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Quote of the class:
Is believing required for belonging…or is belonging a road to believing?
Another great class tonight with Dr. Francis Bridger at Fuller Theological Seminary…we spent the first half working through a case study in groups.
Would love to have you in my small group as we work through this Case Study together.
Caleb and Lacey have recently moved into your neighborhood. They have been co-habiting for 3 years…during this time, they have had a daughter Jazlyn. They have no attachment to a church but have now decided they want to get married “in God’s house.” As the pastor of a local church, they have asked you to marry them? How would you respond to their request?
As we worked through this case study, these 5 questions were posed for our consideration to help guide us.
1. What more do you want to know?
2. What issues does this request raise for you?
3. What theological principles would you bring to bear in considering their request?
4. What options are open to you in framing a response to them?
5. Which option most adequately fits (a) your theology (b) your ethical principles (c) your pastoral responsibilities (d) the realities of the situation?
Would love to hear your input.
In an earlier post I talked about a professor’s adamant request that we stop asking God to join what we are doing…to stop inviting him into a situation…because the reality is, he is already present and at work and it is our job to respond to His love and to join Him in what He is already doing.
Two comments that stuck out…
Rhett Smith Says:
January 30th, 2006 at 12:18 pmI like how Dr. Ray Anderson would tell us in class that the whole concept of WWJD is pretty ridiculous when you think about it. The question is not what would Jesus do, but what is Jesus doing. He is alread here in our midsts.
Rhett,
Love it…Ray was the first to really challenge this concept in my life…Christ is already present and at work and we have the choice over whether or not we follow him or not.
Steve Says:
January 31st, 2006 at 8:35 amYes, Jesus is already present in this place, but we have been given this incredible gift of free will, and so He says “Behold, I stand at the door and knock”, seeking a welcome from us.
Think of Moses, who followed clouds and pillars of fire of God’s presence and yet still was trying to strike the rock o get Jesus to perform for Him. God does not need to be compelled to show up, he’s already there, but he does want us to ask for his grace.
Steve,
so right you are…he is present yet he does not force his will upon us…we must receive him.
The fantastic thing is that we have confidence when we respond to his free gift of love because he is present and we don’t have to wonder if he will show up or not.
I love the passage you quoted from Revelation 3:20.
I don’t want to make any assumptions about how you interpret that passage but I recently have been processing whether or not, even I myself, have misinterpreted this passage.
I have generally understood it as an evangelistic device. Jesus stands and knocks at the door of our hearts and it is our choice whether or not to invite him in. I have been taught this for years and have heard it in countless sermons…but recent conversations with pastors and seminary professors has made me rethink why I believe what I believe about this passage.
When you look at the context of this passage, it is written to the church in Laodicea NOT a non-believer. As we look at the entire passage we see John’s vision of the Son of Man rebuking a lukewarm church that does not have it’s eyes focused on Christ. This passage comes in the midst of Jesus’ message to 6 other churches…not one referance to the nonconverted…
So the questions that I ask are:
”why do we think we can take this verse out of context and use it in an individualistic and evangelistic sense?”
“are we taking it out of context?”
“is this passage directed more at us the church rather than those outside the church?”
Would love to hear your thoughts…as you formulate your thoughts, check out an interesting review of Revelation 3:20 that I stumbled upon…
Wow…another amazing class with Dr. Francis Bridger at Fuller Theological Seminary.
So, the question came up in class, “How often do we in our prayers and in our conversations invite Jesus into a situation or a place?”
I mean, when you think about it, we do it all the time.
“Jesus, during this difficult time, we invite you into this place and give us peace.”
“Lord, we ask that you be with us here today as we plan the upcoming year.”
It has become so common in our language that if you type in “inviting Jesus” into Google, 1,680,000 search results come up at the time this was written.
So when our teacher brought up this common request today in class…we all thought nothing of it.
Until he said it was…
unbiblical.
what? unbiblical? are you saying that thousands of pastors and, come to think of it, millions of believers pray an unbiblical prayer?
after our initial shock gave way to an awkward silence…one student broke through and asked what we were all thinking, “what?”
He replied,
How dare we invite Jesus into this place? How dare we have the audacity to think we are the gatekeepers who can beckon and hold back God at our whim? How dare we miss the biblical truth that God is already present in this place…that He was here long before we arrived…that He is already at work in ways beyond our comprehension. Rather, our pray should be, ‘God, we recognize you are here in this place and are in control. How can we join you in what you are already doing? How can we respond to the love you have initiated to us through your Son, Jesus Christ? We want to follow you, show us the way.
Silence.
What if he was right? What if Christ was bigger than our feeble attempts to “bring him” into a situation? What if God is already at work in a situation and desires us to pray for the next step…he is already there…we don’t need to waste our time and believe we have to invite him in….he is already ahead of us and we are to follow.
How would this change counseling sessions? Instead of inviting Jesus into a situation we would point to the reality that he is here in our midst walking alongside us in our pain.
How would this change church meetings? Instead of inviting Jesus in to bless our plans and our process we would acknowledge his leading and ask in ernest prayer that our scales would fall from our eyes so that we could collectively see the direction he is leading.
How would this change my life? Instead of inviting Jesus into my life, I would live a life of responding to the love that he initiated…that he set into motion long before I sent him the invitation. That I would go beyond seeing Jesus as another part of my diverse portfolio that will give me a better life…but humbly acknowledging that the only way this thing works is if I allow Jesus to take the wheel of my life instead of trying to wrench it from him…
How can we move from living as false gatekeepers of God to authentic Christ-followers?
Oh Jesus, show us the way…
Another fascinating class with Dr. Francis Bridger tonight at Fuller Theological Seminary.
Tonight’s discussion: Are there certain instances when it is not right to forgive?
Going into tonight’s discussion, I would have said that in all occassions a person should forgive the other if they are repentent…following Jesus’ command in Mark 11:25-26:
And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins. But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father who is in heaven forgive your sins.
But the TA threw in a unique twist for our case study tonight that happened to be a true story…in fact, it was documented in Simon Wiesenthal’s book, The Sunflower:
A Nazi officer who admitted to killing hundreds of Jews by burning them alive in their homes was on his deathbed while serving time in prison for his offenses. As he lay their dying, he ushered Simon Wiesenthal, a Jew over to him. Overcome with remorse, the Nazi officer confessed his crimes to Simon and asked for his forgiveness. However, when he asked for forgiveness, he asked to be forgiven in the name of all that he had already killed. He essentially was asking Simon to speak on the dead’s behalf and forgive him.
Question: Should Simon forgive him?
So I am going to let this question hang until Friday when I will post the class discussion and answers to this case study…would love to hear your feedback until then.
Wow, just got out of a fantastic first class taught by Dr. Francis Bridger at Fuller Theological Seminary. The three hour class was packed with questions that he posed I know I will be wrestling with over the weeks ahead.
One of the compelling questions he raised was, “Is pastoral ministry defined by doing or being?” How we answer this question has major ramifications for how we engage in ministry. Is ministry defined by what we do, is it defined by who we minister to, is it defined by what our job description entails, is it defined by how many are in our ministry?
In his response, Dr. Bridger said that even though we normally focus on pastoral ministry as what we do (i.e. I am a high school pastor, I oversee a staff of 45, I provide vision and lead a congregation of 500) but this leads to a seriously inadequate theology of what it means to be a pastor. Instead, we need to view our ministry through the lens of who we are. In fact, he said:
The start point is different…our doing flows through our being…what we do in ministry flows out of who we are in Christ and how we have been called. When we look at Jesus’ life, he is constantly withdrawing from the crowd and is in communion with the Father. At the very simplest, this presents a model that is rooted in being and not doing. Jesus constantly said no to doing things so that he could stay in communion with the Father.
It is imperative that we view our pastoral ministry through the lens of who we are rather than what we do.
In order to do this, it is essential to develop a healthy ontology, or theology of being. In order for us to understand who we are it is imperative that we understand who God is. Who we are is intrinsically linked to who God is.
Dr. Bridger made an interesting observation that the link that connects who we are to who God is can be found in the concept of imago dei. Because we have been created in God’s image, we are given the opportunity to participate, if we choose, in God’s mission on earth. 1 John 4:19 says that, “We love because God first loved us.” God is the initiator of the love that we give and the ministry that we engage in as a result of our identity in Christ.
For further reading, see Henri Nouwen’s Life of the Beloved, which helps us gain an understanding of our true identity in Christ. One of my favorite books, Nouwen’s Life of the Beloved looks at how Jesus received his identity from God as “my beloved Son,” at his baptism. Nouwen points out the startling fact that Jesus receives his identity before he performed any miracles, before he had any followers, and before anybody had said anything about him! He received his identity before he did anything! This is a complete contradiction to traditional Western concepts of identity. Precisely, Nouwen says that our identity is rooted in the fact that God calls us his beloved children through regeneration and our adoption into his family. And until we can fully understand and experience our identity into the core of our being, we will not be able to truly love others.
Awesome stuff…high recommended reading.
Alright, I need to get some sleep…so much more to share…will do a follow up tomorrow…
