Vacation Blessings: Day 1

Blogger's Note: This is the inaugural post in my series of Vacation Blessings. I have obtained two weeks of paid leave from my place of gainful employment to relax, refresh, and reinvigorate. My wife, sweet son, and I are therefore road-tripping to see my Grandmother and Aunt in Corinth, MS, and then headed out to Burke, VA to see some dear friends.

The Trip

Got off work and headed west on I- 70. Drove a while and then stopped for the night at a Super 8 in Kingdom City, MO. We had initially thought of stopping at the Comfort Inn across the highway, but we intended to do some shopping around to ensure we weren't missing any fantastic hotel deals in the vicinity.

Our good intentions lasted through the second hotel we hit, Super 8. They offered us a room for $9 less than the Comfort Inn, and when I returned to the car to discuss the matter with Wifey, I found her tired and the baby cranky for lack of milk, so I took Super 8's offer.

Subsequently, we found out why it was $9 less. The room wasn't great, and Wifey was afraid to leave the boy's carseat outside for fear that someone would break into our car to steal it. We affectionately nicknamed the hotel the "Discomfort Inn." It wasn't terrible, but it wasn't nearly as nice-looking as the Comfort Inn had been. Overall, not a bad night, but nothing to tweet @Mom about.

The Blessings

Where do I start? Oh, yes: Paid Vacation. It is so nice to have three weeks (plus a day or two) of paid vacation / sick leave per year. I especially like that it is all combined into one lump of paid time off so I'm not tempted to be dishonest in order to use sick leave as vacation time. On top of that, I get to come back to a job I genuinely enjoy after my vacation is done.

Date Time. On the way to Kingdom City, we discussed our marriage, our relationship, our communication, and our attitudes with the help of a marriage workbook from Dr. Emerson Eggerichs. I don't agree with the man in some areas (such as his fundamental concept of gender and his belief that God designed marriages to have conflict), but I have found his ideas very useful in facilitating communication about our values, assumptions, and needs. His concept of "The Crazy Cycle" is especially enlightening.

We've only been looking at the material for a couple of weeks, but I already feel like I have grown a lot closer to Wifey and learned a great deal about what she needs in our relationship.

Reliable Vehicle. No breakdowns, overheating, bad brakes, or any other issues so far. We are so happy to have a paid-for vehicle that can reliably transport us and our stuff halfway across the country and back!

Anticipation. The beginning of a journey is always filled with hope, expectations, and happy thoughts about what lies ahead. Proverbs 13:12 says that hope deferred makes the heart sick. I think about this verse about each time something goes differently than I had wanted. I think this concept is also what made it so hard when a seven-week-old baby in our church died a couple of weeks ago. But the verse also contains the flip-side of that truth: A longing fulfilled is a tree of life.

Here's hoping that this trip fulfills our longings!

Open Note to Rev. Terry Jones of Gainesville

For background, look here, here, and here.

Dear Rev. Jones,

Thank you for (maybe) canceling your burning of the Qur'an.

That was your attaboy; now for your beatdown.

You should probably re-read Matthew 10:16 - "Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves; so be shrewd as serpents and innocent as doves."

Rev. Jones, what on earth were you thinking? Your plan to burn the Qur'an on 9/11 (or possibly try to blackmail someone into moving the site of the "Ground Zero" mosque) was neither shrewd nor harmless.

I agree with you that the Bible is God's word and is powerful and can change people. But think about it -- how does burning someone else's holy book make yours any more potent? In fact, doesn't it betray a lack of confidence in the efficacy of yours?

Throughout this whole series of events, you took advantage of the freedom you have in the United States and used it to threaten the lives of Christians all over the globe. Yes, you have the right to burn the Qur'an. But what in Heaven's name made you think "Gee, that sure would be a good idea"?

The God you and I profess is not glorified when we tear down other people's idols. Now, when we cast down our own, that might do something. How about if you attack the idol of your hunger for publicity, I attack the idol of my foolish self-righteousness, and we call each other in the morning?

Praying for you. Your fellow failure,

luaphacim

My Best-Laid Plans... And the Better Things That Come

I'm not supposed to be home this weekend.

I had fully intended to be at Hutchmoot 2010 right now. I had dreamed, schemed, planned, and budgeted for it. I had even gotten my boss's permission to take the day off even though we would be understaffed without me.

All that remained, in short, was to actually buy the tickets, and maybe check out some of the recommended reading material from my local library. Annie Dillard, C. S. Lewis, Flannery O'Connor, Walt Wangerin, Jr., and many others were to be there in printed form, and Wangerin was also slated to show up in person. And, of course, the icing on the cake: Andrew Peterson, Ben Shive, Andy Gullahorn, and other great musicians. Literature, music, and late-night desserts and coffee with some of the most interesting people one could wish to meet.

So why am I sitting at home this evening instead of being spiritually, aesthetically, and intellectually fed at Hutchmoot 2010? Honestly, I'm not quite sure. Maybe bad luck, maybe poor planning, maybe my no-good pig-stealing great-great-grandfather.

Here's how it happened:

May 5, 2010
I learn about Hutchmoot 2010 on The Rabbit Room, which has recently become one of my must-read blogs. It sounds great: Discussions about art and aesthetics with other Christians who care about those things. And not only that, but also a chance for really good seats at the release concert for Andrew Peterson's Counting Stars album. And not only that, but an opportunity to meet some of the people whose writing I have admired for some time.

Awesome, right? I start to align the stars in my mini-firmament: planning, scheming, crunching the numbers to figure out how I will pay for the expedition to Nashville, and even obtaining a co-conspirator to go with me.

It takes me a couple of weeks to obtain buyoff from all the stakeholders (especially my sweet spouse and my boss), but soon, I am ready.

May 14, 2010
I am over at a friend's house for the evening. I have finalized my plans and am ready to register. I am on my friend's computer, just about to pay the registration fee, when my phone rings.

It's my wife, calling to see if I spent several hundred dollars at iPath Footwear. I haven't.

I also haven't spent a hundred dollars at HomeShoppingNetwork.com or a couple hundred to purchase a subscription to a scholarly journal.

Needless to say, I do not register for Hutchmoot 2010 this evening. Instead, I spend quite a bit of time checking my bank account and cancelling my debit card.

May 17, 2010
After using my lunch and breaks to get things straightened out with my debit card, I come home from work and prepare to register for the event. Then, I see this:

Update 3:40pm: The Hutchmoot is now full. If you missed your chance this year, we hope to see you in 2011.

Proverbs 13:12 says, "Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life." That's about how I was feeling after coming home to that announcement on May 17.

And if that had been the end of the story, I can imagine myself being a little bit bitter, angry that someone else's sinful behavior had made me miss something I was really looking forward to.

But fortunately, there's more (as there always is). Romans 8:28-30 says,

And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren; and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified.

In other words, no matter how I feel about what's happening, I can rest assured that I will benefit from it. The work described in verses 29-30 is not always pleasant, but nonetheless, it's exciting to know that almighty God is working on ME. He has a goal for me and is using every single thing that happens in my life to move me closer to that goal.

So that's the first good thing that comes from this event: I can be sure that, one way or another, this is leading me closer to glorification with Christ. But there are so many other blessings that have come from this weekend at home:

• A co-worker of mine got to leave early when he needed to on Friday, since I wasn't going to be gone after all
  
• I had a delightful date with my wife and baby at various art galleries, followed by a delicious dinner and cuddling at home
  
• We had a great time at a good friend's daughter's first birthday party in Kansas City on Saturday
  
• On our way home, we stopped through our old college town for shopping and sushi
  
• We got to see my brother's wonderful family Saturday night since they came over to our house for baths (their tub was being painted)

In short, it was a great weekend of growing closer to my wife and son and enjoying our family and the blessings God has given us. And if my debit card information hadn't been stolen on May 14, I would have missed out on all this great stuff!

All of this just demonsrates once again a lesson that I have had a very hard time learning: my disappointment isn't the end of good things. In fact, it seems like what comes after the disappointment is even better than what I had planned for myself.

To the person who thwarted my dreams of Hutchmoot 2010 by obtaining my card information and using it to buy fancy shoes and scholarly journals: I forgive you. If I may paraphrase Joseph in Genesis 50:20, you may have meant this thing for evil, but God meant it for good.

The Boy and the Cars

There are some advantages to living by a busy street. For instance, the street can entertain my son when I don't feel like it...

Review: Rob Bell's "Velvet Elvis"

I won't lie: I was somewhat hesitant to read Rob Bell's book, Velvet Elvis. I had heard many disturbing things about the author. For example:

• He is a heretic
  
• He denies the inerrancy of scripture
  
• He denies the immutability of scripture
  
• He denies the immaculate conception of Christ
  
• He denies Christ's substitutionary atonement for the sins of the world
  
• He secretly devours the souls of small children

Since I do not normally enjoy the company of heretics or baby-soul-eaters, I had my doubts about reading anything by this man. However, I also believe in giving people a chance to speak for themselves. Also, my friend Joseph Lynch generously offered to lend me Velvet Elvis, so I didn't even have to check it out at the library or purchase it in order to peruse Mr. Bell's ideas.

I knew Bell's ideas have been labeled as revolutionary, so I was ready for some new concepts in his writing. Prepared though I was, what I found in this book shocked me. More on that later; first, let me summarize the book so you can be ready to make a semi-informed snap decision about how heretical it is.

Bell's project is an ambitious one. His main premise is that modern Christianity (and, in particular, Evangelical Christian ecclesiology, exegesis, and theology proper) is fair game for review, rethinking, and revision. He writes,

As part of [the Protestant] tradition, I embrace the need to keep painting, to keep reforming. By this I do not mean cosmetic, superficial changes ... I mean theology: the beliefs about God, Jesus, the Bible, salvation, the future. We must keep reforming the way the Christian faith is defined, lived, and explained."¹

Right now, if you're anything like me, you're thinking, "Them is some mighty big britches for one man to fill."

But big britches or no, Bell does an admirable job of creating an accessible, interesting, and even compelling case for his postmodern Christian credo. He uses powerful metaphors to build his approach, and, rhetorically, his use of scripture to support his assertions is masterful (especially since his arguments are fairly certain to face vocal opposition from the "sola scriptura" crowd).

Despite Bell's implication that he will be shaking the very underpinnings of the Christian faith, his project is not one of overturning orthodoxy. Rather, he wants to shift the focus of what he sees as a dry, dull Christianity back to the things that made the teachings of Jesus so compelling:

• His offer of access to an otherwise unknowable God
  
• His promise to be our Way -- our only Way
• His love for marginalized people
  
• His genuine humanity (as seen in His anguished cry, "My God, my God, why have your forsaken me?")
  
• The transcendent love and joy He offers to those who follow Him²

After the first chapter (or "movement"), Bell does a series of close readings that interpret various teachings of Christ through a sociohistorical lens. In short, he brings historical knowledge to bear in his readings of Christ as one who consciously chose to teach within his own people's tradition: that of the Jewish rabbis.


For example, Bell reads the "yoke" of Christ in Matthew 11:30 as a technical rabbinical term referring to a rabbi's body of teaching. The "binding and loosing" of Matt. 16:19, again, is a technical rabbinical term referring to the strictness of a given rabbi's interpretation of the Torah. Again, these interpretations rely on extrabiblical knowledge, but Bell sees them as having a great deal to do with how Christians should read and apply Biblical truth. They also lead him to conclude that scriptural interpretation -- the binding and loosing and wrestling that are involved in exegesis -- are, or should be, a community-oriented endeavor. (The individualistic founders of the Reformation may now begin barrel-rolling in their respective Papally desecrated graves.)³

Bell goes on to argue that:

• The world is full of God's truth -- even outside of Scripture and the lives of believers -- wherever there is Good or Right or Beauty (Movement Three)
  
• The Bible teaches invaluable lessons for modern life, such as the practice of the Sabbath and the need for leaders to draw strength from the source they point everyone else toward (Movement Four)
  
• God has a much higher opinion of people than we do of ourselves or of others (Movement Five)
  
• God's work in our lives is to take the old us -- the real, old us, that was made in His image and then fell away -- and remake us. In essence, to repair us (Movement Six)
  
• The Church's role is to be an agent of change and a conduit of God's Goodness to the world (Movement Seven)

So, then -- I'll answer the questions I raised earlier, since you're probably getting tired of my rambling and would like me to cut to the chase.

Is Rob Bell a heretic? Does he deny inerrancy, immutability, immaculate conception, and substitutionary atonement? In short, is this book teaching a new gospel?

The answer: no, not that I could see. In some areas, he dances toward the boundaries of orthodoxy, perhaps, but after prayer and close reading, I must say I did not find any false teaching in this book.

So what shocking thing did I find in this book? It was really, really encouraging to me. It made me love God more deeply and think about His word in new ways. In short, it is probably the most invigorating set of new ideas that my spirit has experienced in the past three years. I especially loved the way that Bell tries to reclaim the good things in the world -- the things which, after all, come from the unchanging Father of lights.

I don't agree with everything Bell writes, by any means. I'm not sure I buy his sociohistorical readings of the "yoke" and "binding and loosing" concepts. I'm also a little uncomfortable with the fact that he mentions atonement, sin, judgment, and redemption only in passing. Nonetheless, Bell has a refreshing perspective and a lot of important ideas. If you are a spiritually mature believer in Christ Jesus, read this book. At the very least, it'll give you something to think about.

(P.S.: No, he doesn't eat the souls of small children.)

¹ Bell, Rob. Velvet Elvis. Zondervan: Grand Rapids, 2005, p. 12.
² Ibid., pp. 20-36  
³ Ibid., pp. 66-69