One of the greatest comedy movies of all time, I am convinced, is The Princess Bride.  And one of my many favorite lines, when Inigo has heard Vizzini describe one too many things as “inconceivable,” is “You keep using that word.  I do not think it means what you think it means.”  Well, that can certainly be said about apologetics, as I realized when a friend described his study of the subject a few days ago.  Since I’m in the middle of an apologetics series myself, and since I really don’t intend what many apologists do, it occurs to me that I ought to explain myself…to do an apologia of my apologia, as it were.

Take a look at any of several online etymologic dictionaries, and you’ll see that the term “apologetics” and the related word “apology” come originally from the Greek ἀπολογία (apologia), which was the term for the defense in a court of law.  It’s actually the term used in the New Testament when, for example, Paul made his defense before the crowd in Jerusalem (Acts 22:1), and by Festus when he’s describing Paul’s secular right of defense (Acts 25:16).  Perhaps more to the point of Christian apologetics, it’s the word used for the answer that Peter says we should be ready to give, when someone questions the reason for our hope (1 Pet. 3:15).  I find these uses interesting in that in each case, the defense is offered, not proactively, but rather in response to the questions or charges of another.  This alone may be a relevant object lesson.

There is, however, a different stream in Christian apologetics that we must acknowledge.  For want of a better term to characterize it, I’ll call it “pre-emptive apologetics,” or perhaps even better, “offensive apologetics” (and here I refer primarily to “offense” as the antonym of “defense,” not as the causing of emotional grief, though that is certainly a frequent secondary effect).   It’s what I see happening all over the Evangelical blogosphere, and it’s the attitude I often hear from some who style themselves apologists today.  There are many who seem convinced that sufficiently-compelling constructive arguments (often combined with the destruction of an opponent’s objections) will compel a person to adopt faith in Jesus, rather as CS Lewis testified was the case for him (“the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England,” he said of himself).

I’m actually dubious that pure conversion-by-argument is even possible, but whether it is or not, that is most emphatically not my purpose with this series.  Philosophically speaking, it seems to me rather counterproductive to attempt to win someone to grace by defeating them with reason.  Furthermore, confrontational apologetics maintains the focus on faith as propositional rather than practical … on winning a contest of belief rather than inviting the thirsty to drink.  I’ve maintained for years that credalism puts the focus on the wrong things; popular apologetics puts the focus on credalism.  Guess I’m at least consistent.

So what am I trying to accomplish?  Actually, I’m sorting through my own challenge to myself.  My life of faith, while (I hope) firm in conviction, has been essentially devoid of the experiential or the transcendent … the “relationship with God” so many Christians talk about.  As I’ve repeatedly expressed on this blog, I’m also deeply disturbed by the behavior of many who call themselves “Christians,” particularly when, as Gandhi observed, “your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”  I still struggle with why God seems to let such blatant misrepresentation of himself go unchecked, and often as nearly as I can tell, unanswered.  Yet I remain stubbornly chasing after some halting, imperfect attempt to follow Jesus.  I’m trying to explain why … to myself, and to anyone else who cares to listen.

I don’t know if what I’m writing will “convince” anyone else.  If it does, that’s God working in them, it’s for sure not the dazzling cogency of my thoughts and writing.  If I’m trying to convince anybody else of anything at all, it’s that it is possible to validate a lot of objections atheists and antitheists throw at the church (and I do think many of those objections are valid), and still come finally to a point of faith.  Well, and maybe one more thing … if I can convince a few Christians to let up, to show a little more grace and a little less self-assuredness, I’d consider that progress.

This is a review, but mostly a recommendation, of Carl Medearis’ book Speaking of Jesus – The Art of Not-Evangelism.  I’ll get to the review in a minute, but I’ll start by saying up front:  seriously, this is a book you should buy and read.  If you’re a Christian who’s interested in evangelism, you should read it.  If you’re sick to death of Christians trying to evangelize you, you should read it too.  And if you think there’s something sort of cool about Jesus and can’t figure out why those Christians yammer on about Jesus but seem so not like him, you REALLY should read it!

This book is not new … Carl published it in 2011 and somehow I only learned about it a couple weeks ago.  But I’ve been in dialog with Carl over Facebook for a year or two, mostly around the topic that it’s possible to be unapologetically a fan of Jesus and still have Muslim friends, and even talk with those Muslim friends about Jesus.  He does this through the crazy notion that if you actually love people and treat them as friends instead of, say, part of the “enemy” or the opposing team, they often reciprocate.  He also has this weird idea that if Jesus really is as powerful and important as we say he is, maybe meeting Jesus is more important than thinking the right stuff about Jesus.  So Carl lays out the case for realizing that introducing people to the person, character, and way of Jesus is something entirely different from trying to “win” them to a religion.  As he says in the book:

I don’t want to redefine salvation.  I don’t want to redefine the gospel or even Christianity on the whole.  I suppose I want to undefine them.  I want to strip away the thousands of years of graffiti painted onto the gospel, turning it into a reasonable code of doctrines.  The gospel is not an idea.  It is not a belief.  It is not a favorite verse.  The gospel does not live in your church, it cannot be written down in a simple message, and it is not the sinner’s prayer.  The gospel is not a what.  It is not a how.  The gospel is a Who.  The gospel is literally the good news of Jesus.  Jesus is the gospel.

(emphasis in original)

People who’ve read my blog for any time know that one of my recurring frustrations is when people are driven away from considering the claims of Jesus, not because of who Jesus is, but because of the jerks we Christians can be (see this post if you want a refresher).  Under the guise of the “offense of the gospel,” Christians can be a downright offensive bunch at times.  As Carl put it, “We often blame Jesus when our evangelistic efforts fail … I don’t think it’s Jesus they aren’t liking.  It might be you.”

This book is a great thought-provoker.  One more quote to whet your appetite:

Maybe you’ll read this and think that I’m trying to make salvation easier or make a way for all the gays and liberals and Muslims and Buddhists to get in without going through all the “proper channels.”

Maybe yes and maybe no.  I’m not trying to change what salvation is because salvation is not my responsibility.  God didn’t put Carl Medearis in charge of deciding who stays and who goes.  That’s Jesus’ job, and He can keep it.

My job, no–my joy comes from sharing the good news of Jesus with people.  I point to Him, and He does all the heavy thinking.  I don’t have to convince anybody of anything.

I let Jesus run His kingdom.

Pretty good advice, if you ask me.  Go get this book and read the rest!

When I first heard that Tony Campolo and Shane Claiborne were doing a book on Red Letter Christianity, I was pretty excited.  I have a great deal of respect for both men, and while I don’t always agree with either, I think their prophetic voice in the church is beyond any reasonable dispute.  So I actively sought a review copy of the book, and the kind folks at redletterchristians.org obliged. As a consequence, it’s with more than a little regret that I have to tell you that I found Red Letter Revolution a disappointment. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still worth reading the conversation between Shane and Tony, and there are plenty of spots to get the reader thinking. But considering the authors and the title, I frankly expected a lot more. Red Letter Revolution contains far too few of the red letters (that is, the recorded teachings of Jesus in the gospels, often printed in red), and what’s more, it’s not all that revolutionary.

Longtime readers of this blog will know that I’ve repeatedly suggested Christian theology spends too much time bringing extrabiblical questions to faith. Much of my objection to the traditional creeds is that they create a priority of emphasis that is discordant with scriptural priorities. Part of my own attraction to so-called “Red Letter Christianity” is that, if we approach the gospel accounts, not only for their raw content, but to see what Jesus did–and just as important, what he did not–emphasize, we find areas of focus that differ radically from those taught in most churches, and studied by most theologians. I had hoped Tony and Shane’s book would illustrate this approach, as I believe much of their teaching and living to date has done.

Herein lies my principal disappointment with “Revolution.” The topics chosen for Shane and Tony’s discussion seem to me to have been pulled largely from the agenda of those some might call “liberal” and others “progressive,” not from the gospels. The first eight chapter headings, under the rubric “Red Letter Theology,” illustrate my point: History, Community, the Church, Liturgy, Saints, Hell, Islam, and Economics. Each of these subjects is treated with an interesting and worthwhile perspective, but it’s often one that only tangentially references Jesus’ words–the red letters–at all. And quite frankly, I’m unconvinced that some of these topics, such as liturgy and the saints (that is, those saints recognized and canonized by an official church) would even figure at all in a gospels-sourced curriculum. Others of the eight are more vital, I think, and we certainly can find among the red letters, guidance for how to approach them. But absent the foundation of Jesus’ actual teaching on his kingdom, even these lose their context and much of their power.

The remaining major sections of the book, “Red Letter Living” and “Red Letter World,” continue the pattern established by the first, selecting topics of great interest to progressives (Christian or not) in a manner that I would have expected from Jim Wallis, but I did not anticipate from Campolo and Claiborne. As before, what the two say about the topics so selected is worth reading. But instead of walking the reader through a fresh exploration of life directed by a focus on Jesus’ priorities, I found a book that lays out a decent left-wing alternative to right-wing Evangelicalism. That’s not a bad thing…In fact it’s quite worth doing. But that is not Red-Letter Christianity…it’s Blue-State Christianity. They’re not synonymous.

So in the final analysis this book, though full of interesting insights from two godly men, fails to deliver what it’s title promises. I sincerely hope that the authors will try again.

Disclosure: I received an advance review copy of the book from the publisher; however the opinion expressed herein is my own and (obviously) not that of the publisher or the book’s authors. No consideration regarding the content of this review was asked or offered.

Brian McLaren has recently come out with three little fiction e-books:  The Word of the Lord to Evangelicals, The Word of the Lord to Republicans, and The Word of the Lord to Democrats.

I heartily and without reservation recommend The Word of the Lord to Evangelicals to everyone who reads this blog.  It’s a wonderful little parable in which we follow Wheaton College student Wendy Gullivan.  Wendy has a surprise encounter with God in the form of a homeless man while she’s on an “Urban Immersion” ministry weekend with fellow Wheaton students.  God, it seems, is depressed–suicidally depressed–by Evangelicals…”Especially American Evangelicals.  And most especially in groups.  The more, the scarier.”

Over the next four or five years, Wendy and God meet up several more times, and with each encounter, Wendy learns a little more about how to shift her perspective from an obsession with personal salvation and certainty of doctrine, to loving and ministering to those God loves.  Along the way, McLaren is good for several hearty laughs from those of us who recognize ourselves, our friends, or our churches in his characters.  I don’t want to ruin the story by spilling too much…for three bucks you really ought to just read it!  But I will say his alternate rendition of some Scriptures the way Evangelicals teach them is worth the price alone.  Take this example:

For God so loved the church that he gave to himself his only Son, as a penal substitutionary sacrifice, so that those elect few who believe in this atoning doctrine would not suffer eternal, conscious torment in hell as a result of original sin, but would live forever in heaven after death.  For God did not send his Son into the world to save the world, but to condemn it, and save only the church.  (Not John 3:16-17)

The other two books, The Word of the Lord to Democrats and The Word of the Lord to Republicans are both good, but I can’t give them the same unqualified “You Must Read This” endorsement.  Both are actually funnier, in places, than Evangelicals.  But while McLaren’s skewering of Republicans is both witty and pointed (and quite appropriate, I think), in Democrats Brian pulls his punches too much.  I say this as a Democrat–it seemed to me that McLaren’s “Word of the Lord” to the Dems was largely that they are behaving too much like Republicans.  While this is to some extent accurate, it seems to me that if God were to send a message to Democrats it would have a lot more content than just “make up your mind what you’re going to stand for and then take a stand”  (for one thing, I think God’s message to Democrats would also remind them (us) that morality and holiness aren’t antiquated concepts to be left on the scrap heap of history).  So I finished Democrats rather disappointed that he hadn’t slapped them around with the same gusto he did in Republicans.  I will say, however, that his parody of Rush Limbaugh in Democrats is inspired…

All three books are well worth the $2.99 each.  Unfortunately they are only available as e-books…the good news being that this means they’re cheap, but it also means you can only read them on an e-reader or your computer (either Amazon or Barnes & Noble carry them).

In Scot McKnight book The King Jesus Gospel, which I reviewed a little while ago, Scot issued an interesting challenge: “I have always encountered people who boldly announce to me that they are ‘noncredal’ and even say ‘I don’t believe in the creeds’ because of their next words: ‘I believe in the Bible.’ I respond with one question, and I think I ask this question because I too was at one time one of their number: ‘What line or lines in the Nicene Creed do you not believe?’”  He states later in the same paragraph that “there’s nothing there not to believe.”

With the deepest respect to Scot, this post is my response to his question.  In point of fact, I have what I think are several reasonable objections to the Nicene Creed, which I’m going to lay out below.  First of all, here’s the text I’m using.  There are several variants, and I had to pick one, so I went with the version I found at www.reformed.org/documents/nicene.html:

The Nicene Creed

I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God; begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made.

Who, for us men and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary, and was made man; and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate; He suffered and was buried; and the third day He rose again, according to the Scriptures; and ascended into heaven, and sits on the right hand of the Father; and He shall come again, with glory, to judge the quick and the dead; whose kingdom shall have no end.

And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of Life; who proceeds from the Father and the Son; who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified; who spoke by the prophets.

And I believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church. I acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins; and I look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.

I’m not going to do a complete line-by-line commentary of the Nicene Creed because it’d get real boring real fast.  I will stipulate, in answer to the objections that I’m sure some will raise, that there is a historical context in which the various clauses of the Nicene Creed (and others) may be more fully understood.  But part of the error in insisting upon the creeds, in my view, is precisely that the creeds are taught in most churches as a thing to be believed and assented to, entirely devoid of their historical context.  In fact, if we looked more frequently at the controversies that were being considered, which influenced various clauses in the creed, I rather suspect more of us might come to the conclusion I have, that some of those old arguments don’t compel us as they compelled the Fathers who fought over them in the third, fourth and fifth centuries.

At any rate, the following paragraphs address my major thoughts or objections.

I believe …

Strange as it may seem, my first objection comes with the very first two words, “I believe.”  I’ve mentioned before that I see the Shema of the Old Testament, quoted by Jesus in Mark 12:29-31 among other places, as one of the best examples of a creed actually in the Bible.  The Shema starts off with a simple declarative statement “The LORD our God, the LORD is one.”  The focus is not the fact that we believe something, it is the reality that there is a God and He is one.  God is God, and God is there, and God is one, regardless of what you, I, or anybody else thinks or believes.  The shift from “there is a God” to “I believe in a God” may seem subtle to some, but to me it implies that the individual’s assent is the important thing.

Furthermore, the Shema goes from declaring that there is one God, to commanding that this God is to be loved as Lord.  The creeds, on the other hand, focus merely on “right thoughts,” that is, giving intellectual assent to the existence and character of God.  This is part of the shift from discipleship to religion against which I’ve argued repeatedly on this blog.

… the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds… (referring to Jesus)

This is not a section I actually take issue with, though I do take issue with the proposition that it matters.  What I mean by this is that this clause, along with the “begotten, not made” clause later, address the issue of Jesus’ pre-creation existence.  While I do see texts in scripture that suggest Jesus did in fact pre-exist creation (not least the first chapter of John, and John 8:58), I don’t know that a dogma of Jesus’ origin, and the timetable of his existence, is something we actually need to care about.  Sure, the biblical evidence suggests these clauses are true (I think).  But I fail to see what difference it makes.  I certainly don’t countenance the Constantinople Council’s anathematization of anyone who disagreed.

… God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God … (referring to Jesus)

I rather suspect that only a tiny fraction of everyone who recites this phrase has any clue what it even means.  I’m not sure I do.  I presume it’s referring in some way to Jesus’ divinity, and the commentaries on it that I find through a quick Google suggest the same, though interestingly I find an alternative translation “God from God, Light from Light” etc., which may even be compatible with the divine-yet-subordinate position that I have previously suggested is a more accurate characterization of what Jesus said about himself–that is, that he comes from, and is therefore distinct from, the Father.  So my objection to this phrase depends on how the speaker interprets it:  if as a classic Trinitarian construction that places Jesus as fully divine and equal to the Father, I object to the content; if rather it’s just something the speaker doesn’t comprehend, I then object to reciting as credal, words that have no meaning to the speaker.

I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of Life …

It’s in Pneumatology that I really start to take serious issue with the Nicene Creed.  This is one place where this creed goes far beyond its antecedent Apostles’ Creed, which merely stated “I believe in the Holy Spirit,” full-stop, with no qualification or theorizing.  Whatever the Holy Spirit is or is not (and on this I have previously written), I can think of no place in the Scriptures where the Holy Spirit is referred to as Lord, and “Giver of Life” is mis-attributed altogether.  The two texts to which I would point for this latter would be Genesis 2:7 and its beautiful New Testament mirror in John 20:22.  In Genesis it is God the Father who breathes the breath of life into man (“breath” and “spirit” are synonyms in Greek and, I’m told, in Hebrew too), and in John it is Jesus who breathes the Holy Spirit onto the disciples, initiating or symbolizing their new life in the new Kingdom.  The Spirit is, if anything, the life that is given, not its giver.

… who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified … (referring to the Holy Spirit)

I can find no place in the Scripture that admonishes or commands anyone to worship the Holy Spirit, nor states that the Spirit is glorified.  Nor can I think of any reference to people doing so.  The Breath of God is, as I wrote before, the tangible and very active presence of God working and speaking in the world, but it is never an object of worship.

There is more, I am sure, to be said, and this post is more of an opening for dialog than anything definitive.  Nevertheless each of the above objections is, I believe, a reasonable point to challenge the Nicea crowd for going beyond what is written in some rather substantial ways.

There remain areas where, while I say it differently, I do believe things that are substantially similar to the statements of the great creeds.  I illustrated as much in my post What IS a Christian, Anyway? I’m not saying the creeds are all wrong, but I do hold that emphasizing them is most assuredly wrong.  As Tom Wright stated in a recent lecture at Calvin College, “It is possible to check the credal boxes, and miss the larger reality to which they are the signposts.”  More than that, I would say without reservation that the Nicene Creed includes several boxes that ought not to be checked at all.

The concept and ideas around heaven is one of things that has been hijacked and subverted from its original understanding. I once heard N.T Wright eloquently say it like this: “heaven is great but its not the end of the world.”

Unfortunately most Christians believe that heaven is simply a destination and that death then heaven is what eternal life means. Of course there is something eternal to this thing we call life but the more profound understanding comes when we realize that an eternal kind of life is meant to be started right now in the here and now while we live on this earth.

When we begin to strive to live today as if all was right in the world as God originally intended, it is as if our veil is lifted and we see this world differently. This theme fits nicely into the Kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven reality. If only Christians would be taught more often what it looks like to be used a vessel to usher in heaven into the here and now. This I believe will be the challenge to the church over the next decade and longer.

The church has focused so much on the inner transformation that it has forgotten how to pair that vision with the transformation of the world vision as well. For some strange reason God has chosen to use his people to re-build his Kingdom on earth as it is heaven. Jesus was the first fruits of this vision and now it has been extended to his people through the profound presence of God’s Holy Breath (AKA Spirit).

I love how N.T Wright articulates this in that through Jesus God became King. When you pair that profound way at looking at how the heavenly realm and earthly realm are working toward becoming one with the Christus Victor view of the cross, you end up with a Kingdom citizens vision and mission. Loosely, to not just be recipients of new creation but to be agents of it as well. We are of course to shape ourselves into living an eternal kind of life now but we are too also look for places where the powers have strongholds and through prayer, sacrificial love, non-violence, etc tear down those strongholds and re-claim for the Kingdom what the powers have taken on this earth.

Shockingly in all of those battles Jesus has already won. All we have to do is remind the powers that they lost and send them packing. Because we are image bearers it will be our physical work and words / prayers that will accomplish this feat.

I want to end this post with an image and some reflections on it.

I have to say this image makes an interesting point. Of course it is entirely a generalization and deeply flawed, however, if the Church and God’s people were being loyal to their calling as also being agents of new creation, I believe the words describing Christians would be as follows.

Christian:
Takes care of the sick
Cares for widows and orphans
Advocates for the poor and those on the underside of power
Brings food to the hungry
Brings water to the thirsty
Provides shelter for homeless
……

And many more things rooted in sacrificial love. Believe it or not that list above, and more, is actually what I consider “evangelism.”

Grace and Peace.

Tom (N.T.) Wright recently gave a lecture at Calvin College that I appreciated very much.  In it, he drew attention to an important issue I’ve written about here before: the over-simplification of faithfulness to Christ that takes place when creeds and statements of faith occupy a central position.  I know my own position is more extreme than Wright’s…he suggests putting the creeds in their rightful place while I suggest that the creeds themselves are part of the problem.  In context he still “loves” the creeds, while I accept the Apostle’s Creed as true though incomplete, and consider the Nicene Creed to be partially in error (a topic I intend to address in detail soon).  Nevertheless, I found Tom’s lecture to be refreshing in the extreme and I heartily commend it to you all.  You can read a bit of the background here.  The full audio of the one-hour lecture is also downloadable and though I usually don’t post podcasts, this is well worth a listen.

To whet your appetite, I transcribed one of the most salient (to me) passages which occurs between 8:20 and 10:34 in the audio:

The creeds were drafted in order to highlight points on which the church resolved major difficulties. But when the creeds began to be used as a teaching syllabus (as they often are to this day), then the problem begins, because of course the creeds jump straight from Jesus’ birth to his death … and I have a mental image at that point, of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John standing there saying ‘Excuse me, we spent a lot of time and effort telling you about all that stuff in between, and you just skip over it?  What’s that about?’

Now, I have nothing against the great creeds.  I love them, and I say them or sing them ex animo.  But they have accidentally encouraged—or the way they have been used has accidentally encouraged—a reading of the New Testament in which the main body of the four Gospels is not theologically load-bearing.  For many Christians, it would have been quite sufficient if Jesus of Nazareth had been born of a virgin, died on a cross, and never done anything in between except, perhaps, lived a sinless life.

The four Gospels then, function for many as the dispensible back story for the Gospel as preached by Paul … this is the de facto position of many Protestants and many Evangelicals—many conservative Evangelicals—the irony being, of course, that it’s the exact same position as that of Rudolph Bultman, with the only difference being that Bultman thought most of the stories were pious fictions.  But the reason why most Evangelicals would differ is not that the stories are doing anything theologically, in themselves, but simply to shore up a view of the inspiration of Scripture.  Not for the only time, swaths of Evangelicals are more anxious to protect a theory of Scripture, than to hear what Scripture actually says.

And toward the end, one more excellent quote (55:40 in the audio):

We have substituted the static belief in Jesus’ divinity for the active belief in what the Incarnate Son was actually doing.  It is possible to check the credal boxes, and miss the larger reality to which they are the signposts.

There’s much more to hear.  Take your time and give it a listen!

On Facebook recently I shared an article by Rachel Held Evans on Facebook. It was a great article with a simple desire to point out that asking tough questions about the text is not a slippery slope to faith abandonment.

The sharing of this article sparked a dialogue both online and offline with a number of people which got me thinking and led to the title of this post. I may not be in the same camp on a number of theological issues as much as mainstream evangelicalism. That is one of the reasons I have no problem labeling myself as a non-evangelical and stating that I resonate with different faith traditions more than evangelicalism. Although I ask the tough questions about the text and have come to some different conclusions, I can boldly say I have very good, well thought out, exegetically honest, and communally vetted conclusions.

So why do I bring this up in the first place? Because I have gotten the sense through the years, from those who question where I have landed, that they seem to think that I don’t accept the stock answers because I am stubborn, rebellious or perhaps something worse. I get the sense some think I reject the standard issues just because. I have never gotten the sense from any of the more controversial conversations on controversial subjects that I may actually have deeply researched my conclusion. It seems they assume I have not, yet they have and that is why they are right and I am wrong. When in all actuality nothing can be farther from the truth.

As much as it shocks me to think about this reality, I happen to be a public authority and noted thought leader in the technology industry. This position has earned me a spot as one of the few technology columnists for a number of publications including TIME.com. I speak regularly to captains and leaders of industry at CEO summits, industry trade shows, and many other public and private forums as an authority / expert within my field of knowledge. To accomplish something like this one does not formulate opinions or expertise without deeply researching, analyzing, and vetting ideas in order to make conclusions that I do. I would approach conclusions made to my faith with no less diligence than I do in my professional practice.

This is why I titled this post the way I did. I have finally reached a point in vetting my beliefs and working out my salvation if you will where I am absolutely confident in the areas that for me are black and white (there are still grey areas). I know where I stand on many issues, I know why I stand there, and I can back it up with sound plausible exegesis.

It wasn’t easy and I have been fortunate to have access to noted biblical scholars, heads of noted theology schools, as well as read most of the major scholarly works from a wide range of scholars from a wide range of faith traditions. This journey started when I was 27 and I am now 33. That is how long it took for me and for many it probably takes longer.

I realize for many of those I engage with debate and conversation with, that they have as well vetted and rigorously wrestled with these issues and come out on a different side. I respect that wholeheartedly and in most cases can see where they are coming from. I value their efforts and their convictions and have no problem to agree to disagree and go build the Kingdom together.

With many of my answers to some of the tougher and perhaps more controversial questions about the text it is important to note the vast diversity which is the Christian tradition. If you only explore answers to questions within the very short and heavily Calvin based history of evangelicalism then you are missing the bigger picture.

For many Christians the questions that pop out in my mind about many biblical issues may never come up or they don’t matter as much to them to answer as they do to me. I am OK with that and I fully acknowledge that reality. The truth is not everyone thinks like me and that is OK. This journey is still going as there are still matters that lie in tension, in a good way, in my brain. But there is a peace in confidently knowing not only what you believe but why you believe it.

On her blog, Rachel Held Evans has just issued a challenge to Christian men, to respond to John Piper’s recent pontifications on God’s having given Christianity “a masculine feel.” I suppose it will come as no surprise to most of my readers that I take neither a conventional “egalitarian” nor “complementarian” approach to the issue.

Rachel is absolutely right to call Piper out on this. My own first reaction to the suggestion of a “masculine Christianity” is basically one of “eeewww!” To be fair, what Piper actually suggests might characterize such a faith doesn’t sound so far off:

“When I say masculine Christianity or masculine ministry or Christianity with a masculine feel, here’s what I mean: Theology and church and mission are marked by an overarching godly male leadership in the spirit of Christ with an ethos of tender-hearted strength, contrite courage, risk-taking decisiveness, and readiness to sacrifice for the sake of leading and protecting and providing for the community. All of which is possible only through the death and resurrection of Jesus.”

Interestingly, I rather suspect that if we were to remove the word “male” modifying “leadership” in that paragraph, few readers would find much objectionable in Piper’s description of leadership. This is an important thing to consider. I submit the problem is fundamentally that we have badly misunderstood both gender and leadership as Jesus (and even Paul) taught them, and hence are objecting to all the wrong things. Seriously, what is particularly masculine about “tender-hearted strength, contrite courage, risk-taking decisiveness, and readiness to sacrifice?” I personally know men and women who do, and others who most decidedly do not, exhibit all those characteristics.

Frankly, I’m getting more than a little fed up with the repeated drumbeat of observing “male” or “female” characteristics in God, or in ourselves for that matter. I’m a daddy, it has always given me great joy to embrace and kiss and hold my kids. I could never breastfeed them, obviously, but when our youngest couldn’t nurse, I fed him–and wept many tears over him–while my wife pumped what I would then feed him. Was I getting in touch with “my feminine side” as I did this? Hell no! I was lovingly caring for my son and my wife! I resent the implication that tenderness is uniquely feminine, or the converse that strength is uniquely masculine.

Egalitarians have, in my opinion, been far too acquiescent to these sloppy definitions of gender. Each time one calls out the Pipers and the Driscolls of the church by pointing out “feminine” traits in God, they are tacitly granting these harmful distinctions in gender character (but see my parenthetical comment at the end).

The second key issue I take with this debate is with our definition of leadership in the church. Conservative church leaders insist that pastors, and particularly the “senior pastor,” must be male. Egalitarians object that women are also gifted in the same qualities and should be able to participate in these offices. Neither considers the possibility that the authoritarian structure that is the modern pastorate might itself be unbiblical!

I can think of no better illustration of my point than a passage that is often held up as a prime exhibit of the apostle Paul’s presumed mysogynism…1 Cor. 11:2-16. The common reading of this passage sees all the language that can be interpreted to demean or control women. I’m not going to get into that here. What I want to point out, is verse 5, completely ignored by most it seems, in which Paul doesn’t even question the reality that women are praying and prophesying! One can argue, as I’ve heard before, that prayer is private, but there’s no such thing as private prophecy. Add the record of Philip’s four prophetess daughters (Acts 21:9), and the story of Priscilla and Aquilla (a husband-wife team who schooled Apollos in theology…and Priscilla’s name comes first every time!), and it’s pretty clear that the New Testament church heard plenty from women as well as men.

What we do not find in the New Testament record, is individual church leaders invested with unaccountable, unquestionable authority.  In contrast, throughout Jesus’ ministry we find repeated efforts on Jesus’ part, to disabuse his apostles of the notion they should rule each other or anybody else. In fact, most references throughout Acts and the Epistles to pastors, teachers, apostles, deacons, prophets, or any other function in the church are in the plural.  1 Cor. 12:7 (to each one) and 1 Cor 14:26 (each one contributes) are only two examples of many showing us that the body ought to hear from each other, not merely from a limited cabal of ordained leadership.

So my appeal is that we not correct error with error. The autocratic style of leadership exhibited by male church leaders will not be fixed by simply adding women to the ranks of the autocracy. It will only be repaired when we rediscover the real meaning of Ephesians 5:21 and we all submit ourselves to one another out of reverence for Christ.

One final parenthetical comment.  I remain troubled by the trend among some, while rightly objecting to the male-centric theology that has inhabited the church for too long, to refer to God in female terminology.  This is not least because it seems to me to tilt toward ancient idolatries of goddess worship.  Atheist wags have said in the past that “man created god(s) in his image,” and the gods so created were a pretty disgusting bunch.  No less the goddesses, many of whom demanded various perversions such as human sacrifice, temple prostitution, and other sexual and fertility rites that have been rightly blasted by the prophets throughout the ages.  Feminized idolatry is no less reprehensible than the male version.

Though I am by no means a verbal-inspiration fundamentalist, I do think that God has consistently revealed his character throughout the ages (and in many different cultures) using masculine terminology.  As I pointed out above, the perversion of the concepts of masculine and feminine within our theology and our culture do not change this.  Certainly, whatever the use of male terminology with reference to God may mean, it does NOT carry a sexual component, and any claim to the contrary is blasphemous.  But replacing it with female terminology is, in my view, one of many forms of remaking God in the image of modern humanity instead of the older and more benighted version.  Biblical Christianity deserves better.

Scot McKnight’s latest book The King Jesus Gospel: The Original Good News Revisited, is a worthwhile read and I commend it to all who believe that the message of Jesus is, can be, or ought to be genuinely “good news.”  McKnight has done an excellent job of analyzing what Jesus and the first-century Apostles meant when they spoke of the “gospel” (gospel being derived from the old English godspel or “good news,” is equivalent to the Greek εὐαγγέλιον “euangelion” from which we also get our English words “evangelize” and “evangelism”).  Before I complete this review I’ll examine a significant issue where I think Scot missed the boat, but this is a place for extension of the dialog, and does not in any way temper my recommendation of the book.

The King Jesus Gospel sets out to answer what in my view may be the most breathtakingly misguided question ever asked in modern Christendom.  As McKnight tells it, “John Piper…at a big conference in April of 2010 asked this question: ‘Did Jesus preach Paul’s gospel?’”  Scot’s more charitable than I would be.  He states that he “would defend the legitimacy of Piper’s question,” based as it is on the notion that Paul’s gospel is essentially the doctrine of justification by faith, and that’s not a topic upon which Jesus seems to have spent much (if any) time. Obviously (and I’m sure Piper would agree) any biblical “gospel” must rest entirely on Jesus, and that most certainly includes the “gospel” of justification by faith.  The mere suggestion that Jesus, who himself IS the gospel, might not have preached the gospel, blows my mind.

But I digress.  While McKnight is kinder to Piper’s question than I would be, he quite properly points out that such a question suggests that our very definition of “gospel” may need reexamination.  I absolutely agree with his statement:  “When we can find hardly any instances of our favorite theological category in the whole of the four Gospels, we need to be wary of how important our own interpretations and theological favorites are.”

So what is “the Gospel?”  McKnight goes into a detailed–and, I think, entirely correct–study of the church’s use of the term “gospel.”  His approach is best defined, I think, in his own words:

I want now to make a stinging accusation.  In this book I will be contending firmly that we evangelicals (as a whole) are not really “evangelical” in the sense of the apostolic gospel, but instead we are soterians.  Here’s why I say we are more soterian than evangelical: we evangelicals (mistakenly) equate the word gospel with the word salvation.  Hence, we are really “salvationists.”  When we evangelicals see the word gospel, our instinct is to think (personal) “salvation.”  We are wired this way.  But these two words don’t mean the same thing…(p. 29)

(note for those who don’t play with Greek…”soterian” comes from the Greek σωτῆρ “soter” which means “savior”.  That is, a “soterian” is one who preaches–or emphasizes–salvation)

In this point, Scot is solidly on track.  I have before suggested that salvation gets too much focus within the Christian message…not because salvation is irrelevant or incorrect, but because it’s not the main event in God’s story.  He then spends a significant and important portion of the book refocusing the “good news” preached by both Jesus and the Apostles (as related in Acts), within the story of God’s redemptive work through Israel, and eventually, beyond Israel to the world.  Jesus, according to his own preaching and later that of Peter and Paul, is the culmination of all that God was doing through the nation of Israel up to that point in history.  When Jesus declared the Kingdom of God, he was declaring “good news” on a myriad of levels, of which salvation from sins was definitely one, but only one and not necessarily the greatest.  There was (is) a new king on the throne…the one God promised for ages past.  If that’s not good news, what on earth could be?  (for more on this, see my advent meditation on Jesus’ announcement of Jubilee).  One more quote of note:

My summary point of comparison: gospeling declares that Jesus is that rightful Lord, gospeling summons people to turn from their idols to worship and live under that Lord who saves, and gospeling actually puts us in the co-mediating and co-ruling tasks under our Lord Jesus.  When we reduce the gospel to only personal salvation, as soterians are tempted to do, we tear the fabric out of the Story of the Bible and we cease even needing the Bible.  I don’t know of any other way to put it. (p. 142)

There is much more to glean in the pages of Scot’s book, not least as he discusses the methods by which Christians over time, have attempted to persuade others to consider and accept the claims of Jesus (hint, it hasn’t always been about hell).  Without getting into all of it here, let me commend his perspective to you as well worthy of consideration.  In short, it’s worth looking at how the Apostles evangelized, and contrasting it to the sales pitches we adopt today.

But I want to turn to one area in particular where I part ways fairly substantially with McKnight’s arguments, and that is the credence he gives to the church fathers.  Fairly early in his book (chapter 5), Scot makes the argument that the early church creeds, in particular the Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds, are a direct outgrowth of, and a faithful characterization of, the gospel Jesus and the Apostles preached.  He states directly that the creeds are “an articulation” of Paul’s gospel summary in 1 Corinthians 15, and even that “…denial of the creeds is tantamount to denying the gospel itself because what the creeds seek to do is bring out what is already in the Bible’s gospel.” (emphasis in original)

McKnight returns to this notion in Chapter 10 “Creating a Gospel Culture” when he suggests that following a traditional church calendar can focus the church on a fuller view of the gospel than that embodied by soterians.  He may be onto something when he says that “focusing on these events in their theological and biblical contexts… [will expose the church] …every year to the whole gospel, to the whole Story of Israel coming to its saving completion in the Story of Jesus.”  He continues later to advocate knowing “our creeds,” because “the wisdom of the church is on the side of the value of creeds and confessions of the faith.”

I’ve disagreed with Scot on this before.  In fact, though I doubt he’d remember me, I engaged him a bit on his own Jesus Creed blog a couple years back when he did a series on the historical heresies of the early church.  My point then, which remains a concern today, is that he seems to have given the 3rd- and 4th-century “church fathers” a complete pass from critical examination.  This is unfortunate, as I believe it is precisely in those periods, and in the creation of the creeds themselves, that the seeds of this entire misapprehension of the gospel has its ultimate roots.  Go back and take a look at the actual text of either of the Apostles’ or Nicene creeds (Google is your friend…there are lots of sources).  What’s the operative declaration in every phrase? I believe.  It’s a propositional issue.  Discipleship is at best implicit, though even to say that is being generous.

Look again at what is being stated that one must believe.  God’s nature, Jesus’ origin, his suffering, death, burial, resurrection.  All important stuff, and to deny it is certainly to be talking something other than Jesus’ gospel.  But the whole “Story” that Scot does such a good job of describing in the rest of his book is completely absent from either the Apostles’ Creed or the Nicene Creed.  The Nicene Creed even says that Jesus’ incarnation was “for us men and for our salvation,” a soterian statement if I have ever encountered one.  If he’s right (and I think he is) that the soterian message overtook the gospel in error, then the creeds were (and are) part of the problem, not the solution!  It is precisely the reduction of discipleship to a set of propositions to be believed, that is the very essence of the creeds.  It may have taken a while to get from the Nicene Creed to the Four Spiritual Laws, but the arc was inevitable.

So while McKnight has done an outstanding job of characterizing certain of the symptoms of a deep malady within today’s Evangelical church, I think he’s stopped short of the roots of that malady.  Those roots, I would submit, are firmly embedded in the power struggles of the third and fourth centuries (possibly earlier), and in the whole process that took the Way of following God’s anointed King and reduced it to a “religion” filled with propositions to be “believed.”  Here, at last, the Gospel must be rescued from the religion that has for so long held it captive.  Scot gets us on the road, and for that, his book is worth the purchase and the reading.  I hope we all go further.