April 26: 2010: Courage in the Suburbs

The Bible says that cowardly people will be thrown into the fiery lake of burning sulfur (Revelation 21:8), and that gives me strong motivation not to be cowardly. Even if "the fiery lake of burning sulfur" is just a stark symbol for something that really isn't so bad; even if "the cowardly" only means the very very very cowardly; even if my cowardice is covered by the blood of Christ and only unbelieving cowards burn; even if I succeed in cushioning those hellish words with a thousand evangelical comforts, I still can't help seeing from them that God hates cowardice. (He hates other sins too, but today I'm only talking about this one.) God wants me to be brave.

Twelve years ago a friend gave me a T-shirt that said on the back in large letters, ABORTION IS MEAN. (He had others that said ABORTION IS HOMICIDE.) I thanked him, and planned to wear it, but I don't think I ever did so publicly except maybe once or twice. I always chose a different shirt from my dresser whenever I went to play basketball. Why? Because I didn't want to be polarizing. I didn't want to be seen as abrasive or angry. Christians are supposed to be likable, and you don't make friends by shouting moral judgments from your shirt.

But you may save a life that way. You may even save some poor soul from committing mortal sin.

A few days ago a woman told a group of us that her boyfriend got her pregnant when she was 18. Devastated, she went downtown to get an abortion. While there she looked up and saw a sign that read, "Abortion is Murder", and decided she couldn't go through with it. Her son, now 31, has a great story to tell those who toy with the idea of ending a life. Thank God for the brave souls who put up that sign. And, oh Lord, please forgive my cowardly reticence.

At a men's meeting a couple weeks ago the pastor showed movie clips of battle scenes to illustrate the theme of courage. He asked if any of us were veterans, and apparently none of us were. Somehow we all managed to come of age at a time when hardly any man is battle-tested unless he wants to be.

But tests of courage will still come, even to mild-mannered men living in the suburbs. When my father was in his mid 50s, the company he worked for was bought by corrupt men who tried to pressure him to defraud clients. He refused, and was fired. I wonder if, when ordered to be shady, Dad thought, "If I don't do what they say, and I lose my job, how will I provide for my family?" Surely he knew - as I know - that joblessness is a soul-crusher, an emasculator, a scarlet U. Some men would rather face enemy fire (as he did during WW II) than to see their wives have to keep answering the question, "Has Lowell found a job yet?"

But courage of the sort my Dad possessed in spades quietly goes about doing right even when faced with the prospect of pain or loss or shame or deprivation. I doubt he really had to think twice about whether keeping his job was worth compromising his integrity.

In recent weeks, I have had cause to ask myself "What Would Dad Do?" when faced with the old temptation - the need to be liked - that has often seduced me into hiding convictions that must be proclaimed. I'm in a confessional mood, so I will tell you the dirty little secret of the unemployed pastor: he must, he must, be highly thought of. No flock will seek his shepherding if it does not like him, and he knows it. So, among other ploys to win affection, he will soften the hard edges of biblical truth (like Revelation 21:8) - at least until he is safely tenured in a pulpit. God deliver me from such a carnal, God-dishonoring strategy.

I pass along to you the prayer request I submitted to my small group at church, from Ephesians 5:19-20: "Pray also for me, that whenever I open my mouth, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel... Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should." Amen.

April 13, 2010: To Christian Friends Who Don't Go To Church

I understand - or I think I do. Over the past 15 years, the Lord has brought into my life a surprising number of kind, thoughtful, devout people who can't stand going to church.

You might think I'd be the last person to sympathize with you, given that I am the Ned Flanders of church attendance. I never miss a Sunday, I get to church early and stay late, I sit near the front. I am on record as saying that even if an unspeakable tragedy befalls me on a Saturday, the next day will find me in church worshiping the Lord. I preach with full conviction Hebrews 10:25: "Forsake not the assembling of yourselves together," and am horrified that A. W. Tozer and A. W. Pink (what is it about the initials A. W.?) both stopped going to church once they stopped preaching.

Yet I sympathize with you? I claim to feel your pain? Yes. Yes, seriously.

I'm not directing this at anyone in particular, so I do not know the specific reasons why you stay away. Maybe you long for sincerity, but at church you find showmanship. Maybe you want to embrace simplicity but are confronted with ostentation. Maybe you love to swim in the deep end, but the worship services of your tradition are a shallow splash indeed.

(One of the defining moments of my life occurred when my Protestant brother Dan, sitting next to me in a church where some giggling inanity was going on up front, leaned over and whispered, "I think I'll convert to Catholicism. At least the Mass has dignity.")

Or maybe you've just had some really bad experience. I've never known (I don't think I've ever known) anyone who was molested by a clergyman, but if I did I'm not sure how I could answer him who says, "I'm never going to church again. That's where I got raped."

I do, however, know of people who were judged, mistreated, or driven out of churches (or the ministry) by spiritual zealots who later renounced the faith or committed excommunicable acts. It is understandable if the victims of false brothers develop "trust issues" that make them wary of jumping back into Christian fellowship.

Or maybe in your case it's the darn music. I myself have practically bruised my knuckles gripping in frustration the pew ahead of me as we sing (I'm not making this up) "Yes Lord yes Lord yes yes Lord yes Lord yes Lord yes yes Lord yes Lord yes Lord yes yes Lord yes Lord yes Lord yes yes Lord". I bite my lip and wait for it to end, and try to remember that it may be the favorite song - and a God-honoring expression of praise - of some good soul who thinks that Isaac Watts and William Cowper suck.

No? None of these things has anything to do with why you don't go to church? OK, I'll move on to my point.

Christian, you must attend church. You are commanded to.

I'll not try to persuade you that you'll be glad you went, or that it will be good for you in the long run. I can't guarantee that. Nor will I try to persuade you that it would be good for others if you went - your family, your preacher, the church itself. (Even though that is almost certainly the case, and I've tried to make that point elsewhere, that is not what I am saying here.) Today I want to make my appeal on the simple basis of obedience.

What God commands must be obeyed, and you must not insist on some benefit for yourself before you will submit. Do not say in your heart, "I will obey if this helps me, or, if I like it." That is a certain path to corruption. Imagine saying that in defense of disobedience to some other commandment. "Yes, I know the Bible says not to bear false witness against my neighbor - but I don't like giving truthful testimony. Telling the truth doesn't make me happy - in fact, it kind of annoys me - and it certainly isn't my style." Well, no one is asking if you liked speaking truthfully. Of course, it is good to train yourself to love truth, but even if you never love it, speak it anyway! You must never allow your preference for slander and lies to become a warrant for indulging in them.

Here is another way of looking at it. If you are a Christian with a "non-ecclesiological orientation," then consider yourself a brother to all those poor, devout souls burdened with homosexual orientations. To follow Christ, they must deny themselves, say no to physical relationships they would cherish, and commit to lives of celibacy or heterosexual dissatisfaction. Your burden is far less than theirs (unless of course you have that struggle as well.) You just have to go to church on Sundays. It's not that bad. There are tougher crosses to bear.

April 6, 2010: Do You Know Your Worst Sins? (Part 2)

Dr. Helen Roseveare is a living saint, a medical missionary whose selfless devotion to Christ and his kingdom rivals that of Mother Teresa. She is my hero and inspiration, and I often invoke her example when preaching to others or rebuking myself.

Dr. Roseveare was managing a hospital in the Belgian Congo when it was overrun by rebels in the early 1960s. She was not martyred like many of her missionary colleagues ("the lucky ones who got to go home!" she called them); instead she was beaten, raped, psychologically tortured, and made to watch as her African friends were brutally killed. After the carnage she went back to work at the hospital.

When she spoke to a group of us college students in 1982, she told us how grateful she was to God that he had enabled her, as a rape victim, to minister to others who had been similarly violated. Then she revealed that she had been diagnosed with breast cancer and had to have a double masectomy. But that was just another cause for rejoicing - now she had a whole new group of people to sympathize with and encourage.

Tell me - what sins could so magnificent a saint ever commit? I imagine that someone as selfless, devout, honest, generous, pure, industrious and grateful as Helen Roseveare would never need to preface her daily confessions with words that I feel I should attach to mine: "Oh Lord, how much time do you have?"

But among the riveting stories Roseveare told us was this. One day, quite by accident, she overheard an administrator telling a nurse that he was assigning her to work under Dr. Roseveare. The poor young woman burst into tears. "No, no! Please, I couldn't bear it! I'll do anything, I'll work anywhere - but don't make me work with her!" The administrator sympathized, knowing that Roseveare was an impossible person, but somebody had to do the nasty job of assisting her. Thus Roseveare learned - to her shock, dismay and humiliation - that her colleagues all considered her an emotionally cruel tyrant.

Presumably she took the lesson to heart and repented. At least she was able to tell that embarrassing story on herself, which is a good sign.

Roseveare's confession puts me in mind of many other cases I could cite of people who, conceivably, could examine themselves spiritually all day and all night and never once catch a glimpse of the outrageous character flaw, the howling iniquity, that discerning people spot within five minutes of making their acquaintance. It is one of those things that makes me so suspect of spiritual self-examination. We're bad at it. Even Dr. Roseveare was bad at it, and needed to have somebody else point out what a jerk she was. Others must rebuke the sins we cannot self-diagnose; we're too busy avoiding the sins that pose no danger to us.

Last week I mentioned a radio minister who seemed to obsess over ways to keep himself and others from committing sexual sin. But I frankly doubt that he has ever cheated on his wife or ever would. I wish someone would tell him his real sin, or that, when they tell him, he would listen and repent.

His real problem is that he is a shallow materialist. For example, a while ago he regaled his congregation with the story about how he got tickets to a Miami Dolphins game. He's a Dolphins fanatic. When the Dolphins were scheduled to play a Monday night game at sold-out Lambeau Field in Green Bay, he instructed his son to go online and bid whatever was necessary to get the hard-to-obtain tickets. He spent an admittedly exorbitant sum, got 12 tickets, and then (by God's grace) got another 6 tickets free as a gift from a wealthy patron. The free tickets, he explained, were the ones that God wanted him to have.

Oh no, no, no. I'm reminded of the aristocrat Marquis de Condorcet, who, during the French Revolution, attempted to disguise himself (the story goes) among common folk in order to avoid getting his head chopped off. He was exposed when he ordered an omelet: when asked how many eggs he wanted in it, he said "A dozen." A dozen! What a greedy glutton! Shows what kind of selfish indulgence he's used to.

Would you cut back your own breakfast from two eggs to one so that your guest could eat 12? Or - to put it another way - would you who have never been able to afford a regular-price ticket to a professional football game tithe sacrificially so that your pastor could outbid everybody to land a dozen?

This same pastor bought a house a few years ago for 1.9 million dollars. That is an unnecessary, extravagant, shameful, worldly expenditure which reveals a heart far removed from the spirit of Christ. We worship a Lord who was homeless (Mt. 8:20), who dismissed a rich man unwilling to part with his things (Mt. 19:21), who said it was hard for rich people to get into heaven (Mt. 19:23), who insisted that you could not serve both God and money (Mt. 6:24), and who disparaged the contributions of those who maintained an abundance after all their tithing was done (Mark 12:44). I do not know how such a pastor could preach from any of these texts - or from 1 Timothy 6:6-10 - with a straight face and an unstricken conscience. Nor can I understand the audacity with which he daily begs radio listeners to support his ministry. Sell your home first, Reverend! Let us see if you can make do with an eight-egg omelet before you ask the rest of us to cut back to one.

C. S. Lewis gave us the rule for determining whether we are greedy or biblically generous. If you can still afford "comforts, luxuries, amusements, etc" on par with your peers, then you are not giving enough. Your house should be smaller, your car shabbier, your food humbler, your vacations less extravagant than what anyone would expect them to be. You must be unable to afford them because you have already given so much away. Lewis wrote, "If our charities do not at all pinch or hamper us, I should say they are too small. There ought to be things we should like to do and cannot because our charitable expenditure excludes them." Exactly.

As Roseveare was devout but cruel, and this radio minister is sexually pure but financially profligate, so might all of us, at times, manifest sins that are obvious to others but utterly concealed from our own conscience. King David understood this, and wrote, "Who can discern his errors? Forgive my hidden faults." (Psalm 19:12). We must plead mercy for the sins we commit but never lament because we haven't the faintest idea we've done anything wrong. And we must listen with humility to those irritating holier-than-thous who dare to reveal such sins to us.

What is my hidden fault, you ask? I suppose I do not, could not know. More than once I have been accused of being graceless and judgmental - and that may well be true. But even if it is, I feel certain that it renders false not a single word of what I have written above.