Postmodern Preaching...

This is a response from a class of mine (hence why I have been busy from blogging here lately). Alot of heat was thrown by people of the older generation (with all due respect) toward this article. Some of the comments led to the article being called "demonic, born of a seductive spirit" and even led to personal attacks on the author. Read the article for yourself please

https://www.theooze.com/articles/article.cfm?id=25

Now...here is my response.

Wow! Little did I know before replying (quite tardily I might add) that I was opening quite a Pandora's box of discussion. I greatly appreciate that we can have healthy debate and discussion about controversial topics...this is what university is all about. Though I do not intend to alienate any of my fellow discussion board friends, I must express my disappointment at the reception/response to this article. I feel that most of what was said were mere religious platitutes, personal opinions about how one was raised, and even unthoughtful personal attacks on an author who has written a challenging article.

Nevertheless, i do digress.
I once heard a wise man say "To hold the Bible in your right hand and to shake your fist at culture and say 'I HOLD THE ABSOLUTE TRUTH' is truly the height of arrongance. Rather one should say 'the Absolute Truth has hold of ME.' I think that much of what Bednar is saying in this controversial article is that very principle. From his story about the gay friend to the Soren Kierkegaard quote, it is difficult to make such an open-ended claim of holding truth as though it could be purchased at a store. The Word of God is NOT the Bible, its JESUS! We have to look at truth through the eyes of the man from Heaven. Understand that I, nor the author, are arguing against the inspired Word (see top of page 5)...I am simply being sensitive to the hesitance of a postmodern culture to the sort of prepackaged, "that's the way my daddy did it" gospel. Even Paul opened his ears to his culture by quoting a pagan Creten poet and asserting it as true (Titus 1:12-13). All truth is God's truth. Furthermore, Bednar argues for a distinct prophetic voice in a millenial culture, not conformation. His comments about maintaining integrity while not "eliminating the 'enemy'" are quite solid.

Finally, I do want to issue this statement with all humility. Bednar's status as a "Christian figure" has nothing to do with his contribution to this conversation. If that were true, none of us would have anything to add. That's the beauty of postmodern thinking, however...anyone can enter the dialogue. Its not a status-based validity, but an every-man movement. This is appealing and really quite Scriptural. Whether it be Billy Graham or a gay pride activist, each opinion is worthy to be heard. The truth will decide on itself in the end anyway.

Summer Ruminations

This is a response to one of my intuitive students who decided to turn my questions around on me: Ahhh...i love seeing them challenge one another. I say all of this to defend the fact that I copy and pasted it straight from my response about what the Lord is doing in my life:

Brad Chandler

Today at 12:49am

hmmm well...
I've really been zeroing in on the Word from two perspectives:

1) Holiness (1&2 Peter and 1, 2, 3 John especially)

It seems like everywhere I look, God is just calling me to a higher place. Not that I'm better than someone else, but as God's people we are to be set apart from the world. If someone cannot tell the difference between an unbeliever and a Christ-follower, there is something wrong in our lives. Its really simple theology, I guess...but God is just calling me to be righteous and blameless in every way.
Check out Titus 2:11-14 --- Hecka good. "ZEALOUS for good works"

2) Eschatology (big word for End Times)

Its a very interesting subject. I've been approaching this more from an intellectual level rather than devotional/spiritual. There is a lot of misconception about the end times due to loose interpretations and assumptions in popular literature. yet when we look at what Jesus has to say...it is incredible (Matthew 24-25 blew my mind tonight!). Lots of good stuff i must say.

____________________

Other than that, the Lord is teaching me to be patient and to wait on him...in everyway (what he is doing in my life, in the church, the world, and to wait for his soon coming).

I'm learning to appreciate family more and more back home...and old friendships with my old youth pastor. Very encouraging.

Lastly: Discipline. I developed a detailed personal growth plan for the summer outlining devotional commitments coupled with prayer, journaling, other spiritual disciplines, and ministry goals with SL and Rescue.

____________________

I am beyond words at who the Lord really is...and I'm simply looking forward to what is going to go down this summer.

Thoughts from a New Barbarian...

Ok, so I promised myself that I would do better on this blog thing. Maybe it just all comes down to having enough people who care enough to read this...nevertheless.

I just finished "The Barbarian Way" by Erwin McManus (in 1 1/2 sittings mind you...). Overall, I must say that I was very impressed. I am a huge McManus fan, yet somehow had not read arguably his best book.

The writer's main idea centers around the "untamed, raw nature" of following the Spirit of God. Rather than living the bored, domesticated faith that seems to permeate our desensitized church culture, McManus argues for a "primal, dangerous, barbaric faith." Now in all of this, understand that he is not advocating disorder or chaos, but rather a breaking free of real faith.

Some quotes you may enjoy include:
"This is the sticky part of the barbarian call. Its not fair or equitable. When you hear the call, you follow the call, you must recognize that it is a life-and-death proposition...He is not calling you to the same life everyone else will live. He's not even calling you to live the same path that every follower of Christ will walk. Your life is unique."

"Innovation is a life skill. When we're surrounded by civilization, innovation tends to motivated by boredom. When we are barbarians trying to reach barbarians, innovation is motivated by love."

"We have become believers rather than EXPERIENCERS."

"Discipleship has become the mechanism for uniformity rather than UNIQUENESS."

"The entire focus of our faith has been the elimination of sin, which is important but inadequate, rather than the unleashing of a unique, original, extraordinary, wonderfully untamed faith."

"I wonder how many of us have actually had this conversation with God: Abba, Father, Dad, would you purposefully put me in danger?" I think alot of us haven't asked God that question because we went ahead and answered it for Him."


In short, I can safely (or dangerously?) say that this book has definitely challenged me in soooo many ways. Have I been bored in my faith? As Paul's challenge to the latent Timothy, I needed to "fan my flame." In the words of the great Judah Smith, "God doesn't just want to light your flame, he wants to position it." Can you understand the magnitude of such a statement. So many times we cry on the alter "GOD, light me on fire...light me on fire." But how many times do we say "God take my flame that I already have and position it to a place of influence."

For those of you whom I mentor and lead...I want to leave you with this. I want my flame to be positioned to a place of encouraging and "danger-leading" influence in your life. I REFUSE to let you walk away from Christ because of mere boredom. To do so is to completely misunderstand the overwhelming weight of the gospel.

If you walk away from Jesus, I want you to walk away realizing that you have walked away from "a life of faith, risk, and adventure...to choose a life that is boring, mundane, and ordinary."

May you choose the barbarian way with me...