″‘Child,’ said the Lion, ‘I am telling you your story, not hers. No one is told any story but their own.’” (Aslan)
The culture wars are sometimes rather childish and remind me of little children throwing water balloons at each other and then crying when one hits them in the face. For the most part, these complaints and fights are best ignored. But DON’T MESS with this childhood classic.
I loved Narnia as a kid, and I still love it. I enjoyed the screen adaptation 20 years ago and have waited to see the final three books made into film. Netflix is planning to make six Narnia movies, one for each of the books. Excellent! I can’t wait…except what the?
Aslan has become a woman, or at least that’s the breaking news. Netflix is currently in discussions with Meryl Streep about playing the role of Aslan in The Magician’s Nephew. Streep is a remarkable and versatile actress, but there is a tiny, winy issue here: Aslan is male. Exchanging the baritone for the alto not only sounds odd, but changes the melodic of the entire story.
Part of me suspects that Netflix’s marketing department is using this as a test balloon, to see what they can get away with.
Last year, I watched Ridley Scott’s ‘epic’ Napoleon. It was 3 hours that I’ll never get back. Many a historian went in search of a Napoleonic cannon to aim at the big screen, as Scott massacred history. Movies always take liberties with stories, both fact and fiction. Turning Aslan into a female character isn’t quite the same as butchering the Battle of Waterloo. Yes, Narnia is fiction, so why does it matter at all?
For starters, there is messing with authorial intent. Change the character, and one who also happens to be the main figure and hero of the series, and you change the entire story.
Let’s change Oliver Cromwell to Olivia! Abraham Lincoln shall now be known as Alice Lincoln. Why shouldn’t Florence Nightingale become Fred?
Harry Potter should be Harriet, and Elizabeth Bennet shall be called Eddie and wear a moustache and mullet.
Let’s reverse engineer The Handmaid’s Tale so that it is men and not women who are subjected to tyranny.
Because it doesn’t make sense. You ruin the story.
Also, it’s bad taste and carries all the creative juices of a failing first year arts student who has woken up and realised they’d be better off as an engineer!
It’s interesting to see how cultural values play out in mainstream film and music. There is a clash of ideals that they can’t reconcile. For example, one of today’s axioms is gender fluidity. Gender can change and morph, and shift more often than the tide in Port Phillip Bay. And yet, the worst heresy we can commit today is to misgender somebody. Which is it? Is gender sacrosanct or meaningless? (asking on behalf of women athletes everywhere!)
If Narnia was only fiction, I suspect many would muttter but put up with screwing up a great story. But as we know, C.S. Lewis was doing something more with these books; Narnia is a work of allegory. Narnia is theology through story.
“this signifies that Aslan will be our good lord, whether he means us to live or die. And all’s one, for that. Now, by my counsel, we shall all kneel and kiss his likeness, and then all shake hands one with another, as true friends that may shortly be parted.”
Aslan is famously an allegorical representation of Jesus Christ. The man, the power, the justice and the gentleness, the atoning death and the resurrection are depicted by this character, Aslan.
By turning Aslan into a lioness, he loses more than a mane. You’ve upended C.S. Lewis’ message of Narnia.
The thing is, Jesus was and is a man. He is the Son of God. He is the second Adam. He is a King. All these themes run through Narnia with cause and design.
“For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus” (1 Timothy 2:5)
We don’t mess with Jesus and the eternal persons of the Trinity. I mean, people do, but they shouldn’t. Again, to preach the culture, isn’t misgendering someone paramount to public denouncement?
Jesus seems like an easy target. No, I’m not getting all anxy and angry. Jesus had a particularly wonderful way of responding to those who mocked him on the cross: he forgave and loved. The point is more about ‘live and die by the gender gospel’ that pop culture is at the forefront of hypocrisy. Try this gender swapping from religious figures outside Christianity and see how well that goes!
Apart from ruining one of the great children’s books, Netflix is in danger of playing with The Greatest Story. Who is the likely target audience? Those who know and read Narnia as children, and who now read the books to their children. Are they more or less likely to pay money to watch Aslan emasculated?
If indeed Meryl Streep is a Netflix test balloon, this test balloon is made from lead! Let’s see what Greta Gerwig and Netflix decide to do.
BTW, Reepicheep is standing on the side petitioning to be made into a stallion, as the White Witch demands a colour change into something less colonial. And the Hag is refusing the role until she’s made into Barbie!
Correction: I mentioned Disney at one point when it should be Netflix
‘What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? ‘
“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”
Nah, ‘surely not’, says the entrepreneur hungry for another dollar. As long as there is commerce, trade, and ingenuity, people have contended Jesus is wrong. You can have riches and God. You can have wealth and religion.
Why choose between the two? Can’t we have both, Jesus and a growing portfolio? Perhaps not $4 billion; let’s drop it down to a more reasonable $4 million, enough to live comfortably but not so much that my face and portfolio are splashed in The Australian.
It’s an Aussie dream story: success, celebrity status, and a partnership with Ferrari. Wouldn’t we follow these steps given the chance?
The Gospel of Luke tells the occasion when a young influencer makes a pitstop in front of Jesus while on the way to the Grand Prix (yes, there’s a touch of creative licence in this storytelling, but the point remains the same). Careful not to step his $1200 sneakers in a puddle beside the road, he approached Jesus. He was impressed by the man of Nazareth. This Jesus had a way with words and what he touched turned into something amazing. Jesus is useful.
This young dude introduced himself and spoke respectfully to Jesus. He may be young, but he was already enjoying his prosperity. He was going places, but there was this nagging question lurking at the back of his head: did he have it all?
So he asked Jesus, ‘“Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
Jesus then went through a list, spelling out the requirements of God’s law: Don’t murder, don’t commit adultery, and so on.
This pleased the man because he felt pretty solid on those grounds. But then Jesus went where the man did not want to go: his heart.
“You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
“When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was very wealthy. Jesus looked at him and said, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God! Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”
Wealth remains one of the world’s great con jobs. It promises happiness and success and adventure and respect, and yet it is among the worst of addictions. Wealth can be obtained through family and through hard work. Many creative geniuses have made discoveries or invented new technologies that benefit society and have made a fortune through the process. Others have made millions through theft or deceit. And then there is gambling.
Laurence Escalante is Australia’s 32nd wealthiest person, with a personal fortune of $4.37 Billion. There is a feature story in today’s The Australian, with Laurence Escalante sharing his rags-to-riches journey, and from religion to Los Vegas.
Laurence Escalante grew up in a religious family, first attending a Catholic Church and then joining a large Pentecostal Church in Perth. Speaking to John Stensholt, he said,
“At the time I was very much into faith and religion. I was an acolyte”.
Apparently, Escalante has previously served as a church treasurer and started a Christian gaming company. In the vein of typically cringey Christian products, Escalante made video games based on Timothy and Titus, where players venture not to shoot all the bad guys, but to share the good news.
He left this debt-inducing business and subsequently started a new and massively successful business: casino games.
I’m interested in the way John Stensholt writes. Even he, a journalist, can sense the clash of worlds between Escalante’s Christianity and his worldly lifestyle. The article begins,
“If things had gone according to plan, Laurence Escalante would have had a career developing Christian computer games based on the Apostle Paul’s disciples, Timothy and Titus.
It may have been a decent earner, but it’s unlikely to have brought the level of success the 43-year-old has quickly attained in a decidedly less pious way and allowed him to live what is – judging from his social media accounts – quite the hedonistic lifestyle.”
And notice the headline, Saint to sinner? Or just a migrant kid who can now afford a jet. Even the editors can spot the scam.
Instead of bringing the good news of Jesus to the cyber world, Escalante is now making billions from the credit of the greedy and the foolish and the vulnerable. Stensholt can spot the contradiction, as can many a reader, but what about Escalante?
It would be interesting to hear how Laurence Escalante squares this with Jesus.
The podcast episode accompanying the article is tagged, ‘Guided by God to an online gambling fortune’. I’m not sure whether this is Escalante’s personal view or it’s an editorial interpretation. Either way, it’s not true. Can you imagine, ‘Guided by God to commit adultery’ or Guided by God to steal from my neighbour’? Neither can I. But how often do we reconfigure God in order to justify the life decisions we are making, regardless of what God has actually said (take a look at the Bible).
He wants to assure readers,
“While admitting he isn’t as religious as he once was, Escalante insists he is no sinner. He reckons he doesn’t worry about his reputation, and says he is simply revelling in success earned from hard work and learning from previous business failures.
“I’m having fun, enjoying life,” he says in a rare interview. “Being in the moment. I’ve always been that sort of person, [wanting] to enjoy life.
“I was always into cars; I just didn’t have the means to enjoy them. Now I can afford a jet … You have to enjoy life. You never know when it could disappear.”
Nowhere does Jesus say we can’t have fun in life and enjoy ourselves. But chasing the good life without God is like investing in counterfeit money and pouring your life savings into a scam. Are you running on a high? Sure, until reality hits home.
‘Those who trust in their riches will fall, but the righteous will thrive like a green leaf.’ (Proverbs 11:28)
‘Cast but a glance at riches, and they are gone, for they will surely sprout wings and fly off to the sky like an eagle.’ (Proverbs 23:5)
It is one thing to have wealth and it is another thing to consider how to be good stewards of our wealth. And it is an altogether different moral category when exploring by what means we accumulate our wealth.
But why choose between the two? Can’t we have both, Jesus and a growing portfolio? It’s an Aussie dream story: success, celebrity status, and a partnership with Ferrari. Wouldn’t we follow in his steps given half the chance? Before we throw the first cricket ball at Escalante, we might do well to consider our own hearts.
That’s the thing, Laurence Escalante is a God to riches story, and the appeal is strong. It’s easy to throw stones at this billionaire but what if we share his spiritual DNA? He’s simply succeeded where many more Aussies dream. Human nature hasn’t changed over thousands of years, and Jesus’ words are as sharp and confronting today as they were 2 millennia ago. We all too easily sell the soul for a few years of splashed excess.
Gambling is one of Australia’s favourite evils. We gamble in greater numbers than nearly every other nation on earth. We know it’s harmful. We know it destroys lives and families, and yet from Government to Sport, we’ve created this entanglement where we require gambling to sustain community projects and our appetite for a high standard of living.
To be clear, Escalante’s online casino games are illegal in Australia (from what I gather); he makes his money mostly from customers in the United States and in smaller countries like Malta.
Gambling is about playing on your hope through chance. It’s playing the odds as a means to change your life circumstances. Like every good addiction, gambling promises much and lies like porn. It exploits vulnerable people and strips them of further dignity, security and relationships.
If Escalante believes Jesus is okay with his billions, I urge him to think again.
How different is Jesus’ approach? Jesus isn’t utilitarian. He counted the cost. He chose sacrifice, even atonement for the sins of many. Jesus didn’t exploit the poor, he gave his life as a ransom for many. Instead of mingling with Melbourne’s celebrity culture over caviar and champagne at the Grand Prix, Jesus picked up the pieces left behind and gave life. He welcomed the humble and repentant, whether rich or poor.
That’s part of the problem, isn’t it? We want everything. How often are we told that we deserve everything? We create a list of desires and expect God to contribute, as though he owes us. It may not be a $ amount or material possessions, but likability or recognition or career success. What kind of screwed-up view of God that is. The very premise is mistaken. We neither deserve everything nor can we. If we treat Jesus like the non-essential extra to life, then not only do we miss out on Jesus, but in the end we’ll lose the lot.
What does Jesus tell us,
‘For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of them when he comes in his Father’s glory with the holy angels.” (Mark 8:35-38)
“Greet Tryphena and Tryphosa, those women who work hard in the Lord. Greet my dear friend Persis, another woman who has worked very hard in the Lord. (Romans 16:12)
Why spend another few minutes writing about this ‘sin of empathy’’? Because like its partner in crime, Christian Nationalism, the sin of empathy mood is making way into different corners of Australian Christianity. Opening the doors and letting it inside is only going to make an unnecessary mess, so I’m hoping we leave it outside for the wind to blow away.
Are many men feeling emasculated and shamed for being men? Sure. Are many women threatened by the genderless thinking that is today impacting safe women’s spaces and sports? Absolutely.
The notion that macho-masculinity is somehow the answer to the Church’s woes and that feminine characteristics are the primary sin of the church is theologically shallow and pastorally dangerous. Indeed, the ‘sin of empathy’ crowd is as theologically and pastorally flawed as those who see church as a gender free zone. The danger with the latter is that it’s easy to spot. The world’s values aren’t the church’s, and good old-fashioned evangelicals realise that we don’t get our tune from the culture at large. The danger with the former, patriarchy, is that to the reactionary evangelical type, this can come across as a solution. But why exchange one set of faulty thinking for another? Jumping from one house on fire to setting another light is no way forward.
Men blaming women doesn’t sound particularly masculine to me. It’s Adam 2.0 rather than the Second Adam.
For example…
In the latest online defence of his book, Joe Rigney made this claim,
“in my book The Sin of Empathy, I call Feminism “Queen of the Woke,” because of the way that feminism takes a female strength and pathologizes it by deploying feminine compassion where it doesn’t belong.”
Dani Treweek responded with this,
“Let me translate for y’all.
“Deploying female compassion where it doesn’t belong” = women making any meaningful contribution to the life and ministry of the church.”
I have now read enough of Rigney’s position to know that Dani Treweek is representing him fairly. In fact, the more he doubles down online, the less his views resemble complementarianism and instead suggest a neo-patriarchy.
Rigney then replied,
Once again Dr. Treweek misrepresents the argument of the book, but in the process reveals how deeply influenced she is by feminism.
And yet Joe Rigney says things like this,
“There is a reason that the empathetic sex that women are barred from the pastoral office, they were barred from the priestly office in the Old Testament for the same reason. Because priests and pastors, priests in the Old Testament, pastors and ministers and elders in the New Testament, are charged fundamentally with guarding the doctrine and worship of the church, of setting the perimeter for what is in and out. That’s the calling. And therefore the sex that is bent and wired towards care, nurture, compassion and empathy is ill-suited to that role. So it’s no surprise that in a culture that has become dominated by feminism, it’s deep in the American system at this point, that in that same timeframe, you would have an outbreak of empathy that would become the steering wheel by which every institution is hijacked.”
Back on X (Twitter), Rigney then proceeded to outline how he values the contributions of women in the church…which he then outlines as having babies and cooking meals.
I’m not joking.
‘I’m forced to conclude that, for Dr. Treweek, raising children, managing households, and caring for hurting people are not “meaningful” ministry in the life of the church.
Which is the fundamental feminist lie.’
Ours is an age that often downplays the role of mothers and ignores the tireless love exercised in the home. Our society isn’t the most friendly and affirming for women who make the decision to sit out of the workforce to help raise a family. Is this, however, the sum of women’s contribution to the body of Christ?
It seems that poor Phoebe and Priscilla and a host of women in Romans 16 didn’t get Rigney’s memo.
Again, yes, we ought to esteem and value marriage and children. Ephesians 5 is a wonderful godly model that remains so today. If the totality of women contributing to the church is sex, children, and meals, may I contend that you have wandered a long way from the Scriptures. If Rigney appreciates that it is more, why not include it?
More urgent, how pastorally insensitive and even dangerous, is Rigney’s assumption here? What do Rigney’s words say to single women in our churches? What does his sweeping generalisation communicate to women who are unable to have children?
I know The Handmaid’s Tale’ is a lefty dystopian myth, but sometimes one can imagine where they got the idea from.
To the young men who might be tempted to buy into the Moscow method, it’s only a matter of time before you trip over your beard. If you think that the answer to gender slippery slides is to stand at the top cleaning your rifle and asking when dinner is ready, I humbly suggest that someone ought to push you off the slide.
If men want to know how to lead and serve and love, look to Jesus. Follow his example. We don’t encourage faithfulness in our churches by making gender redundant or by making men sound and smell just a little bit like Andrew Tate.
To begin with, our Western societies are obviously deeply confused about gender. Are there 2 or 74 genders? Is there any difference between men and women? Masculinity is largely defined in negative terms and one can barely say the word without someone assuming toxicity. And what is a woman? One can lose their job if they dare suggest a definition.
The thing is, we don’t resolve one set of problems by introducing another set of problematic ideas. Reactionary theology becomes, or least can become, as destructive as the concerns originally identified. And so we end up with a vicious game of ping-pong, except the ping-pong ball is a live grenade.
The Bible’s vision for both men and women is beautiful and attractive and good. The complementary nature of Genesis chs 1 and 2 is affirmed by the Lord Jesus, and He and the Apostles present in Scripture the full eschatological picture of the glory of being men and women. Every generation finds ways to undermine or twist Christ’s vision and replace it with an alternative. This has been going on since the earliest of days.
Instead of adorning male and female with the Gospel and the fruit of the Spirit, there are men (and a few women) who somewhere think that demeaning women is righteous and noble.
Anger and verbal abuse is their modus operandi. There is zero positive Gospel vision, simply one denouncement after another, as though they’re playing the role of Athanasius or Spurgeon and everyone else is either Arius or a British Baptist! But like the little boy who called wolf, no one is paying attention should they ever get it right for once.
The background to this latest stream of vitriol is Joe Rigney’s appearance on Al Mohler’s show last week to talk about his book, ‘The Sin of Empathy’. I discussed the interview in my previous blog post. Just in case, Rigney’s basic thesis is that empathy is a feminine trait and is largely responsible for the theological drift we are witnessing in our churches. Empathy is this feminist Trojan horse corrupting Christian life and witness. Yes, I know, Jesus is a man and he’s our empathetic High Priest, so go figure!
‘I am sure the ‘theo-bros’ on X will dismiss me as another weak ‘effeminate’ ‘woke’ pastor’.
No one needs to be a prophet to realise how inevitable that was! However, I have a different reason for writing this follow-up piece, and it is to highlight the kind of fruit patriarchy is growing.
A friend of mine and respected Australian theologian, Dani Treweek, is reading Rigney’s book and has begun posting her reflections on X (Twitter). She soon became subject to a targeted troll attack by the ‘theo-bros’. Dani is a complementarian and used to receiving pushback from one direction, but being complementarian isn’t enough forsome conservative circles.
This is how the theobros treat women. It is vile and anti-Christian in every way.
And no, the trolling wasn’t only by anonymous accounts. Megan Basham jumped on and William Wolfe got into the action with a couple of revealing cheap shots. In fact, a week earlier, Wolfe nailed his colours with this preemptive strike,
‘Watching all these church ladies of both sexes getting worked up about @joe_rigney’s book “The Sin of Empathy” only makes me more excited to read it!’
It reminds me of the shelo asani isha, the old Jewish prayer that thanks God for not making me a woman.
I’m unsure where the man himself was, Joe Rigney. He was certainly present online, and he happily responded to Dani Treweek and as well as some others, but not once (to my knowledge) did he rebuke and call out any of misogyny and disgusting pile on. Why? I do not know.
We could simply ignore this latest online abuse, and for the most part, we ought to ignore the ‘theo-bros’. They are widely regarded as being unreachable, and they love nothing more than an argument. And after all, it’s social media, and much of it is an American echo chamber. Except public words, even those online, either represent or misrepresent the God whom we claim to worship. That’s a problem for public Christianity. Also, the echo chamber has bored a hole under the ocean and is appearing in different segments of Aussie churches.
Take one Presy minister from Australia today who excused the bile by suggesting Dani was asking for it because she made a comment about having a PhD. How often has a man used that defence, ‘she was asking for it’. In fact, it’s his comments that have caused me to stop for a few minutes this morning and write this blog.
This is part of the problem. Slander, insult and assault are often excused or explained away, or we remain silent. Where these men are identified and if they are members of a church somewhere, the Elders ought to be dragging them into a meeting and calling them to repentance or removing them from the church.
What did Paul tell Titus,
“Similarly, encourage the young men to be self-controlled. In everything set them an example by doing what is good. In your teaching show integrity, seriousness and soundness of speech that cannot be condemned, so that those who oppose you may be ashamed because they have nothing bad to say about us.”
And Paul had a word of warning for Timothy about men who demean women,
“People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.”
I’m not writing any of this to give the ‘theobros’ oxygen, but rather encourage brothers and sisters: don’t let your church be a place that accepts or excuses the kind of garbage my friend has experienced far too often, and indeed, what many women have experienced (and yes, men too). Churches, teach the Bible well, display the goodness of God’s creative and redemptive purposes, and guard against the patriarchy.
‘Before you criticize a man, walk a mile in his shoes. That way, when you do criticize him, you’ll be a mile away and have his shoes.’ (Steve Martin)
An easterly wind is blowing across the Pacific and blowing dust into some Aussie churches. From Moscow to Queensland, there is a mood swirling about that believes what we need today is a strong Christianity that will defeat the hoards of hell. Weakness is to be blamed for the status quo and to save the day we need a particular masculine-styled Christianity. Out with gentle Jesus, bring in Excalibur Jesus!
Of course, we don’t want to be reductionist and suggest that the Christ who is gentle and kind is not also awesome in power and the judge of the world. He is both the God of mercy and the God of justice.
There is an emerging vigilante approach to Gospel ministry and mission which is, I contend, as big a problem as the spiritual and moral hopelessness it claims to be redeeming.
And before the bros throw around their customary innuendos, I learnt to shoot when I was 10, I know from experience how to chase down a thief and stand up to a violent man, I have a son who made grown men cower when he bowled, and I am proud of my eldest who is serving in the military; so you can stick your manly verbiage in your salad!
Some of the masculine talking and taunting that’s coming out of the United States and sprouting in certain ecclesial Aussie backyards, isn’t complementarianism and therefore not biblical. It’s two versions of a gender culture war playing ping pong against each other, and unfortunately using the church as the table.
If you don’t believe me, Neil Shenvi yesterday sent a test balloon on X,
“If a man were described as kind, gentle, patient, loving, peaceful, joyful, good, and faithful, large segments of Twitter would call him effeminate.”
With the surprise of learning that sea water contains salt, Shenvi is right.
This supposed muscular Christianity found recent expression on the Al Mohler show when Al Mohler interviewed Joe Rigney for his book, ‘the Sin of Empathy’.
Over the years, I have appreciated some of what Al Mohler has said and stood for. This, not so much.
No, I haven’t read Rigney’s book, and I have little desire to do so. Rigney has however, expressed his ideas in this interview, and so presumably he agrees with his own words to Al Mohler. In short, Rigney’s thesis is that empathy is sinful and responsible for churches losing their way today.
Rigney’s complaint is that churches are guilty of the sin of empathy,
“There is a reason that the empathetic sex that women are barred from the pastoral office, they were barred from the priestly office in the Old Testament for the same reason. Because priests and pastors, priests in the Old Testament, pastors and ministers and elders in the New Testament, are charged fundamentally with guarding the doctrine and worship of the church, of setting the perimeter for what is in and out. That’s the calling. And therefore the sex that is bent and wired towards care, nurture, compassion and empathy is ill-suited to that role. So it’s no surprise that in a culture that has become dominated by feminism, it’s deep in the American system at this point, that in that same timeframe, you would have an outbreak of empathy that would become the steering wheel by which every institution is hijacked.”
In other words, empathy is a problem because it’s a trait found in women, and permitting that leads to the slippery slope of feminism and last stop, hell.
No doubt, many readers will find this as problematic as do I, not least because it smacks of misogyny.
Rigney is convinced that the slippery slope of liberalism clambers back to a weak Christianity that is too sympathetic (by which he means, to feminine)
“Every church faces some version of this kind of pressure to have women in the room where it happens to let them make, let’s have them in the room, let’s have them making decisions. We won’t call them pastors, at least initially, but once you started down that road, you’ve effectively seeded the ground that men and women are interchangeable. We don’t know why the Bible says that only men can be pastors. And until we can twist that verse, we’ll hold the line on that one little thing, but it’s a complimentarian thread that’s trying to hold up an egalitarian boulder, and it will not hold in the long run.”
Mohler has also bought into this line of thinking,
“No, and the argument about hermeneutics is I think amply, tragically demonstrable. I don’t know of a single body that has genuinely affirmed women in the pulpit that has not eventually affirmed the LGBTQ revolution. Because if you can take the plain teachings of Scripture, and by the way, reflected all the way through creation order, and you can deny that when it comes to a woman as a pastor of a church, and it’s not that women don’t have many of the gifts, it’s that women, it’s ontologically forbidden by scripture.”
The problem with those statements is that it’s not necessarily true. The slippery slope argument is sometimes real and other times not. Now, before you suggest that I’m some wet slippery progressive who’s drinking the cool-aid, I’m writing as a convinced complementarian and someone who has expressed concerns about current gender ideologies, such that it’s made front page news on major newspapers. The reality is, there are different hermeneutical grids among egalitarians. Not all egalitarians are identical. There are some who hold to a theological framework that does slide into gender fluidity and adopting the latest cultural norms of sex and gender, and there are others whose theological convictions do not permit the slide.
Take Mike Bird for example. Rigney said of Bird this week,
“This comment is particularly funny coming out of a decade or more in which feminism, wokeness, and soft-pedaling sodomy infiltrated the SBC, the PCA, and other conservative evangelical contexts. That’s who I wrote it for.”
yeah, nah. Mike Bird is egalitarian. He’s wrong on this one (and I still love him) but I also know he has a robust anthropology that will not let him fall down into gender relativity or matters like same sex marriage.
The thing is, we don’t advocate for what is and has been the norm among Christian churches throughout its history by adorning men with a 6 pack and rifle slung over the shoulder and making them sound more gruff. Be more Christlike. Be more Biblical, not less.
How does this sin of empathy square with Christ who is our empathetic High Priest? At the very least, Rigney’s interview causes us to cast doubts over or to explain away Bible statements like Hebrews 4:15,
“For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin.” (Hebrews 4:15)
In his commentary on Hebrews, Paul Ellingworth paraphrases, “Our high priest can feel with us in our weaknesses, because he has been tempted in all respects as we are…”
The verb συμπαθῆσαι and its cognates, as Ellingworth notes, “are used most often of family affection”. Peter O’Brien explains, “the verb rendered empathize was used of a bond similar to a mother’s feeling for her children or one brother’s feeling for another.”
Peter O’ Brien notes, “Believers have in heaven a high priest with an unequalled capacity for empathising with them in all their weaknesses, especially the weakness that result in sin”.
If that’s too much empathy for you, let’s bring in a Puritan, Thomas Goodwin,
“The word is a deep one. He suffers with you, he is as tender in his bowels to you as ever he was; that he might be moved to pity you.
He is willing to suffer, as it were, that one place to be left naked, and to be flesh still, on which he may be wounded with your miseries, that so he might be your merciful high priest.”
Al Mohler suggested in the interview that empathy is a 20th Century concept. Goodwin and Hebrews suggests that’s not the case. What’s more likely is that the division between sympathy and empathy is a 20th Century construct.
Can empathy be problematic? Sure, of course it can. When we sever any human emotion or disposition from the work of the Spirit, we are in danger of misuse and misapplication. That doesn’t mean empathy is the sin of our age; the church doesn’t need less empathy, but more.
Some Christian men have the impression that being ferocious like is Jesus is good, whereas showing the gentleness of Jesus somehow inhibits our masculinity and church steadfastness. Everyone wants to be Jesus overthrowing tables and using a whip in the Temple. They love to argue online and are quick to jump on others. Strength and power and angry tone is just as dangerous a foe to Christian vitality as those more gentle of virtues when separated from the Spirit.. Besides, real masculinity does not deny strength or power, but uses it in the service of others. It is therefore humble, sacrificial, gentle and kind. It doesn’t demean women, it honours them. If your version of strong Christianity produces mysogony, think again.
Let’s remember the Apostle Paul who rebuked the Corinthians for their liking of strength and power,
‘Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.’
This is part of the problem with this neo-masculine movement. It doesn’t want weakness and it derides anything that appears ‘effeminate’. If you think empathy is a sign of weakness, I suggest you take that up with our High Priest.
Hamas has paraded four coffins through the streets of Gaza as though they were trophies. Men brandishing their rifles, flagging Hamas regalia while masking their faces, cheered and accompanied four black coffins carrying four Israelis who had been taken hostage on October 7 and murdered subsequently. The 4 coffins included an elderly man, Oded Lifshitz, 83, the two little Bibas children, and their mother, Shiri.
The remains of these 4 human beings were then presented on a stage wrapped in anti-Israel messages and weapons to threaten.
Once the bodies were handed over to the Red Cross and eventually returned to Israel, propaganda was found stuffed inside the coffins. If such insult and injury were not more than the grieving could cope with, it turns out Shiri Bibas was not among the dead. Hamas had placed the body of another woman inside the coffin.
We ought to feel sickened inside at the pictures being shown around the world; I am. I will not show the footage here. Instead, here are Israelis lining the streets as the coffins are driven by.
To humiliate the body of the deceased is to move into a new level of hatred. It is to join the ranks of cultures who abused flesh and bone to humiliate and cripple them in the life to come. This is the action of a deranged and evil group. Sadly, we can already imagine the excuses and justifications being uttered in Hamas’ defence, such are the times we are now living in.
Criminals are afforded a proper burial. Even in war, the dead are respected by the enemy. Mustafa Kamal famously said of the Anzacs buried at Gallipoli,
You, the mothers who sent their sons from faraway countries, wipe away your tears; your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. After having lost their lives on this land they have become our sons as well.
The human body matters, both in life and in death. Our physical being is part of who we are. God has made us with body, mind, heart, and spirit. Harming the body is an affront to human dignity and life. Mistreating the remains of the dead signals a level of disdain both for the dead and for those who are left behind that is inhuman.
A human body is treated with such respect because the life of the human being is of incalculable worth. To return the wrong body and to return bodies with ignominious glee and to stuff coffins with propaganda is unspeakably shocking.
God values the human body so much that his only Son took on human flesh. He became incarnate, a man. When Jesus was crucified he was buried. When God raised the same Jesus to life, he was resurrected, that is with a real physical living heart beating body.
There is so much evil in our world. It has been this way since the fall. The hubris of the optimist believed that with advancing science and technology, and with prosperity winning globally, the world will enter a new age of progress and even ‘the end of history’. This is not utopia. Recent years have taught us that humankind is bent on repeating history.
It is an evil world. Ours is a beautiful world with much to love and enjoy, and yet from the human heart spawns tremendous wickedness. It is astonishing that God should show such patience and grace.
Here is what my Bible reading was this morning, and frankly it is not what we deserve and it cuts against even how my own society often thinks of the human body, and yet it is profoundly good and light and life. In death and life, while enjoying the warmth of the sun or sitting in the darkest place, here is God’s promise,
“Listen, I am telling you a mystery: We will not all fall asleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we will be changed. For this corruptible body must be clothed with incorruptibility, and this mortal body must be clothed with immortality. When this corruptible body is clothed with incorruptibility, and this mortal body is clothed with immortality, then the saying that is written will take place:
Death has been swallowed up in victory.
Where, death, is your victory? Where, death, is your sting?
The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!” (1 Corinthians 15:51-57)
Neil DeGrasse Tyson can’t fathom why Christian athletes don’t blame God when they lose a final, even a Super Bowl. The famous astrophysicist from television told his 14 million followers,
“Curious that talented athletes frequently credit God when they win, but we rarely see them blame God when they lose.”
I’m assuming he’s reacting to a tweet from Kanas City’s star quarterback, Patrick Mahomes, following their loss to Philadelphia in Super Bowl LIX,
“Appreciate all the love and support from #ChiefsKingdom
I let y’all down today. I’ll always continue to work and try and learn and be better for it.
Want to give thanks to God for every opportunity he has given me.
We will be back.”
The astrophysicist can’t explain why the footballer would thank God even in a defeat as brutal as the one the Chiefs received yesterday.
I can’t speak for Patrick Mahomes or for the numerous players from both the Chiefs and Eagles who are known for publicly identifying as Christians, but let me offer 3 reasons why Christians are able to give thanks to God whether they come home with a trophy or not.
Christians have an identity more secure and satisfying than sporting glory.
To be a professional athlete requires astonishing levels of not only natural ability but determination and sacrifice. Athletes don’t win Olympic gold or the Super Bowl without years of dedication, self-control and pain. It’s little wonder that players break down in tears when they fall short of their goals. How can you say, thank you God when you lose?
The not-so-secret answer was laid out in the days leading up to the Super Bowl when several Chief and Eagles players shared their testimonies,
Carson Wentz said, “At the end of the day, He’s the only way. He’s the truth and the life,”
Rick Lovato, What He did for our sins, is something that I will always be in debt of.”
“I keep the focus on making my identity outside of sport – I do sport, but it’s not who I am. That’s been the breakthrough for me – realising that my performance does not determine my identity. Once you do that, you realise that it doesn’t matter whether you win the Olympics or come last, you’re still the same person.”
It’s about perspective. In other words, Jesus Christ provides a ballast and hope that outweighs even winning a Super Bowl.
It’s a shallow religion that can only accept successes. Do we only want to worship a God who is in control when we win and not when life turns difficult? We all need to ground our hopes and selves in a reality that can outlast a sporting match and that can deliver in the darkest moments.
I’m reminded of Australian Olympian medallist, Nicola McDermott who explained in an interview last year,
“I keep the focus on making my identity outside of sport – I do sport, but it’s not who I am. That’s been the breakthrough for me – realising that my performance does not determine my identity. Once you do that, you realise that it doesn’t matter whether you win the Olympics or come last, you’re still the same person.”
It’s almost as though Neil DeGrasse Tyson has adopted a ‘prosperity’ version of Christianity, which claims that faith in Jesus leads to material prosperity and worldly gain, like Midas’s touch. That’s not Christianity, that’s a serpentine fallacy.
This ‘Christ given identity’ not only fits professional athletes but translates into the norms of life for all Christians. Our identity runs deeper than the state of work, relationships and health. We are not defined by VCE marks or job promotion, marital status or the suburb where we live. There is a profound joy that cannot be shaken by success and failure. The Apostle Paul explains it in this remarkable way,
”No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
2. The Eric Liddell approach.
It’s not that Christian athletes are less committed and passionate about their sport. In following Jesus, there is an added dimension. I like to call it the Eric Liddell approach. Eric Liddell (of Chariots of Fire fame) won the 400m track gold medal at the 1924 Paris Olympic Games. Liddell said of running,
“God made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure.”
It is one thing to compete for yourself, it is an ever great good to compete for your teammate, club and supporters. To enjoy God and glorify him in your athleticism is another step up. It’s not an either-or proposition, but both/and, and the addition of glorifying God elevates the privilege and joy in running, throwing, kicking and whatever sport it is.
Noah Gray from the Chiefs said during the week, “Regardless of where you’re at in your life, the fact that God came down and took on flesh and died for our sins, that’s the biggest thing I take away and hold near and dear to my heart every day when I go and make decisions for my family and play football. If God can do that, I can go out there and try to be the best I possibly can in glorifying Him in everything.”
3. What matters most
Eric Liddell won his Olympic gold medal and then became a missionary to China where he died in a Japanese concentration camp during the Second World War. He joyfully laid aside Olympic glory for a crown of righteousness.
Christian faith gives perspective for what is good and what is ultimate, what is temporary and what is eternal. And that gives us permission to fail without being crushed, to lose without life falling apart.
Geelong AFL player, Ollie Dempsey who won the Rising Star award last season, was interviewed by the AFL last week about his football and faith. Well done AFL for having some guts to give a footballer the opportunity to talk about Jesus
Dempsey was open and vulnerable as he shared his personal shortcomings. He left home at 18 to move city and become a professional footballer. He talked about his fears in sharing his faith with his teammates and of his friendship with the great Gary Ablett Jnr who has encouraged him to keep walking with Jesus.
Dempsey shared,
“I put my favourite bible verses on my wrist tape. It’s something I’ve done every game since my second year. Even say I’m having a tough game, I’ll think to myself ‘Trust in God, I’m here for a reason and it’s all part of His plan’. It helps me through the ups and downs of the game.”
“I truly believe that I’m here in the AFL for a purpose bigger than just playing footy and it’s to spread the goodness of Jesus. Especially with my story and only playing six games of school football and somehow getting drafted, which is still crazy to me, I try to give all glory to God for any of my achievements”.
“I still struggle with this and being public about it all because I don’t always live it. I’m never going to be one in someone’s face trying to convert them to Christianity, that’s just not me. But I feel especially this last year by just being myself, trying to be happy and loving, people can see God shining through me and that’s just how I try to approach life.”
For Dempsey, being a Christian doesn’t diminish his desire to excel and become a better athlete and help bring more success to Geelong, his trust in Jesus provides greater motivation and reason.
Do we not accept the Lord of times of winning and losing? The difference between the Christian and the non-Christian in sports is not winning or losing games, and neither is it in feeling elation or sadness. But it is in the fact that knowing your identity is not determined by such things and that the joy and hope you have far out ways the greatest of human triumph. Hence Christian thankfulness is a great antidote to pride and despair, to elation in winning and disappointment in losing.
Why would a Christian athlete blame God for a loss? Neil DeGrasse Tyson might have a grasp on the movement of stars, but he doesn’t seem to understand how a Christian can praise God in the midst of loss.
Christians to this day, sing and repeat Job’s refrain Job is a dude from the Bible who suffered the loss of property, wealth and his children. His friends came along side himself, assuming that he must be guilty of some great sin. How else can you explain his suffering? Job declared,
“Naked I came from my mother’s womb,
and naked I will depart.
The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away;
may the name of the Lord be praised.”
This isn’t nasty fatalism or foolishness, but a depth of knowledge that God remains sovereign and he can be trusted in all life situations.
Last Sunday as a Church, we looked at these words of Jesus from John’s Gospel, words Jesus spoke immediately following Judas’s leaving to betray him, and only hours before he was crucified,
‘Now the Son of Man is glorified and God is glorified in him.If God is glorified in him, God will glorify the Son in himself, and will glorify him at once’.
Jesus didn’t define betrayal as failure but understood God is strong enough to not only out manoeuvre but to use betrayal and Jesus’ crucifixion for real glory. Death wasn’t Jesus failing, it was the means by which he would bring forgiveness.
I wonder if Neil DeGrasse Tyson sees the cross of Jesus as foolish and weak and a failure? Or perhaps look at it from Jesus’ perspective and see how the cross served as glory? You see, all Christian faith comes back to understanding the cross and grasping that Jesus’ death (as evil and shocking as it was) served to bring about monumental good, even eternal life. No wonder those NFL players are happy to love their footy and also praise Jesus.
My teenage daughter has an eye for noting desperation. She perceptively sees through attempts by adults to make Christianity cool, relevant and whatever adjectives are now used among Gen Z. Whether it is the band playing like U2 or the preacher dressing like he’s vying for Vogue, my daughter is able to spot a try-hard attempt from a mile away.
It turns out that the Church of England is turning to the British public for assistance in choosing the next Archbishop of Canterbury. The BBC reports,
“The public is being invited to suggest candidates for the next Archbishop of Canterbury following Justin Welby’s resignation…The Church said the consultation, which runs until 28 March, was “an opportunity to gather the views of a wide range of people from across England and the Anglican Communion on the gifts, qualities and skills needed” for the role.”
How does it look when the British public is asked who’d they like as the next Archbishop of Canterbury? I wouldn’t be surprised if they nominated a man named Rowan (no, not the former Arch Druid, I’m referring to Atkinson). After all Rowan Atkinson has played the role of the archbishop before on stage.
To preempt what some readers are thinking, yes, there are already issues with the traditional process where the Government and King are involved. But this latest attempt takes ‘try hard’ to a new level.
Is the Archbishop of Canterbury a popularity contest? Is this one of those pop idol shows where you send in a text and vote for your favourite?
Does the public even know what the biblical requirements are for Church leadership? Is the public familiar with Christian doctrine? Does the average Brit prefer to have church leaders who believe and can teach such doctrine? Can you imagine the everyday Britt wanting to uphold Christian ethics and where there’s an Archbishop who believes in marriage and godliness in sexuality? Yeah, neither can I.
Either the establishment cannot find a suitable candidate (which wouldn’t surprise anyone given the current college of bishops) or some marketing guru thought, ‘I know what will make the Anglican Church great again, let’s run a popularity contest’. Populism might work in the political world but it’s a certain path to irrelevance for a church. Character really does matter. Believing the Bible and holding to classical Christian teaching really does matter.
Of course, if choosing church leaders is akin to who has the biggest Instagram following, then Jesus would have zero chance. Remember, what happened when God the Son came to earth? People conspired against him and had been crucified.
Even a quick read through the Bible will tell us that it is the responsibility of the church to appoint from their own, a man who is qualified. The Church, not subbing out to politicians and everyone stuck in the London tube during peakhour.
The Apostle Paul on one occasion gave Titus instructions to appoint elders (same as bishop or pastor) in local churches. Here’s what he had to say,
An elder must be blameless, faithful to his wife, a man whose children believe and are not open to the charge of being wild and disobedient. Since an overseer manages God’s household, he must be blameless—not overbearing, not quick-tempered, not given to drunkenness, not violent, not pursuing dishonest gain. Rather, he must be hospitable, one who loves what is good, who is self-controlled, upright, holy and disciplined. He must hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught so that he can encourage others by sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it.”
Can such a man be found in all of England? Yes, there are many, and likely members of non-establishment churches. There are also, like in the days of Elijah, within local Church of England parishes, men and women of character and who will defend the truths of the faith. I know of many, although they’ll never get a look in. Why? The Bishops have set their course and an unbelieving public will have little interest in nominating anyone other than a prophet who preaches their own preferences. And that, of course, only reinforces why the public is disinterested and the pews are emptying. Why bother with church when I can hear the same hopeless message at uni or at this week’s Grammys?
May God have mercy on the Church of England. May he bring repentance and raise up a leader whom they do not deserve and yet desperately need. At stake is a lampstand, let the reader understand.
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4th October Postscript: Dame Sarah Mullally has been appointed as the 106th Archbishop of Canterbury. Her service in the public health sector is widely recognised. Her spiritual and theological commitments follow the current trajectory of the Church of England. Rather than being an appointment that can bring healing and restoration of the Gospel and faithfulness to the word of God, Mullaly’s views on Scripture, Church and human sexuality will only exacerbate the divide. May the Lord have mercy.
‘after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned to each his task. I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow.’
20 years ago today I was inducted as Pastor of Mentone Baptist Church. I won’t lie, it feels like 20 years! Our 3 children have literally grown up in the church. Prior to 2005, Susan and I had spent several years preparing for this scenario. I had always loved serving in my local church, although I had zero desire to move into pastoral ministry. It turned out that God had other plans. My pastor at Camberwell Baps was gracious enough to give me opportunities to teach the Bible; that idea of speaking and sharing God’s words with people got my heart pumping. But an immature 19 year old, is just that, an immature 19 year old! After finishing uni and getting married, Susan and I moved to London and then to Sydney, for training and gaining experience in churches, so that we could return to Melbourne and serve Christ here.
We returned to Melbourne from our place of exile and started at Mentone Baptist Church on February 6 2005.
I’ve wrestled with this for the past week, should I say something about the 20 years or not. I guess it is an anniversary of sorts. As some readers will be aware, I’m someone who writes more than a few words. Through this blog and writing for both Christian and secular publications, I enjoy talking about the gospel and trying to help others think through issues from the lens of scripture. I also love talking about music and cricket, and sharing with friends what my kids are up to and all their latest adventures. Talking about myself, isn’t something I generally do (leaving aside the compulsory self-effacing sermon jokes). I am conscious about not making Murray Campbell the topic of somethingness. It’s hard enough to see Jesus clearly, without my oddities standing in the way!
It was only this morning, as I read my Bible and read those verses in 1 Corinthians 3, that I decided, maybe I’ll put a few thoughts together. Maybe there is something I have learned from serving one church for 20 years that might be helpful to pastors elsewhere. Although, the last impression I want to suggest is that pastoral ministry is about the pastor. I’m not looking for praise (or the inverse!). And serving in the same church for 20 years doesn’t make the work any more or less important than pastors who only serve a few years. I’m also aware of how every church differs in some ways, and that means my particular experiences aren’t identical to a pastor who is serving in Mildura or Maroochydore. Then again, every minister of the Gospel shares the same Bible, the same mission and message, so perhaps similarities and parallels are not so few and far apart.
Here are 20 lessons that I have learned over 20 years of serving at Mentone Baptist Church. It’s not as though I didn’t believe or was unaware of many of these lessons prior to coming to Mentone. And it’s not as though I’ve reached the apex for these 20 themes. Most things in the Christian life are repetitive and a day by day process of sanctification. I’m not planning to provide detailed explanations and examples for these 20 lessons, but rather to note them in passing.
1. I still have much to learn.
I am often amazed at how little I know and how little I understand of the Scriptures and I’m excited at the prospect of continuing to dig deeper and discover more wonders of God in his word.
I’m still learning how to Shepherd a local church. Our Elders are currently reading Andrew Heard’s provocative book, Growth and Change, and am enjoying discussing penetrating questions about ministry and mission. It’s great. I love how the elders (and church) want to keep moving forward in the Gospel and to be more effective in seeing God’s Kingdom growing.
2. God answers prayer.
He really does. When the church has prayed, we have seen God work. Which begs the question, why do we pray so little?
3. God’s Gospel is powerful.
Just last year, our church heard testimonies and witnessed baptisms where the reality of Jesus Christ compelled and changed people’s lives. We have more planned in the early part of 2025. It is so strange to me to hear of churches smudging or avoiding clear and faithful presentation of the Gospel, as though that’s the best strategy for faithfulness and growth. So weird.
4. I’m still learning patience.
I like to run fast but there’s little point sprinting if the church isn’t ready. Sometimes though, I could probably encourage our leaders and members to walk a little faster!
5. God’s word really is beautiful and true and complete.
At Mentone, we use the Bible lots and we want to present God’s words in a way that reflects the treasure that it is. How amazing it is that God has given us a living word that speaks truth and grace today. That’s why we have 2 bible readings every Sunday morning and why we make sure our ministries, from Sunday school to youth group and 1-1 discipleship involve opening, reading and living out his word
6. People will hurt you (and at times you’re no saint either)
Learning to process hurt isn’t quick or easy. Having trusted and godly leaders is really important for working through these times.
7. I’m more convinced about the value of having a plurality of leaders.
The eldership hear me talking about this all the time. We want to grow the number of elders. A church needs a plurality of leaders: from pastors and elders, to deacons, and all kinds of lay ministry leaders. Paul didn’t lay out a paradigm in Ephesians 4 for us to ignore!
8. Make sure the eldership consists of godly men who share a broad breadth of personality, experience and skills.
A church requires greater wisdom than that of one pastor. However, we insist that there is profound and convinced agreement and unity on the church’s doctrine and direction.
9. Trying to set an example for others is hard.
The Bible says that pastors ought to set an example of life and godliness for the believers. It’s a balancing act, trying to share and show how I live outside the pulpit and yet doing so without handing out an autobiography each week.
10. Don’t do everything.
Set early and clear expectations and boundaries and be okay with saying ‘no’. Teach your congregation to be okay in hearing, ‘no’.
11. Membership really is important.
I believed this 20 years ago, and as the years have progressed I’ve become more convinced. Expressive individuals is a scourge on churches and hamstrings Gospel witness and effectiveness. Jesus meant every word when he said, “Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” Want to impact the world for Jesus? Then join a church and love the saints.
12. I will make mistakes and that’s ok.
13. The fear of losing people is common, but not dealing with problems generally makes the situation worse.
14. Technology is a curse.
Ok, not entirely. Tech is both good and bad, a useful servant and a terrible master. As technology changes, churches will often adopt and adapt and yet we also need to be wise in its use. Too often churches begin paying a cost without first thinking through behavioural changes that come about through smart phones or AI. Hey, even schools are now recognising these dangers!
I remember Carl Trueman suggesting once that the invention of the car changed people’s behaviours in ways that negatively impacted the local church. Cars are great, what a blessing it is to be able to move about easily and speedily. Cars give people more freedom and as Trueman explains, people started taking long weekends and pursuing more activities, and this turn impacted church attendance and participation. In other words, the car impacted the ministry and mission of the local church and does so even today.
15. We still need to cultivate a better culture of disciple making.
We talk about it and preach on it and we practice it in all kinds of ways, but I think we are yet to be convinced of how important discipleship is to the health and maturity of church.
16. Repetition is key to cultural change (thinking of point 14).
I’m learning that I need to say the same thing over and over again, and when I’ve done that, I need to repeat it again. I’m also trying to encourage our leaders to press repeat so that messages sink in and therefore lead to changed expectations or behaviours or whatever it is we’re trying to move forward.
Part of the issue isn’t reluctance from people, but leaders remembering that people live busy lives and their heads aren’t in the church 24//7 as mine is.
17. Church history is amazing and it matters.
I don’t need to be sold on history. I’ve always enjoyed reading history books and watching documentaries, even as a 3-year-old kid. I studied history at Melbourne University.
Many years later, I am more persuaded that churches should appreciate and understand that who we are today is the result of the sacrifices, thinking, preaching and lives of the saints from old. Churches make mistakes, take wrong turns, and lean into theological mess because we haven’t learned the lessons of church history.
We ran a course last year on Reformation history and this year we are talking about the Council of Nicaea.
18. Protecting my day off was a great idea.
Pastoral ministry isn’t just a job, it is a way of life. Family is family and church is also family. This makes setting boundaries often murky and imprecise. Susan and I have always wanted our children to view church as a family, and yet we never wanted to sacrifice them at the altar of ministry. I’m thankful for the clear and flexible boundaries that Susan and I set together and which the church embraced.
19. Theological liberalism is an easy gospel enemy to spot, but there is an emerging conservatism that we need to be aware of and keep away from the church.
Christian Nationalism which conflates common grace with the Gospel, and Church with State, is a growing concern not only in the United States but also in segments of Australian Churches.
This isn’t a biggy at Mentone Baps, but knowing this flavoured heresy is gaining popularity in some circles, I have already begun talking about these issues in sermons and discipleship (and of course on this blog). The Gospel is neither left nor right. Our mission isn’t defined by a side of politics, but by the Lordship of Christ and his Gospel that brings the forgiveness of sins.
20. There is so much work do to.
When all is said and done, the most pressing issue today remains the eternal state of people in light of the coming judgement of God. How many millions of people in Melbourne may know their left hand and right but are oblivious to Christ the judge and Christ the redeemer?
Pastoral ministry is the worst job in the world. Pastoral ministry is the best job in the world. I get to see and be part of people’s highest and lowest moments of life, to share their joys and sorrows. Pastors have the terrifying responsibility to preach the full counsel of God and dare suggest, see my life and follow my pattern of living. And we do, knowing that God will hold us to account for how we have shepherded his people. It really is a work that people should avoid and embrace.
I don’t spend a lot of time looking back over the years. To be honest, if you asked me for particular highlights in any given previous year, I may not be able to tell you with any precision. When I do reflect on the 20 years, I do so with some embarrassment and also much thankfulness: for Susan and my children, for a church that was patient and kind and who looks after the staff so well, and for God who never lets us down.
Mentone’s current associate pastor, Mike Veith has now been with us for 14 years in this role (and as a student pastor for 2 years before then), so that’s a milestone for which I am thankful.
I realise that 20 years in one church sounds a little bit unusual, but I know pastors who have served their churches for a great deal many more years. I think of Philip Calman from whom I learned so much during my 4 years at Chatswood Baptist as a student. He has been serving as their senior pastor for 28 years and counting. Praise God!
These are 20 of the lessons I’m learning from my 20 years at Mentone Baptist Church. There are many others, but perhaps among this this 20 there is something that might strike a note or encourage another pastor in their work for the Lord.
People enjoy a big celebration. Whether it is a family birthday, school anniversary or national holiday, people swing into the mood and remember significant milestones: often with food, music and fireworks.
This year, Christians worldwide are commemorating the 1700th Anniversary of one of Christianity’s pivotal moments: the Council of Nicaea. I’m not anticipating fireworks, but this is an anniversary worth celebrating.
I get it, 1700 years sounds and feels like an awful long time ago; that’s because it is! But this length of time doesn’t mean that Nicaea is irrelevant or unhelpful to us today. At Mentone Baptist this year, we’ll be joining with churches from Edinburgh to Egypt, as we affirm the Nicene Creed together and find helpful ways to reflect upon this historic event.
Some people love history, and others not so much. That’s ok. Not every Christian needs to read up on Athanasius and Basil, but neither is if sound or safe for churches to divorce themselves from the hard work these early theologians fought and affirmed, for the benefit of Christ’s mission in the world.
One of the basic rules of life is that who we are today is shaped by what has happened in the past. If we want to understand today, learn history. If we want to secure our churches in something more concrete than the latest weather predictions for Melbourne, ground our people and ministries in the deep truths of the faith, revealed by the Holy Spirit in Scripture, and helpfully posited in these documents known as Creeds.
To this day, churches around the world affirm four Creeds, all 4 were written in the first centuries AD. The Creeds don’t hold the same authority as the Bible, but they are nonetheless accepted as faithful and authoritative documents for churches, whether Anglican or Baptist, Charismatic, Orthodox or Catholic. Creeds are not the only theological statements that churches value. In addition to Creeds, down the centuries churches have produced Confessions; these were predominately written during the Reformation and post-Reformation centuries. It may surprise some readers to learn that it’s not the Presys who stood at the front of this queue, it is the Baptists who produced more Confessions than anyone! Confessions don’t sit in opposition to the Creeds nor do they claim similar standing, but they often provide further details on not only central doctrines but also secondary matters (including church polity). On a third and more local tier, denominations and Christian organisations normally have their own statement of faith, which marks out basic requirements for joining.
There are some church traditions today that still value the Creeds and where discipling new believers includes at least recognition of the Creeds. For many other churches, Creeds have largely fallen behind the pew and are collecting dust. What I want to do here is suggest 3 reasons why we should shake off the dust, copy and paste into PowerPoint and declare as churches ‘what we believe’.
1. Creeds are a way to summarise key Christian beliefs.
Creeds are not essays or sermons, they are a set of short and carefully worded statements that summarise foundational Christian beliefs, especially in regard to the nature of our Triune God.
It shouldn’t surprise most readers that I’m a sola Scriptura kind of guy. I wholeheartedly affirm the complete truthfulness and sufficiency of the Bible. I believe that the Bible is the final authority for matters pertaining to life and doctrine. But as theologians will rightly note, the reformation principle isn’t solo Scriptura, as though we only carry a Bible around with us and ignore the law or medical textbooks or systematic theologies.
When a visitor comes to church and asks what Mentone Baptist Church believes, I could simply hand them a Bible without uttering a word. We love giving away Bibles to people, to the joy of the office who are constantly replenishing our supplies. A visitor might ask, what do we believe about the incarnation or about the Holy Spirit? Straight away, as I speak, I am offering an explanation in using words and summarising the Bible’s teaching on that topic. I am synthesising in a pithy way (or convoluted as can be the case) what the Bible teaches. I’m already systematising and trying to explain our church’s beliefs. One of the benefits of Creeds (and statements of faith) is that they lay out in short form, what we mean by particular important doctrines. There are wiser heads than me who have done the hard work and created these useful summaries.
2. Creeds are a way to guard churches against false doctrine and the misuse of Bible words.
As one of the leaders at my church said recently, Creeds are useful for exposing cults and making clear distinctions between Christianity and other religions. For example, we are Trinitarians, not Muslims or Jehovah’s Witnesses.
How often have I heard someone say, ‘I believe in the Bible’ but when we’ve unpacked their ideas, I discover that they are misusing Bible verses and words.
Reciting a Creed as a church communicates something important to a visitor and it reminds church members of what we do believe. It’s easy for us to forget or even subconsciously drift from sound teaching. Creeds can serve as a useful reminder and correction.
The Creeds function not only to guard against what is false, they are primarily positive documents of what we affirm. For this end, they are helpful catechising tools and encouraging congregational reminders.
The Nicene Creed, for example, addresses particular theological issues that were being debated at the time. Nicaea didn’t create Christian beliefs about the Trinity and Jesus’ nature, rather they articulated and affirmed the Scriptures. Nicaea was important for drawing a line between Christian faith and Arius and his buddies (who were denying key aspects of Jesus Being and of the Trinity). This time situation doesn’t make Nicaea culture and time-bound like a Cyndi Lauper song. The Nicene Creed was universally adopted and quickly became a key document for churches to spell out what we believe.
Any quick read of the Creeds and we notice there are important issues not addressed. For example, not much is made of what has become today a massive issue: anthropology; what does it mean to be a man and a woman? No one says that the Creeds are saying everything important or that the only definition for who’s in and who’s out are the Creeds. Although I suspect, where Christians drift from the Bible on anthropology, they have probably already fallen away from Nicaea at some pivotal junction.
3. Creeds are a way to avoid cultish tendencies and express unity with churches across time and space.
In other words, we are not claiming special knowledge or being the only faithful church. We are not making up what we believe or deviating from the Christian faith, but are in line with historic and orthodox Christianity.
Carl Truman makes the interesting observation, that today’s expressive individualism is one reason why Christians are uncomfortable with Creeds and Confessions. The idea that there is a standard to which Christians should conform and shape their lives, is anathema to a culture that values ‘my truth’ over truth. This is one of the mistakes that some Baptists make when they place personal liberty and freedom of conscience as the highest value. Freedom of conscience is important, but it should not reign above God or be used to justify explaining away what God has spoken. Freedom of conscience for the Christian necessarily sits under the authority of Scripture.
I find it amusing that some who suggest, ‘no Creed but the Bible’, often don’t believe their own 5 word confession. Such anti-creedalists can often be found arguing for the Holy Spirit speaking new words outside of and beyond the Bible. How often have I heard the ‘no Creed but the Bible’ crowd argue for changing doctrine because of human experience and using current ethical theories as the key interpretive grid for reading and even removing parts of the Bible.
At the other end of the spectrum, are neo-fundamentalists, who with their KJVs (not knocking the translation, just the ‘KJV alone’ fan club), claim to be among the few remaining faithful believers on the planet. Creeds protect churches from cultish tendencies, like a road that keeps cars from swerving into houses and rivers and other obstacles.
There is something Gospel-minded and positive about recognising and giving thanks for Christ’s Churches scattered around our cities and countries, and throughout history. We are not the only holders of the truth. We stand with and stand on millions of churches and saints who have gone before us. Being a follower of Jesus can be isolating and lonely (join a church!). By declaring the Creeds we are reminding one another that we are not alone, but there is a great chorus heard even in heaven, of millions upon millions affirming the wonders of God and his salvation. Of course, we can do all this without Creeds, but these historic documents of the living faith will certainly add to this universal and joyful union.
Have you considered talking about and even reciting the Nicene Creed at your church this year?
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