No More Hollywood Sermons

Published
by
Dan
on 11/18/2008
in Bible Study
. 1 Comment

Last weekend I taught 3 times at a Jr. high - Sr. High retreat. there were 5 nazarene churches, so there were about 50 kids and 50 leaders. It was a very good time.

I’m learning that I don’t have to have a big finish when I teach. The big finish, the big closing statement, the final conclusion, is how movies end, not necessarily how you finish preaching the Gospel. Stand up comedians tell their second best joke first, and their best joke last, so that you leave the people laughing. Why? so that they will remember you, and a lot of times people project their very last feeling onto the whole night. In the American Church we have become so accustomed to a sermon being an entertaining/emotional event, that many preachers now have their sermon follow the same flow that a hollywood movie follows:

1. Attention grabbing opening
2. Background explanation of the opening and then transition
3. Slow build up to pre-impact statements
4. Settle down into seriousness after pre-impact statement
5. Build or interesting twist from seriousness into whopper final point
6. Climactic call to action or passionate point of sermon
7. Slow and steady cool-down into next part of the church service
(rinse and repeat steps 3-5 as time allows)

I hope this doesn’t look too cynical, but it was just this past weekend that I realized that this is the sub-concious formula I thought that all sermons had to follow. As I look over the Gospels, Jesus never taught this way at all; I think it’s because He TAUGHT.

I’m done.

I’m not going back to that.

If your point is excitement or entertainment, or membership retention, those steps are fine, but from now on I’m going to teach. I’m not sure what it looks like, but it sure feels good to be free from the idea that I have to ‘finish strong’.

Judging the Law Rightly

Published
by
Dan
on 11/9/2008
in Bible Study
. 1 Comment

“Jesus said to them, “I did one miracle, and you are all astonished. Yet, because Moses gave you circumcision (though actually it did not come from Moses, but from the patriarchs), you circumcise a child on the Sabbath. Now if a child can be circumcised on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses may not be broken, why are you angry with me for healing the whole man on the Sabbath? Stop judging by mere appearances, and make a right judgment.””
(John 7:21-24 NIV)

More and more I am seeing that Jesus just does things differently than we have thought things should be. I am reminded of Isaiah 58, where God says “Is this the kind of fast I have chosen, only a day for a man to humble himself? Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed and for lying on sackcloth and ashes? Is that what you call a fast, a day acceptable to the LORD?” (Is 58:5 NIV)
By the warping of the Law, fasting became fasting for the sake of fasting, and it was just about not eating. The Sabbath became a day when you COULDN’T do this and that, instead of a day of resting and reflecting and looking at all the things God had done in the past week and allowing Him to be the focal point and One and Only Achiever for that day.
I almost want to go back and start reading in Exodus and Leviticus, and look at every law from the perspective of God wanting to do something or show Himself through that Law. One day and the Donut Bank a guy quizzed me when I walk talking about the Babylonian exile.
“Why did God haul all of those people off?”
“Because they had turned away from God.”
“What was the main way they did that?” He asked me with a look on his face like he knew the answer and was just testing me.
“Be…cause they did not give the land a Sabbath rest every seven years. God exiled them and the land had 70 years of Sabbath rest.”
“Well why does God care so much about land?! I thought he cared about people and not land resting?”
I had to think for a minute, and he sat there and didn’t break the silence, and none of my Bible study buddies chimed in b/c I think they were afraid of getting the interrogation next! Then I thought of the answer, “Because God wanted them to know that He would provide for them if they followed His ways. It wasn’t about the land getting a break, it was about the people seeing that God would provide for them on that 7th year when they did not plant or harvest.”

That answer must have been the one he was looking for, because he laughed and we all went back to talking about God in a more conversational and less quiz way.

That conversation and this section where Jesus is telling the Pharisees to judge rightly about healings taking precedence over the Sabbath makes me want to investigate these laws. The Father did not give these laws in the same spirit that people put the ten commandments up at a courthouse, He gave them to be a magnet to Himself.

When a student of a rabbi got something in his teaching wrong, the rabbi would shout at him and tell him he had abolished the entire law by getting that one point wrong. Whenever the student got one thing right, just one little slice of understanding of the law, the rabbi would commend him and tell him that he had just fulfilled the whole law, just by getting that one thing right. (they were seriously into hyperbole)

The Law was given to draw people to God. After a sufficient time of scrambling that Law into a horrible system, God sent Jesus to fulfill the task of drawing people to God. He fulfilled the Law by showing us the intent of the Law.

From Field Goals to Neighbors

Published
by
Dan
on 11/3/2008
in Bible Study and Urbia
. 0 Comments

“Yet, because Moses gave you circumcision (though actually it did not come from Moses, but from the patriarchs), you circumcise a child on the Sabbath. Now if a child can be circumcised on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses may not be broken, why are you angry with me for healing the whole man on the Sabbath?”
(John 7:22-23 NIV)

I was just thinking about this and how God cared so much more about people being in a relationship with Him and having faith in Him than doing all of this stuff just right. To the Pharisees, all of life hinged on making sure you did every single thing just right and if someone did something wrong, finding out who did it and what exactly they did wrong.

God does not want us to be monitors and recorders of who wrongs us either. The Pharisees had a complicated flow-chart life of answering every moral question they could have. On what day should we circumcise a boy? What if that day is a sabbath? What if that day is a feast day? They could just click through the flowchart and think they knew what God wanted. Fast-forward that a couple thousand years, and they forget who that flowchart came from, and who it points to.

Saturday, my next door neighbor had a fire in his kitchen. Joe (my neighbor) severely burned his hands and had to be taken to Louisville for a few days to save his fingers. He is still there. He called me and asked me to take care of his dog and house and bring his stuff to the hospital, namely his laptop so he could skype his wife in Taiwan. On my way home I thought about Joe, and I thought about calling a guy at church that helped us move down here and get into living in the inner city.

At that moment I realized that for the past few years, maybe even a decade, I have viewed everyone I’ve worked with or been neighbors with as someone to be targeted, served, witnessed to, and converted. I haven’t been very open about that, but it has come out some as I talk about them, or think about them, or pray for them. That was my whole life with every person I came in contact with in Asia, and my whole point of moving to where I’ve moved.

But as I was driving home, I was praying for Joe’s fingers, and he just became Joe. He is a computer guy by trade, and if he lost his fingers it would be a big big big deal. I didn’t care about finding a way to witness to him or wonder if I should have slipped a bible into his computer bag or prayed by his bedside or something, I just cared about him being healed.

I feel like in my flowchart lifestyle, I’ve disconnected myself some from people God loves, and just gone off of a self-created mandate to do christian things for people. I think God is starting to free me from my christianese and showing me how to just follow Jesus. He’s working into me a real love for my co-workers and neighbors that doesn’t keep track of a law and how they are breaking it, but instead is beginning to sincerely love them and care about them as normal people and not field goals. I can only imagine how much more the life of Jesus will shine out to real people instead of goals, but I’m not going to concern myself with that, else I just go right back where I was. I’ll focus on Jesus, and His glorious ways, and love my neighbors at the same time.

God is Seeking for Us to Know Him, not ABOUT Him

Published
by
Dan
on 11/2/2008
in Bible Study
. 2 Comments

John 7:19 Has not Moses given you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law. Why do you seek to kill me?”

This sentence is out of place unless you know from other narration what is going on. It just goes to show that God can see right inside our hearts and motives to penetrate our lives. Just like we know that there were men there that were seeking to kill Him, we know that there were men there that had broken the Law of Moses. Jesus didn’t have to call out names or specifics against people, because he wasn’t interested in shame for shame’s sake. He was genuinely interested in the Pharisees turning away from their sin!

When Jesus says “If anyone chooses to do God’s will, he will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own.” (John 7:17) He’s not putting an impossible riddle out for them. The Father wants people to come to Him and to do His will. The Father wants people to bring Him glory and not seek their own. The trouble is that the Pharisees speak in law language that says, “Just tell me what to do.” i.e. activities, outward motions, etc. But Jesus speaks LIFE language that says, “Here is how to be.”

I heard recently that there is a tremendous increase in the popularity of Buddhism in the United States-even among Christians. When further research was done, some people found that for the most part Christianity was taught as a system of intellectual beliefs or instructions, and Buddhism was taught as a way of life. As always, I find my self wondering about the people that are leaving Christianity for Buddhism and if they would have done it had they known Jesus rather than Christianity.

When God said “4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 6 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. 7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. 8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”
He meant for us to live this way. Unfortunately, people turned it into rules of where they should hang things, and so they hung them there and no where else.

That’s why they are so confused and ask “How did this man get such learning without having studied?” The knew all about God’s book. They knew all about every idea about God’s book, but they failed to know God. There are numerous people all over China that have only held in their hands a single page of the Bible, yet from their closeness and openness to God, they live lives more full of Jesus than many graduates from American seminaries.

Jesus talked so much in this section about bringing glory to God and knowing God, but didn’t give any specific instructions. It’s almost like God doesn’t want us to ever have a chance to check something off of our list of following Him. He doesn’t want us to have a list! You can’t just sell all you have, you can’t just leave your family, you can’t just do this thing or that thing, because every time someone asks Him what to do, He changes on them! God is God, and He will not fit into a task list unless its as nebulous as

  1. Believe in the One He sent
  2. Seek His glory
  3. Do His will
  4. Work for His honor
  5. Don’t judge by appearances

I love it because you could read every one of those and then say, “well how do I do that?!” and Jesus’ answer really would be different for every one of us. (I think I want to save and continue this nebulous list I enjoy it so much.)

Seeking Our Own Glory

Published
by
Dan
on 11/1/2008
in Bible Study
. 1 Comment

John 7:18 The one who speaks on his own authority seeks his own glory; but the one who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and in him there is no falsehood.

I remember when I learned that no one in a desperate situation can be trusted. That was also when I learned not to ask people “can you do such and such?” because the guy I was asking would think, “my child hasn’t eaten in 4 days and this guy is going to pay me to do this, so I can figure it out.” Desperation brings out some of the worst things in people. I remember seeing women at the Shoe Carnival push and shove other women, over 40 even-I’m not talking about rowdy teens! over a 6 pack of socks! (if that can be referred to as desperation. I guess they felt like they were, nonetheless.)

I think of that same thing as I read about Jesus talking about people seeking their own glory. Here I am on the weekend before a big election and the news is nothing but people seeking their own glory. And what crazy foolishness God lets people get into when they are focused on their own glory! What silly things we do when we try to get people to like us! And the more diverse the people, the crazier our antics!

The fact that Jesus was not seeking His own glory but the glory of God must have been so absolutely foreign to the Pharisees. To imagine them doing something that would make someone else look good, at their expense, seems impossible. Jesus taught the truth without any care of his reputation or standing with other people. He was free from the bondage of acceptance-shopping, so He could treat everyone equally, rich or poor, powerful or weak, intellectual or simple.

I know I’ve written about this before, but Jesus didn’t need other people to tell Him who He was. He knew who He was, and He knew what God thought of Him, and that was all that He needed. That’s how we know that God does not show favoritism, because Jesus showed us what a person is like that needs no approval, and does not judge people on their outward appearance, or what they are tricked into thinking of our outward appearance.

Babylonian Commander Nebuzaradan cares for the Poor

Published
by
Dan
on 10/21/2008
in Bible Study
. 1 Comment

Jer. 39:10 But Nebuzaradan the commander of the guard left behind in the land of Judah some of the poor people, who owned nothing; and at that time he gave them vineyards and fields.

A commander of the Babylonian army sees fit to give land to people that are poor, but the people of Israel did not. They would not celebrate the Sabbath of the Land or return land to the family from which it came in the year of Jubilee.
What evil shame Nebuzaradan testified to when he gave the poor in the land vineyards and fields to work.

Churched by Matthew Paul Turner: Review By Mimicry

Published
by
Dan
on 10/14/2008
in Bookstore, Family Life and Short Quotes
. 2 Comments

When I was in second grade, I was of the age, just like everyone else in my second grade class, to have my First Communion. Mental maturity or physical maturity, or personal belief for that matter, didn’t really come into play, but since June of 1981 had come and gone and I lived until September and the start of second grade, I was ready for The Lord’s Supper.
Now before you can do something so Holy and powerful as eat the flesh and blood of Jesus, you have to confess your sins, so a few weeks before you have your First Communion, you have to undergo a much less fun, and less celebrated, First Confession. My 14 classmates and I sat at Holy Spirit School and Mrs. Vote explained to us what would happen.
“Whenever you are ready, but don’t wait too long, go up to Father and say ‘Forgive me Father, for I have sinned.’ and then he will ask you to tell him what you’ve done’.”
I forget the exact script, but that was the jist of it. Then, in order to help us think up some sins that we could confess, she began to make a list on the chalkboard. Lying to our mother, lying to our father, lying to our sister, lying to our brother, lying to our grandma, lying to our grandpa, cheating in class, fighting with our friends… “You want to tell him about three things that were sins that you’ve done”
THREE! I looked at the board. I had lying to my mom down, but I was an only child so that wiped out a lot of my options. All of the fighting I did fit more under the heading of getting beat up, so I couldn’t confess that. I started to think through the 10 commandments. I loved God and didn’t bow down to statues… I said “gosh” instead of “god”…I went to church on Sundays, and Mondays and Wednesdays and Fridays and any Holy day in between (benefit of going to Catholic School: on any day religion class could be cancelled and you’d have to go to Mass instead!) I honored my mother and my father (as far as I knew) and I still wasn’t sure about that adultery thing except that it was something that adults did. I was pretty sure I had probably stolen something. I couldn’t think of what, or when, but I was pretty sure I had.
“What if we only have two?” I asked. Mrs. Vote just kind of stared at me for a minute. I think she might have rung up an extra one in that moment while she was still talking and writing on the board, but interrupting your teacher wasn’t on her list.
“If you can only think of two, that’s fine, but try to have three.”
I stuck with my two. My first confession was still 3 days away, so I had time to add on number three.
***
The big day came and I was all dressed up in my school clothes and a tie. Since I wore navy pants and a long sleaved white shirt every day to school, getting dressed up was just putting on a tie or borrowing a suit that was too big. I was glad that for my first confession I just had to add the tie.
Our whole class went in and sat in the front few pews of the church. The priest said some stuff, and our parents looked across the aisle at all of us sitting together, proud as can be of their little confessors.
In a Catholic church, there is a stage area in the front. Not a stage like in a protestant church covered with electrical cables and theatrical lights and subwoofers propped up on Bibles, but a sacred stage. It’s an area of foreboding, and area that is very clean and clear and open and forbidden to civilians. You have to cross yourself whenever you pass the center line, so you learn to make your trips up there all on one side. I was an altar boy, so I had been all over on the sacred stage, except behind the altar. Only the priest went up there.
In front of the altar were two chairs, and after the priest said some things, he went and sat down in one of them, and then stared at all of us. There we were, expected, called, if you will, to come up and sit IN THE MIDDLE OF THE STAGE AND CONFESS OUR SINS! At least there was no microphone, but what about the cool closets on the side of the church?! What about the cool screen that you could go to and the priest wouldn’t know it was you confessing that you lied to your mother! Would he come next Tuesday and talk all about how we shouldn’t lie to our mothers like little Danny Sullivan did!?
One by one all of my friends went up and sat and talked and then came back down and prayed. They all seemed to come away with a big grin on their face, so it didn’t seem like such a bad thing. I went on up, hoping that no one else would go up at the same time and draw a lot of attention to me. It was bad enough having all of my friends sitting there watching, but their parents too! And my MOM! Would she hear? Would Father Foster tell her what I said?!
There was no turning back now, I crossed my self and stepped onto the holy stage. I went up and was greeted warmly and it was all over in about 15 seconds. After I was done, Fr. Foster told me to go say 10 ‘Our Fathers’ and 10 ‘Hail Marys’ and to not do it again. As I stood to walk off, he stopped me and said, “hold on,” was that not enough!? Did he just peer into my soul and notice one that I forgot?!
“Here you go, good job” he said, and handed me a Clark bar.
A Clark bar. Clark Bar
The crunchy peanut butter wrapped in chocolate taste of forgiveness was all mine. “Good job.”
I went smiling back to my seat and stared at my Clark bar for a few seconds before remembering the prayers I had to say.

***

That story was buzzing in my head the whole time I was reading “Churched.” I must say, if Matthew Turner wrote that out, it would be funnier than my version. (his website is www.matthewpaulturner.com )Turner does a very good job of telling stories in a way that you can definitely see what is WRONG about this story, but he doesn’t spoon feed you about what the right way should be.
Since a lot of the story happened when he was in 2nd ish grade, the book made me think a lot about how I’m raising my own sons. Do I mindlessly follow rules that when I really think them through, contradict the teachings of Jesus? Am I living a life-example that is different than the things I want my kids to learn about Jesus? I’m not sure, but Turner’s book has subtly made me consider those things, and consider how I steer my kids down their path towards God.
If you grew up in any church, Catholic or Protestant, this book is going to bring back some funny-only-in-retrospect memories. And if you didn’t grow up this way, you’d better read this book to make sure you aren’t awash in cultural legalism and calling it Christianity rather than living out the life of Jesus that has been resurrected into you.
So here’s the deal: I probably wouldn’t have picked this book up and read it if somebody didn’t ask me to, but I’m really glad that I did read it. I usually read stuff that’s a lot more complicated (on the surface anyway) and makes me angrier, so this was really refreshing. I wish all of my Christian books made my laugh till I had tears in my eyes. So I’m giving away a copy of this book. You can try to win one or go buy one, whichever.
So how should we do the contest? Should we do the comment thing and then I draw out a name? Or do some email thing? Or an in-person contest?
Oooh, wait wait wait! We’ll do an essay contest, yeah, that’s fun.
Write in the comments a short and weird church thing that happened to you growing up. I’ll read them to my wife, without saying your name, and the winner gets the book! That will be fun. No over-shares though, people, this is a public blog!
I’ll even give you a week to do it. You have until October 21 at Midnight.
The runner up will get a Clark bar.
Good job.

Short Quote from “Churched”

Published
by
Dan
on 10/7/2008
in Bookstore and Short Quotes
. 3 Comments

I’m reading “Churched” by Matthew Paul Turner right now, and so far I’ve laughed on every single page. Ok, there may have been one page that I didn’t laugh, but I don’t remember which one that was. This line was too funny to me not to share. It’s in reference to a seminary his pastor went to.

Nobody seemed to know exactly how Fyles Sanderson [seminary] was able to manufacture Christians into professional holy-rolling Baptists, but someone once told me it was similar to how poultry plants turned whole chickens into fryable bite-sized nuggets

It’s a funny read, and as of page 37, I recommend it as a great break from whatever other complicated stuff you might be reading. I’m going to give away a copy next week sometime, but until then you can buy it here…

The Ultimate, Fearless, Sovereign, Power Over Enemies, Grace of God shown in Jesus

Published
by
Dan
on 10/4/2008
in Bible Study and Urbia
. 1 Comment

I talked with a guy yesterday morning for a while about Judas being hand-picked by Jesus. I am overwhelmed at the true meaning of sovereignty shown by Jesus. One of THE TWELVE is “a devil” and He doesn’t flee or try to take him out! He actually shows him a LOT of mercy.

“He called his twelve disciples to him and gave them authority to drive out evil spirits and to heal every disease and sickness.
These are the names of the twelve apostles: first, Simon (who is called Peter) and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him.”
(Matt 10:1-4 NIV)

Jesus gave JUDAS authority to drive out evil spirits and to heal every disease and sickness!

What if we followed Jesus as His disciples, ones that imitate Him, and followed Him down this path?! He chooses men to follow Him, knowing full well that one of them will betray Him with a betrayal that results in His death. I can just imagine if Peter knew about it in advance.
“No Lord, he must not come with us. You’ll die!” says Peter
“Simon, Simon,” Jesus replies, “don’t you know that it is written

Psa. 55:12 If an enemy were insulting me, I could endure it; if a foe were raising himself against me, I could hide from him.
Psa. 55:13 But it is you, a man like myself, my companion, my close friend,
Psa. 55:14 with whom I once enjoyed sweet fellowship as we walked with the throng at the house of God.

And

Psa. 41:5 My enemies say of me in malice, “When will he die and his name perish?”
Psa. 41:6 Whenever one comes to see me, he speaks falsely, while his heart gathers slander; then he goes out and spreads it abroad.
Psa. 41:7 All my enemies whisper together against me; they imagine the worst for me, saying,
Psa. 41:8 “A vile disease has beset him; he will never get up from the place where he lies.”
Psa. 41:9 Even my close friend, whom I trusted, he who shared my bread, has lifted up his heel against me.

“”

So often it seems like we make decisions on the basis of our safety. Especially down here in our neighborhood. Too many times I think I make a decision on who to serve based on whether I can trust them or not, or whether they will be faithful and repay me for what I did for them, either in respect or kindness to my family or openness to Jesus.

But Jesus shows mercy completely free. He gave spiritual gifts to Judas so that the news of The Kingdom would go out, even though His messenger would betray Him to death! I think of giving a beggar some money out of fear of him coming back or guilt that he sees me in my house with all of my riches. Jesus would give to that beggar much more than my little $5 giftcard to McDonald’s, and know full well that the next day that beggar would be shouting for His execution.

The grace of God blows me away once again. I want that fearless, not-withholding grace power in my life!

The Consequences of Increasing Violence with Business

Published
by
Dan
on 9/30/2008
in Bible Study
. 1 Comment

“Through your widespread trade you were filled with violence, and you sinned. So I drove you in disgrace from the mount of God, and I expelled you, O guardian cherub, from among the fiery stones. Your heart became proud on account of your beauty, and you corrupted your wisdom because of your splendor. So I threw you to the earth; I made a spectacle of you before kings. By your many sins and dishonest trade you have desecrated your sanctuaries. So I made a fire come out from you, and it consumed you, and I reduced you to ashes on the ground in the sight of all who were watching.”
(Ezek 28:16-18 NIV)

I know that was about the King of Tyre, and flashing back to be about the devil, but who else does this apply to? Filled with violence because of widespread trade? Proud because of it’s beauty? Corrupt because of its beauty?  Desecrated the sanctuaries with dishonest business?

I’ll leave off what I’m alluding to, in case any of my friends ever want to become president of the United States of America.

May we never forget that all we have and are is a gift from God.

“Is he not the One who says to kings, ‘You are worthless,’ and to nobles, ‘You are wicked,’ who shows no partiality to princes and does not favor the rich over the poor, for they are all the work of his hands? They die in an instant, in the middle of the night; the people are shaken and they pass away; the mighty are removed without human hand. “His eyes are on the ways of men; he sees their every step.”
(Job 34:18-21 NIV)