March 22, 2023 · 6:41 am

Here’s what happened…

There is a large part of me that simply wants to drop things and move on. But it has been declared publicly that I have been found guilty of false teaching, so for those in my former circles who want to know what happened, I offer this. The hurt is deep and real, so I ask forgiveness if my tongue is sharp.

I am not hostile against my former denomination. There are many good people and good shepherds who seek to follow Christ. But they are also trying to make sense of what happened in the last few years.

I believe that it might be helpful to some to hear my perspective on what happened to me, and then I will let this go and leave my reputation in the hands of my loving Savior. I am not afraid of bearing his reproach.

 

If you are new to the workings of the internet or discussion groups, you might not be too familiar with some of the things I am going to talk about. On the other hand, if you have ever belonged to any kind of discussion group online with the word “Reformed” in the title, then you understand what I am about to say.

So for those who do not understand, go to any discussion group with the word “Reformed” or “Geneva” in the title. Look at the people who are the admins. Generally, they will be holding cigars and have long scruffy beards. But not always.

After you have entered the group, start a discussion. You can say,

“Have you read the latest by Aimee Byrd? Dynamite stuff. Really profound!”

or

“I don’t think that there was any hint of a hierarchy before the fall of man. Adam and Eve lived in perfect harmony as one flesh.”

or try this one:

“Genesis 3:16 doesn’t say anything about wives desiring to manipulate and control their husbands. I think that the ESV has that wrong.”

Notice that none of these statements have anything to do with the historic confessions of Reformed theology. All of them are modern discussions and have to do with secondary issues.

Try it, and see what happens. If you are like me, you will receive death threats, threats of church discipline, threats of violence. You will be reviled, insulted, cut off.

If you are not a pastor, like most of my friends, your pastor will receive notes demanding that church discipline be undertaken and that the vicious offender who dares to question the tenets of Whatever-New-Thing-Doug-Wilson-Whipped-Up be driven out of the church.

At first, these types of bullies were fringe. Most of them have , in the past, been viewed with suspicion by the leadership in the church, but church discipline against them was unfortunately very rare.

We considered them zealous, but not according to knowledge, and figured we could work with them.

Now, though, they have taken over most of the NAPARC congregations and they will not rest until anything that they interpret as even mildly woke, egalitarian, liberal or (gasp) feminist is destroyed, crushed and run out of the church. Their positions of white male dominance have been carefully defined as crucial to the Christian faith, and they will tolerate no dissent.

They are not nearly as zealous for actually confessional issues. For the most part they tolerate trinitarian heresy, denials of justification by faith alone, and the sufficiency of the blood of Christ to cleanse from all sin.

In the years that I have pastored, I have seen more and more truly ugly stuff. Church leaders convicted of sexual assault, domineering,  and abuse. Pastors who physically abuse their children or their wives; I’ve seen women excommunicated for fleeing from godless homes. I have heard of officers in good standing publicly teach that it is sometimes necessary, or at least understandable, for men to rape their wives. I have seen young men and young women who have struggled with same sex attraction their whole lives being told that God hates them and that they are going to hell. I’ve seen toddlers scream and try to run away when they see the church building because they associate it with pain. I’ve seen preteen girls being forced to “reconcile” with the grown men who sexually assaulted them.

And hundreds of young people who associate the beautiful Heidelberg Catechism with pain, shame and suffering because of what they have endured in catechism classes.

One man reviled me as “unteachable” when he found out that I allow my wife to read “whatever she wants” without my permission.

I used to reserve for myself the luxury of thinking that these things were fringe. I suppose it is similar to the thinking of men like Martin Luther in the 16th century. Surely the organized church will listen and discuss these things. Surely they desire to bear witness to Christ and throw out this ungodly leaven.

And I’ve spoken out against it. I have sought to look at the errors in theology that lead to such heinous sins. Why is sexual assault tolerated? Why isn’t ONE instance of domestic violence enough to warrant church discipline or even divorce? Why is the position of women as co-heirs of eternal life so controversial in this age?

The scripture speaks of love as the mark of the disciple. And yet, Reformed Fundamentalism has changed the mark from love to fear. They fear being wrong about something. They fear women will take over. They fear that their wives will stop making their sandwiches. They fear that the wrong party will win. They fear anything that hints of humility and so they fear “beta males”. They fear the LGBTQ community and baking the wrong sort of cakes. They fear anything that they are told smacks of socialism. They fear minorities and immigrants. They fear progressive Christians. They fear social justice.

Mostly, to sum it up, they fear losing their place and their nation.

Something is wrong. The church is worshiping power, control and money and is desperately afraid of losing it.

I hate watching powerless people being driven away from Christ and left without hope, whether you are talking about men, women, children, LGBTQ people, liberals, foreigners, people with disabilities. When one is worshiping their own power and control, anyone who is viewed as a threat to that power must be crushed.

 

With that backdrop, let me ask you a question. Unless we are living in complete denial, we as Christians understand that we have a sinful nature that we must struggle with our whole lives. There is a part of us that we inherited from Adam that Paul calls “the flesh” and if we are born again, that part of us is at war with the “born again” part of us. “The flesh wars against the spirit.”

The part of us that is being renewed day by day greatly desires to love our neighbor as ourselves. But the flesh that still dwells in us challenges that desire every time the neighbor’s rooster crows at 2 AM, or we get cut off in traffic or count the number of items in our neighbor’s shopping cart in the express lane.

Do you have a sinful nature that you still struggle against? If you are a believer, then you know that you do.

So here is the question – do you have to have complete victory over that sin nature in order to be qualified to serve in the church of Jesus Christ?

Do you have to be free from all desire to strangle your neighbor’s chicken? Do you have to be free from every tendency to distrust, to fearfully withdraw from the duties of love? Do you have to be completely free from the temptation towards lust?

Do we struggle with our sinful nature our whole lives, or do we find complete victory over sin while still in these corrupt bodies?

If we already have what we hope for, then what value is hope? But we long for victory and see it by faith and strive towards it.

If you say that a minister of the gospel must be free from every form of concupiscence (our sinful tendencies, whether we act on them or not) in order to be qualified to serve God in the church, then I must confess to you that I am not righteous enough to serve Jesus. And neither are you.

As those who confess Christ, we hopefully agree on this. It is nothing more than the Christian faith which has been confessed by all ages. This doctrine was clarified by the church in the controversies with the Donatists who taught that there were SOME sins that we too big to ever be forgiven. The church added “I believe in the forgiveness of sins” to the creed to counter such foolishness. If there are some sins to great too be washed by the blood of Christ, then ALL sins are too great to be washed by the blood of Christ.

So nothing too controversial there. So let’s get personal.

Instead of sinful tendencies in the abstract, let’s put a name to them. Suppose, instead of speaking of our tendency to ungodly anger, racism, lust, greed, and failure to love, we are talking about exclusive same sex attraction? Does that change the doctrine of the forgiveness of sins?

Has Jesus promised to make everyone heterosexual and take away all forms of broken sexuality the moment we believe?

Or has he promised to wash us and cleanse us and make us holy, even in the midst of our struggles in this life?

As the Reformed Fundamentalist world began to single out “same sex attraction” as the unforgiveable sin, I naively thought that I could add my voice to the discussion, and bring it away from the culture wars and back to what the Gospel of Jesus is all about.

In my head were all the people who have been told their whole lives that God hates them and that they are not fit to ever serve the church because their particular sin is too icky to be spoken about. In my head were all who have suffered in silence because they didn’t dare speak the word out loud: “I’m gay”. And I truly hate the idea that Jesus, the Friend of Sinners, has no healing or help or welcome for one particular kind of sinner. Once we say that, we no longer have good news for anyone.

And so I wrote a blog on the subject. Some of the points could have been made clearer. There is a typo or two. I could have softened some of the language. But I stand by the theology. If God doesn’t forgive the sin of the “others”, then he doesn’t forgive anyone’s. When that happens, we might win some sort of culture war, but we no longer have any good news.

No one spoke to me about it. No one called me. No one asked me to clarify anything. From my former brothers in the RCUS, the only thing I received was a notice of charges filed against me for false teaching. The Rev. Dr. Kevin Carroll and the Rev. Steven Carr brought charges against me, without once picking up the phone, sending a note, asking for clarification or even attempting to discuss with me what they thought was unbiblical. The excuse that they used was that my blog was public, so the rebuke should be public.

At the “trial” last fall, my counsel attempted to dismiss the charges on the grounds that the whole thing could have simply been talked about over coffee; that no one attempted to make anything right before jumping right to charges.

But those who were charged with hearing the complaint were also my accusers. Several of the delegates slandered me publicly by saying that I never listen, there is no point in trying to talk to me. They brought up discussions that they had in the hall during the breaks where former members complained that I don’t listen.

So because “I don’t listen”, the Classis determined that the constitutional and Biblical requirement of private admonition did not apply in my case.

Next, we attempted to get them to clarify exactly what I was being accused of. They did not seem to think that was important.

I asked, “You have accused me of false teaching. Can you answer this question for me so I know how to defend myself. ‘Sam Powell is a false teacher because he teaches…what?”

The same delegate that slandered me earlier got up and accused me of being a “hyperproceduralist”.  He said, “This is what happened in the OPC. Every time there was a problem, the lawyers would come out with their procedures.”

So the trial proceeded without any specifications. Several of the delegates were also accusers. and they were out for blood. When I was dismissed so that the body could discuss the charges, there were many other accusations that were brought up. I was dismissed from the room and was not even told what those accusations were until later. Since I didn’t know about them until afterwards, I had no way of defending myself against them. (I wasn’t supposed to know about that, but it was so unjust that it is a part of the complaint going to the Synod.)

For hours, the same delegate filibustered with every accusation he could think of, and his voice was joined by others. The hostility and enmity of several were evident to many.

To this day, no one has clarified what that false teaching was. It really didn’t matter. I was guilty before I walked in. The trial followed none of the biblical or constitutional procedures. I was found guilty and ordered to, among other things, recant of my errors.

Several of the delegates fist bumped after the verdict.

I asked the executive committee to tell me what my error was that I was to recant. They were unable or unwilling to specify them to me, not wanting to “presume to elaborate on what was adopted by the body since it would be merely an opinion which could easily be misleading or incorrect and in addition, it would have no authority.” These are the words from our clerk of Classis.

Several good friends filed a complaint with the denomination which will be heard in May. I filed an appeal in order to gain a little time for my congregation to decide what to do.

About half the congregation left. When the shepherd is struck, the sheep scatter. First Reformed Church was no longer viable and voted to close the doors. Our last Sunday was February 26.

I asked Classis to remove my name from the rolls of ministers, which they did the first week are March, so I am finally free of the ridicule, contempt, and hostility that I endured at every meeting for years. My appeal, then, will not be heard, as I will not attend, but the complaint will still go forward.

In one last typical move, they noted that I resigned “under discipline” which was not true. But that is another story.

My family and I moved to Minnesota and are getting settled. We are excited about the next chapter of our lives.

I am so, so tired of the hostility, the accusations, the ridicule, and the exclusion that I endured every Classis meeting, while the rest of the delegates sit silently. The health of myself and my family is my first responsibility and the stress of continuous threats is taking its toll. The RCUS is not a safe place for me, which is sad, since my commitment to the Reformed confessions has never wavered.

I am tired of not being able to speak freely, or debate freely. The voice of God’s people is silenced and crushed in Reformed churches out of fear, and this should not be the case.

So after a lifetime of membership, and 33 years of continual service, I am no longer a part of the RCUS.

I just can’t do it anymore.

 

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March 18, 2023 · 8:11 am

Husbands, love your wives

I received this comment on one of my blogs. I appreciate that Jon took the time to write, as it gives me an opportunity to draw a distinction between two different religions – modern patriarchy and Christianity. They are not the same, as we will see.

Here is the comment:

It surprised me that this conversation went straight to divorce. I realized many years ago that my happiness does not depend on my wife and that the happiness of my wife does not depend upon me. Once I realized this I made decisions for the family without asking permission, but with giving guidance. As the leader I realized all that was needed was guidance and conviction that I was operating under the leadership of the Holy Spirit. I made decisions, informed my wife of those decisions and did not stop until the task was done. I protected my family as best I could from any tough repercussions from that decision and when the task was complete my family reaped the rewards and were happy.
This all meant that I had to be in lock step with the Spirit and I had to follow through with all my decisions to the end. The worst was having to deal with a wife who was against me for the decision I was making. Previously I would have surrendered my will to what my wife desired which was perceived safety and security. I fought through those issues and was prepared to face the challenges of the task at hand whether it be a business decision or a move or a remodel. Anything I chose to do brought initial kickback from my wife, but follow through and determination brought success and more willingness by my family to trust my decision making.
It is the man’s job in the family to lead. If he allows the fears of the wife to stop any progress, the the family will be stuck. There will be resentment towards the wife and then the man can do very hurtful things.
I am not blaming women. I am blaming men for not being leaders and following through, ignoring in many cases the fears of the wife. Weak men cannot lead a family to victory. Until I became strong I was resentful and hurtful. Now I lead and my family has never been happier and so very successful. My wife and children are honored in the church and community. They are blessed. It is because I quit blaming them and took responsibility for my own actions.
If I have any suggestions for wives, it is to submit to your husband and honor his decisions and hold him accountable to follow through and support him throughout the process. To be patient with the process because everything takes time to complete. Often longer than expected. Do not kill his spirit because once that happens, often to weak men, it will end up in an irreparable relationship.

Dear Jon. The essence of being human is being an image-bearer of God. We are created with the ability to discern between good and evil, to make decisions, to interpret the world, to think and feel and shine God’s beauty and love to the world around us.

We were created to have dominion over all creation and be the voice of praise to the creator, to rest in his presence and join our voices to his in saying, “Behold, it is very good.”

This image-bearing was gifted equally to the male as well as to the female (Genesis 1:27).

God’s beauty and wisdom and love and justice are infinite. Humans are not. But God shows his wisdom by the remarkable diversity in all of creation, including the wonderful different gifts and personalities in each human that he created, male or female.

Of course, when the fall entered, mankind lusted after dominating each other, rather than having dominion over creation and disharmony entered. Men and women became slaves to sin, and there was nothing they could do about it.

So instead of marvelous freedom and diverse gifts and beautiful harmony, there entered domination, slavery, control, and pride. Men and women became slaves to sin.

This was pictured beautifully in Egypt. The whole story of our redemption is painted on the background of the Exodus, where the nation of Israel was redeemed from their hard bondage in Egypt to be the people of God in liberty and joy. Their slavery was so strong that the strength of men could not deliver them. Men could not work up enough will power to deliver them. The husbands could not bring about deliverence through their manliness. They were enslaved and powerless. But God delivered them with his outstretched arm. Both Moses and Miriam sing at the destruction of Pharaoh’s army.

But that was just a picture. As you know from the story, the slavery in Egypt was broken, but the slavery to sin was as powerful as ever. God gave the law from Sinai, and within a few days, Israel was worshiping golden calves. With a golden calf, they believed that they could control Jehovah. A God who speaks, who enters covenants freely, who loves, is actually terrifying because of the bondage of sin. The God who is cannot be controlled. All we can do is rest in his love.

But in order to rest in Jehovah’s love, we have to give up control and believe in the name of the One who Saves.

You can worship control, or you can worship The God Who Saves. But you can’t do both.

On the cross, Jesus broke the bonds of sin and death and misery. The law couldn’t do it. Authority and submission couldn’t do it. If man could have been made righteous by the law, Christ died in vain.

The problem was slavery and powerlessness. We are all subject to death.

Christ delivered us from the fear of death and the power of sin that we might serve him without fear, with our full restored image of God, reflecting his tremendous beauty and wisdom as we were created to do.

When the Holy Spirit was poured out on the church (Acts 2), it was poured out on men and women, old men and maidens. And later that included rich and poor, Greek and Jew, bond and free.

Satan hates God and hates his image. He seeks to silence the voice, crush the will, destroy the spirit. But Jesus died to set his people free. He governs his church by his word and spirit, NOT by tables of stone. He writes the law on the heart.

This means that your wife has equal access to the spirit that you have. The spirit was not poured out on you alone. Throughout scripture, God spoke through holy men AND women and held his people accountable for listening to them.

God could have spoken directly to Barak. But he spoke to him through Deborah. Barak could listen to her and live. Or hold on to his masculine pride and die. Sisera wasn’t defeated by testosterone, but by the power of God.

The two central doctrines of Christianity, the virgin birth and the resurrection, were witnessed by the women. The men could listen to them and live. Or they could ignore them and die. By God’s grace, the apostle’s repented of their hardness of heart and listened to the women.

So one question to answer is this – how certain are you that YOU are the one being led by the spirit and not your wife?

It is not the Spirit of Christ that silences the voices of his people. I fear that you are unaware of the spirit that you are operating under. But Christ came to restore us to his image, not silence us and keep us in bondage.

You are treating your wife like Pharaoh treated the Israelites. This is NOT Christianity. Peter commanded YOU to treat your wife as a co-heir of eternal life, not like one who is still in bondage to sin and misery. You are taking one verse out of context and deriving a whole new religion.

Your religion is a religion of control, not peace. A religion of authority and submission, not rest. A religion of bondage, not freedom of conscience. A religion where YOU are the golden calf, seeking to control the power of God.

This is paganism, not Christianity. If the Holy Spirit is poured out on you, it is also poured out upon your wife, and you will answer to him about how you treated his sheep.

I pray fervently that you will either repent of your cruelty, or that God will provide freedom for you wife. Treating her like this is oppressive and wicked. You are not loving her as Christ loved the church and set her free.

The scripture does not say, “Love your wife as Ahasuerus loved Vashti.”

Nor does it say, “Love your wife and Nabal loved Abigail”.

Nor, “Love your wife and Pharaoh loved Israel”.

All of those examples are examples of wicked men seeking to control people, rather than watching them thrive in freedom.

Love your wife as Christ loved the church. And how did he love his church? Read Philippians 2 carefully. He took the lowest place. He became a slave to all. He gave himself that she might be free.

Assume that your wife is an image-bearer of God and perfectly capable of making her own decisions. Set her free. If you belong to Christ, it is what he has done for you. So how dare you use that liberty as an excuse to enslave your wife and crush her voice?

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February 24, 2023 · 5:57 pm

Believing her, and “false accusations”

This morning, on Facebook, I wrote this:

When someone has been abused, their abuser has also worked very hard to convince them and everyone else that they are liars.

You should be able to understand why.

The fact of human nature is that wicked people can do far worse things to one another than we can possibly imagine. Even people of your own tribe can do unspeakable things to one another.

When we say “I believe you” when someone shares their story, we have given them space to heal, space to breathe, and have gifted them with the first step to their healing and peace. We have borne their burden with them and told them that they are not alone. They are three of the most powerful words we can say.

“I believe you.”

Those words are like water in a desert land, food for a starving man; One spends their life hiding, fearing, silently hoping that she (or he) could speak and someone, anyone would believe them.

We don’t do so well with that. They finally get up the courage to speak up, and most of the time we try everything we can think of to not believe them.

“Are you sure?”

“People don’t act like that.”

“Were there witnesses?”

“We need to get both sides of the story.”

Because if they are lying, then we can continue to pretend that our lives are safe and normal and predictable. But if they are telling the truth, then our world flips over and everything we thought was true proves to be false. It is so much easier if they were just lying.

But they are almost never lying. In fact, it is usually far, far worse than they first tell you.

And so most people never speak. And because they never speak, they aren’t allowed to heal and grieve.

We should do better, even if it turns your world upside down.

“I believe you.”

The normal- albeit disturbing reaction – among certain ones in the church is something like, “What about false accusations, Like Potiphar’s wife?”

So here are a few thoughts on that.

On my original post, I was not speaking to judges, jurists, or anyone else whose business it is to determine the facts of crimes committed. For some reason, Christians have been trained to enter into “jurist” mode whenever a friend discloses abuse. No wonder so many people keep silent.

I am a pastor. When a woman discloses to me,  I listen, I empathize. I ask listening questions to make sure I am understanding right. If there are crimes committed and I am mandated to report, I report it to those who have the duty to investigate. If not, I protect her privacy, but encourage HER to report it to the ones trained in investigation. But I believe her.

For one thing, except for a few exceptions which I will mention later, the reporting victim has everything to lose and nothing to gain. When you look at what all of those who reported abuse in high-profile cases have endured, don’t you wonder why anyone would disclose anything – unless, of course, it was true.

I am trying to think of exceptions – but I can only think of one. Potiphar’s wife. Look at her case:

Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance.
7 And it came to pass after these things that his master’s wife cast longing eyes on Joseph, and she said, “Lie with me.”
8 But he refused and said to his master’s wife, “Look, my master does not know what is with me in the house, and he has committed all that he has to my hand. 9 There is no one greater in this house than I, nor has he kept back anything from me but you, because you are his wife. How then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?”
10 So it was, as she spoke to Joseph day by day, that he did not heed her, to lie with her or to be with her.
11 But it happened about this time, when Joseph went into the house to do his work, and none of the men of the house was inside, 12 that she caught him by his garment, saying, “Lie with me.” But he left his garment in her hand, and fled and ran outside. 13 And so it was, when she saw that he had left his garment in her hand and fled outside, 14 that she called to the men of her house and spoke to them, saying, “See, he has brought in to us a Hebrew to mock us. He came in to me to lie with me, and I cried out with a loud voice. 15 And it happened, when he heard that I lifted my voice and cried out, that he left his garment with me, and fled and went outside.”
16 So she kept his garment with her until his master came home. 17 Then she spoke to him with words like these, saying, “The Hebrew servant whom you brought to us came in to me to mock me; 18 so it happened, as I lifted my voice and cried out, that he left his garment with me and fled outside.”
19 So it was, when his master heard the words which his wife spoke to him, saying, “Your servant did to me after this manner,” that his anger was aroused. 20 Then Joseph’s master took him and put him into the prison, a place where the king’s prisoners were confined. And he was there in the prison
.

The New King James Version (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1982), Ge 39:6–20.

A few things to note – first, SHE was the abuser, not Joseph. The power was not on Joseph’s side. It was on hers. She sexually abused him for a long time and he resisted. She became angry at his resistance and was looking for vengeance. She had nothing to lose. She was the master’s wife. He was a slave with no rights at all.

My guess is that everyone (including Potiphar) knew what kind of a person she was, which could explain why Joseph was kept in prison instead of executed.

But everyone involved in the household knew that the woman was after the slave. He had to keep avoiding her and tried not to be alone with her. The other slaves weren’t stupid. They would all have known who was the victim and who was the aggressor.

The fact is that unless the woman has the upper hand with the power, the money, the privilege – she will NOT be believed. Look at how many witnesses it took to get anyone to listen about Harvey Weinstein, Larry Nassar, Jerry Sandusky, Bill Cosby.

Look at how many years it took to expose the wickedness in the Roman Catholic Church, the Sovereign Grace Ministries, and the Southern Baptist Convention – and the victims STILL are cast out, ridiculed, and threatened.

And then look at what all of the victims have had to go through. They have had the most private things about themselves revealed to the world. They have been mocked, disbelieved, ridiculed, thrown out of churches, they have lost their homes, their families, their friends, their safety –

Who on earth would go through that? – unless, of course, it was true.

Do false accusations exist? Sure. Which is why pastors MUST be trauma informed, trained in the dynamics of abuse and assault, and spend far, far more time listening then they do speaking. And they certainly are not trained investigators. Leave that to those trained in it. Just believe. Listen. Be a pastor.

And if you are a friend, just listen. Believe your friend. She (or he) has risked so, so much to reveal just a tiny bit of what she has endured.

If there are lies involved, they will be exposed. Don’t further wound the injured sheep with skepticism. They are only telling you the tip of the iceberg, in the hopes that they will be believed.

And perhaps, if we quit assuming that she is probably lying, maybe more people will talk to us, exposing the works of darkness. And as we humbly seek change in our own hearts, maybe we can become better at listening.


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February 22, 2023 · 2:23 pm

So much to do….

So much to do….

The legacy of Charles Finney – who taught salvation by moral fortitude, the unofficial religion of America. It is the religion of Ben Franklin and Ralph Waldo Emerson and the McGuffey readers, and it is deadly.

So now when we think of Christianity, we sigh and say, So much to do, so much to keep track of, so much, so much…

Do I shop there, or not. If I shop there I might be accidentally putting money in the wrong pocket.

Is it OK to watch this show? Is it OK to listen to this kind of music? Is there a list somewhere of what music is OK and what music might lead me astray?

If I am a woman, is it OK for me to get a job? Can I speak to a man and keep myself pure? Is it OK to go to dinner with friends?

If I am a man, is it OK to take a woman to the hospital? Is it OK to speak to her? Can I have a conversation with her and still be pure?

How should we raise our kids? Should we home-school? Private School? Charter?

Who should I ask? Should I read this blog or that blog? Can I ask a celebrity preacher to tell me what to wear, where to shop, what to read, what to listen to?

How much am I supposed to desire God? Do I desire him enough? What if I die and miss the mark? What if I am caught in an R rated movie when Jesus comes again.

I’m depressed trying to figure it all out. Should I see a therapist? Should I take a pill? Should I just talk to my pastor and have him pray for me? What if I do it wrong?

What if I make the wrong choices and am not masculine enough? What if I am not feminine enough? What if I die wearing the wrong color shirt or writing a poem?

I read the other day that worry was a sin. I wondered if I worried too much. Then I worried about it. That made me worry about worry, which made me anxious. And then a preacher shouted that anxiety was a sin. So I worried about that.

Worry, anxiety, depression, sin, trouble…

So many shouty people. So many ready to pounce and condemn. So much contempt for the outsiders.

What if they find out what I’m really like and throw me out? What if they already did, I just don’t know about it?

Stop. Rest.

This is why God gave us a Sabbath. That we might rest in him and know that he is the LORD God, and he alone sanctifies his people.

Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved.

And rest.

The Jewish sabbath gives way to the everlasting Sabbath, where we learn to rest at the foot of the cross, and meet him outside the city, with the other outcasts. It is a good company. It is the company of those who learned to grieve this dying world and its lusts. So that we might gain Christ, and attain the resurrection of the dead.

Sing praises to our Redeemer and leave Finney’s legacy in the grave where it belongs. it is the old man. Crucify it with Christ and live.

Learn to walk in newness of life, and live!

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January 31, 2023 · 3:50 pm

Covering the Altar with Tears

Malachi 2:13–14.
     13      And this is the second thing you do:
     You cover the altar of the LORD with tears,
     With weeping and crying;
     So He does not regard the offering anymore,
     Nor receive it with goodwill from your hands.
     14      Yet you say, “For what reason?”
     Because the LORD has been witness
     Between you and the wife of your youth,
     With whom you have dealt treacherously;
     Yet she is your companion
     And your wife by covenant.

The wives in Israel were so treacherously abused that they had no recourse but to cry before the Lord. THEY are the ones covering the altar with tears and bringing their cries to the Lord.

For this reason, God will not hear the prayers or accept the offerings of the husbands. You cannot treat your wife as a slave, a servant, or a beast, without bringing upon yourself the wrath of God.

In fact, Peter alludes to this passage in 1 Peter 3:7

1 Peter 3:7 (NKJV)
7Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered.

If you treat your wife with anything less than the honor befitting a firstborn heir of eternal life in Christ, you are also dealing treacherously with her.

God hears the cries of the oppressed and he answers them.

Remember, dear ones, that Lazarus received evil things on this earth for a time, but when he died he was carried by the angels to the bosom of Abraham, and rests in the arms of Jesus for eternity.

The rich man, on the other hand, who was treacherous to Lazarus, was tormented day and night.

God knows how to deliver the godly and give them peace. The cries never go unheard.

She is a wife by covenant. This does not mean that you can treat her however you wish and she is not allowed to leave you. That is contrary to everything we know about covenants. I have written on that before. Malachi is using Old Testament language to say what Peter says in the New Testament. She is a co-heir of eternal life, a wife by the covenant you made with her, and that covenant can be broken.

Israel understood broken covenants. They had already been cast out of the land because they broke the covenant with their God. And now, as they are resettling the land, they are treating their wives, whom they made covenants with, the same way.

Which follows – they deserve to be cast out.

God is bearing witness of your treachery, and refuses to hear your prayers as long as your wife is covering the altar with tears.

Matthew 5:25–26 (NKJV)
25Agree with your adversary quickly, while you are on the way with him, lest your adversary deliver you to the judge, the judge hand you over to the officer, and you be thrown into prison.
26Assuredly, I say to you, you will by no means get out of there till you have paid the last penny.

In Malachi, the adversary is the oppressed wife, crying out to the judge. Make peace with her before Christ comes in judgment. Repent of your treachery, for there is a God in heaven coming to hand you over to judgment.

In fact, it would be better to give her a divorce and send her away (verse 16).

Therefore, the wise man will hear.

Take heed to your spirit, and do not deal treacherously. (Verse 16)

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January 19, 2023 · 1:46 pm

Co-heirs of eternal life

Have you seen the “trend” going around, where fathers are groomin…oops, I mean “training” – their daughters to serve men, cleaning after them, cooking for them, serving them at the table…?

It is really stomach-churning. But far worse, it isn’t Christianity. Maybe it is God’s desire that we teach our daughters to be more and more like Jesus; perfecting their gifts, using those gifts in their communities, learning to speak without fear, growing in wisdom and stature.

It is true that women, like all of humanity, are called to serve. Men are also called to serve. It isn’t a gender role thing, it is what it means to be like Christ.

Matthew 20:25–28 (NKJV)
25 But Jesus called them to Himself and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them.
26 Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant.
27 And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave—
28 just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”

Mutual service in Christ isn’t what I’m talking about. I’m talking about the fathers and mothers that teach their daughters that they are called to cook and clean and pick up after their fathers and brothers, that they are to serve, while the men are to be served.

And here is where it gets interesting. If I name the names of people who teach this (of which there are many) the response will be “Why did you name names? Did you confront them first? I know that they are good men who love the Lord!” And on and on.

But if I DON’T name names, then the response is “I’ve been a Christian my WHOLE LIFE and have never, ever heard anyone teaching this!”

Any reason at all to discount what I am saying. So I would simply invite you to look over my facebook page and see the hundreds of men and women who have been taught exactly what I am saying – that women’s goal is to be married and to serve men. Men are called to be served at home, since they have to do all the hard work.

None of this is taught in scripture. Yes, the scripture teaches women to serve. It also teaches men to serve. It teaches apostles and prophets, martyrs and pastors and teachers to serve.

And not just “I tell them what to do” kind of service, nor the kind of service like the Pope of Rome, surrounded by wealth, power and prestige and calling himself the “servant of servants”. This is not at all the kind of service that scripture calls for.

It calls for us – men and women – to put on the apron, do a load of laundry, mop the floor, bring our loved ones coffee, love, honor and respect one another.

When Jesus washed his disciples’ feet, it was the work of a servant – THAT is the kind of service Jesus calls us all to.

If you are teaching your boys and girls to have a servant’s heart, you have no argument from me.

It is the teaching that only GIRLS are called to serve. That boys are called to lead and to BE served. None of this is in the bible.

Maybe we can do better. Maybe we can teach our daughters to grow to their full potential, led by the Holy Spirit, with gifts and callings and personalities all their own.

And maybe we can teach them that they can live their lives fully before the face of God without fear and shame, whether they ever marry or not.

Perhaps God’s will for our daughters, just like his will for our sons, is that they be conformed to the image of God’s Son, and thus become fully human, fully alive – without ever having to suppress their voice or their beauty or their wisdom out of fear of insecure masculinity.

Marriage should allow both men and women to be fully who they are before God, thriving and loving as image-bearers, and thus a fountain of blessing to all who know them.

Why isn’t this our goal?

I posted something similar to that on Facebook yesterday and people are losing their minds. I’m being called a hater of God, an unbeliever, a bad influence on Christian women, a pagan, a feminist, a heathen, non-reformed, a Satanist, and so on.

It got me thinking –

Pharaoh lost his mind when Moses said, “Thus saith the Lord, Let my people go.” He didn’t want to lose the work of the slaves. It, after all, was the order that his gods placed on the world. Pharaoh and Egyptian males first, women and Israelites next. Every knows that, right? It is the natural order of things.

But when God said, “Let my people go” it upended everything about Pharaoh’s religion and social order. That is why he couldn’t bend.

Similarly, even though the Lord so clearly loves and values women as his image-bearers, and did not create or redeem them to be the slaves of men, yet His cry, “let my people go!” upends the status quo and turns everything upside down. It arouses the same fury in the ones who hold the power.

BTW – I’m not speaking of divorce right now, I am speaking of letting go of the control and domination of wives and daughters and watching them thrive as image-bearers of God.

If the first thing your wife would do if you let go of your control and dominion is leave your sorry a#@, maybe you should rethink your lifestyle.

You could, maybe, learn to make your own sandwiches.

She is your fitting help, not your property or your servant.

Malachi 2:16 is often translated “God hates divorce”. I have written extensively on how bad that translation is. The Hebrew reads “Because he hates, let her go…”

It is the exact same word used in Moses’ instructions to Pharaoh. “Let my people go” or “let (her) go”. Set her free. If you hate her so much that she is odious to you, send her away.

If not, then please treat her as the scripture commands you to – as a co-heir of eternal life.

One day, you will stand before God and answer to how you treated her, a firstborn son, an heir of all things, and the bride of Christ.

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January 17, 2023 · 4:07 pm

Love and the Cross

20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. 21 I do not set aside the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died in vain.”

The New King James Version (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1982), Galatians 2:20–21.

A friend recently asked me about the cross. The way he had always thought about it was like this: “God finds me so loathsome that the only way he could accept me was by torturing and killing his son.”

My heart hurt for him.

Another friend could not understand how the cross, that ugly instrument of death and unspeakable agony, could demonstrate the love of God.

I can understand that.

It is especially difficult for survivors of childhood sexual assault or other forms of abuse. The abuser convinces his victims that they are worthless, ugly, stupid, and bad. And then they head off to church and hear a fire and brimstone sermon.

“God agrees with the verdict of your abuser” they hear. “He also thinks you are worthless, ugly, bad and worthy only of abuse and degradation. But he degraded and abused Christ instead.”

This is a twisted presentation of an otherwise correct doctrine known as “substitutionary atonement”. It is true that Christ died in our place. But it is NOT true that God finds us loathsome and hateful. These two thoughts are not contrary, but complementary. It has to do with Christ as the head, we as the body; union with Christ before the foundation of the world; and the justice and mercy of God. I probably won’t be able to get to all of that in one blog.

It is no wonder that so many people have a hard time seeing the love of God in the crucifixion of Christ! Today, my prayer for you, dear reader, is for you to know the depth of the love of Jesus. No matter how great and broad and deep his love, it will never be great and broad and deep enough. We will spend all of eternity learning about his love and never exhaust it.

John Calvin famously said that a shepherd must have two voices. One for gathering sheep and another for driving away wolves. One of the big problems of modern preaching is that the wolves are comforted and the sheep are driven away.

The voice to gather sheep is a voice of welcome, of invitation, of patience and peace, shining the love of God. You can’t throw rocks and garbage at the sheep, screaming obscenities at them (I’m looking at YOU, Driscoll), and expect them to come.

The voice to drive away wolves is a voice of rebuke, sharpness, condemnation – in the hopes that they will see themselves as God sees them and flee to the cross for mercy. A wolf is one who views the sheep as his prey. You will know them by their fruits. They have the right words to say in public, but they are abusive to their families, demand recognition and deference, destroy the wounded soul with words, are constant overbearing busybodies, and live according to the lusts of the flesh.

There is one voice to use for the confident and entitled. Another to use for the weak and trembling soul.

In other words, when you threaten the weak, the outcast, the poor, the afflicted, with words of terror, you wound the weak conscience and drive the hurting heart from the love of Christ.

So with that being said, I would like to look at some of what the bible teaches about the cross of Christ.

First, it is never used as a devise to increase toxic guilt and manipulate shame-driven behavior. “Jesus suffered all of this for you! Shouldn’t you repay him by being a better person?” If guilt and shame were capable of rescuing us from ourselves, Christ would not have needed to die in the first place. It is shame and guilt that drive us away from God in the first place. It is new life that draws us back into fellowship. New life does not come by shame and guilt, but by the putting to death of the old man in Adam, and making alive the new man in Christ. Crucifixion, and resurrection – as Paul writes in Galatians 2, quoted above. Jesus did not give himself for us that we might live by the law; but so that we might live by faith in Him.

“If righteousness could come by the law, then Christ died in vain.”

When the preacher tries to increase your guilt and shame, using the cross as a tool to try to manipulate you into better behavior, then he is missing the point of the cross. Toxic guilt never works the righteousness of God.

There is a place for redemptive guilt. Redemptive guilt is the honest appraisal of the soul, the cleansing light that shines in our dark places and brings us out of hiding. We all have those places in our hearts that we try to keep carefully hidden. We think we have those dark holes under control, until they burst out on us, driving us to sleepless nights and even fear of exposure and punishment. Redemptive guilt is the work of the Holy Spirit, like a skilled surgeon, exposing the cancer so that we might be healed by the blood of Christ. It is the voice of Nathan, pointing the finger and saying, “You are the man!” so that David can finally quit hiding and be forgiven and healed. Redemptive guilt bursts forth into the words of Psalm 51.

The first thing that we must do is prayerfully consider the distinction between toxic guilt and redemptive guilt. Toxic guilt is the voice of Satan, driving you into hiding, heaping on your soul things that don’t belong to you. Toxic guilt pounds into your head at night, telling you that you are worthless; that if you were a better person, he wouldn’t have hurt you; hat if you dressed differently or had a different body, or didn’t show your arms, then he wouldn’t have hurt you. Toxic guilt drives you into hiding, crushing you under heavy burdens and leaving you hopeless, dejected, walled off, silent… My parents rejected me because I’m bad. My mom hurts me because I’m not the right sort of person. It is the voice of the accuser, and it is not designed to drive you to Christ. It is designed to crush your soul in despair. Satan is a liar and a murderer. Toxic guilt works effectively for both.

Redemptive guilt is the conviction of the law designed to call you out of hiding. That time you stole from your employer, drank too much and drove home anyway, cursed your neighbor’s child for walking on your grass, used your words to wither and scald the souls of your loved ones. That time you hurt a coworker thinking you were being funny. The damage you did with that one-night stand when you were younger; the flirting with the coworker that definitely went too far.

The Holy Spirit convicts us of these things, so that we are not overcome with despair, so that shame doesn’t continue to destroy us, so that we can finally understand freedom and peace. We stand under the cool, refreshing water, flowing from the rock, and close our eyes while that water washes away the filth of the soul. But it is not the guilt that cleanses our soul. It is only the blood of Christ. That is, he took all of that shame and guilt and pain upon himself. Like a head suffers when a body is wounded and cancerous. He is, after all, flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone. He joined himself to us and to our dying flesh and took all of the tears and shame and pain and death and sorrow upon himself, because he loves us, and he put it to death. Redemptive guilt drives us to repentance and restitution to those we have harmed.

Toxic guilt is not of God. You are not worthless, you are an image-bearer of God. You are not loathsome in his sight, you are like a wandering sheep, waiting to be gathered by the arms of the shepherd.

Redemptive guilt does indeed belong to you. There are real sins that you have committed, because you are human and a child of Adam. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. God does not teach you about the nature of sin so that you can take part in some kind of self-flagellation exercise. There is no redemption there. God’s desire for you is for you simply to confess your sins and be free from them.

Jesus has already born those sins on the cross. He was crucified so that you might know for certain that he took upon himself the curse that was on you. That curse of shame and death that you bear in your deepest part is taken away completely and fully, so that you might be reconciled to God – because the death of the cross was cursed by God. The curse no longer belongs to you. You have been crucified with Christ in order that you might live by faith, not by law.

Shame and hiding no longer belong to you. Jesus took them away, having nailed them to his cross. You have your voice back, your humanity back, your will back. That is the new man, alive in Christ, a life lived in faith, a life fully human and fully alive.

Jesus went to the cross so that you might know for certain that you are NOT loathsome in the eyes of God, but a beloved child. The cross of Christ creates for us a safe space to come into the innermost circle of the dwelling-place of God, the Holiest Place of all.

Hebrews 10:19–22 (NKJV)
19 Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus,
20 by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh,
21 and having a High Priest over the house of God,
22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

And, to clarify another misunderstanding, Jesus and the Father are never at odds. There is only one true eternal God. Jesus is God. The Father is God. The Spirit is God. The Father sent the Son because he loves you. The Son gave himself for you because he loves you. That love in the divine nature is not divided. It is correct to say that God gave his Son. It is also correct to say that the Son gave himself.

But we also need to talk more about the justice of God. But this will take another blog.

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January 5, 2023 · 6:57 pm

The Essence of Humankind

I was brought up in the Reformed Church and nursed on TULIP. As the years passed by, I was more and more dissatisfied with the abbreviation. It is an oversimplification of some tremendous truths. I still hold to the Canons of Dort, which teach more fully those doctrines that are intended to be summarized by TULIP. But I find TULIP to be oversimplified, good as a mnemonic for children, but should probably be left behind when one becomes an adult.

I’ve been thinking about the “T” – Total Depravity. The way I have mostly heard it taught is Jonathan Edwards style – that man and women are loathsome spiders held over the pit of hell by an angry God.

It is emphasized so much in Reformed circles that it is almost as if an essential attribute of humanity is depravity!

It is true that sin is a cancer that has invaded every part of a human being. There is none that seek after God. There is none who do good. No, not one. But we are talking about those kinds of works that can stand before the judgment throne of a holy God. The scripture does not teach the inherent goodness of man. Before God, all of our works must be perfect and we can’t even satisfy our own consciences, much less a holy God. Sin has corrupted us all – body and soul. We have fallen short of the glory of God.

But this does not mean that there is nothing good whatsoever in humankind. Murder is an affront against God because men and women are made in God’s image. To be sure, they are tainted by sin apart from God’s grace, but the image is still there.

Men and women still create beautiful things, have tremendous insights into human nature, and are capable of making relatively wise decisions. We celebrate art and music and humanities, and do not ask whether that celebrated person was in Christ or not. A Hindu or Muslim might teach our children math far better than a Christian could, and this should not alarm us. All gifts of beauty and wisdom come from the Father and are given to the children of Adam and should be celebrated. All humanity needs a Redeemer, but there is something beautiful there to redeem.

There is something in humanity that reflects the nature of God. This is what makes sin such an affront to God. It corrupts his beautiful creation and the dignity with which men and women were created.

That is the bad news. It isn’t the gospel. The gospel is that our Great Physician has redeemed us, body and soul, to belong to him. He has conquered sin and death and misery. He has delivered us from this deadly cancer and has begun the process of our re-creation after his image. We are being restored to his image by union with him. Each day we are his “workmanship – created in Christ Jesus unto good works.”

So what if we started treating people as if they were ESSENTIALLY image bearers of God rather than essentially sinners?

What I mean by essentially is that which makes up the essence of what we are. When all of the accidental attributes are stripped away, and when those things that make us different are stripped away, what is left? What is the humanness of humanity? What is the whatness of the essent?

Here is a hint: It isn’t sin. Sin came later, a pustulant cancer invading the will and the reason and the emotions. It took God’s good creation and turned it inward upon itself like Narcissus in his stagnant pool.

But God came into this world and took upon himself our flesh – born under the law. He bore that sickness and that infirmity and carried it to the cross, putting it to death once and for all.

And our humanity remained, forever united to the divine nature in the person of Christ, risen from the dead.

And in him, our cancer is being healed. Our doubts, lusts, fears, grumblings, pains, sorrows – are all being taken away, until we stand before our Groom complete, beautiful, whole and free from sin. He takes our gaze and lifts our head up from the stagnant pool so that we can see the glory of God and the beauty of his image bearers. And the day will come when we will be whole again.

And still gloriously human, but without sin.

If we view humankind as essentially sinful, then we will view the world as a place to be afraid. We will never rest for we must continually be on our guard against sin. We must look at every person in every situation and find out what they did wrong so that we can fix them.

We tell the church about the horrific abuse we have suffered, and they tell us what we did wrong, for that is all they know.

Our spouse, who vowed to love and cherish us, abuses us and takes a lover, and the church tells us what we did wrong, and how to dress and how to not be bitter, for they only see the world and humans as essentially fallen. They become C.S. Lewis’s dwarves sullenly hiding in their caves, looking out for themselves.

Because so often the church views people, at bottom, as sinners, rather than image-bearers of God. So we discount emotion, we take away choices, we silence the voice, we consider our neighbor as a poison to be avoided.

But what if, instead, humans were image bearers of God in their essence, as the scripture says,

“Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”

And, yes, sin has tainted all of that. It is a deadly cancer eroding its host and will end in death if it is not taken away.

But the cancer of sin is horrible precisely because it has brought corruption and putrefying sores to something that was in essence very beautiful.

Start there. View your neighbor, the barista with the tattoos and nose rings, the lesbian co-worker, your middle aged boss – first and foremost as God’s image-bearers. Practice looking at the world beyond the taint of sin, to the beauty beneath. There you will find the connection, the common ground – the thirst for significance and beauty and intimacy and belonging.

Your view of the world will change. And maybe you will start to think God’s thoughts after him. For he so loved the world, that he sent his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes on him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

Wrath is coming. But first comes mercy.

Edwards famously compared humans to a loathsome spider being held over the pit of hell by an angry God.

Let’s change that image. Jesus showed us how God views sinners: as lepers who need pity, rather than spiders to be crushed.

The crushing will come in God’s time. But today is not that day. Now, God’s hand of compassion is reaching out.

When the leper asked the Son of God, “If you are willing, you can make me clean”…

Jesus said, “I am willing. Be clean.”

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December 26, 2022 · 8:51 pm

How I met my wife

The nineties were a heady time. Flannel shirts, grunge, Janet Reno jokes. I remember it well.

It was in the flurries and scurries of the nineties that I met my wife. It is an interesting story.

It starts with a poker game. I was sitting around the table with my brother, a gamer, a pseudo-philosopher and a hacker. The shots were flowing. Uma was dancing with Travolta on the TV and Marlon Brando was sitting by the fire in the corner with Neil Young and Pocahontas.

The gamer was forming a tin-foil hat for his head to keep the alien rays out and so he was distracted. The philosopher folded (you gotta know when to fold-em) and my brother was raising the pot. We kept going higher and higher, with the hacker matching me each time. Finally, my brother was out, and I went all in.

The hacker couldn’t match, but he wanted to stay in. Marlon Brando stopped mumbling and looked over. The pot was huge and the hacker was out of funds.

“Well”, I said, “What do you have?”

He thought for a moment, and then said, “I can hack Santa’s computer.”

I said “No way.”

He said, “Way” – cause it was the 90s.

The gamer said, “Woah…” but he might have been talking about his new tin foil hat design.

Brando and Young muttered something about the exploitation of the elves, but the atmosphere was too thick.

I said, “What would that do?”

“I can get you his naughty list”

“No way.”

“Way”

“Whoa”

And that is how I got a hold of Santa’s naughty list in 1995.

You all know who you are.

But when I saw Susan’s achievements that landed her on the naughty list, I was smitten. I had to meet this woman. Such daring! Such audacity! Such creativity! I had to meet her.

I couldn’t even repeat the things she did that got her on the list, because I don’t want to give the children ideas. But I couldn’t get her out of my head.

I began scheming.

I knew that she was planning on attending church camp with her family, so I signed up. Maybe we could cause some chaos together. Maybe I too could get on Santa’s naughty list! Oh the places we could go together. But banned from Santa forever, but banned together! I have chills just thinking about it.

I dreamed in my bed at night. My sweat soaked the sheets. Oh the naughtiness! What decadence! What a woman. What a woman!

We could run with scissors. We could NOT finish our plates. We could order dessert and skip the veggies! We could stay up all night and watch QVC with a devil-may-care attitude! We could order Mexican food on Thanksgiving. Oh the wickedness we could get up to! So completely and totally improper! We would make the world blush!

When I got to the camp, I stopped for ice-cream in a small shop and in she walked. The silence descended and in my mind’s eye, a chorus began to sing Orff. Her eyes! Her hair! Her wickedness! I was smitten. The future was pregnant with possibility!

So I hugged her. And she hugged back.

Yada, yada, yada – we were married a few months later.

Almost none of this is true. Some of it is, but as far as I know, she has never been on Santa’s list. Marlon Brando might have been a dream. The nineties were weird. We did pick up Mexican food on Thanksgiving once and she still doesn’t finish her plate, and sometimes she eats pie for dinner, so all of that is true.

Oh the other things I could tell you, too!

But here is what is true.

Her eyes smile peace, and when they lock with mine, I am home.

Today, December 27, we have been married for 27 years – I think. Neither one of us can do math.

What is the secret to a long and happy marriage?

Neither one of us read marriage books, go to conferences, or follow the fads. We are just gloriously ourselves, respect each other, love each other and always defer to each other.

We have never asked “Who is in charge” because when the two become one flesh, that question is an unwelcome intruder, like a mother-in-law on the wedding night.

Just keep your marriage vows and ignore the experts. You’ll be fine.

Lots of love, my wicked awesome wife! You are spectacular.

And the future is still pregnant with possibility. Even more, I should say.

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December 9, 2022 · 4:17 pm

Masculinity, femininity, and minas

It is no secret that those outside of the Christian faith are sometimes confused about gender identity. The confusion has reached the point where some cities are mandating gender neutral restrooms for those who do not identify as either. This post really isn’t about that.

One passage that seems to be quoted frequently in the discussions of gender  is Matthew 19:4-6, where Jesus affirms that God created humankind male and female, and established marriage as an unbreakable union between a man and a woman. I affirm this.

However, as Jesus goes on, even though God’s standards of purity and wholeness are exactly as they were when he created us, there is the reality of the fall that has taken place since the first man and woman. Now we live in a world where sexual brokenness, abuse, shame, gender dysphoria and the other effects of the fall have twisted and corrupted the original beauty.

Can we, as Christians, uphold the perfect standard of the wholeness of Eden and at the same time acknowledge the reality of the fall and confess our need for redemption? I think we have to, to be consistent with the scripture. We might long for the days of Eden, where marriage was without spot and blemish, for example, and still acknowledge that divorce is sometimes necessary “because of the hardness of your hearts”, as Jesus says.

With that being said, I would like to speak of masculinity and femininity. I am not so concerned with the viewpoint of those outside of the Christian religion, except to affirm the image of God in all, even in those we find distasteful. But I am very concerned about gender confusion in the church.

It seems to me that as those outside move farther and farther away from our cultural norms, and even begin to embrace sinful lifestyles with more abandon, the church seems to respond in fear, beyond the bounds of propriety.

We must remember that our guide for faith, for right and wrong, and for our life is the scripture alone. Jesus forbids us to elevate the opinions of men or even cultural observations to the level of canonical status, but the voices of the loud and authoritarian men often seem to shout down all propriety. I, for example, was once ridiculed as “effeminate” for an online picture in which I was wearing a pink shirt.

So I have taken upon myself of talking a bit about masculine and feminine and will attempt to stay as close as possible to the teachings of our Lord found in the scripture.

The first thing to note is that the scripture seems frustratingly silent on “masculinity” or “femininity” as ethical constructs. In fact, our guide for ethics (the Ten Commandments) doesn’t address it at all, except to acknowledge the reality of male and female in the 5th commandment, “Honor your father and your mother.”

Other than that, you simply won’t find instructions on godly femininity or godly masculinity at all. When you find instructions geared towards women (meek, still, submissive, obedient), you will also find the exact same instructions in other places geared towards men.

When men are commended for courage, strength, fortitude, you will find women commended for the same things. I can think of no example of a command in scripture that is exclusively gendered. To clarify, there are case laws and applications that are different for men and for women, but God’s standard is the same for both. The sacrificial system acknowledges men and women, boy children and girl children, but the duty of sacrifice as an act of faith is universal in the Old Covenant, and not gendered.

Again, to keep things sober, our ethical standard is summarized in the Ten Commandments. The distinctions between men and women are certainly acknowledged in the scripture, but the ethical requirements are the same.

I realize at this point that there may be many who will comment “What about…” and bring up something. That’s OK. I will try to answer the best I can as time permits.

However, although ethical standards are never gendered, scripture throughout assumes the distinctions in the sexes. It acknowledges that there are men and women, young men and maidens.

Since God created humankind male and female, there are generally observable traits that are associated with each sex. Sometimes those traits are culturally conditioned. Sometimes they seem to be inborn. Traditionally, men are associated with hunting, sports, competitiveness, aggression, warfare, and power. Women are associated with gentleness, home, nurture, receptiveness, nourishing, softness. Testosterone and estrogen seem to play a role, but there is also mystery. The problem is when we take these generally observable characteristics and make them ethical requirements.

The reality is that even those these traits are more or less observable in the sexes, there are enough exceptions listed in the scripture to throw a wrench into assigning ethical categories to “masculinity” and “femininity”. In other words, there is no such thing as “biblical femininity” or “biblical masculinity” as ethical categories.

Esau was a hairy outdoorsman, his father’s favorite because Isaac loved the hunting stories. Jacob was a homebody, his mother’s favorite. But God loved Jacob and rejected Esau, not because of gender categories, but because of God’s promise and election (Romans 9). There are condemnations of Jacob’s deception, but not of his personality. Esau’s murderous rage was condemned, as was his unbelief, but not his “masculine” traits”

One of the things you see when you read the scripture without the lens of sexism and misogyny, is that believing men and women have many different personality traits. All of these gifts are given to them by God. Whatever gifts these men and women are given, they are commended if they use those gifts faithfully, and condemned if they use those gifts treacherously. Gender roles don’t come into it.

But we shame men for not conforming to our self-declared masculine stereotypes, and we shame women for not conforming to “biblical femininity”. The question is this, “On what basis are we shaming and condemning those who don’t conform to our norms?”

On what basis to we condemn a woman for being competitive, a strong leader, single, headstrong or having strong leadership qualities? Which commandment is she breaking?

On what basis do we condemn a man for writing poetry, playing music, despising sports, no stomach for hunting and no love for stag parties?

And this brings me to minas. Jesus told a parable about a nobleman going away to receive a kingdom and giving his servants minas. He commends the ones who invested his gifts, and condemned the one who buried his gifts.

Christ came to set us free to serve him without fear. It seems to me that it is contrary to the Christian faith to require someone to act a role or pretend to be something that they are not. Either directly or by shame and exclusion, the culture of the church is requiring believers to bury their minas. Men must act in the approved manner, and women must act in the approved manner. The books are multiplied and inflicted on fearful believers. “Here is how to be Masculine men and Feminine women and if you don’t do it right, you deserve to be shamed, beaten, outcast and miserable”. This is how you must be to attract a mate, to be accepted, to fit in, to be approved.

In the extreme, those who step outside of the prescribed roles are mocked and even cast out. Women who wear pants and like to compete in extreme sports. Men who shave and don’t follow sports and really just want to be home, or whatever nonsense is currently being spouted.

Here’s my point. Instead of burying your mina in the ground, use that gift for the glory of God. Instead of teaching our boys and girls that there are “things that boys do” and “things that girls do”, we should instead teach them to use whatever gifts God has given them to encourage, edify and strengthen their neighbor and glorify God.

When men and women are free to be who they are, to invest their gifts without fear, the glorious diversity of the people of God will truly shine.

The Psalmist said, “I am fearfully and wonderfully made”. Perhaps instead of teaching our gifted and beautiful children that God somehow made them wrong if they don’t conform to our extra-biblical gendered stereotypes, we should teach them to use whatever gifts and personalities they have faithfully and without fear, serving God and one another. If your girl wants to fix cars, let her. Teach her. Praise her for her strength and teach her to be industrious and honest. If your boy loves fabrics and colors, teach him to design, to develop, to create and to be industrious and honest. And above all, teach them both that the fruits of the Spirit are so, so much greater than the fear of man and enforced conformity.

Let’s create safe spaces for our children to thrive. There is already enough risk and fear in the investing of our gifts without heaping the risk of exclusion from the community of God’s people for doing it wrong.

And one more thing:

The scripture generally uses the masculine pronoun to refer to God, while at the same time acknowledging that male and female do not apply to him, as he is spirit. Attributes generally associated with the feminine are ascribed to him, such as nurturing, sheltering, mothering, birthing, and nursing, to describe the indescribable and incomprehensible God. And attributes generally associated with masculine are ascribed to him, such as kingship, fatherhood, husband, bridegroom, and so on.

These descriptions are anthropomorphic. They are words given to us by God designed to reveal something about himself by way of analogy. God frequently uses human terms to condescend to our level so that we can understand him. He speaks of his arm to describe his strength, even though we know he does not have a physical arm. He speaks of his eye to denote his omniscience, even though we know that he does not have any organs, since he is spirit. And he also uses both masculine and feminine characteristics to describe himself, even though he is neither male nor female, but a spirit, a wholly other, incomprehensible, transcendent being that has revealed himself in his word.

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