Paisley: Sorry seems to be the hardest word

So Paisley died today.  A truly enigmatic man.  My attitude towards him has changed over time.

When I first went to live in the north (1996) I really struggled with him.  I hated the fact that he tied Christianity to a certain political outlook.  He talked about 'Protestant Culture', but I was a Protestant who did not identify with his culture.  To me Protestantism was about the rediscovery of the truth of justification by grace through faith.  So Protestant was a religious category rather than an ethnic grouping.  I also didn't like his language.  He would refer to 'the people of Ulster', but seemed only to be thinking about one section of the people of Ulster.

People who met him said that he was charming.  He seems to have had a marvellous marriage.  The RTE iplayer archive has a wonderful edition of the Saturday Live show where he is interviewed by his daughter Rhonda, and he comes across as likeable.  He certainly had a change of heart in recent years, and I would like to believe that this was something to do with a work of God in his life.

I just wish he could have said 'sorry'.  When Eammonn Mallie interviewed him for the BBC, Paisley admitted that the lack of social housing provided to Catholics and the lack of representation of nationalists in government were wrong.  Yet when challenged about his own role in the troubles he would admit no wrongdoing.  Of course we may not all agree as to the extent of his culpability for violence in the north.  But his witness as a Christian would have been enhanced if he could have faced up to the fact that he said things that were unhelpful, unkind and unloving.  After all a Christian is not someone who has done no wrong but someone who loves that Christ who has taken our wrongs upon himself on the cross.

The Baptists and the Mosque

I got talking to someone who lived in Cahirvaven at the time when the Baptist Church was being built there.  He said that the movement of the Baptists to the area caused a stir, including from the 'altar' of the local Catholic Church.  I asked him to clarify, 'did the priest want the people to object to our planning permission?'  He suggested that he did.  But the priest's real complaint was along the lines 'what has happened that these sort would move into our area?'  The shocking thing was that such an attitude existed as recently as 1993.

But it is not only Catholics who are guilty of such prejudice and a sense of religious/cultural entitlement.  I lived in County Armagh at a time when the Muslims were looking for planning permission for a Mosque in Portadown (2003).  Many Protestants objected to the idea of such a building being built.  The attitude was 'this is our country not theirs' and the more illogical of people said 'we wouldn't be allowed build our churches in their countries so why should they be allowed build theirs here' (an interesting twist on 'do onto others as you would have them do to you').

I gladly believe in the separation of church and state.  I hate the linking of religion with nationality.  I think that the gospel can thrive where there is true tolerance.  And I fear that our increasingly secular state is becoming increasingly intolerant of religious opinions just as a religious state was intolerant of all dissenters.

Disappointed with Driscoll

Okay, here is the truth.  I like Mark Driscoll.  I have watched a number of clips of him preaching and enjoy how he communicates.  I have read a good few of his books and recommend some of them to others.  So it saddens me that he finds himself in controversy so often.  Over twenty years ago I worked near Seattle and have often wondered what people there think of him; I guess he divides opinions there as he does here.

I love the fact that he can connect with certain groups that the church has failed to reach.  Yet, right from the first books that I read, I had concerns about his slagging of those who did not match his view of masculinity.  Now he is in trouble for comments that he made which were misogynist and homophobic.  He admits he was wrong.

What is the future for a Driscoll?  I don't know.  Just because someone has been in the spotlight does not mean they have to stay there.  Maybe it would be best for him to fade away from public view.  I would certainly be upset if he continues to give people excuses to dismiss the reformed charismatic theology he espouses.  I hope he will lose his taste for controversy and use his gifts more productively.  I hope that he will be more emphatic towards those who are wired differently to him.  I hope that in years to come those who oppose his beliefs will have trouble finding things in his character to criticise.

William Wilberforce

I have recently enjoyed reading a few biographies.  One interesting one was on William Wilberforce by Stephen Tomkins.  When I read a biography I write a list of strengths and weaknesses of the subject at the back of the book.  As well as his opposition to slavery Wilberforce was involved in the setting up of the R.S.P.C.A. and he was personally very generous.  One strength I want to mention is the way that he treated his servants.  Tomkins explains

The family's entourage of servants grew ever greater, not out of a love for grandness, but because Wilberforce could never dismiss anyone for mere incompetence.  Marianne Thornton described his house as 'thronged with servants who are all lame or impotent or blind, or kept from charity'; one would 'hear a chorus of bells all day which nobody answers.'  'Provided the servants have faith,' concluded the poet Southey after seeing them in inaction, 'good works are not to be expected of them.'

Yet Wilberforce had weaknesses.  Tompkins explains

... he did real damage with the part he played in outlawing unions, introducing imprisonments without trial, reducing freedom of speech and assembly, and the individual prosecutions carried out by the Society for the Suppression of Vice; the fact that he used his moral capital as the hero of abolition to do so makes it all the more bitter.  To be sure, the scale of such injury is dwarfed by his achievements in stopping 40,000 Africans a year being made slaves of the British, but it does not diminish his achievements to ask how the same man could be responsible for both.

Dining with the Devil

On Sunday and Monday I read Os Guinness's book Dining with the Devil.   This book is an assessment of the Megachurch movement in the United States.  It might be considered a little out of date now, having been written in 1993.  However, I thought it contained many useful insights that are relevant to the Tuesday lunchtime theology discussion I attend.

Now I have to begin by pointing out that I am not a traditionalist.  While I am a theological conservative I do not want to be tied down to doing things a certain way simply because that is the way the church did them fifty years ago.  We can have adaptable structures that don't compromise our message and we should be thinking how we can best relate the timeless truth of the gospel to our generation.  However, I think that Guinness is helpful in pointing to the danger of being shaped by our culture.

Guinness suggests that:

'Compared with the past, faith today influences culture less. Compared to the past, culture today influences faith more.'

 

'The two most easily recognisable hallmarks of secularisation in America are the exaltation of numbers and technique.'  The danger is that in our desire to build significant church communities we become so obsessed with counting figures that we forget that our primary aim is simply to be faithful to the call of God.  '... church growth viewed in measurable terms, such as numbers, is trivial compared with growth in less measurable but more important terms, such as faith, character, and godliness.'

Guinness points to the church's obsession with being relevant.  If we ask the world what makes us relevant it will simply demand that we seek to meet its felt needs and conform to a certain liberalising agenda.  Many people simply don't recognise our central need as being reconciled to God in Christ.

This leads on to my next point.  We need to depend on the convicting and enlightening work of God the Holy Spirit.  We need to remember again that the battle belongs to the Lord.  The question I want to consider is 'where is our confidence based?'  Is our confidence centred on money; the dynamic communication ability of a 'lead pastor'; the programs and structures; or even the buildings?  'If Jesus Christ is the head of the church and hence the source and goal of its entire life, true growth is only possible in obedience to him.'  Guinness differentiates between bottom-up causation and top-down causation.  Bottom-up causation believes that the success ultimately depends on our efforts.  Top-down causation recognises that success ultimately depends on God and is only measured by him.

A final thought relates to the pastors.  There seems to be a emphasis on having pastors that are trendy.  Do we really think that God is dependant on the pastors image?  Then their is the role that we expect of pastors.  Guinness quotes a Japanese business man who commented to a visiting Australian, 

'Whenever I meet a Buddhist leader, I meet a holy man. Whenever I meet a Christian leader, I meet a manager.' 
 

I have to be careful here because I am limited in management gifting and so maybe I have a bias against a dependence upon it.  Certainly God has used people's organisational skills effectively in the past.  Apparently when John Wesley was a part of the Holy Club at Oxford his nickname was 'the manager.'  Nevertheless, I am wary of the idea that the pastor becomes a CEO.  I am also wary of a church culture that fosters the notion of the celebrity pastor or when pastors are rated on their ability to deliver certain measurable results.

 

Perhaps the best quote in the book is from Simone Weil:

'To be always relevant, you have to say things which are eternal.'

On a Missionary Trail

Last Saturday I took Anya and Ronan into town.  We visited the speciality sweet shop and then they got a milkshake.  After that I found a second hand bookstore.  This shop is worth a visit.  It is an upstairs room crammed with books.  In desperation I prayed that God would help me find something worthwhile.  Well, I certainly found a great book.

On a Missionary Trail is a book about two men who were sent out by the London Missionary Society on a trip to visit their mission stations.  Their trip lasted eight years and is a remarkable adventure.  The author Tom Hiney is not an evangelical Christian but he is impressed by the missionaries of this organisation.

One of the first thoughts is the bravery of pioneer missionaries of that day.  Many died of malaria and typhoid.  A small group were sent to Tonga where four were murdered, one abandoned his faith and the rest were chased by locals, and had to live hand to mouth in a cave.  Many people set off knowing that there was a great chance that they would die for their faith.

Another thing that struck me was that the accusation of the missionaries simply being a puppet of colonialism is not quiet true.  For example the East India Company resisted the presence of missionaries, similarly settlers in southern Africa resented them for the fact that they were reaching out to the local population and calling black people their brothers, and in the Guyana the slave traders wanted them banned.  The evangelicals at that time were known for humanitarian causes such as the anti-slavery movement.

Hiney also mentions the fact that many people claim that the evangelicals have been accused of being destroyers of native cultures.  He points out that the idea of unspoiled natives living uninterfered with in paradise lands is naive.  In India William Carey opposed the practice of Suttee (the burying alive of widows on the funeral fire of their deceased husbands), many cultures practiced infanticide (indeed one pastoral concern was assuring people who had become Christians that they had been forgiven for killing their babies) and then of course there were cultures with cannibalism.  Not that Hiney presents a negative picture of all cultures or their practices.  Not being an evangelical his solution for some religions would be their reformation rather than their conversion.  Of course as evangelicals we want to bring the unique life-changing message that will inevitably alter some aspects of existing culture.  Nevertheless we don't need to destroy aspects of that culture that are not in opposition to gospel truth.  Hiney says that the London Missionary Society tried to accomadate local cultures.

We have an all-age service this week.  So the congregation is going to be told of the journey of John Tyerman and George Bennet.  While I disagree with some of the comments made about Christianity by Tom Hiney On a Missionary Trail is a great read.

What is the future of the church?

The Briefing magazine arrived in the post today.  It contained the third article by Peter Orr on 'What Jesus is Doing Now?' (Peter, I can't find the second one, I think we may be missing a copy of the Briefing).  There is also an interesting article on the future of the church in the UK.  It does not make mention of the unique church scene in Northern Ireland.  I am looking at it from the perspective of living in the Republic of Ireland.  I thought I would offer a couple of reflections.

One shocking thing is the comments on young people.  Thirty-nine percent of churches have no-one attending under eleven years of age.  Fourty-nine percent of churches have no-one attending between the ages of eleven and fourteen.  Fifty-nine percent of churches have no-one attending between the ages of fifteen and nineteen.

I am delighted to be a part of a church that has a healthy age demographic but there can be no room for complacency.  One of the challenges that we face is how to give the young people a sense of ownership of the church.  Indeed there is one age-group (late teens) where we seem to have small numbers. I wonder if the danger for some churches is that we have youth ministries that are separated from everything else that goes on in the church.  Of course young people themselves can be difficult to integrate and get involved.

It is notable that an area of great decline is that of liberal Protestants.  He mentions two denominations that are 'in terminable decline.'  Now I am not suggesting that people choose their theology for pragmatic reasons, but I wonder if liberal Christianity simply fails to inspire.  I also wonder if there is a lesson here for those who are amongst the liberal wing of the emergent movement.  Is the problem with mainline liberals their theology or their style?  If it is simply that people are tired of a dull formalism then new expressions of church may have a future.  If it is because a liberal message lacks power and conviction then simply changing the style of church will be of little long term value.

This article is accompanied by a delightful chart.  It divides the evangelical churches into various tribes.  Personally I am influenced by people in a few of these groups.

Conservative, non-separatist evangelicals (e.g. Stott and Packer), are growing.  But only account for around 8% of evangelicals.

Conservative, separatist evangelicals (11%) (e.g. Banner of Truth, Martyn Lloyd-Jones), are stable.

Pentecostals (23%), are growing.

New churches (12%) are stable.

Charismatic (16%) and declining.

Open/traditional evangelicals (27%) (e.g. NT Wright), are declining.

Emergent (3%) (e.g. Greenbelt, Brian McLaren), are increasing.

Melvin Tinker on the Emerging Church

Is Evangelicalism too individualistic? (Melvin Tinker part 2)

Is evangelical faith a new phenomenon? (Melvin Tinker)

I have been at a preaching conference today. One of the speakers is Melvin Tinker. Melvin is staying with us so I thought I would ask him a few questions for this blog. Here is the first.

Are evangelicals racist?

In Thursday's Irish Times the columnist John Gibbons wrote the following:

'. . . What must be understood about evangelical Christians is how profoundly undemocratic they are. They espouse bigotry, racism, xenophobia and contempt for the US constitution, believing (just like their Islamic counterparts) that they answer only to God. In essence, they are the Fifth Column within the world's most powerful democracy.

Their stated aim is to create a narrow theocracy. The recent racially tinted demonisation of Barak Obama, egged on by Palin's demagoguery, is putting down a marker that, should he prevail next Tuesday, the Christian right will never accept Obama's authority. In most countries, such views would pass for treason, but instead in the US - once the citadel of democracy - these evangelical groups get huge tax breaks and dominate the airwaves with impunity.'

I realise that he is focusing on the American evangelical scene of which I only have a limited knowledge. Yet from the little that I know these comments cannot be sustained. Also Gibbons does not talk about 'some' evangelicals but simply evangelicals, as if these characteristics that he describes are basic to our DNA.

While not wanting to deny that many evangelicals have said and done stupid things, and that at times we have been guilty of bigotry and racism, I find these charges grossly unfair.

Evangelicalism has a dream of a multi-ethnic heaven. Evangelicalism seeks to reach people from all people groups and accepts them as brothers and sisters. Indeed many evangelical churches are among the most ethnically mixed communities in their society.

I assume that Gibbons formed his view based on caricature and misunderstanding.

Note For Sean Mullan's (director of Evangelical Alliance Ireland) letter to the editor of the Irish Times see:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/letters/2008/1104/1225523343115.html

One God, three persons (part 3)

In the last blog I said that while the Trinity is a complicated doctrine it is important that we do not ignore it. In this final blog on this topic I want to demonstrate four ways that thinking about the Trinity can help shape a Christian worldview.

The fact that God is three persons means that God enjoys relationship within himself. The relationship between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit is one of profound love and enjoyment. This means that God did not create us because he was lonely. It also means that a part of being made in image of God implies that we are relational creatures. ‘Our perception of life—that personal relationships are of the highest importance—is correct, for ultimate reality is . . . three persons in eternal relationship’ (Blueprint, Mathias Media).

The three persons of God are involved in people becoming Christians. Indeed if any of the three persons were not God this salvation would not be possible. The Father sent the Son in love for the world (John 3:16). The Son bears the curse for our rebellion on the cross—if the Son was not God then the Father was merely punishing an innocent third-party. Indeed the death of one man could one pay for the crimes of one man, the death of the Son of God is the atoning sacrifice for the world (1 John 2:2). The Holy Spirit convicts the world of guilt (John 16:8), brings about spiritual rebirth (John 3:8), mediates the presence of the Father and Son in our lives (John 14:23) and assures us of the Father’s ongoing acceptance (Galatians 4:6). It is God who saves and each person of the triune God is involved.

The three persons of God each have a role in our praying. Almost every prayer in the New Testament is addressed to the Father. While at times we might pray to Jesus or the Holy Spirit we should normally pray to the Father. The model prayer that Jesus gave begins Our Father. While we pray to the Father we pray in the name of the Son. Praying in the name of the Son involves recognising that it is only because of who were are in him that we can approach the throne of grace with confidence and seeking to make our requests in line with what the Son would approve of. We pray to the Father, through the Son, and in the Holy Spirit. We seek the Holy Spirit’s guidance as we pray and his strength to keep on praying. In Romans 8 we even read that the Holy Spirit interprets our groans when we don’t have the words to say. Each member of the triune God is involved in the Christians prayer.

Finally the relationship between the persons of the Trinity helps us understand the ordering of human relationships. The Son seeks to do the will of the Father, and together with the Father sends the Holy Spirit. Although the Father, Son and Holy Spirit have different roles they live in harmony as equals. Loving submission is illustrated in the relationship of God. For example in Ephesians 5:22 when the Apostle Paul teaches wives to submit to their husbands (and spends twice as long on teaching the husband to love their wives) he is not implying that the wife is not equal to her husband any more than the Son is not equal to the Father but simply that the husband and wife have differing and complimentary roles in marriage.

One God, three persons (part 2)

In both the Old and New Testaments God’s people were surrounded by cultures that believed that there were many gods. Yet the Scriptures taught that there is only one true God. ‘I am the LORD, and there is no other, beside me there is no God’ (Is. 45:5). But how can Christians say that there is one God and yet talk about God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit? J. I. Packer says that this confronts us with ‘perhaps the most difficult thought the mind has ever been asked to handle.’

Within the Old Testament there are several indications of the complex relationship of the triune God. For example in Genesis 1 God says ‘let us make man in our own image.’ This might be considered to be a royal ‘we’ were it not for the fact that the New Testament makes the existence of three persons in the God-head clear. Other Old Testaments indicators of the triune nature of God are the fact the Spirit of God, the angel of the Lord or the wisdom of God ‘seem to be acting as separate from God and yet being God at the same time’ (The Blueprint, Mathias media). Some of the Old Testament passages that look forward to the promised Messiah speak of his divinity—for example he is called ‘Mighty God’ in Isaiah 9:6 and God in Psalm 45:6-7. In the New Testament we see distinction between the Father, Son and Spirit and yet their unity—Jesus commissions the disciples to baptise people in the name [singular] of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (Mathew 28:19).

As we try to understand this complex relationship there are some explanations that we must reject. Clearly we can not claim that the Father, the Son and the Spirit are three different gods. We cannot say that each person is one-third of God, for example the Son is not one third God but is God. Neither can we claim that there is one God with only one person in the Godhead—whether that is through denying that the Son and the Spirit are God or by claiming that God appeared in different forms at different times (i.e. that God became the Son and appears as the Spirit).

What the Bible gives us is a complex picture. It shows God living in intimate relationship. This is something that goes beyond human understanding. It is an idea that humankind would never have thought up were it not revealed to us. The doctrine of the Trinity certainly makes Christianity unique among the world’s religions. Yet even though this is a difficult teaching it should not be ignored. The Trinity has many important implications as we will see in the third, and final, part of this blog.

One God, three persons (part 1)

Evangelical Alliance basis of faith, article 1: We believe in the one true God who lives eternally in three persons—the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

The Bible is clear that there is one true God and that God is one (Deut. 6:4). Yet Christians refer to God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. How can we say that there is one true God and yet speak of three persons being God? In a couple of blogs I want to look at what theologians call the Trinity. This will be the first in a series on the Evangelical Alliance basis of faith.

In this blog I want us to be clear that the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are portrayed in the Scriptures as being God.

The Father is God:
At the opening of his letter to the Galatians the Apostle Paul refers to ‘Jesus Christ and God the Father.’ If Jesus is God, as we shall see he is, then there is a person distinct from Jesus who is God the Father. Jesus continually related to his Father and he taught his disciples to pray beginning ‘Our Father who is in heaven’ (Matt. 6:7). There is no debate that the Father is God.

The Son is God:
If the Jehovah Witnesses were to knock at your door they would contest the wording of John 1:1. I would suggest that you look up a detailed Bible commentary if you want to be clear that it should read ‘. . . the Word was with God, and the Word was God’—as is it does in almost all versions of the Bible. Not only does John begin his gospel teaching saying that Jesus is God he also records a great declaration of this fact in the closing chapters—Thomas meets the risen Jesus and declares ‘My Lord and my God’ (20:28).
A couple of years ago we worked through Mark’s Gospel in our morning services. In the opening half of this gospel it is clear that Mark wants us to see that Jesus is God. He shows Jesus doing things that only God can do. For example Jesus calms a storm by speaking to it, prompting his disciples to ask ‘Who is this, even the wind and the waves obey him?’—in the Bible it is only God who can calm a storm like this (see Ps. 89:9).
The New Testament says that Jesus is God, gives him titles that belong to God (e.g. Rock, Redeemer and Saviour) and shows him doing things only God can do (like forgiving a man his sins).

The Holy Spirit is God:
The Holy Spirit is not a power to be used but a person to be related to - the Holy Spirit is referred to as ‘he’ rather than ‘it’. Jesus refers to the Holy Spirit as another Counsellor (the word translated ‘another’ means ‘another of the same kind’). He is like Jesus in that he teaches, encourages, helps and strengthens God’s people.
The Holy Spirit is referred to as being eternal (Heb. 9:14), being everywhere (Ps. 139:7-10) and having special knowledge (1 Cor. 2:10-11). These attributes tell us that the Holy Spirit is God.

While the Father is God, the Son is God and the Holy Spirit is God this does not mean that the Father is the Son and the Son is the Holy Spirit. The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are three distinct persons. So we are left with our question, ‘How can we say that there is one true God and yet speak of three persons being God?’ I will continue thinking about the Trinity in the next blog.

‘What is an evangelical?’

A couple of months ago someone asked me ‘what do you mean by evangelical Christian?’ I am not sure that I gave a very good response. I have given some thought to the question since.

Evangelical Christians are found in many denominations and some denominations owe their origins to evangelical revival (e.g. the Methodist Church). It is not unusual for an evangelical to feel that they have more in common with evangelicals in other denominations than they have with non-evangelicals in their own. While evangelicals disagree on some theological issues (e.g. modes of baptism) they agree on what they believe are the essentials of Christian faith (as outlined in such documents as the Evangelical Alliance statement of faith).

The historian David Bebbington says that evangelicals share four characteristics (using the words conversionism, activism, biblicalism, and crucicentrism). Here is my spin on these four words.

1. Conversionism (the need for personal faith). The Bible says that without faith in Jesus people are spiritually dead, in slavery to sin, and under God’s condemnation. The Bible also holds out God’s offer of forgiveness and acceptance to those who put their trust in Jesus.

2. Activism: Evangelicals believe that the Christian life is an active life. Indeed a transformed life provides the evidence that we have been made alive in Christ. That life involves sharing the good news about Jesus with others (some in their eagerness and lack of tact have been accused of ‘Bible-bashing’) and demonstrating compassion (Wilberforce and Dr. Barnardo were notable evangelicals).

3. Biblicalism (the Bible as the ultimate authority). In the preface to his collected sermons the John Wesley declared, ‘Let me be homo unius libri [a man of one book].’ The reformer Martin Luther criticised someone saying ‘you stand above God’s word and judge it; I stand under it and let it judge me.’ Evangelicals seek to believe and live in line with the Bible’s recorded revelation.

4. Crucicentrism (the cross is central to the gospel): John Stott writes, ‘If the cross is not central to our religion, ours is not the religion of Jesus.’ Among the things that Jesus did on the cross evangelicals believe that he experienced God’s anger for our rebellion (as affirmed in the doctrine of penal substitution). The cross should be central to our thinking, living, preaching, and singing.