Boston

Recently through a series of events I stumbled upon a website of a Unitarian Universal church (with a once rich Biblical history) in Concord, Massachusetts named First Parish. To make a long story short, I was led to this sermon preached in dedication to a newly constructed wing of their building:

http://www.firstparish.org/cms/sermons/1058-taverns-and-tabernacles

Up until this time I had never actually heard a sermon from a UU church and so I listened. On only one occasion the speaker mentions "God" and he happens to be quoting another person. The rest of the references to a higher power are just that- or less. At one point he openly doubts the records of Exodus to be reliable. He speaks much of spirituality and community and being a church and searching for truth and enlightenment. While I listened I realized a couple things:

His sermon was pretty much a term paper with no redeeming value whatsoever. It sounded more like a history lecture than a sermon for a church. But I guess that's what the UU church is all about. Quasi-spirituality that is just a shell of authenticity. I looked through some picture galleries of the church and in all the pictures everyone is smiling and having a good time and they seem genuinely happy and one album was from a gay pride parade:

http://www.firstparish.org/photos/gallery2/v/2009PrideParade/

Which made me think, "How can they be so happy in such a hopeless and vacuous way of life?"

And then I remembered that a lot of times I sin because it makes me happy for the moment and a lot of the time I'm really good at hiding my guilt and shame from even my closest friends. Which next lead me to think, "How can I reach people who don't want to be reached?"

This is really creating a hitch in me because I feel like God might be sending me to the very area that this church is in, but these people are unashamedly against God and are actively open about it. In Isaiah 6 right after Isaiah says his famous "Here am I! Send me!" statement God says this to him:

“Go, and say to this people:

“‘Keep on hearing, but do not understand;
keep on seeing, but do not perceive.’
10 Make the heart of this people dull,
and their ears heavy,
and blind their eyes;
lest they see with their eyes,
and hear with their ears,
and understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed.”

I've been wrestling over this issue that to me is staring me in the face everyday:

Boston. They hate God. They'll hate you. You will fail. They'll run you out of town and for what? To preach the gospel to people who don't want it anyway and may even have their eyes blinded before you get there? You're not called to go there. You're not obedient. You'll never be able to be used like Matt is.

This fear of failure and of the unknown has been causing me to shrink back from the thought of planting in an area like Boston and, worst of all , it has caused me to stop praying about it like I know that I want to. There's something within me that screams Boston to me all day. What kind of torture is this? I can't shake it and I can't shake God. If this is from God then it almost seems cruel. If it is of my own imagination then God stop me.

I see in a small way how MUCH satan wants to discourage me in this: You aren't God's man. You will fail. You aren't cut out to plant. You...

So now I'm faced with this: When I wake up I feel the weight of Boston. All day I feel the weight. And recently I've been running away from God and the thought of interning in Boston in hopes that it might "go away". Some days I feel this quickening in my spirit that I have a special purpose in Boston. Some days (and most recently) I run.

I'll end this long blog with my fear and my hope. Here is my fear: Hebrews 11 speaks of great men of God who,

"through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, 34 quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight.35 Women received back their dead by resurrection."

The very next verse says this,

Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life. 36 Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. 37 They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated— 38 of whom the world was not worthy—wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.

I'm fearful that I may wind up in the camp who got tortured, sawn in two, and who were destitute. That is honestly one of my sinful worries, but I do admit it. But who am I to worry about that? Because here is my hope: in the very following verses in Hebrews 12:

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

So much could be said from these verses but maybe I'll do that another time. I need only to say this:

My sin of unbelief clings to me and weighs on me very heavily. If God is calling me to plant then He has lovingly determined the race that He has set before me. It is my race, determined for me. Matt's race is not mine. Mine is not his. I look to Jesus because He is all and I don't know how I'm saying this but I just know. I won't be called to plant somewhere because of me but because God has work to do and He has invited me to come see what He's going to do. If God wants me in Boston then that is where I will toil and strive.

I'll end with this because it's all I got right now. Hebrews 12:12-14

12 Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, 13 and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed. 14 Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.

SDG

In Honor of Reformation Day

Tradition holds that one evening Martin Luther came upon a drunken member of his parish in the streets of Wittenberg and rebuked him for public drunkenness. The drunken parishioner searched his coat pockets until he found a folded piece of paper and shook it in Luther's face saying that he had purchased an indulgence from Brother Tetzel that offered "complete forgiveness of all sins- past, present and future."

Martin Luther fled to his study and began listing out all of his grievances with the church's practice of the selling of indulgences and the next day, October 31, 1517, nailed the list to the door of the Wittenberg church.

Religious reform was brought one step closer with every stroke of the hammer that rang out in the Wittenberg square. The actions of Luther brought sudden and widespread attention all across Europe and ultimately to the Pope's door step.

Furthermore, this certain indulgence that Luther encountered on the streets of Wittenberg was unlike any other previous indulgence offered by the Catholic church. This was because the art-loving Pope Leo X was planning to have the St. Peter's Basilica built, sculpted and then painted by Raphael and Michelangelo. This was an exceptionally expensive endeavor and required, in Leo's eyes, an exceptionally desperate measure. When an agreement was met after some shady politicizing with a wealthy bishop in need of more wealth Leo X would be able to achieve the raising of his funds by having his monk John Tetzel devise a plan to raise the money by an "unprecedented sale of indulgences."

The indulgence promised complete forgiveness of past and future sins. He offered sheets of paper that promised the forgiveness of sins without the need of true repentance. One could basically buy their way out of purgatory. Appropriately, the first two of Luther's Ninety-Five theses address this matter:

1. When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said "Repent," he intended that the entire life of believers should be repentance.

2. This word 'repentance' cannot be understood to mean the sacrament of penance, or the act of confession and satisfaction administered by the priests.

John Tetzel coined the catchy german phrase, "Every time a coin in the coffer rings, A soul from purgatory springs" and misled and terrorized thousands of helpless people, eager to earn the required righteousness of God for salvation.

Additionally, this indulgence required the excommunication of any priest that resisted to honor the indulgence. Luther found himself in the most important moment of his life and had a difficult decision to make.

And so he hammered the heck out of that door.

What is The Gospel Really?

It has occurred to me recently in reading many online christian blogs that the term "the gospel" is thrown around a lot. Here are just a few of some topics being discussed:

"Live for the gospel"
"Contend for the gospel"
"Being gospel-centered"
"Gospel intentionality"
"Having gospel-centered community"
"Gospel and method"
Gospel "this and that"


I hope we haven't strayed into thinking that the gospel needs something else to go with it.
i.e. "gospel AND community" or "gospel AND method" Rather, those should be understood as "gospel through community" or "gospel by method[s]"

It got me to thinking. I read ABOUT "the gospel" a lot. Almost everyday. It got me to thinking, "What is the gospel really?" This may sound scary for a church boy to be saying but it seems to me that we are talking a lot about the gospel but neglecting to really tell the gospel. It feels like I hear "Preach the gospel!" more than I hear the gospel preached.

It's the same as when people proclaim the inerrency of scripture while neglecting to procliam its sufficiency. We have so many people pushing inerrency, inerrency, inerrency while neglecting to tell us why the scriptures are sufficient for us in both our joy and suffering. Just like we must emphasize inerrency with sufficiency, we must also actually tell what the gospel is in addition to our many blogs, sermons, and books.

This bugged me enough to search out anybody actually telling what the gospel really is, plain and simple, and why it's important rather than just talking about it. I looked high and low and finally found what I was looking for in a John Piper interview on, ironically enough, the Gospel Coalition website. (Once again, thank you Piper)

In it he tells what he sees as the essentials of what the gospel really is.

Here is the link. I think it is very important to watch...

http://www.thegospelcoalition.org/resources/video/What-Is-The-Gospel---John-Piper#

B.I.B.L.E.

Apparently the Bible's worldwide status has now been upgraded to "Basic Information Before Leave Earth"

~~~~~~~~~

In my reading this morning God impressed upon me the fact that the book I was holding in my hands was one that could cost me my life if I lived in some other parts of the world. How often do we take the scriptures as granted? I have several different Bibles sitting on my desk and I really only use one of them and even the one I use the most doesn't get cracked open as much as it ought to.

And there lies the crux of it. When I read the Bible am I reading it because I ought to or because I absolutely need to? Because for the underground church in China and many churches in other parts of the world, where if they are caught with a Bible they are put in prison and even killed, they need their Bibles. Isn't it funny that they are risking their lives for the very thing that will get them killed? I don't think it's funny or crazy, just radical. We see it as radical because they wholly depend on the scriptures just to get to tomorrow. They are waking up to a life of persecution while clutching their Bibles, reading it, teaching it, living it. And here I sit. I don't search the scriptures out of a deep need for them because I don't consider God's power in and through them. For the underground churches all over the world, they are not reading their Bibles because they have been guilt tripped that week by a pastor. If they are not searching for God in his word, then they have nothing. And here I sit.

If the Scriptures are just seen as basic information before we die then what's the stinking point? When your best friend as a nine-year old is thrown from a vehicle and dies because he wasn't wearing his seat belt, or your brother doesn't come home from the war, or your mother is raped or... A basic information manual won't be able to address the deep anguish in our hearts in those situations.

I think we gloss over Bible reading the same way we might gloss over a video game or driving a car. It has become so automatic in the church to just "know" that we ought to read the Bible that we have become numb to the fact that clinging to God and His word is a radical thing. When we do read, it is often out of a feeling of obligation or Christian karma where if we would read the Bible then God will be pleased with us. Our Bible reading, when we do read it, has become as routine as driving to church. Most of us take the same route to church every Sunday. Many times I have gotten in the car to go somewhere and upon reaching my destination, pause and think, "I don't remember any of this. How did I get here?" It's because I was on autopilot. When my Bible reading is sporadic or nonexistent, it's usually because I don't consider the true power of God's word for and in my life.

I don't have a three step plan to fix this problem that all begins with the same first letter. I'm not proposing proof-texts to help you fix your lack of Bible reading. I am just confessing to not loving the Bible as much as I really do. I just know that the Bible really is more than just "Basic Information Before Leaving Earth" and that may not seem very radical anymore but I yearn to be a radical...

Who knows what the next post will be about.

-Zach

Easy

Forgive the one word, pseudo-profound Rob Bellism, and my absence.

Pornography is a monster. It rips men away from intimacy with their wives, from themselves, and even their best buddies. Through pornography, Satan is out to rob us of our God-given sexuality and some of the most intimate moments we'll ever share with our wives, or future wives.

Let's not sugar coat this. It's a form of adultery, one that can be kept a secret. No one has to know you watched fake sex on the internet, not even your girlfriend, or your wife. Except you, and of course, God.

I know exactly how it feels, whenever I've watched porn in the past, my prayers just hit the ceiling, or I feel they do, my intimacy with God is obliterated. I'm lying to my friends about it because I don't want them to know my sin, so I feel alone. Oh, and did I mention that I'm lying to my girlfriend about it too? Sort of sounds like I've cheated on her, doesn't it?

If you're a Christian man who has looked at porn, you know exactly what I'm talking about. It feels as though you rolled around in mud, and then you're walking around with this film of dirt on you for the rest of the day. That feeling like you never really got to bed last night, and even when you take a shower, you still don't feel clean.

You would think most Christian men would feel this way.

Well, they don't. And these statistics, sad but true, are the proof of it.

51% of pastors admit that internet porn is a possible temptation.

Ok, sure, no problem, its a possible temptation for everybody. I've been called to the ministry and I'm sure once I get married it'll be a daily battle for me then too. This one isn't so shocking.

37% say it's a current struggle.

This one got me. 37% of our evangelical leaders struggle with pornography, probably because they have no accountability.

In a 2000 Christianity Today survey, 33% of clergy admitted to having visited a sexually explicit website. Over HALF visit them a few times a year, and 18% between a couple of times a month and MORE than ONCE a week.

And this is in 2000. Almost ten years ago. With internet porn on the rise, and how easy it is to access...well, I'll let you do the math on this one, my head hurts already thinking about it.

The Barna Group found that 29% of born again Christians feel that it's morally acceptable to view movies with explicit sexual behavior.

That's not porn, but it's the rated R films with the sex scenes, etc.

Those are some pretty big statistics. Big numbers for people who are supposed to be light bearers and servants.

But the real problem is, pastors and churches aren't talking about it. All Christians want to do is make people feel good and enable this gross misinterpretation of sex.

Why aren't pastors talking about this? I don't know, because it's dirty. Because no one wants to get some mud on their on hands. We'd all rather subscribe to the fake church smiles doctrine than really help people with it.

I'm pretty sure this porn thing is no going away, in fact is growing. The number of pornographic pages on the internet more than doubled from 1.3 million in 2003, to 2.4 million in 2006. It's hard to tell how many there are now. It's just all to easy to access.

Isn't it?

All kidding and satire aside, this fear of sex and discussion of sex in the church has to stop. Someone has to step up and bring this much glazed over topic to light, and save some relationships and families. With porn being so easy to access, and the age of kids seeing porn is getting smaller and smaller (average is age of first exposure is 11, the same age I was), it is no longer something that can be swept under the rug, or the mattress, rather...(rimshot), but someting that should be discussed in families, churches, and with friends, so that we can stop this way in which Satan attacks us. A great site to visit is www.xxxchurch.com, and I highly encourage anyone struggling with porn addiction to visit it...

It helped me out.

-Spencer

Getting Ours

Have you ever heard someone say the following:

1. "The pastor is a really good preacher."
2. "I mainly just go to church there because of the worship."
3. "It was a really good sermon, I liked it"
4. "They don't play the kind of music I like so that's why I don't go to church there."
or my favorite:
5. "I go to church on Sunday's but I just don't get anything out of it."

Whenever I hear statements like these it leaves me feeling empty or lacking. Like something is missing or I haven't discovered "true fulfillment" in the pew. Although having pastors who can preach well and can bring in an audience, or sermons that make you feel good for the 30 minutes they last, or worship that is so experiential and moving can often be good things, the first four statements reveal an absence of a deep heart cry. Each reveal a discontentment in the soul.The fifth statement is what piqued my attention recently.

"I go to church on Sunday's but I just don't get anything out of it."

I've heard this statement before but just recently it stuck with me more than it ever has. Sadly, there is a common mindset among church goers today with the idea of "getting something out of church". This notion has become a lifestyle among not just evangelicals but the universal church, most distinctly in America. Over many, many years, the church's focus has turned inward, not through community, but individually. We have sought to "get ours" and make sure we have "gotten out of church" what we want, as if the church was made to cater to our idolatry. Though it is a caricature, believers (and non-believers in the church who think they are) have become mindless pawns to the notion that what church is about is having their 'best life now'. "It's your life, live it to your highest potential" is the mantra.

That is why the largest section at Barnes & Noble is Self-Help. And a majority of "Christian" literature has become a bastion for this type of thinking. The only difference is that the "Christian" books of the same sort often use a part of a verse from scripture to form the whole thesis and then slap Jesus' name on it. Which is worse.

I must also add that the number one reason when I feel like I don't get anything out of church is when I am in sin and therefore not seeking righteousness which leads to the cycle of not seeking righteousness which leads to sin. The statement (or feeling deep down that) "I'm not getting anything out of church" is a red flag to unrepentant sin. This feeling is a heart stirring of God's grace as an alert either to unrepentant sin or an unregenerate soul (1 John 1:6-10; 2 Corinthians 13:5).

With regards to the believer however, there are three distinct components found in the "What can I get out of Church?" mentality. First, in asking "What" reveals a materialistic, lifeless existence whose aim for righteousness comes by way of church attendance or rule keeping in comparison with lesser christians. Secondly, "what can I get" reveals an egotistical, me-centered way of living, and when mixed with church, is a life-stealing poison. Lastly, this mentality has a skewed idea of what Church really is. It is seen as a "thing", an institution, and an obligation.

But there's another way.

What would happen if "What can I get out of church?" was replaced with a lifestyle which sought to ask, "How can I edify the church?"? There is a vast chasm between these two lifestyles of doing church. One is a "going to church" mentality while the other is "being the church". By asking, "how" shows a love for the brotherhood and is full of life as James 3:14 says, "We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death." Secondly, asking, "How can I edify" is evidence of a gospel-centered and church body-centered way of living which is focused on community leading to healing rather than isolation, which leads to spiritual apathy (James 5:16). Truly there is life and transformation found in community as individuals become one, while individualism breeds gossip and emotional and spiritual cuts grow ever deeper. Finally, keeping a "How can I edify the church?" mindset is in right understanding of what the church really is as Jesus intends her to be as His bride, living in life-giving community.

Asking "How can I edify the church?" brings life and transformation, truth and love, depth and reality.

The former should be just that - former.

Zach Barton

And all who believed were together and...sat?

Too often, the church is viewed as only a building. The question “Are you going to church?” has become a phrase likened to, “Spencer we’re having meatloaf for dinner tonight.” [Insert unappealing food in place of meatloaf]

That is to say, it makes my stomach turn over.

We see the church made into this thing a place you just go to, not a body of people, eating, sleeping, talking, and living Christ.

Acts 2:42-47

42 And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. 43 And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. 44 And all who believed were together and had all things in common. 45 And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. 46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

This passage is often the model that many pastors and church planters will refer back to whenever discussing what the church should look like, and it isn’t hard to see why.

Nowhere in this passage, or the Bible, does it say that the people went into the ‘church’ and sat, left inspired, and,

continued sinning.

Tragically, this is often the church model that we see in the “buckle of the Bible belt” as my good friend and brother put so well.

A church should not look like 14,000 people sitting on a Sunday morning, glossing over the Bible for some kind of fortune cookie inspiration to get them going for a few hours, or a chocolate Jesus that makes them feel better momentarily but keeps them on their behinds for the rest of the week.

Let’s say we keep the number at 14,000, but instead of the disastrous results that we see in many of these bloated churches, this body of 14,000 is moving in their community, selling their possessions, giving of themselves to people who desperately need the Gospel of Jesus Christ, opening their homes and church doors to people who so need rest.

But in order for 14,000 people to look like Christ, it has to start with one. It has to start with you and me in community, like the Acts church. It’s contagious, as a good friend and mentor put it to me.

A word to church-

Your building, it’s size, how many football fields it has or how much money it can spend on absolutely insane places to take the youth for a camp, does not matter.

Your Jesus, your Gospel, your doctrine, and your community do.

Spencer Jacobson

New Doors

Refreshment
This past Sunday as I was walking into our church building, I paused and stood outside for a moment. I noticed that something was different but I couldn't quite put my finger on it. I realized that the church building had received two new exterior doors, replacing the old and weathered ones. It was somewhat of a pleasant surprise which caught my attention and made me laugh.

Coming from a 14,000 member mega-church in the buckle of the Bible Belt, I found this to be somewhat of a shock, seeing that the church building I'm in now only holds about 200 people. I've never seen a small town church purchase a simple need like new exterior doors. My soul was refreshed at the sight.

But it's not really about the doors.

Depth Over Width
If it's not really about the doors then what is it?

I have been learning that spiritual depth is more important than numerical width. What I mean is that too often is church growth measured by numerical increase. Spiritual growth is not dependent on how many pews can be filled each Sunday. The more people present does not indicate a level of spiritual maturity or Christ likeness. In this postmodern culture, souls are not crying out for a place to be lost in a sea of fake faces. At the heart of humanity is a need for Truth (Ecclesiastes 3:11). Truth is being searched for whether the postmodernists will admit it or not, as scripture testifies. What evangelicalism has given birth to is a church model of width over depth. Some evangelicals (if they are) today think: "Get as many people in the building and they will become spiritual. And if the building gets to small, just build a bigger one. Oh, and have you been to our Starbucks down the hall?"


Tent Multiplication
I'm learning now that by planting new churches is how God expects His followers to follow the great commission. According to research compiled by Dave Earley of Liberty University, "in the average year, half of all existing churches will not add one new member through conversion growth" thus these existing churches are growing through membership growth. It may sound elementary but membership growth is not conversion growth. These churches are adding new members not because the gospel has penetrated their hearts and they are adopted into the church, the bride of Christ, but because these churches are too concerned with "enlarging the place of their tent".

Ed Stetzer explains and supports this need for church planting as a fulfillment of the Great Commission saying that the, "New Testament Christians acted out these commands as any spiritually healthy, obedient believers would; they planted more New Testament churches."

Missional Methods
C. Peter Wagner has said in his book Church Planting for a Greater Harvest, that, "the single most effective evangelistic methodology under heaven is starting new churches." I myself, and those who have been called to communal, gospel-centered ministry, are not just looking for another method to collect dust on a book shelf, but rather the messy missional living that gets done on the life-on-life level. As I dwell deeper in experience with God my hope is to see a church of souls in community radically transformed by the gospel of Christ, by the power of His Spirit all to the praise of His glorious grace. I don't know exactly what that looks like yet, but I believe church can "be done" this way. More on that later.

Spiritual Rape & Dead Doors
A professor told me of his daughter's first experience with an alter call/sinner's prayer. He knew she did not fully understand the weight of her decision and described the gut wrenching feeling he got as if she had been, as he said, "spiritually raped". If what we are mainly focused on is getting as many people in our tents then all we are doing is attracting them into a building entering through doors leading to death.

New Doors
Although the doors on my church were updated and perhaps more attractive, once inside, the same powerful gospel is preached. In this postmodern world we may have to "become all things to all people" and update the "doors" through which people enter our family, but the one true gospel must not change. Updated, contextualized exterior, same life transforming gospel interior. And all of this because of the cross of Christ.


Zach Barton