The Resurrection as Theodicy and Plausibility Structure

As mentioned before, Karl Barth famously attacked the natural theology project by saying that it came up with a god, but not the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. What he meant by that was that one can propose an argument that nothing comes from nothing, and therefore if there is something – i.e., the universe -- the universe must have been brought forth by something other than itself, and that we would call God. Barth agrees that this argument could lead a person to affirm a creator.

However, there is no way to continue the argument in order to demonstrate that this creator holds us morally responsible, sees our misery, makes promises and covenants. Barth robustly asserts that the god of natural theology, or, if you will, the god of the philosophers, is not the God of Abraham, Issac and Jacob.

C. S. Lewis and others recognize this issue and shifted their apologetics from creation to those attacks which specifically sought to deny the historicity of Jesus, his divinity, and his resurrection. It is somewhere in the middle between the proofs for the existence of God and the defense of the historicity of Jesus that I sense a weakness. And the spot is, as Lewis puts it, in the problem of pain.

To bring this out let us turn our attention to a recent review by Douglas Groothuis of William Lane Craig and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong's "God? A Debate Between a Christian and an Atheist" in the summer issue of Books and Culture. Groothuis, in his review, points out that Craig’s theodicy fails to convince the atheist, but does convince him, the Christian reviewer.

"The nub of the argument over evil seems to boil down to Craig's argument: (1) If God exists, gratuitous suffering does not exist. (2) God exists. (3) Therefore, gratuitous suffering does not exist.11 Craig's strategies for God's possible justification of evils are merely speculative unless one has previously made a strong argument for a metaphysically and morally thick theism through natural theology. That is, background knowledge weighs crucially here. Since Sinnott-Armstrong denies the success of Craig's arguments for God, Craig's explanation for evil rings hollow and desperate to him. But if one takes Craig's overall, fivefold case for God to be strong (as I do), this defangs Sinnott-Armstrong's objections."
Douglas Groothuis “The Great Debate” Books and Culture July August 2008.

One is forced to ask, what good is an apologetic that only convinces Christians? Groothuis adds:

"Since Craig argues forcefully—if briefly—for the resurrection of Jesus as part of the cumulative case for God's existence, it might have served him well to invoke Jesus' resurrection as part of the solution to the problem of evil as well. If Jesus has been raised victorious over death and sin, the world is not without hope. Evil does not have the last word."
Ibid.

Indeed! I would go so far as to say that there is absolutely no theodicy without the resurrection. In fact, I would disagree with Craig and say that suffering that arises from evil is gratuitous, that it is without cause, for if it had a cause it could be justified, and it is not justified if it is evil. However, there is pain that is not in itself evil. But let us stay focused on suffering that arises from evil. This is what the cross and resurrection are all about. Christ came to destroy the works of the devil, and that is how he did it. I truly believe that this needs to be tirelessly presented as our apology in the 21st century. We need to be aggressive in proclaiming and defending the truth that God has seen our misery and taken it upon himself at the cross and overcome it at the empty tomb. And further, that he intends to restructure the world itself and the world order, and that preparing for that is the duty of the Christian community, the church.

In so presenting this core teaching we establish the Christian plausibility structure that Newbigin points us to. True, we cannot, in an enlightenment way, prove that Jesus rose from the dead with logic, and even less, prove the meaning of the resurrection as the overcoming of evil. But, the resurrection as a fact can be defended, and its meaning taught as a structure by which the world may be understood.

C. S. Lewis clearly understood this. In his essay “Meditation in a Toolshed” he speaks of being in a tool shed where light streams in from a crack in the roof. One does not sit and seek to see the light, rather, one should stand in the light and by it see everything else. I would propose that this is Lewis’ way of speaking of Newbigin’s “plausibility structure” built by the knowledge of God and the Christian teaching about God.

Thus, for Lewis the resurrection is not something one proves. One can defend the historical existence of an historical person, namely Jesus. But, one accepts the resurrection (the act of faith) and in so accepting it all other parts of life are understood.

My Apologies (not my apologetic!)

Sorry dear readers, but I am out of country. I will continue next week. Thank you for your patience.

C.S. Lewis and Changing the Plausibility Structure

Two areas of apologetic activity by C.S. Lewis are little known any more, yet they occupied a great deal of his time. The first is live debating. Every week, he met with what was called the Socratic Club at Oxford and debated atheists. He writes of exhausting the phonebooks looking for atheists to debate because after awhile they did not wish to come. Well, to be honest, who would? With his baritone voice, quick wit and mastery of literature and philosophy, Lewis was a formidable opponent by any measure. But, like Francis Schaeffer who engaged in thousands of evangelistic conversations with students, Lewis demonstrated in the debates that Christianity was not to be simply blown off, but had to be seriously engaged by anyone who styled themselves as an honest thinker.

I really believe that debate and engagement is an area that has not been adequately explored in Canada, especially on university campuses. While there has been some, usually sponsored by Inter Varsity, there is room for much more aggressive action here. The results might not be immediately apparent, but in the long run, it would enable Christians to engage the pretensions of atheism in a direct way once again.

The other area not fully appreciated is his professional writing as a scholar of medieval and renaissance literature. Works such as his magisterial study of allegory (The Allegory of Love) and his study of Paradise Lost are consciously written as a Christian, but marvelously meet all the criteria to be taken with absolute seriousness by the scholarly community. Two things come to mind in how he used his scholarly writings as an apologetic tool.

First, he sought, as always, to build the Christian worldview. As an example, in his book The Discarded Image he portrays the worldview of the medieval times and how that affected its literature. As he discusses this, the contrasts with the worldview of the twentieth century become painfully obvious.

At the same time, he loves to debunk cultural lies in these writings. I might add that in common use one might say “debunk myths,” only that use of the term “myth” would probably be offensive to him. For example, in several places he refutes the concept that people in the first century and afterwards considered the world to be flat. And on it went. He truly believed that Satan had embedded many lies into cultural discourse to make it difficult for the truth of Christianity to be perceived. In truth, what Lewis was doing in this part of his project was trying to re-do the plausibility structure of which Newbigin speaks. He was not content to simply work within the twentieth century plausibility structure, he wanted to change it. Thus, in a number of places, he calls for Christians in every profession to remember that they are Christians when they write, whether they are scientists or professors in the humanities. He earnestly felt this would do more in the long run than any other effort.

This, of course, leaves us to ask if his challenge has been taken up. There is now a flowering of evangelicals in academia. I myself have not, and am not able, to peruse their writings, or even to sample them. But in my own small way, I would echo Lewis’ call to write consciously as Christians, for in this way, slowly, you contribute to a paradigm shift in the cultural understanding of plausibility.

Imagination -- Opening a Door to The Holy

The power of the imagination as a pathway for God was something C. S. Lewis would testify to from first- hand experience. Before he was a Christian he purchased a paperback copy of George MacDonald’s Phantastes and, in his words, experienced holiness. What he meant was not sanctity in the sense of moral goodness, but holiness as spoken of by Otto in The Idea of the Holy. Otto spoke of holiness as that sense that we have of something absolutely OTHER. The awareness that there is something, or Someone, behind the world as we ordinarily experience it. From that moment when Lewis had this experience he began to travel a road that led him finally to Christ.

Soon after his conversion Lewis forayed into imaginative writing with the allegory The Pilgrim’s Regress. Personally I love this book, partly because it is a veiled autobiography of Lewis’ spiritual-intellectual journey up to that point, and partly because it contains so many barbed critiques of the English intellectual landscape of the 1930’s, barbs that still have not lost their edge.

Regress was imaginative, but the best was yet to come. From 1938 on through the mid-fifties Lewis blew the doors off beginning with Out of the Silent Planet and moving on in rapid succession to both Perelandra and The Screwtape Letters. Screwtape put Lewis on the cover of Time Magazine and brought him international readership and fame. And yet The Chronicles of Narnia still lay ahead.

What needs to be considered is that all of this was part of his intentional work as an apologist. He believed that there are certain archetypes in the universe and that these form the foundation of our thinking. These archetypes find their expressions in myths. (It should be noted that Lewis claimed to be an expert in myth, and he did not believe that the Gospels were myth.) Thus, myth could carry truth about God to a person who might even be hostile to the truth on another intellectual level. And one of the results might be that the reader will have an experience of The Holy as he himself had had when he read Phantastes. It is worthwhile to mention here that his fellow member of The Inklings, J. R. R. Tolkien, agreed with this approach.

It is hard to measure the impact of these imaginative works on the minds and hearts of millions of readers. Certainly they have reached a mass audience through film that either Lewis or Tolkien would have found hard to believe. But, do they point people to Christ?

To answer that question we have to go back to the train platform where Lewis first picked up Phantastes. He never claimed that it pointed him to Christ. What he claimed was that it unexpectedly opened up his mind to a new dimension of reality, and that once his mind was thus opened he could not resist the gradual intrusion of a presence who brought to him the greatest surprise of his life – joy.

Since the time of Lewis and Tolkien there has been a profusion of fantasy/imaginative writing in pop culture. Some of it has been quite good. Some of it carries a Christian worldview. And, some, like the Philip Pullman trilogy, promotes atheism. In Canada, and in the world, we await the rise of more writers who will effectively carry on the groundbreaking work of Lewis and Tolkien, writers who will tell stories that open the door of the mind and heart to The Holy.

The Complete Apologist

I have been invited to introduce Ravi Zacharias when he gives a lecture on apologetics at Tyndale University in Toronto in 2010. I am honored to do this. From time to time Ravi graciously recalls conversations that we have had together about C. S. Lewis. They began when we sat together once on an airplane and I commented how wherever I went, when I spoke on evangelism or apologetics, almost inevitably someone would come up to me afterwards and testify about how they had come to Christ by reading C. S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity.
I would call C. S. Lewis the complete apologist. In his day he practiced apologetics in every way that it could be done. He not only saw it as an intellectual activity, but as spiritual warfare. Furthermore, when I say he practiced apologetics in every way it could be done, I mean that not only did he practiced the defense of the faith on a wide intellectual front, also he opened up a new area of apologetics when he ventured into addressing the foundational structures of thinking which psychologist Carl Jung was labeling as myth. And more, he also aggressively used more than one way of delivering his apologetic to the marketplace rather than to the limited academy. In this he moved beyond apologetics as pre-evangelism to evangelism itself. And, in so doing he clearly understood that he was conducting spiritual warfare.
My own debt to Lewis cannot be overstated. Simply put, my ministry career has been one of protracted reading of most of what he has written.
In previous blogs I have noted that key evangelical apologists have followed the path of logical refutation of atheistic assaults on Christianity with variations on theistic arguments. In spite of the claim that post-modern thought rejects this line of defense, I have pointed out that the current aggressive atheistic arguments that have reached a mass audience follow the classic line from Hume to the present and that the response by current apologists are well done and well deserved.
Certainly C. S. Lewis considered himself part of this company. He wrote a number of carefully thought out apologetic essays and two closely argued books, Miracles and The Problem of Pain. In a previous blog I mentioned Alvin Plantiga’s argument against naturalism published in the summer 2008 issue of Books and Culture. Of interest is that he says that he is building on the argument which C. S. Lewis put forward in Miracles.
These two show Lewis’ instinct for the issues of the day, day here meaning the entire 20th century and at least the beginning of the 21st. Why is there pain? Why do people suffer? Could not an infinite God who also loves have made it so that we all lived happily? And, attached to the last question is the denial of the possibility of God, who by definition is outside the natural system. Lewis takes these questions on directly. In Miracles and PofP Lewis aggressively asserts that the presence of pain is not something that is incompatible with the existence of God and that Hume made serious errors in asserting that God could not at once be outside the natural system but act within it.
Personally I think these are wonderful books. I have read each a number of times and each time I have been encouraged and strengthened. Further, they are works that do not allow a person to think of Christianity in an off-handed manner, as something that may be contemplated outside of oneself, but point the reader toward encounter. This is especially so in the final chapter of Pain where Lewis opens the discussion of heaven, a discussion carried forward imaginatively in both Perelandra and The Great Divorce. To be honest, I do not know of a single writer who has written about heaven with the power that Lewis has. To read all of his writings on that fair land is to be filled with longing, or, as he might put it, to recognize the longing that fills our every waking moment.
However, back to my conversation with Ravi Zacharias, I have never had anyone tell me that they came to Christ because they read either Miracles or The Problem of Pain. Instead they tell me that they came to Christ because they read Mere Christianity.
Mere Christianity is the next step in understanding Lewis as the complete apologist. It is a compellation of addresses given over the BBC during World War II. One can almost hear air raid sirens in the background as one reads thinly veiled attacks on the world view of the Nazi’s. However it is so much more than a morale booster, even though apparently that is what some at BBC originally had in mind. It is a straightforward presentation of Christianity.
Here Newbigin comes back to mind. Lewis does not feel that somehow he should get people to “accept Jesus” and then, down the road, teach them the basics of Christian doctrine. Rather, he teaches doctrine, and then from within the doctrine the listener/reader is expected to see the whole truth and how she personally is part of that truth.
Most of us are familiar with this work. It begins with what is known as the moral argument for the existence of God. I feel that this is a very powerful argument and attempts to overcome it by arguing that “we can be good without God” because morality can be explained with evolution are in fact answered by Lewis and the answers resonate with many. Lewis moves on into Christian morality, with a discussion of such things as marriage, sin, forgiveness, incarnation and the Trinity, to mention a few. One of my favorite quotes is as follows:
Very well then, atheism is too simple. And I will tell you another view that is also too simple. It is the view I call Christianity-and-water, the view which simply says there is a good God in Heaven and everything is all right—leaving out all the difficult and terrible doctrines about sin and hell and the devil, and the redemption. Both of these are boys’ philosophies. (Mere Christianity, Chapter 2, 1st paragraph)
It is, he is saying, the very complexity of Christianity, and Christianity’s willingness to face the hard reality of life that commends it. And all of this is aimed at the cabdriver, the mother, and the young teen ready to leave for basic training, as they quietly sat by the radio in the evening. No one really knows how many thousands have turned to Christ because of this one work.
And yet, he did not stop here. He pushed out into totally uncharted territory for apologetics; he pushed out into the sea of imagination.

Defending the Factuality of the Resurrection

Newbigin’s third point is also worthy of consideration. It is the attempt, as he puts it, “to neutralize any affirmation of the truth.” It is the contention, almost accepted as a truism in our day, “that the truth is much greater than any one person or any one religious tradition can grasp.” Thus, when this is accepted the exclusive claim of Jesus Christ, and of the gospel, can be immediately discounted, for even if it is accepted as truth the gospel may only be a segment of a much larger truth.
Clearly it is this assumption of the post-modern world that creates the possibility and the plausibility of the “pluralist society.” And, every single person who is seriously seeking to communicate the gospel in Canada today is aware that this assumption is a foundation of the contemporary Canadian worldview.
Newbigin takes some time to dismantle the credibility of this assumption, and does it masterfully by showing that the claim to relativity requires a claim to actually know full reality. The question we have to face is this: how does one speak when a commitment to relativism is part of the plausibility structure of the person to whom one is speaking?
Newbigin’s answer is to stand with the unbelieving neighbor and look at events which the believer sees as communicating God’s actions and will, and to ask the unbelieving neighbor: “stand here with me and see if you don’t see the same pattern as I do.” As an example he calls our attention to the liberal theological interpretation of the resurrection as found in the last century. In an attempt to make the resurrection story “acceptable to contemporary thought” it was explained as something that was generated by the pre-existing faith of the disciples. In other words, nineteenth century liberalism said that the disciples so believed in Jesus, that after he died they interpreted their belief by means of the story of the resurrection. This, Newbigin brilliantly points out, is the exact opposite of what the Gospel writers present. They present disciples snared in unbelief who are brought to belief by the reality of the resurrection.
I would only add here that in relating the story to audiences the disciples also squarely faced the challenge that they were delusional, that they were mistaken, had only seen a vision or an apparition, that they had lied and actually moved the body, or that Jesus was not really dead and had merely recovered after swooning. In short, every objection to the veracity of the resurrection account from either a Hebrew or Greco/Roman perspective was answered. Thus they recognized that it was incumbent upon them as witnesses to establish by means of all accepted criteria that the resurrection was a fact.
So, my first conclusion is that I agree with Newbigin that “we have no reason to be frightened” by the fact that relativism is part of the plausibility structure of our day. Relativism cannot stand up logically. However, that is not enough in itself, for the concept of relativism has power in spite of the fact that it is snared in a logical fallacy.
I believe that the old apologetic practices of proofs and evidences as they arise from the biblical narrative must still be used. If they are not then we will be perceived as offering a story that only gives a perspective on a greater truth. Instead we must make it clear that the narrative of the resurrection is the core narrative that explains and gives coherence to all of history, including the personal history of my unbelieving neighbor.
Having said that I must further make it clear what I am not saying. I am not saying that giving the proofs and evidences for the resurrection constitute in any way the whole work of apologetics and/or evangelism. Instead, I am saying that before we invite our neighbor to stand and look at the narratives of God’s saving actions and to consider that the Bible brings a new way of understanding and interpreting life, we must be ready to defend the reality of that perspective by defending the factuality of the narrative, i.e., the factuality of the resurrection.

Plausibility Structures

Few writers lay out the groundwork for speaking of Christianity to a post-enlightenment epistemology than Leslie Newbigin. His book The Gospel in a Pluralist Society is rightly hailed as a classic, if for no other reason than his careful explication of the epistemological issues. Here I wish to highlight these and comment on them and their relevance to communication of the Gospel in the pluralist society of Canada.
Newbigin opens with a discussion of dogma and doubt, which is part of a wider discussion of plausibility structures. In brief, one of the key moves of the enlightenment was to place everything in doubt. Everything especially included traditions, dogma, and prejudice as things to be disregarded in the quest to know reality. Thus arose various attempts to give “the assured results” of science, or scientific historical inquiry, higher criticism, and other results of inquiry that could be verified and or tested.
Without belaboring the history of epistemology, it has been shown that the attempt to find absolute certainty fails. This is sometimes misunderstood as a collapse into relativism. As we shall see below, a door may be opened to relativism in new epistemological paradigms. However, there is at the same time an attempt once again to explore the role of tradition, dogma and prejudice in knowing truth.
Newbigin brilliantly summarizes this part of the project in three main points. “1. Every kind of systematic thought has to begin from some starting point. It has to begin by taking some things for granted. In every domain of though it is always possible to question the starting point, to ask “Why this rather than another?” or “What grounds are there for starting here?”… No coherent thought is possible without presuppositions. … 2. Every society depends for its coherence upon a set of what Peter Berger calls “plausibility structures,” patterns of belief and practice accepted within a given society, which determine which beliefs are plausible to its members and which are not…. 3. Finally, what may be considered to be an opening of the door to relativism in the establishment as a philosophical commonplace that “the truth is much greater than any one person or any one religious tradition can grasp.” Newbigin critiques this commonplace rather harshly.
I will make a few comments on each point in relation to speaking the gospel in a Canadian pluralist society.
First, Newbigin considers Christian dogma to be the starting point, the set of presuppositions, for the Christian’s thinking. Certainly Christian teaching functions as a framework for all the thinking of a Christian. However, from the standpoint of knowing, should we accept dogma as a starting point? There still has to be a place where believers and non-believers begin, where they agree that to do otherwise is to collapse into meaninglessness. Having said this I recognize that Newbigin assumes this and when he speaks of Christian dogma as the starting point he means that once we have agreed that knowledge is possible then Christian dogma shapes interpretation of the world and in so doing creates the plausibility structure. Newbigin is quite clear about reason:
"The faculty which we call reason, the power of the human mind to think coherently and to organize the data of experience in such a way that it can be grasped in meaningful patterns, is necessarily involved in all knowing of any kind." (TGIAPS, p.10)
Second, the social conditions of belief, the “patterns of belief and practice accepted within a given society, which determine which beliefs are plausible to it members and which are not” is not, Newbigin says, “reason” operating in a sort of vacuum. Rather, reason must operate within the context of “the tradition of a community which cherishes and lives by the story of God’s saving acts.”
Nevertheless, I would point out that the New Testament strongly connects to the plausibility structures and standards, not only of the Hebrew world which found dreams, visions and prophecies as things that created or enhanced plausibility, but also to those things accepted by the Greeks and the Romans as creating plausibility. For example, eyewitness accounts, reference to specific dates, referents to historical people, referents to specific geographic locations and sites (such as David’s grave), as well as local customs and laws. At the same time there is a strong counter-cultural thrust in the rejection of myth. And finally, for both the Greco/Roman world and the Hebrew world, signs and wonders did not require a plausibility structure to be understood, but instead they contributed to the plausibility structure. In other words, in both the case of Jesus and the apostles, healing the sick was accepted as an affirmation of the truth of their message.
It would seem to me that this second point of Newbigin’s is pivotal for any consideration of communication in today’s Canadian society. What is it that contributes to the plausibility structure of this society? Perhaps readers might be willing to join in this discussion.

Do We Also Need To Do An Apologetic For Logic?

There is also at this time a renewed interest in the work of Francis Schaeffer. I was present at Wheaton when he presented the sermons which later became the book: The God Who is There. Schaeffer had a profound and beneficial effect on my thinking and my spiritual walk. There is a core part of his methodology that needs to be thought through again.
Schaeffer was one of the first to wrestle with both apologetics and evangelism to what we now call post-modern people. He understood the central issues of post-enlightenment thinking and was able to marvelously illustrate them from the arts. He also grappled with the work of the Holy Spirit and of the Word of God and the reformed rejection of natural theology, which is the attempt to prove the existence of God apart from the revelation contained in Scripture.
However, he believed that apologetics is not only possible, but biblical. For him John 20:31 “but these are written that you may believe” is an invitation to apologetics-- the giving of reasons to believe, which is more than a defense.
Schaeffer spoke of “taking the roof off” of a person’s intellectual and spiritual house and letting existential rain come in. What he meant by that was that logic should be used to demonstrate the flaws in a non-theistic worldview, especially a worldview that we would now speak of as post-modern but which he spoke of as being “below the line of despair.” He saw the “roof” as the delusion of post-modern man that they can have modernism in science but post-modernism in ethics, art and spirituality. Once the roof was off, the rain could come in, that is, the reality of what the world really would look like if one actually lived out this worldview.
I think this approach, which he used in thousands of evangelistic conversations, has much for us to consider. The respectful approach that does not fear to engage a non-theistic or non-Christian worldview is very important. Further, when Schaeffer exposed the devastating consequences of post-modern thought and its linkage to the existential pain frequently being experienced by the people to whom he spoke, he would go beyond apologetics into soul care and soul cure.However, there also seemed to be in Schaeffer a need to convert people from a post-modern/Hegelian (below the line of despair) epistemology to a modern epistemology as part of “taking off the roof.” Schaeffer saw this from a non-acceptance of logic to an acceptance of logic, i.e., accepting that A cannot be non-A. This raises for us the issue: is it possible to do Christian apologetics without first doing an apologetic for a preferred epistemology?

Relational vs. Logical Apologetics

Once I taught apologetics in an Asian country, and there was some concern that I would bring western rational apologetics which were completely irrelevant. Through the years, I have considered this more and more to be a just concern.
Much of the apologetics that has been written in the past fifty years by evangelical protestants has been based on apologetics written to counter the enlightenment. An example would be the early E. J. Carnell, Gordon H. Clark, and later Norman Geisler who presented logical defenses for the existence of God and for the Christian faith.
However, current writers (David Fitch for example) who desire to engage our culture, decry the classical apologetic project as “modern” and therefore by definition unable to address a post-modern society. In sum, what is meant by this critique is that the defense of the Christian faith to modern or enlightenment thinking is done so using enlightenment assumptions and methods. Hence, as more and more the enlightenment project is considered to have failed, the Christian apologies written against the enlightenment are seen to have actually been co-opted by it and therefore share in its failure.
In the July 2008 issues of Christianity Today and Books and Culture carry articles on apologetics and articles that are in and of themselves defenses of the Christian faith. Consistently, the writers argue for the faith. Alvin Plantinga presents a logically thick attack on naturalism. Other apologists are featured or referred to because they are answering various atheistic attacks presented in the past year. These atheistic attacks are not framed in a post-modern motif, but are classic modernist attacks which seek to refute the core claims of Christianity on the basis of empirical evidence and logic.
Thus the rise of an aggressive, logic/empirical atheist apologetic demonstrates that there is a continued need for a hard-core logic-based Christian apologetic response. As dense as argumentation like Plantinga’s is, it is not simply an intellectual sport, it is a spiritual activity of tearing down strongholds. Some might argue that an argument such as his does little in the arena of evangelism. I would counter by saying that the opposition arguments have done much in the promotion of atheism, so we should not discount the effect of a tightly argued Christian response. However, there is more to the problem than the perfection of argumentation. More in the next blog.

The Golden Apple of Relevancy

Two years ago everyone was eager to preach on the Da Vinci Code, and I suppose there might be a sermon here or there this summer on Harry Potter, the last book of the seven appearing as it is. The need to address what is current is ever with a preacher, and those preachers who ignore what is happening in the world soon pay the price, for their sermons not only seem to be irrelevant, they actually become irrelevant.

Ahh relevancy. The golden apple of communication, or Snow White’s stepmother’s apple, filled with poison. Add to this the need to be relevant to those who do not believe. The Jim and Casper go to church project reminds me of the project of the Anglican Church in Canada which a number of years ago contracted with one of Canada’s foremost atheists, Pierre Berton, to ask his opinion on what the church should do to be more relevant. The result was Berton’s book The Comfortable Pew in which he said many of the things we hear from Casper: forget religion, go out and do good.

When Erwin McManus tells Casper that he won’t understand much of what is going on during the Mosaic worship service, Casper is offended. But actually McManus is in principle correct, for our eyes are blinded to the meaning and relevancy of the Word of God until illuminated by the Holy Spirit. This would also hold true for the worship service to the extent that the worship service is a proclamation of the Word. That is, what is truly understood, in the sense of gaining knowledge of God, is understood because of a gracious act of the Holy Spirit.
I think in our preaching and in our church services we need to return to deep dependence on the Spirit. In saying this I do cringe, because it has been such a cliché. And, wow, aren’t we all dependent? So, I don’t mean to say it as an accusation, but as a way of saying, we have done this, but we need to revisit what we are doing in seeking the Spirit and revitalize the very act of seeking. Or, become seekers before we can preach to seekers. Otherwise, everything is irrelevant by definition.

Jim, Casper and St. Benedict Go to Church

Benedict left the life of Roman society, where he had been born to wealth and privilege, to please the Lord. He tried to live a solitary life, but as others came to be taught by him, we might say “discipled by him” he established thirteen monasteries over which he became abbot. He gave to these a book of rules, now called Benedict’s Rule, which established a routine of prayer and the reading of the Psalms. Benedict’s Rule is became the guiding rule for monasteries across Europe. It is believed that Benedict died in 547. No one has ever found fog machines mentioned in Benedict’s rule.

Randall Holm is a professor of Biblical studies at Providence College in Winnipeg. He writes in a recent issue of TESTIMONY, the magazine of the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada, that he went to visit an Anglican Church in Winnipeg called St. Benedict’s Table. He notes, from their website, that they describe themselves as “first and foremost a Eucharistic worshipping community that is rooted in the ancient future.” Holm describes the service, rooted in audible reading of Scripture, minimal instrumentation for singing, singing songs that seem “calm and quiet the soul,” silence, and of course the Eucharist. He says: “I confess, I walked away from St. Benedict’s table refreshed. I experienced what the Taize community describes as a “holy stop, a sabbatical rest, a truce of worries.”

One of the things lost in the current discussion about church, seekers, worship, is that from the beginning Willow Creek drew a distinction between the worship service and the seeker service. The concept was that Christians would surrender their “right” to worship on Sunday and instead worship mid-week, so that seekers could come on Sunday for a meeting geared to share the gospel with them, but which was not a worship service.

Willow faithfully followed this philosophy and reaped great results. But, few other churches truly followed them in a pure way. So, the Sunday service in most churches became “seeker” which meant a worship service that is not really a worship service, but which is, on the other hand, still a worship service. The results have been mixed. Mixed because what happened too often was that the elements of worship went out the window so that seekers might find a comfort zone.

Is this part of the problem that is creating Barna’s Revolution? That is really hard for me to make a comment on. But, in reading Jim & Casper go to Church I think that it has contributed to the problem. Christians who have grown up in the stripped down worship service find that, in spite of music that is on the edge, and technology that has a wow factor, their souls have not come to a holy stop.

To be honest, I have to say, I don’t think they came to a holy stop in the average evangelical service in the sixties or early seventies either. That is why the Boomers jumped at contemporary music with its streams from African-American worship, Pentecostalism, rock, and folk and probably some other streams as well. And, it has and remains good.

But I hear from Jim and Casper and many others that something is missing, and so missing that they are just simply quitting church.

So, we had better figure out what is missing, and get it back.

Casper and Jim... continued

Casper says: “Certainty is boring. Certainty is closed off. Certainty is against new information. Certainty is a kind of orthodoxy, really, and it was those kinds of “certainty” moments – when I would hear a pastor or others in a church declare themselves absolutely certain of heaven, God’s existence, truth—that I would get a little riled.” (p.153).

Yet, Casper says that he is certain that the U. S. involvement in Iraq is wrong. “However, if he had been in favor of the war in Iraq, well, we would have had a real hard time being friends, Christian or not.” Jim nails him on this, “That sounds somewhat less-than-open-minded, Casper.” (p.90)

This so much reminds me of hearing Francis Schaefer tell how followers of Jean Paul Sartre bowed their heads down and wept when they heard that Sartre had signed the Manifesto of the 121, a declaration from one hundred twenty one French intellectuals which condemned the French war against the Algerian insurgency. In signing Sartre violated the basic premise of his existentialism, that there are no standards, no morals, that one can only gain authenticity by an act of will.

The pull of existentialism, which has contributed more than one card to the hand of what we now call post-modernism, has been like a magnetic north to twentieth century theology. Coming late to evangelicalism, it holds out hope of some refreshment with its emphasis on becoming an authentic person, but also poses powerful dangers.

One such danger is the dilemma of either an irrational leap of faith, which results in “faith in faith” as Schaefer characterized it, or a smugness of certainty in a system that, once discovered, seems to answer all questions. I would propose that this is a false dilemma.

I think the dilemma is false because I see the Bible presenting a middle ground. God has acted in history, and there are witnesses. Yet, we are called upon to risk our eternal souls on their credibility. In the end, faith is faith, but it is not faith leaping into the unknown, it is faith in a God who truly exists, who truly sent his Son into our world to live, die, rise, ascend and come again. Thus, after the Bible, our most ancient document begins with Credo – I believe, and after that, all the things I believe in.

We truly need to hear a condemnation of smugness in stating our beliefs. We need to be honest that we are beset by doubts and assailed by fears. But, we must also say that our belief is not something that has been made up to make us feel better, but something that can be inquired into and about which an assessment of truth can be made.

Casper, Jim and Barna

Of high interest is Jim & Casper Go to Church, published by Tyndale, 2007, a Barna Imprint. The premise is simple. Casper is an atheist from San Diego and Jim, who runs a ministry titled Off the Map contracts with Casper to visit a number of churches, discuss them, rate them, and produce this book. In spite of the fact that the book essentially supports Barna’s thesis in Revolution, and probably Jim Henderson’s thesis as well, the book produces great insights and profound challenges. Every pastor should read it.

What I like is the Q & A at back.. It seems to be a Q & A with Henderson, but it picked up some of my challenges and thoughts as I read through.

The book caused me to consider the following.

Is the imitation rock concert that we call a worship service, really a worship service? Casper wants to know if Jesus told us to buy those fog machines. I can see that if rock concerts are the culture of today, then we need to worship in that culture. But, has this picked up the same deadness as the Hammond organ worship service of the mid-twentieth century?

More deeply, what is a worship service?

Then, is our preaching nearly as relevant as we think it is? Casper is really difficult to challenge with a sermon. After hearing a sermon he counters with questions relating to overall biblical context and application to life. His critiques make me think more deeply about my sermons, and make me want to do way better.

And, in total resonance with Barna, both Casper and Jim want to deconstruct the church to what my son calls a pre-ecclesiology. Virtually echoing Barna, they want to know if the main mission of Jesus was to establish a church.

In this I hear a faint echo of Kierkegaard’s question: “how in Christendom can one be a Christian?” Is it really what God wanted – that we should all gather every week, sing, take an offering and listen to a sermon – and the Eucharist in some churches? Or was being a disciple intended to be something else? That is the challenge that Barna, and now Casper, are throwing down to us.

This blog is open for comments.

A Wall of Remembrance

Speaking of Gracia Burnham who was the lone survivor after the Philippine army, in attempting to rescue her, her husband and a Filipina nurse, Mark Bowden says:

“The raid had been characterized by many in the press as a debacle, but Gracia lived up to her name. She thanked the Philippine people for their prayers, and she thanked the government for her rescue. She talked about how much her husband had loved the country.”
(Mark Bowden, “Jidahasts in Paradise” The Altlantic Monthly, March 2007).

I picture Hebrews 11 as a long wall dedicated to memory. Perhaps the first was the
Vietnam Memorial, quiet and long in its display of names. But since then we have seen walls of remembrance spring up after catastrophic events. Pictures, notes, letters, are pinned to them. I see Hebrews eleven as somewhat like that and pinned to it are the names of all the people of faith. The writer walks up and snatches off a piece of paper with a name on it – Able, turns to us and says a few words, perhaps reading from the note itself. And then, Abraham, and Sarah, and after them he begins to walk along the wall and read various names, almost randomly, adding here and there a comment. And there are more he says – too many to read all of them, but they are there. And from the time he wrote the epistle until now the wall has continued to fill up. Patrick, who brought Christ to the Irish, and Luther, and yes, a village pastor who preached even though it seemed no one cared, and a mother who prayed without ceasing for her daughter. On and on it goes. Gracia Burnham who endured unspeakable agony, only to see her husband and friend die in the end. And now three brothers in Turkey who were faithful to the end. Is there a piece of paper up there with my name on it? What does it say?

Gifting or Office?

The following brief exchange is in response to my pastoral letter which may be found under President at www.cmacan.org The letter concerns the authority of a pastor over the teaching of the Word in the church. Sharon's concern is that I have stated that, with all proper disclaimers in place, the word is the word of the Lord. She asks if this is actually a reference to the prophetic gift.


I don't usually respond... but this time I couldn't help it. I was wondering where the gifts of prophet,apostle and evangelist fit in with this ministry of pastor. I think in a practical sense that we combine these roles and gifts -- pastor/evangelist or pastor/prophet. But I don't know anymore if this is really the right understanding or the best way. In the last couple of paragraphs of your letter I think you have combined the gifts of pastor and prophet. I would like to argue for more separation -- we need the prophet in our churches, in our denomination. But I don't necessarily agree that the pastor IS the prophet. I would love to see this conversation continued on your blog and see what others are thinking. Sharon

OK, I’ll move it over to the blog. But briefly what we have here is a distinction between office and gift. So, a pastor may not have the gift of prophet etc. but he is in charge of the teaching in his church by reason of office. And, no matter what, when he preaches he should expect the anointing for that moment. Now, what about pastors who have no giftedness in either prophecy or teaching? One really has to ask if they should be in the position of teaching every week, i.e., should they be the lead pastor? I don’t think so. With Sincerity, Franklin

Marks of the Church II

Marks of the Church II

Marks of the Church II

One of the respondents asked for a fuller presentation of the Marks of the Church. Thomas Oden’s Systematic Theology, Life in the Spirit, Vol. 3, gives an excellent summary. The Reformed tradition identifies Word (true teaching), Sacrament (proper celebration of Lord’s Supper and Baptism), and Discipline. Earlier creeds identified the church by Unity (founded in Jesus Christ – 2 or 3 gathered in his name…), Holiness (set apart from the world), Catholicity (not bound to a particular place or time) and Apostolicity (grew out of and continues the teaching and ministry of the Apostles). Oden combines the two streams into a “consolidating thesis: That ekklesia in which the Word is rightly preached and sacraments rightly administered and discipline rightly ordered will be one, holy, catholic and apostolic.”

This is very important because we have those who say that we should do mission first, that is, simply proclaim the gospel, and not worry at all about what comes out of it, i.e., the church. At first glance this may seem attractive. But in fact the church begins at Pentecost and it begins with the true preaching of the apostles, with baptism and the breaking of bread, with unity, for as the converts scattered they understood their continuing unity in the Holy Spirit, and with holiness.

This is the core. If we recapture it, then we can stop wasting ink telling each other that a church can be a church even if it meets in a cave or a garage and even if it uses a different format and on and on. Of course it can. But, it can’t be the church without the above marks. So I would beg you that when we talk about how the church needs to change etc. that we start here with the historic understanding of what is being talked about when we say “church.” From here the discussion has promise of being very fruitful.

Marks of the Church

In late November 2006 the Saturday National Post Toronto magazine ran an article titled “God finds a home on Bay Street.” King-Bay chaplaincy, a ministry with a long a solid history, is featured, but also the fact that small groups that focus on prayer, Bible study or both, are beginning to proliferate in the financial district of Toronto.

For some these spiritual oases, as one person describes them, almost function as church. George Barna, in his book Revolution, says that this sort of this is what is beginning to replace traditional church. So the question: when is a group a church?

I think Barna might say that the question is irrelevant. The theological concept of identifying what is a church and what is not a church is simply a misconception. His perspective is completely modern, that is, focused on the individual. The individual must move forward in discipleship, becoming a person who meets the marks of a disciple as found in the New Testament. That is all that matters. Any means by which an individual can get help in doing that is fine. There is no need to worry about the legitimacy or illegitimacy of the service provider, so to speak.

I think the answer lies somewhere in the middle. I think the church is something in and of itself. The New Testament seems to make this clear – but in this piece I don’t want to go into a lengthy exposition of that. So, on that assumption, the church does have a particular place in the economy of God and her health and well being are matters of both concern and interest.

There are things which only the church can provide. These constitute the marks of the church. They include sound teaching that has an accountability structure behind it, and the sound administration of the sacraments, among other things.

At the same time the proliferation of groups and ministries in the market place has to be one of the most exciting spiritual things to happen in Canada in decades. People can and are moved forward in discipleship in these and other venues.

So, I wish to affirm and ratify such things. But, until the full ministry that God wishes to provide is provided through them, they are not church nor are they a substitute for church.

As I write this I am trying to do checks on myself to make sure that I am not doing “bunker mentality” stuff. If anyone wants to correct me, I will listen. Marks of the Church

Staying in Touch

Downfall, a German film about he last days of Hitler, presents some of the most disturbing images of the second world war that I have ever seen. Hitler and his staff are in a large underground bunker as the Soviets advance on Berlin. As news comes of the collapse of German defenses, Hitler continues to order armies to move forward in a pincer movement and drive them back. The only problem? Those armies no longer exist in a meaningful fashion. The total disconnect is highlighted by Eva Braun’s writing to her sister telling her where items of jewelry have been left for repair, and what bills to expect. On the city streets it is obvious that there won’t be bills from any jewelry shops for quite awhile.

This event is perhaps the origin of the phrase “bunker mentality.” It is to take “believing in yourself” and “following your dream” to a place where only destruction awaits. It is to now listen to advice, to eliminate contrary information, to form a death wish rather than allow change.

Leadership requires that “bunker mentality” be resisted absolutely and rigoriously.

Rebirthing Simpson's Vision

Rebirthing Simpson's Vision

Church as a Moral Project

The National Post on Saturday September 23, 2006 published a very provocative column by Andrew Coyne on dual citizenship. Currently in Canada there is a debate on whether people should be allowed to be dual citizens, i.e., Canadians and whatever. Coyne said that Canadians have begun to look upon the nation as a service provider and hence they join in order to receive certain benefits. Instead, he argues, a nation is a “moral project” and people should join because they are committing to this moral project.

I have had to set aside the obvious question: “what is Canada’s moral project” because I can’t seem to come up with an answer. But my mind has turned on this intriguing thought to other commitments. For example, church.

In the nineties the presentation of church as a provider of services loomed on the horizon, and by the turn of the century was probably the most accepted profile among evangelicals. I don’t think it has made its way into formal theological expression, but certainly it has become a working ecclesiology.

And, while that was happening, the same motif was adopted as a definition of denominations. They are, in this motif, the next level of service providers. Denominations, and their subsets, districts, diocese, what have you, are there to provide resources and other services to the church, which in turn is there to provide resources and other services to the people who attend.

Like all concepts, there is of course a large element of truth in this. Churches have always provided for many needs in the lives of people, both individually and communally. For example, the church has frequently been a place for the training of musicians and for musical expression. This is a need that people have, that is, a need for beauty and artistic expression, and people still have this need. Many other felt or unfelt needs could be listed.

This is all fine and good. What I am wondering is this. To what extent have we lost the concept of the church as a moral and, I will add, a spiritual project? That is, the church as something which we join because we believe in what is happening there and we want to be part of making it happen?

As I write this I can already see the responses that will remind me that “this generation does not want to join – they are suspicious of organizations and reluctant to commit.” Perhaps I can jump ahead in the discussion and ask – are we as the church part of the problem? Have we contributed to this non-commitment/individualistic mind set? And, is it possible for pastors and people to find their way back to a concept of local church and denomination as being a project to which we commit?