Category: Theological Thoughts

There was once a prophet who came to Pensacola and proclaimed, “Continue to be who you are, for your kingdom is at hand.” This prophet didn’t wear camel’s hair, nor did he eat wild honey; he consumed large amounts of energy drinks and spoke about love and acceptance. The prophet started an Instagram account and became an immediate sensation. “Look at him,” they said. “He is one of us; he speaks ill of no one, and he doesn’t turn our tables upside down like the previous prophets.”

This prophet wanted the ears of the church also, so he found a platform to communicate his ideas. The local pastor seeing his rhetorical gifts quickly gave him a Sunday to preach. The crowd gathered to hear him from near and far.

After the prophet was introduced, the people stood up and gave him a standing ovation. He stepped up into the pulpit, and slowly he pulled his mask away, revealing himself to be an ugly, devious figure. In fact, he looked like a demon. The people were shocked by this revelation at first, but when he began to speak, he spoke as he always did about being who you are, approving of sins, disregarding the Word of God, etc. The people were so enamored by his message of inclusiveness and acceptance and a new Christianity that they forgot that the prophet was the devil himself.

This morning we affirm dogmatically: Jesus is Lord of the Church. Repent, for the kingdom of God is here! Repent and conform to Jesus. Repent and believe. The man of God does not concern himself with the praises of men for he knows there is only one faith, one Lord, and one baptism.

We spend so much time wondering what someone thinks of us that we fail to proclaim Jesus when we should. People’s perception controls our every step. We wake up allowing others to control our morning. Our sleep is not as it should be because the opinion of others keeps us up at night. As Ed Welch notes:

“We are more concerned about looking stupid (a fear of people) than we are about acting sinfully (fear of the Lord).”

The reason we need corporate worship is that it offers us an opportunity to confess our fear and dependence on men’s opinions in the presence of the very people we fear. Prepare for worship tomorrow and come into his presence with awe.

I am currently working on an introduction to theology for the laity. I hope it will prove beneficial for new Christians and young folks wanting to deepen their faith.

If we have ever come across the word “theology,” our first impression, unless we are predisposed to pursue these subjects, is to view theology as a very impersonal enterprise. But the type of theology we are after is “a theology that reflects upon the God whom Christians worship and adore.”[1] Doing theology is an act of charity to the world. What theology ought to do is change us, so that we are better prepared to change others.

The work of theology ought to make us better students, better husbands and wives, better children, and better laborers in the kingdom of God. Theology is the Christian’s daily workout. When you stop doing it, you become frail and open to sickness and disease.

Theologizing is what we are after, not so much as an exercise to strengthen our intellectual prowess, but as an exercise to serve our fellow church-men. We love best when we know God most.

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[1] Alister McGrath, Christian Theology: An Introduction (Oxford, Blackwell, 2001) 137.

I was in a friendly conversation with a fellow pastor some years ago. The tone changed rather quickly when I spoke positively about C.S. Lewis. In his perspective, Lewis was a dangerous writer who could lead people away from the safety of Reformed confessionalism.

Suddenly, in his eyes, I had gone from a faithful Reformed pastor to someone compromising my orthodoxy. The experience was so shocking and his tone so harsh that I kindly asked if we could continue this conversation another time and left. I knew nothing fruitful would come from that chat. Of course, we never continued that talk and I am frankly grateful. Such reactions stem from an over-reactionary perspective of theology. The idea is that we must be glued to our Reformed forefathers and read nothing else outside our tradition for fear that it might damage our pure ideas of interpretation.

As we approach Reformation Day, I find myself more and more grateful to God to those within and without my particular tradition. Those of us in the Reformational camp have a greater responsibility to provide a framework that is more whole, more catholic, and more complete than other traditions. After all, we produced the Puritans, Bavinck, Kuyper, Van Til, Bahnsen and Sproul. From the Reformation stemmed this gigantic sense that everything in the world is Christ’s and we are in him which means we seek to bring Christ to everything.

The idea that Lewis’ peculiar views on the imprecatory Psalms, for instance, would be a threat to the Reformation is absolutely bizarre. I could easily find peculiarities in Luther. However, the idea that Lewis’ genius would contribute to a more robust Reformation is precisely the kind of world we need to embrace. If the modern Reformed man or woman lives in fear that such and such an author or thinker will remove us from the Reformation, then we have adopted a very narrow view of the Reformation. We have failed to see precisely Calvin’s vision for the church, the Puritan’s vision for the world, and Kuyper’s vision for the culture.

So then, read broadly, hold on to your convictions closely, explore Christendom unashamedly and go to Narnia often. To be Reformed is to be unafraid; it is to know God and to know self.

Solus Christus!

We are living in interesting times when cowardly evangelical men fail to lead their families in godliness, church attendance, tithing, and fellowship and so much more. Membership in a local church is now viewed as optional. There was actually a time when membership in a local body was your identity marker like your baptism. But now people jump from church to church (sometimes several in a short amount of time) with a profound disdain for the pastor and the people’s liturgical and sacramental and shepherding role in their lives.

So, now we enter this stage when a world-wide celebrity enters the evangelical scene with an absolutely well-done album covering all the basics of what a true evangelical man ought to look like and think like and feel like and act like. Further, he affirms how a man ought to lead his house:

“Follow Jesus, listen and obey. No more living for the culture we nobody’s slave. Stand up for my home. Even if I take this walk alone, I bow down to the king upon the throne. My life is his, I’m no longer my own.”

But beyond all that, we are looking at the zeal of what I hope to be a new Christian so eager to explain his new-found faith that his Bible reading flows clearly through his lyrics. It’s true that Kanye has a lot of undoing to do; he needs no penance. In Christ, he is a new creation. But if he genuinely follows Christ in this toxic culture, he can be a powerful voice that can reach millions and millions. His undoing will be like a sweet aroma to so many who long for something more permanent than the temporary pleasures of this world.

Kanye may be God’s greatest humorous art piece in my short life. My hope is that God’s humor through the conversion of men will awaken the silliness of the modern evangelical man and awaken them from their slumber. https://open.spotify.com/album/0FgZKfoU2Br5sHOfvZKTI9…

The results are in! Gratitude wins the day by a landslide. In fact, as a result of this monumental victory, psychology departments are developing entirely new areas of study on the little-known fact of gratitude. According to Robert Emmons, author of “Thanks! How Practicing Gratitude Can Make You Happier,”

“Gratitude is literally one of the few things that can measurably change people’s lives.”

There are measurable benefits! Did you hear that?

Linked to this discovery is the helpful suggestion made by Michael Hyatt that keeping a gratitude journal can be immensely beneficial as we build an arsenal of gratitude pages. Ending the day by listing the reasons for thanksgiving, however small, can actually serve as a rich spiritual exercise.

Of course, we are aware that psychological journals are behind the times. Gratitude has always been a Christian virtue. St. Paul had already broken the news. Later, in the 20th century, Bonhoeffer alluded to this in his remarkable little book, Life Together. There, he takes us back to the glories of gratitude in community life. For Bonhoeffer, if you don’t know where to start in the gratitude journey, start with thanking God for your community. He writes:

“If we do not give thanks daily for the Christian fellowship in which we have been placed, even where there is no great experience, no discoverable riches, but much weakness, small faith, and difficulty; if on the contrary, we only keep complaining to God that everything is so paltry and petty, so far from what we expected, then we hinder God from letting our fellowship grow according to the measure and riches which are there for us all in Jesus Christ.”

The Christian faith is a food religion. The heart of it is found in the death/resurrection of Jesus the Messiah. He became for the world the bread of life. This bread then becomes the food for hungry souls to feed. In the Christian tradition, it is articulated most clearly in the table of the Lord. The table is a table of joy and gratitude; so much gratitude that it is usually referred to as the Eucharistic Table. The word “eucharistia” means “thanksgiving.” Emmons says that “when we feel grateful, we are moved to share the goodness we have received with others.”

It is this sharing of food that forms this table of thanksgiving.

Gratitude builds us in love and compels us to share in the shalom of God with others. To whom much is given much is required. To those of us who partake of God’s goodness often and daily, we are called then to compel others with our own lives and words to share in this community of gratitude formed by the God who gave us His own life.