Speech must be free

I quite like reading Quadrant. This opinion piece on the Israel Folau controversy is offered in the hope that it will clear up the contentious Bible passages that he quoted in his meme. Rather than singling out one particular group of people, the Bible clearly teaches that sin is a universal human condition. In plain language, every human being is a sinner, including me. Every human being needs God's mercy. Even though It is this message may be confronting to some people, it is not helpful to distort it, either in ignorance of its context, or deliberately.

https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2019/06/the-shouting-down-of-free-speech/?fbclid=IwAR0G5Sjaw8qj93_ZgYFRyLV5bzMe8oZ9s5IuiUgPPFc7QWtoBQGD645yPbE

Missing the mark and the point

The Israel Folau controversy has divided the Christian community in Australia, with passionate and vocal people on either side of the debate. Geoff Thompson, a Uniting Church minister and theologian, takes issue with what he considers to be Folau's "cavalier and uninformed" use and interpretation of the Bible, not to mention "disturbingly indifferent to its impact, and strikingly incurious."

Folau has certainly offended people, and he has paid a high personal price for his actions, losing his rugby contract, and taking his former employers to court for wrongful dismissal. Perhaps for legal reasons, to my knowledge, Folau has not yet given a full statement to explain his actions, and the reasons for them. Media reports I have seen have not helped the situation.

With respect to Thompson, it seems to me that he has missed the point. Memes should not be taken as definitive statements on any topic. In the words of a recent article in the Melbourne Catholic, social media users use them to "provoke questions and create conversations." That's what I have used memes for; to prompt people into looking into topics further. The meme was based on I Corinthians 6:9-10. This passage is only part of what the Bible has to say about sin.

In this case, I would hope that it would prompt them to look into Christianity for themselves, without any preconceptions or agendas, and simply take the time to properly understand what the Bible has to say about God, the concept of sin, the human condition, and the solution that God offers to that through Jesus Christ. Far from singling out one group of people, the Bible presents sin as a universal human condition.

If you want to get the full concept of these ideas, and the plan of redemption that the entire Bible narrates, you cannot read one verse, passage, or indeed an entire book of the Bible in isolation from the rest of the Bible as a whole.

https://theconversation.com/why-christians-disagree-over-the-israel-folau-saga-118773

Lurking in the darkness

Several faith based organisations and non governmental organisations including the Bible Society, Micah Challenge, Salvation Army, Tear Fund, and World Evangelical Alliance have joined forces to highlight the issue of corruption.

They aim to collect 1 million signatures to present to world leaders attending the G20 Summit in Brisbane in November 2014.

Every year Transparency International releases its corruption perceptions index. In 2013, Denmark and New Zealand were deemed to be the world's least corrupt countries, and Aghanistan, North Korea, and Somalia judged as the most corrupt. That's hardly something to brag about, is it?

It is estimated that the cumulative cost of worldwide corruption is $1 trillion per year. This figure is comprised of the cost of corporate tax evasion and tax evasion by wealthy individuals. Think of the public goods that such a some of money could be used to provide, like healthcare, education, clean water, and food security, for example. This alone would save thousands of lives.

As well as being a justice issue, this is also a spiritual issue. It is a clear reminder, if any is needed, of a world under the curse of sin (Romans 8:22). It also gives the Old Testament warnings against those who acquire wealth through unjust means fresh resonance (Proverbs 16:8, 21:6, 22:16, 28:16, Jeremiah 17:11, 22:13, Ezekiel 22:13, Habakkuk 2:9).

http://cpi.transparency.org/cpi2013/results/

http://www.exposedcampaign.com

That's hardly earth shattering, is it?

Occasionally I read the blog Groupsects. My take on it is this. The person who runs this blog doesn't let on much about his background, but reading between the lines, the astute reader can work it out for themselves.

He used to attend a church, but was treated badly because of his sexuality. This blog is his way of seeking retribution.

He does this by aggregating news stories about bad things that Christians do, both leaders and laypeople. It might be sexual misconduct, financial fraud, murder, bizarre behaviour informed by acting on distorted teaching, spiritual abuse, dysfunction, and the like.

When I look at this blog, it seems to be about mudslinging. It’s all well and good to aggregate news stories about bad things that Christians do, but it’s not offering a corrective. Most thinking Christians are already well aware that the church is in trouble, so I don't find anything earth shattering here either. The perfect church does not exist, and you won't find it on this side of eternity.

Plenty of people have been given the rough end of the stick by churches, which is very sad. Rather than acting in isolation to relentlessly bag the church and Christians out for their shortcomings, I suggest that obtaining some counselling or forming a support group to help each other heal and move on is a more constructive response.

In any case, I’m nothing without Jesus, and I am utterly incapable of living a life that honours God (Isaiah 64:6) without His grace and mercy. There is no room for pride or feelings of superiority, thinking, "I'm glad I'm not like them." (Luke 18:9-14). To any non-Christians who read that blog, and think, “if that’s what Christians are like, then I don’t want to be one,” I say that even if some Christians are hypocrites, and I do mean some, it doesn't mean you’re off the hook with God. No man or woman has an excuse. You need to bow your knee at the foot of the cross, repent, and receive forgiveness and salvation.

Where's the beef?

Sometimes I turn on my television or radio to have some background noise whilst getting ready to go out somewhere. Yesterday morning I was channel surfing when I came across a sermon from Texan pastor Joel Osteen. Osteen is a preacher, author, televangelist and senior pastor of Lakewood Church in Houston, which is believed to be the largest church in the United States.

There is plenty of critical comment online about Osteen. Many of these critics raise valid concerns about Osteen's teachings. For me to add to them I would be saying the same thing as them but in different words.

The gist of Sunday's message as I understood it was this. God wants Christians to live full and effective lives. This is their destiny and purpose. Often they're not living out this destiny because influential figures in their lives, such as parents, teachers, sports coaches, and the like have spoken negativity into their lives, telling them that they will never amount to anything. Because they don't know any different, so this is how they live. To this we can add the schemes of the devil, who uses these things as part of his strategy to nobble Christians and keep them weak, timid, and fearful.

Some Christians struggle in their faith because their image of God has been distorted by poor relationships with God or other male authority figures in their life. Even though they may understand intellectually that God is a God of love, justice, and holiness, who wants all of humanity to be reconciled to Him, they may perceive Him to be cold, distant, and capricious, who will only accept them if they measure up to His impossible standards. It seems valid to say that there may also be an element of spiritual warfare in these struggles.

To be generous to Osteen, his positive messages offer a corrective to these incorrect views of God. Some Christians do need to hear that God loves and cares for them, as he so strongly emphasizes. Having said that, in his messages there never seems to be any acknowledgement that millions of faithful Christians around the world are suffering hardship and persecution for their faith. 

Instead, he talked about success. When Osteen took over from his late father as pastor of Lakewood Church, people told him that he couldn't do it. If the size of his congregation and his following is any indication, it would appear that he has proven them wrong. He also mentioned the former drug dealer whose life turned around when somebody told him that he could leave his life of crime and use his sales skills in a legitimate job. That was actually an uplifting story.

Osteen lost me thereafter. He talked about how you can have a nicer house if you want it. This almost sounds like the erroneous "name it and claim it" prosperity teaching that other televangelists propagate.

Then he quoted the words of the apostle Paul in Philippians 4:13; "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me."

This verse is not a promise. It has nothing to do with God empowering you to succeed in life and live out your potential. In context, Paul meant to say that the grace of God sustained and enabled him to serve Him faithfully in spite of his very difficult circumstances. He suffered much for the gospel, and knew that one day it would cost him his life. It should not be read or used as some sort of positive thinking affirmation as Osteen seems to think.

Osteen isn't my cup of tea. Yes, God is a God of love, but that's not the whole picture. From what I have seen and heard of Osteen there is no mention in his messages of sin, the cross, the holiness of God, repentance, the need for forgiveness, and the consequences for anyone who rejects Him.

Encouraging messages have their place and are probably needed sometimes, but not all the time. God is loving, but He is also just. Any preacher or teacher of the word must remember that. To emphasize one side of His character at the expense of the other gives a skewed picture of Him, which can potentially be very damaging spiritually. We need to know God as He really is, and not as we perceive Him to be. 

A reflection

In my time, I've done a bit of reading in the area of Christian apologetics, and even though I'm not particularly gifted as an evangelist, I've also tried to share my faith with those outside the church. In doing this, people often put up a range of objections to Christianity. One of the most common ones you hear is that Christians are hypocrites.

This is a gross generalisation. Some of them are, but most of them aren't. Sometimes people who make such statements are making a valid observation. Even if they're not Christian themselves, they have some notion of what being a Christian means, and the standards that Christians are supposed to follow. They correctly see that those who claim to be Christian often fail to uphold these standards. Frequently we see high profile Christian leaders whose moral failings are widely publicised in the media. We also see church members whose moral failings are kept more private, by and large, even if the consequences are often the same.

This is a reminder that Christians don't follow other Christians; they follow Jesus Christ. He is our example, and the one we must answer to. The issue comes down to this. Never mind what other Christians do, who are after all, still flawed human beings. Even if some Christians are hypocrites, or whatever else they may be labelled as, irrespective of this, every individual still needs to consider where they stand before God. At some point, you need to personally consider the claims of Jesus upon your life, if you haven't already. In other words, even if some Christians are hypocrites, this doesn't mean you're off the hook with God.

Reflections on Psalm 7

Each day at Kingsley College begins with spiritual focus, where a staff member or student leads us in prayer and devotional reading of a passage from Scripture. Occasionally this task falls upon me, as it did last Wednesday.

Today’s reading came from Psalm 7, written by King David, the greatest of all ancient Israel's kings. To do something a bit different, I used Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase, The Message. The language is somewhat lurid in places, but does a good job on conveying the meaning of the words of this Psalm to contemporary readers.

APPLICATION

What we see here is that David was threatened by his enemies, as often happened during his life. This time he mentions Cush. Cush was from the tribe of Benjamin, which means that he probably followed Saul. As I’m sure you all know, Saul considered David to be his enemy.

We see him once again pouring out his heart or even complaining before God. He’s asking God for help and deliverance, but he knows that he can’t expect it if he is as guilty before God as his enemies are. He may not have sinned in the same way his enemies have, but he's still a sinner.

David knows that compared to his enemies, he’s done no wrong, but in the end, as we read elsewhere in Scripture, none of us are righteous in God’s eyes. None of us are without sin. God’s justice applies equally to all of us. Those of us who have faith in Jesus can trust and rejoice in God’s mercy. We have righteousness imputed to us through Christ.

It’s very humbling to read these words coming from a great man of God like David. Despite his failings, he was described as a man after God’s own heart. This is a reminder to us all, and certainly to me, to keep a short account with God.

You’ll never get me standing here and telling you to do things that I’m not prepared to do myself. If nothing else, this is a reminder to all of us of how important it to use your prayer time to confess your sins to Him. It’s a good thing to trust in His justice, but all of us need to trust in His mercy as well. I’ll leave you to ponder that.

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, how grateful we are for your justice; that one day you will defeat all evil forever. We, as your children, are also grateful for your mercy towards us. But help us all not to take this for granted.

We ask this in Your Name.

Amen.

Controversy

During the week a storm in a teacup erupted when a Baptist church in Sydney displayed this sign. Of course, it refers to Osama Bin Laden, head of Al-Qaeda. He is believed to have been one of the key instigators of one of the defining events of the 21st century, the September 11 terrorist attacks upon the United States. In a matter of hours, thousands of people were killed, and the lives of thousands more were changed forever. It has been remarked by some commentators that this sign is potentially misleading and offensive, but there is some degree of truthfulness to it.

September 11, 2001 shattered my naivety about human nature. At the time I remembered thinking that most people are inherently good, at least by man's definition. In the days and weeks after those events, as the story of the attacks and how they were planned and carried out emerged, I wondered if it was possible for some people to be irredeemably evil. In spite of the evil and suffering he has caused, as hard as it is for us to comprehend, Jesus does love Bin Laden and his ilk. It's a challenge and reminder to look at such people through God's eyes rather than our own.

Hypothetically, if Bin Laden woke up tomorrow, renounced his particular brand of Islam and its teachings, and accepted Christ, then there would be a place for him in the kingdom of God, regardless of his past. As much as it churns my stomach to even contemplate it at this point, he would become my brother in Christ. It's not my place to decide who is and isn't worthy of God's mercy. The fact of the matter is that none of us actually deserve it. All of us are sinners, but God, in His mercy, provided Jesus to give us salvation, and not the wrath we all deserve.

You need feet

Part of last Sunday was spent visiting relatives in Geelong, in my opinion one of the most beautiful parts of Victoria. The main reason for this visit was to accept an invitation to attend their church, Aberdeen Street Baptist Church. Their reasons for inviting me weren't entirely spiritual, nor were my motives for visiting, but I won't write about that here. In any event, it certainly made for an interesting contrast to my current home church, Diamond Valley Baptist. Whereas Diamond Valley is more contemporary, this is a traditional Baptist church, and the service gave me a greater appreciation of my denominational heritage.

Reverend Andrew Stelling is the pastor of this congregation, and his sermon was based on Mark 9:38-50. Stelling was quite adept at explaining the context of the passage, and also giving it a contemporary application.

38"Teacher," said John, "we saw a man driving out demons in your name and we told him to stop, because he was not one of us."

39"Do not stop him," Jesus said. "No one who does a miracle in my name can in the next moment say anything bad about me, 40for whoever is not against us is for us. 41I tell you the truth, anyone who gives you a cup of water in my name because you belong to Christ will certainly not lose his reward.

42"And if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to be thrown into the sea with a large millstone tied around his neck. 43If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life maimed than with two hands to go into hell, where the fire never goes out. 45And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than to have two feet and be thrown into hell. 47And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell, 48where
" 'their worm does not die,
and the fire is not quenched.' 49Everyone will be salted with fire.

50"Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with each other."

Here's some random and somewhat disjointed notes on this sermon, written in my journal later the same day:

Don't be so presumptuous or judgemental about who is or isn't a genuine follower of Christ in within the body of Christ.

Hands are what you do, feet are places you go, eyes are what you see. Be careful what you do, about the places you go to, and the things you look at.

Here, Jesus wasn't advocating that we literally mutilate ourselves, but he was making the point that we should treat sin as seriously in our lives as if we did.

Little ones can mean children, who are small in stature, spiritually immature Christians, who are small spiritually, or the weak and powerless in society, who are small in status.

To do something in someone's name means acting in a way that reflects their person, to do something in their character. Christians are meant to be ambassadors of Jesus. Our conduct must reflect this, with consistency in words and actions.

Journalling is a good Christian discipline, particularly if you have extended periods of solitude, as I do these days. If you're not already doing so, give it a try.