The folly of listening to conspiracy theories

In a 1952 essay on the return, or Second Coming, of Christ, C. S. Lewis wrote that our “ears should be closed to any future William Miller in advance. The folly of listening to him at all is almost equal to the folly of believing him.” It’s a warning not to fall prey to the heedless disregard some people have for Christ’s own words about his return. To typify this, Lewis looked back to William Miller, a nineteenth century American farmer who also served in the War of 1812. But Miller was also a religious enthusiast. During the 1830s, he preached and published pamphlets of lectures proclaiming the world would end in 1843, with the bodily return of Jesus Christ.

Miller justified his belief from Bible passages he had strung together and put his own spin on. He preached with such passion that many who at first just listened ended up believing that he had actually decoded from Scripture the unknown; that he actually knew. Tens of thousands of people, called the Millerites, amassed around his view, convinced that he knew. Of Miller’s folly, Lewis, relying on the words of Jesus – “of that day and hour knoweth no man” – writes that Miller “couldn’t know what he pretended, or thinks, he knows” (Lewis’s emphasis). But Lewis goes further. In the essay he shows the folly not only of claiming to know when “the world’s last night” (the title of the essay) would arrive but even of listening to the claim.

While reading the essay it hit me that we today would do well to listen to Lewis’s warning about listening. But not about dating systems for Christ’s return. Every generation of Christians since Miller’s has learned its lesson about that. Today we need to learn it about conspiracy theories. And if we say, “well, we don’t really believe them,” with how much honesty can we say that we aren’t listening?

I learned my lesson the hard way. In the late 1970s, a newish believer, I listened to Christians who spoke in hushed tones about secret organizations that had strange names such as the Illuminati, the Bilderbergs, and the Trilateral Commission. Most people don’t know anything about them, I was told, but they have a lot of money and power, and they control world leaders, and through the European Union they’re going to usher in the anti-Christ and set up a new world order. It’s all in the Bible, they said, the signs are everywhere if you look for them.

I came to regret my naivety, but what did I know? I was a young believer. Aren’t we supposed to listen to older believers? But I wasn’t going to take anyone’s word on conspiracy theories. Not even a Christian’s. The stakes were too high. During my years in the occult, before becoming a follower of Jesus, I listened to, and then believed in, and then taught what I later found out were the most unbiblical ideas and views. Christ had delivered me from those subtle yet powerful beliefs and I wasn’t going to let myself get fooled again. So after earnest prayer for guidance and my spiritual antenna tuned up, I plunged down the rabbit hole.

During that labyrinthine journey I saw how even well-meaning people might spin into dark webs of intrigue any number of conspiracy theories from twentieth century human history. But after awhile I also saw that all such listening-journeys were a waste of precious time. A distraction from following Jesus and listening to him.

Trying to pin down the truth about conspiracy theories is like trying to trap a wet watermelon seed between the tabletop and your fingertip: just when you think you have it, it darts of at the last second. Time and time again. That personal experience was supported by a sense of the occult that I discerned on occasion drifting around the dark corners and cul de sacs of conspiratorial thinking.

Besides, I thought, if I were a member of a cabal that really could take over the world but did not want the public to know what our plans were, the first thing we would do would be to concoct a conspiracy theory that had nothing whatsoever to do with our plans; but to a naive public it would seem credible enough to be listened to, if not also believed. Once we had devised that, we would then cleverly use our vast resources to start leaking it out to the public. Its purpose would be to create an on-going distraction in the minds of a gullible public from our real plans. Surely, I thought, any cabal with the money and influence to take over the world would certainly have brains enough to include that kind of misdirection in its plans.

I should add that my decision to have nothing whatsoever to do with conspiracy theories anymore was not an easy decision to make. For the pull into listening is fascinatingly hypnotic, the spell hard to break once you’re lured. But it was such a relief to break free. Knowing the trap even of listening, I refuse to waste time looking into even the popular whisperings available to our ears today. I have done a little look-see into recent offerings, but only briefly, to know what all the fuss is about.

The bottom line is that listening to conspiracies reveals a childish ignorance of God’s sovereign rule over history and opens the door for replacing the fear of the Lord with one of the worst kinds of fear: “the fear of man, which brings a snare” (Proverb 29:25). It ought to be second nature to Christians to know that time and time again the Bible records various interventions of God to stop the wayward plans of rulers and their nations while simultaneously admonishing God’s people to “fear not” the plotting of cabals but instead to “fear the Lord.”

Yet through belief in a conspiracy theory the people of God become ensnared by fear. That is partly the topic of Isaiah 8:10-17, where the prophet announces God’s rebuke to the people for their belief in a conspiracy:

“Do not call conspiracy everything this people calls a conspiracy; do not fear what they fear, and do not dread it. The Lord Almighty is the one you are to regard as holy, he is the one you are to fear, he is the one you are to dread” (v. 12).

The prophet brings lack of trust in God’s sovereignty and both kinds of fear into sharp focus during a time of international intrigue, secret alliances, and public confusion. The message is clear. A faith-based confession in God’s sovereign rule had been replaced by a fear-driven belief in the sovereignty of man. Like severe arthritis can cripple the use of one’s hand or knee, the fear of man had stopped the ability of God’s people to think rightly as God’s people.

Isaiah is in effect disclosing a tragic irony. Bad times are indeed looming for the people of God, but its source is not going to result from the conspiracy being fulfilled but from God’s judgment (vv. 14-15).

But there is another significant part to the text, one that is often missed: even a prophet of God can be about to step into the trap. Using his own words, not the Lord’s, Isaiah includes an explanatory note to his audience that God had warned him not to follow the way of the people. The prophet was in jeopardy of being caught in the same snare, of not thinking rightly.

“The Lord spoke to me with his strong hand upon me, warning me not to follow the way of this people…” (v. 11).

This personalized warning to the prophet needs to be heard and internalized by God’s people today. Pervasive fear in many Christian circles, particularly in American Evangelical communities, is greatly harming the church’s witness and damaging the nation. So it is encouraging to hear David French, for one, a notable writer in the conservative Christian world, speaking to this. As a pastor and friend of mine said, it’s admirable that one of the things to be admired about what French is doing is that he is writing not only as a member of conservative Christianity but as one who makes sense and appears to put Scripture above party platform.

French has been offering not only incisive analysis of why the fear is rampant but why it is rampant now, during a time in America when political and legal movements of the last forty years, at both federal and state levels, have favored conservative Christians, colleges, and businesses more the ever. And yet excessive fear reigns. Here is a recent piece of insightful analysis by French to get you going: “How American Christendom Weakens American Christianity.”

In his essay on the return of Christ, Lewis writes that believing in dating systems for the end of the world has “led Christians into very great follies… To write a history of all these exploded predictions would need a book, and a sad, sordid, tragi-comical book it would be.” We would do well to hear that today about our own folly.

We Christians have made ourselves into a sad, sordid, and tragi-comical lot in the eyes of the world, deservedly so. By listening to conspiracy theories, whispering to our friends about them, blurbing about them on social media, we are not thinking rightly. Enough is enough. “God has not given us the spirit of fear but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:7).

Best we repent and seek God for mercy and grace to close our ears to conspiracy thinking and to instead live in the fear of the Lord. And then, following Isaiah’s lead, let us publicly confess to our Christian friends and on social media how the Lord got our attention and warned us. Whether we are prophets or not. It would be a good start.

Charles Strohmer is a Christian minister and writer. He blogs at www.wagingwisdom.com

Images courtesy of Creative Commons.

“Arms and the Man” v. “Put up thy Sword”: Tough Questions for Rick Joyner, Jim Bakker, and the Prophetic Movement

Not many years before Jesus was born, the Roman poet Virgil died. In the decade preceding his death, Virgil was writing the Aeneid, a poem that has been called the national epic of the Roman empire. In the second half of the epic, Virgil brings his skill as storyteller to the subject of anger, revenge, violence, and bloody warfare.

In a visionary book that explores the limits of violence and war, and skillfully shows the benefits of peaceful change, the late Jonathan Schell puts his finger into history at the time of Virgil and Christ to write about two coexisting yet conflicting traditions. One is worldly and violent, Schell writes. It is “a system, at its best, of standing up for principle with force, right with might; at its worst, of plunder, exploitation, and massacre.” This tradition, Schell notes, was exemplified by Virgil in the Aeneid, whose opening words set the stage: “Of arms, and the man I sing.”

Not long after Virgil was writing “Of arms, and the man I sing,” Jesus, Shell writes, was speaking words that would become much better known: “Put up thy sword, for all who draw the sword will die by the sword.” And “it was in the heat and fury of [a] bloody altercation, not from the quiet of a philosopher’s study,” that Jesus said this. Jesus, Schell continues, “sang of the man without arms,” and since then “the two conflicting traditions – one sanctioning violence, the other forbidding it – have coexisted,” each retaining its power in spite of the other. But, he concludes, “Force can only lead to more force, not to peace. Only a turn to structures of cooperative power can offer hope” (The Unconquerable World: Power, Nonviolence, and the Will of the People).

I was disturbingly reminded of the diametric tug of these two perennial traditions upon the human heart when I watched a television interview of Christian author and speaker Rick Joyner. For those unfamiliar with the name, Rick Joyner founded MorningStar Ministries in 1985 and became fairly well known within charismatic Christian circles for his books and for teaching about his many dreams and visions, which he claimed were prophetic. In 2004, MorningStar purchased part of the former Heritage USA complex, once owned by Jim Bakker and PTL, in North Carolina. Bakker and Joyner have been close friends for decades and it was Bakker’s interview of Joyner that I listened to.

The interview aired two on September 11, 2020, on “The Jim Bakker Show” and ran for nearly an hour. It included much mutual back-patting that lead to this question from Baker: “Where are we in the prophetic time line?” What follows is a long and disturbing conversation in which Joyner mentions a dream he had in 2018 about what he calls a “civil war” being fought in the streets of American cities.

As the interview progresses, Joyner sounds more closely allied with Virgil’s violent warrior Aeneas than with the gospel’s peaceable Jesus. Joyner asserts that America is already in that civil war and that followers of Jesus need to be prepared to take up arms and fight in it. Although Joyner briefly mentions that he “hates to say this,” and that “some people don’t even want to comprehend” it, any fellow feeling meant dissipates before his contention that followers of Jesus get out their guns and join in with those he calls the “good” militias to fight bloody battles in the streets of their cities against those whom he identifies as “the bad people.”

One cannot listen to the second half of the interview and conclude anything other than that Joyner is talking about followers of Jesus getting their guns and participating in a violent civil war. That is the plain message, which Joyner loads with comments such as: “we’re already into it”; “we’re gonna have to fight for what we believe”; “it’s time to choose sides”; “we’ve gotta fight to win.”

Followers of Jesus are meant to join militias to fight and kill fellow American citizens? Followers of Jesus?

Joyner’s battle cry to Christians is not compelling. There are many reasons why, more than can reasonably be assembled here, including the dubious, if not flawed, enlistment of biblical texts to support the call to arms.

But one particular text must be discussed, Luke 22:35-38. It is a brief word from Jesus to his closest followers about forsaking the violence of swordplay and instead follow his way of self-sacrificial love of others, including enemies. Strangely, Joyner flips this word about non-violent resistance around to mean the opposite of what Jesus meant. He lifts Jesus’ comment about a sword out of its context to justify today’s followers of Jesus heading out into the streets to fight a literal civil war in American cities. I want us to spend some time with that text here, as its meaning cannot be quickly understood. But when understood in both its immediate and larger contexts, Jesus’ words actually undermine the entire call to arms.

In the interest of full disclosure I should perhaps first say that I am offering this critical analysis of Joyner’s interpretation of the Luke text as someone who in principle is not opposed to what the New Testament identifies as the gift of prophecy, which, being part of “the way of love,” is meant to be spoken to people “for their strengthening, encouraging and comfort,” or, in short, for edifying the church (1 Corinthians 14:1-4).

I spent most the first fifteen years of my new life as a Christian in charismatic fellowships where, blessedly, mature expressions of the gifts of Spirit were operative, including that of prophecy. If someone stepped out of line, pastoral oversight appropriately addressed the situation. I personally benefited from this learning curve. Although I was eventually called to serve in (so-called) non-charismatic congregations about thirty years ago, I have enjoyed, benefited from, and been greatly thankful for being invited to minister countless times in charismatic fellowships since then. I try to be among them as best I can in the way of love, for their strengthening, encouraging, and comfort. (For the record, I am not a fan of the word “non-charismatic” applied to churches.)

If memory serves, I became acquainted with Joyner through two of his books in the mid-1980s, when I was still active full time within the charismatic tradition. (I don’t recall those books as objectionable in any fundamental sense within what I understood orthodox charismatic theology.) Around 1990, Joyner’s name dropped off my radar. Until the Bakker interview..

Now let’s get down to business. Here is a typical translation of Luke 22:35-38:

Then Jesus asked them, “When I sent you without purse, bag or sandals, did you lack anything?”

“Nothing,” they answered.

He said to them, “But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. It is written: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors’; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment.”

The disciples said, “See, Lord, here are two swords.”

“That is enough!” he replied.

During the interview with Bakker, Joyner places Jesus’ comment about the sword in the service of motivating today’s Christians to fight with weapons in a civil war in American cities. Joyner offers no explanation why he believes in this equivalency, which makes followers of Jesus instruments of violence and bloodshed. “We need to recognize the times, be prepared for them,” he explains, while confessing to viewers his worry that “God’s people” won’t become “part of the militia movements, the good militia” to fight the “bad people.” But “Jesus himself said there’s gonna be a time when you need to sell your coat and buy a sword. That was a physical weapon of their day. And we’re in that time here. We need to realize that.”

Bakker makes not a peep of protest to what Joyner is saying. Nevertheless, prophecies and interpretations of dreams and visions presented to the body of Christ as authoritative have to be tested, examined to determine if they are credible, authentic, or morally acceptable. After careful consideration of the Luke text, I believe that Joyner’s contention fails the test.

Jesus’ meaning about the sword, when considered in both its immediate and its related contexts, cannot be interpreted as call to arms. Instead, it undermines that call. Here’s why.

The immediate context is the Last Supper, where only Jesus’ twelve closest followers were assembled with him (until Judas leaves). The related contexts include events immediately following the Last Supper and also events in the three-year witness of Jesus’ life and ministry on the hillsides and in the towns of Galilee and Judea. Let’s start with the latter.

During those three exceptional years on the road with Jesus, the Twelve had witnessed Jesus’ self-sacrificing love of others, including of enemies. countless times. (The supreme expression being, “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.”) That is essential to who Jesus is. His ministry exemplifies it. In all sorts of relational encounters – whether someone needed counsel, or healing, or was up a tree – Jesus graced people’s lives with all sorts of various and diverse good. Day in and day out, the Twelve not only saw the beneficial effects of this on others, they even a hand at times in making it so.

But something else essential was also taking place. It wasn’t only through his acts of compassion – what the Old Testament person would call chesed (God’s loving-kindness) – but through his teaching that Jesus sought to instill the practice of self-sacrificing love of others into the lives of the Twelve. The fundamentals of that radical teaching are set forth in what we call the Sermon on the Mount, which arguably, can be understood as the Constitution for Jesus’ followers to live by. Their having been diligently taught for there solid years by their Rabbi, whose acts are consistent with what he taught, you can be forgiven for assuming that by the time of their last meal together the love of others would have become normative ministry for the Twelve. But our text in Luke reveals that a strong pull to take up arms had gotten hold of them. How so?

All four Gospels reveal that in the weeks leading up to the Last Supper Jesus knew he would soon be enduring a violent religious and political opposition that would put him to death, crucified as the archetypal act of self-sacrificing love. He also knew he was not going to resist this death with arms, even though he could command a legion of angels to fight for him (Matthew 26:53). With that understanding, let’s enter into some of the sights and sounds of the Last Supper.

All kinds of conversations and activities are going on among the thirteen men who have gathered privately to remember the Passover, a ritual meal that takes several hours. Jesus knows his arrest and violent death are imminent and that this would be their final meal together. In what has been called his farewell discourse, given to us in John chapters 14-17, Jesus offers many words of comfort and instruction for the eleven remaining disciples (Judas had left the meal early on, apparently; see John 13:21-30). At some point during those hours of communion and prayers in that room, Jesus detects a rising attitude of violence among his intimates. It needs to be addressed. So he brings up the subject of swords. He is, in effect, wanting them to know that although things are going to be different for them after his death, his message is not changing. It is still the gospel. The good news. The redeeming love of God. And they are to preach it and live it after he is gone, just as they saw him doing, day in, day out.

Why, then, was Jesus telling them to go buy swords? The answer is, he wasn’t. The Luke text intends for us to understand that no one at the Last Supper slipped out of the room to buy a sword. They did not need to. Some had arrived carrying swords: Lord, we’ve got two swords right here, they tell Jesus, no need to go buy any. As if he hadn’t noticed. Of course Jesus saw their weapons. If you have dinner guests over and two of them are packing, you may not notice that, but you’re sure going to notice if they arrive armed with swords.

What’s with the sword comment, then? The answer will emerge from clues in a few other scenes during this period. One is found in John’s Gospel (18:1-11), which describes a moment during Jesus’ arrest that identifies the bluntly outspoken Simon Peter as one of the two with a sword. The personal identification seems more than an aside. Not many days before the Last Supper, Jesus had revealed to the Twelve, in plain language, that he was going to get arrested, suffer, and die. Hearing that, (Simon) Peter tried to talk Jesus out of going the way of the Cross. For having that attitude, however, Peter got rebuked by Jesus in no uncertain terms. Then Jesus adds: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it” (Matthew 16:21-25). Here was yet another teaching moment from Jesus, seeking to instill in his followers a heart attitude of self-sacrificing love toward others, including enemies.

Did Peter take the hint? Apparently not. The arrest scene described in John’s Gospel seems to imply that Peter arrived at the Last Supper armed with a sword. Maybe he regularly carried that weapon. Maybe he was carrying it the day he rebuked Jesus for wanting to go the way of the Cross. The Gospels are silent on these matters.

Another clue to Jesus’ meaning about the sword is found in Matthew’s Gospel in a scene described after the Passover meal. Jesus takes his inner circle to the Mount of Olives, where he again explains that he is soon to die. This time, Peter does not try to talk Jesus out of going to the Cross. Instead, he declares that he has such steadfast loyalty to Jesus that he is prepared to die with him right then and there. “And all the other disciples said the same” thing (26:35).

How Jesus understood the implication of that ad hoc agreement among his inner circle is important. Under Roman law there would be no legal reason for Peter, or any of the Twelve, to have been in jeopardy of prison or capital punishment at his arrest unless they had broken the law, which they would have done had they brandished weapons and ended up killing people in the mob who had come to arrest Jesus. Now Jesus and his disciples would have been fully aware of this Roman law. Yet at some point during the Last Supper, the eleven remaining intimates let their emotions get the better of them, becoming really angry and motivated by a spirit of violence. By the end of the hours’-long meal and much back-and-forth conversation during the meal and on the heavy walk to the Mount of Olives, these good guys (now sans Judas) are locked and loaded and ready to fight the bad guys, intent on becoming a band of street fighting men, a militia for Jesus.

In other words, the weapons carried in to the Last Supper and then to Jesus’ arrest had a literal meaning for his disciples. The inner circle (sans Judas) will take up arms to fight, even kill if necessary, those who had come to arrest Jesus. They seem to think that’s a good thing. That it is what Jesus is calling them to do.

Jesus had just dedicated three years of his life as a crash course of instruction and training to equip his closest followers to follow his lead, the peaceful way of the gospel. No way he does want them to get arrested, tried, and executed for acts of violence. If they go that way, end of them, end of story. No Book of Acts. It is difficult to imagine how distressed Jesus must have become by their rising attitude of violence just then.

They want to go kill the bad guys? Really? We’ve just broken bread together for the last time. I’m going away. They’re meant to carry my message of love to others, including love of enemies, out into a violent world. Are they going to do that now? What is this spirit of armed resistance among them? They’ve brought swords and mean to use them. What’s up with these guys? That’s not the the message of the Cross. Why do I even bother?

It is not difficult to see why the inner circle held a literal meaning to the swords. Just as we today know what weapons are used for, they too had absorbed that meaning since childhood. By the time they had reached adulthood it had become a given in their worldviews. All around them, for all their lives, they saw Roman legionnaires carrying a gladius (short sword), a pilum (six-and-a-half-foot javelin), and sometimes a pugio (dagger). How often any of the Twelve saw these weapons used in violence, your guess is as good as mine. What does not need guessing is that the sight of these weapons, and a knowledge of what they were used for, was inescapable to anyone who lived in the Roman empire. Jesus alludes to that widespread understanding in an arrest scene described in Matthew, Mark, and Luke: “Am I leading a rebellion, that you have come out with swords and clubs to capture me?”

Can there be any other that a lethal meaning to the swords carried by Jesus’ followers? Jesus is about to demonstrate love of enemy to the uttermost empathy. Yet his intimates have decided they will move in the opposite spirit. I offer that in the Luke text Jesus, through grim irony, gives the weapons another meaning. Consistent with his message and example of love of enemy Jesus eschews the literal meaning of the swords and instead gives them a symbolic meaning: the violence in heart that objects to love of enemy. Jesus, deeply trouble by their attitude, in effect bursts out with, I’ve had enough of this! Let’s just go!

Although that is not how any translation I’m familiar with “hears” the words of Luke 22:38, and though personally I am not partial to paraphrases, at least not for serious study of Scripture, I often benefit from the fresh insight that can be derived from them, such as from this language in The Passion: “The disciples told him, ‘Lord, we already have two swords!’ You still don’t understand,” Jesus responded; and this from The Message: “They said, ‘Look, Master, two swords!’ But he said, ‘Enough of that; no more sword talk!’”

Why no more sword talk? Because Jesus see that his followers are in jeopardy of unleashing violence. They haven’t gotten it through their thick heads that the way of the gospel is absolutely not the way of violence.

Yet even during the heat and fury of his arrest, Jesus has a last go at changing their minds. When a cadre of Jewish religious officials and a crowd of their supporters are about to arrest Jesus, Peter draws his sword and cuts off the ear of the high priest’s servant. Personalizing that violent act even more, John includes the servant’s name, Malchus. And to that violent act Jesus immediately responds with a twofold action whose meaning could not be clearer. First: his sharp rebuke to Peter – “No more of this!” “Put your sword back in its place, for all who draw the sword will die by the sword.” Second: the healing of the servant’s ear (Luke 22:51; Matthew 26:52; John 18:11). Here we see Jesus, the quintessence of love toward others, even to those in the mob come to arrest him, acting consistent with his cry of deep frustration, recorded in Luke 22:38. He has had enough. Off he goes to his crucifixion.

This was not the only time Jesus laid a stern rebuke on members of the Twelve for being motivated by a violent spirit. Earlier in Jesus’ ministry, the brothers James and John (the Sons of Thunder) cited an incident from the life of the prophet Elijah (2 Kings 1:12) to try to justify calling fire down from heaven to destroy an entire village. But Jesus “rebuked them and said, ‘You know not what manner of spirit you are of. For the Son of Man [has] not come to destroy lives but to save them’” (Luke 9:51-56).

Isaiah chapter 53 indicates that the Messiah will be the suffering not the military servant. Sure, followers of Jesus may and do face violent opposition at times and even death. If that hour arrives, let us come boldly before the Throne of Grace for divine help in our time of deepest need, to cry out for the grace of sacrificial love toward our persecutors.

Things are going to be different, now, Jesus in effect said to his disciples. Times are changing. I’m going away. But my message to you to love others is not changing, even when you are threatened with violent religious or political opposition. You have not been called by me to take up arms but to open arms of love. And this you will do through the peaceable gospel in power of the Holy Spirit. For I have come into the world not to add violence to violence but to subtract violence from the world.

Jesus’ intimates eventually got the message. The love that Jesus had toward others became his followers normative witness after his death and resurrection and the Holy Spirit, who testifies about Jesus (John 15:26), took up residence in their hearts. And thus we do have the Book of Acts. It is noteworthy, is it not, that in no place in the Book of Acts, or in any other Epistle, does an Apostle or any other follower of Jesus take up arms, even when facing violent social, political, or religious opposition. In other words, the Last Supper was not just meaningful to Jesus but also to his followers. As the Last Supper represented to them how Jesus had lived, it gave them direction as to how they were to live.

And live that way they did, not perfectly of course, but they were continually reminded about what was at stake through their regular practice of the Lord’s Supper, first mentioned in chapter eleven of First Corinthians. What was at stake was their faithful communion, day in, day out, in the church and in public, with the meaning and message of the Last Supper. And the consequences of maligning that knowledge.

Today we have what we call the Lord’s Supper, which we partake of in remembrance of the Last Supper. (It may known by other names, such as the Lord’s Table, the Breaking of Bread, the Eucharist, Communion.) What are we today remembering? What are we partaking of? What are we agreeing to when we receive the bread and the wine? Of what is it a symbol to us today? For the earliest followers of Jesus it was indeed remembrance of Jesus’ sacrificial death. But it was also a symbolic reminder as to how they were to live everyday, and not just toward some people but to all people, and not just in one’s family or church but in all areas of life. Let us ask ourselves how we’re doing at this. In humble prayer, let us ask the Lord how we’re doing.

To partake of the Lord’s Supper in remembrance of so great a salvation that Jesus Christ has accomplished for us sinners is a great thing. But it is not the only thing. Perhaps every time we partake of the bread and the wine we are also meant to remember that we are no longer our own, that now we live for Another, for the One who himself lived for others. Perhaps each time we partake we are giving our assent anew to follow Jesus, to live in the world as he lived in the world, serving others in denial of self. Perhaps every time we partake we are renewing our commitment to be living epistles who demonstrate to whosoever as best we can, including to enemies, the grace-giving love of Jesus, in small things and large, in any state of affairs, including socially and politically. If it is true that our partaking of the bread and the wine commits us to following Jesus, to live as he lived, it would make it a serious matter indeed to partake unworthily (1 Corinthians 11:27-32).

Will we not be judged as bearing false witness to Christ’s love of others if we if we partake of the Lord’s Supper one day and take up arms the next?

There is another sword spoken of in the New Testament. It is not the sword of a violent, murderous world. It is “the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:17), which we are called to study and rightly divide (2 Timothy 2:15). And “the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword…, it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12). These are exhortations to open our hearts to let the word of God search and refine them in utterly personal ways, including how we interpret the meaning of Luke 22:35-38, especially in the heat and fury of our national moments.

Choosing between the two perennial traditions – the one violent, the other forbidding it – is always being placed before followers of Jesus. Will we walk humbly in the grace and power of the Holy Spirit into the pages of our own Book of Acts? Or will we take up arms to participate in the kind of violence that killed our Lord?

Top photo: Sword sculpture photo by Andrea Brizzi. Lower photo: Grunewald’s-Isenheim Altarpiece. Star flower and two paths images courtesy of Creative Commons.

The Refiner’s Fire in a Time of Crisis

If you missed this or haven’t had the opportunity to listen yet, here is a recent talk I gave, in which I plucked up my nerve to share some thoughts that have been pressing on me for quite some time about this difficult historical moment that is deeply challenging all of us across the whole spectrum of life. Thank you to Pastor Wes White for the invitation to speak about this, to Brennon Carpenter for making it available to you on Vimeo, and to those who have been sharing it around both here and outside the States.

I should add, briefly, so that it’s not confusing when it occurs, that at about 2/3 of the way through the talk, there’s an unexpected time of quiet when I became so overwhelmed I couldn’t talk. When I regained a little composure I was fighting back tears, voice cracking at times for the remainder of the talk. Also, stick around for the reading of a poem, which concluded the talk. If you have time to listen and wish to offer some input that would be good.

Video by Vimeo.

Conversation with Conservative Pastor Joel Hunter, Spiritual Advisor to President Obama

I have interviewed many people over the years, but I don’t think any of those conversations has ever been as timely and important as this one with Pastor Joel Hunter, a theologically conservative Christian who for eight years was a spiritual advisor to the theologically liberal President Barack Obama. Now retired from full time pastoring, the former senior pastor of “Northland, A Church Distributed,” in Central Florida, stays as busy as ever building bridges and coalitions to help people who are in vulnerable communities.

His website, appropriately titled “Imitating Jesus beyond Church Walls,” where he also blogs, bursts with hard-won biblical insight and understanding that he’s learned both as a pastor for nearly five decades and through serving in challenging public contexts, regionally, nationally, and internationally. These are too numerous to detail here, so you really must check out Joel’s website for yourself sometime, especially if you’re meeting him for the first time here.

For some time now, we have been living in a fast-paced and significantly changing world in which inescapable demands have been placed upon us to gain a godly wisdom for such a time as this, and to live by it everyday. The last decade or so has been particularly demanding, socially, economically, and politically. Even our best efforts at public witness in America have often revealed how divided the church had become. The only consensus today seems to be that society at-large says that it is turned off by what public Christian influence there is. Both church and society have come out losers here. And then along comes Covid–19.

In Joel Hunter’s public life and ministry, we find not only a clear understanding but a biblical working out of the demands of Christ’s discipleship on us at a time such as this. He is a respected and important voice in Christian leadership. Of his long and varied callings, we could have talked for hours about a great many things. Instead, we took a hour by phone for a fascinating and insightful conversation about what he learned during eight years as President Obama’s lone conservative spiritual advisor. We then moved from those personal experiences to President Trump’s spiritual advisors. We also talked about Covid–19, as well as about the kind of pastoring that brings healing into congregations that are divided politically, and the importance of crossing boundaries to build relationships. Some of his answers may surprise.

Charles Strohmer: Let’s jump right in, Joel. We first met at a Christian conference in DC when Barack Obama was the President, and you got my attention when you spoke about being a conservative Christian pastor who was also a spiritual advisor to President Obama. What did that responsibility entail during those eight years?

Joel Hunter: Several things. I wrote devotions for him every week out of the Scripture. We prayed together periodically. Really it was a mutually encouraging relationship. I went through some tough times and he called me to make sure I was doing okay. And right after he was out of office, I was making a transition from being a congregational pastor (after almost fifty years) to being a faith community organizer in Florida, and he called me before my last sermon as a congregational pastor and asked, “What are you doing, Joel?” And I said, “I have no idea. I’m going to be a community organizer. What am I doing?” Because that’s what he was before he went into politics. So we’ve had a mutually encouraging relationship, and I have been quite honored to call him a friend.

Charles: When you sent devotionals or prayed with him in person, what kind of approach did you take? Was it personal, or about family matters, or political areas?

Joel: It was all personal. It really wasn’t a political relationship. He did call me a few times before making big announcements. For example, he had just come out for gay marriage, so he called me before that got into the news cycle because he knew that with my conservative Evangelical background I’d be beaten up over our relationship, which I usually was. But almost always our relationship was about personal issues. So when I would pray for him I’d say, “What do we pray about?” By the way, when I would ask him that, he would never ask me to pray for him. He was always asking me to pray for somebody else. He’d said, “I got this letter this week …,” or, “There’s this family that …” It was always about somebody else.

He was also that way in conversation. You could not maintain a conversation about him. He was always more interested in talking about somebody else. That came out of a genuine sense of compassion and humility and the understanding that I’m here to offer others some good. So let’s go to the Lord about that.

Charles: How were you as a theological conservative able to square being a spiritual advisor to a theologically liberal President? It must have been a struggle.

Joel: Yes, we came down on various sides of issues. But when you love and appreciate somebody, you give them the space they need and you trust God to take care of all that. I’ve never needed someone to agree with me in order to love them fully. I would have a very narrow band of relationships if I demanded theological agreement before I loved people. And that’s the way Jesus was. Jesus crossed all kinds of boundaries in order to love people who were not like him. So it sounds difficult, but it was really very easy. When you see somebody as a person who you know is trying to do others good, and you know that even if you disagree on the interpretation of Scripture, that both of you have a keen appreciation for Scripture, then the rest, well, you’ve just kind of got to let go.

Charles: How did you get that gig?

Joel: Early in 2008, I was featured in a New York Times article on racism. A few weeks later, Joshua Dubois, Senator Obama’s religious outreach person, called me and said that Senator Obama would like to have a conversation with me. So I said, “Great,” and about a week later Senator Obama and I talked for about thirty minutes on the phone. His basic question was, “How can the government and faith communities work together without violating the commission of each?” And I said, “Senator, probably the most unused resource for community healing and well being in this country are faith communities. We have the highest percentage of volunteers and we just want to make things better.”

I was then asked to be on a couple panels that asked the presidential candidates, during the campaign, questions, in forums. So I had opportunities to ask questions to people like Hillary Clinton. After I had asked her a question during the second forum, I felt someone behind me tugging on my coat and saying, “Hey, would you come back and pray with Senator Obama before he speaks?” I said, “Sure,” and so I followed this guy down through the catacombs of the building, thinking I’m going to be one of fifty pastors surrounding him. But when I got there it was just me and him in the hallway. And that week the press had just beat him up something terrible. So I said something like, “Senator, you’ve had a rough week.” And he looked at me and said, which was typical of him, “No. The single mom trying to put food on the table had a rough week. I’m fine.” So I prayed with him before he went on, and after that we had a deep relationship.”

Charles: Did he have other kinds of spiritual advisors in his circle?

Joel: There’s an article in the March 15, 2009 New York Times that talks about five of us. I was the only white Evangelical pastor. But there were others in his circle of prayerful encouragement. A couple of times T. D. Jakes and I were with him together in the Oval Office. And sometimes, like on his birthday or special occasions, he would get on the phone with several of us, including people like Joseph Lowery and other great old African-American preachers.

Charles: Was it beneficial for him to have a circle of spiritual advisors who were different theologically?

Joel: Absolutely. He thrives on various perspectives. He’s incredibly smart. I can’t tell you the level of his intellect. So it’s easy for him to take in various perspectives and come up with his amalgamation of what’s just been said and go with that.

Charles: Since Donald Trump’s election, there’s been an avalanche of stories in the media and the press about his conservative and charismatic spiritual advisors. Do you know if he has other kinds of religious advisors in his Presidential circle?

Joel: No. I know many in that group. They are all of the same theological perspective. This President really puts a premium on loyalty and on agreement, so that’s his circle.

Charles: President Trump has quite a different method than, say, President Lincoln. I mean, in her excellent book Team of Rivals, Doris Kearns Goodwin writes extensively about how Lincoln surrounded himself with advisors, including on his cabinet, who were different from him, including even some political enemies. But that method really paid dividends when it came to gaining the kind of wisdom needed back then to keep the union together, even through a civil war.

Joel: Yes. And that’s how President Obama was first elected. He had that team of rivals, a broad field of political friends and advisors. But the machinery of government always takes over. As the time went on, especially in his second term, it did become more consolidated into fewer voices and political agendas in order to get things done.

My mama used to tell me that I would never learn very much from people who think exactly like I do. You learn from people who have a different perspective or a different truth. So I acquaint differences with flourishing, or being enriched.

Charles: How did you process, internally, deal with, struggles you had, being a conservative Christian pastor, with some political decisions President Obama made that you clearly opposed?

Joel: Well, one time I was out driving with my wife, Becky, and I get this call, “The President would like to speak with you.” So I pulled off into a parking lot because I didn’t want to be talking to the President while I’m driving along. So he comes on the phone and says, “Joel, I just want to tell you about a decision I’ve just made. I’ve just had an interview (I think he said it was with ABC) to say that I’ve come out for gay marriage.” And my first response was, “Mr. President, I don’t see that in Scripture.” And his response was, “I know you don’t. But listen to how I arrived at that.” Then he talked about the difference between civil law, which is for all of the citizens, and moral or religious law, which is for the adherence of believers in that particular realm.

As I understood President Obama, you stick this guy and compassion comes out. If somebody’s being left out, it’s almost more than he can take. He made his decision on the basis of what he conceived as fairness, and compassion, and people being hurt unnecessarily as it translated into a law for all citizens. I understood that. When I was interviewed afterward and asked about it, I said, No, that’s not my definition of marriage. When I spoke about it to my congregation, I said you’ve got to be discerning between what’s fair for everybody and what’s right for those us who interpret Scripture in a certain way and our lives that way.

Charles: Over the years, I noticed that there’s a lack of understanding in some Christian circles about the difference between the purpose and function of civil law in American polity and that of moral or religious law. For one thing, I’m convinced that if you try to force a moral law on a people who don’t see the point of obeying it, you’re going to foster rebellion.

Joel: That’s right. Our natural human bent is to try to gain as much power for our POV as we can. Many Christians use politics for that. But there’s not a full trust of God in that process. We need to note this when we’re making decisions, as to why we are making decisions. Are we making them to keep in control and impose our views, or are we making them because we just want to do what we believe is right and then let the circumstances take care of themselves.

Charles: So President Obama didn’t track with your view on gay marriage, but do you know if over those eight years your prayers or wisdom for him influenced him policy-wise or personally or with his family?

President Barack Obama greets Dr. Joel C. Hunter, senior pastor of Northland, A Church Distributed, in Longwood, Fla., during the Easter Prayer Breakfast, Monday, April 14, 2014, in the East Room of the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Joel: I think I know several ways that he took my perspective into consideration when he was making decisions. But I’m really not at liberty to talk about that. I can say that he invited my family to the Oval Office and told them that I had a profound impact I’d had on his life and presidency. He was very kind to say that.

Charles: If you got a call from President Trump’s Chief of Staff to ask you if you’d be his spiritual advisor, would you jump at the chance or would you beg off?

Joel: It’s the President, you know. Scripture tells us to pray for those in authority. I don’t think I’d last very long! But I would do everything I could to give my interpretation of Scripture as to what the subject was and be as supportive as I could while I was doing it.

Charles: Some years ago I participated in conference call with a number of religious and political leaders. We were talking about “learning wisdom from the other.” Which is a biblical idea. Tim Keller was part of that conference call, and when I asked him for his thoughts on this, he immediately located that kind of learning in the Bible’s teaching on common grace. I want to quote for you part of what he said and get your thoughts on it. All human beings, he said, “whether they believe in God or not, share gifts of wisdom, insight, creativity, and beauty because these gifts come to everyone. Christians call this common grace, because they consider these as gifts that come from God. If that’s the case,” he concluded, “then I could expect that my neighbor who does not believe anything like I believe might still have wisdom from God that I have to listen to.” You seem to me to have that kind of heart.

Joel: It’s how I’m wired. My mama used to tell me that I would never learn very much from people who think exactly like I do. You learn from people who have a different perspective or a different truth. So I acquaint differences with flourishing, or being enriched. I’m sure Tim, he’s a friend, must have had this in mind, that our full worship of God depends upon our full pursuit of truth wherever it is. “All truth is God’s truth,” as the saying goes. And as Kepler said, “I think God’s thoughts after him.” It’s so important for us, no matter where truth is coming from, whether from the realm of science, or philosophy, or even from other religions that have a sense of how God has created the world. I’m thirsty for it all. And I bring it all to Christ, because, as it says in Colossians, Jesus is before all things, and in Christ all things hold together. So I am always trying to learn all I can because I believe it will bring me closer to Christ.

Charles: Do you find people have sticking points when it comes to crossing boundaries to build relationships?

Joel: Yes. Our biggest enemy is inertia. We want to do what we’ve always done, and change costs. And that cost we can see. What we can’t see is the cost of not changing. And that’s a tsunami. It’s trying to say, Hey it’s worth changing to be more like Jesus. It’ll be more inconvenient and more uncomfortable, but boy will life be better.

People are driven toward ideology instead of to the harder work of relationship. Ideology has its appeal because it’s so simplistic, and it makes you feel self-righteous, and it gives you a sense of belonging that’s automatic but not real.

Charles: What can we do to break out of listening only to our own peer groups so that we can cross boundaries, be less self-focusing and more relationally open to people who aren’t like us?

Joel: What won’t work is argument and shaming. That works for maybe about a day. I had a professor who used to talk about how difficult change is. “It’s like pushing mush with a stick,” he would say. “The little part you’re pushing moves but the rest of it just stays the same.” But what does work is the general appeal, especially to believers, of what is right and what they could do that they could do fairly easily.

For example, years ago Becky and I created an initiative called Simple Help. You do one thing a day that takes less than five minutes and costs less than five dollars. There are thousands of us that are doing it, and incrementally the world gets better. When you do this it builds in you a mentality that says: I am making a difference. Most people think: I can’t make a difference. But if you don’t think “solve the world’s problems,” but you do think “I can open a door for someone,” or, “I can share with someone how I got through what they are going through, “ those little things make a huge difference. You just have to make the help concrete and accessible enough that people can act on it, and not feel like they’ve got to solve everybody’s problems all at once.

Charles: One ever-present stumbling block to learning wisdom this way can be social media, where a Manichean worldview is increasingly present, in which the world is said to be divided into two enemy camps that are eternally at war with each other. Christians are falling prey to this, too. It’s tragic. It’s further dividing the body of Christ. Using some of the principles you’re learned and applied over the years, how can we start to change that dynamic on social media, or is it hopeless?

Joel: Well, one thing is that I don’t do social media very much. I don’t have a Facebook account and don’t spent spend much time online trying to discuss issues. I’m on Twitter and Instagram, but mostly just to keep up with my friends. But what you’re pointing to is not just characteristic of social media. The whole country right now is becoming more and more polarized and politicized. There seems to be a choice, almost an ultimatum, that you’re either going to be a bridge builder or a wall builder.

You can have an approach that is Christ against the world, very adversarial, battle of light and darkness, which is not Christianity. So some Christians see this as a pitch battle between good and evil and we’re on the good side and everyone who doesn’t agree with us is on the bad side. To me, that is not at all resembling the life of Jesus.

Jesus had this philosophy and approach to life that all the world was God’s, and that even those who didn’t know him, those deemed unacceptable, need to be served and respected and reached out to with the love of God. It’s not about what’s in them. It’s about what’s in us. So I can’t help but hope that the voices that continue to make friends instead of create enemies will in the end gain more ground. But it is going to be a difficult slog with our present adversarial approach. .

Charles: All across America you can find all kinds of congregations filled with all kinds of people. They are ultimately united in Christ through the fellowship of the Spirit, but they still may have different if not conflicting social, economic, or political views within the same congregation, especially during the Trump Presidency, the difficult CV-19 period, and increased racial tensions and activism. You’re a pastor. How can pastors and ministers who are shepherding politically diverse congregations speak to these issues in their sermons, Sunday schools, Zoom groups?

Joel: First of all, put everything is a scriptural context, not a political or cultural one, because pastors need to be representatives of the healing and enlightening truths of Scripture. So whatever we’re talking about, we need to find the place in Scripture where this is a principle. It’s also very important that God made us for relationships. He himself is a relationship. When the Bible says that God created male and female, he created “them” in his own image [Genesis 1:27]. The word there for God is “Elohim,” which is a plural word used in a singular sense. In other words, God is a relationship. So if we’re made in the image of God we’re made for relationships.

How this applies to Covid-19 and also to the political divide in our congregations is that you won’t get very far in maturing your congregation by arguing issues or by trying to come down from the mountain with the answer. You will only get as far as you will build actual relationships with those in the congregation and empower or equip them to build relationships with those outside the congregation. Now, that doesn’t depend on a bunch of people assembling in a building. What it depends on is loving your neighbor as you love yourself.

So the answer is right there, dead center in Scripture, but we’ve become so accustomed to the paradigm of western Christendom; that is, we all gather inside a building, we listen for a while, and then we go back to our regular lives. That’s a very shallow version of Christianity. And that’s going to get wracked by both pandemic results and by the coming culture of a younger generation that has no appetite for institutional religion. So we’d better figure out how to build meaningful relationships that makes the world better. That’s what the first century church was. It was built on relationship, and the world came to Christ because those relationships were making the world better.

Charles: I’m thinking of Jesus’ heartfelt felt prayer for his followers in John 17, just hours before his death. Today we Christians seem so far away from anything even close to that kind of unity in diversity that Jesus wants of us through the fellowship of the Spirit. Instead, we seem increasingly divided by our rigidly held, conflicting ideological positions. That won’t hold the church together.

Joel: No, it won’t. People are driven toward ideology instead of to the harder work of relationship. Ideology has its appeal because it’s so simplistic, and it makes you feel self-righteous, and it gives you a sense of belonging that’s automatic but not real. The harder work of relationship is full of frustrations and ambivalence and “I don’t know if I’m doing any good here or not.” But it’s the only real work there is. Ideology is not a real-world comfort or strength. It’s just siding up with an idea, and getting mad that everyone isn’t going along with you.

Charles: To focus specifically on the rising division over race in our country, what are some creative strategies for helping white pastoral leadership who are resistant to, or even hostile to, discussions about racism in the current divisive crisis? Often the critical source for their hostilities comes from political perspectives.

Joel: One of the keys that Jesus talked about was that before you see the problem with your brother, notice the problem in yourself; before you would take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye, look at the log in your own. Self-examination is key to spiritual maturity. If white pastors will educate themselves, be brave enough to note the structures of privilege that they have because they’re white – the almost invisible systems of racism in which they were raised, designed for white people to keep power.

Part of the resistance is that automatically when we talk about racism people get defensive because they feel like they’re being accused of something that they didn’t intend. But this is not about accusation. It’s about education and self-evaluation. I think of the Psalm that says “create in me a clean heart, O God,” and the Scripture that says if a person says he has no sin, the truth is not in him. All of these call for the question that the disciples asked Jesus the night before he died: Is it me, Lord? Am I the one?

If we can encourage one another to ask that question, if we can say to ourselves and to each other that all of us have some complicity in the present problem – all of us have ways in which we could improve and walk closer to Christ – then we could say: Well, I guess they’re not trying to blame me. I guess they’re just trying to say that there’s something I need to discover that will make the situation better. I think that’s how to approach it.

Charles: Tell us a little about what you’ve been doing, publicly, since retiring a few years ago from pastoring full time. I know you like to regularly convene all sorts of people for regional conversations, with your Community Resource Network.

Joel: I went into the pastorate out of the civil rights movement, so I have always had in my heart a special place for people who were being left out. It’s important to me to spend my remaining days, and I hope they are many, to circle back a place where I can build bridges and coalitions to help people who are in vulnerable communities. So I’ve been trying to do less nationally and internationally and do more in my own region in central Florida. So I was chairman of the Central Florida Commission on Homelessness, and right now I’m doing racial reconciliation with a lot of groups in our area. The more you can do in your own region, where you have the most influence, the more sustainable it’s going to be. So I’m working with a lot of people who have been left out and seeking biblical justice that is restorative and relationally reconciliatory. We have this ministry of reconciliation.

Charles: We’ve been talking about a pretty challenging kind of discipleship. It can be rough at times, learning from people who are not like us, building new relationships. But it’s a discipleship journey in which we get to know Jesus a little better all the time, understand more of his interests across the spectrum of life. So we need to see what Jesus is doing and partner with him for God’s glory and human flourishing. Your closing thoughts for us?

Joel: Well, the older you get and the more you know, the more you realize how much you don’t know. But my grandmother used to say, “Leave a place better than you found it.” And Jeremiah 29:7 talks about seeking the well being, the flourishing, of the city, because in its well being will be your well being. So I would just ask people to be involved in doing whatever good they can for whoever they can, especially those who have been left out. And their lives will be filled with more satisfaction and more peace than they have anticipated.

Charles: Thanks very much for taking time for this conversation, Joel. Much appreciated.

Joel: Glad to help. Thanks for what you’re doing.

Images of Joel Hunter courtesy of Community Resource Network. Dove and Children images courtesy of Creative Commons.

Christ’s Passion and God’s Grace for You

Easter weekend is a good time to take a sabbath from chocolate bunnies and colored eggs to remind ourselves of how harshly the weekend began for Jesus 2,000 years ago. The following reflection is from one of my first books, edited here. It appears in the book in a discussion about pride, humility, and the amazing grace of God.

The sin of pride may not be the most basic sin, but it is probably way ahead of whatever is running in second place. The great American preacher Jonathan Edwards, in his typically vivid imagery, put it this way: “[p]ride is the worst viper that is in the heart, the greatest disturber of the soul’s peace and sweet communion with Christ; it was the first sin that ever was, and lies lowest in the foundation of Satan’s whole building, and is the most difficultly rooted out” (Advice to Young Converts). Powerful words.

Pride is the all-too-human condition that makes “self” the center of my life, so that all others, including God, become subservient to me. The sin of pride is not the pride you may take the good feelings that arise when your child comes home from school with an “A+, or in winning a scholarship to Juilliard, or by making an impossible catch in deep center field. It is the kind of pride that says, subtly and in many diverse ways, “My will be done” (Isaiah 14:13–14 depicts the gravest expression).

Pride is the enemy of humility. Humility is about turning one’s attention away from self to God and to others. When we consider the purposes of God and the welfare of others as greater than ourselves, that is humility. “Self-forgetfulness” is the way C. S. Lewis put it.

Strange and annoying thoughts break in on our personal peace and security when our regard for God’s will and others’ welfare replace our attention to ourselves. A humility, or lowliness of mind, heart, or circumstance, then develops in us. This may occur with the discovery that I am inferior to God and must do what God says. It may come with the acceptance that I am powerless to do anything about the kind of hardship or suffering that is suddenly upon me. It may occur with the recognition of a barrier between myself and Jesus that must be terminated – a chosen career, a proposed marriage, an immoral relationship. There is, then, a shifting of priorities in the move from self to humility.

It may seem unlikely at the time, but in the process that spoils our own desires, hopes, pleasures, ambitions, or longings we receive more of God’s amazing grace to enable us to do what God is requiring of us. “Clothe yourselves with humility towards one another, because ‘God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble’” (1 Peter 5:5).

As we approach the reality of deeper obedience, our imaginations clarify as never before. For what we are about to lose or suffer appears on the path in a last-ditch effort to try to turn aside a heart moving into tender obedience. It is a pivotal moment. Might we not turn the wrong way? We may not want to, but still . . . .

The “self-forgetfulness” of our Lord is our model for humility, as he is in all things. One of the most concentrated expressions of the clarification process comes into sharp relief when our Lord is praying in the Garden of Gethesmane, as it is described in Mark 14:32–34:

“They went to a place called Gethsemane, and Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Sit here while I pray.’ He took Pete, James and John along with him, and he began to be deeply distressed and troubled. ‘My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death,’ he said to them. Stay here and keep watch.”

Just hours before his death by crucifixion, Jesus has walked to the Garden of Gethsemane, which in the Aramaic language means “oil press.” He has gone there to pray about what lay ahead for him, and that imminent future is being clarified to him through the agony he endures there.

Christ’s passion begins. The unbelievable cost of Calvary is being clarified to the Suffering Servant. In Mark’s description, three Greek words in the original New Testament reveal what was taking place in our Lord’s mind. A more accurate rendering of “deeply distressed,” “troubled,” and “overwhelmed” are the words “aghast,” “depressed,” and “grief-stricken.”

That Jesus did not like what he saw is also evident from the long time he took in prayer to ask the Father if “the cup” could pass from him. Drops of his bloody sweat stained the ground while he endured that racking oil press of lowliness. We know that he could have called on his Father to send legions of angels to fight for him (Matthew 26:53).

But Jesus chose to drink the cup, to place the importance of others as greater than himself. This comes ringing home in that climactic outburst before he walks from the garden, “Yet not what I will, but what you will” (Mark 14:36). Thus strengthened by God’s grace, the Suffering Servant declares, “Rise! Let us go” (Mark 14:42).

Jesus exemplifies both the height and depth of realistic self-understanding before God, who has promised grace to the humble. If God had enough grace for Jesus in his passion, God will have more than enough grace for you and for me in our suffering. As the infinite depths of Christ’s descent mount up to the fullness of grace in Him, the humble have a share in both.

Image: Christ being raised of the cross, by Reubens

A note from Charles: For more of the perspectives that Waging Wisdom seeks to present, try following the blog for a while, to see if you like it. You can always unfollow anytime. Just click here, find the “Follow” button in the right margin, enter your email address, and click “Follow.” You will then receive a very short email notice when I post a new article. And, hey, if you like this stuff, tell a friend! Thank you.

The Cradle Fund Revisited

Chris Seiple with refugee children in Bekaa Valley It’s been more than a year since I posted about the remarkable work of the Cradle Fund. For those of you who are new to this blog – and thank you for being here – the Cradle Fund is a non-profit, Christian-run Middle East initiative led by the Institute for Global Engagement (IGE), which “helps rescue, restore and return Middle Eastern Christians and other religious and ethnic groups to a home where they can live and practice their faith free from fear.”

The achievements of the Cradle Fund in the mere three-and-a-half years of its existence are truly amazing. Working with thirteen Cradle Fund partners, it has already helped more than 125,000 refugees. And all of this has been made possible by people’s generous donations.

refugee men and boys shelteed in a community center The Cradle Fund is the only non-profit initiative that this blog supports. I have been friends with Chris Seiple, its founder and president emeritus of IGE, for many years. Whether you have supported the Cradle Fund in the past or have yet to help, I urge you to think about supporting this remarkable initiative.

There is a wealth of information and photos about the Cradle Fund on the IGE website. Here are two recent short articles on the IGE site. This link. And this one.

Here is the first article I wrote about it. It explains its fortuitous beginnings and how we got involved. And it will give you other basic info and photos and link you to subsequent articles on this blog about the Cradle Fund’s evolving history, which is pretty amazing.

Thank you for being approachable about this. Soon we will again remember the resurrection of Christ, who rescued us from our sins. And as the rescued know, there’s nothing like a rescue.

Photos courtesy of the Institute for Global Engagement.

A note from Charles: If you want more of the perspectives that Waging Wisdom seeks to present, I want to invite you to follow the blog. Just click here, find the “Follow” button in the right margin, enter your email address, and click “Follow.” You will then receive a very short email notice whenever I post a new article. And, hey, if you really like this blog, tell a friend! Thank you.

Faith Seeking Wisdom: A Prophetic Approach to Our Time

child reading a Bible The title of this post refers to a sermon I preached last December to the hospitable Evangelical congregation, but I was nervous in the pulpit because I knew it would not be the kind of Evangelical preaching that most Evangelicals would be accustomed to hearing on a Sunday morning. I would not be talking theology. Instead, I had felt compelled to share some biblical insights and personal experiences to indicate ways in which good citizens of all faiths, or no faith at all, have a responsibility to work toward ending “the logic of violence” in this country and replacing it with the peaceable wisdom of God.

As I say, I was nervous and misspoke a few times as a result, such as when I used the word “church” but meant “mosque,” though the congregation understood what was meant. I was also nervous because I was, in part, going to contrast the effect that two different kinds of preached messages can have on a crowd toward stirring up or defusing adversarial relations. The one message was from a Christian, the other from a Muslim. I wasn’t sure how this congregation would take to an illustration in which it was the Muslim who got the gold star. So it was a great relief when, right after my talk the pastor of the church took the mic and affirmed the message to his congregation.

This is the first time we’ve put a talk (by anyone) on this blog. It may be the only time! So this is something of an experiment. We don’t know if it will fly. We’ll leave that up to you.

I should also say that because I’m no great shakes as a preacher, I hemmed and hawed about whether to put this talk on the blog. The tipping point came in recent weeks, as I and countless others have with great sadness watched the already heated social and political climate of this country being kindled with inflammatory rhetoric that has now burst forth into physical violence at Trump rallies. My talk is not on that subject, but I think its message is directly related. If it helps even a few listeners just in that regard, it will have been a successful experiment.

To listen to the talk “Faith Seeking Wisdom: A Prophetic Approach to Our Time,” just click the little arrow and you’re away.

Image by Samantha Sophia, courtesy Unsplash

Our Confession is Good for Their Souls

Like many people who would not consider themselves Christian, I as a Christian have grown to dislike much of what passes as Christianity. If it’s not one thing, it’s another. Talk-radio clichés parroted by the Christian right; the ideological liberalism of the Christian left – both seem to me as different from a gospel-shaped wisdom as night is from day. And far too much privatized pietism and the Hellenistic dualism remain to be swept from our minds.

Inside various kinds of church leadership for decades, I have seen churches run more like business enterprises, psychology sessions, entertainment centers, or political enclaves rather than as sacrificial, life-giving biblical communities working for justice. I have worked in the Christian publishing industry for thirty years and been burned more than once by publishers increasingly organized around the gods of gold and silver more than the God implied in their founding principles. Like churches that follow a similar path, staying committed to “staying in business at all costs” is costing them dearly: the fear of the Lord.

People who are not Christians are not stupid. They pick up on this stuff that we try to pass off as Christian, and they see through it. All sorts of bad rumors about Christianity – many are deserved – have lodged in people’s minds as obstacles to seeking a gospel-shaped wisdom for the ills of the world. When nonChristians see us as hypocritical, irrelevant, simplistic, offensive, or even comic, we have stripped ourselves of our prophetic calling in the realities of contemporary life and end up with little public relevance.

Rather then being voices and samples of biblical truth, healing, and justice to a nation of drifting sinners, exhausted ideologies, and failing structures we too easily take our cues from the world system (already judged by our Lord). What is a transforming vision organized around the principle of a sacrificial life to us? We Christians thus deprive our communities and nations of true insights into their problems. Are we not, then, “wretched, pitiful, poor, and blind”?

Alternatives will have to arise, and many are, but the extent of what needs to take place often seems like a pipe dream to some of us. However, I have been talking in broad categories and abstractions here, but those are not what one meets in real life. There, it is people we meet. People with wounds from Christians. I believe that before we will ever be able to get a fair hearing from such people for whatever truly Christian alternatives we have on offer, we ought to start apologizing publicly for doing so badly. And I think that those of us who are public Christians have a special responsibility here. I have personally seen such wounds healed through a public apology.

Some years ago while traveling and teaching about a Christian view of the New Age Movement, I met two “readers,” as the women called themselves, who turned up at a Davis-Kidd bookstore where I was signing my recent book, a Christian criticism of a New Age subject. They were professional psychics and we had an interesting conversation. It became clear to me that the two women represented the class of non-Christian spiritual seekers who saw through Christian dopiness about the New Age. “A friend said you might be different,” they told me. “So we’ve come to see.”

Their honesty was refreshing, and they were not being petty or cynical or ever bitter as they described some Christian failings they had encountered. They just wanted to think out loud with me about why some Christians don’t seem to know any better. Even though I’m a professional gasbag I really didn’t know what to say to them. But as I listened I began to sense that, as a Christian minister, I ought to offer some sort of apology for the church’s failing of them. But what to say?

Then the penny dropped and I swallowed my pride and said, “I’m also disillusioned about much of the current state of Christianity. In fact, I feel so strongly about this that I wrote about it in my new book. May I read a couple paragraphs to you?” They were good with that, so I picked up one of my books from the table and read from it.

What I read wasn’t a formal apology, but it showed them a public face of Christianity that they had not encountered before. It acknowledged their concerns and commiserated with them, instead of fobbing off their legitimate criticisms and going for the juggler and, say, rebuking them for being psychics.

I don’t know what happened to those two ladies afterward, but we continued to talk and eventually they left. But not before they bought two of the books. Now I had some tough love in that book about the New Age. Did my “apology” lay the groundwork for that to speak to them later? I don’t know. But I do know that they wanted some honest conversation.

Elsewhere during those same years, but now in Nottingham, England, near the legendary Sherwood Forest, I participated in a live, radio debate with a popular spirit medium (I’ll call her Sheila). Just minutes into the gave-and-take it was obvious to both me and the presenter that Sheila was being unjustifiably antagonistic toward me. You could feel the tension in the air of that quiet radio studio. Of course the presenter saw the makings of a real dustup, but I wanted to reach the woman’s heart. And something was definitely in the way. I had a hunch, looked to Heaven, and took a risk.

“This is off the subject,” I said gently, ignoring the presenter’s next question to me. “You seem upset with me. Have I offended you in some way?” When she said no, I asked if she had been hurt by other Christians. “Yes,” she said. “I’ve had some pretty bad experiences. I wasn’t even going come here today when they told me that a Christian would also be here. I’ve learned to stay away from Christians.”

Now what? I was acutely aware that this was going out live – who knows how many were listening – and that the presenter wanted to control what took place. And he wasn’t expecting Sheila to suddenly be talking about some of the wounds she had received from Christians. I was getting nervous and wondered where this was headed. Who ever heard of a debate like this?

I looked to Heaven and took another risk. “I don’t know if this will make sense,” I said, “but as a representative of Christianity, I want to apologize to you on behalf of those Christians.”
In the air and on the air things changed dramatically. It was one of those golden moments. Her animosity melted away. I remember her brightening and saying how nice it was finally to be talking “to a Christian who understands.”

The presenter, bless him, after sidelining himself for a few minutes, reentered the conversation and we improvised for the remaining few minutes. Outside the studio afterward, Kris astonished me. “What are you doing this afternoon?” she asked. “If you’re not busy, how would you like to see some of the historic sights around Nottingham? My daughter and I could show you Sherwood Forest or take you to see the cathedral.” Or take you to see the cathedral? My. What had happened? Unfortunately, I had another commitment, but I probably would have taken her up on the offer otherwise.

An appropriately sincere apology to a nonChristian by one Christian on behalf of Christian failures can be an intercession that warms an offended heart and closes the gap between that person and Jesus. Confession is good for the soul. It may be good for others’ souls too.

Images by Butupa and Radio Caravane respectively (permissions via Creative Commons)

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Faith Seeking Wisdom: A Prophetic Approach to Our Time

Our Confession is Good for Their Souls

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