all sins the same?

The other day I was listening with my wife to a sermon by James MacDonald on what the Bible says about capital punishment. One thing you hear all the time in Christian circles is "all sin is the same to God." We often read this way of thinking into the bible because of what we know to be true of salvation. All sin is the same in that any sin...any one sin...separates from fellowship with God. However, from a non-salvific perspective - all sins are not equal, "biblically or otherwise," in terms of the penalty they incur. The higher the sin the higher the debt.

ER

I know this video has been around a while...but it's definitely worth watching.

Contextualization/Relevance Confused

Should we strive at making the gospel understandable to our culture? Of course. But, how far can we go before we are simply striving for relevance in culture? Our church staff goes back and forth with this issue. Contextualization is good. However, striving for relevance is a poor use of energy, because it is the word of God that is relevant and God is the one who ultimately draws people to Himself. More than that, many "searching" people don't end up going to church because they hear the church is cool and want to be entertained. They go to church because they desire an encounter with God or "a place where God is taken seriously." On the other hand, contextualization is important. The gospel must be set forth in "language" that hearers can understand. There are a few blogs that I frequent. Two of them are interacting right now on the issue of contextualization. Phil Johnson starts out his post, "Read (and believe) enough of the trendy books and blogs that talk about missional living, and you'll get the distinct impression that fitting into this world's cultures is vastly more important—and a much more effective evangelistic strategy—than knowing the gospel message and communicating it with boldness, precision, and clarity." Another blog writer, c michael patton, sums up Phill's post, "He says that in contrast to the compromised message of the postmodern Christian, Paul was not scared of offending people because he does not set his standard by how many people respond positively to the message. In fact, as Phil points out, Paul did not win many by his ”contextualized approach.” Phil says, ”That is the biblical approach to ministry. You don’t measure its success or failure by how pleased the crowd is at the end of the meeting.” Patton follows this with some interaction with Johnson's post and offers a helpful and balanced critique. Take a look, pretty helpful. Parchment and Pen -- Pyromaniacs (see Paul and Cutlure).

"Spirituality for All the Wrong Reasons"

Today I re-read a Christianity Today interview of Eugene Peterson that was recommended to me a few years ago. I must confess that I am not a huge fan of Peterson's writing style - but he has some marvelous things to say. I hate to admit it - I started reading "Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places: A Conversation in Spiritual Theology" about a year and 1/2 ago - but just couldn't finish. Humbling I guess. I like him though cause he's got a beard. I love beards. Except when they are only comprised of neck hair. That's gross. Anyways, here are a few highlights from the interview.

--> What is the most misunderstood aspect of spirituality? "That it's a kind of specialized form of being a Christian, that you have to have some kind of in. It's elitist. Many people are attracted to it for the wrong reasons. Others are put off by it: I'm not spiritual. I like to go to football games or parties or pursue my career."

--> Many people assume that spirituality is about becoming emotionally intimate with God. "...This promise of intimacy is both right and wrong. There is an intimacy with God, but it's like any other intimacy; its part of the fabric of your life. In marriage you don't feel intimate most of the time. Nor with a friend. Intimacy isn't primarily a mystical emotion. It's a way of life, a life of openness, honesty, a certain transparency."

"...I've been a pastor most of my life, for some 45 years. I love doing this. But to tell you the truth, the people who give me the most distress are those who come asking, "Pastor, how can I be spiritual?" Forget about being spiritual. How about loving your husband? Now that's a good place to start. But that's not what they're interested in. How about learning to love your kids, accept them the way they are?"

--> You make spirituality sound so mundane. "I don't want to suggest that those of us who are following Jesus don't have any fun, that there's no joy, no exuberance, no ecstasy. They're just not what the consumer thinks they are. When we advertise the gospel in terms of the world's values, we lie to people. We lie to them, because this is a new life. It involves following Jesus. It involves the Cross. It involves death, an acceptable sacrifice. We give up our lives."

"I think the besetting sin of pastors, maybe especially evangelical pastors, is impatience. We have a goal. We have a mission. We're going to save the world. We're going to evangelize everybody, and we're going to do all this good stuff and fill our churches. This is wonderful. But this is slow, slow work, this soul work, this bringing people into a life of obedience and love and joy before God. And we get impatient and start taking shortcuts and use any means available. We talk about benefits. We manipulate people..."

"Spirituality is not about ends or benefits or things; it's about means. it's about how you do this. How do you live in reality?"

"I think relevance is a crock. I don't think people care a whole lot about what kind of music you have or how you shape the service. They want a place where God is taken seriously, where they're taken seriously, where there is no manipulation of their emotions or their consumer needs. Why did we get captured by this advertising, publicity mindset? I think it's destroying our church."

If you'd like to read the whole interview, you can find it here.

Church...

I read a post on another blog this morning that was encouraging to read. You can find it here.

Mae Ellevene Jones

Our daughter was born last Friday at 3:41 pm! Abigail has a friend who's baby was born at the exact same time. Crazy! We left for the hospital around midnight after a couple hours of sleep. Abigail's water broke - so the doctor told us to come in right away. Abigail had been telling me that "water breaking" usually only happens in the movies (like in "We were Soldiers"). I guess she was part of the 10 percent to whom that happens. Anyways, we went to the hospital and the contractions got worse and worse... She got an epidural around 7:45 am and was ready to go about 9:30 am. For some reason the doctor decided to keep working at his office until his hours were through - so he didn't actually make it until around 3pm. We waited like six hours for him to get there. But, we like him a lot, so we weren't too upset. ah well. My poor parents, brother & soon sister waited at the hospital from like 2am to 6pm on Saturday. Well, the delivery went pretty smoothly. The baby had quite a bit of gunk in her after being born - so they kept wacking her with this soft paddle stick thingy - and then sucked out all the gunk. Pretty gross and cool at the same time. I guess all of the gunk was preventing her from getting a good percentage of oxygen. After a few minutes she was well. We are thankful to God for a healthy new baby. That is my mom holding Mae at the top left. Now, to figure out how to get some sleep at night...

"Better a live heresy than a dead orthodoxy"

What is the correct measure for authentic Christianity from a human perspective? Right believing (orthodoxy)? Right Feelings (orthopathy)? Right living (orthopraxy)? I mentioned a few posts back that I was rereading "The Story of Christian Theology" by Roger Olson as preparation for a Sunday school class I may teach in the future on Church history. Yesterday I was reading about the rise of pietism (17th & 18th centuries). Pietism rose out of the Lutheran heritage - as a movement that sought to complete the renewal movement of the protestant reformation. It was a reaction to "dead orthodoxy," seen as shallow and superficial. After the reformation, Lutheran Christianity in Germany "fell into a state of spiritual, moral and theological lethargy." Olson writes, "Overall, however, authentic Christianity was identified with doctrinal and sacramental correctness..." The phrase, "Better a live heresy than a dead orthodoxy," summarizes the views of some pietists of that time.

It is clear that right living, right feeling, and right believing are all very important. But, is one more important than the others? Or does one lead to the others. I've heard people say right belief leads to right practice - and that - if one's practice is wrong - than his/her belief is wrong or not true belief. I agree with that - but thats not necessarily what I'm asking. I mean - from a human perspective/pastoral perspectve - which one do you value more in the context of the church? Just curious.