'Funny' isn't exactly the first word that comes to mind....

The lyrics to Dave Matthews Band's newest single captures the very same theme that actually inspired the title of this blog, Redemption Groanings. The song is all about how this world is not the way it's supposed to be; it's called Funny the Way it Is:

Lying in the park on a beautiful day
The sunshine in the grass
And the children play
Sirens passing fire engine red
Someone's house is burning down
On a day like this

The evening comes and we're hanging out
On a front step and a car goes by
With the windows rolled down
And that war song is playing
Why can't we be friends
Someone is screaming and crying
In the apartment upstairs

Funny the way it is
Make you think about it
Somebodies going hungry
And someone else is eating out
Funny the way it is
Not right or wrong
Somebodies heart is broken
And it becomes your favorite song

The way your mouth feels in your lover's kiss
Like a pretty bird on the breeze
Or water to a fish
The bomb blast brings the building crashing to the floor
Hear the laughter
While the children play war

Funny the way it is
Make you think about it
One kid walks ten miles to school
An others dropping out
Funny the way it is
Not right or wrong
A soldiers last breath
His babies being born

Standing on a bridge
Watch the water passing underneath
It must have been much harder
When there was no bridge just water
Now the world is small
Compared to how it use to be
With mountains and oceans
And winters and rivers and stars

Funny the way it is
Make you think about it
One kid walks ten miles to school
An others dropping out
Funny the way it is
Not right or wrong
A soldiers last breath
His babies being born

Funny the way it is
Not right or wrong
Somebodies broken heart
And it becomes your favorite song
Funny the way it is
Make you think about it
One kid walks ten miles to school
Another's dropping out

There is something very right about this song, and yet at the same time something terribly wrong. How can Matthews possibly say, 'Funny the way it is/not right or wrong, On a soldier's last breath/His baby's being born' That's not funny, Dave, it's wrong! It's not the way things ought to be!

But what a great joy it is to ponder that our Redeemer is coming, who will one day make all things new. How I wish I had an hour with Dave Matthews to tell him that it's okay to see something wicked and declare it 'wrong,' not 'funny', and to share the great hope of redemption with him!

Five Lessons on Christian Political Involvement

In looking over Healing for a Broken World, I am finding a lot of material that is worth blogging about. So eventually I will get to the specific issue of the separation of church and state, but I thought I'd make a few other posts regarding political involvement. I'll also do my best to intersperse some posts on other issues along the way.

In the first chapter of his book, Monsma examines the life of William Wilberforce (the 18th century British evangelical who, as a member of the British parliament, worked tirelessly to end the African slave trade) and pulls out from his life five principles for Christian involvement in politics:

1. Wilbeforce had a deep personal commitment to Jesus Christ that transformed every aspect of his life. He was not a politician who thought all the answers to society's ills would come through political activism; nor did he think his entire Christian duty was fulfilled in cultivating his inner, private spiritual life. Jesus claimed and transformed every sphere of his life.

2. Wilberforce did not act alone, but was part of a group of fellow Christians who prayed, planned and worked together.

3. Wilberforce experienced great opposition to his work, to the point of even receiving death threats. It took more than twenty years -- after failure upon failure -- for the slave trade to finally be abolished.

4. Wilberforce and his Christian partners worked for the greater good of society as a whole. There were not an evangelical special-interest group, seeking only to protect their narrow self-interests as Christian believers. They pursued political policies that actually hurt their own social class's economic wealth. I think this is especially important when wrestling through the issue of the separation of church and state.

5. Wilberforce acted thoughtfully. That is, he took up issues only after careful study and much prayer and Bible study. When he spoke, he had his facts straight and could defend his positions with skill and knowledge.

There's more to come, so stay tuned. And please leave comments so we can interact on these matters together.

Healing for a Broken World

I received an email last week from a reader of this blog (who didn't leave a comment giving his name, location and church!) who said he'd be interested in reading some thoughts I have on the separation of church and state. I told him I'd do that this week, but some other meetings and sermon preparation have prevented me from doing so.

With a couple of weeks off from preaching beginning next week, I plan to tackle that subject in a few posts next week. But for now I just thought I'd post a book recommendation on the subject. I read Healing for a Broken World last year and thought it was an interesting read. Probably a good bit of what I write next week will cover material that is found in that book in greater depth.

So for those who are interested in thinking through Christian involvement in politics, I'd recommend it.

Why Rainy Days are Blessings

For those in the Tri-State area, it was refreshing to wake up this morning and see the sun wasn't it? It reminded me of Jesus' words in Matthew 5, '[Our heavenly Father] makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.'

The rising of the sun is a profound act of God's love and mercy toward this world that has, by and large, rejected and ignored His goodness. But I am not often inclined to really feel gratitude for the sun. It rises every day, so it's easy to take it for granted.

Yet this morning, I had a deep gratitude for the sun. Which makes me think that rainy days (especially an entire week of rainy days) are actually good blessings from our Maker, which He uses to ignite in us a sense of joy and thanksgiving for the sun that we ought to feel every day.

I Want to Know Who's Out There!

I liked this one on Abraham Piper's blog a few months ago, so let's try it here.

Whether you’re a regular commenter or not, why not come on out and say hello?

I know some people don’t like commenting, and that’s OK.

But here’s a real easy one:

What’s your name, town, and church?

(Your comment will not post immediately; I have to moderate all comments, as a way of cutting down on spam comments)

Talk TO people, not ABOUT people

John Piper, commenting on Luke 18:9, "He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt...":

It may seem minor at first, but notice that it says that Jesus told this parable TO some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous. It does not say he spoke this parable ABOUT them. Jesus was looking the Pharisees in the eye and telling them a parable that implied that they were self-righteous. He was not talking about them but to them.

Though it may seem minor, it contains a lesson that is huge for the health of our church. Let’s be like this. Let’s not talk to others about people’s faults. Let’s talk to them about their faults. It is easy—and far too tasty on the tongue of our sinful souls—to talk about people. But it is hard—and often tastes bitter—to talk to them. When you are talking about them, they can’t correct you or turn the tables and make you the problem. But if you talk to them about a problem, it can be very painful. So it feels safer to talk about people rather than talking to them.

But Jesus does not call us to make safe choices. He calls us to make loving choices. In the short run, love is often more painful than self-protecting conflict-avoidance. But in the long run, our consciences condemn us for this easy path and we do little good for others. So let’s be more like Jesus in this case and not talk about people, but talk to them, both with words of encouragement, because of the evidences of grace we see in their lives, and with words of caution or warning or correction or even rebuke. Paul urged us to use the full range of words for the full range of needs: “Admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all” (1 Thessalonians 5:14).

Matchups like this make me thankful that I have a God who parted the Red Sea and rose from the dead...

NEXT GAME 5/6

TV: CSN, ESPN
RADIO: WPHT 1210, WUBA 1480

@
Citi Field
7:10PM EDT

Park (0-1)

Santana (3-1)

Tickets

Maybe the Phils do have a chance tonight?

Sorry, Today's Phillies Game is Rained Out....Here's a Gospel Presentation for Your Viewing Pleasure

On Sunday after church I planned to watch the Phillies-Mets series finale on TV, but was bummed to find out that the game had been rained out. When I turned on channel 17, I was greeted by the opening few minutes of The Iron Giant, which was being shown in place of the baseball game.

Iron Giant is about a young boy who goes out late one night and finds a huge robot roaming in the wilderness looking for food. I won't recount the whole movie, but toward the end of the movie, the US government launches a nuclear missle to destroy the robot because they perceive him as a threat to the safety of the society. They do this despite the fact that the robot has shown himself to be good and has saved lives with his great power.

In the climactic scene, the missle is heading toward the small town, and is about to destroy not only the robot, but the entire town as well. The Iron Giant decides he must sacrifice himself in order to save the town, and launches himself into the sky in order to intercept the missle. The Giant collides at full speed with the missile, which explodes above the atmosphere, apparently destroying the Giant but sparing the town.

So the Phillies got rained out, but I hope those who stay tuned in to channel 17 didn't miss the Gospel presentation. A robot with supernatural power chooses to sacrifice himself to save the people who are trying to kill him?

I wonder how they come up with such stories....

Forgiveness, Bent Outward

On Thursday nights I'm going through a book on marriage with some friends. This Momentary Marriage is by far the best book I've read on marriage, I can't recommend it enough. And this quote that I read for our study tonight is among my favorites:

“As the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive”—your spouse. As the Lord “bears with” you, so you should bear with your spouse. The Lord “bears with” you everyday as you fall short of his will. Indeed, the distance between what Christ expects of you and what you achieve is infinitely greater than the distance between what you expect of your spouse and what he achieves. Christ always forgives more and endures more than we do. Forgive as you have been forgiven. Bear with as he bears with you. This holds for whether you are married to a believer or an unbeliever. Let the measure of God’s grace to you in the cross of Christ be the measure of your grace to your spouse.

"And if you are married to a believer, you can add this: As the Lord counts you righteous in Christ, though you are not in actual behavior or attitude, so count your spouse righteous in Christ, though he is not—though she is not. In other words, Colossians 3 says, take the vertical grace of forgiveness and justification and bend them out horizontally to your spouse. This is what marriage is for, most ultimately—the display of Christ’s covenant-keeping grace.

I'm a sinner; Michelle is a sinner. But with a foundation built on this kind of awesome grace, I believe we'll flourish until death parts us, even with our manifold flaws. I love this book, not least because it helps me love my beautiful bride a little bit more like the way Jesus loves His.

Born Again, or Born of the World?

In John Piper's book, Finally Alive, he cites statistics reported by the Barna Group indicating that 'born again' or evangelical Christians (terms used interchangeably by the Barna Group) often live with no discernible difference than those who are not Christian believers. For instance:

• Only 9% of evangelicals tithe
• Of 12,000 teenagers who took a vow of abstinence before marriage, 80% had sex outside marriage in the next seven years
• 26% of evangelicals do not think premarital sex is wrong
• White evangelicals are more likely than Catholics and mainline Protestants to object to having black neighbors.

The Barna Group looks at these statistics and conclude that born again Christians are morally indistinguishable from the rest of our society.

There is, of course, another possibility: Millions of people who claim to be born again have never actually been born again.

I believe the Bible points us in this direction in many places. For instance, Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 7:21).

I'm gonna go out on a limb here, but I'll side with Jesus over the Barna Group on this one!

Cutting the Grass and the Delight of God's Creation

Yesterday, on my day off, I mowed our front lawn. I have found over the last year that I love mowing the lawn, which is a surprising statement to those who know me well. I used to hate even the idea of mowing the grass (my mom can surely attest to this). Surely there are more important things to do than cut grass...it just grows right back anyway! Have fun outside; I'll do something productive, like reading a book.

But my attitude ignored that the God I claim to worship and love is both a creator and a cultivator. When God created the heavens and the earth, we're told that they were formless and void. But then God took the disorder of the created world and molded it into something beautiful.

And after creating the first man, he told Adam to do in the Garden what God had done in the whole world: "The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it" (Genesis 2:15). God brought order out of His disordered world; now He calls Adam, and all who are made in His image, to reflect that image in their stewardship of the created world.

Which brings me to cutting the grass. Even though I hated the idea of doing it, there was always something in me that looked at a freshly cut lawn and could see, 'This is good.' Who likes to walk or drive by a lawn that's overgrown, nasty and unkempt (like this photo to the right, which is not what my grass looked like before the cut yesterday!)?

In the last year I've learned that this feeling of satisfaction is multiplied greatly when I am the one who did the cutting. When I finished mowing yesterday and looked back on my 'handiwork', I had a sense of satisfaction that a tiny slice of God's creation had been made a little more orderly.

And I thought to myself, 'I wonder if this is a taste of how God felt, after the sixth day, when He looked at the vast universe that He had created and exclaimed with boundless joy, "This is very good."

Of course, God created me to do much more than just cut grass as a way of bearing His image. He's called all Christians to preach the good news of Christ's life, death and resurrection. Cutting the grass will never accomplish such a task. Nevertheless, I believe God is honored when His people fulfill even their most ordinary tasks (like mowing the lawn) with the joy of knowing that we are doing it for His pleasure. Indeed, I believe it's a way of sharing in the pleasure that He has in the goodness of His lavish creation.

Jesus Wants the Rose!

This video was my first exposure to the ministry of Matt Chandler. Needless to say, I became an instant fan:

More on Care for the Creation

For those interested in reading more about the theme I brought up yesterday regarding Earth Day, you can check out this short article written last year by Noel Piper on the Desiring God blog.

Cursed, In Hope

Today is Earth Day, and for me that is a reminder of both the curse of sin and the hope of redemption.

Last week I heard a message in which one of the most well-known Bible teachers in the world cited an evangelical statement of commitment to care for God's creation. The statement said, 'We commit ourselves to extend Christ's healing to the creation.' The Bible teacher then said, with great cynicism, 'I've got news for you: He cursed it! He started all the weeds and disasters.'

After quoting another evangelical statement saying, 'The cosmos in all its beauty, wildness and life-giving bounty is the work of our loving Creator,' the Bible teacher continued, 'What did they do, skip Genesis 3? He cursed it. God created it good, man sinned, and He corrupted it.'

This grieved me, because it seems to be a gross distortion of the Biblical teaching. Yes, some Christians have become so extreme in their commitment to preserve the environment that they seem to care very little about preaching the saving message of Christ crucified and risen for sinners. This is a grievous error. But it does no good to react to that error by plunging to error on the far opposite side of the pendulum, and doing it with great arrogance and smugness as well.

In reality, what this Bible teacher did was not distort the truth, but truncated it. Yes indeed, God did curse the entire created cosmos as a result of the sin of Adam and Eve. But that is NOT the end of the story, as this Bible teacher seemed to suggest so adamantly. Sadly, the Bible teacher did not mention how Romans 8 fit into his scheme of good creation, sin, and curse. In that chapter, Paul writes,

For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.

Yes, the creation was subjected to futility; it was cursed. But it was cursed in hope, that one day the entire creation will be set free from the curse of bondage and corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. The created world that God cursed is groaning for its coming redemption from that curse, as part of the glorious triumph of the Son of God over sin, death and hell on the Cross.

How a reputable Bible teacher could so casually, cynically speak of God's curse on the creation without mentioning this verse is unfortunate. And whether this Bible teacher agrees with me or not, I believe that Earth Day is a day for Christians to both grieve and celebrate. To grieve, because our sin is what condemned this creation to its current state of bondage and corruption. But also to celebrate, because one day Jesus the Redeemer will set the entire cosmos free from the curse to the praise of His glorious, extravagant grace.

Spurgeon on Being Fashionable

This morning I received a copy of Tullian Tchividjian's new book Unfashionable: Making a Difference in the world by being different. I've been looking forward to reading this one for several months, and it has endorsements from some men I highly respect.

On the first page of the book, Tullian shares this quote from Charles Spurgeon:

The great guide of the world is fashion and its god is respectability -- two phantoms at which brave men laugh! How many of you look around on society to know what to do? You watch the general current and then float upon it! You study the popular breeze and shift your sails to suit it. True men do not so! You ask, 'Is it fashionable? If it is fashionable, it must be done.' Fashion is the law of multitudes, but it is nothing more than the common consent of fools.

I think Spurgeon (and Tullian) is right. In our desire to be 'relevant' and 'culturally engaged,' we best not make an idol out of being fashionable.