Doxological Theological Men

Dear brother,

It is crucial to grasp that knowing good theology does not necessarily lead to godly living. I have met many men whose words were Reformational and biblical while at the same time hurtful and harsh toward wife and children.

Good theology helps create helpful categories to view the world rightly, but at times it can create unhelpful justifications to view people wrongly. The more you know the more equipped you are to use that data for good or ill. I urge good theologizing, good biblicizing, and good catechetical training. But the way forward is to produce churches with theological men who will help create environments of repentance.

If a child or wife has never heard a man repent at home, surely this man will be the kind that will bring curses to a church or will add little to no benefit to the life of the community. We need theological discourse in the context of confession and community. When you divorce theology from that, no matter how Reformational you are, you have failed to reform your soul.

So, press on your studies, but don’t forget the end goal. If your theology cannot produce doxological moments it is in vain. Don’t forget this lesson.

Yours truly,
Pastor Brito

UB Podcast, episode 25, How To Be a Better Listener in 2020

It’s a new year and a new season of podcasts at Uribrito.com. Thanks for listening. And in fact, that’s the topic of this episode, Listening. How can we be more intentional about listening? How can we heed James’ advice to be quick to hear and slow to speak? I tackle briefly this topic on this new episode.

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5 Church Resolutions for the New Year

Dear friend,

Merry 8th Day of Christmas and a Happy New Year! Here are the five resolutions I encourage you to take seriously as members of local churches in 2020:

a) Resolved to attend corporate worship every Lord’s Day unless providentially hindered. We live in a society that treasures entertainment and personal hobbies on Sundays but God has made his commandments clear. If you compromise on this, you are placing your offspring at the altar of preference and convenience and the fruit will be disastrous.

b) Resolved to be engaged in the life of fellowship. This is, of course, an extension of the first though it does not carry the weight of the first. The solution to knowing your community is to be around it beyond Sunday morning. There are activities where it is good and right to attend and there are seasons where attending such activities/events are not profitable nor necessary. Wisdom needs to be considered often. For the life of any Christian body to grow in love and holiness, you are going to have to work extra hard to maintain good community life which demands a commitment, but is rewarding beyond measure.

c) Resolved to grow in the knowledge of God and His Word. One of the great threats of our day is apathy: Christians who sit week after week without growing in the knowledge of the Bible or who are content with the little knowledge they have. Dear friend, it is a sin to not desire to know more about God. To be indifferent as a Christian is a contradiction to the Lordship of Jesus. Jesus demands your souls and bodies. Don’t give him your crumbs.

d) Resolved to be hospitable Christians. Your home—however big or small—is meant to be a garden. I am exhorting you to take your calendars and mark one day a month where you plan to have folks over. Some families are more gifted in this area and will have people over for meals every week—and you are free to go above and beyond—but I am encouraging 12 days a year where you will intentionally invite someone over your home for a meal or dessert or some kind of fellowship. If you need help implementing any of these things, send me a note and I’d be pleased to offer some suggestions. As one who has been practicing hospitality since the beginning of our marriage, I have learned much from these years and am eager to share any lessons.

e) Resolved to live out the Church Calendar in 2020. Depending on your context in a local church, you can still practice many of these things as families and on your own. If your congregation’s leadership is adamantly opposed to the calendar, I would refrain or at the very least talk with them. But in most cases, local churches are indifferent to private practices. Remember that everyone has a calendar. We don’t allow the government or other institutions to determine our calendar. The Church has its own. It takes some practice and creativity to use the calendar wisely. For example, most evangelicals in our culture think that there is only one day of Christmas on the 25th. Anything after the 25th becomes a preparation for the new year. But the Church has set aside 12 days to celebrate Christmas. So, there are things we can do to make these seasons even more festive and meaningful.

In the end, the life of the church is the only true life there is. Live it out faithfully this new year and commit your joys and sorrows to the Head of the Church, Jesus Christ.

Why We Hate Advent

No one likes to long for things. No one likes to wait. We are consumerist beings expecting everything to be hand-delivered not one second too late; preferably, one second earlier. It’s for these and other reasons that we hate Advent! It’s perhaps for this reason also that we join together Advent and Christmas conceptually. We don’t grasp what Schmemann called the “bright sadness,” of this Season, so we rather incorporate it with a happier season.

But we usually don’t hate Advent intentionally; we hate it emotionally–almost like a visceral reaction. We hate it because words like longing, waiting, expecting, hoping don’t find a comfortable home in our hearts or vocabulary. So, I propose we begin the process of un-hating Advent. But we can’t simply un-hate something we have long hated. It takes time to undo our habits. We must try to see Advent for what it really is; a season of practice. It’s a season to warm up our vocal cords for the joys to the world, to strengthen our faith for the adoration of the Christ, the Son of the living God.

Few of us treasure the practice time, rehearsal, the conductor’s corrections to our singing, the coach’s repetitive exercises before the big game. So, there we have it. We hate Advent because we don’t like to practice. Sometimes, however, the solution to stop hating something is to reframe the way you think about that something. Imagine you sit under a tedious professor who reads from his notes with no modulation in his voice. To make matters worse, he rarely if ever looks up to engage your eyes, but buries himself in his manuscript. While the material is wonderful, you long for that intimate connection between the content and the character. The next class comes along and suddenly you have an engaging lecturer who is interested in connecting with you. He will add a couple of funny lines to ensure you are awake. Those professors almost always make a greater emotional impact than the tedious lecturer.

Advent is like longing with an engaging professor who not only enjoys teaching but looks up to you and seeks to connect with your eyes and heart. If adventing (waiting) was only a process of listening without engaging, it would be a duty without pleasure. But Advent is being guided by someone who looks into the eyes of affliction and who talks out of experience. So, yes, it’s about perspective. To Advent is to wait actively, to long hopefully and to engage the dynamic prophets who prophesy and proclaim Messiah Jesus.

If we begin to see Advent as an engaging practice for Christmas, suddenly our distaste for the season before Christmas will decrease and our longing will be more meaningful. Perhaps we won’t hate Advent after all. We will long together with the prophets and those first-century saints who practiced well and embraced Christmas with sounding joy.

UB Podcast, episode 23, Why You Should Write!

It’s not every day you have the privilege of having an author and scholar stop by your office. Today, I took the presence of Dr. Brian Wright for a special episode of Uri Brito podcast. We discussed the process of writing and the role of the pastor as theologian. It’s a short interview but packed with goodies.