Through the course of the discussion which followed yesterday's post about Jefferson Bethke's famous video, Presbyter pointed out that Jefferson has since revised and clarified his views in an article which ran in the Christian Post on 19 January of this year:
The 22-year-old shared that he was in the camp of young Christians pushing the church away. He recalled watching a panel discussion of well-respected theologians and pastors and one question really struck a chord. The group was asked about the most encouraging and discouraging aspect of the millennial generation – responding, that the most encouraging is that “they love Jesus more passionately, more furiously” than previous generations. However, in that same aspect the “most discouraging is that they hate the church more passionately and more furiously.” “Right when I heard that, it just convicted me and God used it as one of those Spirit moments where it’s just ‘man he’s right,’” Bethke told CP. “I realized a lot of my views and treatments of the church were not Scripture-based, they were very experienced-based.” He added, “And that’s when I realized that wasn’t right. God’s church is holy, that’s his bride.”
DeYoung, who saw Bethke as a humble, sincere Christian in love with the Gospel, couldn’t “remember ever receiving such a teachable response to criticism.”
How cool is that? Just for perspective, Jefferson's original video has been viewed nearly 20 million times and he has more than 46,000 Twitter followers! It would seem to be a very difficult thing for a 22-year-old (or even a 45-year old, *ahem*) to humble himself in the midst of such a phenomenon. Yet he did.
"Hymn" ranks as Mrs. Jailer and my favorite Jars of Clay song. We're suckers for poetry. Having said that, I must confess I have yet to figure out what all the lyrics are supposed to mean. Even giving room for poetic license, "And Truth shall Thee forever reign?" It almost has the feel of someone trying too hard.
Ah well. If you have a better explanation I'd love to hear it. Otherwise enjoy. We always do.
O refuge of my hardened heart O fast pursuing lover come As angels dance around Your throne My life by captured fare You own Not silhouette of trodden faith Nor death shall not my steps be guide I'll pirouette upon my grave For in Your path I'll run and hide
[Chorus:] O gaze of love so melt my pride That I may in Your house but kneel And in my brokenness to cry Spring worship unto Thee
When beauty breaks the spell of pain The bludgeoned heart shall burst in vain But not when love be 'pointed king And truth shall Thee forever reign
[Chorus]
Sweet Jesus carry me away From cold of night and dust of day In ragged hour or salt worn eye Be my desire, my well sprung lye
So I've brooded over this long enough. It seems like everyone has had something to say about Jefferson Bethke's video by now. My revolutionary friend Bill over at For the Sake of the Gospel has expressed some sympathy for his views, while most of my more orthodox friends are more critical. So let's discuss ...
We need to begin with Jefferson's poem. Here it is for the few of you who haven't seen it yet.
Among the most well-known of responses to this--which Bill also cites--is that of Kevin DeYoung. While he's critical of many parts of the video, he begins with this important statement, one which I agree with wholeheartedly:
... Jefferson Bethke seems like a sincere young man who wants people to know God’s scandalous grace. I’m sure he’s telling the truth when he says on his Facebook page: “I love Jesus, I’m addicted to grace, and I’m just a messed up dude trying to make Him famous.” If I met him face to face, I bet I’d like Jefferson and his honesty and passion. I bet I’d be encouraged by his story and his desire to free people from the snares of self-help, self-righteous religion.
Amen and amen!
Kevin then does a very thorough job of deconstructing the poem, which I won't confuse matters by trying to replicate here. I will merely encourage you to read it in full and add what stands out to me.
First, Jefferson's most obvious problem is in setting up a false dichotomy between Jesus and religion, rather than reflecting the biblical dichotomy between pure religion and worthless religion. I appeal here to James:
If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person's religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.(James 1:26-27)
There's a little more to this than semantics. Kevin rightly notes that Jesus was not exactly hostile to all religious practices. What he couldn't stand was those which masked the practioners' hard-heartedness. In other words, the problem was not that they were religious, but that their religion was proved worthless by their actions.
Semantics do matter, however, which is part of the problem. Dean Roberts appeals to the dictionary to make the point that nowhere in the very bland definition of "religion" do you find the caricature Jefferson describes. So why are we having this discussion? Ah, for that we must refer to a different dictionary:
Religion - The biggest lie in human history. It has been responsible for more deaths throughout human history than all other unnatural causes combined. For a thousand years the Church was a tyrannical dictatorship that used religion to control the uneducated masses. Free your minds and come into the 21st century.
Of course, the Urban Dictionary is hardly known for its academic, dispassionate definitions. Still, it is something of a weathervane for seeing which way the cultural winds are blowing. The reason we need to listen to brothers like Jefferson is that they provide us important information about our own culture, which is the environment in which ministry happens. In this case, it's important for my orthodox friends to understand that in the prevailing culture, the dictionary definition of "religion" his hardly the consensus. Jefferson's views are important because they are prevalent, and that fact demands the church's attention.
Still, this is not to say I don't have problems with Jefferson's approach. By accepting the prevailing culture's caricatures, he throws a lot of very faithful believers under the bus. Again to Kevin here:
More to the point, Christians need to stop perpetuating the myth that we’ve basically been huge failures in the world. That may win us an audience with non-Christians, but it’s not true. We are sinners like everyone else, so our record is mixed. We’ve been stupid and selfish over the years. But we’ve also been the salt of the earth. The evangelical awakening in England in the eighteenth century is widely credited for preventing the sort of bloodbath that swept over France in the “enlightened” French Revolution. Christians ... give more to charitable causes than their secular counterparts. Christians run countless shelters, pregnancy centers, rescue missions, and food pantries. Christians operate orphanages, staff clinics, dig wells, raise crops, teach children, and fight AIDS around the globe. While we can always do more and may be blind to the needs around us at times, there is no group of people on the planet that do more for the poor than Christians. If you know of a church with a dozen escalators and no money and no heart for the hurting, then blast that church. But we have to stop the self-flagellation and the slander that says Christians do nothing for the poor.
Finally, I suppose something should be said about Jefferson's gratuitous slap at Republicans. There are hypocrites across the political spectrum. But there are also devoted lovers of Jesus. I've taken note before of the tendency for the church to over-rely on political solutions, and that's a real problem, but it's a real problem for everyone.
So in response to Bill's question, "How Would You Respond to Jefferson?" I would offer this: Dear brother Jefferson, I admire your passion, and I appreciate the call to authenticity. Your energy is needed, but beware of the arrogance of youth. Or to shamelessly quote myself circa 2009:
Arrogance and ingratitude are endemic to our sinful condition, and the young are especially vulnerable, as they have not yet been chastised by the hard lessons of years. Most of us learned to despise the wisdom of our elders from an early age, and then had to unlearn that hubris the hard way. As a young believer, I quickly grew to be an "expert" in many things, and I have grown progressively "dumber" over the years, as the experience of those years has exposed me to my limitations. We naturally cling to our vanity and pride until God lets us follow them to their logical, humiliating conclusion.
So that's the trick. We need to hear the call to constant reformation and renewal enunciated by Jefferson (and shared by many), without being sucked in by the accompanying judgmentalism toward our brothers and sisters, or over-identifying with the world's cynical dismissal of all things "religious". We need a "religion that is pure and undefiled before God."
Ten years ago I attended a men's conference in the Santa Cruz Mountains. One of the speakers, whose name I forget but whose message I never will, got up to talk about his recent addiction to pornography. He detailed how he slid down the slope from a teen-aged casual interest to middle-aged life-swallowing compulsion, eventually becoming withdrawn, despondent and even suicidal before he finally was rescued by God. An audience of about 60 men sat transfixed.
What happened next was what I'll never forget.
He placed a chair in the middle of the room and said, "Who is brave enough to sit here and confess your sexual sin?" One by one the men around the circle shuffled to the chair and poured out their hearts to God. As they did, both friends and strangers also came, placed their hands on them, and prayed for them as tears streaked down their faces. Each man's courage inspired the next man. Their confessions were sobering, even shocking, but there was no judgment in that room--only grace and brotherly compassion. The compassion of men who know the stain of this sin. It began with the courage of one man to shine the light in the darkness.
This sin is not going away. In fact, this year someone is making $100 billion by victimizing 30,000 of us every second and terrorizing its employees. They will make more next year. Who's stopping them? Virtually nobody. Perhaps a worse question is, who's paying them? We are.
"Multimedia pornography has become the chief means by which the emergent sex industry encourages the solicitations of the senses to overwhelm the moral and aesthetic feelings of fitness on which all civilized actions and an ordered culture depend. Pornography represents the contemporary means of making Caligulas of us all—with all that that implies in terms of violence, misogyny, and interpersonal grief." - Paul McHugh, University Distinguished Service Professor of Psychiatry, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
What this fancy academic language means is that porn fundamentally alters the way we think--not just about sex, but about ourselves and other human beings. In other words:
Porn use creates the impression that aberrant sexual practices are more common than they really are, and that promiscuous behavior is normal. For example, in a 2000 meta-analysis of 46 published studies put out by the National Foundation for Family Research and Education at the University of Calgary, regular exposure to pornography increased risk of sexual deviancy (including lower age of first intercourse and excessive masturbation), increased belief in the “rape myth” (that women cause rape and rapists are normal), and was associated with negative attitudes regarding intimate relationships (e.g., rejecting the need for courtship and viewing persons as sexual objects). Indeed, neurological imaging confirms the latter finding. Susan Fiske, professor of psychology at Princeton University, used MRI scans to analyze the brain activity of men viewing pornography. She found that after viewing porn, men looked at women more as objects than as human beings.
No wonder Jesus was so serious about what we look at: "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall not commit adultery.' But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart." Little did His disciples imagine what dangers awaited us 2,000 years in the future!
Because as you probably suspect, the problem in the church reflects the problem in the world. Brace yourself:
A 1996 Promise Keepers survey at one of their stadium events revealed that over 50% of the men in attendance were involved with pornography within one week of attending the event.
51% of pastors say cyber-porn is a possible temptation. 37% say it is a current struggle (Christianity Today, Leadership Survey, 12/2001).
Over half of evangelical pastors admits viewing pornography last year.
Roger Charman of Focus on the Family's Pastoral Ministries reports that approximately 20 percent of the calls received on their Pastoral Care Line are for help with issues such as pornography and compulsive sexual behavior.
In a 2000 Christianity Today survey, 33% of clergy admitted to having visited a sexually explicit Web site. Of those who had visited a porn site, 53% had visited such sites “a few times” in the past year, and 18% visit sexually explicit sites between a couple of times a month and more than once a week.
29% of born again adults in the U.S. feel it is morally acceptable to view movies with explicit sexual behavior (The Barna Group).
57% of pastors say that addiction to pornography is the most sexually damaging issue to their congregation (Christians and Sex Leadership Journal Survey, March 2005).
While many sinful activities and temptations remain relatively constant throughout the centuries, porn only gets worse with time, because getting it gets easier every year. When I was in elementary school, I remember sneaking a peek inside a Playboy at the grocery store. When the sharp-eyed clerk caught me, I slunk out the door quickly and resolved never to be seen in that store again. Today, porn is just a click away. The average child sees his or her first pornographic images by age 11.
So what? Is it really so bad? Are you one of the nearly one-third of born-again adults who thinks it's no big deal? Because porn destroys the lives, marriages and families of those who watch it. And that's nothing compared to the horrific experiences of the people trapped in the industry (the very people you whose oppression you are supporting every time you watch that video or click that hyperlink).
Listen to one prominent former porn industry star tell the awful truth:
Is there hope? Yes, there is hope and recovery, but only when there is honesty. If your church, Bible study, or family isn't talking about porn, you're not dealing with reality. It's a terribly difficult and embarrassing topic, but sin thrives in dark corners. Turning the tide starts with shining a light.
It starts with the courage of one person to stand up and tell the truth.
Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first. Consider how far you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place. (Revelation 2:4-5)
I recently had the misfortune to watch the final death struggle of a local church with which I was closely acquainted. I'll call it "First Neighborhood Church" (FNC). The process was hard to watch, but instructive. I took several lessons away:
1. Churches die when their members stop growing in Christ. Spiritual growth is a lifelong process. In a healthy church, every member is challenged with regular doses of biblical teaching. Expository preaching doesn't recycle the same seasonal or self-help themes over and over, and doesn't shy away from difficult topics. Sunday school and Bible study classes are encouraged for all members, not just the children. Discipleship isn't just the topic of one sermon or Bible study course, but is an active process that occurs organically and consistently throughout the body. Members learn and accept that they are accountable to one another and to the church. In the declining years of FNC most were no longer growing; they were atrophying. Eventually they just moved on or lost interest.
2. Churches die when they "fish off the dock" as their primary outreach method. Over the decades FNC had devolved into the kind of church that hung out its shingle and waited for its neighbors to find it based on its reputation, its big events, or the idea that local people still go to their local church. This is both unbiblical and ineffective, especially in today's mobile, post-Christian society. The neighbors aren't coming. If they do show up, they'll visit a time or two to see what's going on before they move on to the next new thing. When the church's primary evangelism method is "fishing off the dock", it will catch a few small fish, many of which have been previously caught and released by others. Don't be surprised when you see several hooks still in the fish's mouth! There are larger schools of fish out there, but it means your members are getting into their boats and pushing out into deeper water. It means they'll have to live evangelistic lives, not just attend evangelistic events. It means they'll have to risk something. A church whose members stay on the dock is a church that will die.
3. Churches die when they over-celebrate their heritage.This point is related to the first. FNC had a glorious past, which it celebrated incessantly by posting portraits, naming memorials, and carrying on traditions. Over time, the building began to feel like a mausoleum. But the children of those celebrated saints grew up and moved away, while all that accumulated heritage became the millstone they relentlessly clung to as they slipped below the surface and sank out of relevance.
4. Churches die when they are populated by members who don't participate in ministry.A clear sign of a church in trouble is when a decreasing number of its members participate in ministry activities, or when the "ministry activities" that do attract participation are reduced to a small number of special events the lazy (yes, I said it) members can claim credit for. Senior members "retire" from ministry rather than "re-mission" to other forms more suited to their station in life. Younger members float along unchallenged and demand to be served and entertained. New members are added in the form of anyone who will pray the "sinner's prayer", submit to baptism or sign the card. Nothing is expected of them and nothing is given, and many leave within weeks of signing up. The leadership team begins to feel isolated and overburdened, at a loss as to how to feed all these gaping mouths. In the final stages, a siege mentality sets in and it becomes us versus them ... the overworked, underappreciated and bitter core versus the disillusioned mass of complaining and diminishing malcontents. It's an ugly scene, and one I've seen played out too many times.
Well, this has been a downer, so I should end with a plug for IX Marks, which devotes itself to building healthy churches on solid, biblical foundations which will endure. To the credit of those who stayed committed to the end, FNC actually made a final, valiant attempt to remake itself in that model, but it was just too late. Burdened by a mountain of financial obligations and a shattered reputation left over from the church's long decline, they simply ran out of time.
Jeremy Lin's unexpected explosion onto the professional sports scene, combined with his evangelical faith in Jesus, already has drawn comparisons to a certain Denver Bronco.
There's certainly a familiar feel to Lin-sanity. From the near-daily lead stories on ESPN to the "enjoy-it-while-it-lasts" skepticism from many professional pundits, it's hard to escape the weird sense of deja vu. Oh, and of course there's also the late-game heroics:
But this is a Christian blog, and so let's get into that. On one hand, he is not shy about declaring unambiguously his allegiance to Jesus Christ, even insisting on at least one occasion that he be given the opportunity to testify to it as a condition of a San Jose Mercury News interview. In it, he explained how the trials of going undrafted and being cut by two NBA teams taught him to ask some hard questions, like "how can I trust God more? How can I surrender more? How can I bring him more glory?"
He also learned to depend on the promise of Romans 8:28 to deal with his anxiety: And we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to his purpose.
Many have observed that Lin's witness is slightly less overt than Tebow's, but that's not to say he hides his light under a bowl. The Tebow hype machine had been building for years at Florida, where he won a Heisman Trophy, two National Championships and earned a controversial first-round NFL selection. Of course, it be attributable to the absence of eye black in basketball (Tebow's habit of writing Scripture verses on his eye black gained so much attention it inspired its own blog).
For those who wonder, Lin's music tastes include Hillsong and a rapper named LaCrae, whom I know as much about as I do about any rapper, which is to say nothing. But nor am I 23 years old, so I'll let Jeremy explain:
As for the whole "Taiwanese Tebow" thing--yes, it's goofy, but so far it doesn't seem to bother Lin much. In fact, he expresses appreciation for the quarterback's example:
I think the things he says in interviews, his approach to the game is just unbelievable and I respect him so much ... I want to be able to do some of the things that he does in terms of the amount of charity work and the nonprofit work, and the way he impacts people off the field. I think that is what is most inspiring to me about him.
So ... learning to be a Bronco fan this year wan't too tough. But the Knicks? I never thought I'd see the day I root for a New York team, but this kid's got me hooked. Holding my nose ...
Next month the Jailer will begin a six-month deployment to Afghanistan. This will be my third deployment in eight years, so my family is accustomed to my periodic extended absences, though missing Jailer Jr.'s high school graduation and first trip to college will be disappointing. More on this later.
Today I think it's appropriate to comment on a kerfuffle that erupted nearly three years ago when a hack posing as a legitimate journalist wormed his way onto Bagram Air Base and put together a video purporting to show military members attempting to violate United States Central Command General Order Number One, in which a variety of forbidden practices are outlined. These include alcohol, pornography, and “proselytizing of any faith, religion or practice” while in theater.
Any fair evaluation of the video would conclude it is shamefully slanted and dishonest. In fact, the individuals portrayed did pretty much everything almost exactly right. There is prayer for the lost, preaching and teaching to the faithful, and an honest discussion of what to do with a stack of Pasthtu and Dari (the official Afghan languages) which were sent to a member by his church in the US in light of the General Order. The presence of these Bibles is a problem, except that the soldier who received them in the mail brought them to the chaplains, who use them as an opportunity to discuss the issue. The preaching is typical of many evangelical worship services, except perhaps the preponderance of military references, which are hardly surprising considering the makeup of the congregation. He was speaking in terms his flock could relate to.
Still, if you are looking for proof that anything can be made to sound scandalous if you're trying hard enough, and the "journalist" found a willing accomplice in Al-Jazeera, which aired this agitprop in May of 2009:
To its credit, the Defense Department refused to surrender the either truth or the high ground:
The Al Jazeera story showed an evangelical religious service on Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan and a discussion about distributing Bibles that had been translated into Dari and Pashtu – the two major languages of Afghanistan.
“American servicemembers are allowed to hold religious services,” a Defense Department official speaking on background said. “The clip shows one of those services with an American chaplain leading a religious service for American servicemembers. In it, he spoke generically about the evangelical faith. That’s all there was to it.”
The chaplain did not urge servicemembers to go among the Afghan people and attempt to gain converts to Christianity, the official said.
In the second instance, a young sergeant received a shipment of Bibles translated into Dari and Pashtu from his church in the United States. The film showed a discussion about the Bibles.
“What it did not show was the chaplain counseling the young sergeant that distributing the Bibles was against U.S. Central Command’s General Order No. 1,” the official said. The chaplain confiscated the Bibles. “As far as we know, none ever got off base.”
The debate over the clear journalistic malpractice is yesterday's news, so I will leave it there. I'd rather turn the discussion to a more delicate problem among Christians--namely whether these servicemembers were unjustly muzzled or should engage in civil disobedience for the sake of the gospel. Put another way, do we have a duty to preach the gospel in all situations regardless of human law or regulation? This is an argument for which there is apparent basis, to include the Great Commission itself, as well as Peter and John's brave assertion before the Sanhedrin:
Then they called them in again and commanded them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John replied, “Which is right in God’s eyes: to listen to you, or to him? You be the judges! As for us, we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard.”
So there is clearly a command to evangelize which transcends certain lesser human commands to cease. The question is whether this is universal or circumstantial. In other words, are there times, places and circumstances in which it is right to obey man and refrain from speaking?
There are indeed. Let me list a few important facts to keep in mind:
In Romans 13:1-7, Paul clearly advocates submission to earthly authorities where appropriate.
Jesus Himself recognized there were times to speak and times to remain quiet. For example, on at least twooccasions He commanded witnesses to healings not to speak of it. He was trying to avoid an onslaught of miracle-seekers who would interfere with His primary mission.
Even in sending out His disciples to preach, He commanded them to be "as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves." There is to be wisdom as well as boldness.
Military members take an oath, which includes the promise "to obey the orders of the President of the United States, and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice." General Order Number One qualifies. If the order were unlawful (such as an order to kill unarmed civilians) then we would have a duty to disobey it. This one is not unlawful, however, and we are obliged to keep our oaths.
More broadly, it is key to remember that narratives matter a lot in Afghanistan. Like most countries in the region, Afghanistan is possessed of a high-context culture, which means that the culture adds a great deal of context to a speaker's words or actions. To that the extent that the speaker understands this context, he can communicate. Unfortunately this also means a speaker who is ignorant of the context will find his messages re-translated in mystifying ways.
Moreover, high-context cultures have very long corporate memories, which add a great deal to the context. History (as they understand it) is extremely important. In such a culture, the Great Crusades were just yesterday, the British Empire was driven out this morning, and the nation of Israel was planted in the Muslim world five minutes ago in an attempt to shame and ultimately destroy their society. Into this environment place an ongoing NATO military operation and a determined enemy aggressively hawking this message via a variety of media and methods.
Then drop in a well-intentioned Christian wearing a US Army uniform, M-4 rifle and body armor, giving a "gift" of a Dari-language Bible to a young man in a military hospital. It doesn't take much imagination to see where this can go.
What's more, what happens when that young man leaves the hospital and is discovered with the Bible by the local mullah or Taliban commander? Prison, torture and death are all possible outcomes. Sure, as Christians we should be willing to lay down our lives for the sake of the gospel, but that doesn't give us the right to put those we're seeking to reach in similar peril while we ourselves sleep relatively securely in our barracks and Constitutional protections.
Which brings us back to the cause of the gospel in that part of the world. It is my hope and belief that God has a plan to reach the Muslim world with the gospel. For this He will use some very brave people such as Yousef Nadarkhani, the Iranian pastor who remains under sentence of death for his faith. I also hope He will use the mantle of liberty our military efforts result in to create a more open society in which future Pastor Yousefs across the region may freely practice and minister.
