I am a fan of something that is loosely referred to as an “orthogonal approach” applied to intensely debated social and religious issues.
So I was excited when I saw that Adam Frank, an astrophysicist from the University of Rochester invoked it in a . And while Frank, who would consider himself a “strident atheist” and myself, a convinced follower of Jesus, have a number of key points of disagreement, I liked the overall trajectory of his article.
At least at first. His take was that we need to try to not fall into the same “us versus them” pattern that can so often derail the discussion. That by thinking “orthogonally” we can put a right angle in the discussion and come up with something that is entirely new.
Then I ran across what I run across all to often in discussions with those who would consider themselves commited scientists and atheists. The issue that  is seemingly not even noticed is the baseline belief that those with religious belief are more opposed to this discussion than those without religious belief. That the religious, with my experience being obviously as a follower of Jesus, have behaved more poorly in the discussion than our counterparts.
Yes, I liked how Frank mentioned Einstein’s concern about fanatical atheists who were as intolerant as their religious counterparts. And yes I liked how he talked about our need to approach a discussion that can often be conducted on one axis (only my side has value) more orthogonally. Not just shoot for a middle position, but take a right angle on the axis and create something different. Adam, I was with you.
Remember, this isn’t about what the conclusion is, Â Frank and I would clearly disagree on that, but rather how we can engage in this discussion seeking to be listeners and not just winners.
But, then it happened. And it was going so well.
Of course the point must always be made that in domains of politics and policy strident atheists are infinitely more tolerent and less damaging than the gang hanging out at other end of the spectrum.
It isn’t even that I am bothered by his opinion on the matter. It is the “Of course” that starts that opinion off. That “of course” approach is what is so frustrating for me.
Much more often than not, when I enter into a discussion with a scientifically oriented atheist, the presumption is that I am likely a knuckle-dragging holdover from an earlier evolutionary stage. Â My experience is that in the significant majority of conversations, Â rarely is time taken to investigate whether their hypotheses about me are true.
I recognize the look of disbelief mixed with frustration, disdain and occasionally even pity.
I am not saying that there aren’t many from among those that follow Jesus that haven’t been equally offensive. I remember a Christian I knew that had a bumper sticker that read “April 1st – National Atheists’ Day” and I remember those that cheered his “bravery” in proudly driving around with it on his bumper.
So I am not saying the faith community has handled itself well all the time. And I am not asking people to feel sorry for me as I know very well that many followers of Jesus around the world suffer much more than disparaging looks.
My issue is that it must at least be acknowledged that, for at least a portion of the atheist/scientific community; this thought is so automatic that it could even find its way into a posting urging its readers to not do that very thing.
Sometimes it would seem we have a very long way to go.
Peace, Jim
Yesterday someone said something to me that bugged me. Â It doesn’t matter who it was or what they said. Â I know this person cares about me and respects me. Â I am sure of it in fact. Â But they did. Â Said something that got me frustrated with them.
It was such a small comment.
But I felt offended a bit, insulted. Â I did however apply Prov 12.16 to the situation. Â It says a fool shows their annoyance at once but the prudent overlook an insult. Â That is something I try to do when I am frustrated. Â It helps me to not get into unnecessary arguments when they can be avoided, and many times I have discovered that the person who said the annoying thing didn’t mean anything by it. Â They meant no offense.
It was the right thing to do.
But later that day I ended up saying something much more thoughtless to someone else. Â I never meant my words to be hurtful but they were. Â An off-hand remark that I didn’t even notice at the time, but as soon as I was told about it I hurt for them. The person I said it to very graciously brought it up to me privately later. Â They offered grace before I even had time to ask for it.
My realization of how easily I can hurt someone with my words makes me desire to offer grace all the more. Â What I receive I want to give.
Peace, Jim
This is part three of a three part posting on processing when God doesn’t do what we ask him to do. Â Posts one and two are below.
When we do that, we can start to do what Nouwen describes here.
“Dear God, I am so afraid to open my clenched fists!
Who will I be when I have nothing left to hold on to? Who will I be when I stand before you with empty hands?
Please help me to gradually open my hands and to discover that I am not what I own, but what you want to give me.
And what you want to give me is love, unconditional, everlasting love.  Amen.”
— Henri Nouwen (The Only Necessary Thing: Living a Prayerful Life)
Nouwen’s point is that we hold things with an open hand. That we trust God enough to relax and instead of grasping or feeling the need to grasp, we relax. It doesn’t mean we don’t work or that effort isn’t needed. It certainly doesn’t mean we don’t ask for specifics, if anything, this has drawn me into asking for more than I did before. It gets to our heart in the midst of that work and effort.
When we are able to see God’s presence in our everyday lives and experiences, and when we can realize that he is more deeply committed to our good and us than we are ever to his. Then our faith, which is the promise of that which is unseen and that which is hoped for, begins to truly come alive.
So, my friend continues to pray for his job. Yes, he would prefer predictability, but what inspires me is his willingness to hang in there for the ride. To pray, to trust, and to remember that he is not alone in this, and he hasn’t been from the start of it.
So, to me, that is what faith is. It isn’t greater predictability, it isn’t a lack of confusion at times or often. It isn’t ceasing asking for specifics out of frustration or confusion. Faith means asking the Father you are convinced loves you for the things that matter to you, and then trusting him, whatever the response. It means holding everything with an open hand, and relaxing. Often he will respond in ways that make sense to us. But that honestly isn’t the point anymore. What matters more than getting what I want is the confidence that I will get what he thinks is best.
More and more, that is enough.
To me, that is the assurance of things unseen, the promise of things hoped for.
Peace, Jim
I have been aware of the season of Lent for as long as I can remember. As a child I remember people talking about it being the time that you gave up chocolate before Easter.  In my mind, you wouldn’t eat  it so that when you got all the candy on Easter morning, you wouldn’t gain too much weight.
Over the years I have come to understand the whole deal a bit better. 🙂 Â I have come to understand the 40-day period of fasting, prayer, generosity and scripture reading as something that is much more robust than something that keeps us trim. Â A period that was symbolically set at the 40 days prior to Easter after the period of time that Jesus was in the wilderness fasting and preparing for his earthly ministry to begin. Â Simply put,and likely overly simply put, we take these days to reflect and consider what Christ did in his life, death and resurecttion. Â We prepare our hearts for what needs to be the biggest day on a follow of Christ’s calendar, the day he phyically showed that even death wasn’t strong enough to hold him. Â Even death has been overcome.
But I cannot think of the last time that I felt led by the Lord to give anything up for it. Â I don’t belong to a denomination or group of churches that mandates engaging in this process. Â So, while most years I would spend time to prepare for the resurrection of Jesus, I never fully engaged the season. Â I just never sensed that God would telling me to and so I chose not to.
This year is different. Â And I cannot fully tell you why.
This post is a part of a three part posting that started here… Welcome to the conversation!
We clearly live in a Westernized culture that has been deeply impacted by both the scientific and industrial revolutions.  Both of those have been unbelievably helpful to our culture and the world.  We are now able to break down complex systems (organic and inorganic) into smaller parts, study them, and in many cases reproduce or replicate them.  These processes are sometimes called systematic deconstruction, we organize something, break it down to its component parts, sort it out then begin to rebuild it. How many advances in medicine can be traced back to those processes?. How many developments in the industrial sector (that we likely appreciate in our economy all the more now) as well?
One of the issues that has come with these advances, though, is that they can tend to be overused and applied in areas where they are less helpful, or even misguided. James Watson, often called the father of Behaviorism, famously stated,
“Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select – doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and, yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors. I am going beyond my facts and I admit it, but so have the advocates of the contrary and they have been doing it for many thousands of years.â€
Even though Watson isn’t as radical as some might think him to be, he applied a deconstructionist model to parenting and most of us would say that was a misuse.
I have a very good friend that is a very godly guy. Over the past several weeks he (and I with many others) have been praying for a job that he would love to have. It seemed like a simple thing, it was a good job, in the field he was interested in, in an exciting city. He had a good confidence that he should go for it and felt good as he prayed for it.
He heard a couple of days ago that he didn’t get it.
Our oldest son, Noah, had the following math problem that I was helping him with last night. “If (some random) high peak in Ohio is 2480 ft above sea level and (some random) low point is 5089% lower, what is the elevation of that low point? He and I were both confused and worked on this problem for about 15 or 20 minutes. Hear that Mr. Knautz? That is dedication! 🙂
Our search for the right process was confusing and frustrating, but there was a resolution when we discovered the right way to set up a proportion, solve for x and get the low point’s elevation.
We were confused, it took a while to find the right equation, but we found it, punched in the numbers, solved for x and walked away with the right answer.
My friend’s problem isn’t that easy to solve. If God has power, awareness and love for my friend, then why didn’t he come through? There is no formulaic equation for that one. No stable x to solve for. Henri Nouwen said it like this.
“Theological formation is the gradual and often painful discovery of God’s incomprehensibility. You can be competent in many things, but you cannot be competent in God.”
Certainly there are many things that we can discover in the scriptures and cling to, I have experienced that personally. But we cannot ever get to the point that God becomes predictable to us. That we approach him in prayer and can be certain that we will get what we ask for the way we asked for it in the timeline we have in mind.
So what is the point of faith and prayer? I believe that faith receives its clearest definition in the book of Hebrews, Chapter 11. Here is what is said about faith. “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” Hebrews 11.1 NIV. It seems simple enough. It is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we don’t see.
But it isn’t that simple, is it?
First we know that we can occasionally hope for the wrong things. My motives aren’t always very good. Hopefully they are getting more aligned with Christ’s heart, but I am confronted with my brokenness daily, and that brokenness does sometimes leak out into what I ask God for. So, if I hope for something that is wrong, the book of James tells me that I won’t get it. “When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.” James 4.3 NIV. Yup, I’ve done that plenty of times.
So, if being certain of whatever we hope for isn’t right, what should we do? Assume Hebrews 11 is wrong? I don’t think so, I think the problem is that we aren’t looking deep enough to get to what we can be assured and certain of. It needs to be a bit deeper than a specific request.
I wonder if we just misunderstand that verse a bit. On Monday I will share what I think and then help me see if I am missing anything…
Peace, Jim
So, over the course of the past few days, a bit of a fervor has been stirred up. Â About Rob Bell, Jesus’ love, and Hell. 
All three of those topics can lead to very intense responses if you feel that they are relevant to you and all three can seem silly if you don’t. Â This post would be for those who do.
Justin Taylor, wrote a about Bell’s new book In the blog he had some very strong things to say about Bell and the possibility that Bell may have embraced universalism. Â Universalism is the idea that God, based on his love for humanity will forgive everyone on the planet upon their death, and allow them to join him in heaven. Â This is regardless of their desire to be with God or to be forgiven by God. Â Here is one quote from Taylor…
So on that level, I’m glad that Rob Bell has the integrity to be lay his cards on the table about universalism. It seems that this is not just optimism about the fate of those who haven’t heard the Good News, but (as it seems from below) full-blown hell-is-empty-everyone-gets-saved universalism.
I want to be clear that I like several aspects of and I value its focus and voice, even if I don’t share all of its views. (If you would like any clarity on that, let me know) Â My issue isn’t with that. Â It is with the apparently over-rapid response to a book that Taylor hadn’t yet read fully. Â His response seems to me to have been too quick and too strong.
At this point, I will direct you to two of my friends, and , who have written a much more complete reflection on what has been going on. Â These are great guys, so, Jr and Eugene, take ‘er away…
First JR’s …
Now …
Thoughts?
I am sure we have all heard about the new iPhone app that is intended to prepare you for confession. Â Here is one of the youtube clips… Â Take a look…
First of all, I am not a huge fan of the flippancy the reporter showed the app.
Second of all, I kind of like it. Â Certainly I have issues with the theology of needing to have a confessor. Â I strongly believe the scriptures make it clear we can go straight to Jesus with our confession, and that we should. Â And while I do believe in repentance, literally “to change your mind,” and that repentance involves action, I do have some significant issues with the practice of penance (or more accurately, some of the works of satisfaction.)
But that having been said, look at what it does. Â At its base it gives you a metric for reflecting on how you have walked with Christ. Â Questions to reflect on are so helpful in this way. Â I have some images of screen shots…
There are some great questions here.
Sorry that I cannot put these pics across the page, I am just not that awesome… Â Here is the next one…
If you cannot read it, you get a scripture for thought and reflection. Â Like that…
You can even reflect on how you have done with obeying the Ten Commandments.
First of all, I am not as positive as I am no this because it is an iphone app. Â Truly.
I like anything that causes us to reflect on how we are actually living out our lives of faith. Â Reflection is important and I find that few in my age demographic really understand its necessity and make appropriate time for it.
Again, there are questions. Â Does it focus on behaviors exclusively? Â I am not sure about that one. Â I would want to be challenged not just in how I follow certain standards and rules, but in how I bring those together with my soul and my life and truly live a life that looks more and more like the one Jesus lived. Â I wouldn’t want something to give someone the impression that they are able to live their life with Christ even more fully alone. Â Those of us that follow Christ have a very communal faith. We are to live it together, grow together, encourage one another together. Â If the app discouraged that, then that would be an additional issue.
I don’t get the sense from the clip that it does though. Â It is a heart preparation tool. Â I like that.
What is your take? Â Aside from pun fun… is it a helpful tool?
Peace, Jim
and I really could have ended up one another’s arch enemies. Â If you know J.R. and I, then you immediately get why.
He and I might be the two best looking men that are a part of the missional movement of the church. Â I know for a fact that he and I are the two best looking men on the board of .
But do we fight? Â No. Â Do we try to bring the other down to raise ourselves up? Â Not recently.
Instead, we took the road less traveled.  We  got to know the person behind the beauty, and (at least I) discovered, he is a great guy that I respect a great deal.
So, I am very excited to let you know about a conference that J.R. has guided into being. Â It is called, . Â Let me share an excerpt from the conference site…
The idea for this conference came from two sources: A post from J.R. Briggs, a pastor at Renew Community in Lansdale, Pa and the wildly popular site .
A few dangerous questions were asked:
-What if we offered a space that is gutsy, hopeful, courageously vulnerable for pastors to let go of the burden to be a Super Pastor?
-What if we could hold an event that was free from the thrills and frills of other pastors conferences?
-What if we came together as epic failures and sought not successful models or how-do’s but instead celebrated faithfulness in ministry because of the reality of Jesus?
-What if we were reminded that we’re not responsible for being ‘successful’ in ministry, but we are responsible for being faithful to the calling that God has laid out for us – regardless of the outcome?
-What if we had a conference that was not led not by famous pastors who are household names, but by scandalously ordinary ministers and leaders who are faithfully attempting to join with God – even in the midst of glaring obscurity and anonymity?
I love those questions!
In my experience I have run into countless examples of two extremes.  I have been to many events 
where either those that are speaking or those that are attending find ways to let everyone know about the numeric success they have experienced.  Sometimes this is subtly done, and other times, less subtly so.  I have also seen examples of those that are so broken, usually by their reletive lack of numeric success, that they become bitter and ultimately frustrated with the very group they were trying to reach.
I can say that I have been in both of those camps. Â During my time at [nlcf] I have experienced multiple seasons of numeric growth and also multiple seasons of having lower numbers. Â Times where I have given in to the temptation to let others know how “well” we are doing and others where I have grown frustrated that the people I am trying to reach don’t want to be reached!
The thread that runs through all that, is that it is primarly about me. Â My kingdom building, my success.
Yes, we get that numbers matter. Â Each of those numbers is a person who matters a great deal to God. Â To that extent, there is an important place for hearing from people that have seen God bless their efforts. Â So, this conference doesn’t deny the value of that. Rather, it honors the fact that the life of faith is a challenge. Â That living our lives in an honest way before our Messiah will mean that at times we will face frustration, confusion, difficulty and failure. Â And in a culture that so highly values numeric success, not demonstrating that success; while not a failure, can certainly feel like it.
So, having a space where men and women can gather and be honest about what hasn’t gone right, what hasn’t shown results and what hasn’t been pleasant, could be a great thing. Â A space that doesn’t worship failure, but one that worships Christ in the midst of it; a space, not to be cynical, but honest, is necessary.
So, go if you can and encourage friends in the ministry to do so as well.
I like the idea so much, I am going to encourage all 2,000 people that attend our church to consider it as well. Â Wait, did that just drop out? 🙂
Peace, Jim
“I didn’t fail the test, I just found 100 ways to do it wrong†Ben Franklin
Like almost everyone that has heard it, the I Have A Dream speech given by Martin Luther King Jr is one of the most powerful speeches I have ever heard. Part of the reason that I write and speak so much is that I have seen the impact of amazing words delivered well.
But my favorite quote from MLK Jr. would be the very simply titled, Letter From Birmingham Jail (April 16, 1963.) You can read it in its entirety . In it, King is responding to Birmingham pastors who were claiming he was, an outsider coming in to stir up trouble. That he should be patient and allow negotiation and discussion to prevail. My favorite excerpt, that I can almost never fully read without tearing up, is this…
We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we stiff creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging dark of segregation to say, “Wait.” But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can’t go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is asking: “Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?”; when you take a cross-country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading “white” and “colored”; when your first name becomes “nigger,” your middle name becomes “boy” (however old you are) and your last name becomes “John,” and your wife and mother are never given the respected title “Mrs.”; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you go forever fighting a degenerating sense of “nobodiness” then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.
I have thought a lot about those Birmingham pastors. And myself.
Would I have been one of them?
