The Gospel Coalition

(Here’s another excerpt from my forthcoming book Unfashionable, due out in April) 

Although we can encourage one another by our actions and attitudes, when the Bible instructs us to encourage one another, it’s referring primarily to what we say — the words we speak. To encourage is to offer an empowering word of affirmation to someone so they see God’s reflection in who they are or what they’ve done.

Francis Schaeffer once observed that one of the best ways to evangelize people is to treat them well and that should include true encouragement. What did he mean?

Our fast-paced modern world has numbed our sense of what it truly means to be human. In our economic driven, highly technological society, our perceived value is based on what, and how well, we produce—human beings are viewed as components in our societal machine. We are simply a product of random evolution meaning that we have no true, inherent dignity apart from our production value. What we can do, and what we have, is prized in our world much more than who we are. In his book God in the Wasteland, David Wells discusses how the modern world and all of its institutions shape the way we think about ourselves and our role in this world. As an example, he writes about the difference between obituaries in the 19th century and obituaries in the 20th century. He writes, “At the beginning of the 19th century most obituaries made some mention of the character of the deceased. But, by 1990, a persons occupation had become the key means by which a person was identified. This substitution of function for character is a unique mark of how the modern world now understands personhood.” Think about just how telling this observation is. You can be sure that people you rub shoulders with every day view themselves not as images of God, not as persons who are fearfully and wonderfully made, but as products and consumers, which makes them feel much less than human. It reduces the level of humanness that they sense on a daily basis. So, encouragement reminds people that they are people. How?

Since encouraging others is the verbal affirmation of God’s reflection in and through them, then encouraging people awakens in them their sense of being made in God’s image. It causes them to feel different, alive, profoundly human—and this helps them to become aware that they are more than a number, more than a product, more than a machine, more than a chance happening. It helps them to feel that they are, in fact, “fearfully and wonderfully made.” This forces them to reflect deeply on who they really are as human beings, which in turn causes them to reflect on their Creator. As Calvin observed, none of us can honestly examine ourselves without coming to see that we’re created by someone for someone. This recognition stirs up real humanness in people, causing them to reflect on what they’re missing spiritually (not materially). They start sensing how there’s more to who they are than what this world is telling them. That’s why genuine encouragement is such a powerful form of evangelism.

I’m heading off to North Carolina in a few minutes where I will be speaking at a conference. I need your prayers. Not only am I asking the Lord for safe travel to and from there, but also stamina as I have to speak six times in five days. Please pray that God would help me and use me.

I don’t know how much I will be able to blog over the next five days so…until Friday!

Now this is refreshing:

Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley, Calif., has a problem not unlike many fast-growing evangelical bodies: It is running out of room.

The 4,000-person suburban congregation hopes to construct a new facility soon on 138 acres of private land just west of the city limits. But building plans for the proposed 3,000-seat sanctuary defy church conventions. The blueprints include no foyer space or coffee bars, no windows or doors, and no walls or roof. Cornerstone intends to hold services outside.

The idea of constructing a massive outdoor amphitheater in lieu of a more traditional brick-and-mortar structure developed out of church leadership meetings on financial stewardship. Lead pastor Francis Chan, a resolute advocate for simplicity and generosity, has instilled the virtue of frugality into his congregation and staff. Chan has downsized into a 1,000-square-foot home for his family of six in the interest of devoting more personal resources to caring for the poor.

The more I hear and read about Francis Chan, the more I like him. Read more in the current issue of World Magazine.

From an article in the Baptist Press:

A new faith healer is making headlines for his claims of supernatural powers, but conservative evangelical leaders warn that Todd Bentley is a fraud and a false teacher.

Bentley, leader of a revival that began in Lakeland, Fla., this spring, is known for his multiple body piercings and tattoos, his violent healing techniques, his claims of angelic visions and “holy” laughter and “holy” vibrating shakes. He even claims to have raised dozens of people from the dead.

In one YouTube video, Bentley, who is Canadian, can be seen kneeing in the stomach a man with stage 4 colon cancer. When the man bent over in obvious pain from the blow, Bentley said, “I had to be obedient to the Lord, sir, but I believe that colon cancer is coming right out of your body now.” In other videos, Bentley explains how he kicked an elderly lady in the face, banged a crippled woman’s legs on a platform “like a baseball bat,” choked a man, “leg-dropped” a pastor, and hit a man so hard it dislodged a tooth — all because God supposedly told him to do so.

Read the whole article here.

I received word yesterday afternoon that Christopher Laurie (33), son of evangelist Greg Laurie, died in a car accident yesterday. You can read about it here. Please be praying for the Laurie family as they are, no doubt, facing the most difficult days of their life.

Lord have mercy!

Conde Nast Portfolio has a write up this month on Joel Osteen, pastor of the largest church in America, Lakewood Church in Houston. The writer of the article, Karl Greenfield, tells of his experience at Lakewood:

Being backstage at a Joel Osteen worship event is remarkably similar to being at an N.B.A. game or a rock concert. Beefy security guards tell you where you can and can’t go. Crew members chow down on a buffet laid out by a local caterer and bark into walkie-talkies between bites. At some point, black Town Cars head down the long, curving driveway into the belly of the arena and drop off the pastors and performers, who retreat into private suites. The night is a celebration of music, state-of-the-art visual effects, and, of course, Christ. Lakewood spends a great deal of money attracting top gospel and Christian talent, and music minister Cindy Cruse-Ratcliff leads a team of Grammy Award winners, including gospel singer Israel Houghton. It’s a thumping occasion, with people dancing in the aisles and even the security guards singing along to “Come Just as You Are” and “We Have Overcome.” Osteen’s entire family is in the act. His mother, wife, and children often play parts in the service. But it’s Osteen himself we have come to see. He wins the crowd over with wholesome jokes and inspires with his sweet-voiced message. The sermon today is based on the notion of “hitting the DELETE button when you have those negative thoughts.” He urges us to banish that voice telling us, “I’ll never get that great job. I’ll never meet that special someone. I’ll never get married.” Hit the delete button, he urges, and reprogram your mind. “Just one inferior thought can keep you off balance and away from your God-given destiny.”

Read the rest of this disturbing article here.

Having just finished a chapter on Christian unity for Unfashionable (see here and here) I was delighted to pick up my June edition of Christianity Today and find a column by Al Hsu on the same subject. In this brief article, Al makes the point that the Apostle Paul’s signature greeting, “Grace and Peace”, was actually a joining of two words which formed a phrase that had never been coined before. Why the innovation on Paul’s part? Al explains:

Paul knew that many of his congregations were torn by factional strife. But he didn’t say, “Grace to you Gentiles, and shalom to you Jews.” Grace is not just for Greeks, and peace is not just for Jews. God’s desire was for the whole community to receive his grace and experience his shalom—not merely the absence of conflict, but the fullness of well being, harmony, wholeness, and life.

So Paul said, “Grace and peace to you.” Paul addressed Gentile and Jewish believers together, as members of one body. He wrote in continuity with their cultural and ethnic backgrounds, yet pointed to a new, countercultural reality. He combined a Greek greeting and a Hebrew greeting to create a distinctively Christian greeting.

Al makes the same point I make in my chapter which is that the church should be the one community breaking down barriers—not erecting them. God intends the church to be demonstrating what surrounding communities could look like where God’s reconciling power is at work.

Read the rest of Al’s article here.

Michael Horton has a new book coming out in October entitled Christless Christianity: The Alternative Gospel of the American Church. Here’s the publishers description:

Is it possible that we have left Christ out of Christianity? Is the faith and practice of American Christians today more American than Christian? These are the provocative questions Michael Horton addresses in this thoughtful, insightful book. He argues that while we invoke the name of Christ, too often Christ and the Christ-centered gospel are pushed aside. The result is a message and a faith that are, in Horton’s words, “trivial, sentimental, affirming, and irrelevant.” This alternative “gospel” is a message of moralism, personal comfort, self-help, self-improvement, and individualistic religion. It trivializes God, making him a means to our selfish ends. Horton skillfully diagnoses the problem and points to the solution: a return to the unadulterated gospel of salvation.

Also, Mike is finishing a one-volume Systematic Theology for Zondervan that is slated to be released in Spring 2009.

Reformed Theological Seminary (my alma mater) has a new online bookstore called Mind and Heart (taken from their motto, “A mind for truth; A heart for God”). All books, by the way, are guaranteed at Amazon.com prices.

Alex Chediak sent me this notice regarding Obama and McCain making a joint appearance at Rick Warren’s church:

Yesterday, Dr. Rick Warren, founding pastor of 22,000-member Saddleback Church in Orange County, CA, announced that Senators John McCain and Barack Obama will be making a joint appearance at the Saddleback Civil Forum on Leadership and Compassion on Saturday, August 16. A two-hour (5-7 PM) forum with the two presidential candidates will be held in a non-debate format and will be open to the media.

Read more about it here.