Update from Rob Martin

An Interesting View for a Picnic

Yesterday I posted about an attempt from The Simple Way to speak to the injustice they see in Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter’s proposed ordinance basically abolishing feeding the homeless unless you have permits and do it at approved places. My friend Rob Martin decided to participate in this gathering, and wrote about the experience over at his blog (Abnormal Anabaptist). Here is a taste:

So, despite all my panic, it was a very subdued, low-key event of a bunch of folks just spending time together.  What did we accomplish?  Well, in the eyes of the world, worried about laws, regulations, and government agencies, not a whole lot.  We didn’t change the law.  We didn’t change any politicians minds.  To that extent, we failed.

To the man who stocked up on sandwiches for the week, it wasn’t a failure.

To the man who stood there while we loved on him with a sandwich, a cupcake, an apple, and a bottle of water, it wasn’t a failure.

To the young man who, strange though he was, found a bunch of folks that just accepted him no matter how outrageous he acted, it wasn’t a failure.

You see, we were with Jesus.  Two or more believers gathered, and Jesus was there.  We fellow-shipped with each other and with other people made in the image of God and Jesus was there.

This was the third way.  This was the way of Christ made flesh.  This proved that it was possible to act counter to justice in a way that did not sacrifice grace, mercy, compassion, and love, even for those with whom we disagree.  Instead of attacking the counsel, we fellow-shipped.  Instead of shouting angrily, we fed quietly.  Instead of chanting slogans, we laughed together.  We demonstrated to everyone who saw us that there was something different, something other going on.

This is what faith can do.  It can change the world.  It’s subversive.  It gets under the skin and transforms people without them even knowing it.

“We’re with Jesus”.

If we remember that, if we take that every where we go, imagine the possibilities.  Imagine what we can accomplish when we decide that, when we’re acting for Jesus, we are acting with him.

And it’s uncomfortable.  When we decide to spend time with Jesus, we’re going to be taken in some very strange places and directions, places that we would never decide on our own to do.  I hate meeting new people, I despise walking into a strange situation where I know no-one.  And yet, that is precisely what God required of me so I could spend time with Jesus.

You see, this is a radical faith we have.  Following Jesus is not safe, it’s not comfortable, it will take you out of your normal life and you will never be able to go back to it the same.  For me, I’m no longer satisfied with living a “normal” life.  I’ve encountered God and the experience has changed me forever.  For those Christians who only know a faith of “agreement” and don’t know that radical, gut-wrenching, whole-body, throw caution to the wind kind of faith, I feel sad.  I know many who don’t know that.  I know many who are satisfied with their life as it is.

“I don’t think I would change anything of my life, even if I wasn’t a Christian”.

Yes, I’ve heard that from some.  And it saddens me.  It tells me that, as much as they may “believe” something, they haven’t yet experienced that transformation that comes from diving in head-first into the terror of a faith lived on the edge.  And it is that experience that I find in Hebrews 11.

If you haven’t experienced that yet, I hope you will stop, think, and start to look around with a new set of radical eyes, seeking for where God is moving.  And if you have experienced it, well… you know EXACTLY what I’m feeling right now.

“We’re with Jesus”.

Picking on the Homeless: Update

My friend Rob Martin will be heading into Philly to participate in an act of civil disobedience with The Simple Way this afternoon around 4:00. Here are some of the detail

On Thursday 22nd March, The Simple Way and family will be having a little love feast/radical “food sharing” at Thomas Paine Plaza. We will break some bread together around unjust regulations like these feeding ordinances. This coincides with the “Food is a Human Right Rally” which starts at 4pm and the final meeting of the Board of Health around the food sharing regulations in Philadelphia.

JOIN US. We will be wearing teeshirts with the slogan “Jesus didn’t need a health permit”. We will bring blankets and supper–with enough extra to share with those who don’t have.

Sharing food is a matter of conscience, and an act of faith, a spiritual practice, an exercise of religious freedom. There are many of us who believe that to be Christian means to be “born again” where we have a new definition of family that runs deeper than biology.

These are our brothers and sisters! The very name of our City comes from the Greek words “phileo”, meaning “I love”, and “adelphos”, meaning “brother” – hence the “City of Brotherly Love”. Phileo specifically describes the kind of deep love that brothers and sisters have for each other.  We hope our City lives up to its name.  We are committed to making sure that it does.
Date: Thursday March 22nd, 2012
Time: The rally starts at 4. We will be sitting down for a love feast at 4:30.
Place: Thomas Paine Plaza, JFK and 14th Street, Philadelphia
What to bring: A blanket to sit on, food to eat and enough extra to share around.

Here is The Simple Way’s public statement on these regulations.
http://www.thesimpleway.org/about/archive/philadelphias-new-food-sharing-ordinance/
We strongly encourage everyone who joins us to “Know your Rights”. You can find more information here. http://www.aclupa.org/issues/freespeech/kyrataprotest.htm

It will be interesting to hear from Rob how it goes. I’m sure he’ll post something about it on his blog, so I’ll be sure to update my reader(s) about it!

Picking on the Homeless

In recent weeks, Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter and the department of health in the city have been championing regulations that would prohibit outdoor distribution of food to the homeless. This seems like the worst of big government intervening with sweeping legislation to solve an occasional problem. I thought I would share the following thoughtful response from The Simple Way.

On March 14, 2012 Mayor Michael Nutter announced a plan to ban “outdoor feeding” in the City of Philadelphia. In effect this would make it illegal to share or distribute food in public places without a permit.

We understand that there are some concerns from the Board of Health regarding health and safety of the food that groups share with the homeless. We are glad to see energy devoted to classes that educate and equip groups in food preparation, storage, and distribution so they can more carefully feed folks who are hungry. We share the desire of the Mayor and Health Department that folks eat in dignified settings. We echo the Mayor’s dream that every person be able to have a nutritious meal sitting around a dinner table, and we look forward to the day when homelessness and poverty are history. But homelessness and poverty are not yet history. They are a reality facing many of our brothers and sisters and fellow Philadelphians.

It is certainly appropriate for the City to intervene when there are specific groups that are sharing food in a way that is unsafe, unsanitary, or irresponsible. However, a citywide ban on food sharing is neither a necessary nor a sensible response to these exceptional cases. We are deeply concerned that these new regulations and policies – and the Mayor’s ban on sharing food – do more harm than good. They create bureaucratic barriers to compassion.

The very name of our City comes from the Greek words “phileo”, meaning “I love”, and “adelphos”, meaning “brother” – hence the “City of Brotherly Love”. Phileo is one of the three Greek words for love, and it describes the kind of deep love that brothers and sisters have for each other.  We hope our City lives up to its name.  We are committed to making sure that it does.

The proposed regulations suggest the requirement of permits when providing food for more than three persons, and other unreasonable requirements, such as providing a menu of food to be served as far as a year in advance. Our fear is that these regulations specifically target and will be selectively enforced against some of our most vulnerable citizens. It is hard to imagine every barbeque cookout, religious service with a potluck dinner, family reunion, or block party being prohibited from sharing food. Of course, failure to equally enforce this type of legislation would be a clear civil rights violation as well as an act of discrimination. The parks and public spaces of our city should be enjoyed by all citizens, rich or poor.

Sharing food with those who are hungry is a fundamental act of human conscience. The thousands of people who share food in any way, both inside and outside, make the world a better place. The economic challenges facing our nation have awakened in us a sense of solidarity, knowing that there is a fine line between “us” and “them”. Additional cuts in City funding threaten to make such acts of generosity even more necessary. Philadelphia’s Deputy Mayor Schwarz has noted that most funds for the City’s human services come from the State, where a new budget threatens to cut $41 million in social service funding, representing a 20% cut, threatening even those services that currently exist – and do so much good.

For many of us, sharing food is not only a matter of conscience, but is also an act of faith, a spiritual practice, an exercise of religious freedom. There are many of us who believe that to be Christian means to be “born again” where we have a new definition of family that runs deeper than biology, making it just as essential to care for those we are biologically unrelated to as those we are. This new legislation potentially makes it illegal for a church youth group to take pizzas to homeless folks in a park, or a family to take the delicious leftovers from a Bar Mitzvah to folks sleeping under a bridge. It is unconscionable.

In the Bible, Jesus even goes so far as to say that when we feed the poor, the “least of these”, we are feeding Christ himself.  When Jesus speaks of the final judgment he says we will be asked by God, “When I was hungry did you feed me?” Can you imagine if our response was, “Sorry God, the city would not give us a permit?”

One of the stories of the Gospel involves Jesus doing a miracle where he takes a few fish and loaves and multiplies them, feeding hundreds of hungry folks.  Jesus didn’t have a health permit to do that outdoor feeding. In fact if Jesus had tried to perform that miracle feeding in Philadelphia under these proposed laws, he would have gotten into serious trouble. Jesus bids us come and follow – feed the poor, care for the hungry. We are not willing to allow unjust policies to be obstacles to love.

Our organization, The Simple Way, started nearly 20 years ago as college students shared food with folks on the street in downtown Philadelphia. Over the years our organization has grown and evolved, but sharing food and resources with those in need continues to be at the core of our mission, and of our faith. In fact, as long as folks are hungry we cannot NOT share.

At various intervals in our history we have faced obstacles to our work, like this current policy. We insist on humbly but persistently interrupting injustice.

Twelve years ago the City began passing anti-homeless regulations and policies very similar to the current food ordinances being enacted by Mayor Nutter and the Board of Health. Hundreds of us voiced our concern about the laws, and dozens of us were arrested for sharing food and sleeping in public. In the end, we won a major victory in court.  In fact, the Philadelphia Judge even declared that those of us who broke the law were not criminals but “freedom fighters”, citing the Boston Tea Party and the Civil Rights movement.

We cannot help but see this current struggle as a new chapter in the story of American activism, which has deep roots right here in Philadelphia.

One of the proverbs of the Civil Rights movement in America was: “Noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as cooperation with good.” And it was St. Augustine who said, “An unjust law is no law at all.” This is an unjust law and we are obliged to not comply.

We deeply value dialogue and are convinced we can all do more together than we can on our own. As for this new government policy, we can do better – and we must.

Thoughts on Gender and Leadership

Thanks to my friend Rob Martin for pointing out an interesting post from J.R. Daniel Kirk at Storied Theology. Kirk is responding to some comments by John Piper in which Piper indicated that Christianity is a masculine religion. I admit that I am unfamiliar with the details of Piper’s description, but the fact that Christ talks about wanting to gather the people of Jerusalem under His wings like a mother hen would gather her chicks (Matt. 23.37, Luke 13.34) makes it seem hard to justify on the surface. This sounds much more like a feminine care and nurture than a masculine display of authority. Kirk looks at the book of Mark to trace how Mark retells the story of the disciples, a collection of males who seem to be the “insiders” in the story, and the women, who seem to reside mostly on the edges and come in and out of the picture, but are never trusted in the inner circle and never specifically empowered to go out and minister.

Kirk points out that it is always the disciples who are clueless as to the point of Jesus’ message. They don’t have enough faith to perform the miracles they are sent out to perform. They tell Jesus that He surely will not die. Peter is rebuked and called Satan! The women in Mark’s narrative fare much better. They are commended for their faith. The widow’s mite is worth more than the rich man’s overflow. The impression that the men are privileged in Scripture and the women are marginalized doesn’t really hold true when we consider the details. The men all run when the time of trial comes, it is the women who remain faithful and follow Him to the foot of the cross (though John’s version places him at the foot of the cross as well).

Here is a taste of the conclusion Kirk draws from the text:

In the story, the disciples do not understand what is entailed in leading the people of God. They think it is about greatness and power rather than service and death.

And so, we have the group represented by Peter. The rock. Is being “the rock” a good thing? In Mark, the rocky soil indicates plants that spring up well, but fall away when danger or persecution arise on account of the word. Mark repeats the language of “falling away” when the disciples scatter, leaving Jesus to die alone.

The Twelve were committed to Jesus, and happy with him–but only as one who came with power. They had no faith in their calling to participate in his way of death. They did not have eyes to see that the ministry of Jesus turned the economy of the world on its head.

Shall we return to the women now?

How are we to assess these women who, in the narrative world, are outsiders, on the margins?

Unlike the disciples who are rebuked for being of little faith, Jesus commends these women as having great faith: “Daughter, go in peace, your faith has made you well.”

Moreover, there is one episode where Jesus ties a human inseparably to the gospel story. It is the episode of the woman who pours out oil over Jesus’ head. This looks to be a royal anointing! But when Jesus defends her he says, “Leave her alone, she has prepared my body beforehand for burial.”

The act of anointing prepares Jesus for burial: Messiahship and death are held together, and here is the only person in the whole story to get it. This is why “wherever the gospel is preached what she has done will also be told in memory of her.”

What does it mean to live at the margins, to be unnamed? How does this compare with being the twelve, the dudes, the insiders?

According to the economy of the world, with its measures of greatness, to be the twelve is to be exemplary, in the place to lead, to exclude others from leadership, to stand close to Jesus and guard the gates of who else can draw near.

And to the extent that we look to Jesus’ selection of them, and the apparent marginalization of the women, as paradigmatic for male leadership in the church, we show ourselves to be people whose minds have not yet been transformed by the very story to which we are appealing.

It is only by agreeing with the disciples’ way of assessing the world that we can see their “insider status” as a true insider status, to be replicated by other men in church history.

Jesus offers another way: You guys don’t get it! It’s the rulers of the Gentiles who lord authority over people. It shall not be so among you.

There is another way. It is the way of the cross.

There is another way. It is the way of the “marginalized” in the worlds eyes lying closest to Jesus in faith and understanding.

Are we really supposed to hold up as our model the “Satan” who denied the gospel of the crucified Christ, and claim that Peter is paradigmatic of the place of men as insiders and faithful leaders in the church?

Or should we not seek out the one who did the good deed for Jesus, holding together Messiah and death from her place at the margins? Should we not seek out the one who sought out Jesus merely to touch the fringe of his garment and learn from her what it means to walk in faith?

The irony of appealing to the boys as insiders is that in so doing we show ourselves to be adopting the boys’ understanding of power, privilege, and leadership in the kingdom.

And this view is roundly rebuked by Jesus in words of dissuasion and the work of the cross.

The economy of the world is not the economy of the Kingdom. The world thrives on power hoarded and protected. The Kingdom is led by a King who serves and sacrifices so that His people may live. To look at Scripture and find justification for a continuance of a “masculine” religion is to fall into an old trap. Leadership in the Kingdom is not about the same things as leadership in the world. It is not about gaining power or privilege, or wielding control. Remember, Paul said that God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and the weak things to shame that which is strong (1 Cor 1.27). We would also do well to recall:

²⁷ For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. ²⁸ There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; foryou are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3.27-28 NASB)

To claim that the Church is supposed to favor one gender ignores this fact. This is not to deny the reality of differences between the genders, but it is to say that these differences must not be used as grounds for subjugation. Verses about female submission only point out that women need to submit, but so do men! We are all to submit to one another in reverence for Christ. These fights for power do nothing to build up the Kingdom of God. Can we please agree to work together to advance the Kingdom, rather than fight for power and authority within the Body of Christ and act as un-Christ-like as many throughout Church history have managed to do?

The Cross and Aslan’s Table

Aslan's Sacrifice on the Stone Table from The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe

An interesting take (a little old, but still worth pointing out to my readers) on looking at the Cross of Christ not as Christ saving us from God’s wrath, but instead as God saving us from our own deserved punishment. Here is the first bit of the article:

Last week, I wrote about my belief that the cross is too beautiful to fit many popular theologies.  It isn’t beautiful in itself, for a Roman cross represents the power of Empire, a power that is always opposed to the way of Jesus.  Rather, the beauty is in the One who chose to endure unjust suffering, knowing that the grave would not be able to hold God’s Messiah down!  The beauty is in a Jesus who models what it means to love our enemies while humbly reminding us that we all were God’s enemies (Romans 5.10).

One thing that I’m convinced of is that God did not pour out Divine wrath against Jesus on the cross in order to be appeased. This view, as Mark Baker states, “can too easily lead to a situation in which we might conclude that Jesus came to save us from God.” I plan to nuance this statement in future articles, but for now it suffices to say that we need alternative ways to think about the cross.

In fact, part of the problem is that we’ve limited the cross to one primary explanation (God’s wrath being poured out on Jesus as a substitute for sinners to appease God’s bind to the Law).  I want to suggest that the New Testament gives multiple images and metaphors for expressing the multifaceted significance of the cross.  Today, lets explore one of these through the lens of a popular story.  Notice that this is one example of how substitution can still be present in atonement theology without the appeasement of God’s wrath (which, as popularly understood, isn’t in the New Testament).

As a child, I remember reading C.S. Lewis’ wonderful masterpiece – The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe in public school.  What I didn’t know then that I know now, is that the scene where Aslan is killed on behalf of Edmund the traitor is a wonderful picture of a theory of atonement that is often called, Christus Victor (or, Jesus’ victory over the powers).  So, let’s try to look at how substitution works out in this understanding of the cross, which some would consider the central story from out of which all other atonement images arise.

You can read the rest here.

Who Is My Enemy?

Interesting thoughts for Christians. We know Jesus’ answer to the question about who is my neighbor (anyone who is in need that we have the means to help), and we know the answer to what we are expected to do to our enemies:

⁴³ “You have heard that it was said, ‘YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR and hate your enemy.’ ⁴⁴ But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, ⁴⁵ so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. ⁴⁶ For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? ⁴⁷ If you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? ⁴⁸ Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (Matthew 5. 43-48, NASB)

But who is our enemy? If we count Muslims as our enemies, as many Americans do, Christians are held to the standard of praying for them and loving them. Does this characterize my perspective toward them? Not always, if I’m honest. I don’t generally hate them, so I may be better than most, but I fall far short of the standard set here by the Messiah. How can I get to know Muslims better, and better love them? I also need to be praying for them, especially those who hate me most and wish to persecute my brothers and sisters in their countries (think some in Egypt, Lybia, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, etc.). Thanks to Matt Hunter to pointing me to information about a new book that I have added to my Amazon.com wish list. Here is an intro from the author. You can find a couple more videos here.

Hurry Up and Wait

Jon Acuff

Over at his “Stuff Christians Like” blog, Jon Acuff ruminates on waiting on God. Here are his thoughts:

I don’t know what questions you ask your wife or your husband or your boyfriend or your girlfriend. I don’t know what questions you ask professors or friends or bosses or anyone else. But I do know one question you ask God. It’s one of the most popular questions we Christians ask. Here it is:

“Do you want me to wait on you right now God?”

Waiting on God is one of the hardest things to figure out. I’ve written about it a bunch before because it’s a question we all ask at some point.

Does God want me to look for a new job, or be still and wait where he has me?

Does God want me to date more if I’m interested in being married, or does he want me to wait on him?

Does God want us to buy a new house or wait on him?

Does God want me to quit my job and join the mission field or wait on him?

The variety of wait-or-go situations is endless. And confusing.

But I have discovered one tiny verse that’s challenged how I view the waiting dilemma.

The verse is Mark 15:43, and it’s really simple. It’s such a fragment of a fragment of a much bigger story that it’s easy to overlook it. But it does speak to waiting in an interesting way.

Here is what it says:

Joseph of Arimathea, a prominent member of the Council, who was himself waiting for the kingdom of God, went boldly to Pilate and asked for Jesus’ body.

On the one hand, Joseph is noted as someone who was “waiting for the kingdom of God.” He is identified as a man of faith, as someone waiting. But then, within the confines of the same exact sentence, he is described as someone that “went boldly.”

He didn’t do one or the other; he did both. Waiting and action were not mutually exclusive in his life. But most of the time, I act like they are. I usually think it’s a one or the other type of world we’re living in. I either wait on God, or I run with God. But Joseph did both.

He waited and he sprinted.

He was calm and bold.

Peaceful and busy. (Insert your own two words that feel weird together.)

Maybe the answer to the question we all keep asking isn’t what we thought it would be.

Maybe the answer to the question, “Should I wait on God or hustle as hard as I can?” is actually “Yes.”

I, for one, feel convicted.

True Pluralism

Pluralism has gotten a bad rap, and much of it earned based on a misuse of the term. Sociologist Christian Smith suggests (HT: John Fea) that Pluralism is actually the answer that we need to balance traditional sectarianism (where we simply scream at each other and demonize those we disagree with) and what he calls “liberal whateverism” (where we all try to get along by pretending there are no disagreements). Here is his conclusion to what we should do:

Is there not a better way for all of us to take religion more seriously without descending into sectarian conflict? That is one of the most important questions of our day.

I think we need to reject both sectarian conflict and liberal whateverism and commit ourselves instead to an authentic pluralism. Genuine pluralism fosters a culture that honors rather than isolates and disparages religious difference. It affirms the right of others to believe and practice their faith, not only in their private lives but also in the public square — while expecting them to allow still others to do the same. Authentic pluralism does not minimize religious differences by saying that “all religions are ultimately the same.” That is false and insipid. Pluralism encourages good conversations and arguments across differences, taking them seriously precisely because they are understood to be about important truths, not merely private “opinions.” It is possible, authentic pluralism insists, to profoundly disagree with others while at the same time respecting, honoring, and perhaps even loving them. Genuine pluralism suspects the multi-cultural regime’s too-easy blanket affirmations of “tolerance” of being patronizing and dismissive. Pluralism, however, also counts atheist Americans as deserving equal public respect, since their beliefs are based as much on a considered faith as are religious views and so should not be automatically denigrated.

Read the rest here. Smith has interesting thoughts about current trends, including the large minority who have a nebulous belief in “karma”.

Note that Smith is not suggesting we ignore differences (what I have typically heard referred to as pluralism, but which Smith more appropriately labels as liberal whateverism). He is suggesting that we acknowledge differences, but offer others the respect that we want from them. If we as Christians want to offer our view in the public square, we should be open to Muslims, atheists, Mormons, Jews, Hindus, etc. offering their views as well. If we want to be listened to, we must listen to them. We don’t have to agree, but we do need to listen to and respect them. This seems like a model our Messiah could endorse. In fact, he did: “In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 7.12 NASB) I think this is a proper balance between the demonizing of those we disagree with, and the blind acceptance of them while ignoring the disagreements. I pray that we as a society can move to this model, rather than the extremes that we have experienced in religion and politics recently.

Is Busyness Next to Godliness?

Most people would answer that question with some comment about how obviously wrong this title is. Still, we often live our lives as if it were true. Over at Relevant Magazine, Mason Slater offers some thoughts about the cult of busyness. After pointing out the cultural pressure, even within the Church, he offers:

Here’s the dirty little secret of the gospel of busyness: It promises us a full and satisfying life, but, in the end, it makes our lives emptier. It uses us for what we can contribute, and in the process we live less, feel less, even love less.

Instead of a life filled with the satisfaction of endless accomplishments, we’ve gotten ourselves a generation of chronic exhaustion, absent workaholic parents and kids who have been not-so-subtly taught that the only way to earn the attention and love of others is with grades, paychecks or championships.

But your value is not determined by what you produce. Your loveliness is not based on what you accomplish or how full your calendar is.

Work is good—it’s part of the way God designed His image-bearers—but it is not the only thing we were made for. He created us to have a balance in life, going so far as to incorporate a cycle of work and rest into the very fabric of the created order. There is a time for work in that cycle, but there is also a time for rest and community and quiet contemplation.

A life of constant overcommitment is not a sign of success, or something to be bragged about. It is a sign of imbalance, a sign we have put our faith in the gospel of busyness instead of in a God who dares us to trust Him and be willing to rest.

But Slater does not leave us to figure it out on our own. He offers the following advice:

There is hope for the overcommitted, though; we don’t have to live this way. We can balance good hard work with rest and play; in fact we were created to live in that balance. And the sooner we realize that, the sooner we can all stop playing the game of bragging that we are so very busy.

So the next time you catch up with a friend, refrain from contributing to the cycle. Refuse to brag about busyness as if it were a virtue, refuse to act like making time to rest is a mark of shame. If the very God who designed us thought that balancing work with rest was worthwhile, perhaps we should give it a try.

You can read the rest here. This is a much needed reminder for many of us. I find myself defending myself for having the ability to take off a little early to accompany Joy to an ultrasound. Why do I feel this need? Because those around me seem to have an expectation that taking a half day is in some way shirking my responsibilities. Do I still get my work done? Yes. Then what is the big deal? We have set up a culture of busyness. We claim that we are busy so that we can have just one more thing we want, or so we can save for that family vacation. Yet, once we have that one thing, or that amazing vacation, we end up back where we started. Busy again. We are, in large part, fooling ourselves and living an illusion. If the point is to have time for our families, why not find a balance that allows us to be home with our family?

That is part of why I took this job over the (much) better paying offer from a pharma company. Here I knew that I would have more flexibility for what was really important to me. I don’t get to pick vacation days, since I need to be in my classes when Messiah College is open. The reward, though, is that I get to set my office hours around classes in such a way that I have flexibility to take off early if I want. Generally, I put in 10 hour days, but I have the freedom to take an early exit if I want. I set my own deadlines, for the most part. I have summers to take as many days out of the office as I want to spend time with Joy and the kids. We can take day trips, or overnight trips, without having to use up vacation days or ask permission. I chose a career based on my calling and skills, but also with the type of life I wanted to live firmly fixed in my mind.

This job also gives me a chance to reflect on articles like this and post my reflections. In many ways, this is actually part of my job. I need to be thinking through issues like this so that I can set a good example for my students of what a balanced, godly life looks like. I also need to be able to talk with them meaningfully about these issues when advising them, and provide them with resources as they process this and make their own choices in life.

Do you know of any other resources for students to encourage the Christ-like life of balance? I’ve blogged about one resource, Mark Buchanan’s The Rest of God. (Check out the posts starting with this, or pick and choose here.) I’m sure there are other resources out there. Please feel free to inform me in the comments section!

If we look at His life, we see the time away balanced with the miracles and preaching. It must have been a significant part of His life, since the Gospel authors all considered it worth noting. Therefore, I think this should be the goal of our lives!

A Response to Pat Robertson

Pat Robertson: At It Again

Recently Pat Robertson told his 700 Club viewers that he would not fault someone who divorced their spouse who had dementia. Most Christians shake their head at just another Pat Robertson statement. Many Christians probably worry about the perception of skeptics who might use Robertson as a reason to discredit the faith. I debated whether to even comment. I recently asked him to be quiet, so why comment again? Well, thanks to my friend, and blog post motivator, Josh Wood who not only sent me the link above to the Yahoo! report on Robertson, he sent me a post that linked to this eloquent response from Russell Moore. Here is a large piece of his post:

Marriage, the Scripture tells us, is an icon of something deeper, more ancient, more mysterious. The marriage union is a sign, the Apostle Paul announces, of the mystery of Christ and his church (Eph. 5). The husband, then, is to love his wife “as Christ loved the church” (Eph. 5:25). This love is defined not as the hormonal surge of romance but as a self-sacrificial crucifixion of self. The husband pictures Christ when he loves his wife by giving himself up for her.

At the arrest of Christ, his Bride, the church, forgot who she was, and denied who he was. He didn’t divorce her. He didn’t leave.

The Bride of Christ fled his side, and went back to their old ways of life. When Jesus came to them after the resurrection, the church was about the very thing they were doing when Jesus found them in the first place: out on the boats with their nets. Jesus didn’t leave. He stood by his words, stood by his Bride, even to the Place of the Skull, and beyond.

A woman or a man with Alzheimer’s can’t do anything for you. There’s no romance, no sex, no partnership, not even companionship. That’s just the point. Because marriage is a Christ/church icon, a man loves his wife as his own flesh. He cannot sever her off from him simply because she isn’t “useful” anymore.

Pat Robertson’s cruel marriage statement is no anomaly. He and his cohorts have given us for years a prosperity gospel with more in common with an Asherah pole than a cross. They have given us a politicized Christianity that uses churches to “mobilize” voters rather than to stand prophetically outside the power structures as a witness for the gospel.

But Jesus didn’t die for a Christian Coalition; he died for a church. And the church, across the ages, isn’t significant because of her size or influence. She is weak, helpless, and spattered in blood. He is faithful to us anyway.

If our churches are to survive, we must repudiate this Canaanite mammonocracy that so often speaks for us. But, beyond that, we must train up a new generation to see the gospel embedded in fidelity, a fidelity that is cruciform.

It’s easy to teach couples to put the “spark” back in their marriages, to put the “sizzle” back in their sex lives. You can still worship the self and want all that. But that’s not what love is. Love is fidelity with a cross on your back. Love is drowning in your own blood. Love is screaming, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me.”

Sadly, many of our neighbors assume that when they hear the parade of cartoon characters we allow to speak for us, that they are hearing the gospel. They assume that when they see the giggling evangelist on the television screen, that they see Jesus. They assume that when they see the stadium political rallies to “take back America for Christ,” that they see Jesus. But Jesus isn’t there.

Jesus tells us he is present in the weak, the vulnerable, the useless. He is there in the least of these (Matt. 25:31-46). Somewhere out there right now, a man is wiping the drool from an 85 year-old woman who flinches because she think he’s a stranger. No television cameras are around. No politicians are seeking a meeting with them.

But the gospel is there. Jesus is there.