Eric Mason is the pastor of Epiphany Fellowship in Philadelphia and the author of Manhood Restored: How the Gospel Makes Men Whole, I first met Eric when he served on the advisory council for The Gospel Project. He’s a powerful preacher who loves his church, his family, and his community. Today, I’ve invited him to the blog for a discussion about God’s vision of manhood.

Trevin Wax: Men’s movements have been a permanent fixture in the evangelical landscape for the past two decades. Why? 

Eric Mason: The absence of men in churches. Even where there are men present in local churches, there seems to be a passivity of presence.

In light of the absence of leadership, there has been everything from Promise Keepers to some of the new manhood movements – Dr. Evans’ Kingdom Man, the whole Men’s Fraternity, etc. This is a phenomenal need and each variation has added its own flair to it. Kostenberger’s God, Marriage, and Family deals with the family as a whole with a special emphasis on the theology of family and the life of men. I think is the best book on men written in the last twenty years. I also can’t leave out Family Life and their contribution. Everywhere I hear the similar issues from the past generations, and these issues have given rise to these movements.

Trevin Wax: What do you think is missing from some of the strategies and principles coming out of the men’s movement?

Eric Mason: At times, we’ve needed to see more vulnerability from leaders. When we are honest about our failures, we help others understand the gospel more effectively. When we are honest about our failures, we can believe God and repent of our sins and turn toward Him because He is faithful. I am not talking about any of the men I’ve mentioned in particular. All of us tend toward moralistic teaching how-tos – how to do this, how to do that, how to be a better husband, how to be a better wife, and while those things have their place, we need a theological framework that sets that up.

I think on the other end we’ve had highly theological works that left men in a daze. We have this beastly theological grid, and especially for some of the younger generations that love intellectualism and robust theology, they’re at a loss with how to apply all their theological terminology. There can be a struggle to live it out.

There needs to be a little more realness. In that realness there needs to be a connection and an intersection between theological richness and cultural connectivity to the reality and progression of culture. I’m not dogging any of the movements that I’ve mentioned; I’m just speaking in general. 

Trevin Wax: You write about the impact of daddy deprivation. What do you mean by this and why is it so important?

Eric Mason: Daddy deprivation was a term I got from a pastor named Blake Wilson in Houston about 13 years ago. That phraseology of daddy deprivation was phenomenal to me and I wanted to flesh it out because as time went on, and I began to see an epidemic of fatherlessness.

In the book Fatherless America, David Blankenhorn talks about the category of fatherlessness. Fatherlessness can go all the way from a guy who’s home, he has his family, he works, he provides but he is emotionally, intellectually absent. That’s fatherlessness because there is no active ministry of presence. But then all the way up to the person who abandons their children or had sex with a woman and kind of rolled out on he,r and the kids never knew who their dad was and they grew up without a father.

Daddy deprivation is anything between from those extreme pendulums. The reason I talk about the importance of this is because as a pastor have seen and experienced the impact of daddy deprivation on the lives of men cross-ethnically.

In our own church, Epiphany Fellowship, we’ve got white men, Asian men, Latino men, black men, different types of African, Caribbean, men, people from overseas. I hear many stories from different people about the formation of family. Daddy deprivation is a consistent issue in biblical manhood that needs to be engaged. It’s systemic because fathers were given the theological and spiritual responsibility to lead. In Proverbs, we see the leading of the family along with a mother who is an instructor as well, but the husband takes the visionary leadership in instructing the family. 

The gospel restores fatherhood by God giving Himself back to us through the restoring work of Jesus Christ. I’m in a neighborhood where there is a 90 percent single parent home rate. So I feel it a lot more overtly than most.

Trevin Wax: You talk about the need for discipleship to include the cultivation of a biblical worldview. What are some of the ways we can prioritize the renewing of the mind as well as the spirit?

Eric Mason: Good question. I teach a great deal on discipleship and I didn’t put it all in this book because I’m going to work on another book that will include a full body ministry of discipleship.

Still, I was fascinated by how much the Bible talks about the mind being renewed. Ephesians 4:23 talks about being renewed in the spirit of your mind. 1 Corinthians 2 – the last few verses – talk about having the mind of Christ. Romans 12: 1-2 talks about it. And even in the Old Testament in Ezekiel 30:25-27 you look at how the gospel restores our heart and in restoring our heart, we get a new mind.

How do we cultivate the new mind? Forming the mind of Christ with the Word of God through discipleship. That means discipleship is just not one on one; it’s everything that is provided through the local church to the people of God, and that means every aspect of equipping – from the pulpit to small groups to going on mission trips to men’s time – all those things play a role in discipling. One of the main formats of discipleship in the New Testament are the “one anothers.”

Jesus says that in order to be a disciple you have to deny yourself. That means denying your preferences and embracing God’s way of doing things based on the Word of God. So how do we prioritize things? Deny self, pick up the cross daily and follow Him in ways that create in us a greater sense of a transformation of our way of thinking into His way of thinking.

Trevin Wax: You devote a section of your book to restored sexuality. What are the particular temptations we are facing today and how does the gospel aid us in our fight against sexual sin?

Eric Mason: Men believe lies that go back to worldview and strongholds. I have a message on strongholds out of Judges 6 that defines strongholds as things that assert themselves against the knowledge of God (2 Corinthians 10). This belief that the enemy has a better handle on sexuality than God causes us to give ourselves over to fallen forms of sex because we don’t believe God has our good in mind even though He created the whole thing. That’s why in 1 Corinthians, Paul utilizes the gospel as the means by which we’re motivated to have sanctified sex and move away from illicit forms. In the book, I talk in detail about some practical ways to embrace a gospel centered worldview as it relates to sex, because I think everything is a belief issue.

Check out the first chapter of the book by clicking here: Manhood Restored Pastor Eric Mason Chapter 1

Matt Papa is one of the leaders in the renaissance of new worship songs coming out of the gospel-centered movement. He serves on staff as a worship leader at The Summit Church in Durham and his latest release is This Changes Everything. 

We had lunch a few weeks ago and wound up talking about Keith Green. Afterwards, we decided to take the conversation to the blog.

Trevin Wax: What first attracted you to the music of Keith Green?

Matt Papa: The thing that first attracted me to Keith’s music was the thing that attracts me to all music: passion. When Keith sang, you got the sense that he needed to. When he played the piano, you got the sense that the piano would be injured.

Keith was sheer intensity, but it wasn’t just the music. The only thing that eclipsed his musical intensity was the almost-awkward intensity of his lyrics. He was A. W. Tozer behind a piano – blunt, abrasive, cutting – but the prophetic fire in his bones was always set to a melody that somehow made the medicine palatable. He had that “thing” all real prophets have: the anointing to offend with enough grace to keep you listening.

Trevin Wax: For the uninitiated, what five songs would you consider Keith’s best work?

Matt Papa: Here are my picks:

• The Sheep and the Goats is a musical work almost in a class by itself.
• Asleep In The Light gives a little taste of his intensity.
• To Obey Is Better Than Sacrifice is another dose of intense.
• There Is A Redeemer is a timeless hymn.
• Oh Lord, You’re Beautiful is a classic worship chorus.

Trevin Wax: Keith spoke out against the development of the Christian music “industry” from a financial standpoint. He foresaw the future of artists crossing over into secular music as well. Do you think Keith was right or wrong in his warning against CCM?

Matt Papa: I think he was probably right and wrong (and I’m not trying to be political here).

I think Keith was right because there is much that is disgusting about the modern Christian music industry. There are plenty of artists out there who hide their greed behind a trite Christian lyric. Keith was certainly not one of those. He once said:

I repent of ever having recorded one single song, and ever having performed one concert, if my music, and more importantly, my life has not provoked you into godly jealousy (Romans 11:11) or to sell out more completely to Jesus!

As many people know, Keith ran his entire ministry by faith – by the love offering. He would not allow money to “hinder” the gospel, and he spoke out violently against the future compromise (and demise) of the Christian music machine. There was a purity to Keith’s ministry that is unparalleled.

I think he was probably wrong in some ways, too.

Early on, Keith was somewhat of a legalist, as many of us tend to be early on in our faith. He expressed blood-earnest conviction about things which, later on in his life, he recanted when the grace of God began to tenderize his heart.

The music industry could have been one of those things. The existence of an industry in and of itself is not a bad thing: Christian music, Christian book publishing, etc. It is good that products are created that manifest the beauty of Jesus Christ and serve people. It’s also good that artists and writers are able to pay their bills. The danger exists because these industries are filled with sinners who can make success an idol.

Trevin Wax: Looking back at Keith’s life and legacy, what do you see as his strengths and weaknesses?

Matt Papa: Keith’s greatest strength was probably also his greatest weakness – it was the fire. Keith was so utterly convinced about everything. I’m sure it was that confidence that made his ministry so compelling. He was reckless, unafraid to offend.

I believe these qualities were used by God to awaken a generation. So many people I meet, still today, have been affected and are still encouraged by his ministry. But along with this certainty, he crossed the line into ungraciousness at times. He reminds me a lot of Peter.

Another virtue with (perhaps) a vice was his pioneering spirit. Keith and Melody had four kids. They had a traveling ministry and a magazine (newsletter). They went on mission trips, they started schools, they opened houses for drug addicts, and the list goes on and on.

So where’s the vice, you ask? One general oversight of the 1970′s was (in my opinion) a lack of involvement and connection to the local church. The “hippie” spirit was a pioneering, wandering one. I’m not sure where Keith and Melody landed on this issue, but my guess is their contribution to a local body was minimal.

Trevin Wax: Had Keith not died so young, where do you think he would have wound up? What was his trajectory?

Matt Papa: That’s a fantastic question, and one that I think about from time to time. My guess is that he would probably would have ended up on the mission field. Late in his life, Keith and Melody took some overseas trips, and Keith was really wrecked by the experience. He became a passionate mobilizer after these trips. I think they might have ended up serving outside North America.

Trevin Wax: No Compromise: The Life Story of Keith Green has been an influential book for many people. What is it about Keith’s story and music that continues to inspire and engage people?

Matt Papa: It was never the songs that made Keith’s songs so great. It was that he lived his songs. Keith was just as passionate behind the dinner table as he was behind the piano. He lived by faith – a wild journey of choosing to follow God and trust Him completely.

Leveraging his music ministry housing drug addicts, helping the poor, serving the least of these… Keith’s whole life was intense, and his songs were just the overflow, the soundtrack of his life. It’s ironic, but what makes his music so amazing, even today is that the music was nothing. Jesus was everything.

I’m encouraged to see a renaissance of worship leaders composing hymns and writing songs that communicate rich theological truths and are easy to sing. Matt Boswell (pastor of ministries and worship at Providence Church) and Michael Bleecker (worship pastor at The Village Church) are at the forefront of this movement. (Check out Matt’s Messenger Hymns. “O Fount of Love” is a personal favorite.)

Matt has brought together a dozen worship pastors to contribute to a new book - Doxology and Theology: How the Gospel Forms the Worship Leader. I read an advance copy and offered this word of recommendation:

Doxology and Theology is filled with gospel truth and practical application for those who have the important task of lifting our hearts in song to the Triune God who in love has saved us. May this book equip church musicians, songwriters, and worship leaders to celebrate and savor the gospel of Jesus Christ!

Today, Matt and Michael join me on the blog for a conversation about doxology and theology.

Trevin Wax: Matt, you say that one of the greatest needs of the modern church is theologically driven worship leaders. What other things end up driving worship leaders today?

Matt Boswell: On the heels of the praise and worship movement of the 70′s and 80′s, the role of the worship leader became heavily influenced by record labels and worship leader celebrities. In some circles, style became the focus rather than substance.

This new paradigm has caused worship leaders to be driven primarily by two different voices: pragmatism or existentialism. On either side of this equation, we need to allow the Word of God to call, inform, and shape how our churches worship. There are many echoes in the world of worship leaders, but few voices. We are praying for voices to continually call churches back to the sufficiency of Scripture and centrality of the gospel. 

Michael Bleecker: Emotionalism also drives worship leaders. Emoting, of course, isn’t wrong, but when emotions stop being roused and shaped by the word of God, we find “a zeal for God, but it is not according to knowledge.” (Rom. 10:2).

Conversely, I have also seen emotionlessness in some worship leaders. Perhaps they have seen emotionalism abused – not grounded in and pushed out by Truth – and have swung the other way, or they may fear they are distraction to those they are leading.

Whatever the case, spontaneous and strong affections from a heart that tastes and sees how good our God is should erupt and instead it is subdued or nonexistent. Jesus tells us in John 4:23 that “true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth.” Mind and heart. Thought and affection.

Trevin Wax: What is the relationship between doxology (worship), theology, and engaging in God’s mission?

Michael Bleecker: The relationship should be one of harmony and constancy.

If God’s mission for us is to proclaim the excellencies of him who called us out of darkness into His marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9) and to make disciples of all nations, teaching them to observe everything he commanded us (Matt 28:19-20), we must be those worship leaders who worship the Lord personally and corporately, who study the Word of God and hide it in our hearts and who are constantly reminded of his mission, making every effort to proclaim His gospel.

Matt Boswell: Right theology leads us to rightful doxology, and both propel the mission of God in the world. As John Piper rightly says, “Worship is the fuel and goal of missions.”

Psalm 96 presents a compelling call to God-centered, theological, missional worship. I hope to move the conversation from theocentric vs. anthropocentric worship services, and instead show how a God-centered view of the Christian life is the greatest good of every person.

Our worship must be rightfully centered on the glory of God, because only then are the desires and needs of man informed and met. As we exalt Christ and glorify God, we are professing things that are true to those in our gatherings who are separated from God by sin. The aim of the mission of God is that all the peoples of the earth would glorify God. God’s mission in the world is accomplished when He is the praise of every tribe, and tongue, and nation.

Trevin Wax: What are some practical steps you’d recommend for worship leaders who want to incorporate a more Scripture-focused, gospel-centered approach to their ministry?

Matt Boswell: In our church, Scripture plays a vital role from the beginning of a gathering to the end. Scripture is read for a call to worship and for times of confession. Scripture is on the screens when there is an instrumental part of a song. Scripture is read before the sermon is preached, and Scripture is our benediction. In the culture of today’s non-liturgical church this idea may seem foreign, but allowing Scripture to shape our practice of worship keeps us tethered to God’s Word.

Michael Bleecker: I would begin with the songs they sing. Do they understand everything they are singing so that they’re able to teach it? Are the lyrics of their songs biblical? Have they taken the time to match Scriptures to the lyrics?

On each of my charts I have a few Scriptures typed in at the top so I’m able to reference them while I’m singing, playing or praying. I also add Scriptures to the bottom of the slides so the church is able to reference them while they are singing as well.

If we’re singing “here I raise my Ebenezer,” 1 Samuel 7:12 will be at the bottom of that slide. If we’re singing “my name is graven on His hands,” Isaiah 49:16 will be at the bottom of that slide. The slides aren’t as clean as they were before, but it’s a great trade for informed worshipers.

Next I would make sure you are preparing your heart before anyone else shows up for the weekend. I get to the church a couple of hours before anyone else so that I can pray. When the band and A/V team show up, we get a quick sound check at the start of rehearsal, I read Scripture over them, pray and we fan out over the sanctuary while a recorded worship song is played over us. We spend that time confessing our sins, singing loudly, raising our hands, getting on our knees, etc. It’s a sweet start to a long weekend.

I want everything I do to be saturated with Scripture, knowing that it will not return void.

Trevin Wax: Often, church members think of worship as the “singing before the sermon.” Why do you recommend seeing worship more holistically, including the preaching of God’s Word?

Matt Boswell: Worship is a holistic practice. The promise of the new covenant is that Jesus is the true and better temple, the true and better mount. The regulations of time and place have been fulfilled in Christ.

This means we are a continually worshipping people, in heart, soul, and mind. The way the church has adopted the use of the word worship is a difficult reality we are faced with. When our people say they enjoyed the worship, I understand they mean the singing, and Scripture reading, and time of confession.

At the same time, when we walk with a robust view of what congregational worship is, everything falls rightly into its place. The singing of songs is not elevated to a level it is not meant for, and the Scripture readings are not demeaned as a necessary obligation.

When we look at a liturgy from beginning to end as the people of God gathered to engage with Him and rehearse the Gospel, an unbroken chain is formed. Every element of a worship gathering is an important tool in the hand of God. At the center of the church gathered is the one element absolutely necessary: the word of God laid open in the midst of His people.

Trevin Wax: What was your experience like as you brought together all these worship leaders to contribute to this book? What do you hope the book will accomplish?

Matt Boswell: These group of worship leaders are some of the most careful thinkers I know pertaining to the role of the worship leader. These men are practitioners who love and serve their local congregation, and also are helping shape the worship of the church at large.

My goal in this project was that if we gathered our voices there would be much greater strength than if we continued to speak independent of one another. We want to see a reformation of the role of the worship leader away from a singer of songs toward a shepherd of souls. We are praying for a generation of men who would lead their congregations in biblical, gospel-wrought worship.

Today, I’ve invited Thom Rainer, president of LifeWay and author of the new book I Am a Church Member: Discovering the Attitude that Makes the Difference to join me for a conversation about church membership.

This book carries a long list of endorsements from church leaders across the theological and methodological spectrum of evangelicalism. It is a brief book that challenges church members to shift their mindset from self-serving to self-giving.

Trevin Wax: I Am a Church Member began as a blog post that garnered a great deal of attention and response. What prompted you to write the initial blog post? What did you learn from the response to that post?

Thom Rainer: I wrote the initial blog post after noting that in my research that church conflict was increasing. Over one-half of the conflict issues dealt with church members arguing over their personal preferences.

I hoped and prayed the blog would cause all of us church members to rethink our attitude about church membership, and to understand we are there to serve, not necessarily to be served.

Trevin Wax: You write about plateaued and declining churches in North America as seen in declining evangelical influence in the culture. We are tempted to blame secular culture, national politics, or church leaders. But you believe church members should “look in the mirror.” Why?

Thom Rainer: If outside forces and culture were the reasons behind declining and non-influential churches, we would likely have no churches today. The greatest periods of growth, particularly the first-century growth, took place in adversarial cultures. We are not hindered by external forces; we are hindered by our own lack of commitment and selflessness.

Trevin Wax: You devote a chapter to encouraging members to pray for their church leaders. There’s a moving story about a busy pastor who has no time to grieve the death of his best friend. Do you find that many church members are unaware of the pressures of pastoral ministry? How can we be better “pray-ers” for our pastors?

Thom Rainer: Most church members have little awareness of the daily demands and pressures of a pastor. His calling is one of the most challenging a person can have. Indeed, it is an impossible task in the pastor’s own strength.

I encourage church members to pick a time of day (for me it’s noon) to pause to pray one or two minutes for their pastors.

Most church members evaluate the pastor through the lens of “what is he doing for me?” We need to ask how we can help our pastor serve others rather than ask what can he do for me.

Trevin Wax: What happens when church members are focused on their own preferences and desires instead of the church’s mission? How can we move from being self-focused to self-giving?

Thom Rainer: The self-focused church becomes a church in conflict. No church can satisfy all the preferences of all the church members.

I recommend strongly that churches have an entry point class (a new members’ class) so clear expectations can be established for church members, including attitudinal issues. I also recommend that every church buy and distribute hundreds of copies of my book

Trevin Wax: There has been a resurgence of interest in church membership in recent years. Where do you see the conversation about meaningful church membership going in the years ahead? What are the strengths and weaknesses of this movement?

Thom Rainer: I am encouraged about the resurgence of interest in church membership. I see the conversation expanding in the near future.

Most of the conversation today is about what we are supposed to do as a church member. Very soon you will likely hear more and more about the attitudes church members should have.

An action plan without a biblical mindset is worthless, if not dangerous.

Trevin Wax: What do you hope this book will accomplish?

Thom Rainer: I pray that my little book will contribute to the conversation about biblical attitudes about church membership. I am even bold enough to pray that God will use it to change hearts from self-serving to serving.

Why do so many guys with good doctrine have bad attitudes?

Can you be biblically orthodox and firm in your faith without being brittle or hard-hearted?

Can we be humble and orthodox?

My friend, Josh Harris, thinks so. His book Humble Orthodoxy: Holding the Truth High Without Putting People Down (Multnomah, 2013) is short and to the point, and it’s a point we need to be reminded of. I asked Josh to join me on the blog for a conversation about the importance of holding to the right beliefs the right way.

Trevin Wax: You write: “Truth matters… but so does our attitude.” What is the danger of focusing only on holding the right doctrines without giving attention to how we hold these doctrines?

Josh Haris: When we disconnect our belief from our lives, we’re deceiving ourselves. We don’t really own the truth—or maybe more accurately it hasn’t owned us. I guess a blaringly obvious example is the guy who knows and teaches all the Bible’s truths about sexual purity but is sleeping with his girlfriend.

The same basic idea applies to orthodox belief. What many of us forget in our fervency to defend sound doctrine is that the precious truths of the faith—the heart of which is the gospel—must be played out in our actions and attitudes. So the truth of being saved by grace alone needs to make us gracious and humble and loving.

So I think the danger is that we would actually contradict with our lives what we claim to believe in our statements of faith.

Remember what Jesus said. He said people would know that we’re His disciples by the way we love each other.

Trevin Wax: You mention two extremes: arrogant orthodoxy and humble heterodoxy. What are these two extremes and why should we avoid them?

Josh Harris: If you don’t know what arrogant orthodoxy is, you’ve never read the comments section of a Christian blog! I think we can all fall into this. It’s being doctrinaire but self-righteous and proud toward those we consider less informed. The other extreme is humble heterodoxy — someone who is so concerned with being “nice” that they don’t end up actually standing for or believing anything.

The reason these should both be avoided is that ultimately they dishonor God and are unloving toward others. Arrogance undermines the gospel. And a so-called humility or kindness that isn’t willing to stand up to error and falsehood can destroy people’s souls. There’s nothing kind about being likable as your friends and neighbors are walking off a cliff.

Trevin Wax: One of the chapters is called “Repentance starts with me.” Why is it important for us to remember our own need for repentance as we seek to defend the truth?

Josh Harris: One thing I think all people (maybe especially Americans) are born with is an incredible radar to detect self-righteousness in other people. The secular culture is very aware of this when they hear the Church’s condemnation of homosexuality for example, but see Christians watching porn and getting divorced left and right.

So the point isn’t that we should stop standing for righteousness and calling people to repentance. The point is that we should model in our own lives what we’re calling them to. We should live out repentance and trust in the gospel ourselves. The world needs to see Christians broken over our sin and daily acknowledging our need for the grace of the gospel.

Trevin Wax: How does this balance between humility and orthodoxy play out in the way we treat others? 

Josh Harris: It’s very simple and I give three easy steps in the book. No, I’m kidding… obviously this is something we each need the power of the Holy Spirit to do. But I think the answer is genuine love for God and others—the two great commandments.

Truth or orthodoxy is not about us. It’s about God—his character, his work, his plan of redemption, his kingdom and glory. So we should care deeply about sound doctrine because people need to know and enjoy this great God.

When we make truth about ourselves or about other people, we’re tempted to either become proud and territorial or water down truth to please an audience. Humble orthodoxy is achieved when we’re primarily aware of the Audience of One.

Alister E. McGrath is a historian, biochemist, and Christian theologian born in Belfast, Northern Ireland. A longtime professor at Oxford University, he now holds the chair in theology, ministry, and education at the University of London.

Dr. McGrath has written a new biography of C. S. Lewis that is well worth your time. I asked him to respond to a few questions about his book - C. S. Lewis – A Life: Eccentric Genius, Reluctant Prophet.

Trevin Wax: There are many well-known biographies of Lewis currently available, including several from those who knew him personally. What prompted you to take on this task? What did you feel was missing from the other treatments of Lewis’ life?

Alister McGrath: There were several issues that made me come to this conclusion.

First, that some biographies to date didn’t really understand Lewis’s Irish background, or the Oxford academic culture in which he worked for so long. I know these both intimately, and was able to cast light on some things that weren’t really understood properly in earlier biographies.

Plus there has been a massive increase in scholarly work on Lewis in the last few decades.

Plus I carried out a lot of archive work, which turned up material that had never been used before – including a new Lewis letter.

Trevin Wax: What was your method in writing? How did you start and sustain such a mammoth project?

Alister McGrath: I began in September 2008. It involved reading everything that Lewis wrote in chronological order, to get a feel for the development of his ideas and writing style. This also allowed me to harvest some great quotes or phrases, which add interest to the text.

After sorting out a publisher, I then began to bring all the material together, with two aims in mind as I wrote:

1. What does someone who has come across Lewis through the Narnia books or movies want to know about him?
2. How best can I explain why Lewis is such a complex and fascinating person?

When I submitted the text, it weighed in at 135,000 words. I wondered if this was too long, but my publisher liked it, and suggested a few areas in which I could expand the book instead.

Trevin Wax: You paint Lewis as a “reluctant prophet” and also an “eccentric genius.” Some fans of Lewis may never have thought of him in these terms. Why is Lewis’ reluctance and eccentricity important for those seeking to understand his life and legacy?

Alister McGrath: These two descriptions capture aspects of Lewis’s character that help us understand his wrestling with fame, especially in the 1940s.

It is obvious that Lewis did not expect or want to become famous, and struggled with his popular acclaim. He also operated from outside the centre – for example, he did not really fit into Oxford’s academic culture. I personally think that one of the reasons that Lewis decided to use a spiritual director was his fear that he would be destroyed by his fame, unless he leaned how to handle it well.

Trevin Wax: You make the case that Lewis was wrong regarding the timing of his own conversion, first to theism and then to Christianity. How did you arrive at this conclusion and why do you think the timing is important?

Alister McGrath: I came to this conclusion when working through his writings in chronological order. When I finished everything relating to 1929, I found myself wondering why there was no sign of any change in outlook or tone! But the writings of 1930 show a mood change, with two very clear points of transition.

I didn’t expect to challenge the date of Lewis’s conversion when I began the project; I thought that I would simply cast more light on various aspects of his religious development.

But when I began to read Lewis in the light of a possible conversion in June 1930 (that seems most likely, but I can’t prove it), everything made a lot more sense.

Is it important? Not for Lewis fans. The important thing for them is that Lewis was an atheist who became a Christian. The exact timing isn’t an issue.

But for Lewis scholars, it is a major issue, as it affects our understanding of the trajectory from atheism to belief in God, and then from belief in God to an acceptance of Christianity.

Trevin Wax: You graciously point out the weakness in Lewis’s writings as well as the shortcomings of his personal life. Why is it important for us to keep these things in mind as we study his work?

Alister McGrath: Like the rest of us, Lewis was human. He made mistakes. He got things wrong. I admire Lewis, but I’m not prepared to idealize him.

I felt that the greatest service I could do Lewis was to paint an accurate picture of his life and character, and allow readers to understand that God can take and use even flawed people, and do great things through them.

How does worship work?

How exactly does liturgical formation shape us?

What are the dynamics of such transformation?

Earlier this year, I read James K. A. Smith’s new book, Imagining the Kingdom: How Worship Works, the follow-up to his well-received and highly discussed Desiring the Kingdom. Smith claims that worship “works” by leveraging our bodies to transform our imagination, and it does this through stories we understand on a register that is closer to body than mind.

Jamie is joining me today to discuss this emphasis on the imagination and its implications for how we think about Christian formation.

Trevin Wax: Imagining the Kingdom begins with the story of Andrew and his daughter Elizabeth, both in a worship service, but having rather different experiences. As a kid, Elizabeth can hardly wait for it to end. But as an adult, Andrew sees the end of worship is a sending.

If we are to understand “how worship works” (as your subtitle says), why is it important to keep the “end” of worship always in mind?

James K. A. Smith: I think it’s crucial that we see and remember the link between worship and mission.

The sanctuary is not a silo that offers escape from “the real world.” Historically, Christian worship doesn’t just end with a dismissal (“That’s all folks! See you next week!”); rather, worship culminates in a benediction that is both a blessing and a charge, sending us out into God’s world as His image bearers.

The end of Christian worship is a weekly echo of Genesis 1. So the “end” of worship is a sending. We are gathered before God’s Word and Table in order to be nourished to carry out the mission of being human.

In the Cultural Liturgies project, I’m arguing that the church needs to be intentional about the shape of our worship if worship is going to shape us to be God’s image bearers in our daily work.

Trevin Wax: You write about the connection between longing and action. Our actions are often determined by our longings, and our desires are formed unconsciously through our actions and habits. How does this connection impact the way we view worship?

James K. A. Smith: It impacts how we should view discipleship, and I think we need to remember that the hub and center of Christian discipleship is worship.

The point is this: a lot of Christians (including pastors and Christian leaders) have implicitly and unwittingly bought into a view of action and behavior that overestimates thinking. This is even true in sectors of evangelicalism that are suspicious of education and intellectual life.

We overestimate thinking when we assume that our action and behavior are the outcomes of discrete decisions we make on the basis of what we know. When we assume that, then we construe discipleship as primarily information dissemination – as if holiness were a matter of just acquiring the knowledge I need to follow Christ as I ought.

But on a gut level, we all know this doesn’t work. My failures to follow Christ in holiness do not stem from a lack of information or knowledge. I know very well what He calls me to. I don’t do it because of bad habits that I’ve acquired. And the fact is, you can’t think yourself out of bad habits. You undo bad habits through “rehabituation” -through practices that inscribe new habits in our gut, as it were.

I think most contemporary evangelical understandings of discipleship have no place to appreciate the power of habit (except perhaps negatively). But that is a very odd scenario since Christians across the ages have long understood habit formation to be at the center of spiritual formation and discipleship. In Imagining the Kingdom, I try to explain how and why this is the case.

Trevin Wax: You believe that our identities, our desires, our loves, our longings operate more on the imagination than the intellect. Why is it important for church leaders to take note of the importance of imagination as we seek to teach/disciple others?

James K. A. Smith: The “imagination” is the term I use to try to name this preconscious, gut-level, tacit orientation we carry to the world, an “understanding” of the world that is carried in our unconscious habits. It’s not that knowledge and ideas and beliefs aren’t important, it’s just that there are also more fundamental ways that we “make sense” of our world that can’t be articulated in propositions.

The imagination is a kind of “know-how” that you carry in your bones. And if we don’t attend to that as Christians, if we don’t recognize the power of the imagination in orienting our lives, then our imaginations are going to be unwittingly captured by secular liturgies while our churches and discipleship strategies focus on “the head.”

Trevin Wax: You speak of the power of a liturgy in terms of what is caught, not just explicitly taught. How does this truth influence the way we conceive of worship services?

James K. A. Smith: A core claim and outcome of Imagining the Kingdom is to help evangelicals see that we have bought into a reductionistic view of worship. When we say “worship,” many of us just think “music” or “singing,” which is already a reduction of historic understandings of worship that comprise the entire service.

But more generally, we have also largely reduced worship to “expression.” We have focused only on the “upward” movement of worship as our sacrifice of praise, which is probably why the grammar of so many contemporary worship choruses actually sing about us (“Here I am to worship…”).

Now clearly our expression of praise to God is part of worship, but it is not the whole of worship. In fact, the primary actor or agent in Christian worship is not us but God.

So historically, worship has been seen as not only expressive, but also formative. When the people of God are gathered by God around his Word and seated at his Table, that sanctuary is the space where God is molding and (re)making us. In that sense, worship is training, is formation.

As I argue in the final chapter of the book, if worship is going to be formative, that means we need to think carefully and intentionally about the form of worship. Not the “style” (this isn’t about pipe organs vs. mandolins), but the narrative form of the Story that is enacted in our communal worship.

Trevin Wax: How would you respond to the person who says the forms of worship are interchangeable, but the message must always remain constant? While admitting there is flexibility in forms from culture to culture, I think you’d want to push against the idea that the forms don’t matter.

James K. A. Smith: Absolutely. I think we buy into a form/content distinction precisely because we’ve reduced the Gospel to a “message.” So then we think we can just distill that “message” (the content) and then drop it into any “form” we want.

But as I argue in the book, forms are not neutral. Indeed, that was one of the core arguments of the first volume, Desiring the Kingdom: cultural practices that we might think are “neutral” – just something that we do – are actually doing something to us. They are formative. But what they form is our heart-habits, our loves and longings that, as we’ve already mentioned, actually drive our action and behavior.

So you can’t just go pick some “popular” cultural form and insert the Gospel “message” and think you have thereby come up with “relevant” worship. Because it’s more likely that you’ve just imported a secular liturgy into Christian worship. Sure, you might have changed the content, but the very form of the practice is training us to love some other vision of the good life. This is why I think a lot of innovation in worship, while well-intentioned, actually ends up welcoming Trojan horses into the sanctuary.

The response is not to come up with “the next best thing” in worship. It is to find new appreciation for historic Christian wisdom about the form of worship for the sake of discipleship. That’s the core argument of Imagining the Kingdom.

In the recent resurgence of church planting across North America, a number of books have emerged challenging and encouraging planting pastors in their role of starting new congregations. Not as much has been written for the families of church planters, particularly the church planting wife.

Enter Christine Hoover, author of The Church Planting Wife: Help and Hope for Her Heart (Moody, 2013). Christine is a church planting wife and the mom of three boys. She also encourages ministry-minded women to live and lead from grace on her blog. I’ve invited her to the blog today to discuss the challenges church planting wives face.

Trevin Wax: What are some of the pressures and challenges that are unique to church planters’ wives (different from the pastor’s wife)?

Christine Hoover: Without question, both the wife of a minister at an established church and the wife of a church planter are essential to her husband’s ministry.

In my experience, however, the church planting wife’s role is more ambiguous than the wife of a minister in an established church. In a church plant, the line between the planter’s family life and ministry life is often extremely blurred.

For example, in our situation, we held our church services and all church events in our home for the first six months. Four years in, we do not yet have a building of our own, so I still host many events and small groups in our home. Because of this, I bear many responsibilities that I did not have as a pastor’s wife in our prior established church.

In church plants, out of need, the wife is almost like an additional staff member in the sense that she usually leads major ministries, such as the children’s ministry or women’s ministry, in addition to setting up on Sundays, printing bulletins, helping with worship, greeting, or managing the church website, all while being a wife and mother. When we served in an established church, my ministry was easy to define based upon my husband’s role, but church planting left it very open-ended.

In some ways, this situation was difficult because I had to do many things I wasn’t necessarily gifted for or passionate about for a long period of time. But in many ways, it helped me discern what my spiritual gifts are and learn how to release responsibility for things I’m not gifted for.

These blurred lines and intense requirements create some unique pressures and challenges for a church planting wife, most of which involve maintaining healthy boundaries and priorities that keep the church plant from completely overtaking her life, her marriage, and her family. In the beginning stages, the church planter and his wife are, out of necessity, so intensely focused on the plant that it’s difficult for them to not rise and fall emotionally based on Sunday’s attendance or the success of an outreach event.

The church planting wife faces almost constant uncertainty and discouragement. She may wrestle with resentment toward her husband’s calling and struggle with the lack of physical and emotional support she might find if she were the pastor’s wife in a more established church.

Trevin Wax: You put a strong emphasis on the heart of the church planter’s wife. Why is it important to remember what God is doing in you – not only through you as you plant a church?

Christine Hoover: I cannot emphasize enough how much influence I have on my husband and, thus, the church. I am his sounding board, his encourager, his helper. I am Aaron to his Moses. I am not making decisions regarding the church, but I am certainly influencing the one who does. More than starting a women’s ministry or practicing hospitality in our home, my ministry to my husband is my most important.

It follows then that I must take care with this influence, which means I must take care to keep my heart soft and submitted to God. I must daily reorient myself to the gospel, root out anything that hinders me from loving God and helping my husband, and depend on the Spirit rather than my own wisdom. Every church planting wife has this responsibility to God and to her husband.

I’ve discovered, too, that it’s not healthy for me to focus on what God is doing through my service to Him in church planting. Looking for fruit or results is often a futile practice, especially in the early years of planting when growth is slow and the church is young and fragile.

But I can always look to God and look for what He is doing in my heart. I can trust that as my heart is soft and submitted before Him, He will use me in whatever ways He chooses.

Trevin Wax: You say that your calling is not to your husband, but to God. Why is this distinction important?

Christine Hoover: This is an important distinction for all wives.

When Paul tells the Colossians to do everything in the name of Jesus, he follows it up with specific instructions on what this would look like for different groups of people: wives, husbands, children, and servants (3:17-24). He asks difficult things of all of them, such as that wives should submit to their husbands. How? Why? With each group, he answers those questions: “As unto the Lord.”

For a wife who misses that qualifier, whose eyes are on her husband, this instruction appears difficult and confounding. But for a wife whose eyes are on God, she always has a worthy and unchanging motivation.

This same principle applies to the church planting wife. When her eyes are on a fallible husband, she may quickly tire of the sacrificial demands of church planting that his calling requires, but when her eyes are on Christ, there are deep, holy, lasting motivations to serve, practice hospitality, and care for people. I’m not saying that the wife shouldn’t joyfully help and serve her husband; I’m saying that her motivation for doing so must be her desire to be faithful to God. This is her “unto the Lord.”

In the beginning of our church plant, when uncertainty prevailed and circumstances looked bleak, I missed that “as unto the Lord” qualifier. This created conflict within me and between us because it fed resentments that I allowed to sit in my heart. It set me up against the church, playing tug-of-war for my husband’s attention. If my calling is to him, then it opens the door for me to demand my way or to only give so much, to view church planting as his job and my life as separate from that. It also means I can excuse myself from using the gifts God has given me that I am individually accountable for.

I no longer consider church planting to be my husband’s job or something that I can excuse myself from. I consider it to be our “together calling,” something that works best when we’re in it together and we both look together to God as our motivation.

In the end, it’s a small distinction because as my calling is to God, He will orient me toward helping my husband. But it is an important distinction because looking to God rather than my husband alters my motivations drastically. I can’t build a lifetime of ministry and kingdom impact based on my husband, but I can based on the worth of God.

Trevin Wax: How have you dealt with the pressure of facing opposition (both from inside the church and from outside)?

Christine Hoover: Fortunately, we have not faced drastic opposition from within our church yet. The beauty of church planting is that we’ve gotten to lay foundations rather than attempting to alter foundations that have already been laid.

However, we have faced opposition, some from other churches in our area. (Having said that, we have also had incredible help, friendship, and support from countless other area churches.)

The most notable opposition we have faced, however, is spiritually-based opposition: Satan using circumstances to come against us and especially his work to steal, kill, and destroy in the lives of our leaders.

I haven’t always dealt with this well. To be honest, I entered church planting with what I now see as naiveté. Instead of expecting difficulty and opposition, I expected that our obedience to God will yield immediate respect, rapport, and results in our community. Instead of being on guard against the enemy, I assumed that we and those near to us would not succumb to temptation. Now, obviously, I know different on both accounts.

I also know now how to better deal with opposition. I’ve learned first and foremost to attribute outside opposition to its original source rather than being easily offended and hurt by unbelievers. I now expect opposition so I’m not as surprised when it comes.

The hardest part, however, has been opposition from other believers. I’ve had to forgive, root out bitterness, and learn to pray for the success and kingdom impact of those who have hurt us. This has been a sanctifying process in my heart, which is why I focus so much in my book on the church planting wife’s heart. I pray for thick skin and a soft heart.

Trevin Wax: How do you advise church planting wives to cultivate a peaceful heart in the midst of the struggle of beginning a church?

Christine Hoover: It’s difficult to live in constant uncertainty, which is what the first year or two (or more) of church planting requires. Uncertainty, if not taken to Christ, breeds fear. If we desire peace in that uncertainty, it follows then that the lesson in church planting for the church planting wife is to feed faith rather than fear.

How do we feed faith? We go to the Word daily, searching out stories, characters, and verses of faith.

My go-to verses in this church planting adventure have been 1 Thessalonians 5:24: “He who called you is faithful and He will do it”, and the recounting of Abraham’s faith in Romans 4:16-22, who “contrary to hope, in hope believed” in God, who “calls those things which do not exist as though they did.”

In order to feed faith, we also must search for and recount God’s faithfulness. Where is He working? How has He worked in the past? A vital faith-feeder for me is remembering how God called us to church planting, how He has provided for us at every turn, and how He has worked in the lives of the people in our city.

In addition, we feed our faith when we meditate on God’s character. He says He is responsible for His church. He says He is the One who changes hearts. And perhaps most important to me personally, He says He is my Father. I am not an orphan; I am a child who is nurtured, led, and provided for. There is peace in knowing I can hide in the shadow of the wings of my good and gracious Father.

Finally, peace comes when we remember what our success is. Success is not necessarily measured by external circumstances. Faith is success and our victory.

Os Guinness is one of the most insightful Christian thinkers on the scene today. Great-great grandson of Arthur Guinness, the Dublin brewer, he was born in China in World War II where both his parents and grandparents were medical missionaries – his grandfather having had the privilege of treating the Empress Dowager, the Last Emperor, and the Imperial family.

A survivor of the terrible Henan famine of 1943, in which five million died in three months, including his two brothers, Os was a witness to the climax of the Chinese revolution in 1949 and the beginning of the reign of terror under Mao Tse Tung. He was expelled with many other foreigners in 1951 and returned to Europe where he was educated in England.

Os has written or edited thirty books on a wide range of themes. Today, we’re looking at one of his older books, The Dust of Death: The Sixties Counterculture and How It Changed America Forever, first published in 1971 and revised in 1994.

Fifty years have passed since the start of the Sixties. I asked Os to join me on the blog for a conversation about this pivotal decade in American history, and what it means for us today.

Trevin Wax: You’ve described the Sixties as bringing about a “seismic shift” in American history. Why are the 1960s crucial for understanding American culture in the 21^st century?

Os Guinness: When people think of the crucial decades that have shaped American history after 1776, they automatically think of the Civil War, the two World Wars, the Depression era, and so on.

But in my estimate, the decade of the Sixties and the so-called “counterculture” ranks with the most important of these, and is even more consequential than the Depression era. It stands as a deep and savage sword thrust through American history and culture.

Too often the Sixties are dismissed in terms of “hippies, drugs, sex, rock and roll, war protests,” and so on, as if that was all there was to it. But in fact much of the best and worst of where we are today can be traced back to the Sixties.

On the “for better” side of the ledger, we owe to the Sixties the great achievements of the Civil Rights movement and such stunning successes as the Apollo moon landing.

On the “for worse” side of the ledger, there was the utopianism, the violence and the humiliations of the Vietnam War, and of course the excesses of the sexual revolution, the stupidities of the new entitlement era, the rise of the culture wars, and the nihilism of postmodernism, all of which are producing such a dark harvest today.

Trevin Wax: When did the seismic shifts begin? Would you pinpoint the changes to 1960 or another time – before or after?

Os Guinness: Talk of “baselines” is often a contentious area!

Many people used to date the Sixties from JFK’s election in 1960, and it is true that the launch of “Camelot” was like a gale of fresh air after the stuffy conventionalism of the 1950s and the Eisenhower era. Others have put the starting date at the city riots in 1963, the Free Speech movement at Berkeley in 1964, and even the arrival of the Beatles in the U.S. in February 1964, and their appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show that was watched by forty percent of the population.

Needless to say, no sooner does someone pick such a date than a host of others immediately find trends that precede it by far. Today, we still use terms such as the Sixties, but there is a far richer understanding of the many threads that were woven together to make the tapestry as a whole.

Trevin Wax: What caused the 1960s to become such a tumultuous decade in American history?

Os Guinness: Where should I begin?

As I see it, the Sixties was above all a grand and damaging blow to the easy complacency of the post-War world and to the illusions of Henry Luce’s “American century.” This was evident at the time as the U.S. became more and more bogged down in the jungles and paddy fields of Vietnam and in the labyrinthine peace negotiations in Paris.

But it slowly became equally evident too in the way that Sixties ideas openly assaulted many of the ideals and ideas that had shaped traditional America:

• What is life?
• How are we to define the family?
• Is there such a thing as truth?
• Does character matter in leaders?
• What part should religion play in public life?
• What do we mean by “Americanism” and “exceptionalism”?
• Does freedom require virtue?

And so on, and so on.

Clearly, the recent answers to such questions not only form the contested issues of the culture wars today, but are significant in various ways. They demonstrate the chasm between the present generation and most Americans before the 1960s, they show the mounting alienation of the educated classes from many ordinary citizens, and they represent the decisive manner in which contemporary America has departed from the founders’ understanding of the republic. It is not too much to say that these Sixties answers are what has called into question the very health of United States and may hasten its decline.

Trevin Wax: Some cultural observers have written as if the 1980s represented a countering of the Sixties culture. Do you agree or disagree with that assessment?

Os Guinness: I agree, though I would call it an “attempted countering.”

Ronald Reagan conquered Jimmy Carter and rode to the White House in opposition to all America’s post-Vietnam and post-Watergate blues, and Carter’s gloomy announcement of the nation’s “malaise.” It was to be “morning in America” again, as Reagan announced in his re-election campaign. From a renewed call to freedom, to a new swing toward unfettered capitalism, to a new forcefulness in exerting American power in the world, the emphasis was on traditional American values and all that was different from the Sixties that had betrayed them.

But was it successful? It may have appeared so until 1989, when it seemed to be confirmed by the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the claim that victory in the Cold War had made the U.S. the unprecedented and unparalleled power in the world, and the greatest superpower since the Roman Empire.

Fortunately, such overheated language has disappeared today, humbled alike by the international realities, economic woes, and the paralyzing gridlock created by fifty years of culture warring. Thus the Sixties has had the last laugh on the Eighties, but the victory is Pyrrhic. President Obama may say that “the best is yet to be,” but few people hear this as anything more than empty campaign rhetoric, and the last laugh has given few people much to smile about.

Trevin Wax: What prompted you to write a book about the 1960s so quickly after the close of the decade? 

Os Guinness: I was at London University in the early Sixties, which was the era of “swinging London,” the Beatles, the films of Ingmar Bergman and Federico Fellini and the like. It was impossible not to think about it.

I was still in my twenties when I wrote the book in 1971. So I am a child of the Sixties myself, and I have always been grateful for the profound challenges it pose to me – to live an examined life, to think through a warranted faith, and to attempt to “read the signs of the times,” and so on.

I first visited the U.S. for six weeks in 1968, the annus calamitosus that was the high point of the Sixties and the most dramatic year of all. I was fascinated by my impressions of America and all that I saw – including visiting Haight Ashbury, meeting Mario Savio, leader of the Free Speech movement, and listening to Grace Slick and Jefferson Airplane at the Fillmore West.

But I was also deeply struck by how few Christians – with the magnificent exception of Carl Henry – understood what was going on in all the tumult. Most Evangelicals did not wake up to it all until 1973 (Watergate, the OPEC oil crisis, and Roe vs. Wade), and of course the Moral Majority was founded in response in 1975.

Out of my dismay came, first, a series of talks on the Sixties given at L’Abri, and later the book. I wrote partly to help Christians understand and partly to counter the then-dominant idea that the counterculture would win – argued, for example, in Charles Reich’s The Greening of America.

Trevin Wax: Decades have passed since you wrote The Dust of Death. What parts of your analysis would you change in light of the passing of so much time?

Os Guinness: Most of what I wrote in The Dust of Death has stood the test of time pretty well, and certain chapters such as “The East no Exit” and “Encircling Eyes” have proved to be well ahead of their time.

But if I were to re-write the book completely with the perspective of forty years of hindsight, I would enlarge the comments on the sexual revolution and add chapters on the rise of postmodernism and the spirit of entitlement. In other words, I would draw even clearer lines between the toxic ideas introduced in the Sixties and the disastrous results they are causing half a century later.

I love the present generation of young people, with their passion to think, to fight for justice, and be willing to challenge the status quo. They are more cynical than we were in the Sixties, but in many ways they are also closer to the best of the Sixties generation than to any generation in between.

I am not a great fan of “decadology,” which often categorizes decades and periods too simply. But it is important to “read the signs of the times” and to seek understand the generation in which we live – above all to be like King David, and to “serve God’s purpose in our own generation.”

Daniel Montgomery and Mike Cosper, both pastors at Sojourn in Louisville, have written a new book together, Faithmapping: A Gospel Atlas for Your Spiritual Journey (Crossway, 2013). I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Their emphasis on “the whole gospel for the whole church for the whole world” is balanced, comprehensive, and pastoral. Put this on your reading list.

Today, Daniel and Mike join me for a discussion about their book.

Trevin Wax: You’ve written a book together called Faithmapping: A Gospel Atlas for Your Spiritual Journey. What is it about us evangelicals that prompted you guys to think we need a “map” of some kind? Was it so we would have a way of navigating the different emphases we hear from different leaders?

Daniel Montgomery and Mike Cosper: Two things sparked our sense that we needed a map.

One is actually exemplified right here on your blog – the vast variation of gospel definitions offered by saints, pastors, and theologians throughout history.

In one sense, there’s a remarkable sense of unanimity about the gospel. (Many of the definitions are echoes of one another.) But in another sense, we see that the definitions have some discord. There are different ways of nuancing and emphasizing one aspect of the gospel over and against emphases on others.

Among evangelicals, we see a kind of tribalism emerge as people rally around one emphasis or another. And – as tribes tend to do – they go to war against one another. So you get the gospel-as-cross (or gospel-as-atonement) guys lobbing verbal bombs at the gospel-as-kingdom guys or the gospel-as-grace guys.

“It’s all about the cross,” says one.

That’s vampire Christianity,” says the other. “You want Jesus for his blood and nothing else.”

And with that kind of conflict, we’re still only talking about gospel-centered folks. Others (those who view the gospel as some sort of entryway to Christian life, and not as the center) want to make mission the center of the church, or some aspect of the church’s identity – community service, worship, or discipleship.

Which brings us to the second reason…

As young pastors, we struggled in the midst of all these conflicting voices. For a while, we drifted from vision to vision, until by God’s grace, we saw the gospel as the key to the whole Christian life. From there, we had to wrestle with what the gospel actually was. Eventually we found John Frame, and of course Tim Keller, and their tri-perspectival understanding of the gospel brought a great deal of clarity.

So Faithmapping is something we’ve written for the folks in our church and beyond who want to trace out a holistic vision for the Christian life, seeing the connections between a whole gospel, the life of the church, and our mission in the world.

TW: What are some of those connections? Spell out how you’d make connections from the gospel to… let’s say “mission.” How does the tri-perspectival understanding of the gospel impact the church’s view of mission?

DM & MC: Well, thinking of “mission” here as the church’s holistic mission to the world – including missions and church planting, but larger than that – we would say this.

First, we need to remember the gospel of grace. Grace tells us that God has freely accepted us at Christ’s expense. It changes the way we’re present to the world because we aren’t bound-up, neurotic, and fearful. We’re welcome. We’re loved. We’re being transformed (hopefully) into more settled, less anxious, more confident children of God because of our confidence in his grace.

Second, we remember the gospel of the cross – the good news that Jesus life, death, and resurrection have paid for our sins and brought us into community with God. It’s a message that simultaneously reminds us of human sinfulness and divine provision – that the world (including us) is a dark and sinful place, but that Jesus’ sacrifice is a perfect atoning payment for that sin. It should empower and motivate our message. The world needs the mercy of God.

Third, we remember the gospel of the Kingdom – the good news that through Jesus, God is inviting us to live under His rule and reign once again, as it was always meant to be. It’s a kingdom that has already won the decisive battle, and will unquestionably move forward.

So to put it slightly differently, God’s grace frees us from fear, reminding us that we’re welcome and accepted by God. God’s cross reminds us that we carry a crucial, life-and-death message to the world, motivating our journey out into it, and God’s kingdom gives us confidence that our mission is, ultimately, going to be a successful one.

TW: You focus on some key words the Bible uses to describe Christians (worshippers, family, witnesses, disciples, servants). How does the gospel shape us into the kind of people who worship and witness?

DM & MC: Being witnesses and worshipers is more basic to human nature. Prior to being Christians, we were already worshipers and witnesses. The way we’re wired up, as Harold Best so perfectly describes it, is that we’re “continuous outpourers.” Our lives are oriented towards praising, celebrating, and honoring, and our action in the world is always functioning this way.

Think of the way that people’s lives get oriented around a certain brand of politics, a school or sports team. Parents get oriented around the lives and achievements of their children. Young lovers become oriented around one another. In every case, they both worship and witness, pouring out their lives to the person or thing loved, declaring their love and loyalty to the wider world.

One aspect of our sanctification is the re-orientation of our hearts, a right ordering of worship with God at the center and these other objects of our love and affection in their proper place – as gifts of a loving Creator.

This is true of all the identities. Like worship and witness, we gravitate naturally towards family (tribal or party loyalty), service (“We’re dying to give ourselves away to something,” as David Foster Wallace once said), and discipleship (think of how people adapt to new cultures, absorbing their habits, language, and traditions in relatively short periods of time). The identities are aspects of what it means to be human, and in Faithmapping, we’re trying to look at how those aspects are transformed – renewed, if you will – by a life lived in the good of the gospel.

TW: What’s the end result you hope will be true in the lives of those who pick up Faithmapping? How do you hope churches will be impacted by your work?

DM & MC: Three goals come to mind.

First, we hope that – in a way that’s clear and simple – we’ve helped to map out the connections between the gospel, church, and mission, leaving folks with a sense of the breadth and depth of the gospel, as well as a vision for how it sits at the center of the life and ministry of the church. You really can center your life, ministry, and church on the gospel.

Second, we hope that we can help to spare folks from some of the confusion that plagued us. A lot of lip-service gets paid to “gospel-centered” these days, and for us, understanding what that meant functionally and theologically took a lot of work.

Some theologians talk about the “perspicuity” of the gospel – the fact that it is clear and able to be understood (as opposed to being an opaque mystery). A five-dollar word like that can sound silly or pretentious, but ultimately, it’s an important idea.

In our day of fads, hype, internet trolls, and flame-throwing theological battles – some of which are important – understanding the roots and foundations of gospel, church, and world can be hard. Our goal was to find a way through the fog and help people see clearly what we believe the Bible is saying about these crucial ideas. Because that clarity was such a struggle for us (in the early days, when we were planting Sojourn), we think it’s probably a struggle for others as well.

Third, we hope that people get excited about the gospel. Yes, there’s a plethora of books, conferences, and tribes that are talking about the gospel, but frankly, it’s not enough. We haven’t said it enough. We haven’t preached it enough. We haven’t pounded the table enough.

Evangelicals are still battling with our tendencies towards assuming the gospel, sidelining it as a mere entryway, or dismissing it as an artifact of a previous generation’s faith. So even if a thousand “gospel” books were published next year, it probably wouldn’t be enough to overcome the barriers and assumptions that stand against gospel-centered efforts.

If our book helps a few folks to see the gospel more clearly, more centrally, then we’ve accomplished our mission.