From the Inside Out

Another great article in Modern Reformation magazine (September/October 2010 issue) by Michael Horton, who I think explains Reformational theology and Christianity in general, better than anyone. He writes,

...people like the conditional nature of the law (he cites Aristotelian logic here for this). We prefer to view life as merit based, structured as if/then statements. If I obey the law, then I am a good person and God will be pleased with me.....What you do defines you, good or bad. This is an attractive perspective because it gives us a sense of control. We think, "If I can just change my behavior, then I will change who I am."


He then continues to describe the outside/inside--inside/outside conundrum,

The world may want to operate according to action/consequence or form the outside in, but God does not perate that way. Rather, He is concerned with the heart, the motivations, the inside, the root, and so is his law in its primary theological function.

In other words, there has to be a change inside BEFORE there is a change outside.

The law is lurking about demanding its perfection in our lives. We cannot do it because we don't have the heart to do it...in other words, a changed heart. We need conversion through Christ. This is precisely why every religion, including other forms of Christianity other than historical evangelical Christianity, misses the mark. Catholics. Mormons, liberal Protestants, emergents, holiness groups, and so forth constantly tell us we have to DO SOMETHING to please God and earn His salvation and/or pleasure. Of course non-Christian religions do this very smae thing too. This is why as an atheist in college, when I heard the true gospel, I thought, "Wow! This sure is a different religion. You mean I don't have to keep 4,000 rules and laws, or worship 4,000 gods, or achieve karma? You mean God did it for me?" That was such a revolutionary idea that I just went ahead after two weeks of struggle (I now realize with the Holy Spirit) that I finally received CHrist as my Savior, bearing it all for me. The problem today is much of the evangelical movemnt is once again falling into a proces theology where you kind of
"ooze" into salvation and/or pleasing God through good works. And this brings us of course, to the emergents because they certainly are on this "process-type of relgion" road. The Christian Right, and now the Christian Right is also on this road. For the Christian Right it was changing people through Governmental laws. For the Christian Left it's changing people through social justice action through--guesss what? Governmental laws. They are basically the same coin, only different sides. And the Christian Left will surely fail just as the Christian Right did.

The Value of Children?

At my age there is little you haven't heard before, although there are certainly parts of things that I might have not known. I just finished reading Dan's recent post at Cerulean Sanctum and I have to admit he has brought up some things that I didn't know. The core of the post is the transition of the role of children from the 19th to the 21st century. The interesting point is the fact that children were needed when the farm and factory were kings. But recently, children are not needed to support their families (except perhaps in the inner city), so what is their function then? I was thinking (although Dan didn't mention abortion in his post) that abortion might be one result of this phenomena--that is--children are not needed so much today. Today, unless you either want children, or a woman gets pregnant and decides NOT to have an abortion out of guilt, religions reasons, etc., why not have an abortion. But if children are needed, as the Romanians were told by their communist ruler in the last years of the cold war, to build up the society, then children are born--wanted or not. Thousands of them ended up in Romanian orphanages, mainly because the parents couldn't afford to take care of them. But in other countries, like China, where there are too many people, parents are told to limit children to one or two. Abortion then becomes the norm. I think this is importan --- to see the roots of abortion, rather than to present arguments that really don't mean much to those who either believe in abortions and/or get abortions. Anyway, lots to think about after reading Dan's post. I hope you will go over to his blog right now and read his post, Youth Ministry Problem--Part 2.

Where Contemp Christian Music has Been and Where it is Headed

I read an interesting article today on how Contemporary Christian Music got started back in the early 70's. The thing that really got my attention was that the early music was evangelistic (and I might add Christ-centered) BECAUSE that is where the church was at that time. But now that the church is going into a full fusion with every philosophy and religion in town, Christian music is following right along. And as the church is at a crossroads, the author of this article points out - so is Christian music. This is really worth the read. It's entitled, The Future of Contemporary Christian Music.

Excellent Post on the Dangers of Yoga

Heads up for the post on the dangers of Yoga. This is the best article on the subject I've seen yet as some of them are very vague as to how yoga fits in with the Hindu--"multi-gods" worship. The Sola Sisters blog post uses a very good term - spiritual syncretism You can find their excellent post here.

"But, Which Group Can I Join?"

I want to join a home group (small church group) in my new church. But as usual, I'm being set up. This is what I call "new person set up." In other words, a set up for rejection. The list in the church bulletin gives the following information:

--the town in which the homegroup meets
--the day and time it meets
--the phone number and name of the leader to call.

It looks good so far doesn't it? So what's missing? Two items that the bulletin doesn't tell are setting up the new person for the "new person set up." First, I found out that some of the groups have certain age groups. So, if someone calls to say they wish to come to the group, is the leader going to ask their age? And then, if the person is too young/old, is the leader going to say, "Oh sorry, this group isn't for you?" Why are American churches doing this type of age segregation? I've already discussed in this blog that I feel the main reason for the emergent apostasy is this segregation of young adults from older ones where the older ones don't have a clue that so many of their younger evangelical counterparts are into what amounts to liberal Protestant apostasy and are bringing into the churches. The last thing our churches need is this continued age segregation, including among adults.

The second thing I found out today is that some churches have "closed" periods wehere new people cannot join. Again, this wasn't in the bulletin. So if a new person calls and the group is closed, I guess the new person would be told, "Sorry you cannot join right now. Our group is closed." I just do not udnderstand why churches don't get how rejecting this type of behavior is. This is why I call this the "new person setup." And almost all churches do it.


Poor communication is the main problem.
The new person/visitor just does not have enough information to act upon, So, many just don't get involved. They sit in the pew for months without joining anything. Or, some just leave. But why would churches do this type of thing. I think there are two reasons why this can happen. One is intentional and the other is unintentional. Many churches just unintentionally put information in their bulletins without really thinking through what type of informtation new people to the church need in order to act. The leaders are essentially thinking of church members when they write the information. It's always interesting to me how churches bend over backwards to welcome new people and then sabotage any efforts for them to really become part of their churches. And this brings us to the intentional rejection of new people. Churches can get cliquy and do not wish "others" to be in their group. This also spills over to ages. While they might welcome new people in their age group, they DO NOT welcome new ones outside their age group. But this is sinking the church at large. The interesting part to me in all of this is churches are finally breaking down the wall between segregating singles from marrieds. One reason for this is probably because the younger singles won't play the "church singles game" anymore. But then how did we get into these tight little age groups?

The present Church Growth movement was started by Donald McGraven, an ex-missionary to India. The sad thing is McGraven never meant for the church to become what it has. And he certainly would not have wished churches to water down the gospel or push it out all together. The following quote is from James Gimpel, professor of political science at the University of Maryland,

I find very little evidence that churches are really transforming their congregations. It's rather quite the reverse. Ministers depend on pleasing a particular congregation for their longevity. The last thing they want is to offend those people or to try to transform their viewpoint....it's conformity all the way.*

As I've discussed here before, it's the numbers and the money. That is the engine that is running too many of our evangelical churches today. And sadly, also Christian publishing houses, Christian colleges and seminaries and denominations. That is why so many denominational and para-church organization leaders are "selling" us out. Churches must begin to be inclusive, not only racially and ex-sin-wise (accepting all repentant sinners no matter what they used to do), but also age-wise. There must not be a church for old, a church for young, a church for Baby Boomers. I don't even believe anymore that there should be a service for the young and one for the old. My old church proved that you can have ONE wonderful and effective church service being very inclusive of all ages. But pastors are going to have to stop being "girlie-men" and get courageous. They will need to explain why we are doing what we are doing. I'm not suggesting churches just one day tell members, "This is what we are going to do. Period." Members deserve explanations, and hopefully, Biblical ones. I don't wish Dictators. I want Explainers. Let's do away with this age segregation, shall we?




*From The Big Sort by Bill Bishop, p. 180

Are All Religions the Same?

You hear more and more today that all religions are about the same. Are they? There are basically two types of religions -- those that adhere to a "book of rules; principles; laws; and those that adhere to a higher consciousness. In the first category ae religions like Judaism and Islam. In the second category are religions like Buddhism and it's offsrping, New Age. In this second category would also be ancient mystery religions where you drank something or took something (alcohol and drugs for example) to get you to the "higher plane." It's almost impossible to "fuse" these two categories together as they are so opposite of each other. Either you are trying to keep rules, or you are trying to go to a higher consciousness. Now, you might have a religion that proposes a lot of rules to get you to a higher consciousness, but when the rules fail, which they ultimately will, that particular religion will fail and fade away.

There is also a third category with just one religion in it. This category is a strange one and really cannot be fused together with any other one, although many have tried it in the past and also now in the present. This religion is Christianity where rules don't need to be followed to get into a "higher consciousness;" things done't need to be meditated on, drunk or taken to get you there; keeping rules doesn't get you in "good with God, god, or the gods and goddesses;" but only receiving what the God has provided through His Son Jesus Christ. This is received by faith alone and grace alone--not by rules and laws and mystical practices.

Today, with Georg Frederich Hegel the most popular dead guy in evangelcial seminaries (along with Kirkegaard and certain postmodern philosophers) you have once again a fusion or "synthesis" (as the phlospher Fichte named the Hegel's fusion in his dialectic) of Christianity with (name of other religion, practice, mystery). It has never worked in the past and it won't work now. Let's put out a call to purify Christianity from Buddhist, occultic, Catholic and every other unChristian thought out there, shall we?

Welcome to the 21st Century Church (At Least--S. Cal Style)

From my local paper:

Five congregations meet Every Sunday for worship at the (name of church) Baptist church at (address of church). The Filipino congregation meets at 10 a.m., followed by the English at 10:45 a.m. and Spanish at 11:15 a.m., Armenian at 1 p.m. and Romanian at 5 p.m.

(If you are confused as to the half-hour church services, I am fairly sure they meet in various parts of the church to have a regular hour+ service).

Welcome to the 21st century church (at least here in Southern California). This, in fact, is very common here.


Memo to Bible Belters: Are you prepared for this? Because, it is cetainly coming your way as more immigrants settle in rural areas. In many churches here, once or twice a year, all the congregations meet together in one big service. I've been in two churches that do this and I'm telling you--the Holy Spirit really shows up when all of these congregations get together. Perhaps a message for the 21st century church?

Testing Healing Prayer Scientifically

The World Health Organization estimates that 278 million people, 80 percent of whom live in developing countries, have moderate to profound hearing loss in both ears; and 314 million people, 87 percent of whom live in developing countries, are visually impaired. Only a tiny fraction of these populations currently receive any treatment.

The above paragraph is part of a fascinating article that will appear in the September 2010 issue of the Southern Meical Journal. Some researchers from Indiana University did a study in both Mozambique and Brazil where, as you read above, hearing aids and glasses are not too available. The researchers tested prayer in proximity (PIP), which is the Charismatic/Pentecostal way of praying for people in person, often laying hands on them. The results were quite dramatic as there was significant improvement in the subjects. The researchers found those with acute vision and hearing problems because they wanted a medical condition that could be proved through hearing tests and vision charts rather than subjects simply saying "they felt better." They tested 25 people in a rural part Mozambique -- 14 with serious hearing loss, and 11 with serious vision problems. I felt it was vague as to if all 25 improved, although the article seemed to indicate this. In some cases there was dramatic improvement after prayer was administered.

I will report on this further when the September Issue comes out. Here is the link from which I gleaned this information:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-08/iu-sfp080310.php

Christian Carnival CCCXXXVIV

Welcome to this week's Christian Carnival. Here's the great lineup for this week:

* This has to be one of the best presentations of the gospel and what Christianity REALLY is, that I've read or heard in a very long time. Many of our evangelical churches are rushing headlong into a form of liberal Protestantism, denying almost everything you will read here. Great post Chris! The post is entitled, The Good News--Part II--The Particulars and Plausibility of the Gospel Article Blog and is found at Random Musings on Anything and Everything--the Blog of Chris Price.


*This is a very clever post. Using Proverbs 31, pf of the Christian Personal Finance blog, presents four (4) principles of a strong financial foundation in the post, Building a Strong Financial Foundation.


*Are you married? Feel like the "honeymoon" is over? Then this blog post at IN HIM WE LIVE AND MOVE AND HAVE OUR BEING is for YOU! THe post is entitled, A spiritual 7-year itch?.


*I've read many articles about murmuring and grumbling but I must admit this post from The Young Pastor's Wife is probably the best and most thorough I've read. A must read! It's called When Life is Hard-How do you respond?.


*Why is coveting a sin? And, exactly what is "coveting?" At the Christian Men-Christian Warriors blog you can find out in the post entitled, Enemy Behind the Line: Coveting.


*And you thought you had heard the last about Mel Gibson.
W…e....l....l....not quite. Chris at the http://lifeasahuman.com">Life As A Human blog writes about the place where The Passion was filmed, Matera, Italy. YOu can find a description of this fascinating place in his post, The Passion of Mel Gibson.


*Was Jesus black? Does it matter? Andrew at the Rely on God in your personal development blog takes this up in his post, Black Jesus?


*The book of the year has to be Francis Chan's Crazy Love. Barry reviews that book at his blog, who am i? in his post, You would ruin manure?


*There is a new doctrine in evangelical land today that stresses deeds, not creeds. This post at eInquisitive might be in that category. It's called Call Them into His Service


*At the In A Clay Pot blog there is a really good exhortation for us to see people through God's eyes in the post entitled, The Image Of God: How Far Does the Apple Fall From the Tree?.


*Here is someone who actually thinks that persecution isn't always what is needed for the church to grow. I found this post rather insightful and different from what we usually hear on this subject. You will find it at Pastor Matt and the post is entitled, Is Persecution Really Good For The Church?


*This is an excellent post about what Islam really is and its contrast to Judaism and Christianity. Do read this one at Thinking in Christ in the post, entitled, Islam and Christianity.


*Here is an interesting post at Christian Colleges 50 Christian Causes You Can Follow on Twitter. Happy Twittering.


*At Christian Colleges Online you can find 8 Tips for Christian College Students Attending Secular Colleges. This would be a good post to send to a Christian you know (or even yourself if it applies) who is attending a secular college or university.


*Jeremy of Parableman resolves the dilemma of a prophecy that, on the surface, seems contradictory. Read Jeremy's solution to this dilemma in his post entitled, Every Male of the House of Ahab.


*If you are among the wealthy, Free Money Finance passes on some advice that the Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy in the post, Advice to the Rich. And if you aren't rich, read this post anyway and you may find tht you are wealthier than you thought.


My contribution this week concerns this new trend of calling Christians Christ-followers or Jesus-followers. But maybe we are really dealing with TWO Jesus' here. My post is entitled, Which Jesus Are You Following Exactly?

Which Christ Are You Following Exactly?

I found a really good article describing and defining the difference between a Christian and a "Christ-Follower" (or in some churches, "Jesus-Follower").

My commentary is simply this: Ask those who are calling thenm Christ-Followers (or Jesus-Followers) which Christ or Jesus they are following? You see, there are two going around. One is the Savior who also has a heart for the poor. The other one is a moral example and really isn't that concerned with sin, but is obsessed with helping the poor and bringing them social justice, mainly through changing government and other power structures into a quasi-Marxist structure.

Here is a snippet from the post I found The link to the entire psot is at the end of today's post.

Now here lies the difference between a Christian and a Christ-follower. A person who is truly born-again has Jesus Christ indwelling him. Jesus lives inside that person. And it is His life in him or her that gives the power to become progressively more like Him (sanctification), as Paul said in his address to Corinthian Christians: “But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord” (II Corinthians 3:18). The believer draws his strength and power from Jesus Christ (who indwells him), and he realizes his salvation and any good thing in him is from Christ; as the Scripture says: “Not of works, lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2:9).

But being born again or having the indwelling of Jesus Christ is not a prerequisite for the Christendom of today. Spiritual formation can be practiced by anyone. Jesus becomes a model or an example who can be followed and mimicked. For example, Ken Blanchard, says Jesus is a perfect model to follow. That’s why he talks so much about leading like Jesus would lead. But Blanchard has shown time and again that he believes meditation is a key factor in becoming like Jesus.



The link is here.

When Youth Group Members Become Elders

I am still wondering how the younger elders in churches, as well as so many young pastors and Christian college and seminary professors got so far off. I think it might be because for the past 30+ years so many churches have held what I have called here in the past, "clown youth group." Good doctrinal teaching (made relevant of course) flew out of the window in many youth groups. These youth do grow up and some of them do become pastors and elders. Methinks we might be reaping what we sowed in those youth groups, and are still sowing. God help us when the next crop of pastors and elders hit the church. He'have to help us.

Disclaimer: This isn't about old-fashioned fundamentalist teaching. This is about younger adults going ga-ga after emergents, seeker sensitives, and every other kind of apostasy out there. This isn't about irrelevance either. When I taught junior high Sunday School in the 1970's, I wanted to throw out the irrelevant curriculum and do my own. In fact, one Sunday I threw the curiculum into the trash can in our SS classroom and got relevant. But I never strayed away from the "Jesus-died-on-the-cross-for-my-sins-and-this-is-extremely-important-to-know" teaching. And, I always stressed "Let's read-the-Bible-and-allow-it-to-speak-for-itself-and-find-out-what-God is saying-and-how-God-is-working-in-our-lives-today."