Been outta town a lot this week... and last.  Sorry to have dissed my bloggies - er, bloggites - er, whatever blog readers are called -- during that time!

I got to spend last weekend in WV visiting family and then heading to OH to visit with fellow former-Chinese orphans and their adoptive parents (the kids are American sons and daughters now), as well as my friends at the Philip Hayden Foundation.  It was wonderful seeing Tim Baker, Leah Zimmer, Andy Ackermann and all their families again (some for the first time face-to-face).  Good times.

I spent this week in Charlotte, NC and Newport News, VA before settling in at home this weekend.  Today I got to paint the laundry room with my wife, go shopping with our 4yr old curly-girly, picked flowers on the side of the road for my wife, as well as getting her Starbucks coffee, mowed the lawn, bought a new weed-whacker, whacked and trimmed the lawn, re-seeded and watered where the Verizon guys dug up to install FiOS in my neighborhood, went grocery shopping, fixed a couple of kids' toys with Super Glue, cleaned the drains (you'd be surprised what 5 girls in one house can do to a sink drain), read a chapter in Mark Driscoll's new book, Religion Saves + 9 other misconceptions (which, BTW, I won at the Advance09 Conference), worked out with my wife (we did the Yoga X workout from P90X) and read my Bible.  Wonderful day!  Oh, yeah, and we all prayed together as a family to start our day... no wonder it went so well!!

Anyway, we're back onto the topic of the 1689 London Baptist Confession, and we're winding down the first chapter, Of The Holy Scriptures.  Without further delay, today's confession article:

 

9. The infallible rule of interpretation of Scripture is the²¹ Scripture itself; and therefore when there is a question about the true and full sense of any Scripture which is not manifold, but one, it must be searched by other places that speak more clearly.
²¹2 Peter 1:20, 21; Acts 15:15, 16 

This one's a favorite.  Scripture interprets Scripture.  We're done.

 

Okay, so I won't leave it like that.  The note here is that, when one comes across an obscure or vague passage of Scripture -- or if you read it and just don't understand, or if it seems to have contradicted another passage, or any other myriad confusion points or misunderstandings --  keep reading and don't just assume something's wrong.  One of the things I hear all the time against Christianity is that the Bible is "full of contradictions", or some such charge.  I guess the funny part is, usually when I hear that I ask, "like which passage?", and I get something to the extent of, "well, I don't remember any right now, but there are lots of them".

What is usually found out, after continued reading or cross-referencing, is that either the passage was misunderstood, or has a meaning greater than its immediate context.  In fact, most of these so-called "contradictions" or "errors" are rather simplistic to resolve.  There are, admittedly, difficult passages that may not have a solid, reasonable understanding -- and likely because the linguistic, historical & cultural contexts lose us.  We just don't get some things today that may well have been clear "back then", because... well, we ain't never been there!

In short, the rule here is that, if a particular passage seems out of sorts or contrary to the rest of Scripture, don't assume it's erroneous or contrarian, rather that your understanding may be limited.  Instead of leaving it there, consult the rest of Scripture -- finish the passage in context; read the cross-references; check out the concordance; or, ask a friend!  Use the resources you have to find the meaning of Scripture in Scripture.  That will help you develop a deeper understanding, and a greater passion for the Word of God.

Sola Scriptura! 

Well, we just got home from visiting family out in West Virginia. I'm hoping to be back on the blogging/Facebook/Twitter trail full on in the next couple of days. I've got some business travel forthcoming, so please pray for safe travels, and that my actions & words would speak to the power of His name. Lord, please help me to make much of you in all that I do! SDG!

Biblical discipline.  Sometimes that phrase strikes fear in the hearts of churchgoers the world over.  It's like saying "the tide is low" to a surfer's conference:  you get this depressed, dreaded sigh.  Still, carrying on with our previous points about biblical discipleship and biblical discipline being key components to not only the resurgence of the church, but the overall vitality of the church, we come to this discussion with some humility... hopefully.

Biblical discipline isn't just "Matthew 18", and I'm not going to expound upon the finer points of church discipline in this column (at least, not today).  The point needing to be driven is that a healthy church practices biblical church discipline.  That means that the leadership *and* the congregation understand what it means to be "disciplined".  Most just associate that with excommunication, or public humiliation, which is why the dread comes when even casually mentioning it.  No, biblical discipline is so much more than that... so much richer than that.  And the point isn't to hurt or humiliate or remove someone, it's intended for the restoration of a brother to the fold of Christ.  It's the reconciliation of sisters who, under our Heavenly Father, are still a part of the same spiritual family and need to, as each is a part of the Body, cooperate and move forward together.  I know that sounds like absurd idealism, but it's something that we as a church have skewed from.  We've let the world tell us that we shouldn't discipline folks, that we should be "tolerant" (without actually defining the term), that "Jesus is love" and forgetting, or ignoring, the fact that discipline is a part of love.

A recovery of biblical discipline also means being willing to help a brother or sister out when you first notice sin in their lives.  It's not running around with your "sin"dex finger in people's faces going, "sinner!  repent!" (although, there's probably a place for that, too...), while living in sin yourself (Matt 7:1ff).  But, it also doesn't mean letting your brother or sister remain in sin just because you know you have sin in your life and are "in no place to tell someone else they're wrong".  Both are extremes that are biblically unsupported.  You *should* warn your spiritual family when you note them in sin, and you should be willing to take note of when someone points it out in your life.  This is the essence of grace within the household of God!  Jesus, the ultimate Grace given to us by our Father God, His sacrifice, His resurrection, His Spirit living within us -- those should be our guidance.  Those should be points of our compass (they'll all point North, BTW) helping us to find our way in and through this world of sin.  Will you stumble?  No question!  Will I?  Just did!

Getting back to the "church idolators" -- these folks will be in your local church body, and some can help it, others maybe not.  The caution I give you is to not return Pharisaicalism with Pharisaicalism, especially cuz you read it on some dude's blog...  Ahem!

Love these folks, reach out to them, show no partiality for God doesn't (Romans 2:11).  Listen, I had a great lunch today with a dear friend (hi, Dennis!) who reminded me that I, too, come from a "failed church" and, as an elder, I failed to fully act upon my duties to discipline and disciple.  I can't think of a single man that I took under my wings as an elder that I purposed to help grow in biblical love, knowledge, trust, faith, understanding, and strength.  I also was part of an elder board who totally bombed biblical discipline - and probably damaged many within the body of that church as a result.  I said then, and I say again, to my shame publicly, that I know I will stand before our Lord on the Day and give an account for my error during that time.  I will.  But, I don't live sullen or despondent of that fact.  I rejoice in the grace that I have received - that we all have received - in the penal substitutionary atonement of Jesus Christ, his life, death, resurrection and coming kingdom, and in the giving of his Spirit to those our Father calls "sons" and "daughters".  How much grace should we extend one another?  Peter asked that same question in Matthew 18.  Go check out Jesus' answer...

I don't have all the answers to the wrongs in the church, and there isn't some magical formula that will fix it all, but I can say that when we make much of Jesus, we'll return to a right understanding of biblical discipleship, discipline, grace, mercy, love, compassion, and justice.  We'll stop feeling like we were wronged, and we'll remember that, ultimately, it was Christ who was wronged.  Will we have perfect churches then?  Not in this life, I don't think.  But,  I do think we'll be a healthier, closer-to-spotless bride awaiting her Bridegroom, not because of works we have done to earn His merit, but because of all He's done for us through His grace.

 

SDG! 

So, my good friend @bobbywastaken commented on my inability to download iPhone 3.0 today until later this afternoon (admittedly, I was a little too excited about that), and how I should blog about "iPhone Idolatry", or somesuch.  Well, here's that blog entry, Bobby!

BTW -- speaking of "iDolatry 3.0":  good ole Bobby stayed awake until at least 0413 EST today waiting to download it... wonder who's more the idolater here.  Hmmm....

 

In my last post I left you thinking that those folks who complained about newcomers in their church were mean, irritable, despicable, loathsome jerks without hope.  Okay, for some that may be true, but generally speaking these individuals are still to be treated as your brothers and sisters in Christ.  Admittedly, there are those in the church who are not regenerate (see Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion for a discussion on the "visible" and "invisible" church), and some of these folks may well be such, BUT we should not assume that right away.  Even Christians get led astray, including you & me, so let's watch our hearts when broaching this issue.  I think this is an issue to be addressed by getting to the heart of the problem:  church idolatry.

So, I asked the question before, "Why?"  The answer lies somewhere in the pastors'¹ laps.  (We "young 'ens" have a role in this as well, which I will talk about in the next post.)

The pastors of previous generations tended to be sole pastors, and they tended to [unintentionally] foster a sense of hubris in their churches by: 1) encouraging isolation from "secular" influences to the degree of creating this Christian sub-culture that is nothing recognizable to the un-churched, 2) minimized the need to act as missionaries in the culture (or the world), and 3) allowing congregants [read: tithers] to influence them with near-biblical authority.

Sure there're more reasons, but I actually believe these, as stated in the previous post, stem ultimately from a failure in two arenas (in order of import):  biblical discipleship & biblical discipline.  Young pastors & seminarians:  TAKE NOTE!

Biblical discipleship needs to be recovered.  Pastors who are retiring or are about to retire undoubtedly have no direct successor to whom they are handing over the under-shepherding role in their local church body.  I'd love to see a statistic of the number of retiring pastors who never created a "succession plan" for pastoring the body Jesus gave them to steward over (Ed Stetzer:  Got one?  LMK!).  That's one of the problems:  it has been previously assumed that this church is "Pastor Bill's church", or "Reverend James' church", or somesuch.  How in the world is anyone to take up that mantle??  Wait:  isn't this Jesus' church?

So, these guys are leaving office, so to speak, and they didn't plan on having a successor until they started planning for their retirement.  If then!  Add to that the relationships that have been established over the many, many years (having been there for generations of marriages, births, marriages, funerals, grandchildren births, etc.), and there comes a sense of intimacy that is difficult to repeat.  When the new pastor comes along, he may be dealing with a rejection of change, not him personally.  In fact, that is highly likely to happen in that environment.

Well, how do we fix this?  I'm not sure it's easily "fixed" immediately, save to encourage younger pastors to return to the heart of biblical discipleship.  That means spending time with men, both young and old, and teaching them to study the Bible for themselves, to pray for their families, to care for others' needs, to truly understand the Gospel and its power in our lives, to be involved in missions (both near and far, short- and long-term), to understand sound doctrine -- basically to raise up elders from within their midst as each are called.  If someone is gifted in preaching, let them preach!  If someone is gifted in teaching, get them teaching!  And so it goes...

The second arena in which we need to address a lack is in biblical discipline.  But, that will have to wait until the next post.

  

 

 

¹ When I refer to "pastors" in this article, I am also including elders, irrespective of whether they are vocational or lay elders.