Reaching Those Who Are Enslaved to a Postmodern Worldview

Many postmoderns feel as if they are entering an alien culture when encountering evangelical Christianity. It is not the job of the unchurched postmodern to enter our culture. It is our job to invade theirs. We do that by recognizing this as mission work.

Mission work is the same in every place; the missionary must radically engage the culture. We must live among them, learn their language, build relationships, and work to discover what kind of redemptive analogies we can adopt from their culture to communicate the message of Christ to them.

Postmoderns are not responding to “sit and let them come to us” evangelism. Reaching postmoderns takes more than just a weekend outreach or a new program. Evangelism to postmoderns is a day-to-day effort. Postmoderns do not want to hear about Christianity; they want to see Christianity in action. A new evangelism paradigm must be used.

-Ed Stetzer, Planting New Churches in a Postmodern World, 140-141.

A couple of afterthoughts to Stetzer’s quote. For the most part it is excellent. I would just clarify that in a real way Christians are “aliens and strangers” in the world so don’t be surprised when we are taken that way, as long it is for the right reason. Also, we should show postmoderns “Christianity in action” but this does not negate the need for them to “hear” the gospel as well. This is because faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God (Romans 10:17).

 

Establishing Our Complete Happiness in God

“Moreover, although our mind cannot comprehend God without rendering some honor to Him, it will not suffice simply to hold that there is One whom all ought to honor and adore, unless we are also persuaded that he is the fountain of every good, and that we must seek nothing elsewhere than in him. This I take to mean that not only does he sustain this universe (as he once founded it) by his boundless might, regulate it by his wisdom, preserve it by his goodness, and especially rule mankind by his righteousness and judgment, bear with it in his mercy, watch over it by his protection; but also that no drop will be found either of wisdom and light, or of righteousness or power or rectitude, or of genuine truth, which does not flow from him, and of which he is not the cause. Thus we may learn to await and seek all these things from him, and thankfully to ascribe them, once received, to him. For this sense of the powers of God is for us a fit teacher of piety, from which religion is born. I call ‘piety’ that reverence joined with the love of God with the knowledge of his benefits induces. For until men recognize that they owe everything to God, that they are nourished by his fatherly care, that he is the Author of their every good, that they should seek nothing beyond him-they will never yield him willing service. Nay, unless they establish their complete happiness in him, they will never give themselves truly and sincerely to him.”

-John Calvin, Institutes, 1.2.1

 

Monday Womanhood: Is Your Husband Sleeping With the Enemy?

Driving home from my ladies small group last week, I turned on the radio and my attention was immediately grabbed by Dr. Tony Evans saying: ” Many a man here is discouraged from taking his rightful role, because he’s sleeping with the enemy.” It took me a minute to grasp that the “enemy” Dr. Evans was referring to was the man’s wife! I don’t know about you, but I don’t many preachers who could get away with that (or have the courage to try!) Sometimes we are so accustomed to hearing certain passages that we kind of tune them out unless the pastor says something shocking that commands our attention. That quote did it for me, so I listened to both of the messages the next day(which I will link at the end), and gleaned some great insights which I want to share with you today.

In Ephesians 5:33 Paul writes: ” However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.”  Dr. Evans says that: ” Without respect, men shrivel up and die…… it is our greatest need and highest motivator to do a better job of caring for you.” He points out from this passage that respect for one’s husband is not optional, just like his loving you as his wife is not optional. We are to not to wait until we think our husband’s have earned our respect. We are to respect them now because Scripture commands obedience in this area. As a Christian woman, does this sound foreign to you? If so, I’ll leave you with one more quote from Dr. Evans : “ Many women are learning their roles in the home from the wrong sources: too much TV, or too many girlfriends…… they are picking up their data from everybody but God.” I hope you’ll take the time to listen to at least one these sermons. He also answers questions about tough issues, such as being married to an unbeliever. Let’s all ask God for grace to respect our husbands, even when we don’t feel like it!

First Sermon

Second Sermon                      

 

Whatever Happened to Community?

Yesterday, I was speaking to a brother and friend on the phone and he keyed me in on this book by Robert D. Putnam. The book is titled Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community. What is interesting is that this book is written from a totally secular perspective. The very idea of community is foreign to most people today, especially those in the church. Here are a couple of “factoids” from the Bowling Alone website:

1. Joining and participating in one group cuts in half your odds of dying next year.

2. Every ten minutes of commuting reduces social capital by 10%.

3. Watching commercial entertainment TV is the only leisure activity where doing more of it is associated with lower social capital.

The website says that social capital is “the very fabric of our connections with each other” and says that this fabric has plummeted. It is clear that God created us to need to be in community with other people. The gospel and the church is all about community. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the only way those of different races, economic classes, nationality, etc. can come together for genuine community as being people who have experienced a common faith (Gal. 3:28; Jude 3). If we aren’t experiencing and practicing and living community in our churches, then we are missing a key element of the gospel itself.

 

Above Reproach

1 Timothy 3:1-2 The saying is trustworthy: If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task. ² Therefore an overseer must be above reproach

As we begin to look at what a biblical elder or pastor looks like, it is important to remember these words from John Calvin, “In this the ancient church followed Paul’s prescription and the examples of the apostles. Their custom was, with highest reverence and with earnest calling upon God’s name, to meet to choose pastors. Moreover, they had a form of examination in which they tested by the standard of Paul the life and teaching of those to be chosen. But they sinned somewhat in their excessive severity, because they wished to require more in a bishop than Paul would require (1 Tim. 3:2-7).” [Calvin, Institutes, 4.4.10] 

If the ancient church sinned by practicing excessive severity (testing by the biblical standards and adding a bunch more), the error of the church of the 21st century is excessive leniancy. That is, the only standard that most churches examine today is found in verse 1 of 1 Tim. 3, “If anyone desires.” The only test for the candidate anymore seems to be that he is willing, so we’ll ordain him. Charles Spurgeon famously refused to be ordain because he was afraid it would be empty hands on empty heads. Spurgeon was a wise man. The first qualification for any may who desires the office of elder/overseer is that he be above reproach. The man who is going to serve as an elder in the church of God must be above criticism, beyond being able to be accused of anything by another. This does not mean he is to be perfect, nor does it disallow for those to be elders who are falsely accused. The apostle Paul is falsely accused throughout the book of Acts and was certainly not disqualified from his ministry because of it. (see Acts 25:8)

Any man who is going to serve as a pastor or elder needs to have the reputation of being a man who lives under the grace of God for the glory of God. That’s what it means to be above reproach. It doesn’t mean that you find men who “have it all together”, rather you find men who know that they don’t have it together and they throw themselves upon the mercy of Jesus Christ. That’s who you want leading your church. Up next, elders are to be the husband of one wife. And here’s a clue, this doesn’t refer to divorce. See you next week!

 

Can You Plant a Church and Sustain it with Expositional Preaching?

Yes, you can and must! Here is an excellent post by Timmy Brister on the sad state of much of the “church planting advice” that is out there.

 

Thomas Manton on the Salvation We Share and Community

Puritan Thomas Manton in his commentary on Jude made the following application from verse 3 and his words from centuries ago speak to us today and our need for fellowship and community as the body of Christ:

This shows how inappropriate it was for religion to be confined to a cloister or wrapped in a black garment or consigned to what was called a religious house. Oh, how far this was from the modesty of the apostles! Peter called the faith of ordinary Christians “a faith as precious as ours” (2 Peter 1:1), and Jude speaks of the salvation we share. The Jews who lived before them confined God’s choice to their nation. They could not bear to hear about salvation among the Gentiles or of a righteousness that came to everyone and on all who believe. We are envious by nature and want to appropriate common favors to ourselves. The church of Rome seeks to bring the whole world under their law and confine truth and faith and salvation within the precincts of their churches. They seize the keys of heaven and open the gate to whomever they wish. Now God has broken down all enclosures that attempt to build up a new wall of separation. Corrupt human nature does not want other people to share the same privileges that we have. People value their lesser differences and the particular opinions they have taken up as if only those of their own party and persuasion could be saved; it is our nature to treat our own opinions as holy, and not to admit that anyone is good unless they agree with us in everything. There were divisions in Corinth. Even the people who said, “I follow Christ” made themselves into a faction (see 1 Corinthians 1:12). We are apt to be harsh toward those who differ from us and to be happy only with those who share our opinions. Beware of hurting your Christian brother. “Why do you look down on your brother?” (Romans 14:10). Since God has made him a Christian, why do you make nothing of him? And why do you make another religion out of all your private opinions as if nobody could be a saint or a believer unless they thought exactly as you do? Beware that you do not fence in the common salvation; enclosures are against the law.

I think the words of Thomas Manton speak for themselves…

 

Family Driven Faith

If anyone is looking for a good book to read on what we are all about. Here it is. I haven’t read the book yet, but have followed Voddie Baucham this last year and know where he stands on this issue. Jim Hamilton says of the book (which I will be reading ASAP), “If you care about the next generation being more Christian than American, you should read this book.” This would be a great Connecting Group Study or just for your own personal benefit. If you would like to start a Connecting Group with this book, let me know.

 

Window on the Reformation: August 14, 2007

This week’s Window on the Reformation is taken from the introduction to Grace and its Fruit, which contains selections from John Calvin on the Pastoral Epistles. This excerpt concerns Calvin’s death.

Calvin’s health continued to decline; he suffered from several afflictions and was often confined to his bed. Despite his failing health, however, he managed to continue his preaching, lecturing, and dictating. Even when his body was miserably weakened, his mind remained sharp, and he was able, before his death, to finish the last of his commentaries, on the book of Joshua. The ailing Reformer preached his last sermon early in February 1564. Thereafter he was sometimes carried to the service of worship, but spoke only a few sentences. During these months of suffering, his colleague Theodore Beza recounts that, even while tormented by so many diseases, he was never heard to utter a word unbecoming to a Christian. He would only raise his eyes towards heaven and say, “O Lord, how long?”

Several days before his death, a few of Calvin’s friends gathered in his house for a last supper with him. Beza recalls that “His whole body was so emaciated that nothing seemed left but spirit.” He died on 27 May 1564, just a few days before his fifty-fifth birthday. Throughout Geneva there was great sadness. The republic had lost a wise and loyal citizen, the church lost a faithful preacher and caring pastor, and the college an incomparable teacher. Almost all the population of Geneva attended his funeral. He was buried without unusual ceremony in a simple, unmarked grave, as he had requested, in a public cemetery in Geneva.

John Calvin, more than any other leader of the Protestant Reformation, created patterns of religious and political thought that would dominate Western culture throughout the modern period. His greatest legacy, however, was his recovery of the doctrines of grace, which he bequeathed to future generations through his commentaries and published sermons. In his will he testifies, “With my whole soul I embrace the mercy which [God] has exercised towards me me through Jesus Christ, atoning for my sins with the merits of his death and passion, that in this way he might satisfy for all my crimes and faults, and blot them from his remembrance.”

 

Crucial Questions About Gender Roles

The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood offers this resource, which is an adaptation of chapter two of Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood by John Piper and Wayne Grudem. Here are a few of the questions and answers for you to ponder on this Monday:

1. Why do you regard the issue of male and female roles as so important? 
 

We are concerned not merely with the behavioral roles of men and women but also with the underlying nature of manhood and womanhood themselves. Biblical truth and clarity in this matter are important because error and confusion over sexual identity leads to:

1. marriage patterns that do not portray the relationship between Christ and the church (Ephesians 5:31-32);
2. parenting practices that do not train boys to be masculine or girls to be feminine;
3. homosexual tendencies and increasing attempts to justify homosexual alliances (see question 41);
4. patterns of unbiblical female leadership in the church that reflect and promote the confusion over the true meaning of manhood and womanhood.

God’s gift of complementary manhood and womanhood was exhilarating from the beginning (Genesis 2:23). It is precious beyond estimation. But today it is esteemed lightly and is vanishing like the rain forests we need but don’t love. We believe that what is at stake in human sexuality is the very fabric of life as God wills it to be for the holiness of His people and for their saving mission to the world. (See the Rationalesection of the Danvers Statement.)

2. What do you mean (in question 1) by “unbiblical female leadership in the church”?
 

We are persuaded that the Bible teaches that only men should be pastors and elders. That is, men should bear primary responsibility for Christlike leadership and teaching in the church. So it is unbiblical, we believe, and therefore detrimental, for women to assume this role.

3. Where in the Bible do you get the idea that only men should be the pastors and elders of the church?
 

The most explicit texts relating directly to the leadership of men in the church are

• 1 Timothy 2:11-15;
• 1 Corinthians 14:34-36;
• 1 Corinthians 11:2-16.

The fifth, six and ninth chapters of Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood present detailed exegetical support for why we believe these texts give abiding sanction to an eldership of spiritual men. Moreover, the Biblical connection between family and church strongly suggests that the headship of the husband at home leads naturally to the primary leadership of spiritual men in the church.

4. What about marriage?   What did you mean (in question 1) by “marriage patterns that do not portray the relationship between Christ and the church”?
 

We believe the Bible teaches that God means the relationship between husband and wife to portray the relationship between Christ and His church. The husband is to model the loving, sacrificial leadership of Christ, and the wife is to model the glad submission offered freely by the church.

5. What do you mean by submission (in question 4)?
 

Submission refers to a wife’s divine calling to honor and affirm her husband’s leadership and help carry it through according to her gifts. It is not an absolute surrender of her will. Rather, we speak of her disposition to yield to her husband’s guidance and her inclination to follow his leadership. Christ is her absolute authority, not the husband. She submits “out of reverence for Christ” (Ephesians 5:21). The supreme authority of Christ qualifies the authority of her husband. She should never follow her husband into sin. Nevertheless, even when she may have to stand with Christ against the sinful will of her husband (e.g., 1 Peter 3:1, where she does not yield to her husband’s unbelief), she can still have a spirit of submission – a disposition to yield. She can show by her attitude and behavior that she does not like resisting his will and that she longs for him to forsake sin and lead in righteousness so that her disposition to honor him as head can again produce harmony.

6. What do you mean when you call the husband “head” (in question 5)?
 

In the home, Biblical headship is the husband’s divine calling to take primary responsibility for Christlike leadership, protection, and provision.

7. Where in the Bible do you get the idea that husbands should be the leaders in their homes?
 

The most explicit texts relating directly to headship and submission in marriage are Ephesians 5:21-33; Colossians 3:18-19; 1 Peter 3:1-7; Titus 2:5; 1 Timothy 3:4, 12; Genesis 1-3. Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood gives detailed exegetical support for why we believe they teach that headship includes primary leadership and that this is the responsibility of the man. Moreover, in view of these teaching passages, the pattern of male leadership that pervades the Biblical portrait of family life is probably not a mere cultural phenomenon over thousands of years but reflects God’s original design, even though corrupted by sin.

There are 50 questions in all and it would be well worth your time to read all of them with their answers. Perhaps you can bookmark the site and return to it for future reference. If you would like to purchase a copy of Piper and Grudem’s book, I have an Amazon link over at Our Sovereign Joy.