Southern Seminary professor Chuck Lawless imagines what he would do if he were Satan, trying to ensnare pastors and church leaders. The whole article is here, but his seven basic points are

First, I would attack those who are most gifted . . . by reminding them that they are gifted. 

Second, I would encourage leaders to talk about accountability . . . but not be personally accountable to anyone.

Third, I would challenge leaders to emphasize spiritual disciplines . . . but only for others.

Fourth, I would focus the leader’s attention on tomorrow . . . rather than today.

Fifth, I would encourage ministry by e-mail . . . especially with those of the opposite gender.

Sixth, I would not hinder ministry success . . . as long as “success” results in few changed lives.

Seventh, I would stress failure . . . and then lead the church to do the same. 

I had to go to my Grandpa’s funeral this past Wednesday. He was the first of my grandparents to go home, so this is about as close to death as I have ever been. The hope of glory has always been real to me. I’ve looked forward to heaven, hoped for it, and dreamed of eternity many times before. But until this week, I’m not sure I ever took quite so much comfort from it, or had to lean quite so heavily on it.

For me—and for my family, too—the week was a weird mixture of sadness and celebration, loss and worship. We thought a lot about Grandpa’s life, we cried with Grandma, and we laughed with each other. And above all, for me at least, it was a week of reminding myself again and again that Grandpa was finally with his Lord Jesus, and that someday soon he would rise again, perfect and glorified, and that gave me enormous comfort. Hope is a glorious thing. 

I gave the eulogy at Grandpa’s funeral. I talked about how strong he was, how he taught me, my brother, and my cousins, and probably my dad and uncle, too, what it meant to be men. I talked about how noble and good he was, how patient, how committed to his ailing wife. We all startled when they fired the twenty-one guns in his honor, we wept when they gave the flag to my Grandma, and I felt proud to be the grandson of such a man. But I also knew that whatever was good and noble in my Grandpa, none of it was natural to him. It was all given to him by his Savior, and in the end his good and noble life said far less about him than it did about the Jesus he loved.

The pastor who preached his funeral said something that will stay with me for a long time. He said, “Sometime Sunday night, between 11:00 and 11:30, God finished his earthly work in Brother Ralph, and He called him home. Brother Ralph fought the good fight. He kept the faith. He finished his race.” Sometimes you can read a passage of Scripture all your life, and think you understand it. But then it sows itself in the soil of real life, in the death of your Grandpa, for instance, and you realize that there’s a depth there that you never saw before. Grandpa finished his race. He finished it well, without stumbling. And O how I want to follow his example. O how I want to finish well, too. 

At the end of the funeral, when everyone was filing by one last time, the pianist played the old song, “The Old Rugged Cross.” I hadn’t heard it in years, and it kind of washed over me for a minute without my giving it a second notice.  But then the words started playing through my mind, and all of a sudden that old song planted itself in my heart and became a treasure to me.

I’ll cherish that old rugged cross,
Till my trophies at last I lay down.
I will cling to the old rugged cross,
And exchange it some day for a crown!

That song isn’t precious to me just because I associate it now with my Grandpa. I do, but that’s not the point. The point is that that old song expresses the glorious hope that we cling to so tightly as Christians—the glorious hope that is now sight for my Grandpa. Last Sunday night, my grandfather laid all his trophies down, and once and for all exchanged that old rugged cross for a crown. And by God’s grace, I will some day do the same.

This side of eternity, death is still a powerful and heartrending thing. You can’t hold back that thought when you see that casket being lowered into that muddy hole in the ground. But death is not as powerful, and it is not as heartrending, as our hope in Jesus Christ is glorious.  

I cried when they buried my Grandpa. But there was joy in the sadness, too. I mourned—I still mourn—but not as one who has no hope. No, I mourn as one who knows beyond a shadow of doubt that Jesus died and rose again, and so I know that God will bring with Jesus those who have died in him. One day, one day soon, the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and the trumpet blast of God.

And then my Grandpa will rise again. He will be changed—in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, the mortal will be clothed with immortality, and once and for all, death will be swallowed up in victory. And so we will be with the Lord forever.

So Death, tell me again.  Whatever happened to your sting?

Wright is quite a speaker. He had my attention with the introduction when he described the painting of a woman sitting on top of the world but giving an illusion of power. An illusion of power gives way to the reality of pain, he said. Before he transitioned to the text, he transitioned to the application, "Isn't that the way it is with so many of us?"

He didn't presume that everyone there would connect with the contradiction between power and pain--he allowed some listeners to keep their distance from his rhetoric--for now. The woman in the painting, the person in the pew, and Hannah from I Samuel all share "a living hell."

Wright made his point clearly:

The real lesson that Hannah gives us from this chapter, the most important word God would have us here is how to hope when the love of God is not plainly evident. Now it’s easy to hope when the evidence is all around you of how good God is but to have the audacity to hope when the love of God is not evident . . . that is the true test of a Hannah type faith . . . even though you can’t see what God is going to do, that’s the real word God would have us here . . .

However, I'm not sure he ever told us "how to hope." If his answer is "hope is what saves us" he is just wrong. If he meant to say "hope in Christ" he left the most important point unsaid. Thabiti, Mike, and Jonathan have all made it clear: Hope does not save us, Christ saves us. Hannah trusted in the promise-keeping God. Those promises are kept in Christ, those promises sustained Paul through trials. Wright mentioned Paul enduring trials but never mentioned the Christ as the one that sustained Paul through his trials and the Christ Paul proclaimed.

Finally, I share Jonathan's concern about Wright's use of "hell." Hell is worse than a spouse that leaves you, it is worse than a broken home. These things are really, really bad and ought not to made light of and must be dealt with, but they are not hell.

Thabiti, thanks for sending us the link . . . let's do it again.

Thabiti,

I just listened to the Jeremiah Wright sermon that you suggested we listen to. I wrote out these comments and only then looked at what you and Mike wrote; and I haven't made any changes since doing that (which is my way of excusing the repetition).  Here’s what I might say to him if he were sitting in review w/us: 

Wow, you are a very gifted and clear communicator. Let me offer some critiques of the sermon, and then some encouragements.

Critiques:

• It felt like you took the text out of context b/c you didn’t tell us where it fit into redemption history? What does it have to do with the promises to Abraham and Moses? How does it point to Christ? Etc. By not doing this, you risk moralizing the point. Speaking of…
• I’m not sure how this was a “Christian” sermon. Couldn’t it have been preached in a synagogue or mosque? In other words, you gave us some good tips for living, but there was no gospel.
• I’d be careful about using the word “hell” to describe dire circumstances in this world. If hell is, in fact, a burning lake of fire, are we doing anyone any favors by causing them to think it’s something less?
• You veered a little close to prosperity gospel. You told us to “maintain the audacity of hope” in our prayers for our child, for our house, for our church. Are you suggesting that our hope should remain fixed on what God may give us in this world? At other times, gratefully, you spoke of praise to God even when our circumstances don’t change.

Encouragements:

• On this last point, I appreciate what you said about about how easy it is to give praise when we’re externally blessed; the real challenge (and real test) is the ability to give praise to God when this world fails us (“for the joy set before him”). I appreciated the way you called us to the vertical over and above the horizontal (note; just make sure you’re not slipping the horiztontal into the vertical; see last point).
•  The illustration of your parents singing “Thank you, Jesus” in hard times was very compelling.
•  Your pastoral sympathy and care for your listeners was very evident.
•  Thinking about my own preaching, I was very challenged by the existential grittiness of your sermon. It’s very clear that you’re getting into the lives of your hearers and identifying with them where they are at. I think expositional and doctrinal preachers could learn a lot from your example here.

Some time ago, I attended a church service where I observed something that struck me as peculiar. Throughout the whole service, a woman was on the platform—way in the very back, inconspicuous, unlighted, and silent. As the music played and the videos ran and the preacher preached, she painted. It wasn’t so much distracting as just interesting. And at the end of the service, when the last song was being sung, she walked away, and a low, tasteful light was raised on her creation. The music ended, and everyone turned to file out.

I asked someone after the service what was up with all that, and I was told that it was the church’s attempt to showcase God’s gifting of this woman, as an artist. So every Sunday a different artist was invited to come on the platform and create during the service, the idea being that his or her art would be inspired by what was being said and sung.

This whole conversation that’s emerging about the place of art in the church is interesting to me, especially given the iconoclasm that’s marked so much of Protestant history. It’s not just the painter-in-the-service, either. I’ve also heard other evangelicals whom I love dearly say that a church needs to have a hallway somewhere in the building (or a room across the street) where artists can showcase their gifts—an art gallery, so to speak.

So what about all this?  Do you think it's necessary, or even a good idea, for the church to incorporate painting or sculpture or whatever into its public worship services?  Does the church need to have an art gallery?  Does all that help the church to fully value the gifts God has given to his people?  Or not?

And here’s another question that comes to mind: What would make artistic gifts different from, say, athletic ones? If you’re going to have someone painting in a worship service to showcase their artistic gifts, why not have an athlete going through the motions of throwing a discus? If you need to have an art gallery in your church, do you also need to have a gym?

Is there any reason why artistic gifts would be privileged over athletic ones in the church? Full disclosure: I don’t see one. There are lots of reasons for that floating around in my mind. Maybe I’ll put them on paper (so to speak) later, but it’ll fun to hear how some of you are thinking about this first.

Thanks for setting the scene Thabiti. My memories of those times consist largely of trying to follow the Sunday Night Football game using the internet on Ryan Townsend's cell phone. Fortunately, Ryan's sermon critiques were usually about 20 minutes long, so he never noticed I was running up his bill.

I'll admit, this wasn't at all what I expected. Given the recent media coverage, I was not prepared for how... well, winsome and warm Rev. Wright was in this sermon. The message was really easy to listen to, very literate, and even inspiring at points.

Things I appreciated:

1. He is obviously outraged at sin in the world. He is bold in speaking against institutionalized injustice and racism. He decries a world which cares about more bombs for the enemy than it does about bread for the hungry. A world that is still more concerned about the color of skin than it is about the content of character. A world more finicky about the texture of hair or what is on the outside of your head than it is about the quality of education or what is on the inside of one’s head.

2. He obviously cares deeply for his people. He is sensitive and pastoral in his sympathetic acknowledgment of his congregation's pain.

3. He encourages his people to trust in God and his love and care.

4. As Thabiti mentioned, Rev. Wright had an outstanding summary of the problem the text is dealing with: how do you continue to hope when the love of God is not plainly evident. That's both a sharp analysis and a well turned phrase.

I agree with everything Thabiti said in terms of a critique. This was a "synagogue sermon", as they say. It could have been preached in a synagogue because there was no mention of the cross or the gospel. Nothing made it a uniquely Christian sermon.

I was also surprised by the lack of a clear doctrine of sin in the sermon. As I mentioned, Rev. Wright clearly identifies institutionalized sin. He even mentions the slings and arrows that come to us from people like Peninnah. But there's no sense that the problems we face are the result of sin and the curse. Even more importantly, there is no encouragement for the listener to see (and repent of) his own sin, both in the way he responds to sin and the way he sins against others. As a result, it's never clear how God will save us or what that salvation will be like. We're just told to "hope".

OK, who's up next?

and he has just turned the volume down on his Bob Marley's greatest hits cd.  The interns are there, sitting too close for comfort on the futon.  Micahel looks comfortable with a cup of English tea, sitting in the big cush chair.  Mark has his typical perch, a rocker strategically positioned to exit into the main part of the house if needed, to grab Owen or Sibbes from a shelf to his right, or to pull the hair on an intern's leg if he's falling asleep.  Mike Law is in the black office chair, spinning around in circles gleefully whistling, "Whheeeee!" like Opie Taylor.  I look at him with mild disdain.  "Little hockey man."

Mark opens us in prayer... and the sermon review begins.  Each person takes a turn commenting on the sermon, what they appreciated, what was helpful to their own souls, what was unclear, mannerisms that were helpful or distracting, including fashion foibles best exhibited in the privacy of one's own home, helpful advice "for the next time you preach this sermon," constructive feedback on outlines, applications, illustrations and the like. 

Thus begins sermon review with visiting preacher, Dr. Jeremiah Wright.

Text: 1 Sam. 1:1-18

Time: 18 minutes

Introduction (6 min 50 seconds).  Wright began with something of a critique of Watts' painting "Hope."  I don't know that I've ever listened to a sermon that opened with a critique of a picture.  I appreciated his use of it as a foil for his treatment of Hannah's situation in 1 Samuel.  "The illusion of power gives way to the reality of pain."  I also appreciated that Wright brought this home in the introduction by pointing to some cases of people "living in a quiet hell" (wife living with the unfaithful husband; divorced families having their dreams "blown to bits;" college students who seem to have everything but are empty, shallow, hurting and lonely).  Just painting these contemporary faces onto the premise helped stage the main applications.

I'm guessing that if there was an outline to the sermon it was "Hannah experienced the pain of (I) a bitter woman to contend with (v. 7); and (II) a barren womb."  Did anyone catch a clearer outline?

Other things I appreciated: Wright's use of language, very vivid and easy to remember with the alliteration at points.  I appreciated the exhortatoin to keep on praying.  He said the real lesson was "How to hope when the love of God is not plainly evident."  Hannah was "barren in her womb, but fertile in spirit."  That's a pastorally helpful idea, but apart from the simple exhortation to keep praying, he didn't at all unpack how to hope when the love of God is not evident.  Would've been helpful to do so, I think.  Last, I appreciated the touch of traditional African American songs at the end of the sermon. 

Main critiques:

1.  No gospel.  He pointed out that "hope is what saves us" but didn't point to the Object of Hope, Christ Jesus or define "hope" in any biblical categories.  No cross, atonement, repentance, faith, etc. in the appeal.

2.  I appreciated the references to other women suffering the pain of barrenness (2 Kings 4; Gen. 16; Luke 1) and the couple of references to Paul, but I would have appreciated closer attention to 1 Sam. 1 and it's meaning in context and in redemptive history.  I gathered some helpful pastoral themes from the sermon, but I don't think I came away better understanding the actual text.

Thanks for encouraging us to hope. 

Mark reclines in his chair, which given that his proportions are roughly similar to my own, must be made of reinforced titanium... or he is secretly bringing in new but identical chairs each Sunday night.  He has been pretending to listen thoughtfully as I spoke... slighly furrowed brow, nibbling on one corner of the morning's service bulletin the way people with glasses sometimes put the tip of one arm of their glasses into their mouths.  "Thank you, Thabiti," he says in a tone just shy of rushed, clearly signaling that it's now someone else's turn. 

Hey guys,

I have an invitation.  What do you think about the group of us doing a sermon review?  I know, most of you have hours and hours of fun already reviewing sermons in Mark's study or, as I have, you've taken the practice with you to another church.  But why don't we make this interesting?  Why don't we review... I don't know... Jeremiah Wright's sermon that landed Obama in trouble?

Now, I don't mean we should engage all the fallout surrounding the sermon.  That wouldn't be edifying.  Rather, let's look at the sermon as pastors and preachers and elders and folks who think about the church.  We can watch it in its entirety and then post the kind of reflections and comments we might offer at a service review in Mark's study.  Perhaps this would be a virtual way for folks who don't regularly have sermon reviews to see into the practice a little bit? 

Any takers?  If so, I'd be happy to get the ball rolling with some comments on next Tuesday.  Here's the mp3 for the sermon that inspired Obama's The Audacity of Hope.

Let me know what you think.

Continuing thoughts for churches that want to plant churches:

2. Find the right church planter.

Presumably you want to plant a church that is similar to yours (note, this does not apply to Self-Loathing Community Church of Almy, WY). In order to do this, you need to find a church planter that is both qualified (right mix of spiritual gifts, experience, passions, and personality for the job) and a good fit for your church. It helps if you can find a church planter who knows your church, understands its DNA, and is committed to a similar way of "doing" church. Now, obviously, no church plant will be exactly like its parent church. But if you're a Baptist church committed to expositional preaching and Reformed theology, you probably aren't going to be happy with a seeker sensitive Methodist church planter.

This may sound spectacularly obvious, but I think a lot of churches tend to look for qualified church planters without considering compatibility issues. I've had experiences in a couple of church plants, and I've seen some of the difficulties and tensions that arise when the church planter isn't quite on the same page with the planting church.

"As dead flies give perfume a bad smell, so a little folly outweighs wisdom and honor." Ecclesiastes 10:1

This verse came to mind when I heard the announcement of NY governor Eliot Spitzer's resignation upon revelation of his adulterous activity. I don't mean to suggest that his behavior equaled "a little folly." Nor do I mean to suggest all his "legal" activity as attorney general and governor was above reproach; I have no comment on those issues.

I'm simply saying to all of you pastors, elders, deacons and seminarians that it doesn't take much folly -- just a little -- to wipe out years of otherwise faithful service. Folly is weightier, it seems, than wisdom and honor. We're called to avoid even a little of it.

How many pastors have been wiped out and sidelined from the gospel fight because of a little folly? I pray that this rising generation of men would be different. Flee, brothers, flee from folly!

Psalm 119:1 says, "Blessed are they whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the Lord."

Hey guys. Thanks for your posts. I know when you think "9Marks", you think "sex". Based on the title, I thought Greg's post was going to be about sex also... but it turns out it wasn't. Bummer.

I was talking this weekend with a pastor of a church that is hoping to plant a church from their congregation soon. He was asking a lot of questions about my experience going out from Capitol Hill Baptist Church, both what we (me, the church planter, and the church as a whole) did right and what we would do differently next time.

So I'd like to do a series of posts with a few thoughts, born of experience, on how you as a pastor can help your church plant another church:

1. Don't build your church around yourself. One prominent pastor commented that our church plant would never get off the ground because no one would come to see me preach when they could drive a few more minutes to see Mark Dever (hey, thanks, I don't have enough discouragement in my life). I think that can be true, and it certainly is reflected in the number of prominent pastors that have elected to pipe in video around the area rather than plant churches.

If you teach your people (subtly or not so subtly) that you are the center of the show and that they are lucky to have a pastor like you, then don't be surprised when they don't want to sacrificially go out with a younger guy to embrace the hard work of church planting. But if you teach your people that they are part of a church in order to sacrificially build the kingdom and spread the gospel, they will have a category for leaving to plant a new church.

More later...

Hey Matt,

Thanks for the helpful posts and comments.  It's awesome to see the fruit the Lord has produced in the years you all have been teaching this at CHBC.  Not only is their greater victory for many people in this area, but there are the many joyous weddings, a higher view of marriage itself, the increase in chivalry (for lack of a better word), and greater acceptance and faithfulness in marital/gender roles.

But this kind of opportunity isn't only for the young singles.  How about middle-aged singles, widows, and divorcees?  Often, middle aged persons are at greater risk of failure in this area because (a) they fear their opportunity for marriage is over, and (b) they rationalize their temptation to sin by saying, "I'm an adult, experienced and able to handle it."  For the most part, Christians are not accustomed to church leaders and churches taking an interest in their intimate lives as you describe, which gets compounded by unhealthy notions of independence in later years.  In most places, we probably need this kind of teaching as an aid to both young and older singles until we build cultures of "close shepherding" and meaningful relationships in the body.

Greg, great insight re: the call to concern ourselves with loving others rather than being loved.

I've been doing some work lately on a Sunday School class about what love looks like in the church.  It's been challenging to me on a lot of different levels, but one thought that's come into my mind again and again is this:  We as Christians can very easily become more concerned about whether other people are loving us, than we are about whether we are loving other people.

I know that being and feeling loved are important needs for any human being. That’s how we’re made. But it’s worth noticing, especially in the context of the church, that the Bible’s command is to “love one another,” not “to be loved by one another.” The language is active, not passive.

That ought to set our priorities, and our expectations, in the church. It seems to me that the default position of too many Christians, when it comes to love, is passive rather than active. They're waiting to be loved, rather than acting to love.

In other words, the switch is set on “intake” rather than “output,” meaning that people spend alot more time analyzing whether they feel cared for, than they do strategizing about how they can care for others. You can see the problem with that pretty easily:  If every switch in the church is set on “intake,” most everyone starts to feel like they’re “not being cared for.” But flip all those switches to “output”—change the priority from “being cared for” to “caring”—and see what happens: Love abounds.

I hope and pray that kind of active love increasingly becomes one of my church’s distinctives.

Last night some of the elders (Mark Dever, Michael Lawrence, Scott Croft and I) gave a somewhat annual talk to the single men (women are next week) of Capitol Hill Baptist Church on physical intimacy prior to marriage. We try to give this talk following a series of lectures entitled Friendship, Courtship and Marriage given in our adult education program. The format we typically use is 30-40 minutes of lecture followed by about an hour of questions and answers.

The essence of our talks were captured in a book entitled Sex and the Supremacy of Christ edited by John Piper and Justin Taylor. A new book that does a good job along the same lines published by Crossway is John Ensor's Doing Things Right in Matters of the Heart.

We initially gave these talks because we saw very little difference between the world and the church when it came to dating. Men were painting a picture of marriage in their dating habits and then stepping away (defrauding). Women were being emotionally hurt or wrongly using physical intimacy to draw men in. After giving this talk now for 10 years we have seen a significant shift in the dating culture of our church. And yet there's always young, single men needing to be instructed (last night was our biggest crowd to date!).

If you've never considered such a seminar in your church, I would strongly encourage you to learn more about your singles and their need for instruction. For the glory of God.

A close friend recently asked me what I’d ask about if I was considering a pastoral position at a church. Good question. Young pastors are too often focused on what they’ll be asked rather than on what they should ask. If this is the flock God is calling you to shepherd, ignorance is not your friend. The list below is not complete, nor should it be used exhaustively. It is simply a list of some things you may want to consider.

1. Statement of Faith. Is it available, used, and understood? Can I affirm each section? Does the congregation live this out? Is it an adequate statement about Scripture, God, and salvation? Does it require anything that the Bible does not require of being a Christian, i.e. abstinence?

2. Church Covenant. Is it available and practiced?

3. Constitution (bylaws). Does one exist? Is it updated and used? In it you’ll learn how they choose officers, accept new members and much more. Constitutions are generally invisible until there’s a problem and then they become incredibly important. Know what it says.

4. Budget. Does a budget exist (you’d be surprised!)? How is it formed? Does the congregation vote to accept the budget? A church’s budget will tell you a lot about the vision and priorities (i.e. heart) of a church.

5. Balance sheet. Don’t just look at the church budget; look at the balance sheet. It will tell you things about debt, designated funds and valuation of buildings. These things are not as important as a statement of faith, but there not unimportant, often dictating what a church can and cannot do financially.

6. Missions. A part of the budget should be international missions. You’ll learn a lot about a church through their missions giving. Do they give? Are they going to hard-to-reach places? How do they pick who to support? Do they support a few people very well or a lot of people poorly?

7. Order of service. Ask to see several weeks’ bulletins to get a feel for what the church does when it gathers.

8. Programs. Are they program heavy? What’s the focus of the programs – insiders or outsiders?

9. Church calendar. Do they have one? Again, what’s the focus?

10. Denomination. Do they support the denomination at the national, state and local level? Is that a good thing? Are they aware of denominational priorities and problems?

11. Membership. How many members are in the church? How many attend? Do they have an inactive list? What’s their understanding of membership? Do they live close to each other and to the church building?

12. Church Discipline. Any understanding of the idea? When was the last time the church removed someone from church membership for unrepentant sin or non-attendance?

13. Former pastor(s). Consider asking for the names and contact information of the last pastor(s). Be careful here. You will learn a lot about that pastor and the flock, but you also owe it to the flock to grant a fresh start and benefit of the doubt (…believing the best). But you also may find pressure points that need to be addressed before you accept a call.

14. Elders/deacons/leaders. Consider asking to have private meetings with key leaders in the church. You can only gain in learning the prejudices, hopes and expectations of the next pastor through these leaders. An easy way to learn is by asking the leaders to review the ministry of the last couple of pastors.

15. Ambitions. Ask this question: If you could be like any church in America, which would it be?

16. Staff and office support. One new pastor I know was surprised to see how much time out of each week was taken up with cleaning/repairing the church building and making bulletins. Find out who does what on the current staff and whether or not there are plans for increased paid or volunteer staff.

17. Weddings and funerals. Are there any policies surrounding functions like these?

18. Living as a pastor. Maybe you don’t take these issues on in the first interview, but eventually they need to be addressed:

a. Cash salary (you need to eat)
b. Housing benefit (you need to sleep)
c. Healthcare (you will get sick)
d. Retirement (you will get old)
e. Days off during the week (you need to rest)
f. Holidays and vacation (you need to get out of Dodge)
g. Sabbatical (you need to recharge)
h. Children’s schooling (they need to learn)
i. Pastor’s wife (she needs to know if anything is expected of her)

No one or any combination of these issues should be regarded as deal breakers. The goal of this list is not to create picky pastoral candidates who will never find a church that satisfies all their criteria--sheep who already have their act together! Rather, asking these types of questions will help you know what you're getting into from the start, and it will give the church some indication of what they would be getting in you--that is, a man who pays attention to these types of things and just might, one day, have an opinion about some of them.

Hey Michael,

I'm praying for you as you prepare Galatians 3.  An awesome section of God's word.  I'm sure the Lord will bless to His people.

Okay... so if I'm understanding you correctly, your beef is that you really oppose organized efforts at showing mercy.  You don't think the church qua church (McKinley, notice the use of italics this time) should commit itself to a particular organizational response (i.e., soup kitchen, homeless shelter) but that individuals should be encouraged to love in this way.  And, you think that an individual under the banner of Christ serving this way may count as "the church" doing mercy.  Am I understanding you correctly?

I don't think I understand (or maybe buy) the distinction you're making between the collective and distributive "we".  Are you assuming that the collective we = "organization managed by the church" and the distributive we = "individual entrepreneurship"?  Are you assuming that an organized response is the same as an organizational response?  For example, the church doesn't have to establish a 501(c)3 to run a soup kitchen.  But surely equipping and having someone provide some administration of the members involved is a better stewardship than just having 40 people each doing their own thing independently.  Admittedly, the difference between organized and organizational can be either slight or huge in any given situation.  And that's where a healthy dose of prudence is required.  But we wouldn't want to collapse these categories and conclude across the board "organized bad, entrepreneurial good" would we?

And when you're resting from Galatians 3, please help a brother out with "theologically I think that [individual entrepreneurship] is the way God designed it."  What do you have in mind there? 

And thanks for this great insight: "as creatures of our culture, we tend to think the solution for individual failure is corporate (bureaucratic) organization."  I think that shows up on a lot of issues. 

Enjoying and benefiting from the chat.

I really should be working on my sermon for Sunday, but here's a quick response, since based on your dead horse post we're not so far apart. My numbers correspond with yours.

1. Of course. The church in its public teaching should explore what justice looks like, and how we as individuals can promote it. Like I said in my first post on this topic, the church should disciple its members to obey Jesus, which includes love of neighbor, which includes acts of mercy and justice. To say the church shouldn't be in the soup kitchen or art gallery business isn't to say that the church shouldn't encourage its members to be in those businesses either.

2. Again, yes of course. But that's not the issue. Its really the other way around The issue is, "If an individual is doing it, does that mean the church is doing it (or should do it)." I contend, "It all depends." If I'm preaching on Sunday morning, then even though an individual is doing it, the church is actually fulfilling her duty. I'm representing the church and the church as a whole has set me aside for that purpose. But if I bake a cake for my neighbor for his birthday in fulfillment of the command to love my neighbor, that doesn't mean the church really baked the cake, or should have. So if no one is "baking cakes" in my church, we have a problem. But the problem isn't that the church hasn't organized a bakery. The problem is that the church hasn't taught its members to love their neighbors. And that is a problem of health, I agree.

3. I don't disagree. But again I think this comes back to the responsibility of discipling our members.

So yes, we need to ask the question you and others are asking: Are we being merciful? How can we be more merciful? How can we be strategic and creative and gospel-driven in our acts of mercy? And the fact that we're not asking these questions and acting on them is a sign that we're not as healthy as we would like to think. But the "we" in these sentences isn't the collective "we" of the church, but the distributive "we" of our church members.

Honestly, I think we're having this discussion as evangelicals because we aren't very merciful, its pricking our conscience, and as creatures of our culture, we tend to think the solution for individual failure is corporate (bureaucratic) organization. Practically I think we'll see more impact with a more entrepreneurial approach. Theologically, I think that's the way God designed it.

Now back to Galatians 3.

Hey Michael,

OK, I admit up front that I may not be the sharpest pencil in the box and I don't have a degree from a fancy school like you do. But I'm not sure I'm following you. Can I ask a couple of questions/give a couple of thoughts? Maybe you can clarify your argument for me.

1. Of course everyone in the church isn't called to love your wife as you do. But doesn't the church qua church (excellent use of "qua", Thabiti! I'm also going to try to work in "vis-a-vis" here.) have a responsibility to and an interest in promoting healthy marriages? Don't you, in your pastoral capacity, do marriage counseling? Would it be inappropriate for a church to do a sermon series on marriage? I think this is an example of something where the church has some responsibility for the way a person discharges their individual responsibility.

2. It seems that the church as a whole can't do anything unless individuals actually do it. The church can't preach the gospel unless some individual stands up and actually opens their mouth. The church can't assemble together unless individuals get out of bed and show up. Mercy ministry (for the lack of a better term) seems to me to be the same way. It will be executed by individuals, but it is the concern of the church as a whole. If no one in your church is being merciful to those in need around them, that's a problem that you as a pastor need to address. It is a sign that the church lacks health, no?

3. I am not suggesting that all churches have to show mercy in the same way. You all are located in a city, so I imagine that there would naturally be opportunities to engage poverty, homelessness, and racial tensions. Out here in the suburbs we see opportunities with divorce, immigration, and people whose BMW's need a shine. But we should both be praying and strategizing as a church and as church leaders about how we can help meet those needs and alleviate suffering in the name of Christ.

I think ultimately we need to stand back and ask (with trembling): are we doing it? Are our churches (or the people in our churches, if you're more comfortable with that language) merciful? If not, there's a real problem.

As Bono once said, "The world is more malleable than you think and it's waiting for you to hammer it into shape." Wait, that's stupid. Never mind.

Thabiti,

Looking forward to seeing you in a few weeks!

As for parsing the church and the individual Christian, I agree that we can push this distinction too far. But a distinction exists nonetheless.

So for example, as a Christian, I am commanded to love my wife as Christ loves the Church. This is a universal mandate for all Christian husbands and an entailment of the gospel. But that in no way means that the members of CHBC are equally commanded to love my wife as Christ loves the church.

No doubt, as all the husbands in our church love their wives in the pattern of Ephesians 5, the worldly  communities of which we are a part will take notice. There will be a collective, social impact. But the responsibility remains several, not joint. The church can't do this for me, or without me, and I'm responsible to fulfill this command whether or not the rest of the church backs me up in it.

I think this is particularly useful in helping us relate "mercy ministry" to the church. It seems to me that mercy ministry is simply an application of the command to "love your neighbor as yourself." That command hits each one of us individually. We can't say we've obeyed the command to love simply by pointing to other people in our church that are loving others on behalf of the church. In fact, isn't the command to love by its very nature inescapably several, rather than joint? Of course, individuals can band together, pool their resources and talents, become highly efficient and skilled in the delivery of physical mercy on a large scale. But it's still in fulfillment of the command to love, which rests upon me.

I think this is fundamentally different from commands like Hebrews 10:25, "Don't forsake the assembling together", or Mat 28:19-20, "Go and make disciples of all nations, etc." These are examples of commands given to the church, as the church. As a member of a local church, I should support the fulfillment of these commands. But the church can and should go on without me should I refuse to help. They are fundamentally joint responsibilities.

So I don't mean to separate the identity of the church from the believer, as McKanna writes, but I don't think they are identical either, or that they exhaust each other. I am a member of a local church. I am also a citizen of a heavenly kingdom. I have responsibilities and privileges as a result of both memberships. They are related and overlap, and inextricably related at this point of redemptive history, but they aren't the same. I'm concerned that we don't help either the church or the individual Christian by blurring this distinction. Frankly, I'd like to see more ministries of mercy and social impact amongst the members of our church, not less. But so long as people think its the responsibility of the church, I fear the opposite will occur.

I don't know if this answers your question about parsing, and I know it raises a host of other questions, but that's the best I can do between dinner and Bible Study!

Hey Michael,

Welcome to the blogosphere brother.  Thanks for the helpful comments.  But my mind was sorta in the same place as Bruce McKanna when he wrote:

when we say that the church has a responsibility in a particular area, but that I have individual responsibility for something else, then it seems that we are separating the identity of the church from the believer. In other words, the church is the leadership (ministry professionals) and programs, and this entity does things for believers, rather than the church as the community of believers.

I don't have a problem saying that mercy ministry should not be a focus of the pastors/elders, but I can't say it should not be at least a part of the spectrum of ministy of the church (local body of believers).

You seemed to define "church" as something other than the collection of Christians covenanted together in a particular local congregation.  I'm still not clear about how something can be a mandate for all Christians and an entailment of the gospel and simultaneously not be a responsibility for the church qua church.  Could you say more about how you're parsing this, brother?

I wasn't really invited to this post, and I haven't even read all the entries, but I was struck by Mike's question, "So, what's the responsibility of the church?"

As far as I can tell, the church, as church, is never given the responsibility to engage in direct social action. Rather, the church is responsible to preach the gospel and disciple it's members, teaching them to obey everything Jesus commanded.

But of course, part of the "everything" is to "love your neighbor as yourself." So our preaching and discpling should make clear the real implications of the gospel on the lives of individual Christians, including implications for how we should engage the society in which we live, as an expression of Christian love. But that's a far cry from saying the church is responsible to reform culture.

It seems to me that two theological concepts are crucial here. One is "sphere sovereignty" and the other is the "kingdom of God."

I was reminded of "sphere sovereignty" recently by the pastor of a large paedobaptist church in a city roughly four hours north of here. I'd first run across it reading Kuyper, and this pastor used it to explain his church's approach to issues of social action/ social justice. He understood that it was not the church's responsibilty to run schools or orphanages or art galleries. Indeed, he went so far as to say it would be wrong of the church to do so, an encroachment on the responsibility given to others and an abandonment of her own responsibility. Rather the church should be discipling her members so that they would go out and do such things to the glory of God and the good of their communities.

On the other hand, as George Eldon Ladd reminded us all some time ago, the "kingdom of God" is not a "realm" but a "reign." The church, as church, gives witness to the kingdom by proclaiming the King and teaching the citizens of that kingdom to obey the words of the King. As a community, the church displays the eschatological reality that the New Age has dawned and heaven has broken in on earthly reality. She is literally so many colonies of heaven. But the church isn't the kingdom! And this side of glory, society at large will never be a colony of heaven. The kingdom of God is bigger than the church, but never co-extensive with society. Rather, it is seen wherever God's saving reign is displayed in and through the lives of believers.

It seems to me, anyway, that Reformed evangelicals' talk about social engagment is largely motivated by the correct sense that the Kingdom of God should be felt and seen wherever Christians are: in the workplace, at school, in the neighborhood, etc. But being creatures of modernity, we immediately think in terms of programs and strucutres, which leads us to the church, and wondering why the "organization" we're a part of isn't more engaged. The initial impulse is correct, but where it leads us is confused. It's not the church's responsibility to address the problem of homelessness in society at large (though it better make sure that it's own members aren't homeless!) It's Christians' responsibility, as servants of the King, individually and together, to address that issue, as we seek to display the saving reign of God in every sphere of life.

A related theological concept that I just realized I was assuming, but should make explicit: Responsibility isn't (necessarily) transitive. This is really just an extension of sphere sovereignty. We all understand this when it comes to our families. I'm a member of my family. I'm also a member of the CHBC pastoral staff. Most days I come home from work not having accomplished everything I should have. My wife is grateful that the church doesn't think the family is somehow repsonsible for making up my incomplete work. It's the same with the church. My discipleship as a Christian is given shape by the church, but it's not exhausted by it. I bear responsbilities as a Christian that the local church does not. And equally important, just because I'm resonsible for something doesn't make the church responsible too.

and especially poor musicians.

Mike, I think I agree with every (serious) sentence you wrote there.  I agree that mercy ministries are an inescapable implication of the gospel---I'd even say a "sign."  I agree that our hearts tend toward the self, and that is to be resisted.  I agree that a renewed emphasis on social ministry in Reformed circles is probably a good thing, and I agree that an outward focus is to be strived for.

The only thing I want to re-emphasize---and the whole reason I've been pressing on the brakes a bit in this conversation---is that the danger of emphasizing social ministry to the point that it eclipses everything else is not just a theoretical one, even in the present.  I'm all in favor of renewing our emphasis on social ministry, but we should be careful not to forget that Christians have already messed this up more than once.

Just kidding, of course. We know you don't hate music.

And most importantly, what's with the embedded pictures? When did we become the cool kids' blog? I thought we were the vanguard of the right wing. Only liberals use visuals... I'm not sure I even know how to embed something.

In all seriousness, Greg, I appreciate your thoughts. You always bring a sharp mind to these kinds of things.

I agree that the list of behaviors I mentioned are examples of Christian ethics. My point would be that if Christians genuinely hold to the ethics taught in the NT, they will have a radical impact on their culture (Wilberforce comes to mind as an example, the church's current stance against abortion is another).

I would even agree that social action/mercy ministry/electing Mike Huckabee are implications of the gospel. But I think that they are inescapable implications. I think Jesus did too. In Matthew 25:31-46, we see the Son of Man coming with his angels to sit on his heavenly throne in glory. And what will he be looking for? What will distinguish his sheep from the goats? Cups of water, food given to the hungry, clothes for those in need. Obviously, the sheep didn't earn their reward by their mercy... so musn't it be the case that Jesus is viewing those actions as the evidence of their saving faith? That's a heck of an implication.

Now, look, I know that in verse 40 Jesus limits the objects of mercy to his "brothers". And Greg, you mentioned the NT doesn't mention the need for mercy outside the family of faith. But in all honesty, I loathe that argument. Certainly the church has an obligation to its own, no doubt about it. I'd even accept that the church's primary obligation is to its own. But when we start to make careful exegetical arguments in order to limit the number of people to whom we owe mercy... well, isn't that exactly what the Pharisees did? Can you imagine standing before the Son of Man, the same one who told the parable of the Good Samaritan, and saying, "Wow, you know, it just wasn't clear in the text. It seemed like we only owed mercy to other Christians." I know my own heart, I know how reluctant I am to show mercy, I know how badly I want to have an excuse not to show mercy to those outside the church... and so I am very suspicious of any argument that justifies my coldness of heart.

Just to be clear, Greg, I am not suggesting that you lack mercy or have a cold heart. In fact, I think you're right that we are talking about matters of emphasis. But I think that the renewed emphasis on social action in Reformed circles is a good thing. As a pastor, I haven't yet found a church member that was too passionate about social reformation and mercy ministry. More often, I have to cajole Christians to simply make friends with a non-believer. I can't wait until my church is so merciful to outsiders that I have to rein them in a little.

This has been a really helpful conversation for me. JD and Mike, thanks for jumping in.  Good stuff. 

I think the language of social ministry being a “sign” or a “display” of the gospel and/or the kingdom is good. Both those words have a sense of pointing to something beyond themselves, which is an important thing for us as Christians to keep in mind when we’re doing social ministry. I think the strongest case for a ministry of social restoration comes from a few places: Jesus’ commands to love our neighbor (the Good Samaritan, for example), his command to do good so the pagans will glorify God, and his commands to be salt and light in the world in order to preserve and illuminate it. There’s also Tabitha in Acts 9, as JD pointed out, the apostles’ command to "do good to all men," and maybe even “xenophilia” in a few places, too.  And of course there’s the example of the early church---there's obviously a tradition of social ministry there. All that would lead me to lead my people to do these sorts of ministries.

But I also want to be careful here. When you write a long paragraph like that listing out the fifteen or twenty places where you see this sort of thing, you run the risk of leaving the impression that social restorative ministry is just absolutely everywhere in the New Testament. And I don’t think it is.  

So Mike, I have to wonder if you’re not overstating the case a little bit in your post—maybe in a couple of places. Tell me what you think:

First, it’s true of course that redemption will ultimately involve the total transformation of the world—its systems, its hierarchies, its economy (whatever that might look like in eternity), etc. But you have to admit that to move from that fact to the church’s obligation to do social restoration ministry as a foretaste of that final consummation is at best an implication. That theological connection makes sense to me, but it’s not a connection that’s drawn explicitly by the New Testament, is it? If anything, we have to say it’s implicit—not illegitimate, but implicit and therefore . . . perhaps to be held somewhat lightly? 

Second, you say that it seems to you that the NT epistles deal with "social issues" very frequently, and you list a number of things like family dynamics, food sacrificed to idols, homosexuality, master/slave relations, and others to make the point.  But it seems to me that most of those things aren't really what we're talking about here. Marriage, master/slaves, idol food, homosexuality, treatment of women—Those are all matters of Christian ethics, Christian behavior, aren't they?  They’re not mercy ministry, or social engagement. (Some of them, in fact—women being silent, slaves obeying masters—wouldn’t exactly cause much rejoicing among the pagans if we started holding them up as examples of NT social engagement!) If those things are more ethical than social restorative, that's important because it means that we can't just list things like that as proof of there being a strong theme in the NT of the church working for social restoration.  Maybe there is such a theme, but those things aren't it.

The only thing you mention in that list that might fit (in my opinion) in the category of "social restoration" is "relief of poverty."  But here's my hitch:  There's really neither example nor command in the NT for Christians to relieve poverty, except within the family of faith, is there?  Jesus doesn't really do any relief of poverty. The apostles don't do any relief of poverty.  No one exhorts the church to do any relief of poverty, except within the family of faith.

Let me sum up my point here perhaps too bluntly: To me, the entire NT seems to be at pains to say, "Don't mess this up.  The Christian gospel is NOT about relieving physical poverty."  Jesus says the poor will always be with you, he says you can give to the poor "whenever you want to," Peter tells the guy asking for alms that he's not going to give him any silver or gold.  The references in the epistles to helping the poor are (always?) about the poor within the community of faith.  It's almost as if Jesus and the apostles knew it would be tempting for Christians to make Christianity primarily about relief of the poor, etc., and moved to cut that error off early. 

Again, I’m not saying that I wouldn’t lead my people to do social restorative kinds of ministries.  I would.  I see enough in the Bible—OT, Jesus, and even the epistles—to do that. At the end of the day, I think what we’re talking about is a matter of emphasis. None of us would say that social ministries are illegitimate, and none of us would say that they are ultimate, either. But in the spirit of talking about emphasis, I suppose my point here is to caution against building up and prioritizing a fully worked-out, church-mission-determining theology of social restoration when the New Testament doesn’t explicitly or forcefully do that.