Aiding The Abused (October 30, 2005)
I remember hearing years ago that if you mistreat a man, you will come to despise him. It is a psychological quirk we resort to in order to spare ourselves the pangs of conscience. We cannot stand to think that we have simply been unjust. So if I hurt you, you must have had it coming. I sure hope you had it coming. Please, somebody tell me that this person I just hurt is evil and I did the right thing. Thank you, I thought so.
Mistreated people don't have a lot of options. If they defend themselves and hit back, they encourage the bullies to be even more brutal. If they cry they seem whiny, and who wants to be around that? If they do nothing, it's hard to tell if they have laudably turned the other cheek or stupidly allowed evil to flourish. It is hard to be a victim.
Which is why I was much encouraged to hear from a friend about the strong stand his church has taken against a particular form of victimization, namely spouse abuse. A recent bulletin insert listed eight sadistic behaviors (wisely non-gender specific), and assured the wounded that "the pastoral staff and elders are committed to stand in the gap for you. You are not alone."
I hope they meant it and are prepared to follow through. I happen to know as I write this that they are being informed of an outrageous case of spouse abuse in their midst. The time to act is upon them.
A month or so ago I informed our church board of my resolve to confront hate-filled abusers. Reading aloud a case study, I said, "If any of you ever do this to your spouse, I will come after you. If any of your spouses do this to you, I will come after them." Abusers must not go unchallenged, and victims must not be left to fend for themselves.
If you ever go to the aid of the wounded, don't be surprised to find them a little disoriented. They have been subjected both to harm that fed hatred and hatred that fed harm. They have listened to James Dobson and Gary Chapman and Dennis Rainey and other "family experts" and found their counsel spectacularly unhelpful. They can't begin to communicate their daily nightmare to those who say, "Why don't you just buy her some flowers?" or, "If you paid him a compliment he would brag about you to everyone." They have tried. It does not work. They don't know what to do any more.
Sunday, October 30, 2005
Sunday, October 23, 2005
The Myth Of The Christian Divorce Rate (October 23, 2005)
From time to time I hear that the divorce rate among Christians is about the same as it is for the population in general. This statistic is presented as fact, a lamentable and ugly thing that requires soul-searching and repentance on the part of the church. But it seems to me that a couple basic things are not being taken into account when it comes to determining this "Christian divorce rate."
First of all, the matter of consent is always ignored. If I were asked, for example, "What is the rape rate among Christians?" I would want to know exactly what that question meant. Does it mean, "What percentage of Christian believers commit rape?" I think the right answer is zero. Christians don't do that. By committing such an act a man would prove that he was not a Christian at all. "But suppose he says he's a Christian and he goes to church all the time?" Well, so what? A man can put on a red suit and say "Ho ho ho" but that does not make him Santa Claus. I think there are cases (unless I just saw it in a movie) where criminals have donned masks of former U.S. presidents and then robbed banks. Does that make us fret about armed robbery committed by ex-presidents? Of course not. Just as no real ex-president has ever robbed a bank, so no real Christian has ever raped - though no doubt many rapists have donned the mask of a Christian façade.
But if the question about the rate of rape among Christians means, "What percentage of Christians have been raped?" I would say I don't know. But whether the right answer is 0 or 100, it is irrelevant to the point of what sins that Christian, or the church as a whole, needs to repent of. It is not a sin to be raped.
If the questioner wanted to erase the distinction, saying, "Raping, being raped - whatever, it's all the same. I just want to know what the rape rate is," then I would answer, "You are so evil that I don't want to talk to you." To lump together perpetrator and victim in a single statistical category and say, "They were involved in a bad thing," is despicable. We don't say that Jews and Nazis had a high
genocide rate. We say that Nazis killed Jews.
In the same way, to speak meaningfully of a divorce rate we really have to know who is divorcing whom and who is consenting to what. Of course, there are plenty of divorces by mutual consent, and there are plenty of bad people who deserve to be divorced by their longsuffering spouses. But there are also good people who are divorced without their consent and against their will by spouses who have handed themselves over to the devil. I deny that there is any insight to be gained by artificially grouping together these disparate categories. Labeling it all "divorce" distorts and artificially inflates the problem, and insidiously reduces the blame that is due perpetrators by stretching it out to cover victims as well. Imagine if the list of registered sex offenders were expanded to include the people they had abused. The total number would be astounding, but not enlightening. And the victims would be fully justified in taking offense and saying, "Our names should not be on the same list as those who hurt us."
In divorce there are victims and perpetrators. Until we can sort that out, it remains as invalid to speak of a "divorce rate" as it is to speak of a generalized rape, abuse or genocide rate.
The other problem I have with the notion of a "Christian divorce rate" is that I never see it specified as to whether one or both parties are Christians. This makes all the difference in the world. If an unbeliever divorces his believing spouse, does that count toward being included in the overall Christian divorce rate? I don't think it should. When Christians are mistreated by unbelievers, we lament and sympathize with them, but we do not rend our clothes and say, "What is the matter with us Christians? We really need to do better." In this case it is the unbelievers who need to do better. The problem here is not with those who embrace the faith but with those who reject it!
I know lots and lots of divorced and divorcing people. But I do not know a single instance, not even one, of two Christians who have divorced each other. I'd be curious to know if anyone who reads this page knows of even one such case. What I have seen are apostates - those who deserted their faith along with their spouses, and frauds - those who claimed to be Christians but whose infidelities or other sins made it clear that they really weren't believers at all. What I have never known is a case where I could say, "These are two real Christian believers who just could not get along, and one divorced the other."
Until I am otherwise convinced, I do not believe that the real "Christian divorce rate," meaningfully defined, is 30, 40, or 50 percent. I think it is zero.
From time to time I hear that the divorce rate among Christians is about the same as it is for the population in general. This statistic is presented as fact, a lamentable and ugly thing that requires soul-searching and repentance on the part of the church. But it seems to me that a couple basic things are not being taken into account when it comes to determining this "Christian divorce rate."
First of all, the matter of consent is always ignored. If I were asked, for example, "What is the rape rate among Christians?" I would want to know exactly what that question meant. Does it mean, "What percentage of Christian believers commit rape?" I think the right answer is zero. Christians don't do that. By committing such an act a man would prove that he was not a Christian at all. "But suppose he says he's a Christian and he goes to church all the time?" Well, so what? A man can put on a red suit and say "Ho ho ho" but that does not make him Santa Claus. I think there are cases (unless I just saw it in a movie) where criminals have donned masks of former U.S. presidents and then robbed banks. Does that make us fret about armed robbery committed by ex-presidents? Of course not. Just as no real ex-president has ever robbed a bank, so no real Christian has ever raped - though no doubt many rapists have donned the mask of a Christian façade.
But if the question about the rate of rape among Christians means, "What percentage of Christians have been raped?" I would say I don't know. But whether the right answer is 0 or 100, it is irrelevant to the point of what sins that Christian, or the church as a whole, needs to repent of. It is not a sin to be raped.
If the questioner wanted to erase the distinction, saying, "Raping, being raped - whatever, it's all the same. I just want to know what the rape rate is," then I would answer, "You are so evil that I don't want to talk to you." To lump together perpetrator and victim in a single statistical category and say, "They were involved in a bad thing," is despicable. We don't say that Jews and Nazis had a high
genocide rate. We say that Nazis killed Jews.
In the same way, to speak meaningfully of a divorce rate we really have to know who is divorcing whom and who is consenting to what. Of course, there are plenty of divorces by mutual consent, and there are plenty of bad people who deserve to be divorced by their longsuffering spouses. But there are also good people who are divorced without their consent and against their will by spouses who have handed themselves over to the devil. I deny that there is any insight to be gained by artificially grouping together these disparate categories. Labeling it all "divorce" distorts and artificially inflates the problem, and insidiously reduces the blame that is due perpetrators by stretching it out to cover victims as well. Imagine if the list of registered sex offenders were expanded to include the people they had abused. The total number would be astounding, but not enlightening. And the victims would be fully justified in taking offense and saying, "Our names should not be on the same list as those who hurt us."
In divorce there are victims and perpetrators. Until we can sort that out, it remains as invalid to speak of a "divorce rate" as it is to speak of a generalized rape, abuse or genocide rate.
The other problem I have with the notion of a "Christian divorce rate" is that I never see it specified as to whether one or both parties are Christians. This makes all the difference in the world. If an unbeliever divorces his believing spouse, does that count toward being included in the overall Christian divorce rate? I don't think it should. When Christians are mistreated by unbelievers, we lament and sympathize with them, but we do not rend our clothes and say, "What is the matter with us Christians? We really need to do better." In this case it is the unbelievers who need to do better. The problem here is not with those who embrace the faith but with those who reject it!
I know lots and lots of divorced and divorcing people. But I do not know a single instance, not even one, of two Christians who have divorced each other. I'd be curious to know if anyone who reads this page knows of even one such case. What I have seen are apostates - those who deserted their faith along with their spouses, and frauds - those who claimed to be Christians but whose infidelities or other sins made it clear that they really weren't believers at all. What I have never known is a case where I could say, "These are two real Christian believers who just could not get along, and one divorced the other."
Until I am otherwise convinced, I do not believe that the real "Christian divorce rate," meaningfully defined, is 30, 40, or 50 percent. I think it is zero.
Sunday, October 16, 2005
Buffoonery In The Pulpit (October 16, 2005)
I hope you all had a better experience at church on Sunday than I did.
On my Sunday off I took the boys to a large evangelical church. I gave them a brief lecture as we pulled into the parking lot. "We are here to worship God," I said, "not critique every little thing that goes on." My sons have highly developed bull detectors, and get irritated when sermon and song are showy and insincere. (They’ve inherited my genes - or maybe in this area I've trained them a little too well.) I didn't want their native cynicism (or mine!) to interfere with the experience of gathering with God's people to worship him.
Then the sermon started and I nearly walked out.
The title was "The DNA of Relationships: Part 3 - How To Create A Safe Environment." It opened with a film clip of some Warner Brothers cartoon character careening about, and the pastor said, "That doesn't have anything to do with the sermon, I just thought it was fun."
Actually, he said, it did have something to do with the sermon: sometimes in our relationships we're just like that cartoon character. Then he told a long folksy story about vacationing with his family and how he was responsible for several mishaps. He made himself out to be an earnest-yet-incompetent Chevy Chase, and the congregation provided the laugh track. Then as the sermon progressed he airmailed in a few Scriptures verses into a 5-point structure plucked from who knows where (not the Bible). Dr. Phil without the reverence.
I didn't storm out, but after the service I did leave depressed, knowing that the same cotton-candy fluff is being served at megachurches all over. Just the other day a member of a Willow Creek clone told me that the sermon series at her church is based on "Desperate Housewives." Pop culture references ("Survivor," "American Idol," "The Apprentice") create the template for what is taught there month to month.
Is it too much to ask that our ministers just preach the Word? What is so hard about this? As far as I’m concerned, a preacher’s message does not have to be entertaining, exciting, funny, captivating, inspiring, or even all that compelling. Not every minister has the ability to give a great talk. We know that and we can live with that. But we can't live without the Word - not spiritually, anyway. "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God" (Matthew 4:4).
My own goal as a preacher is modest: to plow through some text of Scripture, explain it the best I can, and quit before too many people eye the clock or fall asleep. I hope God gives me the grace to keep doing that every (non-vacation) Sunday till he calls me home. But should there come a time when I must sit in a pew rather than stand in a pulpit, I hope it won't be hard to find a church where the Word is
preached. Then I can worship, then I can give thanks, then my spirit can be nourished and my heart can rejoice in the Lord.
I hope you all had a better experience at church on Sunday than I did.
On my Sunday off I took the boys to a large evangelical church. I gave them a brief lecture as we pulled into the parking lot. "We are here to worship God," I said, "not critique every little thing that goes on." My sons have highly developed bull detectors, and get irritated when sermon and song are showy and insincere. (They’ve inherited my genes - or maybe in this area I've trained them a little too well.) I didn't want their native cynicism (or mine!) to interfere with the experience of gathering with God's people to worship him.
Then the sermon started and I nearly walked out.
The title was "The DNA of Relationships: Part 3 - How To Create A Safe Environment." It opened with a film clip of some Warner Brothers cartoon character careening about, and the pastor said, "That doesn't have anything to do with the sermon, I just thought it was fun."
Actually, he said, it did have something to do with the sermon: sometimes in our relationships we're just like that cartoon character. Then he told a long folksy story about vacationing with his family and how he was responsible for several mishaps. He made himself out to be an earnest-yet-incompetent Chevy Chase, and the congregation provided the laugh track. Then as the sermon progressed he airmailed in a few Scriptures verses into a 5-point structure plucked from who knows where (not the Bible). Dr. Phil without the reverence.
I didn't storm out, but after the service I did leave depressed, knowing that the same cotton-candy fluff is being served at megachurches all over. Just the other day a member of a Willow Creek clone told me that the sermon series at her church is based on "Desperate Housewives." Pop culture references ("Survivor," "American Idol," "The Apprentice") create the template for what is taught there month to month.
Is it too much to ask that our ministers just preach the Word? What is so hard about this? As far as I’m concerned, a preacher’s message does not have to be entertaining, exciting, funny, captivating, inspiring, or even all that compelling. Not every minister has the ability to give a great talk. We know that and we can live with that. But we can't live without the Word - not spiritually, anyway. "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God" (Matthew 4:4).
My own goal as a preacher is modest: to plow through some text of Scripture, explain it the best I can, and quit before too many people eye the clock or fall asleep. I hope God gives me the grace to keep doing that every (non-vacation) Sunday till he calls me home. But should there come a time when I must sit in a pew rather than stand in a pulpit, I hope it won't be hard to find a church where the Word is
preached. Then I can worship, then I can give thanks, then my spirit can be nourished and my heart can rejoice in the Lord.
Sunday, October 2, 2005
Worry: Sinful Or Necessary? (October 2, 2005)
Is it wrong to worry?
I've always had a hard time figuring out a simple answer to that question. On the one hand, Jesus said, "Do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear...Which of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?...Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself," etc. (Matthew 6:25-34).
On the other hand, there seems to be a lot of worry in the Bible that is positively commended. Job worried that his children might have sinned, so he offered sacrifices on their behalf just in case (Job 1:5). St. Paul worried constantly about his congregations: "I face daily the pressure of my concern for all the churches. Who is weak, and I do not feel weak? Who is led into sin, and I do not inwardly burn?" (2 Corinthians 11:28-29). He fretted that the Thessalonians might have apostatized: "When I could stand it no longer, I sent to find out about your faith. I was afraid to find that in some way the tempter might have tempted you and our efforts might have been useless" (1 Thessalonians 3:5). Was he disobedient to Christ's command
not to worry when he "struggled" (Greek "agonized") over the Colossian church (Colossians 2:1)? He did not seem to think so.
Even Jesus commanded worry (so it seems to me) in Luke 14:31-32 when he talked about the folly of a king going to battle at a 2-to-1 disadvantage. A foolish king "doesn't worry about it"; a wise king thinks ahead and sues for peace. And Jesus sure looks worried to me on the eve of his crucifixion. Matthew recalls him saying, "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death" (Matthew 26:38), and
Luke writes that he was in anguish, and his sweat fell like drops of blood to the ground (Luke 22:44).
I've tried to come up with a definition of worry that is precise enough to isolate just the sinfully frettish part of it while leaving space for permissible (even commendable) fear and anguish and concern and planning. If I could produce such a definition, then I could condemn "worry" while making it clear that that is not at all what Job and Jesus and Paul were doing. But I have failed - every time I think I've nailed down criteria for distinguishing sinful worry from "legitimate concern," the thing falls apart in my hands as all these biblical exceptions come to mind.
The best I can up with for now are some general principles. They aren't exceptionless, but they may provide some guidelines.
(1) Worry about others, not yourself. Job worried about his children; Paul worried about the churches. Philippians 2:4 says, "Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others." It is better to worry about bad things that might happen to other people than bad things that might happen to yourself.
(2) Worry about spiritual matters, not physical. Jesus said not to worry about things like food, water, shelter, clothes and safety. Instead we should worry about the welfare of our souls and the advance of the kingdom of God. "Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well" (Matthew 6:33). "Fear not those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul" (Matthew
10:28).
(3) Worry about things you can change, not things you can't. If worry provokes you to actions and prayer that will help prevent future misfortune, then that is a good thing. But if there is nothing you can do that would make any difference, and you have already prayed, then you are best off forgetting about the problem and thinking of other things.
By these criteria I suppose the best thing to worry about would be spiritual peril looming in the life of another that you can actually do something about. In that case, cry, fret, pray and intervene. "Whoever turns a sinner back from the error of his way will save him from death and cover over a multitude of sins" (James 5:20). But if you're worried about a material, physical, social or economic problem that is facing mainly you and nothing but God's grace can change it, then relax. Trust that God will take care of you.
One more thing. When something you feared does not materialize, don't forget to rejoice and give thanks to God. Do that quickly and vigorously before falling back to the same old miserable pattern of worrying about the next big problem.
Is it wrong to worry?
I've always had a hard time figuring out a simple answer to that question. On the one hand, Jesus said, "Do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear...Which of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?...Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself," etc. (Matthew 6:25-34).
On the other hand, there seems to be a lot of worry in the Bible that is positively commended. Job worried that his children might have sinned, so he offered sacrifices on their behalf just in case (Job 1:5). St. Paul worried constantly about his congregations: "I face daily the pressure of my concern for all the churches. Who is weak, and I do not feel weak? Who is led into sin, and I do not inwardly burn?" (2 Corinthians 11:28-29). He fretted that the Thessalonians might have apostatized: "When I could stand it no longer, I sent to find out about your faith. I was afraid to find that in some way the tempter might have tempted you and our efforts might have been useless" (1 Thessalonians 3:5). Was he disobedient to Christ's command
not to worry when he "struggled" (Greek "agonized") over the Colossian church (Colossians 2:1)? He did not seem to think so.
Even Jesus commanded worry (so it seems to me) in Luke 14:31-32 when he talked about the folly of a king going to battle at a 2-to-1 disadvantage. A foolish king "doesn't worry about it"; a wise king thinks ahead and sues for peace. And Jesus sure looks worried to me on the eve of his crucifixion. Matthew recalls him saying, "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death" (Matthew 26:38), and
Luke writes that he was in anguish, and his sweat fell like drops of blood to the ground (Luke 22:44).
I've tried to come up with a definition of worry that is precise enough to isolate just the sinfully frettish part of it while leaving space for permissible (even commendable) fear and anguish and concern and planning. If I could produce such a definition, then I could condemn "worry" while making it clear that that is not at all what Job and Jesus and Paul were doing. But I have failed - every time I think I've nailed down criteria for distinguishing sinful worry from "legitimate concern," the thing falls apart in my hands as all these biblical exceptions come to mind.
The best I can up with for now are some general principles. They aren't exceptionless, but they may provide some guidelines.
(1) Worry about others, not yourself. Job worried about his children; Paul worried about the churches. Philippians 2:4 says, "Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others." It is better to worry about bad things that might happen to other people than bad things that might happen to yourself.
(2) Worry about spiritual matters, not physical. Jesus said not to worry about things like food, water, shelter, clothes and safety. Instead we should worry about the welfare of our souls and the advance of the kingdom of God. "Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well" (Matthew 6:33). "Fear not those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul" (Matthew
10:28).
(3) Worry about things you can change, not things you can't. If worry provokes you to actions and prayer that will help prevent future misfortune, then that is a good thing. But if there is nothing you can do that would make any difference, and you have already prayed, then you are best off forgetting about the problem and thinking of other things.
By these criteria I suppose the best thing to worry about would be spiritual peril looming in the life of another that you can actually do something about. In that case, cry, fret, pray and intervene. "Whoever turns a sinner back from the error of his way will save him from death and cover over a multitude of sins" (James 5:20). But if you're worried about a material, physical, social or economic problem that is facing mainly you and nothing but God's grace can change it, then relax. Trust that God will take care of you.
One more thing. When something you feared does not materialize, don't forget to rejoice and give thanks to God. Do that quickly and vigorously before falling back to the same old miserable pattern of worrying about the next big problem.
Sunday, September 25, 2005
Mom’s Well-Worn Bible (September 25, 2005)
Quite by accident today I spotted my mother's Bible on one of my bookshelves. I thought I had lost it. I looked for it months ago when I wanted to use it in a sermon illustration, but somehow I must have scanned right past it. Maybe I missed it then so that God could spring it on me today when I was most in need of a token of his grace.
Mom's Bible is well-worn and full of marginal notes, and leafing through it reveals a thousand insights into a life spent pursuing the wisdom of God. Here are some notes from a single opened page:
- Proverbs 18:12: Haughtiness comes before disaster, and humility before honor. Mom noted, "Hindu word for humility is 'the dust' - Their proverb - 'You can walk on the dust forever, and it never answers back.'"
- 19:6: Many will entreat the favor of the liberal man, and every man is a friend to him who gives gifts. Mom quoted from Harry Ironside, former pastor of Moody Church: "How different the Spirit of Him who was charged with receiving sinners and eating with them, who sought not the smiles of the great nor feared their frown!"
- 19:11: Good sense makes a man restrain his anger, and it is his glory to overlook a transgression or an offense. Mom personalized this verse, crossing out "a man" and "his" and replacing them with "me" and "my."
- 19:13: A self-confident and foolish son is the multiplied calamity of his father, and the contentions of a wife are as a continual dropping of water through a chink in the roof. Mom wrote, "A foolish son and a contentious wife are very likely to be together - wife dismissing her husband's authority and taking sides with children in opposition to his proper discipline. Children will despise father's authority and defy mother's correction when she does attempt it."
- 19:17 He who has pity on the poor lends to the Lord, and that which he has given He will repay to them. Next to this Mom wrote "Jehovah - patron of the poor. Fred and Gloria - R & G $100." I'm pretty sure she was remembering a charitable gift from her friends Fred and Gloria to my sister and brother-in-law.
- 19:25: Strike a scoffer, and the simple will learn prudence; reprove a man of understanding, and he will increase in knowledge. Mom commented, "The truth itself is of greater value in the eyes of him who has understanding than his own dignity."
- 20:3: It is an honor for a man to cease from strife and keep aloof from it. Mom jotted down "2 Chron. 35 Josiah's slip" - a reference to good King Josiah's ill-advised foray into King Neco's war.
So it is on page after page as Mom took the Scriptures to heart by commenting on them, posing questions, quoting from literature and sermons, cross-referencing other verses, rebuking herself(!) and matching Scriptural wisdom to current experience. How many people have had the privilege of being raised by a parent with such a godly
devotion to the Word?
I know that Mom wrote those notes for herself, not for me. But by his mercy God used those notes to help me recover today from a mostly sleepless night and a morning steeped in melancholy. I find that grief still hovers about me, and threatens to render me forgetful of grace and contemptuous of duty. But God nudges me with reminders of the goodness I have known, the holiness I have seen, the spiritual
benefits I have tasted. May he do the same for you, and gladden your heart with glimpses of goodness on days that loom dark.
Quite by accident today I spotted my mother's Bible on one of my bookshelves. I thought I had lost it. I looked for it months ago when I wanted to use it in a sermon illustration, but somehow I must have scanned right past it. Maybe I missed it then so that God could spring it on me today when I was most in need of a token of his grace.
Mom's Bible is well-worn and full of marginal notes, and leafing through it reveals a thousand insights into a life spent pursuing the wisdom of God. Here are some notes from a single opened page:
- Proverbs 18:12: Haughtiness comes before disaster, and humility before honor. Mom noted, "Hindu word for humility is 'the dust' - Their proverb - 'You can walk on the dust forever, and it never answers back.'"
- 19:6: Many will entreat the favor of the liberal man, and every man is a friend to him who gives gifts. Mom quoted from Harry Ironside, former pastor of Moody Church: "How different the Spirit of Him who was charged with receiving sinners and eating with them, who sought not the smiles of the great nor feared their frown!"
- 19:11: Good sense makes a man restrain his anger, and it is his glory to overlook a transgression or an offense. Mom personalized this verse, crossing out "a man" and "his" and replacing them with "me" and "my."
- 19:13: A self-confident and foolish son is the multiplied calamity of his father, and the contentions of a wife are as a continual dropping of water through a chink in the roof. Mom wrote, "A foolish son and a contentious wife are very likely to be together - wife dismissing her husband's authority and taking sides with children in opposition to his proper discipline. Children will despise father's authority and defy mother's correction when she does attempt it."
- 19:17 He who has pity on the poor lends to the Lord, and that which he has given He will repay to them. Next to this Mom wrote "Jehovah - patron of the poor. Fred and Gloria - R & G $100." I'm pretty sure she was remembering a charitable gift from her friends Fred and Gloria to my sister and brother-in-law.
- 19:25: Strike a scoffer, and the simple will learn prudence; reprove a man of understanding, and he will increase in knowledge. Mom commented, "The truth itself is of greater value in the eyes of him who has understanding than his own dignity."
- 20:3: It is an honor for a man to cease from strife and keep aloof from it. Mom jotted down "2 Chron. 35 Josiah's slip" - a reference to good King Josiah's ill-advised foray into King Neco's war.
So it is on page after page as Mom took the Scriptures to heart by commenting on them, posing questions, quoting from literature and sermons, cross-referencing other verses, rebuking herself(!) and matching Scriptural wisdom to current experience. How many people have had the privilege of being raised by a parent with such a godly
devotion to the Word?
I know that Mom wrote those notes for herself, not for me. But by his mercy God used those notes to help me recover today from a mostly sleepless night and a morning steeped in melancholy. I find that grief still hovers about me, and threatens to render me forgetful of grace and contemptuous of duty. But God nudges me with reminders of the goodness I have known, the holiness I have seen, the spiritual
benefits I have tasted. May he do the same for you, and gladden your heart with glimpses of goodness on days that loom dark.
Sunday, September 18, 2005
“You Fill My Cup” (September 18, 2005)
My sister Grace held a Bible study in her home last week with about a dozen women from her church. They all had to bring a mug that meant something to them, and the theme had to do with the filling of our spiritual cups. At one point Grace (whose name, like Jacob or Nabal in the Bible, is providentially matched to her character) told each of the women present how they filled her cup.
Mary does it by talking to Lilliet, Grace's adopted Down Syndrome daughter. Grace said to Mary, "I know that Lilliet is not easy to talk to, but every Sunday at church you go up to her and greet her and ask her how her week was. That fills my cup."
Beth does it by making sure Grace is not alone on a day of grief, like Annie's birthday. Annie was Grace's other retarded adopted daughter who died a year ago of heart failure. "Beth, you visited me on Annie's birthday. That fills my cup."
Jane, Ruth and Nancy do it just by coming to church! Jane has a 6-month old and a 2-year-old, and Grace knows from experience how hard it is to get little ones ready for Sunday worship. Ruth has scoliosis and lives in constant pain, but somehow that does not keep her from church. And Nancy has been hit so hard by life's woes that it is a wonder she can stand at all. She is 23, was raised by foster parents, and has three children - the oldest of which is 4. Seven months ago Nancy's step-father-in-law murdered three people before taking his own life. Three months ago Nancy's husband also committed suicide, and so she moved back in with her foster parents. Grace said, "When you walk into church on Sunday mornings, that fills my cup."
A characteristic that I share with my sister is that I too draw spiritual sustenance from those who persevere in the Lord despite grave sorrow and setback. Like my friend Hosea (not his real name). Some time ago I emailed him the following quote from C. S. Lewis:
"The husband is the head of the wife just in so far as he is to her what Christ is to the Church. He is to love her as Christ loved the Church...and give his life for her (Ephesians 5:25, emphasis original). This headship, then, is most fully embodied not in the husband we should all wish to be but in him whose marriage is most like a crucifixion; whose wife receives most and gives least, is most unworthy of him, is - in her own mere nature - least lovable."
What I didn't know at the time was that Hosea's own marriage was "most like a crucifixion." His wife has run up $74,000 of credit card debt, she curses him and the children with unspeakably foul and hostile language, she has threatened to kill him, she has alienated their mutual friends. And yet Hosea continues to serve the Lord, honors his vows, seeks to do what is right, has ministered frequently to me with words of wisdom and grace in the midst of my own pain. That fills my cup.
A few days ago I turned off a local Christian radio station in disgust as some idiot (forgive me) bragged about the methods he used "to make my good marriage a GREAT marriage." Yeah, right. Look, moron, how hard is it to have a great marriage when your wife is pleasant and godly and loves the Lord? You don't have anything to say to me, and you sure don't fill my cup. Hosea does.
My sister Grace held a Bible study in her home last week with about a dozen women from her church. They all had to bring a mug that meant something to them, and the theme had to do with the filling of our spiritual cups. At one point Grace (whose name, like Jacob or Nabal in the Bible, is providentially matched to her character) told each of the women present how they filled her cup.
Mary does it by talking to Lilliet, Grace's adopted Down Syndrome daughter. Grace said to Mary, "I know that Lilliet is not easy to talk to, but every Sunday at church you go up to her and greet her and ask her how her week was. That fills my cup."
Beth does it by making sure Grace is not alone on a day of grief, like Annie's birthday. Annie was Grace's other retarded adopted daughter who died a year ago of heart failure. "Beth, you visited me on Annie's birthday. That fills my cup."
Jane, Ruth and Nancy do it just by coming to church! Jane has a 6-month old and a 2-year-old, and Grace knows from experience how hard it is to get little ones ready for Sunday worship. Ruth has scoliosis and lives in constant pain, but somehow that does not keep her from church. And Nancy has been hit so hard by life's woes that it is a wonder she can stand at all. She is 23, was raised by foster parents, and has three children - the oldest of which is 4. Seven months ago Nancy's step-father-in-law murdered three people before taking his own life. Three months ago Nancy's husband also committed suicide, and so she moved back in with her foster parents. Grace said, "When you walk into church on Sunday mornings, that fills my cup."
A characteristic that I share with my sister is that I too draw spiritual sustenance from those who persevere in the Lord despite grave sorrow and setback. Like my friend Hosea (not his real name). Some time ago I emailed him the following quote from C. S. Lewis:
"The husband is the head of the wife just in so far as he is to her what Christ is to the Church. He is to love her as Christ loved the Church...and give his life for her (Ephesians 5:25, emphasis original). This headship, then, is most fully embodied not in the husband we should all wish to be but in him whose marriage is most like a crucifixion; whose wife receives most and gives least, is most unworthy of him, is - in her own mere nature - least lovable."
What I didn't know at the time was that Hosea's own marriage was "most like a crucifixion." His wife has run up $74,000 of credit card debt, she curses him and the children with unspeakably foul and hostile language, she has threatened to kill him, she has alienated their mutual friends. And yet Hosea continues to serve the Lord, honors his vows, seeks to do what is right, has ministered frequently to me with words of wisdom and grace in the midst of my own pain. That fills my cup.
A few days ago I turned off a local Christian radio station in disgust as some idiot (forgive me) bragged about the methods he used "to make my good marriage a GREAT marriage." Yeah, right. Look, moron, how hard is it to have a great marriage when your wife is pleasant and godly and loves the Lord? You don't have anything to say to me, and you sure don't fill my cup. Hosea does.
Sunday, September 11, 2005
Suicide And Hell (September 11, 2005)
Do people who commit suicide go to hell?
I was asked that twice last week, so I thought I'd use a Pastor's Page to respond. My short answer is "Not necessarily." My long answer is more complicated.
Suicide is sin because it is murder, a violation of the commandment "Thou shalt not kill." The Bible does not specifically condemn self-murder, but that should not surprise us because the Bible often connects its rules with penalties for their infractions. Suicide renders those responses moot. You can execute a man who has killed someone else, but there is not much you can do to penalize the corpse of a suicide.
There are several suicides in the Bible, and they tend to involve privileged men who went bad. Samson was the original suicide bomber (or rather, suicide building-collapser - Judges 16:28-31). King Saul fell on his own sword to keep from being slain by Philistines (1 Samuel 31:1-6). Ahithophel took his life when Absalom would not take his advice (probably assuming that Absalom’s rebellion against David was doomed to fail - 2 Samuel 17:23). Zimri burned his house down around him (1 Kings 16:18). Judas hung himself after betraying Christ (Matthew 27:3-10). In all these cases the Bible just tells what these men did without telling us whether it was wrong. Of course, they all did wrong things that led to their suicides.
Though suicide is a kind of murder, I think it is the least bad kind. In fact, I actually recommend it to hell-bent fiends who would otherwise kill the innocent - like mothers who smother, drown, or stab their kids (Marilyn Lemak, Susan Smith and Tonya Vasilev, respectively). In such cases I wonder, "Why couldn't you just kill yourself, you demon freak?" Think how many lives could be saved if sick murderers and murderesses would just direct all their lethal hostilities inward.
Does suicide damn the soul? Not by itself, I would say - though suicide is the kind of thing that damned souls do. We are saved by faith in Christ, and no sin but apostasy can take that away. Some believe that suicides go to hell because they die with unconfessed sin (unless, I suppose, they die slow and confess before losing consciousness), but that argument never convinced me. We all have unconfessed sin, all the time, and will die with a million of those on our record. I've already sinned today by not loving the Lord my God with all my heart, soul, mind and strength, and it's only 9 o'clock in morning.
I imagine there are good and faithful servants of Christ, who, in moments of weakness, or suffering from brain chemicals gone haywire, take their own lives. I see no reason why God, who knows the end from the beginning and who takes all things into account, might not have mercy on their souls and receive them into his presence. A friend of mine, a Korean War vet who suffers from tinnitus, told me that one time the ringing in his ears suddenly blasted louder than a freight train for several seconds before dissipating back to its normal level. He said that if that ever happened again, and the noise did not stop, he would definitely kill himself. I thanked him for telling me. If I ever have to conduct his tragic funeral I can tell people what probably transpired. But whatever happens, I know my friend is a believer whose name is written in the Book of Life.
I was once asked the suicide-and-hell question by someone who (I did not know at the time) was suicidal. That is where the question is really dangerous. The last thing I want to do is encourage a depressed person to think, "If I kill myself I get to go to heaven." Heaven forbid. Though it is true that even murderers and adulterers can get to heaven - King David did - we still don't want to encourage murder and adultery. I don't ever want to be guilty of tempting a depressed person with the promise of a happy hereafter. If you are suicidal, (A) Don't do it, and (B) Get help. Take that as an order from God.
Do people who commit suicide go to hell?
I was asked that twice last week, so I thought I'd use a Pastor's Page to respond. My short answer is "Not necessarily." My long answer is more complicated.
Suicide is sin because it is murder, a violation of the commandment "Thou shalt not kill." The Bible does not specifically condemn self-murder, but that should not surprise us because the Bible often connects its rules with penalties for their infractions. Suicide renders those responses moot. You can execute a man who has killed someone else, but there is not much you can do to penalize the corpse of a suicide.
There are several suicides in the Bible, and they tend to involve privileged men who went bad. Samson was the original suicide bomber (or rather, suicide building-collapser - Judges 16:28-31). King Saul fell on his own sword to keep from being slain by Philistines (1 Samuel 31:1-6). Ahithophel took his life when Absalom would not take his advice (probably assuming that Absalom’s rebellion against David was doomed to fail - 2 Samuel 17:23). Zimri burned his house down around him (1 Kings 16:18). Judas hung himself after betraying Christ (Matthew 27:3-10). In all these cases the Bible just tells what these men did without telling us whether it was wrong. Of course, they all did wrong things that led to their suicides.
Though suicide is a kind of murder, I think it is the least bad kind. In fact, I actually recommend it to hell-bent fiends who would otherwise kill the innocent - like mothers who smother, drown, or stab their kids (Marilyn Lemak, Susan Smith and Tonya Vasilev, respectively). In such cases I wonder, "Why couldn't you just kill yourself, you demon freak?" Think how many lives could be saved if sick murderers and murderesses would just direct all their lethal hostilities inward.
Does suicide damn the soul? Not by itself, I would say - though suicide is the kind of thing that damned souls do. We are saved by faith in Christ, and no sin but apostasy can take that away. Some believe that suicides go to hell because they die with unconfessed sin (unless, I suppose, they die slow and confess before losing consciousness), but that argument never convinced me. We all have unconfessed sin, all the time, and will die with a million of those on our record. I've already sinned today by not loving the Lord my God with all my heart, soul, mind and strength, and it's only 9 o'clock in morning.
I imagine there are good and faithful servants of Christ, who, in moments of weakness, or suffering from brain chemicals gone haywire, take their own lives. I see no reason why God, who knows the end from the beginning and who takes all things into account, might not have mercy on their souls and receive them into his presence. A friend of mine, a Korean War vet who suffers from tinnitus, told me that one time the ringing in his ears suddenly blasted louder than a freight train for several seconds before dissipating back to its normal level. He said that if that ever happened again, and the noise did not stop, he would definitely kill himself. I thanked him for telling me. If I ever have to conduct his tragic funeral I can tell people what probably transpired. But whatever happens, I know my friend is a believer whose name is written in the Book of Life.
I was once asked the suicide-and-hell question by someone who (I did not know at the time) was suicidal. That is where the question is really dangerous. The last thing I want to do is encourage a depressed person to think, "If I kill myself I get to go to heaven." Heaven forbid. Though it is true that even murderers and adulterers can get to heaven - King David did - we still don't want to encourage murder and adultery. I don't ever want to be guilty of tempting a depressed person with the promise of a happy hereafter. If you are suicidal, (A) Don't do it, and (B) Get help. Take that as an order from God.
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