The Chi Files

I’m perpetually behind on my podcasts, but I discovered while catching up on “Wretched Radio” recently that this post got a mention and served as some talking points for Todd Friel for a short 4 minute segment on May 4th.  Very affirming, not to mention very cool.

(Oh, and a dude.  Definitely a dude. )

Don’t follow this link if you are easily depressed or have a weak stomach.  I doubt we need another proof that things are bad… but there it is for you all the same.

When it comes to sermons, I really appreciate one that makes me laugh.  Maybe enjoying humor coming from the pulpit calls my piety into question, I don’t know, but I do know that it holds my attention like few other things can.  Reverent yet well-placed humor helps me hold onto the sermon long after that particular Sunday; perhaps this is due to the fact that in order to strike me as funny, it must also be profound.

I’ve linked to such sermons before, and I’ve got another great one for you.  If you are willing to spend 15 minutes with Rev. Reed Lessing on the text of Isaiah 41:9-16, you will see what I mean.

Not long after linking to this post on facebook, a good friend of mine voiced his concern with my stance on homosexuality (and let the record show that I appreciate him for doing so – rather than just rolling his eyes and blocking me or something – immensely!).  He happened to mention having friends who are homosexual, and as I responded to him I tried to think whether or not I, myself, have friends who are homosexual.  I couldn’t think of any as I typed, so I let that go, but within the next few hours I did indeed come up with a list of names.

Now, I think this is interesting for two reasons.  The first being the answer to the question: why does it matter whether I have any homosexual friends?

It matters because of a little thing called empathy (specifically, empathy with the person who identifies as homosexual).

You see, the closer you are to a given issue, the more you know how to act with love and compassion (which is always, always the goal) towards those the issue affects most.  There is a danger present in speaking about something you have no experience with, because by-and-large you will expose a lack of empathy that will merely drive away those who actually deal with it.

An example for you: when I was a young boy my grandfather dealt with chronic back and knee pain, which made him more than a little cranky at times.  My response then was, “tough it out and man-up.  It can’t be bad enough that you have to let it ruin your day!”  Years later, I have dealt with my own periods of chronic pain and I can tell you: yeah, some days it is just that bad.  Would I have ever come to that understanding without my own pain?  Unlikely, at best.  The principle is that the greater the degree of separation between a person and the issue, the less empathy that person will have for those more affected by it.

All that is to say, were I to have no friends who are homosexual to show me that they are human beings and worthy of love and respect like anyone else, it could actually be more destructive than constructive for me to speak on the topic.  This is because, without that experiential context, I would run a great risk of being a mere clanging gong instead of showing grace and acting in love and compassion.  That’s the last thing I want; it should be the last thing any Christian wants (I’m looking at you, Fred Phelps).

The second reason I think the above story is interesting is this: it took me some time to even remember which friends are homosexual, or whether I have any at all!

Okay, so why is that interesting?  Precisely because it demonstrates clearly that homosexuality is not the defining thing about these people in my mind.

Let me take just one individual (of several) as an example of this.  I’ve known this person well more than a year and they are someone I see and interact with 3 to 4+ days a week.  We keep each other sane and have even been known to burst into simultaneous song together.  This person has helped me out in more ways than I can tell you, on more occasions than I can recite, and I have done my best to do the same for them.  If a week goes by and I don’t see this person, I truly miss them.  I am happy and proud to call this person a friend.

And this person is an out-and-out homosexual.

But see, when I was trying to remember if I had any homosexual friends, I couldn’t.  Not for not remembering this person or considering them a friend, but because out of all the things that define this person in my mind, homosexuality is not anywhere near the top of the list.  More than anything, it was an afterthought.

Now, that might come as a shock to some of the militant pro-homosexual activists out there (and here I’m talking about folks like Dan Savage and ilk), who would have us believe that sexual orientation is the defining characteristic of a person.  One reason such umbrage is taken by Savage and company to the idea of homosexuality being actually sinful is the prevailing mentality that, “If you reject my homosexuality you are rejecting me as a person.”

But what I have shared above should completely put that to bed.  Not only do I unequivocally accept my friends-who-are-homosexual as persons (even though I categorically reject homosexuality as sinful in the eyes of God), but I do so without even having reference in my mind to their sexual orientation whatsoever!

Anyway, 2 morals to the story:
1) Make sure and certain that you are prepared and able to be reasonable and compassionate in dealing with this and any issue where people are involved (1 Cor. 13).
2) Recognize that it is possible (nay, necessary) to understand that what defines a person is not, at root, their sinful actions, but their status as one created in the image of God to be looked upon with love, and treated with dignity.  The Gospel of Jesus Christ and Him crucified for the forgiveness of sins is for us and our sins every bit as much as it is for them and theirs.

Final thought:
Remember, in any context, you are the worst sinner.  Make sure you treat others like you believe that.

What the world wants you to think being open minded means.

I found a flyer in the mail today entitled “77 Non-Religious Reasons to Support Man/Woman Marriage”.  It has some pretty solid points inside (as well as couple floppy ones) regarding why the state should spurn homosexual “marriage”.  Overall it is a very natural law-y presentation.

In the end though, I can’t help but think that – if the goal is to actually stem the tide and prevent same-sex marriage from becoming an accepted cultural norm – this is simply barking up the wrong tree.  It seems anymore that everyone thinks this battle is won or lost based on appealing to good secular (i.e. “non-religious”) arguments against same-sex marriage, but that’s absurd.  As long as the argument is a secular one (see the flyer link above for examples) we are not addressing the foundational issue. We can make these arguments until we’re blue in the face, but the rebuttal will always be the same:

“But same-sex marriage is what it takes to make me happy. You can’t deny me my right to happiness, and if you try you are a shameful bigot!”

Which is, of course, a response that has been well-designed to pull on the heartstrings of every non-discerning person within hearing distance, and tends to end the conversation with a win for that side.  Rather than play that game, the issue we need to be focused on is the fact that we are creatures of God, bearing His image – NOT advanced slime-creatures-seeded-from-outer-space (or whatever the prevailing evolutionary theory is these days… real science is shooting them down so quickly it’s hard to keep up). Once we re-focus the conversation off of the secular presupposition that “I have a right to do whatever feels good” and back to “God made me and has revealed His standard for how I am to live my life in a way pleasing to Him” we will be much better positioned to “win the fight”. 

Is that likely to happen? No, because for some reason Christians have – in the name of being considered “open minded” – made our stand predominantly on secular arguments that, by very virtue of being relied upon, grant the secular premise that utilitarianism = morality. Therefore, all that’s left is for the folks on the other side of the debate to gather a majority unto themselves (as they are doing swiftly and effectively) and they are the de facto victors.

Once you grant that premise, the conclusion follows automatically. Therefore: DON’T. GRANT. THE PREMISE.

Seriously, our secular culture demands that we approach the debate without the Bible (“Don’t you try to impose your morality on me!”), and we are tripping over ourselves to accommodate them.  When will we as Christians wake up and realize that this is a losing proposition?  As soon as we forego God’s Word, we have conceded it all, for there can be and is no morality apart from “and each man did what was right in his own eyes” without revelation from the Creator.

So if we can’t rely on secular arguments to make our case, what can be done?  The solution, as I see it, is evangelism.  Only proclaiming the Law in all its harshness, and the Gospel in all of its graciousness, can bring repentance and faith to an apostate people.  At the end of the day the debate is really about God’s will vs. man’s will, and only the restoring power of the Holy Spirit can break our sinful hearts of our own will and bind them unto Christ’s.

Pastor Brown put up an excellent post today about good works in the Christian life using the analogy of – you got it – cake.

Read it here!

On Tuesday’s edition of the Dividing Line, Dr. White spent the first 45 minutes of the program discussing thoughts on the major players in the upcoming general election for President and the implications that it has for the United States of America.  Dr. White’s Alpha and Omega Ministries is a nonprofit ministry and he does not give council on who to vote for, but his insight into the issues as someone who is well-versed  in both history and religion is worth paying attention to as we consider what is important come November.

I was hoping A&O would post the video of this segment on their Youtube channel, but it does not appear they are going to.  Thus, I’ve posted the audio from the segment below so more people can hear it.

Issues covered are Mormonism, Secularism, freedom-of-speech, the declining of the west in the face of agnostic postmodernism, and how to be as wise as serpents and as gentle as doves in the midst of all of this.

Oh, and try to listen to all of it – don’t stop at the 10 or 11 minute mark thinking you know where he’s going… he’s just getting started at that point.

There were two deaths this week that rocked the worlds of people I know.  One was a middle-aged father who leaves behind his widow and teen children; the other a young mother who leaves behind her husband and their infant child.  As in times before, I have asked myself the same question: “what do I say?”  And the answer is the same too… Nothing.  That is, nothing of myself.

Human words can never begin to break through the darkness of despair.  There is no power in them to give hope to the hopeless, or restore what we know should never have been lost.  Human words cannot hold a wife close, hand a diploma to a daughter, or nurse an infant son.  In fact, if I try to speak to a person having lost someone using human words, it is only proof that I do not understand their condition.

But you have probably noticed that I’ve been using “human” as an adjective.  Words are wonderfully helpful – just not mine.  The words I mean are those from the lips of someone who is more than a man.

I am the resurrection and the life.  Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?
- John 11:25b-26

The only word that matters for these hurting people is this: a “yes” put on their lips and in their hearts by the Holy Spirit of God Himself.

And lest I be misunderstood as suggesting that this fervent belief will by any means cease all brokenhearted mourning, remember that, within less than ten verses of this statement, Jesus – the resurrection and the life himself – wept.

And that’s okay.

But what is not okay is me trying to use any words other than His to bind up the brokenhearted.  My words do not bring life to the hearers – His do.¹  My words do not bring peace with God – His do.²  My words do not command the dead to come out of their tombs…

His do.³

Do not give yourself and your ideas/opinions/wisdom to the brokenhearted.
Give them Christ and His promise.

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1. John 6:68

2. John 20:19

3. John 11:43

I came across a worthwhile article in Relevant* magazine online recently (or rather, it came across me – like almost out of nowhere) that I’ve decided to link to here, called:

Beauty vs. Sexuality: Why the fear of lust shames both men and women

I link to it specifically since I may well be one of those bloggers the article calls out, and this may be the best act of penance I can pull off. (kidding, but only kind-of)  Suffice it to say that the article points out that we (read: me and my ilk, apparently) need to recognize this as an area where the Law has been used too rashly and too widely, and we need to remember to apply the Gospel at least as judiciously.

I’m still processing through it all, but I think when all is said and done that this will help greatly with my approach to the issues involved.

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*I’m not sure what I think of “Relevant” magazine, overall.  I’ve read a few (like, 2 or 3) of their articles, and the majority of what I’ve encountered I liked and agreed with; however, I just want to make clear that I am hesitant to recommend the publication on the whole at this point since I really haven’t vetted it for myself.  Just use discernment, as with anything.

Every so often you’ll hear an atheist argue that God can “only be believed in by someone who wants to be a plaything and a slave of a pitiless, totalitarian power,”* or some such thing.

I find this particular bit of rhetoric laughable in light of atheist Francis Crick’s (the co-discoverer of the double-helix pattern of DNA and Nobel Prize winning scientist) admission that, in the atheistic worldview:

“You”, your joys and your sorrows, your memories and your ambitions, your sense of personal identity and free will are in fact no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules.” Francis Crick, The Astonishing Hypothesis, p. 3

Now, call me kooky for thinking so, but natural selection is the most pitiless and totalitarian power you could ever hope to come up with.  Pitiless because it is death itself (particularly young death, before the organism has a chance to procreate) that drives the process and is essential for natural selection to operate, and totalitarian because, according to Francis Crick at least, the process of natural selection that spit you out has already pre-ordained everything about you by means of your genetic code.

So see, at the end of the day atheists don’t really object to being slaves to a pitiless, totalitarian power (even if we allow for the moment that God is, which I do not believe) – they just don’t want that power to be a moral being to whom they are accountable.

For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
- Romans 1:21

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*Quoted from Christopher Hitchens in his debate with Frank Turek