The Blessings of Baptism

1. It is the only religious ordinance (that I know of), that deals with guilt and shame equally at the same time. In the East, shame is the big issue--not measuring up to communal expectations. In the West, guilt is the primary issue, having crossed a line individually. Consider the wisdom of God to give us a practice that is capable of dealing with both our sociological and spiritual needs at once and across all cultural divides.
   

   
    

2. This 'enacted sinner's prayer' is far more memorable than any articulated prayer. Ask how many people remember what they 'said' when they converted; then ask how many remember where, when, and how they were baptized? God knows we are tactile. This is the perfect gift to help us remember our beginnings.
   

   
    

3. Furthermore, this 'sinner's prayer' is always said correctly. It is about the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. You CAN NOT DO IT WRONG! I need that with all the stupid things I say.
   

   
    

4. It starts our Christian walk right. We begin by imitating Jesus in his salvific act. It brings us to 'dead' center in our theology so that our beginning in Christ aims at the core of Christianity as well as our ultimate destiny of resurrection.
   

   
    

5. The Scriptures bind together this gift with the promise of a cleansed conscience and the gift of the Holy Spirit. I want that!
   

 

I'm not so stricken with the question of 'only one way to convert'. I suspect God is far more creative than we give him credit for. However, given these five blessings of baptism, it boggles my mind why anyone would be contentious in refusing such a gift directly from the hand of Jesus, especially when it models the self-abnegation he enjoined on his disciples.

Does Confession of Sin bring Physical Healing?

James 5:15 suggests that the prayer of faith brings healing. Interestingly, this very unusual word for prayer is used only two other times and it is translated both times as "vow" (Acts 18:18; 21:23). This is, of course, accompanied by the Elders anointing the sick person with oil (v. 14) as well as confession of sins (v. 16). Thus it appears that this trio—Elders' oil, vow of faith, and the confession of sins—comprise a sacred request for healing. This raises a number of questions, but here I would like to address just one: the confession of sins as part of the healing process. I never anoint anyone with oil without first asking this question: Do you have any unconfessed sin in your life? There is simply too much power in the process of anointing to allow the infection of sin to be present with it. While sickness and sin are not always connected (cf. John 9:1-2), there certainly is Biblical precedent for connecting the two. Often sickness results from physiological causes of sin (anxiety, breaking the Sabbath principle, chemical abuse, etc), but there is also the spiritual curse of sin that affects the body. Paul explains that those who take the Lord' Supper improperly expose themselves to sickness or even death: "That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep" (1 Cor 11:30). Moreover, over half of the demonic episodes in the Gospels involve sicknesses of various sorts—blind, deaf, mute, epileptic, scoliosis. Hence, both demonization (often connected to sin) and unconfessed sin can cause sickness. Thus, the confession of sins seems to be essential to healing. What does this have to do with a blog about self-abnegation? Everything! Our road to healing involves revealing our secret sins and submitting to the community leaders. The reason many are still sick, even after praying to God for healing, is because their pride and self-dependence inhibits them from open confession and accountability which yields spiritual power even for the healing of the body. Obviously, we have no promises of health and wealth even if we are completely obedient to God's counsel. But many are suffering needlessly because they refuse to heed the word of God, denying themselves in order to receive God's blessing.

A Theology of (un)Valentine’s Day

Ah, love is in the air. It is a day to hold hands, sigh sweetly, and make Hallmark a bundle of money. Perhaps this is the cynic coming out of me, but I suspect that for many women this day is a test to see if the old boy will live up to even a minimal standard of affection. One the other hand, for most men, it is unwelcomed added stress on the heels of a taxing Christmas season. Let's face it gentlemen, we just aren't that good at creative gift-giving, especially when it involves chocolate or Victoria's Secret.

There is, however, another side of Valentine's Day that is usually muted, namely, the huge single population for whom this day is a tacit reminder that romantic love is not part of the current fabric of their lives. For them this day betrays the fact that they have no partner with whom to share this level of love—no whispered sweet nothings, no gentle kisses, no promises 'til death doth us part'. That can be a terribly lonely feeling and often society's implicit evaluation of such a state is negative.

However, the word of God speaks differently of singleness. Sure, there are texts where barren women felt abandoned by God (1 Samuel 1:1–10) or where a divorcee was ostracized by a community (John 4:16–19). But for the believer, such a state may be a call of God to single-minded devotion to the kingdom. For example, Paul considered his singleness a gift from God for the work of the Gospel (1 Cor 7:6). He puts it this way: "An unmarried man is concerned about the Lord's affairs—how he can please the Lord. But a married man is concerned about the affairs of this world—how he can please his wife—and his interests are divided" (1 Cor 7:32–34). Another example is Philip's four virgin daughters (Acts 21:9). Their singleness was connected to their activity as prophetesses—their devotion to their ministries was mentioned with their marital status. This doesn't prove they were single in order to prophesy, but it is suggestive. One could also note that Jesus was single all his life and it would be difficult to say that he was somehow deficient as a human being because of it. Undoubtedly, Christian singles in the early church experienced the same struggles singles do today—loneliness, vulnerability, and lust, which is probably why Paul had to exhort Timothy to flee youthful lusts (2 Tim 2:22). Nonetheless, Christian singles were, and are, an indispensible part of the body of Christ; often they look more like Jesus, Paul, and Timothy than those who have a significant other.

To those of you who are single, please receive this commendation on this day: According to the Bible, you are not deficient, cursed, or broken (you don't need to be fixed or even 'fixed up'). We thank God for you as persons and for the example you offer of single-minded devotion to Christ. To that end, allow me to give this exhortation: Don't forget our single brothers and sisters for whom Valentine 's Day may be very lonely. If you read this message and agree with the value of singles, carve out the time today to phone an 'unValentine' and affirm his or her value and friendship to you. Buy an extra card or box of chocolates and tell someone without a lover that they are dearly loved.

Mark & Barbara Moore

 

Arrogance and Atheism in Christian service

John 3:30 records the zenith of the Baptist's theology: "He must increase but I must decrease." This sentiment has become a mantle of many ministries. That is, guys like me pack their blackberries with emails, engagements, and writing assignments 'for the glory of Christ'. Yet I cannot help but wonder at others and feel compelled to confess for my own culpability in using this 'mantel' as a cloaked ruse for self-promotion. As I sit here alone in my study at nine p.m. nursing a head-ache from another overstuffed day, it occurs to me that Jesus did not intend for me to live like this. My commitments are not all for the glory of God; my own career advancement also looms on the horizon, as does my ever lurking pride and future social security. Allow me, please, to share a truth, from hypocritical lips: If you have more to get done in your day than can be reasonably accomplished without frustration, pressure, impatience or negligence of prayer, a word of peace, a slowly sipped cup of tea, and a linger kiss, I question whether your agenda was completely constructed by your creator. If I really believed Jesus in Matthew 6, that my reward would be in secret from a doting father, I doubt I would work so hard to appropriate such recognition from so many illegitimate venues. Forgive me for setting such a poor example of a life of balance under the glorious liberation of seeking only the glorification of Christ.

Is Yahweh Kenotic?

Philippians 2:7–8 says Jesus "made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant…. he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross!" The words "made himself nothing" are based on the Greek word kenosis, meaning a 'self-emptying or humiliation'. Christian theology recognizes the kenosis of Jesus but can we speak of the kenosis of God? Can we suppose that he, in some way, is humble, suffering, or self-effacing? If Jesus was correct when he told Philip, "Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father" (John 14:9) or if the writer of Hebrews is right to suggest Jesus is the "exact representation" of God (Hebrew 1:3), then perhaps it is not such heresy to understand God as one who suffers or is humble or self-effacing. Zechariah 12:10 contains this provocative text: "And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son." The first sentence obviously speaks of Yahweh, since he alone has the authority to pour out a spirit of grace. The second sentence is thus confusing, for the first pronoun 'look on me' seems to refer back to Yahweh but then the next pronoun switches to 'mourn for him'. So who get's pierced? God or another? The idea that God could get pierced was unthinkable in Judaism. That is perhaps why the Septuagint altered the Hebrew word slightly so it read 'danced' instead of 'pierced'—they didn't pierce Yahweh, they danced (derisively) against him. But what if God can be pierced? What if he can suffer injury? What if he is not so far above us that he is unaffected by our pain, sorrow, or sin? In short, what if Yahweh really is like Jesus?

Advice on Sexual Temptation

The following advice was given to a brother struggling with sexual sin: "Like most men you will struggle with sexual temptation all your life. But let's be honest, most of our failures are deliberate. When you provide yourself with privacy and opportunity (dating alone, late nights with a computer, hotel rooms, isolation, locked doors, etc.) you will inevitably fail. Our penchant for 'alone-time' is planned failure sexually. Stop putting yourself in situations where you know you could fail because this is only allowing yourself to fail knowing that you will apologize to God later. This is pathetic discipleship. I admitted to myself years ago that I was a sexual wretch. I come by it naturally. So instead of trying to be pure I decided to be wise. My success or failure is seldom dependent on my self-control but on my living in open community where I don't allow myself the privacy to fail. Yes we need to work on self-control but even more effective I have found is confession of sin, communal living, pre-sin accountability (telling brothers where and when I will be in known danger), and orchestrating my environment to minimize privacy. This would include where and when you go on dates, with whom you live, placement of computers, and who knows your schedule. If you can't be a good man you better be a wise man."

First and Last Red Letters

How can we share Jesus' a single-minded devotion to the purpose of God? Clearly, he is impressive in his focused obedience to God's plan for his life. Even if he was not the Son of God, one would have to admit that his life is exemplary for his clarity of focus. So what factor(s) contributed to Jesus' uncanny ability toward a single-minded goal? One could, of course, point to dozens of attributes of Jesus, particularly with an idealized portrait of omniscience, omnipotence, and a number of other Docetic attributes of a superhuman untouched be mortal limitations. However, Jesus lived with real pressures and temptations as part of his self-imposed limitations of incarnation. That being said, what can be said about his peculiarly focused life? For the time being, we can focus merely on two texts from one author. Luke provides us with the very first and the very last red letters of Jesus' earthly life. In Luke 2:49, the pubescent 'run-away' retorted to his mother's impassioned rebuke, "Why were you searching for me? Didn't you know I had to be about my Father's business?" [Some versions will translate: "In my Father's House."] Then Luke 23:46 offers the other book-end of Jesus-speak from the cross: "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit." These two form a fascinating inclusio. Both offer two striking characteristics of Jesus that really speak to the question of his single-minded focus. First, both of them indicate Jesus' self-abnegation under the shadow of his absolute theism. He was so convinced that God would care for him that he willingly poured out his own life in self-less service to Yahweh. Second, as was his habit, he addressed Yahweh as "Father," fully persuaded that his great God would care tenderly and intimately for his needs. If we have those two tandem commitments—self-abnegation and the goodness of Father-God—then our lives will display incredible focus of purpose and energy.

Greg Fish on Hispanic Ministry

I love the church.  I love ministry.  I love Hispanic ministry.  But there is one thing that I don't like about many models out there.  To give a little context to my thoughts here, I've been in Brownsville, TX (on the border by the sea) for two years.  I have taken part in and am a member of the Alianza Ministerial Evangélica de Brownsville (an Spanish ministerial alliance) which is celebrating 50 years this year to be precise, this week.  So the big 3 day celebration is underway and will culminate with tonight's dinner/ concert.  Over 900 tickets have been sold, the event center is ready and waiting.  It would have been good for me to be present at the last meeting, but I was busy pulling into the gates of Sea World with my boys only to find that they were closed, but that's beside the point.  Had I been there, I would have known what exactly was being planned.  I found this little detail last night over the loudspeaker-- that the "princes of the church" (a reference made of pastors) would be seated together at the front (the head table, so to speak), a place of honor.  Having conversed with another pastor over the phone this morning, I came to know that "we" would be served on china, and everyone else on cardboard plates. 

 
 

I know I'm not the only one who feels this way, but I would rather be with my people than up there.  My people asked if there was arranged seating.  I told them we'd all try and sit together.  In fact, the speaker that has been flown in to speak three nights has been hammering this point in, community-- not individualism.  Yet those running the show really seem to relish this place of honor.  Self-abnegation is lacking in many circles in the Hispanic Christian community.  This is not the only instance, it's just something that has brought it all back.  I've even lost people to another church, because I was too down to earth.  Down here, the pastor is elevated so high, to a place that certainly does not jive with scripture.  It would do some people good to revisit John 3:30.  I would guess that if Jesus were at tonight's event, even He would rather sit with the sheep, over dining with the "dignitaries".

 
 

I just may have to make a subtle statement tonight.  One of my jobs tonight is to video the event.  So I can probably discreetly choose an outside table for video-filming purposes.  After all, who's gonna want the distraction of a video camera up front and center?

Jesus’ Lethal Love for the Lame

"Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame" (Luke 14:21). With these words Jesus reached the apex of his parable on the Kingdom of God as a banquet. He was responding specifically to a Pharisee who asked about the Messianic banquet in the Last Days. Apparently Jesus' parable expressed itself in his praxis so that the literal blind and lame sought his healing at the very gates of the Temple from which they were excluded (Matt 21:14–15). Now most of us will say, "Now isn't that nice—Jesus incorporated the marginalized and offered them a seat at the table." In actuality, it was not nice, it was socially subversive. You see, Jesus is not merely offering them a seat; he is offering them somebody else's seat: "I tell you, not one of those men who were invited will get a taste of my banquet" (Luke 14:24). To make matters worse, this offer was against every Jewish expectation for the lame and the blind. Leviticus rejects the blind and lame from the Priesthood (21:18) and Kind David used the epitaph 'lame and blind' to describe his enemies (2 Sam 5:8). In Qumran the blind and lame were excluded from fighting in the eschatological battle because they were unclean (1QM 7:4). For the same reason they were excluded from the Messianic banquet: "Every person smitten…in his feet or hands, lame or blind or deaf…let these persons not enter…" (1 QSa 2:3–7).

The Jewish view of the lame could not be clearer than in the Targumim (Aramaic interpretive paraphrases of the OT). Three times the OT prophets promised healing and inclusion to the lame: "I will save the lame and gather the outcast" (Zeph 3:19); "Then shall the lame man leap like a dear" (Isa 35:6); and "I will assemble the lame and gather those who have been driven away, and those whom I have afflicted; and the lame I will make a remnant" (Micah 4:6–8). The Targumim, however, replace the word 'lame' with the word 'exile' so as to apply the promise to the Diaspora Jews rather than to the literal lame who remained marginalized under the cloud of uncleanness and God's curse. Jesus, in the most striking contrast, not only included the lame, but seated them at the head of the parabolic banquet. Is it any wonder, with such social subversion, that his life was in jeopardy long before his 'triumphal' entrance into the capital city?

Can a Christian be Demon-Possessed?

[I am diverging from our John 3:30 theme to answer this question from an email]. First we must recognize that the term "Demon-Possession" is not biblical. The bible simply uses the term 'demonized'. This term is appropriately fluid and can mean everything from tempting, to attacks, to psychological manipulation, to physical control. Obviously, then, Christians can be demonized at some level. Second, to say that a Christian cannot be 'possessed' by a demon because God owns (or 'possesses') them, is to use the term 'possess' in two different senses—one being 'influence' the other being 'ownership'. Third, 1 John 4:4 is often used as a proof-text against Christians being demonized: "the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world." Contextually, however, this verse is claiming that Christians (plural) will ultimately win the Spiritual battle because Jesus is more powerful than the anti-Christ(s). It does not really address the issue of an individual's struggle with a demon. Fourth, the claim that the Spirit of God indwelling us 'fills' us so completely that there is no room for an evil spirit is to place physical constrictions of our world on spiritual entities. It does not appear that the spirit world operates under the same physics as we do. Thus, the metaphor of 'filled-up-and-out-of-space' is inadequate. Fifth, the common misperception that God will not dwell where sin is (i.e. the Holy Spirit would not inhabit the same physical body as an evil spirit), neglects the omnipresence of the Holy Spirit. If he is everywhere, then how can he not co-exist with evil at some level in this world? Furthermore, since my old man is still quite active, how can he indwell me? Sixth, our Western assumption that life must be fair and that innocent people should not suffer is, at best, counter to reality. One ought not to expect the spirit world to operate under common expectations of Democratic Capitalism and Western 'rights' of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Having said all that, I'll now state my opinion quite clearly. (Please recognize this is my opinion based not primarily on Scripture, which is virtually mute on this question, but on testimony of others and personal observations.) A Christian can be demonized. While it would be virtually impossible for an obedient Christian, steeped in Scripture, worship, and community, to be vulnerable to full demonization (i.e. 'possession'), one could be demonized prior to conversion through occult practices, drugs, sex, or even ancestral pledges by those involved in such things. Baptism promises the forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit; it does not necessarily exorcise demons who have a stronghold in a person's life at the time of conversion. This requires renunciation of vows and release of spiritual 'rights' a demon claims on the victim. How such exorcism takes place is a whole other question.