The Morning Walk

/ W. Keith Brenton / 2 Comments

When my dog Roadie and I leave the front door behind at 6:05 a.m. for the morning walk, it is just a shade lighter outside than pitch-black. Here in the Nantahala National Forest — a temperate rainforest — virtually every morning begins with the mountains permeated by mist.

The fog is cool and luminescent, providing the only light. As dawn encroaches and the pupils dilate, the sourceless light becomes only slightly brighter. Using a penlight only makes matters worse; like headlights in dense night fog, the result is only brighter fog.

Air is humid and fresh with a thousand scents: conifers, deciduous trees, ferns, wildflowers, mushrooms, molds, decay. Roadie’s nose tells him a hundred thousand things I would never understand. He pokes. He prods. He investigates.

I breathe it in. I walk. I walk by faith; not by sight — because there isn’t enough light to walk by sight. Roadie is simply a pure-ebony smudge in a setting of charcoal grey. I can barely make out his goofy-looking sideways walk when he reaches the end of his leash. Oddly, even the blacktop appears lighter than tree-trunks or leafy plants. It’s a darkness that tells lies about light, but shares sweet secrets about the wild.

Unlike the views from a few vistas on our evening walk, no distant hills or peaks are visible.

But they are alive, because you can hear them. Crickets, at first. A few peeper frogs who have unsuccessfully dragged the mating call on all night down the hill by the stream feeding Scott’s Creek. Occasionally, the sound of a rig downshifting to climb the hill on distant 441; or a sleepy driver wandering momentarily onto the rumble strips at the side of the pavement. Once in a while, the notes of the first-awakening songbird of the day.

Before the day begins, the world is new. The morning’s bad news has not been seen yet on the television or in the newspaper on the front walk. The tweets and facebook posts of loneliness, pain, stupidity, regret, anger and orneriness have not yet been read. The uncultured wails of country, rock or rap have not yet been heard on the car radio.

Each day has a chance.

Each day has potential.

Each day has a warm, waiting home with sleeping, loving family still tucked cozily under their covers at the end of the return trail.

The woodland light continues to brighten as Roadie and I pause so I can close the front door behind us to grind the beans and perk the coffee.

Whatever the day brings, each day is going to be a good day.

We’ve decided, Roadie and me.

A Spirit-Filled Church

/ W. Keith Brenton / 4 Comments

Do you worship with a church that is primarily concerned with getting it right and doing it right and not doing something wrong?

A church that is a little afraid to do anything because it might not be directly authorized by scripture and might be wrong?

Do you gather with saints who speak mostly of duty and law and authority and judgment?

You’re not alone, and there are many more like you who yearn to be free to worship every day.

Here is something you are free to do and it’s authorized by scripture:

Pray for your church.

Jesus prayed for His church, with some of the last breaths He took as a mortal (John 17).

Paul prayed for the churches in Rome (Romans 1:8-10), Ephesus (Ephesians 1:16), Philippi (Philippians 1:4), Colossae (Colossians 1:3), Thessalonica (1 Thessalonians 1:2),  He prayed for them constantly, always, without stopping — those phrases characterize his descriptions of his prayers for them.

Pray that your fellow believers will receive the Holy Spirit, and receive power and wisdom through Him, just as those in scripture did (Acts 8:15; Ephesians 3:16; Colossians 1:9).

Pray in the Spirit (Romans 8:26; Ephesians 6:18; Jude 1:20).

Pray in faith (Matthew 21:22; Mark 11:24).

Pray boldly to be able to speak boldly. Pray for God to stretch out His hand. Pray for your church to be shaken (Acts 4:23-31).

Ask for the Holy Spirit for yourself, as well (Luke 11:13). He is a promise made to you (Acts 2:37-39).

Then have the courage to start being the answer to your prayers (1 Corinthians 16:13).

It’s important! Vitally, crucially, eternally important!

… And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ.But if Christ is in you, then even though your body is subject to death because of sin, the Spirit gives life because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who livesin you.” ~ Romans 8:9-11

If you can’t see words in scripture that say the Holy Spirit of God and of Jesus Christ is now just a passive, passe, common enthusiasm like the “Spirit of St. Louis,” then it’s not true.

If you can’t see words in scripture that say the Holy Spirit is now just present in you only through your reading of scripture, then it’s not true.

If you can’t see words in scripture that say the Holy Spirit will stop living within, working within, comforting from within, empowering from within, then it’s not true.

If you can’t see words in scripture that say the Holy Spirit “living in you” is just a metaphor; just a simile; just a manner of speaking, then it’s not true.

No matter how many times you hear it; no matter how loudly it’s repeated; no matter how hard the pulpit is pounded when it’s said, it’s not true.

It’s a lie. And it’s from Satan. And it’s designed to de-emphasize, demoralize, and de-energize the church that Christ died to empower with the gospel of truth: the Spirit is His free gift to us, and through that Spirit, life without end.

That life begins in the here-and-now; a life that lives in Christ, for Christ, through Christ by the power of His Spirit living in you.

The utter, plain, inarguable truth of that is the reason that Paul could claim:

I have become its servant by the commission God gave me to present to you the word of God in its fullness—the mystery that has been kept hidden for ages and generations, but is now disclosed to the Lord’s people. To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.

He is the one we proclaim, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ. To this end I strenuously contend with all the energy Christ so powerfully works in me. ~ Colossians 1:25-28

If you want to worship with a Spirit-filled church, be a Spirit-filled person.

Let it begin with you.

Stand for the truth.

Scholars, Logic, Faith, and Making Sense

/ W. Keith Brenton / Leave a comment

I have as much respect for biblical scholars, theological thinkers and ancient language experts as anyone else. Great men are great men. Great women are great women. But opinions are also opinions, which means that great scholars’ opinions are just great scholars’ opinions.

And, obviously, when something doesn’t make good sense … well, then it doesn’t good sense, whether it’s a great scholar’s  opinion, or yours, or mine.

I don’t believe God breathed inspiration into scripture with the overarching intention to confuse us and conceal His will for us, or to make it the private authoritative domain of biblical scholars. Their expertise can certainly help, but of all people, scholars who teach should know the difference between fact and opinion and be able and honest enough to distinguish them.

Our purpose cannot be to defend the historical interpretations, doctrines and opinions of scholarly men and women without question – however great, intelligent and faithful they might be or might have been.

We’re not responsible for their reading of scripture or their knowledge or their faithfulness, but of our own — and how we live accordingly.

Our purpose must be to seek Truth, for in doing so we seek Jesus who is also the Way and the Life. And through Him we seek the Father, our God.

“Do not quench the Spirit. Do not treat prophecies with contempt but test them all; hold on to what is good, reject every kind of evil.” – 1 Thessalonians 5:19-22
That said, when seeking to make sense of scripture that seems perplexing:
Logic has its place in Christian thought. But it’s not first place.

Faith has first place.

Because logic is what tells you not to believe when you see or hear something impossible. Logic is what tells you, “That’s impossible! I can’t believe that. That did not just happen!”

Yet it did.

So faith comes first, and we all know what faith is: “Faith is believing when common sense tells you not to.” (My scripture text is “Miracle on 34th Street” by Valentine Davies, of course. However, John 20:24ff or Hebrews 11will do nicely, too.)

Now, logic will help you sort out what you have/have not seen or heard, and what is or isn’t possible. It will help make sense of that which does not immediately make sense. But it must work within the context or framework of faith.

We believe in gravity, mass, air, airless vacuum, love, justice, mercy and courage though they are invisible. We believe because we see their effects. Logic tells us there must be a cause for these effects, and faith puts a name to each cause because we believe it must exist.

They work together.

But faith first.

Logic later.

(First published on Facebook in two parts, 8/11/12.)

Homosexuality: We Don’t Know What We’re Talking About

/ W. Keith Brenton / 9 Comments

Wow, He Really Knows What He's Talking AboutGive the word a Google: homosexuality. Look it up in dictionaries. Seek out its etymology.

As a word, it’s not that old; just a little over a century.

And the definitions differ. Some describe attraction or desire as well as activity or intercourse … and others don’t. Plus, in the past few generations, the distinction has been blurred with the addition of the word “orientation,” and the word “gay” as a preferred description.

In short, when we talk about it … we don’t know what we’re talking about.

Not exactly.

And when believers talk about it, and the use of the word in newer translations of the Bible, we especially don’t know what we’re talking about.

Since the word was coined a little over 100 years ago, you won’t find homosexual or any of its daughter-words in English translations older than that.

As an adjective it does, in practice and fact, describe both desires/feelings/attractions and actions/intercourse.

As nearly as I can tell, what the Bible speaks of is — in the original languages Greek and Hebrew — actions between individuals of the same sex, specifically male (as much of scripture is, having been written in eras of patriarchal prejudice), and the wording is “man on man.” This isn’t talking about conversations mano a mano or a type of basketball defense. It’s talking about sexual activity, not desire, and it’s talking about something that does not please God.

Let’s not go crazy about this. There are about four or five times the concept comes up in all of scripture. God just doesn’t like it. He didn’t like it in the era of the Old Testament and He doesn’t like it in the era of the New Testament.

In the interest of full disclosure, I am no Greek or Hebrew scholar nor do I play one on TV. That’s why I said, “As nearly as I can tell.” You need to research the matter for yourself; I’m not going to try to condense mine here because it defies abbreviation. Look up the terms used. Look up the scriptures in which they’re used. Look at the parts of speech that are used, and the (no pun intended) conjugations used in the phrasing of the verses. Look at what it means, and if you have to put aside something you have been taught that it means in order to do so, then be brave enough to take God’s word over man’s.

I’ve looked into this as deeply as my brain knows how, for more than the number of years since I wrote The One Where I Just Lose. I’ve come to these conclusions after years of study, prayer, and love for people who are troubled about it. You need to reach your own conclusions, however long it takes and however much it hurts.

I don’t know the reasons why some people feel homosexual attractions or feel them so strongly. I haven’t experienced them, and as much as I would like to be able to sympathize, I simply can’t.

But I can see no evidence in scripture that having those desires or being tempted by them is a sin, or sinful by its nature, or something that causes one to be damned.

It is in acting on tempting desires that displeases God, not in being tempted by them. That’s true of heterosexual desires outside of marriage as surely as it is of homosexual desires. Activity can include choosing to gladly host wholesale lust until acting physically on it is almost inevitable — and in the meantime, the heart meant for God has been turned inward toward self and the conscience almost irrevocably seared.

There are all kinds of sexual behavior and choice that are displeasing to God. Some are more harmful than others; some are downright depraved; a few are even murderous and I don’t even like to think about the fact that they exist.

Probably consensual homosexual activity is one of the socially least harmful of these; and as society sees things currently, consensual homosexuality carries almost no perception of harm.

That doesn’t mean that it’s pleasing to God, or that He wants it for anyone. So there is a harm: it’s in the fact that homosexual activity (and other sins, sexual and otherwise!) will never be something that God wants for us; He wants something better for us. That may be marriage. It may be celibacy.

I hate to be so stark about it, but scripture doesn’t really describe any other good alternatives. Both can be rich gifts from God and powerful lifestyles through which He is served and glorified.

There are alternatives, of course; but they are not good and do not particularly serve Him nor glorify Him. They may serve the desires of self very well, but unfortunately that means that they may very well serve the purposes of the accuser, Satan, too.

God wants better for us. God wants more for us. God wants Himself for us. I have no shame in telling any of my dearly-loved friends this, no matter what they are tempted by or how powerfully their desires draw them. I need to hear it myself, and often, from fellow believers when my will falters and my desire for God withers.

He made us. He knows what is best for us.

All we know is what we want.

Let me reiterate that I do not know why people have homosexual desires and temptations. Let me add, though, that I also do not know why people have heterosexual desires outside of marriage and temptations of every other kind. I don’t know why some people are born healthy and whole and bright and beautiful — and others are not. I don’t know why some are devastated by disease and accident and divorce and chronic pain and death of dear ones — and others escape some or most of these.

Except that we live in a fallen world, a world broken by sin, and what God asks of each of us is to be part of fixing the breaks and raising the world closer to Him — using the gifts, talents, abilities, time, resources, passion, love, faith and gratitude that He has put into our lives for that purpose.

Not our purpose. Not the accuser’s purpose.

His purpose.

So what does a believer do to be a part of God’s plan to reconcile the world to Himself through Jesus, the Christ, the Son of the living God?

Stop judging others.

Love others deeply.

Keep oneself unspotted.

Stop trying to legislate others out of sin. Sin is not a matter that law can handle. We spent a whole testament of scripture proving to God how that doesn’t work, just as if He didn’t already know it.

Sin is a matter of the heart.

Don’t be afraid to tell someone you love that “I think God wants something better for you than what you’ve chosen. I think He wants something better for me than judging other people, and I have a terrible struggle with that. I think He wants better for both of us.”

The Difficult Part

/ W. Keith Brenton / 4 Comments

Now it comes. In ten days, the movers come to start packing up what we haven’t already packed, then to load it in a truck and start for North Carolina three days after that.

Now comes the time we have to say goodbye to family, friends and church family.

We’ll be leaving behind our nineteen-year-old son so he can finish his schooling.

We’ll be parting with dear friends, colleagues and co-workers left to carry on good works we shared a passion for — but without us.

I’ll be leaving my church home for 24 out of the last 29 years for the third time to move out of state. I’ve moved back twice before. This time, there is no real prospect of that happening again.

There will be luncheons and dinners and opportunities to say our goodbyes in these next few hours. Oh, we’ll be back to visit from time to time — because we’ve left that son behind!

But it won’t be the same.

We’ll pray to be blessed with new friends and new church home, and undoubtedly will be.

But it won’t be the same.

There will even be others who’ll become valuable to the ones we leave and the works we enjoyed doing.

But it won’t be the same.

Life isn’t about things staying the same.

Faith isn’t about things staying the same, either … but about believing when you didn’t before … turning from the wrong you were convinced wasn’t that wrong before … confessing what you weren’t sure about before … becoming immersed in the life of Someone you didn’t know before.

It isn’t easy, and it isn’t just five steps, and it isn’t over when you’ve done them. Anyone who tells you differently is trying to sell you a package deal of do-it-and-be-done when the reality is Jesus-did-it-so-you-can-too-all-your-life-long.

The difficult part is saying goodbye to your old life, when much of it really was good and nearly-perfect and comforting and comfortable.

I actually think it’s easier to face the challenge of moving on to the next part of your life and all of its discomfort and challenges that it is to leave the old life behind. The life-you-know calls to you and beckons you back, and as long as you revisit the good parts and not the bad, there’s nothing wrong with spending some time in Memoryville with familiar, cherished ones.

As long as you keep the visits short.

A lot of you folks reading this have probably moved your lives and changed your lives a lot more than I have, and you know what I’m talking about.

Whether you physically move your life or not, being transformed into the image of Christ daily involves all kinds of big and little changes to take you out of your comfort zone and deeper into the life of the One who gave His for yours. (Philippians 2)

Not everyone is called to be an Abraham and get up and leave their home country behind and go on to a new life of promise — some folks are called to that new life without budging a physical inch. I’m not sure it’s any easier.

There wasn’t, as nearly as we can tell, anything desperately wrong with Abraham’s life in Ur. It was probably a pretty good life. But he was called, and the patriarch’s example of faith is cited as prophetic of what must come for each of us:

By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. ~ Hebrews 11:8

(And don’t forget Romans 4 and Galatians 3 .)

“He did not know where he was going.”

Yet he knew the direction to take, and Who would lead him, and that with each step he took, he could get closer to the One who called him.

Still, even knowing this … the goodbyes are the difficult part.

One Nation Under God

/ W. Keith Brenton / 7 Comments

It’s a set of simple but powerful words in the English language that most every school-child of speaking age in the United States knows by heart:

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Our Pledge of Allegiance has an interesting history and has stirred many a patriotic and religiously faithful heart to strong emotions, and sometimes conflict.

Yes, I know this one only has 48 stars. Watch the Red Skelton video.I used to be among those reticent to repeat the Pledge, after years of unthinkingly doing so — having been a teen of the querulous Sixties and having forgotten Red Skelton’s exposition of it — on the grounds that it might, in some way, supercede the overarching supremacy of the Kingdom of God, who is sovereign forever and ever.

But I re-examine it these days, and find no such language. It is a pledge of loyalty to the nation into which I was born, which protected and nourished and educated me … which preserved my rights and freedoms and insisted on my responsibilities as a maturing individual … which required my taxes to do so but in doing so returned much more to me as an individual of average income than I could possibly have paid back … which accepted the sacrifices, willing and unwilling, penultimate and ultimate, of many a brave soul on its soil and beyond to assure the rights and freedoms that should be for all people of all nations — blessings which can only be described as priceless.

The pledge does not require that my loyalty to the United States of America supercede my loyalty of the Kingdom of God. To not pledge some allegiance of some measure to such a nation of nurture, of soaring hopes and high ideals, of openness to diversity and dreams, of empowerment to the enterprising — whatever their resources might or might not be — would be the mark of ingratitude.

Whatever shortcomings this nation has (and there are many, for it is comprised of many imperfect citizens), the United States of America remains an ideal to be accomplished … a declaration of independence from tyranny … a constitution for a more perfect union … a quality of equality worth aiming for and worth hitting dead-center with every single attempt.

So I have dropped my qualms about the Pledge of Allegiance. It does, after all, describe a human republic with hopes for many of the same attributes that are realities of the divine Kingdom:

… one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

 

Ananias and Sapphira – A Closer Look

/ W. Keith Brenton / 5 Comments

Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property. With his wife’s full knowledge he kept back part of the money for himself, but brought the rest and put it at the apostles’ feet.

Then Peter said, “Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? Didn’t it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn’t the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied just to human beings but to God.” When Ananias heard this, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard what had happened. Then some young men came forward, wrapped up his body, and carried him out and buried him.

About three hours later his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. Peter asked her, “Tell me, is this the price you and Ananias got for the land?”

“Yes,” she said, “that is the price.”

Peter said to her, “How could you conspire to test the Spirit of the Lord? Listen! The feet of the men who buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out also.”

At that moment she fell down at his feet and died. Then the young men came in and, finding her dead, carried her out and buried her beside her husband. Great fear seized the whole church and all who heard about these events.

~ Acts 5:1-11

I spend (probably too much) time reading comments and posts on subjects of interest to Christians, and in one of them a few days ago, someone pointed out that this passage doesn’t say that God put them to death.

It doesn’t.

It doesn’t even say that Peter told them they would die (“carry you out also” is said to Sapphira), let alone instantaneously. Though I think Peter knew what was about to happen.

This person went on to posit the possibility that the shock of being impossibly discovered drove one or both Ananias and Sapphira to sudden, fatal cardio events — heart attack or stroke.

I would accept that as a possibility.

But I would also posit the possibility that Ananias and Sapphira simply could not live with what they had done.

In allowing “Satan to fill [their] heart[s]” and thereby rejecting the Holy Spirit, they had conspired to lie to him, judging what was selfish and evil (secretly keeping some of the money) to still somehow be generous and good. They had called evil “good.” They were lying to themselves. They were lying to the Holy Spirit.

By lying to the Holy Spirit, to human beings and to God, they had in a sense blasphemed the Holy Spirit (Matthew 12:31) within them, who gives life to the believer (John 6:63; Romans 8:10; 2 Corinthians 3:6). In that moment when convicted by the truth, the Spirit-who-gives-life, the Pneumatos, was done with His work and gone.

They rejected the Spirit. They rejected life.

Thoughts?

Who Are Your Twelve?

/ W. Keith Brenton / 5 Comments

Our preparation to move to North Carolina is progressing well — we sold our house here in Little Rock Tuesday to a buyer who requested a closing date that is the same day that we had requested on our new house.

We went to see it on a little vacation trip, and enjoyed a day-and-a-half in Gatlinburg and the Smoky Mountains.

I applied and interviewed for a part-time position at the university.

We got acquainted with our new hometowns (Dillsboro, Sylva and Cullowhee) a little bit.

We met people new to us, and made friends over dinner and in prayer afterward last Sunday evening with  another family whom I feel sure will continue to grow closer and more treasured in our hearts.

Now the hard parts: Packing. Leaving. Realizing that it was probably our last family-of-four vacation for at least a long, long time. Helping our son move out of the house and into his apartment today. Saying goodbye to eight treasured friends in our LIFE Group at dinner last night.

As we dined together, I remembered a movie called Joshua where a farewell dinner was given by his friends for a person who has been called to an audience with the pope in Rome … a person who might be a lot more than just a visitor to their small town. Extraordinary things have happened among this group of friends and in their community as a result of the powerful love of this stranger. One of his friends, after the dinner, realizes aloud: “There were twelve of us.”

Last night I was made aware again of how our lives connect with so many others, changing them and being changed by them — but also of how profound those changes can be within a circle of close friends, no matter how different from each other we might be.

It made me wonder again what might happen if — like Christ — believers prayed fervently all night and then formed familial relationships with as few as twelve people … dedicated themselves to exploring His nature and personality together … lived it among themselves and others … prayed for one another from the heart … gave of self, sacrificially … loved deeply.

The movie I remembered starts thoughtfully and well, but I think it ends on a weak note. If I’d written its script, I would have had the character Joshua tell the pope:

“With all due respect, I didn’t come to see you or to satisfy your curiosity. I came to make a difference in the failing faith of twelve people I came to love … to help them experience what it means to believe even when confronted by things you can’t understand.”

My family will have that opportunity to help and be helped in that way when we move in three weeks.

We don’t know whom our twelve might be.

There might be more, or less, than twelve. Some might draw us closer with them to God through His Son than we could have imagined. Some might disappoint or wound us. They might choose us, initially. We might choose them.

But we will choose each other, and we will choose.

One of those days Jesus went out to a mountainside to pray, and spent the night praying to God. When morning came, he called his disciples to him and chose twelve of them, whom he also designated apostles: Simon (whom he named Peter), his brother Andrew, James, John, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Simon who was called the Zealot, Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor. ~ Luke 6:12-16

Who are your twelve?

Inconsistency?

/ W. Keith Brenton / 9 Comments

I find it curious that folks who are willing to assume the existence of Noah’s tools (never mentioned in scripture) – in order to illustrate their defense of a doctrine of expediency (also never mentioned in scripture) … that those same folks blanch at the idea that God might have indeed told Nadab and Abihu and Moses and all of Aaron’s sons that only the fire He had authorized could be used in worship to Him.

True, that instruction never appears as such in scripture. (Just like Noah’s tools.)

Yet it is quite possible that the two oldest sons were bringing their own fire was because they had disobeyed by letting the fire go out (Leviticus 6:9-13) which had come from the presence of the Lord a few verses before (Leviticus 9:24). So fire came out from the Lord again and consumed them (Leviticus 10:2). You have to wonder why else would they be bringing fire in their incense censers, if it had not gone out on the altar …?

I guess that assuming such a command missing from scripture would not be expedient to the argument about God’s silence being prohibitive. Because if God was not silent, but in fact did express a command forbidding fire that was not His … well, the whole argument of God’s silence being prohibitive would hit a major iceberg; that’s the main rationale for it.

That would also put a big, leaky crease in the hull of the theology which goes which that argument.

Which is that God is on the edge of His throne looking down on us for the slightest excuse to utterly destroy anyone who disobeys Him by doing something that He has not specifically authorized (especially in worship).

And that, sadly, reminds me of the way that the steward entrusted with one talent envisioned his master: solely wrathful, greedy and vengeful. He was afraid to do anything with the talent that he hadn’t been specifically authorized to do. So he did the no-risk, nothing-ventured-nothing-gained thing to do: he buried it (Matthew 25:14-30).

(Of course, if you think about it, he hadn’t been specifically authorized to bury it, either.)

Is that really the way that we should assume God operates?

Because the other servants took some risk, transacted some business, put themselves out their to honor their master’s house and to increase the esteem of others at its assets – and his wisdom in choosing and investing in stewards for it.

They were generously rewarded.

Shouldn’t we put ourselves out there when we’re transacting gospel business for the chance at gaining the maximum return on investment? Shouldn’t it be that way every day of the week we’re in business, instead of just one day (which is all it takes to bury something)?

Let’s face it, we’re not specifically authorized to stand motionless singing in four-part harmony with books in our hands following only one song leader, either. So if we decide to start forbidding how hearts gifted by God want to worship Him, where do we draw the lines that scripture doesn’t?

At one day a week? At one day a week, plus maybe a Wednesday night? At one person speaking, rather than two or three? At one cup? At projected lyrics and/or music? At clapping? At a praise team leading? At accompanying instruments? Which instruments? At whatever I think is decent and orderly? At what my brother or sister thinks is decent and orderly? Do we draw the line at what does or doesn’t praise God, because we think we know Him so well through His silence?

Here’s the picture I have of God, and I get it straight out of scripture: someOne who wants us to express His praise, His wonder, His love and His power fully and with all our hearts (and encourage each other and be blessed by doing so!), whether we are gathered in worship, or worshiping by serving, or serving by sharing, or sharing by teaching. SomeOne who wants us to put ourselves out there – way out there! Take some risk. Transact some gospel. Not sell it. Live it. Share it. Give it away. Give it all. Don’t hold back.

Because that’s what He has done and does for us.

That’s what I find Jesus doing, and later, those who followed Him.

And if we picture our God before others as being miserly and stingy and secretive and vindictive, He will become the God we fear … but do not love and trust.

That’s not the provident God described by Peter:

“His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.” ~2 Peter 1:3

A loving God. A giving God. A God who is just, but merciful; righteous but forgiving.

A consistent God.

The Year I Didn’t Go To Church

/ W. Keith Brenton / 29 Comments

Well, that’s a little misleading. The year after my divorce was final, I visited several churches.

And had a little difficulty finding a home.

Churches of Christ (and probably other faith fellowships) weren’t sure what to do with divorced people in 1984, and while I would be greeted enthusiastically as a guest, the warmth of the smiles would visibly cool when I said I was divorced.

I did find a home at Pleasant Valley, where no one seemed to mind very much what my marital status was. There was an singles group, and for the most part, folks did not regard the divorced as people with a scarlet “D” embroidered to their blouses or seared into their chests. But in the meantime I’d found another home among people who readily accepted others and took them in and shared commonalities of interest:

Trekkies. Well, Trekkers, actually: the United Trekkers of Arkansas, so named because there was some kind of nomenclature debate going, in which “Trekkies” was perceived as an insult. Hey, it was just a word then and it’s just a word now. (There’s a chance that “Christian” may have originally been intended as an insult. It certainly is used that way now in some circles.)

You could be a Trek-fan and go to meetings and (in those days before widespread Internet) share rumors of movies being made and news of new books and comic books and collectibles; debate motivations of characters and planetary cultures and 23rd-century technology. And nobody cared if you were married, divorced or single (there were members of all those categories); or whether you were painfully thin or dangerously obese; whether you were old or young or somewhere in-between; or whether you wore Trek t-shirts or uniforms or street clothes or dressed like a Klingon from time to time.

The findings of many a research project in religion point to what people seek most in a church: community. That’s what the Trekkers excelled in. They were a community in which deep friendships formed and grew, based on a shared peculiar interest. They worked together. They had garage sales that raised money for local charities like Big Brothers/Big Sisters. They even put together three or four local science fiction conventions — again benefiting local charities — that attracted some of the writers and actors from the television series and movies to participate.

Not unlike followers of Christ.

Now, the club was no paradise to be sure, and it had a rival. Sort of. There were for a while a few members of the UTA who were also members of a larger local chapter of a national organization known as Starfleet. The national organization — and particularly the local chapter — took their charter very seriously. Members had a rank in Starfleet and could advance, and they wore Starfleet uniforms (whatever era one chose), and they participated in community service projects while wearing them. (The local chapter adopted a mile of highway for cleanup.) One member famously wore her uniform as a candidate for the jury in the impeachment trial of President Clinton.

But the Starfleet folks developed kind of a disdain for the undisciplined ways and unlimited acceptance of the UTA folks, and a rift developed, and most of the UTA folks who had also joined Starfleet let their Starfleet memberships lapse. And Starfleet soon went the way of all interstellar hierarchies.

As far as I know, neither organization persists all these years down the road. I let my membership in UTA lapse in 1987, the year I moved to Shreveport.

And that, really, was the year I didn’t go to church.

There was no Pleasant Valley there. There was a church across the river with a single again group of six morbidly depressed people. There was a church on the north side that was all folding chairs in a circle and worship renewal and total unawareness of visitors. There were others, and I was quick to pick up on the dress code and bylaws and expectations and requirements of them. But there was no home.

Every other month or so, I’d roll three-and-a-half hours back up the road to Little Rock to go to church and reconnect with my Pleasant Valley brothers and sisters. Fortunately, my sojourn in Shreveport was just for that one year, parts of 1987-1988.

Now, the point to all this is (if there is one): Jesus was in Shreveport as surely as He was in Little Rock. It may have been shallow — and may be shallow — for someone to look for a church home based on a craving for community rather than Christ. It may be self-seeking, selfish, self-interested.

Yet it can grow into something more.

When people visit our churches, we have a very narrow window of opportunity to offer them the comforts of home — especially those who are hurting and hungry and desperately in need of comfort. I was one of them, and I am not proud of the judgment I showed or the speed with which I exercised it in some cases.

If we greet people with our charter and our uniform requirements and our expectations for performing service and cleaning up highways and leave a general impression of disdain for folks who aren’t going to advance in the ranks, well ….

On the other hand, if we show acceptance as Christ accepts us … if we do not judge others as He eschewed judgment while in this world; what they wear or what their background is or what their potential level of commitment might be … if we work together to help others and honor children and obviously have a great time doing so … then I think we’ve got a better chance at reaching the folks who are starved for community and may have only the vaguest idea about the One who puts the lonely in families.