The Gospel Coalition

The Gospel and the Piano Recital:

The gospel breaks that cycle of constant comparison. It breaks that cycle by reminding us first of all that there is no best. There is no best because there is no good. Not even one. The ground is like quicksand at the foot of the cross; try as we might to climb up and over our fellows at the base we find ourselves slipping back to the same level as everyone else.

Andy Naselli reviews a book that outlines four views on the Sabbath:

The book is superb. It’s an excellent example of how different views use different hermeneutical approaches and theological methods (i.e., the relationship between exegesis, biblical theology, historical theology, systematic theology, and practical theology).

The Sojourners Dilemma – When Progressive Isn’t Progressive Enough:

It’s not enough (anymore) to be liberal on economic or racial issues and conservative on the sexual ones, as sexual politics have taken precedence over any others in the religious left.   Don’t think for a second it’s just conservatives who have made gay marriage an issue to draw lines over:  the reaction to Wallis’ decision suggests that the time is coming when folks like him and Ron Sider, who want to stop their progressivism at the line of gay relations and marriage, will find themselves in just as odd a position as those who are conservative economically but liberal on sexual politics.

You get more done when you’re focused for several hours without distraction:

According to a study published in the Psychological Review conducted by Dr. K. Anders Ericcson, the key to great success is working harder in short bursts of time. Then give yourself a break before getting back to work.

Today, I’m glad to welcome Dan Darling, author of iFaith: Connecting With God in the 21st Century (New Hope Publishers, 2011). Dan is senior pastor of Gages Lake Bible Church in the northwest suburbs of Chicago. iFaith is a brief, pastoral book on living as Christians in the 21st century.

Trevin Wax: Dan, in the first chapter of iFaith, “A History of Waiting,” you flesh out a theology of waiting on the Lord. Is impatience a particular challenge we face as we live in a fast-paced, connected age?

Dan Darling: Yes. I think waiting is our biggest challenge. Most of us, especially those who live in the “connected generation” (perhaps 45 and under) have grown up in the technological revolution. We have everything at the tip of our fingers and we can have it right now.

If you have a question, you Google it. If you want something to eat, you microwave it and in 2 minutes you’re hunger is satisfied. If you are lost, you’re GPS gets you back on the road. And everything is increasingly faster. Faster downloads. More access. No more waiting.

And yet, we worship a God who delights in making His children wait. If you look at the lives of all the major Bible characters, you’ll find that God made all of them wait.

• David was anointed king as a teen, but it was many years before he assumed the throne.
• Joseph was given a vision of leadership, but endured much waiting and trial before that was fulfilled in his life.
• Moses had a passion to rescue his people, but spent 40 years on the backside of the desert. On and on it goes.

I experienced this in my own life as we were forced to wait for a number of important developments. I realized that waiting is the “DNA” of faith. It is in God’s waiting room where He builds in us a richer faith in His goodness.

Trevin Wax: You use a modern metaphor to bring home the idea of being “connected to God.” You write,

“Like many Christians I’ve often viewed spirituality as a way to refuel, like a thirsty gas tank after a day on the interstate. Go to church, get fired up, and hope it lasts until Tuesday.”

This is a really deficient view of our spiritual life in Christ, isn’t it?

Dan Darling: It really is. Jesus gave us a powerful invitation to “abide” in John 15. He uses the example of a vine and branches, which for most of us means nothing. So I used Jesus’ language and thought perhaps our generation might understand it better if we talked about being “plugged in.”

A few years ago I took a mission’s trip to India. And if you’ve ever lived in a third-world country, you know that the power supply is spotty at best. Basically the power went out 4-5 times an hour and the generators would kick in. It made getting anything constructive done on the computer impossible.

Interestingly, it frustrated the Americans, but the Indians were okay with it. That example is very similar to how we view spirituality. Most of us, like the Indian people, are used to a spirituality that is sort of in and out, patch-work power. But then we wonder why not much of significance takes place, why there are few victories. We need to stop looking at Jesus as a place to refuel, but as a Presence, through the Holy Spirit. His invitation is to stay “plugged in.”

Trevin Wax: People that see the title of your book, iFaith, might assume you are trying to make Christianity more relevant for a wired generation. But you are doing more than that here. You are trying to apply the timeless truths of Christian teaching in a world where time flies.

Dan Darling: Yes, this is not a hip book an how to have a “cool” faith. Thought it’s a short book, I tried to use modern metaphors to call us back to basic Christian doctrines.

For instance, in my chapter on sin, I use the example of a Trojan horse on a computer system. Sin is really like a malicious computer virus, eating at our soul and ultimately destroying our connecting to God. We can’t stay “plugged in” if we’re living in sin. But the good news, as Christians, as that this connection can be immediately restored if we apply 1 John 1:9 and confess our sins, appropriating the grace purchased for us on the cross by Jesus.

Trevin Wax: I liked your image of praying in ALL CAPS. You make a funny point, but there’s a serious truth there.

Dan Darling: ALL CAPS is the official venting language of the connected generation. If someone Tweets in ALL CAPS, they’re shouting. If you see a Facebook post in ALL CAPS, that person is really upset (or annoying). If you have the courage to read comments on news articles, you’ll find some of the highest level of vitriol was typed with the CAPS button engaged.

Sometimes we wish we could fire off an ALL CAPS message to God. Sort of let him know how upset we are with what He is or isn’t doing. I walk through Psalm 73 and Asaph’s raw lament at God. What I have found in this Psalm and in others is that it really is okay to vent to God, that He’s not afraid of our deepest questions. He’d rather we be venting at Him than not speaking to Him at all. Of course, we must always reverence him and, like Job, get ready to hear the answers we may not want to hear.

Trevin Wax: Dan, thanks for stopping by the blog and discussing your book, iFaith. (Kingdom People readers can download a sample chapter of Dan’s book here.)

Scott Lamb on finding heaven and hell in Walmart:

Whatever happened to secularism? The fact is, many people are reading and talking about the afterlife these days… Either way, Christians must not miss taking note of and acting upon this very simple leading cultural indicator: People really want to know what happens after death.

Revising history, for religion’s sake:

You have to look really closely to notice what’s missing from the picture. Did you catch it? Just kidding — can you believe that? Just airbrushing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Counterterrorism Director Audrey Tomason out of a picture?

Parenting 001:

I just know that the longer I parent the more I want to focus on doing a few things really well, and not get too passionate about all the rest. I want to spend time with my kids, teach them the Bible, take them to church, laugh with them, cry with them, discipline them when they disobey, say sorry when I mess up, and pray like crazy. I want them to look back and think, “I’m not sure what my parents were doing or if they even knew what they’re were doing. But I always knew my parents loved me and I knew they loved Jesus.” Maybe it’s not that complicated after all.

The Creation-Evolution Debate in a Nutshell – helpful rundown of the spectrum of positions.

I appreciate this counsel from D.A. Carson on respecting the diversity of reading habits among pastors and scholars:

One of the things that thoughtful scholar-pastors will do is preserve time for reflective reading of the best books. You can find out what those books are by having probing conversations with a variety of scholar-pastors who are more mature than you are – but be sure you seek out the opinions of several people, not just one. Through their books, get to know some epochal thinkers reasonably well. Slow down; read, take notes, think, evaluate.

Yet having said these things… I must quickly add that in this domain of reading, there is, and there should be, quite a diversity of legitimate reading practices. Some, more focused than others and perhaps slower readers and sharper thinkers than others, want you to restrict your reading to very good books that you must read slowly. For some readers, I suspect that that is the wisest choice; for all readers, reading some books slowly and analytically is mandated. But I doubt that it is wise to suggest that every scholar should read only good books and only slowly, for once again there is a diversity of gifts and graces.

If you can develop the habit of reading different things at different speeds, you might be wise to

• read some books slowly, evaluatively, and often;
• to read some books briskly, once but comprehensively;
• to skim other books to see what they are saying;
• to dip into still other books to see if they add anything to a discussion or merely say the same old things with a minor twist here and there.

All that is apart from reading some poetry, some serious literature, and even occasional pieces that have no enduring value but that everyone is reading at the moment – not because you want to spend much time there, or should spend much time there, but so as to offer penetrating firsthand comments on material that virtually every literate person in your world knows something about.

Not every scholar-pastor should attempt to do all these things, but those who have the gift, the time, and the energy to do so, and who then offer their “take” on a broad array of literature, become a great gift to those of us who read more narrowly or at more limited speed. Precisely because there is a diversity of gifts, the perspective of Roger Bacon is memorable: “Reading maketh a full man; speaking maketh a quick man; writing maketh an exact man.”

What is virtually never justified, however, is never reading anything slowly, seriously, analytically, and evaluatively, for such reading of good material not only fills our minds with many good things, but teaches us how to think.

- from The Pastor as Scholar and the Scholar as Pastor: Reflections on Life and Ministry

Interesting article about Steven Tyler’s (Aerosmith) comments after pressuring his girlfriend to get an abortion:

Some sense of responsibility (or curiosity?) compelled him to watch the procedure, with an unanticipated result: “[T]hey put the needle in her belly and squeeze the stuff in and you watch. And it comes out dead. I was pretty devastated. In my mind, I’m going, Jesus, what have I done?”

The New York Times on Southern Baptist disaster relief:

With the ability to feed 20,000 people from one mobile kitchen, and a chain of command so tightly run it would make a military officer proud, the Southern Baptist teams are the backbone of disaster relief here.

Ed Stetzer is working through the recently-released Missional Manifesto part by part. Here he analyzes the section on the kingdom:

There is no question that there as the missional conversation has grown, there has been a keen interest in understanding how the Kingdom of God intersects with mission. In order to understand the missional church, we must consider the Kingdom of God. I think that is a good pursuit but not without some concerns historically and theologically.

Osama bin Laden and the Terror of Narcissism:

Most of us, thank God, will never approach the wickedness he unleashed on the world. But all of us will wrestle with the same root pathology. That’s because, left to ourselves, we all share the same religion as Osama Bin Laden. It isn’t Islam; it’s self-worship.

Scot McKnight lists 10 lessons we learn from the Love Wins debate. I thought this one was particularly interesting:

Seventh, missiology remains the center of gospeling in our world. You can talk all you want about eschatology and about atonement theory and about evangelism and about worship, but the moment you cross a line others perceive to be too far in the wrong directions, you will be called out on it. The essential line in Christianity is the gospel, and all theology is measured by its fidelity to the gospel or its denial of the gospel. Why? Because the church’s message is one about salvation and how we get saved and who gets saved and what one has to do to get saved.  The gospel is more than salvation, but anything that softens salvation or hardens salvation is in for immediate debate. Frankly, Rob Bell’s book called into question the gospel essence evangelicalism has defended since the Reformation. That is the fundamental reason why this book caused such a storm.

First off, let me express my appreciation for John Starke and for his taking the time to read and review Counterfeit Gospels. Aware of the number of books being published each year, I am honored that people would pick up mine and read it, let alone write a thoughtful review. John indicated that he wanted to continue the discussion that my book has started. I’m glad to respond to some of his challenges here as well.

To begin, it is necessary to point out all the common assumptions we share. That’s what makes this conversation worthwhile. We agree on so much that our clarifications, probing distinctions, etc. become a helpful exercise in prodding one another to greater faithfulness to what the Scriptures teach.

John takes issue with the “gospel as a three-legged stool” approach for two reasons:

1. He is unsure why I choose community as a third leg and not personal holiness. He writes:

“Aren’t we expected to be Christians bearing fruit in holiness as much as we are to not neglect gathering with one another (and can’t stools have four legs)?”

My response to this critique is that we should be careful to not separate personal and corporate holiness. The point of God calling out a people is that we would be a holy nation, set apart for his purposes. Too often, we think of holiness only in terms of personal piety and not our corporate witness, our holy lives of love for one another in community.

2. John believes that the three-legged stool approach makes the “gospel story” and the “gospel community” just as critical as the “gospel announcement.” He writes:

“The danger I see in Wax’s solution is that the gospel community and story carry the same weight as the announcement.”

He then offers a counter-solution that makes the announcement the stool itself, with supporting legs (the story, the community, and good works).

The Gospel Community

Every analogy has its limitations, and John puts his finger on one of the weaknesses of the stool analogy. When pressed too far, the analogy could lead to the danger John warns about. People might come away with the impression that the gospel story, announcement, and community are all the same, or that they have the same function. I hope that is not the case, which is why, in the book, whenever I define the relationship between the announcement and the community, I write that the announcement “gives birth” to the community.

The community is not the gospel. John’s exactly right about that. If people misunderstand the stool analogy as saying that the gospel is the church, then I assume that the stool analogy is overriding the book’s clear statements to the contrary, and for that, I will assume responsibility.

My purpose in the book was to creatively communicate the importance of the church – an implication of the gospel, to be sure, but a very important implication. For example, watch how Paul immediately transitions from the vertical reconciliation we have in Christ in the first half of Ephesians 2 to the horizontal reconciliation we have with one another in the second half. That truth is what I’m trying to capture with the stool analogy.

The Gospel and its Implications

On a related note, we need to take care that in our efforts to maintain distinctions between the gospel and its implications that we not neglect the importance of those implications. The gospel is not the church. But the gospel does birth the church. The gospel is not our individual good works. But the gospel does bring about good works in our life. I want to make sure that in our distinguishing between the gospel and its implications that we don’t wind up (unintentionally) downplaying the importance of the implications.

The Gospel Story in Relation to the Gospel Announcement

John is also concerned about confusing “story” and “announcement.” He writes:

“Wax’s solution is a slight counter to some who want to define the gospel as God-Man-Christ-Response or Creation-Fall-Redemption-Restoration.”

It is not clear to me why my proposal is considered a potential confusing of the story and the announcement, when “God-Man-Christ-Response” does essentially the same thing, albeit at a more personal, individual level. If we want to be technical, the “God” and “Man” portion of GMCR is not “gospel” in a restricted sense. The news that God is holy and man is a sinner is part of the context in which we make the gospel announcement. The actual “gospel” part of the God-Man-Christ-Response is the “Christ” section, with “God” and “Man” merely providing the backdrop.

Like Greg Gilbert in What Is the Gospel?, I am insisting on the proper context for understanding the gospel announcement rightly, even if I am broadening that context to encompass other aspects of the narrative. I don’t think that holding together “story” and “announcement” is dangerous. It seems to me that the Apostle Paul himself does this. When he defines the gospel announcement in 1 Corinthians 15, he makes sure we know (twice) that this announcement is “in accordance with the Scriptures.” He is also able to speak of final judgment as part of what “his gospel declares.” (Rom. 2)

So, with John, I affirm that the announcement of Christ’s death and resurrection is at the heart of the gospel. And I recognize that there may be dangers in confusing the story with the gospel announcement itself. But surely it’s also problematic to make too sharp a distinction between the gospel announcement and the story that gives it meaning. At this point, I fear the distinctions that John is making might possibly lead to a disjunction that is unhelpful. Let’s not drive a wedge between the core of the gospel (the announcement) and the story within which this announcement finds meaning.

A personal example may shed light on my thought process here. I once spent significant time witnessing to a coworker, one of the “all religions lead to God-consciousness sort of guy.” He and I went back and forth on the gospel. Eventually, he admitted that he believed Jesus had been raised from the dead bodily. And yet his explanation of this event was this: God raised Jesus from the dead because he’d been unjustly condemned, and his purpose in rising was to demonstrate his God-consciousness so he could beckon us to learn from him. In other words, Jesus was still just Master Teacher and not Savior and Lord. He got the bare facts of the announcement right, and yet the story he was working from was all wrong. The storyline affected the announcement to the point where he really didn’t believe the gospel at all.

John is right to say that the grand narrative is not the gospel per se, and yet I’m sure he and I would agree that the narrative must be in place if we are to get the gospel right. He sees danger in conflating the two. I see danger in separating the two.

Is it potentially misleading for me to insist on the grand narrative or for Greg Gilbert to use “God” and “Man” as part of his gospel definition before getting to “Christ” – the actual gospel announcement? Maybe. But I think we are more likely to mislead people if we don’t include the back story in our gospel definition. Even if the God/Man portion isn’t the good news in a strict sense, it is indeed necessary for understanding the Christ/Response aspect. Let’s not drive apart what is meant to be together.

Conclusion

With that said, I am grateful for John’s robust interaction with the main part of Counterfeit Gospels. It’s always a joy to think through gospel matters and to write on issues of first importance. May this discussion not only lead us to greater precision on these matters, but also on to greater proclamation of the only gospel that saves.

Your first name reflects your age (unless your name is Trevin, and then you don’t find your name in any Top 10 Lists!):

Take a look at the top 10 names for women and men for the last seven decades (from Social Security lists) and compare them to your peers’ names. I bet you’ll find a lot of matches.

A Rather Serious Cheerfulness:

I’d like to share the single most important thing Chip Stam taught me as his student, his friend, and eventually one of his pastors: Christian worship should be both serious and cheerful because the gospel message is both serious and cheerful. He taught this in the classroom, but he taught it even better by just being Chip.

Jim Hamilton reflects on the frequency of taking Communion:

If we become convinced that the earliest church took the Lord’s supper every Lord’s day—and if this was so widespread that when Paul and Luke are traveling from one place to another, they know that if they find a church gathered on the Lord’s day that church will have gathered to break bread—if we become convinced that the earliest church in every place took the Lord’s supper every Lord’s day, we will want to do the same.

Snoopy wasn’t always Charlie Brown’s dog.

“Lord God,
who has left us Your holy Word
to be a lantern unto our feet
and a light unto our steps:

Give to us all Your Holy Spirit,
that out of the same Word we may learn what is Your eternal will
and frame our lives in all holy obedience to the same,
to Your honor and glory and increase of our faith,
through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.

- Edward Dering, 1540-76

If a church truly loves God and the fame of His name, it is jealous for more and more people to know and praise Him. Every conversion means one more mouth is praising God, and every church planted is a chorus of mouths. Our love for the world is born out of our love for God. The greater our love for God, the greater our desire for others to display God’s glory by enjoying Him. We know how good and sweet He is.

- Jonathan Leeman, Reverberation: How God’s Word Brings Light, Freedom, and Action to His People, (193).

Seven links for your weekend reading:

1. Matt Chandler: Is Church Membership Biblical?

2. Canadian Politics 101: A Historic Election (helpful article on how politics and government works in Canada)

3. The New York Times profiles David Barton, president of WallBuilders. GetReligion analyzes their coverage.

4. Nathan Finn’s lengthy and helpful review of the Ancient Christian Doctrine series.

5. Fred Sanders writes about his favorite book on the doctrine of Scripture.

6. When the Lights Go Out: The Death of a Denomination

7. Interview with Tim Chester: Eating with a Mission

And good news for the blogosphere. My friend, Owen Strachan, has resumed blogging.