often behind this rebuke is one of individualism and a resistance to accountability. Let me explain.

The truth is, while we are not supposed to try to be the Holy Spirit to other people we are commanded to “speak the truth in love” (Eph 4:15). And this truth comes from none other than “the Spirit of truth” through the Word of God (John 16:3). The difference is when we try to speak on our own authority. But when we resist a Word spoken in love by another person, we actually risk ignoring the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not my own personal almanac for life, but is the very glue which binds us together with other believers (Eph. 4:3). The Spirit uses each of us to speak into one another’s lives with the Word of God, which is from the Spirit. We deceive ourselves if we think we just need ourselves and our own personal Holy Spirit. God did not design us as believers to function this way. We need to have the humility to recognize that the Spirit works through all the means of grace that God has given and that includes the communion of saints.

We are not supposed to try to be the Holy Spirit to each other, but we are to be the mouthpiece of God, lovingly speaking the truth through which the Spirit works. Your brothers and sisters are not the Paraclete but they are a tool in His hand.

Next time someone says something to you and you begin to think, “You can’t be the Holy Spirit to me!” Check your heart. You might be shutting the Spirit out.

September 17, 2013 0

Love That Accords With Knowledge

“Love so follows knowledge, that no man can perfectly love God who has not previously a full comprehension of his goodness.” – Augustine of Hippo

We grow in our genuine love for God as we grow in the knowledge of Him in what he has revealed about himself. The more we view his loveliness, the more convinced we become of its reality. Many wonderful people are misunderstood as long as no time is taken to get to know them. In fact, so many problems in relationships are due to a lack of gaining understanding and even seeing only what we want to see. Love for God based on our own fabrication of who he is, is not love, but mere fancy. And our world is full of short, shallow, and fanciful relationships that prove this point.

If love for God is lacking then more time should be spent in His word. Any time spent there will not be wasted. Eyes that have been opened to behold the glory of God in the Gospel will perceive the loveliness of God in the Scriptures as long as they are actually taking time to look!

Our love for God grows as our true knowledge of Him increases, thus our love will be perfected when we finally see him and know him beyond the dim lens of sin.

August 8, 2013 0

Pray for Immanuel Fuj.

http://youtu.be/EzCTOKLHqAU

This is a short, crude video I made on a hike behind our house the other day. In this video I share a bit of our vision for the church plant here and ask for prayer.

August 6, 2013 2

The Parish Concept

In the Anglican church, a parish is not only a reference to a church, but a defined geographic area over which a vicar has jurisdiction. The vicar of that parish is responsible for the souls, the spiritual well-being, of everyone in that geographic area. Within the parish the minister has the responsibility to visit the sick, care for the poor and widows, and most importantly – make certain that every individual has heard the Gospel message.

Reflection on this institution has led me to an idea which I am calling “The Parish Concept”. As I work at planting Immanuel Church of Fujairah, I have a burden to see the saints built up and equipped to do the work of Gospel ministry in this city. This city is overflowing with people who have never heard the Gospel and there is a lot of ground to cover. As I have reflected on ways to mobilize the church to reach this city with the Gospel, I have pondered on implementing the idea of parish in the lives of every believer in the church.

What I mean when I say I want to introduce believers in the church to the idea of parish is this:

Show them that God has sovereignly placed them in their neighborhood and job for his purposes. Also, teach them that the same applies to their neighbors and co-workers. (Acts 17)
Prove to them from the Scripture that they are called to love their neighbor in a tangible, above-and-beyond kind of way (Lk 10) and that this love is ultimately shown through obedience to the Great Commission (Matt 28) and lives consistent with our identity as ambassadors for Christ (II Cor 5).
Make the connection between points one and two. God’s sovereignty and the call to Gospel proclamation and lives of sacrificial love. This makes the area where each believer lives, works, and plays their individual “parish” they have been assigned by God himself. That believer is called to seek the spiritual well-being of every person in that parish and to love them in tangible ways.
I then need to disciple and encourage believers to take practical steps toward fulfilling their responsibilities. Encourage them to start with the people in the dwellings or desks closest to them and then to branch out until everyone in their sphere of influence has heard the Gospel and knows that this Christian in their life is someone who loves them.
Through this the goal is that every person in our city would hear the Gospel and personally known a genuine disciple of Jesus Christ.

This doesn’t happen over night, but it is a helpful concept for me as I consider how to mobilize the people at Immanuel Fujairah to reach this amazing city and beyond with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Our hope is not in methods, but in the Spirit of God working through the Word and I long for the Word to be quick on the lips of every Christian here! It is my prayer that every believer in Fujairah would take ownership of the “parish” that God has placed them in and that they would be faithful witnesses there.

August 5, 2013 0

A Puritan Systematic Theology

Recently ordered a copy of this inaugural Puritan systematic theology. Looking forward to having it on hand!

November 14, 2012 0