Category Archives: The World Around Us

Discipline … Driscoll Style

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There isn’t much left to say that hasn’t been said about the recent Mars Hill church discipline story that surfaced this last week.  I do feel the need to address it for a couple of reasons; 1) I know that some of my readers are not blog readers and so this could be the only place they hear of the story – and the story must be heard, 2) I feel for Andrew.  I want him to know that he is loved not only by Christ, but by the church.  I want him to know he is surrounded in grace and peace, and is being prayed for daily.

If you are unaware of the story please take time to read it, it is worth it to know the happenings at one of the largest churches in the country.  Matthew Paul Turner wrote about the story in two parts on his blog; you can read those here – Part One and Part Two.

I was grateful for the blog posts that followed in regards to Turner’s posts.  The two that I thought were the most thoughtful were Kurt Willems post from The Pangea Blog entitled Treat Them Like a Tax Collector; Reflections on Matthew 18, Church Discipline, and Andrew and Roger Wolsey’s post from Sojourners Why Mark Driscoll Needs An Elephant.

I can only imagine the internal struggle Andrew must have went through in order to decide to speak out.  I commend him for his courage.  As Christ’s church, we have chosen to divide among ourselves for menial doctrinal issues, and this divide has broken the body of Christ into a scattered people in small groups among the world.  We define ourselves not as Christians, but as Evangelicals, Baptist, Lutherans, or Catholics.  Although I believe these divisions do more harm then good – I can understand them, I can respect them.  However, a time must come where we recognize that the only label we are under is ‘Christ follower’.  I believe this is one of those times.

Spiritual abuse is unacceptable.  This ‘church discipline’ reeks of control, shame, and misuse of power.  More stories are coming out about this same type of abuse from Mars Hill Seattle, and I imagine there is still more to come.  I must admit my view of Mars Hill Seattle has changed tremendously over the last three years.  I paid good money to see Mark’s conference on Song of Solomon.  I have listened to the majority of his podcasts, read his books, and recommended his teachings to others.  I can observe two things about Mark since following his teaching over the last few years … 1) He knows the Spirit of God, and  2) He has lost touch with that Spirit.

We must pray.  We must pray for the elders and leaders of this church to repent (and when they do – as difficult as it might be – we won’t ask that they succumb to our demands until we decide enough is enough, and repentance has been achieved.)   We must pray for others in this church, and churches like it, who are experiencing spiritual abuse of this nature or another.  We have far too much evil in this world to worry about those who claim to know Christ as followers.  We must pray for Andrew, as he has been removed from his community, and suffering for speaking out against what he knows is wrong.

If you are suffering spiritual abuse please know that you have been given the gift of the Spirit by Christ himself, and you do have the ability to discern right from wrong (1 John 2:20).  The overwhelming desires to please the leaders of church, or to assume that what they say/demand is right is understandable – but you have Christ, and He should ultimately be the person leading you.  Stand up and speak out if you are enduring this.

Living in a community of Christ should not bring you shame, but freedom.  Being part of a church body should not hold you back from repentance, but instead gently guide you to where it is needed.  Elders are to be respected; if their hearts are pure, your soul is their main concern (Hebrews 13:17).  But do not be subjected to a life that is unworthy of Christ’s teachings.

As I said when I started, I am praying for Andrew.  I am praying for the members of Mars Hill.  I am praying for their leaders; including Mark.  This is such a sad story.  This church has the size, numbers, and resources to make a huge difference for Christ; they have the ability to bring peace and teach grace.  Instead they are being blinded of their true calling by the need to control and desire to be in power … not to mention their inaccuracy of woman’s roles in the church, male aggression, and sexual obsession … but those are for another time.

Grace and Peace to Andrew – I believe God has wonderful things planned in your journey apart from Mars Hill.

                                

Saying Goodbye To The Cube Farm

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So I was laid off from my corporate job today- no apologies are necessary.

These last twelve months have been a roller coaster of changes and adjustments.  The people I work(ed) with, in my immediate department, poured out compassion and grace to me every chance they got.  And still, I knew deep within me, very soon after Matt’s death, that sitting in that cubicle was not where I was suppose to be anymore.  With the mourning, the moving, and the months of ongoing adjustments I made the decision to hold to that job.  I knew that the financial stability was smart.  I knew my ability to discern whether or not another ‘life changing event’ should be placed on our home simply wasn’t there.  Even with all that though, it was a day by day effort.  Waking up and getting to a job that had lost all meaning … working for corporate America … and at what cost?  The nagging feeling that I was leaving my children behind in order to do so.

It was about a month ago, maybe two, that my heart started truly aching.  The desire to step out in faith, to follow God’s calling on my life, and do the thing that most people would view as ‘irresponsible’ or financially risky had reached a point that I felt I was about to crawl right out of my skin.  Depression, of a different source this time, was sinking deep down within me.  I felt I was letting down my children by needing to hold a 9-5.  I felt I was letting down my co-workers, both by the change in my work habits, and my loss of passion.  I felt trapped.

Before Christmas the company I work(ed) for had executive level issues, and it was rumored there may be layoffs.  With much angst over how it could possibly sound to a manager, I requested that if layoffs were to take place that I would be the one to go.  It had been weeks since then and there had been no sign or word that it was ever going to happen.  More recently, in the last two weeks, I began to give up hope on that being the tool in which God would use to release me from my old career path.  I became frustrated with God … what was worse was I tried to take control – to handle it without surrender.  I doubted His ability, or possibly more accurately speaking, His willingness to answer my prayers.

Last night was the ugliest night I’ve experienced in a while.  I paced for hours, I wrote feverishly (in private journals never to be seen by the pages of a blog), I prayed, I begged, and I cried.  I asked God to show me, tell me, make it known what was the correct path.  I confessed to Him.  I was honest about my pride, my need to control, my doubt.  I went to sleep.  I woke up.  I went to work.  But when I left?  I went home with confidence and freedom, the kind only Christ can give.

He is so good.  We say that, don’t we … God is good.  It’s almost as if no word ever could even come close to encapsulating Him, so we just nod in knowing and say, ‘He is good.”  But it’s truth to the core … He has been good to me, so good to me.  Even in my doubt, anger, and unfaithfulness He loves me.

I got home and the song How He Loves came on.  Those first words almost knocked me to the ground …

He is jealous for me
Loves like a hurricane, I am a tree
Bending beneath the weight of his wind and mercy
When all of a sudden
I am unaware of these afflictions eclipsed by glory
And I realize just how beautiful You are
And how great Your affections are for me

Where I had felt alone and angry just hours before I could almost now see his love surrounding me in all my weakness.  Jealous to have my faithfulness back – holy and good He bent me like a branch in the wind of his mercy, goodness, and love.

Religion is not a four letter word.

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I’m not too familiar with Jeff Bethke.  And if you somehow have been living under a rock and missed his spoken word piece, which has gone viral this week, you can see it here.  My hope in writing is not to tear down a Christian brother.  My heart is telling me that Jeff loves Christ, that he longs to be Christlike, and that he is very talented (which may be part of the reason people listen past what he is really saying).

The definition of religion has changed over the past years, this I understand.  There are people who see the religious structure as a legalistic hypocrisy.  There are people who call themselves Christian, possible attend church on Sunday, and yet don’t live as Christians at all.  And so a shift begins.  People who are religious sever ties with the term and cling to the core of what makes the structure beautiful.  This isn’t the answer to our problems though.

If it wasn’t for ‘religion’ I wouldn’t be blessed with a new pastor who has come to a broken church family and lovingly said to us, “We will mend this together”.  If it wasn’t for ‘religion’ I wouldn’t be blessed with elders who guide and lead me in a gentle and loving manner so that I do not stumble in my walk.  If it wasn’t for ‘religion’ I wouldn’t be blessed with a denomination, who in the wake of my young husband’s death, came around me to help with the physical, spiritual, and financial needs of my family.  I wouldn’t have a small group of women who I consider sisters.  I wouldn’t have a place to worship our God, who I love so much.

Let us not so quickly forget that Jesus was religious; a very devout Jew.  And so, I too, am religious.  I would like to say I’m not a hypocrite and that I’m a Christian the other six days of the week, but as Paul says in Romans, “For I don’t do the good I want to do, but instead do the evil that I don’t want to do.”  I do the best I can, but it is far from perfect.  This doesn’t mean I’m ready to throw the baby out with the bath water.

My fear is that we are trying to have an internal conversation with the whole world.  It is not that what Jeff, and others, have been saying for some time doesn’t have relevance in a changing world.  I understand people have been hurt by the structure we have built, and for those who have been I am sorry.  Do we take that pain and turn people away from the church though?  I think the answer is to build communities that don’t hurt.  Communities that when hurt does happen grace and forgiveness is worked through together.  These communities do exsist, I am part of one.

We can not undermine the importance of our communities, and I don’t believe that is what Christ wants for us.  We must tread lightly when we label people, and it doesn’t matter the label that you use … religious/legalistic, orthodox/heretic, conservative/liberal, Republican/Democrat, Catholic/Evangelical . . . Jew/Greek, slave/free, male/female.

You see, because we are all one in Christ Jesus.  And a label is ALWAYS a label, no matter how trendy it might be.

To Believe Is Human, To Doubt Divine

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Chapter 2 brings us to some of Pete’s favorite words, ‘To believe is human, to doubt divine”. As in much of Pete’s prior work, and a good chunk of the rest of Insurrection, we are brought to the point in Christ’s crucifixion where Jesus loses God.

Jesus, hanging bloody on the cross, cries out to God, “My God! My God! Why have you forsaken me?”. Pete aligns this moment with the moment that Christ himself experiences doubt; possibly even a/theistic doubt. We are shown throughout his work that a key element in discovering what is beyond Christianity, as we know it, is to seek this point in our own journey. Our own moment of ‘Why has God forsaken me?”.

I could go many directions with my reflection on this chapter, because I certainly felt that cry of Christ deep inside me within the months following my husband’s death. As the days continue, however, I have been drawn to this idea in a more concrete way of living on this Earth. When my husband was alive I felt a deep sense of comfort in life. I shopped without the conscious notion of who was being extorted in order to fulfill my consumerist greed at such a low price. I ate food without the haunting thoughts of what chemicals lay just below the surface of my food. I drank milk without the fear of becoming immune to antibiotics. I bought chocolate as though I was in favor of child slavery, and yet, I was completely unaware of the cost some children pay for us to eat such foods.

My husband had a ease about living, an ease of life that I was attracted to. I was attracted to this partly due to the fact that I am not that way. At the time I met him I was exhausted from the amount of worry I had put myself through. I could no longer take the anxiety that weighed me down so heavily; anxieties not of the world, but of my own failings. In losing the tension I held in my life, I lost something more than that. I failed to pull back the curtain, and see the world around me for what it actually was. Life is not what we see on TV, not on the news, and not in the movies. Those things we see and hear are filled with propaganda sold by corporations in order to make money. It is fueled, motivated, and moved forward by sheer greed, and nothing more.

For me to believe in a life that existed free of worry, anxiety, pain, and suffering was easy. I would look to my carefree husband; I would follow his lead. Years went by, and I began to believe what I saw on ‘Real Housewives of New York City’, what I read in US magazine was somehow real life. That what I was seeing could somehow be connected to my life, but there was no connection here – not for me, or for anyone else I have ever known.

The hard part for me is doubting on a level at which my sanity can remain in tact. I must remember each day that there is tension in this life. I must remove those things unimportant to God’s creation. I must care about the Earth, and take part in making a difference. I must remember my children will live longer than me, and teaching them now is imperative to the world’s well being. I must meet felt needs of the poor and hungry, and not satisfy my own self desire to be ‘good’ by throwing some change at a charity of my choice.

And then . . . I must remember that I will not always do these things well. I will mess up, and at times I must live in a place where life is full of suffering. I must live in the tension of the Earth’s fallen ground. I must find grace there. I must also live outside the suffering, and partake in God’s great creation for us. I must drink and eat with family and friends. I must live life to the fullest, enjoying the gifts He has given to us.

The cry of Christ is deep, is painful, and it can remind us why we too must doubt as He did. There is a thing as too much security. Too much security, in a fallen world, could point to a curtain you have failed to peek behind lately. My hope for you is that you will.

Ethical Judgments and Biblical Interpretations

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My first class in my continuing education has begun; Ethics in Communications. I should be reading my book. I’m in Chapter One, Page … Two, but I have to share. I came across this editorial comment from the ‘Quill’.  Through this comment something I have been grappling with in my faith came jumping out at me. Here is the comment as is:

Ethical judgments are like that. No matter who makes them, they are seldom easy, and they are almost certain to strike some of us as perfectly proper while others regard them as wrongheaded, stupid, unfair, and possibly – as evidence of intellectual and/or moral decay.

All of which is a wonderful thing. Differing definitions of ethical behavior help keep our minds awake and our spirits inflamed. If everyone agreed on all ethical principles, life might be more orderly, but it surely would be more boring.

As I read this I found myself re-reading but replacing ‘Ethical Judgments’ with ‘Biblical Interpretations’. Read it again, and see if it strikes you as it does me.

Biblical interpretations are like that. No matter who makes them, they are seldom easy, and they are almost certain to strike some of us as perfectly proper while others regard them as wrongheaded, stupid, unfair, and possibly – as evidence of intellectual and/or religious decay.

All of which is a wonderful thing. Differing interpretations of the Bible help keep our minds awake and [The Spirit] inflamed. If everyone agreed on all Biblical Interpretations, life might be more orderly, but it surely would be more boring.

I enjoy the conversation that possible biblical interpretations bring to the table of our Christian community, and it continues to boggle my mind when people push this notion away.  Pushing back with assumptions that what they have always been taught must be right.  Easily disregarding someone with something valid to say as a heresy.  Or questioning how ‘questions’ within the faith, within the Word, can be healthy?

Do we not say our kids as they are growing up, ‘There are no wrong questions, only wrong answers’?  When a child asks questions unrelenting about everything they see, feel, hear, or touch don’t we say, ‘That is a sign of intelligence.’?  And is it not Jesus who says, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”?

I think the more childlike we can be in our faith the closer we are to walking with Christ.  And children . . . . well, they question stuff.