The Freedom of Slavery

One of issues always important for Christians to consider is the tension that exists between effectively witnessing to the pagan world around us, while not allowing that world to infiltrate the Gospel. It is crucial that we find ways to make the gospel relevant to those around us; but equally crucial that we don’t allow the culture to dictate values to the Gospel. 

In some ways, the bridge that spans the first century and the twenty-first century needs to be a one-way bridge. We strive to bring the gospel to our own culture, but carefully work to avoid allowing modern culture to infect that message before it gets here!

In some ways, this seems to be the issue at stake in I Corinthians 9:19-23. It is a great text that speaks to the heart of the apostle Paul and perhaps speaks with equal passion to the need you and I have to be sensitive to the cultural boundaries in which we live.

What initially catches my attention in this text is that Paul adamantly declares himself to be in a “state of being free” in reference “to all things.” Yet, in the spirit of being Christ to the world, he makes a volitional choice “to become a slave” to all. He emphatically adds “myself” to the sentence to remind us of his own need to make a decisive move in his life that has as its purpose “to win more.” 

The structure of this paragraph is such that it keeps the careful reader of the text focused on the idea of “in order that I might win more.” Six times he uses a Greek conjunction that most often denotes purpose – often translated in order that. The first five of those six phrases, the same verb is used – a verb whose basic meaning is “to win.” In the sixth phrase, which summarizes his point, he changes verbs from “to win” to the common New Testament verb for “to save.” 

In the final verse Paul speaks to motivation again – “for the sake of the gospel.” Then in a kind of “this is my heart” statement, he speaks of the joy of it all by saying “in order that (same conjunction!) I might become a participant in its blessings.” 

Structure is crucial. If you look at the beginning, he gives up “being free” and “makes himself a slave.” If you look at the end, it is that very willingness to become a slave for the sake of the gospel that gives him joy in life. That’s not exactly the normal idea our religious culture attaches to sacrifice –but it is Paul’s.

Between “the beginning” and “the end” – there is the litany of “I became” statements that speaks to the nature of what it means “to become a slave” and to the purpose of that “slavery” which is “to win some.” 

I’m wondering today . . . how can this text become my own testimony?

When Yahweh Is King

When I read the story of the changing of the name of Joseph a Levite from Cyprus, I can’t help but wonder about my own life. If the people who know me best and saw my faith being worked out on a daily basis decided to change my name, what would it be? In the case of Joseph the Levite from Cyprus, his name was changed to Barnabas, and Luke adds in his Acts 4 :36 record, “which means ‘son of encouragement.’” For me, that’s a pretty sobering question – and one that often causes me to think about how I am “working out my salvation,” to borrow language from Philippians 2:12, 13.

Those kinds of questions lead me to think about all the names mentioned in the Bible. Had I lived during the days Scripture was being written, would my name be there? There are some remarkable people whose names play an important role – people like Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Moses, Sarah, Deborah, David, Solomon, Peter, James, John, Paul, Phoebe, the Mary list, Timothy, John Mark, Titus, . . . Those are people whose lives and ministries we remember because of their greatness.

But – do you remember Malchijah, son of Rechab? If you do, you must have an incredible knowledge of biblical names! I don’t ever remember a Sunday School, Vacation Bible School, Sunday Night Youth Group, or even summer camp lesson about Malchijah! If he were mentioned in my college and graduate school Old Testament classes, I must have been absent or not paying attention. But . . . he is mentioned in Scripture and in a positive way.

I’m not trying to start another “Prayer of Jabez like cottage industry” here, but I’m pretty impressed with Malchijah. According to Nehemiah 3:14 – he “repaired the Dung Gate; he rebuilt it and set up its doors, its bolds and its bars.” (NRSV) Just a sentence is used by Nehemiah, a sentence in the midst of some pretty impressive accomplishments (the next person mentioned repaired the Fountain Gate!) to tell me that Malchijah repaired the Dung Gate. Think how his kids might have felt at elementary school “tell me what your Dad does” day.

If his culture were like ours – even in the church – they likely associated value with function. And while we all want the local sewer system to work well, we tend to see being a sewer worker with less than positive acclaim. Yet he did what God called him to do – and his name is in Scripture. Not a glamorous job by any means – but an answer to God’s call in his life.

There probably were no signs with flashing lights out front announcing that Malchijah successfully completed his task. But in God’s economy, value and function are never linked. What gave him value is simply that he responded to God’s call in his life. It wasn’t what he did, but who he was. His name, by the way, means “Yahweh is King.” Apparently when “Yahweh is King,” even building a Dung Gate is a noble task!

Unusual Politics

Years ago, I remember my practical ministries professor in college, Orval M. Morgan, saying that years in which presidential elections were held were difficult years to keep the church on mission. I suspect that if he were still living, he would still say the same – perhaps even more. To merely say that this year’s (actually more than a year) political process has created tension would be to grossly understate reality. And it is far from over.

So, as Christians, how do we balance our absolute allegiance to Christ as Lord on the one hand, with all of those reminders that believers should “submit themselves to governing authorities,” (Romans 13), “honor the emperor,” (1 Peter 2:17) and Jesus’ own words when He said, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s.” (Matthew 22:21, Mark 12:17, Luke 20:25)

Of course the very apostle who urges the Roman Christians to “submit to the governing authorities” would himself be put to death because he would not obey the Roman demand to call the emperor Lord. (See F.F. Bruce, Paul: Apostle of the Heart Set Free, pages 441 ff.)

I understand that I nor anyone else has an easy answer to the challenge. Knowing exactly what the role of a believer who has declared that Jesus and only Jesus is Lord should be in modern western culture and its governments is a hard, but important, question.

But in re-reading William Robinson’s The Biblical Doctrine of the Church, recently, I discovered some very thoughtful advice that can, perhaps, at least set some of the parameters for us as we think about the next five months of presidential politics. His comments are in a section where he says of the church, “She is in the world, not to conform to the world, but to redeem it.” (page 115) That in itself could change to focus of lots of people were it taken to heart. But, Robinson goes on to say of the church:

• “It is clear that the church herself cannot take political shape and become another political entity over against the state.” (115)
• “It is also clear that the church cannot take national shape. She cannot become the handmaid of the nation to serve her national pride.” (116)
• “It is further clear that the church has to struggle for a Christian civilization, which it must be recognized is something quite different from the life of the church herself. A Christian civilization may be described as one in which the main principles of the Christian ethic are actualized, and in which Christians themselves are able to take on the full disciplines of the Christian life without interference from the state..” (116)

Though Robinson’s book was published in 1948 – it sounds remarkably relevant and remains something worth reading! Perhaps that suggests something about the author’s understanding of the Christian gospel and his faithfulness to proclaim it.

Whatever happens in these tension filled days of political discourse, may we all remember that when all is said and done, the church is here “to redeem” the world!

In As Much As

The first time I taught the class was in the Spring Semester, 1995 and it was called Christian Doctrine. I’ve taught the class every spring since that time, and occasionally in summer school. Over the years the name of the course has changed, first to Biblical Theology, and in its most recent catalog appearance, Theological Foundations for the Christian Life.

 I had a part in the current title for the course, because I believe that doctrine, theology, or whatever we want to call it, can’t merely be another academic check off on the path towards graduation. Theology that doesn’t express itself in life-changing realities might as well be left untaught. In fact it would probably be best if left untaught!

But the name of the course isn’t the only change for that course. When I first taught it, a part of the course requirements was to write a paper on a particular theological topic. To do well on that paper, a student had to do a lot of research on a particular topic, analyze the research in view of biblical testimony, and turn in a well written paper. While none of that is a bad thing to do, for some reason I kept having this sense of dissatisfaction with the assignment. I’m not sure if it was the fact that many students weren’t able to write to please me or reading that many papers was a burdensome chore I wanted to avoid.

The reality is, and I hope I’m not rationalizing my way around the burdensome nature of reading term papers, that something else bothered me about that assignment. I just couldn’t convince myself that the greatest need for a student in his or her first formal study of theology was to be able to write a detailed paper about a particular topic. Every topic we cover in the class is imbedded in the idea that it isn’t really theology until it begins to change who we are and how we live.

For at least five years now, students are put in groups, and groups are required to do what I call a Theology in Life Project. The description of the project includes things like it can’t be done in a local church (that is too easy, I’m not opposed to the local church), it has to take the group outside of normal comfort zones, and the group has to tie the project itself to something we have learned in class.

A part of the preparation for the project is that students have to read from Authentic Christianity, a collection of quotes, essays, etc. from John Stott. The section they read is “Christian Thinking on Social Issues,” where Stott argues that words are abstract, and must be embodied in acts of love. In other words, “real theology” isn’t just learning a dozen reasons why God is God, but actually finding a way to put what we know about God into action.

This morning was group report day for this spring’s class. On their evaluation forms, the class (a total of 33 people) reported investing more than 320 hours in their projects. They did amazing things. One group spent the night outside a homeless area in Atlanta, “just listening.” Another group spent an entire Saturday working at Hope House in Union City with special needs children, while another group spent an afternoon “getting dirty hands” working in the landscaping at Hope House. Another group spent hours and a good bit of their own money making the Point University football team understand that they were indeed a part of the Christian community. Another group did a shoe drive for Atlanta Mission, only to discover when they went to deliver a truck load of shoes, that their help was needed in the nursery, where, as one of the team members said, two overgrown boys “had to put on their nurturing skills” in taking care of small children.

Still another group put on a cook-out and game time in a needy East Point neighborhood, where one lady said, “I walked into a blessing.” A group of four ladies spent an afternoon working in a nursing home near Greenbriar Mall. These ladies were motivated to do this project by Stott’s suggestion of the need for “uncomplicated compassion.”

We ran out of time and still have two groups to report next Tuesday – but I’ve already looked at their written reports, and I know we will hear two more excellent reports from teams who took theology seriously.

All the groups did great things, but those great things are probably not the most important part of the activities. Without exception, groups hinted at or plainly said that their own lives were impacted by what they did. A group that worked with special needs children for a whole Saturday reported that they discovered “how easy it was to love children they once would have likely avoided.” The group who spent the night on the streets of Atlanta “listening” said they realize now better than ever what it means to say all humans are created in the image of God. Another group told us “if you’re serving in your comfort zone, you miss the point.” Still a different group reported that they better understand how “heaven sometimes overlaps earth.”

For me, “heaven was overlapping earth” big time in our class this morning!

I know that Point University isn’t populated by perfect little Christians who always make the right decisions and whose behavior never needs to be addressed. My role here means that I sometimes see the underbelly that isn’t always what it should be. But that’s always been true. In fact, in a letter written by President Redmon on March 27, 1968, he said, “I am sure you are aware that there have been some very unfortunate happenings among our students recently. Some have broken college rules and have engaged in conduct unbecoming Christians.” I have probably written a few notes like that myself during the current academic year, and unless the Lord reappears before next year, will probably need to write a few like that next year.

The folks who always want to be critical of young Christian adults and Point University will always focus on “some very unfortunate happenings.” There isn’t much I can do about that. But had you been sitting in my class this morning, listening to these young Christian adults describe not only what they did but what God did in their lives, then I’m thinking it might be just a little harder to be so negative about young Christians!

I love being in those moments where “heaven overlaps earth!” Hard to be critical of that! Jesus would likely say, “In as much as you have done it to the least of these . . .”

Don’t Forget the Transfer

I am currently serving as an evaluator for an accreditation association, reviewing the self-study reports of three institutions. While I can’t say reading college catalogs, self-study reports, and other similar material is particularly exciting, I can say that it is informative!

One of the places I found myself stopping and re-reading a couple of times was one college’s policy on “transfer of credit.” There is no way a prospective student, wanting to transfer credit from another college to this particular one, would ever gain the slightest idea of how credits transferred from one college to another. I hope their registrar has a law degree of some type to aid in the interpretation of language.

It dawned on me that it was at least a possibility that this college wasn’t the only place in the world that makes “transfer” so complicated. But also got me to thinking about whether or not we have the “transfer” conversations we ought to in the church. And I’m not talking about “transfer of membership” from Church A to Church B.

In one of those wonderful lines for Colossians, Paul puts “transfer” in the Christian vocabulary. Here’s what he says, “For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us into the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.” (Colossians 1:13, 14 NASB)

One can hardly read Scripture without thinking the God is a “rescuing God.” The word rescue in this verse surely harkens to the story of the Exodus, the paradigm story for God and His relationship to His people. We tell the story of “rescue” pretty well. “Come to Jesus and get saved from your sins.” “Become a Christian and escape the punishment of hell.” You can hear that kind of sentiment in lots of what passes for “the Christian witness” in our culture.

But I’m not sure Paul would be pleased that we tend to stop there. Both of these verbs, “rescue” and “transferred” describe something God has done in Christ. They inseparably describe something God has made potentially true for all humans. When we take advantage of the “rescue” and the “transfer” – we “are having redemption, the forgiveness of our sins.” Taking advantage of what God has already done makes it possible for us to make “redemption” the daily story of our lives.

But it isn’t just a rescue operation, it is also a “transfer.” From the domain of darkness to the kingdom of His beloved son kind of transfer. Jerry Sumney, in his commentary on Colossians, summarizes the implication of these words by saying, “One’s allegiance must shift to the king of a new realm. This requires the believer to relativize all other allegiances and commitments. Allegiances to family, city, nation, empire, and all aspects of life must now be evaluated through the values of the kingdom in which that believer has now been made a citizen. This is a dramatic shift in identity, a shift that brings blessings and that grounds the responsibilities to live worthily.” (New Testament Library: Colossians, page 58)

But, despite what seems to be so obvious in this (and many other) text, we seem to talk about Jesus in rescue mode only, forgetting that the rescue operations of God always have destinations in mind. After all, God didn’t call Moses to just get the children of Israel out of Egypt! They had a destination – and perhaps their reluctance to obey God in a way that would get them to the destination is a paradigm for us as well.

Gabe Lyons, in his book The Next Christians, speaks to this issue when he says, “the next Christians believe that Christ’s death and Resurrection were not only meant to save people from something. He wanted to save Christians to something. . . .redemption is the beginning of our participation in God’s work of restoration in our lives and in the world. Understanding that one idea literally changes everything.” (page 53)

It is more than amazing to realize that God is a God who rescues. Perhaps even more amazing that He wants me to be a part of “the kingdom of His beloved Son.” In the rescue and transfer, there is redemption!

Let’s talk the whole story!

Why me?

Every Thursday morning on the campus of Point University, a group of faculty, staff, and students meets to observe the Lord’s Supper. Dr. Barry Blackburn and I have been leading this service for about ten years. We started the service in part because we were concerned about how many students come to Point University from faith settings where the Lord’s Supper is not given much attention and others from faith settings where, though observed weekly, the Lord’s Supper is not given much attention.

I have come to see this brief service as one of the more meaningful things I do in the area of spiritual formation each week. We read Scripture, we pray, we confess our sins, we share with one another the peace of Christ, and of course participate in the partaking of the body and blood of Jesus. At the end, we go in peace to love and serve the Lord!

Today, Maundy Thursday on the Christian calendar, we read big portions of John 13 and 14. Dr. Blackburn was away from campus today, so I both led the service and did the homily. (We normally alternate those roles.) Because it was Maundy Thursday, I wanted the service to acknowledge that on what appears to be Thursday of His final week of life on earth, Jesus washed His disciples feet, He gave them “the new commandment,” and He gave us this meal – a meal for these “in-between-the-times” times in which we live and the meal that anticipates the great wedding feast of the Lamb of God.

Because of limited time, I decided not to actually wash the feet of those who came to the service – though that certainly would not be an inappropriate thing to do. While working on the liturgy of the service for this morning, I decided that after reading the part of John 13 where Jesus makes it clear that His washing of the disciples’ feet was intended to be an example to us about serving – we would go out to the aisles of Westside Chapel, get on our knees, and pray about our role as “foot-washing followers of Jesus.”

We did. And I can’t begin to write adequately of how it impacted me to see a group of college students, up at 7:30 a.m. for communion, on their knees praying about what it means to serve Jesus. It made me wish I could bring some of the critics of college young people in general and Christian college young people in particular in for a look. And if I could do that, I would also want them to somehow take a look at the hundreds of Point University students who spent this past Tuesday on Spring Ministry Day, serving in the name of Jesus, people from deep in Atlanta’s worst zip code to Valley, Alabama and lots of points in between. Then I’d want them to see our campus this past Saturday, as our fifth Global Mission Conference was held – an event entirely planned by students who are determined to be a part of God’s plan to renew and restore His creation. Of course I would want the critics to take a look at the volunteers from two different churches who provided the meals for the GMC – and who apparently thought that by serving, not criticizing, Point University students, they had been blessed to hang out with some of God’s best. On the way back to the Maundy Thursday service, I’d want them to stop by chapel on Wednesday, where our humanities faculty had such a great conversation about how important it is to understand human culture if your goal is to transform human culture.

Of course the critics would probably miss all the sights and sounds of “kingdom people doing kingdom things” by noting that, like we did on Ash Wednesday, when the vast majority of our students made a commitment to focus on how things ought to be instead of how they are, we have gone “gaga” over Maundy Thursday. Of course they will do that while thinking about how to spend “Good Friday” off from work and how many visitors will be in their “Easter” Sunday services! But God forbid that we take advantage of a season of prayer and fasting and get on our knees on Maundy Thursday to focus on what it means to be a “foot-washing follower of Jesus.” And even though I can’t take credit for thinking about this while getting dressed this morning, I actually wore a lavender shirt and purple tie to our Maundy Thursday Communion Service – the liturgical color of Lent. Could be named Pope by this time next year!

I really do understand that the idea of a Christian Calendar is not in the Bible and was developed by early Christians as a means of keeping believers focused on the life of Jesus. I don’t think for a moment that they were creating a Holy Spirit inspired rhythm for the life of the church that unless you follow, you can’t possibly be Christian. But not every tradition is bad – and there is a huge difference in learning from tradition and traditionalism. The same believers who helped create the Christian calendar were also involved in the process that resulted in the canon of the New Testament. Just because something is “tradition” doesn’t mean that to follow it makes you guilty of putting tradition over Scripture!

So, to set the record straight, I know that Ash Wednesday, Lent, Holy Week, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter are not New Testament terms. I also know that neither is “church building,” or “piano,” or “organ,” or “guitar,” or “praise band,” or “PowerPoint sermon notes,” or “church boards,” or whatever else you want to add to the list.

I doubt that anyone on the campus of Point University knows more about the imperfections of our students than I do. My job description includes addressing those imperfections. My guess is that we practice more “discipline” on our campus than our critics do in their churches if they all combined their records.

It just makes me wonder what gene mutation – spiritually speaking – causes people to be critics instead of creators! For me, it’s really down to “why me?” That is, I haven’t yet figured out why God allows me to be a part of a group of students like so many are at Point University – traditional students and Access students. It is a blessing for which I will be eternally grateful!

It’s Wednesday

Our tendency to want to read the four gospels as having been written by our standards of biography can create all sorts of issues that have the potential of causing us to miss the real point. Certainly one of those areas where that is true is the chronology of holy week. All four gospel writers give a substantial portion of their gospel narratives to this one week of Jesus’ life. For Matthew, the triumphal entry is in chapter 21; for Mark, chapter 11; for Luke, chapter 19; and for John, chapter 12. Just this past Sunday, the church acknowledged His entry into Jerusalem with Palm Sunday. Next Sunday, of course, we will acknowledge His resurrection on “the first day of the week” by celebrating Easter.

But in the rhythm of the Christian calendar, we are in the midst of “holy week.” This devotional is being sent out on Wednesday of holy week. Already by Wednesday, Jesus has entered Jerusalem on a donkey – an incredible message in itself. He has cleansed the money changers from the Temple – another rather incredible message. It seems that He spends Tuesday teaching in the temple area – and reading Mark 11:20 – 13:37 and its parallel texts can give you a taste of how that went!

Tomorrow, if you’re reading this on Wednesday, Jesus will meet with His disciples in the upper room for Passover (interesting that this is the “eve of Passover”), washing their feet, talking about love, and instituting the Lord’s Supper. Later that evening He will be betrayed by one of His own, arrested, passed back and forth between Jewish and Roman officials, and by Friday morning, He will be hanging on a cross, an event He will describe with the phrase, “it is finished.” (John 19:30)

But what happened on Wednesday? Robert Stein, in his book, Jesus the Messiah, suggests that on Wednesday Jesus spent the day resting. (page 197) Stein notes how difficult it is to be very specific about dates and times. But, it does seem at least very likely that on Wednesday of holy week, Jesus withdraws from the hustle of life in Jerusalem the week of Passover and rests.

John reminds us, as he begins to tell the story of Thursday night in Jesus’ life, that “Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God . . .” (13:3) It makes me wonder if perhaps on Wednesday, Jesus didn’t spend some time thinking about who He was – the one into whose hands the Father had placed all things; where He came from – His mission was from God; and where He was going – back to the Father who had sent Him in the first place.

Who we are, where we come from, and where we are headed are crucial questions to ask and to answer. For me, that means I will spend some time on Wednesday of holy week thinking about those questions. Understanding that I am a child of God, I am on a mission God has given to His children, and that the ultimate destination is eternity with God can serve to motivate me to do whatever it is God has called me to do at the moment.

If such “rest” was as He face the monumental burden of what was before Him, I fairly confident it might be helpful to me. I suspect the same could be true for you as well.

Find some “rest” on Wednesday – a big week is ahead for us all!