Careful Thought

Justin at Between Two Worlds quotes a hymn for pastors written by John Newton. It’s called, simply, Prayer for Ministers.

Chief Shepherd of thy chosen sheep,
From death and sin set free;
May every under–shepherd keep
His eye, intent on thee!With plenteous grace their hearts prepare,
To execute thy will
Compassion, patience, love and care,
And faithfulness and skill

Inflame their minds with holy zeal
Their flocks to feed and teach;
And let them live, and let them feel
The sacred truths they preach.

Oh, never let the sheep complain
That toys, which fools amuse;
Ambition, pleasure, praise or gain,
Debase the shepherd’s views.

(Read more here)

I probably do a terrible job of supporting our Pastor. Sometimes I’m so wrapped up in church business that I neglect the business of the church, which is to reach a lost and dying world. Our pastor stands firmly and uncompromisingly on the Word. I need to bless him more for what he does.

“Living as we expect to when God’s kingdom is established on earth is the way to overcome darkness with light – cursing the darkness won’t do it.” (Paul Mitchell at Chuck Colson’s Break Point site)

I guess I’m not a ‘darkness curser’. I don’t see the glass as half-empty or even necessarily half-full, but I figure that in His time God will fill it as full as it needs to be.

Are you going to celebrate the incarnation of the hypostatic union on Sunday? Why not? Why don’t store clerks wish you a felicitous incarnation of the hypostatic union? What’s this world coming to?

The hypostatic union is the theological term for the dual nature of Christ, being 100% God and 100% man dwelling together as one person. (Jn.1:14,18 Phil.2:6-8, Isa.9:6 Heb.4, Col.2:9) The incarnation of the hypostatic union is the event that brought that union to earth – Christmas!

The hostility toward evangelical continues, this time (or, once again) in the military. I served for 24 years in the US Air Force and watched with alarm the growing intolerance toward any mention of Jesus the Christ. Reference to a hazy, non-judgmental God is fine. From the Washington Times:

To pray — or not to pray — in Jesus’ name is the question plaguing an increasing number of U.S. military chaplains, one of whom began a multiday hunger strike outside the White House yesterday.”I am a Navy chaplain being fired because I pray in Jesus’ name,” said Navy Lt. Gordon Klingenschmitt, who will be holding 6 p.m. prayer vigils daily in Lafayette Park.

The hunger strike is intended to persuade President Bush to issue an executive order allowing military chaplains to pray according to their individual faith traditions. The American Center for Law and Justice has gathered 173,000 signatures on a petition seeking an executive order.

Seventy-three members of Congress have joined the request, saying in an Oct. 25 letter to the president, “In all branches of the military, it is becoming increasingly difficult for Christian chaplains to use the name of Jesus when praying.” (More)

The Air Force Academy (my alma mater) has seen its share of controversy recently over prayer and proselytizing. The military is increasingly becoming a mirror of our society’s hatred of faith.

The Gospel of John and his letters have always comforted yet challenged me because the author has a way of making the Christian life understandable in context of my life. Pretty quickly I could see those areas in which my actions didn’t match all my Christian talk. One concept John uses repeatedly is the idea that we are to abide in Christ and He in us. What the heck does that mean? When I first thought about it, the image I had was of a Star Trek tranporter accident where one person was fused into another. Not a comforting image. In John 15:5 he says,

“I am the vine and you are the branches; he that abides in Me and I in him will bear much fruit”.

And 1 John 2 says,

“Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you too will abide in the Son and in the Father. And this is the promise that he made to us–eternal life.I write these things to you about those who are trying to deceive you. But the anointing that you received from him abides in you, and you have no need that anyone should teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about everything–and is true and is no lie, just as it has taught you–abide in him.

So what is this abiding stuff and how are we supposed to do it in Christ and Him in us? The more I thought and read and prayed on it, the more it became clear to me that it was about replacing my will with His and acting in accordance with that. If that’s what it means, then I’m good with being a transporter accident.

Yet even though it makes sense to me, a life transformed in Christ is still a disturbing and repugnant thing to a world that glorifies nothing but the self. The good thing is that I don’t have to justify myself to Polly Toynbee or the ACLU or anyone else, just to Christ.

‘Narnia represents everything that is most hateful about religion’

Polly Toynbee at the UK Guardian despises Narnia. It’s not so much C.S. Lewis’ story that causes her to cringe as it is the obvious Christian theme which underlies the story.

After berating Lewis, Disney, Walden Media, Jeb Bush and practically anyone who has ever heard of Narnia or this film, Toynbee gets down to brass tacks:

The lion exchanging his life for Edmund’s is the sort of thing Arthurian legends are made of. Parfait knights and heroes in prisoner-of-war camps do it all the time. But what’s this? After a long, dark night of the soul and women’s weeping, the lion is suddenly alive again. Why? How?, my children used to ask. Well, it is hard to say why. It does not make any more sense in CS Lewis’s tale than in the gospels. Ah, Aslan explains, it is the “deep magic”, where pure sacrifice alone vanquishes death.Of all the elements of Christianity, the most repugnant is the notion of the Christ who took our sins upon himself and sacrificed his body in agony to save our souls. Did we ask him to? Poor child Edmund, to blame for everything, must bear the full weight of a guilt only Christians know how to inflict, with a twisted knife to the heart.

Children are supposed to fall in love with the hypnotic Aslan, though he is not a character: he is pure, raw, awesome power. He is an emblem for everything an atheist objects to in religion. His divine presence is a way to avoid humans taking responsibility for everything here and now on earth, where no one is watching, no one is guiding, no one is judging and there is no other place yet to come. Without an Aslan, there is no one here but ourselves to suffer for our sins, no one to redeem us but ourselves: we are obliged to settle our own disputes and do what we can. We need no holy guide books, only a very human moral compass. Everyone needs ghosts, spirits, marvels and poetic imaginings, but we can do well without an Aslan.

I was struck by the totally barren emptiness of her words, but then I realized that I had the heart and soul of Polly Toynbee once, desparately lost and shaking my fist at God. She doesn’t get it and I didn’t either until the scales were taken from my eyes by the Holy Spirit. As Paul said to the Corinthian church, “[The] word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” (1 Cor 1:18, NIV)

As she says, “Without an Aslan, there is no one here but ourselves to suffer for our sins, no one to redeem us but ourselves: we are obliged to settle our own disputes and do what we can.” And what a pitiful job we do of it. Toynbee understands the sin problem (I think), but completely denies the need for – or the glory of – a Redeemer to wash us free of the problem of sin.

Pray for Polly Toynbee and for all those in desparate need of the real Aslan.