Faith Interface

Life In Those Old Bones

By Ed Stetzer.

A variety of recent movements among emerging generations demonstrate the need and desire for rootedness and history. The church growth movement in the 1970s and ’80s (itself a kind of proto-denomination) perpetuated the mistaken idea that only new and novel methods were effective in reaching the next generation. In exchanging older traditions for newer methodologies, it unintentionally cut itself off from a rich legacy of faith.

A generation later, emerging leaders are yearning for a sense of rootedness. In an age of fragmented social identities, connecting with the past has become synonymous with finding purpose and meaning. We are seeing this passion in a number of current movements: the “young, restless, and Reformed,” the emerging church, and the late Robert Webber’s ancient-future movement.

The church growth movement in the 1970s and ’80s (itself a kind of proto-denomination) perpetuated the mistaken idea that only new and novel methods were effective in reaching the next generation. In exchanging older traditions for newer methodologies, it unintentionally cut itself off from a rich legacy of faith.

These are sometimes overlapping, sometimes distinct, and sometimes competing movements. But each has been informed and fueled by a resurgent yearning for historical lineage and religious heritage. Many leaders of the baby boomer generation untied their churches from tradition and charted their own courses; many of the boomers’ children have spent the last decades looking wistfully to the shore. Denominations have not done a good job of making the case, but they can provide history and legacy to a generation longing for stability.

The need to connect with our spiritual lineage and Christian heritage drives us to shine a light on how we have arrived where we are. Historian and futurist Leonard Sweet offers the metaphor of a swing. A swing’s physics depends on interdependent motions of leaning back and pressing forward.

Many leaders of the baby boomer generation untied their churches from tradition and charted their own courses; many of the boomers’ children have spent the last decades looking wistfully to the shore.

Likewise, denominations can tell inspiring stories of pioneering (leaning back) and progress (pressing forward). They can offer a rich sense of theological and ecclesiological legacy that an independent church simply cannot.

Read the full article here.

Recommended Reading - “Mere Churchianity”

In September 2009 I stumbled across an interesting and sometimes controversial Christian commentator, Michael Spencer, who had a hugely popular blog called The Internet Monk. Spencer classified himself as “Post-evangelical”, meaning that he felt disconnected and out of step with contemporary North American Evangelical Christianity. He felt strongly that American Evangelicalism had lost its way and moved away from the authentic Christian message, and encouraged his readership to find their way back to a “Jesus-Shaped Spirituality”. He also criticized evangelical Christianity for its all-too-common tendency to disconnect itself from Christian history and tradition, in a misguided and, some might argue, unsuccessful attempt to be more appealing to contemporary secular society.

The church growth movement in the 1970s and ’80s (itself a kind of proto-denomination) perpetuated the mistaken idea that only new and novel methods were effective in reaching the next generation. In exchanging older traditions for newer methodologies, it unintentionally cut itself off from a rich legacy of faith.

(Ed Stetzer, Lifeway Research)

Obviously, what Spencer discussed on his blog, and the entertaining podcast it spurned, hit a chord because The Internet Monk blog developed a huge following, with comments following his posts regularly numbering in the hundreds. Obviously many Christians identified with the opinions of The Internet Monk, feeling that they too wanted to live out an authentic Christian life, but felt ‘on the outer’ of American Evangelicalism. Much of what Michael Spencer discussed has a broader application outside of North America, to international Evangelicalism, hence my attraction to his writings. I profiled some of these on the Faith Interface blog:

Lifestyle and Discipleship

More on Christian Discipleship

Thoughts on Liturgy and Worship

Evangelicalism’s Death Rattle - Where To From Here?

More on Advent

Michael Spencer began putting together what would be his first, and unfortunately last, published book throughout 2009. Unfortunately, Spencer died in April 2010 after a short but intense battle with bowel cancer, prior to the release of his book. If The Internet Monk blog and podcast are anything to go by, Spencer’s book should be equally as exciting and thought-provoking.

Many leaders of the baby boomer generation untied their churches from tradition and charted their own courses; many of the boomers’ children have spent the last decades looking wistfully to the shore.

(Ed Stetzer, Lifeway Research)

MERE CHURCHIANITY
Finding Your Way Back to Jesus-Shaped Spirituality

Have you left the church in search of Jesus?

Studies show that one in four young adults claim no formal religious affiliation, and church leaders have long known that this generation is largely missing on Sunday morning. Hundreds of thousands of “church leavers” have had a mentor and pastor, however, in Michael Spencer, known to blog readers as the Internet Monk. Spencer guided a vast online congregation in its search for a more honest and more immediate practice of Christian faith.
 
Spencer discovered the truth that church officials often miss, which is that many who leave the church do so in an attempt to find Jesus. For years on his blog Spencer showed de-churched readers how to practice their faith without the distractions of religious institutions. Sadly, he died in 2010. But now that his last message is available in Mere Churchianity, you can benefit from the biblical wisdom and compassionate teaching that always have been hallmarks of his ministry. 
 
With Mere Churchianity, Spencer’s writing will continue to point the disenchanted and dispossessed to a Jesus-shaped spirituality. And along the way, his teachings show how you can find others who will go with you on the journey.

Check out the Mere Churchianity website here.

Possibly an interesting read

Transformational Church (Ed Stetzer & Thom S. Rainer)

Product Details
ISBN: 9781433669309
Page Count: 320
Binding: Hardcover w/Dust Jacket
Publication Date: June 2010

How are we doing? The church, that is.

And how are we doing it? Congregations have long measured success by “bodies, budget, and buildings” - a certain record of attendance, the offering plate, and square footage. But the scorecard can’t stop there. When it does, the deeper emphasis on accountability, discipleship, and spiritual maturity is lost. Ignoring those details, we see fewer lives transformed, Christian influence wane, and churches thin out - a situation that is all too familiar among Western churches today.

It is time to take heart and rework the scorecard.

Congregations have long measured success by “bodies, budget, and buildings” - a certain record of attendance, the offering plate, and square footage. But the scorecard can’t stop there. When it does, the deeper emphasis on accountability, discipleship, and spiritual maturity is lost.

Based on the most comprehensive study of its kind, including a survey of more than 7,000 churches and hundreds of on-site interviews with pastors, Transformational Church takes us to the thriving congregations where truly changing lives is the norm.

Stetzer and Rainer clearly confirm the importance of disciple-making for all through active biblical engagement and prayerful dependence on God alongside of ever-increasing, intentional participation in mission and ministry activities. As the church engages these issues, the world will see the change:

* More people following Christ
* More believers growing in their faith
* More churches making an impact on their communities

The transformation starts now.

For more information, go to the Transformational Church website.

Google Books preview the book here.

Is Eating Meat Morally Wrong?

In recent podcast interview on Philosophy Bites, philosopher Jeff McMahan argues that humans shouldn’t eat meat, because killing animals deprives them of valuable future life experiences. He believes that the morally bad act of cruelly depriving another conscious being of its future life outweighs the good that humans derive from eating animals. What do you think?

Listen to the podcast here.

This is, I believe, a mis-application of moral philosophy, counter-physiological and just plain silly. McMahan’s initial premise, that the moral harm done to a sentient animal (by cutting short it’s life and depriving it of pleasurable life experiences) outweighs the benefits to humans of eating animal products, is flawed and exactly where this particular argument for vegetarianism falls down. McMahan seems to imply that the only benefit for humans when eating animal products is pleasure. This too is flawed.

If one wants to argue this on evolutionary grounds (a common worldview of secular philosophers), there is ample evidence that humans have evolved as obligate omnivores, in the same manner as chimps and gorillas. Some evidence of this is:

1. Dentition consistent with being an obligate omnivore. This includes both molars for grinding vegetable matter (like a herbivore) and canines for ripping and tearing flesh (like a carnivore).

2. A gastro-intestinal and digestive set up like an obligate omnivore. Not the short gut of a pure carnivore and not the long, multi-stomached GI system of an obligate herbivore.

3. The commonly seen nutritional deficiencies that result from a vegetarian diet that is not artificially supplemented - B12 deficiency, iron deficiency, protein deficiency.

This is strong evidence that humans are physiologically set up as obligate omnivores. Whether this is by evolution or by design is another debate. Couple this with the fact that, if evolution is true,  humans have obviously evolved as hunters and gatherers - that is HUNTERS and gatherers -  with the self-evident evolutionary advantages that this omnivorous diet has conferred.

Either way, by design and by physiology, there really is no argument - HUMANS ARE MEANT TO CONSUME ANIMAL PRODUCTS.

In a Darwinian worldview, is it even coherent to question the morality of eating animals? It seems to me to be a situation of trying to “have your lentils, and eat them too”. Either, as per Darwinian physicalism,  humans have evolved as omnivores and objective morality is illusory, or not. If the former is the case, then as obligate omnivores we should continue to consume animal products, without guilt, in exactly the same manner as we have evolved to - a characteristic that has obviously given us an evolutionary edge over other animals.

That said:

1. Do Westerners eat too much animal products?  It seems so. But the logical response is not to throw the baby out with the bathwater by rejecting the consumption of all animal products, but to consume animal products in physiological moderation, as part of a balanced diet.

2. Should animals intended for consumption be treated humanely and compassionately? Of course, as sentinent and feeling beings, they most certainly should be treated in this manner, at all times and in all ways. Every effort should be made to minimise fear, anxiety, stress and discomfort, both in everyday life and in transit situations.

3. Should animals intended for consumption be killed as cleanly, quickly and painlessly as possible? Of course - catch them by surprise and kill them quickly. Prods and bolts, rather than knives would seem more compassionate and humane, regardless of cultural or religious requirements.

4. Should we get all bound up with worry and self-loathing about how eating animal products deprives these animals of a happy and fulfilling life?  This seems to me to be a naive anthropomorphization - it is almost impossible to conceive sentient life as another species, what constitutes a ‘happy life’ for livestock, and whether the concept of having a ‘happy and fulfilling life’ even registers in their psyches as an everyday priority.

One wonders whether McMahan vexes so much over the concept of depriving a fellow human being of a potentially long, fruitful and fulfilling life, this particular human being having the misfortune of combining the disabilites of being as-yet-unborn, defenceless and (unfortunately) unwanted by it’s parents?

Christianity & Culture - In or Out?

Morris Gleitzman and Christian Mother Goose

Greg Clarke argues for Christianity taking its place within the world, not from a cultural corner.

I can’t remember how I stumbled across it, but it has really threatened my Christian faith. It’s a book unlike any other, challenging my worldview and giving me nights of tossing and turning in a cold sweat. The book is The Christian Mother Goose Book by Marjorie Ainsborough Decker, and it’s enough to make anyone an unbeliever.

No doubt in good faith, Mrs Decker has ‘improved’ the nursery rhymes you and I know from childhood into ones she feels better communicate the Christian message. So, ‘Lavender’s Blue, Dilly Dilly’ begins:

Lavender’s blue, dilly dilly
Lavender’s green
Teach me to say, dilly, dilly
John 3:16.

I am not making this up. The Old Woman Who Lives In A Shoe has so many children “And loved them all, too”. And as Humpty Dumpty falls off the wall, he shouts: “God can put me together again!”. You can probably compose Little Bo Peep and the lost sheep for yourself (if you have any Bible knowledge to speak of).

While I don’t resent the theology in the main, I deeply resent the artistry, and I also resent the cultural implication that everything outside the Christian ideal has to be rewritten, reshaped and ‘Christianised’ within an inch of its life.

Read the full article here.

Materialism and Its Discontents

By Keith Ward.

The clear facts of consciously valued experience and of freely chosen purpose, the intelligibility and elegance of the deep structure of the physical world, the visions of transcendent value in art, the categorical demands of duty and of the search for truth, and the testimony of so many to a felt power making for goodness and uniting the mind to a higher selfless reality of wisdom and bliss - all these things the materialist has to consign to illusion. May it not be that is is the materialist who is refusing to see what is there?

Materialism may possess the powerful attraction of economy and simplicity in its basic postulates, but it also has some major discontents. These are discontents that a materialist may feel in trying to arrive at a wholly adequate and plausible account of reality as we know it in experience. They pose severe problems for materialism. And though the problems may be insoluble or may just have to be lived with, they remain sources of dissatisfaction for anyone who wants to adhere on philosophical grounds to a wholly materialist philosophy.

1. The nature of matter

A first discontent is that the ultimate basis of matter now seems to be unknown. Contemporary materialism faces some very grave problems, largely raised by quantum physics. This is particularly annoying for materialists, since science tends to be a major plank on which on which materialism is based. The gravest objection is that it has become increasingly hard to say just what ‘matter’ is. If your philosophical theory is that everything that exists is composed of matter, it is frustrating to admit that you don’t know what matter is. Matter is very unlike hard solid lumps of stuff. It seems to be a ‘veiled reality’, beyond space and time as we experience them. So it is not clear that consciousness, or some form of mentality or conceptual world, can be ruled out as impossible in principle. If that is so, materialism in the strict sense is no longer so appealing.

Contemporary materialism faces some very grave problems, largely raised by quantum physics. This is particularly annoying for materialists, since science tends to be a major plank on which on which materialism is based.

2. Consciousness

A second discontent is that consciousness - thoughts, feelings, sensations, images, and intentions - remains almost wholly inexplicable in purely physical terms. Materialists take out a blank cheque on the future, and say that we may find a physical explanation one day. But the truth is that no one has the slightest idea even of what such an explanation might be. The contents of consciousness seem to be new, emergent and irreducible sorts of reality, and even the most reductive physicalist occasionally feels a twinge of unease that there may be more to consciousness than matter.

3. Morality

A third discontent is that morality seems very difficult to account for in physical terms. Perhaps the human sense of moral obligation and the importance of pursuing moral ideals can be accounted for in terms of evolutionary psychology. But there remains a nagging feeling that moral values have a categorical and objective force that appeal to genetic and cultural imprinting alone cannot fully explain. To found morality simply on achievable compromises between conflicting human desires may be what the materialist has to do. But how then can we avoid losing that sense of self-sacrificial action for the sake of doing what is right abd just, that most of us secretly admire?

4. Objective purpose in life

A fourth discontent is that we would have to renounce any sense of objective purpose in life. We might have to grit our teeth and bear it. We might even learn to enjoy the thought that we live in a pointless universe, where there is nothing for the sake of which our lives ought to be lived, unless we more or less arbitrarily decide on some ephemeral goal of our own choosing. Yet the sense that our lives, however obscurely, fulfil some sort of plan, or realise some ‘proper’ or authentically human possibilities, is hard to escape. Even Jean-Paul Sartre’s determination to live in total freedom is, in some sense, a determination to live an authentic human life, to be what humans ought to be. We would really need to be very certain of the fact that there is no purpose or goal in human existence, to undermine the common human sense of purpose or destiny. The discontent is that we can never be certain enough of our theoretical disproof of purpose to be quite sure that the sense of purpose many people feel is illusory.

5. The rationality of the cosmos

A fifth discontent is evoked by our committment to rational thinking and to the postulate that our universe has an intelligible and rational structure. Philosophy, logic, mathematics and science all presuppose that it is possible and important to understand the world in a rational way, and that our theories and opinions are not just the products of complex chains of physical causes and effects which happen not to have been eliminated by excessive inefficiency. Committment to reason points to the rationality of bring itself. And whatever matter is, there is absolutely no reason why it should have a rational structure, or why rational thought should be able to discern that structure. The discontent is that materialism, in seeking to be the most rational way of understanding the world, seems to presuppose that there is a rational basis for the world, that the world is not just a chain of purely contingent physical causes and effects. Materialism always seems to be in danger of undermining its own claims by its undue concern for truth as an ultimate value.

6. Explanation of the universe

A sixth discontent is that, for a materialist, there is no possibility of a final explanation of the universe. There is no possible explanation of why there is something rather than nothing, and of why what exists is the way it is. The materialist may reply that no such final explanation is possible on any view, and that we must stop all explanations at some more or less arbitrary point. But many, possibly most, philosophers have held that there can be a self-existent being, necessarily what it is and a source of supreme value. Humans may not be able to comprehend the nature of such a being in any adequate detail. But they can discern its possibility, and the fact that it must be a reality of supreme rational necessity and intrinsic value, from which the universe flows in an intelligible way. It is a major philosophical discontent of materialism that there is not even the possibility of such final explanation.

7. The history of human thought

A seventh discontent is that the thoughts of some of the greatest philosophers and the experiences of thousands of the wisest and most morally heroic mystics and religious teachers, will have to be set aside as delusions. It is depressing in the extreme to view the lives and experiences of those who have loved the Good and the Beautiful for its own sake, who seem to have achieved the peak of human achievement and experience, and whose lives are transparently joyful, kind and gracious - and to conclude that they are founded on a mistake. I am inclined to say that, even if such lives are based on mistaken beliefs, it is better to live in such a way, and to do so would never give cause for regret. Where - as is actually the case - there is no objective way of deciding whether such beliefs are mistaken or not, it must be a cause for discontent that some of the most intense, reflective and creative experiences in human history will have to be discounted because of some rather abstract and highly disputed theory that only material things, and nothing but material things, exist.

These are some of the discontents of materialism. They do not demonstrate that materialism is false. But they may throw some doubt on the claims to theoretical certainty that materialism is a true and adequate interpretation of human experience of reality, and of the nature of reality itself.

I have made my own position  fairly clear. I think the God conclusion stands firm, and that it is the best intellectual defence of the intelligibility of the cosmos, of the objective importance of our moral ideals, of an affirmation of the goodness, the joy and the beauty of life, and of the authenticity of those intimations of transcendence that provide some of the most sublime and transformative human experiences.

Taken from God and the Philosophers, Keith Ward (2009)

The Intellectual Option of Theism

It is possible to have insight into the world as a realm in which goodness, beauty and truth exist as ideals to be followed, though self-will makes their pursuit difficult. Human experience may show traces of such ideals, in the intelligibility and beauty of nature, in the sense of human significance and dignity, in the inclination to do good even in the face of adversity, and in feelings of transcendent depth and value that are so common yet so conceptually ill defined. These are forms of experience that lead to an affirmation of a deeper spiritual reality of supreme objective value beneath the appearances of the sensory world.

What [Nietzsche's atheistic] philosophy shows, in my view, is that if God is totally and consciously rejected, the reason upon which science relies, the values upon which human welfare depends, and the sense of human or personal dignity upon which moral sensitivity relies, is imperilled. That way madness lies.

There is good reason to preserve and strengthen the Western classical philosophical committment to God, while recognising that the idea of God has needed and will always need to be rethought many times, and that it has sometimes been held hostage by negative and over-dogmatic forms of religious belief.

After all the intellectual struggles of the modern world, the God conclusion remains a real and living intellectual possibility, perhaps a moral necessity, for all who are concerned to probe the deepest questions of human meaning and signficance.

Keith Ward, God and the Philosophers (pp128/129)

Professor Keith Ward is a world-renowned philosopher and theologian. He held positions teaching philosophy and theology at Glasgow, London and Cambridge Universities before taking up the position of Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford. For more of Keith Ward, check out his website.

In Christ Alone

A great version by Australia’s Newsboys.

In Christ alone my hope is found,
He is my light, my strength, my song;
this Cornerstone, this solid Ground,
firm through the fiercest drought and storm.
What heights of love, what depths of peace,
when fears are stilled, when strivings cease!
My Comforter, my All in All,
here in the love of Christ I stand.

In Christ alone! who took on flesh
Fullness of God in helpless babe!
This gift of love and righteousness
Scorned by the ones he came to save:
Till on that cross as Jesus died,
The wrath of God was satisfied -
For every sin on Him was laid;
Here in the death of Christ I live.

There in the ground His body lay
Light of the world by darkness slain:
Then bursting forth in glorious Day
Up from the grave he rose again!
And as He stands in victory
Sin’s curse has lost its grip on me,
For I am His and He is mine -
Bought with the precious blood of Christ.

No guilt in life, no fear in death,
This is the power of Christ in me;
From life’s first cry to final breath.
Jesus commands my destiny.
No power of hell, no scheme of man,
Can ever pluck me from His hand;
Till He returns or calls me home,
Here in the power of Christ I’ll stand.

What Then Is A Christian?

What, then, does a faithful and authentic Christian look like in the 21st Century?

I have been a little bewildered over the last few days. “What has bewildered you so, Roger?”, you may ask. Or you may not care in the least, in which case you may shortly click out of this article and find something more interesting to read. For those of you interested, I have found my self somewhat bewildered tonight about how, exactly,  to live as a faithful and authentic Christian in 2010. Rest assured, this is not a ‘crisis of faith’, nor is it a crisis of identity. I am secure in my relationship with Christ and my position in the eyes of the Father, through Christ. No, I’m just wondering more about the finer print  - how to live out the authentic Christian life in my context, in this time.

An array of incidents have contributed to my current state of bewilderment. For several days after the Israel/Pro-Gaza flotilla incident, I participated in a string of Facebook discussions regarding the flotilla incident, the wider Israel/Palestinian conflict, and where a Christian should position themselves in regards to this ongoing Middle East crisis. Some discussions were with Left-wing, pro-Gaza anabaptist and pacificist Christians. These are the the guys who follow the writings of John Howard Yoder, Martin Luther King, Dietrich Boenhoffer, Gandhi and Bono. Their particular take on Christian theology emphasizes non-violence, non-violent themes in the atonement, social justice, environmental justice, reconciliation and world peace. Other discussions were with more right-wing American evangelicals who were predictably pro-Israel and anti-Muslim. Both sides seemed to have a fairly reasonable set of scriptures and theological interpretations to support their particular factional flavour of Christianity.

Later that week, I watched an interesting interview by Australian journalist Andrew Denton with Ciaron O’Reilly, a Geldof-esque Catholic Christian pacifist with obligatory (and moldly-looking) dreadlocks that managed to both intrigue and repulse at the same time. See the interview here. O’Reilly’s particular interpretation of Christian theology leads him to commit recurrent acts of civil disobedience, trespass and property damage as a method of standing against what he sees as state-sanctioned violence and terror. These kind of Christian activists proudly wear their criminal convictions and physical bumps and scrapes like combat medals. They seem almost addicted to the thrill of civil disobedience and protest. I tried hard to keep an open mind while watching this interview, but couldn’t help coming to the conclusion that O’Reilly seemed to promote a form of radical left-wing extremism sanctified with a ‘Christian’ label. International Socialists or Greenpeace in Jesus sandals, you might say [See Ciaron's thoughtful and gracious response to my opinions in the Comments section].

Then tonight while flicking through the latest edition of Dispatch From Jerusalem, a publication of the Christian Zionist organisation Bridges For Peace (a remnant subscription from my past flirtations with Christian Zionism), I read an article on the Jewish and Christian interpretations of the concept of ‘Messiah’. In this article, the author (a prominent Christian Zionist) seemed more interested in acting as an apologist for modern religious Jews who reject Christ then for her fellow Christians. She did this by attempting to muddy the exegetical and hermeneutical waters of Christian and Jewish interpretations of the concept of the Messiah and by almost making excuses for why modern orthodox Jews continue to reject Jesus as the true Messiah. The author takes this position, no doubt, because of her particular dispensational interpretation of Christian theology and the prophetic role of modern-day Israel that motivates her to support Israel, no matter what. Genesis 12:2-3 is a particular favourite of the Christian Zionist movement:

I will make you into a great nation
       and I will bless you;
       I will make your name great,
       and you will be a blessing.

 I will bless those who bless you,
       and whoever curses you I will curse;
       and all peoples on earth
       will be blessed through you.

So for the Chrisitian Zionist, to unflinchingly support the modern State of Israel, no matter what is does and how it acts, is a ticket to personal blessing. To not support Israel, by these verses, is to invite God’s curse.

The last straw tonight was when, soon after putting down this article in frustration, and while flicking through Foxtel cable TV, I happened on the one and only Christian TV station in Australia. Rarely do I find anything of substance shown on this channel, and tonight I wasn’t disappointed. I sat for the next five or so minutes watching another Hillsong cookie-cutter church worship team (I gather from New Zealand) playing a very funky and catchy P & W song, complete with the professional musicians and beautifully groomed worship singers. A perfectly Christianized reproduction (counterfeit maybe?) of a secular R & B song, just with Christianized lyrics. Yet another interpretation of Christian theology and style, I mused.

This left me in my present bewildered and overwhelmed state. It forced me to hit the showers, warm water streaming on my face, asking God quite honestly, “If I feel strongly that all of these particular styles and interpretations of Christianity in the 21st Century all somehow miss the mark - what, then, does a faithful and authentic Christian look like in 2010?”. What indeed.

Here’s some of the options, as I see it:

1. The anabaptist, extreme left-wing, Christian pacifist who idolises John Howard Yoder, Dr King, Boenhoffer, Gandhi and Bono, and thinks that the Christian life should prioritize social justice, eco justice, radical non-violence, reconciliation, Marxist political and economic theory, and civil disobedience against duly elected governments who they see as promoting state-sponsored terrorism and violence.

2. The ‘Young, Restless and Reformed’ neo-Calvinist crowd who idolise long-dead Reformers and Puritans, often wearing T-shirts with slogans such as ‘Jonathan Edwards is my homeboy’. These are the ones who have made modern Calvinist preachers like Mark Driscoll, John Piper, Tim Keller, Albert Mohler and their ilk into nothing short of homiletic rock-stars, and somehow think that teachings like double predestination and particular redemption are theological concepts worth advertising proudly.

3. The faithful Christian Zionist who, like the dutiful and starry-eyed ‘little brother’ to modern day Judaism, thinks that Genesis 3 and other scriptures compels them to politely applaud if the modern State of Israel so much as passes wind in their general direction. Never mind if secular Israel seems to see Christian Zionists as nothing more than convenient and wealthy benefactors, potentially loaded and emotional-spending tourists, and a direct line to Western politicians. No, for these Christians, Israel has a prophetic eschatological role and must be supported no matter what. These Zionists are the ones that seem more motivated to make apologetic excuses for modern-day orthodox Jews who stubbornly deny Jesus as the Messiah already come.

4. The snipped, clipped and plucked middle/upper class young (or not-so-young-anymore) suburban Pentecostal who wants to be the next Darlene Zschech or other Hillsong-esque megachurch worship leader, who dutifully tithes a minimum of ten per cent, believing confidently in those (mainly Old Testament) verses that promise a rich harvest of health, wealth, prosperity and worldly acclaim, ten times or more what they sow into this, that or other schmick television ministry.

This is only a few ways to be a Christian in 2010. What I find bewildering is the staggering array of intepretations of the authentic Christian life. The almost endless interpretive factions of Christian theology and praxis.

How, then, shall I live as a faithful and authentic Christian in 2010? How indeed!

All God’s Children

In a recent article in Christianity Today magazine called A Candle In The Darkness, the president of Compassion International, Wes Stafford,  tells his story of childhood abuse and deliverance in a West Africa boarding school. Read the full article here.

The boarding school in question is the now closed Mamou Alliance Academy in Guinea, West Africa. Mamou was a boarding school for children of Christian missionaries in Africa run by the Christian & Missionary Alliance (C&MA) denomination from the 1920s until it was closed in 1971. The school boarded over 200 children of missionaries working in surrounding regions. Starting at age 6, the children lived there for nine months of every year. Decades on, Mamou is remembered by many of its past students as “the Auschwitz of missionary kid boarding schools”.

The 2008 documentary All God’s Children shows interviews and live footage of Mamou and reveals the tragic ramifications of the abuse inflicted on these children, with survivors ranging from non-believers to committed pastors, but few without psychological and spiritual damage.

Trailer

Excerpt 1 - “Sacrifice and Church Policy”

Excerpt 2 - “Classroom Abuses”

Excerpt 3 - “Lifelong Consequences”

To its credit, the C&MA responded to allegations by sanctioning an independent inquiry in 1995, releasing a report in 1998. Since the release of this report C&MA has made many drastic and positive changes to it’s educational policies and general procedural approach.

For more information on the documentary, go the the All God’s Children website.

Wes Stafford has written a book Too Small To Ignore: Why The Least of These Matters Most (2007).