So I know it’s been quite awhile since I last posted. There has been a lot going on and I have a lot I’d like to talk about. There isn’t a particular reason why I haven’t been posting…other than the fact that I’m lazy. It has been a good last couple of weeks, and here are a few things that have caught my attention:
1) We had a truly fantastic Easter last weekend at New Song. I certainly was not at my best, but I was very proud of our church. I thought everyone did a great job with Sunday morning, and we had a wonderful time of worship together on Sunday night. It was really a great day of celebrating the resurrected Christ.
2) During my spring break I read the book The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief by Francis Collins, the head of the Human Genome Project. My dad, who is not a Christian, recently read the book and he seemed to like it, so I decided it was worth getting a copy of the book and giving it a read. I felt that Collins did a great job of showing how what he knows to be true from his scientific training and what he knows to be true as a Christian need not be seen as contradictory. It particularly recommend the book to those who are Christians and find theories such as young earth creationism and intelligent design to be intellectually unsatisfying. What I most appreciated about the book was Collins’ fair-mindedness. I felt he was very even-handed in his analysis of the various issues that he was considering, and he was cordial towards those with whom he disagreed. I never sensed that he was overly dogmatic, nor did I sense that he sought to belittle those with different persepctives. We need more people who can present their perspectives in the way that Collins does, particularly in the church.
3 ) The Bruins somehow made it to the Final Four. There were some tense moments along the way, but they made it. That is a good thing. The tournament has been a lot of fun this year and has produced several great games. Speaking of March Madness, while my bracket has totally stunk this year, my wife is currently in the 99.9 percentile on espn.com with her bracket. I am humbled and amazed.
4) I just started reading N.T. Wright’s Surprised by Hope the other day. N.T. Wright is a terrific scholar and I am always challenged by reading his writing. So far this book has been about the resurrection, and it appears so far to be a helpful theological corrective. He acknowledges that perhaps the biggest problem when it comes to understanding the resurrection and other issues of life-after-death and eschatology (end times stuff) is simply that many Christians don’t understand what the Bible actually says.
5) Last night at Seven24 we had a woman from Elam Ministries come and share. Elam works to distribute Bibles and otherwise equip the underground church in Iran. It was remarkable to hear stories of what God is doing in Iran. I was both inspired and challenged as I heard about the hunger that the Iranian people have for the Word of God. We have it so easy over here. Towards the end of her talk I asked the woman what we as American Christians in Southern California could learn from our brothers and sisters in Iran. She suggested that perhaps the church in America needs a little bit of persecution in order to wake us up spiritually (not her exact words, but that was the basic gist). I often wonder if she is right. I encourage you to click to their website above and read about some of the terrific work that Elam does.
6) School starts tomorrow. I’m very excited to have another class with Dr. Craig Hovey. He is by far the best professor I have had in my year and a half at Fuller. This class is on political theology and it promises to be a good one.
7) I recently subscribed to Relevant magazine and I have greatly enjoyed the magazine so far. They are speaking the language of twentysomethings at Relevant, and I’ve been impressed with several of the articles I have read. I particularly enjoyed a short essay from the most recent issue that I also just discovered is posted in its entirety here. The piece is called Will We Obey? and it’s written by a guy named Winn Collier. He begins by admitting his distaste for Christian cliches that over simplify faith (a distaste that I fully share), but he then turns the mirror inward and confesses that his frustration with oft cheesy Christian culture has led him to a place of spiritual passivity. In his words:
“I’m noticing the uncomfortable fact that I have used my distaste for Christian cliche as well as my desire for authentic faith illicitly, as a cover for my spiritual passivity. If I imagine everything must be so hard, so complex, so confusing all the time…If I believe honesty requires me to constantly rehash, rethink and circle round and round and round…then I excuse myself from the responsibility of trusting what I do know and from obeying God wherever ) and whenever) He has spoken clearly.”
Collier raises an important point. I believe we are right to acknowledge that faith is more complicated than perhaps we make it out to be, but we are in big trouble if we turn this acknowledgment into a tacit excuse for spiritual passivity. He goes on to quote the great Eugene Peterson, who once said that the most important question we can ask of a passage of Scripture, “What can I obey?” I was deeply convicted by the entire article, as I see in myself and others like me a desire to question and otherwise commiserate about various spiritual issues under the facade of seeking authentic spiritual maturity that is instead hiding a desire to avoid obedience (I’m not sure if that sentence made sense, but oh well). I wholeheartedly believe that questions are good, especially when it comes to faith. But I (we) must not use our questions as a sort of implicit excuse for obedience. Give the essay a read, it will take all of two minutes.
8 ) I got to hang out with my buddy James on Saturday morning. We had a great time talking about our lives and working through various theological issues we have been struggling with. He just returned from Uganda, and is working on starting a great socially pro-active business called Acholi Beads.
9) And finally, I’m teaching on a particularly important passage of Scripture from Mark 9 this weekend. I spent a couple of hours at a coffee shop today studying for the message, and I’m really looking forward to writing the rest of it. It is my hope and prayer that we will have an honest, convicting, and encouraging discussion together this week at Seven24.
That’s it for now…I probably could have written a whole post about all of the above items, but I wanted to at least make a brief mention of all of them. I’ll try to post a little bit more regularly this week…
