H.B.log

Friday's Already-Not Yet

Already
Monday night in New Orleans was a celebration of redemption, the restoration of a city devestated by creation's civil war, when the seas rose up and swamped the dry land.  Thirteen months ago, Hurricane Katrina left a visible reminder of Romans chapter 8, verse 20: "For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it."  On Monday night, we got to celebrate verse 21: "in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay."

Indeed, everything seemed right in the Crescent City, as viewed through the lens of ESPN's Monday Night Football.  When we last saw the iconic Superdome a year ago, it was scarred and shredded on the outside, stinking with sewage on the inside.  On Monday night, it was bathed in multi-colored lights and filled with a raucous crowd.  After a year soujourning in exile, the football Saints marched in and dispatched the propserous visitors from Atlanta.  And even the lion lay down with the lamb as Green Day's Billie Joe Armstrong (looking eerily like Alice Cooper) harmonized with U2's Bono to sing, "After the flood all the colors came out.  It's a beautiful day."

Not Yet
But just beyond the camera's gaze, many of the city's neighborhoods are still a sea of rotting houses abandoned to decay.  They are a visible reminder that though the Dome is rebuilt, it is just a small appetizer of redemption, not the full meal.  Indeed, U2's role on Monday night was to celebrate the "already."  But if they had chosen to remind us of the "not yet," they could have dug deeper into their lyrical well.  They could have told us that "here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come" (Hebrews 13:14).  They could have shown us a place built not on a flood plain but high upon a desert plain, where the streets have no name.  As the great jazz standard has taught us, "Some say this world of trouble is the only one we need.  But I'm waiting for that moment when the new world is revealed.  When the revelation comes...When the revelation comes.  Oh Lord, I want to be in that number when the saints go marching in."         

Jesus as public truth - a 9/11 remembrance

Perhaps the greatest barrier we sophisticated, modern, Western people have to seeing Jesus for who he really is what's sometimes referred to as the "fact-values split."  The great British missionary, Lesslie Newbigin, once described it like this:

It is one of the key features of our culture, and one that we shall have to examine in some depth, that we make a sharp distinction between a world of what we call "values" and a world of what we call "facts."  In the former world we are pluralists; values are a matter of personal choice.  In the latter we are not; facts are facts, whether you like them or not.  It follows that, in this culture, the Church and its preaching belong to the world of "values..." The Church is not generally perceived as concerned with facts, with the realities which finally govern the world and which we shall in the end have to acknowledge whether we like them or not.  In this cultural milieu, the confident announcement of the Christian faith sounds like an arrogant attempt of some people to impose their values on others.  As long as the Church is content to offer its beliefs modestly as simply one of many brands available in the ideological supermarket, no offense is taken.  But the affirmation that the truth in the gospel ought to govern public life is offensive. (The Gospel in a Pluralist Society, 7)

Furthermore, many Christians have made peace with this status quo, content to describe our "personal relationship with Jesus" as a private, emotional experience that helps us cope with the cruelities of life under the sun, while we listen at Christmastime to meek little pastors drone on-and-on about "light being born in our hearts."  But this picture of Jesus, true as it may be, is not complete.  He's LORD, not just of my heart and life but of the whole world.  Colossians 1 describes him in unmistakably cosmic terms: "For by him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities, all things were created through him and for him.  And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together."

Jesus is Lord of all things, which means he is what Newbigin calls "public truth."  In other words, he's not just the plastic bobble-head buddy on your cabbie's dashboard.  He's the clue to understanding all of history...the one who makes sense out of everything in the world...all things, not just my things...public truth, not private opinion...facts, not values.

If Jesus really is public truth, then true witness means applying the gospel events - his life, death, resurrection, and second coming - to real, public conversations that everyone in the world is concerned with.  I recently saw this in action while reading Pastor Tim Keller's (Redeemer Presbyterian Church, NYC) speech at the 9-11 rembrance ceremony attended by victims' families, President Bush, Senator Clinton, Mayor Bloomberg, Governor Pataki, and Rudy Guiliani.  Read it for yourself here at his son Michael's blog, and notice how he winsomely but boldly shows how Jesus death and resurrection give meaning to even the most tragic events.

(HT: Steve McCoy) 

    

Friday's Already-Not Yet

In the blogging world, I'm just a little man staring at the knees of giants like Kevin Cawley, Steve McCoy, and Joe Thorn (hmm...sounds like my real world).  And if I've learned one lesson from these uber-bloggers it's this: have a regular, recurring, unique feature such as the "Friday Photo" or the "Phriday Photo" or the "Friday Photo."  Well, since I'm afraid of dark rooms, I've decided on a new weekly (I hope) feature: The Friday "Already-Not Yet."   

What is the already-not yet?  Let me explain: Perhaps the main theme of the Bible, after Jesus himself, is the "kingdom of God."  Jesus taught us to pray: "Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven," where "kingdom come" and "will be done" are two ways of saying the same thing.  So, the kingdom is a place where God's will is done and everything works like he made it to work.

Right now, in this age between Jesus' first coming (in a manger clothed in baby-goo) and his second coming (on the clouds clothed in glory), the kingdom is both "already" and "not yet."  It is already because we see little glimpses of it breaking into our world: We are forgiven our sins, reconciled to God, made into a new community in the Church.  It is not yet because there is still evil and chaos and fragmentation and death in the world and in ourselves.  This already-not yet tension is summarized well in Hebrews 2:8 - "Now in putting everything in subjection to him (Jesus), he (God the Father) left nothing outside his control.  At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him."

So in the Friday Already-Not yet, I'll ask this question: Where in our world today do we see glimpses of God's perfect order and goodness coming to earth?  And where do we see evidence of a world that is still not in complete subjection to it's good king?  Stated differently, what makes us cheer and leap for joy and what makes us groan and cry for justice?  Without further sermonizing, I present this week's already-not yet.....

Already                          

      

Not Yet

Commentary
As proof that the kingdom had come, Jesus cast out demons and said, "How can someone enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods unless he first binds the strong man?" (Matt. 12:29).  In a similar manner, Ohio State rolled into Darrell K. Royal Memorial Stadium, calf-roped the Great Satan, and posted a 24-7 victory on Bevo's new jumbotron.  But joy was short lived north of the Red River after an officiating blunder in the OU-Oregon game proved that all is not-yet fair in our fallen world.  Now, I'm no Sooner-apologist, but I can empathize with my OU friends after a replay ref failed to recognize that (a) an Oregon player illegally touched an onside kick and (b) an Oklahoma player recovered it.  The blown call set up Oregon's winning touchdown and left head schooner-driver Bobby Stoops threatening a Southern Baptist style boycott of the Pac 10.   

Dave the Dictionary Writer

It hasn't received the build-up of, say, a U2 album release, but by now you've probably heard that Mounce's Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words was released this month.  What's that?  You haven't heard?  OK, so it's not exactly sexy, but maybe it will be when they treat it like the Bible and re-brand it as Mounce's Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words for Teenage Girls.

Still, you ask, why am I blogging about it?  Because I want to brag on my fellow Fellowship Denver pastor Dave ("D.S.") Morlan who wrote 50 articles and edited many more for this book, which really will become a standard Bible study resource.  Good work, Dave!  Now we can all know what "is" is in Greek.

The Piper, The Pope, and The Prophet Mohammed

John Piper (my write-in choice for Pope and pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis) has posted a thoughtful piece on Muslim outrage over Pope Benedict XVI's message about violence and reason.  The whole article can be read here.

Piper says Christians should admit that we have often been on the wrong end of violence (i.e. the giving end) as evidenced by the Crusades.  This is not what Jesus taught us.  We should also recognize that there are many moderate Muslims who do not approve of violence.  Then, he offers up these thought-provokers:

"Point out how Islam, in its most sacred writings and authoritiative teachings, belittles Jesus Christ, not just occasionally in the news, but constantly by its dominant claims. Islam denies that Jesus Christ was and is God, a central truth of the New Testament and the Christian Church (John 1:1-3, Colossians 2:9; Hebrews 1:8).  Dominant streams of Islam deny that Jesus died on the cross and therefore deny that the clam that his death atones for sin and propitiates the wrath of God is true (1Corinthians 15:1-3; Romans 3:21-26; Galatians 3:13; 1 Peter 2:24, 3:18).  Therefore, defenders of Islam defame Jesus Christ and insult the glory of his gospel."

However, "in response to this constant defamation of Jesus Christ, there are no public threats or demands for apologies. This is not because we do not love Jesus above all things, or because we have no zeal for the glory of his name. It is because he told us to expect this (Matthew 10:25; John 15:20) and then modeled for us how to react: 'When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly' (1 Peter 2:23)."

Other Resources
Complete text of the Pope's speech
Associated Press Article
Editorial by Damian Thompson in The Daily Telegraph

Atlantic Monthly: "Means Migration"

The October edition of The Atlantic Monthly features an article by Richard Florida showing that American's growing mass of college grads are all meeting up in big cities.  Title: "Where the Brains Are."  Subtitle: "America's educated elite is clustering in a few cities - and leaving the rest of the country behind."

Atlantic subscribers can read the full article here.  Here are a few interesting facts and quotes:

America went from 11% of the population with college degrees in 1970 to 27% in 2004, but some cities are being affected more than others.  "America' s social fabric has been regularly reshaped by great migrations - of pioneers westward, of immigrants and farmers to rising industrial cities, of African Americans from the rural South to the urban North, of families outward from cities to suburbs to exurbs.  Today, a demographic realignment that may prove just as significant in underway: the mass relocation of highly skilled, highly educated, and highly paid Americans to a relatively small number of metropolitan regions...I call it the 'means migration.'"

What's driving this?  "Increasingly, the most talented and ambitious people need to live in a means metro in order to realize their full economic value.  The physical proximity of talented, highly educated people has a powerful effect on innovation and economic growth..."

What is the culture like in the means metros?  "They are socially tolerant and open to new ways of thinking.  Job switching is common, as is periodic unemployment, and free agents find plenty of common spaces in which to work and meet.  The soup is continuously stirred, and newcomers are assimilated easily."

Florida shows that the cost of living is being driven up in these urban cores, which might eventually displace many middle class workers.  But, this doesn't keep young grads out: "Significantly, young graduates are flocking in even-greater numbers to the 'means metros' where they often live in penury until either making it or being forced out by the high cost of living."

Some of the most concentrated means metros (see chart below): San Jose, San Francisco, Seattle, Boston, Denver, and Atlanta.

Later: I'll reflect on what this means for American church planting and mission.  But I probably won't do better than what Tim Keller has already done here and here and here.

 

Blogging, Take 2

My first blogging relationship was over at the Fellowship Denver blog, but things just weren't working out between us.  We never could "define the relationship" (or "FSO" as the kids now call it).  Me and the church are getting along great, but the blog and I never found our chemistry.  She was too impersonal...too wooden...too uptight...too Janet Reno.  I didn't like having to ask her, "Can I say this without messing up your hair?"  I prefer a little spunk.

So, this is blogging take 2.  The purpose is pretty straightforward: to be myself and keep a conversation going with friends near and far.  To be more exact, I hope the blog will be:

Pastoral.  That's my "day job" but it's really more than a day job; it's an all-the-time calling, and I love it.  So I hope to help people approach life through a genuinely Christian lens.

Missional.  I see myself as a missionary to a great western urban center, speaking a foreign language (Jesus) and eating bad food (have you ever tried to find good BBQ in Colorado?).  I'll share thoughts on the mixture of faith and culture.

Fun & Interesting.  There's a lot of humor in everyday life, so I hope to bring that here.

So, the content on here will come two ways: original writings and links to all the wonderful stuff floating around in cyberspace.  And, of course, your comments will help spark dialogue.