East Meets West

This past week Teri and I have been traveling with IMB trustees to visit missionary teams at work on the field.  With the reorganization of the International Mission Board from a regional emphasis to "people group clusters",  the North Africa Middle East (NAME) target became a world wide objective. Some of the highest concentrations of this cluster are found in Europe. So on this trip the trustees who are responsible for this group `are going not only to the areas of the MIddle East that one would expect, but also to areas around Europe where the biggest concentrations of MIddle Eastern immigrants exist. 

So the first stop was Paris France.

There has been much discussion in Europe about the affects of a growing population of North Africans, East Asians and Middle Easterners that are greatly outpacing the population growth of traditional European societies. "Southern blacks would sing 'We Shall Overcome!" for civil rights, but this group sings, 'We Shall Overwhelm!' my friend John Brady,  the regional leader for NAME jokingly tells me. There are many sociologists here in Europe who believe that if the current trend plays out to it's natural conclusion, the Muslim population in Europe could be the majority within 20 years. The ferries that carry North African immigrants into European ports in southern France have been given names commemorating famous Muslims like Tariq Ibn Ziyad, the Muslim invader of Europe in the 7th century. A not so subtle reminder to all of Europe that a population bomb is on it's way.

The strategy for our missionaries is cut and dry. In muslim dominated Middle Eastern countries, it is very difficult to plant churches and to formally evangelize; but in European countries there are no laws prohibiting it. So our teams are actively targeting these clusters with the gospel knowing that many of them will be moving back into their home countries. Our prayer is that the affect of this will be the gospel spreading in reverse as immigrant families go back into their homelands.

On our first day here we heard from several team leaders who had gathered from countries throughout Europe and the Middle East to meet us. They briefed us on the dynamic situation playing out in countries like Ethiopia, Yemin, Samaria, Oman, Egypt, Israel, France and Spain. It is clear that there is a movement of the Spirit taking place all across this part of the world.

I am continually amazed at the boldness of our friends in this part of the world. They took us to the largest, most active and notorious Mosque in France. Worshippers here routinely block off the streets of Paris during their Friday prayers. Walking toward the mosque, one gets the distinct feeling of being not in Paris France, the one time seat of Medieval Christianity, but of walking down a normal street in Tunis, Amman or Damascus. Gradually the sights, sounds, smells and language changes from distinctively French to traditional Arab or North African. Increasingly we stand out as Westerners. And yet we are not in the Middle East or North Africa, instead we are within the shadow of one of the most enduring symbols of Western culture, the Eiffel Tower.

A few days ago some of our friends began a conversation with some of the members of the Mosque. The conversation got especially heated when the Imam came out and entered the dialogue. The long bearded man commanded a lot of respect in the community and his arrival drew a lot of attention. A large crowd gathered and our friends asked the Imam, an expert in the Koran, "Isn't it true the Koran teaches that Jesus was the Christ?"

"Yes, of course", was his response.

"And does it not teach that Mary conceived Him as a virgin?"

"Yes", was his response, admitting to the passage in Surah 3 and growing increasingly uncomfortable with the conversation.

"And yet you say that Jesus was not the Son of God. Then who was His Father?"

The Imam mumbled something about them not understanding the Arabic of the Koran and waved them off and left.

As they were leaving one of the men standing nearby grabbed the arm of one of our friends and said, "I know who you are."

"Who is that?" My friend asked?

"You are the Christians."

"Yes, that's right." Was the response.

"Do you know what Jesus is going to do to you when he comes back?"  He asked.

"What's that?"

"He is going to kill you."

Their brief encounter at the mosque was a reminder to them that this work here is more than just proclaiming the teachings of Jesus in the scripture. It also involves a great deal of unpacking the complex and twisted distortions that are taught about Jesus in the Koran.

So the proclamation of the gospel around the world begins with meeting people where they are. That is just as true of where they are spiritually as it is where they are physically. Our friends here are committed to engaging this largely unreached people group in both places, whatever the cost.

God in the Furnace

The book of Daniel is one of the those books in the Old Testament that is rich with dramatic images and story lines.  Some of our favorite lessons for preschoolers and grade-schoolers comes out of these visuals.  From this one book we get giant statues, fiery furnaces, hands writing on walls and lions dens.  These are images that are imprinted indelibly on the hearts and minds of any kid whose grown up going to Sunday School.

But more than just great kids stories- the book of Daniel provides post modern believers with enduring principles to live by.

For instance, this week we are focused on the story of the three sons of Israel who were thrown into the fiery furnace for not bowing to Nebuchadnezzars statue.  Here are some principles I see that are helpful to twenty first century believers:

1.  To have biblical faith means to be uncompromising in what we know to be true in a way that demonstrates love and respect.  I think a remarkable side issue to the Daniel 3 story is the quiet steadfast faith of the three sons of Israel.   They were set up, accused and brought before Nebuchadnezzar and threatened with a terrifying sentence, and yet through it all they showed poise and respect without ever backing down from their core belief.   When the Bible says to be prepared to defend your faith with gentleness and respect we should understand that those are not two disconnected ideas.  The reason a person is gentle and respectful while talking about what they believe is precisely because they are confident in that belief and can talk about it intelligently and logically.

The word "intelligence" in fact comes from two root words, "inter" which means "between" and "legere" which means "choose".    The intelligent person is one who knows both sides of an argument and makes an informed choice.  Christian discernment is the result of thinking through beliefs and giving all sides of an argument equal footing before coming to a conclusion.  The Christian operates under the assumption that all truth is God's truth and therefore seeking truth is God's work.  The three sons of Israel showed this kind of discernment when they faced the king when they gave their explanation for their position:

¹⁷ If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it, and he will deliver us from Your Majesty’s hand. ¹⁸ But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”   (Daniel 3:17-18)

Their answer shows a solid theology.  It demonstrates that they grasp both the goodness and greatness of God.  God CAN deliver them if He chooses.  But for reasons they may not yet know, God might not choose to deliver them.  But regardless of what might happen they trust the character and sovereignty of God and can therefore confidently embrace their future.

2.   A second principle here is that to have biblical faith means we know that even tragedy has a purpose.   The world we live in is sometimes very painful and often horribly unjust.  As a pastor for over 25 years I have seen and experienced great tragedy with people.  Sometimes bad things happen to very good people.  Life is often very difficult and unfair.

What are we to make of the problem of pain and suffering in our world?  There is only one answer that makes any sense to me.   I am convinced that it is only in Christianity that one finds purpose in suffering and that is because the central theme of Christianity is that the most tragic event of human history was also the greatest event of human history.

Jesus Christ was brutally and unjustly murdered as an atoning and redemptive sacrifice for our sins.  My sin was so bad God had to die but God's love was so great He was willing to die.  It is the one grand theme of scripture to which all other stories point.   In the dramatic story in Daniel 3 the sons of Israel are thrown into the furnace and yet they are not overcome.  The key to understanding the meaning of this story is that there is a fourth person in the furnace with them.  Most scholars agree that this mysterious figure is the pre-incarnate second person of the trinity- it is Jesus Christ Himself.   What an incredibly poignant foreshadowing picture this is for us.

The story points us to THE story.  It says to us that He is in every furnace and that He is walking with us through all of life injustices.  In Christianity we know that God is not just an uninterested creator- but instead He loves us with a God-like love that caused Him to get into the furnace with us.  Suffering would make no sense without this knowledge.  To paraphrase Romans 5:8:

"God demonstrated His love for us in this, while we were still sinners, God got into the furnace with us and paid the price for us."

That is the overarching principle that drives our lives and the one overwhelming truth that overcomes all other truth.

Relevant Daniel

This coming Sunday we will begin a new series for the next four weeks on the book of Daniel.  The thing that makes this book interesting to me and I think exceptionally relevant to modern Christians is that Daniel is "exilic" literature.  Meaning it was written during the time of the Israelites exile into Babylon after the destruction of Jerusalem.   Daniel and many others were forcefully relocated to a foreign land and were taught a new way of life and forced to adopt a different standard of values and livelihood.   It is an account of God's people struggling with their biblical faith in a place that was antagonistic to that faith.  It is in many ways a parallel to 21st century America.

Last week I had a conversation with one of our college students who told me the story of a professor at OU who opened class a few weeks ago with this question, "Are any of you in this classroom Christians?"

She was the only one who raised her hand.

He then looked at her and made a sarcastic remark about the narrowness of Christianity and told her she would certainly be insulted by what she saw and heard in his class.  Besides thinking what a jerk this guy was, I couldn't help but think of the irony of a professor demonstrating subtle if not coercive bigotry and narrowness to one singled out student while accosting her for having a "narrow" religion.

I know this is nothing new.  A university professor bashing Christianity and Christian conservatives is as common in our society as Oklahoma wind.  What surprised me and also amazed her was that she was the only one who raised her hand.   Do you think her account of her first day of class at OU was an anomaly?   I don't think so.  My sense is that this kind of pressure on traditional Christianity is increasing.

In a recent article in Christianity Today, Drew Dyck made the following observations about twenty somethings who are walking away from their faith:

Recent studies have brought the trend to light. Among the findings released in 2009 from the American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS), one stood out. The percentage of Americans claiming "no religion" almost doubled in about two decades, climbing from 8.1 percent in 1990 to 15 percent in 2008. The trend wasn't confined to one region. Those marking "no religion," called the "Nones," made up the only group to have grown in every state, from the secular Northeast to the conservative Bible Belt. The Nones were most numerous among the young: a whopping 22 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds claimed no religion, up from 11 percent in 1990. The study also found that 73 percent of Nones came from religious homes; 66 percent were described by the study as "de-converts." (The Leavers: Young Doubters Leave The Church, Christianity Today 11-19-2010)

This is what makes the book of Daniel as relevant to us today as it was to adherents of biblical faith in the fifth century B.C.   Although none of us will likely ever face anything like Babylonian religious cleansing, a culture that increasingly sees itself as post-Christian brings new challenges to the modern believer.   Here are some of the major themes I will hit on in the coming weeks:

1.  We need to get out of the salt shaker and into the world.  It is clear from scripture that as Christians we are to engage culture, not separate from it.  God instructed the Israelites to move into Babylon and to become a blessing to the city.  We are to redeem culture and influence it for the good- not isolate and insulate ourselves from it's influence.   Jesus said we are to be "salt and light".  Salt is a preservative and light penetrates darkness.   He prayed that His disicples would be "in the world but not of the world".  That's the principle we live by as Christians.

2.   It is important to know our faith.   When your worldview is being constantly challenged, it is extremely important to know not just WHAT you believe, but WHY you believe it.  If you only know what you believe but not why you believe it, then when your faith is challenged you will tend to feel frustrated and overwhelmed by doubt.  The Bible says we are to "always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks the reason for the hope you have, but do so with gentleness and respect."  (1 Peter 3:15).  The only way to do this is to eagerly learn and get equipped.  It's a theme we hit on constantly, it is extremely important in a world that is increasingly skeptical of biblical faith that we have a strong epistemology.

3.  Remember God has a reason even for our exile.  Never forget that God is in control.  It is apparant from the exilic literature that it was Gods' design that the people of Israel go into exile.  This can only mean that God saw an eternal purpose in their faith being severely challenged in this way.  I think there is a lot to learn from this truth.  There have been many times in my life that my faith has been challenged and I felt somewhat overwhelmed by questioning and skepticism.  But I wouldn't trade any of it for what I have learned through the process of questioning.  Good questions have always caused me to dig deeper for answers.

I remember at one season of my life I had a long conversation with my father about the struggle I was having with people who were challenging my perspective of truth.  He said to me, "Never forget Rick that all truth is God's truth.  When the dust settles on all your questioning, the truth will stand on it's own."

Those words were so helpful to me as a college student.   God knows what He's doing.   We should never forget that God has a purpose for all of our struggle.  Even when it looks as if we are facing overwhelming odds, God plus one always equals a huge majority and His truth prevails through all of life's fiery furnaces and lions dens.

Loving Each Other With Our Real Selves

I'm excited about a new year and some of the things God has been teaching me.   A new year always brings in a sense of starting over and beginning new habits and dreaming new dreams.  As a church I think we have some great opportunities in the new year to do all of that.

I really love where we are as a church right now.   It's great to be debt free and to be unencumbered financially for the first time in a long time- especially in the tough economic times we are in.  Our missions offering this year has also greatly exceeded our expectations!  I believe with all my heart we are postured to accomplish some incredible things for His glory in the days ahead.   We will be stepping up our ministries to the poor and marginalized in our community this year and  gearing up for more intentional missions objectives overseas as well.   I sense real enthusiasm in all levels of our various ministries right now.  Our budget giving fell a little short in the last couple of weeks of the year so we need to transfer the excitement we felt toward paying off the CUBE into giving toward our budget- which is the primary ministry resource for all of our ministry objectives.

Last Sunday I taught the first in a series of sermons about our mission as a church and focused on our calling into covenant community.  Though we couldn't have anticipated it, I thought it was a striking and somewhat providential topic given the tragic news from this week.

We were all shocked by the horrible murders and attempted assassination of U.S. Congresswomen Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona.  The man who attempted her assassination is said to be disturbed and emotionally unstable by friends and classmates who know him.   The one characteristic that stood out to me in the many offered about Jared Loughner was that he was "increasingly isolated".  it is a description we hear a lot for someone who is suffering from mental illness.  In fact most of what we characterize as mental illness begins with isolation and aloneness.  In truth isolation is extremely destabilizing to the human condition.

"It is not good for man to be alone" God said in the creation account in Genesis.  It is a reminder to all of us that God has designed us for life together.  We were created for relationship and when we live in aloneness we become less of what God has created us to be.

In one of the first articles that came out about the Loughner family  a neighbor who lived across the street from them said he didn't know the last name of the family until the news story broke out.  They had been neighbors for 17 years and yet he didn't really know them.  I couldn't help but think of how an internet driven society often depersonalizes relationships.  Many people in our culture are living shockingly isolated lives within close proximity of other people.   Have you noticed that people seem to be more into  virtual relationships today than they are real relationships?

And yet virtual relationships are not contemplated in scripture.

One of the central tenants of our theology is that God came to us.  The essential point of the incarnation is that God came to us in the flesh.  God came to man and looked him in the eye and touched him and felt what man felt and saw life from man's perspective.  He took on human flesh so that He could relate to us in this way.   The implications are many but one of the most important for moderns like us who are challenged by the values of a media culture  is that we are called to each other in physical presence as well.

One of our lead pastors tells a story about his daughter that makes this point.  He came home from a long day at work and plopped in his favorite chair and stuck his head into a newspaper as if to hide from the world around him.   She danced  around the living room in front of him imploring him to look at her new dress and dance moves.  He mumbled his approval from behind his newspaper- not paying much attention.

Finally she crawled in his lap.  He saw her little fingers grab the top of the paper and then pulling it down in front of him she stuck her little face into his and said, "Daddy, I want you to listen to me with your face."

I think that's an awesome picture of the kind of community we need to value in an increasingly virtual world.  We need to listen to each other with our real faces and love each other with our real hearts.

The Incarnation is not Moderately Important

In these weeks of Christmas we are studying together the doctrine of incarnation and it's implications on how we live and how we see life.  I can't emphasize strongly enough how important it is for us to nail this.  It is important for us to have it clearly in our hearts and as parents to get this right with our kids.  In the face of so much cultural pressure to secularize the holiday, it is left to us, the church and parents, to bring to bear the most important elements of the season.  We could look at it as some do as a big negative and rail about the "santaizing" of Jesus' birth.  But I choose to see it as a positive and a fantastic opportunity.  But we have to get it right.

So for the Sundays of advent we will be all over this doctrine.  This coming Sunday I will deal with the aspect of the incarnation that has to do with the assault of Jesus on a world that finds it hard to receive Him.  Jesus birth was surrounded in controversy and trouble.  I think this is emblematic of how Christianity comes into the world.   C.S. Lewis has said that the one thing Christianity cannot be is moderately important.  People did not have a casual view of Jesus.  They either ran from Him, wanted to kill Him or bowed down before Him.  People who truly knew who He was did not think of Him in a casual way.  This was true of His birth and it is just as true of those who honestly analyze their views of Him.   In other words, the fact of His incarnation will inevitably evoke a passionate response.  People who think of this doctrine in a casual, cavalier way just flat out don't get it.

The word "incarnation" means "embodied in the flesh".  It is the teaching that Jesus is the embodiment of God Himself.  This is one of the most controversial, hardest to swallow teachings in the Christian faith.  It is also one of the most crucial to embrace.   It is why the most important image our children should get at Christmas is not Rudolf or Santa but that the tiny baby in the manger is God Himself.  God in the flesh.

I remember years ago a lively discussion I had with an Imam in a Middle Eastern village over this very issue.   For him this was the most important stumbling block for Christianity- the belief that God Himself could become a man.  I asked him the question, "Do you believe God can do anything?  That God is all powerful and nothing is beyond His ability?"  Of course his answer was yes.  I said "That's exactly what we Christians believe and therefore we believe that not only could God do this, but that it is the most important truth of our existence and the central fact of scripture."

I was struck not just by his disagreement with this but how he was insulted by it.  It was another reminder to me that when we truly embrace the doctrines, they are not just subtle truths we live with as we go on our merry way,  they are truths that evoke controversy and resistance and inevitably radically impact the meaning of our lives.  They are not moderately important- they are of ultimate importance!

The One Whom Jesus Loves

This morning in my quiet time I was reading the familiar passage in John 13 in which Jesus reveals to his disciples at the Last Supper that one of them will betray Him.  I've read the passage thousands of times but today these words affected me like never before,

"... one of them, the one whom Jesus loved..."

Of course this was the way John identified himself in the story without actually saying his own name.   But what struck me today as I meditated on this passage was that John's habit of identifying himself this way was more than just literary subtlety, it also displays a kind of profound spiritual discipline.  One of the most important lessons of the gospel is that Christ's love for us profoundly changes the way we live and even the way we see ourselves.  So John's identifier was much more than literary style, it was a kind of self awareness that all of us as Christ followers should possess.  Having embraced the gospel, we should all write ourselves into the story as "the one whom Jesus loved".  

When I look into my own heart I can see that the biggest issues I struggle with are the result of not seeing and understanding His love properly.  When I embrace the reality of His grace I no longer have to prove myself.  When I see His love in this way all of my worry and despair becomes unreasonable.  It is the awareness of His love that answers all my insecurities.   When I see that the God of the universe was willing to die for me I am made aware of my worth in ways that affect me profoundly.  He is the treasure I look for in all other treasure.  He is the joy I seek in all other joys.  He is the love the heart longs for in all other loves.  So when I am able to see myself in the story as "the one whom Jesus loves" it doesn't matter what else is written in the script- whether it be suffering, sadness, frustration or betrayal- because ultimately I know I am loved with an eternal love.  I am the one whom Jesus loves.

Called Out

This week I've been at our IMB meeting in Greensboro NC and wanted to share some thoughts I've had in reflecting on the call to missions:

1.  We say it so much it's become a cliche- but we are all called.  The longer I'm a Christian the more I'm convinced the call of God goes out to all of us- and the closer we are to the heart of God the more we are impacted by that incessant, persistent infinitely important call.  In my 5 years on the IMB board I've heard hundreds of testimonies from young men and women who have responded to the call to missions.   What they all have in common it seems to  me is that the bigger God became to their hearts, the more they believe Him for big things.   God's call is on all of us, and the closer we get to His purposes, the more we feel the weight of that call, no matter where it might lead.

2.  To be at the center of His will is not necessarily the safest place to be.  I hear people say it all the time- "the safest place you can be is at the center of His will." Where does one find that in scripture?  Was that true of Moses?  Of Abraham?  Of David?  Of Peter?  Of Paul?  Of Steven?  Of Jesus?   God hasn't called us to live safe lives, He has called us to live obedient lives.  Sometimes to obey Him is to go to places and serve in ways that are way outside our comfort zones.  When our trustees at the IMB meet with our new missionaries before they are sent out on the field, we ask them how we can pray.  Inevitably some of the biggest prayer needs revolve around parents and family members who are struggling with their decision to go on the field.  It isn't just the fact that so many of these young families are going out of the country away from families and friends, it is more often where they are going and the fact that they are in many cases living in places that are breathtakingly unstable and even dangerous.

3.  In my experience the people who are fully engaged with the call of God on their lives are the most joyful and fulfilled in spite of whatever perceived hardship they experience along the way.   I'm not saying there are no unhappy missionaries- as there are many who are miserable.  I am not saying that God's work is always happy work and God's servants are always happy people.  I'm saying that in my years of experience in ministry I have noticed that the people who give their lives away are the happiest people I know.   Don't misunderstand what I'm saying.  I'm not saying all Christians are living the dream.  Admittedly there are many pretenders who are miserable.  There are many people who are living unsustainably incongruent and unhappy lives within the Christian orbit.   But the people I know who are truly committed to His will and are letting go of their idols and are focused on His grace and goodness are on the whole much happier people.  It is not that they don't suffer or are not living in hardship- but I agree with John Piper who says that the missionary is the ultimate Christian hedonist.    There are many more happy givers than there are happy getters.

4.  The call is manifested differently on people's lives.  To some it means they will give their lives to go to a place where the gospel has not yet penetrated.  Yesterday I met a guy in his 20s who has spent the past few years on the mission field in South America.  He asked the board to reassign him some place else because he thought there were already too many Christians where he was serving.  He wanted to go some place where there was more darkness.  So the board is sending him to a place that is beyond the ends of the earth.  He is going to a place where once you get to the ends of the earth you have to keep going!  He sees his call as hard core trail blazing kingdom building.   There are many who are called to that kind of Kingdom work.  But others are called to serve where they are in compelling ways for the gospel.   Like the business guy in our church who has a vision for sending people into the field with the profits from his business.  Like the CEO in our church whose company has a vision for distributing Bibles around the world.  Like the couple in our church that is starting a ministry to troubled teens.  Like the retired school principle in our church who has started a homeless ministry.   They are all called.   The calling looks different for each of us but the closer we get to the heart of God the more we are compelled to do big things for His glory!