Never Mind Halloween, Here’s Your Year ‘Round Scare

What’s scarier, not just at Halloween, but every day of the year: The idea of your government doing nothing, or your government actually doing something? I mean, taking into consideration governments’ habit of overpaying for things, wasting whatever they buy, and creating a camel when designing a horse?

Much scarier than ghosts, goblins, and horror movies.

Random Monday Musings

1. Cheerios with a dab of FiberOne may be good for the heart and innards, but it’s not food to feed the soul or the taste buds.

2. Kanye West must shop my Wal*Mart; there are Beyonce CDs scattered all over the music section. Maybe that’s what he’s doing now his tour is canceled.

3.  If I have a car accident, it will be in the Wal*Mart parking lot. Most dangerous place I drive by far.

4. Blu-Ray is only as good as the transfers. How like DVDs.

My Pastor Blogs… I React

The teasing finally paid off. My pastor, Dr. Jay Cook, has written a new blog post this week about Chuck Colson’s address to the SBC meeting.

Believe it or not, I have a few reactions to Jay’s post/ Colson’s speech.

Here’s the gist of Colson’s speech, in Jay’s post:

“After all a nation’s culture is its religion incarnate. Did you know that 1/3 of American adults consider themselves evangelical Christians? What would happen if 1/3 of Americans took their faith seriously?”

My response:

1. )”Christian” doesn’t mean to many people what it does to actual church goers. “Christian” means something like “spiritual, righteous, and nice” to most people. That’s why you have mobs of people calling themselves “Christian” who belong to no organized church, whose beliefs run the gamut.

2.)Admittedly there are many more non-evangelical Christians, but my reaction to 1/3 of the populace being evangelical Christian is that the other 2/3 voting block is going to run the country, and quite rightly, too. We’re a representative democracy, after all.

3.) I think it’s a historical fallacy to consider America a “Christian” nation, because as someone pointed out,

Joh 14:21 NET. The person who has my commandments and obeys them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and will reveal myself to him.”

There are entirely too many “Christians” who do not obey His commandments.

I also think, in this vein, it is a fallacy to call the historical Western Civilization after Constantine “Christian”, for the same reason. I am not an Origenist, I don’t think all will be redeemed. I think theology and history are against it.

“…they are trying to take away the conscience clause (so all doctors must perform abortions if asked to) – groundwork is being laid to make any disagreement (or preaching) against sins (like homosexuality) considered hate crimes – and we could go on and on because our governmental leaders are going on and on.”

This is a failure of democracy, not a failure of Christianity. Christianity has spent most of its days in a world where democracy was all but unknown. Why would we then be surprised if the wheel turns back? Early Christians fought the government and the culture, and it went from sporadic torture and execution to widespread torture and execution before Constantine. Yet Christianity thrived in that situation.

Thus it is historically naive to think, “Government and culture are against Christianity! Whatever will we do?”

For that matter, as I point out during election years in particular, “Jesus is a monarchist”.

There are also these things to remember:

Joh 15:18-24 NET. “If the world hates you, be aware that it hated me first. (19) If you belonged to the world, the world would love you as its own. However, because you do not belong to the world, but I chose you out of the world, for this reason the world hates you. (20) Remember what I told you, ‘A slave is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they obeyed my word, they will obey yours too. (21) But they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know the one who sent me. (22) If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin. But they no longer have any excuse for their sin. (23) The one who hates me hates my Father too. (24) If I had not performed among them the miraculous deeds that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin. But now they have seen the deeds and have hated both me and my Father.

Joh 16:33 NET. I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace. In the world you have trouble and suffering, but take courage — I have conquered the world.”

“(2) Our economy is breaking down. In the past 6 months we have taken our national debt to levels never dreamed (except maybe in nightmares). Billions of dollars are being spent on things that will in NO way help the economy. And it’s only going to get worse.”

I don’t disagree, but that is politics. Baptists  believe in separation of church and state, not the least because of Jesus’ words above. When we get so concerned about the world’s issues, we inevitably become too worldly for our own good. I think it hurts the SBC to speak politically as a unit.

“(3) Terrorism is still rising. No matter how sweetly we speak with the radicals, it will NOT help because their desire is not dialogue – their desire is to destroy us.”

No. I think their desire is to make the world into their image of it. They would be happpy if we were dhimmis under a world Islamic government.  Their problem is the same as much of the world’s culture: freedom, and free speech, are just  not popular except as an idea. As the saying goes, it’s one thing to defend free speech; it’s another to defend the free speech of someone whose ideas utterly repulse you.

“(4) We are losing our national identity. We are forgetting who we are – what we came through – what we stood for…”

As Americans? Yep. As Christians? In many ways, too. And as is historic and theological, Christians aren’t really citizens of any country, or members of any race, except Christianity. Early apologists spoke of Christians as a new, third race, separate from the Greco-Romans and all the barbarians, and thus, not obliged to follow either other race’s culture. That we need to recover.

“Really, our country’s worldview is warped. Rarely do we (yes, even we Christians) look at life through the eyes of faith. Instead, faith is either a part of our lives (instead of the totality of our lives) – or it is considered archaic. And all of our troubles can be seen as a result of immorality – yes all of our troubles! If we thought and acted like we should, we would not be in the mess we are in.”

Again, not in complete disagreement. But I think a great deal of the problem is our natural indifference (We like our lifestyles or we would change them; the problems seem so vast compared to any individual) and the inherent problem of the I vs we. We are individualistic, and we put ourselves ahead of others.  Again, as someone has said,

Mat 25:31-46 NET. “When the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. (32) All the nations will be assembled before him, and he will separate people one from another like a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. (33) He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. (34) Then the king will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. (35) For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, (36) I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’ (37) Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? (38) When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or naked and clothe you? (39) When did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ (40) And the king will answer them, ‘I tell you the truth, just as you did it for one of the least of these brothers or sisters of mine, you did it for me.’ (41) “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you accursed, into the eternal fire that has been prepared for the devil and his angels! (42) For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink. (43) I was a stranger and you did not receive me as a guest, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ (44) Then they too will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not give you whatever you needed?’ (45) Then he will answer them, ‘I tell you the truth, just as you did not do it for one of the least of these, you did not do it for me.’ (46) And these will depart into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

A Reaction to Some SBC Meeting Motions

You probably read these on Jim West’s blog, but I hate “wasting” long comments, so, another double post.

Inviting “regenerate” event speakers: Hmm. You think the unregenerate are going to think “Why go to an SBC church? They don’t care for me anyway. Or for how I part my hair. It’s all a bunch of regenerates.”

Christian Flag as symbol or whatever: Ummm. Do these guys know their Baptist history? Probably not before 1845. All too many not before the 1950s, the Golden Age. (Yes, it says a lot about the SBC that the 50s are the Golden Age.)

KJV is 400: You know, SBCers look backwards enough already, I’d say. Besides, who isn’t going to note the KJV birthday? Do we need to jump on that bandwagon?

Exclude any bible which“Questions the validity of any Scripture”: Have these guys studied textual criticism? They still teach it in seminaries, don’t they? Actually, with the de-emphasis in original languages, maybe not. Do I need add, “Whose Scripture”? I didn’t think so, so I did anyway.

“Remove Mark Driscoll from Lifeway”: I dunno. You start this trend it’s going to be a very bare bunch of stores. Not only because there is a lot of junk in Lifeways, but also because SBCers are so picky (see, hair, the parting of).

Obama and Israel: Uhm. Guys? He’s not an SBCer. Further, the SBC is probably as far from his core constituency as a politican as you can get. Sure SBCers voted for him, but do you think as a group they have any interest to him? (I wanted to vote for that heretic, Mitt Romney, truthfully. But then I also believe in separation of church and state, and that the church and the world will never meet, so to speak.In fact, the more they approach meeting, the more worried about the church I get.)

Refute World ending in 2011 (or is it 2012? Or next Thursday?): Do we want to encourage these people by paying attention to them?

Ranks, the shrinking of: Actually, we SBCers played numbers games with the “non-resident” and “Inactive” membership categories. If you’re not attending regularly, you shouldn’t be counted. Period. And anyway, isn’t it traditional and logical, given our notions of the world, that the non-member attendees of a church should be a large percentage of the attendees? In olden days, you had the Interested, the Catechecists, and the Faithful. I think you still should, so to speak. Of course, in olden days, there weren’t churches on every street corner, and every non-member didn’t presume to know more about the church than the members, either. “Familiarity” breeds indifference.

I don’t attend the SBC meeting because no church in their right mind would send me, and I have a job, for bills, the paying of. My store doesn’t send me to shareholders’ meetings for the same “right minded” reason.

On Biblical Lexicons

Because I know Jim West read this comment on his blog and thought, “Holy Deleted! Doesn’t Chuck have a blog of his own?!” And because I haven’t posted anything in a few days. Though, of course, I have commented elsewhere.

So, for the two of you who don’t read Jim West’s blog, (Hi, there Nick Norelli! for one) or the much larger number who see multiple paragraphs and skip on by, here’s my reply. (Brevity not always being the soul of wit. Sometimes it is a lack of something meaningful to say. But when has that ever stopped me?)

“There’s nothing that wrong with Strong’s Numbers, though I prefer Goodrick-Kohlenbarger myself. It’s the lexicon you use them with that’s the problem.

But worst of all is the notion of some sort of direct one to one correspondence between original language words and translation words. Words have connotations and ranges of meaning, some of which even alter over time. (This is one of the problems with the KJV– some of those words didn’t mean what they now mean, so you aren’t necessarily getting what the translators of 1611 or 1769 meant). So a proper lexicon has to discuss not only meaning, not only connotations of meaning, but meaning over time. Yet pretty much any NT Greek resource, for example, before about 1900 is based on classical usage, because it wasn’t until after roughly 1900 that scholars gained access to Koine documents, closer in time and thus usage to the NT than classical Greek works. Strongs just isn’t up to that.

Truth is, there’s simply no short cut, no magic bullet. Use BDAG and HALOT long enough and you’ll grow a list of questions about their accuracy as well. Study Hebrew and Greek and you’ll learn a whole new set of questions about what the Bible means in various places you never considered from translations, even as you settle some problems with translations.

I don’t want to say that studying the Bible in translation is useless, because most people in history have learned the Bible in translation– especially the OT–, but I also don’t want to say learning Greek and Hebrew are useless, simply because most people will never become proficient in those languages. What is required is a healthy dose of modesty about what you know, and a realistic view of the perfection of your sources. I mean, even N.T. Wright admits 1/3 of what he teaches is probably wrong.

A believer obviously wants to know God better, and the two means for doing that are prayer and scripture. These are the tools, weapons, and exercise equipment of believers rolled into one. We must use them, study them, practice with them.

Apologetics-wise, there has never been a time when being acquainted with both the original languages and the transmission of the bible text- textual criticism, boring as so many find it– is more important. The internet has spawned a huge mass of biblical “information” readily available for anyone to misunderstand, misuse, or just plain lie about. If every American classically thinks himself a king in his own home, now every man worldwide thinks himself an expert thanks to a laptop and a wi-fi connection. Dr. Johnson I believe said something to the effect that a writer will use up a whole library to write a single book. Likewise, a Christian will have to know a mass of information from and about the Bible in order to overturn the prejudices and misapprehensions of non-believers.”

Holidays, Holy Days… What’s A Pastor to Do?

I’ve written before about Sundays near national holidays, but this Sunday was a triple hitter: It was the Sunday after Ascension Day, the Sunday before Memorial Day, and our Sunday dedicated to recognizing our high school and college graduates.

My thought is pretty simple: I’m glad I’m not a pastor, because Sundays like that leave one thinking “What’s a pastor to do?”

I personally have little use for secular holidays in church, but I’m sure some members are upset when they are avoided. I think, on the other hand, that free churches like Southern Baptists (though it’s always dangerous to speak of free churches as a monolith) don’t follow the liturgical calendar/holy year enough. Again, I’m sure some members would feel their church was becoming too Episcopal or, horror of horrors, Roman Catholic, if the classic church year got too much notice. The baccalaureate program I don’t mind, since it does lead to sermons on living as a Christian in the world, which we all need to hear.

What did my local church do? Well, we didn’t even recognize Ascension Day, we had the graduate ceremonies, and we had no evening service in order to allow people to go to the local Memorial Day celebration (or to save on the electric bill because so many church members were travelling). That’s a whole ‘nother can of worms, because while I haven’t perfect church attendance, I do like services to be conducted regularly. When Sunday evening or Wednesday evening services are cancelled, I am a mite annoyed, but on the other hand (I have enough hands to be in the bar scene in “Star Wars”, you see), the image of say, a Roman Catholic priest celebrating the Eucharist in a church pretty much by himself strikes me as wrong, too. Church= ecclesia= assembly of people. If it’s just the priest/pastor and the staff, that’s not really church, is it?

As I began, so I end: what’s a pastor to do, a member to think?

(P.S. Nice to see I’ve been blogging long enough to reference previous posts on a topic. Tee Hee!)

Top Ten List: Ten Things Not Worth My Time

A repost of a comment from Nick Norelli’s blogpost:

What’s not worth my time:

1.The vast part of what the entertainment industry puts out.

2. Almost all of the self-help section in most Christian bookstores.

3. A huge chunk of the “scholarship” in most secular bookstores.

4. Most of Christian TV and radio.

5. All but a fraction of a percent of YouTube.

6. Facebook.

7. Well over a hundred million blogs.

8. Major League Sports

9. All forms of universalism

10. Adding anything else to this list

This Is Just STUPID, People! Death at Walmart

Yes, I predicted it, but it doesn’t make it any more acceptable. Since when was shopping in affluent America a matter of life and death?

Worker killed at Walmart in Black Friday Rush.

Luckily a pregnant woman and another worker didn’t join the statistics.

At least little Johnny won’t see blood on his Christmas present, eh? But there’s a crowd of people about whom I wonder: how will they look themselves in the mirror this Christmas? Peace on earth, good will to men?

This is one of the seventeen reasons I can’t stand secular Christmas after two decades in retail.
Consumerism is the REAL opiate of the masses.

Let us pray for the dead man’s family and friends. And for the people involved in his death. And the Walmart employees stricken by this senseless death. And for all of us caught up in this awful culture of “God made me to shop”.

This is a Black Friday, indeed.

UPDATE 1: The poor dead man’s name has been released and the health of the pregnant woman and child apparently confirmed in this AP- based report.

UPDATE 2: Here is the complete text of the statement made by Hank Mullany, Senior Vice President and President, Northeast Divsion, Walmart US, on Friday, November 28, 2008: “We expected a large crowd this morning and added additional internal security, additional third party security, additional store associates, and we worked closely with Nassau County Police. We also erected barricades. Despite all our precautions, this unfortunate incident occurred. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the family of the deceased. We are continuing to work closely with local law enforcement and we are reaching out to those involved.”

UPDATE 3:The sister of Jdimytai Damour has filed wrongful death lawsuits against Walmart, the Green Acres Mall, and the Nassau County Police Department. Is anyone surprised?

Ice Cream as Presidential Election Metaphor

Yes, I’m about sick of the election process at this point, but I thought I should preserve this silly metaphor about voting in general and presidential politics especially.

In most every campaign I feel like a guy who goes to an ice cream shop hungry for a big cone of chocolate. When he arrives, however, he is told his only choices are vanilla and strawberry.

What’s the guy to do? He can only not ice cream or pick among undesired alternatives.  And if he loathes strawberry, what choice is left except vanilla, boring and routine as it is?

In Presidential elections, I haven’t eaten chocolate since 1988. Don’t get me started on state and local elections.

To those who are having their chocolate this election, God bless. I really want some chocolate ice cream at this point.

Now, if you want to read something more intelligent and God-centered on the Presidential race, read Claude Mariottini ’s post on this election. And if you have read it, read it again.<g>

A Personal Last Minute Election Change of Mind

I’m seriously considering voting for all the candidates who don’t inundate my phone and mailbox with their automated “Elect Me!” propaganda. Never mind the party they are associated with. Color me annoyed!

The economy may be down, but I will give good odds sales of answering machines are up Up UP! just to avoid those electronic political phone calls.

Whatever the election results, at least I will be much less irritated. Sheesh!