Friend or Foe? Talk is Cheap...

A couple of days ago, a friend said, "It's good to know who's on our side," in reference to politics. Of course, that was just a passing comment, and I didn't take it too deeply or seriously in the moment. But it came back to my mind later, because if I’m honest, it’s a triggering statement for me. It’s a statement I heard in the religious cult environment I came out of. I suffered a lot in this environment, and have spent a lot of years contemplating this kind of thinking. And through my years of contemplation, I have concluded that you can't really know who’s on your side just by their words.

Talk is cheap. Anyone can preach about a cause. Sermons--even political ones--are a dime a dozen. Posts on the internet are even cheaper. Harp all you want. "Speak out" all you want. But what are you physically doing to further your cause? Because if you're not doing anything about it, it's just talk. Hypocrisy, really. And just because someone said they voted for someone, did they, really? You will never know.

Venting on social media has become an acceptable a form of activism, but it's an illusion. You speak your words, and then you feel some sense of accomplishment, like you've done something about the issues you're concerned about, and that catharsis prevents you from real action. Or worse, you've sabotaged your own cause. What usually happens when you vent on social media is, you make the "other side" angry, and they defensively cling even harder to their own ways of thinking. Haphazardly venting on social media simply strengthens your opposition, that is, if you haven't already unfriended all opposition. If you don't even have people in your spheres with differing opinions, then you're really accomplishing nothing, except for catharsis, which, I suppose has some value. You're "preaching to the choir," and you're very free to do so if it helps you get through the day...

As someone who grew up in church culture, where morality and virtues were often the main theme, I have learned first-hand that when a person says they uphold certain values (what one might call, "virtue-signaling”), it does not mean that person actually upholds that virtue in practice. At least they "want" to uphold it. At worst, people can use this talk to hide in plain sight. And two types of those people come to mind.

First, you have cowards: those who are simply terrified of rejection and will say or do anything to fit in. They likely don’t care about these values at all, and don’t do anything to actually further the cause. When it comes down to it, they fold under pressure and will betray their “values” to conform to the majority. They are liable to betray you or abandon you when you need their support the most.

Second, you have predators: those who have learned to say all the right words in order to prey on the innocent. In fact, it's because of these people that I am most suspicious of those who loudly and boldly virtue-signal. Either they are truly passionate about this thing... or this is the very thing they lack the most and are trying to fool their peers. They will attempt to enslave you in one way or another.

This is also how I feel about the recent blue bracelet idea. If you don't know, it has to do with people feeling unsafe since the results of the election. If you’re wearing this bracelet, you’re identifying yourself as a “safe” person to reassure others. Of course, all kinds of people feel all kinds of ways about it. It honestly sounds like a joke to me: that you would trust a stranger based on what they are wearing… Anyone can wear a bracelet and identify themselves as safe. Furthermore, if you’re wearing that bracelet, you’re also signaling to others that you are afraid and vulnerable, in need of the shallowest sign of solidarity to make you feel safe. Yes, look, like you, I'm wearing the bracelet; come into my van where I keep the candy…

This is why volunteered self-identification tends to come across as disingenuous to me, whether political or otherwise. When someone makes all kinds of "this is who I am" statements without prompting, this is the first red flag to someone like me who has been both emotionally and spiritually abused and abandoned by serial virtue-signalers. That's what the abuser and the coward always start with, "I'm a good person. I’m on your side. You can trust me..." in so many words.

The people on your side are the ones who will be there when you're down, who will love you despite opposing views, who will stand up for you when others falsely accuse, who will fight for you when you can't fight for yourself, and who will not abandon you when you fail to fit their version of "good."

Photo by Marek Studzinski on Unsplash

Christian Gnosticism and Modern Ideologies; a Natural Progression, Part 2

From Neo-Gnosticism to Gender Ideology (Part 2)

If you haven't read part 1, you will have missed some important context for this somewhat longer treatment. This two-part blog series is directed towards Christians in order to show the philosophical underpinnings of many of the existing ideologies in our current society, how they have infiltrated the church (in part 1), and how they are intrinsically different from the normative Christian worldview.

Gnostic thinking has been a part of our Western Worldview for some time now, but it is evolving in American society. This has progressed into what philosophers are now calling "neo-gnosticism." It contains the same dualism of gnosticism, only re-packaged. The spirit has been replaced by the "consciousness," and what is human is entirely contained within the consciousness. And thus, the same hierarchy exists as in previous iterations of gnosticism: a devaluation of the body, and the prioritization of the consciousness. The body is simply material, or perhaps even something purely animal.

In part 1, we have mostly discussed how gnosticism attaches to a moral system--namely Christianity--and distorts it. We talked about the resulting behaviors. We compared this distorted gnostic Christian outlook to what a normative Christian worldview should be. Neo-gnosticism has been attached to our post-modern relativism and individualism, and is inconsistent in its moral logic, because it has only a hodgepodge grouping of moral ideas. And it has become the basis for all kinds of ideologies we now deal with.

Again, much like the gnostics, we see this familiar devaluation of the physical: my body is merely a meat-sack which houses my human essence. It amounts to the idea that what one does with or to the body doesn't really matter, since there is no real moral basis for taking care of it other than for the pure use of it. It is merely physical material, after all. Human acts are reduced to carnal impulses of a physical brain, compared to and even equated to animal impulses. And since there is no external moral system to borrow from, one can then only go inward to look for identity. This creates a sort of hyper-individualism, and the result is the assumption that what one does to the body does not--and should not--affect anyone else but the individual. 

Neo-gnosticism also distorts something good here, namely, individualism. A healthy dose of individualism helps us to understand the importance of personal responsibility. It also helps us build a free society, because we have rights to protect the individual. Individualism is also a Biblical concept. The kingdom of God is a communal identity with an individual invitation. You are not saved because your father or mother is saved, though some may debate this scripturally. The main point is, you must believe for yourself. In the end, God evaluates the heart of every individual, not just the collective. You are responsible for your own life and for your own actions. 

Of course, what we do to our bodies affect us individually. And what happens to my body affects me more than anyone else, because I have to live with this body. But a distinction must be made which is not entirely acknowledged by this framework--and we all instinctively know this--what happens to our own bodies deeply affects our consciousness.

And the idea that what I do with my body affects only me is false; what happens to our bodies affects those around us--especially those who love us. One does not need to have a Christian worldview to understand this. This is the nature of love: we share in each others' experiences and suffering. This is a natural result of being human because we are communal beings. We are by nature interdependent, and that is an essential aspect of our survival. We are even connected to people through time: through ancestry, reproduction, stories, and experiences--a connection with people from the past and into the future. If you exist, this applies to you and you can't avoid it. And, for a more direct connection, quite literally what happens to a pregnant woman's body directly affects the life growing inside of her (I won't delve into this because it is self-evident). But this hyper-individualism can cause us to forget how interconnected we really are.

All that to say, what you do--and doing inherently involves some action of the body--has a ripple effect through all your relationships, attachments, society, and even through time. And while you definitely should have autonomy over your own body, and others should respect your personal freedom to make decisions you feel are best for you, the idea that what you do to your body affects only you is a delusion full of ideological contradictions.

This devaluation of the body can be seen in the way neo-gnostics deal with the human fetus: before it takes human shape, it is merely a clump of material--a clump of cells, with no value. Even the potential for sentience isn't valued, only sentience itself (or consciousness). In this (cut short) debate between Ben Shapiro and Tashika, you can see that Tashika's ideology is entirely gnostic: she states clearly that she only places moral value on human life insomuch as it is perceived to have sentience. This is the typical view of the neo-gnostic. While Ben argues for the "life" of the fetus, she argues for the "sentience" of the fetus. The neo-gnostic then sees abortion as morally justifiable before a certain point in the fetal development.

As we discussed in part 1, Jewish thinking--and consequently Christian thinking--has always seen both the body and soul as two sides of the same coin; one cannot exist without the other. The two parts make a whole person. The life of the body, therefore has high value. This also means the life of the fetus also has a high value. And therefore it becomes excessively ironic for a sentient being--one which relies entirely on a physical body to experience sentience--to place little value on the life of the physical body.

This hyper-individualistic mentality is particularly emphasized in the area of sex, sexual identity, sexual preferences, reproduction, and other results of sex. Sex in particular, and the behaviors motivated by it--what our society now insists are the most intensely individual--is quite literally the most communal aspect of our being. Of course it's deeply personal, but two things can be true at the same time: it's deeply personal and entirely relational, because sex involves other people. Even watching others have sex on a screen involves others. Otherwise you're just alone with your thoughts masturbating (which isn't sex). And it's a direct result of sex that any of us even exist in this current generation of the human race (with a few exceptions). Sex is an act which deeply impacts the individual, promotes intimacy between people, and has the potential to literally create a new human being, ensuring the future of the human race; it is both a personal and communal aspect of our humanity.

Another idea emerging from gnosticism is transhumanism--the idea that the consciousness can actually be separated from the body, and that we will eventually evolve to transfer our consciousness into a largely digital existence. This takes the devaluation of the body to the most extreme. We can only see this played out in fiction, where a person's consciousness is somehow copied and transferred to a robotic body, or even into virtual reality. It questions our very concept of what it means to be human. Can a person's consciousness truly be transferred into a mechanical or even virtual vessel? Or is that person now dead, and the copy is only a copy? Will this be the extinction of mankind, or the continuation of it? I must admit, this idea is highly fascinating to me. I have contemplated it often, and I even enjoy the thought experiments that writers and movie makers incite by their creative story-telling of these futuristic scenarios. But as interesting and philosophically challenging as this is--and even as smart as it sounds--it is still entirely science-fiction. It relies on an understanding of the consciousness which doesn't yet exist (Scientists are apparently not even close), and it depends on a futuristic technology which also doesn't exist. 

For a Christian, the realization of transhumanism means the extinction of the human race; once the body is unable to house the consciousness, this is the end of the person's physical life. And even after death, we still believe that something of the body remains in the eternal realm. The physical body can be sick, disfigured, ugly, or dysfunctional, and we can feel all kinds of ways about whether we like it or not, or even feel uncomfortable with it, but it is still a part of our whole being. It is, after all, the only means our consciousness can interact with the world.

We are seeing the gradual move towards a completely disconnected and disembodied collective psyche which has largely accepted transhumanism as the next eventuality. If humans can now be disconnected even from their own biology, then sexuality has no real meaning. If sexuality has no real meaning, then gender also has no real bearing. And if sexuality and gender aren't important, then family structures also have no value. And since family structures are now dismembered, marriage is also of no value. This plays out in modern dating culture, which is now highly confused in its purpose, almost entirely carnal, and designed to destroy the development of real intimacy and long-term devotion. Human instinct, nature, and biology are being dismissed in favor of a new disembodied way of life where people are starved of their own human needs. This is what Christian gnosticism already set the stage for when its adherents devalued all of these things for different reasons. 

We still have natural, built-in human needs for functioning and thriving. And the more we attempt to disconnect ourselves from these basic human instincts, the weaker we become as a society. 

Neo-gnosticism is also the basis for how our culture now deals with self-identity. If what is human comes solely from within the consciousness, one must then reach within oneself to find the answers. One's identity is something only the individual can define for oneself (hyper-individualism). Of course, to have a free society, the individual must be involved in understanding one's own identity, and others cannot be the dictators of that identification. However, to not allow others (namely parents, family, friends, mentors, etc.) to contribute to that identity defies our very human nature. And to claim that this identity has not been influenced by others is to lie. I would even argue that the emphasis on self-identity comes from a weak sense of identity, and is usually an attempt at belonging; we use all the external labels in order to identify ourselves with a certain group of people. At it's very worst, it's an attempt to feel "special" or more valuable by setting yourself apart from others (again, the temptation of the gnostic who has no grounding framework for the intrinsic value of life).

One problem is, the lack of accountability in our self-identification creates mental fragility. One must choose a static label and everyone around you must uphold this static label. A simple question can threaten your very identity, and this makes you feel completely unstable and highly offended. This is a sign of mental weakness. It's the same framework for cult behavior, and the basis for toxic tribalism. It's also the perfect environment to enable and nurture narcissism.

You can begin to see the unstable wood block tower of logic that is building. When one's identity can only come from within--and everyone MUST affirm this identity to be considered respectful--then everyone must now accommodate the individual instead of the individual learning how to function within the general rules of society. Human society begins to break down. 

To truly value one's self, one must have a high view of the value of the physical body. And to truly value others, one must value oneself. This is the healthiest state to be in, to nurture relationships, marriage, and family. This is what sums up the law of the Bible: Loving God, and loving others as you love yourself.

The Christian's identity is also not wholly determined by factors like sexuality or body image. These are merely part of who we are. The Christian identity comes from God and being part of a greater world-wide family. It does not come exclusively from inside oneself, though the self plays a major role in its realization. In order to truly know one's self, one must know their creator in whose image they are made. And part of how we understand God comes from how we understand those around us. Therefore the body isn't merely there to express one's identity, like clothing, but rather it is a living part of the whole being. It is the living vessel through which we experience the world. It is sacred and invaluable, and apart from it, we cannot live physical life. Therefore it deserves care, love, and protection.

So, for example, with transgenderism, while neo-gnostics would say that changing one's gender is the realization of who you are inside, the Christian would say that changing your physical gender is actually a rejection of who you are, since the body is considered part of the whole. It is seen as an extreme form of self-hate to the point of bodily mutilation. This is considered damaging not only to the health of the body, but also to the health of the mind.

Christians should even have a limit in regards to body "enhancements," like plastic surgery, for example. Where the line should be drawn for enhancing one's appearance or performance, is somewhat unclear, leaving room for interpretation, and somewhat depends on societal norms.; Biblically, there's some flexibility there. While it is not Biblically wrong to enhance the appearance or performance of the body, too much of this is ultimately seen as vanity. Appearing as the opposite gender is seen as either a deception or an extreme form of vanity and ultimately wrong. But what is clear is that forms of self-mutilation--which ultimately damage the body--are definitely not encouraged. What is encouraged is the value of self, and even the love of the self. This true self-love has its own way of preventing us from going too far in seeking out body modifications in general. This self-love is only possible, however, when one is able to first accept the love of God.

More importantly, our appearances, our sexuality, our gender, or even our race are not sources of identity, though they might help us identify part of our role in society. Even then, roles can be bent and sometimes even broken when we see that people do not fit the boxes our society has made for them. If anything, in the kingdom of God, definitions of roles then become somewhat ambiguous, with room for interpretation, rather than narrow and limiting society-defined labels. We don't always see this in Christian communities which often suffer from gnostic, static, and tribalistic thinking (just like any group of humans anywhere). But true Christian thinking allows a woman to have a range of expressions; she can be more masculine without needing to label herself as a man for the sake of communicating her role in society. It also doesn't necessitate that she must be attracted to other women. A man can be more feminine without defining himself as a woman, and he can still be attracted to women. This is because whatever gender we are isn't the most important thing about us. We are more than our bodies or what our consciousness dictates about ourselves. We are whole complex beings, who are worthy of love and care. There is actually more freedom, rather than less, in the Christian identity. Despite how we see it played out in the world, and even in church, in the kingdom of God, there is equality in the value of every human being, regardless of gender, race, or class.

Our core Christian identity is rooted in belonging. We belong to our Father, and we are made in his image; we share his qualities. Everything else is built on that essential identification. This is part of what give us the "peace that surpasses all understanding;" because we know who we are, and have confidence in this.

Gnostic Christians already devalue and reject their bodies, so they will not be able to argue with neo-gnostics, at least not to much avail. To both the Gnostic Christian and the Neo-gnostic, the body only has as much value as its "usefulness." The body is either something to be rejected, or something to be flaunted. Both these may even see the body as disposable when it outlives its use. When in conversations with neo-gnostics, gnostic Christians who don't understand the value of the body will only be able to appeal to the salvation of the soul. But the soul doesn't exist in the mind of a neo-gnostic, so this appeal will not land. The two will relate on one level, and yet be unable to communicate about their differences, because, well... they stand on the same foundation. In the end, the gnostic Christian's final appeal will be, "Your way is evil because God says so." That's not enough reason for the neo-gnostic, because to most of them, God doesn't exist, and therefore what God defines as evil has no bearing on their life. And if he does happen to exist, why would he make such arbitrary rules? This makes him out to be simply controlling, offensive and disagreeable with no rhyme or reason; the ultimate killjoy and not worth our devotion. 

As the gnostic Christian continues to discourse with a neo-gnostic, their version of God will be revealed for what it is--a controlling narcissistic overlord who requires his followers to live in constant denial and self devaluation in order to become something acceptable for heaven, despite the fact that God himself made us. What a criminal, cruel, and disgusting vision of the omnipotent creator. No one truly wants to serve that version of God, and no one should, because it doesn't exist. I could never worship that version of God. Neo-gnostics at least see this for what it is, and reject it. To their credit, they are rejecting the lie already, which gnostic Christians are blinded to.

The God I serve is love himself. He showed it with the purest act of self-sacrifice. And there is no better definition of love--the character of God--than that of the Christian worldview.

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that everyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him. (John 3:16-17 NIV)

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If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a ringing gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have absolute faith so as to move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and exult in the surrender of my body, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no account of wrongs. Love takes no pleasure in evil, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be restrained; where there is knowledge, it will be dismissed. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial passes away.

When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I set aside childish ways. Now we see but a dim reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love; but the greatest of these is love.

(1 Corinthians 13 NIV)

 

Photo by Vinicius "amnx" Amano on Unsplash

Christian Gnosticism and Modern Ideologies; a Natural Progression, Part 1

Part 1 - Two Destructive Aspects of Gnosticism

Gnosticism has been baked into our society, and consequently has seeped into our churches. It's a philosophical ideology that originated with the Greeks, not the Bible. And much of their philosophies have become part of the basis for how Western society thinks today. (some of you know how often I have taught about gnosticism in Jerusalem... this is yet another iteration...)

Gnosticism has a way of distorting good things. There are two specific points from Gnosticism that I want to talk about. First is the idea of salvation through knowledge, and the second is the separation of spiritual and physical. I will first explain these two aspects so that I can explain how these ideas--which were embraced by the church--led us towards what philosophers are now calling neo-gnosticism, the basis for many other ideologies we are dealing with in society today. My goal is to help Christians understand the fundamental differences between their faith and these ideologies. I think many of us know our worldview is incompatible with them, but we don't fully know why. For many Christians, our best answer is, "it's wrong because God says so," which makes God out to be a killjoy for no reason, and doesn't help address the arguments and doubts that we ourselves have. 

First we have to root out some false yet ubiquitous teachings within our own camp to understand why these new ideologies are incompatible with our faith (because they certainly are compatible with the false gnostic distortions many of us have unknowingly adopted). This will be a bit of a longer treatment, so get that kettle started...

The first point from gnosticism is the idea of salvation through knowledge. Here we have a good thing, which is knowledge, yet with a distorted twist; a promise that it can do more than it can do. How many times have you had the knowledge to do the right thing and still not done it? Knowledge might save you some time, some effort, some confusion... It might save you in a lot of small and even big ways, but that's only if you have the wisdom to apply it. What it certainly cannot do is save your soul. 

By all rights, a normative Christian worldview should hold the pursuit of knowledge in high esteem. Anyone who reads our psalms should know this. But again, we should also know that knowledge is not the basis for the salvation of our souls. Only Jesus saves. And while knowledge is a high value, it still does not rank among the top 3 most important values on our list. Our top three are faith, hope, and love  "But the greatest of these is love." (1 Cor 13:13)

This idea of salvation through knowledge has infiltrated the church in a big way. It may not be outright spoken, but there are often undertones and implications of this in sermons and discussions. The Christian gnostic thinker will say "amen," to the statement that knowledge does not save you. You might know in your head that salvation doesn't come through knowledge, but still intrinsically believe this. You might still believe that if we could just know the right things, then we would be truly saved. The best way to figure out if you believe this idea is to see it play out in your logic, actions, and behavior. 

Here are some signs of someone who believes in salvation through knowledge... Does most of your Bible study and prayer time involve seeking out special knowledge? Do you mostly follow obscure teachings that you feel, "if only Christians knew about this, they would be true followers of God." Does your church community believe that you aren't even a true believer or follower of Christ unless you believe the specific teachings from your church--teachings about something other than Christ as the son of God dying on the cross to take away the sins of the world? These are things like specific denominational differences, apocalyptic end-times scenarios, specific fasting schedules, following particular holiday rituals, ancient findings which uncover the "true" meaning of scripture which contradicts all of church history's beliefs for 100s of years, specific regiments of how to be holy, and more... Do you feel that the death and resurrection of Jesus is part of the "basics," which you rarely revisit, and in order to become a mature Christian, you need to move on to other, more spiritual concepts of faith? Do you feel that because people don't know about the specific things you know about, that they are totally deceived by Satan, and will not enter into heaven?

Another sign of the belief in this tenet, which also applies to non-Christians, is when you look at the problems of the world, and your first solution is education. And, to be fair, this is a solution to many problems. If only people knew what they were doing, knew the right information, they wouldn't do what they're doing. And this can be true. But the part that I find entirely naïve is the idea that education will automatically improve a person's character. As if our only problems are that of ignorance, and humans are intrinsically good. My experience of the world, and even from the "most educated" has been that some people are simply so full of hate and pain, they know exactly what they are doing, and they do it on purpose. There are people out there who enjoy inflicting pain, and they have had all the material provision and education they've ever needed in life. Sometimes that knowledge makes them smarter and better at inflicting such pain. The only thing I know which has the power to improve someone's character is love. Knowledge has no such power.

But back to gnostic Christians... 

If the gospel--specifically who Jesus is and what he did for you on the cross--is not the central focus and theme of your faith, you are off center. The gospel is not just the basis, it is the entirety. It is the lens through which we should be filtering all other concepts. But gnosticism feels that knowledge is really where it's at. And special knowledge is REALLY where it's at. Everyone wants to feel special, and if you have that special knowledge, then you're in the secret club of special people--the few who know and are saved by that knowledge. This is why Christians throughout history were susceptible to so many cults which claim to have an edge on salvation through "special revelation." It makes you feel that you are part of the chosen ones. It's an exhilarating and exciting feeling to be one of the few. It's the same hubris as the educated: scholars are always tempted to regard themselves as better or more valuable than others; "the elect" so to speak. This is what makes special knowledge attractive. You've got an edge. You're on the inside. You have more value than others. It's a need born out of a lack of a sense of belonging; an insecure attempt to earn love or feel valuable. It's how the world evaluates us, and that can be hard to shake.

But God evaluates us differently. The Bible teaches us that God already chose you from the beginning of time. Jesus literally died for you. You are already in. You are already loved. You already have a place where you truly belong. This is the core message of Christ's death on the cross--the core message of the gospel. You are intensely loved and worth dying for. Can you accept that at face value? Because, after that, there's nothing left for you to prove. You are already in His kingdom, not because you loved him, but because he loved you first. And nothing that you did earned you this love. You simply are loved. 

The Bible teaches us that God doesn't play favorites, and that he gave his life for the love of the whole world. Each individual is special and valuable to God. Scripture after scripture paints for us the picture of his deep, personal, and unconditional love for each individual person, but no one is more valuable or better than their neighbor. This one is hard for people. We cling to these things so tightly. All that special knowledge you have will not buy you a ticket into heaven. It will not make you more valuable than the next person. It will not earn you true love. Your knowledge can only enhance your life and even the lives of others if you put it to good use. God will even reward you for your knowledge, and esteem your pursuit of it. But his love does not increase or decrease. And he already accepted you before you knew the right things. Thank God he does not require you to know the right things before he accepts you as his son or daughter. Only what Jesus did on the cross is what gets you into heaven, and it's already done and finished. Nothing you do will buy you that ticket. The ticket has already been bought for you, paid for with Jesus' life. Gnosticism tempts the Christian to replace the cross with knowledge.

The irony here is that I'm trying to give you knowledge to help you get back to center. But this knowledge doesn't save you, it merely strengthens you against false Christian teaching (hopefully).

The second tenet of gnosticism which is very relevant to us today is the separation of spiritual and physical, as if your spirit is only tethered to the body, and when you die, it peels entirely away. We have seen this depicted in movies over and over. This is also where we get the dichotomy of sacred vs. secular. And according to gnosticism, this also means that the physical world is evil, and the spiritual world is good. When this idea is applied to Christianity, you get a major distortion of the gospel. It begins to present logical problems, like, if the physical world is evil, then was Jesus evil? And if he can't be evil, than was he even human? Did he even truly die for our sins? (that idea is an old heresy called Arianism, which is still often believed today). Another logical conclusion might be that there is some sort of hierarchy within the trinity; that Jesus is lesser than God, since he had an evil body, which he overcame through his divine will. There are all kinds of other logical and theological problems which emerge from this thinking. 

But this was never a Biblical teaching. Jewish thinking has always considered the spirit and the body to be inseparable parts of one whole being, like two sides of the same coin. You are both a spirit and a body, and your body is not evil. Scripture might tell us that we are born with an "evil nature," but this is not an indictment on the entire physical world. Furthermore, as believers, we are dead to that nature, and risen in Christ. Your body is just as much a part of you as your spirit. Your body has intrinsic value. Christian thinking is built on this. Christian thinking even tells us that something of your physical body remains in the afterlife. Jesus kept his wounds. Paul describes death like that of a seed being planted: something of the seed dies, but not all of it. The seed simply grows into a great tree. So something of the physical body lives on in a mysterious way. Not only that, what happens to our bodies directly affects our spirit and vice versa. We all know this instinctively. Our bodies are the means by which we can engage in the world, and we should value, guard, and protect them even from ourselves.

When we see this gnostic duality of physical and spiritual playing out in Christians, two extreme behaviors emerge and a range of things in between. The two extremes are Asceticism, and Hedonism (license to sin, or pleasure-seeking). Ascetics were originally the "beat-your-body monks," who tortured themselves on the outside so as to gain a higher level of holiness on the inside; because the outside was evil and deserving of suffering, and only existed to serve as a vessel for the redeemed soul. Like our body is merely a meat-sack. Here again, gnosticism takes healthy self-discipline and distorts it to an unhealthy level of self-destruction. Then on the other side of the spectrum, you have those who give up and give in. Though true Hedonists of their day believed in moderation, we understand this word hedonism today as constant pleasure-seeking. And the gnostics here believe that since the body is evil, there's nothing you can do about it so you might as well enjoy all the pleasures indulgently. And there's nothing you need to do because Jesus already redeemed your soul. It then doesn't matter what you do with or to your body. Here, gnosticism is taking healthy enjoyment of pleasures and distorting it into an unhealthy level of destructive gluttony and licentiousness. Both distorted extremes live in a sort of disembodied state of mind.

Today, most gnostic Christians don't go so far as to literally beat themselves. And they certainly know that we shouldn't be indulging so licentiously. But they certainly find all kinds of ways to live self-destructive lives. And they still live out a distorted version of Christianity, with a distorted view of who God is. They struggle with the balance between the physical and the spiritual. Physical pleasures are seen at best as lesser or lower things, and at worst as evil things. Only spiritual things like prayer, reading the Bible, being in church, serving the church, and doing righteous acts are worthy of our time. Many of them often think, "what I want is intrinsically opposed to what God wants." unless it is of a spiritual or righteous nature. And thus, most desire is vilified or suppressed. 

Sexual desire--because it can be so incredibly intense (thank God)--is especially suppressed. And this gnostic thinking often distorts relationships and marriage. People will turn what could be something beautiful into sterilized contracts devoid of feeling, the choice made in the spirit of obligation. I know people who chose their spouse specifically because they had no sexual desire for the person, and this is because they didn't want their spouse to be a distraction to their ministry! What a destructive basis for marriage! What a gnostic distortion of a good thing! This certainly isn't God's design for marriage. When we look at the narrative of the Bible, God has always brought about his promises through love and desire. At best, for lesser extreme gnostics, if there is love in the marriage, these Christians can still tend to go long bouts without sex, sometimes abstaining from it for "spiritual" reasons, and when they do allow for it, they have boring sex because they are afraid of the intensity of their desire. (Of course boring sex happens to all of us, and there are a plethora of reasons for it, so do not take on condemnation here, but this is one result of gnosticism.)

The desire for food is often denied as well. Gnostic Christians thrive on long fasting regiments. I'm not saying all people who fast are gnostic. I'm also NOT saying fasting is wrong. But Gnostics feel that this makes them more spiritual, that it has earned them something, or makes them somehow more spiritually powerful. None of this is Biblical. There's much more to be said here, but I'll simply say when someone is always fasting, making it known, and can never feast with others, this is probably a sign of a gnostic Christian. (If you feel called to be a monk living in seclusion, I am not talking about you. That is something else entirely).

Among the more extreme gnostic Christians, they can barely have a normal conversation because they have to keep the topic on spiritual things. They can't live normal lives because they have to spend all their time in prayer. And when they do indulge in physical pleasures, it also must be for a spiritual reason, or they must somehow spiritualize it. They find all kinds of "spiritual" ways to justify the behavior of their physical bodies. Even joy is redefined. Happiness is an especially vain pursuit; it is shallow and fleeting, whereas joy is apparently defined as some deep and lasting sorrow, which is accompanied by some spiritual comfort. And death is the only real escape from this evil world. Gnostics long for death to save them, but, of course, suicide is a sin... 

Every indulgence in physical pleasure can make a gnostic Christian feel guilty, and so often you will see them mask their constant guilt for existing with pious over-spiritualizing, and this comes across as self-righteous. This can really make a person seem very "holy." It's difficult to relax and let loose around these people. One is tempted to compare and even feel intimidated. And sometimes they really make you feel like you're not good enough with their disapproval of your way of life. They struggle to make friends because no one is "good enough," for them unless they too have a life of regimented spiritual self-destruction--I mean--"discipline." And they quickly "lose respect" for those who fail to constantly exercise these spiritual behaviors as often or as rigorously as they do. (Guys, this is a recipe for spiritual codependency...)

So, we see that a gnostic Christian projects these standards onto others. Again, no one who does not constantly fixate on purely spiritual endeavors is good enough. This is to the detriment of relationships and families. The relationally destructive behaviors include but are not limited to: seeing spouses and even children as merely distractions to ministry (even though their families ARE their first ministry), not being able to relax and enjoy simple pleasures with their families; devaluing family bonding time because it's not spiritual enough; monopolizing family time with only spiritual topics or too many church events; serving the church or the ministry at the expense of the family; not taking care of personal physical needs in favor of the spiritual things; burning out on self-denial, thus becoming emotionally unavailable; not meeting the physical needs of others because they are not important; not acknowledging or appreciating the physical accomplishments of others... or if they do, it's still a sort of lesser kind of appreciation. 

Close friends and family often get pushed into three behaviors around these people: 1) constantly feeling like they are not good enough and give up, often even rejecting the faith, 2) striving to develop the same kind of gnostic spirituality, or 3) developing a codependency on these "more spiritual" gnostic Christians. Codependency is quite damaging because now their faith hangs on the success or failure of the "more spiritual" person, which is the absolute wrong foundation of faith. Because, what happens when they inevitably fail? Our faith should rest on Jesus and what he did for us on the cross, not on the moral success or failure of any human being. I could write much more on these 3 things, because I have experienced all of them at different stages of my faith.

God does not call us to an endless denial of physical needs. For every physical need, God has provided a healthy, enjoyable, and even pleasurable way for us to fulfill it. And every sin is simply a legitimate need fulfilled in an unhealthy way. God "delights in the well-being of his servants." In the Christian journey, God wants us to have good times, to enjoy earthly pleasures, to kick back and relax. He does want us to pray, because he wants us to spend time with him. He wants us to read our Bibles so our faith is strengthened, and he wants us to gather with other Christians so we can encourage and build each other up. He wants all these things for us because he loves us and wants us to thrive. He doesn't want us killing ourselves to make ourselves into something "acceptable" to him. He has already accepted us as we are. And as we spend time with him, he is the one who does the work of transforming us into happier, healthier, more peaceful and righteous people, full of love, and with a sound mind. For him, it really is more about having a relationship than it is about us trying desperately to be a good boy or girl.

The irony is that the practice of constant self-denial actually leads us into sin. Suppression has a horrible way of creating internal pressure, which builds up. When it finally is allowed to release, the result can be much more serious and damaging than we ever thought was possible. When we dismiss all of our real, God-given physical needs, we become worn-out, tired, weak, and most susceptible to temptation. We burn out. And burn-out is an extremely vulnerable and dangerous place to be. Being in this state for long enough usually leads to huge moral failure. If we don't let the stream of desire flow in normal, healthy, God-given pleasurable ways, it will cut a new path, where we don't want it to go; where it's not supposed to go... Eventually we look back and wonder where it all went wrong. We watch ourselves unravel and cause so much destruction as if someone else is calling the shots. This is one major way so many big-wig ministers fail. They finally reach the end of their willpower. And all this destruction that results isn't what we really want in our heart of hearts, and yet, we are doing it, and it can feel impossible to stop it...

When scripture says God is strong in our weakness, it is the tendency of the gnostic to assume it means we should seek to live in weakness, or to revel in our weakness, or even celebrate our weakness. No! When God says he is strong in our weakness, he means that when we reach the limits of our own strength, which we've cultivated and cared for, he can go even further. Nothing is impossible with God. This should be an encouragement and an inspiration to reach our potential, not a mandate to make ourselves weak, to live in pitiful self-denial and misery. It also means, where we would normally fail because of our weaknesses (and we all have weaknesses), God can overcome. Gnostic Christians will struggle to reach their full potential, because they can't allow themselves to be themselves. This is because they see their own needs and desires as evil, or at least as opposed to God. They aren't capable of properly caring for themselves, and therefore they don't have the capacity to truly care for others. And their children watch them suppress their every desire, so what will their reaction be to avoid that?

It can be true; your desires might manifest in a way that would be clearly wrong to indulge in, and definitely in opposition to God. Let's take a less serious example like food: you might prefer to eat junk food over something your body actually needs. And if you cultivate a habit of denying your body the nutrients it needs, you'll come to hate what's healthy. You'll also see an overall decline in your health over time. In this case you need to exercise some healthy self-discipline to fix that. But ultimately what you want is health, is it not? Your body needs nutrients. That distorted desire is appearing because of a legitimate need in your life. If you keep denying yourself all the right ways to fulfill that need, you'll end up seeking out the wrong ways. This will ultimately harm you and others who love you. This is an argument for self-discipline, but in a way that helps redirect your physical desires, not deny or suppress them. The same goes for spiritual things. But the metaphor breaks down quickly when we get into more serious sins, because while it's not a sin to eat the occasional brownie, cheating on your spouse is never an acceptable indulgence.

Gnostics will also struggle to have a normal relationship with Jesus. Following Jesus means living a life doing things I don't want to do, because clearly if my flesh is evil, then that means my desires are also evil, so I must do the opposite of what I want... Honestly, this is such a perversion of the truth. Jesus is the object of our desires. He is also the source of our delight. And when we have him in the center of our lives, the pleasures of the physical world become immensely more enjoyable--even, dare I say it, SEX! 

Jesus isn't gnostic at all. He made the world and called it good. He came to the world as a baby, completely vulnerable to all the dangers of this world. He experienced the world and the temptations in it. His physical body wasn't evil. He ate, burped, farted, and pooped. His mom probably made sweet treats which he indulged in. Maybe his young teen heart even felt attraction to the girls. His clothes weren't cheap, and he drank wine. He laughed, made jokes, and smiled. He learned a trade, and made friends. He "grew up in favor with God and man." He even cooked fish for his disciples and washed their feet. He fed five thousand people. He turned water into wine--and it was the good stuff--so the wedding party could keep on gettin' down into the night. He was taking care of physical needs, and even wants. And even on the cross, he made sure someone was appointed to take care of his mother (when he told John "this is your mother"). Of course he prayed often. He was exceptionally adept at learning and interpreting scripture and therefore also spent a lot of his time in the temple. He had a vibrant relationship with his heavenly father. He lived an integrated, incarnational life.

You might already see the line of logic leading towards other ideologies we are dealing with now. When you devalue the body, all kinds of other things lose their value and tend towards destruction; things like relationships, marriage, children, family, and even community. When Christians themselves don't even understand the value of these things, they won't be able to stand in the face of these other ideologies which devalue them. These Christians have already laid a foundation for their children to embrace the plethora of ideologies which have come through gnosticism. This is what I will be discussing in Part 2.

Photo by Kaleb Nimz on Unsplash

Being Good Isn't All There Is

"Sometimes being good isn't all there is."

As a teacher of mine once said, "If you think salvation is a second chance at becoming a better person, you've missed the whole point." (Kerry MacRoberts)

If "being good" is the sole focus of your life, then you're not really living, are you?

This central motive of self-improvement is what I believe creates a church culture that "shoots its wounded."

When you are so focused on being better, you are in self-preservation mode. Your reasons for doing good deeds are not because you want to do the deeds, but because you want to be a better person, thus the deeds become obligations. The deed becomes a means to self-gain.

You can become so focused on being better, your reasons for making friends are not for enjoyment of those people, not for love of those people, but for their ability to adhere to the same morals and ultimately to help you do the same. These friendships are not true friendships. They become a means for self-improvement, and the "friend" is expendable. Once their behavior doesn't line up with what you believe to be helpful, or acceptable, you either try to "help" them (as in point out what they're doing wrong, thinking this will somehow fix the behavior. You convince yourself that you are doing this out of love), or if helping them doesn't work, you distance yourself from them (after all, "bad company corrupts good character"). You may still spend time with them for the purposes of hopefully being a good influence in their lives, but you no longer regard this person in the same way. This kind of self-improvement-focused person is difficult for me to be around.

Sure, we're attracted to people who make us better. It's not wrong to want that. We enjoy a person who brings out our best! And that factor plays a role in who we should choose to trust. But love comes first. People who love me because they genuinely enjoy my company and value me as a person, those are my friends. Love that comes from Christ naturally makes us better. And being a better person is merely a byproduct of our relationship with Christ, not the end goal.

This is what many churches do to drug addicts, to divorcees, to people who fail to behave well: they try to fix them and if they can't, they "turn them over to Satan." Now these people are further away from the friends they need to perhaps get through the divorce, or overcome the addiction. It's not accountability they need, it's love. They need empathy and understanding. Instead they are left with abandonment and often a hatred for the church, which translates into a hatred for God.

When I started to fail my ministry friends, what I got was a series of interventions (people reminding me of what I was doing wrong, which I already knew and hated myself for), which ultimately led me to feel worse about myself and fall deeper into the bad behavior. It caused me to distance myself from them. And they distanced themselves from me. I believed "being good" was the goal. This was what I taught in my own ministry. And then I suffered the consequences of that way of thinking. I was hurt and alone with no good friends around me to lean on when I needed them the most.

These are good people doing what they believe is right. I believe they've been taught wrong.

Outsiders of the church--those wounded or rejected by it--see the church as a social club whose conditions for membership is good behavior. This becomes their view of God. They think that in order to be accepted by God, they must meet certain behavioral requirements. We can sing "come as you are" all we want, but our actions speak louder than our words. Secular depictions of God always makes Him seem judgmental and condescending, don't you think? Sure we can blame that view on the Devil's lies, but he did it by lying to the Christians first. They are the ones who garnered this reputation.

Christians who are more passionate about righteousness (good behavior) than they are about people are not like Christ, but more like the Pharisees. Christ was passionate about people despite their sins. He hung out with the sinners. He spent time with the "unclean." He died so that sinners could go to heaven. Christ died to enable us to live free of sin. He doesn't want us to focus on good behavior. Christ couldn't stand it when the Pharisees were proud of their good behavior, because righteousness comes by faith, not by works.

So... If being good isn't all there is, what else there? There's having a relationship with the living God. That means trusting God, getting to to know Him, loving Him and enjoying Him, and loving and enjoying the people that He made. Sure there are right and wrong ways to do that (you're allowed to be picky about who your real friends are), but as we focus on Him, we begin to naturally desire the right things.

2 Corinthians 3:18 says, "And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit." We cannot transform ourselves into that image by our actions. He transforms us as we keep our focus on Him.

Even when we say, "a Christian's ultimate purpose is to love God and love others" do we really believe that? The proof is in our actions.

Seeking First the Kingdom of God

And the Role of Parents...

There was a framed scripture hanging on the wall in our house in various places in my childhood homes that I often read and pondered, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added onto you.“ (‭‭Matthew‬ ‭6‬:‭33‬ ‭KJV)

When I think of “the kingdom,” I think of the church. And to be fair, the church is the kingdom. I have been a church minister for my entire adult career. I have served the church in the ways I knew how. I mentored people and served the poor, but I also I built up programs and propped up systems. At times, my idea of "seeking first the kingdom" was narrowed more and more to specifically what happens in this building, or what events this group puts on. Over time, I have learned that when we get so hyper-focused on what we're doing, and the specific goals we make for our communities, we sometimes lose perspective on what the community actually needs, and what changes we need to make to meet them... 

For a long time I was propping up a system which chopped up the various demographics into smaller groups, separated ages, genders, split families into categories… it’s not necessarily bad, because we all need friends and fellow peers to relate to, and we all need safe people to open up to spiritually. But there is a very real risk of developing into something that is detrimental to the community as a whole. The systems I served crossed a threshold, and leadership often put on this pressure, making people feel like if they didn't plug their families into every different program available, they weren't doing their spiritual duty. This amounted to families spending most of their week nights separated from each other, taking time away from being together (Maybe for some people this was a relief). 

We didn't even fully come together on Sundays. Instead of mixing old hymns with new songs in one service to cater to the whole demographic, they did different services in older and newer styles, so one group had to give up the form of worship they most connected with in order to cross over to the other age group, and vice versa. This created a clear split between the senior citizens and the younger adults. And kids were put directly into kid's church. Kids never saw their parents worshiping or how they were moved by the spirit. And parents didn’t have to teach their kids how to worship. It maybe even became weird for parents to show their devotion and vulnerability with God to their kids. With some exceptions, and despite some good teaching, the overall effect was that it incentivized parents to rely almost entirely on the church leaders to teach these things to their kids. And they stopped thinking of themselves as spiritual teachers to their kids, and kids stopped seeing their parents as spiritual resources. It removed the idea of spiritual mentoring from parent to child. For families, it created an unhealthy codependency on the few leaders of the church who were--quite frankly--always on the verge of burn-out.

The older senior citizens grew distant from the younger, and formed a totally separate culture. I often still hear older people say, “oh you’re young, the kids will listen to you better…” this is mostly false. kids listen most to whoever loves them and spends time with them the most. But this separation lead to the older generation to feel that they were obsolete. So the young stopped benefitting from the wisdom of the older generation, and the old were deprived of the joy of teaching and imparting their wisdom to the youth. You only got to do that if you were a minister, if your ministry wasn't specifically directed towards your own age demographic (which it normally was). There was no variety in the content of teaching to cater to the whole. There was no cross-benefit of generations, unless you were in a strong family, or socialized well, or decided to take a risk and join a home group of a total different age demographic.

I did that, somewhat unintentionally. There was a time when I had a real problem and needed advice, but I didn't know who to go to. A friend told me who they trusted, and I ended up joining their weekly Bible Study. It was mostly people decades older than me, and at first I felt really awkward, like I'd maybe made a mistake. I thought maybe this wasn't the group for me, until I started hearing them talk about all kinds of things I needed advice on. So I stayed, and let me tell you, it changed my life. Suddenly I had the benefit of wisdom and perspective in my life that I never had before, growing up miles away from my grandparents and extended family. Now these older people had someone young to invest in, and poured their hearts into me, sharing their advice and giving me encouragement, praying for and rooting for my success. Suddenly, I had emotional support from people who were far more experienced and emotionally intelligent than me. It transformed my life and even removed some of the turmoil and chaos and anxiety I never knew I was dealing with. It made me a stronger, more relaxed, more grounded, and more confident human being. It felt like I had a new extended family. 

If that could happen for me, who took a social risk and crossed an age barrier, I can imagine how strong mine and many other churches could have been if there was more cross-pollination of demographics going on.

Working primarily as a youth and young adult minister, I started to understand the deep impact our parents and families have on us. Of course we can all attest to this; often our deepest wounds and trauma come directly from our family. Often our deepest motivations are somehow propelled by our parents, whether for or against. No amount of mentoring that I could offer a youth had even a fraction of the influence that their parents had on them. I often felt like merely damage control, helping kids learn to forgive their families for neglect or abandonment, or for being too strict or too hard. But I noticed when parents were mentoring their kids spiritually. Those kids stood out. They were so incredibly grounded, and even able to become spiritual leaders. They were far more well-adjusted and strong. This was a deeper level of emotional stability that I did not have the power to foster. What I could do--while rewarding and definitely worth my time--was only a fraction of what a parent could do. 

Even one strong young person can set the trajectory and raise the standard for the rest of the group. I have seen it in action again and again. I see the kids who all the others look to. I have seen their influence and how others will emulate them and even rely on them in the youth groups. And this can carry into adulthood. Even if they don't become leaders in any official capacity, they become pillars of the community who hold up the whole structure and build up others. 

When I think of any church community i have been a part of, I can tell you who the pillars were, even if they didn't realize they were. These are often the ones who have been there for many years, who have normal mundane jobs, who have loved their own families and valued their church community. And most importantly, they are the ones who love God above all else.

People--parents in particular--often see my work as a minister as if it is so much more important than theirs. They put me onto a pedestal as if I had magical spiritual powers of influence, and if they sent their kids to me, their kids would suddenly learn what it means to be a Christian. Meanwhile, parents are the ones with the magical influence. I'm just giving some hours of my week to prepare and teach and spend time with their kids, imparting what wisdom I can, and sure, I have some influence... Parents are the ones framing their life choices and finances and resources and time around the raising of these kids. They are the ones their kids entire lives depend on. Who is doing more work here? Who has more time and influence here? Who's actions and choices have larger consequences here? I wish all parents knew how very important it is to learn how to be a spiritual mentor to their kids. If parents did this, we wouldn't have a need for youth pastors. 

Don't get me wrong, I consider spiritual ministry a high calling. In the process of emphasizing the role of parents, I don't mean to devalue the work of the church. The church needs families and families need the church. We need people who stay committed to studying the Word because they point us towards God and keep us from veering off into strange doctrines. We need teachers of the Word, because the kingdom doesn't know truth without them. We need evangelists because the kingdom doesn't grow without them. We need shepherds because the kingdom is not healthy or strong without them. But I think we often forget the importance of families and downplay the role of a parent. This is what I want to highlight here. We need people who are willing to raise children, because the kingdom will cease to exist without them. 

And parents are the ones most directly influencing the next generation.

I came to a sort of crisis in my mid to late twenties; all the work I had been pouring my life into with such deep dedication was in many ways a detriment… I know we all meant well, and we were doing what we thought was best, doing what we knew how to do… There were good things that came out of it. But a lot of it was propping up a system which had a net damaging effect to the development of the community, hindered the growth of families, and was an obstacle to the raising of the next generation. Because we splintered and separated the demographics, we were headed towards a splintered and fractured community. And I didn't see this as a fault of my own specific church: this was a shared culture, common among many American churches, not just mine. This was a common problem in church because it's a common problem in society and we are all products of our society.

The sum of my ministry experience has taught me that the ministers doing some of the most important work in the kingdom are the ones investing in their own children. They are doing the hard work of caring for the people God has given to them. They are the ones building a stable environment for their young ones to thrive in. They are investing in their own marriages, fighting to keep them together. They are making sacrifices to provide. They are seeking out strong communities to bolster their own efforts (because it takes a village). Even down to being careful to take care of their own personal needs so they can have something left to offer their loved ones (don't underestimate your need for self care, parents! Your heath determines the health of your family!). They are ensuring the success of the kingdom for the next generation. They are securing the future. They are carrying the torch and strengthening their kids to withstand the tides of the new times.

I've known all this for years, but now that I am finally moving towards raising a child of my own, I've had yet another sort of crisis. Even in my process of considering having children, part of me has had to deal with guilt for even wanting them. I genuinely felt I would be giving up my duty to the kingdom of God. For the next season, I would need to stop focusing on the development of the church and start focusing on the development of only one or more specific humans. Part of my identity has been wrapped up in my work. This felt like a betrayal of my calling, like I was now turning my back on my commitment to God. If I'm going to have kids, I want to do it right. I would need to settle down in one place for a longer time and build a stable life for my kids to thrive in, giving up the flexibility I have maintained for the sake of the needs of the church. It felt selfish because I want it, even though it's a selfless act for the sake of the kids. It maybe even felt like a distraction from my life’s purpose. But how terrible for my kids if I kept this mentality--seeing them as a distraction! What a damaging idea! 

I have lived a nomadic life, going wherever God leads me. In a way, all these years I subconsciously felt I had sacrificed the prospect of kids for the sake of the church. And there was a separation in my mind: the role of parents in the church--however valuable I found it to be--was different from my role. This is a true statement; my role was different from theirs. However, it does not mean having a child will force me to stop being devoted to God or to his kingdom. I will simply be building it up in a different way, accomplishing it from a different role for a longer season. More importantly, if God has given me a child, this means he is now calling me to raise it. So this IS my calling now. This IS where God is leading me. Scripture couldn't be any more clear about this.

Today, I read this verse:

”Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.“ (‭‭Matthew‬ ‭6‬:‭19‬-‭21‬ ‭NIV‬‬)

What are the treasures in heaven? Right now, for me, storing up treasures in heaven means investing in my future children. And I don't want to do that half-heartedly.

Photo by Liv Bruce on Unsplash

God Preserves His Word

To Spiritual Leaders Who are Afraid of Formal Education...

I have learned to become the kind of person who will confront my friends with honesty when they talk about their philosophies. I learned this from Israelis when I worked in Jerusalem. Israelis have the most directly confrontational culture in the world (according the book The Culture Map by Erin Meyer). Of course, some of you have experienced my confrontation, and even my rebuke, and it hasn’t always been pleasant. I’m talking specifically to my American and Canadian friends, because I know how much our cultures lack a framework for healthy confrontation, and how much we need it. And because of this lack, our only tool to confront tends to be passive aggression, and we only know how to take direct confrontation as an attack. Our usual response is to lash out bitterly, and it’s not pretty. So, I’m grateful for those of you who have assumed the best of me and taken the time to wrestle with me about these themes. If I’ve confronted you with honest inquiry or critique, it’s only because I believe in you, because I care about you, and I think it's important to address what you’re talking about…

So, with that said, many of my friends were or have become Christian spiritual leaders, and I have confronted several of them in the last half decade. And among all these conversations, I’m now noticing a trend. When I start to argue points by bringing in information that comes from my education on the material we are dealing with, I have gotten the same frustrated response from those who are not formally educated, which is a phrase like this: “But Susan, you don’t have to have a university degree to understand the Word of God.” I cannot tell you how many times I have heard this over the years. Technically, I agree with this statement. The Bible is accessible to everyone, and contains a very simple message; it’s mostly comprised of stories and pictures so that even a child can learn something. But there should be a massive difference between a child and a spiritual leader. What I really hear is an excuse for not knowing what they’re talking about. 

When we identify ourselves as spiritual leaders, teachers, or preachers of the Word, we need to be at a level beyond the layperson's understanding of the word. Years of experience in church is good, but it's not enough for teaching if we never learn the basic practice of good hermeneutics. And I'm realizing this is rarer than I'd hoped...

Sure, it’s very possible for one to be well educated without having obtained a formal university degree. However, people who can do this—and do it well—are rare. Just developing a good standard for what resources are legitimate and which ones are not is half the battle. Most of us need to be guided along so we don’t stray too far into the pseudo-sciences, or away from foundational Biblical principles, thinking we know more than even the educated. How can we know if we’re on the right track without fellow believers to challenge and sharpen us? If every church is turning you away, either all the churches you've approached are wrong—or you're wrong! If "no one else" is teaching this stuff, you've probably veered from the center. There is a scholarly way to study and interpret the Bible that has been well-established over time (it's called hermeneutics), and those of us who teach should seek to be educated in this practice. You must first learn the rules to understand why you might choose to break them. This is true of almost every worthy pursuit.

Those who identify themselves as teachers of the Word should never use the above excuse--that the word should be easy to understand--to validate their lack of education. And unfortunately, I know too many spiritual leaders and lone wolves trying to preach their message, who are proud that they don’t have a formal education. They see themselves as somehow untainted by the “problems of the mainstream church” (another oft-thrown-around phrase). They think they have avoided being influenced by Satan. And listen, I am well aware of the problems, and I know there are massive trends that can go wildly wrong. But if we set ourselves against the church, we are setting ourselves against the body of Christ itself. And the problems that touch our universities and mainstream churches are the same ones that are embedded in our society, and all of us are touched and tainted by them. One must either get a quality education or leave his own society for some years (or both!) in order to properly see what those problems are, and some of us still never see them. At least one of the big problems in our society is this very pride and lack of education, which usually leads us—and consequently our followers—away from our Biblical foundation.

Make no mistake; the goal of the church is to preach the gospel and make disciples. That is our primary directive from Jesus himself. Of course, we’re allowed to preach and teach about every part of scripture, and it’s all valid. We’re welcome to have a very specified or even obscure expertise and teach about it. But if your life’s main message and/or focus is not about the gospel—specifically the person of Jesus Christ and the good news about his death on the cross, his resurrection, and the dispensation of Holy Spirit—if this is not your life’s main focus as a pastor or teacher or just as a Christian, you have strayed away from your foundation. I hear many people say “those are just the basics,” and they feel that mature Christians should move past this basic gospel teaching, looking for something “deeper,” to learn or teach about in order to grow or gain maturity. But the gospel is at the center of everything. It is both simple and deep. There are layers upon layers that can be unfolded. The gospel is the basis of our worship. The Old and New Testament scriptures all point to Christ. If you are a New Covenant Christian, every part of scripture should be read through the lens of the cross. Every prophetic inkling should in some way point us to Christ.

Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2:1-2, “And so it was with me, brothers and sisters. When I came to you, I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. ²For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. (NIV)” This is one scripture that many use to justify not being educated. And it's true; Paul may not have had all the human wisdom and eloquence. But let’s not forget, Paul only began preaching the gospel after spending years studying it with disciples who learned from Jesus. And Paul was a very well-educated Jew before he began preaching the gospel. He understood the scriptures extensively, which was why he had a unique ability to explain the significance of Old Testament themes and how they point us to the cross. God knew what he was doing when he chose Paul. Paul was not as erudite as, say, Apollos, but he was indeed educated.

God expects teachers of scripture to have a deeper, more expansive knowledge of the Word. James 3:1 says “Not many of you should become teachers, my fellow believers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. (NIV)” If we truly value God’s word, and aspire to teach it, we should be devoted to the proper study of it. 2 Timothy 2:15 also says, “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth. (NIV)” Because in the end, we are accountable to God, and no one else (Hebrews 4:13).

I know that formal education doesn’t guarantee you will know the right things... or that you won’t stray into problems, heresy or even bad doctrine. We are all susceptible. And plenty of schools out there are in many ways compromised. I am not blind to that fact. But there are problems and strengths on both sides of the camp. The real sin is pride: whether you have no formal education and that makes you proud you’re “unsullied” by the doctrinal pitfalls of the educated, or you're proud that you are "better" than others because of your education. Both are sinful attitudes. Once you’ve reached this point of pride, you become rigid and cease to be teachable. In this state, the educated become hypocrites and the unlearned become stubborn. It requires humility to learn something new. And with scripture, we can never fully "arrive" at all the knowledge of it. We can, however, learn the foundations of it, upon which we can build. And God can use both conventional and unconventional ways to teach us. Nothing is beyond his reach.

But I am talking more specifically to those who avoid education. I am pointing out the irony of a teacher who hasn't learned. You don't even know what you don't know.  Many people have gone before you and done the very same things you are doing, teaching the same themes you are teaching, but you don't know about them because you haven't studied church history. And that means you will repeat their mistakes; you can't even see how far you are straying, or what fruit your message brings forth, or the destruction you will bring upon the people you influence...

We need Biblical scholars! We need to learn from them! They teach us how to properly interpret the word, because they know it backwards and forwards. They have contended with the theologians of the past, and studied how the books of the Bible came together. They can teach you how to do this! 

Scholars know why certain writings and teachings were rejected by the church over the years. They see what truths have remained stable across the centuries. They can see the overall picture of how churches and even societies become stale and how God brings about revival. They teach us how our predecessors understood the word, all the way back to the apostles. They show us how other ideologies and philosophies have influenced Christianity in different cultures over the centuries. They show us how we have been influenced by our own culture. They help us to understand the Jewish mindset so we can properly understand Jesus, and what he and all the Jewish gospel writers meant in their day. They bring us back to the original meanings of scripture in the Hebrew and Greek, and open our eyes to the truths embedded within; what these verses truly meant before we imposed our Western and Greco-rational thinking upon them. Good Biblical scholars call us back to our foundations. These are people who have seen real ancient Biblical manuscripts with their own eyes, studied every millimeter of the pages in fear and reverence, compared them with others, learned the original languages, and wrestled with the meanings and translations in prayer. They are among the most qualified to strengthen our understanding and to help keep us from falling off the theological wagon.

Satan wants us to think everyone everywhere has been corrupted so we are too afraid to reach out to others and learn the deeper depths of scripture. He wants us to trust only obscure sources so we are distracted and led away from the truth. He wants us to end up alone, paranoid, and afraid of challenge which would make us stronger. We wants us to become useless to the world. If you want to teach, but are too stubborn to learn the established way to properly study the Bible, or are too afraid to search for a good school or training program, I dare say that Satan’s work has succeeded in you. Take this as an honest rebuke from a friend. 

It takes faith to trust that God will lead us through our studies, and faith to trust that God will bring us good teachers. Contrary to what it may seem, not all schools have succumbed to the pressures, and not all teachers have bowed to the demands of the mob. Not all churches have bowed to the “mainstream” ideas. There are still amazing, Christ-centered people out there; people still doing God's work. If God exists, then these good and faithful people exist all over the world. If we are called to teach, we should join their ranks. We should seek out their knowledge. We should treasure their knowledge!

We should ask God for the faith to believe that He can and will preserve His word, and for the faith that he has preserved it throughout the centuries. And we should ask God that our faith in His ability to do so is stronger than our faith in Satan’s ability to obscure it. 

Photo by RUT MIIT on Unsplash

Your Kids Are Your First Ministry

Your role as parent is so important, no matter how much the world wants to downplay it.

As a church minister, I love it when people step up to participate and help their church. It's a strong community where many individuals identify with and take ownership of their group. However, this is out of order for those who do it at the expense of the health of their own family, their marriage, or their kids.

I’ve been working with young adults, youth, and kids in the church for almost 20 years now. I have worked with some very troubled kids, and also with those who have strong families. By now, I can tell when a young person has--or doesn't have--parents who invest their time and effort in their lives. It shows. 

A well-parented child has a greater inner stability and self-confidence, even amidst their struggles and quirks and personal obstacles. They might be eager to please, or determined to create chaos, and that might be frustrating for the parent, but it's never too extreme. Furthermore, there's a bit of healthy distance between them and leaders like me because they already have an established safe place to go when real problems arise. This inner stability and safe place helps them avoid SO MANY problems in life. Even just one involved parent can establish this; just imagine the power of two. Imagine the power of a tight-knit family clan working together. I'm telling you, there is a difference, and it shows. I find it a shame when good parents take this for granted. They don't understand the lifelong value of what they have given to their child.

The less parented youth are a different story. They are desperate for attention. Some shoot for negative attention, others for positive. Negative attention-seekers are a bit more obvious. They are prone to sabotage potentially helpful mentor relationships, because despite their need for love and attention, they also find it difficult to trust. They might be determined to create chaos literally everywhere they go. They have anti-social tendencies, and even antagonize others. The ones desperate for positive attention go about it differently. They are desperate to please and also horrified to disappoint whoever is in authority over them. They have the same struggle to trust, but their way of dealing with this is to try to be whatever they think others want them to be; to avoid rejection at all costs. This is a defense mechanism--they are hiding in plain sight. These kids can even be very strong and can handle a lot of responsibility. But when you get to know them, you can sense that extra edge of desperation and need. Some are really good at faking it. Both types of less-parented youth are so incredibly vulnerable, I fear for them.

And in my opinion, the level of neglect often directly correlates. There are always exceptions to the rule, and I always try to give the benefit of the doubt... But the kids without any parents are the most difficult to reach, and usually end up in a life of crime.

The biggest lesson I learned in my years of working with youth, is that the influence I have as a youth minister is merely a drop in the bucket compared to the power that you as parents have in their lives. That often makes me feel helpless. Parents have thrown their kids at our youth programs, hoping we could do what they couldn't, but this is a pipe dream. How can a couple of years in a place with people who don't know you make up for the entirety of your upbringing? The youth might learn something, sure! And maybe they might actually connect with a mentor who can give them some guidance. But sometimes, despite all the hard work we put in, parents themselves can undo all of the progress we make. Even if I put my whole heart and soul into helping a young person, sometimes the damage is simply too great, and my influence isn't enough. I know my work isn't for nothing, and every seed planted is worthwhile, but it has taught me how incredibly powerful the influence of a parent is.

It has also taught me that things could actually turn around, if only the parents knew the power they did have. If what I do can make the smallest difference, the parents can do FAR more. If only parents wanted to make a difference. Many parents are paralyzed by helplessness, feeling like it's too late. You might be right. But if you stop trying--if you give up--you seal their fate, especially if you do so before they are adults. Whether or not you try is the thing for which God will hold you accountable. 

Listen, not every parent is in control of their circumstances. There are so many unfortunate situations. It's usually more complicated than it looks from the outside looking in, and I've learned to withhold judgment. In these cases, all we can do as a good church community is to help these families make the best of it, by protecting them and being there for them. God is a God of mercy and restoration. God will also hold churches accountable for how they treat these broken families. He will not be proud of those churches which shame, ostracize, and criticize, causing even more fragmentation and loss of faith.

I do really struggle when I see fully capable and wonderful parents--good-intentioned, still married, and well-provisioned--who use up their free time to throw themselves into other endeavors thinking they’re doing something for the greater good, but are blinded to what really matters. They have control over their situation, and are fully capable of making different choices, but then their kids come to me with that same desperation just to be noticed. It is difficult for me. I just want to shake the parents and say, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" 

My life's passion is to strengthen and build up the church. But the church is just people. The more I see the seasons of growth and decay of different churches, I have seen what made them strong. It was the families that raised stable children who became pillars of the community, who then build up and support others. Once the families are weak, the church becomes weak. A vital component to building up the church is protecting families. Families need to spend time together. Kids need to see their parents worshiping God. They don't need to be split up every night of the week in programs. People don't need to be taught to constantly set aside the needs of their own families for the sake of the church. This is damaging. It is out of order. It certainly does NOT bring glory or honor to God. So many pastors have felt it necessary to neglect their own families for the "sake of the kingdom," not realizing that their families ARE a real part of that kingdom; their kids are the FUTURE of that kingdom. Neglecting your kids and then shuffling them into a youth group, thinking this will make up for it... that's NOT how it works.

So here's the proper Biblical order of things: we are meant to put our relationship with God first, then take care of ourselves, then our family, and then our ministry work. You're useless to anyone else if you neglect yourself. Your family has no chance if you've given up on you. And your family--if you have one--is the greatest responsibility God has given you. Since most church-goers aren't career ministers, this means working to provide for your family also has to come before the work you do for the church. (for ministers, this can be a tricky balance).

All I really want to say is this: Don't underestimate the influence YOU have on your own children. Because YOU have the greatest influence in your kids'—and even your teens’—lives. I say this even for those of you who feel like your kids don't listen, and they constantly resist you. I say this even to the parents who have been dealt a tough hand. This is only a season. Your love MATTERS. They are never beyond your influence! What you do and say matters. So do and say the things you can while you still can! Whether or not they actually accept what you have to say, say it anyway. You can't control the outcome, but do the hard work anyway. Take the risks and say the hard things. Don't abandon your sons and daughters while you still have them! Give up the other lesser commitments and spend the time with your family, even if their arms are crossed the whole time. You don't have to be perfect: love covers a multitude of sins.

Photo by Patricia Prudente on Unsplash