I'll take Potporri for 300, Alex

I'm striving to be a little more consistent with my blogging. I don't know how that will work itself out in the coming weeks as the due dates for papers seems to approach at light speed, but nevertheless I will try. In an attempt to not fail in this right after my quite long winded return (see "about time eh?" below) I offer up a short mess of random and somewhat unconnected topics.

Topic #1: Sexist language in sports.

As you all should know (and if you don't I'm wondering how well you really know me) I'm a huge Minnesota Vikings fan (that's an American Football team for those of you not in the US). Part of my rabid fandom consists of spending my free time (or time I spend procrastinating) surfing the internet for any sort of Vikings comments. In my recent internet travels I came across a Vikings blog entitled "Pacifist Viking" - how crazy of a title is that, since vikings are known for raping, pilaging, and burning.

All that to say that while I was on this site the other day I read an interesting take on sexist language in sports. I think that Pacifist Viking (I don't know his name) makes some good points. Although I don't remember using the phrase "man up" in recent years (specifically analagous to "suck it up") he causes me to think about sports cliches. This example made me think of the common basketball phrase "man up" as in play "man to man" coverage (I'm not a basketball expert and except for the Houghton Globetrotters, I loathe the sport - so if i'm using the phrasing wrong I aplogize). Thinking on this I am wondering how we proceed. I am all about gender inclusive language (unless it messes with God language) but it wasn't until now that I realized my double standard when using sports terminology. Does this mean that I have to start using comberson phrases like playing a "person defense" or he's in "person to person coverage"? Can I use man when the sports participants are only men, but must I use woman if the sport consists of women? Although, I doubt I'll really run into the latter case as I don't know if I've watched an all women's sporting event since high school. How does this practically work itself out?

One thing that I thought was very interesting was the experiment that he offers at the end of his post. Thinking about the TAG commercials in this light makes me dislike the product even more than I already do.

Either way I pass this site's article on to you for a short intersting take on sports language. There is also another post here that I found to be an amusing take on sports, total depravity and the prosperity gospel.

In fact, I just realized that I refered to the author of the blog as "he" throughout my whole post. I have no reason to believe it is a he aside from typical gender stereotypes and so I confess I am still working on my gender reconciliation.

Part 2: On Ted Haggard

By now I assume you all have heard about the scandal concerning Ted Haggard, and if you haven't then I feel truly honored that you are visiting my blog prior to visiting the websites of CNN, BBC, or Fox News.

Earlier tonight I was informed about this by a friend over IM and we were talking about it for a bit and here are some of my thoughts.

Sadly I don't know what my first reaction was. It was one of two things. 1) Poor Ted Haggard - Lord be with him. or 2) Oh no, now look at the black eye for christendom. I am truly ashamed that I don't know which was my reaction and am even more ashamed that it may very well have been the second. How heartless and unchristlike can I be?

I want to yell and scream and condem the pastor who allows herself or himself to be in this kind of mess, but then I realize the clique holds true: "there, but for the grace of God, go I" now to be fair I mean that in the general way - not the gay sex or meth way. But seriously I realize my weaknesses and I feel great pain for Haggard despite that fact that I undoubtedly dissagree with him on various theological things like ecclesioloyg, missiology, and sacrametology.

In fact from what little I do know I probably would have listed this man as representing a Christian paradigm that was the complete antithesis of mine. He pastored a large church and was a quasi-church growth guy (if not completley church growth), he was a vocal and popular Christian media voice, and he represented the religious right and was hyper-conservative political in its agenda. Despite all this I feel for Haggard, and pray that he finds healing in the Lord through this situation, whether he did anything or not, and I pray that the christians that looked strongly to him would refocus their faith from leadership to the Christ who leads.

While my heart and prayers go out I cannot help but to look at this situation as an observer and offer some thoughts.

1.) This is obviously not the first time a person in the church has fallen and regretably it will not be the last, however, it is clear that these fallouts become more and more problematic for the church in society as ministers feel the increasing need to become well known in the media. Yes, there will be fallout when ministers fail, but this fallout grows exponentially when are ministers and leaders are media icons. As my friend Greg Sigountos aptly said:

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"[this scenario is] a great case study. See what happens when you intertwine yourselves too closely with the world? Bang, you're ripe for being picked off, and we have a hypocrite bonfire. This is why pastors need to avoid celebrity at all costs... If there wasn't enough evidence against the celebrity pastor already, and how few, if any, can pull it off, maybe this adds one extra bit of incentive. Stay out of the spotlight- the Spirit worked just fine before the TV cameras existed."
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or as St. John Chrysostom says in his treatise On the Priesthood

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if a preacher "is a slave to the sound of applause, again an equal damage threatens both him and the people, because through his passion for praise he aims to speak more for the pleasure than the proft of his hearers...The man who is carried away with the desire for eulogies may have the ability to improve the people, but chooses instead to provide nothing but entertainment. That is the price he pays for thunders of applause....For in fact, if he has already been overtaken by the desire for unmerited praise, neither his great efforts nor his powers of speech will be any use....So a preacher must train himself above all else to despise praise...But if if he has not shaken himself free of it [love of esteem], he involves his soul in an intricate struggle, in unrelieved turmoil, and in the hurly-burly of desperation and every other passion."
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I quote Chyrsostom here not to make accusations against Haggard, as if he was quilty of violating Chrysostom's exhortations, but because these comments seem to apply to the problem of christian leaders becoming media whores. Ministers may indeed fall as has happened throughout church history. This is not the ideal, nor is it desireable, and the issues that arise around a fallen ministry should primarily be reconciliation, forgiveness, and restoration. As American ecclesiology has shifted from small local bodies to large mega-churches so has the focus shifted from quiet locally known pastors to massive media darling pastors. In fact I think one could make a case that the rise of the media star pastor is directly proportional to the number and growth of mega-churches. Now, because of our media-driven or at best media-recognized pastors our primariy concerns as a church is no longer reconciliation, forgiveness, and restoration, but rather how do we deal with the PR nightmare which this causes. Yes try to focus on the others, but we cannot help but deal with and be consumed with the PR fiasco that arises. Chrysostom's quote is just as aplicable to the churches of today as it is to the ministers of yesterday and today. To the church this quote speaks caution of seeking the approval of the masses. Should we be concerned with how they view us? Only insofar as they see our love for God, them and each other. Our hyper concern with putting a good face forward and offering solid entertainment is unbiblical and certainly uncharacteristic of true church for any age. We will never be able to fully ministry to the world if we are overly concerned with getting the right publicity or being seen in a favorably light. Churches as well as ministers should avoid the the rank of celebrity at all costs so that the message and the witness of the people of God can remain uncomprimised.

2.) One of the articles I read concerning this made the comment that Haggard has confessed his sins to the "overseers" of his church. I have to give Haggard tons of credit for this. He is following the biblical model and submitting himself to the biblical authorities. The question this raises has to do with confidentiality. What happens if for some reason this goes to court and his "overseers" are called into court to testify? We are all aware of Patient-Doctor confidentiality and Patient-Counselor, but what about Clergy-laity? Are his overseers obligated to divulge information that he shared to them in a confessional manner? What about if this was in a high church tradition like Catholic, Orthodox, or Anglican? Would the confidentiality issue be different if the confession was done in a confessional, or by ordained members? It seems to me that the possible legal precedent that may be set concerning ecclesial confession has huge ramifications. If they allow these "overseers" to claim a specific confidentiality then what is to stop someone from confessing to any generic religious figure and claiming confessor confidentiality. Let us suppose that these overseers are not officiallly ordained and thus they force them to testify, what does this do for the low church independent church down the street - can the pastor of this church not hear confessions or do counseling without knowing he will have a legal obligation to testify? Does this mean that only ordained people can have this special relationship? If so what about those denomination that ordain elders - do they get this privelage? I dont think these thoughts are too clear, but it seems to me that this Haggard situation has huge legal ramifications if it goes to court for the confessional and counseling ministry of the church - especially in low-ecclesiological protestant churches.

Part 3: Book Excerpt

In preparation for one of my mid-term exams the other day I decided to do some reading. One of our books is: Religion and American Culture by George M. Marsden. I'm not done with the book yet because we only had to read half of it for the exam, but so far I would recommend it. The book is a good outlook on the development of religion in America. It reads much better than a dry account of facts which is most likely due to Marsden's asides that describe how the topic at hand has lead to a current phenomenon or other asides that seem a little preachy in nature. Below is one of the asides that I really liked and found to be the most though provoking.
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"The United States was the first modern nation systematically to shift public veneration of the government from veneration of persons to veneration of the nation and its principles. Soon the United States developed a set of rituals and symbols that bore a striking resemblance to traditional Christian rites and symbols but in which the nation itself was the object of worship. The flag, like the cross in Catholic churches, was a sacred object. Elaborate rules developed as to when and how it could be handled. Pledges to the flag arguably played the role of crossing oneself in a church. One pledged to a creed. The nation developed holidays (holy days) and its own brand of saints. George Washington, for instance, soon took on mythical qualities. National architecture and shrines provied centers for pilgrimages and worship. Some people have pointed out that three of the most popular shrines in Washington D.C. - those to Washington, Lincoln, and Kennedy - have designs that would be appropriate symbols for each of the three members of the Christian Trinity (the transcendent obelisk for the father, the personal presence of the martyred champion of national reconciliation and charity, and the eternal flame, for the spirit of service to country).... The United States, like all modern nations, demands unswerving allegiance from its citizens. It is to the nation in which one is expected to make the supreme sacrifice. Therefore in American wars, national loyalty has always been demanded above church loyalty." (pg 53)

and one that seems to relate to our celebrity ministers as metioned above

"[George] Whitefield's triumphant journey up and down the East Coast, preaching to large gatherings wherever he went, was one of teh first truly intercolonial events. Whitefield was the first "media star" in Ameican history. His medium was the pulpit, and he had immense skill with the spoken word. His tour anticipated a patter in American culture: Lacking long-established traditions and rituals, American have been susceptible to waves of popular enthusiasm for 'stars.' This pattern had its beginings in revivalism and remains a prominent dimension of American cultural and religious life." (pg 32)
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I don't agree with the first quote 100% and I think the thought of the triune nature of the American monuments is a little bit of a stretch but nevertheless it does illustrate a good point. This is a good example of how Marsden gets a little preachy in his book, but I think his assertions are right on target. Personally I have not been able to say the pledge of allegiance for about 4 or 5 years. Once I really began to think of what I was doing I couldn't in good conscience continue to swear my allegiace to a country. My loyalty alone belongs to Christ and to his kingdom. I belong to the US insofar as I live here and they do not forcably violate my religious beliefs. I will not fight for them in a war and I will not pledge my allegiance to any earthly kingdom until the new heavens and the new earth appear and the Kingdom of God is revealed in its fullness on the earth.

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Well, I think that's all that I have to write. I guess the post wasn't as short as I wanted it to be...oh well. Like I said I'll try to be more consistent in posting, but with the impending papers I may have to allow blogging to take a back seat for a month or two. Just incase you were wondering I am writing two major research papers for this semester. The topics for these papers are:

1. Sacramentology in the 1st and 2nd Great Awakenings
2. The eternal subordination of Christ - looking through the lens of the early church fathers.

Blessings to you all and as usual thanks for bearing with my incoherent rambling.

~ Ben

About time eh?

Fear not, I have returned! After over a two month long hiatus I am back and wondering how I will ever begin to put all that is running through my head into a coherent blog. I will try to group it in sections so it's a little easier to follow, but who knows how that will go. With that said, dont' forget to check out my last post. I posted it yesterday and am particularly proud of it.

Part One: Ending the Summer - Learning to understand the development of heresy.

[note I have edited this section from the original post and have placed the restructured text in italics. Much is missing from the original and it is for the better.]

As I sit and reflect about the summer it really feels like it never had an end. I feel like it slammed right into the school year like a runaway train. I feel like I didn't really get a chance to catch my breath before the school year started, but I am still grateful for the summer. The job I worked was loads of fun even despite the countless sleepless nights and weary weeks and I met a bunch of great people and had some interesting experiences that I feel will form how I view people and ministry for years to come. On top of all that I learned a lot more about audio reinforcement and feel like I am a much better sound tech than I was at the beginning of the summer.

As I mentioned I feel like the summer ran right into the school year without a break. I think the reason for this is because I worked a gig the first two weekends I was back to school.

One of these gigs stands out because while I was there I had some interesting thoughts concerning the development of heresy in the early church. It seems to me that heresy could have developed by the bringing of the gospel to a place where it subsequently took root.

Over time - because the area was so isolated and was not connected to the global church- teaching began to develop in a heretical manner and thus that area became a breeding ground for heresy. Now we must be honest and say that this is just a hypothesis and surely not all heresies formed this way, but could it not be that is why all the early church fathers and mothers emphasized the importance of the bishop? They emphasized structure because it was the unity inherent in the structure that kept them connected in the bond they already shared - namely Christ's blood. It was this unity that allowed them to maintain the orthodox faith and determine what heresy was. If the church was to survive and to proclaim Christ for who he was the fathers knew that it couldn't hole itself up in a small geographic location, rather it must commune with believers the world over.

I fear that we, as the American church are in grave danger of doing this to ourselves. We neglect the worldwide church, we are ignorant of the defenders of the faith of ages past and when confronted with our neglect and ignorance we shrug and apathetic shoulder and continue on in our self-absorbed way of "Christianity." This is the travesty in the American church. This is why much of Western Christendom is bankrupt, and this is why we have scarcely a clue what true orthodoxy is in our churches.

Part Two: On the Incarnation

"Oh holy father Athanasius, like a pillar of orthoxy, you supported the church with your teaching, refuting the hertical nonsense of Arius - by asserting that the Father and Son are equal in essence."

Those are the opening lines of one the Athanasian hymn that is sung occasionally in my church. I'm not going to get into the issue of hymns to saints right now (for it would surely consume pages) but I write this to say that it is very true. Athanasius is deserving of sainthood. Even though he was mere scribe at the Council of Nicea and didn't really defend the co-substantial nature of the Father and Son at the council (contrary to popular belief), he truly proved to be a champion of the council's (and true Christian) teaching in his bishopric for years to come. One of his defences of this is his book On the Incarnation, which I finished at the end of the summer but will try to give a brief review here.

Let me say that the book itself is worth the read just for the introduction by C.S. Lewis in the St. Vladimir's Seminary publication. Lewis does an excellent job setting the framework - especially if one is reading this book as a protestant who has no clue what church history is, or what function church tradition should serve.

Aside form teh intro the book is absolutly amazing! I believe it to be a must read. Athanasius starts out discussing our problem as humans (namely the fall) and thus proceeds to describe God's solution to the problem - which is the glorious incarnation. He then describes the death and resurrection of Christ and why it must occur. After discussing and giving thorough explanations and defenses of the above he turns to the refutation of hypothetical objections by both Jews and Gentiles. My personal favorite passage of the book is found in his discourse on the resurrection.

If I could type it all out I would but I'm afraid that wouldn't be within copyright law so I will direct you to a link that you can find the whole section. Click here to find this passage.

In this section Athanasius defends the notion that death is completly and utterly destroyed by the resurrection. His defense of this includes the fact that "All the disciples of Christ despised death; they take the offensive against it and, instead of fearing it, by the sign of the cross and by faith in Christ trample on it as on something dead." Athanasius continues saying that before Christ's death and resurrection even the holy men feared death, but now death has no merit and should not be feared, stating that "all those who believe in Christ tread it [death] underfoot as nothing, and prefer to die rather than to deny their faith in Christ..." The holy saint continues in his defense of Christ's blessed triumph over death in what I find to be the most beautiful example: (let it be known that this example is a little sexist, but if we look at it from a patristic culture point of view then it truly is beautfil - I don't share the Saint's cultural sexism but do share his excitement that death is trampled.)

"...for men who, before they believed in Christ, think death horrible adn are afraid of it, once they are converted despise it so competely that they go eagerly to meet it, and themselves become witnesses of the Savior's resurrection from it. Even children hasten thus to die, and not men only, but women train themselves by bodily discipline to meet it. So weak has death become that even women, who used to be taken in by it, mock at it now as a dead thing robbed of all its strength. Death has become like a tyrant who has been completely conqured by the legitimate monarch; bound hand and foot as he now is, the passers-by jerr at him, hitting him and abusing him, no longer afraid of his cruelty and rage, because of the king who has conquered him. So has death been conqured and branded for what it is by the Savior on the cross."

Wow!! I can't believe that. I about fall out of my chair every time I think of this passage. Amen and Amen is all I can say.

This isn't the only part of the book I enjoyed but it is the part that brings me to tears of joy and sorrow at the same time (and it is one that allows me to launch into a rant). If you know me well, as most of you who read this do, then you can probably anticipate why I love this passage. My longing and expectance of martydom is no secret to many of you (as it has been a constant in my mind for the past 3 years) and this passage is encouraging as it makes me seem not so crazy for having no fear of death and even as the saint says running "eagerly to meet it. But more than that I find it so uplifting to know that the message of Christ's conquering of death is so essential and so connected to the incarnation and act of our Savior that we can scarcely meditate on Christ without thinking of it. Yes I long for martrydom, not as a mad man, but as one who has no fear of death. And this is where the rant begins.

It seems to me that this theology has left our churches. In general the protestant church as a whole fears death. In fact, we don't just fear death we fear almost everything. I can barely look at the western church today without seeing a group that is drenched in fear. If you doubt this take a look at the popular theological (or rather psuedo-theological) works that are popular among many christians. Look at the rise and expectancy of the pre-tribulation rapture and the numerous books and shows that propegate a theology that declares Christ's return in the next few years. Even examin at a distance the plethora of books (both fictional and non) about the evil powers that prevail against us and provide us with gimicks on how to overcome. The church today is drenched and filled with fear!!! We are afraid of the evil one, we are afraid of the powers, we are afraid of the government, and we are especially afraid of death. The question I ask is why?!?

Why on earth are our churches living in such states of fear? I propose that it is because we have no concept of the power of the cross. If Christ truly has conquered the power of death, and thus we should have no fear of it, then why in the world should we fear anything. It is by the power of the cross and ressurection that we are saved and thus are given authority and power as children of God. If we need not fear death then we also need not fear anything. All is in submission to the cross and if we bear that cross then we have nothing to fear... not even, as the cliche says, 'fear itself'. I suggest that the church reclaim this teaching, and walk in this boldness. Embrace the fact that we died and were raised with Christ in our baptism and run to our death. It may be a scary thought but we need not fear it. Out death may be immenant or it may be far off. My thought is who cares, pursue the cross and it matters not when death comes - for it truly comes in vain!!

Part Three: Solo (and not the DC Talk album)

Since sophomore year in college I have been under the opinion, which as with all of my opinions I do not hold to lightly, that solos (i.e. a guitar solo - though it could be any instrument or voice) are completely out of place in the worship of the church.

I came about to this thinking as a result of the mentorship of Troy Mcknight and Brian Emerson in Koinonia and continued to teach this idea as a leader in that ministry in undergrad and as a pastoral intern without giving much thought to an opposing view point. I say all this not because I'm questioning my thinking, because I would firmly argue that solos don't belong in the worship of the church for various reasons, but because I have met with some resitance to this thinking and am looking to clarify it. First let me lay out a few reasons why I think solos have no place.

1. They draw attention to one individual and are a novelty that takes the worship away form the Triune God and places it on the individual performing the solo.

2. As if 1 wasn't reason enough, they serve no theological purpose in ushering the community into the presence of God.

3. The spontaneous nature of the solo in the context of corporate worship, specificaly because it lacks introduction and explanation via the structure of the service or audible explanation, disengages the congregation and inturupts their participation in the worship of God.

4. The solo is inherently self-focused and being performed rather than serving as an integral part of the liturgy that allows the "work of the people" (literal meaning of liturgy) to continue.

Let me be clear on one of these points. In number 3 I am in no means rejecting any spontinaity in worship. Worship can and should have degress of spontinaity but, that spontinaity is often placed within the structure of the church's worship so that it is contextualized by the service, and thus explained, or is prefaced by an explanation of some sort that explains what the spontanious time is meant to do. Performing a solo without liturgical context or verbal explanation seems to be quite analogous to speaking in tongues without an interpretor in a corporate setting - and as we know, St. Paul tells us that this is right out.

Just incase it hasn't been clear so far I am mostly referring to an instrumental (and also a vocal) solo during a worship team lead liturgy as this is the most common venue for this occurance. The reason I write all this is because as I think about this I am at a struggle to precisely define what the difference is between a solo and such things as an interlude, a fill, or an anthem.

I think my above number 3 seems to set a solo off from an anthem but I am still interested in what you all are thinking - especially my friends from undergrad who have music degrees. What are the musical differences, how about theological ones? Do you think I'm right in my assertion or am I am off base? I would appreciate help in thinking through this. So let me know. As always comments are good but you are all my friends (unless your some stranger) and you probably have my phone number so calls are welcome as well.

Part Four: Community vs. the Trinity

Both at Houghton and at Asbury over the past few years there has been much discussion as to the great importance of community in the church. This has been brought to our attention through things such as postmodernism, the vast lack of a sense of community in the church, and the emergent movement. As a member of the worship design (aka Chapel Intern) at Asbury I have been examining and listening to our chapel speakers to see what is being emphasized in our chapels. I have noticed that quite often community is stressed, the practice of it is implored and the abandonment of it has been chastized. One other thing that I have noticed is that Community is mentioned 10:1 over the Trinity. And while the argument can be made that we frame our discussion of community trinitarianly I would argue that "framing" is not enough. If we hold to the Trinity as the ultimate truth of the Godhead revealed, which I do, then we must do more than use it to frame our thinking. Why on earth are we talking about community more than the Triune God? Has community become our new idol along with relevance? (see my earlier post entitled "Current??")

It worries me that the western protestant church is spending so much time worrying about community and not talking about the fullest revelation of truth. Are we or are we not a people who claim to worship a Triune God? If we are then I suggest we do it - with our "framing" with our words and with our actions. I believe that becasue the Trinity is in community then community will flow out of our worship of the Trinity, but I seriously doubt that true trinitarian worship can ever flow strictly out of the practice of community.

This emphasis on community is particularly emphasized in many of the self proclaimed "emergent churches," which as many of you already know I consider nothing more than a great basterdization of the church, but nonetheless they serve as another great example of the wrong direction the church is taking.

Many of these emergent churches have decided to meet in the "round" (cf. Doug Pagit "Re-imagining Spiritual Formation) which basically means that they design their seating so as to face each other in a circle. They do this so as not to elevate one person (ie the pastor) over the rest of the congregation and also to emphasize that everyone is important.

Now compare this seating design to that of the high-church Orthodox Church. In the Orthodox church the congregation always faces east to symbolize the direction in which Christ ascended and will return. An Icon of Christ is always placed at the front to focus the worship of the congregation on Christ our God. The priest, instead of facing the congregation for the whole service (as in western traditions) faces the icon to symbolize the priestly mediation of the prayers of the people ascending toward God.

Now tell me the implicit theological focus of each one of these seating designs. Who is the object, center and focus for the Orthodoxy - well the seating as well as the liturgy declare that it is Christ our God who recieves all Glory with the Father and the all Holy, Good, and Life Creating Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages. While the design of the emergent gathering focuses on one another, on the "community" and thus places us as the object of worship.

This is a perfect example of how we are slowly elevating "us" to the center of worship. All this is is classic theological liberalism at it's best and paganism at it's worst. We can never get Triune theology out of community, but we can and will get community out of Trinity. The question posed to us as Christians is which do we want to emphasize.

Part Five: Regularity and Novelty

This one should be pretty short. I've been asked a few times (mainly by my parents) but also by a few other people how I can get anything out of church. To be fair this question is based on the fact that I go to an Orthodox Church which practices the same liturgy every Sunday. So the question is very fair and very appropriate.

There really isn't an easy answer. I do know that God reveals himself to me in the liturgy every Sunday. I know that as I recite the liturgy over and over I am begining to learn scripture and theology and allowing it to embed in my being deeper and deeper.

I don't want to assert that variety in worship is bad, but I do think there is much value to consitency and repetition. Our priest gave a great example of this the other day in church. He was expounding on the Orthodox practice of saying "Lord have mercy" repeatedly and pointed out that there are some prayers in which that line is said almost 50 times in a row. When questioned explaining how it could have meaning the 50th time he said that we really only understand what were saying the last 3 times. The first 47 times are preparing us and shaping our hearts to really understand and mean "Lord have mercy." I thought this was a beautiful illustration.

Another great explanation as to how repeated liturgy can be beneficial is offered by the great protestant theologian C.S. Lewis. Lewis says the following:

“A worship service works best when, through long familiarity, we don’t have to think about it… The perfect church service would be the one we were almost unaware of; our attention would have been on God. But every novelty prevents this. It fixes our attention on the service itself; and thinking about worship is a different thing from worshipping… Tis mad idolatry that makes the service greater than the god. A still worse thing may happen. Novelty may fix our attention not even on the service but on the celebrant…There is really some excuse for the man who said, ‘I wish they’d remember that the chart to Peter was ‘Feed my sheep’; not ‘Try experiments on my rats’, or even ‘Teach my performing dogs new tricks.’”

To Lewis' statement all I have to say is Amen. I do feel that there is so much novelty in so many of our church services that we lose sight of the true importance. We reject the great affirmations of the faith because we recited them every Sunday as kids, or we throw out theologically packed hymns because they're old and boring.

The problem, my friends, is not with the liturgy, the hymns, the creeds, no it is with us. We have allowed our entertainment cravings for something new to drive our worship of God. We have ceased to see ceased to see God in the ordinary things of the liturgy not because we they're too often said and thus God is not speaking through them, but because we've hardened our hearts to them because we're bored. As Ben Witherington once said "Boredom is the state of mind for those who lack imagination" and to be sure we have become theologically bored with the great traditions of the faith not because they are rote, but because we lack an imagination that is holy and constantly renewed by God.

Am I allowed to write a creed?

Either way I wrote one. I think this has been a long time coming, but I was sitting in class tonight and a friend charged me to write a creed so I did.

I know it's not the right time in teh Christian Year for this creed as it is surely one that fits into a church season, but nonetheless I shall post it now. I wrote it tonight (10/19) so it's fresh - it still may go through some revisions but here it is.


The Symbol of our Faith as affirmed by the holy bishops in the 1st Ecumenical Council in Wilmore, KY.

I believe in one team, the Yankees, evil upon evil, destroyer of all good in baseball both visible and invisible.

And in George Steinbrenner, the progenitor of evil. Begotten of evil before he came to power. Yankee of Yankee, evil of evil, begotten and not made evil, of once essence with the Yankees, by whom all disaster to baseball is made. Who for us baseball fans and our angst came to power from hell and was made the owner, not by virgin birth, but by dispensation of dirty cash and became owner. And he was caused to flourish under Bud Selig and enacted his power in free agency and won championships. And the fourth year he lost the series, according to the choking of Rivera, and thus descended to playoff abyss and now sits right in the middle of the AL, and lo, he shall rise again with evil to rule the AL: whose reign may have no end.

And in the evil Derek Jeter, the shortstop, the poser of clutch, who proceeds from the Yankees; who with the Yankees, and the Steinbrenner is to be loathed and hated, who plays in New York.

In one Unholy, Catholic and Sinister Fan base. I acknowledge one Nathan’s Hot Dogs for the partaking of evil. I look for the destruction of the empire and the hope of the MLB to come. Amen

Yes, I know....

I'm a bad person. I haven't posted in forever. The semester has been long and very busy. I do actually have a post started (I started it about a month ago).

I will try to finish it this weekend and make some sort of a post. I think I should be able to make it happen. If not it's because i'm a huge slacker, or maybe I'm catching up on all my school work. - bust most likely because i'm a big slacker.

So stick around you know you all are gonna want to read this. It's gonna blow your mind!!

- Ben

Summer Ramblings II

My declaration that I would try to post more often seems to be in vain, as I haven't found the time to post because I've been so busy with work. Here are some random thoughts that go back as far as the weekend around July 4th.

-------Thoughts from the Road------

I found myself in Dayton, OH on the days immediately preceding the 4th of July and had and interesting conversation with one of the guys that works occasional weekends with our company. He found out I was studying to be a pastor and was trying to strike up conversation with me when he asked "What do you think about those new churches people are going to now?" I replied that I didn't know what he meant, to which he replied: "You know, those new churches like Quest and [another large church in our area]. I realized that both of these churches were well known for being "seeker churches" in fact the people at Quest define themselves solely as a "seeker church". I tried to control myself and not launch into a long lecture on the evils of seeker churches and how they are destroying the very fabric of the church, so I told him something ot the effect of "I guess they're ok, I personally don't enjoy them, but you know..."

His response (the reason for retelling this story) was: "Yeah, I don't like them, I really don't get much from them. They're no real message to em." When he said that I about fell off of the case I was sitting on. It just blew me away that this guy who wouldn't call himself a Christian who doesn't claim to live the Christian life or anything along those lines, is repulsed by the seeker churches in the area. It seems that he would rather have the church be the church instead of trying to mask itself and pretend that it is something it's not (entertainment). I just find it amazing that the people these seeker churches are trying to reach aren't interested in them because they're not Christian enough. Crazy!!

I'll avoid getting on my soap box again and allow the above comments to suffice. I just thought it was a cool story.

----- Thoughts on the 4th of July----
Yes, I know it was a while ago, but it still burns me up. It it wasn't for the super-cool combination of fireworks and BBQs I'm very sure I would hate the 4th of July. I don't hate it because I hate America or anything like that. My biggest problem with Independence day is the reaction the protestant church in America has to it. I firmly believe that the Sunday closest to the 4th of July is the most syncretistic day in all of Protestantism. It is a day when we mesh our worship of a Holy and Triune God with our worship for our nation-state. We, as a church, take this Sunday as an opportunity to jump on the "hooray America" bandwagon and become idolators of our nation.

Frankly this syncretism makes me want to vomit. I am not opposed to being patriotic and I am not opposed to supporting our nation's leaders and things of that nature. But there is absolutly no way that the people of God should be so enamoured with a nation-state, whether it be the USA, England, Iraq, or even the political nation of Israel. To be completely supportive of a nation-state is to lose sight of the kingdom of which we are true citizens - namely the Kingdom of God.

There is also absolutly no way that the work of the people of God (the truest sense of liturgy) should be bastardized with hymning any nation! Yes, it is meet and right to thank God for our freedoms and it is good that we should praise him for the blessing of a stable govermental system surrounding us, but we cannot allow that to be the focal point of our liturgy on the Sunday of Independence day, or on any Sunday. I would even go so far as to argue that to sing patriotic songs in the church is a corruption of the purpose for the gathering of the church.

This problem is not isolated to merely the 4th of July, no, this syncretism runs deep within American Christianity and we must begin to uproot it and rid ourselves of it. We must always remember that our hearts and our homes are not of this or any nation-state, we are citizens of the Kingdom of God. Our citizenship is sealed by partaking of our Lord's death. No one and no nation can lay claim upon us except the one into who's death we have been baptized - our glorious bridegroom Jesus Christ.

------- Topics from the list --------

On my last post I put a list of things I was thinking about at the bottom. Here is one of them.

My church history musings:

A while back I got into a discussion about the start of the papacy with some friends and the issue has been nagging me ever since. Most protestant historians date the start of the papacy with Leo the Great (approx. 450ad) some scholars date this earlier and some a little later, but this seems to be the time of general concensus.

My contention is that there could not have been a "Pope" in the way most would understand it until after the Great Schism (1054). I think that any assertion of a papacy before this date is due to anachronistic and westernly biased reading of the early church documents. Although the common arguments for the papacy first originated with Leo the Great it is very clear from reading church history that he is not taken as the supreme bishop. His word does not sway all the other bishops and he does not have the power to control all the other regions of the church. It is my thought that protestant scholars have read church history through a western lens for so long that they fail to understand the eastern idea of "order of primacy." Order of primacy simly means that one is the highest among equals. In other words if the Roman bishop (Leo) had the highest order of primacy he would not have more power than the other bishops, but his opinion would have been held with a little (note little) more weight than some of the others. This does not imply that he has more power, it is just an issue of respect.

I may have not explained that clear enough, but this is what I think we have in the case of Leo and the other early bishops of Rome that the protestant scholars like to refer to as popes. To be clear it is obviously absurd to think that the Great Schism happened and "poof" we have a pope. Yes, this was a growing political force which finally came to a head when the Bishop of Rome acted upon the power he thought he had and inserted a phrase into the Nicene Creed.

I argue that the Bishop of Rome could not have been a true Pope at the point of the Schism because if he was then the rest of the Bishops would have naturally followed his lead by adding this phrase into the creed because he would have been the theological supreme. However, not a single bishop followed this move and thus the Bishop of Rome did not have the power he believed himself to have (and the power which protestant historians credit to him).

I am not intentionally trying to take an Eastern line on this subject, this is just what makes the most sense to me. I think that our historians are reading church history ignoring the concept of "order of primacy" and are thus misconstruing our perception of church history. Yes, I admit I could be wrong, these scholars have much more training than I, but somehow this seems to make the most sense, especially after growing up seeing church history with western eyes and now trying to view it with eastern eyes.

----------

Well I think that's all I'm going to post for now. I'm tired and need to go to bed. Hopefully I'll post a little more frequently.


Blessings,


Ben

Summer Ramblings: Part 1

It's been a long time since I posted and I know that you all have missed my ramblings greatly. Let me apologize for not posting and offer a few explanations.

1. I have been working like a dog. I don't know how the full time sound guys at our company do it, I fear this summer will be the death of me. But if it doesn't kill me I'll have some good experiences and a life skill in case this ministry things doesn't work out =) .

2. Ding Dong the Houghton Laptop is dead. I would offer a "may it rest in peace" but I'm pretty sure that it is burning in laptop hell because it truly sucked. So yeah, I probably won't be posting with any consistency until I'm able to buy a new laptop. I think I'm going mac so we'll see how that goes.

With that said, on to "Summer Ramblings: Part 1"

I'll try to break things into chunks so that you can skip various parts if you want.

Since I last posted I have finished reading one of the books on my list and started two others not on my list. I have finished "The Final Quest" and have started "One the Incarnation" by St. Athanasius and "Ancient-Future Time" by Robert Webber.

--------------Book Review ------------------

"The Final Quest" is a good book. I would probably describe it as "The Great Divorce" meets "the Lord of the Rings." The imagery is beautiful and it has quite a bit of substance. I really liked it, however, I feel that I can't put the book in the same place in which I gather the author would like the book to be put. In the preface the author notifies the reader that the book is not fiction but rather the transcription of a series of 3 prophetic visions he had. Although he does not claim that this should be taken as Canon he does allude that it should be just a few notches below it on the authoritative ladder.

I have no problem with prophecy nor with visions, but I still feel, after reading the book that it has little more weight to it than Lewis' "The Great Divorce." Although nothing in the book was blatantly heretical, and there wasn't anything that screamed "false teaching" a few things did catch my eye.

If we take the premise that the book is fully prophetic and truly a vision of heaven, then I am completely blown away at the non-Trinitarian nature of heaven and the end times. I am not saying it was anti-Trinitarian, but other than Christ the other two members of the God-head were scarcely mentioned, if at all. This troubled me greatly. He mentioned the Trinity about as much a normal Sunday at a Baptist church (read: not at all). This is problematic because the doctrine of the Trinity is THE foundational doctrine of all of Christianity. If an accurate vision of heaven is that only Christ is around, then we have some deep theological problems. Either we've been believing wrong for about 2,000 years, or the vision is not fully revelatory. I would opt for the latter.

The other thing that caught my attention was the general emphasis of the book. Although many of the things that were written I would agree with, it was evident that the terminology and various emphasizes were from a particular tradition (namely the Pentecostal tradition) this does not make these things any less true or legitimate, but the things that were emphasized and the things that were glossed over definitely pointed out that this was coming through a socio-Pentecostal lens.

So that's my take on the book, it's a good read and it makes some good points. I'm sure those who are big lit buffs (ie. Gustav and the rest of you who can write coherently) would question the literary quality, but hey, I'm a theologian so I don't pay no mind to that.

------End Book Review------

I mentioned the other two books I've started to read, and I won't write long on them except to say that "On the Incarnation" by St. Athanasius is amazing. It is a must read for anyone. It's worth the price just to read the introduction by C.S. Lewis in the interpretation published by St. Vladimir's Press.

-------Experiences from a Sound Guy-------

Although I've been working my tail off at the Sound Company I work for, I've only been at two shows. I've done a lot of work for other shows, but things have come up and I've only been able to make it to two places for the show (granted one was a 3 day long Blue Grass festival). I find it interesting that in both of the shows I've been at I've been engaged in some sort of theological discussion. I'm not the type of person to start a random theological conversations with random people unless I know they're church people who like to talk about stuff like that (or my sister, I just like make her listen to me ramble, it's fun that's not to say that she's not a church person but that she just doesn't like theological conversations), but I have conversations at shows that have been initiated by others.

The first show was a Billy Currington (some country artist) in Lebanon, KY. I was working on the stage with his bass player and we started talking about NY because he just happened to be from Geneva, NY just outside of Rochester. Once he found out that seminary was the reason that I came down south he started asking if we were "liberal" or "conservative" and it turns out that I am just as disgusted with the "religious right" and the "moral majority" as is he. While he can't stand them because of his extreme political views, I can't stand them because they try to label Christianity by their political stances (well that and some of their moral views). We then proceeded to talk about same sex marriage and other social issues. I find it extremely sad that he defines Christianity by politics and groups that try to legislate morality. I fear that to many people outside of the church (and probably inside as well: Jimmy Dobson and the like) Christianity is nothing more than a political force driven by greed and power just as much as any other political force. I find this notion disgusting and am sickened by those in Christendom that play so much politics that they forget was Christianity is truly about.

The second conversation was at the Blue Grass festival (FYI: Blue Grass is freakin sweet!!). The head guy started to engage me because he saw me reading a lot of theological articles while I was babysitting the light board at the show. Our conversation boiled down to the fact that he appreciated Christianity and liked to see young people be committed, but he sees so much power play and greed involved that he can't move past the notion that humans have corrupted this thing and thus it holds little to no truth. All in all this guy was just a regular run of the mill pluralistic deist. I find it interesting how his perspective allows him to love and sing along with the old blue grass gospel songs and yet see no truth in them. I also find it intriguing that he looks at history and sees nothing but corruption and I look at history and see God's preservation of the orthodox faith in spite of the massive corruption.

I know my stories make me sound heartless because I seem to me analyzing them on a purely intellectual level, but my heart really does break for these people. Even more my heart breaks for the thousands like them that know the church as greedy and self idolaterous, people who reject the faith, because the church has allowed herself to become syncritized with the American/world consumer culture and fall away from the faith handed down through the generations.

----------------

There is so much more going through my mind, and I'll try to bum one of my housemates computers to blog about them soon. I'm still working on sorting them out so that there at least coherent enough to blog about. So in the future look for one of these exciting topics:

- My Ecclesiological paradigmatic dilemma
- My church history musings
- Christianity in the South vs Christianity in the North thoughts
- Syncritism and American Christianity
- The "fluffy I" problem in Christian Music and in Worship music.
- another book review (when I finish them)
- more thoughts from work
- or who knows what.

Blessings to you all, and if you are too anxious and can't wait for me to get off my lazy butt and blog then just call my cell.

~Ben

Summer Reading List

My favorite part of the year is almost here. Summer is upon us, the semester is over (except for one massive final) and I'm starting to compile my summer reading list. I thought I'd share some of the books I'm planning on reading and ask for any suggestions on what else to read. I always end up planning on way more than I ever finish, but I think it's more fun that way. My list isn't too specific yet, but that's why I'm asking for suggestions.

Here's what I have so far:

- The Final Quest by Rick Joyner - suggested by my friend Jan
- Running Against the Wind by Brian Flynn - Suggested by my mom
- Finally finishing The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
- On Being a Christian by Hans Kung

Those are the titles I've decided on. I also include at least one or two books by A. W. Tozer (as if you had any doubt) on my summer reading list but I have yet to select the titles. I also like to balance any contemporary reading I do with at least one early church father or mother for every three contemporary books I read. So I need to put those titles in, but I'm still trying to figure out what fathers and mothers I want to read. For the fathers and mothers I'm leaning toward St. Cyprian, St. Athanasius, St. Chrysostom, Macrina the Younger and (although she's not technically an early church mother) St. Teresa Avila.

So those are my thoughts. Please send me suggestions, they don't need to be theological, shoot I may even try to tackle The Da Vinci Code before I go to see the movie this summer. I'm looking to expand my horizons and feed my soul, anything that will do either one is a welcome suggestion.

Blessings,

Ben

Current?

This post has been in my mind for a while, and thus I finally decided to write it. [edit: I penned most of this right after Christmas/January break 1/29 to be exact, and didn't post it because it wanted to edit it. So now I am doing it. Any significant thoughts that I add will be indicated in brackets and italics.] [edit 2: I reposted it but it posted way down on the list so i'm changing the date and reposting it.]

The thoughts started while I was reading Os Guinness' Prophetic Untimeliness, a book that Kyle Nagy recommended to me a year or so ago. I decided to read it over Christmas break and am just finishing it up. [edit: at the end of January]

As I read the introduction I felt as if I was reading my own blog... Well at least the thoughts from my blog put in coherent sentence structure by an Oxford educated man. The thoughts that I am talking about are the ones in the post entitled Postmodernism and other similar posts.

Although I saw some similarities between my post and Os' introduction there was also a difference, namely, that while I was critiquing our emphatuation with Postmodernism, he was critiquing modernism or more specifically our view of time. He did this, ironically without embracing Postmodernism, yay!!

Guiness argues that we are too caught up in being relevant or as he phrases it "timely." Basically what it says is that we place way to much importance on staying current. This caused me to wonder about that nature and the development of theology in recent decades or even centuries.

It seems to me that so many theologians today are busy trying to come up with a new idea or trying to discuss the latest trend that they forget what made the great Christian thinkers of the past great - the trial of Church history. We bounce from idea to idea and consider men like Pinnock, Sanders, Piper, Pagit, and so many others to be great thinkers and the new standard for where theology is going. We hold them up with the great minds of Christian antiquity like St. Athanasius, Augustine, Aquinas, and Ignatius, forgetting that it wasn't the fact that Augustine and the rest came up with great ideas that made them great, rather it was that their ideas lasted the test of time. They were forged in Church history! Their ideas slowly progressed throughout the church and were slowly approved of by the masses of Christians throughout the world.

Today we dialogue about ideas in seconds and publish articles after a month or a year of thought. Once these things are published, Pastors, laity, and students who strive to be on the "cutting edge" grab ahold of them like they've found the Holy Grail. There is no sense of historical community, no trial by fire. We don't allow time for these ideas to circulate through the church and and be approved or repudiated by the masses.

One chief example of this is Open Theism. Clark Pinnock published a book and so did a couple of his friends, their ideas spread through the seminaries and Christian colleges like crazy. The ideas were new and trendy and it seems that may decided to embrace the idea because it appeared to "work" and it was the new thing.

There was little dialogue on this concept done in the churches, this concept was strictly and ivory tower debate among scholars. There was no time given for this idea to pass through the godly saints of the church, the masses of saints who are out of touch with scholarly circles. It was simple, they had an idea, the published the idea and now there are many open theists around the globe.

Suppose this process had been the case with Arianism back in the early centuries of the church (300-500ad). We would have surely had a problem on our hands. Suppose for a moment that Arias had and idea, wrote a book and published it. Suppose the communication was as quick as it is now. Arianism would have spread geographically to all parts of the church. The Orthodox faith of the Trinity would have been attacked from all sides [This is not to say that Arianism has not spread, but rather to say that it's spread was contained by the filter of Christian Saints testing and approving (or in this case disapproving) this teaching.]

I wonder, if open theism had been proposed in the early centuries of the church (say 300-500ad) would the Fathers and Mothers of the faith have been so willing to accept it without a moments notice? Wouldn't it have taken years to discuss and dialogue. [I think this is just one example where we run into danger by our emphasis on staying current and relevant. I'm not saying (yet) that Open Theism is a heresy (although it's right on the edge), but because this teaching is so new and so incredibly 'original' we should be very wary. This is just one example.]

[Along these same lines, is something that I briefly touched on above. Namely that I think scholars and those of us who run in scholarly circles often find more joy in coming up with a new thought or idea than we do when we internalize an important truth about God. I find this is especially the case with Protestant scholarship. The Protestant community has long forgotten that any church history happened before Luther nailed his infamous 95 Theses to the Door of the Wittenberg Cathedral. We have allowed ourselves to ignore church history and the teaching of the great cloud of witness that has preserved the scriptures through the ages. We emphasize the latest trends and hot topics and forget that if something is new it should be tested and weighed heavily. In fact some Saints of the church held to the belief that if there was anything new in their writing then it must be discarded at once (cf. Tozer, C.S. Lewis). We feel that in the name of good scholarship that we can treat the text how we want, this however is absurd. We have been handed the scripture through the witness of generations of Christians before us, what makes us think that we, being increasingly more removed from Christ's earthly life, have superior insight into what he really said. Yes we may gain some better insights and understanding through the analysis of texts and recent discoveries, but if anything is truly different than what the church has believed for centuries then what real good is it?]

[I think I rambled a bit there in the last paragraph and didn't really express my thoughts clearly. I'm tempted to put off posting these thoughts until I can better refine them but as the story of this post accounts, that may not be a good idea, as I probably won't get around to it again until July. So I guess I'll leave the thoughts as they are. They're a work in progress and as always I open myself up to your insights and thoughts on the matter. Maybe I'm completely off base or maybe I hit the nail right on the head, who knows. ]

Maran atha - Come our Lord!

I just finished classes for the day/week (I don't have classes on Friday or Monday) and I was back here in my apartment and had one of those awesome moments where the Spirit just falls on you in a special way, where you are completely just blown away in the goodness of the Holy Spirit and he just is pouring in and out of you. I wasn't really doing anything special, in fact, I was just fixing dinner and came back to my computer to put up an AIM away message and it just happened, it was completely unexpected, but it was so good. All this to say, that as the Holy Spirit was ministering to me I felt prompted to write something. I guess you could call it a poem or something akin to a poem, or maybe you could call it a short hymn because the substance is very similar to the Christ Hymns in the New Testament. I don't write stuff like this often, in fact the last time I wrote anything like this was 9/24/05 and the last time I wrote something like this in the Spirit was 8/3/05. The quickest place I could go to write it down was in an away message window, so if you happen to read it here and there, I'm sorry for being redundant. So here it is, I post not to share 'my art' or to show you what 'I've done' but to share what the Spirit seemed to be breathing into me. I hope that it ministers to you and helps you exalt Christ.

----------------------------------------------------------------
Maran atha we cry aloud - Come Lord Jesus!!
We truly long for you like a bride waiting for her groom.
You are the preincarnate One, true God of true God,
made flesh to suffer and die, a bloody sacrifice for the redemption of humanity.
You were exalted to the right hand of the Father and intercede for us now, your beloved!
You are truly worthy to be praised! You are the very wisdom of God, the glorious Son,
worthy to be exalted with the Father and the Holy Spirit now and forevermore! Amen.
- BH 4/27/06
--------------------------------------------------------------

Flee to the Eucharist!

Is one of my favorite quotes by Robert Webber. I love the imagery and the power of thinking about fleeing to the cup and the bread to meet Christ and to partake in his suffering and death.

Today at our weekly mid-week Eucharist chapel I had an unusual experience concerning 'fleeing to the Eucharist.'

As a sound person I am use to getting neglected during most services and especially during communion. I rarely get served and usually end up having to serve myself after the service is over. Well today, like many others, i was forgotten and I planned on going to partake in the sacrament after the service was over. Well, just as I was walking down the stairs someone came and took all the bread and one of the cups away. So I had to hastily walk (cause i didn't want to make a huge scene) after her to get the Eucharist.

I just thought this was a funny story, especially when I remember Webber's quote. It turns out sometimes you have to literally flee after the Eucharist, as well as flee to it.

On Easter

So Becca asked me to post some thoughts on Easter (cf. The comments under the "Beaux Arts Ball" post) and I really don't feel like I have anything profound to write about. So I hope I don't disappoint anyone with the lack of profound insights but here are some of my thoughts ranging from Easter and the events surrounding Easter.

As weird as it may seem, I'm actually sort of sad that lent is over. I know, it's weird, a time of mourning and fasting a time where the church has traditionally (mainly the Catholics and not the Orthodox or Protestants) prohibited the use of "Hallelujah" - you wouldn't think I'd be sad about this time ending. Especially with the fact that Lent ends on my favorite Church holy-days of all time - Easter Sunday. Don't get me wrong, I love the joyful time of living in Eastertide (the season after Easter and before Pentecost) I love Easter, and I don't particularly enjoy fasting, but I still am sort of sad that Great and Holy Lent is over. There is something very special about traveling through life in those 40 days of intense concentration and humility. There is something unique about living out 40 days in a mystical desert. Maybe it's that I learned a lot during this Lent, maybe it's that I like the somber feel of it, I'm not really sure, but I do know that I am torn between the joy of Eastertide and the ache of Lent. I think that's why both of these are so essential to our church calendar (something a majority of Protestantism has completely neglected).

Easter was great though. Although I spent a lot of the weekend on the road, driving back home and then back to KY, it was good to get home and visit family and friends. It was interesting being back in a protestant church, but I don't think I could have picked a better situation. I love my home pastor and I don't know if I've ever met a better pastor than he. I only wish that he would have came to Port while I was still a full-time attender there. It was definitely different, but good to be back. I also find it hard to sit in a pew on a Sunday like Easter Sunday. There is so much joy and so much energy just flowing through me it was all I could do just to remain silent and sit in the pew. I so badly wanted to just get up and start preaching. This isn't to say that Pastor Beckley did a bad job, on the contrary, he did an excellent job as always, but there is so much I want to convey that it still pains my heart to be silent in church - especially in a protestant church. I think it pains me more in a protestant church because I know that I can serve there. In the Orthodox Church I attend I know from the outset that I have no authority and it would be wrong for me to speak as one with authority to these people so it doesn't really burn within me as much there, but when I go to a protestant church I just want to shout it out.

I don't want to critique Pastor Beckley because as I said his sermon was heartfelt and truly a word from the Lord, but I feel like the things that were running through my heart and mind were not conveyed how I would convey them. This is probably just a difference in personalities, but either way it gives me a small opportunity to pontificate here.

What my heart wanted to scream was along these lines although these are admittedly very raw ideas that would need some polishing. And this "list" is by no means meant to symbolize any of my thoughts of Pastor Beckley's sermon.

Although the Church does a good job at celebrating Easter I feel we do a poor job of internalizing Easter. I wanted to scream and shout at the top of my lungs, I wanted to convey the truth that Easter is not just the rising of Christ. Easter is the beginning of the end of time. The pinnacle of human history happened that Easter Sunday 2,000 years ago. Jesus Christ conquered death and with that he initiated the final age of the world. His resurrection does not just mark the start of a movement, but truly was (as the gospel writers indicate) the highest point of all human history. This is it! This is all we could ever hope for and imagine. God enfleshed conquering death, conquering sin! I wish I could convey the excitement that fills my heart as I meditate on this and write these words. I am just baffled every year at how the Church can just go about her Easter 'celebration' in such a nonchalant way. This is the essence of everything we are and hope to be. We live in this reality. We worship because of this event. We can have hope in life and amidst death because of this glorious act. I can't even describe the joy and excitement in my heart. That's why I want to scream and shout. I want to help people to realize what this means for them, for the church, for humanity. This isn't just something that happened and is over. This is a living reality! Christ did not rise (completed past tense) but "he is risen" (past action that continues through to the present). So many Christian's treat Easter with no excitement, no joy and no holy fear and trembling. It's like we pass the same judgment on the celebration of Easter that Pope Benedict (I think it was Benedict or maybe John Paul) said of Mel Gibson's Passion - "it is was it is." How can we live in such apathy toward the highest holy day of the year? "It just baffles me" (and yes that was a Madden reference). My heart is warmed every time I think on these things. I don't understand it and it brings me to the verge of tears - both of sadness and frustration. Sadness because of the state of the church and frustration because I don't know how, as a future minister, to convey this joy to people. How can we do it? How can we help people to realize that this is it! This is our life-long curriculum. We are called to live and to learn in the shadow of the cross and the empty tomb everyday of our Christian lives.

This life-long learning about how to live in the reality of Easter is why it is so vitally important for us to remember that every Sunday, every Sunday of the year is like a mini-Easter. This is why the ancient Christians decided that we should meet on Sunday rather than the Sabbath (Saturday). They knew that Easter was the center of life and thus every week we meet and celebrate the resurrection as a community of faith. We learn the curriculum of the resurrection every Sunday, or at least that's what Church is supposed to be. [This could be a launching point for some of my anti-church growth/seeker church sentiments but we'll save that for another day, but feel free to insert them yourselves.] We are people of the resurrection, that is our identity, and that is how we ought to define ourselves. Is it any wonder that the early believers greeted one another with the statement "he is risen" and the response "he is risen indeed." This didn't start as a Easter Sunday ritual, it started as an everyday ritual to identify believers. We are identified by the resurrection! This is who we are and thus it should effect every ounce of our being - especially the way we remember the resurrection.

So I guess I had more thoughts on Easter than I realized, they're more just out of the normal "Easter meditations" box.

~ Ben

Beaux Arts Ball

On saturday I worked a show in Lexington called the "Beaux Arts Ball" and after talking about it with Eryn I think it has given me a new perspective on postmodernism. To understand that point though I need to do a brief description of the Ball.

The Ball is basically a masquerade rave. The costumes varried quite a bit, a few examples are: tetris blocks, S&M gear, rabbit suits, and stategically placed duct tape. The people were mainly 20-30 something with the few exceptions of older people in their 40s and 50s. The events for my stage were as follows:

8:30-10:30 - 1st DJ
10:30-11:15ish - Drag Show (fashion show with drag queens)
11:20-2:00am - 2nd DJ (with a fashion show at the begining)

To describe the event a little more it was basically a dark room with loud techno music with people "dancing" all over each other. It's hard to describe it without getting really graphic, but lets just say that I saw guys kissing guys, girls kissing girls, and guys kissing girls, I saw people wearing nothing but dog collars and chainlink thongs, and a bunch of other stuff. So the event was truly eclectic, to put it one way.

Ok, hopefully that gives you at least some picture of the event.

The event definetly transcended my normal experiences and was eye opening. I think the saddest part was the Drag Show and they way the croud reacted. When these women came on stage (they do like to be called women) the crowd (about 1,500-2,000 people) reacted to them with more excitement and more zeal than rock stars normally get by their screaming fans. It wasn't just the gay men that were excited but everyone was cheering them on with and was excited to see them "strut their stuff"(for lack of a better descriptor). It made me sad to see these men who found their fulfillment in dressing and acting like women, and buying into the lie of society. It almost made me cry, it was sad because they really seemed to be enjoying who they "were." Now obviously I tried to justify their joy by saying, 'well i bet they're really broken, they probably cry to themselves a lot, they probably aren't really happy, they're probably hurting really bad on the inside.' But ya know what, I can't make those kind of qualifications. That's just a stereo type I've been taught by society since I was young. These people may be truly happy with who they are, yes they're lost, they need Jesus, they're flling themselves with lies, but they may be happy with being drag. It was thinking back on this and the rest of the event that led me to my thoughts about postmodernism. Yes I'm finally getting to the point.

The experience was wierd, and my mind has images in it that I wish weren't there, but I wouldn't trade the experience for anything, i mean i really think that this event typifies a whole segment of the population, i think this was post modern america, not what we vaguely concieve of as postmodernism. I guess my thoughts on this issues aren't as formed as I would like them to be, but it just seems that we treat postmodernism like it's something that we can look at and examine in a lab. I feel like what we concieve of didn't match up at all with what I observed saturday night. I'm entirely sure how to describe the difference, but I know there was one and it seems to me that after observing these differences these people do not need postmodern ministries. They don't need us to understand postmodernism they don't need us to keep talking about it as if it's a static reality that we can fix once we crack the code. This is a whole group of society, they're all governed by different assumptions and different things make them tick, they may be postmodern, they may be modern, who cares, they are lost and broken people. What they need is for the church to stop dialogue over how best to reach them and to start being the church. They don't need the church to create new lame ministries that will reach to their inherent postmodern philosophies (or lack thereof) but what they need is for the church to be the church.

We spend all our time, especially in academia trying to asses the culture, asses the postmodern world thinking that we can crack this code, churches can implement the solution and then all the culture's probelems along with ours will be solved. Can we not see past this ridiculous fallacy? All the church was ever asked to be from God was the church. All we were asked to do was love God and love others. Creating postmodern christian raves is not the answer, creating christian coffehouses isn't the answer, sure they may be fun and good, but the answer is to renew the church, to call the people of God to set their focus on one thing and one thing alone - Loving God. We need to abandon, what seems to me to be, our faulty conception of postmodernism and embrace intimate love with the Holy Triune God, rather than embrace a newer more accurate conception of postmodernism.

I guess these really aren't new thoughts. I feel I've said this same thing before. I feel these people looked more like true postmodernism than what we concieve it to be. I don't know exactly how to describe it (for that I apologize), but I do believe that it doesn't matter how this differes from our conception, as long as we focus on being the real church, which is by nature overflowing with love.

~ Ben

Not a Lenten thought

Although this occured during lent, I don't think it qualifies as a "lenten thought" per se.

As you all know I am not very fond of people that I consider heretics posing as orthodox christians, such as Joel Osteen.

I know that many of you probably have a similar disdain for their teaching and so I thought I'd take a short minute to refer you to Dr. Witherington's newest blog post entitled "What's Wrong With Prospering? The Gospel Accroding to Joel Osteen." Witherington does a fine job commenting on the problems with Osteen's theology and I think that he offers a better critique than I have or could at this time.

I don't want to imply that I'm becoming a Witherington disciple, but the man is brilliant and he continues to amaze me. He also has a unquenchable passion for Christ and for the church. Yes, I do disagree with him on some issues, and to be truthful he does come across as arogant sometimes, but I feel that some of his arogance may be passion misconstrued. All that to say, that not only do I find his classes heart warming and his book enlightening, but I also find his blog stimulating and encouraging. Plus it's really fun when fundamentalists comment and he tears them to shreds.

But the main reason I say this is to draw your attention to the Osteen article, but also to encourage you to check it out if you find yourself with some spare time. I found the post previous to the Osteen article to be amazing. I thought the poem was very well written.

The link is over to the right on the bottom of the links section incase you didn't notice.

Peace.

Lenten lesson 101

Ok, so there have been so many things I've wanted to post about since lent started but haven't had the time to sit down and write out a long post. Hopefully I'll post on them later, but I wanted to post this quick thought while it's fresh. I attend St. Athanasius Orthodox Church in Nicholasville, KY on Sundays and find the liturgy to be incredibly meaningful. During lent we are using the Liturgy of St. Basil and in one of the sections there is a place for a different song to be sung each Sunday. This isn't like special music, the whole service is singing except the sermon, this is more like instead of singing "O for a Thousand Tongues to Sing" at the start of every school year at Houghton they mixed it up once in a while with "And Can it Be." As I stood there yesterday listening to the choir (again not like typical protestant choirs) sing the song I heard these words. I'll try to quote them the best I can.

"The flaming sword of Eden has been extinguished by the wood of the cross...enter in to paradise!"

Isn't that beautiful! The imagery just fills my heart. Only with God could something so paradoxical become a reality. Wood extinguishing fire? Death bringing life in paradise? These are not intuitive things. Truly the cross is foolishness and a stumbling block and yet all the more we proclaim Christ and him crucified! Just as the first Adam's actions removed us from paradise, so the second Adam's actions allow us to reclaim it, or better yet, recieve a new one.

Amen. Come Lord Jesus.

Thoughts on Ash Wednesday

Just some short thoughts from Ash Wednesday.

Today in chapel we had the traditional imposition of ashes. When the ashes were imposed on my forehead in the sign of the cross these words were spoken to me (or at least very close to these) "from dust you came, to dust you will return, now go and live in the shadow of the cross." Wow, such powerful words. Ash Wednesday is about us, about our sin, and about God breaking into history through the incarnation to mend the brokenness and redeem humanity.

One "profound" thing that really struck me today was this. I often forgot I had ashes on my forehead during the day. It was often only when I saw the cross on someone else's forehead that I remembered that I too was living in the reality of being marked by the cross. It seems to me that this experience beautifully symbolizes the body of Christ. Sometimes when things get rough or when life gets hard we forget that we are living lives that are marked by the cross. We forget that we are really the living dead because "those who are baptized are already dead" (JD Walt). Sometimes it takes the community of faith, the great cloud of witnesses, to remind us of the shadow that we live in. Oh that the true cross that we carry was as visible to everyone as the ashes that we wear on our foreheads. We are truly a people marked by the cross, that is what our baptism represents, that is the pinnacle of our existence. We are people of the cross! May that marking permeate all aspects of our lives.

LENT!!

Lent starts tomorrow!

Yes that's right tomorrow is Ash wednesday. I never understood the church seasons or the various holidays other than Christmas and Easter, until my junior and senior years at Houghton. I have now come to embrace the Christian Calendar as a means to focus and live the Christian life throughout the year. After reflecting on the Christian Year for a little while now I have come to realize that Lent is by far my favorite season and Easter my favorite holiday.

I love the stark, somber mood that inhabits lent as we "descend to the cross with Christ" as JD Walt said in chapel the other day. We start our descent on Wednesday with the imposition of ashes (tomorrow will be my second time) and maintain our time of reflection through prayMer and fasting until Easter Sunday when we loudly exclaim CHRIST IS RISEN!! HE IS RISEN INDEED!!

Praise the Lord!! Amen!

I hope to post some lenten thoughts throughout the 40 days (not counting sundays), but we'll see how that goes as I have a NT Theology paper due for Dr. Witherington in a month. But for now, I just wanted to share my joy and excitement that Lent is here and Easter is coming.

Isn't it a great reminder of the reality that we live in. Just as before Easter the earth cried out for atonement, so it is after Easter that the earth cries out for the return of the King.

And so my soul yearns within me, and crys out even more during this time of year - MARANATHA - Come Lord Jesus!!!

In Response

This post is more a response to the comments that were posted concerning the post entitled "Is it really too much to ask?!"

First let me say that I'm not saying that the Church has never had problems until now, and I'm not saying that all churches are bad. My point is not that I haven't found a church to suit me, rather the point is a lament for the state of the church, especially the western church.

The church has had its problems, and I suspect will continue to have problems, but I also feel that a strong case can be made that Christianity in North America is at one of the lowest points in all of Church history. I lament this fact, I lament the easy Christianity and pseudo-psycho-babble-pop Christianity that I see all over the place. I hear sermons on how to have less stress, or how to be successful in life. I see churches teaching doctrines that involve merely being happy and being driven by the purpose of self-fulfillment. Can you seriously tell me that this is Christianity? Can you say that this is the powerful word of the Lord? Does this in any way resemble the Kingdom of God that Jesus spent his whole ministry teaching about? By no means does this in any way, shape, or form look like, true Christianity.

This is my lament. I ache over the fact that the church is in such a sour state that it is neither cool nor hot. The gospel much of the church is preaching is like what Tozer says - if it were medicine it would be too weak to cure anyone and if it were poison it would be too weak to kill anyone. (paraphrase)

What shall we as members of the body of Christ do about this betrayal of Kingdom ethics and values.

To address the critique raised by Sam - "maybe we should just trust that Christ will redeem his bride as is written, no? And that...The battle has already been won, by Christ."

Although the point is a decent one, that he caps off with a call to just living in mercy. This seems to be too far of an apathetic stance. Can we just sit by and watch the church self-destruct? Can we sit there while heresy and false teaching spread like cancer through the whole body of Christ? Granted it is true that the true church will not fall, but how can we say we love the church and do nothing when she is in no way a resemblance of who she is called to be?

I pray often for the purity of the Church, I pray that the chaff that fills the buildings every Sunday will be made pure first and foremost, but if not then be cleansed away. I pray for persecution to come upon the western church. Not because I'm some sadist who loves to see people injured and dead, but because I firmly believe that if you are not willing at a moment's notice to give your life and sacrifice everything for the sake of Jesus Christ, then you have no business calling yourself a Christian and claiming to be the church.

But we must not only pray for the purity of the Church, we must use the gifts that God has given us. We cannot sit idly by and credit our apathy with the fact that Christ will prevail and all will be right in the end. Christ will prevail indeed! Praise the Lord! But until then he has charged us, the body of Christ, to use our gifts to edify one another and build up the church in his image. We must always fight for the purity of the people of God. We must use our gifts of encouragement, healing, prophecy, tongues, etc. For the edification of the body. It is when we do that and stop living in this bismal state of the church that we will truly be on fire for God. And as Wesley said, when one man is ignited aflame for the Lord hundreds more [unbelievers] will come just to see him burn. (paraphrase) Then our witness will be pure. Then we will live in love, and mercy, and compassion.

The call is to the Church now! Prepare ye the way of the Lord! We cannot avoid our call to proclaim the coming of the Kingdom, to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord and to shout at the top of our lungs, REPENT! For the Kingdom of Heaven is at Hand!!

That is our call, that is why I lament over the church. I love the church and I see her potential. Yes, she has always had her problems, she will continue to struggle because she is made up of humans, but with the Spirit filling her, she can be pure and spotless and ready for the coming of the Bridegroom!

Just one final disclaimer, I don't' speak these words because I'm one of those crazy kooks who thinks that the coming will be within the next 15 years when Russia invades Israel. I say this because this has always been the message of the Church. Just as her hearts cry must always be: MARANATHA - COME LORD JESUS!!

Question

So the last time I worked a country show I had some theological thoughts to post. Well, I just worked another show at the same bar with another country band and I have some more thoughts. These however are neither profound nor theological. In fact it's more one question rather than a set of thoughts. So if you all will allow me a rare deviation from my theological ponderings I will put out a question that I hope some of you may be able to answer.

Here is the question:

Why do they always put mirrors behind bars? Is it just to make the room look bigger? Why is it?

Ok, that's my question and my rare non-theological thought for the blog. I'm sure I'll post another one in another 4 or 5 months.

Is it really to much to ask?!

I just got back from yet another failure at finding a church. I think I'm beginning to lose hope. Since I've moved here to Wilmore I've visited 14 different churches, and some of them more than once. That's right, I have been in Wimore for 19 Sundays and have visited 14 different churches and have yet to find one that is good (yes, I know good is really arbitrary).

You may be thinking that I'm just too picky, or that I'm just buying into the consumeristic notion of "church shopping," but I feel it's more than that. I feel that it's something deeper.

All I'm really asking for is a Church that shifts the focus from us to God, a church that calls its congregants into a deep and loving relationship with God. I'm looking for a church that isn't married to American consumerism or Republican politics. I'm asking for a church that preaches the hard prophetic word of the Lord in a loving way, one that doesn't water down the message of the cross and the cost of discipleship in order to be "seeker friendly." I long to find a church that truly meets with God instead of meeting with each other in a valiant grasp to look religious and fulfill some preconceived notion of what it means to be a Christian. It would be great if I found a church where the gifts of the Spirit were actually used and not just talked about, where women were actually encouraged to be in ministry and not just theologized about being in ministry.

I've come to the conclusion that a church like this doesn't exist. I've known that for a while, but seriously, I would settle for any small combination. I really just want a place where I can serve God and others, where people are actually passionate about God and interested in knowing him more intimately every day. I don't care about worship styles, I don't care about size (although I bet my changes are better with a small church), I really don't care what denomination, I just want a place to encounter God with fellow believers who are seeking God.

Maybe I can't gauge a church on a one Sunday visit; maybe I need constantly remember that John Stott is right when he says "Every church in every place at every time is in need of reform and renewal. But we need to beware lest we despise the church of God and are blind to his work in history."

Do I hate the church? No! May God forbid it! Although, I use to hate the church, I hated the church for 2 or 3 years, from a senior in High School to a sophomore at Houghton. Then I read Stott's quote while leading a Lifeline group. I don't hate the church, on the contrary; I love the Church. I love the Church more than you could ever believe. That's why my heart breaks every week. Every week when I hear pastors speak mere fluff, wasting away their precious minutes to convey a life-changing truth from God. It breaks when I hear congregations sing half-heartedly about "how good Jesus makes me feel," when I take communion with believers that have no concept of the grace given during the Holy Eucharist. I want to scream and shout, I want to weep and wail. Every week I feel like I'm going to die, I feel like I want to die. I feel like the Church is dead and there is no hope for it. I think it's for this reason that I burn with anxiousness to get out of seminary and to go minister. The church is dying, or maybe it's already dead... can anyone save it? I realize I can't do it in and of my own desire and ambition. I realize that it is by the grace and power of the Most High that the church must be resurrected out of its ashes like the phoenix of lore.

I'm beginning to think that maybe the best thing right now is for me to finish the training that God has set before me and then I will be better equipped to tackle the small portion of the monumentous task that God will give me. Yes, I'll do what I can now, but maybe training is essential. But what if I miss the fight? I feel like an anxious soldier waiting for his chance to see some action. What if the fight is over by the time I get out of here in 3 or 4 years? The sad part is that I doubt it will be over. The church is in trouble and unless the hand of God reaches and raises up his bride form the muck and the mire, she will continue to wallow in it for a long number of years.

I'm not saying that I've made my decision to stay in seminary, nor am I saying that I've given up fighting until I'm out. I'm just saying that we have an uphill battle and it will take much work, prayer, and probably a good old fashioned persecution to bring the Church back to be the pure bride that she once was.

Until that day, it seems that my only solace can be found in the words of Thomas Oden, from his book The Living God. Oden says: "Even when preachers are heretics, as long as they celebrate Holy Communion in due order, the liturgy is not invalidated, and the rite itself performs the ironic task of contradicting what has been badly taught."

I hope and pray that he is right, because right now there is a lot of bad teaching from pastors, worship leaders, and other ministers, and it is by the grace of God that the church still stands in even a vague shadow of her former glory.