The Bigfoot of the Bible

Every once in awhile, I like to invite a guest blogger to write a post on my blog.  Actually, what I like to do is just find a great blog somewhere and then cut and paste it here.  I like to do that for several reasons.  It's a lot easier than thinking up something new from scratch.  Also "guest blog" come with "plausible deniability."  If somepne doesn't like it, I can just blame the author and claim that I posted it just as an example of the goofy things people write.  And I think it's good occasional to have something deep, well-thought our and helpful on the blog.  Actually some one told me that my blog is both good and original-- unfortunately the part that is original isn't very good and the part that's good isn't original.  (In case your wondering, that line is good... so it isn't original).

I ran across the following article on The Christian Post and thought it was both good and original.  It was written by Greg Stier of Dare 2 Share Ministries.  Obviously, I'm posting it because I like it and I like it because I agree with him.  So, for what it's worth...

The Bigfoot of the Bible

"There will be plenty of people in hell who said the sinner's prayer." That's what I told the host of a nationally broadcasted Christian radio program when he tried to force a reluctant caller to "just say this prayer" to be saved. To the host's chagrin I intervened (and for some reason haven't been invited back since!)  A lot of bad theology is hidden behind the phrase, "Just say this prayer and you'll be saved." Think about these Scriptural realities:

• Jesus never led anyone through a sinner's prayer.

• The disciples didn't either.

• Nor did the Apostle Paul.

The Sinner's Prayer is the Bigfoot of the Bible, talked about a lot, but nowhere to be found. This yakking Yeti doesn't even leave a fake footprint.  Listen to this zinger Jesus shot in Matthew 7:21 about those who think they can just say the right words and be saved, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven." And what is the Father's will? Jesus answers that question clearly in John 6:40, "For my Father's will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day." 

Saying a prayer is not believing in Christ, believing in Christ is believing in Christ. Now, having said that, somebody may be expressing their faith in Jesus in the form of a prayer which is great! But just saying "the magic words" (aka "Lord! Lord!") doesn't save anyone. 

Many, "just say these words" defense attorneys turn to Romans 10:9,10 to make their case, "…if you confess with your mouth, 'Jesus is Lord,' and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.' But it's hard for me to believe that, if saying a prayer is essential for salvation, God would confine this command to just one passage of Scripture. And it's impossible for me to believe that, if saying a prayer is required for salvation, that some form of Sinner's Prayers wouldn't be sprinkled across the Gospels and the book of Acts. 

Actually, if you read Romans 10 in context, it has just as much to do with evangelism as it does salvation. Romans 10 is the "How will they hear without a preacher?" passage. Confessing that "Jesus is Lord" in this context was a way of preaching to friends, neighbors and relatives that you were now a follower of Jesus, that you now believed that "Jesus is Lord." This confession was considered heresy by the Jewish community (who believed only the Father, YAWHEW, was Lord) and treason by the Romans (who thought only Caesar was Lord.)   

This controversial confession accompanied public baptism in the closest river or lake and was very public in nature. This public confession of faith identified you as a Christian and steeled and sealed your faith and your fate (which could include being mocked, marginalized or murdered by angry neighbors!)  Believing in our hearts justifies us (declared us righteous in the eyes of God.) Proclaiming with our mouths saves us in the sanctificational sense of the word. In other words, our internal faith saves us from hell and confessing our faith verbally and publicly saves us from a stunted Christian walk. Faith gets us in the kingdom. Confession makes us more like the King because we are boldly identifying ourselves with Jesus! 

All this to say that I have no problem leading someone through a salvation prayer (and I do it a lot!) with this important caveat. I ALWAYS tell the person that saying a prayer doesn't save them, it's just a simple way of expressing their newfound faith in their newfound Savior to their newfound Father. 

No, the Bigfoot of the Bible is nowhere to be found. But what is found is a victorious Savior who died the death that we deserved then rose to offer us the new life we didn't. Let's put our focus and faith in the rock-solid reality of Jesus, not the legends of the mysterious and elusive sinner's prayer. 

If you agree then just say these words outloud to God…(just kidding!)

Accepting Everyone But Not Everything

The Pharisees didn't get it. They could not understand why Jesus was spending so much time with all those "tax collectors and sinners," the untouchable caste of their culture. You see, they believed that sin was something that was "caught," much the same way that one became ceremonially unclean by touching someone or something that ceremonially unclean. So why would any rabbi risk such contamination by eating with someone like Matthew and his collection of tax collectors and sinners? They didn't get it.

Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:31).

They didn't get Jesus' response either.  They didn't get that  Jesus was including THEM in the number of all those "sick" folks that Jesus had come to seek and save.  Jesus was trying to win everyone—publican and Pharisee alike. You know, given what we know about the Pharisees, we would likely point to all those times that Jesus ate at some Pharisee's house and ask, "Why does he spend so much time being chummy with all those Pharisees?" Jesus was trying to win everyone-- holy and unholy alike.  The Pharisees didn't get that they needed a doctor.

And I wonder if we have forgotten that the tax collectors needed the doctor too. Jesus didn't come to just call sinners (Matt 9:12). Jesus came to call them to repentance (Luke 5:31). No, Jesus never declared war on the sinners of his culture.  He never carried signs proclaimed God hates this or that sin or sinner.  Jesus was called the friend of sinners" (Matt 11:19), but He also called sinners to repentance.  Jesus accepted everyone, but he didn't accept everything. He accepted people and sat around the table with them so he could encourage them to repent.  Jesus remarked about how different was the public perception was between himself and John the Baptist (again, Matt 11:19), but their message was the exactly same, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near" (Matt 3:2, 4:12). Jesus didn't just accept sinners; He also called them to stop sinning (John 5:14, 8:11).

I wonder if in our rush to accept everyone (like Jesus) that we have failed to call everyone to repent (like Jesus). Kenda Creasy Dean in here book Almost Christian has coined the acronym “MTD.” She claims the actual religion taught in many (most) American churches today is not Christianity but Moralistic Therapeutic Deism. Moralistic because it helps us to be basically good people. Therapeutic because it helps us to feel better about ourselves. And Deism because God largely stays out of our way. Dean refers to this as "pasteurized" Christianity where all the "transformative elements cooked out." In our rush to accept everybody we have accepted everything.

Christianity is about discipleship, about picking up the cross of Jesus and following him. It is about living as a counterculture in a world that is not our own as we look for "a city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God" (Heb 11:20). It about following Jesus "outside the camp, bearing the disgrace that he bore" (Heb 13:12). It is about standing against the prevailing values and ideals of this world because they stand opposed to the values and ideals of the kingdom of God.

We must accept everyone, but we cannot accept everything.  We must call everyone (including ourselves) to repentance.

Church: Are We Visiting or Living?

Lord, who may dwell in your sanctuary?
    Who may live on your holy hill? (Psalm 15:1)

There's a old saw about a plane that began to crash. Someone screamed, "Quick, someone do something religious!" So they passed the hat! This might be a sad commentary on the way that many non-church people see church. But maybe it also is a sad commentary on how many Christians feel as well. Because we understand the importance of worship and "going to church," we may come believe (or maybe act like we believe) that the essence of religion are the things that we do when we are at church. As long as one is a member of the right church and does the right things when they are at church, then they are serious about religion.

Psalms was the worship manual of ancient Israel and the hymn book of the early church. So when David writes a song asking, "Lord, who may dwell in your sanctuary," we need to read it in the context of worship. True worship and true worshippers come from the context of a whole life lived in the presence of God. David does not ask, "Who may visit your sanctuary;" he asks "Who may live there?" In Psalm 15:2-5, he describes the kind of worshiper that God is seeking--

2 He whose walk is blameless and who does what is righteous,
who speaks the truth from his heart
3 and has no slander on his tongue, who does his neighbor no wrong
and casts no slur on his fellowman,
4 who despises a vile man but honors those who fear the Lord,
who keeps his oath even when it hurts,
5 who lends his money without usury and does not accept
a bribe against the innocent.

The essence of true worship for David was to be found in true worshippers who brought true hearts and lives before God. The spiritual and true worship that Jesus tells us the Father is seeking (John 4:23-24) comes from lives of holiness and integrity lived before God. David concludes, "He who does these things will never be shaken." The way that we live today at work, with our families and before the world is in essence preparation for the worship that we will share together on Sunday.

What Do We Stress?

Wednesday night we spent some time discussing our tendency to play religious games while missing the whole point of discipleship. We looked at Mark 12 and how the Jewish religious leaders tried to "game" Jesus into saying something they could use against him. They sent a combined delegation of Pharisees and Herodians to ask him about paying taxes so that no matter what answer Jesus gave, half the crowd would be angered. Then some Sadducees asked him about the resurrection, using a concocted hypothetical story that had probably been stumping the Pharisees for years. Finally, a legal expert stepped up and asked Jesus a question about the law. The point we might miss is that these expert religious practitioners were playing games of trivia pursuit after already deciding to kill Jesus (Mark 3:6, 12:12). Playing religious games while missing the whole point of religion-- literally missing God Himself!

Do we play religious games today while missing the point of discipleship? Well, there are some things that we do seem to emphasize much more than does God. For example, while the New Testament talks about "the assembly" of Christians, the details are never really fleshed out with any detail at all. But that's OK because we are more than willing to supply the details. Think about all that has been said and written (and shouted) about the right style, form and format of church music when the New Testament barely has enough material on music to make a good paragraph. We seem to be much more interested in how we do worship than God is.

On the other hand, God seems so obviously interested in some things to which the church barely gives lip-service. How much does the Bible say about unity, peace and harmony among believers? But then we'd rather fight over church music!

God goes to great lengths to emphasize unity. Look at the rather unique imagery of Psalm 133 (today's daily Bible reading) where David extols the the beauty of fellowship and unity. He affirms that it is good and pleasant when God’s family lives together in peace and harmony. This little Psalm is dripping (pun intended) with metaphors that emphasize this message of harmony. There are two types of anointing here that stress the sweetness of unity:

• Anointing of the Priest. Here the oil runs down Aaron’s beard and onto the collar his robe, joining the priest and the priestly robe. Though the sweetness of the oil isn't specifically mentioned, that seems to be the imagery here.
  
  
• Anointing of the Mountain. Here the dew of Mt. Hermon, the highest of the mountains in Palestine and one known for its moisture, falls on (and thus anoints) little Mt. Zion, the hill upon which Jerusalem sits. So the two mountains are joined by the anointing.

Maybe the focus of the Psalm is seen in the second couplet of verse 3,  “For there the LORD bestows his blessing, even life forevermore.” It is God who takes the initiative to make unity possible. It is on Mt. Zion, at the Temple, in the presence of God that this blessing of unity is given. This sweetness of harmony is not possible when based solely on human power alone. Just think about how well people get along today in the region of Mt. Hermon and Mt. Zion! It was God who made unity possible in Israel. It is God who makes unity possible today. And that is Paul’s point in Ephesians 2:17—

For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility.

Not only does God demand unity, He is working to bring it about in us. If we keep ourselves close to Him, then we will also stay close to all others who are seeking Him. When we come closer to the cross, we also come closer to each other! That’s why unity is no optional extra for those seeking the face of God. The closer you get to Him, the more you bump into to others seeking to get close to Him as well!