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Don’t Waste Your Twenties
A writer named Trevin Wax, who is 33, gives these pieces of advice for those of you in your twenties:
- Read beyond the requirements of college, church, or work. That’s right. Read. Feel free to enjoy video games, movie-watching, or other fun activities, but make sure you are intentional about deepening the well of your spiritual and educational life. You’ll soon discover how much need to draw from that well.
- Build relationships and connections with people who care about similar things. Find people you respect. Learn from them. Walk with people in ministry and learn from their successes and failures. Seek out mentors and listen to them.
- Embrace the big markers of life. If you believe God is calling you to marriage and childbearing, don’t postpone those two things indefinitely. Truth is, no one is ever really “ready” to have a kid. Ever. You’re never “mature” enough or “financially stable” enough to get married or have kids. I actually think, most of the time, the reverse is true. Marriage and kids are often what God uses to grow us up.
- For those who are single by circumstances or by calling, please do not misinterpret the previous word as suggesting that you can’t be mature without marriage or kids. History is filled with examples of Christians whose singleness (whether permanent or temporary) provided the opportunity to channel passion and wisdom into fruitful ministry. Take John Stott’s advice: “Go wherever your gifts will be exploited the most.”
- Future pastors, sermon preparation doesn’t start when you get a ministry position. It’s the result of whole-life preparation. Remember that. And start preparing now. Immerse yourself in the Word and in the lives of people.
- Future missionaries and church leaders, you are on mission now. You don’t need a title, a ministry position, or a seminary degree before you’re on mission. Jesus’ commissioning is all you need to love God, love people, and witness to the truth of the gospel. John Mayer sings ”Waiting On the World To Change.” It did. 2000 years ago when a dead Man walked out of His tomb. So let’s get going.
- When the day arrives and a leadership role is thrust upon you, you’d better be the person you need to be. You can and will do some training, of course, but so much of your role requires you to be a certain kind of person, not just do a certain kind of thing.
- Be willing to serve in the trenches of ministry without praise or acclamation. Serve your church. Work hard at whatever job you’re at. Encourage the people around you. If God chooses to expand your sphere of influence, wonderful. If not, then be the best you can be right where you are.
He ends with this encouragement:
Friends, if you are entering or still in your twenties, let me exhort you: do not sit these years out. Do not wait on the big job or the amazing ministry you think you deserve. Love God and love people now.
Become the person you want to be in your thirties; prepare for the role you’d like to have, even if, like me, you’re busing tables at Cracker Barrel. You’re not waiting on anyone, and time won’t wait for you either.
If you’d like to keep thinking about your twenties, last year I wrote a booklet specifically for you called Surviving Your Twenties and you can download it here.
Jesus, Friend of Sinners (Notes from Last Night)
Last night we finished few weeks of looking at what the Christian message is with a practical look at how Jesus himself reached out to different kinds of people, and what that means for us. Here are the notes:
Here are the scripture we read to start off: Luke 7:31–50, Luke 19:1-10; Luke 14:34-15:2; Mark 2:13–17; Matthew 11:19; 1 Corinthians 5:9-13; 1 Corinthians 10:27; Ephesians 5:1-11; 1 Peter 4:1-
Observations:
We know that in pursuing these relationships, Jesus could not have been sinning. So he wasn’t “partaking” of the “unfruitful works of darkness” (Eph 5:1) or “running with them in the flood dissipation” (1 Peter 4:4)—he was not participating in the sin. But he was “keeping company” with these non-believers (1 Cor 5:10), eating with them (1 Cor 10:27), and thus he was called their “friend” (Mt 11:19, Luke 7:34). He ate meals with them (Mk 2:13-17, Lk 5:29-30), stayed at their houses (Lk 19:5), let them touch him and show affection to him publicly (Lk 7:38-39), asked them to follow him (Mk 2:14), and spent time teaching them (Luke 15:1). So he was not worried about being “defiled” by the people themselves. (This would have been the concern of the religious leaders who were criticizing him.) Instead, his holiness was contagious (this ideas was from Craig Blomberg). So we see that it is sin that defiles, not people. (Here the teaching on food from Mark 7 can be key—it’s what comes out of our hearts in the form of sin that defiles, not what we eat.) Sin can’t be transmitted through contact, hanging out, or friendship. It only spreads as an individual himself or herself gives in to temptation and commits sin.
Applications:
- We must not participate in the life-style around us so characterized by the things Peter and Paul write about: greed, mistreatment of others, sinful partying, and unrestrained sexuality. In that sense, we need to be careful about what situations we allow ourselves to participate in. If we can’t be somewhere without basically doing what they’re doing, or if we’ll be tempted to do the same things, we should stay away from the situation.
- However, it’s important that we do not think that the sin of those around us can make us sinful by association. Sin can’t spread like a virus. So we have no reason to stay away from people in general, in fact, like Jesus and Paul, we have a mandate to befriend them and to be with them.
- Practically, what that means is that we must invite them into our lives and houses, and we must pursue meeting with them on both neutral ground (starbucks, etc.) and in their places. We could easily hang out in their house without attending one of their parties. But we don’t hang in the bar with them when everyone’s drinking up and partying. Do we attend a blatantly sinful bachelor party or go with a group to a place where sin is the main attraction? No. But do we hang at their house, do sports games together, join biking clubs, work out together, and a hundred other activities like that? Do we go to weddings and other social get-togethers, even parties, that don’t require us to do what Peter or Paul say to avoid? Absolutely.
- We must learn how to love people enough that we know when and how to tell them that what they’re doing is wrong. There is a time and a way where it is loving to help someone see that they’re dishonoring God and hurting themselves.
- If we’re going to do this, we must learn not to be put off by the symptoms of people’s sin, or even by speech and behavior which seems “course” or sinful to us. This is sometimes difficult but it requires that we live in the moment by the leading of the Spirit and a deep heart which is being changed by God’s love for us and everyone.
- In all of this, we don’t have to worry that our friendship with these people is “condoning their lifestyle.” Associating with people is our way of showing God’s love and we can only show them God’s love by being with people and among them. We need a relationship with someone to really show them God’s love. (See John 17:15-19, John 16:7-11)
12 Steps to Defend the BIble
See how typical this sounds for you:
“I saw an intriguing exchange on Twitter the other day. My friend Mike Betts had written something very innocuous – the Bible says we should trust God, or something like that – and someone responded, in a series of tweets that quickly degenerated into expletives and accusations of idiocy, that it is ridiculous to base our lives on an Iron Age text. What evidence is there, they demanded, that the Bible is true? After a few helpful questions, Mike wisely suggested that 140 characters might not be the best medium with which to argue for biblical authority, and said he could point them to some useful resources if they wanted. His interlocutor, apparently satisfied that “I can’t explain all that in a tweet” meant “I have no reason to believe it whatsoever”, immediately left the discussion, no doubt even more entrenched in their view that all Christians are idiots who are simply too stupid to have thought about whether the Bible can be trusted. Sigh.”
That’s a guy named Andrew Wilson setting up what I found to be a helpful article on ways to respond to such conversations. He wonders: “How would I explain the argument for biblical authority, to a secular person, as quickly and logically as possible?” Then he gives a succinct bit of logic to try to do exactly that. Here are the twelve steps to his thinking:
- There are multiple, literarily independent, first century historical sources that attest to the empty tomb and/or the resurrection appearances of Jesus of Nazareth. (For the very skeptical, this can be established by learning Koine Greek and visiting the Chester Beatty Library, the British Museum, and so on).
- Historical scholars generally agree that this is because the tomb of Jesus was empty, and his followers had experiences which they understood to be resurrection appearances.
- If miracles are possible, the most likely explanation of this evidence is that Jesus of Nazareth was bodily raised from the dead. If miracles are impossible, an alternative explanation – hallucination, conspiracy, swoon, other – is required.
- If the existence of a creator God is possible, then miracles – understood as suspensions of natural laws as a result of divine action – are possible, since a creator God could act in any way they chose.
- The existence of God is possible. (Philosophically, this may be the most contentious premise so far – but since anyone denying it has to show the impossibility of God, and that has proved beyond the reach of most, I consider it fair game).
- Therefore miracles are possible (from #4, #5).
- Therefore the most likely explanation for the historical evidence we have is that Jesus of Nazareth was bodily raised from the dead (from #3, #6).
- If Jesus of Nazareth was bodily raised from the dead, the most likely meaning of this event is that Israel’s God has vindicated and exalted him as Lord.
- If Israel’s God has vindicated and exalted Jesus as Lord, then we should accept and embrace his view of the way God’s authority functions in the world. (Again, almost everyone in history who believe Jesus was resurrected has believed something like this).
- The historical evidence we have indicates that Jesus of Nazareth believed divine authority was expressed through (a) the Hebrew scriptures, (b) his own prophetic teaching and actions, and (c) the teaching and actions of those whom he delegated as apostles.
- The Bible is the collection of (a) the Hebrew scriptures (Genesis to Malachi), (b) Jesus’ own prophetic teaching and actions (Matthew to John), and (c) the teaching and actions of those whom he delegated as apostles (Acts to Revelation). (It is of course open to anyone to object that, properly speaking, several of these books were not written by apostles. Rather than entering into a protracted defense of the Protestant canon here, I will simply direct the reader to Michael Kruger’s Canon Revisited, and point out that even if someone disagrees with him, they would still need to concede the authority of the vast majority of the Bible).
- Therefore we should accept and embrace the authority of the Bible (from #8, #9, #10, #11).
Did you find that helpful? Wilson concedes:
Obviously I wouldn’t assume someone could be persuaded by a few hundred words–and in my experience, people who fire expletives around on Twitter are not usually looking to be persuaded of anything anyway–but I thought it might be helpful to lay out the argument, at least as I see it, both to give an example of how a Christian might respond, and to help a skeptic identify the point in the argument at which they differ. (Usually, it comes down to the resurrection. If I believe Jesus is alive, I probably accept biblical authority, even if I nuance it differently from other Christians; if I don’t, then I don’t. On the basis of 1 Corinthians 15:12-19, I think Paul would be with me on that).
That last point is key. I’ve found it helpful to remember that my message to the world isn’t first, “I have the perfect book!” but (first) “Jesus is alive!” The fact that Jesus is raised from the dead is our central, most important message. The fact that the Bible gives perfect, trustworthy witness to that fact is essential, but as part of the support to our main gospel.
All of us are sinners, none of us are freaks.
A couple weeks ago Time Magazine arrived in my mailbox declaring that our nation was at a tipping point–we were about to become acclimated to and supportive of people pursuing any and all forms of transgendered lifestyles.
Here’s another conversation we need to prepare to have (especially ever Christian under forty). Have you thought about what you will say when someone challenges your idea that there are two separate genders which are tied to congenital, biological differences between men and women?
Here’s some helpful thoughts to start the process from Russell Moore (he’s president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission for the Southern Baptist Convention–This was published back in August):
The Internet is abuzz with conversation about the “T” in “LGBT” this week, after California Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law legislation supporting “equal access” for students who believe themselves to be the opposite gender from their biological sex. As a conservative evangelical Christian, I believe the so-called transgender question will require a church with a strong theological grounding, and a winsome pastoral footing.
Here’s why.
Ultimately, the transgender question is about more than just sex. It’s about what it means to be human.
Poet Wendell Berry responded to techno-utopian scientism with the observation that civilization must decide whether we see persons as creatures or as machines. If we are creatures, he argued, then we have purpose and meaning, but also limits. If we see ourselves, and the world around us, as a machine, then we believe the Faustian myth of our own limitless power to recreate ourselves.
This is, it seems to me, the question at the heart of the transgender controversy. Are we created, as both the Hebrew Scriptures and Jesus put it, “male and female,” from the beginning or are these categories arbitrary and self-willed? Do our bodies, and our sexes, represent something of who we were designed to be, and thus impose limits on our ability to recreate ourselves?
Laws such as those in California will quickly test the boundaries of society’s tolerance for a psychological and individualistic definition of gender. There are reasons, after all, why societies put boys and girls in different bathrooms, men and women on different sports teams. When gender identity is severed from biological sex, where does one’s self-designation end, and who will be harmed in the process?
As conservative Christians, we do not see transgendered persons as “freaks” to be despised or ridiculed.
We acknowledge that there are some persons who feel alienated from their identities as men or as women.
Of course that would be the case in a fallen universe in which all of us are alienated, in some way, from how God created us to be.
But we don’t believe this alienation can be solved by pretending as though we have Pharaoh-like dominion over our maleness or femaleness. These categories, we believe (along with every civilization before us), are about more than just self-construction, and they can’t be eradicated by a change of clothes or chemical tinkering or a surgeon’s knife, much less by an arbitrary announcement in the high school gym.
The transgender question means that conservative Christian congregations such as mine must teach what’s been handed down to us, that our maleness and femaleness points us to an even deeper reality, to the unity and complementarity of Christ and the church. A rejection of the goodness of those creational realities then is a revolt against God’s lordship, and against the picture of the gospel that God had embedded in the creation.
But this also means that we will love and be patient with those who feel alienated from their created identities.
We must recognize that some in our churches will face a long road of learning what it means to live as God created them to be, as male or female. That sort of long, slow, plodding and sometimes painful obedience is part of what Jesus said would be true of every believer: the bearing of a cross. That cross-bearing reminds us that God doesn’t receive us because of our own effort but because God reconciled us to himself through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.
Our transgendered neighbors will disagree with us, of course, that discipleship means an acceptance of who we are as men and women, and that our selves are not separate from our bodies. We should expect such disagreements. But we believe we can no more surgically alter our gospel than we can surgically alter our gender.
All we can do is say what we believe as Christians: that all of us are sinners, and that none of us are freaks.
We must conclude that all of us are called to repentance, and part of what repentance means is to receive the gender with which God created us, even when that’s difficult. We must affirm that God loves all persons, and that the gospel is good news for repentant prodigal sons and daughters, even for those who have trouble figuring out which is which.
If you’d like to continue delving into the biblical foundation for believing in the connection between biology and gender identification, check out this blog post.
What’s the big deal with sin? (Notes from last night.)
Last night we continued our look through scriptures to grow in our understanding and ability to communicate the message of Jesus. Here are the notes:
What’s the issue with Sin? First, the bible states clearly that Sin separates from God. Read Isaiah 59:1-15. Why does sin separate us from God? The first reason is what Isaiah saw in Chapter 6. God is holy. Simply, here in this passage, that would mean that he simply won’t be connected to the kind of things we see happening in chapter 59. (Notice also Psalm 51:4–all sin is against God.)
This is all easier to start to understand more of this when we break it down and look at the different ways the bible describes our relationship to God.
1. God is the Creator (Genesis 1:27-31)
Sin ruins what God made. God made everything good. Sin “vandalizes” the good thing God made, and ruins the good purposes God made it for. (One author says sin vandalizes God’s “Shalom.”) We are meant to be stewards and cultivators of God’s creation. In sin we leave that role and instead become vandalizers of God’s creation, ruining it by twisting it to our purposes which are opposite of God’s purposes. In doing so we cause pain, loss, and death. (See Genesis 9:6 where murder is seen as ruining the image of God, and James 3:9 where cursing each other is seen as cursing the image of God.)
2. God is the Judge (Rev 20:11-13)
Sin is breaking a law by wronging God or someone else, and incurring real moral guilt. Humans are made to be upright, free and spreaders of justice. Sin degrades us and causes us to be in bondage to the effects of our sin, including the incarceration of guilt. (See also 2 Timothy 4:1 and Acts 17:30-31.)
3. God is the King? (Psalm 42:7)
Sin is rebellion against the rightful ruler, Sin is bringing division and war into the kingdom. Humans are made to be citizens of the perfect, eternal kingdom. We are called to share God’s rule with him over the earth, under his authority. In sin we forfeit that place and try to establish our own rule. (See also 1 Timothy 1:17 and Matthew 28:18-20)
4. God is the most important person for us to relate to. (Mark 8:38)
Sin is adultery. Sin breaks the covenant with God and harms a relationship. Sin hurts God. We are called to be I the closets possible relationship to God. Sin ruins that relationship and wounds us by cutting us off from our connection to God. Sin also grieves God. It negatively affects him emotionally; see Ephesians 4:30.
Sin dishonors God as Father. Sin dishonors the head of the family. Sin denies the family connection and tries to break down the family. We are children of God. Sin denies that relationship and the authority of the Father over us. Sin expresses disdain for God’s house. (See Luke 3:38 and Malachi 1:6.)
Sometimes sin is seen as against God in the role of groom or spouse. SeeHosea 1:2.
God is the most important person in the universe. He is the one we most have to relate to. Everything is relational. It’s what the universe is. To ignore it would be like getting married, moving into a house together, and then thinking the relationship is all about the house. You take care of the house, enjoy the house, and live in the house together. But then, when you ignore her and bring home other women, you get confused when she gets mad. It’s not enough to live in the house and take care of it. The meaning of the house is the relationship. To mess up the relationship is to ignore and mess up the whole thing—and when you get a divorce, you’ll lose the house with the relationship. To act like we can ignore, belittle, or pervert our relationship to God, and it shouldn’t matter, is to misunderstand the whole universe.
Summing it up: In each of these cases, we see that sin is an offense against our relationship to God, and his creation, in each of the different aspects of that relationship.
But how, then, does God relate to us in our sin? God loves us, even thought there’s been all this damage we’ve done to the relationship.He is looking for you, and rejoices when you repent: See Luke 15:4-7.
Proof that People Get Saved in College…
One of the ideas settling into our culture as an accepted, unchallenged truth is the idea that people never change. They just believe what they believe, and stay the way they are, forever. And so, the idea goes, to try to spread your beliefs or persuade people of the truth of the gospel is really a waste of time.
Today we offer a response to that idea, in the form of the fourth installment in our video series entitled “Being Christian in College.” This one features two people recently wrapping up college, who both entered school unsaved, with no background in Christianity at all. While at school, they met some believers, were intrigued by what they discovered as they began to hang around Christians, and ended up meeting Jesus. Everything changed.
This is really one of the most important videos in this series. Whether you’ve got a semester of college coming up in the fall or not, this will be well worth your three minutes of viewing time, and can stir your heart to keep being a living witness to the non-believers in your life. If you can’t see the embedded version, you can see it on Vimeo at this link: How Did Christians Help You Come to Know Christ at College?
Enjoy…
Videos in this Series:
Series introduction:
Recently we had several friends from CC Philly who are finishing up their fourth year of school stop by to discuss college life with us. They brought a few more friends with them, people they had met and bonded with at school.
They agreed to let us film them discussing their experiences, so that we could share them with all of you who are currently in, or about to enter, a college or university.
Two of them were unsaved when they began school, and they talk about their experience meeting Christians and beginning to walk with Christ. The others entered school as Christians, and they share thoughts on going through school and actually making a difference for Christ on campus.
Being Christian in College
1. What Surprised you Most about College?
2. What Should Christians Do Together on Campus?
3. What Should Christian Do Before They Go To College?
4. How Did Christians Help You Come to Know Christ at College?
How does Jesus think we need to repent?
During one of our Monday night studies a few weeks ago, we looked at the report of the beginning of Jesus’ preaching ministry recorded in Matthew 4:17. It reads like this:
From that time Jesus began to preach and to say, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
We also noted that this verse probably gives us, not something Jesus said only once, but the summary and encapsulation, as well as the very beginning, of his entire life of teaching. In other words, what was Jesus saying as he walked around teaching all the time? Well, basically, he was saying that the kingdom of God was coming, and that as a result everyone needed to repent–to reorient themselves in light of his message. In passing during the study, I noted that if we didn’t have any more recorded about Jesus’ teaching, we might not be very clear on what exactly that meant. Like, so…what needs to change, exactly? Doesn’t God love us all? (Just the way we are?)
In the study I noted that I thought we had an answer right in Matthew, beginning right in the next chapter, in fact.
If you put the question to Jesus, “So what do you mean, practically, by saying ‘repent’? What do you want us to change?” I think he would have responded with Matthew chapters five through seven. In other words, what we commonly call “The Sermon on the Mount” is the “repent” side of Jesus’ teaching. (The “kingdom” side comes later in Matthew, like in chapters 13, 24, and 25). While it is certainly other things for us as well, the Sermon on the Mount is Jesus’ manual on repentance. It is a catalogue of the kinds of things that need to change when someone realizes how near the kingdom of God is.
(Note: I am not saying that this is a list of things that we must do to be saved and enter the kingdom; I’m saying this is Jesus’ way of explaining the kinds of changes we need to make when we encounter him. It is his way of showing us that we really aren’t fit to be citizens of the kingdom with out his forgiveness and instruction.)
So what exactly does Jesus mean when he says, “Repent”?
- Renounce self-glorifying, self-promoting, self-seeking ways of advancing your own agenda. (5:3-9)
- Be willing to endure criticism and oppression from people who disagree with Jesus. (5:10-12)
- Have a life wholly flavored by the things Jesus promotes, and not any other flavor. (5:13)
- Begin living a life of such obvious good that people think about God when they see you, and not you. (5:14-16)
- Don’t misunderstand Jesus by separating him from the previous things revealed (that is, don’t think of him as unrelated to the Old Testament). In other words, stop thinking wrongly about Jesus–Let the Bible tell you who he is. (5:17-18)
- Learn the correct way of weighing and obeying the commands of God. (5:19-20)
- Stop thinking so little of people that you get angry and wish them harm. (5:21-22)
- Stop fighting each other in court. (5:23-26)
- Stop looking at each other out of (and in order to stir up) sexual desire. (5:27-28)
- Stop acting like things God calls sin don’t have eternal consequences. (5:29-30)
- Stop divorcing each other. (5:31-32)
- Speak simple truth, and nothing else. (5:33-37)
- Instead of self-protection, practice generosity. (5:38-42)
- Stop hating your enemies and retaliating. Love people across any divide. (5:43-48)
- Don’t do things for people to see you, especially spiritual things or charitable things. Care more about what God sees than what people see. (6:1-18)
- Rather than self-dependence, practice dependence on your heavenly Father by praying to him constantly. (6:9-13)
- Stop holding grudges and thinking it’s ok with God. (6:14-15)
- Don’t amass wealth and want what others have as if there’s no life beyond the grave. (6:19-24)
- Stop worrying and acting like there’s no loving God in the world. (6:25-30)
- Care more about this coming Kingdom of God than your own daily needs. (6:31-34)
- Don’t always assume you know enough to fully evaluate or pass sentence on others. (7:1-5)
- Instead of relying on people, ask God for what you need. (7:6-12)
- Stop assuming that traveling the same way as the majority will lead you to heaven. Don’t trust what most people think about how to get there. (7:13-14)
- Be careful about who you let tell you what to think and how to live. (7:15-20)
- Don’t be duped by people with a show of power, even spiritual power–and don’t think these things will earn you any merit with God. (7:21-23)
- Stop listening to what Jesus says, and then not doing it. Base your whole life only on his teachings. (7:24-27)
Ok, so that was a long list. But it seems worthwhile to go through in our day, not only for those of us who believe and want to live by Jesus, but even more so for our wider culture.
Basically everyone today thinks that Jesus accepts them just the way they are. If you asked the average person if they thought Jesus would be cool with them, you can pretty much bet they’d tell you that he is! In fact our whole national conscience is skewed that way–just watch the acceptance speeches at any award show and see who they thank. We really feel like God is happy with us all.
But honestly, who could look at that list and not find, like, ten or fifteen things in their life Jesus clearly isn’t cool with? A little bible reading will tell us where the real Jesus stands with who we are. If we want to know, it’s all there in black and white.
All we need is ears to hear.
What Should Christians Do Together at College? (Being Christian at College, Movie 3)
The next installment in our video series entitled “Being Christian in College” just finished production. This part of the discussion with a few friends finishing their fourth year of college looks at the question What Should Christian Do Before They Go To College? They share thoughts about what kinds of preparations Christians should make before they begin school in order to set themselves up for a strong and fruit-filled time at school. While directed at students about to enter school as freshmen, their thoughts are applicable to anyone about to start a new semester. And since they offer some practical advice, the beginning of the Summer is the best time to hear what they have to say, because you actually have time to carry out their advice.
Enjoy…
Videos in this Series:
Series introduction:
Recently we had several friends from CC Philly who are finishing up their fourth year of school stop by to discuss college life with us. They brought a few more friends with them, people they had met and bonded with at school.
They agreed to let us film them discussing their experiences, so that we could share them with all of you who are currently in, or about to enter, a college or university.
Two of them were unsaved when they began school, and they talk about their experience meeting Christians and beginning to walk with Christ. The others entered school as Christians, and they share thoughts on going through school and actually making a difference for Christ on campus.
Being Christian in College
1. What Surprised you Most about College?
2. What Should Christians Do Together on Campus?
3. What Should Christian Do Before They Go To College?
Don’t Trust this Man
A parable:
But Christians don’t hold any of their beliefs because they like the way it feels. These aren’t whims or fantasies we’re working with here. Christians have come to see that they stand in the long line of a history–our basic message is something happened! In fact, our message is even more than that–a whole bunch of things have happened! For thousands of years, God has spoken to people, acted, moved water, air and earth, won battles, raised dead people to life, pulled nations out of slavery, saved little babies, heard prayer, kept promises, foretold the future…and then, the Son of God came and looked out of human eyes, spoke with a human mouth, healed crowds, let his body be killed, raised it up to new life, and ascended into the sky with a promise to return!
In other words, we hold the beliefs we do about God because of a whole history of events (events which happened in our world, in our history) in which God has personally proven his character to us. He didn’t have to. But he did it anyway.
When people doubt this history, it doesn’t prove a thing about whether or not the events happened. If they haven’t personally seen a resurrection, that doesn’t say anything about whether the event could or did happen. It only reveals their personal experience.
And so, we don’t need to listen to people who scoff at our ideas about God, or our witness to what he’s done in the world, when their only objection is how long ago it all seems to them and how unlike their daily experience the stories are. Living after something happened doesn’t change what happened before. Distance in time from an event doesn’t transform the event into fantasy.
We wouldn’t trust a man with no long-term memory to tell us about his life. Neither should we trust one collective Man with a tragically bad memory.
Not all truths are found in verses
Have you ever heard someone say, “Show me one verse that says ___________ (insert controversial/complex topic)”? Usually the words one verse are emphasized, as if to show how absurd the discussion really is, when, honestly, “We both know there’s no verse that says what you’re trying to say!”
Or what about when people say things (like a popular pastor said the other night on CNN) like, “I’m still waiting for someone to show me the quote where Jesus addressed [hot-button social issue].”
Find one verse.
Show me the quote.
Ok, we can all acknowledge the power of this kind of talk. But does it really get us closer to truth? Is that really how these things work? What about Christian teachings (like the fact that God is a trinity) that aren’t necessarily found a verse at a time? (There’s no verse that says, for instance, “God is a trinity.”)
Recently I heard Fred Sanders, (who wrote my favorite book on the Trinity) say something to this effect:
“I like my doctrine in in verse-sized bites as much as any other person, but some doctrines don’t come that way.”
In other words: We might all wish that every question we had came with an answer in a perfect package one sentence long–but the Bible doesn’t always work that way. Often we need to have the patience to read whole paragraphs, groups of paragraphs, whole chapters–even whole books and groups of books–in order to see the truths we need to see.
Sanders continues with this thought:
“We have train our minds to think in bigger sections of scripture than just a verse here and a verse there. The bigger the better.”
In our day, when we are regularly called on to give an answer for why we believe the things we do, and we are often asked to prove it from the scriptures, we need to take Sanders’ exhortation seriously.
Verses can be great. They help us find things in the Bible and give us manageable bits to memorize and quote. They fit nice on an Instagram post. But remember: the Bible wasn’t written in verses.
There were no verse numbers in the Bible until hundreds of years after it was written. The writers weren’t necessarily thinking in, or trying to communicate in, verse-sized thoughts. And with many things the writers of scripture needed to discuss, they didn’t feel the need to cram everything into a verse. They often took their time and developed a thought over sentences and paragraphs and whole letters or books. So if you’re just scanning for verses or doing a word search on Google, you’ll miss what the Bible really says.
Instead, you’ve got to sit with the actual words-on-the-page Bible, give God time to speak to you, humbly seek understanding with patience and diligence, and wait to see what God shows you in all those histories, poems, prophecies, and letters.
So the next time someone demands a verse from you, by all means, give them one if there is one. But if not, take time to explain that the Bible is an intelligent piece of communication which requires patience from intelligent minds, and that, in its pages God has often given us lengthy explanations rather than easily tweetable one-liners.
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