As a second-grader, I thrilled to be able to actually see, close-up, a genuine U.S. Navy fighter jet parked on the tarmac of a base visitor’s center while we were on vacation to the east coast. So, a few weeks later, I was overwhelmed when my dad brought home my first Renwal plastic model kit – “AUTHENTIC IN EVERY DETAIL” – of that fighter jet, and I couldn’t wait to rip off the cellophane and open the cardboard box and peer inside.

It was almost as advertised on the box, down to the last rivet, except for one major detail: the nose cone. While the prototype jet had a sharp, pointed, air-piercing nose; the model kit had a blunt bulb of misshapen plastic and an instruction sheet which advised the modeler to soften the bulb chemically or with heat and shape by hand to conform to the original.

Clearly, this required powers and abilities far beyond those of a seven-year-old child and a father who had never before assembled a plastic model kit.

So we put it together as it was and mounted it on its clear styrene stand. But with its Jimmy Durante schnozz, it was pretty hard for me to imagine it soaring in the stratosphere at supersonic speed.

The U.S. Navy fighter jet I saw was genuine – the real thing.

The model kit was not quite authentic – like the real thing; only smaller. (And with a pug nose.)

Genuine, Authentic. These words, as here compared, have reference to historical documents. We call a document genuine when it can be traced back ultimately to the author or authors from whom it professes to emanate. Hence, the word has the meaning, “not changed from the original, uncorrupted, unadulterated:” as, a genuine text. We call a document authentic when, on the ground of its being thus traced back, it may be relied on as true and authoritative (from the primary sense of “having an author, vouched for”); hence its extended signification, in general literature, of trustworthy, as resting on unquestionable authority or evidence; as, an authentic history; an authentic report of facts.

A genuine book is that which was written by the person whose name it bears, as the author of it. An authentic book is that which relates matters of fact as they really happened. A book may be genuine without being, authentic, and a book may be authentic without being genuine. –Bp. Watson.

– Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary

I’ll leave this thought with you while I’m winging to California on a decidedly subsonic passenger jet with a nose cone somewhere between the two described above:

I wonder if too many Christians aspire to – and are satisfied with – an authentic faith, an authentic worship experience, an authentic church,- all just like the real thing IN EVERY DETAIL ….

… rather than the genuine article, the real thing, the faith that comes from the heart, the worship that is in Spirit and in truth, the church that the Lord established through the water and His blood.

It’s a fine distinction.

But an important one.

Angi and I will be presenting a class on the Pilgrim Heart Group Guide we wrote on Friday at the Pepperdine Lectureship (http://www.pepperdine.edu/biblelectures/schedule/complete-by-participant.htm?id=10337), and we’re looking forward to seeing good friends, meeting new friends and enjoying our first getaway together – without our kids attached – in about a decade. Too long!

Our home church is really well represented among presenters this year … our Singles Minister, our Family Life Center Manager, even a part-time member who lives in Tennessee but has family here and visits frequently.

We’re eagerly anticipating Pie Night, fish tacos, ocean air and ZOE worship.

And you, hopefully!

I just received my copy of Pagan Christianity? by Frank Viola and George Barna from Amazon, and have begun to read the first chapter.

I’m going to withhold full judgment until I’ve read it fully, but my first impression is mixed.

I can’t disagree with the premise that a lot of what Christians do today in gathered worship has little in common with what Christians did in their worship together in century one.

What I’m not certain about is whether that’s a completely bad thing.

The first chapter of the book speaks to the point that both Jews and pagans differed from early Christians in their worship by their emphases on sacred places, people and things – and that, over time, Christianity began to absorb the same fascinations. Did Christians in century one never purchase or build a place for worship together? There’s no record of it in scripture. Can we assume that it never happened?

More importantly – does it matter?

Can God be worshiped acceptably in other places?

In the early days of Christianity, Jewish Christians met in the temple courtyards. Daily.

For good reason: Jesus taught in the temple courts, too. And on mountainsides, from a boat, on a plain. He accepted worship in the home of a Pharisee, on the streets as he traveled, on horseback … all right, donkeyback. He went to synagogue, read Isaiah there. (Synagogue was not something God included in His commandments revealed through Moses.) He prayed in lonely places. He sang with his followers after Passover in a second-story room. He prayed in a garden.

Stephen taught on the road in a chariot. Paul taught (and presumably worshiped) in synagogues, and when they booted him out, went next door to the synagogue ruler’s house or rented a lecture hall. (He could have spent the money on meeting the needs of the poor.) Or looked for a place of worship and prayer by a river where there might not be any synagogues. Christians met in homes, broke bread together – however you wish to interpret that phrase.

You can probably think of a lot more.

I get the picture that what’s important about worshiping together is not so much the where, but the how: in spirit and in truth. With His Spirit poured into our hearts to commune with Him; with our hearts, minds, souls and strength truly engaged.

If God accepts worship from within a stinky animal stable from foreign astrologers, from inside a religious leader’s home tainted by a sinner’s perfume, from a magnificent incense-fragranced temple made with hands, from a fresh-aired lake or a mountainside or a plain made by His hand – where can we go to escape His Spirit? Where can we flee from His presence?

Are we not to be the aroma of Christ to others wherever we are?

Are the prayers of the saints not regarded as incense to Him in heaven?

Does scripture ever, at any point, say that God has vested authority in scripture?

He has given it to His Son, to His Son’s followers, to leaders, even in a limited way to Satan for a time. But to scripture? Ever?

If not, where do some folks get that idea?

Three simple verses, all beginning with the word “but.” They have a couple of other keywords in common.

“But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” ~ Jesus, Matthew 9:13

“But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’ ” ~ Jesus, Luke 18:13

“But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his unlimited patience as an example for those who would believe on him and receive eternal life.” ~ Paul, 1 Timothy 1:16

Did you catch the keywords?

I think they begin with “but” because they state a truth that is in contrast to the world’s view and behavior. That is, to my view and behavior, all too often.

When I think I’ve sacrificed, when I’m tempted to boast to God in prayer about all I’ve done for Him, when I’m convinced that I’ve been doing the right thing in the right way and for the right reason … I need to be reminded Whose perfection and sacrifice did everthing for me that I could not do.

I need to be reminded that – though forgiven – I am still a sinner, and that I should show what I have been shown; give what I have been given: mercy, faith, patience, an example.

Some things I’m curious about:

Was the “Law of Prohibitive Silence” created from the motto “We speak where the Bible speaks; we are silent where the Bible is silent” created by the Restoration founders?

What name(s) can be credited with its first phrasing and defense? (Surely – unlike Topsy – it must have be borned rather than just growed.)

Was its use initially or primarily to refute instrumental worship, or was its early use just as often dedicated to refuting cooperation among churches, multiple communion cups and sundry other items termed “innovations”?

Has anyone done a scholarly study of any elucidations of the “Law of Prohibitive Silence” regarding the amount of inductive reasoning compared to the amount of deductive reasoning used?

By the way, I don’t know the answers to these questions; I am honestly asking them.

It just seems like the answers would be enlightening.

If you skip over this link to Doug Schaefer’s post Did Jesus Come to Teach Us How to Live?, you will miss a profound insight into an aspect of Jesus’ nature and character we often miss, an insight clearly and humbly expressed.

That said, I believe Jesus did come to teach us how to live – among many other things for which He came – to be Himself a perfect example of self-sacrifice so that we would not be willing to settle for less.

And, realizing that we cannot live up to it, to be willing to accept His perfection, given to us through grace as a gift beyond any other price.

When we rely pretty much solely on opening our church buildings to the public at large and inviting them in with a sign out front or – at a very progressive church – with a newspaper advertisement or a (gasp!) flyer or a radio or TV spot …

When we tacitly invite those yet unreached by the love of Christ to sit in our church buildings and listen to our lessons and sing our songs with us and pray our prayers with us and innately comprehend our secret biblical language and all of its insider terminology …

When we kinda expect them to clean up themselves and their clothing and their lives before setting foot on our holy premises and mingling in our holy fellowship …

Are we expecting too much of the Holy Spirit?

True, He is promised to guide Jesus’ followers into all truth; to convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment.

But …

It was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves but you, when they spoke of the things that have now been told you by those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. Even angels long to look into these things. ~ I Peter 1:12

Are we expecting Him to go out and do all the work for us – but without us?

… they always fall off.”

If you grew up during the golden age of Ronco television commercials, you will not be able to forget this one for the Buttoneer. The commercial’s voice-over repeated this phrase ad nauseam.

The problem with the commercial is … well, they don’t. Buttons don’t always fall off.

You would be a soul of weak and gullible mind to believe such a claim to begin with, but even the tender-aged among us shrugged off such outlandish illogic as simply advertising.

The problem with the commercial is … well, we absorbed that “simply advertising” shrug as a culture and made it acceptable in discourse to assert outlandish and illogical claims as proof of the point we wish to sell.

It’s as if the vast majority of us slept through Sesame Street the morning that the show covered “sometimes, always and never.”

Christianity has not been at all immune to this tactic. Even those who consider themselves the most logical among us fall prey to the most insidious logical fallacies – which, as far as I can tell, are only rarely taught in our schools these days so that they can be recognized for what they are.

A couple of examples:

“I’d rather be a legalist than an illegalist.”

Well, that sounds right, doesn’t it? Plus, it’s short and clever-sounding. The problem is that it assumes that there are only two mutually-oppositional positions available and the other one is morally wrong, therefore being a legalist is morally right.

“The postmodernist claims that he can’t and doesn’t know anything for certain.”

The problem is that this is a generalization, an overstatement, un-attributed to any source, and applied to a labelled group of people. Worse, there is an implication that such people are somehow stupid by choice and can’t be taught anything, so why try?

Behind such rationalizations is an implicit demeanor of “I’m right; you’re wrong. I go to heaven; you go to hell.” That pride and arrogance – rather than true rational thinking – is what puts off so many unreached people whose first encounter with Christianity is that attitude. The truth is that all have sinned and fall short of God’s glory. The truth is that while we were impotent, Christ died for us, the ungodly. The truth is that no one is righteous; not even one of us.

That’s the truth we need to express in thought and word and deed and attitude and behavior.

The problem is that self-righteous, chest-swelling, button-popping pride.

Please pray for my blogging brother Kinney Mabry, who blogs as “preacherman” at http://kinneymabry.blogspot.com/.

He has been suffering severe migraines of late, and though a CAT scan showed no tumors, he is concerned about an upcoming neurological exam.

I have migraines from time to time, too, but I have only had the debilitating, fetal-position-in-a-cool-dark-room-thank-God-I-don’t-have-a-gun-in-the-house kind three times that I can remember. (You don’t want to remember them.)

Also please remember storm victims in the midwest states through which the storms and tornadoes tore a swath last night; my church’s Luke 10:37 response team is gearing up to go to north central Arkansas as soon as possible. (One of their leaders is unavailable right now, since he’s down in Honduras building a couple of houses as a volunteer.)

But especially lift Kinney to the Father.