The Burr in the Burgh

You may have heard - and certainly will be hearing more - about this alleged "Gospel of Judas." This is really much ado about doo doo. From what I understand, the "Gospel of Judas" is just another old gnostic pseudapigraphic text. Judas didn't write it any more than Thomas wrote the gospel of Thomas. Gnostics were people who held to a varied set of heretical teachings. There were numerous such sects in the early centuries of Christianity.

Common themes in gnostic texts include:

• The Highest God did not create the world, some lower deity or emanation of God did.
  
• The material world is evil
• Only spirit is good
• Thus, gnostics tended to promote celibacy because the body doesn't matter.
• Some went the opposite direction and lived licentiously because the body doesn't matter.
• Women were often denigrated. The "Gospel of Thomas" states that a woman (Mary Magdalene) must become a man in order to be saved.
• The Logos (eternal only-begotten Son of God) was not incarnated. The true God could not become a man because the material world is evil.
• One theory was that Jesus was not truly human, he only appeared to be flesh and blood.
• Another theory suggested that Jesus wasn't any more divine than you or I.
• Because the material world is intrinsically evil, Jesus did not rise bodily from the grave.
• Because the material world is evil, Christians do not receive His body and blood in the Eucharist.
• Because the material world is evil, salvation means being set free from the body.
• Because the material world is intrinsically evil, you will not rise bodily on the Last Day.
• The word Gnosticism comes from the Greek word for knowledge (gnosis). Gnostics held that Jesus passed on certain teachings only to a few. And these secret teachings are passed along only to the worthy. So only those ascended masters, the enlightened ones, who posseses this secret knowledge gain the highest salvation.

And so forth. Does that sound anything at all like Christianity? If you believe ANY of the above statements, you cannot in good conscience speak the Nicene Creed. And if you cannot honestly confess the Nicene Creed, you are not a Christian.

Soon, I will be preparing a series of lectures on the Da Vinci Code, so you will be reading more from me on these matters.

Christianity Today has a nice write up on this which I recommend you read.

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I was reading LCMS news maven, Miss Mollie Ziegler, at Get Religion and discovered a very helpful website called Quack Watch. I'm not a doctor and so I'm not qualified to evaluate all of the information on Quack Watch. But I do believe people need to do a bit of level-headed research before embracing so-called alternative medicines and therapies. It's amazing how much quasi-voodoo superstitious nonsense people will accept. Such things as Reiki, therapeutic touch, chakras, aromatherapy, reflexology, past lives therapy and so forth are bewitching legions of otherwise reasonable Americans.

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I'm doing some serious thought these days on topics related to bio-ethics. And this afternoon, I've been pondering the internal process involved in making a tough ethical decision. Tell me, if you are faced with a difficult ethical decision - such as the Terri Schiavo case - which of these factors are most important in how you arrive at a decision:

• How will this affect me?
• Will I be burdened or inconvenienced?
  
• What do I want?
• What do I think the person would want?
• What is the financial cost?
• Does God's Word provide any guidance?
• Is one decision more in line with traditional Christian living?

You see, I think Dr. Richard Eyer is correct in his little book: Holy People, Holy Lives: Law and Gospel in Bioethics. He writes that people today usually think in terms of what is practical and/or what do I want. In other words, they make decisions according to whether it is pragmatically and emotionally satisfying instead of which course of action most reflects the mind of Christ as revealed in Scripture and 2 millenia of Christian reflection.

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You need to read this movie review by Dr. Angus Menuge over at The Pearcey Report.

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John and Nancy Pearcey run the Pearcey Report webzine. I just discovered it and will be adding it to my daily read list. You must read Nancy Pearcey's book Total Truth: Liberating Christianity from Its Cultural Captivity.

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I still love this stuff. Buy an egg every couple of months or so. Here you can get me a giant five pound blob.

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One of my favorite characters in the Chronicles of Narnia is Reepicheep the mouse. Well, guess who's going to be his voice for the Prince Caspian movie. See here.

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Hi all,
Today we had a very successful seminar on Intelligent Design with Dr. Angus Menuge of Concordia University, WI. Turnout was delightfully higher than expected and people came from all over the city, as well as some from Ohio.

We are just now in the process of building our church website and will very soon have Dr. Menuge's powerpoint presentation available for viewing there.

One favorite quote came from C.S. Lewis who talked about chronological snobbery. I heard it somewhere said that just because it's newer doesn't mean it's truer.

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Take a look at one of my favorite Lutheran blogs: What You Do, Do Quickly, from whom I shamelessly have "borrowed" the image to the left. I just think it aptly illustrates a sad indictment against major streams of contemporary Christianity: the blight of cross-less-ness.

It stuns me when I listen to highly respected Christian preachers on the radio or television who preach and preach and preach, but fail to mention the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Sometimes I catch Charles Stanley when I'm in the car and when I do, I always listen. He's a gifted communicator, in my opinion. Gives lots of good biblical advice. He just doesn't preach the gospel very much - at least from what I have heard. (Maybe I just tuned in on the wrong days). Oh, he mentions God A LOT. He's very God-centered, to be sure. But there is a diff between being God-centered and being Christ-centered. A few days ago, I listened to one of his sermons and thought afterwards that any Mormon could have delivered that message. That was a really good Mormon lecture on ethics. And we wonder why most evangelicals, in surveys, still think that you basically get to heaven by faith plus works. Come to think of it, can you really be called an EVANGELICAL if you don't understand forensic justification? What then is the "evangel?"

You see, if you ask a person what the main message of Christianity is and they say it's something like:

• Love. Love God and love your neighbor.
• Following Jesus.
• Being totally committed to Christ in everything you do.
• Believe in God and follow His commandment

...then they maybe haven't grasped the central notions of sin & grace, the nature of God, the incarnation of the eternal Logos, the life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus, the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost, etc.

I am a regular guest on a local radio talk program Sunday nights 9:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. Two Lutheran pastors and one layman hashing stuff out and taking calls. A couple of weeks ago, we were talking about revivalist Charles Finney with Dr. Lawrence Rast from Concordia Theological Seminary in Ft. Wayne, IN. We discussed the "new measures" Finney employed to gain converts. And as we were criticizing the stress on gimickry and emotional manipulation of Finney (not to mention his rank heresies), a caller phoned with a question. He said his church won't allow you to join unless you can report having had an experience of conversion and a dedication to Christ. We had been talking about altar calls and the like. As we chatted, he wanted to be able to point to a moment in time when a person commits himself to Jesus as the moment of personal regeneration. He was confusing faith with commitment. Or justification with sanctification. At the end of the call, he accused us of "easy-believism" because we were emphasizing salvation by grace through faith alone.

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Does this worry anyone besides me?

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I urge you to go read this very fine post by The Beast. And please, write him an encouraging comment. He has, in my opinion, expressed clearly the way God's accusations and God's promises work together. Judgment and Mercy. Wrath and Grace. And how one w/o the other is lame.

He also picks up on one of the greatest blights on the American church: the Church Growth Movement. We are all in favor of the church growing. I didn't become a pastor because I want the church to shrivel and die. I take the mission of the church very much to heart, believe you me. But true spiritual growth is often not quantifiable. You can't count it. As one of my professors, tongue in cheek, said, "Numbers is not the only book in the bible." Sometimes, right preaching of the Word will cause the number of believers to increase. Other times, it will drive them away. After all, the cross is an offense to natural man.

As Mother Theresa said, "We are called to be faithful, not necessarily successful." And those who water down the message in order to put butts in the pews are not helping anyone. I tell people that we have got to get over this obsession with the A B Cs of church life (Attendance, Buildings, and Cash).

Let's keep the message straight. Let's get the message out. And then let's let the Holy Spirit do his job. Let God be God.

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This is priceless.

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Mark Twain once said that everyone complains about the weather but nobody does anything about it. As Frederica Mathewes-Green says in this recent piece in Christianity Today, instead of trying to change the weather, maybe we should pay more attention to sheltering a few individuals from the storm.

Christians in America are so caught up in fighting the culture wars, that they risk losing a much bigger battle. Whether Roman Catholics or Evangelicals, we talk about overturning Roe and cleaning up prime-time T.V. but think too little about humility and grace. Instead of focusing on something as amorphous as "the culture," perhaps we should concentrate on serving our neighbor through our vocations.

I support many of the causes typically espoused by traditionalist Christians in these so-called culture wars, but FMG has a point. Let's not miss the trees for the forest.

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A Baptist youth minister with a penchant for gruesome horror movies. Right on! I enjoy the blog of Philip Meade over at The Beast's Lair and wish he would post more often. And one question I'd pose is this: Why do so many contemporary Japanese horror flicks (and their American re-makes) center on murdered children? (Ie. The Ring, The Grudge, Dark Water, Three Extremes)

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I am currently reading the book Mr. Vonnegut wrote after swearing never to write another book. "Wait right there," you say. "Why is a Christian, conservative, hawk reading an atheist, liberal, pacifist?" Quite frankly, I enjoy Vonnegut's dark sense of humor. He's a pessimist about human nature and so am I. I seldom agree with him on the big stuff: Religion, politics, morals. But I often agree with him on the small stuff, much of which is really big stuff.

My favorite line so far: We are here on earth to fart around. Don't let anybody tell you any different. And to that I say, "Amen." I do think that he's got a point here. People who are always "on a mission" scare me. God put us here to live our lives, not to revolutionize the world. I don't say this to celebrate mediocrity, but to hallow the mundane. 9 times out 10, the ordinary is more important than the extraordinary.

I suppose I probably miss Vonnegut's point and am just reading him through lenses of my own, but that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

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• Conversion is the work of the Holy Spirit working through the Gospel.
  
  
• Evangelization takes place when and where God's threats and promises are correctly expounded.
  
  
• The Law of God accuses sinners.
• The Law must be expressed in a way that truly convicts people of their sinfulness. Our basic problem is not that we are broken, hurting, lost, confused, or unhappy. Our basic problem is that we are proud rebels against God.

• The Gospel is not simply that God loves us or that He can help you with your problems.
  
• The Gospel is justification. There are a number of biblical ways this can be expressed but should include: the blood sacrifice of Jesus, propitiation, forensic justification, forgiveness, reconciliation, imputation of righteousness.

• Any human attempt to dress up the Gospel to make it more appealing is doomed to fail and damage (or even murder) souls, though it may well boost church attendance.
  
  
• Reliance upon principles of group dynamics to lead people to Christ is manipulative and detracts from the power of God's Word.
  
  
• God alone deserves the glory and credit when a sinner believes.
  
  
• Saying the evangelist deserved zero credit does not mean Christians should not strive to speak the truth clearly, lovingly, firmly, fearlessly and with respect.
  

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As you may have heard, a movie about the Blessed Virgin Mary is being made called Nativity. I just found out that 16-year-old Keisha Castle-Hughes will play the role of the Mother of God, Mary of Nazareth.

You may remember her from Whale Rider.

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Another good Breakpoint article by Charles Colson. Do you believe that the universe and human life are the result of blind chance and purposelessness? How very unscientific of you!

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OK, so we're not sorry? Actually, I think this is a positive development. It's good to read some historical balance for a change. On the Crusades.

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Today is the Third Sunday in Lent and our Gospel reading was Jesus chasing the merchants and money changers out of the Temple in John 2.

It's really the only text from the Gospel that show Jesus becoming truly angry, even violently so. Other places show him to be annoyed or irritated or brash, but not like this.

Zeal for God's house consumed Him.

Today, our Sunday school kids - in conjunction with this lesson - built a model of the Second Temple. You can get them here.

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