Props to the Preachers

I want to take some time to publicly acknowledge those who have most impacted my life as a disciple of Christ and a minister of the gospel. There is no question these fine gentlemen have much better fruit to their credit than me, but from this, maybe the fruitiest, a very sincere thanks to these men of God for a job well done.

Rex Bornman
Rex was my first pastor after coming to Christ. My first visit to the State College Assembly of God, where he pastored, came a week after I marched the aisle and was subsequently baptized at a Southern Baptist Church in Harrisburg, PA (my home town). I totally freaked out-- the place was positively spooky, but even though it scared the bejeebers out of me, I felt a strange compulsion to go back to that place, where the people responded to God in a way that made sense, at least if one truly believed in hell and salvation.

As I devoured the Word and talked with God, the Lord would instruct and illumine me. Sunday after Sunday, Rex would preach (in his own flamboyant style), and repeat almost verbatim what God had been speaking to me in my “prayer closet.” Talk about being pumped! I learned what God sounded like through that ongoing experience and developed sensitivity to and trust in the voice of the Holy Spirit. You’ll not likely ever read this Rex, but thanks. You’re the best in my book, and still the most effective preacher I have ever had the pleasure to see or hear. 

Stephen Michaels
The first time I heard Steve preach was on the street outside Schwab Auditorium on the campus of Penn State. Generally, I did not like street preachers: they were nothing but clanging cymbals playing for shock value to get an audience. Not Steve, he spoke with passion, but logically, sensibly, persuasively.

A couple of years later, Rex introduced him as the new campus pastor for the Chi Alpha chapter the State College A/G was sponsoring at Penn State. Steve cleaned up real well! In my first conversation with him, I slightly hinted (and I do mean just slightly!) that I was intrigued by the Holy Spirit. Steve told me he’d be at my room at 5pm, and gave me little chance to object.

With Bible in hand he began going through the scriptures concerning the Holy Ghost. I was getting excited, and after about ten minutes of his presentation, I knew God wanted to baptize me in the Holy Ghost and would. Steve went on for about another 20 minutes or so, while I was chomping at the bit. He laid hands on my head, I felt overwhelmed and overflowing, and started speaking in heavenly language I did not know.

From that time until I left college (I hung around for a short while after graduation) Steve was a friend and counselor, discipler and example. Thank you Steve, for the much good you did for me. 

Mike Smith
I started Bible college in January of 1984, 1100 miles away from home, in a town I’d never been at before, knowing no one but my poor wife, who got dragged along with me into the frozen tundra (sweet thing, she came along cheerfully). We began searching for a church family. In the process, one Sunday morning, we got on a schoolbus that had come to North Central and off we went to who knows where.

We ended up in White Bear Lake, MN at Calvary A/G. They worshipped there, it was refreshing. Then, Mike Smith got up to preach. He was a rugged looking fellow, with a kind voice, and light in his eyes. He was refreshing. A couple of years later, he gave me my first job in ministry. He was one of the nicest people I have ever met. To this day, I don’t think I have met a better example of kindness and grace. Thank you Mike, for the start and for the example.

Paul Grabill
When I was a home missions pastor in Pittsburgh, one of the Sectional Committeemen was assigned by the presbyter to be my mentor and treasurer. He was a doctoral candidate at Fuller, attempting to lead an old A/G church stuck in the 50’s into the 80’s. He had flaming red hair! He was patient and smart, and knew more about the nuts and bolts of church life than anyone I ever met. He poured knowledge liberally upon my hardened head—some of it seeped in!

I learned more about human nature and how it effects ministry and church life, and how leaders need to work with it realistically in a few months with Paul than in years of Bible College. I thank God for the gift of time and the abundance of knowledge I received from Paul. In a strange twist of fate, Paul pastored that very same State College Assembly of God mentioned above (as well as serving as the Asst. Supt. of the Penn-Del District), and from which he went on to his eternal reward August 11, 2011.

Robert Owen
My wife grew up going to church. She was saved when only four years old! When she was 12, her family started attending South Hills A/G in Pittsburgh, pastored by Robert Owen. He’s a Welshman, which means he loves to sing and has a great accent! The first time I sat in his church, I was visiting my new fiancée’s family. In a sanctuary filled to capacity, he looked right at me from the pulpit, and told me to take the gum out of my mouth (evidently, he didn’t want to look out and see a bunch of cows chewing their cud). Talk about seeker sensitivity! I don’t remember when, exactly, I got over it. ;-)

For years his church was the largest congregation in the Penn-Del District, yet no matter how large it got, he and Miriam would stand at the back door greeting everyone by name when they left the service. Even in a room packed with hundreds and hundreds of people, the place still felt like a familiar place, like family. He’s taught me so many valuable lessons about call, ministry, commitment, integrity, and generosity, I wouldn’t know where to begin enumerating them. Thank you, Pastor Owen, you served the cause of Christ until the end of your days (November 19, 2012) and planted seeds in the hearts of men.

There you have it: the ministers that have meant so much to me. Their service was of benefit to thousands, I’m just grateful I was one of them. So, props to the preachers, may blessing continue to pour forth from you even long after you're gone.

On the Road to Emmaus

In the Wizard of Oz, the dramatic tension breaks when Toto pulls back the curtain to reveal a rather stodgy old man behind all the pyrotechnics and bluster. None of it had been real. The shivering dread of the Wizard melted and immediately turned into recriminations, but after some explanations turned into familiar friendship. With no more curtain there was no more distance, no more show, no more uncertainty.

I fear too many Christians have a Wizard of Oz relationship with Christ. He's not a real figure to them-- if anything, maybe just a scary voice in their heads, perhaps projecting from a lifeless representation hanging on a cross screwed to a wall, assumed to be infused with ultimate, frightening, cosmic power (but really, who knows?). But what about the real Jesus, you know, that guy walking on the road to Emmaus with a couple of disciples on a Sunday afternoon? Or what about that fellow making breakfast for his buddies after a morning of fishing? Or the reality of the old hymn:

And He walks with me,
And He talks with me,
And He tells me I am His own.
And the joy we share as we tarry there
None other has ever known?

We presume a lot in the American church. We go to altars with tears and foreboding, confess all that's not right with us (at least in summary form), invite Jesus into our hearts, and then press cruise control and go on with life, eternal life insurance now safely in hand. I don't know how we convince ourselves that all this works, when the first time God gets a little too close and a little too real, we're scared witless and want to run away.

Let revival break out, let Ichabod be replaced by Ebenezer, and those who worship brass saviors on sticks will howl the loudest about emotionalism and excess. We have a real God, not a fake wizard. He was dead, but is no longer. Although we remember him until he comes again, he is not relegated to live only in our memories. We ought to be walking with him and talking with him now, actually.

Should we not be as excited as the first disciples were to see him alive again, to know that the passion wasn't the end, but only the beginning? I see no reason that we should not be as excited, enthused, and passionate about walking with Jesus and knowing him intimately as were they. Does knowing Jesus, the King of Glory thrill your heart and capture your imagination? If not, personal revival is sorely needed.

Thankfully, can be found somewhere along the road to Emmaus.

Sail in the Breath of God

The one thing most essential and yet most feared in revival is the Holy Spirit. People have been misinterpreting the indications and expressions of his presence from the beginning of the church age. His activity and influence are often seen as excessive, ecstatic, and irrational. That's not what's actually happening in revival, but why is the Holy Spirit's influence often mistakenly perceived as raw emotion or irrational foolishness?

One possible answer is that the Holy Spirit, moving among us, makes God tangibly real. That is a spooky, scary proposition for sinful mankind. We're more comfortable with some distance and some room for interpretation. That's been the case since the beginning of the human race. God walking in the garden wouldn't seem a frightful image, but sin distorts our perception and makes us cower in fear hidden away from what is actually a very approachable God.

Perhaps even more frightful is showing up in the camp in power. His presence, all too real, is overpowering, so we'd rather let someone else deal with him. We're comfortable at a distance, capable of ignoring him from our little corner, able to go on with life unaffected. Religion doesn't make one any less likely to adopt such an approach, if anything, religion is that approach, and the religious always fight revival. It is better in their minds to classify revival as emotional excess so that it can avoided proscriptively and dismissed out of hand if it should sneak past resistance and break out in some quarter. 

Another possible answer is the human desire for control. That, too, has been around since the beginning of sinful humankind. It's not consistent though-- folk will let anything and anyone lead them down the primrose path, as long as it's not God. When they do follow God, it tends to be the boxed variety, not the One who can meet us up close and personal and rock our world. There are real consequences to God being real, and some folk will avoid them at any cost.

Emotions can be difficult to control, if not impossible. That's why big boys (as I was told when I was young) and big girls (thanks Fergie and Frankie Valli for the info) don't cry. Cross the threshold of uncontrolled emotion and there's no telling where things might end. Don't open that Pandora's box! For the unwilling, all that is necessary is to equate revival with emotionalism and the rationale of suppression is turnkey ready.

To step past the cherubim and see God, to walk with him in the garden, we are going to have to humble ourselves and let God be God. That is a frightening prospect, I understand. But blast the consequences, God is beyond our control anyhow, whether up close and personal or not. Control is just an illusion that keeps us from being real with God and God from being real to us. So, hoist the main sail and let your ship ride on the wind!

Revival awaits some souls hungry for a visit with God, who cast off fleshly mooring lines that keep them bound to the manageable and mundane, and who, with faith in hand, set off unafraid to sail in the breath of God.

When Fellowship Grates

The interaction of Christians sometimes looks more like the chaos of an explosion at the fireworks plant than it does the choreographed wonder of a fireworks show. Nonetheless, Christians alive in the Spirit are vessels of fire, and God wants to put them on open display for the world to see. Revival is about the rekindling of that fire, but too often it ends up being about chaos. Why?

Let me suggest that in either the excitement of personal experience or the concern for collective purity we forget about the benefits of corporate fellowship. We forget that iron sharpens iron. Everything is NOT intended to go smoothly between us, but what does go between us should make us smoother. Let's look at some of the collateral processes that accompany fellowship and which work to bring out the best in us.

FRICTION
We grow by rubbing off on each other. In a three stranded cord there is some friction, yet in staying together, despite the rubbing, that rope's strength is multiplied. Friction is unavoidable, separation is not. Another believer's imperfections are never a reason for us to discard him or her, nor are ours reason to hide from him or her. In the words of Benjamin Franklin, “We must all hang together, or most assuredly we will all hang separately."

GRINDING
We cannot get any sharper without some grinding. To improve our edge, rust and grit, unevenness, and even notches have to be whetted down. The simple fact is, none of us can do that alone. It takes at least two hands and a little oil to get 'er done. We don't have the judgment to see our own flaws for one thing, and we don't have the capacity to sharpen ourselves for another. It takes another tool. We have to be willing to accept the Spirit directed benefit of someone else grinding on us and subject ourselves to it. All criticism from a friend can be constructive, if we keep our egos in check.

SHAVING
I can shave myself, most men can. Some of us find it relaxing, however, to let a barber apply a hot towel, brush up a good lather, and then skillfully wield a just honed straight razor to scrape off all that uncomfortable stubble that marks our manliness. To be honest, the thought of someone else holding a razor to my throat kinda freaks me out! However, if one is to experience the sharpening of appearance and the release of tension that a really close shave delivers, he is going to have to trust the man with the blade. Trusting another to improve your countenance through his or her sincere counsel leads to that refreshing splash of aftershave that says I'm ready for life.

In view of the benefits we get through the various ways fellowship can be grating, perhaps our response to the trimming should be, "Thanks, I needed that!"

Stop, In the Name of the Law

What we do has no impact on our acceptance by God. Our record cannot add to, nor detract from what has already been done by Christ; in other words, present actions cannot rewrite ancient history. It is on the basis, and only on the basis of what Christ finished, that our standing with God rests. God quenched the flames of his wrath in the blood of Christ, so there is none left for us who believe! Everyone who puts their faith in Christ's finished work has become, and will remain the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.

Faith in Christ is what matters, but what we do does reflect upon the reality of that faith. If I say I have faith but have no works, I'm a liar plain and simple. Such is at best merely so-called faith, which cannot save but only leave me in my sin under the wrath of God. Faith that is efficacious salvifically doesn't try to bamboozle God with lip-service while a faithless heart does evil works. Faith is active, faith works, specifically, through love.

What good works we do are actually not our own fault. These "things" have been seeded by the hand of our loving God onto the pathway of our lives. We will stumble into them just by walking, without having to climb Everest or swim the English Channel to accomplish them. To miss such "things" so readily provided by God could only mean that we didn't have the faith to bother. Oblivious is not something faith is.

We live out of what Christ has freely given to us through faith; namely, righteousness and the Holy Spirit. We have nothing to prove by trying to live up to some code by willful exertion. If we attempted to prove something to God in that fashion, we would only prove that we are sinners. Doing the good that God has prepared for us to do and endeavoring to emulate Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit only demonstrates the faith in him that we do have.

It certainly is a joy to be alive, accepted, and actuated by God. Burdening ourselves and others with a need to earn status or to measure up before God is joyless. It's embracing the law instead of the gospel and trying to find satisfaction in emptiness. That's a fool's errand that smacks of the curse. The law was not given to us that we could gain righteousness by it. If that's what you're doing, please, stop in the name of Jesus, and especially in the name of the Law.Stop, In the Name of the Law

Bring on the Wooden Spoon

It's humid today in Pennsylvania, downright soupy. In fact, the air's so thick, if God was minded to, he could drop a big wooden spoon out of the heavenlies and give everything a good stir. Maybe that's just what we need--a heavenly stirring! A whirling breeze exchanging the stale for the fresh, the energy of air on the move, roiling up the grace of new savors throughout the pot. As much as a change in the weather of wind and air would be nice, a change in the weather of Spirit would be even nicer.

Am I longing for revival? Perhaps, but there are some drawbacks that make me pause. Revivals have occurred frequently throughout the age of the church, so much so, that we can look at their characteristics and make some observations. There are some negatives!

Revivals fade. Generally speaking, they last for for about 3-6 years, and then, in about the same amount of time, whatever spiritual impact they've made on society has vanished, like the Titanic on the northern Atlantic. It might have been a big deal while it was afloat, but there wasn't even an oil slick marking it's passing shortly thereafter.

Revivals spoil the taste of their participants. Like candy does before a meal, revival makes everything else, even of substance, seem tasteless. The intensity and excitement of the revival experience hooks the desire of the participant like heroin does the addict. Afterwards ennui sets in, and the one revived becomes bored with, even critical of, the taste of life in the interregnum between revivals.

Revivals infect people with a self-centered spirituality. Participants become like kids in an amusement park. They bounce from one thing to the next looking for a bigger thrill. Experiences are compared on the basis of the thrill delivered. Preachers transform into carnival barkers, cheerleading about the rush to be felt at their meetings. Some turn into reverse-engineers trying to replicate and improve the thrill gotten at another venue. Spirituality riding on a roller coaster!

Revival displaces Jesus as the object of one's affections. Idolatry pure and simple: some of the "revived" relish revival more than they do friendship with Jesus! Their eyes on not fixed on the author and perfecter, but on the next possibility of revival.

Then, I look up from this soup, flicking my hands in frustration, spattering the world around me with sweat and tears, and realize just how badly we need a stirring. Our biggest thrill should be knowing the King of Glory personally, as a friend, rather than the gifts he lavishes on us, but we're thrilled with little if anything at all. Something's gotta change!

We could use some renewing:
A new start of obedience;
A fresh dedication to sharpening one another;
A new sensitivity to the Holy Spirit;
A new enthusiasm for knowing Christ personally;
A new hunger for making Him known to others.

All things being equal, I guess my hope is that God would bring out the big wooden spoon and stir up a revival.

To Hell With It

I said in an earlier post that we do not have anything to prove to God, nor can we measure up to his (or anyone else's) standard. All that we can prove by such vain efforts is that in our own Adamic natures, we are sinners. Does that mean we should live willy nilly, that anything goes? No, sin will always be sin, and God will always hate it. Ultimately, he must completely disable it!

Philosophically, sin is an impossibility. How can that which is against the will of God (sin) exist in objective reality when God is omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent and righteous? God could not be said to have the last two attributes if he allowed or could not stop sin. So, sin can only exist in this temporary framework of spacetime, which is constricted, cursed and scheduled for termination.

The grace of God allows the illusion of ongoing sinful life for, really, just a moment, because of the possibility of repentance and redemption among the denizens therein. A time is coming, and shortly, when reality will come a-knocking, and then, nothing that stands in opposition to the will of God will stand any longer. That coming, ultimate reality check is called hell.

Some folk wonder how a loving God could put living human beings into a fiery lake forever, but I don't know what other possibility could exist. They usually think that, even if the lake is real, it cannot possibly be forever. Sometime, the flame has to go out, and the worm metamorphose and fly away to different quarry. All of us who are parents, or who had parents, realize that punishment ends sometime, right? No, such thoughts arise from a misunderstanding of human and angelic nature, sin and independent wills.

Ultimately, how can any will exist but that which is omnipotent, particularly if the omnipotent one was righteous too? For any opposing will to exist contemporaneously and/or permanently would undermine the nature of the supposedly omnipotent, righteous one. That one would then, in fact, not be omnipotent and righteous, but impotent and indifferent-- merely capable of conceiving but not of delivering.

Why does that make hell necessary?

Primarily, human and angelic being cannot be disposed of nor dissolved. We know the Spirit of God is eternal and indestructible, but what he lends breath or personal spirit to cannot be destroyed either, though it can be established with independence as a being. Humans and angels (I don't have a scripture reference for angels, but it does make sense to me) fall into this category. If everything in nature reveals something about the invisible attributes of God, think about what the conservation of mass and energy reveals to us about the breath from God that makes us a person-- it cannot be destroyed.

Once created, humans and angels cannot be destroyed. However, they can be disabled, they can cease having independent freedom of thought and action. How? Overwhelm their will with incessant fire and they will never entertain a thought, nor devise a scheme, nor hatch a plot in opposition to God's will again. They will never act on such again. Don Piper's experience of a painful recovery after a traffic accident is helpful here:

In the first few weeks of my recovery, I was in such constant physical pain I couldn't hold any thoughts in my mind for more than a second or two (from 90 Minutes in Heaven, p. 102)

One long "arrrrgh!" will be their lot, cosmic pink noise. Coherent thought will be impossible, no conceptions nor communications. Their eternal will is silenced in perpetual flames, whereas God's will continues unabated, unfettered by opposition. It has to be.

God created us with divine-like capacities in order to fellowship with him. Christ reveals in flesh and bone, in spirit and in thought what that looks like. It’s not oppressive nor coercive, but food and life, joy and peace. Our wills are meant to be experienced as the replication and expression of his. Exertion of our will (our works) is not the means to achieve that, inspiration is. As for sin, to hell with it!

There Is an Everlasting Hell!

It is often said by detractors and non-believers that a loving God would never send people to hell for eternity. They do not say that because of their experience of the loving God, but in my view, because of their lack thereof. Perhaps, even more so, because of their indifference to that loving God, and what he reveals readily to all who dwell on planet Earth. The scriptures state:

"The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse."
Romans 1:18-20 (NIV)

In this passage, we are informed that we can know what God is like through the things he has made. Not only can we discover those touchy-feely attributes that give us warm fuzzies: God is a gracious provider, a wondrous artist, and a master engineer, but we also discover those scary attributes: God is not like us, he is willing to keep us at arm's length, his anger brings dire consequences. Some may ask, "how can you learn of those scary things just from the creation?" To which I would answer, "look at life."

What about our existence doesn't reveal that God takes exception to the human race? Disease wracks the rich and poor, the just and the unjust, virtually everyone indiscriminantly. God certainly has the power to do life differently, but it is what it is, and it tells us something. Good people, nice people, even godly people drown in floods, are crushed in landslides, or dragged out to sea, or are tossed like ragdolls in the wind. How could anyone think that a God who allows all of that in life would promise anything better after death? For all anyone knows, it could well be worse!

And then there is death itself. Everything dies, not only the living, but stuff too, it's called entropy. We can remain indifferent to God, never pursuing the knowledge of him, or more importantly, a friendship with him. We can remain at arm's length throughout our lives, such as they are, but what do those lives as we live them portend? The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven, but what is it SCREAMING AT US IN BOLD CAPITALS? I hope it's telling you to flee the fullness of that wrath which is yet to come. I hope it's telling you there is a hell and it needs to be avoided.

It seems to me that the one purporting a lovey-dovey God, not bent out of shape by the human race is the one who has no case. Even pardon for the believing was purchased at the price of incredible cruelty inflicted upon one absolutely innocent. Nothing about God's revelation in nature, or in the nature of the gospel tells us that God is a pushover, or that sin is a trifling thing. Jesus may have been silent or  even enigmatic in much in his teaching, but on one thing he was crystal clear-- there is an everlasting hell!