I'm Fightin' Mad as a Brave Warrior Irishman

No, I'm not a Notre Dame fan. But I am a redheaded, fair-skinned, blue-eyed guy with more than a few drops of Irish blood in me.

And I'm offended.

Perhaps you've read about this new NCAA ruling that prohibits the use of American Indian nicknames and mascots in NCAA postseason games so as to avoid negative stereotypes. Never mind the fact that the Seminole tribe in the state of Florida supports the Florida State nickname. And never mind the negative stereotypes propagated by the "Fightin' Irish" nickname and mascot. Why isn't the NCAA looking out for my demographic? It's all this readhead can do to control his temper.

But it did give me the chance to blog about Notre Dame. Hopefully the Paleoevangelical jinx that has fallen on Barry Bonds and Phil Mickelson due to my previous posts about them will land with equal weight on South Bend. If ND loses its first three I'm dedicating a whole week to the University of Michigan.

By the way, would this be a bad time to suggest it's high time for Baptist high schools and colleges to drop the "Crusader" nickname? I can't think of much that is more ridiculous than wanting to identify ourselves with Roman Catholics who want to kill Moslems.

Bread and Circuses

Where would the gospel be without "a good show?"

Many evangelical churches see 13-year-old hearts and minds as the ultimate battlefield in the culture wars. If Jesus is competing with 50 Cent for the soul of today's youth, megachurches like Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, Texas, are making sure the Lord is not outgunned. Their junior high worship area features a million-dollar sound system and mammoth movie screens that play to an audience of as many as 1,000 teenagers on Sundays. Prestonwood's executive pastor, Mike Buster, makes no apologies for the slick production values. It takes a good show to expose kids to the good word, he says, because there is so much competition from what he calls a "perverted" teen culture in the U.S.

[Quote is from page two of the Time article.]

P.S. Anybody want to argue that Awana bucks and other such children's church gimmicks are anything more than a poor man's version of Prestonwood's approach?

Reflections on a Supreme Court Nomination

On Thursday news broke that Supreme Court nominee John Roberts willing contributed time (pro bono) to a gay rights case that produced a landmark ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court in favor of the gay lobby. Read the original article here. (It may be a free registration situation. I'm sure similar articles are available elsewhere online as well.)

Over the next couple days I engaged in an e-mail exchange with a friend who follows such things more closely than I do. Yesterday we talked for a half hour or so. After we hung up, I realized that we were largely talking past each other. He was essentially saying, "Give Roberts a fair chance." I was saying, "Roberts was a bad nomination."

After reflection, I think both positions are valid and tenable. Roberts may well be a true conservative. We should probably give him a chance. I'm guessing that he'll make a pretty decent justice.

But that's the problem. We're guessing.

President Bush promised during his campaign to appoint justices in the mold of Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. That statement was as significant for what it didn't say as for what it did. Notice that Bush didn't say Scalia, Thomas, and Rehnquist. I'm convinced there was a reason for that choice. Although Rehnquist is a conservative, he's a bit softer than Scalia and Thomas. Bush knew that his religious conservative base would not respond as positively to a Rehnquist-style nominee as to a Scalia/Thomas nominee.

Here we are a year later. What did we get with the first appointment? Someone we don't really know. Someone we are guessing about. Someone who clerked for Rehnquist, not Scalia or Thomas. Someone who has made strong statements on some issues but is unclear on abortion and gay rights, the two issues that are undoubtedly the hottest of the hot buttons to the religious conservatives.

I'm going to argue, however, that no one should be ticked off at Roberts for this situation. He is who he is (whoever that is). In 3–5 years we'll know much more about that. If I had to guess right now, I would guess that he will be pretty similar to Rehnquist. Give him a chance to prove that.

If there is anyone with whom conservatives have reason to be disappointed, it is the President. Why? Because he's given them no reason to think that he kept his promise. Because appellate court justices Michael McConnell and Mike Luttig have demonstrated reliably conservative viewpoints through their opinions. Because Bush chose the guy who would be easily confirmed. Because by choosing a white male with his first appointment he essentially eliminated any possibility that McConnell or Luttig will ever become Supreme Court justices. Because all conservatives can do today is guess and hope.

Bush knows many things I don't. I hope one of them is that Roberts is a conservative, originalist ideologue. I hope that I am compelled ten years from now to write him a letter apologizing for my bad judgment. I suspect that I won't.

Drinking from Wells: If a Paleo- Recommendation Wasn't Enough

Ligon Duncan also recommends David Wells' No Place for Truth. Duncan, pastor of First Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Jackson, Mississippi, is a name worth knowing. You can become a little more familiar with his theology and personality by listening to interviews of him concerning Church and Culture and Worship.

Polity Matters: Part X

Whether you love or hate Tom Ascol's theological persuasions, I hope you can appreciate his call for meaningful church membership and his honesty about the meaninglessness of membership numbers as an indicator of church health or denominational strength.

Parts One and Two of his "Honest Statistics: A Large Convention of Small Churches" are both incisive. Likewise, Jim Eliff's article, "Southern Baptists, an Unregenerate Denomination," is just brutally honest, scathing, and necessary.

I know that many Paleoevangelical readers, like myself, are not Southern Baptists, but I suspect many of us can find parallels in the churches we know well. But what are we doing about it? Wednesday Al Mohler commented near the end of his daily radio program that without discipline the church "eventually ceases to be the church. It becomes a voluntary association. It becomes a social club with a steeple." I think we all know intuitively that he's right.

Check out a series of articles on church discipline that Christianity Today published here.

Piper on Why You Shouldn't Be a "Piperite"

I realize this isn't the authorial intent, but the dispensationalist in me sees a . . . "principle."

If the mailman brings you a love letter from your fiancé, don’t fall in love with the mailman. That’s what summer is: God’s messenger with a sun-soaked, tree-green, flower-blooming, lake-glistening letter of love to show us what he is planning for us in the age to come—“things which eye has notseen and ear has not heard, and which have not entered into the heart of man, God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). Don’t fall in love with the video preview, and find yourself unable to love the coming reality.

Read the full text of yesterday's "Fresh Words" from Desiring God Ministries.

I like to hear positive reviews of my preaching as much as anyone else—probably more than most, to my shame. But the thought that struck me more directly than usual not long ago is that all the preacher does is explain God's truth (duh). I didn't create the truth or even discover it (duh). The sermon does not belong to me (duh). (Well, the bad parts do [big-time duh].) Anything that is true or right or helpful or beautiful is a gift from God to all the hearers—not owned in any fashion by me more than by anyone else.

Piper is a gifted writer and speaker, but more importantly, he is a gifted communicator of God's truth on matters that are at the very heart of the gospel. But the truth does not belong to him. The gospel does not belong to him. The gift of teaching belongs to him only in the sense that the vineyard belongs to the one responsible to care for it and cultivate its fruit. Keep falling in love with Yahweh, not with Piper (or any other minister of the gospel, for that matter). I'm convinced he would be the first to agree.

Soli Deo Gloria.

An Interview with Bob Bixby: God Focused Training Conference Speaker

Conducting this interview with Bob Bixby was fun, but it was certainly more than that. It was personally challenging. The pull quotes at the beginning (below) cut to my heart. A thought that distinctly crystallized in my mind during the hour was that if there is hope for the Church in this age, that hope will be manifested in churches—not organizations, ministries, or movements. I know that is far more obvious than it is profound, but it is just way too easy for me to lose sight of that truth. Here are some of Bob's sound bites:

Being God-focused is actually a work of grace. It's not a work of decision.

I don't think these people can come to a God-Focused Conference and think they can walk away with a program unless they come prepared to be repenters, and cry out to God to start working in their souls.

And what I hope to encourage young pastors or youth pastors is, "Change your mindset from being an activities director to being a shepherd of their souls."

It has been interesting to see registrations pick up in the past couple weeks. The geographical distribution is amazing, and some of the encouragement from registrants has been overwhelming. My favorite is from an associate pastor who was so amazed to see someone training youth workers to emphasize God-centered preaching rather than wowing kids with games and gimmicks that he pulled the entire church staff into his office to show them the website.

I hope to meet some of you here this fall.

P.S. In case you missed my earlier post about my interview with Frank Hamrick, the driving force behind this conference, you can listen to it here.

Memorable Snippets from Last Night's Reading

From Dr. Steve Lemke's article cited in my post here yesterday:

Slavery to tradition:

Just the fact that there was some question about this long-standing evangelistic tradition [invitations] was troubling enough for me.

Argue the point if you want, but because we've done something for 150 years makes untouchable?

Irony:

There is always a danger of convention executives and staff forgetting that they exist not to direct the churches of the SBC but to serve them.

Like when seminary provosts take shots at Founders churches?

Comedy:

This is the first generation in which 1st John, 2nd John, and 3rd John have had more impact on Southern Baptists than have our denominational leaders and denominational publishing house (I refer, of course, to John MacArthur, John Piper,and John Maxwell).

And that's a bad thing? I mean, 2/3 ain't perfect, but it's an improvement.

Quote Guessing Round 4

If this guy is right, 21st century Calvinists are waaaaay too nice.

But lest I should really be an occasion of injury to some persons, I would here give notice, that though I generally speak of that doctrine, concerning free will and moral agency, which I oppose, as an Arminian docrine; yet I would not be understood as asserting, that every divine or author whom I have occasion to mention as maintaining that doctrine, was properly an Arminian, or one of that sort which is commonly called by that name. Some of them went far beyond the Arminians; and I would by no means charge Arminians in general with all the corrupt doctrine which these maintained . . .

. . . And, on the other hand, though I suppose this notion to be a leading article in the Arminian scheme, that which, if pursued in its consequences, will truly infer, or naturally lead to all the rest; yet I do not charge all that have held this doctrine with being Arminians. For whatever may be the consequences of the doctrine really, yet some that hold this doctrine may not own nor see these consequences; and it would be unjust, in many instances, to charge every author with believing and maintaining all the real consequencs of his avowed doctrines . . .

. . . [T]hat particular Arminian doctrine which [the well-known author of an essay] maintained is never the better for being held by such an one; nor is there less need of opposing it on that account; but rather is there the more need of it; as it will be likely to have the more pernicious influence, for being taught by a divine of his name and character; supposing the doctrine to be wrong, and in itself to be of an ill tendency.

It occurred to me that I should clarify the google rule. Google however you want without googling the text of the quote. That should be a reasonable approach.

What I'm Reading Tonight

I hate to blog about something before I read it, but I'll be working too late in shipping tonight (it's a good problem for this time of year) to read and write, and I'm sure this exchange will be at the very least an interesting read:

1: An article by Steve Lemke of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary on "The Future of Southern Baptists as Evangelicals"

2: Commentary on Lemke's article from SBC President Bobby Welch in "Calvinism and Christ's Great Commission"

3, 4, and 5: A series of responses from Tom Ascol, Executive Director of Founders Ministries, the SBC fellowship that calls for a return to the SBC's Calvinistic roots

Then I'll sift back through another book I'm reading to find the quote I want to use for "Round 4" and then maybe dive into the next chapter.