evangelism

Freedom to choose

/ W. Keith Brenton / 1 Comment

What so many of my fellow Christians fail to understand is that freedom of religion and the separation of church from state in a democracy is the ideal environment for faith to grow.

Because our faith is based on choice.

Always has been. Always will be.

From the choice of fruit in Eden to “choose you this day whom you will serve” to the great and mudane daily choices we make to try and reflect the nature of Christ, it has been our freedom to choose that’s the key.

Not coercion. Not enforcement. Not Sharia-type law.

A choice that’s forced is no choice at all. It doesn’t create a change of heart, or compel a desire to live graciously, or inspire a devotion to truth or justice or kindness or respect.

And the attitude that Christians are somehow morally superior to make these choices for others through law or compulsion — simply because we’ve have been forgiven — is ludicrous on its face. No one should have that attitude because none of us has that moral authority.

Were we asleep when we read or were taught that we are not to judge, or do we just choose to ignore it in a consistently defiant way?

And how effective is that kind of arrogance in trying to attract people while we say we are imitating Christ? Surely that hypocrisy is transparent to the most casual observer!

Did we miss the fact that scripture teaches God gave law to a new and undisciplined nation emerging in a savage and primitive environment — but it wasn’t good enough long-term to draw people closer to His nature, so grace had to be brought by His own Son? How difficult is that to understand? Law can only do so much! It was the schoolmaster until the Master arrived.

We believers have inched away from who He is and what He taught until we are nearly as far away, savage and primitive as the early era of law was from its inevitable Successor.

I’m no preacher and not even qualified to play one on TV — but these truths ought to be taught and preached and insisted upon until they are so obvious that it’s an embarrassment to deny or ignore them.

Choice, not coercion.

Faith, not force.

Compassion, not control.

Grace, not governing.

Love. Not law.

Your neighbor. Yourself. Your enemies.

No exceptions. No excuses.

If we want others to live changed lives, we need to live lives that are changed, exemplary, gracious, forgiving, generous, lovely.

You can’t make that a law.

It has to be chosen.

And maybe we need to be looking into the faces and hearts and lives of people around us who don’t believe, but live that kind of life, and we need to see Jesus there instead of in the mirror and we need to ask ourselves why.

‘Lost’ and ‘Saved’

/ W. Keith Brenton / 2 Comments

Honestly, I don’t think folks are as interested in being “saved” as they are in having a significant, purposeful life.

I think if we Christians were living significant, purposeful lives that were winsome and loving, we’d have something to talk about without ever resorting to words that hold no meaning or attraction.

“Saved” is a church term that means little or nothing to someone who doesn’t believe, especially if they don’t have a church background.

It may have meant a lot to those using the term in Acts 2 — who were familiar with God’s wrath and prophecy; who felt guilty because they were complicit in the murder of the Messiah — but it doesn’t particularly hold weight today.

I think it would take a long time to set up as a meaningful term, or at least one with which people would identify.

They are already wary of the idea of a wrathful God who judges and damns nearly everyone He made and claims to love; wary of that love that seems conditional upon a litany of specific responses, but no seeming emphasis on continuing to grow better, stop judging others, accept others, forgive others, love more deeply, help others, be generous, etc. It’s not what they see in us.

And “Lost” has long felt like an insult to me. An assessment. A judgment. The very thing we’re specifically told not to do.

It’s a term that sounds like it comes from a place of superiority, even if not earned (or actual!). It’s an instant turn-off.

And “saved” is the flip side of that coin. What does “saved” mean to someone who’s been termed “lost?”

Does “saved”
mean being in the position of moral authority to judge others to be “lost?”

How attractive.

The rest of the Story

/ W. Keith Brenton / 2 Comments

If the gospel you hear is all about Jesus dying and being resurrected but nothing about how He lived what He taught, you’re missing the part of the story that really changes your life.

Because it tells and shows you how to live what He taught.

How to love others as yourself, show grace, forgive, be generous, be compassionate, feed others, wash their feet, help them heal, and be self-less.

If the whole story doesn’t make you want to change your life to reflect that, then all the faith and confession and water immersion and ritual-observance is just a way to spend some time.

The whole gospel changes you. Who you are. Who you want to be. The kind of person you want to live as.

If you didn’t hear that in the good news you heard, you were cheated. You were misled. You were misdirected, maybe for the sake of conversion numbers and goals; maybe just from being taught by someone who was mis-taught and under-informed. You got a little good news, and it may have sounded like the whole thing, because life-after-death is a pretty spectacular idea.

But it’s not the whole idea. THIS life matters NOW. Other people matter NOW. How you live and who you are matters NOW.

Oliver Wendell Holmes is credited with first framing the saying about people who are so heavenly minded that they are no earthly good.

And there’s a point there. That outlook comes from buying into half-a-gospel; the gospel that’s good news for ME. A death and resurrection that means I get to live again.

But that doesn’t really have any meaning if life isn’t lived fully — “abundantly” is the word Jesus of Nazareth uses — right here and now. So that others whom He loves (and we should love) can benefit from that life here and now as well.

I mean, how are people going to be convinced that they matter in an afterlife if they don’t feel like they matter in this life?

Sorry to sermonize on a Sunday. I’m still no preacher. But sometimes I see other posts that feel like what Brian McLaren called “Adventures in Missing the Point.”

Rant over.

Sermons

/ W. Keith Brenton / 1 Comment

They seem to be the centerpiece of the worship service at church, no matter how long they are or what they’re called: sermons, teachings, messages, homilies.

I’m not sure they should be, but they kind of are by default for almost a couple thousand years now.

I would vote for the eucharist, the Lord’s supper, to take that honor and let Him host and be the center of worship, honor and praise.

But, hey, nobody asked me.

So we surround the sermon with all our other acts of worship (singing, prayers, reading of scripture, etc.), and — like I said — it becomes the centerpiece of the table we surround by default.

And what do we hear?

I attended church from before the time I could think or speak until just a couple of years ago. I think I can fairly say I’ve heard about every kind of sermon imaginable, from the very best to the very worst.

I learned a lot, I’m sure; and some of what I learned, I had to later unlearn — because what I heard was not valid, or helpful, or sometimes just wasn’t true. Occasionally it didn’t even conform to what scripture said, and even rarely contradicted and defied it.

But looking back, I think the very best sermons I heard gave me insight into the life, teachings, example and nature of Jesus of Nazareth.

They conveyed His humanity and divinity, His winsome appeal, His unflagging love for all, and His refusal to judge people while being unflinchingly judgmental about how to speak, act and relate to others in a world that God made and God cares about and God watches over all the time.

Sermons like that made me crave that nature and yearn for that living grace; they challenged me to imitate it in what I do and say with the goal of making it my nature.

I genuinely don’t know how you can preach a gospel sermon without talking about Jesus; He is the very best of all the good news in scripture. I tried preaching for several years, but it is not my gift. When I did preach, I genuinely tried to draw my listeners to the grace of Christ.

To the cross, yes, sometimes; even to the empty tomb. But, you see, that’s what the Lord’s table is for; that’s largely His story to tell in His inimitable way — by living it to death and then living it forever.

I can’t do better than that.

And you see, if that were all there is to His story, we would miss out on the part that makes it whole and full and complete: the incredible life of love and compassion that He lived. That, as much as anything else, is what proves He was/is/will always be the Son of God.

God could have raised anyone from the dead — it’s not like He’d never done it before! But who else but His very own Son could have lived such an exemplary life, seen and communicated the loving grace of heaven so clearly, had the unalterable faith to let mankind do its worst and still speak words of forgiveness?

Sermons come and go. A million every Sunday, maybe, all around the world.

But they are only heard by the people who listen to them; and if those people don’t leave that church inspired to live what they’ve heard, then only words have been spoken. Not The Word, the living Logos, the meaning of what God spoke into existence, the why of being, the purpose of living, the joy of loving, the embodiment of grace.

Well, I’ve rattled on here long enough. If I could live like that, I could still try preaching. But I know there is no credibility in what you say if you don’t practice what you preach.

So I’ve chosen to leave that to others of better qualifications, and just do my best to live up to some poor semblance of the One that I most admire.

They say that’s a sermon too.